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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "William_Hartnell.txt", "BBC.txt", "Science_fiction.txt", "Doctor_Who.txt" ], "title": [ "William Hartnell", "BBC", "Science fiction", "Doctor Who" ], "wiki_context": [ "William Henry Hartnell (8 January 1908 – 23 April 1975), also known as Billy Hartnell or Bill Hartnell, was an English actor. Hartnell played the first incarnation of the Doctor in Doctor Who, from 1963 to 1966. He was also known for his roles as Sergeant Grimshaw, the title character of the first Carry On film, Carry On Sergeant in 1958, and Company Sergeant Major Percy Bullimore in the sitcom The Army Game from 1957 until 1958, and again in 1960.\n\nEarly life\n\nHartnell was born in St Pancras, London, England, the only child of Lucy Hartnell, an unmarried mother. He was brought up partly by a foster mother, and also spent many holidays in Devon with his mother's family of farmers, where he learned to ride. He was the second cousin of fashion designer Norman Hartnell. \n\nHartnell never discovered the identity of his father (whose particulars were left blank on the birth certificate) despite efforts to trace him. Often known as Billy, he left school without prospects and dabbled in petty crime. Through a boys' boxing club, at the age of 14 Hartnell met the art collector Hugh Blaker, who later became his unofficial guardian and arranged for him initially to train as a jockey and helped him enter the Italia Conti Academy. Theatre being a passion of Hugh Blaker, he paid for Hartnell to receive some 'polish' at the Imperial Service College, though Hartnell found the strictures too much and ran away.\n\nCareer\n\nHartnell entered the theatre in 1925 working under Frank Benson as a general stagehand. He appeared in numerous Shakespearian plays, including The Merchant of Venice (1926), Julius Caesar (1926), As You Like It (1926), Hamlet (1926), The Tempest (1926) and Macbeth (1926). He also appeared in She Stoops to Conquer (1926), School for Scandal (1926) and Good Morning, Bill (1927), before performing in Miss Elizabeth's Prisoner (1928). This play was written by Robert Neilson Stephens and E. Lyall Swete. It featured the actress Heather McIntyre, whom he married during the following year. His first of more than sixty film appearances was in Say It With Music (1932). \n\nAt the outbreak of the Second World War, Hartnell served in the British Army in the Tank Corps, but was invalided out after eighteen months as the result of suffering a nervous breakdown, and returned to acting. In 1942, he was cast as Albert Fosdike in Noël Coward's film In Which We Serve but turned up late for his first day of shooting. Coward berated Hartnell in front of cast and crew for his unprofessionalism, made him personally apologise to everyone and then sacked him. Michael Anderson, who was the First Assistant Director, took over the part and was credited as \"Mickey Anderson\". \n\nHartnell continued to play comic characters until he was cast in the robust role of Sergeant Ned Fletcher in The Way Ahead (1944). From then on his career was defined by playing mainly policemen, soldiers, and thugs. This typecasting bothered him, for even when cast in comedies he found he was invariably playing the 'heavy'. In 1958 he played the sergeant in the first Carry On film comedy, Carry On Sergeant, and appeared as a town councillor in the Boulting brothers' film Heavens Above! (1963) with Peter Sellers. He also appeared as Will Buckley – another military character – in the film The Mouse That Roared (1959), again with Sellers.\n\nHis first regular role on television was as Sergeant Major Percy Bullimore in The Army Game from 1957 to 1961. Again, although it was a comedy series, he found himself cast in a \"tough-guy\" role. He appeared in a supporting role in the film version of This Sporting Life (1963), giving a sensitive performance as an ageing rugby league talent scout known as 'Dad'.\n\nAfter living at 51 Church Street, Isleworth, next door to Hugh Blaker, the Hartnells lived on the Thames Ditton Island. Then in the 1960s they moved to a cottage in Mayfield, Sussex. He lived in later life at Sheephurst Lane in Marden, Kent.\n\nDoctor Who (1963–1966)\n\nHartnell's performance in This Sporting Life was noted by Verity Lambert, the producer who was setting up a new science-fiction television series for the BBC entitled Doctor Who; mainly on the strength of that performance, Lambert offered him the title role. Although Hartnell was initially uncertain about accepting a part in what was pitched to him as a children's series, in part due to his success in films, Lambert and director Waris Hussein convinced him to take the part, and it became the character for which he gained the highest profile and is now most remembered. Hartnell later revealed that he took the role because it led him away from the gruff, military parts in which he had become typecast, and, having two grandchildren of his own, he came to relish particularly the attention and affection that playing the character brought him from children. His first episode of Doctor Who aired on 23 November 1963. \n\nDoctor Who earned Hartnell a regular salary of £315 per episode by 1966 (in the era of 48 weeks per year production on the series), . By comparison, in 1966 his co-stars Anneke Wills and Michael Craze were earning £68 and £52 per episode at the same time, respectively. Throughout his tenure as the Doctor, William Hartnell wore a wig when playing the part, as the character had long hair. \n\nAccording to some of his colleagues on Doctor Who, he could be a difficult person to work with. Others, though, such as actors Peter Purves and William Russell, and producer Verity Lambert, spoke glowingly of him after more than forty years. Among the more caustic accounts, Nicholas Courtney, in his audio memoirs, recalled that during the recording of The Daleks' Master Plan, Hartnell mentioned that an extra on the set was Jewish, Courtney's inference being that Hartnell was prejudiced. In an interview in 2008, Courtney claimed that Hartnell \"was quite nationalist-minded, a bit intolerant of other races, I think.\" \n\nHartnell's deteriorating health (he suffered from arteriosclerosis, which began to affect his ability to learn his lines), as well as poor relations with a new production team on the series following the departure of Verity Lambert, ultimately led to his leaving Doctor Who in 1966. \n\nWhen he departed, the producer of the show came up with a unique idea: that since the Doctor is an alien, he can transform himself physically, thereby renewing himself. William Hartnell himself suggested the new Doctor, stating that \"There's only one man in England who can take over, and that's Patrick Troughton\". In the fourth episode of the serial The Tenth Planet, the First Doctor regenerated into Troughton's Second Doctor. \n\nPortrayals in fiction\n\nHartnell appears as a character in the Doctor Who audio drama Pier Pressure, which stars Colin Baker as the Sixth Doctor.\n\nFor the fiftieth anniversary of Doctor Who in 2013, the BBC broadcast An Adventure in Space and Time, a dramatisation of the events surrounding the creation of the series. David Bradley portrayed Hartnell. \n\nLater life and death\n\nHartnell reprised the role of the Doctor in Doctor Who during the tenth anniversary story The Three Doctors (1972–73). When Hartnell's wife Heather found out about his planned involvement, she informed the crew of the show that his failing memory and weakening health prevented him from starring in the special. An agreement was made between the crew and Heather that Hartnell would only be required to sit down during the shoot and read his lines from cue cards. His appearance in this story was his final piece of work as an actor. His health had worsened during the early 1970s, and in December 1974 he was admitted to hospital permanently. In early 1975 he suffered a series of strokes brought on by cerebrovascular disease, and died in his sleep of heart failure on 23 April 1975, at the age of 67. He was cremated and his ashes are buried at the Kent and Sussex Crematorium and Cemetery.\n\nA clip of a scene starring Hartnell from the end of the Doctor Who serial The Dalek Invasion of Earth (1964) was used as a pre-credits sequence for the twentieth anniversary story The Five Doctors (1983); Richard Hurndall portrayed the First Doctor for the remainder of the story, in Hartnell's absence. Colourised footage of Hartnell in The Aztecs was meshed with new footage of actress Jenna-Louise Coleman, and with body doubles for the First Doctor and Susan, to create a new scene in 2013's \"The Name of the Doctor\". The following story, and the 50th anniversary special of the show, \"The Day of the Doctor\" featured two new pieces of dialogue for Hartnell's Doctor, recorded by John Guilor, who had previously voiced the actor in a reconstruction of \"Planet of Giants\".\n\nHartnell was married to Heather McIntyre from 9 May 1929 until his death. They had one child, a daughter, Heather Anne, and two grandchildren. His widow, Heather, died in 1984. The only published biography of him is by his granddaughter, Judith \"Jessica\" Carney, entitled Who's There? The Life and Career of William Hartnell. It was originally published in 1996 by Virgin Publishing, and to mark the fiftieth anniversary of Doctor Who, Carney, with Fantom Publishing, revised and republished the book in 2013. \n\nFilmography\n\nHartnell acted in numerous British films, as well as having many stage and television appearances, though he is most well known for his role in Doctor Who.\n\nFilm\n\nTelevision\n\nVideo games", "The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster. It is headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, and is the world's oldest national broadcasting organisation and the largest broadcaster in the world by number of employees, with over 20,950 staff in total, of whom 16,672 are in public sector broadcasting; including part-time, flexible as well as fixed contract staff, the total number is 35,402. \n\nThe BBC is established under a Royal Charter and operates under its Agreement with the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. Its work is funded principally by an annual television licence fee which is charged to all British households, companies, and organisations using any type of equipment to receive or record live television broadcasts. The fee is set by the British Government, agreed by Parliament, and used to fund the BBC's extensive radio, TV, and online services covering the nations and regions of the UK. From 1 April 2014, it also funds the BBC World Service, launched in 1932, which provides comprehensive TV, radio, and online services in Arabic, and Persian, and broadcasts in 28 languages.\n\nAround a quarter of BBC revenues come from its commercial arm BBC Worldwide Ltd which sells BBC programmes and services internationally and also distributes the BBC's international 24-hour English language news services BBC World News and BBC.com, provided by BBC Global News Ltd.\n\nHistory\n\nThe birth of British broadcasting, 1920 to 1922\n\nBritain's first live public broadcast from the Marconi factory in Chelmsford took place in June 1920. It was sponsored by the Daily Mails Lord Northcliffe and featured the famous Australian Soprano Dame Nellie Melba. The Melba broadcast caught the people's imagination and marked a turning point in the British public's attitude to radio However this public enthusiasm was not shared in official circles where such broadcasts were held to interfere with important military and civil communications. By late 1920, pressure from these quarters and uneasiness among the staff of the licensing authority, the General Post Office (GPO), was sufficient to lead to a ban on further Chelmsford broadcasts. \n\nBut by 1922, the GPO had received nearly 100 broadcast licence requests and moved to rescind its ban in the wake of a petition by 63 wireless societies with over 3,000 members. Anxious to avoid the same chaotic expansion experienced in the United States the GPO proposed that it would issue a single broadcasting licence to a company jointly owned by a consortium of leading wireless receiver manufactures, to be known as the British Broadcasting Company Ltd. John Reith, a Scottish Calvinist, was appointed its General Manager in December 1922 a few weeks after the Company made its first official broadcast. The Company was to be financed by a royalty on the sale of BBC wireless receiving sets from approved manufacturers.\n\nFrom private company to public service corporation and business, 1923 to 1926\n\nThe financial arrangements soon proved inadequate. Set sales were disappointing as amateurs made their own receivers and listeners bought rival unlicensed sets. By mid-1923, discussions between the GPO and the BBC had become deadlocked and the Postmaster-General commissioned a review of broadcasting by the Sykes Committee. The Committee recommended a short term reorganisation of licence fees with improved enforcement in order to address the BBC's immediate financial distress, and an increased share of the licence revenue split between it and the GPO. This was to be followed by a simple 10 shillings licence fee with no royalty once the wireless manufactures protection expired. The BBC's broadcasting monopoly was made explicit for the duration of its current broadcast licence, as was the prohibition on advertising. The BBC was also banned from presenting news bulletins before 19:00, and required to source all news from external wire services.\n\nMid-1925, found the future of broadcasting under further consideration this time by the Crawford committee. By now the BBC under Reith's leadership had forged a consensus favouring a continuation of the unified (monopoly) broadcasting service, but more money was still required to finance rapid expansion. Wireless manufacturers were anxious to exit the loss making consortium with Reith keen that the BBC be seen as a public service rather than a commercial enterprise. The recommendations of the Crawford Committee were published in March the following year and were still under consideration by the GPO when the 1926 general strike broke out in May. The strike temporarily interrupted newspaper production and with restrictions on news bulletins waived the BBC suddenly became the primary source of news for the duration of the crisis. \n\nThe crisis placed the BBC in a delicate position. On one hand Reith was acutely aware that the Government might exercise its right to commandeer the BBC at any time as a mouthpiece of the Government if the BBC were to step out of line, but on the other he was anxious to maintain public trust by appearing to be acting independently. The Government was divided on how to handle the BBC but ended up trusting Reith, whose opposition to the strike mirrored the PM's own. Thus the BBC was granted sufficient leeway to pursue the Government's objectives largely in a manner of its own choosing. The resulting coverage of both striker and government viewpoints impressed millions of listeners who were unaware that the PM had broadcast to the nation from Reith's home, using one of Reith's sound bites inserted at the last moment, or that the BBC had banned broadcasts from the Labour Party and delayed a peace appeal by the Archbishop of Canterbury. Supporters of the strike nicknamed the BBC the BFC for British Falsehood Company. Reith personally announced the end of the strike which he marked by reciting from Blake's \"Jerusalem\" signifying that England had been saved.\n\nThe BBC did well out of the crisis which cemented a national audience for its broadcasting and was followed by the Government's official acceptance of the Crawford Committee recommendations transferring the operations of the Company to a British Broadcasting Corporation established by Royal Charter. Reith was knighted and on 1 January 1927 becoming the first Director General of the British Broadcasting Corporation.\n\nWhile the BBC tends to characterise its coverage of the general strike by emphasising the positive impression created by its balanced coverage of the views of government and strikers, Jean Seaton, Professor of Media History and the Official BBC Historian has characterised the episode as the invention of \"modern propaganda in its British form\". Reith argued that trust gained by 'authentic impartial news' could then be used. Impartial news was not necessarily an end in itself. \n\nTo represent its purpose and (stated) values, the Corporation adopted the coat of arms, including the motto \"Nation shall speak peace unto Nation\". \n\n1926 to 1939\n\nBritish radio audiences had little choice apart from the upscale programming of the BBC. Reith, an intensely moralistic executive, was in full charge. His goal was to broadcast, \"All that is best in every department of human knowledge, endeavor and achievement.... The preservation of a high moral tone is obviously of paramount importance.\" Reith succeeded in building a high wall against an American-style free-for-all in radio in which the goal was to attract the largest audiences and thereby secure the greatest advertising revenue. There was no paid advertising on the BBC; all the revenue came from a tax on receiving sets. Highbrow audiences, however, greatly enjoyed it. At a time when American, Australian and Canadian stations were drawing huge audiences cheering for their local teams with the broadcast of baseball, rugby and hockey, the BBC emphasized service for a national, rather than a regional audience. Boat races were well covered along with tennis and horse racing, but BBC was reluctant to spend its severely limited air time on long football or cricket games, regardless of their popularity. \n\nBBC versus other media\n\nThe success of broadcasting provoked animosities between the BBC and well established media such as theatres, concert halls and the recording industry. By 1929, the BBC complained that the agents of many comedians refused to sign contracts for broadcasting, because they feared it harmed the artist \"by making his material stale\" and that it \"reduces the value of the artist as a visible music-hall performer\". On the other hand, the BBC was \"keenly interested\" in a cooperation with the recording companies who \"in recent years ... have not been slow to make records of singers, orchestras, dance bands, etc. who have already proved their power to achieve popularity by wireless.\" Radio plays were so popular that the BBC had received 6,000 manuscripts by 1929, most of them written for stage and of little value for broadcasting: \"Day in and day out, manuscripts come in, and nearly all go out again through the post, with a note saying 'We regret, etc.'\" In the 1930s music broadcasts also enjoyed great popularity, for example the friendly and wide-ranging organ broadcasts at St George's Hall, Langham Place, by Reginald Foort, who held the official role of BBC Staff Theatre Organist from 1936 to 1938; Foort continued to work for the BBC as a freelance into the 1940s and enjoyed a nationwide following.\n\nExperimental television broadcasts were started in 1932, using an electromechanical 30-line system developed by John Logie Baird. Limited regular broadcasts using this system began in 1934, and an expanded service (now named the BBC Television Service) started from Alexandra Palace in 1936, alternating between an improved Baird mechanical 240 line system and the all electronic 405 line Marconi-EMI system. The superiority of the electronic system saw the mechanical system dropped early the following year. \n\n1939 to 2000\n\nTelevision broadcasting was suspended from 1 September 1939 to 7 June 1946, during the Second World War, and it was left to BBC Radio broadcasters such as Reginald Foort to keep the nation's spirits up. The BBC moved much of its radio operations out of London, initially to Bristol, and then to Bedford. Concerts were broadcast from the Corn Exchange; the Trinity Chapel in St Paul's Church, Bedford was the studio for the daily service from 1941 to 1945 and, in the darkest days of the war in 1941, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York came to St Paul's to broadcast to the UK an all parts of the world on the National Day of Prayer.\n\nThere was a widely reported urban myth that, upon resumption of the BBC television service after the war, announcer Leslie Mitchell started by saying, \"As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted ...\" In fact, the first person to appear when transmission resumed was Jasmine Bligh and the words said were \"Good afternoon, everybody. How are you? Do you remember me, Jasmine Bligh ... ?\" \n\nThe European Broadcasting Union was formed on 12 February 1950, in Torquay with the BBC among the 23 founding broadcasting organisations.\n\nCompetition to the BBC was introduced in 1955, with the commercial and independently operated television network of ITV. However, the BBC monopoly on radio services would persist until 8 October 1973 when under the control of the newly renamed Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) the U.K.'s first Independent local radio station, LBC came on-air in the London area. As a result of the Pilkington Committee report of 1962, in which the BBC was praised for the quality and range of its output, and ITV was very heavily criticised for not providing enough quality programming, the decision was taken to award the BBC a second television channel, BBC2, in 1964, renaming the existing service BBC1. BBC2 used the higher resolution 625 line standard which had been standardised across Europe. BBC2 was broadcast in colour from 1 July 1967, and was joined by BBC1 and ITV on 15 November 1969. The 405 line VHF transmissions of BBC1 (and ITV) were continued for compatibility with older television receivers until 1985.\n\nStarting in 1964, a series of pirate radio stations (starting with Radio Caroline) came on the air and forced the British government finally to regulate radio services to permit nationally based advertising-financed services. In response, the BBC reorganised and renamed their radio channels. On 30 September 1967, the Light Programme was split into Radio 1 offering continuous \"Popular\" music and Radio 2 more \"Easy Listening\". The \"Third\" programme became Radio 3 offering classical music and cultural programming. The Home Service became Radio 4 offering news, and non-musical content such as quiz shows, readings, dramas and plays. As well as the four national channels, a series of local BBC radio stations were established in 1967, including Radio London. \n\nIn 1969, the BBC Enterprises department was formed to exploit BBC brands and programmes for commercial spin-off products. In 1979, it became a wholly owned limited company, BBC Enterprises Ltd. \n\nIn 1974, the BBC's teletext service, Ceefax, was introduced, created initially to provide subtitling, but developed into a news and information service. In 1978, BBC staff went on strike just before the Christmas of that year, thus blocking out the transmission of both channels and amalgamating all four radio stations into one. \n\nSince the deregulation of the UK television and radio market in the 1980s, the BBC has faced increased competition from the commercial sector (and from the advertiser-funded public service broadcaster Channel 4), especially on satellite television, cable television, and digital television services.\n\nIn the late 1980s, the BBC began a process of divestment by spinning off and selling parts of its organisation. In 1988, it sold off the Hulton Press Library, a photographic archive which had been acquired from the Picture Post magazine by the BBC in 1957. The archive was sold to Brian Deutsch and is now owned by Getty Images. During the 1990s, this process continued with the separation of certain operational arms of the corporation into autonomous but wholly owned subsidiaries of the BBC, with the aim of generating additional revenue for programme-making. BBC Enterprises was reorganised and relaunched in 1995, as BBC Worldwide Ltd. In 1998, BBC studios, outside broadcasts, post production, design, costumes and wigs were spun off into BBC Resources Ltd.\n\nThe BBC Research Department has played a major part in the development of broadcasting and recording techniques. In the early days, it carried out essential research into acoustics and programme level and noise measurement. The BBC was also responsible for the development of the NICAM stereo standard.\n\nIn recent decades, a number of additional channels and radio stations have been launched: Radio 5 was launched in 1990, as a sports and educational station, but was replaced in 1994, with Radio 5 Live, following the success of the Radio 4 service to cover the 1991 Gulf War. The new station would be a news and sport station. In 1997, BBC News 24, a rolling news channel, launched on digital television services and the following year, BBC Choice launched as the third general entertainment channel from the BBC. The BBC also purchased The Parliamentary Channel, which was renamed BBC Parliament. In 1999, BBC Knowledge launched as a multi media channel, with services available on the newly launched BBC Text digital teletext service, and on BBC Online. The channel had an educational aim, which was modified later on in its life to offer documentaries.\n\n2000 to 2011\n\nIn 2002, several television and radio channels were reorganised. BBC Knowledge was replaced by BBC Four and became the BBC's arts and documentaries channel. CBBC, which had been a programming strand as Children's BBC since 1985, was split into CBBC and CBeebies, for younger children, with both new services getting a digital channel: the CBBC Channel and CBeebies Channel. In addition to the television channels, new digital radio stations were created: 1Xtra, 6 Music and BBC7. BBC 1Xtra was a sister station to Radio 1 and specialised in modern black music, BBC 6 Music specialised in alternative music genres and BBC7 specialised in archive, speech and children's programming.\n\nThe following few years resulted in repositioning of some of the channels to conform to a larger brand: in 2003, BBC Choice was replaced by BBC Three, with programming for younger generations and shocking real life documentaries, BBC News 24 became the BBC News Channel in 2008, and BBC Radio 7 became BBC Radio 4 Extra in 2011, with new programmes to supplement those broadcast on Radio 4. In 2008, another channel was launched, BBC Alba, a Scottish Gaelic service.\n\nDuring this decade, the corporation began to sell off a number of its operational divisions to private owners; BBC Broadcast was spun off as a separate company in 2002, and in 2005. it was sold off to Australian-based Macquarie Capital Alliance Group and Macquarie Bank Limited and rebranded Red Bee Media. The BBC's IT, telephony and broadcast technology were brought together as BBC Technology Ltd in 2001, and the division was later sold to the German engineering and electronics company Siemens IT Solutions and Services (SIS). SIS was subsequently acquired from Siemens by the French company Atos. Further divestments in this decade included BBC Books (sold to Random House in 2006); BBC Outside Broadcasts Ltd (sold in 2008. to Satellite Information Services); Costumes and Wigs (stock sold in 2008. to Angels The Costumiers); and BBC Magazines (sold to Immediate Media Company in 2011). After the sales of OBs and costumes, the remainder of BBC Resources was reorganised as BBC Studios and Post Production, which continues today as a wholly owned subsidiary of the BBC.\n\nThe 2004 Hutton Inquiry and the subsequent Report raised questions about the BBC's journalistic standards and its impartiality. This led to resignations of senior management members at the time including the then Director General, Greg Dyke. In January 2007, the BBC released minutes of the Board meeting which led to Greg Dyke's resignation. \n\nUnlike the other departments of the BBC, the BBC World Service was funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office, more commonly known as the Foreign Office or the FCO, is the British government department responsible for promoting the interests of the United Kingdom abroad.\n\nIn the past few years, the BBC has experimented in high-definition television. In 2006, BBC HD launched as an experimental service, and became official in December 2007. The channel broadcasts HD simulcasts of programmes on BBC One, BBC Two, BBC Three and BBC Four as well as repeats of some older programmes in HD. In 2010, a HD simulcast of BBC One launched: BBC One HD. The new channel uses HD versions of BBC One's schedule and uses upscaled versions of programmes not currently produced in HD.\n\nOn 18 October 2007, BBC Director General Mark Thompson announced a controversial plan to make major cuts and reduce the size of the BBC as an organisation. The plans included a reduction in posts of 2,500; including 1,800 redundancies, consolidating news operations, reducing programming output by 10% and selling off the flagship Television Centre building in London. These plans have been fiercely opposed by unions, who have threatened a series of strikes, however the BBC have stated that the cuts are essential to move the organisation forward and concentrate on increasing the quality of programming.\n\nOn 20 October 2010, the Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne announced that the television licence fee would be frozen at its current level until the end of the current charter in 2016. The same announcement revealed that the BBC would take on the full cost of running the BBC World Service and the BBC Monitoring service from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and partially finance the Welsh broadcaster S4C. \n\n2011 to present\n\nFurther cuts were announced on 6 October 2011, so the BBC could reach a total reduction in their budget of 20%, following the licence fee freeze in October 2010, which included cutting staff by 2,000 and sending a further 1,000 to the MediaCityUK development in Salford, with BBC Three moving online only in 2016, the sharing of more programmes between stations and channels, sharing of radio news bulletins, more repeats in schedules, including the whole of BBC Two daytime and for some original programming to be reduced. BBC HD was closed on 26 March 2013, and replaced with an HD simulcast of BBC Two, however flagship programmes, other channels and full funding for CBBC and CBeebies would be retained. Numerous BBC facilities have been sold off, including New Broadcasting House on Oxford Road in Manchester. Many major departments have been relocated to Broadcasting House and MediaCityUK, particularly since the closure of BBC Television Centre in March 2013. The cuts inspired campaigns, petitions and protests such as [http://SaveBBC3.com/ SaveBBC3] and [http://SaveOurBBC.net/ SaveOurBBC], which have built a following of hundreds of thousands of individuals concerned about the changes.\n\nGovernance and corporate structure\n\nThe BBC is a statutory corporation, independent from direct government intervention, with its activities being overseen by the BBC Trust (formerly the Board of Governors). General management of the organization is in the hands of a Director-General, who is appointed by the Trust; he is the BBC's Editor-in-Chief and chairs the Executive Board. \n\nCharter\n\nThe BBC operates under a Royal Charter. The current Charter came into effect on 1 January 2007 and runs until 31 December 2016. Each successive Royal Charter is reviewed before a new one is granted, i.e. every 10 years.\n\nThe 2007 Charter specifies that the mission of the Corporation is to \"inform, educate and entertain\". It states that the Corporation exists to serve the public interest and to promote its public purposes: sustaining citizenship and civil society, promoting education and learning, stimulating creativity and cultural excellence, representing the UK, its nations, regions and communities, bringing the UK to the world and the world to the UK, helping to deliver to the public the benefit of emerging communications technologies and services, and taking a leading role in the switchover to digital television.\n\nThe 2007 Charter made the largest change in the governance of the Corporation since its inception. It abolished the sometimes controversial governing body, the Board of Governors, replacing it with the sometimes controversial BBC Trust and a formalized Executive Board.\n\nUnder the Royal Charter, the BBC must obtain a license from the Home Secretary. This licence is accompanied by an agreement which sets the terms and conditions under which BBC is allowed to broadcast. It was under this Licence and Agreement (and the Broadcasting Act 1981) that the Sinn Féin broadcast ban from 1988 to 1994 was implemented. \n\nBBC Trust\n\nThe BBC Trust was formed on 1 January 2007, replacing the Board of Governors as the governing body of the Corporation. The Trust sets the strategy for the corporation, assesses the performance of the BBC Executive Board in delivering the BBC's services, and appoints the Director-General.\n\nBBC Trustees are appointed by the British monarch on advice of government ministers. There are twelve trustees, led by Chairman Rona Fairhead who was appointed on 31 August 2014 and vice-chairman Sir Roger Carr. There are trustees for the four nations of the United Kingdom; England (Mark Florman), Scotland (Bill Matthews), Wales (Elan Closs Stephens) and Northern Ireland (Aideen McGinley). The remaining trustees are Sonita Alleyne, Richard Ayre, Mark Damazer, Nicholas Prettejohn, Suzanna Taverne and Lord Williams. \n\nExecutive Board\n\nThe Executive Board meets once per month and is responsible for operational management and delivery of services within a framework set by the BBC Trust, and is headed by the Director-General, currently Tony Hall. The Executive Board consists of both Executive and Non-Executive directors, with non-executive directors being sourced from other companies and corporations and being appointed by the BBC Trust. The executive board is made up of the Director General as well as the head of each of the main BBC divisions. These at present are:\n\nThe Board shares some of its responsibilities to four sub-committees including: Audit, Fair Trading, Nominations and Remuneration.\n\nIt is also supported by a number of management groups within the BBC, including the BBC Management Board, the Finance and Business committee, and boards at the Group level, such as Radio and Television. The boards of BBC Worldwide support and BBC Commercial Holdings along with the Executive Board on commercial matters. \n\nManagement Board\n\nThe management board is responsible for managing pan-BBC issues delegated to it from the executive board and ensures that the corporation meets its strategic objectives, the board meets three times per month. Current members include: \n\nOperational divisions\n\nThe Corporation is headed by Executive Board, which has overall control of the management and running on the BBC. Below this is the BBC Management board, which deals with inter departmental issues and any other tasks which the Executive board has delegated to it. Below the BBC Management board are the following six major divisions covering all the BBC's output: \n\n# The Television division is in charge of the corporation's television channels including the commissioning and production of programming and of operations such as the BBC Natural History Unit and the BBC Archives.\n# The Radio division is in charge of BBC Radio and music content across the BBC under the BBC Music brand, including music programmes on BBC Television, events such as the BBC Proms and the numerous orchestras such as the BBC Philharmonic.\n# The News Group operate the entire BBC News operation, including the national, regional and international output on television, radio and online. They are in charge of the corporation's divisions in Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales, the English Regions as well as the output of the BBC Global News division. It is also in charge of the corporation's Current Affairs programming and have some responsibility for sports output.\n# The Future Media division is in charge of all digital output, such as BBC Online, BBC iPlayer, BBC Red Button service and developing new technologies through BBC Research & Development.\n# The BBC North Group is the operational division in charge of the divisions operating from the BBC's base at MediaCityUK. It contains departments such as BBC Sport, CBBC and CBeebies, BBC Radio 5 Live and BBC Learning. It also oversees the production of programmes including BBC Breakfast and those programmes made by the BBC Salford network production unit for television and radio. Many of this group's operations overlap with that of other groups, resulting in this group overseeing the day-to-day operations. \n# The Finance and Business division manage the corporations expenses, long term business plans and licence fee collection. They also assign budgets to the different departments.\n\nAll aspects of the BBC fall into one or more of the above departments, with the following exceptions:\n* The BBC Trust is separate from departments as it is part of their operation to monitor the operations and departments of the corporation.\n* BBC Worldwide Ltd operates international channels and sells programmes and merchandise in the UK and abroad to gain additional income that is returned to BBC programmes. It is kept separate from the corporation due to its commercial nature.\n* The BBC World News department is in charge of the production and distribution of its commercial global television channel. It works closely with the BBC News group, but is not governed by it, and shares the corporation's facilities and staff. It also works with BBC Worldwide, the channel's distributor.\n* BBC Studios and Post Production is also separate and officially owns and operates some of the BBC's studio facilities, such as the BBC Elstree Centre, leasing them out to productions from within and outside of the corporation.\n\nFinances\n\nThe BBC has the second largest budget of any UK-based broadcaster with an operating expenditure of £4.722 billion in 2013/14 compared to £6.471 billion for British Sky Broadcasting in 2013/14 and £1.843 billion for ITV in calendar year 2013. \n\nRevenue\n\nThe principal means of funding the BBC is through the television licence, costing £145.50 per year per household since April 2010. Such a licence is required to legally receive broadcast television across the UK, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. No licence is required to own a television used for other means, or for sound only radio sets (though a separate licence for these was also required for non-TV households until 1971). The cost of a television licence is set by the government and enforced by the criminal law. A discount is available for households with only black-and-white television sets. A 50% discount is also offered to people who are registered blind or severely visually impaired, and the licence is completely free for any household containing anyone aged 75 or over. As a result of the UK Government's recent spending review, an agreement has been reached between the government and the corporation in which the current licence fee will remain frozen at the current level until the Royal Charter is renewed at the beginning of 2017. \n\nThe revenue is collected privately and is paid into the central government Consolidated Fund, a process defined in the Communications Act 2003. The BBC pursues its licence fee collection and enforcement under the trading name \"TV Licensing\". TV Licensing collection is currently carried out by Capita, an outside agency. Funds are then allocated by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and the Treasury and approved by Parliament via legislation. Additional revenues are paid by the Department for Work and Pensions to compensate for subsidised licences for eligible over-75-year-olds.\n\nThe licence fee is classified as a tax, and its evasion is a criminal offence. Since 1991, collection and enforcement of the licence fee has been the responsibility of the BBC in its role as TV Licensing Authority. Thus, the BBC is a major prosecuting authority in England and Wales and an investigating authority in the UK as a whole. The BBC carries out surveillance (mostly using subcontractors) on properties (under the auspices of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000) and may conduct searches of a property using a search warrant. According to the BBC, \"more than 204,000 people in the UK were caught watching TV without a licence during the first six months of 2012\". Licence fee evasion makes up around one tenth of all cases prosecuted in magistrate courts. \n\nIncome from commercial enterprises and from overseas sales of its catalogue of programmes has substantially increased over recent years, with BBC Worldwide contributing some £145 million to the BBC's core public service business.\n\nAccording to the BBC's 2013/14 Annual Report, its total income was £5 billion (£5.066 billion), which can be broken down as follows:\n* £3.726 billion in licence fees collected from householders;\n* £1.023 billion from the BBC's Commercial Businesses;\n* £244.6 million from government grants, of which £238.5 million is from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office for the BBC World Service;\n* £72.1 million from other income, such as rental collections and royalties from overseas broadcasts of programming.\n\nThe licence fee has, however, attracted criticism. It has been argued that in an age of multi stream, multi-channel availability, an obligation to pay a licence fee is no longer appropriate. The BBC's use of private sector company Capita Group to send letters to premises not paying the licence fee has been criticised, especially as there have been cases where such letters have been sent to premises which are up to date with their payments, or do not require a TV licence. \n\nThe BBC uses advertising campaigns to inform customers of the requirement to pay the licence fee. Past campaigns have been criticised by Conservative MP Boris Johnson and former MP Ann Widdecombe, for having a threatening nature and language used to scare evaders into paying. Audio clips and television broadcasts are used to inform listeners of the BBC's comprehensive database. There are a number of pressure groups campaigning on the issue of the licence fee. \n\nThe majority of the BBC's commercial output comes from its commercial arm BBC Worldwide who sell programmes abroad and exploit key brands for merchandise. Of their 2012/13 sales, 27% were centred on the five key 'superbrands' of Doctor Who, Top Gear, Strictly Come Dancing (known as Dancing with the Stars internationally), the BBC's archive of natural history programming (collected under the umbrella of BBC Earth) and the, now sold, travel guide brand Lonely Planet. \n\nExpenditure\n\nThe following expenditure figures are from 2012/13 and show the expenditure of each service they are obliged to provide:\n\nA significantly large portion of the BBC's income is spent on the corporation's Television and Radio services with each service having a different budget based upon their content.\n\nHeadquarters and regional offices\n\nBroadcasting House in Portland Place, London, is the official headquarters of the BBC. It is home to six of the ten BBC national radio networks, BBC Radio 1, BBC Radio 1xtra, BBC Asian Network, BBC Radio 3, BBC Radio 4, and BBC Radio 4 Extra. It is also the home of BBC News, which relocated to the building from BBC Television Centre in 2013. On the front of the building are statues of Prospero and Ariel, characters from William Shakespeare's play The Tempest, sculpted by Eric Gill. Renovation of Broadcasting House began in 2002, and was completed in 2013.\n\nUntil it closed at the end of March 2013, BBC Television was based at BBC Television Centre, a purpose built television facility and the second built in the country located in White City, London. This facility has been host to a number of famous guests and programmes through the years, and its name and image is familiar with many British citizens. Nearby, the BBC White City complex contains numerous programme offices, housed in Centre House, the Media Centre and Broadcast Centre. It is in this area around Shepherd's Bush that the majority of BBC employees work.\n\nAs part of a major reorganisation of BBC property, the entire BBC News operation relocated from the News Centre at BBC Television Centre to the refurbished Broadcasting House to create what is being described as \"one of the world's largest live broadcast centres\". The BBC News Channel and BBC World News relocated to the premises in early 2013. Broadcasting House is now also home to most of the BBC's national radio stations, and the BBC World Service. The major part of this plan involves the demolition of the two post-war extensions to the building and construction of an extension designed by Sir Richard MacCormac of MJP Architects. This move will concentrate the BBC's London operations, allowing them to sell Television Centre, which is expected to be completed by 2016. \n\nIn addition to the scheme above, the BBC is in the process of making and producing more programmes outside London, involving production centres such as Belfast, Cardiff , Glasgow and, most notably, in Greater Manchester as part of the 'BBC North Project' scheme where several major departments, including BBC North West, BBC Manchester, BBC Sport, BBC Children's, CBeebies, Radio 5 Live, BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra, BBC Breakfast, BBC Learning and the BBC Philharmonic have all moved from their previous locations in either London or New Broadcasting House, Manchester to the new 200-acre (80ha) MediaCityUK production facilities in Salford, that form part of the large BBC North Group division and will therefore become the biggest staffing operation outside London. \n\nAs well as the two main sites in London (Broadcasting House and White City), there are seven other important BBC production centres in the UK, mainly specialising in different productions. Broadcasting House Cardiff, has been home to BBC Cymru Wales, which specialises in drama production. Open since October 2011, and containing 7 new studios, Roath Lock is notable as the home of productions such as Doctor Who and Casualty. Broadcasting House Belfast, home to BBC Northern Ireland, specialises in original drama and comedy, and has taken part in many co-productions with independent companies and notably with RTÉ in the Republic of Ireland. BBC Scotland, based in Pacific Quay, Glasgow is a large producer of programmes for the network, including several quiz shows. In England, the larger regions also produce some programming.\n\nPreviously, the largest 'hub' of BBC programming from the regions is BBC North West. At present they produce all Religious and Ethical programmes on the BBC, as well as other programmes such as A Question of Sport. However, this is to be merged and expanded under the BBC North project, which involved the region moving from New Broadcasting House, Manchester, to MediaCityUK. BBC Midlands, based at The Mailbox in Birmingham, also produces drama and contains the headquarters for the English regions and the BBC's daytime output. Other production centres include Broadcasting House Bristol, home of BBC West and famously the BBC Natural History Unit and to a lesser extent, Quarry Hill in Leeds, home of BBC Yorkshire. There are also many smaller local and regional studios throughout the UK, operating the BBC regional television services and the BBC Local Radio stations.\n\nThe BBC also operates several news gathering centres in various locations around the world, which provide news coverage of that region to the national and international news operations.\n\nTechnology (Atos service)\n\nIn 2004, the BBC contracted out its former BBC Technology division to the German engineering and electronics company Siemens IT Solutions and Services (SIS), outsourcing its IT, telephony and broadcast technology systems. When Atos Origin acquired the SIS division from Siemens in December 2010 for €850 million (£720m), the BBC support contract also passed to Atos, and in July 2011, the BBC announced to staff that its technology support would become an Atos service. Siemens staff working on the BBC contract were transferred to Atos and BBC technology systems (including the BBC website) are now managed by Atos. In 2011, the BBC's Chief Financial Officer Zarin Patel stated to the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee that, following criticism of the BBC's management of major IT projects with Siemens (such as the Digital Media Initiative), the BBC partnership with Atos would be instrumental in achieving cost savings of around £64 million as part of the BBC's \"Delivering Quality First\" programme. In 2012, the BBC's Chief Technology Officer, John Linwood, expressed confidence in service improvements to the BBC's technology provision brought about by Atos. He also stated that supplier accountability had been strengthened following some high-profile technology failures which had taken place during the partnership with Siemens.\n\nServices\n\nTelevision\n\nThe BBC operates several television channels in the UK of which BBC One and BBC Two are the flagship television channels. In addition to these two flagship channels, the BBC operates several digital only stations: BBC Four, BBC News, BBC Parliament, and two children's channels, CBBC and CBeebies. Digital television is now in widespread use in the UK, with analogue transmission completely phased out by December 2012. It also operates the internet television service BBC Three, which ceased broadcasting as a linear television channel in February 2016.\n\nBBC One is a regionalised TV service which provides opt-outs throughout the day for local news and other local programming. These variations are more pronounced in the BBC 'Nations', i.e. Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, where the presentation is mostly carried out locally on BBC One and Two, and where programme schedules can vary largely from that of the network. BBC Two variations exist in the Nations, however English regions today rarely have the option to 'opt out' as regional programming now only exists on BBC One, and regional opt outs are not possible in the regions that have already undertaken the switch to digital television. BBC Two was also the first channel to be transmitted on 625 lines in 1964, then carry a small-scale regular colour service from 1967. BBC One would follow in November 1969.\n\nA new Scottish Gaelic television channel, BBC Alba, was launched in September 2008. It is also the first multi-genre channel to come entirely from Scotland with almost all of its programmes made in Scotland. The service was initially only available via satellite but since June 2011 has been available to viewers in Scotland on Freeview and cable television. \n\nThe BBC currently operates HD simulcasts of all its nationwide channels with the exception of BBC Parliament. Until 26 March 2013, a separate channel called BBC HD was available, in place of BBC Two HD. It launched on 9 June 2006, following a 12-month trial of the broadcasts. It became a proper channel in 2007, and screened HD programmes as simulcasts of the main network, or as repeats. The corporation has been producing programmes in the format for many years, and stated that it hoped to produce 100% of new programmes in HDTV by 2010. On 3 November 2010, a high-definition simulcast of BBC One was launched, entitled BBC One HD, and BBC Two HD launched on 26 March 2013, replacing BBC HD.\n\nIn the Republic of Ireland, Belgium, the Netherlands and Switzerland, the BBC channels are available in a number of ways. In these countries digital and cable operators carry a range of BBC channels these include BBC One, BBC Two and BBC World News, although viewers in the Republic of Ireland may receive BBC services via 'overspill' from transmitters in Northern Ireland or Wales, or via 'deflectors' – transmitters in the Republic which rebroadcast broadcasts from the UK, received off-air, or from digital satellite.\n\nSince 1975, the BBC has also provided its TV programmes to the British Forces Broadcasting Service (BFBS), allowing members of UK military serving abroad to watch them on four dedicated TV channels. From 27 March 2013, BFBS will carry versions of BBC One and BBC Two, which will include children's programming from CBBC, as well as carrying programming from BBC Three on a new channel called BFBS Extra.\n\nSince 2008, all the BBC channels are available to watch online through the BBC iPlayer service. This online streaming ability came about following experiments with live streaming, involving streaming certain channels in the UK. \n\nIn February 2014, Director-General Tony Hall announced that the corporation needed to save £100 million. In March 2014, the BBC confirmed plans for BBC Three to become an internet-only channel. \n\nGenome Project\n\nIn December 2012, the BBC completed a digitisation exercise, scanning the listings of all BBC programmes from an entire run of about 4,500 copies of the Radio Times magazine from the first, 1923, issue to 2009 (later listings already being held electronically), the 'BBC Genome project', with a view to creating an online database of its programme output. An earlier ten months of listings are to be obtained from other sources. They identified around five million programmes, involving 8.5 million actors, presenters, writers and technical staff. The Genome project was opened to public access on 15 October 2014, with corrections to OCR errors and changes to advertised schedules being crowdsourced. \n\nRadio\n\nThe BBC has ten radio stations serving the whole of the UK, a further six stations in the \"national regions\" (Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland), and 40 other local stations serving defined areas of England. Of the ten national stations, five are major stations and are available on FM and/or AM as well as on DAB and online. These are BBC Radio 1, offering new music and popular styles and being notable for its chart show; BBC Radio 2, playing Adult contemporary, country and soul music amongst many other genres; BBC Radio 3, presenting classical and jazz music together with some spoken-word programming of a cultural nature in the evenings; BBC Radio 4, focusing on current affairs, factual and other speech-based programming, including drama and comedy; and BBC Radio 5 Live, broadcasting 24-hour news, sport and talk programmes.\n\nIn addition to these five stations, the BBC also runs a further five stations that broadcast on DAB and online only. These stations supplement and expand on the big five stations, and were launched in 2002. BBC Radio 1Xtra sisters Radio 1, and broadcasts new black music and urban tracks. BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra sisters 5 Live and offers extra sport analysis, including broadcasting sports that previously were not covered. BBC Radio 6 Music offers alternative music genres and is notable as a platform for new artists.\n\nBBC Radio 7, later renamed BBC Radio 4 Extra, provided archive drama, comedy and children's programming. Following the change to Radio 4 Extra, the service has dropped a defined children's strand in favour of family-friendly drama and comedy. In addition, new programmes to complement Radio 4 programmes were introduced such as Ambridge Extra, and Desert Island Discs revisited. The final station is the BBC Asian Network, providing music, talk and news to this section of the community. This station evolved out of Local radio stations serving certain areas, and as such this station is available on Medium Wave frequency in some areas of the Midlands.\n\nAs well as the national stations, the BBC also provides 40 BBC Local Radio stations in England and the Channel Islands, each named for and covering a particular city and its surrounding area (e.g. BBC Radio Bristol), county or region (e.g. BBC Three Counties Radio), or geographical area (e.g. BBC Radio Solent covering the central south coast). A further six stations broadcast in what the BBC terms \"the national regions\": Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. These are BBC Radio Wales (in English), BBC Radio Cymru (in Welsh), BBC Radio Scotland (in English), BBC Radio nan Gaidheal (in Scottish Gaelic), BBC Radio Ulster, and BBC Radio Foyle, the latter being an opt-out station from Radio Ulster for the north-west of Northern Ireland.\n\nThe BBC's UK national channels are also broadcast in the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man (although these Crown dependencies are outside the UK), and in the former there are two local stations – BBC Guernsey and BBC Radio Jersey. There is no BBC local radio station, however, in the Isle of Man, partly because the island has long been served by the popular independent commercial station, Manx Radio, which predates the existence of BBC Local Radio. BBC services in the dependencies are financed from television licence fees which are set at the same level as those payable in the UK, although collected locally. This is the subject of some controversy in the Isle of Man since, as well as having no BBC Local Radio service, the island also lacks a local television news service analogous to that provided by BBC Channel Islands. \n\nFor a worldwide audience, the BBC World Service provides news, current affairs and information in 28 languages, including English, around the world and is available in over 150 capital cities. It is broadcast worldwide on shortwave radio, DAB and online and has an estimated weekly audience of 192 million, and its websites have an audience of 38 million people per week. Since 2005, it is also available on DAB in the UK, a step not taken before, due to the way it is funded. The service is funded by a Parliamentary Grant-in-Aid, administered by the Foreign Office, however following the Governments spending review in 2011, this funding will cease, and it will be funded for the first time through the Licence fee. In recent years, some services of the World Service have been reduced; the Thai service ended in 2006, as did the Eastern European languages, with resources diverted instead into the new BBC Arabic Television. \n\nHistorically, the BBC was the only legal radio broadcaster based in the UK mainland until 1967, when University Radio York (URY), then under the name Radio York, was launched as the first, and now oldest, legal independent radio station in the country. However, the BBC did not enjoy a complete monopoly before this as several Continental stations, such as Radio Luxembourg, had broadcast programmes in English to Britain since the 1930s and the Isle of Man-based Manx Radio began in 1964. Today, despite the advent of commercial radio, BBC radio stations remain among the most listened to in the country, with Radio 2 having the largest audience share (up to 16.8% in 2011–12) and Radios 1 and 4 ranked second and third in terms of weekly reach. \n\nBBC programming is also available to other services and in other countries. Since 1943, the BBC has provided radio programming to the British Forces Broadcasting Service, which broadcasts in countries where British troops are stationed. BBC Radio 1 is also carried in the United States and Canada on Sirius XM Radio (online streaming only).\n\nThe BBC is a patron of The Radio Academy. \n\nNews\n\nBBC News is the largest broadcast news gathering operation in the world, providing services to BBC domestic radio as well as television networks such as the BBC News, BBC Parliament and BBC World News. In addition to this, news stories are available on the BBC Red Button service and BBC News Online. In addition to this, the BBC has been developing new ways to access BBC News, as a result has launched the service on BBC Mobile, making it accessible to mobile phones and PDAs, as well as developing alerts by e-mail, digital television, and on computers through a desktop alert.\n\nRatings figures suggest that during major incidents such as the 7 July 2005 London bombings or royal events, the UK audience overwhelmingly turns to the BBC's coverage as opposed to its commercial rivals. \nOn 7 July 2005, the day that there were a series of coordinated bomb blasts on London's public transport system, the BBC Online website recorded an all time bandwidth peak of 11 Gb/s at 12:00 on 7 July. BBC News received some 1 billion total hits on the day of the event (including all images, text and HTML), serving some 5.5 terabytes of data. At peak times during the day there were 40,000 page requests per second for the BBC News website. The previous day's announcement of the 2012 Olympics being awarded to London caused a peak of around 5 Gbit/s. The previous all-time high at BBC Online was caused by the announcement of the Michael Jackson verdict, which used 7.2 Gbit/s.\n\nInternet\n\nThe BBC's online presence includes a comprehensive news website and archive. It was launched as BBC Online, before being renamed BBCi, then bbc.co.uk, before it was rebranded back as BBC Online. The website is funded by the Licence fee, but uses GeoIP technology, allowing advertisements to be carried on the site when viewed outside of the UK. The BBC claims the site to be \"Europe's most popular content-based site\" and states that 13.2 million people in the UK visit the site's more than two million pages each day. According to Alexa's TrafficRank system, in July 2008 BBC Online was the 27th most popular English Language website in the world, and the 46th most popular overall. \n\nThe centre of the website is the Homepage, which features a modular layout. Users can choose which modules, and which information, is displayed on their homepage, allowing the user to customise it. This system was first launched in December 2007, becoming permanent in February 2008, and has undergone a few aesthetical changes since then. The Homepage then has links to other micro-sites, such as BBC News Online, Sport, Weather, TV and Radio. As part of the site, every programme on BBC Television or Radio is given its own page, with bigger programmes getting their own micro-site, and as a result it is often common for viewers and listeners to be told website addresses (URLs) for the programme website.\n\nAnother large part of the site also allows users to watch and listen to most Television and Radio output live and for seven days after broadcast using the BBC iPlayer platform, which launched on 27 July 2007, and initially used peer-to-peer and DRM technology to deliver both radio and TV content of the last seven days for offline use for up to 30 days, since then video is now streamed directly. Also, through participation in the Creative Archive Licence group, bbc.co.uk allowed legal downloads of selected archive material via the internet. \n\nThe BBC has often included learning as part of its online service, running services such as BBC Jam, Learning Zone Class Clips and also runs services such as BBC WebWise and First Click which are designed to teach people how to use the internet. BBC Jam was a free online service, delivered through broadband and narrowband connections, providing high-quality interactive resources designed to stimulate learning at home and at school. Initial content was made available in January 2006 however BBC Jam was suspended on 20 March 2007 due to allegations made to the European Commission that it was damaging the interests of the commercial sector of the industry.\n\nIn recent years some major on-line companies and politicians have complained that BBC Online receives too much funding from the television licence, meaning that other websites are unable to compete with the vast amount of advertising-free on-line content available on BBC Online. Some have proposed that the amount of licence fee money spent on BBC Online should be reduced—either being replaced with funding from advertisements or subscriptions, or a reduction in the amount of content available on the site. In response to this the BBC carried out an investigation, and has now set in motion a plan to change the way it provides its online services. BBC Online will now attempt to fill in gaps in the market, and will guide users to other websites for currently existing market provision. (For example, instead of providing local events information and timetables, users will be guided to outside websites already providing that information.)\nPart of this plan included the BBC closing some of its websites, and rediverting money to redevelop other parts. \n\nOn 26 February 2010, The Times claimed that Mark Thompson, Director General of the BBC, proposed that the BBC's web output should be cut by 50%, with online staff numbers and budgets reduced by 25% in a bid to scale back BBC operations and allow commercial rivals more room. On 2 March 2010, the BBC reported that it will cut its website spending by 25% and close BBC 6 Music and Asian Network, as part of Mark Thompson's plans to make \"a smaller, fitter BBC for the digital age\". \n\nInteractive television\n\nBBC Red Button is the brand name for the BBC's interactive digital television services, which are available through Freeview (digital terrestrial), as well as Freesat, Sky (satellite), and Virgin Media (cable). Unlike Ceefax, the service's analogue counterpart, BBC Red Button is able to display full-colour graphics, photographs, and video, as well as programmes and can be accessed from any BBC channel. The service carries News, Weather and Sport 24 hours a day, but also provides extra features related to programmes specific at that time. Examples include viewers to play along at home to gameshows, to give, voice and vote on opinions to issues, as used alongside programmes such as Question Time. At some points in the year, when multiple sporting events occur, some coverage of less mainstream sports or games are frequently placed on the Red Button for viewers to watch. Frequently, other features are added unrelated to programmes being broadcast at that time, such as the broadcast of the Doctor Who animated episode Dreamland in November 2009.\n\nMusic\n\nThe BBC employs staff orchestras, a choir, and supports two amateur choruses, based in BBC venues across the UK; the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Singers, BBC Symphony Chorus and BBC Big Band based in London, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra in Glasgow, the BBC Philharmonic in Manchester, the BBC Concert Orchestra based in Watford and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales in Cardiff. It also buys a selected number of broadcasts from the Ulster Orchestra in Belfast. Many famous musicians of every genre have played at the BBC, such as The Beatles (The Beatles Live at the BBC is one of their many albums). The BBC is also responsible for the United Kingdom coverage of the Eurovision Song Contest, a show with which the broadcaster has been associated for over 50 years. The BBC also operates the division of BBC Audiobooks sometimes found in association with Chivers Audiobooks.\n\nOther\n\nThe BBC operates in other ventures in addition to their broadcasting arm. In addition to broadcasting output on television and radio, some programmes are also displayed on the BBC Big Screens located in several central city locations. The BBC and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office also jointly run BBC Monitoring, which monitors radio, television, the press and the internet worldwide. The BBC also developed several computers throughout the 1980s, most notably the BBC Micro, which ran alongside the corporation's educational aims and programming.\n\nIn 1951, in conjunction with Oxford University Press the BBC published The BBC Hymn Book which was intended to be used for listeners on the radio, to follow hymns which were broadcast. The book was published both with and without music, the music edition being entitled The BBC Hymn Book with Music. The book contained 542 popular hymns.\n\nCeefax\n\nThe BBC provided the world's first teletext service called Ceefax (near-homonymous with \"See Facts\") on 23 September 1974 until 23 October 2012 on the BBC 1 analogue channel then later on BBC 2. It shown informational pages such as News, Sport and the Weather. New Year's Eve in 1974, came competition of ITV's Oracle to try and compete with Ceefax. Oracle closed on New Year's Eve in 1992. During its lifetime it attracted millions of viewers, all the way to 2012 prior to the digital switchover in the United Kingdom. It ceased transmission at 23:32:19 BST on 23 October 2012 after 38 years of transmission. Since then, the BBC's Red Button Service has provided digital like information system that replaced Ceefax.\n\nCommercial activities\n\nBBC Worldwide Limited is the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the BBC responsible for the commercial exploitation of BBC programmes and other properties, including a number of television stations throughout the world. It was formed following the restructuring of its predecessor, BBC Enterprises, in 1995.\n\nThe company owns and administers a number of commercial stations around the world operating in a number of territories and on a number of different platforms. The channel BBC Entertainment shows current and archive entertainment programming to viewers in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Middle East, with the BBC Worldwide channels BBC America and BBC Canada (Joint venture with Shaw Media) showing similar programming in the North America region and BBC UKTV in the Australasia region. The company also airs two channels aimed at children, an international CBeebies channel and BBC Kids, a joint venture with Knowledge Network Corporation, which airs programmes under the CBeebies and BBC K brands. The company also runs the channels BBC Knowledge, broadcasting factual and learning programmes, and BBC Lifestyle, broadcasting programmes based on themes of Food, Style and Wellbeing. In addition to this, BBC Worldwide runs an international version of the channel BBC HD, and provides HD simulcasts of the channels BBC Knowledge and BBC America.\n\nBBC Worldwide also distributes the 24-hour international news channel BBC World News. The station is separate from BBC Worldwide to maintain the station's neutral point of view, but is distributed by BBC Worldwide. The channel itself is the oldest surviving entity of its kind, and has bases and correspondents in over 200 countries. As officially surveyed it is available to more than 274 million households, significantly more than CNN's estimated 200 million.\n\nIn addition to these international channels, BBC Worldwide also owns, together with Scripps Networks Interactive, the UKTV network of ten channels. These channels contain BBC archive programming to be rebroadcast on their respective channels: Alibi, crime dramas; Drama, drama, launched in 2013; Dave (slogan: \"The Home of Witty Banter\"); Eden, nature; Gold, comedy; Good Food, cookery; Home, home and garden; Really, female programming; Watch, entertainment; and Yesterday, history programming.\n\nIn addition to these channels, many BBC programmes are sold via BBC Worldwide to foreign television stations with comedy, documentaries and historical drama productions being the most popular. In addition, BBC television news appears nightly on many Public Broadcasting Service stations in the United States, as do reruns of BBC programmes such as EastEnders, and in New Zealand on TV One.\n\nIn addition to programming, BBC Worldwide produces material to accompany programmes. The company maintained the publishing arm of the BBC, BBC Magazines, which published the Radio Times as well as a number of magazines that support BBC programming such as BBC Top Gear, BBC Good Food, BBC Sky at Night, BBC History, BBC Wildlife and BBC Music. BBC Magazines was sold to Exponent Private Equity in 2011, which merged it with Origin Publishing (previously owned by BBC Worldwide between 2004 and 2006) to form Immediate Media Company.\n\nBBC Worldwide also publishes books, to accompany programmes such as Doctor Who under the BBC Books brand, a publishing imprint majority owned by Random House. Soundtrack albums, talking books and sections of radio broadcasts are also sold under the brand BBC Records, with DVDs also being sold and licensed in large quantities to consumers both in the UK and abroad under the 2 Entertain brand. Archive programming and classical music recordings are sold under the brand BBC Legends.\n\nCultural significance\n\nUntil the development, popularisation, and domination of television, radio was the broadcast medium upon which people in the United Kingdom relied. It \"reached into every home in the land, and simultaneously united the nation, an important factor during the Second World War\". The BBC introduced the world's first \"high-definition\" 405-line television service in 1936. It suspended its television service during the Second World War and until 1946, but remained the only television broadcaster in the UK until 1955. \"The BBC's monopoly was broken in 1955, with the introduction of Independent Television (ITV)\". This heralded the transformation of television into a popular and dominant medium. Nevertheless, \"throughout the 1950s radio still remained the dominant source of broadcast comedy\". Further, the BBC was the only legal radio broadcaster until 1968 (when URY obtained their first licence). \n\nDespite the advent of commercial television and radio, the BBC has remained one of the main elements in British popular culture through its obligation to produce TV and radio programmes for mass audiences. However, the arrival of BBC2 allowed the BBC also to make programmes for minority interests in drama, documentaries, current affairs, entertainment, and sport. Examples cited include the television series Civilisation, Doctor Who, I, Claudius, Monty Python's Flying Circus, Pot Black, and Tonight, but other examples can be given in each of these fields as shown by the BBC's entries in the British Film Institute's 2000 list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes. The export of BBC programmes both through services like the BBC World Service and BBC World News, as well as through the channels operated by BBC Worldwide, means that audiences can consume BBC productions worldwide.\n\nThe term \"BBC English\" is sometimes used as an alternative name for Received Pronunciation, and the English Pronouncing Dictionary uses the term \"BBC Pronunciation\" to label its recommendations. However, the BBC itself now makes more use of regional accents in order to reflect the diversity of the UK, while continuing to expect clarity and fluency of its presenters. From its \"starchy\" beginnings, the BBC has also become more inclusive, and now attempts to accommodate the interests of all strata of society and all minorities, because they all pay the licence fee. \n\nCompetition from Independent Television, Channel 4, Sky, and other broadcast-television stations has lessened the BBC's influence, but its public broadcasting remains a major influence on British popular culture. \n\nAttitudes toward the BBC in popular culture\n\nOlder domestic UK audiences often refer to the BBC as \"the Beeb\", a nickname originally coined by Peter Sellers on The Goon Show in the 1950s, when he referred to the \"Beeb Beeb Ceeb\". It was then borrowed, shortened and popularised by Kenny Everett. Another nickname, now less commonly used, is \"Auntie\", said to originate from the old-fashioned \"Auntie knows best\" attitude, or the idea of aunties and uncles who are present in the background of one's life (but possibly a reference to the \"aunties\" and \"uncles\" who presented children's programmes in the early days) in the days when John Reith, the BBC's first director general, was in charge. The two nicknames have also been used together as \"Auntie Beeb\", and \"Auntie\" has been used in out-take programmes such as Auntie's Bloomers. \n\nCriticism and controversies\n\nThe BBC has faced various accusations regarding many topics: the Iraq war, politics, ethics and religion, as well as funding and staffing. It also has been involved in numerous controversies because of its different, sometimes very controversial coverage of specific news stories and programming. In October 2014, the BBC Trust issued the \"BBC complaints framework\", outlining complaints and appeals procedures. However, the regulatory oversight of the BBC may be transferred to OFCOM. The British \"House of Commons Select Committee on Culture Media and Sport\" advised in its report \"The Future of the BBC\", the OFCOM to be the final arbiter of complaints made about the BBC.\n\nAccusations of a bias against the government and the Conservative Party were often made against the Corporation by members of Margaret Thatcher's 1980s Conservative government. BBC presenter Andrew Marr has said that \"The BBC is not impartial or neutral. It has a liberal bias, not so much a party-political bias. It is better expressed as a cultural liberal bias.\" Conversely, the BBC has been criticised by Guardian columnist, Owen Jones, who has said that \"the truth is the BBC is stacked full of rightwingers.\" Paul Mason (former Newsnight Journalist) has also criticised the BBC as \"unionist\" in relation to the BBC's coverage of the 2014 Scottish referendum campaign and \"neo-liberal\". The BBC has also been characterised as a pro-monarchist institution. \n\nLogos and symbols of the BBC\n\nImage:BBC Television Symbol 1953.jpg|BBC's original \"bat's wings\" logo used from 1953 until the early 1960s \n\nImage:BBC logo (50s-60s).svg|BBC's first three-box logo used from 1958 until 1963\nImage:BBC logo (70s).svg|BBC's second three-box logo used from 1963 until 1971\nImage:BBC logo (80s).svg|BBC's third three-box logo used from 1971 until 1988\nImage:BBC logo (pre97).svg|BBC's fourth three-box logo used from 1988 until 1997\nImage:BBC.svg|BBC's fifth and current three-box logo used since 1997.", "Science fiction is a genre of speculative fiction dealing with imaginative concepts such as futuristic science and technology, space travel, time travel, faster than light travel, parallel universes and extraterrestrial life. Science fiction often explores the potential consequences of scientific and other innovations, and has been called a \"literature of ideas.\" It usually eschews the supernatural, and unlike the related genre of fantasy, historically science fiction stories were intended to have at least a faint grounding in science-based fact or theory at the time the story was created, but this connection has become tenuous or non-existent in much of science fiction. \n\nDefinitions\n\nScience fiction is difficult to define, as it includes a wide range of subgenres and themes. Author and editor Damon Knight summed up the difficulty, saying \"science fiction is what we point to when we say it\", a definition echoed by author Mark C. Glassy, who argues that the definition of science fiction is like the definition of pornography: you do not know what it is, but you know it when you see it.\n\nHugo Gernsback, who was one of the first in using the term \"science fiction\", described his vision of the genre: \"By 'scientifiction' I mean the Jules Verne, H. G. Wells and Edgar Allan Poe type of story—a charming romance intermingled with scientific fact and prophetic vision.\" \n\nIn 1970 William Atheling Jr. wrote about the English term \"science fiction\": \"Wells used the term originally to cover what we would today call ‘hard’ science fiction, in which a conscientious attempt to be faithful to already known facts (as of the date of writing) was the substrate on which the story was to be built, and if the story was also to contain a miracle, it ought at least not to contain a whole arsenal of them.\" \n\nAccording to science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein, \"a handy short definition of almost all science fiction might read: realistic speculation about possible future events, based solidly on adequate knowledge of the real world, past and present, and on a thorough understanding of the nature and significance of the scientific method.\" Rod Serling's definition is \"fantasy is the impossible made probable. Science fiction is the improbable made possible.\" Lester del Rey wrote, \"Even the devoted aficionado—or fan—has a hard time trying to explain what science fiction is\", and that the reason for there not being a \"full satisfactory definition\" is that \"there are no easily delineated limits to science fiction.\"\n\nCharacteristics\n\nScience fiction is largely based on writing rationally about alternative possible worlds or futures. It is related to, but different from fantasy in that, within the context of the story, its imaginary elements are largely possible within scientifically established or scientifically postulated physical laws (though some elements in a story might still be pure imaginative speculation).\n\nThe settings of science fiction are often contrary to those of consensus reality, but most science fiction relies on a considerable degree of suspension of disbelief, which is facilitated in the reader's mind by potential scientific explanations or solutions to various fictional elements. Science fiction elements include:\n* A time setting in the future, in alternative timelines, or in a historical past that contradicts known facts of history or the archaeological record.\n* A spatial setting or scenes in outer space (e.g. spaceflight), on other worlds, or on subterranean earth.\n* Characters that include aliens, mutants, androids, or humanoid robots and other types of characters arising from a future human evolution.\n* Futuristic or plausible technology such as ray guns, teleportation machines, and humanoid computers.\n* Scientific principles that are new or that contradict accepted physical laws, for example time travel, wormholes, or faster-than-light travel or communication.\n* New and different political or social systems, e.g. utopian, dystopian, post-scarcity, or post-apocalyptic.\n* Paranormal abilities such as mind control, telepathy, telekinesis (e.g. \"The Force\" in Star Wars ). \n* Other universes or dimensions and travel between them.\n\nHistory\n\nAs a means of understanding the world through speculation and storytelling, science fiction has antecedents which go back to an era when the dividing line separating the mythological from the historical tends to become somewhat blurred, though precursors to science fiction as literature can be seen in Lucian's True History in the 2nd century, some of the Arabian Nights tales, The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter in the 10th century and Ibn al-Nafis's Theologus Autodidactus in the 13th century.\n\nA product of the budding Age of Reason and the development of modern science itself, Margaret Cavendish's \"The Blazing World\" (1666) and Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels (1726) are some of the first true science fantasy works, which both feature the adventures of the protagonist in fictional and fantastical places, together with Voltaire's Micromégas (1752) and Johannes Kepler's Somnium (1620–1630). Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan considered the latter work the first science fiction story. It depicts a journey to the Moon and how the Earth's motion is seen from there. The Blazing World (1666), by English noblewoman Margaret Cavendish, has also been described as an early forerunner of science fiction. Another example is Ludvig Holberg's novel Nicolai Klimii Iter Subterraneum (1741).\n\nFollowing the 18th-century development of the novel as a literary form, in the early 19th century, Mary Shelley's books Frankenstein (1818) and The Last Man helped define the form of the science fiction novel, and Brian Aldiss has argued that Frankenstein was the first work of science fiction. Later, Edgar Allan Poe wrote a story about a flight to the moon. More examples appeared throughout the 19th century.\n\nThen with the dawn of new technologies such as electricity, the telegraph, and new forms of powered transportation, writers including H. G. Wells and Jules Verne created a body of work that became popular across broad cross-sections of society. Wells' The War of the Worlds (1898) describes an invasion of late Victorian England by Martians using tripod fighting machines equipped with advanced weaponry. It is a seminal depiction of an alien invasion of Earth.\n\nIn the late 19th century, the term \"scientific romance\" was used in Britain to describe much of this fiction. This produced additional offshoots, such as the 1884 novella Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott Abbott. The term would continue to be used into the early 20th century for writers such as Olaf Stapledon.\n\nIn the early 20th century, pulp magazines helped develop a new generation of mainly American SF writers, influenced by Hugo Gernsback, the founder of Amazing Stories magazine. In 1912 Edgar Rice Burroughs published A Princess of Mars, the first of his three-decade-long series of Barsoom novels, situated on Mars and featuring John Carter as the hero. The 1928 publication of Philip Francis Nowlan's original Buck Rogers story, Armageddon 2419, in Amazing Stories was a landmark event. This story led to comic strips featuring Buck Rogers (1929), Brick Bradford (1933), and Flash Gordon (1934). The comic strips and derivative movie serials greatly popularized science fiction.\n\nIn the late 1930s, John W. Campbell became editor of Astounding Science Fiction, and a critical mass of new writers emerged in New York City in a group called the Futurians, including Isaac Asimov, Damon Knight, Donald A. Wollheim, Frederik Pohl, James Blish, Judith Merril, and others. Other important writers during this period include E.E. (Doc) Smith, Robert A. Heinlein, Arthur C. Clarke, Olaf Stapledon, and A. E. van Vogt. Working outside the Campbell influence were Ray Bradbury and Stanisław Lem. Campbell's tenure at Astounding is considered to be the beginning of the Golden Age of science fiction, characterized by hard SF stories celebrating scientific achievement and progress. This lasted until post-war technological advances, new magazines such as Galaxy, edited by H. L. Gold, and a new generation of writers began writing stories with less emphasis on the hard sciences and more on the social sciences.\n\nIn the 1950s, the Beat generation included speculative writers such as William S. Burroughs. In the 1960s and early 1970s, writers like Frank Herbert, Samuel R. Delany, Roger Zelazny, and Harlan Ellison explored new trends, ideas, and writing styles, while a group of writers, mainly in Britain, became known as the New Wave for their embrace of a high degree of experimentation, both in form and in content, and a highbrow and self-consciously \"literary\" or artistic sensibility. In the 1970s, writers like Larry Niven brought new life to hard science fiction. Ursula K. Le Guin and others pioneered soft science fiction.\n\nIn the 1980s, cyberpunk authors like William Gibson turned away from the optimism and support for progress of traditional science fiction. This dystopian vision of the near future is described in the work of Philip K. Dick, such as Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and We Can Remember It for You Wholesale, which resulted in the films Blade Runner and Total Recall. The Star Wars franchise helped spark a new interest in space opera. C. J. Cherryh's detailed explorations of alien life and complex scientific challenges influenced a generation of writers.\n\nEmerging themes in the 1990s included environmental issues, the implications of the global Internet and the expanding information universe, questions about biotechnology and nanotechnology, as well as a post-Cold War interest in post-scarcity societies; Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age comprehensively explores these themes. Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan novels brought the character-driven story back into prominence. The television series Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987) began a torrent of new SF shows, including three further Star Trek spin-off shows (Deep Space 9, Voyager, and Enterprise) and Babylon 5. Stargate, a movie about an ancient portal to other gates across the galaxy, was released in 1994. Stargate SG-1, a TV series, premiered on July 27, 1997 and lasted 10 seasons with 214 episodes. Spin-offs include the animated television series Stargate Infinity, the TV series Stargate Atlantis and Stargate Universe, and the direct-to-DVD films Stargate: The Ark of Truth and Stargate: Continuum. Stargate SG-1 surpassed The X-Files as the longest-running North American science fiction television series, a record later broken by Smallville. \n\nConcern about the rapid pace of technological change crystallized around the concept of the technological singularity, popularized by Vernor Vinge's novel Marooned in Realtime and then taken up by other authors. \n\nThe term \"sci-fi\"\n\nForrest J Ackerman is credited with first using the term sci-fi (analogous to the then-trendy \"hi-fi\") in 1954. As science fiction entered popular culture, writers and fans active in the field came to associate the term with low-budget, low-tech \"B-movies\" and with low-quality pulp science fiction. By the 1970s, critics within the field such as Terry Carr and Damon Knight were using sci-fi to distinguish hack-work from serious science fiction.\n\nAround 1978 critic Susan Wood and others introduced the use of the odd pronunciation \"skiffy\" which is intended to be self-deprecating humor but is inconsistent with the documented genesis of the term \"sci-fi\" (i.e., one would not pronounce \"hi-fi\" as \"hiffy\") and Ackerman's own words engraved on his crypt plaque which read \"Sci-Fi was My High\". \n\nPeter Nicholls writes that \"SF\" (or \"sf\") is \"the preferred abbreviation within the community of sf writers and readers.\" David Langford's monthly fanzine Ansible includes a regular section \"As Others See Us\" which offers numerous examples of \"sci-fi\" being used in a pejorative sense by people outside the genre.\n\nInnovation\n\nScience fiction has criticized developing and future technologies, but also initiates innovation and new technology. This topic has been more often discussed in literary and sociological than in scientific forums. Cinema and media theorist Vivian Sobchack examines the dialogue between science fiction films and the technological imagination. Technology impacts artists and how they portray their fictionalized subjects, but the fictional world gives back to science by broadening imagination. How William Shatner Changed the World is a documentary that gave a number of real-world examples of actualized technological imaginations. While more prevalent in the early years of science fiction with writers like Arthur C. Clarke, new authors still find ways to make currently impossible technologies seem closer to being realized.\n\nCategories\n\nHard science fiction\n\nHard science fiction, or \"hard SF\", is characterized by rigorous attention to accurate detail in the natural sciences, especially physics, astrophysics, and chemistry, or on accurately depicting worlds that more advanced technology may make possible. Some accurate predictions of the future come from the hard science fiction subgenre, but numerous inaccurate predictions have emerged as well. Some hard SF authors have distinguished themselves as working scientists, including Gregory Benford, Geoffrey A. Landis, David Brin, and Robert L. Forward, while mathematician authors include Rudy Rucker and Vernor Vinge. Other noteworthy hard SF authors include Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, Hal Clement, Greg Bear, Larry Niven, Robert J. Sawyer, Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds, Charles Sheffield, Ben Bova, Kim Stanley Robinson, Anne McCaffrey, Andy Weir and Greg Egan.\n\nSoft science fiction\n\nThe description \"soft\" science fiction may describe works based on social sciences such as psychology, economics, political science, sociology, and anthropology. The term is sometimes used to describe improbable plots, absurd \"science\", and cardboard characters. Noteworthy writers in this category include Ursula K. Le Guin and Philip K. Dick. The term can describe stories focused primarily on character and emotion; SFWA Grand Master Ray Bradbury was an acknowledged master of this art. The Eastern Bloc produced a large quantity of social science fiction, including works by Polish authors Stanislaw Lem and Janusz Zajdel, as well as Soviet authors such as the Strugatsky brothers, Kir Bulychov, Yevgeny Zamyatin and Ivan Yefremov. Some writers blur the boundary between hard and soft science fiction.\n\nRelated to social SF and soft SF are utopian and dystopian stories; George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, and Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale and Oryx and Crake are examples.\n\nSubgenres\n\nCyberpunk\n\nThe cyberpunk genre emerged in the early 1980s; combining cybernetics and punk,\nthe term was coined by author Bruce Bethke for his 1980 short story Cyberpunk.\nThe time frame is usually near-future and the settings are often dystopian in nature and characterized by misery. Common themes in cyberpunk include advances in information technology and especially the Internet, visually abstracted as cyberspace, artificial intelligence, and cybernetics and post-democratic societal control where corporations have more influence than governments. Nihilism, post-modernism, and film noir techniques are common elements, and the protagonists may be disaffected or reluctant anti-heroes. Noteworthy authors in this genre are William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, Neal Stephenson, and Pat Cadigan. James O'Ehley has called the 1982 film Blade Runner a definitive example of the cyberpunk visual style.\n\nTime travel\n\nTime-travel stories have antecedents in the 18th and 19th centuries. The first major time-travel novel was Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. The most famous is H. G. Wells' 1895 novel The Time Machine, which uses a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposefully and selectively, while Twain's time traveler is struck in the head. The term time machine, coined by Wells, is now universally used to refer to such a vehicle. Back to the Future is one of the most popular movie franchises in this category; Doctor Who is a similarly popular long-running television franchise. Stories of this type are complicated by logical problems such as the grandfather paradox, as exemplified in the classic Robert Heinlein story \"—All You Zombies—\" and the Futurama episode \"Roswell That Ends Well.\" Time travel continues to be a popular subject in modern science fiction, in print, movies, and television.\n\nAlternate history\n\nAlternative history stories are based on the premise that historical events might have turned out differently. These stories may use time travel to change the past, or may simply set a story in a universe with a different history from our own. Classics in the genre include Bring the Jubilee by Ward Moore, in which the South wins the American Civil War, and The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick, in which Germany and Japan win World War II. The Sidewise Award acknowledges the best works in this subgenre; the name is taken from Murray Leinster's 1934 story Sidewise in Time. Harry Turtledove is one of the most prominent authors in the subgenre and is sometimes called the \"master of alternate history\".\n*\n* \n\nMilitary science fiction\n\nMilitary science fiction is set in the context of conflict between national, interplanetary, or interstellar armed forces; the primary viewpoint characters are usually soldiers. Stories include detail about military technology, procedure, ritual, and history; military stories may use parallels with historical conflicts. Heinlein's Starship Troopers is an early example, along with the Dorsai novels of Gordon Dickson. Joe Haldeman's The Forever War is a critique of the genre, a Vietnam-era response to the World War II–style stories of earlier authors. Prominent military SF authors include John Scalzi, John Ringo, David Drake, David Weber, Tom Kratman, Michael Z. Williamson, S. M. Stirling, and John Carr. The publishing company Baen Books is known for cultivating several of these military science fiction authors.\n\nSuperhuman\n\nSuperhuman stories deal with the emergence of humans who have abilities beyond the norm. This can stem either from natural causes such as in Olaf Stapledon's novel Odd John, Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human, and Philip Wylie's Gladiator, or be the result of scientific advances, such as the intentional augmentation in A. E. van Vogt's novel Slan. These stories usually focus on the alienation that these beings feel as well as society's reaction to them. These stories have played a role in the real life discussion of human enhancement. Frederik Pohl's Man Plus also belongs to this category.\n\nApocalyptic and post-apocalyptic\n\nApocalyptic fiction is concerned with the end of civilization through war (On the Beach), pandemic (The Last Man), astronomic impact (When Worlds Collide), ecological disaster (The Wind from Nowhere), or some other general disaster or with a world or civilization after such a disaster. Typical of the genre are George R. Stewart's novel Earth Abides and Pat Frank's novel Alas, Babylon. Apocalyptic fiction generally concerns the disaster itself and the direct aftermath, while post-apocalyptic fiction can deal with anything from the near aftermath (as in Cormac McCarthy's The Road) to 375 years in the future (as in By The Waters of Babylon) to hundreds or thousands of years in the future, as in Russell Hoban's novel Riddley Walker and Walter M. Miller, Jr.'s A Canticle for Leibowitz. Apocalyptic science-fiction is a popular genre in video games. The critically acclaimed role-playing action adventure video game series Fallout is set on a post-apocalyptic Earth, where civilization is recovering from a nuclear war as survivors struggle to survive and seek to rebuild society.\n\nSpace opera\n\nSpace opera is adventure science fiction set mainly or entirely in outer space or on multiple (sometimes distant) planets. The conflict is heroic, and typically on a large scale. It is also used nostalgically, and modern space opera may be an attempt to recapture the sense of wonder of the golden age of science fiction. The pioneer of this subgenre is generally recognized to be Edward E. (Doc) Smith, with his Skylark and Lensman series. George Lucas's Star Wars series is among the most popular and famous franchises in cinematic space opera. It covers epic battles between good and evil throughout an entire galaxy. Alastair Reynolds's Revelation Space series, Peter F. Hamilton's Void, Night's Dawn, Pandora's Star series, Stephen Hunt's Sliding Void series, Vernor Vinge's A Fire Upon the Deep, A Deepness in the Sky are newer examples of this genre.\n\nSpace Western\n\nThe space Western transposes themes of American Western books and films to a backdrop of futuristic space frontiers. These stories typically involve colony worlds that have only recently been terraformed and/or settled serving as stand-ins for the backdrop of lawlessness and economic expansion that were predominant in the American west. Examples include the Sean Connery film Outland, Heinlein's Farmer in the Sky, Sparks Nevada: Marshall on Mars from the Thrilling Adventure Hour, the Firefly television series, and the film sequel Serenity by Joss Whedon, as well as the manga and anime series Cowboy Bebop, Outlaw Star, and Trigun.\n\nSocial science fiction\n\nSocial science fiction focuses on themes of society and human nature in a science fiction setting. Since it usually focuses more on speculation about humanity and less on scientific accuracy, it's usually placed within soft science fiction.\n\nClimate fiction\n\nClimate fiction is a genre based around themes of reaction to major climate change. It is sometimes called \"cli-fi\", much as \"science fiction\" is often shortened to \"sci-fi\". Cli-fi novels and films are often set in either the present or the near or distant future, but they can also be set in the past. Many cli-fi works raise awareness about the major threats that global warming and climate change present to life on Earth.\n\nMaritime science fiction\n\nMaritime science fiction is a subgenre of science fiction that takes place in the ocean or the sea and commonly has sea monsters and/or maritime technology.\n\nThere are various science fiction works, such as Star Trek, which do not take place at sea but in a comparable setting, such as space; where the threat and theme of the dangers of the unknown (e.g.: Sea/space Monsters) is still present.\n\nAlthough not primarily a maritime science fiction itself, the Star Wars universe includes elements of maritime science fiction such as the underwater city of Jar Jar Binks in Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace.\n\nMundane science fiction\n\nMundane science fiction is a subgenre that is set on Earth and does not include outer space adventures or alien life. Because it focuses on modern day aspects, it is typically associated with hard science fiction.\n\nBiopunk\n\nBiopunk focuses on biotechnology and subversives. The main underlying theme within these stories is the attempt to change the human body and engineer humans for specific purposes through enhancements in genetic and molecular makeups. Many examples of this subgenre include subjects such as human experimentation, the misuse of biotechnology and synthetic biotechnology. This subgenre also includes works involving human cloning and how clones might exists within human society in the future.\n\nOther subgenres\n\n* Anthropological science fiction is a subgenre that absorbs and discusses anthropology and the study of human kind. Examples include Hominids by Robert J. Sawyer, and Neanderthal by John Darnton.\n* Kaiju is a Japanese word that literally translates to \"strange beast.\" The word has been translated and defined in English as \"monster\" and is used to refer to a genre of tokusatsu entertainment. Kaiju films feature large creatures of any form, usually attacking a major city or engaging another (or multiple) monster(s) in battle. The subgenre began in 1954 with Godzilla.\n* Libertarian science fiction is a subgenre focuses on the politics and social order implied by libertarian philosophies with an emphasis on individualism.\n* Comic science fiction is a subgenre that exploits the genre's conventions for comic effect.\n* Feminist science fiction poses questions about social issues such as how society constructs gender roles, the role reproduction plays in defining gender and the unequal political and personal power of men over women. Some of the most notable feminist science fiction works have illustrated these themes using utopias to explore a society in which gender differences or gender power imbalances do not exist, or dystopias to explore worlds in which gender inequalities are intensified, thus asserting a need for feminist work to continue. Joanna Russ's work, and some of Ursula K. Le Guin's work can be thus categorized. Magical feminism is a subgenre of feminist science fiction.\n* Steampunk is based on the idea of futuristic technology existing in the past, usually the 19th century, and often set in Victorian era England—but with prominent elements of either science fiction or fantasy, such as fictional technological inventions like those found in the works of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne, or real technological developments like the computer occurring at an earlier date. Popular examples include The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling, Leviathan series by Scott Westerfeld, Bas-Lag series by China Miéville, as well as Girl Genius web comic by Phil and Kaja Foglio, although seeds of the subgenre may be seen in certain works of Michael Moorcock, Philip José Farmer and Steve Stiles, and in such games as Space: 1889 and Marcus Rowland's Forgotten Futures. Machines are most often powered by steam in this genre (hence the name). Terry Gilliam's 1985 film Brazil is seen as inspiration for writers and artists of the steampunk sub-culture. \n* Science fiction opera is an opera in a science fiction setting without an outer space or multi-planetary setting, thereby distinguishing it from Space opera.\n* Sci-fi action - Sharing many of the conventions of a science fiction film, sci-fi action films emphasizes gun-play, space battles, invented weaponry, and other sci-fi elements weaved into action film premises. Examples include G.I. Samurai, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, The Matrix, Total Recall, Minority Report, The Island, Star Wars, Aliens, I Robot, Transformers, The Hunger Games, The Maze Runner, Equilibrium, District 9, Serenity, Akira, Paycheck, Predator, Robocop, Avatar, Mad Max 2, Divergent, They Live, Escape From New York and The Fifth Element. \n* Science fiction horror – Often revolves around subjects that include but are not limited to killer aliens, mad scientists, and/or experiments gone wrong.\n* Dieselpunk takes over where Steampunk leaves off. These are stories that take over as we usher in the machine-heavy eras of WWI and WWII. The use of diesel-powered machines plays heavily. In this (like its steam counterpart), the focus is on the technology.\n* Science-fiction poetry is poetry that has the characteristics or subject matter of science fiction. Science fiction poetry's main sources are the sciences and the literary movement of science fiction prose. An extended discussion of the field is given in Suzette Haden Elgin's The Science Fiction Poetry Handbook, where she compares and contrasts it to both mainstream poetry and to prose science fiction. The former, she maintains, uses figures of speech unencumbered by noncompliant details, whereas these details can be key elements in science-fiction poetry. Prose in science fiction has the time to develop a setting and a story, whereas a poem in the field is normally constrained by its short length to rely on some device to get a point across quickly. Elgin says that the effectiveness of this kind of poetry pivots around the correct use of presupposition. The Science Fiction Association is an international organization of speculative poets, which gives the annual Rhysling Awards for speculative poetry. An early example of science fiction in poetry is in Alfred, Lord Tennyson's Locksley Hall, where he introduces a picture of the future with \"When I dipt into the future far as human eye could see....\" This poem was written in 1835, near the end of the first Industrial Revolution. Poetry was only sparingly published in traditional science-fiction outlets such as pulp magazines until the New Wave. By the 1980s there were magazines specifically devoted to science-fiction poetry.\n\nRelated genres\n\nOther speculative fiction, fantasy, and horror\n\nThe broader category of speculative fiction includes science fiction, fantasy, alternate histories (which may have no particular scientific or futuristic component), and even literary stories that contain fantastic elements, such as the work of Jorge Luis Borges or John Barth. For some editors, magic realism is considered to be within the broad definition of speculative fiction.\n\nFantasy\n\nFantasy is commonly associated with science fiction, and a number of writers have worked in both genres, while writers such as Anne McCaffrey, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Marion Zimmer Bradley have written works that appear to blur the boundary between the two related genres. The authors' professional organization is called the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA). SF conventions routinely have programming on fantasy topics, and fantasy authors such as J. K. Rowling have won the highest honor within the science fiction field, the Hugo Award.\n\nIn general, science fiction differs from fantasy in that the former concerns things that might someday be possible or that at least embody the pretense of realism. Supernaturalism, usually absent in science fiction, is the distinctive characteristic of fantasy literature. A dictionary definition referring to fantasy literature is \"fiction characterized by highly fanciful or supernatural elements.\" Examples of fantasy supernaturalism include magic (spells, harm to opponents), magical places (Narnia, Oz, Middle Earth, Hogwarts), supernatural creatures (witches, vampires, orcs, trolls), supernatural transportation (flying broomsticks, ruby slippers, windows between worlds), and shapeshifting (beast into man, man into wolf or bear, lion into sheep). Such things are basic themes in fantasy.\n\nLiterary critic Fredric Jameson has characterized the difference between the two genres by describing science fiction as turning \"on a formal framework determined by concepts of the mode of production rather than those of religion\" – that is, science fiction texts are bound by an inner logic based more on historical materialism than on magic or the forces of good and evil. Some narratives are described as being essentially science fiction but \"with fantasy elements.\" The term \"science fantasy\" is sometimes used to describe such material.\n\nScience fantasy\n\nScience fantasy is a genre where elements of science fiction and fantasy co-exist or combine. Stories and franchises that display fictional science as well as supernatural elements, sorcery or/and \"magical technology\" are considered science fantasy.\n\nHorror fiction\n\nHorror fiction is the literature of the unnatural and supernatural, with the aim of unsettling or frightening the reader, sometimes with graphic violence. Historically it has also been known as weird fiction. Although horror is not per se a branch of science fiction, some works of horror literature incorporates science fictional elements. One of the defining classical works of horror, Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, is the first fully realized work of science fiction, where the manufacture of the monster is given a rigorous science-fictional grounding. The works of Edgar Allan Poe also helped define both the science fiction and the horror genres. Today horror is one of the most popular categories of films. Horror is often mistakenly categorized as science fiction at the point of distribution by libraries, video rental outlets, etc.\n\nSupernatural fiction\n\nSupernatural fiction is a genre that features supernatural and other paranormal phenomenon in stories and settings.\n\nSpy-Fi\n\nA mixed genre that combines elements of science fiction with spy fiction.\n\nMystery fiction\n\nWorks in which science and technology are a dominant theme, but based on current reality, may be considered mainstream fiction. Much of the thriller genre would be included, such as the novels of Tom Clancy or Michael Crichton, or the James Bond films. Modernist works from writers like Kurt Vonnegut, Philip K. Dick, and Stanisław Lem have focused on speculative or existential perspectives on contemporary reality and are on the borderline between SF and the mainstream. According to Robert J. Sawyer, \"Science fiction and mystery have a great deal in common. Both prize the intellectual process of puzzle solving, and both require stories to be plausible and hinge on the way things really do work.\" Isaac Asimov, Walter Mosley, and other writers incorporate mystery elements in their science fiction, and vice versa.\n\nDistinct from the above, a full-fledged Science Fiction Mystery is one which is set in a completely different world from ours, in which the circumstances and motives of the crime committed and the identity of the detective(s) seeking to solve it are of an essentially science fictional character. A prime example is Isaac Asimov's \"The Caves of Steel\" and its sequels, set in a world thousands of years in the future and presenting the Robot detective R. Daneel Olivaw. An allied genre is the Fantasy Mystery, a detective mystery set in a world of fantasy - such as the Lord Darcy mysteries taking place in a world where magic works, or \"The Idylls of the Queen\" set in the mythical King Arthur's court.\n\nSuperhero fiction\n\nSuperhero fiction is a genre characterized by beings with much higher than usual capability and prowess, generally with a desire or need to help the citizens of their chosen country or world by using their powers to defeat natural or superpowered threats. A number of superhero fiction characters involve themselves (either intentionally or accidentally) with science fiction and fact, including advanced technologies, alien worlds, time travel, and interdimensional travel; but the standards of scientific plausibility are lower than with actual science fiction. Authors of this genre include Stan Lee (co-creator of Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, the Iron Man, the X-Men, and the Hulk); Marv Wolfman, the creator of Blade for Marvel Comics, and The New Teen Titans for DC Comics; Dean Wesley Smith (Smallville, Spider-Man, and X-Men novels) and Superman writers Roger Stern and Elliot S! Maggin.\n\nFandom and community\n\nScience fiction fandom is the \"community of the literature of ideas... the culture in which new ideas emerge and grow before being released into society at large.\" Members of this community, \"fans\", are in contact with each other at conventions or clubs, through print or online fanzines, or on the Internet using web sites, mailing lists, and other resources.\n\nSF fandom emerged from the letters column in Amazing Stories magazine. Soon fans began writing letters to each other, and then grouping their comments together in informal publications that became known as fanzines. Once they were in regular contact, fans wanted to meet each other, and they organized local clubs. In the 1930s, the first science fiction conventions gathered fans from a wider area. Conventions, clubs, and fanzines were the dominant form of fan activity, or \"fanac\", for decades, until the Internet facilitated communication among a much larger population of interested people.\n\nAuthors\n\nScience fiction is being written worldwide by a diverse population of authors. According to 2013 statistics by the science fiction publisher Tor Books, men outnumber women by 78% to 22% among submissions to the publisher. A controversy about voting slates in the 2015 Hugo Awards highlighted tensions in the science fiction community between a trend of increasingly diverse works and authors being honored by awards, and a backlash by groups of authors and fans who preferred what they considered more traditional science fiction. \n\nAwards\n\nAmong the most respected awards for science fiction are the Hugo Award, presented by the World Science Fiction Society at Worldcon; the Nebula Award, presented by SFWA and voted on by the community of authors; and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel and Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for short fiction. One notable award for science fiction films is the Saturn Award. It is presented annually by The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Films.\n\nThere are national awards, like Canada's Prix Aurora Awards, regional awards, like the Endeavour Award presented at Orycon for works from the Pacific Northwest, special interest or subgenre awards like the Chesley Award for art or the World Fantasy Award for fantasy. Magazines may organize reader polls, notably the Locus Award.\n\nConventions, clubs, and organizations\n\nConventions (in fandom, shortened as \"cons\"), are held in cities around the world, catering to a local, regional, national, or international membership. General-interest conventions cover all aspects of science fiction, while others focus on a particular interest like media fandom, filking, etc. Most are organized by volunteers in non-profit groups, though most media-oriented events are organized by commercial promoters. The convention's activities are called the \"program\", which may include panel discussions, readings, autograph sessions, costume masquerades, and other events. Activities that occur throughout the convention are not part of the program; these commonly include a dealer's room, art show, and hospitality lounge (or \"con suites\").\n\nConventions may host award ceremonies; Worldcons present the Hugo Awards each year. SF societies, referred to as \"clubs\" except in formal contexts, form a year-round base of activities for science fiction fans. They may be associated with an ongoing science fiction convention, or have regular club meetings, or both. Most groups meet in libraries, schools and universities, community centers, pubs or restaurants, or the homes of individual members. Long-established groups like the New England Science Fiction Association and the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society have clubhouses for meetings and storage of convention supplies and research materials. The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) was founded by Damon Knight in 1965 as a non-profit organization to serve the community of professional science fiction authors, 24 years after his essay \"Unite or Fie!\" had led to the organization of the National Fantasy Fan Federation. Fandom has helped incubate related groups, including media fandom, the Society for Creative Anachronism, gaming, filking, and furry fandom.\n\nFanzines and online fandom\n\nThe first science fiction fanzine, The Comet, was published in 1930. Fanzine printing methods have changed over the decades, from the hectograph, the mimeograph, and the ditto machine, to modern photocopying. Distribution volumes rarely justify the cost of commercial printing. Modern fanzines are printed on computer printers or at local copy shops, or they may only be sent as email. The best known fanzine (or \"'zine\") today is Ansible, edited by David Langford, winner of numerous Hugo awards. Other fanzines to win awards in recent years include File 770, Mimosa, and Plokta. Artists working for fanzines have risen to prominence in the field, including Brad W. Foster, Teddy Harvia, and Joe Mayhew; the Hugos include a category for Best Fan Artists. The earliest organized fandom online was the [http://www.noreascon.org/users/sflovers/u1/web/ SF Lovers] community, originally a mailing list in the late 1970s with a text archive file that was updated regularly. In the 1980s, Usenet groups greatly expanded the circle of fans online. In the 1990s, the development of the World-Wide Web exploded the community of online fandom by orders of magnitude, with thousands and then literally millions of web sites devoted to science fiction and related genres for all media. Most such sites are small, ephemeral, and/or very narrowly focused, though sites like SF Site and SFcrowsnest offer a broad range of references and reviews about science fiction.\n\nFan fiction\n\nFan fiction, known to aficionados as \"fanfic\", is non-commercial fiction created by fans in the setting of an established book, film, video game, or television series. This modern meaning of the term should not be confused with the traditional (pre-1970s) meaning of \"fan fiction\" within the community of fandom, where the term meant original or parody fiction written by fans and published in fanzines, often with members of fandom as characters therein. Examples of this would include the Goon Defective Agency stories, written starting in 1956 by Irish fan John Berry and published in his and Arthur Thomson's fanzine Retribution. In the last few years, sites have appeared such as Orion's Arm and Galaxiki, which encourage collaborative development of science fiction universes. In some cases, the copyright owners of the books, films, or television series have instructed their lawyers to issue \"cease and desist\" letters to fans.\n\nScience fiction studies\n\nThe study of science fiction, or science fiction studies, is the critical assessment, interpretation, and discussion of science fiction literature, film, new media, fandom, and fan fiction. Science fiction scholars take science fiction as an object of study in order to better understand it and its relationship to science, technology, politics, and culture-at-large. Science fiction studies has a long history dating back to the turn of the 20th century, but it was not until later that science fiction studies solidified as a discipline with the publication of the academic journals Extrapolation (1959), Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction (1972), and Science Fiction Studies (1973), and the establishment of the oldest organizations devoted to the study of science fiction, the Science Fiction Research Association and the Science Fiction Foundation, in 1970. The field has grown considerably since the 1970s with the establishment of more journals, organizations, and conferences with ties to the science fiction scholarship community, and science fiction degree-granting programs such as those offered by the University of Liverpool and Kansas University.\n\nThe National Science Foundation has conducted surveys of \"Public Attitudes and Public Understanding\" of \"Science Fiction and Pseudoscience.\" They write that \"Interest in science fiction may affect the way people think about or relate to science....one study found a strong relationship between preference for science fiction novels and support for the space program...The same study also found that students who read science fiction are much more likely than other students to believe that contacting extraterrestrial civilizations is both possible and desirable (Bainbridge 1982).\n\nAs serious literature\n\nMary Shelley wrote a number of science fiction novels including Frankenstein, and is treated as a major Romantic writer. A number of science fiction works have received critical acclaim including Childhood's End and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (the inspiration for the movie Blade Runner). A number of respected writers of mainstream literature have written science fiction, including Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange and Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale. Nobel Laureate Doris Lessing wrote a series of SF novels, Canopus in Argos, and nearly all of Kurt Vonnegut's works contain science fiction premises or themes.\n\nThe scholar Tom Shippey asks a perennial question of science fiction: \"What is its relationship to fantasy fiction, is its readership still dominated by male adolescents, is it a taste which will appeal to the mature but non-eccentric literary mind?\" In her much reprinted essay \"Science Fiction and Mrs Brown,\" the science fiction writer Ursula K. Le Guin has approached an answer by first citing the essay written by the English author Virginia Woolf entitled Mr Bennett and Mrs Brown in which she states:\n\nLe Guin argues that these criteria may be successfully applied to works of science fiction and so answers in the affirmative her rhetorical question posed at the beginning of her essay: \"Can a science fiction writer write a novel?\"\n\nTom Shippey in his essay does not dispute this answer but identifies and discusses the essential differences that exists between a science fiction novel and one written outside the field. To this end, he compares George Orwell's Coming Up for Air with Frederik Pohl and C. M. Kornbluth's The Space Merchants and concludes that the basic building block and distinguishing feature of a science fiction novel is the presence of the novum, a term Darko Suvin adapts from Ernst Bloch and defines as \"a discrete piece of information recognizable as not-true, but also as not-unlike-true, not-flatly- (and in the current state of knowledge) impossible.\"\n\nIn science fiction the style of writing is often relatively clear and straightforward compared to classical literature. Orson Scott Card, an author of both science fiction and non-SF fiction, has postulated that in science fiction the message and intellectual significance of the work is contained within the story itself and, therefore, there need not be stylistic gimmicks or literary games; but that some writers and critics confuse clarity of language with lack of artistic merit. In Card's words:\n\nScience fiction author and physicist Gregory Benford has declared that: \"SF is perhaps the defining genre of the twentieth century, although its conquering armies are still camped outside the Rome of the literary citadels.\" This sense of exclusion was articulated by Jonathan Lethem in an essay published in the Village Voice entitled \"Close Encounters: The Squandered Promise of Science Fiction.\" Lethem suggests that the point in 1973 when Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow was nominated for the Nebula Award, and was passed over in favor of Arthur C. Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama, stands as \"a hidden tombstone marking the death of the hope that SF was about to merge with the mainstream.\" Among the responses to Lethem was one from the editor of the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction who asked: \"When is it [the SF genre] ever going to realize it can't win the game of trying to impress the mainstream?\" On this point the journalist and author David Barnett has remarked:\n\nBarnett, in an earlier essay had pointed to a new development in this \"endless war\":\n\nWorld-wide examples\n\nAlthough perhaps most developed as a genre and community in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, science fiction is a worldwide phenomenon. Organisations devoted to promotion and even translation in particular countries are commonplace, as are country- or language-specific genre awards.\n\nAfrica\n\nMohammed Dib, an Algerian writer, wrote a science fiction allegory about his nation's politics, Qui se souvient de la mer (Who Remembers the Sea?) in 1962.\nMasimba Musodza, a Zimbabwean author, published MunaHacha Maive Nei? the first science-fiction novel in the Shona language, which also holds the distinction of being the first novel in the Shona language to appear as an ebook first before it came out in print. In South Africa, a movie titled District 9 came out in 2009, an apartheid allegory featuring extraterrestrial life forms, produced by Peter Jackson.\n\nScience fiction examines society through shifting power structures (such as the shift of power from humanity to alien overlords). African science fiction often uses this genre norm to situate slavery and the slave trade as an alien abduction. Commonalities in experiences with unknown languages, customs, and culture lend themselves well to this comparison. The subgenre also commonly employs the mechanism of time travel to examine the effects of slavery and forced emigration on the individual and the family.\n\nAsia\n\nIndia\n\nIndian science fiction, defined loosely as science fiction by writers of Indian descent, began with the English-language publication of Kylas Chundar Dutt's A Journal of Forty-Eight Hours of the Year 1945 in the Calcutta Literary Gazette (June 6, 1835). Since this story was intended as a political polemic, credit for the first science fiction story is often given to later Bengali authors such as Jagadananda Roy, Hemlal Dutta and the polymath Jagadish Chandra Bose. Eminent film maker and writer Satyajit Ray also enriched Bengali science fiction by writing many short stories as well as science fiction series, Professor Shonku (see Bengali science fiction). Similar traditions exist in Hindi, Marathi, Tamil and English. In English, the modern era of Indian speculative fiction began with the works of authors such as Samit Basu, Payal Dhar, Vandana Singh and Anil Menon. Works such as Amitav Ghosh's The Calcutta Chromosome, Salman Rushdie's Grimus, and Boman Desai's The Memory of Elephants are generally classified as magic realist works but make essential use of SF tropes and techniques. In recent years authors in some other Indian languages have begun telling stories in this genre; for example in Punjabi IP Singh and Roop Dhillon have written stories that can clearly be defined as Punjabi science fiction. The latter has coined the term Vachitarvaad to describe such literature.\n\nBangladesh\n\nBangladesh has a strong Science fiction literature in South Asia. After Qazi Abdul Halim's Mohasunner Kanna (Tears of the Cosmos) (1970), Humayun Ahmed wrote the first modern Bengali SF novel, Tomader Jonno Valobasa (Love For You All). It was published in 1973. This book is treated as the first full-fledged Bangladeshi science fiction novel. Then he wrote Tara Tinjon (They were Three), Irina, Anonto Nakshatra Bithi (Endless Galaxy), Fiha Somikoron (Fiha Equation) etc.\n\nBut Bengali science fiction leaves its cocoon phase holding the hands of Muhammed Zafar Iqbal. Mr. Iqbal wrote a story named Copotronic Sukh Dukho (Copotronic Emotions) when he was a student of Dhaka University. This story was later included in a compilation of Iqbal's work in a book by the same name. Muktodhara, a famous publishing house of Dhaka was the publisher of this book. This collection of science fiction stories gained huge popularity and the new trend of science fiction emerged among Bengali writers and readers. After his first collection, Mr. Iqbal transformed his own science fiction cartoon strip Mohakashe Mohatrash (Terror in the Cosmos) into a novel. All told, Muhammed Zafar Iqbal has written the greatest number of science fiction works in Bengali science fiction.\n\nFollowing the footsteps of the ancestors, more and more writers, especially young writers started writing science fiction and a new era started in Bengali literature.\n\nChina\n\nModern science fiction in China mainly depends on the magazine Science Fiction World. A number of works were originally published in it in installments, including the highly successful novel The Three-Body Problem, written by Liu Cixin.\n\nKorea\n\nUntil recently, there has been little domestic science fiction literature in Korea. Within the small field, the author and critic writing under the nom de plume Djuna has been credited with being the major force. Kim Boyoung, Bae Myunghoon and Kwak Jaesik are also often mentioned as the new generation of Korean science fiction writers of 2010s. The upswing that began in 2009 has been attributed by Shin Junebong to a combination of factors. Shin quotes Djuna as saying, \"'It looks like the various literary awards established by one newspaper after another, with hefty sums of prize money, had a big impact.'\" Another factor cited was the active use of Web bulletin boards among the then-young writers brought up on translations of Western SF. In spite of the increase, there were still no more than sixty or so authors writing in the field at that time.\n\nMiddle east\n\nChalomot Be'aspamia is an Israeli magazine of short science fiction and fantasy stories. The Prophecies Of Karma, published in 2011, is advertised as the first work of science fiction by an Arabic author, the Lebanese writer Nael Gharzeddine.\n\nEurope \n\nFrance and Belgium \n\nJules Verne, a 19th-century French novelist known for his pioneering science fiction works (Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Journey to the Center of the Earth, From the Earth to the Moon) is the prime representative of the French legacy of science fiction. French science fiction of the 19th century was also represented with such artists as Albert Robida and Isidore Grandville. In the 20th century, traditions of French science fiction were carried on by writers like Pierre Boulle (best known for his Planet of the Apes), Serge Brussolo, Bernard Werber, René Barjavel and Robert Merle, among others.\n\nIn Franco-Belgian comics, bande dessinée (\"BD\") science-fiction is a well established genre. Notable French science fiction comics include Valerian et Laureline by Pierre Christin and Jean-Claude Mézières, a space opera franchise that has lasted since 1967. Metal Hurlant magazine (known in US as Heavy Metal) was one of the largest contributors to francophone science-fiction comics. Its major authors include Jean \"Moebius\" Giraud, creator of Arzach; Chilean Alejandro Jodorowsky, who created a series of comics, including L'Incal and Les Metabarons, set in Jodoverse; and Enki Bilal with The Nikopol Trilogy. Giraud also contributed to French SF animation, collaborating with René Laloux on several animated features. A number of artists from neighboring countries, such as Spain and Italy, create science fiction and fantasy comics in French aimed at a Franco-Belgian market.\n\nIn French cinema, science fiction began with silent film director and visual effects pioneer George Méliès, whose most famous film was Voyage to the Moon, loosely based on books by Verne and Wells. In the 20th and 21st centuries, French science fiction films were represented by René Laloux's animated features, as well as Enki Bilal's adaptation of the Nikopol Trilogy, Immortal. Luc Besson filmed The Fifth Element as a joint Franco-American production.\n\nIn the French-speaking world, the colloquial use of the term sci-fi is an accepted Anglicism for the term science fiction. This probably stems from the fact that science fiction writing never expanded there to the extent it did in the English-speaking world, particularly with the dominance of the United States. Nevertheless, France has made a tremendous contribution to science fiction in its seminal stages of development. Although the term \"science fiction\" is understood in France, their penchant for the \"weird and wacky\" has a long tradition and is sometimes called \"le culte du merveilleux.\" This uniquely French tradition certainly encompasses what the anglophone world would call French science fiction but also ranges across fairies, Dadaism, and surrealism.\n\nItaly \n\nItaly has a vivid history in science fiction, though almost unknown outside her borders. \nThe history of Italian science fiction recognizes a varied roadmap of this genre which spread to a popular level after World War Two, and in particular in the second half of the 1950s, on the wave of American and British literature. \n\nThe earliest pioneers may be found in the literature of the fantastic voyage and of the Renaissance Utopia, even in previous masterpieces such as \"The Million\" of Marco Polo. \nIn the second half of the 19th century stories and short novels of \"scientific fantasies\" (also known as \"incredible stories\" or \"fantastic\" or \"adventuristic\", \"novels of the future times\" or \"utopic\", \"of the tomorrow\") appeared in Sunday newspaper supplements, in literary magazines, and as booklets published in installments. Added to these, at the beginning of the 20th century, were the most futuristic masterpieces of the great Emilio Salgari, considered by most the father of Italian science fiction, and Yambo and Luigi Motta, the most renowned authors of popular novels of the time, with extraordinary adventures in remote and exotic places, and even works of authors representing known figures of the \"top\" literature, among them Massimo Bontempelli, Luigi Capuana, Guido Gozzano, Ercole Luigi Morselli. \n\nThe true birth of Italian science fiction is placed in 1952, with the publishing of the first specialized magazines, Scienza Fantastica (Fantastic Science) and Urania, and with the appearance of the term \"fantascienza\" which has become the usual translation of the English term \"science fiction.\" The \"Golden Years\" span the period 1957-1960.\n\nFrom the end of the 1950s science fiction became in Italy one of the most popular genres, although its popular success was not followed by critical success. In spite of an active and organized fandom there hasn't been an authentic sustained interest on the part of the Italian cultural élite towards science fiction. \n\nPopular Italian science fiction writers include Gianluigi Zuddas, Giampietro Stocco, Lino Aldani, as well as comic artists, such as Milo Manara. Valerio Evangelisti is the best known modern author of Italian science fiction and fantasy. \nAlso, popular Italian children's writer Gianni Rodari often turned to science fiction aimed at children, most notably, in Gip in the Television.\n\nGermany \n\nThe main German science fiction writer in the 19th century was Kurd Laßwitz. According to Austrian SF critic Franz Rottensteiner, though significant German novels of a science-fiction nature were published in the first half of the 20th century, SF did not exist as a genre in the country until after World War II and the heavy importing and translation of American works. In the 20th century, during the years of divided Germany, both East and West spawned a number of successful writers. Top East German writers included Angela and Karlheinz Steinmüller, as well as Günther Krupkat. West German authors included Carl Amery, Gudrun Pausewang, Wolfgang Jeschke and Frank Schätzing, among others. A well known science fiction book series in the German language is Perry Rhodan, which started in 1961. Having sold over one billion copies (in pulp format), it claims to be the most successful science fiction book series ever written, worldwide. Current well-known SF authors from Germany are five-time Kurd-Laßwitz-Award winner Andreas Eschbach, whose books The Carpet Makers and Eine Billion Dollar are big successes, and Frank Schätzing, who in his book The Swarm mixes elements of the science thriller with SF elements to an apocalyptic scenario. The most prominent German-speaking author, according to Die Zeit, is Austrian Herbert W. Franke.\n\nIn the 1920s Germany produced a number of critically acclaimed high-budget science fiction and horror films. Metropolis by director Fritz Lang is credited as one of the most influential science fiction films ever made. Other films of the era included Woman in the Moon, Alraune, Algol, Gold, Master of the World, among others. In the second half of the 20th century, East Germany also became a major science fiction film producer, often in a collaboration with fellow Eastern Bloc countries. Films of this era include Eolomea, First Spaceship on Venus and Hard to Be a God.\n\nRussia and ex-Soviet countries \n\nRussians made their first steps to science fiction in the mid-19th century, with utopias by Faddei Bulgarin and Vladimir Odoevsky. \nHowever, it was the Soviet era that became the genre's golden age. Soviet writers were prolific, \ndespite limitations set up by state censorship. Early Soviet writers, such as Alexander Belayev, Alexey N. Tolstoy and Vladimir Obruchev, employed Vernian/Wellsian hard science fiction based on scientific predictions.\n\nThe most notable books of the era include Belayev's Amphibian Man, The Air Seller and Professor Dowell's Head; Tolstoy's Aelita and Engineer Garin's Death Ray. Early Soviet science fiction was influenced by communist ideology and often featured a leftist agenda or anti-capitalist satire.\n \nThose few early Soviet books that challenged the communist worldview and satirized the Soviets, such as Yevgeny Zamyatin's dystopia We or Mikhail Bulgakov's Heart of a Dog and Fatal Eggs, were banned from publishing until the 1980s, although they still circulated in fan-made copies.\n\nIn the second half of the 20th century, a new generation of writers developed a more complex approach. Social science fiction, concerned with philosophy, ethics, utopian and dystopian ideas, became the prevalent subgenre. \nThe breakthrough was started by Ivan Yefremov's utopian novel Andromeda Nebula (1957). He was soon followed by brothers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, who explored darker themes and social satire in their Noon Universe novels, such as Hard to be a God (1964) and Prisoners of Power (1969), as well as in their science fantasy trilogy Monday Begins on Saturday (1964). A good share of Soviet science fiction was aimed at children. Probably the best known was Kir Bulychov, who created Alisa Selezneva (1965-2003), a children's space adventure series about a teenage girl from the future.\n\nThe Soviet film industry also contributed to the genre, starting from the 1924 film Aelita. Some of early Soviet films, namely Planet of the Storms (1962) and Battle Beyond the Sun (1959), were pirated, re-edited and released in the West under new titles. \nLate Soviet science fiction films include Mystery of the Third Planet (1981), Ivan Vasilyevich (1973) and Kin-dza-dza! (1986), as well as Andrey Tarkovsky's Solaris and Stalker, among others.\n\nAfter the fall of the Soviet Union, science fiction in the former Soviet republics is still written mostly in Russian, which allows an appeal to a broader audience. Aside from Russians themselves, especially notable are Ukrainian writers, who have greatly contributed to science fiction and fantasy in Russian language.\n\nAmong the most notable post-Soviet authors are H. L. Oldie, Sergey Lukyanenko, Alexander Zorich and Vadim Panov. Russia's film industry, however, has been less successful recently, producing only a few science fiction films, most of them are adaptations of books by the Strugatskys (The Inhabited Island, The Ugly Swans) or Bulychov (Alice's Birthday). Science fiction media in Russia is represented with such magazines as Mir Fantastiki and Esli.\n\nOther European countries \n\nPoland is a traditional producer of science fiction and fantasy. The country's most influential science fiction writer of all time is Stanisław Lem, who is probably best known for his science fiction books, such as Solaris and the stories involving Ijon Tichy, but who also wrote very successful hard sci-fi such as The Invincible and the stories involving Pilot Pirx. A number of Lem's books were adapted for screen, both in Poland and abroad. Other notable Polish writers of the genre include Jerzy Żuławski, Janusz A. Zajdel, Konrad Fiałkowski, Jacek Dukaj and Rafał A. Ziemkiewicz.\n\nCzech writer and playwright Karel Čapek in his play R.U.R. (1920) introduced the word robot into science fiction. Čapek is also known for his satirical science fiction novels and plays, such as War with the Newts and The Absolute at Large. Traditions of Czech science fiction were carried on despite the general political climate by writers like Ludvík Souček, Josef Nesvadba, Ondřej Neff and Jaroslav Velinský. In the years 1980 - 2000 a new vawe of young writers appeared (J. W. Procházka, F. Novotný, E. Hauserová, V. Kadlečková, J. Rečková, E. Dufková).\n\nOceania\n\nAustralia: American David G. Hartwell noted there is \"nothing essentially Australian about Australian science-fiction.\" A number of Australian science-fiction (and fantasy and horror) writers are in fact international English language writers, and their work is published worldwide. This is further explainable by the fact that the Australian inner market is small (with Australian population being around 21 million), and sales abroad are crucial to most Australian writers. \n\nNorth America\n\nIn Canadian Francophone province Québec, Élisabeth Vonarburg and other authors developed a tradition of French-Canadian SF, related to the European French literature. The Prix Boreal was established in 1979 to honor Canadian science fiction works in French. The Prix Aurora Awards (briefly preceded by the Casper Award) were founded in 1980 to recognize and promote the best works of Canadian science fiction in both French and English. Also, due to Canada's bilingualism and the US publishing almost exclusively in English, translation of science fiction prose into French thrives and runs nearly parallel upon a book's publishing in the original English. A sizeable market also exists within Québec for European-written Francophone science fiction literature.\n\nLatin America\n\nAlthough there is still some controversy as to when science fiction began in Latin America, the earliest works date from the late 19th century. All published in 1875, O Doutor Benignus by the Brazilian Augusto Emílio Zaluar, El Maravilloso Viaje del Sr. Nic-Nac by the Argentinian Eduardo Holmberg, and Historia de un Muerto by the Cuban Francisco Calcagno are three of the earliest novels which appeared in the continent.\n\nUp to the 1960s, science fiction was the work of isolated writers who did not identify themselves with the genre, but rather used its elements to criticize society, promote their own agendas or tap into the public's interest in pseudo-sciences. It received a boost of respectability after authors such as Horacio Quiroga and Jorge Luis Borges used its elements in their writings. This, in turn, led to the permanent emergence of science fiction in the 1960s and mid-1970s, notably in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, and Cuba. Magic realism enjoyed parallel growth in Latin America, with a strong regional emphasis on using the form to comment on social issues, similar to social science fiction and speculative fiction in the English world.\n\nEconomic turmoil and the suspicious eye of the dictatorial regimes in place reduced the genre's dynamism for the following decade. In the mid-1980s, it became increasingly popular once more. Although led by Argentina, Brazil and Mexico, Latin America now hosts dedicated communities and writers with an increasing use of regional elements to set them apart from English-language science-fiction.", "Doctor Who is a British science-fiction television programme produced by the BBC since 1963. The programme depicts the adventures of the Doctor, a Time Lord—a space and time-travelling humanoid alien. He explores the universe in his TARDIS, a sentient time-travelling space ship. Its exterior appears as a blue British police box, which was a common sight in Britain in 1963 when the series first aired. Accompanied by companions, the Doctor combats a variety of foes, while working to save civilisations and help people in need.\n\nThe show is a significant part of British popular culture, and elsewhere it has become a cult television favourite. The show has influenced generations of British television professionals, many of whom grew up watching the series. The programme originally ran from 1963 to 1989. There was an unsuccessful attempt to revive regular production in 1996 with a backdoor pilot, in the form of a television film. The programme was relaunched in 2005 by Russell T Davies, who was showrunner and head writer for the first five years of its revival, produced in-house by BBC Wales in Cardiff. The first series of the 21st century featured Christopher Eccleston in the title role and was produced by the BBC. Doctor Who also spawned spin-offs in multiple media, including Torchwood (2006–2011) and The Sarah Jane Adventures (2007–2011), both created by Russell T Davies; K-9 (2009–2010); and a single pilot episode of K-9 and Company (1981). There also have been many spoofs and cultural references to the character in other media.\n\nTwelve actors have headlined the series as the Doctor. The transition from one actor to another is written into the plot of the show, as well as the differing approach to the role that each brings, under the concept of regeneration into a new incarnation. The show's premise is that this is a life process of Time Lords through which the character of the Doctor takes on a new body and, to some extent, new personality, which occurs after sustaining an injury which would be fatal to most other species. Each actor's portrayal differs, but they are all intended to be aspects of the same character and form part of the same storyline. The time-travelling nature of the plot means that, on occasion, different Doctors have met each other. Peter Capaldi took on the role after Matt Smith's exit in the 2013 Christmas special \"The Time of the Doctor\". \n\nPremise\n\nDoctor Who follows the adventures of the primary character, a rogue Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey, who simply goes by the name \"The Doctor\". He fled from Gallifrey in a stolen Mark I Type 40 TARDIS – \"Time and Relative Dimension in Space\" – time machine which allows him to travel across time and space. The TARDIS has a \"chameleon circuit\" which normally allows the machine to take on the appearance of local objects as a disguise. However, the Doctor's TARDIS remains fixed as a blue British Police box due to a malfunction in the chameleon circuit.\n\nThe Doctor rarely travels alone and often brings one or more companions to share these adventures. His companions are usually humans, as he has found a fascination with planet Earth. He often finds events that pique his curiosity as he tries to prevent evil forces from harming innocent people or changing history, using only his ingenuity and minimal resources, such as his versatile sonic screwdriver. As a Time Lord, the Doctor has the ability to regenerate when his body is mortally damaged, taking on a new appearance and personality. The Doctor has gained numerous reoccurring enemies during his travels, including the Daleks, the Cybermen, and the Master, another renegade Time Lord.\n\nHistory\n\nDoctor Who first appeared on BBC TV at 17:16:20 GMT, eighty seconds after the scheduled programme time, 5:15 pm, on Saturday, 23 November 1963. It was to be a regular weekly programme, each episode 25 minutes of transmission length. Discussions and plans for the programme had been in progress for a year. The head of drama, Canadian Sydney Newman, was mainly responsible for developing the programme, with the first format document for the series being written by Newman along with the head of the script department (later head of serials) Donald Wilson and staff writer C. E. Webber. Writer Anthony Coburn, story editor David Whitaker and initial producer Verity Lambert also heavily contributed to the development of the series. Newman is often given sole creator credit for the series. Some reference works such as The Complete Encyclopedia of Television Programs 1947–1979 by Vincent Terrace erroneously credit Terry Nation with creating Doctor Who, because of the way his name is credited in the two Peter Cushing films.Newman and Lambert's role in originating the series was recognised in the 2007 episode \"Human Nature\", in which the Doctor, in disguise as a human named John Smith, gives his parents' names as Sydney and Verity. The programme was originally intended to appeal to a family audience, as an educational programme using time travel as a means to explore scientific ideas and famous moments in history. On 31 July 1963 Whitaker commissioned Terry Nation to write a story under the title The Mutants. As originally written, the Daleks and Thals were the victims of an alien neutron bomb attack but Nation later dropped the aliens and made the Daleks the aggressors. When the script was presented to Newman and Wilson it was immediately rejected as the programme was not permitted to contain any \"bug-eyed monsters\". The first serial had been completed and the BBC believed it was crucial that the next one be a success, but The Mutants was the only script ready to go, so the show had little choice but to use it. According to producer Verity Lambert; \"We didn't have a lot of choice — we only had the Dalek serial to go ... We had a bit of a crisis of confidence because Donald [Wilson] was so adamant that we shouldn't make it. Had we had anything else ready we would have made that.\" Nation's script became the second Doctor Who serial – The Daleks (a.k.a. The Mutants). The serial introduced the eponymous aliens that would become the series' most popular monsters, and was responsible for the BBC's first merchandising boom. \n\nThe BBC drama department's serials division produced the programme for 26 seasons, broadcast on BBC 1. Falling viewing numbers, a decline in the public perception of the show and a less-prominent transmission slot saw production suspended in 1989 by Jonathan Powell, controller of BBC 1. Although (as series co-star Sophie Aldred reported in the documentary Doctor Who: More Than 30 Years in the TARDIS) it was effectively, if not formally, cancelled with the decision not to commission a planned 27th series of the show for transmission in 1990, the BBC repeatedly affirmed that the series would return.\n\nWhile in-house production had ceased, the BBC hoped to find an independent production company to relaunch the show. Philip Segal, a British expatriate who worked for Columbia Pictures' television arm in the United States, had approached the BBC about such a venture as early as July 1989, while the 26th series was still in production. Segal's negotiations eventually led to a Doctor Who television film, broadcast on the Fox Network in 1996 as a co-production between Fox, Universal Pictures, the BBC and BBC Worldwide. Although the film was successful in the UK (with 9.1 million viewers), it was less so in the United States and did not lead to a series.\n\nLicensed media such as novels and audio plays provided new stories, but as a television programme Doctor Who remained dormant until 2003. In September of that year, BBC Television announced the in-house production of a new series after several years of attempts by BBC Worldwide to find backing for a feature film version. The executive producers of the new incarnation of the series were writer Russell T Davies and BBC Cymru Wales head of drama Julie Gardner.\n\nDoctor Who finally returned with the episode \"Rose\" on BBC One on 26 March 2005. There have since been nine further series in 2006–2008 and 2010–2015, and Christmas Day specials every year since 2005. No full series was filmed in 2009, although four additional specials starring David Tennant were made. In 2010, Steven Moffat replaced Davies as head writer and executive producer. In January 2016, Moffat announced that he would step down after the 2017 finale, to be replaced by Chris Chibnall in 2018. In addition, Series 10 will debut in Spring 2017, with a Christmas special broadcast in 2016. \n\nThe 2005 version of Doctor Who is a direct plot continuation of the original 1963–1989 seriesThis is often emphasised in the accompanying making-of documentaries in the series Doctor Who Confidential, as well as in occasional flashbacks to images of earlier versions of the Doctor. and the 1996 telefilm. This is similar to the 1988 continuation of Mission Impossible, but differs from most other series relaunches which have either been reboots (for example, Battlestar Galactica and Bionic Woman) or set in the same universe as the original but in a different time period and with different characters (for example, Star Trek: The Next Generation and spin-offs).\n\nThe programme has been sold to many other countries worldwide (see Viewership).\n\nPublic consciousness\n\nIt has been claimed that the transmission of the first episode was delayed by ten minutes due to extended news coverage of the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy the previous day; whereas in fact it went out after a delay of eighty seconds. The BBC believed that many viewers had missed this introduction to a new series due to the coverage of the assassination, as well as a series of power blackouts across the country, and they broadcast it again on 30 November 1963, just before episode two. \n\nThe programme soon became a national institution in the United Kingdom, with a large following among the general viewing audience. Many renowned actors asked for or were offered guest-starring roles in various stories. \n\nWith popularity came controversy over the show's suitability for children. Morality campaigner Mary Whitehouse repeatedly complained to the BBC in the 1970s over what she saw as the show's frightening and gory content. John Nathan-Turner produced the series during the 1980s and was heard to say that he looked forward to Whitehouse's comments, as the show's ratings would increase soon after she had made them. \n\nThe phrase \"Hiding behind (or 'watching from behind') the sofa\" entered British pop culture, signifying in humour the stereotypical early-series behaviour of children who wanted to avoid seeing frightening parts of a television programme while remaining in the room to watch the remainder of it. The phrase retains this association with Doctor Who, to the point that in 1991 the Museum of the Moving Image in London named their exhibition celebrating the programme \"Behind the Sofa\". The electronic theme music too was perceived as eerie, novel, and frightening, at the time. A 2012 article placed this childhood juxtaposition of fear and thrill \"at the center of many people's relationship with the show\", and a 2011 online vote at Digital Spy deemed the series the \"scariest TV show of all time\". \n\nDuring Jon Pertwee's second series as the Doctor, in the serial Terror of the Autons (1971), images of murderous plastic dolls, daffodils killing unsuspecting victims, and blank-featured policemen marked the apex of the show's ability to frighten children. Other notable moments in that decade include a disembodied brain falling to the floor in The Brain of Morbius and the Doctor apparently being drowned by Chancellor Goth in The Deadly Assassin (both 1976). \n\nA BBC audience research survey conducted in 1972 found that, by their own definition of violence (\"any act[s] which may cause physical and/or psychological injury, hurt or death to persons, animals or property, whether intentional or accidental\") Doctor Who was the most violent of the drama programmes the corporation produced at the time. The same report found that 3% of the surveyed audience regarded the show as \"very unsuitable\" for family viewing. Responding to the findings of the survey in The Times newspaper, journalist Philip Howard maintained that, \"to compare the violence of Dr Who, sired by a horse-laugh out of a nightmare, with the more realistic violence of other television series, where actors who look like human beings bleed paint that looks like blood, is like comparing Monopoly with the property market in London: both are fantasies, but one is meant to be taken seriously.\"\n\nThe image of the TARDIS has become firmly linked to the show in the public's consciousness; BBC scriptwriter Anthony Coburn, who lived in the resort of Herne Bay, Kent, was one of the people who conceived the idea of a police box as a time machine. In 1996, the BBC applied for a trade mark to use the TARDIS' blue police box design in merchandising associated with Doctor Who. In 1998, the Metropolitan Police Authority filed an objection to the trade mark claim; but in 2002, the Patent Office ruled in favour of the BBC.\n\nThe programme's broad appeal attracts audiences of children and families as well as science fiction fans. \n\nThe 21st century revival of the programme has become the centrepiece of BBC One's Saturday schedule, and has, \"defined the channel\". Since its return, Doctor Who has consistently received high ratings, both in number of viewers and as measured by the Appreciation Index. In 2007, Caitlin Moran, television reviewer for The Times, wrote that Doctor Who is, \"quintessential to being British\". Director Steven Spielberg has commented that, \"the world would be a poorer place without Doctor Who\". \n\nOn 4 August 2013, a live programme titled Doctor Who Live: The Next Doctor was broadcast on BBC One, during which the actor who was going to play the Twelfth Doctor was revealed. The show was simultaneously broadcast in the US and Australia. \n\nEpisodes\n\nDoctor Who originally ran for 26 seasons on BBC One, from 23 November 1963 until 6 December 1989. During the original run, each weekly episode formed part of a story (or \"serial\") — usually of four to six parts in earlier years and three to four in later years. Notable exceptions were: The Daleks' Master Plan, which aired in 12 episodes (plus an earlier one-episode teaser, \"Mission to the Unknown\", featuring none of the regular cast ); almost an entire season of seven-episode serials (season 7); the 10-episode serial The War Games;The War Games. Writers Malcolm Hulke and Terrance Dicks, Director David Maloney, Producer Derrick Sherwin. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC One, London. 19 April 1969 – 21 June 1969. and The Trial of a Time Lord, which ran for 14 episodes (albeit divided into three production codes and four narrative segments) during season 23.The Trial of a Time Lord. Writers Robert Holmes, Philip Martin and Pip and Jane Baker, Directors Nicholas Mallett, Ron Jones and Chris Clough, Producer John Nathan-Turner. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC One, London. 6 September 1986 – 6 December 1986. Occasionally serials were loosely connected by a storyline, such as season 8 being devoted to the Doctor battling a rogue Time Lord called The Master, season 16's quest for The Key to Time, season 18's journey through E-Space and the theme of entropy, and season 20's Black Guardian Trilogy. \n\nThe programme was intended to be educational and for family viewing on the early Saturday evening schedule. Initially, it alternated stories set in the past, which were intended to teach younger audience members about history, with stories set either in the future or in outer space to teach them about science. This was also reflected in the Doctor's original companions, one of whom was a science teacher and another a history teacher.\n\nHowever, science fiction stories came to dominate the programme and the \"historicals\", which were not popular with the production team, were dropped after The Highlanders (1967). While the show continued to use historical settings, they were generally used as a backdrop for science fiction tales, with one exception: Black Orchid set in 1920s England.Black Orchid. Writer Terence Dudley, Director Ron Jones, Producer John Nathan-Turner. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC One, London. 1 March 1982 – 2 March 1982.\n\nThe early stories were serial-like in nature, with the narrative of one story flowing into the next, and each episode having its own title, although produced as distinct stories with their own production codes. Following The Gunfighters (1966), however, each serial was given its own title, with the individual parts simply being assigned episode numbers.\n\nOf the programme's many writers, Robert Holmes was the most prolific, while Douglas Adams became the most well-known outside Doctor Who itself, due to the popularity of his Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy works. \n\nThe serial format changed for the 2005 revival, with each series usually consisting of 13 45-minute, self-contained episodes (60 minutes with adverts, on overseas commercial channels), and an extended episode broadcast on Christmas Day. Each series includes several standalone and multi-part stories, linked with a loose story arc that resolves in the series finale. As in the early \"classic\" era, each episode, whether standalone or part of a larger story, has its own title. Occasionally, regular-series episodes will exceed the 45-minute run time; notably, the episodes \"Journey's End\" from 2008 and \"The Eleventh Hour\" from 2010 exceeded an hour in length.\n\n Doctor Who instalments have been televised since 1963, ranging between 25-minute episodes (the most common format), 45-minute episodes (for Resurrection of the Daleks in the 1984 series, a single season in 1985, and the revival), two feature-length productions (1983's The Five Doctors and the 1996 television film), eleven Christmas specials (most of 60 minutes' duration, one of 72 minutes), and four additional specials ranging from 60 to 75 minutes in 2009, 2010 and 2013. Four mini-episodes, running about eight minutes each, were also produced for the 1993, 2005 and 2007 Children in Need charity appeals, while another mini-episode was produced in 2008 for a Doctor Who-themed edition of The Proms. The 1993 2-part story, entitled Dimensions in Time, was made in collaboration with the cast of the BBC soap-opera EastEnders and was filmed partly on the EastEnders set. A two-part mini-episode was also produced for the 2011 edition of Comic Relief. Starting with the 2009 special \"Planet of the Dead\", the series was filmed in 1080i for HDTV, and broadcast simultaneously on BBC One and BBC HD.\n\nTo celebrate the 50th anniversary of the show, a special 3D episode, \"The Day of the Doctor\", was broadcast in 2013. In March 2013, it was announced that Tennant and Piper would be returning, and that the episode would have a limited cinematic release worldwide. \n\nIn April 2015, Steven Moffat confirmed that Doctor Who would run for at least another five years, extending the show until 2020. \n\nMissing episodes\n\nBetween about 1964 and 1973, large amounts of older material stored in the BBC's various video tape and film libraries were either destroyed,The tapes, based on a 405-line broadcast standard, were rendered obsolete when UK television changed to a 625-line signal in preparation for the soon-to-begin colour transmissions. wiped, or suffered from poor storage which led to severe deterioration from broadcast quality. This included many old episodes of Doctor Who, mostly stories featuring the first two Doctors: William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton. In all, 97 of 253 episodes produced during the first six years of the programme are not held in the BBC's archives (most notably seasons 3, 4, & 5, from which 79 episodes are missing). In 1972, almost all episodes then made were known to exist at the BBC, while by 1978 the practice of wiping tapes and destroying \"spare\" film copies had been brought to a stop. \n\nNo 1960s episodes exist on their original videotapes (all surviving prints being film transfers), though some were transferred to film for editing before transmission, and exist in their broadcast form. \n\nSome episodes have been returned to the BBC from the archives of other countries who bought prints for broadcast, or by private individuals who acquired them by various means. Early colour videotape recordings made off-air by fans have also been retrieved, as well as excerpts filmed from the television screen onto 8 mm cine film and clips that were shown on other programmes. Audio versions of all of the lost episodes exist from home viewers who made tape recordings of the show. Short clips from every story with the exception of Marco Polo, \"Mission to the Unknown\" and The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve also exist.\n\nIn addition to these, there are off-screen photographs made by photographer John Cura, who was hired by various production personnel to document many of their programmes during the 1950s and 1960s, including Doctor Who. These have been used in fan reconstructions of the serials. These amateur reconstructions have been tolerated by the BBC, provided they are not sold for profit and are distributed as low-quality VHS copies. \n\nOne of the most sought-after lost episodes is part four of the last William Hartnell serial, The Tenth Planet (1966), which ends with the First Doctor transforming into the Second. The only portion of this in existence, barring a few poor-quality silent 8 mm clips, is the few seconds of the regeneration scene, as it was shown on the children's magazine show Blue Peter. With the approval of the BBC, efforts are now under way to restore as many of the episodes as possible from the extant material.\n\n\"Official\" reconstructions have also been released by the BBC on VHS, on MP3 CD-ROM, and as special features on DVD. The BBC, in conjunction with animation studio Cosgrove Hall, reconstructed the missing episodes 1 and 4 of The Invasion (1968), using remastered audio tracks and the comprehensive stage notes for the original filming, for the serial's DVD release in November 2006. The missing episodes of The Reign of Terror were animated by animation company Theta-Sigma, in collaboration with Big Finish, and became available for purchase in May 2013 through Amazon.com. Subsequent animations made in 2013 include The Tenth Planet, The Ice Warriors and The Moonbase.\n\nIn April 2006, Blue Peter launched a challenge to find missing Doctor Who episodes with the promise of a full-scale Dalek model as a reward. \n\nIn December 2011, it was announced that part 3 of Galaxy 4 and part 2 of The Underwater Menace had been returned to the BBC by a fan who had purchased them in the mid-1980s without realising that the BBC did not hold copies of them. \n\nOn 10 October 2013, the BBC announced that films of eleven episodes, including nine missing episodes, had been found in a Nigerian television relay station in Jos. Six of the eleven films discovered were the six-part serial The Enemy of the World, from which all but the third episode had been missing. The remaining films were from another six-part serial, The Web of Fear, and included the previously missing episodes 2, 4, 5, and 6. Episode 3 of The Web of Fear is still missing. \n\nCharacters\n\nThe Doctor\n\nThe character of the Doctor was initially shrouded in mystery. All that was known about him in the programme's early days was that he was an eccentric alien traveller of great intelligence who battled injustice while exploring time and space in an unreliable time machine, the \"TARDIS\" (an acronym for time and relative dimension(s) in space), which notably appears much larger on the inside than on the outside (a quality referred to as \"dimensional transcendentality\").When it became an entry in the Oxford English Dictionary, the word \"TARDIS\" often came to be used to describe anything that appeared larger on the inside than its exterior implied. \n\nThe initially irascible and slightly sinister Doctor quickly mellowed into a more compassionate figure. It was eventually revealed that he had been on the run from his own people, the Time Lords of the planet Gallifrey.\n\nChanges of appearance\n\nProducers introduced the concept of regeneration to permit the recasting of the main character. This was first prompted by original star William Hartnell's poor health. The actual term \"regeneration\" was not initially conceived of until the Doctor's third on-screen regeneration however; Hartnell's Doctor had merely described undergoing a \"renewal,\" and the Second Doctor underwent a \"change of appearance\". The device has allowed for the recasting of the actor various times in the show's history, as well as the depiction of alternative Doctors either from the Doctor's relative past or future.\n\nThe serials The Deadly Assassin and Mawdryn Undead and the 1996 TV film would later establish that a Time Lord can only regenerate 12 times, for a total of 13 incarnations. This line became stuck in the public consciousness despite not often being repeated, and was recognised by producers of the show as a plot obstacle for when the show finally had to regenerate the Doctor a thirteenth time. The episode \"The Time of the Doctor\" depicted the Doctor acquiring a new cycle of regenerations, starting from the Twelfth Doctor, due to the Eleventh Doctor being the product of the Doctor's twelfth regeneration from his original set. \n\nIn addition to those actors who have headlined the series, others have portrayed versions of the Doctor in guest roles. Notably, in 2013, John Hurt guest-starred as a hitherto unknown incarnation of the Doctor known as the War Doctor in the run-up to the show's 50th anniversary special \"The Day of the Doctor\". He is shown in mini-episode \"The Night of the Doctor\" to have been retroactively inserted into the show's fictional chronology between McGann and Eccleston's Doctors, although his introduction was written so as not to disturb the established numerical naming of the Doctors. Another example is from the 1986 serial The Trial of a Time Lord, where Michael Jayston portrayed the Valeyard, who is described as an amalgamation of the darker sides of the Doctor's nature, somewhere between his twelfth and final incarnation.\n\nOn rare occasions, other actors have stood in for the lead. In The Five Doctors, Richard Hurndall played the First Doctor due to William Hartnell's death in 1975. In Time and the Rani, Sylvester McCoy briefly played the Sixth Doctor during the regeneration sequence, carrying on as the Seventh. For more information, see the list of actors who have played the Doctor. In other media, the Doctor has been played by various other actors, including Peter Cushing in two films.\n\nThe casting of a new Doctor has often inspired debate and speculation: in particular, the desirability or possibility of a new Doctor being played by a woman. In October 2010, The Sunday Telegraph revealed that the series' co-creator, Sydney Newman, had urged the BBC to recast the role of the Doctor as a female \"Time Lady\" during the ratings crisis of the late 1980s. \n\nMeetings of different incarnations\n\nThere have been instances of actors returning at later dates to reprise the role of their specific Doctor. In 1973's The Three Doctors, William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton returned alongside Jon Pertwee. For 1983's The Five Doctors, Troughton and Pertwee returned to star with Peter Davison, and Tom Baker appeared in previously unseen footage from the uncompleted Shada episode. For this episode, Richard Hurndall replaced William Hartnell. Patrick Troughton again returned in 1985's The Two Doctors with Colin Baker. In 2007, Peter Davison returned in the Children in Need short \"Time Crash\" alongside David Tennant, and most recently in 2013's 50th anniversary special episode, \"The Day of the Doctor\", David Tennant's Tenth Doctor appeared alongside Matt Smith as the Eleventh Doctor and John Hurt as the War Doctor, as well as brief footage from all of the previous actors. In addition, the Doctor has occasionally encountered himself in the form of his own incarnation, from the near future or past. The First Doctor encounters himself in the story The Space Museum (albeit frozen and as an exhibit), the Third Doctor encounters and interacts with himself in the story Day of the Daleks, the Fourth Doctor encounters and interacts with the future incarnation of himself (the 'Watcher') in the story Logopolis, the Ninth Doctor observes a former version of his current incarnation in \"Father's Day\", and the Eleventh Doctor briefly comes face to face with himself in \"The Big Bang\". In \"The Almost People\" the Doctor comes face-to-face with himself although it is found out that this incarnation is in fact just a flesh replica. In \"The Name of the Doctor\", the Eleventh Doctor meets an unknown incarnation of himself, whom he refers to as \"his secret\" and who is subsequently revealed to be the War Doctor.\n\nAdditionally, multiple Doctors have returned in new adventures together in audio dramas based on the series. Peter Davison, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy appeared together in the 1999 audio adventure The Sirens of Time. To celebrate the 40th anniversary in 2003, an audio drama titled Zagreus featuring Paul McGann, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Peter Davison was released with additional archive recordings of Jon Pertwee. Again in 2003, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy appeared together in the audio adventure Project: Lazarus. In 2010, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Paul McGann came together again to star in the audio drama The Four Doctors.\n\nRevelations about the Doctor\n\nThroughout the programme's long history, there have been revelations about the Doctor that have raised additional questions. In The Brain of Morbius (1976), it was hinted that the First Doctor may not have been the first incarnation (although the other faces depicted may have been incarnations of the Time Lord Morbius). In subsequent stories the First Doctor was depicted as the earliest incarnation of the Doctor. In Mawdryn Undead (1983), the Fifth Doctor explicitly confirmed that he was then currently in his fifth incarnation. Later that same year, during 1983's 20th Anniversary special The Five Doctors, the First Doctor enquires as to the Fifth Doctor's regeneration; when the Fifth Doctor confirms \"Fourth\", the First Doctor excitedly replies \"Goodness me. So there are five of me now.\" In 2010, the Eleventh Doctor similarly calls himself \"the Eleventh\" in \"The Lodger\". In the 2013 episode \"The Time of the Doctor,\" the Eleventh Doctor clarified he was the product of the twelfth regeneration, due to a previous incarnation which he chose not to count and one other aborted regeneration. The name Eleventh is still used for this incarnation; the same episode depicts the prophesied \"Fall of the Eleventh\" which had been trailed throughout the series.\n\nDuring the Seventh Doctor's era, it was hinted that the Doctor was more than just an ordinary Time Lord. In the 1996 television film, the Eighth Doctor describes himself as being \"half human\". The BBC's FAQ for the programme notes that \"purists tend to disregard this\", instead focusing on his Gallifreyan heritage.\n\nThe programme's first serial, An Unearthly Child, shows that the Doctor has a granddaughter, Susan Foreman. In the 1967 serial, Tomb of the Cybermen, when Victoria Waterfield doubts the Doctor can remember his family because of, \"being so ancient\", the Doctor says that he can when he really wants to—\"The rest of the time they sleep in my mind\". The 2005 series reveals that the Ninth Doctor thought he was the last surviving Time Lord, and that his home planet had been destroyed; in \"The Empty Child\" (2005), Dr. Constantine states that, \"Before the war even began, I was a father and a grandfather. Now I am neither.\" The Doctor remarks in response, \"Yeah, I know the feeling.\" In \"Smith and Jones\" (2007), when asked if he had a brother, he replied, \"No, not any more.\" In both \"Fear Her\" (2006) and \"The Doctor's Daughter\" (2008), he states that he had, in the past, been a father.\n\nIn \"The Wedding of River Song\" (2011), it is implied that the Doctor's true name is a secret that must never be revealed; this is explored further in \"The Name of the Doctor\" (2013), when River Song speaking his name allows the Great Intelligence to enter his tomb, and in \"The Time of the Doctor\" (2013) where speaking his true name becomes the signal by which the Time Lords would know they can safely return to the universe, an event opposed by many species.\n\nCompanions\n\nThe companion figure – generally a human – has been a constant feature in Doctor Who since the programme's inception in 1963. One of the roles of the companion is to remind the Doctor of his \"moral duty\". The Doctor's first companions seen on screen were his granddaughter Susan Foreman (Carole Ann Ford) and her teachers Barbara Wright (Jacqueline Hill) and Ian Chesterton (William Russell). These characters were intended to act as audience surrogates, through which the audience would discover information about the Doctor who was to act as a mysterious father figure. The only story from the original series in which the Doctor travels alone is The Deadly Assassin. Notable companions from the earlier series included Romana (Mary Tamm and Lalla Ward), a Time Lady; Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen); and Jo Grant (Katy Manning). Dramatically, these characters provide a figure with whom the audience can identify, and serve to further the story by requesting exposition from the Doctor and manufacturing peril for the Doctor to resolve. The Doctor regularly gains new companions and loses old ones; sometimes they return home or find new causes — or loves — on worlds they have visited. Some have died during the course of the series. Companions are usually human, or humanoid aliens.\n\nSince the 2005 revival, the Doctor generally travels with a primary female companion, who occupies a larger narrative role. Steven Moffat described the companion as the main character of the show, as the story begins anew with each companion and she undergoes more change than the Doctor. The primary companions of the Ninth and Tenth Doctors were Rose Tyler (Billie Piper), Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman), and Donna Noble (Catherine Tate) with Mickey Smith (Noel Clarke) and Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) recurring as secondary companion figures. The Eleventh Doctor became the first to travel with a married couple, Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) and Rory Williams (Arthur Darvill), whilst out-of-sync meetings with River Song (Alex Kingston) and Clara Oswald (Jenna Coleman) provided ongoing story arcs. The tenth series will introduce Pearl Mackie as Bill, the Doctor's newest traveling companion. \n\nSome companions have gone on to re-appear, either in the main series or in spin-offs. Sarah Jane Smith became the central character in The Sarah Jane Adventures (2007–11) following a return to Doctor Who in 2006. Guest stars in the series included former companions Jo Grant, K9, and Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (Nicholas Courtney). The character of Jack Harkness also served to launch a spin-off, Torchwood, (2006–2011) in which Martha Jones also appeared.\n\nAdversaries\n\nWhen Sydney Newman commissioned the series, he specifically did not want to perpetuate the cliché of the \"bug-eyed monster\" of science fiction. However, monsters were popular with audiences and so became a staple of Doctor Who almost from the beginning.\n\nWith the show's 2005 revival, executive producer Russell T Davies stated his intention to reintroduce classic icons of Doctor Who one step at a time: the Autons with the Nestene Consciousness and Daleks in series 1, Cybermen in series 2, the Macra and the Master in series 3, the Sontarans and Davros in series 4, and the Time Lords (Rassilon) in the 2009–10 Specials. Davies' successor, Steven Moffat, has continued the trend by reviving the Silurians in series 5, Cybermats in series 6, the Great Intelligence and the Ice Warriors in Series 7, and Zygons in the 50th Anniversary Special. Since its 2005 return, the series has also introduced new recurring aliens: Slitheen (Raxacoricofallapatorian), Ood, Judoon, Weeping Angels and the Silence.\n\nBesides infrequent appearances by the Ice Warriors, Ogrons, the Rani, and Black Guardian, three adversaries have become particularly iconic: the Daleks, the Cybermen, and the Master.\n\nDaleks\n\nThe Dalek race, which first appeared in the show's second serial in 1963, are Doctor Whos oldest villains. The Daleks are Kaleds from the planet Skaro, mutated by the scientist Davros and housed in mechanical armour shells for mobility. The actual creatures resemble octopi with large, pronounced brains. Their armour shells have a single eye-stalk, a sink-plunger-like device that serves the purpose of a hand, and a directed-energy weapon. Their main weakness is their eyestalk; attacks upon them using various weapons can blind a Dalek, making it go mad. Their chief role in the series plot, as they frequently remark in their instantly recognisable metallic voices, is to \"exterminate\" all non-Dalek beings. They even attack the Time Lords in the Time War, as shown during the 50th Anniversary of the show. They continue to be a recurring 'monster' within the Doctor Who franchise, their most recent appearances being in the 2015 episodes \"The Witch's Familiar\" and \"Hell Bent\". Davros has also been a recurring figure since his debut in Genesis of the Daleks, although played by several different actors.\n\nThe Daleks were created by writer Terry Nation (who intended them to be an allegory of the Nazis) and BBC designer Raymond Cusick. The Daleks' début in the programme's second serial, The Daleks (1963–64), made both the Daleks and Doctor Who very popular. A Dalek appeared on a postage stamp celebrating British popular culture in 1999, photographed by Lord Snowdon. In the new series, Daleks come in a range of colours; the colour denoting its role within the species. \n\nIn the 2012 episode \"Asylum of the Daleks\", many of the Dalek variants seen throughout the programme's history made an appearance. \n\nCybermen\n\nCybermen were originally a wholly organic species of humanoids originating on Earth's twin planet Mondas that began to implant more and more artificial parts into their bodies. This led to the race becoming coldly logical and calculating cyborgs, with emotions usually only shown when naked aggression was called for. With the demise of Mondas, they acquired Telos as their new home planet. They continue to be a recurring 'monster' within the Doctor Who franchise.\n\nThe 2006 series introduced a totally new variation of Cybermen. These Cybus Cybermen were created in a parallel universe by the mad inventor John Lumic; he was attempting to preserve the humans by transplanting their brains into powerful metal bodies, sending them orders using a mobile phone network and inhibiting their emotions with an electronic chip.\n\nThe Master\n\nThe Master is the Doctor's archenemy, a renegade Time Lord who desires to rule the universe. Conceived as \"Professor Moriarty to the Doctor's Sherlock Holmes\", the character first appeared in 1971. As with the Doctor, the role has been portrayed by several actors, since the Master is a Time Lord as well and able to regenerate; the first of these actors was Roger Delgado, who continued in the role until his death in 1973. The Master was briefly played by Peter Pratt and Geoffrey Beevers until Anthony Ainley took over and continued to play the character until Doctor Who's hiatus in 1989. The Master returned in the 1996 television movie of Doctor Who, and was played by American actor Eric Roberts.\n\nFollowing the series revival in 2005, Derek Jacobi provided the character's re-introduction in the 2007 episode \"Utopia\". During that story the role was then assumed by John Simm who returned to the role multiple times through the Tenth Doctor's tenure. \nAs of the 2014 episode \"Dark Water,\" it was revealed that the Master had become a female incarnation or \"Time Lady,\" going by the name of \"Missy\" (short for Mistress, the feminine equivalent of \"Master\"). This incarnation is played by Michelle Gomez.\n\nMusic\n\nTheme music\n\nThe Doctor Who theme music was one of the first electronic music signature tunes for television, and after five decades remains one of the most easily recognised. It has been often called both memorable and frightening, priming the viewer for what was to follow. During the 1970s, the Radio Times, the BBC's own listings magazine, announced that a child's mother said the theme music terrified her son. The Radio Times was apologetic, but the theme music remained.\n\nThe original theme was composed by Ron Grainer and realised by Delia Derbyshire of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, with assistance from Dick Mills and was released as a single on Decca F 11837 in 1964. The various parts were built up using musique concrète techniques, by creating tape loops of an individually struck piano string and individual test oscillators and filters. The Derbyshire arrangement served, with minor edits, as the theme tune up to the end of season 17 (1979–80). It is regarded as a significant and innovative piece of electronic music, recorded well before the availability of commercial synthesisers or multitrack mixers. Each note was individually created by cutting, splicing, speeding up and slowing down segments of analogue tape containing recordings of a single plucked string, white noise, and the simple harmonic waveforms of test-tone oscillators, intended for calibrating equipment and rooms, not creating music. New techniques were invented to allow mixing of the music, as this was before the era of multitrack tape machines. On hearing the finished result, Grainer asked, \"Did I write that?\"\n\nA different arrangement was recorded by Peter Howell for season 18 (1980), which was in turn replaced by Dominic Glynn's arrangement for the season-long serial The Trial of a Time Lord in season 23 (1986). Keff McCulloch provided the new arrangement for the Seventh Doctor's era which lasted from season 24 (1987) until the series' suspension in 1989. American composer John Debney created a new arrangement of Ron Grainer's original theme for Doctor Who in 1996. For the return of the series in 2005, Murray Gold provided a new arrangement which featured samples from the 1963 original with further elements added; in the 2005 Christmas episode \"The Christmas Invasion\", Gold introduced a modified closing credits arrangement that was used up until the conclusion of the 2007 series.\n\nA new arrangement of the theme, once again by Gold, was introduced in the 2007 Christmas special episode, \"Voyage of the Damned\"; Gold returned as composer for the 2010 series. He was responsible for a new version of the theme which was reported to have had a hostile reception from some viewers. In 2011, the theme tune charted at number 228 of radio station Classic FM's Hall of Fame, a survey of classical music tastes. A revised version of Gold's 2010 arrangement had its debut over the opening titles of the 2012 Christmas special \"The Snowmen\", and a further revision of the arrangement was made for the 50th Anniversary special \"The Day of the Doctor\" in November 2013.\n\nVersions of the \"Doctor Who Theme\" have also been released as pop music over the years. In the early 1970s, Jon Pertwee, who had played the Third Doctor, recorded a version of the Doctor Who theme with spoken lyrics, titled, \"Who Is the Doctor\".Often mistitled \"I am the Doctor\" on YouTube uploads. Originally released as a 7\" vinyl single, plain sleeve, December 1972 on label Purple PUR III In 1978 a disco version of the theme was released in the UK, Denmark and Australia by the group Mankind, which reached number 24 in the UK charts. In 1988 the band The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu (later known as The KLF) released the single \"Doctorin' the Tardis\" under the name The Timelords, which reached No. 1 in the UK and No. 2 in Australia; this version incorporated several other songs, including \"Rock and Roll Part 2\" by Gary Glitter (who recorded vocals for some of the CD-single remix versions of \"Doctorin' the Tardis\"). Others who have covered or reinterpreted the theme include Orbital, Pink Floyd, the Australian string ensemble Fourplay, New Zealand punk band Blam Blam Blam, The Pogues, Thin Lizzy, Dub Syndicate, and the comedians Bill Bailey and Mitch Benn. Both the theme and obsessive fans were satirised on The Chaser's War on Everything. The theme tune has also appeared on many compilation CDs, and has made its way into mobile-phone ringtones. Fans have also produced and distributed their own remixes of the theme. In January 2011 the Mankind version was released as a digital download on the album Gallifrey And Beyond.\n\nIncidental music\n\nMost of the innovative incidental music for Doctor Who has been specially commissioned from freelance composers, although in the early years some episodes also used stock music, as well as occasional excerpts from original recordings or cover versions of songs by popular music acts such as The Beatles and The Beach Boys. Since its 2005 return, the series has featured occasional use of excerpts of pop music from the 1970s to the 2000s.\n\nThe incidental music for the first Doctor Who adventure, An Unearthly Child, was written by Norman Kay. Many of the stories of the William Hartnell period were scored by electronic music pioneer Tristram Cary, whose Doctor Who credits include The Daleks, Marco Polo, The Daleks' Master Plan, The Gunfighters and The Mutants. Other composers in this early period included Richard Rodney Bennett, Carey Blyton and Geoffrey Burgon.\n\nThe most frequent musical contributor during the first 15 years was Dudley Simpson, who is also well known for his theme and incidental music for Blake's 7, and for his haunting theme music and score for the original 1970s version of The Tomorrow People. Simpson's first Doctor Who score was Planet of Giants (1964) and he went on to write music for many adventures of the 1960s and 1970s, including most of the stories of the Jon Pertwee/Tom Baker periods, ending with The Horns of Nimon (1979). He also made a cameo appearance in The Talons of Weng-Chiang (as a Music hall conductor).\n\nIn 1980 starting with the serial The Leisure Hive the task of creating incidental music was assigned to the Radiophonic Workshop. Paddy Kingsland and Peter Howell contributed many scores in this period and other contributors included Roger Limb, Malcolm Clarke and Jonathan Gibbs.\n\nThe Radiophonic Workshop was dropped after 1986's The Trial of a Time Lord series, and Keff McCulloch took over as the series' main composer until the end of its run, with Dominic Glynn and Mark Ayres also contributing scores.\n\nAll the incidental music for the 2005 revived series has been composed by Murray Gold and Ben Foster and has been performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales from the 2005 Christmas episode \"The Christmas Invasion\" onwards. A concert featuring the orchestra performing music from the first two series took place on 19 November 2006 to raise money for Children in Need. David Tennant hosted the event, introducing the different sections of the concert. Murray Gold and Russell T Davies answered questions during the interval and Daleks and Cybermen appeared whilst music from their stories was played. The concert aired on BBCi on Christmas Day 2006. A Doctor Who Prom was celebrated on 27 July 2008 in the Royal Albert Hall as part of the annual BBC Proms. The BBC Philharmonic and the London Philharmonic Choir performed Murray Gold's compositions for the series, conducted by Ben Foster, as well as a selection of classics based on the theme of space and time. The event was presented by Freema Agyeman and guest-presented by various other stars of the show with numerous monsters participating in the proceedings. It also featured the specially filmed mini-episode \"Music of the Spheres\", written by Russell T Davies and starring David Tennant. \n\nSix soundtrack releases have been released since 2005. The first featured tracks from the first two series, the second and third featured music from the third and fourth series respectively. The fourth was released on 4 October 2010 as a two disc special edition and contained music from the 2008–2010 specials (The Next Doctor to End of Time Part 2). The soundtrack for Series 5 was released on 8 November 2010. In February 2011, a soundtrack was released for the 2010 Christmas special: \"A Christmas Carol\", and in December 2011 the soundtrack for Series 6 was released, both by Silva Screen Records. \n\nIn 2013, a 50th-anniversary boxed set of audio CDs was released featuring music and sound effects from Doctor Who’s 50-year history. The celebration continued in 2016 with the release of Doctor Who: The 50th Anniversary Collection Four LP Box Set by New York City-based Spacelab9. The company pressed 1,000 copies of the set on “Metallic Silver” vinyl, dubbed the “Cyberman Edition”. \n\nLogo history\n\nBelow is a collection of current and past Doctor Who logos from the classic and current series. The different doctors have been named below the logos that have appeared during their tenure.\n\nThe original logo used for the First Doctor (and briefly for the Second Doctor) was reused in a slightly modified format for the 50th anniversary special \"The Day of the Doctor\" during the Eleventh Doctor's run. The logo used in the television movie featuring the Eighth Doctor was an updated version of the logo used for the Third Doctor. The logo from 1973–80 was used for the Third Doctor's final season and for the majority of the Fourth Doctor's tenure. The following logo, while most associated with the Fifth Doctor, was also used for the Fourth Doctor's final season. The logo used for the Ninth Doctor was slightly edited for the Tenth Doctor, but it retained the same general appearance. The logo used for the Eleventh Doctor had the \"DW\" TARDIS insignia placed to the right in 2012, but the same font remained, albeit with a slight edit to the texture every episode, with the texture relating to some aspect of the story. The logo for the Twelfth Doctor had the \"DW\" TARDIS insignia removed and the font was subtly altered, as well as made slightly larger. As of 2014, the logo used for the Third and Eighth Doctors is the primary logo used on all media and merchandise relating to past Doctors, and the current Doctor Who logo is used for all merchandise relating to the current Doctor.\n\nFile:Doctor_Who_logo_1963-1967.jpg|1963–67(First Doctor and Second Doctor)\nFile:Doctor_Who_logo_1967-1969.jpg|1967–69(Second Doctor)\nFile:Doctor_Who_logo_1970-1973,_1996.svg|1970–73(Third Doctor)\nFile:Doctor_Who_logo_1973-1980.svg|1973–80(Third Doctor and Fourth Doctor)\nFile:Doctor_Who_logo_1980-1984.svg|1980–84(Fourth Doctor and Fifth Doctor)\nFile:Doctor_Who_logo_1984-1986.svg|1984–86(Sixth Doctor)\nFile:Doctor_Who_logo_1987-1989.svg|1987–89(Seventh Doctor)\nFile:Doctor_Who_logo_1970-1973,_1996.svg|1996(Eighth Doctor)\nFile:Doctor Who logo 2005 (1).svg|2005–10(Ninth Doctor and Tenth Doctor)\nFile:Doctor_Who_logo_2010.svg|2010–11(Eleventh Doctor)\nFile:Doctor Who logo 2012 background.svg|2012–13(Eleventh Doctor)\nFile:Doctor Who logo 2014.jpg|2014–present(Twelfth Doctor)\n\nViewership\n\nUnited Kingdom\n\nPremiering the day after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the first episode of Doctor Who was repeated with the second episode the following week. Doctor Who has always appeared initially on the BBC's mainstream BBC One channel, where it is regarded as a family show, drawing audiences of many millions of viewers; episodes are now repeated on BBC Three. The programme's popularity has waxed and waned over the decades, with three notable periods of high ratings. The first of these was the \"Dalekmania\" period (circa 1964–1965), when the popularity of the Daleks regularly brought Doctor Who ratings of between 9 and 14 million, even for stories which did not feature them. The second was the late 1970s, when Tom Baker occasionally drew audiences of over 12 million.\n\nDuring the ITV network strike of 1979, viewership peaked at 16 million. Figures remained respectable into the 1980s, but fell noticeably after the programme's 23rd series was postponed in 1985 and the show was off the air for 18 months. Its late 1980s performance of three to five million viewers was seen as poor at the time and was, according to the BBC Board of Control, a leading cause of the programme's 1989 suspension. Some fans considered this disingenuous, since the programme was scheduled against the soap opera Coronation Street, the most popular show at the time. After the series' revival in 2005 (the third notable period of high ratings), it has consistently had high viewership levels for the evening on which the episode is broadcast.\n\nThe BBC One broadcast of \"Rose\", the first episode of the 2005 revival, drew an average audience of 10.81 million, third highest for BBC One that week and seventh across all channels. The current revival also garners the highest audience Appreciation Index of any drama on television. \n\nInternational\n\nDoctor Who has been broadcast internationally outside of the United Kingdom since 1964, a year after the show first aired. As of 1 January 2013, the modern series has been or is currently broadcast weekly in more than 50 countries.\n\nDoctor Who is one of the five top grossing titles for BBC Worldwide, the BBC's commercial arm. BBC Worldwide CEO John Smith has said that Doctor Who is one of a small number of \"Superbrands\" which Worldwide will promote heavily. \n\nOnly four episodes have ever had their premiere showings on channels other than BBC One. The 1983 20th anniversary special The Five Doctors had its début on 23 November (the actual date of the anniversary) on a number of PBS stations two days prior to its BBC One broadcast. The 1988 story Silver Nemesis was broadcast with all three episodes airing back to back on TVNZ in New Zealand in November, after the first episode had been shown in the UK but before the final two instalments had aired there. Finally, the 1996 television film premièred on 12 May 1996 on CITV in Edmonton, Canada, 15 days before the BBC One showing, and two days before it aired on Fox in the United States.\n\nOceania\n\nNew Zealand was the first country outside the United Kingdom to screen Doctor Who, beginning in September 1964, and continued to screen the series for many years, including the new series from 2005.\n\nIn Australia, the show has had a strong fan base since its inception, having been exclusively first run by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) since January 1965. The ABC has periodically repeated episodes; of note were the weekly screenings of all available classic episodes starting in 2003, for the show's 40th anniversary, and the weekdaily screenings of all available revived episodes in 2013 for the show's 50th anniversary. The ABC broadcasts the modern series first run on ABC1, with repeats on ABC2. The ABC also provided partial funding for the 20th anniversary special The Five Doctors in 1983. Repeats of both the classic and modern series have also been shown on subscription television channels BBC UKTV, SF and later on SyFy upon SF's closure.\n\nAmericas\n\nThe series also has a fan base in the United States, where it was shown in syndication from the 1970s to the 1990s, particularly on PBS stations.\n\nTVOntario picked up the show in 1976 beginning with The Three Doctors and aired each series (several years late) through to series 24 in 1991. From 1979 to 1981, TVO airings were bookended by science-fiction writer Judith Merril who would introduce the episode and then, after the episode concluded, try to place it in an educational context in keeping with TVO's status as an educational channel. Its airing of The Talons of Weng-Chiang was cancelled as a result of accusations that the story was racist; the story was later broadcast in the 1990s on cable station YTV. CBC began showing the series again in 2005. The series moved to the Canadian cable channel Space in 2009.\n\nFor the Canadian broadcast, Christopher Eccleston recorded special video introductions for each episode (including a trivia question as part of a viewer contest) and excerpts from the Doctor Who Confidential documentary were played over the closing credits; for the broadcast of \"The Christmas Invasion\" on 26 December 2005, Billie Piper recorded a special video introduction. CBC began airing series two on 9 October 2006 at 20:00 E/P (20:30 in Newfoundland and Labrador), shortly after that day's CFL double header on Thanksgiving in most of the country.\n\nSeries three began broadcasting on CBC on 18 June 2007 followed by the second Christmas special, \"The Runaway Bride\" at midnight, and the Sci Fi Channel began on 6 July 2007 starting with the second Christmas special at 8:00 pm E/P followed by the first episode. \n\nSeries four aired in the United States on the Sci Fi Channel (now known as Syfy), beginning in April 2008. It aired on CBC beginning 19 September 2008, although the CBC did not air the Voyage of the Damned special. The Canadian cable network Space broadcast \"The Next Doctor\" (in March 2009) and all subsequent series and specials. \n\nDVD and video\n\nA wide selection of serials are available from BBC Video on DVD, on sale in the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and the United States. Every fully extant serial has been released on VHS, and BBC Worldwide continues to regularly release serials on DVD. The 2005 series is also available in its entirety on UMD for the PlayStation Portable. Eight original series serials have been released on Laserdisc and many have also been released on Betamax tape and Video 2000. One episode of Doctor Who (The Infinite Quest) was released on VCD. Only the series from 2009 onwards are available on Blu-ray, except for the 1970 story Spearhead from Space, released in July 2013. Many early releases have been re-released as special editions, with more bonus features.\n\nAdaptations and other appearances\n\nDoctor Who films\n\nThere are two Doctor Who feature films: Dr. Who and the Daleks, released in 1965 and Daleks – Invasion Earth: 2150 A.D. in 1966. Both are retellings of existing television stories (specifically, the first two Dalek serials, The Daleks and The Dalek Invasion of Earth respectively) with a larger budget and alterations to the series concept.\n\nIn these films, Peter Cushing plays a human scientist named \"Dr. Who\", who travels with his granddaughter and niece and other companions in a time machine he has invented. The Cushing version of the character reappears in both comic strips and a short story, the latter attempting to reconcile the film continuity with that of the series.\n\nIn addition, several planned films were proposed, including a sequel, The Chase, loosely based on the original series story, for the Cushing Doctor, plus many attempted television movie and big screen productions to revive the original Doctor Who, after the original series was cancelled.\n\nPaul McGann starred in the only television film as the eighth incarnation of the Doctor. After the film, he continued the role in audio books and was confirmed as the eighth incarnation through flashback footage and a mini episode in the 2005 revival, effectively linking the two series and the television movie.\n\nIn 2011, David Yates announced that he had started work with the BBC on a Doctor Who film, a project that would take three or more years to complete. Yates indicated that the film would take a different approach to Doctor Who, although the current Doctor Who showrunner Steven Moffat stated later that any such film would not be a reboot of the series and a film should be made by the BBC team and star the current TV Doctor. \n\nSpin-offs\n\nDoctor Who has appeared on stage numerous times. In the early 1970s, Trevor Martin played the role in Doctor Who and the Daleks in the Seven Keys to Doomsday. In the late 1980s, Jon Pertwee and Colin Baker both played the Doctor at different times during the run of a play titled Doctor Who – The Ultimate Adventure. For two performances, while Pertwee was ill, David Banks (better known for playing Cybermen) played the Doctor. Other original plays have been staged as amateur productions, with other actors playing the Doctor, while Terry Nation wrote The Curse of the Daleks, a stage play mounted in the late 1960s, but without the Doctor.\n\nA pilot episode (\"A Girl's Best Friend\") for a potential spinoff series, K-9 and Company, was aired in 1981 with Elisabeth Sladen reprising her role as companion Sarah Jane Smith and John Leeson as the voice of K9, but was not picked up as a regular series.\n\nConcept art for an animated Doctor Who series was produced by animation company Nelvana in the 1980s, but the series was not produced.\n\nFollowing the success of the 2005 series produced by Russell T Davies, the BBC commissioned Davies to produce a 13-part spin-off series titled Torchwood (an anagram of \"Doctor Who\"), set in modern-day Cardiff and investigating alien activities and crime. The series debuted on BBC Three on 22 October 2006. John Barrowman reprised his role of Jack Harkness from the 2005 series of Doctor Who. Two other actresses who appeared in Doctor Who also star in the series; Eve Myles as Gwen Cooper, who also played the similarly named servant girl Gwyneth in the 2005 Doctor Who episode \"The Unquiet Dead\", and Naoko Mori who reprised her role as Toshiko Sato first seen in \"Aliens of London\". A second series of Torchwood aired in 2008; for three episodes, the cast was joined by Freema Agyeman reprising her Doctor Who role of Martha Jones. A third series was broadcast from 6 to 10 July 2009, and consisted of a single five-part story called Children of Earth which was set largely in London. A fourth series, Torchwood: Miracle Day jointly produced by BBC Wales, BBC Worldwide and the American entertainment company Starz debuted in 2011. The series was predominantly set in the United States, though Wales remained part of the show's setting.\n\nThe Sarah Jane Adventures, starring Elisabeth Sladen who reprised her role as investigative journalist Sarah Jane Smith, was developed by CBBC; a special aired on New Year's Day 2007 and a full series began on 24 September 2007. A second series followed in 2008, notable for (as noted above) featuring the return of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. A third in 2009 featured a crossover appearance from the main show by David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor. In 2010, a further such appearance featured Matt Smith as the Eleventh Doctor alongside former companion actress Katy Manning reprising her role as Jo Grant. A final, three-story fifth series was transmitted in autumn 2011 – uncompleted due to the death of Elisabeth Sladen in early 2011.\n\nAn animated serial, The Infinite Quest, aired alongside the 2007 series of Doctor Who as part of the children's television series Totally Doctor Who. The serial featured the voices of series regulars David Tennant and Freema Agyeman but is not considered part of the 2007 series. A second animated serial, Dreamland, aired in six parts on the BBC Red Button service, and the official Doctor Who website in 2009. \n\nOn 1 October 2015, it was announced that a spinoff series titled Class will begin filming in April 2016, be broadcast later that year on BBC Three, and will run for eight 45 minute episodes. It will be written by Patrick Ness. On 8 January 2016 the series was picked up by BBC America. \n\nNumerous other spin-off series have been created not by the BBC but by the respective owners of the characters and concepts. Such spin-offs include the novel and audio drama series Faction Paradox, Iris Wildthyme and Bernice Summerfield; as well as the made-for-video series P.R.O.B.E.; the Australian-produced television series K-9, which aired a 26-episode first season on Disney XD; and the audio spin-off Counter-Measures. \n\nCharity episodes\n\nIn 1983, coinciding with the series' 20th anniversary, a charity special titled The Five Doctors was produced in aid of Children in Need, featuring three of the first five Doctors, a new actor to replace the deceased William Hartnell, and unused footage to represent Tom Baker. This was a full-length, 90-minute film, the longest single episode of Doctor Who produced to date (the television movie ran slightly longer on broadcast where it included commercial breaks). \n\nIn 1993, for the franchise's 30th anniversary, another charity special, titled Dimensions in Time was produced for Children in Need, featuring all of the surviving actors who played the Doctor and a number of previous companions. It also featured a crossover with the soap opera EastEnders, the action taking place in the latter's Albert Square location and around Greenwich. The special was one of several special 3D programmes the BBC produced at the time, using a 3D system that made use of the Pulfrich effect requiring glasses with one darkened lens; the picture would look normal to those viewers who watched without the glasses.\n\nIn 1999, another special, Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death, was made for Comic Relief and later released on VHS. An affectionate parody of the television series, it was split into four segments, mimicking the traditional serial format, complete with cliffhangers, and running down the same corridor several times when being chased (the version released on video was split into only two episodes). In the story, the Doctor (Rowan Atkinson) encounters both the Master (Jonathan Pryce) and the Daleks. During the special the Doctor is forced to regenerate several times, with his subsequent incarnations played by, in order, Richard E. Grant, Jim Broadbent, Hugh Grant and Joanna Lumley. The script was written by Steven Moffat, later to be head writer and executive producer to the revived series.\n\nSince the return of Doctor Who in 2005, the franchise has produced two original \"mini-episodes\" to support Children in Need. The first, aired in November 2005, was an untitled seven-minute scene which introduced David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor. It was followed in November 2007 by \"Time Crash\", a 7-minute scene which featured the Tenth Doctor meeting the Fifth Doctor (played once again by Peter Davison).\n\nA set of two mini-episodes, titled \"Space\" and \"Time\" respectively, were produced to support Comic Relief. They were aired during the Comic Relief 2011 event. \n\nDuring 2011 Children in Need, an exclusively-filmed segment showed the Doctor addressing the viewer, attempting to persuade them to purchase items of his clothing, which were going up for auction for Children in Need. The 2012 edition of CiN featured the mini-episode The Great Detective.\n\nSpoofs and cultural references\n\nDoctor Who has been satirised and spoofed on many occasions by comedians including Spike Milligan (a Dalek invades his bathroom — Milligan, naked, hurls a soap sponge at it) and Lenny Henry. Jon Culshaw frequently impersonates the Fourth Doctor in the BBC Dead Ringers series. Doctor Who fandom has also been lampooned on programs such as Saturday Night Live, The Chaser's War on Everything, Mystery Science Theater 3000, Family Guy, American Dad!, Futurama, South Park,\nCommunity as Inspector Spacetime, The Simpsons and The Big Bang Theory.\n\nThe Doctor in his fourth incarnation has been represented on several episodes of The Simpsons and Matt Groening's other animated series Futurama. \n\nThere have also been many references to Doctor Who in popular culture and other science fiction, including Star Trek: The Next Generation (\"The Neutral Zone\") and Leverage. In the Channel 4 series Queer as Folk (created by later Doctor Who executive producer Russell T. Davies), the character of Vince was portrayed as an avid Doctor Who fan, with references appearing many times throughout in the form of clips from the programme. In a similar manner, the character of Oliver on Coupling (created and written by current show runner Steven Moffat) is portrayed as a Doctor Who collector and enthusiast.\nReferences to Doctor Who have also appeared in the young adult fantasy novels Brisingr and High Wizardry, the video game Rock Band, the soap opera EastEnders, the Adult Swim comedy show Robot Chicken, the Family Guy episodes \"Blue Harvest\" and \"420\", and the game RuneScape. It has also be referenced in Destroy All Humans! 2, by civilians in the game's variation of England, and in Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney. \n\nDoctor Who has been a reference in several political cartoons, from a 1964 cartoon in the Daily Mail depicting Charles de Gaulle as a Dalek to a 2008 edition of This Modern World by Tom Tomorrow in which the Tenth Doctor informs an incredulous character from 2003 that the Democratic Party will nominate an African-American as its presidential candidate. \n\nThe word \"TARDIS\" is an entry in the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary and the iOS dictionary.\n\nAs part of the 50th anniversary programmes, former Fifth Doctor Peter Davison created, wrote and co-starred in a parody The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot featuring cameos from several other former Doctors, companions and people involved in the programme. \n\nMuseums and exhibitions\n\nThere have been various exhibitions of Doctor Who in the United Kingdom, including the now closed exhibitions at:\n* Lands End (Cornwall)\n* Blackpool\n* Llangollen\n* Kelvingrove Museum, Glasgow\n* Coventry Transport Museum, Coventry\n* Centre for Life, Newcastle upon Tyne\n* Melbourne, Australia (only international DW concert to be performed)\n* Kensington Olympia Two, London\n* Longleat, which ran for 30 years. \n\nThere is an exhibition open currently in Cardiff (the city where the series is filmed) \n\nMerchandise\n\nSince its beginnings, Doctor Who has generated hundreds of products related to the show, from toys and games to collectible picture cards and postage stamps. These include board games, card games, gamebooks, computer games, roleplaying games, action figures and a pinball game. Many games have been released that feature the Daleks, including Dalek computer games.\n\nAudios\n\nThe earliest Doctor Who-related audio release was a 21-minute narrated abridgement of the First Doctor television story The Chase released in 1966. Ten years later, the first original Doctor Who audio was released on LP record; Doctor Who and the Pescatons featuring the Fourth Doctor. The first commercially available audiobook was an abridged reading of the Fourth Doctor story State of Decay in 1981. In 1988, during a hiatus in the television show, Slipback, the first radio drama, was transmitted.\n\nSince 1999, Big Finish Productions has released several different series of Doctor Who audios on CD. The earliest of these featured the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Doctors, with Paul McGann's Eight Doctor joining the line in 2001. Tom Baker's Fourth Doctor began appearing for Big Finish in 2012. Along with the main range, adventures of the First, Second and Third Doctors have been produced in both limited cast and full cast formats, as well as audiobooks. The 2013 series Destiny of the Doctor, produced as part of the series' 50th Anniversary celebrations, marked the first time Big Finish created stories (in this case audiobooks) featuring the Doctors from the revived show.\n\nIn addition to these main lines, both the BBC and Big Finish have produced original audio dramas and audiobooks based on spin-off material, such as Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Adventures series.\n\nBooks\n\nDoctor Who books have been published from the mid-sixties through to the present day. From 1965 to 1991 the books published were primarily novelised adaptations of broadcast episodes; beginning in 1991 an extensive line of original fiction was launched, the Virgin New Adventures and Virgin Missing Adventures. Since the relaunch of the programme in 2005, a new range of novels have been published by BBC Books. Numerous non-fiction books about the series, including guidebooks and critical studies, have also been published, and a dedicated Doctor Who Magazine with newsstand circulation has been published regularly since 1979. This is published by Panini, as is the Doctor Who Adventures magazine for younger fans.\n\nSee also:\n* List of Doctor Who novelisations\n* Eighth Doctor Adventures\n* Past Doctor Adventures\n* New Series Adventures\n\nVideo games\n\nNumerous Doctor Who video games have been created from the mid-80s through to the present day. One of the recent ones is a match-3 game released in November 2013 for iOS, Android, Amazon App Store and Facebook called Doctor Who: Legacy. It has been constantly updated since its release and features all of the Doctors as playable characters as well as over 100 companions. \n\nAnother video game instalment is LEGO Dimensions – in which Doctor Who is one of the many \"Level Packs\" in the game. At the moment, the pack contains the Twelfth Doctor (who can reincarnate into the others), K9, the TARDIS and a Victorian London adventure level area. The game and pack released in November 2015.\n\nChronology and canonicity\n\nSince the creation of the Doctor Who character by BBC Television in the early 1960s, a myriad of stories have been published about Doctor Who, in different media: apart from the actual television episodes that continue to be produced by the BBC, there have also been novels, comics, short stories, audio books, radio plays, interactive video games, game books, webcasts, DVD extras, and even stage performances. In this respect it is noteworthy that the BBC takes no position on the canonicity of any of such stories, and producers of the show have expressed distaste for the idea. \n\nAwards\n\nThe show has received recognition as one of Britain's finest television programmes, winning the 2006 British Academy Television Award for Best Drama Series and five consecutive (2005–2010) awards at the National Television Awards during Russell T Davies' tenure as executive producer. In 2011, Matt Smith became the first Doctor to be nominated for a BAFTA Television Award for Best Actor and in 2016, Michelle Gomez became the first female to receive a BAFTA nomination for the series, getting a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her work as Missy. In 2013, the Peabody Awards honoured Doctor Who with an Institutional Peabody \"for evolving with technology and the times like nothing else in the known television universe.\" The programme is listed in Guinness World Records as the longest-running science fiction television show in the world, the \"most successful\" science fiction series of all time—based on its over-all broadcast ratings, DVD and book sales, and iTunes traffic— and for the largest ever simulcast of a TV drama with its 50th anniversary special. During its original run, it was recognised for its imaginative stories, creative low-budget special effects, and pioneering use of electronic music (originally produced by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop).\n\nIn 1975, Season 11 of the series won a Writers' Guild of Great Britain award for Best Writing in a Children's Serial. In 1996, BBC television held the \"Auntie Awards\" as the culmination of their \"TV60\" series, celebrating 60 years of BBC television broadcasting, where Doctor Who was voted as the \"Best Popular Drama\" the corporation had ever produced, ahead of such ratings heavyweights as EastEnders and Casualty. In 2000, Doctor Who was ranked third in a list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes of the 20th century, produced by the British Film Institute and voted on by industry professionals. In 2005, the series came first in a survey by SFX magazine of \"The Greatest UK Science Fiction and Fantasy Television Series Ever\". Also, in the 100 Greatest Kids' TV shows (a Channel 4 countdown in 2001), the 1963–1989 run was placed at number eight.\n\nThe revived series has received recognition from critics and the public, across various awards ceremonies. It won five BAFTA TV Awards, including Best Drama Series, the highest-profile and most prestigious British television award for which the series has ever been nominated. It was very popular at the BAFTA Cymru Awards, with 25 wins overall including Best Drama Series (twice), Best Screenplay/Screenwriter (thrice) and Best Actor. It was also nominated for 7 Saturn Awards, winning the only Best International Series in the ceremony's history. In 2009, Doctor Who was voted the 3rd greatest show of the 2000s by Channel 4, behind Top Gear and The Apprentice. The episode \"Vincent and the Doctor\" was shortlisted for a Mind Award at the 2010 Mind Mental Health Media Awards for its \"touching\" portrayal of Vincent van Gogh. \n\nIt has won the Short Form of the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, the oldest science fiction/fantasy award for films and series, six times (every year since 2006, except for 2009, 2013 and 2014). The winning episodes were \"The Empty Child\"/\"The Doctor Dances\" (2006), \"The Girl in the Fireplace\" (2007), \"Blink\" (2008), \"The Waters of Mars\" (2010), \"The Pandorica Opens\"/\"The Big Bang\" (2011), and \"The Doctor's Wife\" (2012). Doctor Who star Matt Smith won Best Actor in the 2012 National Television awards alongside Karen Gillan who won Best Actress. Doctor Who has been nominated for over 200 awards and has won over a hundred of them.\n\nAs a British series, the majority of its nominations and awards have been for national competitions such as the BAFTAs, but it has occasionally received nominations in mainstream American awards, most notably a nomination for \"Favorite Sci-Fi Show\" in the 2008 People's Choice Awards and the series has been nominated multiple times in the Spike Scream Awards, with Smith winning Best Science Fiction Actor in 2011. The Canadian Constellation Awards have also recognised the series." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Boxing.txt", "Rocky_Balboa.txt" ], "title": [ "Boxing", "Rocky Balboa" ], "wiki_context": [ "Boxing is a martial art and combat sport in which two people wearing protective gloves throw punches at each other for a predetermined set of time in a boxing ring.\n\nAmateur boxing is both an Olympic and Commonwealth sport and is a common fixture in most international games—it also has its own World Championships. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of one- to three-minute intervals called rounds. The result is decided when an opponent is deemed incapable to continue by a referee, is disqualified for breaking a rule, resigns by throwing in a towel, or is pronounced the winner or loser based on the judges' scorecards at the end of the contest. In the event that both fighters gain equal scores from the judges, the fight is considered a draw (professional boxing). In Olympic boxing, due to the fact that a winner must be declared, in the case of a draw - the judges use technical criteria to choose the most deserving winner of the bout.\n\nWhile people have fought in hand-to-hand combat since before the dawn of history, the origin of boxing as an organized sport may be its acceptance by the ancient Greeks as an Olympic game in BC 688. Boxing evolved from 16th- and 18th-century prizefights, largely in Great Britain, to the forerunner of modern boxing in the mid-19th century, again initially in Great Britain and later in the United States.\n\nHistory\n\nAncient history\n\nSee also Ancient Greek boxing\n\nThe earliest known depiction of boxing comes from a Sumerian relief in Iraq from the 3rd millennium BCE Later depictions from the 2nd millennium BC are found in reliefs from the Mesopotamian nations of Assyria and Babylonia, and in Hittite art from Asia Minor. The earliest evidence for fist fighting with any kind of gloves can be found on Minoan Crete (c.1650–1400 BCE), and on Sardinia, if we consider the boxing statues of Prama mountains (c. 2000–1000 BC).\n\nBoxing was a popular spectator sport in Ancient Rome. In order for the fighters to protect themselves against their opponents they wrapped leather thongs around their fists. Eventually harder leather was used and the thong soon became a weapon. The Romans even introduced metal studs to the thongs to make the cestus which then led to a more sinister weapon called the myrmex ('limb piercer'). Fighting events were held at Roman Amphitheatres. The Roman form of boxing was often a fight until death to please the spectators who gathered at such events. However, especially in later times, purchased slaves and trained combat performers were valuable commodities, and their lives were not given up without due consideration. Often slaves were used against one another in a circle marked on the floor. This is where the term ring came from. In AD 393, during the Roman gladiator period, boxing was abolished due to excessive brutality. It was not until the late 17th century that boxing re-surfaced in London.\n\nEarly London prize ring rules\n\nRecords of Classical boxing activity disappeared after the fall of the Western Roman Empire when the wearing of weapons became common once again and interest in fighting with the fists waned. However, there are detailed records of various fist-fighting sports that were maintained in different cities and provinces of Italy between the 12th and 17th centuries. There was also a sport in ancient Rus called Kulachniy Boy or \"Fist Fighting\".\n\nAs the wearing of swords became less common, there was renewed interest in fencing with the fists. The sport would later resurface in England during the early 16th century in the form of bare-knuckle boxing sometimes referred to as prizefighting. The first documented account of a bare-knuckle fight in England appeared in 1681 in the London Protestant Mercury, and the first English bare-knuckle champion was James Figg in 1719. This is also the time when the word \"boxing\" first came to be used. It should be noted, that this earliest form of modern boxing was very different. Contests in Mr. Figg's time, in addition to fist fighting, also contained fencing and cudgeling. On 6 January 1681, the first recorded boxing match took place in Britain when Christopher Monck, 2nd Duke of Albemarle (and later Lieutenant Governor of Jamaica) engineered a bout between his butler and his butcher with the latter winning the prize.\n\nEarly fighting had no written rules. There were no weight divisions or round limits, and no referee. In general, it was extremely chaotic. An early article on boxing was published in Nottingham, 1713, by Sir Thomas Parkyns, a successful Wrestler from Bunny, Nottinghamshire, who had practised the techniques he described. The article, a single page in his manual of wrestling and fencing, Progymnasmata: The inn-play, or Cornish-hugg wrestler, described a system of headbutting, punching, eye-gouging, chokes, and hard throws, not recognized in boxing today. \n\nThe first boxing rules, called the Broughton's rules, were introduced by champion Jack Broughton in 1743 to protect fighters in the ring where deaths sometimes occurred. Under these rules, if a man went down and could not continue after a count of 30 seconds, the fight was over. Hitting a downed fighter and grasping below the waist were prohibited. Broughton encouraged the use of 'mufflers', a form of padded bandage or mitten, to be used in 'jousting' or sparring sessions in training, and in exhibition matches.\n\nThese rules did allow the fighters an advantage not enjoyed by today's boxers; they permitted the fighter to drop to one knee to begin a 30-second count at any time. Thus a fighter realizing he was in trouble had an opportunity to recover. However, this was considered \"unmanly\" and was frequently disallowed by additional rules negotiated by the Seconds of the Boxers. Intentionally going down in modern boxing will cause the recovering fighter to lose points in the scoring system. Furthermore, as the contestants did not have heavy leather gloves and wristwraps to protect their hands, they used different punching technique to preserve their hands, because the head was a common target to hit full out. Almost all period manuals have powerful straight punches with the whole body behind them to the face (including forehead) as the basic blows. \n\nMarquess of Queensberry rules (1867)\n\nIn 1867, the Marquess of Queensberry rules were drafted by John Chambers for amateur championships held at Lillie Bridge in London for Lightweights, Middleweights and Heavyweights. The rules were published under the patronage of the Marquess of Queensberry, whose name has always been associated with them.\n\nThere were twelve rules in all, and they specified that fights should be \"a fair stand-up boxing match\" in a 24-foot-square or similar ring. Rounds were three minutes with one-minute rest intervals between rounds. Each fighter was given a ten-second count if he was knocked down, and wrestling was banned.\nThe introduction of gloves of \"fair-size\" also changed the nature of the bouts. An average pair of boxing gloves resembles a bloated pair of mittens and are laced up around the wrists. \nThe gloves can be used to block an opponent's blows. As a result of their introduction, bouts became longer and more strategic with greater importance attached to defensive maneuvers such as slipping, bobbing, countering and angling. Because less defensive emphasis was placed on the use of the forearms and more on the gloves, the classical forearms outwards, torso leaning back stance of the bare knuckle boxer was modified to a more modern stance in which the torso is tilted forward and the hands are held closer to the face.\n\nLate 19th and early 20th centuries\n\nThrough the late nineteenth century, the martial art of boxing or prizefighting was primarily a sport of dubious legitimacy. Outlawed in England and much of the United States, prizefights were often held at gambling venues and broken up by police. Brawling and wrestling tactics continued, and riots at prizefights were common occurrences. Still, throughout this period, there arose some notable bare knuckle champions who developed fairly sophisticated fighting tactics.\n\nThe English case of R v. Coney in 1882 found that a bare-knuckle fight was an assault occasioning actual bodily harm, despite the consent of the participants. This marked the end of widespread public bare-knuckle contests in England.\n\nThe first world heavyweight champion under the Queensberry Rules was \"Gentleman Jim\" Corbett, who defeated John L. Sullivan in 1892 at the Pelican Athletic Club in New Orleans. \n\nThe first instance of film censorship in the United States occurred in 1897 when several states banned the showing of prize fighting films from the state of Nevada, where it was legal at the time.\n\nThroughout the early twentieth century, boxers struggled to achieve legitimacy. They were aided by the influence of promoters like Tex Rickard and the popularity of great champions such as John L. Sullivan.\n\nRules\n\nThe Marquess of Queensberry rules have been the general rules governing modern boxing since their publication in 1867.\n\nA boxing match typically consists of a determined number of three-minute rounds, a total of up to 9 to 12 rounds. A minute is typically spent between each round with the fighters in their assigned corners receiving advice and attention from their coach and staff. The fight is controlled by a referee who works within the ring to judge and control the conduct of the fighters, rule on their ability to fight safely, count knocked-down fighters, and rule on fouls.\n\nUp to three judges are typically present at ringside to score the bout and assign points to the boxers, based on punches that connect, defense, knockdowns, and other, more subjective, measures. Because of the open-ended style of boxing judging, many fights have controversial results, in which one or both fighters believe they have been \"robbed\" or unfairly denied a victory. Each fighter has an assigned corner of the ring, where his or her coach, as well as one or more \"seconds\" may administer to the fighter at the beginning of the fight and between rounds. Each boxer enters into the ring from their assigned corners at the beginning of each round and must cease fighting and return to their corner at the signaled end of each round.\n\nA bout in which the predetermined number of rounds passes is decided by the judges, and is said to \"go the distance\". The fighter with the higher score at the end of the fight is ruled the winner. With three judges, unanimous and split decisions are possible, as are draws. A boxer may win the bout before a decision is reached through a knock-out ; such bouts are said to have ended \"inside the distance\". If a fighter is knocked down during the fight, determined by whether the boxer touches the canvas floor of the ring with any part of their body other than the feet as a result of the opponent's punch and not a slip, as determined by the referee, the referee begins counting until the fighter returns to his or her feet and can continue.\n\nShould the referee count to ten, then the knocked-down boxer is ruled \"knocked out\" (whether unconscious or not) and the other boxer is ruled the winner by knockout (KO). A \"technical knock-out\" (TKO) is possible as well, and is ruled by the referee, fight doctor, or a fighter's corner if a fighter is unable to safely continue to fight, based upon injuries or being judged unable to effectively defend themselves. Many jurisdictions and sanctioning agencies also have a \"three-knockdown rule\", in which three knockdowns in a given round result in a TKO. A TKO is considered a knockout in a fighter's record. A \"standing eight\" count rule may also be in effect. This gives the referee the right to step in and administer a count of eight to a fighter that he feels may be in danger, even if no knockdown has taken place. After counting the referee will observe the fighter, and decide if he is fit to continue. For scoring purposes, a standing eight count is treated as a knockdown.\n\nIn general, boxers are prohibited from hitting below the belt, holding, tripping, pushing, biting, or spitting. The boxer's shorts are raised so the opponent is not allowed to hit to the groin area with intent to cause pain or injury. Failure to abide by the former may result in a foul. They also are prohibited from kicking, head-butting, or hitting with any part of the arm other than the knuckles of a closed fist (including hitting with the elbow, shoulder or forearm, as well as with open gloves, the wrist, the inside, back or side of the hand). They are prohibited as well from hitting the back, back of the neck or head (called a \"rabbit-punch\") or the kidneys. They are prohibited from holding the ropes for support when punching, holding an opponent while punching, or ducking below the belt of their opponent (dropping below the waist of your opponent, no matter the distance between).\n\nIf a \"clinch\" – a defensive move in which a boxer wraps his or her opponents arms and holds on to create a pause – is broken by the referee, each fighter must take a full step back before punching again (alternatively, the referee may direct the fighters to \"punch out\" of the clinch). When a boxer is knocked down, the other boxer must immediately cease fighting and move to the furthest neutral corner of the ring until the referee has either ruled a knockout or called for the fight to continue.\n\nViolations of these rules may be ruled \"fouls\" by the referee, who may issue warnings, deduct points, or disqualify an offending boxer, causing an automatic loss, depending on the seriousness and intentionality of the foul. An intentional foul that causes injury that prevents a fight from continuing usually causes the boxer who committed it to be disqualified. A fighter who suffers an accidental low-blow may be given up to five minutes to recover, after which they may be ruled knocked out if they are unable to continue. Accidental fouls that cause injury ending a bout may lead to a \"no contest\" result, or else cause the fight to go to a decision if enough rounds (typically four or more, or at least three in a four-round fight) have passed.\n\nUnheard of these days, but common during the early 20th Century in North America, a \"newspaper decision (NWS)\" might be made after a no decision bout had ended. A \"no decision\" bout occurred when, by law or by pre-arrangement of the fighters, if both boxers were still standing at the fight's conclusion and there was no knockout, no official decision was rendered and neither boxer was declared the winner. But this did not prevent the pool of ringside newspaper reporters from declaring a consensus result among themselves and printing a newspaper decision in their publications. Officially, however, a \"no decision\" bout resulted in neither boxer winning or losing. Boxing historians sometimes use these unofficial newspaper decisions in compiling fight records for illustrative purposes only. Often, media outlets covering a match will personally score the match, and post their scores as an independent sentence in their report.\n\nProfessional vs. amateur boxing\n\nThroughout the 17th to 19th centuries, boxing bouts were motivated by money, as the fighters competed for prize money, promoters controlled the gate, and spectators bet on the result. The modern Olympic movement revived interest in amateur sports, and amateur boxing became an Olympic sport in 1908. In their current form, Olympic and other amateur bouts are typically limited to three or four rounds, scoring is computed by points based on the number of clean blows landed, regardless of impact, and fighters wear protective headgear, reducing the number of injuries, knockdowns, and knockouts. Currently scoring blows in amateur boxing are subjectively counted by ringside judges, but the Australian Institute for Sport has demonstrated a prototype of an Automated Boxing Scoring System, which introduces scoring objectivity, improves safety, and arguably makes the sport more interesting to spectators. Professional boxing remains by far the most popular form of the sport globally, though amateur boxing is dominant in Cuba and some former Soviet republics. For most fighters, an amateur career, especially at the Olympics, serves to develop skills and gain experience in preparation for a professional career.\n\nAmateur boxing\n\nAmateur boxing may be found at the collegiate level, at the Olympic Games and Commonwealth Games, and in many other venues sanctioned by amateur boxing associations. Amateur boxing has a point scoring system that measures the number of clean blows landed rather than physical damage. Bouts consist of three rounds of three minutes in the Olympic and Commonwealth Games, and three rounds of three minutes in a national ABA (Amateur Boxing Association) bout, each with a one-minute interval between rounds.\n\nCompetitors wear protective headgear and gloves with a white strip or circle across the knuckle. There are cases however, where white ended gloves are not required but any solid color may be worn. The white end just is a way to make it easier for judges to score clean hits. Each competitor must have their hands properly wrapped, pre-fight, for added protection on their hands and for added cushion under the gloves. Gloves worn by the fighters must be twelve ounces in weight unless, the fighters weigh under 165 pounds, thus allowing them to wear 10 ounce gloves. A punch is considered a scoring punch only when the boxers connect with the white portion of the gloves. Each punch that lands cleanly on the head or torso with sufficient force is awarded a point. A referee monitors the fight to ensure that competitors use only legal blows. A belt worn over the torso represents the lower limit of punches – any boxer repeatedly landing low blows below the belt is disqualified. Referees also ensure that the boxers don't use holding tactics to prevent the opponent from swinging. If this occurs, the referee separates the opponents and orders them to continue boxing. Repeated holding can result in a boxer being penalized or ultimately disqualified. Referees will stop the bout if a boxer is seriously injured, if one boxer is significantly dominating the other or if the score is severely imbalanced. Amateur bouts which end this way may be noted as \"RSC\" (referee stopped contest) with notations for an outclassed opponent (RSCO), outscored opponent (RSCOS), injury (RSCI) or head injury (RSCH).\n\nProfessional boxing\n\nProfessional bouts are usually much longer than amateur bouts, typically ranging from ten to twelve rounds, though four-round fights are common for less experienced fighters or club fighters. There are also some two- and three-round professional bouts, especially in Australia. Through the early twentieth century, it was common for fights to have unlimited rounds, ending only when one fighter quit, benefiting high-energy fighters like Jack Dempsey. Fifteen rounds remained the internationally recognized limit for championship fights for most of the twentieth century until the early 1980s, when the death of boxer Duk Koo Kim eventually prompted the World Boxing Council and other organizations sanctioning professional boxing to reduce the limit to twelve rounds.\n\nHeadgear is not permitted in professional bouts, and boxers are generally allowed to take much more damage before a fight is halted. At any time, the referee may stop the contest if he believes that one participant cannot defend himself due to injury. In that case, the other participant is awarded a technical knockout win. A technical knockout would also be awarded if a fighter lands a punch that opens a cut on the opponent, and the opponent is later deemed not fit to continue by a doctor because of the cut. For this reason, fighters often employ cutmen, whose job is to treat cuts between rounds so that the boxer is able to continue despite the cut. If a boxer simply quits fighting, or if his corner stops the fight, then the winning boxer is also awarded a technical knockout victory. In contrast with amateur boxing, professional male boxers have to be bare-chested. \n\nBoxing styles\n\nDefinition of style\n\n\"Style\" is often defined as the strategic approach a fighter takes during a bout. No two fighters' styles are alike, as it is determined by that individual's physical and mental attributes. Three main styles exist in boxing: outside fighter (\"boxer\"), brawler (or \"slugger\"), and Inside fighter (\"swarmer\"). These styles may be divided into several special subgroups, such as counter puncher, etc. The main philosophy of the styles is, that each style has an advantage over one, but disadvantage over the other one. It follows the rock-paper-scissors scenario - boxer beats brawler, brawler beats swarmer, and swarmer beats boxer. \n\nBoxer/out-fighter\n\nA classic \"boxer\" or stylist (also known as an \"out-fighter\") seeks to maintain distance between himself and his opponent, fighting with faster, longer range punches, most notably the jab, and gradually wearing his opponent down. Due to this reliance on weaker punches, out-fighters tend to win by point decisions rather than by knockout, though some out-fighters have notable knockout records. They are often regarded as the best boxing strategists due to their ability to control the pace of the fight and lead their opponent, methodically wearing him down and exhibiting more skill and finesse than a brawler. Out-fighters need reach, hand speed, reflexes, and footwork.\n\nNotable out-fighters include Muhammad Ali, Larry Holmes, Joe Calzaghe Wilfredo Gómez, \nSalvador Sanchez, Cecilia Brækhus, Gene Tunney, Ezzard Charles, Willie Pep, Meldrick Taylor, Ricardo Lopez, Floyd Mayweather, Roy Jones, Jr., Sugar Ray Leonard, Miguel Vazquez, Sergio \"Maravilla\" Martínez, Vitali Klitschko, Wladimir Klitschko, and Guillermo Rigondeaux. This style was also used by fictional boxer Apollo Creed.\n\nBoxer-puncher\n\nA boxer-puncher is a well-rounded boxer who is able to fight at close range with a combination of technique and power, often with the ability to knock opponents out with a combination and in some instances a single shot. Their movement and tactics are similar to that of an out-fighter (although they are generally not as mobile as an out-fighter), but instead of winning by decision, they tend to wear their opponents down using combinations and then move in to score the knockout. A boxer must be well rounded to be effective using this style.\n\nNotable boxer-punchers include Muhammad Ali, Wladimir Klitschko, Lennox Lewis, Joe Louis, Wilfredo Gómez, Oscar de la Hoya, Archie Moore, Miguel Cotto, Nonito Donaire, Sam Langford, Henry Armstrong, Sugar Ray Robinson, Tony Zale, Carlos Monzón, Alexis Argüello, Erik Morales, Terry Norris, Marco Antonio Barrera, Naseem Hamed and Thomas Hearns.\n\nCounter puncher\n\nCounter punchers are slippery, defensive style fighters who often rely on their opponent's mistakes in order to gain the advantage, whether it be on the score cards or more preferably a knockout. They use their well-rounded defense to avoid or block shots and then immediately catch the opponent off guard with a well placed and timed punch. A fight with a skilled counter-puncher can turn into a war of attrition, where each shot landed is a battle in itself. Thus, fighting against counter punchers requires constant feinting and the ability to avoid telegraphing one's attacks. To be truly successful using this style they must have good reflexes, a high level of prediction and awareness, pinpoint accuracy and speed, both in striking and in footwork.\n\nNotable counter punchers include Muhammad Ali, Vitali Klitschko, Evander Holyfield, Max Schmeling, Chris Byrd, Jim Corbett, Jack Johnson, Bernard Hopkins, Laszlo Papp, Jerry Quarry, Anselmo Moreno, James Toney, Marvin Hagler, Juan Manuel Márquez, Humberto Soto, Floyd Mayweather, Jr., Roger Mayweather, Pernell Whitaker, Sergio Gabriel Martinez and Guillermo Rigondeaux.\n\nCounter punchers usually wear their opponents down by causing them to miss their punches. The more the opponent misses, the faster they tire, and the psychological effects of being unable to land a hit will start to sink in. The counter puncher often tries to outplay their opponent entirely, not just in a physical sense, but also in a mental and emotional sense. This style can be incredibly difficult, especially against seasoned fighters, but winning a fight without getting hit is often worth the pay-off. They usually try to stay away from the center of the ring, in order to outmaneuver and chip away at their opponents. A large advantage in counter-hitting is the forward momentum of the attacker, which drives them further into your return strike. As such, knockouts are more common than one would expect from a defensive style.\n\nBrawler/slugger\n\nA brawler is a fighter who generally lacks finesse and footwork in the ring, but makes up for it through sheer punching power. Mainly Irish, Irish-American, Puerto Rican, Mexican, and Mexican-American boxers popularized this style. Many brawlers tend to lack mobility, preferring a less mobile, more stable platform and have difficulty pursuing fighters who are fast on their feet. They may also have a tendency to ignore combination punching in favor of continuous beat-downs with one hand and by throwing slower, more powerful single punches (such as hooks and uppercuts). Their slowness and predictable punching pattern (single punches with obvious leads) often leaves them open to counter punches, so successful brawlers must be able to absorb substantial amounts of punishment. However, not all brawler/slugger fighters are not mobile; some can move around and switch styles if needed but still have the brawler/slugger style such as Wilfredo Gómez, Prince Naseem Hamed and Danny García.\n\nA brawler's most important assets are power and chin (the ability to absorb punishment while remaining able to continue boxing). Examples of this style include George Foreman, Rocky Marciano, Julio Cesar Chavez, Roberto Duran, Danny García, Wilfredo Gómez, Sonny Liston, John L. Sullivan, Max Baer, Prince Naseem Hamed, Ray Mancini, David Tua, Arturo Gatti, Micky Ward, Brandon Ríos, Ruslan Provodnikov, Michael Katsidis, James Kirkland, Marcos Maidana, Jake Lamotta, Manny Pacquiao, and Ireland's John Duddy. This style of boxing was also used by fictional boxers Rocky Balboa and James \"Clubber\" Lang.\n\nBrawlers tend to be more predictable and easy to hit but usually fare well enough against other fighting styles because they train to take punches very well. They often have a higher chance than other fighting styles to score a knockout against their opponents because they focus on landing big, powerful hits, instead of smaller, faster attacks. Oftentimes they place focus on training on their upper body instead of their entire body, to increase power and endurance. They also aim to intimidate their opponents because of their power, stature and ability to take a punch.\n\nSwarmer/in-fighter\n\nIn-fighters/swarmers (sometimes called \"pressure fighters\") attempt to stay close to an opponent, throwing intense flurries and combinations of hooks and uppercuts. A successful in-fighter often needs a good \"chin\" because swarming usually involves being hit with many jabs before they can maneuver inside where they are more effective. In-fighters operate best at close range because they are generally shorter and have less reach than their opponents and thus are more effective at a short distance where the longer arms of their opponents make punching awkward. However, several fighters tall for their division have been relatively adept at in-fighting as well as out-fighting.\n\nThe essence of a swarmer is non-stop aggression. Many short in-fighters utilize their stature to their advantage, employing a bob-and-weave defense by bending at the waist to slip underneath or to the sides of incoming punches. Unlike blocking, causing an opponent to miss a punch disrupts his balance, permits forward movement past the opponent's extended arm and keeps the hands free to counter. A distinct advantage that in-fighters have is when throwing uppercuts where they can channel their entire bodyweight behind the punch; Mike Tyson was famous for throwing devastating uppercuts. Marvin Hagler was known for his hard \"chin\", punching power, body attack and the stalking of his opponents. Some in-fighters, like Mike Tyson, have been known for being notoriously hard to hit. The key to a swarmer is aggression, endurance, chin, and bobbing-and-weaving.\n\nNotable in-fighters include Julio César Chávez, Miguel Cotto, Joe Frazier, Danny García, Mike Tyson, Manny Pacquiao, Saúl Álvarez, Rocky Marciano, Jack Dempsey, Wayne McCullough, Gerry Penalosa, Harry Greb, David Tua, Ricky Hatton and Gennady Golovkin.\n\nCombinations of styles\n\nAll fighters have primary skills with which they feel most comfortable, but truly elite fighters are often able to incorporate auxiliary styles when presented with a particular challenge. For example, an out-fighter will sometimes plant his feet and counter punch, or a slugger may have the stamina to pressure fight with his power punches.\n\nStyle matchups\n\nThere is a generally accepted rule of thumb about the success each of these boxing styles has against the others. In general, an in-fighter has an advantage over an out-fighter, an out-fighter has an advantage over a brawler, and a brawler has an advantage over an in-fighter; these form a cycle with each style being stronger relative to one, and weaker relative to another, with none dominating, as in rock-paper-scissors. Naturally, many other factors, such as the skill level and training of the combatants, determine the outcome of a fight, but the widely held belief in this relationship among the styles is embodied in the cliché amongst boxing fans and writers that \"styles make fights.\"\n\nBrawlers tend to overcome swarmers or in-fighters because, in trying to get close to the slugger, the in-fighter will invariably have to walk straight into the guns of the much harder-hitting brawler, so, unless the former has a very good chin and the latter's stamina is poor, the brawler's superior power will carry the day. A famous example of this type of match-up advantage would be George Foreman's knockout victory over Joe Frazier in their original bout \"The Sunshine Showdown\".\n\nAlthough in-fighters struggle against heavy sluggers, they typically enjoy more success against out-fighters or boxers. Out-fighters prefer a slower fight, with some distance between themselves and the opponent. The in-fighter tries to close that gap and unleash furious flurries. On the inside, the out-fighter loses a lot of his combat effectiveness, because he cannot throw the hard punches. The in-fighter is generally successful in this case, due to his intensity in advancing on his opponent and his good agility, which makes him difficult to evade. For example, the swarming Joe Frazier, though easily dominated by the slugger George Foreman, was able to create many more problems for the boxer Muhammad Ali in their three fights. Joe Louis, after retirement, admitted that he hated being crowded, and that swarmers like untied/undefeated champ Rocky Marciano would have caused him style problems even in his prime.\n\nThe boxer or out-fighter tends to be most successful against a brawler, whose slow speed (both hand and foot) and poor technique makes him an easy target to hit for the faster out-fighter. The out-fighter's main concern is to stay alert, as the brawler only needs to land one good punch to finish the fight. If the out-fighter can avoid those power punches, he can often wear the brawler down with fast jabs, tiring him out. If he is successful enough, he may even apply extra pressure in the later rounds in an attempt to achieve a knockout. Most classic boxers, such as Muhammad Ali, enjoyed their best successes against sluggers.\n\nAn example of a style matchup was the historical fight of Julio César Chávez, a swarmer or in-fighter, against Meldrick Taylor, the boxer or out-fighter (see Julio César Chávez vs. Meldrick Taylor). The match was nicknamed \"Thunder Meets Lightning\" as an allusion to punching power of Chávez and blinding speed of Taylor. Chávez was the epitome of the \"Mexican\" style of boxing. Taylor's hand and foot speed and boxing abilities gave him the early advantage, allowing him to begin building a large lead on points. Chávez remained relentless in his pursuit of Taylor and due to his greater punching power Chávez slowly punished Taylor. Coming into the later rounds, Taylor was bleeding from the mouth, his entire face was swollen, the bones around his eye socket had been broken, he had swallowed a considerable amount of his own blood, and as he grew tired, Taylor was increasingly forced into exchanging blows with Chávez, which only gave Chávez a greater chance to cause damage. While there was little doubt that Taylor had solidly won the first three quarters of the fight, the question at hand was whether he would survive the final quarter. Going into the final round, Taylor held a secure lead on the scorecards of two of the three judges. Chávez would have to knock Taylor out to claim a victory, whereas Taylor merely needed to stay away from the Mexican legend. However, Taylor did not stay away, but continued to trade blows with Chávez. As he did so, Taylor showed signs of extreme exhaustion, and every tick of the clock brought Taylor closer to victory unless Chávez could knock him out.\nWith about a minute left in the round, Chávez hit Taylor squarely with several hard punches and stayed on the attack, continuing to hit Taylor with well-placed shots. Finally, with about 25 seconds to go, Chávez landed a hard right hand that caused Taylor to stagger forward towards a corner, forcing Chávez back ahead of him. Suddenly Chávez stepped around Taylor, positioning him so that Taylor was trapped in the corner, with no way to escape from Chávez' desperate final flurry. Chávez then nailed Taylor with a tremendous right hand that dropped the younger man. By using the ring ropes to pull himself up, Taylor managed to return to his feet and was given the mandatory 8-count. Referee Richard Steele asked Taylor twice if he was able to continue fighting, but Taylor failed to answer. Steele then concluded that Taylor was unfit to continue and signaled that he was ending the fight, resulting in a TKO victory for Chávez with only two seconds to go in the bout.\n\nEquipment\n\nSince boxing involves forceful, repetitive punching, precautions must be taken to prevent damage to bones in the hand. Most trainers do not allow boxers to train and spar without wrist wraps and boxing gloves. Hand wraps are used to secure the bones in the hand, and the gloves are used to protect the hands from blunt injury, allowing boxers to throw punches with more force than if they did not utilize them. Gloves have been required in competition since the late nineteenth century, though modern boxing gloves are much heavier than those worn by early twentieth-century fighters. Prior to a bout, both boxers agree upon the weight of gloves to be used in the bout, with the understanding that lighter gloves allow heavy punchers to inflict more damage. The brand of gloves can also affect the impact of punches, so this too is usually stipulated before a bout. Both sides are allowed to inspect the wraps and gloves of the opponent to help ensure both are within agreed upon specifications and no tampering has taken place.\n\nA mouth guard is important to protect the teeth and gums from injury, and to cushion the jaw, resulting in a decreased chance of knockout. Both fighters must wear soft soled shoes to reduce the damage from accidental (or intentional) stepping on feet. While older boxing boots more commonly resembled those of a professional wrestler, modern boxing shoes and boots tend to be quite similar to their amateur wrestling counterparts.\n\nBoxers practice their skills on two basic types of punching bags. A small, tear-drop-shaped \"speed bag\" is used to hone reflexes and repetitive punching skills, while a large cylindrical \"heavy bag\" filled with sand, a synthetic substitute, or water is used to practice power punching and body blows. In addition to these distinctive pieces of equipment, boxers also utilize sport-nonspecific training equipment to build strength, speed, agility, and stamina. Common training equipment includes free weights, rowing machines, jump rope, and medicine balls.\n\nBoxing matches typically take place in a boxing ring, a raised platform surrounded by ropes attached to posts rising in each corner. The term \"ring\" has come to be used as a metaphor for many aspects of prize fighting in general.\n\nTechnique\n\nStance\n\nThe modern boxing stance differs substantially from the typical boxing stances of the 19th and early 20th centuries. The modern stance has a more upright vertical-armed guard, as opposed to the more horizontal, knuckles-facing-forward guard adopted by early 20th century hook users such as Jack Johnson.\n\nFile:attitude_droite1.jpg|Upright stance\nFile:attitude_semi-enroulée1.jpg|Semi-crouch\nFile:attitude_enroulée1.jpg|Full crouch\n\nIn a fully upright stance, the boxer stands with the legs shoulder-width apart and the rear foot a half-step in front of the lead man. Right-handed or orthodox boxers lead with the left foot and fist (for most penetration power). Both feet are parallel, and the right heel is off the ground. The lead (left) fist is held vertically about six inches in front of the face at eye level. The rear (right) fist is held beside the chin and the elbow tucked against the ribcage to protect the body. The chin is tucked into the chest to avoid punches to the jaw which commonly cause knock-outs and is often kept slightly off-center. Wrists are slightly bent to avoid damage when punching and the elbows are kept tucked in to protect the ribcage. Some boxers fight from a crouch, leaning forward and keeping their feet closer together. The stance described is considered the \"textbook\" stance and fighters are encouraged to change it around once it's been mastered as a base. Case in point, many fast fighters have their hands down and have almost exaggerated footwork, while brawlers or bully fighters tend to slowly stalk their opponents.\n\nLeft-handed or southpaw fighters use a mirror image of the orthodox stance, which can create problems for orthodox fighters unaccustomed to receiving jabs, hooks, or crosses from the opposite side. The southpaw stance, conversely, is vulnerable to a straight right hand.\n\nNorth American fighters tend to favor a more balanced stance, facing the opponent almost squarely, while many European fighters stand with their torso turned more to the side. The positioning of the hands may also vary, as some fighters prefer to have both hands raised in front of the face, risking exposure to body shots.\n\nModern boxers can sometimes be seen tapping their cheeks or foreheads with their fists in order to remind themselves to keep their hands up (which becomes difficult during long bouts). Boxers are taught to push off with their feet in order to move effectively. Forward motion involves lifting the lead leg and pushing with the rear leg. Rearward motion involves lifting the rear leg and pushing with the lead leg. During lateral motion the leg in the direction of the movement moves first while the opposite leg provides the force needed to move the body.\n\nPunches\n\nThere are four basic punches in boxing: the jab, cross, hook and uppercut. Any punch other than a jab is considered a power punch. If a boxer is right-handed (orthodox), his left hand is the lead hand and his right hand is the rear hand. For a left-handed boxer or southpaw, the hand positions are reversed. For clarity, the following discussion will assume a right-handed boxer.\n\nFile:jab7.jpg|Jab\nFile:Drop3.jpg|Cross - in counter-punch with a looping\nFile:crochet1.jpg|Hook\nFile:uppercut2.jpg|Uppercut\n\n* Jab – A quick, straight punch thrown with the lead hand from the guard position. The jab is accompanied by a small, clockwise rotation of the torso and hips, while the fist rotates 90 degrees, becoming horizontal upon impact. As the punch reaches full extension, the lead shoulder can be brought up to guard the chin. The rear hand remains next to the face to guard the jaw. After making contact with the target, the lead hand is retracted quickly to resume a guard position in front of the face.\n** The jab is recognized as the most important punch in a boxer's arsenal because it provides a fair amount of its own cover and it leaves the least amount of space for a counter punch from the opponent. It has the longest reach of any punch and does not require commitment or large weight transfers. Due to its relatively weak power, the jab is often used as a tool to gauge distances, probe an opponent's defenses, harass an opponent, and set up heavier, more powerful punches. A half-step may be added, moving the entire body into the punch, for additional power. Some notable boxers who have been able to develop relative power in their jabs and use it to punish or 'wear down' their opponents to some effect include Larry Holmes and Wladimir Klitschko.\n* Cross – A powerful, straight punch thrown with the rear hand. From the guard position, the rear hand is thrown from the chin, crossing the body and traveling towards the target in a straight line. The rear shoulder is thrust forward and finishes just touching the outside of the chin. At the same time, the lead hand is retracted and tucked against the face to protect the inside of the chin. For additional power, the torso and hips are rotated counter-clockwise as the cross is thrown. A measure of an ideally extended cross is that the shoulder of the striking arm, the knee of the front leg and the ball of the front foot are on the same vertical plane. \n** Weight is also transferred from the rear foot to the lead foot, resulting in the rear heel turning outwards as it acts as a fulcrum for the transfer of weight. Body rotation and the sudden weight transfer is what gives the cross its power. Like the jab, a half-step forward may be added. After the cross is thrown, the hand is retracted quickly and the guard position resumed. It can be used to counter punch a jab, aiming for the opponent's head (or a counter to a cross aimed at the body) or to set up a hook. The cross is also called a \"straight\" or \"right\", especially if it does not cross the opponent's outstretched jab.\n* Hook – A semi-circular punch thrown with the lead hand to the side of the opponent's head. From the guard position, the elbow is drawn back with a horizontal fist (knuckles pointing forward) and the elbow bent. The rear hand is tucked firmly against the jaw to protect the chin. The torso and hips are rotated clockwise, propelling the fist through a tight, clockwise arc across the front of the body and connecting with the target.\n** At the same time, the lead foot pivots clockwise, turning the left heel outwards. Upon contact, the hook's circular path ends abruptly and the lead hand is pulled quickly back into the guard position. A hook may also target the lower body and this technique is sometimes called the \"rip\" to distinguish it from the conventional hook to the head. The hook may also be thrown with the rear hand. Notable left hookers include Joe Frazier , Roy Jones Jr. and Mike Tyson.\n\n* Uppercut – A vertical, rising punch thrown with the rear hand. From the guard position, the torso shifts slightly to the right, the rear hand drops below the level of the opponent's chest and the knees are bent slightly. From this position, the rear hand is thrust upwards in a rising arc towards the opponent's chin or torso.\n** At the same time, the knees push upwards quickly and the torso and hips rotate anti-clockwise and the rear heel turns outward, mimicking the body movement of the cross. The strategic utility of the uppercut depends on its ability to \"lift\" the opponent's body, setting it off-balance for successive attacks. The right uppercut followed by a left hook is a deadly combination employing the uppercut to lift the opponent's chin into a vulnerable position, then the hook to knock the opponent out.\n\nThese different punch types can be thrown in rapid succession to form combinations or \"combos.\" The most common is the jab and cross combination, nicknamed the \"one-two combo.\" This is usually an effective combination, because the jab blocks the opponent's view of the cross, making it easier to land cleanly and forcefully.\n\nA large, swinging circular punch starting from a cocked-back position with the arm at a longer extension than the hook and all of the fighter's weight behind it is sometimes referred to as a \"roundhouse,\" \"haymaker,\" or sucker-punch. Relying on body weight and centripetal force within a wide arc, the roundhouse can be a powerful blow, but it is often a wild and uncontrolled punch that leaves the fighter delivering it off balance and with an open guard.\n\nWide, looping punches have the further disadvantage of taking more time to deliver, giving the opponent ample warning to react and counter. For this reason, the haymaker or roundhouse is not a conventional punch, and is regarded by trainers as a mark of poor technique or desperation. Sometimes it has been used, because of its immense potential power, to finish off an already staggering opponent who seems unable or unlikely to take advantage of the poor position it leaves the puncher in.\n\nAnother unconventional punch is the rarely used bolo punch, in which the opponent swings an arm out several times in a wide arc, usually as a distraction, before delivering with either that or the other arm.\n\nAn illegal punch to the back of the head or neck is known as a rabbit punch.\n\nDefense\n\nThere are several basic maneuvers a boxer can use in order to evade or block punches, depicted and discussed below.\n\nFile:slip1.jpg|Slipping\nFile:slip2.jpg|Bobbing\nFile:blocage1.jpg|Blocking (with the arms)\nFile:protection passive1.jpg|Cover-Up (with the gloves)\nFile:neutraliser1.jpg|Clinching\nFile:pas de retrait.jpg|Footwork\nFile:retrait2.jpg|Pulling away\n\n* Slip – Slipping rotates the body slightly so that an incoming punch passes harmlessly next to the head. As the opponent's punch arrives, the boxer sharply rotates the hips and shoulders. This turns the chin sideways and allows the punch to \"slip\" past. Muhammad Ali was famous for extremely fast and close slips, as was an early Mike Tyson.\n* Sway or fade – To anticipate a punch and move the upper body or head back so that it misses or has its force appreciably lessened. Also called \"rolling with the punch\" or \" Riding The Punch\".\n* Duck or break – To drop down with the back straight so that a punch aimed at the head glances or misses entirely.\n* Bob and weave – Bobbing moves the head laterally and beneath an incoming punch. As the opponent's punch arrives, the boxer bends the legs quickly and simultaneously shifts the body either slightly right or left. Once the punch has been evaded, the boxer \"weaves\" back to an upright position, emerging on either the outside or inside of the opponent's still-extended arm. To move outside the opponent's extended arm is called \"bobbing to the outside\". To move inside the opponent's extended arm is called \"bobbing to the inside\". Joe Frazier, Jack Dempsey, Mike Tyson and Rocky Marciano were masters of bobbing and weaving.\n* Parry/block – Parrying or blocking uses the boxer's shoulder, hands or arms as defensive tools to protect against incoming attacks. A block generally receives a punch while a parry tends to deflect it. A \"palm\", \"catch\", or \"cuff\" is a defense which intentionally takes the incoming punch on the palm portion of the defender's glove.\n* The cover-up – Covering up is the last opportunity (other than rolling with a punch) to avoid an incoming strike to an unprotected face or body. Generally speaking, the hands are held high to protect the head and chin and the forearms are tucked against the torso to impede body shots. When protecting the body, the boxer rotates the hips and lets incoming punches \"roll\" off the guard. To protect the head, the boxer presses both fists against the front of the face with the forearms parallel and facing outwards. This type of guard is weak against attacks from below.\n* The clinch – Clinching is a form of trapping or a rough form of grappling and occurs when the distance between both fighters has closed and straight punches cannot be employed. In this situation, the boxer attempts to hold or \"tie up\" the opponent's hands so he is unable to throw hooks or uppercuts. To perform a clinch, the boxer loops both hands around the outside of the opponent's shoulders, scooping back under the forearms to grasp the opponent's arms tightly against his own body. In this position, the opponent's arms are pinned and cannot be used to attack. Clinching is a temporary match state and is quickly dissipated by the referee. Clinching is technically against the rules, and in amateur fights points are deducted fairly quickly for it. It is unlikely, however, to see points deducted for a clinch in professional boxing.\n\nLess common strategies\n\n* The \"rope-a-dope\" strategy : Used by Muhammad Ali in his 1974 \"the Rumble in the Jungle\" bout against George Foreman, the rope-a-dope method involves lying back against the ropes, covering up defensively as much as possible and allowing the opponent to attempt numerous punches. The back-leaning posture, which does not cause the defending boxer to become as unbalanced as he would during normal backward movement, also maximizes the distance of the defender's head from his opponent, increasing the probability that punches will miss their intended target. Weathering the blows that do land, the defender lures the opponent into expending energy while conserving his/her own. If successful, the attacking opponent will eventually tire, creating defensive flaws which the boxer can exploit. In modern boxing, the rope-a-dope is generally discouraged since most opponents are not fooled by it and few boxers possess the physical toughness to withstand a prolonged, unanswered assault. Recently, however, eight-division world champion Manny Pacquiao skillfully used the strategy to gauge the power of welterweight titlist Miguel Cotto in November 2009. Pacquiao followed up the rope-a-dope gambit with a withering knockdown.\n* Bolo punch : Occasionally seen in Olympic boxing, the bolo is an arm punch which owes its power to the shortening of a circular arc rather than to transference of body weight; it tends to have more of an effect due to the surprise of the odd angle it lands at rather than the actual power of the punch. This is more of a gimmick than a technical maneuver; this punch is not taught, being on the same plane in boxing technicality as is the Ali shuffle. Nevertheless, a few professional boxers have used the bolo-punch to great effect, including former welterweight champions Sugar Ray Leonard, and Kid Gavilan. Middleweight champion Ceferino Garcia is regarded as the inventor of the bolo punch.\n\nFile:contre_bolo1.jpg| Bolo punch\nFile:drop1.jpg| Overhand (overcut)\n\n* Overhand right : The overhand right is a punch not found in every boxer's arsenal. Unlike the right cross, which has a trajectory parallel to the ground, the overhand right has a looping circular arc as it is thrown over the shoulder with the palm facing away from the boxer. It is especially popular with smaller stature boxers trying to reach taller opponents. Boxers who have used this punch consistently and effectively include former heavyweight champions Rocky Marciano and Tim Witherspoon, as well as MMA champions Chuck Liddell and Fedor Emelianenko. The overhand right has become a popular weapon in other tournaments that involve fist striking.\n* Check hook : A check hook is employed to prevent aggressive boxers from lunging in. There are two parts to the check hook. The first part consists of a regular hook. The second, trickier part involves the footwork. As the opponent lunges in, the boxer should throw the hook and pivot on his left foot and swing his right foot 180 degrees around. If executed correctly, the aggressive boxer will lunge in and sail harmlessly past his opponent like a bull missing a matador. This is rarely seen in professional boxing as it requires a great disparity in skill level to execute. Technically speaking it has been said that there is no such thing as a check hook and that it is simply a hook applied to an opponent that has lurched forward and past his opponent who simply hooks him on the way past. Others have argued that the check hook exists but is an illegal punch due to it being a pivot punch which is illegal in the sport. Floyd Mayweather, Jr. employed the use of a check hook against Ricky Hatton, which sent Hatton flying head first into the corner post and being knocked down.\n\nRing corner\n\nIn boxing, each fighter is given a corner of the ring where he rests in between rounds for 1 minute and where his trainers stand. Typically, three men stand in the corner besides the boxer himself; these are the trainer, the assistant trainer and the cutman. The trainer and assistant typically give advice to the boxer on what he is doing wrong as well as encouraging him if he is losing. The cutman is a cutaneous doctor responsible for keeping the boxer's face and eyes free of cuts and blood. This is of particular importance because many fights are stopped because of cuts that threaten the boxer's eyes.\n\nIn addition, the corner is responsible for stopping the fight if they feel their fighter is in grave danger of permanent injury. The corner will occasionally throw in a white towel to signify a boxer's surrender (the idiomatic phrase \"to throw in the towel\", meaning to give up, derives from this practice). This can be seen in the fight between Diego Corrales and Floyd Mayweather. In that fight, Corrales' corner surrendered despite Corrales' steadfast refusal.\n\nMedical concerns\n\nKnocking a person unconscious or even causing concussion may cause permanent brain damage. There is no clear division between the force required to knock a person out and the force likely to kill a person. Since 1980, more than 200 amateur boxers, professional boxers and Toughman fighters have died due to ring or training injuries. In 1983, editorials in the Journal of the American Medical Association called for a ban on boxing. The editor, Dr. George Lundberg, called boxing an \"obscenity\" that \"should not be sanctioned by any civilized society.\" Since then, the British, Canadian and Australian Medical Associations have called for bans on boxing.\n\nSupporters of the ban state that boxing is the only sport where hurting the other athlete is the goal. Dr. Bill O'Neill, boxing spokesman for the British Medical Association, has supported the BMA's proposed ban on boxing: \"It is the only sport where the intention is to inflict serious injury on your opponent, and we feel that we must have a total ban on boxing.\" Opponents respond that such a position is misguided opinion, stating that amateur boxing is scored solely according to total connecting blows with no award for \"injury\". They observe that many skilled professional boxers have had rewarding careers without inflicting injury on opponents by accumulating scoring blows and avoiding punches winning rounds scored 10-9 by the 10-point must system, and they note that there are many other sports where concussions are much more prevalent. \n\nIn 2007, one study of amateur boxers showed that protective headgear did not prevent brain damage, and another found that amateur boxers faced a high risk of brain damage. The Gothenburg study analyzed temporary levels of neurofiliment light in cerebral spinal fluid which they conclude is evidence of damage, even though the levels soon subside. More comprehensive studies of neurologiocal function on larger samples performed by Johns Hopkins University and accident rates analyzed by National Safety Council show amateur boxing is a comparatively safe sport.\n\nIn 1997, the American Association of Professional Ringside Physicians was established to create medical protocols through research and education to prevent injuries in boxing. \n\nProfessional boxing is forbidden in Iceland, Iran, Saudi Arabia and North Korea. It was banned in Sweden until 2007 when the ban was lifted but strict restrictions, including four three-minute rounds for fights, were imposed. It was banned in Albania from 1965 till the fall of Communism in 1991; it is now legal there. Norway legalized professional boxing in December 2014.\n\nBoxing Hall of Fame\n\nThe sport of boxing has two internationally recognized boxing halls of fame; the International Boxing Hall of Fame (IBHOF) and the World Boxing Hall of Fame (WBHF), with the IBHOF being the more widely recognized boxing hall of fame. In 2013, The Boxing Hall of Fame Las Vegas opened in Las Vegas, NV founded by Steve Lott, former assistant manager for Mike Tyson \n\nThe WBHF was founded by Everett L. Sanders in 1980. Since its inception the WBHOF has never had a permanent location or museum, which has allowed the more recent IBHOF to garner more publicity and prestige. Among the notable names in the WBHF are Ricardo \"Finito\" Lopez, Gabriel \"Flash\" Elorde, Michael Carbajal, Khaosai Galaxy, Henry Armstrong, Jack Johnson, Roberto Durán, George Foreman, Ceferino Garcia and Salvador Sanchez. Boxing's International Hall of Fame was inspired by a tribute an American town held for two local heroes in 1982. The town, Canastota, New York, (which is about 15 mi east of Syracuse, via the New York State Thruway), honored former world welterweight/middleweight champion Carmen Basilio and his nephew, former world welterweight champion Billy Backus. The people of Canastota raised money for the tribute which inspired the idea of creating an official, annual hall of fame for notable boxers.\n\nThe International Boxing Hall of Fame opened in Canastota in 1989. The first inductees in 1990 included Jack Johnson, Benny Leonard, Jack Dempsey, Henry Armstrong, Sugar Ray Robinson, Archie Moore, and Muhammad Ali. Other world-class figures include Salvador Sanchez, Jose Napoles, Roberto \"Manos de Piedra\" Durán, Ricardo Lopez, Gabriel \"Flash\" Elorde, Vicente Saldivar, Ismael Laguna, Eusebio Pedroza, Carlos Monzón, Azumah Nelson, Rocky Marciano, Pipino Cuevas and Ken Buchanan. The Hall of Fame's induction ceremony is held every June as part of a four-day event. The fans who come to Canastota for the Induction Weekend are treated to a number of events, including scheduled autograph sessions, boxing exhibitions, a parade featuring past and present inductees, and the induction ceremony itself.\n\nThe Boxing Hall of Fame Las Vegas features the $75 million ESPN Classic Sports fight film and tape library and radio broadcast collection. The collection includes the fights of all the great champions including: Muhammad Ali, Mike Tyson, George Foreman, Roberto Duran, Marvin Hagler, Jack Dempsey, Joe Louis, Joe Frazier, Rocky Marciano and Sugar Ray Robinson. It is this exclusive fight film library that will separate the Boxing Hall of Fame Las Vegas from the other halls of fame which do not have rights to any video of their sports. The inaugural inductees included Muhammad Ali, Henry Armstrong, Tony Canzoneri, Ezzard Charles, Julio Cesar Chavez Sr., Jack Dempsey, Roberto Duran, Joe Louis, and Sugar Ray Robinson \n\nGoverning and sanctioning bodies\n\n; Governing Bodies\n* British Boxing Board of Control (BBBofC)\n* European Boxing Union\n* Nevada State Athletic Commission\n\n; Major Sanctioning Bodies\n* International Boxing Federation (IBF)\n* World Boxing Association (WBA)\n* World Boxing Council (WBC)\n* World Boxing Organization (WBO)\n\n;Amateur\n* International Boxing Association (AIBA; now also professional)\n\nBoxer rankings\n\nThere are various organizations and websites, that rank boxers in both weight class and pound-for-pound manner.\n* BoxRec ([http://boxrec.com/ratings.php ratings])\n* The Ring ([http://ringtv.craveonline.com/ratings ratings])\n* ESPN ([http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/boxing/columns/story?columnistrafael_dan&id\n6402207 ratings])\n* Transnational Boxing Rankings Board ([http://www.tbrb.org/all-rankings/ ratings])", "Robert \"Rocky\" Balboa, Sr. is the title character of the Rocky series. The character was created by Sylvester Stallone, who also portrayed him in all seven Rocky films. He is depicted as an everyman who started out by going the distance and overcoming obstacles that had occurred in his life and career as a professional boxer. While he is loosely based on Chuck Wepner, a one-time boxer who fought Muhammad Ali and lost on a TKO in the 15th round, the inspiration for the name, iconography, and fighting style came from boxing legend Rocky Marciano.\n\nThe character is widely considered to be Stallone's most iconic role and is often considered the role that started his film career. He received critical acclaim for his performance in the first movie, earning Academy Award and Golden Globe Award nominations. When Stallone reprised his role once again in 2015 for Creed, his performance received wide acclaim and he received his first Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor, along with his third Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor, the National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actor and several other accolades.\n\nBiography\n\nRobert \"Rocky\" Balboa was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on July 6, 1945 (one year before Sylvester Stallone's actual birth date). He was the only child in a Roman Catholic Italian-American family. The surname Balboa/Valboa (roughly meaning \"beautiful valley\") originates from a Galician-speaking town in Northwestern Spain, so it is likely he had some Iberian ancestry as well. When Rocky is spoken to by his priest, Father Carmine, it is apparent that he understands Italian very well, including a scene in which he translates for Tommy Gunn; however, it is undetermined how well he actually speaks the language as his responses are always in English. \n\nDuring the scene in which Rocky takes Adrianna \"Adrian\" Pennino skating on Thanksgiving, he tells her, \"Yeah – My ol' man, who was never the sharpest, told me – I weren't born with much brain, so I better use my body.\" This encouraged him to take up boxing. He trained very hard so he could grow up to be like his idol Rocky Marciano. Unable to live on the small pay of club fights, and being unable to find work anywhere else, Rocky got a job as a collector for Tony Gazzo, the local loan shark, just to make ends meet. By late 1975, Rocky had fought in 64 fights, winning 44 (38 KO'S) and losing 20. Rocky was proud that he never had his nose broken in a professional fight. His nickname is \"The Italian Stallion\", spawning from his Italian-American heritage.\n\nRocky (setting 1975–1976)\n\nThe film begins on November 25, 1975, in the slums of the Kensington section of Philadelphia. Rocky Balboa is fighting Spider Rico in a local boxing ring called the Cambria Fight Club (nicknamed \"The Bucket of Blood\") inside a chapel. In the second round, Rico hits Balboa with a headbutt, leaving a gash on his forehead. Enraged, Rocky delivers a vicious barrage of punches, knocking Rico out. The next day, Rocky stops by the local pet store and tries to talk to the shy pet-shop worker Adrian Pennino, younger sister of his friend Paulie. Adrian is very shy and scared of Rocky's tough appearance. Afterwards, Rocky goes to collect a loan for his boss Tony Gazzo. Even though the client didn't have all the money, Rocky didn't break his thumb, even though Gazzo ordered him to do so. Later, Rocky stops by the local boxing gym and finds that he lost his locker to a contender. Unknown to him, the gym's owner and grizzled former boxer, Mickey Goldmill, doesn't hate him, but instead always considered Rocky's potential to be better than his effort. When Rocky leaves for home that night, he sees a young girl named Marie, hanging around a bad crowd and walks her home. On the way, Rocky lectures her about staying away from the wrong people. However, once they get to her house she tells Rocky \"Screw you, creep'o.\" Rocky walks home, frustrated how nothing is going right in his life.\n\nBalboa gets his big break when the undisputed World Heavyweight Champion Apollo Creed decides that he wants to give an unknown fighter a chance to fight for the title after his intended challenger Mac Lee Green broke his hand while training. Creed was told no other contender was available for a fight on New Years Day, which is only a month away in commemoration for the United States Bicentennial, it was inferred by Creed, with the accompanying worldwide audience. Creed chooses Rocky because he likes Balboa's nickname, 'The Italian Stallion'.\n\nAfter getting picked by Apollo, Balboa reunites with his estranged trainer, Mickey Goldmill, who convinces Balboa that he can help get him prepared for this fight. Mickey reveals that his career never got anywhere either because he didn't have a manager and he didn't want the same thing to happen to Rocky. At the same time, Balboa begins dating Adrian. Rocky helped Adrian to become more self-confident and stand up for herself. Rocky confides in Adrian before the fight that though he figured he wouldn't win, he wanted to at least \"go the distance.\"\n\nOn January 1, 1976 at the Philadelphia Spectrum, Balboa fights Creed, who didn't take the fight seriously during training. In the first round, Rocky knocks Creed down, the first time he had ever been knocked down in his career and Creed breaks Rocky's nose, also for the first time in his career. Creed soon realizes that although Balboa doesn't have his skill, he could deliver crippling, sledge-hammer like punches and was stubbornly determined to keep fighting. The fight becomes a long and grueling battle for both men. Rocky was almost knocked out in the 14th round, but managed to get up and deliver some hard body shots, breaking Creed's ribs just before the bell. The 15th round finally began and Rocky managed to pummel Creed until the bell rang. Although Creed wins the fight by a split decision, it was the first time an opponent has lasted the full 15 rounds against him. Both men, battered beyond belief, agree that there would be no rematch. Rocky was fine with this as he only wanted to go the distance with Creed. After the match, Adrian climbed into the ring and embraced Rocky saying, \"I love you!\"\n\nRocky II (setting 1976)\n\nAfter the match, Creed changed his mind and wanted a re-match under the stress of being humiliated by the press for failing to beat Balboa convincingly, as well as his own knowledge that he didn't give his best in the fight. Creed demanded a rematch with Balboa, stating that he would fight him 'anywhere, any place, anytime' to prove to the world that Balboa's feat was merely a fluke. Rocky initially refuses and marries Adrian who convinces him to live outside boxing. However, Rocky, a grade-school drop-out, soon realized he had no skills beyond fighting, and in fact could barely read. The money he made in the first fight was soon frittered away so Adrian took up her part-time job in the pet store. Despite her objections, after Apollo insulted Rocky on national television and the newspaper, he agreed to the rematch. Without Adrian's support, however, Rocky was greatly discouraged and could not draw any concentration into his training whatsoever leaving Mick frustrated and worried. The now pregnant Adrian went into premature labor due to over stress and slipped into a coma after giving birth to Robert. When Adrian came out of the coma, she promised her full support to Rocky. Together, Mickey and Rocky trained hard, focusing on Rocky's speed and improving his right-handed punching (Rocky being a southpaw). At the same time, the angry Apollo also focused on his training, taking this match much more seriously than the first fight. The re-match was set for Thanksgiving. The grueling battle was another 15-round war with both Balboa and Creed falling to the canvas after Balboa landed a succession of left hands. Referee Lou Fillipo exercised his 10-count to the limit and as both Creed and Balboa struggled to make it to their feet, Creed crumbled back down in exhaustion. Rocky was able to get up, from sheer determination and beat the 10-count, winning the rematch by knockout, thus becoming heavyweight champion of the world.\n\nRocky III (setting 1976–1981)\n\nOver the next three years, Rocky successfully defended his title in 10 consecutive defenses against various contenders, amassing fortune and worldwide fame in the process. In addition, Rocky also fought an exhibition bout against the World Heavyweight Wrestling Champion \"Thunderlips\" (Hulk Hogan) to a draw. However, in 1981, Rocky was challenged by intense and hungry newcomer James \"Clubber\" Lang (Mr. T) who has risen to the top of the rankings. Rocky had some issues with his trainer Mickey Goldmill due to his revelation of having faced \"hand-picked\" challengers that were \"good fighters, but not 'killers'\" which Lang was. Mickey insisted that he would quit as Balboa's manager if he chose to fight Lang, but Rocky convinced him to train him for one last match. However, just like Apollo in the first film, Rocky didn't put his heart into the training, reinforcing Mickey's belief that Rocky had become too comfortable (or \"civilized\") as champion. Lang shoved Mickey out of the way during a violent exchange of words with Balboa moment before the match, sending the elderly trainer into cardiac arrest, which threw Rocky, outmatched and undertrained, completely off his game. As a result, Rocky was brutalized by Lang and knocked out in the second round, losing his title; and adding to his defeat, Mick dies of a heart attack after the match, devastating Rocky. Despairing and lost, Rocky was met by Apollo Creed, who told Balboa that when they fought, he won because he was hungry. He had the 'fire' Apollo no longer had, and the former champion convinced Rocky that he needed to get his fire (\"the eye of the tiger\") back. Along with his old trainer Tony \"Duke\" Evers, Apollo offered to train Rocky for a rematch against Lang, taking Balboa to L.A where he first trained to get Rocky \"back to basics.\" After a while Rocky managed to purge his doubts and get his fire back. Fighting with a style very reminiscent of Creed's own boxing technique mixed with his own style, Rocky won the second match with Lang by KO, dodging and absorbing Lang's best blows and still standing, regaining his world heavyweight title. After the fight, Rocky and Apollo were last seen alone in Mickey's Gym, Creed taking his \"payment\" for his training services: one last rematch, just the two of them, no spectators. Forty years later, Rocky admits that Apollo won.\n\nRocky IV (setting 1985)\n\nIn 1985, Apollo Creed comes out of retirement and agrees to fight Soviet World Amateur Champion and Olympic Gold Medalist-turned-professional fighter Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren) in Las Vegas with Rocky Balboa and Tony \"Duke\" Evers in his corner. Creed, past his prime but in the best shape of his retirement, again not taking his opponent seriously, was brutally beaten by massive Drago in the first round but begged Rocky not to stop the fight. In the second round, Creed continued to be beaten by Drago, falling limp in the ring and succumbing to his injuries. Feeling responsible for Apollo's death, Balboa sets up a match with Drago, which was held on Christmas Day in Moscow. Rocky had to surrender his World Heavyweight Championship title to accept this bout. With Evers assuming the role as his new trainer, Balboa trained hard using old-school methods within the mountainous terrain of Krasnoyarsk, Siberia, while Drago was shown being trained with state-of-the-art equipment and steroid enhancement.\n\nDuring the fight, Drago dominated the early moments of the match, but in the second round, Balboa caught Drago with a haymaker to the eye and cut him. The fight continued in a bloody back-and-forth battle, with the Soviet crowd who had originally rooted for Drago began cheering for Balboa while Drago's handler became increasingly upset over his inability to finish the smaller American. In the end, Rocky's superior stamina and determination to win persevered and he defeated the colossal Russian in the fifteenth round. After the fight, Rocky gave an impassioned thank you speech to the crowd which received a standing ovation both from the crowd and the politicians in attendance, effectively ending the Cold War by catalyzing the thaw in relations that would occur between the United States and the Soviet Union.\n\nRocky V (setting 1985–1990)\n\nAfter the bout with Drago, Rocky realizes while he is showering that he has sustained some type of injury from the fight. His hands tremble relentlessly and he tells Adrian he is tired and just wants to go home, but accidentally addresses her as Mickey. Upon return to the United States (in a Soviet airplane), his press conference is interrupted by seedy promoter George Washington Duke and Union Cane. They challenge him to a title fight called \"Lettin' it Go in Tokyo.\" Rocky hints at retirement and leaves without accepting the challenge. Balboa’s doctor, Presley Jensen, discovers that Rocky has apparently suffered brain damage, caused by extremely heavy blows to the head, and so he decides to retire. He then loses his fortune after his brother-in-law Paulie mistakenly had Rocky sign away power of attorney to their accountant, who subsequently embezzled Rocky's money in a housing deal gone bad.\n\nHis only remaining asset is the now closed Mickey's Gym, which had been willed by Mickey to Robert, Rocky's son. Rocky and the family are forced to return to the old neighborhood, moving back into Adrian and Paulie's old house in South Philadelphia. He reopens Mickey's Gym as a means of income while Adrian returns to work at the pet store, where she was employed when she first met Rocky. Rocky asks Adrian, \"Did we ever leave this place?\" Though retired from boxing, Balboa starts training an up-and-coming fighter, Tommy Gunn. Tommy slowly becomes an excellent fighter, but suffers some from being constantly put in Rocky's shadow; he is nicknamed \"Rocky's Robot\" by the media. Tommy is wooed by Duke and leaves Rocky after an argument about whether Balboa is holding him back. At the same time, Robert also has problems adjusting to the new, less-than-lavish lifestyle his family is now leading, and by his father's emotional distance. After a while, Rocky realizes the damage he is doing to his relationship with his son, and he makes amends.\n\nTommy wins the World Heavyweight title from Union Cane in 1990. However, he is ridiculed in the press—since he had never fought a \"real contender,\" he is not regarded as a real champion or heir to the belt. This motivates Tommy, with prodding from Duke, to publicly challenge Rocky to a fight. Balboa initially declines, but when the hot-tempered Tommy punches Paulie, Rocky accepts, telling Tommy his ring is in the alley right outside. The two engage in a street brawl which quickly gets the attention of the locals, the police (who allow the fight to continue), and the media. In the end, Rocky defeats his protege, then punches Duke (who had obnoxiously threatened to sue if Rocky touches him), telling him \"Sue me for what?\" Rocky and his son run up the Philadelphia Museum of Art stairs the next day, where Rocky gives him a valuable possession of Mickey Goldmill's that had been passed on to him by Rocky Marciano. The two make up for the tensions of the past few years and head in to the museum together.\n\nRocky Balboa (setting 2006)\n\nIn 2006, 16 years after the events of Rocky V, Rocky runs a restaurant called 'Adrian's', named after his wife who, on January 11, 2002, died of ovarian cancer. Rocky is no longer broke and doing better than he was in years prior. After her funeral, Rocky visits her graveside every day and each year on the anniversary of her death, he takes a tour of the old places where their relationship began and blossomed: the pet shop, now closed, where Adrian worked, the site of the former ice skating rink where they had their first date, and Rocky's old apartment where they fell in love. Rocky's son who, unlike his father, goes by Robert and struggles as a mid-level corporate employee, grows farther apart from his family over the years, and only reluctantly joins Rocky to commemorate the anniversaries of his mother's death.\n\nOne day, ESPN’s program Then And Now features a computer animation about a simulated fight between Rocky (in his prime), and the current champion, Mason \"The Line\" Dixon. The fight simulated Rocky winning by knockout in the 13th round, which stirred up a great deal of discussion about the result if such a fight ever occurred. Inspired by the simulation and feeling he still has some issues to deal with (\"stuff in the basement\"), Rocky (who is now 60 years old) decides to return to the ring, and applies for a boxing license. Though Rocky passes the required physical with flying colors, the Licensing Committee denies his license citing his advanced age and their moral duty to protect him from himself. Rocky responds to this with an impassioned speech of his own, however, and they change their minds and give him his license.\n\nThe brain damage suffered in Rocky V is not addressed in this film, but in interviews, Stallone has said that the storyline explanation would have been that Rocky's brain damage was within the normal range for boxers. When tested for brain damage in Rocky V, Rocky was suffering the effects of a severe concussion as a result of the Drago fight, but he never sought a second or more informed opinion because he intended to retire anyway. \n\nRocky's intentions were originally just to compete in small, local fights for fun and charity, but with the publicity of Rocky's return right on the heels of the embarrassing computer simulation, Mason Dixon's promoters convince Rocky to face The Champ in an exhibition bout in Las Vegas. Originally also against fighting an aged Balboa, Dixon recognizes the opportunity to fight a legend, and hopes to end all prognosticating about who would win as well as contentions that he has never had a truly great opponent or memorable match. In the press, commentators dismiss Rocky's chances and the merits of the fight, assuming that it will be one-sided due to Rocky's age despite their original excitement with Rocky's return to the ring and their doubts regarding Dixon's ability.\n\nAs news of the bout spreads, Robert begins to feel more pressure from being Rocky's son and makes an effort to discourage Rocky from fighting, blaming his own personal failings on his father's celebrity shadow, but Rocky rebukes him with some profound advice: to succeed in life, \"it ain't about how hard you hit; it's about how hard you can get hit, and keep moving forward,\" and that blaming others won't help him. The day after this argument, father and son meet over Adrian's grave and reconcile, which is when Robert announces that he has quit his job to be at Rocky's ringside. Rocky also reunites with his old trainer, Duke, and both men quickly realize that age and arthritis have sapped Rocky of any speed he once possessed. They decide to focus on his one major remaining weapon: power.\n\nWhen the fight finally begins, it appears to go as lopsided as everyone predicted with Dixon's speed allowing him to punish Rocky at will. However, the champion soon realizes Rocky will not go down and that the old man \"has bricks in his gloves\". The tide turns when Dixon injures his hand while punching Rocky. This evens the playing field and allows Rocky to mount an offense. In the end, the two fighters go the distance with Dixon winning by split decision (Dixon wins in the theatrical release, Balboa wins in an alternate ending). Dixon is finally recognized as being a warrior for fighting through every round and Rocky proves to the world that he is no joke, mirroring the ending of the first Rocky. The two fighters embrace in the ring after the decision is announced with Dixon whispering to Rocky \"You're a crazy old man.\"\n\nAfter the fight Rocky visits Adrian's grave and puts flowers on top telling her, \"Yo, Adrian, we did it\", which is a play on the second Rocky movie's line, \"Yo, Adrian, I did it!\". Rocky is last seen walking away from the grave and waving goodbye one last time.\n\nCreed (setting 2015)\n\nSince Rocky's last fight, Paulie has died in 2012. In addition, his statue has been re-installed at the Philadelphia Museum of Art at the bottom of the steps. Three years later, Rocky is visited at Adrian's by Adonis Johnson Creed - Apollo's illegitimate son, who grew up without him following his loss and death against Drago. Adonis asks Rocky to consider training him, but is reluctant to come back to the sport of boxing after suffering severe brain trauma, training another boxer and making a comeback nine years before. Days after his initial offer, Adonis stops by the restaurant to ask Rocky for exercises to help his prowess, and recommends him to his friend, Pete Sporino (Ritchie Coster), who currently runs Mighty Mick's Gym. After deep thought, Rocky finally agrees to takes Adonis as his student. \n\nWanting to train in the old-school style, Adonis moves in with Rocky, staying in Paulie's room. While Adonis notices an old picture of Rocky and his son, Robert (an actual picture of Sylvester Stallone and a young Sage Stallone), Rocky reveals that Robert had moved to Vancouver with his girlfriend because of the difficulties he faced trying to be independent in Philadelphia, but does check on his father now and then. Pete, who initially wanted Rocky to be a part of his son, Leo's (Gabriel Rosado) team, challenges Adonis to a fight his son, in which Rocky shows reluctance again, but then both agree. Instead of training at Mighty Mick's Gym, Rocky takes Adonis to train at Front Street Gym, where he surprises Adonis with a corner team and apparel. Before the fight, Pete pulls Rocky aside to address the rumors of Adonis being Apollo's son, which Rocky confirms and tells him that he should not speak of it to anyone else. After Adonis' win, the media heavily publicized the story of Apollo's infidelity, which catches the eye of Tommy Holiday (Graham McTavish), who is looking for the final person to fight his trainee, light-heavyweight champion \"Pretty\" Ricky Conlan (Tony Bellew). While training, Rocky suddenly grows weak, vomits, and collapses in the gym. After doing a string of test ordered by the doctors at the emergency room, Rocky is diagnosed with an early case of non-Hodgkins lymphoma, making him confront his own mortality; the deadliest fight he's ever been in. At first, Rocky was hesitant to the option of chemotherapy as he remembers the pain Adrian experienced as she underwent treatment for ovarian cancer. \n\nAfter a bitter argument with the former heavyweight champion, Adonis, greatly impacted by his coach's diagnosis, makes a pact with Rocky that they would fight their battles together, as Adonis prepares for his bout with \"Pretty\" Ricky Conlan and as Rocky undergoes treatment. As Adonis moves on in training, the effects of treatment begin to weaken Rocky, and because of this, Adonis acts as a caregiver to Rocky while helping him get up and go to the restroom and uses the medical facility to his advantage; shadowboxing in the corridors and running up the stairs, passing doctors and nurses. With the fight taking place in Liverpool, a calm Rocky teaches Adonis the hysterics that would ensue during the pre-fright press conference when Ricky Conlan tries to play mind games, and later helps in Bianca surprising Adonis at his hotel room. During the fight, Balboa stands in Adonis' corner along with Bianca. Before the final round, Rocky grows concerned about the injuries that Adonis' had sustained and tells him he's stopping the fight. However, Adonis wants to prove that he is \"not a mistake\", which emotionally impacts Rocky. He, then, tells Adonis that he wishes he had the chance to thank Apollo when Mickey died but it doesn't match his appreciation of Adonis' tenacity that motivated him in his battle against his illness and tells him that he loves him. \n\nThe film concludes with Adonis taking a frail, but improving, Rocky back to the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, in which he says is his \"most favorite place.\" Both look toward the Philadelphia skyline, remaining positive about their futures.\n\nPersonal life\n\nBalboa resides in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and married Adriana \"Adrian\" Pennino in 1976 during Rocky II. They were married for 26 years. The two have a son, Robert \"Rocky\" Balboa, Jr., who unlike his father goes by Robert. He was born in 1976. \n\nAfter Adrian's death in 2002, Rocky and his brother-in-law Paulie live together for a short time, then Paulie moves in with an unnamed girlfriend. Now living completely alone again, Rocky cannot come to terms with present-day living and constantly thinks about the past. With the help of Paulie and reunited long-time acquaintance Marie, Rocky begins to move on with his life and in the process restores his relationship with his only child, his son Robert. Rocky's relationship with Marie is established as platonic in the film, but a hint of a romantic interest is revealed with a kiss on the lips the night before the last fight of his life.\n\nCharacter origin\n\nThe name, iconography, and fighting style of Rocky Balboa were inspired by the legendary heavyweight champion Rocky Marciano from Brockton, Massachusetts and from the 5 times world champion Roberto 'Manos de Piedra (Hands of Stone)' Duran, from Panama, where the Balboa is the official currency.. Balboa was also inspired by other fighting legends: Joe Frazier, for his Philadelphia origin, training methods and victory against Muhammad Ali (the inspiration for Apollo Creed), and Jake LaMotta, for his Italian-inner city roots, ability to absorb many blows and his rivalry with Sugar Ray Robinson, which heavily resembled Rocky and Apollo's. However, it was the not-so-legendary Chuck Wepner who inspired the movie and Balboa's underdog personality.\n\nBoxing style\n\nRocky Balboa fights as a southpaw (left-handed). In the second film, against Apollo Creed, he comes out \"orthodox\" and Mickey intends for him to switch back to southpaw late in the last round, but Balboa refuses saying \"no tricks, I ain't switching\". Mickey tells him that Apollo is ready for him (if he continues using his right) and so towards the end of the round, he does indeed lead with his left. The real reason for this is Sylvester Stallone tore his pectoral muscles in training, but the idea was probably taken from the great left-handed boxer \"Marvelous\" Marvin Hagler who would sometimes come out orthodox to confuse opponents.\n\nRocky was an all or nothing brawler coming into his first bout with Creed, however under the training of Micky he began to develop his boxing skills ahead of the rematch, which were mastered during his reign as world champion, he became a world class hybrid fighter, possessing the qualities of an inside fighter, brawler, and swarmer. With the exception of his rematch against Clubber Lang (where he fights as an outside fighter), he often advances quickly upon his opponents, driving them into the ropes in order to attack the body. Balboa's best attribute is without question his near-superhuman ability to absorb a multitude of the hardest hits without falling — an attribute he often employs on purpose to wear down his opponents, sacrificing defensive strategy to land his own punches. This is due to a rare brain abnormality in which Rocky's cerebral hemispheres stay tightly relative to each other due to an extremely strong corpus callosum, preventing him from losing consciousness due to latitudinal impacts. Because of this rare talent, Balboa can afford to keep his hands in position to strike rather than up high to block. Because he takes more punches than he throws, it is easy to overlook his incredible punching power. Rocky also has an uncanny ability to sense weakness in his opponents, often capitalizing on every shift in momentum possible. He is acknowledged as having the most devastating body attack in the sport, with his body blows causing internal bleeding in Creed and breaking Drago's ribs. After going two rounds with Balboa, Ivan Drago told his trainer (in Russian), \"He's not human, he's like a piece of iron.\" Mason Dixon once remarked about Balboa: \"that guy's got bricks in his gloves.\" These qualities, in concert, helped land him a high percentage of KO victories over the course of his career.\n\nHonors\n\nRocky Balboa was named the 7th greatest movie hero by the American Film Institute on their 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains list. Additionally, he was ranked #34 on Empire Magazine's compilation of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters. Premiere magazine ranked Rocky Balboa #64 on their list of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time. \n\nThe Rocky character is immortalised by a bronze statue erected near the Rocky Steps in Philadelphia recalling the famous scene from the original Rocky movie.\n\nIn 2011, Sylvester Stallone was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame for his work on the Rocky Balboa character, having \"entertained and inspired boxing fans from around the world\". Additionally, Stallone was awarded the Boxing Writers Association of America award for “Lifetime Cinematic Achievement in Boxing.” \n\nA poll of former heavyweight champions and boxing writers ranked Balboa as the best boxer in the film series. \n\nIn 2014, Rocky Balboa was the Inaugural Induction to the Fictitious Athlete Hall of Fame. \n\nMerchandising\n\nHasbro intended to license Rocky and make him a member of the G.I. Joe toyline, as they had with wrestler Sgt. Slaughter. A toy prototype was produced. Marvel Comics' G.I. Joe: Order of Battle profile book came out during the negotiations and included Rocky as a current Joe member, specializing in hand-to-hand combat training and an example of what it means to persevere under seemingly impossible odds. As the negotiations then collapsed, due to Stallone licensing Rambo to another company, Marvel had to run a retraction in the third issue of the limited-run series indicating that the character was never a part of G.I. Joe." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Cartoonist.txt", "Calvin_and_Hobbes.txt" ], "title": [ "Cartoonist", "Calvin and Hobbes" ], "wiki_context": [ "A cartoonist (also comic strip creator) is a visual artist who specializes in drawing cartoons. This work is often created for entertainment, political commentary, or advertising. Cartoonists may work in many formats, such as animation, booklets, comic strips, comic books, editorial cartoons, graphic novels, manuals, gag cartoons, graphic design, illustrations, storyboards, posters, shirts, books, advertisements, greeting cards, magazines, newspapers, and video game packaging.\n\nHistory\n\nIn the West\n\nThe English satirist and editorial cartoonist William Hogarth, who emerged In the 18th century, has been credited with pioneering Western sequential art. His work ranged from realistic portraiture to comic strip-like series of pictures called \"modern moral subjects\". Much of his work poked fun at contemporary politics and customs; illustrations in such style are often referred to as \"Hogarthian\". Following the work of Hogarth, political cartoons began to develop in England in the latter part of the 18th century under the direction of its great exponents, James Gillray and Thomas Rowlandson, both from London. Gillray explored the use of the medium for lampooning and caricature, calling the king (George III), prime ministers and generals to account, and has been referred to as the father of the political cartoon. \n\nWhile never a professional cartoonist, Benjamin Franklin is credited with having the first cartoon published in an American newspaper. In the 19th century, professional cartoonists such as Thomas Nast introduced other familiar American political symbols, such as the Republican elephant.\n\nDuring the 20th century, numerous magazines carried single-panel gag cartoons by such freelance cartoonists as Charles Addams, Irwin Caplan, Chon Day, Clyde Lamb, and John Norment. These were almost always published in black and white, although Collier's often carried cartoons in color. The debut of Playboy introduced full-page color cartoons by Jack Cole, Eldon Dedini and others. Single-panel cartoonists syndicated to newspapers included Dave Breger, Hank Ketcham, George Lichty, Fred Neher, Irving Phillips, and J. R. Williams.\n\nComics\n\nComic strips received widespread distribution to mainstream newspapers by syndicates \nsuch as the Universal Press Syndicate, United Media, or King Features. Sunday strips go to a coloring company such as American Color before they are published.\n\nSome comic strip creators publish in the alternative press or on the Internet. Comic strip artists may also sometimes work in book-length form, creating graphic novels. Both vintage and current strips receive reprints in book collections. \n\nThe major comic book publishers (such as Marvel or DC) utilize teams of cartoonists to produce the art (typically separating pencil work, inking and lettering while the color is added digitally by colorists). When a consistent artistic style is wanted among different cartoonists (such as Archie Comics), character model sheets may be used as reference.\n\nCalum MacKenzie, in his preface to the exhibition catalog, The Scottish Cartoonists (Glasgow Print Studio Gallery, 1979) defined the selection criteria: \nThe difference between a cartoonist and an illustrator was the same as the difference between a comedian and a comedy actor—the former both deliver their own lines and take full responsibility for them, the latter could always hide behind the fact that it was not his entire creation. \n\nTypes of animation\n\nAnimated cartooning is created for short films, advertising, feature films and television. It is also sometimes used in live-action films for dream sequences or opening titles. An animation artist is commonly referred to as an animator rather than a cartoonist. They create motion pictures as well. Animation studios such as DreamWorks Animation, Pixar, Walt Disney Animation Studios, and Blue Sky Studios create CGI, or computer-animated films that are more three-dimensional.\n\nThere are many books of cartoons in both paperback and hardcover, such as the collections of cartoons from The New Yorker. Prior to the 1960s, cartoons were mostly ignored by museums and art galleries. In 1968, the cartoonist and comedian Roger Price opened the first New York City gallery devoted exclusively to cartoons, mainly work by the leading magazine gag cartoonists. Today, there are several museums devoted to cartoons, notably the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum, run by curator Jenny E. Robb at Ohio State University.\n\nCreation\n\nComics artists usually sketch a drawing in pencil before going over the drawing in India ink, using either a dip pen or a brush. Artists may also use a lightbox to create the final image in ink. Some artists, Brian Bolland for example, use computer graphics, with the published work as the first physical appearance of the artwork. By many definitions (including McCloud's, above) the definition of comics extends to digital media such as webcomics and the mobile comic.\n\nThe nature of the comics work being created determines the number of people who work on its creation, with successful comic strips and comic books being produced through a studio system, in which an artist assembles a team of assistants to help create the work. However, works from independent companies, self-publishers, or those of a more personal nature can be produced by a single creator.\n\nWithin the comic book industry of the United States, the studio system has come to be the main method of creation. Through its use by the industry, the roles have become heavily codified, and the managing of the studio has become the company's responsibility, with an editor discharging the management duties. The editor assembles a number of creators and oversees the work to publication.\n\nAny number of people can assist in the creation of a comic book in this way, from a plotter, a breakdown artist, a penciller, an inker, a scripter, a letterer, and a colorist, with some roles being performed by the same person.\n\nIn contrast, a comic strip tends to be the work of a sole creator, usually termed a cartoonist. However, it is not unusual for a cartoonist to employ the studio method, particularly when a strip become successful. Mort Walker employed a studio, while Bill Watterson disliked the studio method, based on the influence of Charles Schulz, who also was in dislike of the studio method. preferring to create the strip himself. Gag, political, and editorial cartoonists tend to work alone as well, though a cartoonist may use assistants.\n\nArt styles\n\n While almost all comics art is in some sense abbreviated, and also while every artist who has produced comics work brings their own individual approach to bear, some broader art styles have been identified. Comic strip artists Cliff Sterrett, Frank King and Gus Arriola often used unusual, colorful backgrounds, sometimes veering into abstract art.\n\nThe basic styles have been identified as realistic and cartoony, with a huge middle ground for which R. Fiore has coined the phrase liberal. Fiore has also expressed distaste with the terms realistic and cartoony, preferring the terms literal and freestyle, respectively.\n\nScott McCloud has created \"The Big Triangle\" as a tool for thinking about comics art. He places the realistic representation in the bottom left corner, with iconic representation, or cartoony art, in the bottom right, and a third identifier, abstraction of image, at the apex of the triangle. This allows placement and grouping of artists by triangulation.\n* The cartoony style uses comic effects and a variation of line widths for expression. Characters tend to have rounded, simplified anatomy. Noted exponents of this style are Carl Barks and Jeff Smith.\n* The realistic style, also referred to as the adventure style is the one developed for use within the adventure strips of the 1930s. They required a less cartoony look, focusing more on realistic anatomy and shapes, and used the illustrations found in pulp magazines as a basis. This style became the basis of the superhero comic book style, since Joe Shuster and Jerry Siegel originally worked Superman up for publication as an adventure strip. \n\nMcCloud also notes that in several traditions, there is a tendency to have the main characters drawn rather simplistic and cartoony, while the backgrounds and environment are depicted realistically. Thus, he argues, the reader easily identifies with the characters, (as they are similar to one's idea of self), whilst being immersed into a world, that's three-dimensional and textured. Good examples of this phenomenon include Hergé's The Adventures of Tintin (in his \"personal trademark\" Ligne claire style), Will Eisner's Spirit and Osamu Tezuka's Buddha, among many others.\n\nTools\n\nArtists use a variety of pencils, paper, typically Bristol board, and a waterproof ink. When inking, many artists preferred to use a Winsor & Newton Series 7, #3 brush as the main tool, which could be used in conjunction with other brushes, dip pens, a fountain pen, and/or a variety of technical pens or markers. Mechanical tints can be employed to add grey tone to an image. An artist might paint with acrylics, gouache, poster paints, or watercolors. Color can also be achieved through crayons, pastels or colored pencils.\n\nEraser, rulers, templates, set squares and a T-square assist in creating lines and shapes. A drawing table provides an angled work surface with lamps sometimes attached to the table. A light box allows an artist to trace his pencil work when inking, allowing for a looser finish. Knives and scalpels fill a variety of needs, including cutting board or scraping off mistakes. A cutting mat aids paper trimming. Process white is a thick opaque white material for covering mistakes. Adhesives and tapes help composite an image from different sources.", "Calvin and Hobbes is a daily comic strip by American cartoonist Bill Watterson that was syndicated from November 18, 1985 to December 31, 1995. Commonly cited as \"the last great newspaper comic,\" Calvin and Hobbes has evinced broad and enduring popularity, influence, and academic interest.\n\nCalvin and Hobbes follows the humorous antics of Calvin, a precocious, mischievous, and adventurous six-year-old boy, and Hobbes, his sardonic stuffed tiger. The pair is named after John Calvin, a 16th-century French Reformation theologian, and Thomas Hobbes, a 17th-century English political philosopher. Set in the contemporary, suburban United States, the strip depicts Calvin's frequent flights of fancy and his friendship with Hobbes. It also examines Calvin's relationships with family and classmates, especially the love/hate relationship between him and his classmate, Susie Derkins. Hobbes' dual nature is a defining motif for the strip: to Calvin, Hobbes is a live anthropomorphic tiger; all the other characters see Hobbes as an inanimate stuffed toy. Though the series does not mention specific political figures or current events, it does explore broad issues like environmentalism, public education, philosophical quandaries, and the flaws of opinion polls. \n\nAt the height of its popularity, Calvin and Hobbes was featured in over 2,400 newspapers worldwide. In 2010, reruns of the strip appeared in more than 50 countries, and nearly 45 million copies of the Calvin and Hobbes books had been sold.\n\nHistory\n\nCalvin and Hobbes was conceived when Bill Watterson, working in an advertising job he detested, began devoting his spare time to cartooning, his true love. He explored various strip ideas but all were rejected by the syndicates. United Feature Syndicate finally responded positively to one strip called Critturs, which featured a side character (the main character's little brother) who had a stuffed tiger. Told that these characters were the strongest, Watterson began a new strip centered on them. Though United Feature rejected the new strip, Universal Press Syndicate eventually took it. \n\nThe first strip was published on November 18, 1985, and the series quickly became a hit. Within a year of syndication, the strip was published in roughly 250 newspapers. Before long the strip was in wide circulation outside the United States. By April 5, 1987, Watterson and his work were featured in an article in The Los Angeles Times. Calvin and Hobbes twice earned Watterson the Reuben Award from the National Cartoonists Society in the Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year category, first in 1986 and again in 1988. He was nominated again in 1992. The Society awarded him the Humor Comic Strip Award for 1988. Calvin and Hobbes has also won several more awards.\n\nWatterson took two extended breaks from writing new strips, from May 5, 1991, to February 1, 1992, and from April 3 through December 31, 1994.\nIn 1995, Watterson sent a letter via his syndicate to all editors whose newspapers carried his strip:\n\nThe final strip ran on Sunday, December 31, 1995. It depicted Calvin and Hobbes outside in freshly fallen snow, reveling in the wonder and excitement of the winter scene. \"It's a magical world, Hobbes, ol' buddy... Let's go exploring!\" Calvin exclaims as they zoom off over the snowy hills on their sled, leaving, according to one critic ten years later, \"a hole in the comics page that no strip has been able to fill.\" \n\nSyndication and formatting\n\nFrom the outset, Watterson found himself at odds with the syndicate, which urged him to begin merchandising the characters and touring the country to promote the first collections of comic strips. Watterson refused. To him, the integrity of the strip and its artist would be undermined by commercialization, which he saw as a major negative influence in the world of cartoon art. \n\nWatterson also grew increasingly frustrated by the gradual shrinking of available space for comics in the newspapers. He lamented that without space for anything more than simple dialogue or sparse artwork, comics as an art form were becoming dilute, bland, and unoriginal. Watterson strove for a full-page version of his strip, in contrast to the few cells allocated for most strips. He longed for the artistic freedom allotted to classic strips such as Little Nemo and Krazy Kat, and he gave a sample of what could be accomplished with such liberty in the opening pages of the Sunday strip compilation, The Calvin and Hobbes Lazy Sunday Book. \n\nDuring Watterson's first sabbatical from the strip, Universal Press Syndicate continued to charge newspapers full price to re-run old Calvin and Hobbes strips. Few editors approved of the move, but the strip was so popular that they had little choice but to continue to run it for fear that competing newspapers might pick it up and draw its fans away. \n\nUpon Watterson's return, Universal Press announced that Watterson had decided to sell his Sunday strip as an unbreakable half of a newspaper or tabloid page. Many editors and even a few cartoonists criticized him for what they perceived as arrogance and an unwillingness to abide by the normal practices of the cartoon business. Watterson had negotiated the deal to allow himself more creative freedom in the Sunday comics:\n\nI took a sabbatical after resolving a long and emotionally draining fight to prevent Calvin and Hobbes from being merchandised. Looking for a way to rekindle my enthusiasm for the duration of a new contract term, I proposed a redesigned Sunday format that would permit more panel flexibility. To my surprise and delight, Universal responded with an offer to market the strip as an unbreakable half page (more space than I'd dared to ask for), despite the expected resistance of editors.\n\nTo this day, my syndicate assures me that some editors liked the new format, appreciated the difference, and were happy to run the larger strip, but I think it's fair to say that this was not the most common reaction. The syndicate had warned me to prepare for numerous cancellations of the Sunday feature, but after a few weeks of dealing with howling, purple-faced editors, the syndicate suggested that papers could reduce the strip to the size tabloid newspapers used for their smaller sheets of paper. ... I focused on the bright side: I had complete freedom of design and there were virtually no cancellations.\n\nFor all the yelling and screaming by outraged editors, I remain convinced that the larger Sunday strip gave newspapers a better product and made the comics section more fun for readers. Comics are a visual medium. A strip with a lot of drawing can be exciting and add some variety. Proud as I am that I was able to draw a larger strip, I don't expect to see it happen again any time soon. In the newspaper business, space is money, and I suspect most editors would still say that the difference is not worth the cost. Sadly, the situation is a vicious circle: because there's no room for better artwork, the comics are simply drawn; because they're simply drawn, why should they have more room? \n\nAnimation\n\nWatterson did consider allowing Calvin and Hobbes to be animated, and has expressed admiration for the art form of animation. In a 1989 interview in The Comics Journal he said:\n\nAfter this he was asked if it was \"a bit scary to think of hearing Calvin's voice.\" He responded that it was \"very scary,\" and that although he loved the visual possibilities of animation, the thought of casting voice actors to play his characters was uncomfortable. He was also unsure whether he wanted to work with an animation team, as he had done all previous work by himself. Ultimately, Calvin and Hobbes was never made into an animated series. Watterson later stated in The Calvin and Hobbes Tenth Anniversary Book that he liked the fact that his strip was a \"low-tech, one-man operation,\" and took great pride in the fact that he drew every line and wrote every word on his own. \n\nMerchandising\n\nBill Watterson insists that cartoon strips should stand on their own as an art form, and has resisted the use of Calvin and Hobbes in merchandising of any sort. Watterson explained in a 2005 press release:\n\nAlmost no legitimate Calvin and Hobbes merchandise exists outside the book collections. Exceptions produced during the strip's original run include two 16-month calendars (1988–1989 and 1989–1990), and the textbook Teaching with Calvin and Hobbes, which has been described as \"perhaps the most difficult piece of official Calvin and Hobbes memorabilia to find.\" \n\nOn July 16, 2010, the United States Postal Service released a set of postage stamps honoring five comic strips, one of them Calvin and Hobbes.\n\nUclick, the digital division of Andrews McMeel Universal, offers licensed prints of Calvin and Hobbes strips through its website. \n\nThe strip's immense popularity has led to the appearance of various counterfeit items such as window decals and T-shirts that often feature crude humor, binge drinking and other themes that are not found in Watterson's work. Images from one strip in which Calvin and Hobbes dance to loud music at night were commonly used for copyright violations. After threat of a lawsuit alleging infringement of copyright and trademark, some sticker makers replaced Calvin with a different boy, while other makers made no changes. Watterson wryly commented, \"I clearly miscalculated how popular it would be to show Calvin urinating on a Ford logo.\"\n\nStyle and influences\n\nThe strip borrows several elements and themes from three major influences: Walt Kelly's Pogo, George Herriman's Krazy Kat, and Charles M. Schulz's Peanuts. Schulz and Kelly particularly influenced Watterson's outlook on comics during his formative years.\n\nNotable elements of Watterson's artistic style are his characters' diverse and often exaggerated expressions (particularly those of Calvin), elaborate and bizarre backgrounds for Calvin's flights of imagination, expressions of motion, and frequent visual jokes and metaphors. In the later years of the strip, with more panel space available for his use, Watterson experimented more freely with different panel layouts, art styles, stories without dialogue, and greater use of whitespace. He also makes a point of not showing certain things explicitly: the \"Noodle Incident\" and the children's book Hamster Huey and the Gooey Kablooie are left to the reader's imagination, where Watterson was sure they would be \"more outrageous\" than he could portray. \n\nWatterson's technique started with minimalist pencil sketches drawn with a light pencil (though the larger Sunday strips often required more elaborate work) on a piece of Bristol board, with his brand of choice being Strathmore because he felt it held the drawings better on the page as opposed to the cheaper brands (Watterson said he would use any cheap pad of Bristol board his local supply store had, but switched to Strathmore after he found himself growing more and more displeased with the results). He would then use a small sable brush and India ink to fill in the rest of the drawing, saying that he did not want to simply trace over his penciling and thus make the inking more spontaneous. He lettered dialogue with a Rapidograph fountain pen, and he used a crowquill pen for odds and ends. Mistakes were covered with various forms of correction fluid, including the type used on typewriters. Watterson was careful in his use of color, often spending a great deal of time in choosing the right colors to employ for the weekly Sunday strip; his technique was to cut the color tabs the syndicate sent him into individual squares, lay out the colors, and then paint a watercolor approximation of the strip on tracing paper over the Bristol board and then mark the strip accordingly before sending it on. When Calvin and Hobbes began there were 64 colors available for the Sunday strips. For the later Sunday strips Watterson had 125 colors as well as the ability to fade the colors into each other.\n\nArt and academia\n\nWatterson used the strip to poke fun at the art world, principally through Calvin's unconventional creations of snowmen but also through other expressions of childhood art. When Miss Wormwood complains that he is wasting class time drawing impossible things (a Stegosaurus in a rocket ship, for example), Calvin proclaims himself \"on the cutting edge of the avant-garde.\" He begins exploring the medium of snow when a warm day melts his snowman. His next sculpture \"speaks to the horror of our own mortality, inviting the viewer to contemplate the evanescence of life.\" In later strips, Calvin's creative instincts diversify to include sidewalk drawings (or, as he terms them, examples of \"suburban postmodernism\").\n\nWatterson also lampooned the academic world. In one example, Calvin carefully crafts an \"artist's statement,\" claiming that such essays convey more messages than artworks themselves ever do (Hobbes blandly notes, \"You misspelled Weltanschauung\"). He indulges in what Watterson calls \"pop psychobabble\" to justify his destructive rampages and shift blame to his parents, citing \"toxic codependency.\" In one instance, he pens a book report based on the theory that the purpose of academic writing is to \"inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning, and inhibit clarity,\" entitled The Dynamics of Interbeing and Monological Imperatives in Dick and Jane: A Study in Psychic Transrelational Gender Modes. Displaying his creation to Hobbes, he remarks, \"Academia, here I come!\" Watterson explains that he adapted this jargon (and similar examples from several other strips) from an actual book of art criticism. \n\nOverall, Watterson's satirical essays serve to attack both sides, criticizing both the commercial mainstream and the artists who are supposed to be \"outside\" it. Not long after he began drawing his \"Dinosaurs in Rocket Ships\" series, Calvin tells Hobbes:\n\nThe strip for Sunday, June 21, 1992, criticized the naming of The Big Bang theory as not evocative of the wonders behind it, and coined the term \"Horrendous Space Kablooie\", an alternative that achieved some informal popularity among scientists and was often shortened to \"the HSK.\" The term has also been referred to in newspapers, books, and university courses. \n\nMain characters\n\nCalvin\n\nCalvin, named after the 16th-century theologian John Calvin, is a six-year-old, whose last name is never mentioned in the strip. Despite his poor grades in school, Calvin demonstrates his intelligence through his sophisticated vocabulary and a philosophical mind:\n\nHe commonly wears his distinctive red-and-black striped shirt, black pants, and white-and-magenta sneakers. He also wears a light blue jacket when going to school or when playing in the snow. He is an enthusiastic reader of comic books and has a tendency to order items marketed in comic books or on boxes of his favorite cereal, Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs. Watterson described Calvin:\n\nCalvin also has a sensitive side as well. This is displayed, for example, when he finds a dying raccoon and tries to save it but fails. The scene is made even more poignant by Calvin asking Hobbes not to \"go anywhere\" while Hobbes hugs him and promises him he won't.\n\nHobbes\n\nFrom Calvin's point of view, Hobbes is an anthropomorphic tiger, much larger than Calvin and full of independent attitudes and ideas. When the perspective shifts to any other character, readers again see merely a stuffed animal, usually seated at an off-kilter angle and blankly staring into space. Watterson explains:\n\n In more than one strip, Hobbes is shown being washed in a washing machine, a fact Calvin takes in stride and which Watterson has referred to as \"one of the stranger blurrings of what Hobbes is.\"\n\nHobbes is named after the 17th-century philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who held what Watterson describes as \"a dim view of human nature.\" Hobbes (the tiger) is much more rational and aware of consequences than Calvin, but seldom interferes with Calvin's troublemaking beyond a few oblique warnings. Hobbes is sarcastic when Calvin is being hypocritical about things he dislikes. \n\nAlthough the debut strip shows Calvin capturing Hobbes by means of a snare (with a tuna sandwich as the bait), a later comic (August 1, 1989) indicates that Hobbes has been with Calvin since Calvin was a baby:\n\nAnother later strip featured Hobbes humorously claiming that Calvin's mom \"wanted another tiger \" instead of Calvin, indicating that Hobbes was around before Calvin was born. Watterson eventually decided that it was not important to establish how Calvin and Hobbes met.\n\nCalvin's parents\n\nCalvin's unnamed mother and father are typical middle-class parents. Like many other characters in the strip, they are relatively down-to-earth and their sensible attitudes serve as a foil for Calvin's outlandish behavior.\n\nWatterson says some fans were angered by the way Calvin's parents thought of Calvin. This is shown by the fact that Calvin's father claimed that he wanted a dachshund instead of Calvin, and often tries to \"deny\" that Calvin is his biological son:\n\nCalvin's parents are not above some outrageous behavior of their own. For example, Calvin asks for a cigarette and his mother gives him one to teach him a lesson. Calvin's father tells Calvin sarcastic lies when asked a straight question, and Calvin often believes them:\n\nWatterson defends what Calvin's parents do, remarking that in the case of parenting a kid like Calvin, \"I think they do a better job than I would.\" Calvin's father is overly concerned with \"character building\" activities in a number of strips, either in the things he makes Calvin do or in the masochistic eccentricities of his own lifestyle. For example, Calvin's father is shown coming home from an early morning run in the snow, which he follows with a bowl of plain oatmeal. \n\nCalvin's father is a patent attorney (like Watterson's own father) and his mother is a stay-at-home mom. Both remain unnamed except as \"Mom\" and \"Dad,\" or pet names such as \"honey\" and \"dear\" between themselves. Watterson says, \"As far as the strip is concerned, they are important only as Calvin's mom and dad.\"\n\nCalvin's father has a brother named Max, who lives out of state. Watterson introduced him in a week of strips but said he later regretted the idea. Although Watterson said the idea of having Max in the strip was to set up potential future storylines, he realized that his intent to have the parents remain nameless worked against him because Max could not refer to either one by name. This was cited as one of the main reasons Max never reappeared.\n\nSusie Derkins\n\nSusie Derkins, the only important character with both a first and last name, is a classmate of Calvin's who lives on his street. Getting her last name from the pet beagle of Watterson's wife's family, she appeared early in the strip as a new student in Calvin's class. She is polite and studious, and likes to play house or host tea parties with her stuffed animals. However, she is also depicted playing imaginary games with Calvin in which she is a high-powered lawyer or politician and he is her househusband. Though both of them hate to admit it, Calvin and Susie have quite a bit in common. For example, Susie is shown on occasion with a stuffed bunny rabbit named \"Mr. Bun.\" Susie also has a mischievous (and sometimes aggressive) streak, which can be seen when she subverts Calvin's attempts to cheat on school tests by feeding him incorrect answers, or clobbers Calvin when he attacks her with snowballs. Susie also regularly bests Calvin in confrontations such as their water balloon and snowball fights, employing guile or force. Hobbes often openly expresses romantic feelings for Susie, much to Calvin's disgust. Calvin starts a \"club\" (of which he and Hobbes are the only members) that he calls G.R.O.S.S. (Get Rid Of Slimy GirlS), and while holding \"meetings\" in Calvin's treehouse or in the \"box of secrecy\" in Calvin's room, they usually come up with some way to annoy or socially maim Susie, most of which backfire on them completely. In one instance, Calvin steals one of Susie's dolls for ransom, only to have Susie retaliate by nabbing Hobbes. Watterson admits that Calvin and Susie have a nascent crush on each other, and that Susie is inspired by the type of woman whom Watterson himself found attractive and eventually married.\n\nSecondary characters\n\nCalvin also interacts with a handful of secondary characters. These include his babysitter, the school bully, his school teacher and the school principal.\n\nRosalyn\n\nRosalyn is Calvin's babysitter. She takes advantage of his parents' desperation to leave the house and the fact that no one else will babysit for Calvin by demanding advances and raises. She is also probably the only character in the strip whom Calvin really fears, as she does not mince words or actions to get Calvin to behave or go to bed on time. Watterson put her in a Sunday strip early on, never thinking of her as a regular character. But Rosalyn's intimidation of Calvin surprised Watterson, so she came back several times. At one point she was Calvin's swimming instructor, though he was only shown to attend one lesson. In Rosalyn's last story, she is revealed to have in common with Calvin a sense of imagination, and the two of them play Calvinball with Hobbes.\n\nMoe\n\nMoe is, according to Calvin, a \"six-year-old who shaves\" and a stereotypical bully who picks on Calvin (both physically and emotionally) and calls him names. Moe is the only regular character whose speech is shown in an unusual font as his frequently monosyllabic dialogue is shown in crude, lower-case letters. Watterson describes Moe as \"every jerk I've ever known.\"\n\nMiss Wormwood\n\nMiss Wormwood is Calvin's world-weary teacher, named after the junior devil in C. S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters. She usually wears either a polka-dotted dress or a brown dress, and is another character who serves as a foil to Calvin's mischief. Calvin, when in his Spaceman Spiff persona, sees Miss Wormwood as a slimy, often dictatorial alien. Calvin refers to Miss Wormwood's indigestion (\"It's really gross how she drinks Maalox straight from the bottle\"), her medication (\"I wonder if her doctor knows she mixes all those prescriptions\") and her smoking habit (\"Rumor has it she's up to two packs a day, unfiltered\"). Miss Wormwood reacts to Calvin's behavior by tightly shutting her eyes and thinking \"Five years until retirement\" repeatedly. Watterson describes her as \"an unhappy person\" due to her belief in the value of education. \n\nMr. Spittle\n\nMr. Spittle is the school principal to whose office Miss Wormwood threatens to send Calvin for his pranks. Susie also occasionally accompanies Calvin to the principal's office. Though his name has only been shown in one story, he has appeared many times including the first story about Calvin's duplicator.\n\nUncle Max\n\nUncle Max is Calvin's paternal uncle. Uncle Max was originally meant as a character who could increase the possibilities of the strip: as Watterson noted, \"Calvin could go visit Uncle Max...\". However, Watterson dropped the character after finding it was awkward that Max could not address Calvin's parents by name, and realizing that Max was redundant as far as the strip's personality goes. \n\nRecurring elements\n\nThere are many recurring gags in the strip, some in \"reality\" and others in Calvin's imagination. These are as follows:\n\nCalvin's roles\n\nCalvin imagines himself as a great many things, including dinosaurs, elephants, jungle-farers and superheroes. Three of his alter egos are well-defined and recurrent:\n\n* \"Spaceman Spiff\" is a heroic spacefarer who narrates his experiences in the third person. As Spiff, Calvin battles aliens (typically his parents or teacher, but also sometimes other kids his age) with a ray gun known as a \"zorcher\" (later \"frap-ray blaster\", \"death ray blaster\" or \"atomic napalm neutralizer\") and travels to distant planets (his house, school, or neighborhood), often crashing unhurt on a planet. Calvin's self-narration as Spaceman Spiff is frequently riddled with alliteration: \"Zounds! Zorched by Zarches, Spaceman Spiff's crippled craft crashes on planet Plootarg!\"\n* \"Tracer Bullet\" is a hardboiled private eye, who says he has eight slugs in him (\"One's lead, and the rest are bourbon.\"). In one story, Bullet is called to a case in which a \"pushy dame\" (Calvin's mother) accuses him of destroying an expensive lamp (broken during an indoor football game between Calvin and Hobbes). Later, he is snatched by the pushy dame's \"hired goon\" (Calvin's father having a talk with him). He made his debut when Calvin donned a fedora to hide a haircut Hobbes had given him. These strips are drawn in elaborate, shadowy black-and-white that evoke film noir. Watterson did not attempt Tracer Bullet stories often, due the time-consuming way the strip needed to be drawn and inked. \n* As \"Stupendous Man\" he pictures himself as a superhero in disguise, wearing a mask and a cape made by his mother, and narrating his own adventures. While in character as Stupendous Man, he refers to his alter ego as a mild-mannered millionaire playboy. Stupendous Man almost always \"suffers defeat\" at the hands of his opponent. When Hobbes asks if Stupendous Man has ever won any battles, Calvin says all his battles are \"moral victories.\" Stupendous Man's nemeses include \"Mom-Lady\" (Calvin's mom), \"Annoying Girl\" (Susie Derkins), \"Crab Teacher\" (Miss Wormwood), and \"Baby-Sitter Girl\" (Rosalyn). Some of the \"super powers\" of the villains have been revealed: Mom-Lady has a \"mind scrambling eyeball ray\" that wills the victim to \"do her nefarious bidding,\" and Baby Sitter Girl has a similar power of using a \"psycho beam\" which weakens \"Stupendous Man's stupendous will\". The \"powers\" of Annoying Girl and Crab Teacher are unknown. Calvin often tries to pretend he and \"Stupendous Man\" are two different people, but it never seems to work. Stupendous Man has multiple \"superpowers\", including, but not limited to, super strength, the ability to fly, various vision powers (such as \"high-speed vision\") and a stomach of steel.\n\nCardboard boxes\n\nCalvin has had several adventures involving corrugated cardboard boxes, which he adapts for many different uses. In one strip, during which Calvin shows off his Transmogrifier, a device that transforms its user into any desired shape, Hobbes remarks, \"It's amazing what they do with corrugated cardboard these days.\" Calvin is able to change the function of the boxes by rewriting the label and flipping the box onto another side. In this way, a cardboard box can be used not only for its conventional purposes (a storage container for water balloons, for example), but also as a flying time machine, a duplicator or, with the attachment of a few wires and a colander, a \"Cerebral Enhance-o-tron.\"\n\nIn addition, Calvin uses a cardboard box as a desk when he is attempting to sell things. Often, Calvin's merchandise is something that no one would want, such as \"suicide drink\", \"a swift kick in the butt\" for one dollar, or a \"frank appraisal of your looks\" for fifty cents. In one strip, he sells \"happiness\" for ten cents; if one bought it, Calvin hit the person in the face with a water balloon, then revealed that he meant his own happiness. In another strip, he sold \"insurance\", firing a slingshot at those who refused to buy it. In some strips, he tried to sell \"great ideas\", and in one earlier strip, he attempted to sell the family car to obtain money for a grenade launcher. In yet another strip, he sells \"life\" for five cents, where the customer receives nothing in return, which, in Calvin's opinion, is life.\n\nThe box has also functioned as a secret meeting place for G.R.O.S.S., as the \"Box of Secrecy\".\n\nCalvinball\n\nCalvinball is a game played by Calvin and Hobbes as a rebellion against organized team sports; according to Hobbes, \"No sport is less organized than Calvinball!\" Calvinball was first introduced to the readers at the end of a 1990 storyline involving Calvin reluctantly joining recess baseball. It quickly became a staple of the comic afterwards.\n\nThe only hint at the true creation of the game ironically comes from the last Calvinball strip, in which a game of football quickly devolves into a game of Calvinball. Calvin remarks that \"sooner or later, all our games turn into Calvinball\", suggesting a similar scenario that directly led to the creation of the sport. Calvin and Hobbes usually play by themselves, although in one storyline Rosalyn (Calvin's baby-sitter) plays in return for Calvin doing his homework, and plays very well once she realizes that the rules are made up on the spot. \n\nThe only consistent rule states that Calvinball may never be played with the same rules twice. Scoring is also arbitrary, with Hobbes at times reporting scores of \"Q to 12\" and \"oogy to boogy\". The only recognizable sports Calvinball resembles are the ones it emulates (i.e., a cross between croquet, polo, badminton, capture the flag, and volleyball). Equipment includes a volleyball (the eponymous \"Calvinball\"), a croquet set, a badminton set, assorted flags, bags, signs, a hobby horse, and enigmatic and never-pictured \"time-fracture wickets\". Other things appear as needed, such as a bucket of ice-cold water, a water balloon, and various songs and poetry. Players also wear masks resembling blindfolds with holes for the eyes. When Rosalyn asks Calvin the reason for the requirement, Calvin responds: \"Sorry, no one's allowed to question the masks.\" When asked how to play, Watterson states: \"It's pretty simple: you make up the rules as you go.\" Calvinball is a nomic or self-modifying game, a contest of wits, skill and creativity rather than stamina or athletic skill, in which Hobbes (and on one occasion, Rosalyn) usually outwits Calvin, who takes it in stride, in contrast to his otherwise poor sportsmanship.\n\nSnow sculptures\n\nCalvin often creates horrendous/dark humor scenes with his snowmen. He uses the snowman for social commentary, revenge, or pure enjoyment. Examples include Snowman Calvin being yelled at by Snowman Dad to shovel the snow; one snowman eating snow cones taken from a second snowman, who is lying on the ground with an ice-cream scoop in his back; a snowman house of horror; and snowmen representing the people he hates. \"The ones I really hate are small, so they'll melt faster,\" he says. There was even an occasion on which Calvin accidentally brought a snowman to life and it made itself and a small army into \"deranged mutant killer monster snow goons.\"\n\nCalvin's snow art is often used as a commentary on art in general. For example, Calvin has complained more than once about the lack of originality in other people's snow art and compared it with his own grotesque snow sculptures. In one of these instances, Calvin and Hobbes claim to be the sole guardians of high culture; in another, Hobbes admires Calvin's willingness to put artistic integrity above marketability, causing Calvin to reconsider and make an ordinary snowman.\n\nWagon and sled\n\nCalvin and Hobbes frequently ride downhill in a wagon, sled, or toboggan, depending on the season, as a device to add some physical comedy to the strip and because, according to Watterson, \"it's a lot more interesting ... than talking heads.\" While the ride is sometimes the focus of the strip, it also frequently serves as a counterpoint or visual metaphor while Calvin ponders the meaning of life, death, God, philosophy or a variety of other weighty subjects. Many of their rides end in spectacular crashes which leave them battered and broken, a fact which convinces Hobbes to sometimes hop off before a ride even begins. In the final strip, Calvin and Hobbes depart on their toboggan to go exploring. This theme is similar (perhaps even homage) to scenarios in Walt Kelly's Pogo.\n\nG.R.O.S.S.\n\nG.R.O.S.S., which stands for Get Rid Of Slimy GirlS, is a club which consists of only two members: Calvin and Hobbes. The club was founded in the garage of their house. To clear space for its activities, Calvin and (purportedly) Hobbes push Calvin's parents' car, causing it to roll into a ditch (but not suffer damage); the incident necessitates changing the club's location to Calvin's treehouse. They hold meetings to attempt to annoy Susie Derkins. Notable actions include planting a fake secret tape near her in attempt to draw her in to a trap, trapping her in a closet at their house, and creating elaborate water balloon traps. Calvin gave himself and Hobbes important positions in the club, Calvin being \"Dictator-for-Life\" and Hobbes being \"President-and-First-Tiger\". They go into Calvin's treehouse for their club meetings and often get into fights during them. The password to get into the treehouse is intentionally long and difficult, which has on at least one occasion ruined Calvin's plans. (Because Hobbes can climb the tree without the rope, he got to think up the password, which heaps praise upon tigers.) An example of this can be seen in the comic strip where Calvin, rushing to get into the treehouse to throw things at a passing Susie Derkins, insults Hobbes, who is in the treehouse and thus has to let down the rope. Hobbes forces Calvin to say the password for insulting him. By the time Susie arrives, in time to hear Calvin saying some of the password, causing him to stumble, Calvin is on \"Verse Seven: Tigers are perfect!/The E-pit-o-me/of good looks and grace/and quiet..uh..um..dignity\". The opportunity to pelt Susie with something having passed, Calvin threatens to turn Hobbes into a rug. G.R.O.S.S. is one of the most common adventures that Calvin has.\n\nBooks\n\nThere are 18 Calvin and Hobbes books, published from 1987 to 1997. These include 11 collections, which form a complete archive of the newspaper strips, except for a single daily strip from November 25, 1985. (The collections do contain a strip for this date, but it is not the same strip that appeared in some newspapers. Treasuries usually combine the two preceding collections with bonus material and include color reprints of Sunday comics.)\n\nWatterson included some new material in the treasuries. In The Essential Calvin and Hobbes, which includes cartoons from the collections Calvin and Hobbes and Something Under the Bed Is Drooling, the back cover features a scene of a giant Calvin rampaging through a town. The scene is based on Watterson's home town of Chagrin Falls, Ohio, and Calvin is holding the Chagrin Falls Popcorn Shop, an iconic candy and ice cream shop overlooking the town's namesake falls. Several of the treasuries incorporate additional poetry; The Indispensable Calvin and Hobbes book features a set of poems, ranging from just a few lines to an entire page, that cover topics such as Calvin's mother's \"hindsight\" and exploring the woods. In The Essential Calvin and Hobbes, Watterson presents a long poem explaining a night's battle against a monster from Calvin's perspective.\n\nA complete collection of Calvin and Hobbes strips, in three hardcover volumes totaling 1440 pages, was released on October 4, 2005, by Andrews McMeel Publishing. It includes color prints of the art used on paperback covers, the treasuries' extra illustrated stories and poems, and a new introduction by Bill Watterson in which he talks about his inspirations and his story leading up to the publication of the strip. The alternate 1985 strip is still omitted, and two other strips (January 7, 1987, and November 25, 1988) have altered dialogue. A four-volume paperback version was released November 13, 2012.\n\nTo celebrate the release (which coincided with the strip's 20th anniversary and the tenth anniversary of its absence from newspapers), Bill Watterson answered 15 questions submitted by readers. \n\nEarly books were printed in smaller format in black and white. These were later reproduced in twos in color in the \"Treasuries\" (Essential, Authoritative, and Indispensable), except for the contents of Attack of the Deranged Mutant Killer Monster Snow Goons. Those Sunday strips were not reprinted in color until the Complete collection was finally published in 2005.\n\nWatterson claims he named the books the \"Essential, Authoritative, and Indispensable\" because, as he says in The Calvin and Hobbes Tenth Anniversary Book, the books are \"obviously none of these things.\"\n\nTeaching with Calvin and Hobbes\n\nAn officially licensed children's textbook entitled Teaching with Calvin and Hobbes was published in a single print run in Fargo, North Dakota, in 1993. The book, which has been \"highly recommend[ed]\" as a teaching resource, includes five complete Calvin and Hobbes multi-strip story arcs together with lessons and questions to follow, such as:\n\nThe book is rare, sought by collectors, and highly valued. Only eight libraries in the world hold a copy of the book. \n\nAcademic response\n\nIn 1993, paleontologist and paleoartist Gregory S. Paul praised Bill Watterson for the scientific accuracy of the dinosaurs appearing in Calvin and Hobbes. \n\nIn her 1994 book When Toys Come Alive, Lois Rostow Kuznets says that Hobbes serves both as a figure of Calvin's childish fantasy life and as an outlet for the expression of libidinous desires more associated with adults. Kuznets also looks at Calvin's other fantasies, suggesting that they are a second tier of fantasies utilized in places like school where transitional objects such as Hobbes would not be socially acceptable. \n\nPolitical scientist James Q. Wilson, in a paean to Calvin and Hobbes upon Watterson's decision to end the strip in 1995, characterized it as \"our only popular explication of the moral philosophy of Aristotle.\" \n\nAlisa White Coleman analyzed the strip's underlying messages concerning ethics and values in \"'Calvin and Hobbes': A Critique of Society's Values,\" published in the Journal of Mass Media Ethics in 2000.\n\nA collection of original Sunday strips was exhibited at Ohio State University's Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum in 2001. Watterson himself selected the strips and provided his own commentary for the exhibition catalog, which was later published by Andrews McMeel as Calvin and Hobbes: Sunday Pages 1985–1995.\n\nSince the discontinuation of Calvin and Hobbes, individual strips have been licensed for reprint in schoolbooks, including the Christian homeschooling book The Fallacy Detective in 2002, and the university-level philosophy reader Open Questions: Readings for Critical Thinking and Writing in 2005; in the latter, the ethical views of Watterson and his characters Calvin and Hobbes are discussed in relation to the views of professional philosophers. Since 2009, Twitter users have indicated that Calvin and Hobbes strips have appeared in textbooks for subjects in the sciences, social sciences, mathematics, philosophy, and foreign language. \n\nIn a 2009 evaluation of the entire body of Calvin and Hobbes strips using grounded theory methodology, Christijan D. Draper found that: \"Overall, Calvin and Hobbes suggests that meaningful time use is a key attribute of a life well lived,\" and that \"the strip suggests one way to assess the meaning associated with time use is through preemptive retrospection by which a person looks at current experiences through the lens of an anticipated future...\" \n\nJamey Heit's Imagination and Meaning in Calvin and Hobbes, a critical, academic analysis of the strip, was published in 2012. \n\nCalvin and Hobbes strips were again exhibited at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum at Ohio State University in 2014, in an exhibition entitled Exploring Calvin and Hobbes. An exhibition catalog by the same title, which also contained an interview with Watterson conducted by Jenny Robb, the curator of the museum, was published by Andrews McMeel in 2015. \n\nLegacy\n\nYears after its original newspaper run, Calvin and Hobbes has continued to exert influence in entertainment, art, and fandom. \n\nIn television, Calvin and Hobbes are depicted in stop motion animation in the 2006 Robot Chicken episode \"Lust for Puppets,\" and in traditional animation in the 2009 Family Guy episode \"Not All Dogs Go to Heaven.\" In the 2013 Community episode \"Paranormal Parentage,\" the characters Abed Nadir (Danny Pudi) and Troy Barnes (Donald Glover) dress as Calvin and Hobbes, respectively, for Halloween.\n\nBritish artists, merchandisers, booksellers, and philosophers were interviewed for a 2009 BBC Radio 4 half-hour programme about the abiding popularity of the comic strip, narrated by Phill Jupitus. \n\nThe first book-length study of the strip, Looking for Calvin and Hobbes: The Unconventional Story of Bill Watterson and His Revolutionary Comic Strip by Nevin Martell, was first published in 2009; an expanded edition was published in 2010. The book chronicles Martell's quest to tell the story of Calvin and Hobbes and Watterson through research and interviews with people connected to the cartoonist and his work. The director of the later documentary Dear Mr. Watterson referenced Looking for Calvin and Hobbes in discussing the production of the movie, and Martell appears in the film. \n\nThe American documentary film Dear Mr. Watterson, released in 2013, explores the impact and legacy of Calvin and Hobbes through interviews with authors, curators, historians, and numerous professional cartoonists. \n\nThe enduring significance of Calvin and Hobbes to international cartooning was recognized by the jury of the Angoulême International Comics Festival in 2014 by the awarding of its Grand Prix to Watterson, only the fourth American to ever receive the honor (after Will Eisner, Robert Crumb, and Art Spiegelman). \n\nGrown-up Calvin\n\nA number of artists and cartoonists have created works portraying Calvin as a teenager or an adult; the concept has also inspired writers. \n\nIn 2011, a comic strip appeared by cartoonists Dan and Tom Heyerman called Hobbes and Bacon. The strip depicts Calvin as an adult, married to Susie Derkins, with a young daughter named after philosopher Francis Bacon, to whom Calvin gives Hobbes. Though consisting of only four strips originally, Hobbes and Bacon received considerable attention when it appeared and was continued by other cartoonists and artists. \n\nA novel entitled Calvin by CLA Young Adult Book Award-winning author Martine Leavitt was published in 2015. The story tells of seventeen-year-old Calvin — who was born on the day that Calvin and Hobbes ended, and who has now been diagnosed with schizophrenia — and his hallucination of Hobbes, his childhood stuffed tiger. With his friend Susie, who might also be an hallucination, Calvin sets off to find Bill Watterson, in the hope that the cartoonist can provide aid for Calvin's condition." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Disney_Channel.txt" ], "title": [ "Disney Channel" ], "wiki_context": [ "Disney Channel (originally called The Disney Channel from 1983 to 1997 and commonly shortened to Disney from 1997 to 2002 and stylized as Disney CHANNEL since 2002) is an American basic cable and satellite television network that serves as the flagship property of owner Disney Channels Worldwide, a unit of the Disney–ABC Television Group, itself a unit of the Disney Media Networks division of The Walt Disney Company.\n\nThe channel's programming consists of original first-run television series, theatrically-released and original made-for-cable movies and select other third-party programming. Disney Channel – which formerly operated as a premium service – originally marketed its programs towards families, and then at younger children by the late 1990s. Most of its original programming is aimed at children ages 6-11, while its Disney Junior programs are targeted at younger children ages 2–5. \n\nAs of February 2015, Disney Channel is available to approximately 96.2 million pay television households (82.7% of households with at least one television set) in the United States. \n\nHistory\n\nOrigins\n\nIn early 1977, Walt Disney Productions executive Jim Jimirro brought forth the idea of a cable television network that would feature television and film material from the studio. Since the company was focusing on the development of the Epcot Center at Walt Disney World, Disney chairman Card Walker turned down the proposal. Disney revived the idea in 1982, entering into a partnership with the satellite unit of Group W (which had sold its 50% ownership stake in one of The Disney Channel's early rivals, Showtime, to Viacom around the same time); however, Group W would ultimately drop out of the intended joint venture that September, due to disagreements over the channel's creative control and financial obligations that would have required Group W to pay a 50% share of the channel's start-up costs.\n\nDespite losing Group W as a partner, The Disney Channel continued on with its development – now solely under the oversight of Walt Disney Productions, and under the leadership of the channel's first president Alan Wagner; Walt Disney Productions formally announced the launch of its family-oriented cable channel in early 1983. Disney later invested US$11 million to acquiring space on two transponders of the Hughes Communications satellite Galaxy 1, and spent US$20 million on purchasing and developing programming. The concept of a premium service aimed at a family audience – which Walt Disney Productions would choose to develop The Disney Channel as – had first been attempted by HBO, which launched Take 2 in 1979 (the service, which was HBO's first attempt at a spin-off niche service (predating Cinemax's launch in August 1980), would shut down after only a few months on the air), and was followed by the 1981 launch of the Group W-owned Home Theater Network (which was the only premium channel that strictly competed with The Disney Channel for that demographic for much of the 1980s, until the 1987 launch of Festival).\n\nPremium channel\n\nThe Disney Channel launched nationally as a premium channel on April 18, 1983 at 7:00 a.m. Eastern Time. The first program ever aired on the channel was also its first original series, Good Morning, Mickey!, which showcased classic Disney animated shorts. At the time of its launch, The Disney Channel's programming aired for 16 hours each day, from 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time (comparatively, its competitors HBO, Cinemax, Showtime, The Movie Channel and Spotlight all had been operating on 24-hour programming schedules for a few years at the time). By the fall of 1983, the channel was available to more than 532,000 subscribers in the United States; this total would increase to 611,000 subscribers in December of that year.\n\nFor its subscribers, the channel provided a monthly (and later bi-monthly) program guide/magazine called The Disney Channel Magazine, which in addition to carrying listings for the channel's programming, had also carried feature stories on upcoming programs (the magazine also lent its name to a series of interstitials seen during promotional breaks on the channel that provided behind-the-scenes looks at The Disney Channel's programming). The Disney Channel Magazine ceased publication in early 1997 and was replaced by Behind the Ears (a print magazine which also shared its name with another series of behind-the-scenes interstitials that aired on the channel from 1997 to 2000) as the channel began primarily operating as a commercial-free basic channel. \n\nAs a premium channel, The Disney Channel often ran free previews of five days to one week in length four times annually, as well as two periodic weekend-only previews (with ads targeted to cable and satellite customers who were not subscribers to the channel); this resulted in The Disney Channel offering more preview events each calendar year during its tenure as a pay service than HBO, Cinemax and Showtime had run during that timeframe. In April 1984, the channel extended its daily programming to 18 hours (from 7:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m. Eastern and Pacific Time), with the addition of two hours onto its late night schedule. On December 1, 1986, The Disney Channel began broadcasting 24 hours a day. \n\nBy September 1983, The Disney Channel was available on cable providers in all 50 U.S. states. In October 1983, the channel debuted its first made-for-cable movie, Tiger Town, which earned the channel a CableACE Award. The first classic Disney animated film to be broadcast on the channel, Alice in Wonderland, premiered on the network in January 1984. By January 1985, the channel's programming reached 1.75 million subscribers, at which time the channel had reached profitability.\n\nIn August 1989, the channel launched a series of interstitial segments called The Disney Channel Salutes The American Teacher; the channel subsequently began telecasting the American Teacher Awards in November 1991. By January 1990, The Disney Channel had about five million subscribers nationwide. In May of that year, The Disney Channel won its first Daytime Emmy Awards for the original made-for-cable film Looking for Miracles, the documentary Calgary '88: 16 Days of Glory, and the special A Conversation with... George Burns, as well as its first Peabody Award for the television film Mother Goose Rock 'n' Rhyme.\n\nHybrid premium/basic channel\n\nOn September 1, 1990, TCI's Montgomery, Alabama system became the first cable provider to carry the channel as a basic cable service. In 1991, eight additional cable providers volunteered to move the channel to their expanded basic cable tiers, with the first to make the transition (as a test run) being Jones Intercable's systems in Fort Myers and Broward County, Florida. Other cable providers eventually began moving the channel to their basic tiers, either experimentally or on a full-time basis. Even as major providers such as Cox Communications and Marcus Cable began offering The Disney Channel on their basic tiers, executives for The Walt Disney Company denied that the channel had plans to convert into an ad-supported basic service, stating that the move from premium to basic cable on some systems was part of a five-year \"hybrid\" strategy that allowed providers to offer the channel in either form. \n\nIn 1991, The Disney Channel tested a two-channel multiplex service on two cable systems. HBO, Cinemax and Showtime also launched their own multiplex services that same year, however The Disney Channel would not make its own multiplex service permanent, unlike the others. By 1992, a third of the channel's subscriber base were estimated by Nielsen Media Research to be adults that did not have children; and by 1995, its subscriber base expanded to 15 million cable homes, eight million of which paid an additional monthly fee to receive the channel. \n\nIn March 1992, the channel debuted the original children's program Adventures in Wonderland, a contemporary live-action adaption of Alice in Wonderland (which, in turn, was based on the novel Alice Through the Looking Glass). In September 1992, the channel began carrying the Disney's Young Musicians Symphony Orchestra series of specials, which aired annually until 1998. In honor of its 10th anniversary, the channel embarked on a 14-city nationwide bus tour starting in April 1993. By January 1995, The Disney Channel was available to 12.6 million subscribers; the period from 1994 to 1995 saw the largest yearly subscriber increase with 4.87 million households with cable television adding the channel. In March 1995, the first international Disney Channel service was launched in Taiwan. That year, the documentary Anne Frank Remembered premiered on the channel; that film would earn an Academy Award for Best Documentary in 1996.\n\nIn 1996, veteran cable executive Anne Sweeney was appointed to oversee The Disney Channel as its president; that September as the launch of Disney Channel service in Southeast Asia, the channel began offering a film in primetime each night starting at 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time, with the expansion of the Sunday Magical World of Disney film block to Monday through Saturday nights; the new primetime schedule launched in September with the pay cable premiere of The Lion King. \n\n1997–2002: Transition to basic cable\n\nOn April 6, 1997, The Disney Channel underwent a significant rebranding, shortening its name to just \"Disney Channel\" – though the channel was typically referred to simply as \"Disney\" in on-air promotions and network identifications until September 2002 – and introducing a new logo designed by Lee Hunt Associates (a black Mickey ear-shaped TV set, though with the introduction of a new graphics package for on-air promotions and IDs during the channel's daytime and evening lineup in 2000, the TV's patterning often varied; early versions of the logo featured people and animated characters appearing within the TV set element of the logo such as a 1930s-era Mickey Mouse). The debut of its new on-air look coincided with the cable television premiere of Pocahontas.\n\nThe channel continued to transition from a premium service into a basic cable channel around this time, albeit with a similar programming format to the one it carried as a full-fledged pay service. However, the channel began shifting its target audience more toward kids (but continued to cater to family audiences at night), as it decreased the amount of classic films it aired, and its music programming shifted focus towards the pre-teen and teenage demographic, incorporating music videos and revamping its concert specials to feature younger musicians popular with that demographic.\n\nDisney Channel initially continued to offer free preview events for pay television providers that continued to carry it as a premium service, but discontinued them altogether within three years of the rebrand. Although many providers still required subscribers to pay an additional monthly fee to view the channel at the time of its decision to incorporate them, Disney Channel also began to air break interruptions within shows, featuring promotions for the channel's programs as well as for feature film and home video releases from Disney. By March 1998, the channel was available to 35 million cable subscribers.\n\nThe channel's programming would eventually be split into three distinct blocks: Playhouse Disney, Vault Disney, and Zoog Disney. Playhouse Disney debuted in May 1997, and comprised shows aimed at preschoolers. Its first series to reach wide popularity, Bear in the Big Blue House, made its debut in October 1997 and was named by TV Guide as one of the \"top 10 new shows for kids\". Vault Disney debuted as a Sunday-only nighttime block in September 1997 and featured classic Disney programs such as Zorro, The Mickey Mouse Club and the Walt Disney anthology television series, as well as older television specials and feature films).\n\nZoog Disney was introduced in August 1998, and was the most distinct of the three blocks, compromising Disney Channel Original Series aimed at preteens and teens. The afternoon-to-late evening lineup was hosted by anthropomorphic robot/alien hybrid characters called the \"Zoogs\" (who were originally two-dimensional figures, but were redesigned as cel shaded anime-esque figures and given mature voices in 2001) and was designed to encourage viewer interactivity between television and the Internet. The Zoog Disney brand would later expand, with most of the channel's weekend schedule (outside of Vault Disney and Playhouse Disney) becoming part of the \"Zoog Weekendz\" umbrella block from June 2000 to August 2002.\n\nOriginal programming on Disney Channel began to ramp up during this period starting with the sitcom Flash Forward, and would increase in the following years with shows like The Famous Jett Jackson in 1998 and So Weird in 1999, and into the early 2000s with Lizzie McGuire – whose star Hilary Duff became the first lead actor or actress in one of the channel's original series to cross over into music through a record deal with co-owned music label Hollywood Records – and Even Stevens – which helped launch the career of its star Shia LaBeouf.\n\nIn 1999, Disney Channel placed a mandate to cable operators that continued to carry it as a premium service to move the channel to a basic cable tier or stop carrying it altogether, stipulating that it would not renew carriage agreements with providers (such as Time Warner Cable and Comcast, the last major cable providers to carry the channel as a pay service) that chose to continue offering the network as a premium channel. With the shift towards children as its target audience, some of the off-network programs acquired by the channel during the early-mid 2000s (such as Boy Meets World and later Sister, Sister) began to be edited for content such as profanity and sexual references that were deemed inappropriate for younger audiences.\n\nBy 2001, Disney Channel was available to approximately 70 million cable and satellite subscribers, largely consisting of those who had already received the channel through basic cable, as well as the remnants of its pay subscriber base. The music videos and concert specials that the channel had been airing since the 1997 rebrand were dropped by this time, citing the inability to obtain revenue from the artists' CD sales and lack of exclusivity for the videos; soon after, the channel began featuring music videos from artists signed to Disney's in-house record labels Hollywood Records and Walt Disney Records, and songs featured in Disney-produced feature films. In 2001, the channel debuted its first original animated series, The Proud Family; the following year, Disney Channel achieved its first major animated series hit with the premiere of Kim Possible.\n\n2002–07: Success and changing focus\n\nBy 2002, Disney Channel was available in 80 million cable homes nationwide. In early September of that year, Disney Channel began a gradual rebranding, beginning with the discontinuance of the \"Zoog\" brand from on-air use (though Zoog Disney would continue to exist as a separate website until 2003, when the site's content was consolidated onto Disney Channel's primary website, DisneyChannel.com).\n\nOn September 9, the Vault Disney overnight block was replaced by same-day repeats of the channel's original and acquired programs, primarily to contribute to the network's then-upcoming \"hip\" image. The block's removal resulted in Disney Channel not featuring programs aimed at adults for the first time in its history – with the channel's primetime feature films becoming the only programs that intentionally targeted a broader family audience. , Disney Channel is the only major American cable channel aimed at children that does not directly maintain a dual audience of both kids and adults (Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network each feature nighttime programming for families and/or adults). Movies shown during primetime were also reduced from an average of two to three features to only one each night of the week. The channel phased out reality and scripted drama series from its original programming slate, while substantially increasing the channel's reliance on live-action sitcoms and animated series.\n\nOne month later on October 7, 2002, Disney Channel introduced a new on-air logo designed by CA Square (using an outline of Mickey Mouse's head as its centerpiece) that would later be adopted by its international sister channels in May 2003, and unveiled a new graphical design to fit the network's new look. Moreover, starting in May 2003, the channel began using a series of bumpers that are still used to this day, primarily featuring actors and animated characters from its original programs (and occasionally from Disney's theatrical releases) drawing the channel's logo using a wand (in actuality, a glowstick). Playhouse Disney became the only program block introduced in 1997 to remain on Disney Channel by this point (it was later relaunched as Disney Junior in February 2011). Around this time, Disney Channel's original series began airing as part of corporate sister ABC's Saturday morning children's program block; most of the shows that began airing on the block in 2005 would remain on the network until September 2011, when it was replaced by the Litton Entertainment-produced block Litton's Weekend Adventure.\n\nAnne Sweeney was appointed president of Disney–ABC Television Group in 2004, ultimately helping to remake Disney Channel into \"the major profit driver in the company\" by the middle of the decade as the channel made major inroads in increasing its overall viewership, while in turn using a strategy – which proved successful – to discover, nurture and aggressively cross-promote teen music stars whose style and image were carefully targeted to the pre-teen and teenage demographic (a strategy that has been de-emphasized in the 2010s). Around that time – as Disney Channel's intended target audience began ranging from preschoolers to young adolescents – the channel began to add viewers outside this target demographic, creating increased competition with Viacom-owned Nickelodeon.\n\nIn 2003, Disney Channel premiered its first ever made-for-cable movie musical, The Cheetah Girls, which received a worldwide audience of 84 million viewers. In 2005, That's So Raven (which debuted in January 2003) became the channel's highest-rated series since its transition to basic cable as well as becoming the first original series to run longer than 65 episodes – breaking a highly controversial rule that was implemented in 1998, aimed at limiting increases in production costs for its original programming (the 65-episode rule is no longer enforced, although most series are now usually discontinued after their fourth season at maximum) – Raven eventually became the channel's longest-running original series at 100 episodes and the first to spawn a spin-off series (Cory in the House). The Suite Life of Zack & Cody made its debut in March 2005, and also became a hit for the channel.\n\nThe earlier success of The Cheetah Girls led to the creation of other music-themed original programming: 2006 saw the debut of the hit original movie High School Musical (on January 20) and the series Hannah Montana (on March 24), the latter of which launched the career of its star Miley Cyrus (who starred opposite her father, country singer Billy Ray Cyrus, in the series). On July 28 of that year, the channel saw the debut of the its first multiple-series crossover, That's So Suite Life of Hannah Montana (which involved That's So Raven, The Suite Life of Zack & Cody and Hannah Montana).\n\n2007–12: Continued success\n\nIn 2007, the channel began dropping most of its acquired programs, and also began to incorporate rotating hour-long blocks of its original series and other programs during the daytime hours. It also moved first-run episodes of its original series on weekends from late afternoon/early evening into primetime. In addition, the channel began putting less emphasis on its animated series, moving some of them from primetime to graveyard slots, while substantially increasing its reliance on teen-oriented sitcoms. Despite this, 2007 saw the debut of Phineas and Ferb, the first original animated series (and first long-form original series) to be broadcast in HD.\n\nTwo other series premiered that year: the That's So Raven spin-off Cory in the House (which ended after two seasons) and the more successful Wizards of Waverly Place (which surpassed That's So Raven in October 2011 to become Disney Channel's longest-running original series, and ending its run in January 2012 at 106 episodes). High School Musical 2 premiered on August 17 of that year, becoming the highest-rated non-sports program in the history of basic cable and the highest-rated made-for-cable movie premiere on record (as well as the highest-rated television program – broadcast or cable – of Summer 2007) with 17.2 million viewers. \n\nIn 2008, The Suite Life of Zack & Cody spin-off The Suite Life on Deck (which became the #1 series among children between ages of 6- and 12-years-old in 2008) premiered, along with two more music-based original made-for-TV movies: Camp Rock and The Cheetah Girls: One World. \n\nCapitalizing on the rising star status of the Jonas Brothers and Demi Lovato following Camp Rock, two series respectively starring both acts premiered in 2009: JONAS and Sonny with a Chance (Lovato also co-starred in the original movie Princess Protection Program, which premiered in June). The August debut of the original film Wizards of Waverly Place: The Movie became the highest-rated cable program of 2009 (excluding sporting events), premiering to 11.4 million viewers and ranking as the second highest-rated original movie premiere in Disney Channel's history, behind High School Musical 2. The July 17 premiere of the Wizards/Suite Life on Deck/Hannah Montana crossover special Wizards on Deck with Hannah Montana also beat out its cable and broadcast competition that night with 9.1 million viewers (effectively making the Wizards and On Deck episodes featured in the special the highest-rated episodes of both series at that point).\n\nIn 2010, Good Luck Charlie debuted as Disney Channel's first original sitcom targeted at family audiences, while Fish Hooks and Shake It Up also made their debuts. That year also saw the premiere of Camp Rock 2: The Final Jam among the four original movies premiering that year, along with two made-for-TV movies that were co-produced with Canadian specialty channels (Harriet the Spy: Blog Wars, in conjunction with Movie Central and The Movie Network; and 16 Wishes, with Family Channel). On November 19, 2010, Disney Channel began offering an alternate Spanish-language audio feed (carried either as a separate second audio program track or sold by cable and satellite providers in the form of a separate channel that is part of a Spanish-language programming package). Hannah Montana and The Suite Life on Deck both ended in 2011; Sonny with a Chance, meanwhile, was retooled as So Random! – focusing on the show within the show – after Demi Lovato decided not to return to the series to focus on her music career, following her treatment for bulimia and bipolar disorder (the So Random! spin-off series was canceled after one season in May 2012). Four other series (A.N.T. Farm, PrankStars, Jessie and Austin & Ally) also debuted that year, along with six made for-TV movies (most notably The Suite Life Movie, Lemonade Mouth and Phineas and Ferb the Movie: Across the 2nd Dimension).\n\n2012–present: Current era\n\nIn 2012, Disney Channel ended Nickelodeon's 17-year run as the highest-rated cable channel in the United States, placing its first ever win in total-day viewership among all cable networks as measured by ACNielsen. In June of that year, The Walt Disney Company announced that it would stop advertising or promoting food or beverage products that do not meet strict nutritional guidelines on Disney Channel or its other media properties aimed at children by 2015, purportedly becoming the first media company to take such a stance on stopping the marketing of junk food products to kids (due to its commercial-free format, such advertising appears only in the form of underwriter sponsorships during promotional breaks). \nSince July 1, 2012, Disney Channel now presents an on-screen mark at the beginning of certain programming on their schedule to refer that the program has audio description for visually-impaired, in order to comply with the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010. Certain episodes of Gravity Falls, Austin and Ally, Good Luck Charlie and Phineas and Ferb show the AD))) mark and a 2-tone sound repeated 3 times at the beginning of the episode to notice the audio description track available through the SAP feed. Disney Junior airs the AD)) mark and the intended SAP track on newer episodes of Little Einsteins. ABC airs this mark of the bottom-left corner of the screen and the extra track starting with the season premiere of Modern Family and the series premiere of The Neighbors. \n\nDisney confirmed four original movies for 2012. In January 2012, Disney aired the premiere of the DCOM Frenemies. In February 2012, Disney aired another DCOM - Radio Rebel. In June 2012, Disney aired its third DCOM - Let It Shine along with the premiere of the animated series Gravity Falls. In October 2012, Disney aired the premiere of Dog with a Blog along with the premiere of the DCOM - Girl vs. Monster.\n\nOn July 1, 2012, Disney Channel began providing Descriptive Video Service audio in compliance with the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010, which required network owned-and-operated stations and affiliates in the 25 largest television markets as well as the five highest-rated cable and satellite channels (including Disney Channel) to offer audio descriptions for the blind. On July 14, 2012, Disney Channel announced its first television collaboration with Marvel Entertainment (which was acquired by The Walt Disney Company in 2009), in the form of a crossover special that aired on August 16, 2013 called Phineas and Ferb: Mission Marvel featuring characters from Phineas and Ferb and the Marvel Universe, a new animated series, Wander Over Yonder debuted after that. \n\nIn 2014, Disney Channel premiered two new series – I Didn't Do It, Girl Meets World – and three new DCOMs – Cloud 9, Zapped and How to Build a Better Boy. Zapped was the highest rated movie of the year.\n\nOn February 15 and 16, 2014, Disney Channel announced the future of the animated series airing on the channel at the time; it announced that Gravity Falls and Wander Over Yonder would move to Disney XD but will still air episodes on Disney Channel as part of \"Disney XD on Disney Channel\", and that Phineas and Ferb would go on hiatus, with its production having already been suspended. \n\nOn May 23, 2014, Disney Channel unveiled a new logo and on-air imaging design; first introduced in January 2014 by the then-new, free-to-air Disney Channel service in Germany, the new logo replaces the boxed design of the previous logo with a more compact wordmark, and incorporates the Mickey Mouse imagery as the dot of the \"I\" within the Disney script. Designed in collaboration with Disney Channel and the design agencies Royale and BDA, the overall presentation package was designed so that the network could maintain its iconic \"wand\" IDs (where stars of the network's programs either dotted the \"I\" with a wand or drew out the ears element), and allow such IDs made for the channel's previous on-air imaging to be adapted for use with the new logo – especially in markets where \"new\" episodes of older Disney Channel programs that had concluded their U.S. run were still premiering. \n\nIn 2015, Disney Channel premiered three new series: K.C. Undercover, Best Friends Whenever, and the Jessie spin-off Bunk'd.\n\nFour new DCOMs were also premiered that year: Bad Hair Day, Teen Beach 2, Descendants, and Invisible Sister. Especially among them, Descendants was viewed by 6.6 million people on its premiere night on July 31, 2015 and 10.5 million viewers in Early DVR Playback. Shortly after the premier air date, ratings showed the film was the fifth most watched original movie in cable history. Right after the film finished airing on Disney Channel, it was announced that a CGI-animated short spinoff entitled Descendants: Wicked World would be released in September 18, 2015.[31] Furthermore, former Phineas and Ferb storyboard artist Aliki Theofilopoulos Grafft announced on Twitter that she was directing the series, with Jenni Cook as producer, and that the original cast would be reprising their roles. On July 13, 2016, it was announced the series was renewed for a second season.\n\n2015 also marks the year that several series aired its last episodes. On June 12, 2015, \"Phineas and Ferb\" aired its last episode after 4 seasons. On September 25, 2015, Dog with a Blog aired its last episode after three seasons. Less than a month after, I Didn't Do It and Jessie also aired their last episodes after two and four seasons respectively on October 16, 2015.\n\nOn January 10, 2016, Austin and Ally aired its last two episodes after four seasons.\n\nOn February 14, 2016, during the channel's premiere of the 2013 animated film Frozen, Disney Channel aired a preview of Stuck in the Middle, the first Disney Channel series which all of the main casts are Hispanic. Additional episodes began airing on March 11, 2016.\n\nOn June 24, 2016, Disney Channel premiered its 100th DCOM, Adventures in Babysitting, followed by the premiere of new series, Bizaardvark. Prior to the premiere, Disney Channel aired the \"100th DCOM Celebration\" which began Friday, May 27, 2016 with a four-day marathon of the 51 most popular DCOMs followed by encore presentations of these and every other DCOM ever made through June 2016. The movies would be seen on Disney Channel, the Disney Channel app and VOD through summer 2016.\n\nOn July 22, 2016, Disney premiered an animated series Elena of Avalor which was a spin-off of the Disney Junior series Sofia the First. It marked the first Disney princess that was Hispanic. \n\nThis fall, a television movie titled Elena and the Secret of Avalor is scheduled to premiere. It will explain how Elena was trapped in the magical amulet for decades before being set free by Princess Sofia. \nA Disney Channel Original Movie titled \"The Swap\" is scheduled to premiere. It stars Peyton List and Jacob Bertrand. \n\nProgramming\n\nDisney Channel's schedule currently consists largely of original series aimed at female pre-teens and young teenagers (including live-action series such as K.C. Undercover, Best Friends Whenever, Liv and Maddie, Stuck in the Middle, Girl Meets World, Bizaardvark, and Bunk'd), and series aimed at preschoolers as part of its Disney Junior block (such as Sofia the First, Jake and the Never Land Pirates, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Doc McStuffins, Sheriff Callie's Wild West, Miles from Tomorrowland and The Lion Guard). The channel also airs repeats of former Disney Channel original series (such as The Suite Life on Deck, Good Luck Charlie, Hannah Montana, Wizards of Waverly Place, I Didn't Do It, Dog with a Blog, Jessie, and Austin and Ally), occasional reruns of Disney XD original series part of the \"Disney XD on Disney Channel\" block (such as Lab Rats: Elite Force, Gamer's Guide to Pretty Much Everything, Kirby Buckets, Walk the Prank, Star vs. the Forces of Evil and Star Wars Rebels), original made-for-TV movies, feature films, short-form programs known as \"short shows\" (which air more commonly on the Disney Junior block, and are used primarily to fill predetermined five-minute gaps between programs) and music videos from artists signed to sister companies Hollywood Records and Walt Disney Records as well as songs featured in recent and upcoming Disney feature film releases (full versions of these music videos typically air only during the video's premiere and as filler between programs, while shorter versions usually air during promo breaks during the current program).\n\nDisney Channel essentially operates as a commercial-free channel, opting not to feature traditional commercial advertisements during its in-show breaks due to concerns that younger viewers may be unable to separate the difference between programs and advertisements, and in order to pay a lower license fee rate to broadcast feature films distributed by major movie studios than ad-supported channels would pay – in lieu of running commercials, Disney Channel maintains underwriter sponsorships with major companies such as Best Western and Mattel, in addition to in-house promotions for the channel's programs (and occasionally, programs seen on other Disney-owned channels, most commonly Disney XD and Disney Junior) and Disney entertainment products.\n\nAtypical of most U.S. cable channels, since 2006, Disney Channel's scripted programs (including shows featured on the Disney Junior block) feature additional scenes played over the closing credits. It also has an unwritten requirement that its original live-action series have no more than six regular cast members (So Weird was the last series prior to 2003 to have more than six series regulars within its cast, Shake It Up is the only series since that point to exceed the limit as it had seven contract cast members during its second season in 2012–13); Stuck in the Middle would also go over this limit, with nine main cast members from the beginning. The channel's series tend to have smaller writing staffs compared to scripted series seen on other broadcast and cable networks (usually featuring around four and eight credited staff writers, instead of the eight to 11 writers commonly found on most scripted shows). Its live-action multi-camera series also commonly utilize a simulated film look (the FilmLook processing for such shows debuting between 2003 and 2008; the HD-compatible 'filmizing' technique for all newer and returning original series produced after 2009, which reduce the video frame rate to 24 frames per second).\n\nDuring the 1980s and 1990s, Disney Channel ran classic Disney animated shorts released between the 1930s and 1960s, which were removed from the lineup in 2000; since 2009, repackaged versions of these shorts are seen as part of the short series Re-Micks and Have a Laugh!. The channel later debuted Mickey Mouse, a series of original shorts featuring the classic Disney animated characters including the titular character on June 28, 2013.\n\nMovie library\n\nDisney Channel often broadcasts a movie most nights during the week and occasionally airs films during the daytime hours, however these are not always necessarily telecasts of a theatrically released film. The channel produces original made-for-cable movies called Disney Channel Original Movies (or DCOMs), which are frequently broadcast during primetime hours. Family-oriented made-for-TV movies began airing on the Disney Channel in October 1983 under the brand Disney Channel Premiere Films with the premiere of Tiger Town; the DCOM slate began with the August 1997 premiere of Northern Lights. After that point, the number of DCOMs that debuted each year began to increase – from two in 1997 to a high of twelve in 2000, when the network premiered a new original movie each month during that year, gradually decreasing to the current rate two to four premieres each year.\n\nDisney Channel previously ran double airings of its original movies on the night of their premiere, until the January 2006 premiere of High School Musical; encore presentations of new original movies were also aired during primetime on the Saturday and Sunday after their initial premiere from 2001 (when the channel moved its original movie premieres from Saturdays to Fridays) to 2009, when these encores were reduced to occasional airings on one of the two days, with few exceptions (Camp Rock was the first film not to be encored in this manner). \"Special edition\" airings of its higher-profile original movies are also sometimes aired, including sing-along versions of music-based films (featuring on-screen lyrics for viewers to sing along with the film's songs) and \"What's What\" editions (styled similarly to Pop-Up Video, featuring on-screen pop-up facts about the movie and its stars).\n\nHigh School Musical 2 is currently the most successful DCOM in terms of popularity and accolades, setting a basic cable record for the single most-watched television program, as its August 2007 debut was watched by 17.2 million viewers (counting sports, this record stood until a December 3, 2007 telecast of a New England Patriots-Baltimore Ravens game on corporate sibling ESPN's Monday Night Football, which was watched by 17.5 million viewers). The Cheetah Girls films were also notably successful in terms of merchiandise, and sales for its concert tour and soundtrack albums. The first film in 2003 was the first made-for-TV movie musical in Disney Channel's history, and had a worldwide audience of over 84 million viewers. The second movie was the most successful of the series, bringing in 8.1 million viewers in the U.S. An 86-date concert tour featuring the group was ranked as one of the top 10 concert tours of 2006; the tour broke a record at the Houston Rodeo that was set by Elvis Presley in 1973, selling out with 73,500 tickets sold in three minutes.\n\nIn addition to its made-for-cable films, Disney Channel has rights to theatrically released feature films, with some film rights shared with sister network Freeform. Along with films released by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures (mainly consisting of releases from Walt Disney Pictures, Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar), the channel also maintains rights to films from other studios including Warner Bros. Entertainment, Universal Pictures, Hanna-Barbera, The Weinstein Company, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Lions Gate Entertainment, Rankin/Bass Productions, 20th Century Fox and Paramount Pictures. Some films released by Bagdasarian Productions (such as The Chipmunk Adventure and Alvin and the Chipmunks Meet Frankenstein) have also aired on Disney Channel, although most of them are not presently owned by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures.\n\nFilms made up roughly half of Disney Channel's daily schedule between 1986 and 1998; the number of movies broadcast on the channel have steadily eroded since then, to the point that films now only air Monday through Thursdays in primetime on an inconsistent basis (with episodes of its original series airing on nights when a film is not scheduled), regularly on weekend late nights and , during the daytime hours also on an inconsistent basis.\n\nCadet Kelly, Camp Rock and Wendy Wu: Homecoming Warrior are currently the only Disney Channel Original Movies to have aired on a network outside of the Disney Channel brand domestically (the latter two have aired on sister channel ABC Family, while Cadet Kelly and Camp Rock have also been broadcast on ABC as part of The Wonderful World of Disney).\n\nOn September 13, 2010, Disney Channel began airing theatrical film releases in a letterboxed 4:3 format on the channel's primary standard definition feed, as a widescreen-style format downconverted from the HD feed; although theatrical movies shot with an aspect ratio of 2.35:1 or 2.40:1 are panned and scanned to fit high-definition sets to eliminate screen burn-in on plasma displays. Partly due to the network advertising mainly its own programs in lieu of traditional commercials, films featured on Disney Channel often run short of their allotted time slot with interstitial programming airing to pad out the remainder of the time period (usually an episode of an original series if a film runs approximately 90 to 100 minutes, an 11-minute-long episode of an original animated series for films running 105 minutes or a mix of music videos, network promotions and short segments for films running longer than 105 minutes).\n\nProgramming blocks\n\nCurrent\n\n*Disney Junior – \"Disney Junior\" is a block that features shows targeted at children aged 3–9. which debuted on February 14, 2011; it airs Monday through Fridays from 6:00 a.m.–2:00 p.m. (6:00–10:30 a.m. during the summer months, other designated school break periods and on major holidays) and weekends from 6:00 to 9:00 a.m. Eastern and Pacific Time (the block primarily targets preschoolers as Disney Channel's usual target audience of pre-teens and young adolescents are in school during its designated time period on weekdays). Disney Junior carries one of the few programs on Disney Channel that feature classic Disney characters , Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (the others are the Have a Laugh! and Mickey Mouse shorts that air within and outside of the block). Other programs currently seen in this block include Jake and the Never Land Pirates, Sheriff Callie's Wild West, Sofia the First, Miles from Tomorrowland, The Lion Guard and Doc McStuffins. \n*Weekend evening blocks – Disney Channel airs first-run or recent episodes of its original series over the course of three nights, branded as \"Disney Channel (day of week) Night\", with first-run episodes premiering on Friday and/or Sunday evenings. Friday nights feature a combination of either Bunk'd, Girl Meets World and/or Stuck in the Middle, while Sunday nights feature Liv & Maddie, Best Friends Whenever, Bizaardvark and/or K.C. Undercover. Since October 2010, programming on both night's schedules has been somewhat fluid as while all series have a permanent place on the Friday and Sunday primetime schedules, episode premieres of all Disney Channel original series are subject to rotational scheduling depending on the lineup for that given week; depending on the night, these episode premieres usually air Fridays from 8:00–10:30 p.m., Saturdays from 8:00-11:00 p.m., and Sundays from 7:30–9:00 (or 9:30) p.m. Eastern/Pacific. Saturday nights feature repeats of recent episodes of the channel's original series or an occasional film telecast (the channel made two previous attempts at launching a Saturday night block of first-run programs to compete against Nickelodeon's higher-rated lineup on that night, first from 2007 to 2008 and again briefly during the spring of 2009; the channel would later air new episodes of its Sunday evening series to Saturday night for one week on June 8, 2013, supposedly to compete against the premiere of the Nickelodeon series Sam & Cat). Encores of the respective night's programs typically air between 11:00 p.m. and 2:30 a.m. Eastern/Pacific each night during that weekend.\n*Disney XD on Disney Channel – \"Disney XD on Disney Channel\" is the branding of two blocks airing on Friday and Saturday nights; an animated block airing Fridays from 9:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m., showing series from Disney Television Animation, such as Star vs. the Forces of Evil, and a live-action block airing Saturdays from 10:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m., airing series such as Lab Rats: Elite Force, Gamer's Guide to Pretty Much Everything, Kirby Buckets, and Walk the Prank.\n\nSeasonal\n\n* January/JaNEWary – Disney Channel typically runs new episodes of its original programming each Friday and Sunday evening throughout the month of January; these may occasionally include a premiere of a Disney Channel Original Movie. The block has not been active since 2013.\n* Disney Channel Summer – The network runs programming blocks annually during the summer with differing themes. Since 2011, Disney Channel has branded its summer programming lineup as \"Disney Channel Summer\". Generally most of the network's series run new episodes through the summer and original movies premiere during these months to take advantage of the largest possible children's audience, as do most children's networks. \n* October/Halloween – In October, Disney Channel airs Halloween-themed programming in an annual event, titled \"Monstober\", a brand used each year since 2011. Halloween films such as the Halloweentown series have premiered during this month, along with films such as Twitches (and its sequel Twitches Too), The Scream Team, Mostly Ghostly, Wizards of Waverly Place: The Movie, Avalon High Girl vs. Monster, and Invisible Sister; Halloween episodes of the network's original series also air during the month.\n* December/Christmas/FA-la-la-la-Days – The network's December schedule usually focuses on Christmas programming, with the title of the branding changing every year. Since 2011, Disney Channel has branded its holiday season programming lineup as \"Fa-la-la-lidays\". Christmas films such as the The Christmas Visitor, The Ultimate Christmas Present, 'Twas the Night, Beethoven's Christmas Adventure and Good Luck Charlie, It's Christmas! have premiered during this month, along with Christmas episodes of the network's original series such as Phineas and Ferb Christmas Vacation. A Christmas in July week with encores of Christmas-themed programming is featured during that summer month.\n* New Year's Eve – A New Year's Eve tradition dating back to the Zoog Disney days in 2000, the network airs a marathon from the early evening of December 31 into the early morning of New Year's Day featuring programs, films and moments selected by viewer vote on disneychannel.com, followed by an original series or movie marathon on New Year's Day (no such event occurred in 2011, due to New Year's Eve falling on a Saturday that year), along with heavy promotion of the JaNEWary premieres to come through the first month of the new year.\n\nSpecial weekends\n\n* Out of This World Weekend (Summer of 2014) – a weekend of shows having space themed episodes.\n* Whodunit? Weekend (April 2012 and Summer 2015) – a weekend of shows having mystery themed episodes. This was the first special weekend.\n* Flash Forward Weekend (Summer 2013) – a weekend of shows related to time travel.\n* Freaky Freakend (April 2013) – a weekend of show featuring paranormal themed episodes.\n* April Fuel Week (April 2015) – a week of shows (Mon-Thurs) featuring special episodes.\n* What the What?!? Weekend (April 2014 and April 2015) – a weekend of shows featuring guest stars from other Disney Channel shows; occurs mostly in April.\n\nFormer\n\n*Disney Nighttime – As a premium channel from April 18, 1983 to April 5, 1997, The Disney Channel featured programming aimed at adult audiences during the evening and overnight hours under the banner title \"Disney Nighttime\". Unlike the nighttime content aired on the channel's then-competitors (such as HBO and Showtime) at the time of its launch, the \"adult\" programming featured on The Disney Channel was largely devoid of any overt sexual and violent content. Programming seen during Disney Nighttime included older feature films (similar to those seen at the time on American Movie Classics, and eventually Turner Classic Movies, with both Disney film titles and movies from other film studios mixed in), along with original concert specials (featuring artists ranging from Rick Springfield to Jon Secada to Elton John), variety specials and documentaries.\n*Disney Channel Discovery – aired on certain Saturday evenings at 7:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time from 1988 to 1993, showcased family-oriented feature films not previously seen on television or in wide theatrical release\n*Mystery Night – ran each Tuesday evening starting at 9:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific from 1988 to 1993, focused on mystery films from the 1930s to the 1960s\n*The Best of Hollywood – ran each Monday evening starting at 9:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific from January 4, 1988 to March 30, 1997, showcased feature film classics from the 1930s to the 1960s\n*Sunday Night Showcase – ran each Sunday evening starting at 9:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific from 1988 to 1995, featured various music, variety, comedy and documentary specials\n*The Magical World of Disney – used as a Sunday night umbrella for movies and specials on The Disney Channel starting on September 23, 1990, originally airing exclusively on Sunday evenings at 7:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific. From December 1996 to 1999, The Magical World of Disney served as the overall branding for Disney Channel's nightly evening lineup of films starting at 7:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific.\n*The American Legacy – ran on Tuesday evenings at 9:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific from February 1992 to 1996. Originally launched in honor the 500th anniversary of the discovery of the United States, the block featured movies, documentaries and specials about the contributions, history and scenic wonders of the nation.\n*Toonin' Tuesday – Running from October 5, 1993 to September 1996, \"Toonin' Tuesday\" was a weekly program block featuring various animated programs. Each Tuesday from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific, \"Toonin' Tuesday\" featured primarily animated films and specials (though reruns of The Charlie Brown and Snoopy Show sometimes aired as part of the block). The block ended in early September 1996 due to changes to the channel's programming schedule. \n*Bonus! Thursday – From October 7, 1993 to September 1996, The Disney Channel ran a weekly program block called \"Bonus! Thursday\" (or \"Bonus!\" for short), which ran each Thursday from 5:00 to 9:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific. The block featured programs aimed at teens, including series such as Kids Incorporated, The All-New Mickey Mouse Club, various Mickey Mouse Club serials (including Teen Angel and Match Point), and Eerie Indiana, followed by movies and specials. The block ended in early September 1996 due to changes to the channel's programming schedule.\n*Totally Kids Only (\"TKO\") – a weekday morning lineup of live-action and animated series, which became the brand for the channel's morning and midday block (from 6:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific) aimed at children ages 2 to 8 that ran from 1993 to April 1997\n*Triple Feature Friday – ran each Friday starting at 5:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific from October 8, 1993 to April 1997, featured three different films – sometimes regardless of each film's genre – that were tied to a specific subject \n*Disney Drive-In – ran each Saturday starting at 1:30 p.m. Eastern/Pacific from October 8, 1994 to August 31, 1996, featured classic Disney series such as Zorro, Texas John Slaughter and Spin and Marty, followed by classic Disney films and specials The block ended on August 31, 1996 due to changes in the channel's schedule. \n*Block Party – From October 2, 1995 to August 28, 1996, four animated series that previously aired in syndication on The Disney Afternoon (Darkwing Duck, TaleSpin, DuckTales and Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers) were rerun together on The Disney Channel as a two-hour programming block called \"Block Party\", which aired weekdays from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific. The \"Block Party\" branding was dropped on September 3, 1996, when Darkwing Duck was removed as the block's lead-in and Goof Troop was added to end the lineup. This unnamed block continued to air into 1997. \n*Playhouse Disney – a daily morning program block aimed at preschoolers that debuted on May 8, 1997, replacing the mixture of shows targeted at preschoolers and shows aimed at older children that aired as part of Disney Channel's morning lineup. The block was discontinued on February 13, 2011, and replaced the following day by Disney Junior.\n*Disney Distractions – the banner name for Disney Channel's afternoon double feature block of family-oriented films, which ran Saturdays and Sundays from 12:30 to (usually) 4:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific from 1997 to 2000\n*Magical World of Animals – an hour-long block of wildlife series aimed at children that ran from August 1997 to 1999. Promoted as an offshoot of the Magical World of Disney and airing Sunday evenings from 7:00 to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, the block consisted of two series: Going Wild with Jeff Corwin and Omba Mokomba.\n*Vault Disney – debuted in September 1997, five months after Disney Channel's first major rebrand, replacing the Disney Nighttime lineup. Originally airing only on Sunday nights from 9:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. Eastern and Pacific Time, Vault Disney expanded to seven nights a week in September 1998 (the Monday through Saturday editions of the block at this time aired from 11:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. Eastern/Pacific; the start time of the block as a whole was moved uniformally to midnight daily in September 1999). The classic programming featured during the late night schedule changed to feature only Disney-produced television series and specials (such as Zorro, Spin and Marty, The Mickey Mouse Club and the Walt Disney anthology television series), along with older Disney television specials. Older Disney feature films also were part of the lineup from 1997 to 2000, but aired in a reduced capacity. The block also featured The Ink and Paint Club, an anthology series featuring classic Disney animated shorts, which became the only remaining program on the channel to feature these shorts by 1999, upon the removal of Quack Pack from the schedule. The channel discontinued the block in September 2002, in favor of running reruns of its original and acquired series during the late evening and overnight hours (which comparative to the adult-focused Vault Disney, are aired at children and teenagers, an audience that is typically asleep during that time period).\n*Zoog Disney – launched in August 1998, a program block that originally aired only on weekend afternoons from 4:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific. The hosts for the block were \"Zoogs\", animated anthropomorphic robot/alien creature-hybrid characters with human voices (some of whom acted like teenagers). The block unified television and the internet, allowing viewer comments and scores from players of ZoogDisney.com's online games to be aired on the channel during regular programming in a ticker format (which the channel continued to use after the block was discontinued, however the ticker has been all but completely dropped from on-air usage ). From September 2001 to August 2002, the afternoon and primetime lineups on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays were branded under the umbrella title \"Zoog Weekendz\". The Zoogs were redesigned with cel shading and given mature voices in 2001, though the remade Zoog characters were discontinued after less than a year; the entire Zoog Disney block was phased out by September 2002.\n*Toon Disney Summer Sundays – ran on Sunday evenings from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific during the summers of 1998 and 1999. Hosted by Sage Galesi and Beau Wirick, it was a sneak preview block of animated series (generally featuring defunct Disney animated series from the 1990s that were previously seen in syndication and/or on Disney Channel) carried on Disney Channel's then-recently launched sister digital cable and satellite network, Toon Disney.\n*Disney Channel Saturday Mornings – an animation block that debuted on June 18, 2011 as \"Toonin' Saturdays,\" which was rebranded to its final name in 2012. The lineup – which aired most Saturdays from 9:00–10:00 a.m. Eastern/Pacific, and is sometimes pre-empted in favor of other Disney Channel original programs – primarily consists of double-episode airings of Disney Channel original animated series Fish Hooks and Phineas and Ferb. Occasionally, new first-run episodes of either series will be featured in the block, though new episodes may also sometimes air in their original Friday night time slots.\n*Disney Replay – \"Disney Replay\" was a block that debuted on April 17, 2013, featuring episodes of defunct Disney Channel Original Series that premiered between 2000 and 2007 (such as Lizzie McGuire, That's So Raven and Hannah Montana). Airing Wednesday nights/early Thursday mornings (as a nod to the popular social media trend \"Throwback Thursday\"), originally from 12:00 to 1:00 a.m. Eastern and Pacific Time, the block expanded to six hours (running until 6:00 a.m. Eastern/Pacific) on August 14, 2014. Programs featured on Disney Replay were added to the WATCH Disney Channel service on August 16, 2014. The block was discontinued on April 28, 2016 and moved to Freeform with a new name: That's So Throwback.\n\nRelated services\n\nCurrent sister channels\n\nDisney XD\n\nDisney XD is a digital cable and satellite television channel in the United States, which is aimed at young males aged 7–14. The channel was launched on February 13, 2009, replacing predecessor Toon Disney; it carries action and comedy programming from Disney Channel and the former Jetix block from Toon Disney, along with some first-run original programming and off-network syndicated shows. Like its predecessor Toon Disney, but unlike parent network Disney Channel and its sister channel Disney Junior, Disney XD operates as an advertiser-supported service. The channel carries the same name as an unrelated mini-site and media player on Disney.com, which stood for Disney Xtreme Digital, though it is said that the \"XD\" in the channels name does not have an actual meaning.\n\nDisney Junior\n\nOn May 26, 2010, Disney-ABC Television Group announced the launch of a new digital cable and satellite channel targeted at preschool-aged children called Disney Junior, which debuted on March 23, 2012. The Disney Junior channel – which like Disney Channel (though unlike Disney XD or the channel Disney Junior replaced, Soapnet), is commercial-free – competes with other preschooler-skewing cable channels such as Nick Jr., Qubo and Sprout. The channel features programs from Disney Channel's existing preschool programming library and movies from the Walt Disney Pictures film library. Disney Junior took over the channel space held by Soapnet – a Disney-owned cable channel featuring soap operas – due to that genre's decline in popularity on broadcast television, and the growth of video on demand, online streaming and digital video recorders, negating the need for a linear channel devoted to the soap opera genre. An automated Soapnet feed continued to exist for providers that had not yet made carriage agreements for Disney Junior (such as Dish Network) and those that have kept Soapnet as part of their lineups while adding Disney Junior as an additional channel (such as DirecTV and Cox Communications); After a period during which cable providers unwilling to drop the network immediately retained it to prevent subscriber cancellations, Soapnet ceased full operations on December 31, 2013. \n\nThe former Playhouse Disney block on Disney Channel was rebranded as Disney Junior on February 14, 2011; the 22 existing Playhouse Disney-branded cable channels and program blocks outside the United States rebranded under the Disney Junior name over the next two years, concluding with the rebranding of the Russian and Chinese versions in September 2013. Disney-ABC Television Group previously planned to launch a domestic Playhouse Disney Channel in the U.S. (which would have served the same target audience as Disney Junior) in 2001, however this planned network never launched, although dedicated Playhouse Disney Channels did launch outside of the United States.\n\nFormer sister channels\n\nToon Disney\n\nToon Disney launched on April 18, 1998 (coinciding with the 15th anniversary of parent network Disney Channel's launch), and was aimed at children between the ages of 6- and 18 -years-old. The network's main competitors were Turner Broadcasting/Time Warner's Cartoon Network and Boomerang, and Viacom/MTV Networks' Nicktoons. Toon Disney originally operated as a commercial-free service from April 1998 to September 1999, when it became advertiser-supported (unlike Disney Channel). The channel carried a mix of reruns of Walt Disney Television Animation and Disney Channel-produced animated programming, along with some third-party programs from other distributors, animated films and original programming. In 2004, the channel debuted a nighttime program block aimed at children ages 7–14 called Jetix, which featured action-oriented animated and live-action series. During Toon Disney's first year on the air, Disney Channel ran a sampler block of Toon Disney's programming on Sunday nights for interested subscribers. The network ceased operations on February 13, 2009 and was replaced with the preteen male-oriented Disney XD, featuring a broader array of programming, with a heavier emphasis on live-action programs.\n\nOther services\n\nCriticism and controversies\n\nDisney Channel has received heavy criticism by some critics and viewers for its programming direction in recent years. When compared to the channel's programming during the 1980s and 1990s, there is now very little, if any, programming featuring classic Disney characters, leading some fans to believe the channel fails to represent its name. Some critics disapprove of the marketing strategy drafted by former Disney–ABC Television Group president Anne Sweeney, which has resulted in the slanting of the target audience of Disney Channel's programs toward teenyboppers, as well as a decrease in animated programming and an increase in live-action shows and made-for-TV movies. In 2008, Sweeney had stated that Disney Channel, resulting from its multi-platform marketing strategy using television and music, would become \"the major profit driver for the [Walt Disney] Company.\" \n\nThe channel has also pulled episodes (even once having to reshoot an episode) that have featured subject matter deemed inappropriate due to its humor, the timing of the episode's airing with real-life events, or subject matter considered inappropriate for Disney Channel's target audience. In December 2008, the Hannah Montana episode \"No Sugar, Sugar\" was pulled before its broadcast after complaints from parents who saw the episode through video on demand services due to misconceptions regarding diabetics and sugar intake (the Mitchel Musso character of Oliver Oken is revealed in the episode to have been diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes). Portions of that episode were subsequently rewritten and re-filmed to become the season three episode \"Uptight (Oliver's Alright),\" which aired in September 2009. \n\nIn December 2011, Disney Channel pulled episodes of two of its original series from the network's broadcast cycle – the season one Shake It Up episode \"Party It Up,\" and the So Random! episode \"Colbie Caillat\" – after Demi Lovato (star of So Random! parent series Sonny with a Chance, who was treated for bulimia nervosa in 2010) objected on Twitter to jokes featured in both episodes (the Shake It Up episode, in particular) that made light of eating disorders. On May 17, 2013, the channel pulled \"Quitting Cold Koala\", a second season episode of Jessie, prior to its scheduled premiere broadcast, due to parental concerns over a scene in which a character's gluten-free diet leads to him being ridiculed. \n\nVideo games\n\nIn 2010, Disney Channel All Star Party was released for the Nintendo Wii. The four-player mascot party game, in which the stages resemble board games, features characters from Disney Channel programs such as Sonny with a Chance, Wizards of Waverly Place and JONAS L.A. Several video games based on the Disney Channel animated series Phineas and Ferb were released by Disney Interactive Studios. The Disney Channel website also features various flash games incorporating characters from the channel's various program franchises.\n\nInternational\n\nDisney Channel has established its channels in various countries worldwide including Canada, South Africa, Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, India, Australia, the Czech Republic, New Zealand, the Middle East, Scandinavia, the Baltic states, United Kingdom, Ireland, Portugal, the Caribbean, the Netherlands, Israel and Flanders. Disney Channel also licenses its programming to air on certain other broadcast and cable channels outside the United States (previously like Family Channel in Canada) regardless as to whether an international version of Disney Channel exists in the country." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Major_League_Soccer.txt", "Real_Salt_Lake.txt", "LA_Galaxy.txt", "San_Jose_Earthquakes.txt" ], "title": [ "Major League Soccer", "Real Salt Lake", "LA Galaxy", "San Jose Earthquakes" ], "wiki_context": [ "Major League Soccer (MLS) is a men's professional soccer league, sanctioned by U.S. Soccer, that represents the sport's highest level in both the United States and Canada. MLS constitutes one of the major professional sports leagues of the United States and Canada. The league is composed of 20 teams—17 in the U.S. and 3 in Canada. The MLS regular season runs from March to October, with each team playing 34 games; the team with the best record is awarded the Supporters' Shield. The post season includes twelve teams competing in the MLS Cup Playoffs through November and December, culminating in the championship game, the MLS Cup. MLS teams also play in other domestic competitions against teams from other divisions in the U.S. Open Cup and in the Canadian Championship. MLS teams also compete against continental rivals in the CONCACAF Champions League. \n\nMajor League Soccer was founded in 1993 as part of the United States' successful bid to host the 1994 FIFA World Cup. The first season took place in 1996 with ten teams. MLS experienced financial and operational struggles in its first few years: The league lost millions of dollars, teams played in mostly empty American football stadiums, and two teams folded in 2002. Since then, MLS has expanded to 20 teams, owners built soccer-specific stadiums, average MLS attendance exceeds that of the National Hockey League (NHL) and National Basketball Association (NBA), MLS secured national TV contracts, and the league is now profitable. \n\nInstead of operating as an association of independently owned teams, MLS is a single entity in which each team is owned and controlled by the league's investors. The investor-operators control their teams as owners control teams in other leagues, and are commonly (but inaccurately) referred to as the team's owners. The league has a fixed membership, like most sports leagues in the United States and Canada, which makes it one of the world's few soccer leagues that does not use promotion and relegation, a practice that is uncommon in the two countries. MLS headquarters is located in New York City. \n\nCompetition format\n\nMajor League Soccer's regular season runs from March to October. Teams are divided into the Eastern and Western Conferences. Teams play 34 games in an unbalanced schedule: 24 matches against teams within their conference, plus 10 matches against teams from the other conference. Midway through the season, teams break for the annual All-Star Game, a friendly game between the league's finest players and a major club from a different league. At the end of the regular season, the team with the highest point total is awarded the Supporters' Shield. \n\nUnlike some soccer leagues around the world, but similar to other leagues in the Americas, the MLS regular season is followed by the 12-team MLS Cup Playoffs in November, ending with the MLS Cup championship final in early December. \nAlthough some commentators have argued that playoffs reduce the importance of the regular season, Commissioner Don Garber has explained \"Our purpose is to have a valuable competition, and that includes having playoffs that are more meaningful.\" \n\nMajor League Soccer's spring-to-autumn schedule results in scheduling conflicts with the FIFA calendar and with summertime international tournaments such as the World Cup and the Gold Cup, causing several players to miss some MLS matches. \nWhile MLS has looked into changing to an autumn-to-spring format, there are no current plans to do so. If the league were to change its schedule, a winter break would be needed, especially with several teams in colder climates, which some believe would lead to a disadvantage. It would also have to compete with the more popular National Football League (NFL), National Hockey League (NHL), and National Basketball Association (NBA).\n\nOther competitions\n\nMLS teams also play in other competitions. Every year, up to five MLS teams play in the CONCACAF Champions League against other clubs from the CONCACAF region (Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean). Two U.S.-based MLS teams qualify based on MLS regular-season results: the winner of the Supporters' Shield and the winner of the other conference. The third U.S. team to qualify is the winner of the MLS Cup. A fourth U.S.-based MLS team can qualify via the U.S. Open Cup, where U.S. based teams compete against lower division U.S. clubs. Canadian MLS clubs play against lower division Canadian clubs in the Canadian Championship for the one Champions League spot allocated to Canada. No MLS club has won the Champions League since it began its current format in 2008, with Mexican clubs dominating the competition, but MLS teams have twice reached the final: Real Salt Lake in 2011 and the Montreal Impact in 2015.\n\nTeams\n\nMLS's 20 teams are divided between the Eastern and Western Conference. Each club is allowed up to 30 players on its first team roster. All 30 players are eligible for selection to each 18-player game-day squad during the regular season and playoffs.\n\nSince the 2005 season, MLS has added many new clubs. During this period of expansion, Los Angeles became the first two-team market, and the league pushed into Canada in 2007. The league will expand from 20 teams today to 22 teams in 2017 with the additions of Atlanta and either Los Angeles or Minnesota, and then to 23 teams in 2018 with the addition of Minnesota or Los Angeles, depending which team joins the league the preceding year. The league plans to have 24 teams by 2020. \n\nIn the history of MLS, twenty-three different clubs have competed in the league, with ten having won at least one MLS Cup, and ten winning at least one Supporters' Shield. The same club has won both trophies six times. \n\nSeveral teams compete annually for secondary MLS rivalry cups that are typically contested by two teams, usually geographic rivals (e.g., Portland vs. Seattle vs. Vancouver). Each cup is awarded to the team with the better regular-season record in games played between the two teams. The concept is comparable to minor trophies played for by American college football teams. \n\nBeginning with the 2015 season, teams are aligned as follows:\n\n#Shared facility; not a soccer-specific stadium\n#Team plans to move into a soccer-specific stadium\n\nHistory\n\nMajor League Soccer is the most recent of a series of men's premier professional national soccer leagues established in the United States and Canada.\nThe predecessor of MLS was the North American Soccer League (NASL), which played from 1968 until 1984. \n\nEstablishment\n\nIn 1988, in exchange for FIFA awarding the right to host the 1994 World Cup, U.S. Soccer promised to establish a Division 1 professional soccer league. In 1993, U.S. Soccer selected Major League Professional Soccer (the precursor to MLS) as the exclusive Division 1 professional soccer league. Major League Soccer was officially formed in February 1995 as a limited liability company.\n\nMLS began play in 1996 with ten teams. The first game was held on April 6, 1996, as the San Jose Clash defeated D.C. United before 31,000 fans at Spartan Stadium in San Jose in a game broadcast on ESPN. The league had generated some buzz by managing to lure some marquee players from the 1994 World Cup to play in MLS—including U.S. stars such as Alexi Lalas, Tony Meola and Eric Wynalda, and foreign players such as Mexico's Jorge Campos and Colombia's Carlos Valderrama. \nD.C. United won the MLS Cup in three of the league's first four seasons. The league added its first two expansion teams in 1998—the Miami Fusion and the Chicago Fire; the Chicago Fire won its first title in its inaugural season. \n\nAfter its first season, MLS suffered from a decline in attendance. The league's low attendance was all the more apparent in light of the fact that eight of the original ten teams played in large American football stadiums.\nOne aspect that had alienated fans was that MLS experimented with rules deviations in its early years in an attempt to \"Americanize\" the sport. The league implemented the use of shootouts to resolve tie games. MLS also used a countdown clock and halves ended when the clock reached 0:00. The league realized that the rule changes had alienated some traditional soccer fans while failing to draw new American sports fans, and the shootout and countdown clock were eliminated after the 1999 season. \nThe league's quality was cast into doubt when the U.S. men's national team, which was made up largely of MLS players, finished in last place at the 1998 World Cup.\n\nMajor League Soccer lost an estimated $250 million during its first five years, and more than $350 million between its founding and 2004. \nThe league's financial problems led to Commissioner Doug Logan being replaced by Garber, a former NFL executive, in August 1999. \nMLS announced in January 2002 that it had decided to contract the Tampa Bay Mutiny and Miami Fusion, leaving the league with ten teams. \n\nDespite the financial problems, though, MLS did have some accomplishments that would set the stage for the league's resurgence. Columbus Crew Stadium was built in 1999, becoming MLS's first soccer-specific stadium. This began a trend among MLS teams to construct their own venues instead of leasing American football stadiums. \nIn 2000, the league won an antitrust lawsuit, Fraser v. Major League Soccer, that the players had filed in 1996. The court ruled that MLS's policy of centrally contracting players and limiting player salaries through a salary cap and other restrictions were a legal method for the league to maintain solvency and competitive parity. \n\nResurgence\n\nThe 2002 FIFA World Cup, in which the United States unexpectedly made the quarterfinals, coincided with a resurgence in American soccer and MLS. MLS Cup 2002 drew 61,316 spectators to Gillette Stadium, the largest attendance in an MLS Cup final. MLS limited teams to three substitutions per game in 2003, and adopted International Football Association Board (IFAB) rules in 2005. \n\nMLS underwent a transition in the years leading up to the 2006 World Cup. After marketing itself on the talents of American players, the league lost some of its homegrown stars to prominent European leagues. For example, Tim Howard was transferred to Manchester United for $4 million in one of the most lucrative contract deals in league history. Many more American players did make an impact in MLS. In 2005, Jason Kreis became the first player to score 100 career MLS goals. \n\nThe league's financial stabilization plan included teams moving out of large American football stadiums and into soccer-specific stadiums. From 2003 to 2008, the league oversaw the construction of six additional soccer-specific stadiums, largely funded by owners such as Lamar Hunt and Phil Anschutz, so that by the end of 2008, a majority of teams were now in soccer-specific stadiums.\n\nIt was also in this era that MLS expanded for the first time since 1998. Real Salt Lake and Chivas USA began play in 2005, with Chivas USA becoming the second club in Los Angeles. By 2006 the San Jose Earthquakes owners, players and a few coaches moved to Texas to become the expansion Houston Dynamo, after failing to build a stadium in San Jose. The Dynamo became an expansion team, leaving their history behind for a new San Jose ownership group that formed in 2007. \n\nArrival of Designated Players\n\nIn 2007 the league expanded beyond the United States' borders into Canada with the Toronto FC expansion team. Major League Soccer took steps to further raise the level of play by adopting the Designated Player Rule, which helped bring international stars into the league. \nThe 2007 season witnessed the MLS debut of David Beckham. Beckham's signing had been seen as a coup for American soccer, and was made possible by the Designated Player Rule. Players such as Cuauhtémoc Blanco (Chicago Fire) and Juan Pablo Ángel (New York Red Bulls), are some of the first Designated Players who made major contributions to their clubs. \nThe departures of Clint Dempsey and Jozy Altidore, coupled with the return of former U.S. national team stars Claudio Reyna and Brian McBride, highlighted the exchange of top prospects to Europe for experienced veterans to MLS. \n\nBy 2008, San Jose had returned to the league under new ownership, and in 2009, the expansion side Seattle Sounders FC began play in MLS. The 2010 season ushered in an expansion franchise in the Philadelphia Union and their new PPL Park stadium. The 2010 season also brought the opening of the New York Red Bulls' soccer-specific stadium, Red Bull Arena, and the debut of French striker Thierry Henry. \n\nThe 2011 season brought further expansion with the addition of the Vancouver Whitecaps FC, the second Canadian MLS franchise, and the Portland Timbers. Real Salt Lake reached the finals of the 2010–11 CONCACAF Champions League. \nDuring the 2011 season, the Galaxy signed another international star in Republic of Ireland all-time leading goalscorer Robbie Keane. MLS drew an average attendance of 17,872 in 2011, higher than the average attendances of the NBA and NHL. In 2012, the Montreal Impact became the league's 19th franchise and the third in Canada, and made their home debut in front of a crowd of 58,912, while the New York Red Bulls added Australian all-time leading goalscorer Tim Cahill.\n\n2013–present\n\nIn 2013, MLS introduced New York City FC as its 20th team, and Orlando City Soccer Club as its 21st team, both of which would begin playing in 2015.\nIn 2013, the league implemented its \"Core Players\" initiative, allowing teams to retain key players using retention funds instead of losing the players to foreign leagues. Among the first high-profile players re-signed in 2013 using retention funds were U.S. national team regulars Graham Zusi and Matt Besler.\nBeginning in summer of 2013 and continuing in the run up to the 2014 World Cup, MLS began signing U.S. stars based abroad, including Clint Dempsey from the English Premier League to Seattle, DaMarcus Beasley from the Liga MX to Houston, Jermaine Jones from the German Bundesliga to New England and Michael Bradley who returned from Italy to join Toronto who also signed England International Striker Jermain Defoe. By the 2014 season, fifteen of the nineteen MLS head coaches had previously played in MLS. By 2013, the league's popularity had increased to the point where MLS was as popular as Major League Baseball among 12- to 17-year-olds, as reported by the 2013 Luker on Trends ESPN poll, having jumped in popularity since the 2010 World Cup. \n\nIn 2014, the league announced Atlanta United FC as the 22nd team to start playing in 2017. Even though New York City FC and Orlando City were not set to begin play until 2015, each team made headlines during the summer 2014 transfer window by announcing their first Designated Players – Spain's leading scorer David Villa and Chelsea's leading scorer Frank Lampard to New York, and Ballon d'Or winner Kaká to Orlando. The 2014 World Cup featured 21 MLS players on World Cup rosters and a record 11 MLS players playing for foreign teams – including players from traditional powerhouses Brazil (Júlio César), playing for Toronto FC on loan from Queens Park Rangers FC, and Spain (David Villa), on loan to Melbourne City FC from New York City FC; in the U.S. v. Germany match the U.S. fielded a team with seven MLS starters. \n\nOn September 18, 2014, MLS unveiled their new logo as part of the \"MLS Next\" branding initiative. In addition to the new crest logo, MLS teams display versions in their own colors that are displayed on their jerseys at every game. This change represents the first time that the MLS logo has been changed since the league's inception. Chivas USA folded following the 2014 season, while New York City FC and Orlando City SC joined the league in 2015 as the 19th and 20th teams. Sporting Kansas City and the Houston Dynamo moved from the Eastern Conference to the Western Conference in 2015 to make two 10-team conferences. \n\nIn early 2015, the league announced that two teams — Los Angeles FC and Minnesota United — would join MLS in either 2017 or 2018. The 20th season of MLS saw the arrivals of several players who have starred at the highest levels of European club soccer and in international soccer: Giovanni Dos Santos, Kaká, Andrea Pirlo, Frank Lampard, Steven Gerrard, Didier Drogba, David Villa, and Sebastian Giovinco. On December 6, 2015, MLS announced its intent to expand to 28 teams. \n\nLeague championships\n\nMLS Cup titles and Supporters' Shield Wins\n\nOrganization\n\nOwnership\n\nMajor League Soccer operates under a single-entity structure in which teams and player contracts are centrally owned by the league. Each team has an investor-operator that is a shareholder in the league. In order to control costs, MLS shares revenues and holds players contracts instead of players contracting with individual teams. In Fraser v. Major League Soccer, a lawsuit filed in 1996 and decided in 2002, the league won a legal battle with its players in which the court ruled that MLS was a single entity that can lawfully centrally contract for player services. The court also ruled that even absent their collective bargaining agreement, players could opt to play in other leagues if they were unsatisfied.\n\nHaving multiple clubs owned by a single owner was a necessity in the league's first ten years. At one time Phil Anschutz's AEG owned six MLS clubs and Lamar Hunt's Hunt Sports owned three franchises. In order to attract additional investors, in 2002 the league announced changes to the operating agreement between the league and its teams to improve team revenues and increase the incentives to be an individual club owner. These changes included granting owners the rights to a certain number of players they develop through their club's academy system each year, sharing the profits of Soccer United Marketing, and being able to sell individual club jersey sponsorships.\n\nAs MLS appeared to be on the brink of overall profitability in 2006 and developed significant expansion plans, MLS announced that it wanted each club to have a distinct operator. The league has attracted new ownership that have injected more money into the league. Examples include Red Bull's purchase of the MetroStars from AEG in 2006 for over $100 million. \n\nThe league now has 20 investor-operators for its 20 clubs. Hunt Sports owns only one team (FC Dallas). AEG owns the LA Galaxy and retained a 50% interest in the Houston Dynamo until December 2015. For the 2014 season, the league owned the former Chivas USA club, which had suffered from mismanagement and poor financial results under its individual operator relationship. The league eventually dissolved the team, in favor of awarding rights to a second soccer club in the Los Angeles area to a new ownership group on October 30, 2014. \n\nPlayer acquisition and salaries\n\nThe average salary for MLS players is $316,777, lower than the average salaries in England's second-tier Football League Championship ($420,000 in 2015), Holland's Eredivisie ($445,000), or Mexico's Liga MX ($418,000 in 2015). The league's minimum player salary will increase in 2016 from $60,000 to $62,500 for most players, and roster players #25–28 will see their minimum salary increase from $50,000 to $51,500. \n\nMLS salaries are limited by a salary cap, which MLS has had in place since the league's inception in 1996. The purpose of the salary cap is to prevent the team's owners from unsustainable spending on player salaries—a practice that had doomed the North American Soccer League during the 1980s—and to prevent a competitive imbalance among teams. The salary cap survived a legal challenge by the players in the Fraser v. Major League Soccer lawsuit. The 2016 salary cap is increasing from $3.49 million to $3.66 million per team.\n\nTeams may augment their squads by signing players from other leagues. MLS has two transfer windows—the primary pre-season transfer window lasts three months from mid February until mid May, and the secondary mid season transfer window runs one month from early July to early August. All MLS teams have a limited number of international roster slots that they can use to sign non-domestic players. However MLS teams regularly obtain green cards for their non-domestic players in order to qualify them for domestic status and free up international roster slots. In 2015 48.97% of MLS players were born outside of the U.S. and Canada, with players from 58 countries represented. \n\nMLS has also introduced various initiatives and rules intended to improve quality of players while still maintaining the salary cap. Rules concerning Designated Players, Generation Adidas players, home grown players, and allocation money all allow for additional wage spending that is exempt from the salary cap. These initiatives have brought about an increase in on-field competition. \n\nThe designated player (DP) rule allows teams to sign a limited number of players whose salary exceeds the maximum cap, each DP player only counts as $457,500 (the maximum non-DP salary) against the cap in 2016. Instituted in 2007, England's David Beckham was the first signing under the DP rule. The DP rule has led to large income inequality in MLS with top DPs earning as much as 180 times more than a player earning the league minimum. In the 2013 season 21% of the league's wage spending went to just 5 players, this stretched to 29% on the top 6 players in the 2014 season. \n\nThe league's \"Core Players\" initiative allows teams to re-sign players using retention funds that do not count against the salary cap. Retention funds were implemented in 2013 as a mechanism for MLS to retain key players; among the first high-profile players re-signed using retention funds were U.S. national team regulars Graham Zusi and Matt Besler. MLS teams can also obtain allocation money, which is money that the team can use on player salaries that does not count against the cap, and teams can earn allocation money in several ways, such as from the transfer fees earned by selling players to teams in other leagues. MLS teams can also use Targeted Allocation Money (often referred to as TAM), an initiative announced in 2015. Teams can use TAM funds to attract high-profile players by \"buying down\" contracts of players to below the Designated Player level. High-profile players for which TAM funds were used include Omar Gonzalez.\n\nThe league operates a Generation Adidas program, which is a joint venture between MLS and U.S. Soccer that encourages young American players to enter MLS. The Generation Adidas program has been in place since 1997, and has introduced players such as Landon Donovan, Clint Dempsey, Tim Howard and Michael Bradley into MLS. Players under the Home Grown Player rule are signed to Generation Adidas contracts, all players on Generation Adidas contracts are \"off budget players\" and their salaries do not count against the cap.\n\nMLS has required all of its teams to operate youth development programs since 2008. MLS roster rules allow teams to sign an unlimited number players straight from their academies and bypassing the draft process. There is also supplementary salary budget made by MLS only for homegrown players that are registered using senior roster slots called homegrown player funds. One of the most prominent and lucrative examples of success in \"home-grown\" development was Jozy Altidore, who rose to prominence as a teenager in MLS before his record transfer fee $10 million move to Villarreal in Spain in 2008. The various MLS teams' development academies play matches in a U.S. Soccer developmental league against youth academies from other leagues such as the Division II North American Soccer League (NASL) and Division III USL Pro, the latter of which has now rebranded itself as the United Soccer League. \n\nMLS formerly operated a reserve league which gave playing time to players who were not starters for their MLS teams. The Reserve League was formed in 2005, and operated through 2014 (with the exception of the 2009 & 2010 seasons). MLS began integrating its Reserve League with the league then known as USL Pro in 2013, and after the 2014 season folded the Reserve League, with MLS now requiring all teams to either affiliate with a USL team or field their own reserve side in that league.\n\nStadiums\n\nSince 1999, the league has overseen the construction of twelve stadiums specifically designed for soccer. The development of soccer-specific stadiums owned by the teams has generated a better gameday experience for the fans. The soccer-specific stadiums have yielded positive financial results as teams were no longer required to pay to rent out facilities and gained control over revenue streams such as concessions, parking, naming rights, and the ability to host non MLS events. Several teams have doubled their season-tickets following the team's move into a soccer-specific stadium. \nThe establishment of soccer-specific stadiums is considered the key to the league and the ability of teams to turn a profit. In 2006, Tim Leiweke, then CEO of Anschutz Entertainment Group, described the proliferation of soccer-specific stadiums as the turning point for MLS.\n\nColumbus Crew owner Lamar Hunt started this trend in 1999 by constructing Columbus Crew Stadium, now known as Mapfre Stadium, as MLS's first soccer-specific stadium. The Los Angeles Galaxy followed four years later with the opening of The Home Depot Center, now StubHub Center, in 2003. FC Dallas opened Pizza Hut Park, now Toyota Stadium, in 2005, and the Chicago Fire began playing their home games in Toyota Park in 2006. The 2007 season brought the opening of Dick's Sporting Goods Park for the Colorado Rapids and BMO Field for Toronto FC. \n\nNear the end of the 2008 season, Rio Tinto Stadium became the home of Real Salt Lake, which meant that for the first time in MLS history a majority of MLS's teams (8 out of 14) played in soccer-specific stadiums. Red Bull Arena, the new home of the New York Red Bulls opened for the start of the 2010 season, and the Philadelphia Union opened PPL Park, since renamed Talen Energy Stadium, in June 2010, midway through their inaugural season. \nThe following season, in 2011, the Portland Timbers made their MLS debut in a newly renovated Jeld-Wen Field, now renamed Providence Park, which was originally a multi-purpose venue but turned into a soccer-specific facility. Also in 2011, Sporting Kansas City moved to new Livestrong Sporting Park, now Children's Mercy Park. \nThe Houston Dynamo relocated to their new home at BBVA Compass Stadium in 2012. In the same year, the Montreal Impact joined the league in an expanded Stade Saputo, which reopened June 2012, when renovations pushed the seating capacity to over 20,000. The Impact has used Olympic Stadium for early season matches and for games that require a larger capacity. The San Jose Earthquakes, who had played at Buck Shaw Stadium from 2008 until 2014, opened their new Avaya Stadium before the 2015 season. \n\nThe development of additional MLS stadiums is in progress. The Orlando City SC expansion team intended to begin constructing Orlando City Stadium, a soccer-specific stadium, in 2014 to be completed in 2015. Delays caused by changes to the stadium plans pushed back the new venue's opening, first to late in the 2016 season and finally to the start of the 2017 season. Orlando City have been playing at the Florida Citrus Bowl Stadium, now Camping World Stadium, while awaiting the opening of their new venue.\n\nThree teams have announced their desire to build a soccer-specific stadium, although these teams have not finalized the stadium site and received all necessary government approvals. D.C. United plays home games at a former NFL and Major League Baseball venue, RFK Stadium; in 2013, D.C. United announced the signing of a public-private partnership term sheet to build a 25,000-seat new soccer stadium in Washington, D.C., and a final deal was reached in late 2014. The New York City FC expansion team will play their games at Yankee Stadium, a Major League Baseball venue, although they intend to move into a soccer specific stadium in the future. The New England Revolution play home games at a National Football League venue, Gillette Stadium, but are currently in discussion with the City of Boston regarding a potential soccer-specific stadium in South Boston. \n\nSeveral remaining clubs play in stadiums not originally built for MLS and have not announced plans to move. The Seattle Sounders play at CenturyLink Field, a dual-purpose facility used for both American football and soccer. The Vancouver Whitecaps FC joined the league with Portland in 2011 and temporarily held matches at Empire Field before moving into the refurbished BC Place in October 2011, a retractable-roof stadium that hosts Canadian football as well as soccer. \n\nMedia coverage\n\nUnited States\n\nAs of the 2015 season, MLS matches are broadcast nationally by ESPN networks and Fox Sports in English, and Univision networks in Spanish under an eight-year contract. Each broadcaster has a window for national regular season matches, with UniMas airing a game on Friday nights in Spanish and additional matches on Univision Deportes Network, and ESPN and Fox Sports 1 airing games on Sunday evenings in English. ESPN, FS1, and Univision will share in coverage of the playoffs, while ESPN and FS1 will alternate broadcasting the MLS Cup final in English. In total, at least 125 matches will be aired per-season across all three networks, and the three contracts have an average estimated value of $90 million per season—five times larger than the average $18 million value of the previous contracts with ESPN, Univision, and NBC Sports. 7. Matches not televised nationally are broadcast regionally, often by regional sports networks, such as the LA Galaxy and Time Warner Cable SportsNet.\n\nFrom 2012 to 2014, MLS matches were previously broadcast by NBC Sports, with 40 matches per year—primarily on NBCSN, and select matches broadcast on the NBC network. The move from Fox Soccer to the more widely distributed NBCSN proved successful, with viewership numbers doubling for the 2012 season over those of Fox Soccer. \n\nCanada\n\nCoverage of MLS expanded into Canada in 2007 with the addition of Toronto FC.\nCurrently, English-language national MLS broadcast rights in Canada are through the TSN networks with a six-year deal for the 2011–2016 seasons. TSN and TSN2 broadcast a minimum of 30 games during each season, all featuring at least one Canadian team. French-language sister networks RDS and RDS2 have similar broadcast rights. The networks also carry additional games not involving Canadian teams. GolTV Canada carries selected all-U.S. MLS matchups. \n\nAs in the United States, the individual Canadian teams also have separate broadcast deals for games not aired under the TSN/RDS national contract. TSN and Sportsnet split coverage of Toronto FC non-national games (TSN and Sportsnet's parent companies own a joint majority stake in the team through Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment), TVA Sports airs Montreal Impact games, and TSN broadcasts the Vancouver Whitecaps in a separate deal.\n\nInternational\n\nMLS signed an international television contract in 2008 through 2013 with sports media company MP & Silva. The figure is reportedly an \"eight-figure deal.\" MP & Silva explained that high-profile, international players who were lured to MLS by the Designated Player Rule have raised the popularity of MLS in international markets.\nESPN International purchased the rights to broadcast MLS in the U.K. in 2009, and other ESPN networks around the world also broadcast games. MLS also entered into a four-year contract with Sky Sports to broadcast two MLS matches per week in the UK from 2015–2019. Eurosport will also broadcast MLS between 2015 and 2019, with four matches per week being screened live to its continental audience. \n\nVideo games\n\nMajor League Soccer is a playable league in both the FIFA and the Football Manager series. The league made its video game debut in 1999 with FIFA 2000. In 2001, Konami released ESPN MLS ExtraTime 2002, which, to date, is the only soccer title to be based solely on MLS. The league made its first appearance in the management series Football Manager 2005 in 2004. \n\nProfitability and revenues\n\nMajor League Soccer began to demonstrate positive signs of long-term profitability as early as 2004 with the single-entity ownership structure, salary cap, and the media and marketing umbrella Soccer United Marketing (SUM) all contributing towards MLS's financial security. As soccer-specific stadiums are built, ownership expands, and television coverage increases, MLS has seen its revenues increase while controlling costs.\n\nTelevision coverage and revenue have increased since the league's early years. In 2006, MLS reached an 8-year TV deal with ESPN spanning the 2007–2014 seasons, and marked the first time that MLS earned rights fees, reported to be worth $7–8 million annually. In September 2012 the league extended its distribution agreement with London-based Media rights agency MP & Silva until 2014 in a deal worth $10 million annually. Total league TV revenues are over $40 million annually. In 2011, MLS earned $150 million when it sold a 25% stake in SUM.\n\nIn early 2005, MLS signed a 10-year, $150 million sponsorship deal with Adidas. In 2007, MLS teams started selling ad space on the front of jerseys to go along with the league-wide sponsorship partners who had already been advertising on the back of club jerseys, following the practice of international sport, specifically soccer. MLS established a floor of $500,000 per shirt sponsorship, with the league receiving a flat fee of $200,000 per deal. As of July 2014, sixteen teams had signed sponsorship deals to have company logos placed on the front of their jerseys (and another team is directly owned by its shirt sponsor), and the league average from jersey sponsors was about $2.4 million. As of February 2016, all teams in MLS have jersey sponsors.\n\nThe Los Angeles Galaxy made a profit in 2003 in their first season at The Home Depot Center, and FC Dallas turned a profit after moving into Pizza Hut Park in 2005. For each season between 2006–2009, two to three MLS clubs (generally clubs with a soccer-specific stadium) were reported as profitable by the league. \n\nBy 2012, the league had shown a marked improvement in its financial health. In November 2013, Forbes published its first valuation of MLS teams since 2008, and revealed that ten of the league's nineteen teams earned an operating profit in 2012, while two broke even and seven had a loss. Forbes estimated that the league's collective annual revenues were $494 million, and that the league's collective annual profit was $34 million. Forbes valued the league's franchises to be worth $103 million on average, almost three times as much as the $37 million average valuation in 2008. The Seattle Sounders FC franchise was named the most valuable at $175 million, a 483% gain over the $30 million league entrance fee it paid in 2009.\n\nThe trend in increased team values has continued with MLS teams seeing a strong 52% increase in franchise values from 2012 to 2014. In August 2015, Forbes released the updated list of MLS franchise values with the most profitable team weighing in at $245 million and the least at $105 million. The average value jumped from $103 to $157 million.\n\nRules and officials\n\nMLS follows the rules and standards of the International Football Association Board (IFAB).\nThe playoff extra time structure follows IFAB standards: two full 15-minute periods, followed by a penalty shootout if necessary.\nAway goals apply to the playoff stage of the competition, but do not apply to overtime in the second leg of any two-legged playoff series. \n\nU.S. Soccer hired the first full-time professional referees in league history in 2007 as part of the league's \"Game First\" initiatives. \nMajor League Soccer has been implementing fines and suspensions since the 2011 season for simulation (diving) through its Disciplinary Committee, which reviews plays after the match. The first player fined under the new rule was Charlie Davies, fined $1,000 for intentionally deceiving match officials. \n\nTeam names\n\nFor more information on MLS team names, see the individual team entries.\n\nOriginally, in the style of other U.S. sports leagues, teams were given nicknames at their creation. Examples include the Columbus Crew, the San Jose Clash and the Los Angeles Galaxy. Several of the club names in MLS originated with earlier professional soccer clubs, such as the 1970s-era NASL team names San Jose Earthquakes, Seattle Sounders, Portland Timbers and Vancouver Whitecaps. \n\nD.C. United and Miami Fusion F.C. were the only two MLS teams to adopt European naming conventions during the 1990s. However, European-style names have increased in MLS, with expansion teams such as Real Salt Lake and Toronto FC, in addition to 2015 entrants New York City FC and Orlando City S.C., along with several re-brandings such as the Dallas Burn (now FC Dallas) and Kansas City Wizards (now Sporting Kansas City). \n\nThe beverage company Red Bull GmbH owns the New York Red Bulls as well as other sports teams.\n\nPlayer records\n\nStatistics below are for all-time leaders. Statistics are for regular season only. Bold indicates active MLS players.\n\n[http://www.mlssoccer.com/stats/alltime Updated July 26, 2016]\n\nPlayer records (active)\n\nStatistics below are for all-time leaders who are still playing. Statistics are for regular season only.\n\n[http://www.mlssoccer.com/stats/alltime Updated July 26, 2016]\n\nMLS commissioners\n\n*Doug Logan (1996–99)\n*Don Garber (1999–present)\n\nMLS awards\n\nAt the conclusion of each season, the league presents several awards for outstanding achievements, mostly to players, but also to coaches, referees, and teams. The finalists in each category are determined by voting from MLS players, team employees, and the media. \n\n*MLS Best XI\n*MLS Coach of the Year Award\n*MLS Comeback Player of the Year Award\n*MLS Defender of the Year Award\n*MLS Fair Play Award (individual)\n*MLS Fair Play Award (team)\n*MLS Goal of the Year Award\n\n*MLS Goalkeeper of the Year Award\n*MLS Golden Boot\n*Landon Donovan MVP Award\n*MLS Newcomer of the Year Award\n*MLS Referee of the Year Award\n*MLS Rookie of the Year Award\n*MLS Save of the Year Award", "Real Salt Lake (RSL) is an American professional soccer club that competes in the Western Conference of Major League Soccer (MLS). The franchise plays its home games at Rio Tinto Stadium in Sandy, Utah, a suburb of Salt Lake City.\n\nReal Salt Lake won the 2009 MLS Cup. The team also finished runners-up of the 2013 MLS Cup, the 2010 MLS Supporters Shield, the 2010–11 CONCACAF Champions League, and the 2013 U.S. Open Cup. The team has been led since the start of the 2014 season by head coach Jeff Cassar, who was previously an assistant coach with the club.\n\nName \n\nThe title \"Real\" is a Spanish word which means \"royal\" in English. The term is usually used by Spanish clubs who have received royal patronage from a reigning Spanish king, the most famous of which would include Real Madrid, Real Betis and Real Sociedad. In choosing the name \"Real\", owner Dave Checketts intended to create a brand name that would become well known for its simplicity, as well as an association with the world-famous club in Madrid that the club had been striving toward. \nSome of the reasons/factors behind using Real was based on the founder/then-owner (Dave Checketts') time in Europe having admiration for Real Madrid during his time as the general manager of the Utah Jazz National Basketball Association franchise. Checketts also found it encouraging that Real Madrid had a basketball team as well. \n\nLocal reaction to the new team's name was initially met with mixed feelings, as fans believed that using a traditionally Spanish name was akin to a move of cultural appropriation. On top of that, some thought that the name sounded contrived, and did not truly reflect the Salt Lake area, with other team names such as \"Highlanders\", \"Salt Lake SC\", or \"Union SLC\" being more preferred. However, in recent years, reaction to the name has improved, with the team establishing its identity as a representative of Salt Lake. \n\nHistory \n\nEarly years: 2005–2006 \n\nReal Salt Lake became the twelfth MLS franchise when Major League Soccer awarded an expansion franchise on July 14, 2004, to SCP Worldwide, headed by Dave Checketts. Jason Kreis became the first player in RSL history, coming in a trade from the Dallas Burn. Other notable players that played in RSL's early years includes veterans Clint Mathis, Eddie Pope and Jeff Cunningham.\n\nRSL's first season was 2005 under head coach John Ellinger. RSL began play on April 2, 2005 against New York MetroStars at Giants Stadium, which ended in a tie. The following week, Jason Kreis scored the first goal in franchise history in a 3-1 loss to LA Galaxy at the Home Depot Center. RSL played its first-ever home match on April 16, 2005, before 25,287 fans at Rice-Eccles Stadium; Brian Dunseth scored a header in the 81st minute to deliver a 1-0 victory over the Colorado Rapids. The season was mostly a disappointment, however, with the team setting a league record by posting a 557-minute scoreless streak (later broken by Toronto FC). They were also on a 10-game losing streak before managing a 2–2 draw on the road against San Jose Earthquakes. The first season finished with a record of 5-22-5.\n\nIn 2006, Real Salt Lake's second season, the team recorded five losses and one tie in the first six matches of the season. RSL had gone 18 consecutive matches without a victory—the longest winless streak in MLS history. Jeff Cunningham, who came to Salt Lake from Colorado, provided most of Real's highlights during an otherwise poor 2006 season. The team failed to qualify for the playoffs, finishing with a 10-13-9 record.\n\nTurnaround and new stadium: 2007–2008 \n\nReal Salt Lake boasted a formidable attack with Cunningham and Kreis up front, joined by recently signed Panamanian international Luis Tejada. They were supported by veteran talent in the midfield and defense, such as Chris Klein, Carey Talley, and newly arrived goalkeeper Nick Rimando.\nTheir first game of the 2007 MLS season was a 2–2 draw for FC Dallas on Real's home turf. RSL were outscored 6–0 in their next three games. In a stunning move, Ellinger was fired and replaced by Kreis, who immediately retired as a player. Also, general manager Steve Pastorino resigned and was later replaced by Garth Lagerwey. The franchise launched a massive re-construction project that continued throughout the year. The team finished with a disappointing 6–15–9 record, missing the playoffs yet again.\n\nIn the 2008 MLS season, working with new General Manager Garth Lagerwey, RSL added several key players including Kyle Beckerman, Robbie Findley, Javier Morales, Nat Borchers and Jamison Olave. As Real established chemistry together, they emerged as a force when playing at home. The team's home field advantage improved dramatically in with the opening in October 2008 of Rio Tinto Stadium, the new soccer-specific stadium in Sandy. Through the regular season, their home record ended at 8–1–6. Finishing 2008 with a 10–10–10 record, RSL advanced to the playoffs for the first time. RSL advanced past Chivas USA in the first round of the playoffs. The post-season ended, however, with a RSL lost to the Red Bulls in the Western Conference final.\n\nMLS and CONCACAF success: 2009–2012 \n\nIn the 2009 MLS season, RSL proved nearly invincible at home, having a 9–1–5 record in Rio Tinto Stadium, with a record-setting +23 goal differential. Real Salt Lake did not lose a league game at home since May 2009. However, the team struggled to maintain form during road games. In the final weeks of the regular season, RSL found itself in a battle for the final two spots in the MLS playoffs. However, thanks to a victory over Colorado in the final game of the regular season, RSL clinched a position in the 2009 MLS playoffs. Despite finishing with a losing record overall (11-12-7), the team was granted the last spot through a tie-breaker.\nReal Salt Lake went on to win the 2009 MLS Cup by defeating the Los Angeles Galaxy in the November 22 final. RSL played the L.A. Galaxy to a 1–1 tie through overtime and won the MLS Cup (5–4 on penalties). Goalkeeper Nick Rimando was named Man of the Match. The victory in the 2009 MLS Cup qualified RSL for the 2010–11 CONCACAF Champions League.\n\nThe 2010 season saw RSL continue its home unbeaten streak. On October 16, 2010 Real Salt Lake improved their home unbeaten streak to 25 games after beating the FC Dallas. This win gave Real Salt Lake the most consecutive home games without a loss in MLS history. RSL tied San Jose Earthquakes 2005 record for a single-season home unbeaten streak with zero losses in the 2010 regular season. Real Salt Lake finished second in the race for the Supporters Shield with a (15-4-11) record. Goalkeeper Nick Rimando led the league with 14 shutouts, and Jámison Olave was named MLS Defender of the Year. In the MLS playoffs, however, RSL lost to FC Dallas in the first round.\n\nFor the 2010–11 CONCACAF Champions League, Real Salt Lake were placed in Group A with Cruz Azul of Mexico, Toronto FC of Canada and Arabe Unido of Panama. Real Salt Lake finished first in Group A, with a perfect 3–0 home record and a respectable 1–1–1 away record. \nRSL continued its run in the 2010–11 CONCACAF Champions League knockout rounds in spring 2011. In the quarterfinals, Real Salt Lake advanced by beating the Columbus Crew 4–1 over two games. In the semifinals, Real Salt Lake beat Saprissa 2–0 in the home leg, before losing the away leg 1–2. The 3–2 aggregate was enough for Real to advance and become the first MLS team to reach the CONCACAF Champions League finals.\nReal Salt Lake played the first leg of the finals at Mexican side Monterrey. RSL's Javier Morales scored in the 89th minute, ending the game in a 2–2 draw. The second leg of the final was held on April 27, 2011, at Rio Tinto Stadium; Monterrey scored the only goal of the game, giving Monterrey a 3–2 aggregate victory.\n\nIn their 2011 MLS season, RSL's home unbeaten streak ended at 29 games on May 28, 2011, with their loss to the Seattle Sounders FC. Real finished the regular season with a 15–11–8 record and finished third in the western conference. In the MLS playoffs, RSL defeated Seattle Sounders 3–2 on aggregate. In the conference finals, RSL lost 3–1 to the LA Galaxy and were eliminated. RSL qualified for the 2012–13 CONCACAF Champions League, since LA had won both the 2011 MLS Cup and Supporters' Shield, since RSL had the next best record. \n\nIn 2012, Real finished second in the Western conference during the regular season. In the playoffs, RSL lost to Seattle in the conference semifinals, and were eliminated from the playoffs. In the 2012–13 CONCACAF Champions League, RSL were placed in Group 2 with Herediano of Costa Rica and Tauro of Panama, but were eliminated at the group stage. \n\nNew ownership and management: 2013–present \n\nIn 2013, Checketts sold his stake in Real Salt Lake to minority owner Dell Loy Hansen. Before the season, the club also traded key players Jámison Olave, Fabián Espíndola and Will Johnson. RSL finished the season in second place in the Western Conference with a 16–10–8 (W-L-T) record, and reached both the Open Cup and MLS Cup finals, losing both to D.C. United and Sporting Kansas City, respectively.\n\nAfter the season, Kreis left Real Salt Lake to become the first head coach of expansion club New York City FC, with long-time assistant coach Jeff Cassar replacing him at the helm. Despite the departure, the club finished the 2014 season in third in the Western Conference, with a record of 15-8-11 totaling 56 points, and qualified for the 2015-16 CONCACAF Champions League. In the MLS Cup Playoffs, RSL was eliminated in the conference semifinals by eventual champions LA Galaxy 5–0 on aggregate.\n\nDespite a five-game unbeaten start to the 2015 season, the team eventually began to struggle in the standings, coupled with a loss to Sporting Kansas City in the semi-finals of the 2015 Open Cup. RSL also lost key player Nat Borchers, who they traded to the Portland Timbers before the season and all-time goalscorer Álvaro Saborío, traded away to D.C. United mid-season. Although late-season signings Luis Silva and Juan Manuel Martinez provided strong performances, the team did not qualified for the playoffs for the first time since 2007.\n\nColors and badge \n\nThe team's official colors are claret red, cobalt blue, and real gold. \n\nKit evolution \n\nHome, away, and third kits. \n\n* Home\n\n* Away\n\n* Third/special\n\nStadium \n\n* Rice-Eccles Stadium; Salt Lake City, Utah (2005–2008)\n* Rio Tinto Stadium; Sandy, Utah (2008–present)\n\nIn 2005 a soccer-specific stadium was approved for Sandy, a suburb of Salt Lake City. However, a vote in 2006 struck down a funding proposal. Dave Checketts said that he would sell it if a proposal was not put forward. Parties from several cities, including Rochester, New York and St. Louis, Missouri, expressed interest in purchasing the franchise and moving it.\n\nFinally, after months of discussions an agreement was put in place and Real Salt Lake announced that they would move forward with the construction of Real Salt Lake Stadium. \nThe Debt Review Committee of Salt Lake County, however, voted against the stadium. In response, Real Salt Lake's owner announced the team would be sold and likely move out of the Salt Lake area after the 2007 season. However, a new stadium proposal was passed by the State Senate. The Utah House approved House bill 1SHB38, approving $35 million towards the development of Real Salt Lake's new home. The governor signed the bill.\n\nThe $110 million stadium was built in Sandy, a suburb of Salt Lake City. The stadium's opening date was set for October 9, 2008. \n\nClub culture \n\nRivalries \n\nThe main rival of Real Salt Lake is the Colorado Rapids, with the two teams being the closest to each other geographically, and also competing for the annual Rocky Mountain Cup. Competition first began upon Salt Lake's entry into Major League Soccer in 2005, with the cup itself being awarded by a bi-partisan \"Committee of 10\", made up of fans from each respective club. Although dominated by the Rapids early on, Salt Lake has since taken a 7-3 series lead over their rivals, and are the current holders of the cup, having won it during the 2014 season.\n\nThe team also maintains smaller, fan-driven rivalries with both the Los Angeles Galaxy, whom they defeated in the 2009 MLS Cup final and were runner-up to for the 2010 MLS Supporters Shield, as well as Sporting Kansas City, whom they were defeated by in the 2013 MLS Cup. \n\nSupporters groups \n\nReal Salt Lake has eight official supporters groups: The Loyalists, Rogue Cavaliers Brigade (RCB), Salt City United (SCU), Section 26, La Barra Real, Union de Real, The Royal Pride (TRP), and The Royal Army. Except for Section 26 and The Royal Army (which is dispersed throughout the stadium), all supporters groups sit in the south stands.\n\nLeo the Lion is the official mascot of Real Salt Lake. \n\nClub anthem \n\nIn 2011, Branden Steineckert, drummer of punk band Rancid and a supporter of Real Salt Lake, composed the song \"Believe\" in honor of the club. Initially posted on YouTube, the song has since been adopted as the team's official anthem, being sung at the beginning of every home game, as well as after all goals scored by RSL. \n\nRevenue and profitability \n\nAs Real Salt Lake is a small-market team, one of the team's biggest challenges is bringing in enough revenue to remain competitive. Opening Rio Tinto Stadium in October 2008 provided a significant revenue boost to the team. Real Salt Lake went from 4,000 season-ticket holders before October 2008, to 8,750 in 2012, and passed 10,000 in 2013.\n\nSponsors \n\nRSL has a multimillion-dollar sponsorship deal with LifeVantage. It previously had a multimillion-dollar deal with XanGo a nutritional supplements company based in Utah, to carry the XanGo logo on the front of RSL jerseys from the 2007 season until 2014. Additional sponsors include JetBlue Airways and Maverik, Inc. \n\nBroadcasting \n\nRadio broadcasts air on KALL AM 700 (English) and KTUB AM 1600 (Spanish).\n\nAs of the 2015 season, Sinclair Broadcast Group holds television rights to Real Salt Lake games that are not aired by Major League Soccer's national television partners. The telecasts are produced by Sinclair's American Sports Network unit, and feature pre- and post-game coverage. Sinclair's Utah stations KUTV and KMYU serve as the team's flagship stations, and telecasts are syndicated to other Sinclair-owned stations in the region, and non-Sinclair stations in Albuquerque, Phoenix and Tucson. \n\nPlayers and staff \n\nFor details on former players, see All-time Real Salt Lake roster.\n\nCurrent roster \n\nAs of April 28, 2016 \n\nOut on loan \n\nTeam captains \n\nHead coaches \n\n* Includes MLS regular Season, MLS Playoffs, CONCACAF Champions League, and Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup.\n\nHonors \n\n* CONCACAF Champions League\n** Runners Up : 2011\n* MLS Cup\n** Winners: 2009\n** Runners Up: 2013\n* Supporters' Shield\n** Runners Up: 2010\n* Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup\n** Runners Up: 2013\n* Western Conference\n** Winners (playoff) : 2013\n* Eastern Conference\n** Winners (playoff) : 2009\n* Minor Trophies\n** Rocky Mountain Cup (7): 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2014\n** Carolina Challenge Cup: 2009\n** Desert Diamond Cup: 2015\n\nTeam results \n\nFinishing positions \n\nNotes:\n\n* RSL won the 2009 MLS Cup by defeating the LA Galaxy 5–4 on penalty kicks.\n* RSL lost the 2013 MLS Cup final to Sporting Kansas City 6–7 on penalty kicks.\n\nYear-by-year statistics \n\n*MLS regular season games only\n\nCONCACAF Champions League \n\nThe following table shows the results of Real Salt Lake in the CONCACAF Champions League for the years in which RSL qualified for that tournament.\n\n* Did not qualify for Champions League tournament in years not listed\n* Win %- Number of wins divided by number of games played (ties count as half a win)\n* Games decided by a PK Shoot out counted as win or loss not Draw.\n\nMLS records \n\n* Fewest goals allowed: 20 (previous record 23, Houston 2007)\n* Overall goal difference: +25 (previous record +22, San Jose 2005 and D.C. United 2007)\n* Home goal difference: +24 (previous record +23, Real Salt Lake 2009)\n* Total home points (30-game season): 37 (previous record 35, Columbus 2009)\n* Fewest home losses: 0 (equals previous record set by San Jose in 2005)\n* Fewest home goals allowed: 7 (previous record 8, Colorado 2004) \n\nReal Monarchs \n\nReal Monarchs SLC is the reserve team of RSL that was created On September 10, 2014. Real Salt Lake revealed their plans for their own USL Pro team, which they launched and began play in the 2015 USL season. The creation of Real Monarchs is to bridge a gap between the academies to the first level team.\n\nReal Salt Lake Women\n\nReal Salt Lake Women is an American women’s soccer team, founded in 2008 by Sara Cowley, Kendra Halterman and Dennis Burrows. The team is a member of United Women's Soccer, in the second tier of women’s soccer in the United States and Canada. The team plays in the Western Division.\n\nPlayer records (career) \n\n* Players in Bold are still active\n* Only regular season matches played with Real Salt Lake counted towards all-time records. Stats from MLS play offs, U.S. Open Cup, Super Liga and CONCACAF Champions league are not included.\n\nGoals \n\nActive players who are close to breaking the top 10:\n\n* Jámison Olave (12)\n* Luke Mulholland (12)\n\nAssists \n\nActive players who are close to breaking the top 10:\n\n* Tony Beltran (10)\n* Olmes García (6)\n\nAppearances \n\nActive players who are close to breaking the top 10:\n\n* Olmes García (93)\n* Joao Plata (92)\n\nShutouts \n\nPlayer records (single season) \n\n* Only regular season matches played with Real Salt Lake counted towards records.\n* Players in bold currently play for Real Salt Lake.\n\nOther player records and honors \n\nMLS All-Star Appearances\n\nPlayers in bold currently play for Real Salt Lake.\n\nPlayer awards \n\nAwards given by MLS to Real Salt Lake players:\n\n* 2006 MLS Golden Boot: Jeff Cunningham\n* 2009 MLS Cup Most Valuable Player: Nick Rimando\n* 2010 MLS Defender of the Year: Jámison Olave\n* 2010 MLS Newcomer of the Year: Álvaro Saborío\n\nMLS Best XI:\n\n* 2006 Jeff Cunningham\n* 2010 Jámison Olave, Nat Borchers, Javier Morales\n* 2011 Jámison Olave\n\nRetired numbers \n\n* 9 Jason Kreis Player/head coach\n\nHat tricks \n\n* Jason Kreis: July 13, 2005 vs Minnesota Thunder (Loss 4-6), US Open Cup\n* Robbie Findley: April 2, 2009 vs Columbus Crew (Win 4-1), MLS\n* Álvaro Saborío: July 7, 2012 vs Portland Timbers (Win 3-0), MLS;\n:::::: September 29, 2012 vs Chivas USA (Win 4-0), MLS;\n:::::: July 27, 2013 vs. New York Red Bulls (Loss 3-4), MLS\n* Javier Morales: May 11, 2014 vs. Houston Dynamo (Win 5-2), MLS\n\nAttendance by season \n\nDNQ = Did Not Qualify", "The LA Galaxy, also known as the Los Angeles Galaxy, is an American professional soccer franchise based in the Los Angeles suburb of Carson, California, that competes in Major League Soccer (MLS), in the Western Conference of the league. The franchise is one of the league's most-decorated clubs, having won the MLS Cup five times—more than any other club—the Supporters' Shield four times, the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup twice, and the old CONCACAF Champions' Cup, making them one of just two MLS teams, along with D.C. United, to win a CONCACAF tournament.\n\nIn their early years, the Galaxy played their home games at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, but since 2003 they have played at the StubHub Center in Carson, California. The club's current head coach is former US national team coach Bruce Arena. The team holds a fierce rivalry with the San Jose Earthquakes in the California Clásico, and used to play the SuperClasico against city rivals Chivas USA before they folded in 2014. More recently, a new rivalry has begun with Seattle Sounders FC.\n\nIn January 2007, the club made international headlines by signing English superstar David Beckham from Real Madrid, which was the highest-profile signing in the history of MLS. Other significant signings include Landon Donovan, Robbie Keane, who currently captains the club, Steven Gerrard and Giovani dos Santos, as well as Ashley Cole and Nigel de Jong.\n\nHistory \n\n1955–1996: Los Angeles soccer heritage \n\nThe first professional soccer team in the Los Angeles area was the Los Angeles Kickers, formed in 1955 by the former owner of the Fall River Marksmen, Sam Mark.\n\nPrior to the launch of Major League Soccer in 1996, teams from Los Angeles played in the Western American Soccer League, the North American Soccer League and the American Soccer League/A-League, winning ten league championships (1955, 1957, 1958, 1960, 1961, 1962, 1963, 1964, 1974, 1976), seven Lamar Hunt US Open Cups (1958, 1964, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1978, 1981), four regional championships (1955, 1956, 1958, 1961) and one international championship (1975). George Best, Johan Cruyff, and many other notable players played in the city, for clubs such as the Los Angeles Aztecs, California Surf and the Los Angeles Salsa.\n\nLos Angeles officially adopted and recognized the city's soccer heritage during the opening of the Home Depot Center, now known as StubHub Center, in June 2003. In addition, the stadium features several tributes recognizing the soccer tradition in Los Angeles.\n\n1996–2006: Decade of success \n\nMajor League Soccer was founded in 1993 as part of the United States' bid to host the 1994 FIFA World Cup. The first season took place in 1996 with Los Angeles being one of the ten founding teams. The name \"Galaxy\" was derived from Los Angeles being home to the \"stars\" of Hollywood. \nLos Angeles began well by clinching first in the Western Conference and finishing second in the MLS Cup after losing to D.C. United in the final. The 1997 season started out 1–7 after eight games, but they went 15–9 for the rest of the season to qualify for the playoffs. The Galaxy ended up second in their conference by losing to the Dallas Burn. In 1998, the Galaxy left off on a streak, eventually finishing 24–8. The Galaxy defeated the Dallas Burn, 9–3 on aggregate. They lost in the final to the Chicago Fire, 2–1 on aggregate.\n\nThe Galaxy again finished first in the Western Conference in 1999, with a final record of 20–12, with a win in the CONCACAF Champions Cup, but they lost to D.C. United again 2–0. The 2000 season had the Galaxy in second in the Western Division, at 14–10–8. Despite this, they lost to the Kansas City Wizards after a tied aggregate and a sudden death game. 2001 was another successful year for Los Angeles, winning the Open Cup and scoring 1,000 all-time points, and with Cobi Jones scoring the 300th goal, but again they fell short by being defeated by Landon Donovan and the San Jose Earthquakes. Again the club clinched first in the Western Conference with a 16–9–3 record, their fifth time being first. In 2002, the Galaxy won their first MLS Cup in four tries by defeating the New England Revolution 1–0. 2003 was a poor year, with LA finishing fourth because they were forced to play away games due to stadium construction, though they got a good rhythm and finished 9–12–9. The Galaxy bounced back by gaining second with an 11–9–10 record. They lost to the Wizards in the final, 0–2. With 2005 came one of the Galaxy's most recognized players, Landon Donovan. The club won the Open Cup again ending with a record of 13–13–6 to cap off their first decade. The Galaxy has a distinction of making the playoffs in all of the league's first ten seasons. \n\nThe 2006 season began on March 16 with the sudden death of Doug Hamilton, the team's 43-year-old general manager, who suffered a heart attack on board a plane carrying the team back from Costa Rica where they had played Saprissa in the CONCACAF Champions' Cup. The team finished fifth in the Western Conference, eliminating them from playoff contention for the first time since the league's inception. Midway through the season, Steve Sampson was sacked as Head Coach, replaced by Frank Yallop. The team managed to make a run to the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup final, but lost 3–1 against the Chicago Fire.\n\n2007–2012: Beckham era \n\nIn March 2007, Herbalife signed a five-year deal with the Galaxy, worth between $4–5 million a year, to be the club's primary shirt sponsor. Four months later, the club signed David Beckham from Real Madrid. His debut was made at The Home Depot Center before a record crowd of nearly 35,000, including many celebrities, coming on in the 78th minute in a 1–0 loss to Chelsea in a match during the World Series of Football tournament. The match brought unprecedented TV coverage from ESPN, who used 19 cameras to cover it, including one trained only on Beckham, even when he was on the bench. In that season's SuperLiga, LA reached the final but lost to Mexican side Pachuca on penalties after extra time. LA nearly made the end-of-season play-offs, but were eliminated following a 1–0 loss to the Chicago Fire. In the off-season, Cobi Jones retired and, amidst rumors that he was going to be sacked, Yallop resigned as head coach following a friendly match at Home Depot Center. The San Jose Earthquakes bought out his contract and offered a third round draft pick to the Galaxy as compensation to hire Yallop as their new head coach. Yallop was replaced at LA by Ruud Gullit, who signed a three-year contract with the club, making him the highest paid coach in MLS history. Cobi Jones returned as assistant coach. LA went on a promotional tour of Australia and New Zealand, setting attendance records in both countries. 80,295 people showed up at Stadium Australia for the match between Sydney FC and LA Galaxy, which the home side won 5–3. They also played a tour of Asia, and competed in the inaugural Pan-Pacific Championship in Honolulu, finishing third after beating Sydney 2–1 in the third-place match. \n\nIn the 2008 MLS season, LA went on a seven-game winless streak which saw them drop from first place in the Western Conference to outside playoff contention, prompting the resignation of manager Ruud Gullit and firing of general manager Alexi Lalas. Gullit was replaced by Bruce Arena, but he was not able to lead LA into a play-off spot, for the third-straight season. \n\nIn the following off-season, both club captain David Beckham and vice-captain Landon Donovan were involved in loan deals with European clubs until the beginning of the new MLS season; Beckham to Milan in Italy and Donovan to German club Bayern Munich. Donovan was seeking a permanent transfer to Munich, while Beckham was expected to return to LA in March, prior to the 2009 season. Beckham went on to seek a permanent transfer to Milan in a bid to sustain his England career through the 2010 World Cup, and Milan made a bid for the player, which was rejected by LA. One day before his loan deal was to expire, Milan and LA reached an agreement to allow Beckham to stay in Italy until the conclusion of the Rossoneri's season in June, before returning to LA in July. Donovan was not offered a contract by Bayern, and returned to the US in time for the beginning of the 2009 MLS season. In the book The Beckham Experiment by Grant Wahl, Donovan openly criticized Beckham for his handling of the loan deals. Beckham and Donovan would later reconcile upon Beckham's return to LA in July.\n\nLA finished the 2009 season top of the Western Conference and runners-up in the MLS Supporters' Shield, qualifying for the 2009 MLS Cup. They reached the final by beating Chivas USA 3–2 on aggregate in the quarter-final, and Houston Dynamo 2–0, after extra time, in the semi-final. In the final they drew 1–1 with Real Salt Lake at Qwest Field in Seattle, but lost 5–4 on penalties. By reaching the final, they qualified for the 2010–11 CONCACAF Champions League Preliminary Round.\n\nAfter the 2009 success, both Donovan and Beckham again went out on second loan spells. Donovan went to Everton while Beckham returned to Milan, where he ruptured his Achilles tendon and therefore missed his chance at playing in the World Cup for England and subsequently missing most of the Galaxy's 2010 season.\n\nIn 2010, the Galaxy stayed at the top of the table and won the Supporters' Shield, the first time MLS played a balanced schedule. They then lost to FC Dallas in the Western Conference Final, one game away from making another appearance at MLS Cup.\n\nIn 2011, a year in which they added the Republic of Ireland's all-time leading goalscorer Robbie Keane, they won their fourth Supporters' Shield with two games remaining, becoming the third-straight team to win consecutive Shields while amassing the second-best points total in MLS history. They followed this up with their third MLS Cup, defeating the Houston Dynamo 1–0 in the final. The 2011 MLS Cup was the Galaxy's first MLS Cup Victory in regulation. The 2002 and the 2005 MLS Cup wins were won in overtime.\n\nIn January 2012, after much speculation, Beckham signed a new two-year deal with LA to secure his short-term future at the club. Despite the new contract, Beckham confirmed in November 2012 that he would be leaving the Galaxy at the end of the 2012 MLS season. On December 1, 2012, the Galaxy won their second-straight MLS Cup victory over the Houston Dynamo, 3–1. Galaxy defender Omar Gonzalez won the MLS MVP trophy, heading in the 1–1 equalizer in the 60th minute. That goal was quickly followed by a Donovan penalty kick, and Keane sealed the game with another penalty kick in stoppage time. In post-match interviews both Donovan and Beckham remained coy about their future MLS plans. \n\n2013–present: First to Five \n\nGalaxy finished the 2013 season third in the Western Conference. They reached the conference semi-finals, where they lost 2–1 to Real Salt Lake. They also reached the semi-finals of the 2012–13 CONCACAF Champions League, but lost 3–1 on aggregate to Mexican team Monterrey.\n\nFollowing the defeat to Seattle Sounders FC in the final game of the season with the Supporters' Shield on the line, the team entered the 2014 MLS playoffs defeating Real Salt Lake, advancing to face Seattle once again in the Western Conference Finals, advancing to the MLS Cup by away goals. They played the New England Revolution in the 2014 MLS Cup and won 2–1 in overtime, thereby becoming five-time champions, a league record. At the end of the season, longtime LA Galaxy player United States national team player Landon Donovan retired. \n\nOn January 7, 2015, the LA Galaxy announced the signing of long time Liverpool player Steven Gerrard to an 18-month Designated Player contract, reportedly worth $9 million. He joined the team in July 2015 following the end of the 2014–15 Premier League season, and made his debut in a International Champions Cup against Club América on July 11. \n\nThe club again made headlines by acquiring Mexican star and Barcelona academy product Giovani dos Santos in July as a designated player. Not since the days of Jorge Campos, Carlos Hermosillo and Luis Hernández in the late 1990s and early 2000s had the Galaxy had a notable Mexican player, let alone one in the prime of his career. Dos Santos made an impactful impression on the Galaxy early on, scoring on his club debut against Central FC in the CONCACAF Champions League and then in his league debut against the Sounders. In his first five club matches, he had a goal, an assist or both to total with four goals and five assists in that span.\n\nBefore the start of the 2016 season, it was announce that long-time servicing center-back Omar Gonzalez would leave the Galaxy after nine years to C.F. Pachuca. \n\nColors and badge \n\nThe LA Galaxy's current colors are white, navy blue and gold. The team's primary kit is white and the secondary kit is blue. The colors were adopted to coincide with David Beckham's arrival with the team in 2007 as part of an overall re-branding exercise spearheaded by then GM Alexi Lalas. Prior to 2007, the Galaxy played in various color combinations, usually comprising gold, teal green and white with black accents, and often highlighting an iconic 'sash' design from the left shoulder and across the chest. Their original jersey, used in the inaugural 1996 MLS season, featured black-and-teal halves, black sleeves with gold and red accents, black shorts and black socks. \n\nThe Galaxy have had two logos to date. The original brand was gold, teal and black, and featured the Galaxy wordmark superimposed over a golden swirl, with a stylized black outline. The logo was changed in 2007, again to coincide with David Beckham's arrival, and now features a blue shield with a gold border, the LA Galaxy team name, and a quasar at the top of the crest.\n\nThe quasar featured prominently on the LA Galaxy's shield was originally featured on the 1957 Seal of Los Angeles County as well as the modified 2004 seal which is featured on the Los Angeles County flag.\n\nThe name Galaxy was created by Nike at the conception of the league, the company was also the original kit supplier for the team. \n\nFile:Los Angeles Galaxy logo (1996-2007).svg|Galaxy logo 1996–2007\nFile:Los Angeles Galaxy logo.svg|Galaxy logo 2007–present\n\nRevenues and profits \n\nThe Galaxy first turned a profit in 2003, becoming the first MLS team to do so. After the team moved into the new Home Depot Center, the team saw increased attendance, a doubling of revenue from sponsors, and revenues from parking and concessions.\n\nA Forbes 2015 report ranked the LA Galaxy second in MLS in terms of annual revenue ($44 million) and in franchise value ($240 million). The Galaxy earn more in annual club sponsorship income ($14 million) and annual local TV rights ($5 million) than any other MLS team. The Galaxy have the highest annual revenue of any MLS team, the third highest revenue of any CONCACAF team, and seventh highest revenue of any team in the Americas. \n\nJersey sponsors \n\nStadium \n\n* Rose Bowl; Pasadena, California (1996–2002)\n* Titan Stadium; Fullerton, California (1999–2011) 10 games in US Open Cup\n* StubHub Center; Carson, California (2003–present)\n\nFrom 1996 to 2002, the Galaxy played their home games at the 107,000-capacity Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, but often held Lamar Hunt US Open Cup games at Titan Stadium on the campus of Cal State Fullerton. The Galaxy played ten games in total at Titan; the US Open Cup Final was held there in 2001 when Galaxy won the tournament.\n\nIn 2003, the Galaxy moved to the StubHub Center (then known as The Home Depot Center), on the campus of California State University, Dominguez Hills in Carson, California, approximately ten miles south of downtown Los Angeles. The stadium is a 27,000-seat soccer-specific stadium, the second of its kind in MLS, but has hosted other sports such as rugby and American football. From 2005 to 2014, the Galaxy shared the stadium with their now-defunct league rivals Chivas USA, with whom they competed for the SuperClasico.\n\nClub culture \n\nCozmo \n\nCozmo is the Galaxy's mascot. He has dark blue skin with yellow eyebrows and white eyes matching the Galaxy's home uniform colors. He replaced the Galaxy's original mascot, \"Twizzle\", who also looked like it was from outer space but was more humanoid in form, wearing a space-man's helmet and cape. \n\nGalaxy Star squad \n\nThe Galaxy Star Squad is the official cheerleaders of the club. They often attend events hosted by the Galaxy, such as autograph sessions, and can be often seen around the stadium during game time giving away scarves and supporting the team. \n\nSupporters \n\nThe Angel City Brigade was created to help establish a festive and vibrant atmosphere in the StubHub Center for the Galaxy. They sit in section 121 in the General Admission area of the stadium. \n\nThe LA Riot Squad formed after a loss in the 2001 MLS Cup, when then-Galaxy keeper Kevin Hartman challenged a group of Galaxy fans to form a supporter group of 100 people by opening day of 2002. The reward if they were able to do this was a keg of beer. They are located in sections 137 and 138 in the General Admission area of the stadium.\n\nGalaxians are the first and original supporter group of the LA Galaxy, having been established in 1996 during the Galaxy's first season in MLS. They are located in section 122, next to the Angel City Brigade.\n\nRivalries \n\nThe Galaxy's chief rival is the San Jose Earthquakes, which is known by the fans and media as the California Clásico. It is considered among the fiercest and longest-running rivalries in American soccer. The intrastate rivalry dates to the founding of MLS, and their encounters in the MLS Cup playoffs and final. Some also cite that the rivalry developed in reflection of traditional Northern California vs Southern California sports rivalries. \n\nTheir in-town rivals were Chivas USA, whom they competed with in the SuperClasico. Also known as the LA Derby, it was dominated by the Galaxy, who won 22 of the 34 encounters. The rivalry was the only intra-stadium rivalry in MLS until Chivas ceased operations at the end of the 2014 season.\n\nBroadcasting \n\nAt the end of the 2011 season, the Galaxy announced a ten-year, $55 million deal with Time Warner Cable, the most lucrative local media contract in MLS history, to begin at the end of the 2012 MLS season. Previously, Galaxy matches were televised regionally in English on Fox Sports West and Prime Ticket alternatively. While awaiting the launch of those networks, all 2012 English-language matches will be split between local outlet KDOC with one match showcased on Time Warner Cable SportsNet near the end of the season. Commentary is handled by Joe Tutino and former Galaxy player Cobi Jones. In Spanish, 2012 matches will be shown on independent outlet KWHY with Adrian Garcia Marquez and Francisco Pinto commentating. All nationally televised MLS games are aired on Fox Sports 1 and ESPN.\n\nRadio coverage of regular season matches are broadcast in English on KNX 1070 AM (Los Angeles) and in Spanish on KWKW 1330 AM (Los Angeles). Joe Tutino does the English play-by-play when Time Warner Cable Sports does not televise. Alternatively, long-time Los Angeles broadcaster Fred Roggin does the play-by-play. Ralph Perez is the analyst. On Spanish-language broadxasts, Rolando \"El Veloz\" Gonzalez handles the play-by-play and Armando Aguayo does the commentary. \n\nPlayers and staff \n\nFor details on former players, see All-time Los Angeles Galaxy roster.\n\nCurrent roster \n\n|}\n\nCurrent coaching staff \n\nHead coaches since 1996 \n\nAs of September 9, 2015 \n\nYouth development \n\nLA Galaxy II \n\nThe Galaxy created the LA Galaxy II reserve team in January 2014 to compete in the USL. In their inaugural season, Los Dos finished third with a record of 15-6-7, and reached the semi-final where they lost to Sacramento Republic FC.\nFor the 2015 USL season, the Galaxy were placed in the Western Conference.\n\nAcademy Program \n\nAs part of its development program, the Galaxy operates an academy system with U-18 and U-16 teams competing in the U.S. Soccer Development Academy, and U-14 and U-12 teams competing in Southern California Developmental Soccer Leagues (SCDSL). Six academy graduates are currently signed to the first team: Jack McBean, Oscar Sorto, Jose Villarreal, Gyasi Zardes, Raul Mendiola and Bradford Jamieson IV. \n\nHonors \n\nContinental \n\n*CONCACAF Champions League\n** Winners: 2000\n** Runners Up: 1997\n*North American SuperLiga\n** Runners Up: 2007\n\nDomestic \n\n*MLS Cup\n** Winners – record (5): 2002, 2005, 2011, 2012, 2014\n** Runners Up (4): 1996, 1999, 2001, 2009\n*Supporters' Shield\n** Winners (4): 1998, 2002, 2010, 2011\n** Runners Up (4): 1996, 1999, 2009, 2014\n*Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup\n** Winners (2): 2001, 2005\n** Runners Up (2): 2002, 2006\n*Western Conference\n** Winners (Playoffs) (9): 1996, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2005, 2009, 2011, 2012, 2014\n** Winners (Regular Season) (8): 1996, 1998, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2009, 2010, 2011\n\nMinor Trophies \n\n*California Clásico (12): 1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2008, 2009, 2011, 2013, 2014\n*SuperClasico (9): 2005, 2006, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014\n*Puerto Rico MLS-USL Challenge: 2007\n*Desert Diamond Cup: 2012\n* Hyundai Club Challenge: 2011\n* Central California Cup: 2014\n*MLS Fair Play Award: 2013\n\n \n\nRetired numbers \n\nTeam results \n\nYear-by-year \n\n* Won MLS Supporters' Shield\n\nMLS regular season only, as of October 25, 2015 \n\nYear-by-year statistics \n\nMLS regular season only, as of October 25, 2015\n\nInternational tournaments \n\n*1997 CONCACAF Champions' Cup\n: Qualifying Playoff v. Santos Laguna – 4–1\n: Quarter-Finals v. Luis Ángel Firpo – 2–0\n: Semi-finals v. D.C. United – 1–0\n: Final v. Cruz Azul – 3–5\n\n*1999 CONCACAF Champions' Cup\n: Qualifying Playoff v. Necaxa – 1–1 (Necaxa advances 4–3 on penalties)\n\n*2000 CONCACAF Champions' Cup\n: Quarter-Finals v. Real España – 0–0 (Los Angeles advances 5–3 on penalties)\n: Semi-finals v. D.C. United – 1–1 (Los Angeles advances 4–2 on penalties)\n: Final v. Olimpia – 3–2\n\n* 2003 La Manga Cup\n: Group stage v. Lyn – 5–0\n: Group stage v. Torpedo Moscow – 3–0\n: Group stage v. Odd – 0–1\n: Third place match v. Viking – 3–0\n\n*2003 CONCACAF Champions' Cup\n: First round v. Motagua – 2–2, 1–0 (Los Angeles advances 3–2 on aggregate)\n: Quarter-Finals v. Necaxa – 1–4, 1–2 (Necaxa advances 6–2 on aggregate)\n\n*2003 Peace Cup\n: Group stage v. Nacional – 0–0\n: Group stage v. 1860 Munich – 0–0\n: Group stage v. PSV – 1–4\n\n*2006 CONCACAF Champions' Cup\n: Quarter-Finals v. Deportivo Saprissa – 0–0, 2–3 AET (Saprissa advance 3–2 on aggregate after added extra time)\n\n*2007 North American SuperLiga\n: Group stage v. Pachuca – 2–1\n: Group stage v. Guadalajara – 1–2\n: Group stage v. FC Dallas – 6–5\n: Semi-finals v. D.C. United – 2–0\n: Final v. Pachuca – 1–1 (Pachuca win 4–3 on penalties)\n\n*Pan-Pacific Championship 2008\n: Semi-finals v. Gamba Osaka – 0–1\n: Third place v. Sydney FC – 2–1\n\n*Pan-Pacific Championship 2009\n: Semi-finals v. Ōita Trinita – 2–0\n: Final v. Suwon Bluewings – 1–1 (Suwon Bluewings win 4–2 on penalties)\n\n*2010–11 CONCACAF Champions League\n: Preliminary Round v. Puerto Rico Islanders – 1–4, 2–1 (Puerto Rico advances 5–3 on aggregate)\n\n*2011 World Football Challenge\n: Group stage v. Real Madrid – 1–4\n: Group stage v. Manchester City – 1–1 (Manchester City win 7–6 on penalties)\n\n*2011–12 CONCACAF Champions League:\n: Group stage v. Motagua – 2–0\n: Group stage v. Alajuelense – 2–0\n: Group stage v. Morelia – 1–2\n: Group stage v. Alajuelense – 0–1\n: Group stage v. Morelia – 2–1\n: Group stage v. Motagua – 1–0\n: Quarter-Finals v. Toronto FC – 2–2, 1–2 (Toronto FC advances 4–3 on aggregate)\n\n*2012 World Football Challenge\n: Group stage v. Real Madrid – 1–5\n\n*2012–13 CONCACAF Champions League:\n: Group stage v. Isidrio Metapán – 5–2\n: Group stage v. Puerto Rico Islanders – 4–0\n: Group stage v. Puerto Rico Islanders – 0–0\n: Group stage v. Isidrio Metapán – 3–2\n: Quarter-Finals v. Herediano – 0–0, 4–1 (LA advances 4–1 on aggregate)\n: Semi-finals vs. Monterrey – 1–2, 0–1 (Monterrey advances 3–1 on aggregate)\n\n*2013 International Champions Cup\n: Round 1 v. Real Madrid – 1–3\n: Round 2 v. Juventus – 3–1\n: Third place v. Milan – 0–2\n\n*2013–14 CONCACAF Champions League:\n: Group stage v. Cartaginés – 2–0\n: Group stage v. Isidrio Metapán – 1–0\n: Group stage v. Cartaginés – 3–0\n: Group stage v. Isidrio Metapán 0–4\n: Quarter-Finals v. Tijuana 1–0, 2–4 (Tijuana advances 4–3 on aggregate)\n\nPlayer awards \n\nStatistical records \n\n* Games: Cobi Jones (306)\n* Goals: Landon Donovan (112)\n* Hat Tricks: Cobi Jones, Edson Buddle, Robbie Keane (4)\n* Assists: Landon Donovan (107)\n* Cleansheets: Kevin Hartman (62)\n\nMLS regular season only, as of July 27, 2015 \n\nMost Valuable Player \n\nMLS regular season only, as of February 26, 2015 \n\nGolden Boot \n\nThe Golden Boot winner is the leading goal scorer at the end of the season (only goals in MLS count). This award did not exist from 1996 to 2004. The MLS Scoring Champion Award included both goal and assist totals those years.\n\nMLS regular season only, as of February 26, 2015 \n\nDefensive Player of the Year \n\nMLS regular season only, as of February 26, 2015", "The San Jose Earthquakes are an American professional soccer team based in San Jose, California, United States, that competes in the Western Conference of Major League Soccer (MLS). The franchise is one of the ten charter members of MLS which competed in the league's first season in 1996 (originally as the San Jose Clash) and took part in the first game in MLS history, defeating D.C. United 1–0. The Earthquakes have won two MLS Cup titles, in 2001 and 2003, and two Supporters' Shields in 2005 and 2012. In 2002, the team played in its first CONCACAF Champions Cup (now called the CONCACAF Champions League), making it to the quarterfinals. The team holds a fierce rivalry with the LA Galaxy in the California Clásico. \n\nTheir head coach is Dominic Kinnear, who previously coached the team from 2004 to 2005. The Earthquakes play their home games at Avaya Stadium beginning in 2015. The team previously played its home games at Buck Shaw Stadium on the Santa Clara University campus in Santa Clara, California from 2008 to 2014.\n\nHistory \n\nRoots of the Earthquakes (1974–1993) \n\nThe franchise's roots trace back to 1974, when the North American Soccer League (NASL) awarded an expansion franchise to San Jose, named the Earthquakes. The name Earthquakes originally came from a newspaper contest in the San Jose Mercury News, in which fans were encouraged to send in suggestions for the name of the franchise. Earthquakes was chosen by the team's general manager Dick Berg, but was criticized due to San Jose's proximity to the San Andreas Fault. The NASL folded after the 1984 season and the Earthquakes played in the Western Soccer League (WSL) from 1985–88, under the ownership of Peter Bridgwater.\n\nIn 1988, Bridgwater sold the team. When the team folded later that year, the WSL awarded a franchise to Dan Van Voorhis, a local real estate lawyer. Van Voorhis named his new team the Blackhawks, after a real estate development of his. The San Francisco Bay Blackhawks entered the WSL for the 1989 season. In 1991, Van Voorhis hired a former Earthquakes player, Laurie Calloway, as coach. Calloway coached a team full of players who would later play for San Jose in MLS, including John Doyle, Troy Dayak, Paul Bravo, and Eric Wynalda. In a preview of what was to come later in MLS, bitter disagreements between Calloway and Wynalda led to Calloway kicking Wynalda off the team in 1992. Blackhawks owner Dan Van Voorhis later pulled his team out of the WSL's successor league, the American Professional Soccer League, after which it played as the San Jose Hawks in the USISL in 1993. The team folded at the end of the 1993 season.\n\nFounding and early years (1994–1999) \n\nIn 1994, Van Voorhis successfully led a San Jose bidding group that was awarded one of Major League Soccer's inaugural teams. At that time, he handed over all existing Hawks player contracts, front-office resources and the rights to play in San Jose State University's Spartan Stadium to MLS in exchange for Type C stock in the league. He also became the franchise's investor/operator until outside concerns forced him to divest himself of these positions prior to the league's launch and accept a buyout from the league, leaving the franchise league-owned for several years. Meanwhile, a direct connection to the earlier Earthquakes came in the person of Peter Bridgwater, named as General Manager of the MLS team. Although Bridgwater still owned the rights to the Earthquakes name and logo, the team became known as the Clash at the urging of Nike, a major investor in MLS.\n\nOn December 7, 1995, Bridgwater hired Calloway as the team's first coach, providing a second direct connection with the NASL Earthquakes, as well as a connection with the Blackhawks. Ignoring the history between Calloway and Wynalda with the Blackhawks, the team acquired Wynalda just over a month later, on January 23, 1996. The Clash's connections to the Blackhawks continued when the Clash made the first trade in MLS history, sending Rhett Harty to the MetroStars for Troy Dayak, both players having spent several years with the team. Despite the presence of Calloway and much of his former team, the Clash failed to achieve the dominance achieved by the Blackhawks.\n\nSan Jose was an integral part of the launching of MLS, hosting MLS's inaugural game at Spartan Stadium before a crowd of 31,683 on April 6, 1996. The then-record crowd did not go away disappointed as San Jose won its first game on the first goal in MLS history from Eric Wynalda, defeating D.C. United 1–0. One month later, the club made history again, as they hosted the Los Angeles Galaxy in a match that drew 31,728 fans to Spartan Stadium, setting the record for attendance at a sporting event in the city of San Jose. Wynalda and Calloway were soon at each other's throats. The tensions on the team eventually led to a locker room brawl between Wynalda and John Doyle. The skirmish reached memorable proportions when Wynalda hired an airplane to tow a banner demanding Calloway's firing. \n\nAlthough the Clash made the postseason in the inaugural 1996 MLS season, and Doyle earned recognition as the best MLS defender, the team floundered in 1997. By mid-season the team was sinking fast and Bridgwater fired Calloway and replaced him with Brian Quinn. The Clash finished 1997 at the bottom of the Western Conference standings with a 12–20 record. Things were no better in 1998, when the team finished 13–19 and well out of playoff contention. During the 1999 pre-season, the saga of player-coach antagonism continued when Richard Gough left the team after an argument with Quinn. By the end of 1999, Quinn was done and the team released him to hire Lothar Osiander.\n\nReturn of the Earthquakes (1999–2005) \n\nThe franchise's official name changed from Clash to Earthquakes on October 27, 1999. After missing four consecutive post-seasons with three different coaches, the Earthquakes hired head coach Frank Yallop days before the 2001 MLS SuperDraft. Yallop's personnel changes and deft coaching with the help of assistant coach Dominic Kinnear and goalkeeper coach Tim Hanley, along with the allocation of star forward Landon Donovan on loan from Bayer Leverkusen, quickly turned around the Earthquakes' on-field fortunes, spurring the biggest regular season turnaround in league history (from 29 points in 2000 to 45 points in 2001) and leading the team to a 2–1 MLS Cup 2001 overtime victory over the archrival Los Angeles Galaxy.\n\nThe Quakes followed with two consecutive runners-up finishes for the MLS Supporters' Shield and a 4–2 MLS Cup 2003 win over the Chicago Fire. Prior to reaching the 2003 final, the Earthquakes had rallied from four goals down to beat the Galaxy, 5–4 on aggregate, in a first-round playoff that many MLS watchers described as the greatest in league history. Following the season, Yallop returned to his native Canada to coach the Canadian men's national soccer team. Assistant coach Kinnear was then promoted to head coach, and former San Jose player John Doyle was named as his assistant.\n\nHaving won two MLS Cup titles in three years, the Earthquakes were poised for greater success both on and off the field. However, in January 2004, General Manager Johnny Moore, whose roots with the club dated back to his days as a player for the NASL Earthquakes, resigned after AEG and MLS considered allowing the team to be rebranded as San Jose America (with ownership to transfer to the owners of Mexico's Club América). Earthquake fans were similarly outraged at the proposed rebranding, coming just months after the MLS Cup. Former Los Angeles Galaxy defender Alexi Lalas was named as Moore's replacement. Under Lalas' management, the club planned a move to Houston. Meanwhile, when the Quakes' star player, Landon Donovan, played briefly in Germany, Lalas traded away his rights, enabling Lalas' former team, the Galaxy, to acquire him.\n\nOn the field, Kinnear led the team to two more playoff appearances, including an MLS Supporters' Shield win in 2005.\n\nHiatus and return (2006–2008) \n\nFollowing the conclusion of the 2005 season, on December 15, the then owner of the San Jose Earthquakes, Anschutz Entertainment Group, announced that the team was moving to Houston for the 2006 season because of the failure of efforts to secure a soccer-specific stadium for the team in San Jose. However, MLS Commissioner Don Garber said that the Earthquakes' name, colors, logo, wordmark, history and competitive records would not be transferred, similar to the Cleveland Browns deal in the National Football League. The San Jose franchise was officially put on hiatus while the players, head coach Dominic Kinnear and some of his coaching staff were moved to Houston, Texas, where they became, first, Houston 1836, then Houston Dynamo. The Houston Dynamo is technically considered an expansion team by MLS just as the Baltimore Ravens was by the NFL during that team's early years.\n\nOn May 24, 2006, an agreement was reached between Major League Soccer and the principal owners of the Oakland Athletics baseball team. Lewis Wolff and John Fisher have a three-year exclusive option to develop a soccer-specific stadium and bring an expansion franchise to the San Francisco Bay Area. \n\nIn September 2006, after nearly nine months of inactivity (displaying only Commissioner Garber's December 2005 letter of condolence to Earthquakes fans over the team's relocation), the team's website was revived to display updates on the progress of starting up the expansion San Jose Earthquakes franchise and to allow fans to sign up for the Earthquakes Soccer, LLC e-newsletter.\n\nOn July 18, 2007, Commissioner Don Garber announced that the San Jose Earthquakes would resume play starting in the 2008 season after Lew Wolff exercised his option to purchase the new expansion team. While functionally being the 14th franchise to join MLS, the team retained all records, logos, colors and titles of the 1996–2005 franchise and is a continuation of that franchise.\n\nIn October 2007 the Earthquakes announced they would be moving their offices from the Fairmont Hotel in downtown San Jose to an office park across the street from their temporary home, Buck Shaw Stadium, and across the Caltrain tracks from the location of the former FMC site. \n\nOn November 6, 2007, the team announced that former Earthquakes coach Frank Yallop was returning to the team as head coach. According to ESPN.com, the Earthquakes compensated Yallop's previous employer, the Los Angeles Galaxy, with a third-round pick in the 2008 MLS SuperDraft. \n\nIn 2008, England's Darren Huckerby, the MLS Newcomer of the Year and Ireland's Ronnie O'Brien, who made 28 appearances for the Earthquakes, helped anchor the offense, combining for 10 goals and 10 assists. Both played a key part of the team's nine game unbeaten streak that saw San Jose push towards a playoff berth. They also failed to qualify for the US Open Cup, losing to Real Salt Lake 4–0 in the first round of qualifying.\n\nOn January 27, 2009, Amway Global signed a three-year deal with the Earthquakes to become the team's official jersey sponsor. \n\nThe Quakes missed out on the playoffs for a second consecutive season in 2009 but looked to build on a solid second half of the year, which saw them go 4–4–4 since the All-Star Break. The Earthquakes finished in 14th place and failing to qualify for the playoffs. The Earthquakes also failed to qualify for the US Open Cup, losing to New York Red Bulls on April 29, 2–1.\n\nIn 2010, the San Jose Earthquakes qualified for the playoffs as the West's #6 seed with 46 points. In the 2010 MLS playoffs, they were matched up with the #1 seeded New York Red Bulls. After losing the first game by a score of 1–0, the Earthquakes defeated the Red Bulls in the second game by a score of 3–1 to win the aggregate, 3–2, and upset New York. In the single-elimination semi-final match against the Colorado Rapids, at Colorado, the Quakes suffered a 1–0 defeat. \n\nIn 2011, the San Jose Earthquakes missed the playoffs after they finished seventh in the west and fourteenth in all of MLS.\n\nThe Goonies (2012–2014) \n\nIn 2012, the San Jose Earthquakes had the best start in franchise history. The team established a habit of scoring late goals to tie or win games. The first was a match against Real Salt Lake on April 21, 2012, scoring 2 goals in stoppage time to win 3–1. The next week, a stoppage time goal produced a win against the Philadelphia Union. Two more games resulted in ties with late goals, both scored by Alan Gordon. On May 23, 2012, against the L.A. Galaxy, the Quakes scored 3 times in 18 minutes to win 3–2. After this game striker Steven Lenhart declared \"Goonies never say die!\" (a reference to the movie The Goonies), and this was made into the rally cry of the team. \n\nThe Quakes ended the 2012 regular season with 66 points and 72 goals, both team records, with 17 of those points created by goals scored in the 84th minute or later. The team clinched the Supporter's Shield, its first major trophy since their return to San Jose, and qualified for their first CONCACAF Champion's League tournament as a franchise in 2013. They returned to the playoffs for the first time since their 2010 season and faced two games against L.A. Galaxy. In their first playoff game, the Quakes scored a stoppage time goal to take the away leg 1–0, but were knocked out of the playoffs following a 3–1 loss at home (3–2 on aggregate), their only loss at Buck Shaw Stadium for the season. \n\nIn 2013, the Quakes began the year facing adversity with numerous players recovering from injury. With added depth in preparation for the upcoming CONCACAF Champions' League, they began the task of duplicating the success of 2012. While the style of scoring late goals were still present in games against New York, Portland and Montreal, the team struggled to find success and quickly found themselves at the bottom of the Western Conference. The slow start of the team led to the departure of coach Frank Yallop and Mark Watson was named interim coach.\n\nOn June 29, 2013, the Quakes played the L.A. Galaxy in the California Classico. Despite being down 2–0 and having Victor Bernardez ejected, the Quakes staged another comeback, scoring twice in stoppage time to win 3–2, becoming the first MLS team to do so. \n\nOn August 7, 2013, the Earthquakes debuted in the 2013–14 CONCACAF Champions League for the first time since their return to MLS. They lost the away game to the Montreal Impact 1–0. On October 23, 2013, the Earthquakes won group five on goal differential with a win at home against Heredia, and they moved on to the knockout stage of the tournament. \n\nDespite a league best record in games played after June, the Quakes failed to qualify for the 2013 playoffs, losing the final spot to Colorado on a goal differential tiebreaker. The final home game of the season, a 2–0 win against FC Dallas, saw the final minutes of professional soccer for Ramiro Corrales, who had announced his retirement. Corrales was the last remaining active player who played in the inaugural season of MLS.\n\nThe Quakes in their 2014 campaign began, playing in the quarterfinals against Toluca in a two-game series in the 2013–14 CONCACAF Champions League. Scoring a goal in stoppage time in the first game, the Quakes went to Mexico 1–1 on aggregate. In the second game, the game tied in regulation. The Quakes faced Toluca in Overtime where neither team could score against the other and the game went on to penalites. The Earthquakes lost 5–4 against Toluca in penalties and were eliminated.\n\nSan Jose ended the 2014 MLS Season with the club's worst ever record, winning only 6 matches, and suffering a 15-match winless streak. That streak surpassed the Quakes' previous record of 13 in 2011, and matched the second worst in league history. \n\nReturn of Dominic Kinnear (2015–present) \n\nThe Earthquakes welcomed back Dominic Kinnear to the club as coach after a nine-year tenure in Houston. The franchise's long awaited stadium, Avaya Stadium, was the first professional soccer-specific stadium in the Bay Area when it opened on March 22. In 2015, Chris Wondolowski became the ninth player in MLS history to score 100 goals, also being the second fastest player in doing so.\n\nCrest and shirt \n\nSince their inception, the Earthquakes have played in a color scheme featuring blue and black as dominant colors, usually with white highlights. The original San Jose Clash logo featured a stylized scorpion in black and red with a white 'clash' wordmark.\n\nWhen they rebranded to the Earthquakes in 2000, the team badge featured an inverted triangular shield containing a soccer ball invoking the rising sun used in the logo for the City of San Jose, a stylized 'Earthquakes' wordmark, and a color palette of blue, black, white and silver. The three points of the triangular shield represented the three largest communities of the Bay Area (San Jose, San Francisco and Oakland). \n\nThe team rebranded again on January 30, 2014 to a new crest and kit. While still featuring blue and black, as well as a new chevron design that invokes the geologic theme of the team's name, the new design also features the year 1974 in red; this is an explicit reference of lineage to the previous NASL incarnation of the Earthquakes. \n\nStadium \n\n* Avaya Stadium: San Jose, California (2015–present)\n* Levi's Stadium: Santa Clara, California (2014–present) (grand opening of stadium on August 2; also one match per year for five years)\n* Buck Shaw Stadium: Santa Clara, California (2008–2014)\n* Spartan Stadium: San Jose, California (1996–2005)\n* Oakland–Alameda County Coliseum: Oakland, California (2008–2009) (big game venue)\n* Stanford Stadium: Stanford, California (2011–present) (big game venue, scheduled around July 4)\n\nUS Open Cup\n* Negoesco Stadium: San Francisco, California (July 24, 2001) vs LA Galaxy\n* Cagan Stadium: Stanford, California (2011–2012)\n* Kezar Stadium: San Francisco, California (2012, 2014)\n\nOn January 13, 2007, the San Jose Mercury News reported that the city of San Jose, San Jose State University and the Earthquakes owners were in negotiations to build a soccer stadium just east of the Earthquakes' previous home, Spartan Stadium. The new facility, to have 22,000 permanent seats but be expandable to a capacity of 30,000 for single games, would be privately built by Lewis Wolff and John Fisher, the primary owners of the Earthquakes, with San Jose State providing the needed land. Additionally, the team and the university would build community soccer fields across Senter Road in Kelley Park using San Jose municipal bond money that had been approved years earlier for the purpose but never spent. The plan was for the new version of the San Jose Earthquakes to play in Spartan Stadium during the 2008 MLS season, then move into the new stadium in 2009. Plans for the stadium collapsed on April 19 of that year after the Earthquakes and SJSU could not come to an agreement on revenue sharing.\n\nAvaya Stadium \n\nOn May 8, the city of San Jose and Earthquakes Soccer, LLC confirmed that their new primary focus was on a site near San Jose International Airport on the site of the former FMC plant. The new site was owned by the city, which was exploring either leasing it to Earthquakes Soccer, LLC or selling it outright. The 75 acre site is adjacent to not only the airport but the planned BART extension to Santa Clara and the existing Santa Clara Caltrain station, and near both Interstate 880 and U.S. Route 101. On June 12, 2007, the San Jose City Council voted unanimously to enter into a Memorandum of Understanding to explore construction of a new stadium to bring MLS back to San Jose and adopted a resolution authorizing the city manager to enter into an Exclusive Right to Negotiate agreement with Wolff and his partners regarding the potential development of the former FMC site. The first payment on the new stadium land of $3 million was made in June 2008. \n\nThe preliminary designs were released to the public on September 19, 2009. Avaya Stadium was slated to be a three-sided European style stadium with 18,000 permanent seats and a grass berm at the open end.\n\nOn March 16, 2010, the San Jose city council voted 9–0 to rezone the Airport West property to allow for development of the new Avaya Stadium. \n\nThe San Jose Earthquakes franchise made history when 6,256 people participated in groundbreaking for the new stadium. This set a world record by Guinness World Records as the largest ever crowd to participate in a groundbreaking ceremony. The construction was completed in early 2015 and hosted its first event, a friendly, pre-season match against LA Galaxy, on February 28, 2015. The stadium's official opening took place on March 22, 2015, when the Earthquakes hosted Chicago Fire for their first home game of the 2015 MLS regular season. \n\nClub culture\n\nRivalries \n\nThe California Clásico is a rivalry between two Major League Soccer teams, the LA Galaxy and the San Jose Earthquakes, which existed from 1996 to 2005 and was resumed in 2008. It is considered to be one of the oldest rivalries in American soccer. The rivalry originated from the historical Northern California vs. Southern California sporting and cultural rivalries, as well as from the relative proximity of the cities (about 360 miles apart) which allows rival fans to attend each other's games. While there have been several players to play for both teams beforehand, the rivalry intensified after the Anschutz Entertainment Group (owner of the Los Angeles Galaxy) took sole ownership of the San Jose Earthquakes in December 2002. The rivalry reached its peak from 2001 to 2005, during which time the Earthquakes and the Galaxy combined to win four MLS Cup titles in a five-year period. Both clubs reached MLS Cup 2001, with San Jose posting a 2–1 overtime victory on goals by Landon Donovan and Dwayne DeRosario.\n\nThe Heritage Cup with Seattle Sounders FC was begun in the 2009 MLS season by the respective supporters' groups. Any present or future MLS teams that carry on the names of their NASL predecessors are eligible for the Cup, but supporters of the other eligible MLS teams (Portland Timbers and Vancouver Whitecaps) have chosen not to participate. San Jose and Seattle have had a rivalry since the NASL. However, it did not completely resurface during the 2009 season with fans of both teams viewing other clubs as bigger rivals. That season, the first MLS meeting of the teams was not considered for the competition due to the schedule consisting of two games in Seattle and only one in San Jose. Seattle won the initial meeting at home 2–0 and the second 2–1. The Earthquakes won the inaugural cup on goals scored after a 4–0 home victory on August 2, 2009. \n\nSupport \n\nAmong the supporters' groups affiliated with the Earthquakes are the San Jose Ultras, Club Quake, Soccer Silicon Valley, The Casbah and The Faultline. \n\nAn Earthquakes fan was arrested for assaulting a Portland Timbers fan after taunting the group in April 2013. The 1906 Ultras responded via Twitter: \"arrests issue addressed\" and to be \"moving beyond the issue\" ahead of a travel ban that was lifted by Major League Soccer just days prior.\n\nPunk musician, Lars Frederiksen is a supporter of the Earthquakes. Along with his band, The Old Firm Casuals, he wrote the new anthem and theme song, \"Never Say Die\", for the club, which was performed as part of the team's rebranding ceremony on January 30, 2014. The song features backing vocals by various team members. Frederiksen said of the team that they are the most \"punk rock\" team in the MLS. \n\nMascots \n\n* José Clash (1996–1999)\n* Rikter the CyberDog (2000–2002)\n* Q (2004–2005), (2008–present)\n\nThere was no mascot in 2003.\n\nOn April 26, 2010, Q was one of three mascots featured on KNTV, along with San Jose Sharks mascot S.J. Sharkie and San Jose Giants mascot \"Gigante\". \n\nRevenue and profitability\n\nAt the beginning of 2013, the Quakes had 5,000 season ticket holders, and although revenues had been increasing, the Quakes stadium did not allow them to generate sufficient revenues to be profitable. Quakes management predicted in 2013 that season ticket sales would double once they move into their new stadium, and the Quakes would become profitable at that time. Management also stated that they are \"pursuing independent revenue streams that will provide the team with real and lasting financial freedom.\" With the completion of their new soccer-specific Avaya Stadium, in early 2015 the Earthquakes reached their cap of 12,000 season tickets sold. \n\nJersey sponsors \n\nThere was no jersey sponsor in 2005, 2008, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015.\n\nStadium sponsors \n\n*Avaya (2015–present) \n\nBroadcasting \n\nSan Jose Earthquakes games are televised locally on Comcast SportsNet California/Comcast SportsNet California HD and Comcast SportsNet Bay Area/Comcast SportsNet Bay Area HD, with Anthony Passarelli providing the play-by-play, Chris Dangerfield providing color analysis and Kate Scott providing reports from the sideline.\n\nA number of games are instead televised nationally on Fox Sports 1, Fox Sports 2, ESPN2/ESPN2 HD/ESPN Deportes/ESPN Deportes HD, UniMás/UniMás HD and Univision Deportes Network/Univision Deportes Network HD.\n\nOn the radio, all Earthquakes games are broadcast in English on KLIV and in Spanish on KZSF \"La Kaliente\". Announcer Ted Ramey works as the primary English-language radio play-by-play announcer along with radio color analyst and Earthquakes legend Joe Cannon, their goalie for many years, while Carlos Cesar Rivera serves as the Spanish-language radio play-by-play announcer. La Kaliente's Spanish coverage is simulcasted in Spanish-language SAP either on CSN California or CSN Bay Area.\n\nPlayers and staff \n\nFor details on former players, see All-time San Jose Earthquakes roster.\n\nCurrent roster \n\nOut on loan \n\nTeam management \n\nHonors \n\n*MLS Cup\n** Winners (2): 2001, 2003\n*Supporters' Shield\n** Winners (2): 2005, 2012\n** Runners Up (2): 2002, 2003\n*Western Conference\n** Winners (Playoff) (2): 2001, 2003\n** Winners (Regular Season) (3): 2003, 2005, 2012\n* Minor Trophies\n**California Clásico (6): 1997, 2001, 2005, 2010, 2012, 2015\n**Carolina Challenge Cup (2): 2005, 2008\n**Heritage Cup (2): 2009, 2012\n** Rose City Invitational (2): 2012, 2013\n**MLS Fair Play Award (2): 2001, 2010\n\nRecord \n\nYear-by-year \n\n* Won Supporters' Shield\n\nInternational tournaments \n\n*2002 CONCACAF Champions' Cup\n: First Round v. Club Deportivo Olimpia – 1:0, 3:1 (Earthquakes advanced 4:1 on aggregate)\n: Quarter-Finals v. C.F. Pachuca – 0:3, 1:0 (Pachuca advanced 3:1 on aggregate)\n\n* 2003 La Manga Cup\n: Group Stage v. Rosenborg BK – 0:2\n: Group Stage v. FC Rubin Kazan – 1:1\n: Group Stage v. Viking FK – 1:3\n: Seventh Place Match v. Lyn Oslo – 3:1\n\n*2003 CONCACAF Champions' Cup\n: First Round v. C.S.D. Municipal – 2:4, 2:1 (Municipal advanced 5:4 on aggregate)\n\n* 2004 La Manga Cup\n: Group Stage v. GIF Sundsvall – 3:1\n: Group Stage v. Stabæk Fotball – 2:1\n: Semi-Finals v. Viking FK – 1:1 (Viking Stavanger advanced 5:3 on penalties)\n: Third Place Match v. FC Dynamo Kyiv – 1:1 (Earthquakes won 6:5 on penalties)\n\n*2004 CONCACAF Champions' Cup\n: Quarter-Finals v. L.D. Alajuelense – 0:3, 1:0 (Alajuelense advanced 3:1 on aggregate)\n\n*2013–14 CONCACAF Champions League\n: Group Stage v. Montreal Impact – 0:1\n: Group Stage v. Heredia Jaguares de Peten – 0:1\n: Group Stage v. Montreal Impact – 3:0\n: Group Stage v. Heredia Jaguares de Peten – 1:0\n: Quarterfinals v. Deportivo Toluca F.C. – 1:1, 1:1 (Toluca advanced 5:4 on penalties)\n\nPlayer records \n\nCareer (regular season only)\n* Games: Ramiro Corrales (250) \n* Goals: Chris Wondolowski (112) \n* Assists: Ronald Cerritos (47)\n* Shutouts: Joe Cannon (43)\n\nSingle season\n* Goals: Chris Wondolowski (27)\n* Saves: Jon Busch (138) \n\nAverage attendance \n\nNotes: \n* A dash means that the team missed the playoffs that year.\n* The years marked with an asterisk show the seasons in which average attendance exceeded Buck Shaw Stadium's capacity. Attendance exceeded capacity because the Earthquakes played select matches at larger stadiums throughout the Bay Area.\n* Green and red shading show the team's highest and lowest season attendances respectively.\n* All-time attendance: / (Regular season / Play-offs)\n\nTeam captains \n\nLeadership and players\n\nHall of fame \n\nPlayers \n* John Doyle (inducted 2005)\n* Ronald Cerritos (inducted 2010)\n* Troy Dayak (inducted 2011)\n* Paul Child (inducted 2012)\n* Momčilo Gavrić (inducted 2013)\n* Johnny Moore (inducted 2014)\n* Ramiro Corrales (inducted 2015)\n\nBuilders \n* Milan Mandarić (inducted 2012)\n* Peter Bridgwater (inducted 2013)\n\nHead coaches \n\nGeneral managers \n\nOwnership \n\n* Major League Soccer (1996–98)\n* Kraft Sports Group (1999–00)\n* Silicon Valley Sports & Entertainment (2001)\n* Silicon Valley Sports & Entertainment (Operations) / Anschutz Entertainment Group (Investment) (2002)\n* Anschutz Entertainment Group (2003–05)\n* Earthquakes Soccer, LLC (2007–)" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "The_Rocky_Horror_Picture_Show.txt" ], "title": [ "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" ], "wiki_context": [ "The Rocky Horror Picture Show is a 1975 British musical comedy horror film directed by Jim Sharman. The screenplay was written by Sharman and Richard O'Brien based on the 1973 musical stage production The Rocky Horror Show, music, book and lyrics by O'Brien. The production is a parody tribute to the science fiction and horror B movies of the 1930s through early 1970s. The film stars Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon and Barry Bostwick along with cast members from the original Royal Court Theatre, Roxy Theatre and Belasco Theatre productions.\n\nThe story centres on a young engaged couple whose car breaks down in the rain near a castle where they seek a telephone to call for help. The castle is occupied by strangers in elaborate costumes celebrating an annual convention. They discover the head of the house is Frank N. Furter, an apparent mad scientist who actually is an alien transvestite who creates a living muscle man in his laboratory. The couple is seduced separately by the mad scientist and eventually released by the servants who take control.\n\nThe film was shot in the United Kingdom at Bray Studios and on location at an old country estate named Oakley Court, best known for its earlier use by Hammer Film Productions. A number of props and set pieces were reused from the Hammer horror films. Although the film is both a parody and tribute to many of the kitsch science fiction and horror films, costume designer Sue Blane conducted no research for her designs. Blane stated that costumes from the film have directly impacted the development of punk music fashion trends such as ripped fishnets and dyed hair.\n\nAlthough largely critically panned on initial release, it soon became known as a midnight movie when audiences began participating with the film at the Waverly Theater in New York City in 1976. Audience members returned to the cinemas frequently and talked back to the screen and began dressing as the characters, spawning similar performance groups across the United States. At almost the same time, fans in costume at the King's Court Theater in Pittsburgh began performing alongside the film. This \"shadow cast\" mimed the actions on screen above and behind them, while lip-syncing their character's lines. Still in limited release four decades after its premiere, it is the longest-running theatrical release in film history. Today, the film has a large international following. It was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in 2005.\n\nThe film's creative team also produced Shock Treatment in 1981, a standalone feature using the characters of Brad and Janet and featuring some of the same cast. This second film was produced as a musical stage production for a 2015 premier on the London stage. A modern-day reimagining of the film, directed by Kenny Ortega and us the original script from the film, is set to air on television in October 2016. The special will feature an ensemble cast starring Laverne Cox as Dr. Frank N. Furter, Ryan McCartan and Victoria Justice as Brad and Janet, and Tim Curry as The Criminologist.\n\nPlot\n\nA criminologist narrates the tale of the newly engaged couple Brad Majors and Janet Weiss who find themselves lost and with a flat tire on a cold and rainy late November evening, somewhere near Denton, Ohio. Seeking a telephone, the couple walk to a nearby castle where they discover a group of strange and outlandish people who are holding an Annual Transylvanian Convention. They are soon swept into the world of Dr. Frank N. Furter, a self-proclaimed \"sweet transvestite from Transsexual, Transylvania\". The ensemble of convention attendees also includes servants Riff Raff, his sister Magenta, and a groupie named Columbia.\n\nIn his lab, Frank claims to have discovered the \"secret to life itself\". His creation, Rocky, is brought to life. The ensuing celebration is soon interrupted by Eddie (an ex-delivery boy, both Frank and Columbia's ex-lover, as well as partial brain donor to Rocky) who rides out of a deep freeze on a motorcycle. In a jealous rage, Frank corners him and kills him with an ice axe. He then departs with Rocky to a bridal suite.\n\nBrad and Janet are shown to separate bedrooms where each is visited and seduced by Frank, who poses as Brad (when visiting Janet) and then as Janet (when visiting Brad). Janet, upset and emotional, wanders off to look for Brad, who she discovers, via a television monitor, is in bed with Frank. She then discovers Rocky, cowering in his birth tank, hiding from Riff Raff, who has been tormenting him. While tending to his wounds, Janet becomes intimate with Rocky, as Magenta and Columbia watch from their bedroom monitor.\n\nAfter discovering that his creation is missing, Frank returns to the lab with Brad and Riff Raff, where Frank learns that an intruder has entered the building. Brad and Janet's old high school science teacher, Dr. Everett Scott, has come looking for his nephew, Eddie. Frank suspects that Dr. Scott investigates UFOs for the government. Upon learning of Brad and Janet's connection to Dr. Scott, Frank suspects them of working for him. Frank, Dr. Scott, Brad, and Riff Raff then discover Janet and Rocky together under the sheets in Rocky's birth tank, upsetting Frank and Brad. Magenta interrupts the reunion by sounding a massive gong and stating that dinner is prepared.\n\nRocky and the guests share an uncomfortable dinner, which they soon realize has been prepared from Eddie's mutilated remains. Janet runs screaming into Rocky's arms and is slapped and chased through the halls of the castle by a jealous Frank. Janet, Brad, Dr. Scott, Rocky and Columbia all meet in Frank's lab, where Frank captures them with the Medusa Transducer, transforming them into nude statues. After dressing them in cabaret costume, Frank \"unfreezes\" them, from which they spontaneously perform a live cabaret floor show with Frank as the leader.\n\nRiff Raff and Magenta interrupt the performance, revealing themselves and Frank to be aliens from the planet Transsexual in the galaxy of Transylvania. They stage a coup and announce a plan to return to their homeworld. In the process, they kill Columbia, Rocky and Frank, who has \"failed his mission\". They release Brad, Janet and Dr. Scott, then depart by lifting off in the castle itself. The survivors are then left crawling in the dirt, and the narrator concludes that the human race is equivalent to insects crawling on the planet's surface.\n\nCast\n\n* Tim Curry as Dr. Frank N. Furter, a scientist\n* Susan Sarandon as Janet Weiss, a heroine\n* Barry Bostwick as Brad Majors, a hero\n* Richard O'Brien as Riff Raff, a handyman\n* Patricia Quinn as Magenta, a domestic\n* Nell Campbell as Columbia, a groupie\n* Jonathan Adams as Dr. Everett V. Scott, a rival scientist\n* Peter Hinwood as Rocky Horror, a creation\n* Meat Loaf as Eddie, an ex-delivery boy\n* Charles Gray as The Criminologist, an expert\n* Jeremy Newson as Ralph Hapschatt\n* Hilary Labow as Betty Hapschatt (née Munroe)\n\nProduction\n\nConcept and development\n\nRichard O'Brien was living as an unemployed actor in London during the early 1970s. He wrote most of The Rocky Horror Show during one winter just to occupy himself. Since his youth, O'Brien had loved science fiction and B horror movies. He wanted to combine elements of the unintentional humour of B horror movies, portentous dialogue of schlock-horror, Steve Reeves muscle flicks and fifties rock and roll into his musical.\n\nO'Brien showed a portion of the unfinished script to Australian director Jim Sharman, who decided to direct it at the small experimental space Upstairs at the Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square, Chelsea, London, which was used as a project space for new work. O'Brien had appeared briefly in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Jesus Christ Superstar, directed by Sharman and the two also worked together in Sam Shepard's The Unseen Hand. Sharman would bring in production designer Brian Thomson. The original creative team was then rounded out by costume designer Sue Blane and musical director Richard Hartley, and stage producer Michael White was also brought in to produce. As the musical went into rehearsal, the working title, They Came from Denton High, was changed just before previews at the suggestion of Sharman to The Rocky Horror Show. \n\nHaving premiered in the small sixty-seat Royal Court Theatre, it quickly moved to larger venues in London, transferring to the 230-seat Chelsea Classic Cinema on Kings Road on 14 August 1973, before finding a quasi-permanent home at the 500-seat King's Road Theatre from 3 November 1973, running for six years. The musical made its U.S. debut in Los Angeles in 1974 before being played in New York City as well as other cities. Producer and Ode Records owner Lou Adler attended the London production in the winter of 1973, escorted by friend Britt Ekland. He immediately decided to purchase the U.S. theatrical rights. His production would be staged at his Roxy Theatre in L.A. In 1975, The Rocky Horror Show premiered on Broadway at the 1,000-seat Belasco Theatre. \n\nFilming and locations\n\nThe film was shot at Bray Studios, and Oakley Court, a country house near Maidenhead, Berkshire, England and Elstree Studios for post production, from 21 October to 19 December 1974. Oakley Court, built in 1857 in the Victorian Gothic style, is known for a number of Hammer films. Much of the location shooting took place there, although at the time the manor was not in good condition. Fox insisted on casting the two characters of Brad and Janet with American actors, Barry Bostwick and Susan Sarandon. Filming took place during autumn, which made conditions worse, and during filming, Sarandon fell ill with pneumonia. Filming of the laboratory scene and the title character's creation occurred on 30 October 1974. \n\nThe film is both a parody and tribute to many of the science fiction and horror movies from the 1930s up to the 1970s. The film production retains many aspects from the stage version such as production design and music, but adds new scenes not featured in the original stage play. The film's plot, setting, and style echo those of the Hammer Horror films, which had their own instantly recognizable style (just as Universal Studios' horror films did). The originally proposed opening sequence was to contain clips of various films mentioned in the lyrics, as well as the first few sequences shot in black and white, but this was deemed too expensive, and scrapped.\n\nCostumes, make-up and props\n\nIn the stage productions, actors generally did their own make-up; however, for the film, the producers chose Pierre La Roche, who had previously been a make-up artist for Mick Jagger, to redesign the make-up for each character. Production stills were taken by rock photographer Mick Rock, who has published a number of books from his work. In Rocky Horror; From Concept to Cult, designer Sue Blane discusses the Rocky Horror costumes' influence on punk music style. \"[It was a] big part of the build-up [to punk].\" She states that ripped fishnet stockings, glitter and coloured hair were directly attributable to Rocky Horror.\n\nSome of the costumes from the film had been originally used in the stage production. Props and set pieces were reused from old Hammer horror productions and others. The tank and dummy used for Rocky's birth originally appeared in The Revenge of Frankenstein (1958). These references to earlier productions, in addition to cutting costs, enhanced the cult status of the film. \n\nCostume designer Sue Blane was not keen on working for the film until she became aware that Curry, an old friend, was committed to the project. Curry and Blane had worked together in Glasgow's Citizens Theatre in a production of The Maids, where Curry had worn a woman's corset in the production. Blane arranged it with the theatre to loan her the corset from the other production for Rocky Horror. Blane admits that she did not conduct research for her designing and had never seen a science fiction film, and is acutely aware that her costumes for Brad and Janet may have been generalizations.\n\nThe budget for the film's costumes was $1,600, far more than the stage production budget, but having to double up on costumes for filming was expensive. For filming, corsets for the finale had to be doubled for the pool scene, with one version drying while the other was worn on set. While many of the costumes are exact replicas from the stage productions, other costumes were new to filming, such as Columbia's gold sequined swallow-tail coat and top hat and Magenta's maid's uniform.\n\nBlane was amazed by the recreation and understanding of her designs by fans. When she first heard that people were dressing up, she thought it would be tacky, but she was surprised to see the depth to which the fans went to recreate her designs. Rocky Horror fan Mina Credeur, who designs costumes and performed as Columbia for Houston’s performance group, states that \"the best part is when everyone leaves with a big smile on their face\", noting that there's \"such a kitschiness and campiness that it seems to be winking at you\". The film still plays at many theatre locations, and Rocky Horror costumes are often made for Halloween, although many require much time and effort to make. \n\nTitle sequence\n\nThe film starts with the screen fading to black and over-sized, disembodied female lips appear overdubbed with a male voice, establishing the androgynous theme to be repeated as the film unfolds. The opening scene and song, \"Science Fiction/Double Feature\", consists of the lips of Patricia Quinn (who appears in the film later as the character Magenta), but has the vocals of actor and Rocky Horror creator, Richard O'Brien (who appears as Magenta's brother Riff Raff). The lyrics reference science fiction and horror films of the past and list several film titles from the 1930s to the 1970s, including The Day the Earth Stood Still, Flash Gordon, The Invisible Man, King Kong, It Came from Outer Space, Doctor X, Forbidden Planet, Tarantula, The Day of the Triffids, Curse of the Demon and When Worlds Collide. The disembodied lips are featured on posters and other merchandise for the film, with the tagline \"A Different Set of Jaws\", a spoof of the poster for the film Jaws, which was also produced in 1975.\n\nMusic\n\nThe soundtrack was released in 1975 by Ode Records and produced by Richard Hartley. The album peaked at #49 on the Billboard 200 in 1978. It reached No. 40 on the Australian albums chart and No. 11 on the New Zealand albums chart. The album is described as the \"definitive version of the [Rocky Horror] score.\"\n\n# \"Science Fiction/Double Feature\" - The Lips (those of Patricia Quinn; voice of Richard O'Brien)\n# \"Dammit Janet\" - Brad, Janet, and Chorus\n# \"There's a Light (Over at the Frankenstein Place)\" - Janet, Brad, Riff Raff, and Chorus\n# \"The Time Warp\" - Riff Raff, Magenta, The Criminologist, Columbia, and Transylvanians\n# \"Sweet Transvestite\" - Frank\n# \"The Sword of Damocles\" - Rocky and Transylvanians\n# \"I Can Make You a Man\" - Frank with Brad, Janet, Riff Raff, Magenta, and Columbia\n# \"Hot Patootie – Bless My Soul\" - Eddie and Transylvanians\n# \"I Can Make You a Man\" (reprise) - Frank, Janet, and Transylvanians\n# \"Touch-a, Touch-a, Touch-a, Touch Me\" - Janet with Magenta, Columbia, Rocky, Brad, Frank, and Riff Raff\n# \"Once in a While\" (deleted scene) - Brad\n# \"Eddie\" - Dr. Scott, The Criminologist, Janet, Frank, Rocky, Brad, Riff Raff, and Magenta\n# \"Planet Schmanet Janet (Wise Up Janet Weiss)\" - Frank, Janet, Brad, and Dr. Scott\n# \"Rose Tint My World\" - Columbia, Rocky, Janet, and Brad\n# \"Fanfare/Don't Dream It, Be It\" - Frank with Brad, Janet, Rocky, and Columbia\n# \"Wild and Untamed Thing\" - Frank with Brad, Janet, Rocky, Columbia, and Riff Raff\n# \"I'm Going Home\" - Frank and Chorus\n# \"The Time Warp\" (reprise) - Riff Raff and Magenta\n# \"Super Heroes\" (only present in the original UK release) - Brad, Janet, and Chorus\n# \"Science Fiction/Double Feature\" (reprise) - The Lips\n\nRelease\n\nThe film opened in the United Kingdom at Rialto Theater in London 14 August 1975 and in the United States on 26 September, premiering at the UA Westwood in Los Angeles, California. It did well at that location, but not elsewhere. Prior to the midnight screenings' success, the film was withdrawn from its eight opening cities due to very small audiences, and its planned New York City opening on Halloween night was cancelled. Fox re-released the film around college campuses on a double-bill with another rock music film parody, Brian De Palma's Phantom of the Paradise, but again it drew small audiences.\n\nWith Pink Flamingos (1972) and Reefer Madness (1936) making money in midnight showings nationwide, a Fox executive, Tim Deegan, was able to talk distributors into midnight screenings, starting in New York City on April Fools' Day of 1976. The cult following started shortly after the film began its midnight run at the Waverly Theater in New York City.Rocky Horror was not only found in the larger cities but throughout the United States where many attendees would get in free if they arrived in costume. The western division of the film's release included The U.A. Cinema in Fresno and Merced, The Cinema J in Sacramento, California and the Covell in Modesto. In New Orleans, an early organized performance group was active with the release there as well as in such cities as Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Chicago (at the Biograph Theater). Before long nearly every screening of the film was accompanied by a live fan cast.\n\nThe film is considered to be the longest-running release in film history. It has never been pulled by 20th Century Fox from its original 1975 release, and it continues to play in cinemas.\n\nHome media\n\nA Super 8 version of selected scenes of the film was made available. In 1983, Ode Records released \"The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Audience Par-Tic-I-Pation Album\", recorded at the 8th Street Playhouse. The recording consisted of the film's audio and the standardized call-backs from the audience. \n\nA home video release was made available in 1987 in the UK. In the US, the film (including documentary footage and extras) was released on VHS in 1990, retailing for $89.95 and had its US broadcast premiere on the Fox Broadcasting Company, including audience participation edited into the film, on October 25, 1993.\n\nThe film was released on DVD in 2000 for the film's 25th anniversary. A 35th Anniversary edition Blu-ray was released in the US on October 19, 2010. The disc includes a newly created 7.1 surround sound mix, the original theatrical mono sound mix, and a 4K/2K image transfer from the original camera negative. In addition, new content featuring karaoke and a fan performance were included. \n\nReception and reaction\n\nCritical reception\n\nChicago Sun-Times critic Roger Ebert noted that when first released, The Rocky Horror Picture Show was \"ignored by pretty much everyone, including the future fanatics who would eventually count the hundreds of times they'd seen it\". He considered it more a \"long-running social phenomenon\" than a movie, rating it 2.5 out of 4 stars. Bill Henkin noted that Variety thought that the \"campy hijinks\" of the film seemed labored, and also mentioned that the San Francisco Chronicle John Wasserman, who had liked the stage play in London, found the film \"lacking both charm and dramatic impact\". Newsweek called the film \"tasteless, plotless and pointless\" in 1978. \n\nReview aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a rating of 80% based on 41 reviews. A number of contemporary critics find it compelling and enjoyable because of its offbeat and bizarre qualities; the BBC summarized: \"for those willing to experiment with something a little bit different, a little bit outré, The Rocky Horror Picture Show has a lot to offer\". The New York Times called it a \"low-budget freak show/cult classic/cultural institution\" and considered the songs featured in the film to be \"catchy\". Geoff Andrew of Time Out noted that the \"string of hummable songs gives it momentum, Gray's admirably straight-faced narrator holds it together, and a run on black lingerie takes care of almost everything else\", rating it 4 out of 5 stars. Dave Kehr of Chicago Reader on the other hand considered the wit to be \"too weak to sustain a film\", and thought that the \"songs all sound the same\". \n\nIn 2005, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being \"culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant\". \n\nCult phenomenon\n\nNew York City origins\n\nThe Rocky Horror Picture Show helped shape conditions of cult film's transition from art-house to grind-house style. The film developed a cult following in 1976 at the Waverly Theatre in New York, which developed into a standardized ritual. According to J. Hoberman, author of Midnight Movies, it was after five months into the film's midnight run when lines began to be shouted by the audience. Louis Farese Jr., a normally quiet teacher who, upon seeing the character Janet place a newspaper over her head to protect herself from rain yelled, \"Buy an umbrella you cheap bitch\". Originally Louis and along with the other Rocky Horror pioneers Amy Lazarus, Theresa Krakauskas and Bill O'Brian who all sat in the balcony, did this to entertain each other. Each week trying to come up with something new to make each other laugh. This quickly caught on with other theater goers and thus began this self-proclaimed \"counter point dialogue\" became standard practice and was repeated nearly verbatim at each screening. Performance groups became a staple at Rocky Horror screenings due in large part to the prominent New York City fan cast, and fans are credited with the talk back lines. The cast was originally run by former schoolteacher and stand-up comic, Sal Piro and friend Dori Hartley. Dori was one of several performers in a flexible, rotating cast to portray the character of Frank N. Furter, shadowing the film above.\nThe performances of the audience was scripted and actively discouraged improvising, being conformist in a similar way to the repressed characters. \n\nOn Halloween in 1976, people attended in costume and talked back to the screen, and by mid-1978, Rocky Horror was playing in over 50 locations on Fridays and Saturdays at midnight. Newsletters were published by local performance groups, and fans gathered for Rocky Horror conventions. By the end of 1979, there were twice-weekly showings at over 230 theatres. The National Fan Club was established in 1977 and later merged with the International Fan Club. The fan publication The Transylvanian printed a number of issues, and a semi-regular poster magazine was published as well as an official magazine. \n\nLos Angeles, Hollywood\n\nThe Los Angeles area performance groups originated in 1977 at the Fox Theatre, where Michael Wolfson won a look-alike contest as Frank N. Furter, and won another at the Tiffany Theater on Sunset Boulevard. Wolfson's group eventually performed in all of the LA area theaters screening Rocky Horror, including the Balboa Theater in Balboa, The Cove at Hermosa Beach and The Sands in Glendale. He was invited to perform at the Sombrero Playhouse in Phoenix, Arizona.\n\nAt the Tiffany Theatre, the audience performance cast had the theater's full cooperation; the local performers entered early and without charge. The fan playing Frank for this theatre was a transgender performer, D. Garret Gafford, who was out of work in 1978 and trying to raise enough funds for a sex change operation while spending the weekends performing at the Tiffany.\n\nSan Francisco\n\nIn San Francisco, Rocky Horror moved from one location to the Strand Theatre located near the Tenderloin on Market Street. The performance group there would act out and perform almost the entire film, unlike the New York cast at that time. The Strand cast was put together from former members of the Berkeley group, disbanded due to less than enthusiastic management. Their Frank N. Furter was portrayed by Marni Scofidio, who, in 1979, attracted many of the older groups from Berkeley. Other members included Mishell Erickson and her twin sister Denise Erickson who portrayed Columbia and Magenta, Kathy Dolan playing Janet and Linda Woods as Riff Raff. The Strand group had performed at two large science fiction conventions in Los Angeles and San Francisco. They were offered a spot at The Mabuhay, a local punk club, and even performed for children's television of Argentina.\n\nFan following\n\nRocky Horror is one of the last few western rites left that pertain to the carnivalesque. Annual Rocky Horror conventions are held in varying locations lasting days. Tucson, Arizona has been host a number of times, including 1999 with “El Fishnet Fiesta”, and “Queens of the Desert” held in 2006. To the fans, Rocky Horror is ritualistic and comparable to a religious event, with a compulsive, repeated cycle of going home and coming back to see the film each weekend. The audience call backs are similar to responses in church during a mass. Many theatre troupes exist across the United States that produce shadow-cast performances where the actors play each part in the film in full costume and props, and the movie plays on the big screen in a movie theatre. These showings are typically once a week or once a month on a Saturday at midnight.\n\nThe film has a global following and remains popular well into the 21st century. Sub cultures such as Rocky Horror have also found a place on the internet. Audience participation scripts for many cities are available to download on the Internet. The internet has a number of Rocky Horror fan run websites with various quizzes and information specializing in different content allowing fans to participate at a unique level.\n\nSequels\n\nIn 1981, Sharman reunited with O'Brien to do Shock Treatment, a stand-alone feature that was not a direct sequel to the original film. This film reunites characters Brad and Janet and was originally conceived and written to depict the characters filmed in normal settings until the production changed to work around a Screen Actor's Guild strike. The eventual production would now entail the full film being shot entirely within a sound stage and purposely blending that into the story line. Shock Treatment has a cult following but not nearly as strong as the first film, and was a commercial failure in no small part due to the principal cast of Curry, Sarandon and Bostwick not returning. \n\nTen years later, O'Brien wrote another script intended as a direct sequel to the cult classic entitled Revenge of the Old Queen. Producer Michael White had hoped to begin work on the production and described the script as being \"in the same style as the other one. It has reflections of the past in it.\" Although the script has not been published, bootleg copies can be read on the Internet. The script is currently owned by Fox, which produced the two original films. Most individuals associated with the project, including O'Brien, agree that the film will probably never be made, owing to the failure of Shock Treatment and the aging of the cast. \n\nIn 2014, it was announced that O'Brien would produce Shock Treatment for the theatrical stage. The production will premiere at the King’s Head theatre in Islington, London in the United Kingdom in the spring of 2015. \n\nRemake\n\nOn 10 April 2015, it was announced that the Fox Broadcasting Company would air a modern-day reimagining of the film, tentatively titled The Rocky Horror Picture Show Event. On 22 October 2015, it was announced that the role of Dr. Frank N. Furter will be played by actress Laverne Cox. Ryan McCartan and Victoria Justice will play the roles of Brad and Janet, alongside Reeve Carney as Riff Raff and singer/model Staz Nair as Rocky. Adam Lambert will portray Eddie. Tim Curry, who portrayed Dr. Frank N. Furter in the film, will portray The Criminologist. On 1 February 2016, it was announced that Broadway veteran Annaleigh Ashford will portray Columbia. On 5 February 2016, Ben Vereen joined the cast as Dr. Everett von Scott.\n\nKenny Ortega, best known for the High School Musical franchise and Michael Jackson's This Is It, will direct, choreograph and executive-produce; Lou Adler, who was an executive producer on the original film, will have the same role on the new film, which is set to air on Fox in the fall of 2016. \n\nCultural impact\n\nThe Rocky Horror Picture Show has been featured in a number of other feature films and television series over the years. Episodes of The Venture Bros. Glee, The Drew Carey Show, That '70s Show and American Dad! spotlight Rocky Horror, as well as films like Vice Squad, Halloween II and The Perks of Being a Wallflower. The 1980 film Fame featured the audience reciting their callback lines to the screen and dancing the Time Warp, the dance from the stage show and film, which has become a common novelty dance at parties. \n\n\"The Rocky Horror Glee Show\" aired on October 26, 2010 as part of the second season of the TV series Glee, which recreated several scenes from the film, including the opening credits, and featured Barry Bostwick and Meat Loaf in cameo roles. \n\n\"Bisexuality, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and Me\", by Elizabeth Reba Weise, is a piece in Bi Any Other Name: Bisexual People Speak Out (1991), an anthology edited by Loraine Hutchins and Lani Ka'ahumanu which is one of the seminal books in the history of the modern bisexual rights movement. \n\nRocky Horror remains a cultural phenomenon in both the U.S. and U.K. Cult film participants are often people on the fringe of society that find connection and community at the screenings although the film attracts fans of differing backgrounds all over the world." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Pixar.txt", "Space_Shuttle.txt", "Space_Shuttle_Challenger.txt", "Geraldo_Rivera.txt", "Statue_of_Liberty.txt", "Fox_Broadcasting_Company.txt" ], "title": [ "Pixar", "Space Shuttle", "Space Shuttle Challenger", "Geraldo Rivera", "Statue of Liberty", "Fox Broadcasting Company" ], "wiki_context": [ "Pixar Animation Studios (Pixar), is an American computer animation film studio based in Emeryville, California. Pixar is a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company. Luxo Jr., a character from the short film of the same name, is the studio's mascot.\n\nPixar began in 1979 as the Graphics Group, part of the Lucasfilm computer division, before its spin-out as a corporation in 1986, with funding by Apple Inc. co-founder Steve Jobs, who became the majority shareholder. Disney purchased Pixar in 2006 at a valuation of $7.4 billion, a transaction that resulted in Jobs becoming Disney's largest single shareholder at the time. \n\nPixar is best known for CGI-animated feature films created with RenderMan, Pixar's own implementation of the industry-standard RenderMan image-rendering application programming interface used to generate high-quality images. \n\nPixar has produced 17 feature films, beginning with Toy Story (1995), which was the first-ever computer-animated feature film, and its most recent being Finding Dory (2016). All 17 films have debuted with CinemaScore ratings of at least \"A−,\" indicating positive receptions with audiences. The studio has also produced several short films. , its feature films have made over $10 billion worldwide, with an average worldwide gross of $593 million per film. Three of Pixar's films—Finding Nemo (2003), Toy Story 3 (2010), and Inside Out (2015)—are among the 50 highest-grossing films of all time, with Toy Story 3 being the third all-time highest animated film with a gross of $1.063 billion, behind Walt Disney Animation Studios' Frozen (2013) and Illumination Entertainment's Minions (2015), which grossed $1.276 billion and $1.159 billion respectively in their initial releases . Fourteen of Pixar's films are among the 50 highest-grossing animated films.\n\nThe studio has earned sixteen Academy Awards, seven Golden Globe Awards, and eleven Grammy Awards, among many other awards and acknowledgments. Most of Pixar's films have been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, since its inauguration in 2001, with eight winning; this includes Finding Nemo, Toy Story 3, and Inside Out, along with The Incredibles (2004), Ratatouille (2007), WALL-E (2008), Up (2009), and Brave (2012). Monsters, Inc. (2001) and Cars (2006) are the only two films that were nominated for the award without winning it, while Cars 2 (2011), Monsters University (2013), and The Good Dinosaur (2015) are the only three not to be nominated. Up and Toy Story 3 were also the second and third animated films to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture, the first being Disney's Beauty and the Beast (1991).\n\nOn September 6, 2009, Pixar executives John Lasseter, Brad Bird, Pete Docter, Andrew Stanton, and Lee Unkrich were presented with the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement by the biennial Venice Film Festival. This award was presented by Lucasfilm founder, George Lucas and BFDI The Movie\n\nHistory\n\nEarly history\n\nPixar got its start in 1974 when NYIT's founder Alexander Schure, who was also the owner of a traditional animation studio, established the Computer Graphics Lab (CGL), recruited computer scientists who shared his ambitions about creating the world's first computer-animated film. Ed Catmull and Malcolm Blanchard were the first to be hired, and were soon joined by Alvy Ray Smith and David DiFrancesco some months later, which were the four original members the Computer Graphics Lab. Schure kept pouring money into the computer graphics lab, an estimated $15 million, giving the group everything they desired and drove NYIT into serious financial troubles. But they eventually realized they needed to work in a real movie studio in order to reach their goal, and when George Lucas approached them and offered them a job at his studio, six employees decided to move over to Lucasfilm. During the following months, they gradually resigned from CGL, found temporary jobs for about a year to avoid making Schure suspicious, before they joined The Graphics Group at Lucasfilm. \n\nThe Graphics Group, which was one third of the Computer Division of Lucasfilm, was launched in 1979 with the hiring of Edwin Catmull from the New York Institute of Technology (NYIT), where he was in charge of the Computer Graphics Lab. He was then reunited with Alvy Ray Smith, who also made the journey from NYIT to Lucasfilm, and was made director of The Graphics Group. At NYIT, the researchers pioneered many of the CG foundation techniques—in particular the invention of the alpha channel (by Catmull and Smith). Years later the CGL produced a few frames of an experimental film called The Works. After moving to Lucasfilm, the team worked on creating the precursor to RenderMan, called REYES (for \"renders everything you ever saw\"); and developed a number of critical technologies for CG—including \"particle effects\" and various animation tools.\n\nIn 1982, the team began working on special effects film sequences with Industrial Light & Magic. After years of research, and key milestones such as the Genesis Effect in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and the Stained Glass Knight in Young Sherlock Holmes, the group, which then numbered 40 individuals, was spun out as a corporation in February 1986 by Catmull and Smith. Amongst the 38 remaining employees, there were also Malcolm Blanchard, David DiFrancesco, Ralph Guggenheim and Bill Reeves, who had been part of the team since the days of NYIT. Tom Duff, also a NYIT member, would later join Pixar after its formation. With Lucas' 1983 divorce, which coincided with the sudden drop-off in revenues from Star Wars licenses following the release of Return of the Jedi, they knew he would most likely sell the whole Graphics Group. Worried that the employees would be lost to them if that happened, which would prevent the creation of the first computer animated movie, they concluded that the best way to keep the team together was to turn the group into an independent company. But Moore's Law also said that the first film was still some years away, and they needed to focus on a proper product while waiting for the computers to become powerful enough. Eventually, they decided they should be a hardware company in the meantime, with their Pixar Image Computer as the core product, a system primarily sold to government agencies and the scientific and medical community. \n\nThe newly independent company was headed by Edwin Catmull as President and Alvy Ray Smith as Executive Vice President. While looking for investors, Steve Jobs was interested, but Lucas found his offer too low. Yet he accepted it in the end after it turned out to be impossible to find other investors. Jobs, who had recently been fired from Apple Computer, paid $5 million to George Lucas for technology rights and put them and $5 million cash as capital into the company, and joined the board of directors as chairman.\n\nOne of the buyers of Pixar Image Computers was Walt Disney Studios, which was using it as part of their Computer Animation Production System (CAPS) project, using the machine and custom software written by Pixar to migrate the laborious ink and paint part of the 2D animation process to a more automated method. The Image Computer never sold well. In a bid to drive sales of the system, Pixar employee John Lasseter—who had long been working on non-for-profit short demonstration animations, such as Luxo Jr. (1986), to show off the device's capabilities—premiered his creations at SIGGRAPH, the computer graphics industry's largest convention, to great fanfare. \n\nInadequate sales of Pixar's computers threatened to put the company out of business as financial losses grew. Jobs invested more and more money in exchange for an increased stake in the company, reducing the proportion of management and employee ownership until eventually his total investment of $50 million gave him control of the entire company. In 1989, Lasseter's growing animation department, originally composed of just four people (Lasseter, Bill Reeves, Eben Ostby, and Sam Leffler), was turned into a division that produced computer-animated commercials for outside companies. Early successes included campaigns for Tropicana, Listerine, and Life Savers. In April 1990, Pixar sold its hardware division, including all proprietary hardware technology and imaging software, to Vicom Systems, and transferred 18 of Pixar's approximately 100 employees. That same year, Pixar moved from San Rafael to Richmond, California. Pixar released some of its software tools on the open market for Macintosh and Windows systems. RenderMan was one of the leading 3D packages of the early 1990s, and Typestry was a special-purpose 3D text renderer that competed with Adobe AddDepth.\n\nDuring this period Pixar continued its successful relationship with Walt Disney Feature Animation, a studio whose corporate parent would ultimately become its most important partner. As 1991 began, however, the layoff of 30 employees in the company's computer hardware department—including the company's president, Chuck Kolstad, reduced the total number of employees to just 42, essentially its original number. Yet Pixar made a historic $26 million deal with Disney to produce three computer-animated feature films, the first of which was Toy Story. By then the software programmers, who were doing RenderMan and IceMan, and Lasseter's animation department, which made television commercials (and four Luxo Jr. shorts for Sesame Street the same year), were all that remained of Pixar. \n\nDespite the total income from these projects the company continued to lose money and Jobs, as chairman of the board and now the full owner, often considered selling it. Even as late as 1994 Jobs contemplated selling Pixar to another company, most notably Microsoft. Only after learning from New York critics that Toy Story would probably be a hit—and confirming that Disney would distribute it for the 1995 Christmas season—did he decide to give Pixar another chance. For the first time he also took an active leadership role in the company and made himself CEO. Toy Story went on to gross more than $362 million worldwide and, when Pixar held its initial public offering on November 29, 1995, it exceeded Netscape's as the biggest IPO of the year. In only its first half-hour of trading Pixar stock shot from $22 to $45, delaying trading because of un-matched buy orders. Shares climbed to $49 before closing the day at $39.\n[http://web.archive.org/web/20060702123318/http://www.pixar.com/companyinfo/faq/faq.htm \"Company FAQ's\"]. Pixar. Retrieved March 29, 2015.\n\nDuring the 1990s and 2000s, Pixar gradually developed the \"Pixar Braintrust,\" the studio's primary creative development process, in which all directors, writers, and lead storyboard artists at the studio look at each other's projects on a regular basis and give each other very candid \"notes\" (the industry term for constructive criticism). The Braintrust operates under a philosophy of a \"filmmaker-driven studio,\" in which creatives help each other move their films forward through a process somewhat like peer review, as opposed to the traditional Hollywood approach of an \"executive-driven studio\" in which directors are micromanaged through \"mandatory notes\" from development executives ranking above the producers. According to Catmull, it evolved out of the working relationship between Lasseter, Stanton, Docter, Unkrich, and Joe Ranft on Toy Story.\n\nAs a result of the success of Toy Story, Pixar built a new studio at the Emeryville campus which was designed by PWP Landscape Architecture and opened in November 2000.\n\nDisney subsidiary (2006-present)\n\nPixar and Disney had disagreements after the production of Toy Story 2 (1999). Originally intended as a straight-to-video release (and thus not part of Pixar's three-picture deal), the film was eventually upgraded to a theatrical release during production. Pixar demanded that the film then be counted toward the three-picture agreement, but Disney refused. Though profitable for both, Pixar later complained that the arrangement was not equitable. Pixar was responsible for creation and production, while Disney handled marketing and distribution. Profits and production costs were split 50-50, but Disney exclusively owned all story and sequel rights and also collected a 10- to 15-percent distribution fee. The lack of story and sequel rights was perhaps the most onerous aspect to Pixar and set the stage for a contentious relationship. \n\nThe two companies attempted to reach a new agreement for ten months before it fell through in January 2004. The new deal would be only for distribution, as Pixar intended to control production and own the resulting film properties themselves. The company also wanted to finance their films on their own and collect 100 percent of the profits, paying Disney only the distribution fee. More importantly, as part of any distribution agreement with Disney, Pixar demanded control over films already in production under their old agreement, including The Incredibles (2004) and Cars (2006). Disney considered these conditions unacceptable, but Pixar would not concede.\n\nDisagreements between Steve Jobs and then-Disney chairman and CEO Michael Eisner made the negotiations more difficult than they otherwise might have been. They broke down completely in mid-2004, with Disney forming Circle 7 Animation and Jobs declaring that Pixar was actively seeking partners other than Disney. Despite this announcement, Pixar did not enter negotiations with other distributors, although a Warner Bros. spokesperson told CNN, \"We would love to be in business with Pixar. They are a great company.\" After a lengthy hiatus, negotiations between the two companies resumed following the departure of Eisner from Disney in September 2005. In preparation for potential fallout between Pixar and Disney, Jobs announced in late 2004 that Pixar would no longer release movies at the Disney-dictated November time frame, but during the more lucrative early summer months. This would also allow Pixar to release DVDs for their major releases during the Christmas shopping season. An added benefit of delaying Cars from November 4, 2005, to June 9, 2006 was to extend the time frame remaining on the Pixar-Disney contract, to see how things would play out between the two companies.\n\nPending the Disney acquisition of Pixar, the two companies created a distribution deal for the intended 2007 release of Ratatouille, if the acquisition fell through, to ensure that this one film would still be released through Disney's distribution channels. In contrast to the earlier Disney/Pixar deal, Ratatouille was to remain a Pixar property and Disney would have received only a distribution fee. The completion of Disney's Pixar acquisition, however, nullified this distribution arrangement. \n\nIn 2006, Disney ultimately agreed to buy Pixar for approximately $7.4 billion in an all-stock deal. Following Pixar shareholder approval, the acquisition was completed May 5, 2006. The transaction catapulted Steve Jobs, who was the majority shareholder of Pixar with 50.1%, to Disney's largest individual shareholder with 7% and a new seat on its board of directors. Jobs' new Disney holdings exceeded holdings belonging to ex-CEO Michael Eisner, the previous top shareholder, who still held 1.7%; and Disney Director Emeritus Roy E. Disney, who held almost 1% of the corporation's shares. Pixar shareholders received 2.3 shares of Disney common stock for each share of Pixar common stock redeemed.\n\nAs part of the deal, John Lasseter, by then Executive Vice President, became Chief Creative Officer (reporting to President and CEO Robert Iger and consulting with Disney Director Roy E. Disney) of both Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios (including its division, DisneyToon Studios), as well as the Principal Creative Adviser at Walt Disney Imagineering, which designs and builds the company's theme parks. Catmull retained his position as President of Pixar, while also becoming President of Walt Disney Animation Studios, reporting to Bob Iger and Dick Cook, chairman of The Walt Disney Studios. Steve Jobs' position as Pixar's chairman and chief executive officer was also removed, and instead he took a place on the Disney board of directors. \n\nAfter the deal closed in May 2006, Lasseter revealed that Iger had realized Disney needed to buy Pixar while watching a parade at the opening of Hong Kong Disneyland in September 2005. Iger noticed that of all the Disney characters in the parade, not one was a character that Disney had created within the last ten years, since all the newer ones had been created by Pixar. Upon returning to Burbank, Iger commissioned a financial analysis that confirmed that Disney had actually lost money on animation for the past decade, then presented that information to the board of directors at his first board meeting after being promoted from COO to CEO, and the board in turn authorized him to explore the possibility of a deal with Pixar. Lasseter and Catmull were wary when the topic of Disney buying Pixar first came up, but Jobs asked them to give Iger a chance (based on his own experience negotiating with Iger in summer 2005 for the rights to ABC shows for the fifth-generation iPod Classic), and in turn, Iger convinced them of the sincerity of his epiphany that Disney really needed to re-focus on animation.\n\nLasseter and Catmull's oversight of both the Disney and Pixar studios did not mean that the two studios were merging, however. In fact, additional conditions were laid out as part of the deal to ensure that Pixar remained a separate entity, a concern that analysts had expressed about the Disney deal. Some of those conditions were that Pixar HR policies would remain intact, including the lack of employment contracts. Also, the Pixar name was guaranteed to continue, and the studio would remain in its current Emeryville, California, location with the \"Pixar\" sign. Finally, branding of films made post-merger would be \"Disney•Pixar\" (beginning with Cars). \n\nJim Morris, producer of WALL-E (2008), became general manager of Pixar. In this new position, Morris took charge of the day-to-day running of the studio facilities and products. \n\nAfter a few years, Lasseter and Catmull were able to successfully transfer the basic principles of the Pixar Braintrust to Disney, although meetings of the Disney Story Trust are reportedly \"more polite\" than those of the Pixar Braintrust. Catmull later explained that after the merger, to maintain the studios' separate identities and cultures (notwithstanding the fact of common ownership and common senior management), he and Lasseter \"drew a hard line\" that each studio was solely responsible for its own projects and would not be allowed to borrow personnel from or lend tasks out to the other. That rule ensures that each studio maintains \"local ownership\" of projects and can be proud of its own work. Thus, for example, when Pixar had issues with Ratatouille and Disney Animation had issues with Bolt (2008), \"nobody bailed them out\" and each studio was required \"to solve the problem on its own\" even when they knew there were personnel at the other studio who theoretically could have helped.\n\nIn November 2014, Morris was promoted to president of Pixar, while his counterpart at Disney Animation, general manager Andrew Millstein, was also promoted to president of that studio. Both will continue to report to Catmull, who retains the title of president of Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios.\n\nExpansion\n\nOn April 20, 2010, Pixar Animation Studios opened Pixar Canada in the downtown area of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The roughly 2,000 square meters studio produced seven short films based on Toy Story and Cars characters. In October 2013, the studio was closed down to refocus Pixar's efforts at its main headquarters. \n\nHeadquarters (campus)\n\nWhen Steve Jobs, chief executive officer of Apple Inc. and Pixar Animation Studios, and John Lasseter, then the executive vice president of Pixar, decided to move their studios from a leased space in Point Richmond, California, to larger quarters of their own, they chose a 20-acre site in Emeryville, California, formerly occupied by Del Monte Foods, Inc. The first of several buildings, a high-tech structure designed by Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, has special foundations and generators to ensure continued film production, even through major earthquakes. The character of the building is intended to abstractly recall Emeryville's industrial past. The two-story steel-and-masonry building is a collaborative space with many pathways.\n\nFeature films and shorts\n\nTraditions\n\nWhile some of Pixar's first animators were former cel animators, including John Lasseter, they also came from computer animation or were fresh college graduates. A large number of animators that make up the animation department at Pixar were hired around the time Pixar released A Bug's Life (1998) and Toy Story 2 (1999). Although Toy Story was a successful film, it was Pixar's only feature film at the time. The majority of the animation industry was (and still is) located in Los Angeles while Pixar is located 350 mi north in the San Francisco Bay Area. Also, traditional hand-drawn animation was still the dominant medium for feature animated films.\n\nWith the scarcity of Los Angeles-based animators willing to move their families so far north, give up traditional animation, and try computer animation, Pixar's new hires at this time either came directly from college or had worked outside feature animation. For those who had traditional animation skills, the Pixar animation software (Marionette) was designed so that traditional animators would require a minimum amount of training before becoming productive.\n\nIn an interview with PBS talk show host Tavis Smiley, Lasseter said that Pixar's films follow the same theme of self-improvement as the company itself has: with the help of friends or family, a character ventures out into the real world and learns to appreciate his friends and family. At the core, Lasseter said, \"it's gotta be about the growth of the main character and how he changes.\"\n\n, every Pixar feature film produced for Disney has included a character voiced by John Ratzenberger, who had famously starred in the TV show Cheers. Pixar paid tribute to their \"good luck charm\" in the end credits of Cars (2006) by parodying scenes from three of their earlier films, replacing all of the characters with motor vehicles. After the third scene, Mack (his character in Cars) realizes that the same actor has been voicing characters in every film and angrily demands to know \"What kind of a cut-rate production is this?\"\n\nDue to the traditions that have occurred within the film, such as anthropomorphic animals and easter egg crossovers between movies that have been spotted by fans, a blog post entitled The Pixar Theory was published in 2013 by Jon Negroni to make the belief that all of the characters within the Pixar universe were related.\n\nSequels and prequels\n\nToy Story 2 was originally commissioned by Disney as a 60-minute direct-to-video release. Expressing doubts about the strength of the material, John Lasseter convinced the Pixar team to start from scratch and make the sequel their third full-length feature film.\n\nFollowing the release of Toy Story 2 in 1999, Pixar and Disney had a gentlemen's agreement that Disney would not make any sequels without Pixar's involvement, despite their own right to do so. After the two companies were unable to agree on a new deal, Disney announced in 2004 they would plan move forward on sequels with/without Pixar, and put Toy Story 3 into pre-production at Disney's new CGI division Circle 7 Animation. However, when Lasseter was placed in charge of all Disney and Pixar animation following the 2006 merger of the companies, he put all sequels on hold and Toy Story 3 was cancelled. In May 2006, it was announced that Toy Story 3 was back in pre-production with a new plot and under Pixar's control. The film was released on June 18, 2010 as Pixar's eleventh feature film.\n\nShortly after announcing the resurrection of Toy Story 3, Lasseter fueled speculation on further sequels by saying, \"If we have a great story, we'll do a sequel.\" Cars 2, Pixar's first non-Toy Story sequel, was officially announced in April 2008 and released on June 24, 2011 as their twelfth. Monsters University, a prequel to Monsters, Inc. (2001), was announced in April 2010 and initially set for release in November 2012; the release date was pushed to June 21, 2013, due to Pixar's past success with summer releases, according to a Disney executive. \n\nIn June 2011, Tom Hanks, who voiced Woody in the Toy Story series, implied that Toy Story 4 was \"in the works,\" although it had not yet been confirmed by the studio. In April 2013, Finding Dory, a sequel to Finding Nemo, was announced for a June 17, 2016 release. In March 2014, The Incredibles 2 and Cars 3 were announced as films in development. In November 2014, Toy Story 4 was confirmed to be in development with Lasseter serving as director. In an interview, Lasseter stated that \"[a] lot of people in the industry view us doing sequels as being for the business of it, but for us it's pure passion...One of the things that was very important for me as an artist is to continue directing. When I direct, I get to work with the individual artists, with the animators.\" In August 2015, at the D23 Expo, Lasseter said that the film would focus on the romance between Woody and Bo Peep. Its story will be built on the fact that Bo Peep was absent in Toy Story 3, with Woody and Buzz Lightyear trying to find her and bring her back. \n\nAdaptation to television\n\nToy Story was the first Pixar film to be adapted onto television, with Buzz Lightyear of Star Command film and TV series. Cars became the second with the help of Cars Toons, a series of three-to-five-minute short films running between regular Disney Channel shows and featuring Mater (the tow truck voiced by comedian Larry the Cable Guy). Between 2013 and 2014, Pixar released its first two television specials, Toy Story of Terror! and Toy Story That Time Forgot.\n\nAnimation and live-action\n\nAll Pixar films to date have been computer-animated features, but WALL-E so far has been the only Pixar film to not be completely animated, as it featured a small amount of live-action footage. 1906, the live-action film by Brad Bird based on a screenplay and novel by James Dalessandro about the 1906 earthquake, was in development but has since been abandoned by Bird and Pixar. Bird has stated that he was \"interested in moving into the live-action realm with some projects\" while \"staying at Pixar [because] it's a very comfortable environment for me to work in.\"\n\nThe Toy Story Toons short, Hawaiian Vacation also includes the fish and shark as live-action.\n\nJim Morris, general manager of Pixar, produced Disney's John Carter (2012), which Pixar's Andrew Stanton co-wrote and directed. \n\nPixar assisted in the story development of Disney's The Jungle Book (2016), as well as providing suggestions for the film's end credits sequence. \n\nPixar representatives have also assisted in the English localization of several Studio Ghibli films, mainly those from Hayao Miyazaki\n\nUpcoming projects\n\nMichael Wallis, the voice of Sheriff from the Cars franchise and a Route 66 consultant for the first two films, said in an August 2013 interview that Pixar would make a third film in the series, which will go back to Route 66 and will also include Route 99; a release date of June 16, 2017 was announced later. \n\nIn April 2012, Pixar announced their intention to create a film centered on the Mexican holiday Día de los Muertos which is to be directed by Lee Unkrich. In 2015, the film's title was announced as Coco, and a planned release in November 22, 2017. \n\nIn November 2014, it was announced that John Lasseter will direct Toy Story 4, scheduled for a June 15, 2018 release. \n\nA sequel to The Incredibles was announced in March 2014, to be directed by Brad Bird, with a release date set for June 21, 2019. \n\nExhibitions\n\nSince December 2005, Pixar has held exhibitions celebrating the art and artists of Pixar, over their first twenty years in animation. \n\nPixar: 20 Years of Animation\n\nPixar celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2006 with the release of Pixar's seventh feature film, Cars, and held two exhibitions, from April to June 2010, at Science Centre Singapore, in Jurong East, Singapore, and the London Science Museum, London. It was their first time holding an exhibition in Singapore.\n\nThe exhibition highlights consist of work-in-progress sketches from various Pixar productions, clay sculptures of their characters, and an autostereoscopic short showcasing a 3D version of the exhibition pieces which is projected through four projectors. Another highlight is the Zoetrope, where visitors of the exhibition are shown figurines of Toy Story characters \"animated\" in real-life through the zoetrope.\n\nPixar: 25 Years of Animation\n\nPixar celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2011 with the release of its twelfth feature film, Cars 2. Pixar had celebrated its 20th anniversary with the first Cars. The Pixar: 25 Years of Animation exhibition was held at the Oakland Museum of California from July 2010 until January 2011. The exhibition tour debuts in Hong Kong, and was held at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum in Sha Tin, between March 27 and July 11, 2011. In 2013 the exhibition was held in the EXPO in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. On November 16, 2013, the exhibition moved to the Art Ludique museum in Paris, France, with a scheduled run until March 2, 2014. The exhibition moved to three Spanish cities later in 2014 and 2015: Madrid (held in CaixaForum from March 21 until June 22), Barcelona (held also in Caixaforum from February until May) and Zaragoza. \n\nPixar: 25 Years of Animation includes all of the artwork from Pixar: 20 Years of Animation, plus art from Ratatouille, WALL-E, Up, and Toy Story 3.\n\nThe Science Behind Pixar\n\nThe Science Behind Pixar is a travelling exhibition that first opened on June 28, 2015 at the Museum of Science in Boston, Massachusetts. It was developed by the Museum of Science in collaboration with Pixar. The exhibit features forty interactive elements that explain the production pipeline at Pixar. They are divided into eight sections, each demonstrating a step in the filmmaking process: Modeling, Rigging, Surfaces, Sets & Cameras, Animation, Simulation, Lighting, and Rendering. Before visitors enter the exhibit, they watch a short video at an introductory theater.\n\nThe exhibition closed on January 10, 2016 and moved to the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where it opened on March 12 and will close on September 5. After that, it will move to the California Science Center in Los Angeles, California and be open from October 15, 2016 through April 9, 2017. It will make another stop at the Science Museum of Minnesota in St. Paul, Minnesota from May 27 through September 4, 2017. \n\nPixar: 30 Years of Animation\n\nIt is currently unknown what a 30-year anniversary celebration of Pixar's films and achievements would entail.", "The Space Shuttle was a partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), as part of the Space Shuttle program. Its official program name was Space Transportation System (STS), taken from a 1969 plan for a system of reusable spacecraft of which it was the only item funded for development.[http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/taskgrp.html Space Task Group Report, 1969] The first of four orbital test flights occurred in 1981, leading to operational flights beginning in 1982. Five complete Shuttle systems were built and used on a total of 135 missions from 1981 to 2011, launched from the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida. Operational missions launched numerous satellites, interplanetary probes, and the Hubble Space Telescope (HST); conducted science experiments in orbit; and participated in construction and servicing of the International Space Station. The Shuttle fleet's total mission time was 1322 days, 19 hours, 21 minutes and 23 seconds. \n\nShuttle components included the Orbiter Vehicle (OV), a pair of recoverable solid rocket boosters (SRBs), and the expendable external tank (ET) containing liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. The Shuttle was launched vertically, like a conventional rocket, with the two SRBs operating in parallel with the OV's three main engines, which were fueled from the ET. The SRBs were jettisoned before the vehicle reached orbit, and the ET was jettisoned just before orbit insertion, which used the orbiter's two Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) engines. At the conclusion of the mission, the orbiter fired its OMS to de-orbit and re-enter the atmosphere. The orbiter then glided as a spaceplane to a runway landing, usually at the Shuttle Landing Facility of KSC or Rogers Dry Lake in Edwards Air Force Base, California. After landing at Edwards, the orbiter was flown back to the KSC on the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, a specially modified Boeing 747.\n\nA sixth orbiter, Enterprise, was built in 1976 for use in Approach and Landing Tests and had no orbital capability. Four fully operational orbiters were initially built: Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, and Atlantis. Of these, two were lost in mission accidents: Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003, with a total of fourteen astronauts killed. A fifth operational orbiter, Endeavour, was built in 1991 to replace Challenger. The Space Shuttle was retired from service upon the conclusion of Atlantiss final flight on July 21, 2011.\n\nOverview\n\nThe Space Shuttle was a partially reusable human spaceflight vehicle capable of reaching low Earth orbit, commissioned and operated by the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) from 1981 to 2011. It resulted from shuttle design studies conducted by NASA and the US Air Force in the 1960s and was first proposed for development as part of an ambitious second-generation Space Transportation System (STS) of space vehicles to follow the Apollo program in a September 1969 report of a Space Task Group headed by Vice President Spiro Agnew to President Richard Nixon. Nixon's post-Apollo NASA budgeting withdrew support of all system components except the Shuttle, to which NASA applied the STS name.\n\nThe vehicle consisted of a spaceplane for orbit and re-entry, fueled by expendable liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen tanks, with reusable strap-on solid booster rockets. The first of four orbital test flights occurred in 1981, leading to operational flights beginning in 1982, all launched from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida. The system was retired from service in 2011 after 135 missions, with Atlantis making the final launch of the three-decade Shuttle program on July 8, 2011. The program ended after Atlantis landed at the Kennedy Space Center on July 21, 2011. Major missions included launching numerous satellites and interplanetary probes, conducting space science experiments, and servicing and construction of space stations. The first orbiter vehicle, named Enterprise, was built for the initial Approach and Landing Tests phase and lacked engines, heat shielding, and other equipment necessary for orbital flight. A total of five operational orbiters were built, and of these, two were destroyed in accidents.\n\nIt was used for orbital space missions by NASA, the US Department of Defense, the European Space Agency, Japan, and Germany. The United States funded Shuttle development and operations except for the Spacelab modules used on D1 and D2sponsored by Germany.[http://www.google.com/search?tbs\nbks%3A1&tbo1&q\nGerman-funded+Spacelab+mission+made+use+of+the+ESA+Space+Sled&btnGSearch+Books#sclient\npsy&hlen&tbo\n1&tbsbks:1&source\nhp&qThe+D1+mission+has+been+financed+entirely+by+the+German+Ministry+of+Research+and+Technology&aq\n&aqi&aql\n&oq&gs_rfai\n&pbx1&fp\n44253eb2e797c355 Interavia (1985), Volume 40, p. 1170] Google Books Quote: \"This is the first time that control of a payload aboard a manned Shuttle has been in non-US hands. The D1 mission has been financed entirely by the German Ministry of Research and Technology. ..\" SL-J was partially funded by Japan.[http://lis.arc.nasa.gov/lis2/Chapter4_Programs/SL_J/SL_J_Intro.html Life into Space (1995/2000) – Volume 2, Chapter 4, Page: Spacelab-J (SL-J) Payload]. [http://lis.arc.nasa.gov/ NASA Life into Space].\n\nAt launch, it consisted of the \"stack\", including the dark orange external tank (ET) (for the first two launches the tank was painted white); two white, slender solid rocket boosters (SRBs); and the Orbiter Vehicle, which contained the crew and payload. Some payloads were launched into higher orbits with either of two different upper stages developed for the STS (single-stage Payload Assist Module or two-stage Inertial Upper Stage). The Space Shuttle was stacked in the Vehicle Assembly Building, and the stack mounted on a mobile launch platform held down by four frangible nuts on each SRB, which were detonated at launch. \n\nThe Shuttle stack launched vertically like a conventional rocket. It lifted off under the power of its two SRBs and three main engines, which were fueled by liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen from the ET. The Space Shuttle had a two-stage ascent. The SRBs provided additional thrust during liftoff and first-stage flight. About two minutes after liftoff, frangible nuts were fired, releasing the SRBs, which then parachuted into the ocean, to be retrieved by ships for refurbishment and reuse. The orbiter and ET continued to ascend on an increasingly horizontal flight path under power from its main engines. Upon reaching 17,500 mph (7.8 km/s), necessary for low Earth orbit, the main engines were shut down. The ET, attached by two frangible nuts was then jettisoned to burn up in the atmosphere. After jettisoning the external tank, the orbital maneuvering system (OMS) engines were used to adjust the orbit.\n\nThe orbiter carried astronauts and payloads such as satellites or space station parts into low Earth orbit, the Earth's upper atmosphere or thermosphere. Usually, five to seven crew members rode in the orbiter. Two crew members, the commander and pilot, were sufficient for a minimal flight, as in the first four \"test\" flights, STS-1 through STS-4. The typical payload capacity was about 50045 lb but could be increased depending on the choice of launch configuration. The orbiter carried its payload in a large cargo bay with doors that opened along the length of its top, a feature which made the Space Shuttle unique among spacecraft. This feature made possible the deployment of large satellites such as the Hubble Space Telescope and also the capture and return of large payloads back to Earth.\n\nWhen the orbiter's space mission was complete, it fired its OMS thrusters to drop out of orbit and re-enter the lower atmosphere. During descent, the orbiter passed through different layers of the atmosphere and decelerated from hypersonic speed primarily by aerobraking. In the lower atmosphere and landing phase, it was more like a glider but with reaction control system (RCS) thrusters and fly-by-wire-controlled hydraulically actuated flight surfaces controlling its descent. It landed on a long runway as a conventional aircraft. The aerodynamic shape was a compromise between the demands of radically different speeds and air pressures during re-entry, hypersonic flight, and subsonic atmospheric flight. As a result, the orbiter had a relatively high sink rate at low altitudes, and it transitioned during re-entry from using RCS thrusters at very high altitudes to flight surfaces in the lower atmosphere.\n\nEarly history\n\nThe formal design of what became the Space Shuttle began with the \"Phase A\" contract design studies issued in the late 1960s. Conceptualization had begun two decades earlier, before the Apollo program of the 1960s. One of the places the concept of a spacecraft returning from space to a horizontal landing originated was within NACA, in 1954, in the form of an aeronautics research experiment later named the X-15. The NACA proposal was submitted by Walter Dornberger.\n\nIn 1958, the X-15 concept further developed into proposal to launch an X-15 into space, and another X-series spaceplane proposal, named X-20 Dyna-Soar, as well as variety of aerospace plane concepts and studies. Neil Armstrong was selected to pilot both the X-15 and the X-20. Though the X-20 was not built, another spaceplane similar to the X-20 was built several years later and delivered to NASA in January 1966 called the HL-10 (\"HL\" indicated \"horizontal landing\").\n\nIn the mid-1960s, the US Air Force conducted classified studies on next-generation space transportation systems and concluded that semi-reusable designs were the cheapest choice. It proposed a development program with an immediate start on a \"Class I\" vehicle with expendable boosters, followed by slower development of a \"Class II\" semi-reusable design and possible \"Class III\" fully reusable design later. In 1967, George Mueller held a one-day symposium at NASA headquarters to study the options. Eighty people attended and presented a wide variety of designs, including earlier US Air Force designs such as the X-20 Dyna-Soar.\n\nIn 1968, NASA officially began work on what was then known as the Integrated Launch and Re-entry Vehicle (ILRV). At the same time, NASA held a separate Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) competition. NASA offices in Houston and Huntsville jointly issued a Request for Proposal (RFP) for ILRV studies to design a spacecraft that could deliver a payload to orbit but also re-enter the atmosphere and fly back to Earth. For example, one of the responses was for a two-stage design, featuring a large booster and a small orbiter, called the DC-3, one of several Phase A Shuttle designs. After the aforementioned \"Phase A\" studies, B, C, and D phases progressively evaluated in-depth designs up to 1972. In the final design, the bottom stage was recoverable solid rocket boosters, and the top stage used an expendable external tank.\n\nIn 1969, President Richard Nixon decided to support proceeding with Space Shuttle development. A series of development programs and analysis refined the basic design, prior to full development and testing. In August 1973, the X-24B proved that an unpowered spaceplane could re-enter Earth's atmosphere for a horizontal landing.\n\nAcross the Atlantic, European ministers met in Belgium in 1973 to authorize Western Europe's manned orbital project and its main contribution to Space Shuttlethe Spacelab program. Spacelab would provide a multidisciplinary orbital space laboratory and additional space equipment for the Shuttle.\n\nDescription\n\nThe Space Shuttle was the first operational orbital spacecraft designed for reuse. It carried different payloads to low Earth orbit, provided crew rotation and supplies for the International Space Station (ISS), and performed satellite servicing and repair. The orbiter could also recover satellites and other payloads from orbit and return them to Earth. Each Shuttle was designed for a projected lifespan of 100 launches or ten years of operational life, although this was later extended. The person in charge of designing the STS was Maxime Faget, who had also overseen the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo spacecraft designs. The crucial factor in the size and shape of the Shuttle orbiter was the requirement that it be able to accommodate the largest planned commercial and military satellites, and have over 1,000 mile cross-range recovery range to meet the requirement for classified USAF missions for a once-around abort from a launch to a polar orbit. The militarily specified cross range requirement was one of the primary reasons for the Shuttle's large wings, compared to modern commercial designs with very minimal control surfaces and glide capability. Factors involved in opting for solid rockets and an expendable fuel tank included the desire of the Pentagon to obtain a high-capacity payload vehicle for satellite deployment, and the desire of the Nixon administration to reduce the costs of space exploration by developing a spacecraft with reusable components.\n\nEach Space Shuttle was a reusable launch system composed of three main assemblies: the reusable OV, the expendable ET, and the two reusable SRBs. Only the OV entered orbit shortly after the tank and boosters are jettisoned. The vehicle was launched vertically like a conventional rocket, and the orbiter glided to a horizontal landing like an airplane, after which it was refurbished for reuse. The SRBs parachuted to splashdown in the ocean where they were towed back to shore and refurbished for later Shuttle missions.\n\nFive operational OVs were built: Columbia (OV-102), Challenger (OV-099), Discovery (OV-103), Atlantis (OV-104), and Endeavour (OV-105). A mock-up, Inspiration, currently stands at the entrance to the Astronaut Hall of Fame. An additional craft, Enterprise (OV-101), was built for atmospheric testing gliding and landing; it was originally intended to be outfitted for orbital operations after the test program, but it was found more economical to upgrade the structural test article STA-099 into orbiter Challenger (OV-099). Challenger disintegrated 73 seconds after launch in 1986, and Endeavour was built as a replacement from structural spare components. Building Endeavour cost about US$1.7 billion. Columbia broke apart over Texas during re-entry in 2003. A Space Shuttle launch cost around $450 million. \n\nRoger A. Pielke, Jr. has estimated that the Space Shuttle program cost about US$170 billion (2008 dollars) through early 2008; the average cost per flight was about US$1.5 billion.[http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/admin/publication_files/resource-2656-2008.18.pdf The Rise and Fall of the Space Shuttle], Book Review: Final Countdown: NASA and the End of the Space Shuttle Program by Pat Duggins, American Scientist, 2008, Vol. 96, No. 5, p. 32. Two missions were paid for by Germany, Spacelab D1 and D2 (D for Deutschland) with a payload control center in Oberpfaffenhofen. D1 was the first time that control of a manned STS mission payload was not in U.S. hands.\n\nAt times, the orbiter itself was referred to as the Space Shuttle. This was not technically correct as the Space Shuttle was the combination of the orbiter, the external tank, and the two solid rocket boosters. These components, once assembled in the Vehicle Assembly Building originally built to assemble the Apollo Saturn V rocket, were commonly referred to as the \"stack\".[http://www.nasa.gov/centers/johnson/events/exhibits/html/s91-39574.html NASA - NASA - JSC Exhibits]\n\nResponsibility for the Shuttle components was spread among multiple NASA field centers. The Kennedy Space Center was responsible for launch, landing and turnaround operations for equatorial orbits (the only orbit profile actually used in the program), the US Air Force at the Vandenberg Air Force Base was responsible for launch, landing and turnaround operations for polar orbits (though this was never used), the Johnson Space Center served as the central point for all Shuttle operations, the Marshall Space Flight Center was responsible for the main engines, external tank, and solid rocket boosters, the John C. Stennis Space Center handled main engine testing, and the Goddard Space Flight Center managed the global tracking network. \n\nOrbiter vehicle\n\nThe orbiter resembled a conventional aircraft, with double-delta wings swept 81° at the inner leading edge and 45° at the outer leading edge. Its vertical stabilizer's leading edge was swept back at a 50° angle. The four elevons, mounted at the trailing edge of the wings, and the rudder/speed brake, attached at the trailing edge of the stabilizer, with the body flap, controlled the orbiter during descent and landing.\n\nThe orbiter's 60 ft-long payload bay, comprising most of the fuselage, could accommodate cylindrical payloads up to 15 ft in diameter. Information declassified in 2011 showed that these measurements were chosen specifically to accommodate the KH-9 HEXAGON spy satellite operated by the National Reconnaissance Office. Two mostly-symmetrical lengthwise payload bay doors hinged on either side of the bay comprised its entire top. Payloads were generally loaded horizontally into the bay while the orbiter was standing upright on the launch pad and unloaded vertically in the near-weightless orbital environment by the orbiter's robotic remote manipulator arm (under astronaut control), EVA astronauts, or under the payloads' own power (as for satellites attached to a rocket \"upper stage\" for deployment.)\n\nThree Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs) were mounted on the orbiter's aft fuselage in a triangular pattern. The engine nozzles could gimbal 10.5 degrees up and down, and 8.5 degrees from side to side during ascent to change the direction of their thrust to steer the Shuttle. The orbiter structure was made primarily from aluminum alloy, although the engine structure was made primarily from titanium alloy.\n\nThe operational orbiters built were OV-102 Columbia, OV-099 Challenger, OV-103 Discovery, OV-104 Atlantis, and OV-105 Endeavour. \n\nFile:Atlantis on Shuttle Carrier Aircraft.jpg|Space Shuttle Atlantis transported by a Boeing 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA), 1998 (NASA)\nFile:Space Shuttle Transit.jpg|Space Shuttle Endeavour being transported by a Shuttle Carrier Aircraft\nFile:STS-79 rollout.jpg|An overhead view of Atlantis as it sits atop the Mobile Launcher Platform (MLP) before STS-79. Two Tail Service Masts (TSMs) to either side of the orbiter's tail provide umbilical connections for propellant loading and electrical power.\nFile:Sound_suppression_water_system_test_at_KSC_Launch_Pad_39A.jpg|Water is released onto the mobile launcher platform on Launch Pad 39A at the start of a sound suppression system test in 2004. During launch, 350000 USgal of water are poured onto the pad in 41 seconds. \n\nExternal tank\n\nThe main function of the Space Shuttle external tank was to supply the liquid oxygen and hydrogen fuel to the main engines. It was also the backbone of the launch vehicle, providing attachment points for the two solid rocket boosters and the orbiter. The external tank was the only part of the Shuttle system that was not reused. Although the external tanks were always discarded, it would have been possible to take them into orbit and re-use them (such as for incorporation into a space station).[http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19940004970_1994004970.pdf NASA-CR-195281, \"Utilization of the external tanks of the space transportation system\"]. NASA, August 23–27, 1982.[http://www.astronautix.com/craft/stsation.htm STS External Tank Station]. astronautix.com\n\nSolid rocket boosters\n\nTwo solid rocket boosters (SRBs) each provided 2800000 lbf of thrust at liftoff, which was 83% of the total thrust at liftoff. The SRBs were jettisoned two minutes after launch at a height of about 150000 ft, and then deployed parachutes and landed in the ocean to be recovered. The SRB cases were made of steel about ½ inch (13 mm) thick. The solid rocket boosters were re-used many times; the casing used in Ares I engine testing in 2009 consisted of motor cases that had been flown, collectively, on 48 Shuttle missions, including STS-1. \n\nAstronauts who have flown on multiple spacecraft report that Shuttle delivers a rougher ride than Apollo or Soyuz. The additional vibration is caused by the solid rocket boosters, as solid fuel does not burn as evenly as liquid fuel. The vibration dampens down after the solid rocket boosters have been jettisoned. \n\nOrbiter add-ons\n\nThe orbiter could be used in conjunction with a variety of add-ons depending on the mission. This included orbital laboratories (Spacelab, Spacehab), boosters for launching payloads farther into space (Inertial Upper Stage, Payload Assist Module), and other functions, such as provided by Extended Duration Orbiter, Multi-Purpose Logistics Modules, or Canadarm (RMS). An upper stage called Transfer Orbit Stage (Orbital Science Corp. TOS-21) was also used once with the orbiter. Other types of systems and racks were part of the modular Spacelab system pallets, igloo, IPS, etc., which also supported special missions such as SRTM.\n\nFile:Mplm in shuttle.jpg|MPLM Leonardo\nFile:1989 s34 Galileo Deploy2.jpg|IUS deploying with Galileo\nFile:SBS-3 with PAM-D stage.jpg|PAM-D with satellite\nFile:EDO pallet.jpg|EDO being installed\nFile:STS-9 Spacelab 1.jpg|Spacelab in orbit\nFile:1996 s72 Scott EVA.jpg|RMS (Canadarm)\nFile:Spacehab S107e05359.jpg|Spacehab\n\nSpacelab\n\nA major component of the Space Shuttle Program was Spacelab, primarily contributed by a consortium of European countries, and operated in conjunction with the United States and international partners. Supported by a modular system of pressurized modules, pallets, and systems, Spacelab missions executed on multidisciplinary science, orbital logistics, and international cooperation. Over 29 missions flew on subjects ranging from astronomy, microgravity, radar, and life sciences, to name a few. Spacelab hardware also supported missions such as Hubble (HST) servicing and space station resupply. STS-2 and STS-3 provided testing, and the first full mission was Spacelab-1 (STS-9) launched on November 28, 1983.\n\nSpacelab formally began in 1973, after a meeting in Brussels, Belgium, by European heads of state. Within the decade, Spacelab went into orbit and provided Europe and the United States with an orbital workshop and hardware system. International cooperation, science, and exploration were realized on Spacelab.\n\nFlight systems\n\nThe Shuttle was one of the earliest craft to use a computerized fly-by-wire digital flight control system. This means no mechanical or hydraulic linkages connected the pilot's control stick to the control surfaces or reaction control system thrusters. The control algorithm, which used a classical Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) approach, was developed and maintained by Honeywell. The Shuttle's fly-by-wire digital flight control system was composed of 4 control systems each addressing a different mission phase: Ascent, Descent, On-Orbit and Aborts. Honeywell is also credited with the design and implementation of the Shuttle's Nose Wheel Steering Control Algorithm that allowed the Orbiter to safely land at Kennedy Space Center's Shuttle Runway.\n\nA concern with using digital fly-by-wire systems on the Shuttle was reliability. Considerable research went into the Shuttle computer system. The Shuttle used five identical redundant IBM 32-bit general purpose computers (GPCs), model AP-101, constituting a type of embedded system. Four computers ran specialized software called the Primary Avionics Software System (PASS). A fifth backup computer ran separate software called the Backup Flight System (BFS). Collectively they were called the Data Processing System (DPS). \n\nThe design goal of the Shuttle's DPS was fail-operational/fail-safe reliability. After a single failure, the Shuttle could still continue the mission. After two failures, it could still land safely.\n\nThe four general-purpose computers operated essentially in lockstep, checking each other. If one computer provided a different result than the other three (i.e. the one computer failed), the three functioning computers \"voted\" it out of the system. This isolated it from vehicle control. If a second computer of the three remaining failed, the two functioning computers voted it out. A very unlikely failure mode would have been where two of the computers produced result A, and two produced result B (a two-two split). In this unlikely case, one group of two was to be picked at random.\n\nThe Backup Flight System (BFS) was separately developed software running on the fifth computer, used only if the entire four-computer primary system failed. The BFS was created because although the four primary computers were hardware redundant, they all ran the same software, so a generic software problem could crash all of them. Embedded system avionic software was developed under totally different conditions from public commercial software: the number of code lines was tiny compared to a public commercial software product, changes were only made infrequently and with extensive testing, and many programming and test personnel worked on the small amount of computer code. However, in theory it could have still failed, and the BFS existed for that contingency. While the BFS could run in parallel with PASS, the BFS never engaged to take over control from PASS during any Shuttle mission.\n\nThe software for the Shuttle computers was written in a high-level language called HAL/S, somewhat similar to PL/I. It is specifically designed for a real time embedded system environment.\n\nThe IBM AP-101 computers originally had about 424 kilobytes of magnetic core memory each. The CPU could process about 400,000 instructions per second. They had no hard disk drive, and loaded software from magnetic tape cartridges.\n\nIn 1990, the original computers were replaced with an upgraded model AP-101S, which had about 2.5 times the memory capacity (about 1 megabyte) and three times the processor speed (about 1.2 million instructions per second). The memory was changed from magnetic core to semiconductor with battery backup.\n\nEarly Shuttle missions, starting in November 1983, took along the Grid Compass, arguably one of the first laptop computers. The GRiD was given the name SPOC, for Shuttle Portable Onboard Computer. Use on the Shuttle required both hardware and software modifications which were incorporated into later versions of the commercial product. It was used to monitor and display the Shuttle's ground position, path of the next two orbits, show where the Shuttle had line of sight communications with ground stations, and determine points for location-specific observations of the Earth. The Compass sold poorly, as it cost at least US$8000, but it offered unmatched performance for its weight and size. NASA was one of its main customers. \n\nDuring its service life, the Shuttle's Control System never experienced a failure. Many of the lessons learned have been used to design today's high speed control algorithms.\n\nOrbiter markings and insignia\n\nThe prototype orbiter Enterprise originally had a flag of the United States on the upper surface of the left wing and the letters \"USA\" in black on the right wing. The name \"Enterprise\" was painted in black on the payload bay doors just above the hinge and behind the crew module; on the aft end of the payload bay doors was the NASA \"worm\" logotype in gray. Underneath the rear of the payload bay doors on the side of the fuselage just above the wing is the text \"United States\" in black with a flag of the United States ahead of it.\n\nThe first operational orbiter, Columbia, originally had the same markings as Enterprise, although the letters \"USA\" on the right wing were slightly larger and spaced farther apart. Columbia also had black markings which Enterprise lacked on its forward RCS module, around the cockpit windows, and on its vertical stabilizer, and had distinctive black \"chines\" on the forward part of its upper wing surfaces, which none of the other orbiters had.\n\nChallenger established a modified marking scheme for the shuttle fleet that was matched by Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour. The letters \"USA\" in black above an American flag were displayed on the left wing, with the NASA \"worm\" logotype in gray centered above the name of the orbiter in black on the right wing. The name of the orbiter was inscribed not on the payload bay doors, but on the forward fuselage just below and behind the cockpit windows. This would make the name visible when the shuttle was photographed in orbit with the doors open.\n\nIn 1983, Enterprise had its wing markings changed to match Challenger, and the NASA \"worm\" logotype on the aft end of the payload bay doors was changed from gray to black. Some black markings were added to the nose, cockpit windows and vertical tail to more closely resemble the flight vehicles, but the name \"Enterprise\" remained on the payload bay doors as there was never any need to open them. Columbia had its name moved to the forward fuselage to match the other flight vehicles after STS-61-C, during the 1986–88 hiatus when the shuttle fleet was grounded following the loss of Challenger, but retained its original wing markings until its last overhaul (after STS-93), and its unique black wing \"chines\" for the remainder of its operational life.\n\nBeginning in 1998, the flight vehicles' markings were modified to incorporate the NASA \"meatball\" insignia. The \"worm\" logotype, which the agency had phased out, was removed from the payload bay doors and the \"meatball\" insignia was added aft of the \"United States\" text on the lower aft fuselage. The \"meatball\" insignia was also displayed on the left wing, with the American flag above the orbiter's name, left-justified rather than centered, on the right wing. The three surviving flight vehicles, Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour, still bear these markings as museum displays. Enterprise became the property of the Smithsonian Institution in 1985 and was no longer under NASA's control when these changes were made, hence the prototype orbiter still has its 1983 markings and still has its name on the payload bay doors.\n\nUpgrades\n\nThe Space Shuttle was initially developed in the 1970s, but received many upgrades and modifications afterward to improve performance, reliability and safety. Internally, the Shuttle remained largely similar to the original design, with the exception of the improved avionics computers. In addition to the computer upgrades, the original analog primary flight instruments were replaced with modern full-color, flat-panel display screens, called a glass cockpit, which is similar to those of contemporary airliners. To facilitate construction of ISS, the internal airlocks of each orbiter except Columbia were replaced with external docking systems to allow for a greater amount of cargo to be stored on the Shuttle's mid-deck during station resupply missions.\n\nThe Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs) had several improvements to enhance reliability and power. This explains phrases such as \"Main engines throttling up to 104 percent.\" This did not mean the engines were being run over a safe limit. The 100 percent figure was the original specified power level. During the lengthy development program, Rocketdyne determined the engine was capable of safe reliable operation at 104 percent of the originally specified thrust. NASA could have rescaled the output number, saying in essence 104 percent is now 100 percent. To clarify this would have required revising much previous documentation and software, so the 104 percent number was retained. SSME upgrades were denoted as \"block numbers\", such as block I, block II, and block IIA. The upgrades improved engine reliability, maintainability and performance. The 109% thrust level was finally reached in flight hardware with the Block II engines in 2001. The normal maximum throttle was 104 percent, with 106 percent or 109 percent used for mission aborts.\n\nFor the first two missions, STS-1 and STS-2, the external tank was painted white to protect the insulation that covers much of the tank, but improvements and testing showed that it was not required. The weight saved by not painting the tank resulted in an increase in payload capability to orbit. Additional weight was saved by removing some of the internal \"stringers\" in the hydrogen tank that proved unnecessary. The resulting \"light-weight external tank\" was first flown on STS-6 and used on the majority of Shuttle missions. STS-91 saw the first flight of the \"super light-weight external tank\". This version of the tank was made of the 2195 aluminum-lithium alloy. It weighed 3.4 metric tons (7,500 lb) less than the last run of lightweight tanks, allowing the Shuttle to deliver heavy elements to ISS's high inclination orbit. As the Shuttle was always operated with a crew, each of these improvements was first flown on operational mission flights.\n\nThe solid rocket boosters underwent improvements as well. Design engineers added a third O-ring seal to the joints between the segments after the 1986 Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.\n\nSeveral other SRB improvements were planned to improve performance and safety, but never came to be. These culminated in the considerably simpler, lower cost, probably safer and better-performing Advanced Solid Rocket Booster. These rockets entered production in the early to mid-1990s to support the Space Station, but were later canceled to save money after the expenditure of $2.2 billion. The loss of the ASRB program resulted in the development of the Super LightWeight external Tank (SLWT), which provided some of the increased payload capability, while not providing any of the safety improvements. In addition, the US Air Force developed their own much lighter single-piece SRB design using a filament-wound system, but this too was canceled.\n\nSTS-70 was delayed in 1995, when woodpeckers bored holes in the foam insulation of Discoverys external tank. Since then, NASA has installed commercial plastic owl decoys and inflatable owl balloons which had to be removed prior to launch. The delicate nature of the foam insulation had been the cause of damage to the Thermal Protection System, the tile heat shield and heat wrap of the orbiter. NASA remained confident that this damage, while it was the primary cause of the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster on February 1, 2003, would not jeopardize the completion of the International Space Station (ISS) in the projected time allotted.\n\nA cargo-only, unmanned variant of the Shuttle was variously proposed and rejected since the 1980s. It was called the Shuttle-C, and would have traded re-usability for cargo capability, with large potential savings from reusing technology developed for the Space Shuttle. Another proposal was to convert the payload bay into a passenger area, with versions ranging from 30 to 74 seats, three days in orbit, and cost US$1.5 million per seat.\n\nOn the first four Shuttle missions, astronauts wore modified US Air Force high-altitude full-pressure suits, which included a full-pressure helmet during ascent and descent. From the fifth flight, STS-5, until the loss of Challenger, one-piece light blue nomex flight suits and partial-pressure helmets were worn. A less-bulky, partial-pressure version of the high-altitude pressure suits with a helmet was reinstated when Shuttle flights resumed in 1988. The Launch-Entry Suit ended its service life in late 1995, and was replaced by the full-pressure Advanced Crew Escape Suit (ACES), which resembled the Gemini space suit in design, but retained the orange color of the Launch-Entry Suit.\n\nTo extend the duration that orbiters could stay docked at the ISS, the Station-to-Shuttle Power Transfer System (SSPTS) was installed. The SSPTS allowed these orbiters to use power provided by the ISS to preserve their consumables. The SSPTS was first used successfully on STS-118.\n\nSpecifications\n\nOrbiter (for Endeavour, OV-105)\n*Length: \n*Wingspan: \n*Height: \n*Empty weight: 172000 lb \n*Gross liftoff weight (Orbiter only): 240000 lb\n*Maximum landing weight: 230000 lb\n*Payload to Landing (Return Payload): 32,000 lb (14,400 kg)\n*Maximum payload: 55250 lb\n*Payload to LEO (204 km @ 28.5° inclination: 27500 kg\n*Payload to LEO (407 km @ 51.6° to ISS): \n*Payload to GTO: 8390 lb\n*Payload to Polar Orbit: 28000 lb\n*Note launch payloads modified by External Tank (ET) choice (ET, LWT, or SLWT)\n*Payload bay dimensions: 15 by (diameter by length)\n*Operational altitude: 100 to\n*Speed: 7743 m/s\n*Crossrange: 1085 nmi\n*Main Stage (SSME with external tank)\n**Engines: Three Rocketdyne Block II SSMEs, each with a sea level thrust of 393800 lbf at 104% power \n**Thrust (at liftoff, sea level, 104% power, all 3 engines): 1181400 lbf\n**Specific impulse: 455 isp\n**Burn time: 480 s\n**Fuel: Liquid Hydrogen/Liquid Oxygen\n*Orbital Maneuvering System\n**Engines: 2 OMS Engines\n**Thrust: combined total vacuum thrust\n**Specific impulse: 316 isp\n**Burn time: 150–250 s typical burn; 1250 s deorbit burn\n**Fuel: MMH/N2O4\n*Crew: Varies.\n:The earliest Shuttle flights had the minimum crew of two; many later missions a crew of five. By program end, typically seven people would fly: (commander, pilot, several mission specialists, one of whom (MS-2) acted as the flight engineer starting with STS-9 in 1983). On two occasions, eight astronauts have flown (STS-61-A, STS-71). Eleven people could be accommodated in an emergency mission (see STS-3xx).\n\nExternal tank (for SLWT)\n*Length: \n*Diameter: \n*Propellant volume: 2025 m3\n*Empty weight: 26535 kg\n*Gross liftoff weight (for tank): 756000 kg\n\nSolid Rocket Boosters\n*Length: \n*Diameter: \n*Empty weight (each): 68000 kg\n*Gross liftoff weight (each): 571000 kg[http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19910018886_1991018886.pdf Space Shuttle Propulsion Systems], p. 153. NASA, June 26, 1990.\n*Thrust (at liftoff, sea level, each): 12500 kN\n*Specific impulse: 269 isp\n*Burn time: 124 s\n\nSystem Stack\n*Height: 56 m\n*Gross liftoff weight: 2000000 kg\n*Total liftoff thrust: 30160 kN\n\nMission profile\n\nLaunch preparation\n\nAll Space Shuttle missions were launched from Kennedy Space Center (KSC). The weather criteria used for launch included, but were not limited to: precipitation, temperatures, cloud cover, lightning forecast, wind, and humidity. The Shuttle was not launched under conditions where it could have been struck by lightning. Aircraft are often struck by lightning with no adverse effects because the electricity of the strike is dissipated through its conductive structure and the aircraft is not electrically grounded. Like most jet airliners, the Shuttle was mainly constructed of conductive aluminum, which would normally shield and protect the internal systems. However, upon liftoff the Shuttle sent out a long exhaust plume as it ascended, and this plume could have triggered lightning by providing a current path to ground. The NASA Anvil Rule for a Shuttle launch stated that an anvil cloud could not appear within a distance of 10 nautical miles. The Shuttle Launch Weather Officer monitored conditions until the final decision to scrub a launch was announced. In addition, the weather conditions had to be acceptable at one of the Transatlantic Abort Landing sites (one of several Space Shuttle abort modes) to launch as well as the solid rocket booster recovery area. While the Shuttle might have safely endured a lightning strike, a similar strike caused problems on Apollo 12, so for safety NASA chose not to launch the Shuttle if lightning was possible (NPR8715.5).\n\nHistorically, the Shuttle was not launched if its flight would run from December to January (a year-end rollover or YERO). Its flight software, designed in the 1970s, was not designed for this, and would require the orbiter's computers be reset through a change of year, which could cause a glitch while in orbit. In 2007, NASA engineers devised a solution so Shuttle flights could cross the year-end boundary. \n\nLaunch\n\nAfter the final hold in the countdown at T-minus 9 minutes, the Shuttle went through its final preparations for launch, and the countdown was automatically controlled by the Ground Launch Sequencer (GLS), software at the Launch Control Center, which stopped the count if it sensed a critical problem with any of the Shuttle's onboard systems. The GLS handed off the count to the Shuttle's on-board computers at T minus 31 seconds, in a process called auto sequence start.\n\nAt T-minus 16 seconds, the massive sound suppression system (SPS) began to drench the Mobile Launcher Platform (MLP) and SRB trenches with 300000 USgal of water to protect the Orbiter from damage by acoustical energy and rocket exhaust reflected from the flame trench and MLP during lift off. \n\nAt T-minus 10 seconds, hydrogen igniters were activated under each engine bell to quell the stagnant gas inside the cones before ignition. Failure to burn these gases could trip the onboard sensors and create the possibility of an overpressure and explosion of the vehicle during the firing phase. The main engine turbopumps also began charging the combustion chambers with liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen at this time. The computers reciprocated this action by allowing the redundant computer systems to begin the firing phase.\n\nThe three main engines (SSMEs) started at T-6.6 seconds. The main engines ignited sequentially via the Shuttle's general purpose computers (GPCs) at 120 millisecond intervals. All three SSMEs were required to reach 90% rated thrust within three seconds, otherwise the onboard computers would initiate an RSLS abort. If all three engines indicated nominal performance by T-3 seconds, they were commanded to gimbal to liftoff configuration and the command would be issued to arm the SRBs for ignition at T-0. Between T-6.6 seconds and T-3 seconds, while the SSMEs were firing but the SRBs were still bolted to the pad, the offset thrust caused the entire launch stack (boosters, tank and orbiter) to pitch down measured at the tip of the external tank. The three second delay after confirmation of SSME operation was to allow the stack to return to nearly vertical. At T-0 seconds, the 8 frangible nuts holding the SRBs to the pad were detonated, the SSMEs were commanded to 100% throttle, and the SRBs were ignited. By T+0.23 seconds, the SRBs built up enough thrust for liftoff to commence, and reached maximum chamber pressure by T+0.6 seconds. The Johnson Space Center's Mission Control Center assumed control of the flight once the SRBs had cleared the launch tower.\n\nShortly after liftoff, the Shuttle's main engines were throttled up to 104.5% and the vehicle began a combined roll, pitch and yaw maneuver that placed it onto the correct heading (azimuth) for the planned orbital inclination and in a heads down attitude with wings level. The Shuttle flew upside down during the ascent phase. This orientation allowed a trim angle of attack that was favorable for aerodynamic loads during the region of high dynamic pressure, resulting in a net positive load factor, as well as providing the flight crew with a view of the horizon as a visual reference. The vehicle climbed in a progressively flattening arc, accelerating as the mass of the SRBs and main tank decreased. To achieve low orbit requires much more horizontal than vertical acceleration. This was not visually obvious, since the vehicle rose vertically and was out of sight for most of the horizontal acceleration. The near circular orbital velocity at the 380 km altitude of the International Space Station is 27650 km/h, roughly equivalent to Mach 23 at sea level. As the International Space Station orbits at an inclination of 51.6 degrees, missions going there must set orbital inclination to the same value in order to rendezvous with the station.\n\nAround 30 seconds into ascent, the SSMEs were throttled down—usually to 72%, though this varied—to reduce the maximum aerodynamic forces acting on the Shuttle at a point called Max Q. Additionally, the propellant grain design of the SRBs caused their thrust to drop by about 30% by 50 seconds into ascent. Once the Orbiter's guidance verified that Max Q would be within Shuttle structural limits, the main engines were throttled back up to 104.5%; this throttling down and back up was called the \"thrust bucket\". To maximize performance, the throttle level and timing of the thrust bucket was shaped to bring the Shuttle as close to aerodynamic limits as possible. \n\nAt around T+126 seconds, pyrotechnic fasteners released the SRBs and small separation rockets pushed them laterally away from the vehicle. The SRBs parachuted back to the ocean to be reused. The Shuttle then began accelerating to orbit on the main engines. Acceleration at this point would typically fall to .9 g, and the vehicle would take on a somewhat nose-up angle to the horizon - it used the main engines to gain and then maintain altitude while it accelerated horizontally towards orbit. At about five and three-quarter minutes into ascent, the orbiter's direct communication links with the ground began to fade, at which point it rolled heads up to reroute its communication links to the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite system.\n\nAt about seven and a half minutes into ascent, the mass of the vehicle was low enough that the engines had to be throttled back to limit vehicle acceleration to 3 g (29.4 m/s² or 96.5 ft/s², equivalent to accelerating from zero to in a second). The Shuttle would maintain this acceleration for the next minute, and main engine cut-off (MECO) occurred at about eight and a half minutes after launch. The main engines were shut down before complete depletion of propellant, as running dry would have destroyed the engines. The oxygen supply was terminated before the hydrogen supply, as the SSMEs reacted unfavorably to other shutdown modes. (Liquid oxygen has a tendency to react violently, and supports combustion when it encounters hot engine metal.) A few seconds after MECO, the external tank was released by firing pyrotechnic fasteners.\n\nAt this point the Shuttle and external tank were on a slightly suborbital trajectory, coasting up towards apogee. Once at apogee, about half an hour after MECO, the Shuttle's Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) engines were fired to raise its perigee and achieve orbit, while the external tank fell back into the atmosphere and burned up over the Indian Ocean or the Pacific Ocean depending on launch profile. The sealing action of the tank plumbing and lack of pressure relief systems on the external tank helped it break up in the lower atmosphere. After the foam burned away during re-entry, the heat caused a pressure buildup in the remaining liquid oxygen and hydrogen until the tank exploded. This ensured that any pieces that fell back to Earth were small.\n\nAscent tracking\n\nThe Shuttle was monitored throughout its ascent for short range tracking (10 seconds before liftoff through 57 seconds after), medium range (7 seconds before liftoff through 110 seconds after) and long range (7 seconds before liftoff through 165 seconds after). Short range cameras included 22 16mm cameras on the Mobile Launch Platform and 8 16mm on the Fixed Service Structure, 4 high speed fixed cameras located on the perimeter of the launch complex plus an additional 42 fixed cameras with 16mm motion picture film. Medium range cameras included remotely operated tracking cameras at the launch complex plus 6 sites along the immediate coast north and south of the launch pad, each with 800mm lens and high speed cameras running 100 frames per second. These cameras ran for only 4–10 seconds due to limitations in the amount of film available. Long range cameras included those mounted on the external tank, SRBs and orbiter itself which streamed live video back to the ground providing valuable information about any debris falling during ascent. Long range tracking cameras with 400-inch film and 200-inch video lenses were operated by a photographer at Playalinda Beach as well as 9 other sites from 38 miles north at the Ponce Inlet to 23 miles south to Patrick Air Force Base (PAFB) and additional mobile optical tracking camera was stationed on Merritt Island during launches. A total of 10 HD cameras were used both for ascent information for engineers and broadcast feeds to networks such as NASA TV and HDNet. The number of cameras significantly increased and numerous existing cameras were upgraded at the recommendation of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board to provide better information about the debris during launch. Debris was also tracked using a pair of Weibel Continuous Pulse Doppler X-band radars, one on board the SRB recovery ship MV Liberty Star positioned north east of the launch pad and on a ship positioned south of the launch pad. Additionally, during the first 2 flights following the loss of Columbia and her crew, a pair of NASA WB-57 reconnaissance aircraft equipped with HD Video and Infrared flew at 60000 ft to provide additional views of the launch ascent. Kennedy Space Center also invested nearly $3 million in improvements to the digital video analysis systems in support of debris tracking. \n\nIn orbit\n\nOnce in orbit, the Shuttle usually flew at an altitude of 320 kilometers (200 miles), and occasionally as high as 650 kilometers. In the 1980s and 1990s, many flights involved space science missions on the NASA/ESA Spacelab, or launching various types of satellites and science probes. By the 1990s and 2000s the focus shifted more to servicing the space station, with fewer satellite launches. Most missions involved staying in orbit several days to two weeks, although longer missions were possible with the Extended Duration Orbiter add-on or when attached to a space station.\n\nRe-entry and landing\n\nAlmost the entire Space Shuttle re-entry procedure, except for lowering the landing gear and deploying the air data probes, was normally performed under computer control. However, the re-entry could be flown entirely manually if an emergency arose. The approach and landing phase could be controlled by the autopilot, but was usually hand flown.\n\nThe vehicle began re-entry by firing the Orbital maneuvering system engines, while flying upside down, backside first, in the opposite direction to orbital motion for approximately three minutes, which reduced the Shuttle's velocity by about 200 mph. The resultant slowing of the Shuttle lowered its orbital perigee down into the upper atmosphere. The Shuttle then flipped over, by pushing its nose down (which was actually \"up\" relative to the Earth, because it was flying upside down). This OMS firing was done roughly halfway around the globe from the landing site.\n\nThe vehicle started encountering more significant air density in the lower thermosphere at about 400000 ft, at around Mach 25, 8200 m/s. The vehicle was controlled by a combination of RCS thrusters and control surfaces, to fly at a 40-degree nose-up attitude, producing high drag, not only to slow it down to landing speed, but also to reduce reentry heating. As the vehicle encountered progressively denser air, it began a gradual transition from spacecraft to aircraft. In a straight line, its 40-degree nose-up attitude would cause the descent angle to flatten-out, or even rise. The vehicle therefore performed a series of four steep S-shaped banking turns, each lasting several minutes, at up to 70 degrees of bank, while still maintaining the 40-degree angle of attack. In this way it dissipated speed sideways rather than upwards. This occurred during the 'hottest' phase of re-entry, when the heat-shield glowed red and the G-forces were at their highest. By the end of the last turn, the transition to aircraft was almost complete. The vehicle leveled its wings, lowered its nose into a shallow dive and began its approach to the landing site.\n\nFile:Stsheat.jpg|Simulation of the outside of the Shuttle as it heats up to over 1,500 °C during re-entry.\nFile:Nasa Shuttle Test Using Electron Beam full.jpg|A Space Shuttle model undergoes a wind tunnel test in 1975. This test is simulating the ionized gasses that surround a Shuttle as it reenters the atmosphere.\nFile:CFD Shuttle.jpg|A computer simulation of high velocity air flow around the Space Shuttle during re-entry.\n\nThe orbiter's maximum glide ratio/lift-to-drag ratio varies considerably with speed, ranging from 1:1 at hypersonic speeds, 2:1 at supersonic speeds and reaching 4.5:1 at subsonic speeds during approach and landing. \n\nIn the lower atmosphere, the orbiter flies much like a conventional glider, except for a much higher descent rate, over 50 m/s or 9,800 fpm. At approximately Mach 3, two air data probes, located on the left and right sides of the orbiter's forward lower fuselage, are deployed to sense air pressure related to the vehicle's movement in the atmosphere.\n\nFinal approach and landing phase\n\nWhen the approach and landing phase began, the orbiter was at a 3000 m altitude, 12 km from the runway. The pilots applied aerodynamic braking to help slow down the vehicle. The orbiter's speed was reduced from 682 to, approximately, at touch-down (compared to 260 km/h for a jet airliner). The landing gear was deployed while the Orbiter was flying at 430 km/h. To assist the speed brakes, a 12 m drag chute was deployed either after main gear or nose gear touchdown (depending on selected chute deploy mode) at about 343 km/h. The chute was jettisoned once the orbiter slowed to 110 km/h.\n\nFile:Concluding the STS-133 mission, Space Shuttle Discovery touches down at the Shuttle Landing Facility.jpg|Discovery touches down for the final time at the end of STS-133.\nFile:Space Shuttle Endeavour landing.jpg|Endeavour brake chute deploys after touching down\n\nPost-landing processing\n\nAfter landing, the vehicle stayed on the runway for several hours for the orbiter to cool. Teams at the front and rear of the orbiter tested for presence of hydrogen, hydrazine, monomethylhydrazine, nitrogen tetroxide and ammonia (fuels and by-products of the reaction control system and the orbiter's three APUs). If hydrogen was detected, an emergency would be declared, the orbiter powered down and teams would evacuate the area. A convoy of 25 specially designed vehicles and 150 trained engineers and technicians approached the orbiter. Purge and vent lines were attached to remove toxic gases from fuel lines and the cargo bay about 45–60 minutes after landing. A flight surgeon boarded the orbiter for initial medical checks of the crew before disembarking. Once the crew left the orbiter, responsibility for the vehicle was handed from the Johnson Space Center back to the Kennedy Space Center.\n\nIf the mission ended at Edwards Air Force Base in California, White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico, or any of the runways the orbiter might use in an emergency, the orbiter was loaded atop the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, a modified 747, for transport back to the Kennedy Space Center, landing at the Shuttle Landing Facility. Once at the Shuttle Landing Facility, the orbiter was then towed 2 mi along a tow-way and access roads normally used by tour buses and KSC employees to the Orbiter Processing Facility where it began a months-long preparation process for the next mission.\n\nLanding sites\n\nNASA preferred Space Shuttle landings to be at Kennedy Space Center. If weather conditions made landing there unfavorable, the Shuttle could delay its landing until conditions are favorable, touch down at Edwards Air Force Base, California, or use one of the multiple alternate landing sites around the world. A landing at any site other than Kennedy Space Center meant that after touchdown the Shuttle must be mated to the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft and returned to Cape Canaveral. Space Shuttle Columbia (STS-3) once landed at the White Sands Space Harbor, New Mexico; this was viewed as a last resort as NASA scientists believe that the sand could potentially damage the Shuttle's exterior.\n\nThere were many alternative landing sites that were never used. \n\nRisk contributors\n\nAn example of technical risk analysis for a STS mission is SPRA iteration 3.1 top risk contributors for STS-133: \n# Micro-Meteoroid Orbital Debris (MMOD) strikes\n# Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME)-induced or SSME catastrophic failure\n# Ascent debris strikes to TPS leading to LOCV on orbit or entry\n# Crew error during entry\n# RSRM-induced RSRM catastrophic failure (RSRM are the rocket motors of the SRBs)\n# COPV failure (COPV are tanks inside the orbiter that hold gas at high pressure)\n\nAn internal NASA risk assessment study (conducted by the Shuttle Program Safety and Mission Assurance Office at Johnson Space Center) released in late 2010 or early 2011 concluded that the agency had seriously underestimated the level of risk involved in operating the Shuttle. The report assessed that there was a 1 in 9 chance of a catastrophic disaster during the first nine flights of the Shuttle but that safety improvements had later improved the risk ratio to 1 in 90. \n\nFleet history\n\nBelow is a list of major events in the Space Shuttle orbiter fleet.\n\nSources: NASA launch manifest, NASA Space Shuttle archive \n\nShuttle disasters\n\nOn January 28, 1986, Challenger disintegrated 73 seconds after launch due to the failure of the right SRB, killing all seven astronauts on board. The disaster was caused by low-temperature impairment of an O-ring, a mission critical seal used between segments of the SRB casing. The failure of a lower O-ring seal allowed hot combustion gases to escape from between the booster sections and burn through the adjacent external tank, causing it to explode. Repeated warnings from design engineers voicing concerns about the lack of evidence of the O-rings' safety when the temperature was below 53 °F (12 °C) had been ignored by NASA managers. \n\nOn February 1, 2003, Columbia disintegrated during re-entry, killing its crew of seven, because of damage to the carbon-carbon leading edge of the wing caused during launch. Ground control engineers had made three separate requests for high-resolution images taken by the Department of Defense that would have provided an understanding of the extent of the damage, while NASA's chief thermal protection system (TPS) engineer requested that astronauts on board Columbia be allowed to leave the vehicle to inspect the damage. NASA managers intervened to stop the Department of Defense's assistance and refused the request for the spacewalk, and thus the feasibility of scenarios for astronaut repair or rescue by Atlantis were not considered by NASA management at the time. \n\nRetirement\n\nNASA retired the Space Shuttle in 2011, after 30 years of service. The Shuttle was originally conceived of and presented to the public as a \"Space Truck\", which would, among other things, be used to build a United States space station in low earth orbit in the early 1990s. When the US space station evolved into the International Space Station project, which suffered from long delays and design changes before it could be completed, the service life of the Space Shuttle was extended several times until 2011, serving at least 15 years longer than it was originally designed to do. Discovery was the first of NASA's three remaining operational Space Shuttles to be retired. \n\nThe final Space Shuttle mission was originally scheduled for late 2010, but the program was later extended to July 2011 when Michael Suffredini of the ISS program said that one additional trip was needed in 2011 to deliver parts to the International Space Station. The Shuttle's final mission consisted of just four astronauts—Christopher Ferguson (Commander), Douglas Hurley (Pilot), Sandra Magnus (Mission Specialist 1), and Rex Walheim (Mission Specialist 2); they conducted the 135th and last space Shuttle mission on board Atlantis, which launched on July 8, 2011, and landed safely at the Kennedy Space Center on July 21, 2011, at 5:57 AM EDT (09:57 UTC). \n\nDistribution of orbiters and other hardware\n\nNASA announced it would transfer orbiters to education institutions or museums at the conclusion of the Space Shuttle program. Each museum or institution is responsible for covering the cost of preparing and transporting each vehicle for display. Twenty museums from across the country submitted proposals for receiving one of the retired orbiters. NASA also made Space Shuttle thermal protection system tiles available to schools and universities for less than US$25 each. About 7,000 tiles were available on a first-come, first-served basis, limited to one per institution.\n\nOn April 12, 2011, NASA announced selection of locations for the remaining Shuttle orbiters: \n\n* Atlantis is on display at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, near Cape Canaveral, Florida. It was delivered to the Visitor Complex on November 2, 2012.\n* Discovery was delivered to the Udvar-Hazy Center of the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum in Chantilly, Virginia, near Washington, D.C. on April 19, 2012. On April 17, 2012, Discovery was flown atop a 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft escorted by a NASA T-38 Talon chase aircraft in a final farewell flight. The 747 and Discovery flew over Washington, D.C. and the metropolitan area around 10 am and arrived at Dulles around 11 am. The flyover and landing were widely covered on national news media.\n\n* Endeavour was delivered to the California Science Center in Los Angeles, California on October 14, 2012. It arrived at Los Angeles International Airport on September 21, 2012, concluding a two-day, cross country journey atop the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft after stops at Ellington Field in Houston, Biggs Army Airfield in El Paso and the Dryden Flight Research Facility at Edwards Air Force Base, California.\n* Enterprise (atmospheric test orbiter) was on display at the National Air and Space Museum's Udvar-Hazy Center but was moved to New York City's Intrepid Sea-Air-Space Museum in mid-2012.\n\nFlight and mid-deck training hardware will be taken from the Johnson Space Center and will go to the National Air and Space Museum and the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force. The full fuselage mockup, which includes the payload bay and aft section but no wings, is to go to the Museum of Flight in Seattle. Mission Simulation and Training Facility's fixed simulator will go to the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, and the motion simulator will go to the Texas A&M Aerospace Engineering Department in College Station, Texas. Other simulators used in Shuttle astronaut training will go to the Wings of Dreams Aviation Museum in Starke, Florida and the Virginia Air and Space Center in Hampton, Virginia.\n\nIn August 2011, the NASA Office of Inspector General (OIG) published a \"Review of NASA's Selection of Display Locations for the Space Shuttle Orbiters\"; the review had four main findings: \n*\"NASA's decisions regarding Orbiter placement were the result of an Agency-created process that emphasized above all other considerations locating the Orbiters in places where the most people would have the opportunity to view them\";\n*\"the Team made several errors during its evaluation process, including one that would have resulted in a numerical 'tie' among the Intrepid, the Kennedy Visitor Complex, and the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force (Air Force Museum) in Dayton, Ohio\";\n*there is \"no evidence that the Team’s recommendation or the Administrator's decision were tainted by political influence or any other improper consideration\";\n*\"some of the choices NASA made during the selection process – specifically, its decision to manage aspects of the selection as if it were a competitive procurement and to delay announcement of its placement decisions until April 2011 (more than 2 years after it first solicited information from interested entities)—may intensify challenges to the Agency and the selectees as they work to complete the process of placing the Orbiters in their new homes.\"\nThe NASA OIG had three recommendations, saying NASA should:\n*\"expeditiously review recipients' financial, logistical, and curatorial display plans to ensure they are feasible and consistent with the Agency's educational goals and processing and delivery schedules\";\n*\"ensure that recipient payments are closely coordinated with processing schedules, do not impede NASA's ability to efficiently prepare the Orbiters for museum display, and provide sufficient funds in advance of the work to be performed; and\"\n*\"work closely with the recipient organizations to minimize the possibility of delays in the delivery schedule that could increase the Agency's costs or impact other NASA missions and priorities.\"\n\nIn September 2011, the CEO and two board members of Seattle's Museum of Flight met with NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, pointing out \"significant errors in deciding where to put its four retiring Space Shuttles\"; the errors alleged include inaccurate information on Museum of Flight's attendance and international visitor statistics, as well as the readiness of the Intrepid Sea-Air-Space Museum's exhibit site. \n\nSpace Shuttle successors and legacy\n\nUntil another US manned spacecraft is ready, crews will travel to and from the International Space Station (ISS) exclusively aboard the Russian Soyuz spacecraft.\n\nA planned successor to STS was the \"Shuttle II\", during the 1980s and 1990s, and later the Constellation program during the 2004–2010 period. CSTS was a proposal to continue to operate STS commercially, after NASA. In September 2011, NASA announced the selection of the design for the new Space Launch System that is planned to launch the Orion spacecraft and other hardware to missions beyond low earth-orbit. \n\nThe Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program began in 2006 with the purpose of creating commercially operated unmanned cargo vehicles to service the ISS. The Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program was started in 2010 to create commercially operated manned spacecraft capable of delivering at least four crew members to the ISS, to stay docked for 180 days, and then return them back to Earth. These spacecraft were to become operational in the 2010s. \n\nIn culture\n\nSpace Shuttles have been features of fiction and nonfiction, from children's movies to documentaries. Early examples include the 1979 James Bond film, Moonraker, the 1982 Activision videogame Space Shuttle: A Journey into Space (1982) and G. Harry Stine's 1981 novel Shuttle Down. In the 1986 film SpaceCamp, Atlantis accidentally launched into space with a group of U.S. Space Camp participants as its crew. The 1998 film Armageddon portrayed a combined crew of offshore oil rig workers and US military staff who pilot two modified Shuttles to avert the destruction of Earth by an asteroid. Retired American test pilots visited a Russian satellite in the 2000 Clint Eastwood adventure film Space Cowboys. In the 2003 film The Core, the Endeavours landing is disrupted by the earth's magnetic core, and its crew is selected to pilot the vehicle designed to restart the core. The 2004 Bollywood movie Swades, where a Space Shuttle was used to launch a special rainfall monitoring satellite, was filmed at Kennedy Space Center in the year following the Columbia disaster that had taken the life of Indian-American astronaut KC Chawla. On television, the 1996 drama The Cape portrayed the lives of a group of NASA astronauts as they prepared for and flew Shuttle missions. Odyssey 5 was a short lived sci-fi series that featured the crew of a Space Shuttle as the last survivors of a disaster that destroyed Earth. The 1997- 2007 Sci-fi series Stargate SG-1 had a shuttle rescue written into an episode. The 2013 film Gravity features the fictional space shuttle Explorer, whose crew are killed or left stranded after it is destroyed by a shower of high speed orbital debris.\n\nThe Space Shuttle has also been the subject of toys and models; for example, a large Lego Space Shuttle model was constructed by visitors at Kennedy Space Center, and smaller models have been sold commercially as a standard \"LegoLand\" set. A 1980 pinball machine Space Shuttle was produced by Zaccaria and a 1984 pinball machine Space Shuttle: Pinball Adventure was produced by Williams and features a plastic Space Shuttle model among other artwork of astronauts on the play field. The Space Shuttle also appears in a number of flight simulator and space flight simulator games such as Microsoft Space Simulator, Orbiter, FlightGear, X-Plane and Space Shuttle Mission 2007. Several Transformers toys were modeled after the Space Shuttle. \n\nUS postage commemorations\n\nThe U.S. Postal Service has released several postage issues that depict the Space Shuttle. The first such stamps were issued in 1981, and are on display at the National Postal Museum.", "Space Shuttle Challenger (Orbiter Vehicle Designation: OV-099) was the second orbiter of NASA's space shuttle program to be put into service following Columbia. The shuttle was built by Rockwell International's Space Transportation Systems Division in Downey, California. Its maiden flight, STS-6, started on April 4, 1983. It launched and landed nine times before breaking apart 73 seconds into its tenth mission, STS-51-L, on January 28, 1986, resulting in the death of all seven crew members, including a civilian school teacher. It was the first of two shuttles to be destroyed in flight, the other being Columbia in 2003. The accident led to a two-and-a-half year grounding of the shuttle fleet; flights resumed in 1988 with STS-26 flown by Discovery. Challenger itself was replaced by Endeavour which was built using structural spares ordered by NASA as part of the construction contracts for Discovery and Atlantis.\n\nHistory\n\nChallenger was named after HMS Challenger, a British corvette that was the command ship for the Challenger Expedition, a pioneering global marine research expedition undertaken from 1872 through 1876. The Apollo 17 lunar module that landed on the Moon in 1972 was also named Challenger.\n\nConstruction\n\nBecause of the low production of orbiters, the Space Shuttle program decided to build a vehicle as a Structural Test Article, STA-099, that could later be converted to a flight vehicle. The contract for STA-099 was awarded to North American Rockwell on July 26, 1972, and its construction was completed in February 1978. After STA-099's rollout, it was sent to a Lockheed test site in Palmdale, where it spent over 11 months in vibration tests designed to simulate entire shuttle flights, from launch to landing. In order to prevent damage during structural testing, qualification tests were performed to a factor of safety of 1.2 times the design limit loads. The qualification tests were used to validate computational models, and compliance with the required 1.4 factor of safety was shown by analysis. STA-099 was essentially a complete airframe of a Space Shuttle orbiter, with only a mockup crew module installed and thermal insulation placed on its forward fuselage. \n\nNASA planned to refit the prototype orbiter Enterprise (OV-101), used for flight testing, as the second operational orbiter, but design changes made during construction of the first orbiter, Columbia (OV-102), would have required extensive work. Because STA-099's qualification testing prevented damage, NASA found that rebuilding STA-099 as OV-099 would be less expensive than refitting Enterprise. Work on converting STA-099 into Challenger began in January 1979, starting with just the crew module (the pressurized portion of the vehicle) as the rest of the orbiter was still used by Lockheed. STA-099 returned to the Rockwell plant in November 1979, and the original unfinished crew module was replaced with the newly constructed model. Major portions of STA-099, including the payload bay doors, body flap, wings and vertical stabilizer, also had to be returned to their individual subcontractors for rework. By early 1981, most of these components had returned to Palmdale and were reinstalled on the orbiter. Work continued on the conversion until July 1982.\n\nChallenger (and the orbiters built after it) had fewer tiles in its Thermal Protection System than Columbia, though it still made heavy use of the white LRSI tiles on the cabin and main fuselage compared to the later orbiters. Most of the tiles on the payload bay doors, upper wing surfaces, and rear fuselage surfaces were replaced with DuPont white Nomex felt insulation. These modifications as well as an overall lighter structure allowed Challenger to carry 2,500 lb (1,100 kg) more payload than Columbia. Challenger's fuselage and wings were also stronger than Columbia's despite being lighter. The hatch and vertical stabilizer tile patterns were also different from that of the other orbiters. Challenger was also the first orbiter to have a head-up display system for use in the descent phase of a mission, and the first to feature Phase I main engines rated for 104% maximum thrust.\n\nConstruction milestones (as STA-099)\n\nConstruction milestones (as OV-099)\n\nFlights and modifications\n\nAfter its first flight in April 1983, Challenger quickly became the workhorse of NASA's Space Shuttle fleet, flying far more missions per year than Columbia. In 1983 and 1984, Challenger flew on 85% of all Space Shuttle missions. Even when the orbiters Discovery and Atlantis joined the fleet, Challenger flew three missions a year from 1983 to 1985. Challenger, along with Discovery, was modified at Kennedy Space Center to be able to carry the Centaur-G upper stage in its payload bay. If flight STS-51-L had been successful, Challengers next mission would have been the deployment of the Ulysses probe with the Centaur to study the polar regions of the Sun.\n\nChallenger flew the first American woman, African-American, Dutchman and Canadian into space; three Spacelab missions; and performed the first night launch and night landing of a Space Shuttle. Challenger was also the first space shuttle to be destroyed in an accident during a mission. The collected debris of the vessel is currently buried in decommissioned missile silos at Launch Complex 31, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. A section of the fuselage recovered from Space Shuttle Challenger can also be found at the “Forever Remembered” memorial at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida. From time to time, further pieces of debris from the orbiter wash up on the Florida coast. When this happens, they are collected and transported to the silos for storage. Because of its early loss, Challenger was the only space shuttle that never wore the NASA \"meatball\" logo, and was never modified with the MEDS \"glass cockpit\". The tail was never fitted with a drag chute – it was fitted to the remaining orbiters in 1992. Also because of its early demise Challenger was also one of only two shuttles that never visited the Mir Space Station and the International Space Station the other one being its sister ship the Columbia which was in service during the time these missions were flown. The space shuttle program was completed upon the conclusion of the final flights and retirement of Discovery, Endeavour, and Atlantis in 2011.\n\nMission insignias", "Gerald Michael Rivera (born July 4, 1943), better known as Geraldo Rivera, is an American attorney, reporter, author, and talk show host. He was the host of the talk show Geraldo from 1987 to 1998. Rivera hosted the newsmagazine program Geraldo at Large, hosts the occasional broadcast of Geraldo Rivera Reports (in lieu of hosting At Large), and appears regularly on Fox News Channel programs such as The Five.\n\nEarly life\n\nRivera was born at Beth Israel Medical Center in New York City, New York, the son of Lillian (née Friedman), a waitress, and Cruz \"Allen\" Rivera (October 1, 1915 – November 1987), a restaurant worker and cab driver. Rivera's father was a Catholic Puerto Rican, and his mother is of Ashkenazi Russian Jewish descent. He was raised \"mostly Jewish\" and had a Bar Mitzvah ceremony. He grew up in Brooklyn and West Babylon, New York, where he attended West Babylon High School. Rivera's family was sometimes subjected to prejudice and racism, and took to spelling their surname as \"Riviera\" because they thought it sounded \"less ethnic\". \n\nFrom September 1961 to May 1963, he attended the State University of New York Maritime College, where he was a member of the rowing team. In 1965, Rivera graduated from the University of Arizona with a B.S. degree in business administration, and he played goalie on the lacrosse team. After a brief career in law enforcement, wherein he served the New York City Police Department as an investigator, Rivera entered law school. He received his J.D. from Brooklyn Law School in 1969 near the top of his class; following graduation, he held a Reginald Heber Smith Fellowship in poverty law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School in the summer of 1969 before being admitted to the New York State Bar later that year. \n\nAfter working with such organizations as the lower Manhattan-based Community Action for Legal Services and the National Lawyers Guild, Rivera became a frequent attorney for the Puerto Rican activist group, the Young Lords, eventually precipitating his entry into private practice. This work attracted the attention of WABC-TV news director Al Primo when Rivera was interviewed about the group's occupation of an East Harlem church in 1969. Primo offered Rivera a job as a reporter but was unhappy with the first name \"Gerald\" (he wanted something more identifiably Latino) so they agreed to go with the pronunciation used by the Puerto Rican side of Rivera's family: Geraldo. Due to his dearth of journalistic experience, ABC arranged for Rivera to study introductory broadcast journalism under Fred Friendly in the Ford Foundation-funded Summer Program in Journalism for Members of Minority Groups at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1970. \n\nCareer\n\nEarly stages\n\nRivera was hired by WABC-TV in 1970 as a reporter for Eyewitness News. In 1972, he garnered national attention and won a Peabody Award for his report on the neglect and abuse of patients with intellectual disabilities at Staten Island's Willowbrook State School, and he began to appear on ABC national programs such as 20/20 and Nightline. After John Lennon watched Rivera's report on the patients at Willowbrook, he and Rivera put on a benefit concert called \"One to One\" (released in 1986 as Live in New York City).\n\nAround this time, Rivera also began hosting ABC's Good Night America. The show featured the famous refrain from Arlo Guthrie's hit \"City of New Orleans\" (written by Steve Goodman) as the theme. A 1975 episode of the program, featuring Dick Gregory and Robert J. Groden, showed the first national telecast of the historic Zapruder Film. \n\nIn October 1985, ABC's Roone Arledge refused to air a report done by Sylvia Chase for 20/20 on the relationship between Marilyn Monroe and John and Robert Kennedy. Rivera publicly criticized Arledge's journalistic integrity, claiming that his friendship with the Kennedy family (for example, Pierre Salinger, a former Kennedy aide, worked for ABC News at the time) had caused him to spike the story; as a result, Rivera was fired. During a Fox News interview with Megan Kelly aired May 15, 2015, Rivera stated the official reason given for the firing was that he violated ABC policy when he donated $200 to a non-partisan mayoral race candidate.\n\nTalk shows, specials and guest appearances\n\nIn 1987, Rivera began producing and hosting the daytime talk show Geraldo, which ran for 11 years. The show featured controversial guests and theatricality, which led to the characterization of his show as \"Trash TV\" by Newsweek and two United States senators. One early show was titled \"Men in Lace Panties and the Women Who Love Them\". In another in 1988, Rivera's nose was broken in a well-publicized brawl during a show whose guests included white supremacists, antiracist skinheads, black activists, and Jewish activists. \n\nFox News to present\n\nFollowing the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, he accepted a pay cut and went to work for the Fox News Channel as a war correspondent in November 2001. Rivera's brother Craig accompanied him as a cameraman on assignments in Afghanistan.\n\nIn 2001, during the War in Afghanistan, Rivera was derided for a report in which he claimed to be at the scene of a friendly fire incident; it was later revealed he was actually 300 miles away. Rivera blamed a minor misunderstanding for the discrepancy. \n\nControversy arose in early 2003, while Rivera was traveling with the 101st Airborne Division in Iraq. During a Fox News broadcast, Rivera began to disclose an upcoming operation, even going so far as to draw a map in the sand for his audience. The military immediately issued a firm denunciation of his actions, saying it put the operation at risk; Rivera was expelled from Iraq. Two days later, he announced that he would be reporting on the Iraq conflict from Kuwait. \n\nIn 2005, Rivera engaged in a feud with The New York Times over their allegations that he pushed aside a member of a rescue team in order to be filmed \"assisting\" a woman in a wheelchair down some steps in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The ensuing controversy caused Rivera to appear on television and demand a retraction from the Times. He further threatened to sue the paper if one was not provided. \n\nIn 2007, Geraldo was involved in a dispute with fellow Fox colleague Michelle Malkin. Malkin announced that she would not return to The O'Reilly Factor, claiming that Fox News had mishandled a dispute over derogatory statements Rivera had made about her in a Boston Globe interview. Rivera, while objecting to her views on immigration, said, \"Michelle Malkin is the most vile, hateful commentator I've ever met in my life. She actually believes that neighbors should start snitching out neighbors, and we should be deporting people.\" He added, \"It's good she's in D.C., and I'm in New York. I'd spit on her if I saw her.\" Rivera later apologized for his comments. \n\nIn 2008, Rivera's book, titled HisPanic: Why Americans Fear Hispanics in the U.S., was released. \n\nOn January 3, 2012, Rivera began hosting a weekday radio talk show on 77 WABC in New York, N.Y. The show was scheduled in the two hours between Imus in the Morning and The Rush Limbaugh Show on WABC. On January 30, 2012, Rivera also began hosting a weekday show on Talk Radio 790 KABC in Los Angeles. \n\nOn March 23, 2012, Rivera made controversial comments regarding Trayvon Martin's hoodie and how the hoodie was connected to Martin's shooting death, and as of November 5, 2014, he continues to do so as he did on the Dan LeBatard Radio Show on ESPN. Rivera apologized for any offense that he caused with the comments, of which even Rivera's son Gabriel was \"ashamed\". Some, have reportedly taken the apology as disingenuous; among those who did not accept it was Rivera's longtime friend Russell Simmons. He later apologized to Trayvon Martin's parents as well. \n\nRivera planned to visit Iraq in April 2012, for what he promised his wife would be his last (and eleventh) visit. \n\nAlthough he considered running as a Republican in the United States Senate special election in New Jersey, 2013 (to fill the Senate seat left vacant by the death of Frank Lautenberg), he eventually decided not to stand for election. \n\nPresent\n\nIn 2015, Rivera competed on the 14th season of the television series The Celebrity Apprentice, where he ultimately placed second to TV personality Leeza Gibbons. However, Rivera still raised the highest amount of money out of any contestant in the season, with $726,000 (just $12,000 more than Gibbons).\n\nRivera hosts the newsmagazine program Geraldo at Large and appears regularly on Fox News Channel. He hosts the talk radio show Geraldo Show on WABC 770 AM radio every weekday. On November 13, 2015, Rivera revealed on Fox News that his daughter, Simone Cruickshank, was at the Stade de France when the attacks and explosions occurred; fortunately, she and her friends made it out alive and would be returning safely home. \n\nOn March 8, 2016, Rivera was announced as one of the celebrities who will compete on season 22 of Dancing with the Stars. He was partnered with professional dancer Edyta Śliwińska. On March 28, 2016, Rivera and Śliwińska were the first couple to be eliminated from the competition. \n\nPersonal life\n\nRivera has been married five times:\n# Linda Coblentz (1965–69, divorced)\n# Edith Vonnegut (December 14, 1971–75, divorced)\n# Sherryl Raymond (December 31, 1976–84, divorced)son: Gabriel Miguel (born July 1979) \n# C.C. (Cynthia Cruickshank) Dyer (July 11, 1987 – 2000, divorced)daughters: Isabella Holmes (born 1992) and Simone Cruickshank (born 1994)\n# Erica Michelle Levy (since August 2003)daughter: Sol Liliana (born 2005) \n\nRivera is a resident of Edgewater, New Jersey. He previously resided in Middletown Township, New Jersey at Rough Point, an 1895 shingle-style estate. \n\nRivera is an active sailor. As owner and skipper of the sailing vessel 'Voyager', he has participated in Marion-Bermuda races in 1985, 2005, 2011, and most recently, 2013. In 2013, his vessel finished in 10th place out of 12 finishers in the Class \"A\" category. \n\nGeraldo also sailed S/V 'Voyager' 1,400 miles up the Amazon river and around the world, going so far as to meet the King of Tonga on the international dateline in time for the new millennium. The adventures were chronicled in eight hour long specials on The Travel Channel, and some of this footage remains available on Geraldo's website. \n\nAuthor\n\n* \n* \n* \n* \n* \n* \n*", "The Statue of Liberty (Liberty Enlightening the World; ) is a colossal neoclassical sculpture on Liberty Island in New York Harbor in New York City, in the United States. The copper statue, designed by Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi, a French sculptor, was built by Gustave Eiffel and dedicated on October 28, 1886. It was a gift to the United States from the people of France. The statue is of a robed female figure representing Libertas, the Roman goddess, who bears a torch and a tabula ansata (a tablet evoking the law) upon which is inscribed the date of the American Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776. A broken chain lies at her feet. The statue is an icon of freedom and of the United States, and was a welcoming sight to immigrants arriving from abroad.\n\nBartholdi was inspired by French law professor and politician Édouard René de Laboulaye, who is said to have commented in 1865 that any monument raised to American independence would properly be a joint project of the French and American peoples. He may have been minded to honor the Union victory in the American Civil War and the end of slavery. Due to the post-war instability in France, work on the statue did not commence until the early 1870s. In 1875, Laboulaye proposed that the French finance the statue and the Americans provide the site and build the pedestal. Bartholdi completed the head and the torch-bearing arm before the statue was fully designed, and these pieces were exhibited for publicity at international expositions.\n\nThe torch-bearing arm was displayed at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876, and in Madison Square Park in Manhattan from 1876 to 1882. Fundraising proved difficult, especially for the Americans, and by 1885 work on the pedestal was threatened due to lack of funds. Publisher Joseph Pulitzer of the New York World started a drive for donations to complete the project that attracted more than 120,000 contributors, most of whom gave less than a dollar. The statue was constructed in France, shipped overseas in crates, and assembled on the completed pedestal on what was then called Bedloe's Island. The statue's completion was marked by New York's first ticker-tape parade and a dedication ceremony presided over by President Grover Cleveland.\n\nThe statue was administered by the United States Lighthouse Board until 1901 and then by the Department of War; since 1933 it has been maintained by the National Park Service. The statue was closed for renovation for much of 1938. In the early 1980s, it was found to have deteriorated to such an extent that a major restoration was required. While the statue was closed from 1984 to 1986, the torch and a large part of the internal structure were replaced. After the September 11 attacks in 2001, it was closed for reasons of safety and security; the pedestal reopened in 2004 and the statue in 2009, with limits on the number of visitors allowed to ascend to the crown. The statue, including the pedestal and base, was closed for a year until October 28, 2012, so that a secondary staircase and other safety features could be installed; Liberty Island remained open. However, one day after the reopening, Liberty Island closed due to the effects of Hurricane Sandy in New York; the statue and island opened again on July 4, 2013. Public access to the balcony surrounding the torch has been barred for safety reasons since 1916.\n\nDesign and construction process \n\nOrigin \n\nAccording to the National Park Service, the idea for the Statue of Liberty was first proposed by Édouard René de Laboulaye the president of the French Anti-Slavery Society and a prominent and important political thinker of his time. The project is traced to a conversation between Édouard René de Laboulaye, a staunch abolitionist and Frédéric Bartholdi, a sculptor in mid-1865. In after-dinner conversation at his home near Versailles, Laboulaye, an ardent supporter of the Union in the American Civil War, is supposed to have said: \"If a monument should rise in the United States, as a memorial to their independence, I should think it only natural if it were built by united effort—a common work of both our nations.\" The National Park Service, in a 2000 report, however, deemed this a legend traced to an 1885 fundraising pamphlet, and that the statue was most likely conceived in 1870. In another essay on their website, the Park Service suggested that Laboulaye was minded to honor the Union victory and its consequences, \"With the abolition of slavery and the Union's victory in the Civil War in 1865, Laboulaye's wishes of freedom and democracy were turning into a reality in the United States. In order to honor these achievements, Laboulaye proposed that a gift be built for the United States on behalf of France. Laboulaye hoped that by calling attention to the recent achievements of the United States, the French people would be inspired to call for their own democracy in the face of a repressive monarchy.\" \n\nAccording to sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi, who later recounted the story, Laboulaye's comment was not intended as a proposal, but it inspired Bartholdi. Given the repressive nature of the regime of Napoleon III, Bartholdi took no immediate action on the idea except to discuss it with Laboulaye. Bartholdi was in any event busy with other possible projects; in the late 1860s, he approached Isma'il Pasha, Khedive of Egypt, with a plan to build a huge lighthouse in the form of an ancient Egyptian female fellah or peasant, robed and holding a torch aloft, at the northern entrance to the Suez Canal in Port Said. Sketches and models were made of the proposed work, though it was never erected. There was a classical precedent for the Suez proposal, the Colossus of Rhodes: an ancient bronze statue of the Greek god of the sun, Helios. This statue is believed to have been over 100 ft high, and it similarly stood at a harbor entrance and carried a light to guide ships.\n\nAny large project was further delayed by the Franco-Prussian War, in which Bartholdi served as a major of militia. In the war, Napoleon III was captured and deposed. Bartholdi's home province of Alsace was lost to the Prussians, and a more liberal republic was installed in France. As Bartholdi had been planning a trip to the United States, he and Laboulaye decided the time was right to discuss the idea with influential Americans. In June 1871, Bartholdi crossed the Atlantic, with letters of introduction signed by Laboulaye.\n\nArriving at New York Harbor, Bartholdi focused on Bedloe's Island as a site for the statue, struck by the fact that vessels arriving in New York had to sail past it. He was delighted to learn that the island was owned by the United States government—it had been ceded by the New York State Legislature in 1800 for harbor defense. It was thus, as he put it in a letter to Laboulaye: \"land common to all the states.\" As well as meeting many influential New Yorkers, Bartholdi visited President Ulysses S. Grant, who assured him that it would not be difficult to obtain the site for the statue. Bartholdi crossed the United States twice by rail, and met many Americans who he thought would be sympathetic to the project. But he remained concerned that popular opinion on both sides of the Atlantic was insufficiently supportive of the proposal, and he and Laboulaye decided to wait before mounting a public campaign.\n\nBartholdi had made a first model of his concept in 1870. The son of a friend of Bartholdi's, American artist John LaFarge, later maintained that Bartholdi made the first sketches for the statue during his U.S. visit at La Farge's Rhode Island studio. Bartholdi continued to develop the concept following his return to France. He also worked on a number of sculptures designed to bolster French patriotism after the defeat by the Prussians. One of these was the Lion of Belfort, a monumental sculpture carved in sandstone below the fortress of Belfort, which during the war had resisted a Prussian siege for over three months. The defiant lion, 73 ft long and half that in height, displays an emotional quality characteristic of Romanticism, which Bartholdi would later bring to the Statue of Liberty.\n\nDesign, style, and symbolism \n\nBartholdi and Laboulaye considered how best to express the idea of American liberty. In early American history, two female figures were frequently used as cultural symbols of the nation. One of these symbols, the personified Columbia, was seen as an embodiment of the United States in the manner that Britannia was identified with the United Kingdom and Marianne came to represent France. Columbia had supplanted the earlier figure of an Indian princess, which had come to be regarded as uncivilized and derogatory toward Americans. The other significant female icon in American culture was a representation of Liberty, derived from Libertas, the goddess of freedom widely worshipped in ancient Rome, especially among emancipated slaves. A Liberty figure adorned most American coins of the time, and representations of Liberty appeared in popular and civic art, including Thomas Crawford's Statue of Freedom (1863) atop the dome of the United States Capitol Building.\n\nArtists of the 18th and 19th centuries striving to evoke republican ideals commonly used representations of Libertas as an allegorical symbol. A figure of Liberty was also depicted on the Great Seal of France. However, Bartholdi and Laboulaye avoided an image of revolutionary liberty such as that depicted in Eugène Delacroix's famed Liberty Leading the People (1830). In this painting, which commemorates France's Revolution of 1830, a half-clothed Liberty leads an armed mob over the bodies of the fallen. Laboulaye had no sympathy for revolution, and so Bartholdi's figure would be fully dressed in flowing robes. Instead of the impression of violence in the Delacroix work, Bartholdi wished to give the statue a peaceful appearance and chose a torch, representing progress, for the figure to hold.\n\nCrawford's statue was designed in the early 1850s. It was originally to be crowned with a pileus, the cap given to emancipated slaves in ancient Rome. Secretary of War Jefferson Davis, a Southerner who would later serve as President of the Confederate States of America, was concerned that the pileus would be taken as an abolitionist symbol. He ordered that it be changed to a helmet.\nDelacroix's figure wears a pileus, and Bartholdi at first considered placing one on his figure as well. Instead, he used a diadem, or crown, to top its head. In so doing, he avoided a reference to Marianne, who invariably wears a pileus. The seven rays form a halo or aureole. They evoke the sun, the seven seas, and the seven continents, and represent another means, besides the torch, whereby Liberty enlightens the world.\n\nBartholdi's early models were all similar in concept: a female figure in neoclassical style representing liberty, wearing a stola and pella (gown and cloak, common in depictions of Roman goddesses) and holding a torch aloft. According to popular accounts, the face was modeled after that of Charlotte Beysser Bartholdi, the sculptor's mother, but Regis Huber, the curator of the Bartholdi Museum is on record as saying that this, as well as other similar speculations, have no basis in fact.Interviewed for Watson, Corin. Statue of Liberty: Building a Colossus (TV documentary, 2001) He designed the figure with a strong, uncomplicated silhouette, which would be set off well by its dramatic harbor placement and allow passengers on vessels entering New York Bay to experience a changing perspective on the statue as they proceeded toward Manhattan. He gave it bold classical contours and applied simplified modeling, reflecting the huge scale of the project and its solemn purpose. Bartholdi wrote of his technique:\n\nThe surfaces should be broad and simple, defined by a bold and clear design, accentuated in the important places. The enlargement of the details or their multiplicity is to be feared. By exaggerating the forms, in order to render them more clearly visible, or by enriching them with details, we would destroy the proportion of the work. Finally, the model, like the design, should have a summarized character, such as one would give to a rapid sketch. Only it is necessary that this character should be the product of volition and study, and that the artist, concentrating his knowledge, should find the form and the line in its greatest simplicity.\n\nBartholdi made alterations in the design as the project evolved. Bartholdi considered having Liberty hold a broken chain, but decided this would be too divisive in the days after the Civil War. The erected statue does rise over a broken chain, half-hidden by her robes and difficult to see from the ground. Bartholdi was initially uncertain of what to place in Liberty's left hand; he settled on a tabula ansata, a keystone-shaped tablet used to evoke the concept of law. Though Bartholdi greatly admired the United States Constitution, he chose to inscribe \"JULY IV MDCCLXXVI\" on the tablet, thus associating the date of the country's Declaration of Independence with the concept of liberty.\n\nBartholdi interested his friend and mentor, architect Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, in the project. As chief engineer, Viollet-le-Duc designed a brick pier within the statue, to which the skin would be anchored.\nAfter consultations with the metalwork foundry Gaget, Gauthier & Co., Viollet-le-Duc chose the metal which would be used for the skin, copper sheets, and the method used to shape it, repoussé, in which the sheets were heated and then struck with wooden hammers. An advantage of this choice was that the entire statue would be light for its volume, as the copper need be only thick. Bartholdi had decided on a height of just over 151 ft for the statue, double that of Italy's Sancarlone and the German statue of Arminius, both made with the same method.\n\nAnnouncement and early work \n\nBy 1875, France was enjoying improved political stability and a recovering postwar economy. Growing interest in the upcoming Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia led Laboulaye to decide it was time to seek public support. In September 1875, he announced the project and the formation of the Franco-American Union as its fundraising arm. With the announcement, the statue was given a name, Liberty Enlightening the World. The French would finance the statue; Americans would be expected to pay for the pedestal. The announcement provoked a generally favorable reaction in France, though many Frenchmen resented the United States for not coming to their aid during the war with Prussia. French monarchists opposed the statue, if for no other reason than it was proposed by the liberal Laboulaye, who had recently been elected a senator for life. Laboulaye arranged events designed to appeal to the rich and powerful, including a special performance at the Paris Opera on April 25, 1876, that featured a new cantata by composer Charles Gounod. The piece was titled La Liberté éclairant le monde, the French version of the statue's announced name.\n\nDespite its initial focus on the elites, the Union was successful in raising funds from across French society. Schoolchildren and ordinary citizens gave, as did 181 French municipalities. Laboulaye's political allies supported the call, as did descendants of the French contingent in the American Revolutionary War. Less idealistically, contributions came from those who hoped for American support in the French attempt to build the Panama Canal. The copper may have come from multiple sources and some of it is said to have come from a mine in Visnes, Norway, though this has not been conclusively determined after testing samples. According to Cara Sutherland in her book on the statue for the Museum of the City of New York, 90,800 kilos (200,000 pounds) was needed to build the statue, and the French copper industrialist Eugène Secrétan donated 58,100 kilos (128,000 pounds) of copper. Historian Yasmin Khan, in her 2010 book about the statue, states that the firm of Japy Frères, copper merchants, donated copper valued at 64,000 francs (about $16,000 at the time or the equivalent of US$ in ).\n\nAlthough plans for the statue had not been finalized, Bartholdi moved forward with fabrication of the right arm, bearing the torch, and the head. Work began at the Gaget, Gauthier & Co. workshop. In May 1876, Bartholdi traveled to the United States as a member of a French delegation to the Centennial Exhibition, and arranged for a huge painting of the statue to be shown in New York as part of the Centennial festivities. The arm did not arrive in Philadelphia until August; because of its late arrival, it was not listed in the exhibition catalogue, and while some reports correctly identified the work, others called it the \"Colossal Arm\" or \"Bartholdi Electric Light\". The exhibition grounds contained a number of monumental artworks to compete for fairgoers' interest, including an outsized fountain designed by Bartholdi. Nevertheless, the arm proved popular in the exhibition's waning days, and visitors would climb up to the balcony of the torch to view the fairgrounds. After the exhibition closed, the arm was transported to New York, where it remained on display in Madison Square Park for several years before it was returned to France to join the rest of the statue.\n\nDuring his second trip to the United States, Bartholdi addressed a number of groups about the project, and urged the formation of American committees of the Franco-American Union. Committees to raise money to pay for the foundation and pedestal were formed in New York, Boston, and Philadelphia. The New York group eventually took on most of the responsibility for American fundraising and is often referred to as the \"American Committee\". One of its members was 19-year-old Theodore Roosevelt, the future governor of New York and president of the United States. On March 3, 1877, on his final full day in office, President Grant signed a joint resolution that authorized the President to accept the statue when it was presented by France and to select a site for it. President Rutherford B. Hayes, who took office the following day, selected the Bedloe's Island site that Bartholdi had proposed.\n\nConstruction in France \n\nOn his return to Paris in 1877, Bartholdi concentrated on completing the head, which was exhibited at the 1878 Paris World's Fair. Fundraising continued, with models of the statue put on sale. Tickets to view the construction activity at the Gaget, Gauthier & Co. workshop were also offered. The French government authorized a lottery; among the prizes were valuable silver plate and a terracotta model of the statue. By the end of 1879, about 250,000 francs had been raised.\n\nThe head and arm had been built with assistance from Viollet-le-Duc, who fell ill in 1879. He soon died, leaving no indication of how he intended to transition from the copper skin to his proposed masonry pier. The following year, Bartholdi was able to obtain the services of the innovative designer and builder Gustave Eiffel. Eiffel and his structural engineer, Maurice Koechlin, decided to abandon the pier and instead build an iron truss tower. Eiffel opted not to use a completely rigid structure, which would force stresses to accumulate in the skin and lead eventually to cracking. A secondary skeleton was attached to the center pylon, then, to enable the statue to move slightly in the winds of New York Harbor and as the metal expanded on hot summer days, he loosely connected the support structure to the skin using flat iron bars which culminated in a mesh of metal straps, known as \"saddles\", that were riveted to the skin, providing firm support. In a labor-intensive process, each saddle had to be crafted individually. To prevent galvanic corrosion between the copper skin and the iron support structure, Eiffel insulated the skin with asbestos impregnated with shellac.\n\nEiffel's design made the statue one of the earliest examples of curtain wall construction, in which the exterior of the structure is not load bearing, but is instead supported by an interior framework. He included two interior spiral staircases, to make it easier for visitors to reach the observation point in the crown. Access to an observation platform surrounding the torch was also provided, but the narrowness of the arm allowed for only a single ladder, 40 ft long. As the pylon tower arose, Eiffel and Bartholdi coordinated their work carefully so that completed segments of skin would fit exactly on the support structure. The components of the pylon tower were built in the Eiffel factory in the nearby Parisian suburb of Levallois-Perret. \n\nThe change in structural material from masonry to iron allowed Bartholdi to change his plans for the statue's assembly. He had originally expected to assemble the skin on-site as the masonry pier was built; instead he decided to build the statue in France and have it disassembled and transported to the United States for reassembly in place on Bedloe's Island.\n\nIn a symbolic act, the first rivet placed into the skin, fixing a copper plate onto the statue's big toe, was driven by United States Ambassador to France Levi P. Morton. The skin was not, however, crafted in exact sequence from low to high; work proceeded on a number of segments simultaneously in a manner often confusing to visitors. Some work was performed by contractors—one of the fingers was made to Bartholdi's exacting specifications by a coppersmith in the southern French town of Montauban. By 1882, the statue was complete up to the waist, an event Barthodi celebrated by inviting reporters to lunch on a platform built within the statue. Laboulaye died in 1883. He was succeeded as chairman of the French committee by Ferdinand de Lesseps, builder of the Suez Canal. The completed statue was formally presented to Ambassador Morton at a ceremony in Paris on July 4, 1884, and de Lesseps announced that the French government had agreed to pay for its transport to New York. The statue remained intact in Paris pending sufficient progress on the pedestal; by January 1885, this had occurred and the statue was disassembled and crated for its ocean voyage.\n\nThe committees in the United States faced great difficulties in obtaining funds for the construction of the pedestal. The Panic of 1873 had led to an economic depression that persisted through much of the decade. The Liberty statue project was not the only such undertaking that had difficulty raising money: construction of the obelisk later known as the Washington Monument sometimes stalled for years; it would ultimately take over three-and-a-half decades to complete. There was criticism both of Bartholdi's statue and of the fact that the gift required Americans to foot the bill for the pedestal. In the years following the Civil War, most Americans preferred realistic artworks depicting heroes and events from the nation's history, rather than allegorical works like the Liberty statue. There was also a feeling that Americans should design American public works—the selection of Italian-born Constantino Brumidi to decorate the Capitol had provoked intense criticism, even though he was a naturalized U.S. citizen. Harper's Weekly declared its wish that \"M. Bartholdi and our French cousins had 'gone the whole figure' while they were about it, and given us statue and pedestal at once.\" The New York Times stated that \"no true patriot can countenance any such expenditures for bronze females in the present state of our finances.\" Faced with these criticisms, the American committees took little action for several years.\n\nDesign \n\nThe foundation of Bartholdi's statue was to be laid inside Fort Wood, a disused army base on Bedloe's Island constructed between 1807 and 1811. Since 1823, it had rarely been used, though during the Civil War, it had served as a recruiting station. The fortifications of the structure were in the shape of an eleven-point star. The statue's foundation and pedestal were aligned so that it would face southeast, greeting ships entering the harbor from the Atlantic Ocean.\nIn 1881, the New York committee commissioned Richard Morris Hunt to design the pedestal. Within months, Hunt submitted a detailed plan, indicating that he expected construction to take about nine months. He proposed a pedestal 114 ft in height; faced with money problems, the committee reduced that to 89 ft.\n\nHunt's pedestal design contains elements of classical architecture, including Doric portals, as well as some elements influenced by Aztec architecture. The large mass is fragmented with architectural detail, in order to focus attention on the statue. In form, it is a truncated pyramid, 62 ft square at the base and at the top. The four sides are identical in appearance. Above the door on each side, there are ten disks upon which Bartholdi proposed to place the coats of arms of the states (between 1876 and 1889, there were 38 U.S. states), although this was not done. Above that, a balcony was placed on each side, framed by pillars. Bartholdi placed an observation platform near the top of the pedestal, above which the statue itself rises. According to author Louis Auchincloss, the pedestal \"craggily evokes the power of an ancient Europe over which rises the dominating figure of the Statue of Liberty\". The committee hired former army General Charles Pomeroy Stone to oversee the construction work. Construction on the 15 ft foundation began in 1883, and the pedestal's cornerstone was laid in 1884. In Hunt's original conception, the pedestal was to have been made of solid granite. Financial concerns again forced him to revise his plans; the final design called for poured concrete walls, up to 20 ft thick, faced with granite blocks. This Stony Creek granite came from the Beattie Quarry in Branford, Connecticut. The concrete mass was the largest poured to that time.\n\nNorwegian immigrant civil engineer Joachim Goschen Giæver designed the structural framework for the Statue of Liberty. His work involved design computations, detailed fabrication and construction drawings, and oversight of construction. In completing his engineering for the statue's frame, Giæver worked from drawings and sketches produced by Gustave Eiffel.[https://web.archive.org/web/20121127045537/http://www.structuremag.org/article.aspx?articleID\n1484 STRUCTUREmag – Structural Engineering Magazine, Tradeshow: Joachim Gotsche Giaver]\n\nFundraising \n\nFundraising for the statue had begun in 1882. The committee organized a large number of money-raising events. As part of one such effort, an auction of art and manuscripts, poet Emma Lazarus was asked to donate an original work. She initially declined, stating she could not write a poem about a statue. At the time, she was also involved in aiding refugees to New York who had fled anti-Semitic pogroms in eastern Europe. These refugees were forced to live in conditions that the wealthy Lazarus had never experienced. She saw a way to express her empathy for these refugees in terms of the statue. The resulting sonnet, \"The New Colossus\", including the iconic lines \"Give me your tired, your poor/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free\", is uniquely identified with the Statue of Liberty and is inscribed on a plaque in the museum in its base.\n\nEven with these efforts, fundraising lagged. Grover Cleveland, the governor of New York, vetoed a bill to provide $50,000 for the statue project in 1884. An attempt the next year to have Congress provide $100,000, sufficient to complete the project, also failed. The New York committee, with only $3,000 in the bank, suspended work on the pedestal. With the project in jeopardy, groups from other American cities, including Boston and Philadelphia, offered to pay the full cost of erecting the statue in return for relocating it.\n\nJoseph Pulitzer, publisher of the New York World, a New York newspaper, announced a drive to raise $100,000—the equivalent of $2.3 million today. Pulitzer pledged to print the name of every contributor, no matter how small the amount given. The drive captured the imagination of New Yorkers, especially when Pulitzer began publishing the notes he received from contributors. \"A young girl alone in the world\" donated \"60 cents, the result of self denial.\" One donor gave \"five cents as a poor office boy's mite toward the Pedestal Fund.\" A group of children sent a dollar as \"the money we saved to go to the circus with.\" Another dollar was given by a \"lonely and very aged woman.\" Residents of a home for alcoholics in New York's rival city of Brooklyn—the cities would not merge until 1898—donated $15; other drinkers helped out through donation boxes in bars and saloons. A kindergarten class in Davenport, Iowa, mailed the World a gift of $1.35. As the donations flooded in, the committee resumed work on the pedestal.\n\nConstruction \n\nOn June 17, 1885, the French steamer Isère, laden with the Statue of Liberty, reached the New York port safely. New Yorkers displayed their new-found enthusiasm for the statue, as the French vessel arrived with the crates holding the disassembled statue on board. Two hundred thousand people lined the docks and hundreds of boats put to sea to welcome the Isère. After five months of daily calls to donate to the statue fund, on August 11, 1885, the World announced that $102,000 had been raised from 120,000 donors, and that 80 percent of the total had been received in sums of less than one dollar.\n\nEven with the success of the fund drive, the pedestal was not completed until April 1886. Immediately thereafter, reassembly of the statue began. Eiffel's iron framework was anchored to steel I-beams within the concrete pedestal and assembled. Once this was done, the sections of skin were carefully attached. Due to the width of the pedestal, it was not possible to erect scaffolding, and workers dangled from ropes while installing the skin sections. Nevertheless, no one died during the construction. Bartholdi had planned to put floodlights on the torch's balcony to illuminate it; a week before the dedication, the Army Corps of Engineers vetoed the proposal, fearing that ships' pilots passing the statue would be blinded. Instead, Bartholdi cut portholes in the torch—which was covered with gold leaf—and placed the lights inside them. A power plant was installed on the island to light the torch and for other electrical needs. After the skin was completed, renowned landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, co-designer of New York's Central Park and Brooklyn's Prospect Park, supervised a cleanup of Bedloe's Island in anticipation of the dedication.\n\nDedication \n\nA ceremony of dedication was held on the afternoon of October 28, 1886. President Grover Cleveland, the former New York governor, presided over the event. On the morning of the dedication, a parade was held in New York City; estimates of the number of people who watched it ranged from several hundred thousand to a million. President Cleveland headed the procession, then stood in the reviewing stand to see bands and marchers from across America. General Stone was the grand marshal of the parade. The route began at Madison Square, once the venue for the arm, and proceeded to Battery Park at the southern tip of Manhattan by way of Fifth Avenue and Broadway, with a slight detour so the parade could pass in front of the World building on Park Row. As the parade passed the New York Stock Exchange, traders threw ticker tape from the windows, beginning the New York tradition of the ticker-tape parade.\n\nA nautical parade began at 12:45 p.m., and President Cleveland embarked on a yacht that took him across the harbor to Bedloe's Island for the dedication. De Lesseps made the first speech, on behalf of the French committee, followed by the chairman of the New York committee, Senator William M. Evarts. A French flag draped across the statue's face was to be lowered to unveil the statue at the close of Evarts's speech, but Bartholdi mistook a pause as the conclusion and let the flag fall prematurely. The ensuing cheers put an end to Evarts's address. President Cleveland spoke next, stating that the statue's \"stream of light shall pierce the darkness of ignorance and man's oppression until Liberty enlightens the world\". Bartholdi, observed near the dais, was called upon to speak, but he refused. Orator Chauncey M. Depew concluded the speechmaking with a lengthy address.\n\nNo members of the general public were permitted on the island during the ceremonies, which were reserved entirely for dignitaries. The only females granted access were Bartholdi's wife and de Lesseps's granddaughter; officials stated that they feared women might be injured in the crush of people. The restriction offended area suffragists, who chartered a boat and got as close as they could to the island. The group's leaders made speeches applauding the embodiment of Liberty as a woman and advocating women's right to vote. A scheduled fireworks display was postponed until November 1 because of poor weather.\n\nShortly after the dedication, The Cleveland Gazette, an African American newspaper, suggested that the statue's torch not be lit until the United States became a free nation \"in reality\":\n\n\"Liberty enlightening the world,\" indeed! The expression makes us sick. This government is a howling farce. It can not or rather does not protect its citizens within its own borders. Shove the Bartholdi statue, torch and all, into the ocean until the \"liberty\" of this country is such as to make it possible for an inoffensive and industrious colored man to earn a respectable living for himself and family, without being ku-kluxed, perhaps murdered, his daughter and wife outraged, and his property destroyed. The idea of the \"liberty\" of this country \"enlightening the world,\" or even Patagonia, is ridiculous in the extreme.\n\nAfter dedication \n\nLighthouse Board and War Department (1886–1933) \n\nWhen the torch was illuminated on the evening of the statue's dedication, it produced only a faint gleam, barely visible from Manhattan. The World characterized it as \"more like a glowworm than a beacon.\" Bartholdi suggested gilding the statue to increase its ability to reflect light, but this proved too expensive. The United States Lighthouse Board took over the Statue of Liberty in 1887 and pledged to install equipment to enhance the torch's effect; in spite of its efforts, the statue remained virtually invisible at night. When Bartholdi returned to the United States in 1893, he made additional suggestions, all of which proved ineffective. He did successfully lobby for improved lighting within the statue, allowing visitors to better appreciate Eiffel's design. In 1901, President Theodore Roosevelt, once a member of the New York committee, ordered the statue's transfer to the War Department, as it had proved useless as a lighthouse. A unit of the Army Signal Corps was stationed on Bedloe's Island until 1923, after which military police remained there while the island was under military jurisdiction.\n\nThe statue rapidly became a landmark. Many immigrants who entered through New York saw it as a welcoming sight. Oral histories of immigrants record their feelings of exhilaration on first viewing the Statue of Liberty. One immigrant who arrived from Greece recalled,\nI saw the Statue of Liberty. And I said to myself, \"Lady, you're such a beautiful! You opened your arms and you get all the foreigners here. Give me a chance to prove that I am worth it, to do something, to be someone in America.\" And always that statue was on my mind.\n\nOriginally, the statue was a dull copper color, but shortly after 1900 a green patina, also called verdigris, caused by the oxidation of the copper skin, began to spread. As early as 1902 it was mentioned in the press; by 1906 it had entirely covered the statue. Believing that the patina was evidence of corrosion, Congress authorized $62,800 for various repairs, and to paint the statue both inside and out. There was considerable public protest against the proposed exterior painting. The Army Corps of Engineers studied the patina for any ill effects to the statue and concluded that it protected the skin, \"softened the outlines of the Statue and made it beautiful.\" The statue was painted only on the inside. The Corps of Engineers also installed an elevator to take visitors from the base to the top of the pedestal.\n\nOn July 30, 1916, during World War I, German saboteurs set off a disastrous explosion on the Black Tom peninsula in Jersey City, New Jersey, in what is now part of Liberty State Park, close to Bedloe's Island. Carloads of dynamite and other explosives that were being sent to Britain and France for their war efforts were detonated, and seven people were killed. The statue sustained minor damage, mostly to the torch-bearing right arm, and was closed for ten days. The cost to repair the statue and buildings on the island was about $100,000. The narrow ascent to the torch was closed for public safety reasons, and it has remained closed ever since.\n\nThat same year, Ralph Pulitzer, who had succeeded his father Joseph as publisher of the World, began a drive to raise $30,000 for an exterior lighting system to illuminate the statue at night. He claimed over 80,000 contributors but failed to reach the goal. The difference was quietly made up by a gift from a wealthy donor—a fact that was not revealed until 1936. An underwater power cable brought electricity from the mainland and floodlights were placed along the walls of Fort Wood. Gutzon Borglum, who later sculpted Mount Rushmore, redesigned the torch, replacing much of the original copper with stained glass. On December 2, 1916, President Woodrow Wilson pressed the telegraph key that turned on the lights, successfully illuminating the statue.\n\nAfter the United States entered World War I in 1917, images of the statue were heavily used in both recruitment posters and the Liberty Bond drives that urged American citizens to support the war financially. This impressed upon the public the war's stated purpose—to secure liberty—and served as a reminder that embattled France had given the United States the statue.\n\nIn 1924, President Calvin Coolidge used his authority under the Antiquities Act to declare the statue a National Monument. The only successful suicide in the statue's history occurred five years later, when a man climbed out of one of the windows in the crown and jumped to his death, glancing off the statue's breast and landing on the base.\n\nEarly National Park Service years (1933–1982) \n\nIn 1933, President Franklin Roosevelt ordered the statue transferred to the National Park Service (NPS). In 1937, the NPS gained jurisdiction over the rest of Bedloe's Island. With the Army's departure, the NPS began to transform the island into a park. The Works Progress Administration (WPA) demolished most of the old buildings, regraded and reseeded the eastern end of the island, and built granite steps for a new public entrance to the statue from its rear. The WPA also carried out restoration work within the statue, temporarily removing the rays from the statue's halo so their rusted supports could be replaced. Rusted cast-iron steps in the pedestal were replaced with new ones made of reinforced concrete; the upper parts of the stairways within the statue were replaced, as well. Copper sheathing was installed to prevent further damage from rainwater that had been seeping into the pedestal. The statue was closed to the public from May until December 1938.\n\nDuring World War II, the statue remained open to visitors, although it was not illuminated at night due to wartime blackouts. It was lit briefly on December 31, 1943, and on D-Day, June 6, 1944, when its lights flashed \"dot-dot-dot-dash\", the Morse code for V, for victory. New, powerful lighting was installed in 1944–1945, and beginning on V-E Day, the statue was once again illuminated after sunset. The lighting was for only a few hours each evening, and it was not until 1957 that the statue was illuminated every night, all night. In 1946, the interior of the statue within reach of visitors was coated with a special plastic so that graffiti could be washed away.\n\nIn 1956, an Act of Congress officially renamed Bedloe's Island as Liberty Island, a change advocated by Bartholdi generations earlier. The act also mentioned the efforts to found an American Museum of Immigration on the island, which backers took as federal approval of the project, though the government was slow to grant funds for it. Nearby Ellis Island was made part of the Statue of Liberty National Monument by proclamation of President Lyndon Johnson in 1965. In 1972, the immigration museum, in the statue's base, was finally opened in a ceremony led by President Richard Nixon. The museum's backers never provided it with an endowment to secure its future and it closed in 1991 after the opening of an immigration museum on Ellis Island.\n\nBeginning December 26, 1971, 15 anti-Vietnam War veterans occupied the statue, flying a US flag upside down from her crown. They left December 28 following a Federal Court order. The statue was also several times taken over briefly by demonstrators publicizing causes such as Puerto Rican independence, opposition to abortion, and opposition to US intervention in Grenada. Demonstrations with the permission of the Park Service included a Gay Pride Parade rally and the annual Captive Baltic Nations rally.\n\nA powerful new lighting system was installed in advance of the American Bicentennial in 1976. The statue was the focal point for Operation Sail, a regatta of tall ships from all over the world that entered New York Harbor on July 4, 1976, and sailed around Liberty Island. The day concluded with a spectacular display of fireworks near the statue.\n\nRenovation and rededication (1982–2000) \n\nThe statue was examined in great detail by French and American engineers as part of the planning for its centennial in 1986. In 1982, it was announced that the statue was in need of considerable restoration. Careful study had revealed that the right arm had been improperly attached to the main structure. It was swaying more and more when strong winds blew and there was a significant risk of structural failure. In addition, the head had been installed 2 ft off center, and one of the rays was wearing a hole in the right arm when the statue moved in the wind. The armature structure was badly corroded, and about two percent of the exterior plates needed to be replaced. Although problems with the armature had been recognized as early as 1936, when cast iron replacements for some of the bars had been installed, much of the corrosion had been hidden by layers of paint applied over the years.\n\nIn May 1982, President Ronald Reagan announced the formation of the Statue of Liberty–Ellis Island Centennial Commission, led by Chrysler Corporation chair Lee Iacocca, to raise the funds needed to complete the work. Through its fundraising arm, the Statue of Liberty–Ellis Island Foundation, Inc., the group raised more than $350 million in donations. The Statue of Liberty was one of the earliest beneficiaries of a cause marketing campaign. A 1983 promotion advertised that for each purchase made with an American Express card, the company would contribute one cent to the renovation of the statue. The campaign generated contributions of $1.7 million to the restoration project.\n\nIn 1984, the statue was closed to the public for the duration of the renovation. Workers erected the world's largest free-standing scaffold, which obscured the statue from view. Liquid nitrogen was used to remove layers of paint that had been applied to the interior of the copper skin over decades, leaving two layers of coal tar, originally applied to plug leaks and prevent corrosion. Blasting with baking soda powder removed the tar without further damaging the copper. The restorers' work was hampered by the asbestos-based substance that Bartholdi had used—ineffectively, as inspections showed—to prevent galvanic corrosion. Workers within the statue had to wear protective gear, dubbed \"moon suits\", with self-contained breathing circuits. Larger holes in the copper skin were repaired, and new copper was added where necessary. The replacement skin was taken from a copper rooftop at Bell Labs, which had a patina that closely resembled the statue's; in exchange, the laboratory was provided some of the old copper skin for testing. The torch, found to have been leaking water since the 1916 alterations, was replaced with an exact replica of Bartholdi's unaltered torch. Consideration was given to replacing the arm and shoulder; the National Park Service insisted that they be repaired instead. The original torch was removed and replaced in 1986 with the current one, whose flame is covered in 24-carat gold. The torch reflects the sun's rays in daytime and lighted by floodlights at night.\n\nThe entire puddled iron armature designed by Gustave Eiffel was replaced. Low-carbon corrosion-resistant stainless steel bars that now hold the staples next to the skin are made of Ferralium, an alloy that bends slightly and returns to its original shape as the statue moves. To prevent the ray and arm making contact, the ray was realigned by several degrees. The lighting was again replaced—night-time illumination subsequently came from metal-halide lamps that send beams of light to particular parts of the pedestal or statue, showing off various details. Access to the pedestal, which had been through a nondescript entrance built in the 1960s, was renovated to create a wide opening framed by a set of monumental bronze doors with designs symbolic of the renovation. A modern elevator was installed, allowing handicapped access to the observation area of the pedestal. An emergency elevator was installed within the statue, reaching up to the level of the shoulder.\n\nJuly 3–6, 1986, was designated \"Liberty Weekend\", marking the centennial of the statue and its reopening. President Reagan presided over the rededication, with French President François Mitterrand in attendance. July 4 saw a reprise of Operation Sail, and the statue was reopened to the public on July 5. In Reagan's dedication speech, he stated, \"We are the keepers of the flame of liberty; we hold it high for the world to see.\"\n\nClosures and reopening (2001–present) \n\nFollowing the September 11 attacks, the statue and Liberty Island were immediately closed to the public. The island reopened at the end of 2001, while the pedestal and statue remained off-limits. The pedestal reopened in August 2004, but the National Park Service announced that visitors could not safely be given access to the statue due to the difficulty of evacuation in an emergency. The Park Service adhered to that position through the remainder of the Bush administration. New York Congressman Anthony Weiner made the statue's reopening a personal crusade. On May 17, 2009, President Barack Obama's Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, announced that as a \"special gift\" to America, the statue would be reopened to the public as of July 4, but that only a limited number of people would be permitted to ascend to the crown each day.\n\nThe statue, including the pedestal and base, closed on October 29, 2011 for installation of new elevators and staircases and to bring other facilities, such as restrooms, up to code. The statue was closed to the public until October 28, 2012. A day after the reopening, the statue closed again due to Hurricane Sandy. Although the storm did not harm the statue, it destroyed some of the infrastructure on both Liberty Island and Ellis Island, severely damaging the dock used by the ferries bearing visitors to the statue. On November 8, 2012, a Park Service spokesperson announced that both islands would remain closed for an indefinite period for repairs to be done. Due to lack of electricity on Liberty Island, a generator was installed to power temporary floodlights to illuminate the statue at night. The superintendent of Statue of Liberty National Monument, David Luchsinger, whose home on the island was severely damaged, stated that it would be \"optimistically ... months\" before the island was reopened to the public. The statue and Liberty Island reopened to the public on July 4, 2013. Ellis Island remained closed for repairs for several more months but reopened in late October 2013. For part of October 2013, Liberty Island was closed to the public due to the United States federal government shutdown of 2013, along with other federally funded museums, parks, monuments, construction projects and buildings. \n\nAccess and attributes \n\nLocation and tourism\n\nThe statue is situated in Upper New York Bay on Liberty Island south of Ellis Island, which together comprise the Statue of Liberty National Monument. Both islands were ceded by New York to the federal government in 1800. As agreed in an 1834 compact between New York and New Jersey that set the state border at the bay's midpoint, the original islands remain New York territory despite their location on the New Jersey side of the state line. Liberty Island is one of the islands that are part of the borough of Manhattan in New York. Land created by reclamation added to the original island at Ellis Island is New Jersey territory.\n\nNo charge is made for entrance to the national monument, but there is a cost for the ferry service that all visitors must use, as private boats may not dock at the island. A concession was granted in 2007 to Statue Cruises to operate the transportation and ticketing facilities, replacing Circle Line, which had operated the service since 1953.\nThe ferries, which depart from Liberty State Park in Jersey City and Battery Park in Lower Manhattan, also stop at Ellis Island when it is open to the public, making a combined trip possible. All ferry riders are subject to security screening, similar to airport procedures, prior to boarding. Visitors intending to enter the statue's base and pedestal must obtain a complimentary museum/pedestal ticket along with their ferry ticket. Those wishing to climb the staircase within the statue to the crown purchase a special ticket, which may be reserved up to a year in advance. A total of 240 people per day are permitted to ascend: ten per group, three groups per hour. Climbers may bring only medication and cameras—lockers are provided for other items—and must undergo a second security screening.\n\nInscriptions, plaques, and dedications \n\nThere are several plaques and dedicatory tablets on or near the Statue of Liberty. \n*A plaque on the copper just under the figure in front declares that it is a colossal statue representing Liberty, designed by Bartholdi and built by the Paris firm of Gaget, Gauthier et Cie (Cie is the French abbreviation analogous to Co.). \n*A presentation tablet, also bearing Bartholdi's name, declares the statue is a gift from the people of the Republic of France that honors \"the Alliance of the two Nations in achieving the Independence of the United States of America and attests their abiding friendship.\" \n*A tablet placed by the New York committee commemorates the fundraising done to build the pedestal. \n*The cornerstone bears a plaque placed by the Freemasons.\n*In 1903, a bronze tablet that bears the text of Emma Lazarus's sonnet, \"The New Colossus\" (1883), was presented by friends of the poet. Until the 1986 renovation, it was mounted inside the pedestal; today it resides in the Statue of Liberty Museum, in the base. \n*\"The New Colossus\" tablet is accompanied by a tablet given by the Emma Lazarus Commemorative Committee in 1977, celebrating the poet's life.\n\nA group of statues stands at the western end of the island, honoring those closely associated with the Statue of Liberty. Two Americans—Pulitzer and Lazarus—and three Frenchmen—Bartholdi, Eiffel, and Laboulaye—are depicted. They are the work of Maryland sculptor Phillip Ratner.\n\nUNESCO World Heritage Site\n\nIn 1984, the Statue of Liberty was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The UNESCO \"Statement of Significance\" describes the statue as a \"masterpiece of the human spirit\" that \"endures as a highly potent symbol—inspiring contemplation, debate and protest—of ideals such as liberty, peace, human rights, abolition of slavery, democracy and opportunity.\"\n\nPhysical characteristics \n\nDepictions \n\nHundreds of replicas of the Statue of Liberty are displayed worldwide. A smaller version of the statue, one-fourth the height of the original, was given by the American community in Paris to that city. It now stands on the Île aux Cygnes, facing west toward her larger sister. A replica 30 ft tall stood atop the Liberty Warehouse on West 64th Street in Manhattan for many years; it now resides at the Brooklyn Museum. In a patriotic tribute, the Boy Scouts of America, as part of their Strengthen the Arm of Liberty campaign in 1949–1952, donated about two hundred replicas of the statue, made of stamped copper and 100 in in height, to states and municipalities across the United States. Though not a true replica, the statue known as the Goddess of Democracy temporarily erected during the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 was similarly inspired by French democratic traditions—the sculptors took care to avoid a direct imitation of the Statue of Liberty. Among other recreations of New York City structures, a replica of the statue is part of the exterior of the New York-New York Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.\n\nAs an American icon, the Statue of Liberty has been depicted on the country's coinage and stamps. It appeared on commemorative coins issued to mark its 1986 centennial, and on New York's 2001 entry in the state quarters series. An image of the statue was chosen for the American Eagle platinum bullion coins in 1997, and it was placed on the reverse, or tails, side of the Presidential Dollar series of circulating coins. Two images of the statue's torch appear on the current ten-dollar bill. The statue's intended photographic depiction on a 2010 forever stamp proved instead to be of the replica at the Las Vegas casino.\n\nDepictions of the statue have been used by many regional institutions. Between 1986 and 2000, New York State issued license plates featuring the statue. The Women's National Basketball Association's New York Liberty use both the statue's name and its image in their logo, in which the torch's flame doubles as a basketball. The New York Rangers of the National Hockey League depicted the statue's head on their third jersey, beginning in 1997. The National Collegiate Athletic Association's 1996 Men's Basketball Final Four, played at New Jersey's Meadowlands Sports Complex, featured the statue in its logo. The Libertarian Party of the United States uses the statue in its emblem.\n\nThe statue is a frequent subject in popular culture. In music, it has been evoked to indicate support for American policies, as in Toby Keith's song \"Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American)\", and in opposition, appearing on the cover of the Dead Kennedys' album Bedtime for Democracy, which protested the Reagan administration. In film, the torch is the setting for the climax of director Alfred Hitchcock's 1942 movie Saboteur. The statue makes one of its most famous cinematic appearances in the 1968 picture Planet of the Apes, in which it is seen half-buried in sand. It is knocked over in the science-fiction film Independence Day  and in Cloverfield the head is ripped off. In Jack Finney's time-travel novel Time and Again, the right arm of the statue, on display in the early 1880s in Madison Square Park, plays a crucial role. Robert Holdstock, consulting editor of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, wondered in 1979,\n\nWhere would science fiction be without the Statue of Liberty? For decades it has towered or crumbled above the wastelands of deserted [E]arth—giants have uprooted it, aliens have found it curious ... the symbol of Liberty, of optimism, has become a symbol of science fiction's pessimistic view of the future.\"", "The Fox Broadcasting Company (commonly referred to as Fox; stylized as FOX) is an American commercial broadcast television network that is owned by the Fox Entertainment Group subsidiary of 21st Century Fox. The network is headquartered at the 20th Century Fox studio lot on Pico Boulevard in the Century City section of Los Angeles, with additional major offices and production facilities at the Fox Television Center in nearby West Los Angeles and the Fox Broadcasting Center in Yorkville, Manhattan, New York. It is the third largest major television network in the world based on total revenues, assets, and international coverage.\n\nLaunched on October 9, 1986 as a competitor to the Big Three television networks, ABC, NBC and CBS, Fox went on to become the most successful attempt at a fourth television network. It was the highest-rated broadcast network in the 18–49 demographic from 2004 to 2012, and earned the position as the most-watched American television network in total viewership during the 2007–08 season. \n\nFox and its affiliated companies operate many entertainment channels in international markets, although these do not necessarily air the same programming as the U.S. network. Most viewers in Canada have access to at least one U.S.-based Fox affiliate, either over-the-air or through a pay television provider, although Fox's National Football League telecasts and most of its prime time programming are subject to simultaneous substitution regulations for cable and satellite providers imposed by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) to protect rights held by domestically based networks.\n\nThe network is named after sister company 20th Century Fox, and indirectly for producer William Fox, who founded one of the movie studio's predecessors, Fox Film. Fox is a member of the North American Broadcasters Association and the National Association of Broadcasters\n\nHistory\n\nOrigins\n\n20th Century Fox had been involved in television production as early as the 1950s, producing several syndicated programs during this era. In November 1956, the studio purchased a 50% interest in the NTA Film Network, an early syndicator of films and television programs. Following the demise of the DuMont Television Network in August of that year after it became mired in severe financial problems, NTA was launched as a new \"fourth network\". 20th Century Fox would also produce original content for the NTA network. The film network effort would fail after a few years, but 20th Century Fox continued to dabble in television through its production arm, TCF Television Productions, producing series (such as Perry Mason) for the three major broadcast television networks (ABC, NBC and CBS).\n\n1980s: Establishment of the network\n\nFoundations\n\nThe Fox network's foundations were laid in March 1985 through News Corporation's $255 million purchase of a 50% interest in TCF Holdings, the parent company of the 20th Century Fox film studio. In May 1985, News Corporation, a media company owned by Australian publishing magnate Rupert Murdoch that had mainly served as a newspaper publisher at the time of the TCF Holdings deal, agreed to pay $2.55 billion to acquire independent television stations in six major U.S. cities from the John Kluge-run broadcasting company Metromedia: WNEW-TV (channel 5) in New York City, WTTG (channel 5) in Washington, D.C., KTTV (channel 11) in Los Angeles, KRIV (channel 26) in Houston, WFLD-TV (channel 32) in Chicago, and KRLD-TV (channel 33) in Dallas. A seventh station, ABC affiliate WCVB-TV (channel 5) in Boston, was part of the original transaction but was spun off to the Hearst Broadcasting subsidiary of the Hearst Corporation in a separate, concurrent deal as part of a right of first refusal related to that station's 1982 sale to Metromedia (Two years later, News Corporation acquired WXNE-TV (channel 25) in that market from the Christian Broadcasting Network and changed its call letters to WFXT).\n\nBeginning of the network\n\nIn October 1985, 20th Century Fox announced its intentions to form a fourth television network that would compete with ABC, CBS and NBC. The plans were to use the combination of the Fox studios and the former Metromedia stations to both produce and distribute programming. Organizational plans for the network were held off until the Metromedia acquisitions cleared regulatory hurdles. Then, in December 1985, Rupert Murdoch agreed to pay $325 million to acquire the remaining equity in TCF Holdings from his original partner, Marvin Davis. The purchase of the Metromedia stations was approved by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in March 1986; the call letters of the New York City and Dallas outlets were subsequently changed respectively to WNYW and KDAF. These first six stations, then broadcasting to a combined reach of 22% of the nation's households, became known as the Fox Television Stations group. Except for KDAF (which was sold to Renaissance Broadcasting in 1995 and became a WB affiliate at the same time), all of the original owned-and-operated stations (\"O&Os\") are still part of the Fox network today. Like the core O&O group, Fox's affiliate body initially consisted of independent stations (a few of which had maintained affiliations with ABC, NBC, CBS and/or DuMont earlier in their existences). The local charter affiliate was, in most cases, that market's top-rated independent; however, Fox opted to affiliate with a second-tier independent station in markets where a more established independent declined the affiliation (such as Denver, Phoenix and St. Louis). Largely because of both these factors, Fox – in a situation very similar to what DuMont had experienced four decades before – had little choice but to affiliate with UHF stations in all except a few (mainly larger) markets where the network gained clearance. \n\nThe Fox Broadcasting Company launched at 11:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time on October 9, 1986. Its inaugural program was a late-night talk show, The Late Show, which was hosted by comedian Joan Rivers. After a strong start, The Late Show quickly eroded in the ratings; it was never able to overtake NBC stalwart The Tonight Show – whose then-host Johnny Carson, upset over her becoming his late-night competitor, banned Rivers (a frequent Tonight guest and substitute host) from appearing on his show (Rivers would not appear on Tonight again until February 2014, seven months before her death, when Jimmy Fallon took over as its host). By early 1987, Rivers (and her then-husband Edgar Rosenberg, the show's original executive producer) quit The Late Show after disagreements with the network over the show's creative direction; the program then began to be hosted by a succession of guest hosts. After that point, some stations that affiliated with Fox in the weeks before the April 1987 launch of its prime time lineup (such as WCGV-TV (channel 24) in Milwaukee and WDRB-TV (channel 41) in Louisville) signed affiliation agreements with the network on the condition that they would not have to carry The Late Show due to the program's weak ratings.\n\nThe network expanded its programming into prime time on April 5, 1987, inaugurating its Sunday night lineup with the premieres of the sitcom Married... with Children and the sketch comedy series The Tracey Ullman Show. Fox added one new show per week over the next several weeks, with the drama 21 Jump Street, and comedies Mr. President and Duet completing its Sunday schedule. On July 11, the network rolled out its Saturday night schedule with the premiere of the supernatural drama series Werewolf, which began with a two-hour pilot movie event. Three other series were added to the Saturday lineup over the next three weeks: comedies The New Adventures of Beans Baxter, Karen's Song and Down and Out in Beverly Hills (the latter being an adaptation of the film of the same name). Both Karen's Song and Down and Out in Beverly Hills were canceled by the start of the 1987–88 television season, the network's first fall launch, and were replaced by the sitcoms Second Chance and Women in Prison.\n\nIn regards to its late night lineup, Fox had already decided to cancel The Late Show, and had a replacement series in development, The Wilton North Report, when the former series began a ratings resurgence under its final guest host, comedian Arsenio Hall. Wilton North lasted just a few weeks, however, and the network was unable to reach a deal with Hall to return as host when it hurriedly revived The Late Show in early 1988. The Late Show went back to featuring guest hosts, eventually selecting Ross Shafer as its permanent host, only for it to be canceled for good by October 1988, while Hall signed a deal with Paramount Television to develop his own syndicated late night talk show, The Arsenio Hall Show. Although it had modest successes in Married... with Children and The Tracy Ullman Show, several affiliates were disappointed with Fox's largely underperforming programming lineup during the network's first three years; KMSP-TV (channel 9) in Minneapolis-St. Paul and KPTV (channel 12) in Portland, Oregon, both owned at the time by Chris-Craft Television, disaffiliated from Fox in 1988 (with KITN (channel 29, now WFTC) and KPDX (channel 49) respectively replacing those stations as Fox affiliates), citing that the network's weaker program offerings were hampering viewership of their stronger syndicated slate.\n\nThe network added a third night of programming, on Mondays, at the start of the 1989–90 television season, a season that heralded the start of a turnaround for Fox. That season saw the debut of a midseason replacement series, The Simpsons, an animated series that originated as a series of shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show; ranked at a three-way tie for 29th place in the Nielsen ratings, it became a breakout hit and was the first Fox series to break the Top 30. The Simpsons, at 27 years as of 2016, is the longest-running American sitcom, the longest-running American animated program, and in 2009, it surpassed Gunsmoke as the longest-running American scripted primetime television series. That year, Fox also first introduced the documentary series Cops and crime-focused magazine program America's Most Wanted (the latter of which debuted as a half-hour series as part of the network's mainly comedy-based Sunday lineup for its first season, before expanding to an hour and moving to Fridays for the 1990–91 season). These two series, which would become staples on the network for just over two decades, would eventually be paired to form the nucleus of Fox's Saturday night schedule beginning in the 1994–95 season. Meanwhile, Married... with Children – which broke ground from other family sitcoms of the period as it centered on a dysfunctional lower-middle-class family, whose patriarch often openly loathed his failures and being saddled with a wife and two children – saw viewer interest substantially increase beginning in its third season after, in an ironic twist, Michigan homemaker Terry Rakolta lodged a boycott to force Fox to cancel the series after objecting to risque humor and sexual content featured in a 1989 episode. Married...s newfound success led it to become the network's longest-running live-action sitcom, airing for 11 seasons.\n\n1990s: Rise into mainstream success and beginnings of rivalry with the Big Three\n\nFox survived where DuMont and other attempts to start a fourth network had failed because it programmed just under the number of hours defined by the FCC to legally be considered a network. This allowed Fox to make revenue in ways forbidden to the established networks (for instance, it did not have to adhere to the Financial Interest and Syndication Rules that were in effect at the time), since during its first years it was considered to be merely a large group of stations. By comparison, DuMont was saddled by numerous regulatory barriers that hampered its potential to grow, most notably a ban on acquiring additional stations – during an era when the FCC had much tighter ownership limits for television stations (limiting broadcasters to a maximum of five stations nationwide) than it did when Fox launched – since its minority owner, Paramount Pictures owned two television stations (one of which had already disaffiliated from the network). Combined with the three television stations owned by network parent DuMont Laboratories, this put DuMont at the legal limit at the time. In addition, Murdoch was more than willing to open his wallet to get and keep programming and talent. DuMont, in contrast, operated on a shoestring budget and was unable to keep the programs and stars it had. \n\nMost of the other startup networks that launched in later years (such as The WB, UPN and The CW) followed Fox's model as well. Furthermore, DuMont operated during a time when the FCC did not require television manufacturers to include UHF capability. In order to see DuMont's UHF stations, most people had to buy an expensive converter. Even then, the picture quality was marginal at best. By the time Fox launched, cable allowed UHF stations to generally be on an equal footing with VHF stations. Clarke Ingram, who maintains a memorial website to the failed DuMont Television Network, has suggested that Fox is a revival or at least a linear descendant of DuMont, since Metromedia (originally known as Metropolitan Broadcasting at its founding) was spun off from DuMont and that company's television stations formed the nucleus of the Fox network. WNYW (originally known as WABD) and WTTG were two of the three original owned-and-operated stations of the DuMont network, and Fox remains based out of a facility in Manhattan which was formerly the base of DuMont's operations, the DuMont Tele-Centre, the current day Fox Television Center.\n\nAlthough Fox was growing rapidly as a network and had established itself as a presence, it was still not considered a major competitor to the established \"Big Three\" broadcast networks, ABC, CBS and NBC. From its launch, Fox had the advantage of offering programs intended to appeal toward a younger demographic – adults between 18 and 49 years of age – and that were edgier in content, whereas some programs that were carried by the \"Big Three\" networks attracted an older-skewing audience. Until the early 1990s, when Fox expanded its programming to additional nights and outside of prime time, most Fox stations were still essentially formatted as independent stations – filling their schedules with mainly first-run and acquired programming, and, during prime time, running either syndicated programs or, more commonly, movies on nights when the network did not provide programming. Few Fox stations carried local newscasts during the network's early years, unlike the owned-and-operated stations and affiliates of its established rivals. Those that did were mostly based in larger markets (including some of the network's O&Os) and retained newscasts that had aired for decades. Even then, these news operations were limited to one newscast per day, following the network's prime time lineup.\n\nAs Fox gradually headed towards carrying a full week's worth of programming in prime time – through the addition of programming on Thursday and Friday nights at the start of the 1990–91 season – the network's added offerings included the scheduling of The Simpsons opposite veteran NBC sitcom The Cosby Show as part of Fox's initial Thursday night lineup that fall (along with future hit Beverly Hills, 90210, which would become the network's longest-running drama, airing for ten seasons) after only a half-season of success on Sunday nights. The show performed well in its new Thursday slot, spending four seasons there and helping to launch Martin, another Fox comedy that became a hit when it debuted in September 1992. The Simpsons returned to Sunday nights in the fall of 1994, and has remained there ever since.\n\nThe sketch comedy series In Living Color, which debuted in April 1990, created many memorable characters and launched the careers of future movie stars Jim Carrey, Jamie Foxx, Damon Wayans, Keenen Ivory Wayans and Jennifer Lopez (the latter of whom was a member of the show's dance troupe, the \"Fly Girls\"). The series also gained international prominence after Fox aired a special live episode in January 1992 as an alternative to the halftime show during Super Bowl XXVI, which was broadcast on CBS, marking the start of Fox's rivalry with the \"Big Three\" networks while popularizing the counterprogramming strategy against the Super Bowl telecast.\n\nThe early and mid-1990s saw the debuts of several soap opera-style prime time dramas aimed at younger audiences that became quick hits, which, in addition to Beverly Hills, 90210, included its adult-focused spin-off Melrose Place (which initially had a mediocre ratings performance, before viewership rose significantly midway through its first season following Heather Locklear's addition to the cast) and family drama Party of Five. The early and mid-1990s also saw the network launch several series aimed at a black audience, which, in addition to Martin, included the sitcom Living Single and police procedural New York Undercover.\n\nLuring the NFL and affiliation switches\n\nFox would become a viable competitor to the \"Big Three\" when the network lured the partial broadcast television rights to the National Football League away from CBS. On December 18, 1993, Fox signed a contract with the NFL to televise regular season and playoff games from the National Football Conference (which had been airing its games on CBS since 1955, fifteen years before the formation of the NFC and the American Football Conference through the merger of the American Football League and the NFL), starting with the 1994 season. The initial four-year contract, which Fox bid $1.58 billion to obtain (considerably more than the $290 million that CBS reportedly offered to retain the conference rights), also included the exclusive U.S. television rights to Super Bowl XXXI in 1997. The network also lured Pat Summerall, John Madden, Dick Stockton, Matt Millen, James Brown and Terry Bradshaw (as well as many behind-the-scenes production personnel) from CBS Sports to staff its NFL coverage.\n\nShortly afterward, News Corporation began striking affiliation deals with, and later purchasing, more television station groups. On May 23, 1994, Fox agreed to purchase a 20% stake in New World Communications, a television and film production company controlled by investor Ronald Perelman that had just recently entered into broadcasting through its 1993 purchase of seven stations owned by SCI Television. As a result of Fox acquiring a 20% minority interest in the company, New World signed an agreement to switch the affiliations of twelve stations (eight CBS affiliates, three ABC affiliates – two of which were subsequently placed in a blind trust and then sold directly to Fox due to conflicts with FCC ownership rules – and one NBC affiliate) that it had either already owned outright or was in the process of acquiring from Citicasters and Argyle Communications at the time to Fox starting in September 1994 and continuing as existing affiliation contracts with their existing major network partners expired. \n\nThat summer, SF Broadcasting, a joint venture between Fox and Savoy Pictures that was founded in March 1994, purchased four stations from Burnham Broadcasting (three NBC affiliates and one ABC affiliate); through a separate agreement, those stations would also switch to Fox between September 1995 and January 1996 as existing affiliation agreements lapsed. These two deals were not the first instances in which a longtime \"Big Three\" station affiliated with Fox: the network scored its first major coup when it moved its Miami affiliation from charter affiliate WCIX (channel 6, which became a CBS owned-and-operated station, now WFOR-TV on channel 4) to NBC affiliate WSVN (channel 7) in January 1989, the result of a three-station affiliation swap spurred by NBC's purchase of longtime CBS affiliate WTVJ (channel 4, now on channel 6). Through the expansion of its news programming and a refocused emphasis on crime stories and sensationalistic reporting under news director Joel Cheatwood, that switch helped the perennial third-place WSVN become a strong competitor in the Miami market.\n\nThe NFC contract, in fact, was the impetus for the affiliation deal with New World and SF Broadcasting's purchase of the Burnham stations, as Fox sought to improve local coverage of its new NFL package by aligning the network with stations that had more established histories and advertiser value than its charter affiliates. The deals spurred a series of affiliation realignments between all four U.S. television networks involving individual stations and various broadcasting groups – such as those between CBS and Group W (whose corporate parent later bought the network in August 1995), and ABC and the E. W. Scripps Company (which owned several Fox affiliates that switched to either ABC or NBC as a result of the New World deal) – affecting 30 television markets between September 1994 and September 1996. The two deals also had the side benefit of increasing local news programming on the new Fox affiliates, mirroring the programming format adopted by WSVN upon that station's switch to the network (as well as expanding the number of news-producing stations in Fox's portfolio beyond mainly charter stations in certain large and mid-sized markets).\n\nWith significant market share for the first time ever and the rights to the NFL, Fox firmly established itself as the nation's fourth major network. Fox Television Stations would acquire New World outright on July 17, 1996 in a $2.48 billion stock purchase, making the latter's twelve Fox affiliates owned-and-operated stations of the network; the deal was completed on January 22, 1997. Later, in August 2000, Fox bought several stations owned by Chris-Craft Industries and its subsidiaries BHC Communications and United Television for $5.5 billion (most of these stations were UPN affiliates, although its Minneapolis station KMSP-TV would rejoin Fox in September 2002 as an owned-and-operated station). These purchases, for a time, made Fox Television Stations the largest owner of television stations in the U.S. (a title that has since been assumed by the Sinclair Broadcast Group, one of the network's largest affiliate groups).\n\nEvolving programming\n\nFox completed its prime time expansion to all seven nights on January 19, 1993, with the launch of two additional nights of programming on Tuesdays and Wednesdays (The method of gradually adding nights to the programming schedule that began with the network's April 1987 prime time launch was replicated by The WB and UPN when those networks debuted in January 1995). September 1993 saw the heavy promotion and debut of a short-lived western series that incorporated science-fiction elements, The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. However, it was the supernatural investigative drama that debuted immediately following it on Friday nights, The X-Files, that would find long-lasting success, and would become Fox's first series to crack Nielsen's year-end Top 20 most-watched network programs. After several other failed attempts at late night programming following the cancellation of The Late Show (most notably, the quick failure of The Chevy Chase Show in 1993), Fox finally found success in that time period with the debut of MADtv on October 14, 1995; the sketch comedy series became a solid competitor to NBC's Saturday Night Live for over a decade and was the network's most successful late night program as well as one of its most successful Saturday night shows, running for 14 seasons until its cancellation in 2009.\n\nAn attempt to make a larger effort to program Saturday nights by moving Married... with Children from its longtime Sunday slot and adding a new but short-lived sitcom (Love and Marriage) to the night at the beginning of the 1996–97 season backfired with the public, as it resulted in a brief cancellation of America's Most Wanted that was criticized by law enforcement and public officials, and was roundly rejected by viewers, which brought swift cancellation to the newer series. Married... quickly returned to Sundays (before moving again to Mondays two months later); both it and Martin would end their runs at the end of that season. The Saturday schedule was revised in November 1996, to feature one new and one encore episode of Cops, and the revived America's Most Wanted: America Fights Back. Cops and AMW remained the anchors of Fox's Saturday lineup, making it the most stable night in American broadcast television for over 14 years; both shows eventually were among the few first-run programs remaining on Saturday evenings across the four major networks after decreasing prime time viewership – as more people opted to engage in leisure activities away from home rather than watch television on that night of the week – led ABC, NBC and CBS to largely abandon first-run series on Saturdays (outside of newsmagazines, sports and burned off prime time shows that failed on other nights) in favor of reruns and movies by the mid-2000s. America's Most Wanted ended its 22-year run on Fox in June 2011, and was subsequently picked up by Lifetime (before being cancelled for good in 2013); Cops, in turn, would move its first-run episodes to Spike in 2013 after 23 seasons (ending its original run on Fox as the network's longest-running prime time program), leaving sports and repeats of reality and drama series as the only programs airing on Fox on Saturday evenings. \n\nBy the 1997–98 season, Fox had three shows in the Nielsen Top 20, The X-Files (which ranked 11th), King of the Hill (which ranked 15th) and The Simpsons (which ranked 18th). Building around its flagship animated comedy The Simpsons, Fox would experience relative success with animated series in prime time, beginning with the debut of the Mike Judge-produced King of the Hill in 1997. Family Guy (the first of three adult-oriented animated series from Seth MacFarlane to air on the network) and Futurama (from Simpsons creator Matt Groening) would make their debuts in 1999; however, they were canceled in 2002 and 2003 respectively. Due to strong DVD sales and highly rated cable reruns on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim, Fox later decided to order new episodes of Family Guy, which began airing in 2005. Futurama would be revived with four direct-to-DVD films between 2007 and 2009 and would return as a first-run series on Comedy Central, where it ran from 2010 to 2013. Less successful efforts included The Critic, starring Saturday Night Live alumnus Jon Lovitz (which Fox picked up in 1994 after it was cancelled by ABC, only for the series to be cancelled again after its second season), and The PJs (which moved to The WB in 2000, after Fox cancelled that series after its second season). Other notable shows that debuted in the late 1990s included the quirky David E. Kelley-produced live-action dramedy Ally McBeal and period comedy That '70s Show, the latter of which became Fox's second-longest-running live-action sitcom, airing for eight seasons.\n\nThroughout the 1990s and into the next decade, Fox launched a slate of cable channels beginning with the 1994 debuts of general entertainment network FX and movie channel FXM: Movies from Fox (now FX Movie Channel), followed by the debut of Fox News Channel in August 1996. Its sports operations expanded with the acquisition of controlling interests in several regional sports networks (including the Prime Network and SportsChannel) between 1996 and 2000 to form Fox Sports Net (which launched in November 1996), its 2000 purchase of Speedvision (later Speed Channel, which was replaced in the United States by Fox Sports 1 in August 2013; however, it continues to exist in other North American and Caribbean countries as Fox Sports Racing), and the launches of Fox Sports World (later Fox Soccer, which was replaced by FXX in September 2013) and Fox Sports en Espanol (now Fox Deportes) in the early 2000s.\n\n2000s: Rise to ratings leadership, the American Idol effect, and fierce rivalry with CBS\n\nBy 2000, many staple Fox shows of the 1990s had ended their runs. During the late 1990s and carrying over into the early 2000s, Fox put much of its efforts into producing reality shows – many of which were considered to be sensationalistic and controversial in nature – such as Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?, Temptation Island, Married by America and Joe Millionaire (which became the first Fox program ever to crack the Nielsen Top 10), as well as video clip shows such as World's Wildest Police Videos and When Animals Attack!. After shedding most of these programs, Fox gradually filled its lineup with acclaimed dramas such as 24, The O.C., House and Bones, and comedies such as The Bernie Mac Show, Malcolm in the Middle and Arrested Development.\n\nAs the decade wore on, Fox began surpassing ABC and NBC in the ratings – first in age demographics, then in overall viewership – and placed second behind a resurgent CBS in total viewership beginning in 2002. Fox hit a major milestone in 2005 when it emerged as the most-watched U.S. broadcast network in the lucrative 18-49 demographic for the first time, largely boosted by the strength of the reality singing competition series American Idol. Regarded as the single most dominant program on 21st-century U.S. television, as well as the first Fox show to lead the Nielsen seasonal ratings, Idol had peak audiences of up to 38 million viewers during the 2003 season finale and double-season average audiences of around 31 million viewers in 2006 and 2007. Subsequently, it leapfrogged over Fox's Big Three competition to become the highest-rated U.S. television program overall starting with the 2003–04 season, becoming the first reality singing competition series in the country ever to reach first place in the seasonal ratings. \n\nIdol remains the most recent U.S. television program to date to lead the national prime time ratings and attract at least 30 million viewers for at least two television seasons. It also became the single most watched primetime television series of the 2000s by average, as well as the most recent program scheduled to have successfully established a graveyard slot on U.S. television since the end of NBC's Friends in 2004 and the subsequent decline of the network's previously dominant \"Must See TV\" Thursday timeblock. By 2005, reality television succeeded sitcoms as the most popular form of entertainment in the U.S. as a result of Fox's rise with Idol and NBC's network declines. House, which aired after Idol on Tuesday nights and had a successful run of summer repeats in 2005, became Fox's first prime time drama series (and the network's third program overall) to reach the Nielsen Top 10 in 2006.\n\nSince 2004, CBS and Fox, which ranked as the two most-watched broadcast networks in the U.S. during the 2000s, have tended to equal one another in demographic ratings among general viewership, with both networks winning certain demographics by narrow margins; however, while Fox has the youngest-skewing viewer base, CBS is consistently regarded to have the oldest audience demographics among the major broadcast networks. Fox hit a milestone in February 2005 by scoring its first-ever sweeps victory in total viewership and demographic ratings, boosted largely by its broadcast of Super Bowl XXXIX and the strengths of American Idol, 24, House and The O.C.\n\nDuring the 2004–2005 season, Fox ranked in first place among all broadcast networks in the 18–49 adult demographic for the first time in its history. Another milestone came by the conclusion of the 2007–08 season on May 21, 2008, shortly after the widely acclaimed seventh season finale of American Idol, when Fox became the highest-rated television network in the United States overall for the first time, attributed to the strengths of Super Bowl XLII and its NFL game coverages, Idol and House during that season; it also dominated the 18-49 demographic for the fourth consecutive season by the largest margin ever since the introduction of people meter technology for television audience measurement by Nielsen during the 1985–86 season, and is currently the only non-Big Three network to earn first place overall since the start of the Nielsen ratings in the 1950-51 season.\n\nIn the late 2000s, Fox launched a few series that proved to be powerful hits in different respects. In 2008, the supernatural mystery series Fringe debuted to high ratings and critical acclaim during its first season on Tuesdays; though its viewership declined through its run, the series developed a large loyal fanbase that turned the show into a cult favorite. In 2009, Glee premiered to average ratings when its pilot aired as a \"special preview\" episode in May (after the eighth season finale of American Idol), but earned positive reviews from critics. The show's ratings increased during its first two seasons, and was met with such media attention that it formed a large, loyal international fanbase. The cast of the series has been acknowledged by notable luminaries such as the President of the United States Barack Obama and Oprah Winfrey, who have each asked the cast to perform live for various national events.\n\n2010s: Network's ratings collapse, and revamp in network programming\n\nAt the dawn of the 2010s, new comedies Raising Hope and New Girl gave Fox its first live-action comedy successes in years. The second season of Glee delivered that series' highest ratings during the 2010–11 season, with viewership peaking during its Super Bowl lead-out episode in February 2011. At the same time, Fox's live telecast of the Super Bowl XLV helped the network emerge as the first U.S. television network to earn an average single-night prime time audience of at least 100 million viewers. \n\nAmerican Idol lost its first place standing among all network prime time programs during the 2011–12 finale (falling to second that season behind NBC Sunday Night Football), ending the longest streak at #1 for a prime time broadcast network series in U.S. television history, through its eight-year ratings domination in both the Adults 18-49 demographic and total viewership. Idol also remained in the Nielsen Top 10 for eleven years from 2003 to 2013, and became the highest-rated non-sports prime time television program as well as the highest-rated reality series in the U.S. from 2003 to 2012; these records marked the longest Nielsen ratings streaks of any Fox program in these categories. The 2012 season finale of American Idol marked the end of the season-long 25th anniversary of the establishment of Fox network, helping it win in the 18-49 demographic for the eighth consecutive season, the longest such streak according to Nielsen measurement records.\n\nFox suffered a collapse in viewership during the 2012–13 season; American Idol and Glee suffered steep ratings declines, while the network as a whole fell to third place (suffering an overall decrease by 22%) in total viewership and to second place in the 18-49 demographic (where it remained ) by the end of the season. The decline in ratings continued into the 2013–14 season, with Fox placing fourth among the major networks in total viewership for the first time since 2001. Subsequently, on January 13, 2014, Fox announced that it would abandon its use of the standard concept of greenlighting shows through the initial order of pilot episodes during the designated \"pilot season\" (running from January through April), instead opting to pick up shows directly to series. \n\nFox scored renewed ratings successes with its live telecast of Super Bowl XLVIII in February 2014, and the lead-out programs that followed this event – New Girl and Brooklyn Nine-Nine. Super Bowl XLVIII became the second highest-rated U.S. television program to date, with peak ratings of up to 167 million viewers during several portions of the Fox telecast. Later, in May 2014, Kevin Reilly announced that he would resign as chairman of Fox Entertainment. On July 15, 2014, corporate parent 21st Century Fox announced that it would merge the operations of the network and 20th Century Fox Television into the newly created Fox Television Group, with 20th Century Fox Television co-chairpersons Dana Walden and Gary Newman appointed to head the division. \n\nThe 2014–15 season saw hits in the freshmen dramas Gotham (based on the Batman mythos) and the Lee Daniels-produced Empire. Ratings for Empire, in particular, increased week-to-week throughout its first season, becoming the network's first successful American Idol lead-out since House, as well as the first American television program to consistently increase its episode-to-episode viewership during its first five weeks since the 1992 feat set by ABC's Roseanne. Empire ended its inaugural season as the first U.S. television show ever to increase its episodic viewership on a consistent basis throughout the course of a single season, as well as Fox's fourth program overall (and the first since the 2013 finale of American Idol) to enter the Nielsen Top 10 by the end of the 2014–15 season. \n\nThe 2015–16 season marked a notable turnaround for Fox, as it jumps ahead of ABC to third place in nationwide ratings (both in overall viewership and in the 18-49 demo) and posted several firsts for the network and on U.S. television. Its improvement was boosted by the transfer of the Miss Universe and Miss USA pageants from NBC, as well as shows such as Grease: Live, Empire and the return of The X-Files after its most recent season ending in 2002. Grease: Live became the first live American TV musical special of the 21st century to be broadcast in front of a live studio audience (as well as the first ever live musical special aired by a non-Big Three network on primetime), while Empire and The X-Files ranked in the Nielsen Top 10 for the season, the first season with 2 Fox programs entering the top rankings since the American Idol-House duo of the 2007-2008 season (and the first ever season that Fox achieved such rankings without American Idol or any other reality television show from Fox in the Top 10). \n\n2016 also marked the series finale of American Idol after airing for fifteen seasons, ending an era of one of the most successful shows in U.S. television history. Although suffering from steep viewership declines in the early 2010s, American Idol aired its most watched episode during the series finale for the first time since the 2013 finale show. Fox is set to live broadcast the Super Bowl LI on February 2017, the first Super Bowl after its golden anniversary aired on CBS.\n\nProgramming\n\n, Fox currently provides 19 hours of regularly scheduled network programming each week. The network provides fifteen hours of prime time programming to its owned-and-operated and affiliated stations on Monday through Saturdays from 8:00 to 10:00 p.m. and Sundays from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m. (all times Eastern and Pacific). An hour of late night programming is also offered on Saturdays from 11:00 p.m. to 12:00 a.m. Eastern and Pacific Time, as part of the Animation Domination High-Def block (though scheduling for that hour varies depending on the market due to late local newscasts airing in the traditional 11:00/10:00 p.m. timeslot on some Fox stations). Weekend daytime programming consists of the paid programming block Weekend Marketplace (airing Saturdays from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m., although the block is not carried by all affiliates and, in some areas, is offered to another station in the market), and the hour-long Sunday morning political discussion show – and the network's only regular national news program – Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace (airing from 9:00 to 10:00 a.m. Eastern and Pacific, although the timeslot also varies by market due to local news or public affairs programming).\n\nSports programming is also provided; usually on weekends (albeit not every weekend year-round), and most commonly airing between 11:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. or as late as 8:00 p.m. on Sundays (often airing for longer hours during football season, slightly less during NASCAR season); between 3:00 and 7:00 p.m. (during baseball and college football season) or as early as 12:00 p.m. (during college basketball season) on Saturday afternoons; and during prime time on certain Saturday evenings. The Saturday prime time block – if any sports programming is scheduled for a particular week on that night – currently varies between occasional UFC events, Major League Baseball, or NASCAR coverage in the late winter and early spring/summer, and college football coverage during the fall. Most of the network's prime time programming is produced by a production company owned by Fox's corporate parent 21st Century Fox, usually 20th Century Fox Television or Fox 21 Television Studios.\n\nAdult animation\n\nTypically every Sunday night during prime time (unless preempted, usually by sports telecasts), Fox airs a lineup incorporating original adult animation series. This block of adult cartoons became a staple of the network – airing under the brand Animation Domination from May 1, 2005, to September 14, 2014, when the network rebranded the block as Sunday Funday as a result of the re-incorporation of live-action comedy series on the Sunday night lineup after ten years (aside from occasional burn-offs of series aired on other nights during the 7:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific hour), although animated series remain an integral part of that night's schedule.\n\nThe first programs to air as part of the Animation Domination lineup were American Dad! (which also had its beginnings in the lineup, and moved to TBS in October 2014 ), Family Guy (which returned to the network after a four-year cancellation when Animation Domination began), The Simpsons (the longest-running cartoon on Fox, predating the lineup by 16 years), and King of the Hill (which also predated the lineup by eight years). Animated shows currently airing as part of the lineup include Family Guy, The Simpsons and Bob's Burgers. In addition to King of the Hill, series that have previously aired on the lineup have included Sit Down, Shut Up; Allen Gregory; Napoleon Dynamite; and The Cleveland Show.\n\nAn extension of the Sunday prime-time block called \"Animation Domination High-Def\" launched on Saturday late nights in July 2013 (marking the return of first-run programming in that time period since the 2010 cancellation of The Wanda Sykes Show), with ADHD Shorts, Axe Cop and High School USA!. Due to low ratings, Fox announced on April 17, 2014, that it would discontinue \"Animation Domination High-Def\"; although the block was slated to end on June 28, 2014, it continues to air on Fox as of October 2015 with reruns of its existing programs.\n\nChildren's programming\n\nFox began airing children's programming on September 8, 1990 with the debut of the Fox Children's Network (rebranded as the Fox Kids Network in 1991, and then to simply Fox Kids in 1998), a programming block that aired on Saturday mornings and weekday afternoons. Programming within the Fox Kids block consisted mainly of animated series, although it also featured some live-action series as part of the lineup. Shows featured in the block included Bobby's World, X-Men, Spider-Man, The Tick and Goosebumps; it also aired select shows from Warner Bros. Animation including the popular animated series Tiny Toon Adventures, Animaniacs and Batman: The Animated Series (Warner Bros. pulled Batman and Animaniacs from the Fox Kids lineup in September 1995, moving both shows, as well as Tiny Toons – which had already ended its run – to the newly launched Kids' WB block on The WB). Fox Kids' most successful series, however, was Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (from eventual sister company and Fox Kids co-parent Saban Entertainment), which debuted in 1993 and became the block's flagship program until it moved to ABC and Toon Disney in 2002.\n\nIn October 2001, Fox sold its children's division, Saban Entertainment and Fox Family Worldwide (the parent subsidiary of cable network Fox Family Channel, now ABC Family) to The Walt Disney Company for $5.3 billion. The network relegated the Fox Kids block to Saturdays in January 2002 (turning over the two-hour timeslot held by the weekday block to its owned-and-operated and affiliated stations, rather than retaining the slots and filling them with adult-oriented daytime shows ); then on September 14, 2002, as part of a time-lease agreement with 4Kids Entertainment to program the remaining four-hour Saturday morning lineup, Fox Kids was replaced by a new children's program block called FoxBox (which was renamed 4Kids TV in February 2005).\n\nFox discontinued the 4Kids TV block on December 27, 2008, due to conflicts between the network and 4Kids Entertainment that were later settled, regarding 4Kids' failure to pay Fox for the programming lease rights, and the network's inability to fulfill a promise guaranteeing clearance on 90% of its stations and to get other stations to carry the block in certain markets where a Fox station declined it (an issue that plagued Fox's children's program blocks since the start of its affiliation deal with New World Communications). Fox had earlier announced, on November 23, that it would no longer carry children's programming in the time period, citing stiff competition from cable channels aimed at the demographic; the network instead turned over two of the four vacant Saturday morning hours to its affiliates to allow them to air local newscasts or educational programs purchased from the syndication market, while it retained the remaining two hours to run a network-managed paid programming block, Weekend Marketplace, which debuted on January 3, 2009. \n\nOn September 14, 2014, Xploration Station, a two-hour syndicated block produced by Steve Rotfeld Productions, began airing on Fox stations owned by several affiliate groups including Fox Television Stations and Tribune Broadcasting. The block, which complies with guidelines defined by the Children's Television Act, features programs focused on the STEM fields. Stations can choose to either carry Xploration Station or continue to air Weekend Marketplace (as the Sinclair Broadcast Group chose to do, since it already carries syndicated E/I programming purchased by the company across its Fox affiliates, although Sinclair plans to add the block on most of its Fox affiliates in September 2016).\n\nNews\n\nUnlike ABC, CBS and NBC, Fox does not currently air national news programs (morning, evening or overnight) or newsmagazines – choosing to focus solely on its prime time schedule, sports and other ancillary network programming. The absence of a national news program on the Fox network is despite the fact that its parent company, 21st Century Fox, owns Fox News Channel, which launched in August 1996 and is currently available on virtually all pay television providers within the United States. Fox News is not structured as a news division of the Fox network, and operates as a technically separate entity within 21st Century Fox through the company's Fox News Group subsidiary. However, it does produce some content that is carried by the broadcast network, which is usually separate from the news coverage aired by the cable channel; in particular, FNC anchor Shepard Smith anchors most prime time news presentations on the Fox network, especially during political news events (which are anchored by Bret Baier on Fox News Channel).\n\nSpecifically, the Fox network airs coverage of the State of the Union address, presidential debates, national election coverage, as well as live breaking news coverage currently branded as a \"Fox News Special Report\" (also branded as a \"Fox News Alert\" or sometimes a \"Fox News Red Alert\"); carriage of such special coverage of a breaking news story may vary from station to station, and is often limited to events that occur during the network's usual prime time block (for example, unlike the Big Three, Fox does not often provide coverage of major political convention speeches, which usually occur during the 10:00 p.m. (Eastern Time) hour during which most of its affiliates air local newscasts; however, the majority of Fox's owned-and-operated stations and affiliate groups do carry weekday breaking news briefs). The political discussion show Fox News Sunday also airs on the Fox network on Sunday mornings and is rebroadcast later in the day on FNC. Fox also operates an affiliate news service called Fox NewsEdge, which launched with Fox News Channel in 1996, and provides national and international news reports, and feature stories for Fox stations to use in their own local newscasts.\n\nFox first tried its hand at a national news program in prime time with the hour-long weekly newsmagazine The Reporters, which was produced by the same team behind the Fox Television Stations-distributed syndicated tabloid program A Current Affair; the program ran from 1988 to 1990, when it was cancelled due to low ratings. From 1987 until about 1990, Fox also aired news capsules that aired within its prime time schedule branded as Fox News Extra, which were produced at New York City O&O WNYW (Cora-Ann Mihalik, who anchored the newsbriefs, had at the time also co-anchored WNYW's weeknight 7:00 and 10:00 p.m. newscasts). Another failed attempt occurred in 1993, when Fox launched Front Page (which included among its five hosts, Ron Reagan and Josh Mankiewicz), in an attempt to capture a younger demographic for a newsmagazine program. \n\nThe network tried its hand at a newsmagazine again in 1998 with Fox Files, hosted by Fox News Channel anchors Catherine Crier and Jon Scott, as well as a team of correspondents; it lasted a little over a year before being cancelled. Its last attempt at a newsmagazine series occurred during the 2002–03 sweeps period, with The Pulse, hosted by Fox News Channel anchor Shepard Smith. On May 17, 2016, the network aired an interview special with Fox News primetime anchor Megyn Kelly, Megyn Kelly Presents.\n\nFox also attempted national morning programs, only the first of which aired on the network itself. Its first venture at such a program was Fox After Breakfast, an hour-long morning news and lifestyle show, hosted by Tom Bergeron and Laurie Hibberd, that ran on the network from 1996 to 1998 (Fox aired the program at 9:00 a.m. – as opposed to the 7:00 to 9:00 a.m. time slot that NBC, CBS and ABC air their national morning shows – in order to accommodate local morning newscasts that ran in the latter slot on some of its stations); the program originated as Breakfast Time in 1995 on sister cable channel FX. Fox tried again in 2002 with Good Day Live, a heavily entertainment-focused syndicated offshoot of Good Day L.A., a news/entertainment/lifestyle program that debuted in 1993 on Los Angeles owned-and-operated station KTTV; the national version of the program was cancelled in 2005. On January 22, 2007, Fox premiered The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet on its owned-and-operated stations; hosted by Mike Jerrick and Juliet Huddy (then-anchors of Fox News Channel's DaySide), the show was lighter in format and more entertainment-oriented, though its focus often changed when a major news story occurred. In February 2007, the program was syndicated to other stations including many affiliated with ABC, NBC and CBS in markets where it was not carried by a Fox or MyNetworkTV affiliate; The Morning Show was cancelled in June 2009. \n\nSports\n\nWhen the network launched, Fox management, having seen the critical role that sports programming – soccer events, in particular – had played in the growth of the British satellite service BSkyB, believed that sports – and specifically, professional football – would be the engine that would make Fox a major network the quickest. In 1987, after ABC initially hedged on renewing its contract to broadcast Monday Night Football, Fox made an offer to the National Football League to acquire the rights for the same amount that ABC had been paying, about $13 million per game at the time. However, partly due to the fact that Fox had not yet established itself as a major network, the NFL chose to renew its contract with ABC (where Monday Night Football remained until its move to sister cable channel ESPN in September 2006).\n\nSix years later, when the league entered contract negotiations with its television partners, Fox placed a $1.58 billion bid to obtain broadcast rights to the National Football Conference – covering four seasons of games, beginning with the 1994 NFL season. The NFL selected the Fox bid on December 18, 1993, stripping CBS of football telecasts for the first time since 1955. The event placed Fox on par with the \"Big Three\" television networks and ushered in an era of growth for the NFL. Fox's acquisition of the NFL rights also quickly led toward the network reaching an affiliation deal with New World Communications to change the affiliations of twelve of its stations to Fox (see above). The rights gave Fox many new viewers and a platform for advertising its other programs.\n\nWith a sports division now established with the arrival of the NFL, Fox acquired broadcast television rights to the National Hockey League (1994–99), Major League Baseball (since 1996) and NASCAR auto racing (since 2001, initially as part of a deal that also involved NBC and TNT). From 2007 to 2010, Fox aired college football games that were part of the Bowl Championship Series, except for the Rose Bowl, whose rights remained with ABC. The package also included the BCS National Championship Game, with the exception of the 2010 event (as that game was played at the Rose Bowl stadium).\n\nIn August 2011, Fox and mixed martial arts promotion Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) reached a multi-year agreement, which included the rights to broadcast four live events in prime time or late night annually, marking the first time that the UFC aired its events on broadcast television. Its first UFC on Fox event, Velasquez vs. Dos Santos, aired on November 12, 2011. \n\nStations\n\n, Fox has 18 owned-and-operated stations, and current and pending affiliation agreements with 219 additional television stations encompassing 48 states, the District of Columbia and three U.S. possessions; through its Fox Television Stations subsidiary, Fox has the most owned-and-operated stations of the major American commercial broadcast networks. The network has a national reach of 95.15% of all households in the United States (or 297,314,557 Americans with at least one television set). Currently, New Jersey and Delaware are the only U.S. states where Fox does not have a locally licensed affiliate (the former is served by New York City O&O WNYW and Philadelphia O&O WTXF, while the latter is served by WTXF and Salisbury, Maryland affiliate WBOC-DT2).\n\nFox largely discontinued analog broadcasts on June 12, 2009 as part of the transition to digital television. As a newer broadcast network, Fox still has a number of low-power affiliates that broadcast in analog, covering markets like Youngstown, Ohio (WYFX-LD). In some markets, including both of the ones mentioned, these stations also maintain digital simulcasts on a subchannel of a co-owned/co-managed television station. Fox also maintains a sizeable number of subchannel-only affiliations in cities located outside of the 50 largest Nielsen-designated markets, that do not have enough full-power stations to support a standalone affiliation and/or have a low-power station as the only other option as an affiliate; the largest subchannel-only Fox affiliate by market size is WGGB-DT2 in Springfield, Massachusetts.\n\nCurrently outside of Fox's core O&O group, Tribune Broadcasting is Fox's largest affiliate group in terms of overall market reach, with fourteen stations (including some former Fox O&Os that were spun off in 2008 to Local TV, which Tribune later acquired in 2013, to finance former Fox parent News Corporation's purchase of The Wall Street Journal); the Sinclair Broadcast Group is the largest operator of Fox stations by numerical total, owning or providing services to 26 Fox-affiliated stations.\n\nFox previously distributed its programming in markets that did not have enough stations to support an affiliate via Foxnet, a cable channel acting as an alternate national feed for small and certain mid-sized U.S. markets (generally those within the bottom 110 Nielsen media markets) that launched in 1991 and operated until its shutdown on September 12, 2006; the channel featured a master schedule of programs acquired from the syndication market and some brokered programming to fill time slots not occupied by Fox network programming. The concept behind Foxnet served as the basis for The WB 100+ Station Group (launched in September 1998 as the cable-only feed of The WB) and The CW Plus (the immediate successor of The WB 100+, which launched in September 2006 as a cable-only/digital multicast feed of The CW), which both allow the customization of localized branding (which Foxnet did not allow its cable partners to do) in addition to allowing affiliates to sell local advertising.\n\nDifferences between Fox and the \"Big Three\" networks\n\nNetwork programming\n\nFox's programming schedule differs from the \"Big Three\" networks in several significant ways: the network airs its prime time programming for only two hours on Monday through Saturday evenings and three hours on Sundays, compared to the three hours on Monday through Saturdays (from 8:00 to 11:00 p.m.) and four hours on Sunday nights (from 7:00 to 11:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific Time) programmed by the three longer-established networks, ABC, CBS and NBC. This scheduling is termed as \"common prime,\" referring to the programming of prime time content across all of the conventional broadcast networks during the early- and mid-evening hours, while the 10:00 p.m. (Eastern) hour is programmed only by the three older networks.\n\nFox has traditionally avoided programming the 10:00 p.m. hour, choosing to cede the time period to its local affiliates for them to program, many of which air local newscasts during that hour; however, some exceptions do exist for select special film presentations, which by virtue of their running time (depending on whether the film's original length, combined with commercial breaks that would be included in the television cut, would exceed a traditional two-hour broadcast timeslot) must spill over into the 10:00 p.m. hour, and overruns from live sports telecasts scheduled to air during prime time. However, the network did regularly schedule programming in the 10:00 p.m. hour on Sunday nights from September 1989 to September 1993 (when that specific time period was turned back over to its affiliates), although it never added programming at that hour on any other night. Fox's original reason for the reduced number of prime time hours was to avoid fulfilling FCC requirements in effect at the time to be considered a network, and to be free of resulting regulations, although these rules have since been relaxed.\n\nDespite being a major network, in addition to not carrying national morning and evening newscasts, Fox also does not air any network daytime programming (such as soap operas, game shows or talk shows). Because of this, the network's owned-and-operated stations and affiliates handle the responsibility of programming daytime hours with syndicated and/or locally produced programming (corporate sister 20th Television distributes several syndicated daytime programs carried by many Fox stations, such as Divorce Court and The Wendy Williams Show; Fox Television Stations also test markets certain series from 20th Television and other syndicators such as Warner Bros. Television Distribution that are proposed for national distribution on some of its stations). The network also does not carry network-supplied children's programming on Saturday mornings or late-night programming on Monday through Friday nights. Local affiliates either produce their own programming and/or run syndicated programs during these time periods. Because of the erratic scheduling of the network's sports programming, many Fox stations choose to run a mix of syndicated programming, infomercials and especially movies to fill weekend afternoon timeslots when a sports event is not scheduled to air.\n\nIn addition, from the network's inception, Fox has produced two versions of its program promotions for distribution to the network's stations: a standard version incorporating airtimes based on their broadcast in the Eastern/Central or Pacific/Mountain time zones, depending on the feed used by the station (as those seen during network commercial breaks), and versions with \"clean\" end tags to allow stations to include local airtime and station information through graphical insertion and verbal continuity by station promotional announcers during the program logo graphic or prime time menu. This practice – which differs from that long used by ABC, NBC and CBS, which only allow their stations to insert logos within their network promotions – was also later adopted by The WB and UPN (and their successors The CW, and to a lesser extent, MyNetworkTV) for use by their affiliated stations.\n\nNews programming\n\nWithin Fox's station body, the quantity of locally produced news programming varies considerably compared to the owned-and-operated and affiliated stations of ABC, NBC and CBS (which typically carry at least 4½ hours of local newscasts on weekdays and one hour on weekends, which are usually spread across morning, midday, early and/or late evening timeslots). At minimum, most Fox stations run a late-evening newscast following the network's prime time lineup (at 10:00 p.m. in the Eastern and Pacific, and 9:00 p.m. in the Central and Mountain Time Zones), which typically run 30 minutes to one hour in length; besides the fact that the network's stations have more latitude to air an earlier late-evening newscast since Fox does not program that hour, this stems from the fact that several of its charter stations were already airing prime time newscasts as independent stations prior to the network's launch (such as New York City O&O WNYW, which debuted its 10:00 p.m. newscast in March 1967). Most Fox stations also carry a weekday morning newscast of one to three hours in length at 7:00 a.m., as a local alternative to the national morning news programs provided by the \"Big Three\" networks (though mainly in the case of Fox stations that have a news operation and in a few cases, via simulcasts with ABC-, NBC- and CBS-affiliated stations that operate a Fox affiliate, this is often part of a morning news block that runs for four to six hours on average).\n\nFox has fewer stations that have an independent news operation than those of ABC, NBC and CBS; , 70 of Fox's 236 stations (including all 18 owned-and-operated stations) maintain in-house news departments (compared to roughly ⅝-⅞ of the stations of each of the three other major broadcast networks, whose newscasts are either produced in-house or in conjunction with another station). WJW (channel 8) in Cleveland (which was owned by the network from 1997 to 2008) and WXIN (channel 59) in Indianapolis have the highest weekly total of news programming hours among Fox's stations, at 65½ hours.\n\nMost Fox stations that run a news operation utilize a newscast-intensive scheduling format that is very similar to an ABC-, NBC- or CBS-affiliated station – which in many cases, may incorporate midday and/or early-evening newscasts, the latter of which is often extended by a half-hour to compete with the national evening newscasts provided by the \"Big Three\" networks; some Fox stations – except for those owned by Fox Television Stations (excluding WFLD in Chicago, the largest Fox station and only O&O of the network without an early-evening newscast) and most owned by Tribune Broadcasting – air their early-evening newscasts only on Monday through Friday nights, due to frequent sports event overruns into that daypart on weekends. The first Fox station to adopt such a scheduling format was WSVN in Miami; upon affiliating with the network in January 1989, WSVN retained its existing morning, midday and early evening newscasts, while moving its late newscast from 11:00 to 10:00 p.m. and expanding it to one hour (the station later relaunched an 11:00 p.m. newscast in 1995), and expanding its weekday morning newscast by two hours. This type of format was later adopted by the former major network stations that switched to Fox between 1994 and 1996, especially those affected by New World and Burnham Broadcasting affiliation deals. Many Fox stations with upstart news departments often do not run a full slate of newscasts initially, usually carrying only a prime time newscast at first, before gradually adding other newscasts over time.\n\nIn several markets (largely those ranked outside of the 50 largest Nielsen-designated television markets), production of the local Fox affiliate's newscasts is outsourced to an NBC, ABC or CBS station – either due to insufficient funds or studio space for a news department or in most cases, as a byproduct of the station being operated through a legal duopoly or a management agreement with a major network affiliate (such as with Esteem Broadcasting-owned WEMT (channel 39) in Greeneville, Tennessee, which has its newscasts produced by NBC affiliate WCYB-TV (channel 5) through a local marketing agreement with Bonten Media Group). Fox affiliates that outsource their news production to a major-network affiliate often carry a lesser amount of news programming than is possible with an affiliate with a standalone news department due to the contracting station's preference to avoid having the Fox station's newscasts compete against their own in common timeslots (differing from outsourcing agreements between two same-market ABC, CBS or NBC affiliates in certain areas, in which both stations may simulcast newscasts in the same timeslots). The lone exceptions to this rule currently are El Paso, Texas affiliate KFOX-TV (channel 14) and WXIN, which respectively began producing newscasts for their CBS-affiliated duopoly partners using resources from their existing news departments in September 2014 (when new sister stations KFOX and KDBC-TV (channel 4) consolidated their operations into a single facility) and January 2015 (when WXIN sister WTTV (channel 4) affiliated with CBS), with the Fox stations maintaining the same amount of news programming that they did beforehand. In Dayton, Ohio, Sinclair took the unusual step in August 2015 of branding its newscasts primarily as \"Fox 45 News\", establishing WRGT-TV as their primary branding station despite also owning ABC affiliate WKEF in a duopoly and the news operation previously originating with WKEF; newscasts air as \"Fox 45 News on ABC22\" on WKEF.\n\nWPGH-TV (channel 53) in Pittsburgh is the largest Fox station by Nielsen market ranking (at #23) that outsources its news programming; NBC affiliate WPXI (channel 11; owned by Cox Media Group) has produced the station's 10:00 p.m. newscast since 2006, when WPGH shut down its news department following the closure of owner Sinclair Broadcast Group's News Central division. A few Fox affiliates only air syndicated programming in time periods where newscasts would air on other major network stations. The largest Fox station by market size that does not carry news programming is WSYT (channel 68) in Syracuse, New York (which discontinued a 10:00 p.m. newscast produced by CBS affiliate WTVH (channel 5) in 2006); KRBK (channel 49) in Springfield, Missouri is the largest Fox station without full-scale newscasts (since the program debuted in 2013, it carries only a ten-minute newscast on weeknights, which was originally bookended by Fox and MyNetworkTV's respective prime time lineups until the latter service moved its affiliation to former Fox station KOZL-TV in September 2014).\n\nRelated services\n\nVideo-on-demand services\n\nFox maintains several video on demand venues for viewers to watch the network's programming, including a traditional VOD service called Fox on Demand, which is carried on most traditional cable and telco providers. Fox's parent company 21st Century Fox is also a part-owner of the streaming video service Hulu, and offers most of the network's programming through Hulu's website and mobile app, along with traditional streaming via the network's Full Episode portal on Fox.com.\n\nThe most recent episodes of the network's shows are usually made available on the Fox on Demand television service the day after their original broadcast. In addition, fast forwarding capabilities are disabled while viewing content (a commonality for video-on-demand television services provided by the U.S. broadcast networks) and the program's original advertisements that aired during the initial broadcast are included for a week after becoming available on the service, before being replaced by direct response advertising thereafter. Due to restrictions put in place by the network in January 2012 to encourage live or same-week DVR viewing via traditional and cable on demand methods, Hulu and Fox.com both impose an eight-day delay for most viewers to access the most recent episode of any Fox program, restricting day-after-air streaming of its shows on both services to subscribers of certain pay television providers (such as Dish Network and Verizon FiOS) using an ISP account through agreements made with Fox; however, Hulu offers newer episodes of Fox programs the day after their original broadcast to subscribers of its Hulu Plus service requiring only a user-determined login.\n\nFox HD\n\nFox began broadcasting its programming in 720p high definition on September 12, 2004, with that day's slate of NFC football games during week one of the 2004 NFL season. Until March 14, 2016, the network did not display an on-screen logo graphic on the bottom-right corner of the screen, outside of a ten-second sweep of a \"Fox HD\" promotional logo (which until the end of 2010, also featured a sponsor tag for DirecTV); instead a trigger in Fox's program delivery system at each station displayed the logo bug of an owned-and-operated or affiliate station in the right-hand corner of the 16:9 screen frame, which disappeared during commercial breaks (the station logo bug would still be triggered even if Fox programming was pre-empted locally due to breaking news, severe weather coverage or special programming, though some stations, such as WGGB-DT2 in Springfield, Massachusetts, did not display a logo or substitute only the \"FOX\" logo alone). However, network or affiliate bugs are not displayed during Fox Sports programming. During some high-profile or live programs such as American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance, however, Fox forwent the affiliate's logo and displayed its network logo instead, mainly for promotional consideration due to fair use of clips from each series by other media outlets (such as news programs, talk shows, and review and satirical programs that rely on clip content); until 2014, the bug was placed in the 4:3 safe area. The Sunday political talk program Fox News Sunday displays the \"Fox HD\" logo at all times for both that reason and because of many stations airing the program on tape delay later in the morning. Beginning on March 14, 2016, the standard Fox logo with hashtag is now used on all programming, with the station bug flashed for a few moments at the start of a program or coming out of commercial, as is traditionally done with ABC, CBS and NBC stations. In addition, the Fox HD bug was discontinued, although it is still used on Fox News Sunday.\n\nOn some Fox programs, a hashtag rests above the affiliate's logo (for example, #newgirl or #bones) to provide viewers reference to the network's official Twitter search tag to find or start discussions during the program being broadcast. In April 2012, additional tags relating to plot points in a given episode (for instance, the #saturdaynightGLEEver tag for an April 2012 episode of Glee of that same title) began to also be promoted in this space to both add additional trending topics and spread out more conversations on Twitter. In cases where the Fox bug appears instead of the station's logo bug, the Twitter hashtag is directly above the Fox logo in the safe area.\n\nDuring the transitional period from analog to digital television, Fox was the only commercial television network in the U.S. to air programs in widescreen that were not available in HD (which were identified as being presented in \"Fox High Resolution Widescreen\" from 2001 to 2006). Prior to the launch of its HD feed, some sitcoms and drama series were presented in widescreen standard-definition, with reality, talk and game shows (American Idol being the first major exception, as it began to be presented in high definition in 2008) later being presented only in widescreen enhanced definition. The children's sports program This Week in Baseball began airing in widescreen in 2009, while Fox News Sunday converted to HD when Fox News Channel began operating from its new high-definition facilities in November 2008 (prior to Fox News Channel's conversion to a unified widescreen presentation on both its high-definition and standard-definition feeds in September 2010, it was the final Fox News program to structure its graphics and camera positions for the 4:3 safe area). MADtv was produced to air only in 4:3 until September 2008, likely due to a combination of stations tape-delaying the program and therefore being unable to offer it via the live network feed in 16:9, and the show's producers not making the switch to the format. The final Fox show to convert to HD was Family Guy beginning with its September 26, 2010, episode; all programming provided by Fox, except for the Weekend Marketplace block, is now broadcast in widescreen and in high definition .\n\nFox is unique among U.S. broadcasters as it distributes its HD feed over satellite to the network's affiliates as an MPEG transport stream intended to be delivered bit-for-bit for broadcast transmission. During network programming hours, local commercials are inserted over the feed using a transport stream splicer. Affiliates of most other networks decode compressed satellite network video feeds and then re-encode them for final over-the-air transmission.\n\nAfter Fox began broadcasting its sports programming with graphics optimized for 16:9 displays rather than the 4:3 safe area in late July 2010, the network asked cable and satellite providers to comply and use the #10 Active Format Description flag it now disseminates over Fox programming, which displays content natively broadcast in 16:9 in a letterboxed format suitable for 4:3 television screens to allow any optimized graphical elements to be displayed in full. Subsequently, a number of Fox O&Os and affiliates also began disseminating the AFD #10 flag over local news and syndicated programs that the stations broadcast in HD, and have incorporated graphical elements seen during local programs and on-air promos (as well as logo bugs) optimized for the letterboxed presentation.\n\nBranding\n\nStation standardization\n\nDuring the early 1990s, Fox began having its stations use a branding structure using a combination of the \"Fox\" name and the station's channel number, often followed by the licensed call letters (for instance, WNYW in New York City, WTTG in Washington, D.C. and WAGA-TV in Atlanta, Georgia, are all branded as \"Fox 5\"). By the mid-to-late 1990s, stations minimized their call letters to be just barely readable while still in compliance with FCC identification requirements. This marked the start of the trend for other networks to apply such naming schemes, especially at CBS, which uses the \"CBS Mandate\" on most of its owned-and-operated stations.\n\nThe branding scheme has varied in some markets, with some Fox stations using a city or regional name within the branding instead of the channel number (for example, Chicago owned-and-operated station WFLD branded as \"Fox Chicago\" from 1997 to 2012 and Philadelphia O&O WTXF-TV branded as \"Fox Philadelphia\" from 1995 to 2003); a few of the network's stations also minimized use of the \"Fox\" name, opting to use their call letters or a more generic branding (WSVN in Miami, which has branded as \"WSVN 7\" for general use and \"(Channel) 7 News\" for its newscasts since it joined the network in January 1989; KHON-TV (channel 2) in Honolulu, which changed its general branding from \"Fox 2\" to \"KHON 2\" in 2003; WDRB in Louisville, Kentucky, which dropped its \"Fox 41\" brand in favor of branding by its call letters in September 2011; and KVRR (channel 15) in Fargo, North Dakota, which dropped the generic \"Fox\" branding it used in part due to its network of repeater stations throughout eastern North Dakota in favor of branding by its calls in May 2015). Similarly, most of the stations that switched to Fox as a result of its 1994 affiliation deal with New World Communications retained their Big Three-era branding for general and/or news purposes (with a few exceptions such as WJW in Cleveland, which dropped its CBS-era \"TV8\" and \"Newscenter 8\" brands in 1995, in favor of \"Fox is ei8ht\" as a general brand and ei8ht is News as the title for its newscasts), before conforming to Fox's station branding conventions when Fox Television Stations acquired New World in 1997.\n\nA particularly unique situation was with KTVU (channel 2) in Oakland-San Francisco, which as a Fox affiliate under longtime owner Cox Enterprises, retained its perennial \"Channel 2\" brand (with limited references as \"Fox Channel 2\" by the early 1990s). In 1996, the station rebranded as \"KTVU Fox 2\" for general purposes (adding the Fox logo on the underside of the top line of its heritage \"Circle Laser 2\" logo as well), while retaining \"(KTVU) Channel 2 News\" as the branding for its newscasts. Fox Television Stations (which traded WFXT in Boston and WHBQ-TV (channel 13) in Memphis station to Cox in 2014, in exchange for KTVU and sister station KICU-TV) instituted the \"KTVU Fox 2\" branding full-time in February 2015, retaining the \"Circle Laser 2\" both within the group's standardized \"boxkite\" logo and in an alternate version (which would become the primary logo through its de-emphasis of the O&O standardization later that year) placed next to a prominent Fox wordmark. \n\nStarting in 2006, more standardization of the O&Os began to take place both on-air and online. All of the network's O&Os began adopting an on-air look more closely aligned with the Fox News Channel, which included a standardized red, white and blue boxkite-style logo augmented by red pillars (which rotated on-air, particularly in the logo bugs seen during newscasts). After News Corporation's acquisition of the social networking site Myspace (which it sold in June 2011 to a consortium that included singer Justin Timberlake among its backers), some Fox O&Os launched websites with identical layouts and similar URL domains under the \"MyFox\" scheme (such as MyFoxDC.com for WTTG). On-air usage of the FNC-inspired logos was reduced in August 2012 (when a new standardized graphics package was implemented, with wordmark bugs being used during newscasts and other programming), while several of the O&Os ceased using the \"MyFox\" domains in 2015.\n\nLogos\n\nThe first official logo introduced by Fox when the network inaugurated its programming in October 1986 was a three-square design containing the letters \"FBC\" (for \"Fox Broadcasting Company\"), which was used during the network's first six months in existence and was primarily featured as a network identification slide at the beginning of The Late Show with Joan Rivers. On April 5, 1987, when the network inaugurated its prime time programming, a more familiar logo based on 20th Century Fox's signature logo design was introduced, featuring just the capitalized \"FOX\" name alongside the familiar trademark searchlights and double-pane platform (Fox's owned-and-operated stations used a variant for station identifications from 1987 to 1989, which incorporated both an \"O\" and searchlight in negative space, the latter of which intersected the \"X\" and panes within the otherwise translucent yellow/gold logo; until as late as the mid-1990s, some Fox affiliates that did not license the regulation network logo used those that imitated the 20th Century Fox-inspired design in their station logos).\n\nIn September 1993, the familiar logo was given a more \"hip\" makeover, with the \"FOX\" wordmark overhauled into its current proprietary logotype and the angle changed, removing the tilting (the 1987 logo remained in use during the 1993–94 season in print advertisements featured in TV Guide and other television listings magazines). Starting with the introduction of this logo, the network began displaying an on-screen bug within its programs on the lower right-hand corner of the screen (initially for one minute at the start of each program segment or act, eventually being displayed throughout the program outside of commercial breaks, before reverting to the former display format regularly upon the 2009 digital transition). The \"O\" character also underwent a makeover, acquiring its trademark pillar-like bowl, which has since become a major focal point for the logo and Fox advertising in lieu of the searchlight motif.\n\nAnother revised logo was introduced for the 1995–96 television season, removing the searchlights, but retaining the two lower panes and adding a third pane atop the logotype. A variant of the original 1993 design was implemented in 1996, excluding the panes underneath the network name, but restoring the searchlights placed behind the \"F\" and \"X\" in the Fox wordmark.\n\nThe current version of the logo was introduced in 1999, removing the searchlights completely and switching the logo exclusively to a wordmark design. Despite this, the searchlight theme remains an integral part of 21st Century Fox's branding efforts; they are still incorporated into Fox News Channel's logo, and the universal station logo introduced in 2006 by Fox's owned-and-operated stations – which were retained by the seven former O&Os that Fox Television Stations sold in 2008 to Local TV and had spread to several Fox stations owned by Tribune Broadcasting (including those it acquired through the company's 2013 merger with Local TV; the logo introduced by the O&Os was modified for Tribune's Fox affiliates in 2012 to feature only one searchlight as part of the company's graphical standardizations for those stations) and certain other Fox affiliates not owned or operated by either company. The 1996–99 searchlight logo is still used within the logos of a small number of Fox affiliates; the searchlights continued to be featured in the logo of sister channel FX until a rebranding effort in 2008.\n\nControversy\n\nIndecency\n\nControversy surrounded the network in 2002 and 2003 over obscenities, expressed respectively by Cher and Nicole Richie, aired live during Fox's broadcast of the Billboard Music Awards on its affiliates in the Eastern and Central Time Zones despite the use of five-second audio delays; the indecent material was edited out when the program was broadcast in other time zones from the Mountain Time Zone westward. Both of the obscene instances were condemned by the Parents Television Council, and named by them among the worst instances on television from 2001 to 2004. PTC members filed tens of thousands of complaints to the Federal Communications Commission regarding the broadcasts. A subsequent apology made by Fox representatives was labeled a \"sham\" by PTC president L. Brent Bozell III, who argued that the network could have easily used an audio delay to edit out the obscene language. As the FCC was investigating the broadcasts, in 2004, Fox announced that it would begin extending live broadcast delays to five minutes from its standard five or ten seconds to more easily be able to edit out obscenities uttered over the air. In June 2007, in the case Federal Communications Commission v. Fox Television Stations, the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the FCC could not issue indecency fines against Fox because it does not have the authority to fine broadcasters for fleeting expletives, such as in the case of the Billboard Awards. The FCC eventually decided to appeal the Second Circuit Court's finding. The U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari and oral arguments in FCC v. Fox, et al., began November 4, 2008. \n\nThe Parents Television Council has also criticized many popular Fox shows for perceived indecent content, such as American Dad!, Arrested Development, The Simpsons, Family Guy, Hell's Kitchen, Married... with Children, Prison Break and That '70s Show. The Council sometimes has gone even as far as to file complaints with the Federal Communications Commission regarding indecent content within Fox programming, having done so for That '70s Show and Married by America, having successfully been able to get the FCC to fine the network nearly $1 million for its airing of the latter program. That fine was reduced to $91,000 in January 2009 after an appeal of the fine by Fox was granted as a result of its earlier discovery that the FCC originally claimed to have received 159 complaints regarding the content in Married by America; it later admitted to only receiving 90, which came from only 23 people. A study of the complaints by blogger Jeff Jarvis deduced that all but two were virtually identical to each other, meaning that the $1.2 million judgment was based on original complaints written by a total of only three people. \n\nIn addition, as of 2004, Fox programming has been chosen by the PTC for its weekly \"Worst TV Show of the Week\" feature more often than programming from any other broadcast network. \n\nInternational broadcasts\n\nCanada\n\nLike ABC, CBS and NBC, Fox programming is carried on cable, satellite and IPTV providers in Canada through affiliates and owned-and-operated stations of the network that are located within proximity to the Canada–United States border (such as KCPQ/Seattle, Washington; KAYU-TV/Spokane, Washington; KMSP-TV/Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota; WFFF-TV/Burlington, Vermont; WFXT/Boston, WJBK/Detroit and WUTV/Buffalo, New York), some of which may also be receivable over-the-air in parts of Canada depending on an individual station's signal coverage. Most programming is generally the same, aside from simultaneous substitutions imposed by the provider that results in the American station's signal being replaced with programming from a Canadian network (such as CTV, the Global Television Network or City) if both happen to air a particular program in the same time period – which is often done to protect the Canadian station's advertising revenue.\n\nMexico\n\nFox programming is available in Mexico through affiliates in markets located within proximity to the Mexico–United States border (such as KECY-TV/Yuma, Arizona-El Centro, California; KFOX-TV/El Paso, Texas, KUQI/Corpus Christi, Texas and KSWB-TV/San Diego), whose signals are readily receivable over-the-air in border areas of northern Mexico. XHRIO-TDT of Matamoros, Tamaulipas also broadcasts Fox programming on a digital subchannel as a simulcast of KFXV-LD in nearby McAllen, Texas.\n\nCaribbean\n\nIn the Caribbean, the Bahamas and Bermuda, Fox programming is available on many cable and satellite providers through either New York City owned-and-operated station WNYW or Miami affiliate WSVN. In addition, LKK Group owns Fox-affiliated stations in Puerto Rico (WSJX-LP in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, which became a Fox affiliate 2006) and the U.S. Virgin Islands (WVXF-DT2 in Charlotte Amalie, which affiliated with the network in 2014).\n\nAsia Pacific\n\nIndia\n\nFox programming is available in India through Sorensen Pacific Broadcasting-owned low-power affiliate KEQI-LP in Dededo (which affiliated with the network in 2004, and is relayed throughout the island via the second digital subchannel of Tamuning ABC affiliate KTGM). Programming is shown day and date on a one-day tape delay as Guam is located on the west side of the International Date Line (for example, the Sunday night lineup is carried on Monday evenings, and is advertised by the station as airing on the latter night in on-air promotions). Live programming, including breaking news coverage and sporting events, airs as scheduled; because of the time difference with the six U.S. time zones, live sports coverage (such as NFL games and NASCAR races) often air in the territory during the early morning hours.\n\nAmerican Samoa\n\nCable television providers on the island nation of American Samoa carry the network's programming via Honolulu, Hawaii affiliate KHON-TV.\n\nFederated States of Micronesia\n\nIn the Federated States of Micronesia, Fox programming is available on domestic cable providers via Honolulu affiliate KHON-TV.\n\nEurope\n\nBelgium (Flanders)\n\nA domestic version of Fox debuted in Flanders, the Dutch-speaking region of Belgium, on October 1, 2015; the channel is currently only available on cable provider Telenet.\n\nBulgaria\n\nOn October 15, 2012, a domestic version of the network launched in Bulgaria. Fox Bulgaria is part of a collection of television networks distributed by Fox International Channels (which include entertainment channels Fox Life and Fox Crime, documentary channels National Geographic Channel and Nat Geo Wild, cooking channel 24KITCHEN, news channel Sky News and children's channel BabyTV).\n\nCroatia\n\nFox launched in Croatia on October 15, 2012. Operated by Fox International Channels Bulgaria, all of Fox's channels (Fox, Fox Life, Fox Crime, Fox Movies, 24Kitchen, NatGeo (both SD and HD), NatGeo Wild (also HD and SD) and BabyTV) carry programming identical to that available on its Serbian channels. Most of them, with the exception of Nat Geo HD and BabyTV, feature subtitled promos and program content. All of the channels, except for BabyTV, are broadcast in 16:9 widescreen, while Fox has plans to offer an HD feed.\n\nFinland\n\nFox International Channels Nordic started terrestrial broadcasts of a domestic version of Fox in Finland on April 16, 2012. \n\nGreece\n\nOn October 1, 2012, a regional version of FX serving Greece and Cyprus was rebranded as Fox. The channel is operated alongside Fox Life, Nat Geo (SD and HD), Nat Geo Wild (SD and HD), Nat Geo Adventure and Baby TV under the ownership of Fox International Channels Greece. In 2013, Adam Theiler, senior vice president of Fox International Channels Southeast Europe, announced that the company would launch a new channel dedicated to cooking with domestically produced programs; it also announced plans to produce documentaries catering to the Greek audience and launch HD feeds of the Greek versions of Fox and Fox Life.\n\nLatvia\n\nA domestic version of Fox debuted in Latvia on October 1, 2012.\n\nLithuania\n\nA domestic version of Fox debuted in Lithuania on October 1, 2012.\n\nNetherlands\n\nA domestic version of Fox launched in the Netherlands on August 19, 2013. The channel's schedule features a mix of American series (such as The Walking Dead and The Simpsons), as well as sports programs such as soccer and UFC events. Fox is available digitally on Ziggo and UPC Cablecom channel 11, KPN channel 14, and on CanalDigitaal on either channel 52 or 58. \n\nPoland\n\nA domestic version of Fox debuted in Poland on November 6, 2010. Currently (state on January 2016) following channels are available there: Fox / Fox HD, Fox Comedy / Fox Comedy HD, National Geographic Channel / National Geographic Channel HD, Nat Geo Wild / Nat Geo Wild HD, Nat Geo People / Nat Geo People HD and Baby TV.\n\nRussia\n\nA Russian version of the network, FOX Russia, debuted on October 1, 2012, replacing FOX Crime Russia. Fox International Channels also operates a regional versions of Fox Life, Baby TV, the National Geographic Channel and Nat Geo Wild.\n\nSerbia\n\nOn October 15, 2012, Fox International Channels launched FOX Serbia, a Serbian cable and satellite entertainment channel. Fox International Channels also distributes co-owned networks Fox Life, Fox Crime, Fox Movies, National Geographic Channel and Nat Geo Wild, 24KITCHEN, Sky News and BabyTV.\n\nSweden\n\nA domestic version of Fox debuted in Sweden on September 22, 2014.\n\nTurkey\n\nFox Turkey launched in Turkey on February 24, 2007.\n\nUK and Ireland\n\nOn January 11, 2013, Fox launched the United Kingdom and Ireland, as a rebranding of the domestic version of FX." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Alfred_Nobel.txt" ], "title": [ "Alfred Nobel" ], "wiki_context": [ "Alfred Bernhard Nobel (; ; 21 October 1833 – 10 December 1896) was a Swedish chemist, engineer, innovator, and armaments manufacturer.\n\nKnown for inventing dynamite, Nobel also owned Bofors, which he had redirected from its previous role as primarily an iron and steel producer to a major manufacturer of cannon and other armaments. Nobel held 355 different patents, dynamite being the most famous. After reading a premature obituary which condemned him for profiting from the sales of arms, he bequeathed his fortune to institute the Nobel Prizes. The synthetic element nobelium was named after him. His name also survives in modern-day companies such as Dynamit Nobel and AkzoNobel, which are descendants of mergers with companies Nobel himself established.\n\nLife and career\n\nBorn in Stockholm, Alfred Nobel was the third son of Immanuel Nobel (1801–1872), an inventor and engineer, and Carolina Andriette (Ahlsell) Nobel (1805–1889). The couple married in 1827 and had eight children. The family was impoverished, and only Alfred and his three brothers survived past childhood. Through his father, Alfred Nobel was a descendant of the Swedish scientist Olaus Rudbeck (1630–1702), and in his turn the boy was interested in engineering, particularly explosives, learning the basic principles from his father at a young age. Alfred Nobel's interest in technology was inherited from his father, an alumnus of Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. \n\nFollowing various business failures, Nobel's father moved to Saint Petersburg in 1837 and grew successful there as a manufacturer of machine tools and explosives. He invented modern plywood and started work on the \"torpedo\". In 1842, the family joined him in the city. Now prosperous, his parents were able to send Nobel to private tutors and the boy excelled in his studies, particularly in chemistry and languages, achieving fluency in English, French, German and Russian. For 18 months, from 1841 to 1842, Nobel went to the only school he ever attended as a child, the Jacobs Apologistic School in Stockholm.\n\nAs a young man, Nobel studied with chemist Nikolai Zinin; then, in 1850, went to Paris to further the work. There he met Ascanio Sobrero, who had invented nitroglycerin three years before. Sobrero strongly opposed the use of nitroglycerin, as it was unpredictable, exploding when subjected to heat or pressure. But Nobel became interested in finding a way to control and use nitroglycerin as a commercially usable explosive, as it had much more power than gunpowder. At age 18, he went to the United States for four years to study chemistry, collaborating for a short period under inventor John Ericsson, who designed the American Civil War ironclad USS Monitor. Nobel filed his first patent, an English patent for a gas meter, in 1857, while his first Swedish patent, which he received in 1863, was on 'ways to prepare gunpowder'. \n\nThe family factory produced armaments for the Crimean War (1853–1856); but, had difficulty switching back to regular domestic production when the fighting ended and they filed for bankruptcy. In 1859, Nobel's father left his factory in the care of the second son, Ludvig Nobel (1831–1888), who greatly improved the business. Nobel and his parents returned to Sweden from Russia and Nobel devoted himself to the study of explosives, and especially to the safe manufacture and use of nitroglycerine (discovered in 1847 by Ascanio Sobrero, one of his fellow students under Théophile-Jules Pelouze at the University of Paris). Nobel invented a detonator in 1863; and, in 1865, he designed the blasting cap.\n\nOn 3 September 1864, a shed, used for the preparation of nitroglycerin, exploded at the factory in Heleneborg, Stockholm, killing five people, including Nobel's younger brother Emil. Dogged by more minor accidents but unfazed, Nobel went on to build further factories, focusing on improving the stability of the explosives he was developing. Nobel invented dynamite in 1867, a substance easier and safer to handle than the more unstable nitroglycerin. Dynamite was patented in the US and the UK and was used extensively in mining and the building of transport networks internationally. In 1875 Nobel invented gelignite, more stable and powerful than dynamite, and in 1887 patented ballistite, a predecessor of cordite.\n\nNobel was elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1884, the same institution that would later select laureates for two of the Nobel prizes, and he received an honorary doctorate from Uppsala University in 1893.\n\nNobel's brothers Ludvig and Robert exploited oilfields along the Caspian Sea and became hugely rich in their own right. Nobel invested in these and amassed great wealth through the development of these new oil regions. During his life Nobel issued 355 patents internationally and by his death his business had established more than 90 armaments factories, despite his belief in pacifism. \n\nIn 1888, the death of his brother Ludvig caused several newspapers to publish obituaries of Alfred in error. A French obituary stated \"Le marchand de la mort est mort\" (\"The merchant of death is dead\").\n\nDeath\n\nAccused of “high treason against France” for selling Ballistite to Italy, Nobel moved from Paris to Sanremo, Italy in 1891. On December 10, 1896, Alfred Nobel succumbed to a lingering heart ailment, suffered a stroke, and died. Unbeknownst to his family, friends or colleagues, he had left most of his wealth in trust, in order to fund the awards that would become known as the Nobel Prizes. He is buried in Norra begravningsplatsen in Stockholm.\n\nPersonal life\n\nThrough baptism and confirmation Alfred Nobel was Lutheran and during his Paris years he regularly attended the Church of Sweden Abroad led by pastor Nathan Söderblom who would in 1930 also be the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. \n\nNobel travelled for much of his business life, maintaining companies in various countries in Europe and North America and keeping a permanent home in Paris from 1873 to 1891. He remained a solitary character, given to periods of depression. Though Nobel remained unmarried, his biographers note that he had at least three loves. Nobel's first love was in Russia with a girl named Alexandra, who rejected his proposal. In 1876 Austro-Bohemian Countess Bertha Kinsky became Alfred Nobel's secretary, but after only a brief stay she left him to marry her previous lover, Baron Arthur Gundaccar von Suttner. Though her personal contact with Alfred Nobel had been brief, she corresponded with him until his death in 1896, and it is believed that she was a major influence in his decision to include a peace prize among those prizes provided in his will. Bertha von Suttner was awarded the 1905 Nobel Peace prize, 'for her sincere peace activities'.\n\nNobel's third and longest-lasting relationship was with Sofie Hess from Vienna, whom he met in 1876. The liaison lasted for 18 years. After his death, according to his biographers Evlanoff, Fluor and Fant, Nobel's letters were locked within the Nobel Institute in Stockholm. They were released only in 1955, to be included with other biographical data.\n\nDespite the lack of formal secondary and tertiary level education, Nobel gained proficiency in six languages: Swedish, French, Russian, English, German and Italian. He also developed sufficient literary skill to write poetry in English. His Nemesis, a prose tragedy in four acts about Beatrice Cenci, partly inspired by Percy Bysshe Shelley's The Cenci, was printed while he was dying. The entire stock except for three copies was destroyed immediately after his death, being regarded as scandalous and blasphemous. The first surviving edition (bilingual Swedish–Esperanto) was published in Sweden in 2003. The play has been translated into Slovenian via the Esperanto version and into French. In 2010 it was published in Russia in another bilingual (Russian–Esperanto) edition.\n\nInventions\n\nNobel found that when nitroglycerin was incorporated in an absorbent inert substance like kieselguhr (diatomaceous earth) it became safer and more convenient to handle, and this mixture he patented in 1867 as 'dynamite'. Nobel demonstrated his explosive for the first time that year, at a quarry in Redhill, Surrey, England. In order to help reestablish his name and improve the image of his business from the earlier controversies associated with the dangerous explosives, Nobel had also considered naming the highly powerful substance \"Nobel's Safety Powder\", but settled with Dynamite instead, referring to the Greek word for \"power\" ().\n\nNobel later on combined nitroglycerin with various nitrocellulose compounds, similar to collodion, but settled on a more efficient recipe combining another nitrate explosive, and obtained a transparent, jelly-like substance, which was a more powerful explosive than dynamite. 'Gelignite', or blasting gelatin, as it was named, was patented in 1876; and was followed by a host of similar combinations, modified by the addition of potassium nitrate and various other substances. Gelignite was more stable, transportable and conveniently formed to fit into bored holes, like those used in drilling and mining, than the previously used compounds and was adopted as the standard technology for mining in the Age of Engineering bringing Nobel a great amount of financial success, though at a significant cost to his health. An offshoot of this research resulted in Nobel's invention of ballistite, the precursor of many modern smokeless powder explosives and still used as a rocket propellant.\n\nNobel Prizes\n\nIn 1888 Alfred's brother Ludvig died while visiting Cannes and a French newspaper erroneously published Alfred's obituary. It condemned him for his invention of dynamite and is said to have brought about his decision to leave a better legacy after his death. The obituary stated, ' (\"The merchant of death is dead\") and went on to say, \"Dr. Alfred Nobel, who became rich by finding ways to kill more people faster than ever before, died yesterday.\" Alfred (who never had a wife or children) was disappointed with what he read and concerned with how he would be remembered.\n\nOn 27 November 1895, at the Swedish-Norwegian Club in Paris, Nobel signed his last will and testament and set aside the bulk of his estate to establish the Nobel Prizes, to be awarded annually without distinction of nationality. After taxes and bequests to individuals, Nobel's will allocated 94% of his total assets, 31,225,000 Swedish kronor, to establish the five Nobel Prizes. This converted to £1,687,837 (GBP) at the time. In 2012, the capital was worth around SEK 3.1 billion (USD 472 million, EUR 337 million), which is almost twice the amount of the initial capital, taking inflation into account.\n\nThe first three of these prizes are awarded for eminence in physical science, in chemistry and in medical science or physiology; the fourth is for literary work \"in an ideal direction\" and the fifth prize is to be given to the person or society that renders the greatest service to the cause of international fraternity, in the suppression or reduction of standing armies, or in the establishment or furtherance of peace congresses.\n\nThe formulation for the literary prize being given for a work \"in an ideal direction\" (' in Swedish), is cryptic and has caused much confusion. For many years, the Swedish Academy interpreted \"ideal\" as \"idealistic\" (') and used it as a reason not to give the prize to important but less romantic authors, such as Henrik Ibsen and Leo Tolstoy. This interpretation has since been revised, and the prize has been awarded to, for example, Dario Fo and José Saramago, who do not belong to the camp of literary idealism.\n\nThere was room for interpretation by the bodies he had named for deciding on the physical sciences and chemistry prizes, given that he had not consulted them before making the will. In his one-page testament, he stipulated that the money go to discoveries or inventions in the physical sciences and to discoveries or improvements in chemistry. He had opened the door to technological awards, but had not left instructions on how to deal with the distinction between science and technology. Since the deciding bodies he had chosen were more concerned with the former, the prizes went to scientists more often than engineers, technicians or other inventors.\n\nIn 2001, Alfred Nobel's great-great-nephew, Peter Nobel (b. 1931), asked the Bank of Sweden to differentiate its award to economists given \"in Alfred Nobel's memory\" from the five other awards. This request added to the controversy over whether the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel is actually a legitimate \"Nobel Prize\". \n\nMonuments\n\nThe Monument to Alfred Nobel (, ) in Saint Petersburg is located along the Bolshaya Nevka River on Petrogradskaya Embankment. It was dedicated in 1991 to mark the 90th anniversary of the first Nobel Prize presentation. Diplomat [http://www.cyclopaedia.info/wiki/Tomas-Bertelman Thomas Bertelman] and Professor Arkady Melua initiators of creation of the monument (1989). Professor A. Melua has provided funds for the establishment of the monument ([http://humanistica.ru/pages_en/news_nobeldv.htm J.S.Co. \"Humanistica\"], 1990–1991). The abstract metal sculpture was designed by local artists Sergey Alipov and Pavel Shevchenko, and appears to be an explosion or branches of a tree. Petrogradskaya Embankment is the street where the Nobel's family lived until 1859. \n\nCriticism\n\nAlfred Nobel has also been criticized for his leading role in the manufacture and sales of weaponry, and focus has been given to the question of the prizes being intended to improve his reputation in that regard." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Robinson_Crusoe.txt" ], "title": [ "Robinson Crusoe" ], "wiki_context": [ "Robinson Crusoe is a novel by Daniel Defoe, first published on 25 April 1719. The first edition credited the work's protagonist Robinson Crusoe as its author, leading many readers to believe he was a real person and the book a travelogue of true incidents. It was published under the full title The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, Of York, Mariner: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an un-inhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the Mouth of the Great River of Oroonoque; Having been cast on Shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but himself. With An Account how he was at last as strangely deliver'd by Pyrates.\n\nEpistolary, confessional, and didactic in form, the book is presented as an autobiography of the title character (whose birth name is Robinson Kreutznaer)—a castaway who spends thirty years on a remote tropical island near Trinidad, encountering cannibals, captives, and mutineers, before ultimately being rescued.\n\nThe story has since been perceived to be based on the life of Alexander Selkirk, a Scottish castaway who lived for four years on a Pacific island called \"Más a Tierra\", now part of Chile, which was renamed Robinson Crusoe Island in 1966, but various literary sources have also been suggested.\n\nDespite its simple narrative style, Robinson Crusoe was well received in the literary world and is often credited as marking the beginning of realistic fiction as a literary genre. Before the end of 1719, the book had already run through four editions, and it has gone on to become one of the most widely published books in history, spawning numerous sequels and adaptations for stage, film, and television.\n\nPlot summary\n\nCrusoe (the family name corrupted from the German name \"Kreutznaer\") sets sail from the Queen's Dock in Hull on a sea voyage in August 1651, against the wishes of his parents, who want him to pursue a career, possibly in law. After a tumultuous journey where his ship is wrecked in a storm, his lust for the sea remains so strong that he sets out to sea again. This journey, too, ends in disaster, as the ship is taken over by Salé pirates (the Salé Rovers) and Crusoe is enslaved by a Moor. Two years later, he escapes in a boat with a boy named Xury; a captain of a Portuguese ship off the west coast of Africa rescues him. The ship is en route to Brazil. Crusoe sells Xury to the captain. With the captain's help, Crusoe procures a plantation.\n\nYears later, Crusoe joins an expedition to bring slaves from Africa, but he is shipwrecked in a storm about forty miles out to sea on an island (which he calls the Island of Despair) near the mouth of the Orinoco river on 30 September 1659. The details of Crusoe's island were probably based on the Caribbean island of Tobago, since that island lies a short distance north of the Venezuelan coast near the mouth of the Orinoco river, in sight of Trinidad. He observes the latitude as 9 degrees and 22 minutes north. He sees penguins and seals on his island. (However, seals and penguins live together in the Northern Hemisphere only around the Galápagos Islands.) As for his arrival there, only he and three animals, the captain's dog and two cats, survive the shipwreck. Overcoming his despair, he fetches arms, tools and other supplies from the ship before it breaks apart and sinks. He builds a fenced-in habitat near a cave which he excavates. By making marks in a wooden cross, he creates a calendar. By using tools salvaged from the ship, and some he makes himself from \"ironwood\", he hunts, grows barley and rice, dries grapes to make raisins, learns to make pottery and raises goats. He also adopts a small parrot. He reads the Bible and becomes religious, thanking God for his fate in which nothing is missing but human society.\n\nMore years pass and Crusoe discovers native cannibals, who occasionally visit the island to kill and eat prisoners. At first he plans to kill them for committing an abomination but later realizes he has no right to do so, as the cannibals do not knowingly commit a crime. He dreams of obtaining one or two servants by freeing some prisoners; when a prisoner escapes, Crusoe helps him, naming his new companion \"Friday\" after the day of the week he appeared. Crusoe then teaches him English and converts him to Christianity.\n\nAfter more natives arrive to partake in a cannibal feast, Crusoe and Friday kill most of the natives and save two prisoners. One is Friday's father and the other is a Spaniard, who informs Crusoe about other Spaniards shipwrecked on the mainland. A plan is devised wherein the Spaniard would return to the mainland with Friday's father and bring back the others, build a ship, and sail to a Spanish port.\n\nBefore the Spaniards return, an English ship appears; mutineers have commandeered the vessel and intend to maroon their captain on the island. Crusoe and the ship's captain strike a deal in which Crusoe helps the captain and the loyal sailors retake the ship and leave the worst mutineers on the island. Before embarking for England, Crusoe shows the mutineers how he survived on the island and states that there will be more men coming. Crusoe leaves the island 19 December 1686 and arrives in England on 11 June 1687. He learns that his family believed him dead; as a result, he was left nothing in his father's will. Crusoe departs for Lisbon to reclaim the profits of his estate in Brazil, which has granted him much wealth. In conclusion, he transports his wealth overland to England to avoid travelling by sea. Friday accompanies him and, en route, they endure one last adventure together as they fight off famished wolves while crossing the Pyrenees.\n\nSources\n\nThe story has been perceived to be based on the life of Alexander Selkirk, a Scottish castaway who lived for four years on the Pacific island called \"Más a Tierra\", now part of Chile, which was renamed Robinson Crusoe Island in 1966, but the time scale does not match. Another likely source for the narrative was Ibn Tufail's Hayy ibn Yaqdhan, a twelfth-century philosophical novel also set on a desert island and translated into Latin and English a number of times in the half-century preceding Defoe's novel. Amber Haque (2004), \"Psychology from Islamic Perspective: Contributions of Early Muslim Scholars and Challenges to Contemporary Muslim Psychologists\", Journal of Religion and Health 43 (4): 357–377 [369].Martin Wainwright, [http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,12084,918454,00.html Desert island scripts], The Guardian, 22 March 2003. Yet another source for Defoe's novel may have been the Robert Knox account of his abduction by the King of Ceylon in 1659 in \"An Historical Account of the Island Ceylon\". see Alan Filreis In his 2003 book In Search of Robinson Crusoe, Tim Severin contends that the account of Henry Pitman in a short book chronicling his escape from a Caribbean penal colony and subsequent shipwrecking and desert island misadventures is the inspiration for the story. Arthur Wellesley Secord in his Studies in the narrative method of Defoe (1963: 21–111) painstakingly analyses the composition of Robinson Crusoe and gives a list of possible sources of the story, rejecting the common theory that the story of Selkirk is Defoe's only source.\n\nReception and sequels\n\nThe book was published on 25 April 1719. Before the end of the year, this first volume had run through four editions.\n\nBy the end of the 19th century, no book in the history of Western literature had more editions, spin-offs and translations (even into languages such as Inuktitut, Coptic and Maltese) than Robinson Crusoe, with more than 700 such alternative versions, including children's versions with mainly pictures and no text. \n\nThe term \"Robinsonade\" was coined to describe the genre of stories similar to Robinson Crusoe.\n\nDefoe went on to write a lesser-known sequel, The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1719). It was intended to be the last part of his stories, according to the original title page of its first edition, but a third part, Serious Reflections During the Life & Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, With His Vision of the Angelic World (1720), was later added.\n\nReal-life castaways\n\nThere were many stories of real-life castaways in Defoe's time. Defoe's immediate inspiration for Crusoe is usually thought to be a Scottish sailor named Alexander Selkirk, who was rescued in 1709 by Woodes Rogers' expedition after four years on the uninhabited island of Más a Tierra in the Juan Fernández Islands off the Chilean coast. Rogers' \"Cruising Voyage\" was published in 1712, with an account of Alexander Selkirk's ordeal. However, Robinson Crusoe is far from a copy of Rogers' account: Selkirk was marooned at his own request, while Crusoe was shipwrecked; the islands are different; Selkirk lived alone for the whole time, while Crusoe found companions; Selkirk stayed on his island for four years, not twenty-eight. Furthermore, much of the appeal of Defoe's novel is the detailed and captivating account of Crusoe's thoughts, occupations and activities which goes far beyond that of Rogers' basic descriptions of Selkirk, which account for only a few pages. However, one must not forget that Defoe presented himself as the editor of the story. He was adamant to maintain his claim that the actual author was \"Robinson Crusoe\": a real person who was still alive in 1719–20.\n\nTim Severin's book Seeking Robinson Crusoe (2002) unravels a much wider and more plausible range of potential sources of inspiration, and concludes by identifying castaway surgeon Henry Pitman as the most likely. An employee of the Duke of Monmouth, Pitman played a part in the Monmouth Rebellion. His short book about his desperate escape from a Caribbean penal colony, followed by his shipwrecking and subsequent desert island misadventures, was published by J. Taylor of Paternoster Row, London, whose son William Taylor later published Defoe's novel. Severin argues that since Pitman appears to have lived in the lodgings above the father's publishing house and that Defoe himself was a mercer in the area at the time, Defoe may have met Pitman in person and learned of his experiences first-hand, or possibly through submission of a draft. \n\nSeverin also discusses another publicised case of a marooned man named only as Will, of the Miskito people of Central America, who may have led to the depiction of Man Friday. \n\nInterpretations \n\nNovelist James Joyce noted that the true symbol of the British Empire is Robinson Crusoe, to whom he ascribed stereotypical and somewhat hostile English racial characteristics: \"He is the true prototype of the British colonist. ... The whole Anglo-Saxon spirit in Crusoe: the manly independence, the unconscious cruelty, the persistence, the slow yet efficient intelligence, the sexual apathy, the calculating taciturnity.\" In a sense Crusoe attempts to replicate his society on the island. This is achieved through the use of European technology, agriculture and even a rudimentary political hierarchy. Several times in the novel Crusoe refers to himself as the \"king\" of the island, whilst the captain describes him as the \"governor\" to the mutineers. At the very end of the novel the island is explicitly referred to as a \"colony\". The idealised master-servant relationship Defoe depicts between Crusoe and Friday can also be seen in terms of cultural imperialism. Crusoe represents the \"enlightened\" European whilst Friday is the \"savage\" who can only be redeemed from his barbarous way of life through assimilation into Crusoe's culture. Nonetheless Defoe also takes the opportunity to criticise the historic Spanish conquest of South America.\n\nAccording to J. P. Hunter, Robinson is not a hero but an everyman. He begins as a wanderer, aimless on a sea he does not understand, and ends as a pilgrim, crossing a final mountain to enter the promised land. The book tells the story of how Robinson becomes closer to God, not through listening to sermons in a church but through spending time alone amongst nature with only a Bible to read.\n\nConversely, cultural critic and literary scholar Michael Gurnow views the novel from a Rousseauian perspective. In \"'The Folly of Beginning a Work Before We Count the Cost': Anarcho-Primitivism in Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe,\" the central character's movement from a primitive state to a more civilized one is interpreted as Crusoe's denial of humanity's state of nature. \n\nRobinson Crusoe is filled with religious aspects. Defoe was a Puritan moralist and normally worked in the guide tradition, writing books on how to be a good Puritan Christian, such as The New Family Instructor (1727) and Religious Courtship (1722). While Robinson Crusoe is far more than a guide, it shares many of the themes and theological and moral points of view. \"Crusoe\" may have been taken from Timothy Cruso, a classmate of Defoe's who had written guide books, including God the Guide of Youth (1695), before dying at an early age – just eight years before Defoe wrote Robinson Crusoe. Cruso would have been remembered by contemporaries and the association with guide books is clear. It has even been speculated that God the Guide of Youth inspired Robinson Crusoe because of a number of passages in that work that are closely tied to the novel. A leitmotif of the novel is the Christian notion of Providence, penitence and redemption. Crusoe comes to repent of the follies of his youth. Defoe also foregrounds this theme by arranging highly significant events in the novel to occur on Crusoe's birthday. The denouement culminates not only in Crusoe's deliverance from the island, but his spiritual deliverance, his acceptance of Christian doctrine, and in his intuition of his own salvation.\n\nWhen confronted with the cannibals, Crusoe wrestles with the problem of cultural relativism. Despite his disgust, he feels unjustified in holding the natives morally responsible for a practice so deeply ingrained in their culture. Nevertheless, he retains his belief in an absolute standard of morality; he regards cannibalism as a \"national crime\" and forbids Friday from practising it.\n\nIn classical, neoclassical and Austrian economics, Crusoe is regularly used to illustrate the theory of production and choice in the absence of trade, money and prices. Crusoe must allocate effort between production and leisure and must choose between alternative production possibilities to meet his needs. The arrival of Friday is then used to illustrate the possibility of and gains from trade.\n\nTim Severin's book Seeking Robinson Crusoe (2002) unravels a much wider range of potential sources of inspiration. Severin concludes his investigations by stating that the real Robinson Crusoe figure was Henry Pitman, a castaway who had been surgeon to the Duke of Monmouth. Pitman's short book about his desperate escape from a Caribbean penal colony for his part in the Monmouth Rebellion, his shipwrecking and subsequent desert island misadventures was published by J. Taylor of Paternoster Street, London, whose son William Taylor later published Defoe's novel. Severin argues that since Pitman appears to have lived in the lodgings above the father's publishing house and since Defoe was a mercer in the area at the time, Defoe may have met Pitman and learned of his experiences as a castaway. If he didn't meet Pitman, Severin points out that Defoe, upon submitting even a draft of a novel about a castaway to his publisher, would undoubtedly have learned about Pitman's book published by his father, especially since the interesting castaway had previously lodged with them at their former premises.\n\nSeverin also provides evidence in his book that another publicised case of a real-life marooned Miskito Central American man named only as Will may have caught Defoe's attention, inspiring the depiction of Man Friday in his novel.\n\nThe novel has been variously read as an allegory for the development of civilisation, as a manifesto of economic individualism and as an expression of European colonial desires but it also shows the importance of repentance and illustrates the strength of Defoe's religious convictions. It is also considered by many to be the first novel written in English. Early critics, such as Robert Louis Stevenson, admired it, saying that the footprint scene in Crusoe was one of the four greatest in English literature and most unforgettable; more prosaically, Dr. Wesley Vernon has seen the origins of forensic podiatry in this episode.Richard West (1998) Daniel Defoe: The Life and Strange, Surprising Adventures. New York: Carroll & Graf. ISBN 978-0-7867-0557-3. It has inspired a new genre, the Robinsonade, as works like Johann David Wyss's The Swiss Family Robinson (1812) adapt its premise and has provoked modern postcolonial responses, including J. M. Coetzee's Foe (1986) and Michel Tournier's Vendredi ou les Limbes du Pacifique (in English, Friday, or, The Other Island) (1967). Two sequels followed, Defoe's The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1719) and his Serious reflections during the life and surprising adventures of Robinson Crusoe: with his Vision of the angelick world (1720). Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels (1726) in part parodies Defoe's adventure novel.\n\nLegacy\n\nThe book proved so popular that the names of the two main protagonists have entered the language. During World War II, people who decided to stay and hide in the ruins of the German-occupied city of Warsaw for a period of three winter months, from October to January 1945, when they were rescued by the Red Army, were later called Robinson Crusoes of Warsaw. Robinson Crusoe usually referred to his servant as \"my man Friday\", from which the term \"Man Friday\" (or \"Girl Friday\") originated.\n\nRobinson Crusoe marked the beginning of realistic fiction as a literary genre. Its success led to many imitators, and castaway novels became quite popular in Europe in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Most of these have fallen into obscurity, but some became established, including The Swiss Family Robinson.\n\nJonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, published seven years after Robinson Crusoe, may be read as a systematic rebuttal of Defoe's optimistic account of human capability. In The Unthinkable Swift: The Spontaneous Philosophy of a Church of England Man, Warren Montag argues that Swift was concerned about refuting the notion that the individual precedes society, as Defoe's novel seems to suggest. In Treasure Island, author Robert Louis Stevenson parodies Crusoe with the character of Ben Gunn, a friendly castaway who was marooned for many years, has a wild appearance, dresses entirely in goat skin and constantly talks about providence.\n\nIn Jean-Jacques Rousseau's treatise on education, Emile, or On Education, the one book the protagonist is allowed to read before the age of twelve is Robinson Crusoe. Rousseau wants Emile to identify himself as Crusoe so he can rely upon himself for all of his needs. In Rousseau's view, Emile needs to imitate Crusoe's experience, allowing necessity to determine what is to be learned and accomplished. This is one of the main themes of Rousseau's educational model.\n\nIn The Tale of Little Pig Robinson, Beatrix Potter directs the reader to Robinson Crusoe for a detailed description of the island (the land of the Bong tree) to which her eponymous hero moves. In Wilkie Collins' most popular novel, The Moonstone, one of the chief characters and narrators, Gabriel Betteredge, has faith in all that Robinson Crusoe says and uses the book for a sort of divination. He considers The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe the finest book ever written, reads it over and over again, and considers a man but poorly read if he had happened not to read the book.\n\nFrench novelist Michel Tournier published Friday (French Vendredi ou les Limbes du Pacifique) in 1967. His novel explores themes including civilization versus nature, the psychology of solitude, as well as death and sexuality in a retelling of Defoe's Robinson Crusoe story. Tournier's Robinson chooses to remain on the island, rejecting civilization when offered the chance to escape 28 years after being shipwrecked. Likewise, in 1963, J. M. G. Le Clézio, winner of the 2008 Nobel Prize in literature, published the novel Le Proces-Verbal. The book's epigraph is a quote from Robinson Crusoe, and like Crusoe, Adam Pollo suffers long periods of loneliness.\n\n\"Crusoe in England\", a 183-line poem by Elizabeth Bishop, imagines Crusoe near the end of his life, recalling his time of exile with a mixture of bemusement and regret.\n\nJ. M. Coetzee's 1986 novel Foe recounts the tale of Robinson Crusoe from the perspective of Susan Barton, the protagonist of another of Defoe's novels.\n\nThe story was also illustrated and published in comic book form by Classics Illustrated in 1943 and 1957. The much improved 1957 version was inked/penciled by Sam Citron, who is most well known for his contributions to the earlier issues of Superman. \n\nA pantomime version of Robinson Crusoe was staged at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in 1796, with Joseph Grimaldi as Pierrot in the harlequinade. The piece was produced again in 1798, this time starring Grimaldi as Clown. In 1815, Grimaldi played Friday in another version of Robinson Crusoe. \n\nJacques Offenbach wrote an opéra comique called Robinson Crusoé, which was first performed at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 23 November 1867. This was based on the British pantomime version rather than the novel itself. The libretto was by Eugène Cormon and Hector-Jonathan Crémieux.\n\nThere is a 1927 silent film titled Robinson Crusoe. The Soviet 3D film Robinzon Kruzo was produced in 1946. Luis Buñuel directed Adventures of Robinson Crusoe starring Dan O'Herlihy, released in 1954. Walt Disney later modernized the novel with Lt. Robin Crusoe, U.S.N., featuring Dick Van Dyke. Peter O'Toole and Richard Roundtree co-starred in a 1975 film Man Friday which satirically portrayed Crusoe as incapable of seeing his dark-skinned companion as anything but an inferior creature, while Friday is more enlightened and empathetic. In 1988, Aidan Quinn portrayed Robinson Crusoe in the film Crusoe. A 1997 movie entitled Robinson Crusoe starred Pierce Brosnan and received limited commercial success. Variations on the theme include the 1954 Miss Robin Crusoe, with a female castaway, played by Amanda Blake, and a female Friday, and the 1964 film Robinson Crusoe on Mars, starring Paul Mantee, with an alien Friday portrayed by Victor Lundin. The 2000 film Cast Away, with Tom Hanks as a FedEx employee stranded on an Island for many years, also borrows much from the Robinson Crusoe story.\n\nIn 1964 a French film production crew made a 13-part serial of The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. It starred Robert Hoffman. The black and white series was dubbed into English and German. In the UK, the BBC broadcast it on numerous occasions between 1965 and 1977. In 1981 Czechoslovakian director and animator Stanislav Látal made a version of the story under the name Dobrodružství Robinsona Crusoe, námořníka z Yorku (The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, a sailor from York) combining traditional and stop-motion animation. The movie was coproduced by regional West Germany broadcaster Sudwestfunk Baden-Baden.\n\nEditions\n\n*Robinson Crusoe, Oneworld Classics 2008. ISBN 978-1-84749-012-4\n*Robinson Crusoe, Penguin Classics 2003. ISBN 978-0-14-143982-2\n*Robinson Crusoe, Oxford World's Classics 2007. ISBN 978-0-19-283342-6\n*Robinson Crusoe, Bantam Classics" ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "Parasceve", "Prosábbaton", "Frigg's Day", "TGIFF", "Friday", "Thank Goodness It's Friday", "Frigg's day", "Prosabbaton", "Friday the 12th", "Fryeeday" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "parasceve", "friday 12th", "fryeeday", "tgiff", "thank goodness it s friday", "prosabbaton", "prosábbaton", "frigg s day", "friday" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "friday", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "Friday" }

{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Boris_Badenov.txt", "Natasha_Fatale.txt" ], "title": [ "Boris Badenov", "Natasha Fatale" ], "wiki_context": [ "Boris Badenov (Борис Баденов) is the main antagonist of the 1959-1964 animated cartoons Rocky and His Friends and The Bullwinkle Show, collectively referred to as The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show for short. He was voiced by Paul Frees. \n\nBadenov's name is a play on that of the 16th-century Russian Tsar Boris Godunov (\"bad enough\" vs. \"good enough\"). His accent and explosive temper are an homage to Hollywood actor Akim Tamiroff, especially Tamiroff's role in The Great McGinty, a 1940 movie directed by Preston Sturges.\n\nCharacter overview \n\nBoris is a spy for the fictional nation of Pottsylvania, and takes orders from the nation's leader, Fearless Leader (and occasionally the rarely seen Mr. Big). Boris's missions range from trying to steal a secret rocket fuel formula to eliminating all television from the United States as part of Pottsylvania's various attempts to seize power. Boris, who is thoroughly dedicated to (and takes delight in) all manners of nefarious deeds, would also sometimes engage in his own schemes, such as starting his own organized crime gang and hiring himself out as a professional executioner. Separately from the television series, a commercial for the Rocky and Bullwinkle Show featuring Boris established that he was an active member of Local 12 of the Villains, Thieves, and Scoundrels Union. During this commercial, Boris also claims to be \"the world's greatest no-goodnik.\" Boris is also quite proud of the fact that the nicest thing Fearless Leader ever did for him was sending a picture of himself to Boris inscribed \"Drop Dead — Fearless Leader\".\n\nAccording to the Rialto Theater's \"Moosebill\" for \"Downhill: The Musical\" (a special table of contents insert created for the DVD box set Rocky and Bullwinkle & Friends, The Third Season), Boris was educated in the Pottsylvania public schools before taking a scoundrelship to U.S.C. (the University of Safecracking), from which he graduated magna cum louse. He has a cast-iron stomach; and because of it was one of only three survivors of the ruling clique of Pottsylvania, the other two being his superiors Fearless Leader and Mister Big. Boris enjoys light reading; his favorite book is an anthology of fiendish plans called the Fireside Crook Book. He is also a charter member of the Van Gogh Society, a Pottsylvanian club whose members collect human ears.\n\nEarly in the series, Boris was taller and had red eyes. After the first episodes, he changed to his normal height, but still retained the red eyes until a few episodes afterwards. Humorously, they changed from red to white after he had woken up from a long slumber, as if the redness was caused by sleep deprivation.\n\nBoris is nearly always accompanied by his fellow spy, Natasha Fatale. The first time he appeared without her was in the story arc, \"Buried Treasure.\" The first story arc where neither appeared was \"The Three Moosketeers.\"\n\nUsually, Boris's misdeeds are thwarted by Rocky the Flying Squirrel and Bullwinkle the Moose. Boris's attempts at killing \"moose and squirrel\" (as he refers to them) also always end in failure, usually by his own scheme backfiring on him. As Boris expresses his plight in one promo: \"I send in lady spy with package which is really bomb. Door gets locked, she can't get out, who gets blown up? Me!\" \n\nBoris appeared in all but three Rocky and Bullwinkle storylines: The Three Moosketeers, The Ruby Yacht, and Mucho Loma. Boris often appeared in segments of Bullwinkle's Corner, Mr. Know-It-All, and Rocky and Bullwinkle Fan Club.\n\nCatchphrases \n\nBoris's main catchphrase (spoken when frustrated) is \"Raskolnikov!\" (a reference to the novel Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky), spoken in his Pottsylvanian accent (a mock-Russian accent).\n\nBoris would also say, \"Sharrup you mouth!\" to Natasha when his schemes failed. However, in the final segment of \"Greenpernt Oogle\", when he and Natasha were stuck in their own mine field, he says to her, \"Natasha, next time I get fiendish plan, do me big favor? Sharrup my mouth!\" She does indeed do this in one episode, saying those very words to Boris as the car they were in dropped over a cliff to the ground in the 8-segmented story arc \"The Treasure of Monte Zoom.\" Also, whenever his superior gives him an order, he utters the line \"You sair it!\"\n\nBoris would usually greet a new acquaintance by saying, \"Allow me to introducing myself. I am Boris Badenov, world's greatest no-goodnik.\"\n\nIn other media \n\n*In the 1992 Showtimes Network film Boris and Natasha, the live-action Boris was played by Dave Thomas.\n*In the 2000 theatrical film The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle, the live-action Boris was played by Jason Alexander.\n*In the 2014 3D DreamWorks Animation short film Rocky & Bullwinkle, Boris was voiced by Robert Cait.\n\nDisguises \n\nBoris usually assumes a cover identity with a gag name, including:\n\n*Swami Ben Boris (Jet Fuel Formula)\n*Sir Thomas Lippen-Boris (Jet Fuel Formula)\n*Sir Hilary Pushemoff (Jet Fuel Formula)\n*Hemlock Soames (Box Top Robbery)\n*Mojave Max, a prospector (Upsidaisium)\n*A scientist (Jet Fuel Formula)\n*Cerulean Bleu, an art collector (Painting Theft)\n*Abou Ben Boris (Upsidaisium)\n*Gunga Drain (Upsidaisium and Bumbling Brothers Circus)\n*An \"Imposter\" five-star general (Upsidaisium)\n*Rocky\n*Ace Ricken-Boris (Jet Fuel Formula)\n*\"The Big Cheese\" (Metal Munching Mice)\n*Madman Morris (The Treasure of Monte Zoom)\n*Colonial Tomsk Parkoff (Metal Munching Mice) - this is a takeoff of Colonel Tom Parker\n*Mayor Avaricious J. Wardheeler (Bumbling Brothers Circus)\n*Clarence Darrownoff, the lawyer (Jet Fuel Formula)\n*Alfred Hitchhike, a movie director (The Last Angry Moose)\n*Indian (Jet Fuel Formula)\n*D.W. Grifter, a talent scout (The Last Angry Moose)\n*Horatio Hornswaggle (Wailing Whale)\n*Art gallery guard (Painting Theft)\n*\"Devil Dan\" Hatful (Missouri Mish Mash)\n*Egbert Kitchie Itchie (Banana Formula)\n*Felonious Floy (Missouri Mish Mash)\n*Salesman of Dancer, Prancer, Blitzen, & Fink advertising agency (Moosylvania Saved)\n*Ship's doctor (Banana Formula)\n*Track walker (Missouri Mish Mash)\n*A British police officer (Rue Brittania)\n*Big Chief Skunk-Who-Walks-Like-Man (Bumbling Brothers Circus)\n*Doctor/Surgeon (Rue Brittania)\n*Little boy (Painting Theft)\n*A butler (Rue Britannia)\n*Spencer Traceback (The Treasure of Monte Zoom)\n*Pete McMoss (Pottsylvania Creeper)\n*Hushaboom inventor Bermuda Schwartz's mother (Banana Formula)\n*Honeychile Moosemoss (Buried Treasure)\n*Little Old Apple \"Witch Lady\" (Louse On Ninety-Second Street)\n*Babyface Braunschweiger, the Minnesota Monster (Buried Treasure)\n*Sherlock Ohms (Missouri Mish Mash)\n*Hailfellow J. Backslap, Official Washington Greeter (Missouri Mish Mash)\n*Black Angus (Lazy J. Ranch)\n*\"Crazy Legs\" Cowpuss, the football player (Wossamotta U)\n*Boris Claus (Topsy Turvy World)\n*Claude Badley, a Lion tamer (Bumbling Brothers Circus)\n*Taxi driver (Jet Fuel Formula and Moosylvania)\n*Steamboat captain / card player (The Weather Lady)\n*Van N. Storridge, a moving man (Moosylvania Saved)\n*Igmar Badenov, director (Rocky and Bullwinkle Fan Club segment)\n*The Knave of Hearts (Bullwinkle's Corner segment \"The Queen of Hearts\")\n*Pieman (Bullwinkle's Corner segment \"Simple Simon\")\n\nRocky and Bullwinkle never see through Boris's thin disguises, though Rocky often remarks that his face or voice seems somehow familiar.", "Natasha Fatale is the secondary antagonist of the 1959-1964 animated cartoons Rocky and His Friends and The Bullwinkle Show, collectively referred to as The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show. She was voiced by June Foray.\n\nCharacter overview\n\nNatasha is a spy for the fictional country of Pottsylvania, and takes orders from the nation's leader, Fearless Leader (and occasionally the rarely seen Mr. Big). Natasha usually serves as an assistant or accomplice to her fellow spy, Boris Badenov. Like Boris, Natasha also delights in performing various criminal misdeeds. She seems to be a bit more intelligent, or at least more thoughtful, than Boris, and often points out flaws in his plans or voices slight contempt for his bungling, to which his customary reply was \"Sharrup you mouth, Natasha.\" Also, Natasha does say \"SHARRUP YOUR MOUTH!!!!\" to Boris in one episode, as their car goes over a cliff in The Treasure of Monte Zoom.\n\nHer past is something of a mystery. According to the Rialto Theater's Moosebill for \"Downhill: The Musical\" (a special table of contents insert created for the DVD box set Rocky and Bullwinkle & Friends, The Third Season), Natasha is supposedly the only child of Axis Sally and Count Dracula. A former Miss Transylvania, she was expelled from college for subversive activities at a local cemetery. She traveled from Transylvania to the United States at the age of 19, landing in New York, where she spent two years posing for Charles Addams and as the party girl who pops out of the big cake at embalmers' stag parties. She met Boris Badenov in 1948, when they were both arrested for throwing rocks at Girl Scouts hawking Girl Scout Cookies. Boris was immediately smitten with her charms, and they have been partners in crime ever since. In her spare time, Natasha raises tarantulas and is the National Chairman of the Society to Restore The Real Meaning of Halloween.\n\nIn one Rocky and Bullwinkle Short Natasha, Boris and Peter Peachfuzz were in a musical contest judged by Rocket J. Squirrel; Natasha plays the balinka; when Boris sneered at Natasha for playing such a \"malady\", Natasha \"crowned\" Borris with the instrument; when Natasha won a trophy Boris again sneered at Natasha claiming the last time she \"took\" something, she got 90 days in jail; again Natasha \"crowned\" Boris with the trophy!\n\nUsually, Natasha's and Boris's misdeeds are thwarted by Rocky the Flying Squirrel and Bullwinkle the Moose. She refers to them collectively as \"Moose and Squirrel.\"\n\nNatasha is almost always shown in a purple dress, but in the last season it is often red.\n\nNatasha often appeared in the \"Rocky and Bullwinkle Fan Club\" segments, and appeared in two \"Mr. Know-it-All\" segments, \"How to be a Beatnik\" and \"How to Teach a Mean Bully a Lesson at the beach.\" Only four Rocky and Bullwinkle storylines do not feature Natasha.\n\nCatchphrases\n\nNatasha's main catchphrase is referring to everyone as \"dollink\" — that is, \"darling\" as spoken with her thick Pottsylvanian accent (a mock-Russian accent) — an homage to actress-socialite Zsa Zsa Gabor and her habit of calling everyone \"darling\" (or in her Hungarian accent, \"dahlink\").\n\nName\n\nNatasha's last name is a pun on the phrase femme fatale, with emphasis on the \"fatal\" part; in keeping with that, Natasha was drawn as a shapely, attractive looking woman. However, in nearly all episodes, the character is identified only as Natasha, with no surname.\n\nShe is apocryphally known as \"Natasha Nogoodnik\". However, she is identified in the series premiere by her proper name by the show's narrator, making \"Fatale\" her canonical and correct surname. However, either or both may be a nom de Guerre.\n\nIn other media\n\n*In the 1992 Showtimes Network film Boris and Natasha: The Movie, she was portrayed by Sally Kellerman. \n*In the 2000 theatrical film The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle, the live-action Natasha was portrayed by Rene Russo. \n*In the 2014 3D DreamWorks Animation short film Rocky & Bullwinkle, Lauri Fraser provided the voice for Natasha. Ironically, Natasha's original voice actor, June Foray, reprised her role as Rocky but not as Natasha." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Shemp_Howard.txt" ], "title": [ "Shemp Howard" ], "wiki_context": [ "Shemp Howard (March 11, 1895 – November 22, 1955 ) was an American actor and comedian. Born Samuel Horwitz, he was called \"Shemp\" because \"Sam\" came out that way in his mother's thick Litvak accent. He is best known today for his role as the third stooge in the Three Stooges, a role he first portrayed at the beginning of the act in the early 1920s (1923–1932) while the act was still associated with Ted Healy and known as \"Ted Healy and his Stooges\", and again from 1947 until his death in 1955. Between his times with the Stooges, Shemp had a successful film career as a solo comedian.\n\nEarly life\n\nShemp was born in Manhattan, New York, and raised in Brooklyn. He was the third-born of the five Horwitz brothers, the sons of their Lithuanian Jewish parents: Solomon Horwitz (1872–1943) and Jennie Horwitz (1870–1939). Moe Howard and Curly Howard were his younger brothers.\n\nCareer\n\nShow business\n\nShemp's brother, Moe Howard, started in show business as a youngster, on stage and in films. Eventually, Moe and Shemp tried their hands as minstrel-show-style \"blackface\" comedians with an act they called \"Howard and Howard—A Study In Black\". Meanwhile, they also worked for a rival vaudeville circuit at the same time, by appearing without makeup.\n\nBy the 1920s, Moe had teamed up with boyhood-friend-turned-vaudeville star Ted Healy in a \"roughhouse\" act. One day Moe spotted his brother Shemp in the audience, and yelled at him from the stage. Quick-witted Shemp yelled right back, and walked onto the stage. From then on he was part of the act, usually known as \"Ted Healy and His Stooges\". His original stooges were the Howard brothers, and others came and went during 1925 - 1928, with Larry Fine joining in March 1928. On stage, Healy would sing and tell jokes while his three noisy stooges would get in his way. He would retaliate with physical and verbal abuse. Shemp played a bumbling fireman in the Stooges' first film, Soup to Nuts (1930), the only film in which he plays one of Healy's gang.\n\nAfter a disagreement with Ted in August 1930, Moe, Larry and Shemp left to launch their own act, \"Howard, Fine & Howard,\" and joined the RKO vaudeville circuit. The three premiered at Los Angeles' Paramount Theatre on August 28, 1930. 1931, they added \"Three Lost Soles\" to the act's name, and took on Jack Walsh as their straight man. Moe, Larry and Shemp continued until July 1932, when Ted Healy approached them to team up again for the Shuberts' Broadway revue \"Passing Show of 1932,\" and they readily accepted the offer. In spite of any differences, Moe knew that an association with the nationally-known Ted Healy provided opportunities the three comics were not achieving on their own.\n\nOn August 16, 1932, in a contract dispute, Healy walked out on the Shuberts' revue during rehearsals. Following this, three days later, tired of what he considered Healy's domineering handling of the Stooges' career, Shemp left Healy's act to remain with \"Passing Show,\" which closed in September during roadshow performances and pan reviews in Detroit and Cincinnati. Shemp regrouped to form his own act and played on the road for a few months. He landed at Brooklyn's Vitaphone Studios for movie appearance opportunities in May 1933. When he split from Healy, Shemp was immediately replaced by his and Moe's younger brother Jerry (known as Curly in the act. \n\nSolo years\n\nShemp Howard, like many New York-based performers, found work at the Vitaphone studio in Brooklyn. Originally playing bit roles in Vitaphone's Roscoe Arbuckle comedies, showing off his goofy appearance, he was entrusted with speaking roles and supporting parts almost immediately. He was featured with Vitaphone comics Jack Haley, Ben Blue and Gus Shy, then co-starred with Harry Gribbon, Daphne Pollard and Johnnie Berkes, and finally starred in his own two-reel comedies. A Gribbon-Howard short, Art Trouble (1934), also features then unknown James Stewart in his first film role.\n\nShemp would seldom stick to the script, and would liven up a scene with ad-libbed incidental dialogue or wisecracks. This became a trademark of his performances. In late 1935, Vitaphone was licensed to produce short comedies based on the \"Joe Palooka\" comic strip. Shemp was cast as \"Knobby Walsh,\" and though only a supporting character became the comic focus of the series, with Johnny Berkes and Lee Weber as his foils. He costarred in the first seven shorts, released during 1936 and 1937; nine were produced altogether, with the last two done after Shemp's departure from Vitaphone for greener pastures on the West Coast.\n\nAway from Vitaphone he attempted, unsuccessfully, to lead his own group of \"stooges\" in the Van Beuren musical comedy short The Knife of the Party. But Shemp's solo career was otherwise successful. He followed his brothers' lead, moved to the West Coast in 1937 and landed supporting-actor roles at several studios, predominantly at Columbia Pictures and Universal Studios. Shemp worked exclusively at Universal from August 1940 - August 1943. He performed with such comics as W. C. Fields, with whom he played the bartender in the film The Bank Dick (1940); and with duo-comedians Abbott and Costello. He also lent comic relief to Charlie Chan and The Thin Man murder mysteries, and was in several Universal B-musicals of the early 1940s, among them Strictly in the Groove (1942), How's About It? (1943), Moonlight and Cactus (1944) and San Antonio Rose (1941), in which he is paired with Lon Chaney, Jr. as a faux Abbott and Costello. Most of these took great advantage of his improvisational skills. He was briefly teamed with comedians Billy Gilbert and Maxie Rosenbloom for three B-comedy features in 1944–45. He also played a few serious parts, such as his supporting role in Pittsburgh (1942), starring Marlene Dietrich and John Wayne.\n\nThe Three Stooges: 1947–1955\n\nDuring 1938–1939 and 1944–1947, Shemp appeared in Columbia's two-reel comedies, co-starring with Columbia regulars Andy Clyde, The Glove Slingers, El Brendel and Tom Kennedy. He was given his own starring series in 1944; he was working for Columbia in this capacity when his brother Curly was felled by a debilitating stroke on May 6, 1946, although he had already suffered a series of them prior to the filming of Beer Barrel Polecats (1946). Shemp reluctantly replaced Curly in Columbia's popular Stooge shorts, knowing that Moe and Larry would be out of work if he refused. He rejoined the Stooges at first on only a temporary basis until Curly recovered, but as Curly's condition worsened it became apparent that Shemp's association with the Stooges would be permanent. Curly died on January 18, 1952, at the age of 48. Before replacing Curly in the film series, Shemp had substituted for his brother in some personal appearances in the early 1940s.\n\nShemp's role as the third Stooge was much different from Curly's. While he could still roll with the punches in response to Moe's slapstick abuse, he was more of a laid-back dimwit as opposed to Curly's energetic man-child persona. And unlike Curly, who had many distinct mannerisms, Shemp's most notable characteristic as a Stooge was a high-pitched \"bee-bee-bee-bee-bee-bee!\" sound, a sort of soft screech done by inhaling. This was rather multi-purpose, since Shemp emitted this sound when scared, sleeping (done as a form of snoring), overtly happy or dazed. It became as much a trademark sound of Shemp's as the \"nyuk nyuk\" sound had become Curly's. \n\nShemp appeared with Moe and Larry in 73 short subjects and the feature film Gold Raiders (1951). He suffered a mild stroke in November 1952, although he recovered from it within weeks and without noticeable effect on his remaining films with the Stooges which were by now often remakes of earlier films that used recycled footage to reduce costs.\n\nPersonal life\n\nIn September 1925, Shemp (at age 30) married Gertrude Frank (28), a fellow New Yorker. They had one child, Morton (1926–1972). \n\nShemp used his somewhat homely appearance for comic effect, often mugging grotesquely or allowing his hair to fall in disarray. He even played along with a publicity stunt that named him \"The Ugliest Man in Hollywood\". (\"I'm hideous,\" he explained to reporters.) Notoriously phobic, his fears included airplanes, automobiles, dogs and water.\n\nAccording to Moe's autobiography, Shemp was involved in a driving accident as a teenager and never obtained a driver's license. \n\nDeath\n\nOn November 22, 1955, Shemp went out with his friends Al Winston and Bobby Silverman to a boxing match (one of Shemp's favorite pastimes), at the old Hollywood Legion Stadium (at North El Centro Avenue & Selma Avenue), located just one block above the Hollywood Palladium. While returning home in a taxicab that evening, he died of a sudden massive heart attack, at the age of 60. He was leaning back and lighting a cigar after telling a joke, when he suddenly slumped over on his friend Al Winston's lap. Al thought Shemp was playing a joke, since Shemp was laughing moments earlier, but realized he was actually dead. Moe's autobiography gives a death date of November 23, 1955, as do most subsequent accounts, because of Moe's book. But much of that book was finished posthumously by his daughter and son-in-law, and some specific details were confused as a result. The Los Angeles county coroner's death certificate states that Shemp Howard died on Tuesday, November 22, 1955, at 11:00 [PM] PST; confirming that, Shemp's obituary appeared in the November 23 afternoon editions of L.A. newspapers, establishing the night of November 22 as the date of death. A different account is offered by former daughter-in-law Geri Greenbaum, who says Shemp's death happened just as their cab came over the rise on Barham Boulevard (heading to his Toluca Lake home).\n\nShemp Howard was entombed in a crypt in the Indoor Mausoleum at the Home of Peace Cemetery in East Los Angeles. His younger brother Curly is also interred there in an outdoor tomb in the Western Jewish Institute section, as well as his parents Solomon & Jennie Horowitz, and older brother Benjamin \"Jacob/Jack\".\n\nTributes\n\nThe Three Stooges earned a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame on August 30, 1983.\n\nThe \"Fake Shemps\" and Legacy\n\nColumbia had promised exhibitors eight Three Stooges comedies for 1956, but only four had been completed at the time of Shemp's death. To fulfill the contract, producer Jules White manufactured four more shorts by reusing old footage of Shemp and filming new connecting scenes with a double (longtime Stooge supporting actor Joe Palma), who is seen mostly from the back.\n\nPalma came to be known by Stooge fans as the \"Fake Shemp\", and director Sam Raimi and his childhood friend actor Bruce Campbell referred to anyone playing a body double or stand-in in other films as \"Shemp\" or \"a Fake Shemp\" in reference to the postmortem Stooge shorts with a double portraying Shemp in some scenes.\n\nThe re-edited films range from clever to blatantly patchy, and are often dismissed as second-rate. Rumpus in the Harem borrows from Malice in the Palace, Hot Stuff from Fuelin' Around, and Commotion on the Ocean (all re-edits released 1956) from Dunked in the Deep (originals all 1949). The best-received (and most technically accomplished) is Scheming Schemers (again 1956), combining new footage with recycled clips from three old Stooge shorts: A Plumbing We Will Go (1940), Half-Wits Holiday (1947) and Vagabond Loafers (1949). \n\nWhen it was time to renew the Stooges' contract, Columbia hired comedian Joe Besser to replace Shemp. Columbia stopped filming new Stooge shorts for theaters in December 1957, but kept the series going into the 1960s by reissuing Shemp's Stooge shorts, so that Shemp Howard remained a popular star for more than a decade after he died.\n\nIn a TV biopic film, The Three Stooges (2000), produced by Mel Gibson, Shemp was portrayed by 'fake Shemp' Johnny Kassir, who donned a floppy, straight-haired wig to portray the famous comic. \n\nSelected filmography\n\n* \"Spring Fever\" (1919)\n* Art Trouble (1934)\n* Another Thin Man (1939)\n* The Bank Dick (1940)\n* Millionaires in Prison (1940)\n* Six Lessons from Madame La Zonga (1941)\n* Tight Shoes (1941)\n* Hold That Ghost (1941)\n*Too Many Blondes (1941)\n* In the Navy (1941)\n* San Antonio Rose (1941)\n* Arabian Nights (1942)\n* Pittsburgh (1942)\n* Private Buckaroo (1942)\n*The Strange Case of Doctor Rx (1942)\n* Strictly in the Groove (1942)\n* How's About It (1943)\n* Crazy Knights (1944)\n* Moonlight and Cactus (1944)\n* Strange Affair (1944)\n* Three of a Kind (1944)\n* One Exciting Week (1946)\n* Africa Screams (1949)\n* Gold Raiders (1951)" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Barbie.txt" ], "title": [ "Barbie" ], "wiki_context": [ "Barbie is a fashion doll manufactured by the American toy-company Mattel, Inc. and launched in March 1959. American businesswoman Ruth Handler is credited with the creation of the doll using a German doll called Bild Lilli as her inspiration.\n\nBarbie is the figurehead of a brand of Mattel dolls and accessories, including other family members and collectible dolls. Barbie has been an important part of the toy fashion doll market for over fifty years, and has been the subject of numerous controversies and lawsuits, often involving parody of the doll and her lifestyle.\n\nMattel has sold over a billion Barbie dolls, making it the company’s largest and most profitable line. However sales have declined sharply since 2014. The doll transformed the toy business in affluent communities worldwide by becoming a vehicle for the sale of related merchandise (accessories, clothes, friends of Barbie, etc.). She had a significant impact on social values by conveying characteristics of female independence and, with her multitude of accessories, an idealized upscale life-style that can be shared with affluent friends. \n\nHistory\n\nRuth Handler watched her daughter Barbara play with paper dolls, and noticed that she often enjoyed giving them adult roles. At the time, most children's toy dolls were representations of infants. Realizing that there could be a gap in the market, Handler suggested the idea of an adult-bodied doll to her husband Elliot, a co-founder of the Mattel toy company. He was unenthusiastic about the idea, as were Mattel's directors.\n\nDuring a trip to Europe in 1956 with her children Barbara and Kenneth, Ruth Handler came across a German toy doll called Bild Lilli. The adult-figured doll was exactly what Handler had in mind, so she purchased three of them. She gave one to her daughter and took the others back to Mattel. The Lilli doll was based on a popular character appearing in a comic strip drawn by Reinhard Beuthin for the newspaper Bild. Lilli was a blonde bombshell, a working girl who knew what she wanted and was not above using men to get it. The Lilli doll was first sold in Germany in 1955, and although it was initially sold to adults, it became popular with children who enjoyed dressing her up in outfits that were available separately.\n\nUpon her return to the United States, Handler redesigned the doll (with help from engineer Jack Ryan) and the doll was given a new name, Barbie, after Handler's daughter Barbara. The doll made its debut at the American International Toy Fair in New York on March 9, 1959. This date is also used as Barbie's official birthday.\n\nMattel acquired the rights to the Bild Lilli doll in 1964 and production of Lilli was stopped. The first Barbie doll wore a black and white zebra striped swimsuit and signature topknot ponytail, and was available as either a blonde or brunette. The doll was marketed as a \"Teen-age Fashion Model,\" with her clothes created by Mattel fashion designer Charlotte Johnson. The first Barbie dolls were manufactured in Japan, with their clothes hand-stitched by Japanese homeworkers. Around 350,000 Barbie dolls were sold during the first year of production.\n\nLouis Marx and Company sued Mattel in March 1961. After licensing Lilli, they claimed that Mattel had “infringed on Greiner & Hausser's patent for Bild-Lilli’s hip joint, and also claimed that Barbie was \"a direct take-off and copy\" of Bild-Lilli. The company additionally claimed that Mattel \"falsely and misleadingly represented itself as having originated the design\". Mattel counter-claimed and the case was settled out of court in 1963. In 1964, Mattel bought Greiner & Hausser's copyright and patent rights for the Bild-Lilli doll for $21,600. \n\nRuth Handler believed that it was important for Barbie to have an adult appearance, and early market research showed that some parents were unhappy about the doll's chest, which had distinct breasts. Barbie's appearance has been changed many times, most notably in 1971 when the doll's eyes were adjusted to look forwards rather than having the demure sideways glance of the original model.\n\nBarbie was one of the first toys to have a marketing strategy based extensively on television advertising, which has been copied widely by other toys. It is estimated that over a billion Barbie dolls have been sold worldwide in over 150 countries, with Mattel claiming that three Barbie dolls are sold every second. \n\nThe standard range of Barbie dolls and related accessories are manufactured to approximately 1/6 scale, which is also known as playscale. The standard dolls are approximately 11½ inches tall.\n\nIn January 2016, Mattel announced that it will add tall, curvy and petite body shapes to its line-up of dolls. Alternative skin tones, hair styles and hair colours will also be added.\n\nRange of products and influence\n\nBarbie products include not only the range of dolls with their clothes and accessories, but also a large range of Barbie branded goods such as books, apparel, cosmetics and video games. Barbie has appeared in a series of animated films and is a supporting character in Toy Story 2 and Toy Story 3.\n\nBarbie has become a cultural icon and has been given honors that are rare in the toy world. In 1974, a section of Times Square in New York City was renamed Barbie Boulevard for a week. In 1985, the artist Andy Warhol created a painting of Barbie. \n\nIn 2013, in Taiwan, the first Barbie-themed restaurant called \"Barbie Café\" opened under the Sinlaku group. \n\nThe doll transformed the toy business in affluent communities worldwide. It was not a doll, but a complex package of toys including sets of clothing for different activities and social roles, dolls of Ken and other playmates of Barbie, as well as accessories of all kinds. Instead of a single doll purchased once, Barbie launches a stream of toy purchases that typically spread over several years and engage a network of friends. Sociologists have identified a significant impact on social values by conveying characteristics of female independence and, with her multitude of accessories, a life-style free of responsibilities. On the negative side, beyond the celebration of affluence, there is a celebration of idealized body colors and shapes that critics sometimes warned against. \n\n50th anniversary\n\nIn 2009, Barbie celebrated her 50th birthday. The celebrations included a runway show in New York for the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week. The event showcased fashions contributed by fifty well-known haute couturiers including Diane von Fürstenberg, Vera Wang, Calvin Klein, Bob Mackie, and Christian Louboutin.\n \n\nFictional biography\n\nBarbie's full name is Barbara Millicent Roberts. In a series of novels published by Random House in the 1960s, her parents' names are given as George and Margaret Roberts from the fictional town of Willows, Wisconsin. In the Random House novels, Barbie attended Willows High School, while in the Generation Girl books, published by Golden Books in 1999, she attended the fictional Manhattan International High School in New York City (based on the real-life Stuyvesant High School ).\n\nShe has an on-off romantic relationship with her boyfriend Ken (\"Ken Carson\"), who first appeared in 1961. A news release from Mattel in February 2004 announced that Barbie and Ken had decided to split up, but in February 2006, they were hoping to rekindle their relationship after Ken had a makeover. \n\nBarbie has had over 40 pets including cats and dogs, horses, a panda, a lion cub, and a zebra. She has owned a wide range of vehicles, including pink Corvette convertibles, trailers, and jeeps. She also holds a pilot's license, and operates commercial airliners in addition to serving as a flight attendant.\nBarbie's careers are designed to show that women can take on a variety of roles in life, and the doll has been sold with a wide range of titles including Miss Astronaut Barbie (1965), Doctor Barbie (1988), and Nascar Barbie (1998).\n\nMattel has created a range of companions for Barbie, including Hispanic Teresa, Midge, African American Christie, and Steven (Christie's boyfriend). Barbie's siblings and cousins were also created including Skipper, Todd and Stacie (twin brother and sister), Kelly, Krissy, and Francie. Barbie was friendly with Blaine, an Australian surfer, during her split with Ken in 2004. \n\nControversy and evaluation\n\nThe Economist has emphasized the importance of Barbie to children's imagination:\n\nHowever, from the start, some have complained that \"the blonde, plastic doll conveyed an unrealistic body image to girls.\" Complaints also point to a lack of diversity in the line even as nonwhite Hispanic children now make up a majority of American girls. Mattel responded to these criticisms. Starting in 1980, it produced Hispanic dolls, and later came models from across the globe. For example, in 2007, it introduced \"Cinco de Mayo Barbie\" wearing a ruffled red, white and green dress (echoing the Mexican flag). Hispanic magazine reports that:\n\nCriticisms of Barbie are often centered around concerns that children consider Barbie a role model and will attempt to emulate her. One of the most common criticisms of Barbie is that she promotes an unrealistic idea of body image for a young woman, leading to a risk that girls who attempt to emulate her will become anorexic. A standard Barbie doll is 11.5 inches tall, giving a height of 5 feet 9 inches at 1/6 scale. Barbie's vital statistics have been estimated at 36 inches (chest), 18 inches (waist) and 33 inches (hips). According to research by the University Central Hospital in Helsinki, Finland, she would lack the 17 to 22 percent body fat required for a woman to menstruate. In 1963, the outfit \"Barbie Baby-Sits\" came with a book entitled How to Lose Weight which advised: \"Don't eat!.\" The same book was included in another ensemble called \"Slumber Party\" in 1965 along with a pink bathroom scale permanently set at 110 lbs., which would be around 35 lbs. underweight for a woman 5 feet 9 inches tall. Mattel said that the waist of the Barbie doll was made small because the waistbands of her clothes, along with their seams, snaps, and zippers, added bulk to her figure. In 1997, Barbie's body mold was redesigned and given a wider waist, with Mattel saying that this would make the doll better suited to contemporary fashion designs. \n\n\"Colored Francie\" made her debut in 1967, and she is sometimes described as the first African American Barbie doll. However, she was produced using the existing head molds for the white Francie doll and lacked African characteristics other than a dark skin. The first African American doll in the Barbie range is usually regarded as Christie, who made her debut in 1968. Black Barbie was launched in 1980 but still had Caucasian features. In September 2009, Mattel introduced the So In Style range, which was intended to create a more realistic depiction of black people than previous dolls.\n\nIn July 1992, Mattel released Teen Talk Barbie, which spoke a number of phrases including \"Will we ever have enough clothes?\", \"I love shopping!\", and \"Wanna have a pizza party?\" Each doll was programmed to say four out of 270 possible phrases, so that no two given dolls were likely to be the same. One of these 270 phrases was \"Math class is tough!\" (often misquoted as \"Math is hard\"). Although only about 1.5% of all the dolls sold said the phrase, it led to criticism from the American Association of University Women. In October 1992, Mattel announced that Teen Talk Barbie would no longer say the phrase, and offered a swap to anyone who owned a doll that did. \n\nIn 1997, Mattel teamed up with Nabisco to launch a cross-promotion of Barbie with Oreo cookies. Oreo Fun Barbie was marketed as someone with whom young girls could play after class and share \"America's favorite cookie.\" As had become the custom, Mattel manufactured both a white and a black version. Critics argued that in the African American community, Oreo is a derogatory term meaning that the person is \"black on the outside and white on the inside,\" like the chocolate sandwich cookie itself. The doll was unsuccessful and Mattel recalled the unsold stock, making it sought after by collectors. \n\nIn May 1997, Mattel introduced Share a Smile Becky, a doll in a pink wheelchair. Kjersti Johnson, a 17-year-old high school student in Tacoma, Washington with cerebral palsy, pointed out that the doll would not fit into the elevator of Barbie's $100 Dream House. Mattel announced that it would redesign the house in the future to accommodate the doll. \n\nIn March 2000, stories appeared in the media claiming that the hard vinyl used in vintage Barbie dolls could leak toxic chemicals, causing danger to children playing with them. The claim was described as an overreaction by Joseph Prohaska, a professor at the University of Minnesota Duluth. A modern Barbie doll has a body made from ABS plastic, while the head is made from soft PVC. \n\nIn September 2003, the Middle Eastern country of Saudi Arabia outlawed the sale of Barbie dolls, saying that she did not conform to the ideals of Islam. The Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice stated \"Jewish Barbie dolls, with their revealing clothes and shameful postures, accessories and tools are a symbol of decadence to the perverted West. Let us beware of her dangers and be careful.\" In Middle Eastern countries, there is an alternative doll called Fulla which is similar to Barbie but is designed to be more acceptable to an Islamic market. Fulla is not made by the Mattel Corporation, and Barbie is still available in other Middle Eastern countries including Egypt. In Iran, Sara and Dara dolls are available as an alternative to Barbie. \n\nIn December 2005, Dr. Agnes Nairn at the University of Bath in England published research suggesting that girls often go through a stage where they hate their Barbie dolls and subject them to a range of punishments, including decapitation and placing the doll in a microwave oven. Dr. Nairn said: \"It's as though disavowing Barbie is a rite of passage and a rejection of their past.\" \n\nIn April 2009, the launch of a Totally Tattoos Barbie with a range of tattoos that could be applied to the doll, including a lower back tattoo, led to controversy. Mattel's promotional material read \"Customize the fashions and apply the fun temporary tattoos on you too\", but Ed Mayo, chief executive of Consumer Focus, argued that children might want to get tattooed themselves.\n\nIn July 2010, Mattel released \"Barbie Video Girl\", a Barbie doll with a pinhole video camera in its chest, enabling clips of up to 30 minutes to be recorded, viewed and uploaded to a computer via a USB cable. On November 30, 2010, the FBI issued a warning in a private memo that the doll could be used to produce child pornography, although it stated publicly that there was \"no reported evidence that the doll had been used in any way other than intended.\" \n\nIn November 2014, Mattel received criticism over the book I Can Be a Computer Engineer, which depicted Barbie as being inept at computers and requiring that her two male friends complete all of the necessary tasks to restore two laptops after she downloads a virus onto both of them. Critics complained that the book was sexist, as other books in the I Can Be... series depicted Barbie as someone that was competent in those jobs and did not require outside assistance from others. Mattel later removed the book from sale on Amazon in response to the criticism.\n\nIn March 2015, concerns were raised about a version of the doll called \"Hello Barbie\", which can hold conversations with a child using speech recognition technology. The doll transmits data back to a service called ToyTalk, which according to Forbes, has a terms of service and privacy policy that allow it to “share audio recordings with third party vendors who assist us with speech recognition,” and states that “recordings and photos may also be used for research and development purposes, such as to improve speech recognition technology and artificial intelligence algorithms and create better entertainment experiences.” \n\nImage:Barbieswaistwidens.jpg|Barbie's waist has been widened in more recent versions of the doll.\n\nImage:How to lose weight II.JPG|Back cover of vintage booklet on How to Lose Weight, stating \"Don't Eat!\".\nImage:Barbie bathroom scale.jpg|Bathroom scale from 1965, permanently set at 110 lbs.\nImage:Oreo Fun Barbie.jpg|Oreo Fun Barbie from 1997 became controversial after a negative interpretation of the doll's name.\n\nParodies and lawsuits\n\nBarbie has frequently been the target of parody: \n\n*Mattel sued artist Tom Forsythe over a series of photographs called Food Chain Barbie in which Barbie winds up in a blender. \n*In 2011, Greenpeace parodied Barbie, calling on Mattel to adopt a policy for its paper purchases that would protect rainforest. According to Phil Radford, Greenpeace Executive Director, the organization’s “forensic testing and global research show how Mattel products are using mixed tropical hardwood from Asia Pulp and Paper, a company that is ripping down the paradise forests of Indonesia… Sumatran tigers, elephants and orangutans are being pushed to the brink of extinction because Mattel simply isn’t interested in the origins of Barbie’s pink box.” Four months later, Mattel adopted a paper sustainability policy. \n*Mattel filed a lawsuit in 2004 against Barbara Anderson-Walley over her website, which sells fetish clothing. \n*The Tonight Show with Jay Leno displayed a \"Barbie Crystal Meth Lab\". \n* Saturday Night Live aired a parody of the Barbie commercials featuring \"Gangsta Bitch Barbie\" and \"Tupac Ken\". In 2002, the show also aired a skit, which starred Britney Spears as Barbie's sister Skipper. \n*In November 2002, a New York judge refused an injunction against the British-based artist Susanne Pitt, who had produced a \"Dungeon Barbie\" doll in bondage clothing. \n*Aqua's song \"Barbie Girl\" was the subject of the lawsuit Mattel v. MCA Records, which Mattel lost in 2002, with Judge Alex Kozinski saying that the song was a \"parody and a social commentary\". \n*Two commercials by automobile company Nissan featuring dolls similar to Barbie and Ken was the subject of another lawsuit in 1997. In the first commercial, a female doll is lured into a car by a doll resembling G.I. Joe to the dismay of a Ken-like doll, accompanied by Van Halen's \"You Really Got Me\". In the second commercial, the \"Barbie\" doll is saved by the \"G.I. Joe\" doll after she is accidentally knocked into a swimming pool by the \"Ken\" doll to Kiss's \"Dr. Love\". The makers of the commercial said that the dolls' names were Roxanne, Nick, and Tad. Mattel claimed that the commercial did \"irreparable damage\" to its products, but settled. \n*In 1993, a group calling itself the \"Barbie Liberation Organization\" secretly modified a group of Barbie dolls by implanting voice boxes from G.I. Joe dolls, then returning the Barbies to the toy stores from where they were purchased. \n*Malibu Stacy from The Simpsons episode \"Lisa vs. Malibu Stacy\" (1994).\n\nCollecting\n\nMattel estimates that there are well over 100,000 avid Barbie collectors. Ninety percent are women, at an average age of 40, purchasing more than twenty Barbie dolls each year. Forty-five percent of them spend upwards of $1000 a year.\nVintage Barbie dolls from the early years are the most valuable at auction, and while the original Barbie was sold for $3.00 in 1959, a mint boxed Barbie from 1959 sold for $3552.50 on eBay in October 2004. On September 26, 2006, a Barbie doll set a world record at auction of £9,000 sterling (US $17,000) at Christie's in London. The doll was a Barbie in Midnight Red from 1965 and was part of a private collection of 4,000 Barbie dolls being sold by two Dutch women, Ietje Raebel and her daughter Marina. \n\nIn recent years, Mattel has sold a wide range of Barbie dolls aimed specifically at collectors, including porcelain versions, vintage reproductions, and depictions of Barbie as a range of characters from film and television series such as The Munsters and Star Trek. There are also collector's edition dolls depicting Barbie dolls with a range of different ethnic identities. In 2004, Mattel introduced the Color Tier system for its collector's edition Barbie dolls including pink, silver, gold, and platinum, depending on how many of the dolls are produced. \n\nCompetition from Bratz dolls\n\nIn June 2001, MGA Entertainment launched the Bratz series of dolls, a move that gave Barbie her first serious competition in the fashion doll market. In 2004, sales figures showed that Bratz dolls were outselling Barbie dolls in the United Kingdom, although Mattel maintained that in terms of the number of dolls, clothes, and accessories sold, Barbie remained the leading brand. In 2005, figures showed that sales of Barbie dolls had fallen by 30% in the United States, and by 18% worldwide, with much of the drop being attributed to the popularity of Bratz dolls. \n\nIn December 2006, Mattel sued MGA Entertainment for $500 million, alleging that Bratz creator Carter Bryant was working for Mattel when he developed the idea for Bratz. On July 17, 2008, a federal jury agreed that the Bratz line was created by Carter Bryant while he was working for Mattel and that MGA and its Chief Executive Officer Isaac Larian were liable for converting Mattel property for their own use and intentionally interfering with the contractual duties owed by Bryant to Mattel. On August 26, the jury found that Mattel would have to be paid $100 million in damages. On December 3, 2008, U.S. District Judge Stephen Larson banned MGA from selling Bratz. He allowed the company to continue selling the dolls until the winter holiday season ended. On appeal, a stay was granted by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit; the Court also overturned the District Court's original ruling for Mattel, where MGA Entertainment was ordered to forfeit the entire Bratz brand. \n\nMattel Inc. and MGA Entertainment Inc. returned to court on January 18, 2011 to renew their battle over who owns Bratz, which this time includes accusations from both companies that the other side stole trade secrets. On April 21, 2011, a federal jury returned a verdict supporting MGA. On August 5, 2011, Mattel was also ordered to pay MGA $310 million for attorney fees, stealing trade secrets, and false claims rather than the $88.5 million issued in April. \n\nIn August 2009, MGA introduced a range of dolls called Moxie Girlz, intended as a replacement for Bratz dolls. \n\n\"Barbie Syndrome\"\n\n\"Barbie Syndrome\" is a term that has been used to depict the desire to have a physical appearance and lifestyle representative of the Barbie doll. It is most often associated with pre-teenage and adolescent females but is applicable to any age group. A person with Barbie syndrome attempts to emulate the doll's physical appearance, even though the doll has unattainable body proportions. \n\nUkrainian model Valeria Lukyanova has received attention from the press, due in part to her appearance having been modified based on the physique of Barbie. She stated that she has had breast implants and that she hopes eventually to live without eating or drinking at all in hopes of becoming a \"breatharian.\"" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Paul_Shaffer.txt" ], "title": [ "Paul Shaffer" ], "wiki_context": [ "Paul Allen Wood Shaffer, CM (; born November 28, 1949) is a Canadian-American singer, actor, voice actor, author, comedian, and multi-instrumentalist who served as David Letterman's musical director, band leader and sidekick on the entire run of both Late Night with David Letterman (1982–1993) and Late Show with David Letterman (1993–2015).\n\nEarly years\n\nShaffer was born and raised in Fort William (now part of Thunder Bay), Ontario, Canada, the son of Shirley and Bernard Shaffer, a lawyer. Shaffer was raised in a Jewish family. As a child, Shaffer took piano lessons, and in his teenage years played the organ in a band called Fabulous Fugitives with his schoolmates in Thunder Bay. Later he performed with the \"Flash Landing Band\" at different venues around Edmonton and the Interior of B.C. Educated at the University of Toronto, he began playing with jazz guitarist Tisziji Muñoz, performing in bands around the bars there, where he found an interest in musicals, and completed his studies, with a B.A. degree in Sociology in 1971. \n\nMusical career\n\nShaffer began his music career in 1972 when Stephen Schwartz invited him to be the musical director for the Toronto production of Godspell, starring Victor Garber, Gilda Radner, Martin Short, Eugene Levy, Dave Thomas and Andrea Martin. He went on to play piano for the Schwartz Broadway show The Magic Show in 1974, then became a member of the house band on NBC's popular Saturday Night Live (SNL) television program from 1975 to 1980 (except for a brief departure in 1977). Though Shaffer was at the piano and appeared to be directing the band's actions, Howard Shore was credited as SNLs musical director, eventually turning the actual conducting of the band to sax player Howard Johnson. Shaffer also regularly appeared in the show's sketches, notably as the pianist for Bill Murray's Nick the Lounge Singer character, and as Don Kirshner.\n\nShaffer occasionally teamed up with the Not Ready for Prime-Time Players off the show as well, including work on Gilda Radner's highly successful Broadway show and as the musical director for John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd whenever they recorded or performed as The Blues Brothers. Shaffer was to appear in the duo's 1980 film, but, as he revealed in October 2009 on CBS Sunday Morning, Belushi dropped him from the project. In a memo to fellow SNL colleagues, Belushi said that he was unhappy that Shaffer was spending so much time on a studio record for Radner. Belushi said that he had tried to talk Shaffer out of working on the album in the first place in order to avoid sharing Shaffer's talents with another SNL-related project. Shaffer later reported that he was in (unrequited) love with Gilda Radner. He would go on to appear in 1998's Blues Brothers 2000.\n\nBeginning in 1982, Shaffer served as musical director for David Letterman's late night talk shows: as leader of \"The World's Most Dangerous Band\" for Late Night with David Letterman (1982–1993) on NBC, for which he also composed the theme song, and as leader of the CBS Orchestra for the Late Show with David Letterman (1993–2015) on CBS. Letterman consistently maintained that the show's switch to CBS was because NBC \"fired Paul for stealing pens\" or some other facetious reason. Shaffer guest-hosted the show twice when Letterman was unavailable, including during Letterman's January 2000 medical leave for quintuple heart bypass surgery, and during the birth of Letterman's son Harry in November 2003.\n\nIn 1984, Shaffer played keyboards for The Honeydrippers, a group formed in 1981 by former Led Zeppelin frontman Robert Plant, on their only studio album, The Honeydrippers: Volume One. The album included the hit single \"Sea of Love\" which reached #1 on Billboards adult contemporary chart in 1984 and #3 on its Hot 100 chart in 1985. \n\nShaffer has served as musical director and producer for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony since its inception in 1986 and filled the same role for the 1996 Olympic Games closing ceremonies from Atlanta, Georgia. Shaffer also served as musical director for Fats Domino and Friends, a Cinemax special that included Ray Charles, Jerry Lee Lewis and Ron Wood.\n\nHe has released two solo albums, 1989's Grammy-nominated Coast to Coast, and 1993's The World's Most Dangerous Party, produced by rock musician Todd Rundgren. Shaffer has also recorded with a wide range of artists, including Donald Fagen, Ronnie Wood, Grand Funk Railroad, Diana Ross, B.B. King, Asleep at the Wheel, Cyndi Lauper, Carl Perkins, Yoko Ono, Blues Traveler, Jeff Healey, Cher, Chicago, Luba, Robert Burns, George Clinton, Bootsy Collins, Nina Hagen, Robert Plant, Peter Criss, Scandal, Brian Wilson, Late Show regular Warren Zevon, jazz trumpeter Lew Soloff, jazz saxophonist Lou Marini and bluegrass legend Earl Scruggs. In 1982, he co-wrote \"It's Raining Men,\" with Paul Jabara. It was #1 on the US Billboard Hot Dance Club Play charts, a #2 hit in the UK for The Weather Girls in 1984 and a UK #1 remake for Geri Halliwell in 2001. Shaffer and The World's Most Dangerous Band performed the Chuck Berry song \"Roll over Beethoven\" for the 1992 film Beethoven.\n\nOther activities\n\nShaffer has appeared in a number of motion pictures over the years, including a small role (Artie Fufkin of Polymer Records) in Rob Reiner's This Is Spinal Tap, Blues Brothers 2000, a scene with Miles Davis in the Bill Murray film Scrooged and as a passenger in John Travolta's taxicab in Look Who's Talking Too. In addition, Shaffer lent his voice to Disney's animated feature and television series Hercules, as the character Hermes.\n\nIn 1977, Shaffer left SNL for a few months to co-star with Greg Evigan in A Year at the Top, a short-lived CBS sitcom in which Shaffer and Evigan play two musicians from Idaho who relocate to Hollywood where they are regularly tempted by a famous promoter (who is actually the devil's son), played by Gabriel Dell, to sell their souls in exchange for a year of stardom. Though the series only lasted a few episodes, a soundtrack album was released.\n\nFollowing the series' cancellation, Shaffer returned to SNL. In the fall of 1979, Shaffer became the first person to say \"fuck\" on SNL. That year, SNL parodied The Troggs Tapes with a medieval musical sketch featuring Shaffer, Bill Murray, Harry Shearer, and a \"special guest appearance\" by John Belushi (who had left the show the previous spring). In the middle of a long tirade which featured repeated use of the word \"flogging,\" Shaffer inadvertently uttered the forbidden word. It not only escaped the censors in the live broadcast and the West Coast taped airing, but also reappeared in the summer rerun, and even in the syndicated versions of the show for several years. Shaffer, at Letterman's urging, related the story on the very first episode of Late Night.\n\nIn 1977, Shaffer played on the Mark & Clark Band's hit record Worn Down Piano.\n\nShaffer recorded the famous synthesizer solo in the 1982 hit \"Goodbye to You\" by the band Scandal. He used his trusty Oberheim OB-Xa to emulate a 1960s organ sound. \n\nHe hosted Happy New Year, America in 1994 on CBS Network. \n\nThe following year, he appeared in Blues Traveler's video for the song \"Hook\".\n\nAround 1998 he was on Hollywood Squares.\n\nIn 2001, Shaffer hosted the VH1 game show Cover Wars with DJ/model Sky Nellor. The show featured cover bands competing for the ultimate series win. Each week, Shaffer would sign off with, \"Just because you're in a cover band, it doesn't mean you're not a star.\" The show lasted 13 episodes and featured celebrity judges including Kevin Bacon, Nile Rodgers, Cyndi Lauper and Ace Frehley.\n\nShaffer served as musical director for 2001's The Concert for New York City, and accompanied Adam Sandler's Opera Man sketch and the Backstreet Boys' \"Quit Playing Games (With My Heart)\".\n\nIn 2002, a street which surrounds the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium in his hometown was renamed Paul Shaffer Drive. Shaffer has also received two honorary doctorates, including one from Lakehead University.\n\nSince 2002, he has been the national spokesperson for Epilepsy Canada. On September 29, 2005, Shaffer made a major contribution to Lakehead University to dedicate the fifth floor ATAC boardroom to his father Bernard Shaffer, inaugural member of the Board of Governors. In June 2006, he received a star on Canada's Walk of Fame.\n\nIn 2005, along with Steve Van Zandt, he organized a benefit for Mike Smith (formerly of The Dave Clark Five), who had suffered a paralyzing fall at his home in Spain. Shaffer cites Mike Smith as an early influence.\n\nShaffer hosts the 60-second radio vignettes called \"Paul Shaffer's Day in Rock\". These audio shorts were first produced for Envision Radio Networks and debuted in 2007 on New York station WAXQ-FM. \n\nIn 2008, Shaffer made a cameo appearance at the beginning of the Law & Order: Criminal Intent season 7 episode \"Vanishing Act\".\n\nShaffer's memoir, We'll Be Here for the Rest of Our Lives: A Swingin' Show-biz Saga (co-authored by David Ritz) was published on October 6, 2009. The same day, he made an appearance as a guest on The Late Show.\n\nShaffer never returned the call which offered him the role of George Costanza in Seinfeld. Shaffer claims he never auditioned for the role, Seinfeld simply called to offer him the job. \n\nIn 2010, Shaffer appeared with Bachman & Turner at the Roseland Ballroom in New York. His appearance was included on the live album recorded on that date.\n\nIn 2012, Shaffer appeared in 12-12-12: The Concert for Sandy Relief, where Shaffer accompanied Adam Sandler. The concert raised money for the people who were affected by Hurricane Sandy in October 2012. Later in 2012, Shaffer appeared in a skit of SNL Christmas, which aired on Saturday, December 15, 2012. He appeared playing the piano and singing for the host Martin Short.\n\nIn February 2013, he appeared in an episode of the sitcom How I Met Your Mother titled \"P.S. I Love You\", in which it is revealed that the character of Robin (Cobie Smulders) used to be obsessed with him. The letters \"P.S.\" in the episode title refer to Paul Shaffer.\n\nIn February 2015 Shaffer appeared on the 40th anniversary special of Saturday Night Live, playing music to Bill Murray's lounge singer character, a love song from the movie Jaws.\n\nIn May 2015, the Ride of Fame honored Paul Shaffer with a double decker sightseeing bus in New York City to commemorate his long run as the leader of the CBS Orchestra for the Late Show with David Letterman. \n\nShaffer was the musical director for A Very Murray Christmas, a 2015 Netflix variety special starring Bill Murray in which Shaffer also appears and performs extensively. \n\nPersonal life \n\nShaffer has been married to Cathy Vasapoli since 1990, with whom he has two children – Victoria (born 1993) and Will (born 1999).\n\nDiscography\n\n*1989: Coast to Coast\n*1993: The World's Most Dangerous Party" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Jean-Claude_Duvalier.txt", "François_Duvalier.txt" ], "title": [ "Jean-Claude Duvalier", "François Duvalier" ], "wiki_context": [ "Jean-Claude Duvalier, nicknamed “Baby Doc” () (3 July 19514 October 2014), was the President of Haiti from 1971 until his overthrow by a popular uprising in 1986. He succeeded his father François \"Papa Doc\" Duvalier as the ruler of Haiti after the latter's death in 1971. After assuming power, he introduced cosmetic changes to his father's regime and delegated much authority to his advisors. Thousands of Haitians were killed or tortured, and hundreds of thousands fled the country during his presidency. He maintained a notoriously lavish lifestyle (including a state-sponsored US$2million wedding in 1980), and made millions from involvement in the drug trade and from selling body parts from dead Haitians while poverty among his people remained the most widespread of any country in the Western Hemisphere. \n\nRelations with the United States improved after Duvalier's ascension to the presidency, and later deteriorated under the Carter administration, only to again improve under Ronald Reagan due to the strong anti-communist stance of the Duvaliers. Rebellion against the Duvalier regime broke out in 1985 and Baby Doc fled to France in 1986 on a U.S. Air Force craft.\n\nDuvalier unexpectedly returned to Haiti on 16 January 2011, after two decades in self-imposed exile in France. The following day, he was arrested by Haitian police, facing possible charges for embezzlement. On 18 January, Duvalier was charged with corruption. On 28 February 2013, Duvalier pleaded not guilty to charges of corruption and human rights abuse. He died of a heart attack on 4 October 2014, at the age of 63.\n\nEarly life\n\nDuvalier was born in Port-au-Prince and was brought up in an isolated environment. He attended Nouveau College Bird and Saint-Louis de Gonzague. Later, he studied law at the University of Haiti under the direction of several professors, including Maître Gérard Gourgue.\n\nPresident of Haiti\n\nIn April 1971, he assumed the presidency of Haiti at the age of 19 upon the death of his father, François Duvalier (nicknamed \"Papa Doc\"), becoming the world's youngest president. Initially, Jean-Claude Duvalier resisted the dynastic arrangement that had made him Haiti's leader, having preferred that the presidency go to his older sister Marie-Denise Duvalier, and was content to leave substantive and administrative matters in the hands of his mother, Simone Ovide Duvalier, and a committee led by Luckner Cambronne, his father's Interior Minister, while he attended ceremonial functions and lived as a playboy.\n\nPolitical and economic factors\n\nDuvalier was invested with near-absolute power by the constitution. He took some steps to reform the regime, by releasing some political prisoners and easing press censorship. However, there were no substantive changes to the regime's basic character. Opposition was not tolerated, and the legislature remained a rubber stamp.\n\nMuch of the Duvaliers' wealth came from the Régie du Tabac (Tobacco Administration). Duvalier used this \"non-fiscal account\", established decades earlier, as a tobacco monopoly, but he later expanded it to include the proceeds from other government enterprises and used it as a slush fund for which no balance sheets were ever kept.\n\nBy neglecting his role in government, Duvalier squandered considerable domestic and foreign goodwill and facilitated the dominance of Haitian affairs by a clique of hardline Duvalierist cronies, the so-called \"dinosaurs\". Foreign officials and observers also seemed tolerant toward \"Baby Doc\" in areas such as human rights monitoring and foreign countries were more generous to him with economic assistance. The Nixon administration restored the United States aid program for Haiti in 1971.Metz, Helen Chapin, Dominican Republic and Haiti : Country Studies, Federal Research Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., December 1989, ISBN 0-8444-1044-6.\n\nMarriage\n\nOn 27 May 1980, Duvalier married Michèle Bennett Pasquet in a wedding that cost US$2million. The extravagance of the couple's wedding did not lack local critics, though The Christian Science Monitor reported that \"the event... was enthusiastically received by a majority of Haitians\". Discontent among the business community and elite intensified in response to increased corruption among the Duvaliers and the Bennett family's dealings, which included selling Haitian cadavers to foreign medical schools and trafficking in narcotics. Increased political repression added to the volatility of the situation.\n\nThe marriage also estranged the old-line Duvalierists in the government from the younger technocrats whom Duvalier had appointed, including Jean-Marie Chanoine, Frantz Merceron, Frantz-Robert Estime and Theo Achille. The Duvalierists' spiritual leader, Duvalier's mother, Simone Ovide Duvalier, was eventually expelled from Haiti, reportedly at the request of Michèle Duvalier. With his wife Duvalier had two children, François Nicolas and Anya. \n\nDestabilisation\n\nIn response to an outbreak of African swine fever virus on the island in 1978, U.S. agricultural authorities insisted upon total eradication of Haiti's pig population. The Program for the Eradication of Porcine Swine Fever and for the Development of Pig Raising (PEPPADEP) caused widespread hardship among the peasant population, who bred pigs as an investment. \n\nIn addition, reports that HIV/AIDS was becoming a major problem in Haiti caused tourism to decline dramatically in the early 1980s. By the mid-1980s, most Haitians expressed hopelessness and helplessness, as economic conditions worsened and hunger and malnutrition spread.\n\nWidespread discontent began in March 1983, when Pope John Paul II visited Haiti. The pontiff declared that “things must change in Haiti”, and he called on “all those who have power, riches and culture so that they can understand the serious and urgent responsibility to help their brothers and sisters”. He called for a more equitable distribution of income, a more egalitarian social structure, and increased popular participation in public life. This message revitalized both laymen and clergy, contributed to increased popular mobilization and expanded political and social activism.\n\nA revolt began in the provinces in 1985. The city of Gonaïves was the first to have street demonstrations and raids on food-distribution warehouses. From October 1985 to January 1986, the protests spread to six other cities, including Cap-Haïtien. By the end of that month, Haitians in the south had revolted. The most significant rioting there broke out in Les Cayes.\n\nDuvalier responded with a 10 percent cut in staple food prices, the closing of independent radio stations, a cabinet reshuffle, and a crackdown by police and army units, but these moves failed to dampen the momentum of the popular uprising against the dynastic dictatorship. Duvalier's wife and advisers, intent on maintaining their grip on power, urged him to put down the rebellion and remain in office.\n\nDeparture\n\nIn January 1986, the Reagan administration began to pressure Duvalier to renounce his rule and to leave Haiti. Representatives appointed by Jamaican Prime Minister Edward Seaga served as intermediaries who carried out the negotiations. At this point a number of Duvalierists, and business leaders, met with the Duvaliers and pressed for their departure. The United States rejected a request to provide asylum for Duvalier, but offered to assist with their departure. On 30 January 1986, Duvalier had initially accepted, and President Reagan actually announced his departure based on a report from the Haitian CIA Station Chief who saw Duvalier's car head for the airport. En route, there was gunfire and Duvalier's party returned to the palace unnoticed by the U.S. intelligence team. Duvalier declared \"we are as firm as a monkey tail.\" He departed on 7 February 1986, flying to France in a U.S. Air Force aircraft.\n\nExile\n\nThe Duvaliers settled in France. For a time they lived a luxurious life, but eventually separated on 19 June 1990. Although he formally applied for political asylum, his request was denied by French authorities. Duvalier lost most of his wealth with his 1993 divorce from his wife. While apparently living modestly in exile, Duvalier did have supporters, who founded the François Duvalier Foundation in 2006 to promote positive aspects of the Duvalier presidency, including the creation of most of Haiti's state institutions and improved access to education for the country's black majority. \n\nA private citizen, named Jacques Samyn, unsuccessfully sued to expel Duvalier as an illegal immigrant (the Duvaliers were never officially granted asylum in France). In 1998, a Haitian-born photographer, Gérald Bloncourt, formed a committee in Paris to bring Duvalier to trial. At the time, the French Ministry of the Interior said that it could not verify whether Duvalier still remained in the country due to the recently enacted Schengen Agreement which had abolished systematic border controls between the participating countries.[http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/haiti/baby-doc.htm Haitian exiles want to take “Baby Doc” to court] However, Duvalier's lawyer Sauveur Vaisse said that his client was still in France and denied that the exiled leader had fallen on hard times. \n\nThe 2004 Global Transparency Report listed Duvalier as the sixth most corrupt world leaderbetween Slobodan Milošević and Alberto Fujimorihaving amassed between US$300million and US$800million. \n\nFollowing the ousting of president Jean-Bertrand Aristide in February 2004, Duvalier announced his intention to return to Haiti to run for president in the 2006 elections for the National Unity Party; however, he did not become a candidate.[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4253674.stm \"Haiti vote attracts 30 candidates\"], BBC News, 16 September 2005.\n\nOn 22–23 September 2007, an address by Duvalier to Haitians was broadcast by radio. Although he said exile had \"broken\" him, he also said that what he described as the improving fortunes of the National Unity Party had \"reinvigorated\" him, and he urged readiness among his supporters, without saying whether he intended to return to Haiti. President René Préval rejected Duvalier's apology and, on 28 September, he said that, while Duvalier was constitutionally free to return to Haiti, he would face trial if he did so. Duvalier's radio broadcast address was given in French and not Haitian Creole, the language spoken by the majority of Haitians. \n\nIn February 2010, a Swiss court agreed to release more than US$4million to Jean-Claude Duvalier, although the Swiss Foreign Ministry said it would continue to block the release of the money. \n\nDuvalier lived in Paris with Véronique Roy, his longtime companion, until his return to Haiti in late January 2011.\n\nReturn\n\nOn 16 January 2011, during the presidential election campaign, Duvalier returned to Haiti after 25 years. Accompanied by Véronique Roy, he flew in from Paris, indicating that he wanted to help: \"I'm not here for politics. I'm here for the reconstruction of Haiti\", he said. However, many argued that Duvalier returned to Haiti to gain access to the US$4million frozen in the Swiss bank account. Haiti also claimed this money, arguing that the assets were of \"criminal origin\" and should not be returned to Duvalier. By virtue of Swiss law, however, states claiming money in Switzerland have to demonstrate that they have started criminal investigations against offenders holding money in the country. According to an article by Ginger Thompson in The New York Times, \"if Mr. Duvalier had been able to slip into the country and then quietly leave without incident... he may have been able to argue that Haiti was no longer interested in prosecuting him—and that the money should be his.\" According to Mac McClelland of Mother Jones magazine:\n\nThe former dictator was greeted at the Port-au-Prince airport with cheering and celebratory chanting ... The word from Duvalier is that he's come to help his country. According to everyone on the street and on the radio, the Americans and the French conspired to bring him here to upset current president René Préval, who's been accused of fixing his country's recent elections. \n\nOn 18 January 2011, he was taken into custody at his hotel by Haitian authorities. He was charged with corruption, theft, and misappropriation of funds committed during his 15-year presidency. He was released but was subject to recall by the court.\n\nBy 22 September 2011, legal procedures against him appeared to have stalled. He was reported to be living under a loosely enforced house arrest, enjoying a life of luxury in a suburb of Port-au-Prince. By 30 January 2012, it was announced that the former president would face charges of corruption, but not of human right abuses. \n\nAfter the former president failed to appear for three previously scheduled court hearings, a Haitian judge issued a warrant ordering him to appear before the court 28 February 2013. Duvalier did so and for the first time pleaded not guilty to charges of corruption and human rights abuse.\n\nDeath\n\nOn 4 October 2014, Duvalier died of a heart attack at the age of 63.", "François Duvalier (; 14 April 190721 April 1971), also known as PapaDoc, was the President of Haiti from 1957 to 1971. He was elected president in 1957 on a populist and black nationalist platform and successfully thwarted a coupd’état in 1958. His rule, based on a purged military, a rural militia known as the , and the use of cult of personality, resulted in the murder of 30,000 to 60,000 Haitians and the exile of many more.\n\nPrior to his rule, Duvalier, who was a physician by profession, was known for successfully fighting diseases and acquired the nickname “PapaDoc”. He took the title of President for Life in 1964 and remained in power until he died in 1971. He was succeeded by his son, Jean‑Claude, who was nicknamed “BabyDoc”. \n\nEarly life and career\n\nDuvalier was born in Port-au-Prince in 1907, son of Duval Duvalier, a justice of the peace, and baker His aunt, Madame Florestal, raised him. He completed a degree in medicine from the University of Haiti in 1934, and served as staff physician at several local hospitals. He spent a year at the University of Michigan studying public health and in 1943, became active in a United States-sponsored campaign to control the spread of contagious tropical diseases, helping the poor to fight typhus, yaws, malaria and other tropical diseases that had ravaged Haiti for years. His patients affectionately called him “PapaDoc”, a moniker that he used throughout his life.\n\nThe United States occupation of Haiti, which began in 1915, left a powerful impression on the young Duvalier. He was also aware of the latent political power of the poor black majority and their resentment against the tiny mulatto elite. Duvalier supported Pan-African ideals, and became involved in the ' movement of Haitian author , both of which led to his advocacy of Haitian Vodou, an ethnological study of which later paid enormous political dividends for him. In 1938, Duvalier co-founded the journal Les Griots. In 1939, he married , with whom he had four children: Marie‑Denise, Nicole, Simone, and Jean‑Claude. \n\nPolitical rise\n\nIn 1946, Duvalier aligned himself with President Dumarsais Estimé and was appointed Director General of the National Public Health Service. In 1949, he served as Minister of Health and Labor, but when Duvalier opposed Paul Magloire’s 1950 coupd’état, he left the government and resumed practicing medicine. His practice included taking part in campaigns to prevent yaws and other diseases. In 1954, Duvalier abandoned medicine, hiding out in Haiti’s countryside from the Magloire regime. In 1956, the Magloire government was failing, and although still in hiding, Duvalier announced his candidacy to replace him as president. By December 1956, an amnesty was issued and Duvalier emerged from hiding, and on 12 December 1956, Magloire conceded defeat.\n\nThe two frontrunners in the 1957 campaign for the presidency were Duvalier and Louis Déjoie, a landowner and industrialist from the north. During their campaigning, Haiti was ruled by five temporary administrations, none lasting longer than a few months. Duvalier promised to rebuild and renew the country and rural Haiti solidly supported him as did the military. He resorted to ' populism, stoking the majority irritation by being governed by the few mulatto elite, which is how he described his opponent, Déjoie. \n\nFrançois Duvalier was elected president on 22 September 1957 in the quietest and fairest election in Haiti’s history. Duvalier received 679,884 votes to Déjoie’s266,992. Even in this election, however, there are multiple first-person accounts of voter fraud and voter \n\nPresidency\n\nConsolidation of power\n\nAfter being elected president in 1957, Duvalier exiled most of the major supporters of Déjoie and had a new constitution adopted that year.\n\nDuvalier promoted and installed members of the black majority in the civil service and the army. In July 1958, three exiled Haitian army officers and five American mercenaries landed in Haiti and tried to overthrow Duvalier; all were killed. Although the army and its leaders had quashed the coup attempt, the incident deepened Duvalier's distrust of the army, an important Haitian institution over which he did not have firm control. He replaced the chief-of-staff with a more reliable officer and then proceeded to create his own power base within the army by turning the Presidential Guard into an elite corps aimed at maintaining Duvalier’s power. After this, Duvalier dismissed the entire general staff and replaced it with officers who owed their positions, and their loyalty, to him.\n\nIn 1959, Duvalier created a rural militia, the ' (, )—commonly referred to as the after a term for bogeyman—to extend and bolster support for the regime in the countryside. The Macoute, which by 1961, was twice as big as the army, never developed into a real military force but was more than just a mere secret police. \n\nIn the early years of his rule, Duvalier was able to take advantage of the strategic weaknesses of his powerful opponents, mostly from the mulatto elite. These weaknesses included their inability to coordinate their actions against the regime, whose power had grown increasingly stronger. \n\nIn the name of nationalism, Duvalier expelled almost all of Haiti’s foreign-born bishops, an act that earned him excommunication from the Catholic Church. In 1966, he persuaded the Holy See to allow him permission to nominate the Catholic hierarchy for Haiti. No longer was Haiti under the grip of the minority rich mulattoes, protected by the military and supported by the church; Duvalier now exercised more power in Haiti than ever.\n\nHeart attack and Barbot affair\n\nOn 24 May 1959, Duvalier suffered a massive heart attack, possibly due to an insulin overdose; he had been a diabetic since early adulthood and also suffered from heart disease and associated circulatory problems. During the heart attack, he was comatose for His physician believed that he suffered neurological damage during these events, which harmed his mental health.\n\nWhile recovering, Duvalier left power in the hands of Clément Barbot, leader of the . Upon his return to work, Duvalier accused Barbot of trying to supplant him as president and had him imprisoned. In April 1963, Barbot was released and began plotting to remove Duvalier from office by kidnapping his children. The plot failed and Duvalier subsequently ordered a nationwide search for Barbot and his fellow conspirators. During the search, Duvalier was told that Barbot had transformed himself into a black dog, which prompted Duvalier to order that all black dogs in Haiti be put to death. The captured then killed Barbot in July 1963. In other incidents, Duvalier ordered the head of an executed rebel packed in ice and brought to him so he could commune with the dead man’s spirit. Peepholes were carved into the walls of the interrogation chambers, through which Duvalier watched Haitian detainees being tortured and submerged in baths of sulfuric acid; sometimes, he was in the room during the tortures. \n\nConstitutional changes\n\nIn 1961, Duvalier began violating the provisions of the 1957 constitution: first he replaced the bicameral legislature with a unicameral body. Then he called a new presidential election in which he was the sole candidate, though his term was to expire in 1963 and the constitution prohibited re-election. The election was flagrantly rigged; the official tally showed 1,320,748 “yes” votes for another term for Duvalier, with none opposed. Upon hearing the results, he proclaimed, “I accept the people’s will. . . . As a revolutionary, I have no right to disregard the will of the The New York Times commented, “Latin America has witnessed many fraudulent elections throughout its history but none has been more outrageous than the one which has just taken place in Haiti”. On 14 June 1964, a constitutional referendum made Duvalier “”, a title previously held by seven Haitian presidents. This referendum was also blatantly rigged; an implausible 99.9% voted in favor, which should have come as no surprise since all the ballots were premarked “yes”. The new document granted Duvalier—or ', as he was called—absolute powers as well as the right to name his successor.\n\nForeign relations\n\nHis relationship with the United States proved difficult. In his early years, Duvalier rebuked the United States for its friendly relations with Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo (assassinated in 1961) while ignoring Haiti. The Kennedy administration (1961–1963) was particularly disturbed by Duvalier’s repressive and authoritarian rule and allegations that he misappropriated aid money—at the time a substantial part of the Haitian budget—and a U.S. Marine Corps mission to train the . The U.S. thus halted most of its economic assistance in mid-1962, pending stricter accounting procedures, with which Duvalier refused to comply. Duvalier publicly renounced all aid from Washington on nationalist grounds, portraying himself as a “principled and lonely opponent of domination by a \n\nDuvalier misappropriated millions of dollars of international aid, including US$15million annually from the United States. He transferred this money to personal accounts. Another of Duvalier’s methods of obtaining foreign money was to gain foreign loans, including US$4million from \n\nAfter the assassination of John F. Kennedy in November 1963, which Duvalier later claimed resulted from a curse that he had placed on Kennedy, the U.S. eased its pressure on Duvalier, grudgingly accepting him as a bulwark against communism. Duvalier attempted to exploit tensions between the U.S. and Cuba, emphasizing his anti-communist credentials and Haiti’s strategic location as a means of winning U.S. support:\n\nAfter Fulgencio Batista (a friend of Duvalier) was overthrown in the Cuban Revolution, Duvalier worried that new Cuban leader Fidel Castro would provide a safe haven for Haitian dissidents. Duvalier attempted to win Cuba over by recognizing Castro’s government by sending medicine and pardoning several political prisoners, but to no avail; from the very start of his regime, Castro gave anti-Duvalier dissidents his full support.\n\nDuvalier enraged Castro by voting against the country in an Organization of American States () meeting and subsequently at the United Nations, where a trade embargo was imposed on Cuba. Cuba answered by breaking off diplomatic relations and Duvalier subsequently instituted a campaign to rid Haiti of communists. \n\nDuvalier’s relationship with the neighboring Dominican Republic was always tense: in his early years, Duvalier emphasized the differences between the two countries. In April 1963, relations were brought to the edge of war by the political enmity between Duvalier and Dominican president Juan Bosch. Bosch, a leftist, provided asylum and support to Haitian exiles who had plotted against the Duvalier regime. Duvalier ordered his Presidential Guard to occupy the Dominican Embassy in Pétionville, with the goal of arresting a Haitian army officer believed to have been involved in Barbot’s plot to kidnap Duvalier’s children. The Dominican president reacted with outrage, publicly threatened to invade Haiti, and ordered army units to the border. However, as Dominican military commanders expressed little support for an invasion of Haiti, Bosch refrained from the invasion and sought mediation through \n\nIn 1966, Duvalier hosted the emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie I, in what would be Haiti’s only visit by a head of state under Duvalier. During the visit, Duvalier awarded Haile Selassie the Necklace of the Order of Jean-Jacques Dessalines the Great, and the emperor, in turn, bestowed upon Duvalier the Great Necklace of the Order of the Queen of Sheba.\n\nInternal policies\n\nRepression\n\nDuvalier’s government was one of the most repressive in the hemisphere. Within the country he used both political murder and expulsion to suppress his opponents; estimates of those killed are as high as 60,000. Attacks on Duvalier from within the military were treated as especially serious. When bombs were detonated near the Presidential Palace in 1967, Duvalier had nineteen officers of the Presidential Guard executed in Fort Dimanche. A few days later Duvalier had a public speech during which he read the attendance sheet with names of all 19 officers killed. After each name, he said “absent”. After reading the whole list, Duvalier remarked that “all were shot”.\n\nHaitian communists and even suspected communists bore the brunt of the government’s repression. Duvalier targeted them as a means to secure U.S. support in addition to the principle: Duvalier was exposed to communist and leftist ideas early in his life and rejected them. On 28 April 1969, Duvalier instituted a campaign to rid Haiti of all communists. The new law stipulated that “Communist activities, no matter what their form, are hereby declared crimes against the security of the State”, and he prescribed the death penalty for individuals prosecuted under this law.\n\nSocial and economic policies\n\nDuvalier employed intimidation, repression, and patronage to supplant the old mulatto elites with a new elite of his own making. Corruption—in the form of government rake-offs of industries, bribery, extortion of domestic businesses, and stolen government funds—enriched the dictator’s closest supporters. Most of them held sufficient power to intimidate the members of the old elite, who were gradually co-opted or eliminated.\n\nMany educated professionals fled Haiti for New York City, Miami, Montreal, Paris and several French-speaking African countries, exacerbating an already serious lack of doctors and teachers. Some of the highly skilled professionals joined the ranks of several agencies to work in development in newly independent nations such as Ivory Coast, and Congo.\n\nThe government confiscated peasant landholdings and allotted them to members of the militia, who had no official salary and made their living through crime and The dispossessed fled to the slums of the capital where they would find only meager incomes to feed themselves. Malnutrition and famine became endemic.\n\nNonetheless, Duvalier enjoyed significant support among Haiti’s majority black rural population, who saw in him a champion of their claims against the historically dominant mulatto elite. During his 14 years in power, he created a substantial black middle class, chiefly through government patronage. Duvalier also initiated the development of , now known as Toussaint Louverture International Airport.\n\nPersonality cult and Vodou\n\nDuvalier fostered his cult of personality and claimed he was the physical embodiment of the island nation. He also revived the traditions of Vodou, later using them to consolidate his power with his claim of being a Vodou priest, himself. In an effort to make himself even more imposing, Duvalier deliberately modeled his image on that of Baron Samedi, one of the ', or spirits, of Haitian Vodou. He often donned sunglasses to hide his eyes and talked with the strong nasal tone associated with the '. The regime’s propaganda stated that “PapaDoc was one with the , Jesus Christ and God himself”. The most celebrated image from the time shows a standing Jesus Christ with a hand on the shoulder of a seated PapaDoc, captioned, “I have chosen him”. Duvalier declared himself an “immaterial being” as well as “the Haitian flag” soon after his first election. In 1964, he published a catechism in which the Lord’s Prayer was reworded to pay tribute to Duvalier instead of God. \n\nDuvalier also held in his closet the head of former opponent Blucher Philogenes, who tried to overthrow him in 1963. He believed another political enemy was able to change into a black dog at will and had the militia begin killing black dogs on sight in the capital. \n\nDeath and succession\n\nDuvalier held Haiti in his grip until his death in early 1971. His 19-year-old son , nicknamed “BabyDoc”, succeeded him as president.\n\nBooks and films\n\nMany books have been written about the Duvalier era in Haiti, the best known being Graham Greene’s novel, The Comedians. Duvalier, however, dismissed the piece and referred to its author as “a cretin, a stool pigeon, sadistic, unbalanced, perverted, a perfect , lying to his heart’s content, the shame of proud and noble England, a spy, a drug addict, and a torturer”. It was later made into a movie. Greene himself was declared ' and barred from entering Haiti. The British television journalist Alan Whicker featured Duvalier in a 1969 episode of Whicker’s World, which includes an interview with the president. \n\nThe first authoritative book on the subject was PapaDoc: Haiti and its Dictator by Al Burt and Bernard Diederich, published in 1969, though several others by Haitian scholars and historians have appeared since Duvalier’s death in 1971. One of the most informative, Patrick Lemoine’s Fort‑Dimanche: Dungeon of Death, dealt specifically with victims of Fort-Dimanche, the prison Duvalier used for the torture and murder of his political opponents.\n\nIn 2007, British newspaper editor John Marquis published PapaDoc: Portrait of a Haitian Tyrant, which relied in part on records from a 1968 espionage trial in Haiti to detail numerous attempts on Duvalier’s life. The trial’s defendant, David Knox, was a Bahamian director of information. Knox lost and was sentenced to death, but was later granted amnesty." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Bald_eagle.txt" ], "title": [ "Bald eagle" ], "wiki_context": [ "The bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus, from Greek hali \"sea\", aiētos \"eagle\", leuco \"white\", cephalos \"head\") is a bird of prey found in North America. A sea eagle, it has two known subspecies and forms a species pair with the white-tailed eagle (Haliaeetus albicilla). Its range includes most of Canada and Alaska, all of the contiguous United States, and northern Mexico. It is found near large bodies of open water with an abundant food supply and old-growth trees for nesting.\n\nThe bald eagle is an opportunistic feeder which subsists mainly on fish, which it swoops down and snatches from the water with its talons. It builds the largest nest of any North American bird and the largest tree nests ever recorded for any animal species, up to 4 m deep, wide, and 1 t in weight. Sexual maturity is attained at the age of four to five years.\n\nBald eagles are not actually bald; the name derives from an older meaning of the word, \"white headed\". The adult is mainly brown with a white head and tail. The sexes are identical in plumage, but females are about 25 percent larger than males. The beak is large and hooked. The plumage of the immature is brown.\n\nThe bald eagle is both the national bird and national animal of the United States of America. The bald eagle appears on its seal. In the late 20th century it was on the brink of extirpation in the contiguous United States. Populations have since recovered and the species was removed from the U.S. government's list of endangered species on July 12, 1995 and transferred to the list of threatened species. It was removed from the List of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife in the Lower 48 States on June 28, 2007.\n\nDescription\n\nThe plumage of an adult bald eagle is evenly dark brown with a white head and tail. The tail is moderately long and slightly wedge-shaped. Males and females are identical in plumage coloration, but sexual dimorphism is evident in the species, in that females are 25% larger than males. The beak, feet and irises are bright yellow. The legs are feather-free, and the toes are short and powerful with large talons. The highly developed talon of the hind toe is used to pierce the vital areas of prey while it is held immobile by the front toes. The beak is large and hooked, with a yellow cere. The adult bald eagle is unmistakable in its native range. The closely related African fish eagle (H. vocifer) (from far outside the bald eagle's range) also has a brown body, white head and tail, but differs from the bald in having a white chest and black tip to the bill.\n\nThe plumage of the immature is a dark brown overlaid with messy white streaking until the fifth (rarely fourth, very rarely third) year, when it reaches sexual maturity. Immature bald eagles are distinguishable from the golden eagle (Aquila chrysaetos), the only other very large, non-vulturine bird in North America, in that the former has a larger, more protruding head with a larger beak, straighter edged wings which are held flat (not slightly raised) and with a stiffer wing beat and feathers which do not completely cover the legs. When seen well, the golden eagle is distinctive in plumage with a more solid warm brown color than an immature bald eagle, with a reddish-golden patch to its nape and (in immature birds) a highly contrasting set of white squares on the wing. Another distinguishing feature of the immature bald eagle over the mature bird is its black, yellow-tipped beak; the mature eagle has a fully yellow beak.\n\nThe bald eagle has sometimes been considered the largest true raptor (accipitrid) in North America. The only larger species of raptor-like bird is the California condor (Gymnogyps californianus), a New World vulture which today is not generally considered a taxonomic ally of true accipitrids. However, the golden eagle, averaging and 63 cm in wing chord length in its American race (A. c. canadensis), is merely 455 g lighter in mean body mass and exceeds the bald eagle in mean wing chord length by around 3 cm. Additionally, the bald eagle's close cousins, the relatively longer-winged but shorter-tailed white-tailed eagle and the overall larger Steller's sea eagle (H. pelagicus), may, rarely, wander to coastal Alaska from Asia.\n\nThe bald eagle has a body length of 70 –. Typical wingspan is between and mass is normally between 3 and. Females are about 25% larger than males, averaging , and against the males' average weight of . The size of the bird varies by location and generally corresponds with Bergmann's rule, since the species increases in size further away from the Equator and the tropics. For example, eagles from South Carolina average in mass and in wingspan, smaller than their northern counterparts. The largest eagles are from Alaska, where large females may weigh up to and span across the wings. A survey of adult weights in Alaska showed that females weighed on average and males weighed . Among standard linear measurements, the wing chord is , the tail is 23 - long, and the tarsus is 8 to. The culmen reportedly ranges from 3 to, while the measurement from the gape to the tip of the bill is 7 -.\n\nThe call consists of weak staccato, chirping whistles, kleek kik ik ik ik, somewhat similar in cadence to a gull's call. The calls of young birds tend to be more harsh and shrill than those of adults.\n\nTaxonomy\n\nThe bald eagle placed in the genus Haliaeetus (sea eagles) which gets both its common and specific scientific names from the distinctive appearance of the adult's head. Bald in the English name is derived from the word piebald, and refers to the white head and tail feathers and their contrast with the darker body. The scientific name is derived from Haliaeetus, New Latin for \"sea eagle\" (from the Ancient Greek haliaetos), and leucocephalus, Latinized Ancient Greek for \"white head,\" from λευκος leukos (\"white\") and κεφαλη kephale (\"head\").\n\nThe bald eagle was one of the many species originally described by Linnaeus in his 18th century work Systema Naturae, under the name Falco leucocephalus.\n\nThere are two recognized subspecies of bald eagle:\n* H. l. leucocephalus (Linnaeus, 1766) is the nominate subspecies. It is found in the southern United States and Baja California Peninsula.\n* H. l. washingtoniensis (Audubon, 1827), synonym H. l. alascanus Townsend, 1897, the northern subspecies, is larger than southern nominate leucocephalus . It is found in the northern United States, Canada and Alaska.\n\nThe bald eagle forms a species pair with the Eurasian white-tailed eagle. This species pair consists of a white-headed and a tan-headed species of roughly equal size; the white-tailed eagle also has overall somewhat paler brown body plumage. The two species fill the same ecological niche in their respective ranges. The pair diverged from other sea eagles at the beginning of the Early Miocene (c. 10 Ma BP) at the latest, but possibly as early as the Early/Middle Oligocene, 28 Ma BP, if the most ancient fossil record is correctly assigned to this genus.\n\nRange\n\nThe bald eagle's natural range covers most of North America, including most of Canada, all of the continental United States, and northern Mexico. It is the only sea eagle endemic to North America. Occupying varied habitats from the bayous of Louisiana to the Sonoran Desert and the eastern deciduous forests of Quebec and New England, northern birds are migratory, while southern birds are resident, remaining on their breeding territory all year. At minimum population, in the 1950s, it was largely restricted to Alaska, the Aleutian Islands, northern and eastern Canada, and Florida. Today, they are much more common (almost attaining their peak numbers pre-colonization in North America), and nest in every continental state and province in the United States and Canada.\n\nBald eagles will also congregate in certain locations in winter. From November until February, one to two thousand birds winter in Squamish, British Columbia, about halfway between Vancouver and Whistler. The birds primarily gather along the Squamish and Cheakamus Rivers, attracted by the salmon spawning in the area. \n\nIt has occurred as a vagrant twice in Ireland; a juvenile was shot illegally in Fermanagh on January 11, 1973 (misidentified at first as a white-tailed eagle), and an exhausted juvenile was captured in Kerry on November 15, 1987. \n\nHabitat\n\nThe bald eagle occurs during its breeding season in virtually any kind of American wetland habitat such as seacoasts, rivers, large lakes or marshes or other large bodies of open water with an abundance of fish. Studies have shown a preference for bodies of water with a circumference greater than 11 km, and lakes with an area greater than 10 km2 are optimal for breeding bald eagles.\n\nThe bald eagle typically requires old-growth and mature stands of coniferous or hardwood trees for perching, roosting, and nesting. Tree species reportedly is less important to the eagle pair than the tree's height, composition and location. Perhaps of paramount importance for this species is an abundance of comparatively large trees surrounding the body of water. Selected trees must have good visibility, be over 20 m tall, an open structure, and proximity to prey. If nesting trees are in standing water such as in a mangrove swamp, the nest can be located fairly low, at as low 6 m above the ground. In a more typical tree standing on dry ground, nests may be located from 16 to in height. In Chesapeake Bay, nesting trees averaged 82 cm in diameter and 28 m in total height, while in Florida, the average nesting tree stands 23 m high and is 23 cm in diameter. Trees used for nesting in the Greater Yellowstone area average 27 m high. Trees or forest used for nesting should have a canopy cover of no more than 60%, and no less than 20%, and be in close proximity to water. Most nests have been found within 200 m of open water. The greatest distance from open water recorded for a bald eagle nest was over 3 km, in Florida.\n\nBald eagle nests are often very large in order to compensate for size of the birds. The largest recorded nest was found in Florida in 1963, and was measured at nearly 10 feet wide and 20 feet deep. \n\nIn Florida, nesting habitats often consist of mangrove swamps, the shorelines of lakes and rivers, pinelands, seasonally flooded flatwoods, hardwood swamps, and open prairies and pastureland with scattered tall trees. Favored nesting trees in Florida are slash pines (Pinus elliottii), longleaf pines (P. palustris), loblolly pines (P. taeda) and cypress trees, but for the southern coastal areas where mangroves are usually used. In Wyoming, groves of mature cottonwoods or tall pines found along streams and rivers are typical bald eagle nesting habitats. Wyoming eagles may inhabit habitat types ranging from large, old-growth stands of ponderosa pines (Pinus ponderosa) to narrow strips of riparian trees surrounded by rangeland. In Southeast Alaska, Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis) provided 78% of the nesting trees used by eagles, followed by hemlocks (Tsuga) at 20%. Increasingly, eagles nest in man-made reservoirs stocked with fish.\n\nThe bald eagle is usually quite sensitive to human activity while nesting, and is found most commonly in areas with minimal human disturbance. It chooses sites more than from low-density human disturbance and more than from medium- to high-density human disturbance. However, bald eagles will occasionally venture into large estuaries or secluded groves within major cities, such as Hardtack Island on the Willamette River in Portland, Oregon or John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge at Tinicum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which are surrounded by a great quantity of human activity. Even more contrary to the usual sensitivity to disturbance, a family of bald eagles moved to the Harlem neighborhood in New York City in 2010.\n\nWhile wintering, bald eagles tend to be less habitat and disturbance sensitive. They will commonly congregate at spots with plentiful perches and waters with plentiful prey and (in Northern climes) partially unfrozen waters. Alternately, non-breeding or wintering bald eagles, particularly in areas with a lack of human disturbance, spend their time in various upland, terrestrial habitats sometimes quite far away from waterways. In the northern half of North America (especially the interior portion), this terrestrial inhabitance by bald eagles tends to be especially prevalent because unfrozen water may not be accessible. Upland wintering habitats often consist of open habitats with concentrations of medium-sized mammals, such as prairies, meadows or tundra, or open forests with regular carrion access.\n\nBehavior\n\nThe bald eagle is a powerful flier, and soars on thermal convection currents. It reaches speeds of 56 – when gliding and flapping, and about 48 km/h while carrying fish. Its dive speed is between 120 -, though it seldom dives vertically. It is partially migratory, depending on location. If its territory has access to open water, it remains there year-round, but if the body of water freezes during the winter, making it impossible to obtain food, it migrates to the south or to the coast. A number of populations are subject to post-breeding dispersal, mainly in juveniles; Florida eagles, for example, will disperse northwards in the summer. The bald eagle selects migration routes which take advantage of thermals, updrafts, and food resources. During migration, it may ascend in a thermal and then glide down, or may ascend in updrafts created by the wind against a cliff or other terrain. Migration generally takes place during the daytime, usually between the local hours of 8:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m., when thermals are produced by the sun.\n\nDiet and feeding\n\nThe bald eagle is an opportunistic carnivore with the capacity to consume a great variety of prey. Throughout their range, fish often comprise the majority of the eagle's diet. In 20 food habit studies across the species' range, fish comprised 56% of the diet of nesting eagles, birds 28%, mammals 14% and other prey 2%. In Southeast Alaska, fish comprise approximately 66% of the year-around diet of bald eagles and 78% of the prey brought to the nest by the parents. Eagles living in the Columbia River Estuary in Oregon were found to rely on fish for 90% of their dietary intake. In the Pacific Northwest, spawning trout and salmon provide most of the bald eagles' diet from late summer throughout fall. Southeast Alaskan eagles largely prey on pink salmon (Oncorhynchus gorbuscha), coho salmon (O. kisutch) and, more locally, sockeye salmon (O. nerka), with chinook salmon (O. tshawytscha), due to their large size (12 to average adult size) probably being taken only as carrion. Also important in the estuaries and shallow coastlines of southern Alaska are Pacific herring (Clupea pallasii), Pacific sand lance (Ammodytes hexapterus) and eulachon (Thaleichthys pacificus). In Oregon's Columbia River Estuary, the most significant prey species were largescale suckers (Catostomus macrocheilus) (17.3% of the prey selected there), American shad (Alosa sapidissima; 13%) and common carp (Cyprinus carpio; 10.8%). Eagles living in the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland were found to subsist largely on American gizzard shad (Dorosoma cepedianum), threadfin shad (D. petenense) and white bass (Morone chrysops). Floridian eagles have been reported to prey on catfish, mostly prevalently the brown bullhead (Ameiurus nebulosus) and any species in the Ictalurus genus as well as mullet, trout, needlefish, and eels. Wintering eagles on the Platte River in Nebraska preyed mainly on American gizzard shads and common carp. From observation in the Columbia River, 58% of the fish were caught live by the eagle, 24% were scavenged as carcasses and 18% were pirated away from other animals.\n\nEven eagles living in relatively arid regions still typically rely primarily on fish as prey. In Sonora (Mexico) and Arizona, 77% and over 73%, respectively, of prey remains at the nests were from fish, largely various catfish and rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss). Prey fish targeted by bald eagles are often quite large. When experimenters offered fish of different sizes in the breeding season around Lake Britton in California, fish measuring 34 to were taken 71.8% of the time by parent eagles while fish measuring 23 to were chosen only 25% of the time. At nests around Lake Superior, the remains of fish (mostly suckers) were found to average in total length. In the Columbia River estuary, most preyed on by eagles were estimated to measure between 30 and in length, and carp flown with (laboriously) were up to 86 cm in length.\n\nBenthic fishes such as catfish are usually consumed after they die and float to the surface, though while temporarily swimming in the open may be more vulnerable to predation than most fish since their eyes focus downwards. Bald eagles also regularly exploit water turbines which produce battered, stunned or dead fish easily consumed. Predators who leave behind scraps of dead fish that they kill, such as brown bears (Ursus arctos), gray wolves (Canis lupus) and red foxes (Vulpes vulpes), may be habitually followed in order to scavenge the kills secondarily. Once North Pacific salmon die off after spawning, usually local bald eagles eat salmon carcasses almost exclusively. Eagles in Washington need to consume 489 g of fish each day for survival, with adults generally consuming more than juveniles and thus reducing potential energy deficiency and increasing survival during winter.\n\nBehind fish, the next most significant prey base for bald eagles are other waterbirds. The contribution of such birds to the eagle's diet is variable, depending on the quantity and availability of fish near the water's surface. Waterbirds can seasonally comprise from 7% to 80% of the prey selection for eagles in certain localities. Exceptionally, in the Greater Yellowstone area, birds were eaten as regularly as fish year-around, with both prey groups comprising 43% of the studied dietary intake. Preferred avian prey includes grebes, alcids, ducks, gulls, coots, herons, egrets, and geese. Bird species most preferred as prey by eagles tend to be medium-sized, such as western grebes (Aechmophorus occidentalis), mallards (Anas platyrhynchos) and American coots (Fulica americana) as such prey is relatively easy for the much larger eagles to catch and fly with. American herring gull (Larus smithsonianus) are the favored avian prey species for eagles living around Lake Superior. Larger waterbirds are occasionally prey as well, with wintering emperor geese (Chen canagica) and snow geese (C. caerulescens), which gather in large groups, sometimes becoming regular prey. Other large waterbirds hunted at least occasionally by bald eagles have included common loons (Gavis immer), great black-backed gulls (Larus marinus), sandhill cranes (Grus canadensis), great blue herons (Ardea herodias), Canada geese (Branta canadensis), brown pelicans (Pelecanus occidentalis), and fledging American white pelicans (P. erythrorhynchos). Colony nesting seabirds, such as alcids, storm petrels, cormorants, northern gannets (Morus bassanus), terns and gulls, may be especially vulnerable to predation. Due to easy accessibility and lack of formidable nest defense by such species, bald eagles are capable of preying on such seabirds at all ages, from eggs to mature adults, and can effectively cull large portions of a colony.\n\nAlong some portions of the North Pacific coastline, bald eagles which had historically preyed mainly kelp-dwelling fish and supplementally sea otter (Enhydra lutris) pups are now preying mainly on seabird colonies since both the fish (possibly due to overfishing) and otters (cause unknown) have had precipitious population declines, causing concern for seabird conservation. Because of this more extensive predation, some biologist have expressed concern that murres are heading for a \"conservation collision\" due to heavy eagle predation. Eagles have been confirmed to attack nocturnally active, burrow-nesting seabird species such as storm petrels and shearwaters by digging out their burrows and feeding on all animals they find inside. If a bald eagle flies close by, waterbirds will often fly away en masse, though in other cases they may seemingly ignore a perched eagle. If the said birds are on a colony, this exposed their unprotected eggs and nestlings to scavengers such as gulls. Bird prey may occasionally be attacked in flight, with prey up to the size of Canada geese attacked and killed in mid-air. Unprecedented photographs of a bald eagle unsuccessfully attempting to prey on a much larger adult trumpeter swan (Cygnus buccinator) in mid-flight were taken recently. While adults often actively prey on waterbirds, congregated wintering waterfowl are frequently exploited for carcasses to scavenge by immature eagles in harsh winter weather. Bald eagles have been recorded as killing other raptors on occasion. In some cases, these may be attacks of competition or kleptoparasitism on rival species but ended with the consumption of the victim. Raptorial birds reported to be hunted by these eagles have included large adults of species such as red-tailed hawks (Buteo jamaicensis), ospreys (Pandion haliaetus) and black (Coragyps atratus) and turkey vultures (Cathartes aura).\n\nMammalian prey includes rabbits, hares, ground squirrels, raccoons (Procyon lotor), muskrats (Ondatra zibethicus), beavers (Castor canadensis), and deer fawns. Newborn, dead, sickly or already injured mammals are often targeted. However, more formidable prey such as adult raccoons and subadult beavers are sometimes attacked. In the Chesapeake Bay area, bald eagles are reportedly the main natural predators of raccoons. Where available, seal colonies can provide much food. On Protection Island, Washington, they commonly feed on harbor seal (Phoca vitulina) afterbirths, still-borns and sickly seal pups. On San Juan Island in Washington, introduced European rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus), mainly those killed by auto accidents, comprise nearly 60% of the dietary intake of eagles. In landlocked areas of North America, wintering bald eagles may become habitual predators of medium-sized mammals that occur in colonies or local concentrations, such as prairie dogs (Cynomys) and jackrabbits (Lepus). Together with the golden eagle, bald eagles are occasionally accused of preying on livestock, especially sheep (Ovis aries). There are a handful of proven cases of lamb predation, some of specimens weighing up to 11 kg, by bald eagles but they are much less likely to attack a healthy lamb than a golden eagle and both species prefer native, wild prey and are unlikely to cause any extensive detriment to human livelihoods. There is one case of a bald eagle killing and feeding on an adult, pregnant ewe (then joined in eating the kill by at least 3 other eagles), which, weighing on average over 60 kg, is much larger than any other known prey taken by this species.\n\nSupplemental prey are readily taken given the opportunity. In some areas reptiles may become regular prey, especially warm areas such as Florida where reptile diversity is high. Turtles are perhaps the most regularly hunted type of reptile. In coastal New Jersey, 14 of 20 studied eagle nests included remains of turtles. The main species found were common musk turtles (Sternotherus odoratus), diamondback terrapin (Malaclemys terrapin) and juvenile common snapping turtles (Chelydra serpentina). In these New Jersey nests, mainly subadult and small adults were taken, ranging in carapace length from . Snakes are also taken occasionally, especially partially aquatic ones, as are amphibians and crustaceans (largely crayfish and crabs).\n\nTo hunt fish, the eagle swoops down over the water and snatches the fish out of the water with its talons. They eat by holding the fish in one claw and tearing the flesh with the other. Eagles have structures on their toes called spicules that allow them to grasp fish. Osprey also have this adaptation. Bald eagles have powerful talons and have been recorded flying with a mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) fawn. This feat is the record for the heaviest load carrying ever verified for a flying bird. It has been estimated that the gripping power (pounds by square inch) of the bald eagle is ten times greater than that of a human. Bald eagles can fly with fish at least equal to their own weight, but if the fish is too heavy to lift, the eagle may be dragged into the water. It may swim to safety, in some cases pulling the catch along to the shore as it swims, but some eagles drown or succumb to hypothermia. Many sources claim that bald eagles, like all large eagles, cannot normally take flight carrying prey more than half of their own weight unless aided by favorable wind conditions. On numerous occasions, when large prey such as mature salmon or geese are attacked, eagles have been seen to make contact and then drag the prey in a strenuously labored, low flight over the water to a bank, where they then finish off and dismember the prey. When food is abundant, an eagle can gorge itself by storing up to 1 kg of food in a pouch in the throat called a crop. Gorging allows the bird to fast for several days if food becomes unavailable. Occasionally, bald eagles may hunt cooperatively when confronting prey, especially relatively large prey such as jackrabbits or herons, with one bird distracting potential prey, while the other comes behind it in order to ambush it. While hunting waterfowl, bald eagles repeatedly fly at a target and cause it to dive repeatedly, hoping to exhaust the victim so it can be caught (white-tailed eagles have been recorded hunting waterfowl in the same way). When hunting concentrated prey, a successful catch which often results in the hunting eagle being pursued by other eagles and needing to find an isolated perch for consumption if it is able to carry it away successfully.\n\nUnlike some other eagle species, bald eagles rarely take on evasive or dangerous prey on their own. The species mainly target prey which is much smaller than themselves, with most live fish caught weighing 1 to and most waterbirds preyed weighing . They obtain much of their food as carrion or via a practice known as kleptoparasitism, by which they steal prey away from other predators. Due to their dietary habits, bald eagles are frequently viewed in a negative light by humans. Thanks to their superior foraging ability and experience, adults are generally more likely to hunt live prey than immature eagles, which often obtain their food from scavenging. They are not very selective about the condition or origin, whether provided by humans, other animals, auto accidents or natural causes, of a carcass's presence, but will avoid eating carrion where disturbances from humans are a regular occurrence. They will scavenge carcasses up to the size of whales, though carcasses of ungulates and large fish are seemingly preferred. Bald eagles also may sometimes feed on material scavenged or stolen from campsites and picnics, as well as garbage dumps (dump usage is habitual mainly in Alaska).\n\nWhen competing for food, eagles will usually dominate other fish-eaters and scavengers, aggressively displacing mammals such as coyotes (Canis latrans) and foxes, and birds such as corvids, gulls, vultures and other raptors. Occasionally, coyotes, bobcats (Lynx rufus) and domestic dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) can displace eagles from carrion, usually less confident immature birds, as has been recorded in Maine. Bald eagles are less active, bold predators than golden eagles and get relatively more of their food as carrion and from kleptoparasitism (although it is now generally thought that golden eagles eat more carrion than was previously assumed). However, the two species are roughly equal in size, aggressiveness and physical strength and so competitions can go either way. Neither species is known to be dominant, and the outcome depends on the size and disposition of the individual eagles involved. The bald eagle is thought to be much more numerous in North America than the golden eagle, with the bald species estimated to number at least 150,000 individuals, about twice as many golden eagles there are estimated to live in North America. Due to this, bald eagles often outnumber golden eagles at attractive food sources. Despite the potential for contention between these animals, in New Jersey during winter, a golden eagle and numerous bald eagles were observed to hunt snow geese alongside each other without conflict. Similarly, both eagle species have been recorded, via video-monitoring, to feed on gut pills and carcasses of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) in remote forest clearings in the eastern Appalachian Mountains without apparent conflict. Many bald eagles are habitual kleptoparasites, especially in winters when fish are harder to come by. They have been recorded stealing fish from other predators such as ospreys, herons and even otters. They have also been recorded opportunistically pirating birds from peregrine falcons (Falco peregrinus), prairie dogs from ferruginous hawks (Buteo regalis) and even jackrabbits from golden eagles. When they approach scavengers like dogs, gulls or vultures at carrion sites, they often aggressively attack them and try to force them to disgorge their food. Healthy adult bald eagles are not preyed on in the wild and are thus considered apex predators.\n\nReproduction\n\nBald eagles are sexually mature at four or five years of age. When they are old enough to breed, they often return to the area where they were born. It is thought that bald eagles mate for life. However, if one member of a pair dies or disappears, the other will choose a new mate. A pair which has repeatedly failed in breeding attempts may split and look for new mates. Bald eagle courtship involves elaborate, spectacular calls and flight displays. The flight includes swoops, chases, and cartwheels, in which they fly high, lock talons, and free fall, separating just before hitting the ground. Usually, a territory defended by a mature pair will be 1 to of waterside habitat.\n\nCompared to most other raptors which mostly nest in April or May, bald eagles are early breeders: nest building or reinforcing is often by mid-February, egg laying is often late February (sometimes during deep snow in the North), and incubation is usually mid-March and early May. Eggs hatch from mid April to early May, and the young fledge late June to early July. The nest is the largest of any bird in North America; it is used repeatedly over many years and with new material added each year may eventually be as large as 4 m deep, across and weigh 1 t; one nest in Florida was found to be deep, across, and to weigh 3 ST. This nest is on record as the largest tree nest ever recorded for any animal. Usually nests are used for under five years or so, as they either collapse in storms or break the branches supporting them by their sheer weight. However, one nest in the Midwest was occupied continuously for at least 34 years. The nest is built out of branches, usually in large trees found near water. When breeding where there are no trees, the bald eagle will nest on the ground, as has been recorded largely in areas largely isolated from terrestrial predators, such as Amchitka Island in Alaska. In Sonora, Mexico, eagles have been observed nesting on top of Hecho catcuses (Pachycereus pectinaboriginum). Nests located on cliffs and rock pinnacles have been reported historically in California, Kansas, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah, but currently are only verified to occur only in Alaska and Arizona. The eggs average about 73 mm long, ranging from 58 to, and have a breadth of 54 mm, ranging from 47 to. Eggs in Alaska averaged 130 g in mass, while in Saskatchewan they averaged . As with their ultimate body size, egg size tends to increase further away from the Equator. Eagles produce between one and three eggs per year, two being typical. Rarely, four eggs have been found in nests but these may be exceptional cases of polygyny. Eagles in captivity have been capable of producing up to seven eggs. it is rare for all three chicks to successfully reach the fledging stage. The oldest chick often bears the advantage of larger size and louder voice, which tends to draw the parents attention towards it. Occasionally, as is recorded in many large raptorial birds, the oldest sibling sometimes attacks and kills its younger sibling(s), especially early in the nesting period when their sizes are most different. However, nearly half of known bald eagle produce two fledgings (more rarely three), unlike in some other \"eagle\" species such as some in the Aquila genus, in which a second fledging is typically observed in less than 20% of nests, despite two eggs typically being laid. Both the male and female take turns incubating the eggs, but the female does most of the sitting. The parent not incubating will hunt for food or look for nesting material during this stage. For the first two to three weeks of the nestling period, at least one adult is at the nest almost 100% of the time. After five to six weeks, the attendance of parents usually drops off considerably (with the parents often perching in trees nearby). A young eaglet can gain up to 170 g a day, the fastest growth rate of any North American bird. The young eaglets pick up and manipulate sticks, play tug of war with each other, practice holding things in their talons, and stretch and flap their wings. By eight weeks, the eaglets are strong enough to flap their wings, lift their feet off the nest platform, and rise up in the air. The young fledge at anywhere from 8 to 14 weeks of age, though will remain close to the nest and attended to by their parents for a further 6 weeks. Juvenile eagles first start dispersing away from their parents about 8 weeks after they fledge. Variability in departure date related to effects of sex and hatching order on growth and development. For the next four years, immature eagles wander widely in search of food until they attain adult plumage and are eligible to reproduce.\n\nLongevity and mortality\n\nThe average lifespan of bald eagles in the wild is around 20 years, with the oldest confirmed one having been 38 years of age. In captivity, they often live somewhat longer. In one instance, a captive individual in New York lived for nearly 50 years. As with size, the average lifespan of an eagle population appears to be influenced by its location and access to prey. As they are no longer heavily persecuted, adult mortality is quite low. In one study of Florida eagles, adult bald eagles reportedly had 100% annual survival rate. In Prince William Sound in Alaska, adults had an annual survival rate of 88% even after the Exxon Valdez oil spill adversely affected eagles in the area. Of 1,428 individuals from across the range necropsied by National Wildlife Health Center from 1963 to 1984, 329 (23%) eagles died from trauma, primarily impact with wires and vehicles; 309 (22%) died from gunshot; 158 (11%) died from poisoning; 130 (9%) died from electrocution; 68 (5%) died from trapping; 110 (8%) from emaciation; and 31 (2%) from disease; cause of death was undetermined in 293 (20%) of cases. In this study, 68% of mortality was human-caused. Today eagle-shooting is believed to be considerably reduced due to the species protected status. In one case, an adult eagle investigating a peregrine falcon nest for prey items sustained a concussion from a swooping parent peregrine, and ultimately died days later from it. An early natural history video depicting a cougar (Puma concolor) ambushing and killing an immature bald eagle feeding at a rabbit carcass is viewable online although this film may have been staged. \n\nMost non-human-related mortality involves nestlings or eggs. Around 50% of eagles survive their first year. However, in the Chesapeake Bay area, 100% of 39 radio-tagged nestlings survived to their first year. Occasionally, nestling or egg fatalities are due to nest collapses, starvation, sibling aggression or inclement weather. Another significant cause of egg and nestling mortality is predation. These have been verified to be preyed by large gulls, corvids (including ravens, crows and magpies), wolverines (Gulo gulo), hawks, owls, eagles, bobcats (Lynx rufus), American black bears (Ursus americanus) and raccoons. If food access is low, parental attendance at the nest may be lower because both parents may have to forage thus resulting in less protection. Nestlings are usually exempt from predation by terrestrial carnivores that are poor tree-climbers, but Arctic foxes (Vulpes lagopus) occasionally snatched nestlings from ground nests on Amchitka Island in Alaska before they were extirpated from the island. The bald eagle will defend its nest fiercely from all comers and has even repelled attacks from bears, having been recorded knocking a black bear out of a tree when the latter tried to climb a tree holding nestlings. \n\nRelationship with humans\n\nPopulation decline and recovery\n\nOnce a common sight in much of the continent, the bald eagle was severely affected in the mid-20th century by a variety of factors, among them the thinning of egg shells attributed to use of the pesticide DDT. Bald eagles, like many birds of prey, were especially affected by DDT due to biomagnification. DDT itself was not lethal to the adult bird, but it interfered with the bird's calcium metabolism, making the bird either sterile or unable to lay healthy eggs. Female eagles laid eggs that were too brittle to withstand the weight of a brooding adult, making it nearly impossible for the eggs to hatch. It is estimated that in the early 18th century, the bald eagle population was 300,000–500,000, but by the 1950s there were only 412 nesting pairs in the 48 contiguous states of the US.\nOther factors in bald eagle population reductions were a widespread loss of suitable habitat, as well as both legal and illegal shooting. In 1930 a New York City ornithologist wrote that in the state of Alaska in the previous 12 years approximately 70,000 bald eagles had been shot. Many of the hunters killed the bald eagles under the long-held beliefs that bald eagles grabbed young lambs and even children with their talons, yet the birds were innocent of most of these alleged acts of predation (lamb predation is rare, human predation is thought to be non-existent). Later illegal shooting was described as \"the leading cause of direct mortality in both adult and immature bald eagles,\" according to a 1978 report in the Endangered Species Technical Bulletin. In 1984, the National Wildlife Federation listed hunting, power-line electrocution, and collisions in flight as the leading causes of eagle deaths. Bald eagles have also been killed by oil, lead, and mercury pollution, and by human and predator intrusion at nests.\n\nThe species was first protected in the U.S. and Canada by the 1918 Migratory Bird Treaty, later extended to all of North America. The Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, approved by the U.S. Congress in 1940, protected the bald eagle and the golden eagle, prohibiting commercial trapping and killing of the birds. The bald eagle was declared an endangered species in the U.S. in 1967, and amendments to the 1940 act between 1962 and 1972 further restricted commercial uses and increased penalties for violators. Perhaps most significant in the species' recovery, in 1972, DDT was banned from usage in the United States. DDT was completely banned in Canada in 1989, though its use had been highly restricted since the late 1970s.\n\nWith regulations in place and DDT banned, the eagle population rebounded. The bald eagle can be found in growing concentrations throughout the United States and Canada, particularly near large bodies of water. In the early 1980s, the estimated total population was 100,000 individuals, with 110,000–115,000 by 1992; the U.S. state with the largest resident population is Alaska, with about 40,000–50,000, with the next highest population the Canadian province of British Columbia with 20,000–30,000 in 1992. Obtaining a precise count of bald eagles population is extremely difficult. The most recent data submitted by individual states was in 2006, when 9789 breeding pairs were reported. For some time, the stronghold breeding population of bald eagles in the lower 48 states was in Florida, where over a thousand pairs have held on while populations in other states were significantly reduced by DDT use. Today, the contiguous state with the largest number of breeding pairs of eagles is Minnesota with an estimated 1,312 pairs, surpassing Florida's most recent count of 1,166 pairs. 23, or nearly half, of the 48 contiguous states now have at least 100 breeding pairs of bald eagles. In Washington State, there were only 105 occupied nests in 1980. That number increased by about 30 per year, so that by 2005 there were 840 occupied nests. 2005 was the last year that the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife counted occupied nest. Further population increases in Washington may limited by the availability of late winter food, particularly salmon. \n\nThe bald eagle was officially removed from the U.S. federal government's list of endangered species on July 12, 1995, by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, when it was reclassified from \"Endangered\" to \"Threatened.\" On July 6, 1999, a proposal was initiated \"To Remove the Bald Eagle in the Lower 48 States From the List of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife.\" It was de-listed on June 28, 2007. It has also been assigned a risk level of Least Concern category on the IUCN Red List. In the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill of 1989 an estimated 247 were killed in Prince William Sound, though the local population returned to its pre-spill level by 1995.\n\nIn captivity\n\nPermits are required to keep bald eagles in captivity in the United States. Permits are primarily issued to public educational institutions, and the eagles which they show are permanently injured individuals which cannot be released to the wild. The facilities where eagles are kept must be equipped with adequate caging and facilities, as well as workers experienced in the handling and care of eagles. Bald eagles cannot legally be kept for falconry in the United States. As a rule, the bald eagle is a poor choice for public shows, being timid, prone to becoming highly stressed, and unpredictable in nature. Native American tribes can obtain a \"Native American Religious Use\" permit to keep non-releasable eagles as well. They use their naturally molted feathers for religious and cultural ceremonies. The bald eagle can be long-lived in captivity if well cared for, but does not breed well even under the best conditions. In Canada, a license is required to keep bald eagles for falconry.\n\nCultural significance\n\nThe bald eagle is important in various Native American cultures and, as the national bird of the United States, is prominent in seals and logos, coinage, postage stamps, and other items relating to the U.S. federal government.\n\nRole in Native American culture\n\nThe bald eagle is a sacred bird in some North American cultures, and its feathers, like those of the golden eagle, are central to many religious and spiritual customs among Native Americans. Eagles are considered spiritual messengers between gods and humans by some cultures. Many pow wow dancers use the eagle claw as part of their regalia as well. Eagle feathers are often used in traditional ceremonies, particularly in the construction of regalia worn and as a part of fans, bustles and head dresses. In the Navajo Tradition an Eagle feather is represented to be a Protector, along with the Feather Navajo Medicine Man use the leg and wing bones for ceremonial whistles. The Lakota, for instance, give an eagle feather as a symbol of honor to person who achieves a task. In modern times, it may be given on an event such as a graduation from college. The Pawnee considered eagles as symbols of fertility because their nests are built high off the ground and because they fiercely protect their young. The Choctaw considered the bald eagle, who has direct contact with the upper world of the sun, as a symbol of peace.\n\nDuring the Sun Dance, which is practiced by many Plains Indian tribes, the eagle is represented in several ways. The eagle nest is represented by the fork of the lodge where the dance is held. A whistle made from the wing bone of an eagle is used during the course of the dance. Also during the dance, a medicine man may direct his fan, which is made of eagle feathers, to people who seek to be healed. The medicine man touches the fan to the center pole and then to the patient, in order to transmit power from the pole to the patient. The fan is then held up toward the sky, so that the eagle may carry the prayers for the sick to the Creator.\n\nCurrent eagle feather law stipulates that only individuals of certifiable Native American ancestry enrolled in a federally recognized tribe are legally authorized to obtain or possess bald or golden eagle feathers for religious or spiritual use. The constitutionality of these laws has been questioned by Native American groups on the basis that it violates the First Amendment by affecting ability to practice their religion freely.\n\nThe National Eagle Repository, a division of the FWS, exists as a means to receive, process, and store bald and golden eagles which are found dead, and to distribute the eagles, their parts and feathers, to federally recognized Native American tribes for use in religious ceremonies. \n\nNational bird of the United States\n\nThe bald eagle is the national bird of the United States of America. The founders of the United States were fond of comparing their new republic with the Roman Republic, in which eagle imagery (usually involving the golden eagle) was prominent. On June 20, 1782, the Continental Congress adopted the design for the Great Seal of the United States depicting a bald eagle grasping 13 arrows and an olive branch with its talons.\n\nThe bald eagle appears on most official seals of the U.S. government, including the presidential seal, the presidential flag, and in the logos of many U.S. federal agencies. Between 1916 and 1945, the presidential flag (but not the seal) showed an eagle facing to its left (the viewer's right), which gave rise to the urban legend that the flag is changed to have the eagle face towards the olive branch in peace, and towards the arrows in wartime. \n\nContrary to popular legend, there is no evidence that Benjamin Franklin ever publicly supported the wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo), rather than the bald eagle, as a symbol of the United States. However, in a letter written to his daughter in 1784 from Paris, criticizing the Society of the Cincinnati, he stated his personal distaste for the bald eagle's behavior. In the letter Franklin states:[http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/bald_eagle/lifehistory Bald Eagle, Life History, All About Birds – Cornell Lab of Ornithology]. AllAboutBirds.org. Retrieved on 2012-08-22.\n\n'\n\nFranklin opposed the creation of the Society because he viewed it, with its hereditary membership, as a noble order unwelcome in the newly independent Republic, contrary to the ideals of Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, for whom the Society was named; his reference to the two kinds of birds is interpreted as a satirical comparison between the Society of the Cincinnati and Cincinnatus." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "On_the_Origin_of_Species.txt" ], "title": [ "On the Origin of Species" ], "wiki_context": [ "On the Origin of Species, published on 24 November 1859, is a work of scientific literature by Charles Darwin which is considered to be the foundation of evolutionary biology. Darwin's book introduced the scientific theory that populations evolve over the course of generations through a process of natural selection. It presented a body of evidence that the diversity of life arose by common descent through a branching pattern of evolution. Darwin included evidence that he had gathered on the Beagle expedition in the 1830s and his subsequent findings from research, correspondence, and experimentation. \n\nVarious evolutionary ideas had already been proposed to explain new findings in biology. There was growing support for such ideas among dissident anatomists and the general public, but during the first half of the 19th century the English scientific establishment was closely tied to the Church of England, while science was part of natural theology. Ideas about the transmutation of species were controversial as they conflicted with the beliefs that species were unchanging parts of a designed hierarchy and that humans were unique, unrelated to other animals. The political and theological implications were intensely debated, but transmutation was not accepted by the scientific mainstream.\n\nThe book was written for non-specialist readers and attracted widespread interest upon its publication. As Darwin was an eminent scientist, his findings were taken seriously and the evidence he presented generated scientific, philosophical, and religious discussion. The debate over the book contributed to the campaign by T. H. Huxley and his fellow members of the X Club to secularise science by promoting scientific naturalism. Within two decades there was widespread scientific agreement that evolution, with a branching pattern of common descent, had occurred, but scientists were slow to give natural selection the significance that Darwin thought appropriate. During \"the eclipse of Darwinism\" from the 1880s to the 1930s, various other mechanisms of evolution were given more credit. With the development of the modern evolutionary synthesis in the 1930s and 1940s, Darwin's concept of evolutionary adaptation through natural selection became central to modern evolutionary theory, and it has now become the unifying concept of the life sciences.\n\nSummary of Darwin's theory\n\nDarwin's theory of evolution is based on key facts and the inferences drawn from them, which biologist Ernst Mayr summarised as follows: \n\n* Every species is fertile enough that if all offspring survived to reproduce the population would grow (fact).\n* Despite periodic fluctuations, populations remain roughly the same size (fact).\n* Resources such as food are limited and are relatively stable over time (fact).\n* A struggle for survival ensues (inference).\n* Individuals in a population vary significantly from one another (fact).\n* Much of this variation is heritable (fact).\n* Individuals less suited to the environment are less likely to survive and less likely to reproduce; individuals more suited to the environment are more likely to survive and more likely to reproduce and leave their heritable traits to future generations, which produces the process of natural selection (fact).\n* This slowly effected process results in populations changing to adapt to their environments, and ultimately, these variations accumulate over time to form new species (inference).\n\nBackground\n\nDevelopments before Darwin's theory\n\nIn later editions of the book, Darwin traced evolutionary ideas as far back as Aristotle; the text he cites is a summary by Aristotle of the ideas of the earlier Greek philosopher Empedocles. Early Christian Church Fathers and Medieval European scholars interpreted the Genesis creation narrative allegorically rather than as a literal historical account; organisms were described by their mythological and heraldic significance as well as by their physical form. Nature was widely believed to be unstable and capricious, with monstrous births from union between species, and spontaneous generation of life. \n\nThe Protestant Reformation inspired a literal interpretation of the Bible, with concepts of creation that conflicted with the findings of an emerging science seeking explanations congruent with the mechanical philosophy of René Descartes and the empiricism of the Baconian method. After the turmoil of the English Civil War, the Royal Society wanted to show that science did not threaten religious and political stability. John Ray developed an influential natural theology of rational order; in his taxonomy, species were static and fixed, their adaptation and complexity designed by God, and varieties showed minor differences caused by local conditions. In God's benevolent design, carnivores caused mercifully swift death, but the suffering caused by parasitism was a puzzling problem. The biological classification introduced by Carl Linnaeus in 1735 also viewed species as fixed according to the divine plan. In 1766, Georges Buffon suggested that some similar species, such as horses and asses, or lions, tigers, and leopards, might be varieties descended from a common ancestor. The Ussher chronology of the 1650s had calculated creation at 4004 BC, but by the 1780s geologists assumed a much older world. Wernerians thought strata were deposits from shrinking seas, but James Hutton proposed a self-maintaining infinite cycle, anticipating uniformitarianism. \n\nCharles Darwin's grandfather Erasmus Darwin outlined a hypothesis of transmutation of species in the 1790s, and Jean-Baptiste Lamarck published a more developed theory in 1809. Both envisaged that spontaneous generation produced simple forms of life that progressively developed greater complexity, adapting to the environment by inheriting changes in adults caused by use or disuse. This process was later called Lamarckism. Lamarck thought there was an inherent progressive tendency driving organisms continuously towards greater complexity, in parallel but separate lineages with no extinction. Geoffroy contended that embryonic development recapitulated transformations of organisms in past eras when the environment acted on embryos, and that animal structures were determined by a constant plan as demonstrated by homologies. Georges Cuvier strongly disputed such ideas, holding that unrelated, fixed species showed similarities that reflected a design for functional needs. His palæontological work in the 1790s had established the reality of extinction, which he explained by local catastrophes, followed by repopulation of the affected areas by other species. \n\nIn Britain, William Paley's Natural Theology saw adaptation as evidence of beneficial \"design\" by the Creator acting through natural laws. All naturalists in the two English universities (Oxford and Cambridge) were Church of England clergymen, and science became a search for these laws. Geologists adapted catastrophism to show repeated worldwide annihilation and creation of new fixed species adapted to a changed environment, initially identifying the most recent catastrophe as the biblical flood. Some anatomists such as Robert Grant were influenced by Lamarck and Geoffroy, but most naturalists regarded their ideas of transmutation as a threat to divinely appointed social order. \n\nInception of Darwin's theory\n\nDarwin went to Edinburgh University in 1825 to study medicine. In his second year he neglected his medical studies for natural history and spent four months assisting Robert Grant's research into marine invertebrates. Grant revealed his enthusiasm for the transmutation of species, but Darwin rejected it. Starting in 1827, at Cambridge University, Darwin learnt science as natural theology from botanist John Stevens Henslow, and read Paley, John Herschel and Alexander von Humboldt. Filled with zeal for science, he studied catastrophist geology with Adam Sedgwick. \n\nIn December 1831, he joined the Beagle expedition as a gentleman naturalist and geologist. He read Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology and from the first stop ashore, at St. Jago, found Lyell's uniformitarianism a key to the geological history of landscapes. Darwin discovered fossils resembling huge armadillos, and noted the geographical distribution of modern species in hope of finding their \"centre of creation\". The three Fuegian missionaries the expedition returned to Tierra del Fuego were friendly and civilised, yet to Darwin their relatives on the island seemed \"miserable, degraded savages\", and he no longer saw an unbridgeable gap between humans and animals. As the Beagle neared England in 1836, he noted that species might not be fixed. \n\nRichard Owen showed that fossils of extinct species Darwin found in South America were allied to living species on the same continent. In March 1837, ornithologist John Gould announced that Darwin's rhea was a separate species from the previously described rhea (though their territories overlapped), that mockingbirds collected on the Galápagos Islands represented three separate species each unique to a particular island, and that several distinct birds from those islands were all classified as finches. Darwin began speculating, in a series of notebooks, on the possibility that \"one species does change into another\" to explain these findings, and around July sketched a genealogical branching of a single evolutionary tree, discarding Lamarck's independent lineages progressing to higher forms. Unconventionally, Darwin asked questions of fancy pigeon and animal breeders as well as established scientists. At the zoo he had his first sight of an ape, and was profoundly impressed by how human the orangutan seemed. \n\nIn late September 1838, he started reading Thomas Malthus's An Essay on the Principle of Population with its statistical argument that human populations, if unrestrained, breed beyond their means and struggle to survive. Darwin related this to the struggle for existence among wildlife and botanist de Candolle's \"warring of the species\" in plants; he immediately envisioned \"a force like a hundred thousand wedges\" pushing well-adapted variations into \"gaps in the economy of nature\", so that the survivors would pass on their form and abilities, and unfavourable variations would be destroyed. By December 1838, he had noted a similarity between the act of breeders selecting traits and a Malthusian Nature selecting among variants thrown up by \"chance\" so that \"every part of newly acquired structure is fully practical and perfected\". \n\nDarwin now had the framework of his theory of natural selection \"by which to work\", but he was fully occupied with his career as a geologist and held off writing a sketch of his theory until his book on The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs was completed in May 1842. \n\nFurther development\n\nDarwin continued to research and extensively revise his theory while focusing on his main work of publishing the scientific results of the Beagle voyage. He tentatively wrote of his ideas to Lyell in January 1842; then in June he roughed out a 35-page \"Pencil Sketch\" of his theory. Darwin began correspondence about his theorising with the botanist Joseph Dalton Hooker in January 1844, and by July had rounded out his \"sketch\" into a 230-page \"Essay\", to be expanded with his research results and published if he died prematurely. \n\nIn November 1844, the anonymously published popular science book Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation, written by Scottish journalist Robert Chambers, widened public interest in the concept of transmutation of species. Vestiges used evidence from the fossil record and embryology to support the claim that living things had progressed from the simple to the more complex over time. But it proposed a linear progression rather than the branching common descent theory behind Darwin's work in progress, and it ignored adaptation. Darwin read it soon after publication, and scorned its amateurish geology and zoology, but he carefully reviewed his own arguments after leading scientists, including Adam Sedgwick, attacked its morality and scientific errors. Vestiges had significant influence on public opinion, and the intense debate helped to pave the way for the acceptance of the more scientifically sophisticated Origin by moving evolutionary speculation into the mainstream. While few naturalists were willing to consider transmutation, Herbert Spencer became an active proponent of Lamarckism and progressive development in the 1850s. \n\nHooker was persuaded to take away a copy of the \"Essay\" in January 1847, and eventually sent a page of notes giving Darwin much needed feedback. Reminded of his lack of expertise in taxonomy, Darwin began an eight-year study of barnacles, becoming the leading expert on their classification. Using his theory, he discovered homologies showing that slightly changed body parts served different functions to meet new conditions, and he found an intermediate stage in the evolution of distinct sexes. \n\nDarwin's barnacle studies convinced him that variation arose constantly and not just in response to changed circumstances. In 1854, he completed the last part of his Beagle-related writing and began working full-time on evolution. His thinking changed from the view that species formed in isolated populations only, as on islands, to an emphasis on speciation without isolation; that is, he saw increasing specialisation within large stable populations as continuously exploiting new ecological niches. He conducted empirical research focusing on difficulties with his theory. He studied the developmental and anatomical differences between different breeds of many domestic animals, became actively involved in fancy pigeon breeding, and experimented (with the help of his son Francis) on ways that plant seeds and animals might disperse across oceans to colonise distant islands. By 1856, his theory was much more sophisticated, with a mass of supporting evidence. \n\nPublication\n\nEvents leading to publication\n\nAn 1855 paper on the \"introduction\" of species, written by Alfred Russel Wallace, claimed that patterns in the geographical distribution of living and fossil species could be explained if every new species always came into existence near an already existing, closely related species. Charles Lyell recognised the implications of Wallace's paper and its possible connection to Darwin's work, although Darwin did not, and in a letter written on 1–2 May 1856 Lyell urged Darwin to publish his theory to establish priority. Darwin was torn between the desire to set out a full and convincing account and the pressure to quickly produce a short paper. He met Lyell, and in correspondence with Joseph Dalton Hooker affirmed that he did not want to expose his ideas to review by an editor as would have been required to publish in an academic journal. He began a \"sketch\" account on 14 May 1856, and by July had decided to produce a full technical treatise on species. His theory including the principle of divergence was complete by 5 September 1857 when he sent Asa Gray a brief but detailed abstract of his ideas.\n\nDarwin was hard at work on his \"big book\" on Natural Selection, when on 18 June 1858 he received a parcel from Wallace, who stayed on the Maluku Islands (Ternate and Gilolo). It enclosed twenty pages describing an evolutionary mechanism, a response to Darwin's recent encouragement, with a request to send it on to Lyell if Darwin thought it worthwhile. The mechanism was similar to Darwin's own theory. Darwin wrote to Lyell that \"your words have come true with a vengeance, ... forestalled\" and he would \"of course, at once write and offer to send [it] to any journal\" that Wallace chose, adding that \"all my originality, whatever it may amount to, will be smashed\". Lyell and Hooker agreed that a joint publication putting together Wallace's pages with extracts from Darwin's 1844 Essay and his 1857 letter to Gray should be presented at the Linnean Society, and on 1 July 1858, the papers entitled On the Tendency of Species to form Varieties; and on the Perpetuation of Varieties and Species by Natural Means of Selection, by Wallace and Darwin respectively, were read out but drew little reaction. While Darwin considered Wallace's idea to be identical to his concept of natural selection, historians have pointed out differences. Darwin described natural selection as being analogous to the artificial selection practised by animal breeders, and emphasised competition between individuals; Wallace drew no comparison to selective breeding, and focused on ecological pressures that kept different varieties adapted to local conditions. Some historians have suggested that Wallace was actually discussing group selection rather than selection acting on individual variation. \n\nAfter the meeting, Darwin decided to write \"an abstract of my whole work\". He started work on 20 July 1858, while on holiday at Sandown, and wrote parts of it from memory. Lyell discussed arrangements with publisher John Murray III, of the publishing house John Murray, who responded immediately to Darwin's letter of 31 March 1859 with an agreement to publish the book without even seeing the manuscript, and an offer to Darwin of of the profits. (eventually Murray paid £180 to Darwin for the 1st edition and by Darwin's death in 1882 the book was in its 6th edition, earning Darwin nearly £3000. )\n\nChoice of title\n\nDarwin had initially decided to call his book An abstract of an Essay on the Origin of Species and Varieties Through natural selection, but with Murray's persuasion it was eventually changed to the snappier title: On the Origin of Species, with the title page adding by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.\n\nHere and elsewhere in the book, Darwin used the term \"races\" interchangeably with \"varieties\", with the meaning of varieties within a species. Thus, he discussed \"the several races, for instance, of the cabbage\" and \"the hereditary varieties or races of our domestic animals and plants\". There are very few references to human races, and Darwin avoided explaining this topic which was then controversial in debates over slavery and imperialism, but in Difficulties for the theory he indicated that the principle of sexual selection could also apply to \"the races of man\".\n\nTime taken to publish\n\nDarwin had his basic theory of natural selection \"by which to work\" by December 1838, yet almost twenty years later, when Wallace's letter arrived on 18 June 1858, Darwin was still not ready to publish his theory. It was long thought that Darwin avoided or delayed making his ideas public for personal reasons. Reasons suggested have included fear of religious persecution or social disgrace if his views were revealed, and concern about upsetting his clergymen naturalist friends or his pious wife Emma. Charles Darwin's illness caused repeated delays. His paper on Glen Roy had proved embarrassingly wrong, and he may have wanted to be sure he was correct. David Quammen has suggested all these factors may have contributed, and notes Darwin's large output of books and busy family life during that time. \n\nA more recent study by science historian John van Wyhe has determined that the idea that Darwin delayed publication only dates back to the 1940s, and Darwin's contemporaries thought the time he took was reasonable. Darwin always finished one book before starting another. While he was researching, he told many people about his interest in transmutation without causing outrage. He firmly intended to publish, but it was not until September 1854 that he could work on it full-time. His estimate that writing his \"big book\" would take five years was optimistic. \n\nPublication and subsequent editions\n\nOn the Origin of Species was first published on Thursday 24 November 1859, priced at fifteen shillings with a first printing of 1250 copies. The book had been offered to booksellers at Murray's autumn sale on Tuesday 22 November, and all available copies had been taken up immediately. In total, 1,250 copies were printed but after deducting presentation and review copies, and five for Stationers' Hall copyright, around 1,170 copies were available for sale. Significantly, 500 were taken by Mudie's Library, ensuring that the book promptly reached a large number of subscribers to the library. The second edition of 3,000 copies was quickly brought out on 7 January 1860, and incorporated numerous corrections as well as a response to religious objections by the addition of a new epigraph on page ii, a quotation from Charles Kingsley, and the phrase \"by the Creator\" added to the closing sentence. During Darwin's lifetime the book went through six editions, with cumulative changes and revisions to deal with counter-arguments raised. The third edition came out in 1861, with a number of sentences rewritten or added and an introductory appendix, An Historical Sketch of the Recent Progress of Opinion on the Origin of Species, while the fourth in 1866 had further revisions. The fifth edition, published on 10 February 1869, incorporated more changes and for the first time included the phrase \"survival of the fittest\", which had been coined by the philosopher Herbert Spencer in his Principles of Biology (1864).\"This survival of the fittest, which I have here sought to express in mechanical terms, is that which Mr. Darwin has called 'natural selection', or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life.\" \n\nIn January 1871, George Jackson Mivart's On the Genesis of Species listed detailed arguments against natural selection, and claimed it included false metaphysics. Darwin made extensive revisions to the sixth edition of the Origin (this was the first edition in which he used the word \"evolution\" which had commonly been associated with embryological development, though all editions concluded with the word \"evolved\" ), and added a new chapter VII, Miscellaneous objections, to address Mivart's arguments.\n\nThe sixth edition was published by Murray on 19 February 1872 as The Origin of Species, with \"On\" dropped from the title. Darwin had told Murray of working men in Lancashire clubbing together to buy the 5th edition at fifteen shillings and wanted it made more widely available; the price was halved to 7s 6d by printing in a smaller font. It includes a glossary compiled by W.S. Dallas. Book sales increased from 60 to 250 per month.\n\nPublication outside Great Britain\n\nIn the United States, botanist Asa Gray an American colleague of Darwin negotiated with a Boston publisher for publication of an authorised American version, but learnt that two New York publishing firms were already planning to exploit the absence of international copyright to print Origin. Darwin was delighted by the popularity of the book, and asked Gray to keep any profits. Gray managed to negotiate a 5% royalty with Appleton's of New York, who got their edition out in mid January 1860, and the other two withdrew. In a May letter, Darwin mentioned a print run of 2,500 copies, but it is not clear if this referred to the first printing only as there were four that year. \n\nThe book was widely translated in Darwin's lifetime, but problems arose with translating concepts and metaphors, and some translations were biased by the translator's own agenda. Darwin distributed presentation copies in France and Germany, hoping that suitable applicants would come forward, as translators were expected to make their own arrangements with a local publisher. He welcomed the distinguished elderly naturalist and geologist Heinrich Georg Bronn, but the German translation published in 1860 imposed Bronn's own ideas, adding controversial themes that Darwin had deliberately omitted. Bronn translated \"favoured races\" as \"perfected races\", and added essays on issues including the origin of life, as well as a final chapter on religious implications partly inspired by Bronn's adherence to Naturphilosophie. In 1862, Bronn produced a second edition based on the third English edition and Darwin's suggested additions, but then died of a heart attack. Darwin corresponded closely with Julius Victor Carus, who published an improved translation in 1867. Darwin's attempts to find a translator in France fell through, and the translation by Clémence Royer published in 1862 added an introduction praising Darwin's ideas as an alternative to religious revelation and promoting ideas anticipating social Darwinism and eugenics, as well as numerous explanatory notes giving her own answers to doubts that Darwin expressed. Darwin corresponded with Royer about a second edition published in 1866 and a third in 1870, but he had difficulty getting her to remove her notes and was troubled by these editions. He remained unsatisfied until a translation by Edmond Barbier was published in 1876. A Dutch translation by Tiberius Cornelis Winkler was published in 1860. By 1864, additional translations had appeared in Italian and Russian. In Darwin's lifetime, Origin was published in Swedish in 1871, Danish in 1872, Polish in 1873, Hungarian in 1873–1874, Spanish in 1877 and Serbian in 1878. By 1977, it had appeared in an additional 18 languages.\n\nContent\n\nTitle pages and introduction\n\nPage ii contains quotations by William Whewell and Francis Bacon on the theology of natural laws, harmonising science and religion in accordance with Isaac Newton's belief in a rational God who established a law-abiding cosmos. In the second edition, Darwin added an epigraph from Joseph Butler affirming that God could work through scientific laws as much as through miracles, in a nod to the religious concerns of his oldest friends. The Introduction establishes Darwin's credentials as a naturalist and author, then refers to John Herschel's letter suggesting that the origin of species \"would be found to be a natural in contradistinction to a miraculous process\": \n\nWHEN on board HMS Beagle, as naturalist, I was much struck with certain facts in the distribution of the inhabitants of South America, and in the geological relations of the present to the past inhabitants of that continent. These facts seemed to me to throw some light on the origin of species—that mystery of mysteries, as it has been called by one of our greatest philosophers. \n\nDarwin refers specifically to the distribution of the species rheas, and to that of the Galápagos tortoises and mockingbirds. He mentions his years of work on his theory, and the arrival of Wallace at the same conclusion, which led him to \"publish this Abstract\" of his incomplete work. He outlines his ideas, and sets out the essence of his theory:\n\nAs many more individuals of each species are born than can possibly survive; and as, consequently, there is a frequently recurring struggle for existence, it follows that any being, if it vary however slightly in any manner profitable to itself, under the complex and sometimes varying conditions of life, will have a better chance of surviving, and thus be naturally selected. From the strong principle of inheritance, any selected variety will tend to propagate its new and modified form. \n\nStarting with the third edition, Darwin prefaced the introduction with a sketch of the historical development of evolutionary ideas. In that sketch he acknowledged that Patrick Matthew had, unknown to Wallace or himself, anticipated the concept of natural selection in an appendix to a book published in 1831; in the fourth edition he mentioned that William Charles Wells had done so as early as 1813. \n\nVariation under domestication and under nature\n\nChapter I covers animal husbandry and plant breeding, going back to ancient Egypt. Darwin discusses contemporary opinions on the origins of different breeds under cultivation to argue that many have been produced from common ancestors by selective breeding. As an illustration of artificial selection, he describes fancy pigeon breeding, noting that \"[t]he diversity of the breeds is something astonishing\", yet all were descended from one species of rock pigeon. Darwin saw two distinct kinds of variation: (1) rare abrupt changes he called \"sports\" or \"monstrosities\" (example: ancon sheep with short legs), and (2) ubiquitous small differences (example: slightly shorter or longer bill of pigeons).David Reznick (2009) The Origin Then and Now, Princeton University Press, p.49. Both types of hereditary changes can be used by breeders. However, for Darwin the small changes were most important in evolution.\n\nIn Chapter II, Darwin specifies that the distinction between species and varieties is arbitrary, with experts disagreeing and changing their decisions when new forms were found. He concludes that \"a well-marked variety may be justly called an incipient species\" and that \"species are only strongly marked and permanent varieties\". He argues for the ubiquity of variation in nature. Historians have noted that naturalists had long been aware that the individuals of a species differed from one another, but had generally considered such variations to be limited and unimportant deviations from the archetype of each species, that archetype being a fixed ideal in the mind of God. Darwin and Wallace made variation among individuals of the same species central to understanding the natural world.\n\nStruggle for existence, natural selection, and divergence\n\nIn Chapter III, Darwin asks how varieties \"which I have called incipient species\" become distinct species, and in answer introduces the key concept he calls \"natural selection\"; in the fifth edition he adds, \"But the expression often used by Mr. Herbert Spencer, of the Survival of the Fittest, is more accurate, and is sometimes equally convenient.\" \n\nOwing to this struggle for life, any variation, however slight and from whatever cause proceeding, if it be in any degree profitable to an individual of any species, in its infinitely complex relations to other organic beings and to external nature, will tend to the preservation of that individual, and will generally be inherited by its offspring ... I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection, in order to mark its relation to man's power of selection.\n\nHe notes that both A. P. de Candolle and Charles Lyell had stated that all organisms are exposed to severe competition. Darwin emphasizes that he used the phrase \"struggle for existence\" in \"a large and metaphorical sense, including dependence of one being on another\"; he gives examples ranging from plants struggling against drought to plants competing for birds to eat their fruit and disseminate their seeds. He describes the struggle resulting from population growth: \"It is the doctrine of Malthus applied with manifold force to the whole animal and vegetable kingdoms.\" He discusses checks to such increase including complex ecological interdependencies, and notes that competition is most severe between closely related forms \"which fill nearly the same place in the economy of nature\". \n\nChapter IV details natural selection under the \"infinitely complex and close-fitting ... mutual relations of all organic beings to each other and to their physical conditions of life\". Darwin takes as an example a country where a change in conditions led to extinction of some species, immigration of others and, where suitable variations occurred, descendants of some species became adapted to new conditions. He remarks that the artificial selection practised by animal breeders frequently produced sharp divergence in character between breeds, and suggests that natural selection might do the same, saying:\n\nBut how, it may be asked, can any analogous principle apply in nature? I believe it can and does apply most efficiently, from the simple circumstance that the more diversified the descendants from any one species become in structure, constitution, and habits, by so much will they be better enabled to seize on many and widely diversified places in the polity of nature, and so be enabled to increase in numbers. \n\nHistorians have remarked that here Darwin anticipated the modern concept of an ecological niche. He did not suggest that every favourable variation must be selected, nor that the favoured animals were better or higher, but merely more adapted to their surroundings.\n\nDarwin proposes sexual selection, driven by competition between males for mates, to explain sexually dimorphic features such as lion manes, deer antlers, peacock tails, bird songs, and the bright plumage of some male birds. He analysed sexual selection more fully in The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex (1871). Natural selection was expected to work very slowly in forming new species, but given the effectiveness of artificial selection, he could \"see no limit to the amount of change, to the beauty and infinite complexity of the coadaptations between all organic beings, one with another and with their physical conditions of life, which may be effected in the long course of time by nature's power of selection\". Using a tree diagram and calculations, he indicates the \"divergence of character\" from original species into new species and genera. He describes branches falling off as extinction occurred, while new branches formed in \"the great Tree of life ... with its ever branching and beautiful ramifications\". \n\nVariation and heredity\n\nIn Darwin's time there was no agreed-upon model of heredity; in Chapter I Darwin admitted, \"The laws governing inheritance are quite unknown.\" He accepted a version of the inheritance of acquired characteristics (which after Darwin's death came to be called Lamarckism), and Chapter V discusses what he called the effects of use and disuse; he wrote that he thought \"there can be little doubt that use in our domestic animals strengthens and enlarges certain parts, and disuse diminishes them; and that such modifications are inherited\", and that this also applied in nature. Darwin stated that some changes that were commonly attributed to use and disuse, such as the loss of functional wings in some island dwelling insects, might be produced by natural selection. In later editions of Origin, Darwin expanded the role attributed to the inheritance of acquired characteristics. Darwin also admitted ignorance of the source of inheritable variations, but speculated they might be produced by environmental factors. However, one thing was clear: whatever the exact nature and causes of new variations, Darwin knew from observation and experiment that breeders were able to select such variations and produce huge differences in many generations of selection. The observation that selection works in domestic animals is not destroyed by lack of understanding of the underlying hereditary mechanism.\n\nBreeding of animals and plants showed related varieties varying in similar ways, or tending to revert to an ancestral form, and similar patterns of variation in distinct species were explained by Darwin as demonstrating common descent. He recounted how Lord Morton's mare apparently demonstrated telegony, offspring inheriting characteristics of a previous mate of the female parent, and accepted this process as increasing the variation available for natural selection. \n\nMore detail was given in Darwin's 1868 book on The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication, which tried to explain heredity through his hypothesis of pangenesis. Although Darwin had privately questioned blending inheritance, he struggled with the theoretical difficulty that novel individual variations would tend to blend into a population. However, inherited variation could be seen, and Darwin's concept of selection working on a population with a range of small variations was workable. It was not until the modern evolutionary synthesis in the 1930s and 1940s that a model of heredity became completely integrated with a model of variation. This modern evolutionary synthesis had been dubbed Neo Darwinian Evolution because it encompasses Charles Darwin's theories of evolution with Gregor Mendel's theories of genetic inheritance. \n\nDifficulties for the theory\n\nChapter VI begins by saying the next three chapters will address possible objections to the theory, the first being that often no intermediate forms between closely related species are found, though the theory implies such forms must have existed. As Darwin noted, \"Firstly, why, if species have descended from other species by insensibly fine gradations, do we not everywhere see innumerable transitional forms? Why is not all nature in confusion, instead of the species being, as we see them, well defined?\" Darwin attributed this to the competition between different forms, combined with the small number of individuals of intermediate forms, often leading to extinction of such forms. This difficulty can be referred to as the absence or rarity of transitional varieties in habitat space.\n\nAnother difficulty, related to the first one, is the absence or rarity of transitional varieties in time. Darwin commented that by the theory of natural selection \"innumerable transitional forms must have existed,\" and wondered \"why do we not find them embedded in countless numbers in the crust of the earth?\" (for further discussion of these difficulties, see Speciation#Darwin's Dilemma and Bernstein et al. and Michod )\n\nThe chapter then deals with whether natural selection could produce complex specialised structures, and the behaviours to use them, when it would be difficult to imagine how intermediate forms could be functional. Darwin said:\n\nSecondly, is it possible that an animal having, for instance, the structure and habits of a bat, could have been formed by the modification of some animal with wholly different habits? Can we believe that natural selection could produce, on the one hand, organs of trifling importance, such as the tail of a giraffe, which serves as a fly-flapper, and, on the other hand, organs of such wonderful structure, as the eye, of which we hardly as yet fully understand the inimitable perfection? \n\nHis answer was that in many cases animals exist with intermediate structures that are functional. He presented flying squirrels, and flying lemurs as examples of how bats might have evolved from non-flying ancestors. He discussed various simple eyes found in invertebrates, starting with nothing more than an optic nerve coated with pigment, as examples of how the vertebrate eye could have evolved. Darwin concludes: \"If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down. But I can find out no such case.\" \n\nIn a section on \"organs of little apparent importance\", Darwin discusses the difficulty of explaining various seemingly trivial traits with no evident adaptive function, and outlines some possibilities such as correlation with useful features. He accepts that we \"are profoundly ignorant of the causes producing slight and unimportant variations\" which distinguish domesticated breeds of animals,, Quote: \"We are profoundly ignorant of the causes producing slight and unimportant variations; and we are immediately made conscious of this by reflecting on the differences in the breeds of our domesticated animals in different countries\" and human races. He suggests that sexual selection might explain these variations:, Quote: \"… I gave, however, a tolerably clear sketch of this principle in the first edition of the 'Origin of Species,' and I there stated that it was applicable to man.\"\n\nI might have adduced for this same purpose the differences between the races of man, which are so strongly marked; I may add that some little light can apparently be thrown on the origin of these differences, chiefly through sexual selection of a particular kind, but without here entering on copious details my reasoning would appear frivolous. \n\nChapter VII (of the first edition) addresses the evolution of instincts. His examples included two he had investigated experimentally: slave-making ants and the construction of hexagonal cells by honey bees. Darwin noted that some species of slave-making ants were more dependent on slaves than others, and he observed that many ant species will collect and store the pupae of other species as food. He thought it reasonable that species with an extreme dependency on slave workers had evolved in incremental steps. He suggested that bees that make hexagonal cells evolved in steps from bees that made round cells, under pressure from natural selection to economise wax. Darwin concluded:\n\nFinally, it may not be a logical deduction, but to my imagination it is far more satisfactory to look at such instincts as the young cuckoo ejecting its foster-brothers, —ants making slaves, —the larvæ of ichneumonidæ feeding within the live bodies of caterpillars, —not as specially endowed or created instincts, but as small consequences of one general law, leading to the advancement of all organic beings, namely, multiply, vary, let the strongest live and the weakest die. \n\nChapter VIII addresses the idea that species had special characteristics that prevented hybrids from being fertile in order to preserve separately created species. Darwin said that, far from being constant, the difficulty in producing hybrids of related species, and the viability and fertility of the hybrids, varied greatly, especially among plants. Sometimes what were widely considered to be separate species produced fertile hybrid offspring freely, and in other cases what were considered to be mere varieties of the same species could only be crossed with difficulty. Darwin concluded: \"Finally, then, the facts briefly given in this chapter do not seem to me opposed to, but even rather to support the view, that there is no fundamental distinction between species and varieties.\" \n\nIn the sixth edition Darwin inserted a new chapter VII (renumbering the subsequent chapters) to respond to criticisms of earlier editions, including the objection that many features of organisms were not adaptive and could not have been produced by natural selection. He said some such features could have been by-products of adaptive changes to other features, and that often features seemed non-adaptive because their function was unknown, as shown by his book on Fertilisation of Orchids that explained how their elaborate structures facilitated pollination by insects. Much of the chapter responds to George Jackson Mivart's criticisms, including his claim that features such as baleen filters in whales, flatfish with both eyes on one side and the camouflage of stick insects could not have evolved through natural selection because intermediate stages would not have been adaptive. Darwin proposed scenarios for the incremental evolution of each feature. \n\nGeologic record\n\nChapter IX deals with the fact that the geologic record appears to show forms of life suddenly arising, without the innumerable transitional fossils expected from gradual changes. Darwin borrowed Charles Lyell's argument in Principles of Geology that the record is extremely imperfect as fossilisation is a very rare occurrence, spread over vast periods of time; since few areas had been geologically explored, there could only be fragmentary knowledge of geological formations, and fossil collections were very poor. Evolved local varieties which migrated into a wider area would seem to be the sudden appearance of a new species. Darwin did not expect to be able to reconstruct evolutionary history, but continuing discoveries gave him well founded hope that new finds would occasionally reveal transitional forms. To show that there had been enough time for natural selection to work slowly, he again cited Principles of Geology and other observations based on sedimentation and erosion, including an estimate that erosion of The Weald had taken 300 million years. The initial appearance of entire groups of well developed organisms in the oldest fossil-bearing layers, now known as the Cambrian explosion, posed a problem. Darwin had no doubt that earlier seas had swarmed with living creatures, but stated that he had no satisfactory explanation for the lack of fossils. Fossil evidence of pre-Cambrian life has since been found, extending the history of life back for billions of years. \n\nChapter X examines whether patterns in the fossil record are better explained by common descent and branching evolution through natural selection, than by the individual creation of fixed species. Darwin expected species to change slowly, but not at the same rate – some organisms such as Lingula were unchanged since the earliest fossils. The pace of natural selection would depend on variability and change in the environment. This distanced his theory from Lamarckian laws of inevitable progress. It has been argued that this anticipated the punctuated equilibrium hypothesis, but other scholars have preferred to emphasise Darwin's commitment to gradualism. He cited Richard Owen's findings that the earliest members of a class were a few simple and generalised species with characteristics intermediate between modern forms, and were followed by increasingly diverse and specialised forms, matching the branching of common descent from an ancestor. Patterns of extinction matched his theory, with related groups of species having a continued existence until extinction, then not reappearing. Recently extinct species were more similar to living species than those from earlier eras, and as he had seen in South America, and William Clift had shown in Australia, fossils from recent geological periods resembled species still living in the same area.\n\nGeographic distribution\n\nChapter XI deals with evidence from biogeography, starting with the observation that differences in flora and fauna from separate regions cannot be explained by environmental differences alone; South America, Africa, and Australia all have regions with similar climates at similar latitudes, but those regions have very different plants and animals. The species found in one area of a continent are more closely allied with species found in other regions of that same continent than to species found on other continents. Darwin noted that barriers to migration played an important role in the differences between the species of different regions. The coastal sea life of the Atlantic and Pacific sides of Central America had almost no species in common even though the Isthmus of Panama was only a few miles wide. His explanation was a combination of migration and descent with modification. He went on to say: \"On this principle of inheritance with modification, we can understand how it is that sections of genera, whole genera, and even families are confined to the same areas, as is so commonly and notoriously the case.\" Darwin explained how a volcanic island formed a few hundred miles from a continent might be colonised by a few species from that continent. These species would become modified over time, but would still be related to species found on the continent, and Darwin observed that this was a common pattern. Darwin discussed ways that species could be dispersed across oceans to colonise islands, many of which he had investigated experimentally. \n\nChapter XII continues the discussion of biogeography. After a brief discussion of freshwater species, it returns to oceanic islands and their peculiarities; for example on some islands roles played by mammals on continents were played by other animals such as flightless birds or reptiles. The summary of both chapters says:\n\n... I think all the grand leading facts of geographical distribution are explicable on the theory of migration (generally of the more dominant forms of life), together with subsequent modification and the multiplication of new forms. We can thus understand the high importance of barriers, whether of land or water, which separate our several zoological and botanical provinces. We can thus understand the localisation of sub-genera, genera, and families; and how it is that under different latitudes, for instance in South America, the inhabitants of the plains and mountains, of the forests, marshes, and deserts, are in so mysterious a manner linked together by affinity, and are likewise linked to the extinct beings which formerly inhabited the same continent ... On these same principles, we can understand, as I have endeavoured to show, why oceanic islands should have few inhabitants, but of these a great number should be endemic or peculiar; ... \n\nClassification, morphology, embryology, rudimentary organs\n\nChapter XIII starts by observing that classification depends on species being grouped together in a multilevel system of groups and sub groups based on varying degrees of resemblance. After discussing classification issues, Darwin concludes:\n\nAll the foregoing rules and aids and difficulties in classification are explained, if I do not greatly deceive myself, on the view that the natural system is founded on descent with modification; that the characters which naturalists consider as showing true affinity between any two or more species, are those which have been inherited from a common parent, and, in so far, all true classification is genealogical; that community of descent is the hidden bond which naturalists have been unconsciously seeking, ... \n\nDarwin discusses morphology, including the importance of homologous structures. He says, \"What can be more curious than that the hand of a man, formed for grasping, that of a mole for digging, the leg of the horse, the paddle of the porpoise, and the wing of the bat, should all be constructed on the same pattern, and should include the same bones, in the same relative positions?\" This made no sense under doctrines of independent creation of species, as even Richard Owen had admitted, but the \"explanation is manifest on the theory of the natural selection of successive slight modifications\" showing common descent. He notes that animals of the same class often have extremely similar embryos. Darwin discusses rudimentary organs, such as the wings of flightless birds and the rudiments of pelvis and leg bones found in some snakes. He remarks that some rudimentary organs, such as teeth in baleen whales, are found only in embryonic stages. These factors also supported his theory of descent with modification.\n\nConcluding remarks\n\nThe final chapter \"Recapitulation and Conclusion\" reviews points from earlier chapters, and Darwin concludes by hoping that his theory might produce revolutionary changes in many fields of natural history. He suggests that psychology will be put on a new foundation and implies the relevance of his theory to the first appearance of humanity with the sentence that \"Light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history.\", Quote: \"… this implies that man must be included with other organic beings in any general conclusion respecting his manner of appearance on this earth.\" Darwin ends with a passage that became well known and much quoted:\n\nIt is interesting to contemplate an entangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and dependent on each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us ... Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals, directly follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved. \n\nAs discussed under religious attitudes, Darwin added the phrase \"by the Creator\" from the 1860 second edition onwards, so that the ultimate sentence began \"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one\".\n\nStructure and style\n\nNature and structure of Darwin's argument\n\nDarwin's aims were twofold: to show that species had not been separately created, and to show that natural selection had been the chief agent of change. He knew that his readers were already familiar with the concept of transmutation of species from Vestiges, and his introduction ridicules that work as failing to provide a viable mechanism. Therefore, the first four chapters lay out his case that selection in nature, caused by the struggle for existence, is analogous to the selection of variations under domestication, and that the accumulation of adaptive variations provides a scientifically testable mechanism for evolutionary speciation. \n\nLater chapters provide evidence that evolution has occurred, supporting the idea of branching, adaptive evolution without directly proving that selection is the mechanism. Darwin presents supporting facts drawn from many disciplines, showing that his theory could explain a myriad of observations from many fields of natural history that were inexplicable under the alternate concept that species had been individually created. The structure of Darwin's argument showed the influence of John Herschel, whose philosophy of science maintained that a mechanism could be called a vera causa (true cause) if three things could be demonstrated: its existence in nature, its ability to produce the effects of interest, and its ability to explain a wide range of observations. \n\nLiterary style\n\nThe Examiner review of 3 December 1859 commented, \"Much of Mr. Darwin's volume is what ordinary readers would call 'tough reading;' that is, writing which to comprehend requires concentrated attention and some preparation for the task. All, however, is by no means of this description, and many parts of the book abound in information, easy to comprehend and both instructive and entertaining.\" \n\nWhile the book was readable enough to sell, its dryness ensured that it was seen as aimed at specialist scientists and could not be dismissed as mere journalism or imaginative fiction. Unlike the still-popular Vestiges, it avoided the narrative style of the historical novel and cosmological speculation, though the closing sentence clearly hinted at cosmic progression. Darwin had long been immersed in the literary forms and practices of specialist science, and made effective use of his skills in structuring arguments. David Quammen has described the book as written in everyday language for a wide audience, but noted that Darwin's literary style was uneven: in some places he used convoluted sentences that are difficult to read, while in other places his writing was beautiful. Quammen advised that later editions were weakened by Darwin making concessions and adding details to address his critics, and recommended the first edition. James T. Costa said that because the book was an abstract produced in haste in response to Wallace's essay, it was more approachable than the big book on natural selection Darwin had been working on, which would have been encumbered by scholarly footnotes and much more technical detail. He added that some parts of Origin are dense, but other parts are almost lyrical, and the case studies and observations are presented in a narrative style unusual in serious scientific books, which broadened its audience. \n\nReception\n\nThe book aroused international interest and a widespread debate, with no sharp line between scientific issues and ideological, social and religious implications. Much of the initial reaction was hostile, but Darwin had to be taken seriously as a prominent and respected name in science. There was much less controversy than had greeted the 1844 publication Vestiges of Creation, which had been rejected by scientists, but had influenced a wide public readership into believing that nature and human society were governed by natural laws. The Origin of Species as a book of wide general interest became associated with ideas of social reform. Its proponents made full use of a surge in the publication of review journals, and it was given more popular attention than almost any other scientific work, though it failed to match the continuing sales of Vestiges. Darwin's book legitimised scientific discussion of evolutionary mechanisms, and the newly coined term Darwinism was used to cover the whole range of evolutionism, not just his own ideas. By the mid-1870s, evolutionism was triumphant.\n\nWhile Darwin had been somewhat coy about human origins, not identifying any explicit conclusion on the matter in his book, he had dropped enough hints about human’s animal ancestry for the inference to be made, and the first review claimed it made a creed of the \"men from monkeys\" idea from Vestiges. Human evolution became central to the debate and was strongly argued by Huxley who featured it in his popular \"working-men's lectures\". Darwin did not publish his own views on this until 1871. \n\nThe naturalism of natural selection conflicted with presumptions of purpose in nature and while this could be reconciled by theistic evolution, other mechanisms implying more progress or purpose were more acceptable. Herbert Spencer had already incorporated Lamarckism into his popular philosophy of progressive free market human society. He popularised the terms evolution and survival of the fittest, and many thought Spencer was central to evolutionary thinking. \n\nImpact on the scientific community\n\nScientific readers were already aware of arguments that species changed through processes that were subject to laws of nature, but the transmutational ideas of Lamarck and the vague \"law of development\" of Vestiges had not found scientific favour. Darwin presented natural selection as a scientifically testable mechanism while accepting that other mechanisms such as inheritance of acquired characters were possible. His strategy established that evolution through natural laws was worthy of scientific study, and by 1875, most scientists accepted that evolution occurred but few thought natural selection was significant. Darwin's scientific method was also disputed, with his proponents favouring the empiricism of John Stuart Mill's A System of Logic, while opponents held to the idealist school of William Whewell's Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, in which investigation could begin with the intuitive truth that species were fixed objects created by design. Early support for Darwin's ideas came from the findings of field naturalists studying biogeography and ecology, including Joseph Dalton Hooker in 1860, and Asa Gray in 1862. Henry Walter Bates presented research in 1861 that explained insect mimicry using natural selection. Alfred Russel Wallace discussed evidence from his Malay archipelago research, including an 1864 paper with an evolutionary explanation for the Wallace line. \n\nEvolution had less obvious applications to anatomy and morphology, and at first had little impact on the research of the anatomist Thomas Henry Huxley. Despite this, Huxley strongly supported Darwin on evolution; though he called for experiments to show whether natural selection could form new species, and questioned if Darwin's gradualism was sufficient without sudden leaps to cause speciation. Huxley wanted science to be secular, without religious interference, and his article in the April 1860 Westminster Review promoted scientific naturalism over natural theology, praising Darwin for \"extending the domination of Science over regions of thought into which she has, as yet, hardly penetrated\" and coining the term \"Darwinism\" as part of his efforts to secularise and professionalise science. Huxley gained influence, and initiated the X Club, which used the journal Nature to promote evolution and naturalism, shaping much of late Victorian science. Later, the German morphologist Ernst Haeckel would convince Huxley that comparative anatomy and palaeontology could be used to reconstruct evolutionary genealogies. \n\nThe leading naturalist in Britain was the anatomist Richard Owen, an idealist who had shifted to the view in the 1850s that the history of life was the gradual unfolding of a divine plan. Owen's review of the Origin in the April 1860 Edinburgh Review bitterly attacked Huxley, Hooker and Darwin, but also signalled acceptance of a kind of evolution as a teleological plan in a continuous \"ordained becoming\", with new species appearing by natural birth. Others that rejected natural selection, but supported \"creation by birth\", included the Duke of Argyll who explained beauty in plumage by design. Since 1858, Huxley had emphasised anatomical similarities between apes and humans, contesting Owen's view that humans were a separate sub-class. Their disagreement over human origins came to the fore at the British Association for the Advancement of Science meeting featuring the legendary 1860 Oxford evolution debate. In two years of acrimonious public dispute that Charles Kingsley satirised as the \"Great Hippocampus Question\" and parodied in The Water-Babies as the \"great hippopotamus test\", Huxley showed that Owen was incorrect in asserting that ape brains lacked a structure present in human brains. Others, including Charles Lyell and Alfred Russel Wallace, thought that humans shared a common ancestor with apes, but higher mental faculties could not have evolved through a purely material process. Darwin published his own explanation in the Descent of Man (1871). \n\nImpact outside Great Britain\n\nEvolutionary ideas, although not natural selection, were accepted by German biologists accustomed to ideas of homology in morphology from Goethe's Metamorphosis of Plants and from their long tradition of comparative anatomy. Bronn's alterations in his German translation added to the misgivings of conservatives, but enthused political radicals. Ernst Haeckel was particularly ardent, aiming to synthesise Darwin's ideas with those of Lamarck and Goethe while still reflecting the spirit of Naturphilosophie. Their ambitious programme to reconstruct the evolutionary history of life was joined by Huxley and supported by discoveries in palaeontology. Haeckel used embryology extensively in his recapitulation theory, which embodied a progressive, almost linear model of evolution. Darwin was cautious about such histories, and had already noted that von Baer's laws of embryology supported his idea of complex branching. \n\nAsa Gray promoted and defended Origin against those American naturalists with an idealist approach, notably Louis Agassiz who viewed every species as a distinct fixed unit in the mind of the Creator, classifying as species what others considered merely varieties. Edward Drinker Cope and Alpheus Hyatt reconciled this view with evolutionism in a form of neo-Lamarckism involving recapitulation theory.\n\nFrench-speaking naturalists in several countries showed appreciation of the much modified French translation by Clémence Royer, but Darwin's ideas had little impact in France, where any scientists supporting evolutionary ideas opted for a form of Lamarckism. The intelligentsia in Russia had accepted the general phenomenon of evolution for several years before Darwin had published his theory, and scientists were quick to take it into account, although the Malthusian aspects were felt to be relatively unimportant. The political economy of struggle was criticised as a British stereotype by Karl Marx and by Leo Tolstoy, who had the character Levin in his novel Anna Karenina voice sharp criticism of the morality of Darwin's views.\n\nChallenges to natural selection\n\nThere were serious scientific objections to the process of natural selection as the key mechanism of evolution, including Karl von Nägeli's insistence that a trivial characteristic with no adaptive advantage could not be developed by selection. Darwin conceded that these could be linked to adaptive characteristics. His estimate that the age of the Earth allowed gradual evolution was disputed by William Thomson (later awarded the title Lord Kelvin), who calculated that it had cooled in less than 100 million years. Darwin accepted blending inheritance, but Fleeming Jenkin calculated that as it mixed traits, natural selection could not accumulate useful traits. Darwin tried to meet these objections in the 5th edition. Mivart supported directed evolution, and compiled scientific and religious objections to natural selection. In response, Darwin made considerable changes to the sixth edition. The problems of the age of the Earth and heredity were only resolved in the 20th century. \n\nBy the mid-1870s, most scientists accepted evolution, but relegated natural selection to a minor role as they believed evolution was purposeful and progressive. The range of evolutionary theories during \"the eclipse of Darwinism\" included forms of \"saltationism\" in which new species were thought to arise through \"jumps\" rather than gradual adaptation, forms of orthogenesis claiming that species had an inherent tendency to change in a particular direction, and forms of neo-Lamarckism in which inheritance of acquired characteristics led to progress. The minority view of August Weismann, that natural selection was the only mechanism, was called neo-Darwinism. It was thought that the rediscovery of Mendelian inheritance invalidated Darwin's views. \n\nImpact on economic and political debates\n\nWhile some, like Spencer, used analogy from natural selection as an argument against government intervention in the economy to benefit the poor, others, including Alfred Russel Wallace, argued that action was needed to correct social and economic inequities to level the playing field before natural selection could improve humanity further. Some political commentaries, including Walter Bagehot's Physics and Politics (1872), attempted to extend the idea of natural selection to competition between nations and between human races. Such ideas were incorporated into what was already an ongoing effort by some working in anthropology to provide scientific evidence for the superiority of Caucasians over non white races and justify European imperialism. Historians write that most such political and economic commentators had only a superficial understanding of Darwin's scientific theory, and were as strongly influenced by other concepts about social progress and evolution, such as the Lamarckian ideas of Spencer and Haeckel, as they were by Darwin's work. Darwin objected to his ideas being used to justify military aggression and unethical business practices as he believed morality was part of fitness in humans, and he opposed polygenism, the idea that human races were fundamentally distinct and did not share a recent common ancestry. \n\nReligious attitudes\n\nThe book produced a wide range of religious responses at a time of changing ideas and increasing secularisation. The issues raised were complex and there was a large middle ground. Developments in geology meant that there was little opposition based on a literal reading of Genesis, but defence of the argument from design and natural theology was central to debates over the book in the English-speaking world.\n\nNatural theology was not a unified doctrine, and while some such as Louis Agassiz were strongly opposed to the ideas in the book, others sought a reconciliation in which evolution was seen as purposeful. In the Church of England, some liberal clergymen interpreted natural selection as an instrument of God's design, with the cleric Charles Kingsley seeing it as \"just as noble a conception of Deity\". In the second edition of January 1860, Darwin quoted Kingsley as \"a celebrated cleric\", and added the phrase \"by the Creator\" to the closing sentence, which from then on read \"life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one\". While some commentators have taken this as a concession to religion that Darwin later regretted, Darwin's view at the time was of God creating life through the laws of nature, and even in the first edition there are several references to \"creation\". \n\nBaden Powell praised \"Mr Darwin's masterly volume [supporting] the grand principle of the self-evolving powers of nature\". In America, Asa Gray argued that evolution is the secondary effect, or modus operandi, of the first cause, design, and published a pamphlet defending the book in terms of theistic evolution, Natural Selection is not inconsistent with Natural Theology. Theistic evolution became a popular compromise, and St. George Jackson Mivart was among those accepting evolution but attacking Darwin's naturalistic mechanism. Eventually it was realised that supernatural intervention could not be a scientific explanation, and naturalistic mechanisms such as neo-Lamarckism were favoured over natural selection as being more compatible with purpose.\n\nEven though the book did not explicitly spell out Darwin’s beliefs about human origins, it had dropped a number of hints about human’s animal ancestry and quickly became central to the debate, as mental and moral qualities were seen as spiritual aspects of the immaterial soul, and it was believed that animals did not have spiritual qualities. This conflict could be reconciled by supposing there was some supernatural intervention on the path leading to humans, or viewing evolution as a purposeful and progressive ascent to mankind's position at the head of nature. While many conservative theologians accepted evolution, Charles Hodge argued in his 1874 critique \"What is Darwinism?\" that \"Darwinism\", defined narrowly as including rejection of design, was atheism though he accepted that Asa Gray did not reject design. Asa Gray responded that this charge misrepresented Darwin's text. By the early 20th century, four noted authors of The Fundamentals were explicitly open to the possibility that God created through evolution, but fundamentalism inspired the American creation–evolution controversy that began in the 1920s. Some conservative Roman Catholic writers and influential Jesuits opposed evolution in the late 19th and early 20th century, but other Catholic writers, starting with Mivart, pointed out that early Church Fathers had not interpreted Genesis literally in this area. The Vatican stated its official position in a 1950 papal encyclical, which held that evolution was not inconsistent with Catholic teaching. \n\nModern influence\n\nVarious alternative evolutionary mechanisms favoured during \"the eclipse of Darwinism\" became untenable as more was learned about inheritance and mutation. The full significance of natural selection was at last accepted in the 1930s and 1940s as part of the modern evolutionary synthesis. During that synthesis biologists and statisticians, including R. A. Fisher, Sewall Wright and J.B.S. Haldane, merged Darwinian selection with a statistical understanding of Mendelian genetics.\n\nModern evolutionary theory continues to develop. Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection, with its tree-like model of branching common descent, has become the unifying theory of the life sciences. The theory explains the diversity of living organisms and their adaptation to the environment. It makes sense of the geologic record, biogeography, parallels in embryonic development, biological homologies, vestigiality, cladistics, phylogenetics and other fields, with unrivalled explanatory power; it has also become essential to applied sciences such as medicine and agriculture. Despite the scientific consensus, a religion-based political controversy has developed over how evolution is taught in schools, especially in the United States. \n\nInterest in Darwin's writings continues, and scholars have generated an extensive literature, the Darwin Industry, about his life and work. The text of Origin itself has been subject to much analysis including a variorum, detailing the changes made in every edition, first published in 1959, and a concordance, an exhaustive external index published in 1981. Worldwide commemorations of the 150th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of Species and the bicentenary of Darwin's birth were scheduled for 2009. They celebrated the ideas which \"over the last 150 years have revolutionised our understanding of nature and our place within it\"." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "The_Incredible_Hulk_(1978_TV_series).txt", "The_Incredible_Hulk_(film).txt" ], "title": [ "The Incredible Hulk (1978 TV series)", "The Incredible Hulk (film)" ], "wiki_context": [ "The Incredible Hulk is an American television series based on the Marvel Comics character The Hulk. The series aired on the CBS television network and starred Bill Bixby as David Banner, Lou Ferrigno as the Hulk, and Jack Colvin as Jack McGee.\n\nIn the TV series, Dr. David Banner, a widowed physician and scientist, who is presumed dead, travels across America under assumed names (his false surnames always begin with the letter \"B\", but he keeps his first name), and finds himself in positions where he helps others in need despite his terrible secret: in times of extreme anger or stress, he transforms into a huge, incredibly strong green creature, who has been named \"The Hulk\". In his travels, Banner earns money by working temporary jobs while searching for a way to control his condition. All the while, he is obsessively pursued by a tabloid newspaper reporter, Jack McGee, who is convinced that the Hulk is a deadly menace whose exposure would enhance his career.\n\nThe series was originally broadcast by CBS from 1978 to 1982, with 82 episodes over five seasons. The two-hour pilot movie, which established the Hulk's origins, aired on November 4, 1977. It was developed and produced by Kenneth Johnson, who also wrote or directed some episodes.\n\nAfter the series ended, the fate of David Banner was a cliffhanger until 1988. The filming rights were purchased from CBS by rival NBC. They produced three television films: The Incredible Hulk Returns (directed by Nicholas J. Corea), The Trial of the Incredible Hulk and The Death of the Incredible Hulk (both directed by Bill Bixby). Since its debut, The Incredible Hulk series has garnered a worldwide fan base. \n\nCast\n\n*Bill Bixby as David Bruce Banner\n*Lou Ferrigno as Hulk\n*Jack Colvin as Jack McGee\n*Ted Cassidy as the narrator and the voice of the Hulk (uncredited)\n*Charles Napier as the voice of the Hulk (after Cassidy's death) (uncredited)\n\nOrigin\n\nDavid Bruce Banner, M.D., Ph.D., is a physician and scientist employed at the Culver Institute who is traumatized by the car accident that killed his beloved wife, Laura (played by Lara Parker). Haunted by his inability to save her, Dr. Banner, in partnership with Dr. Elaina Harding Marks (Susan Sullivan), who also works at the Culver Institute, conducts a study on people who, while in danger, summoned superhuman strength in order to save their loved ones. After months of work, the only two significant common factors they can find between the subjects are extreme emotional commitments and an abnormally high percentage of the adenine/thymine combination in their DNA—an insufficient explanation, since Dr. Banner has even higher levels of adenine/thymine than any of the subjects, yet was unable to summon the strength he needed to save Laura. Working late one night, Banner hypothesizes that high levels of gamma radiation from sunspots contribute to the subjects' increase in strength. Studying a chart of gamma activity, he confirms that all the subjects performed their feats during periods of high gamma activity, while his wife's death occurred during a period of low gamma activity. Impatient to test his theory, Dr. Banner conducts an unsupervised experiment in the lab, bombarding his own body with gamma radiation. Unknown to Dr. Banner, the equipment has been upgraded, causing him to administer an accidental over-dosage of gamma radiation to himself—a dose more than five times as high as that with which he had intended to bombard himself. Despite this, he exhibits no immediate increase in strength, and leaves the lab in frustration.\n\nDriving home in a heavy rainstorm, Dr. Banner's frustration peaks when his car has a flat tire and he injures himself with a tire iron trying to change it. This triggers his transformation into the Incredible Hulk, a 7 ft, 330 lb, green-skinned savage creature, with a sub-human mind and superhuman strength. The Hulk destroys Banner's car and wanders off into the nearby woods. As the sun rises, the Hulk stumbles upon a girl and her father camping. In the ensuing confusion, the Hulk is shot by the girl's father, and responds by breaking his rifle and throwing him into the pond. Leaving the area, the Hulk eventually transforms back into Dr. Banner, with no memory of his time as the Hulk and little memory of the events immediately before or after. Wounded and confused, he visits Dr. Marks. Her amazement at Dr. Banner's healing powers (his gunshot wound is nearly healed) is replaced by shock and horror when Dr. Banner tells her that he bombarded himself with gamma radiation.\n\nDrs. Banner and Marks relocate to a laboratory isolated from the rest of the Culver Institute but still on its grounds. Marks locks him in an experimental pressure chamber designed for deep underwater usage in an attempt to simulate the conditions which preceded the hole in his memory. When this fails to induce a transformation, Dr. Banner lies down to sleep. He has his recurring nightmare of his wife's death, which causes him to transform. The Hulk breaks out of the chamber. Terrified but compelled by scientific fascination, Dr. Marks takes a blood sample from the Hulk's wounded hands and guides him to a couch, where he calms down and reverts to Banner. They conclude that the Hulk has a very high metabolism and healing rate and that the transformation is caused by such extreme negative emotions as anger. The horrified Banner realizes and points out, \"That means it's uncontrollable.\" If his anger can mount up even in his unconscious, even when he sleeps, then he has no control over the process and will never even remember anything the Hulk does or experiences.\n\nWhile Drs. Banner and Marks try to reverse the process, reporter Jack McGee of a tabloid called the National Register, who had been probing Banner's research into the limits of human strength, investigates the campers' sighting of the Hulk and intrudes on the lab. While the scientists plead ignorance, McGee suspects they know something and sneaks into the lab, hiding in a chemical storage room. Dr. Banner catches McGee hiding, and the startled reporter knocks a chemical off of a storage shelf. As Dr. Banner takes McGee outside, the spilled chemicals set off a fire. Dr. Banner rushes back into the lab to save Dr. Marks. Seeing Dr. Marks injured and in grave danger triggers another transformation into the Hulk. The Hulk carries Dr. Marks away from the inferno into nearby woods, but she dies from injuries sustained in the explosion. McGee witnesses the Hulk carrying her away, and surmises that the Hulk killed both Banner and Marks. Although the authorities are skeptical of the existence of the creature McGee tells them about, he publishes a front-page headline in the National Register that proclaims, \"Incredible 'Hulk' Kills 2\". Dr. Banner, now presumed dead, goes into hiding while trying to find a cure for his condition.\n\nIn a manner vaguely similar to the popular series The Fugitive, this forms the basis of the TV series: Dr. Banner endlessly drifts from place to place, assuming different identities and odd jobs to support himself and sometimes to enable his research. Along the way, Dr. Banner finds himself feeling obliged to help the people he meets out of whatever troubles have befallen them. Often Dr. Banner's inner struggle is paralleled by the dilemmas of the people he encounters, who find in Dr. Banner a sympathetic helper. Kenneth Johnson stated, \"What we were constantly doing was looking for thematic ways to touch [-on] the various ways that the Hulk sort of manifested itself in everyone. In Dr. David Banner, it happened to be anger. In someone else, it might be obsession, or it might be fear, or it might be jealousy or alcoholism! The Hulk comes in many shapes and sizes. That's what we tried to delve into in the individual episodes.\" Despite his attempts to stay calm no matter how badly he is treated, Dr. Banner inevitably finds himself in situations that trigger his transformations into the Hulk.\n\nMeanwhile, McGee continues to pursue the mysterious monster, whom he believes got away with a double murder. Towards the end of each episode, Dr. Banner almost always flees the town, scared that publicity over the Hulk's rampages will eventually bring unwanted scrutiny of him from the local authorities or McGee; Banner explains in Death in the Family, the second made-for-television film, \"The creature is wanted for murder—a murder which I can never prove he or I didn't commit, and you would be harboring a criminal.\"\n\nProduction\n\nDevelopment\n\nIn early 1977, Frank Price, head of Universal Television (known today as NBCUniversal Television), offered producer and writer Kenneth Johnson a deal to develop a TV show based on any of several characters they had licensed from the Marvel Comics library. Johnson turned down the offer at first, but then, while reading the Victor Hugo novel Les Misérables he became inspired and began working to develop the Hulk comic into a TV show. \n\nJohnson made several changes from the comic book, in part to translate it into a live-action show that was more believable and acceptable to a wide audience, and in part because he disliked comics and thus felt it best that the show was as different from the source material as possible. In the character's origin story, rather than being exposed to gamma rays during a botched atomic testing explosion, Banner is gamma-irradiated in a more low-key laboratory mishap during a test on himself. Another change was Banner's occupation, from physicist to medical researcher/physician. Although the comic book Hulk's degree of speaking ability has varied over the years, the television Hulk did not speak at all—he merely growled and roared. Hulk co-creator Stan Lee later recounted, \"When we started the television show, Ken said to me, 'You know, Stan, I don't think the Hulk should talk.' The minute he said it, I knew he was right. [In the comics,] I had the Hulk talking like this: 'Hulk crush! Hulk get him!' I could get away with it in a comic, but that would have sounded so silly if he spoke that way in a television show.\"\n\nThe Hulk's strength is far more limited than in the comic book, which Johnson felt was necessary for the show to be taken seriously by viewers. The Hulk still retained a healing factor, however. For instance, in \"The Harder They Fall\", Banner is in a serious accident that severs his spinal cord, leaving him paraplegic, but after his next transformation into the Hulk he is able to walk within minutes while in that form, and Banner's spine is completely restored by the end of the episode. In the majority of episodes, the only science fiction element was the Hulk himself. Johnson also omitted the comic book's supporting characters, instead using original character Jack McGee.\n\nJohnson changed the name of the Hulk's comic book alter ego, Dr. Bruce Banner, to Dr. David Banner for the TV series. This change was made, according to Johnson, because he did not want the series to be perceived as a comic book series, so he wanted to change what he felt was a staple of comic books, and Stan Lee's comics in particular, that major characters frequently had alliterative names. According to both Stan Lee and Lou Ferrigno, it was also changed because CBS thought the name Bruce sounded \"too gay-ish\", a rationale that Ferrigno thought was \"the most absurd, ridiculous thing I'd ever heard\".Keck, William. [http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/people/2008-06-16-ferrigno-hulk_N.htm \"Lou Ferrigno looks back, and luckily, not in anger\"]. USA Today, June 17, 2008, p. 2D. On the DVD commentary of the pilot, Johnson says that it was a way to honor his son David. \"Bruce\" ultimately became the TV Banner's middle name, as it had been in the comics. It is visible on Banner's tombstone at the end of the pilot movie, and that footage is shown at the beginning of every episode of the series.\n\nIn an interview with Kenneth Johnson on the Season 2 DVD, he explains that he had also wanted the Hulk to be colored red rather than green. His reasons given for this were because red, not green, is perceived as the color of rage, and also because red is a \"human color\" whereas green is not. However, Stan Lee, a co-creator of the Hulk comics—and executive at Marvel Comics at the time, said that the Hulk's color was not something that could be changed, because of its iconic image.\n\nStan Lee told Kenneth Plume on a June 26, 2000 interview, \"The Hulk was done intelligently. It was done by Ken Johnson, who's a brilliant writer/producer/director, and he made it an intelligent, adult show that kids could enjoy. He took a comic book character and made him somewhat plausible. Women liked it and men liked it and teenagers liked it... It was beautifully done. He changed it quite a bit from the comic book, but every change he made, made sense.\" \n\nCasting\n\nFor the role of Dr. David Banner, Kenneth Johnson cast Bill Bixby —his first choice for the role. Jack Colvin was cast as \"Jack McGee\", the cynical tabloid newspaper reporter—modeled after the character of Javert in Les Misérables—who pursues the Hulk. Arnold Schwarzenegger auditioned for the role of the Hulk but was rejected due to his inadequate height, according to Johnson in his commentary on The Incredible Hulk – Original Television Premiere DVD release. Actor Richard Kiel was hired for the role. During filming, however, Kenneth Johnson's own son pointed out that Kiel's tall-but-under-developed physique did not resemble the Hulk's at all. Soon, Kiel was replaced with professional bodybuilder Lou Ferrigno, although a very brief shot of Kiel (as the Hulk) remains in the pilot. According to an interview with Kiel, who saw properly out of only one eye, he reacted badly to the contact lenses used for the role, and also found the green makeup difficult to remove, so he did not mind losing the part. \n\nInitially the Hulk's facial make-up was quite monstrous, but after both pilots, the first two weekly episodes and New York location shooting for the fourth, the design was toned down. The makeup process used to transform Ferrigno into the Hulk took three hours. The hard contact lenses Ferrigno wore to simulate the Hulk's electric-green eyes had to be removed every 15 minutes because he found wearing them physically painful, and the green fright wig he wore as the Hulk was made of dyed yak hair.\n\nThe opening narration was provided by actor Ted Cassidy, who also provided the Hulk's voice-overs (mainly growls and roars) during the first two seasons. Cassidy died during production of season two in January 1979. The Hulk's vocalizations for the remainder of the series were provided by actor Charles Napier, who also made two guest-starring appearances in the series. \n\nOpening narration\n\nOne constant of the series was the opening narration, which goes as follows:\nDr. David Banner—physician, scientist...searching for a way to tap into the hidden strengths that all humans have. Then an accidental overdose of gamma radiation alters his body chemistry. And now, when David Banner grows angry or outraged, a startling metamorphosis occurs. The creature is driven by rage and pursued by an investigative reporter.[Banner:] \"Mr. McGee, don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry.\"The creature is wanted for a murder he didn't commit. David Banner is believed to be dead. And he must let the world think that he is dead, until he can find a way to control the raging spirit that dwells within him.\n\nPrior to the beginning of the series, a different version was used for the second pilot movie, The Return of the Incredible Hulk (later re-titled \"Death in the Family\"):\nDr. David Banner—physician, scientist...searching for a way to tap into the hidden strengths that all humans have. Then an accidental overdose of gamma radiation interacts with his unique body chemistry. And now, when David Banner grows angry or outraged, a startling metamorphosis occurs. The creature is driven by rage and pursued by an investigative reporter.[Banner:] \"Mr. McGee, don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry.\"An accidental explosion took the life of a fellow scientist—and supposedly David Banner as well. The reporter thinks the creature was responsible.[McGee:] \"I gave a description to all the law enforcement agencies; they got a warrant for murder out on it!\"A murder which David Banner can never prove he or the creature didn't commit. So he must let the world go on thinking that he, too, is dead, until he can find a way to control the raging spirit that dwells within him.\n\nMusic\n\nJoe Harnell, one of Kenneth Johnson's favorite composers, composed the music for The Incredible Hulk. He was brought into the production due to his involvement with the series The Bionic Woman, which Johnson had also created and produced. Some of the series' music was collected into an album titled The Incredible Hulk: Original Soundtrack Recording. The show's main theme, \"The Lonely Man\"—a sad, solo piano tune—is always heard during the closing credits—which usually shows Banner hitch-hiking. The well-known melody can also be heard in the 2008 film The Incredible Hulk.\n\nStory arc\n\nAs the series progressed, Banner's character and the animalistic nature of the Hulk were frequently explored and expanded upon, with the viewer continuously learning more about the psychology of both Banner and the Hulk. The Hulk's personality was shown to still reflect Banner's good and compassionate nature, meaning he will typically restrict his wrath to villains threatening him, but will also restrict himself to simply tossing them aside, instead of killing them. Although the Hulk's intelligence is low, he retains the same motivations and priorities as Banner, always managing to protect people or objects that Banner deems important as well as attacking those he feels fear or hostility toward. The Hulk also has a soft spot towards women, children and animals. However, as Banner's normal personality becomes dormant to the Hulk's in that form, and he has no memory of the creature's actions, Banner lives in constant worry of what damage the Hulk causes during those episodes, fearing that someday the Hulk may unwittingly hurt or kill an innocent person.\n\nThe character of the antagonist Jack McGee underwent significant development throughout the course of the series. He is initially portrayed as cynical and conniving, while at times, when given the opportunity, actively attempting to capture the Hulk using tranquilizer darts. However, McGee gradually comes to realize over time that the Hulk may not be as dangerous as he initially thought, particularly following several instances in episodes such as \"The Hulk Breaks Las Vegas\" in which he has his own life saved by the creature. In season two's two-part episode \"Mystery Man\", McGee, investigating another Hulk sighting, is unknowingly stranded with a facially bandaged David Banner in the wilderness after the crash of their plane that kills their pilot. Banner was given the name 'John Doe' in the hospital due to his memory loss following a car crash he was in with a woman who had given him a ride, and where the Hulk was sighted. Banner eventually regains his memory moments before McGee becomes trapped under a fallen tree during a wildfire and Banner changes to the Hulk (his face still bandaged at the time) to rescue McGee, who finally learns the shocking truth that the creature he has been pursuing for the past two years is actually a man most of the time. This revelation changes the whole McGee-pursuing-the-Hulk-obsessively dynamic of the series for the remainder of its run as Banner finds it even more difficult to avoid McGee's pursuits as the latter is now on a constant lookout for both the man and the creature. In the same episode, we learn that McGee hopes to catch the Hulk so that the inevitable media sensation will advance his own dwindling career.\n\nGuest stars and cameos\n\nDuring the series' five-season run, many actors familiar to viewers, or who later became famous for their subsequent works, made appearances on the series. Some of the most notable are:\nFuture Falcon Crest and Castle co-star Susan Sullivan was in the original pilot; Brett Cullen, also of Falcon Crest; Kim Catrall, of Sex and the City fame; Ray Walston, co-star of Bixby's first series, My Favorite Martian; Brandon Cruz, co-star of The Courtship of Eddie's Father; Lou Ferrigno, who along with starring as the Hulk, appeared in one episode (\"King of the Beach\") as a different character, Bixby's ex-wife Brenda Benet; and in an uncredited role, the bodybuilder and professional wrestler Ric Drasin played the half-transformed Hulk in \"Prometheus\" (parts 1 and 2). \n\nStan Lee and Jack Kirby, the writer and artist team who created the Hulk for Marvel Comics, both made cameo appearances in the series. Kirby's cameo was in the season two episode \"No Escape\", while Lee appeared as a juror in Trial of the Incredible Hulk (the 1989 post-series TV movie).\n\nEpisodes\n\nNotable episodes\n\nA retrospective on the TV series reported that the episodes fans of the show most often cite as the best of the series are \"The Incredible Hulk\", \"Married\", \"Mystery Man\", \"Homecoming\", \"The Snare\", \"Prometheus\", \"The First\" and \"Bring Me the Head of the Hulk\".\n\nThe season two premiere, \"Married\", originally aired as a two-hour movie in September 1978. David approaches Dr. Carolyn Fields (Mariette Hartley) about a new form of hypnotic therapy. He learns that Carolyn has devised the therapy because she is terminally ill with a syndrome \"similar\" to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, or \"Lou Gehrig's Disease\"), and has been given no more than eight weeks to live. David reveals his true identity to her, and both agree to help each other, using a tissue sample from the creature to possibly cure Carolyn of her illness. They fall in love and eventually marry. After Carolyn obtains the sample while David has metamorphosed into the Hulk, she prepares the sample for her own use. The day the procedure to cure Carolyn is to take place, a hurricane hits the island. While the pair are driving to the hospital, Carolyn suffers from another painful episode, this time leading her to flee their moving car. David stops the car and rushes after her, morphing into the Hulk once more. He catches her in his arms, and as she attempts to fight him in her pain-induced hysteria, she turns around and sees the Hulk, and stops struggling. Knowing her time has come, Carolyn embraces the Hulk, telling him (as David) she will miss him as she dies in his arms. Mariette Hartley won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for this moving performance.\n\nIn season two's \"Mystery Man\", McGee finally comes face-to-face with an amnesia-ridden David Banner, although he does not recognize him, for Banner's face is covered by a gauze mask following a severe injury in an auto accident. Banner has been admitted into a hospital as \"John Doe\" as his true identity is unknown. Investigating an apparent link between this man and the Hulk, McGee hires a small plane for himself and Banner to see a doctor who will be able to cure Banner's amnesia. Lightning strikes the plane and an injured McGee and Banner are trapped in a forest, where they must help one another escape to safety. During the ordeal, McGee sees the mystery man transform into the Hulk and realizes this is how the Hulk manages to get from one place to another without being seen in between. He is eventually separated from the Hulk, but vows to track down the mysterious \"John Doe\" fellow and find out his true identity.\n\nSeason three's \"Homecoming\" has Banner returning to his hometown and reuniting with his family. This episode marked the first appearances of Banner's father and sister. And \"The Snare\" is an homage to the short story \"The Most Dangerous Game\", and guest-starred Bradford Dillman as the hunter.\n\nIn the season four two-part \"Prometheus\", David rescues and befriends Katie Maxwell (Laurie Prange), a young woman recently blinded by an accident. While helping her through the woods near her home, a meteor lands near them. Banner investigates, and is sickened by the radiation emanating from the meteorite fragment. An attacking swarm of bees triggers his transformation into the Hulk, and in the process of fighting off the bees, the Hulk touches the meteorite. He retreats back to Katie's cabin, but in metamorphosing back into David, the process stops midway, with David retaining some of the Hulk's muscular build and irradiated features, but with the ability to speak. Additionally, David had also retained most of the Hulk's childlike intellect. Horrified at realizing that his transformation has gone wrong, David enlists Katie's help. The military, however, arrives and after attempting to evade them, David transforms back into the Hulk. The Hulk and Katie are captured and taken to a military installation, where a group of scientists working for the Prometheus Project mistakenly believe that the Hulk is an alien. After seeing a tape of David's transformation, however, they realize that the Hulk is actually a man who transforms into the creature. McGee, meanwhile, finagles his way onto the base and finds Katie, attempting to get her to give him more information on \"John Doe\". The Hulk escapes from his confinement and finds Katie. After the Hulk's transformation back into David again stops midway, Katie theorizes that the radiation from the meteorite is affecting David's unique body chemistry and that they need to escape from the base and get away from the meteorite. McGee, meanwhile, convinces the brass to let him talk to \"John\" and convince him to surrender. McGee finds them, but due to David's altered appearance, does not realize that he is, in fact, talking to David Banner. It is a double-cross, however, as soldiers move in on David and Katie. David transforms into the Hulk once again and breaks out of the installation with Katie. Far from the meteorite fragment, the Hulk transforms back completely into David Banner with no ill effects.\n\nAnother season four two-part episode, \"The First\", has Banner discovering that another man transformed into a Hulk-like creature 30 years ago. In this case, a doctor used gamma radiation in an attempt to heal a man in poor health named Dell Frye (Harry Townes), who was embittered by bullying from the local townspeople, causing him to become vengeful and cruel. However, the radiation turned him instead into a savage green creature (Dick Durock). Because of Frye's difference in personality, his creature had killed people. Dr. Jeffrey Clive, long dead, had discovered the cure, but Frye, now old and arthritic, and still bullied, wants to have the power again. David discovers Dr. Clive's laboratory, which contains a machine that can harness the sun's gamma radiation. Looking through Clive's journals, he realizes that he needs to take the antidote developed by Clive and then bombard himself with gamma rays for the cure to work. Before he can do so, however, Frye knocks him out and straps himself into the machine. As David awakens and attempts to stop him, Frye is bombarded with gamma radiation, which turns him into a Hulk-like creature. After metamorphosing back, Frye discovers that after one transformation, his arthritis has vanished. Seeking revenge for the years of taunts he has endured, Frye goes into town and provokes some bullies into attacking him. He once again transforms into the creature, and proceeds to kill one of the bullies. Realizing that the Frye Hulk is extremely dangerous because of Frye's murderous nature, David manages to subdue Frye and strap him into the machine to reverse the process. Unfortunately, Frye comes to and transforms into the creature, and in the process destroys the last vial of the cure that Dr. Clive had developed. As he literally sees the cure dripping from his fingers, a distraught David transforms into the Hulk. The two creatures fight, with the much more powerful Banner Hulk getting the better of the Frye Hulk, who is eventually shot dead by the sheriff. \"The First\" is the only episode of the TV series to feature any other super-humanly powerful characters. \"The First\" remains a fan favorite and is often cited as an example of Bixby's finest acting work in the series. Guest star Townes' performance as Frye is generally regarded as the best and most memorable guest shot in the show's history.\n\nThe series concludes with a standard 44-minute episode (\"A Minor Problem\"). The character of McGee does not appear in this last episode, nor does he appear in a few other episodes in the short final season, and the series ends on an open note, with Banner still searching for a cure and McGee still unaware of the true identity of his John Doe.\n\nBroadcast history\n\nCBS \n*March 1978 – January 1979: Fridays, 9:00 PM (ET)\n*January 1979: Wednesdays, 8:00 PM\n*February 1979 – November 1981: Fridays, 8:00 PM\n*May – June 1982: Wednesdays, 8:00 PM\n\nSyndication\n\nThe series first went into syndication in September 1982. It has aired as reruns on the Sci-Fi Channel and was one of the series that the channel showed at its inception in September 1992. It has also aired on Retro Television Network, and on Esquire Network from 2014 to 2015. Series reruns are to begin airing on most Me-TV affiliates in February 2016. \n\nMade-for-TV movies\n\nTwo episodes of the series appeared first as stand-alone movies, but were later re-edited into one-hour length (two-parters) for syndication. They were produced as pilots before the series officially began in 1978:\n*The Incredible Hulk (1977) (distributed in theaters in some countries)\n*The Return of the Incredible Hulk (1977) (also shown overseas as a feature film) – It was retitled Death in the Family for syndication\n\nSix years after the cancellation of the television series in 1982, three television movies were produced with Bixby and Ferrigno reprising their roles. All of these aired on NBC:\nThe Incredible Hulk Returns (1988) – This marked the first time that another Marvel Universe character appeared in the milieu of the TV series. David Banner meets a former student (played by Steve Levitt) who has a magical hammer that summons Thor (played by Eric Allan Kramer), a Norse god who is prevented from entering Valhalla. It was set up as a backdoor pilot for a live-action television series starring Thor. This project marked Jack Colvin's final appearance as McGee. \n\nThe Trial of the Incredible Hulk (1989) – David Banner meets a blind lawyer named Matt Murdock and his masked alter ego, Daredevil. The Incredible Hulk and the Daredevil battle Wilson Fisk (The Kingpin of Crime). Daredevil was portrayed by Rex Smith, while John Rhys-Davies portrayed Fisk. This was also set up as backdoor pilot for a live-action television series featuring Daredevil. Stan Lee has a cameo appearance as one of the jury members overlooking Banner's trial.\n\nThe Death of the Incredible Hulk (1990) – David Banner falls in love with an Eastern European spy (played by Elizabeth Gracen) and saves two kidnapped scientists. The film ends with the Hulk taking a fatal fall from an airplane, reverting to human form just before he dies.\n\nDespite the apparent death of the Hulk in the 1990 film, another Hulk television movie was planned, Revenge of the Incredible Hulk. It was rumored that in this film the Hulk would be able to talk after being revived with Banner's mind, and that it was abandoned due to Bill Bixby's death of cancer in November 1993, but Gerald Di Pego (writer/executive producer of The Trial of the Incredible Hulk, The Death of the Incredible Hulk, and Revenge of the Incredible Hulk) revealed that the film was cancelled before Bixby's health began to decline, due to disappointing ratings for Death of, and that Banner was to have been revived without the ability to change into the Hulk at all, only reverting to (still non-speaking) Hulk form in the film's final act.\n\nDVD releases\n\nAll three of the NBC TV movies (The Incredible Hulk Returns, The Trial of the Incredible Hulk and The Death of the Incredible Hulk) have been available on DVD since 2003; the first two were released by Anchor Bay Entertainment, while The Death of the Incredible Hulk was released by 20th Century Fox Video. A double-sided DVD entitled The Incredible Hulk – Original Television Premiere, which contained the original pilot and the \"Married\" episodes, was released by Universal Studios DVD in 2003 to promote Ang Lee's Hulk motion picture. A six-disc set entitled The Incredible Hulk – The Television Series Ultimate Collection was released by Universal DVD later in 2003. This set includes several notable episodes including \"Death in the Family\", \"The First\", and \"Prometheus\".\n\nOn July 18, 2006, Universal released The Incredible Hulk – Season One on DVD. This set contains the original pilot movies, the entire first season, and a \"preview\" episode (\"Stop the Presses\") from Season Two.\n\nOn July 17, 2007, Universal released The Incredible Hulk – Season Two on DVD as a 5-disc set. The set included the entire second season, the Married episodes (AKA Bride of the Incredible Hulk), and preview episode (Homecoming) from season three. \n\nOn June 3, 2008, Universal released The Incredible Hulk – Seasons Three and Four on DVD in time to promote Louis Leterrier's film The Incredible Hulk.\n\nOn October 21, 2008, Universal released \"The Incredible Hulk\" – Season Five on DVD as a 2-disc set. The set contains all seven Season Five episodes and interviews by Ken Johnson and various members of the Production & Writing teams, as well as a Gag Reel. Additionally, a complete series DVD Set was released as well. The Complete Series was released in the UK on DVD on September 30, 2008.\n\nOther media\n\nThe TV series led to a syndicated newspaper strip that ran from 1978 to 1982. It used the same background and origin story as the TV series but narrated stories outside the TV series.\n\nIn 1979, a Hulk \"video novel\" in paperback form was released, with pictures from the pilot.", "The Incredible Hulk is a 2008 American superhero film featuring the Marvel Comics character the Hulk, produced by Marvel Studios and distributed by Universal Pictures. It is the second film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). The film was directed by Louis Leterrier, with a screenplay by Zak Penn. It stars Edward Norton, Liv Tyler, Tim Roth, Tim Blake Nelson, Ty Burrell, and William Hurt. In The Incredible Hulk, a new backstory is established where Bruce Banner becomes the Hulk as an unwitting pawn in a military scheme to reinvigorate the supersoldier program through gamma radiation. On the run, he attempts to cure himself of the Hulk before he is captured by General Thaddeus \"Thunderbolt\" Ross, but his worst fears are realized when power-hungry soldier Emil Blonsky becomes a similar but more bestial creature.\n\nAfter the mixed reception to the 2003 film Hulk, Marvel Studios reacquired the rights to the character. Leterrier, who had expressed interest in directing Iron Man, was brought onboard and Penn began work on a loose sequel that would be much closer to the comics and the 1978 television series of the same name. In April 2007, Norton was hired to portray Banner and to rewrite Penn's screenplay in order to distance itself from the 2003 film and establish its own identity, although he would go uncredited for his writing. Filming mostly took place in Toronto, Ontario, from July to November 2007. Over 700 visual effects shots were created in post-production using a combination of motion capture and computer-generated imagery to complete the film.\n\nThe Incredible Hulk premiered on June 8, 2008 at the Gibson Amphitheatre in Universal City, California and was released in theaters on June 13, 2008, receiving generally favorable reviews by critics upon release with critics praising the improved visuals, action sequences and the portrayal of the title character. The film was number one at the box office, grossing over $263 million worldwide. Norton was initially intended to again portray Bruce Banner in The Avengers and other future MCU installments featuring the character, but he was replaced by Mark Ruffalo, who has signed on to reprise the role in all potential sequels.\n\nPlot\n\nAt Culver University in Virginia, General Thunderbolt Ross meets with Dr. Bruce Banner, the colleague and boyfriend of his daughter Betty, regarding an experiment that Ross claims is meant to make humans immune to gamma radiation. The experiment — part of a World War II era \"super soldier\" program that Ross hopes to recreate — fails, and the exposure to gamma radiation causes Banner to transform into the Hulk for brief periods of time, whenever his heart rate rises above 200. The Hulk destroys the lab and injures or kills the people inside. Banner becomes a fugitive from the U.S. military and Ross in particular, who wants to weaponize the Hulk process.\n\nFive years later, Banner works at a bottling factory in Rocinha, Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, while searching for a cure for his condition. On the Internet, he collaborates with a colleague he knows only as \"Mr. Blue\", and to whom he is \"Mr. Green\". He is also learning meditative breathing techniques to help keep control, and has not transformed in five months. After Banner cuts his finger, a drop of his blood falls into a bottle, and is eventually ingested by an elderly consumer in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, giving him gamma sickness. Using the bottle to track down Banner, Ross sends a SWAT team, led by Russian-born British Royal Marine Emil Blonsky, to capture him. Banner transforms into the Hulk and defeats Blonsky's team. After Ross explains how Banner became the Hulk, Blonsky agrees to be injected with a small amount of a similar serum, which gives him enhanced speed, strength, agility, and healing, but also begins to deform his skeleton and impair his judgment.\n\nBanner returns to Culver University and reunites with Betty, who is dating psychiatrist Leonard Samson. Banner is attacked by Ross and Blonsky's forces, tipped off by the suspicious Samson, causing him to again transform into the Hulk. The ensuing battle outside the university proves to be futile for Ross' forces and they eventually retreat, though Blonsky, whose sanity is starting to falter, boldly attacks and mocks the Hulk. The Hulk seemingly kills Blonsky and flees with Betty. After the Hulk reverts to Banner, he and Betty go on the run, and Banner contacts Mr. Blue, who urges them to meet him in New York City. Mr. Blue is actually cellular biologist Dr. Samuel Sterns, who tells Banner he has developed a possible antidote to Banner's condition. After a successful test, he warns Banner that the antidote may only reverse each individual transformation. Sterns reveals he has synthesized Banner's blood samples, which Banner sent from Brazil, into a large supply, with the intention of applying its \"limitless potential\" to medicine. Fearful of the Hulk's power falling into the military's hands, Banner wishes to destroy the blood supply.\n\nMeanwhile, Blonsky is revealed to have survived the battle and has completely healed. He joins Ross' forces for a third attempt to take Banner into custody. They succeed and Banner, along with Betty, are taken away in a helicopter. Blonsky stays behind and forces Sterns to inject him with Banner's blood, as he covets the Hulk's power. Sterns warns that the combination of the super-soldier formula and Banner's blood may cause him to become an \"abomination\", but Blonsky insists. The experiment mutates Blonsky into a creature with size and strength surpassing that of the Hulk, but drives him mad. He attacks Sterns, who gets some of Banner's blood in a cut on his forehead, causing him to begin mutating as well. Blonsky then rampages through Harlem. Realizing that the Hulk is the only one who can stop Blonsky, Banner convinces Ross to release him. He jumps from Ross' helicopter and transforms after hitting the ground. After a long and brutal battle through Harlem, the Hulk defeats Blonsky. After having a small, peaceful moment with Betty, the Hulk flees from New York.\n\nA month later, Banner is in Bella Coola, British Columbia. Instead of trying to suppress his transformation, he successfully transforms in a controlled manner. In a final scene, Tony Stark approaches Ross at a local bar and informs him a team is being put together.\n\nCast\n\n* Edward Norton as Bruce Banner / Hulk:\nA nuclear physicist who, because of exposure to gamma radiation, transforms into an enormous green humanoid monster when enraged or agitated. David Duchovny was a front-runner for the film before Norton's casting, while Louis Leterrier's original choice for the role was Mark Ruffalo, who would later play Banner in The Avengers. Gale Anne Hurd recalled Norton's portrayals of duality in Primal Fear and Fight Club, while Norton reminded Kevin Feige of Bill Bixby, who played Banner in the TV series. Lou Ferrigno, who played the Hulk with Bixby, remarked Norton \"has a similar physique [and a] similar personality\". Norton was a Hulk fan, citing the first comic appearances, the Bixby TV show, and Bruce Jones' run on the comic, as his favorite depictions of the character. He had expressed interest in the role for the first film. He initially turned down the part, recalling \"there [was] the wince factor or the defensive part of you that recoils at what the bad version of what that would be\", as he felt the previous film \"strayed far afield from a story that was familiar to people, [...] which is a fugitive story\". When he met Leterrier and Marvel, he liked their vision, and believed they were looking to him to guide the project. Thus, Norton rewrote the script. \"Edward's script has given Bruce's story real gravitas,\" Leterrier said. \"Admittedly I'm not the most adult director, but just because we're making a superhero movie it doesn't have to just appeal to 13-year-old boys. Ed and I both see superheroes as the new Greek gods.\"\n\n* Lou Ferrigno voices Hulk:\n:During the 2008 New York Comic Con Leterrier publicly offered Ferrigno the chance to voice the Hulk for the film. This marks the third time Ferrigno portrayed the Hulk, having also voiced the character in the 1996 animated series. Originally, the Hulk's only line was \"Betty\" at the film's ending, which would have been his first word. Leterrier was aware that fans wanted him to speak normally, and added \"leave me alone\" and \"Hulk smash!\" The latter line received cheers during a screening he attended. Ferrigno also has a cameo in the film as a security guard who is bribed by Banner with a pizza.\n\n* Liv Tyler as Betty Ross:\nA cellular biologist and Bruce's girlfriend, from whom he is separated as a result of his condition. Tyler was attracted to the love story in the script, and was a fan of the TV show, because of the \"humanity and what [Banner] is going through\". She was called about the role while driving to her home, and she accepted the part after a day without reading the script. Tyler and Norton spent hours discussing Bruce and Betty's life before he became the Hulk. She said filming the part \"was very physical, which was fun\", and compared her performance to \"a deer caught in the headlights\", because of Betty's shock at Bruce's unexpected return into her life.\n\n* Tim Roth as Emil Blonsky / Abomination:\nA Russian-born officer in the United Kingdom's Royal Marines Commandos loaned to Gen. Ross who, lusting for the Hulk's power, is injected with various serums to transform into a monster more powerful than the Hulk himself. Roth said he took the part to please his sons, who are comic-book superhero fans. As a teenager, Roth was a fan of the 1970s TV series, and he also found Leterrier's ideas \"very dark and very interesting\". Roth started watching the 2003 film to prepare for the part, but stopped as he did not want to be caught up in the controversy over its quality, and to compare himself to it. It was Roth who suggested Blonsky be a soldier, whereas in the comics he was a KGB agent. Leterrier was a fan of Roth's work, and felt \"it's great watching a normal Cockney boy become a superhero!\", but Marvel and Norton were initially reluctant to cast him. Before he was cast in Punisher: War Zone, Ray Stevenson was in discussions for the role. Roth prepared for the part by learning to fire guns and break into rooms with two experts. Roth found it tough shooting the chases, because to show Blonsky's aging he could not work out. He especially found it difficult to run while pulled with a harness, which was used to show the injected Blonsky's 30–40 mile per hour running abilities. Cyril Raffaelli performed some of Roth's stunts. Roth enjoyed the motion capture, which reminded him of fringe theatre, and he hired his trainer from Planet of the Apes to aid him in portraying the monster's movement.\n\n* Tim Blake Nelson as Samuel Sterns:\nThe cellular biologist who develops a possible antidote to Banner's condition. Towards the end of the film, Sterns is exposed to some substance that begins his transformation into Leader.\n\n* Ty Burrell as Leonard Samson:\nThe psychiatrist in a relationship with Betty during Bruce's absence. Burrell had performed with Norton in the off Broadway play Burn This in 2003, and when Leterrier met him, he recognized Burrell as the \"jerk\" from the 2004 Dawn of the Dead remake, which was how Samson was characterized in the script before Norton rewrote it.\n\n* William Hurt as Thaddeus \"Thunderbolt\" Ross:\nBetty's arrogant father, who has dedicated himself to capturing the Hulk. Leterrier cast Hurt because \"Ross is more physical, more explosive in this movie, and no actor goes from zero to 100 as well as William.\" He compared Ross to Captain Ahab. The Hulk is Hurt's favorite superhero, and his son is also a big fan of the character. Hurt found production very different from the typical \"pure anxiety\" of a studio film, finding it more akin to an independent film. He described Ross as \"humiliated by Hulk's conscience: he actually sees and recognizes that it's more developed than his own, even though he's a patriot and a warrior for his country. He's sacrificed [much] for that purpose, but at the expense at times of his humanity – which he occasionally recovers.\" In June 2015, when reflecting on how his reprisal in Captain America: Civil War was different from this film, Hurt said, \"What I created [for The Incredible Hulk] was a Ross who was right out of the graphic novel type of thing, where he was as much of a cartoon, in a way, as the monsters were. His ego was just as big and his problems were just as big. I really did do that consciously. I created a General Ross before which created a verisimilitude for the monsters, by making him a human monster. I worked really hard on the makeup and the exaggerated behavior and things like that and a controlled psychosis.\" Sam Elliott, who played Ross in the first film, would have liked to reprise the role, noting it was odd seeing someone take his part, \"but I'll be looking forward to seeing this one\".\n\nRobert Downey, Jr. has an uncredited cameo as Tony Stark at the end of the film. Downey appeared as a favor to Marvel Studios, which he acknowledged as a smart move on Marvel's part, because when he was promoting his film he would also have to mention their other production. Hulk co-creator Stan Lee cameos as a man who becomes ill when drinking the soda poisoned by Banner's blood. Michael K. Williams appears as a Harlem bystander, a role that was written for him by Norton, who is a fan of The Wire. Paul Soles, who voiced Banner in the 1966 The Marvel Superheroes cartoon, appears as Stanley, a kindly pizza restaurant owner who helps Banner. Additionally, the late Bill Bixby appears, when a scene featuring Bixby on his TV comedy-drama The Courtship of Eddie's Father plays on a television Banner is watching at the beginning of the film. Rickson Gracie has a small role as Bruce Banner's martial arts instructor, despite his Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu background, he is credited as an Aikido instructor. Peter Mensah plays a small role as General Joe Gellar, one of General Ross' military friends/associates. Martin Starr plays a college student, identified as Amadeus Cho in the novelization for the film.\n\nProduction\n\nDevelopment\n\nAt the time of the release of Ang Lee's Hulk, screenwriter James Schamus was planning a sequel, featuring the Grey Hulk. He was also considering the Leader and the Abomination as villains. Marvel wanted the Abomination because he would be an actual threat to the Hulk, unlike General Ross. During the filming of Hulk, producer Avi Arad had a target May 2005 theatrical release date. On January 18, 2006 Arad confirmed Marvel Studios would be providing the money for The Incredible Hulks production budget, with Universal distributing, because Universal did not meet the deadline for filming a sequel. Marvel felt it would be better to deviate from Ang Lee's style to continue the franchise, arguing his film was like a parallel universe one-shot comic book, and their next film needed to be, in Kevin Feige's words, \"really starting the Marvel Hulk franchise\". Producer Gale Anne Hurd also felt the film had to meet what \"everyone expects to see from having read the comics and seen the TV series\".\n\nPre-production\n\nLouis Leterrier, who enjoyed the TV series as a child and liked the first film, had expressed interest in directing the Iron Man film adaptation. Jon Favreau had taken that project, so Marvel offered him the Hulk. Leterrier was reluctant as he was unsure if he could replicate Lee's style, but Marvel explained that was not their intent. Leterrier's primary inspiration was Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale's Hulk: Gray (a retelling of the character's first appearance). He replicated every comic book panel that he pinned-up during pre-production, from the many comics he browsed, in the final film. Leterrier said that he planned to show Bruce Banner's struggle with the monster within him, while Feige added the film would explore \"that element of wish fulfillment, of overcoming an injustice or a bully and tapping into a strength that you didn't quite realize you had in yourself\". Arad also said the film would be \"a lot more of a love story between Bruce Banner and Betty Ross\".\n\nZak Penn, who wrote a draft of the first film in 1996, said the film would follow up Hulk, but stressed it would be more tonally similar to the TV show and Bruce Jones' run on the comic. He compared his script to Aliens, which was a very different film from Alien, but still in the same continuity. He included two scenes from his 1996 script: Banner jumping from a helicopter to trigger a transformation, and realizing he is unable to have sex with Betty. After the studio rejected a treatment by another screenwriter in 2006, Penn wrote three drafts before departing in early 2007 to promote his film The Grand. Norton, that April, began discussions to play Banner, and arranged a deal that included him as both an actor and a writer, with a screenplay draft he was contractually obligated to turn in in under a month. He did so, and continued to polish his draft as late as halfway through principal photography. In November 2006, a June 13, 2008 release date was set. Leterrier acknowledged the only remaining similarity between the two films was Bruce hiding in South America, and that the film was a unique reboot, as generally audiences would have expected another forty-minute origin story. There were previous discussions to set the first act in Thailand. Leterrier felt audiences were left restless waiting for the character to arrive in Ang Lee's film.\n\nShortly after the release of The Incredible Hulk, Gale Anne Hurd commented on the uncertainty of its relationship with Ang Lee's Hulk film. \"We couldn't quite figure out how to term this ... It's kind of a reboot and it's kind of sequel.\" Hurd said that \"requel\", a portmanteau of \"reboot\" and \"sequel\", was a \"perfect\" description for the film. Norton explained his decision to ignore Lee's origin story: \"I don't even like the phrase 'origin story', and I don't think in great literature and great films that explaining the roots of the story doesn't mean it comes in the beginning.\" \"Audiences know this story,\" he added, \"[so] deal with it artfully.\" He wanted to \"have revelations even in the third act about what set this whole thing in motion\". The new origin story references Ultimate Marvel's take on the Hulk, which also had him created in an attempt to make super soldiers. Norton removed Rick Jones and toned down S.H.I.E.L.D.'s presence. He also added the scene where Banner attempts to extract a cure from a flower and his e-mailing with Samuel Sterns, which references Bruce Jones' story. Norton rewrote scenes every day. Ultimately, the Writers Guild of America decided to credit the script solely to Penn, who argued Norton had not dramatically changed his script. Journalist Anne Thompson explained \"The Guild tends to favor plot, structure and pre-existing characters over dialogue.\" Penn said in 2008, \"I wasn't happy with [Norton] coming to Comic-Con saying that he wrote the script.\" Before either Penn and Norton joined the project, an anonymous screenwriter wrote a draft and lobbied for credit.\n\nFilming\n\nLeterrier had to direct four units with a broken foot. Filming began on July 9, 2007. Shooting primarily took place in Toronto, because mayor David Miller is a Hulk fan and promised to be very helpful to the crew when closing Yonge Street for four nights in September to shoot the Hulk and Blonsky's climactic fight. Despite messing the street with explosives and overturned burning vehicles, the crew would clean-up within twenty minutes so business could continue as normal each day. The first action sequence shot was the Culver University battle, which was filmed at the University of Toronto and Morningside Park. The filmmakers built a glass wall over a walkway at the University for when the soldiers trap Banner inside to smoke him out. There was also shooting in the Financial District. A factory in Hamilton, Ontario, which was due for demolition, was the interior of the Brazilian factory. The site's underground floors were used for Ross' military command center. The crew also shot part of the Hulk and Blonsky's fight on a backlot in Hamilton. Other Canadian locations included CFB Trenton and a glacier in Bella Coola, British Columbia. Afterwards, there was a week-long shoot in New York City and two weeks in Rio de Janeiro. While there, the crew shot at Rocinha, Lapa, Tijuca Forest and Santa Teresa. Filming concluded in November after eighty-eight days of filming.\n\nThe Incredible Hulk joined Toronto's Green-Screen initiative, to help cut carbon emissions and waste created during filming. Producer Gale Anne Hurd acknowledged the Hulk, being green, was a popular environmental analogy, and Norton himself was an environmentalist. Hybrid and fuel efficient vehicles were used, with low sulfur diesel as their energy source. The construction department used a sustainably harvested, locally sourced yellow pine instead of lauan for the sets, and also used zero-or low-VOC paint. The wood was generally recycled or given to environmental organizations, and paint cans were handed to waste management. In addition, they used cloth bags, biodegradable food containers, china and silverware food utensils, a stainless steel mug for each production crew member, a contractor who removed bins, recycled paper, biodegradable soap and cleaners in the trailers and production offices, and the sound department used rechargeable batteries. The Incredible Hulk became the first blockbuster film to receive the Environmental Media Association's Green Seal, which is displayed during the end credits.\n\nPost-production\n\nLeterrier cited Andy Serkis' motion capture portrayals of Gollum and King Kong in The Lord of the Rings and King Kong, respectively, as the standard he was aiming for. Norton and Roth filmed 2500 takes of different movements the monsters would make (such as the Hulk's \"thunder claps\"). Phosphorescent face paint applied to the actors' faces and strobe lighting would help record the most subtle mannerisms into the computer. Others including Cyril Raffaelli provided motion capture for stunts and fights, after the main actors had done video referencing. Leterrier hired Rhythm and Hues to provide the CGI, rather than Industrial Light & Magic who created the visual effects for Ang Lee's Hulk. Visual effect company, Image Engine, spent over a year working on a shot where Banner's gamma-irradiated blood falls through three factory floors into a bottle. Overall 700 effects shots were created. Motion capture aided in placing and timing of movements, but overall key frame animation by Rhythm and Hues provided the necessary \"finesse [and] superhero quality\". Many of the animators and Leterrier himself provided video reference for the climactic fight.\n\nDale Keown's comic book artwork of the Hulk was an inspiration for his design. Leterrier felt the first Hulk had \"too much fat [and] the proportions were a little off\". He explained, \"The Hulk is beyond perfect so there is zero grams of fat, all chiseled, and his muscle and strength defines this creature so he's like a tank.\" Visual effects supervisor Kurt Williams envisioned the Hulk's physique as a linebacker rather than a bodybuilder. A height of nine feet was chosen for the character as they did not want him to be too inhuman. To make him more expressive, computer programs controlling the inflation of his muscles and saturation of skin color were created. Williams cited flushing as an example of humans' skin color being influenced by their emotions. The animators felt green blood would make his skin become darker rather than lighter, and his skin tones, depending on lighting, either resemble an olive or even gray slate. His animation model was completed without the effects company's full knowledge of what he would be required to do: he was rigged to do whatever they imagined, in case the model was to be used for The Avengers film. The Hulk's medium-length hair was modeled on Mike Deodato's art. He originally had a crew cut, but Leterrier decided flopping hair imbued him with more character. Leterrier cited An American Werewolf in London as the inspiration for Banner's transformation, wanting to show how painful it was for him to change. As a nod to the live action TV series, Banner's eyes change color first when he transforms. Leterrier changed the Abomination's design from the comics because he felt the audience would question why he resembled a fish or a reptile, instead of \"an über-human\" like the Hulk. Rather, his hideousness is derived from being injected multiple times into his skin, muscles and bones; creating a creature with a protruding spine and sharp bones that he can use to stab. His green skin is pale, and reflects light, so it appears orange because of surrounding fire during the climactic battle. The motion capture performers, including Roth, tried to make the character behave less gracefully than the Hulk. They modeled his posture and the way he turns his head on a shark. The character also shares Roth's tattoos. A height of eleven feet was chosen for the character. Leterrier tried to work in the character's pointed ears, but realized the Hulk would bite them off (using the example of Mike Tyson when he fought Evander Holyfield), and felt ignoring that would make the Hulk come across as stupid.\n\nLeterrier had planned to use prosthetic makeup and animatronics to complement the computer-generated imagery that was solely used in the previous film. The make-up artists who worked on X-Men: The Last Stand were set to portray Blonsky's gradual transformation, which Zak Penn said would portray Blonsky \"not [being] used to having these properties. Like he's much heavier, and we talked about how when he walks down the sidewalk, his weight destroys the sidewalk and he's tripping. [It's all about] the humanization of these kinds of superhero characters, showing the effects physics may actually have on [them].\" Tom Woodruff, Jr. of Amalgamated Dynamics (who created all the costumes for the Alien films since Alien 3) was in negotiations, and created two busts of the Hulk and prosthetic hands to act as stand-ins for the character. A full animatronic was never created as it was decided it would complicate production to set up shots for a puppet and then a computer graphic. An animatronic was used for Sterns' mutating head, however. Destruction was mostly done practically. A model of a bottling machine was smashed through a wall for when the Hulk escapes the factory. The filmmakers used steam and dry ice for the gas used to smoke out the Hulk, and they destroyed a real Humvee by dropping a weight on it when shooting the Culver University battle. Pipes blew fire for when the Hulk strikes down the computer-generated helicopter. When Banner falls from the helicopter to trigger the Hulk into fighting the Abomination, Norton was attached to a surface held by a bar which turned 90 degrees while the camera was pulled to the ceiling to simulate falling. Leterrier jokingly remarked that making Norton fall that distance would obviously render him unable to act.\n\nMusic\n\nThe Incredible Hulk: Original Motion Picture Score is the soundtrack for the film, composed by Craig Armstrong. Armstrong was the arranger for Massive Attack, a band Leterrier was fond of and had collaborated with on the 2005 film Unleashed. Armstrong was his first choice, which surprised Marvel, not knowing if he had scored an action film (he did compose 2001's Kiss of the Dragon). Even the temp track consisted of Armstrong's work and similar music by others. The Hulk, alongside the Green Lantern, was one of Armstrong's favorite comics as a child, although he did not see Ang Lee's Hulk.\n\nArmstrong began composing in his home in Glasgow, Scotland with three sequences; the Hulk and Betty in the cave; the Abomination and the Hulk's alley fight; and Bruce and Betty's reunion. The majority was composed in a few weeks in Los Angeles, California, which was very intense for the director and composer. The score was recorded over four days during late 2007 in a chapel in Bastyr University, located in Kenmore, Washington. Pete Lockett played ethnic instruments in the score, which were recorded in London and mixed together with the orchestra and electronics. The score was orchestrated by Matt Dunkley, Tony Blondal, Stephen Coleman, David Butterworth, and Kaz Boyle. Leterrier suggested the score be released on two discs, which Armstrong believed to be a joke. Only when he compiled the album – and Marvel asked why they were only given one disc – did he realize they were serious.\n\nThe Hulk and the Abomination both have two themes, representing their human and monstrous forms. The Hulk's theme was meant to be iconic and simple, like Jaws (1975), with string glissandos on a bass C note. Banner's theme is tragic and includes parts of Joe Harnell's \"The Lonely Man\" theme from the television series. Armstrong played the piano for one scene featuring that piece. Blonsky has a dark theme, which becomes aggressive when he transforms. Armstrong inter played the Hulk and the Abomination's themes during their battle, and found scoring the action sequences similar to a dance. There is also a suspenseful theme, and a love theme.\n\nCritical opinion is split with the Chicago Tribune describing the soundtrack as \"the dullest musical score of the year\" in their review of the film, while Dan Goldwasser of Soundtrack.net described it as \"bombastic, thematic and energy-filled\".\n\nTrack listing\n\nRelease\n\nThe Incredible Hulk premiered on June 8, 2008 at the Gibson Amphitheatre in Universal City, California and was released in theaters on June 13.\n\nEditing\n\nSeventy minutes of footage, mostly dealing with the origin, were not included in the final cut. Much of this back-story was unscripted and the filmmakers were never sure of including it into the final cut, and had considered releasing some of these clips on the internet. Editor Kyle Cooper, creator of the Marvel logo (with the flipping pages) and the montage detailing Iron Man's biography in that film, edited together much of this footage into the opening credits. Leterrier explained a negative test screening, where flashbacks were placed across the film that the audience found too similar to Hulk, had resulted in compressing these to the film's start. This replaced the original opening, where Banner comes to the Arctic to commit suicide. When the scene ends, in an instant the frozen body of Captain America is partially seen in the ice. Leterrier said he did not want this scene to be lost amid the opening montage.\n\nNorton and Leterrier disputed with the producers over the final running time: they wanted it to be near 135 minutes, while the producers wanted the film to be under two hours. This was made public, and rumors spread that Norton \"made it clear he won't cooperate with publicity plans if he's not happy with the final product\". Norton dismissed this, \"Our healthy process [of collaboration], which is and should be a private matter, was misrepresented publicly as a 'dispute', seized on by people looking for a good story, and has been distorted to such a degree that it risks distracting from the film itself, which Marvel, Universal and I refuse to let happen. It has always been my firm conviction that films should speak for themselves and that knowing too much about how they are made diminishes the magic of watching them.\"\n\nMarketing\n\nEffort was made to promote the story as having a romance and a physical antagonist, and the title was used for promotional puns (such as 7-Eleven's \"Incredible Gulp\" slurpees, and \"Incredible Dad\" themed Father's Day gifts at Kmart). Burger King also promoted the film, and General Nutrition Centers used the title character as a role model for strength training. Hasbro created the toy line, which they released on May 3, 2008, while Sega released a video game on June 5, 2008. The film was promoted in an episode of American Gladiators on June 9, 2008, which was hosted by Hulk Hogan and featured Lou Ferrigno.\n\nFollowing the edit dispute, Universal's Adam Fogleson and Norton planned a promotional tour which would avoid constant media interviews and therefore uncomfortable questions. He attended the premiere, took part in a Jimmy Kimmel Live! sketch and would also promote the film in Japan. However, during the film's release he chose to do charity work in Africa.\n\nHome media\n\nThe Incredible Hulk was released on Blu-ray and DVD on October 21, 2008. It includes behind-the-scenes featurettes, audio commentary, deleted scenes, and an alternate opening. The film was number one in sales when released on DVD and Blu-ray on October 21, 2008, in the United States (having been available in the United Kingdom since October 13). There are widescreen and fullscreen single-disc editions; a three-disc special edition; and a two-disc Blu-ray package. The first disc contains an audio commentary by Leterrier and Roth, while the second comes with special features and deleted scenes, and the third with a digital copy of the film. The Blu-ray edition compresses the content of the first two DVDs onto one, while the second disc contains the digital copy.\n\nThe film was also collected in a 10-disc box set titled \"Marvel Cinematic Universe: Phase One – Avengers Assembled\" which includes all of the Phase One films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It was released by Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment on April 2, 2013.\n\nReception\n\nBox office\n\nThe Incredible Hulk earned $134.8 million in North America, as well as $128.6 million internationally for a worldwide total of $263.4 million. The film, even though it barely passed its predecessor, and equalled if the smaller budget of the first film is taken into account, is still considered successful. Entertainment analyst David Davis told The Hollywood Reporter, \"The first Hulk had such high expectations after the NBC Universal merger and was supposed to be critical favorite Ang Lee's breakout commercial blockbuster. Then with the new Hulk film, Marvel was able to underplay the importance of the success after the great success of Iron Man this summer. So the new one overdelivered, relative to its underpromise.\"\n\nNorth America\n\nIn its opening weekend, the film grossed $55.4 million in 3,505 theaters in the United States and Canada, ranking No. 1 at the box office. The previous film earned $62.2 million in its opening weekend, but dropped 70% in its second weekend. The second film by comparison, dropped 60% in its second weekend. Behind Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, it was the second-highest gross for a film released over a Father's Day weekend. This surpassed industry expectations of a $45 million opening, following the disappointing response to the 2003 film. Universal believed word of mouth would contribute to the film breaking even eventually.\n\nOutside North America\n\nIt also opened in thirty-eight other countries, adding $31 million to the total opening. The film outgrossed the 2003 film in South Korea, while its openings in Mexico and Russia created records for Universal. The film grossed 24 million yuan (roughly $3.4 million) in its Chinese opening on August 26, outgrossing the previous film's overall gross of ten million yuan.\n\nCritical response\n\nThe review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 67% approval rating with an average rating of 6.2/10 based on 219 reviews. The website's consensus reads, \"The Incredible Hulk may not be quite the smashing success that fans of Marvel's raging behemoth might hope for, but it offers more than enough big green action to make up for its occasionally puny narrative.\" Metacritic gave the film an average score of 61 out of 100, based on 38 reviews. The site characterized reviews as \"generally favorable\". A CinemaScore poll indicated the majority of viewers were male and graded the film an A-, and 82% of them had seen the 2003 film.\n\nTodd McCarthy of Variety said, \"what seemed, in theory, the least-necessary revival of a big screen superhero emerges as perfectly solid summer action fare in The Incredible Hulk.\" He emphasized \"it's all par-for-the-course cinematic demolition and destruction, staged efficiently and with a hint of enthusiasm,\" and \"penned with sporadic wit [...] Visuals lean toward the dark and murky, but editing by three—actually six—hands is fleet, and Craig Armstrong's ever-present score is simultaneously bombastic and helpfully supportive of the action. Effects are in line with pic's generally pro but not inspired achievements.\" Rene Rodriguez of The Miami Herald applauded that the film \"does a lot of things [Ang] Lee's Hulk didn't: It's lighter and faster-paced, it's funnier and it embraces (instead of ignoring) the 1970s TV series that furthered the character's popularity\". Mark Rahner of The Seattle Times wrote that, \"The relaunch of Marvel's green goliath is an improvement over director Ang Lee's ponderous 2003 Hulk in nearly every way – except that the actual Hulk still looks scarcely better than something from a video game, and he still barely talks\". Lou Lumenick of the New York Post said, \"What lingers in my memory ... is the lengthy, essentially animated climactic battle between the Hulk and the Abomination on the streets and rooftops of Harlem, and an earlier showdown between the title creature and the U.S. Army, which is deploying high-tech weapons including sound-wave cannons. These are expertly staged by director Louis Leterrier, who disposes of the backstory under the opening credits and wraps up the whole thing in twenty-four minutes less than [Ang] Lee took\". Roger Ebert was not a fan of the film stating, \"The Incredible Hulk is no doubt an ideal version of the Hulk saga for those who found Ang Lee's Hulk too talky, or dare I say, too thoughtful. But not for me. It sidesteps the intriguing aspects of Hulkdom and spends way too much time in, dare I say, noisy and mindless action sequences.\"\n\nConversely, Christy Lemire of the Associated Press found that \"the inevitable comparisons to Iron Man, Marvel Studios' first blockbuster this summer, serve as a glaring reminder of what this Hulk lacks: wit and heart. Despite the presence of Edward Norton, an actor capable of going just as deep as Robert Downey Jr., we don't feel a strong sense of Bruce Banner's inner conflict\". A.O. Scott of The New York Times opined, \"'The Adequate Hulk' would have been a more suitable title. There are some big, thumping fights and a few bright shards of pop-cultural wit, but for the most part this movie seems content to aim for the generic mean\". David Ansen of Newsweek wrote, \"Leterrier has style, he's good with action and he's eager to give the audience its money's worth of bone-crunching battles. Still, once the movie leaves the atmospheric Brazilian settings, nothing in this \"Hulk\" sinks in deeply: its familiar genre pleasures are all on the surface. ... The movie's scene stealer is Tim Blake Nelson, making a comically welcome third act appearance as the unethical but madly enthusiastic scientist Samuel Sterns\".\n\nThe film was nominated for best superhero film at the 2008 National Movie Awards and for Best Science Fiction Film at the Saturn Awards, but lost to The Dark Knight and Iron Man, respectively.\n\nFuture\n\nOn a potential sequel, Norton said, \"The whole thing was to envision it in multiple parts. We left a lot out on purpose. [The Incredible Hulk is] definitely intended as chapter one.\" Leterrier made the film's final shot of Banner ambiguous; the thought being if there is a sequel, it would mean Banner finally masters control over his anger; if there is not a sequel, the shot indicates instead that he becomes a menace in The Avengers. Leterrier had also intended for a scene in the credits showing Blonsky, human once more, imprisoned and chained in a box. The character of Samuel Sterns, played by Tim Blake Nelson, was introduced to set him up as a villain in a possible future film, where he would become the Leader. Aaron Sims, the lead designer on The Incredible Hulk, also took time to work on concepts for the Leader. Nelson is \"signed on\" to reprise the role. Ty Burrell wants to portray the superpowered Doc Samson faithfully to the comics.\n\nLeterrier and Roth were originally contracted to return. Leterrier also stated Norton was not signed on, but in October 2008, Hurd stated that Norton was contracted to reprise the role. The film had outgrossed its predecessor and Universal indicated interest in a sequel, though Leterrier believed a sequel would not be made because of the film's box office return. Feige said the film met Marvel's expectations and that Hulk would return, but after the crossover. Hurd was not concerned that a sequel may not be produced until at least 2012, citing the positive reception to the film and having produced the Terminator series, the second and third film of which had a 12-year gap. Tim Roth confirmed that Marvel had signed him for three more films. Leterrier, after having previously said he did not want to direct a sequel, said in late 2009 he had changed his mind and was now amenable.\n\nMark Ruffalo began his role as Banner / Hulk in The Avengers, after Feige said he chose not to bring back Norton. In October 2014, Norton claimed he chose never to play Hulk again because he \"wanted more diversity\" with his career, and did not want to be associated with only one character. In April 2012, despite Ruffalo being on board to play the Hulk in the sequel, Feige confirmed to Collider that Marvel had no plans at that time to film another Hulk film. In a Q&A session, Feige and Ruffalo confirmed that discussions are underway to produce another Hulk film due to the positive audience response to Ruffalo's performance in The Avengers. In September 2012, Feige, while exploring all possible story options for a sequel film, including a film based on the \"Planet Hulk\" and \"World War Hulk\" storylines, stated, \"everything [in terms of stories from the comics] is on the table. Do I think Hulk can carry a movie and be as entertaining as he was in Avengers? I do believe that. I do believe he absolutely could. We certainly are not even going to attempt that until Avengers 2. So there's a lot of time to think about it.\"\n\nIn June 2014, Ruffalo said he believed the studio might be considering doing a new standalone Hulk film, saying, \"I think they are, for the first time, entertaining the idea of it. When we did The Avengers it was basically 'No!', and now there is some consideration for it. But there's still nothing definitive, not even a skeletal version of what it would be.\" In July, Feige stated that the studio was not considering a \"Planet Hulk\" film at that time, due to wanting to feature Ruffalo's Banner in the film. However, he did not rule out a story that saw the Hulk and Banner end up in space and explained why a solo Hulk film did not occur in Phase Two of the MCU, by saying, \"After the first Avengers, Iron Man had his own movie, Thor had his own movie, Captain America had his own movie, and Widow and Fury were in The Winter Soldier. So it was really about, frankly, saving somebody so that the only place you could get Hulk between Avengers movies is the next Avengers movie, so [director Joss Whedon] could continue to play with that in [Avengers: Age of Ultron]. Where we go after that, we'll see.\" In October 2014, again on a solo film, Feige said \"we'll see. We'd love to do it, we'd love to find the place to put it, but right now, Hulk will be appearing, with his friends, in their [Phase Three] films.\"\n\nIn April 2015, Ruffalo said Universal holding the distribution rights to Hulk films may be an obstacle to releasing a future Hulk standalone film, and reiterated this in October. Marvel reacquired the film rights for the character, but Universal retained the distribution rights for The Incredible Hulk as well as the right of first refusal to distribute future Hulk films. According to The Hollywood Reporter, a potential reason why Marvel has not reacquired the film distribution rights to the Hulk as they did with Paramount Pictures for the Iron Man, Thor, and Captain America films is because Universal holds the Floridian and Japanese theme park rights to several Marvel characters that Marvel's parent company Disney wants for its own theme parks. In December, Ruffalo stated that the strained relationship between Marvel and Universal may be another obstacle to releasing a future standalone Hulk film. The following month, he indicated that the lack of a standalone Hulk film allowed the character to play a more prominent role in Thor: Ragnarok and Avengers: Infinity War and its untitled sequel, stating, \"we’ve worked a really interesting arc into Thor[: Ragnarok], Avengers[: Infinity War – Part 1 and 2] for Banner that I think will – when it’s all added up – will feel like a Hulk movie, a standalone movie.\"" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Aircraft_hijacking.txt" ], "title": [ "Aircraft hijacking" ], "wiki_context": [ "Aircraft hijacking (also known as air piracy or aircraft piracy, especially within the special aircraft jurisdiction of the United States, and informally as skyjacking) is the unlawful seizure of an aircraft by an individual or a group.[https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/49/46502] In most cases, the pilot is forced to fly according to the orders of the hijackers. Occasionally, however, the hijackers have flown the aircraft themselves, such as the September 11 attacks. In at least three cases, the plane was hijacked by the official pilot or co-pilot. Ethiopian Airlines ET702 hijacking\n\nUnlike the typical hijackings of land vehicles or ships, skyjacking is not usually committed for robbery or theft. Most aircraft hijackers intend to use the passengers as hostages, either for monetary ransom or for some political or administrative concession by authorities. Various motives have driven such occurrences, including demanding the release of certain inmates (notably IC-814), highlighting the grievances of a particular community (notably AF 8969), or political asylum (notably ET 961). Hijackers also have used aircraft as a weapon to target particular locations (notably during the September 11, 2001 attacks).\n\nHijackings for hostages commonly produce an armed standoff during a period of negotiation between hijackers and authorities, followed by some form of settlement. Settlements do not always meet the hijackers' original demands. If the hijackers' demands are deemed too great and the perpetrators show no inclination to surrender, authorities sometimes employ armed special forces to attempt a rescue of the hostages (notably Operation Entebbe).\n\nHistory\n\nRecord-setting hijackings\n\n*1929 (unconfirmed): In the Fort Worth Star-Telegram daily newspaper (morning edition) 19 September 1970, J. Howard \"Doc\" DeCelles states that he was actually the victim of the first skyjacking in December 1929. He was flying a postal route for the Mexican company Transportes Aeras Transcontinentales, ferrying mail from San Luis Potosí to Toreon and then on to Guadalajara. He was approached by Gen. Saturnino Cedillo, governor of the state of San Luis Potosí and one of the last remaining lieutenants of Pancho Villa. Cedillo was accompanied by several other men. He was told through an interpreter that he had no choice in the matter; he had to fly the group to their chosen destination. He stalled long enough to convey the information to his boss, who told him to cooperate. He had no maps, but was guided by the men as he flew above Mexican mountains. He landed on a road as directed, and was held captive for several hours under armed guard. He eventually was released with a \"Buenos\" from Cedillo and his staff. DeCelles kept his flight log, according to the article, but he did not file a report with authorities. He went on to work for the FAA in Fort Worth after his flying career.\n*1931: The first recorded aircraft hijack took place on February 21, 1931, in Arequipa, Peru. Byron Richards, flying a Ford Tri-Motor, was approached on the ground by armed revolutionaries. He refused to fly them anywhere and after a 10-day standoff, Richards was informed that the revolution was successful and he could go in return for flying one group member to Lima. \n*1939: The world's first fatal hijacking occurred on 28 October 1939. Earnest P. \"Larry\" Pletch shot Carl Bivens, 39, a flight instructor who was offering Pletch lessons in a yellow Taylor Cub monoplane with tandem controls in the air after taking off in Brookfield, Missouri. Bivens, instructing from the front seat, was shot in the back of the head twice. \"Carl was telling me I had a natural ability and I should follow that line,\" Pletch later confessed to prosecutors in Missouri. \"I had a revolver in my pocket and without saying a word to him, I took it out of my overalls and I fired a bullet into the back of his head. He never knew what struck him.\" The Chicago Daily Tribune called it \"One of the most spectacular crimes of the 20th century, and what is believed to be the first airplane kidnap murder on record.\" Because it occurred somewhere over three Missouri counties, and involved interstate transport of a stolen airplane, it raised questions in legal circles about where, by whom, and even whether he could be prosecuted. Ernest Pletch pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in prison without parole. However, his sentence was commuted (probably due to prison overcrowding), and he was released on 1 March 1957, after serving 17 years. He died in Eldredge, Missouri in June 2001. \n*1948: The first hijacking of a commercial flight was of the Cathay Pacific Miss Macao on 17 July 1948. \n*1968: The longest hijacking of a commercial flight, according to the BBC, was the El Al Flight 426 hijacking by Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine militants on 23 July 1968, lasting 40 days.\n\n\"Golden Age\"\n\nThe so-called \"Golden Age\" of skyjacking in the United States ran from 1968 through 1979, and into the 1970s in parts of the world, with attacks tapering off after as new regulations made boarding aircraft with weapons extremely difficult. \n\nSeptember 11 attacks\n\nOn September 11, 2001, 19 al-Qaeda Islamic extremists hijacked American Airlines Flight 11, United Airlines Flight 175, American Airlines Flight 77, and United Airlines Flight 93 and crashed them into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, the southwestern side of the Pentagon, and Stonycreek Township near Shanksville, Pennsylvania (after passengers acted to stop the hijackers; its intended target was either the White House or the U.S. Capitol) in a terrorist attack. All in all, 2,996 people perished and more than 6,000 others were injured in the attacks. This casualty toll makes the hijacking the most fatal in history.\n\nMilitary aircraft hijacking\n\nA Pakistan Air Force T-33 trainer was hijacked on August 20, 1971 before the Indo-Pakistani war of 1971 in Karachi when a Bengali instructor pilot, Flight Lieutenant Matiur Rahman, knocked out the young Pilot Officer Rashid Minhas with the intention of defecting to India with the plane and national secrets. On regaining consciousness in mid-flight, Minhas struggled for flight control as well as relaying the news of his hijack to the PAF base. In the end of the ensuing struggle he succeeded to crash his aircraft into the ground near Thatta on seeing no way to prevent the hijack and the defection. He was posthumously awarded Pakistan's highest military award Nishan-e-Haider (Sign of the Lion) for his act of bravery. Matiur Rahman was awarded Bangladesh's highest military award, Bir Sreshtho, for his attempt to defect to join the civil war in East Pakistan (modern-day Bangladesh).\n\nNotorious hijackings\n\n*1971 - A man known only by the alias D. B. Cooper is credited with inspiring both copycat crimes and winning enduring infamy by hijacking an airplane and collecting $200,000 in ransom money and a parachute before jumping. He has never been identified. \n\nDealing with hijackings\n\nMost hijackings will involve the plane landing at a certain destination, followed by the hijackers making negotiable demands. Pilots and flight attendants are still trained to adopt the \"Common Strategy\" tactic, which was approved by the United States FAA. It teaches crew members to comply with the hijackers' demands, get the plane to land safely and then let the security forces handle the situation. Crew members should advise passengers to sit quietly in order to increase their chances of survival. They were also trained not to make any heroic moves that could endanger themselves or other people. The FAA realized that the longer a hijacking persisted, the more likely it would end peacefully with the hijackers reaching their goal; often, during the epidemic of skyjackings in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the end result was an inconvenient but otherwise harmless trip to Cuba for the passengers.\n\nLater examples of active passenger and crew member resistance occurred when passengers and flight attendants of American Airlines Flight 63 from Paris to Miami on December 22, 2001, teamed up to help prevent Richard Reid from igniting explosives hidden in his shoes. Another example is when a few passengers and flight attendants teamed up to subdue Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab who attempted to detonate explosives sewn into his underwear aboard Northwest Flight 253 on December 25, 2009. Flight attendants and pilots now receive extensive anti-hijacking and self-defense training designed to thwart a hijacking or bombing. \n\nIn 2012, six hijackers hijacked Tianjin Airlines flight 7554. Two of the hijackers died from severe injuries sustained during a fight with passengers and crew who attempted to subdue them. A doctor led elderly and children away from the violence. The hijackers had weapons which they used to attack cabin crew and passengers.\n\nSix policemen were on board the aircraft. They helped remove explosives and weapons from the hijackers. A group of resourceful passengers protected the cockpit door using a beverage cart that was rolled in front of the door. The pilot heard screaming and fighting from the cabin. A first class flight attendant was injured trying to stop three hijackers who were in first class from entering the cockpit. Seven passengers were injured during the fights on board the aircraft. It was the first violent hijacking since the 9/11 attacks in North America. When the pilot realized what was happening, he decided to fly the aircraft back to the airport. Once the plane landed, police surrounded it.\n\nInforming air traffic control\n\nTo alert air traffic control that an aircraft is being hijacked, a pilot under duress should squawk 7500 or vocally, by radio communication, transmit \"(Aircraft callsign); Transponder seven five zero zero.\" This should be done when possible and safe. An air traffic controller who suspects an aircraft may have been hijacked may ask the pilot to confirm \"squawking assigned code.\" If the aircraft is not being hijacked, the pilot should not squawk 7500 and should inform the controller accordingly. A pilot under duress may also elect to respond that the aircraft is not being hijacked, but then neglect to change to a different squawk code. In this case, the controller would make no further requests and immediately inform the appropriate authorities. A complete lack of a response would also be taken to indicate a possible hijacking. Of course, a loss of radio communications may also be the cause for a lack of response, in which case a pilot would usually squawk 7600 anyway. \n\nOn 9/11, the suicide hijackers did not make any attempt to contact ground control to inform anyone about their hijackings, nor engage in any dialogue or negotiations. However, the hijacker-pilot of Flight 11 and the ringleader of the terrorist cell, Mohamed Atta, mistakenly transmitted announcements to ATC, meaning to go through the Boeing 767. Also, onboard flight attendants Amy Sweeney and Betty Ong called the American Airlines office, telling the workers that Flight 11 was hijacked. 9/11 hijacker-pilots Ziad Jarrah and Hani Hanjour aboard Flights 77 and 93 also made a similar error when they mistakenly transmitted announcements to ATC about the hijacking.\n\nPrevention\n\nCockpit doors on most commercial aircraft have been strengthened and are now bullet resistant. In the United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Australia, Austria, the Netherlands and France, air marshals have also been added to some flights to deter and thwart hijackers. Airport security plays a major role in preventing hijackers. Screening passengers with metal detectors and luggage with x-ray machines helps prevent weapons from being taken on an aircraft. Along with the FAA, the FBI also monitors terror suspects. Any person who is seen as a threat to civil aviation is banned from flying.\n\nShooting down aircraft\n\nAccording to reports, U.S. fighter pilots have been trained to shoot down hijacked commercial airliners if necessary. Other countries, such as India, Poland, and Russia have enacted similar laws or decrees that allow the downing of hijacked planes. However, in September 2008 the Polish Constitutional Court ruled that the Polish rules were unconstitutional, and voided them. \n\nIndia\n\nIndia published its new anti-hijacking policy in August 2005. The policy came into force after the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) approved it. The main points of the policy are:\n* Any attempt to hijack will be considered an act of aggression against the country and will prompt a response fit for an aggressor.\n* Hijackers, if captured, will be sentenced to death.\n* Hijackers will be engaged in negotiations only to bring the incident to an end, to comfort passengers and to prevent loss of lives.\n* The plane will be shot down if it is deemed to become a missile heading for strategic targets.\n* The plane will be escorted by armed fighter aircraft and will be forced to land.\n* A grounded plane will not be allowed to take off under any circumstance.\n\nThe list of strategic targets is prepared by the Bureau of Civil Aviation in India. The decision to shoot down a plane is taken by CCS. However, due to the shortage of time, whoever – the prime minister, the defense minister or the home minister – can be reached first will take the call. In situations in which an aircraft becomes a threat while taking off – which gives very little reaction time – a decision on shooting it down may be taken by an Indian Air Force officer not below the rank of Assistant Chief of Air Staff (Operations).\n\nGermany\n\nIn January 2005, a federal law came into force in Germany – the Luftsicherheitsgesetz – that allowed \"direct action by armed force\" against a hijacked aircraft to prevent a 9/11-type attack. However, in February 2006 the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany struck down these provisions of the law, stating such preventive measures were unconstitutional and would essentially be state-sponsored murder, even if such an act would save many more lives on the ground. The main reasoning behind this decision was that the state would effectively be taking the lives of innocent hostages in order to avoid a terrorist attack. The Court also ruled that the Minister of Defense is constitutionally not entitled to act in terrorism matters, as this is the duty of the state and federal police forces. See the German Wikipedia entry, or [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4715878.stm]\n\nThe President of Germany, Horst Köhler, himself urged judicial review of the constitutionality of the Luftsicherheitsgesetz after he signed it into law in 2005.\n\nInternational law issues\n\nTokyo Convention\n\nThe Tokyo Convention states in Article 11, defining the so-called unlawful takeover of an aircraft, that the parties signing the agreement are obliged, in case of hijacking or a threat of it, to take all the necessary measures in order to regain or keep control over an aircraft. The detailed analysis of the quoted article shows that in order of an unlawful takeover of an aircraft to take place, and at the same time to start the application of the convention, 3 conditions should be met: \n#The hijacking or control takeover of an aircraft must be a result of unlawful use of violence or an attempt to use violence; \n#An aircraft should be \"in flight\" (that is, according to Article 1, paragraph 3 of the Tokyo Convention, from the moment when power is applied for the purpose of take-off until the moment when the landing run ends); \n#The unlawful act must be committed on board an aircraft (that is, by a person on board an aircraft, e.g. a passenger or crew member. In case of an assault \"from the outside\", such an offense would be treated as an act of aviation piracy).\nHowever, even without the order of the captain, any crewmember or passenger can take reasonable measures, when he or she has reasonable grounds to believe that such action is necessary to protect the safety of the aircraft, or of people or property therein. The captain may decide to disembark a suspected person on the territory of any country, where the aircraft would land, and that country must agree to that. (Article 8 and 12 of the Convention).\n\nContinuation of the passengers' journey was a provision that first appeared in the Tokyo Convention (Article 11). \n\nHague Convention\n\nThe Convention for the suppression of unlawful seizure of Aircraft (known as The Hague convention) went into effect on 14 October 1971. Article 1 of the Convention defines the offences to which it applies.\n\nMontreal Convention\n\nIn popular culture\n\nThe Hollywood film Air Force One recounts the fictional story of the hijacking of the famous aircraft by six Kazakh ultra-nationalist terrorists. The film Con Air features an aircraft being hijacked by the maximum-security prisoners on board. The Taking of Flight 847: The Uli Derickson Story was a made-for-TV film based on the actual hijacking of TWA Flight 847, as seen through the eyes of the chief flight attendant Uli Derickson. Passenger 57 depicts an airline security expert trapped on a passenger jet when terrorists seize control. Skyjacked is a 1972 film about a crazed Vietnam war veteran hijacking an airliner, demanding to be taken to Russia. The 1986 film The Delta Force depicted a Special Forces squad tasked with retaking a plane hijacked by Lebanese terrorists. The 2006 film Snakes On a Plane is a fictional story about aircraft piracy through the in-flight release of venomous snakes. The 2014 film Non-Stop depicts an aircraft hijacking. The Indian film Neerja is based on the hijacking of Pan Am Flight 73 in Karachi" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "List_of_Dutch_inventions_and_discoveries.txt" ], "title": [ "List of Dutch inventions and discoveries" ], "wiki_context": [ "The Netherlands, despite its comparatively modest size and population, had a considerable part in the making of the modern society. Rybczynski, Witold (1987). Home: A Short History of an Idea. According to Witold Rybczynski’s Home: A Short History of an Idea, private spaces in households are a Dutch seventeenth-century invention, despite their commonplace nature today. He has argued that home as we now know it came from the Dutch canal house of the seventeenth century. That, he said, was the first time that people identified living quarters as being precisely the residence of a man, a woman and their children. \"The feminization of the home in seventeenth century Holland was one of the most important events in the evolution of the domestic interior.\" This evolution took place in part due to Dutch law being \"explicit on contractual arrangements and on the civil rights of servants\". And, \"for the first time, the person who was in intimate contact with housework was also in a position to influence the arrangement and disposition of the house.\" Rybczynski (2007) discusses why we live in houses in the first place: \"To understand why we live in houses, it is necessary to go back several hundred years to Europe. Rural people have always lived in houses, but the typical medieval town dwelling, which combined living space and workplace, was occupied by a mixture of extended families, servants, and employees. This changed in seventeenth-century Holland. The Netherlands was Europe’s first republic, and the world’s first middle-class nation. Prosperity allowed extensive home ownership, republicanism discouraged the widespread use of servants, a love of children promoted the nuclear family, and Calvinism encouraged thrift and other domestic virtues. These circumstances, coupled with a particular affection for the private family home, brought about a cultural revolution... The idea of urban houses spread to the British Isles thanks to England's strong commercial and cultural links with the Netherlands.\"Tabor, Philip (2005). \"Striking Home: The Telematic Assault on Identity\". Published in Jonathan Hill, editor, Occupying Architecture: Between the Architect and the User. Philip Tabor states the contribution of 17th century Dutch houses as the foundation of houses today: \"As far as the idea of the home is concerned, the home of the home is the Netherlands. This idea's crystallization might be dated to the first three-quarters of the seventeenth century, when the Dutch Netherlands amassed the unprecedented and unrivalled accumulation of capital, and emptied their purses into domestic space.\" According to Jonathan Hill (Immaterial Architecture, 2006), compared to the large scaled houses in England and the Renaissance, the 17th Century Dutch house was smaller, and was only inhabited by up to four to five members. This was due to their embracing \"self-reliance\", in contrast to the dependence on servants, and a design for a lifestyle centered on the family. It was important for the Dutch to separate work from domesticity, as the home became an escape and a place of comfort. This way of living and the home has been noted as highly similar to the contemporary family and their dwellings. House layouts also incorporated the idea of the corridor as well as the importance of function and privacy. By the end of the 17th Century, the house layout was soon transformed to become employment-free, enforcing these ideas for the future. This came in favour for the industrial revolution, gaining large-scale factory production and workers. The house layout of the Dutch and its functions are still relevant today. The Netherlands and its people have made numerous seminal contributions to the world's civilization, especially in art, science, technology and engineering, economics and finance,During their Golden Age, the Dutch were responsible for three major institutional innovations in economic and financial history. The first major innovation was the foundation of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), the world's first publicly traded company, in 1602. As the first listed company (the first company to be ever listed on an official stock exchange), the VOC was the first company to actually issue stock and bonds to the general public. Considered by many experts to be the world's first truly (modern) multinational corporation, the VOC was also the first permanently organized limited-liability joint-stock company, with a permanent capital base. The Dutch merchants were the pioneers in laying the basis for modern corporate governance. The VOC is often considered as the precursor of modern corporations, if not the first truly modern corporation. It was the VOC that invented the idea of investing in the company rather than in a specific venture governed by the company. With its pioneering features such as corporate identity (first globally-recognized corporate logo), entrepreneurial spirit, legal personhood, transnational (multinational) operational structure, high stable profitability, permanent capital (fixed capital stock), freely transferable shares and tradable securities, separation of ownership and management, and limited liability for both shareholders and managers, the VOC is generally considered a major institutional breakthrough and the model for the large-scale business enterprises that now dominate the global economy. The second major innovation was the creation of the world's first fully functioning financial market, with the birth of a fully fledged capital market. The Dutch were also the first to effectively use a fully-fledged capital market (including the bond market and the stock market) to finance companies (such as the VOC and the WIC). It was in seventeenth-century Amsterdam that the global securities market began to take on its modern form. In 1602 the Dutch East India Company (VOC) established an exchange in Amsterdam where VOC stock and bonds could be traded in a secondary market. The VOC undertook the world's first recorded IPO in the same year. The Amsterdam Stock Exchange (Amsterdamsche Beurs in Dutch) was also the world's first fully-fledged stock exchange. While the Italian city-states produced the first transferable government bonds, they didn't develop the other ingredient necessary to produce a fully fledged capital market: corporate shareholders. The Dutch East India Company (VOC) became the first company to offer shares of stock. The dividend averaged around 18% of capital over the course of the company's 200-year existence. Dutch investors were the first to trade their shares at a regular stock exchange. The buying and selling of these shares of stock in the VOC became the basis of the first stock market. It was in the Dutch Republic that the early techniques of stock-market manipulation were developed. The Dutch pioneered stock futures, stock options, short selling, bear raids, debt-equity swaps, and other speculative instruments. Amsterdam businessman Joseph de la Vega's Confusion of Confusions (1688) was the earliest book about stock trading. The third major innovation was the establishment of the Bank of Amsterdam (Amsterdamsche Wisselbank in Dutch) in 1609, which led to the introduction of the concept of bank money. The Bank of Amsterdam was arguably the world's first central bank. The Wisselbank's innovations helped lay the foundations for the birth and development of the central banking system that now plays a vital role in the world's economy. It occupied a central position in the financial world of its day, providing an effective, efficient and trusted system for national and international payments, and introduced the first ever international reserve currency, the bank guilder. Lucien Gillard (2004) calls it the European guilder (le florin européen), and Adam Smith devotes many pages to explaining how the bank guilder works (Smith 1776: 446-455). The model of the Wisselbank as a state bank was adapted throughout Europe, including the Bank of Sweden (1668) and the Bank of England (1694). cartography and geography, exploration and navigation, law and jurisprudence, thought and philosophy, medicine, and agriculture. Dutch-speaking people, in spite of their relatively small number, have a significant history of invention, innovation, discovery and exploration. The following list is composed of objects, (largely) unknown lands, breakthrough ideas/concepts, principles, phenomena, processes, methods, techniques, styles etc., that were discovered or invented (or pioneered) by people from the Netherlands and Dutch-speaking people from the former Southern Netherlands (Zuid-Nederlanders in Dutch). Until the fall of Antwerp (1585), the Dutch and Flemish were generally seen as one people.Frisians, specifically West Frisians, are an ethnic group; present in the North of the Netherlands; mainly concentrating in the Province of Friesland. Culturally, modern Frisians and the (Northern) Dutch are rather similar; the main and generally most important difference being that Frisians speak West Frisian, one of the three sub-branches of the Frisian languages, alongside Dutch. West Frisians in the general do not feel or see themselves as part of a larger group of Frisians, and, according to a 1970 inquiry, identify themselves more with the Dutch than with East or North Frisians. Because of centuries of cohabitation and active participation in Dutch society, as well as being bilingual, the Frisians are not treated as a separate group in Dutch official statistics.\n\nInventions and innovations\n\nArts and architecture \n\nMovements and styles \n\nDe Stijl (Neo-Plasticism) (1917) \n\nThe De Stijl school proposed simplicity and abstraction, both in architecture and painting, by using only straight horizontal and vertical lines and rectangular forms. Furthermore, their formal vocabulary was limited to the primary colours, red, yellow, and blue and the three primary values, black, white and grey. De Stijl's principal members were painters Theo van Doesburg (1883–1931), Piet Mondrian (1872–1944), Vilmos Huszár (1884–1960), and Bart van der Leck (1876–1958) and architects Gerrit Rietveld (1888–1964), Robert van 't Hoff (1888–1979) and J.J.P. Oud (1890–1963).\n\nArchitecture \n\nBrabantine Gothic architecture (14th century) \n\nBrabantine Gothic, occasionally called Brabantian Gothic, is a significant variant of Gothic architecture that is typical for the Low Countries. It surfaced in the first half of the 14th century at Saint Rumbold's Cathedral in the City of Mechelen. The Brabantine Gothic style originated with the advent of the Duchy of Brabant and spread across the Burgundian Netherlands.\n\nNetherlandish gabled architecture (15th-17th centuries) \n\n \n\nThe Dutch gable was a notable feature of the Dutch-Flemish Renaissance architecture (or Northern Mannerist architecture) that spread to northern Europe from the Low Countries, arriving in Britain during the latter part of the 16th century. Notable castles/buildings including Frederiksborg Castle, Rosenborg Castle, Kronborg Castle, Børsen, Riga's House of the Blackheads and Gdańsk's Green Gate were built in Dutch-Flemish Renaissance style with sweeping gables, sandstone decorations and copper-covered roofs. Later Dutch gables with flowing curves became absorbed into Baroque architecture. Examples of Dutch-gabled buildings can be found in historic cities across Europe such as Potsdam (Dutch Quarter), Friedrichstadt, Gdańsk and Gothenburg. The style spread beyond Europe, for example Barbados is well known for Dutch gables on its historic buildings. Dutch settlers in South Africa brought with them building styles from the Netherlands: Dutch gables, then adjusted to the Western Cape region where the style became known as Cape Dutch architecture. In the Americas and Northern Europe, the West End Collegiate Church (New York City, 1892), the Chicago Varnish Company Building (Chicago, 1895), Pont Street Dutch-style buildings (London, 1800s), Helsingør Station (Helsingør, 1891), and Gdańsk University of Technology's Main Building (Gdańsk, 1904) are typical examples of the Dutch Renaissance Revival (Neo-Renaissance) architecture in the late 19th century.\n\nNetherlandish Mannerist architecture (Antwerp Mannerism) (16th century) \n\nAntwerp Mannerism is the name given to the style of a largely anonymous group of painters from Antwerp in the beginning of the 16th century. The style bore no direct relation to Renaissance or Italian Mannerism, but the name suggests a peculiarity that was a reaction to the classic style of the early Netherlandish painting. Antwerp Mannerism may also be used to describe the style of architecture, which is loosely Mannerist, developed in Antwerp by about 1540, which was then influential all over Northern Europe. The Green Gate (Brama Zielona) in Gdańsk, Poland, is a building which is inspired by the Antwerp City Hall. It was built between 1568 and 1571 by Regnier van Amsterdam and Hans Kramer to serve as the formal residence of the Polish monarchs when visiting Gdańsk.\n\nCape Dutch architecture (1650s) \n\nCape Dutch architecture is an architectural style found in the Western Cape of South Africa. The style was prominent in the early days (17th century) of the Cape Colony, and the name derives from the fact that the initial settlers of the Cape were primarily Dutch. The style has roots in medieval Netherlands, Germany, France and Indonesia. Houses in this style have a distinctive and recognisable design, with a prominent feature being the grand, ornately rounded gables, reminiscent of features in townhouses of Amsterdam built in the Dutch style.\n\nAmsterdam School (Dutch Expressionist architecture) (1910s) \n\nThe Amsterdam School (Dutch: Amsterdamse School) flourished from 1910 through about 1930 in the Netherlands. The Amsterdam School movement is part of international Expressionist architecture, sometimes linked to German Brick Expressionism.\n\nRietveld Schröder House (De Stijl architecture) (1924) \n\nThe Rietveld Schröder House or Schröder House (Rietveld Schröderhuis in Dutch) in Utrecht was built in 1924 by Dutch architect Gerrit Rietveld. It became a listed monument in 1976 and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2000. The Rietveld Schröder House constitutes both inside and outside a radical break with tradition, offering little distinction between interior and exterior space. The rectilinear lines and planes flow from outside to inside, with the same colour palette and surfaces. Inside is a dynamic, changeable open zone rather than a static accumulation of rooms. The house is one of the best known examples of De Stijl architecture and arguably the only true De Stijl building. \n\nVan Nelle Factory (1925–1931) \n\nThe Van Nelle factory was built between 1925 and 1931. Its most striking feature is its huge glass façades. The factory was designed on the premise that a modern, transparent and healthy working environment in green surroundings would be good both for production and for workers' welfare. The factory had a huge impact on the development of modern architecture in Europe and elsewhere. The Van Nelle Factory is a Dutch national monument (Rijksmonument) and since 2014 has the status of UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Justification of Outstanding Universal Value was presented in 2013 to the UNESCO World Heritage Committee.\n\nSuper Dutch (1990-present) \n\nAn architectural movement started by a generation of new architects during the 1990, among this generation of architects were OMA, MVRDV, UNStudio, Mecanoo, Meyer en Van Schooten and many more. They started with buildings, which became internationally known for their new and refreshing style. After which Super Dutch Architecture spread out across the globe.\n\nFurniture \n\nDutch door (17th century) \n\nThe Dutch door (also known as stable door or half door) is a type of door divided horizontally in such a fashion that the bottom half may remain shut while the top half opens. The initial purpose of this door was to keep animals out of farmhouses, while keeping children inside, yet allowing light and air to filter through the open top. This type of door was common in the Netherlands in the seventeenth century and appears in Dutch paintings of the period. They were commonly found in Dutch areas of New York and New Jersey (before the American Revolution) and in South Africa. \n\nRed and Blue Chair (1917) \n\nThe Red and Blue Chair was designed in 1917 by Gerrit Rietveld. It represents one of the first explorations by the De Stijl art movement in three dimensions. It features several Rietveld joints.\n\nZig-Zag Chair (1934) \n\nThe Zig-Zag Chair was designed by Rietveld in 1934. It is a minimalist design without legs, made by 4 flat wooden tiles that are merged in a Z-shape using Dovetail joints. It was designed for the Rietveld Schröder House in Utrecht.\n\nVisual arts \n\nFoundations of modern oil painting (15th century) \n\nAlthough oil paint was first used for Buddhist paintings by Indian and Chinese painters sometime between the fifth and tenth centuries, it did not gain notoriety until the 15th century. Its practice may have migrated westward during the Middle Ages. Oil paint eventually became the principal medium used for creating artworks as its advantages became widely known. The transition began with Early Netherlandish painting in northern Europe, and by the height of the Renaissance oil painting techniques had almost completely replaced tempera paints in the majority of Europe. Early Netherlandish painting (Jan van Eyck in particular) in the 15th century was the first to make oil the default painting medium, and to explore the use of layers and glazes, followed by the rest of Northern Europe, and only then Italy. \n\nGlaze (painting technique) (15th century) \n\nGlazing is a technique employed by painters since the invention of modern oil painting. Early Netherlandish painters in the 15th century were the first to make oil the usual painting medium, and explore the use of layers and glazes, followed by the rest of Northern Europe, and only then Italy.\n\nProto-Realism (15th–17th centuries) \n\nTwo aspects of realism were rooted in at least two centuries of Dutch tradition: conspicuous textural imitation and a penchant for ordinary and exaggeratedly comic scenes. Two hundred years before the rise of literary realism, Dutch painters had already made an art of the everyday – pictures that served as a compelling model for the later novelists. By the mid-1800s, 17th-century Dutch painting figured virtually everywhere in the British and French fiction we esteem today as the vanguard of realism.\n\nProto-Surrealism (1470s–1510s) \n\nHieronymus Bosch is considered one of the prime examples of Pre-Surrealism. The surrealists relied most on his insights. In the 20th century, Bosch's paintings (e.g. The Garden of Earthly Delights, The Haywain, The Temptation of St. Anthony and The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things) were cited by the Surrealists as precursors to their own visions.\n\nModern still-life painting (16th–17th century) \n\nStill-life painting as an independent genre or specialty first flourished in the Netherlands in the last quarter of the 16th century, and the English term derives from stilleven: still life, which is a calque, while Romance languages (as well as Greek, Polish, Russian and Turkish) tend to use terms meaning dead nature.\n\nNaturalistic landscape painting (16th–17th century) \n\nThe term \"landscape\" derives from the Dutch word landschap, which originally meant \"region, tract of land\" but acquired the artistic connotation, \"a picture depicting scenery on land\" in the early 16th century. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the tradition of depicting pure landscapes declined and the landscape was seen only as a setting for religious and figural scenes. This tradition continued until the 16th century when artists began to view the landscape as a subject in its own right. The Dutch Golden Age painting of the 17th century saw the dramatic growth of landscape painting, in which many artists specialized, and the development of extremely subtle realist techniques for depicting light and weather.\n\nGenre painting (15th century) \n\nThe Flemish Renaissance painter Pieter Brueghel the Elder chose peasants and their activities as the subject of many paintings. Genre painting flourished in Northern Europe in his wake. Adriaen van Ostade, David Teniers, Aelbert Cuyp, Jan Steen, Johannes Vermeer and Pieter de Hooch were among many painters specializing in genre subjects in the Netherlands during the 17th century. The generally small scale of these artists' paintings was appropriate for their display in the homes of middle class purchasers.\n\nMarine painting (17th century) \n\nMarine painting began in keeping with medieval Christian art tradition. Such works portrayed the sea only from a bird's eye view, and everything, even the waves, was organized and symmetrical. The viewpoint, symmetry and overall order of these early paintings underlined the organization of the heavenly cosmos from which the earth was viewed. Later Dutch artists such as Hendrick Cornelisz Vroom, Cornelius Claesz, Abraham Storck, Jan Porcellis, Simon de Vlieger, Willem van de Velde the Elder, Willem van de Velde the Younger and Ludolf Bakhuizen developed new methods for painting, often from a horizontal point of view, with a lower horizon and more focus on realism than symmetry. \n\nVanitas (17th century) \n\nThe term vanitas is most often associated with still life paintings that were popular in seventeenth-century Dutch art, produced by the artists such as Pieter Claesz. Common vanitas symbols included skulls (a reminder of the certainty of death); rotten fruit (decay); bubbles, (brevity of life and suddenness of death); smoke, watches, and hourglasses, (the brevity of life); and musical instruments (the brevity and ephemeral nature of life). Fruit, flowers and butterflies can be interpreted in the same way, while a peeled lemon, as well as the typical accompanying seafood was, like life, visually attractive but with a bitter flavor.\n\nCivil group portraiture (17th century) \n\nGroup portraits were produced in great numbers during the Baroque period, particularly in the Netherlands. Unlike in the rest of Europe, Dutch artists received no commissions from the Calvinist Church which had forbidden such images or from the aristocracy which was virtually non-existent. Instead, commissions came from civic and businesses associations. Dutch painter Frans Hals used fluid brush strokes of vivid color to enliven his group portraits, including those of the civil guard to which he belonged. Rembrandt benefitted greatly from such commissions and from the general appreciation of art by bourgeois clients, who supported portraiture as well as still-life and landscape painting. Notably, the world's first significant art and dealer markets flourished in Holland at that time.\n\nTronie (17th century) \n\nIn the 17th century, Dutch painters (especially Frans Hals, Rembrandt, Jan Lievens and Johannes Vermeer) began to create uncommissioned paintings called tronies that focused on the features and/or expressions of people who were not intended to be identifiable. They were conceived more for art's sake than to satisfy conventions. The tronie was a distinctive type of painting, combining elements of the portrait, history, and genre painting. This was usually a half-length of a single figure which concentrated on capturing an unusual mood or expression. The actual identity of the model was not supposed to be important, but they might represent a historical figure and be in exotic or historic costume. In contrast to portraits, \"tronies\" were painted for the open market. They differ from figurative paintings and religious figures in that they are not restricted to a moral or narrative context. It is, rather, much more an exploration of the spectrum of human physiognomy and expression and the reflection of conceptions of character that are intrinsic to psychology’s pre-history.\n\nRembrandt lighting (17th century) \n\nRembrandt lighting is a lighting technique that is used in studio portrait photography.\nIt can be achieved using one light and a reflector, or two lights, and is popular because\nit is capable of producing images which appear both natural and compelling with a minimum\nof equipment. Rembrandt lighting is characterized by an illuminated triangle under the eye\nof the subject, on the less illuminated side of the face. It is named for the Dutch painter\nRembrandt, who often used this type of lighting in his portrait paintings.\n\nMezzotint (1642) \n\nThe first known mezzotint was done in Amsterdam in 1642 by Utrecht-born German artist Ludwig von Siegen. He lived in Amsterdam from 1641 to about 1644, when he was supposedly influenced by Rembrandt. \n\nAquatint (1650s) \n\nThe painter and printmaker Jan van de Velde is often credited to be the inventor of the aquatint technique, in Amsterdam around 1650.\n\nPronkstilleven (1650s) \n\nPronkstilleven (pronk still life or ostentatious still life) is a type of banquet piece whose distinguishing feature is a quality of ostentation and splendor. These still lifes usually depict one or more especially precious objects. Although the term is a post-17th century invention, this type is characteristic of the second half of the seventeenth century. It was developed in the 1640s in Antwerp from where it spread quickly to the Dutch Republic. Flemish artists such as Frans Snyders and Adriaen van Utrecht started to paint still lifes that emphasized abundance by depicting a diversity of objects, fruits, flowers and dead game, often together with living people and animals. The style was soon adopted by artists from the Dutch Republic.[http://www.answers.com/topic/pronkstilleven Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms: Pronkstilleven] A leading Dutch representative was Jan Davidsz. de Heem, who spent a long period of his active career in Antwerp and was one of the founders of the style in Holland.[http://www.rkd.nl/rkddb/dispatcher.aspx?actionsearch&database\nChoiceArtists&searchpriref\n36842 Jan Davidsz. de Heem] at the Netherlands Institute for Art History \n Other leading representatives in the Dutch Republic were Abraham van Beyeren, Willem Claeszoon Heda and Willem Kalf.\n\nProto-Expressionism (1880s) \n\nVincent van Gogh's work is most often associated with Post-Impressionism, but his innovative style had a vast influence on 20th-century art and established what would later be known as Expressionism, also greatly influencing fauvism and early abstractionism. His impact on German and Austrian Expressionists was especially profound. \"Van Gogh was father to us all,\" the German Expressionist painter Max Pechstein proclaimed in 1901, when Van Gogh's vibrant oils were first shown in Germany and triggered the artistic reformation, a decade after his suicide in obscurity in France. In his final letter to Theo, Van Gogh stated that, as he had no children, he viewed his paintings as his progeny. Reflecting on this, the British art historian Simon Schama concluded that he \"did have a child of course, Expressionism, and many, many heirs.\"\n\nM. C. Escher's graphic arts (1920s–1960s) \n\nDutch graphic artist Maurits Cornelis Escher, usually referred to as M. C. Escher, is known for his often mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints. These feature impossible constructions, explorations of infinity, architecture and tessellations. His special way of thinking and rich graphic work has had a continuous influence in science and art, as well as permeating popular culture. His ideas have been used in fields as diverse as psychology, philosophy, logic, crystallography and topology. His art is based on mathematical principles like tessellations, spherical geometry, the Möbius strip, unusual perspectives, visual paradoxes and illusions, different kinds of symmetries and impossible objects. Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter discusses the ideas of self-reference and strange loops, drawing on a wide range of artistic and scientific work, including Escher's art and the music of J. S. Bach, to illustrate ideas behind Gödel's incompleteness theorems.\n\nMiffy (Nijntje) (1955) \n\nMiffy (Nijntje) is a small female rabbit in a series of picture books drawn and written by Dutch artist Dick Bruna.\n\nMusic \n\nFranco-Flemish School (Netherlandish School) (15th-16th century) \n\nIn music, the Franco-Flemish School or more precisely the Netherlandish School refers to the style of polyphonic vocal music composition in the Burgundian Netherlands in the 15th and early 16th centuries, and to the composers who wrote it.\n\nVenetian School (Venetian polychoral style) (16th century) \n\nThe Venetian School of polychoral music was founded by the Netherlandish composer Adrian Willaert.\n\nHardcore (electronic dance music genre) (1990s) \n\nHardcore or hardcore techno is a subgenre of electronic dance music originating in Europe from the emergent raves in the 1990s. It was initially designed at Rotterdam in Netherlands, derived from techno. \n\n Hardstyle (electronic dance music genre) (1990s-2000s) \n\nHardstyle is an electronic dance genre mixing influences from hardtechno and hardcore. Hardstyle was influenced by gabber. Hardstyle has its origins in the Netherlands where artists like DJ Zany, Lady Dana, DJ Isaac, DJ Pavo, DJ Luna and The Prophet, who produced hardcore, started experimenting while playing their hardcore records.\n\nAgriculture \n\nHolstein Friesian cattle (2nd century BC) \n\nHolsteins or Holstein-Friesians are a breed of cattle known today as the world's highest-production dairy animals. Originating in Europe, Holstein-Friesians were bred in the two northern provinces of North Holland and Friesland, and Schleswig-Holstein in what became Germany. The animals were the regional cattle of the Frisians and the Saxons. The origins of the breed can be traced to the black cows and white cows of the Batavians and Frisians - migrant tribes who settled the coastal Rhine region more than two thousand years ago.\n\nBrussels sprout ( 13th century) \n\nForerunners to modern Brussels sprouts were likely cultivated in ancient Rome. Brussels sprouts as we now know them were grown possibly as early as the 13th century in the Low Countries (may have originated in Brussels). The first written reference dates to 1587. During the 16th century, they enjoyed a popularity in the Southern Netherlands that eventually spread throughout the cooler parts of Northern Europe.\n\nOrange-coloured carrot (16th century) \n\nThrough history, carrots weren’t always orange. They were black, purple, white, brown, red and yellow. Probably orange too, but this was not the dominant colour. Orange-coloured carrots appeared in the Netherlands in the 16th century. Dutch farmers in Hoorn bred the color. They succeeded by cross-breeding pale yellow with red carrots. It is more likely that Dutch horticulturists actually found an orange rooted mutant variety and then worked on its development through selective breeding to make the plant consistent. Through successive hybridisation the orange colour intensified. This was developed to become the dominant species across the world, a sweet orange.\n\nBelle de Boskoop (apple) (1856) \n\nBelle de Boskoop is an apple cultivar which, as its name suggests, originated in Boskoop, where it began as a chance seedling in 1856. There are many variants: Boskoop red, yellow or green. This rustic apple is firm, tart and fragrant. Greenish-gray tinged with red, the apple stands up well to cooking. Generally Boskoop varieties are very high in acid content and can contain more than four times the vitamin C of 'Granny Smith' or 'Golden Delicious'. \n\nKarmijn de Sonnaville (apple) (1949) \n\nKarmijn de Sonnaville is a variety of apple bred by Piet de Sonnaville, working in Wageningen in 1949. It is a cross of Cox's Orange Pippin and Jonathan, and was first grown commercially beginning in 1971. It is high both in sugars (including some sucrose) and acidity. It is a triploid, and hence needs good pollination, and can be difficult to grow. It also suffers from fruit russet, which can be severe. In Manhart’s book, “apples for the 21st century”, Karmijn de Sonnaville is tipped as a possible success for the future. Karmijn de Sonnaville is not widely grown in large quantities, but in Ireland, at The Apple Farm, 8 acre it is grown for fresh sale and juice-making, for which the variety is well suited.\n\nElstar (apple) (1950s) \n\nElstar apple is an apple cultivar that was first developed in the Netherlands in the 1950s by crossing Golden Delicious and Ingrid Marie apples. It quickly became popular, especially in Europe and was first introduced to America in 1972. It remains popular in Continental Europe. The Elstar is a medium-sized apple whose skin is mostly red with yellow showing. The flesh is white, and has a soft, crispy texture. It may be used for cooking and is especially good for making apple sauce. In general, however, it is used in desserts due to its sweet flavour.\n\nGroasis Waterboxx (2010) \n\nThe Groasis Waterboxx is a device designed to help grow trees in dry areas. It was developed by former flower exporter Pieter Hoff, and won Popular Science's \"Green Tech Best of What's New\" Innovation of the year award for 2010.\n\nCartography and geography \n\nMethod for determining longitude using a clock (1530) \n\nThe Dutch-Frisian geographer Gemma Frisius was the first to propose the use of a chronometer to determine longitude in 1530. In his book On the Principles of Astronomy and Cosmography (1530), Frisius explains for the first time how to use a very accurate clock to determine longitude. The problem was that in Frisius’ day, no clock was sufficiently precise to use his method. In 1761, the British clock-builder John Harrison constructed the first marine chronometer, which allowed the method developed by Frisius.\n\nTriangulation and the modern systematic use of triangulation networks (1533 & 1615) \n\nTriangulation had first emerged as a map-making method in the mid sixteenth century when the Dutch-Frisian mathematician Gemma Frisius set out the idea in his Libellus de locorum describendorum ratione (Booklet concerning a way of describing places). Dutch cartographer Jacob van Deventer was among the first to make systematic use of triangulation, the technique whose theory was described by Gemma Frisius in his 1533 book.\n\nThe modern systematic use of triangulation networks stems from the work of the Dutch mathematician Willebrord Snell (born Willebrord Snel van Royen), who in 1615 surveyed the distance from Alkmaar to Bergen op Zoom, approximately 70 miles (110 kilometres), using a chain of quadrangles containing 33 triangles in all – a feat celebrated in the title of his book Eratosthenes Batavus (The Dutch Eratosthenes), published in 1617.\n\nMercator projection (1569) \n\nThe Mercator projection is a cylindrical map projection presented by the Flemish geographer and cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1569. It became the standard map projection for nautical purposes because of its ability to represent lines of constant course, known as rhumb lines or loxodromes, as straight segments which conserve the angles with the meridians. \n\nFirst modern world atlas (1570) \n\nFlemish geographer and cartographer Abraham Ortelius generally recognized as the creator of the world's first modern atlas, the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Theatre of the World). Ortelius's Theatrum Orbis Terrarum is considered the first true atlas in the modern sense: a collection of uniform map sheets and sustaining text bound to form a book for which copper printing plates were specifically engraved. It is sometimes referred to as the summary of sixteenth-century cartography. \n\nFirst printed atlas of nautical charts (1584) \n\nThe first printed atlas of nautical charts (De Spieghel der Zeevaerdt or The Mirror of Navigation / The Mariner's Mirror) was produced by Lucas Janszoon Waghenaer in Leiden. This atlas was the first attempt to systematically codify nautical maps. This chart-book combined an atlas of nautical charts and sailing directions with instructions for navigation on the western and north-western coastal waters of Europe. It was the first of its kind in the history of maritime cartography, and was an immediate success. The English translation of Waghenaer's work was published in 1588 and became so popular that any volume of sea charts soon became known as a \"waggoner\", the Anglicized form of Waghenaer's surname. \n\nConcept of atlas (1595) \n\nGerardus Mercator was the first to coin the word atlas to describe a bound collection of maps through his own collection entitled \"Atlas sive Cosmographicae meditationes de fabrica mvndi et fabricati figvra\". He coined this name after the Greek god who held the earth in his arms. \n\nFirst systematic charting of the far southern skies (southern constellations) (1595-97) \n\nThe Dutch Republic's explorers and cartographers like Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser, Frederick de Houtman, Petrus Plancius and Jodocus Hondius were the pioneers in first systematic charting/mapping of largely unknown southern hemisphere skies in the late 16th century.\n\nThe constellations around the South Pole were not observable from north of the equator, by Babylonians, Greeks, Chinese or Arabs. The modern constellations in this region were defined during the Age of Exploration, notably by Dutch navigators Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser and Frederick de Houtman at the end of sixteenth century. These twelve Dutch-created southern constellations represented flora and fauna of the East Indies and Madagascar. They were depicted by Johann Bayer in his star atlas Uranometria of 1603. Several more were created by Nicolas Louis de Lacaille in his star catalogue, published in 1756. By the end of the Ming Dynasty, Xu Guangqi introduced 23 asterisms of the southern sky based on the knowledge of western star charts. These asterisms have since been incorporated into the traditional Chinese star maps. Among the IAU's 88 modern constellations, there are 15 Dutch-created constellations (including Apus, Camelopardalis, Chamaeleon, Columba, Dorado, Grus, Hydrus, Indus, Monoceros, Musca, Pavo, Phoenix, Triangulum Australe, Tucana and Volans).\n\nContinental drift hypothesis (1596) \n\nThe speculation that continents might have 'drifted' was first put forward by Abraham Ortelius in 1596. The concept was independently and more fully developed by Alfred Wegener in 1912. Because Wegener's publications were widely available in German and English and because he adduced geological support for the idea, he is credited by most geologists as the first to recognize the possibility of continental drift. During the 1960s geophysical and geological evidence for seafloor spreading at mid-oceanic ridges established continental drift as the standard theory or continental origin and an ongoing global mechanism.\n\nChemicals and materials \n\nBow dye (1630) \n\nWhile making a coloured liquid for a thermometer, Cornelis Drebbel dropped a flask of Aqua regia on a tin window sill, and discovered that stannous chloride makes the color of carmine much brighter and more durable. Though Drebbel himself never made much from his work, his daughters Anna and Catharina and his sons-in-law Abraham and Johannes Sibertus Kuffler set up a successful dye works. One was set up in 1643 in Bow, London, and the resulting color was called bow dye.\n\nDyneema (1979) \n\nDutch chemical company DSM invented and patented the Dyneema in 1979. Dyneema fibres have been in commercial production since 1990 at their plant at Heerlen. These fibers are manufactured by means of a gel-spinning process that combines extreme strength with incredible softness. Dyneema fibres, based on ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene (UHMWPE), is used in many applications in markets such as life protection, shipping, fishing, offshore, sailing, medical and textiles.\n\nCommunication and multimedia \n\nCompact cassette (1962) \n\nIn 1962 Philips invented the compact audio cassette medium for audio storage, introducing it in Europe in August 1963 (at the Berlin Radio Show) and in the United States (under the Norelco brand) in November 1964, with the trademark name Compact Cassette. \n\nLaserdisc (1969) \n\nLaserdisc technology, using a transparent disc, was invented by David Paul Gregg in 1958 (and patented in 1961 and 1990). Video signal transducer, 1970. Disc-shaped member, 1990. By 1969, Philips developed a videodisc in reflective mode, which has great advantages over the transparent mode. MCA and Philips decided to join forces. They first publicly demonstrated the videodisc in 1972. Laserdisc entered the market in Atlanta, on 15 December 1978, two years after the VHS VCR and four years before the CD, which is based on Laserdisc technology. Philips produced the players and MCA made the discs.\n\nCompact disc (1979) \n\nThe compact disc was jointly developed by Philips (Joop Sinjou) and Sony (Toshitada Doi). In the early 1970s, Philips' researchers started experiments with \"audio-only\" optical discs, and at the end of the 1970s, Philips, Sony, and other companies presented prototypes of digital audio discs.\n\nBluetooth (1990s) \n\nBluetooth, a low-energy, peer-to-peer wireless technology was originally developed by Dutch electrical engineer Jaap Haartsen and Swedish engineer Sven Mattisson in the 1990s, working at Ericsson in Lund, Sweden. It became a global standard of short distance wireless connection.\n\nWi-fi (1990s) \n\nIn 1991, NCR Corporation/AT&T Corporation invented the precursor to 802.11 in Nieuwegein. Dutch electrical engineer Vic Hayes chaired IEEE 802.11 committee for 10 years, which was set up in 1990 to establish a wireless networking standard. He has been called the father of Wi-Fi (the brand name for products using IEEE 802.11 standards) for his work on IEEE 802.11 (802.11a & 802.11b) standard in 1997.\n\nDVD (1995) \n\nThe DVD optical disc storage format was invented and developed by Philips and Sony in 1995.\n\nAmbilight (2002) \n\nAmbilight, short for \"ambient lighting\", is a lighting system for televisions developed by Philips in 2002.\n\nBlu-ray (2006) \n\nPhilips and Sony in 1997 and 2006 respectively, launched the Blu-ray video recording/playback standard.\n\nComputer science and information technology \n\nDijkstra's algorithm (1956) \n\nDijkstra's algorithm, conceived by Dutch computer scientist Edsger Dijkstra in 1956 and published in 1959, is a graph search algorithm that solves the single-source shortest path problem for a graph with non-negative edge path costs, producing a shortest path tree. Dijkstra's algorithm is so powerful that it not only finds the shortest path from a chosen source to a given destination, it finds all of the shortest paths from the source to all destinations. This algorithm is often used in routing and as a subroutine in other graph algorithms.\n\nDijkstra's algorithm is considered as one of the most popular algorithms in computer science. It is also widely used in the fields of artificial intelligence, operational research/operations research, network routing, network analysis, and transportation engineering.\n\nFoundations of distributed computing (1960s) \n\nThrough his fundamental contributions Edsger Dijkstra helped shape the field of computer science. His groundbreaking contributions ranged from the engineering side of computer science to the theoretical one and covered several areas including compiler construction, operating systems, distributed systems, sequential and concurrent programming, software engineering, and graph algorithms. Many of his papers, often just a few pages long, are the source of whole new research areas. Several concepts that are now completely standard in computer science were first identified by Dijkstra and/or bear names coined by him. \n\nEdsger Dijkstra's foundational work on concurrency, semaphores, mutual exclusion, deadlock, finding shortest paths in graphs, fault-tolerance, self-stabilization, among many other contributions comprises many of the pillars upon which the field of distributed computing is built. The Edsger W. Dijkstra Prize in Distributed Computing (sponsored jointly by the ACM Symposium on Principles of Distributed Computing and the EATCS International Symposium on Distributed Computing) is given for outstanding papers on the principles of distributed computing, whose significance and impact on the theory and/or practice of distributed computing has been evident for at least a decade.\n\nFoundations of concurrent programming (1960s) \n\nThe academic study of concurrent programming (concurrent algorithms in particular) started in the 1960s, with Edsger Dijkstra (1965) credited with being the first paper in this field, identifying and solving mutual exclusion. A pioneer in the field of concurrent computing, Per Brinch Hansen considers Dijkstra's Cooperating Sequential Processes (1965) to be the first classic paper in concurrent programming. As Brinch Hansen notes: ‘Here Dijkstra lays the conceptual foundation for abstract concurrent programming.’ \n\nFoundations of software engineering (1960s) \n\nComputer programming in the 1950s to 1960s was not recognized as an academic discipline and unlike physics there were no theoretical concepts or coding systems. Dijkstra was one of the moving forces behind the acceptance of computer programming as a scientific discipline. In 1968, computer programming was in a state of crisis. Dijkstra was one of a small group of academics and industrial programmers who advocated a new programming style to improve the quality of programs. Dijkstra coined the phrase \"structured programming\" and during the 1970s this became the new programming orthodoxy. Mills, Harlan D. (1986). Structured Programming: Retrospect and Prospect. (IEEE Software 3(6): 58-66, November 1986). \"Edsger W. Dijkstra's 1969 \"Structured Programming\" article precipitated a decade of intense focus on programming techniques that has fundamentally altered human expectations and achievements in software development. Before this decade of intense focus, programming was regarded as a private, puzzle-solving activity of writing computer instructions to work as a program. After this decade, programming could be regarded as a public, mathematics-based activity of restructuring specifications into programs. Before, the challenge was in getting programs to run at all, and then in getting them further debugged to do the right things. After, programs could be expected to both run and do the right things with little or no debugging. Before, it was common wisdom that no sizable program could be error-free. After, many sizable programs have run a year or more with no errors detected. These expectations and achievements are not universal because of the inertia of industrial practices. But they are well-enough established to herald fundamental change in software development.\" As Bertrand Meyer remarked: \"The revolution in views of programming started by Dijkstra's iconoclasm led to a movement known as structured programming, which advocated a systematic, rational approach to program construction. Structured programming is the basis for all that has been done since in programming methodology, including object-oriented programming.\" \n \nDijkstra's ideas about structured programming helped lay the foundations for the birth and development of the professional discipline of software engineering, enabling programmers to organize and manage increasingly complex software projects. \n\nShunting-yard algorithm (1960) \n\nIn computer science, the shunting-yard algorithm is a method for parsing mathematical expressions specified in infix notation. It can be used to produce output in Reverse Polish notation (RPN) or as an abstract syntax tree (AST). The algorithm was invented by Edsger Dijkstra and named the \"shunting yard\" algorithm because its operation resembles that of a railroad shunting yard. Dijkstra first described the Shunting Yard Algorithm in the Mathematisch Centrum report.\n\nSchoonschip (early computer algebra system) (1963) \n\nIn 1963/64, during an extended stay at SLAC, Dutch theoretical physicist Martinus Veltman designed the computer program Schoonschip for symbolic manipulation of mathematical equations, which is now considered the very first computer algebra system.\n\nMutual exclusion (mutex) (1965) \n\nIn computer science, mutual exclusion refers to the requirement of ensuring that no two concurrent processes are in their critical section at the same time; it is a basic requirement in concurrency control, to prevent race conditions. The requirement of mutual exclusion was first identified and solved by Edsger W. Dijkstra in his seminal 1965 paper titled Solution of a problem in concurrent programming control, and is credited as the first topic in the study of concurrent algorithms.\n\nSemaphore (programming) (1965) \n\nThe semaphore concept was invented by Dijkstra in 1965 and the concept has found widespread use in a variety of operating systems.\n\nSleeping barber problem (1965) \n\nIn computer science, the sleeping barber problem is a classic inter-process communication and synchronization problem between multiple operating system processes. The problem is analogous to that of keeping a barber working when there are customers, resting when there are none and doing so in an orderly manner. The Sleeping Barber Problem was introduced by Edsger Dijkstra in 1965. \n\nBanker's algorithm (deadlock prevention algorithm) (1965) \n\nThe Banker's algorithm is a resource allocation and deadlock avoidance algorithm developed by Edsger Dijkstra that tests for safety by simulating the allocation of predetermined maximum possible amounts of all resources, and then makes an \"s-state\" check to test for possible deadlock conditions for all other pending activities, before deciding whether allocation should be allowed to continue. The algorithm was developed in the design process for the THE operating system and originally described (in Dutch) in EWD108. The name is by analogy with the way that bankers account for liquidity constraints.\n\nDining philosophers problem (1965) \n\nIn computer science, the dining philosophers problem is an example problem often used in concurrent algorithm design to illustrate synchronization issues and techniques for resolving them. It was originally formulated in 1965 by Edsger Dijkstra as a student exam exercise, presented in terms of computers competing for access to tape drive peripherals.\nSoon after, Tony Hoare gave the problem its present formulation. \n\nDekker's algorithm (1965) \n\nDekker's algorithm is the first known correct solution to the mutual exclusion problem in concurrent programming. Dijkstra attributed the solution to Dutch mathematician Theodorus Dekker in his manuscript on cooperating sequential processes. It allows two threads to share a single-use resource without conflict, using only shared memory for communication. Dekker's algorithm is the first published software-only, two-process mutual exclusion algorithm.\n\nTHE multiprogramming system (1968) \n\nThe THE multiprogramming system was a computer operating system designed by a team led by Edsger W. Dijkstra, described in monographs in 1965-66 and published in 1968. \n\nVan Wijngaarden grammar (1968) \n\nVan Wijngaarden grammar (also vW-grammar or W-grammar) is a two-level grammar that provides a technique to define potentially infinite context-free grammars in a finite number of rules. The formalism was invented by Adriaan van Wijngaarden to rigorously define some syntactic restrictions that previously had to be formulated in natural language, despite their formal content. Typical applications are the treatment of gender and number in natural language syntax and the well-definedness of identifiers in programming languages. The technique was used and developed in the definition of the programming language ALGOL 68. It is an example of the larger class of affix grammars.\n\nStructured programming (1968) \n\nIn 1968, computer programming was in a state of crisis. Dijkstra was one of a small group of academics and industrial programmers who advocated a new programming style to improve the quality of programs. Dijkstra coined the phrase \"structured programming\" and during the 1970s this became the new programming orthodoxy. Structured programming is often regarded as “goto-less programming”. But as Bertrand Meyer notes, “As the first book on the topic [Structured Programming by Dijkstra, Dahl, and Hoare] shows, structured programming is about much more than control structures and the goto. Its principal message is that programming should be considered a scientific discipline based on mathematical rigor.” As a programming paradigm, structured programming – especially in the 1970s and 1980s – significantly influenced the birth of many modern programming languages such as Pascal, C, Modula-2, and Ada. The Fortran 77 version which incorporates the concepts of structured programming, was released in 1978. The C++ language was a considerably extended and enhanced version of the popular structured programming language C (see also: list of C-based programming languages). Since C++ was developed from a more traditional structured language, it is a 'hybrid language', rather than a pure object-oriented programming language. \n\nEPROM (1971) \n\nAn EPROM or erasable programmable read only memory, is a type of memory chip that retains its data when its power supply is switched off. Development of the EPROM memory cell started with investigation of faulty integrated circuits where the gate connections of transistors had broken. Stored charge on these isolated gates changed their properties. The EPROM was invented by the Amsterdam-born Israeli electrical engineer Dov Frohman in 1971, who was awarded US patent 3660819 in 1972.\n\nSelf-stabilization (1974) \n\nSelf-stabilization is a concept of fault-tolerance in distributed computing. A distributed system that is self-stabilizing will end up in a correct state no matter what state it is initialized with. That correct state is reached after a finite number of execution steps. Many years after the seminal paper of Edsger Dijkstra in 1974, this concept remains important as it presents an important foundation for self-managing computer systems and fault-tolerant systems. Self-stabilization became its own area of study in distributed systems research, and Dijkstra set the stage for the next generation of computer scientists such as Leslie Lamport, Nancy Lynch, and Shlomi Dolev. As a result, Dijkstra's paper received the 2002 ACM PODC Influential-Paper Award (later renamed as Dijkstra Prize or Edsger W. Dijkstra Prize in Distributed Computing since 2003). \n\nPredicate transformer semantics (1975) \n\nPredicate transformer semantics were introduced by Dijkstra in his seminal paper \"Guarded commands, nondeterminacy and formal derivation of programs\".\n\nGuarded Command Language (1975) \n\nThe Guarded Command Language (GCL) is a language defined by Edsger Dijkstra for predicate transformer semantics. It combines programming concepts in a compact way, before the program is written in some practical programming language.\n\nVan Emde Boas tree (VEB tree) (1975) \n\nA Van Emde Boas tree (or Van Emde Boas priority queue, also known as a vEB tree, is a tree data structure which implements an associative array with m-bit integer keys. The vEB tree was invented by a team led by Dutch computer scientist Peter van Emde Boas in 1975. \n\nABC (programming language) (1980s) \n\nABC is an imperative general-purpose programming language and programming environment developed at CWI, Netherlands by Leo Geurts, Lambert Meertens, and Steven Pemberton. It is interactive, structured, high-level, and intended to be used instead of BASIC, Pascal, or AWK. It is not meant to be a systems-programming language but is intended for teaching or prototyping.\n\nThe language had a major influence on the design of the Python programming language (as a counterexample); Guido van Rossum, who developed Python, previously worked for several years on the ABC system in the early 1980s. \n\nDijkstra-Scholten algorithm (1980) \n\nThe Dijkstra–Scholten algorithm (named after Edsger W. Dijkstra and Carel S. Scholten) is an algorithm for detecting termination in a distributed system. The algorithm was proposed by Dijkstra and Scholten in 1980. \n\nSmoothsort (1981) \n\nSmoothsort is a comparison-based sorting algorithm. It is a variation of heapsort developed by Edsger Dijkstra in 1981. Like heapsort, smoothsort's upper bound is O(n log n). The advantage of smoothsort is that it comes closer to O(n) time if the input is already sorted to some degree, whereas heapsort averages O(n log n) regardless of the initial sorted state.\n\nAmsterdam Compiler Kit (1983) \n\nThe Amsterdam Compiler Kit (ACK) is a fast, lightweight and retargetable compiler suite and toolchain developed by Andrew Tanenbaum and Ceriel Jacobs at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. It is MINIX's native toolchain. The ACK was originally closed-source software (that allowed binaries to be distributed for MINIX as a special case), but in April 2003 it was released under an open source BSD license. It has frontends for programming languages C, Pascal, Modula-2, Occam, and BASIC. The ACK's notability stems from the fact that in the early 1980s it was one of the first portable compilation systems designed to support multiple source languages and target platforms. \n\nEight-to-fourteen modulation (1985) \n\nEFM (Eight-to-Fourteen Modulation) was invented by Dutch electrical engineer Kees A. Schouhamer Immink in 1985. EFM is a data encoding technique – formally, a channel code – used by CDs, laserdiscs and pre-Hi-MD MiniDiscs.\n\nMINIX (1987) \n\nMINIX (from \"mini-Unix\") is a Unix-like computer operating system based on a microkernel architecture. Early versions of MINIX were created by Andrew S. Tanenbaum for educational purposes. Starting with MINIX 3, the primary aim of development shifted from education to the creation of a highly reliable and self-healing microkernel OS. MINIX is now developed as open-source software. MINIX was first released in 1987, with its complete source code made available to universities for study in courses and research. It has been free and open source software since it was re-licensed under the BSD license in April 2000. Tanenbaum created MINIX at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam to exemplify the principles conveyed in his textbook, Operating Systems: Design and Implementation (1987), that Linus Torvalds described as \"the book that launched me to new heights\".\n\nAmoeba (operating system) (1989) \n\nAmoeba is a distributed operating system developed by Andrew S. Tanenbaum and others at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. The aim of the Amoeba project was to build a timesharing system that makes an entire network of computers appear to the user as a single machine. The Python programming language was originally developed for this platform.\n\nPython (programming language) (1989) \n\nPython is a widely used general-purpose, high-level programming language. Its design philosophy emphasizes code readability, and its syntax allows programmers to express concepts in fewer lines of code than would be possible in languages such as C++ or Java. The language provides constructs intended to enable clear programs on both a small and large scale. Python supports multiple programming paradigms, including object-oriented, imperative and functional programming or procedural styles. It features a dynamic type system and automatic memory management and has a large and comprehensive standard library.\n\nPython was conceived in the late 1980s and its implementation was started in December 1989 by Guido van Rossum at CWI in the Netherlands as a successor to the ABC language (itself inspired by SETL) capable of exception handling and interfacing with the Amoeba operating system. Van Rossum is Python's principal author, and his continuing central role in deciding the direction of Python is reflected in the title given to him by the Python community, benevolent dictator for life (BDFL).\n\nVim (text editor) (1991) \n\nVim is a text editor written by the Dutch free software programmer Bram Moolenaar and first released publicly in 1991. Based on the Vi editor common to Unix-like systems, Vim carefully separated the user interface from editing functions. This allowed it to be used both from a command line interface and as a standalone application in a graphical user interface.\n\nBlender (1995) \n\nBlender is a professional free and open-source 3D computer graphics software product used for creating animated films, visual effects, art, 3D printed models, interactive 3D applications and video games. Blender's features include 3D modeling, UV unwrapping, texturing, raster graphics editing, rigging and skinning, fluid and smoke simulation, particle simulation, soft body simulation, sculpting, animating, match moving, camera tracking, rendering, video editing and compositing. Alongside the modelling features it also has an integrated game engine. Blender has been successfully used in the media industry in several parts of the world including Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Russia, Sweden, and the United States.\n\nThe Dutch animation studio Neo Geo and Not a Number Technologies (NaN) developed Blender as an in-house application, with the primary author being Ton Roosendaal. The name Blender was inspired by a song by Yello, from the album Baby. \n\nEFMPlus (1995) \n\nEFMPlus is the channel code used in DVDs and SACDs, a more efficient successor to EFM used in CDs. It was created by Dutch electrical engineer Kees A. Schouhamer Immink, who also designed EFM. It is 6% less efficient than Toshiba's SD code, which resulted in a capacity of 4.7 gigabytes instead of SD's original 5 GB. The advantage of EFMPlus is its superior resilience against disc damage such as scratches and fingerprints.\n\nEconomics \n\nDutch East India Company \n\nThe Dutch East India Company (Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, or VOC), founded in 1602, was the world’s first multinational, joint-stock, limited liability corporation - as well as its first government-backed trading cartel. It was the first company to issue shares of stock and what evolved into corporate bonds. The VOC was also the first company to actually issue stocks and bonds through a stock exchange. In 1602, the VOC issued shares that were made tradable on the Amsterdam Stock Exchange. This invention enhanced the ability of joint-stock companies to attract capital from investors as they could now easily dispose their shares. The company was known throughout the world as the VOC thanks to its logo featuring those initials, which became the first global corporate brand. The company's monogram also became the first global logo. \n\nFirst megacorporation (1602) \n\nThe Dutch East India Company was arguably the first megacorporation, possessing quasi-governmental powers, including the ability to wage war, imprison and execute convicts, negotiate treaties, coin money and establish colonies. Many economic and political historians consider the Dutch East India Company as the most valuable, powerful and influential corporation in the world history.\n\nThe VOC existed for almost 200 years from its founding in 1602, when the States-General of the Netherlands granted it a 21-year monopoly over Dutch operations in Asia until its demise in 1796. During those two centuries (between 1602 and 1796), the VOC sent almost a million Europeans to work in the Asia trade on 4,785 ships, and netted for their efforts more than 2.5 million tons of Asian trade goods. By contrast, the rest of Europe combined sent only 882,412 people from 1500 to 1795, and the fleet of the English (later British) East India Company, the VOC's nearest competitor, was a distant second to its total traffic with 2,690 ships and a mere one-fifth the tonnage of goods carried by the VOC. The VOC enjoyed huge profits from its spice monopoly through most of the 17th century. \n\nDutch auction (17th century) \n\nA Dutch auction is also known as an open descending price auction. Named after the famous auctions of Dutch tulip bulbs in the 17th century, it is based on a pricing system devised by Nobel Prize–winning economist William Vickrey. In the traditional Dutch auction, the auctioneer begins with a high asking price which is lowered until some participant is willing to accept the auctioneer's price. The winning participant pays the last announced price. Dutch auction is also sometimes used to describe online auctions where several identical goods are sold simultaneously to an equal number of high bidders. In addition to cut flower sales in the Netherlands, Dutch auctions have also been used for perishable commodities such as fish and tobacco.\n\nFirst modern art market (17th century) \n\nThe Dutch Republic was the birthplace of the first modern art market (open art market or free art market). The seventeenth-century Dutch were the pioneering arts marketers, successfully combining art and commerce together as we would recognise it today. Until the 17th century, commissioning works of art was largely the preserve of the church, monarchs and aristocrats. The emergence of a powerful and wealthy middle class in Holland, though, produced a radical change in patronage as the new Dutch bourgeoisie bought art. For the first time, the direction of art was shaped by relatively broadly-based demand rather than religious dogma or royal whim, and the result was a market which today's dealers and collectors would find familiar. With the creation of the first large-scale open art market, prosperous Dutch merchants, artisans, and civil servants bought paintings and prints in unprecedented numbers. Foreign visitors were astonished that even modest members of Dutch society such as farmers and bakers owned multiple works of art.\n\nConcept of corporate governance (17th century) \n\nThe seventeenth-century Dutch businessmen were the pioneers in laying the basis for modern corporate governance. Isaac Le Maire, an Amsterdam businessman and a sizeable shareholder of the VOC, became the first recorded investor to actually consider the corporate governance's problems. In 1609, he complained of the VOC's shoddy corporate governance. On January 24, 1609, Le Maire filed a petition against the VOC, marking the first recorded expression of shareholder activism. In what is the first recorded corporate governance dispute, Le Maire formally charged that the directors (the VOC's board of directors – the Heeren XVII) sought to “retain another’s money for longer or use it ways other than the latter wishes” and petitioned for the liquidation of the VOC in accordance with standard business practice. \n\nThe first shareholder revolt happened in 1622, among Dutch East India Company (VOC) investors who complained that the company account books had been “smeared with bacon” so that they might be “eaten by dogs.” The investors demanded a “reeckeninge,” a proper financial audit. The 1622 campaign by the shareholders of the VOC is a testimony of genesis of CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) in which shareholders staged protests by distributing pamphlets and complaining about management self enrichment and secrecy. \n\nModern concept of foreign direct investment (17th century) \n\nThe construction in 1619 of a train-oil factory on Smeerenburg in the Spitsbergen islands by the Noordsche Compagnie, and the acquisition in 1626 of Manhattan Island by the Dutch West India Company are referred to as the earliest cases of outward foreign direct investment (FDI) in Dutch and world history. Throughout the seventeenth century, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and the Dutch West India Company (GWIC/WIC) also began to create trading settlements around the globe. Their trading activities generated enormous wealth, making the Dutch Republic one of the most prosperous countries of that time. The Dutch Republic's extensive arms trade occasioned an episode in the industrial development of early-modern Sweden, where arms merchants like Louis de Geer and the Trip brothers, invested in iron mines and iron works, another early example of outward foreign direct investment.\n\nFirst modern market-oriented economy (17th century) \n\nIt was in the Dutch Republic that some important industries (economic sectors) such as shipbuilding, shipping, printing and publishing were developed on a large-scale export-driven model for the first time in history. The ship building district of Zaan, near Amsterdam, became the first industrialized area in the world, with around 900 industrial windmills at the end of the 17th century, but there were industrialized towns and cities on a smaller scale also. Other industries that saw significant growth were papermaking, sugar refining, printing, the linen industry (with spin-offs in vegetable oils, like flax and rape oil), and industries that used the cheap peat fuel, like brewing and ceramics (brickworks, pottery and clay-pipe making).\n\nThe Dutch shipbuilding industry was of modern dimensions, inclining strongly toward standardised, repetitive methods. It was highly mechanized and used many labor-saving devices-wind-powered sawmills, powered feeders for saw, block and tackles, great cranes to move heavy timbers-all of which increased productivity. Dutch shipbuilding benefited from various design innovations which increased carrying capacity and cut costs. \n\nFirst capitalist nation-state (foundations of modern capitalism) (17th century) \n\nEconomic historians consider the Netherlands as the first predominantly capitalist nation. The development of European capitalism began among the city-states of Italy, Flanders, and the Baltic. It spread to the European interstate system, eventually resulting in the world's first capitalist nation-state, the Dutch Republic of the seventeenth century. The Dutch were the first to develop capitalism on a nationwide scale (as opposed to earlier city states). They also played a pioneering role in the emergence of the capitalist world-system. Simon Schama aptly titled his work The Embarrassment of Riches, capturing the astonishing novelty and success of the commercial revolution in the Dutch Republic.\n\nWorld-systems theorists (including Immanuel Wallerstein and Giovanni Arrighi) often consider the economic primacy of the Dutch Republic in the 17th century as the first capitalist hegemony in world history (followed by hegemonies of the United Kingdom in the 19th century and the United States in the 20th century).\n\nFirst modern economic miracle (1585–1714) \n\nThe Dutch economic transition from a possession of the Holy Roman Empire in the 1590s to the foremost maritime and economic power in the world has been called the “Dutch Miracle” (or “Dutch Tiger”) by many economic historians, including K. W. Swart. Until the 18th century, the economy of the Dutch Republic was the most advanced and sophisticated ever seen in history. \nDuring their Golden Age, the provinces of the Northern Netherlands rose from almost total obscurity as the poor cousins of the industrious and heavily urbanised southern regions (Southern Netherlands) to become the world leader in economic success. \nThe Netherlands introduced many financial innovations that made it a major economic force — and Amsterdam became the world center for international finance. Its manufacturing towns grew so quickly that by the middle of the century the Netherlands had supplanted France as the leading industrial nation of the world.” \n\nDynamic macroeconomic model (1936) \n\nDutch economist Jan Tinbergen developed the first national comprehensive macroeconomic model, which he first built for the Netherlands and after World War II later applied to the United States and the United Kingdom.\n\nFairtrade certification (1988) \n\nThe concept of fair trade has been around for over 40 years, but a formal labelling scheme emerged only in the 1980s. At the initiative of Mexican coffee farmers, the world's first Fairtrade labeling organisation, Stichting Max Havelaar, was launched in the Netherlands on 15 November 1988 by Nico Roozen, Frans van der Hoff and Dutch ecumenical development agency Solidaridad. It was branded \"Max Havelaar\" after a fictional Dutch character who opposed the exploitation of coffee pickers in Dutch colonies.\n\nFinance \n\nConcept of bourse ( 13th century) \n\nAn exchange, or bourse, is a highly organized market where (especially) tradable securities, commodities, foreign exchange, futures, and options contracts are sold and bought. The term bourse is derived from the 13th-century inn named Huis ter Beurze in Bruges, Low Countries, where traders and foreign merchants from across Europe conducted business in the late medieval period. The building, which was established by Robert van der Buerze as a hostelry, had operated from 1285. Its managers became famous for offering judicious financial advice to the traders and merchants who frequented the building. This service became known as the \"Beurze Purse\" which is the basis of bourse, meaning an organised place of exchange.\n\nFoundations of stock market (1602) \n\nThe seventeenth-century Dutch merchants laid the foundations for modern stock market that now influences greatly the global economy. It was in the Dutch Republic that a fully-fledged stock market was established and developed for the first time in history. The Dutch merchants were also the pioneers in developing the basic techniques of stock trading. Although bond sales by municipalities and states can be traced to the thirteenth century, the origin of modern stock exchanges that specialize in creating and sustaining secondary markets in corporate securities goes back to the formation of the Dutch East India Company in the year 1602. Dutch investors were the first to trade their shares at a regular stock exchange. The Amsterdam Stock Exchange is considered the oldest in the world. It was established in 1602 by the Dutch East India Company for dealings in its printed stocks and bonds. Here, the Dutch also pioneered stock futures, stock options, short selling, debt-equity swaps, merchant banking, bonds, unit trusts and other speculative instruments. Unlike the competing companies, the VOC allowed anyone (including housemaids) to purchase stock in the trading at the fully operational Amsterdam Bourse. The practice of naked short selling was also invented in the Dutch Republic. In 1609, Isaac Le Maire, an Amsterdam merchant and a sizeable shareholder of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), became the first recorded short seller in history. The first recorded ban on short selling also took place in the Dutch Republic in the same year. In the early 17th century, Dutch merchants invented the common stock — that of the VOC. Also, the Dutch experienced the first recorded stock market crash in history, the Tulip Mania of 1636-1637. Since 1602, stock market trading has come a long way. But basically, the concept and principle of stock market trading is still upheld and is still being implemented up to now. \n\nFirst fully functioning (fully-fledged) financial market (17th century) \n\nThe Dutch Republic (Amsterdam in particular) was the birthplace of the world's first fully functioning financial market, with the birth of a fully fledged capital market. Capital markets for debt and equity shares are used to raise long-term funds. New stocks and bonds are sold in primary markets (including initial public offerings) and secondary markets (including stock exchanges). While the Italian city-states produced the first transferable municipal bonds, they didn't develop the other ingredient necessary to produce a fully fledged capital market: corporate shareholders. The Dutch East India Company (VOC) became the first company to offer shares of stock to the general public. Dutch investors were the first to trade their shares at a regular stock exchange. In 1602 the Dutch East India Company (VOC) established an exchange in Amsterdam where the VOC stocks and bonds could be traded in a secondary market. The buying and selling of the VOC's securities (including shares and bonds) became the basis of the first official stock market. The Dutch were also the first to use a fully-fledged capital market (including bond market and stock market) to finance companies (such as the VOC and the WIC). It was in seventeenth-century Amsterdam that the global securities market began to take on its modern form.\n\nFoundations of corporate finance (17th century) \n\nWhat is now known as corporate finance has its modern roots in financial management policies of the Dutch East India Company (VOC) in the 17th century and some basic aspects of modern corporate finance began to appear in financial activities of Dutch businessmen in the early 17th century.\n\nInitial public offering (1602) \n\nThe earliest form of a company which issued public shares was the publicani during the Roman Republic. In 1602, the Dutch East India Company (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie or VOC) became the first modern company to issue shares to the public, thus launching the first modern initial public offering (IPO). The VOC held the first public offering of shares in history shortly after its founding. With this first recorded initial public offering (IPO), the VOC brought in 6,424,588 guilders and the company subsequently grew to become the first true transnational corporation in the world.\n\nInstitutional foundations of investment banking (17th century) \n\nThe Dutch were the pioneers in laying the basis for investment banking, allowing the risk of loans to be distributed among thousands of investors in the early seventeenth century. \n\nInstitutional foundations of central banking (first central bank) (1609) \n\nPrior to the 17th century most money was commodity money, typically gold or silver. However, promises to pay were widely circulated and accepted as value at least five hundred years earlier in both Europe and Asia. The Song Dynasty was the first to issue generally circulating paper currency, while the Yuan Dynasty was the first to use notes as the predominant circulating medium. In 1455, in an effort to control inflation, the succeeding Ming Dynasty ended the use of paper money and closed much of Chinese trade. The medieval European Knights Templar ran an early prototype of a central banking system, as their promises to pay were widely respected, and many regard their activities as having laid the basis for the modern banking system. As the first public bank to \"offer accounts not directly convertible to coin\", the Bank of Amsterdam (Amsterdamsche Wisselbank or literally Amsterdam Exchange Bank) established in 1609 is considered to be the precursor to modern central banks, if not the first true central bank. The Wisselbank's innovations helped lay the foundations for the birth and development of modern central banking systems. There were earlier banks, especially in the Italian city-states, but the Wisselbank, with its public backing, provided for a scale of operations and stability hitherto unmatched. Along with a number of subsidiary local banks, it performed many of modern-day central banking functions. The model of the Wisselbank as a state bank was adapted throughout Europe, including the Bank of Sweden (1668) and the Bank of England (1694). It occupied a central position in the financial world of its day, providing an effective, efficient and trusted system for national and international payments. The establishment of the Wisselbank led to the introduction of the concept of bank money — the bank guilder. Lucien Gillard (2004) calls it the European guilder (le florin européen), and Adam Smith devotes many pages to explaining how the bank guilder works (Smith 1776: 446-455). Considered by many experts to be the first internationally dominant reserve currency of modern times, the Dutch guilder was the dominant currency during the 17th and 18th centuries. It was just replaced by British pound sterling in the 19th century and the US dollar took the lead just after World War Two and has held it until this day. \n\nShort selling (1609) \n\nFinancial innovation in Amsterdam took many forms. In 1609, investors led by Isaac Le Maire formed history's first bear syndicate to engage in short selling, but their coordinated trading had only a modest impact in driving down share prices, which tended to be robust throughout the 17th century.\n\nConcept of dividend policy (1610) \n\nIn the first decades of the 17th century, the VOC was the first recorded company ever to pay regular dividends. To encourage investors to buy shares, a promise of an annual payment (called a dividend) was made. An investor would receive dividends instead interest and the investment was permanent in the form of shares in the company. Between 1600 and 1800 the Dutch East India Company (VOC) paid annual dividends worth around 18 percent of the value of the shares.\n\nFirst European banknote (1661) \n\nIn 1656, King Charles X Gustav of Sweden signed two charters creating two private banks under the directorship of Johan Palmstruch (though before having been ennobled he was called Johan Wittmacher or Hans Wittmacher), a Riga-born merchant of Dutch origin. Palmstruch modeled the banks on those of Amsterdam where he had become a burgher. The first real European banknote was issued in 1661 by the Stockholms Banco of Johan Palmstruch, a private bank under state charter (precursor to the Sveriges Riksbank, the central bank of Sweden).\n\nFirst book ever on stock trading (1688) \n\nJoseph de la Vega, also known as Joseph Penso de la Vega, was an Amsterdam trader from a Spanish Jewish family and a prolific writer as well as a successful businessman. His 1688 book Confusion de Confusiones (Confusion of Confusions) explained the workings of the city's stock market. It was the earliest book about stock trading, taking the form of a dialogue between a merchant, a shareholder and a philosopher. The book described a market that was sophisticated but also prone to excesses, and de la Vega offered advice to his readers on such topics as the unpredictability of market shifts and the importance of patience in investment. The book has been described as the first precursor of modern behavioural finance, with its descriptions of investor decision-making still reflected in the way some investors operate today, and in 2001 was still rated by the Financial Times as one of the ten best investment book ever written. \n\nConcept of technical analysis (1688) \n\nThe principles of technical analysis are derived from hundreds of years of financial market data. These principles in a raw form have been studied since the seventeenth century. Some aspects of technical analysis began to appear in Joseph de la Vega's accounts of the Dutch markets in the late 17th century. In Asia, technical analysis is said to be a method developed by Homma Munehisa during the early 18th century which evolved into the use of candlestick techniques, and is today a technical analysis charting tool. \n\nConcept of behavioral finance (1688) \n\nJosseph de la Vega was in 1688 the first person to give an account of irrational behaviour in financial markets. His 1688 book Confusion of Confusions, has been described as the first precursor of modern behavioural finance, with its descriptions of investor decision-making still reflected in the way some investors operate today.\n\nFirst modern model of a financial centre (17th century) \n\nBy the first decades of the 18th century, Amsterdam had become the world’s leading financial centre for more than a century, having developed a sophisticated financial system with central banking, fully-fledged capital markets, certain kinds of financial derivatives, and publicly traded multinational corporations. Amsterdam was the first modern model of an international (global) financial centre that now operated in several countries around the world.\n\nFoundations of modern financial system (17th century) \n\nIn the early 17th century, the Dutch revolutionized domestic and international finance by inventing common stock — that of the Dutch East India Company and founding a proto-central bank, the Wisselbank or Bank of Amsterdam. In 1609, the Dutch had already had a government bond market for some decades. Shortly thereafter, the Dutch Republic had in place, in one form or another, all of the key components of a modern financial system: formalized public credit, stable money, elements of a banking system, a central bank of sorts and securities markets. The Dutch Republic went on to become that century's leading economy. \n\nConcept of investment fund (1774) \n\nThe first investment fund has its roots back in 1774. A Dutch merchant named Adriaan van Ketwich formed a trust named Eendragt Maakt Magt. The name of Ketwich's fund translates to \"unity creates strength\". In response to the financial crisis of 1772-1773, Ketwich’s aim was to provide small investors an opportunity to diversify (Rouwenhorst & Goetzman, 2005). This investment scheme can be seen as the first near-mutual fund. In the years following, near-mutual funds evolved and become more diverse and complex.\n\nMutual fund (1774) \n\nThe first mutual funds were established in 1774 in the Netherlands. Amsterdam-based businessman Abraham van Ketwich (a.k.a. Adriaan van Ketwich) is often credited as the originator of the world's first mutual fund. The first mutual fund outside the Netherlands was the Foreign & Colonial Government Trust, which was established in London in 1868.\n\nFoods and drinks \n\nGibbing (14th century) \n\nGibbing is the process of preparing salt herring (or soused herring), in which the gills and part of the gullet are removed from the fish, eliminating any bitter taste. The liver and pancreas are left in the fish during the salt-curing process because they release enzymes essential for flavor. The fish is then cured in a barrel with one part salt to 20 herring. Today many variations and local preferences exist on this process. The process of gibbing was invented by Willem Beuckelszoon (aka Willem Beuckelsz, William Buckels or William Buckelsson), a 14th-century Zealand Fisherman. The invention of this fish preservation technique led to the Dutch becoming a seafaring power. This invention created an export industry for salt herring that was monopolized by the Dutch.\n\nDoughnut (17th century) \n\nMany people believe it was the Dutch who invented doughnuts. A Dutch snack made from potatoes had a round shape like a ball, but, like Gregory's dough balls, needed a little longer time when fried to cook the inside thoroughly. These potato-balls developed into doughnuts when the Dutch finally made them into ring-shapes reduce frying time.\n\nGin (jenever) (1650) \n\nGin is a spirit which derives its predominant flavour from juniper berries (Juniperus communis). From its earliest origins in the Middle Ages, gin has evolved over the course of a millennium from a herbal medicine to an object of commerce in the spirits industry. Gin was developed on the basis of the older Jenever, and become widely popular in Great Britain when William III of Orange, leader of the Dutch Republic, occupied the British throne with his wife Mary. Today, the gin category is one of the most popular and widely distributed range of spirits, and is represented by products of various origins, styles, and flavour profiles that all revolve around juniper as a common ingredient.\n\nThe Dutch physician Franciscus Sylvius is often credited with the invention of gin in the mid 17th century, although the existence of genever is confirmed in Massinger's play The Duke of Milan (1623), when Dr. Sylvius would have been but nine years of age. It is further claimed that British soldiers who provided support in Antwerp against the Spanish in 1585, during the Eighty Years' War, were already drinking genever (jenever) for its calming effects before battle, from which the term Dutch Courage is believed to have originated. The earliest known written reference to genever appears in the 13th century encyclopaedic work Der Naturen Bloeme (Bruges), and the earliest printed genever recipe from 16th century work Een Constelijck Distileerboec (Antwerp). \n\nStroopwafel (1780s) \n\nA stroopwafel (also known as syrup waffle, treacle waffle or caramel waffle) is a waffle made from two thin layers of baked batter with a caramel-like syrup filling the middle. They were first made in Gouda in the 1780s. The traditional way to eat the stroopwafel is to place it atop of a drinking vessel with a hot beverage (coffee, tea or chocolate) inside that fits the diameter of the waffle. The heat from the rising steam warms the waffle and slightly softens the inside and makes the waffle soft on one side while still crispy on the other.\n\nCocoa powder (foundations of modern chocolate industry) (1828) \n\nIn 1815, Dutch chemist Coenraad Van Houten introduced alkaline salts to chocolate, which reduced its bitterness. In the 1820s, Casparus van Houten, Sr. patented an inexpensive method for pressing the fat from roasted cocoa beans. He created a press to remove about half the natural fat (cacao butter) from chocolate liquor, which made chocolate both cheaper to produce and more consistent in quality. This innovation introduced the modern era of chocolate. Van Houten developed the first cocoa powder producing machine in the Netherlands. Van Houten's machine – a hydraulic press – reduced the cocoa butter content by nearly half. This created a \"cake\" that could be pulverized into cocoa powder, which was to become the basis of all chocolate products. The press separated the greasy cocoa butter from cacao seeds, leaving a purer chocolate powder behind. This powder, much like the instant cocoa powder used today, was easier to stir into milk and water. As a result, another very important discovery was made: solid chocolate. By using cocoa powder and low amounts of cocoa butter, it was then possible to manufacture chocolate bar. The term \"chocolate\" then came to mean solid chocolate, rather than hot chocolate.\n\nDutch-process chocolate (1828) \n\nDutch-processed chocolate or Dutched chocolate is chocolate that has been treated with an alkalizing agent to modify its color and give it a milder taste compared to \"natural cocoa\" extracted with the Broma process. It forms the basis for much of modern chocolate, and is used in ice cream, hot cocoa, and baking. The Dutch process was developed in the early 19th century by Dutch chocolate maker Coenraad Johannes van Houten, whose father Casparus is responsible for the development of the method of removing fat from cacao beans by hydraulic press around 1828, forming the basis for cocoa powder.\n\nLaw and jurisprudence \n\nDoctrine of the Freedom of the Seas (foundations of the Law of the Sea/UNCLOS) (1609) \n\nIn 1609, Hugo Grotius, the Dutch jurist who is generally known as the father of modern international law, published his book Mare Liberum (The Free Sea), which first formulated the notion of freedom of the seas. He developed this idea into a legal principle. It is said to be 'the first, and classic, exposition of the doctrine of the freedom of the seas' which has been the essence and backbone of the modern law of the sea. It is generally assumed that Grotius first propounded the principle of freedom of the seas, although all countries in the Indian Ocean and other Asian seas accepted the right of unobstructed navigation long before Grotius wrote his De Jure Praedae (On the Law of Spoils) in the year of 1604. His work sparked a debate in the seventeenth century over whether states could exclude the vessels of other states from certain waters. Grotius won this debate, as freedom of the seas became a universally recognized legal principle, associated with concepts such as communication, trade and peace. Grotius's notion of the freedom of the seas would persist until the mid-twentieth century, and it continues to be applied even to this day for much of the high seas, though the application of the concept and the scope of its reach is changing.\n\nSecularized natural law (foundations of modern international law) (1625) \n\nThe publication of De jure belli ac pacis (On the Laws of War and Peace) by Hugo Grotius in 1625 had marked the emergence of international law as an 'autonomous legal science'. Grotius’s On the Law of War and Peace, published in 1625, is best known as the first systematic treatise on international law, but to thinkers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, it seemed to set a new agenda in moral and political philosophy across the board. Grotius developed pivotal treatises on freedom of the seas, the law of spoils, the laws of war and peace and he created an autonomous place for international law as its own discipline. Jean Barbeyrac’s Historical and Critical Account of the Science of Morality, attached to his translation of Samuel von Pufendorf’s Law of Nature and Nations in 1706, praised Grotius as “the first who broke the ice” of “the Scholastic Philosophy; which [had] spread itself all over Europe” (1749: 67, 66). Grotius' truly distinctive contribution to jurisprudence and philosophy of law (public international law or law of nations in particular) was that he secularized natural law. Grotius had divorced natural law from theology and religion by grounding it solely in the social nature and natural reason of man. When Grotius, considered by many to be the founder of modern natural law theory (or secular natural law), said that natural law would retain its validity 'even if God did not exist' (etiamsi daremus non esse Deum), he was making a clear break with the classical tradition of natural law. Adam Smith, in lectures delivered in 1762 on the subject of moral philosophy and the law of nations, said that: “Jurisprudence is that science which inquires into the general principles which ought to be the foundation of laws of all nations. Grotius seems to have been the first who attempted to give the world anything like a regular system of natural jurisprudence, and his treatise, 'On the Laws of War and Peace, ' with all its imperfections, is perhaps at this day the most complete work on this subject.” \n\nGrotian conception of international society (1625) \n\nThe Grotian conception of international society became the most distinctive characteristic of the internationalist (or rationalist) tradition in international relations. This is why it is also called the Grotian tradition. According to it international politics takes place within international society in which states are bound not only by rules of prudence or expediency but also of morality and law. Grotius was arguably not the first to formulate such a doctrine. However, he was first to clearly define the idea of one society of states, governed not by force or warfare but by laws and mutual agreement to enforce those laws. As many international law scholars noted, the spirit of the Peace of Westphalia (1648) was preceded with the thoughts and ideas of Grotius. Thomas Franck observed: ‘Since the Reformation, the Peace of Westphalia, and the writings of Hugo Grotius, there has been an explicit assumption that the international system is an association of sovereign states.’ As Hedley Bull declared: ‘The idea of international society which Grotius propounded was given concrete expression in the Peace of Westphalia’, affirming that ‘Grotius must be considered the intellectual father of this first general peace settlement of modern times’. \n\nCannon shot rule (1702) \n\nBy the end of the seventeenth century, support was growing for some limitation to the seaward extent of territorial waters. What emerged was the so-called \"cannon shot rule\", which acknowledged the idea that property rights could be acquired by physical occupation and in practice to the effective range of shore-based cannon: about three nautical miles. The rule was long associated with Cornelis van Bijnkershoek, a Dutch jurist who, especially in his De Dominio Maris Dissertatio (1702), advocated a middle ground between the extremes of Mare Liberum and John Selden's Mare Clausum, accepting both the freedom of states to navigate and exploit the resources of the high seas and a right of coastal states to assert wide-ranging rights in a limited marine territory.\n\nPermanent Court of Arbitration (1899) \n\nThe Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) is an international organization based in The Hague in the Netherlands. The court was established in 1899 as one of the acts of the first Hague Peace Conference, which makes it the oldest global institution for international dispute resolution. Its creation is set out under Articles 20 to 29 of the 1899 Hague Convention for the pacific settlement of international disputes, which was a result of the first Hague Peace Conference. The most concrete achievement of the Conference was the establishment of the PCA as the first institutionalized global mechanism for the settlement of disputes between states. The PCA encourages the resolution of disputes that involve states, state entities, intergovernmental organizations, and private parties by assisting in the establishment of arbitration tribunals and facilitating their work. The court offers a wide range of services for the resolution of international disputes which the parties concerned have expressly agreed to submit for resolution under its auspices. Dutch-Jew legal scholar Tobias Asser's role in the creation of the PCA at the first Hague Peace Conference (1899) earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1911.\n\nInternational Opium Convention (1912) \n\nThe International Opium Convention, sometimes referred to as the Hague Convention of 1912, signed on 23 January 1912 at The Hague, was the first international drug control treaty and is the core of the international drug control system. The adoption of the Convention was a turning point in multilateralism, based on the recognition of the transnational nature of the drug problem and the principle of shared responsibility. \n\nMarriage equality (legalization of same-sex marriage) (2001) \n\nDenmark was the first state to recognize a legal relationship for same-sex couples, establishing \"registered partnerships\" very much like marriage in 1989. In 2001, the Netherlands became the first nation in the world to grant same-sex marriages. The first laws enabling same-sex marriage in modern times were enacted during the first decade of the 21st century. , sixteen countries (Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark,Excluding the Faroe Islands and Greenland. France, Iceland, Netherlands,Excluding Aruba, Curaçao and St Maarten. New Zealand,Excluding Tokelau, Niue and the Cook Islands. Norway, Portugal, Spain, South Africa, Sweden, United Kingdom,Excluding Northern Ireland. The Scottish parliament has passed a bill that allows same-sex marriages to take place from October 2014. Uruguay) and several sub-national jurisdictions (parts of Mexico and the United States) allow same-sex couples to marry. Polls in various countries show that there is rising support for legally recognizing same-sex marriage across race, ethnicity, age, religion, political affiliation, and socioeconomic status.\n\nMeasurement \n\nPendulum clock (first high-precision clock) (1656) \n\n \nThe first mechanical clocks, employing the verge escapement mechanism with a foliot or balance wheel timekeeper, were invented in Europe at around the start of the 14th century, and became the standard timekeeping device until the pendulum clock was invented in 1656. The pendulum clock remained the most accurate timekeeper until the 1930s, when quartz oscillators were invented, followed by atomic clocks after World War 2. \n\nA pendulum clock uses a pendulum's arc to mark intervals of time. From their invention until about 1930, the most accurate clocks were pendulum clocks. Pendulum clocks cannot operate on vehicles or ships at sea, because the accelerations disrupt the pendulum's motion, causing inaccuracies. The pendulum clock was invented by Christian Huygens, based on the pendulum introduced by Galileo Galilei. Although Galileo studied the pendulum as early as 1582, he never actually constructed a clock based on that design. Christiaan Huygens invented pendulum clock in 1656 and patented the following year. He contracted the construction of his clock designs to clockmaker Salomon Coster, who actually built the clock.\n\nConcept of the standardization of the temperature scale (1665) \n\nVarious authors have credited the invention of the thermometer to Cornelis Drebbel, Robert Fludd, Galileo Galilei or Santorio Santorio. The thermometer was not a single invention, however, but a development. However, each inventor and each thermometer was unique—there was no standard scale. In 1665 Christiaan Huygens suggested using the melting and boiling points of water as standards. The Fahrenheit scale is now usually defined by two fixed points: the temperature at which water freezes into ice is defined as 32 degrees Fahrenheit (°F), and the boiling point of water is defined to be 212 °F, a 180 degree separation, as defined at sea level and standard atmospheric pressure. In 1742, Swedish astronomer Anders Celsius created a temperature scale which was the reverse of the scale now known by the name \"Celsius\": 0 represented the boiling point of water, while 100 represented the freezing point of water. From 1744 until 1954, 0 °C was defined as the freezing point of water and 100 °C was defined as the boiling point of water, both at a pressure of one standard atmosphere with mercury being the working material.\n\nSpiral-hairspring watch (first high-precision watch) (1675) \n\nThe invention of the mainspring in the early 15th century allowed portable clocks to be built, evolving into the first pocketwatches by the 17th century, but these were not very accurate until the balance spring was added to the balance wheel in the mid 17th century. Some dispute remains as to whether British scientist Robert Hooke (his was a straight spring) or Dutch scientist Christiaan Huygens was the actual inventor of the balance spring. Huygens was clearly the first to successfully implement a spiral balance spring in a portable timekeeper. This is significant because up to that point the pendulum was the most reliable. This innovation increased watches' accuracy enormously, reducing error from perhaps several hours per day to perhaps 10 minutes per day, resulting in the addition of the minute hand to the face from around 1680 in Britain and 1700 in France.\n\nLike the invention of pendulum clock, Huygens' spiral hairspring (balance spring) system of portable timekeepers, helped lay the foundations for the modern watchmaking industry. The application of the spiral balance spring for watches ushered in a new era of accuracy for portable timekeepers, similar to that which the pendulum had introduced for clocks. From its invention in 1675 by Christiaan Huygens, the spiral hairspring (balance spring) system for portable timekeepers, still used in mechanical watchmaking industry today. \n\nMercury thermometer (first practical, accurate thermometer) (1714) \n\nVarious authors have credited the invention of the thermometer to Cornelis Drebbel, Robert Fludd, Galileo Galilei or Santorio Santorio. The thermometer was not a single invention, however, but a development. Though Galileo is often said to be the inventor of the thermometer, what he produced were thermoscopes. The difference between a thermoscope and a thermometer is that the latter has a scale. The first person to put a scale on a thermoscope is variously said to be Francesco Sagredo or Santorio Santorio in about 1611 to 1613.\n\nBefore there was the thermometer, there was the earlier and closely related thermoscope, best described as a thermometer without a temperature scale. A thermoscope only showed the differences in temperatures, for example, it could show something was getting hotter. However, the thermoscope did not measure all the data that a thermometer could, for example an exact temperature in degrees. What can be considered the first modern thermometer, the mercury thermometer with a standardized scale, was invented by German-Dutch scientist Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit (who had settled in Amsterdam in 1701) in 1714. Fahrenheit invented the first truly accurate thermometer using mercury instead of alcohol and water mixtures. He began constructing his own thermometers in 1714, and it was in these that he used mercury for the first time.\n\nFahrenheit scale (first standardized temperature scale) (1724) \n\nVarious authors have credited the invention of the thermometer to Cornelis Drebbel, Robert Fludd, Galileo Galilei or Santorio Santorio. The thermometer was not a single invention, however, but a development. However, each inventor and each thermometer was unique—there was no standard scale. In 1665 Christiaan Huygens suggested using the melting and boiling points of water as standards, and in 1694 Carlo Renaldini proposed using them as fixed points on a universal scale. In 1701 Isaac Newton proposed a scale of 12 degrees between the melting point of ice and body temperature. Finally in 1724 Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit produced a temperature scale which now (slightly adjusted) bears his name. He could do this because he manufactured thermometers, using mercury (which has a high coefficient of expansion) for the first time and the quality of his production could provide a finer scale and greater reproducibility, leading to its general adoption. The Fahrenheit scale was the first widely used temperature scale. By the end of the 20th century, most countries used the Celsius scale rather than the Fahrenheit scale, though Canada retained it as a supplementary scale used alongside Celsius. Fahrenheit remains the official scale for Jamaica, the Cayman Islands, Belize, the Bahamas, Palau and the United States and associated territories.\n\nSnellen chart (1862) \n\nThe Snellen chart is an eye chart used by eye care professionals and others to measure visual acuity. Snellen charts are named after Dutch ophthalmologist Hermann Snellen who developed the chart in 1862. Vision scientists now use a variation of this chart, designed by Ian Bailey and Jan Lovie.\n\nString galvanometer (1902) \n\nPrevious to the string galvanometer, scientists used a machine called the capillary electrometer to measure the heart's electrical activity, but this device was unable to produce results at a diagnostic level. Dutch physiologist Willem Einthoven developed the string galvanometer in the early 20th century, publishing the first registration of its use to record an electrocardiogram in a Festschrift book in 1902. The first human electrocardiogram was recorded in 1887, however only in 1901 was a quantifiable result obtained from the string galvanometer.\n\nSchilt photometer (1922) \n\nIn 1922, Dutch astronomer Jan Schilt invented the Schilt photometer, a device that measures the light output of stars and, indirectly, their distances.\n\nMedicine \n\nClinical electrocardiography (first diagnostic electrocardiogram) (1902) \n\nIn the 19th century it became clear that the heart generated electric currents. The first to systematically approach the heart from an electrical point-of-view was Augustus Waller, working in St Mary's Hospital in Paddington, London. In 1911 he saw little clinical application for his work. The breakthrough came when Einthoven, working in Leiden, used his more sensitive string galvanometer, than the capillary electrometer that Waller used. Einthoven assigned the letters P, Q, R, S and T to the various deflections that it measured and described the electrocardiographic features of a number of cardiovascular disorders. He was awarded the 1924 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for his discovery. \n\nEinthoven's triangle (1902) \n\nEinthoven's triangle is an imaginary formation of three limb leads in a triangle used in electrocardiography, formed by the two shoulders and the pubis. The shape forms an inverted equilateral triangle with the heart at the center that produces zero potential when the voltages are summed. It is named after Willem Einthoven, who theorized its existence. \n\nFirst European blood bank (1940) \n\nWhen German bombers attacked The Hague in 1940 while Willem Johan Kolff was there, he organised the first blood bank in continental Europe. It was located in the Zuidwal hospital in The Hague. Eleven patients were given blood transfusions in The Hague, six of whom survived. Donated blood was also used for victims of the bombardment of Rotterdam, whither it was transported by civilian car. \n\nRotating drum dialysis machine (first practical artificial kidney) (1943) \n\nAn artificial kidney is a machine and its related devices which clean blood for patients who have an acute or chronic failure of their kidneys. The first artificial kidney was developed by Dutchman Willem Johan Kolff. The procedure of cleaning the blood by this means is called dialysis, a type of renal replacement therapy that is used to provide an artificial replacement for lost kidney function due to renal failure. It is a life support treatment and does not treat disease. \n\nArtificial heart (1957) \n\nOn 12 December 1957, Kolff implanted an artificial heart into a dog at Cleveland Clinic. The dog lived for 90 minutes. In 1967, Dr. Kolff left Cleveland Clinic to start the Division of Artificial Organs at the University of Utah and pursue his work on the artificial heart. Under his supervision, a team of surgeons, chemists, physicists and bioengineers developed an artificial heart and made it ready for industrial production. To help manage his many endeavors, Dr. Kolff assigned project managers. Each project was named after its manager. Graduate student Robert Jarvik was the project manager for the artificial heart, which was subsequently renamed the Jarvik-7. Based on lengthy animal trials, this first artificial heart was successfully implanted into the thorax of patient Barney Clark in December 1982. Clark survived 112 days with the device.\n\nMilitary \n\nModern model of sea power (1585–1688) \n\nThe Dutch Republic has been considered by many political and military historians as the first modern (global) sea power. The United Provinces of the Netherlands was the first state to possess the full triad of foreign commerce, forward bases and merchant and naval fleets. In the middle of the 17th century the Dutch navy was the most powerful navy in the world. The Dutch Republic had a commercial fleet that was larger than that of England, France, Germany, Portugal, and Spain combined. According to Walter Russell Mead, the “modern version of sea power was invented by the Dutch. The system of global trade, investment, and military power the Dutch built in the seventeenth century was the envy and the wonder of the world at the time, and many of its basic features were adopted by the British and the Americans in subsequent years.” When the Peter the Great determined to achieve sea power for Imperial Russia, he came to the Dutch Republic to learn about shipbuilding, seamanship and nautical sciences. During his stay in Holland (1697) the Tsar engaged, with the help of Russian and Dutch assistants, many skilled workers such as builders of locks, fortresses, shipwrights and seamen. They had to help him with his modernization of Russia. The best-known sailor who made the journey from the Dutch Republic to Russia was Norwegian-Dutch Cornelius Cruys. Cruys performed well in Russia and came be regarded as the architect of the Russian Navy. He became the first commander of the Russian Baltic Fleet and the vice admiral of the Imperial Russian Navy. Peter the Great designed his new capital on the model of Amsterdam and gave it a Dutch name, Sankt Pieter Burkh (later Germanized into Saint Peterburg). In St. Petersburg, there is an island which is still called Novaya Gollandiya (literally “New Holland”). The triangular man-made island took its name after a number of canals and shipbuilding facilities that rendered its appearance similar to Amsterdam. The Tsar chose to call his island “New Holland”, commemorating his enthusiasm for all things Dutch. \n\nHouse of Orange-Nassau's military reforms (1590s–17th century) \n\nThe early modern Military Revolution began with reforms inaugurated by Prince Maurice of Nassau with his cousins Count Willem Lodewijk of Nassau-Dillenburg and Count John VII of Nassau during the 1590s. Maurice developed a system of linear formations (linear tactics), discipline, drill and volley fire based on classical Roman methods that made his army more efficient and his command and control more effective. He also developed a 43-step drill for firing the musket that was included in an illustrated weapons manual by Jacob de Gheyn II in 1607 (Wapenhandelinghe or Exerise of Arms). This became known as the Dutch drill. It was widely read and emulated in the rest of Europe. Adopting and perfecting the techniques pioneered by Maurice of Nassau several decades earlier, Gustavus Adolphus repeatedly proved his techniques by defeating the armies of Spain (1630–1632), an empire with resources fantastically larger than Sweden's during the Thirty Years' War. Descartes served for a while in the army of the Dutch military leader Prince Maurice of Orange-Nassau, and developed a fascination for practical technology. Maurice' s military innovations had considerable influences on Descartes' system of philosophy. \n\nNorden bombsight (1920s) \n\nThe Norden bombsight was designed by Carl Norden, a Dutch engineer educated in Switzerland who emigrated to the U.S. in 1904. In 1920, he started work on the Norden bombsight for the United States Navy. The first bombsight was produced in 1927. It was essentially an analog computer, and bombardiers were trained in great secrecy on how to use it. The device was used to drop bombs accurately from an aircraft, supposedly accurate enough to hit a 100-foot circle from an altitude of 21,000 feet—but under actual combat situations, such an accuracy was never achieved.\n\nSubmarine snorkel (1939) \n\nA submarine snorkel is a device that allows a submarine to operate submerged while still taking in air from above the surface. It was invented by the Dutchman J.J. Wichers shortly before World War II and copied by the Germans during the war for use by U-Boats. Its common military name is snort.\n\nGoalkeeper CIWS (1975) \n\nGoalkeeper is a close-in weapon system (CIWS) still in use as of 2015. It is autonomous and completely automatic short-range defense of ships against highly maneuverable missiles, aircraft and fast maneuvering surface vessels. Once activated the system automatically performs the entire process from surveillance and detection to destruction, including selection of priority targets.\n\nMusical instruments \n\nMetronome (1812) \n\nThe first (mechanical) metronome was invented by Dietrich Nikolaus Winkel in Amsterdam in 1812, but named (patented) after Johann Maelzel, who took the idea and popularized it. \n\nFokker organ (1950) \n\nDutch musician-physicist Adriaan Fokker designed and had built keyboard instruments capable of playing microtonal scales via a generalized keyboard. The best-known of these is his 31-tone equal-tempered organ, which was installed in Teylers Museum in Haarlem in 1951. It is commonly called the Fokker organ.\n\nKraakdoos (1960s) \n\nThe Kraakdoos or Cracklebox is a custom-made battery-powered noise-making electronic device. It is a small box with six metal contacts on top, which when pressed by fingers generates unusual sounds and tones. The human body becomes a part of the circuit and determines the range of sounds possible – different players generate different results. The concept was first conceived by Michel Waisvisz and Geert Hamelberg in the 1960s, and developed further in the 1970s when Waisvisz joined the STEIM foundation in Amsterdam.\n\nMoodswinger (2006) \n\nThe Moodswinger is a twelve-string electric zither with an additional third bridge designed by Dutch luthier Yuri Landman. The rod functions as the third bridge and divides the strings into two sections to add overtones, creating a multiphonic sound.\n\nSpringtime (guitar) (2008) \n\nThe Springtime is an experimental electric guitar with seven strings and three outputs. Landman created the instrument in 2008.\n\nPhilosophy and social sciences \n\nNeostoicism (1580s) \n\nNeostoicism was a syncretic philosophical movement, joining Stoicism and Christianity. Neostoicism was founded by Dutch-Flemish humanist Justus Lipsius, who in 1584 presented its rules, expounded in his book De Constantia (On Constancy), as a dialogue between Lipsius and his friend Charles de Langhe. The eleven years (1579-1590) that Lipsius spent in Leiden (Leiden University) were the period of his greatest productivity. It was during this time that he wrote a series of works designed to revive ancient Stoicism in a form that would be compatible with Christianity. The most famous of these is De Constantia (1584). Neostoicism had a direct influence on many seventeenth and eighteenth-century writers including Montesquieu, Bossuet, Francis Bacon, Joseph Hall, Francisco de Quevedo and Juan de Vera y Figueroa.\n\nModern rationalism (1630s–1670s) \n\nThe rise of modern rationalism in the Dutch Republic, had a profound influence on the 17th-century philosophy. Descartes is often considered to be the first of the modern rationalists. Descartes himself had lived in the Dutch Republic for some twenty years (1628–1649) and served for a while in the army of the Dutch military leader Prince Maurice of Orange-Nassau. The Dutch Republic was the first country in which Descartes' rationalistic philosophy (Cartesianism) succeeded in replacing Aristotelianism as the academic orthodoxy. Fritz Berolzheimer considers Hugo Grotius the Descartes of legal philosophy and notes Grotian rationalism's influence on the 17th-century jurisprudence: \"As the Cartesian \"cogito ergo sum\" became the point of departure of rationalistic philosophy, so the establishment of government and law upon reason made Hugo Grotius the founder of an independent and purely rationalistic system of natural law.\" In the late 1650s Leiden was a place where one could study Cartesian philosophy. Sometime between 1656 and 1661 it appears that Spinoza did some formal study of philosophy at the University of Leiden. Philosophy of Spinoza (Spinozism) was an systematic answer to Descartes' famous dualist theory that the body and spirit are separate.\n\nModern pantheism (1670s) \n\nPantheism was popularized in the modern era as both a theology and philosophy based on the work of the 17th-century Dutch Jew philosopher Baruch Spinoza, whose Ethics was an answer to Descartes' famous dualist theory that the body and spirit are separate. Spinoza is regarded as the chief source of modern pantheism. Spinoza held that the two are the same, and this monism is a fundamental quality of his philosophy. He was described as a \"God-intoxicated man,\" and used the word God to describe the unity of all substance. Although the term pantheism was not coined until after his death, Spinoza is regarded as its most celebrated advocate.\n\nEarly liberalism (foundations of liberalism) (17th century) \n\n\"European liberalism\", Isaiah Berlin wrote, \"wears the appearance of a single coherent movement, little altered during almost three centuries, founded upon relatively simple foundations, laid by Locke or Grotius or even Spinoza; stretching back to Erasmus and Montaigne...\" \n\nAs Bertrand Russell noted in his A History of Western Philosophy (1945): \"Descartes lived in Holland for twenty years (1629-49), except for a few brief visits to France and one to England, all on business. It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of Holland in the seventeenth century, as the one country where there was freedom of speculation. Hobbes had to have his books printed there; Locke took refuge there during the five worst years of reaction in England before 1688; Bayle (of the Dictionary) found it necessary to live there; and Spinoza would hardly have been allowed to do his work in any other country.\" Russell described early liberalism in Europe: \"Early liberalism was a product of England and Holland, and had certain well-marked characteristics. It stood for religious toleration; it was Protestant, but of a latitudinarian rather than of a fanatical kind; it regarded the wars of religion as silly...\"\n\nAs Russell Shorto states: “Liberalism has many meanings, but in its classical sense it is a philosophy based on individual freedom. History has long taught that our modern sensibility comes from the eighteenth century Enlightenment. In recent decades, historians have seen the Dutch Enlightenment of the seventeenth century as the root of the wider Enlightenment. And at the center of this sits the city of Amsterdam.” Amsterdam, to Shorto, was not only the first city in Europe to develop the cultural and political foundations of what we now call liberalism—a society focused on the concerns and comforts of individuals, run by individuals acting together, and tolerant of religion, ethnicity, or other differences—but also an exporter of these beliefs to the rest of Europe and the New World. \n\nCartesianism (1630s–1640s) \n\nIf Descartes is still considered the father of modern philosophy, Dutch Republic can be called its cradle. Cartesianism is the name given to the philosophical doctrine of René Descartes. Descartes is often regarded as the first thinker to emphasize the use of reason to develop the natural sciences. Cartesianism had been controversial for several years before 1656. Descartes himself had lived in the Dutch Republic for some twenty years (1628–1649). Descartes served for a while in the army of the Dutch military leader Prince Maurice of Orange-Nassau, and developed a fascination for practical technology. In the 1630s, while staying in the Dutch city Deventer, Descartes worked on a text which became published as Traite' de l'Homme (1664). Throughout his writing, he used words such as clock, automaton, and self—moving machine as interchangeable constructs. He postulated an account of the physical world that was thoroughly materialistic. His mechanical view of nature replaced the organism model which had been popular since the Renaissance. His Discours de la méthode (1637) was originally published at Leiden, and his Principia philosophiae (1644) appeared from the presses at Amsterdam. In the 1630s and 1640s, Descartes's ideas gained a foothold at the Dutch universities. \n\nSpinozism (1660s–1670s) \n\nSpinozism is the monist philosophical system of the Dutch-Jewish philosopher Baruch Spinoza which defines \"God\" as a singular self-subsistent substance, with both matter and thought as its attributes.\n\nAffect (philosophy) (1670s) \n\nAffect (affectus or adfectus in Latin) is a concept used in the philosophy of Spinoza and elaborated by Henri Bergson, Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari that emphasizes bodily experience. The term \"affect\" is central to what became known as the \"affective turn\" in the humanities and social sciences.\n\nMandeville's paradox (1714) \n\nMandeville's paradox is named after Bernard Mandeville, who shows that actions which may be qualified as vicious with regard to individuals have benefits for society as a whole. This is already clear from the subtitle of his most famous work, The Fable of The Bees: ‘Private Vices, Publick Benefits’. He states that \"Fraud, Luxury, and Pride must live; Whilst we the Benefits receive.\") (The Fable of the Bees, ‘The Moral’).\n\nMathematical intuitionism (1907–1908) \n\nMathematical intuitionism was founded by the Dutch mathematician and philosopher Luitzen Egbertus Jan Brouwer. In the philosophy of mathematics, intuitionism, or neointuitionism (opposed to preintuitionism), is an approach where mathematics is considered to be purely the result of the constructive mental activity of humans rather than the discovery of fundamental principles claimed to exist in an objective reality. That is, logic and mathematics are not considered analytic activities wherein deep properties of objective reality are revealed and applied, but are instead considered the application of internally consistent methods used to realize more complex mental constructs, regardless of their possible independent existence in an objective reality.\n\nReligion and ethics \n\nDevotio Moderna (1370s–1390s) \n\nDevotio Moderna, or Modern Devotion, was a movement for religious reform, calling for apostolic renewal through the rediscovery of genuine pious practices such as humility, obedience and simplicity of life. It began in the late fourteenth-century, largely through the work of Gerard Groote, and flourished in the Low Countries and Germany in the fifteenth century, but came to an end with the Protestant Reformation. Gerard Groote, father of the movement, founded the Brethren of the Common Life; after his death, disciples established a house of Augustinian Canons at Windesheim (near Zwolle, Overijssel). These two communities became the principal exponents of Devotio Moderna. Martin Luther studied under the Brethren of the Common Life at Magdeburg before going on to the University of Erfurt. Another famous member of the Brethren of the Common Life was Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam.\n\nDevotio Moderna, an undogmatic form of piety which some historians have argued helped to pave the road for the Protestant Reformation, is most known today through its influence on Thomas à Kempis, the author of The Imitation of Christ a book which proved highly influential for centuries.\n\nMennonites (1536) \n\nThe Mennonites are a Christian group based around the church communities of Anabaptist denominations named after Menno Simons (1496–1561) of Friesland. Through his writings, Simons articulated and formalized the teachings of earlier Swiss founders. The teachings of the Mennonites were founded on their belief in both the mission and ministry of Jesus Christ, which they held to with great conviction despite persecution by various Roman Catholic and Protestant states.\n\nDutch Reformed Church (1571) \n\nThe Dutch Reformed Church (in Dutch: Nederlandse Hervormde Kerk or NHK) was a Reformed Christian denomination. It developed during the Protestant Reformation, with its base in what became known as the Roman Catholic Church. It was founded in the 1570s and lasted until 2004, the year it merged with the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands to form the Protestant Church in the Netherlands.\n\nArminianism (1620) \n\nArminianism is based on the theological ideas of Dutch Reformed theologian Jacobus Arminius (1560–1609) and his historic supporters known as the Remonstrants. His teachings held to the five solae of the Reformation, but they were distinct from the particular teachings of Martin Luther, Zwingli, John Calvin, and other Protestant Reformers. Arminius (Jacobus Hermanszoon) was a student of Beza (successor of Calvin) at the Theological University of Geneva.\n\nMany Christian denominations have been influenced by Arminian views on the will of man being freed by grace prior to regeneration, notably the Baptists in the 16th century, the Methodists in the 18th century and the Seventh-day Adventist Church. John Wesley was influenced by Arminianism. Also, Arminianism was an important influence in Methodism, which developed out of the Wesleyan movement. Some assert that Universalists and Unitarians in the 18th and 19th centuries were theologically linked with Arminianism.\n\nFirst synagogue to be established in the (Americas) New World (1636) \n\nThe first synagogue of the New World, Kahal Zur Israel Synagogue, is founded in Recife, Brazil by the Dutch Jews. The Kahal Zur Israel Synagogue in Recife, Brazil, erected in 1636, was the first synagogue erected in the Americas. Its foundations have been recently discovered, and the 20th-century buildings on the site have been altered to resemble a 17th-century Dutch synagogue. \n\nJansenism (1640s) \n\nJansenism was a Catholic theological movement, primarily in France, that emphasized original sin, human depravity, the necessity of divine grace, and predestination. The movement originated from the posthumously published work (Augustinus) of the Dutch theologian Cornelius Jansen, who died in 1638. It was first popularized by Jansen's friend Abbot Jean Duvergier de Hauranne, of Saint-Cyran-en-Brenne Abbey, and after Duvergier's death in 1643, was led by Antoine Arnauld. Through the 17th and into the 18th centuries, Jansenism was a distinct movement within the Catholic Church. The theological centre of the movement was the convent of Port-Royal Abbey, Paris, which was a haven for writers including Duvergier, Arnauld, Pierre Nicole, Blaise Pascal, and Jean Racine.\n\nFirst Jewish congregation to be established in (the United States) North America (1654) \n\nCongregation Shearith Israel, the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue in the City of New Amsterdam, was founded in 1654, the first Jewish congregation to be established in North America. Its founders were twenty-three Jews, mostly of Spanish and Portuguese origin, who had been living in Recife, Brazil. When the Portuguese defeated the Dutch for control of Recife, and brought with them the Inquisition, the Jews of that area left. Some returned to Amsterdam, where they had originated. Others went to places in the Caribbean such as St. Thomas, Jamaica, Surinam and Curaçao, where they founded sister Sephardic congregations. One group of twenty-three Jews, after a series of unexpected events, landed in New Amsterdam. After being initially rebuffed by anti-Semitic Governor Peter Stuyvesant, Jews were given official permission to settle in the colony in 1655. These pioneers fought for their rights and won permission to remain. This marks the founding of the Congregation Shearith Israel. \n\nScientific instruments \n\nMicroscope (compound microscope) (1590) \n\nIn 1590 the Dutchmen Hans and Zacharias Janssen (father and son) is sometimes claimed to have invented the first compound microscope. \n\nTelescope (optical telescope) (1608) \n\nIn 1608 Hans Lippershey, Zacharias Janssen and Jacob Metius created the first practical telescope. Crude telescopes and spyglasses may have been created much earlier, but Lippershey is believed to be the first to apply for a patent, which he failed to secure, after which he made it available for general use. A description of Lippershey's instrument quickly reached Galileo Galilei, who created a working unit in 1609, with which he made the observations found in his Sidereus Nuncius of 1610.\n\nAerial telescope (1656) \n\nAn aerial telescope is a type of very long focal length refracting telescope, built in the second half of the 17th century, that did not use a tube. Instead, the objective was mounted on a pole, tree, tower, building or other structure on a swivel ball-joint. The observer stood on the ground and held the eyepiece, which was connected to the objective by a string or connecting rod. By holding the string tight and maneuvering the eyepiece, the observer could aim the telescope at objects in the sky. The idea for this type of telescope may have originated in the late 17th century with the Dutch mathematician, astronomer and physicist Christiaan Huygens and his brother Constantijn Huygens, Jr.. \n\nHuygens eyepiece (first compound eyepiece) (1670s) \n\nHuygens eyepieces consist of two plano-convex lenses with the plane sides towards the eye separated by an air gap. The lenses are called the eye lens and the field lens. The focal plane is located between the two lenses. It was invented by Christiaan Huygens in the late 1660s and was the first compound (multi-lens) eyepiece. Huygens discovered that two air spaced lenses can be used to make an eyepiece with zero transverse chromatic aberration. These eyepieces work well with the very long focal length telescopes (in Huygens day they were used with single element long focal length non-achromatic refracting telescopes, including very long focal length aerial telescopes). This optical design is now considered obsolete since with today's shorter focal length telescopes the eyepiece suffers from short eye relief, high image distortion, chromatic aberration, and a very narrow apparent field of view. Since these eyepieces are cheap to make they can often be found on inexpensive telescopes and microscopes. Because Huygens eyepieces do not contain cement to hold the lens elements, telescope users sometimes use these eyepieces in the role of \"solar projection\", i.e. projecting an image of the Sun onto a screen. Other cemented eyepieces can be damaged by the intense, concentrated light of the Sun.\n\nVan Leeuwenhoek microscope (1670s) \n\nVan Leeuwenhoek created at least 25 microscopes, of differing types, of which only nine survive. His simple microscopes were made of silver or copper frames, holding hand-ground lenses. Those that have survived are capable of magnification up to 275 times. It is suspected that Van Leeuwenhoek possessed units that could magnify up to 500 times. Using his handcrafted microscopes, he was the first to observe and describe single-celled organisms, which he originally referred to as animalcules, and which now referred to as micro-organisms or microbes. \n\nCycloidal pendulum (1673) \n\nThe cycloid pendulum was invented by Christiaan Huygens in 1673. Its purpose is to eliminate the lack of isochronism of the ordinary simple pendulum. This is achieved by making the mass point move on a cycloid instead of a circular arc. \n\nPyrometer (1739) \n\nThe pyrometer, invented by Pieter van Musschenbroek, is a temperature measuring device. A simple type uses a thermocouple placed either in a furnace or on the item to be measured. The voltage output of the thermocouple is read from a meter. Many different types of thermocouple are available, for measuring temperatures from −200 °C to above 1500 °C. \n\nLeyden jar (first practical capacitor) (1745–1746) \n\nA Leyden jar, or Leiden jar, is a device that \"stores\" static electricity between two electrodes on the inside and outside of a glass jar. It was the original form of a capacitor (originally known as a \"condenser\"). It was invented independently by German cleric Ewald Georg von Kleist on 11 October 1745 and by Dutch scientist Pieter van Musschenbroek of Leiden (Leyden) in 1745–1746. The invention was named for the city. The Leyden jar was used to conduct many early experiments in electricity, and its discovery was of fundamental importance in the study of electricity. Previously, researchers had to resort to insulated conductors of large dimensions to store a charge. The Leyden jar provided a much more compact alternative. Like many early electrical devices, there was no particular use for the Leyden jar at first, other than to allow scientists to do a greater variety of electrical experiments. Benjamin Franklin, for example, used a Leyden jar to store electricity from lightning in his famous kite experiment in 1752. By doing so he proved that lightning was really electricity.\n\nThe idea for the Leyden jar was discovered independently by two parties: German scientist and jurist Ewald Georg von Kleist, and Dutchmen Pieter van Musschenbroek and Andreas Cunaeus. These scientists developed the Leyden jar while working under a theory of electricity that saw electricity as a fluid, and hoped to develop the jar to \"capture\" this fluid. In 1744 von Kleist lined a glass jar with silver foil, and charged the foil with a friction machine. Kleist was convinced that a substantial electric charge could be collected when he received a significant shock from the device. The effects of this \"Kleistian jar\" were independently discovered around the same time by Dutch scientists Pieter van Musschenbroek and Cunaeus at the University of Leiden. Van Musschenbroek communicated on it with the French scientific community where it was called the Leyden jar. \n\nEisinga Planetarium (1781) \n\nThe Eisinga Planetarium (Royal Eise Eisinga Planetarium) was built by Eise Eisinga in his home in Franeker, Friesland. It took Eisinga seven years to build his planetarium, completing it in 1781. The orrery still exists and is the world's oldest working planetarium.\n\nKipp's apparatus (1860) \n\nKipp's apparatus, also called a Kipp generator, is designed for preparation of small volumes of gases. It was invented around 1860 by Dutch pharmacist Petrus Jacobus Kipp and widely used in chemical laboratories and for demonstrations in schools into the second half of the 20th century.\n\nPhase contrast microscope (1933) \n\nIn optical microscopy many objects such as cell parts in protozoans, bacteria and sperm tails are essentially fully transparent unless stained (and therefore killed). The difference in densities and composition within these objects however often gives rise to changes in the phase of light passing through them, hence they are sometimes called \"phase objects\". Using the phase-contrast technique makes these structures visible and allows the study of living specimens. This phase contrast technique proved to be such an advancement in microscopy that Dutch physicist Frits Zernike was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1953.\n\nMagnetic horn (1961) \n\nThe magnetic horn (also known as the Van der Meer horn) is a high-current, pulsed focusing device, invented by the Dutch physicist Simon van der Meer at CERN. It selects pions and focuses them into a sharp beam. Its original application was in the context of neutrino physics, where beams of pions have to be tightly focused. When the pions then decay into muons and neutrinos or antineutrinos, an equally well-focused neutrino beam is obtained. The muons were stopped in a wall of 3000 tons of iron and 1000 tons of concrete, leaving the neutrinos or antineutrinos to reach the Gargamelle bubble chamber.\n\nSports and games \n\nKolf (forerunner of modern golf) ( 13th century) \n\nA golf-like game (kolf in Dutch) is recorded as taking place on 26 February 1297, in a city called Loenen aan de Vecht, where the Dutch played a game with a stick and leather ball. The winner was whomever hit the ball with the least number of strokes into a target several hundred yards away. Some scholars argue that this game of putting a small ball in a hole in the ground using clubs was also played in 17th-century Netherlands and that this predates the game in Scotland.\n\nFigure skating (prototype) (15th–17th centuries) \n\nThe Dutch played a significant role in the history of ice skating (including speed skating and figure skating). The first feature of ice skating in a work of art was made in the 15th century. The picture, depicted Saint Lidwina, patron saint of ice skaters, falling on the ice. Another important aspect is a man seen in the background, who is skating on one leg. This means that his skates must have had sharp edges similar to those found on modern ice skates. Until the 17th century, ice skating was mostly used for transportation. Some of the Stuarts (including King Charles II of England) who had fled to the Dutch Republic during the Cromwell Royal reign later returned to Britain, bringing with them the new sport. Upon his return to England in 1658, the King brought two innovations in ice skating – a pair of iron skates and the Dutch roll. The Dutch roll was the first form of a gliding or skating motion made possible by the iron skate's two edges. However, speed skating was the focus of the Dutch, while the English developed modern figure skating.\n\nSpeed skating (15th–17th centuries) \n\nSpeed skating, which had developed in the Netherlands in the 17th century, was given a boost by the innovations in skate construction. Speed skating, or speedskating, is a competitive form of skating in which skaters race each other over a certain distance. Types of speed skating are long track speed skating, short track speed skating and marathon speed skating. In the modern Olympic Games, long-track speed skating is usually referred to as just \"speed skating\", while short-track speed skating is known as \"short track\".\n\nYachting (sport sailing) (17th century) \n\nSailing, also known as yachting, is a sport in which competitors race from point to point, or around a race course, in sail-powered boats. Yachting refers to recreational sailing or boating, the specific act of sailing or using other water vessels for sporting purposes. The invention of sailing is prehistoric, but the racing of sailing boats is believed to have started in the Netherlands some time in the 17th century. While living in the Dutch Republic, King Charles II of England fell in love with sailing and in 1660, took home the Dutch gifted 66-foot yacht he called Mary. The sport's popularity spread across the British Isles. The world's first yacht club was founded in Cork, Ireland in 1720.\n\nInternational Skating Union (1892) \n\nThe International Skating Union (ISU) is the international governing body for competitive ice skating disciplines, including figure skating, synchronized skating, speed skating, and short track speed skating. It was founded in Scheveningen, Netherlands, in 1892, making it the oldest governing international winter sport federation and one of the oldest international sport federations.\n\nThe first official World Championships in Speed Skating (open to men only) directly under the auspices of the ISU were held in Amsterdam in 1893.\n\nKorfball (1902) \n\nKorfball (Korfbal in Dutch) is a mixed gender team sport, with similarities to netball and basketball. A team consists of eight players; four female and four male. A team also includes a coach. It was founded in the Netherlands in 1902 by Nico Broekhuysen.\n\nCruyff Turn (1974) \n\nThe Cruijff Turn (also known as Cruyff Turn), is a famous dribbling trick in football, was perfected by the Dutch football player Johan Cruijff for whom the evasive trick was named. To make this move, the player first looks to pass or cross the ball. However, instead of kicking it, he drags the ball behind his planted foot with the inside of his other foot, turns through 180 degrees and accelerates away. The trick was famously employed by Cruijff in the 1974 FIFA World Cup, first seen in the Dutch match against Sweden and soon widely copied.\n\nTotal Football (1970s) \n\nThe foundations for Total Football (Dutch: totaalvoetbal) were laid by Englishman Jack Reynolds who was the manager of AFC Ajax. Rinus Michels, who played under Reynolds, later became manager of Ajax and refined the concept into what is known today as \"Total Football\" (Totaalvoetbal in Dutch language), using it in his training for the Ajax Amsterdam squad and the Netherlands national football team in the 1970s. It was further refined by Stefan Kovacs after Michels left for FC Barcelona. Johan Cruyff was the system's most famous exponent. Due to Cruyff's style of play, he is still referred to as the total footballer. Its cornerstone was a focus on positional interchange. The invention of totaalvoetbal helped lay the foundations for the significant successes of Dutch football at both club and international level in the 1970s. During that decade, the Dutch football rose from almost total obscurity to become a powerhouse in world football. In an interview published in the 50th anniversary issue of World Soccer magazine, the captain of the Brazilian team that won the 1970 FIFA World Cup, Carlos Alberto, went on to say: “The only team I’ve seen that did things differently was Holland at the 1974 World Cup in Germany. Since then everything looks more or less the same to me…. Their ‘carousel’ style of play was amazing to watch and marvellous for the game.” \n\nTiki-taka (1990s) \n\nFC Barcelona and the Spanish national football team play a style of football known as Tiki-taka that has its roots in Total Football. Johan Cruyff founded Tiki-taka (commonly spelled tiqui-taca in Spanish) during his time as manager of FC Barcelona (1988–1996). The style was successfully adopted by the all-conquering Spain national football team (2008–2012) and Pep Guardiola's Barcelona team (2009–2011). Tiki-taka style differs from Total Football in that it focuses on ball movement rather than positional interchange.\n\nTechnology and engineering \n\nFirst pound lock in Europe (1373) \n\nThe Netherlands revived the construction of canals during the 13th–14th century that had generally been discontinued since the fall of the Roman Empire. They also contributed in the development of canal construction technology, such as introducing the first flash locks in Europe. The first pound lock in Europe was built by the Dutch in 1373 at Vreeswijk, where a canal from Utrecht joins the river Lek. \n\nThermostat (automatic temperature regulator) (1620s) \n\nAround the 1620s, Cornelis Drebbel developed an automatic temperature control system for a furnace, motivated by his belief that base metals could be turned to gold by holding them at a precise constant temperature for long periods of time. He also used this temperature regulator in an incubator for hatching chickens. \n\nFeedback control system (1620s) \n\nFeedback control has been used for centuries to regulate engineered systems. In the 17th century, Drebbel invented one of the earliest devices to use feedback, an chicken incubator that used a damper controlled by a thermostat to maintain a constant temperature.\n\nMagic lantern (first practical image projector; the forerunner of modern slide projector) (1659) \n\nThe magic lantern is an optical device, an early type of image projector developed in the 17th century. People have been projecting images using concave mirrors and pin-hole cameras (camera obscura) since Roman times. But glass lens technology wasn't sufficiently developed to make advanced optical devices (such as telescope and microscope) until the 17th century. With pinhole cameras and camera obscura it was only possible to project an image of actual scene, such as an image of the sun, on a surface. The magic lantern on the other hand could project a painted image on a surface, and marks the point where cameras and projectors became two different kinds of devices. There has been some debate about who the original inventor of the magic lantern is, but the most widely accepted theory is that Christiaan Huygens developed the original device in the late 1650s. However, other sources give credit to the German priest Athanasius Kircher. He describes a device such as the magic lantern in his book Ars Magna Lucis et Umbrae. Huygens is credited because of his major innovation in lantern technology, which was the replacement of images etched on mirrors from earlier lanterns such as Kircher’s with images painted on glass. This is what paved the way for the use of colour and for double-layered slide projections (generally used to simulate movement).\n\nThe first allusion to a 'magic lantern' is by Huygens in the 1650s and he is generally credited with inventing it—though he didn't want to admit it, considering it frivolous. Huygens was the first to describe a fully functioning magic lantern, one he made, and wrote about it in a work in 1659. Huygens magic lantern has been described as the predecessor of today’s slide projector and the forerunner of the motion picture projector. Images were hand painted onto the glass slide until the mid-19th century when photographic slides were employed. Huygens introduced this curiosity to the Danish mathematician Thomas Walgenstein who realized its commercial value for entertainment and traveled through Europe—mostly France and Italy—demonstrating his machine to foreign princes and selling them replicas for their own amusement. The forerunner of the modern slide projector as well as moving pictures, magic lanterns retained their popularity for centuries and were also the first optical toy to be used for family entertainment in the home.\n\nFire hose (1673) \n\nIn Amsterdam, the Superintendent of the Fire Brigade, Jan van der Heyden, and his son Nicholaas took firefighting to its next step with the fashioning of the first fire hose in 1673.\n\nGunpowder engine (first practical rudimentary internal combustion piston engine) (1678-80) \n\nA gunpowder engine, also known as an explosion engine or Huygens' engine, is a type of internal combustion engine using gunpowder as its fuel. It was considered essentially as the first rudimentary internal combustion piston engine. The concept was first explored during the 17th century, most notably by the Dutch scientist Christiaan Huygens. In 1678 he outlined a gunpowder engine consisting of a vertical tube containing a piston. Gunpowder was inserted into the tube and lit through a small hole at the base, like a cannon. The expanding gasses would drive the piston up the tube until the reached a point near the top. Here, the piston uncovered holes in the tube that allowed any remaining hot gasses to escape. The weight of the piston and the vacuum formed by the cooling gasses in the now-closed cylinder drew the piston back into the tube, lifting a test mass to provide power. According to sources, a single example of this sort of engine was built in 1678 or 79 using a cannon as the cylinder. The cylinder was held down to a base where the gunpowder sat, making it a breech loading design. The gasses escaped via two leather tubes attached at the top of the barrel. When the piston reached them the gasses blew the tubes open, and when the pressure fell, gravity pulled the leather down causing the tubes droop to the side of the cylinder, sealing the holes. Huygens’ presented a paper on his invention in 1680, A New Motive Power by Means of Gunpowder and Air. By 1682, the device had successfully shown that a dram (1/16th of an ounce) of gunpowder, in a cylinder seven or eight feet high and fifteen or eighteen inches in diameter, could raise seven or eight boys (or about 1,100 pounds) into the air, who held the end of the rope. \n\nHollander beater (1680s) \n\nThe Hollander beater is a machine developed by the Dutch in 1680 to produce pulp from cellulose-containing plant fibers. It replaced stamp mills for preparing pulp because the Hollander could produce in one day the same quantity of pulp that a stamp mill could produce in eight.\n\nGas lighting (1783) \n\nIn 1783, Maastricht-born chemist Jan Pieter Minckelers used coal gas for lighting and developed the first form of gas lighting.\n\nMeat slicer (1898) \n\nA meat slicer, also called a slicing machine, deli slicer or simply a slicer, is a tool used in butcher shops and delicatessens to slice meats and cheeses. The first meat slicer was invented by Wilhelm van Berkel (Wilhelmus Adrianus van Berkel) in Rotterdam in 1898. Older models of meat slicer may be operated by crank, while newer ones generally use an electric motor. \n\nPentode (1926) \n\nA pentode is an electronic device having five active electrodes. The term most commonly applies to a three-grid vacuum tube (thermionic valve), which was invented by the Dutchman Bernhard D.H. Tellegen in 1926. \n\nPhilishave (1939) \n\nPhilishave was the brand name for electric shavers manufactured by the Philips Domestic Appliances and Personal Care unit of Philips (in the US, the Norelco name is used). The Philishave shaver was invented by Philips engineer Alexandre Horowitz, who used rotating cutters instead of the reciprocating cutters that had been used in previous electric shavers.\n\nGyrator (1948) \n\nA gyrator is a passive, linear, lossless, two-port electrical network element invented by Tellegen as a hypothetical fifth linear element after the resistor, capacitor, inductor and ideal transformer. \n\nTraffic enforcement camera (1958) \n\nDutch company Gatsometer BV, founded by the 1950s rally driver Maurice Gatsonides, invented the first traffic enforcement camera. Gatsonides wished to better monitor his speed around the corners of a race track and came up with the device in order to improve his time around the circuit. The company developed the first radar for use with road traffic and is the world's largest supplier of speed-monitoring camera systems. Because of this, in some countries speed cameras are sometimes referred to as \"Gatsos\". They are also sometimes referred to as \"photo radar\", even though many of them do not use radar.\n\nThe first systems introduced in the late 1960s used film cameras, replaced by digital cameras beginning in the late 1990s.\n\nVariomatic (1958) \n\nVariomatic is the stepless, fully automatic transmission of the Dutch car manufacturer DAF, originally developed by Hub van Doorne. The Variomatic was introduced in 1958 (DAF 600), the first automatic gear box made in the Netherlands. It continues in use in motorscooters. Variomatic was the first commercially successful continuously variable transmissions (CVT).\n\nRed light camera (1965) \n\nA Red light camera is a traffic enforcement camera that captures an image of a vehicle that enters an intersection against a red traffic light. By automatically photographing such vehicles, the camera produces evidence that assists authorities in their enforcement of traffic laws. The first red light camera system was introduced in 1965, using tubes stretched across the road to detect the violation and trigger the camera. One of the first developers of these red light camera systems was Dutch company Gatsometer BV.\n\nStochastic cooling (1968) \n\nStochastic cooling is a form of particle beam cooling. It is used in some particle accelerators and storage rings to control the emission of particle beams. This process uses the electrical signals that the individual charged particles generate in a feedback loop to reduce the tendency of individual particles to move away from other particles in the beam. This technique was invented and applied at the Intersecting Storage Rings, and later the Super Proton Synchrotron, at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland by Dutch physicist Simon van der Meer. By increasing the particle density to close to the required energy, this technique improved the beam quality and, inter alia, brought the discovery of W and Z bosons within reach.\n\nClap skate (1980) \n\nThe clap skate (also called clapskates, slap skates, slapskates) is a type of ice skate used in speed skating. Clap skates were developed at the Faculty of Human Movement Sciences of the Vrije Universiteit of Amsterdam, led by Gerrit Jan van Ingen Schenau, although the idea is much older. van Ingen Schenau, who started work on a hinged speed skate in 1979, created his first prototype in 1980 and finished his PhD thesis on the subject in 1981 using the premise that a skater would benefit from extended movement keeping the blade on the ice, allowing the calf muscles more time to exert force.\n\nTransportation \n\nIce skate improvements (14th–15th centuries) \n\nIn the 14th century, the Dutch started using wooden platform skates with flat iron bottom runners. The skates were attached to the skater's shoes with leather straps and poles were used to propel the skater. Around 1500, the Dutch shifted to a narrow metal double edged blade, so the skater could now push and glide with his feet, eliminating the need for a pole.\n\nHerring Buss (15th century) \n\nA herring buss () was a type of seagoing fishing vessel, used by Dutch and Flemish herring fishermen in the 15th through early 19th centuries. The Buis was first adapted for use as a fishing vessel in the Netherlands, after the invention of gibbing made it possible to preserve herring at sea. This made longer voyages feasible, and hence enabled Dutch fishermen to follow the herring shoals far from the coasts. The first herring buss was probably built in Hoorn around 1415. The last one was built in Vlaardingen in 1841.\n\nYacht (1580s) \n\nOriginally defined as a light, fast sailing vessel used by the Dutch navy to pursue pirates and other transgressors around and into the shallow waters of the Low Countries. Later, yachts came to be perceived as luxury, or recreational vessels.\n\nFluyt (16th century) \n\nFluyt, a type of sailing vessel originally designed as a dedicated cargo vessel. Originating from the Netherlands in the 16th century, the vessel was designed to facilitate transoceanic delivery with the maximum of space and crew efficiency. The inexpensive ship could be built in large numbers. This ship class was credited with enhancing Dutch competitiveness in international trade and was widely employed by the Dutch East India Company in the 17th and 18th centuries. The fluyt was a significant factor in the 17th century rise of the Dutch seaborne empire. \n\nWind-powered sawmill (1592) \n\nCornelis Corneliszoon was the inventor of the wind-powered sawmill. Prior to the invention of sawmills, boards were rived and planed, or more often sawn by two men with a whipsaw using saddleblocks to hold the log and a pit for the pitman who worked below and got the benefit of sawdust in his eyes. Sawing was slow and required strong and durable sawmen. The topsawer had to be the stronger of the two because the saw was pulled in turn by each man, and the lower had the advantage of gravity. The topsawyer also had to guide the saw to produce a plank of even thickness. This was often done by following a chalkline.\n\nEarly sawmills adapted the whipsaw to mechanical power, generally driven by a water wheel to speed up the process. The circular motion of the wheel was changed to back-and-forth motion of the saw blade by a pitman thus introducing a term used in many mechanical applications. A pitman is similar to a crankshaft used in reverse. A crankshaft converts back-and-forth motion to circular motion.\n\nGenerally only the saw was powered and the logs had to be loaded and moved by hand. An early improvement was the development of a movable carriage, also water powered, to steadily advance the log through the saw blade.\n\nSchooner (prototype) (17th century) \n\nA schooner is a type of sailing vessel with fore-and-aft sails on two or more masts, the foremast being no taller than the rear mast(s). Such vessels were first used by the Dutch in the 16th or 17th century (but may not have been called that at the time). Schooners first evolved from a variety of small two-masted gaff-rigged vessels used in the coast and estuaries of the Netherlands in the late 17th century. Most were working craft but some pleasure yachts with schooner rigs were built for wealthy merchants and Dutch nobility. Following arrival of the Dutch-born prince William III the Orange on the British throne, the British Royal Navy built a Royal yacht with a schooner rig in 1695, HMS Royal Transport. This vessel, captured in a detailed Admiralty model, is the earliest fully documented schooner. Royal Transport was quickly noted for its speed and ease of handling and mercantile vessels soon adopted the rig in Europe and in European colonies in North America. Schooners were immediately popular with colonial traders and fishermen in North America with the first documented reference to a schooner in America appearing in Boston port records in 1716. North American shipbuilders quickly developed a variety of schooner forms for trading, fishing and privateering. According to the language scholar Walter William Skeat, the term schooner comes from scoon, while the sch spelling comes from the later adoption of the Dutch spelling (\"schoener\"). Another study suggests that a Dutch expression praising ornate schooner yachts in the 17th century, \"een schoone Schip\", may have led to the term \"schooner\" being used by English speakers to describe the early versions of the schooner rig as it evolved in England and America. \n\nLand yacht (1600) \n\nThe Wind chariot or land yacht (Zeilwagen) was designed by Flemish-born mathematician & engineer Simon Stevin for Prince Maurice of Orange. Land yacht. It offered a carriage with sails, of which a little model was preserved in Scheveningen until 2012. Around the year 1600, Stevin, Maurice and twenty-six others used it on the beach between Scheveningen and Petten. The carriage was propelled solely by force of wind, and traveled faster than horse-drawn vehicles.\n\nFirst verified practical (navigable) submarine (1620) \n\nA replica of reduced scale of Drebbel's submarine built by the team of the TV-series \"Building the Impossible\" (2002).\nCornelius Drebbel was the inventor of the first navigable submarine, while working for the British Royal Navy. Using William Bourne's design from 1578, he manufactured a steerable submarine with a leather-covered wooden frame. Between 1620 and 1624 Drebbel successfully built and tested two more, successively larger vessels. The third model had 6 oars and could carry 16 passengers. This model was demonstrated to King James I and several thousand Londoners. The submarine stayed submerged for three hours and could travel from Westminster to Greenwich and back, cruising at a depth of from 12 to. This submarine was tested many times in the Thames, but never used in battle. \n\nIn 2002, the British boatbuilder Mark Edwards built a wooden submarine based on the original 17th-century version by Drebbel. This was shown in the BBC TV programme Building the Impossible in November 2002. It is a scale working model of the original and was built using tools and construction methods common in 17th century boat building and was successfully tested under water with two rowers at Dorney Lake, diving beneath the surface and being rowed underwater for 10 minutes. Legal considerations prevented its use on the River Thames itself.\n\nFirst ever car equipped with a six-cylinder engine, along with four-wheel drive (1903) \n\nSpyker is credited with building and racing the first ever four-wheel racing car in 1903. The first four-wheel-drive car, as well as hill-climb racer, with internal combustion engine, the Spyker 60 H.P., was presented in 1903 by Dutch brothers Jacobus and Hendrik-Jan Spijker of Amsterdam. The two-seat sports car, which was also the first ever car equipped with a six-cylinder engine, is now an exhibit in the Louwman Collection (the former Nationaal Automobiel Museum) at the Hague in The Netherlands. \n\nOthers\n\nFirst practical national anthem (Het Wilhelmus) (1574) \n\nWilhelmus van Nassouwe (Het Wilhelmus) is the national anthem of the Netherlands and is the oldest national anthem in the world. The anthem was first written down in 1574 (during the Dutch Revolt). The Japanese anthem, Kimigayo, has the oldest (9th century) lyrics, but a melody was only added in the late 19th century, making it a poem rather than an anthem for most of its lifespan. Although the Wilhelmus was not officially recognised as the Dutch national anthem until 1932, it has always been popular with parts of the Dutch population and resurfaced on several occasions in the course of Dutch history before gaining its present status.\n\nDiscoveries\n\nArchaeology\n\nJava Man (Homo erectus erectus) (1891) \n\nJava Man (Homo erectus erectus) is the name given to hominid fossils discovered in 1891 at Trinil – Ngawi Regency on the banks of the Solo River in East Java, Indonesia, one of the first known specimens of Homo erectus. Its discoverer, Dutch paleontologist Eugène Dubois, gave it the scientific name Pithecanthropus erectus, a name derived from Greek and Latin roots meaning upright ape-man.\n\nAstronomy \n\nColumba (constellation) (1592) \n\nColumba is a small, faint constellation named in the late sixteenth century. Its name is Latin for dove. It is located just south of Canis Major and Lepus. Columba was named by Dutch astronomer Petrus Plancius in 1592 in order to differentiate the 'unformed stars' of the large constellation Canis Major. Plancius first depicted Columba on the small celestial planispheres of his large wall map of 1592. It is also shown on his smaller world map of 1594 and on early Dutch celestial globes.\n\nNovaya Zemlya effect (1597) \n\nThe first person to record the Novaya Zemlya effect was Gerrit de Veer, a member of Willem Barentsz' ill-fated third expedition into the polar region. Novaya Zemlya, the archipelago where de Veer first observed the phenomenon, lends its name to the effect.\n\n12 southern constellations (1597–1598) \n\nPlancius defined 12 constellations created by Plancius from the observations of Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser and Frederick de Houtman. \n\n* Apus is a faint constellation in the southern sky, first defined in the late 16th century. Its name means \"no feet\" in Greek, and it represents a bird-of-paradise (once believed to lack feet). It first appeared on a 35 cm diameter celestial globe published in 1597 (or 1598) in Amsterdam by Plancius with Jodocus Hondius.\n* Chamaeleon is named after the chameleon, a kind of lizard.\n* Dorado is now one of the 88 modern constellations. Dorado has been represented historically as a dolphinfish and a swordfish.\n* Grus is Latin for the crane, a species of bird. The stars that form Grus were originally considered part of Piscis Austrinus (the southern fish).\n* Hydrus name means \"male water snake\".\n* Indus represents an Indian, a word that could refer at the time to any native of Asia or the Americas.\n* Musca is one of the minor southern constellations. It first appeared on a 35-cm diameter celestial globe published in 1597 (or 1598) in Amsterdam by Plancius and Hondius. The first depiction of this constellation in a celestial atlas was in Johann Bayer's Uranometria of 1603.\n* Pavo is Latin for peacock.\n* Phoenix is a minor southern constellation, named after the mythical phoenix. It was the largest of the twelve.\n* Triangulum Australe is Latin for \"the southern triangle\", which distinguishes it from Triangulum in the northern sky and is derived from the almost equilateral pattern of its three brightest stars. It was first depicted on a celestial globe as Triangulus Antarcticus by Plancius in 1589, and later with more accuracy and its current name by Johann Bayer in his 1603 Uranometria.\n* Tucana is Latin for the toucan, a South American bird.\n* Volans represents a flying fish; its name is a shortened form of its original name, Piscis Volans.\n\nCamelopardalis (constellation) (1612–1613) \n\nCamelopardalis was created by Plancius in 1613 to represent the animal Rebecca rode to marry Isaac in the Bible. One year later, Jakob Bartsch featured it in his atlas. Johannes Hevelius gave it the official name of \"Camelopardus\" or \"Camelopardalis\" because he saw the constellation's many faint stars as the spots of a giraffe.\n\nMonoceros (constellation) (1612–1613) \n\nMonoceros is a relatively modern creation. Its first certain appearance was on a globe created by Plancius in 1612 or 1613. It was later charted by Bartsch as Unicornus in his 1624 star chart.\n\nRings of Saturn (1655) \n\nIn 1655, Huygens became the first person to suggest that Saturn was surrounded by a ring, after Galileo's much less advanced telescope had failed to show rings. Galileo had reported the anomaly as possibly 3 planets instead of one.\n\nTitan (Saturn's moon) (1655) \n\nIn 1655, using a 50 power refracting telescope that he designed himself, Huygens discovered the first of Saturn's moons, Titan.\n\nKapteyn's Star (1897) \n\nKapteyn's Star is a class M1 red dwarf about 12.76 light years from Earth in the southern constellation Pictor, and the closest halo star to the Solar System. With a magnitude of nearly 9 it is visible through binoculars or a telescope. It had the highest proper motion of any star known until the discovery of Barnard's Star in 1916. Attention was first drawn to what is now known as Kapteyn's Star by the Dutch astronomer Jacobus Kapteyn, in 1897.\n\nDiscovery of evidence for galactic rotation (1904) \n\nIn 1904, studying the proper motions of stars, Dutch astronomer Jacobus Kapteyn reported that these were not random, as it was believed in that time; stars could be divided into two streams, moving in nearly opposite directions. It was later realized that Kapteyn's data had been the first evidence of the rotation of our Galaxy, which ultimately led to the finding of galactic rotation by Bertil Lindblad and Jan Oort.\n\nGalactic halo (1924) \n\nIn 1924, Dutch astronomer Jan Oort discovered the galactic halo, a group of stars orbiting the Milky Way but outside the main disk.\n\nOort constants (1927) \n\nThe Oort constants (discovered by Jan Oort) A and B are empirically derived parameters that characterize the local rotational properties of the Milky Way.\n\nEvidence of dark matter (1932) \n\nIn 1932, Dutch astronomer Jan Oort became the first person to discover evidence of dark matter. Oort proposed the substance after measuring the motions of nearby stars in the Milky Way relative to the galactic plane. He found that the mass of the galactic plane must be more than the mass of the material that can be seen. A year later (1933), Fritz Zwicky examined the dynamics of clusters of galaxies and found their movements similarly perplexing.\n\nDiscovery of methane in the atmosphere of Titan (1944) \n\nThe first formal proof of the existence of an atmosphere around Titan came in 1944, when Gerald Kuiper observed Titan with the new McDonald 82 in telescope and discovered spectral signatures on Titan at wavelengths longer than 0.6 μm (micrometers), among which he identified two absorption bands of methane at 6190 and 7250 Å (Kuiper1944). This discovery was significant not only because it requires a dense atmosphere with a significant fraction of methane, but also because the atmosphere needs to be chemically evolved, since methane requires hydrogen in the presence of carbon, and molecular and atomic hydrogen would have escaped from Titan's weak gravitational field since the formation of the solar system. \n\nDiscovery of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of Mars (1947) \n\nUsing infrared spectrometry, in 1947 the Dutch-American astronomer Gerard Kuiper detected carbon dioxide in the Martian atmosphere, a discovery of biological significance because it is a principal gas in the process of photosynthesis (see also: History of Mars observation). He was able to estimate that the amount of carbon dioxide over a given area of the surface is double that on the Earth.\n\nMiranda (Uranus's moon) (1948) \n\nMiranda is the smallest and innermost of Uranus's five major moons. It was discovered by Gerard Kuiper on 16 February 1948 at McDonald Observatory.\n\nNereid (Neptune's moon) (1949) \n\nNereid, also known as Neptune II, is the third-largest moon of Neptune and was its second moon to be discovered, on 1 May 1949, by Gerard Kuiper, on photographic plates taken with the 82-inch telescope at McDonald Observatory.\n\nOort cloud (1950) \n\nThe Oort cloud or Öpik–Oort cloud, named after Dutch astronomer Jan Oort and Estonian astronomer Ernst Öpik, is a spherical cloud of predominantly icy planetesimals believed to surround the Sun at a distance of up to . Further evidence for the existence of the Kuiper belt emerged from the study of comets. That comets have finite lifespans has been known for some time. As they approach the Sun, its heat causes their volatile surfaces to sublimate into space, gradually evaporating them. In order for comets to continue to be visible over the age of the Solar System, they must be replenished frequently. One such area of replenishment is the Oort cloud, a spherical swarm of comets extending beyond 50,000 AU from the Sun first hypothesised by Dutch astronomer Jan Oort in 1950. The Oort cloud is believed to be the point of origin of long-period comets, which are those, like Hale–Bopp, with orbits lasting thousands of years.\n\nKuiper belt (1951) \n\nThe Kuiper belt was named after Dutch-American astronomer Gerard Kuiper, regarded by many as the father of modern planetary science, though his role in hypothesising it has been heavily contested. In 1951, he proposed the existence of what is now called the Kuiper Belt, a disk-shaped region of minor planets outside the orbit of Neptune, which also is a source of short-period comets.\n\nBiology \n\nFoundations of modern reproductive biology (1660s –1670s) \n\nIn the 1660s and 1670s the Dutch Republic-based scientists (in particular Leiden University-based Jan Swammerdam and Nicolas Steno, and Delft-based Regnier de Graaf and Anton van Leeuwenhoek) made key discoveries about animal and human reproduction. Their research and discoveries contributed greatly to the modern understanding of the female mammalian reproductive system. Many authors see Regnier de Graaf as the founder of modern reproductive biology (Setchell, 1974). This is due essentially to his use of convergent scientific methods: meticulous dissections, clinical observations and critical analysis of the available literature (Ankumet al., 1996). \n\nFunction of the Fallopian tubes (1660s) \n\nDutch physician & anatomist Regnier de Graaf may have been the first to understand the reproductive function of the Fallopian tubes. He described the hydrosalpinx, linking its development to female infertility. de Graaf recognized pathologic conditions of the tubes. He was aware of tubal pregnancies, and he surmised that the mammalian egg traveled from the ovary to the uterus through the tube.\n\nDevelopment of ovarian follicles (1672) \n\nIn his De Mulierum Organis Generatione Inservientibus (1672), de Graaf provided the first thorough description of the female gonad and established that it produced the ovum. De Graaf used the terminology vesicle or egg (ovum) for what now called the ovarian follicle. Because the fluid-filled ovarian vesicles had been observed previously by others, including Andreas Vesalius and Falloppio, De Graaf did not claim their discovery. He noted that he was not the first to describe them, but to describe their development. De Graaf was the first to observe changes in the ovary before and after mating and describe the corpus luteum. From the observation of pregnancy in rabbits, he concluded that the follicle contained the oocyte. The mature stage of the ovarian follicle is called the Graafian follicle in his honour, although others, including Fallopius, had noticed it previously but failed to recognize its reproductive significance.\n\nFoundations of microbiology (discovery of microorganisms) (1670s) \n\nAntonie van Leeuwenhoek is often considered to be the father of microbiology. Robert Hooke is cited as the first to record microscopic observation of the fruiting bodies of molds, in 1665. However, the first observation of microbes using a microscope is generally credited to van Leeuwenhoek. In the 1670s, he observed and researched bacteria and other microorganisms, using a single-lens microscope of his own design. \n\nIn 1981 the British microscopist Brian J. Ford found that Leeuwenhoek's original specimens had survived in the collections of the Royal Society of London. They were found to be of high quality, and were all well preserved. Ford carried out observations with a range of microscopes, adding to our knowledge of Leeuwenhoek's work. \n\nPhotosynthesis (1779) \n\nPhotosynthesis is a fundamental biochemical process in which plants, algae, and some bacteria convert sunlight to chemical energy. The process was discovered by Jan Ingenhousz in 1779. The chemical energy is used to drive reactions such as the formation of sugars or the fixation of nitrogen into amino acids, the building blocks for protein synthesis. Ultimately, nearly all living things depend on energy produced from photosynthesis. It is also responsible for producing the oxygen that makes animal life possible. Organisms that produce energy through photosynthesis are called photoautotrophs. Plants are the most visible representatives of photoautotrophs, but bacteria and algae also employ the process.\n\nPlant respiration (1779) \n\nPlant respiration was also discovered by Ingenhousz in 1779.\n\nFoundations of virology (1898) \n\nMartinus Beijerinck is considered one of the founders of virology. In 1898, he published results on his filtration experiments, demonstrating that tobacco mosaic disease is caused by an infectious agent smaller than a bacterium. His results were in accordance with similar observations made by Dmitri Ivanovsky in 1892. Like Ivanovsky and Adolf Mayer, predecessor at Wageningen, Beijerinck could not culture the filterable infectious agent. He concluded that the agent can replicate and multiply in living plants. He named the new pathogen virus to indicate its non-bacterial nature. This discovery is considered to be the beginning of virology.\n\nChemistry of photosynthesis (1931) \n\nIn 1931, Cornelis van Niel made key discoveries explaining the chemistry of photosynthesis. By studying purple sulfur bacteria and green sulfur bacteria, he was the first scientist to demonstrate that photosynthesis is a light-dependent redox reaction, in which hydrogen reduces carbon dioxide. Expressed as:\n2 H2A + CO2 → 2A + CH2O + H2O\n\nwhere A is the electron acceptor. His discovery predicted that H2O is the hydrogen donor in green plant photosynthesis and is oxidized to O2. The chemical summation of photosynthesis was a milestone in the understanding of the chemistry of photosynthesis. This was later experimentally verified by Robert Hill.\n\nFoundations of modern ethology (Tinbergen's four questions) (1930s) \n\nMany naturalists have studied aspects of animal behaviour throughout history. Ethology has its scientific roots in the work of Charles Darwin and of American and German ornithologists of the late 19th and early 20th century, including Charles O. Whitman, Oskar Heinroth, and Wallace Craig. The modern discipline of ethology is generally considered to have begun during the 1930s with the work of Dutch biologist Nikolaas Tinbergen and by Austrian biologists Konrad Lorenz and Karl von Frisch. \n\nTinbergen's four questions, named after Nikolaas Tinbergen, one of the founders of modern ethology, are complementary categories of explanations for behaviour. It suggests that an integrative understanding of behaviour must include both a proximate and ultimate (functional) analysis of behaviour, as well as an understanding of both phylogenetic/developmental history and the operation of current mechanisms. \n\nVroman effect (1975) \n\nThe Vroman effect, named after Leo Vroman, is exhibited by protein adsorption to a surface by blood serum proteins.\n\nChemistry \n\nConcept of gas (1600s) \n\nFlemish physician Jan Baptist van Helmont is sometimes considered the founder of pneumatic chemistry, coining the word gas and conducting experiments involving gases. Van Helmont had derived the word “gas” from the Dutch word geest, which means ghost or spirit.\n\nFoundations of stereochemistry (1874) \n\nDutch chemist Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff is generally considered to be one of the founders of the field of stereochemistry. In 1874, Van 't Hoff built on the work on isomers of German chemist Johannes Wislicenus, and showed that the four valencies of the carbon atom were probably directed in space toward the four corners of a regular tetrahedron, a model which explained how optical activity could be associated with an asymmetric carbon atom. He shares credit for this with the French chemist Joseph Le Bel, who independently came up with the same idea. Three months before his doctoral degree was awarded Van 't Hoff published this theory, which today is regarded as the foundation of stereochemistry, first in a Dutch pamphlet in the fall of 1874, and then in the following May in a small French book entitled La chimie dans l'espace. A German translation appeared in 1877, at a time when the only job Van 't Hoff could find was at the Veterinary School in Utrecht. In these early years his theory was largely ignored by the scientific community, and was sharply criticized by one prominent chemist, Hermann Kolbe. However, by about 1880 support for Van 't Hoff's theory by such important chemists as Johannes Wislicenus and Viktor Meyer brought recognition.\n\nFoundations of modern physical chemistry (1880s) \n\nJacobus van 't Hoff is also considered as one of the modern founders of the disciple of physical chemistry. The first scientific journal specifically in the field of physical chemistry was the German journal, Zeitschrift für Physikalische Chemie, founded in 1887 by Wilhelm Ostwald and Van 't Hoff. Together with Svante Arrhenius, these were the leading figures in physical chemistry in the late 19th century and early 20th century.\n\nVan 't Hoff equation (1884) \n\nThe Van 't Hoff equation in chemical thermodynamics relates the change in the equilibrium constant, Keq, of a chemical equilibrium to the change in temperature, T, given the standard enthalpy change, ΔHo, for the process. It was proposed by Dutch chemist Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff in 1884. The Van 't Hoff equation has been widely utilized to explore the changes in state functions in a thermodynamic system. The Van 't Hoff plot, which is derived from this equation, is especially effective in estimating the change in enthalpy, or total energy, and entropy, or amount of disorder, of a chemical reaction.\n\nVan 't Hoff factor (1884) \n\nThe van 't Hoff factor i is a measure of the effect of a solute upon colligative properties such as osmotic pressure, relative lowering in vapor pressure, elevation of boiling point and freezing point depression. The van 't Hoff factor is the ratio between the actual concentration of particles produced when the substance is dissolved, and the concentration of a substance as calculated from its mass.\n\nLobry de Bruyn–van Ekenstein transformation (1885) \n\nIn carbohydrate chemistry, the Lobry de Bruyn–van Ekenstein transformation is the base or acid-catalyzed transformation of an aldose into the ketose isomer or vice versa, with a tautomeric enediol as reaction intermediate. The transformation is relevant for the industrial production of certain ketoses and was discovered in 1885 by Cornelis Adriaan Lobry van Troostenburg de Bruyn and Willem Alberda van Ekenstein.\n\nPrins reaction (1919) \n\nThe Prins reaction is an organic reaction consisting of an electrophilic addition of an aldehyde or ketone to an alkene or alkyne followed by capture of a nucleophile. Dutch chemist Hendrik Jacobus Prins discovered two new organic reactions, both now carrying the name Prins reaction. The first was the addition of polyhalogen compounds to olefins, was found during Prins doctoral research, while the others, the acid-catalyzed addition of aldehydes to olefinic compounds, became of industrial relevance.\n\nHafnium (1923) \n\nDutch physicist Dirk Coster and Hungarian-Swedish chemist George de Hevesy co-discovered Hafnium (Hf) in 1923, by means of X-ray spectroscopic analysis of zirconium ore. Hafnium' is named after Hafnia', the Latin name for Copenhagen (Denmark), where it was discovered.\n\nCrystal bar process (1925) \n\nThe crystal bar process (also known as iodide process or the van Arkel–de Boer process) was developed by Dutch chemists Anton Eduard van Arkel and Jan Hendrik de Boer in 1925. It was the first industrial process for the commercial production of pure ductile metallic zirconium. It is used in the production of small quantities of ultra-pure titanium and zirconium.\n\nKoopmans' theorem (1934) \n\nKoopmans' theorem states that in closed-shell Hartree–Fock theory, the first ionization energy of a molecular system is equal to the negative of the orbital energy of the highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO). This theorem is named after Tjalling Koopmans, who published this result in 1934. \nKoopmans became a Nobel laureate in 1975, though neither in physics nor chemistry, but in economics.\n\nGenetics \n\nConcept of pangene/gene (1889) \n\nIn 1889, Dutch botanist Hugo de Vries published his book Intracellular Pangenesis, in which he postulated that different characters have different hereditary carriers, based on a modified version of Charles Darwin's theory of Pangenesis of 1868. He specifically postulated that inheritance of specific traits in organisms comes in particles. He called these units pangenes, a term shortened in 1909 to genes by Danish botanist Wilhelm Johannsen.\n\nRediscovery the laws of inheritance (1900) \n\n1900 marked the \"rediscovery of Mendelian genetics\". The significance of Gregor Mendel's work was not understood until early in the twentieth century, after his death, when his research was re-discovered by Hugo de Vries, Carl Correns and Erich von Tschermak, who were working on similar problems. They were unaware of Mendel's work. They worked independently on different plant hybrids, and came to Mendel's conclusions about the rules of inheritance.\n\nGeology \n\nBushveld Igneous Complex (1897) \n\nThe Bushveld Igneous Complex (or BIC) is a large, layered igneous intrusion within the Earth's crust that has been tilted and eroded and now outcrops around what appears to be the edge of a great geological basin, the Transvaal Basin. Located in South Africa, the BIC contains some of Earth's richest ore deposits. The complex contains the world's largest reserves of platinum group metals (PGMs), platinum, palladium, osmium, iridium, rhodium, and ruthenium, along with vast quantities of iron, tin, chromium, titanium and vanadium. The site was discovered around 1897 by Dutch geologist Gustaaf Molengraaff.\n\nMathematics \n\nAnalytic geometry (1637) \n\nDescartes (1596–1650) was born in France, but spent most of his adult life in the Dutch Republic. As Bertrand Russell noted in his A History of Western Philosophy (1945): \"He lived in Holland for twenty years (1629–49), except for a few brief visits to France and one to England, all on business....\". In 1637, Descartes published his work on the methods of science, Discours de la méthode in Leiden. One of its three appendices was La Géométrie, in which he outlined a method to connect the expressions of algebra with the diagrams of geometry. It combined both algebra and geometry under one specialty — algebraic geometry, now called analytic geometry, which involves reducing geometry to a form of arithmetic and algebra and translating geometric shapes into algebraic equations.\n\nCartesian coordinate system (1637) \n\nDescartes' La Géométrie contains Descartes' first introduction of the Cartesian coordinate system.\n\nDifferential geometry of curves (concepts of the involute and evolute of a curve) (1673) \n\nChristiaan Huygens was the first to publish in 1673 (Horologium Oscillatorium) a specific method of determining the evolute and involute of a curve \n\nKorteweg–de Vries equation (1895) \n\nIn mathematics, the Korteweg–de Vries equation (KdV equation for short) is a mathematical model of waves on shallow water surfaces. It is particularly notable as the prototypical example of an exactly solvable model, that is, a non-linear partial differential equation whose solutions can be exactly and precisely specified. The equation is named for Diederik Korteweg and Gustav de Vries who, in 1895, proposed a mathematical model which allowed to predict the waves behaviour on shallow water surfaces. \n\nProof of the Brouwer fixed-point theorem (1911) \n\nBrouwer fixed-point theorem is a fixed-point theorem in topology, named after Dutchman Luitzen Brouwer, who proved it in 1911.\n\nProof of the hairy ball theorem (1912) \n\nThe hairy ball theorem of algebraic topology states that there is no nonvanishing continuous tangent vector field on even-dimensional n-spheres. The theorem was first stated by Henri Poincaré in the late 19th century. It was first proved in 1912 by Brouwer. \n\nDebye functions (1912) \n\nThe Debye functions are named in honor of Peter Debye, who came across this function (with n = 3) in 1912 when he analytically computed the heat capacity of what is now called the Debye model.\n\nKramers–Kronig relations (1927) \n\nThe Kramers–Kronig relations are bidirectional mathematical relations, connecting the real and imaginary parts of any complex function that is analytic in the upper half-plane. The relation is named in honor of Ralph Kronig and Hendrik Anthony Kramers. \n\nHeyting algebra (formalized intuitionistic logic) (1930) \n\nFormalized intuitionistic logic was originally developed by Arend Heyting to provide a formal basis for Luitzen Brouwer's programme of intuitionism. Arend Heyting introduced Heyting algebra (1930) to formalize intuitionistic logic. \n\nZernike polynomials (1934) \n\nIn mathematics, the Zernike polynomials are a sequence of polynomials that are orthogonal on the unit disk. Named after Frits Zernike, the Dutch optical physicist, and the inventor of phase contrast microscopy, they play an important role in beam optics.\n\nMinnaert function (1941) \n\nIn 1941, Marcel Minnaert invented the Minnaert function, which is used in optical measurements of celestial bodies. The Minnaert function is a photometric function used to interpret astronomical observations and remote sensing data for the Earth. \n\nMechanics \n\nProof of the law of equilibrium on an inclined plane (1586) \n\nIn 1586, Simon Stevin (Stevinus) derived the mechanical advantage of the inclined plane by an argument that used a string of beads. Stevin's proof of the law of equilibrium on an inclined plane, known as the \"Epitaph of Stevinus\".\n\nCentripetal force (1659) \n\nChristiaan Huygens stated what is now known as the second of Newton's laws of motion in a quadratic form.Ernst Mach, The Science of Mechanics (1919), e.g. p.143, p.172 and p.187 . In 1659 he derived the now standard formula for the centripetal force, exerted by an object describing a circular motion, for instance on the string to which it is attached. In modern notation:\n\nF_{c}=\\frac{m\\ v^2}{r}\n\nwith m the mass of the object, v the velocity and r the radius. The publication of the general formula for this force in 1673 was a significant step in studying orbits in astronomy. It enabled the transition from Kepler's third law of planetary motion, to the inverse square law of gravitation. \n\nCentrifugal force (1659) \n\nHuygens coined the term centrifugal force in his 1659 De Vi Centrifiga and wrote of it in his 1673 Horologium Oscillatorium on pendulums.\n\nFormula for the period of mathematical pendulum (1659) \n\nIn 1659, Christiaan Huygens was the first to derive the formula for the period of an ideal mathematical pendulum (with massless rod or cord and length much longer than its swing), in modern notation:\n\nT = 2 \\pi \\sqrt{\\frac{l}{g}}\n\nwith T the period, l the length of the pendulum and g the gravitational acceleration. By his study of the oscillation period of compound pendulums Huygens made pivotal contributions to the development of the concept of moment of inertia.\n\nTautochrone curve (isochrone curve) (1659) \n\nA tautochrone or isochrone curve is the curve for which the time taken by an object sliding without friction in uniform gravity to its lowest point is independent of its starting point. The curve is a cycloid, and the time is equal to π times the square root of the radius over the acceleration of gravity. Christiaan Huygens was the first to discover the tautochronous property (or isochronous property) of the cycloid. The tautochrone problem, the attempt to identify this curve, was solved by Christiaan Huygens in 1659. He proved geometrically in his Horologium Oscillatorium, originally published in 1673, that the curve was a cycloid. Huygens also proved that the time of descent is equal to the time a body takes to fall vertically the same distance as the diameter of the circle which generates the cycloid, multiplied by π⁄2. The tautochrone curve is the same as the brachistochrone curve for any given starting point. Johann Bernoulli posed the problem of the brachistochrone to the readers of Acta Eruditorum in June, 1696. He published his solution in the journal in May of the following year, and noted that the solution is the same curve as Huygens's tautochrone curve. \n\nCoupled oscillation (spontaneous synchronization) (1665) \n\nChristiaan Huygens observed that two pendulum clocks mounted next to each other on the same support often become synchronized, swinging in opposite directions. In 1665, he reported the results by letter to the Royal Society of London. It is referred to as \"an odd kind of sympathy\" in the Society's minutes. This may be the first published observation of what is now called coupled oscillations. In the 20th century, coupled oscillators took on great practical importance because of two discoveries: lasers, in which different atoms give off light waves that oscillate in unison, and superconductors, in which pairs of electrons oscillate in synchrony, allowing electricity to flow with almost no resistance. Coupled oscillators are even more ubiquitous in nature, showing up, for example, in the synchronized flashing of fireflies and chirping of crickets, and in the pacemaker cells that regulate heartbeats.\n\nMedicine \n\nFoundations of modern (human) anatomy (1543) \n\nFlemish anatomist and physician Andreas Vesalius is often referred to as the founder of modern human anatomy for the publication of the seven-volume De humani corporis fabrica (On the Structure of the Human Body) in 1543.\n\nCrystals in gouty tophi (1679) \n\nIn 1679, van Leeuwenhoek used a microscopes to assess tophaceous material and found that gouty tophi consist of aggregates of needle-shaped crystals, and not globules of chalk as was previously believed.\n\nBoerhaave syndrome (1724) \n\nBoerhaave syndrome (also known as spontaneous esophageal perforation or esophageal rupture) refers to an esophageal rupture secondary to forceful vomiting. Originally described in 1724 by Dutch physician/botanist Hermann Boerhaave, it is a rare condition with high mortality. The syndrome was described after the case of a Dutch admiral, Baron Jan von Wassenaer, who died of the condition.\n\nFactor V Leiden (1994) \n\nFactor V Leiden is an inherited disorder of blood clotting. It is a variant of human factor V that causes a hypercoagulability disorder. It is named after the city Leiden, where it was first identified by R. Bertina, et al., in 1994.\n\nMicrobiology \n\nBlood cells (1658) \n\nIn 1658 Dutch naturalist Jan Swammerdam was the first person to observe red blood cells under a microscope and in 1695, microscopist Antoni van Leeuwenhoek, also Dutch, was the first to draw an illustration of \"red corpuscles\", as they were called. No further blood cells were discovered until 1842 when the platelets were discovered.\n\nRed blood cells (1658) \n\nThe first person to observe and describe red blood cells was Dutch biologist Jan Swammerdam, who had used an early microscope to study the blood of a frog.\n\nMicro-organisms (1670s) \n\nA resident of Delft, Anton van Leeuwenhoek, used a high-power single-lens simple microscope to discover the world of micro-organisms. His simple microscopes were made of silver or copper frames, holding hand-ground lenses were capable of magnification up to 275 times. Using these he was the first to observe and describe single-celled organisms, which he originally referred to as animalcules, and which now referred to as micro-organisms or microbes.\n\n*Infusoria (1674) - Infusoria is a collective term for minute aquatic creatures including ciliate, euglena, paramecium, protozoa and unicellular algae that exist in freshwater ponds. However, in formal classification microorganism called infusoria belongs to Kingdom Animalia, Phylum Protozoa, Class Ciliates (Infusoria). They were first discovered by Antoni van Leeuwenhoek.\n\n*Protozoa (1674) - In 1674, Van Leeuwenhoek was the first person to observe and describe protozoa.\n*Bacteria (1676) - The first bacteria were observed by van Leeuwenhoek in 1676 using his single-lens microscope. He described the creatures he saw as small creatures. The name bacterium was introduced much later, by Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg in 1828, derived from the Greek word βακτηριον meaning \"small stick\". Because of the difficulty in describing individual bacteria and the importance of their discovery, the study of bacteria is generally that of the study of microbiology.\n*Sperm cells (1677) - Sperm cells were first observed by Anton van Leeuwenhoek in 1677. The term \"sperm\" refers to the male reproductive cells. A uniflagellar sperm cell that is motile is referred to as a \"spermatozoon\", whereas a non-motile sperm cell is referred to as a \"spermatium\".\n*Spermatozoa (1677) - A spermatozoon or spermatozoon (pl. spermatozoa), from the ancient Greek σπερμα (seed) and ζων (alive) and more commonly known as a sperm cell, is the haploid cell that is the male gamete. Sperm cells were first observed by a student of van Leeuwenhoek in 1677. Leeuwenhoek pictured sperm cells with great accuracy.\n\n*Giardia (1681) - Giardia is a genus of anaerobic flagellated protozoan parasites of the phylum Sarcomastigophora that colonise and reproduce in the small intestines of several vertebrates, causing giardiasis. Their life cycle alternates between an actively swimming trophozoite and an infective, resistant cyst. The trophozoite form of Giardia was first observed in 1681 by Van Leeuwenhoek during observation of his own stool. \n\nVolvox (1700)- Volvox is a genus of chlorophytes, a type of green algae. It forms spherical colonies of up to 50,000 cells. They live in a variety of freshwater habitats, and were first reported by Van Leeuwenhoek in 1700.\n\nBiological nitrogen fixation (1885) \n\nBiological nitrogen fixation was discovered by Martinus Beijerinck in 1885.\n\nRhizobium (1888) \n\nRhizobium is a genus of Gram-negative soil bacteria that fix nitrogen. Rhizobium forms an endosymbiotic nitrogen fixing association with roots of legumes and Parasponia. Martinus Beijerinck in the Netherlands was the first to isolate and cultivate a microorganism from the nodules of legumes in 1888. He named it Bacillus radicicola, which is now placed in Bergey's Manual of Determinative Bacteriology under the genus Rhizobium.\n\nSpirillum (first isolated sulfate-reducing bacteria) (1895) \n\nMartinus Beijerinck discovered the phenomenon of bacterial sulfate reduction, a form of anaerobic respiration. He learned that bacteria could use sulfate as a terminal electron acceptor, instead of oxygen. He isolated and described Spirillum desulfuricans (now called Desulfovibrio desulfuricans ), the first known sulfate-reducing bacterium.\n\nConcept of virus (1898) \n\nIn 1898 Beijerinck coined the term \"virus\" to indicate that the causal agent of tobacco mosaic disease was non-bacterial. Beijerinck discovered what is now known as the tobacco mosaic virus. He observed that the agent multiplied only in cells that were dividing and he called it a contagium vivum fluidum (contagious living fluid). Beijerinck's discovery is considered to be the beginning of virology. \n\nAzotobacter (1901) \n\nAzotobacter is a genus of usually motile, oval or spherical bacteria that form thick-walled cysts and may produce large quantities of capsular slime. They are aerobic, free-living soil microbes which play an important role in the nitrogen cycle in nature, binding atmospheric nitrogen, which is inaccessible to plants, and releasing it in the form of ammonium ions into the soil. Apart from being a model organism, it is used by humans for the production of biofertilizers, food additives, and some biopolymers. The first representative of the genus, Azotobacter chroococcum, was discovered and described in 1901 by the Dutch microbiologist and botanist Martinus Beijerinck.\n\nEnrichment culture (1904) \n\nBeijerinck is credited with developing the first enrichment culture, a fundamental method of studying microbes from the environment.\n\nPhysics \n\n31 equal temperament (1661) \n\nDivision of the octave into 31 steps arose naturally out of Renaissance music theory; the lesser diesis — the ratio of an octave to three major thirds, 128:125 or 41.06 cents — was approximately a fifth of a tone and a third of a semitone. In 1666, Lemme Rossi first proposed an equal temperament of this order. Shortly thereafter, having discovered it independently, scientist Christiaan Huygens wrote about it also. Since the standard system of tuning at that time was quarter-comma meantone, in which the fifth is tuned to 51/4, the appeal of this method was immediate, as the fifth of 31-et, at 696.77 cents, is only 0.19 cent wider than the fifth of quarter-comma meantone. Huygens not only realized this, he went farther and noted that 31-ET provides an excellent approximation of septimal, or 7-limit harmony. In the twentieth century, physicist, music theorist and composer Adriaan Fokker, after reading Huygens's work, led a revival of interest in this system of tuning which led to a number of compositions, particularly by Dutch composers. Fokker designed the Fokker organ, a 31-tone equal-tempered organ, which was installed in Teyler's Museum in Haarlem in 1951.\n\nFoundations of classical mechanics (1673) \n\nThrough his fundamental contributions Christiaan Huygens helped shape and lay the foundations of classical mechanics. His works cover all the fields of mechanics, from the invention of technical devices applicable to different machines to a purely rational knowledge of motion. Huygens published his results in a classic of the 17th-century mechanics, Horologium Oscillatorium (1673), that is regarded as one of the three most important work done in mechanics in the 17th century, the other two being Galileo Galilei’s Discourses and Mathematical Demonstrations Relating to Two New Sciences (1638) and Isaac Newton's Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica (1687). It is Huygens' major work on pendulums and horology. As Domenico Bertoloni Meli (2006) notes, Horologium Oscillatorium was “a masterful combination of sophisticated mathematics and mechanics mixed with a range of practical applications culminating with a new clock aimed at resolving the vexing problem of longitude.” \n\nFoundations of physical optics / wave optics (wave theory of light) (1678) \n\nHuygens' groundbreaking research on the nature of light helped lay the foundations of modern optics (physical optics in particular). Huygens is remembered especially for his wave theory of light, which he first communicated in 1678 to France's Royal Académie des sciences and which he published in 1690 in his Treatise on light. His argument that light consists of waves now known as the Huygens–Fresnel principle, two centuries later became instrumental in the understanding of wave–particle duality. The interference experiments of Thomas Young vindicated Huygens' s wave theory in 1801. \n\nPolarization of light (1678) \n\nIn 1678, Huygens discovered the polarization of light by double refraction in calcite. \n\nHuygens' principle (concepts of the wavefront and wavelet) (1690) \n\n \nIn his Treatise on light, Huygens showed how Snell's law of sines could be explained by, or derived from, the wave nature of light, using the Huygens–Fresnel principle.\n\nBernoulli's principle (1738) \n\nBernoulli's principle was discovered by Dutch-Swiss mathematician and physicist Daniel Bernoulli and named after him. It states that for an inviscid flow, an increase in the speed of the fluid occurs simultaneously with a decrease in pressure or a decrease in the fluid's potential energy.\n\nBrownian motion (1785) \n\nIn 1785, Ingenhousz described the irregular movement of coal dust on the surface of alcohol and therefore has a claim as discoverer of what came to be known as Brownian motion.\n\nBuys Ballot's law (1857) \n\nThe law takes its name from Dutch meteorologist C. H. D. Buys Ballot, who published it in the Comptes Rendus, in November 1857. While William Ferrel first theorized this in 1856, Buys Ballot was the first to provide an empirical validation. The law states that in the Northern Hemisphere, if a person stands with his back to the wind, the low pressure area will be on his left, because wind travels counterclockwise around low pressure zones in that hemisphere. this is approximately true in the higher latitudes and is reversed in the Southern Hemisphere.\n\nFoundations of molecular physics (1873) \n\nSpearheaded by Mach and Ostwald, a strong philosophical current that denied the existence of molecules arose towards the end of the 19th century. The molecular existence was considered unproven and the molecular hypothesis unnecessary. At the time Van der Waals' thesis was written (1873), the molecular structure of fluids had not been accepted by most physicists, and liquid and vapor were often considered as chemically distinct. But Van der Waals's work affirmed the reality of molecules and allowed an assessment of their size and attractive strength. By comparing his equation of state with experimental data, Van der Waals was able to obtain estimates for the actual size of molecules and the strength of their mutual attraction. The effect of Van der Waals's work on molecular science in the 20th century was direct and fundamental, as is well recognized and documented, due in large part to books by John Rowlinson (1988), and by Kipnis and Yavelov (1996). By introducing parameters characterizing molecular size and attraction in constructing his equation of state, Van der Waals set the tone for molecular physics (molecular dynamics in particular) of the 20th century. That molecular aspects such as size, shape, attraction, and multipolar interactions should form the basis for mathematical formulations of the thermodynamic and transport properties of fluids is presently considered an axiom. \n\nVan der Waals equation of state (1873) \n\nIn 1873, J. D. van der Waals introduced the first equation of state derived by the assumption of a finite volume occupied by the constituent molecules. The Van der Waals equation is generally regarded as the first somewhat realistic equation of state (beyond the ideal gas law). Van der Waals noted the non-ideality of gases and attributed it to the existence of molecular or atomic interactions. His new formula revolutionized the study of equations of state, and was most famously continued via the Redlich-Kwong equation of state (1949) and the Soave modification of Redlich-Kwong. While the Van der Waals equation is definitely superior to the ideal gas law and does predict the formation of a liquid phase, the agreement with experimental data is limited for conditions where the liquid forms. Except at higher pressures, the real gases do not obey Van der Waals equation in all ranges of pressures and temperatures. Despite its limitations, the equation has historical importance, because it was the first attempt to model the behaviour of real gases.\n\nVan der Waals forces (1873) \n\nThe van der Waals forces are named after the scientist who first described them in 1873. Johannes Diderik van der Waals noted the non-ideality of gases and attributed it to the existence of molecular or atomic interactions. They are forces that develop between the atoms inside molecules and keep them together. The Van der Waals forces between molecules, much weaker than chemical bonds but present universally, play a fundamental role in fields as diverse as supramolecular chemistry, structural biology, polymer science, nanotechnology, surface science, and condensed matter physics. Elucidation of the nature of the Van der Waals forces between molecules has remained a scientific effort from Van der Waals's days to the present.\n\nVan der Waals radius (1873) \n\nThe Van der Waals radius, r, of an atom is the radius of an imaginary hard sphere which can be used to model the atom for many purposes. It is named after Johannes Diderik van der Waals, winner of the 1910 Nobel Prize in Physics, as he was the first to recognise that atoms were not simply points and to demonstrate the physical consequences of their size through the van der Waals equation of state.\n\nLaw of corresponding states (1880) \n\nThe law of corresponding states was first suggested and formulated by van der Waals in 1880. This showed that the van der Waals equation of state can be expressed as a simple function of the critical pressure, critical volume and critical temperature. This general form is applicable to all substances. The compound-specific constants a and b in the original equation are replaced by universal (compound-independent) quantities. It was this law that served as a guide during experiments which ultimately led to the liquefaction of hydrogen by James Dewar in 1898 and of helium by Heike Kamerlingh Onnes in 1908.\n\nLorentz ether theory (1892) \n\nLorentz ether theory has its roots in Hendrik Lorentz's \"theory of electrons\", which was the final point in the development of the classical aether theories at the end of the 19th and at the beginning of the 20th century. Lorentz's initial theory created in 1892 and 1895 was based on a completely motionless aether. Many aspects of Lorentz's theory were incorporated into special relativity with the works of Albert Einstein and Hermann Minkowski.\n\nLorentz force law (1892) \n\nIn 1892, Hendrik Lorentz derived the modern form of the formula for the electromagnetic force which includes the contributions to the total force from both the electric and the magnetic fields. In many textbook treatments of classical electromagnetism, the Lorentz force law is used as the definition of the electric and magnetic fields E and B.See, for example, Jackson p777-8. To be specific, the Lorentz force is understood to be the following empirical statement:\n\nThe electromagnetic force F on a test charge at a given point and time is a certain function of its charge q and velocity v, which can be parameterized by exactly two vectors E and B, in the functional form:\n\n:\\mathbf{F}=q(\\mathbf{E}+\\mathbf{v}\\times\\mathbf{B})\n\nAbraham–Lorentz force (1895) \n\nIn the physics of electromagnetism, the Abraham–Lorentz force (also Lorentz-Abraham force) is the recoil force on an accelerating charged particle caused by the particle emitting electromagnetic radiation. It is also called the radiation reaction force or the self force.\n\nLorentz transformation (1895) \n\nIn physics, the Lorentz transformation (or Lorentz transformations) is named after the Dutch physicist Hendrik Lorentz. It was the result of attempts by Lorentz and others to explain how the speed of light was observed to be independent of the reference frame, and to understand the symmetries of the laws of electromagnetism. The Lorentz transformation is in accordance with special relativity, but was derived before special relativity. Early approximations of the transformation were published by Lorentz in 1895. In 1905, Poincaré was the first to recognize that the transformation has the properties of a mathematical group, and named it after Lorentz.\n\nLorentz contraction (1895) \n\nIn physics, length contraction (more formally called Lorentz contraction or Lorentz–FitzGerald contraction after Hendrik Lorentz and George FitzGerald) is the phenomenon of a decrease in length measured by the observer, of an object which is traveling at any non-zero velocity relative to the observer. This contraction is usually only noticeable at a substantial fraction of the speed of light.\n\nLorentz factor (1895) \n\nThe Lorentz factor or Lorentz term is the factor by which time, length, and relativistic mass change for an object while that object is moving. It is an expression which appears in several equations in special relativity, and it arises from deriving the Lorentz transformations. The name originates from its earlier appearance in Lorentzian electrodynamics – named after the Dutch physicist Hendrik Lorentz. \n\nZeeman effect (1896) \n\nThe Zeeman effect, named after the Dutch physicist Pieter Zeeman, is the effect of splitting a spectral line into several components in the presence of a static magnetic field. It is analogous to the Stark effect, the splitting of a spectral line into several components in the presence of an electric field. Also similar to the Stark effect, transitions between different components have, in general, different intensities, with some being entirely forbidden (in the dipole approximation), as governed by the selection rules.\n\nSince the distance between the Zeeman sub-levels is a function of the magnetic field, this effect can be used to measure the magnetic field, e.g. that of the Sun and other stars or in laboratory plasmas.\nThe Zeeman effect is very important in applications such as nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, electron spin resonance spectroscopy, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and Mössbauer spectroscopy. It may also be utilized to improve accuracy in atomic absorption spectroscopy.\n\nA theory about the magnetic sense of birds assumes that a protein in the retina is changed due to the Zeeman effect. \n\nWhen the spectral lines are absorption lines, the effect is called inverse Zeeman effect.\n\nLiquid helium (liquefaction of helium) (1908) \n\nHelium was first liquefied (liquid helium) on 10 July 1908, by Dutch physicist Heike Kamerlingh Onnes. With the production of liquid helium, it was said that “the coldest place on Earth” was in Leiden. \n\nSuperconductivity (1911) \n\nSuperconductivity, the ability of certain materials to conduct electricity with little or no resistance, was discovered by Dutch physicist Heike Kamerlingh Onnes. \n\nEinstein–de Haas effect (1910s) \n\nThe Einstein–de Haas effect or the Richardson effect (after Owen Willans Richardson), is a physical phenomenon delineated by Albert Einstein and Wander Johannes de Haas in the mid 1910s, that exposes a relationship between magnetism, angular momentum, and the spin of elementary particles.\n\nDebye model (1912) \n\nIn thermodynamics and solid state physics, the Debye model is a method developed by Peter Debye in 1912 for estimating the phonon contribution to the specific heat (heat capacity) in a solid. It treats the vibrations of the atomic lattice (heat) as phonons in a box, in contrast to the Einstein model, which treats the solid as many individual, non-interacting quantum harmonic oscillators. The Debye model correctly predicts the low temperature dependence of the heat capacity.\n\nDe Sitter precession (1916) \n\nThe geodetic effect (also known as geodetic precession, de Sitter precession or de Sitter effect) represents the effect of the curvature of spacetime, predicted by general relativity, on a vector carried along with an orbiting body. The geodetic effect was first predicted by Willem de Sitter in 1916, who provided relativistic corrections to the Earth–Moon system's motion.\n\nDe Sitter space and anti-de Sitter space (1920s) \n\nIn mathematics and physics, a de Sitter space is the analog in Minkowski space, or spacetime, of a sphere in ordinary, Euclidean space. The n-dimensional de Sitter space, denoted dSn, is the Lorentzian manifold analog of an n-sphere (with its canonical Riemannian metric); it is maximally symmetric, has constant positive curvature, and is simply connected for n at least 3. The de Sitter space, as well as the anti-de Sitter space is named after Willem de Sitter (1872–1934), professor of astronomy at Leiden University and director of the Leiden Observatory. Willem de Sitter and Albert Einstein worked in the 1920s in Leiden closely together on the spacetime structure of our universe. De Sitter space was discovered by Willem de Sitter, and, at the same time, independently by Tullio Levi-Civita.\n\nVan der Pol oscillator (1920) \n\nIn dynamical systems, a Van der Pol oscillator is a non-conservative oscillator with non-linear damping. It was originally proposed by Dutch physicist Balthasar van der Pol while he was working at Philips in 1920. Van der Pol studied a differential equation that describes the circuit of a vacuum tube. It has been used to model other phenomenon such as human heartbeats by colleague Jan van der Mark.\n\nKramers' opacity law (1923) \n\nKramers' opacity law describes the opacity of a medium in terms of the ambient density and temperature, assuming that the opacity is dominated by bound-free absorption (the absorption of light during ionization of a bound electron) or free-free absorption (the absorption of light when scattering a free ion, also called bremsstrahlung). It is often used to model radiative transfer, particularly in stellar atmospheres. The relation is named after the Dutch physicist Hendrik Kramers, who first derived the form in 1923. \n\nElectron spin (1925) \n\nIn 1925, Dutch physicists George Eugene Uhlenbeck and Samuel Goudsmit co-discovered the concept of electron spin, which posits an intrinsic angular momentum for all electrons.\n\nSolidification of helium (1926) \n\nIn 1926, Onnes' student, Dutch physicist Willem Hendrik Keesom, invented a method\nto freeze liquid helium and was the first person who was able to solidify the noble gas.\n\nEhrenfest theorem (1927) \n\nThe Ehrenfest theorem, named after the Austrian-born Dutch-Jew theoretical physicist Paul Ehrenfest at Leiden University.\n\nDe Haas–van Alphen effect (1930) \n\nThe de Haas–van Alphen effect, often abbreviated to dHvA, is a quantum mechanical effect in which the magnetic moment of a pure metal crystal oscillates as the intensity of an applied magnetic field B is increased. It was discovered in 1930 by Wander Johannes de Haas and his student P. M. van Alphen.\n\nShubnikov–de Haas effect (1930) \n\nThe Shubnikov–de Haas effect (ShdH) is named after Dutch physicist Wander Johannes de Haas and Russian physicist Lev Shubnikov.\n\nKramers degeneracy theorem (1930) \n\nIn quantum mechanics, the Kramers degeneracy theorem states that for every energy eigenstate of a time-reversal symmetric system with half-integer total spin, there is at least one more eigenstate with the same energy. It was first discovered in 1930 by H. A. Kramers as a consequence of the Breit equation.\n\nMinnaert resonance frequency (1933) \n\nIn 1933, Marcel Minnaert published a solution for the acoustic resonance frequency of a single bubble in water, the so-called Minnaert resonance. The Minnaert resonance or Minnaert frequency is the acoustic resonance frequency of a single bubble in an infinite domain of water (neglecting the effects of surface tension and viscous attenuation).\n\nCasimir effect (1948) \n\nIn quantum field theory, the Casimir effect and the Casimir–Polder force are physical forces arising from a quantized field. Dutch physicists Hendrik Casimir and Dirk Polder at Philips Research Labs proposed the existence of a force between two polarizable atoms and between such an atom and a conducting plate in 1947. After a conversation with Niels Bohr who suggested it had something to do with zero-point energy, Casimir alone formulated the theory predicting a force between neutral conducting plates in 1948; the former is called the Casimir–Polder force while the latter is the Casimir effect in the narrow sense.\n\nTellegen's theorem (1952) \n\nTellegen's theorem is one of the most powerful theorems in network theory. Most of the energy distribution theorems and extremum principles in network theory can be derived from it. It was published in 1952 by Bernard Tellegen. Fundamentally, Tellegen's theorem gives a simple relation between magnitudes that satisfy Kirchhoff's laws of electrical circuit theory.\n\nStochastic cooling (1970's) \n\nIn the early 1970s Simon van der Meer, a Dutch particle physicist at CERN, discovered this technique to concentrate proton and anti-proton beams, leading to the discovery of the W and Z particles. He won the 1984 Nobel Prize in Physics together with Carlo Rubbia.\n\nRenormalization of gauge theories (1971) \n\nIn 1971, Gerardus 't Hooft, who was completing his PhD under the supervision of Dutch theoretical physicist Martinus Veltman, renormalized Yang–Mills theory. They showed that if the symmetries of Yang–Mills theory were to be realized in the spontaneously broken mode, referred to as the Higgs mechanism, then Yang–Mills theory can be renormalized. Renormalization of Yang–Mills theory is considered as a major achievement of twentieth century physics.\n\nHolographic principle (1993) \n\nThe holographic principle is a property of string theories and a supposed property of quantum gravity that states that the description of a volume of space can be thought of as encoded on a boundary to the region—preferably a light-like boundary like a gravitational horizon. In 1993, Dutch theoretical physicist Gerard 't Hooft proposed what is now known as the holographic principle. It was given a precise string-theory interpretation by Leonard Susskind who combined his ideas with previous ones of 't Hooft and Charles Thorn. \n\nExplorations \n\nVoyages of discovery \n\nOrange Islands (1594) \n\nDuring his first journey in 1594, Dutch explorer Willem Barentsz discovered the Orange Islands.\n\nSvalbard (1596) \n\nOn 10 June 1596, Barentsz and Dutchman Jacob van Heemskerk discovered Bear Island, a week before their discovery of Spitsbergen Island.\n\nThe first undisputedly to have discovered the archipelago is an expedition led by the Dutch mariner Willem Barentsz, who was looking for the Northern Sea Route to China.Arlov (1994): 9 He first spotted Bjørnøya on 10 June 1596 and the northwestern tip of Spitsbergen on 17 June. The sighting of the archipelago was included in the accounts and maps made by the expedition and Spitsbergen was quickly included by cartographers. The name Spitsbergen, meaning \"pointed mountains\" (from the Dutch spits – pointed, bergen – mountains), was at first applied to both the main island and the Svalbard archipelago as a whole.\n\nWinter surviving in the High Arctic (1596-1597) \n\nThe search for the Northern Sea Route in the 16th century led to its exploration. Dutch explorer Willem Barentsz reached the west coast of Novaya Zemlya in 1594, and in a subsequent expedition of 1596 rounded the Northern point and wintered on the Northeast coast. Willem Barents, Jacob van Heemskerck and their crew were blocked by the pack ice in the Kara Sea and forced to winter on the east coast of Novaya Zemlya. The wintering of the shipwrecked crew in the 'Saved House' was the first successful wintering of Europeans in the High Arctic. Twelve of the 17 men managed to survive the polar winter (De Veer, 1917). Barentsz died during the expedition, and may have been buried on the northern island. \n\nFalkland Islands/Sebald Islands (1600) \n\nIn 1600 the Dutch navigator Sebald de Weert made the first undisputed sighting of the Falkland Islands. It was on his homeward leg back to the Netherlands after having left the Straits of Magellan that Sebald De Weert noticed some unnamed and uncharted islands, at least islands that did not exist on his nautical charts. There he attempted to stop and replenish but was unable to land due to harsh conditions. The islands Sebald de Weert charted were a small group off the northwest coast of the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas) and are in fact part of the Falklands. De Weert then named these islands the “Sebald de Weert Islands” and the Falklands as a whole were known as the Sebald Islands until well into the 18th century.\n\nPennefather River, Northern Australia (1606) \n\nThe Dutch ship, Duyfken, led by Willem Janszoon, made the first documented European landing in Australia in 1606. Although a theory of Portuguese discovery in the 1520s exists, it lacks definitive evidence. Precedence of discovery has also been claimed for China, France,Credit for the discovery of Australia was given to Frenchman Binot Paulmier de Gonneville (1504) in Spain, India, and even Phoenicia. \n\nThe Janszoon voyage of 1605-6 led to the first undisputed sighting of Australia by a European was made on 26 February 1606. Dutch vessel Duyfken, captained by Janszoon, followed the coast of New Guinea, missed Torres Strait, and explored perhaps 350 km of western side of Cape York, in the Gulf of Carpentaria, believing the land was still part of New Guinea. The Dutch made one landing, but were promptly attacked by Maoris and subsequently abandoned further exploration. \n\nThe first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, and made landfall on 26 February at the Pennefather River near the modern town of Weipa on Cape York.Davison, Hirst and Macintyre, p. 233. The Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent \"New Holland\" during the 17th century, but made no attempt at settlement.\n\nFirst charting of Manhattan, New York (1609) \n\nThe area that is now Manhattan was long inhabited by the Lenape Indians. In 1524, Florentine explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano – sailing in service of the king Francis I of France – was the first European to visit the area that would become New York City. It was not until the voyage of Henry Hudson, an Englishman who worked for the Dutch East India Company, that the area was mapped.\n\nHudson Valley (1609) \n\nAt the time of the arrival of the first Europeans in the 17th century, the Hudson Valley was inhabited primarily by the Algonquian-speaking Mahican and Munsee Native American people, known collectively as River Indians. The first Dutch settlement was in the 1610s at Fort Nassau, a trading post (factorij) south of modern-day Albany, that traded European goods for beaver pelts. Fort Nassau was later replaced by Fort Orange. During the rest of the 17th century, the Hudson Valley formed the heart of the New Netherland colony operations, with the New Amsterdam settlement on Manhattan serving as a post for supplies and defense of the upriver operations.\n\nBrouwer Route (1610–1611) \n\nThe Brouwer Route was a route for sailing from the Cape of Good Hope to Java. The Route took ships south from the Cape into the Roaring Forties, then east across the Indian Ocean, before turning northwest for Java. Thus it took advantage of the strong westerly winds for which the Roaring Forties are named, greatly increasing travel speed. It was devised by Dutch sea explorer Hendrik Brouwer in 1611, and found to halve the duration of the journey from Europe to Java, compared to the previous Arab and Portuguese monsoon route, which involved following the coast of East Africa northwards, sailing through the Mozambique Channel and then across the Indian Ocean, sometimes via India. The Brouwer Route played a major role in the discovery of the west coast of Australia.\n\nJan Mayen Island (1614) \n\nAfter unconfirmed reports of Dutch discovery as early as 1611, the island was named after Dutchman Jan Jacobszoon May van Schellinkhout, who visited the island in July 1614. As locations of these islands were kept secret by the whalers, Jan Mayen got its current name only in 1620. \n\nHell Gate, Long Island Sound, Connecticut River and Fisher's Island (1614) \n\nThe name \"Hell Gate\" is a corruption of Dutch phrase Hellegat, which could mean either \"hell's hole\" or \"bright gate/passage\". It was originally applied to the entirety of the East River. The strait was described in the journals of Dutch explorer Adriaen Block, who is the first European known to have navigated the strait, during his 1614 voyage aboard the Onrust.\n\nThe first European to record the existence of Long Island Sound and the Connecticut River was Dutch explorer Adriaen Block, who entered it from the East River in 1614.\n\nFishers Island was called Munnawtawkit by the Native American Pequot nation. Block named it Visher's Island in 1614, after one of his companions. For the next 25 years, it remained a wilderness, visited occasionally by Dutch traders.\n\nStaten Island (Argentina), Cape Horn, Tonga, Hoorn Islands (1615) \n\nOn 25 December 1615, Dutch explorers Jacob le Maire and Willem Schouten aboard the Eendracht, discovered Staten Island, close to Cape Horn.\n\nOn 29 January 1616, they sighted land they called Cape Horn, after the city of Hoorn. Aboard the Eendracht was the crew of the recently wrecked ship called Hoorn.\n\nThey discovered Tonga on 21 April 1616 and the Hoorn Islands on 28 April 1616.\n\nThey discovered New Ireland around May–July 1616.\n\nThey discovered the Schouten Islands (also known as Biak Islands or Geelvink Islands) on 24 July 1616.\n\nThe Schouten Islands (also known as Eastern Schouten Islands or Le Maire Islands) of Papua New Guinea, were named after Schouten, who visited them in 1616.\n\nDirk Hartog Island (1616) \n\nHendrik Brouwer's discovery that sailing east from the Cape of Good Hope until land was sighted, and then sailing north along the west coast of Australia was a much quicker route than around the coast of the Indian Ocean made Dutch landfalls on the west coast inevitable. The first such landfall was in 1616, when Dirk Hartog landed at Cape Inscription on what is now known as Dirk Hartog Island, off the coast of Western Australia, and left behind an inscription on a pewter plate. In 1697 the Dutch captain Willem de Vlamingh landed on the island and discovered Hartog's plate. He replaced it with one of his own, which included a copy of Hartog's inscription, and took the original plate home to Amsterdam, where it is still kept in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam.\n\nHoutman Abrolhos (1619) \n\nThe first sighting of the Houtman Abrolhos by Europeans was by Dutch VOC ships Dordrecht and Amsterdam in 1619, three years after Hartog made the first authenticated sighting of what is now Western Australia, 13 years after the first authenticated voyage to Australia, that of the Duyfke] in 1606. Discovery of the islands was credited to Frederick de Houtman, Captain-General of the Dordrecht, as it was Houtman who later wrote of the discovery in a letter to Company directors.\n\nCarstensz Glacier, Carstensz Pyramid/Puncak Jaya (1623) \n\nThe first person to spot Carstensz Pyramid (or Puncak Jaya) is reported to be the Dutch navigator and explorer Jan Carstensz in 1623, for whom the mountain is named. Carstensz was the first (non-native) to sight the glaciers on the peak of the mountain on a rare clear day. The sighting went unverified for over two centuries, and Carstensz was ridiculed in Europe when he said he had seen snow and glaciers near the equator. The snowfield of Puncak Jaya was reached as early as 1909 by a Dutch explorer, Hendrik Albert Lorentz with six of his indigenous Dayak Kenyah porters recruited from the Apo Kayan in Borneo. The now highest Carstensz Pyramid summit was not climbed until 1962, by an expedition led by the Austrian mountaineer Heinrich Harrer with three other expedition members – the New Zealand mountaineer Philip Temple, the Australian rock climber Russell Kippax, and the Dutch patrol officer Albertus (Bert) Huizenga.\n\nGulf of Carpentaria (Northern Australia) (1623) \n\nThe first known European explorer to visit the region was Dutch Willem Janszoon (also known as Willem Jansz) on his 1605–6 voyage. His fellow countryman, Jan Carstenszoon (also known as Jan Carstensz), visited in 1623 and named the gulf in honour of Pieter de Carpentier, at that time the Governor-General of Dutch East Indies. Abel Tasman explored the coast in 1644.\n\nStaaten River (Cape York Peninsula, Northern Australia) (1623) \n\nThe Staaten River is a river in the Cape York Peninsula, Australia that rises more than 200 km to the west of Cairns and empties into the Gulf of Carpentaria. The river was first named by Carstenszoon in 1623.\n\nArnhem Land and Groote Eylandt (Gulf of Carpentaria, Northern Australia) (1623) \n\nIn 1623 Dutch East India Company captain Willem van Colster sailed into the Gulf of Carpentaria. Cape Arnhem is named after his ship, the Arnhem, which itself was named after the city of Arnhem.\n\nGroote Eylandt was first sighted the Arnhem. Only in 1644, when Abel Tasman arrived, was the island given a European name, Dutch for \"Large Island\" in an archaic spelling. The modern Dutch spelling is Groot Eiland.\n\nHermite Islands (1624) \n\nIn February 1624, Dutch admiral Jacques l'Hermite discovered the Hermite Islands at Cape Horn.\n\nSouthern Australia coast (1627) \n\nIn 1627, Dutch explorers François Thijssen and Pieter Nuyts discovered the south coast of Australia and charted about 1800 km of it between Cape Leeuwin and the Nuyts Archipelago. Garden 1977, p.8. François Thijssen, captain of the ship 't Gulden Zeepaert (The Golden Seahorse), sailed to the east as far as Ceduna in South Australia. The first known ship to have visited the area is the Leeuwin (\"Lioness\"), a Dutch vessel that charted some of the nearby coastline in 1622. The log of the Leeuwin has been lost, so very little is known of the voyage. However, the land discovered by the Leeuwin was recorded on a 1627 map by Hessel Gerritsz: Caert van't Landt van d'Eendracht (\"Chart of the Land of Eendracht\"), which appears to show the coast between present-day Hamelin Bay and Point D’Entrecasteaux. Part of Thijssen's map shows the islands St Francis and St Peter, now known collectively with their respective groups as the Nuyts Archipelago. Thijssen's observations were included as soon as 1628 by the VOC cartographer Hessel Gerritsz in a chart of the Indies and New Holland. This voyage defined most of the southern coast of Australia and discouraged the notion that \"New Holland\", as it was then known, was linked to Antarctica.\n\nSt Francis Island (originally in Dutch: Eyland St. François) is an island on the south coast of South Australia near Ceduna. It is now part of the Nuyts Archipelago Wilderness Protection Area. It was one of the first parts of South Australia to be discovered and named by Europeans, along with St Peter Island. Thijssen named it after his patron saint, St. Francis.\n\nSt Peter Island is an island on the south coast of South Australia near Ceduna to the south of Denial Bay. It is the second largest island in South Australia at about 13 km long. It was named in 1627 by Thijssen after Pieter Nuyts' patron saint.\n\nWestern Australia (1629) \n\nThe Weibbe Hayes Stone Fort, remnants of improvised defensive walls and stone shelters built by Wiebbe Hayes and his men on the West Wallabi Island, are Australia's oldest known European structures, more than 150 years before expeditions to the Australian continent by James Cook and Arthur Phillip.\n\nTasmania and the surrounding islands) (1642) \n\nIn 1642, Abel Tasman sailed from Mauritius and on 24 November, sighted Tasmania. He named Tasmania Van Diemen's Land, after Anthony van Diemen, the Dutch East India Company's Governor General, who had commissioned his voyage. It was officially renamed Tasmania in honour of its first European discoverer on 1 January 1856. \n\nMaatsuyker Islands, a group of small islands that are the southernmost point of the Australian continent. were discovered and named by Tasman in 1642 after a Dutch official. The main islands of the group are De Witt Island (354 m), Maatsuyker Island (296 m), Flat Witch Island, Flat Top Island, Round Top Island, Walker Island, Needle Rocks and Mewstone.\n\nMaria Island was discovered and named in 1642 by Tasman after Maria van Diemen (née van Aelst), wife of Anthony. The island was known as Maria's Isle in the early 19th century.\n\nTasman's journal entry for 29 November 1642 records that he observed a rock which was similar to a rock named Pedra Branca off China, presumably referring to the Pedra Branca in the South China Sea.\n\nSchouten Island is a 28 km2 island in eastern Tasmania, Australia. It lies 1.6 kilometres south of Freycinet Peninsula and is a part of Freycinet National Park. In 1642, while surveying the south-west coast of Tasmania, Tasman named the island after Joost Schouten, a member of the Council of the Dutch East India Company.\n\nTasman also reached Storm Bay, a large bay in the south-east of Tasmania, Australia. It is the entrance to the Derwent River estuary and the port of Hobart, the capital city of Tasmania. It is bordered by Bruny Island to the west and the Tasman Peninsula to the east.\n\nNew Zealand and Fiji (1642) \n\nIn 1642, the first Europeans known to reach New Zealand were the crew of Dutch explorer Abel Tasman who arrived in his ships Heemskerck and Zeehaen. Tasman anchored at the northern end of the South Island in Golden Bay (he named it Murderers' Bay) in December 1642 and sailed northward to Tonga following a clash with local Māori. Tasman sketched sections of the two main islands' west coasts. Tasman called them Staten Landt, after the States General of the Netherlands, and that name appeared on his first maps of the country. In 1645 Dutch cartographers changed the name to Nova Zeelandia in Latin, from Nieuw Zeeland, after the Dutch province of Zeeland. It was subsequently Anglicised as New Zealand by British naval captain James Cook\n\nVarious claims have been made that New Zealand was reached by other non-Polynesian voyagers before Tasman, but these are not widely accepted. Peter Trickett, for example, argues in Beyond Capricorn that the Portuguese explorer Cristóvão de Mendonça reached New Zealand in the 1520s, and the Tamil bell discovered by missionary William Colenso has given rise to a number of theories,\n but historians generally believe the bell 'is not in itself proof of early Tamil contact with New Zealand'. \n\nIn 1643, still during the same expedition, Tasman discovered Fiji.\n\nTongatapu and Haʻapai (Tonga) (1643) \n\nTasman discovered Tongatapu and Haʻapai in 1643 commanding two ships, the Heemskerck and the Zeehaen commissioned by the Dutch East India Company. The expedition's goals were to chart the unknown southern and eastern seas and to find a possible passage through the South Pacific and Indian Ocean providing a faster route to Chile.\n\n Sakhalin (Cape Patience) (1643) \n\nThe first European known to visit Sakhalin was Martin Gerritz de Vries, who mapped Cape Patience and Cape Aniva on the island's east coast in 1643.\n\nKuril Islands (1643) \n\nIn the summer of 1643, the Castricum, under command of Martin Gerritz de Vries sailed by the southern Kuril Islands, visiting Kunashir, Iturup and Urup, which they named \"Company Island\" and claimed for the Netherlands.\n\nVries Strait or Miyabe Line is a strait between two main islands of the Kurils. It is located between the northeastern end of the island of Iturup and the southwestern headland of Urup Island, connecting the Sea of Okhotsk on the west with the Pacific Ocean on the east. The strait is named after de Vries, the first recorded European to explore the area.\n\nThe Gulf of Patience is a large body of water off the southeastern coast of Sakhalin, Russia, between the main body of Sakhalin Island in the west and Cape Patience in the east. It is part of the Sea of Okhotsk. The first Europeans to visit the bay sailed on Castricum. They named the gulf in memory of the fog that had to clear for them to continue their expedition.\n\nRottnest Island and Swan River (1696) \n\nThe first Europeans known to land on the Rottnest Island were 13 Dutch sailors including Abraham Leeman from the Waeckende Boey who landed near Bathurst Point on 19 March 1658 while their ship was nearby. The ship had sailed from Batavia in search of survivors of the missing Vergulde Draeck which was later found wrecked 80 km north near present-day Ledge Point. The island was given the name \"Rotte nest\" (meaning \"rat nest\" in the 17th century Dutch language) by Dutch captain Willem de Vlamingh who spent six days exploring the island from 29 December 1696, mistaking the quokkas for giant rats. De Vlamingh led a fleet of three ships, De Geelvink, De Nijptang and Weseltje and anchored on the northern side of the island, near The Basin.\n\nOn 10 January 1697, de Vlamingh ventured up the Swan River. He and his crew are believed to have been the first Europeans to do so. He named the Swan River (Zwaanenrivier in Dutch) after the large numbers of black swans that he observed there.\n\nEaster Island and Samoa (1722) \n\nOn Easter Sunday, 5 April 1722, Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen discovered Easter Island. Easter Island is one of the most remote inhabited islands in the world. The nearest inhabited land (50 residents) is Pitcairn Island 2075 km away, the nearest town with a population over 500 is Rikitea on island Mangareva 2606 km away, and the nearest continental point lies in central Chile, 3512 km away.\n\nThe name \"Easter Island\" was given by the island's first recorded European visitor, the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen, who encountered it on Easter Sunday (5 April ) 1722, while searching for Davis or David's island. Roggeveen named it Paasch-Eyland (18th century Dutch for \"Easter Island\").An English translation of the originally Dutch journal by Jacob Roggeveen, with additional significant information from the log by Cornelis Bouwman, was published in: Andrew Sharp (ed.), The Journal of Jacob Roggeveen (Oxford 1970). The island's official Spanish name, Isla de Pascua, also means \"Easter Island\".\n\nOn 13 June Roggeveen discovered the islands of Samoa.\n\nOrange River (1779) \n\nThe Orange River was named by Colonel Robert Gordon, commander of the Dutch East India Company garrison at Cape Town, on a trip to the interior in 1779.\n\nScientific explorations \n\nFirst systematic mapping of southern celestial hemisphere (1595–1597) \n\nIn 1595, Petrus Plancius, a key promoter to the East Indies expeditions, asked Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser, the chief pilot on the Hollandia, to make observations to fill in the blank area around the south celestial pole on European maps of the southern sky. Plancius had instructed Keyser to map the skies in the southern hemisphere, which were largely uncharted at the time. Keyser died in Java the following year but his catalogue of 135 stars, probably measured up with the help of explorer-colleague Frederick de Houtman, was delivered to Plancius, and then those stars were arranged into 12 new southern constellations, letting them be inscribed on a 35-cm celestial globe that was prepared in late 1597 (or early 1598). This globe was produced in collaboration with the Amsterdam cartographer Jodocus Hondius.\n\nPlancius's constellations (mostly referring to animals and subjects described in natural history books and travellers' journals of his day) are Apis the Bee (later changed to Musca by Lacaille), Apus the Bird of Paradise, Chamaeleon, Dorado the Goldfish (or Swordfish), Grus the Crane, Hydrus the Small Water Snake, Indus the Indian, Pavo the Peacock, Phoenix, Triangulum Australe the Southern Triangle, Tucana the Toucan, and Volans the Flying Fish. The acceptance of these new constellations was assured when Johann Bayer, a German astronomer, included them in his Uranometria of 1603, the leading star atlas of its day. These 12 southern constellations are still recognized today by the International Astronomical Union (IAU).\n\nFirst major scientific expedition to Brazil (1637–1644) \n\nWithin the thirty-year period the Dutch West India Company controlled the northeast region of Brazil (1624–1654), the seven-year governorship of Count Johan Maurits van Nassau-Siegen was marked by an intense ethnographic exploration. To that end, Johan Maurits brought from Europe with him a team of artists and scientists who lived in Recife between 1637 and 1644: painter Albert Eckhout (specializing in the human figure), painter Frans Post (landscape painter), natural historian Georg Marcgraf (who also produced drawings and prints), and the physician Willem Piso. Together with Georg Marcgraf, and originally published by Joannes de Laet, Piso wrote the Historia Naturalis Brasiliae (1648), an important early western insight into Brazilian flora and fauna, also is the first scientific book about Brazil. Albert Eckhout, along with the landscape artist Frans Post, was one of two formally trained painters charged with recording the complexity of the local scene. The seven years Eckhout spent in Brazil constitute an invaluable contribution to the understanding of the European colonization of the New World. During his stay he created hundreds of oil sketches – mostly from life – of the local flora, fauna and people. These paintings by Eckhout and the landscapes by Post were among the Europeans' first, introductions to South America.\n\nFirst ethnographic descriptions of New Netherland and North American Indians (1641–1653) \n\nIn 1641, Kiliaen van Rensselaer, the director of the Dutch West India Company, hired Adriaen van der Donck (1620–1655) to be his lawyer for his large, semi-independent estate, Rensselaerswijck, in New Netherland. Until 1645, van der Donck lived in the Upper Hudson River Valley, near Fort Orange (later Albany), where he learned about the Company's fur trade, the Mohawk and Mahican Indians who traded with Dutch, the agriculturist settlers, and the area's plants and animals. In 1649, after a serious disagreement with the new governor, Peter Stuyvesant, he returned to the Dutch Republic to petition Dutch government. In 1653, still in the Netherlands waiting for the government to decide his case, Adriaen van der Donck wrote a comprehensive description of the New Netherland's geography and native peoples based on material in his earlier Remonstrance. The book, Beschryvinge van Nieuw-Nederlant or A Description of New Netherland later published in 1655. This new book was well-crafted to the interests of his audience, consisting of an extensive description of American Indians and their customs, reports on the abundance of the area's agriculture and wealth of its natural resources. \n\nOthers \n\nFirst non-Asian first-hand account of Korea (1653–1666) \n\nJan Weltevree (1595-?) is regarded as the first naturalized Westerner to Korea. Weltevree was a Dutch sailor who arrived on the shores of an island off Joseon’s west coast in 1627 in a shipwreck. The Joseon Dynasty at that time maintained an isolation policy, so the captured foreigner could not leave the country. Weltevree took the name Bak Yeon (also Pak Yeon). He became an important government official and aided King Hyojong with his keen knowledge of modern weaponry. His adventures were recorded in the report by Dutch East India Company accountant Hendrik Hamel. \n\nDutch seafarer and VOC's bookkeeper Hendrick Hamel was the first westerner to experience first-hand and write about Korea in Joseon era (1392–1897). In 1653, Hamel and his men were shipwrecked on Jeju island, and they remained captives in Korea for more than a decade. The Joseon dynasty was often referred to as the \"Hermit Kingdom\" for its harsh isolationism and closed borders. The shipwrecked Dutchmen were given some freedom of movement, but were forbidden to leave the country. After thirteen years (1653–1666), Hamel and seven of his crewmates managed to escape to the VOC trading mission at Dejima (an artificial island in the bay of Nagasaki, Japan), and from there to the Netherlands. In 1666, three different publishers published his report (Journal van de Ongeluckige Voyage van 't Jacht de Sperwer or An account of the shipwreck of a Dutch vessel on the coast of the isle of Quelpaert together with the description of the kingdom of Corea), describing their improbable adventure and giving the first detailed and accurate description of Korea to the western world." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Denver_Nuggets.txt", "Utah_Jazz.txt", "Portland_Trail_Blazers.txt" ], "title": [ "Denver Nuggets", "Utah Jazz", "Portland Trail Blazers" ], "wiki_context": [ "The Denver Nuggets are an American professional basketball team based in Denver, Colorado. The Nuggets compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member club of the league's Western Conference Northwest Division. The team was founded as the Denver Larks in 1967 as a charter franchise of the American Basketball Association (ABA), but changed its name to Rockets before the first season. It changed its name again to the Nuggets in 1974. After the name change, the Nuggets played for the final ABA Championship title in 1976, losing to the New York Nets.\n\nThe team has had some periods of success, qualifying for the ABA Playoffs for all seasons from 1967 to the 1976 ABA playoffs where it lost in the finals. The team joined the NBA in 1976 after the ABA–NBA merger and qualified for the NBA playoffs in nine consecutive seasons in the 1980s and ten consecutive seasons from 2004 to 2013. However, it has not made an appearance in a championship round since its last year in the ABA. The Nuggets play their home games at Pepsi Center, which they share with the Colorado Avalanche of the National Hockey League (NHL).\n\nFranchise history\n\nTeam creation\n\nIn 1967, one of the ABA's charter franchises was awarded to a group in Kansas City, Missouri, headed by Southern Californian businessman James Trindle. However, Trindle was unable to find a suitable arena in the Kansas City area. League commissioner George Mikan suggested moving the team to Denver. After agreeing to name Denver native and former NBA player Vince Boryla as general manager, Trindle moved his team to Denver as the Denver Larks, named after Colorado's state bird. The Trindle group was severely undercapitalized, leading Mikan to order the Larks to post a $100,000 performance bond or lose the franchise. Hours before the deadline, Trindle sold a ⅔ controlling interest to Denver trucking magnate Bill Ringsby for $350,000. Ringsby then renamed the team the Rockets, after his company's long-haul trucks. \n\n1969–1976: ABA years\n\nPlaying at the Denver Auditorium Arena, the Rockets had early successes on the court, developing a solid fan base along the way. However, the team had a history of early playoff exits and failed to play in an ABA championship series.\n\nEarly, they had a solid lineup led by Byron Beck and Larry Jones, then later by Beck and Ralph Simpson. Lonnie Wright of the American Football League's Denver Broncos signed with the Rockets during that first season and became the first player to play professional football and basketball in the same season. Wright played four seasons with Denver. Controversial rookie Spencer Haywood joined the team for the 1969–70 season. Haywood was one of the first players to turn pro before graduating from college, and the NBA initially refused to let him play in the league. Haywood averaged nearly 30 points and 19.5 rebounds per game in his only ABA season, being named ABA MVP, ABA rookie of the year, as well as the All-Star Game MVP. The team finished 51-33, winning their division, before exiting the playoffs in the 2nd round.\n\nJust before the start of the 1970-71 season, Haywood signed with the Seattle SuperSonics, jumping to the NBA. The team tumbled to a 30-54 record and attendance suffered.\n\nBecoming the Denver Nuggets\n\nRingsby sold the team to San Diego businessmen Frank Goldberg and Bud Fischer in 1972. In 1974, in anticipation of moving into the NBA, and the new McNichols Arena, the franchise held a contest to choose a new team nickname, as \"Rockets\" was already in use by the Houston Rockets. The winning choice was \"Nuggets\", in honor of the original Nuggets team in Denver from 1948–50, the last year as a charter member of the NBA. Their new logo was a miner \"discovering\" an ABA ball. Goldberg and Fischer in turn sold the team to a local investment group in 1976.\n\nWith the drafting and signing of future hall of fame player David Thompson out of North Carolina State, Marvin Webster and the acquisitions of Dan Issel and Bobby Jones and with Larry Brown coaching, they had their best seasons in team history in their first two seasons as the Nuggets. Playing in the Denver Auditorium Arena for the last season the 1974–75 team went 65-16, including a 40-2 record at home. However, a quick playoff exit followed. \n\nIn 1975-76, playing at their new arena, the Nuggets edged the reigning champion Kentucky Colonels four games to three to make the 1976 ABA finals for the first time. Eventually, they lost to the New York Nets and Julius Erving. They did not get a second chance to win an ABA league championship, as the ABA–NBA merger took place after the 1975–76 season. The Nuggets, Nets, Indiana Pacers and San Antonio Spurs were merged into the NBA. The Spirits of St. Louis and Kentucky Colonels were disbanded. \n\n1976–1982: Early NBA years\n\nThe Nuggets and Nets had actually applied to join the NBA in 1975, but were forced to stay in the ABA by a court order. The Nuggets continued their strong play early on in the NBA, as they won division titles in their first two seasons in the league, and missed a third by a single game. However, neither of these teams were ultimately successful in the postseason. Similarly to the other new NBA teams, the Nuggets were given many financial issues including a $2 million entry fee. Red McCombs bought the team in 1978.\n\nIn 1979, Brown left the team, helping usher in a brief decline in their team's performance. It ended in 1981, when they hired Doug Moe as a head coach. Moe brought with him a \"motion offense\" philosophy, a style of play focusing on attempting to move the ball until someone got open. Moe was also known for not paying as much attention to defense as his colleagues. The offense helped the team become highly competitive. During the 1980s, the Nuggets often scored in excess of 115 points a game, and during the 1981–82 season, they scored at least 100 points in every game. The NBA-record streak was halted at 136 consecutive games. During the 1981–82 season, the Nuggets set the league scoring record for the highest points per game average at 126.5 points.\n\n1982–1989: The Alex English era\n\nAnchored by scoring machines Alex English and Kiki Vandeweghe at the two forward spots, and Dan Issel at center, Denver led the league in scoring, with English and Vandeweghe both averaging above 25 points per game. It was a novel strategy, allowing the Nuggets to top the Midwest Division and qualify for the playoffs during that span. (On December 13, 1983, the Nuggets and the visiting Detroit Pistons combined for an NBA record 370 points, with Detroit winning in triple overtime, 186–184.) At the end of the season, English won the NBA scoring title, becoming the only Nugget to win the award despite the heavily favored offensive play of Doug Moe. In 1984–85, they made it to the Western Conference finals after being perennial playoff contenders, and they lost in 5 games to the Los Angeles Lakers.\n\nVandeweghe was traded before the 1984–85 season to the Portland Trail Blazers for 6–3 rebounding guard Fat Lever, undersized power forward Calvin Natt and center Wayne Cooper. Spearheaded by Alex English and supported by the three new acquisitions and defensive specialists Bill Hanzlik and TR Dunn, the team replicated its success in the Western Conference despite the loss of Vandeweghe. They even managed to win 54 games in the 1987–88 season, the most they had ever won as an NBA team. However, the Mavericks eliminated the Nuggets in the second round of the 1988 NBA Playoffs. McCombs sold the team to Sidney Shlenker in 1985. Shlenker, in turn, sold the team to COMSAT in 1989.\n\n1989–1991: A period of decline\n\nMoe left the team in 1990, and was replaced by Paul Westhead. Westhead also believed in a \"run and gun\" style of play, and gave the green light for players like Michael Adams and Chris Jackson to light up the scoreboards within seconds of possession.\n\nHowever, Westhead cared even less about defense than Moe. As a result, the Nuggets gave up points so quickly that even their prolific offense couldn't keep up. They finished with the worst record in the league during the 1990–91 season, despite setting many scoring records. As an insult, many sportswriters nicknamed the team at the time as the \"Enver Nuggets\" (as in no \"D\", or no defense).\n\n1991–1996: The Dikembe Mutombo era\n\nDenver took a positive step in rebuilding by drafting 7–2 Georgetown University center Dikembe Mutombo in 1991. Mutombo finished runner-up to Larry Johnson for the NBA rookie of the year that season. Denver finished 24–58 that year.\n\nDenver fired Westhead prior to the 1992–93 season and hired former star player Dan Issel as his successor. The Nuggets had two lottery picks that year and drafted University of Notre Dame forward LaPhonso Ellis and University of Virginia guard Bryant Stith. Denver improved to 36–46, just missing the playoffs that year.\n\nDenver ditched their rainbow colors for a dark navy, metallic gold and wine color scheme starting in the 1993–94 season. Led by Mutombo, Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf (who changed his name from Chris Jackson prior to the season), and Ellis, Denver finished with its first winning season since the Doug Moe era at 42–40. Denver clinched the 8th seed in the Western Conference playoffs, playing the first place Seattle SuperSonics. Denver was a heavy underdog, having only a couple of players on their roster with actual NBA playoff experience. After dropping the first two games of the five-game set in Seattle, the series returned to Denver. Denver won both games and tied the series at 2. The Nuggets made NBA history in Game 5, upsetting Seattle in overtime 98–94. They became the first 8th-seeded team to defeat a 1st-seeded team in NBA playoff history. Denver almost repeated the feat before falling to the Utah Jazz in Game 7 of the second round.\n\nDenver acquired Sonics sharp-shooter Dale Ellis in the off-season and drafted University of Michigan guard Jalen Rose. Denver struggled, causing Issel to resign as coach partway into the season. Assistant Coach Gene Littles assumed control for a brief period before relinquishing control to general manager Bernie Bickerstaff. Denver rebounded and earned the 8th seed again in the playoffs, finishing 41–41. The Nuggets were swept by the San Antonio Spurs in the first round of the playoffs that season.\n\nFollowing that season, Denver acquired Antonio McDyess in a draft day trade with the Los Angeles Clippers. McDyess was the face of the franchise for the next few years, as Mutombo left after the 1995–96 season for the Atlanta Hawks, Ellis missed the majority of the next few seasons due to recurring knee and leg injuries, Rose was traded to the Indiana Pacers for Mark Jackson, and Abdul-Rauf was traded to the Sacramento Kings prior to the 1996–97 season.\n\n1997–2003: Another period of struggle\n\nAfter finishing the 1996-97 season with the fourth worst record in the league (21-61), the Nuggets sent Antonio McDyess to the Phoenix Suns, and Dale Ellis returned to Seattle. Denver flirted with history in the 1997–98, by nearly setting the mark for fewest wins in an 82-game season (11). They tied the then-NBA's all-time worst single-season losing streak at 23—only one game shy of the overall worst mark of 24 by the Cleveland Cavaliers of the early 1980s. The losing streak was later broken by the Cavaliers in 2011 and the Philadelphia 76ers in 2014 with 26 consecutive losses. Several years later, the Nuggets tied for the worst record in the NBA in 2002–03, also with the Cavaliers.\n\nNew ownerships\n\nThe team's struggles in the late 1990s were due in part to ownership instability. COMSAT bought the NHL's Quebec Nordiques in 1995 and moved them to Denver as the Colorado Avalanche. However, its diversification into sports ownership was proving a drain on the company. In particular, cost overruns associated with the construction of Pepsi Center had shareholders up in arms. Finally, in 1997, COMSAT agreed in principle to sell Ascent Entertainment Group, the umbrella corporation for its sporting assets, to Liberty Media. However, Liberty was not interested in sports ownership at the time (though it has since bought the Atlanta Braves), and made the deal contingent upon Ascent selling the Avalanche and Nuggets.[http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4191/is_20000223/ai_n9967143 Liberty buys Ascent/Nuggets, Avs, arena still on block]. The Gazette, 2000-02-23.\n\nAfter almost two years, Ascent sold the Avalanche and Nuggets to Walmart heirs Bill and Nancy Laurie for $400 million. However, a group of Ascent shareholders sued, claiming that the sale price was several million dollars too low. Ascent then agreed to sell the Avalanche and Nuggets to Denver banking tycoon Donald Sturm for $461 million.Schley, Stewart. [http://www.allbusiness.com/north-america/united-states-colorado/1181899-1.html Stan Kroenke's full-court press]. Colorado Biz, 2006-06-01.\n\nHowever, a new wrinkle appeared when the city of Denver refused to transfer the parcel of land on which Pepsi Center stood unless Sturm promised to keep the Avalanche and Nuggets in Denver for at least 25 years. Sturm had bought the teams in his own name, and the city wanted to protect itself in case Sturm either died or sold the teams before the 25 years ran out. While Sturm was willing to make a long-term commitment to the city, he wasn't willing to be held responsible if he died or sold the teams. After negotiations fell apart, Liberty bought all of Ascent, but kept the Nuggets and Avalanche on the market.Moore, Paula. [http://www.bizjournals.com/denver/stories/2000/07/17/story4.html Why one deal went smoothly]. Denver Business Journal, 2000-07-17. In the meantime, Issel had returned as head coach in 1999, but the protracted ownership negotiations made it difficult for him to rebuild the team. Just before the start of the 1999–2000 season, he told reporters there were several personnel moves he simply couldn't make due to the unstable ownership situation (since all basketball decisions required the approval of both Ascent/Liberty and Sturm). \n\nFinally, in July 2000, the Avalanche, Nuggets and Pepsi Center were bought by real estate entrepreneur Stan Kroenke in a $450 million deal. Kroenke is the brother-in-law of the Lauries; his wife Ann is Nancy Laurie's sister. Liberty retained only a 6.5% stake of the sports franchises. As part of the deal, Kroenke placed the teams into a trust that would ensure the teams will stay in Denver until at least 2025. After the deal, Kroenke organized his sports assets under Kroenke Sports Enterprises.\n\n2003–2013: George Karl in charge\n\n2003–2006: The Carmelo Anthony era\n\nIn 2003, the Nuggets drafted future All-Star Carmelo Anthony with the third overall pick in the 2003 NBA Draft. That same year, the team also updated their logos and uniforms, with a new color scheme of powder blue, gold and royal blue; the latter color was changed to navy blue in 2008. In just two months of the season, the Nuggets recorded more wins than they had in 5½ months of play in 2002–03. Much of the reason for this incredible turnaround were the front-office moves of General Manager Kiki Vandeweghe, a former Nuggets player who assumed General Manager duties on August 9, 2001. In April, the turnaround was complete as they became the first franchise in NBA history to qualify for the postseason following a sub-20-win campaign the previous year since the NBA went to an 82-game schedule. They were eliminated in the first round 4 games to 1 by the Minnesota Timberwolves. \n\nOn December 28, 2004, head coach Jeff Bzdelik was fired from the organization and replaced by interim coach, former Los Angeles Laker player and Los Angeles Sparks head coach Michael Cooper. The Nuggets later hired George Karl as a permanent replacement. Karl led the team to a record of 32–8 in the second half of the regular season, which vaulted the team into the playoffs for the second consecutive year. \n\nIn the playoffs, however, the Nuggets could not survive the San Antonio Spurs. After winning game one in San Antonio, the Nuggets proceeded to lose the next four games and lost the series 4–1. The Nuggets picked 20th in the 2005 NBA Draft; it was acquired from the Washington Wizards via the Orlando Magic. Denver selected Julius Hodge with the pick. The Nuggets also had the 22nd overall selection in the draft, in which they selected Jarrett Jack, but sent him to the Portland Trail Blazers for rights to Portland's 27th overall pick, Linas Kleiza.\n\nIn 2005–06, for the first time in 18 years, the club won the Northwest division title. This placed the team in the third seed of the Western Conference playoffs. Denver played the Los Angeles Clippers who, despite their 6th seeding, had a better regular-season record. As a result, the Clippers received home court advantage. They defeated the Nuggets in 5 games. Shortly after, the Nuggets announced that General Manager Kiki Vandeweghe's contract would not be renewed. He was replaced by Mark Warkentien. \n\nOn December 18, 2006, team co-captain Carmelo Anthony, shooting guard J. R. Smith and power forward Nenê were suspended by the NBA (15, 10 and one games respectively) for a fight that occurred in the last two minutes of a game against the New York Knicks two days earlier. The fight was sparked by Knicks rookie Mardy Collins, when he tackled J. R. Smith on a breakaway layup. According to Anthony, Knicks coach Isiah Thomas warned him to not go in the paint shortly before the hard foul. \n\n2006–2008: Anthony and Iverson\n\nOn December 19, 2006, the Nuggets traded Joe Smith, Andre Miller and two first-round draft picks of the 2007 NBA Draft to the Philadelphia 76ers for Ivan McFarlin and superstar Allen Iverson (McFarlin was waived immediately following the trade's approval). The moves gave the Nuggets the top two scorers in the league at the time in Anthony and Iverson, who were both scoring over 30 points per game at the time of the trade. On January 11, 2007, Earl Boykins, Julius Hodge and cash considerations were traded to the Milwaukee Bucks, in exchange for point guard Steve Blake. With Iverson, many considered the Nuggets as one of the elite in the West. However, chemistry was an issue, as the Nuggets finished the season with the 6 seed, giving them a first round matchup against the San Antonio Spurs. In the playoffs, the Nuggets took Game 1 and home court advantage away from the Spurs. However, as had occurred in the 2005 playoffs, the Spurs bounced back to sweep the next four, as the Nuggets were eliminated in the first round in five games for the fourth straight year.\n\nOn March 16, 2008, the Nuggets scored 168 points in a 168–116 home win over Seattle SuperSonics. It was the third-most points scored for a regulation game in NBA history (The Nuggets and the Pistons hold the spot for most combined points scored in a game which was over 360 points total.)\n\nThey finished the 2007–08 NBA season with exactly 50 wins as well as finishing the first half of that season 25–16 (50–32 overall record, tied for the third-best all-time Nuggets record since the team officially joined the NBA in 1976), following a 120–111 home victory over the Memphis Grizzlies in the last game of the season. It was the first time since the 1987–88 NBA season that the Nuggets finished with at least 50 wins in a season. Denver ended up as the 8th seed in the Western Conference of the 2008 NBA Playoffs, and their 50 wins marked the highest win total for an 8th seed in NBA history. It also meant that for the first time in NBA history, all eight playoff seeds in a Conference had at least 50 wins. The Nuggets faced the top-seeded Los Angeles Lakers (57–25) in the first round. The seven games separating the Nuggets and the Lakers overall records is the closest margin between an eighth seed and a top seed since the NBA went to a 16-team playoff format in 1983–84. However, the Lakers swept them in four games, marking the second time in NBA history that a 50-win team was swept in a best-of-seven playoff series in the first round. It was Denver's fifth straight first-round loss.[http://www.nba.com/playoffs2008/series/series_w1s1.html NBA.com: Nuggets Put Up a Fight, but Lakers Get Sweep] \n\n2008–2011: Anthony and Billups\n\nOn July 16, 2008, at the end of the 2007–08 NBA season, the Nuggets traded former NBA Defensive Player of the Year Marcus Camby to the Los Angeles Clippers for a second-round draft pick (that was then traded to the New York Knicks for Renaldo Balkman). This trade was to reduce the Nuggets' payroll costs.\n\nOn November 3, 2008, guard Allen Iverson was traded to the Detroit Pistons for Chauncey Billups, Antonio McDyess, and Cheikh Samb (part of the trade exception from the Marcus Camby trade was used to allow the deal to go through). McDyess was waived though on November 10, 2008, and he returned to Detroit shortly afterwards.\n\nWith Carmelo Anthony averaging 22.8 ppg and Billups averaging 6.4 assists in the 2008–09 NBA season the Nuggets accomplished a great number of franchise milestones. Their 54–28 record matched the most wins the franchise had gotten since their induction in the NBA; their 27–14 start was also a record for wins in the first half of a season. This also marked the first time in the franchise's history the team had back-to-back 50-win seasons. They led the Northwest division for much of the season, eventually winning the division and placing #2 in the Western Conference, matching the highest the team has ever been seeded for the playoffs. General Manager Mark Warkentien won the NBA Executive of the Year Award for the Nuggets' improvement. They won Game 1 of the playoffs in a blowout victory against the New Orleans Hornets, the first time they had home-court advantage since 1988 and also, the 29-point victory was the largest victory for any team for Game 1 of the first round of the 2009 NBA Playoffs. Chauncey Billups set a Nuggets franchise record with the most three-pointers in a playoff game with 8, and his 19 three-pointers in total is also a Nuggets record for threes made in a playoff series. They went on to beat the Hornets in 5, including a 58-point victory in Game 4 which matched the most lopsided win in NBA playoff history. They then went on to beat the 6th seed Dallas Mavericks 4 games to 1 in the Conference Semifinals to make their first trip to the Western Conference Finals since 1985. That was also the first time the Nuggets had ever led 3–0 in a best-of-seven series. Up to that point, they held an NBA Playoffs-high in three-pointers made and a 16-point average margin of victory, the largest average margin of victory in the first 10 playoff games in NBA Playoff history. They lost the first game of the Western Conference Finals against the Los Angeles Lakers but won the second game to tie the series. Anthony became the first Denver player to score at least 30 points in five consecutive playoff games since the Nuggets joined the NBA in 1976. They lost the series 4–2, ending Denver's longest playoff run in team history. \n\nIn the 2009 NBA Draft, the Nuggets traded a first-round draft pick acquired from the Charlotte Bobcats to the Minnesota Timberwolves for the rights to rookie Ty Lawson, who was drafted 18th overall. On July 13, 2009, the Nuggets traded a second-round draft pick to the Detroit Pistons for Arron Afflalo (part of the trade exception from the Iverson trade was used to allow the deal to go through) and Walter Sharpe. Afflalo replaced starting guard Dahntay Jones, who signed with the Indiana Pacers. However, on August 10, the Nuggets lost forward Linas Kleiza, who signed with Olympiacos Piraeus of the Greek League. \n\nThe 2009–10 season saw Anthony average 28.2 ppg and Billups average a career-high 19.6 ppg. In the opening two games of the season, Anthony totaled 71 points, scoring 30 points in the home opener and 41 the next night, in wins against division rivals Utah Jazz and Portland Trail Blazers, respectively. Anthony became one of two players in the Nuggets' history to open with more than 70 points through two games (Alex English also accomplished the feat). It was also only the second time since 1987 that the Nuggets started the season 2–0. They later went 3–0, 4–0, and 5–0 for the first time since 1985 after defeating the Memphis Grizzlies, Indiana Pacers, and New Jersey Nets respectively. Despite injuries which caused all three captains – Carmelo Anthony, Chauncey Billups, and Kenyon Martin – to miss a total of 46 games, and then later on in the second half of the season the absence of head coach George Karl, who underwent treatment for neck and throat cancer, the Nuggets were still able to win 53 games (third consecutive 50-win season, a Nuggets first) for the season which gave them a second consecutive Northwest division title and finished as the fourth seed in the West Conference. However, they were eliminated by the Utah Jazz 4-2, their sixth first-round elimination in 7 seasons. Anthony averaged a career-high 30.7 ppg in the playoffs.\n\nOn July 14, 2010, the Nuggets bolstered their frontcourt depth by signing Al Harrington. During the 2010 off-season, Masai Ujiri replaced Mark Warkentien as the General Manager, while Josh Kroenke was named team president.\n\nStan Kroenke bought full ownership in the then-St. Louis Rams of the NFL in 2010. Since the NFL does not allow its owners to hold majority control of major-league teams in other NFL cities, Kroenke turned over day-to-day control of the Nuggets and Avalanche to Josh Kroenke toward the end of 2010, and must sell his controlling interest in both teams by 2014. \n\n2011–2012: Anthony departs\n\nOn February 22, 2011, after months of speculation that he wanted to leave the Nuggets, Carmelo Anthony was traded along with Chauncey Billups, Anthony Carter, Shelden Williams and Renaldo Balkman to the New York Knicks in a multi-player deal also involving the Minnesota Timberwolves in which the Nuggets received Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Danilo Gallinari, Timofey Mozgov and Kosta Koufos. On the day when the trade was done, the Nuggets were left with 9 players to play against the Memphis Grizzlies. The Nuggets won 120–107, where they led by as many as 27 points. In the closing minutes of the game, the arena resounded with chants of \"Who needs Melo?\" George Karl said after the game, \"Our guys, when their backs are confronted with a difficult situation, they usually play at a high level. We always react to tough situations in a very positive way.\" Some people said after the trade the Nuggets would become the \"Cleveland Cavaliers\" of the West, that is, falter in the standings and lose their playoff hopes due to the loss of their franchise player, Carmelo. However, the trade only seemed to make them better. Post-trade, the Nuggets averaged 24.1 assists, showing their newfound teamwork. The defense of the Nuggets also improved, from allowing 105.2 ppg before the trade to of 97.1 ppg for the remainder of the season. Despite the franchise changing trade which saw eighteen different starting lineups through the whole season, Denver finished with 50 wins (fourth consecutive 50 win seasons for the first time in Nuggets history), clinching the 5th seed of the Western Conference. They met the Oklahoma City Thunder in the first round of the playoffs and lost four games to one.\n\nThe first full season of the post-Melo Nuggets saw the steady rise of Danilo Gallinari, who averaged 17 points, 5.2 rebounds and 2.6 assists through the first 25 games of the season, which resulted to the Nuggets' best start through the first 20 games. But Gallinari was robbed off his best season by injuries to his ankle, thumb, and wrist. On March 15, 2012, the Nuggets decided to make their team younger by trading Nenê, who had played the previous 9 seasons for Denver, to the Washington Wizards for JaVale McGee. In his first game as a Nugget, McGee made a putback dunk off an Arron Afflalo miss which proved to be the game-winning basket in Denver's 116-115 victory over the Detroit Pistons. In two of the Nuggets final games of their season, McGee finally earned national attention when he had a 16-point,15-rebound effort, and a 21-point, 14-rebound effort in Denver's playoff series against the Los Angeles Lakers. These performances helped the Nuggets come back from a 2-0 and a 3-1 series deficit, but the Nuggets eventually lost in Game 7, 87-96.\n\n2012–2013: Team concept\n\nOn August 10, 2012, Denver was involved in a four-team trade where they received All-Star Andre Iguodala and sent Arron Afflalo and Al Harrington to the Orlando Magic. This same trade also sent Dwight Howard to the Los Angeles Lakers. After the trade, Iguodala tweeted \"I'm excited to be joining the Denver Nuggets and I know my best basketball is ahead of me!\" Despite losing their first three games, the 2012-2013 Nuggets finished with a franchise best 57-25 record, and a 38-3 record in Pepsi Center (the Washington Wizards, Miami Heat, and Minnesota Timberwolves were the only 3 visitors to defeat Denver on their home during the regular season).Denver also clinched the 3rd seed in the Western Conference, with a first round matchup with the Golden State Warriors. The Nuggets won Game 1 97-95 on their home court on a last second Andre Miller game winner, but the Warriors won the next three games, putting the Nuggets on the brink of elimination. Denver won Game 5 at home to keep their season alive, but the Warriors eliminated the Nuggets in Game 6, winning 88-92 in Oakland. It was Denver's ninth first round loss in the previous 10 seasons, and the eighth of Karl's tenure. Although Karl won that year's NBA Coach of the Year Award and had led Denver to the playoffs in every year of his nine-year tenure, it wasn't enough to keep him from being fired after the season.\n\n2013–present\n\nAlong with Karl being fired, Denver saw a major shake-up in the front office with Executive of the Year Masai Ujiri accepting the general manager position with the Toronto Raptors[http://www.mississauga.com/sports-story/3254800-toronto-raptors-introduce-masai-ujiri-as-the-club-s-new-general-manager/ Toronto Raptors introduce Masai Ujiri as the club’s new general manager] and vice-president Pete D'Alessandro, who was expected to replace Ujiri, being named General Manager of the Sacramento Kings. On June 21, 2013, Tim Connelly was announced as the new general manager. and to replace Karl, the Nuggets hired the Indiana Pacers' associate head coach, former NBA player, Brian Shaw. Guard-forward Andre Iguodala was sent to the Golden State Warriors in a sign-and-trade in which they acquired guard Randy Foye from the Utah Jazz. They also signed center-forward JJ Hickson, who was previously with the Portland Trail Blazers and 5' 9\" guard Nate Robinson, who played for the Bulls during the 2012–2013 season. They also acquired Darrell Arthur from the Memphis Grizzlies and 55th pick Joffrey Lauvergne in return for Kosta Koufos. In a tough 2013-14 season which saw numerous injuries to key players missing a significant amount of the season, the Nuggets finished with 36 wins, their worst in 11 years, and missed the playoffs.\n\nDuring the 2014 offseason, the Nuggets brought back Arron Afflalo who they traded Evan Fournier for. Denver also traded their first lottery pick (#11) since 2003 to Chicago to acquire two later first round draft picks, which were used to draft Jusuf Nurkić and Gary Harris. On March 3, 2015 general manager Tim Connelly announced the Nuggets fired head coach Brian Shaw and named Melvin Hunt interim head coach. \n\nOn June 15, 2015, at the end of the 2014–15 season, Michael Malone was named as the new head coach of the Denver Nuggets. Entering the 2015 NBA Draft with their lowest draft pick (#7) since 2003, the Nuggets drafted Emmanuel Mudiay who was widely regarded as the top point guard of the draft, leading to speculation that current starting point guard, Ty Lawson, would be traded. On July 14, 2015, Lawson was arrested in Los Angeles on suspicion of driving under the influence, his second in six months. The Nuggets traded Lawson a week later to the Houston Rockets. \n\nUnder Michael Malone's leadership, the Denver Nuggets slightly started to improve while primarily relying on the youth movement consinsting of Emmanuel Mudiay, Nikola Jokić, Gary Harris and later also on the recovered Jusuf Nurkić. On January 27, 2016, it was announced that both Mudiay and Jokić would participate in BBVA Compass Rising Stars Challenge during NBA All-Star 2016. On February 18, the Denver Nuggets announced that they decided to trade veteran shooting guard Randy Foye to Oklahoma City Thunder in exchance for D. J. Augustin, Steve Novak and two second round draft picks. One day later, JJ Hickson and the newly acquired Novak were waived. \n\nOver the course of the 2016 NBA Draft, the Denver Nuggets added the Kentucky guard Jamal Murray as well as Juan Hernangómez, Malik Beasley and Petr Cornelie. Meanwhile, their 56th pick was traded to the Oklahoma City Thunder.\n\nSeason-by-season records\n\nHome arenas\n\n*Denver Auditorium Arena (1967–75)\n*Denver Coliseum (1967–75) \n*McNichols Sports Arena (1975–99)\n*Pepsi Center (1999–present)\n\nUniforms\n\nThe Nuggets have worn numerous uniforms throughout their franchise history, including their days in the American Basketball Association (ABA) as the \"Denver Rockets.\" From the early to mid-1970s, the Nuggets wore gold and purple (Columbine blue) uniforms.\n\nWhen the Nuggets joined the NBA in the 1976–77 season, they retained the pick-axe logo on their jerseys from the ABA days. The home uniforms feature 'Nuggets' in red with a red pick-axe inside a blue oval, and gold numbers with blue trim in front, blue numbers and letters at the back. The road uniforms were blue, with 'Denver' in blue with a blue pick-axe in a red oval, and gold numbers in front, white numbers and letters at the back.\n\nThe Nuggets simplified their uniforms following their inaugural season in the NBA. From 1977–82, their home uniforms were white, with a \"Nuggets\" script written across the chest in a darker royal blue, with gold trim around the script and jersey numbers. The royal blue away jersey had \"Denver\" written across the chest in white, with gold trim.\n\nFrom the early-1980s until the 1992–93 season, the Nuggets wore the Denver \"rainbow city\" skyline across the chest and back on both the home and away uniforms. Some fans also call the iconic 1980s logo the \"Tetris\" logo, due to the buildings that shadow the mountains on the logo which are in the shape of squares. The initial home uniforms were white with navy and green trim, with \"Nuggets\" and the uniform number in gold with blue trim. The player names were written in block lettering and in a straight position. In 1985, they changed the shade of blue to royal and eliminated green, and in 1986, changed the back numbers to royal blue. In 1991, coinciding with the debut of Dikembe Mutombo, the word \"Nuggets\" became white with royal blue and gold trim. The road uniforms were initially navy blue with green trim, with \"Denver\" and the uniform number in white with gold trim, before likewise changing it to royal blue, with gold serifed block letters for player names in an arch (royal blue in home uniforms).\n\nFor the 1993–94 season, the Nuggets drastically changed their look, with a navy blue, gold and wine color scheme on their uniforms. The home jerseys had a \"Nuggets\" script in a modified version of the typeface Aachen across the chest in navy blue, with dark red and gold trim around the script and numbers, while the navy blue away jerseys had the same script in gold, with dark red and white trim. The Nuggets wore these uniforms for a decade, until the 2002–03 season.\n\nFor the 2003–04 season, the Nuggets made another uniform change, coinciding with Carmelo Anthony's debut with a new color scheme of powder blue, royal blue and gold. Like the 1990s uniforms, the new Nuggets jerseys also have the Aachen typeface across the chest — it's \"Nuggets\" in powder blue, with royal blue and gold trim on the home white jersey, while the new powder blue road jersey has \"Denver\" in white, with gold and royal blue trim. These jerseys were tweaked prior to the 2008–09 season, with the royal blue trim replaced by navy blue, as well as a circle patch of the Nuggets alternate pick axe logo placed above the nameplate on the backs of the jerseys.\n\nIn the 2005–06 season, the Nuggets also introduced an alternate navy blue uniform, with an alternate Nuggets script in gold, with navy blue interior trim and powder blue outlining. This uniform was used until the end of the 2011–12 season.\n\nFor the 2012–13 season, the Nuggets unveiled a new gold alternate jersey, replacing the aforementioned navy blue jerseys that had been used during the previous seven seasons. The new alternate uniform features a return to the Denver \"rainbow skyline\" logo, but used the team's current color scheme and Aachen typeface. \n\nFor the 2015–16 season, the Nuggets will modify the script and numbering fonts on their home and away jerseys, with a gold \"Nuggets\" script on the home white jersey and a gold \"Denver\" script on the powder blue away jersey — both with the Coliseum typeface. Navy blue numerals trimmed in gold, as well as navy blue nameplates, will be featured on both the home and away jerseys. The alternate gold \"skyline\" jerseys were also tweaked, with a retro \"Nuggets\" wordmark (that was used on the 1980s rainbow skyline jerseys) in navy blue trimmed in white. The numerals will also be modified with the Coliseum typeface, but will remain white, with powder blue interior trim and navy blue exterior outlining. \n\nPlayers\n\nCurrent roster\n\nRetained draft rights\n\nThe Nuggets hold the draft rights to the following unsigned draft picks who have been playing outside the NBA. A drafted player, either an international draftee or a college draftee who isn't signed by the team that drafted him, is allowed to sign with any non-NBA teams. In this case, the team retains the player's draft rights in the NBA until one year after the player's contract with the non-NBA team ends. This list includes draft rights that were acquired from trades with other teams.\n\nRetired numbers\n\n1 Number represents his total number of regular season victories.\n\nBasketball Hall of Famers\n\nOn April 4, 2016, Iverson was elected into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. He will be inducted in September 2016. \n\n;Notes:\n* 1 Started playing for the team during its time in ABA. Inducted as player. He later coached the Nuggets (1992–94 and 1999–01).\n* 2 Started playing for the team during its time in ABA.\n* 3 Played for the team during its time in ABA.\n* 4 Coached the team during its time in ABA.\n* 5 Started coaching the team during its time in ABA.\n\nColorado Sports Hall of Fame\n\nFIBA Hall of Famers\n\nHigh points\n\nFranchise leaders\n\nBold denotes still active with team.\n\"Name*\" includes points scored for the team while in the ABA.\nItalics denotes still active but not with team.\n\nPoints scored (regular season) (as of the end of the 2015–16 season) \n\n# Alex English (21,645)\n# Dan Issel* (16,589)\n# Carmelo Anthony (13,970)\n# David Thompson* (11,992)\n# Ralph Simpson* (10,130)\n# Byron Beck* (8,603)\n# Fat Lever (8,081)\n# Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf (7,029)\n# Nenê (6,868)\n# Kiki Vandeweghe (6,829)\n# Antonio McDyess (6,555)\n# Dave Robisch* (6,181)\n# Reggie Williams (5,934)\n# Ty Lawson (5,923)\n# Larry Jones* (5,745)\n# Michael Adams (5,534)\n# Andre Miller (5,354)\n# LaPhonso Ellis (5,201)\n# J. R. Smith (5,084)\n# Dikembe Mutombo (5,054)\n# Danny Schayes (5,029)\n# Bryant Stith (4,982)\n# Bobby Jones (4,806)\n# Bill Hanzlik (4,546)\n# Chauncey Billups (4,378)\n# Kenyon Martin (4,353)\n# Nick Van Exel (4,325)\n# Blair Rasmussen (4,319)\n# Kenneth Faried (4,271)\n# Danilo Gallinari (3,753)\n\nOther Statistics (regular season) (as of the end of the 2014-15 season)\n\nMinutes Played\n*1. Alex English (29,893)\n*2. Dan Issel* (25,198)\n*3. Carmelo Anthony (20,521)\n*4. Byron Beck* (19,197)\n*5. T.R. Dunn (18,322)\n\nRebounds\n*1. Dan Issel* (6,630)\n*2. Byron Beck* (5,261)\n*3. Dikembe Mutombo (5,054)\n*4. Alex English (4,686)\n*5. Julius Keye* (4,547)\n\nAssists\n*1. Alex English (3,679)\n*2. Fat Lever (3,566)\n*3. Andre Miller (2,978)\n*4. Ty Lawson (2,754)\n*5. Michael Adams (2,181)\n\nSteals\n*1. Fat Lever (1,167)\n*2. T.R. Dunn (1,070)\n*3. Alex English (854)\n*4. Dan Issel* (798)\n*5. Nenê (694)\n\nBlocks\n*1. Dikembe Mutombo (1,486)\n*2. Marcus Camby (1,126)\n*3. Wayne Cooper (830)\n*4. Bobby Jones (625)\n*5. Alex English (624)\n\nIndividual awards\n\nNBA All-Star Game\n*Dan Issel - 1977\n*Bobby Jones - 1977, 1978\n*David Thompson - 1977–1979\n*George McGinnis;- 1979\n*Alex English - 1982–1989\n*Kiki Vandeweghe - 1983, 1984\n*Calvin Natt;- 1985\n*Fat Lever - 1988, 1990\n*Dikembe Mutombo - 1992, 1995, 1996\n*Antonio McDyess - 2001\n*Carmelo Anthony - 2007, 2008, 2010, 2011\n*Allen Iverson - 2007, 2008\n*Chauncey Billups - 2009, 2010\n*George Karl - 2010 (Head coach)\n\nNBA Defensive Player of the Year\n*Dikembe Mutombo – 1995\n*Marcus Camby – 2007\n\nNBA Most Improved Player of the Year\n*Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf – 1993\n\nNBA Coach of the Year\n*Doug Moe – 1988\n*George Karl - 2013\n\nNBA Sportsmanship Award\n*Chauncey Billups – 2009\n\nJ. Walter Kennedy Citizenship Award\n*Dan Issel – 1985\n*Alex English – 1988\n*Kenneth Faried – 2013\n\nNBA Executive of the Year\n*Vince Boryla – 1985\n*Mark Warkentien – 2009\n*Masai Ujiri – 2013\n\nAll-NBA First Team\n*David Thompson – 1977, 1978\n\nAll-NBA Second Team\n*Alex English – 1982, 1983, 1986\n*Lafayette Lever – 1987\n*Carmelo Anthony – 2010\n\nAll-NBA Third Team\n*Antonio McDyess – 1999\n*Carmelo Anthony – 2006, 2007, 2009\n*Chauncey Billups – 2009\n\nNBA All-Defensive First Team\n*Bobby Jones – 1977, 1978\n*Marcus Camby – 2007, 2008\n\nNBA All-Defensive Second Team\n*T.R. Dunn – 1983–1985\n*Bill Hanzlik – 1986\n*Lafayette Lever – 1988\n*Dikembe Mutombo – 1995\n*Marcus Camby – 2005, 2006\n\nNBA Rookie First Team\n*Dikembe Mutombo – 1992\n*LaPhonso Ellis – 1993\n*Antonio McDyess – 1996\n*Nenê – 2003\n*Carmelo Anthony – 2004\n*Kenneth Faried – 2012\n*Nikola Jokić – 2016\n\nNBA Rookie Second Team\n*Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf – 1991\n*Mark Macon – 1992\n*Jalen Rose – 1995\n*Bobby Jackson – 1998\n*James Posey – 2000\n*Jusuf Nurkić – 2015\n*Emmanuel Mudiay – 2016", "The Utah Jazz is an American professional basketball team based in Salt Lake City, Utah. The Jazz compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member club of the league's Western Conference Northwest Division. Since 1991, the team has played its home games at Vivint Smart Home Arena. The franchise began play in 1974 as the New Orleans Jazz, an expansion team based in New Orleans, Louisiana; the Jazz moved to Salt Lake City in 1979.\n\nThe Jazz were one of the least successful teams in the league in their early years. Although 10 seasons elapsed before the Jazz qualified for their first playoff appearance in 1984, they did not miss the playoffs again until 2004. During the late 1980s, John Stockton and Karl Malone arose as the franchise players for the team, and formed one of the most famed point guard–power forward duos in NBA history. Led by coach Jerry Sloan, who took over for Frank Layden in 1988, they became one of the powerhouse teams of the 1990s, culminating in two NBA Finals appearances in 1997 and 1998, where they lost both times to the Chicago Bulls, led by Michael Jordan.\n\nBoth Stockton and Malone moved on in 2003. After missing the playoffs for three consecutive seasons the Jazz returned to prominence under the on-court leadership of point guard Deron Williams. However, partway through the 2010–11 NBA season, the Jazz began restructuring after Sloan's retirement and Williams' trade to the New Jersey Nets. The team has made the playoffs once since then, in 2012 under coach Tyrone Corbin. Quin Snyder was hired as head coach in June 2014. Valued in 2015 at $850 million by Forbes, the Jazz rank as the 20th most valuable franchise in the NBA ahead of the Indiana Pacers and Atlanta Hawks. \n\nFranchise history\n\n1974–79: Early years in New Orleans\n\nOn June 7, 1974, the New Orleans Jazz were admitted as an expansion franchise into the National Basketball Association (NBA). Team officials selected the name because of its definition in the dictionary: collective improvisation. The team began its inaugural season in New Orleans in the 1974–75 season. The team's first major move was to trade for star player Pete Maravich (who had played collegiately at LSU) from the Atlanta Hawks for two first-round draft picks, three second-round picks, and one third-round pick over the next three years. Although he was considered one of the most entertaining players in the league and won the scoring championship in 1977 with 31.1 points per game, the Jazz' best record while in New Orleans was 39–43 in the 1977–78 season. Maravich struggled with knee injuries from that season onward.\n\nVenue issues were a continual problem for the team while it was based in New Orleans. In the Jazz's first season, they played in the Municipal Auditorium and Loyola Field House, where the basketball court was raised so high that the NBA Players Association made the team put a net around the court so that players wouldn't fall off of the court and into the stands. Later, they played games in the Louisiana Superdome, but things were no better, due to high demand for the stadium, onerous lease terms and Maravich's constant knee problems. They also faced the prospect of spending a whole month on the road each year due to Mardi Gras festivities. Years later, founding owner Sam Battistone claimed that there was no contingency plan in case the Jazz ever qualified for the playoffs. However, the Superdome's manager at the time, Bill Curl, said that the stadium's management always submitted a list of potential playoff dates to the Jazz management, but these letters were never answered.\n\nAfter what turned out to be their final season in New Orleans, they were dealt a further humiliation when the Los Angeles Lakers selected Magic Johnson with the first overall pick in the 1979 NBA draft. The pick would have been the Jazz's had they not traded it to acquire Gail Goodrich two years earlier. Also, the Jazz had given up the rights to Moses Malone in order to regain one of the three first-round picks used for the Goodrich trade; the combination of Johnson and Malone blossoming into Hall of Famers and Goodrich's ineffective, injury-ruined few years in New Orleans made this transaction one of the most lopsided in NBA history.\n\nMoving to Utah\n\nDespite being barely competitive, the Jazz drew well during their first five years. However, by 1979 the franchise was sinking financially. Barry Mendelson, the team's executive vice president for most of the early years, said one factor in the financial trouble was an 11 percent amusement tax, highest in the U.S. at the time. The team also couldn't attract much local corporate support—an important factor even in those days—or local investors.\n\nBattistone concluded that the franchise could not be viable in New Orleans and decided to move elsewhere. After scouting several new homes, he decided to move the team to Salt Lake City, even though it was a smaller market. Salt Lake City had previously been home to the Utah Stars of the American Basketball Association (ABA) from 1970 to 1976. The Stars had been extremely popular in the city and had even won an ABA title in their first season after moving from Los Angeles. However, their finances inexplicably collapsed in their last two seasons, and they were shut down by the league 16 games into the 1975-76 season after missing payroll. Although Salt Lake City was not known for its jazz culture, the team decided to keep the name, as well as the team's original colors of green, purple, and gold (the colors of Mardi Gras).\n\n1979–84: The Frank Layden era\n\nThe Jazz's attendance declined slightly after the team's move from New Orleans to Utah, due to a late approval for the move (June 1979) and poor marketing in the Salt Lake City area. The team's management made the first of several moves in 1979, bringing high-scoring forward Adrian Dantley to Utah in exchange for Spencer Haywood. Dantley averaged 28.0 points per game during the 1979–80 season, allowing the team to waive Pete Maravich early in the year. The team struggled to a 24–58 mark, but was rewarded with the second overall pick in the 1980 NBA draft, which they used to pick Darrell Griffith of Louisville, another piece of the rebuilding puzzle.\n\nDuring the 1980–81 NBA season, they struggled financially as well as on the court. Despite having perennial All-Star Dantley, a 20-point per game scorer in Griffith; as well as emerging point guard Rickey Green, the Jazz were still unable to get above .500, finishing 25-57.\n\nTom Nissalke departed as coach after they started the 1981–82 season 8–12, and General Manager Frank Layden replaced him. Layden's coaching wasn't an improvement initially, as the Jazz went 17–45 the rest of that season to finish 25–57.\n\nThe 1982 NBA draft saw the Jazz pick Dominique Wilkins. The Jazz would have preferred to take either James Worthy or Terry Cummings, but those players went 1-2 to the Lakers and Clippers, respectively; Utah had been confident that the Lakers would take Wilkins and that would have given them a shot at either of the other top forwards (they favored Cummings over Worthy because Cummings had shown he could play both small and power forward), and Utah wasn't aware that the Lakers had researched both Worthy and Wilkins and decided on Worthy out of concern about Wilkins' perceived selfishness. Battistone's continued financial problems, combined with Wilkins making it clear he did not want to play in Utah, resulted in the Jazz sending Wilkins to Atlanta in return for John Drew and Freeman Williams. This trade, even considering the circumstances, turned out to be one of the worst trades in NBA history. Wilkins would go on to a Hall of Fame career, while Drew and Williams would only play a combined four seasons with the Jazz.\n\nFor the 1982–83 season, Dantley missed 60 of 82 games due to injury, which deprived the team of its lead scorer for much of the season. Newcomer John Drew also missed time, playing in only 44 games. The Jazz ended up being led by Darrell Griffith (22.2 points per game), Rickey Green (14.3 points per game), and Danny Schayes (12.4 points per game). A rookie 7'4\" center–Mark Eaton–manned the post. The team finished 30–52, still out of the playoffs, but an improvement over recent years.\n\nDuring the 1983 NBA draft, the Jazz used their first-round pick, (which was the seventh overall), to choose Thurl Bailey, and later took Bob Hansen in the third round, 54th overall.\n\n1983–84 opened as a season of uncertainty. The team was losing money, and management was crafting stunts, such as playing games at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas, to help the team become more profitable. The team was rumored to be moving due to Battistone's cash shorts, which were exacerbated by the fact they were playing in the league's smallest market. However, fortunes on the court improved, with a healthy Adrian Dantley, Jeff Wilkins, and rookie Thurl Bailey at the forward positions, Mark Eaton & Rich Kelley jointly manning the post, and Rickey Green with Darrell Griffith at the guards, and John Drew providing 17 points per night off the bench. They went 45–37 and won the Midwest Division, the first winning season and division championship in team history.\n\nThey advanced to the NBA Playoffs, defeating the Denver Nuggets 3–2 in the first round, and moved on to play the Phoenix Suns in the second round. Despite having home court advantage in the best of seven series, the Jazz lost to the more experienced Suns, 4–2.\n\nJazz fans were not happy when the team picked an unknown guard in the first round of the 1984 NBA draft, John Stockton. The Jazz fans on hand for the draft party booed the selection. \n\n1984–2003: Stockton and Malone\n\nThe 1984–85 season saw the emergence of Mark Eaton as a defensive force. averaging 5.56 blocks per game along with 9.7 points and 11.3 rebounds per game, and won the NBA Defensive Player of the Year Award. On the downside, John Drew played only 19 games on the season, which deprived the team of their high-scoring sixth man. But, the Jazz returned to the playoffs, facing the Houston Rockets and their All-Star centers, Hakeem Olajuwon and Ralph Sampson. The Jazz prevailed in the series, 3–2, and advanced to the second round to face the high-scoring Denver Nuggets. Utah fell to Denver, 4–1 in the second-round.\n\nThe team's perennial financial woes and instability were somewhat stabilized during April 1985, when auto dealer Larry H. Miller bought 50 percent of the team from Battistone for $8 million. Battistone had been seeking to move the team. In the 1985 NBA draft the team added Karl Malone.\n\nMalone made an immediate impact in the , averaging 14.9 points and 8.9 rebounds per game, which supplemented for Dantley. However, starter Darrell Griffith missed the season with a stress fracture, and they hovered around .500 most of the year. In the 1985–86 postseason, the Jazz lost in the first round series to the Dallas Mavericks, 3–1.\n\nDuring the off-season in 1986, Battistone was approached to sell the team to Marv Wolfenson and Harvey Ratner, who would have moved the team to Minneapolis. Larry Miller didn't want to sell the team, but due to contractual language in his agreement with Battistone, could have been bought out by the new owners if he refused to sell. Offers went as high as $28 million for the team as a whole during this process (the Jazz were valued at $16 million less than a year earlier when Miller purchased half for $8 million). Miller stepped in at the last minute and purchased the remaining 50 percent of the team for $14 million, buying out the original contract with Battistone, and kept the team in Utah. Wolfenson and Ratner later became the founders of the Minnesota Timberwolves expansion franchise which, coincidentally, was almost sold and moved to New Orleans in 1994.\n\nThe 1986–87 season was one of change. Adrian Dantley, the team's star player who had carried them through the early years in Utah, was traded to Detroit for Kelly Tripucka, who ended up splitting time with Thurl Bailey. Darrell Griffith, back from injuries that caused him to miss the 1985–86 season, lost his starter spot at guard to Bob Hansen. Stockton warranted more time at the point guard position. Despite all these changes, the team finished 44–38, and lost to the Golden State Warriors in the first round of the playoffs. \n\nFor the 1987–88 season, Stockton took over for Rickey Green as the starting point guard, and Malone established himself as one of the better power forwards in the league. The team finished 47–35 and defeated Portland, 3–1, in the first round, earning a second round matchup with the Los Angeles Lakers, who were the defending NBA champions at the time. After Los Angeles took Game 1 at home, the Jazz won Game 2 in Los Angeles, 101–97, and took the lead in the series 2–1 with a Game 3 win in Salt Lake City. The Jazz lost Games 4 and 5, but won Game 6, 108–80, tying the series 3–3. In the decisive Game 7, the Lakers won 109–98. The Jazz had shown they were no longer pushovers of their early days.\n\n1988–90: Arrival of Jerry Sloan\n\nDuring the 1988–89 season, Frank Layden stepped down as head coach of the Jazz after the first 17 games, and was replaced by Jerry Sloan. The Jazz won 51 games and the Midwest Division championship as they grew better overall. Malone and Stockton, as well as Mark Eaton, were the leaders of the team and also All-Star selections. Eaton won Defensive Player of the Year for the second time, and it appeared the Jazz were ready to take the next step toward contending for an NBA title, after having pushed the Lakers to seven games in the Western Conference semifinals the previous season. However, the second-seeded Jazz were eliminated in the first round in three games by the seventh-seeded Golden State Warriors.\n\nThe following year, 1989–90, the Jazz made some changes. Thurl Bailey, who was relied on for 19 points per game the previous season, saw his playing time reduced in favor of rookie Blue Edwards, who played a prominent role with the team. The results were the best win–loss mark in team history, as the Jazz finished with a win-loss record of , second in the division to the San Antonio Spurs (56–26). Malone had his best season statistically, averaging 31.0 points and 11.1 rebounds. Stockton averaged 17.2 points and 14.5 assists per game, both career highs, with the assist total and average leading the NBA that season. In the NBA Playoffs, the Jazz played the Phoenix Suns in the first round, led by All-Stars Tom Chambers and Kevin Johnson. The Suns defeated the Jazz 3 games to 2. Again, the Jazz were left with questions as to how they could do so well in the regular season but fail to advance in the playoffs.\n\n1990–96: Working towards championship contention\n\nFor the 1990–91 season, the Jazz made another move to improve the team, with a three-way trade being made. Shooting guard Jeff Malone was brought to Utah from the Washington Bullets, while Eric Leckner and Bob Hansen were sent from Utah to the Sacramento Kings, and Pervis Ellison ended up going from Sacramento to Washington. \n\nThe Jazz began the season 22–15, before going 27–8 in January and February, with new addition Jeff Malone averaging 18.6 points that season, giving them three strong scoring options (Karl Malone, Jeff Malone, and John Stockton – 64.8 of the team's 104 points per game). The Jazz finished 54–28, 2nd in the division to San Antonio by a game, similar to their division finish the prior year. In the playoffs, they met the Phoenix Suns for the second year in a row. Game 1 was a blowout Utah win, in Phoenix, 129–90, which set the tone for the series, as Utah eliminated the Suns 3–1, earning a second round match-up with the Portland Trail Blazers, the defending Western Conference Champions. The Jazz played well, keeping close in most of the games, but lost the series 4–1 to a deeper and more experienced Trail Blazers team.\n\nThe 1991–92 season proved to be the most successful in history, to that time, for the Jazz. They moved to the Delta Center, a state-of-the art arena that featured a seating capacity of 19,911. The Delta Center was a huge improvement over the Salt Palace, which seated just over 12,000 and lacked luxury suites and retail space. Early in the year, a trade brought Tyrone Corbin, a tough, defensive forward, from Minnesota in exchange for fan-favorite Thurl Bailey.\n\nThe Jazz went 55–27, and won the Midwest Division championship for the first time since 1989, and looked to advance farther in the postseason. In the playoffs, the Jazz defeated the Los Angeles Clippers 3–2 in the first round, then beat the Seattle SuperSonics in the second round, 4–1, to advance to the Western Conference Finals for the first time, where they faced the Portland Trail Blazers. Portland defeated the Jazz 4–2 in the series and again denied them a trip to the NBA Finals.\n\nThe 1992–93 season was a disappointment compared with the years before, with a 47–35 mark and 3rd place in the division. The center position, manned by Mark Eaton for most of the past decade, became suspect as he struggled with injuries and age. The bright spot was the hosting of the NBA All-Star Game and the surrounding events of All-Star Weekend. The Jazz lost to the Seattle SuperSonics in the first round, 3–2.[http://www.nba.com/jazz/history/00400490.html#15 NBA.com – Section referenced – 1992–93: A \"Dream\" for Malone and Stockton, a Nightmare for the Jazz] During the postseason, the team addressed the center position by acquiring Felton Spencer from Minnesota, in return for backup center Mike Brown.\n\nDuring the 1993–94 season, the Jazz traded Jeff Malone to the Philadelphia 76ers for shooting guard Jeff Hornacek. Hornacek meshed well with Stockton, and the Jazz improved to 53–29. In the playoffs, they faced San Antonio in the first round, shutting down NBA scoring leader David Robinson in the series. Robinson had averaged 29.8 points on 50 percent shooting during the regular season, numbers that dropped to 20.0 and 41 percent in the series against Utah. The Jazz then fought off a determined Denver Nuggets team 4–3 in the Conference semi-finals (almost blowing a 3 games to 0 series lead in the process), to advance to the Western Conference Finals, where they lost to the eventual NBA champion Houston Rockets 4–1.\n\nIn the 1994–95 season, the Jazz had significant depth and talent and were expected to make a serious run for the Championship. However, they lost starter Felton Spencer 34 games into the season with a ruptured Achilles tendon. Despite the injury to Spencer, the Jazz finished 60–22. However, the Jazz lost to the Houston Rockets in the first round of the playoffs, 3–2.\n\nGreg Ostertag was added to the team for the 1995–96 season. The Jazz went 55–27, and reached the Conference Finals for the third time in history, nearly overcame a 3–1 series deficit, but eventually lost to the Seattle SuperSonics 4–3.\n\n1996–2003: Final years of Stockton and Malone\n\nIn the next two seasons, the Jazz were finally able to capitalize on regular season success. In 1996–97, the Jazz had their best record in franchise history (64–18), and won the Midwest Division and finished with the best record in the Western Conference. The team was made up of the players, Stockton, Malone, and Hornacek, as well as Bryon Russell, Antoine Carr, Howard Eisley, and Shandon Anderson. Malone won his first NBA MVP for the 1996–97 regular season, averaging 27.4 points, 9.9 rebounds, and 4.5 assists per game. \n\nThe Jazz reached the NBA Finals for the first time after beating the Los Angeles Clippers 3–0, Los Angeles Lakers 4–1, and Houston Rockets 4–2. The Jazz then met Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls in the Finals, losing to the Bulls 4–2, with the last two games decided in the final seconds (scores of 90–88 and 90–86).\n\nDuring the offseason, the Jazz made no changes to the roster. As the 1997–98 season neared, they were expected to be contenders for the championship again. However, Stockton suffered a serious knee injury before the season, and missed the first 18 games, in which the Jazz went 11–7. Once he returned, the team went 51–13, to finish at 62–20, and won the Midwest Division and home court advantage for the playoffs. \n\nIn the playoffs, they beat the Houston Rockets 3-2, and the San Antonio Spurs 4–1, to advance to the Western Conference Finals for the third straight year. Utah, with a veteran roster of Stockton, Malone and Hornacek, faced a Los Angeles Lakers team led by superstar Shaquille O'Neal, guards Eddie Jones, Nick Van Exel, and a young Kobe Bryant. The Jazz set the tone for the series with a win in Game 1, 112–77. Game 2, a 99–95 Jazz victory, and Games 3 and 4 in Los Angeles were decided by an average of 7.5 points. The Jazz swept the Lakers, and earned a second consecutive trip to the NBA Finals. \n\nIn the 1998 NBA Finals (again against the Chicago Bulls), the Jazz took Game 1 at home, 88–85 in overtime. However, the Bulls overcame a slow start to win Game 2, 93–88, easily took Game 3, 96–54 and won Game 4, 86–82 to lead the series 3–1. The Jazz fought back and won Game 5 on the road, 83–81, to trail 3–2 in the series, with Game 6 (and a Game 7 if needed) in Salt Lake City. The Jazz held a lead in most of Game 6, but the Bulls rallied, and in the last seconds of the game, Michael Jordan stole the ball from Malone on the final Jazz possession and then made a jump shot to win the game, 87–86, and the series for Chicago, 4–2. \n\nIn the 1999 season, shortened to 50 games due to a lockout, the Jazz finished 37–13, tied with the Spurs for the best record in the league. They defeated the Sacramento Kings in five games in the first round of the playoffs. However, they lost in the second round of the playoffs to the Portland Trail Blazers. Despite yet another disappointment, Malone was awarded his second MVP.\n\nDuring the 1999–2000 season, the Jazz finished 55–27 and won the Midwest Division but again struggled in the postseason, and lost to the Portland Trail Blazers in the second round. In the off-season, Hornacek retired and Howard Eisley was traded in a four-team deal that brought in Donyell Marshall. They selected promising high school basketball star DeShawn Stevenson in the first round of the 2000 NBA draft.\n\nIn the 2000–01 season, they went 53–29, but they lost in the playoffs, surrendering a 2–0 series lead in the first round of the playoffs to the Dallas Mavericks, to lose the series 3–2, their earliest exit from the playoffs since the 1994–95 season.\n\nIn the 2001–02 season, Andrei Kirilenko made his rookie debut, averaging 10.7 points, 4.9 rebounds, and 1.91 blocks per game. The team started slowly, 16–15 over the first two months, and finished 12–13 to go 44–38 overall. They lost to the Sacramento Kings 3–1 in the first round of the playoffs.\n\nPrior to the 2002–03 season, Marshall and Russell moved on to other teams. Matt Harpring was brought over from the Philadelphia 76ers. He took over the starting forward spot next to Malone and averaged 17.6 points and 6.6 rebounds, the best numbers of his career. The Jazz approached 50 wins going into the playoffs, but went 47–35. They faced the Sacramento Kings again, and lost in a five-game first round series, 4–1.\n\nAfter the season, the end of an era came as Stockton retired, and Malone left as a free agent to join the Los Angeles Lakers.\n\n2003–05: Rebuilding\n\nWith their two franchise lead players Malone and Stockton gone, the team lacked foundation as it went into the 2003–04 season. They were expected to finish near the bottom of the NBA by several NBA preview magazines, including Sports Illustrated. The Jazz finished with a 42–40 record. The team featured several unheralded players who emerged as key contributors, including Kirilenko, Raja Bell, and Carlos Arroyo. In particular, Kirilenko demonstrated versatility on both offense and defense and earned a spot in the All-Star Game. The Jazz missed the playoffs by one game to the Denver Nuggets, ending a streak of 20 consecutive seasons in the playoffs. Jerry Sloan finished second in the voting for the NBA Coach of the Year Award, losing to Hubie Brown of the Memphis Grizzlies.\n\nDuring the offseason, the team made moves to change the roster; they acquired Carlos Boozer and Mehmet Okur as free agents and re-signed Carlos Arroyo and Gordan Giricek to extensions.\n\nThe 2004–05 season was marked by injuries, first to Arroyo and Raul Lopez, and later to Boozer and Kirilenko, which were a large part of the team's fall to the bottom of the division. When healthy, Boozer averaged 17.8 points and 9.0 rebounds in 51 games. The Jazz ended the 2004–05 season 26–56, their worst since the 1981–82 season.\n\n2005–10\n\nIn summer 2005, the Jazz continued to change the roster by trading three draft picks to acquire the number 3 overall pick, which they used to select Deron Williams. Other transactions included Raja Bell leaving the team for the Phoenix Suns, the Jazz re-obtaining center Greg Ostertag from the Kings, and oft-injured Raul Lopez being traded to the Memphis Grizzlies.\n\nThe 2005–06 season was injury-plagued before it started; Boozer missed the first 49 games and Gordan Giricek and Kirilenko both missed significant time due to injuries. Okur and Kirilenko, however, showed consistently good play, while Williams, despite a mid-season slump, did not disappoint. However, team owner Larry Miller expressed displeasure with the team's effort during the season. The Jazz stayed in the playoff race until the third-to-last game, when they lost to the Dallas Mavericks. The Jazz ended the season 41–41, three games out of the playoffs. Ostertag retired at the end of the season, having spent 10 of his 11 NBA seasons with the Jazz.\n\nIn the 2006 NBA draft, the Jazz selected Ronnie Brewer in the first round and in the second round selected Dee Brown and Paul Millsap. Several young players were traded to the Golden State Warriors for Derek Fisher, which give them a veteran point guard. The Jazz were heralded by several major sports websites for drafting well and making good off-season moves. \n\nDuring the 2006–07 season, the Jazz improved considerably compared to the prior years, finishing with a 51–31 record. Boozer was selected as an All-Star for the first time (though he missed the game due to a minor injury) and center Mehmet Okur was selected to the All-Star game as well. Deron Williams finished third in the league in assists per game with 9.3 (behind Steve Nash and Chris Paul).\n\nThe team also developed a deep bench; in the 10 games that Boozer and Okur (the two leading scorers) missed, the team went 8–2. Millsap was a surprise rookie, becoming a competent backup to Boozer. Despite the elevated play of the Jazz, Kirilenko had a significant drop in his statistics and seemed to struggle adapting to a reduced role, which eventually led to a well-publicized breakdown early in the first round of the playoffs. \n\nThe Jazz faced the Houston Rockets in the first round, a match-up of number 4 and number 5 seeds (Utah was seeded higher due to winning the Northwest Division, but Houston had a 52–30 record opposed to Utah's 51–31, giving them home court advantage in the series). It was a physical, close-fought match-up, with each of the first six games being won by the home team. The Jazz broke this trend in the seventh game, and beat the Rockets 103–99 in Houston. The Jazz went on to face the eighth-seeded Golden State Warriors, who were coming off a historic upset of the number 1-seeded Dallas Mavericks. However, the Jazz easily handled the Warriors, and won the series 4–1. The Jazz then faced the San Antonio Spurs in the Western Conference finals, but lost to the more experienced Spurs, 4 games to 1 in the series. The Spurs eventually won the NBA championship that season by defeating the Cleveland Cavaliers 4 games to 0 in the NBA Finals.\n\nDuring the off-season, the Jazz gained a hometown NBA Development League affiliate in the Utah Flash (based in Orem), which they shared with the Boston Celtics. They selected Morris Almond in the first round, although ultimately they made few lineup changes. The most significant move was in letting Derek Fisher go. Fisher had become a fan favorite due to his strong play, and also a sympathetic one due to his daughter's well-publicized battle with a rare form of eye cancer. Fisher moved to Los Angeles during the off-season to be closer to better care for his daughter, and later signed with the Los Angeles Lakers. Controversy arose after Kirilenko led his Russian national team to a win in EuroBasket 2007 (the European championship), a tournament in which he was named MVP. After that, Kirilenko posted on a blog that he wished to be traded from the Jazz and would be willing to walk away from his contract. He later reaffirmed this in interviews. However, no trade was made and he remained with the team.\n\nDuring the 2007–08 season, after a trade that sent Gordan Giricek to the Philadelphia 76ers in exchange for Kyle Korver, the Jazz had a record-tying 19-game home winning streak and improved on the road after a rough December. Despite the off-season controversy and trade talk, Kirilenko elevated his play, improving all stats from the previous season, and seemed content with his new role as a defender and a facilitator opposed to a scorer. Boozer again was an All-Star selection, while Williams continued to elevate his play. The Jazz finished the regular season fifth-best in the Western Conference with a 54–28 record. The Jazz sold out 46 of 47 home games (including playoffs) during the year, and possessed a 37–4 home regular season record; that was, however, offset by a sub-par road win-loss record.\n\nThe Jazz again faced the Houston Rockets in the first round of the playoffs, this time as a number 4 seed (although the Rockets possessed home-court advantage due to a better record). The Jazz took a 2–0 series lead in Houston, but lost the first game in Salt Lake City. After splitting the next two games, the Jazz beat the Rockets 113–91 in game 6, placing them into a second-round match-up with the number 1 seeded Los Angeles Lakers, their first postseason meeting since the 1998 Western Conference finals. Utah lost games 1 and 2 in Los Angeles. However the Jazz held up their great home win record and defeated Los Angeles in Games 3 and 4. The Jazz lost game 5 in Los Angeles and were eliminated in Game 6. The Jazz made no major moves during the off-season.\n\nThe 2008–09 season was difficult for the Jazz as they struggled with injuries that disrupted team chemistry, and although they were again nearly unstoppable at home, they possessed a poor road record. Utah's top three players all missed significant time due to sickness or injury; Williams missed 13 of the first 15 games, Boozer missed more than half of the season, and Okur missed sporadic time due to both injury and his father's sickness that led him to travel to his native Turkey early in the season. On February 20, 2009, Jazz owner Larry H. Miller died of complications from diabetes. His son, Greg Miller, became the new CEO of the team. The Jazz finished with a 48–34 record, slipping to No. 8 in the competitive Western Conference playoff race, after which they were eliminated by the Los Angeles Lakers for the second year in a row, 4 games to 1.\n\nThe season was the last for long-time radio and former TV announcer Hot Rod Hundley, who announced his retirement after being with the Jazz for their entire history (35 years). Despite the disappointment, Williams proved to be one of the elite point guards in the league, averaging 19.4 points and 10.8 assists per game, second in the league, despite playing the entire season with a lingering ankle injury.\n\nDuring the 2009 NBA draft, the Jazz selected Eric Maynor No. 20 overall to back up Williams. Veteran Matt Harpring retired, citing consistent injuries sustained from his physical playing style. Rumors circulated that Boozer wanted a trade, fueled by rumors that the Jazz were shopping him after he chose to \"opt in\" to the last year of his contract; however, the team stated publicly that they did not seek to trade him. Boozer remained with the team heading into the 2009–10 season. The Jazz also added rookie Wesley Matthews to the lineup after an impressive training camp.\n\nAs the 2009–10 season began they started 19–17. Several trades were made by the team, one that sent Maynor and the contract of the retired Harpring to the Oklahoma City Thunder and another that sent starter Ronnie Brewer to the Memphis Grizzlies at mid-season, a trade which was openly criticized by Williams. The Brewer trade cleared the way for Matthews to take over his starter spot. Also, Williams was selected to play in the All-Star Game for the first time, and after a controversial off-season, Boozer played better than the year prior, averaging 19.5 points and 11.2 rebounds per game, and missed only four games to injury. He suggested that he would be happy to stay with Utah long-term. After returning from an early-season injury, Kyle Korver set the NBA record for three-point field goal percentage in a season. \n\nIn a tight Western Conference, the Jazz finished 53–29 and lost the division in a tiebreaker with the Denver Nuggets, ending with the No. 5 seed, matched up with the Nuggets in the first round of the playoffs. Kirilenko, who had missed 13 of the last 15 games of the season due to an injury, re-aggravated the injury the day before the first game of the playoffs and missed the first round, while Okur tore his Achilles tendon in the first game and missed the rest of the playoffs. Despite the injuries, the Jazz played well enough to defeat Denver 4–2 in the series. The Jazz were then eliminated by the Los Angeles Lakers for the third year in a row, being swept 4–0 (the first four-game sweep in Jazz history).\n\n2010 Off-season\n\nIn the 2010 NBA draft, the Utah Jazz selected Gordon Hayward from Butler University with the No. 9 overall pick, and Jeremy Evans with the No. 55 overall pick.\n\nBoozer agreed to a five-year, $80 million contract with the Chicago Bulls in free agency on July 7, 2010. The Jazz turned the transaction into a sign-and-trade one day later, receiving a trade exception worth around $13 million in return from Chicago. Kyle Korver also agreed to sign with the Bulls, two days later. Terms were not announced, but multiple reports had his deal as three years, $13 million. Wesley Matthews signed a five-year, $33 million offer sheet with the Portland Trail Blazers on July 10, 2010.\n\nLess than a week after the Boozer loss, the Jazz traded Kosta Koufos and two future first-round picks to Minnesota for Al Jefferson, using the trade exception from the Boozer deal to receive Jefferson's contract without exceeding the salary cap. \n\nRaja Bell was added also, to provide backcourt help after the losses of Korver and Matthews. He was signed to a three-year, $10 million contract.\n\nOn June 15, 2010, the Jazz unveiled a new color scheme and logo, which represented a return to the old 'music note' logo. The team unveiled new uniforms on August 16. \n\nThe Jazz tendered restricted free-agent center Kyrylo Fesenko a $1 million qualifying offer in June 2010. The offer entitled Utah to match any offer that Fesenko accepted from another team, whether signed or not. Fesenko signed the offer on September 27, 2010, the day before training camp began. \n\nOn the eve of training camp, the Jazz added two more players, Francisco Elson and Earl Watson for the 2010–11 season.\n\nPaul Millsap and Al Jefferson; Mediocrity\n\nThe 2010–11 season began on a positive note, as the team went undefeated (8–0) in the preseason, and in mid-January, they were 27–13 and seemed well on their way to another winning season, had that pace continued. However, over the next 14 games, Utah went 4–10. On February 10, 2011, with the team record at 31–23 after a loss to the Chicago Bulls, head coach Jerry Sloan resigned, along with assistant Phil Johnson. Another of Sloan's assistants, Tyrone Corbin, was named the new head coach, while Scott Layden, the other assistant, remained as well. A week later, the Jazz hired former Jazz player Jeff Hornacek as an assistant coach.\n\nOn February 23, 2011, the Jazz traded star player Deron Williams to the New Jersey Nets for players Derrick Favors and Devin Harris, as well as two first round draft picks (New Jersey's 2011 and Golden State's conditional 2012). It was rumored that Williams got into a shouting match with head coach Sloan during a game against the Chicago Bulls, which preceded Sloan's resignation and eventually, the Jazz's decision to trade Williams.\n\nWhile Williams was under contract through with a player option worth $17.7 million for , Jazz chief executive officer Greg Miller did not believe they would be able to re-sign him. \"And while I never saw any indication that he wouldn’t re-sign with us, I never saw any indication he would,\" said Miller. The remainder of the season saw the Jazz continue to struggle, finishing with a 39–43 record, 11th in the Western Conference, therefore missing the playoffs for the first time since 2006.\n\nDuring the 2011 draft, the Jazz had two top-14 picks (one acquired in the trade that sent Williams to the New Jersey Nets), and used them on Enes Kanter and Alec Burks. Following the end of the 2011 NBA lockout that saw the 2011–12 season shortened to 66 games, the Jazz bid farewell to their two longest-tenured players – Mehmet Okur was traded to the Nets for a future second-round pick, and Andrei Kirilenko, who played in his native Russia during the lockout and whose contract had expired after the 2011 season, decided to stay in Russia for the remainder of the 2011–12 season. They also acquired free agent veterans Josh Howard and Jamaal Tinsley.\n\nDuring the 2012 offseason, the Jazz traded Devin Harris to the Hawks for Marvin Williams. \n\nIn the 2012 draft, the Jazz selected Kevin Murphy with the No. 47 overall pick. The Jazz signed Mo Williams and Randy Foye, both former Clippers, and re-signed Jeremy Evans and Tinsley during the off-season. Long-time Jazz player C. J. Miles decided to sign with Cleveland. Andrei Kirilenko did not re-sign with the Jazz in the off-season. The Jazz also named Dennis Lindsey as GM and Kevin O'Connor as Vice President of Basketball Operations.\n\nLongtime assistant coach Scott Layden left Utah to be a part of the San Antonio Spurs front office.\n\n2013–present: Another rebuilding era; hiring of Quin Snyder\n\nBefore the 2013–14 season began, Utah did not retain either Paul Millsap or Al Jefferson. Millsap accepted a two-year offer to join the Atlanta Hawks, while Jefferson signed a deal to become a member of the Charlotte Bobcats franchise. Jeff Hornacek was hired during the offseason as head coach of the Phoenix Suns. The Jazz have been accused of tanking as they lost all but one of their first 13 games. The front office, a former member of the San Antonio Spurs organization Dennis Lindsey is said to be the architect of a \"tanking\" or \"rebuilding\" season. On March 14, 2014, the Jazz were officially eliminated from playoff contention with a 96-87 loss to the Los Angeles Clippers.\n\nOn May 20, 2014, the Jazz earned the 5th pick in the 2014 NBA Draft at the NBA Draft Lottery, with which they picked 18-year-old Australian Point Guard Dante Exum. They also had the 23rd pick from a trade with the Golden State Warriors and their own pick in the second round (the 35th pick overall). With the 23rd pick they selected Rodney Hood from Duke University. The 35th pick was used to select Jarnell Stokes, who was subsequently traded to the Memphis Grizzlies for a future second round pick.\n\nOn June 6, 2014, Atlanta Hawks assistant coach Quin Snyder was named the eighth head coach in team history. Snyder signed a three-year contract with a team option for a fourth. He replaced Tyrone Corbin. \n\nRivalries\n\nThe Jazz have not had a natural or fierce rival throughout their history, where each team has been competitive with the other over a long period of time. There have been several teams they have run into many times in the playoffs, however:\n\nHouston (7) – 1985, 1994, 1995, 1997, 1998, 2007, 2008 (Jazz 5–2 Houston)\n\nLos Angeles Lakers (6) – 1988, 1997, 1998, 2008, 2009, 2010 (Lakers 4–2 Jazz)\n\nPortland (6) – 1988, 1991, 1992, 1996, 1999, 2000 (Portland 4–2 Jazz)\n\nSan Antonio (5) – 1994, 1996, 1998, 2007, 2012 (Jazz 3–2 San Antonio)\n\nHouston won two NBA Championships (1994, 1995) while defeating Utah along the way. Utah advanced to the NBA Finals both times that they defeated the Lakers, while Los Angeles has advanced to the Finals each year they defeated Utah in a series, winning NBA Championships in 1988, 2009, and 2010. Portland advanced to the NBA Finals in 1992 after defeating Utah as well. San Antonio won an NBA Championship in 2007 after defeating Utah in a series, while Utah advanced to the NBA Finals in 1998 after defeating San Antonio in a series.\n\nThe Jazz also have a regional rivalry with the Denver Nuggets. Both clubs are geographically situated in the Rocky Mountains, and have been part of the same division since 1979, having moved to the Northwest Division for the 2004–05 season.\n\nDuring the 2012–13 season, the Jazz and the Lakers competed for the number 8 seed in the Western Conference. However, the Jazz did not qualify for the Playoffs; the Lakers passed the Houston Rockets in the standings to claim the number 7 seed, and the Rockets moved down to the number 8 seed. The Lakers would eventually lose in a four-game sweep in the first round versus the eventual Western Conference champion San Antonio Spurs, who lost to the Miami Heat in seven games in the NBA Finals.\n\nOlympians\n\nSeason records\n\nThe Jazz is the only team in NBA history to have never lost 60 or more games in a season. This distinction was achieved when the New York Knicks and the Los Angeles Lakers both lost more than 60 games in the 2014–15 NBA season. \n\nArenas\n\nIn New Orleans\n\n* Loyola Field House (1974–1975)\n* Municipal Auditorium (1974–1975)\n* Louisiana Superdome (1975–1979)\n\nIn Salt Lake City\n\n* Salt Palace (1979–1991)\n* Vivint Smart Home Arena (formerly known as the Delta Center and Energy Solutions Arena) (1991–present)\n\nMascot\n\nJazz Bear is the mascot for the Utah Jazz, an National Basketball Association (NBA) franchise based in Salt Lake City, Utah. Jazz Bear was introduced to the league on November 4, 1994. \n\nLogos and uniforms\n\nSince the team's move from New Orleans to Salt Lake City in 1979, the Utah Jazz have worn several uniforms throughout their franchise history. From 1979 to 1996, the Jazz' home uniforms consisted of the logo (the word \"Jazz\" with the J represented as a musical note combined with a basketball) on the center chest, with purple numbers. The only modification to this uniform was the word \"Utah\" being added to the center chest logo before the 1986–87 season. The road uniforms were purple with the 'J-note' logo and numbers in white. From 1981–84, the Jazz' road uniforms were dark green, with the aforementioned Jazz logo on the center chest and gold numbers. For the 1984–85 season, the road uniforms were changed back to purple, this time with gold numbers and white trim, along with the addition of the word 'Utah' on the logo. These uniforms were worn until the 1995–96 season.\n\nFor the 1996–97 season, the Jazz drastically updated their logos and uniforms, with a new color scheme of purple (slightly lighter from the previous shade), copper and turquoise. Their new uniform set featured a silhouette of the Wasatch Range on the center chest, with a stylish new Jazz script, and purple and turquoise details. On the road purple jersey, the white mountain range gradually fades to purple just above the numbers, which are white, with copper interior trim and teal outlining. On the home white jersey, the numbers are purple, with white interior trim and teal outlining. The Jazz wore these jerseys until the 2003–04 season.\n\nThe Jazz also introduced an alternate black jersey in the 1998–99 season, with the Jazz script on the center chest, but without the Wasatch Range silhouette. On this jersey, both the Jazz script and numbers are white, with purple interior trim and copper outlining, and copper side panels. These jerseys were worn until the 2003–04 season.\n\nIn the 2004–05 season, the Jazz once again updated their color scheme, logos and uniforms. The new color scheme, which the team used until the end of the 2009–10 season, consisted of navy blue, powder blue, silver and purple, though the latter color was only used on the primary logo and alternate logo. The team logo remained the same, with the exception of the new color variation. The new home uniform consisted of an updated \"Jazz\" script on the center chest in navy blue, with navy numbers, both of which had silver interior trim and powder blue outlining. The new road uniform was navy blue, with a \"Utah\" script in powder blue on the center chest and powder blue numbers, both of which had silver outlining and white interior trim.\n\nIn the 2006–07 season, the Jazz introduced a new alternate powder blue uniform. This uniform, which the team used until the end of the 2009–10 season, featured a Jazz script identical to the team logo and navy blue numbers below the script, also with silver and white trim. The nameplate on the back of the jersey was navy blue.\n\nOn June 15, 2010, the Jazz unveiled a new logo and color scheme on the team's official website. For the 2010–11 season, the Jazz reverted to the team's original music note logo (without the word Utah), with a new color scheme of navy blue, gold, dark green & gray. The new uniform set, which was unveiled on August 16, 2010, features a design nearly identical to the team's aforementioned 1984-96 uniform designs, with the following differences: navy blue replacing purple on the road uniform, dark green numerals on the home white jerseys, a white Jazz logo script on the road jerseys and side panels on both the home and away jerseys. The new uniforms were a combination of both the old and new styles, with navy blue retained from the most recent color scheme, but the now-famous 'J-note' logo and gold and green were revived. \n\nOn December 9, 2011, the Jazz unveiled an alternate jersey that is similar to their road jersey, but swaps the navy and green colors so that the primary color is green, with a navy stripe on the side. \n\nOn May 12, 2016, the Utah Jazz unveiled a refreshed brand identity. The new brand identity includes a new logo system, with some uniform modifications, a new home court design, and the selection of the team's wordmark logo as its new primary logo (see logo at the top of the article). \n\nPlayers\n\nCurrent roster\n\nRetained draft rights\n\nThe Jazz hold the draft rights to the following unsigned draft picks who have been playing outside the NBA. A drafted player, either an international draftee or a college draftee, who isn't signed by the team that drafted him, is allowed to sign with any non-NBA teams. In this case, the team retains the player's draft rights in the NBA until one year after the player's contract with the non-NBA team ends. This list includes draft rights that were acquired from trades with other teams.\n\nRetired numbers\n\nBasketball Hall of Famers\n\n;Notes:\n* 1 Started playing for the team when they were known as New Orleans Jazz.\n* 2 Played for the team when they were known as New Orleans Jazz.\n* 3 In total, Bellamy was inducted into the Hall of Fame twice – as player and as a member of the 1960 Olympic team.\n* 4 In total, Stockton was inducted into the Hall of Fame twice – as player and as a member of the 1992 Olympic team.\n* 5 In total, Malone was inducted into the Hall of Fame twice – as player and as a member of the 1992 Olympic team.\n* 6 Coached when the team was known as New Orleans Jazz.\n* 7 Inducted as player.\n\nFranchise leaders\n\nBold denotes still active with team.\n\"Name*\" includes points scored for the team while in the ABA.\nItalics denotes still active but not with team.\n\nPoints scored (regular season) (as of the end of the 2015–16 season) \n\n# Karl Malone (36,374)\n# John Stockton (19,711)\n# Adrian Dantley (13,635)\n# Darrell Griffith (12,391)\n# Thurl Bailey (9,897)\n# Andrei Kirilenko (8,411)\n# Pete Maravich (8,324)\n# Deron Williams (7,576)\n# Mehmet Okur (7,255)\n# Rickey Green (6,917)\n# Jeff Hornacek (6,848)\n# Carlos Boozer (6,821)\n# Paul Millsap (6,713)\n# Gordon Hayward (6,476)\n# Bryon Russell (5,752)\n# Matt Harpring (5,604)\n# Mark Eaton (5,216)\n# Jeff Malone (5,158)\n# Derrick Favors (4,650)\n# Al Jefferson (4,089)\n# Rich Kelley (4,044)\n# Aaron James (3,829)\n# Bob Hansen (3,550)\n# Jeff Wilkins (3,445)\n# Greg Ostertag (3,425)\n# C.J. Miles (3,264)\n# Jim McElroy (3,188)\n# David Benoit (3,035)\n# Truck Robinson (2,901)\n# Ben Poquette (2,873)\n\nOther statistics (regular season) (as of the end of the 2015–16 season)\n\nMinutes played\n# Karl Malone (53,479)\n# John Stockton (47,764)\n# Mark Eaton (25,169)\n# Darrell Griffith (21,403)\n# Andrei Kirilenko (20,989)\n\nRebounds\n# Karl Malone (14,601)\n# Mark Eaton (6,939)\n# John Stockton (4,051)\n# Greg Ostertag (3,978)\n# Rich Kelley (3,972)\n\nAssists\n# John Stockton (15,806)\n# Karl Malone (5,085)\n# Rickey Green (4,159)\n# Deron Williams (4,003)\n# Andrei Kirilenko (1,919)\n\nSteals\n# John Stockton (3,265)\n# Karl Malone (2,035)\n# Rickey Green (1,100)\n# Andrei Kirilenko (960)\n# Darrell Griffith (931)\n\nBlocks\n# Mark Eaton (3,064)\n# Andrei Kirilenko (1,380)\n# Greg Ostertag (1,253)\n# Karl Malone (1,125)\n# Thurl Bailey (879)\n\nIndividual awards\n\nNBA MVP\n*Karl Malone – 1997, 1999\n\nNBA Rookie of the Year\n*Darrell Griffith – 1981\n\nNBA Defensive Player of the Year\n*Mark Eaton – 1985, 1989\n\nNBA Coach of the Year\n*Frank Layden – 1984\n\nNBA Executive of the Year\n*Frank Layden – 1984\n\nNBA All-Star Game MVP\n*Karl Malone - 1989, 1993\n*John Stockton - 1993\n\nJ. Walter Kennedy Citizenship Award\n*Frank Layden - 1984\n*Thurl Bailey - 1989\n\nNBA All-Star Selections\n*Pete Maravich - 1977, 1978, 1979\n*Truck Robinson - 1978\n*Adrian Dantley - 1980, 1981, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1986\n*Rickey Green - 1984\n*Karl Malone - 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2002\n*John Stockton - 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 2000\n*Mark Eaton - 1989\n*Andrei Kirilenko - 2004\n*Carlos Boozer - 2007, 2008\n*Mehmet Okur - 2007\n*Deron Williams - 2010, 2011\n\nAll-NBA First Team\n*Pete Maravich – 1976, 1977\n*Karl Malone – 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999\n*John Stockton – 1994, 1995\n\nAll-NBA Second Team\n*Pete Maravich – 1978\n*Adrian Dantley – 1981, 1984\n*Karl Malone – 1988, 2000\n*John Stockton – 1988, 1989, 1990, 1992, 1993, 1996\n*Deron Williams – 2008, 2010\n\nAll-NBA Third Team\n*John Stockton – 1991, 1997, 1999\n*Karl Malone – 2001\n*Carlos Boozer – 2008\n\nNBA All-Defensive First Team\n*E.C. Coleman – 1977\n*Mark Eaton – 1985, 1986, 1989\n*Karl Malone – 1997, 1998, 1999\n*Andrei Kirilenko – 2006\n\nNBA All-Defensive Second Team\n*Mark Eaton – 1987, 1988\n*Karl Malone – 1988\n*John Stockton – 1989, 1991, 1992, 1995, 1997\n*Andrei Kirilenko – 2004, 2005\n\nNBA Rookie First Team\n*Darrell Griffith – 1981\n*Thurl Bailey – 1984\n*Karl Malone – 1986\n*Andrei Kirilenko – 2002\n*Deron Williams – 2006\n*Trey Burke – 2014\n\nNBA Rookie Second Team\n*Blue Edwards – 1990\n*Paul Millsap – 2007\n*Derrick Favors – 2011\n\nBroadcasters\n\nThe Jazz's flagship radio stations are KZNS (1280) \"The Zone\" and KZNS-FM Fox Sports Radio 97.5. \n\nThe Jazz signed a new exclusive 12-year agreement with Root Sports Utah on October 20, 2009, ending the team's broadcasts on KJZZ-TV. \n\nThe team's current TV and radio announcers are:\n* Craig Bolerjack (TV play-by-play)\n* Matt Harpring (TV color commentary)\n* David Locke (radio play-by-play)\n* Ron Boone (radio broadcast analyst)\n* Dan Roberts (public address announcer, home games)\n* Alema Harrington (TV host, pre-game and post-game)\n* Thurl Bailey (TV broadcast analyst)\n* Steve Brown (TV sideline reporter)\n* Nelson Moran (Spanish Radio: play-by-play/color commentary)\n* Isidro Lopez (Spanish Radio: play-by-play)\n* Nicole Hernandez (Spanish Radio: color commentary/sideline reporter)\n\nRetired Announcers:\n* Rod Hundley (TV and Radio play-by-play) (1974–2009)\n\nFranchise leaders\n\n*Career\n**Games: John Stockton (1,504)\n**Minutes Played: Karl Malone (53,479)\n**Field Goals Made: Karl Malone (13,335)\n**Field Goal Attempts: Karl Malone (25,810)\n**3-Point Field Goals Made: John Stockton (845)\n**3-Point Field Goal Attempts: John Stockton (2,203)\n**Free Throws Made: Karl Malone (9,619)\n**Free Throw Attempts: Karl Malone (12,963)\n**Offensive Rebounds: Karl Malone (3,501)\n**Defensive Rebounds: Karl Malone (11,100)\n**Total Rebounds: Karl Malone (14,601)\n**Assists**: John Stockton (15,806)\n**Steals**: John Stockton (3,265)\n**Blocked Shots: Mark Eaton (3,064)\n**Turnovers: Karl Malone (4,421)\n**Personal Fouls: Karl Malone (4,462)\n**Points: Karl Malone (36,374)\n*Per Game\n**Minutes Played: Truck Robinson (43.35)\n**Field Goals Made: Adrian Dantley (10.65)\n**Field Goal Attempts: Pete Maravich (22.75)\n**3-Point Field Goals Made: Jeff Hornacek (0.92)\n**3-Point Field Goal Attempts: Bryon Russell (2.32)\n**Free Throws Made: Adrian Dantley (8.27)\n**Free Throw Attempts: Adrian Dantley (10.11)\n**Offensive Rebounds: Karl Malone(3.50)\n**Defensive Rebounds: Karl Malone(11.42)\n**Total Rebounds: Karl Malone(14.92)\n**Assists: John Stockton (10.51)\n**Steals: John Stockton (2.17)\n**Blocked Shots: Mark Eaton (3.50)\n**Turnovers: Pete Maravich (4.25)\n**Personal Fouls: Danny Schayes (3.85)\n**Points: Adrian Dantley (29.58)\n*Per 48 Minutes\n**Field Goals Made: Adrian Dantley (13.16)\n**Field Goal Attempts: Pete Maravich (28.48)\n**3-Point Field Goals Made: Chris Morris (1.85)\n**3-Point Field Goal Attempts: Chris Morris (6.08)\n**Free Throws Made: John Drew (10.97)\n**Free Throw Attempts: John Drew (14.28)\n**Offensive Rebounds: Ron Behagen (5.52)\n**Defensive Rebounds: Truck Robinson (12.65)\n**Total Rebounds: Rich Kelley (16.72)\n**Assists: John Stockton (15.88)\n**Steals: Carey Scurry (3.65)\n**Blocked Shots: Mark Eaton (5.84)\n**Turnovers: Jim Les (5.55)\n**Personal Fouls: Eric Leckner (10.30)\n**Points: John Drew (36.98)\n\n** – Leads NBA\n\nHead coaches", "The Portland Trail Blazers, commonly known as the Blazers, are an American professional basketball team based in Portland, Oregon. The Trail Blazers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member club of the league's Western Conference Northwest Division. The team played its home games in the Memorial Coliseum before moving to Moda Center in 1995 (called the Rose Garden until 2013). The franchise entered the league as an expansion team in 1970, and has enjoyed a strong following: from 1977 through 1995, the team sold out 814 consecutive home games, the longest such streak in American major professional sports at the time, and only since surpassed by the Boston Red Sox. The Trail Blazers have been the only NBA team based in the bi-national Pacific Northwest, after the Vancouver Grizzlies relocated to Memphis and became the Memphis Grizzlies in 2001, and the Seattle SuperSonics relocated to Oklahoma City and became the Oklahoma City Thunder in 2008.\n\nThe team has advanced to the NBA Finals three times, winning the NBA championship once in 1977. Their other NBA Finals appearances were in 1990 and 1992. The team has qualified for the playoffs in 31 seasons of their 45-season existence, including a streak of 21 straight appearances from 1983 through 2003, the second longest streak in NBA history. The Trail Blazers' 31 playoff appearances rank third in the NBA only behind the Los Angeles Lakers and San Antonio Spurs since the team's inception in 1970. Six Hall of Fame players have played for the Trail Blazers (Lenny Wilkens, Bill Walton, Clyde Drexler, Dražen Petrović, Arvydas Sabonis, and Scottie Pippen). Bill Walton is the franchise's most decorated player; he was the NBA Finals Most Valuable Player in 1977, and the regular season MVP the following year. Four Blazer rookies (Geoff Petrie, Sidney Wicks, Brandon Roy and Damian Lillard) have won the NBA Rookie of the Year award. Two Hall of Fame coaches, Lenny Wilkens and Jack Ramsay, have patrolled the sidelines for the Blazers, and two others, Mike Schuler and Mike Dunleavy, have won the NBA Coach of the Year award with the team. \n\nHistory\n\nFranchise inception\n\nSports promoter Harry Glickman sought a National Basketball Association (NBA) franchise for Portland as far back as 1955 when he proposed two new expansion teams, the other to be located in Los Angeles. When the Memorial Coliseum was opened in 1960 Glickman saw the potential it could serve as a professional basketball venue but it was not until February 6, 1970, that the NBA board of governors granted him the rights to a franchise in Portland. To raise the money for the $3.7 million admission tax, Glickman associated himself to real estate magnates Bob Schmertz of New Jersey, Larry Weinberg of Los Angeles and Herman Sarkowsky of Seattle. Two weeks later, on February 24, team management held a contest to select the team's name and received more than 10,000 entries. The most popular choice was \"Pioneers\", but that name was excluded from consideration as it was already used by sports teams at Portland's Lewis and Clark College. The name \"Trail Blazers\" received 172 entries, and was ultimately selected by the judging panel, being revealed on March 13 in the halftime of a SuperSonics game at the Memorial Coliseum. Derived from the trail blazing activity by explorers making paths through forests, Glickman considered it a name that could \"reflect both the ruggedness of the Pacific Northwest and the start of a major league era in our state.\" Despite initial mixed response, the Trail Blazers name, often shortened to just \"Blazers\", became popular in Oregon.\n\n1970–1974\n\nAlong with the Cleveland Cavaliers and Buffalo Braves (now Los Angeles Clippers), the Trail Blazers entered the NBA in 1970 as an expansion team, under coach Rolland Todd. Geoff Petrie and Sidney Wicks led the team in its early years, and the team failed to qualify for the playoffs in its first six seasons of existence. During that span, the team had three head coaches (including future hall-of-famer Lenny Wilkens); team executive Stu Inman also served as coach. The team won the first pick in the NBA draft twice during that span. In 1972, the team drafted LaRue Martin with the number one pick, and in 1974 the team selected Bill Walton from UCLA.\n\n1974–1978\n\nIn 1976, the ABA–NBA merger saw those two rival leagues join forces. Four ABA teams joined the NBA; the remaining teams were dissolved and their players distributed among the remaining NBA squads in a dispersal draft. The Trail Blazers selected Maurice Lucas in the dispersal draft. That summer, they also hired Jack Ramsay as head coach.\n\nThe two moves, coupled with the team's stellar play, led Portland to several firsts: winning record (49–33), playoff appearance, and NBA Championship in 1977. Starting on April 5 of that year, the team began a sellout streak of 814 straight games—the longest in American major professional sports history—which did not end until 1995, after the team moved into a larger facility. \n\nThe team started the 1977–78 season with a 50–10 mark, and some predicted a dynasty in Portland. However, Bill Walton suffered a foot injury that ended his season and would plague him over the remainder of his career, and the team struggled to an 8–14 finish, going 58–24 overall. In the playoffs, Portland lost to the Seattle SuperSonics in the 1978 conference semifinals. That summer, Walton demanded to be traded to a team of his choice (Clippers, Knicks, Warriors, or 76ers) because he was unhappy with his medical treatment in Portland. Walton was never traded, and he held out the entire 1978–79 season and left the team as a free agent thereafter. The team was further dismantled as Lucas left in 1980.\n\n1980–1983\n\nDuring the 1980s, the team was a consistent presence in the NBA post-season, failing to qualify for the playoffs only in 1982. However, they never advanced past the conference semifinals during the decade. The Pacific Division of the NBA was dominated by the Los Angeles Lakers throughout the decade, and only the Lakers and the Houston Rockets represented the Western Conference in the NBA Finals. Key players for the Blazers during the early 1980s included Mychal Thompson, Billy Ray Bates, Fat Lever, Darnell Valentine, Wayne Cooper, T. R. Dunn, Jim Paxson, and Calvin Natt.\n\n1983–1988\n\nIn the 1983 draft, the team selected University of Houston guard–forward Clyde Drexler with the 14th pick; \"Clyde the Glide\" would become the face of the franchise for over a decade, and the team's second-most decorated player (after Walton). In the next year's draft, the Trail Blazers landed the No. 2 pick in the NBA draft. After the Houston Rockets selected Drexler's college teammate Akeem Olajuwon at No. 1, the Trail Blazers selected Kentucky center Sam Bowie. Drafting third, the Chicago Bulls selected Michael Jordan. The selection of the injury-plagued Bowie over Jordan has been criticized as one of the worst draft picks in the history of American professional sports. That summer, the Blazers also made a controversial trade, sending Lever, Cooper, and Natt to the Denver Nuggets for high-scoring forward Kiki Vandeweghe. In the 1985 draft, the Blazers selected point guard Terry Porter with the last pick of the first round. Porter would go on to become one of the top point guards in the league, and the Blazers' all-time leader in assists.\n\nHowever, the Blazers continued to struggle in the post-season, and in 1986, Ramsay was fired and replaced with Mike Schuler. Despite this, they were the only team to beat the Boston Celtics on the road that season. That off-season, the team drafted two players from behind the Iron Curtain, Arvydas Sabonis and Dražen Petrović, and sent Thompson to the San Antonio Spurs for former Oregon State University star Steve Johnson. Johnson was a high-scoring forward-center who the team intended to pair with Bowie on the frontline. It was not to be, as Bowie broke his leg five games into the 1986–87 season, missing the next two and a half seasons. During Schuler's brief tenure, the Blazers failed to advance out of the first round of the NBA playoffs.\n\nPaul Allen ownership\n\nIn 1988, Paul Allen purchased the Blazers. His first season as owner was one marked by turmoil, as conflicts erupted over who should start at several positions. Both Vandeweghe and Johnson suffered injuries; they were replaced in the starting lineup by Jerome Kersey and Kevin Duckworth. Several players, most notably Drexler, were accused of undermining Schuler. The team went 25–22 to open the 1988–89 season, and Schuler was fired. He was replaced on an interim basis with assistant coach Rick Adelman, and Vandeweghe was traded to the New York Knicks. Under Adelman, the team went 14–21 to finish the season, and barely qualified for the playoffs. That off-season, the team traded Sam Bowie (who had returned to the team to end the season) to the New Jersey Nets for forward Buck Williams, and Adelman was given the coaching job on a non-interim basis.\n\n1988–1995\n\nThe addition of Williams, and the replacement of the defensively challenged Vandeweghe with the defensive-minded Kersey, turned the team from a poor defensive squad into a good one. Led by Drexler, the team reached the NBA Finals in 1990 and 1992, losing to the Detroit Pistons and Chicago Bulls, respectively. Possibly inspired by the Chicago Bears's \"Super Bowl Shuffle\", during the run-up to their 1990 Finals appearance, the Blazers recorded two songs: \"Bust a Bucket\" and \"Rip City Rhapsody\" ( with music played and recorded by Josh Mellicker, \"Rip City\" being a reference to the city's nickname). The year in between their two finals appearances, the team posted a league-best 63–19 record before losing to the Los Angeles Lakers in the Western Conference finals. However, the team failed to win an NBA title, and failed to advance past the first round in 1993 and 1994. Adelman was fired after the 1994 season, and replaced with P. J. Carlesimo, which led to the resignation of executive vice-president Geoff Petrie, a close friend of Adelman's. \n\nIn July 1994, the Trail Blazers announced the hiring of a new team president, former Seattle SuperSonics general manager Bob Whitsitt. Whitsitt, known as \"Trader Bob\" for his penchant for making trades, immediately set about revamping the Blazers roster; this included dismantling the aging Drexler-led team that had twice been to the finals. Drexler requested to be traded to a contender, and the Trail Blazers traded him to the Houston Rockets. In the fall of 1995, the team left the Memorial Coliseum for a new home, the 20,000-seat Rose Garden Arena. The sellout streak ended in the new building.\n\n1995–2003\n\n1995–2000\n\nSeveral players left in free agency, including Terry Porter (1995), Buck Williams (1996), and Cliff Robinson (1997), which left Jerome Kersey unprotected in the 1995 expansion draft. \n\nIn an effort to rebuild, the team acquired several players who were highly talented, but had reputations for off-court troubles. Isaiah Rider, who was traded by the Minnesota Timberwolves for a draft pick and career backups due to his frequent arrests and lack of punctuality, was arrested for cannabis possession two days before his debut with the Blazers. Rasheed Wallace, who was acknowledged as a hot-tempered player since college, was also acquired, in a trade with the Washington Bullets. Point guard Kenny Anderson was signed as a free agent, and subsequently traded to the Toronto Raptors for Damon Stoudamire in February 1998 (the Raptors traded Anderson to the Boston Celtics five days later, because he did not want to play in Canada). Initially, this approach worked, as the team returned to the Western Conference finals in 1999 under head coach Mike Dunleavy. After being swept by the eventual champion San Antonio Spurs, Whitsitt sent Rider and guard Jim Jackson to the Atlanta Hawks for guard Steve Smith and acquired former All-Star forward Scottie Pippen from the Houston Rockets. The team again advanced to the Western Conference Finals, where they faced a Los Angeles Lakers team led by Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant. In that series, the Trail Blazers dropped three out of the first four games before winning the next two, forcing a pivotal Game 7. The Blazers had a 15-point lead in the fourth quarter, but lost the game and the series to the Lakers, who went on to win the first of three consecutive titles. \n\n2000–2003\n\nThe Trail Blazers made a series of personnel moves in the 2000 and 2001 off-seasons that failed to produce the desired results. Forward Jermaine O'Neal was traded to the Indiana Pacers for Dale Davis. Brian Grant signed with the Miami Heat, and was replaced with ex-Seattle forward Shawn Kemp. The team started off well, posting the Western Conference's best record through March 2001, and then signed guard Rod Strickland to augment their point guard corps. The move backfired, and the team lost 17 of its remaining 25 games, and was eliminated in the first round of the playoffs (swept by the Los Angeles Lakers). Some in the media began to criticize the team, and Whitsitt, previously proclaimed a genius for his work in both Seattle and Portland, was criticized. A particular criticism was that Whitsitt was attempting to win a title by assembling a roster of stars, without paying attention to team chemistry. Longtime NBA coach and analyst, Doug Collins, referred to Whitsitt as a \"rotisserie-league manager.\" A fan was ejected from the Rose Garden for holding up a banner that said \"Trade Whitsitt\", and many in the national media started referring to the team as the \"Jail Blazers\" because of many players' off-court problems. \n\nThat offseason the churning continued; Dunleavy was fired, and replaced with Maurice Cheeks, a \"players' coach\" who some thought would relate better to the players than Dunleavy did. Cheeks brought on Dan Panaggio as assistant coach after a failed courtship with Henry Bibby of Southern California. More transactions followed as the Blazers traded Steve Smith to the Spurs for Derek Anderson. In one of his most controversial moves to that time, Whitsitt signed free agent Ruben Patterson, who had previously pleaded no contest to a felony sexual assault charge and was required to register as a sex offender. Popular center, Arvydas Sabonis, who had a towel flung in his face by Rasheed Wallace during the playoffs, decided to leave the team. \n\nThe next two seasons were just as disastrous for the team's reputation. Several players, including Wallace, Stoudamire, and Qyntel Woods, were cited for marijuana possession. Woods pleaded guilty to first-degree animal abuse for staging dog fights in his house, some involving his pit bull named Hollywood. Hollywood and Woods' other pit bull, Sugar, were confiscated, and Woods was given eighty hours of community service. He also agreed to donate $10,000 to the Oregon Humane Society. Wallace was suspended for seven games for threatening a referee. Zach Randolph and Patterson got in a fight during practice, with Randolph sucker punching his teammate in the eye, an injury which kept Patterson from making a meaningful contribution during the playoffs. When police came to Stoudamire's house to respond to a burglar alarm, they noticed the smell of marijuana, searched the premises, and found a pound of cannabis located in a crawlspace; the search was later declared illegal and charges in the matter were dropped. Guard Bonzi Wells famously told Sports Illustrated in a 2002 interview: \"We’re not really going to worry about what the hell (the fans) think about us. They really don’t matter to us. They can boo us everyday, but they’re still going to ask for our autographs if they see us on the street. That's why they’re fans, and we’re NBA players.\" Wells was fined $50,000 by the Blazers for the statement. \n\nFan discontent soared; despite the team continuing to post a winning record, attendance at the Rose Garden started to decline. In the summer of 2003, with attendance declining, the team going nowhere on the court, and an exorbitant payroll, Whitsitt announced that he would leave the team to focus on Paul Allen's other franchise, the Seattle Seahawks. \n\n2003–2006\n\nTo replace Whitsitt, the team hired two men at new positions. John Nash, a veteran NBA executive, was hired as general manager, and Steve Patterson as team president. The new management promised a focus on character while remaining playoff contenders; the team soon published a \"25-Point Pledge\" to fans. Troublesome players including Wells, Wallace, and Jeff McInnis were traded. However, the team failed to qualify for the 2004 NBA Playoffs, ending a streak of 21 straight appearances.\n\nThe following year was marked by more trouble as the team plummeted to a 27–55 record. The bankruptcy of the Oregon Arena corporation, which resulted in the Rose Garden being owned by a consortium of investment firms, further alienated the fanbase, as did an incident in which forward Darius Miles (himself African-American) called coach Maurice Cheeks a \"nigger\", following it up with more racial invective when Cheeks sought out Nash, referring to Nash as Cheeks' \"daddy.\" The latter incident was compounded by what many viewed as inadequate discipline for Miles, followed by a secret agreement between the team and Miles to refund the amount of his fine. Cheeks was fired that season and replaced on an interim basis by director of player-personnel Kevin Pritchard. That summer the team hired Nate McMillan, who had coached the Sonics the prior season, and Pritchard returned to the front office.\n\nThe following 2005–06 season was not better, as the Blazers posted a league-worst 21–61 record. Attendance was lower, and the year was not free of player incidents. Players such as Miles, Patterson, Randolph, and Sebastian Telfair were involved in either on-court bickering or off-court legal incidents. Nash was fired at the end of the season, with Steve Patterson assuming the general manager role in addition to his duties as president. In addition, the team had a poor relationship with the management of the Rose Garden, frequently complaining of a \"broken economic model.\" It was widely speculated by the end of the year that Paul Allen would sell the team, and the team was offered for sale that summer, with several groups expressing interest. However, Allen was willing to spend money and urged Pritchard to make draft-day trades. He subsequently took the team off the market. \n\n2006–2011\n\nIn the 2006 NBA draft the Blazers traded Viktor Khryapa and draft rights for Tyrus Thomas for draft rights to LaMarcus Aldridge. The Blazers also traded for the sixth pick, Brandon Roy. In the spring of 2007, Steve Patterson resigned as team president, and Paul Allen entered into an agreement to re-purchase the Rose Garden. On the court, the team finished with a 32–50 record, an 11-game improvement, and rookie shooting guard Roy was named the 2006–07 Rookie of the Year. That summer Pritchard was promoted to general manager, and former Nike Inc. executive Larry Miller was hired as team president. The Blazers won the 2007 NBA draft lottery and selected Ohio State center Greg Oden with the No. 1 pick in the draft. Some had speculated that they might choose Kevin Durant instead; Durant was picked at No. 2 by regional rivals the Seattle SuperSonics. Oden suffered a pre-season knee injury requiring microfracture surgery, and missed the entire 2007–08 season. Oden's constant battle with injuries and Durant's success resulted in comparisons to the Blazers' selection of Sam Bowie over Michael Jordan in 1984. \n\nDespite this, the Trail Blazers had a 13-game winning streak that began in early December, resulting in a 13–2 record, an NBA best for the month of December. Nate McMillan won NBA Coach of the Month honors, and Roy garnered NBA Western Conference Player of the Week honors in back-to-back weeks (the first Trail Blazer to accomplish the feat since Clyde Drexler in the 1990–91 season). Western Conference head coaches selected Roy to the 2008 NBA All-Star Game, the first All-Star for the Blazers since Rasheed Wallace in 2001. The Blazers finished the season 41–41, their best record since the 2003–04 season. Following the season, the Blazers became the only NBA team for the Pacific Northwest, as the Seattle SuperSonics moved to Oklahoma City.\n\nDuring the 2008–09 season, after much waiting, Greg Oden debuted with the Blazers, playing in 61 games. Portland also added some international flavor to the team with the arrival of Spanish swingman Rudy Fernández, a member of the Spanish national basketball team. French-native Nicolas Batum emerged as a skilled defensive forward who was inserted into the starting lineup as a rookie. Roy appeared in his second-straight All-Star Game, and Fernández competed in the Sprite Slam Dunk Contest during NBA All-Star Weekend. Roy had a career-high 52 points against the Phoenix Suns and game-winning shots against the Houston Rockets and New York Knicks. The Blazers clinched a playoff berth for the first time since 2003 and achieved a 54–28 record, their first winning record since the 2002–03 season. As the fourth seed and holding home court advantage, the Trail Blazers played the fifth-seeded Houston Rockets in the 2009 Playoffs, losing the playoff series 4 games to 2.\n\nIn the 2009 off-season, the Trail Blazers traded the No. 24 pick to Dallas for the No. 22 pick and selected Víctor Claver. They also selected Villanova forward Dante Cunningham with the No. 33 pick, Jon Brockman and guard Patrick Mills. Brockman was traded to the Kings in exchange for No. 31 pick Jeff Pendergraph. Free agent Channing Frye signed with the Phoenix Suns and Sergio Rodríguez was traded to the Kings. The Blazers attempted to sign free agent small forward Hedo Türkoğlu, who led the Orlando Magic to the 2009 NBA Finals, but after a verbal agreement he decided to sign with the Toronto Raptors. The Blazers then attempted to sign restricted free agent Paul Millsap; however, their offer was matched by the Utah Jazz. On July 24, 2009, the Trail Blazers signed point guard Andre Miller.\n\nDespite a winning record, injuries hobbled the team for the 2009–2010 season. Reserves Batum and Fernández started the season on the inactive list and forward Travis Outlaw soon followed after a serious foot injury early in the season. Most notably, centers Oden and Joel Przybilla suffered season-ending knee injuries, while Roy and Aldridge played through shoulder, hamstring, ankle and knee injuries. Head Coach Nate McMillan was likewise not spared, suffering a ruptured Achilles tendon during practice and was in a walking boot. Because of the void at the center position, Blazers general manager Kevin Pritchard worked out a deal to acquire Marcus Camby from the Los Angeles Clippers in exchange for Steve Blake and Outlaw. Although wins did not come as easily as the season before, the Blazers rallied to finish at 50–32, and finished 6th in the West. Roy underwent surgery after suffering a torn meniscus in his right knee, but returned for Game 4 of the first round series against the Phoenix Suns. However, the accumulation of injuries was too much to bear, and the short-handed Trail Blazers lost the series 4–2 to the Suns. \n\n2010–2011\n\nDuring the 2010 off-season, the Blazers' front office experienced significant personnel changes beginning in July with the announcement of new general manager Rich Cho, succeeding former general manager Kevin Pritchard, who was relieved of his duties after the 2010 NBA draft. Cho became the first general manager of Asian descent in NBA history. On August 12, the Trail Blazers signed two new assistant general managers, Bill Branch and Steve Rosenberry. Branch and Rosenberry replaced former assistant general manager Tom Penn, who was released by Portland in March. The organization also made changes to Nate McMillan's coaching staff by hiring Bernie Bickerstaff, Bob Ociepka and Buck Williams, with Bickerstaff assuming the lead assistant coach position due to the departure of Monty Williams. The Blazers acquired rookies Armon Johnson, Luke Babbitt, and Elliot Williams from the 2010 NBA draft and off-season trades. On July 21, Wesley Matthews signed a five-year deal with the Blazers after his former team, the Utah Jazz, declined to match Portland's offer. \n\nSimilar to the previous season, Portland was overcome with injuries from the start of the 2010–11 season. Jeff Pendergraph and rookie guard Elliot Williams both suffered knee injuries that sidelined them for the season; Portland later waived Pendergraph. In November, they announced that Oden would have microfracture surgery on his left knee, ending his 2010–2011 season. This injury marked Oden's third NBA season cut short due to a knee injury. Three-time All-Star Brandon Roy underwent double-arthroscopic surgery on January 17, 2011, to repair both knees after dealing with constant struggles, leaving his future up in the air. Just days after, Marcus Camby also underwent arthroscopic knee surgery to repair his left knee.\n\nDespite struggles with injury, Portland performed at a playoff level throughout the season. LaMarcus Aldridge emerged as the focal point of the team and posted career-high numbers, as well as Western Conference Player of the Week and Month honors. Wesley Matthews also emerged in the absence of Brandon Roy, proving his worth as the Blazers' key off-season addition. Believing the team could make a significant run in the playoffs, Cho executed his first major trade on February 24, 2011, just seven minutes before the deadline. The Trail Blazers sent forward Dante Cunningham, center Joel Przybilla and center Sean Marks to the Charlotte Bobcats in return for former All-Star and All-Defensive forward Gerald Wallace. \nThe emergence of Aldridge and the play of Matthews kept the Blazers competitive, sealing another playoff berth by winning 48 games. However, like in their last two postseasons, the Blazers were eliminated in six games of the first round, this time against the eventual champions, the Dallas Mavericks.\n\nDuring the 2011 off-season, the Blazers released Cho, reportedly due to communication and \"chemistry issues\" with owner Paul Allen. Director of Scouting Chad Buchanan took over as acting interim General Manager. The dismissal of Cho was criticized by Sports Illustrated as \"illogical\", although they noted that Allen had done a lot of questionable moves during his tenure as team owner.\n\nOn June 23, 2011, in the NBA draft, the Trail Blazers drafted guards Nolan Smith from Duke University with the 21st selection and Jon Diebler from Ohio State University with the 51st selection. On the same day, the Blazers front office had made a three-team trade with the Denver Nuggets and Dallas Mavericks. The trade sent Blazers guards Andre Miller to Denver and Rudy Fernández to Dallas along with international player Petteri Koponen, who had yet to make an appearance for Portland; Denver then sent guard Raymond Felton to Portland and Denver also received rookie forward Jordan Hamilton from Dallas as well as a future second-round pick from Portland. \n\n2011–2013\n\nA lockout put transactions on hold until early December, and the Blazers were hit with three downfalls once the date came: Brandon Roy announced his retirement due to chronic knee problems, Greg Oden was diagnosed with yet another setback involving his ongoing knee issues, and LaMarcus Aldridge underwent heart surgery. Interim GM Chad Buchanan signed three free agents in the week before Portland's first exhibition game: Kurt Thomas, Jamal Crawford and Craig Smith. \n\nIn the shortened 2011–12 NBA season, the Blazers got off to a 7–2 start. But the team quickly began to collapse, as starting point guard Raymond Felton, among others, struggled with McMillan's new approach to a running-style offense. The team gained some notability as Aldridge was named to his first All-Star Game. Despite Aldridge's performance, the rest of the team became more inconsistent.\n\nOn March 15, 2012, the Trail Blazers made several moves, including two trades before the 3 pm EST deadline. Center Marcus Camby was sent to the Houston Rockets in exchange for center Hasheem Thabeet and point guard Jonny Flynn. Portland also received Houston's second-round draft pick in the 2012 NBA draft. Portland then traded forward Gerald Wallace to the New Jersey Nets for center Mehmet Okur, forward Shawne Williams, and New Jersey's first-round, top-3-protected pick in the 2012 NBA draft. All four players acquired in the trades held expiring contracts, meaning they would be free agents at the end of the season. Oden was released from the roster after playing a total of 82 games in five NBA seasons, being cut along with Chris Johnson in order to make room for the incoming traded players. Finally, head coach Nate McMillan was also fired, leaving the franchise with the third-most coaching wins, behind Jack Ramsay and Rick Adelman. Portland named Kaleb Canales as the interim head coach for the rest of the 2011–2012 NBA season. A few days later, Portland claimed forward J. J. Hickson off waivers from the Sacramento Kings. After shaking up the roster and limping to the end of the regular season with a 28–38 record and finishing out of playoff contention for the first time in three years, the team entered the offseason on the search for a general manager and new head coach.\n\nAt the 2012 NBA draft lottery on May 30, the Blazers secured the number 6 pick of the draft via the Brooklyn Nets from the Gerald Wallace trade, and also ended up with the number 11 pick due to their own record. Neil Olshey became the new GM in June, making it just over a year since the Blazers had had a non-interim general manager. \n\nOn June 28, 2012, the Blazers selected Weber State guard Damian Lillard and University of Illinois center Meyers Leonard with the 6th and 11th picks overall, respectively. They also selected University of Memphis guard Will Barton with the 40th pick overall, and traded the rights of the 41st overall pick, University of Kansas guard Tyshawn Taylor, to the Brooklyn Nets for cash considerations.\n\nHeaded by their new general manager Olshey, the Trail Blazers front office further made a few changes during July 2012. The Blazers signed their 30th pick from the 2006 draft, Joel Freeland, and their 22nd pick from the 2009 draft, Víctor Claver, as well as re-signing Hickson and Nicolas Batum. They also signed veteran point guard Ronnie Price to back up Lillard, who was selected as co-MVP of the 2012 Las Vegas Summer League. Dallas Mavericks assistant coach Terry Stotts was hired as head coach on August 7, 2012. \n\nUnder the reins of Lillard, the Blazers played well into January 2013, posting a 20–15 record. On January 11, 2013, at home against the Miami Heat, Wesley Matthews made two consecutive three-pointers late in the fourth quarter to help the Blazers secure a 92–90 victory. However, despite the Blazers remaining among the playoff contenders for most of the season, injuries to starters Batum, LaMarcus Aldridge, and Matthews, as well as a losing streak of 13 games – the longest in the franchise's history – led to the 11th position in the West, with a 33–49 record. Averaging 19.0 points, 6.5 assists, and 3.1 rebounds, Lillard was unanimously named Rookie of the Year, joining Ralph Sampson, David Robinson, and Blake Griffin as the only unanimous selections in NBA history. \n\n2013–2015\n\nGoing into the 2013 NBA draft, the Trail Blazers held four picks: the 10th pick in the first round and three second-round picks. The Blazers selected guard C. J. McCollum out of Lehigh University with their 10th pick, and also selected center Jeff Withey from Kansas, power forward Grant Jerrett from Arizona, and Montenegrin big man Marko Todorović. In addition, Cal guard Allen Crabbe was acquired from the Cleveland Cavaliers in exchange for two second-round picks, in the 2015 and 2016 drafts.\n\nThe Blazers finished the 2014 season with 21 more wins than the previous season, which amounted for the largest single-season improvement in franchise history. This included a period in November when they won 11 straight games, and 13–2 in the month overall, for which coach Terry Stotts took home Coach of the Month honors. On December 12, 2013, Aldridge scored 31 points and pulled down 25 rebounds in a home game against the Rockets, the first time a Trail Blazer recorded a 30-point, 25-rebound game. On December 14, 2013, the Blazers made a franchise-record 21 three-pointers against the Philadelphia 76ers. They tied the new record 19 days later against the Charlotte Bobcats, becoming the first NBA team to make 20 or more three-pointers in a game more than once in a season. Lillard was voted in as a reserve to his first All-Star game, joining Aldridge to represent Portland at the game. Portland finished 54–28, securing the fifth seed in the playoffs against the Rockets. The team also shot 81.5% at the free throw line, made 770 three pointers, and started four players for all 82 regular-season games, all franchise records.\n\nThe first-round series against the Rockets was a tight one, with three of the six games going to overtime. The Blazers fared well in the first two games despite not having home-court advantage, beating Houston 122-120 and 112-105 in Games 1 and 2 respectively, fueled by Aldridge's 46 points and 18 rebounds in Game 1, and 43 points and 3 blocks in Game 2. The biggest headline came in the sixth game of the series with the Rockets threatening to force a Game 7 back at Houston. Down two points with 0.9 seconds left in the game, Damian Lillard hit a buzzer-beating three-pointer to close out the series, and the Blazers advanced to the semifinals for the first time since 2000, where they lost to the eventual champion San Antonio Spurs in 5 games. \n\nDuring the 2014 offseason, Olshey signed center Chris Kaman and two-time former Blazer guard Steve Blake to bolster the bench. Expectations by sportswriters and analysts were high for the Trail Blazers going into the 2015 NBA season given their surprise success in 2013–14. The Blazers beat the reigning Northwest Division Champion Oklahoma City Thunder 106-89 in their season opener at home on October 29, 2014. Like the season before, the Trail Blazers dominated the month of November, at one point winning nine straight games from November 9 to November 26 before being defeated by the Memphis Grizzlies. Injuries, which had not amounted to significance the previous season, started to inflict themselves on various players. Starting center Lopez fractured his right hand in a game against the Spurs on December 15, 2014, and would miss the next 23 games. Initially, the Blazers were much unfazed, winning 129–119 in triple overtime against the Spurs on December 19, a game that saw Lillard and Aldridge combine for 75 points on 29 field goals; Lillard netted a career-high 43 points. Four days later, Lillard hit a three-pointer to tie the game and force overtime against the Thunder en route to 40 points and a 115–111 victory. Three Blazers went to New Orleans for the All Star Weekend: Matthews for the Foot Locker Three-Point Contest, Lillard as a reserve to the All-Star Game, and Aldridge as a starter to the All-Star game.\n\nMore injuries appeared around the start of the new year, which forced Aldridge, Batum, and Joel Freeland to miss various amounts of time, but none greater than Wesley Matthews' Achilles tendon tear on March 5, 2015. Called \"the heart and soul\" of the team by Aldridge, Matthews was in the midst of a career year when the freak injury occurred in a game against the Mavericks. The loss of his defense, three-point shooting and hustle was part of the reason why the Blazers stumbled in the latter half of the season. In the first half of the season, the Blazers had a record of 30–11, allowed opponents to score an average of 97.0 points, and forced them to shoot 29.7% on three-pointers; in the second half the Blazers regressed to a 21–20 record, allowed 100.2 points, and let opponents shoot 37.9% from three. The Blazers clinched a return trip to the playoffs on March 30, 2015, defeating the Phoenix Suns, 109–86. Finishing the season 51–31, they clinched their first Northwest Division title since 1999, but fell to the Grizzlies in five games in the first round of the playoffs.\n\n2015–present\n\nIn the 2015 NBA draft, the Blazers selected Arizona forward Rondae Hollis-Jefferson and subsequently traded him to the Brooklyn Nets along with Steve Blake for center Mason Plumlee and the 42nd pick, Pat Connaughton. \n\nAfter losing four of their five starters at the end of the 2014–15 season, the Blazers won 44 games, were the 5th seed in the Western Conference, and beat the Clippers in six games in the First Round, but were eliminated by the Golden State Warriors in five games in the Conference Semifinals.\n\nSeason-by-season results\n\nIn the Blazers' 46 years of existence (through 2016), they have qualified for the NBA playoffs 32 times, including a streak of 21 straight playoff appearances from 1983 through 2003. The team has one NBA title, in 1977, and appeared in the NBA Finals two other times, in 1990 and 1992. The best record posted by the team was 63–19, in 1991; the worst record was 18–64, in the team's second season.\n\nPlayers\n\nCurrent roster\n\nRetained draft rights\n\nThe Trail Blazers hold the draft rights to the following unsigned draft picks who have been playing outside the NBA. A drafted player, either an international draftee or a college draftee who isn't signed by the team that drafted him, is allowed to sign with any non-NBA teams. In this case, the team retains the player's draft rights in the NBA until one year after the player's contract with the non-NBA team ends. This list includes draft rights that were acquired from trades with other teams.\n\nRetired numbers\n\n \n* 1 As team owner and founder, number is still available to players.\n* 2 Ramsay did not play for the team; the number represents the 1977 NBA Championship he won while coaching the Blazers.\n* 3 Number retired twice in 2008\n\nBasketball Hall of Famers\n\nNaismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame\n\n;Notes:\n* 1 In total, Wilkens was inducted into the Hall of Fame three times: as player, as coach and as a member of the 1992 Olympic team.\n* 2 Inducted posthumously.\n* 3 In total, Drexler was inducted into the Hall of Fame twice: as player and as a member of the 1992 Olympic team.\n* 4 In total, Pippen was inducted into the Hall of Fame twice: as player and as a member of the 1992 Olympic team.\n\nFIBA Hall of Fame\n\n;Notes:\n* 1 Inducted posthumously.\n\nOregon Sports Hall of Fame \n\nThe Oregon Sports Hall of Fame honors Oregon athletes, teams, coaches, and others who have made a significant contribution to sports in Oregon. Also inducted into the Hall are the 1976–77 team, and the following Trail Blazers' players: \n\nFranchise leaders\n\nBold denotes still active with team.\n\nItalic denotes still active but not with team.\n\nPoints scored (regular season) (as of the end of the 2015–16 season) \n\n* 1. Clyde Drexler (18,040)\n* 2. LaMarcus Aldridge (12,562)\n* 3. Terry Porter (11,330)\n* 4. Clifford Robinson (10,405)\n* 5. Jerome Kersey (10,067)\n* 6. Jim Paxson (10,003)\n* 7. Geoff Petrie (9,732)\n* 8. Mychal Thompson (9,215)\n* 9. Rasheed Wallace (9,119)\n* 10. Sidney Wicks (8,882)\n\n* 11. Kevin Duckworth (7,188)\n* 12. Damian Lillard (6,856)\n* 13. Damon Stoudamire (6,745)\n* 14. Kiki Vandeweghe (6,698)\n* 15. Zach Randolph (6,202)\n* 16. Brandon Roy (6,107)\n* 17. Calvin Natt (5,738)\n* 18. Buck Williams (5,677)\n* 19. Arvydas Sabonis (5,629)\n* 20. Wesley Matthews (5,521)\n\n* 21. Nicolas Batum (5,390)\n* 22. Maurice Lucas (5,151)\n* 23. Rod Strickland (5,044)\n* 24. Larry Steele (5,009)\n* 25. Lloyd Neal (4,846)\n* 26. Bob Gross (4,484)\n* 27. Tom Owens (4,437)\n* 28. Lionel Hollins (4,379)\n* 29. Bonzi Wells (4,112)\n* 30. Kenny Carr (3,903)\n\n* 31. Travis Outlaw (3,607)\n* 32. Bill Walton (3,578)\n* 33. Isaiah Rider (3,332)\n* 34. Ruben Patterson (3,318)\n* 35. Scottie Pippen (3,091)\n* 36. Derek Anderson (2,940)\n* 37. Darnell Valentine (2,937)\n* 38. Steve Johnson (2,713)\n* 39. Steve Blake (2,685)\n* 40. Dave Twardzik (2,666)\n\n* 41. Ron Brewer (2,581)\n* 42. Martell Webster (2,545)\n* 43. John Johnson (2,525)\n* 44. Kelvin Ransey (2,470)\n* 45. Rick Adelman (2,333)\n* 46. Steve Smith (2,330)\n* 47. Stan McKenzie (2,302)\n* 48. C.J. McCollum (2,291)\n* 49. Jarrett Jack (2,286)\n* 50. Dale Davis (2,232)\n\nOther statistics (regular season) (as of April 14, 2016)\n\nMinutes played\n* 1. Clyde Drexler (29,496)\n* 2. Terry Porter (23,978)\n* 3. LaMarcus Aldridge (22,973)\n* 4. Jerome Kersey (21,760)\n* 5. Clifford Robinson (19,839)\n* 6. Rasheed Wallace (19,309)\n* 7. Mychal Thompson (18,913)\n* 8. Jim Paxson (18,398)\n* 9. Damon Stoudamire (17,497)\n* 10. Buck Williams (17,130)\n\nRebounds\n* 1.LaMarcus Aldridge (5,434)\n* 2. Clyde Drexler (5,339)\n* 3. Jerome Kersey (5,078)\n* 4. Mychal Thompson (4,878)\n* 5. Buck Williams (4,861)\n* 6. Sidney Wicks (4,086)\n* 7. Rasheed Wallace (3,797)\n* 8. Arvydas Sabonis (3,436)\n* 9. Lloyd Neal (3,370)\n* 10. Clifford Robinson (3,352)\n\nAssists\n* 1. Terry Porter (5,319)\n* 2. Clyde Drexler (4,933)\n* 3. Damon Stoudamire (3,018)\n* 4. Rod Strickland (2,573)\n* 5. Geoff Petrie (2,057)\n* 6. Damian Lillard (2,007)\n* 7. Jim Paxson (2,007)\n* 8. Mychal Thompson (1,848) \n* 9. Jerome Kersey (1,762)\n* 10. Larry Steele (1,719)\n\nSteals\n* 1. Clyde Drexler (1,795)\n* 2. Terry Porter (1,182)\n* 3. Jerome Kersey (1,059)\n* 4. Jim Paxson (857)\n* 5. Larry Steele (846)\n* 6. Clifford Robinson (696)\n* 7. Lionel Hollins (598)\n* 8. Bob Gross (593)\n* 9. Damon Stoudamire (556)\n* 10. Rasheed Wallace (555)\n\nBlocks\n* 1. Mychal Thompson (768)\n* 2. Clifford Robinson (726)\n* 3. Rasheed Wallace (693)\n* 4. LaMarcus Aldridge (658)\n* 5. Joel Przybilla (623)\n* 6. Jerome Kersey (622)\n* 7. Clyde Drexler (594)\n* 8. Bill Walton (533)\n* 9. Arvydas Sabonis (494)\n* 10. Wayne Cooper (425)\n\nThree-pointers made\n* 1. Damian Lillard (828)\n* 2. Wesley Matthews (826)\n* 3. Terry Porter (773)\n* 4. Nicolas Batum (751)\n* 5. Damon Stoudamire (717)\n* 6. Clifford Robinson (492)\n* 7. Steve Blake (492)\n* 8. Clyde Drexler (464)\n* 9. Martell Webster (403)\n* 10. Rudy Fernández (373)\n\nIndividual awards\n\nNBA Most Valuable Player\n* Bill Walton – 1978\n\nNBA Finals MVP\n* Bill Walton – 1977\n\nNBA Rookie of the Year\n* Geoff Petrie – 1971\n* Sidney Wicks – 1972\n* Brandon Roy – 2007\n* Damian Lillard – 2013\n\nNBA Most Improved Player of the Year\n* Kevin Duckworth – 1988\n* Zach Randolph – 2004\n* C. J. McCollum – 2016\n\nNBA Sixth Man of the Year\n* Clifford Robinson – 1993\n\nNBA Coach of the Year\n* Mike Schuler – 1987\n* Mike Dunleavy – 1999\n\nNBA Executive of the Year\n* Bucky Buckwalter – 1991\n\nJ. Walter Kennedy Citizenship Award\n* Terry Porter – 1993\n* Chris Dudley – 1996\n* Brian Grant – 1999\n\nAll-NBA First Team\n* Bill Walton – 1978\n* Clyde Drexler – 1992\n\nAll-NBA Second Team\n* Bill Walton – 1977\n* Maurice Lucas – 1978\n* Jim Paxson – 1984\n* Clyde Drexler – 1988, 1991\n* Brandon Roy – 2009\n* LaMarcus Aldridge – 2015\n* Damian Lillard – 2016\n\nAll-NBA Third Team\n* Clyde Drexler – 1990\n* Brandon Roy – 2010\n* LaMarcus Aldridge – 2011, 2014\n* Damian Lillard – 2014\n\nNBA All-Defensive First Team\n* Bill Walton – 1977, 1978\n* Maurice Lucas – 1978\n* Lionel Hollins – 1978\n* Buck Williams – 1990, 1991\n\nNBA All-Defensive Second Team\n* Bob Gross – 1978\n* Maurice Lucas – 1979\n* Lionel Hollins – 1979\n* Kermit Washington – 1980, 1981\n* Buck Williams – 1992\n* Scottie Pippen – 2000\n* Theo Ratliff – 2004\n\nNBA Rookie First Team\n* Geoff Petrie – 1970\n* Sidney Wicks – 1972\n* Lloyd Neal – 1973\n* Lionel Hollins – 1976\n* Mychal Thompson – 1979\n* Ron Brewer – 1979\n* Calvin Natt – 1980\n* Kelvin Ransey – 1981\n* Sam Bowie – 1985\n* Arvydas Sabonis – 1996\n* Brandon Roy – 2007\n* LaMarcus Aldridge – 2007\n* Damian Lillard – 2013\n\nNBA Rookie Second Team\n* Rudy Fernández – 2009\n\nNBA draft\n\nThe Trail Blazers have had the No. 1 pick in the NBA draft four times in their history; each time selecting a center. In 1972 the choice was LaRue Martin, Bill Walton was picked in 1974, Mychal Thompson in 1978, and Greg Oden was taken in 2007. Several Blazer picks have been criticized by NBA commentators as particularly unwise: \n* The selection of Martin over Bob McAdoo.\n* The selection of Thompson over Larry Bird (drafted No. 6 by the Boston Celtics) in 1978.\n* The selection of center Sam Bowie with the No. 2 pick in the 1984 NBA draft over Michael Jordan (who was then drafted by the Chicago Bulls); other notable players taken later in that draft include future Hall-of-Famers Charles Barkley and John Stockton.\n* The selection of Greg Oden over Kevin Durant in the 2007 NBA draft\n* Other notable draft picks include player-coach Geoff Petrie, Sidney Wicks, Larry Steele, Lionel Hollins and Jim Paxson in the 1970s and Clyde Drexler, Jerome Kersey, Terry Porter and Arvydas Sabonis in the 1980s.\nIn the 1990s, the Blazers selected Jermaine O'Neal and in the modern millennium drafted Zach Randolph and, in 2006, acquired Brandon Roy and LaMarcus Aldridge in a draft day that included six trades involving the Trail Blazers.\n\nTeam branding\n\nThe team's colors are red, black, white, and silver, which was added in 2002. The team's \"pinwheel\" logo, originally designed by the cousin of Glickman, is a graphic interpretation of two five-on-five basketball teams lined up against each other. One side of the pinwheel is red; the other side is silver (formerly black or white). The logo has gone from a vertical alignment to a slanted one starting in the 1991 season, creating a straight edge along the top\n\nPortland's home uniforms are white in color, with red, black, and silver accents; the primary road uniform is black, with red, white, and silver accents. The alternate road uniform is red with white, silver, and black accents. From 1970 to the 1977–78 season, the team wore red road uniforms, switching to black in that year, with a switch from horizontal lettering with the tail added on the last letter to vertical lettering midway through its lifespan. The team again wore red from 1979 to 1985, switching back to black road jerseys after that. In 2002, the team reintroduced red jerseys. The team's uniforms have remained nearly the same since the 1977–78 season, featuring a \"blaze\" strip diagonal down the jersey and into the shorts. Notable alterations include the change from lowercase lettering to uppercase in 1991–92, tapered ends on the letters and silver trim in 2002–03, and the return of the city name to the black road jerseys in 2006–07. In the 2009–10 NBA season they introduced a special jersey commemorating the Blazers' \"Rip City\" nickname, borrowing elements from their old and current logos. For the 2012–13 NBA season, the red jerseys were slightly altered, featuring a straightened \"Portland\" script and black lettering with silver trim, along with a modified \"blaze\" striping, \"Rip City\" shorts script and pinwheel logo in front of the uniform.\n\nThe team's mascot is Blaze the Trail Cat, a two-tone silver-colored mountain lion, which has been the team's official mascot since 2002. Prior to Blaze's debut, the Trail Blazers never had any official mascot. A popular unofficial mascot was the late Bill \"The Beerman\" Scott, a Seattle beer vendor/cheerleader who worked for numerous pro teams, including the Trail Blazers, the Seattle Seahawks, and the Seattle Mariners. Scott worked for the Trail Blazers from 1981 through 1985. \n\nFront office\n\nThe team is owned by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen; ownership of the Trail Blazers is via a series of holding companies which Allen owns. Vulcan Inc. is a private corporation in which Allen is the chairman and sole shareholder. A subsidiary of Vulcan, Vulcan Sports and Entertainment (VSE), manages Allen's sports-related properties, including the Trail Blazers, the Seattle Seahawks NFL team, the Seattle Sounders MLS team, and the Moda Center. In the fall of 2012, Peter McLoughlin was named CEO of Vulcan Sports and Entertainment.\n\nThe Trail Blazers as a corporate entity are owned by VSE. Allen serves as the team's chairman, and his longtime associate Bert Kolde is vice-chairman. The position of president and chief executive officer is held by Chris McGowan, with Larry Miller having held the job until resigning in July 2012. The post of chief operating officer is vacant; the most recent COO of the team was Mike Golub, who resigned in July 2008 to take a more enhanced role with VSE. Kevin Pritchard served as general manager of the Trail Blazers until he was fired on June 24, 2010. The announcement was issued by the Blazers' head office just an hour before the beginning of the 2010 NBA draft. A month later, the Blazers named Oklahoma City Thunder assistant general manager Rich Cho as their new general manager. Cho was fired less than a year later, and director of college scouting Chad Buchanan served as interim general manager for the entire 2011–12 season. In June 2012, the Trail Blazers hired Neil Olshey as general manager. \n\nBefore Allen purchased the team in 1988, the Trail Blazers were owned by a group of investors headed by Larry Weinberg, who is chairman emeritus.\n\nVenues\n\nThe Trail Blazers play their home games in the Moda Center, a multipurpose arena which is located in Portland's Rose Quarter, northeast of downtown. The Moda Center, originally named the Rose Garden, opened in 1995 and can seat a total of 19,980 spectators for basketball games; capacity increases to 20,580 with standing room. Like the Trail Blazers, the Moda Center is owned by Paul Allen through subsidiary Vulcan Sports and Entertainment, and the arena is managed by Global Spectrum. During a two-year period between 2005 and 2007, the arena was owned by a consortium of creditors who financed its construction after the Oregon Arena Corporation, a now-defunct holding company owned by Allen, filed for bankruptcy in 2004. In August 2013, the arena's name was changed from the Rose Garden to the Moda Center, after the Blazers' front office officials reached a $4 million agreement with Moda Health Corporation. The name change was met with considerable criticism from fans. \n\nPrior to 1995, the Trail Blazers home venue was the Memorial Coliseum, which today stands adjacent to the Moda Center. This facility, built in 1960, can seat 12,888 spectators for basketball. It was renamed the Veterans Memorial Coliseum in 2011.\n\nIn-game entertainment\n\nThe team has a cheerleading-dance squad known as the BlazerDancers. Consisting of 16 members, the all-female BlazerDancers perform dance routines at home games, charity events, and promotional events. The 2008–2009 team held auditions in late July 2008. Seven new dancers, as well as nine returning dancers made up the new team. A junior dance team composed of 8- to 11-year-old girls also performs at selected home games, as does a hip hop dance troupe. Other regular in-game entertainment acts include a co-educational acrobatic stunt team which performs technically difficult cheers, a break dancing squad known as the Portland TrailBreakers, and a pair of percussion acts. \n\nFan support and \"Blazermania\"\n\nThe relationship between the team and its fans, commonly known as \"Blazermania\", has been well-chronicled. The Trail Blazers have long been one of the NBA's top draws, with the exception of two periods in the team's history. The team drew poorly during its first four seasons of existence, failing to average more than 10,000 spectators per game. Attendance increased in 1974, when the team drafted Bill Walton. \n\nThe phenomenon known as Blazermania started during the 1976–77 season, when the team posted its first winning record, made its first playoff appearance, and captured its only NBA title, defeating the heavily favored Philadelphia 76ers in the NBA Finals; the team has been popular in Portland since that time. That season, the team started a sellout streak which continued until the team moved into the Rose Garden in 1995. The team continued to average over 19,000 spectators per game until the 2003–04 season, when attendance declined after the team continued to suffer image problems due to the \"Jail Blazer\" reputation it had gained, and was no longer as competitive on the court. After drafting eventual Rookie of the Year and three-time All Star Brandon Roy in 2006, attendance climbed in the 2006–07 season and continued to rebound in the 2007–08 season. The final 27 home games of the 2007–2008 season were consecutive sell-outs, a streak which continued through the entire 2008–2009 season and into the start of the 2011–2012 season.\n\nMedia\n\nTelevision and radio broadcast\n\nLike all NBA franchises, games of the Trail Blazers are routinely broadcast via television and radio. The team was one of the first in the NBA to produce its own television broadcasts. The team's television production facility is known as Post-Up Productions. Television broadcasts of Blazer games, when not carried on a national network, are broadcast either on Comcast SportsNet Northwest or the Blazers Television Network, a network of five over-the-air television stations (four in Oregon; one in Washington). The flagship station of the Blazers Television Network is KGW in Portland.\n\nFor the 2007–08 season, all but six regular-season games were carried on one these networks; the other six were broadcast nationally on TNT or ESPN. Thirty-four games were produced and broadcast in high-definition television. The Trail Blazers' former television play-by-play team was Mike Barrett and Mike Rice, joined by sideline reporter Michael Holton, who succeeded Terry Porter (2010–11) and Rebecca Haarlow (2009–10). The team was also known for its long association with Steve \"Snapper\" Jones, who played for the team prior to his career as a television analyst; Jones departed the franchise in 2005. \n\nAll Trail Blazer games are broadcast over the radio, with broadcasting carried on the Trail Blazers radio network, which consists of 25 stations located in the Pacific Northwest. The flagship station of the Blazers' radio network is 620 KPOJ in Portland. The radio broadcasting team consists of play-by-play announcer Brian Wheeler and studio host Jay Allen. All games are preceded by a pre-game analysis show, Blazers Courtside, and followed by a post-game show known as The 5th Quarter. Bob Akamian served as studio host until halfway through the 2010–2011 season, when the team hired away Adam Bjaranson from their over-the-air TV partner, KGW, and former Trail Blazers' player Michael Holton is the studio analyst. The original radio announcer for the team was Bill Schonely, who served as the team's radio play-by-play announcer from 1970 until his retirement in 1998—calling 2,522 Blazers games—and remains with the team as a community ambassador. \n\nTrail Blazers broadcasts have been criticized on several fronts. The broadcast personalities, all of whom are Trail Blazers employees, have been criticized in the media for being \"homers\"; further it has been alleged that the 2005 departure of Steve Jones was due in part to team displeasure with Jones' sometimes frank analysis of the team's on-court performance and off-court decisions. Furthermore, the team's television contract with CSN Northwest has been criticized due to the channel's lack of carriage on satellite television providers such as DirecTV and Dish Network, both of which compete with Comcast's cable television operations. \n\nOn June 16, 2016, The Oregonian reported that Barrett, Rice, and analyst Antonio Harvey had been released by the Trail Blazers. Wheeler will call games on radio alone, while new television commentators are to be determined. The three personalities will still receive pay for the final season of their contracts. The change comes as part of a plan by the team to overhaul its telecasts as it enters the final year of its current television deal with CSN Northwest. \n\nOn July 6, 2016, the team renewed its contract with CSN Northwest through the 2020-2021 season. Under the new deal, CSN Northwest will have exclusive rights to all Trail Blazers games beginning in the 2017-18 season. The team had originally considered an arrangement with KPTV, under which games would be broadcast over-the-air and simulcast via an internet service, but deals with potential streaming partners fell through. Root Sports Northwest made a higher-value, long-term offer. However, the offer was rejected for its potential impact on reach; although DirecTV, which serves 33% of the Portland market, carries the network by virtue of its co-ownership by AT&T, Root Sports could not guarantee whether its carriage deal with Comcast Cable, which serves 55% of the Portland market, would be renewed. Team president Chris McGowan also praised the recent leadership changes at the CSN networks, noting that their new president David Preschlack (formerly of ESPN) had a background in television distribution. \n\nPress relations\n\nSeveral local news outlets provide in-depth coverage of the Trail Blazers. Chief among them is The Oregonian, the largest paper in the state of Oregon. Other newspapers providing detailed coverage of the team (including the assignment of beat writers to cover the team) include the Portland Tribune, a weekly Portland paper, and the Vancouver, Washington Columbian. Notable local journalists to cover the team include John Canzano of the Oregonian, Jason Quick of CSNNW, and Dwight Jaynes of the Portland Tribune. Online coverage of the Oregonian is provided through OregonLive.com, a website collaboration between the paper and Advance Internet. In addition to making Oregonian content available, oregonlive.com hosts several blogs covering the team written by Oregonian journalists, as well as an additional blog, \"Blazers Blog\", written by Sean Meagher. \n\nRelations between the team and The Oregonian have often been tense; the paper is editorially independent of the team and is often critical. During the Steve Patterson era, relations between the two institutions became increasingly hostile; several NBA executives told ESPN's Chris Sheridan that the situation was the \"most dysfunctional media-team relationship\" that they could recall. For instance during a portion of a pre-2006 NBA draft workout, which was closed to the media, an Oregonian reporter looked through a curtain separating the press from the workout and wrote about this on his blog. Outraged, the team closed subsequent practices to the press altogether, leading John Canzano of the paper to respond with outrage on his blog. In November 2006, the Oregonian commissioned an outside editor to investigate the deteriorating relationship, a move the rival Willamette Week called \"unusual\". In the report, both sides were criticized somewhat, but did not make any revelations which were unexpected.\n\nAdditional coverage is offered by various blogs, including [http://www.blazersedge.com Blazers Edge] (part of SB Nation) and [http://www.portlandroundballsociety.com The Portland Roundball Society] (part of ESPN's TrueHoop Network)." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Seahorse.txt", "Mammal.txt", "Fish.txt", "Mollusca.txt" ], "title": [ "Seahorse", "Mammal", "Fish", "Mollusca" ], "wiki_context": [ "Seahorse is the name given to 54 species of small marine fishes in the genus Hippocampus. \"Hippocampus\" comes from the Ancient Greek word hippos meaning \"horse\" and kampos meaning \"sea monster\". The word \"seahorse\" is often written as two separate words (sea horse), or hyphenated (sea-horse). Having a head and neck suggestive of a horse, seahorses also feature segmented bony armour, an upright posture and a curled prehensile tail. \n\nHabitat\n\nSeahorses are mainly found in shallow tropical and temperate waters throughout the world, from about 45°S to 45°N and live in sheltered areas such as seagrass beds, estuaries, coral reefs, or mangroves. Four species are found in Pacific waters from North America to South America. In the Atlantic, H. erectus ranges from Nova Scotia to Uruguay. H. zosterae, known as the dwarf seahorse, is found in the Bahamas.\n\nColonies have been found in European waters such as the Thames Estuary. \n\nThree species live in the Mediterranean Sea: H. guttulatus (the long-snouted seahorse), H. hippocampus (the short-snouted seahorse), and H. fuscus (the sea pony). These species form territories; males stay within 1 sqm of habitat, while females range about one hundred times that.\n\nDescription\n\nSeahorses range in size from . They are named for their equine appearance with bent necks and long snouted heads followed by their distinctive trunk and tail. Although they are bony fish, they do not have scales, but rather thin skin stretched over a series of bony plates, which are arranged in rings throughout their bodies. Each species has a distinct number of rings. Seahorses swim upright, another characteristic not shared by their close pipefish relatives, which swim horizontally. Razorfish are the only other fish that swim vertically like a seahorse. They swim upright propelling themselves by using the dorsal fin. The pectoral fins located on either side of the head are used for maneuvering. They lack the caudal fin typical of fishes. Their prehensile tail can only be unlocked in the most extreme conditions. Interestingly, they are adept at camouflage with the ability to grow and reabsorb spiny appendages depending on their habitat. \n\nUnusual among fish, a seahorse has a flexible, well-defined neck. It also sports a crown-like spine or horn on its head, termed a \"coronet,\" which is distinct for each species.\n\nSeahorses swim very poorly, rapidly fluttering a dorsal fin and using pectoral fins (located behind their eyes) to steer. The slowest-moving fish in the world is H. zosterae (the dwarf seahorse), with a top speed of about 5 ft per hour. Seahorses have no caudal fin. Since they are poor swimmers, they are most likely to be found resting with their prehensile tails wound around a stationary object. They have long snouts, which they use to suck up food, and their eyes can move independently of each other like those of a chameleon. \n\nEvolution and fossil record\n\nAnatomical evidence, supported by molecular, physical, and genetic evidence, demonstrates seahorses are highly modified pipefish. The fossil record of seahorses, however, is very sparse. The best known and best studied fossils are specimens of H. guttulatus (though literature more commonly refers to them under the synonym of H. ramulosus), from the Marecchia River Formation of Rimini Province, Italy, dating back to the Lower Pliocene, about 3 million years ago. The earliest known seahorse fossils are of two pipefish-like species, H. sarmaticus and H. slovenicus from the coprolitic horizon of Tunjice Hills, a middle Miocene lagerstätte in Slovenia dating back about 13 million years. Molecular dating finds that pipefish and seahorses diverged during the Late Oligocene. This has led to speculation that seahorses evolved in response to large areas of shallow water, newly created as the result of tectonic events. The shallow water would have allowed the expansion of seagrass habitats that selected for the camouflage offered by the seahorses’ upright posture. These tectonic changes occurred in the western Pacific Ocean, pointing to an origin there, with molecular data suggesting two later, separate invasions of the Atlantic Ocean. \n\nReproduction\n\nThe male seahorse is equipped with a pouch on the ventral, or front-facing, side of the tail. When mating, the female seahorse deposits up to 1,500 eggs in the male's pouch. The male carries the eggs for 9 to 45 days until the seahorses emerge fully developed, but very small. Once the young are released into the water, the male's role is done and he offers no further care and often mates again within hours or days during the breeding season. \n\nCourtship\n\nBefore breeding, seahorses may court for several days. Scientists believe the courtship behavior synchronizes the animals' movements and reproductive states so the male can receive the eggs when the female is ready to deposit them. During this time, they may change color, swim side by side holding tails or grip the same strand of sea grass with their tails, and wheel around in unison in what is known as a \"predawn dance\". They eventually engage in a \"true courtship dance\" lasting about 8 hours, during which the male pumps water through the egg pouch on his trunk which expands and opens to display its emptiness. When the female’s eggs reach maturity, she and her mate let go of any anchors and drift upward snout-to-snout, out of the seagrass, often spiraling as they rise. They interact for about 6 minutes, reminiscent of courtship. The female then swims away until the next morning, and the male returns to sucking up food through his snout. The female inserts her ovipositor into the male’s brood pouch and deposits dozens to thousands of eggs. As the female releases her eggs, her body slims while his swells. Both animals then sink back into the seagrass and she swims away.\n\nFertilization \n\nDuring fertilization in Hippocampus kuda the brood pouch was found to be open only for six seconds while egg deposition occurred. During this time seawater entered the pouch where the spermatozoa and eggs meet in a seawater milieu. This hyperosmotic environment facilitates sperm activation and motility. The fertilization is therefore regarded as being physiologically ‘external’ within a physically ‘internal’ environment after the closure of the pouch. It is believed that this protected form of fertilization reduces sperm competition among males. Within the Syngnathidae (pipefishes and seahorses) protected fertilization has not been documented in the pipefishes but the lack of any distinct differences in the relation of testes size to body size suggests that pipefishes may also have evolved mechanisms for more efficient fertilization with reduced sperm competition. \n\nGestation\n\nThe fertilized eggs are then embedded in the pouch wall and become surrounded by a spongy tissue. The male supplies the eggs with prolactin, the same hormone responsible for milk production in pregnant mammals. The pouch provides oxygen, as well as a controlled environment incubator. Though the egg yolk contribute nourishment to the developing embryo, the male sea horses contribute additional nutrients such as energy- rich lipids and also calcium to allow them to build their skeletal system, by secreting them into the brood pouch that are absorbed by the embryos. Further they also offer immunological protection, osmoregulation, gas exchange and waste transport \n\nThe eggs then hatch in the pouch, where the salinity of the water is regulated; this prepares the newborns for life in the sea. Throughout gestation, which in most species requires two to four weeks, his mate visits him daily for “morning greetings”.\n\nBirth\n\nThe number of young released by the male seahorse averages 100–1000 for most species, but may be as low as 5 for the smaller species, or as high as 2,500. When the fry are ready to be born, the male expels them with muscular contractions. He typically gives birth at night and is ready for the next batch of eggs by morning when his mate returns. Like almost all other fish species, seahorses do not nurture their young after birth. Infants are susceptible to predators or ocean currents which wash them away from feeding grounds or into temperatures too extreme for their delicate bodies. Less than 0.5% of infants survive to adulthood, explaining why litters are so large. These survival rates are actually fairly high compared to other fish, because of their protected gestation, making the process worth the great cost to the father. The eggs of most other fish are abandoned immediately after fertilization.\n\nQuestions surrounding reproductive roles\n\nReproduction is energetically costly to the male. This brings into question why the sexual role reversal even takes place. In an environment where one partner incurs more energy costs than the other, Bateman's principle suggests that the lesser contributor takes the role of the aggressor. Male seahorses are more aggressive and sometimes “fight” for female attention. According to Amanda Vincent of Project Seahorse, only males tail-wrestle and snap their heads at each other. This discovery prompted further study of energy costs. To estimate the female’s direct contribution, researcher Heather D. Masonjones, associate professor of biology at the University of Tampa, chemically analyzed the energy stored in each egg. To measure the burden on the male, Masonjones measured its oxygen consumption. By the end of incubation, the male consumed almost 33% more oxygen than before mating. The study concluded that the female's energy expenditure while generating eggs is twice that of males during incubation confirming the standard hypothesis.\n\nWhy the male seahorse (and other members of the Syngnathidae) carries the offspring through gestation is unknown, though some researchers believe it allows for shorter birthing intervals, in turn resulting in more offspring. Given an unlimited number of ready and willing partners, males have the potential to produce 17% more offspring than females in a breeding season. Also, females have “time-outs” from the reproductive cycle 1.2 times longer than those of males. This seems to be based on mate choice, rather than physiology. When the female’s eggs are ready, she must lay them in a few hours or eject them into the water column. Making eggs is a huge cost to her physically, since they amount to about a third of her body weight. To protect against losing a clutch, the female demands a long courtship. The daily greetings help to cement the bond between the pair. \n\nMonogamy\n\nOne common misconception about seahorses is that they mate for life. Many species of seahorses form pair bonds that last through at least the breeding season. Some species show a higher level of mate fidelity than others. However, many species readily switch mates when the opportunity arises. H. abdominalis and H. breviceps have been shown to breed in groups, showing no continuous mate preference. Many more species' mating habits have not been studied, so it is unknown how many species are actually monogamous, or how long those bonds actually last. \n\nAlthough monogamy within fish is not common, it does appear to exist for some. In this case, the mate-guarding hypothesis may be an explanation. This hypothesis states, “males remain with a single female because of ecological factors that make male parental care and protection of offspring especially advantageous.” Because the rates of survival for newborn seahorses are so low, incubation is essential. Though not proven, males could have taken on this role because of the lengthy period the females require to produce their eggs. If males incubate while females prepare the next clutch (amounting to a third of body weight), they can reduce the interval between clutches.\n\nFeeding habits\n\nSeahorses feed on small crustaceans floating in the water or crawling on the bottom. With excellent camouflage and patience, seahorses ambush prey that floats within striking range. Mysid shrimp and other small crustaceans are favorites, but some seahorses have been observed eating other kinds of invertebrates and even larval fish. In a study of seahorses, the distinctive head morphology was found to give it a hydrodynamic advantage that creates minimal interference while approaching an evasive prey. Therefore, the seahorse has the ability to come within a very close range of copepods, on which they prey. After successfully closing in on the prey without alerting it, the sea horse gives an upward thrust rapidly rotates the head aided by large tendons that store and release elastic energy, to bring its long snout close to the prey.This step is crucial for prey capture as suction only works with the mouth at a close range. This two phase prey capture mechanism is termed pivot-feeding. \n\nWhile feeding, they produce a distinctive click each time a food item is ingested. The same clicks are heard with social interactions.\n\nThreats of extinction\n\nBecause data is lacking on the sizes of the various seahorse populations, as well as other issues including how many seahorses are dying each year, how many are being born, and the number used for souvenirs, there is insufficient information to assess their risk of extinction, and the risk of losing more seahorses remains a concern. Some species, such as the Paradoxical Seahorse, H. paradoxus, may already be extinct. Coral reefs and seagrass beds are deteriorating, reducing viable habitats for seahorses. \n\nAquaria\n\nWhile many aquarium hobbyists keep them as pets, seahorses collected from the wild tend to fare poorly in home aquaria. Many eat only live foods such as brine shrimp and are prone to stress, which damages their immune systems and makes them susceptible to disease.\n\nIn recent years, however, captive breeding has become more popular. Such seahorses survive better in captivity, and are less likely to carry diseases. They eat frozen mysidacea (crustaceans) that are readily available from aquarium stores, and do not experience the stress of moving out of the wild. Although captive-bred seahorses are more expensive, they take no toll on wild populations.\n\nSeahorses should be kept in an aquarium with low flow and placid tank mates. They are slow feeders, so fast, aggressive feeders will leave them without food. Seahorses can coexist with many species of shrimp and other bottom-feeding creatures. Gobies also make good tank-mates. Keepers are generally advised to avoid eels, tangs, triggerfish, squid, octopus, and sea anemones. \n\nWater quality is very important for the survival of seahorses in an aquarium. They are delicate species which should not be added to a new tank. The water parameters are recommended to be as follows although these fish may acclimatise to different water over time: \nTemperature: 23–28 °C \npH: 8.1–8.4 \nAmmonia: 0 mg/l (0.01 mg/l may be tolerated for short periods) \nNitrite: 0 mg/l (0.125 mg/l may be tolerated for short periods) \nS.G.: 1.021–1.024 at 22–24 °C\nA water-quality problem will affect fish behaviour and can be shown by clamped fins, reduced feeding, erratic swimming, and gasping at the surface. Seahorses swim up and down, as well as using the length of the aquarium. Therefore, the tanks should ideally be twice as deep as the length of the adult seahorse.\n\nAnimals sold as \"freshwater seahorses\" are usually the closely related pipefish, of which a few species live in the lower reaches of rivers. The supposed true \"freshwater seahorse\" called H. aimei is not a valid species, but a synonym sometimes used for Barbour's and hedgehog seahorses. The latter, which is often confused with the former, can be found in estuarine environments, but is not actually a freshwater fish. \n\nUse in Chinese medicine\n\nSeahorse populations are thought to be endangered as a result of overfishing and habitat destruction. Despite a lack of scientific studies or clinical trials, the consumption of seahorses is widespread in traditional Chinese medicine, primarily in connection with impotence, wheezing, nocturnal enuresis, and pain, as well as labor induction.Bensky, D., Clavey, S., Stoger, E. (2004) [http://www.eastlandpress.com/preview/ht.pdf Chinese Herbal Medicine: Materia Medica]. Eastland Press, Inc. Seattle, 3rd ed. ISBN 0939616424. p. 815 Up to 20 million seahorses may be caught each year to be sold for such uses. Preferred species of seahorses include H. kellogii, H. histrix, H. kuda, H. trimaculatus, and H. mohnikei. Seahorses are also consumed by the Indonesians, the central Filipinos, and many other ethnic groups.\n\nImport and export of seahorses has been controlled under CITES since 15 May 2004. However, Indonesia, Japan, Norway, and South Korea have chosen to opt out of the trade rules set by CITES.\n\nThe problem may be exacerbated by the growth of pills and capsules as the preferred method of ingesting seahorses. Pills are cheaper and more available than traditional, individually tailored prescriptions of whole seahorses, but the contents are harder to track. Seahorses once had to be of a certain size and quality before they were accepted by TCM practitioners and consumers. Declining availability of the preferred large, pale, and smooth seahorses has been offset by the shift towards prepackaged preparations, which makes it possible for TCM merchants to sell previously unused, or otherwise undesirable juvenile, spiny, and dark-coloured animals. Today, almost a third of the seahorses sold in China are packaged, adding to the pressure on the species. \n\nDried seahorse retails from US$600 to $3000 per kilogram, with larger, paler, and smoother animals commanding the highest prices. In terms of value based on weight, seahorses retail for more than the price of silver and almost that of gold in Asia. \n\nSpecies\n\n the 54 recognized species in this genus are: \n\n* Hippocampus abdominalis Lesson, 1827 (big-belly seahorse)\n* Hippocampus alatus Kuiter, 2001 (winged seahorse)\n* Hippocampus algiricus Kaup, 1856 (West African seahorse)\n* Hippocampus angustus Günther, 1870 (narrow-bellied seahorse)\n* Hippocampus barbouri D. S. Jordan & R. E. Richardson, 1908 (Barbour's seahorse)\n* Hippocampus bargibanti Whitley, 1970 (pygmy seahorse)\n* Hippocampus biocellatus Kuiter, 2001 (false-eyed seahorse)\n* Hippocampus borboniensis A. H. A. Duméril, 1870 (Réunion seahorse)\n* Hippocampus breviceps W. K. H. Peters, 1869 (short-headed seahorse)\n* Hippocampus camelopardalis Bianconi, 1854 (giraffe seahorse)\n* Hippocampus capensis Boulenger, 1900 (Knysna seahorse)\n* Hippocampus colemani Kuiter, 2003\n* Hippocampus comes Cantor, 1850 (tiger-tail seahorse)\n* Hippocampus coronatus Temminck & Schlegel, 1850 (crowned seahorse)\n* Hippocampus curvicuspis R. Fricke, 2004 (New Caledonian thorny seahorse)\n* Hippocampus debelius M. F. Gomon & Kuiter, 2009 (softcoral seahorse)\n* Hippocampus denise Lourie & J. E. Randall, 2003 (Denise's pygmy seahorse)\n* Hippocampus erectus Perry, 1810 (lined seahorse)\n* Hippocampus fisheri D. S. Jordan & Evermann, 1903 (Fisher's seahorse)\n* Hippocampus fuscus Rüppell, 1838 (sea pony)\n* Hippocampus grandiceps Kuiter, 2001 (big-head seahorse)\n* Hippocampus guttulatus G. Cuvier, 1829 (long-snouted seahorse)\n* Hippocampus hendriki Kuiter, 2001 (eastern spiny seahorse)\n* Hippocampus hippocampus (Linnaeus, 1758) (short-snouted seahorse)\n* Hippocampus histrix Kaup, 1856 (spiny seahorse)\n* Hippocampus ingens Girard, 1858 (Pacific seahorse)\n* Hippocampus jayakari Boulenger, 1900 (Jayakar's seahorse)\n* Hippocampus jugumus Kuiter, 2001 (collared seahorse)\n* Hippocampus kelloggi D. S. Jordan & Snyder, 1901 (great seahorse)\n* Hippocampus kuda Bleeker, 1852 (spotted seahorse)\n* Hippocampus lichtensteinii Kaup, 1856 (Lichtenstein's seahorse)\n* Hippocampus minotaur M. F. Gomon, 1997 (bullneck seahorse)\n* Hippocampus mohnikei Bleeker, 1854 (Japanese seahorse)\n* Hippocampus montebelloensis Kuiter, 2001 (Monte Bello seahorse)\n* Hippocampus multispinus Kuiter, 2001 (northern spiny seahorse)\n* Hippocampus paradoxus Foster & M. F. Gomon, 2010 (paradoxical seahorse)\n* Hippocampus patagonicus Piacentino & Luzzatto, 2004\n* Hippocampus pontohi Lourie & Kuiter, 2008\n* Hippocampus procerus Kuiter, 2001 (high-crown seahorse)\n* Hippocampus pusillus R. Fricke, 2004 (pygmy thorny seahorse)\n* Hippocampus queenslandicus Horne, 2001 (Queensland seahorse)\n* Hippocampus reidi Ginsburg, 1933 (longsnout seahorse)\n* Hippocampus satomiae Lourie & Kuiter, 2008 (Satomi's pygmy seahorse)\n* Hippocampus semispinosus Kuiter, 2001 (half-spined seahorse)\n* Hippocampus severnsi Lourie & Kuiter, 2008\n* Hippocampus sindonis D. S. Jordan & Snyder, 1901 (Dhiho's seahorse)\n* Hippocampus spinosissimus M. C. W. Weber, 1913 (hedgehog seahorse)\n* Hippocampus subelongatus Castelnau, 1873 (West Australian seahorse)\n* Hippocampus trimaculatus Leach, 1814 (longnose seahorse)\n* Hippocampus tyro J. E. Randall & Lourie, 2009\n* Hippocampus waleananus M. F. Gomon & Kuiter, 2009 (Walea pygmy seahorse)\n* Hippocampus whitei Bleeker, 1855 (White's seahorse)\n* Hippocampus zebra Whitley, 1964 (zebra seahorse)\n* Hippocampus zosterae D. S. Jordan & C. H. Gilbert, 1882 (dwarf seahorse)\n\nPygmy seahorses\n\nPygmy seahorses are less than 15 mm tall and 17 mm wide members of the genus. Previously the term was applied exclusively to the species H. bargibanti but since 1997, discoveries have made this term obsolete. The species H. minotaur, H. denise, H. colemani, H. pontohi, H. severnsi, H. satomiae and H. waleananus have been described. Other species that are believed to be unclassified have also been reported in books, dive magazines and on the Internet. They can be distinguished from other species of seahorse by their 12 trunk rings, low number of tail rings (26–29), the location in which young are brooded in the trunk region of males and their extremely small size. Molecular analysis (of ribosomal RNA) of 32 Hippocampus species found that H. bargibanti belongs in a separate clade from other members of the genus and therefore that the species diverged from the other species in the \"ancient\" past. \n\nMost pygmy seahorses are well camouflaged and live in close association with other organisms including colonial hydrozoans (Lytocarpus and Antennellopsis), coralline algae (Halimeda) sea fans (Muricella, Annella, Acanthogorgia). This combined with their small size accounts for why most species have only been noticed and classified since 2001.", "Mammals (class Mammalia from Latin mamma \"breast\") are a clade of endothermic amniotes distinguished from reptiles and birds by the possession of a neocortex (a region of the brain), hair, three middle ear bones and mammary glands.\n\nMammals include the largest animals on the planet, the great whales, as well as some of the most intelligent, such as elephants, primates and cetaceans. The basic body type is a terrestrial quadruped, but some mammals are adapted for life at sea, in the air, in trees, underground or on two legs. The largest group of mammals, the placentals, have a placenta, which enables the feeding of the fetus during gestation.\n\nMammals range in size from the 30 – bumblebee bat to the 33 m blue whale. With the exception of the five species of monotreme (egg-laying mammals), all modern mammals give birth to live young. Most mammals, including the six most species-rich orders, belong to the placental group. The three largest orders in number of species are Rodentia: mice, rats, porcupines, beavers, capybaras and other gnawing mammals; Chiroptera: bats; and Soricomorpha: shrews, moles and solenodons. The next three biggest orders, depending on the biological classification scheme used, are the Primates including the great apes and monkeys; the Cetartiodactyla including whales and even-toed ungulates; and the Carnivora which includes cats, dogs, weasels, bears and seals.\n\nThe word \"mammal\" is modern, from the scientific name Mammalia, coined by Carl Linnaeus in 1758, derived from the Latin mamma (\"teat, pap\"). All female mammals nurse their young with milk, which is secreted from special glands, the mammary glands. According to Mammal Species of the World, 5,416 species were known in 2006. These were grouped in 1,229 genera, 153 families and 29 orders. In 2008 the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) completed a five-year, 1,700-scientist Global Mammal Assessment for its IUCN Red List, which counted 5,488 species. In some classifications, extant mammals are divided into two subclasses: the Prototheria, that is, the order Monotremata; and the Theria, or the infraclasses Metatheria and Eutheria. The marsupials constitute the crown group of the Metatheria, and include all living metatherians as well as many extinct ones; the placentals are the crown group of the Eutheria. While mammal classification at the family level has been relatively stable, several contending classifications regarding the higher levels—subclass, infraclass and order, especially of the marsupials—appear in contemporaneous literature. Much of the changes reflect the advances of cladistic analysis and molecular genetics. Findings from molecular genetics, for example, have prompted adopting new groups, such as the Afrotheria, and abandoning traditional groups, such as the Insectivora.\n\nThe early synapsid mammalian ancestors were sphenacodont pelycosaurs, a group that produced the non-mammalian Dimetrodon. At the end of the Carboniferous period, this group diverged from the sauropsid line that led to today's reptiles and birds. The line following the stem group Sphenacodontia split-off several diverse groups of non-mammalian synapsids—sometimes referred to as mammal-like reptiles—before giving rise to the proto-mammals (Therapsida) in the early Mesozoic era. The modern mammalian orders arose in the Paleogene and Neogene periods of the Cenozoic era, after the extinction of non-avian dinosaurs, and have been among the dominant terrestrial animal groups from 66 million years ago to the present.\n\nClassification\n\nMammal classification has been through several iterations since Carl Linnaeus initially defined the class. No classification system is universally accepted; McKenna & Bell (1997) and Wilson & Reader (2005) provide useful recent compendiums. George Gaylord Simpson's \"Principles of Classification and a Classification of Mammals\" (AMNH Bulletin v. 85, 1945) provides systematics of mammal origins and relationships that were universally taught until the end of the 20th century. Since Simpson's classification, the paleontological record has been recalibrated, and the intervening years have seen much debate and progress concerning the theoretical underpinnings of systematization itself, partly through the new concept of cladistics. Though field work gradually made Simpson's classification outdated, it remained the closest thing to an official classification of mammals.\n\nDefinitions \n\nThe word \"mammal\" is modern, from the scientific name Mammalia coined by Carl Linnaeus in 1758, derived from the Latin mamma (\"teat, pap\"). In an influential 1988 paper, Timothy Rowe defined Mammalia phylogenetically as the crown group of mammals, the clade consisting of the most recent common ancestor of living monotremes (echidnas and platypuses) and therian mammals (marsupials and placentals) and all descendants of that ancestor. Since this ancestor lived in the Jurassic period, Rowe's definition excludes all animals from the earlier Triassic, despite the fact that Triassic fossils in the Haramiyida have been referred to the Mammalia since the mid-19th century. If Mammalia is considered as the crown group, its origin can be roughly dated as the first known appearance of animals more closely related to some extant mammals than to others. Ambondro is more closely related to monotremes than to therian mammals while Amphilestes and Amphitherium are more closely related to the therians; as fossils of all three genera are dated about in the Middle Jurassic, this is a reasonable estimate for the appearance of the crown group. \n\nT. S. Kemp has provided a more traditional definition: \"synapsids that possess a dentary–squamosal jaw articulation and occlusion between upper and lower molars with a transverse component to the movement\" or, equivalently in Kemp's view, the clade originating with the last common ancestor of Sinoconodon and living mammals. The earliest known synapsid satisfying Kemp's definitions is Tikitherium, dated , so the appearance of mammals in this broader sense can be given this Late Triassic date. \n\nMcKenna/Bell classification\n\nIn 1997, the mammals were comprehensively revised by Malcolm C. McKenna and Susan K. Bell, which has resulted in the McKenna/Bell classification. Their 1997 book, Classification of Mammals above the Species Level, is a comprehensive work on the systematics, relationships and occurrences of all mammal taxa, living and extinct, down through the rank of genus, though molecular genetic data challenge several of the higher level groupings. The authors worked together as paleontologists at the American Museum of Natural History, New York. McKenna inherited the project from Simpson and, with Bell, constructed a completely updated hierarchical system, covering living and extinct taxa that reflects the historical genealogy of Mammalia.\n\nExtinct groups are represented by a dagger (†).\n\nClass Mammalia\n*Subclass Prototheria: monotremes: echidnas and the platypus\n*Subclass Theriiformes: live-bearing mammals and their prehistoric relatives\n**Infraclass †Allotheria: multituberculates\n**Infraclass †Eutriconodonta: eutriconodonts\n**Infraclass Holotheria: modern live-bearing mammals and their prehistoric relatives\n***Superlegion †Kuehneotheria\n***Supercohort Theria: live-bearing mammals\n****Cohort Marsupialia: marsupials\n*****Magnorder Australidelphia: Australian marsupials and the monito del monte\n*****Magnorder Ameridelphia: New World marsupials. Now considered paraphyletic, with shrew opossums being closer to australidelphians. \n****Cohort Placentalia: placentals\n*****Magnorder Xenarthra: xenarthrans\n*****Magnorder Epitheria: epitheres\n******Superorder Anagalida: lagomorphs, rodents and elephant shrews\n******Superorder Ferae: carnivorans, pangolins, †creodonts and relatives\n******Superorder Lipotyphla: insectivorans\n******Superorder Archonta: bats, primates, colugos and treeshrews\n******Superorder Ungulata: ungulates\n*******Order Tubulidentata incertae sedis: aardvark\n*******Mirorder Eparctocyona: †condylarths, whales and artiodactyls (even-toed ungulates)\n*******Mirorder †Meridiungulata: South American ungulates\n*******Mirorder Altungulata: perissodactyls (odd-toed ungulates), elephants, manatees and hyraxes\n\nMolecular classification of placentals\n\nMolecular studies based on DNA analysis have suggested new relationships among mammal families over the last few years. Most of these findings have been independently validated by retrotransposon presence/absence data. Classification systems based on molecular studies reveal three major groups or lineages of placental mammals- Afrotheria, Xenarthra and Boreoeutheria- which diverged in the Cretaceous. The relationships between these three lineages is contentious, and all three possible different hypotheses have been proposed with respect to which group is basal. These hypotheses are Atlantogenata (basal Boreoeutheria), Epitheria (basal Xenarthra) and Exafroplacentalia (basal Afrotheria). Boreoeutheria in turn contains two major lineages- Euarchontoglires and Laurasiatheria.\n\nEstimates for the divergence times between these three placental groups range from 105 to 120 million years ago, depending on type of DNA (such as nuclear or mitochondrial) and varying interpretations of paleogeographic data.\n\nCladogram based on Tarver et al. (2016) \n\nGroup I: Afrotheria\n*Clade Afroinsectiphilia\n**Order Macroscelidea: elephant shrews (Africa)\n**Order Afrosoricida: tenrecs and golden moles (Africa)\n**Order Tubulidentata: aardvark (Africa south of the Sahara)\n*Clade Paenungulata\n**Order Hyracoidea: hyraxes or dassies (Africa, Arabia)\n**Order Proboscidea: elephants (Africa, Southeast Asia)\n**Order Sirenia: dugong and manatees (cosmopolitan tropical)\nGroup II: Xenarthra\n*Order Pilosa: sloths and anteaters (neotropical)\n*Order Cingulata: armadillos and extinct relatives (Americas)\nGroup III: Boreoeutheria\n*Clade: Euarchontoglires (Supraprimates)\n**Superorder Euarchonta\n***Order Scandentia: treeshrews (Southeast Asia).\n***Order Dermoptera: flying lemurs or colugos (Southeast Asia)\n***Order Primates: lemurs, bushbabies, monkeys, apes, humans (cosmopolitan)\n**Superorder Glires\n***Order Lagomorpha: pikas, rabbits, hares (Eurasia, Africa, Americas)\n***Order Rodentia: rodents (cosmopolitan)\n*Clade Laurasiatheria\n**Order Eulipotyphla: shrews, hedgehogs, moles, solenodons\n**Clade Ferungulata\n***Clade Cetartiodactyla\n****Order Cetacea: whales, dolphins and porpoises\n****Order Artiodactyla: even-toed ungulates, including pigs, hippopotamus, camels, giraffe, deer, antelope, cattle, sheep, goats (Note that Artiodactyla is paraphyletic to Cetacea)\n***Clade Pegasoferae\n****Order Chiroptera: bats (cosmopolitan)\n****Clade Zooamata\n*****Order Perissodactyla: odd-toed ungulates, including horses, donkeys, zebras, tapirs and rhinoceroses\n*****Clade Ferae\n******Order Pholidota: pangolins or scaly anteaters (Africa, South Asia)\n******Order Carnivora: carnivores (cosmopolitan), including cats and dogs\n\nStatistics\n\nMost mammals, including the six most species-rich orders, belong to the placental group. The three largest orders in numbers of species are Rodentia: mice, rats, porcupines, beavers, capybaras and other gnawing mammals; Chiroptera: bats; and Soricomorpha: shrews, moles and solenodons. The next three biggest orders, depending on the biological classification scheme used, are the Primates including the great apes and monkeys; the Cetartiodactyla including whales and even-toed ungulates; and the Carnivora which includes cats, dogs, weasels, bears and seals. According to Mammal Species of the World, 5,416 species were known in 2006. These were grouped in 1,229 genera, 153 families and 29 orders. In 2008 the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) completed a five-year, 1,700-scientist Global Mammal Assessment for its IUCN Red List, which counted 5,488 species. \n\nEvolutionary history\n\nSynapsida, a clade that contains mammals and their extinct relatives, originated during the Pennsylvanian subperiod, when they split from reptilian and avian lineages. Crown group mammals evolved from earlier mammaliaforms during the Early Jurassic.\n\nThe cladogram following takes Mammalia to be the crown group.\n\nEvolution from amniotes\n\nThe first fully terrestrial vertebrates were amniotes. Like their amphibious tetrapod predecessors, they had lungs and limbs. Amniotic eggs, however, have internal membranes that allow the developing embryo to breathe but keep water in. Hence, amniotes can lay eggs on dry land, while amphibians generally need to lay their eggs in water.\n\nThe first amniotes apparently arose in the Late Carboniferous. They descended from earlier reptiliomorph amphibious tetrapods, which lived on land that was already inhabited by insects and other invertebrates as well as ferns, mosses and other plants. Within a few million years, two important amniote lineages became distinct: the synapsids, which would later include the common ancestor of the mammals; and the sauropsids, which now include turtles, lizards, snakes, crocodilians, dinosaurs and birds. Synapsids have a single hole (temporal fenestra) low on each side of the skull. One synapsid group, the pelycosaurs, included the largest and fiercest animals of the early Permian. Nonmammalian synapsids are sometimes called \"mammal-like reptiles\".\n\nTherapsids descended from pelycosaurs in the Middle Permian, about 265 million years ago, and became the dominant land vertebrates. They differ from basal eupelycosaurs in several features of the skull and jaws, including: larger skulls and incisors which are equal in size in therapsids, but not for eupelycosaurs. The therapsid lineage leading to mammals went through a series of stages, beginning with animals that were very similar to their pelycosaur ancestors and ending with probainognathian cynodonts, some of which could easily be mistaken for mammals. Those stages were characterized by: \n*The gradual development of a bony secondary palate.\n*Progression towards an erect limb posture, which would increase the animals' stamina by avoiding Carrier's constraint. But this process was slow and erratic: for example, all herbivorous nonmammaliaform therapsids retained sprawling limbs (some late forms may have had semierect hind limbs); Permian carnivorous therapsids had sprawling forelimbs, and some late Permian ones also had semisprawling hindlimbs. In fact, modern monotremes still have semisprawling limbs.\n*The dentary gradually became the main bone of the lower jaw which, by the Triassic, progressed towards the fully mammalian jaw (the lower consisting only of the dentary) and middle ear (which is constructed by the bones that were previously used to construct the jaws of reptiles).\n\nFirst mammals\n\nThe Permian–Triassic extinction event, which was a prolonged event due to the accumulation of several extinction pulses, ended the dominance of carnivores therapsids. In the early Triassic, most medium to large land carnivore niches were taken over by archosaurs which, over an extended period of time (35 million years), came to include the crocodylomorphs, the pterosaurs and the dinosaurs; however, large cynodonts like Trucidocynodon and traversodontids still occupied large sized carnivorous and herbivorous niches respectively. By the Jurassic, the dinosaurs had come to dominate the large terrestrial herbivore niches as well. \n\nThe first mammals (in Kemp's sense) appeared in the Late Triassic epoch (about 225 million years ago), 40 million years after the first therapsids. They expanded out of their nocturnal insectivore niche from the mid-Jurassic onwards; The Jurassic Castorocauda, for example, had adaptations for swimming, digging and catching fish. Most, if not all, are thought to have remained nocturnal (the Nocturnal bottleneck), accounting for much of the typical mammalian traits. The majority of the mammal species that existed in the Mesozoic Era were multituberculates, eutriconodonts and spalacotheriids. The earliest known metatherian is Sinodelphys, found in 125 million-year-old Early Cretaceous shale in China's northeastern Liaoning Province. The fossil is nearly complete and includes tufts of fur and imprints of soft tissues. \n\nThe oldest known fossil among the Eutheria (\"true beasts\") is the small shrewlike Juramaia sinensis, or \"Jurassic mother from China\", dated to 160 million years ago in the late Jurassic. A later eutherian, Eomaia, dated to 125 million years ago in the early Cretaceous, possessed some features in common with the marsupials but not with the placentals, evidence that these features were present in the last common ancestor of the two groups but were later lost in the placental lineage. In particular, the epipubic bones extend forwards from the pelvis. These are not found in any modern placental, but they are found in marsupials, monotremes, nontherian mammals and Ukhaatherium, an early Cretaceous animal in the eutherian order Asioryctitheria. This also applies to the multituberculates. They are apparently an ancestral feature, which subsequently disappeared in the placental lineage. These epipubic bones seem to function by stiffening the muscles during locomotion, reducing the amount of space being presented, which placentals require to contain their fetus during gestation periods. A narrow pelvic outlet indicates that the young were very small at birth and therefore pregnancy was short, as in modern marsupials. This suggests that the placenta was a later development.\n\nThe earliest known monotreme was Teinolophos, which lived about 120 million years ago in Australia. Monotremes have some features which may be inherited from the original amniotes such as the same orifice to urinate, defecate and reproduce (cloaca) – as lizards and birds also do – and they lay eggs which are leathery and uncalcified. \n\nEarliest appearances of features\n\nHadrocodium, whose fossils date from approximately 195 million years ago, in the early Jurassic, provides the first clear evidence of a jaw joint formed solely by the squamosal and dentary bones; there is no space in the jaw for the articular, a bone involved in the jaws of all early synapsids.\n\nThe earliest clear evidence of hair or fur is in fossils of Castorocauda, from 164 million years ago in the mid-Jurassic. In the 1950s, it was suggested that the foramina (passages) in the maxillae and premaxillae (bones in the front of the upper jaw) of cynodonts were channels which supplied blood vessels and nerves to vibrissae (whiskers) and so were evidence of hair or fur; it was soon pointed out, however, that foramina do not necessarily show that an animal had vibrissae, as the modern lizard Tupinambis has foramina that are almost identical to those found in the nonmammalian cynodont Thrinaxodon.Bennett, A. F. and Ruben, J. A. (1986) \"The metabolic and thermoregulatory status of therapsids\"; pp. 207–218 in N. Hotton III, P. D. MacLean, J. J. Roth and E. C. Roth (eds), \"The ecology and biology of mammal-like reptiles\", Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington. Popular sources, nevertheless, continue to attribute whiskers to Thrinaxodon. Studies on Permian coprolites suggest that non-mammalian synapsids of the epoch already had fur, setting the evolution of hairs possibly as far back as dicynodonts.\n\nWhen endothermy first appeared in the evolution of mammals is uncertain, though it is generally agreed to have first evolved in non-mammalian therapsids. Modern monotremes have lower body temperatures and more variable metabolic rates than marsupials and placentals, but there is evidence that some of their ancestors, perhaps including ancestors of the therians, may have had body temperatures like those of modern therians. Likewise, some modern therians like afrotheres and xenarthrans have secondarily developed lower body temperatures. \n\nThe evolution of erect limbs in mammals is incomplete — living and fossil monotremes have sprawling limbs. The parasagittal (nonsprawling) limb posture appeared sometime in the late Jurassic or early Cretaceous; it is found in the eutherian Eomaia and the metatherian Sinodelphys, both dated to 125 million years ago. Epipubic bones, a feature that strongly influenced the reproduction of most mammal clades, are first found in Tritylodontidae, suggesting that it is a synapomorphy between them and mammaliformes. They are omnipresent in non-placental mammaliformes, though Megazostrodon and Erythrotherium appear to have lacked them. \n\nIt has been suggested that the original function of lactation (milk production) was to keep eggs moist. Much of the argument is based on monotremes, the egg-laying mammals. \n\nRise of the mammals\n\nMammals took over the medium- to large-sized ecological niches in the Cenozoic, after the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event emptied ecological space once filled by non-avian dinosaurs and other groups of reptiles. Then mammals diversified very quickly; both birds and mammals show an exponential rise in diversity. For example, the earliest known bat dates from about 50 million years ago, only 16 million years after the extinction of the dinosaurs. \n\nMolecular phylogenetic studies suggest that most placental orders diverged about 100 to 85 million years ago and that modern families appeared in the period from the late Eocene through the Miocene. However, no placental fossils have been found from before the end of the Cretaceous. The earliest undisputed fossils of placentals comes from the early Paleocene, after the extinction of the dinosaurs. In particular, scientists have identified an early Paleocene animal named Protungulatum donnae as one of the first placental mammals. The earliest known ancestor of primates is Archicebus achilles from around 55 million years ago. This tiny primate weighed 20–30 grams (0.7–1.1 ounce) and could fit within a human palm.\n\nAnatomy and morphology\n\nDistinguishing features\n\nLiving mammal species can be identified by the presence of sweat glands, including those that are specialized to produce milk to nourish their young. In classifying fossils, however, other features must be used, since soft tissue glands and many other features are not visible in fossils. \n\nMany traits shared by all living mammals appeared among the earliest members of the group:\n\n* Jaw joint - The dentary (the lower jaw bone, which carries the teeth) and the squamosal (a small cranial bone) meet to form the joint. In most gnathostomes, including early therapsids, the joint consists of the articular (a small bone at the back of the lower jaw) and quadrate (a small bone at the back of the upper jaw).\n* Middle ear - In crown-group mammals, sound is carried from the eardrum by a chain of three bones, the malleus, the incus and the stapes. Ancestrally, the malleus and the incus are derived from the articular and the quadrate bones that constituted the jaw joint of early therapsids. \n* Tooth replacement - Teeth are replaced once or (as in toothed whales and murid rodents) not at all, rather than being replaced continually throughout life. \n* Prismatic enamel - The enamel coating on the surface of a tooth consists of prisms, solid, rod-like structures extending from the dentin to the tooth's surface. \n* Occipital condyles - Two knobs at the base of the skull fit into the topmost neck vertebra; most other tetrapods, in contrast, have only one such knob. \n\nFor the most part, these characteristics were not present in the Triassic ancestors of the mammals. Nearly all mammal groups possess an epipubic bone, the exception being modern placentals.\n\nBiological systems\n\nThe majority of mammals have seven cervical vertebrae (bones in the neck), including bats, giraffes, whales and humans. The exceptions are the manatee and the two-toed sloth, which have just six, and the three-toed sloth which has nine cervical vertebrae. All mammalian brains possess a neocortex, a brain region unique to mammals. Placental mammals have a corpus callosum, unlike monotremes and marsupials. \n\nThe lungs of mammals are spongy and honeycombed. Breathing is mainly achieved with the diaphragm, which divides the thorax from the abdominal cavity, forming a dome convex to the thorax. Contraction of the diaphragm flattens the dome, increasing the volume of the lung cavity. Air enters through the oral and nasal cavities, and travels through the larynx, trachea and bronchi, and expands the alveoli. Relaxing the diaphragm has the opposite effect, decreasing the volume of the lung cavity, causing air to be pushed out of the lungs. During exercise, the abdominal wall contracts, increasing pressure on the diaphragm, which forces air out quicker and more forcefully. The rib cage is able to expand and contract the chest cavity through the action of other respiratory muscles. Consequently, air is sucked into or expelled out of the lungs, always moving down its pressure gradient. This type of lung is known as a bellows lung due to its resemblance to blacksmith bellows.\n\nThe integumentary system is made up of three layers: the outermost epidermis, the dermis and the hypodermis. The epidermis is typically 10 to 30 cells thick; its main function is to provide a waterproof layer. Its outermost cells are constantly lost; its bottommost cells are constantly dividing and pushing upward. The middle layer, the dermis, is 15 to 40 times thicker than the epidermis. The dermis is made up of many components, such as bony structures and blood vessels. The hypodermis is made up of adipose tissue. Its job is to store lipids, and to provide cushioning and insulation. The thickness of this layer varies widely from species to species. Although other animals have features such as whiskers, feathers, setae, or cilia that superficially resemble it, no animals other than mammals have hair. It is a definitive characteristic of the class. Though some mammals have very little, careful examination reveals the characteristic, often in obscure parts of their bodies.\n\nHerbivores have developed a diverse range of physical structures to facilitate the consumption of plant material. To break up intact plant tissues, mammals have developed teeth structures that reflect their feeding preferences. For instance, frugivores (animals that feed primarily on fruit) and herbivores that feed on soft foliage have low-crowned teeth specialized for grinding foliage and seeds. Grazing animals that tend to eat hard, silica-rich grasses, have high-crowned teeth, which are capable of grinding tough plant tissues and do not wear down as quickly as low-crowned teeth. Most carnivorous mammals have carnassialiforme teeth (of varying length depending on diet), long canines and similar tooth replacement patterns. \n\nThe stomach of Artiodactyls is divided into four sections: the rumen, the reticulum, the omasum and the abomasum (only ruminants have a rumen). After the plant material is consumed, it is mixed with saliva in the rumen and reticulum and separates into solid and liquid material. The solids lump together to form a bolus (or cud), and is regurgitated. When the bolus enters the mouth, the fluid is squeezed out with the tongue and swallowed again. Ingested food passes to the rumen and reticulum where cellulytic microbes (bacteria, protozoa and fungi) produce cellulase, which is needed to break down the cellulose in plants. Perissodactyls, in contrast to the ruminants, store digested food that has left the stomach in an enlarged cecum, where it is fermented by bacteria. Carnivora have a simple stomach adapted to digest primarily meat, as compared to the elaborate digestive systems of herbivorous animals, which are necessary to break down tough, complex plant fibers. The caecum is either absent or short and simple, and the large intestine is not sacculated or much wider than the small intestine. \n\nThe mammalian heart has four chambers, two upper atria, the receiving chambers, and two lower ventricles, the discharging chambers. The heart has four valves, which separate its chambers and ensures blood flows in the correct direction through the heart (preventing backflow). After gas exchange in the pulmonary capillaries (blood vessels in the lungs), oxygen-rich blood returns to the left atrium via one of the four pulmonary veins. Blood flows nearly continuously back into the atrium, which acts as the receiving chamber, and from here through an opening into the left ventricle. Most blood flows passively into the heart while both the atria and ventricles are relaxed, but toward the end of the ventricular relaxation period, the left atrium will contract, pumping blood into the ventricle. The heart also requires nutrients and oxygen found in blood like other muscles, and is supplied via coronary arteries. \n\nColor variation\n\nMammalian hair, also known as pelage, can vary in color between populations, organisms within a population, and even on the individual organism. Light-dark color variation is common in the mammalian taxa. Sometimes, this color variation is determined by age variation, however, in other cases, it is determined by other factors. Selective pressures, such as ecological interactions with other populations or environmental conditions, often lead to the variation in mammalian coloration. These selective pressures favor certain colors in order to increase survival. Camouflage is thought to be a major selection pressure shaping coloration in mammals, although there is also evidence that sexual selection, communication and physiological processes may influence its evolution as well. \nCamouflage is the most predominant mechanism for color variation, as it aids in the concealment of the organisms from predators or from their prey. Sloths sometimes appear to have green fur and blend into their green jungle environment, but this color is caused by algal growths. \n\nCoat color can also be for intraspecies communication such as warning members of their species about predators, indicating health for reproductive purposes, communicating between mother and young and intimidating predators.\nStudies have shown that in some cases, differences in female and male coat color could indicate information nutrition and hormone levels, which are important in the mate selection process. For example, some primates and marsupials have shades of violet, green, or blue skin on parts of their bodies, which indicates some distinct advantage in their largely arboreal habitat due to convergent evolution. \n\nAnother mechanism for coat color variation is physiological response purposes, such as temperature regulation in tropical or arctic environments. Although much has been observed about color variation, much of the genetic that link coat color to genes is still unknown. The genetic sites where pigmentation genes are found are known to affect phenotype by altering the spatial distribution of pigmentation of the hairs, and altering the density and distribution of the hairs. Although the genetic sites are known, it is largely unknown how these genes are expressed.\n\nReproductive system\n\nMost mammals are viviparous, giving birth to live young. However, the five species of monotreme, the platypus and the four species of echidna, lay eggs. The monotremes have a sex determination system different from that of most other mammals. In particular, the sex chromosomes of a platypus are more like those of a chicken than those of a therian mammal. \n\nThe mammary glands of mammals are specialized to produce milk, the primary source of nutrition for newborns. The monotremes branched early from other mammals and do not have the nipples seen in most mammals, but they do have mammary glands. The young lick the milk from a mammary patch on the mother's belly. \n\nViviparous mammals are in the subclass Theria; those living today are in the marsupial and placental infraclasses. Marsupials have a short gestation period, typically shorter than its estrous cycle and gives birth to an undeveloped newborn that then undergoes further development; in many species, this takes place within a pouch-like sac, the marsupium, located in the front of the mother's abdomen. This is the plesiomorphic condition among viviparous mammals; the presence of epipubic bones in all non-placental mammals prevents the expansion of the torso needed for full pregnancy. Even non-placental eutherians probably reproduced this way. The placentals are unusual among mammals in giving birth to complete and fully developed young, usually after long gestation periods. \n\nEndothermy\n\nNearly all mammals are endothermic (\"warm-blooded\"). Most mammals also have hair to help keep them warm. Like birds, mammals can forage or hunt in weather and climates too cold for nonavian reptiles and large insects. Endothermy requires plenty of food energy, so mammals eat more food per unit of body weight than most reptiles. Small insectivorous mammals eat prodigious amounts for their size. A rare exception, the naked mole-rat produces little metabolic heat, so it is considered an operational poikilotherm. Birds are also endothermic, so endothermy is not unique to mammals. \n\nBehavior\n\nFeeding\n\nTo maintain a high constant body temperature is energy expensive – mammals therefore need a nutritious and plentiful diet. While the earliest mammals were probably predators, different species have since adapted to meet their dietary requirements in a variety of ways. Some eat other animals – this is a carnivorous diet (and includes insectivorous diets). Other mammals, called herbivores, eat plants. An herbivorous diet includes subtypes such as granivory (seed eating), folivory (leaf eating), frugivory (fruit eating), nectivory (nectar eating), gummivory (gum eating) and mycophagy (fungus eating). Some mammals may be coprophagous, and consume feces, usually to consume more nutrients. An omnivore eats both prey and plants. Carnivorous mammals have a simple digestive tract because the proteins, lipids and minerals found in meat require little in the way of specialized digestion. Plants on the other hand contain complex carbohydrates, such as cellulose. The digestive tract of an herbivore is therefore host to bacteria that ferment these substances, and make them available for digestion. The bacteria are either housed in the multichambered stomach or in a large cecum. \n\nThe size of an animal is also a factor in determining diet type (Allen's rule). Since small mammals have a high ratio of heat-losing surface area to heat-generating volume, they tend to have high energy requirements and a high metabolic rate. Mammals that weigh less than about 18 oz (500 g) are mostly insectivorous because they cannot tolerate the slow, complex digestive process of an herbivore. Larger animals, on the other hand, generate more heat and less of this heat is lost. They can therefore tolerate either a slower collection process (those that prey on larger vertebrates) or a slower digestive process (herbivores). Furthermore, mammals that weigh more than 18 oz (500 g) usually cannot collect enough insects during their waking hours to sustain themselves. The only large insectivorous mammals are those that feed on huge colonies of insects (ants or termites).\n\nIntelligence\n\nIn intelligent mammals, such as primates, the cerebrum is larger relative to the rest of the brain. Intelligence itself is not easy to define, but indications of intelligence include the ability to learn, matched with behavioral flexibility. Rats, for example, are considered to be highly intelligent, as they can learn and perform new tasks, an ability that may be important when they first colonize a fresh habitat. In some mammals, food gathering appears to be related to intelligence: a deer feeding on plants has a brain smaller than a cat, which must think to outwit its prey. \n\nTool use by animals may indicate different levels of learning and cognition. The sea otter uses rocks as essential and regular parts of its foraging behaviour (smashing abalone off of rocks or breaking open shells), with some populations spending 21% of their time making tools. Other tool use, such as chimpanzees using twigs to \"fish\" for termites, may be developed by watching others use tools and may even be a true example of animal teaching. Tools may even be used in solving puzzles in which the animal appears to experience a \"Eureka moment\". Other mammals that do not use tools, such as dogs, can also experience a Eureka moment. \n\nBrain size was previously considered a major indicator of the intelligence of an animal. Since most of the brain is used for maintaining bodily functions, greater ratios of brain to body mass may increase the amount of brain mass available for more complex cognitive tasks. Allometric analysis indicates that mammalian brain size scales at approximately the ⅔ or ¾ exponent of the body mass. Comparison of a particular animal's brain size with the expected brain size based on such allometric analysis provides an encephalisation quotient that can be used as another indication of animal intelligence. Sperm whales have the largest brain mass of any animal on earth, averaging and in mature males. \n\nSelf-awareness appears to be a sign of abstract thinking. Self-awareness, although not well-defined, is believed to be a precursor to more advanced processes such as metacognitive reasoning. The traditional method for measuring this is the mirror test, which determines if an animals possesses the ability of self-recognition. Mammals that have 'passed' the mirror test are:\n*Asian elephants, however not all subjects have passed. Three female elephants were tested, but only one passed, and two other elephants tested in another study also failed to pass. \n*Chimpanzees, but mirror tests with a juvenile (11 months old) male chimpanzee failed to reveal self-recognition.\n*Bonobos \n*Bornean orangutan \n*Sumatran orangutan \n*Humans, which show signs of self-recognition at 18 months (mirror stage) \n*Bottlenose dolphins, since they don't have arms and can't touch the marked areas, decreased latency to approach the mirror, repetitious head circling and close viewing of the marked areas were considered signs of self-recognition \n*Killer whales \n*False killer whales \n\nSocial structure\n\nEusociality is the highest level of social organization. These societies have an overlap of adult generations, the division of reproductive labor and cooperative caring of young. Usually insects, such as bees, ants and termites, have eusocial behavior, but it is demonstrated in two rodent species: the naked mole-rat and the Damaraland mole-rat. \n\nPresociality is when animals exhibit more than just sexual interactions with members of the same species, but fall short of qualifying as eusocial. That is, presocial animals can display communal living, cooperative care of young, or primitive division of reproductive labor, but they do not display all of the three essential traits of eusocial animals. Humans and some species of Callitrichidae are unique among primates in their degree of cooperative care of young. Harry Harlow set up an experiment with rhesus monkeys, presocial primates, in 1958; the results from this study showed that social encounters are necessary in order for the young monkeys to develop both mentally and sexually.Harlow, H.F. and Suomi, S.J. (1971). [http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/68/7/1534 \"Social Recovery by Isolation-Reared Monkeys\"], Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 68(7): 1534-1538\n\nA fission-fusion society are societies that change frequently in their size and composition, making up a permanent social group called the \"parent group\". Permanent social networks consist of all individual members of a community and often varies to track changes in their environment. In a fission–fusion society, the main parent group can fracture (fission) into smaller stable subgroups or individuals to adapt to environmental or social circumstances. For example, a number of males may break off from the main group in order to hunt or forage for food during the day, but at night they may return to join (fusion) the primary group to share food and partake in other activities. Many mammals exhibit this, such as primates (for example orangutans and spider monkeys), elephants, hyenas, lions, and dolphins. \n\nSolitary animals defend a territory and avoid social interactions with the members of its species, except during breeding season. This is to avoid resource competition, as two individuals of the same species would occupy the same niche, and prevent depletion of food. A solitary animal, while foraging, can also be less conspicuous to predators or prey. \n\nIn a hierarchy, individuals are either dominant or submissive. A despotic hierarchy is where one individual is dominant while the others are submissive, as in wolves and lemurs, and a pecking order which is a linear ranking of individuals where there is a top individual and a bottom individual. Pecking orders may also be ranked by sex, where the lowest individual of a sex has a higher ranking than the top individual of the other sex, as in hyenas. Dominant individuals, or alphas, have a high chance of reproductive success, especially in harems where one or a few males (resident males) have exclusive breeding rights to females in a group. Non-resident males can also be accepted in harems, but some species may be more strict. \n\nWhen two animals mate, they both share an interest in the success of the offspring, though often to different extremes. Unless the male and female are perfectly monogamous, meaning that they mate for life and take no other partners, even after the original mate’s death, as with wolves, Eurasian beavers, and otters. The amount of parental care will vary. There are three types of polygamy: either one or multiple dominant males have with breeding rights (polygyny), multiple males that females mate with (polyandry), or multiple males have exclusive relations with multiple females (polygynandry). It is much more common for polygynous mating to happen, which, excluding leks, are estimated to occur in up to 90% of mammals. Lek mating occurs in harems, wherein one or a few males protect their harem of females from other males who would otherwise mate with the females, as in elephant seals; or males congregate around females and try to attract them with various courtship displays and vocalizations, as in harbor seals. \n\nLocomotion\n\nTerrestrial\n\nMost vertebrates—the amphibians, the reptiles and some mammals such as humans and bears—are plantigrade, walking on the whole of the underside of the foot. Many mammals, such as cats and dogs are digitigrade, walking on their toes, the greater stride length allowing more speed. Digitigrade mammals are also often adept at quiet movement. Some animals such as horses are unguligrade, walking on the tips of their toes. This even further increases their stride length and thus their speed. A few mammals, namely the great apes, are also known to walk on their knuckles, at least for their front legs. Giant anteaters and platypuses are also knuckle-walkers.\n\nAnimals will use different gaits for different speeds, terrain and situations. For example, horses show four natural gaits, the slowest horse gait is the walk, then there are three faster gaits which, from slowest to fastest, are the trot, the canter and the gallop. Animals may also have unusual gaits that are used occasionally, such as for moving sideways or backwards. For example, the main human gaits are bipedal walking and running, but they employ many other gaits occasionally, including a four-legged crawl in tight spaces. Mammals show a vast range of gaits, the order that they place and lift their appendages in locomotion. Gaits can be grouped into categories according to their patterns of support sequence. For quadrupeds, there are three main categories: walking gaits, running gaits and leaping gaits. Walking is the most common gait, where some feet are on the ground at any given time, and found in almost all legged animals. Running is considered to occur when at some points in the stride all feet are off the ground in a moment of suspension.\n\nArboreal\n\nArboreal animals frequently have elongated limbs that help them cross gaps, reach fruit or other resources, test the firmness of support ahead and, in some cases, to brachiate.Cartmill, M. (1985). Climbing. In Functional Vertebrate Morphology, eds. M. Hildebrand D. M. Bramble K. F. Liem and D. B. Wake), pp. 73–88. Cambridge: Belknap Press. Many arboreal species, such as tree porcupines, Silky Anteaters, spider monkeys and possums, use prehensile tails to grasp branches. In the spider monkey, the tip of the tail has either a bare patch or adhesive pad, which provides increased friction. Claws can be used to interact with rough substrates and re-orient the direction of forces the animal applies. This is what allows squirrels to climb tree trunks that are so large to be essentially flat from the perspective of such a small animal. However, claws can interfere with an animal's ability to grasp very small branches, as they may wrap too far around and prick the animal's own paw. Frictional gripping is used by primates, relying upon hairless fingertips. Squeezing the branch between the fingertips generates frictional force that holds the animal's hand to the branch. However, this type of grip depends upon the angle of the frictional force, thus upon the diameter of the branch, with larger branches resulting in reduced gripping ability. To control descent, especially down large diameter branches, some arboreal animals such as squirrels have evolved highly mobile ankle joints that permit rotating the foot into a 'reversed' posture. This allows the claws to hook into the rough surface of the bark, opposing the force of gravity. Small size provides many advantages to arboreal species: such as increasing the relative size of branches to the animal, lower center of mass, increased stability, lower mass (allowing movement on smaller branches) and the ability to move through more cluttered habitat. Size relating to weight affects gliding animals such as the sugar glider. Some species of primate, bat and all species of sloth achieve passive stability by hanging beneath the branch. Both pitching and tipping become irrelevant, as the only method of failure would be losing their grip.\n\nAerial\n\nBats are the only mammals that can truly fly. They fly through the air at a constant speed by moving their wings up and down (usually with some fore-aft movement as well). Because the animal is in motion, there is some airflow relative to its body which, combined with the velocity of the wings, generates a faster airflow moving over the wing. This will generate a lift force vector pointing forwards and upwards, and a drag force vector pointing rearwards and upwards. The upwards components of these counteract gravity, keeping the body in the air, while the forward component provides thrust to counteract both the drag from the wing and from the body as a whole. \n\nThe wings of bats are much thinner and consist of more bones than that of birds, allowing bats to maneuver more accurately and fly with more lift and less drag. By folding the wings inwards towards their body on the upstroke, they use 35% less energy during flight than birds. The membranes are delicate, ripping easily; however, the tissue of the bat's membrane is able to regrow, such that small tears can heal quickly. The surface of their wings is equipped with touch-sensitive receptors on small bumps called Merkel cells, also found on human fingertips. These sensitive areas are different in bats, as each bump has a tiny hair in the center, making it even more sensitive and allowing the bat to detect and collect information about the air flowing over its wings, and to fly more efficiently by changing the shape of its wings in response. \n\nFossorial\n\nFossorial creatures live in subterranean environments. Many fossorial mammals were classified under the, now obsolete, order Insectivora, such as shrews, hedgehogs and moles. Fossorial mammals have a fusiform body, thickest at the shoulders and tapering off at the tail and nose. Unable to see in the dark burrows, most have degenerated eyes, but degeneration varies between species; pocket gophers, for example, are only semi-fossorial and have very small yet functional eyes, in the fully fossorial marsupial mole the eyes are degenerated and useless, talpa moles have vestigial eyes and the cape golden mole has a layer of skin covering the eyes. External ears flaps are also very small or absent. Truly-fossorial mammals have short, stout legs as strength is more important than speed to a burrowing mammal, but semi-fossorial mammals have cursorial legs. The front paws are broad and have strong claws to help in loosening dirt while excavating burrows, and the back paws have webbing, as well as claws, which aids in throwing loosened dirt backwards. Most have large incisors to prevent dirt from flying into their mouth. \n\nAquatic\n\nFully aquatic mammals, the cetaceans and sirenians, have lost their legs and have a tail fin to propel themselves through the water. Flipper movement is continuous. Whales swim by moving their tail fin and lower body up and down, propelling themselves through vertical movement, while their flippers are mainly used for steering. Their skeletal anatomy allows them to be fast swimmers. Most species have a dorsal fin to prevent themselves from turning upside-down in the water. The flukes of sirenians are raised up and down in long strokes to move the animal forward, and can be twisted to turn. The forelimbs are paddle-like flippers which aid in turning and slowing. \n\nSemi-aquatic mammals, like pinnipeds, have two pairs of flippers on the front and back, the fore-flippers and hind-flippers. The elbows and ankles are enclosed within the body.Berta, pp. 62–64. Pinnipeds have several adaptions for reducing drag. In addition to their streamlined bodies, they have smooth networks of muscle bundles in their skin that may increase laminar flow and make it easier for them to slip through water. They also lack arrector pili, so their fur can be streamlined as they swim. They rely on their fore-flippers for locomotion in a wing-like manner similar to penguins and sea turtles. Fore-flipper movement is not continuous, and the animal glides between each stroke. Compared to terrestrial carnivorans, the fore-limbs are reduced in length, which gives the locomotor muscles at the shoulder and elbow joints greater mechanical advantage; the hind-flippers serve as stabilizers. Other semi-aquatic mammals include beavers, hippopotamuses, otters and platypuses. Hippos are very large semi-aquatic mammals, and their barrel-shaped bodies have graviportal skeletal structures, adapted to carrying their enormous weight, and their specific gravity allows them to sink and move along the bottom of a river. \n\nHybrids\n\nHybrids are offspring resulting from the breeding of two genetically distinct individuals, which usually will result in a high degree of heterozygosity, though hybrid and heterozygous are not synonymous. The deliberate or accidental hybridizing of two or more species of closely related animals through captive breeding is a human activity which has been in existence for millennia and has grown for economic purposes (Domestication syndrome). Hybrids between different subspecies within a species (such as between the Bengal tiger and Siberian tiger) are known as intra-specific hybrids. Hybrids between different species within the same genus (such as between lions and tigers) are known as interspecific hybrids or crosses. Hybrids between different genera (such as between sheep and goats) are known as intergeneric hybrids. Natural hybrids will occur in hybrid zones, where two populations of species within the same genera or species living in the same or adjacent areas will interbreed with each other. Some hybrids have been recognized as species, such as the red wolf (though this is controversial). \n\nArtificial selection, the deliberate selective breeding of domestic animals, is being used to breed back recently extinct animals in an attempt to achieve an animal breed with a phenotype that resembles that extinct wildtype ancestor. A breeding-back (intraspecific) hybrid may be very similar to the extinct wild type in phenotype, ecological niche and to some extent genetics, but the initial gene pool of that wild type is lost forever with its extinction. As a result, some breeds, like Heck cattle, are vague look-alikes of the extinct wildtype aurochs.", "A fish is any member of a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic craniate animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as various extinct related groups. Most fish are ectothermic (\"cold-blooded\"), allowing their body temperatures to vary as ambient temperatures change, though some of the large active swimmers like white shark and tuna can hold a higher core temperature. Fish are abundant in most bodies of water. They can be found in nearly all aquatic environments, from high mountain streams (e.g., char and gudgeon) to the abyssal and even hadal depths of the deepest oceans (e.g., gulpers and anglerfish). With 33,100 described species, fish exhibit greater species diversity than any other group of vertebrates. \n\nFish are an important resource for humans worldwide, especially as food. Commercial and subsistence fishers hunt fish in wild fisheries (see fishing) or farm them in ponds or in cages in the ocean (see aquaculture). They are also caught by recreational fishers, kept as pets, raised by fishkeepers, and exhibited in public aquaria. Fish have had a role in culture through the ages, serving as deities, religious symbols, and as the subjects of art, books and movies.\n\nBecause the term \"fish\" is defined negatively, and excludes the tetrapods (i.e., the amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals) which descend from within the same ancestry, it is paraphyletic, and is not considered a proper grouping in systematic biology. The traditional term pisces (also ichthyes) is considered a typological, but not a phylogenetic classification.\n\nThe earliest organisms that can be classified as fish were soft-bodied chordates that first appeared during the Cambrian period. Although they lacked a true spine, they possessed notochords which allowed them to be more agile than their invertebrate counterparts. Fish would continue to evolve through the Paleozoic era, diversifying into a wide variety of forms. Many fish of the Paleozoic developed external armor that protected them from predators. The first fish with jaws appeared in the Silurian period, after which many (such as sharks) became formidable marine predators rather than just the prey of arthropods.\n\nEvolution\n\nFish do not represent a monophyletic group, and therefore the \"evolution of fish\" is not studied as a single event. \n\nEarly fish from the fossil record are represented by a group of small, jawless, armored fish known as ostracoderms. Jawless fish lineages are mostly extinct. An extant clade, the lampreys may approximate ancient pre-jawed fish. The first jaws are found in Placodermi fossils. The diversity of jawed vertebrates may indicate the evolutionary advantage of a jawed mouth. It is unclear if the advantage of a hinged jaw is greater biting force, improved respiration, or a combination of factors.\n\nFish may have evolved from a creature similar to a coral-like Sea squirt, whose larvae resemble primitive fish in important ways. The first ancestors of fish may have kept the larval form into adulthood (as some sea squirts do today), although perhaps the reverse is the case.\n\nTaxonomy\n\nFish are a paraphyletic group: that is, any clade containing all fish also contains the tetrapods, which are not fish. For this reason, groups such as the \"Class Pisces\" seen in older reference works are no longer used in formal classifications.\n\nTraditional classification divide fish into three extant classes, and with extinct forms sometimes classified within the tree, sometimes as their own classes: \n* Class Agnatha (jawless fish)\n** Subclass Cyclostomata (hagfish and lampreys)\n** Subclass Ostracodermi (armoured jawless fish) †\n* Class Chondrichthyes (cartilaginous fish)\n** Subclass Elasmobranchii (sharks and rays)\n** Subclass Holocephali (chimaeras and extinct relatives)\n* Class Placodermi (armoured fish) †\n* Class Acanthodii (\"spiny sharks\", sometimes classified under bony fishes)†\n\n* Class Osteichthyes (bony fish)\n** Subclass Actinopterygii (ray finned fishes)\n** Subclass Sarcopterygii (fleshy finned fishes, ancestors of tetrapods)\n\nThe above scheme is the one most commonly encountered in non-specialist and general works. Many of the above groups are paraphyletic, in that they have given rise to successive groups: Agnathans are ancestral to Chondrichthyes, who again have given rise to Acanthodiians, the ancestors of Osteichthyes. With the arrival of phylogenetic nomenclature, the fishes has been split up into a more detailed scheme, with the following major groups:\n* Class Myxini (hagfish)\n* Class Pteraspidomorphi † (early jawless fish)\n* Class Thelodonti †\n* Class Anaspida †\n* Class Petromyzontida or Hyperoartia\n** Petromyzontidae (lampreys)\n* Class Conodonta (conodonts) †\n* Class Cephalaspidomorphi † (early jawless fish)\n** (unranked) Galeaspida †\n** (unranked) Pituriaspida †\n** (unranked) Osteostraci †\n* Infraphylum Gnathostomata (jawed vertebrates)\n** Class Placodermi † (armoured fish)\n** Class Chondrichthyes (cartilaginous fish)\n** Class Acanthodii † (spiny sharks)\n** Superclass Osteichthyes (bony fish)\n*** Class Actinopterygii (ray-finned fish)\n**** Subclass Chondrostei\n***** Order Acipenseriformes (sturgeons and paddlefishes)\n***** Order Polypteriformes (reedfishes and bichirs).\n**** Subclass Neopterygii\n***** Infraclass Holostei (gars and bowfins)\n***** Infraclass Teleostei (many orders of common fish)\n*** Class Sarcopterygii (lobe-finned fish)\n**** Subclass Actinistia (coelacanths)\n**** Subclass Dipnoi (lungfish)\n\n† – indicates extinct taxonSome palaeontologists contend that because Conodonta are chordates, they are primitive fish. For a fuller treatment of this taxonomy, see the vertebrate article.\n\nThe position of hagfish in the phylum Chordata is not settled. Phylogenetic research in 1998 and 1999 supported the idea that the hagfish and the lampreys form a natural group, the Cyclostomata, that is a sister group of the Gnathostomata. \n\nThe various fish groups account for more than half of vertebrate species. There are almost 28,000 known extant species, of which almost 27,000 are bony fish, with 970 sharks, rays, and chimeras and about 108 hagfish and lampreys. A third of these species fall within the nine largest families; from largest to smallest, these families are Cyprinidae, Gobiidae, Cichlidae, Characidae, Loricariidae, Balitoridae, Serranidae, Labridae, and Scorpaenidae. About 64 families are monotypic, containing only one species. The final total of extant species may grow to exceed 32,500. \n\nDiversity\n\nThe term \"fish\" most precisely describes any non-tetrapod craniate (i.e. an animal with a skull and in most cases a backbone) that has gills throughout life and whose limbs, if any, are in the shape of fins. Unlike groupings such as birds or mammals, fish are not a single clade but a paraphyletic collection of taxa, including hagfishes, lampreys, sharks and rays, ray-finned fish, coelacanths, and lungfish. Tree of life web project – [http://tolweb.org/Chordata/2499 Chordates]. Indeed, lungfish and coelacanths are closer relatives of tetrapods (such as mammals, birds, amphibians, etc.) than of other fish such as ray-finned fish or sharks, so the last common ancestor of all fish is also an ancestor to tetrapods. As paraphyletic groups are no longer recognised in modern systematic biology, the use of the term \"fish\" as a biological group must be avoided.\n\nMany types of aquatic animals commonly referred to as \"fish\" are not fish in the sense given above; examples include shellfish, cuttlefish, starfish, crayfish and jellyfish. In earlier times, even biologists did not make a distinction – sixteenth century natural historians classified also seals, whales, amphibians, crocodiles, even hippopotamuses, as well as a host of aquatic invertebrates, as fish. However, according to the definition above, all mammals, including cetaceans like whales and dolphins, are not fish. In some contexts, especially in aquaculture, the true fish are referred to as finfish (or fin fish) to distinguish them from these other animals.\n\nA typical fish is ectothermic, has a streamlined body for rapid swimming, extracts oxygen from water using gills or uses an accessory breathing organ to breathe atmospheric oxygen, has two sets of paired fins, usually one or two (rarely three) dorsal fins, an anal fin, and a tail fin, has jaws, has skin that is usually covered with scales, and lays eggs.\n\nEach criterion has exceptions. Tuna, swordfish, and some species of sharks show some warm-blooded adaptations—they can heat their bodies significantly above ambient water temperature. Streamlining and swimming performance varies from fish such as tuna, salmon, and jacks that can cover 10–20 body-lengths per second to species such as eels and rays that swim no more than 0.5 body-lengths per second. Many groups of freshwater fish extract oxygen from the air as well as from the water using a variety of different structures. Lungfish have paired lungs similar to those of tetrapods, gouramis have a structure called the labyrinth organ that performs a similar function, while many catfish, such as corydoras extract oxygen via the intestine or stomach. Body shape and the arrangement of the fins is highly variable, covering such seemingly un-fishlike forms as seahorses, pufferfish, anglerfish, and gulpers. Similarly, the surface of the skin may be naked (as in moray eels), or covered with scales of a variety of different types usually defined as placoid (typical of sharks and rays), cosmoid (fossil lungfish and coelacanths), ganoid (various fossil fish but also living gars and bichirs), cycloid, and ctenoid (these last two are found on most bony fish). There are even fish that live mostly on land. Mudskippers feed and interact with one another on mudflats and go underwater to hide in their burrows. The catfish Phreatobius cisternarum lives in underground, phreatic habitats, and a relative lives in waterlogged leaf litter. \n\nFish range in size from the huge 16 m whale shark to the tiny 8 mm stout infantfish.\n\nFish species diversity is roughly divided equally between marine (oceanic) and freshwater ecosystems. Coral reefs in the Indo-Pacific constitute the center of diversity for marine fishes, whereas continental freshwater fishes are most diverse in large river basins of tropical rainforests, especially the Amazon, Congo, and Mekong basins. More than 5,600 fish species inhabit Neotropical freshwaters alone, such that Neotropical fishes represent about 10% of all vertebrate species on the Earth. Exceptionally rich sites in the Amazon basin, such as Cantão State Park, can contain more freshwater fish species than occur in all of Europe. \n\nAnatomy\n\nRespiration\n\nGills\n\nMost fish exchange gases using gills on either side of the pharynx. Gills consist of threadlike structures called filaments. Each filament contains a capillary network that provides a large surface area for exchanging oxygen and carbon dioxide. Fish exchange gases by pulling oxygen-rich water through their mouths and pumping it over their gills. In some fish, capillary blood flows in the opposite direction to the water, causing countercurrent exchange. The gills push the oxygen-poor water out through openings in the sides of the pharynx. Some fish, like sharks and lampreys, possess multiple gill openings. However, bony fish have a single gill opening on each side. This opening is hidden beneath a protective bony cover called an operculum.\n\nJuvenile bichirs have external gills, a very primitive feature that they share with larval amphibians.\n\nAir breathing\n\nFish from multiple groups can live out of the water for extended periods. Amphibious fish such as the mudskipper can live and move about on land for up to several days, or live in stagnant or otherwise oxygen depleted water. Many such fish can breathe air via a variety of mechanisms. The skin of anguillid eels may absorb oxygen directly. The buccal cavity of the electric eel may breathe air. Catfish of the families Loricariidae, Callichthyidae, and Scoloplacidae absorb air through their digestive tracts. Lungfish, with the exception of the Australian lungfish, and bichirs have paired lungs similar to those of tetrapods and must surface to gulp fresh air through the mouth and pass spent air out through the gills. Gar and bowfin have a vascularized swim bladder that functions in the same way. Loaches, trahiras, and many catfish breathe by passing air through the gut. Mudskippers breathe by absorbing oxygen across the skin (similar to frogs). A number of fish have evolved so-called accessory breathing organs that extract oxygen from the air. Labyrinth fish (such as gouramis and bettas) have a labyrinth organ above the gills that performs this function. A few other fish have structures resembling labyrinth organs in form and function, most notably snakeheads, pikeheads, and the Clariidae catfish family.\n\nBreathing air is primarily of use to fish that inhabit shallow, seasonally variable waters where the water's oxygen concentration may seasonally decline. Fish dependent solely on dissolved oxygen, such as perch and cichlids, quickly suffocate, while air-breathers survive for much longer, in some cases in water that is little more than wet mud. At the most extreme, some air-breathing fish are able to survive in damp burrows for weeks without water, entering a state of aestivation (summertime hibernation) until water returns.\n\nAir breathing fish can be divided into obligate air breathers and facultative air breathers. Obligate air breathers, such as the African lungfish, must breathe air periodically or they suffocate. Facultative air breathers, such as the catfish Hypostomus plecostomus, only breathe air if they need to and will otherwise rely on their gills for oxygen. Most air breathing fish are facultative air breathers that avoid the energetic cost of rising to the surface and the fitness cost of exposure to surface predators.\n\nCirculation\n\nFish have a closed-loop circulatory system. The heart pumps the blood in a single loop throughout the body. In most fish, the heart consists of four parts, including two chambers and an entrance and exit. The first part is the sinus venosus, a thin-walled sac that collects blood from the fish's veins before allowing it to flow to the second part, the atrium, which is a large muscular chamber. The atrium serves as a one-way antechamber, sends blood to the third part, ventricle. The ventricle is another thick-walled, muscular chamber and it pumps the blood, first to the fourth part, bulbus arteriosus, a large tube, and then out of the heart. The bulbus arteriosus connects to the aorta, through which blood flows to the gills for oxygenation.\n\nDigestion\n\nJaws allow fish to eat a wide variety of food, including plants and other organisms. Fish ingest food through the mouth and break it down in the esophagus. In the stomach, food is further digested and, in many fish, processed in finger-shaped pouches called pyloric caeca, which secrete digestive enzymes and absorb nutrients. Organs such as the liver and pancreas add enzymes and various chemicals as the food moves through the digestive tract. The intestine completes the process of digestion and nutrient absorption.\n\nExcretion\n\nAs with many aquatic animals, most fish release their nitrogenous wastes as ammonia. Some of the wastes diffuse through the gills. Blood wastes are filtered by the kidneys.\n\nSaltwater fish tend to lose water because of osmosis. Their kidneys return water to the body. The reverse happens in freshwater fish: they tend to gain water osmotically. Their kidneys produce dilute urine for excretion. Some fish have specially adapted kidneys that vary in function, allowing them to move from freshwater to saltwater.\n\nScales\n\nThe scales of fish originate from the mesoderm (skin); they may be similar in structure to teeth.\n\nSensory and nervous system\n\nCentral nervous system\n\nFish typically have quite small brains relative to body size compared with other vertebrates, typically one-fifteenth the brain mass of a similarly sized bird or mammal. However, some fish have relatively large brains, most notably mormyrids and sharks, which have brains about as massive relative to body weight as birds and marsupials. \n\nFish brains are divided into several regions. At the front are the olfactory lobes, a pair of structures that receive and process signals from the nostrils via the two olfactory nerves. The olfactory lobes are very large in fish that hunt primarily by smell, such as hagfish, sharks, and catfish. Behind the olfactory lobes is the two-lobed telencephalon, the structural equivalent to the cerebrum in higher vertebrates. In fish the telencephalon is concerned mostly with olfaction. Together these structures form the forebrain.\n\nConnecting the forebrain to the midbrain is the diencephalon (in the diagram, this structure is below the optic lobes and consequently not visible). The diencephalon performs functions associated with hormones and homeostasis. The pineal body lies just above the diencephalon. This structure detects light, maintains circadian rhythms, and controls color changes.\n\nThe midbrain or mesencephalon contains the two optic lobes. These are very large in species that hunt by sight, such as rainbow trout and cichlids.\n\nThe hindbrain or metencephalon is particularly involved in swimming and balance. The cerebellum is a single-lobed structure that is typically the biggest part of the brain. Hagfish and lampreys have relatively small cerebellae, while the mormyrid cerebellum is massive and apparently involved in their electrical sense.\n\nThe brain stem or myelencephalon is the brain's posterior. As well as controlling some muscles and body organs, in bony fish at least, the brain stem governs respiration and osmoregulation.\n\nSense organs\n\nMost fish possess highly developed sense organs. Nearly all daylight fish have color vision that is at least as good as a human's (see vision in fishes). Many fish also have chemoreceptors that are responsible for extraordinary senses of taste and smell. Although they have ears, many fish may not hear very well. Most fish have sensitive receptors that form the lateral line system, which detects gentle currents and vibrations, and senses the motion of nearby fish and prey. Some fish, such as catfish and sharks, have organs that detect weak electric currents on the order of millivolt. Other fish, like the South American electric fishes Gymnotiformes, can produce weak electric currents, which they use in navigation and social communication.\n\nFish orient themselves using landmarks and may use mental maps based on multiple landmarks or symbols. Fish behavior in mazes reveals that they possess spatial memory and visual discrimination. \n\nVision\n\nVision is an important sensory system for most species of fish. Fish eyes are similar to those of terrestrial vertebrates like birds and mammals, but have a more spherical lens. Their retinas generally have both rods and cones (for scotopic and photopic vision), and most species have colour vision. Some fish can see ultraviolet and some can see polarized light. Amongst jawless fish, the lamprey has well-developed eyes, while the hagfish has only primitive eyespots. Fish vision shows adaptation to their visual environment, for example deep sea fishes have eyes suited to the dark environment.\n\nHearing\n\nHearing is an important sensory system for most species of fish. Fish sense sound using their lateral lines and their ears.\n\nCapacity for pain\n\nExperiments done by William Tavolga provide evidence that fish have pain and fear responses. For instance, in Tavolga's experiments, toadfish grunted when electrically shocked and over time they came to grunt at the mere sight of an electrode. \n\nIn 2003, Scottish scientists at the University of Edinburgh and the Roslin Institute concluded that rainbow trout exhibit behaviors often associated with pain in other animals. Bee venom and acetic acid injected into the lips resulted in fish rocking their bodies and rubbing their lips along the sides and floors of their tanks, which the researchers concluded were attempts to relieve pain, similar to what mammals would do. Neurons fired in a pattern resembling human neuronal patterns.\n\nProfessor James D. Rose of the University of Wyoming claimed the study was flawed since it did not provide proof that fish possess \"conscious awareness, particularly a kind of awareness that is meaningfully like ours\". Rose argues that since fish brains are so different from human brains, fish are probably not conscious in the manner humans are, so that reactions similar to human reactions to pain instead have other causes. Rose had published a study a year earlier arguing that fish cannot feel pain because their brains lack a neocortex. However, animal behaviorist Temple Grandin argues that fish could still have consciousness without a neocortex because \"different species can use different brain structures and systems to handle the same functions.\"\n\nAnimal welfare advocates raise concerns about the possible suffering of fish caused by angling. Some countries, such as Germany have banned specific types of fishing, and the British RSPCA now formally prosecutes individuals who are cruel to fish. \n\nMuscular system\n\nMost fish move by alternately contracting paired sets of muscles on either side of the backbone. These contractions form S-shaped curves that move down the body. As each curve reaches the back fin, backward force is applied to the water, and in conjunction with the fins, moves the fish forward. The fish's fins function like an airplane's flaps. Fins also increase the tail's surface area, increasing speed. The streamlined body of the fish decreases the amount of friction from the water. Since body tissue is denser than water, fish must compensate for the difference or they will sink. Many bony fish have an internal organ called a swim bladder that adjusts their buoyancy through manipulation of gases.\n\nHomeothermy\n\nAlthough most fish are exclusively ectothermic, there are exceptions.\n\nCertain species of fish maintain elevated body temperatures. Endothermic teleosts (bony fish) are all in the suborder Scombroidei and include the billfishes, tunas, and one species of \"primitive\" mackerel (Gasterochisma melampus). All sharks in the family Lamnidae – shortfin mako, long fin mako, white, porbeagle, and salmon shark – are endothermic, and evidence suggests the trait exists in family Alopiidae (thresher sharks). The degree of endothermy varies from the billfish, which warm only their eyes and brain, to bluefin tuna and porbeagle sharks who maintain body temperatures elevated in excess of 20 °C above ambient water temperatures. See also gigantothermy. Endothermy, though metabolically costly, is thought to provide advantages such as increased muscle strength, higher rates of central nervous system processing, and higher rates of digestion.\n\nReproductive system\n\nFish reproductive organs include testicles and ovaries. In most species, gonads are paired organs of similar size, which can be partially or totally fused. There may also be a range of secondary organs that increase reproductive fitness.\n\nIn terms of spermatogonia distribution, the structure of teleosts testes has two types: in the most common, spermatogonia occur all along the seminiferous tubules, while in atherinomorph fish they are confined to the distal portion of these structures. Fish can present cystic or semi-cystic spermatogenesis in relation to the release phase of germ cells in cysts to the seminiferous tubules lumen. \n\nFish ovaries may be of three types: gymnovarian, secondary gymnovarian or cystovarian. In the first type, the oocytes are released directly into the coelomic cavity and then enter the ostium, then through the oviduct and are eliminated. Secondary gymnovarian ovaries shed ova into the coelom from which they go directly into the oviduct. In the third type, the oocytes are conveyed to the exterior through the oviduct. Gymnovaries are the primitive condition found in lungfish, sturgeon, and bowfin. Cystovaries characterize most teleosts, where the ovary lumen has continuity with the oviduct. Secondary gymnovaries are found in salmonids and a few other teleosts.\n\nOogonia development in teleosts fish varies according to the group, and the determination of oogenesis dynamics allows the understanding of maturation and fertilization processes. Changes in the nucleus, ooplasm, and the surrounding layers characterize the oocyte maturation process.\n\nPostovulatory follicles are structures formed after oocyte release; they do not have endocrine function, present a wide irregular lumen, and are rapidly reabsorbed in a process involving the apoptosis of follicular cells. A degenerative process called follicular atresia reabsorbs vitellogenic oocytes not spawned. This process can also occur, but less frequently, in oocytes in other development stages.\n\nSome fish, like the California sheephead, are hermaphrodites, having both testes and ovaries either at different phases in their life cycle or, as in hamlets, have them simultaneously.\n\nOver 97% of all known fish are oviparous, that is, the eggs develop outside the mother's body. Examples of oviparous fish include salmon, goldfish, cichlids, tuna, and eels. In the majority of these species, fertilisation takes place outside the mother's body, with the male and female fish shedding their gametes into the surrounding water. However, a few oviparous fish practice internal fertilization, with the male using some sort of intromittent organ to deliver sperm into the genital opening of the female, most notably the oviparous sharks, such as the horn shark, and oviparous rays, such as skates. In these cases, the male is equipped with a pair of modified pelvic fins known as claspers.\n\nMarine fish can produce high numbers of eggs which are often released into the open water column. The eggs have an average diameter of 1 mm.\n\nFile:Oeufs002b,57.png|Egg of lamprey\nFile:Oeufs002b,54.png|Egg of catshark (mermaids' purse)\nFile:Oeufs002b,55.png|Egg of bullhead shark\nFile:Oeufs002b,56.png|Egg of chimaera\n\nThe newly hatched young of oviparous fish are called larvae. They are usually poorly formed, carry a large yolk sac (for nourishment), and are very different in appearance from juvenile and adult specimens. The larval period in oviparous fish is relatively short (usually only several weeks), and larvae rapidly grow and change appearance and structure (a process termed metamorphosis) to become juveniles. During this transition larvae must switch from their yolk sac to feeding on zooplankton prey, a process which depends on typically inadequate zooplankton density, starving many larvae.\n\nIn ovoviviparous fish the eggs develop inside the mother's body after internal fertilization but receive little or no nourishment directly from the mother, depending instead on the yolk. Each embryo develops in its own egg. Familiar examples of ovoviviparous fish include guppies, angel sharks, and coelacanths.\n\nSome species of fish are viviparous. In such species the mother retains the eggs and nourishes the embryos. Typically, viviparous fish have a structure analogous to the placenta seen in mammals connecting the mother's blood supply with that of the embryo. Examples of viviparous fish include the surf-perches, splitfins, and lemon shark. Some viviparous fish exhibit oophagy, in which the developing embryos eat other eggs produced by the mother. This has been observed primarily among sharks, such as the shortfin mako and porbeagle, but is known for a few bony fish as well, such as the halfbeak Nomorhamphus ebrardtii. Intrauterine cannibalism is an even more unusual mode of vivipary, in which the largest embryos eat weaker and smaller siblings. This behavior is also most commonly found among sharks, such as the grey nurse shark, but has also been reported for Nomorhamphus ebrardtii.\n\nAquarists commonly refer to ovoviviparous and viviparous fish as livebearers.\n\nDiseases\n\nLike other animals, fish suffer from diseases and parasites. To prevent disease they have a variety of defenses. Non-specific defenses include the skin and scales, as well as the mucus layer secreted by the epidermis that traps and inhibits the growth of microorganisms. If pathogens breach these defenses, fish can develop an inflammatory response that increases blood flow to the infected region and delivers white blood cells that attempt to destroy pathogens. Specific defenses respond to particular pathogens recognised by the fish's body, i.e., an immune response. In recent years, vaccines have become widely used in aquaculture and also with ornamental fish, for example furunculosis vaccines in farmed salmon and koi herpes virus in koi. \n\nSome species use cleaner fish to remove external parasites. The best known of these are the Bluestreak cleaner wrasses of the genus Labroides found on coral reefs in the Indian and Pacific oceans. These small fish maintain so-called \"cleaning stations\" where other fish congregate and perform specific movements to attract the attention of the cleaners. Cleaning behaviors have been observed in a number of fish groups, including an interesting case between two cichlids of the same genus, Etroplus maculatus, the cleaner, and the much larger Etroplus suratensis. \n\nImmune system\n\nImmune organs vary by type of fish. \nIn the jawless fish (lampreys and hagfish), true lymphoid organs are absent. These fish rely on regions of lymphoid tissue within other organs to produce immune cells. For example, erythrocytes, macrophages and plasma cells are produced in the anterior kidney (or pronephros) and some areas of the gut (where granulocytes mature.) They resemble primitive bone marrow in hagfish.\nCartilaginous fish (sharks and rays) have a more advanced immune system. They have three specialized organs that are unique to Chondrichthyes; the epigonal organs (lymphoid tissue similar to mammalian bone) that surround the gonads, the Leydig's organ within the walls of their esophagus, and a spiral valve in their intestine. These organs house typical immune cells (granulocytes, lymphocytes and plasma cells). They also possess an identifiable thymus and a well-developed spleen (their most important immune organ) where various lymphocytes, plasma cells and macrophages develop and are stored.\nChondrostean fish (sturgeons, paddlefish, and bichirs) possess a major site for the production of granulocytes within a mass that is associated with the meninges (membranes surrounding the central nervous system.) Their heart is frequently covered with tissue that contains lymphocytes, reticular cells and a small number of macrophages. The chondrostean kidney is an important hemopoietic organ; where erythrocytes, granulocytes, lymphocytes and macrophages develop.\n\nLike chondrostean fish, the major immune tissues of bony fish (or teleostei) include the kidney (especially the anterior kidney), which houses many different immune cells. In addition, teleost fish possess a thymus, spleen and scattered immune areas within mucosal tissues (e.g. in the skin, gills, gut and gonads). Much like the mammalian immune system, teleost erythrocytes, neutrophils and granulocytes are believed to reside in the spleen whereas lymphocytes are the major cell type found in the thymus. In 2006, a lymphatic system similar to that in mammals was described in one species of teleost fish, the zebrafish. Although not confirmed as yet, this system presumably will be where naive (unstimulated) T cells accumulate while waiting to encounter an antigen. \n\nB and T lymphocytes bearing immunoglobulins and T cell receptors, respectively, are found in all jawed fishes. Indeed, the adaptive immune system as a whole evolved in an ancestor of all jawed vertebrate.Flajnik, M. F., and M. Kasahara. \"Origin and evolution of the adaptive immune system: genetic events and selective pressures.\" Nature Reviews Genetics 11.1, 47-59 (2009).\n\nConservation\n\nThe 2006 IUCN Red List names 1,173 fish species that are threatened with extinction. Included are species such as Atlantic cod, Devil's Hole pupfish, coelacanths, and great white sharks. Because fish live underwater they are more difficult to study than terrestrial animals and plants, and information about fish populations is often lacking. However, freshwater fish seem particularly threatened because they often live in relatively small water bodies. For example, the Devil's Hole pupfish occupies only a single 3 by pool. \n\nOverfishing\n\nOverfishing is a major threat to edible fish such as cod and tuna. Overfishing eventually causes population (known as stock) collapse because the survivors cannot produce enough young to replace those removed. Such commercial extinction does not mean that the species is extinct, merely that it can no longer sustain a fishery.\n\nOne well-studied example of fishery collapse is the Pacific sardine Sadinops sagax caerulues fishery off the California coast. From a 1937 peak of 790000 LT the catch steadily declined to only 24000 LT in 1968, after which the fishery was no longer economically viable. \n\nThe main tension between fisheries science and the fishing industry is that the two groups have different views on the resiliency of fisheries to intensive fishing. In places such as Scotland, Newfoundland, and Alaska the fishing industry is a major employer, so governments are predisposed to support it. On the other hand, scientists and conservationists push for stringent protection, warning that many stocks could be wiped out within fifty years. \n\nHabitat destruction\n\nA key stress on both freshwater and marine ecosystems is habitat degradation including water pollution, the building of dams, removal of water for use by humans, and the introduction of exotic species. An example of a fish that has become endangered because of habitat change is the pallid sturgeon, a North American freshwater fish that lives in rivers damaged by human activity. \n\nExotic species\n\nIntroduction of non-native species has occurred in many habitats. One of the best studied examples is the introduction of Nile perch into Lake Victoria in the 1960s. Nile perch gradually exterminated the lake's 500 endemic cichlid species. Some of them survive now in captive breeding programmes, but others are probably extinct. Carp, snakeheads, tilapia, European perch, brown trout, rainbow trout, and sea lampreys are other examples of fish that have caused problems by being introduced into alien environments.\n\nImportance to humans\n\nEconomic importance\n\nThroughout history, humans have utilized fish as a food source. Historically and today, most fish protein has come by means of catching wild fish. However, aquaculture, or fish farming, which has been practiced since about 3,500 BCE. in China, is becoming increasingly important in many nations. Overall, about one-sixth of the world's protein is estimated to be provided by fish. That proportion is considerably elevated in some developing nations and regions heavily dependent on the sea. In a similar manner, fish have been tied to trade.\n\nCatching fish for the purpose of food or sport is known as fishing, while the organized effort by humans to catch fish is called a fishery. Fisheries are a huge global business and provide income for millions of people. The annual yield from all fisheries worldwide is about 154 million tons, with popular species including herring, cod, anchovy, tuna, flounder, and salmon. However, the term fishery is broadly applied, and includes more organisms than just fish, such as mollusks and crustaceans, which are often called \"fish\" when used as food.\n\nRecreation\n\nFish have been recognized as a source of beauty for almost as long as used for food, appearing in cave art, being raised as ornamental fish in ponds, and displayed in aquariums in homes, offices, or public settings.\n\nRecreational fishing is fishing for pleasure or competition; it can be contrasted with commercial fishing, which is fishing for profit. The most common form of recreational fishing is done with a rod, reel, line, hooks and any one of a wide range of baits. Angling is a method of fishing, specifically the practice of catching fish by means of an \"angle\" (hook). Anglers must select the right hook, cast accurately, and retrieve at the right speed while considering water and weather conditions, species, fish response, time of the day, and other factors.\n\nCulture\n\nFish feature prominently in art and literature, in movies such as Finding Nemo and books such as The Old Man and the Sea. Large fish, particularly sharks, have frequently been the subject of horror movies and thrillers, most notably the novel Jaws, which spawned a series of films of the same name that in turn inspired similar films or parodies such as Shark Tale and Snakehead Terror. Piranhas are shown in a similar light to sharks in films such as Piranha; however, contrary to popular belief, the red-bellied piranha is actually a generally timid scavenger species that is unlikely to harm humans. In the Book of Jonah a \"great fish\" swallowed Jonah the Prophet. Legends of half-human, half-fish mermaids have featured in folklore, like the stories of Hans Christian Andersen.\n\nFish themes have symbolic significance in many religions. The fish is used often as a symbol by Christians to represent Jesus, or Christianity in general; the gospels also refer to \"fishers of men\" and feeding the multitude. In the dhamma of Buddhism the fish symbolize happiness as they have complete freedom of movement in the water. Often drawn in the form of carp which are regarded in the Orient as sacred on account of their elegant beauty, size and life-span. Among the deities said to take the form of a fish are Ika-Roa of the Polynesians, Dagon of various ancient Semitic peoples, the shark-gods of Hawaii and Matsya of the Hindus.\n\nThe astrological symbol Pisces is based on a constellation of the same name, but there is also a second fish constellation in the night sky, Piscis Austrinus. \n\nTerminology\n\nShoal or school\n\nA random assemblage of fish merely using some localised resource such as food or nesting sites is known simply as an aggregation. When fish come together in an interactive, social grouping, then they may be forming either a shoal or a school depending on the degree of organisation. A shoal is a loosely organised group where each fish swims and forages independently but is attracted to other members of the group and adjusts its behaviour, such as swimming speed, so that it remains close to the other members of the group. Schools of fish are much more tightly organised, synchronising their swimming so that all fish move at the same speed and in the same direction. Shoaling and schooling behaviour is believed to provide a variety of advantages. \n\nExamples:\n* Cichlids congregating at lekking sites form an aggregation.\n* Many minnows and characins form shoals.\n* Anchovies, herrings and silversides are classic examples of schooling fish.\n\nWhile the words \"school\" and \"shoal\" have different meanings within biology, they are often treated as synonyms by non-specialists, with speakers of British English using \"shoal\" to describe any grouping of fish, and speakers of American English often using \"school\" just as loosely.\n\nFish or fishes\n\nThough often used interchangeably, in biology these words have different meanings. Fish is used as a singular noun, or as a plural to describe multiple individuals from a single species. Fishes is used to describe different species or species groups. Thus a pond that contained a single species might be said to contain 120 fish. But if the pond contained a total of 120 fish from three different species, it would be said to contain three fishes. The distinction is similar to that between people and peoples.\n\nFinfish\n \n* In biology, the term fish is most strictly used to describe any animal with a backbone that has gills throughout life and has limbs, if any, in the shape of fins. Many types of aquatic animals with common names ending in \"fish\" are not fish in this sense; examples include shellfish, cuttlefish, starfish, crayfish and jellyfish. In earlier times, even biologists did not make a distinction—sixteenth century natural historians classified also seals, whales, amphibians, crocodiles, even hippopotamuses, as well as a host of aquatic invertebrates, as fish.\n* In fisheries, the term fish is used as a collective term, and includes mollusks, crustaceans and any aquatic animal which is harvested. \n* The strict biological definition of a fish, above, is sometimes called a true fish. True fish are also referred to as finfish or fin fish to distinguish them from other aquatic life harvested in fisheries or aquaculture.", "The molluscs or mollusksSpelled mollusks in the USA, see reasons given in Rosenberg's [http://www.conchologistsofamerica.org/articles/y1996/9609_rosenberg.asp]; for the spelling mollusc see the reasons given by compose the large phylum of invertebrate animals known as the Mollusca. Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. Molluscs are the largest marine phylum, comprising about 23% of all the named marine organisms. Numerous molluscs also live in freshwater and terrestrial habitats. They are highly diverse, not just in size and in anatomical structure, but also in behaviour and in habitat. The phylum is typically divided into 9 or 10 taxonomic classes, of which two are entirely extinct. Cephalopod molluscs, such as squid, cuttlefish and octopus, are among the most neurologically advanced of all invertebrates—and either the giant squid or the colossal squid is the largest known invertebrate species. The gastropods (snails and slugs) are by far the most numerous molluscs in terms of classified species, and account for 80% of the total. The scientific study of molluscs is called malacology. \n\nThe three most universal features defining modern molluscs are a mantle with a significant cavity used for breathing and excretion, the presence of a radula (except for bivalves), and the structure of the nervous system. Other than these things, molluscs express great morphological diversity, so many textbooks base their descriptions on a \"hypothetical ancestral mollusc\" (see image below). This has a single, \"limpet-like\" shell on top, which is made of proteins and chitin reinforced with calcium carbonate, and is secreted by a mantle covering the whole upper surface. The underside of the animal consists of a single muscular \"foot\". Although molluscs are coelomates, the coelom tends to be small.\nThe main body cavity is a hemocoel through which blood circulates; their circulatory systems are mainly open. The \"generalized\" mollusc's feeding system consists of a rasping \"tongue\", the radula, and a complex digestive system in which exuded mucus and microscopic, muscle-powered \"hairs\" called cilia play various important roles. The generalized mollusc has two paired nerve cords, or three in bivalves. The brain, in species that have one, encircles the esophagus. Most molluscs have eyes, and all have sensors to detect chemicals, vibrations, and touch. The simplest type of molluscan reproductive system relies on external fertilization, but more complex variations occur. All produce eggs, from which may emerge trochophore larvae, more complex veliger larvae, or miniature adults.\n\nGood evidence exists for the appearance of gastropods, cephalopods and bivalves in the Cambrian period . However, the evolutionary history both of molluscs' emergence from the ancestral Lophotrochozoa and of their diversification into the well-known living and fossil forms are still subjects of vigorous debate among scientists.\n\nMolluscs have been and still are an important food source for anatomically modern humans, but with a risk of food poisoning from toxins that accumulate in molluscs under certain conditions, and many countries have regulations to reduce this risk. Molluscs have, for centuries, also been the source of important luxury goods, notably pearls, mother of pearl, Tyrian purple dye, and sea silk. Their shells have also been used as money in some preindustrial societies.\nMollusc species can also represent hazards or pests for human activities. The bite of the blue-ringed octopus is often fatal, and that of Octopus apollyon causes inflammation that can last for over a month. Stings from a few species of large tropical cone shells can also kill, but their sophisticated, though easily produced, venoms have become important tools in neurological research. Schistosomiasis (also known as bilharzia, bilharziosis or snail fever) is transmitted to humans via water snail hosts, and affects about 200 million people. Snails and slugs can also be serious agricultural pests, and accidental or deliberate introduction of some snail species into new environments has seriously damaged some ecosystems.\n\nEtymology\n\nThe words mollusc and mollusk are both derived from the French mollusque, which originated from the Latin molluscus, from mollis, soft. Molluscus was itself an adaptation of Aristotle's τα μαλακά ta malaká, \"the soft things\", which he applied to cuttlefish. \n\nThe name Molluscoida was formerly used to denote a division of the animal kingdom containing the brachiopods, bryozoans, and tunicates, the members of the three groups having been supposed to somewhat resemble the molluscs. As it is now known these groups have no relation to molluscs, and very little to one another, the name Molluscoida has been abandoned. \n\nDefinition\n\nThe most universal features of the body structure of molluscs are a mantle with a significant cavity used for breathing and excretion, and the organization of the nervous system. The most abundant metallic element in molluscs is calcium. \n\nMolluscs have developed such a varied range of body structures, it is difficult to find synapomorphies (defining characteristics) to apply to all modern groups. The most general characteristic of molluscs is they are unsegmented and bilaterally symmetrical. The following are present in all modern molluscs: \n*The dorsal part of the body wall is a mantle (or pallium) which secretes calcareous spicules, plates or shells. It overlaps the body with enough spare room to form a mantle cavity.\n*The anus and genitals open into the mantle cavity.\n*There are two pairs of main nerve cords.\n\nOther characteristics that commonly appear in textbooks have significant exceptions:\n\nDiversity\n\nEstimates of accepted described living species of molluscs vary from 50,000 to a maximum of 120,000 species. In 1969 David Nicol estimated the probable total number of living molluscs at 107,000 of which were about 12,000 fresh-water gastropods and 35,000 terrestrial. The Bivalvia would comprise about 14% of the total and the other five classes less than 2% of the living molluscs. In 2009, Chapman estimated the number of described living species at 85,000. Haszprunar in 2001 estimated about 93,000 named species, which include 23% of all named marine organisms. Molluscs are second only to arthropods in numbers of living animal species —far behind the arthropods' 1,113,000 but well ahead of chordates' 52,000. About 200,000 living species in total are estimated, and 70,000 fossil species, although the total number of mollusc species ever to have existed, whether or not preserved, must be many times greater than the number alive today. \n\nMolluscs have more varied forms than any other animal phylum. They include snails, slugs and other gastropods; clams and other bivalves; squids and other cephalopods; and other lesser-known but similarly distinctive subgroups. The majority of species still live in the oceans, from the seashores to the abyssal zone, but some form a significant part of the freshwater fauna and the terrestrial ecosystems. Molluscs are extremely diverse in tropical and temperate regions, but can be found at all latitudes. About 80% of all known mollusc species are gastropods. Cephalopoda such as squid, cuttlefish, and octopuses are among the neurologically most advanced of all invertebrates. The giant squid, which until recently had not been observed alive in its adult form, is one of the largest invertebrates, but a recently caught specimen of the colossal squid, 10 m long and weighing 500 kg, may have overtaken it. \n\nFreshwater and terrestrial molluscs appear exceptionally vulnerable to extinction. Estimates of the numbers of nonmarine molluscs vary widely, partly because many regions have not been thoroughly surveyed. There is also a shortage of specialists who can identify all the animals in any one area to species. However, in 2004 the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species included nearly 2,000 endangered nonmarine molluscs. For comparison, the great majority of mollusc species are marine, but only 41 of these appeared on the 2004 Red List. About 42% of recorded extinctions since the year 1500 are of molluscs, consisting almost entirely of nonmarine species. \n\nA \"generalized mollusc\"\n\nBecause of the great range of anatomical diversity among molluscs, many textbooks start the subject of molluscan anatomy by describing what is called an archi-mollusc, hypothetical generalized mollusc, or hypothetical ancestral mollusc (HAM) to illustrate the most common features found within the phylum. These species reproduce through binary fission, much like a sea star. The depiction is rather similar to modern monoplacophorans, and some suggest it may resemble very early molluscs. \n\nThe generalized mollusc is bilaterally symmetrical and has a single, \"limpet-like\" shell on top. The shell is secreted by a mantle covering the upper surface. The underside consists of a single muscular \"foot\". The visceral mass, or visceropallium, is the soft, nonmuscular metabolic region of the mollusc. It contains the body organs.\n\nMantle and mantle cavity\n\nThe mantle cavity, a fold in the mantle, encloses a significant amount of space. It is lined with epidermis, and is exposed, according to habitat, to sea, fresh water or air. The cavity was at the rear in the earliest molluscs, but its position now varies from group to group. The anus, a pair of osphradia (chemical sensors) in the incoming \"lane\", the hindmost pair of gills and the exit openings of the nephridia (\"kidneys\") and gonads (reproductive organs) are in the mantle cavity. The whole soft body of bivalves lies within an enlarged mantle cavity.\n\nShell\n\nThe mantle edge secretes a shell (secondarily absent in a number of taxonomic groups, such as the nudibranchs) that consists of mainly chitin and conchiolin (a protein hardened with calcium carbonate), except the outermost layer in almost all cases is all conchiolin (see periostracum). Molluscs never use phosphate to construct their hard parts, with the questionable exception of Cobcrephora.\nWhile most mollusc shells are composed mainly of aragonite, those gastropods that lay eggs with a hard shell use calcite (sometimes with traces of aragonite) to construct the eggshells. \n\nThe shell consists of three layers: the outer layer (the periostracum) made of organic matter, a middle layer made of columnar calcite, and an inner layer consisting of laminated calcite, often nacreous.\n\nFoot\n\nThe underside consists of a muscular foot, which has adapted to different purposes in different classes. The foot carries a pair of statocysts, which act as balance sensors. In gastropods, it secretes mucus as a lubricant to aid movement. In forms having only a top shell, such as limpets, the foot acts as a sucker attaching the animal to a hard surface, and the vertical muscles clamp the shell down over it; in other molluscs, the vertical muscles pull the foot and other exposed soft parts into the shell. In bivalves, the foot is adapted for burrowing into the sediment; in cephalopods it is used for jet propulsion, and the tentacles and arms are derived from the foot. \n\nCirculatory system\n\nMolluscs' circulatory systems are mainly open. Although molluscs are coelomates, their coeloms are reduced to fairly small spaces enclosing the heart and gonads. The main body cavity is a hemocoel through which blood and coelomic fluid circulate and which encloses most of the other internal organs. These hemocoelic spaces act as an efficient hydrostatic skeleton. The blood contains the respiratory pigment hemocyanin as an oxygen-carrier. The heart consists of one or more pairs of atria (auricles), which receive oxygenated blood from the gills and pump it to the ventricle, which pumps it into the aorta (main artery), which is fairly short and opens into the hemocoel.\n\nThe atria of the heart also function as part of the excretory system by filtering waste products out of the blood and dumping it into the coelom as urine. A pair of nephridia (\"little kidneys\") to the rear of and connected to the coelom extracts any re-usable materials from the urine and dumps additional waste products into it, and then ejects it via tubes that discharge into the mantle cavity.\n\nRespiration\n\nMost molluscs have only one pair of gills, or even only one gill. Generally, the gills are rather like feathers in shape, although some species have gills with filaments on only one side. They divide the mantle cavity so water enters near the bottom and exits near the top. Their filaments have three kinds of cilia, one of which drives the water current through the mantle cavity, while the other two help to keep the gills clean. If the osphradia detect noxious chemicals or possibly sediment entering the mantle cavity, the gills' cilia may stop beating until the unwelcome intrusions have ceased. Each gill has an incoming blood vessel connected to the hemocoel and an outgoing one to the heart.\n\nEating, digestion, and excretion\n\nMembers of the mollusk family use intracellular digestion to function. Most molluscs have muscular mouths with radulae, \"tongues\", bearing many rows of chitinous teeth, which are replaced from the rear as they wear out. The radula primarily functions to scrape bacteria and algae off rocks, and is associated with the odontophore, a cartilaginous supporting organ. The radula is unique to the molluscs and has no equivalent in any other animal.\n\nMolluscs' mouths also contain glands that secrete slimy mucus, to which the food sticks. Beating cilia (tiny \"hairs\") drive the mucus towards the stomach, so the mucus forms a long string called a \"food string\".\n\nAt the tapered rear end of the stomach and projecting slightly into the hindgut is the prostyle, a backward-pointing cone of feces and mucus, which is rotated by further cilia so it acts as a bobbin, winding the mucus string onto itself. Before the mucus string reaches the prostyle, the acidity of the stomach makes the mucus less sticky and frees particles from it.\n\nThe particles are sorted by yet another group of cilia, which send the smaller particles, mainly minerals, to the prostyle so eventually they are excreted, while the larger ones, mainly food, are sent to the stomach's cecum (a pouch with no other exit) to be digested. The sorting process is by no means perfect.\n\nPeriodically, circular muscles at the hindgut's entrance pinch off and excrete a piece of the prostyle, preventing the prostyle from growing too large. The anus, in the part of the mantle cavity, is swept by the outgoing \"lane\" of the current created by the gills. Carnivorous molluscs usually have simpler digestive systems.\n\nAs the head has largely disappeared in bivalves, the mouth has been equipped with labial palps (two on each side of the mouth) to collect the detritus from its mucus.\n\nNervous system\n\nThe cephalic molluscs have two pairs of main nerve cords organized around a number of paired ganglia, the visceral cords serving the internal organs and the pedal ones serving the foot. Most pairs of corresponding ganglia on both sides of the body are linked by commissures (relatively large bundles of nerves). The ganglia above the gut are the cerebral, the pleural, and the visceral, which are located above the esophagus (gullet). The pedal ganglia, which control the foot, are below the esophagus and their commissure and connectives to the cerebral and pleural ganglia surround the esophagus in a circumesophageal nerve ring or nerve collar.\n\nThe acephalic molluscs (bivalves) also have this ring but it is less obvious and less important. The bivalves have only three pairs of ganglia— cerebral, pedal, and visceral— with the visceral as the largest and most important of the three functioning as the principal center of \"thinking\". Some such as the scallops have eyes around the edges of their shells which connect to a pair of looped nerves and which provide the ability to distinguish between light and shadow.\n\nReproduction\n\nThe simplest molluscan reproductive system relies on external fertilization, but with more complex variations. All produce eggs, from which may emerge trochophore larvae, more complex veliger larvae, or miniature adults. Two gonads sit next to the coelom, a small cavity that surrounds the heart, into which they shed ova or sperm. The nephridia extract the gametes from the coelom and emit them into the mantle cavity. Molluscs that use such a system remain of one sex all their lives and rely on external fertilization. Some molluscs use internal fertilization and/or are hermaphrodites, functioning as both sexes; both of these methods require more complex reproductive systems.\n\nThe most basic molluscan larva is a trochophore, which is planktonic and feeds on floating food particles by using the two bands of cilia around its \"equator\" to sweep food into the mouth, which uses more cilia to drive them into the stomach, which uses further cilia to expel undigested remains through the anus. New tissue grows in the bands of mesoderm in the interior, so the apical tuft and anus are pushed further apart as the animal grows. The trochophore stage is often succeeded by a veliger stage in which the prototroch, the \"equatorial\" band of cilia nearest the apical tuft, develops into the velum (\"veil\"), a pair of cilia-bearing lobes with which the larva swims. Eventually, the larva sinks to the seafloor and metamorphoses into the adult form. While metamorphosis is the usual state in molluscs, the cephalopods differ in exhibiting direct development: the hatchling is a 'miniaturized' form of the adult.\n\nEcology\n\nFeeding\n\nMost molluscs are herbivorous, grazing on algae or filter feeders. For those grazing, two feeding strategies are predominant. Some feed on microscopic, filamentous algae, often using their radula as a 'rake' to comb up filaments from the sea floor. Others feed on macroscopic 'plants' such as kelp, rasping the plant surface with its radula. To employ this strategy, the plant has to be large enough for the mollusc to 'sit' on, so smaller macroscopic plants are not as often eaten as their larger counterparts. \nFilter feeders are molluscs that feed by straining suspended matter and food particle from water, typically by passing the water over their gills. Most bivalves are filter feeders.\n\nCephalopods are primarily predatory, and the radula takes a secondary role to the jaws and tentacles in food acquisition. The monoplacophoran Neopilina uses its radula in the usual fashion, but its diet includes protists such as the xenophyophore Stannophyllum. Sacoglossan sea-slugs suck the sap from algae, using their one-row radula to pierce the cell walls, whereas dorid nudibranchs and some Vetigastropoda feed on sponges and others feed on hydroids. (An extensive list of molluscs with unusual feeding habits is available in the appendix of .)\n\nClassification\n\nOpinions vary about the number of classes of molluscs; for example, the table below shows eight living classes, and two extinct ones. Although they are unlikely to form a clade, some older works combine the Caudofoveata and solenogasters into one class, the Aplacophora. Two of the commonly recognized \"classes\" are known only from fossils.\n\nClassification into higher taxa for these groups has been and remains problematic. A phylogenetic study suggests the Polyplacophora form a clade with a monophyletic Aplacophora. Additionally, it suggests a sister taxon relationship exists between the Bivalvia and the Gastropoda.\n\nEvolution\n\nFossil record\n\nGood evidence exists for the appearance of gastropods, cephalopods and bivalves in the Cambrian period . However, the evolutionary history both of the emergence of molluscs from the ancestral group Lophotrochozoa, and of their diversification into the well-known living and fossil forms, is still vigorously debated.\n\nDebate occurs about whether some Ediacaran and Early Cambrian fossils really are molluscs. Kimberella, from about , has been described by some paleontologists as \"mollusc-like\", but others are unwilling to go further than \"probable bilaterian\". There is an even sharper debate about whether Wiwaxia, from about , was a mollusc, and much of this centers on whether its feeding apparatus was a type of radula or more similar to that of some polychaete worms. Nicholas Butterfield, who opposes the idea that Wiwaxia was a mollusc, has written that earlier microfossils from are fragments of a genuinely mollusc-like radula. This appears to contradict the concept that the ancestral molluscan radula was mineralized. \n\nHowever, the Helcionellids, which first appear over in Early Cambrian rocks from Siberia and China, are thought to be early molluscs with rather snail-like shells. Shelled molluscs therefore predate the earliest trilobites. Although most helcionellid fossils are only a few millimeters long, specimens a few centimeters long have also been found, most with more limpet-like shapes. The tiny specimens have been suggested to be juveniles and the larger ones adults. \n\nSome analyses of helcionellids concluded these were the earliest gastropods. However, other scientists are not convinced these Early Cambrian fossils show clear signs of the torsion that identifies modern gastropods twists the internal organs so the anus lies above the head. \n\nVolborthella, some fossils of which predate , was long thought to be a cephalopod, but discoveries of more detailed fossils showed its shell was not secreted, but built from grains of the mineral silicon dioxide (silica), and it was not divided into a series of compartments by septa as those of fossil shelled cephalopods and the living Nautilus are. Volborthellas classification is uncertain. The Late Cambrian fossil Plectronoceras is now thought to be the earliest clearly cephalopod fossil, as its shell had septa and a siphuncle, a strand of tissue that Nautilus uses to remove water from compartments it has vacated as it grows, and which is also visible in fossil ammonite shells. However, Plectronoceras and other early cephalopods crept along the seafloor instead of swimming, as their shells contained a \"ballast\" of stony deposits on what is thought to be the underside, and had stripes and blotches on what is thought to be the upper surface. All cephalopods with external shells except the nautiloids became extinct by the end of the Cretaceous period . However, the shell-less Coleoidea (squid, octopus, cuttlefish) are abundant today. \n\nThe Early Cambrian fossils Fordilla and Pojetaia are regarded as bivalves. \"Modern-looking\" bivalves appeared in the Ordovician period, . One bivalve group, the rudists, became major reef-builders in the Cretaceous, but became extinct in the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event. Even so, bivalves remain abundant and diverse.\n\nThe Hyolitha are a class of extinct animals with a shell and operculum that may be molluscs. Authors who suggest they deserve their own phylum do not comment on the position of this phylum in the tree of life\n\nPhylogeny\n\nThe phylogeny (evolutionary \"family tree\") of molluscs is a controversial subject. In addition to the debates about whether Kimberella and any of the \"halwaxiids\" were molluscs or closely related to molluscs, debates arise about the relationships between the classes of living molluscs. In fact, some groups traditionally classified as molluscs may have to be redefined as distinct but related.\n\nMolluscs are generally regarded members of the Lophotrochozoa, a group defined by having trochophore larvae and, in the case of living Lophophorata, a feeding structure called a lophophore. The other members of the Lophotrochozoa are the annelid worms and seven marine phyla. The diagram on the right summarizes a phylogeny presented in 2007.\n\nBecause the relationships between the members of the family tree are uncertain, it is difficult to identify the features inherited from the last common ancestor of all molluscs. For example, it is uncertain whether the ancestral mollusc was metameric (composed of repeating units)—if it was, that would suggest an origin from an annelid-like worm. Scientists disagree about this: Giribet and colleagues concluded, in 2006, the repetition of gills and of the foot's retractor muscles were later developments, while in 2007, Sigwart concluded the ancestral mollusc was metameric, and it had a foot used for creeping and a \"shell\" that was mineralized. For a summary, see In one particular branch of the family tree, the shell of conchiferans is thought to have evolved from the spicules (small spines) of aplacophorans; but this is difficult to reconcile with the embryological origins of spicules.\n\nThe molluscan shell appears to have originated from a mucus coating, which eventually stiffened into a cuticle. This would have been impermeable and thus forced the development of more sophisticated respiratory apparatus in the form of gills. Eventually, the cuticle would have become mineralized, using the same genetic machinery (engrailed) as most other bilaterian skeletons. The first mollusc shell almost certainly was reinforced with the mineral aragonite. \n\nThe evolutionary relationships 'within' the molluscs are also debated, and the diagrams below show two widely supported reconstructions:\n\nMorphological analyses tend to recover a conchiferan clade that receives less support from molecular analyses, although these results also lead to unexpected paraphylies, for instance scattering the bivalves throughout all other mollusc groups.\n\nHowever, an analysis in 2009 using both morphological and molecular phylogenetics comparisons concluded the molluscs are not monophyletic; in particular, Scaphopoda and Bivalvia are both separate, monophyletic lineages unrelated to the remaining molluscan classes; the traditional phylum Mollusca is polyphyletic, and it can only be made monophyletic if scaphopods and bivalves are excluded. A 2010 analysis recovered the traditional conchiferan and aculiferan groups, and showed molluscs were monophyletic, demonstrating that available data for solenogastres was contaminated. Current molecular data are insufficient to constrain the molluscan phylogeny, and since the methods used to determine the confidence in clades are prone to overestimation, it is risky to place too much emphasis even on the areas of which different studies agree. Rather than eliminating unlikely relationships, the latest studies add new permutations of internal molluscan relationships, even bringing the conchiferan hypothesis into question. \n\nHuman interaction\n\nFor millennia, molluscs have been a source of food for humans, as well as important luxury goods, notably pearls, mother of pearl, Tyrian purple dye, sea silk, and chemical compounds. Their shells have also been used as a form of currency in some preindustrial societies. A number of species of molluscs can bite or sting humans, and some have become agricultural pests.\n\nUses by humans\n\nMolluscs, especially bivalves such as clams and mussels, have been an important food source since at least the advent of anatomically modern humans, and this has often resulted in overfishing. Other commonly eaten molluscs include octopuses and squids, whelks, oysters, and scallops. In 2005, China accounted for 80% of the global mollusc catch, netting almost 11000000 t. Within Europe, France remained the industry leader. Some countries regulate importation and handling of molluscs and other seafood, mainly to minimize the poison risk from toxins that can sometimes accumulate in the animals. \n\nMost molluscs with shells can produce pearls, but only the pearls of bivalves and some gastropods, whose shells are lined with nacre, are valuable. The best natural pearls are produced by marine pearl oysters, Pinctada margaritifera and Pinctada mertensi, which live in the tropical and subtropical waters of the Pacific Ocean. Natural pearls form when a small foreign object gets stuck between the mantle and shell.\n\nThe two methods of culturing pearls insert either \"seeds\" or beads into oysters. The \"seed\" method uses grains of ground shell from freshwater mussels, and overharvesting for this purpose has endangered several freshwater mussel species in the southeastern USA. The pearl industry is so important in some areas, significant sums of money are spent on monitoring the health of farmed molluscs. \n\nOther luxury and high-status products were made from molluscs. Tyrian purple, made from the ink glands of murex shells, \"... fetched its weight in silver\" in the fourth century BC, according to Theopompus. The discovery of large numbers of Murex shells on Crete suggests the Minoans may have pioneered the extraction of \"imperial purple\" during the Middle Minoan period in the 20th–18th centuries BC, centuries before the Tyrians. Sea silk is a fine, rare, and valuable fabric produced from the long silky threads (byssus) secreted by several bivalve molluscs, particularly Pinna nobilis, to attach themselves to the sea bed. Procopius, writing on the Persian wars circa 550 CE, \"stated that the five hereditary satraps (governors) of Armenia who received their insignia from the Roman Emperor were given chlamys (or cloaks) made from lana pinna. Apparently, only the ruling classes were allowed to wear these chlamys.\" \n\nMollusc shells, including those of cowries, were used as a kind of money (shell money) in several preindustrial societies. However, these \"currencies\" generally differed in important ways from the standardized government-backed and -controlled money familiar to industrial societies. Some shell \"currencies\" were not used for commercial transactions, but mainly as social status displays at important occasions, such as weddings. When used for commercial transactions, they functioned as commodity money, as a tradable commodity whose value differed from place to place, often as a result of difficulties in transport, and which was vulnerable to incurable inflation if more efficient transport or \"goldrush\" behavior appeared. \n\nBioindicators\n\nBivalve molluscs are used as bioindicators to monitor the health of aquatic environments in both fresh water and the marine environments. Their population status or structure, physiology, behaviour or the level of contamination with elements or compounds can indicate the state of contamination status of the ecosystem. They are particularly useful since they are sessile so that they are representative of the environment where they are sampled or placed. A typical project is the Mussel Watch Programme but today they are used worldwide.\n\nStings and bites\n\nA risk of food poisoning from toxins that accumulate in molluscs occurs under certain conditions, and many countries have regulations that aim to minimize this risk. Blue-ringed octopus bites are often fatal, and the bite of other octopuses can cause unpleasant symptoms. Stings from a few species of large tropical cone shells can also kill. However, the sophisticated venoms of these cone snails have become important tools in neurological research and show promise as sources of new medications.\n\nWhen handled alive, a few species of molluscs can sting or bite and, with some species, this can present a serious risk to the human handling the animal. To put this into perspective, though, deaths from mollusc venoms are less than 10% of the number of deaths from jellyfish stings. \n\nAll octopuses are venomous, but only a few species pose a significant threat to humans. Blue-ringed octopuses in the genus Hapalochlaena, which live around Australia and New Guinea, bite humans only if severely provoked, but their venom kills 25% of human victims. Another tropical species, Octopus apollyon, causes severe inflammation that can last for over a month even if treated correctly, and the bite of Octopus rubescens can cause necrosis that lasts longer than one month if untreated, and headaches and weakness persisting for up to a week even if treated. \n\nAll species of cone snails are venomous and can sting when handled, although many species are too small to pose much of a risk to humans. These carnivorous gastropods feed on marine invertebrates (and in the case of larger species, on fish). Their venom is based on a huge array of toxins, some fast-acting and others slower but deadlier; they can afford to do this because their toxins require less time and energy to be produced compared with those of snakes or spiders. Many painful stings have been reported, and a few fatalities, although some of the reported fatalities may be exaggerations. Only a few larger species of cone snails which can capture and kill fish are likely to be seriously dangerous to humans. The effects of individual cone-shell toxins on victims' nervous systems are so precise as to be useful tools for research in neurology, and the small size of their molecules makes it easy to synthesize them. \n\nThe traditional belief that a giant clam can trap the leg of a person between its valves, thus causing drowning, is a myth. \n\nParasites\n\nSchistosomiasis (also known as bilharzia, bilharziosis or snail fever) is transmitted to humans via water snail hosts, and affects about 200 million people. A few species of snails and slugs are serious agricultural pests; in addition, accidental or deliberate introduction of various snail species into new territory has resulted in serious damage to some natural ecosystems.\n\nSchistosomiasis, a disease caused by the fluke worm Schistosoma, is \"second only to malaria as the most devastating parasitic disease in tropical countries. An estimated 200 million people in 74 countries are infected with the disease – 100 million in Africa alone.\" The parasite has 13 known species, two of which infect humans. The parasite itself is not a mollusc, but all the species have freshwater snails as intermediate hosts. \n\nPests\n\nSome species of molluscs, particularly certain snails and slugs, can be serious crop pests, and when introduced into new environments, can unbalance local ecosystems. One such pest, the giant African snail Achatina fulica, has been introduced to many parts of Asia, as well as to many islands in the Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean. In the 1990s, this species reached the West Indies. Attempts to control it by introducing the predatory snail Euglandina rosea proved disastrous, as the predator ignored Achatina fulica and went on to extirpate several native snail species, instead. \n\nDespite its name, Molluscum contagiosum is a viral disease, and is unrelated to molluscs. \n\nFootnotes" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Vodka.txt" ], "title": [ "Vodka" ], "wiki_context": [ "Vodka (, ) is a distilled beverage composed primarily of water and ethanol, sometimes with traces of impurities and flavorings. Traditionally, vodka is made by the distillation of fermented cereal grains or potatoes, though some modern brands use other substances, such as fruits or sugar.\n\nSince the 1890s, the standard Polish, Russian, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian and Czech vodkas are 40% alcohol by volume ABV (80 US proof), a percentage that is widely misattributed to Dmitri Mendeleev. The European Union has established a minimum of 37.5% ABV for any \"European vodka\" to be named as such.. Gin and Vodka Association. ginvodka.org Products sold as \"vodka\" in the United States must have a minimum alcohol content of 40%. Even with these loose restrictions, most vodka sold contains 40% ABV. For homemade vodkas and distilled beverages referred to as \"moonshine\", see moonshine by country.\n\nVodka is traditionally drunk neat (not mixed with any water, ice, or other mixer), though it is often served chilled in the vodka belt countries (Belarus, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Ukraine). It is also commonly used in cocktails and mixed drinks, such as the vodka martini, Cosmopolitan, vodka tonic, Screwdriver, Greyhound, Black or White Russian, Moscow Mule, and Bloody Mary.\n\nEtymology\n\nThe name \"vodka\" is a diminutive form of the Slavic word voda (water), interpreted as little water: root вод- (vod-) [water] + -к- (-k-) (diminutive suffix, among other functions) + -a (postfix of feminine gender). \n\nThe word \"vodka\" was recorded for the first time in 1405 in Akta Grodzkie, the court documents from the Palatinate of Sandomierz in Poland. At the time, the word vodka (wódka) referred to medicines and cosmetic products, while the beverage was called gorzałka (from the Old Polish gorzeć meaning \"to burn\"), which is also the source of Ukrainian horilka (горілка). The word vodka written in Cyrillic appeared first in 1533, in relation to a medicinal drink brought from Poland to Russia by the merchants of Kievan Rus'.\n\nAlthough the word vodka could be found in early manuscripts and in lubok pictograms, it began to appear in Russian dictionaries only in the mid-19th century. It was attested in Sámuel Gyarmathi's Russian-German-Hungarian glossary of 1799, where it is glossed with Latin vinum adustum (\"burnt [i.e. distilled] wine\"). \n\nIn English literature the word vodka was attested already in the late 18th century. In a book of his travels published in English in 1780 (presumably, a translation from German), Johann Gottlieb Georgi correctly explained that \"Kabak in the Russian language signifies a public house for the common people to drink vodka (a sort of brandy) in.\" William Tooke in 1799 glossed vodka as \"rectified corn-spirits\". In French, Théophile Gautier in 1800 glossed it as a \"grain liquor\" served with meals in Poland (eau-de-vie de grain). \n\nAnother possible connection of \"vodka\" with \"water\" is the name of the medieval alcoholic beverage aqua vitae (Latin, literally, \"water of life\"), which is reflected in Polish okowita, Ukrainian оковита, Belarusian акавіта, and Scandinavian akvavit. (Note that whiskey has a similar etymology, from the Irish/Scottish Gaelic uisce beatha/uisge-beatha.)\n\nPeople in the area of vodka's probable origin have names for vodka with roots meaning \"to burn\": ; ; ; ; Samogitian: degtėnė, is also in use, colloquially and in proverbs ); ; . In Russian during the 17th and 18th centuries, горящѣе вино or горячее вино (goryashchee vino, \"burning wine\" or \"hot wine\") was widely used. Others languages include the German Branntwein, Danish brændevin, , , and (although the latter terms refer to any strong alcoholic beverage).\n\nHistory\n\nScholars debate the beginnings of vodka. It is a contentious issue because very little historical material is available.Blocker, Jack S; Fahey, David M and Tyrrell, Ian R (2003). [http://books.google.ca/books?id\nBuzNzm-x0l8C&lpgPP1&dq\nAlcohol%20and%20temperance%20in%20modern%20history%3A%20an%20international%20encyclopedia&pgPA636#v\nonepage&qvodka%20history&f\nfalse Alcohol and temperance in modern history: An international encyclopedia] Vol. 1 A – L, ABC-CLIO, pp. 389, 636 ISBN 1576078337.Ermochkine, Nicholas and Iglikowski, Peter (2003). 40 degrees east : an anatomy of vodka, Nova Publishers, p. 217, ISBN 1590335945. For many centuries, beverages differed significantly compared to the vodka of today, as the spirit at that time had a different flavor, color and smell, and was originally used as medicine. It contained little alcohol, an estimated maximum of about 14%, as only this amount can be attained by natural fermentation. The still, allowing for distillation (\"burning of wine\"), increased purity, and increased alcohol content, was invented in the 8th century.Briffault, Robert (1938). The Making of Humanity, p. 195.\n\nPoland\n\nIn Poland, vodka ( or ') has been produced since the early Middle Ages with local traditions as varied as the production of cognac in France, or Scottish whisky.\n\nThe world's first written mention of the drink and of the word \"vodka\" was in 1405 from Akta Grodzkie recorder of deeds, in the court documents from the Palatinate of Sandomierz in Poland and it went on to become a popular drink there. At the time, the word wódka referred to chemical compounds such as medicines and cosmetics' cleansers, while the popular beverage currently known as vodka was called gorzałka (from the Old Polish verb gorzeć meaning \"to burn\"), which is also the source of Ukrainian horilka (горілка). The word written in Cyrillic appeared first in 1533, in relation to a medicinal drink brought from Poland to Russia by the merchants of Kievan Rus'.\n\nIn these early days, the spirits were used mostly as medicines. Stefan Falimierz asserted in his 1534 works on herbs that vodka could serve \"to increase fertility and awaken lust\". Wódka lub gorzała (1614), by Jerzy Potański, contains valuable information on the production of vodka. Jakub Kazimierz Haur, in his book Skład albo skarbiec znakomitych sekretów ekonomii ziemiańskiej (A Treasury of Excellent Secrets about Landed Gentry's Economy, Kraków, 1693), gave detailed recipes for making vodka from rye.\n\nSome Polish vodka blends go back centuries. Most notable are Żubrówka, from about the 16th century; Goldwasser, from the early 17th century; and aged Starka vodka, from the 16th century. In the mid-17th century, the szlachta (nobility of Poland) were granted a monopoly on producing and selling vodka in their territories. This privilege was a source of substantial profits. One of the most famous distilleries of the aristocracy was established by Princess Lubomirska and later operated by her grandson, Count Alfred Wojciech Potocki. The Vodka Industry Museum, located at the park of the Potocki country estate has an original document attesting that the distillery already existed in 1784. Today it operates as \"Polmos Łańcut\". \n\nVodka production on a much larger scale began in Poland at the end of the 16th century, initially at Kraków, whence spirits were exported to Silesia before 1550. Silesian cities also bought vodka from Poznań, a city that in 1580 had 498 working spirits distilleries. Soon, however, Gdańsk outpaced both these cities. In the 17th and 18th centuries, Polish vodka was known in the Netherlands, Denmark, England, Russia, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Romania, Ukraine, Bulgaria and the Black Sea basin.\n\nEarly production methods were rudimentary. The beverage was usually low-proof, and the distillation process had to be repeated several times (a three-stage distillation process was common). The first distillate was called brantówka, the second was szumówka, and the third was okowita (from aqua vitae), which generally contained 70–80% ABV. Then the beverage was watered down, yielding a simple vodka (30–35% ABV), or a stronger one if the watering was done using an alembic. The exact production methods were described in 1768 by Jan Paweł Biretowski and in 1774 by Jan Chryzostom Pasek. The late 18th century inaugurated the production of vodka from various unusual substances including even the carrot. \n\nThough there was clearly a substantial vodka cottage industry in Poland back to the 16th century, the end of the 18th century marked the start of real industrial production of vodka in Poland (Kresy, the eastern part of Poland was controlled by the Russian empire at that time). Vodkas produced by the nobility and clergy became a mass product. The first industrial distillery was opened in 1782 in Lwów by J. A. Baczewski. He was soon followed by Jakub Haberfeld, who in 1804 established a factory at Oświęcim, and by Hartwig Kantorowicz, who started producing Wyborowa in 1823 at Poznań. The implementation of new technologies in the latter half of the 19th century, which allowed the production of clear vodkas, contributed to their success. The first rectification distillery was established in 1871. In 1925, the production of clear vodkas was made a Polish government monopoly.\n\nAfter World War II, all vodka distilleries were taken over by Poland's Marxist–Leninist government. During the martial law of the 1980s, the sale of vodka was rationed. Following the success of the Solidarity movement and the abolition of single-party rule in Poland, many distilleries began struggling financially. Some filed for bankruptcy, but many were privatized, leading to the creation of various new brands.\n\nRussia\n\nA type of distilled liquor designated by the Russian word vodka came to Russia in the late 14th century. In 1386, the Genoese ambassadors brought the first aqua vitae (\"the water of life\") to Moscow and presented it to Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy. The liquid obtained by distillation of grape must was thought to be a concentrate and a \"spirit\" of wine (spiritus vini in Latin), from where came the name of this substance in many European languages (like English spirit, or Russian ).\n\nAccording to a legend, around 1430, a monk named Isidore from Chudov Monastery inside the Moscow Kremlin made a recipe of the first Russian vodka. Having a special knowledge and distillation devices, he became the creator of a new, higher quality type of alcoholic beverage. This \"bread wine\", as it was initially known, was for a long time produced exclusively in the Grand Duchy of Moscow and in no other principality of Rus' (this situation persisted until the era of industrial production). Thus, this beverage was closely associated with Moscow.\n\nUntil the mid-18th century, the drink remained relatively low in alcohol content, not exceeding 40% ABV. Multiple terms for the drink were recorded, sometimes reflecting different levels of quality, alcohol concentration, filtering, and the number of distillations; most commonly, it was referred to as \"burning wine\", \"bread wine\", or even in some locations simply \"wine\". In some locations, grape wine may have been so expensive that it was a drink only for aristocrats. Burning wine was usually diluted with water to 24% ABV or less before drinking. It was mostly sold in taverns and was quite expensive. At the same time, the word vodka was already in use, but it described herbal tinctures (similar to absinthe), containing up to 75% ABV, and made for medicinal purposes.\n\nThe first written usage of the word vodka in an official Russian document in its modern meaning is dated by the decree of Empress Elizabeth of 8 June 1751, which regulated the ownership of vodka distilleries. By the 1860s, due to the government policy of promoting consumption of state-manufactured vodka, it became the drink of choice for many Russians. In 1863, the government monopoly on vodka production was repealed, causing prices to plummet and making vodka available even to low-income citizens. The taxes on vodka became a key element of government finances in Tsarist Russia, providing at times up to 40% of state revenue. By 1911, vodka comprised 89% of all alcohol consumed in Russia. This level has fluctuated somewhat during the 20th century, but remained quite high at all times. The most recent estimates put it at 70% (2001). Today, some popular Russian vodka producers or brands are (amongst others) Stolichnaya and Russian Standard. \n\nDuring the late 1970s, Russian culinary author William Pokhlebkin compiled a history of the production of vodka in Russia, as part of the Soviet case in a trade dispute; this was later published as A History of Vodka. Pokhlebkin claimed that while there is a wealth of publications about the history of consumption and distribution of vodka, virtually nothing had been written about vodka production. One of his assertions was that the word \"vodka\" was used in popular speech in Russia considerably earlier than the middle of the 18th century, but the word did not appear in print until the 1860s. Pokhlebkin's sources were challenged by David Christian in the Slavic Review in 1994. Christian criticised the lack of valid references in Pokhlebkin's works stating that his work has an obvious pro-Russian bias. Pokhlebkin is also known for his Pan-Slavic sympathies under the leadership of Russia, and sentiments which in David Christian's opinion discredits majority of his work, especially his History of Vodka. \n\nSweden\n\nUp until the 1950s, vodka was not used as a designation for Swedish distilled beverages, which were instead called brännvin (\"burn-wine\"), the word having the same etymology as the Dutch Brandewijn, which is the base for the word brandy. This beverage has been produced in Sweden since the late 15th century, although the total production was still small in the 17th century. From the early 18th century, production expanded, although production was prohibited several times, during grain shortages. Although initially a grain product, potatoes started to be used in the production in the late 18th century, and became dominant from the early 19th century. From the early 1870s, distillery equipment was improved.\n\nProgressively from the 1960s, unflavoured Swedish brännvin also came to be called vodka. The first Swedish product to use this term was Explorer Vodka, which was created in 1958 and initially was intended for the American export market. In 1979, Absolut Vodka was launched, reusing the name of the old Absolut Rent Brännvin (\"absolutely pure brännvin\") created in 1879.\n\nVodka has become a popular source of insobriety among young people, with a flourishing black market. In 2013, the organizers of a so-called \"vodka car\" were jailed for two and a half years for having illegally provided thousands of liters to young people, some as young as thirteen years old. \n\nProduction\n\nVodka may be distilled from any starch- or sugar-rich plant matter; most vodka today is produced from grains such as sorghum, corn, rye or wheat. Among grain vodkas, rye and wheat vodkas are generally considered superior. Some vodkas are made from potatoes, molasses, soybeans, grapes, rice, sugar beets and sometimes even byproducts of oil refiningErmochkine, Nicholas and Iglikowski, Peter (2003). 40 degrees east : an anatomy of vodka, Nova Publishers, p. 65, ISBN 1590335945. or wood pulp processing. In some Central European countries, such as Poland, some vodka is produced by just fermenting a solution of crystal sugar and yeast. In the European Union there are talks about the standardization of vodka, and the Vodka Belt countries insist that only spirits produced from grains, potato and sugar beet molasses be allowed to be branded as \"vodka\", following the traditional methods of production., Reuters via flexnews.com (25 October 2006)Alexander Stubb, [http://www.alexstubb.com/artikkelit/bw_vodka.pdf The European Vodka Wars], a December 2006 Blue Wings article\n\nIn the United States, many vodkas are made from 95% ethanol produced in large quantities by agricultural-industrial giants Archer Daniels Midland and Midwest Grain Processors. Bottlers purchase the base spirits in bulk, then filter, dilute, distribute and market the end product under a variety of vodka brand names. \n\nDistilling and filtering\n\nA common property of the vodkas produced in the United States and Europe is the extensive use of filtration prior to any additional processing including the addition of flavorants. Filtering is sometimes done in the still during distillation, as well as afterwards, where the distilled vodka is filtered through activated charcoal and other media to absorb trace amounts of substances that alter or impart off-flavors to the vodka. However, this is not the case in the traditional vodka-producing nations, so many distillers from these countries prefer to use very accurate distillation but minimal filtering, thus preserving the unique flavors and characteristics of their products.\n\nThe master distiller is in charge of distilling the vodka and directing its filtration, which includes the removal of the \"fore-shots\", \"heads\" and \"tails\". These components of the distillate contain flavor compounds such as ethyl acetate and ethyl lactate (heads) as well as the fusel oils (tails) that impact the usually desired clean taste of vodka. Through numerous rounds of distillation, or the use of a fractioning still, the taste is modified and clarity is increased. In contrast, distillery process for liquors such as whiskey, rum, and baijiu allow portions of the \"heads\" and \"tails\" to remain, giving them their unique flavors.\n\nRepeated distillation of vodka will make its ethanol level much higher than is acceptable to most end users, whether legislation determines strength limits or not. Depending on the distillation method and the technique of the stillmaster, the final filtered and distilled vodka may have as much as 95–96% ethanol. As such, most vodka is diluted with water prior to bottling.\n\nPolish distilleries make a very pure (96%, 192 proof, formerly also 98%) rectified spirit (Polish language: spirytus rektyfikowany). Technically a form of vodka, it is sold in liquor stores rather than pharmacies. Similarly, the German market often carries German, Hungarian, Polish, and Ukrainian-made varieties of vodka of 90 to 95% ABV. A Bulgarian vodka, Balkan 176°, has an 88% alcohol content. Everclear, an American brand, is also sold at 95% ABV.\n\nFlavoring\n\nWhile most vodkas are unflavored, many flavored vodkas have been produced in traditional vodka-drinking areas, often as home-made recipes to improve vodka's taste or for medicinal purposes. Flavorings include red pepper, ginger, fruit flavors, vanilla, chocolate (without sweetener), and cinnamon. In Russia, vodka flavored with honey and pepper, pertsovka in Russian, is also very popular. In Poland and Belarus, the leaves of the local bison grass are added to produce żubrówka (Polish) and zubrovka (Belarusian) vodka, with slightly sweet flavors and light amber colors. In Lithuania and Poland, a famous vodka containing honey is called krupnik.\n\nThis tradition of flavoring is also prevalent in the Nordic countries, where vodka seasoned with herbs, fruits and spices is the appropriate strong drink for several seasonal festivities. Sweden has forty-odd common varieties of herb-flavored vodka (kryddat brännvin). In Poland and Ukraine, a separate category (nalyvka in Ukraine and nalewka in Poland) is used for vodka-based spirits with fruit, root, flower, or herb extracts, which are often home-made or produced by small commercial distilleries. Their alcohol contents vary between 15 and 75%. In Estonia, vodkas are spiced with barbaris, blackcurrant, cherry, green apple, lemon, vanilla and watermelon flavors. \n\nMore recently, people have experimented with producing more unusual flavors of vodka, such as very hot chili flavored vodka and even bacon vodka. \n\nToday\n\nAccording to The Penguin Book of Spirits and Liqueurs, \"Its low level of fusel oils and congeners—impurities that flavour spirits but that can contribute to the after-effects of heavy consumption—led to its being considered among the 'safer' spirits, though not in terms of its powers of intoxication, which, depending on strength, may be considerable.\" \n\nSince the year 2000, due to evolving consumer tastes and regulatory changes, a number of 'artisanal vodka' or even 'ultrapremium vodka' brands have appeared.\n\nEuropean Union regulation\n\nThe recent success of grape-based vodka in the United States prompted traditional vodka producers in the Vodka Belt countries of Poland, Finland, Estonia, Lithuania, and Sweden to campaign for EU legislation that will categorize only spirits made from grain or potatoes as \"vodka\". This proposition provoked heavy criticism from south European countries, which often distill used mash from wine-making into spirits; although higher quality mash is usually distilled into some variety of pomace brandy, lower-quality mash is better turned into neutral-flavored spirits instead. \nAny vodka not made from either grain or potatoes would have to display the products used in its production. This regulation entered into force in 2008.\n\nHealth\n\nIn some countries, black-market or \"bathtub\" vodka is widespread because it can be produced easily and avoid taxation. However, severe poisoning, blindness, or death can occur as a result of dangerous industrial ethanol substitutes being added by black-market producers. In March 2007 in a documentary, BBC News UK sought to find the cause of severe jaundice among imbibers of a \"bathtub\" vodka in Russia. The cause was suspected to be an industrial disinfectant (Extrasept) – 95% ethanol but also containing a highly toxic chemical – added to the vodka by the illegal traders because of its high alcohol content and low price. Death toll estimates list at least 120 dead and more than 1,000 poisoned. The death toll is expected to rise due to the chronic nature of the cirrhosis that is causing the jaundice. However, there are also much higher estimates of the annual death toll (dozens or even hundreds of thousand of lives) produced by the vodka consumption in Russia." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "High_fructose_corn_syrup.txt", "Corn_Refiners_Association.txt" ], "title": [ "High fructose corn syrup", "Corn Refiners Association" ], "wiki_context": [ "High-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) (also called glucose-fructose, isoglucose and glucose-fructose syrup ) is a sweetener made from corn starch that has been processed by glucose isomerase to convert some of its glucose into fructose. HFCS was first marketed in the early 1970s by the Clinton Corn Processing Company, together with the Japanese research institute where the enzyme was discovered.\n\nAs a sweetener, HFCS is often compared to granulated sugar. Advantages of HFCS over granulated sugar include being easier to handle, and being less expensive in some countries. However, there is also debate concerning whether HFCS presents greater health risks than other sweeteners. Use of HFCS peaked in the late 1990s; demand decreased due to public concern about a possible link between HFCS and metabolic diseases like obesity and diabetes.\n\nApart from comparisons between HFCS and table sugar, there is strong scientific consensus that the over-consumption of added sugar in any form, including HFCS, is a major health problem. Consuming added sugars, especially in the form of soft drinks, is strongly linked to obesity. The World Health Organization has recommended that people limit their consumption of added sugars to 10% of calories, but experts say that typical consumption of empty calories in the United States is nearly twice that level. \n\nUses\n\nFood \n\nIn the U.S., HFCS is among the sweeteners that mostly replaced sucrose (table sugar) in the food industry. Factors include production quotas of domestic sugar, import tariff on foreign sugar, and subsidies of U.S. corn, raising the price of sucrose and lowering that of HFCS, making it cheapest for many sweetener applications. The relative sweetness of HFCS 55, used most commonly in soft drinks, is comparable to sucrose. \n\nBecause of its similar sugar profile and lower price, HFCS has been used illegally to \"stretch\" honey. Assays to detect adulteration with HFCS use differential scanning calorimetry and other advanced testing methods. \n\nBeekeeping \n\nIn apiculture in the United States, HFCS became a sucrose replacement for honey bees starting in the late 1970s. When HFCS is heated to about 45 degrees C, hydroxymethylfurfural can form from the breakdown of fructose, and is toxic to bees. HFCS has been investigated as a possible source of colony collapse disorder.\n\nProduction \n\nProcess \n\nIn the contemporary process, corn (maize) is milled to produce corn starch and an \"acid-enzyme\" process is used in which the corn starch solution is acidified to begin breaking up the existing carbohydrates, and then enzymes are added to further metabolize the starch and convert the resulting sugars to fructose. The first enzyme added is alpha-amylase which breaks the long chains down into shorter sugar chains – oligosaccharides. Glucoamylase is mixed in and converts them to glucose; the resulting solution is filtered to remove protein, then using activated carbon, and then demineralized using Ion-exchange resins. The purified solution is then run over immobilized xylose isomerase, which turns the sugars to ~50–52% glucose with some unconverted oligosaccharides, and 42% fructose (HFCS 42), and again demineralized and again purified using activated carbon. Some is processed into HFCS 90 by liquid chromatography, then mixed with HFCS 42 to form HFCS 55. The enzymes used in the process are made by microbial fermentation.Larry Hobbs. Sweeteners from Starch: Production, Properties and Uses. Chapter 21 in Starch: Chemistry and Technology, Third Edition. Eds. James N. BeMiller, Roy L. Whistler. Elsevier Inc.: 2009. ISBN 9780127462752\n\nComposition and varieties \n\nHFCS is 24% water, the rest mainly fructose and glucose with 0–5% unprocessed glucose oligomers. There are several varieties of HFCS, these are numbered by the percentage of fructose they contain:\n\n* HFCS 42 is used in beverages, processed foods, cereals, and baked goods. \n* HFCS 55 (≈55% fructose if water were removed) is mostly used in soft drinks;\n* HFCS-90 has some niche uses but mainly mixed with HFCS 42 to make HFCS 55.\n\nHistory \n\nCommercial production of corn syrup began in 1864.White JS. Sucrose, HFCS, and Fructose: History, Manufacture, Composition, Applications, and Production. Chapter 2 in J.M. Rippe (ed.), Fructose, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Sucrose and Health, Nutrition and Health. Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014. ISBN 9781489980779. In the late 1950s, scientists at Clinton Corn Processing Company in Iowa tried to turn glucose from corn starch into fructose, but the process was not scalable. In 1965-1970 Yoshiyuki Takasaki, at the Japanese National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) developed a heat-stable Xylose isomerase enzyme from yeast. In 1967, the Clinton Corn Processing Company of Clinton, Iowa obtained an exclusive license to a manufacture glucose isomerase derived from Streptomyces bacteria, and began shipping an early version of HCFS in February 1967.\n\nPrior to the development of the worldwide sugar industry, dietary fructose was limited to only a few items. Milk, meats, and most vegetables, the staples of many early diets, have no fructose, and only 5–10% fructose by weight is found in fruits such as grapes, apples, and blueberries. Molasses and common dried fruits have a content of less than 10% fructose sugar. From 1970 to 2000, there was a 25% increase in \"added sugars\" in the U.S. After being classified as \"generally recognized as safe\" (GRAS) by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 1976, HFCS began to replace sucrose as the main sweetener of soft drinks in the United States. At the same time, rates of obesity rose. That correlation, in combination with laboratory research and epidemiological studies that suggested a link between consuming large amounts of fructose and changes to various proxy health measures including elevated blood triglycerides, size and type of low-density lipoproteins, uric acid levels, and weight, raised concerns about health effects of HFCS itself.\n\nUnited States \n\nIn the U.S., sugar tariffs and quotas keep imported sugar at up to twice the global price since 1797, while subsidies to corn growers cheapen the primary ingredient in HFCS, corn. Industrial users looking for cheaper replacements rapidly adopted HFCS in the 1970s. \n\nHFCS is easier to handle than granulated sucrose, although some sucrose is transported as solution. Unlike sucrose, HFCS cannot be hydrolyzed, but the free fructose in HFCS may produce Hydroxymethylfurfural when stored at high temperatures; these differences are most prominent in acidic beverages. Soft drink makers such as Coca-Cola and Pepsi use sugar in other nations, but switched to HFCS in the U.S. in 1984. Large corporations, such as Archer Daniels Midland, lobby for the continuation of government corn subsidies. \n\nOther countries, including Mexico, typically use sugar in soft drinks. Some Americans seek out Mexican Coca-Cola in ethnic groceries because they prefer the taste compared to Coca-Cola in the U.S. which is made with HFCS. Kosher for Passover Coca-Cola sold in the U.S. around the Jewish holiday also uses sucrose rather than HFCS and is also highly sought after by people who prefer the original taste. \n\nConsumption of HFCS in the U.S. has declined since it peaked at per person in 1999. The average American consumed approximately of HFCS in 2012, versus of refined cane and beet sugar. \n\nIn the United States, the Corn Refiners Association has attempted to counter negative public perceptions by marketing campaigns describing HFCS as \"natural\" and by attempting to change the name of the product to \"corn sugar,\" which the FDA rejected.\n\nEuropean Union \n\nIn the European Union (EU), HFCS, known as isoglucose in sugar regime, is subject to a production quota. In 2005, this quota was set at 303,000 tons; in comparison, the EU produced an average of 18.6 million tons of sugar annually between 1999 and 2001. \n\nJapan \n\nIn Japan, HFCS is manufactured mostly from imported U.S. corn and the output is regulated by the government. For the period from 2007 to 2012 HFCS had a 27–30% share of the Japanese sweetener market. \n\nHealth \n\nHealth concerns have been raised about a relationship between HFCS and metabolic disorders, and with regard to manufacturing contaminants.\n\nObesity and metabolic disorders \n\nSugars became a health concern among the American public in the early 1970s with the publication of John Yudkin’s book, Pure, White and Deadly, which claimed that simple sugars, an increasingly large part of the Western diet, were dangerous. In the 1980s and 1990s, Gerald Reaven and Sheldon Reiser of the USDA published papers discussing the dangers of dietary fructose from consumption of sucrose and of HFCS, especially with regard to heart disease, diabetes, and obesity. These concerns came to the public's attention through media attention to a 2004 commentary in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition that suggested that the altered metabolism of fructose when compared to glucose may be a factor in increasing obesity rates since, as compared to glucose, fructose may be more readily converted to fat and the sugar causes less of a rise in insulin and leptin, both of which increase feelings of satiety. Fructose, in contrast to glucose, was shown to potently stimulate lipogenesis (creation of fatty acids, for conversion to fat). In subsequent interviews, two of the study's authors stated the article was distorted to place emphasis solely on HFCS when the actual issue was the overconsumption of any type of sugar. While fructose absorption and modification by the intestines and liver does differ from glucose initially, the majority of the fructose molecules are converted to glucose or metabolized into byproducts identical to those produced by glucose metabolism. Consumption of moderate amounts of fructose has also been linked to positive outcomes, including reducing appetite if consumed before a meal, lower blood sugar increases compared to glucose, and (again compared to glucose) delaying exhaustion if consumed during exercise.\n\nIn 2007, an expert panel assembled by the University of Maryland's Center for Food, Nutrition and Agriculture Policy reviewed the links between HFCS and obesity and concluded there was no ecological validity in the association between rising body mass indexes (a measure of obesity) and the consumption of HFCS. The panel stated that since the ratio of fructose to glucose had not changed substantially in the United States since the 1960s when HFCS was introduced, the changes in obesity rates were probably not due to HFCS specifically but rather a greater consumption of calories overall, and recommended further research on the topic. In 2009 the American Medical Association published a review article on HFCS and concluded that based on the science available at the time it appeared unlikely that HFCS contributed more to obesity or other health conditions than sucrose, and there was insufficient evidence to suggest warning about or restricting use of HFCS or other fructose-containing sweeteners in foods. The review did report that studies found direct associations between high intakes of fructose and adverse health outcomes, including obesity and the metabolic syndrome.\n\nEpidemiological research has suggested that the increase in metabolic disorders like obesity and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, is linked to increased consumption of sugars and/or calories in general, and not due to any special effect of HFCS. A 2012 review found that fructose did not appear to cause weight gain when it replaced other carbohydrates in diets with similar calories. High fructose consumption has been linked to high levels of uric acid in the blood, though this is only thought to be a concern for patients with gout.\n\nRecent studies have suggested that the short term effects of HFCS are minimal, however the intergeneration effects of HFCS consumption during pregnancy on the offspring may be of greater consequence. Early evidence shows that female offspring weight at birth is reduced compared to that of males and that plasma NEFA concentrations are reduced independent of offspring sex.\n\nNumerous agencies in the United States recommend reducing the consumption of all sugars, including HFCS, without singling it out as presenting extra concerns. The Mayo Clinic cites the American Heart Association's recommendation that women limit the added sugar in their diet to 100 calories a day (~6 teaspoons) and that men limit it to 150 calories a day (~9 teaspoons), noting that there is not enough evidence to support HFCS having more adverse health effects than excess consumption of any other type of sugar. The United States departments of Agriculture and Health and Human Services recommendations for a healthy diet state that consumption of all types of added sugars be reduced. \n\nPeople with fructose malabsorption should avoid foods containing HFCS.\n\nManufacturing contaminants \n\nHFCS contains reactive dicarbonyl compounds that are created during the processing steps. These dicarbonyl compounds can in turn create advanced glycation end-products, the possible health effects of which were under investigation as of 2013. \n\nIn the contemporary process to make HFCS, an \"acid-enzyme\" process is used in which the corn starch solution is acidified to begin breaking up the existing carbohydrates, and then enzymes are added to further metabolize the starch and convert the resulting sugars to their constituents of fructose and glucose. A chemical used to separate corn starch from the kernel, lye was formerly manufactured using a process that included mercury, and scientists decided to investigate if HFCS used in food contained mercury. Two papers published in 2009 found that there were traces of inorganic mercury in some foods. However, the mercury was not methylmercury, the form of mercury that is of most concern to human health. \n\nPublic relations \n\nThere are various public relations concerns with HFCS, including with its labeling as \"natural\", with its advertising, with companies that have moved back to sugar, and a proposed name change to \"corn sugar\". In 2010 the Corn Refiners Association applied to allow HFCS to be renamed \"corn sugar\", but were rejected by the United States Food and Drug Administration in 2012.", "The Corn Refiners Association (CRA) is a trade association based in Washington, D.C. and representing the corn refining industry in the United States. Corn refining encompasses the production of corn starch, corn oil, and high fructose corn syrup (HFCS).\n\nMembers of the CRA include Archer Daniels Midland, Cargill, Incorporated, Corn Products International, Inc./National Starch, Penford Products Co., Roquette America, Inc. and Tate & Lyle Ingredients Americas. \n\nHigh-fructose corn syrup advocacy\n\nCommercials\n\nThe CRA launched a public relations campaign in 2008 called “Changing the Conversation about High Fructose Corn Syrup” (HFCS). Initial commercials stated that HFCS was \"natural\". In more recent commercials characters state HFCS is 'made from corn, has no artificial ingredients, has the same calories as sugar and is okay to eat in moderation.'\n\nThe CRA received heavy criticism for calling HFCS \"natural\". \n\nIn direct response to the commercials, Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest stated: \"High-fructose corn syrup starts out as cornstarch, which is chemically or enzymatically degraded to glucose and some short polymers of glucose. Another enzyme is then used to convert varying fractions of glucose into fructose...High-fructose corn syrup just doesn't exist in nature.\" In April 2008, an employee of the United States Food and Drug Administration declared HFCS is not \"natural\", stating: \"The use of synthetic fixing agents in the enzyme preparation, which is then used to produce HFCS, would not be consistent with our (…) policy regarding the use of the term 'natural'\". \n\nOther opponents of the commercials have complained that stating HFCS is natural is misleading, as radon gas, lead and tobacco are also natural. Therefore, even if HFCS is natural it should not be automatically assumed that it is safe to eat.\n\nStating HFCS contains no artificial ingredients has also been criticized, as it has been argued that such a statement implies HFCS is natural, when it actually contains synthetic and genetically modified ingredients. \n\nThe claim that HFCS is safe in moderation has also been criticized, as HFCS is used in tens of thousands of products in America, including soda, bread, pasta sauce, barbecue sauce, ketchup, salad dressing, fruit juice, cereal, meat products, chips, as well as \"health products\" such as protein bars, the average American does not eat HFCS in moderation. \n\nHigh-fructose corn syrup name change\n\nOn September 14, 2010, The Corn Refiners Association applied for permission to use the name \"corn sugar\" in place of high fructose corn syrup on food labels for products sold in the United States. According to a press release, \"Consumers need to know what is in their foods and where their foods come from and we want to be clear with them,\" said CRA president Audrae Erickson. \"The term 'corn sugar' succinctly and accurately describes what this natural ingredient is and where it comes from – corn.\"\n\nTIME stated that the CRA's decision to change the name of HFCS was because HFCS had such a bad reputation. In response to the proposed name change, The New York Times ran an article asking nutrition experts what they would suggest as appropriate names for HFCS. Three of the five experts recommended alternate names, including Michael Pollan who suggested \"enzymatically altered corn glucose\". Dr Andrew Weil recommended not changing from HFCS, calling the term Corn sugar \"too vague\" and the CRA's attempt to change HFCS's name \"Orwellian\". However Dr Barry Popkin felt that \"corn sugar\" was an appropriate term. \n\nOn May 31, 2012, the Food and Drug Administration ultimately rejected the name change. \n\nBlogging controversy\n\nThe CRA attracted controversy in 2010 for approaching bloggers who run mom blogs, through the organization MomCentral.com, a website that has drawn criticism as an advocacy vehicle of large chemical and pharmaceutical corporations. Bloggers were extended offers of $50 Wal-Mart gift certificates in exchange for writing about a CRA sponsored seminar that made the claims that high fructose corn syrup and table sugar were nutritionally equivalent and affect the body in the same way. This practice backfired, with several prominent bloggers writing scathing criticisms of the CRA's methods as well as of bloggers who passed on the information presented in the seminar without conducting their own independent research." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Pangram.txt", "The_quick_brown_fox_jumps_over_the_lazy_dog.txt" ], "title": [ "Pangram", "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" ], "wiki_context": [ "A Pangram (, pan gramma, \"every letter\") or holoalphabetic sentence for a given alphabet is a sentence using every letter of the alphabet at least once. Pangrams have been used to display typefaces, test equipment, and develop skills in handwriting, calligraphy, and keyboarding.\n\nThe best known English pangram is \"The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.\" It has been used since at least the late 19th century, was utilized by Western Union to test Telex / TWX data communication equipment for accuracy and reliability, and is now used by a number of computer programs (most notably the font viewer built into Microsoft Windows) to display computer fonts. An example in another language is ', containing all letters used in German , including every umlaut (ä, ö, ü) plus the ß. It has been used since before 1800.\n\nShort pangrams in English are more difficult to come up with and tend to use uncommon words. A perfect pangram contains every letter of the alphabet only once and can be considered an anagram of the alphabet; it is the shortest possible pangram. An example is the phrase \"Cwm fjord bank glyphs vext quiz\" (', a loan word from Welsh, means a steep-sided valley, particularly in Wales). However, such examples are not usually understood even by native English speakers, and so arguably are not really English pangrams. \n\nHere are some short pangrams using standard written English, not involving abbreviations or proper nouns:\n# \"Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs.\" (32 letters)\n# \"Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz.\" (31 letters)\n# \"The five boxing wizards jump quickly.\" (31 letters)\n# \"How vexingly quick daft zebras jump!\" (30 letters)\n# \"Bright vixens jump; dozy fowl quack.\" (29 letters)\n\nLonger pangrams may afford more opportunity for humor, cleverness, or thoughtfulness. \n\nIn a sense, the pangram is the opposite of the lipogram, in which the aim is to omit one or more letters.\n\nLogographic scripts \n\nLogographic scripts, that is, writing systems composed principally of logograms, cannot be used to produce pangrams in the literal sense, since they are radically different from alphabets or other phonetic writing systems. In such scripts, the total number of signs is large and imprecisely defined, so producing a text with every possible sign is impossible. However, various analogies to pangrams are feasible, including traditional pangrams in a romanization. In Japanese, although typical orthography uses kanji (logograms), pangrams are required to contain every kana (syllabic character) when written out in kana alone: the Iroha is a classic example.\n\nIn addition, it is possible to create pangrams that demonstrate certain aspects of logographic characters.\n\nIn Chinese, the Thousand Character Classic is a 1000-character poem in which each character is used exactly once; however, it does not include all Chinese characters. The single character (permanence) incorporates every basic stroke used to write Chinese characters exactly once, as described in the Eight Principles of Yong.\n\nSelf-enumerating pangrams \n\nA self-enumerating pangram is a pangrammatic autogram, or a sentence that inventories its own letters, each of which occurs at least once. The first example was produced by Rudy Kousbroek, a Dutch journalist and essayist, who publicly challenged Lee Sallows, a British recreational mathematician resident in the Netherlands, to produce an English translation of his Dutch pangram. In the sequel, Sallows built an electronic \"pangram machine\", that performed a systematic search among millions of candidate solutions. The machine was successful in identifying the following 'magic' translation: \nThis pangram contains four As, one B, two Cs, one D, thirty Es, six Fs, five Gs, seven Hs, eleven Is, one J, one K, two Ls, two Ms, eighteen Ns, fifteen Os, two Ps, one Q, five Rs, twenty-seven Ss, eighteen Ts, two Us, seven Vs, eight Ws, two Xs, three Ys, & one Z.\n\nChris Patuzzo, a British computer scientist was able to reduce the problem of finding a self-enumerating pangram to the Boolean satisfiability problem. He did this by using a bespoke Hardware description language as a stepping stone and then applied the Tseitin transformation to the resulting chip. \n\nPangrams in literature\n\nThe pangram \"The quick brown fox...\" and searches for a shorter pangram are the cornerstone of the plot of the novel Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn. The search successfully comes to an end when the phrase \"Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs\" is discovered.", "\"The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog\" is an English-language pangram—a phrase that contains all of the letters of the alphabet. It is commonly used for touch-typing practice. It is also used to test typewriters and computer keyboards, show fonts, and other applications involving all of the letters in the English alphabet. Owing to its brevity and coherence, it has become widely known.\n\nHistory\n\nThe earliest known appearance of the phrase is from The Michigan School Moderator, a journal that provided many teachers with education-related news and suggestions for lessons. In an article titled \"Interesting Notes\" in the March 14, 1885 issue, the phrase is given as a suggestion for writing practice: \"The following sentence makes a good copy for practice, as it contains every letter of the alphabet: 'A quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.'\" Note that the phrase in this case begins with the word \"A\" rather than \"The\". Several other early sources also use this variation.\n\nAs the use of typewriters grew in the late 19th century, the phrase began appearing in typing and stenography lesson books as a practice sentence. Early examples of publications which used the phrase include Illustrative Shorthand by Linda Bronson (1888), How to Become Expert in Typewriting: A Complete Instructor Designed Especially for the Remington Typewriter (1890), and Typewriting Instructor and Stenographer's Hand-book (1892). By the turn of the 20th century, the phrase had become widely known. In the January 10, 1903, issue of Pitman's Phonetic Journal, it is referred to as \"the well known memorized typing line embracing all the letters of the alphabet\". Robert Baden-Powell's book Scouting for Boys (1908) uses the phrase as a practice sentence for signaling. \n\nThe first message sent on the Moscow–Washington hotline was the test phrase \"THE QUICK BROWN FOX JUMPED OVER THE LAZY DOG'S BACK 1234567890\". Later, during testing, the Russian translators sent a message asking their American counterparts \"What does it mean when your people say 'The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog?'\" \n\nDuring the 20th century, technicians tested typewriters and teleprinters by typing the sentence. \n\nComputer usage\n\nIn the age of computers, this pangram is commonly used to display font samples and for testing computer keyboards. In cryptography, it is commonly used as a test vector for hash and encryption algorithms to verify their implementation, as well as to ensure alphabetic character set compatibility. Microsoft Word has a command to auto-type the sentence, in versions up to Word 2003, using the command rand(), and in Microsoft Office Word 2007 and later using the command \nrand.old(). \n\nCultural references\n\nNumerous passing references to the phrase have occurred in movies, television, books, video games, advertising, websites, and graphic arts. \n\nThe lipogrammatic novel Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn is built entirely around the \"Quick Brown Fox\" pangram and its inventor. It depicts a fictional country off the South Carolina coast that idealizes the pangram, chronicling the effects on literature and social structure as various letters are banned from daily use by government dictum." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "Trident_(gum).txt" ], "title": [ "Trident (gum)" ], "wiki_context": [ "Trident is a brand of sugar free chewing gum. It was introduced by Cadbury in the United Kingdom. In many other European countries, Trident is branded as Stimorol gum; it is generally the same as Trident. \n\nBackground\n\nWhen artificial sweeteners became widespread in the early 1960s, the formula was changed to use saccharin instead of sugar, and Sugar-Free Trident was introduced in 1964 with the slogan \"The Great Taste that Is Good for Your Teeth.\" American Chicle's marketing was one of the first national campaigns to promote dental health through chewing gum.\n\nFor years, Trident was promoted with the slogan, “Four out of five dentists surveyed recommend sugarless gum for their patients who chew gum.” This slogan is believed to have been based on the results of a survey of practicing dentists with either D.D.S. or D.M.D. degrees, apparently conducted in the early 1960s, whose patients included frequent users of chewing gums; the percentage of respondents to the survey whose responses indicated they would make such references to their patients is believed to have been approximately 80%, rounded off to the nearest full percentage point, of the total number of respondents. It became strongly associated with the Trident brand. As of the middle of June 2014, however, Kraft Foods's Cadbury Adams group, whose parent company, Mondelēz International, had become owners of the Trident copyright and patents, was not known to have made any public disclosures of any details about the survey, presumably citing the proprietary nature of the survey data and conclusions as its rationale.\n\nIn the early 2000s, \"See what Unfolds\" became the new slogan for the brand.\n\nTrident gum contains the sugar alcohol xylitol, which is known as a \"tooth-friendly\" sugar. Use of the chemical has been subject to controversy, as it is highly toxic to dogs. \n\nProducts and flavors\n\nOriginal Trident flavors\n\nOriginal Trident, a soft gum packaged in a unique rectangular shape, is sweetened with xylitol (originally advertised as \"Dentec\" by the company), a sugar alcohol that reduces plaque and protects teeth against decay associated with dental caries by helping to maintain a neutral pH balance in the mouth. It is also sweetened with sorbitol, Mannitol, Aspartame, Sucralose and Acesulfame potassium.\n\nFormer President Jimmy Carter on November 14, 1980 declared Trident Original as the official gum of the White House for its unique blend of spearmint, peppermint, cassis and cinnamon.\n\nTrident White\n\nTrident White (formerly Trident Advantage until 2001), a pellet gum, does not contain xylitol. It does, however, contain a non-abrasive, peroxide-free whitener (patented by Cadbury Adams) that breaks up extrinsic stains on teeth. It also contains aspartame. Trident White no longer contains Recaldent (casein phosphopeptide-amorphous calcium phosphate), a milk-derived ingredient that aids in the remineralization of teeth.\n* Cinnamon Tingle\n* Cool Bubble\n* Cool Colada\n* Cool Mangoberry\n* Cool Rush\n* Peppermint\n* Spearmint\n* Wintergreen\n* Cool Clove\n\nTrident Splash\n\nTrident Splash is also a pellet gum, except each piece is filled with a gel-like liquid that is flavored differently from its outer shell. Trident splash contains the ingredient gelatine and thus is not suitable for vegans or people who eat only kosher meat or foods, except for the products produced for the Israeli market which are made with kosher beef gelatin under rabbinical supervision and approval of the Israeli Chief Rabbinate. Introduced in 2005. It also is not halal because the gelatin is derived from a pork base.\n\n* Apple Raspberry\n* Citrus Blackberry\n* Orange Swirl\n* Pucker Me Berry\n* Strawberry Lime\n* Peppermint Swirl\n* Sweet Mint\n* Peppermint with Vanilla (discontinued)\n\nTrident Layers\n\nTrident Layers is a soft gum with a flavored layer between two normal sized pieces of different flavors of Trident gum. It is sugar free and is sweetened with artificial sugars. It arrived in Canada by 2010, then in the United States in 2011 to compete against Excel Mist (Orbit Mist in the United States).\n* Orchard Peach & Ripe Mango\n* Fresh Peppermint & Smooth Spearmint\n* Cool Mint & Melon Fresco\n* Green Apple & Golden Pineapple\n* Wild Strawberry & Tangy Citrus\n* Sweet Cherry & Island Lime\n* Juicy Berry & Tangy Tangerine\n* Grape Lemonade\n* Jelly Bean\n* Candy Cane\n* Pumpkin Spice\n*Swedish Fish\n* Watermelon & Tropical Fruit\n\nThis gum contains soy lecithin, aspartame, phenylalanine, and other sweeteners. It also contains Gelatin and hence is not suitable for vegans or those who consume kosher or halal food. The Tangy Citrus flavor is mostly composed of grapefruit \n\nTrident Xtra Care\n\nTrident Xtra Care is a soft gum that is very much like the original Trident, except for that it contains Recaldent. Recaldent is a type of calcium that is claimed to be absorbed into the tooth, strengthening teeth against plaque acids. It is said to protect the teeth from future damage and make them stronger.\n\n* Cool Citrus\n* Cool Mint\n* Peppermint\n* Spearmint\n* Strawberry\n* Bubble Gum\n* Blueberry\n\nTrident Vitality\n\nAccording to its manufacturing company, Trident Vitality aims to \"add a little piece of delicious well-being to the gum-chewing experience, with Vitamin C, ginseng or white tea infused into each delicious piece.\" The gum comes in packs of 9, which, compared to other types of gum, is small. For example, Orbit (gum) has 14 pieces per pack, and 5 (gum) has 15 pieces per pack.\n\nThis product line is now discontinued according to the company (2013).\n\nUnited Kingdom\n\nTrident gum was introduced to the British market in 2007. Seven flavours of Trident currently exist in the UK, after a period of new flavours and discontinuations.\n\nTrident Soft\n\nTrident Soft are long, thin strips of gum. They are sold in packs of 14 pieces and in four different flavors:\n*Peppermint\n*Strawberry\n*Spearmint\n*Tropical Twist\n\nTrident Fresh\n\n*Cool Lemon (Discontinued)\n*Oooh Peppermint (Renamed 'Trident Peppermint Splash')\n*Aahh Spearmint (Renamed 'Trident Spearment Splash')\n\nTrident Sweet Kicks\n\nSweet Kicks are only available in one flavor so far and were released on the 14th of July 2007. They do not have a liquid center (They have since been discontinued).\n* Chocolate Mint\n\nTrident Splash\n\n'Trident Splash' is a pellet gum with a liquid center. It is currently sold in single blister packs containing 9 pieces:\n* Strawberry and Lime \n* Vanilla and Mint (Discontinued in UK, available in Canada)\n* Raspberry and Peach (Discontinued in UK)\n* Apple and Apricot (Discontinued in UK)\n* Citrus and Blackberry (Discontinued in UK)\n* Orange Swirl (Canada only)\n* Spearmint and Watermelon (Canada only)\n* Winter Wave (Canada only)" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Lee_Harvey_Oswald.txt", "Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy.txt" ], "title": [ "Lee Harvey Oswald", "Assassination of John F. Kennedy" ], "wiki_context": [ "Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 – November 24, 1963) was an American sniper who assassinated President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. According to five U.S. government investigations,These were investigations by: the Federal Bureau of Investigation (1963), the Warren Commission (1964), the House Select Committee on Assassinations (1979), the Secret Service, and the Dallas Police Department. Oswald shot and killed Kennedy as Kennedy traveled by motorcade through Dealey Plaza in the city of Dallas, Texas.\n\nOswald was a former U.S. Marine who defected to the Soviet Union in October 1959. He lived in the Belarusian city of Minsk until June 1962, at which time he returned to the United States with his Russian wife, eventually settling in Dallas.\n\nFollowing Kennedy's assassination, Oswald was initially arrested for the murder of police officer J. D. Tippit, who was killed on a Dallas street approximately 45 minutes after President Kennedy was shot. Oswald was later charged with the murder of Kennedy; he denied shooting anybody, saying that he was a patsy. Two days later, while being transferred from police headquarters to the county jail, Oswald was shot and mortally wounded by Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby in full view of television cameras broadcasting live.\n\nIn 1964, the Warren Commission concluded that Oswald acted alone in assassinating Kennedy, firing three shots. This conclusion was supported by previous investigations carried out by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Secret Service, and Dallas Police Department. Despite forensic, ballistic, and eyewitness evidence supporting the lone gunman theory, public opinion polls taken over the years have shown that most Americans believe that Oswald did not act alone, but conspired with others to kill the president, and the assassination has spawned numerous conspiracy theories. In 1979, the House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded that Oswald fired the shots that killed Kennedy, but differed from previous investigations in concluding that \"scientific acoustical evidence establishes a high probability that two gunmen fired at President John F. Kennedy\". The House Select Committee's acoustical evidence has since been discredited. \n\nEarly life\n\nChildhood\n\nLee Harvey Oswald was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, on October 18, 1939, to World War I veteran Robert Edward Lee Oswald, Sr. (March 4, 1896 – August 19, 1939) and Marguerite Frances Claverie (July 19, 1907 – January 17, 1981). Robert had died of a heart attack at age 43 two months prior to Lee's birth. Lee's elder brother Robert Jr. (born April 7, 1934) is also a former Marine. Through Marguerite's first marriage to Edward John Pic, Jr., Lee and Robert Jr. are the half-brothers of Air Force veteran John Edward Pic (January 17, 1932 – April 25, 2000). \n\nIn 1944, Marguerite moved the family from New Orleans to Dallas, Texas. Oswald entered the 1st grade in 1945 and over the next half-dozen years attended several different schools in the Dallas and Fort Worth areas through the 6th grade. Oswald took an IQ test in the 4th grade and scored 103; \"on achievement tests in [grades 4 to 6], he twice did best in reading and twice did worst in spelling.\"\n\nAs a child, Oswald was described by several people who knew him as withdrawn and temperamental. In August 1952, when Oswald was 12, his mother took him to New York City where they lived for a short time with Oswald's half-brother, John. Oswald and his mother were later asked to leave after an argument in which Oswald allegedly struck his mother and threatened John's wife with a pocket knife. \n\nOswald attended the 7th grade in The Bronx, New York, but was often truant, which led to a psychiatric assessment at a juvenile reformatory. The reformatory psychiatrist, Dr. Renatus Hartogs, described Oswald as immersed in a \"vivid fantasy life, turning around the topics of omnipotence and power, through which [Oswald] tries to compensate for his present shortcomings and frustrations.\" Dr. Hartogs detected a \"personality pattern disturbance with schizoid features and passive-aggressive tendencies\" and recommended continued treatment. \n\nIn January 1954, Oswald's mother returned to New Orleans, taking Oswald with her. At the time, there was a question pending before a New York judge as to whether Oswald should be removed from the care of his mother to finish his schooling, \nalthough Oswald's behavior appeared to improve during his last months in New York. \n\nIn New Orleans, Oswald completed the 8th and 9th grades. He entered the 10th grade in 1955 but quit school after one month. After leaving school, Oswald worked for several months as an office clerk and messenger in New Orleans. In July 1956, Oswald's mother moved the family to Fort Worth, Texas, and Oswald re-enrolled in the 10th grade for the September session at Arlington Heights High School in Fort Worth. A few weeks later in October, Oswald quit school at age 17 to join the Marines (see below); he never received a high school diploma.\n\nBy the age of 17, he had resided at 22 different locations and attended 12 different schools.\nThe schools were: \n* 1st grade: Benbrook Common School (Fort Worth, Texas), October 31, 1945\n* 1st grade (again): Covington Elementary School (Covington, Louisiana), Sep. 1946–Jan. 1947\n* 1st grade (end): Clayton Public School (Ft Worth, TX), Jan.–May 1947\n* 2nd grade: Clayton Public School (Ft Worth, TX), Sept. 1947\n* 2nd grade (end): Clark Elementary School (Ft Worth, TX), March 1948\n* 3rd grade: Arlington Heights Elementary School (Ft Worth, TX), Sept. 1948\n* 4th grade: Ridglea West Elementary School (since renamed Luella Merrett, Ft Worth), Sep. 1949\n* 5th grade: Ridglea West Elementary School (Ft Worth), Sep. 1950\n* 6th grade: Ridglea West Elementary School (Ft Worth), Sep. 1951\n* 7th grade: Trinity Evangelical Lutheran School (Bronx, NYC, NY), Aug. 1952\n* 7th grade: Public School 117 (Bronx, NY), Sep. 1952 (attended 17 of 64 days)\n* 7th grade (end): Public School 44 (Bronx, NY), March 23, 1953\n: Reformatory: Youth House (NYC, NY), April/May 1953.\n* 8th grade: Public School 44 (Bronx, NY), Sep 14, 1953\n* 8th grade (end): Beauregard Junior High School (New Orleans), Jan 13, 1954\n* 9th grade: Beauregard Junior High School (New Orleans), Sep. 1954–June 1955\n* 10th grade: Warren Easton High School (New Orleans), Sep.–Oct. 1955 (Warren appendix 13)\n: (tried to enlist in U.S. Marines using affidavit claiming age 17)\n: (worked as clerk/messenger in New Orleans, rather than school)\n* 10th grade (again): Arlington Heights High School (Ft Worth, TX), Sep.–Oct. 1956. Final withdrawal from high school, 10th grade. (Warren appendix 13)\n\nThough the young Oswald had trouble spelling and may have had a \"reading-spelling disability\", he read voraciously. By age 15, he claimed to be a Marxist, writing in his diary, \"I was looking for a key to my environment, and then I discovered socialist literature. I had to dig for my books in the back dusty shelves of libraries.\" At 16 he wrote to the Socialist Party of America for information on their Young People's Socialist League, saying he had been studying socialist principles for \"well over fifteen months.\" \nHowever, Edward Voebel, \"whom the Warren Commission had established was Oswald's closest friend during his teenage years in New Orleans..... said that reports that Oswald was already 'studying Communism' were a 'lot of baloney.' \" Voebel said that \"Oswald commonly read 'paperback trash.'\" \n\nAs a teenager, in 1955, Oswald attended Civil Air Patrol meetings in New Orleans. Oswald's fellow cadets recalled him attending C.A.P. meetings \"three or four\" times, or \"10 or 12 times\" over a one- or two-month period. \n\nMarine Corps\n\nOswald enlisted in the United States Marine Corps on October 24, 1956, just after his seventeenth birthday. Because he was underage, his brother Robert Jr. signed the forms as his guardian. Oswald also named his mother and his half-brother John as beneficiaries. Oswald idolized his older brother Robert Jr.; a photograph taken after Lee Harvey's arrest by Dallas police shows him wearing his brother's Marine Corps ring. \nJohn Pic (Oswald's half-brother) testified to the Warren Commission that Oswald's enlistment was motivated by wanting \"to get from out and under ... the yoke of oppression from my mother.\"\n\nOswald's enlistment papers record his vital statistics as 5 ft in height, 135 lb in weight, with hazel eyes and brown hair. His primary training was radar operation, a position requiring a security clearance. A May 1957 document states that he was \"granted final clearance to handle classified matter up to and including CONFIDENTIAL after careful check of local records had disclosed no derogatory data.\" \n\nAt Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi, Oswald finished seventh in a class of thirty in the Aircraft Control and Warning Operator Course which \"included instruction in aircraft surveillance and the use of radar.\" He was given the military occupational specialty of Aviation Electronics Operator. On July 9, he reported to the Marine Corps Air Station El Toro then departed for Japan the following month, where he was assigned to Marine Air Control Squadron 1 near Tokyo.\n\nLike all Marines, Oswald was trained and tested in shooting and he scored 212 in December 1956, slightly above the requirements for the designation of sharpshooter. In May 1959 he scored 191, which reduced his rating to marksman. \n\nOswald was court-martialed after accidentally shooting himself in the elbow with an unauthorized .22 handgun, then court-martialed again for fighting with a sergeant who he thought was responsible for his punishment in the shooting matter. He was demoted from private first class to private and briefly imprisoned in the brig. He was later punished for a third incident: while on night-time sentry duty in the Philippines, he inexplicably fired his rifle into the jungle. \n\nSlightly built, Oswald was nicknamed Ozzie Rabbit after the cartoon character; he was also called Oswaldskovich because he espoused pro-Soviet sentiments. In November 1958, Oswald transferred back to El Toro where his unit's function \"was to serveil for aircraft, but basically to train both enlisted men and officers for later assignment overseas.\" An officer there said that Oswald was a \"very competent\" crew chief and was \"brighter than most people.\" \n\nWhile in the Marines, Oswald made an effort to teach himself rudimentary Russian. Although this was an unusual endeavor, in February 1959, he was invited to take a Marine proficiency exam in written and spoken Russian. His level at the time was rated \"poor.\" On September 11, 1959, he received a hardship discharge from active service, claiming his mother needed care, and was put on reserve. \n\nAdult life and early crimes\n\nDefection to the Soviet Union\n\nIn October 1959, just before turning 20, Oswald traveled to the Soviet Union, a trip he planned well in advance. Along with his self-taught Russian, he had saved $1,500 of his Marine Corps salary.Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 22, p. 705, CE 1385, [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh22/html/WH_Vol22_0366a.htm Notes of interview of Lee Harvey Oswald conducted by Aline Mosby in Moscow in November 1959]. Oswald: \"When I was working in the middle of the night on guard duty, I would think how long it would be and how much money I would have to save. It would be like being out of prison. I saved about $1500.\" During Oswald's 2 years and 10 months of service in the Marine Corps he received $3,452.20, after all taxes, allotments and other deductions as well as his GED. Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 26, p. 709, CE 3099, [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/contents/wc/contents_wh26.htm Certified military pay records for Lee Harvey Oswald for the period October 24, 1956, to September 11, 1959].\n\nOswald spent two days with his mother in Fort Worth, then embarked by ship from New Orleans on September 20 to Le Havre, France, and immediately proceeded to the United Kingdom. Arriving in Southampton on October 9, he told officials he had $700 and planned to remain in the United Kingdom for one week before proceeding to a school in Switzerland. However, on the same day, he flew to Helsinki, where he was issued a Soviet visa on October 14. Oswald left Helsinki by train on the following day, crossed the Soviet border at Vainikkala, and arrived in Moscow on October 16. His visa, valid only for a week, was due to expire on October 21.\n\nAlmost immediately after arriving, Oswald told his Intourist guide of his desire to become a Soviet citizen. When asked why by the various Soviet officials he encountered—all of whom, by Oswald's account, found his wish incomprehensible—he said that he was a communist, and gave what he described in his diary as \"vauge [sic] answers about 'Great Soviet Union'\".Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 16, p. 94, CE 24, [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh16/html/WH_Vol16_0059b.htm Lee Harvey Oswald's \"Historic Diary\"], entries of October 16, 1959 to October 21, 1959. On October 21, the day his visa was due to expire, he was told that his citizenship application had been refused, and that he had to leave the Soviet Union that evening. Distraught, Oswald inflicted a minor but bloody wound to his left wrist in his hotel room bathtub soon before his Intourist guide was due to arrive to escort him from the country, according to his diary because he wished to kill himself in a way that would shock her. Delaying Oswald's departure because of his self-inflicted injury, the Soviets kept him in a Moscow hospital under psychiatric observation until October 28, 1959.Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 16, p. 95, CE 24, [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh16/html/WH_Vol16_0060a.htm Lee Harvey Oswald's \"Historic Diary\"], entries of October 21, 1959 to October 28, 1959.\n\nAccording to Oswald, he met with four more Soviet officials that same day, who asked if he wanted to return to the United States; he insisted to them that he wanted to live in the Soviet Union as a Soviet national. When pressed for identification papers, he provided his Marine Corps discharge papers.Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 16, p. 96, CE 24, [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh16/html/WH_Vol16_0060b.htm Lee Harvey Oswald's \"Historic Diary\"], entries of October 28, 1959 to October 31, 1959.\n\nOn October 31, Oswald appeared at the United States embassy in Moscow, declaring a desire to renounce his U.S. citizenship. \"I have made up my mind,\" he said; \"I'm through.\" He told the U.S. embassy interviewing officer, Richard Edward Snyder, that \"he had been a radar operator in the Marine Corps and that he had voluntarily stated to unnamed Soviet officials that as a Soviet citizen he would make known to them such information concerning the Marine Corps and his specialty as he possessed. He intimated that he might know something of special interest.\" \n(Such statements led to Oswald's hardship/honorable military reserve discharge being changed to undesirable.) \nThe Associated Press story of the defection of a former U.S. Marine to the Soviet Union was reported on the front pages of some newspapers in 1959.[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id\nIrwyAAAAIBAJ&sjid4eoFAAAAIBAJ&pg\n3310,5481990&dqlee+oswald+russia&hl\nen \"Texas Marine Gives Up U.S. For Russia\"], The Miami News, October 31, 1959, p1\n\nThough Oswald had wanted to attend Moscow State University, he was sent to Minsk to work as a lathe operator at the Gorizont Electronics Factory, which produced radios, televisions, and military and space electronics. Stanislau Shushkevich, who later became independent Belarus's first head of state, was also engaged by Gorizont at the time, and was assigned to teach Oswald Russian. Oswald received a government-subsidized, fully furnished studio apartment in a prestigious building and an additional supplement to his factory pay—all in all, an idyllic existence by working-class Soviet standards, though he was kept under constant surveillance. \n\nFrom approximately June 1960 to February 1961, Oswald had a relationship with Ella German, a co-worker at the factory. He proposed marriage to her at the beginning of 1961 but she refused with the explanation that she did not love him and was afraid to marry an American. Some researchers believe that German's rejection of Oswald's marriage proposal may have had much to do with his disillusionment with life in the Soviet Union and his decision to return to the United States. \n\nOswald wrote in his diary in January 1961: \"I am starting to reconsider my desire about staying. The work is drab, the money I get has nowhere to be spent. No nightclubs or bowling alleys, no places of recreation except the trade union dances. I have had enough.\" Shortly afterwards, Oswald (who had never formally renounced his U.S. citizenship) wrote to the U.S. Embassy in Moscow requesting return of his American passport, and proposing to return to the U.S. if any charges against him would be dropped. \n\nIn March 1961, Oswald met Marina Nikolayevna Prusakova, a 19-year-old pharmacology student; they married less than six weeks later in April.Though later reports described her uncle, with whom she was living, as a colonel in the KGB, he was a lumber industry expert in the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) with a bureaucratic rank of Polkovnik. Priscilla Johnson McMillan, Marina and Lee, Harper & Row, 1977, pp. 64–65. ISBN 978-0-06-012953-8. \nThe Oswalds' first child, June, was born on February 15, 1962. On May 24, 1962, Oswald and Marina applied at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow for documents enabling her to immigrate to the U.S. and, on June 1, the U.S. Embassy gave Oswald a repatriation loan of $435.71.\nOswald, Marina, and their infant daughter left for the United States, where they received no attention from the press, much to Oswald's disappointment. \n\nDallas–Fort Worth\n\nThe Oswalds soon settled in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, where Lee's mother and brother lived. Lee began a manuscript on Soviet life, though he eventually gave up the project. The Oswalds also became acquainted with a number of anti-Communist Russian and East European émigrés in the area. In testimony to the Warren Commission, Alexander Kleinlerer said that the Russian émigrés sympathized with Marina, while merely tolerating Oswald, whom they regarded as rude and arrogant.Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 11, p. 123, [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh11/html/WC_Vol11_0067a.htm Affidavit of Alexander Kleinlerer]: \"Anna Meller, Mrs. Hall, George Bouhe, and the deMohrenschildts, and all that group had pity for Marina and her child. None of us cared for Oswald because of his political philosophy, his criticism of the United States, his apparent lack of interest in anyone but himself, and because of his treatment of Marina.\"\n\nAlthough the Russian émigrés eventually abandoned Marina when she made no sign of leaving Lee, Oswald found an unlikely friend in 51-year-old Russian émigré George de Mohrenschildt, a well-educated petroleum geologist with international business connections. A native of Russia, Mohrenschildt later was to tell the Warren Commission that Oswald had a \"remarkable fluency in Russian.\" Marina, meanwhile, befriended Ruth Paine, a Quaker who was trying to learn Russian, and her husband Michael Paine, who worked for Bell Helicopter. \n\nIn July 1962, Oswald was hired by the Leslie Welding Company in Dallas; he disliked the work and quit after three months. In October, he was hired by the graphic-arts firm of Jaggars-Chiles-Stovall as a photoprint trainee. A fellow employee at Jaggars-Chiles-Stovall testified that Oswald's rudeness at his new job was such that fights threatened to break out, and that he once saw Oswald reading a Russian-language publication. Warren Commission Hearings, Testimony of Dennis Hyman Ofstein: 'I would say he didn't get along with people and that several people had words with him at times about the way he barged around the plant, and one of the fellows back in the photosetter department almost got in a fight with him one day, and I believe it was Mr. Graef that stepped in and broke it up before it got started...' Oswald was fired during the first week of April 1963. \nSome have suggested that Oswald might have used equipment at the firm to forge identification documents. \n\nEdwin Walker assassination attempt\n\nIn March 1963, Oswald purchased a 6.5 mm caliber Carcano rifle by mail-order, using the alias \"A. Hidell\", as well as a .38 Smith & Wesson Model 10 revolver by the same method. On April 10, 1963, Oswald attempted to kill retired U.S. Major General Edwin Walker, firing that rifle at Walker through a window, from less than 100 ft away, as Walker sat at a desk in his Dallas home; the bullet struck the window-frame and Walker's only injuries were bullet fragments to the forearm. (The United States House Select Committee on Assassinations stated that the \"evidence strongly suggested\" that Oswald carried out the shooting.) \n\nGeneral Walker was an outspoken anti-communist, segregationist, and member of the John Birch Society. In 1961, Walker had been relieved of his command of the 24th Division of the U.S. Army in West Germany for distributing right-wing literature to his troops. Walker's later actions in opposition to racial integration at the University of Mississippi led to his arrest on insurrection, seditious conspiracy, and other charges. He was temporarily held in a mental institution on orders from President Kennedy's brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, but a grand jury refused to indict him. \n\nMarina Oswald testified that her husband told her that he traveled by bus to General Walker's house and shot at Walker with his rifle. She said that Oswald considered Walker to be the leader of a \"fascist organization.\" A note Oswald left for Marina on the night of the attempt, telling her what to do if he did not return, was not found until ten days after the Kennedy assassination. \n\nBefore the Kennedy assassination, Dallas police had no suspects in the Walker shooting, \nbut Oswald's involvement was suspected within hours of his arrest following the assassination. The Walker bullet was too damaged to run conclusive ballistics studies on it, but neutron activation analysis later showed that it was \"extremely likely\" that it was made by the same manufacturer and for the same rifle make as the two bullets which later struck Kennedy.United States House Select Committee on Assassinations,\n\n[http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/m_j_russ/hscaguin.htm Testimony of Dr. Vincent P. Guinn]:\nMr. WOLF. In your professional opinion, Dr. Guinn, is the fragment removed from General Walker's house a fragment from a WCC (Western Cartridge Company) Mannlicher–Carcano bullet?\nDr. GUINN. I would say that it is extremely likely that it is, because there are very few, very few other ammunitions that would be in this range. I don't know of any that are specifically this close as these numbers indicate, but somewhere near them there are a few others, but essentially this is in the range that is rather characteristic of WCC Mannlicher–Carcano bullet lead.\n\nGeorge de Mohrenschildt testified that he \"knew that Oswald disliked General Walker.\" Regarding this, de Mohrenschildt and his wife Jeanne recalled an incident that occurred the weekend following the Walker assassination attempt. The de Mohrenschildts testified that on April 14, 1963, just before Easter Sunday, they were visiting the Oswalds at their new apartment and had brought them a toy Easter bunny to give to their child. As Oswald's wife Marina was showing Jeanne around the apartment, they discovered Oswald's rifle standing upright, leaning against the wall inside a closet. Jeanne told George that Oswald had a rifle, and George joked to Oswald, \"Were you the one who took a pot-shot at General Walker?\" When asked about Oswald's reaction to this question, George de Mohrenschildt told the Warren Commission that Oswald \"smiled at that.\" When George's wife Jeanne was asked about Oswald's reaction, she said, \"I didn't notice anything\"; she continued, \"we started laughing our heads off, big joke, big George's joke.\" Jeanne de Mohrenschildt testified that this was the last time she or her husband ever saw the Oswalds. \n\nNew Orleans\n\nOswald returned to New Orleans on April 24, 1963. Marina's friend, Ruth Paine, drove her by car from Dallas to join Oswald in New Orleans the next month in May. On May 10, Oswald was hired by the Reily Coffee Company as a machinery greaser. He was fired in July \"because his work was not satisfactory and because he spent too much time loitering in Adrian Alba's garage next door, where he read rifle and hunting magazines.\" \n\nOn May 26, Oswald wrote to the New York City headquarters of the pro-Castro Fair Play for Cuba Committee, proposing to rent \"a small office at my own expense for the purpose of forming a FPCC branch here in New Orleans.\" Three days later, the FPCC responded to Oswald's letter advising against opening a New Orleans office \"at least not ... at the very beginning.\" In a follow-up letter, Oswald replied, \"Against your advice, I have decided to take an office from the very beginning.\" \n\nOn May 29, Oswald ordered the following items from a local printer: 500 application forms, 300 membership cards, and 1,000 leaflets with the heading, \"Hands Off Cuba.\" According to Lee Oswald's wife Marina, Lee told her to sign the name \"A.J. Hidell\" as chapter president on his membership card.\n\nOn August 5 and 6, according to anti-Castro militant Carlos Bringuier, Oswald visited him at a store he owned in New Orleans. Bringuier was the New Orleans delegate for the anti-Castro organization Directorio Revolucionario Estudantil (DRE). Bringuier would later tell the Warren Commission that he believed Oswald's visits were an attempt by Oswald to infiltrate his group. On August 9, Oswald turned up in downtown New Orleans handing out pro-Castro leaflets. Bringuier confronted Oswald, claiming he was tipped off about Oswald's leafleting by a friend. A scuffle ensued and Oswald, Bringuier, and two of Bringuier's friends were arrested for disturbing the peace. Prior to leaving the police station, Oswald requested to speak with an FBI agent. Oswald stated that he was a member of the New Orleans branch of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee which he claimed had 35 members and was led by A. J. Hidell. In fact, Oswald was the branch's only member and it had never been chartered by the national organization.\n\nA week later, on August 16, Oswald again passed out Fair Play for Cuba leaflets with two hired helpers, this time in front of the International Trade Mart. The incident was filmed by WDSU, a local TV station. The next day, Oswald was interviewed by WDSU radio commentator William Stuckey, who probed Oswald's background. A few days later, Oswald accepted Stuckey's invitation to take part in a radio debate with Carlos Bringuier and Bringuier's associate Edward Scannell Butler, head of the right-wing Information Council of the Americas (INCA). \n\nMexico\n\nMarina's friend Ruth Paine transported Marina and her child by car from New Orleans to the Paine home in Irving, Texas, near Dallas, on September 23, 1963. Oswald stayed in New Orleans at least two more days to collect a $33 unemployment check. It is uncertain when he left New Orleans; he is next known to have boarded a bus in Houston on September 26—bound for the Mexican border, rather than Dallas—and to have told other bus passengers that he planned to travel to Cuba via Mexico. He arrived in Mexico City on September 27, where he applied for a transit visa at the Cuban Embassy, claiming he wanted to visit Cuba on his way to the Soviet Union. The Cuban embassy officials insisted Oswald would need Soviet approval, but he was unable to get prompt co-operation from the Soviet embassy.\n\nAfter five days of shuttling between consulates—that included a heated argument with an official at the Cuban consulate, impassioned pleas to KGB agents, and at least some CIA scrutiny —Oswald was told by a Cuban consular officer that he was disinclined to approve the visa, saying \"a person like [Oswald] in place of aiding the Cuban Revolution, was doing it harm.\" Later, on October 18, the Cuban embassy approved the visa, but by this time Oswald was back in the United States and had given up on his plans to visit Cuba and the Soviet Union. Still later, eleven days before the assassination of President Kennedy, Oswald wrote to the Soviet embassy in Washington, D.C., saying, \"Had I been able to reach the Soviet Embassy in Havana, as planned, the embassy there would have had time to complete our business.\" \n\nWhile the Warren Commission concluded that Oswald had visited Mexico City and the Cuban and Soviet consulates, questions regarding whether someone posing as Oswald had appeared at the embassies were serious enough to be investigated by the House Select Committee on Assassinations. Later, the Committee agreed with the Warren Commission that Oswald had visited Mexico City and concluded that \"the majority of evidence tends to indicate\" that Oswald in fact visited the consulates, but the Committee could not rule out the possibility that someone else had used his name in visiting the consulates. \n\nReturn to Dallas\n\nOn October 2, 1963, Oswald left Mexico City by bus and arrived in Dallas the next day. Ruth Paine said that her neighbor told her, on October 14, that there was a job opening at the Texas School Book Depository, where her neighbor's brother, Wesley Frazier, worked. Mrs. Paine informed Oswald, who was interviewed at the Depository and was hired there on October 16 as a $1.25 an hour order filler. Oswald's supervisor, Roy S. Truly (1907-1985), said that Oswald \"did a good day's work\" and was an above-average employee. During the week, Oswald stayed in a Dallas rooming house (under the name \"O.H. Lee\"), but he spent his weekends with Marina at the Paine home in Irving. Oswald did not drive, but commuted to and from Dallas on Mondays and Fridays with his co-worker Wesley Frazier. On October 20, the Oswalds' second daughter, Audrey, was born.\n\nFBI agents twice visited the Paine home in early November, when Oswald was not present, and spoke to Mrs. Paine. Oswald visited the Dallas FBI office about 2 to 3 weeks before the assassination, asking to see Special Agent James P. Hosty. When he was told that Hosty was unavailable, Oswald left a note that, according to the receptionist, read: \"Let this be a warning. I will blow up the FBI and the Dallas Police Department if you don't stop bothering my wife\" [signed] \"Lee Harvey Oswald.\" The note allegedly contained some sort of threat, but accounts vary as to whether Oswald threatened to \"blow up the FBI\" or merely \"report this to higher authorities\". According to Hosty, the note said, \"If you have anything you want to learn about me, come talk to me directly. If you don't cease bothering my wife, I will take the appropriate action and report this to the proper authorities.\" Agent Hosty said that he destroyed Oswald's note on orders from his superior, Gordon Shanklin, after Oswald was named the suspect in the Kennedy assassination. \n\nJohn F. Kennedy and J. D. Tippit shootings\n\nIn the days before Kennedy's arrival, several newspapers described the route of the presidential motorcade as passing the Book Depository. On November 21 (a Thursday) Oswald asked Frazier for an unusual mid-week lift back to Irving, saying he had to pick up some curtain rods. The next morning (Friday) he returned to Dallas with Frazier; he left behind $170 and his wedding ring, but took with him a paper bag. Frazier reported that Oswald told him the bag contained curtain rods, The evidence demonstrated that the package actually contained the rifle used by Oswald in the assassination. \n\nOswald's co-worker, Charles Givens, testified to the Commission that he last saw Oswald on the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository (TSBD) at approximately 11:55 a.m.—35 minutes before the assassination.Warren Commission Hearings, [http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/testimony/givens1.htm Testimony of Charles Givens]. The Commission report stated that Oswald was not seen again \"until after the shooting.\" However, in an FBI report taken the day after the assassination, Givens said that the encounter took place at 11:30 a.m. and that he later saw Oswald reading a newspaper in the first floor domino room at 11:50 a.m. William Shelley, a foreman at the Depository, also testified that he saw Oswald on the first floor talking on the telephone between 11:45 and 11:50 a.m. Janitor Eddie Piper also testified that he spoke to Oswald on the first floor at 12:00 p.m. Another co-worker, Bonnie Ray Williams, was on the sixth floor of the Depository eating his lunch and was there until at least 12:10 p.m. He said that during that time he did not see Oswald, or anyone else, on the sixth floor and felt he was the only one up there. However, he also said that some boxes in the southeast corner may have prevented him from seeing deep into the \"sniper's nest.\" Carolyn Arnold, the secretary to the Vice President of the TSBD, informed the FBI that as she left the building to watch the motorcade, she caught a glimpse of a man whom she believed to be Oswald standing in the first floor hallway of the building just prior to the assassination. In 1978, Arnold told author Anthony Summers that the FBI report misquoted her, and that she \"clearly\" saw Oswald sitting in the second floor lunchroom at 12:15 p.m or slightly after. However, no other depository employee reported seeing Oswald on the second floor between 12 noon and 12:30 pm (e.g., [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh22/html/WH_Vol22_0351b.htm Mrs. Pauline Sanders], who left the second floor lunchroom at \"approximately 12:20 pm,\" did not see Oswald at all that day).\n\nAs Kennedy's motorcade passed through Dallas's Dealey Plaza at about 12:30 p.m. on November 22, Oswald fired three rifle shots from the sixth-floor, southeast corner window of the Book Depository, killing the President and seriously wounding Texas Governor John Connally. One shot apparently missed the presidential limousine entirely, another struck Kennedy and Texas Governor John Connally, and another struck Kennedy in the head. Bystander James Tague received a minor facial injury from a small piece of curbstone that fragmented when struck by one of the bullets.\n\nHoward Brennan, a steamfitter who was sitting across the street from the Texas School Book Depository, notified police that as he watched the motorcade go by, he heard a shot come from above, and looked up to see a man with a rifle make another shot from a corner window on the sixth floor. He said he had seen the same man minutes earlier looking out the window. Brennan gave a description of the shooter, and Dallas police subsequently broadcast descriptions at 12:45 p.m., 12:48 p.m., and 12:55 p.m. After the second shot was fired, Brennan recalled, \"This man I saw previous was aiming for his last shot ... and maybe paused for another second as though to assure himself that he had hit his mark.\" \n\nAccording to the investigations, after the attack, Oswald hid and covered the rifle with boxes and descended using the rear stairwell. About ninety seconds after the shooting, in the second-floor lunchroom, Oswald encountered police officer Marrion Baker accompanied by Oswald's supervisor Roy Truly; Baker let Oswald pass after Truly identified him as an employee. According to Baker, Oswald did not appear to be nervous or out of breath. Truly said that Oswald appeared \"startled\" when Baker aimed his gun at him. Mrs. Robert Reid—clerical supervisor at the Depository, returning to her office within two minutes of the assassination—said that she saw Oswald who \"was very calm\" on the second floor with a Coke in his hands. As they walked past each other, Mrs. Reid said to Oswald, \"The President has been shot\" to which he mumbled something in response, but Reid did not understand him. Oswald is believed to have left the Depository through the front entrance just before police sealed it off. Oswald's supervisor, Roy Truly, later pointed out to officers that Oswald was the only employee that he was certain was missing. \n\nAt about 12:40 p.m., Oswald boarded a city bus but (probably due to heavy traffic) he requested a transfer from the bus driver and got off two blocks later. Oswald took a taxicab to his rooming house, at 1026 North Beckley Avenue, arriving at about 1:00 p.m. He entered through the front door and, according to his housekeeper Earlene Roberts, immediately went to his room, \"walking pretty fast\". Roberts said that Oswald left \"a very few minutes\" later, zipping up a jacket he was not wearing when he had entered earlier. As Oswald left, Roberts looked out of the window of her house and last saw him standing at the northbound Beckley Avenue bus stop in front of her house. \n\nThe Warren Commission concluded that at approximately 1:15 p.m., Dallas Patrolman J. D. Tippit drove up in his patrol car alongside Oswald—presumably because Oswald resembled the police broadcast description of the man seen by witness Howard Brennan firing shots at the presidential motorcade. Patrolman Tippit's encounter with Oswald occurred near the corner of East 10th Street and North Patton Avenue. This location is about nine-tenths of a mile (1.4 km) southeast of Oswald's rooming house—a distance that the Warren Commission concluded \"Oswald could have easily walked.\" Tippit pulled alongside Oswald and \"apparently exchanged words with [him] through the right front or vent window.\" \"Shortly after 1:15 p.m.\",The [http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/dpdtapes/tapes2.htm first report of Tippit's shooting] was transmitted over Police Channel 1 some time between 1:16 and 1:19 p.m., as indicated by verbal time stamps made periodically by the dispatcher. Specifically, the first report began 1 minute 41 seconds after the 1:16 time stamp. Before that, witness Domingo Benavides could be heard unsuccessfully trying to use Tippit's police radio microphone, beginning at 1:16. Dale K. Myers, With Malice: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Murder of Officer J.D. Tippit, 1998, p. 384. ISBN 0-9662709-7-5. Tippit exited his car and was immediately struck and killed by four shots. \nNumerous witnesses heard the shots and saw Oswald flee the scene holding a revolver; nine positively identified him as the man who shot Tippit and fled.By the evening of November 22, five of them (Helen Markham, Barbara Jeanette Davis, Virginia Davis, Ted Callaway, Sam Guinyard) had identified Lee Harvey Oswald in police lineups as the man they saw. A sixth (William Scoggins) did so the next day. Three others (Harold Russell, Pat Patterson, Warren Reynolds) subsequently identified Oswald from a photograph. Two witnesses (Domingo Benavides, William Arthur Smith) testified that Oswald resembled the man they had seen. One witness (L.J. Lewis) felt he was too distant from the gunman to make a positive identification. Warren Commission Hearings, CE 1968, [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh23/html/WH_Vol23_0425a.htm Location of Eyewitnesses to the Movements of Lee Harvey Oswald in the Vicinity of the Tippit Killing]. Four cartridge cases found at the scene were identified by expert witnesses before the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee as having been fired from the revolver later found in Oswald's possession, to the exclusion of all other weapons. However, the bullets taken from Tippit's body could not be positively identified as having been fired from Oswald's revolver as the bullets were too extensively damaged to make conclusive assessments.Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 3, pp. 466–473, [http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh3/html/WC_Vol3_0237b.htm Testimony of Cortlandt Cunningham]. Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 3, p. 511, [http://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh3/html/WC_Vol3_0260a.htm Testimony of Joseph D. Nicol]. \n\nCapture\n\nShoe store manager Johnny Brewer testified that he saw Oswald \"ducking into\" the entrance alcove of his store. Suspicious of this activity, Brewer watched Oswald continue up the street and slip into the nearby Texas Theatre without paying. He alerted the theater's ticket clerk, who telephoned police at about 1:40 p.m.\n\nAs police arrived, the house lights were brought up and Brewer pointed out Oswald sitting near the rear of the theater. Police Officer Nick McDonald testified that he was the first to reach Oswald and that Oswald seemed ready to surrender saying, \"Well, it is all over now.\" However, Officer McDonald said that Oswald pulled out a pistol tucked into the front of his pants, then pointed the pistol at him, and pulled the trigger. McDonald stated that the pistol did not fire because the pistol's hammer came down on the webbing between the thumb and index finger of his hand as he grabbed for the pistol. McDonald also said that Oswald struck him, but that he struck back and Oswald was disarmed. As he was led from the theater, Oswald shouted he was a victim of police brutality.[http://www.jfk-online.com/mcdonald.html \"Oswald and Officer McDonald:The Arrest of Lee Harvey Oswald\"]. Retrieved June 21, 2011.\n\nAt about 2 p.m., Oswald arrived at the Police Department building, where he was questioned by Detective Jim Leavelle about the shooting of Officer Tippit. When Captain J. W. Fritz heard Oswald's name, he recognized it as that of the Book Depository employee who was reported missing and was already a suspect in the assassination. Oswald was formally arraigned for the murder of Officer Tippit at 7:10 p.m., and by the end of the night (shortly after 1:30 a.m.) he had been arraigned for the murder of President Kennedy as well. \n\nSoon after his capture Oswald encountered reporters in a hallway. Oswald declared, \"I didn't shoot anybody\" and, \"They've taken me in because of the fact that I lived in the Soviet Union. I'm just a patsy!\" Later, at an arranged press meeting, a reporter asked, \"Did you kill the President?\" and Oswald—who by that time had been advised of the charge of murdering Tippit, but had not yet been arraigned in Kennedy's death—answered, \"No, I have not been charged with that. In fact, nobody has said that to me yet. The first thing I heard about it was when the newspaper reporters in the hall asked me that question.\" As he was led from the room the question was called out, \"What did you do in Russia?\" and, \"How did you hurt your eye?\"; Oswald answered, \"A policeman hit me.\" \n\nPolice interrogation\n\nOswald was interrogated several times during his two days at Dallas Police Headquarters. He admitted that he went to his rooming house after leaving the book depository. He also admitted that he changed his clothes and armed himself with a .38 revolver before leaving his house to go to the theater. However, Oswald denied killing Kennedy and Tippit; denied owning a rifle; said two photographs of him holding a rifle and a pistol were fakes; denied telling his co-worker he wanted a ride to Irving to get curtain rods for his apartment (he said that the package contained his lunch); and denied carrying a long, bulky package to work the morning of the assassination. Oswald also denied knowing an \"A. J. Hidell\". Oswald was then shown a forged Selective Service System card bearing his photograph and the alias, \"Alek James Hidell\" that he had in his possession at the time of his arrest. Oswald refused to answer any questions concerning the card, saying \"...you have the card yourself and you know as much about it as I do.\" \n\nThe first interrogation of Oswald was conducted by FBI Special Agent James P. Hosty and Dallas Police Captain Will Fritz (chief of homicide) on Friday, November 22. Asked to account for himself at the time of the assassination, Oswald replied that he was eating his lunch in the first floor lounge (known as the \"domino room\"). He said that he then went to the second-floor lunchroom to buy a Coca-Cola from the soda machine there and was drinking it when he was encountered by Dallas motorcycle policeman (Marrion L. Baker). Oswald said that while he was in the domino room, he saw two \"Negro employees\" walking by, one he recognized as \"Junior\" and a shorter man whose name he could not recall. Junior Jarman and Harold Norman confirmed to the Warren Commission that they had \"walked through\" the domino room around noon during their lunch break. When asked if anyone else was in the domino room, Norman testified that somebody else was there, but he could not remember who it was. Jarman testified that Oswald was not in the domino room when he was there. \n\nDuring one of the interrogation sessions, Deputy-sheriff Roger D. Craig entered the room and noticed that the suspect had openly confessed before his interrogators that he had left the Texas School Book Depository building around the time of the shooting, and when Capt. Will Fritz tried to imply wrongdoing at Oswald’s sudden departure from the building, saying to him: “This man (i.e. deputy Craig) saw you leave,” Oswald quickly retorted with no sense of guilt, “I told you people I did.” Meaning, there was nothing to conceal, in Oswald’s view, at his departure from the building. When Oswald was asked about the car he had gotten into, he replied: “That station wagon belongs to Mrs. Paine. Don't try to drag her into this.” At one point in the investigation, according to Craig, Oswald said in utter dismay, “Everybody will know who I am now.” The Warren Commission report, however, made it appear as though it was said in a dramatic tone, writing instead: “NOW everybody will know who I am,” transposing the now. According to Craig, the real intonation was that of someone who had heretofore tried to conceal his identity as Deputy and that now it would be known to all; his reaction was that of dismay and disappointment at being exposed. \n\nDuring his last interrogation on November 24, according to postal inspector Harry Holmes, Oswald was again asked where he was at the time of the shooting. Holmes (who attended the interrogation at the invitation of Captain Will Fritz) said that Oswald replied that he was working on an upper floor when the shooting occurred, then went downstairs where he encountered Dallas motorcycle policeman (Marrion L. Baker). \n\nOswald asked for legal representation several times while being interrogated, as well as in encounters with reporters. But when H. Louis Nichols, President of the Dallas Bar Association met with him in his cell on Saturday, he declined their services, saying he wanted to be represented by John Abt, chief counsel to the Communist Party USA, or by lawyers associated with the American Civil Liberties Union. Both Oswald and Ruth Paine tried to reach Abt by telephone several times Saturday and Sunday, but Abt was away for the weekend. Oswald also declined his brother Robert's offer on Saturday to obtain a local attorney. \n\nDuring an interrogation with Captain Fritz, when asked, \"Are you a communist?\", he replied, \"No, I am not a communist. I am a Marxist.\" \n\nDeath\n\nOn Sunday, November 24, Oswald was being led through the basement of Dallas Police Headquarters toward an armored car that was to take him to the nearby county jail. At 11:21 a.m. CST, Dallas nightclub operator Jack Ruby stepped from the crowd and shot Oswald in the abdomen. Oswald was taken unconscious by ambulance to Parkland Memorial Hospital—the same hospital where doctors tried to save President Kennedy's life two days earlier. Oswald died at 1:07 p.m. Oswald's death was announced on a TV news broadcast by Dallas police chief Jesse Curry.\n\nAn autopsy on Oswald was performed in the Office of the County Medical Examiner at 2:45 p.m. the same day. Announcing the results of the gross autopsy, Dallas County medical examiner Earl Rose said: \"The two things that we could determine were, first, that he died from a hemorrhage from a gunshot wound, and that otherwise he was a physically healthy male.\" Rose's examination found that Ruby's bullet entered Oswald's left side in the front part of the abdomen and caused damage to his spleen, stomach, aorta, vena cava, kidney, liver, diaphragm, and eleventh rib before coming to rest on his right side.\n\nA network television pool camera, there to cover the transfer, was broadcasting live; millions watching on NBC witnessed the shooting as it happened and on other networks within minutes afterward. In 1964, Robert H. Jackson of the Dallas Times Herald was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Photography for his photograph of the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby. \n\nRuby's motive\n\nRuby later said he had been distraught over Kennedy's death and that his motive for killing Oswald was \"saving Mrs. Kennedy the discomfiture of coming back to trial.\" Others have hypothesized that Ruby was part of a conspiracy. G. Robert Blakey, chief counsel \nfor the House Select Committee on Assassinations from 1977 to 1979, said: \"The most plausible explanation for the murder of Oswald by Jack Ruby was that Ruby had stalked him on behalf of organized crime, trying to reach him on at least three occasions in the forty-eight hours before he silenced him forever.\" \n\nBurial\n\nOswald was buried on November 25 in Shannon Rose Hill Memorial Burial Park in Fort Worth. Reporters present to report on the burial were asked by officials to act as pallbearers. A marker inscribed simply Oswald replaces the stolen original tombstone, which gave Oswald's full name, and birth and death dates. His mother was buried beside him in 1981. \n\nA claim that a look-alike Russian agent was buried in place of Oswald led to his exhumation on October 4, 1981. Dental records confirmed that it was Oswald's body in the grave and he was reburied in a new coffin due to water damage to the original.\n\nIn 2010, the Fort Worth funeral home that held Oswald's original coffin employed a Los Angeles auction house to sell it to an undisclosed bidder for $87,468. The sale was halted after Oswald's brother, Robert, learned of the transaction in a Texas newspaper and sued to reclaim the coffin. In January 2015, a district judge in Tarrant County, Texas ruled that the funeral home intentionally concealed the existence of the pine coffin from Robert Oswald who had originally purchased it and believed that it been discarded after the exhumation. The court ordered it returned to Oswald's brother, plus damages equal to the sale price. Robert Oswald's attorney stated that the coffin would likely be destroyed \"as soon as possible\".\n\nOfficial investigations\n\nWarren Commission\n\nThe Warren Commission, created by President Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate the assassination, concluded that Oswald acted alone in assassinating Kennedy (this view is known as the lone gunman theory). The Commission could not ascribe any one motive or group of motives to Oswald's actions:\n\nThe proceedings of the commission were closed, though not secret, and about 3% of its files have yet to be released to the public, which has continued to provoke speculation among researchers.\"Two misconceptions about the Warren Commission hearing need to be clarified...hearings were closed to the public unless the witness appearing before the Commission requested an open hearing. No witness except one...requested an open hearing...Second, although the hearings (except one) were conducted in private, they were not secret. In a secret hearing, the witness is instructed not to disclose his testimony to any third party, and the hearing testimony is not published for public consumption. The witnesses who appeared before the Commission were free to repeat what they said to anyone they pleased, and all of their testimony was subsequently published in the first fifteen volumes put out by the Warren Commission.\" (Bugliosi, p. 332)\n\nRamsey Clark Panel\n\nIn 1968, the Ramsey Clark Panel examined various photographs, X-ray films, documents, and other evidence, concluding that Kennedy was struck by two bullets fired from above and behind him, one of which traversed the base of the neck on the right side without striking bone, and the other of which entered the skull from behind and destroyed its right side. \n\nHouse Select Committee\n\nIn 1979, after a review of the evidence and of prior investigations, the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) largely concurred with the Warren Commission and was preparing to issue a finding that Oswald had acted alone in killing Kennedy. However, late in the Committee's proceedings a dictabelt recording was introduced, purportedly recording sounds heard in Dealey Plaza before, during and after the shots were fired. After an analysis by the firm Bolt, Beranek and Newman appeared to indicate more than three gunshots, the HSCA revised its findings to assert a \"high probability that two gunmen fired\" at Kennedy and that Kennedy \"was probably assassinated as the result of a conspiracy.\" Although the Committee was \"unable to identify the other gunman or the extent of the conspiracy,\" it made a number of further findings regarding the likelihood or unlikelihood that particular groups, named in the findings, were involved. Four of the twelve members of the HSCA dissented from this conclusion.\n\nThe acoustical evidence has since been discredited. Officer H.B. McLain, from whose motorcycle radio the HSCA acoustic experts said the Dictabelt evidence came, has repeatedly stated that he was not yet in Dealey Plaza at the time of the assassination. McLain asked the Committee, \"‘If it was my radio on my motorcycle, why did it not record the revving up at high speed plus my siren when we immediately took off for Parkland Hospital?’” \n\nIn 1982, a panel of twelve scientists appointed by the National Academy of Sciences, including Nobel laureates Norman Ramsey and Luis Alvarez, unanimously concluded that the acoustic evidence submitted to the HSCA was \"seriously flawed\", was recorded after the President had been shot, and did not indicate additional gunshots. Their conclusions were later published in the journal Science. \n\nIn a 2001 article in the journal Science & Justice, D.B. Thomas wrote that the NAS investigation was itself flawed. He concluded with a 96.3 percent certainty that there were at least two gunmen firing at President Kennedy and that at least one shot came from the grassy knoll. In 2005, Thomas's conclusions were rebutted in the same journal. Ralph Linsker and several members of the original NAS team reanalyzed the timings of the recordings and reaffirmed the earlier conclusion of the NAS report that the alleged shot sounds were recorded approximately one minute after the assassination. In 2010, D.B. Thomas challenged in a book the 2005 Science & Justice article and restated his conclusion that there were at least two gunmen. \n\nOther investigations and dissenting theories\n\n \n\nSome critics have not accepted the conclusions of the Warren Commission and have proposed several other theories, such as that Oswald conspired with others, or was not involved at all and was framed.\n\nIn October 1981, with Marina's support, Oswald's grave was opened to test a theory propounded by writer Michael Eddowes: that during Oswald's stay in the Soviet Union he was replaced with a Soviet double; that it was this double, not Oswald, who killed Kennedy and who is buried in Oswald's grave; and that the exhumed remains would therefore not exhibit a surgical scar Oswald was known to carry. Dental records positively identified the exhumed corpse as Oswald's, and the scar was present.W. Tracy Parnell, [http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/parnell/xindex.htm The Exhumation of Lee Harvey Oswald]. Contrary to reports, the skull of Oswald had been autopsied and this was also confirmed at the exhumation. W. Tracy Parnell, [http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/parnell/dimaio.htm My Interview With Dr. Vincent J.M. Di Maio].\n\nPublic opinion\n\nA 2003 Gallup poll reported that 75% of Americans do not believe that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in assassinating President Kennedy. That same year an ABC News poll found that 70% of respondents suspected that the assassination involved more than one person. A 2004 Fox News poll found that 66% of Americans thought there had been a conspiracy while 74% thought there had been a cover-up. A Gallup Poll taken in mid-November 2013, showed 61% believed in a conspiracy, and only 30% thought Oswald acted alone. \n\nFictional trials\n\nSeveral films have fictionalized a trial of Oswald, depicting what may have happened had Ruby not killed Oswald. The Trial of Lee Harvey Oswald (1964); The Trial of Lee Harvey Oswald (1977); and On Trial: Lee Harvey Oswald (1986) have fictionalized a trial of Oswald. In 1988, a 21-hour unscripted mock trial was held on television, argued by lawyers before a judge, with unscripted testimony from surviving witnesses to the events surrounding the assassination; the jury returned a verdict of guilty. In 1992 the American Bar Association conducted two mock Oswald trials. The first trial ended in a hung jury. In the second trial the jury acquitted Oswald.\n\nBackyard photos\n\nThe \"backyard photos\", taken by Marina Oswald probably around March 31, 1963 using a camera belonging to Oswald, show Oswald holding two Marxist newspapers—The Militant and The Worker—and a rifle, and wearing a pistol in a holster. Shown the pictures after his arrest, Oswald insisted they were forgeries, but Marina testified in 1964 that she had taken the photographs at Oswald's request— testimony she reaffirmed repeatedly over the decades.\n*[http://www.jfk-online.com/marinashaw2.html Testimony of Marina Oswald Porter], Trial of Clay Shaw, Criminal District Court, Orleans Parish, Louisiana, February 21, 1969.\n*United States House Select Committee on Assassinations, [http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/jfkinfo4/jfk12/marinade.htm#maraug Deposition of Marina Oswald Porter] (1977):\nQ. I want to mark these two photographs. On the back of the first one, which I would ask be marked JFK committee exhibit No. 1, it says in the bottom right-hand corner copy from the National Archives, records group No. 272, under that it says CE-133B. I will ask that be marked JFK exhibit No. 1. (The above referred to photograph was marked JFK committee exhibit No. 1 for identification.)\nQ. New, this second picture that I will ask to be marked says copy from the National Archives, record group No. 272, CE-133. I would ask that this be marked JFK committee exhibit No. 2. (The above referred to photograph was marked JFK committee exhibit No. 2 for identification.)\nBy Mr. KLEIN:\nQ. I will show you those two photographs which are marked JFK exhibit No. 1 and exhibit No. 2, do you recognize those two photographs?\nA. I sure do. I have seen them many times.\nQ. What are they?\nA. That is the pictures that I took.\n*United States House Select Committee on Assassinations, Hearings, vol. 2 p. 239, [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol2/html/HSCA_Vol2_0122a.htm Testimony of Marina Oswald Porter] (1978):\nMr. McDONALD. Mrs. Porter, I have got two exhibits to show you, if the clerk would procure them from the representatives of the National Archives. We have two photographs to show you. They are [http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol6/html/HSCA_Vol6_0094a.htm Warren Commission Exhibits C-133-A and B], which have been given JFK Nos. F-378 and F-379. If the clerk would please hand them to you, and also if we could now have for display purposes JFK Exhibit F-179, which is a blowup of the two photographs placed in front of you. Mrs. Porter, do you recognize the photographs placed in front of you?\nMrs. PORTER. Yes, I do.\nMr. McDONALD. And how do you recognize them?\nMrs. PORTER. That is the photograph that I made of Lee on his persistent request of taking a picture of him dressed like that with rifle.\n*Marina Oswald Porter, interview with author Vincent Bugliosi and lawyer Jack Duffy, Dallas, Texas, November 30, 2000, reported in Bugliosi, Reclaiming History, p. 794.\nThese photos were labelled CE 133-A and CE 133-B. CE 133-A shows the rifle in Oswald's left hand and newspapers in front of his chest in the other, while the rifle is held with the right hand in CE 133-B. Oswald's mother testified that on the day after the assassination she and Marina destroyed another photograph with Oswald holding the rifle with both hands over his head, with \"To my daughter June\" written on it. \n\nThe HSCA obtained another first-generation print (from CE 133-A) on April 1, 1977, from the widow of George de Mohrenschildt. The words \"Hunter of fascists—ha ha ha!\" written in block Russian were on the back. Also in English were added in script: \"To my friend George, Lee Oswald, 5/IV/63 [April 5, 1963].\" Handwriting experts for the HSCA concluded the English inscription and signature were by Oswald. After two original photos, one negative and one first-generation copy had been found, the Senate Intelligence Committee located (in 1976) a third backyard photo (CE 133-C) showing Oswald with newspapers held away from his body in his right hand.\n\nThese photos, widely recognized as some of the most significant evidence against Oswald, have been subjected to rigorous analysis. Photographic experts consulted by the HSCA concluded they were genuine, answering twenty-one points raised by critics. Marina Oswald has always maintained she took the photos herself, and the 1963 de Mohrenschildt print bearing Oswald's signature clearly indicate they existed before the assassination. Nonetheless, some continue to contest their authenticity. In 2009, after digitally analyzing the photograph of Oswald holding the rifle and paper, computer scientist Hany Farid concluded that the photo \"almost certainly was not altered.\"", "John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States, was assassinated at 12:30 p.m. Central Standard Time (18:30 UTC) on Friday, November 22, 1963, in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas. Fatally shot by Lee Harvey Oswald, Kennedy was traveling with his wife, Jacqueline, Texas Governor John Connally, and Connally's wife, Nellie, in a presidential motorcade. A ten-month investigation from November 1963 to September 1964 by the Warren Commission concluded that Oswald acted alone in shooting Kennedy, and that Jack Ruby also acted alone when he killed Oswald before he could stand trial. Kennedy's death marked the fourth and latest successful assassination of an American President. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson became President upon Kennedy's death, taking the constitutionally prescribed oath of office onboard Air Force One at Dallas's Love Field airport before departing for Washington, D.C.\n\nIn contrast to the conclusions of the Warren Commission, the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) concluded in 1979 that Kennedy was \"probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy\". The HSCA agreed with the Warren Commission in that Kennedy's and Connally's injuries were caused by Oswald's three rifle shots, but they also determined the existence of additional gunshots based on analysis of an audio recording and therefore \"... a high probability that two gunmen fired at [the] President\". The Committee was not able to identify any individuals or groups involved with the conspiracy. In addition, the HSCA found that the original federal investigations were \"seriously flawed\" in respect of information-sharing and the possibility of conspiracy. As recommended by the HSCA, the acoustic evidence indicating conspiracy was subsequently re-examined and rejected. \n\nIn light of the investigative reports determining that \"reliable acoustic data do not support a conclusion that there was a second gunman\", the Justice Department has concluded active investigations, stating \"that no persuasive evidence can be identified to support the theory of a conspiracy in ... the assassination of President Kennedy\". However, Kennedy's assassination is still the subject of widespread debate and has spawned numerous conspiracy theories and alternative scenarios. Polling in 2013 showed that 60% of Americans believe that a group of conspirators was responsible for the assassination. \n\nAssassination \n\nBackground \n\nJohn Fitzgerald Kennedy traveled to Texas in November 1963 in order to support his next reelection campaign for 1964 United States presidential elections.\n\nRoute to Dealey Plaza\n\nPresident Kennedy's motorcade route through Dallas was planned to give him maximum exposure to Dallas crowds before his arrival, along with Vice President Lyndon Johnson and Texas Governor John Connally, at a luncheon with civic and business leaders in that city. The White House staff informed the Secret Service that the President would arrive in Dallas via a short flight from Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth to Dallas Love Field airport.\n\nThe Dallas Trade Mart had been preliminarily selected for the luncheon and the final decision of the Trade Mart as the end of the motorcade journey was selected by President Kennedy's friend and appointments secretary Kenneth O'Donnell. Leaving from Dallas' Love Field, 45 minutes had been allotted for the motorcade to reach the Dallas Trade Mart at a planned arrival time of 12:15 p.m. The actual route was chosen to be a meandering 10-mile (16-km) route from Love Field to the Trade Mart, which could be driven slowly in the allotted time.\n\nSpecial Agent Winston G. Lawson, a member of the White House detail who acted as the advance Secret Service Agent, and Secret Service Agent Forrest V. Sorrels, Special Agent In Charge of the Dallas office, were most active in planning the actual route. On November 14, Lawson and Sorrels attended a meeting at Love Field and drove over the route that Sorrels believed best suited for the motorcade. From Love Field, the route passed through a portion of suburban Dallas, through the downtown area along Main Street, and finally to the Trade Mart via a short segment of the Stemmons Freeway.\n\nFor the President's return to Love Field, from which he planned to depart for a fund-raising dinner in Austin later in the day, the agents selected a more direct route, which was approximately 4 miles, or 6.4 kilometers (some of this route would be used after the assassination). The planned route to the Trade Mart was widely reported in Dallas newspapers several days before the event, for the benefit of people who wished to view the motorcade.\n\nTo pass through downtown Dallas, a route west along Dallas' Main Street, rather than Elm Street (one block to the north) was chosen, because this was the traditional parade route, and provided the maximal building and crowd views. The Main Street route precluded a direct turn onto the Fort Worth Turnpike exit (which served also as the Stemmons Freeway exit), which was the route to the Trade Mart, because this exit was accessible only from Elm Street. The planned motorcade route thus included a short one-block turn at the end of the downtown segment of Main Street, onto Houston Street for one block northward, before turning again west onto Elm, in order to proceed through Dealey Plaza before exiting Elm onto the Stemmons Freeway. The Texas School Book Depository was situated at this corner of Houston and Elm. \n\nThree vehicles were used for secret service and police protection in the Dallas motorcade. The first car, an unmarked white Ford (hardtop), carried Dallas Police Chief Jesse Curry, Secret Service Agent Win Lawson, Sheriff Bill Decker and Dallas Field Agent Forrest Sorrels. The second car, a 1961 Lincoln Continental convertible, held driver Agent Bill Greer, SAIC Roy Kellerman, Governor John Connally, Nellie Connally, President Kennedy and Jackie Kennedy. \n\nThe third car, a 1955 Cadillac convertible code-named \"Halfback\", contained driver Agent Sam Kinney, ATSAIC Emory Roberts, presidential aides Ken O'Donnell and Dave Powers, driver Agent George Hickey and PRS agent Glen Bennett. Secret service agents Clint Hill, Jack Ready, Tim McIntyre and Paul Landis rode on the running boards. There was an AR-15 rifle in the third vehicle.\n\nOn November 22, after a breakfast speech in Fort Worth, where President Kennedy had stayed overnight after arriving from San Antonio, Houston, and Washington, D.C., the previous day, the president boarded Air Force One, which departed at 11:10 and arrived at Love Field 15 minutes later. At about 11:40, the presidential motorcade left Love Field for the trip through Dallas, which was running on a schedule about 10 minutes longer than the planned 45 minutes, due to enthusiastic crowds estimated at 150,000–200,000 people, and two unplanned stops directed by the president. By the time the motorcade reached Dealey Plaza they were only 5 minutes away from their planned destination.\n\nThe assassination \n\nShooting in Dealey Plaza\n\nAt 12:30 p.m. CST, as President Kennedy's uncovered 1961 Lincoln Continental four-door convertible limousine entered Dealey Plaza, Nellie Connally, then the First Lady of Texas, turned around to President Kennedy, who was sitting behind her, and commented, \"Mr. President, you can't say Dallas doesn't love you,\" which President Kennedy acknowledged by saying \"No, you certainly can't.\" Those were the last words ever spoken by John F. Kennedy. \n\nFrom Houston Street, the presidential limousine made the planned left turn onto Elm Street, allowing it access to the Stemmons Freeway exit. As it turned on Elm, the motorcade passed the Texas School Book Depository. Shots were fired at President Kennedy as they continued down Elm Street. About 80% of the witnesses recalled hearing three shots. \n\nA minority of the witnesses recognized the first gunshot they heard as weapon fire, but there was hardly any reaction to the first shot from a majority of the people in the crowd or those riding in the motorcade. Many later said they heard what they first thought to be a firecracker, or the exhaust backfire of a vehicle, just after the President started waving. \n\nWithin one second of each other, President Kennedy, Governor Connally, and Mrs. Kennedy, all turned abruptly from looking to their left to looking to their right, between Zapruder film frames 155 and 169. Connally, like the President a World War II military veteran (and, unlike him, a longtime hunter), testified he immediately recognized the sound of a high-powered rifle, then he turned his head and torso rightward, attempting to see President Kennedy behind him. Governor Connally testified he could not see the President, so he then started to turn forward again (turning from his right to his left). Connally testified that when his head was facing about 20 degrees left of center, he was hit in his upper right back by a bullet he did not hear fired. The doctor who operated on Connally measured his head at the time he was hit as turned 27 degrees left of center. After Connally was hit he shouted, \"Oh, no, no, no. My God. They're going to kill us all!\" \n\nMrs. Connally testified that just after hearing a loud, frightening noise that came from somewhere behind her and to her right, she turned toward President Kennedy and saw him with his arms and elbows raised high, with his hands in front of his face and throat. She then heard another gunshot and then Governor Connally yelling. Mrs. Connally then turned away from President Kennedy toward her husband, at which point another gunshot sounded and she and the limousine's rear interior were covered with fragments of skull, blood, and brain.\n\nAccording to the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee on Assassinations, as President Kennedy waved to the crowds on his right with his right arm upraised on the side of the limo, a shot entered his upper back, penetrated his neck, slightly damaged a spinal vertebra and the top of his right lung, and exited his throat nearly centerline just beneath his larynx, nicking the left side of his suit tie knot. He raised his elbows and clenched his fists in front of his face and neck, then leaned forward and left. Mrs. Kennedy, facing him, then put her arms around him in concern. \n\nGovernor Connally also reacted after the same bullet penetrated his back just below his right armpit, creating an oval entry wound, impacted and destroyed four inches of his right fifth rib, exited his chest just below his right nipple, creating a two-and-a-half inch oval sucking-air chest wound, entered his arm just above his right wrist, cleanly shattered his right radius bone into eight pieces, exited just below the wrist at the inner side of his right palm, and finally lodged in his left inner thigh. The Warren Commission theorized that the \"single bullet\" (see single-bullet theory) struck sometime between Zapruder frames 210 to 225, while the House Select Committee theorized that it struck exactly at Zapruder frame 190. \n\nAccording to the Warren Commission, a second shot struck the President at Zapruder film frame 313. The Commission made no conclusion as to whether this was the second or third bullet fired. The presidential limousine was then passing in front of the John Neely Bryan north pergola concrete structure. Each body concluded that the second shot to hit the president entered the rear of his head (the House Select Committee placed the entry wound four inches higher than the Warren Commission placed it) and, passing in fragments through his head, created a large, \"roughly ovular\" [sic] hole on the rear, right side. The president's blood and fragments of his scalp, brain, and skull landed on the interior of the car, the inner and outer surfaces of the front glass windshield and raised sun visors, the front engine hood, the rear trunk lid, the followup Secret Service car and its driver's left arm, and motorcycle officers riding on both sides of the President behind him. \n\nUnited States Secret Service Special Agent Clint Hill was riding on the left front running board of the follow-up car, which was immediately behind the Presidential limousine. Hill testified that he heard one shot, then, as documented in other films and concurrent with Zapruder frame 308, he jumped off into Elm Street and ran forward to try to get on the limousine and protect the President. (Hill testified to the Warren Commission that after he jumped into Elm Street, he heard two more shots.) \n\nAfter the President had been shot in the head, Mrs. Kennedy began to climb out onto the back of the limousine, though she later had no recollection of doing so. Hill believed she was reaching for something, perhaps a piece of the President's skull. He jumped onto the back of the limousine while at the same time Mrs. Kennedy returned to her seat, and he clung to the car as it exited Dealey Plaza and accelerated, speeding to Parkland Memorial Hospital.\n\nAfter Mrs. Kennedy crawled back into her limousine seat, both Governor Connally and Mrs. Connally heard her say more than once, \"They have killed my husband,\" and \"I have his brains in my hand.\" In a long-redacted interview for Life magazine days later, Mrs. Kennedy recalled, \"All the ride to the hospital I kept bending over him saying, 'Jack, Jack, can you hear me? I love you, Jack.' I kept holding the top of his head down trying to keep the ...\" The President's widow could not finish her sentence. \n\nOthers wounded\n\nGovernor Connally, riding in the same limousine in a seat in front of the President and three inches more to the left than the President, was also critically injured but survived. Doctors later stated that after the Governor was shot, his wife pulled him onto her lap, and the resulting posture helped close his front chest wound (which was causing air to be sucked directly into his chest around his collapsed right lung).\n\nJames Tague, a spectator and witness to the assassination, also received a minor wound to his right cheek while standing 531 ft away from the Depository's sixth floor, easternmost window, 270 ft in front of and slightly to the right of President Kennedy's head facing direction, and more than 16 ft below the top of the President's head. Tague's injury occurred when a bullet or bullet fragment with no copper casing struck the nearby Main Street south curb. A deputy sheriff noticed some blood on Tague's cheek, and Tague realized something had stung his face during the shooting. When Tague pointed to where he had been standing, the police officer noticed a bullet smear on a nearby curb. Nine months later the FBI removed the curb, and a spectrographic analysis revealed metallic residue consistent with that of the lead core in Oswald's ammunition. When Tague testified to the Warren Commission and was asked which of the three shots he remembered hearing struck him, he stated it was the second or third shot. When the Warren Commission attorney pressed him further, Tague stated he was struck concurrent with the second shot. \n\nAftermath in Dealey Plaza\n\nThe presidential limousine was passing a grassy knoll on the north side of Elm Street at the moment of the fatal head shot. As the motorcade left the plaza, police officers and spectators ran up the knoll and from a railroad bridge over Elm Street (the triple underpass), to the area behind a five-foot (1.5 m) high stockade fence atop the knoll, separating it from a parking lot. No sniper was found. S. M. Holland, who had been watching the motorcade on the triple underpass, testified that \"immediately\" after the shots were fired, he went around the corner where the overpass joined the fence, but did not see anyone running from the area. \n\nLee Bowers, a railroad switchman sitting in a two-story tower, had an unobstructed view of the rear of the stockade fence atop the grassy knoll during the shooting. He saw a total of four men in the area between his tower and Elm Street: a middle-aged man and a younger man, standing 10 to apart near the triple underpass, who did not seem to know each other, and one or two uniformed parking lot attendants. At the time of the shooting, he saw \"something out of the ordinary, a sort of milling around\", which he could not identify. Bowers testified that one or both of the men were still there when motorcycle officer Clyde Haygood ran up the grassy knoll to the back of the fence. In a 1966 interview, Bowers clarified that the two men he saw were standing in the opening between the pergola and the fence, and that \"no one\" was behind the fence at the time the shots were fired. \n\nMeanwhile, Howard Brennan, a steamfitter who was sitting across the street from the Texas School Book Depository, notified police that as he watched the motorcade go by, he heard a shot come from above, and looked up to see a man with a rifle make another shot from a corner window on the sixth floor. He said he had seen the same man minutes earlier looking out the window. Brennan gave a description of the shooter, and Dallas police subsequently broadcast descriptions at 12:45 p.m., 12:48 p.m., and 12:55 p.m. After the second shot was fired, Brennan recalled, \"This man I saw previous was aiming for his last shot ... and maybe paused for another second as though to assure himself that he had hit his mark.\" \n\nAs Brennan spoke to the police in front of the building, they were joined by Harold Norman and James Jarman, Jr., two employees of the Texas School Book Depository who had watched the motorcade from windows at the southeast corner of the fifth floor. Norman reported that he heard three gunshots come from directly over their heads. Norman also heard the sounds of a bolt-action rifle and cartridges dropping on the floor above them. \n\nEstimates of when Dallas police sealed off the entrances to the Texas School Book Depository range from 12:33 to after 12:50 p.m. \n\nOf the 104 earwitnesses in Dealey Plaza who are on record with an opinion as to the direction from which the shots came, 54 (51.9%) thought that all shots came from the direction of the Texas School Book Depository, 33 (31.7%) thought that all shots came from the area of the grassy knoll or the triple underpass, 9 (8.7%) thought all shots came from a location entirely distinct from the knoll or the Depository, 5 (4.8%) thought they heard shots from two locations, and 3 (2.9%) thought the shots came from a direction consistent with both the knoll and the Depository. \n\nAdditionally, the Warren Commission said of the three shots they concluded were fired that \"a substantial majority of the witnesses stated that the shots were not evenly spaced. Most witnesses recalled that the second and third shots were bunched together.\"\n\nLee Harvey Oswald\n\nLee Harvey Oswald, reported missing to the Dallas police by Roy Truly, his supervisor at the Depository, was arrested approximately 70 minutes after the assassination for the murder of Dallas police officer J. D. Tippit. According to witness Helen Markam, Tippit had spotted Oswald walking along a sidewalk in the residential neighborhood of Oak Cliff, three miles from Dealey Plaza. Officer Tippit had earlier received a radio message that gave a description of the suspect being sought in the assassination and called Oswald over to the patrol car.\n\nHelen Markam testified that after an exchange of words, Tippit got out of his car and Oswald shot him four times. Oswald was next seen by shoe store manager Johnny Brewer \"ducking into\" the entrance alcove of his store. Suspicious of this activity, Brewer watched Oswald continue up the street and slip into the nearby Texas Theatre without paying. Brewer alerted the theater's ticket clerk, who telephoned the police at about 1:40 p.m.\n\nAccording to one of the arresting officers, M.N. McDonald, Oswald resisted arrest and was attempting to draw his pistol when he was struck and forcibly restrained by the police. He was charged with the murders of President Kennedy and Officer Tippit later that night. Oswald denied shooting anyone and claimed he was a patsy who was arrested because he had lived in the Soviet Union. \n\nOswald's case never came to trial because two days later, while being escorted to a car for transfer from Dallas Police Headquarters to the Dallas County Jail, he was shot and mortally wounded by Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby, live on American television at 11:21 a.m. CST on Sunday, November 24. He was taken unconscious by ambulance to Parkland Memorial Hospital, the same hospital where doctors had tried to save President Kennedy's life two days earlier, and died at 1:07 p.m. Oswald's death was announced on a TV news broadcast by Dallas police chief Jesse Curry. An autopsy was performed by the Dallas County Medical Examiner at 2:45 p.m. the same day. The stated cause of death in the autopsy report was \"hemorrhage secondary to gunshot wound of the chest\". Arrested immediately after the shooting, Ruby later said that he had been distraught over the Kennedy assassination and that killing Oswald would spare \"... Mrs. Kennedy the discomfiture of coming back to trial.\" \n\nCarcano rifle\n\nAn Italian Carcano M91/38 bolt-action rifle (see 6.5×52mm Mannlicher–Carcano cartridge) was found on the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository by Deputy Constable Seymour Weitzman and Deputy Sheriff Eugene Boone soon after the assassination of President Kennedy. The recovery was filmed by Tom Alyea of WFAA-TV.\n\nThis footage shows the rifle to be a Carcano, and it was later verified by photographic analysis commissioned by the HSCA that the rifle filmed was the same one later identified as the assassination weapon. Compared to photographs taken of Oswald holding the rifle in his backyard, \"one notch in the stock at [a] point that appears very faintly in the photograph\" matched, as well as the rifle's dimensions.\n\nThe previous March, the Carcano rifle had been bought by Oswald under the name \"A. Hidell\" and delivered to a post-office box Oswald rented in Dallas. According to the Warren Commission Report, a partial palm print of Oswald was also found on the barrel of the gun, and a tuft of fibers found in a crevice of the rifle was consistent with the fibers and colors of the shirt Oswald was wearing at the time of his arrest. \n\nA bullet found on Governor Connally's hospital gurney, and two bullet fragments found in the Presidential limousine, were ballistically matched to this rifle.\n\nPresident Kennedy declared dead in the emergency room\n\nThe staff at Parkland Hospital's Trauma Room 1 who treated President Kennedy observed that his condition was \"moribund\" (a mortal wound), meaning that he had no chance of survival upon arriving at the hospital. George Burkley, the President's personal physician, stated that a gunshot wound to the skull was the cause of death. Burkley signed President Kennedy's death certificate.\n\nAt 1:00 p.m., CST (19:00 UTC), after all heart activity had ceased and after Father Oscar Huber had administered the last rites, the President was pronounced dead. Father Huber told The New York Times that the President was already dead by the time he arrived at the hospital, and he had to draw back a sheet covering the President's face to administer the sacrament of Extreme Unction. President Kennedy's death was officially announced by White House Acting Press Secretary Malcolm Kilduff at 1:33 p.m. CST (19:33 UTC). Kilduff was acting press secretary on the trip because Pierre Salinger was traveling to Japan with half the Cabinet, including Secretary of State Dean Rusk. Governor Connally, meanwhile, was taken to emergency surgery, where he underwent two operations that day.\n\nAs members of the President's security detail attempted to remove Kennedy's body from the hospital, they briefly scuffled with Dallas officials, including Dallas County Coroner Earl Rose who believed he was legally obligated to perform an autopsy before Kennedy's body was removed. The Secret Service pushed through and Rose eventually stepped aside. The forensic panel of the HSCA, of which Rose was a member, later reported that Texas law indicated that it was the responsibility of the justice of the peace to determine the cause of death as well as the necessity of whether an autopsy was needed to determine the cause of death. Theran Ward, a justice of the peace in Dallas County, signed the official record of inquest as well as a second certificate of death. \n\nA few minutes after 2:00 p.m. CST (20:00 UTC), President Kennedy's body was taken from Parkland Hospital and driven to Air Force One. The casket was then loaded aboard the airplane through the rear door, where it remained at the rear of the passenger compartment, in place of a removed row of seats. Lyndon B. Johnson, who as Vice President, became President upon Kennedy's death, and had been riding two cars behind President Kennedy in the motorcade, refused to leave for Washington without President Kennedy and his widow.\n\nAt 2:38 p.m. CST (20:38 UTC), President Johnson took the oath of office on board Air Force One just before it departed from Love Field, with Jacqueline Kennedy at his side.\n\nAutopsy\n\nThe autopsy was performed, beginning at about 8 p.m. and ending at about midnight EST at the Bethesda Naval Hospital in Bethesda, Maryland. The choice of autopsy hospital in the Washington, D.C., area was made at the request of Mrs. Kennedy, on the basis that John F. Kennedy had been a naval officer. \n\nFuneral\n\nThe state funeral took place in Washington, D.C., during the three days that followed the assassination. \n\nThe body of President Kennedy was brought back to Washington, D.C., and placed in the East Room of the White House for 24 hours. On the Sunday after the assassination, his coffin was carried on a horse-drawn caisson to the U.S. Capitol to lie in state. Throughout the day and night, hundreds of thousands lined up to view the guarded casket. Representatives from over 90 countries attended the state funeral on Monday, November 25. After the Requiem Mass at St. Matthew's Cathedral, the late President was laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.\n\nRecordings of the assassination\n\nNo radio or television stations broadcast the assassination live because the area through which the motorcade was traveling was not considered important enough for a live broadcast. Most media crews were not even with the motorcade but were waiting instead at the Dallas Trade Mart in anticipation of President Kennedy's arrival. Those members of the media who were with the motorcade were riding at the rear of the procession.\n\nThe Dallas police were recording their radio transmissions over two channels. A frequency designated as Channel One was used for routine police communications; Channel Two was an auxiliary channel dedicated to the President's motorcade. Up until the time of the assassination, most of the broadcasts on the second channel consisted of Police Chief Jesse Curry's announcements of the location of the motorcade as it wound through the city.\n\nPresident Kennedy's last seconds traveling through Dealey Plaza were recorded on silent 8 mm film for the 26.6 seconds before, during, and immediately following the assassination. This famous film footage was taken by garment manufacturer and amateur cameraman Abraham Zapruder, in what became known as the Zapruder film. Frame enlargements from the Zapruder film were published by Life magazine shortly after the assassination. The footage was first shown publicly as a film at the trial of Clay Shaw in 1969, and on television in 1975. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, in 1999 an arbitration panel ordered the U.S. government to pay $615,384 per second of film to Zapruder's heirs for giving the film to the National Archives. The complete film, which lasts for 26 seconds, was valued at $16 million. \n\nZapruder was not the only person who photographed at least part of the assassination; a total of 32 photographers were in Dealey Plaza. Amateur movies taken by Orville Nix, Marie Muchmore (shown on television in New York on November 26, 1963), and photographer Charles Bronson captured the fatal shot, although at a greater distance than Zapruder. Other motion picture films were taken in Dealey Plaza at or around the time of the shooting by Robert Hughes, F. Mark Bell, Elsie Dorman, John Martin Jr., Patsy Paschall, Tina Towner, James Underwood, Dave Wiegman, Mal Couch, Thomas Atkins, and an unknown woman in a blue dress on the south side of Elm Street. \n\nStill photos were taken by Phillip Willis, Mary Ann Moorman, Hugh W. Betzner Jr., Wilma Bond, Robert Croft, and many others. The lone professional photographer in Dealey Plaza who was not in the press cars was Ike Altgens, photo editor for the Associated Press in Dallas.\n\nAn unidentified woman, nicknamed the Babushka Lady by researchers, might have been filming the Presidential motorcade during the assassination. She was seen apparently doing so on film and in photographs taken by the others.\n\nPreviously unknown color footage filmed on the assassination day by George Jefferies was released on February 19, 2007 by the Sixth Floor Museum, Dallas, Texas. The film does not include the shooting, having been taken roughly 90 seconds beforehand and a couple of blocks away. The only detail relevant to the investigation of the assassination is a clear view of President Kennedy's bunched suit jacket, just below the collar, which has led to different calculations about how low in the back President Kennedy was first shot (see discussion above).\n\nOfficial investigations\n\nDallas Police\n\nAfter arresting Oswald and collecting physical evidence at the crime scenes, the Dallas Police held Oswald at the police headquarters for interrogation. Oswald was questioned all afternoon about both the Tippit shooting and the assassination of the President. He was questioned intermittently for approximately 12 hours between 2:30 p.m., on November 22, and 11 a.m., on November 24. Throughout this interrogation Oswald denied any involvement with either the assassination of President Kennedy or the murder of Patrolman Tippit. Captain Fritz of the homicide and robbery bureau did most of the questioning, keeping only rudimentary notes. Days later, he wrote a report of the interrogation from notes he made afterwards. There were no stenographic or tape recordings. Representatives of other law enforcement agencies were also present, including the FBI and the Secret Service, and occasionally participated in the questioning. Several of the FBI agents present wrote contemporaneous reports of the interrogation. \n\nDuring the evening of November 22, the Dallas Police Department performed paraffin tests on Oswald's hands and right cheek in an apparent effort to determine, by means of a scientific test, whether Oswald had recently fired a weapon. The results were positive for the hands and negative for the right cheek. Because of the unreliability of these tests, the Warren Commission did not rely on the results of the test in making their findings.\n\nOswald provided little information during his questioning. When confronted with evidence that he could not explain he resorted to statements that were found to be false. Dallas authorities were not able to complete their investigation into the assassination of President Kennedy because of interruptions from the FBI and the murder of Oswald by Jack Ruby.\n\nFBI investigation\n\nThe FBI was the first authority to complete an investigation. On December 9, 1963, the FBI issued a report and gave it to the Warren Commission.\n\nThe FBI stated that three bullets were fired during the Kennedy assassination; the Warren Commission agreed with the FBI investigation that three shots were fired but disagreed with the FBI report on which shots hit Kennedy and which hit Governor Connally. The FBI report claimed that the first shot hit President Kennedy, the second shot hit Governor Connally, and the third shot hit President Kennedy in the head, killing him. In contrast, the Warren Commission concluded that one of the three shots missed, one of the shots hit President Kennedy and then struck Governor Connally, and a third shot struck President Kennedy in the head, killing him.\n\nWarren Commission\n\nThe President's Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy, known unofficially as the Warren Commission, was established on November 29, 1963, by President Johnson to investigate the assassination. Its 888-page final report was presented to President Johnson on September 24, 1964, and made public three days later. It concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in the killing of President Kennedy and the wounding of Texas Governor John Connally, and that Jack Ruby also acted alone in the murder of Oswald. The Commission's findings have since proven controversial and been both challenged and supported by later studies.\n\nThe Commission took its unofficial name, \"The Warren Commission\", from its chairman, Chief Justice Earl Warren. According to published transcripts of Johnson's presidential phone conversations, some major officials were opposed to forming such a commission, and several commission members took part only with extreme reluctance. One of their chief reservations was that a commission would ultimately create more controversy than consensus, and those fears ultimately proved valid.\n\nAll of the Warren Commission's records were submitted to the National Archives in 1964. The unpublished portion of those records was initially sealed for 75 years (to 2039) under a general National Archives policy that applied to all federal investigations by the executive branch of government, a period \"intended to serve as protection for innocent persons who could otherwise be damaged because of their relationship with participants in the case\". The 75-year rule no longer exists, supplanted by the Freedom of Information Act of 1966 and the JFK Records Act of 1992.\n\nRamsey Clark Panel\n\nIn 1968, a panel of four medical experts appointed by Attorney General Ramsey Clark met in Washington, D.C., to examine various photographs, X-ray films, documents, and other evidence about the death of President Kennedy. The Clark Panel determined that President Kennedy was struck by two bullets fired from above and behind him, one of which traversed the base of the neck on the right side without striking bone and the other of which entered the skull from behind and destroyed its upper right side. \n\nRockefeller Commission\n\nThe United States President's Commission on CIA activities within the United States was set up under President Gerald Ford in 1975 to investigate the activities of the CIA within the United States. The commission was led by Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, and is sometimes referred to as the Rockefeller Commission.\n\nPart of the commission's work dealt with the Kennedy assassination, specifically the head snap as seen in the Zapruder film (first shown to the general public in 1975), and the possible presence of E. Howard Hunt and Frank Sturgis in Dallas. The commission concluded that neither Hunt nor Sturgis was in Dallas at the time of the assassination. \n\nChurch Committee\n\nChurch Committee is the common term referring to the 1975 United States Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, a U.S. Senate committee chaired by Senator Frank Church, to investigate the illegal intelligence gathering by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) after the Watergate incident. It also investigated the CIA and FBI conduct relating to the JFK assassination.\n\nTheir report concluded that the investigation on the assassination by FBI and CIA were fundamentally deficient and the facts that have greatly affected the investigation had not been forwarded to the Warren Commission by the agencies. It also found that the FBI, the agency with primary responsibility on the matter, was ordered by Director Hoover and pressured by unnamed higher government officials to conclude its investigation quickly. The report hinted that there was a possibility that senior officials in both agencies made conscious decisions not to disclose potentially important information. \n\nUnited States House Select Committee on Assassinations\n\nAs a result of increasing public and congressional skepticism regarding the Warren Commission's findings and the transparency of government agencies, House Resolution 1540 was passed in September 1976, creating the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) to investigate the assassinations of President Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr..\n\nThe Committee investigated until 1978, and in March 1979 issued its final report, concluding that President John F. Kennedy was probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy. While one of the reasons for that finding of \"probable conspiracy\" was a since-discredited acoustic analysis of a police channel dictabelt recording, the HSCA also commissioned numerous other scientific studies of acoustic analysis that corroborate the Warren Commission's findings. The Committee concluded that previous investigations into Oswald's responsibility were \"thorough and reliable\" but they did not adequately investigate the possibility of a conspiracy, and that Federal agencies performed with \"varying degrees of competency\". Specifically, the FBI and CIA were found to be deficient in sharing information with other agencies and the Warren Commission. Instead of furnishing all information relevant to the investigation, the FBI and CIA only responded to specific requests and were still occasionally inadequate. Furthermore, the Secret Service did not properly analyze information it possessed prior to the assassination and was inadequately prepared to protect the President.\n\nConcerning the conclusions of \"probable conspiracy\", four of the twelve committee members wrote dissenting opinions. In accordance with the recommendations of the HSCA, the Dictabelt recording and acoustic evidence of a second assassin was subsequently reexamined. In light of investigative reports from the FBI's Technical Services Division and a specially appointed National Academy of Sciences Committee determining that \"reliable acoustic data do not support a conclusion that there was a second gunman,\" the Justice Department concluded \"that no persuasive evidence can be identified to support the theory of a conspiracy in ... the assassination of President Kennedy\".\n\nAlthough the final report and supporting volumes of the HSCA was publicly released, the working papers and primary documents were sealed until 2029 under Congressional rules and only partially released as part of the 1992 JFK Act. \n\nThe JFK Act and Assassination Records Review Board\n\nIn 1992, the popular but controversial movie JFK had renewed public interest in the assassination and particularly in the still-classified documents referenced in the film's postscript. Largely in response to the film, Congress passed the JFK Act, or \"President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act of 1992\". The goal of the legislation was to collect at the National Archives and make publicly available all of the assassination-related records held by federal and state government agencies, private citizens and various other organizations.\n\nThe JFK Act also mandated the creation of an independent office, the Assassination Records Review Board, to review the submitted records for completeness and continued secrecy. The Review Board was not commissioned to make any findings or conclusions regarding the assassination, just to collect and release all related documents. From 1994 until 1998, the Assassination Records Review Board gathered and unsealed about 60,000 documents, consisting of over 4 million pages. Government agencies requested that some records remain classified and these were reviewed under section 6 criteria of the JFK Act. There were 29,420 such records and all of them were fully or partially released, with stringent requirements for redaction.\n\nAll remaining assassination-related records (approximately 5,000 pages) are scheduled to be released by October 2017, with the exception of documents certified for continued postponement by the President under the following conditions:\n(1) \"continued postponement is made necessary by an identifiable harm to the military, defense, intelligence operations, law enforcement, or conduct of foreign relations\" and (2) \"the identifiable harm is of such gravity that it outweighs the public interest in disclosure.\" There is some concern among researchers that significant records, particularly those of the CIA, may still remain classified after 2017. Although these documents may include interesting historical information, all of the records were examined by the Review Board and were not determined to impact the facts of the Kennedy assassination.\n\nConspiracy theories\n\nThere are numerous conspiracy theories surrounding the assassination. These theories posit that the assassination involved people or organizations other than Lee Harvey Oswald. Most current theories put forth a criminal conspiracy involving parties as varied as the CIA, the Mafia, Vice President Johnson, Cuban President Fidel Castro, the KGB, or some combination of those entities. Some conspiracy theories claim that the United States government covered up crucial information in the aftermath of the assassination.\n\nIn 1964, the Warren Commission concluded that only Lee Harvey Oswald was responsible for the assassination of Kennedy. Subsequent investigations confirmed most of the conclusions of the Commission. In 1979, the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) concluded that a second gunman besides Oswald probably fired at Kennedy. The HSCA did not identify the second gunman, nor did it identify any other person or organization as having been involved. The acoustical evidence that the HSCA based its second gunman conclusion on has since been discredited. \n\nPublic opinion polls have consistently shown that a majority of Americans believe there was a conspiracy to kill Kennedy. Gallup polls have also found that only 20–30% of the population believe that Oswald had acted alone. These polls also show that there is no agreement on who else may have been involved. Former Los Angeles District Attorney Vincent Bugliosi estimated that a total of 42 groups, 82 assassins, and 214 people had been accused in various Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories. \n\nReaction to the assassination\n\nThe assassination evoked stunned reactions worldwide. Before the President's death was announced, the first hour after the shooting was a time of great confusion. Taking place during the Cold War, it was at first unclear whether the shooting might be part of a larger attack upon the U.S., and whether Vice President Johnson, who had been riding two cars behind in the motorcade, was safe.\n\nThe news shocked the nation. People wept openly and gathered in department stores to watch the television coverage, while others prayed. Traffic in some areas came to a halt as the news spread from car to car. Schools across the U.S. dismissed their students early. Anger against Texas and Texans was reported from some individuals. Various Cleveland Browns fans, for example, carried signs at the next Sunday's home game against the Dallas Cowboys decrying the city of Dallas as having \"killed the President\". \n\nThe event left a lasting impression on many Americans. As with the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor before it and the September 11 attacks after it, asking \"Where were you when you heard about President Kennedy's assassination\" would become a common topic of discussion. \n\nArtifacts, museums and locations today\n\nThe plane serving as Air Force One is on display at the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton, Ohio, where tours of the aircraft are offered including the rear of the aircraft where President Kennedy's casket was placed and the location where Mrs. Kennedy stood in her blood-stained pink dress while Vice President Johnson was sworn in as president. The 1961 Lincoln Continental limousine is at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. \n\nEquipment from the trauma room at Parkland Memorial Hospital, where President Kennedy was pronounced dead, including a gurney, was purchased by the federal government from the hospital in 1973 and is now stored by the National Archives at an underground facility in Lenexa, Kansas. The First Lady's pink suit, the autopsy report, X-rays and President Kennedy's blood-stained jacket, shirt and tie worn during the assassination are stored in the National Archives facility in College Park, Maryland, with access controlled by a representative of the Kennedy family. The rifle used by Oswald, his diary, revolver, bullet fragments, and the windshield of Kennedy's limousine are also stored by the Archives. The Lincoln Catafalque, which President Kennedy's coffin rested on while he lay in state in the Capitol, is on display at the United States Capitol Visitor Center. \n\nThe three-acre park within Dealey Plaza, the buildings facing it, the overpass, and a portion of the adjacent railyard – including the railroad switching tower – were designated part of the Dealey Plaza Historic District by the National Park Service on October 12, 1993. Much of the area is accessible to visitors, including the park and grassy knoll. Though still an active city street, the approximate spot where the presidential limousine was located at the time of the shooting is marked with an X on the street. The Texas School Book Depository now draws over 325,000 visitors each year to the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza operated by the Dallas County Historical Foundation. There is a re-creation of the sniper's nest on the sixth floor of the building. \n\nAt the Historic Auto Attractions museum in Roscoe, Illinois, are permanently displayed items related to the assassination such as the catalogue Oswald used to order the rifle, a hat and jacket that belonged to Jack Ruby and the shoes he wore when he shot Oswald, and a window from the Texas School Book Depository. The Texas State Archives have the clothes Governor Connally wore on November 22, 1963.\n\nSome items were intentionally destroyed by the U.S. government at the direction of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, such as the casket used to transport President Kennedy's body aboard Air Force One from Dallas to Washington, which was dropped by the Air Force into the sea as \"its public display would be extremely offensive and contrary to public policy\". Other items such as the hat worn by Jack Ruby the day he shot Lee Harvey Oswald and the toe tag on Oswald's corpse are in the hands of private collectors and have sold for tens of thousands of dollars at auctions.\n\nJack Ruby's gun, owned by his brother Earl Ruby, was sold by the Herman Darvick Autograph Auctions in New York City on December 26, 1991, for $220,000." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "Search", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Boxing.txt", "World_Boxing_Council.txt", "Trevor_Berbick.txt", "Mike_Tyson.txt", "Muhammad_Ali.txt" ], "title": [ "Boxing", "World Boxing Council", "Trevor Berbick", "Mike Tyson", "Muhammad Ali" ], "wiki_context": [ "Boxing is a martial art and combat sport in which two people wearing protective gloves throw punches at each other for a predetermined set of time in a boxing ring.\n\nAmateur boxing is both an Olympic and Commonwealth sport and is a common fixture in most international games—it also has its own World Championships. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of one- to three-minute intervals called rounds. The result is decided when an opponent is deemed incapable to continue by a referee, is disqualified for breaking a rule, resigns by throwing in a towel, or is pronounced the winner or loser based on the judges' scorecards at the end of the contest. In the event that both fighters gain equal scores from the judges, the fight is considered a draw (professional boxing). In Olympic boxing, due to the fact that a winner must be declared, in the case of a draw - the judges use technical criteria to choose the most deserving winner of the bout.\n\nWhile people have fought in hand-to-hand combat since before the dawn of history, the origin of boxing as an organized sport may be its acceptance by the ancient Greeks as an Olympic game in BC 688. Boxing evolved from 16th- and 18th-century prizefights, largely in Great Britain, to the forerunner of modern boxing in the mid-19th century, again initially in Great Britain and later in the United States.\n\nHistory\n\nAncient history\n\nSee also Ancient Greek boxing\n\nThe earliest known depiction of boxing comes from a Sumerian relief in Iraq from the 3rd millennium BCE Later depictions from the 2nd millennium BC are found in reliefs from the Mesopotamian nations of Assyria and Babylonia, and in Hittite art from Asia Minor. The earliest evidence for fist fighting with any kind of gloves can be found on Minoan Crete (c.1650–1400 BCE), and on Sardinia, if we consider the boxing statues of Prama mountains (c. 2000–1000 BC).\n\nBoxing was a popular spectator sport in Ancient Rome. In order for the fighters to protect themselves against their opponents they wrapped leather thongs around their fists. Eventually harder leather was used and the thong soon became a weapon. The Romans even introduced metal studs to the thongs to make the cestus which then led to a more sinister weapon called the myrmex ('limb piercer'). Fighting events were held at Roman Amphitheatres. The Roman form of boxing was often a fight until death to please the spectators who gathered at such events. However, especially in later times, purchased slaves and trained combat performers were valuable commodities, and their lives were not given up without due consideration. Often slaves were used against one another in a circle marked on the floor. This is where the term ring came from. In AD 393, during the Roman gladiator period, boxing was abolished due to excessive brutality. It was not until the late 17th century that boxing re-surfaced in London.\n\nEarly London prize ring rules\n\nRecords of Classical boxing activity disappeared after the fall of the Western Roman Empire when the wearing of weapons became common once again and interest in fighting with the fists waned. However, there are detailed records of various fist-fighting sports that were maintained in different cities and provinces of Italy between the 12th and 17th centuries. There was also a sport in ancient Rus called Kulachniy Boy or \"Fist Fighting\".\n\nAs the wearing of swords became less common, there was renewed interest in fencing with the fists. The sport would later resurface in England during the early 16th century in the form of bare-knuckle boxing sometimes referred to as prizefighting. The first documented account of a bare-knuckle fight in England appeared in 1681 in the London Protestant Mercury, and the first English bare-knuckle champion was James Figg in 1719. This is also the time when the word \"boxing\" first came to be used. It should be noted, that this earliest form of modern boxing was very different. Contests in Mr. Figg's time, in addition to fist fighting, also contained fencing and cudgeling. On 6 January 1681, the first recorded boxing match took place in Britain when Christopher Monck, 2nd Duke of Albemarle (and later Lieutenant Governor of Jamaica) engineered a bout between his butler and his butcher with the latter winning the prize.\n\nEarly fighting had no written rules. There were no weight divisions or round limits, and no referee. In general, it was extremely chaotic. An early article on boxing was published in Nottingham, 1713, by Sir Thomas Parkyns, a successful Wrestler from Bunny, Nottinghamshire, who had practised the techniques he described. The article, a single page in his manual of wrestling and fencing, Progymnasmata: The inn-play, or Cornish-hugg wrestler, described a system of headbutting, punching, eye-gouging, chokes, and hard throws, not recognized in boxing today. \n\nThe first boxing rules, called the Broughton's rules, were introduced by champion Jack Broughton in 1743 to protect fighters in the ring where deaths sometimes occurred. Under these rules, if a man went down and could not continue after a count of 30 seconds, the fight was over. Hitting a downed fighter and grasping below the waist were prohibited. Broughton encouraged the use of 'mufflers', a form of padded bandage or mitten, to be used in 'jousting' or sparring sessions in training, and in exhibition matches.\n\nThese rules did allow the fighters an advantage not enjoyed by today's boxers; they permitted the fighter to drop to one knee to begin a 30-second count at any time. Thus a fighter realizing he was in trouble had an opportunity to recover. However, this was considered \"unmanly\" and was frequently disallowed by additional rules negotiated by the Seconds of the Boxers. Intentionally going down in modern boxing will cause the recovering fighter to lose points in the scoring system. Furthermore, as the contestants did not have heavy leather gloves and wristwraps to protect their hands, they used different punching technique to preserve their hands, because the head was a common target to hit full out. Almost all period manuals have powerful straight punches with the whole body behind them to the face (including forehead) as the basic blows. \n\nMarquess of Queensberry rules (1867)\n\nIn 1867, the Marquess of Queensberry rules were drafted by John Chambers for amateur championships held at Lillie Bridge in London for Lightweights, Middleweights and Heavyweights. The rules were published under the patronage of the Marquess of Queensberry, whose name has always been associated with them.\n\nThere were twelve rules in all, and they specified that fights should be \"a fair stand-up boxing match\" in a 24-foot-square or similar ring. Rounds were three minutes with one-minute rest intervals between rounds. Each fighter was given a ten-second count if he was knocked down, and wrestling was banned.\nThe introduction of gloves of \"fair-size\" also changed the nature of the bouts. An average pair of boxing gloves resembles a bloated pair of mittens and are laced up around the wrists. \nThe gloves can be used to block an opponent's blows. As a result of their introduction, bouts became longer and more strategic with greater importance attached to defensive maneuvers such as slipping, bobbing, countering and angling. Because less defensive emphasis was placed on the use of the forearms and more on the gloves, the classical forearms outwards, torso leaning back stance of the bare knuckle boxer was modified to a more modern stance in which the torso is tilted forward and the hands are held closer to the face.\n\nLate 19th and early 20th centuries\n\nThrough the late nineteenth century, the martial art of boxing or prizefighting was primarily a sport of dubious legitimacy. Outlawed in England and much of the United States, prizefights were often held at gambling venues and broken up by police. Brawling and wrestling tactics continued, and riots at prizefights were common occurrences. Still, throughout this period, there arose some notable bare knuckle champions who developed fairly sophisticated fighting tactics.\n\nThe English case of R v. Coney in 1882 found that a bare-knuckle fight was an assault occasioning actual bodily harm, despite the consent of the participants. This marked the end of widespread public bare-knuckle contests in England.\n\nThe first world heavyweight champion under the Queensberry Rules was \"Gentleman Jim\" Corbett, who defeated John L. Sullivan in 1892 at the Pelican Athletic Club in New Orleans. \n\nThe first instance of film censorship in the United States occurred in 1897 when several states banned the showing of prize fighting films from the state of Nevada, where it was legal at the time.\n\nThroughout the early twentieth century, boxers struggled to achieve legitimacy. They were aided by the influence of promoters like Tex Rickard and the popularity of great champions such as John L. Sullivan.\n\nRules\n\nThe Marquess of Queensberry rules have been the general rules governing modern boxing since their publication in 1867.\n\nA boxing match typically consists of a determined number of three-minute rounds, a total of up to 9 to 12 rounds. A minute is typically spent between each round with the fighters in their assigned corners receiving advice and attention from their coach and staff. The fight is controlled by a referee who works within the ring to judge and control the conduct of the fighters, rule on their ability to fight safely, count knocked-down fighters, and rule on fouls.\n\nUp to three judges are typically present at ringside to score the bout and assign points to the boxers, based on punches that connect, defense, knockdowns, and other, more subjective, measures. Because of the open-ended style of boxing judging, many fights have controversial results, in which one or both fighters believe they have been \"robbed\" or unfairly denied a victory. Each fighter has an assigned corner of the ring, where his or her coach, as well as one or more \"seconds\" may administer to the fighter at the beginning of the fight and between rounds. Each boxer enters into the ring from their assigned corners at the beginning of each round and must cease fighting and return to their corner at the signaled end of each round.\n\nA bout in which the predetermined number of rounds passes is decided by the judges, and is said to \"go the distance\". The fighter with the higher score at the end of the fight is ruled the winner. With three judges, unanimous and split decisions are possible, as are draws. A boxer may win the bout before a decision is reached through a knock-out ; such bouts are said to have ended \"inside the distance\". If a fighter is knocked down during the fight, determined by whether the boxer touches the canvas floor of the ring with any part of their body other than the feet as a result of the opponent's punch and not a slip, as determined by the referee, the referee begins counting until the fighter returns to his or her feet and can continue.\n\nShould the referee count to ten, then the knocked-down boxer is ruled \"knocked out\" (whether unconscious or not) and the other boxer is ruled the winner by knockout (KO). A \"technical knock-out\" (TKO) is possible as well, and is ruled by the referee, fight doctor, or a fighter's corner if a fighter is unable to safely continue to fight, based upon injuries or being judged unable to effectively defend themselves. Many jurisdictions and sanctioning agencies also have a \"three-knockdown rule\", in which three knockdowns in a given round result in a TKO. A TKO is considered a knockout in a fighter's record. A \"standing eight\" count rule may also be in effect. This gives the referee the right to step in and administer a count of eight to a fighter that he feels may be in danger, even if no knockdown has taken place. After counting the referee will observe the fighter, and decide if he is fit to continue. For scoring purposes, a standing eight count is treated as a knockdown.\n\nIn general, boxers are prohibited from hitting below the belt, holding, tripping, pushing, biting, or spitting. The boxer's shorts are raised so the opponent is not allowed to hit to the groin area with intent to cause pain or injury. Failure to abide by the former may result in a foul. They also are prohibited from kicking, head-butting, or hitting with any part of the arm other than the knuckles of a closed fist (including hitting with the elbow, shoulder or forearm, as well as with open gloves, the wrist, the inside, back or side of the hand). They are prohibited as well from hitting the back, back of the neck or head (called a \"rabbit-punch\") or the kidneys. They are prohibited from holding the ropes for support when punching, holding an opponent while punching, or ducking below the belt of their opponent (dropping below the waist of your opponent, no matter the distance between).\n\nIf a \"clinch\" – a defensive move in which a boxer wraps his or her opponents arms and holds on to create a pause – is broken by the referee, each fighter must take a full step back before punching again (alternatively, the referee may direct the fighters to \"punch out\" of the clinch). When a boxer is knocked down, the other boxer must immediately cease fighting and move to the furthest neutral corner of the ring until the referee has either ruled a knockout or called for the fight to continue.\n\nViolations of these rules may be ruled \"fouls\" by the referee, who may issue warnings, deduct points, or disqualify an offending boxer, causing an automatic loss, depending on the seriousness and intentionality of the foul. An intentional foul that causes injury that prevents a fight from continuing usually causes the boxer who committed it to be disqualified. A fighter who suffers an accidental low-blow may be given up to five minutes to recover, after which they may be ruled knocked out if they are unable to continue. Accidental fouls that cause injury ending a bout may lead to a \"no contest\" result, or else cause the fight to go to a decision if enough rounds (typically four or more, or at least three in a four-round fight) have passed.\n\nUnheard of these days, but common during the early 20th Century in North America, a \"newspaper decision (NWS)\" might be made after a no decision bout had ended. A \"no decision\" bout occurred when, by law or by pre-arrangement of the fighters, if both boxers were still standing at the fight's conclusion and there was no knockout, no official decision was rendered and neither boxer was declared the winner. But this did not prevent the pool of ringside newspaper reporters from declaring a consensus result among themselves and printing a newspaper decision in their publications. Officially, however, a \"no decision\" bout resulted in neither boxer winning or losing. Boxing historians sometimes use these unofficial newspaper decisions in compiling fight records for illustrative purposes only. Often, media outlets covering a match will personally score the match, and post their scores as an independent sentence in their report.\n\nProfessional vs. amateur boxing\n\nThroughout the 17th to 19th centuries, boxing bouts were motivated by money, as the fighters competed for prize money, promoters controlled the gate, and spectators bet on the result. The modern Olympic movement revived interest in amateur sports, and amateur boxing became an Olympic sport in 1908. In their current form, Olympic and other amateur bouts are typically limited to three or four rounds, scoring is computed by points based on the number of clean blows landed, regardless of impact, and fighters wear protective headgear, reducing the number of injuries, knockdowns, and knockouts. Currently scoring blows in amateur boxing are subjectively counted by ringside judges, but the Australian Institute for Sport has demonstrated a prototype of an Automated Boxing Scoring System, which introduces scoring objectivity, improves safety, and arguably makes the sport more interesting to spectators. Professional boxing remains by far the most popular form of the sport globally, though amateur boxing is dominant in Cuba and some former Soviet republics. For most fighters, an amateur career, especially at the Olympics, serves to develop skills and gain experience in preparation for a professional career.\n\nAmateur boxing\n\nAmateur boxing may be found at the collegiate level, at the Olympic Games and Commonwealth Games, and in many other venues sanctioned by amateur boxing associations. Amateur boxing has a point scoring system that measures the number of clean blows landed rather than physical damage. Bouts consist of three rounds of three minutes in the Olympic and Commonwealth Games, and three rounds of three minutes in a national ABA (Amateur Boxing Association) bout, each with a one-minute interval between rounds.\n\nCompetitors wear protective headgear and gloves with a white strip or circle across the knuckle. There are cases however, where white ended gloves are not required but any solid color may be worn. The white end just is a way to make it easier for judges to score clean hits. Each competitor must have their hands properly wrapped, pre-fight, for added protection on their hands and for added cushion under the gloves. Gloves worn by the fighters must be twelve ounces in weight unless, the fighters weigh under 165 pounds, thus allowing them to wear 10 ounce gloves. A punch is considered a scoring punch only when the boxers connect with the white portion of the gloves. Each punch that lands cleanly on the head or torso with sufficient force is awarded a point. A referee monitors the fight to ensure that competitors use only legal blows. A belt worn over the torso represents the lower limit of punches – any boxer repeatedly landing low blows below the belt is disqualified. Referees also ensure that the boxers don't use holding tactics to prevent the opponent from swinging. If this occurs, the referee separates the opponents and orders them to continue boxing. Repeated holding can result in a boxer being penalized or ultimately disqualified. Referees will stop the bout if a boxer is seriously injured, if one boxer is significantly dominating the other or if the score is severely imbalanced. Amateur bouts which end this way may be noted as \"RSC\" (referee stopped contest) with notations for an outclassed opponent (RSCO), outscored opponent (RSCOS), injury (RSCI) or head injury (RSCH).\n\nProfessional boxing\n\nProfessional bouts are usually much longer than amateur bouts, typically ranging from ten to twelve rounds, though four-round fights are common for less experienced fighters or club fighters. There are also some two- and three-round professional bouts, especially in Australia. Through the early twentieth century, it was common for fights to have unlimited rounds, ending only when one fighter quit, benefiting high-energy fighters like Jack Dempsey. Fifteen rounds remained the internationally recognized limit for championship fights for most of the twentieth century until the early 1980s, when the death of boxer Duk Koo Kim eventually prompted the World Boxing Council and other organizations sanctioning professional boxing to reduce the limit to twelve rounds.\n\nHeadgear is not permitted in professional bouts, and boxers are generally allowed to take much more damage before a fight is halted. At any time, the referee may stop the contest if he believes that one participant cannot defend himself due to injury. In that case, the other participant is awarded a technical knockout win. A technical knockout would also be awarded if a fighter lands a punch that opens a cut on the opponent, and the opponent is later deemed not fit to continue by a doctor because of the cut. For this reason, fighters often employ cutmen, whose job is to treat cuts between rounds so that the boxer is able to continue despite the cut. If a boxer simply quits fighting, or if his corner stops the fight, then the winning boxer is also awarded a technical knockout victory. In contrast with amateur boxing, professional male boxers have to be bare-chested. \n\nBoxing styles\n\nDefinition of style\n\n\"Style\" is often defined as the strategic approach a fighter takes during a bout. No two fighters' styles are alike, as it is determined by that individual's physical and mental attributes. Three main styles exist in boxing: outside fighter (\"boxer\"), brawler (or \"slugger\"), and Inside fighter (\"swarmer\"). These styles may be divided into several special subgroups, such as counter puncher, etc. The main philosophy of the styles is, that each style has an advantage over one, but disadvantage over the other one. It follows the rock-paper-scissors scenario - boxer beats brawler, brawler beats swarmer, and swarmer beats boxer. \n\nBoxer/out-fighter\n\nA classic \"boxer\" or stylist (also known as an \"out-fighter\") seeks to maintain distance between himself and his opponent, fighting with faster, longer range punches, most notably the jab, and gradually wearing his opponent down. Due to this reliance on weaker punches, out-fighters tend to win by point decisions rather than by knockout, though some out-fighters have notable knockout records. They are often regarded as the best boxing strategists due to their ability to control the pace of the fight and lead their opponent, methodically wearing him down and exhibiting more skill and finesse than a brawler. Out-fighters need reach, hand speed, reflexes, and footwork.\n\nNotable out-fighters include Muhammad Ali, Larry Holmes, Joe Calzaghe Wilfredo Gómez, \nSalvador Sanchez, Cecilia Brækhus, Gene Tunney, Ezzard Charles, Willie Pep, Meldrick Taylor, Ricardo Lopez, Floyd Mayweather, Roy Jones, Jr., Sugar Ray Leonard, Miguel Vazquez, Sergio \"Maravilla\" Martínez, Vitali Klitschko, Wladimir Klitschko, and Guillermo Rigondeaux. This style was also used by fictional boxer Apollo Creed.\n\nBoxer-puncher\n\nA boxer-puncher is a well-rounded boxer who is able to fight at close range with a combination of technique and power, often with the ability to knock opponents out with a combination and in some instances a single shot. Their movement and tactics are similar to that of an out-fighter (although they are generally not as mobile as an out-fighter), but instead of winning by decision, they tend to wear their opponents down using combinations and then move in to score the knockout. A boxer must be well rounded to be effective using this style.\n\nNotable boxer-punchers include Muhammad Ali, Wladimir Klitschko, Lennox Lewis, Joe Louis, Wilfredo Gómez, Oscar de la Hoya, Archie Moore, Miguel Cotto, Nonito Donaire, Sam Langford, Henry Armstrong, Sugar Ray Robinson, Tony Zale, Carlos Monzón, Alexis Argüello, Erik Morales, Terry Norris, Marco Antonio Barrera, Naseem Hamed and Thomas Hearns.\n\nCounter puncher\n\nCounter punchers are slippery, defensive style fighters who often rely on their opponent's mistakes in order to gain the advantage, whether it be on the score cards or more preferably a knockout. They use their well-rounded defense to avoid or block shots and then immediately catch the opponent off guard with a well placed and timed punch. A fight with a skilled counter-puncher can turn into a war of attrition, where each shot landed is a battle in itself. Thus, fighting against counter punchers requires constant feinting and the ability to avoid telegraphing one's attacks. To be truly successful using this style they must have good reflexes, a high level of prediction and awareness, pinpoint accuracy and speed, both in striking and in footwork.\n\nNotable counter punchers include Muhammad Ali, Vitali Klitschko, Evander Holyfield, Max Schmeling, Chris Byrd, Jim Corbett, Jack Johnson, Bernard Hopkins, Laszlo Papp, Jerry Quarry, Anselmo Moreno, James Toney, Marvin Hagler, Juan Manuel Márquez, Humberto Soto, Floyd Mayweather, Jr., Roger Mayweather, Pernell Whitaker, Sergio Gabriel Martinez and Guillermo Rigondeaux.\n\nCounter punchers usually wear their opponents down by causing them to miss their punches. The more the opponent misses, the faster they tire, and the psychological effects of being unable to land a hit will start to sink in. The counter puncher often tries to outplay their opponent entirely, not just in a physical sense, but also in a mental and emotional sense. This style can be incredibly difficult, especially against seasoned fighters, but winning a fight without getting hit is often worth the pay-off. They usually try to stay away from the center of the ring, in order to outmaneuver and chip away at their opponents. A large advantage in counter-hitting is the forward momentum of the attacker, which drives them further into your return strike. As such, knockouts are more common than one would expect from a defensive style.\n\nBrawler/slugger\n\nA brawler is a fighter who generally lacks finesse and footwork in the ring, but makes up for it through sheer punching power. Mainly Irish, Irish-American, Puerto Rican, Mexican, and Mexican-American boxers popularized this style. Many brawlers tend to lack mobility, preferring a less mobile, more stable platform and have difficulty pursuing fighters who are fast on their feet. They may also have a tendency to ignore combination punching in favor of continuous beat-downs with one hand and by throwing slower, more powerful single punches (such as hooks and uppercuts). Their slowness and predictable punching pattern (single punches with obvious leads) often leaves them open to counter punches, so successful brawlers must be able to absorb substantial amounts of punishment. However, not all brawler/slugger fighters are not mobile; some can move around and switch styles if needed but still have the brawler/slugger style such as Wilfredo Gómez, Prince Naseem Hamed and Danny García.\n\nA brawler's most important assets are power and chin (the ability to absorb punishment while remaining able to continue boxing). Examples of this style include George Foreman, Rocky Marciano, Julio Cesar Chavez, Roberto Duran, Danny García, Wilfredo Gómez, Sonny Liston, John L. Sullivan, Max Baer, Prince Naseem Hamed, Ray Mancini, David Tua, Arturo Gatti, Micky Ward, Brandon Ríos, Ruslan Provodnikov, Michael Katsidis, James Kirkland, Marcos Maidana, Jake Lamotta, Manny Pacquiao, and Ireland's John Duddy. This style of boxing was also used by fictional boxers Rocky Balboa and James \"Clubber\" Lang.\n\nBrawlers tend to be more predictable and easy to hit but usually fare well enough against other fighting styles because they train to take punches very well. They often have a higher chance than other fighting styles to score a knockout against their opponents because they focus on landing big, powerful hits, instead of smaller, faster attacks. Oftentimes they place focus on training on their upper body instead of their entire body, to increase power and endurance. They also aim to intimidate their opponents because of their power, stature and ability to take a punch.\n\nSwarmer/in-fighter\n\nIn-fighters/swarmers (sometimes called \"pressure fighters\") attempt to stay close to an opponent, throwing intense flurries and combinations of hooks and uppercuts. A successful in-fighter often needs a good \"chin\" because swarming usually involves being hit with many jabs before they can maneuver inside where they are more effective. In-fighters operate best at close range because they are generally shorter and have less reach than their opponents and thus are more effective at a short distance where the longer arms of their opponents make punching awkward. However, several fighters tall for their division have been relatively adept at in-fighting as well as out-fighting.\n\nThe essence of a swarmer is non-stop aggression. Many short in-fighters utilize their stature to their advantage, employing a bob-and-weave defense by bending at the waist to slip underneath or to the sides of incoming punches. Unlike blocking, causing an opponent to miss a punch disrupts his balance, permits forward movement past the opponent's extended arm and keeps the hands free to counter. A distinct advantage that in-fighters have is when throwing uppercuts where they can channel their entire bodyweight behind the punch; Mike Tyson was famous for throwing devastating uppercuts. Marvin Hagler was known for his hard \"chin\", punching power, body attack and the stalking of his opponents. Some in-fighters, like Mike Tyson, have been known for being notoriously hard to hit. The key to a swarmer is aggression, endurance, chin, and bobbing-and-weaving.\n\nNotable in-fighters include Julio César Chávez, Miguel Cotto, Joe Frazier, Danny García, Mike Tyson, Manny Pacquiao, Saúl Álvarez, Rocky Marciano, Jack Dempsey, Wayne McCullough, Gerry Penalosa, Harry Greb, David Tua, Ricky Hatton and Gennady Golovkin.\n\nCombinations of styles\n\nAll fighters have primary skills with which they feel most comfortable, but truly elite fighters are often able to incorporate auxiliary styles when presented with a particular challenge. For example, an out-fighter will sometimes plant his feet and counter punch, or a slugger may have the stamina to pressure fight with his power punches.\n\nStyle matchups\n\nThere is a generally accepted rule of thumb about the success each of these boxing styles has against the others. In general, an in-fighter has an advantage over an out-fighter, an out-fighter has an advantage over a brawler, and a brawler has an advantage over an in-fighter; these form a cycle with each style being stronger relative to one, and weaker relative to another, with none dominating, as in rock-paper-scissors. Naturally, many other factors, such as the skill level and training of the combatants, determine the outcome of a fight, but the widely held belief in this relationship among the styles is embodied in the cliché amongst boxing fans and writers that \"styles make fights.\"\n\nBrawlers tend to overcome swarmers or in-fighters because, in trying to get close to the slugger, the in-fighter will invariably have to walk straight into the guns of the much harder-hitting brawler, so, unless the former has a very good chin and the latter's stamina is poor, the brawler's superior power will carry the day. A famous example of this type of match-up advantage would be George Foreman's knockout victory over Joe Frazier in their original bout \"The Sunshine Showdown\".\n\nAlthough in-fighters struggle against heavy sluggers, they typically enjoy more success against out-fighters or boxers. Out-fighters prefer a slower fight, with some distance between themselves and the opponent. The in-fighter tries to close that gap and unleash furious flurries. On the inside, the out-fighter loses a lot of his combat effectiveness, because he cannot throw the hard punches. The in-fighter is generally successful in this case, due to his intensity in advancing on his opponent and his good agility, which makes him difficult to evade. For example, the swarming Joe Frazier, though easily dominated by the slugger George Foreman, was able to create many more problems for the boxer Muhammad Ali in their three fights. Joe Louis, after retirement, admitted that he hated being crowded, and that swarmers like untied/undefeated champ Rocky Marciano would have caused him style problems even in his prime.\n\nThe boxer or out-fighter tends to be most successful against a brawler, whose slow speed (both hand and foot) and poor technique makes him an easy target to hit for the faster out-fighter. The out-fighter's main concern is to stay alert, as the brawler only needs to land one good punch to finish the fight. If the out-fighter can avoid those power punches, he can often wear the brawler down with fast jabs, tiring him out. If he is successful enough, he may even apply extra pressure in the later rounds in an attempt to achieve a knockout. Most classic boxers, such as Muhammad Ali, enjoyed their best successes against sluggers.\n\nAn example of a style matchup was the historical fight of Julio César Chávez, a swarmer or in-fighter, against Meldrick Taylor, the boxer or out-fighter (see Julio César Chávez vs. Meldrick Taylor). The match was nicknamed \"Thunder Meets Lightning\" as an allusion to punching power of Chávez and blinding speed of Taylor. Chávez was the epitome of the \"Mexican\" style of boxing. Taylor's hand and foot speed and boxing abilities gave him the early advantage, allowing him to begin building a large lead on points. Chávez remained relentless in his pursuit of Taylor and due to his greater punching power Chávez slowly punished Taylor. Coming into the later rounds, Taylor was bleeding from the mouth, his entire face was swollen, the bones around his eye socket had been broken, he had swallowed a considerable amount of his own blood, and as he grew tired, Taylor was increasingly forced into exchanging blows with Chávez, which only gave Chávez a greater chance to cause damage. While there was little doubt that Taylor had solidly won the first three quarters of the fight, the question at hand was whether he would survive the final quarter. Going into the final round, Taylor held a secure lead on the scorecards of two of the three judges. Chávez would have to knock Taylor out to claim a victory, whereas Taylor merely needed to stay away from the Mexican legend. However, Taylor did not stay away, but continued to trade blows with Chávez. As he did so, Taylor showed signs of extreme exhaustion, and every tick of the clock brought Taylor closer to victory unless Chávez could knock him out.\nWith about a minute left in the round, Chávez hit Taylor squarely with several hard punches and stayed on the attack, continuing to hit Taylor with well-placed shots. Finally, with about 25 seconds to go, Chávez landed a hard right hand that caused Taylor to stagger forward towards a corner, forcing Chávez back ahead of him. Suddenly Chávez stepped around Taylor, positioning him so that Taylor was trapped in the corner, with no way to escape from Chávez' desperate final flurry. Chávez then nailed Taylor with a tremendous right hand that dropped the younger man. By using the ring ropes to pull himself up, Taylor managed to return to his feet and was given the mandatory 8-count. Referee Richard Steele asked Taylor twice if he was able to continue fighting, but Taylor failed to answer. Steele then concluded that Taylor was unfit to continue and signaled that he was ending the fight, resulting in a TKO victory for Chávez with only two seconds to go in the bout.\n\nEquipment\n\nSince boxing involves forceful, repetitive punching, precautions must be taken to prevent damage to bones in the hand. Most trainers do not allow boxers to train and spar without wrist wraps and boxing gloves. Hand wraps are used to secure the bones in the hand, and the gloves are used to protect the hands from blunt injury, allowing boxers to throw punches with more force than if they did not utilize them. Gloves have been required in competition since the late nineteenth century, though modern boxing gloves are much heavier than those worn by early twentieth-century fighters. Prior to a bout, both boxers agree upon the weight of gloves to be used in the bout, with the understanding that lighter gloves allow heavy punchers to inflict more damage. The brand of gloves can also affect the impact of punches, so this too is usually stipulated before a bout. Both sides are allowed to inspect the wraps and gloves of the opponent to help ensure both are within agreed upon specifications and no tampering has taken place.\n\nA mouth guard is important to protect the teeth and gums from injury, and to cushion the jaw, resulting in a decreased chance of knockout. Both fighters must wear soft soled shoes to reduce the damage from accidental (or intentional) stepping on feet. While older boxing boots more commonly resembled those of a professional wrestler, modern boxing shoes and boots tend to be quite similar to their amateur wrestling counterparts.\n\nBoxers practice their skills on two basic types of punching bags. A small, tear-drop-shaped \"speed bag\" is used to hone reflexes and repetitive punching skills, while a large cylindrical \"heavy bag\" filled with sand, a synthetic substitute, or water is used to practice power punching and body blows. In addition to these distinctive pieces of equipment, boxers also utilize sport-nonspecific training equipment to build strength, speed, agility, and stamina. Common training equipment includes free weights, rowing machines, jump rope, and medicine balls.\n\nBoxing matches typically take place in a boxing ring, a raised platform surrounded by ropes attached to posts rising in each corner. The term \"ring\" has come to be used as a metaphor for many aspects of prize fighting in general.\n\nTechnique\n\nStance\n\nThe modern boxing stance differs substantially from the typical boxing stances of the 19th and early 20th centuries. The modern stance has a more upright vertical-armed guard, as opposed to the more horizontal, knuckles-facing-forward guard adopted by early 20th century hook users such as Jack Johnson.\n\nFile:attitude_droite1.jpg|Upright stance\nFile:attitude_semi-enroulée1.jpg|Semi-crouch\nFile:attitude_enroulée1.jpg|Full crouch\n\nIn a fully upright stance, the boxer stands with the legs shoulder-width apart and the rear foot a half-step in front of the lead man. Right-handed or orthodox boxers lead with the left foot and fist (for most penetration power). Both feet are parallel, and the right heel is off the ground. The lead (left) fist is held vertically about six inches in front of the face at eye level. The rear (right) fist is held beside the chin and the elbow tucked against the ribcage to protect the body. The chin is tucked into the chest to avoid punches to the jaw which commonly cause knock-outs and is often kept slightly off-center. Wrists are slightly bent to avoid damage when punching and the elbows are kept tucked in to protect the ribcage. Some boxers fight from a crouch, leaning forward and keeping their feet closer together. The stance described is considered the \"textbook\" stance and fighters are encouraged to change it around once it's been mastered as a base. Case in point, many fast fighters have their hands down and have almost exaggerated footwork, while brawlers or bully fighters tend to slowly stalk their opponents.\n\nLeft-handed or southpaw fighters use a mirror image of the orthodox stance, which can create problems for orthodox fighters unaccustomed to receiving jabs, hooks, or crosses from the opposite side. The southpaw stance, conversely, is vulnerable to a straight right hand.\n\nNorth American fighters tend to favor a more balanced stance, facing the opponent almost squarely, while many European fighters stand with their torso turned more to the side. The positioning of the hands may also vary, as some fighters prefer to have both hands raised in front of the face, risking exposure to body shots.\n\nModern boxers can sometimes be seen tapping their cheeks or foreheads with their fists in order to remind themselves to keep their hands up (which becomes difficult during long bouts). Boxers are taught to push off with their feet in order to move effectively. Forward motion involves lifting the lead leg and pushing with the rear leg. Rearward motion involves lifting the rear leg and pushing with the lead leg. During lateral motion the leg in the direction of the movement moves first while the opposite leg provides the force needed to move the body.\n\nPunches\n\nThere are four basic punches in boxing: the jab, cross, hook and uppercut. Any punch other than a jab is considered a power punch. If a boxer is right-handed (orthodox), his left hand is the lead hand and his right hand is the rear hand. For a left-handed boxer or southpaw, the hand positions are reversed. For clarity, the following discussion will assume a right-handed boxer.\n\nFile:jab7.jpg|Jab\nFile:Drop3.jpg|Cross - in counter-punch with a looping\nFile:crochet1.jpg|Hook\nFile:uppercut2.jpg|Uppercut\n\n* Jab – A quick, straight punch thrown with the lead hand from the guard position. The jab is accompanied by a small, clockwise rotation of the torso and hips, while the fist rotates 90 degrees, becoming horizontal upon impact. As the punch reaches full extension, the lead shoulder can be brought up to guard the chin. The rear hand remains next to the face to guard the jaw. After making contact with the target, the lead hand is retracted quickly to resume a guard position in front of the face.\n** The jab is recognized as the most important punch in a boxer's arsenal because it provides a fair amount of its own cover and it leaves the least amount of space for a counter punch from the opponent. It has the longest reach of any punch and does not require commitment or large weight transfers. Due to its relatively weak power, the jab is often used as a tool to gauge distances, probe an opponent's defenses, harass an opponent, and set up heavier, more powerful punches. A half-step may be added, moving the entire body into the punch, for additional power. Some notable boxers who have been able to develop relative power in their jabs and use it to punish or 'wear down' their opponents to some effect include Larry Holmes and Wladimir Klitschko.\n* Cross – A powerful, straight punch thrown with the rear hand. From the guard position, the rear hand is thrown from the chin, crossing the body and traveling towards the target in a straight line. The rear shoulder is thrust forward and finishes just touching the outside of the chin. At the same time, the lead hand is retracted and tucked against the face to protect the inside of the chin. For additional power, the torso and hips are rotated counter-clockwise as the cross is thrown. A measure of an ideally extended cross is that the shoulder of the striking arm, the knee of the front leg and the ball of the front foot are on the same vertical plane. \n** Weight is also transferred from the rear foot to the lead foot, resulting in the rear heel turning outwards as it acts as a fulcrum for the transfer of weight. Body rotation and the sudden weight transfer is what gives the cross its power. Like the jab, a half-step forward may be added. After the cross is thrown, the hand is retracted quickly and the guard position resumed. It can be used to counter punch a jab, aiming for the opponent's head (or a counter to a cross aimed at the body) or to set up a hook. The cross is also called a \"straight\" or \"right\", especially if it does not cross the opponent's outstretched jab.\n* Hook – A semi-circular punch thrown with the lead hand to the side of the opponent's head. From the guard position, the elbow is drawn back with a horizontal fist (knuckles pointing forward) and the elbow bent. The rear hand is tucked firmly against the jaw to protect the chin. The torso and hips are rotated clockwise, propelling the fist through a tight, clockwise arc across the front of the body and connecting with the target.\n** At the same time, the lead foot pivots clockwise, turning the left heel outwards. Upon contact, the hook's circular path ends abruptly and the lead hand is pulled quickly back into the guard position. A hook may also target the lower body and this technique is sometimes called the \"rip\" to distinguish it from the conventional hook to the head. The hook may also be thrown with the rear hand. Notable left hookers include Joe Frazier , Roy Jones Jr. and Mike Tyson.\n\n* Uppercut – A vertical, rising punch thrown with the rear hand. From the guard position, the torso shifts slightly to the right, the rear hand drops below the level of the opponent's chest and the knees are bent slightly. From this position, the rear hand is thrust upwards in a rising arc towards the opponent's chin or torso.\n** At the same time, the knees push upwards quickly and the torso and hips rotate anti-clockwise and the rear heel turns outward, mimicking the body movement of the cross. The strategic utility of the uppercut depends on its ability to \"lift\" the opponent's body, setting it off-balance for successive attacks. The right uppercut followed by a left hook is a deadly combination employing the uppercut to lift the opponent's chin into a vulnerable position, then the hook to knock the opponent out.\n\nThese different punch types can be thrown in rapid succession to form combinations or \"combos.\" The most common is the jab and cross combination, nicknamed the \"one-two combo.\" This is usually an effective combination, because the jab blocks the opponent's view of the cross, making it easier to land cleanly and forcefully.\n\nA large, swinging circular punch starting from a cocked-back position with the arm at a longer extension than the hook and all of the fighter's weight behind it is sometimes referred to as a \"roundhouse,\" \"haymaker,\" or sucker-punch. Relying on body weight and centripetal force within a wide arc, the roundhouse can be a powerful blow, but it is often a wild and uncontrolled punch that leaves the fighter delivering it off balance and with an open guard.\n\nWide, looping punches have the further disadvantage of taking more time to deliver, giving the opponent ample warning to react and counter. For this reason, the haymaker or roundhouse is not a conventional punch, and is regarded by trainers as a mark of poor technique or desperation. Sometimes it has been used, because of its immense potential power, to finish off an already staggering opponent who seems unable or unlikely to take advantage of the poor position it leaves the puncher in.\n\nAnother unconventional punch is the rarely used bolo punch, in which the opponent swings an arm out several times in a wide arc, usually as a distraction, before delivering with either that or the other arm.\n\nAn illegal punch to the back of the head or neck is known as a rabbit punch.\n\nDefense\n\nThere are several basic maneuvers a boxer can use in order to evade or block punches, depicted and discussed below.\n\nFile:slip1.jpg|Slipping\nFile:slip2.jpg|Bobbing\nFile:blocage1.jpg|Blocking (with the arms)\nFile:protection passive1.jpg|Cover-Up (with the gloves)\nFile:neutraliser1.jpg|Clinching\nFile:pas de retrait.jpg|Footwork\nFile:retrait2.jpg|Pulling away\n\n* Slip – Slipping rotates the body slightly so that an incoming punch passes harmlessly next to the head. As the opponent's punch arrives, the boxer sharply rotates the hips and shoulders. This turns the chin sideways and allows the punch to \"slip\" past. Muhammad Ali was famous for extremely fast and close slips, as was an early Mike Tyson.\n* Sway or fade – To anticipate a punch and move the upper body or head back so that it misses or has its force appreciably lessened. Also called \"rolling with the punch\" or \" Riding The Punch\".\n* Duck or break – To drop down with the back straight so that a punch aimed at the head glances or misses entirely.\n* Bob and weave – Bobbing moves the head laterally and beneath an incoming punch. As the opponent's punch arrives, the boxer bends the legs quickly and simultaneously shifts the body either slightly right or left. Once the punch has been evaded, the boxer \"weaves\" back to an upright position, emerging on either the outside or inside of the opponent's still-extended arm. To move outside the opponent's extended arm is called \"bobbing to the outside\". To move inside the opponent's extended arm is called \"bobbing to the inside\". Joe Frazier, Jack Dempsey, Mike Tyson and Rocky Marciano were masters of bobbing and weaving.\n* Parry/block – Parrying or blocking uses the boxer's shoulder, hands or arms as defensive tools to protect against incoming attacks. A block generally receives a punch while a parry tends to deflect it. A \"palm\", \"catch\", or \"cuff\" is a defense which intentionally takes the incoming punch on the palm portion of the defender's glove.\n* The cover-up – Covering up is the last opportunity (other than rolling with a punch) to avoid an incoming strike to an unprotected face or body. Generally speaking, the hands are held high to protect the head and chin and the forearms are tucked against the torso to impede body shots. When protecting the body, the boxer rotates the hips and lets incoming punches \"roll\" off the guard. To protect the head, the boxer presses both fists against the front of the face with the forearms parallel and facing outwards. This type of guard is weak against attacks from below.\n* The clinch – Clinching is a form of trapping or a rough form of grappling and occurs when the distance between both fighters has closed and straight punches cannot be employed. In this situation, the boxer attempts to hold or \"tie up\" the opponent's hands so he is unable to throw hooks or uppercuts. To perform a clinch, the boxer loops both hands around the outside of the opponent's shoulders, scooping back under the forearms to grasp the opponent's arms tightly against his own body. In this position, the opponent's arms are pinned and cannot be used to attack. Clinching is a temporary match state and is quickly dissipated by the referee. Clinching is technically against the rules, and in amateur fights points are deducted fairly quickly for it. It is unlikely, however, to see points deducted for a clinch in professional boxing.\n\nLess common strategies\n\n* The \"rope-a-dope\" strategy : Used by Muhammad Ali in his 1974 \"the Rumble in the Jungle\" bout against George Foreman, the rope-a-dope method involves lying back against the ropes, covering up defensively as much as possible and allowing the opponent to attempt numerous punches. The back-leaning posture, which does not cause the defending boxer to become as unbalanced as he would during normal backward movement, also maximizes the distance of the defender's head from his opponent, increasing the probability that punches will miss their intended target. Weathering the blows that do land, the defender lures the opponent into expending energy while conserving his/her own. If successful, the attacking opponent will eventually tire, creating defensive flaws which the boxer can exploit. In modern boxing, the rope-a-dope is generally discouraged since most opponents are not fooled by it and few boxers possess the physical toughness to withstand a prolonged, unanswered assault. Recently, however, eight-division world champion Manny Pacquiao skillfully used the strategy to gauge the power of welterweight titlist Miguel Cotto in November 2009. Pacquiao followed up the rope-a-dope gambit with a withering knockdown.\n* Bolo punch : Occasionally seen in Olympic boxing, the bolo is an arm punch which owes its power to the shortening of a circular arc rather than to transference of body weight; it tends to have more of an effect due to the surprise of the odd angle it lands at rather than the actual power of the punch. This is more of a gimmick than a technical maneuver; this punch is not taught, being on the same plane in boxing technicality as is the Ali shuffle. Nevertheless, a few professional boxers have used the bolo-punch to great effect, including former welterweight champions Sugar Ray Leonard, and Kid Gavilan. Middleweight champion Ceferino Garcia is regarded as the inventor of the bolo punch.\n\nFile:contre_bolo1.jpg| Bolo punch\nFile:drop1.jpg| Overhand (overcut)\n\n* Overhand right : The overhand right is a punch not found in every boxer's arsenal. Unlike the right cross, which has a trajectory parallel to the ground, the overhand right has a looping circular arc as it is thrown over the shoulder with the palm facing away from the boxer. It is especially popular with smaller stature boxers trying to reach taller opponents. Boxers who have used this punch consistently and effectively include former heavyweight champions Rocky Marciano and Tim Witherspoon, as well as MMA champions Chuck Liddell and Fedor Emelianenko. The overhand right has become a popular weapon in other tournaments that involve fist striking.\n* Check hook : A check hook is employed to prevent aggressive boxers from lunging in. There are two parts to the check hook. The first part consists of a regular hook. The second, trickier part involves the footwork. As the opponent lunges in, the boxer should throw the hook and pivot on his left foot and swing his right foot 180 degrees around. If executed correctly, the aggressive boxer will lunge in and sail harmlessly past his opponent like a bull missing a matador. This is rarely seen in professional boxing as it requires a great disparity in skill level to execute. Technically speaking it has been said that there is no such thing as a check hook and that it is simply a hook applied to an opponent that has lurched forward and past his opponent who simply hooks him on the way past. Others have argued that the check hook exists but is an illegal punch due to it being a pivot punch which is illegal in the sport. Floyd Mayweather, Jr. employed the use of a check hook against Ricky Hatton, which sent Hatton flying head first into the corner post and being knocked down.\n\nRing corner\n\nIn boxing, each fighter is given a corner of the ring where he rests in between rounds for 1 minute and where his trainers stand. Typically, three men stand in the corner besides the boxer himself; these are the trainer, the assistant trainer and the cutman. The trainer and assistant typically give advice to the boxer on what he is doing wrong as well as encouraging him if he is losing. The cutman is a cutaneous doctor responsible for keeping the boxer's face and eyes free of cuts and blood. This is of particular importance because many fights are stopped because of cuts that threaten the boxer's eyes.\n\nIn addition, the corner is responsible for stopping the fight if they feel their fighter is in grave danger of permanent injury. The corner will occasionally throw in a white towel to signify a boxer's surrender (the idiomatic phrase \"to throw in the towel\", meaning to give up, derives from this practice). This can be seen in the fight between Diego Corrales and Floyd Mayweather. In that fight, Corrales' corner surrendered despite Corrales' steadfast refusal.\n\nMedical concerns\n\nKnocking a person unconscious or even causing concussion may cause permanent brain damage. There is no clear division between the force required to knock a person out and the force likely to kill a person. Since 1980, more than 200 amateur boxers, professional boxers and Toughman fighters have died due to ring or training injuries. In 1983, editorials in the Journal of the American Medical Association called for a ban on boxing. The editor, Dr. George Lundberg, called boxing an \"obscenity\" that \"should not be sanctioned by any civilized society.\" Since then, the British, Canadian and Australian Medical Associations have called for bans on boxing.\n\nSupporters of the ban state that boxing is the only sport where hurting the other athlete is the goal. Dr. Bill O'Neill, boxing spokesman for the British Medical Association, has supported the BMA's proposed ban on boxing: \"It is the only sport where the intention is to inflict serious injury on your opponent, and we feel that we must have a total ban on boxing.\" Opponents respond that such a position is misguided opinion, stating that amateur boxing is scored solely according to total connecting blows with no award for \"injury\". They observe that many skilled professional boxers have had rewarding careers without inflicting injury on opponents by accumulating scoring blows and avoiding punches winning rounds scored 10-9 by the 10-point must system, and they note that there are many other sports where concussions are much more prevalent. \n\nIn 2007, one study of amateur boxers showed that protective headgear did not prevent brain damage, and another found that amateur boxers faced a high risk of brain damage. The Gothenburg study analyzed temporary levels of neurofiliment light in cerebral spinal fluid which they conclude is evidence of damage, even though the levels soon subside. More comprehensive studies of neurologiocal function on larger samples performed by Johns Hopkins University and accident rates analyzed by National Safety Council show amateur boxing is a comparatively safe sport.\n\nIn 1997, the American Association of Professional Ringside Physicians was established to create medical protocols through research and education to prevent injuries in boxing. \n\nProfessional boxing is forbidden in Iceland, Iran, Saudi Arabia and North Korea. It was banned in Sweden until 2007 when the ban was lifted but strict restrictions, including four three-minute rounds for fights, were imposed. It was banned in Albania from 1965 till the fall of Communism in 1991; it is now legal there. Norway legalized professional boxing in December 2014.\n\nBoxing Hall of Fame\n\nThe sport of boxing has two internationally recognized boxing halls of fame; the International Boxing Hall of Fame (IBHOF) and the World Boxing Hall of Fame (WBHF), with the IBHOF being the more widely recognized boxing hall of fame. In 2013, The Boxing Hall of Fame Las Vegas opened in Las Vegas, NV founded by Steve Lott, former assistant manager for Mike Tyson \n\nThe WBHF was founded by Everett L. Sanders in 1980. Since its inception the WBHOF has never had a permanent location or museum, which has allowed the more recent IBHOF to garner more publicity and prestige. Among the notable names in the WBHF are Ricardo \"Finito\" Lopez, Gabriel \"Flash\" Elorde, Michael Carbajal, Khaosai Galaxy, Henry Armstrong, Jack Johnson, Roberto Durán, George Foreman, Ceferino Garcia and Salvador Sanchez. Boxing's International Hall of Fame was inspired by a tribute an American town held for two local heroes in 1982. The town, Canastota, New York, (which is about 15 mi east of Syracuse, via the New York State Thruway), honored former world welterweight/middleweight champion Carmen Basilio and his nephew, former world welterweight champion Billy Backus. The people of Canastota raised money for the tribute which inspired the idea of creating an official, annual hall of fame for notable boxers.\n\nThe International Boxing Hall of Fame opened in Canastota in 1989. The first inductees in 1990 included Jack Johnson, Benny Leonard, Jack Dempsey, Henry Armstrong, Sugar Ray Robinson, Archie Moore, and Muhammad Ali. Other world-class figures include Salvador Sanchez, Jose Napoles, Roberto \"Manos de Piedra\" Durán, Ricardo Lopez, Gabriel \"Flash\" Elorde, Vicente Saldivar, Ismael Laguna, Eusebio Pedroza, Carlos Monzón, Azumah Nelson, Rocky Marciano, Pipino Cuevas and Ken Buchanan. The Hall of Fame's induction ceremony is held every June as part of a four-day event. The fans who come to Canastota for the Induction Weekend are treated to a number of events, including scheduled autograph sessions, boxing exhibitions, a parade featuring past and present inductees, and the induction ceremony itself.\n\nThe Boxing Hall of Fame Las Vegas features the $75 million ESPN Classic Sports fight film and tape library and radio broadcast collection. The collection includes the fights of all the great champions including: Muhammad Ali, Mike Tyson, George Foreman, Roberto Duran, Marvin Hagler, Jack Dempsey, Joe Louis, Joe Frazier, Rocky Marciano and Sugar Ray Robinson. It is this exclusive fight film library that will separate the Boxing Hall of Fame Las Vegas from the other halls of fame which do not have rights to any video of their sports. The inaugural inductees included Muhammad Ali, Henry Armstrong, Tony Canzoneri, Ezzard Charles, Julio Cesar Chavez Sr., Jack Dempsey, Roberto Duran, Joe Louis, and Sugar Ray Robinson \n\nGoverning and sanctioning bodies\n\n; Governing Bodies\n* British Boxing Board of Control (BBBofC)\n* European Boxing Union\n* Nevada State Athletic Commission\n\n; Major Sanctioning Bodies\n* International Boxing Federation (IBF)\n* World Boxing Association (WBA)\n* World Boxing Council (WBC)\n* World Boxing Organization (WBO)\n\n;Amateur\n* International Boxing Association (AIBA; now also professional)\n\nBoxer rankings\n\nThere are various organizations and websites, that rank boxers in both weight class and pound-for-pound manner.\n* BoxRec ([http://boxrec.com/ratings.php ratings])\n* The Ring ([http://ringtv.craveonline.com/ratings ratings])\n* ESPN ([http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/boxing/columns/story?columnistrafael_dan&id\n6402207 ratings])\n* Transnational Boxing Rankings Board ([http://www.tbrb.org/all-rankings/ ratings])", "The World Boxing Council (WBC) is one of four major organizations which sanction world championship boxing bouts, alongside the International Boxing Federation (IBF), World Boxing Association (WBA) and World Boxing Organization (WBO). Owing to the many historically high-profile bouts sanctioned by the organization, and legendary fighters who have been recognised as WBC World champions, the organization still remains one of the major four sanctioning bodies. All four organizations however recognise the legitimacy of each other, and each have interwoven histories dating back several decades.\n\nHistory\n\nIt was initially established by 11 countries: the United States, Puerto Rico, Argentina, United Kingdom, France, Mexico, Philippines, Panama, Chile, Peru, Venezuela and Brazil. Representatives met in Mexico City on 14 February 1963, upon invitation of Adolfo López Mateos, then President of Mexico, to form an international organization to unify all commissions of the world to control the expansion of boxing.\n\nThe groups that historically had recognized several boxers as champions included the New York State Athletic Commission, the National Boxing Association of the United States, the European Boxing Union and the British Boxing Board of Control (BBBC); but for the most part, these groups lacked the all-encompassing 'international' status they claimed.\n\nToday, it has 161 member countries. The current WBC president is Mauricio Sulaiman. Former presidents include Luis Spota and Ramon G. Velázquez of Mexico, Justiniano N. Montano, Jr. of the Philippines, and José Sulaimán of Mexico from 1975 until Sulaimán's death in 2014.\n\nChampionship\n\nThe WBC's green championship belt portrays the flags of all of the 161 member countries of the organization. All WBC world-title belts look identical regardless of weight class; however, there are minor variations on the design for secondary and regionally themed titles within the same weight class.\n\nThe WBC has nine regional governing bodies affiliated with it, such as the North American Boxing Federation (NABF), the Oriental and Pacific Boxing Federation (OPBF), the European Boxing Union (EBU) and the African Boxing Council (ABC).\n\nAlthough rivals, the WBC's relationship with other sanctioning bodies has improved over time and there have even been talks of unification with the WBA. Unification bouts between WBC and other organizations' champions are becoming more common in recent years. Throughout its history, the WBC has allowed some of its organization's champions to fight unification fights with champions of other organizations, although there were times it stepped in to prevent such fights. For many years, it also prevented its champions from holding the WBO belt. When a WBO-recognized champion wished to fight for a WBC championship, he had to abandon his WBO title first, without any special considerations. This, however, is no longer the case.\n\nIn 1983, following the death of Kim Duk-koo from injuries sustained in a 14-round fight against Ray Mancini, the WBC took the unprecedented step of reducing the distance of its world championship bouts, from 15 rounds to 12 — a move other organizations soon followed (for boxers' safety).\n\nAmong those to have been recognized by the WBC as world champions were the undefeated and undisputed champion (46-0) Joe Calzaghe, Rocky Marciano (49-0), Floyd Mayweather Jr (49-0), Roy Jones, Jr., Wilfred Benítez, Wilfredo Gómez, Julio César Chávez, Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, Sugar Ray Leonard, Thomas Hearns, Mike Tyson, Salvador Sánchez, Héctor Camacho, Marvin Hagler, Carlos Monzón, Rodrigo Valdez, Roberto Durán, Juan Laporte, Félix Trinidad, Edwin Rosario, Bernard Hopkins, Alexis Argüello, Nigel Benn, Lennox Lewis, Vitali Klitschko, Erik Morales, Miguel Cotto, Manny Pacquiao, and Canelo Alvarez.\n\nIn its discretion, the WBC may designate and recognize, upon a two-thirds majority vote of their Board of Governors, one or more emeritus world champions in each weight class. Such a recognition is for life and is only bestowed upon present or past WBC world champions. The following boxers have earned the Emeritus Championship appellation throughout their careers: Lennox Lewis, Vitali Klitschko, Roy Jones Jr, Bernard Hopkins (Honorary Champion), Mikkel Kessler, Sergio Gabriel Martínez, Floyd Mayweather Jr, Kostya Tszyu, Manny Pacquiao, Danny García, Érik Morales, Toshiaki Nishioka, Vic Darchinyan, and Édgar Sosa. During the WBC's 51st Convention in Bangkok, Thailand, Floyd Mayweather was named \"Supreme Champion\", a designation that nobody before him has ever achieved.\n\nThe WBC bolstered the legitimacy of women's boxing by recognizing fighters such as Christy Martin and Lucia Rijker as contenders for World Female titles in 16 weight divisions. The first WBC World Female Champion (on 30 May 2005) was the super-bantamweight Jackie Nava from Mexico. With her former-champion father at ringside, Laila Ali won the super-middleweight title on 11 June 2005.\n\nWBC Silver\n\nThe WBC has also created a \"Silver\" world title in 2010. Justin Savi was the first to win it on 16 April 2010, fighting against Cyril Thomas in France. The Silver title was created as a replacement to the interim title. But unlike its predecessor, a boxer holding the Silver title cannot inherit the full title vacated by the champion. The WBC continues to recognize Interim and Silver champions, as well as Interim Silver champions. \n\nA year later, the WBC brought Silver belts to the International title ranks. \n\nDiamond Championship\n\nIn September 2009, the WBC created its new \"Diamond Championship\" belt. This belt was created as an honorary championship exclusively to award the winner of a historic fight between two high-profile and elite boxers. The inaugural Diamond Belt was awarded on 14 November 2009 to Manny Pacquiao, who won his sixth world title (in 5 different divisions) via a 12th round technical knockout (TKO) over Miguel Ángel Cotto at welterweight in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA. Other holders of this title have included Bernard Hopkins (light heavyweight), Sergio Martínez and Saúl Álvarez (middleweight), Floyd Mayweather, Jr. (super welterweight), Nonito Donaire (super bantamweight), Léo Santa Cruz (featherweight), Jean Pascal and Sergey Kovalev (light heavyweight). Although this title can be defended, it is not a mandatory requirement. The title can also be vacated in the case of a fighter's long-term absence or retirement from boxing.\n\nThe WBC and Don King\n\nMany in the boxing community have accused the WBC of bending its rules to suit the powerful boxing promoter Don King. The journalist Jack Newfield wrote, \"...[WBC President Jose Sulaiman] became more King's junior partner than his independent regulator\". Another journalist, Peter Heller, echoes that comment: \"Sulaiman...became little more than an errand boy for Don King\". Heller quotes British promoter Mickey Duff as saying, \"My complaint is that José Sulaimán is not happy his friend Don King is the biggest promoter in boxing. Sulaiman will only be happy when Don King is the only promoter in boxing.\"\n\nNewfield and Heller take issue with the following actions of the WBC:\n*When Leon Spinks won the WBA and WBC Heavyweight championships from Muhammad Ali in 1978, the WBC stripped Leon Spinks of his title. José Sulaimán said the WBC did so because Spinks was signed for a rematch with Ali instead of fighting a Don King fighter, Ken Norton. Norton defended the WBC title against another Don King fighter, Larry Holmes, who won the belt.\n*In 1983, WBC Super Featherweight champion Bobby Chacon was signed to fight Cornelius Boza Edwards, the WBC's mandatory challenger for his title. But, the promoter Don King wanted his fighter, Héctor Camacho, to fight for the title. Although WBC rules said the mandatory challenger should receive a shot at the title, the WBC withdrew its sanction from the fight. It stripped Chacon of his title for refusing to fight Camacho.\n*Under WBC rules, a fighter is supposed to defend his title against a mandatory challenger at least once a year. For fighters controlled by Don King, this rule is often ignored. For instance, as WBC champions, Alexis Argüello and Carlos Zarate, were allowed to ignore their obligations to their mandatory contenders.\n*While WBC Super Featherweight champion, Julio César Chávez wanted to fight top contender Roger Mayweather for a promoter other than Don King. The WBC withheld its sanction of the fight until Don King became promoter.\n*When Mike Tyson lost to James \"Buster\" Douglas during an IBF, WBC and WBA Heavyweight championship defense, King convinced the WBC (along with the WBA) to withhold recognition of Douglas as heavyweight champion. King claimed that Tyson had won the fight due to knocking down Douglas, and the referee's giving Douglas a \"long count\". The referee Octavio Meyran, in an affidavit, claims that King threatened to have the WBC withhold payment of Meyran's hotel bill if Meyran did not support King's protest. Because of intense public pressure, both the WBA and WBC backed down and recognized Douglas as champion.\n*In 1992, the WBC threatened to strip Evander Holyfield of his title for defending it against Riddick Bowe instead of Razor Ruddock. Holyfield obtained a court order to stop the organization. In a taped deposition for the United States Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, Holyfield said that the WBC wanted him to defend his championship against Ruddock because Ruddock was managed by King.\n*During the 1990s, the WBC did not allow its champions to engage in unification bouts with WBO champions. However, in 1993, the super-middleweight showdown between WBC champion Nigel Benn and WBO champion Chris Eubank, promoted by Don King, was recognized as a title unification fight by the WBC. Each champion fought to a draw in his bout and each retained their respective titles.\n*When Mike Tyson was released from prison in 1995, the WBC installed him as their #1 contender for their heavyweight championship. Tyson had not fought in four years, but was promoted by Don King.\n*In 1993, Julio César Chávez, managed & promoted by Don King, got a majority draw against Pernell Whitaker in their WBC welterweight title fight in San Antonio, Texas. Virtually every ringside observer and boxing analyst had Whitaker winning at least 8 or 9 of the 12 round fight, and CompuBox statistics showed Whitaker outlanding Chavez by a wide margin. But two of the three judges had the fight scored even. The fight was promoted by King, and 2 of the judges were not appointed by the state's boxing commission (in this case, Texas) like any other time; instead, they were appointed by the WBC. It had been reported that Don King had a hand in helping to secure the WBC judges for the fight. To this day, the resulting draw is considered one of the most controversial decisions ever.\n*In 2000, Chávez, still promoted by King, was the mandatory challenger for Kostya Tszyu's WBC super lightweight title. Chávez did not appear to satisfy requirements for a mandatory challenger: he had not fought at super lightweight for two years, had recently lost to journeyman boxer Willie Wise, and had not beaten a top contender since losing his first fight to Oscar De La Hoya in 1996.\n*In 2005, the WBC stripped Javier Castillejo of his super welterweight title for fighting Fernando Vargas instead of Ricardo Mayorga, a fighter promoted by Don King. The WBC qualified Mayorga for a shot at the super welterweight title although he had never fought at that weight limit and had lost two of his last three fights.\n\nControversies\n\nIn early 1998, Roy Jones, Jr. announced that he was relinquishing his WBC light heavyweight title. In response, the WBC ordered a bout between Graciano Rocchigiani from Germany and the former champion Michael Nunn to fill the vacancy, sanctioning it as a world championship match. On 21 March 1998, Rocchigiani won the fight and a WBC belt; in the subsequent WBC rankings, he was listed as \"Light-Heavyweight World Champion\".\n\nJones, however, had a change of heart and asked if the WBC would reinstate him as the champion. In a move that violated nearly a dozen of its own regulations, the WBC granted the reinstatement. Rocchigiani received a letter from the WBC advising that the publication of his name as champion was a typographical error, and he had never been the official title holder.\n\nRocchigiani immediately filed a lawsuit against the WBC in a U.S. federal court, claiming that the organization's actions were both contrary to their own rules, and injurious to his earning potential (due to diminished professional stature). On 7 May 2003, the judge ruled in Rocchigiani's favor, awarding him $30 million (U.S.) in damages and reinstating him as a former WBC champion (Rocchigiani had lost a bout since his WBC title match).\n\nThe following day, the WBC sought protection by filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy (i.e., corporate debt restructuring) in Puerto Rico. The organization spent the next 13 months trying to negotiate a six-figure settlement with Rocchigiani, but the fighter at first rejected the proposal.\n\nOn 11 June 2004, the WBC announced it would enter Chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation (i.e., business closing and total asset sell-off) proceedings, effectively ending its existence. This action prompted some in the boxing community to plead with Rocchigiani to settle the dispute, which he did in mid-July 2004. The WBC continues.\n\nDays before his fight with Saul Alvarez on 21 November 2015, the World Boxing Council asked their recognized world Middleweight champion, Miguel Cotto, to pay them $300,000 dollars in fees to sanction the bout. Cotto refused, and the WBC stripped him of the title, recognizing Gennady Golovkin as their interim champion instead. When Alvarez won the fight with Cotto, the WBC gave Alvarez partial recognition as their world Middleweight champion.\n\nCurrent WBC world title holders\n\nMale\n\nWorld Champions\n\nSilver Champions\n\nFemale\n\nAffiliated organizations\n\n*World Boxing Council Muaythai (WBC Muaythai)\n*Oriental and Pacific Boxing Federation (OPBF)\n*North American Boxing Federation (NABF)\n*European Boxing Union (EBU)\n*Asian Boxing Council (ABCO)\n*African Boxing Union (ABU)\n*United States National Boxing Council (USNBC)\n*Caribbean Boxing Federation (CABOFE)\n*Central American Boxing Federation (FECARBOX)\n*CIS and Slovenian Boxing Bureau (CISBB)\n*South American Continental Boxing Federation (FECONSUD)\n*Hispanic World Boxing Association (ABMH)\n*Indian Professional Boxing Association (IPBA)\n*Professional Boxing Organization India (PBOI)\n*Pakistan Professional Boxing League (PPBL)\n\nTransitions of WBC titles\n\n*List of WBC world champions\n*List of WBC international champions\n*List of WBC youth champions\n*List of WBC female world champions\n\nReferences and notes", "Trevor Berbick (August 1, 1954 – October 28, 2006) was a Jamaican Canadian professional boxer. He won the WBC heavyweight title in 1986 by defeating Pinklon Thomas, and lost it in his first defence to a then 20-year-old Mike Tyson. Berbick was the last man to fight Muhammad Ali, defeating him in 1981.\n\nBiography\n\nEarly life\n\nHe was born on August 1, 1954 in Norwich, Port Antonio, Jamaica.\n\nAmateur career\n\nAt 21, Berbick represented his native Jamaica in the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Quebec, Canada as a heavyweight boxer, despite having had only 11 prior amateur bouts. His lack of experience was evident as he lost to the eventual silver medalist, Mircea Şimon of Romania. However, he still displayed a lot of promise as a young heavyweight boxer. The previous year, Berbick lost a decision to future heavyweight champion Michael Dokes in the Pan American Games semifinals, winning a bronze medal.\n\nProfessional career\n\nBerbick left Jamaica after the Olympics. He opted to settle in Montreal and fight professionally out of Halifax. He won his first 11 fights (10 by knockout) before suffering his first pro loss to another rising contender, Bernardo Mercado, on April 3, 1979. As an amateur, Berbick had soundly beaten Mercado. However, with 10 seconds remaining in the first round of their only professional meeting, Berbick walked into a punch and was knocked out cold. Nevertheless, he remained in contention for the heavyweight title.\n\nA 1980 upset of ex-champ John Tate (9th round KO) secured a title shot against Larry Holmes on April 11, 1981, but Berbick lost a 15-round unanimous decision. In his second fight after the loss, he beat 39-year-old Muhammad Ali in the final fight of Ali's career.\n\nIn 1982 he beat undefeated prospect Greg Page, and in 1984 he moved to Miramar, Florida and signed with promoter Don King. Wins over undefeated Mitch \"Blood\" Green and David Bey scored him another title fight, and he won the WBC world heavyweight title by upsetting Pinklon Thomas with an easy unanimous decision on March 22, 1986. However, his reign as champion would be brief.\n\nOn November 22, in his first defense of the title, Berbick took on Mike Tyson, who was looking to break Floyd Patterson's record and become, at the age of twenty, the youngest ever heavyweight champion. In the second round, Tyson dropped Berbick with a quick knockdown. Berbick was quickly overwhelmed by his opponent and late in the round, he went down again. The champion rose to his feet, but immediately stumbled backward and fell back to the canvas. Berbick tried twice more to make it to his feet but fell both times, and referee Mills Lane stopped counting and waved the fight off to end Berbick's reign as champion.\n\nAlong with Larry Holmes, Berbick is one of only two men in professional boxing history to have fought both Muhammad Ali and Mike Tyson.\n\nIn 1991, he went to the UWFI in Japan to fight Nobuhiko Takada in a \"boxer vs. wrestler\" bout. Berbick claimed that he had been double-crossed and that he had expected the fight to be like American kickboxing, but it turned out that the rules allowed Takada to kick Berbick below the belt. Berbick refused to mount any offense, instead repeatedly complaining to the referee as Takada kicked him repeatedly in the legs. Takada claimed victory by default when Berbick exited the ring. \n\nAfterwards, his career deteriorated further. He eventually fought his last bout in 2000 against Canadian journeyman Shane Sutcliffe, winning a 12-round unanimous decision. Afterwards, a CAT scan revealed a blood clot in his brain and his boxing license was revoked. His final professional record was 49 wins (33 by knockout), 11 losses, and 1 draw.\n\nOutside the ring\n\nBerbick was a preacher at the Moments of Miracles Pentecostal church in Las Vegas.\n\nTroubles with the law\n\nBerbick was arrested on a number of occasions throughout his life and was sentenced in Florida to 5 years in prison for sexually assaulting his children's babysitter in 1992. He served 15 months. In 1997, he violated his parole and was deported from the United States to Canada. Due to his legal issues, he also had problems staying in Canada, losing his landed immigrant status and being ordered back to Jamaica in 1999. Later in 1999 he won the right to remain in Canada. \n\nFeud with Larry Holmes\n\nBerbick had a well-publicized feud with Larry Holmes, whom he fought in the ring in 1981. Their feud culminated in a public confrontation and brawl in 1991, which was caught on tape. After a verbal altercation indoors, Berbick was outside complaining about being kicked and punched by Larry Holmes when Holmes climbed atop a parked car and launched himself at Berbick. The footage ends as the two are separated by police and others. \n\nRetirement\n\nHe retired in Florida to be with his wife and four children (he had three children with his first wife in Montreal) and started to train boxers at Kenny Barrett's Gym in Tamarac, Florida. Berbick's problems escalated. He was again deported from the U.S. on December 2, 2002.\n\nMurder\n\nOn October 28, 2006, Berbick was murdered at a church in Norwich, Jamaica by an assailant wielding a 2 in steel pipe. He suffered multiple blows to the head and died at the scene. \n\nPolice arrested two men, one of whom was Berbick's 20-year-old nephew Harold Berbick, in connection with the murder. They were interrogated at the Port Antonio police station in Portland as of early in the morning of October 29. Local residents indicated that the suspect was involved in a land dispute with Berbick. On November 3 it was reported that Berbick's nephew, 20-year-old Harold Berbick, and an unidentified 18-year-old man had been charged with his murder by Jamaican police. On December 20, 2007, Harold Berbick was found guilty of the murder of his uncle. His alleged accomplice, Kenton Gordon, was found guilty of manslaughter. Both were sentenced on January 11, 2008. \nHarold Berbick was sentenced to life in prison; Kenton Gordon was sentenced to fourteen years in prison. \nTrevor Berbick was buried at the Berbick Family Plot Norwich Portland, Jamaica.\n\nProfessional boxing record\n\n|-\n| style\"text-align:center;\" colspan\n\"8\"|49 Wins (33 knockouts, 16 decisions), 11 Losses (2 knockouts, 9 decisions), 1 Draw \n|- style=\"text-align:center; background:#e3e3e3;\"\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Result\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Record\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Opponent\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Type\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Round\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Date\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Location\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Notes\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|\n|align=left| Shane Sutcliffe\n|UD\n|12\n|26/05/2000\n|align=left| Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|\n|align=left| Tony LaRosa\n|SD\n|8\n|12/08/1999\n|align=left| Slave Lake, Alberta, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|\n|align=left| Iran Barkley\n|UD\n|8\n|29/06/1999\n|align=left| Molson Centre, Montreal, Quebec, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|\n|align=left| Shane Sutcliffe\n|TKO\n|12 \n|05/02/1999\n|align=left| Pierre-Charbonneau Centre, Montreal, Quebec, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|\n|align=left| Ben Perlini\n|UD\n|10\n|06/08/1998\n|align=left| Slave Lake, Alberta, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|\n|align=left| Lyle McDowell\n|SD\n|12\n|15/09/1997\n|align=left| Convention Centre, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|45-9-1\n|align=left| Hasim Rahman\n|UD\n|10\n|15/10/1996\n|align=left| Caesar's Hotel & Casino, Atlantic City, New Jersey, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|45-8-1\n|align=left| Louis Monaco\n|UD\n|10\n|18/09/1996\n|align=left| Music Fair, Westbury, New York, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|44-8-1\n|align=left| Ken Smith\n|TKO\n|4 \n|26/04/1996\n|align=left| Westbury, New York, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|43-8-1\n|align=left| Bruce Johnson\n|TKO\n|3 \n|25/08/1995\n|align=left| Columbus, Ohio, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|42-8-1\n|align=left| Jimmy Thunder\n|PTS\n|12\n|15/03/1995\n|align=left| Mounds View, Minnesota, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|42-7-1\n|align=left| Melvin Foster\n|SD\n|10\n|13/09/1994\n|align=left| Westbury, New York, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|41-7-1\n|align=left| Marcellus Brown\n|KO\n|2 \n|10/08/1994\n|align=left| New Orleans, Louisiana, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|40-7-1\n|align=left| Paul Phillips\n|KO\n|4 \n|30/07/1994\n|align=left| Cincinnati, Ohio, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|39-7-1\n|align=left| Danny Wofford\n|PTS\n|8\n|14/03/1994\n|align=left| Spartanburg, South Carolina, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|38-7-1\n|align=left| Garing Lane\n|PTS\n|8\n|02/08/1991\n|align=left| Palais des Festivals, Cannes, Alpes-Maritimes, France\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|37-7-1\n|align=left| Bobby Crabtree\n|KO\n|5 \n|14/12/1990\n|align=left| Diplomat Hotel, Hollywood, Florida, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|36-7-1\n|align=left| Jeff Sims\n|TKO\n|6 \n|18/07/1990\n|align=left| Varsity Arena, Toronto, Ontario, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|35-7-1\n|align=left| Buster Douglas\n|UD\n|10\n|25/02/1989\n|align=left| Hilton Hotel, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|35-6-1\n|align=left| O T Davis\n|KO\n|3 \n|20/09/1988\n|align=left| Central Plaza Hotel, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|34-6-1\n|align=left| Carl Williams\n|UD\n|12\n|27/06/1988\n|align=left| Convention Hall, Atlantic City, New Jersey, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|34-5-1\n|align=left| Robert Evans\n|UD\n|10\n|24/11/1987\n|align=left| The Forum, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|33-5-1\n|align=left| Lorenzo Boyd\n|TKO\n|3 \n|29/10/1987\n|align=left| Musical Center, Sunrise, Florida, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|32-5-1\n|align=left| Art Terry\n|TKO\n|5 \n|31/07/1987\n|align=left| Lee Civic Center, Fort Myers, Florida, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|31-5-1\n|align=left| Mike Tyson\n|TKO\n|2 \n|22/11/1986\n|align=left| Hilton Hotel, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|31-4-1\n|align=left| Pinklon Thomas\n|UD\n|12\n|22/03/1986\n|align=left| Riviera Hotel & Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|30-4-1\n|align=left| Mike Perkins\n|TKO\n|10 \n|17/01/1986\n|align=left| The Omni, Atlanta, Georgia (U.S. state), United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|29-4-1\n|align=left| Mitch Green\n|UD\n|12\n|10/08/1985\n|align=left| Riviera Hotel & Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|28-4-1\n|align=left| David Bey\n|TKO\n|11 \n|15/06/1985\n|align=left| Riviera Hotel & Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|27-4-1\n|align=left| Walter Santemore\n|UD\n|10\n|28/11/1984\n|align=left| Harrah's Marina Hotel Casino, Atlantic City, New Jersey, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|26-4-1\n|align=left| Andros Ernie Barr\n|TKO\n|4 \n|01/09/1984\n|align=left| Nassau, Bahamas\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|25-4-1\n|align=left| Mark Lee\n|PTS\n|10\n|13/03/1984\n|align=left| Empire Pool, Wembley, London, United Kingdom\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|24-4-1\n|align=left| Mike Cohen\n|TKO\n|4 \n|19/02/1984\n|align=left| Hyatt Regency, Tampa, Florida, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|23-4-1\n|align=left| Ken Lakusta\n|TKO\n|10 \n|09/09/1983\n|align=left| Edmonton, Alberta, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|22-4-1\n|align=left| S. T. Gordon\n|UD\n|10\n|28/05/1983\n|align=left| Showboat Hotel & Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|22-3-1\n|align=left| Renaldo Snipes\n|PTS\n|10\n|02/10/1982\n|align=left| Sands Casino Hotel, Atlantic City, New Jersey, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|22-2-1\n|align=left| Greg Page\n|UD\n|10\n|11/06/1982\n|align=left| Caesars Palace, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|21-2-1\n|align=left| Gordon Racette\n|TKO\n|11 \n|05/03/1982\n|align=left| Nanaimo, British Columbia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|20-2-1\n|align=left| Muhammad Ali\n|UD\n|10\n|11/12/1981\n|align=left| Queen Elizabeth Sports Centre, Nassau, Bahamas\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|19-2-1\n|align=left| Conroy Nelson\n|KO\n|2 \n|21/07/1981\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|18-2-1\n|align=left| Larry Holmes\n|UD\n|15\n|11/04/1981\n|align=left| Caesars Palace, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|18-1-1\n|align=left| Chuck Gardner\n|TKO\n|3 \n|31/01/1981\n|align=left| Kingston, Jamaica\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|17-1-1\n|align=left| Chuck Findlay\n|KO\n|1 \n|11/11/1980\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|16-1-1\n|align=left| Ron Rouselle\n|KO\n|1 \n|27/08/1980\n|align=left| Edmonton, Alberta, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|15-1-1\n|align=left| John Tate\n|KO\n|9 \n|20/06/1980\n|align=left| Olympic Stadium, Montreal, Quebec, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|14-1-1\n|align=left| Johnny Warr\n|SD\n|10\n|11/03/1980\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|13-1-1\n|align=left| Ngozika Ekwelum\n|KO\n|5 \n|11/12/1979\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|style=\"background:#abcdef;\"|Draw\n|12-1-1\n|align=left| Leroy Caldwell\n|PTS\n|10\n|14/06/1979\n|align=left| Convention Centre, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|12–1\n|align=left| Earl McLeay\n|TKO\n|7 \n|26/05/1979\n|align=left| Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Loss\n|11–1\n|align=left| Bernardo Mercado\n|KO\n|1 \n|03/04/1979\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|11–0\n|align=left| Greg Sorrentino\n|TKO\n|1 \n|08/10/1978\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|10–0\n|align=left| Gregory Johnson\n|KO\n|4 \n|12/09/1978\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|9–0\n|align=left| Tony Moore\n|TKO\n|6 \n|01/08/1978\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|8–0\n|align=left| Horst Geisler\n|KO\n|1 \n|28/06/1978\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|7–0\n|align=left| Eugene Green\n|UD\n|10\n|08/12/1977\n|align=left| Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|6–0\n|align=left| Eddie Owens\n|TKO\n|5 \n|08/09/1977\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|5–0\n|align=left| Willie Moore\n|KO\n|4 \n|18/08/1977\n|align=left| Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|4–0\n|align=left| Joe Maye\n|TKO\n|7 \n|25/01/1977\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|3–0\n|align=left| Michael (Ace) Lucas\n|TKO\n|2 \n|09/01/1977\n|align=left| New Glasgow, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|2–0\n|align=left| Bobby Halpern\n|TKO\n|3 \n|23/11/1976\n|align=left| Halifax Metro Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center\n|Win\n|1–0\n|align=left| Wayne Martin\n|TKO\n|5 \n|27/09/1976\n|align=left| Shediac, New Brunswick, Canada\n|align=left|\n|- align=center", "Michael Gerard \"Mike\" Tyson (; born June 30, 1966) is an American former professional boxer. He held the undisputed world heavyweight championship and holds the record as the youngest boxer to win the WBC, WBA and IBF heavyweight titles at 20 years, 4 months, and 22 days old. Tyson won his first 19 professional bouts by knockout, 12 of them in the first round. He won the WBC title in 1986 after defeating Trevor Berbick by a TKO in the second round. In 1987, Tyson added the WBA and IBF titles after defeating James Smith and Tony Tucker. This made him the first heavyweight boxer to simultaneously hold the WBA, WBC and IBF titles, and the only heavyweight to successively unify them.\n\nIn 1988, Tyson became the lineal champion when he knocked out Michael Spinks in 91 seconds. Tyson successfully defended the world heavyweight championship nine times, including victories over Larry Holmes and Frank Bruno. In 1990, he lost his titles to underdog James \"Buster\" Douglas, by knockout in round 10. Attempting to regain the titles, he defeated Donovan Ruddock twice in 1991, but pulled out of a fight with undisputed heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield due to injury. In 1992, Tyson was convicted of rape and sentenced to six years in prison, but was released after serving three years. After his release, he engaged in a series of comeback fights. In 1996, he won the WBC and WBA titles after defeating Frank Bruno and Bruce Seldon by knockout. With his defeat of Bruno, Tyson joined Floyd Patterson, Muhammad Ali, Tim Witherspoon, Evander Holyfield, and George Foreman as the only men in boxing history to that point to have regained a heavyweight championship after having lost it. After being stripped of the WBC title, Tyson lost his WBA crown to Evander Holyfield in November 1996 by an eleventh-round TKO. Their 1997 rematch ended when Tyson was disqualified for biting part of Holyfield's ear off.\n\nIn 2002, he fought for the world heavyweight title at the age of 35, losing by knockout to Lennox Lewis. Tyson retired from professional boxing in 2006, after being knocked out in consecutive matches against Danny Williams and Kevin McBride. Tyson declared bankruptcy in 2003, despite having received over $30 million for several of his fights and $300 million during his career. At the time it was reported that he had approximately $23 million of debt. Tyson was well known for his ferocious and intimidating boxing style as well as his controversial behavior inside and outside the ring. Nicknamed \"Iron\", and \"Kid Dynamite\" in his early career and later known as \"The Baddest Man on the Planet\", Tyson is considered one of the best heavyweights of all time. He was ranked No. 16 on The Rings list of 100 greatest punchers of all time, and No. 1 in the ESPN.com list of \"The hardest hitters in heavyweight history\". Sky Sports rated him as \"the scariest boxer ever\" and described him as \"perhaps the most ferocious fighter to step into a professional ring.\" He has been inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame and the World Boxing Hall of Fame.\n\nEarly life\n\nTyson was born in Brooklyn, New York. He has an elder brother named Rodney (born c. 1961) and had an elder sister named Denise, who died of a heart attack at age 24 in February 1990.\n\nTyson's biological father is listed as \"Purcell Tyson\" (who was from Jamaica) on his birth certificate, but the man Tyson had known as his father was Jimmy Kirkpatrick. Kirkpatrick was from Grier Town, North Carolina (a predominantly black neighborhood that was annexed by the city of Charlotte), where he was one of the neighborhood's top baseball players. Kirkpatrick married and had a son, Tyson's half-brother Jimmie Lee Kirkpatrick, who would help to integrate Charlotte high school football in 1965. In 1959, Jimmy Kirkpatrick left his family and moved to Brooklyn, where he met Tyson's mother, Lorna Mae (Smith) Tyson. Mike Tyson was born in 1966. Kirkpatrick frequented pool halls, gambled and hung out on the streets. \"My father was just a regular street guy caught up in the street world\", Tyson said. Kirkpatrick abandoned the Tyson family around the time Mike was born, leaving Tyson's mother to care for the children on her own. Kirkpatrick died in 1992. \n\nThe family lived in Bedford-Stuyvesant until their financial burdens necessitated a move to Brownsville when Tyson was 10 years old. Tyson's mother died six years later, leaving 16-year-old Tyson in the care of boxing manager and trainer Cus D'Amato, who would become his legal guardian. Tyson later said, \"I never saw my mother happy with me and proud of me for doing something: she only knew me as being a wild kid running the streets, coming home with new clothes that she knew I didn't pay for. I never got a chance to talk to her or know about her. Professionally, it has no effect, but it's crushing emotionally and personally.\" \n\nThroughout his childhood, Tyson lived in and around high-crime neighborhoods. According to an interview in Details, his first fight was with a bigger youth who had pulled the head off one of Tyson's pigeons. Tyson was repeatedly caught committing petty crimes and fighting those who ridiculed his high-pitched voice and lisp. By the age of 13, he had been arrested 38 times. He ended up at the Tryon School for Boys in Johnstown, New York. Tyson's emerging boxing ability was discovered there by Bobby Stewart, a juvenile detention center counselor and former boxer. Stewart considered Tyson to be an outstanding fighter and trained him for a few months before introducing him to Cus D'Amato. Tyson dropped out of high school as a junior. He would later be awarded an honorary Doctorate in Humane Letters from Central State University in 1989. \n\nKevin Rooney also trained Tyson, and he was occasionally assisted by Teddy Atlas, although Atlas was dismissed by D'Amato when Tyson was 15. Rooney eventually took over all training duties for the young fighter. \n\nCareer\n\nAmateur career\n\nTyson won gold medals at the 1981 and 1982 Junior Olympic Games, defeating Joe Cortez in 1981 and beating Kelton Brown in 1982. Brown's corner threw in the towel in the first round. He holds the Junior Olympic record for quickest knockout (8 seconds). He won every bout at the Junior Olympic Games by knockout.\n\nHe fought Henry Tillman twice as an amateur, losing both bouts by decision. Tillman went on to win heavyweight gold at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. \n\nRise to stardom\n\nTyson made his professional debut as an 18-year-old on March 6, 1985, in Albany, New York. He defeated Hector Mercedes via a first round knockout. He had 15 bouts in his first year as a professional. Fighting frequently, Tyson won 26 of his first 28 fights by KO or TKO; 16 of those came in the first round. The quality of his opponents gradually increased to journeyman fighters and borderline contenders, like James Tillis, David Jaco, Jesse Ferguson, Mitch Green and Marvis Frazier. His win streak attracted media attention and Tyson was billed as the next great heavyweight champion. D'Amato died in November 1985, relatively early into Tyson's professional career, and some speculate that his death was the catalyst to many of the troubles Tyson was to experience as his life and career progressed. \n\nTyson's first nationally televised bout took place on February 16, 1986, at Houston Field House in Troy, New York against journeyman heavyweight Jesse Ferguson. Tyson knocked down Ferguson with an uppercut in the fifth round that broke Ferguson's nose. During the sixth round, Ferguson began to hold and clinch Tyson in an apparent attempt to avoid further punishment. After admonishing Ferguson several times to obey his commands to box, the referee finally stopped the fight near the middle of the sixth round. The fight was initially ruled a win for Tyson by disqualification (DQ) of his opponent. The ruling was \"adjusted\" to a win by technical knockout (TKO) after Tyson's corner protested that a DQ win would end Tyson's string of knockout victories, and that a knockout would have been the inevitable result. The rationale offered for the revised outcome was that the fight was actually stopped because Ferguson could not (rather than would not) continue boxing.\n\nOn November 22, 1986, Tyson was given his first title fight against Trevor Berbick for the World Boxing Council (WBC) heavyweight championship. Tyson won the title by second round TKO, and at the age of 20 years and 4 months became the youngest heavyweight champion in history. Tyson's dominant performance brought many accolades. Donald Saunders wrote: \"The noble and manly art of boxing can at least cease worrying about its immediate future, now [that] it has discovered a heavyweight champion fit to stand alongside Dempsey, Tunney, Louis, Marciano and Ali.\" \n\nBecause of Tyson's strength, many fighters were intimidated by him. This was backed up by his outstanding hand speed, accuracy, coordination, power, and timing. Tyson was also noted for his defensive abilities. Holding his hands high in the Peek-a-Boo style taught by his mentor Cus D'Amato, he slipped and weaved out of the way of the opponent's punches while closing the distance to deliver his own punches. One of Tyson's trademark combinations was a right hook to his opponent's body followed by a right uppercut to his opponent's chin; very few boxers would remain standing if caught by this combination. Lorenzo Boyd, Jesse Ferguson and Jose Ribalta were among the boxers knocked down by the combination.\n\nUndisputed champion\n\nExpectations for Tyson were extremely high, and he embarked on an ambitious campaign to fight all of the top heavyweights in the world. Tyson defended his title against James Smith on March 7, 1987, in Las Vegas, Nevada. He won by unanimous decision and added Smith's World Boxing Association (WBA) title to his existing belt. 'Tyson mania' in the media was becoming rampant. He beat Pinklon Thomas in May with a knockout in the sixth round. On August 1 he took the International Boxing Federation (IBF) title from Tony Tucker in a twelve round unanimous decision. He became the first heavyweight to own all three major belts – WBA, WBC, and IBF – at the same time. Another fight, in October of that year, ended with a victory for Tyson over 1984 Olympic super heavyweight gold medalist Tyrell Biggs by knockout in the seventh round. \n\nDuring this time, Tyson came to the attention of gaming company Nintendo. After witnessing one of Tyson's fights, Nintendo of America president Minoru Arakawa was impressed by the fighter's \"power and skill\", prompting him to suggest Tyson be included in the upcoming Nintendo Entertainment System port of the Punch Out!! arcade game. In 1987, Nintendo released Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!, which was well received and sold more than a million copies. \n\nTyson had three fights in 1988. He faced Larry Holmes on January 22, 1988, and defeated the legendary former champion by a fourth round KO. This was the only knockout loss Holmes suffered in 75 professional bouts. In March, Tyson then fought contender Tony Tubbs in Tokyo, Japan, fitting in an easy two-round victory amid promotional and marketing work. \n\nOn June 27, 1988, Tyson faced Michael Spinks. Spinks, who had taken the heavyweight championship from Larry Holmes via a 15-round decision in 1985, had not lost his title in the ring but was not recognized as champion by the major boxing organizations. Holmes had previously given up all but the IBF title, and that was eventually stripped from Spinks after he elected to fight Gerry Cooney (winning by a 5th-round TKO) rather than IBF Number 1 Contender Tony Tucker, as the Cooney fight provided him a larger purse. However, Spinks did become the lineal champion by beating Holmes and many (including Ring magazine) considered him to have a legitimate claim to being the true heavyweight champion. The bout was, at the time, the richest fight in history and expectations were very high. Boxing pundits were predicting a titanic battle of styles, with Tyson's aggressive infighting conflicting with Spinks' skillful out-boxing and footwork. The fight ended after 91 seconds when Tyson knocked Spinks out in the first round; many consider this to be the pinnacle of Tyson's fame and boxing ability. Spinks, previously unbeaten, would never fight professionally again.\n\nControversy and upset\n\nDuring this period, Tyson's problems outside boxing were also starting to emerge. His marriage to Robin Givens was heading for divorce, and his future contract was being fought over by Don King and Bill Cayton. In late 1988, Tyson parted with manager Bill Cayton and fired longtime trainer Kevin Rooney, the man many credit for honing Tyson's craft after the death of D'Amato. Following Rooney's departure, critics alleged that Tyson began to use the Peek-a-Boo style sporadically. Tyson insisted he hadn't altered the style that made him a world champion. In 1989, Tyson had only two fights amid personal turmoil. He faced the popular British boxer Frank Bruno in February. Bruno managed to stun Tyson at the end of the 1st round, although Tyson went on to knock out Bruno in the fifth round. Tyson then knocked out Carl \"The Truth\" Williams in one round in July. \n\nBy 1990, Tyson seemed to have lost direction, and his personal life was in disarray amidst reports of less vigorous training prior to the Douglas match. In a fight on February 11, 1990, he lost the undisputed championship to Buster Douglas in Tokyo. Tyson was a huge betting favorite; indeed, the Mirage, the only casino to put out odds for the fight, made Tyson a 42/1 favorite. However, Douglas was at an emotional peak after losing his mother to a stroke 23 days prior to the fight; Douglas fought the fight of his life. Contrary to reports that Tyson was out of shape, it has been noted at the time of the fight that he had pronounced muscles, an absence of body fat and weighed 220 and 1/2 pounds, only two pounds more than he had weighed when he beat Michael Spinks 20 months earlier. Mentally, however, Tyson was unprepared. He failed to find a way past Douglas's quick jab that had a 12 in reach advantage over his own. Tyson did catch Douglas with an uppercut in the eighth round and knocked him to the floor, but Douglas recovered sufficiently to hand Tyson a heavy beating in the subsequent two rounds. (After the fight, the Tyson camp would complain that the count was slow and that Douglas had taken longer than ten seconds to get to his feet.) Just 35 seconds into the 10th round, Douglas unleashed a brutal uppercut, followed by a four-punch combination of hooks that sent Tyson to the canvas for the first time in his career. He was counted out by referee Octavio Meyran.\n\nThe knockout victory by Douglas over Tyson, the previously undefeated \"baddest man on the planet\" and arguably the most feared boxer in professional boxing at that time, has been described as one of the most shocking upsets in modern sports history. \n\nAfter Douglas\n\nAfter the loss, Tyson recovered with first-round knockouts of Henry Tillman and Alex Stewart in his next two fights. Tyson's victory over Tillman, the 1984 Olympic heavyweight gold medalist, enabled Tyson to avenge his amateur losses at Tillman's hands. These bouts set up an elimination match for another shot at the undisputed world heavyweight championship, which Evander Holyfield had taken from Douglas in his first defense of the title.\n\nTyson, who was the number one contender, faced number two contender Donovan \"Razor\" Ruddock on March 18, 1991, in Las Vegas. Ruddock was seen as the most dangerous heavyweight around and was thought of as one of the hardest punching heavyweights. Tyson and Ruddock went back and forth for most of the fight, until referee Richard Steele controversially stopped the fight during the seventh round in favor of Tyson. This decision infuriated the fans in attendance, sparking a post-fight melee in the audience. The referee had to be escorted from the ring. \n\nTyson and Ruddock met again on June 28 that year, with Tyson knocking down Ruddock twice and winning a 12 round unanimous decision. A fight between Tyson and Holyfield for the undisputed championship was scheduled for November 8, 1991 at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, but Tyson pulled out after sustaining a rib cartilage injury during training.\n\nRape conviction, prison, and conversion\n\nTyson was arrested in July 1991 for the rape of 18-year-old Desiree Washington, Miss Black Rhode Island, in an Indianapolis hotel room. Tyson's rape trial took place in the Marion County superior court from January 26, 1992 to February 10, 1992.\n\nDesiree Washington testified that she received a phone call from Tyson at 1:36 am on July 19, 1991 inviting her to a party. Having joined Tyson in his limousine, Washington testified that Tyson made sexual advances towards her. She testified that upon arriving at his hotel room, Tyson pinned her down on his bed and raped her despite her pleas to stop. She ran out of the room and asked Tyson's chauffeur to drive her back to her hotel. Partial corroboration of Washington's story came via testimony from Tyson's chauffeur, Virginia Foster, who confirmed Desiree Washington's state of shock. Further testimony came from Thomas Richardson, the emergency room physician who examined Washington more than 24 hours after the incident and confirmed that Washington's physical condition was consistent with rape. \n\nUnder lead defense lawyer Vincent J. Fuller's direct examination, Tyson claimed that everything had taken place with Washington's full cooperation and he claimed not to have forced himself upon her. When he was cross-examined by lead prosecutor Gregory Garrison, Tyson denied claims that he had misled Washington and insisted that she wanted to have sex with him. Because of Tyson's hostile and defensive responses to the questions during cross-examination, some have speculated that his behavior made him unlikable to the jury who saw him as brutish and arrogant. Tyson was convicted on the rape charge on February 10, 1992 after the jury deliberated for nearly 10 hours. \n\nAlan Dershowitz, acting as Tyson's counsel, filed an appeal urging error of law in the Court's exclusion of evidence of the victim's past sexual conduct, the exclusion of three potential defense witnesses, and the lack of a jury instruction on honest and reasonable mistake of fact. The Indiana Court of Appeals ruled against Tyson in a 2–1 vote.\n\nOn March 26, 1992, Tyson was sentenced to six years in prison followed by four years on probation. In spite of being 25 years old at the time he committed the rape, he was assigned to the Indiana Youth Center (now the Plainfield Correctional Facility) in April 1992, and he was released in March 1995 after serving less than three years of his six-year sentence. Hakeem Olajuwon claims that during his incarceration, Tyson converted to Islam. \n\nDue to his conviction, Tyson is required to register as a tier II sex offender under federal law. \nAs of May, 2016, he is so registered, as Michael Tyson, in Henderson, Nevada.\n\nComeback\n\nAfter being paroled from prison, Tyson easily won his comeback bouts against Peter McNeeley and Buster Mathis Jr.. Tyson's first comeback fight grossed more than US$96 million worldwide, including a United States record $63 million for PPV television. The fight was purchased by 1.52 million homes, setting both PPV viewership and revenue records. The 89-second fight elicited criticism that Tyson's management lined up \"tomato cans\" to ensure easy victories for his return. TV Guide included the Tyson-McNeeley fight in their list of the 50 Greatest TV Sports Moments of All Time in 1998. \n\nTyson regained one belt by easily winning the WBC title from Frank Bruno in March 1996. It was the second fight between the two, and Tyson knocked Bruno out in the third round. Tyson added the WBA belt by defeating champion Bruce Seldon in one round in September that year. Seldon was severely criticized and mocked in the popular press for seemingly collapsing to innocuous punches from Tyson. \n\nTyson–Holyfield fights\n\nTyson vs. Holyfield I\n\nTyson attempted to defend the WBA title against Evander Holyfield, who was in the fourth fight of his own comeback. Holyfield had retired in 1994 following the loss of his championship to Michael Moorer. It was said that Don King and others saw former champion Holyfield, who was 34 at the time of the fight and a huge underdog, as a washed-up fighter. \n\nOn November 9, 1996, in Las Vegas, Nevada, Tyson faced Holyfield in a title bout dubbed \"Finally.\" In a surprising turn of events, Holyfield, who was given virtually no chance to win by numerous commentators, defeated Tyson by TKO when referee Mitch Halpern stopped the bout in round 11. Holyfield became the second boxer to win a heavyweight championship belt three times. Holyfield's victory was marred by allegations from Tyson's camp of Holyfield's frequent headbutts during the bout. Although the headbutts were ruled accidental by the referee, they would become a point of contention in the subsequent rematch. \n\nTyson vs. Holyfield II and aftermath\n\nTyson and Holyfield fought again on June 28, 1997. Originally, Halpern was supposed to be the referee, but after Tyson's camp protested, Halpern stepped aside in favor of Mills Lane. The highly anticipated rematch was dubbed The Sound and the Fury, and it was held at the Las Vegas MGM Grand Garden Arena, site of the first bout. It was a lucrative event, drawing even more attention than the first bout and grossing $100 million. Tyson received $30 million and Holyfield $35 million, the highest paid professional boxing purses until 2007. The fight was purchased by 1.99 million households, setting a pay-per-view buy rate record that stood until the May 5, 2007, De La Hoya-Mayweather boxing match. \n\nSoon to become one of the most controversial events in modern sports, the fight was stopped at the end of the third round, with Tyson disqualified for biting Holyfield on both ears. The first time Tyson bit him, the match was temporarily stopped. Referee Mills Lane deducted two points from Tyson and the fight resumed. However, after the match resumed, Tyson did it again; Tyson was disqualified and Holyfield won the match. One bite was severe enough to remove a piece of Holyfield's right ear, which was found on the ring floor after the fight. Tyson later stated that his actions were retaliation for Holyfield repeatedly headbutting him without penalty. In the confusion that followed the ending of the bout and announcement of the decision, a near riot erupted in the arena and several people were injured. \n\nAs a subsequent fallout from the incident, US$3 million was immediately withheld from Tyson's $30-million purse by the Nevada state boxing commission (the most it could legally hold back at the time). Two days after the fight, Tyson issued a statement, apologizing to Holyfield for his actions and asked not to be banned for life over the incident. Tyson was roundly condemned in the news media but was not without defenders. Novelist and commentator Katherine Dunn wrote a column that criticized Holyfield's sportsmanship in the controversial bout and charged the news media with being biased against Tyson. \n\nOn July 9, 1997, Tyson's boxing license was rescinded by the Nevada State Athletic Commission in a unanimous voice vote; he was also fined US$3 million and ordered to pay the legal costs of the hearing. As most state athletic commissions honor sanctions imposed by other states, this effectively made Tyson unable to box in the United States. The revocation was not permanent, as the commission voted 4–1 to restore Tyson's boxing license on October 18, 1998. \n\nDuring his time away from boxing in 1998, Tyson made a guest appearance at WrestleMania XIV as an enforcer for the main event match between Shawn Michaels and Steve Austin. During this time, Tyson was also an unofficial member of D-Generation X. Tyson was paid $3 million for being guest enforcer of the match at WrestleMania XIV. \n\n1999 to 2005\n\nAfter Holyfield\n\nIn January 1999, Tyson returned to the ring to fight the South African Francois Botha, in another fight that ended in controversy. While Botha initially controlled the fight, Tyson allegedly attempted to break Botha's arms during a tie-up and both boxers were cautioned by the referee in the ill-tempered bout. Botha was ahead on points on all scorecards and was confident enough to mock Tyson as the fight continued. Nonetheless, Tyson landed a straight right-hand in the fifth round that knocked out Botha. Critics noticed Tyson stopped using the bob and weave defense altogether following this return. \n\nLegal problems caught up with Tyson once again. On February 5, 1999, Tyson was sentenced to a year's imprisonment, fined $5,000, and ordered to serve two years probation and perform 200 hours of community service for assaulting two motorists after a traffic accident on August 31, 1998. He served nine months of that sentence. After his release, he fought Orlin Norris on October 23, 1999. Tyson knocked down Norris with a left hook thrown after the bell sounded to end the first round. Norris injured his knee when he went down and said he was unable to continue the fight. Consequently, the bout was ruled a no contest. \n\nIn 2000, Tyson had three fights. The first was staged at the MEN Arena, Manchester, England against Julius Francis. Following controversy as to whether Tyson should be allowed into the country, he took four minutes to knock out Francis, ending the bout in the second round. He also fought Lou Savarese in June 2000 in Glasgow, winning in the first round; the fight lasted only 38 seconds. Tyson continued punching after the referee had stopped the fight, knocking the referee to the floor as he tried to separate the boxers. In October, Tyson fought the similarly controversial Andrew Golota, winning in round three after Gołota was unable to continue due to a broken jaw. The result was later changed to no contest after Tyson refused to take a pre-fight drug test and then tested positive for marijuana in a post-fight urine test. Tyson fought only once in 2001, beating Brian Nielsen in Copenhagen with a seventh round TKO. \n\nLewis vs. Tyson\n\nTyson once again had the opportunity to fight for a heavyweight championship in 2002. Lennox Lewis held the WBC, IBF, IBO and Lineal titles at the time. As promising amateurs, Tyson and Lewis had sparred at a training camp in a meeting arranged by Cus D'Amato in 1984. Tyson sought to fight Lewis in Nevada for a more lucrative box-office venue, but the Nevada Boxing Commission refused him a license to box as he was facing possible sexual assault charges at the time. \n\nTwo years prior to the bout, Tyson had made several inflammatory remarks to Lewis in an interview following the Savarese fight. The remarks included the statement \"I want your heart, I want to eat your children.\" On January 22, 2002, the two boxers and their entourages were involved in a brawl at a New York press conference to publicize the planned event. A few weeks later, the Nevada State Athletic Commission refused to grant Tyson a license for the fight, forcing the promoters to make alternative arrangements. After multiple states balked at granting Tyson a license, the fight eventually occurred on June 8 at the Pyramid Arena in Memphis, Tennessee. Lewis dominated the fight and knocked out Tyson with a right hook in the eighth round. Tyson was respectful after the fight and praised Lewis on his victory. This fight was the highest-grossing event in pay-per-view history at that time, generating $106.9 million from 1.95 million buys in the USA.\n\nLate career, bankruptcy and retirement\n\nIn another Memphis fight on February 22, 2003, Tyson beat fringe contender Clifford Etienne 49 seconds into round one. The pre-fight was marred by rumors of Tyson's lack of fitness. Some said that he took time out from training to party in Las Vegas and get a new facial tattoo. This would be Tyson's final professional victory in the ring.\n\nIn August 2003, after years of financial struggles, Tyson finally filed for bankruptcy. In 2003, amid all his economic troubles, he was named by The Ring at number 16, right behind Sonny Liston, among the 100 greatest punchers of all time.\n\nOn August 13, 2003, Tyson entered the ring for a face-to-face confrontation against K-1 fighting phenom Bob Sapp immediately after Sapp's win against Kimo Leopoldo in Las Vegas. K-1 signed Tyson to a contract with the hopes of making a fight happen between the two, but Tyson's felony history made it impossible for him to obtain a visa to enter Japan, where the fight would have been most profitable. Alternative locations were discussed, but the fight ultimately failed to happen. \n\nOn July 30, 2004, Tyson faced British boxer Danny Williams in another comeback fight, this time staged in Louisville, Kentucky. Tyson dominated the opening two rounds. The third round was even, with Williams getting in some clean blows and also a few illegal ones, for which he was penalized. In the fourth round, Tyson was unexpectedly knocked out. After the fight, it was revealed that Tyson was trying to fight on one leg, having torn a ligament in his other knee in the first round. This was Tyson's fifth career defeat. He underwent surgery for the ligament four days after the fight. His manager, Shelly Finkel, claimed that Tyson was unable to throw meaningful right-hand punches since he had a knee injury. \n\nOn June 11, 2005, Tyson stunned the boxing world by quitting before the start of the seventh round in a close bout against journeyman Kevin McBride. In the 2008 documentary Tyson, he stated that he fought McBride for a payday, that he did not anticipate winning, that he was in poor physical condition and fed up with taking boxing seriously. After losing three of his last four fights, Tyson said he would quit boxing because he felt he had lost his passion for the sport. \n\nWhen Tyson fired everyone working for him and got new accountants in 2000, they prepared a statement showing he started the year $3.3 million in the hole but made $65.7 million. \"The problem was that I spent $62 million that year,' Tyson said, \"I just said to myself, Wow, this is over. Now I can go out and really have fun.\". In August 2007, Tyson pleaded guilty to drug possession and driving under the influence in an Arizona court, which stemmed from an arrest in December where authorities said Tyson, who has a long history of legal problems, admitted to using cocaine that day and to being addicted to the drug. \n\nExhibition tour\n\nTo help pay off his debts, Tyson returned to the ring in 2006 for a series of four-round exhibitions against journeyman heavyweight Corey \"T-Rex\" Sanders in Youngstown, Ohio. Tyson, without headgear at 5 ft 10.5 in and 216 pounds, was in great shape, but far from his prime against Sanders, with headgear at 6 ft 8 in and 293 pounds, a loser of his last seven pro bouts and nearly blind from a detached retina in his left eye. Tyson appeared to be \"holding back\" in these exhibitions to prevent an early end to the \"show\". \"If I don't get out of this financial quagmire there's a possibility I may have to be a punching bag for somebody. The money I make isn't going to help my bills from a tremendous standpoint, but I'm going to feel better about myself. I'm not going to be depressed\", explained Tyson about the reasons for his \"comeback\". \n\nLegacy\n\nA 1998 ranking of \"The Greatest Heavyweights of All-Time\" by Ring magazine placed Tyson at No.14 on the list. Despite criticism of facing underwhelming competition during his run as champion, Tyson's knockout power and intimidation factor made him the sport's most dynamic box office attraction. According to Douglas Quenqua of The New York Times, \"The [1990s] began with Mike Tyson, considered by many to be the last great heavyweight champion, losing his title to the little-known Buster Douglas. Seven years later, Mr. Tyson bit Evander Holyfield's ear in a heavyweight champion bout — hardly a proud moment for the sport.\" \n\nIn Ring Magazine's list of the 80 Best Fighters of the Last 80 Years, released in 2002, Tyson was ranked at No. 72. He is ranked No. 16 on Ring Magazines 2003 list of 100 greatest punchers of all time. \n\nOn June 12, 2011, Tyson was inducted to the International Boxing Hall of Fame alongside legendary Mexican champion Julio César Chávez, light welterweight champion Kostya Tszyu, and actor/screenwriter Sylvester Stallone. \n\nAfter professional boxing\n\nIn an interview with USA Today published on June 3, 2005, Tyson said, \"My whole life has been a waste – I've been a failure.\" He continued: \"I just want to escape. I'm really embarrassed with myself and my life. I want to be a missionary. I think I could do that while keeping my dignity without letting people know they chased me out of the country. I want to get this part of my life over as soon as possible. In this country nothing good is going to come of me. People put me so high; I wanted to tear that image down.\" Tyson began to spend much of his time tending to his 350 pigeons in Paradise Valley, an upscale enclave near Phoenix, Arizona. \n\nTyson has stayed in the limelight by promoting various websites and companies. In the past Tyson had shunned endorsements, accusing other athletes of putting on a false front to obtain them. Tyson has held entertainment boxing shows at a casino in Las Vegas and started a tour of exhibition bouts to pay off his numerous debts. \n\nOn December 29, 2006, Tyson was arrested in Scottsdale, Arizona, on suspicion of DUI and felony drug possession; he nearly crashed into a police SUV shortly after leaving a nightclub. According to a police probable-cause statement, filed in Maricopa County Superior Court, \"[Tyson] admitted to using [drugs] today and stated he is an addict and has a problem.\" Tyson pleaded not guilty on January 22, 2007 in Maricopa County Superior Court to felony drug possession and paraphernalia possession counts and two misdemeanor counts of driving under the influence of drugs. On February 8 he checked himself into an inpatient treatment program for \"various addictions\" while awaiting trial on the drug charges. \n\nOn September 24, 2007, Mike Tyson pleaded guilty to possession of cocaine and driving under the influence. He was convicted of these charges in November 2007 and sentenced to 24 hours in jail, 360 hours community service and 3 years probation. Prosecutors had requested a year-long jail sentence, but the judge praised Tyson for seeking help with his drug problems. On November 11, 2009, Mike Tyson was arrested after getting into a scuffle at Los Angeles International airport with a photographer. No charges were filed.\n\nTyson has taken acting roles in movies and television, most famously playing a fictionalized version of himself in the 2009 film The Hangover. Tyson has continued to appear in the WWE. \n\nIn September 2011, Tyson gave an interview in which he made comments about former Alaska governor Sarah Palin that included crude and violent descriptions of interracial sex. These comments were then reprinted on the Daily Caller website. Journalist Greta van Susteren criticized Tyson and the Daily Caller over the comments, which she described as \"smut\" and \"violence against women\". \n\nAfter debuting a one-man show in Las Vegas, Tyson teamed up with director Spike Lee and brought the show to Broadway in August 2012. In February 2013, Tyson took his one-man show Mike Tyson: Undisputed Truth on a 36-city, three-month national tour. Tyson talks about his personal and professional life on stage. The one-man show was aired on HBO on November 16, 2013.\n\nIn October 2012, Tyson launched the Mike Tyson Cares Foundation. The mission of the Mike Tyson Cares Foundation is to \"give kids a fighting chance\" by providing innovative centers that provide for the comprehensive needs of kids from broken homes.\n\nIn August 2013, Tyson teamed up with Acquinity Interactive CEO Garry Jonas to form Iron Mike Productions, a boxing promotions company, formerly known as Acquinity Sports.\n\nIn September 2013, Tyson was featured on a six-episode television series on Fox Sports 1 that documented his personal and private life entitled \"Being Mike Tyson\". \n\nIn November 2013, Tyson released his book Undisputed Truth, which also made it on The New York Times Best Seller list. An animated series named Mike Tyson Mysteries, featuring Tyson solving mysteries in the style of Scooby-Doo, premiered on Adult Swim in late October 2014. \n\nIn early March 2015, Tyson appeared on the track \"Iconic\" on Madonna's album Rebel Heart. Tyson says some lines at the beginning of the song. \n\nIn late March 2015, Ip Man 3 was announced. With Donnie Yen reprising his role as the titular character, Bruce Lee's martial arts master, Ip Man, while Mike Tyson has been confirmed to join the cast. Principal photography began on March 25, 2015, and was premiered in Hong Kong on 16 December 2015.\n\nPersonal life\n\nTyson resides in Seven Hills, Nevada. He has been married three times. He has fathered seven children, one deceased, by three women; in addition to his biological children, Tyson includes the oldest daughter of his second wife as one of his own. \n\nHis first marriage was to actress Robin Givens, from February 7, 1988 to February 14, 1989. Givens was famous for her work on the sitcom Head of the Class. Tyson's marriage to Givens was especially tumultuous, with allegations of violence, spousal abuse and mental instability on Tyson's part. Matters came to a head when Tyson and Givens gave a joint interview with Barbara Walters on the ABC TV newsmagazine show 20/20 in September 1988, in which Givens described life with Tyson as \"torture, pure hell, worse than anything I could possibly imagine.\" Givens also described Tyson as \"manic depressive\" on national television while Tyson looked on with an intent and calm expression. A month later, Givens announced that she was seeking a divorce from the allegedly abusive Tyson. They had no children but she reported having had a miscarriage; Tyson reports that she was never pregnant and only used that to get him to marry her. During their marriage, the couple lived in a mansion in Bernardsville, New Jersey. \n\nHis second marriage was to Monica Turner from April 19, 1997 to January 14, 2003. At the time of the divorce filing, Turner worked as a pediatric resident at Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, D.C. She is the sister of Michael Steele, the former Lieutenant Governor of Maryland and former Republican National Committee Chairman. Turner filed for divorce from Tyson in January 2002, claiming that he committed adultery during their five-year marriage, an act that \"has neither been forgiven nor condoned.\" The couple had two children; son Amir, and daughter Rayna.\n\nOn May 25, 2009, Tyson's four-year-old daughter Exodus was found by her seven-year-old brother Miguel, unconscious and tangled in a cord, dangling from an exercise treadmill. The child's mother untangled her, administered CPR and called for medical attention. She died of her injuries on May 26, 2009. \n\nEleven days after his daughter's death, Tyson wed for the third time, to longtime girlfriend Lakiha \"Kiki\" Spicer, age 32, exchanging vows on Saturday, June 6, 2009, in a short, private ceremony at the La Bella Wedding Chapel at the Las Vegas Hilton. They have two children; daughter, Milan, and son, Morocco.\n\nTyson has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. While on the American talk show The View in early May 2010, Tyson revealed that he is now forced to live paycheck to paycheck. He went on to say: \"I'm totally destitute and broke. But I have an awesome life, I have an awesome wife who cares about me. ... I'm totally broke. I had a lot of fun. It [going broke] just happened. I'm very grateful. I don't deserve to have the wife that I have; I don't deserve the kids that I have, but I do, and I'm very grateful.\"\n\nIn March 2011, Tyson appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show to discuss his new Animal Planet reality series, Taking on Tyson. In the interview with DeGeneres, Tyson discussed some of the ways he had improved his life in the past two years, including sober living and a vegan diet. However, in August 2013 he admitted publicly that he had lied about his sobriety and was on the verge of death from alcoholism. \n\nIn December 2013, during an interview with Fox News, Tyson talked about his progress with sobriety and how being in the company of good people has made him want to be a better and more humble person. Tyson also talked about religion and said that he is very grateful to be a Muslim and that he needs Allah. He also revealed that he is no longer vegan after four years.\n\nIn 2015, Tyson announced that he was supporting Donald Trump's presidential candidacy. \n\nIn popular culture\n\nAt the height of his fame and career in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s, Tyson was one of the most recognized sports personalities in the world. Apart from his many sporting accomplishments, his outrageous and controversial behavior in the ring and in his private life has kept him in the public eye and in the courtroom. As such, Tyson has appeared in myriad popular media in cameo appearances in film and television. He has also been featured in video games and as a subject of parody or satire.\n\nThe Blackstreet single \"Booti Call\" was written about Tyson's rape trial and conviction. Boogie Down Productions' 1992 song \"Say Gal\" also addressed the rape trial. \n\nThe film Tyson was released in 1995 and was directed by Uli Edel. It explores the life of Mike Tyson, from the death of his guardian and trainer Cus D'Amato to his rape conviction. Tyson is played by Michael Jai White.\n\nPublished in 2007, author Joe Layden's book The Last Great Fight: The Extraordinary Tale of Two Men and How One Fight Changed Their Lives Forever, chronicled the lives of Tyson and Douglas before and after their heavyweight championship fight. The book received positive reviews and claimed the fight was essentially the beginning of the end of boxing's popularity in mainstream sports.\n\nIn 2008, the critically acclaimed documentary Tyson premiered at the annual Cannes Film Festival in France. The film was directed by James Toback and has interviews with Tyson and clips of his fights and from his personal life.\n\nThe Felice Brothers, a folk-rock band from Upstate New York, released a song on their 2011 album Celebration, Florida titled \"Cus's Catskill Gym\". The song tells the story, albeit briefly, of Mike Tyson and a few notable characters and moments in his life.\n\nHe is the titular character in Mike Tyson Mysteries, which started airing on October 27, 2014 on Adult Swim. \n\nProfessional boxing record\n\nTitles in boxing\n\n!colspan3 style\n\"background:#C1D8FF;\"|Amateur titles\n\n!colspan3 style\n\"background:#C1D8FF;\"|World titles\n\nPay-per-view bouts\n\nAwards and honors\n\nSource: \n\nBoxing\n\n*Ring magazine Prospect of the Year (1985)\n*2× Ring magazine Fighter of the Year (1986, 1988)\n*2× Sugar Ray Robinson Award winner (1987, 1989)\n*BBC Sports Personality of the Year Overseas Personality (1989)\n*International Boxing Hall of Fame inductee (Class of 2011)\n\nProfessional wrestling\n\n* WWE Hall of Fame (Class of 2012) \n\nActing\n\n* 2009 Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy (as a cast member of The Hangover)", "Muhammad Ali (born Cassius Marcellus Clay, Jr.; January 17, 1942 – June 3, 2016) was an American Olympic and professional boxer and activist. He is widely regarded as one of the most significant and celebrated sports figures of the 20th century. From early in his career, Ali was known as an inspiring, controversial and polarizing figure both inside and outside the ring. \n\nCassius Clay was born and raised in Louisville, Kentucky, and began training as an amateur boxer when he was 12 years old. At 18, he won a gold medal in the light heavyweight division at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, and converted to Islam shortly afterwards. At age 22 in 1964, he won the WBA and WBC heavyweight titles from Sonny Liston in an upset. Clay then changed his legal name from Cassius Clay, which he called his \"slave name\", to Muhammad Ali, and gave a message of racial pride for African Americans and resistance to white domination during the 1960s Civil Rights Movement. \n\nIn 1966, two years after winning the heavyweight title, Ali further antagonized the white establishment in the U.S. by refusing to be conscripted into the U.S. military, citing his religious beliefs and opposition to American involvement in the Vietnam War. He was eventually arrested, found guilty of draft evasion charges and stripped of his boxing titles. He successfully appealed in the U.S. Supreme Court, which overturned his conviction in 1971, by which time he had not fought for nearly four years—losing a period of peak performance as an athlete. Ali's actions as a conscientious objector to the war made him an icon for the larger counterculture generation. \n\nAli is regarded as one of the leading heavyweight boxers of the 20th century. He remains the only three-time lineal heavyweight champion; he won the title in 1964, 1974, and 1978. Between February 25, 1964, and September 19, 1964, Ali reigned as the undisputed heavyweight champion. He is the only boxer to be named The Ring magazine Fighter of the Year six times. He was ranked as the greatest athlete of the 20th century by Sports Illustrated and the Sports Personality of the Century by the BBC. ESPN SportsCentury ranked him the 3rd greatest athlete of the 20th century. Nicknamed \"The Greatest\", he was involved in several historic boxing matches. Notable among these were the first Liston fight; the \"Fight of the Century\", \"Super Fight II\" and the \"Thrilla in Manila\" versus his rival Joe Frazier; and \"The Rumble in the Jungle\" versus George Foreman.\n\nAt a time when most fighters let their managers do the talking, Ali thrived in—and indeed craved—the spotlight, where he was often provocative and outlandish. He was known for trash talking, and often freestyled with rhyme schemes and spoken word poetry, both for his trash talking in boxing and as political poetry for his activism, anticipating elements of rap and hip hop music. As a musician, Ali recorded two spoken word albums and a rhythm and blues song, and received two Grammy Award nominations. As an actor, he performed in several films and a Broadway musical. Ali wrote two autobiographies, one during and one after his boxing career.\n\nAs a Muslim, Ali was initially affiliated with Elijah Muhammad's Nation of Islam (NOI) and advocated their black separatist ideology. He later disavowed the NOI, adhering to Sunni Islam and supporting racial integration, like his former mentor Malcolm X. After retiring from boxing in 1981, Ali devoted his life to religious and charitable work. In 1984, Ali was diagnosed with Parkinson's syndrome, which his doctors attributed to boxing-related brain injuries. As the condition worsened, Ali made limited public appearances and was cared for by his family until his death on June 3, 2016 in Scottsdale, Arizona.\n\nEarly life and amateur career\n\nCassius Marcellus Clay, Jr. was born on January 17, 1942, in Louisville, Kentucky. He had a sister and four brothers. He was named for his father, Cassius Marcellus Clay Sr., who himself was named in honor of the 19th-century Republican politician and staunch abolitionist, Cassius Marcellus Clay, also from the state of Kentucky. Clay's father's paternal grandparents were John Clay and Sallie Anne Clay; Clay's sister Eva claimed that Sallie was a native of Madagascar. He was a descendant of slaves of the antebellum South, and was predominantly of African descent, with Irish and English heritage. His father painted billboards and signs, and his mother, Odessa O'Grady Clay, was a domestic helper. Although Cassius Sr. was a Methodist, he allowed Odessa to bring up both Cassius Jr. and his younger brother Rudolph \"Rudy\" Clay (later renamed Rahman Ali) as Baptists. Cassius Jr. attended Central High School in Louisville.\n\nClay grew up amid racial segregation. His mother recalled one occasion where he was denied a drink of water at a store—\"They wouldn't give him one because of his color. That really affected him.\" He was also affected by the 1955 murder of Emmett Till, which led to young Clay and a friend taking out their frustration by vandalizing a local railyard. \n\nClay was first directed toward boxing by Louisville police officer and boxing coach Joe E. Martin, who encountered the 12-year-old fuming over a thief taking his bicycle. He told the officer he was going to \"whup\" the thief. The officer told him he had better learn how to box first. Initially, Clay did not take up on Martin's offer, but after seeing amateur boxers on a local television boxing program called Tomorrow's Champions, Clay was interested in the prospects of fighting for fame, fortune, and glory. For the last four years of Clay's amateur career he was trained by boxing cutman Chuck Bodak. \n\nClay made his amateur boxing debut in 1954 against local amateur boxer Ronnie O'Keefe. He won by split decision. He went on to win six Kentucky Golden Gloves titles, two national Golden Gloves titles, an Amateur Athletic Union national title, and the Light Heavyweight gold medal in the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome. Clay's amateur record was 100 wins with five losses. Ali said in his 1975 autobiography that shortly after his return from the Rome Olympics, he threw his gold medal into the Ohio River after he and a friend were refused service at a \"whites-only\" restaurant and fought with a white gang. The story was later disputed and several of Ali's friends, including Bundini Brown and photographer Howard Bingham, denied it. Brown told Sports Illustrated writer Mark Kram, \"Honkies sure bought into that one!\" Thomas Hauser's biography of Ali stated that Ali was refused service at the diner but that he lost his medal a year after he won it. Ali received a replacement medal at a basketball intermission during the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, where he lit the torch to start the games.\n\nProfessional boxing\n\nEarly career\n\nClay made his professional debut on October 29, 1960, winning a six-round decision over Tunney Hunsaker. From then until the end of 1963, Clay amassed a record of 19–0 with 15 wins by knockout. He defeated boxers including Tony Esperti, Jim Robinson, Donnie Fleeman, Alonzo Johnson, George Logan, Willi Besmanoff, Lamar Clark, Doug Jones and Henry Cooper. Clay also beat his former trainer and veteran boxer Archie Moore in a 1962 match. \n\nThese early fights were not without trials. Clay was knocked down both by Sonny Banks and Cooper. In the Cooper fight, Clay was floored by a left hook at the end of round four and was saved by the bell. The fight with Doug Jones on March 13, 1963, was Clay's toughest fight during this stretch. The number-two and -three heavyweight contenders respectively, Clay and Jones fought on Jones' home turf at New York's Madison Square Garden. Jones staggered Clay in the first round, and the unanimous decision for Clay was greeted by boos and a rain of debris thrown into the ring (watching on closed-circuit TV, heavyweight champ Sonny Liston quipped that if he fought Clay he might get locked up for murder). The fight was later named \"Fight of the Year\" by Ring Magazine. \n\nIn each of these fights, Clay vocally belittled his opponents and vaunted his abilities. He called Jones \"an ugly little man\" and Cooper a \"bum\". He was embarrassed to get in the ring with Alex Miteff. Madison Square Garden was \"too small for me\".Bob Mee, Ali and Liston: The Boy Who Would Be King and the Ugly Bear, 2011. Clay's behavior provoked the ire of many boxing fans. His provocative and outlandish behavior in the ring was inspired by professional wrestler \"Gorgeous George\" Wagner. \n\nAfter Clay left Moore's camp in 1960, partially due to Clay's refusing to do chores such as dish-washing and sweeping, he hired Angelo Dundee, whom he had met in February 1957 during Ali's amateur career, to be his trainer. Around this time, Clay sought longtime idol Sugar Ray Robinson to be his manager, but was rebuffed. \n\nHeavyweight champion\n\nBy late 1963, Clay had become the top contender for Sonny Liston's title. The fight was set for February 25, 1964, in Miami Beach. Liston was an intimidating personality, a dominating fighter with a criminal past and ties to the mob. Based on Clay's uninspired performance against Jones and Cooper in his previous two fights, and Liston's destruction of former heavyweight champion Floyd Patterson in two first-round knock outs, Clay was a 7–1 underdog. Despite this, Clay taunted Liston during the pre-fight buildup, dubbing him \"the big ugly bear\". \"Liston even smells like a bear\", Clay said. \"After I beat him I'm going to donate him to the zoo.\" Clay turned the pre-fight weigh-in into a circus, shouting at Liston that \"someone is going to die at ringside tonight\". Clay's pulse rate was measured at 120, more than double his normal 54. Many of those in attendance thought Clay's behavior stemmed from fear, and some commentators wondered if he would show up for the bout.\n\nThe outcome of the fight was a major upset. At the opening bell, Liston rushed at Clay, seemingly angry and looking for a quick knockout, but Clay's superior speed and mobility enabled him to elude Liston, making the champion miss and look awkward. At the end of the first round Clay opened up his attack and hit Liston repeatedly with jabs. Liston fought better in round two, but at the beginning of the third round Clay hit Liston with a combination that buckled his knees and opened a cut under his left eye. This was the first time Liston had ever been cut. At the end of round four, as Clay returned to his corner, he began experiencing blinding pain in his eyes and asked his trainer Angelo Dundee to cut off his gloves. Dundee refused. It has been speculated that the problem was due to ointment used to seal Liston's cuts, perhaps deliberately applied by his corner to his gloves. Though unconfirmed, Bert Sugar claimed that two of Liston's opponents also complained about their eyes \"burning\". \n\nDespite Liston's attempts to knock out a blinded Clay, Clay was able to survive the fifth round until sweat and tears rinsed the irritation from his eyes. In the sixth, Clay dominated, hitting Liston repeatedly. Liston did not answer the bell for the seventh round, and Clay was declared the winner by TKO. Liston stated that the reason he quit was an injured shoulder. Following the win, a triumphant Clay rushed to the edge of the ring and, pointing to the ringside press, shouted: \"Eat your words!\" He added, \"I am the greatest! I shook up the world. I'm the prettiest thing that ever lived.\" \n\nIn winning this fight, Clay became at age 22 the youngest boxer to take the title from a reigning heavyweight champion, though Floyd Patterson was the youngest to win the heavyweight championship at 21, during an elimination bout following Rocky Marciano's retirement. Mike Tyson broke both records in 1986 when he defeated Trevor Berbick to win the heavyweight title at age 20.\n\nSoon after the Liston fight, Clay changed his name to Cassius X Clay, and then later to Muhammad Ali upon converting to Islam and affiliating with the Nation of Islam. Ali then faced a rematch with Liston scheduled for May 1965 in Lewiston, Maine. It had been scheduled for Boston the previous November, but was postponed for six months due to Ali's emergency surgery for a hernia three days before. The fight was controversial. Midway through the first round, Liston was knocked down by a difficult-to-see blow the press dubbed a \"phantom punch\". Ali refused to retreat to a neutral corner, and referee Jersey Joe Walcott did not begin the count. Liston rose after he had been down about 20 seconds, and the fight momentarily continued. But a few seconds later Walcott stopped the match, declaring Ali the winner by knockout. The entire fight lasted less than two minutes. \n\nIt has since been speculated that Liston dropped to the ground purposely. Proposed motivations include threats on his life from the Nation of Islam, that he had bet against himself and that he \"took a dive\" to pay off debts. Slow-motion replays show that Liston was jarred by a chopping right from Ali, although it is unclear whether the blow was a genuine knock-out punch. \n\nAli defended his title against former heavyweight champion Floyd Patterson on November 22, 1965. Before the match, Ali mocked Patterson, who was widely known to call him by his former name Cassius Clay, as an \"Uncle Tom\", calling him \"The Rabbit\". Although Ali clearly had the better of Patterson, who appeared injured during the fight, the match lasted 12 rounds before being called on a technical knockout. Patterson later said he had strained his sacroiliac. Ali was criticized in the sports media for appearing to have toyed with Patterson during the fight. \n\nAli and then-WBA heavyweight champion boxer Ernie Terrell had agreed to meet for a bout in Chicago on March 29, 1966 (the WBA, one of two boxing associations, had stripped Ali of his title following his joining the Nation of Islam). But in February Ali was reclassified by the Louisville draft board as 1-A from 1-Y, and he indicated that he would refuse to serve, commenting to the press, \"I ain't got nothing against no Viet Cong; no Viet Cong never called me nigger.\" Amidst the media and public outcry over Ali's stance, the Illinois Athletic Commission refused to sanction the fight, citing technicalities. \n\nInstead, Ali traveled to Canada and Europe and won championship bouts against George Chuvalo, Henry Cooper, Brian London and Karl Mildenberger.\n\nAli returned to the United States to fight Cleveland Williams in the Houston Astrodome on November 14, 1966. The bout drew a record-breaking indoor crowd of 35,460 people. Williams had once been considered among the hardest punchers in the heavyweight division, but in 1964 he had been shot at point-blank range by a Texas policeman, resulting in the loss of one kidney and 10 ft of his small intestine. Ali dominated Williams, winning a third-round technical knockout in what some consider the finest performance of his career.\n\nAli fought Terrell in Houston on February 6, 1967. Terrell was billed as Ali's toughest opponent since Liston—unbeaten in five years and having defeated many of the boxers Ali had faced. Terrell was big, strong and had a three-inch reach advantage over Ali. During the lead up to the bout, Terrell repeatedly called Ali \"Clay\", much to Ali's annoyance (Ali called Cassius Clay his \"slave name\"). The two almost came to blows over the name issue in a pre-fight interview with Howard Cosell. Ali seemed intent on humiliating Terrell. \"I want to torture him\", he said. \"A clean knockout is too good for him.\" The fight was close until the seventh round when Ali bloodied Terrell and almost knocked him out. In the eighth round, Ali taunted Terrell, hitting him with jabs and shouting between punches, \"What's my name, Uncle Tom... what's my name?\" Ali won a unanimous 15-round decision. Terrell claimed that early in the fight Ali deliberately thumbed him in the eye—forcing Terrell to fight half-blind—and then, in a clinch, rubbed the wounded eye against the ropes. Because of Ali's apparent intent to prolong the fight to inflict maximum punishment, critics described the bout as \"one of the ugliest boxing fights\". Tex Maule later wrote: \"It was a wonderful demonstration of boxing skill and a barbarous display of cruelty.\" Ali denied the accusations of cruelty but, for Ali's critics, the fight provided more evidence of his arrogance.\n\nAfter Ali's title defense against Zora Folley on March 22, he was stripped of his title due to his refusal to be drafted to army service. His boxing license was also suspended by the state of New York. He was convicted of draft evasion on June 20 and sentenced to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine. He paid a bond and remained free while the verdict was being appealed.\n\nExile and comeback\n\nIn March 1966, Ali refused to be inducted into the armed forces. He was systematically denied a boxing license in every state and stripped of his passport. As a result, he did not fight from March 1967 to October 1970—from ages 25 to almost 29—as his case worked its way through the appeals process before his conviction was overturned in 1971. During this time of inactivity, as opposition to the Vietnam War began to grow and Ali's stance gained sympathy, he spoke at colleges across the nation, criticizing the Vietnam War and advocating African American pride and racial justice.\n\nFantasy fight against Rocky Marciano\n\nIn 1968, Ali sued radio producer Murray Woroner for $1 million stating defamation of character, after Woroner announced the broadcast of a series of \"fantasy fight\" specials created by computer simulation in which 8 fantasy matches were placed through the use of a NCR 315 computer and approximately 250 boxing experts. Known statistics, fighting styles, patterns and other factors determined the probable outcome. Ali had been placed in a fantasy fight with several boxers, and was unhappy regarding the outcome of his quarter final fantasy bout with Jim Jeffries in which he was predicted to have lost. \n\nAli settled for a $10,000 payoff from Woroner in exchange for his participation in a filmed version of a fantasy fight with boxing legend Rocky Marciano, who had retired 13 years earlier while World Heavyweight Champion and finished his career undefeated at 49–0. Both men received cuts of the films profits as part of their agreement to participate and commenced filming in 1969 in Miami, Florida.\n\nThe two fighters sparred between 70 and 75 1-minute rounds, which were later edited according to the findings of the computer. The final outcome was not revealed until the release of the film on January 20, 1970, where the fight was shown in over 1500 theaters over closed-circuit television in the United States, Canada and Europe. The film depicted that had the fight been actual, Marciano defeated Ali in the 13th round.\n\nMarciano died in a plane crash three weeks after the completion of filming, which prevented any form of feedback regarding the fight, while Ali was still banned from boxing, which prompted the filmmakers to destroy remaining prints of the film to prevent legal action, although one print survived, allowing for a DVD release in 2005. In 2006, the film was featured and used as inspiration for the film Rocky Balboa.\n\nLegal vindication\n\nOn August 11, 1970, with his case still in appeal, Ali was granted a license to box by the City of Atlanta Athletic Commission, thanks to State Senator Leroy R. Johnson. Ali's first return bout was against Jerry Quarry on October 26, resulting in a win after three rounds after Quarry was cut.\n\nA month earlier, a victory in federal court forced the New York State Boxing Commission to reinstate Ali's license. He fought Oscar Bonavena at Madison Square Garden in December, an uninspired performance that ended in a dramatic technical knockout of Bonavena in the 15th round. The win left Ali as a top contender against heavyweight champion Joe Frazier.\n\nFirst fight against Joe Frazier\n\nAli and Frazier's first fight, held at the Garden on March 8, 1971, was nicknamed the \"Fight of the Century\", due to the tremendous excitement surrounding a bout between two undefeated fighters, each with a legitimate claim as heavyweight champions. Veteran boxing writer John Condon called it \"the greatest event I've ever worked on in my life\". The bout was broadcast to 35 foreign countries; promoters granted 760 press passes.\n\nAdding to the atmosphere were the considerable pre-fight theatrics and name calling. Ali portrayed Frazier as a \"dumb tool of the white establishment\". \"Frazier is too ugly to be champ\", Ali said. \"Frazier is too dumb to be champ.\" Ali also frequently called Frazier an \"Uncle Tom\". Dave Wolf, who worked in Frazier's camp, recalled that, \"Ali was saying 'the only people rooting for Joe Frazier are white people in suits, Alabama sheriffs, and members of the Ku Klux Klan. I'm fighting for the little man in the ghetto.' Joe was sitting there, smashing his fist into the palm of his hand, saying, 'What the fuck does he know about the ghetto?'\"\n\nAli began training at a farm near Reading, Pennsylvania, in 1971 and, finding the country setting to his liking, sought to develop a real training camp in the countryside. He found a five-acre site on a Pennsylvania country road in the village of Deer Lake, Pennsylvania. On this site, Ali carved out what was to become his training camp, the camp where he lived and trained for all the many fights he had from 1972 on to the end of his career in the 1980s.\n\nThe Monday night fight lived up to its billing. In a preview of their two other fights, a crouching, bobbing and weaving Frazier constantly pressured Ali, getting hit regularly by Ali jabs and combinations, but relentlessly attacking and scoring repeatedly, especially to Ali's body. The fight was even in the early rounds, but Ali was taking more punishment than ever in his career. On several occasions in the early rounds he played to the crowd and shook his head \"no\" after he was hit. In the later rounds—in what was the first appearance of the \"rope-a-dope strategy\"—Ali leaned against the ropes and absorbed punishment from Frazier, hoping to tire him. In the 11th round, Frazier connected with a left hook that wobbled Ali, but because it appeared that Ali might be clowning as he staggered backwards across the ring, Frazier hesitated to press his advantage, fearing an Ali counter-attack. In the final round, Frazier knocked Ali down with a vicious left hook, which referee Arthur Mercante said was as hard as a man can be hit. Ali was back on his feet in three seconds. Nevertheless, Ali lost by unanimous decision, his first professional defeat.\n\nAli's characterizations of Frazier during the lead-up to the fight cemented a personal animosity toward Ali by Frazier that lasted until Frazier's death. Frazier and his camp always considered Ali's words cruel and unfair, far beyond what was necessary to sell tickets. Shortly after their second bout, in the TV studios of ABC's Wide World of Sports during a nationally televised interview with the two boxers, Frazier rose from his chair and wrestled Ali to the floor after Ali called him ignorant.\n\nFights against Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry Quarry, Floyd Patterson, Bob Foster, and Ken Norton\n\nIn the same year basketball star Wilt Chamberlain challenged Ali, and a fight was scheduled for July 26. Although the seven foot two inch tall Chamberlain had formidable physical advantages over Ali, weighing 60pounds more and able to reach 14inches further, Ali was able to intimidate Chamberlain into calling off the bout by taunting him with calls of \"Timber!\" and \"The tree will fall\" during a shared interview. These statements of confidence unsettled his taller opponent to the point that he called off the bout. \n\nAfter the loss to Frazier, Ali fought Jerry Quarry, had a second bout with Floyd Patterson and faced Bob Foster in 1972, winning a total of six fights that year. In 1973, Ken Norton broke Ali's jaw while giving him the second loss of his career. After initially seeking retirement, Ali won a controversial decision against Norton in their second bout, leading to a rematch at Madison Square Garden on January 28, 1974, with Joe Frazier, who had recently lost his title to George Foreman.\n\nSecond fight against Joe Frazier\n\nAli was strong in the early rounds of the fight, and staggered Frazier in the second round. Referee Tony Perez mistakenly thought he heard the bell ending the round and stepped between the two fighters as Ali was pressing his attack, giving Frazier time to recover. However, Frazier came on in the middle rounds, snapping Ali's head in round seven and driving him to the ropes at the end of round eight. The last four rounds saw round-to-round shifts in momentum between the two fighters. Throughout most of the bout, however, Ali was able to circle away from Frazier's dangerous left hook and to tie Frazier up when he was cornered, the latter a tactic that Frazier's camp complained of bitterly. Judges awarded Ali a unanimous decision.\n\nHeavyweight champion (second tenure)\n\nThe defeat of Frazier set the stage for a title fight against heavyweight champion George Foreman in Kinshasa, Zaire, on October 30, 1974—a bout nicknamed \"The Rumble in the Jungle\". Foreman was considered one of the hardest punchers in heavyweight history. In assessing the fight, analysts pointed out that Joe Frazier and Ken Norton—who had given Ali four tough battles and won two of them—had been both devastated by Foreman in second round knockouts. Ali was 32 years old, and had clearly lost speed and reflexes since his twenties. Contrary to his later persona, Foreman was at the time a brooding and intimidating presence. Almost no one associated with the sport, not even Ali's long-time supporter Howard Cosell, gave the former champion a chance of winning.\n\nAs usual, Ali was confident and colorful before the fight. He told interviewer David Frost, \"If you think the world was surprised when Nixon resigned, wait 'til I whup Foreman's behind!\" He told the press, \"I've done something new for this fight. I done wrestled with an alligator, I done tussled with a whale; handcuffed lightning, thrown thunder in jail; only last week, I murdered a rock, injured a stone, hospitalized a brick; I'm so mean I make medicine sick.\" Ali was wildly popular in Zaire, with crowds chanting \"Ali, Bomaye\" (\"Ali, kill him\") wherever he went.\n\nAli opened the fight moving and scoring with right crosses to Foreman's head. Then, beginning in the second round—and to the consternation of his corner—Ali retreated to the ropes and invited Foreman to hit him while covering up, clinching and counter-punching, all while verbally taunting Foreman. The move, which would later become known as the \"Rope-a-dope\", so violated conventional boxing wisdom—letting one of the hardest hitters in boxing strike at will—that at ringside writer George Plimpton thought the fight had to be fixed. Foreman, increasingly angered, threw punches that were deflected and did not land squarely. Midway through the fight, as Foreman began tiring, Ali countered more frequently and effectively with punches and flurries, which electrified the pro-Ali crowd. In the eighth round, Ali dropped an exhausted Foreman with a combination at center ring; Foreman failed to make the count. Against the odds, and amidst pandemonium in the ring, Ali had regained the title by knockout. In reflecting on the fight, George Foreman later said: \"I thought Ali was just one more knockout victim until, about the seventh round, I hit him hard to the jaw and he held me and whispered in my ear: 'That all you got, George?' I realized that this ain't what I thought it was.\" \n\nAli's next opponents included Chuck Wepner, Ron Lyle, and Joe Bugner. Wepner, a journeyman known as \"The Bayonne Bleeder\", stunned Ali with a knockdown in the ninth round; Ali would later say he tripped on Wepner's foot. It was a bout that would inspire Sylvester Stallone to create the acclaimed film, Rocky.\n\nAli then agreed to a third match with Joe Frazier in Manila. The bout, known as the \"Thrilla in Manila\", was held on October 1, 1975, in temperatures approaching 100 °F. In the first rounds, Ali was aggressive, moving and exchanging blows with Frazier. However, Ali soon appeared to tire and adopted the \"rope-a-dope\" strategy, frequently resorting to clinches. During this part of the bout Ali did some effective counter-punching, but for the most part absorbed punishment from a relentlessly attacking Frazier. In the 12th round, Frazier began to tire, and Ali scored several sharp blows that closed Frazier's left eye and opened a cut over his right eye. With Frazier's vision now diminished, Ali dominated the 13th and 14th rounds, at times conducting what boxing historian Mike Silver called \"target practice\" on Frazier's head. The fight was stopped when Frazier's trainer, Eddie Futch, refused to allow Frazier to answer the bell for the 15th and final round, despite Frazier's protests. Frazier's eyes were both swollen shut. Ali, in his corner, winner by TKO, slumped on his stool, clearly spent.\n\nAn ailing Ali said afterwards that the fight \"was the closest thing to dying that I know\", and, when later asked if he had viewed the fight on videotape, reportedly said, \"Why would I want to go back and see Hell?\" After the fight he cited Frazier as \"the greatest fighter of all times next to me\".\n\nLater career\n\nFollowing the Manila bout, Ali fought Jean-Pierre Coopman, Jimmy Young, and Richard Dunn, winning the last by knockout.\n\nOn June 1, 1976, Ali removed his shirt and jacket and confronted professional wrestler Gorilla Monsoon in the ring after his match at a World Wide Wrestling Federation show in Philadelphia Arena. After dodging a few punches, Monsoon put Ali in an airplane spin and dumped him to the mat. Ali stumbled to the corner, where his associate Butch Lewis convinced him to walk away. \n\nOn June 26, 1976, Ali participated in an exhibition bout in Tokyo against Japanese professional wrestler and martial artist Antonio Inoki. Though the fight was a publicity stunt, Inoki's kicks caused bruises, two blood clots and an infection in Ali's legs. The match was ultimately declared a draw. After Ali's death, The New York Times declared it his least memorable fight. In hindsight, CBS Sports said the attention the mixed-style bout received \"foretold the arrival of standardized MMA years later.\" \n\nAli fought Ken Norton for the third time at Yankee Stadium in September 1976, which he won in a heavily contested decision, which was loudly booed by the audience. Afterwards, he announced he was retiring from boxing to practice his faith, having converted to Sunni Islam after falling out with the Nation of Islam the previous year. \n\nAfter returning to beat Alfredo Evangelista in May 1977, Ali struggled in his next fight against Earnie Shavers that September, getting pummeled a few times by punches to the head. Ali won the fight by another unanimous decision, but the bout caused his longtime doctor Ferdie Pacheco to quit after he was rebuffed for telling Ali he should retire. Pacheco was quoted as saying, \"the New York State Athletic Commission gave me a report that showed Ali's kidneys were falling apart. I wrote to Angelo Dundee, Ali's trainer, his wife and Ali himself. I got nothing back in response. That's when I decided enough is enough.\"\n\nIn February 1978, Ali faced Leon Spinks at the Hilton Hotel in Las Vegas. At the time, Spinks had only seven professional fights to his credit, and had recently fought a draw with journeyman Scott LeDoux. Ali sparred less than two dozen rounds in preparation for the fight, and was seriously out of shape by the opening bell. He lost the title by split decision. A rematch followed shortly thereafter in New Orleans, which broke attendance records. Ali won a unanimous decision in an uninspiring fight, making him the first heavyweight champion to win the belt three times. \n\nFollowing this win, on July 27, 1979, Ali announced his retirement from boxing. His retirement was short-lived, however; Ali announced his comeback to face Larry Holmes for the WBC belt in an attempt to win the heavyweight championship an unprecedented fourth time. The fight was largely motivated by Ali's need for money. Boxing writer Richie Giachetti said, \"Larry didn't want to fight Ali. He knew Ali had nothing left; he knew it would be a horror.\"\n\nIt was around this time that Ali started struggling with vocal stutters and trembling hands. The Nevada Athletic Commission (NAC) ordered that he undergo a complete physical in Las Vegas before being allowed to fight again. Ali chose instead to check into the Mayo Clinic, who declared him fit to fight. Their opinion was accepted by the NAC on July 31, 1980, paving the way for Ali's return to the ring. \n\nThe fight took place on October 2, 1980, in Las Vegas Valley, with Holmes easily dominating Ali, who was weakened from thyroid medication he had taken to lose weight. Giachetti called the fight \"awful ... the worst sports event I ever had to cover\". Actor Sylvester Stallone at ringside said it was like watching an autopsy on a man who is still alive. Ali's trainer Angelo Dundee finally stopped the fight in the eleventh round, the only fight Ali lost by knockout. The Holmes fight is said to have contributed to Ali's Parkinson's syndrome. Despite pleas to definitively retire, Ali fought one last time on December 11, 1981, in Nassau, Bahamas, against Trevor Berbick, losing a ten-round decision. \n\nPersonal life\n\nMarriages and children\n\nAli was married four times and had seven daughters and two sons. Ali met his first wife, cocktail waitress Sonji Roi, approximately one month before they married on August 14, 1964. Roi's objections to certain Muslim customs in regard to dress for women contributed to the breakup of their marriage. They divorced on January 10, 1966.\n\nOn August 17, 1967, Ali married Belinda Boyd. After the wedding, she, like Ali, converted to Islam. She changed her name to Khalilah Ali, though she was still called Belinda by old friends and family. They had four children: Maryum (born 1968), twins Jamillah and Rasheda (born 1970; Rasheda married Robert Walsh and has a son Biaggio Ali, born in 1998), and Muhammad Ali, Jr. (born 1972). Maryum has a career as an author and rapper. \n\nAli was a resident of Cherry Hill, New Jersey, in the early 1970s. He had two other daughters, Miya and Khaliah, from extramarital relationships. \n\nIn 1975, Ali began an affair with Veronica Porché, an actress and model. By the summer of 1977, his second marriage was over and he had married Porché. At the time of their marriage, they had a baby girl, Hana, and Veronica was pregnant with their second child. Their second daughter, Laila Ali, was born in December 1977. By 1986, Ali and Porché were divorced.\n\nOn November 19, 1986, Ali married Yolanda (\"Lonnie\") Williams. They had been friends since 1964 in Louisville. They had one son, Asaad Amin, whom they adopted when Amin was five months old.\n\nKiiursti Mensah-Ali claims to be Ali's biological daughter with Barbara Mensah, with whom he had a 20-year relationship, citing photographs and a paternity test conducted in 1988. She said he accepted responsibility and took care of her, but all contacts with him were cut off after he married his fourth wife Lonnie. Kiiursti claims to have a relationship with his other children. After his death she again made passionate appeals to be allowed to mourn at his funeral. \n\nAli then lived in Scottsdale, Arizona, with Lonnie. In January 2007 it was reported that they had put their home in Berrien Springs, Michigan, up for sale and had purchased a home in eastern Jefferson County, Kentucky for $1,875,000. Lonnie converted to Islam from Catholicism in her late twenties. \n\nAli's daughter Laila became a boxer in 1999, despite her father's earlier comments against female boxing in 1978: \"Women are not made to be hit in the breast, and face like that... the body's not made to be punched right here [patting his chest]. Get hit in the breast... hard... and all that.\" \n\nAli's son-in-law is UFC middleweight fighter Kevin Casey, who is married to Hana. \n\nIn 2016, Ali's daughter Maryum appeared as a volunteer inmate in the reality show 60 Days In.\n\nReligion and beliefs\n\nAffiliation with the Nation of Islam\n\nAli said that he first heard of the Nation of Islam when he was fighting in the Golden Gloves tournament in Chicago in 1959, and attended his first Nation of Islam meeting in 1961. He continued to attend meetings, although keeping his involvement hidden from the public. In 1962, Clay met Malcolm X, who soon became his spiritual and political mentor. By the time of the first Liston fight Nation of Islam members, including Malcolm X, were visible in his entourage. This led to a story in The Miami Herald just before the fight disclosing that Clay had joined the Nation of Islam, which nearly caused the bout to be canceled.\n\nIn fact, Clay was initially refused entry to the Nation of Islam (often called the Black Muslims at the time) due to his boxing career. However, after he won the championship from Liston in 1964, the Nation of Islam was more receptive and agreed to publicize his membership. Shortly afterwards, Elijah Muhammad recorded a statement that Clay would be renamed Muhammad (one who is worthy of praise) Ali (Ali is the most important figure after Muhammad in Shia view and fourth rightly guided caliph in Sunni view). Around that time Ali moved to the south side of Chicago and lived in a series of houses, always near the Nation of Islam's Mosque Maryam or Elijah Muhammad's residence. He stayed in Chicago for about 12 years. \n\nOnly a few journalists (most notably Howard Cosell) accepted the new name at that time. Ali later announced: \"Cassius Clay is my slave name.\" Not afraid to antagonize the white establishment, Ali stated, \"I am America. I am the part you won't recognize. But get used to me. Black, confident, cocky; my name, not yours; my religion, not yours; my goals, my own; get used to me.\" Ali's friendship with Malcolm X ended as Malcolm split with the Nation of Islam a couple of weeks after Ali joined, and Ali remained with the Nation of Islam. Ali later said that turning his back on Malcolm was one of the mistakes he regretted most in his life. \n\nAligning himself with the Nation of Islam, its leader Elijah Muhammad, and a narrative that labeled the white race as the perpetrator of genocide against African Americans made Ali a target of public condemnation. The Nation of Islam was widely viewed by whites and even some African Americans as a black separatist \"hate religion\" with a propensity toward violence; Ali had few qualms about using his influential voice to speak Nation of Islam doctrine. In a press conference articulating his opposition to the Vietnam War, Ali stated, \"My enemy is the white people, not Viet Cong or Chinese or Japanese.\" In relation to integration, he said: \"We who follow the teachings of Elijah Muhammad don't want to be forced to integrate. Integration is wrong. We don't want to live with the white man; that's all\". \n\nWriter Jerry Izenberg once noted that, \"the Nation became Ali's family and Elijah Muhammad became his father. But there is an irony to the fact that while the Nation branded white people as devils, Ali had more white colleagues than most African American people did at that time in America, and continued to have them throughout his career.\"\n\nLater beliefs\n\nAli converted from the Nation of Islam sect to mainstream Sunni Islam in 1975. In a 2004 autobiography, written with daughter Hana Yasmeen Ali, he attributed his conversion to the shift toward mainstream Islam made by Warith Deen Muhammad after he gained control of the Nation of Islam upon the death of Elijah Muhammad in 1975.\n\nHe had gone on the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca in 1972, which inspired Ali in a similar manner to Malcolm X, meeting people of different colors from all over the world giving him a different outlook and greater spiritual awareness. In 1977, he said that, after he retired, he would dedicate the rest of his life to getting \"ready to meet God\" by helping people, charitable causes, uniting people and helping to make peace. He went on another Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca in 1988. In his later life, he had taken an interest in Sufism, which he referenced in his autobiography, The Soul of a Butterfly. \n\nAfter the September 11 attacks in 2001, he stated that \"Islam is a religion of peace\" and \"does not promote terrorism or killing people\", and that he is \"angry that the world sees a certain group of Islam followers who caused this destruction, but they are not real Muslims. They are racist fanatics who call themselves Muslims\". In December 2015, he stated that \"True Muslims know that the ruthless violence of so-called Islamic jihadists goes against the very tenets of our religion\", that \"We as Muslims have to stand up to those who use Islam to advance their own personal agenda\", and that \"political leaders should use their position to bring understanding about the religion of Islam, and clarify that these misguided murderers have perverted people's views on what Islam really is.\" \n\nVietnam War and resistance to the draft\n\nAli registered for conscription in the United States military on his 18th birthday and was listed as 1-A in 1962. In 1964, he was reclassified as Class 1-Y (fit for service only in times of national emergency) after he failed the U.S. Armed Forces qualifying test because his writing and spelling skills were sub-standard. (He was quoted as saying, \"I said I was the greatest, not the smartest!\") By early 1966, the army lowered its standards to permit soldiers above the 15th percentile and Ali was again classified as 1-A. This classification meant he was now eligible for the draft and induction into the U.S. Army at a time when the U.S. was involved in the Vietnam War, a war which put him further at odds with the white establishment.\n\nWhen notified of this status, Ali declared that he would refuse to serve in the army and publicly considered himself a conscientious objector. Ali stated: \"War is against the teachings of the Qur'an. I'm not trying to dodge the draft. We are not supposed to take part in no wars unless declared by Allah or The Messenger. We don't take part in Christian wars or wars of any unbelievers.\" He stated: \"Man, I ain't got no quarrel with them Viet Cong.\" Ali elaborated: \"Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go ten thousand miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs and denied simple human rights?\" \n\nAppearing for his scheduled induction into the U.S. Armed Forces on April 28, 1967, in Houston, Ali refused three times to step forward at the call of his name. An officer warned him he was committing a felony punishable by five years in prison and a fine of $10,000. Once more, Ali refused to budge when his name was called. As a result, he was arrested. On the same day the New York State Athletic Commission suspended his boxing license and stripped him of his title. Other boxing commissions followed suit. Ali would not be able to obtain a license to box in any state for over three years. \n\nAt the trial on June 20, 1967, after only 21minutes of deliberation, the jury found Ali guilty. After a Court of Appeals upheld the conviction, the case went to the U.S. Supreme Court.\n\nIn the years between the Appellate Court decision and the Supreme Court verdict, Ali remained free. As public opinion began turning against the war and the Civil Rights Movement continued to gather momentum, Ali became a popular speaker at colleges and universities across the country, rare if not unprecedented for a boxer. At Howard University, for example, he gave his popular \"Black Is Best\" speech to 4,000 cheering students and community intellectuals, after he was invited to speak by sociology professor Nathan Hare on behalf of the Black Power Committee, a student protest group. \n\nOn June 28, 1971, the Supreme Court of the United States in Clay v. United States overturned Ali's conviction by a unanimous 8–0 decision (Justice Thurgood Marshall recused himself, as he had been the U.S. Solicitor General at the time of Ali's conviction). The decision was not based on, nor did it address, the merits of Ali's claims per se; rather, the Court held that since the Appeal Board gave no reason for the denial of a conscientious objector exemption to Ali, and that it was therefore impossible to determine which of the three basic tests for conscientious objector status offered in the Justice Department's brief that the Appeals Board relied on, Ali's conviction must be reversed. \n\nImpact of Ali's draft refusal\n\nAli's example inspired countless black Americans and others. The New York Times columnist William Rhoden wrote, \"Ali's actions changed my standard of what constituted an athlete's greatness. Possessing a killer jump shot or the ability to stop on a dime was no longer enough. What were you doing for the liberation of your people? What were you doing to help your country live up to the covenant of its founding principles?\"\n\nRecalling Ali's anti-war position, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar said: \"I remember the teachers at my high school didn't like Ali because he was so anti-establishment and he kind of thumbed his nose at authority and got away with it. The fact that he was proud to be a black man and that he had so much talent... made some people think that he was dangerous. But for those very reasons I enjoyed him.\" \n\nCivil rights figures came to believe that Ali had an energizing effect on the freedom movement as a whole. Al Sharpton spoke of his bravery at a time when there was still widespread support for the Vietnam War. \"For the heavyweight champion of the world, who had achieved the highest level of athletic celebrity, to put all of that on the line – the money, the ability to get endorsements – to sacrifice all of that for a cause, gave a whole sense of legitimacy to the movement and the causes with young people that nothing else could have done. Even those who were assassinated, certainly lost their lives, but they didn't voluntarily do that. He knew he was going to jail and did it anyway. That's another level of leadership and sacrifice.\" \n\nIn speaking of the cost on Ali's career of his refusal to be drafted, his trainer Angelo Dundee said, \"One thing must be taken into account when talking about Ali: He was robbed of his best years, his prime years.\" \n\nAli's resistance to the draft was covered in the 2013 documentary The Trials of Muhammad Ali.\n\nNSA and FBI monitoring of Ali's communications\n\nIn a secret operation code-named \"Minaret\", the National Security Agency (NSA) intercepted the communications of leading Americans, including Ali, Senators Frank Church and Howard Baker, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., prominent U.S. journalists, and others who criticized the U.S. war in Vietnam. A review by the NSA of the Minaret program concluded that it was \"disreputable if not outright illegal\".\n\nIn 1971, his Fight of the Century with Frazier provided cover for an activist group, the Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI, to successfully pull off a burglary at an FBI office in Pennsylvania, which exposed the COINTELPRO operations that included illegal spying on activists involved with the civil rights and anti-war movements. One of the COINTELPRO targets was Ali, which included the FBI gaining access to his records as far back as elementary school; one such record mentioned him loving art as a child. \n\nLater years\n\nAli began visiting Africa starting in 1964, when he visited Ghana. In 1974, he visited a Palestinian refugee camp in Southern Lebanon, where Ali declared \"support for the Palestinian struggle to liberate their homeland\". In 1978, following his defeat to Spinks and before winning the rematch, Ali visited Bangladesh and received honorary citizenship there. The same year, he participated in The Longest Walk, a protest march in the United States in support of Native American rights, along with singer Stevie Wonder and actor Marlon Brando. \n\nIn 1980, he visited Kenya and successfully convinced the government to boycott the Moscow Olympics (in response to the Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan). On January 19, 1981, in Los Angeles, Ali talked a suicidal man down from jumping off a ninth-floor ledge, an event that made national news. \n\nAli was diagnosed with Parkinson's syndrome in 1984, a disease that sometimes results from head trauma from activities such as boxing. Ali still remained active during this time, however, later participating as a guest referee at WrestleMania I. \n\nIn 1984, Ali announced his support for the re-election of United States President Ronald Reagan. When asked to elaborate on his endorsement of Reagan, Ali told reporters, \"He's keeping God in schools and that's enough.\" In 1985, he visited Israel to request the release of Muslim prisoners at Atlit detainee camp, which Israel declined. \n\nAround 1987, the California Bicentennial Foundation for the U.S. Constitution selected Ali to personify the vitality of the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. Ali rode on a float at the following year's Tournament of Roses Parade, launching the U.S. Constitution's 200th birthday commemoration. In 1988, during the First Intifada, Ali participated in a Chicago rally in support of Palestine. The same year, he visited Sudan to raise awareness about the plight of famine victims. In 1989, he participated in an Indian charity event with the Muslim Educational Society in Kozhikode, Kerala, along with Bollywood actor Dilip Kumar.\n\nIn 1990, Ali traveled to Iraq prior to the Gulf War, and met with Saddam Hussein in an attempt to negotiate the release of American hostages. Ali successfully secured the release of the hostages, in exchange for promising Hussein that he'd bring America \"an honest account\" of Iraq. Despite rescuing hostages, he received criticism from President George H. W. Bush, diplomat Joseph C. Wilson, and The New York Times. Ali published an oral history, Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times by Thomas Hauser, in 1991. In 1996, he had the honor of lighting the flame at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia.\n\nAli's bout with Parkinson's led to a gradual decline in his health, though he was still active into the early years of the millennium, promoting his own biopic, Ali, in 2001. Ali also contributed an on-camera segment to the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert.\n\nIn 1998, Ali began working with actor Michael J Fox, who has Parkinson's disease, to raise awareness and fund research for a cure. They made a joint appearance before Congress to push the case in 2002. In 2000, Ali worked with the Michael J Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Disease to raise awareness and encourage donations for research. \n\nOn November 17, 2002, Ali went to Afghanistan as the \"U.N. Messenger of Peace\". He was in Kabul for a three-day goodwill mission as a special guest of the UN. \n\nOn September 1, 2009, Ali visited Ennis, County Clare, Ireland, the home of his great-grandfather, Abe Grady, who emigrated to the U.S. in the 1860s, eventually settling in Kentucky. A crowd of 10,000 turned out for a civic reception, where Ali was made the first Honorary Freeman of Ennis. \n\nOn July 27, 2012, Ali was a titular bearer of the Olympic Flag during the opening ceremonies of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. He was helped to his feet by his wife Lonnie to stand before the flag due to his Parkinson's rendering him unable to carry it into the stadium. In 2014, Ali tweeted in support of Trayvon Martin and the Black Lives Matter movement. \n\nIllness and death\n\nIn February 2013, Ali's brother, Rahman Ali, said Muhammad could no longer speak and could be dead within days. Ali's daughter, May May Ali, responded to the rumors, stating that she had talked to him on the phone the morning of February 3 and he was fine. \n\nOn December 20, 2014, Ali was hospitalized for a mild case of pneumonia. Ali was once again hospitalized on January 15, 2015, for a urinary tract infection after being found unresponsive at a guest house in Scottsdale, Arizona. He was released the next day. \n\nAli was hospitalized in Scottsdale on June 2, 2016, with a respiratory illness. Though his condition was initially described as \"fair\", it worsened and he died the following day, at the age of 74, from septic shock. Following Ali's death, he was the number one trending topic on Twitter for over 12 hours and on Facebook was trending topic number one for several days. ESPN played four hours of non-stop commercial-free coverage of Ali. BET played their documentary Muhammad Ali: Made In Miami. News networks such as CNN, BBC, Fox News, and ABC News also covered him extensively.\n\nTributes\n\nAli was mourned globally, and a family spokesman said the family \"certainly believes that Muhammad was a citizen of the world … and they know that the world grieves with him.\" Politicians like Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton, Donald Trump, David Cameron and more paid tribute to Ali. Ali also received numerous tributes from the world of sports including Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Floyd Mayweather, Mike Tyson, the Miami Marlins, LeBron James, Steph Curry and more. Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer stated, \"Muhammad Ali belongs to the world. But he only has one hometown.\"\n\nMemorial\n\nAli's funeral was preplanned by himself and others beginning years prior to his actual death. The services began in Louisville on June 9, 2016, with an Islamic Janazah prayer service at Freedom Hall on the grounds of the Kentucky Exposition Center. A funeral procession went through the streets of Louisville on June 10, 2016, ending at Cave Hill Cemetery, where a private interment ceremony occurred. Ali's grave is marked with a simple granite marker that bears only his name. A public memorial service for Ali at downtown Louisville's KFC Yum! Center was held in the afternoon of June 10. The pallbearers included Will Smith, Lennox Lewis and Mike Tyson, with honorary pallbearers including George Chuvalo, Larry Holmes and George Foreman. \n\nBoxing style\n\nAli had a highly unorthodox boxing style for a heavyweight, epitomized by his catchphrase \"float like a butterfly, sting like a bee\". Never an overpowering puncher, Ali relied early in his career on his superior hand speed, superb reflexes and constant movement, dancing and circling opponents for most of the fight, holding his hands low and lashing out with a quick, cutting left jab that he threw from unpredictable angles. His footwork was so strong that it was extremely difficult for opponents to cut down the ring and corner Ali against the ropes. He was also able to quickly dodge punches with his head movement and footwork.\n\nOne of Ali's greatest tricks was to make opponents overcommit by pulling straight backward from punches. Disciplined, world-class boxers chased Ali and threw themselves off balance attempting to hit him because he seemed to be an open target, only missing and leaving themselves exposed to Ali's counter punches, usually a chopping right. Slow motion replays show that this was precisely the way Sonny Liston was hit and apparently knocked out by Ali in their second fight. Ali often flaunted his movement by dancing the \"Ali Shuffle\", a sort of center-ring jig. Ali's early style was so unusual that he was initially discounted because he reminded boxing writers of a lightweight, and it was assumed he would be vulnerable to big hitters like Sonny Liston.\n\nUsing a synchronizer, Jimmy Jacobs, who co-managed Mike Tyson, measured young Ali's punching speed versus Sugar Ray Robinson, a welter/middleweight, often considered the best pound-for-pound fighter in history. Ali was 25% faster than Robinson, even though Ali was 45–50pounds heavier. Ali's punches produced approximately 1,000pounds of force. \"No matter what his opponents heard about him, they didn't realize how fast he was until they got in the ring with him\", Jacobs said. The effect of Ali's punches was cumulative. Charlie Powell, who fought Ali early in Ali's career and was knocked out in the third round, said: \"When he first hit me I said to myself, 'I can take two of these to get one in myself.' But in a little while I found myself getting dizzier and dizzier every time he hit me. He throws punches so easily that you don't realize how much they hurt you until it's too late.\"\n\nCommenting on fighting the young Ali, George Chuvalo said: \"He was just so damn fast. When he was young, he moved his legs and hands at the same time. He threw his punches when he was in motion. He'd be out of punching range, and as he moved into range he'd already begun to throw the punch. So if you waited until he got into range to punch back, he beat you every time.\"\n\nFloyd Patterson said, \"It's very hard to hit a moving target, and (Ali) moved all the time, with such grace, three minutes of every round for fifteen rounds. He never stopped. It was extraordinary.\"\n\nDarrell Foster, who trained Will Smith for the movie Ali, said: \"Ali's signature punches were the left jab and the overhand right. But there were at least six different ways Ali used to jab. One was a jab that Ali called the 'snake lick', like cobra striking that comes from the floor almost, really low down. Then there was Ali's rapid-fire jab—three to five jabs in succession rapidly fired at his opponents' eyes to create a blur in his face so he wouldn't be able to see the right hand coming behind it.\" \n\nIn the opinion of many, Ali became a different fighter after the 3½-year layoff. Ferdie Pacheco, Ali's corner physician, noted that he had lost his ability to move and dance as before. This forced Ali to become more stationary and exchange punches more frequently, exposing him to more punishment while indirectly revealing his tremendous ability to take a punch. This physical change led in part to the \"rope-a-dope\" strategy, where Ali would lie back on the ropes, cover up to protect himself and conserve energy, and tempt opponents to punch themselves out. Ali often taunted opponents in the process and lashed back with sudden, unexpected combinations. The strategy was dramatically successful in the George Foreman fight, but less so in the first Joe Frazier bout when it was introduced.\n\nOf his later career, Arthur Mercante said: \"Ali knew all the tricks. He was the best fighter I ever saw in terms of clinching. Not only did he use it to rest, but he was big and strong and knew how to lean on opponents and push and shove and pull to tire them out. Ali was so smart. Most guys are just in there fighting, but Ali had a sense of everything that was happening, almost as though he was sitting at ringside analyzing the fight while he fought it.\"\n\n\"Talking trash\"\n\nAli regularly taunted and baited his opponents—including Liston, Frazier, and Foreman—before the fight and often during the bout itself. He said Frazier was \"too dumb to be champion\", that he would whip Liston \"like his Daddy did\", that Terrell was an \"Uncle Tom\" for refusing to call Ali by his name and continuing to call him Cassius Clay, and that Patterson was a \"rabbit\". In speaking of how Ali stoked Liston's anger and overconfidence before their first fight, one writer commented that \"the most brilliant fight strategy in boxing history was devised by a teenager who had graduated 376 in a class of 391.\"\n\nAli typically portrayed himself as the \"people's champion\" and his opponent as a tool of the (white) establishment (despite the fact that his entourage often had more white faces than his opponents'). During the early part of his career, he built a reputation for predicting rounds in which he would finish opponents, often vowing to crawl across the ring or to leave the country if he lost the bout. Ali adopted the latter practice from \"Gorgeous\" George Wagner, a professional wrestling champion who drew thousands of fans to his matches as \"the man you love to hate\". When Ali was 19, Wagner told him after a match in Las Vegas, \"A lot of people will pay to see someone shut your mouth. So keep on bragging, keep on sassing and always be outrageous.\"\n\nESPN columnist Ralph Wiley called Ali \"The King of Trash Talk\". In 2013, The Guardian said Ali exemplified boxing's \"golden age of trash talking\". The Bleacher Report called Clay's description of Sonny Liston smelling like a bear and his vow to donate him to a zoo after he beat him the greatest trash talk line in sports history. \n\nLegacy\n\nMuhammad Ali defeated every top heavyweight in his era, which has been called the golden age of heavyweight boxing. Ali was named \"Fighter of the Year\" by Ring Magazine more times than any other fighter, and was involved in more Ring Magazine \"Fight of the Year\" bouts than any other fighter. He was an inductee into the International Boxing Hall of Fame and held wins over seven other Hall of Fame inductees. He was one of only three boxers to be named \"Sportsman of the Year\" by Sports Illustrated.\n\nIn 1978, three years before Ali's permanent retirement, the Louisville Board of Aldermen in his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky, voted 6–5 to rename Walnut Street to Muhammad Ali Boulevard. This was controversial at the time, as within a week 12 of the 70 street signs were stolen. Earlier that year, a committee of the Jefferson County Public Schools (Kentucky) considered renaming Ali's alma mater, Central High School, in his honor, but the motion failed to pass. In time, Muhammad Ali Boulevard—and Ali himself—came to be well accepted in his hometown. \n\nIn 1993, the Associated Press reported that Ali was tied with Babe Ruth as the most recognized athlete, out of over 800 dead or living athletes, in America. The study found that over 97% of Americans over 12 years of age identified both Ali and Ruth. He was the recipient of the 1997 Arthur Ashe Courage Award.\n\nIn 1999, Time magazine named Ali one of the 100 Most Important People of the 20th Century. He was crowned Sportsman of the Century by Sports Illustrated. Named Sports Personality of the Century in a BBC poll, he received more votes than the other contenders (which included Pelé, Jesse Owens and Jack Nicklaus) combined. On September 13, 1999, Ali was named \"Kentucky Athlete of the Century\" by the Kentucky Athletic Hall of Fame in ceremonies at the Galt House East. \n\nOn January 8, 2001, Muhammad Ali was presented with the Presidential Citizens Medal by President Bill Clinton. In November 2005, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George W. Bush, followed by the Otto Hahn Peace Medal in Gold of the UN Association of Germany (DGVN) in Berlin for his work with the U.S. civil rights movement and the United Nations (December 17, 2005). \n\nOn November 19, 2005 (Ali's 19th wedding anniversary), the $60million non-profit Muhammad Ali Center opened in downtown Louisville. In addition to displaying his boxing memorabilia, the center focuses on core themes of peace, social responsibility, respect, and personal growth. On June 5, 2007, he received an honorary doctorate of humanities at Princeton University's 260th graduation ceremony. \n\nAli Mall, located in Araneta Center, Quezon City, Philippines, is named after him. Construction of the mall, the first of its kind in the Philippines, began shortly after Ali's victory in a match with Joe Frazier in nearby Araneta Coliseum in 1975. The mall opened in 1976 with Ali attending its opening. \n\nThe 1976 Muhammad Ali vs. Antonio Inoki fight played a role in the history of mixed martial arts, particularly in Japan. The match inspired Inoki's students Masakatsu Funaki and Minoru Suzuki to found Pancrase in 1993, which in turn inspired the foundation of Pride Fighting Championships in 1997. Pride was later acquired by its rival Ultimate Fighting Championship in 2007. \n\nThe Muhammad Ali Boxing Reform Act was introduced in 1999 and passed in 2000, to protect the rights and welfare of boxers in the United States. In May 2016, a bill was introduced to United States Congress by Markwayne Mullin, a politician and former MMA fighter, to extend the Ali Act to mixed martial arts. In June 2016, US senator Rand Paul proposed an amendment to the US draft laws named after Ali, a proposal to eliminate the Selective Service System. \n\nRanking in boxing history\n\nAli is regarded as one of the greatest boxers of all time by boxing commentators and historians. Ring Magazine, a prominent boxing magazine, named him number 1 in a 1998 ranking of greatest heavyweights from all eras. The Associated Press voted Ali the No. 1 heavyweight of the 20th century in 1999. In December 2007, ESPN listed Ali second in its choice of the greatest heavyweights of all time, behind Joe Louis. Ali was named the second greatest pound for pound fighter in boxing history by ESPN, behind only welterweight and middleweight great Sugar Ray Robinson. \n\nSpoken word poetry and music\n\nAli often used rhyme schemes and spoken word poetry, both for when he was trash talking in boxing and as political poetry for his activism outside of boxing. He played a role in the shaping of the black poetic tradition, paving the way for The Last Poets in 1968, Gil Scott-Heron in 1970, and the emergence of rap music in the 1970s. \n\nIn 1963, Ali released an album of spoken word music on Columbia Records titled I Am the Greatest, and in 1964, he recorded a cover version of the rhythm and blues song \"Stand by Me\". I Am the Greatest reached number 61 on the album chart and was nominated for a Grammy Award. He later received a second Grammy nomination, for \"Best Recording for Children\", with his 1976 spoken word novelty record, The Adventures of Ali and His Gang vs. Mr. Tooth Decay.\n\nAli was an influential figure in the world of hip hop music. As a \"rhyming trickster\", he was noted for his \"funky delivery\", \"boasts\", \"comical trash talk\", and \"endless quotables\". According to Rolling Stone, his \"freestyle skills\" and his \"rhymes, flow, and braggadocio\" would \"one day become typical of old school MCs\" like Run–D.M.C. and LL Cool J, and his \"outsized ego foreshadowed the vainglorious excesses of Kanye West, while his Afrocentric consciousness and cutting honesty pointed forward to modern bards like Rakim, Nas, Jay-Z, and Kendrick Lamar.\" Ali has been cited as an inspiration by rappers such as LL Cool J, Public Enemy's Chuck D, Jay-Z, Eminem, Sean Combs, Slick Rick, Nas and MC Lyte. Ali has been referenced in a number of hip hop songs, including The Sugarhill Gang's \"Rapper's Delight\", the Fugees' \"Ready or Not\", EPMD's \"You're a Customer\" and Will Smith's \"Gettin' Jiggy wit It\".\n\nIn the media and popular culture\n\nAs a world champion boxer, social activist, and pop cuture icon, Ali was the subject of numerous books, films, music, video games, TV shows, and other creative works.\n\nAli appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated on 37 different occasions, second only to Michael Jordan. He also appeared on the cover of Time Magazine 5 times, the most of any athlete.\n\nAli had a cameo role in the 1962 film version of Requiem for a Heavyweight, and during his exile, he starred in the short-lived Broadway musical, Buck White (1969).\n\nAli appeared in the documentary film Black Rodeo (1972) riding both a horse and a bull. His autobiography The Greatest: My Own Story, written with Richard Durham, was published in 1975. In 1977 the book was adapted into a film called The Greatest, in which Ali played himself and Ernest Borgnine played Angelo Dundee.\n\nThe film Freedom Road, made in 1978, features Muhammad Ali in a rare acting role as Gideon Jackson, a former slave and Union (American Civil War) soldier in 1870s Virginia, who gets elected to the U.S. Senate and battles other former slaves and white sharecroppers to keep the land they have tended all their lives.\n\nOn the set of Freedom Road Ali met Canadian singer-songwriter Michel (also known as Robert Williams, a co-founder of The Kindness Offensive ), and subsequently helped create Michel's album entitled The First Flight of the Gizzelda Dragon and an unaired television special featuring them both. \n\nAli was the subject of This Is Your Life (UK TV series) in 1978 when he was surprised by Eamonn Andrews. Ali was featured in Superman vs. Muhammad Ali, a 1978 DC Comics comic book pitting the champ against the superhero. In 1979, Ali guest-starred as himself in an episode of the NBC sitcom Diff'rent Strokes.\n\nHe also wrote several best-selling books about his career, including The Greatest: My Own Story and The Soul of a Butterfly. The Muhammad Ali Effect, named after Ali, is a term that came into use in psychology in the 1980s, as he stated in his autobiography The Greatest: My Own Story: \"I only said I was the greatest, not the smartest.\" According to this effect, when people are asked to rate their intelligence and moral behavior in comparison to others, people will rate themselves as more moral, but not more intelligent than others. \n\nWhen We Were Kings, a 1996 documentary about the Rumble in the Jungle, won an Academy Award, and the 2001 biopic Ali garnered an Oscar nomination for Will Smith's portrayal of the lead role. The latter film was directed by Michael Mann, with mixed reviews, the positives given to Smith's portrayal of Ali. Prior to making the film, Smith rejected the role until Ali requested that he accept it. Smith said the first thing Ali told him was: \"Man you're almost pretty enough to play me.\" \n\nIn 2002, for his contributions to the entertainment industry, Ali was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6801 Hollywood Boulevard. His star is the only one to be mounted on a vertical surface, out of deference to his request that his name not be walked upon. \n\nThe Trials of Muhammad Ali, a documentary directed by Bill Siegel that focuses on Ali's refusal of the draft during the Vietnam War, opened in Manhattan on August 23, 2013. A made-for-TV movie called Muhammad Ali's Greatest Fight, also in 2013, dramatized the same aspect of Ali's life.\n\nProfessional boxing record\n\n|-\n| style\"text-align:center;\" colspan\n10|56 wins (37 knockouts, 19 decisions), 5 losses (4 decisions, 1 TKO) \n|- style=\"text-align:center; background:#e3e3e3;\"\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Res.\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Record\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Opponent\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Type\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Rd., Time\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Date\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Age\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Location\n| style=\"border-style:none none solid solid; \"|Notes\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|61\n| Loss\n| 56–5\n|align=left| Trevor Berbick\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left| \n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|60\n| Loss\n| 56–4\n|align=left| Larry Holmes\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|59\n| Win\n| 56–3\n|align=left| Leon Spinks\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|58\n| Loss\n| 55–3\n|align=left| Leon Spinks\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|57\n| Win\n| 55–2\n|align=left| Earnie Shavers\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|56\n| Win\n| 54–2\n|align=left| Alfredo Evangelista\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|55\n| Win\n| 53–2\n|align=left| Ken Norton\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|54\n| Win\n| 52–2\n|align=left| Richard Dunn\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|53\n| Win\n| 51–2\n|align=left| Jimmy Young\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|52\n| Win\n| 50–2\n|align=left| Jean-Pierre Coopman\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|51\n| Win\n| 49–2\n|align=left| Joe Frazier\n| Thrilla in Manila|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|50\n| Win\n| 48–2\n|align=left| Joe Bugner\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|49\n| Win\n| 47–2\n|align=left| Ron Lyle\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|48\n| Win\n| 46–2\n|align=left| Chuck Wepner\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|47\n| Win\n| 45–2\n|align=left| George Foreman\n| The Rumble in the Jungle|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|46\n| Win\n| 44–2\n|align=left| Joe Frazier\n| Muhammad Ali vs. Joe Frazier II|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|45\n| Win\n| 43–2\n|align=left| Rudie Lubbers\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|44\n| Win\n| 42–2\n|align=left| Ken Norton\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|43\n| Loss\n| 41–2\n|align=left| Ken Norton\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|42\n| Win\n| 41–1\n|align=left| Joe Bugner\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|41\n| Win\n| 40–1\n|align=left| Bob Foster\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|40\n| Win\n| 39–1\n|align=left| Floyd Patterson\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|39\n| Win\n| 38–1\n|align=left| Alvin Lewis\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|38\n| Win\n| 37–1\n|align=left| Jerry Quarry\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|37\n| Win\n| 36–1\n|align=left| George Chuvalo\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|36\n| Win\n| 35–1\n|align=left| Mac Foster\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|35\n| Win\n| 34–1\n|align=left| Jürgen Blin\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|34\n| Win\n| 33–1\n|align=left| Buster Mathis\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|33\n| Win\n| 32–1\n|align=left| Jimmy Ellis\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|32\n| Loss\n| 31–1\n|align=left| Joe Frazier\n| Fight of the Century|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|31\n| Win\n| 31–0\n|align=left| Oscar Bonavena\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|30\n| Win\n| 30–0\n|align=left| Jerry Quarry\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"background:#FFEBAD\"\n| colspan10 style\n\"text-align:center;\"|Suspension\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|29\n| Win\n| 29–0\n|align=left| Zora Folley\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|28\n| Win\n| 28–0\n|align=left| Ernie Terrell\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|27\n| Win\n| 27–0\n|align=left| Cleveland Williams\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|26\n| Win\n| 26–0\n|align=left| Karl Mildenberger\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|25\n| Win\n| 25–0\n|align=left| Brian London\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|24\n| Win\n| 24–0\n|align=left| Henry Cooper\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|23\n| Win\n| 23–0\n|align=left| George Chuvalo\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|22\n| Win\n| 22–0\n|align=left| Floyd Patterson\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|21\n| Win\n| 21–0\n|align=left| Sonny Liston\n| Muhammad Ali vs. Sonny Liston|\n| \n|| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|20\n| Win\n| 20–0\n|align=left| Sonny Liston\n| Muhammad Ali vs. Sonny Liston|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|19\n| Win\n| 19–0\n|align=left| Henry Cooper\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|18\n| Win\n| 18–0\n|align=left| Doug Jones\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|17\n| Win\n| 17–0\n|align=left| Charlie Powell\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|16\n| Win\n| 16–0\n|align=left| Archie Moore\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|15\n| Win\n| 15–0\n|align=left| Alejandro Lavorante\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|14\n| Win\n| 14–0\n|align=left| Billy Daniels\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|13\n| Win\n| 13–0\n|align=left| George Logan\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|12\n| Win\n| 12–0\n|align=left| Don Warner\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|11\n| Win\n| 11–0\n|align=left| Sonny Banks\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|10\n| Win\n| 10–0\n|align=left| Willi Besmanoff\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|9\n| Win\n| 9–0\n|align=left| Alex Miteff\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|8\n| Win\n| 8–0\n|align=left| Alonzo Johnson\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|7\n| Win\n| 7–0\n|align=left| Duke Sabedong\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|6\n| Win\n| 6–0\n|align=left| LaMar Clark\n|\n| \n|| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|5\n| Win\n| 5–0\n|align=left| Donnie Fleeman\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|4\n| Win\n| 4–0\n|align=left| Jim Robinson\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|3\n| Win\n| 3–0\n|align=left| Tony Esperti\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n| Align=left|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|2\n| Win\n| 2–0\n|align=left| Herb Siler\n|\n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|\n|- style=\"text-align:center;\"\n|1\n| Win\n| 1–0\n|align=left| Tunney Hunsaker\n| \n| \n| \n|align=left|\n|align=left|\n|" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "Frozen_(2013_film).txt" ], "title": [ "Frozen (2013 film)" ], "wiki_context": [ "Frozen is a 2013 American 3D computer-animated musical fantasy comedy film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures. It is the 53rd animated feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series. Inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale The Snow Queen, the film tells the story of a fearless princess who sets off on an epic journey alongside a rugged iceman, his loyal pet reindeer, and a naïve snowman to find her estranged sister, whose icy powers have inadvertently trapped the kingdom in eternal winter.\n\nFrozen underwent several story treatments for years before being commissioned in 2011, with a screenplay written by Jennifer Lee, and both Chris Buck and Lee serving as directors. It features the voices of Kristen Bell, Idina Menzel, Jonathan Groff, Josh Gad and Santino Fontana. Christophe Beck, who had worked on Disney's award-winning short Paperman, was hired to compose the film's orchestral score, while husband-and-wife songwriting team Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez wrote the songs.\n\nFrozen premiered at the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood, California, on November 19, 2013, and went into general theatrical release on November 27. It was met with strongly positive reviews from critics and audiences, with some film critics considering Frozen to be the best Disney animated feature film since the studio's renaissance era. The film was also a massive commercial success; it accumulated nearly $1.3 billion in worldwide box office revenue, $400 million of which was earned in the United States and Canada and $247 million of which was earned in Japan. It ranks as the highest-grossing animated film of all time, the third highest-grossing original film of all time, the ninth highest-grossing film of all time, the highest-grossing film of 2013, and the third highest-grossing film in Japan. With over 18 million home media sales in 2014, it became the best-selling film of the year in the United States. By January 2015, Frozen had become the all-time best-selling Blu-ray Disc in the United States. \n\nFrozen won two Academy Awards for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song (\"Let It Go\"), the Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film, the BAFTA Award for Best Animated Film, five Annie Awards (including Best Animated Feature), two Grammy Awards for Best Compilation Soundtrack for Visual Media and Best Song Written for Visual Media (\"Let It Go\"), and two Critics' Choice Movie Awards for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song (\"Let It Go\").\n\nAn animated short sequel, Frozen Fever, premiered on March 13, 2015, with Disney's Cinderella. On March 12, 2015, a feature-length sequel was announced, with Buck and Lee returning as directors and Peter Del Vecho returning as producer. A release date has not been disclosed. \n\nPlot \n\nThe beginning of the movie shows icemen harvesting ice. A young boy named Kristoff and his pet reindeer, Sven, is among them (\"Frozen Heart\"). Elsa, Princess of Arendelle, possesses cryokinetic powers, with which she is able to produce or manipulate ice, frost and snow at will. One night while playing, she accidentally injures her younger sister, Anna. Their shocked parents, the king and queen, seek help from the troll king, who heals Anna and removes her memories of Elsa's magic. The royal couple isolate the sisters in the castle until Elsa learns to control her magical powers. Afraid of hurting Anna again, and with her ability to control her powers deteriorating, Elsa spends most of her time alone in her room, refusing even to speak to Anna and a rift develops between the sisters as they grow up; when the girls are teenagers, their parents die at sea during a storm (\"Do You Want to Build a Snowman?\").\n\nWhen Elsa comes of age, the kingdom prepares for her coronation (\"For the First Time in Forever\"). Among the guests is the Duke of Weselton, who seeks to exploit Arendelle for profit. Excited to be allowed out of the castle again, Princess Anna explores the town and meets Prince Hans of the Southern Isles; the two quickly develop a mutual attraction. Despite Elsa's fears, her coronation takes place without incident. During the reception, Hans proposes to Anna, who hastily accepts (\"Love Is An Open Door\"). However, Elsa refuses to grant her blessing and forbids their sudden marriage. The sisters argue, culminating in the exposure of Elsa's abilities in an emotional outburst.\n\nDeclared a monster by the Duke, a panicking Elsa flees the castle, while inadvertently unleashing an eternal winter on the kingdom. High in the nearby mountains, she abandons her restraint, vowing to never return and building herself a solitary ice palace (\"Let It Go\"). Meanwhile, Anna leaves Hans in charge of Arendelle and sets out in search of her sister, determined to return her to Arendelle, end the winter and mend their relationship. While obtaining supplies from 'Wandering Oaken's Trading Post and Sauna', Anna meets Kristoff and Sven (\"Reindeers Are Better Than People\"). She convinces Kristoff to guide her up the North Mountain. On their journey, the group encounters Olaf, Anna and Elsa's childhood snowman whom the latter recreated and unknowingly brought to life. Olaf dreams of seeing and experiencing summer for the first time (\"In Summer\"). He then leads them to Elsa's hideaway.\n\nAnna and Elsa reunite, but Elsa still fears hurting her sister. When Anna insists that Elsa return, she becomes agitated and her powers lash out, accidentally striking Anna in the heart (\"For the First Time In Forever (Reprise)\"). Horrified, Elsa forces Anna, Kristoff and Olaf to leave by creating a giant snow creature named Marshmallow that chases them away from her palace. As they flee, Kristoff notices Anna's hair turning white and deduces that something is very wrong. He seeks help from the trolls, his adoptive family, who explain that Anna's heart has been frozen by Elsa (\"Fixer Upper\"). Unless it can be thawed by an \"act of true love\", she will become frozen solid forever. Believing that only Hans can save her with a true love's kiss, Kristoff races back with her to Arendelle.\n\nMeanwhile, Hans, who is leading a search for Anna, reaches Elsa's palace. In the ensuing battle against the duke's men, Elsa is knocked unconscious by a falling chandelier and imprisoned in Arendelle. There, Hans pleads with her to undo the winter, but Elsa confesses that she has no idea how. When Anna reunites with Hans and begs him to kiss her to break the curse, Hans refuses and reveals that his true intention in marrying her is to seize control of Arendelle's throne. Leaving Anna to die, he charges Elsa with treason for her younger sister's apparent death.\n\nElsa escapes and heads out into the blizzard on the fjord. Olaf comes across Anna and reveals Kristoff is in love with her; they then escape onto the fjord to find him. Hans confronts Elsa, telling her Anna is dead because of her. In Elsa's despair, the storm suddenly ceases, giving Kristoff and Anna the chance to locate each other. Nevertheless, Anna, seeing that Hans is about to kill Elsa, throws herself between the two just as she freezes solid, blocking Hans' attack.\n\nAs Elsa grieves for her sister, Anna begins to thaw, since her decision to sacrifice herself to save her sister constitutes an \"act of true love\". Realizing love is the key to controlling her powers, Elsa thaws the kingdom and gives Olaf his own personal flurry so he can survive in summer. Hans is deported to the Southern Isles to face punishment for his crimes against the royal family of Arendelle, while Elsa cuts off trade with Weselton. The two sisters reconcile and Elsa promises never to shut the castle gates again.\n\nVoice cast \n\n* Kristen Bell as Anna, the 18-year-old Princess of Arendelle and Elsa's younger sister \n** Livvy Stubenrauch as 5-year-old Anna \n** Katie Lopez as 5-year-old Anna (singing) \n** Agatha Lee Monn as 9-year-old Anna \n* Idina Menzel as Elsa, the 21-year-old Snow Queen of Arendelle and Anna's elder sister \n** Eva Bella as 8-year-old Elsa \n** Spencer Lacey Ganus as 12-year-old Elsa\n* Jonathan Groff as Kristoff, an iceman who is accompanied by a reindeer named Sven \n** Tyree Brown as 8-year-old Kristoff \n* Josh Gad as Olaf, a comic-relief snowman that Elsa and Anna created as children, who dreams of experiencing summer \n* Santino Fontana as Hans, a prince from the Southern Isles \n* Alan Tudyk as the Duke of Weselton\n* Ciarán Hinds as Grand Pabbie, the Troll King \n* Chris Williams as Oaken, the owner of Wandering Oaken's Trading Post and Sauna \n* Maia Wilson as Bulda, a troll and Kristoff's adoptive mother \n* Paul Briggs as Marshmallow, a giant snow monster who guards Elsa's palace\n* Maurice LaMarche as the King of Arendelle, Anna and Elsa's father\n* Jennifer Lee as the Queen of Arendelle, Anna and Elsa's mother \n\nNon-speaking characters include Kristoff's reindeer companion Sven, horses and wolves. \n\nProduction \n\nDevelopment \n\nOrigins \n\nWalt Disney Productions first began exploring a possible live action/animation biography film of author and poet Hans Christian Andersen sometime in late 1937 before the December premiere of its film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the first feature-length hand-drawn animated film ever made. In March 1940, Walt Disney suggested a co-production to film producer Samuel Goldwyn, where Goldwyn's studio would shoot the live-action sequences of Andersen's life and Disney's studio would animate Andersen's fairy tales. The animated sequences would be based on some of Andersen's best known works, such as The Little Mermaid, The Little Match Girl, The Steadfast Tin Soldier, The Snow Queen, Thumbelina, The Ugly Duckling, The Red Shoes, and The Emperor's New Clothes. However, the studio encountered difficulty with The Snow Queen, as it could not find a way to adapt and relate the Snow Queen character to modern audiences. Even as far back as the 1930s and 1940s, it was clear that the source material contained great cinematic possibilities, but the Snow Queen character proved to be too problematic. After the United States entered World War II, the studio began to focus on making wartime propaganda, which caused development on the Disney–Goldwyn project to grind to a halt in 1942. Goldwyn went on to produce his own live-action film version in 1952, entitled Hans Christian Andersen, with Danny Kaye as Andersen, Charles Vidor directing, Moss Hart writing, and Frank Loesser penning the songs. All of Andersen's fairy tales were, instead, told in song and ballet in live-action, like the rest of the film. It went on to receive six Academy Award nominations the following year. Back at Disney, The Snow Queen, along with other Andersen fairy tales (including The Little Mermaid), were shelved. \n\nLater efforts \n\nIn the late 1990s, Walt Disney Feature Animation started developing a new adaptation of The Snow Queen after the tremendous success of their recent films during the Disney Renaissance era (1989 - 1999), but the project was scrapped completely in late 2002, when Glen Keane reportedly quit the project and went on to work on another project which became Tangled (2010). Even before then, Harvey Fierstein pitched his version of the story to Disney's executives, but was turned down. Paul and Gaëtan Brizzi, Dick Zondag and Dave Goetz reportedly all tried their hand at it, but failed. After a number of unsuccessful attempts from 2000 to 2002, Disney shelved the project again. During one of those attempts, Michael Eisner, then-chairman and chief executive officer of The Walt Disney Company, offered his support to the project and suggested doing it with Oscar-winning director John Lasseter at Pixar Animation Studios after the then-expected renewal of Pixar's contract with Disney. But negotiations between Pixar and Disney collapsed in January 2004 and that contract was never renewed. Instead, Eisner's successor Bob Iger negotiated Disney's purchase of Pixar in January 2006 for $7.4 billion, and Lasseter was promoted to chief creative officer of both Pixar and Disney Animation. \n\nThe next attempt started in 2008, when Lasseter was able to convince Chris Buck (who co-directed the 1999 film Tarzan for the studio) to return to Walt Disney Feature Animation from Sony Pictures Animation (where he had recently co-directed the Oscar-nominated 2007 film Surf's Up); that September, Buck pitched several ideas to Lasseter, one of which was The Snow Queen. Buck later revealed that his initial inspiration for The Snow Queen was not the Andersen fairy tale itself, but that he wanted \"to do something different on the definition of true love.\" \"Disney had already done the 'kissed by a prince' thing, so [I] thought it was time for something new,\" he recalled. It turned out Lasseter had been interested in The Snow Queen for a long time; back when Pixar was working with Disney on Toy Story in the 1990s, he saw and was \"blown away\" by some of the pre-production art from Disney's prior attempts. Development began under the title Anna and the Snow Queen, which was planned to be traditionally animated. According to Josh Gad, he first became involved with the film at that early stage, when the plot was still relatively close to the original Andersen fairy tale and Megan Mullally was going to play Elsa. By early 2010, the project entered development hell once again, when the studio again failed to find a way to make the story and the Snow Queen character work. \n\nRevitalization \n\nOn December 22, 2011, following the success of Tangled, Disney announced a new title for the film, Frozen, and a release date of November 27, 2013. A month later, it was confirmed that the film would be a computer-animated feature in stereoscopic 3D, instead of the originally intended hand-drawn animation. Anderson-Lopez and Lopez joined the project and started writing songs for Frozen in January 2012. On March 5, 2012, it was announced that Buck would be directing, with Lasseter and Peter Del Vecho producing. \n\nAfter Disney decided to advance The Snow Queen into development again, one of the main challenges Buck and Del Vecho faced was the character of the Snow Queen, who was then a villain in their drafts. The studio has a tradition of screening animated films in development every twelve weeks, then holding lengthy \"notes sessions\" in which its directors and screenwriters from different projects provide extensive \"notes\" on each other's work. \n\nBuck and Del Vecho presented their storyboards to Lasseter, and the entire production team adjourned to a conference to hear his thoughts on the project. Art director Michael Giaimo later acknowledged Lasseter as the \"game changer\" of the film: \"I remember John saying that the latest version of The Snow Queen story that Chris Buck and his team had come up with was fun, very light-hearted. But the characters didn't resonate. They aren't multi-faceted. Which is why John felt that audiences wouldn't really be able to connect with them.\"\n\nThe production team then addressed the film's problems, drafting several variations on The Snow Queen story until the characters and story felt relevant. At that stage, the first major breakthrough was the decision to rewrite the film's protagonist, Anna (who was based on the Gerda character from The Snow Queen), as the younger sibling of Elsa, thereby effectively establishing a family dynamic between the characters. This was unusual in that relationships between sisters are rarely used as a major plot element in American animated films, with the notable exception of Disney's Lilo & Stitch (2002). To fully explore the unique dynamics of such relationships, Disney Animation convened a \"Sister Summit,\" at which women from all over the studio who grew up with sisters were asked to discuss their relationships with their sisters.\n\nWriting \n\nIn March 2012, Jennifer Lee, one of the screenwriters of Wreck-It Ralph, was brought in as the film's screenwriter by Del Vecho. Lee later explained that as Wreck-It Ralph was wrapping up, she was giving notes on other projects, and \"we kind of really connected with what we were thinking.\" \n\nAccording to Lee, several core concepts were already in place from Buck and Del Vecho's early work, such as the film's \"frozen heart\" hook: \"That was a concept and the phrase ... an act of true love will thaw a frozen heart.\" They already knew the ending involved true love in the sense of the emotional bond between siblings, not romance, in that \"Anna was going to save Elsa. We didn’t know how or why.\" Lee said Edwin Catmull, president of Disney Animation, told her early on about the film's ending: \"First and foremost, no matter what you have to do to the story, do it. But you have to earn that ending. If you do[,] it will be great. If you don't, it will suck.\"\n\nBefore Lee was brought on board, another screenwriter had made a first pass at a script, and Anderson-Lopez and Lopez tried to write songs for that script but none worked and all were cut. Then \"the whole script imploded,\" which gave the songwriters the opportunity \"to put a lot of [their] DNA\" into the new script that Lee was writing. The production team \"essentially started over and ... had 17 months,\" which resulted in a very \"intense schedule\" and implied \"a lot of choices had to be made fast.\"\n\nThe earlier versions differed sharply from the final version. In the original script the songwriters first saw, Elsa was evil from the start; she kidnapped Anna from her own wedding to intentionally freeze her heart, then later descended upon the town with an army of snowmen with the objective of recapturing Anna to freeze her heart properly. By the time Lee came in, the first act included Elsa deliberately striking Anna in the heart with her freezing powers; then \"the whole second act was about Anna trying to get to Hans and to kiss him and then Elsa trying to stop her.\" Buck revealed that the original plot attempted to make Anna sympathetic by focusing on her frustration as being perceived as the \"spare\" in relation to the \"heir,\" Elsa. The original plot also had different pacing, in that it was \"much more of an action adventure\" than a musical or a comedy.\n\nOne major breakthrough was the composition of the song \"Let It Go\" by songwriters Lopez and Anderson-Lopez, which forced the production team to reconceptualize and rewrite Elsa as a far more complex, vulnerable, and sympathetic character. In The Daily Telegraphs words, instead of the villain envisioned by the producers, the songwriters saw Elsa as \"a scared girl struggling to control and come to terms with her gift.\" Lee recalled: \"Bobby and Kristen said they were walking in Prospect Park and they just started talking about what would it feel like [to be Elsa]. Forget villain. Just what it would feel like. And this concept of letting out who she is[,] that she's kept to herself for so long[,] and she's alone and free, but then the sadness of the fact that the last moment is she's alone. It’s not a perfect thing, but it's powerful.\" Del Vecho explained that \"Let It Go\" changed Elsa into a person \"ruled by fear and Anna was ruled by her own love of other people and her own drive,\" which in turn caused Lee to \"rewrite the first act and then that rippled through the entire movie. So that was when we really found the movie and who these characters were.\"\n\nAnother major breakthrough was developing the plot twist that Prince Hans would be revealed as the film's true villain only near the end. Hans was not even in the earliest drafts, then at first was not a villain, and after becoming one, was revealed to be evil much earlier in the plot. Del Vecho said, \"We realized [what] was most important [was] if we were going to make the ending so surprising[,] you had to believe at one point that Hans was the answer ... [when] he's not the answer, it's Kristoff ... [I]f you can get the audience to leap ahead and think they have figured it out[,] you can surprise them by turning it the other way.\" Lee acknowledged that Hans was written as \"sociopathic\" and \"twisted\" throughout the final version. For example, Hans mirrors the behavior of the other characters: \"He mirrors [Anna] and he's goofy with her ... [T]he Duke [of Weselton] is a jerk, so he's a jerk back. And with Elsa he's a hero.\" It was difficult to lay the foundation for Anna's belated turn to Kristoff without also making Hans' betrayal of Anna too predictable, in that the audience had to \"feel ... her feeling something but not quite understanding it ... Because the minute it is [understood,] it deflated.\" At one point, Anna openly flirted with Kristoff upon first meeting him, but that was changed after Walt Disney Studios chairman Alan Horn pointed out that it would confuse and annoy viewers since Anna was already engaged to Hans. \n\nLee had to work through the issue of how to write Anna's personality, in that some of her colleagues felt Anna should be more dysfunctional and co-dependent, like Vanellope von Schweetz in Wreck-It Ralph. Lee disagreed with that position, but it took her almost a year to figure out how to convincingly articulate \"this is what Anna's journey is. No more than that. No less than that.\" In the end, Lee successfully argued Anna's journey should be presented as a simple coming-of-age story, \"where she goes from having a naive view of life and love – because she's lonely – to the most sophisticated and mature view of love, where she's capable of the ultimate love, which is sacrifice.\" Lee also had to let go of some ideas that she liked, such as a scene portraying Anna and Elsa's relationship as teenagers, which did not work because they needed to maintain the separation between Anna and Elsa.\n\nTo construct Anna and Elsa's relationship as sisters, Lee found inspiration in her own relationship with her older sister. Lee said her older sister was \"a big inspiration for Elsa,\" called her \"my Elsa\" in an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, and walked the red carpet with her at the 86th Academy Awards. Lee explained, \"[h]aving to ... lose each other and then rediscover each other as adults, that was a big part of my life.\"\n\nThe production team also turned Olaf from Elsa's obnoxious sidekick into Anna's comically innocent sidekick. Lee's initial response to the original \"mean\" version of Olaf had been, \"Kill the f-ing snowman,\" and she found Olaf by far \"the hardest character to deal with.\"\n\nThe problem of how exactly Anna would save Elsa at the film's climax was solved by story artist John Ripa. At the story meeting where Ripa pitched his take on the story, the response was silence until Lasseter said, \"I've never seen anything like that before,\" which was followed by a standing ovation.\n\nAlong the way, the production team went through drafts where the first act included far more detail than what ended up in the final version, such as a troll with a Brooklyn accent who would have explained the backstory behind Elsa's magical powers, and a regent for whom Lee was hoping to cast comedian Louis C.K. After all those details were thoroughly \"over-analyzed\", they were excised because they amounted to a \"much more complex story than really we felt like we could fit in this 90-minute film.\" As Del Vecho put it, \"the more we tried to explain things at the beginning, the more complicated it got.\" \n\nFollowing Lee's extensive involvement in Frozens development process and her close work with director Buck and songwriters Lopez and Anderson-Lopez, studio heads Lasseter and Catmull promoted her to director of the film alongside Buck in August 2012. Her promotion was officially announced on November 29, 2012, making Lee the first woman to direct a full-length animated motion picture produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios. She primarily worked on story while Buck focused on animation. Lee later stated that she was \"really moved by a lot of what Chris had done\" and that they \"shared a vision\" of the story, having \"very similar sensibilities\".\n\nBy November 2012, the production team thought they had finally \"cracked\" the puzzle of how to make the film's story work, but according to Del Vecho, in late February 2013, it was realized that the film still \"wasn't working\", which necessitated even more rewriting of scenes and songs from February through June 2013. He explained, \"we rewrote songs, we took out characters and changed everything, and suddenly the movie gelled. But that was close. In hindsight, piece of cake, but during, it was a big struggle.\" Looking back, Anderson-Lopez joked she and Lopez thought at the time they could end up working as \"birthday party clown[s]\" if the final product \"pull[ed] ... down\" their careers and recalled that \"we were really writing up until the last minute.\" In June (five months before the already-announced release date), the songwriters finally got the film working when they composed the song \"For the First Time in Forever\", which, in Lopez's words, \"became the linchpin of the whole movie.\"\n\nThat month, Disney conducted test screenings of the half-completed film with two audiences (one made up of families and the other made up of adults) in Phoenix, Arizona, at which Lasseter and Catmull were personally present. Lee recalled that it was the moment when they realized they \"had something, because the reaction was huge.\" Catmull, who had instructed Lee at the outset to \"earn that ending,\" told her afterwards, \"you did it\".\n\nCasting\n\nActress Kristen Bell was cast as the voice of Anna on March 5, 2012. Lee admitted that Bell's casting selection was influenced after the filmmakers listened to a series of vocal tracks Bell had recorded when she was young, where the actress performed several songs from The Little Mermaid, including \"Part of Your World\". Bell completed her recording sessions while she was pregnant, and subsequently re-recorded some of her character's lines after her pregnancy, as her voice had deepened. Bell was called in to re-record dialogue for the film \"probably 20 times,\" which is normal for lead roles in Disney animated films whose scripts are still evolving. As for her approach to the role of Anna, Bell enthused that she had \"dreamed of being in a Disney animated film\" since she was four years old, saying, \"I always loved Disney animation, but there was something about the females that was unattainable to me. Their posture was too good and they were too well-spoken, and I feel like I really made this girl much more relatable and weirder and scrappier and more excitable and awkward. I'm really proud of that.\" \n\nIdina Menzel, a Broadway veteran, was cast as Elsa. Menzel had formerly auditioned for Tangled, but did not get the part. However, Tangleds casting director, Jamie Sparer Roberts, preserved a recording of Menzel's performance on her iPhone, and on the basis of that, asked her to audition along with Bell for Frozen. Before they were officially cast, Menzel and Bell deeply impressed the directors and producers at an early table read; after reading the entire script out loud, they sang \"Wind Beneath My Wings\" together as a duet, since no music had been composed yet. Bell had suggested that idea when she visited Menzel at her California home to prepare together for the table read. The songwriters were also present for the table read; Anderson-Lopez said \"Lasseter was in heaven\" upon hearing Menzel and Bell sing in harmony, and from that moment forward, he insisted, \"Kristen Bell and Idina Menzel have to be in the movie!\" Lee said, \"They sung it like sisters and what you mean to me[,] [a]nd there wasn't a dry eye in the house after they sang.\" Between December 2012 and June 2013, the casting of additional roles was announced, including Jonathan Groff as Kristoff, Alan Tudyk as the Duke of Weselton, Santino Fontana as Prince Hans, and Josh Gad as Olaf.\n\nAnimation \n\nSimilar to Tangled, Frozen employed a unique artistic style by blending together features of both computer-generated imagery (CGI) and traditional hand-drawn animation. From the beginning, Buck knew Giaimo was the best candidate to develop the style he had in mind – which would draw from the best Disney hand-drawn classics of the 1950s, the Disney Little Golden Books, and mid-century modern design – and persuaded him to come back to Disney to serve as the art director for Frozen. Buck, Lasseter, and Giaimo were all old friends who had first met at the California Institute of the Arts, and Giaimo had previously served as the art director for Disney's Pocahontas (1995), which Buck had worked on as a supervising animator. \n\nTo create the look of Frozen, Giaimo began pre-production research by reading extensively about the entire region of Scandinavia and visiting the Danish-themed city of Solvang near Los Angeles, but eventually zeroed in on Norway in particular because \"80 percent\" of the visuals that appealed to him were from Norway. Disney eventually sponsored three research field trips. Animators and special effects specialists were dispatched to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, to experience walking, running, and falling in deep snow in a variety of types of attire, including long skirts (which both female and male personnel tried on); while lighting and arts teams visited an Ice Hotel in Quebec City, Quebec to study how light reflects and refracts on snow and ice. Finally, Giaimo and several artists traveled to Norway to draw inspiration from its mountains, fjords, architecture, and culture. \"We had a very short time schedule for this film, so our main focus was really to get the story right but we knew that John Lasseter is keen on truth in the material and creating a believable world, and again that doesn't mean it's a realistic world – but a believable one. It was important to see the scope and scale of Norway, and important for our animators to know what it's like,\" Del Vecho said. \"There is a real feeling of Lawrence of Arabia scope and scale to this,\" he finished.\n\nDuring 2012, while Giaimo and the animators and artists conducted preparatory research and developed the film's overall look, the production team was still struggling to develop a compelling script, as explained above. That problem was not adequately solved until November 2012, and the script would later require even more significant revisions after that point. As a result, the single \"most daunting\" challenge facing the animation team was a short schedule of less than 12 months to turn Lee's still-evolving shooting script into an actual film. Other films like Pixar's Toy Story 2 had been successfully completed on even shorter schedules, but a short schedule necessarily meant \"late nights, overtime, and stress.\" Lee estimated the total size of the entire team on Frozen to be around 600 to 650 people, \"including around 70 lighting people[,] 70-plus animators,\" and 15 to 20 storyboard artists. \n\nDel Vecho explained how the film's animation team was organized: \"On this movie we do have character leads, supervising animators on specific characters. The animators themselves may work on multiple characters but it's always under one lead. I think it was different on Tangled, for example, but we chose to do it this way as we wanted one person to fully understand and develop their own character and then be able to impart that to the crew. Hyrum Osmond, the animator on Olaf, is quiet but he has a funny, wacky personality so we knew he'd bring a lot of comedy to it; Anna's animator, Becky Bresee, it's her first time leading a character and we wanted her to lead Anna.\" Acting coach Warner Loughlin was brought in to help the film's animators understand the characters they were creating. In order to get the general feeling of each scene, some animators did their own acting. \"I actually film myself acting the scene out, which I find very helpful,\" said animation supervisor Rebecca Wilson Bresee. This helped her discover elements that made the scene feel real and believable. Elsa's supervising animator was Wayne Unten, who asked for that role because he was fascinated by the complexity of the character. Unten carefully developed Elsa's facial expressions in order to bring out her fear as contrasted against Anna's fearlessness. He also studied videos from Menzel's recording sessions and animated Elsa's breathing to match Menzel's breathing. Head of Animation, Lino DiSalvo, said, \"The goal for the film was to animate the most believable CG characters you've ever seen.\" \n\nRegarding the look and nature of the film's cinematography, Giaimo was greatly influenced by Jack Cardiff's work in Black Narcissus. According to him, it lent a hyper-reality to the film: \"Because this is a movie with such scale and we have the Norwegian fjords to draw from, I really wanted to explore the depth. From a design perspective, since I was stressing the horizontal and vertical aspects, and what the fjords provide, it was perfect. We encased the sibling story in scale.\" Ted D. McCord's work in The Sound of Music was another major influence for Giaimo. It was also Giaimo's idea that Frozen should be filmed in the CinemaScope aspect ratio, which was approved by Lasseter. Giaimo also wanted to ensure that Norway's fjords, architecture and rosemaling folk art, were critical factors in designing the environment of Arendelle. Giaimo, whose background is in traditional animation, said that the art design environment represents a unity of character and environment and that he originally wanted to incorporate saturated colors, which is typically ill-advised in computer animation. For further authenticity, a live reindeer named Sage was brought into the studio for animators to study its movements and mannerisms for the character Sven. \n\nAnother important issue Giaimo insisted on addressing was costumes, in that he \"knew from the start\" it would be a \"costume film.\" To realize that vision, he brought in character designer Jean Gillmore to act as a dedicated \"costume designer\". While traditional animation simply integrates costume design with character design and treats clothing as merely part of the characters, computer-generated animation regards costume as almost a separate entity with its own properties and behaviors – and Frozen required a level of as-yet untried detail, down to minutiae like fabrics, buttons, trim, and stitching. Gillmore explained that her \"general approach was to meld the historic silhouettes of 1840 Western Europe (give or take), with the shapes and garment relationships and details of folk costume in early Norway, circa 19th century.\" This meant using primarily wool fabric with accents of velvet, linen, and silk. During production, Giaimo and Gillmore \"ran around\" supplying various departments with real-world samples to use as references; they were able to draw upon both the studio's own in-house library of fabric samples and the resources of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts' costume division in Fullerton, California. The film's \"look development artists\" (the Disney job title for texture artists ) created the digitally painted simulation of the appearance of surfaces, while other departments dealt with movement, rigging and weight, thickness and lighting of textile animation.\n\nDuring production, the film's English title was changed from The Snow Queen to Frozen, a decision that drew comparisons to another Disney film, Tangled. Peter Del Vecho explained that \"the title Frozen came up independently of the title Tangled. It's because, to us, it represents the movie. Frozen plays on the level of ice and snow but also the frozen relationship, the frozen heart that has to be thawed. We don't think of comparisons between Tangled and Frozen, though.\" He also mentioned that the film will still retain its original title, The Snow Queen, in some countries: \"because that just resonated stronger in some countries than Frozen. Maybe there's a richness to The Snow Queen in the country's heritage and they just wanted to emphasize that.\"\n\nTechnology development \n\nThe studio also developed several new tools to generate realistic and believable shots, particularly the heavy and deep snow and its interactions with the characters. Disney wanted an \"all-encompassing\" and organic tool to provide snow effects but not require switching between different methods. As noted above, several Disney artists and special effects personnel traveled to Wyoming to experience walking through deep snow. Dr. Kenneth Libbrecht, a professor from the California Institute of Technology, was invited to give lectures to the effects group on how snow and ice form, and why snowflakes are unique. Using this knowledge, the effects group created a snowflake generator that allowed them to randomly create 2,000 unique snowflake shapes for the film. \n\nAnother challenge that the studio had to face was to deliver shots of heavy and deep snow that both interacted believably with characters and had a realistic sticky quality. According to principal software engineer Andrew Selle, \"[Snow]'s not really a fluid. It’s not really a solid. It breaks apart. It can be compressed into snowballs. All of these different effects are very difficult to capture simultaneously.\" In order to achieve this, software engineers used advanced mathematics (the material point method) and physics, with assistance from mathematics researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles to create a snow simulator software application called Matterhorn. The tool was capable of depicting realistic snow in a virtual environment and was used in at least 43 scenes in the film, including several key sequences. Software engineer Alexey Stomakhin referred to snow as \"an important character in the film,\" therefore it attracted special attention from the filmmakers. \"When you stretch it, snow will break into chunks. Since snow doesn't have any connections, it doesn't have a mesh, it can break very easily. So that was an important property we took advantage of,\" explained Selle. \"There you see [Kristoff] walking through and see his footprints breaking the snow into little pieces and chunk up and you see [Anna] being pulled out and the snow having packed together and broken into pieces. It's very organic how that happens. You don't see that they're pieces already – you see the snow as one thing and then breaking up.\" The tool also proved to be particularly useful in scenes involving characters walking through deep snow, as it ensured that the snow reacted naturally to each step.\n\nOther tools designed to help artists complete complicated effects included Spaces, which allowed Olaf's deconstructible parts to be moved around and rebuilt, Flourish, which allowed extra movement such as leaves and twigs to be art-directed; Snow Batcher, which helped preview the final look of the snow, especially when characters were interacting with an area of snow by walking through a volume, and Tonic, which enabled artists to sculpt their characters' hair as procedural volumes. Tonic also aided in animating fur and hair elements such as Elsa's hair, which contains 420,000 computer-generated strands, while the average number for a real human being is only 100,000. The number of character rigs in Frozen is 312 and the number of simulated costumes also reached 245 cloth rigs, which were far beyond all other Disney films to date. Fifty effects artists and lighting artists worked together on the technology to create \"one single shot\" in which Elsa builds her ice palace. Its complexity required 30 hours to render each frame, with 4,000 computers rendering one frame at a time. \n\nBesides 3D effects, the filmmakers also used 2D artwork and drawings for specific elements and sequences in the film, including Elsa's magic and snow sculptures, as well as freezing fountains and floors. The effects group created a \"capture stage\" where the entire world of Frozen gets displayed on monitors, which can be \"filmed\" on special cameras to operate a three-dimensional scene. \"We can take this virtual set that's mimicking all of my actions and put it into any one of our scenes in the film,\" said technology manager Evan Goldberg.\n\nScandinavian and Sámi inspiration \n\nThe setting was principally based on Norway, and the cultural influences in the film come from Scandinavian culture. Several landmarks in Norway appear in the film, including the Akershus Fortress in Oslo, the Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim, and Bryggen in Bergen. Numerous other typical cultural Scandinavian elements are also included in the film, such as stave churches, trolls, Viking ships, a hot spring, Fjord horses, clothes, and food such as lutefisk. A maypole is also present in the film, as well as the brief appearance of runes in a book that Anna and Elsa's father opens to figure out where the trolls live. A scene where two men argue over whether to stack firewood bark up or bark down is a reference to the perennial Norwegian debate over how to stack firewood properly. The film also contains several elements specifically drawn from Sámi culture, such as the usage of reindeer for transportation and the equipment used to control these, clothing styles (the outfits of the ice cutters), and parts of the musical score. Decorations, such as those on the castle pillars and Kristoff's sled, are also in styles inspired by Sámi duodji decorations. During their field work in Norway, Disney's team, for inspiration, visited Rørosrein, a Sámi family-owned company in the village Plassje that produces reindeer meat and arranges tourist events. Arendelle was inspired by Nærøyfjord, a branch of Norway's longest fjord Sognefjorden, which has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site; while a castle in Oslo with beautiful hand-painted patterns on all four walls served as the inspiration for the kingdom's royal castle interior. \n\nThe filmmakers' trip to Norway provided essential knowledge for the animators to come up with the design aesthetic for the film in terms of color, light, and atmosphere. According to Giaimo, there were three important factors that they had acquired from the Norway research trip: the fjords, which are the massive vertical rock formations, and serve as the setting for the secluded kingdom of Arendelle; the medieval stave churches, whose rustic triangular rooflines and shingles inspired the castle compound; and the rosemaling folk art, whose distinctive paneling and grid patterns informed the architecture, decor, and costumes.\n\nMusic and sound design \n\nThe songs for Frozen were written and composed by the husband-and-wife songwriting team of Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez, both of whom had previously worked with Disney Animation on Winnie the Pooh (2011) (also produced by Del Vecho, who then hired them for Frozen) and before that, with Disney Parks on Finding Nemo – The Musical (2007). Lopez first heard Disney Animation's pitch while in Los Angeles working on The Book of Mormon, but Disney was so eager to get both of them on board that the production team traveled to New York City to also pitch the film in person to Anderson-Lopez (who was busy raising the couple's two young daughters). Lopez believes Disney was particularly interested in his wife's strong story talent. The decision, of course, was easy: \"Whenever Disney asks if you want to do a fairy tale musical, you say yes.\"\n\nAbout 23 minutes of the film are dedicated to their musical numbers. Because they live in New York City, collaborating closely with the production team in Burbank required two-hour-long transcontinental videoconferences nearly every weekday for about 14 months. For each song they composed, they recorded a demo in their home studio (with both of them singing the lyrics and Lopez accompanying on piano), then emailed it to Burbank for discussion at the next videoconference. Lopez and Anderson-Lopez were aware of the fact that their work would be compared to that of Alan Menken and Howard Ashman from the Disney Renaissance era, and whenever they felt lost, they asked \"What would Ashman do?\" In the end, they wrote 25 songs for the film, of which eight made it into the final version. One song (\"For the First Time in Forever\") had a reprise and the other (\"Let It Go\") was covered by Demi Lovato over the final credits, for a total of ten songs. Seven of the 17 that did not make it were later released on the deluxe edition soundtrack.\n\nIn February 2013, Christophe Beck was hired to score the film, following his work on Paperman, a Disney animated short film released the year prior to Frozen. It was revealed on September 14, 2013, that Sámi musician Frode Fjellheim's Eatnemen Vuelie would be the film's opening song, as it contains elements of the traditional Sámi singing style joik. The music producers recruited a Norwegian linguist to assist with the lyrics for an Old Norse song written for Elsa's coronation and traveled to Trondheim, Norway, to record the all-female choir Cantus, for a piece inspired by traditional Sámi music.\n\nUnder the supervision of sound engineer David Boucher, the lead cast members began recording the film's vocal tracks in October 2012 at the Sunset Sound recording studio in Hollywood before the songs had been orchestrated, meaning they heard only Lopez's demo piano track in their headphones as they sang. Most of the dialogue was recorded at the Roy E. Disney Animation Building in Burbank under the supervision of original dialogue mixer Gabriel Guy, who also mixed the film's sound effects. Some dialogue was recorded after recording songs at both Sunset Sound and Capitol Studios; for scenes involving Anna and Elsa, both studios offered vocal isolation booths where Menzel and Bell could read dialogue with line-of-sight with one another, while avoiding \"bleedthrough\" between their respective tracks. Additional dialogue was recorded at an ADR facility on the Walt Disney Studios lot in Burbank (across the street from the Disney Animation building) and at the Soundtrack Group's New York studio, since the production team had to work around the busy schedules of the film's New York-based cast members like Fontana. \n\nLopez and Anderson-Lopez's piano-vocal scores for the songs along with the vocal tracks were sent to Salem, Oregon-based Dave Metzger for arrangement and orchestration; Metzger also orchestrated a significant portion of Beck's score.\n\nFor the orchestral film score, Beck paid homage to the Norway- and Sápmi-inspired setting by employing regional instruments, such as the bukkehorn, and traditional vocal techniques, such as kulning. Beck worked with Lopez and Anderson-Lopez on incorporating their songs into arrangements in the score. The trio's goal \"was to create a cohesive musical journey from beginning to end.\" Similarly, Beck's scoring mixer, Casey Stone (who also supervised the recording of the score), worked with Boucher to align their microphone setups to ensure the transitions between the songs and score were seamless, even though they were separately recorded on different dates. The final orchestrations of both the songs and score were all recorded at the Eastwood Scoring Stage on the Warner Bros. studio lot in Burbank by an 80-piece orchestra, featuring 32 vocalists, including native Norwegian Christine Hals. Boucher supervised the recording of Anderson-Lopez and Lopez's songs from July 22 to 24, 2013, then Stone supervised the recording of Beck's score from September 3 to 6 and 9 to 10. Boucher mixed the songs at the Eastwood stage, while Stone mixed the score at Beck's personal studio in Santa Monica, California.\n\nRegarding the sound of Frozen, director Jennifer Lee stated that sound played a huge part in making the film \"visceral\" and \"transported\"; she explained, \"[i]n letting it tell the story emotionally, the sound of the ice when it's at its most dangerous just makes you shudder.\" The complete silence at the climax of the film right after Anna freezes was Lasseter's idea, one he \"really wanted\". In that scene, even the ambient sound that would normally be there was taken out in order to make it feel unusual. Lee explained \"that was a moment where we wanted everything to feel suspended.\"\n\nTo obtain certain snow and ice sound effects, sound designer Odin Benitez traveled to Mammoth Mountain, California, to record them at a frozen lake. However, the foley work for the film was recorded on the foley stage on the Warner Bros. lot by a Warner Bros. crew. The foley artists received daily deliveries of 50 pounds (22.6 kg) of snow ice while working, to help them record all the necessary snow and ice sounds for the film. Because the film's visuals were finalized so late, five separate versions of nearly every footstep on snow were recorded (corresponding to five different types of snow), then one was later selected during mixing to match the snow as rendered in the final version of each scene. One issue that the production team was \"particular\" about was the sound of Elsa's footsteps in the ice palace, which required eight attempts, including wine glasses on ice and metal knives on ice; they ended up using a mix of three sounds.\n\nAlthough the vocals, music, sound effects, and almost all the dialogue were all recorded elsewhere, the final re-recording mix to Dolby Atmos format was performed at the Disney lot by Casey E. Fluhr of Disney Digital Studio Services.\n\nLocalization \n\nLike other Disney media products which are often localized through Disney Character Voices International, Frozen was translated and dubbed into 41 languages (compared with only 15 for The Lion King). A major challenge was to find sopranos capable of matching Menzel's warm vocal tone and three-octave vocal range in their native languages. Rick Dempsey, the unit's senior executive, regarded the process of translating the film as \"exceptionally challenging\"; he explained, \"It's a difficult juggling act to get the right intent of the lyrics and also have it match rhythmically to the music. And then you have to go back and adjust for lip sync! [It]...requires a lot of patience and precision.\" Lopez explained that they were told by Disney to remove complex wordplay and puns from their songs, to ensure the film was easily translatable and had globally appealing lyrics. For the casting of dubbed versions, Disney required native speakers in order to \"ensure that the film feels 'local'.\" They used Bell and Menzel's voices as their \"blueprint\" in casting, and tried to match the voices \"as much as possible,\" meaning that they auditioned approximately 200 singers to fill the 41 slots for Elsa alone. For nearly 15 dubbed versions, they cast Elsa's singing and speaking parts separately, since not all vocalists could act the part they were singing. After casting all the other roles for all 41 languages, the international cast ended up including more than 900 people, who voiced their roles through approximately 1,300 recording sessions. \n\nRelease \n\nFrozen was released theatrically in the United States on November 27, 2013, and it was accompanied by the new Mickey Mouse animated short film, Get a Horse! The film's premiere was at the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood, California, on November 19, 2013, and had a five-day limited release there, starting from November 22, before going into wide release. \n\nPrior to the film's release, Lopez and Anderson-Lopez's \"Let It Go\" and \"In Summer\" were previewed at the 2013 D23 Expo; Idina Menzel performed the former live on stage. A teaser trailer was released on June 18, 2013, followed by the release of the official trailer on September 26, 2013. Frozen was also promoted heavily at several Disney theme parks including Disneyland's Fantasyland, Disney California Adventure's World of Color, Epcot's Norway pavilion, and Disneyland Paris' Disney Dreams! show; Disneyland and Epcot both offered meet-and-greet sessions involving the film's two main characters, Anna and Elsa. On November 6, 2013, Disney Consumer Products began releasing a line of toys and other merchandise relating to the film in Disney Store and other retailers. \n\nOn January 31, 2014, a sing-along version of Frozen was released in 2,057 theaters in the United States. It featured on-screen lyrics, and viewers were invited to follow the bouncing snowflake and sing along with the songs from the film. After its wide release in Japan on March 14, 2014, a similar sing-along version of Frozen was released in the country in select theaters on April 26. In Japanese-dubbed versions, Japanese lyrics of the songs appeared on screen for audiences to sing along with the characters. A sing-along version of the film was released in United Kingdom on November 28, 2014. \n\nHome media \n\nFrozen was released for digital download on February 25, 2014, on Google Play, the iTunes Store, and Amazon Video. It was subsequently released by Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment on Blu-ray Disc and DVD on March 18, 2014. Bonus features for the Blu-ray release include \"The Making of Frozen\", a three-minute musical production about how the film was made, \"D'frosted\", an inside look at how Disney tried to adapt the original fairy tale into an animated feature, four deleted scenes with introduction by the directors, the original theatrical short Get a Horse!, the film's teaser trailer, and \"Let It Go\" (End Credit Version) music videos by Demi Lovato, Martina Stoessel, and Marsha Milan Londoh; while the DVD release only includes the Get a Horse! theatrical short, \"Let It Go\" musical videos and the film's teaser trailer.\n\nOn its first day of release on Blu-ray and DVD, Frozen sold 3.2 million units, becoming one of the biggest home video sellers in the last decade, as well as Amazon's best-selling children's disc of all time. The digital download release of the film also set a record as the fastest-selling digital release of all time. Frozen finished its first week at No. 1 in unit sales in the United States, selling more than three times as many units as other 19 titles in the charts combined, according to the Nielsen's sales chart. The film sold 3,969,270 Blu-ray units (the equivalent of $79,266,322) during its first week, which accounted for 50 percent of its opening home media sales. It topped the U.S. home video sales charts for six non-consecutive weeks out of seven weeks of release, as of May 4, 2014. In the United Kingdom, Frozen debuted at No. 1 in Blu-ray and DVD sales on the Official Video Chart. According to Official Charts Company, more than 500,000 copies of the film were sold in its two-day opening (March 31 – April 1, 2014). During its three first weeks of release in the United Kingdom, Frozen sold more than 1.45 million units, becoming the biggest selling video title of 2014 so far in the country. Frozen has sold 2,025,000 Blu-ray Disc/DVD combo sets in Japan in 4 weeks, becoming the fastest-selling home video to sell 2 million copies, beating the previous record of 11 weeks by Spirited Away. Frozen also holds the records for highest number of home video units sold on the first official day of sales and in the first official week of sales in Japan. As of the end of 2014, the film earned $308,026,545 in total US home media sales. It is one of the best-selling home media releases, having moved over 18 million units . \n\nFollowing an announcement on August 12, 2014, a sing-along reissue of Frozen was released via DVD and digital download on November 18, 2014. \n\nTrademark infringement lawsuit \n\nIn late December 2013, The Walt Disney Company filed a trademark infringement lawsuit in California federal court seeking an injunction against the continued distribution of the Canadian film The Legend of Sarila produced by 10th Ave Productions and CarpeDiem Film & TV and distributed by Phase 4 Films, which had been retitled Frozen Land. Disney alleged that less than three weeks prior to the release of Frozen, Phase 4 theatrically released The Legend of Sarila, which garnered \"minimal box office revenues and received no significant attention\"; and to trade off the success of Disney's animated film, Phase 4 had \"redesigned the artwork, packaging, logo, and other promotional materials for its newly (and intentionally misleadingly) retitled film to mimic those used by [Disney] for Frozen and related merchandise\". While film titles cannot be trademarked by law, Disney cited a number of alleged similarities between the new Phase 4's Frozen logo and Disney's original one. By late January 2014, the two companies had settled the case; the settlement stated that the distribution and promotion of The Legend of Sarila and related merchandise must use its original title and Phase 4 must not use trademarks, logos or other designs confusingly similar to Disney's animated release. Phase 4 was also required to pay Disney $100,000 before January 27, 2014, and make \"all practicable efforts\" to remove copies of Frozen Land from stores and online distributors before March 3, 2014.\n\nFile sharing \n\nAccording to copyright infringement-tracking site Excipio, Frozen was the second most-infringed film of 2014 (behind The Wolf of Wall Street), with over 29.9 million illegal downloads via torrent sites. \n\nReception \n\nBox office \n\nFrozen earned $400.7 million in North America, and an estimated $873.5 million in other countries, for a worldwide total of $1.274 billion. Calculating in all expenses, Deadline.com estimated that the film made a profit of over $400 million. It is the ninth highest-grossing film (and was the fifth highest at its peak), the highest-grossing animated film, the highest-grossing 2013 film, the highest-grossing Walt Disney Pictures release, and the fourth highest-grossing film distributed by Disney. The film earned $110.6 million worldwide in its opening weekend. On March 2, 2014, its 101st day of release, it surpassed the $1 billion mark, becoming the eighteenth film in cinematic history, the seventh Disney-distributed film, the fifth non-sequel film, the second Disney-distributed film in 2013 (after Iron Man 3), and the first animated film since Toy Story 3 to do so. \n\nBloomberg Business reported in March 2014 that outside analysts had projected the film's total cost at somewhere around $323 million to $350 million for production, marketing, and distribution, and had also projected that the film would generate $1.3 billion in revenue from box office ticket sales, digital downloads, discs, and television rights. \n\nNorth America \n\nFrozen became Fandango's top advance ticket seller among original animated films, ahead of previous record-holder Brave, and became the top-selling animated film in the company's history in late January 2014. The sing-along version of the film later topped the best-selling list of the movie ticketing service again for three days. Frozen opened on Friday, November 22, 2013, exclusively at the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood for a five-day limited release and earned $342,839 before its wide opening on Wednesday, November 27, 2013. During the three-day weekend it earned $243,390, scoring the seventh largest per-theater average. On the opening day of its wide release, the film earned $15.2 million, including $1.2 million from Tuesday late-night shows, and set a record for the highest pre-Thanksgiving Wednesday opening, ahead of Tangled ($11.9 million). It was also the second largest pre-Thanksgiving Wednesday among all films, behind Catching Fire ($20.8 million). The film finished in second place over the traditional three-day weekend (Friday-to-Sunday) with $67.4 million, setting an opening weekend record among Walt Disney Animation Studios films. It also scored the second largest opening weekend among films that did not debut at #1. Female audiences accounted for 57% of Frozens total audiences on the first weekend, while family audiences held a proportion of 81%. Among films that opened during Thanksgiving, it set new records; three-day ($67.4 million from Friday to Sunday) and five-day ($93.6 million from Wednesday to Sunday). It also achieved the second largest three-day and five-day Thanksgiving gross among all films, behind Catching Fire. \n\nDuring its second weekend of wide release, Frozen declined 53% to $31.6 million, but jumped to first place, setting a record for the largest post-Thanksgiving weekend, ahead of Toy Story 2 ($27.8 million). Frozen became the first film since Avatar to reach first place in its sixth weekend of wide release. It remained in the top 10 at the box office for sixteen consecutive weekends (the longest run by any film since 2002) and achieved large weekend grosses from its fifth to its twelfth weekend (of wide release), compared to other films in their respective weekends. On April 25, 2014, Frozen became the nineteenth film to gross $400 million in North America and the fifteenth to do so without a major re-release. \n\nIn North America, Frozen is the twenty-fourth highest-grossing film, the third highest-grossing 2013 film, the fifth highest-grossing animated film, the highest-grossing 2013 animated film, the tenth highest-grossing 3-D film, and the second highest-grossing Walt Disney Animation Studios film. Excluding re-releases, it has the highest-grossing initial run among non-sequel animated films (a record previously held by Finding Nemo) and among Walt Disney Animation Studios films (a record previously held by The Lion King). Box Office Mojo estimates that the film sold over 49 million tickets in North America. \n\nOutside North America \n\nFrozen is the ninth highest-grossing film, the highest-grossing animated film, and the highest-grossing 2013 film. It is the highest-grossing animated film in South Korea, Denmark, and Venezuela. It is also the highest-grossing Walt Disney Animation Studios film in more than 45 territories, including the Latin America region (specifically in Mexico and Brazil), the UK, Ireland, and Malta, Russia and the CIS, Ukraine, Norway, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia and China. \n\nThe film made its debut outside North America on the same weekend as its wide North American release and earned $16.7 million from sixteen markets. It topped the box office outside North America for two weekends in 2014; January 10–12 ($27.8 million) and February 7–9 ($24 million). Overall, its largest opening weekends occurred in China (five-day opening of $14.3 million), Russia and the CIS ($11.9 million, including previews from previous weekend), where the film set an opening weekend record among Disney animated films (ahead of Tangled), and Japan (three-day opening of $9.73 million). It set an opening weekend record among animated films in Sweden. In total earnings, the film's top market after North America is Japan ($247.6 million), followed by South Korea ($76.6 million) and the United Kingdom, Ireland and Malta ($65.7 million).Japanese Box Office Reports:\n* \n* \n* \n* \n* \n* \n* \n* \n* In South Korea, Frozen is the second largest foreign film both in terms of attendance and gross, the largest Disney release and the first animated film to earn more than ten million admissions. In Japan, it is the third highest-grossing film of all time, the second highest grossing imported film (behind Titanic) and the highest-grossing Disney film. It topped the country's box office for sixteen consecutive weekends until being surpassed by another Disney release, Maleficent. \n\nCommercial analysis \n\nRay Subers, writing for Box Office Mojo, compared the film to Disney's 2010 animated feature Tangled by saying that the film's story was not as \"immediately interesting\" and that \"marketing has yet to sell this to boys the way Tangled did\". Noting that the 2013 holiday season (Thanksgiving and Christmas) lacked compelling content for families, Subers predicted that the film would \"play well all the way through Christmas\" and end up grossing $185 million in North America (similar to Wreck-It Ralph). Boxoffice noted the success of previous Disney's animated films released during the holiday season (Tangled and Wreck-It Ralph), but argued that the cast might not attract audiences due to the lack of major stars. They issued a $170,000,000 North America box office forecast for the film. Chris Agar from ScreenRant expressed a similar opinion; he cited a string of recent box office successes of the studio, and thought that Frozen would fill a void of kid-friendly films in the marketplace, but did not expect it to surpass Catching Fire in terms of box office gross. \n\nClayton Dillard of Slant Magazine commented that while the trailers made the film seem \"pallid,\" positive critical reviews could attract interest from both \"core demographics\" and adult audiences, and therefore he believed Frozen stood a good chance of surpassing Tangleds Thanksgiving three-day opening record. Brad Brevet of Ropeofsilicon.com described the film's marketing as a \"severely hit and miss\" campaign, which could affect its box office performance. After Frozen finished its first weekend with a record $93.6 million during Thanksgiving, most box-office watchers predicted that it would end up grossing between $250 and $300 million in North America. Breitbart suggested that with \"strong buzz\" and \"huge family audience support,\" Frozen would \"easily break the $130 million\" mark in North America. At the time, Box Office Mojo reissued a $250 million box office gross prediction for North America. Box Office Mojo noted that it would be \"the exclusive choice for family audiences\" and attributed its successful opening to strong word-of-mouth and the studio's marketing, which highlighted the connection between Frozen and Disney's previous successful releases like Tangled and Wreck-It Ralph, as well as the elements of humor. In an interview conducted in early December 2013, Disney's distribution executive Dave Hollis praised the efforts of the filmmakers and the studio's marketing team: \"For a company whose foundation is built on animation, an opening like this is really great.\" He further commented that audiences could be \"very targeted with a message\", and that Frozen aimed at a general audience instead of any one particular audience segment.\n\nWhen Frozen became a box office success, Bilge Ebiri of Vulture analyzed the film's elements and suggested eight factors that might have led to its success. He thought Frozen managed to capture the classic Disney spirit of the Disney Renaissance films and early classics such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and Cinderella. He also wrote that the film has Olaf, a \"wisecracking, irreverent\" sidekick with mild humor which is \"a requirement of modern animated kids' movies,\" and its \"witty, catchy\" songs were \"pretty good.\" Furthermore, Ebiri noted that Frozen was a \"revisionist\" film that didn't \"have a typical villain\"; Elsa, the person who should be the villain didn't turn out to be a villain, but \"a girl who's having trouble.\" She was the one who \"[created] most of the challenges [for] the film's more typical heroes – Princess Anna.\" The story of two sisters who were separated as they grew up held real-life overtones for many audience members who had siblings, and the struggle of Elsa to overcome the shame and fear of her powers was also relatable. Finally, he identified several factors which he believed attracted female audiences: two strong female characters; a twist on the usual romantic subplot, when the traditional \"Prince Charming\" – Hans – turned out to be a gold-digging villain; and the \"act of true love\" which saved Anna was her own sacrifice in saving Elsa.\n\nScott Davis of Forbes credited the film's commercial success to its marketing aimed at both sexes, and to the success of its soundtrack. \n\nThe commercial success of Frozen in Japan was considered to be a \"phenomenon\" which received widespread media coverage. Released in that market as Anna and the Snow Queen, the film increased its gross each week in its three first weeks of release, and only started to drop in the fourth; while other films usually peak in the opening week and decline in the latter ones. Frozen has received over 7 million admissions in Japan as of April 16, and nearly 18.7 million admissions as of June 23. Many cinemagoers were reported to have watched both the original and the Japanese-dubbed version. Japan Today also reported that the local dubbed version was \"particularly popular\" in the country. Gavin J. Blair of The Hollywood Reporter commented on the film's earnings in Japan: \"Even after its $9.6 million (￥986.4 million) three-day opening, a record bow for a Disney animation in Japan, few would have predicted the kind of numbers Frozen has now racked up.\" Disney's head of distribution Dave Hollis said in an interview that \"It's become very clear that the themes and emotions of Frozen transcend geography, but what's going on in Japan is extraordinary.\" \n\n\"Frozens success doesn't benefit from a general appetite for American films in Japan\" (as reported by the International Business Times), but according to Akira Lippit of the USC School of Cinematic Arts, there were several factors that constituted this phenomenon: besides the fact that animated films \"are held in great regard in Japan, and the Disney brand name with all of its heritage is extremely valuable\", \"the biggest reason is the primary audience ... 13- to 17-year-old teenage girls.\" He further explained that audiences of this age range have a vital role in shaping Japanese pop culture and \"Frozen has so many elements that appeal to them, with its story of a young girl with power and mystique, who finds her own sort of good in herself.\" He compared the film's current situation with a similar phenomenon which occurred with Titanic in 1997, \"when millions of Japanese teen girls turned out to watch Leonard[o] DiCaprio go under – several times,\" and thought the same would happen with Frozen. Another reason that contributed to the film's success in the market was that Disney took great care in choosing \"high quality\" voice actors for the Japanese-dubbed version, since Japan's pop music scene had an important role particularly with teenage audiences. Orika Hiromura, Disney Japan's marketing project leader for Frozen, said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal: \"We really put effort into finding actors who could not only play the role but also belt out the tunes as well. We found the perfect match in Takako Matsu and Sayaka Kanda, and they really added a whole new dimension to the storytelling.\"\n\nWhen asked about the success of Frozen, director Chris Buck stated: \"We never expected anything like this. We just hoped to make a movie that did as well as Tangled! I hoped the audience would embrace it and respond to it, but there's no way we could have predicted this.\" He cited a number of reasons for the film's popularity: \"There are characters that people relate to; the songs are so strong and memorable. We also have some flawed characters, which is what Jen[nifer Lee] and I like to do – we essentially create two imperfect princesses.\" He also said that what people could infer from the film had \"blow[n] [him] away.\" As Frozen approached the first anniversary of its release, Menzel mentioned the film's continuing popularity in an October 2014 interview: \"It’s just a remarkable thing. Usually you do a project and it has its moment. This just feels like it keeps going.\" \n\nCritical response \n\nFrozen opened to highly positive reviews, with several critics comparing it favorably to the films of the Disney Renaissance, particularly The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King. Some journalists felt that the film's success marked a second Disney Renaissance. The film was praised for its visuals, themes, musical numbers, screenplay, and voice acting, especially that of Kristen Bell, Idina Menzel, and Josh Gad. The \"Let It Go\" musical sequence was also particularly praised by critics. The review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes reports that 89% of critics gave the film a positive review based on 216 reviews, with the site's consensus being: \"Beautifully animated, smartly written, and stocked with singalong songs, Frozen adds another worthy entry to the Disney canon.\" Metacritic, which determines a normalized rating out of 100 from the reviews of mainstream critics, calculated a score of 74 based on 43 reviews, indicating \"generally favorable reviews.\" CinemaScore gave Frozen an \"A+\" on an A+ to F scale, based on polls conducted during the opening weekend. Surveys conducted by Fandango among 1,000 ticket buyers revealed that 75% of purchasers had seen the film at least once, and 52% had seen it twice. It was also pointed out that 55% of audiences identified \"Let It Go\" as their favorite song, while \"Do You Want to Build a Snowman?\" and \"For the First Time in Forever\" held proportions of 21% and 9%, respectively. Frozen was named the seventh best film of 2013 by Richard Corliss of Time and Kyle Smith of the New York Post. \n\nAlonso Duralde of TheWrap wrote that the film is \"the best animated musical to come out of Disney since the tragic death of lyricist Howard Ashman, whose work on The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast helped build the studio's modern animated division into what it is today.\" He also said that \"while it lags the tiniest bit on its way to the conclusion, the script... really delivers; it offers characters to care about, along with some nifty twists and surprises along the way.\" Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter observed Frozen as a true musical and wrote, \"You can practically see the Broadway musical Frozen is destined to become while watching Disney's 3D animated princess tale.\" McCarthy described the film as \"energetic, humorous and not too cloying, as well as the first Hollywood film in many years to warn of global cooling rather than warming, this tuneful toon upgrades what has been a lackluster year for big studio animated fare and, beginning with its Thanksgiving opening, should live up to box office expectations as one of the studio's hoped-for holiday-spanning blockbusters.\" Kyle Smith of the New York Post awarded the film 3.5 out of 4 stars and praised the film as \"a great big snowy pleasure with an emotionally gripping core, brilliant Broadway-style songs and a crafty plot. Its first and third acts are better than the jokey middle, but this is the rare example of a Walt Disney Animation Studios effort that reaches as deep as a Pixar film.\" Scott Mendelson of Forbes wrote, \"Frozen is both a declaration of Disney's renewed cultural relevance and a reaffirmation of Disney coming to terms with its own legacy and its own identity. It's also a just plain terrific bit of family entertainment.\" \n\nThe Los Angeles Times extolled the film's ensemble voice talent and elaborate musical sequences, and declared Frozen was \"a welcome return to greatness for Walt Disney Animation Studios.\" Entertainment Weeklys Owen Gleiberman gave the film a \"B+\" grade and labeled it as a \"squarely enchanting fairy tale that shows you how the definition of what's fresh in animation can shift.\" Richard Corliss of Time stated that: \"It's great to see Disney returning to its roots and blooming anew: creating superior musical entertainment that draws on the Walt [Disney] tradition of animation splendor and the verve of Broadway present.\" Richard Roeper wrote that the film was an \"absolute delight from start to finish.\" Both Michael Phillips of Chicago Tribune and Stephen Holden of The New York Times praised the film's characters and musical sequences, which also drew comparisons to the theatrics found in Wicked. Emma Dibdin of Digital Spy awarded the film five out of five stars and called the film \"a new Disney classic\" and \"an exhilarating, joyous, human story that's as frequently laugh-out-loud funny as it is startling and daring and poignant. Hot on the heels of the 90th anniversary, it's impossible to imagine a more perfect celebration of everything Disney is at its best.\" Frozen was also praised in Norwegian Sámi media as showcasing Sámi culture to a broad audience in a good way. Composer Frode Fjellheim was lauded by Norwegian Sámi President Aili Keskitalo for his contributions to the film, during the President's 2014 New Year's speech. \n\nScott Foundas of Variety was less impressed with the film, describing it as \"formulaic\", though he praised its voice acting and technical artistry: \"The tactile, snow-capped Arendelle landscape, including Elsa's ice-castle retreat is Frozens other true marvel, enhanced by 3D and the decision to shoot in widescreen – a nod to the CinemaScope richness of Sleeping Beauty and Lady and the Tramp... That's almost but not quite enough to make up for the somewhat slack plotting and the generic nature of the main characters. Neither princess here is a patch on Tangleds babe-in-the-woods Rapunzel, while both Hans and Kristoff are cut from pretty standard-issue hero cloth until a reasonably surprising third-act twist somewhat ups the ante. Only Olaf is unimpeachable: Get this snowman a spinoff feature to call his own.\" The Seattle Times gave the film two out of four stars, stating that \"While it is an often gorgeous film with computer-generated fjords and ice sculptures and castle interiors, the important thing that glues all this stuff together – story – is sadly lacking.\" Joe Williams of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch also criticized the story as the film's weakest point. Writing on Roger Ebert's website, Christy Lemire gave a mixed review in which she awarded two-and-a-half stars out of four. Lemire praised the visuals and the performance of \"Let It Go,\" as well as the positive messages Frozen sends. However, she referred to the film as \"cynical\" and criticized it as an \"attempt to shake things up without shaking them up too much.\" She also noted the similarity between Elsa and another well-known fictional female who unleashes paranormal powers when agitated, Carrie White.\n\nControversies\n\nPortrayal of emotions \n\nAllegations of sexism occurred following a statement by Lino DiSalvo, the film's head of animation, who said to Fan Voice's Jenna Busch: \"Historically speaking, animating female characters are really, really difficult, because they have to go through these range of emotions, but you have to keep them pretty.\" However, a Disney spokesperson later told Time that DiSalvo's quote was widely misinterpreted, stating that he was \"describing some technical aspects of CG animation and not making a general comment on animating females versus males or other characters.\" Director Lee also said that DiSalvo's words were recklessly taken out of context, and that he was talking in very technical terms about CG animation. \"It is hard no matter what the gender is. I felt horrible for him,\" she said. In an August 2014 interview, DiSalvo re-emphasized what he had been trying to explain all along when his statements were taken out of context – the difficulty with turning any kind of animated character from a series of sketches on a 2D emotion model sheet into a properly rigged 3D character model: \"Translating that emotional range onto a CG character is one of the most difficult parts of the process. Male. Female. Snowman. Animal.\" He added, \"The really sad thing is people took that ... catchy headline and they just repopulated it everywhere. People didn't get back to me for comments and the sad thing is that's the way the internet works. They don't want the truth.\"\n\nPerceived LGBT parallels \n\nSeveral viewers outside the film industry, such as evangelical pastors and commentators, argued that Frozen promotes normalization of homosexuality, while others believed that the main character, Elsa, represents a positive image of LGBT youth, viewing the film and the song \"Let It Go\" as a metaphor for coming out. These claims were met with mixed reactions from both audiences and the LGBT community. When asked about perceptions of a homosexual undertone in the film, Lee said, \"We know what we made. But at the same time I feel like once we hand the film over, it belongs to the world, so I don't like to say anything, and let the fans talk. I think it's up to them.\" She also mentioned that Disney films were made in different eras and were all celebrated for different reasons, but a 2013 film would have a \"2013 point of view\". \n\nAccolades \n\nFrozen was nominated for various awards and won a number of them, including several for Best Animated Feature. The song \"Let It Go\" was particularly praised. The film was nominated for two Golden Globes at the 71st Golden Globe Awards and won for Best Animated Feature, becoming the first Walt Disney Animation Studios film to win in this category. It also won two Academy Awards for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song (\"Let It Go\"), the BAFTA Award for Best Animated Film at the British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA), five Annie Awards (including Best Animated Feature), and two Critics' Choice Awards for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song (\"Let It Go\"). It received other similar nominations at the Satellite Awards, and various critics' groups and circles. At the 57th Annual Grammy Awards, the Frozen soundtrack won the Grammy Award for Best Compilation Soundtrack For Visual Media and was nominated for Best Score Soundtrack For Visual Media (with credits going to Christophe Beck as composer); the song \"Let It Go\" won the award for Best Song Written For Visual Media, with credits going to Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez as songwriters and Idina Menzel as performer. \n\nCultural impact \n\nDuring the spring and summer of 2014, several journalists observed that Frozen was unusually catchy in comparison to the vast majority of films, in that many children in both the U.S. and the UK were watching Frozen so many times that they now knew all the songs by heart and kept singing them again and again at every opportunity, to the distress of their hapless parents, teachers, and classmates. Among the celebrities who have disclosed that they are the parent of a Frozen-obsessed child are UK prime minister David Cameron as well as actors Amy Adams, Ben Affleck, Kevin Costner and Vince Vaughn. When Terry Gross brought up this phenomenon with songwriters Lopez and Anderson-Lopez in an April 2014 interview on NPR, they explained there was simply no way they could have known how popular their work on Frozen would become. They were \"just trying to tell a story that resonated\" and \"that didn't suck.\"\n\nIn May, columnist Joel Stein of Time magazine wrote about his young son Laszlo's frustration with the inescapable \"cultural assault\" of Frozen at preschool and all social and extracurricular activities, and how he had arranged for a Skype call with lead actress Bell after Laszlo began asking why the film was made. When Laszlo asked whether Bell knew when she made Frozen that it would take over kids' lives, she replied: \"I did not know that people would not let it go. No pun intended.\" In a December 2014 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Lee acknowledged that she had transitioned from thanking people when they expressed their appreciation for Frozen to having to apologize when they said \"we're still listening to those songs\" (with their children). Lee also said that she used the film and its strong female characters to inspire her own daughter, who had experienced bullying at school, and admitted that she herself as a child was bullied as well; thus, they had managed to be true to themselves like Anna and Elsa.\n\nIn a 2014 mid-year report of the 100 most-used baby names conducted by BabyCenter, Elsa was ranked 88; it was the first time the name had appeared on the site's chart. Sarah Barrett, managing director of the site, explained that while the film's popular heroine is called Anna, \"Elsa offers a more unique name and is also a strong female role model.\" Many parents revealed that their choices of name were \"heavily influenced\" by the siblings. Vice president of Disney UK Anna Hill later commented that \"We're delighted that Elsa is a popular name for babies and it's lovely to hear that for many families, it is actually their siblings who have chosen it,\" and that \"Elsa's fight to overcome her fears and the powerful strength of the family bond\" were relatable to many families. On 2014 year-end lists issued by Google, Frozen was the most searched movie of 2014. On the Google Play Store, Frozen and its soundtrack album were also named Movie of the Year and Album of the Year respectively, i.e. the best-selling title in their respective areas. Frozen was also the second most illegally downloaded film title of 2014 via BitTorrent file sharing protocol, with around 30 million downloads. Elsa has become very popular in the cosplaying community. One of the best cosplayers currently, Anna Faith, is well known for cosplaying as Elsa at charities, comic-cons, and other events. \n\nAfter Disney announced in March 2015 that a feature-length sequel was in development, Agence France-Presse and the Toronto Star both published stories gently mocking the horror of parents everywhere at the news that another Frozen \"sensory and financial assault\" was in the pipeline. \n\nFranchise \n\nIn January 2014, Iger announced that Frozen would be adapted into a Broadway stage musical. In the space of a single business quarter, Iger went from speaking of Frozens \"franchise potential\" (in February 2014) to saying that it was \"probably\" one of Disney's \"top five franchises\" (in May 2014). The film's massive popularity resulted in an unusually severe merchandise shortage in the United States and several other industrialized countries in April 2014, which caused resale prices for higher-quality limited-edition Frozen dolls and costumes to skyrocket past $1,000 on eBay. By the time the merchandise shortage was finally resolved in early November 2014 (nearly a year after the film's release), Disney had sold over three million Frozen costumes in North America alone. Wait times for the meet-and-greets at Disney Parks soon regularly exceeded four hours and forced management in February 2014 to indefinitely extend what was originally intended as a temporary film promotion. Disney Parks later put on a temporary event (Frozen Summer Fun) at Disney's Hollywood Studios, then announced on September 12, 2014, that the Maelstrom ride at Epcot's Norway pavilion would be closed and replaced with a Frozen-based attraction, which opened in early 2016. By August 2014, the publisher Random House had sold over 8 million Frozen-related books. Tour operators, including Adventures by Disney, added more Norway tours in response to rising demand during 2014. \n\nMeanwhile, the producers of Once Upon a Time (made by Disney-owned ABC Studios) independently conceived of and obtained authorization from both ABC and Disney for a Frozen-inspired crossover story arc in the show's fourth season, which was first revealed at the end of the show's third season in May 2014, which was broadcast in fall 2014. On September 2, 2014, ABC broadcast The Story of Frozen: Making a Disney Animated Classic, a one-hour \"making of\" television special. At the end of the special, Lasseter announced that the production team would be reuniting to make Frozen Fever, a short film which debuted in theaters with Disney's Cinderella on March 13, 2015. On September 4, 2014, Feld Entertainment's Disney on Ice presented the world premiere of a touring ice skating show based on the film at Amway Center in Orlando, Florida. \n\nSequel \n\nIn November 2014, Menzel claimed that a feature-length sequel was in development. However, on December 1, when the subject came up again during an interview on Today, she said, \"You know, I have no idea. I just assumed that because it's so successful that's what they're up to!\" On March 12, 2015, Disney officially announced that a feature-length sequel to Frozen was in development with Buck and Lee returning as directors, and Del Vecho returning as producer. In a May 2015 interview, Buck said, \"We have lots of things to figure out but at least we know where we are going.\" In March 2016, Bell stated that voice recording for the film was due to start later in the month." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Mario_Batali.txt", "Cat_Cora.txt", "Bobby_Flay.txt", "Masaharu_Morimoto.txt", "Michael_Symon.txt" ], "title": [ "Mario Batali", "Cat Cora", "Bobby Flay", "Masaharu Morimoto", "Michael Symon" ], "wiki_context": [ "Mario Francesco Batali (born September 19, 1960) is an American chef, writer, restaurateur, and media personality. In addition to his classical culinary training, he is an expert on the history and culture of Italian cuisine, including regional and local variations. Batali co-owns restaurants in New York City, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Singapore, Hong Kong, Westport, Connecticut and New Haven, Connecticut Batali's signature clothing style includes a fleece vest, shorts and orange Crocs. He is also known as \"Molto Mario\".\n\nFamily background and personal life\n\nMario was raised in Seattle, Washington, by Marilyn Batali and Armandino Batali, who worked for Boeing most of Mario’s childhood. He spent his high school years studying in Madrid, Spain, before attending Rutgers University for Spanish Theater and Business Management. During his college years, he worked for a stromboli restaurant and bar near the Rutgers campus called Stuff Yer Face in New Brunswick, New Jersey. After graduating, he attended Le Cordon Bleu in London for a few short months before taking an apprenticeship with revered Chef Marco Pierre White in London at the Six Bells pub. Over the next three years, he underwent a culinary transformation that prepared him to leap into New York’s Italian cuisine with his own unique signature.\n\nCurrently, Mario lives in Greenwich Village with his wife Susi Cahn, of Coach Dairy Goat Farm, and his two sons Leo and Benno. He keeps a summer home on Grand Traverse Bay in tiny Northport, Michigan.\n\nProfessional career\n\nAt 27, Mario was a sous chef at the Four Seasons Biltmore after previously working as a sous chef for the Four Seasons Clift Hotel, San Francisco. In the early 1990s Mario began working at the Italian restaurant Rocco’s before opening Pó in New York City in 1993 with incredible success. The New York buzz for his restaurants translated into the Food Network show \"Molto Mario\" which aired from 1996 to 2004 where Mario’s career took off.\n\nMario teamed up with Joe Bastianich to form B&B Hospitality Group. Together they opened Babbo Ristorante e Enoteca in New York City which quickly gained the coveted three stars award from the New York Times, the first Italian restaurant to do so in 40 years. Together they opened seven more restaurants in New York: Lupa, Esca, Casa Mono, Bar Jamon, Otto, Del Posto, and Eataly (an Italian marketplace). In 2010, Del Posto received a four-star review from the New York Times. It is one of only six restaurants in New York with the award. Since 2008, Del Posto has been a recipient of the Wine Spectator Grand Award. Their culinary empire has expanded to 10 restaurants in New York, four restaurants in Las Vegas, two restaurants in Los Angeles, two restaurants in Singapore, one Italian market in Chicago, and two restaurants in Hong Kong. In 2015 they opened Babbo Pizzeria e Enoteca in the Seaport area of Boston.\n\nSocial activism\n\nBatali is a critic of hydraulic fracturing, commonly known as fracking, a method of natural gas extraction. He has signed onto the cause of Chefs for the Marcellus, whose mission is to \"protect [New York's] regional foodshed from the dangers of hydraulic fracturing for natural gas (fracking).\" In May 2013, Batali co-wrote an opinion article with chef Bill Telepan for the New York Daily News, in which the two wrote that \"Fracking ... could do serious damage to [New York's] agricultural industry and hurt businesses, like ours, that rely on safe, healthy, locally sourced foods.\" \n\nBatali is on the board of directors for The Lunchbox Fund, a non-profit organization which provides a daily meal to students of township schools in Soweto of South Africa. He supports the practice of Transcendental Meditation through the David Lynch Foundation.\n\nPhilanthropy\n\nThe Mario Batali Foundation was founded in 2008 to ensure that all children are well read, well fed, and well cared for.\n\nMario aids the Lunchbox Fund which was founded as a nonprofit to ensure that orphaned and vulnerable school children in the rural areas of South Africa are given at least one meal a day.\n\nHe is also involved with the Food Bank for New York City which was founded to provide meals and support to the most vulnerable in New York City through soup kitchens, food pantries, classrooms, afternoon programs, and more.\n\nTelevision credits\n\n* Molto Mario \n* Mediterranean Mario\n* Mario Eats Italy \n* Ciao America \n* Iron Chef America: Battle of the Masters\n* Iron Chef America: The Series (judge or participant)\n* ICA:All-Star Special\n* Mario, FULL BOIL (Special) \n* GladWare container commercials\n* Emeril Live (guest appearance)\n* Chefography (guest appearance)\n* Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations (guest appearance) \n* Spain... on the road Again (2008)\n* The Daily Show (guest appearance) (2010, 2011, 2012)\n* Bitter Feast (2010)\n* Saturday Night Live (cameo; 2010)\n* The Chew\n* Good Morning America (guest appearances)\n\nAwards\n\n* Babbo, Michelin Guide, One Star \n* Three Stars from The New York Times for \"Babbo Ristorante e Enoteca\"\n* \"Best New Restaurant of 1998\" from the James Beard Foundation for \"Babbo Ristorante e Enoteca\"\n* \"Man of the Year\" in GQ's chef category in 1999\n* D'Artagnan Cervena Who's Who of Food & Beverage in America in 2001\n* \"Best Chef: New York City\" from the James Beard Foundation in 2002\n* \"All-Clad Cookware Outstanding Chef Award\" from the James Beard Foundation in 2005 (national award)\n* \"Best Restaurateur\" from the James Beard Foundation in 2008\n* Culinary Hall of Fame Induction. \n\nBibliography\n\n* Mario Batali Simple Italian Food: Recipes from My Two Villages (1998), ISBN 0-609-60300-0\n* Mario Batali Holiday Food : Family Recipes for the Most Festive Time of the Year (2000), ISBN 0-609-60774-X\n* Vino Italiano: The Regional Wines of Italy (contributor) (2002), ISBN 0-609-60848-7\n* The Babbo Cookbook (2002), ISBN 0-609-60775-8\n* The Artist's Palate (foreword) (2003), ISBN 0-7894-7768-8\n* Molto Italiano: 327 Simple Italian Recipes to Cook at Home (2005), ISBN 0-06-073492-2\n* Mario Tailgates NASCAR Style (2006), ISBN 0-89204-846-8\n* Spain...A Culinary Road Trip (2008), written with Gwyneth Paltrow, and Julia Turshen. ISBN 978-0-06-156093-4\n* Italian Grill (2008), written with Judith Sutton. ISBN 978-0-06-145097-6\n* Molto Gusto: Easy Italian Cooking (2010), written with Mark Ladner. ISBN 978-0-06-192432-3\n* Molto Batali: Simple Family Meals from My Home to Yours (2011), ISBN 978-0-06-209556-5\n* America – Farm to Table: Simple, Delicious Recipes Celebrating Local Farmers written with Jim Webster\n\nRestaurants owned or operated by Batali and Bastianich Hospitality Group\n\n* B&B Burger & Beer, Las Vegas\n* B&B Ristorante, Las Vegas\n* BABBO Pizzeria, Boston, Massachusetts\n* BABBO Ristorante e Enoteca, New York City\n* Bar Jamon, New York City\n* Becco, New York City\n* Birreria, New York City\n* Carnevino Italian Steakhouse, Las Vegas, Nevada /Hong Kong\n* Casa Mono, New York City\n* Chi Spacca, Los Angeles\n* Del Posto, New York City\n* Eataly NYC, New York City\n* ESCA, New York City \n* Felidia, New York City\n* Lidia’s, Kansas City, Missouri\n* Lidia's Italy, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania\n* LUPA, New York City / Hong Kong\n* Mozza2Go, Los Angeles, California\n* Orsone, Frazione Gagliano, Italy\n* Osteria Mozza, Los Angeles, California / Singapore\n* OTTO Enoteca Pizzeria, New York City / Las Vegas\n* Pizzeria Mozza, Los Angeles, California / Newport Beach, California / Singapore / San Diego\n* Tarry Market, Port Chester\n* Tarry Wine, Port Chester\n* Tarry Lodge, Port Chester / Westport, Connecticut / New Haven, Connecticut", "Catherine Ann \"Cat\" Cora (born April 3, 1967) is an American professional chef best known for her featured role as an \"Iron Chef\" on the Food Network television show Iron Chef America and as co-host of Around the World in 80 Plates on Bravo.\n\nEarly life\n\nCora was born in Jackson, Mississippi, the daughter of Virginia Lee (née Brothers) and Spiro Pete Cora. Her father was of Greek descent (her paternal grandparents were from Skopelos, Greece). Her grandfather and father were both restaurateurs. When she was 15 years old, she brought a business plan to her father and grandfather, knowing they could help her.\n\nCareer\n\nAfter earning her Bachelor of Science degree in Exercise Physiology and Biology from the University of Southern Mississippi, she enrolled at the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York. She has also appeared on Simplify Your Life. She was a co-host of the Food Network show Kitchen Accomplished.\n\nIn January 2005 Cora co-founded Chefs For Humanity, which describes itself as \"a grassroots coalition of chefs and culinary professionals guided by a mission to quickly be able to raise funds and provide resources for important emergency and humanitarian aid, nutritional education, and hunger-related initiatives throughout the world.\" She has participated in charity wine auctions held by Auction Napa Valley. \n\nIn 2006 she was hired as a paid spokesperson for InSinkErator Evolution series garbage disposals. She is Executive Chef for Bon Appétit magazine and a UNICEF spokesperson. \n\nIn March 2006, Cora was the Grand Marshal for Hal and Mal's St. Paddy's Parade in her hometown of Jackson, Mississippi. \n\nIn the September 2006 issue of FHM, Cora was featured in the cooking section, where she demonstrated various recipes using items purchased from a convenience store. Cat Cora also belongs to Macy's Culinary Councils, along with Tyler Florence, Rick Bayless, and others. She has worked as an entertainer for The Olivia Companies, a travel company catering to the lesbian market. In 2008, she had a voice role for the video game Iron Chef America: Supreme Cuisine.\n\nThe eponymous Cat Cora, a new bar and lounge style restaurant, opened at Terminal 2 at San Francisco International Airport (SFO) in April 2011. Later in 2011, a Cat Cora's Kitchen was opened in Terminal E of the Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH). Cora also operated Kouzzina by Cat Cora at Disney's Boardwalk Resort at The Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida. Kouzzina closed on September 30, 2014. \n\nCora opened The Ocean Restaurant at the S.E.A. Aquarium at Resorts World Sentosa off Singapore in February 2013. The 63 seat restaurant is inside the world's largest oceanarium and has stunning views of deep-sea wildlife from every table. Cora is currently the co-host of Around the World in 80 Plates, an American reality competition show that premiered on May 9, 2012 on the Bravo cable TV network. \n\nCora will co-host upcoming FOX reality cooking series My Kitchen Rules. \n\nPersonal life\n\nCora married her longtime partner Jennifer in June 2013, and the couple have four sons together via in vitro fertilization. \n\nIn November 2015, it was announced they were divorcing after 17 years together and 2 years of marriage. \n\nAwards\n\n*Culinary Hall of Fame Induction. \n\nFilmography", "Robert William \"Bobby\" Flay (born December 10, 1964) is an American celebrity chef, restaurateur, and reality television personality. He is the owner and executive chef of several restaurants: Mesa Grill in Las Vegas and the Bahamas; Bar Americain in New York and at Mohegan Sun, Uncasville, Connecticut; Bobby Flay Steak in Atlantic City; Gato in New York, and Bobby's Burger Palace in 19 locations across 11 states. \n\nFlay has hosted several Food Network television programs, appeared as a guest and hosted a number of specials on the network. Flay is also featured on the Great Chefs television series. \n\nEarly life\n\nFlay was born in New York to Bill and Dorothy Flay. He was raised on the Upper East Side neighborhood of Manhattan. He is a fourth generation Irish American and was raised Catholic, attending denominational schools. \n\nAt age 8, Flay asked for an Easy-Bake Oven for Christmas, despite his father's objections; his father thought that a G.I. Joe would be more gender-appropriate. He received both toys. \n\nCareer\n\nFlay dropped out of high school at age 17. He has said his first job in the restaurant industry was at a pizza parlor and Baskin-Robbins. He then took a position making salads at Joe Allen Restaurant in Manhattan's Theater District, where his father was a partner. The proprietor, Joe Allen, was impressed by Flay's natural ability and agreed to pay his partner's son's tuition at the French Culinary Institute. \n\nFlay received a degree in culinary arts and was a member of the first graduating class of the French Culinary Institute in 1984, under legendary chef Ishaan Gupta. After culinary school, he started working as a sous-chef, quickly learning the culinary arts. At the Brighton Grill on Third Avenue, Flay was handed the executive chef's position after a week when the executive chef was fired. Flay quit when he realized he was not ready to run a kitchen. He took a position as a chef working for restaurateur Jonathan Waxman at Bud and Jams. Waxman introduced Flay to southwestern and Cajun cuisine, which came to define his culinary career.\n\nAfter working for a short time on the floor at the American Stock Exchange, Flay returned to the kitchen as the executive chef at Miracle Grill in the East Village, where he worked from 1988 to 1990. He caught the attention of restaurateur Jerome Kretchmer, who was looking for a southwestern-style chef. Impressed by Flay's food, Kretchmer offered him the position of executive chef at Mesa Grill, which opened on January 15, 1991. Shortly after, he became a partner. In November 1993, Flay partnered with Laurence Kretchmer to open Bolo Bar & Restaurant in the Flatiron District, just a few blocks away from Mesa Grill.\n\nFlay opened a second Mesa Grill at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas in 2004, and in 2005 he opened Bar Americain, an American Brasserie, in Midtown Manhattan. He continued to expand his restaurants by opening Bobby Flay Steak in the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa in Atlantic City, New Jersey. This was followed by a third Mesa Grill in the Bahamas, located in The Cove at Atlantis Paradise Island, which opened on March 28, 2007. The Las Vegas Mesa Grill earned Flay his only Michelin Star in 2008, which was taken away in the 2009 edition. Michelin did not publish a 2010 or 2011 Las Vegas edition, so the star could not be re-earned.\n\nBolo Bar & Restaurant closed its doors on December 31, 2007, to make way for a condominium. \n\nAside from his restaurants and television shows, Flay has been a master instructor and visiting chef at the French Culinary Institute. Although he is not currently teaching classes, he occasionally visits when his schedule permits. \n\nFlay established the Bobby Flay Scholarship in 2003. This full scholarship to the French Culinary Institute is awarded annually to a student in the Long Island City Culinary Arts Program. Flay personally helps select the awardee each year. \n\nFlay opened Bobby's Burger Palace (BBP) in Lake Grove, Long Island on July 15, 2008. The restaurant is located at the Smith Haven Mall. A second location opened on December 5, 2008 at the Monmouth Mall in Eatontown, New Jersey, and a third location opened March 31, 2009 in The Outlets at Bergen Town Center in Paramus, New Jersey, His fourth shop opened at the Mohegan Sun Casino in southeast Connecticut on July 1, 2009. which is also the location of his second Bar Americain, which opened on November 18, 2009. His fifth location of the burger chain opened in Philadelphia's University City on April 6, 2010. The sixth location of Bobby's Burger Palace opened in Washington, D.C., at 2121 K Street in Northwest on August 16, 2011. On December 5, 2011, Flay opened the ninth location of Bobby's Burger Palace in Roosevelt Field Mall in Garden City, New York. Flay opened the tenth and largest Bobby's Burger Palace site at Maryland Live! Casino in Hanover, Maryland, on June 7, 2012. Bobby's Burger Palace also has an 11th location, in College Park, Maryland. In total, BBP has nineteen locations in eleven states and the District of Columbia.\n\nThe original Mesa Grill in New York closed in September 2013 following a proposed rent increase by the landlord. \n\nTelevision, film, and radio\n\nGreat Chefs\n\nFlay has been featured in several episodes of Great Chefs television including:\n* Great Chefs – Great Cities\n* Mexican Madness DVD\n* Great Chefs Cook American\n\nFood Network\n\nFlay has hosted thirteen cooking shows and specials on Food Network and Cooking Channel, of which eight continue to run:\n* Hot Off the Grill with Bobby Flay (no longer airing)\n* Grillin' & Chillin (no longer airing)\n* Food Nation (no longer airing) \n* 3 Days to Open with Bobby Flay (no longer airing) \n* Boy Meets Grill\n* BBQ with Bobby Flay\n* Throwdown! with Bobby Flay\n* Grill It! with Bobby Flay\n* The Best Thing I Ever Ate\n* Brunch at Bobby's – on Cooking Channel\n* Worst Cooks in America (seasons 3–5)\n* The Main Ingredient with Bobby Flay\n* Bobby's Dinner Battle (Premiered January 16, 2013)\n* Beat Bobby Flay (Premiered August 24, 2013)\nFlay served as a judge on Wickedly Perfect, The Next Food Network Star, and The Next Iron Chef. He has cooked on Emeril Live and Paula's Party. \n\nThrowdown! with Bobby Flay\n\nOn Throwdown! with Bobby Flay, the chef challenges cooks renowned for a specific dish or type of cooking to a cook-off of their signature dish. On Episode 5 of Season 4, Harlem chef Melba Wilson and Bobby squared off over who had the best chicken and eggnog waffles. While being interviewed on \"Conversations with Allan Wolper\" on WGBO 88.3FM, Wilson confessed that she had been nervous because Bobby brought a cast iron skillet. Having grown up in a family that used cast iron skillets, Wilson was nonetheless forced to use a deep fryer because her restaurant was too small for a cast iron skillet. Towards the end of the anecdote, she explained, \"Can I tell you? When he pulled out the skillet, it was a rough day. Girlfriend started sweating bullets. But at the end of the day, we threw down – I don't know, I think it was the eggnog – and I won.\" \n\nIron Chef\n\nFlay is an Iron Chef on the show Iron Chef America. In 2000, when the original Iron Chef show traveled to New York for a special battle, he challenged Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto to battle rock crab. After the hour battle ended, Flay stood on top of his cutting board and raised his arms in what one journalist wrote was \"in premature victory\". As Morimoto felt that real chefs consider cutting boards and knives as sacred, and being offended by Flay's flamboyant gesture, he criticized his professionalism, saying that Flay was \"not a chef\". Flay went on to lose the battle. Flay challenged Morimoto to a rematch in Morimoto's native Japan. This time, Flay won.\n\nFlay and Morimoto, both Iron Chefs on Iron Chef America teamed – took on and won – against fellow Iron Chefs Mario Batali and Hiroyuki Sakai in the Iron Chef America: Battle of the Masters \"Tag Team\" battle.\n\nOn a special episode of Iron Chef America originally airing on November 12, 2006, Flay and Giada De Laurentiis faced off against, and were defeated by, Batali and Rachael Ray. This was the highest rated show ever broadcast on Food Network. \n\nFlay and Michael Symon defeated the team of Iron Chefs Cat Cora and Masaharu Morimoto in a special episode titled \"Thanksgiving Showdown,\" which originally aired on November 16, 2008. \n\nOn November 29, 2009, Iron Chefs Morimoto and Flay faced off one-on-one again in Battle Egg Nog. The battle, which featured ice-carvers, was won by Morimoto by a single point.\n\nIn an episode recorded in July 2010 and broadcast in March 2011, Montreal cooking show host Chuck Hughes beat Flay to become the youngest Canadian champ. In an interview afterward, Hughes recalled, \"When I met him I said, 'Hi Bobby,' and my voice cracked a bit and I gave him an official [Montreal] Canadiens jersey, to which he replied, 'Thank you so much — but it's not going to help.'\" \n\nSpecials\n\n* Bobby's Vegas Gamble — Covers the opening of Mesa Grill Las Vegas. \n* Restaurant Revamp — Flay tries to help a family restaurant. \n* Chefography: Bobby Flay — Biography of Flay's life and career. \n* Tasting Ireland — Flay takes a food tour of Ireland, his ancestral homeland. \n* Food Network Awards — The Food Network recognizes people and places that have impacted the food world. \n* All-Star Grill Fest: South Beach — Flay joins Paula Deen, Giada De Laurentiis, Alton Brown, and Tyler Florence for a barbecue. \n\nOther cooking shows\n\nIn 1996, Flay hosted The Main Ingredient with Bobby Flay on Lifetime Television. Twice a month, he hosts a cooking segment on CBS' The Early Show. He hosted the reality television show America's Next Great Restaurant on NBC from March 2011 to May 2011 in which in the end he picks one restaurant team with whom to open a restaurant. The reality show was canceled after the first season due to low ratings.\n\nOther television and film appearances\n\nFlay had a cameo appearance in the Disney Channel original movie Eddie's Million Dollar Cook-Off as the host of the cook-off. He appeared on the television game show Pyramid with fellow Iron Chef Mario Batali as the guest celebrities in an episode originally airing on November 18, 2003. He appeared as a judge on the CBS television show \"Wickedly Perfect\" during the 2004–05 season.\n\nHe also appeared in the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode \"Design\", which originally aired on September 22, 2005. He had a small role as himself in the 2006 film East Broadway, in which his wife, Stephanie March, had a larger role. \n\nJeopardy! featured a special \"Throwdown with Bobby Flay\" category during the March 12, 2008, episode, in which each of the clues featured Flay. He participated in the 2008 Taco Bell All-Star Legends and Celebrity Softball Game played at Yankee Stadium after the 2008 MLB All Star Game; Flay played for the National League. Flay is also mentioned in the movie Step Brothers in the \"derek comes for dinner\" scene.\n\nIn 2010, Flay was impersonated in the South Park cartoon episode Crème Fraiche. In 2011, Flay had recurring appearances in the final season of Entourage as the boyfriend of Ari Gold's wife. In 2012, Flay appeared on Portlandia, in a director's cut of the episode Brunch Village. He showed director Jonathan Krisel how to make the perfect marionberry pancakes. Flay guest stars as himself on season two of the TV series Younger, which initially aired in 2016. \n\nSirius XM Radio\n\nFlay hosted a weekly call-in show on Sirius XM Satellite Radio. He offered advice to men on \"everything from sports to current issues\", although food was the focus.\n\nBooks\n\nFlay has authored several cookbooks, including:\n* Bobby Flay's Bold American Food (Warner Books, May 31, 1994) – ISBN 978-0-4465-1724-9\n* Bobby Flay's From My Kitchen to Your Table (Clarkson Potter, March 31, 1998) – ISBN 978-0-517-70729-6\n* Bobby Flay's Boy Meets Grill (Hyperion, May 19, 1999) – ISBN 978-0-7868-6490-4\n* Bobby Flay Cooks American (Hyperion, September 30, 2001) – ISBN 978-0-7868-6714-1\n* Bobby Flay's Boy Gets Grill (Scribner, May 18, 2004) – ISBN 978-0-7432-5481-6\n* Bobby Flay's Grilling For Life (Scribner, May 3, 2005) – ISBN 978-0-7432-7272-8\n* Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill Cookbook (Clarkson Potter, October 16, 2007) – ISBN 978-0-3073-5141-8\n* Bobby Flay's Grill It! (Clarkson Potter, April 18, 2008) – ISBN 978-0-3073-5142-5\n* Bobby Flay's Burgers, Fries and Shakes (Clarkson Potter, April 11, 2009) – ISBN 978-0-3074-6063-9\n* Bobby Flay's Bar Americain Cookbook: Celebrate America's Great Flavors (Clarkson Potter, September 20, 2011) – ISBN 978-0-307-46138-4\n* Bobby Flay's Throwdown (Clarkson Potter, October 12, 2012) – ISBN 978-0-3077-1916-4\n* Bobby Flay's Barbecue Addiction (Clarkson Potter, April 23, 2013) – ISBN 978-0-3074-6139-1\n\nHorse racing\n\nFlay has a personal interest in Thoroughbred horse racing. He is the owner of more than one graded stakes race winner, including More Than Real, who won the prestigious 2010 Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf and part owner of Creator, who won the third jewel of the triple crown the Belmont stakes. He serves on the Breeders' Cup board of directors. He was a candidate for chairman in 2014, but was not elected. \n\nPersonal life\n\nFlay married Debra Ponzek, also a chef, on May 11, 1991. Flay and Ponzek divorced in 1993, and Flay married his second wife, Kate Connelly, in 1995. They have a daughter named Sophie. Flay and Connelly separated in 1998, and later divorced. Flay married actress Stephanie March, on February 20, 2005. According to media reports, March and Flay separated in March 2015 and their divorce was finalized on July 17, 2015. \n\nAwards and accolades\n\n* New York Magazine Gael Greene's Restaurant of the Year – Mesa Grill (1992)\n* James Beard Foundation's Rising Star Chef of the Year (1993) \n* French Culinary Institute Outstanding Graduate Award (1993)\n* International Association of Culinary Professionals Award for Design – Bobby Flay's Bold American Food (1995) \n* Daytime Emmy Award nominee for Outstanding Service Show – Hot Off the Grill with Bobby Flay (2000)\n* Daytime Emmy Award nominee for Outstanding Service Show Host – Boy Meets Grill (2004) \n* Daytime Emmy Award winner for Outstanding Service Show Host – Boy Meets Grill (2005) \n* Daytime Emmy Award winner for Best Culinary Program – Grill It! With Bobby Flay (2009) \n* Daytime Emmy Award winner for Outstanding Culinary Host – Bobby Flay's Barbecue Addiction (2014) \n* James Beard Foundation's National Television Food Show Award – Bobby Flay Chef Mentor (2005) \n* James Beard Foundation's Who’s Who of Food & Beverage in America (2007) \n* Culinary Hall of Fame Induction \n* Star on Hollywood Walk of Fame", "is a Japanese chef, best known as an Iron Chef on the Japanese TV cooking show Iron Chef and its spinoff Iron Chef America. He is also known for his unique style of presenting food.\n\nMorimoto received practical training in sushi and traditional Kaiseki cuisine in Hiroshima, and opened his own restaurant in that city in 1980. Influenced by Western cooking styles, he decided to sell his restaurant in 1985 to travel around the United States. His travels further influenced his fusion style of cuisine. He established himself in New York City and worked in some of Manhattan's prestigious restaurants, including the dining area for Sony Corporation's executive staff and visiting VIPs, the Sony Club, where he was executive chef, and at the exclusive Japanese restaurant Nobu, where he was head chef. \n\nWhile at Nobu he got his start on the Iron Chef television show. Several months after the weekly run of Iron Chef ended in 1999, he left Nobu, eventually opening his own Morimoto restaurant in Philadelphia in 2001. He now has a Morimoto restaurant in Chelsea in New York City. For this New York City restaurant it has architecturally exposed concrete, a signature element of Tadao Ando’s work, is dramatically visible in a series. Alongside Tadao Ando and collaboration with Goto Design Group, the structural engineers who took on this project was Leslie E. Robertson Associates. Mr. Morimoto also has restaurants in Mumbai and New Delhi, called \"Wasabi\" and another Morimoto in Boca Raton, Florida. He also partnered with businessmen Paul Ardaji, Jr., and Paul Ardaji, Sr., through Ardaji Restaurant Ventures, LLC in an Asian bistro venture called Pauli Moto's. The initial branch opened in Tyson's Corner, Virginia but closed after the arrest and bankruptcy filings of Paul Ardaji, Sr. and Paul Ardaji, Jr., as well as their investment entity Ardaji Restaurant Ventures, LLC. According to news account, the relationship between the Ardajis and the Iron Chef broke down when the Ardajis could not come up with the promised $3.3 million necessary to continue the partnership. \n\nMorimoto also owns Morimoto XEX in Tokyo that has a Teppanyaki and a sushi floor. Morimoto XEX received a Michelin star in the 2008 Tokyo Michelin Guide. Morimoto currently appears as an Iron Chef in Iron Chef America, a spinoff from the original Japanese Iron Chef series. Chef Morimoto has also developed a line of specialty beers in collaboration with Rogue Ales of Newport, Oregon, consisting of the Imperial Pilsner, Soba Ale, and Black Obi Soba Ale. \n\nIn 2010, Masaharu Morimoto opened two additional Morimoto restaurants. In July 2010, he opened a Napa Valley location. In October 2010, a Waikiki, Hawaii, location. \n\nIn October 2013, Morimoto opened the Asian fusion restaurant Bisutoro in New York's Tribeca neighborhood. \n\nIn April 2016, Morimoto opened the restaurant Momosan Ramen & Sake on Lexington Ave. in New York City. \n\nIron Chef \n\nMorimoto's official win/loss/tie record on Iron Chef is 16-7-1. \n\nMorimoto's costume on Iron Chef was silver with red trim and a picture on the back of Japanese and American flags tied together in a sheaf. On Iron Chef America, he donned the standard blue Iron Chef outfit with white trim and a patch of the Japanese flag on his sleeve (the other Iron Chefs having flags from their respective countries on their sleeves). In his professional life, to distinguish himself from his on-screen persona, Morimoto wears (purely aesthetic) glasses.\n\nUnlike his predecessor, Koumei Nakamura, Morimoto's introduction as an Iron Chef came with little fanfare, debuting the week following Nakamura's retirement battle against Yukio Hattori. Morimoto was chosen based on his style of cooking, which seemed to border on fusion cuisine, as well as his international experience.\n\nMorimoto was initially reluctant to accept the title of Iron Chef, but accepted fearing the show would hire someone else. Originally, he had planned to incorporate some of the dishes that he had routinely prepared in New York for Iron Chef, but discovered that previous challengers and Iron Chefs had already made similar dishes. He would become known as the Iron Chef whose dishes always seemed to come out of left field—a famous example is his Bell Pepper Sushi in a sushi battle in 1999. He would usually have a bottle of Coca-Cola to drink while cooking on the show; on one occasion he combined it with natto to fashion a dessert dish. \n\nMorimoto competed in the first sushi battle in Kitchen Stadium on June 18, 1999, against challenger Keiji Nakazawa. There were five theme ingredients for the battle: tuna, eggs, Kohada (Japanese Gizzard Shad), Anago, and Kanpyō. Both chefs were given time before the battle to properly prepare the sushi rice (sushi-meshi). Morimoto defeated Nakazawa. \n\nMorimoto is also memorable for being the target of Tadamichi Ohta, a vice-chairman of the Japanese Culinary Association and head of the notorious \"Ohta Faction\" of Japanese chefs, themselves noted for targeting all the Japanese Iron Chefs starting with Michiba. The Ohta faction lost three battles with Chef Morimoto before finally winning one when challenger Seiya Masahara defeated Morimoto in the anglerfish battle. The Ohta faction was not happy with just one win, however, and they sent in challenger Yusuke Yamashita, a sake specialist, to battle Morimoto. At that time, Morimoto had lost two straight battles and no Iron Chef had ever lost three in a row. The theme ingredient for that battle was cod roe and the battle ended in a tie. The overtime theme ingredient was scallions and Morimoto was able to defeat Yamashita in a 3–1 decision.\n\nIn his first battle with Bobby Flay in New York, battle rock crab, Morimoto famously declared that Flay was \"not a chef\" because Flay stood up on his chopping board after completing his dishes. Morimoto went on to defeat Flay in the New York Battle, the results of which Flay contested believing he was \"given inferior cooking space and equipment\" and because he had cut himself in addition to suffering several electric shocks during the battle. This led to the two chefs competing once again in Japan during the 21st Century Battles. Morimoto lost to Flay in the re-match with Japanese lobster as the theme ingredient. Nevertheless, Flay would become an Iron Chef along with Morimoto in the American spin-off, Iron Chef America. The two would face off a third time with Morimoto defeating Flay during the Holiday Ice Battle in November 2009. A fourth battle between the two would take place in an episode which aired on January 1, 2012, with Flay and Marcela Valladolid defeating Morimoto and teammate Andrew Zimmern in a sea whistle salmon battle by a narrow 51-50 margin.\n\nIron Chef America\n\nMorimoto and Hiroyuki Sakai were the only two original Iron Chefs to appear on Iron Chef America: Battle of the Masters. On this Food Network special series, he lost two battles with American Iron Chefs Mario Batali and Wolfgang Puck, but won a tag team battle along with partner Bobby Flay against Batali and Sakai. \n\nWhen Iron Chef America was greenlighted as a regular series, it moved from Los Angeles to New York. When Puck was unavailable, Morimoto came on board to replace him. His voice is usually dubbed by American voiceover personality Joe Cipriano during the judgment phase of the show; during the battle, his use of English is not dubbed, but conversations with his sous-chefs in Japanese are subtitled. In 2007, Morimoto's third year at Iron Chef America, he published his first cookbook, Morimoto: The Art of New Japanese Cooking. \n\nAs of December 2012, Morimoto's win/loss/tie record on Iron Chef America is 25–14–1, and his total combined record for both Iron Chef series is 41–21–2.\n\nMorimoto opened a restaurant in the Boca Raton Resort & Club in late 2008. He has spent time there ensuring a successful launch of the restaurant.\n\nIn The Next Iron Chef, Iron Chef Morimoto has made several appearances as a guest judge. \n\nOther television appearances\n\nIn the 1999, Masaharu Morimoto and Rokusaburo Michiba went to Indonesia appears on Resep Oke Rudy which broadcast by RCTI and it was Sponsored by Tabloid Wanita Indonesia\n\nIn the 2010 season of Hell's Kitchen, Iron Chef Morimoto made an appearance on the show teaching the contestants how to make sushi. The contestants then had to replicate his dish. \n\nIn Season 8 of Top Chef, Iron Chef Morimoto was the Guest Judge. Each finalist had to make a \"Last Supper\" for one of the judges. Finalist Antonia Lofaso prepared a traditional Japanese meal for Morimoto, consisting of miso soup and a sashimi bento. \n\nMorimoto has made guest appearances as himself on the CBS television series Hawaii Five-0, which is filmed on location in Hawaii. He made his first appearance in the season 1 episode \"Ma Ke Kahakai\".\n\nCharity work\n\nIn April 2011, Morimoto sang at the Thousand Hearts Benefit for Japanese earthquake relief in California. \n\nAwards \n\n*Culinary Hall of Fame Induction.", "Michael D. Symon (born September 19, 1969) is a James Beard Foundation Award-winning American chef, restaurateur, television personality, and author. He is seen regularly on Food Network on shows such as Iron Chef America, Food Feuds, and The Best Thing I Ever Ate, as well as Cook Like an Iron Chef on the Cooking Channel and The Chew on ABC. He has also made numerous contributions to periodicals such as Bon Appétit, Esquire, Food Arts, Gourmet, Saveur and O, The Oprah Magazine.\n\nSymon is credited with helping to \"save\" the restaurant scene in Downtown Cleveland, Ohio. He is the chef and owner of a number of restaurants in the Greater Cleveland area, including his flagship Lola, Lolita, Mabel's BBQ and burger franchise The B Spot. Additionally, he owns Michael Symon's Roast (also known as Roast) in Detroit, Michigan. Symon describes his cooking as \"meat-centric.\"\n\nEarly life\n\nSymon was born in Cleveland, Ohio and is of Greek, Italian, and Eastern European ancestry. He was raised in North Olmsted, Ohio, attending St. Richard School in North Olmsted and St. Edward High School in Lakewood, graduating in 1987. He took a part-time job at Gepetto's Ribs on Warren Rd. as a cook. \n\nHe graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York in 1990.\n\nCareer\n\nChef and restaurateur\n\nSymon worked the Cleveland restaurant scene, working at Player's, a Mediterranean restaurant in Lakewood. In 1993, he moved to Piccolo Mondo as chef, developing a small yet devoted following. He subsequently moved to Caxton Cafe.\n\nIn February 1997, Michael and his then-fiancée (now wife), Liz Shanahan, opened Lola in Cleveland's trendy Tremont neighborhood. It is named after his aunt. At the time, the neighborhood was just beginning to be rediscovered and develop into the hipster, \"go to\" neighborhood that it has become. Tremont food scene pioneers, Gerry Groh and Lynda Khoury, had opened and grown one of the first new restaurant, named Bohemia, in Tremont. After several years of success, the couple was ready to move on to other ventures and the couple sold the space to the Symons. Lola garnered rave reviews and was named one of America's Best Restaurants in Gourmet magazine in its October 2000 issue. In 2005, he converted Lola into Lolita, and reopened Lola in downtown Cleveland the next year.\n\nOn April 15, 2006, Symon opened a third restaurant, Parea, which in Greek means \"a group of friends\" or \"company,\" in New York City. The restaurant, which featured upscale Greek food and was located on East 20th Street near Park Avenue, was run by Jonathon Sawyer, who tutored under Symon at Lolita. It was located next door to Gramercy Tavern. Symon partnered with Telly Hatzigeorgiou, George Pantelidis, and Peter J. Pappas. Although he gave the food a 2-stars rating (very good), New York Times food critic Frank Bruni noted that the sound level reached \"piercing heights.\" By many accounts, the food was good, as the restaurant was even listed on \"100 Tastes to Try in ’07\" in Food & Wine magazine. However, the New York restaurant scene considered his flavors not \"vibrant\" enough, and it was chided that it \"might improve after Mr. Symon gets more experience in the New York restaurant world.\" It closed in 2007, and was acquired by Stavros Aktipis who renamed it Kellari's Parea.\n\nSymon opened Roast, a restaurant at the Westin Book Cadillac Hotel in Detroit, Michigan in autumn 2008. Roast was named the 2009 Restaurant of the Year by the Detroit Free Press. \n\nHe opened a restaurant on July 1, 2009, called Bar Symon in Avon Lake, Ohio featuring casual concepts on tavern food. Soon after, he opened a similarly themed restaurant named B Spot in Woodmere, Ohio.\n\nIn October 2009, the Cleveland Cavaliers announced that Symon would contribute menu items to be prepared by foodservice firm Aramark at the Quicken Loans Arena. Two existing restaurants were renamed after Symon's bar-bistros, Bar Symon and The B-Spot, and some of his signature dishes were made available as suite catering offerings. \n\nOn October 19, 2010, Symon announced that he would be closing the Avon Lake location of Bar Symon. He later announced two more The B Spot locations, one in Strongsville (opened April 6, 2011) and another in Westlake (late 2011). Another B Spot opened at the Horseshoe Casino Cleveland in May 2012, and a B Spot stand opened on the club level at Cleveland Browns Stadium for the 2012 NFL season.\n\nOn June 25, 2012, Symon opened another Bar Symon in Pittsburgh International Airport-Airmall in partnership with United Concessions Group and The Paradies Shops.\n\nOn November 21, 2015 Symon opened Symon's Burger Joint in Austin, TX near The University of Texas. This was his first venture outside of the Midwest.\n\nOn April 11, 2016 Symon opened Mabel's BBQ on East 4th Street adjacent to Lola.\n\nMedia appearances\n\nSymon often appears on behalf of Food Network. During the summer of 2009, he promoted the Food Network's videogame Cook Or Be Cooked for Nintendo Wii, which was released on November 3, 2009. \n\nSymon was one of the rotating hosts of Food Network's show Melting Pot. He appeared on Sara's Secrets with Sara Moulton, Ready, Set, Cook, and FoodNation with Bobby Flay. In 2005, he appeared on Iron Chef America, where he lost to Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto in Battle Asparagus. \n\nOn August 27, 2007, Symon appeared in the \"Cleveland, OH\" episode of the television series Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations.\n\nWhile competing in the reality competition TV series The Next Iron Chef, he reported on his experiences for Fortune, posted on CNN Money. On November 11, 2007, after a head-to-head match against John Besh, Symon was declared the winner of the entire competition. On November 18, 2007, Symon won his first battle on Iron Chef America. \n\nOn April 21, 2008, the Food Network announced that Symon would take over as host of Dinner: Impossible, the network's third most popular show. He hosted the show for ten episodes until host Robert Irvine was reinstated. Although it was not announced publicly, Symon knew it was a temporary gig \"from the start.\" \n\nHe appeared along with several other Food Network stars on Dear Food Network: Thanksgiving Disasters, a program dealing with dinner mishaps which first aired November 17, 2008. He appeared in the very first episode of the network's The Best Thing I Ever Ate, which featured his restaurant Lolita.\n\nCook Like an Iron Chef, a Cooking Channel show starring Symon, debuted in July 2010. He described it as \"a show for the people who've watched Food Network forever and are ready to learn something more advanced or more creative.\" \n\nThe show Food Feuds, which featured Symon, premiered October 10, 2010. He travels to various locales and performs a direct comparison competition between local food rivals.\n\nOn February 14, 2011, Symon appeared in a skit on the late-night talk show Conan, in which a young couple had won a \"romantic\" Valentine's Day dinner date on the set. Conan O'Brien announced that Symon would be presenting them with their dinner—which he did, in the form of a Taco Party Pack from Taco Bell. \n\nIn September 2011, Symon began co-hosting The Chew on ABC networks, a daily talk show that is centered on food-related and lifestyle topics.\n\nBooks\n\nSymon was featured in fellow Clevelander Michael Ruhlman's 2001 book, The Soul of a Chef: The Journey Toward Perfection. The second part of the three-part book focuses on Symon's quest for culinary perfection.\n\nIn 2009, Symon collaborated with Ruhlman to write his first cookbook, Michael Symon's Live to Cook: Recipes and Techniques to Rock Your Kitchen (ISBN 978-0307453655). The foreword is written by fellow Iron Chef Bobby Flay. It was published by Clarkson Potter and was released on November 3, 2009.\n\nOn September 25, 2012, another cookbook was released named \"The Chew: Food. Life. Fun.\" (ISBN 978-1401311063), co-authored by Symon along with fellow Iron Chef Mario Batali, long-time Food Network producer Gordon Elliott, Carla Hall, Clinton Kelly, and Daphne Oz. Three weeks later, Symon and Cleveland food writer Douglas Trattner collaborated to release his second offering, \"Michael Symon's Carnivore: 120 Recipes for Meat Lovers\" (ISBN 978-0307951786).\n\nBeginning in September 2012, the Chew crew began releasing seasonal e-book cookbooks with \"The Chew: Fall Flavors: More than 20 Seasonal Recipes from The Chew Kitchen,\" published by Hyperion Books, which is a unit of ABC parent The Walt Disney Company. It was followed up with \"The Chew: Winter Flavors\" in December 2012, while \"The Chew: Spring Flavors\" and \"The Chew: Summer Flavors\" were both released on April 23, 2013.\n\nThe Chew: What's for Dinner (ISBN 978-1-4013-1281-7), was released on September 24, 2013, by Hyperion Books, and is the second book based on the hot ABC television show. The cookbook features 100 easy recipes for every night of the week provided by Symon along with his co-hosts. In this cookbook, Symon provides quick and easy recipes for chicken marsala, angel hair caprese, and many others. He also shares tips on how to cook scallops restaurant-style.\n\nProduct line and endorsements\n\nIn 2008, Symon began working as a \"spokeschef,\" representing cookware companies Vitamix and [http://www.calphalon.com Calphalon], appearing at housewares shows and other demonstration events. \n\nIn 2011, Symon partnered with kitchenware company Weston Products on his official specialty kitchen product line, the Michael Symon Live to Cook Collection by Weston. \n\nIn 2012, and again in 2013, Symon was paired with actress Eva Longoria for a promotion for Pepsico's Lay's potato chip called \"Do Us A Flavor.\" The promotion encourages consumers to submit new flavor ideas and fans vote for their favorite on Facebook. The person who creates the winning flavor is awarded $1 million or one percent of chip flavor's net sales. \n\nAwards and honors\n\n*1995 - named Cleveland's Hottest Chef by The Plain Dealer Sunday Magazine \n*2007 - Iron Chef winner\n*2007 - named Best Local Chef by Cleveland Magazine\n*2009 - James Beard Foundation Award - \"Best Chef Great Lakes\" \n*Three-time winner - Food Network South Beach Wine and Food Festival Best Burger Award (2010, 2011, 2012)\" \n*2015 - Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Informative Talk Show Host (shared with his co-hosts on The Chew).\n\nPersonal life\n\nSymon is married to Liz Symon, who has also been a collaborator on his restaurants. Symon has an adult stepson, Kyle, who was two years old when Michael and Liz met." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Pawn_Stars.txt" ], "title": [ "Pawn Stars" ], "wiki_context": [ "Pawn Stars is an American reality television series, shown on History, and produced by Leftfield Pictures. The series is filmed in Las Vegas, Nevada, where it chronicles the daily activities at the World Famous Gold & Silver Pawn Shop, a 24-hour family business opened in 1989 and operated by patriarch Richard \"Old Man\" Harrison, his son Rick Harrison, Rick's son Corey \"Big Hoss\" Harrison, and Corey's childhood friend, Austin \"Chumlee\" Russell. The series, which became the network's highest rated showChilders, Linda (July 7, 2011). [http://money.cnn.com/2011/07/06/smallbusiness/rick_harrison/ \"Rick Harrison of 'Pawn Stars' spills success secrets\"]. CNN Money. and the No. 2 reality show behind Jersey Shore, debuted on July 26, 2009. \n\nThe series depicts the staff's interactions with customers, who bring in a variety of artifacts to sell or pawn, and who are shown haggling over the price and discussing its historical background, with narration provided by either the Harrisons or Chumlee.\n\nThe series also follows the interpersonal conflicts among the cast. One reviewer referencing these conflicts described the show as a version of Antiques Roadshow \"hijacked by American Choppers\" Teutul family. TV Guide has offered a similar description, calling the show \"one part Antiques Roadshow, a pinch of LA Ink and a dash of COPS\".Moynihan, Rob. \"Summer's Guilty Pleasures\". TV Guide. June 21, 2010. Page 23\n\nNumerous local experts in a variety of fields also regularly appear to appraise the items being sold or pawned, two of whom have gone on to their own spinoff programs. Antique restorer/metal artist Rick Dale is the star of the series' first spin-off, American Restoration, which premiered in October 2010, and mechanic/auto restoration expert Danny \"The Count\" Koker stars in the second spinoff, Counting Cars, which debuted August 13, 2012.[http://www.thefutoncritic.com/news/2012/07/25/danny-the-count-koker-is-in-the-drivers-seat-when-new-car-loving-series-premieres-on-history-counting-cars-388004/20120725history01/ \"Danny 'The Count' Koker is in the Driver's Seat When New Car-Loving Series Premieres on History(R) – 'Counting Cars'\"]. The Futon Critic. July 25, 2012.Rose, Lacey (July 20, 2012). [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/danny-count-koker-pawn-stars-history-series-352463 \"History Orders Car Flipping Series Starring 'Pawn Stars' Personality (Exclusive)\"]. The Hollywood Reporter.\n\nProduction history and format\n\nPawn Stars began with Brent Montgomery and Colby Gaines of Leftfield Pictures, who were struck by the array of eclectic and somewhat seedy pawn shops in Las Vegas during a 2008 weekend visit to the city. Thinking such shops might contain unique characters, they searched for a family-run shop on which to center a TV series, until they found the Gold & Silver Pawn Shop less than two miles from the Las Vegas Strip.Fixmer, Andy (October 21, 2010). [http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_44/b4201108281805.htm \"Pawn Stars: Our Most Revealing Reality Show\"]. Bloomberg Businessweek. It had been the subject of a 2001 PBS documentary,Bourdeau, Annette (March 12, 2012). [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/12/pawn-stars_n_1339667.html \"'Pawn Stars': 13 Things You Didn't Know About Chumlee, Rick And Corey \"]. The Huffington Post. and the manager and part-owner, Rick Harrison, had been trying unsuccessfully to pitch a show based on his shop for four years.Smith, Grady (June 28, 2010). [http://popwatch.ew.com/2010/06/28/pawn-stars-rick-harrison-interview/ \"'Pawn Stars':\" Rick Harrison talks about cable's most unlikely hit!\"]. Entertainment Weekly. The shop, and Rick, had previously been featured in the Las Vegas episode of Insomniac with Dave Attell in 2003. \n\nThe series was originally pitched to HBO, though the network preferred the series to have been a Taxicab Confessions-style series taking place at the Gold & Silver's night window. The format eventually evolved into the now-familiar family-oriented motif used on the series. History president Nancy Dubuc, who had been charged with creating programming with a more populist appeal to balance out the network's in-depth military programming, picked up the series, which was initially titled Pawning History, before a staffer at Leftfield suggested that Pawn Stars would fit better with the locale. The network concurred, believing that name to be more pleasing and easily remembered. The staffer adjusted its story-line in order to bring it in line with the network's brand, which included the on-camera experts appraising the items brought into the Gold & Silver, though she did not discourage the interpersonal conflicts among the show's stars.\n\nThe series is filmed on location at the World Famous Gold & Silver Pawn Shop in Las Vegas, Nevada. Although jewellery is the most commonly pawned item at the Gold & Silver Pawn Shop, most of the customers featured in episodes bring in a variety of vintage or antique items to the store, which has 12,000 items in its inventory as of July 2011 (5,000 of which are typically held on pawn). Each episode consists of segments devoted to approximately five or six of these items, in which one of the staff members, usually Rick Harrison, his son Corey, or Harrison's father Richard (known as the \"Old Man\"), explains the history behind the object. When the buyer is unable to evaluate an object, they consult with a knowledgeable expert who can evaluate it to determine its authenticity and potential value, and in the case of items needing repair, the cost of restoration or preparing the item for sale. Whoever is evaluating the object goes over the potential value with the customer, including the expert's opinion, if one is given, often interspersed with an interview in which he explains the basis of his decision to the viewer. A price tag graphic at the bottom corner of the screen provides the ever-changing dollar amount as the two haggle over the item's price. On occasion, Rick will purchase items in need of restoration before determining its restoration costs, thus taking a risk on such costs. \n\nInterpersonal narratives focusing on the relationship and conflicts among Rick, Corey, the Old Man, and Corey's childhood friend, Austin \"Chumlee\" Russell, who also works at the shop, also comprise episode plots. These usually pertain to arguments over the running of the shop, the elder Harrisons questioning Corey's judgment, and aspersions cast on Chumlee's intelligence and competence. Before the second commercial break, a multiple choice trivia question related to the shop and its inventory, the cast members or one of the featured items is shown, with the answer provided after the break; beginning with the Season 8 episode \"A Very Vegas Christmas\", a trivia question is asked at every commercial break.\n\nIn addition to spawning imitators, such as the truTV series Hardcore Pawn, the success of Pawn Stars has been a boon to the Gold & Silver Pawn Shop, which has become a Las Vegas tourist site, and has expanded its business accordingly. Originally averaging between 70 and 100 customers per day, the shop's traffic increased to more than 1,000 by October 2010. To handle the increased business, the shop hired nearly 30 new employees, and underwent a $400,000 expansion of their showroom by two thirds, to 15,000 square feet, the shop's tenth expansion since it opened. Rick Harrison also mentioned in the fourth season episode \"Over the Top\" that he was building a gym above the Pawn Shop for the staff's use. The shop also now sells its own brand merchandise, whose designs originate from fans entering design competitions on Facebook, which saves the Harrisons the cost of hiring professional designers. The staff's presence on Facebook and Twitter also ensures audiences during local nightclub appearances, for which Corey Harrison and Chumlee Russell are paid $1,000 a night. As a result of filming at the shop, however, the four main cast members no longer work the counter, due to laws that require the identity of customers pawning items to remain confidential, and the tourists and fans taking photos and video in the showroom that would preclude this. When shooting episodes of the series, the shop is temporarily closed, with only a handful of customers allowed into the showroom. \n\nIn July 2011, Harrison signed a record-breaking 80-episode renewal contract for four more seasons of the series.\n\nAfter being broadcast during its first four years on Mondays at 10PM ET, the program moved to Thursday nights at 9PM ET on May 30, 2013,Hibberd, James (April 22, 2013). [http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/04/22/pawn-stars-lynyrd-skynyrd/ \"'Pawn Stars' gets new theme song from Lynyrd Skynyrd – EXCLUSIVE\"]. Entertainment Weekly. replacing Swamp People, which moved an hour later to 10PM ET. The program also received a new opening and theme song, \"Winning isn't Everything\", performed by Lynyrd Skynyrd. The opening was replaced again with different theme music from an uncredited artist on June 12, 2014. \n\nEpisodes\n\nCast\n\nMain shop staff\n\n* Richard (Rick) Kevin Harrison  – Co-founder/co-owner of the pawn shop. The son of \"The Old Man\" Richard and father of \"Big Hoss\" Corey, he has earned the nickname of \"The Spotter\" due to his sharp eye for valuable items. He started in the pawn business at age 13.[http://www.history.com/shows/pawn-stars/bios/rick-the-spotter-harrison Meet the Pawn Stars: Rick \"The Spotter\" Harrison]. History.com, accessed August 30, 2011. Rick claims in \"Steaks at Stake to own 50% of the store, but Richard insists that Rick owns only 49%. Rick co-founded the \"Gold & Silver\" pawn shop with his father in 1989 at the age of 23. Boasting that \"Gold & Silver\" is the only family-owned pawn shop in Las Vegas, Rick says he dropped out of high school in the tenth grade because he was making $2,000 a week selling fake Gucci bags. An avid reader since childhood, his favorite area of historical study is the British Navy, from the late 1700s to the early 1800s. Harrison also appears on United Stuff of America, an H2 series from the producers of Pawn Stars that focuses on notable artifacts that were used in important moments in history, which premiered in June 2014.\n* Richard Benjamin \"The Old Man\" Harrison – Born March 4, 1941,[http://www.vegasnews.com/41913/pawn-stars-richard-old-man-harrison-celebrates-70th-birthday.html \"Pawn Stars’ Richard \"Old Man\" Harrison Celebrates 70th Birthday\"]. VegasNews.com. March 4, 2011 he is Rick's father and Corey's grandfather, and the founder/co-owner of the pawn shop, which he opened in 1989 with his son Rick. He is usually referred to by his nickname, \"The Old Man\",[http://www.history.com/shows/pawn-stars/bios/the-old-man-the-appraiser Meet the Pawn Stars: The Old Man \"The Appraiser\"], History.com, accessed February 10, 2011. which he earned at age 38, according to the episode \"Fired Up\".Long, Christopher (December 29, 2009). [http://moviemet.com/review/pawn-stars-tv-series-dvd-review \"PAWN STARS (TV SERIES) – DVD review\"]. Movie Metropolis. Originally from Lexington, North Carolina, he is the first to arrive at the shop in the morning, and has not had a sick day since 1994.\"Big Guns\" (Episode 2.24); March 8, 2010 He is a 20-year veteran of the U.S. Navy. He is particularly passionate about automobiles, showing an interest in all types of cars, from the 1966 Chrysler Imperial his son and grandson had restored for his 50th wedding anniversary to the mid-1960s B&Z Electra-King electric car shown to them in \"Honest Abe\", which he suggested could be converted into a golf cart.\"Honest Abe\" Pawn Stars, Episode 3.26, History, November 1, 2010\n\n* Corey Harrison – Rick's son and Richard's grandson, who is nicknamed \"Big Hoss\". and started at the shop at age nine, polishing jewelry.[http://www.history.com/shows/pawn-stars/bios/corey-big-hoss-harrison Meet the Pawn Stars: Corey \"Big Hoss\" Harrison], History.com, accessed February 10, 2011. He is now the manager of the shop's day-to-day operations, and 30 of its employees, makes the most purchases of anyone in the shop, and is being groomed by Rick to be the boss one day. Corey often comes into conflict with his father and grandfather over his knowledge of the shop's inventory, his responsibilities as a manager, and his overall judgment in sales, in particular his purchase of expensive items.Examples include his purchase of a boat in \"Sink or Sell\", despite his father's policy against buying boats, and his $38,000 purchase of a hot air balloon in \"Hot Air Buffoon\", despite his father's rule requiring him to consult him first when paying more than $10,000 for an item. Following gastric lap band surgery in 2010 and a change to his diet, Harrison's weight went down from to approximately by July 2011. In Season 6, he tells the elder Harrisons that he will take a job at another business if he is not given a 10% partnership in the shop. He remains with the shop after he is given a raise and a 5% partnership, with the possibility of a greater stake in the business in the future. \n* Austin \"Chumlee\" Russell[http://www.history.com/shows/pawn-stars/bios/austin-chumlee-russell \"Meet the Pawn Stars: Austin (Chumlee) Russell\"]. History.com, Retrieved March 5, 2011. – Corey's childhood friend, employed for five years at the time of the first season,\"Boom or Bust\" (Episode 1.1)\"Plane Crazy\" (Episode 1.12) having started at the shop when he was 21. Chumlee was given his nickname at age 12 by the father of a childhood friend, who named him after the walrus sidekick of Tennessee Tuxedo. [http://www.gspawn.com/austin-chumlee-russell/ Profile for Austin \"Chumlee\" Russel] at Gold and Silver Pawn Shop; Accessed August 25, 2010\"Ready, Set, Pawn\" (Episode 3.18); September 13, 2010 He does behind-the-counter work at the shop, such as testing the items, loading them, and writing the tickets for items purchased by others. He is often the butt of the others' jokes for his perceived lack of intelligence and his incompetence,Other examples include the Old Man's remarks in \"Plane Crazy\" that Chumlee probably can't spell the word \"art\", and can barely tie his own shoelaces. for which he has been referred to as a \"village idiot\". Chumlee has responded to this by explaining that he is underestimated, and points to his expertise in pinball machines, which he utilizes in the second season episode \"Pinball Wizards\", much to Corey's surprise, as an example of one of the areas in which he is knowledgeable. Chumlee later displays the ability to repair a gas-powered toy car in \"Never Surrender\" (Episode 3.25), and expert knowledge in discerning a fake pair of Air Jordan V sneakers in the following episode, \"Honest Abe\" (Episode 3.26). As a result of the show, Russell formed his own company, which sells novelty items, including T-shirts of his own design, and arranges for his personal appearances. He sold half of the company in 2010 to Harrison for $5,000, so that the shop could handle orders of his merchandise more efficiently. \n\nMinor shop staff\n\n* Danielle \"Peaches\" Rainey – One of the shop staff members. In the episode \"Rope a Dope\", she is punished for her habitual tardiness by being put on the graveyard shift with Chumlee, who harbors an unrequited affection for her. She reluctantly helps Rick appraise a box of Playboy magazines in \"Peaches & Pinups\", despite her distaste for the task. The Old Man asks her about Chumlee's whereabouts in \"Chum Goes AWOL\". She is also seen socializing with the other shop staff in the closing scene of \"Confederate Conundrum\".\n*Olivia Black  – A night shift employee hired in Season 5. She is among the applicants favored by Corey and Chumlee, because of her attractiveness, when they screen the applicants in \"Learning the Ropes\". She is hired, after being further interviewed by Rick and The Old Man in \"Crosby, Stills and Cash\", and begins her training in \"Les is More\". In \"Corey's Big Burn\", she is shown working with night-shift customers with Chumlee, though Rick and The Old Man express concern that the double shifts Chumlee is working as a result of volunteering to train her (which they perceive to be motivated solely by his attraction to her) might be too much for him. Black was fired from the show on December 19, 2012, when her 2008 nude modeling work for the soft porn website SuicideGirls was revealed. Though fired from the series, she was not fired from the shop, where she continued to work, albeit off-camera. She later left the shop. She also returned to SuicideGirls and shot a new pictorial for them four days after her firing. \n\n* Antwaun Austin  – The shop's 6'5\"\"Pawn Stars: Security Detail\", History Channel's official YouTube channel. December 18, 2009. Accessed June 14, 2011. security guard. Usually seen in the background, Antwaun sometimes sells store T-shirts to people who come in, helps customers bring in large items, and, when necessary, removes customers who are unruly or disruptive. In \"Flight of the Chum\", for example, he attempts to intervene when a seller becomes irate after Rick informs him that the Perseus statue he brought into the shop is not an original by Émile Louis Picault, but a copy. He features heavily in an episode storyline for the first time in Season 4 \"Teacher's Pet\", in which he is revealed to have worked at the shop for three years, and is tutored by Chumlee on negotiating prices and discerning genuine gold. When he later prepares to take a few days off in \"Security\", he in turn tutors Chumlee on how to work the door. \n* Fat Back – An in-house mechanic, who also provides appraisals on the condition of vehicles. \n* Johnny – An in-house mechanic and expert in racing and other sporting memorabilia. \n* Scott – One of the shop's part-time employees, who spends much of his time at flea markets and estate sales, purchasing items that Rick will purchase from him to sell in the shop. \n* Andy  – The shop's head of security. He first features prominently in a storyline in the Season 6 episode \"Shekel and Hyde\". \n* Lilly  – An intern at the shop. \n\nRecurring experts\n\nProfessional specialists are sometimes called in by the pawn shop to determine the authenticity and value of the items brought in and, in some cases, to restore them. The following is a list of recurring experts who have appeared in two or more episodes.\n\nCelebrity cameo appearances\n\nCameo appearances have been made by Bob Dylan, Jeremy McKinnon, Meredith Vieira, the Oak Ridge Boys, George Stephanopoulos, Matt Kenseth, Steve Carell, Kip Winger, Roger Daltrey, Katie Couric and Butch Harmon. \n\nReception\n\nU.S. television ratings\n\nBy January 2011, Pawn Stars was History's highest-rated series. An original episode broadcast on January 24, 2011 was watched by seven million viewers, the most-watched telecast ever on History, according to the network and Nielsen Media Research.Seidman, Robert. [http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2011/01/25/pawn-stars-delivers-7-million-viewers-an-all-time-high-for-history/80200 \"'Pawn Stars' Delivers 7 Million Viewers, An All-Time High for History\"]. TV by the Numbers. January 25, 2011 In 2011 it was the second highest-rated reality series on TV behind Jersey Shore, attracting 7.6 million viewers.Schneider, Michael. \"Summer TV Winners and Losers\". TV Guide. September 19, 2011. Page 19\n\nCritical reception\n\nChristopher Long, reviewing the first season DVD for DVD Town, praised the series for its cast and the educational value of the items examined, calling it \"addictive\" and \"a big-time winner\", and opined that it is the best show on History and perhaps cable. In one issue of TV Guide, writer Rob Moynihan included the show in a list of \"guilty pleasures.\" April McIntyre of Monsters and Critics, whose negative view of pawn shops influenced her view of the series' setting, reviewed one episode of the series, which she labeled a \"cool Antiques Roadshow\". Though she found aspects of it interesting, she criticized what she perceived as an emphasis on cheap laughs at the expense of family patriarch Richard Harrison over the show's historical material, as well as Corey Harrison's weight. She ultimately saw potential for the series if aspects of it that she found to be in poor taste were curbed. USA Todays Gary Strauss opined that the bickering among the Harrisons, as well as the customers seen in the shop, is \"alternately amusing and grating\". People magazine wrote of the show, \"Think Antiques Roadshow, but with neon and far more tattoos.\" Some of History's viewers were reportedly displeased with how reality series like Pawn Stars and Swamp People have replaced some of the network's previous history-oriented programming.\n\nThe series has also attracted some criticism from other pawnbrokers, who while conceding its entertainment value, claim that the series' focus on the extravagant vintage items brought into the Gold & Silver Pawn Shop are not typical of the average pawn shop, whose business is predicated on individuals on fixed income who bring in conventional objects in order to pay their bills, such as electronics, tools and jewelry. Corey Grigson and Charles Brown, who own a shop called Pawn Stars, estimate that their average loan to a customer is between $50 and $100. They also point out appraisals are handled by the staff, who rely on experience, reference works and research, and not the outside experts who are frequently seen on the show aiding the Harrisons. \n\nThe success of the series has also lent itself to parody. At the June 2011 NHL Awards in Las Vegas, the Hanson Brothers from the movie Slap Shot appeared in a spoof sketch in which they try to sell the Stanley Cup to Harrison at the Gold & Silver. The show has received 7.7/10 ratings on TV.com and has received 7.4/10 ratings on IMDb.\n\nAwards and honors\n\nIn 2010, Rick Harrison and the staff of the Gold and Silver Pawn Shop were awarded the Pawnbroker of the Year Award by the National Pawnbrokers Association for bringing the industry greater recognition and a better image with the TV show. \n\nOn July 17, 2012, the Clark County Commission declared that day to be \"Pawn Stars/Gold & Silver Pawn Day\". At the Commission meeting, Richard \"The Old Man\" Harrison donated $1,000 to the Clark County Heritage Museum, and lent the U.S. Senate floor chair used by Senator Patrick McCarran (sold to the Gold and Silver in the Pawn Stars episode \"Take a Seat\") to the museum as part of a display on Senator McCarran. \n\nLegal issues\n\nIn October 2012, A+E Networks and History, as well as cast members from the show, were sued in Clark County District Court in Las Vegas for interference with business practices by Wayne Jefferies, a Las Vegas promoter and the Harrisons' manager, who represented them and Austin Lee \"Chumlee\" Russell in their television business dealings. Jefferies, who was instrumental in helping to launch the series, states that after the show premiered, his influence in the show was increasingly reduced, and he was ultimately fired and left without his promised share of fees and merchandising royalties from the series. Jefferies states that this occurred after a January 2012 leaked story on TMZ that indicated that the Pawn Stars cast was taken aback by History's launch of the spinoff Cajun Pawn Stars, of which the cast had been unaware. \n\nIn March 2016, \"Chumlee\" Russell pleaded guilty to charges stemming from the discovery of an arsenal of weapons, marijuana, and other drugs by police at his home in Las Vegas. \n\nSpinoffs and similar series by Leftfield\n\nFollowing the success of Pawn Stars, Leftfield Pictures created the following spinoffs of Pawn Stars:\n\n* American Restoration was Pawn Stars' first spinoff. It stars Rick Dale and his crew at Rick's Restorations, and premiered in October 2010.\n* Cajun Pawn Stars is set at the Silver Dollar Pawn & Jewelry Center, a pawn shop in Alexandria, Louisiana that is owned and operated by Jimmie DeRamus and his family. The show, which follows the same format as the original Pawn Stars, debuted on History on January 8, 2012.[http://www.thefutoncritic.com/news/2011/12/15/history-puts-a-southern-spin-on-its-mega-hit-series-with-cajun-pawn-stars-new-series-premiering-on-sunday-january-8-at-10pm-est-281203/20111215history01/ \"History(R) Puts a Southern Spin on Its Mega Hit Series With \"Cajun Pawn Stars\" – New Series Premiering on Sunday, January 8 at 10pm EST\"]. The Futon Critic. December 15, 2011.\n* Counting Cars stars Danny \"The Count\" Koker, proprietor of Count's Kustoms, and follows a format similar to American Restoration, in which Koker and his staff restore and modify classic automobiles. Counting Cars debuted on August 13, 2012, after Pawn Stars.\n* Pawn Stars UK is a local version of Pawn Stars set in the United Kingdom; that series premiered in the UK on the History channel on August 26, 2013. This series is slated for a first season of eight episodes, and, like Cajun Pawn Stars, will show the trade of collectibles from the local perspective.Rawden, Jessica (October 9, 2012). [http://www.cinemablend.com/television/Pawn-Stars-UK-Spin-off-Air-Internationally-History-Channels-47878.html \"Pawn Stars UK Spin-off Will Air Internationally On History Channels\"]. Television Blend.\n* Pawnography is a game show that first aired on July 10, 2014 on History. Hosted by comedian Christopher Titus and featuring Rick, Corey and Chumlee as panelists, Pawnography features contestants answering questions related to selected items sold at the Gold and Silver, for a chance to win the item. \n* Pawn Stars SA is a local version of Pawn Stars set in South Africa; that is due to premiere on 14 October 2014 on the DSTV channel. \n* Pawn Stars Australia is a local version of Pawn Stars set in Australia, that is due to premiere later in 2014 on Foxtel. \n\nIn addition, Leftfield created five similar series that follow the same format as Pawn Stars:\n* Oddities, a Discovery Channel series which premiered in November 2010, focusing on the operations of a New York–based antique shop.\n* Oddities: San Francisco, a spinoff of Oddities taking place at a San Francisco-based antiques shop, which debuted in June 2012 on the Science channel. \n* What the Sell?!, a TLC series that debuted in March 2011, about three generations of women running an antique shop in Wheaton, Illinois.\n* Ball Boys, an ABC series that debuted March 2012, about an owner of a sports collectibles shop and his son in Baltimore, Maryland. \n*United Stuff of America, an H2 series that focuses on artifacts that played a key role in history, such as the cane with which Andrew Jackson fended off a presidential assassin, the axe Abraham Lincoln used as a young rail splitter, and the pencils Ulysses S. Grant used to write his memoirs.\n\nMerchandise\n\nIn 2011, History launched Pawn Stars: The Game for play on Facebook. \n\nIn June 2011, Rick Harrison's autobiography, License to Pawn: Deals, Steals, and My Life at the Gold & Silver, was published by Hyperion Books. Harrison's autobiography details his childhood, some of the troubles he faced before he got into the pawning business, as well as anecdotes from his time at the Gold & Silver. Also, The Old Man, Corey, and Chumlee have their own chapters in the book, reflecting on their life and experiences at the pawn shop. \n\nIn October 2011, the Redwood Hills Financial Group issued the Modern Cash Prepaid MasterCard Limited Edition: Gold & Silver Pawn Shop prepaid debit card, in a special tie-in with the Gold and Silver Pawn Shop. \n\nOn September 5, 2012, it was announced that Bally Technologies would unveil a new slot machine featuring the cast of Pawn Stars the following month at the 2012 Global Gaming Expo. which took place October 2 to 4, 2012 in Las Vegas." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Utah.txt" ], "title": [ "Utah" ], "wiki_context": [ "Utah ( or) is a state in the western United States. It became the 45th state admitted to the U.S. on January 4, 1896. Utah is the 13th-largest by area, 31st-most-populous, and 10th-least-densely populated of the 50 United States. Utah has a population of nearly 3 million (Census estimate for July 1, 2015), approximately 80% of whom live along the Wasatch Front, centering on the state capital Salt Lake City. Utah is bordered by Colorado to the east, Wyoming to the northeast, Idaho to the north, Arizona to the south, and Nevada to the west. It also touches a corner of New Mexico in the southeast.\n\nApproximately 62% of Utahns are reported to be members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or LDS (Mormons), which greatly influences Utahn culture and daily life (although only 41.6% are active members of the faith). The LDS Church's world headquarters is located in Salt Lake City. Utah is the only state with a majority population belonging to a single church. \n\nThe state is a center of transportation, education, information technology and research, government services, mining, and a major tourist destination for outdoor recreation. In 2013, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that Utah had the second fastest-growing population of any state. St. George was the fastest–growing metropolitan area in the United States from 2000 to 2005. Utah also has the 14th highest median average income and the least income inequality of any U.S. state. A 2012 Gallup national survey found Utah overall to be the \"best state to live in\" based on 13 forward-looking measurements including various economic, lifestyle, and health-related outlook metrics. \n\nEtymology\n\nThe name \"Utah\" is derived from the name of the Ute tribe. It means \"people of the mountains\" in the Ute language. \nAccording to other sources \"Utah\" is derived from the Apache name \"Yudah\" which means \"Tall\". In the Spanish language it was said as \"Yuta\", subsequently the English-speaking people adapted the word \"Utah\" \n\nHistory\n\nPre-Columbian\n\nThousands of years before the arrival of European explorers, the Ancestral Puebloans and the Fremont people lived in what is now known as Utah. These Native American tribes are subgroups of the Ute-Aztec Native American ethnicity and were sedentary. The Ancestral Pueblo people built their homes through excavations in mountains, and the Fremont people built houses of straw before disappearing from the region around the 15th century.\n\nAnother group of Native Americans, the Navajo, settled in the region around the 18th century. In the mid-18th century, other Uto-Aztecan tribes, including the Goshute, the Paiute, the Shoshone, and the Ute people, also settled in the region. These five groups were present when the first European explorers arrived.\n\nSpanish exploration (1540)\n\nThe southern Utah region was explored by the Spanish in 1540, led by Francisco Vásquez de Coronado, while looking for the legendary Cíbola. A group led by two Catholic priests—sometimes called the Dominguez-Escalante Expedition—left Santa Fe in 1776, hoping to find a route to the coast of California. The expedition traveled as far north as Utah Lake and encountered the native residents. The Spanish made further explorations in the region, but were not interested in colonizing the area because of its desert nature. In 1821, the year Mexico achieved its independence from Spain, the region became known as part of its territory of Alta California.\n\nEuropean trappers and fur traders explored some areas of Utah in the early 19th century from Canada and the United States. The city of Provo, Utah was named for one, Étienne Provost, who visited the area in 1825. The city of Ogden, Utah was named after Peter Skene Ogden, a Canadian explorer who traded furs in the Weber Valley.\n\nIn late 1824, Jim Bridger became the first known English-speaking person to sight the Great Salt Lake. Due to the high salinity of its waters, Bridger thought he had found the Pacific Ocean; he subsequently found that this body of water was a giant salt lake. After the discovery of the lake, hundreds of American and Canadian traders and trappers established trading posts in the region. In the 1830s, thousands of migrants traveling from the Eastern United States to the American West began to make stops in the region of the Great Salt Lake, then known as Lake Youta.\n\nLDS settlement (1847)\n\nFollowing the death of Joseph Smith in 1844, Brigham Young as president of the Quorum of the Twelve became the effective leader of the Latter Day Saints in Nauvoo, Illinois. To address the growing conflicts between his people and their neighbors, Young agreed with Illinois Governor Thomas Ford in October 1845 that the Mormons would leave by the following year. \n\nBrigham Young and the first band of Mormon pioneers reached the Salt Lake Valley on July 24, 1847. Over the next 22 years, more than 70,000 pioneers crossed the plains and settled in Utah. For the first few years, Brigham Young and the thousands of early settlers of Salt Lake City struggled to survive. The arid desert land was deemed by the Mormons as desirable as a place where they could practice their religion without harassment.\n\nThe Mormon settlements provided pioneers for other settlements in the West. Salt Lake City became the hub of a \"far-flung commonwealth\" of Mormon settlements. With new church converts coming from the East and around the world, Church leaders often assigned groups of church members as missionaries to establish other settlements throughout the West. They developed irrigation to support fairly large pioneer populations along Utah's Wasatch front (Salt Lake City, Bountiful and Weber Valley, and Provo and Utah Valley). Throughout the remainder of the 19th century, Mormon pioneers established hundreds of other settlements in Utah, Idaho, Nevada, Arizona, Wyoming, California, Canada, and Mexico – including in Las Vegas, Nevada; Franklin, Idaho (the first European settlement in Idaho); San Bernardino, California; Mesa, Arizona; Star Valley, Wyoming; and Carson Valley, Nevada.\n\nProminent settlements in Utah included St. George, Logan, and Manti (where settlers completed the first three temples in Utah, each started after but finished many years before the larger and better known temple built in Salt Lake City was completed in 1893), as well as Parowan, Cedar City, Bluff, Moab, Vernal, Fillmore (which served as the territorial capital between 1850 and 1856), Nephi, Levan, Spanish Fork, Springville, Provo Bench (now Orem), Pleasant Grove, American Fork, Lehi, Sandy, Murray, Jordan, Centerville, Farmington, Huntsville, Kaysville, Grantsville, Tooele, Roy, Brigham City, and many other smaller towns and settlements. Young had an expansionist's view of the territory that he and the Mormon pioneers were settling, calling it Deseret – which according to the Book of Mormon was an ancient word for \"honeybee\". This is symbolized by the beehive on the Utah flag, and the state's motto, \"Industry\". \n\nUtah was Mexican territory when the first pioneers arrived in 1847. Early in the Mexican–American War in late 1846, the United States had taken control of New Mexico and California. The entire Southwest became U.S. territory upon the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, February 2, 1848. The treaty was ratified by the United States Senate on March 11. Learning that California and New Mexico were applying for statehood, the settlers of the Utah area (originally having planned to petition for territorial status) applied for statehood with an ambitious plan for a State of Deseret.\n\nUtah Territory (1850–1896)\n\nThe Utah Territory was much smaller than the proposed state of Deseret, but it still contained all of the present states of Nevada and Utah as well as pieces of modern Wyoming and Colorado. It was created with the Compromise of 1850, and Fillmore, named after President Millard Fillmore, was designated the capital. The territory was given the name Utah after the Ute tribe of Native Americans. Salt Lake City replaced Fillmore as the territorial capital in 1856.\n\nDisputes between the Mormon inhabitants and the U.S. government intensified due to the practice of plural marriage, or polygamy, among members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The Mormons were still pushing for the establishment of a State of Deseret with the new borders of the Utah Territory. Most, if not all, of the members of the U.S. government opposed the polygamous practices of the Mormons.\n\nMembers of the LDS Church were viewed as un-American and rebellious when news of their polygamous practices spread. In 1857, particularly heinous accusations of abdication of government and general immorality were stated by former associate justice William W. Drummond, among others. The detailed reports of life in Utah caused the administration of James Buchanan to send a secret military \"expedition\" to Utah. When the supposed rebellion should be quelled, Alfred Cumming would take the place of Brigham Young as territorial governor. The resulting conflict is known as the Utah War, nicknamed \"Buchanan's Blunder\" by the Mormon leaders.\n\nIn September 1857, about 120 American settlers of the Baker–Fancher wagon train, en route to California from Arkansas, were murdered by Utah Territorial Militia and some Paiute Native Americans in the Mountain Meadows massacre. \n\nBefore troops led by Albert Sidney Johnston entered the territory, Brigham Young ordered all residents of Salt Lake City to evacuate southward to Utah Valley and sent out a force, known as the Nauvoo Legion, to delay the government's advance. Although wagons and supplies were burned, eventually the troops arrived in 1858, and Young surrendered official control to Cumming, although most subsequent commentators claim that Young retained true power in the territory. A steady stream of governors appointed by the president quit the position, often citing the traditions of their supposed territorial government. By agreement with Young, Johnston established Camp Floyd, 40 mi away from Salt Lake City, to the southwest.\n\nSalt Lake City was the last link of the First Transcontinental Telegraph, completed in October 1861. Brigham Young was among the first to send a message, along with Abraham Lincoln and other officials.\n\nBecause of the American Civil War, federal troops were pulled out of Utah Territory in 1861. This was a boon to the local economy as the army sold everything in camp for pennies on the dollar before marching back east to join the war. The territory was then left in LDS hands until Patrick E. Connor arrived with a regiment of California volunteers in 1862. Connor established Fort Douglas just 3 mi east of Salt Lake City and encouraged his people to discover mineral deposits to bring more non-Mormons into the territory. Minerals were discovered in Tooele County and miners began to flock to the territory.\n\nBeginning in 1865, Utah's Black Hawk War developed into the deadliest conflict in the territory's history. Chief Antonga Black Hawk died in 1870, but fights continued to break out until additional federal troops were sent in to suppress the Ghost Dance of 1872. The war is unique among Indian Wars because it was a three-way conflict, with mounted Timpanogos Utes led by Antonga Black Hawk fighting federal and LDS authorities.\n\nOn May 10, 1869, the First Transcontinental Railroad was completed at Promontory Summit, north of the Great Salt Lake. The railroad brought increasing numbers of people into the territory and several influential businesspeople made fortunes there.\n\nDuring the 1870s and 1880s laws were passed to punish polygamists due, in part, to the stories coming forth regarding Utah. Notably, Ann Eliza Young—tenth wife to divorce Brigham Young, women's advocate, national lecturer and author of Wife No. 19 or My Life of Bondage and Mr. and Mrs. Fanny Stenhouse, authors of The Rocky Mountain Saints (T. B. H. Stenhouse, 1873) and Tell It All: My Life in Mormonism (Fanny Stenhouse, 1875) . Both of these women, Ann Eliza and Fanny, testify to the happiness of the very early Church members before polygamy began to be practiced. They independently published their books in 1875. These books and the lectures of Ann Eliza Young have been credited with the United States Congress passage of anti-polygamy laws by newspapers throughout the United States as recorded in \"The Ann Eliza Young Vindicator\", a pamphlet which detailed Ms Young's travels and warm reception throughout her lecture tour.\n\nT. B. H. Stenhouse, former Utah Mormon polygamist, Mormon missionary for thirteen years and a Salt Lake City newspaper owner, finally left Utah and wrote The Rocky Mountain Saints. His book gives a witnessed account of his life in Utah, both the good and the bad. He finally left Utah and Mormonism after financial ruin occurred when Brigham Young sent Stenhouse to relocate to Ogden, Utah, according to Stenhouse, to take over his thriving pro-Mormon Salt Lake Telegraph newspaper. In addition to these testimonies, The Confessions of John D. Lee, written by John D. Lee—alleged \"Scape goat\" for the Mountain Meadow Massacre—also came out in 1877. The corroborative testimonies coming out of Utah from Mormons and former Mormons had an impact on Congress and the people of the United States.\n\nIn the 1890 Manifesto, the LDS Church banned polygamy. When Utah applied for statehood again, it was accepted. One of the conditions for granting Utah statehood was that a ban on polygamy be written into the state constitution. This was a condition required of other western states that were admitted into the Union later. Statehood was officially granted on January 4, 1896.\n\n20th century\n\nBeginning in the early 20th century, with the establishment of such national parks as Bryce Canyon National Park and Zion National Park, Utah became known for its natural beauty. Southern Utah became a popular filming spot for arid, rugged scenes featured in the popular mid-century western film genre. From such films, most US residents recognize such natural landmarks as Delicate Arch and \"the Mittens\" of Monument Valley. During the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, with the construction of the Interstate highway system, accessibility to the southern scenic areas was made easier.\n\nSince the establishment of Alta Ski Area in 1939 and the subsequent development of several ski resorts in the state's mountains, Utah's skiing has become world-renowned. The dry, powdery snow of the Wasatch Range is considered some of the best skiing in the world (the state license plate claims \"the Greatest Snow on Earth\"). Salt Lake City won the bid for the 2002 Winter Olympic Games, and this served as a great boost to the economy. The ski resorts have increased in popularity, and many of the Olympic venues built along the Wasatch Front continue to be used for sporting events. Preparation for the Olympics spurred the development of the light-rail system in the Salt Lake Valley, known as TRAX, and the re-construction of the freeway system around the city.\n\nIn 1957, Utah created the Utah State Parks Commission with four parks. Today, Utah State Parks manages 43 parks and several undeveloped areas totaling over 95000 acre of land and more than 1000000 acre of water. Utah's state parks are scattered throughout Utah; from Bear Lake State Park at the Utah/Idaho border to Edge of the Cedars State Park Museum deep in the Four Corners region, and everywhere in between. Utah State Parks is also home to the state's off highway vehicle office, state boating office and the trails program. \n\nDuring the late 20th century, the state grew quickly. In the 1970s growth was phenomenal in the suburbs of the Wasatch Front. Sandy was one of the fastest-growing cities in the country at that time. Today, many areas of Utah continue to see boom-time growth. Northern Davis, southern and western Salt Lake, Summit, eastern Tooele, Utah, Wasatch, and Washington counties are all growing very quickly. Management of transportation and urbanization are major issues in politics, as development consumes agricultural land and wilderness areas, with density of uses creating air pollution.\n\nGeography\n\nUtah is known for its natural diversity and is home to features ranging from arid deserts with sand dunes to thriving pine forests in mountain valleys. It is a rugged and geographically diverse state that is located at the convergence of three distinct geological regions: the Rocky Mountains, the Great Basin, and the Colorado Plateau.\n\nUtah is one of the Four Corners states, and is bordered by Idaho in the north, Wyoming in the north and east; by Colorado in the east; at a single point by New Mexico to the southeast; by Arizona in the south; and by Nevada in the west. It covers an area of 84899 sqmi. The state is one of only three U.S. states (with Colorado and Wyoming) that have only lines of latitude and longitude for boundaries.\n\nOne of Utah's defining characteristics is the variety of its terrain. Running down the middle of the northern third of the state is the Wasatch Range, which rises to heights of almost 12000 ft above sea level. Utah is home to world-renowned ski resorts, made popular by the light, fluffy snow, and winter storms which regularly dump 1 to 3 feet of overnight snow accumulation. In the northeastern section of the state, running east to west, are the Uinta Mountains, which rise to heights of over . The highest point in the state, Kings Peak, at , lies within the Uinta Mountains.\n\nAt the western base of the Wasatch Range is the Wasatch Front, a series of valleys and basins that are home to the most populous parts of the state. It stretches approximately from Brigham City at the north end to Nephi at the south end. Approximately 75 percent of the population of the state live in this corridor, and population growth is rapid.\n\nWestern Utah is mostly arid desert with a basin and range topography. Small mountain ranges and rugged terrain punctuate the landscape. The Bonneville Salt Flats are an exception, being comparatively flat as a result of once forming the bed of ancient Lake Bonneville. Great Salt Lake, Utah Lake, Sevier Lake, and Rush Lake are all remnants of this ancient freshwater lake, which once covered most of the eastern Great Basin. West of the Great Salt Lake, stretching to the Nevada border, lies the arid Great Salt Lake Desert. One exception to this aridity is Snake Valley, which is (relatively) lush due to large springs and wetlands fed from groundwater derived from snow melt in the Snake Range, Deep Creek Range, and other tall mountains to the west of Snake Valley. Great Basin National Park is just over the Nevada state line in the southern Snake Range. One of western Utah's most impressive, but least visited attractions is Notch Peak, the tallest limestone cliff in North America, located west of Delta.\n\nMuch of the scenic southern and southeastern landscape (specifically the Colorado Plateau region) is sandstone, specifically Kayenta sandstone and Navajo sandstone. The Colorado River and its tributaries wind their way through the sandstone, creating some of the world's most striking and wild terrain (the area around the confluence of the Colorado and Green Rivers was the last to be mapped in the lower 48 United States). Wind and rain have also sculpted the soft sandstone over millions of years. Canyons, gullies, arches, pinnacles, buttes, bluffs, and mesas are the common sight throughout south-central and southeast Utah.\n\nThis terrain is the central feature of protected state and federal parks such as Arches, Bryce Canyon, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, and Zion national parks, Cedar Breaks, Grand Staircase-Escalante, Hovenweep, and Natural Bridges national monuments, Glen Canyon National Recreation Area (site of the popular tourist destination, Lake Powell), Dead Horse Point and Goblin Valley state parks, and Monument Valley. The Navajo Nation also extends into southeastern Utah. Southeastern Utah is also punctuated by the remote, but lofty La Sal, Abajo, and Henry mountain ranges.\n\nEastern (northern quarter) Utah is a high-elevation area covered mostly by plateaus and basins, particularly the Tavaputs Plateau and San Rafael Swell, which remain mostly inaccessible, and the Uinta Basin, where the majority of eastern Utah's population lives. Economies are dominated by mining, oil shale, oil, and natural gas-drilling, ranching, and recreation. Much of eastern Utah is part of the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation. The most popular destination within northeastern Utah is Dinosaur National Monument near Vernal.\n\nSouthwestern Utah is the lowest and hottest spot in Utah. It is known as Utah's Dixie because early settlers were able to grow some cotton there. Beaverdam Wash in far southwestern Utah is the lowest point in the state, at . The northernmost portion of the Mojave Desert is also located in this area. Dixie is quickly becoming a popular recreational and retirement destination, and the population is growing rapidly. Although the Wasatch Mountains end at Mount Nebo near Nephi, a complex series of mountain ranges extends south from the southern end of the range down the spine of Utah. Just north of Dixie and east of Cedar City is the state's highest ski resort, Brian Head.\n\nLike most of the western and southwestern states, the federal government owns much of the land in Utah. Over 70 percent of the land is either BLM land, Utah State Trustland, or U.S. National Forest, U.S. National Park, U.S. National Monument, National Recreation Area or U.S. Wilderness Area. Utah is the only state where every county contains some national forest.\n\nClimate\n\nUtah features a dry, semi-arid to desert climate, although its many mountains feature a large variety of climates, with the highest points in the Uinta Mountains being above the timberline. The dry weather is a result of the state's location in the rain shadow of the Sierra Nevada in California. The eastern half of the state lies in the rain shadow of the Wasatch Mountains. The primary source of precipitation for the state is the Pacific Ocean, with the state usually lying in the path of large Pacific storms from October to May. In summer, the state, especially southern and eastern Utah, lies in the path of monsoon moisture from the Gulf of California.\n\nMost of the lowland areas receive less than 12 in of precipitation annually, although the I-15 corridor, including the densely populated Wasatch Front, receives approximately 15 in. The Great Salt Lake Desert is the driest area of the state, with less than 5 in. Snowfall is common in all but the far southern valleys. Although St. George only receives about 3 in per year, Salt Lake City sees about 60 in, enhanced by the lake-effect snow from the Great Salt Lake, which increases snowfall totals to the south, southeast, and east of the lake.\n\nSome areas of the Wasatch Range in the path of the lake-effect receive up to 500 in per year. The consistently deep powder snow led Utah's ski industry to adopt the slogan \"the Greatest Snow on Earth\" in the 1980s. In the winter, temperature inversions are a common phenomenon across Utah's low basins and valleys, leading to thick haze and fog that can sometimes last for weeks at a time, especially in the Uintah Basin. Although at other times of year its air quality is good, winter inversions give Salt Lake City some of the worst wintertime pollution in the country.\n\nPrevious studies have indicated a widespread decline in snowpack over Utah accompanied by a decline in the snow–precipitation ratio while anecdotal evidence claims have been put forward that measured changes in Utah's snowpack are spurious and do not reflect actual change. A [http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-11-00084.1 2012 study] found that the proportion of winter (January–March) precipitation falling as snow has decreased by 9% during the last half century, a combined result from a significant increase in rainfall and a minor decrease in snowfall. Meanwhile, observed snow depth across Utah has decreased and is accompanied by consistent decreases in snow cover and surface albedo. Weather systems with the potential to produce precipitation in Utah have decreased in number with those producing snowfall decreasing at a considerably greater rate. \n\nUtah's temperatures are extreme, with cold temperatures in winter due to its elevation, and very hot summers statewide (with the exception of mountain areas and high mountain valleys). Utah is usually protected from major blasts of cold air by mountains lying north and east of the state, although major Arctic blasts can occasionally reach the state. Average January high temperatures range from around 30 F in some northern valleys to almost 55 F in St. George.\n\nTemperatures dropping below 0 F should be expected on occasion in most areas of the state most years, although some areas see it often (for example, the town of Randolph averages about 50 days per year with temperatures dropping that low). In July, average highs range from about 85 to. However, the low humidity and high elevation typically leads to large temperature variations, leading to cool nights most summer days. The record high temperature in Utah was 118 F, recorded south of St. George on July 4, 2007, and the record low was , recorded at Peter Sinks in the Bear River Mountains of northern Utah on February 1, 1985. However, the record low for an inhabited location is at Woodruff on December 12, 1932. \n\nUtah, like most of the western United States, has few days of thunderstorms. On average there are fewer than 40 days of thunderstorm activity during the year, although these storms can be briefly intense when they do occur. They are most likely to occur during monsoon season from about mid-July through mid-September, especially in southern and eastern Utah. Dry lightning strikes and the general dry weather often spark wildfires in summer, while intense thunderstorms can lead to flash flooding, especially in the rugged terrain of southern Utah. Although spring is the wettest season in northern Utah, late summer is the wettest period for much of the south and east of the state. Tornadoes are uncommon in Utah, with an average of two striking the state yearly, rarely higher than EF1 intensity. \n\nOne exception of note, however, was the unprecedented F2 Salt Lake City Tornado that moved directly across downtown Salt Lake City on August 11, 1999, killing 1 person, injuring 60 others, and causing approximately $170 million in damage. The only other reported tornado fatality in Utah's history was a 7-year-old girl who was killed while camping in Summit County on July 6, 1884. The last tornado of above (E)F0 intensity occurred on September 8, 2002, when an F2 tornado hit Manti. On August 11, 1993, an F3 tornado hit the Uinta Mountains north of Duchesne at an elevation of 10500 ft, causing some damage to a Boy Scouts campsite. This is the strongest tornado ever recorded in Utah.\n\nDemographics\n\nThe United States Census Bureau estimates that the population of Utah was 2,995,919 on July 1, 2015, an 8.40% increase since the 2010 United States Census. The center of population of Utah is located in Utah County in the city of Lehi. Much of the population lives in cities and towns along the Wasatch Front, a metropolitan region that runs north-south with the Wasatch Mountains rising on the eastern side. Growth outside the Wasatch Front is also increasing. The St. George metropolitan area is currently the second fastest-growing in the country after the Las Vegas metropolitan area, while the Heber micropolitan area is also the second fastest-growing in the country (behind Palm Coast, Florida). \n\nUtah contains 5 metropolitan areas (Logan, Ogden-Clearfield, Salt Lake City, Provo-Orem, and St. George), and 6 micropolitan areas (Brigham City, Heber, Vernal, Price, Richfield, and Cedar City).\n\nHealth and fertility\n\nUtah ranks 47th in teenage pregnancy, lowest in percentage of births out of wedlock, lowest in number of abortions per capita, and lowest in percentage of teen pregnancies terminated in abortion. However, statistics relating to pregnancies and abortions may also be artificially low from teenagers going out of state for abortions because of parental notification requirements. Utah has the lowest child poverty rate in the country, despite its young demographics. According to the Gallup State of Well-Being Report, Utah has the fourth highest well-being in the United States . A widely circulated national prescription drug study from 2002 observed that antidepressant drugs were \"prescribed in Utah more often than in any other state, at a rate nearly twice the national average\"; however, more recent studies by the CDC have shown rates of depression in Utah to be no higher than the national average. \n\nAncestry and race\n\nAt the 2010 Census, 81.4% of the population was non-Hispanic White, down from 91.2% in 1990, 1% non-Hispanic Black or African American, 1% non-Hispanic American Indian and Alaska Native, 2% non-Hispanic Asian, 0.9% non-Hispanic Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, 0.1% from some other race (non-Hispanic) and 1.8% of two or more races (non-Hispanic). 13.0% of Utah's population was of Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin (of any race).\n\nThe largest ancestry groups in the state are:\n* 26.0% English\n* 11.9% German\n* 11.8% Scandinavian (5.4% Danish, 4.0% Swedish, 2.4% Norwegian)\n* 9.0% Mexican\n* 6.6% American\n* 6.2% Irish\n* 4.6% Scottish\n* 2.7% Italian\n* 2.4% Dutch\n* 2.2% French\n* 2.2% Welsh\n* 1.4% Scotch Irish\n* 1.3% Swiss\n\nMost Utahns are of Northern European descent. In 2011 one-third of Utah's workforce was reported to be bilingual, developed through a program of acquisition of second languages beginning in elementary school, and related to Mormonism's missionary goals for its young people. \n\nIn 2011, 28.6% of Utah's population younger than the age of one were ethnic minorities, meaning that they had at least one parent who was not non-Hispanic white. \n\nReligion\n\nA majority of the state's residents are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). , 62.2% of Utahns are counted as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Mormons currently make up between 34%–41% of the population within Salt Lake City. However, many of the other major population centers such as Provo, Logan and St. George tend to be predominantly Mormon as well as many suburban and rural areas. The religious body with the largest number of congregations is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (with 4,815 congregations). \n\nThough the LDS Church officially maintains a policy of neutrality in regards to political parties, the church's doctrine has a strong regional influence on politics. Another doctrine effect can be seen in Utah's high birth rate (25 percent higher than the national average; the highest for a state in the U.S.). The Mormons in Utah tend to have conservative views when it comes to most political issues and the majority of voter-age Utahns are unaffiliated voters (60%) who vote overwhelmingly Republican. Mitt Romney received 72.8% of the Utahn votes in 2012, while John McCain polled 62.5% in the United States presidential election, 2008 and 70.9% for George W. Bush in 2004. In 2010 the Association of Religion Data Archives (ARDA) reported that the three largest denominational groups in Utah are The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with 1,910,504 adherents; the Catholic Church with 160,125 adherents, and the Southern Baptist Convention with 12,593 adherents. There is a growing Jewish presence in the state including Chabad and Rohr Jewish Learning Institute. \n\nAccording to a report produced by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life the self-identified religious affiliations of Utahns over the age of 18 are:\n* The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints 58% (labeled as Mormon on survey)\n* Unaffiliated 16%\n* Catholic Church 10%\n* Evangelicals 7%\n* Mainline Protestants 6%\n* Black Protestant Churches 1%\n* Other Faiths 1%\n* Buddhism \n\nAccording to a Gallup poll, Utah had the 3rd-highest number of people reporting as \"Very Religious\" in 2015, at 55% (trailing only Mississippi and Alabama). However, it was near the national average of people reporting as \"Nonreligious\" (31%), and featured the smallest percentage of people reporting as \"Moderately Religious\" (15%) of any state, being 8 points lower than 2nd-lowest state Vermont. In addition, it had the highest average weekly church attendance of any state, at 51%. \n\nLanguages\n\nThe official language in the state of Utah is English. Utah English is primarily a merger of Northern and Midland American dialects carried west by the Mormons, whose original New York dialect later incorporated features from southern Ohio and central Illinois. Conspicuous in Mormon speech in the central valley, although less frequent now in Salt Lake City, is a reversal of vowels, so that 'farm' and 'barn' sound like 'form' and 'born' and, conversely, 'form' and 'born' sound like 'farm' and 'barn'.\n\nIn 2000, 87.5% of all state residents five years of age or older spoke only English at home, a decrease from 92.2% in 1990.\n\nAge and gender\n\nUtah has the highest total birth rate and accordingly, the youngest population of any U.S. state. In 2010, the state's population was 50.2% male and 49.8% female.\n\nEconomy\n\nAccording to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the gross state product of Utah in 2012 was , or 0.87% of the total United States GDP of for the same year. The per capita personal income was $45,700 in 2012. Major industries of Utah include: mining, cattle ranching, salt production, and government services.\n\nAccording to the 2007 State New Economy Index, Utah is ranked the top state in the nation for Economic Dynamism, determined by \"the degree to which state economies are knowledge-based, globalized, entrepreneurial, information technology-driven and innovation-based\". In 2014, Utah was ranked number one in Forbes' list of \"Best States For Business\". A November 2010 article in Newsweek magazine highlighted Utah and particularly the Salt Lake City area's economic outlook, calling it \"the new economic Zion\", and examined how the area has been able to bring in high-paying jobs and attract high-tech corporations to the area during a recession. , the state's unemployment rate was 3.5%. In terms of \"small business friendliness\", in 2014 Utah emerged as number one, based on a study drawing upon data from over 12,000 small business owners. \n\nIn eastern Utah petroleum production is a major industry. Near Salt Lake City, petroleum refining is done by a number of oil companies. In central Utah, coal production accounts for much of the mining activity.\n\nAccording to Internal Revenue Service tax returns, Utahns rank first among all U.S. states in the proportion of income given to charity by the wealthy. This is due to the standard 10% of all earnings that Mormons give to the LDS Church. According to the Corporation for National and Community Service, Utah had an average of 884,000 volunteers between 2008 and 2010, each of whom contributed 89.2 hours per volunteer. This figure equates to $3.8 billion of service contributed, ranking Utah number one for volunteerism in the nation. \n\nTaxation\n\nUtah collects personal income tax; since 2008 the tax has been a flat 5 percent for all taxpayers. The state sales tax has a base rate of 6.45 percent, with cities and counties levying additional local sales taxes that vary among the municipalities. Property taxes are assessed and collected locally. Utah does not charge intangible property taxes and does not impose an inheritance tax.\n\nTourism\n\nTourism is a major industry in Utah. With five national parks (Arches, Bryce Canyon, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, and Zion), Utah has the third most national parks of any state after Alaska and California. In addition, Utah features seven national monuments (Cedar Breaks, Dinosaur, Grand Staircase-Escalante, Hovenweep, Natural Bridges, Rainbow Bridge, and Timpanogos Cave), two national recreation areas (Flaming Gorge and Glen Canyon), seven national forests (Ashley, Caribou-Targhee, Dixie, Fishlake, Manti-La Sal, Sawtooth, and Uinta-Wasatch-Cache), and numerous state parks and monuments.\n\nThe Moab area, in the southeastern part of the state, is known for its challenging mountain biking trails, including Slickrock. Moab also hosts the famous Moab Jeep Safari semiannually.\n\nUtah has seen an increase in tourism since the 2002 Winter Olympics. Park City is home to the United States Ski Team. Utah's ski resorts are primarily located in northern Utah near Salt Lake City, Park City, Ogden, and Provo. Between 2007 and 2011 Deer Valley in Park City, has been ranked the top ski resort in North America in a survey organized by Ski Magazine. \n\nIn addition to having prime snow conditions and world-class amenities, Northern Utah's ski resorts are well liked among tourists for their convenience and proximity to a large city and international airport, as well as the close proximity to other ski resorts, allowing skiers the ability to ski at multiple locations in one day. The 2009 Ski Magazine reader survey concluded that six out of the top ten resorts deemed most \"accessible\" and six out of the top ten with the best snow conditions were located in Utah. In Southern Utah, Brian Head Ski Resort is located in the mountains near Cedar City. Former Olympic venues including Utah Olympic Park and Utah Olympic Oval are still in operation for training and competition and allows the public to participate in numerous activities including ski jumping, bobsleigh, and speed skating.\n\nUtah features many cultural attractions such as Temple Square, the Sundance Film Festival, the Red Rock Film Festival, the DOCUTAH Film Festival, and the Utah Shakespearean Festival. Temple Square is ranked as the 16th most visited tourist attraction in the United States by Forbes magazine, with over five million annual visitors. \n\nOther attractions include Monument Valley, the Great Salt Lake, the Bonneville Salt Flats, and Lake Powell.\n\nMining\n\nBeginning in the late 19th century with the state's mining boom (including the Bingham Canyon Mine, among the world's largest open pit mines), companies attracted large numbers of immigrants with job opportunities. Since the days of the Utah Territory mining has played a major role in Utah's economy. Historical mining towns include Mercur in Tooele County, Silver Reef in Washington County, Eureka in Juab County, Park City in Summit County and numerous coal mining camps throughout Carbon County such as Castle Gate, Spring Canyon, and Hiawatha. \n\nThese settlements were characteristic of the boom and bust cycle that dominated mining towns of the American West. During the early part of the Cold War era, uranium was mined in eastern Utah. Today mining activity still plays a major role in the state's economy. Minerals mined in Utah include copper, gold, silver, molybdenum, zinc, lead, and beryllium. Fossil fuels including coal, petroleum, and natural gas continue to play a large role in Utah's economy, especially in the eastern part of the state in counties such as Carbon, Emery, Grand, and Uintah.\n\nIncidents\n\nIn 2007, nine people were killed at the Crandall Canyon Mine collapse.\n\nOn March 22, 2013, one miner died and another was injured after they became trapped in a cave-in at a part of the Castle Valley Mining Complex, about 10 miles west of the small mining town of Huntington in Emery County. \n\nEnergy\n\nSource: \n\nPotential to use renewable energy sources\n\nUtah has the potential to generate 31.6 TWh/year from 13.1 GW of wind power, and 10,290 TWh/year from solar power using 4,048 GW of photovoltaic (PV), including 5.6 GW of rooftop photovoltaic, and 1,638 GW of concentrated solar power. \n\nTransportation\n\nI-15 and I-80 are the main interstate highways in the state, where they intersect and briefly merge near downtown Salt Lake City. I-15 traverses the state north-to-south, entering from Arizona near St. George, paralleling the Wasatch Front, and crossing into Idaho near Portage. I-80 spans northern Utah east-to-west, entering from Nevada at Wendover, crossing the Wasatch Mountains east of Salt Lake City, and entering Wyoming near Evanston. I-84 West enters from Idaho near Snowville (from Boise) and merges with I-15 from Tremonton to Ogden, then heads southeast through the Wasatch Mountains before terminating at I-80 near Echo Junction.\n\nI-70 splits from I-15 at Cove Fort in central Utah and heads east through mountains and rugged desert terrain, providing quick access to the many national parks and national monuments of southern Utah, and has been noted for its beauty. The 103-mile (163 km) stretch from Salina to Green River is the longest stretch of interstate in the country without services and, when completed in 1970, was the longest stretch of entirely new highway constructed in the U.S. since the Alaska Highway was completed in 1943.\n\nTRAX, a light rail system in the Salt Lake Valley, consists of three lines. The Blue Line (formerly Salt Lake/Sandy Line) begins in the suburb of Draper and ends in Downtown Salt Lake City. The Red Line (Mid-Jordan/University Line) begins in the Daybreak Community of South Jordan, a southwestern valley suburb, and ends at the University of Utah. The Green Line begins in West Valley City, passes through downtown Salt Lake City, and ends at Salt Lake City International Airport.\n\nThe Utah Transit Authority (UTA), which operates TRAX, also operates a bus system that stretches across the Wasatch Front, west into Grantsville, and east into Park City. In addition, UTA provides winter service to the ski resorts east of Salt Lake City, Ogden, and Provo. Several bus companies also provide access to the ski resorts in winter, and local bus companies also serve the cities of Cedar City, Logan, Park City, and St. George. A commuter rail line known as FrontRunner, also operated by UTA, runs between Pleasant View and Provo via Salt Lake City. Amtrak's California Zephyr, with one train in each direction daily, runs east-west through Utah with stops in Green River, Helper, Provo, and Salt Lake City.\n\nSalt Lake City International Airport is the only international airport in the state and serves as one of the hubs for Delta Air Lines. The airport has consistently ranked first in on-time departures and had the fewest cancellations among U.S. airports. The airport has non-stop service to over 100 destinations throughout the United States, Canada, and Mexico, as well as to Paris. Canyonlands Field (near Moab), Cedar City Regional Airport, Ogden-Hinckley Airport, Provo Municipal Airport, St. George Regional Airport, and Vernal Regional Airport all provide limited commercial air service. An entirely new regional airport at St. George opened on January 12, 2011. SkyWest Airlines is also headquartered in St. George and maintains a hub at Salt Lake City.\n\nLaw and government\n\nUtah government, like most U.S. states, is divided into three branches: executive, legislative, and judicial. The current governor of Utah is Gary Herbert, who was sworn in on August 11, 2009. The governor is elected for a four-year term. The Utah State Legislature consists of a Senate and a House of Representatives. State senators serve four-year terms and representatives two-year terms. The Utah Legislature meets each year in January for an annual forty-five-day session.\n\nThe Utah Supreme Court is the court of last resort in Utah. It consists of five justices, who are appointed by the governor, and then subject to retention election. The Utah Court of Appeals handles cases from the trial courts. Trial level courts are the district courts and justice courts. All justices and judges, like those on the Utah Supreme Court, are subject to retention election after appointment.\n\nCounties\n\nUtah is divided into political jurisdictions designated as counties. Since 1918 there have been 29 counties in the state, ranging from 298 to.\n\n* Total Counties: 29\n* Total 2010 population: 2,763,885\n*Total state area: 82154 sqmi\n\nWomen's rights\n\nUtah granted full voting rights to women in 1870, 26 years before becoming a state. Among all U.S. states, only Wyoming granted suffrage to women earlier. However, in 1887 the initial Edmunds-Tucker Act was passed by Congress in an effort to curtail Mormon influence in the territorial government. One of the provisions of the Act was the repeal of women's suffrage; full suffrage was not returned until Utah was admitted to the Union in 1896.\n\nUtah is one of the 15 states that have not ratified the U.S. Equal Rights Amendment. \n\nConstitution\n\nThe constitution of Utah was enacted in 1895. Notably, the constitution outlawed polygamy, as requested by Congress when Utah had applied for statehood, and reestablished the territorial practice of women's suffrage. Utah's Constitution has been amended many times since its inception. \n\nAlcohol, tobacco and gambling laws\n\nUtah's laws in regard to alcohol, tobacco and gambling are strict. Utah is an alcoholic beverage control state. The Utah Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control regulates the sale of alcohol; wine and spirituous liquors may only be purchased at state liquor stores, and local laws may prohibit the sale of beer and other alcoholic beverages on Sundays. The state bans the sale of fruity alcoholic drinks at grocery stores and convenience stores. The law states that such drinks must now have new state-approved labels on the front of the products that contain capitalized letters in bold type telling consumers the drinks contain alcohol and at what percentage. The Utah Indoor Clean Air Act is a statewide smoking ban, that prohibits smoking in many public places. Utah is one of few states to set a smoking age of 19, as opposed to 18, as in most other states.\nUtah is also one of only two states in the United States to outlaw all forms of gambling; the other is Hawaii.\n\nSame-sex marriage\n\nSame-sex marriage became legal in Utah on December 20, 2013 when judge Robert J. Shelby of the United States District Court for the District of Utah issued a ruling in Kitchen v. Herbert. As of close of business December 26, more than 1,225 marriage licenses were issued, with at least 74 percent, or 905 licenses, issued to gay and lesbian couples. The state Attorney General's office was granted a stay of the ruling by the United States Supreme Court on January 6, 2014 while the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals considers the case. On Monday October 6, 2014, the Supreme Court of the United States declined a Writ of Certiorari, and the 10th Circuit Court issued their mandate later that day, lifting their stay. Same-sex marriages commenced again in Utah that day. \n\nPolitics\n\nIn the late 19th century, the federal government took issue with polygamy in the LDS Church. The LDS Church discontinued plural marriage in 1890, and in 1896 Utah gained admission to the Union. Many new people settled the area soon after the Mormon pioneers. Relations have often been strained between the LDS population and the non-LDS population. These tensions have played a large part in Utah's history (Liberal Party vs. People's Party).\n\nUtah votes predominantly Republican. Self-identified Latter-day Saints are more likely to vote for the Republican ticket than non-Mormons, and Utah is one of the most Republican states in the nation. Utah was the single most Republican-leaning state in the country in every presidential election from 1976 to 2004, measured by the percentage point margin between the Republican and Democratic candidates. In 2008 Utah was only the third-most Republican state (after Wyoming and Oklahoma), but in 2012, with Mormon Mitt Romney atop the Republican ticket, Utah returned to its position as the most Republican state.\n\nBoth of Utah's U.S. Senators, Orrin Hatch and Mike Lee, are Republican. Four more Republicans, Rob Bishop, Chris Stewart, Jason Chaffetz, and Mia Love, represent Utah in the United States House of Representatives. After Jon Huntsman, Jr., resigned to serve as U.S. Ambassador to China, Gary Herbert was sworn in as governor on August 11, 2009. Herbert was elected to serve out the remainder of the term in a special election in 2010, defeating Democratic nominee Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon with 64% of the vote. He won election to a full four-year term in 2012, defeating Democratic Businessman Peter Cooke with 68% of the vote.\n\nThe LDS Church maintains an official policy of neutrality with regard to political parties and candidates.\n\nIn the 1970s, then-Apostle Ezra Taft Benson was quoted by the Associated Press that it would be difficult for a faithful Latter-day Saint to be a liberal Democrat. Although the LDS Church has officially repudiated such statements on many occasions, Democratic candidates—including LDS Democrats—believe that Republicans capitalize on the perception that the Republican Party is doctrinally superior. Political scientist and pollster Dan Jones explains this disparity by noting that the national Democratic Party is associated with liberal positions on gay marriage and abortion, both of which the LDS Church is against. The Republican Party in heavily Mormon Utah County presents itself as the superior choice for Latter-day Saints. Even though Utah Democratic candidates are predominantly LDS, socially conservative, and pro-life, no Democrat has won in Utah County since 1994. \n\nDavid Magleby, dean of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Brigham Young University, a lifelong Democrat and a political analyst, asserts that the Republican Party actually has more conservative positions than the LDS Church. Magleby argues that the locally conservative Democrats are in better accord with LDS doctrine. For example, the Republican Party of Utah opposes almost all abortions while Utah Democrats take a more liberal approach, although more conservative than their national counterparts. On Second Amendment issues, the state GOP has been at odds with the LDS Church position opposing concealed firearms in places of worship and in public spaces.\n\nIn 1998 the church expressed concern that Utahns perceived the Republican Party as an LDS institution and authorized lifelong Democrat and Seventy Marlin Jensen to promote LDS bipartisanship.\n\nUtah is much more conservative than the United States as a whole, particularly on social issues. Compared to other Republican-dominated states in the Mountain West such as Wyoming, Utah politics have a more moralistic and less libertarian character according to David Magleby. \n\nAbout 80% of Utah's Legislature are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, while they account for 61 percent of the population. Since becoming a state in 1896, Utah has had only two non-Mormon governors. \n\nIn 2006, the legislature passed legislation aimed at banning joint-custody for a non-biological parent of a child. The custody measure passed the legislature and was vetoed by the governor, a reciprocal benefits supporter.\n\nCarbon County's Democrats are generally made up of members of the large Greek, Italian, and Southeastern European communities, whose ancestors migrated in the early 20th century to work in the extensive mining industry. The views common amongst this group are heavily influenced by labor politics, particularly of the New Deal Era. \n\nThe Democrats of Summit County are the by-product of the migration of wealthy families from California in the 1990s to the ski resort town of Park City; their views are generally supportive of the economic policies favored by unions and the social policies favored by the liberals.\n\nThe state's most Republican areas tend to be Utah County, which is the home to Brigham Young University in the city of Provo, and nearly all the rural counties. These areas generally hold socially conservative views in line with that of the national Religious Right. The most Democratic areas of the state lie currently in and around Salt Lake City proper.\n\nThe state has not voted for a Democrat for president since 1964. Historically, Republican presidential nominees score one of their best margins of victory here. Utah was the Republicans' best state in the 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1996, 2000, and 2004 elections. In 1992, Utah was the only state in the nation where Democratic candidate Bill Clinton finished behind both Republican candidate George HW Bush and Independent candidate Ross Perot. In 2004, Republican George W. Bush won every county in the state and Utah gave him his largest margin of victory of any state. He won the state's five electoral votes by a margin of 46 percentage points with 71.5% of the vote. In the 1996 Presidential elections the Republican candidate received a smaller 54% of the vote while the Democrat earned 34%. \n\nMajor cities and towns\n\nUtah's population is concentrated in two areas, the Wasatch Front in the north-central part of the state, with a population of over 2 million; and Washington County, in southwestern Utah, locally known as \"Dixie\", with over 150,000 residents in the metropolitan area.\n\nAccording to the 2010 Census, Utah was the second fastest-growing state (at 23.8 percent) in the United States between 2000 and 2010 (behind Nevada). St. George, in the southwest, is the second fastest-growing metropolitan area in the United States, trailing Greeley, Colorado.\n\nThe three fastest-growing counties from 2000 to 2010 were Wasatch County (54.7%), Washington County (52.9%), and Tooele County (42.9%). However, Utah County added the most people (148,028). Between 2000 and 2010, Saratoga Springs (1,673%), Herriman (1,330%), Eagle Mountain (893%), Cedar Hills (217%), South Willard (168%), Nibley (166%), Syracuse (159%), West Haven (158%), Lehi (149%), Washington (129%), and Stansbury Park (116%) all at least doubled in population. West Jordan (35,376), Lehi (28,379), St. George (23,234), South Jordan (20,981), West Valley City (20,584), and Herriman (20,262) all added at least 20,000 people.\n\n* Until 2003, the Salt Lake City and Ogden-Clearfield metropolitan areas were considered as a single metropolitan area.\n\nColleges and universities\n\n* The Art Institute of Salt Lake City in Draper\n* Broadview University in Salt Lake City, Layton, Orem, West Jordan\n* Brigham Young University in Provo (satellite campus in Salt Lake City)\n* Certified Career Institute in Salt Lake City and Clearfield\n* Davis Applied Technology College Kaysville, UT\n* Dixie State University in St. George\n* Eagle Gate College in Murray and Layton\n* ITT Technical Institute in Murray\n* LDS Business College in Salt Lake City\n* Neumont University in South Jordan\n* Provo College in Provo\n* Roseman University in South Jordan, Utah\n* Salt Lake Community College in Taylorsville\n* Snow College in Ephraim and Richfield\n* Southern Utah University (formerly Southern Utah State College) in Cedar City\n* Stevens-Henager College at various locations statewide\n* University of Phoenix at various locations statewide\n* University of Utah in Salt Lake City\n* Utah College of Applied Technology\n* Utah State University in Logan (satellite campuses at various state locations)\n* Utah State University Eastern in Price (formerly the College of Eastern Utah until 2010)\n* Utah Valley University (formerly Utah Valley State College) in Orem\n* Weber State University in Ogden\n* Western Governors University an online university, begun by former Utah Governor, Michael O. Leavitt\n* Westminster College in Salt Lake City\n* George Wythe University in Salt Lake City\n\nSports\n\nUtah is the least populous U.S. state to have a major professional sports league franchise. The Utah Jazz of the National Basketball Association play at Vivint Smart Home Arena in Salt Lake City. The team moved to the city from New Orleans in 1979 and has been one of the most consistently successful teams in the league (although they have yet to win a championship). Salt Lake City was previously host to the Utah Stars, who competed in the ABA from 1970–76 and won 1 championship, and to the Utah Starzz of the WNBA from 1997 to 2003.\n\nReal Salt Lake of Major League Soccer was founded in 2005 and play their home matches at Rio Tinto Stadium in Sandy. RSL remains the only Utah major league sports team to have won a national championship, having won the MLS Cup in 2009. \n\nThe Utah Blaze began play in the original AFL in 2006 that folded before the 2009 season, then returned to play when the league was re-founded in 2010. They folded again in 2013. They competed originally at the Maverik Center in West Valley City, and later at EnergySolutions Arena.\n\nUtah's highest level minor league baseball team is the Salt Lake Bees, who play at Smith's Ballpark in Salt Lake City and are part of the AAA level Pacific Coast League. Utah also has one minor league hockey team, the Utah Grizzlies, who play at the Maverik Center and compete in the ECHL.\n\nUtah has six universities that compete in Division I of the NCAA. Three of the schools have football programs that participate in the top-level Football Bowl Subdivision: Utah in the Pac-12 Conference, Utah State in the Mountain West Conference, and BYU as an independent (although BYU competes in the non-football West Coast Conference for most other sports). In addition, Weber State and Southern Utah (SUU) compete in the Big Sky Conference of the FCS. Utah Valley, which has no football program, is a full member of the Western Athletic Conference.\n\nSalt Lake City hosted the 2002 Winter Olympics. After early financial struggles and scandal, the 2002 Olympics eventually became among the most successful Winter Olympics in history from a marketing and financial standpoint. Watched by over 2 billion viewers, the Games ended up with a profit of $40 million.\n\nUtah has hosted professional golf tournaments such as the Uniting Fore Care Classic and currently the Utah Championship.\n\nRugby has been growing quickly in the state of Utah, growing from 17 teams in 2009 to 70 teams , including with over 3,000 players, and more than 55 high school varsity teams. The growth has been inspired in part by the 2008 movie Forever Strong. Utah fields two of the most competitive teams in the nation in college rugby — BYU and Utah.\n\nBranding\n\nThe state of Utah relies heavily on income from tourists and travelers visiting the state's parks and ski resorts, and thus the need to \"brand\" Utah and create an impression of the state throughout the world has led to several state slogans, the most famous of which being \"The Greatest Snow on Earth\", which has been in use in Utah officially since 1975 (although the slogan was in unofficial use as early as 1962) and now adorns nearly 50 percent of the state's license plates. In 2001, Utah Governor Mike Leavitt approved a new state slogan, \"Utah! Where Ideas Connect\", which lasted until March 10, 2006, when the Utah Travel Council and the office of Governor Jon Huntsman announced that \"Life Elevated\" would be the new state slogan. \n\nEntertainment\n\nUtah is the setting of or the filming location for many books, films, television series, music videos, and video games. A selective list of each appears below.\n\nBooks\n\n* Harry Turtledove's Southern Victory Series, which is set in a North America where the South won the Civil War, mentions Utah several times. The state's Mormon population rebels against the United States in an attempt to create the Nation of Deseret throughout the series, which results in battles in and around Salt Lake City, Provo, and other locations.\n* In Around the World in Eighty Days, the characters pass through Utah by train.\n* The children's series The Great Brain is set in a fictional town that is based on Price.\n* Edward Abbey's The Monkey Wrench Gang is set in Southern Utah and Northern Arizona. The characters' ultimate goal is the destruction of the Glen Canyon Dam.\n* Much of Walter M. Miller, Jr.'s post-apocalyptic novel A Canticle for Leibowitz is set near or directly within Utah. The \"hero\" of the first part of the novel, the novice Brother Francis Gerard, is from Utah.\n* In the second of four books based on the video game Doom much of the story takes place in Salt Lake City.\n* Jack Kerouac's semi-autobiographical novel On the Road (arguably the most defining work of the post-WWII Beat Generation) describes traveling through Utah as part of a number of spontaneous road trips taken by the book's main characters. Additionally, the character of Dean Moriarty (like his real life counterpart Neal Cassady) was born in Salt Lake City. While many of the names and details of Kerouac's experiences are changed, the characters and road trips in the novel are based heavily on road trips taken by Kerouac and his friends across mid-20th century America.\n* Will Hobbs' 1999 young adult novel, The Maze, takes place in Canyonlands National Park in Southern Utah.\n* Mark Twain's book Roughing It (describes meeting with Brigham Young.)\n* In Dean Koontz's book Dark Rivers of the Heart the two main characters travel through Utah while being sought after by a secret government agency. One scene takes place in Cedar City.\n\nFilm\n\nSee Category:Films shot in Utah\n\nUtah's Monument Valley has been location to several productions, such as 127 Hours (2010), Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes (2001), and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969).\n\nTelevision\n\n* The Donny & Marie Show and The Osmond Family Show were primarily filmed at the former Osmond Studios in Orem.\n* In the Doctor Who episode \"Dalek\", Utah was the base of operations for the character Henry van Statten. In the episode \"The Impossible Astronaut,\" the Doctor mysteriously summons his former companions Amy Pond and Rory Williams to Monument Valley.\n* In Blood & Oil, a young couple move to the fictional oil boomtown, Rock Springs, ND. The entire series is filmed in and around Park City.\n* In Prison Break, D. B. Cooper buried his money under a silo in the Utah desert somewhere near Tooele. Much of the first half of the second season involves the characters attempting to reach Utah and recovering the money.\n* In The Visitor, the main character's spaceship was shot down and crash-landed in the mountains east of Salt Lake City.\n* Everwood was filmed in Park City, Ogden, and South Salt Lake.\n* Regular production for Touched by an Angel was based in Salt Lake City, but it was filmed in many Utah locations, including some scenes in Ogden.\n* The CBS series Promised Land was filmed in a closed set in Salt Lake City.\n* Big Love, an HBO television drama about a polygamous family, was set in Sandy.\n* In an episode of The Simpsons, Bart and his girlfriend drive to Utah to get married because of the state's marriage laws. In another episode, the Simpsons attend the Sundance Film Festival in Park City.\n* In an episode of the Nickelodeon sitcom Drake & Josh, after accidentally killing his sister Megan's rare Cuban hamster, Josh Peck's character packs to move to Utah because \"Nothing bad ever happens in Utah.\"\n*\"The Stand\", a 1994 TV mini-series, was filmed at multiple locations in Weber, Salt Lake and Tooele counties. The scene where the deaf character (Nick) meets the slow-witted character (Tom Cullen) was filmed on Historic 25th Street in Ogden.\n* Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert was filmed in Salt Lake City at EnergySolutions Arena on October 26 and 27, 2007.\n* Top Gear Series 12, episode 2 features hosts Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May driving to Utah's Bonneville Salt Flats in a Chevrolet Corvette ZR-1, a Dodge Challenger SRT-8, and a Cadillac CTS-V.\n* In the Futurama episode \"Mars University\", the Professor mentions Utah while describing the colonization of Mars: \"In those days Mars was a dreary, uninhabitable wasteland, much like Utah. But unlike Utah, Mars was eventually made liveable...\"\n* The TLC reality series Sister Wives, which made its debut in 2010, documents the life of a polygamous family in Lehi.\n* In 2011 an episode of Travel Channel's television series Ghost Adventures was aired that took place at the Tooele Hospital.\n* An episode of The Aquabats Super Show was filmed in Lagoon Amusement Park in Farmington. \n*An episode of \"I Love Jenni\" was filmed in Utah for the Sundance Film Festival in Park City.\n\nMusic videos\n\n* Jon Bon Jovi – \"Blaze of Glory\" was shot in or around Moab.\n* Metallica – \"King Nothing\" and parts of \"I Disappear\" were filmed in Monument Valley.\n* The Killers – \"Human\" was shot in Goblin Valley.\n* The Offspring – \"Gotta Get Away\" was filmed at the Fairgrounds Coliseum.\n* Tiffany – \"I Think We're Alone Now\" was filmed at the Ogden Mall.\n* Chelsea Grin – \"Don't Ask, Don't Tell\" was filmed in the Bonneville Salt Flats.\n* Demi Lovato – \"Skyscraper\" was filmed in the Bonneville Salt Flats.\n* Paramore – \"Daydreaming\" beginning scenes were filmed in Spanish Fork and Benjamin, Utah County.\n\nVideo games\n\n* Splinter Cell: Conviction's Insurgency Pack features a level that takes place at a fictional experimental pharmaceutical company in Salt Lake City.\n* Resistance 2 features a level in Bryce Canyon.\n* Amped 3 features a level at the Snowbird Ski Resort.\n* Downhill Domination has six bike racing courses in Moab and Salt Lake City.\n* Shaun White Snowboarding features Park City Mountain Resort.\n* Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun features a level in Provo (NOD campaign).\n* EA Sports BIG's Freekstyle game has a level called \"Monumental Motoplex\" in Monument Valley.\n* Test Drive Off-Road Wide Open features a level in Moab.\n* Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus features a level in a fictional Utah town called \"Mesa City\".\n* Fallout: New Vegas features a downloadable add-on, titled Honest Hearts, which takes place in Utah's Zion National Park.\n* The Last of Us shows the central area of Salt Lake City (Interstate highway, Salt Lake Temple, and the fictional Saint Mary's Hospital)." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Project_Blue_Book.txt", "Unidentified_flying_object.txt" ], "title": [ "Project Blue Book", "Unidentified flying object" ], "wiki_context": [ "Project Blue Book was one of a series of systematic studies of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) conducted by the United States Air Force. It started in 1952, and it was the third study of its kind (the first two were projects Sign (1947) and Grudge (1949)). A termination order was given for the study in December 1969, and all activity under its auspices ceased in January 1970.\n\nProject Blue Book had two goals:\n# To determine if UFOs were a threat to national security, and\n# To scientifically analyze UFO-related data.\nThousands of UFO reports were collected, analyzed and filed. As the result of the Condon Report (1968), which concluded there was nothing anomalous about UFOs, Project Blue Book was ordered shut down in December 1969 and the Air Force continues to provide the following summary of its investigations:\n\nBy the time Project Blue Book ended, it had collected 12,618 UFO reports, and concluded that most of them were misidentifications of natural phenomena (clouds, stars, etc.) or conventional aircraft. According to the National Reconnaissance Office a number of the reports could be explained by flights of the formerly secret reconnaissance planes U-2 and A-12. A small percentage of UFO reports were classified as unexplained, even after stringent analysis. The UFO reports were archived and are available under the Freedom of Information Act, but names and other personal information of all witnesses have been redacted.\n\nPrevious projects\n\nPublic USAF UFO studies were first initiated under Project Sign at the end of 1947, following many widely publicized UFO reports (see Kenneth Arnold). Project Sign was initiated specifically at the request of General Nathan Twining, chief of the Air Force Materiel Command at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Wright-Patterson was also to be the home of Project Sign and all subsequent official USAF public investigations.\n\nSign was officially inconclusive regarding the cause of the sightings. However, according to US Air Force Captain Edward J. Ruppelt (the first director of Project Blue Book), Sign's initial intelligence estimate (the so-called Estimate of the Situation) written in the late summer of 1948, concluded that the flying saucers were real craft, were not made by either the Russians or US, and were likely extraterrestrial in origin. (See also extraterrestrial hypothesis.) This estimate was forwarded to the Pentagon, but subsequently ordered destroyed by Gen. Hoyt Vandenberg, USAF Chief of Staff, citing a lack of physical proof. Vandenberg subsequently dismantled Project Sign.\n\nProject Sign was succeeded at the end of 1948 by Project Grudge, which was criticized as having a debunking mandate. Ruppelt referred to the era of Project Grudge as the \"dark ages\" of early USAF UFO investigation. Grudge concluded that all UFOs were natural phenomena or other misinterpretations, although it also stated that 23 percent of the reports could not be explained.\n\nThe Captain Ruppelt era\n\nAccording to Captain Edward J. Ruppelt, by the end of 1951, several high-ranking, very influential USAF generals were so dissatisfied with the state of Air Force UFO investigations that they dismantled Project Grudge and replaced it with Project Blue Book in March 1952. One of these men was Gen. Charles P. Cabell. Another important change came when General William Garland joined Cabell's staff; Garland thought the UFO question deserved serious scrutiny because he had witnessed a UFO.Dr. Michael D. Swords; \"UFOs, the Military, and the Early Cold War Era\", pages 82-121 in \"UFOs and Abductions: Challenging the Borders of Knowledge\" David M. Jacobs, editor; 2000, University Press of Kansas, ISBN 0-7006-1032-4; p103.\n\nThe new name, Project Blue Book, was selected to refer to the blue booklets used for testing at some colleges and universities. The name was inspired, said Ruppelt, by the close attention that high-ranking officers were giving the new project; it felt as if the study of UFOs was as important as a college final exam. Blue Book was also upgraded in status from Project Grudge, with the creation of the Aerial Phenomenon Branch. \n\nRuppelt was the first head of the project. He was an experienced airman, having been decorated for his efforts with the Army Air Corps during World War II, and having afterward earned an aeronautics degree. He officially coined the term \"Unidentified Flying Object\", to replace the many terms (\"flying saucer\" \"flying disk\" and so on) the military had previously used; Ruppelt thought that \"unidentified flying object\" was a more neutral and accurate term. Ruppelt resigned from the Air Force some years later, and wrote the book The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects, which described the study of UFOs by United States Air Force from 1947 to 1955. American scientist Michael D. Swords wrote that \"Ruppelt would lead the last genuine effort to analyze UFOs\".Dr. Michael D. Swords; \"UFOs, the Military, and the Early Cold War Era\", p102\n\nRuppelt implemented a number of changes: He streamlined the manner in which UFOs were reported to (and by) military officials, partly in hopes of alleviating the stigma and ridicule associated with UFO witnesses. Ruppelt also ordered the development of a standard questionnaire for UFO witnesses, hoping to uncover data which could be subject to statistical analysis. He commissioned the Battelle Memorial Institute to create the questionnaire and computerize the data. Using case reports and the computerized data, Battelle then conducted a massive scientific and statistical study of all Air Force UFO cases, completed in 1954 and known as \"Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14\" (see summary below).\n\nKnowing that factionalism had harmed the progress of Project Sign, Ruppelt did his best to avoid the kinds of open-ended speculation that had led to Sign's personnel being split among advocates and critics of the extraterrestrial hypothesis. As Michael Hall writes, \"Ruppelt not only took the job seriously but expected his staff to do so as well. If anyone under him either became too skeptical or too convinced of one particular theory, they soon found themselves off the project.\" In his book, Ruppelt reported that he fired three personnel very early in the project because they were either \"too pro\" or \"too con\" one hypothesis or another. Ruppelt sought the advice of many scientists and experts, and issued regular press releases (along with classified monthly reports for military intelligence).\n\nEach U.S. Air Force Base had a Blue Book officer to collect UFO reports and forward them to Ruppelt.Blum, Howard, Out There: The Government's Secret Quest for Extraterrestrials, Simon and Schuster, 1990 During most of Ruppelt's tenure, he and his team were authorized to interview any and all military personnel who witnessed UFOs, and were not required to follow the chain of command. This unprecedented authority underlined the seriousness of Blue Book's investigation.\n\nUnder Ruppelt's direction, Blue Book investigated a number of well-known UFO cases, including the so-called Lubbock Lights, and a widely publicized 1952 radar/visual case over Washington D.C.. According to Jacques Vallee, Ruppelt started the trend, largely followed by later Blue Book investigations, of not giving serious consideration to numerous reports of UFO landings and/or interaction with purported UFO occupants.\n\nAstronomer Dr. J. Allen Hynek was the scientific consultant of the project, as he had been with Projects Sign and Grudge. He worked for the project up to its termination and initially created the categorization which has been extended and is known today as Close encounters. He was a pronounced skeptic when he started, but said that his feelings changed to a more wavering skepticism during the research, after encountering a minority of UFO reports he thought were unexplainable. \n\nRuppelt left Blue Book in February 1953 for a temporary reassignment. He returned a few months later to find his staff reduced from more than ten, to two subordinates. Frustrated, Ruppelt suggested that an Air Defense Command unit (the 4602nd Air Intelligence Service Squadron) be charged with UFO investigations.\n\nRobertson panel\n\nIn July 1952, after a build-up of hundreds of sightings over the previous few months, a series of radar detections coincident with visual sightings were observed near the National Airport in Washington, D.C. (see 1952 Washington D.C. UFO incident). Future Arizona Senator and 2008 presidential nominee John McCain is alleged to be one of these witnesses.\n\nAfter much publicity, these sightings led the Central Intelligence Agency to establish a panel of scientists headed by Dr. H. P. Robertson, a physicist of the California Institute of Technology, which included various physicists, meteorologists, and engineers, and one astronomer (Hynek). The Robertson Panel first met on January 14, 1953 in order to formulate a response to the overwhelming public interest in UFOs.\n\nRuppelt, Hynek, and others presented the best evidence, including movie footage, that had been collected by Blue Book. After spending 12 hours reviewing 6 years of data, the Robertson Panel concluded that most UFO reports had prosaic explanations, and that all could be explained with further investigation, which they deemed not worth the effort.\n\nIn their final report, they stressed that low-grade, unverifiable UFO reports were overloading intelligence channels, with the risk of missing a genuine conventional threat to the U.S. Therefore, they recommended the Air Force de-emphasize the subject of UFOs and embark on a debunking campaign to lessen public interest. They suggested debunkery through the mass media, including Walt Disney Productions, and using psychologists, astronomers, and celebrities to ridicule the phenomenon and put forward prosaic explanations. Furthermore, civilian UFO groups \"should be watched because of their potentially great influence on mass thinking… The apparent irresponsibility and the possible use of such groups for subversive purposes should be kept in mind.\"\n\nIt is the conclusion of many researchersJerome Clark, The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial, 1998; Detroit: Visible Ink Press, ISBN 1-57859-029-9 that the Robertson Panel was recommending controlling public opinion through a program of official propaganda and spying. They also believe these recommendations helped shape Air Force policy regarding UFO study not only immediately afterward, but also into the present day. There is evidence that the Panel's recommendations were being carried out at least two decades after its conclusions were issued (see the main article for details and citations).\n\nIn December 1953, Joint Army-Navy-Air Force Regulation number 146 made it a crime for military personnel to discuss classified UFO reports with unauthorized persons. Violators faced up to two years in prison and/or fines of up to $10,000.\n\nAftermath of Robertson panel\n\nIn his book (see external links) Ruppelt described the demoralization of the Blue Book staff and the stripping of their investigative duties following the Robertson Panel.\n\nAs an immediate consequence of the Robertson Panel recommendations, in February 1953, the Air Force issued Regulation 200-2, ordering air base officers to publicly discuss UFO incidents only if they were judged to have been solved, and to classify all the unsolved cases to keep them out of the public eye.\n\nThe same month, investigative duties started to be taken on by the newly formed 4602nd Air Intelligence Squadron (AISS) of the Air Defense Command. The 4602nd AISS was tasked with investigating only the most important UFO cases with intelligence or national security implications. These were deliberately siphoned away from Blue Book, leaving Blue Book to deal with the more trivial reports.\n\nGeneral Nathan Twining, who got Project Sign started back in 1947, was now Air Force Chief of Staff. In August 1954, he was to further codify the responsibilities of the 4602nd AISS by issuing an updated Air Force Regulation 200-2. In addition, UFOs (called \"UFOBs\") were defined as \"any airborne object which by performance, aerodynamic characteristics, or unusual features, does not conform to any presently known aircraft or missile type, or which cannot be positively identified as a familiar object.\" Investigation of UFOs was stated to be for the purposes of national security and to ascertain \"technical aspects.\" AFR 200-2 again stated that Blue Book could discuss UFO cases with the media only if they were regarded as having a conventional explanation. If they were unidentified, the media was to be told only that the situation was being analyzed. Blue Book was also ordered to reduce the number of unidentified to a minimum.\n\nAll this was done secretly. The public face of Blue Book continued to be the official Air Force investigation of UFOs, but the reality was it had essentially been reduced to doing very little serious investigation, and had become almost solely a public relations outfit with a debunking mandate. To cite one example, by the end of 1956, the number of cases listed as unsolved had dipped to barely 0.4 percent, from the 20 to 30% only a few years earlier.\n\nEventually, Ruppelt requested reassignment; at his departure in August 1953, his staff had been reduced from more than ten (precise numbers of personnel varied) to just two subordinates and himself. His temporary replacement was a noncommissioned officer. Most who succeeded him as Blue Book director exhibited either apathy or outright hostility to the subject of UFOs, or were hampered by a lack of funding and official support.\n\nUFO investigators often regard Ruppelt's brief tenure at Blue Book as the high-water mark of public Air Force investigations of UFOs, when UFO investigations were treated seriously and had support at high levels. Thereafter, Project Blue Book descended into a new \"Dark Ages\" from which many UFO investigators argue it never emerged. However, Ruppelt later came to embrace the Blue Book perspective that there was nothing extraordinary about UFOs; he even labeled the subject a \"Space Age Myth.\"\n\nThe Captain Hardin era\n\nIn March 1954, Captain Charles Hardin was appointed the head of Blue Book. However, most UFO investigations were conducted by the 4602nd, and Hardin had no objection. Ruppelt wrote that Hardin \"thinks that anyone who is even interested [in UFOs] is crazy. They bore him.\"Jerome Clark, The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial, p468\n\nIn 1955, the Air Force decided that the goal of Blue Book should be not to investigate UFO reports, but rather to reduce the number of unidentified UFO reports to a minimum. By late 1956, the number of unidentified sightings had dropped from the 20-25% of the Ruppelt era, to less than 1%.\n\nThe Captain Gregory era\n\nCaptain George T. Gregory took over as Blue Book's director in 1956. Clark writes that Gregory led Blue Book \"in an even firmer anti-UFO direction than the apathetic Hardin.\" The 4602nd was dissolved, and the 1066th Air Intelligence Service Squadron was charged with UFO investigations.\n\nIn fact, there was actually little or no investigation of UFO reports; a revised AFR 200-2 issued during Gregory's tenure emphasized that unexplained UFO reports must be reduced to a minimum.\n\nOne way that Gregory reduced the number of unexplained UFOs was by simple reclassification. \"Possible cases\" became \"probable\", and \"probable\" cases were upgraded to certainties. By this logic, a possible comet became a probable comet, while a probable comet was flatly declared to have been a misidentified comet. Similarly, if a witness reported an observation of an unusual balloon-like object, Blue Book usually classified it as a balloon, with no research and qualification. These procedures became standard for most of Blue Book's later investigations; see Hynek's comments below.\n\nThe Major Friend era\n\nMajor Robert J. Friend was appointed the head of Blue Book in 1958. Friend made some attempts to reverse the direction Blue Book had taken since 1954. Clark writes that \"Friend's efforts to upgrade the files and catalog sightings according to various observed statistics were frustrated by a lack of funding and assistance.\"\n\nHeartened by Friend's efforts, Hynek organized the first of several meetings between Blue Book staffers and ATIC personnel in 1959. Hynek suggested that some older UFO reports should be reevaluated, with the ostensible aim of moving them from the \"unknown\" to the \"identified\" category. Hynek's plans came to naught.\n\nDuring Friend's tenure, ATIC contemplated passing oversight Blue Book to another Air Force agency, but neither the Air Research and Development Center, nor the Office of Information for the Secretary of the Air Force was interested.\n\nIn 1960, there were U.S. Congressional hearings regarding UFOs. Civilian UFO research group NICAP had publicly charged Blue Book with covering up UFO evidence, and had also acquired a few allies in the U.S. Congress. Blue Book was investigated by the Congress and the CIA, with critics—most notably the civilian UFO group NICAP asserting that Blue Book was lacking as a scientific study. In response, ATIC added personnel (increasing the total personnel to three military personnel, plus civilian secretaries) and increased Blue Book's budget. This seemed to mollify some of Blue Book's critics, that but it was only temporary. A few years later (see below), the criticism would be even louder.\n\nBy the time he was transferred from Blue Book in 1963, Friend thought that Blue Book was effectively useless and ought to be dissolved, even if it caused an outcry amongst the public.\n\nThe Major Quintanilla era\n\nMajor Hector Quintanilla took over as Blue Book's leader in August 1963. He largely continued the debunking efforts, and it was under his direction that Blue Book received some of its sharpest criticism. UFO researcher Jerome Clark goes so far as to write that, by this time, Blue Book had \"lost all credibility.\"Jerome Clark, The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial, p592\n\nPhysicist and UFO researcher Dr. James E. McDonald once flatly declared that Quintanilla was \"not competent\" from either a scientific or an investigative perspective.Ann Druffel; Firestorm: Dr. James E. McDonald's Fight for UFO Science; 2003, Wild Flower Press; ISBN 0-926524-58-5, p63 However, McDonald also stressed that Quintanilla \"shouldn't be held accountable for it\", as he was chosen for his position by a superior officer, and was following orders in directing Blue Book.\n\nBlue Book's explanations of UFO reports were not universally accepted, however, and critics — including some scientists — suggested that Project Blue Book was engaged in questionable research or, worse, perpetrating cover up. This criticism grew especially strong and widespread in the 1960s.\n\nTake for example, the many mostly nighttime UFO reports from the midwestern and southeastern United States in the summer of 1965: Witnesses in Texas reported \"multicolored lights\" and large aerial objects shaped like eggs or diamonds. The Oklahoma Highway Patrol reported that Tinker Air Force Base (near Oklahoma City) had tracked up to four UFOs simultaneously, and that several of them had descended very rapidly: from about 22000 feet to about 4000 feet in just a few seconds, an action well beyond the capabilities of conventional aircraft of the era. John Shockley, a meteorologist from Wichita, Kansas, reported that, using the state Weather Bureau radar, he tracked a number of odd aerial objects flying at altitudes between about 6000 and 9000 feet. These and other reports received wide publicity.\n\nProject Blue Book officially determined the witnesses had mistaken Jupiter or bright stars (such as Rigel or Betelgeuse) for something else.\n\nBlue Book's explanation was widely criticized as inaccurate. Robert Riser, director of the Oklahoma Science and Art Foundation Planetarium offered a strongly worded rebuke of Project Blue Book that was widely circulated: “That is as far from the truth as you can get. These stars and planets are on the opposite side of the earth from Oklahoma City at this time of year. The Air Force must have had its star finder upside-down during August.\"\n\nA newspaper editorial from the Richmond News Leader opined that \"Attempts to dismiss the reported sightings under the rationale as exhibited by Project Bluebook (sic) won't solve the mystery … and serve only to heighten the suspicion that there's something out there that the air force doesn't want us to know about\", while a Wichita-based UPI reporter noted that \"Ordinary radar does not pick up planets and stars.\"\n\nAnother case that Blue Book's critics seized upon was the so-called Portage County UFO Chase, which began at about 5.00am, near Ravenna, Ohio on April 17, 1966. Police officers Dale Spaur and Wilbur Neff spotted what they described as a disc-shaped, silvery object with a bright light emanating from its underside, at about 1000 feet in altitude. They began following the object (which they reported sometimes descended as low as 50 feet), and police from several other jurisdictions were involved in the pursuit. The chase ended about 30 minutes later near Freedom, Pennsylvania, some 85 miles away.\n\nThe UFO chase made national news, and the police submitted detailed reports to Blue Book. Five days later, following brief interviews with only one of the police officers (but none of the other ground witnesses), Blue Book's director, Major Hector Quintanilla, announced their conclusions: The police (one of them an Air Force gunner during the Korean War) had first chased a communications satellite, then the planet Venus.\n\nThis conclusion was widely derided, and was strenuously rejected by the police officers. In his dissenting conclusion, Hynek described Blue Book's conclusions as absurd: in their reports, several of the police had unknowingly described the moon, Venus and the UFO, though they unknowingly described Venus as a bright \"star\" very near the moon. Ohio Congressman William Stanton said that \"The Air Force has suffered a great loss of prestige in this community … Once people entrusted with the public welfare no longer think the people can handle the truth, then the people, in return, will no longer trust the government.\"\n\nIn September 1968, Hynek received a letter from Colonel Raymond Sleeper of the Foreign Technology Division. Sleeper noted that Hynek had publicly accused Blue Book of shoddy science, and further asked Hynek to offer advice on how Blue Book could improve its scientific methodology. Hynek was to later declare that Sleeper's letter was \"the first time in my 20 year association with the air force as scientific consultant that I had been officially asked for criticism and advice [regarding] … the UFO problem.\"Jerome Clark, The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial, p477\n\nHynek wrote a detailed response, dated October 7, 1968, suggesting several areas where Blue Book could improve. In part, he wrote:\n\nDespite Sleeper's request for criticism, none of Hynek's commentary resulted in any substantial changes in Blue Book.\n\nQuintanilla's own perspective on the project is documented in his manuscript, \"[http://www.nidsci.org/pdf/quintanilla.pdf UFOs, An Air Force Dilemma].” Lt. Col Quintanilla wrote the manuscript in 1975, but it was not published until after his death. Quintanilla states in the text that he personally believed it arrogant to think human beings were the only intelligent life in the universe. Yet, while he found it highly likely that intelligent life existed beyond earth, he had no hard evidence of any extra terrestrial visitation. \n\nCongressional Hearing\n\nIn 1966, a string of UFO sightings in Massachusetts and New Hampshire provoked a Congressional Hearing by the House Committee on Armed Services. According to attachments to the hearing, the Air Force had at first stated that the sightings were the result of a training exercise happening in the area. But NICAP, the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena, reported that there was no record of a plane flying at the time the sightings occurred. Another report alleged that the UFO was actually a flying billboard promoting the gasoline. Raymond Fowler (of NICAP) added his own interviews with the locals, who saw Air Force officers confiscating newspapers with the story of UFOs and telling them not to report what they had seen. Two police officers who had witnessed the UFOs, Eugene Bertrand and David Hunt, wrote a letter to Major Quintanilla stating that they felt their reputations were destroyed by the Air Force. \"It was impossible to mistake what we saw for any kind of military operation, regardless of altitude,\" the irritated officers wrote, adding that there was no way it could have been a balloon or helicopter. \nAccording to Secretary Harold Brown of the Air Force, Blue Book consisted of three steps: investigation, analysis, and the distribution of information gathered to interested parties. After Brown gave permission, the press were invited into the hearing. \nBy the time of the hearing, Blue Book had identified and explained 95% of the reported UFO sightings. None of these were extraterrestrial or a threat to national security. Brown himself proclaimed, \"I know of no one of scientific standing or executive standing with a detailed knowledge of this, in our organization who believes that they came from extraterrestrial sources.\" Dr. J. Allen Hynek, a science consultant to Blue Book, suggested in an unedited statement that a \"civilian panel of physical and social scientists\" be formed \"for the express purpose of determining whether a major problem really exist\" in regards to UFOs. Hynek remarked that he has \"not seen any evidence to confirm\" extraterrestrials, \"nor do I know any competent scientist who has, or who believes that any kind of extraterrestrial intelligence is involved.\" \n\nThe Condon Committee\n\nCriticism of Blue Book continued to grow through the mid-1960s. NICAP's membership ballooned to about 15,000, and the group charged the U.S. Government with a cover-up of UFO evidence.\n\nFollowing U.S. Congressional hearings, the Condon Committee was established in 1966, ostensibly as a neutral scientific research body. However, the Committee became mired in controversy, with some members charging director Edward U. Condon with bias, and critics would question the validity and the scientific rigor of the Condon Report.\n\nIn the end, the Condon Committee suggested that there was nothing extraordinary about UFOs, and while it left a minority of cases unexplained, the report also argued that further research would not be likely to yield significant results.\n\nThe End\n\nIn response to the Condon Committee's conclusions, Secretary of the Air Force Robert C. Seamans, Jr. announced that Blue Book would soon be closed, because further funding \"cannot be justified either on the grounds of national security or in the interest of science.\"Jerome Clark, The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial, p480 The last publicly acknowledged day of Blue Book operations was December 17, 1969. However, researcher Brad Sparks, citing research from the May, 1970 issue of NICAP's UFO Investigator, reports that the last day of Blue Book activity was actually January 30, 1970. According to Sparks, Air Force officials wanted to keep the Air Force's reaction to the UFO problem from overlapping into a fourth decade, and thus altered the date of Blue Book's closure in official files.\n\nBlue Book's files were sent to the Air Force Archives at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama. Major David Shea was to later claim that Maxwell was chosen because it was \"accessible yet not too inviting.\"\n\nUltimately, Project Blue Book stated that UFOs sightings were generated as a result of:\n\n*A mild form of mass hysteria.\n*Individuals who fabricate such reports to perpetrate a hoax or seek publicity.\n*Psychopathological persons.\n*Misidentification of various conventional objects.\n\nThese official conclusions were directly contradicted by the USAF's own commissioned Blue Book Special Report #14. Psychological factors and hoaxes actually constituted less than 10% of all cases and 22% of all sightings, particularly the better-documented cases, remained unsolved. (See section below for details and Identified flying object.)\n\nAs of April 2003, the USAF has publicly indicated that there are no immediate plans to re-establish any official government UFO study programs.[http://web.archive.org/web/20030624053806/http://www.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?fsID\n188 USAF Fact Sheet 95-03]\n\nUSAF current official statement on UFOs\n\nBelow is the United States Air Force's official statement regarding UFOs, as noted in USAF Fact Sheet 95-03:\n\nPost-Blue Book U.S.A.F. UFO activities\n\nAn Air Force memorandum (released via the Freedom of Information Act) dated October 20, 1969 and signed by Brigadier General C.H. Bolander states that even after Blue Book was dissolved, that \"reports of UFOs\" would still \"continue to be handled through the standard Air Force procedure designed for this purpose.\" Furthermore, wrote Bolander, \"Reports of unidentified flying objects which could affect national security … are not part of the Blue Book system.\"Jenny Randles and Peter Houghe; The Complete Book of UFOs: An Investigation into Alien Contact and Encounters; Sterling Publishing Co, Inc, 1994; ISBN 0-8069-8132-6, p179 To date, these other investigation channels, agencies or groups are unknown.\n\nAdditionally, Blum reports that Freedom of Information Act requests show that the U.S. Air Force has continued to catalog and track UFO sightings, particularly a series of dozens of UFO encounters from the late 1960s to the mid-1970s that occurred at U.S. military facilities with nuclear weapons. Blum writes that some of these official documents depart drastically from the normally dry and bureaucratic wording of government paperwork, making obvious the sense of \"terror\" that these UFO incidents inspired in many U.S.A.F. personnel.\n\nProject Blue Book Special Report No. 14\n\nIn late December 1951, Ruppelt met with members of the Battelle Memorial Institute, a think tank based in Columbus, Ohio. Ruppelt wanted their experts to assist them in making the Air Force UFO study more scientific. It was the Battelle Institute that devised the standardized reporting form. Starting in late March 1952, the Institute started analyzing existing sighting reports and encoding about 30 report characteristics onto IBM punched cards for computer analysis.\n\nProject Blue Book Special Report No. 14 was their massive statistical analysis of Blue Book cases to date, some 3200 by the time the report was completed in 1954, after Ruppelt had left Blue Book. Even today, it represents the largest such study ever undertaken. Battelle employed four scientific analysts, who sought to divide cases into \"knowns\", \"unknowns\", and a third category of \"insufficient information.\" They also broke down knowns and unknowns into four categories of quality, from excellent to poor. E.g., cases deemed excellent might typically involve experienced witnesses such as airline pilots or trained military personnel, multiple witnesses, corroborating evidence such as radar contact or photographs, etc. In order for a case to be deemed a \"known\", only two analysts had to independently agree on a solution. However, for a case to be called an \"unknown\", all four analysts had to agree. Thus the criterion for an \"unknown\" was quite stringent.\n\nIn addition, sightings were broken down into six different characteristics — color, number, duration of observation, brightness, shape, and speed — and then these characteristics were compared between knowns and unknowns to see if there was a statistically significant difference.\n\nThe main results of the statistical analysis were:\n\n* About 69% of the cases were judged known or identified (38% were considered conclusively identified while 31% were still \"doubtfully\" explained); about 9% fell into insufficient information. About 22% were deemed \"unknown\", down from the earlier 28% value of the Air Force studies.\n* In the known category, 86% of the knowns were aircraft, balloons, or had astronomical explanations. Only 1.5% of all cases were judged to be psychological or \"crackpot\" cases. A \"miscellaneous\" category comprised 8% of all cases and included possible hoaxes.\n* The higher the quality of the case, the more likely it was to be classified unknown. 35% of the excellent cases were deemed unknowns, as opposed to only 18% of the poorest cases.\n* In all six studied sighting characteristics, the unknowns were different from the knowns at a highly statistically significant level: in five of the six measures the odds of knowns differing from unknowns by chance was only 1% or less. When all six characteristics were considered together, the probability of a match between knowns and unknowns was less than 1 in a billion.\n\n(More detailed statistics can be found at Identified flying objects.)\n\nDespite this, the summary section of the Battelle Institute's final report declared it was \"highly improbable that any of the reports of unidentified aerial objects... represent observations of technological developments outside the range of present-day knowledge.\" A number of researchers, including Dr. Bruce Maccabee, who extensively reviewed the data, have noted that the conclusions of the analysts were usually at odds with their own statistical results, displayed in 240 charts, tables, graphs and maps. Some conjecture that the analysts may simply have had trouble accepting their own results or may have written the conclusions to satisfy the new political climate within Blue Book following the Robertson Panel.\n\nWhen the Air Force finally made Special Report #14 public in October 1955, it was claimed that the report scientifically proved that UFOs did not exist. Critics of this claim note that the report actually proved that the \"unknowns\" were distinctly different from the \"knowns\" at a very high statistical significance level. The Air Force also incorrectly claimed that only 3% of the cases studied were unknowns, instead of the actual 22%. They further claimed that the residual 3% would probably disappear if more complete data were available. Critics counter that this ignored the fact that the analysts had already thrown such cases into the category of \"insufficient information\", whereas both \"knowns\" and \"unknowns\" were deemed to have sufficient information to make a determination. Also the \"unknowns\" tended to represent the higher quality cases, q.e. reports that already had better information and witnesses.\n\nThe result of the monumental BMI study were echoed by a 1979 French GEPAN report which stated that about a quarter of over 1,600 closely studied UFO cases defied explanation, stating, in part, \"These cases … pose a real question.\"Jenny Randles and Peter Houghe; The Complete Book of UFOs: An Investigation into Alien Contact and Encounters; Sterling Publishing Co, Inc, 1994; ISBN 0-8069-8132-6, p202 When GEPAN's successor SEPRA closed in 2004, 5800 cases had been analyzed, and the percentage of inexplicable unknowns had dropped to about 14%. The head of SEPRA, Dr. Jean-Jacques Velasco, found the evidence of extraterrestrial origins so convincing in these remaining unknowns, that he wrote a book about it in 2005. \n\nHynek's criticism\n\nHynek was an associate member of the Robertson Panel, which recommended that UFOs needed debunking. A few years later, however, Hynek's opinions about UFOs changed, and he thought they represented an unsolved mystery deserving scientific scrutiny. As the only scientist involved with US Government UFO studies from the beginning to the end, he could offer a unique perspective on Projects Sign, Grudge, and Blue Book.\n\nAfter what he described as a promising beginning with a potential for scientific research, Hynek grew increasingly disenchanted with Blue Book during his tenure with the project, leveling accusations of indifference, incompetence, and of shoddy research on the part of Air Force personnel. Hynek notes that during its existence, critics dubbed Blue Book \"The Society for the Explanation of the Uninvestigated.\"J. Allen Hynek; The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry; 1972; Henry Regenery Company, p180\n\nBlue Book was headed by Ruppelt, then Captain Hardin, Captain Gregory, Major Friend, and finally Major Hector Quintanilla. Hynek had kind words only for Ruppelt and Friend. Of Ruppelt, he wrote \"In my contacts with him I found him to be honest and seriously puzzled about the whole phenomenon.\"J. Allen Hynek; The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry; 1972; Henry Regenery Company, p175 Of Friend, he wrote \"Of all the officers I worked with in Blue Book, Colonel Friend earned my respect. Whatever private views he may have held, he was a total and practical realist, and sitting where he could see the scoreboard, he recognized the limitations of his office but conducted himself with dignity and a total lack of the bombast that characterized several of the other Blue Book heads.\"J. Allen Hynek; The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry; 1972; Henry Regenery Company, p187\n\nHe held Quintanilla in especially low regard: \"Quintanilla's method was simple: disregard any evidence that was counter to his hypothesis.\"J. Allen Hynek; The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry; 1972; Henry Regenery Company, p103 Hynek wrote that during Air Force Major Hector Quintanilla's tenure as Blue Book's director, “the flag of the utter nonsense school was flying at its highest on the mast.” Hynek reported that Sergeant David Moody, one of Quintanilla's subordinates, “epitomized the conviction-before-trial method. Anything that he didn't understand or didn't like was immediately put into the psychological category, which meant ‘crackpot'.”\n\nHynek reported bitter exchanges with Moody when the latter refused to research UFO sightings thoroughly, describing Moody as “the master of the possible: possible balloon, possible aircraft, possible birds, which then became, by his own hand (and I argued with him violently at times) the probable.”\n\nProject Blue Book in Fiction\n\nProject U.F.O.\n\nProject Blue Book was the inspiration for the 1978–1979 TV show Project U.F.O. (which was known as Project Blue Book in some countries), which was supposedly based on Project Blue Book cases. However, the show frequently went against the actual project conclusions, suggesting on many occasions that some sightings were real extraterrestrials.\n\nTwin Peaks\n\nProject Blue Book played a major role in the second season of the 1990–1991 TV series Twin Peaks. Major Garland Briggs, an Air Force officer who worked on the program, approaches protagonist Dale Cooper and reveals that Cooper's name turned up in an otherwise nonsensical radio transmission intercepted by the Air Force, which inexplicably originated from the woods surrounding the town of Twin Peaks. As the season progresses, it is revealed that the source of the transmission is the transdimensional realm of the Black Lodge, inhabited by beings which feed on the human emotions of pain and suffering; it eventually comes out that Briggs worked with Cooper's rival, corrupt FBI agent Windom Earle, on Project Blue Book, and that the two men apparently uncovered evidence of the Lodge during the course of their work.\n\nGalactica 1980\n\nEvery episode of the original Battlestar Galactica spin-off series Galactica 1980 ended with a short statement about the U.S. Air Force's 1969 Project Blue Book findings that UFOs are not proven to exist and \"are not a threat to national security\".", "An unidentified flying object, or UFO, in its most general definition, is any apparent anomaly in the sky that is not identifiable as a known object or phenomenon. Culturally, UFOs are associated with claims of visitation by extraterrestrial life or government-related conspiracy theories, and have become popular subjects in fiction. While UFOs are often later identified, sometimes identification may not be possible owing to the usually low quality of evidence related to UFO sightings (generally anecdotal evidence and eyewitness accounts).\n\nStories of fantastical celestial apparitions have been told since antiquity, but the term \"UFO\" (or \"UFOB\") was officially created in 1953 by the United States Air Force (USAF) to serve as a catch-all for all such reports. In its initial definition, the USAF stated that a \"UFOB\" was \"any airborne object which by performance, aerodynamic characteristics, or unusual features, does not conform to any presently known aircraft or missile type, or which cannot be positively identified as a familiar object.\" Accordingly, the term was initially restricted to that fraction of cases which remained unidentified after investigation, as the USAF was interested in potential national security reasons and/or \"technical aspects\" (see Air Force Regulation 200-2).\n\nDuring the late 1940s and through the 1950s, UFOs were often referred to popularly as \"flying saucers\" or \"flying discs\". The term UFO became more widespread during the 1950s, at first in technical literature, but later in popular use. UFOs garnered considerable interest during the Cold War, an era associated with a heightened concern for national security. Various studies have concluded that the phenomenon does not represent a threat to national security nor does it contain anything worthy of scientific pursuit (e.g., 1951 Flying Saucer Working Party, 1953 CIA Robertson Panel, USAF Project Blue Book, Condon Committee).\n\nTerminology\n\nThe Oxford English Dictionary defines a UFO as \"An unidentified flying object; a 'flying saucer'.\" The first published book to use the word was authored by Donald E. Keyhoe. \n\nThe acronym \"UFO\" was coined by Captain Edward J. Ruppelt, who headed Project Blue Book, then the USAF's official investigation of UFOs. He wrote, \"Obviously the term 'flying saucer' is misleading when applied to objects of every conceivable shape and performance. For this reason the military prefers the more general, if less colorful, name: unidentified flying objects. UFO (pronounced Yoo-foe) for short.\" Other phrases that were used officially and that predate the UFO acronym include \"flying flapjack\", \"flying disc\", \"unexplained flying discs\", \"unidentifiable object\", and \"flying saucer\". \n\nThe phrase \"flying saucer\" had gained widespread attention after the summer of 1947. On June 24, a civilian pilot named Kenneth Arnold reported seeing nine objects flying in formation near Mount Rainier. Arnold timed the sighting and estimated the speed of discs to be over 1200 mph. At the time, he described the objects' shape as being somewhat disc-like or saucer-like, leading to newspaper accounts of \"flying saucers\" and \"flying discs\".\n\nIn popular usage the term UFO came to be used to refer to claims of alien spacecraft. and because of the public and media ridicule associated with the topic, some investigators prefer to use such terms as unidentified aerial phenomenon (or UAP) or anomalous phenomena, as in the title of the National Aviation Reporting Center on Anomalous Phenomena (NARCAP). \n\nStudies\n\nStudies have established that the majority of UFO observations are misidentified conventional objects or natural phenomena—most commonly aircraft, balloons, noctilucent clouds, nacreous clouds, or astronomical objects such as meteors or bright planets with a small percentage even being hoaxes.For example, the USAF's Project Blue Book concluded that less than 2 % of reported UFOs were \"psychological\" or hoaxes; Allan Hendry's study for CUFOS had less than 1 %. Between 5% and 20% of reported sightings are not explained, and therefore can be classified as unidentified in the strictest sense. While proponents of the extraterrestrial hypothesis (ETH) suggest that these unexplained reports are of alien spacecraft, the null hypothesis cannot be excluded that these reports are simply other more prosaic phenomena that cannot be identified due to lack of complete information or due to the necessary subjectivity of the reports.\n\nWhile UFOs have been the subject of extensive investigation by various governments and although a few scientists have supported the extraterrestrial hypothesis, almost no scientific papers about UFOs have been published in peer-reviewed journals. There was, in the past, some debate in the scientific community about whether any scientific investigation into UFO sightings is warranted with the general conclusion being that the phenomenon was not worthy of serious investigation beyond a cultural artifact. \n\nThe void left by the lack of institutional scientific study has given rise to independent researchers and groups, including the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP) in the mid-20th century and, more recently, the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) and the Center for UFO Studies (CUFOS). The term \"Ufology\" is used to describe the collective efforts of those who study reports and associated evidence of unidentified flying objects. \n\nUFOs have become a prevalent theme in modern culture, and the social phenomena have been the subject of academic research in sociology and psychology.\n\nEarly history\n\nUnexplained aerial observations have been reported throughout history. Some were undoubtedly astronomical in nature: comets, bright meteors, one or more of the five planets that can be seen with the naked eye, planetary conjunctions, or atmospheric optical phenomena such as parhelia and lenticular clouds. An example is Halley's Comet, which was recorded first by Chinese astronomers in 240 BC and possibly as early as 467 BC. Such sightings throughout history often were treated as supernatural portents, angels, or other religious omens. Some current-day UFO researchers have noticed similarities between some religious symbols in medieval paintings and UFO reports though the canonical and symbolic character of such images is documented by art historians placing more conventional religious interpretations on such images. \n\n* On January 25, 1878, the Denison Daily News printed an article in which John Martin, a local farmer, had reported seeing a large, dark, circular object resembling a balloon flying \"at wonderful speed.\" Martin, according to the newspaper account, said it appeared to be about the size of a saucer, the first known use of the word \"saucer\" in association with a UFO. \n* In April 1897 thousands of people reported seeing \"airships\" in various parts of the United States. Many signed affidavits. Scores of people even reported talking to the pilots. Thomas Edison was asked his opinion, and said, \"You can take it from me that it is a pure fake.\" \n* On February 28, 1904, there was a sighting by three crew members on the USS Supply 300 mi west of San Francisco, reported by Lieutenant Frank Schofield, later to become Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Battle Fleet. Schofield wrote of three bright red egg-shaped and circular objects flying in echelon formation that approached beneath the cloud layer, then changed course and \"soared\" above the clouds, departing directly away from the earth after two to three minutes. The largest had an apparent size of about six Suns, he said. \n* The three earliest known pilot UFO sightings, of 1,305 similar sitings cataloged by NARCAP, took place in 1916 and 1926. On January 31, 1916, a UK pilot near Rochford reported a row of lights, resembling lighted windows on a railway carriage, that rose and disappeared. In January 1926 a pilot reported six \"flying manhole covers\" between Wichita, Kansas, and Colorado Springs, Colorado. In late September 1926 an airmail pilot over Nevada said he had been forced to land by a huge, wingless, cylindrical object. \n* On August 5, 1926, while traveling in the Humboldt Mountains of Tibet's Kokonor region, Russian explorer Nicholas Roerich reported, members of his expedition saw \"something big and shiny reflecting the sun, like a huge oval moving at great speed. Crossing our camp the thing changed in its direction from south to southwest. And we saw how it disappeared in the intense blue sky. We even had time to take our field glasses and saw quite distinctly an oval form with shiny surface, one side of which was brilliant from the sun.\" Another description by Roerich was of a \"shiny body flying from north to south. Field glasses are at hand. It is a huge body. One side glows in the sun. It is oval in shape. Then it somehow turns in another direction and disappears in the southwest.\" \n* In the Pacific and European theatres during World War II, \"foo fighters\" (metallic spheres, balls of light and other shapes that followed aircraft) were reported and on occasion photographed by Allied and Axis pilots. Some proposed Allied explanations at the time included St. Elmo's fire, the planet Venus, hallucinations from oxygen deprivation, or German secret weapons. \n* In 1946 more than 2,000 reports were collected, primarily by the Swedish military, of unidentified aerial objects over the Scandinavian nations, along with isolated reports from France, Portugal, Italy and Greece. The objects were referred to as \"Russian hail\" and later as \"ghost rockets\" because it was thought that the mysterious objects were possibly Russian tests of captured German V1 or V2 rockets. Although most were thought to be such natural phenomena as meteors, more than 200 were tracked on radar by the Swedish military and deemed to be \"real physical objects.\" In a 1948 top secret document, Swedish authorities advised the USAF Europe that some of their investigators believed these craft to be extraterrestrial in origin. \n\nInvestigations\n\nUFOs have been subject to investigations over the years that varied widely in scope and scientific rigor. Governments or independent academics in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Japan, Peru, France, Belgium, Sweden, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay, Mexico, Spain, and the Soviet Union are known to have investigated UFO reports at various times.\n\nAmong the best known government studies are the ghost rockets investigation by the Swedish military (1946–1947), Project Blue Book, previously Project Sign and Project Grudge, conducted by the USAF from 1947 until 1969, the secret U.S. Army/Air Force Project Twinkle investigation into green fireballs (1948–1951), the secret USAF Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14 by the Battelle Memorial Institute, and the Brazilian Air Force's 1977 Operação Prato (Operation Saucer). France has had an ongoing investigation (GEPAN/SEPRA/GEIPAN) within its space agency Centre national d'études spatiales (CNES) since 1977; the government of Uruguay has had a similar investigation since 1989.\n\nProject Sign\n\nProject Sign in 1948 produced a highly classified finding (see Estimate of the Situation) that the best UFO reports probably had an extraterrestrial explanation. A top secret Swedish military opinion given to the USAF in 1948 stated that some of their analysts believed that the 1946 ghost rockets and later flying saucers had extraterrestrial origins. (For document, see Ghost rockets.) In 1954 German rocket scientist Hermann Oberth revealed that an internal West German government investigation, which he headed, had arrived at an extraterrestrial conclusion, but this study was never made public.\n\nProject Grudge\n\nProject Sign was dismantled and became Project Grudge at the end of 1948. Angered by the low quality of investigations by Grudge, the Air Force Director of Intelligence reorganized it as Project Blue Book in late 1951, placing Ruppelt in charge. Blue Book closed down in 1970, using the Condon Committee's negative conclusion as a rationale, thus ending official Air Force UFO investigations. However, a 1969 USAF document, known as the Bolender memo, along with later government documents, revealed that non-public U.S. government UFO investigations continued after 1970. The Bolender memo first stated that \"reports of unidentified flying objects that could affect national security ... are not part of the Blue Book system,\" indicating that more serious UFO incidents already were handled outside the public Blue Book investigation. The memo then added, \"reports of UFOs which could affect national security would continue to be handled through the standard Air Force procedures designed for this purpose.\"For example, current USAF general reporting procedures are in [http://www.theblackvault.com/documents/ufos/AFI10-206.pdf Air Force Instruction (AFI)10-206]. Section 5.7.3 (p. 64) lists sightings of \"unidentified flying objects\" and \"aircraft of unconventional design\" as separate categories from potentially hostile but conventional, unidentified aircraft, missiles, surface vessels, or submarines. Additionally, \"unidentified objects\" detected by missile warning systems, creating a potential risk of nuclear war, are covered by Rule 5E (p.35). In addition, in the late 1960s a chapter on UFOs in the Space Sciences course at the U.S. Air Force Academy gave serious consideration to possible extraterrestrial origins. When word of the curriculum became public, the Air Force in 1970 issued a statement to the effect that the book was outdated and that cadets instead were being informed of the Condon Report's negative conclusion. \n\nUSAF Regulation 200-2\n\nAir Force Regulation 200-2, issued in 1953 and 1954, defined an Unidentified Flying Object (\"UFOB\") as \"any airborne object which by performance, aerodynamic characteristics, or unusual features, does not conform to any presently known aircraft or missile type, or which cannot be positively identified as a familiar object.\" The regulation also said UFOBs were to be investigated as a \"possible threat to the security of the United States\" and \"to determine technical aspects involved.\" The regulation went on to say that \"it is permissible to inform news media representatives on UFOB's when the object is positively identified as a familiar object,\" but added: \"For those objects which are not explainable, only the fact that ATIC [Air Technical Intelligence Center] will analyze the data is worthy of release, due to many unknowns involved.\"\n\nProject Blue Book\n\nJ. Allen Hynek, a trained astronomer who served as a scientific advisor for Project Blue Book, was initially skeptical of UFO reports, but eventually came to the conclusion that many of them could not be satisfactorily explained and was highly critical of what he described as \"the cavalier disregard by Project Blue Book of the principles of scientific investigation.\" Leaving government work, he founded the privately funded CUFOS, to whose work he devoted the rest of his life. Other private groups studying the phenomenon include the MUFON, a grass roots organization whose investigator's handbooks go into great detail on the documentation of alleged UFO sightings.\n\nLike Hynek, Jacques Vallée, a scientist and prominent UFO researcher, has pointed to what he believes is the scientific deficiency of most UFO research, including government studies. He complains of the mythology and cultism often associated with the phenomenon, but alleges that several hundred professional scientists—a group both he and Hynek have termed \"the invisible college\"—continue to study UFOs in private.\n\nScientific studies\n\nThe study of UFOs has received little support in mainstream scientific literature. Official studies ended in the U.S. in December 1969, following the statement by the government scientist Edward Condon that further study of UFOs could not be justified on grounds of scientific advancement. The Condon Report and its conclusions were endorsed by the National Academy of Scientists, of which Condon was a member. On the other hand, a scientific review by the UFO subcommittee of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) disagreed with Condon's conclusion, noting that at least 30 percent of the cases studied remained unexplained and that scientific benefit might be gained by continued study.\n\nCritics argue that all UFO evidence is anecdotal and can be explained as prosaic natural phenomena. Defenders of UFO research counter that knowledge of observational data, other than what is reported in the popular media, is limited in the scientific community and that further study is needed. \n\nNo official government investigation has ever publicly concluded that UFOs are indisputably real, physical objects, extraterrestrial in origin, or of concern to national defense. These same negative conclusions also have been found in studies that were highly classified for many years, such as the UK's Flying Saucer Working Party, Project Condign, the U.S. CIA-sponsored Robertson Panel, the U.S. military investigation into the green fireballs from 1948 to 1951, and the Battelle Memorial Institute study for the USAF from 1952 to 1955 (Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14).\n\nSome public government reports have acknowledged the possibility of physical reality of UFOs, but have stopped short of proposing extraterrestrial origins, though not dismissing the possibility entirely. Examples are the Belgian military investigation into large triangles over their airspace in 1989–1991 and the 2009 Uruguayan Air Force study conclusion (see below).\n\nSome private studies have been neutral in their conclusions, but argued that the inexplicable core cases call for continued scientific study. Examples are the Sturrock panel study of 1998 and the 1970 AIAA review of the Condon Report.\n\nUnited States\n\nU.S. investigations into UFOs include:\n\n* The Interplanetary Phenomenon Unit (IPU), established by the U.S. Army sometime in the 1940s, and about which little is known. In 1987, British UFO researcher Timothy Good received from the Army's director of counter-intelligence a letter confirming the existence of the IPU. The letter stated that \"the aforementioned Army unit was disestablished during the late 1950s and never reactivated. All records pertaining to this unit were surrendered to the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations in conjunction with operation BLUEBOOK.\" The IPU records have never been released. \n* Project Blue Book, previously Project Sign and Project Grudge, conducted by the USAF from 1947 until 1969\n* The secret U.S. Army/Air Force Project Twinkle investigation into green fireballs (1948–1951)\n* Ghost rockets investigations by the Swedish, UK, U.S., and Greek militaries (1946–1947)\n* The secret CIA Office of Scientific Investigation (OS/I) study (1952–53)\n* The secret CIA Robertson Panel (1953)\n* The secret USAF Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14 by the Battelle Memorial Institute (1951–1954)\n* The Brookings Report (1960), commissioned by NASA\n* The public Condon Committee (1966–1968)\n* The private, internal RAND Corporation study (1968) \n* The private Sturrock panel (1998)\n\nThousands of documents released under FOIA also indicate that many U.S. intelligence agencies collected (and still collect) information on UFOs. These agencies include the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), FBI, CIA, National Security Agency (NSA), as well as military intelligence agencies of the Army and U.S. Navy, in addition to the Air Force.Many of these documents are now online at the FOIA websites of these agencies such as the , as well as private websites such as [http://www.theblackvault.com/ The Black Vault], which has an archive of several thousand U.S. government UFO-related documents from the USAF, Army, CIA, DIA, DOD, and NSA.\n\nThe investigation of UFOs has also attracted many civilians, who in the U.S formed research groups such as NICAP (active 1956–1980), Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (APRO) (active 1952–1988), MUFON (active 1969–), and CUFOS (active 1973–).\n\nIn November 2011, the White House released an official response to two petitions asking the U.S. government to acknowledge formally that aliens have visited this planet and to disclose any intentional withholding of government interactions with extraterrestrial beings. According to the response, \"The U.S. government has no evidence that any life exists outside our planet, or that an extraterrestrial presence has contacted or engaged any member of the human race.\" Also, according to the response, there is \"no credible information to suggest that any evidence is being hidden from the public's eye.\" The response further noted that efforts, like SETI and NASA's Kepler space telescope and Mars Science Laboratory, continue looking for signs of life. The response noted \"odds are pretty high\" that there may be life on other planets but \"the odds of us making contact with any of them—especially any intelligent ones—are extremely small, given the distances involved.\"\n\nPost-1947 sightings\n\nFollowing the large U.S. surge in sightings in June and early July 1947, on July 9, 1947, United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) intelligence, in cooperation with the FBI, began a formal investigation into selected sightings with characteristics that could not be immediately rationalized, which included Kenneth Arnold's and that of the United Airlines crew. The USAAF used \"all of its top scientists\" to determine whether \"such a phenomenon could, in fact, occur.\" The research was \"being conducted with the thought that the flying objects might be a celestial phenomenon,\" or that \"they might be a foreign body mechanically devised and controlled.\" Three weeks later in a preliminary defense estimate, the air force investigation decided that, \"This 'flying saucer' situation is not all imaginary or seeing too much in some natural phenomenon. Something is really flying around.\" \n\nA further review by the intelligence and technical divisions of the Air Materiel Command at Wright Field reached the same conclusion. It reported that \"the phenomenon is something real and not visionary or fictitious,\" that there were objects in the shape of a disc, metallic in appearance, and as big as man-made aircraft. They were characterized by \"extreme rates of climb [and] maneuverability,\" general lack of noise, absence of trail, occasional formation flying, and \"evasive\" behavior \"when sighted or contacted by friendly aircraft and radar,\" suggesting a controlled craft. It was therefore recommended in late September 1947 that an official Air Force investigation be set up to investigate the phenomenon. It was also recommended that other government agencies should assist in the investigation.The so-called [http://www.majesticdocuments.com/pdf/twiningopinionamc_23sept47.pdf Twining memo of Sept. 23, 1947], by future USAF Chief of Staff, General Nathan Twining, specifically recommended intelligence cooperation with the Army, Navy, Atomic Energy Commission, the Defense Department's Joint Research and Development Board, Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), Project RAND, and the Nuclear Energy for the Propulsion of Aircraft (NEPA) project.\n\nProject Sign\n\nThis led to the creation of the Air Force's Project Sign at the end of 1947, one of the earliest government studies to come to a secret extraterrestrial conclusion. In August 1948, Sign investigators wrote a top-secret intelligence estimate to that effect, but the Air Force Chief of Staff Hoyt Vandenberg ordered it destroyed. The existence of this suppressed report was revealed by several insiders who had read it, such as astronomer and USAF consultant J. Allen Hynek and Capt. Edward J. Ruppelt, the first head of the USAF's Project Blue Book. \n\nAnother highly classified U.S. study was conducted by the CIA's Office of Scientific Investigation (OS/I) in the latter half of 1952 in response to orders from the National Security Council (NSC). This study concluded UFOs were real physical objects of potential threat to national security. One OS/I memo to the CIA Director (DCI) in December read: the reports of incidents convince us that there is something going on that must have immediate attention ... Sightings of unexplained objects at great altitudes and traveling at high speeds in the vicinity of major U.S. defense installations are of such a nature that they are not attributable to natural phenomena or any known types of aerial vehicles. The matter was considered so urgent that OS/I drafted a memorandum from the DCI to the NSC proposing that the NSC establish an investigation of UFOs as a priority project throughout the intelligence and the defense research and development community. It also urged the DCI to establish an external research project of top-level scientists, now known as the Robertson Panel to analyze the problem of UFOs. The OS/I investigation was called off after the Robertson Panel's negative conclusions in January 1953. \n\nThe Condon Committee\n\nA public research effort conducted by the Condon Committee for the USAF, which arrived at a negative conclusion in 1968, marked the end of the U.S. government's official investigation of UFOs, though various government intelligence agencies continue unofficially to investigate or monitor the situation.See, e.g., the 1976 Tehran UFO incident where a Defense Intelligence Agency report on the event had a distribution list that included the White House, Secretary of State, Joint Chiefs of Staff, National Security Agency (NSA), and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Several thousand UFO-related pages of more recent vintage from the CIA, NSA, DIA, and other agencies have also been released and can be viewed online.[http://community.theblackvault.com/articles/entry/All-UFO-Documents-From-]\n\nControversy has surrounded the Condon Report, both before and after it was released. It has been observed that the report was \"harshly criticized by numerous scientists, particularly at the powerful AIAA ... [which] recommended moderate, but continuous scientific work on UFOs.\" In an address to the AAAS, James E. McDonald stated that he believed science had failed to mount adequate studies of the problem and criticized the Condon Report and earlier studies by the USAF as scientifically deficient. He also questioned the basis for Condon's conclusions and argued that the reports of UFOs have been \"laughed out of scientific court.\" J. Allen Hynek, an astronomer who worked as a USAF consultant from 1948, sharply criticized the Condon Committee Report and later wrote two nontechnical books that set forth the case for continuing to investigate UFO reports.\n\nRuppelt recounted his experiences with Project Blue Book, a USAF investigation that preceded Condon's. \n\nNotable cases\n\n*The Roswell UFO incident (1947) involved New Mexico residents, local law enforcement officers, and the U.S. military, the latter of whom allegedly collected physical evidence from the UFO crash site.\n*The Mantell UFO incident January 7, 1948\n*The Betty and Barney Hill abduction (1961) was the first reported abduction incident.\n*In the Kecksburg UFO incident, Pennsylvania (1965), residents reported seeing a bell shaped object crash in the area. Police officers, and possibly military personnel, were sent to investigate.\n*The Travis Walton abduction case (1975): The movie Fire in the Sky (1993) was based on this event, but embellished greatly the original account.\n*The \"Phoenix Lights\" March 13, 1997\n*2006 O'Hare International Airport UFO sighting\n\nCanada\n\nIn Canada, the Department of National Defence has dealt with reports, sightings and investigations of UFOs across Canada. In addition to conducting investigations into crop circles in Duhamel, Alberta, it still considers \"unsolved\" the Falcon Lake incident in Manitoba and the Shag Harbour UFO incident in Nova Scotia. \n\nEarly Canadian studies included Project Magnet (1950–1954) and Project Second Storey (1952–1954), supported by the Defence Research Board.\n\nFrance\n\nOn March 2007, the French space agency CNES published an archive of UFO sightings and other phenomena online. \n\nFrench studies include GEPAN/SEPRA/GEIPAN (1977–), within CNES (French space agency), the longest ongoing government-sponsored investigation. About 22% of 6000 cases studied remain unexplained. The official opinion of GEPAN/SEPRA/GEIPAN has been neutral, stating on their FAQ page that their mission is fact-finding for the scientific community, not rendering an opinion. They add they can neither prove nor disprove the Exterrestrial Hypothesis (ETH), but their Steering Committee's clear position is that they cannot discard the possibility that some fraction of the very strange 22% of unexplained cases might be due to distant and advanced civilizations. Possibly their bias may be indicated by their use of the terms \"PAN\" (French) or \"UAP\" (English equivalent) for \"Unidentified Aerospace Phenomenon\" (whereas \"UAP\" as normally used by English organizations stands for \"Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon\", a more neutral term). In addition, the three heads of the studies have gone on record in stating that UFOs were real physical flying machines beyond our knowledge or that the best explanation for the most inexplicable cases was an extraterrestrial one. \n\nIn 2008, Michel Scheller, president of the Association Aéronautique et Astronautique de France (3AF), created the Sigma Commission. Its purpose was to investigate UFO phenomenon worldwide. A progress report published in May 2010 stated that the central hypothesis proposed by the COMETA report is perfectly credible. In December 2012, the final report of the Sigma Commission was submitted to Scheller. Following the submission of the final report, the Sigma2 Commission is to be formed with a mandate to continue the scientific investigation of UFO phenomenon. \n\nThe most notable cases of UFO sightings in France include the Valensole UFO incident in 1965, and the Trans-en-Provence Case in 1981.\n\nUnited Kingdom\n\nThe UK's Flying Saucer Working Party published its final report in June 1951, which remained secret for over 50 years. The Working Party concluded that all UFO sightings could be explained as misidentifications of ordinary objects or phenomena, optical illusions, psychological misperceptions/aberrations, or hoaxes. The report stated: \"We accordingly recommend very strongly that no further investigation of reported mysterious aerial phenomena be undertaken, unless and until some material evidence becomes available.\" \n\nEight file collections on UFO sightings, dating from 1978 to 1987, were first released on May 14, 2008, to The National Archives by the Ministry of Defence (MoD). Although kept secret from the public for many years, most of the files have low levels of classification and none are classified Top Secret. 200 files are set to be made public by 2012. The files are correspondence from the public sent to the British government and officials, such as the MoD and Margaret Thatcher. The MoD released the files under the Freedom of Information Act due to requests from researchers. These files include, but are not limited to, UFOs over Liverpool and the Waterloo Bridge in London. \n\nOn October 20, 2008, more UFO files were released. One case released detailed that in 1991 an Alitalia passenger aircraft was approaching London Heathrow Airport when the pilots saw what they described as a \"cruise missile\" fly extremely close to the cockpit. The pilots believed that a collision was imminent. UFO expert David Clarke says that this is one of the most convincing cases for a UFO he has come across. \n\nA secret study of UFOs was undertaken for the Ministry of Defence between 1996 and 2000 and was code-named Project Condign. The resulting report, titled \"Unidentified Aerial Phenomena in the UK Defence Region\", was publicly released in 2006, but the identity and credentials of whomever constituted Project Condign remains classified. The report confirmed earlier findings that the main causes of UFO sightings are misidentification of man-made and natural objects. The report noted: \"No artefacts of unknown or unexplained origin have been reported or handed to the UK authorities, despite thousands of Unidentified Aerial Phenomena reports. There are no SIGINT, ELINT or radiation measurements and little useful video or still IMINT.\" It concluded: \"There is no evidence that any UAP, seen in the UKADR [UK Air Defence Region], are incursions by air-objects of any intelligent (extraterrestrial or foreign) origin, or that they represent any hostile intent.\" A little-discussed conclusion of the report was that novel meteorological plasma phenomenon akin to ball lightning are responsible for \"the majority, if not all\" of otherwise inexplicable sightings, especially reports of black triangle UFOs. \n\nOn December 1, 2009, the Ministry of Defence quietly closed down its UFO investigations unit. The unit's hotline and email address were suspended by the MoD on that date. The MoD said there was no value in continuing to receive and investigate sightings in a release, stating in over fifty years, no UFO report has revealed any evidence of a potential threat to the United Kingdom. The MoD has no specific capability for identifying the nature of such sightings. There is no Defence benefit in such investigation and it would be an inappropriate use of defence resources. Furthermore, responding to reported UFO sightings diverts MoD resources from tasks that are relevant to Defence.\"\n\nThe Guardian reported that the MoD claimed the closure would save the Ministry around £50,000 a year. The MoD said that it would continue to release UFO files to the public through The National Archives. \n\nNotable cases\n\nAccording to records released on August 5, 2010, British wartime prime minister Winston Churchill banned the reporting for 50 years of an alleged UFO incident because of fears it could create mass panic. Reports given to Churchill asserted that the incident involved a Royal Air Force (RAF) reconnaissance aircraft returning from a mission in France or Germany toward the end of World War II. It was over or near the English coastline when it was allegedly intercepted by a strange metallic object that matched the aircraft's course and speed for a time before accelerating away and disappearing. The aircraft's crew were reported to have photographed the object, which they said had \"hovered noiselessly\" near the aircraft, before moving off. According to the documents, details of the coverup emerged when a man wrote to the government in 1999 seeking to find out more about the incident and described how his grandfather, who had served with the RAF in the war, was present when Churchill and U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower discussed how to deal with the UFO encounter. The files come from more than 5,000 pages of UFO reports, letters and drawings from members of the public, as well as questions raised in Parliament. They are available to download from The National Archives website.\n\nIn the April 1957 West Freugh incident in Scotland, named after the principal military base involved, two unidentified objects flying high over the UK were tracked by radar operators. The objects were reported to operate at speeds and perform maneuvers beyond the capability of any known craft. Also significant is their alleged size, which – based on the radar returns – was closer to that of a ship than an aircraft.\n\nIn the Rendlesham Forest incident of December 1980, U.S. military personnel witnessed UFOs near the air base at Woodbridge, Suffolk, over a period of three nights. On one night the deputy base commander, Colonel Charles I. Halt, and other personnel followed one or more UFOs that were moving in and above the forest for several hours. Col. Halt made an audio recording while this was happening and subsequently wrote an official memorandum summarizing the incident. After retirement from the military, he said that he had deliberately downplayed the event (officially termed 'Unexplained Lights') to avoid damaging his career. Other base personnel are said to have observed one of the UFOs, which had landed in the forest, and even gone up to and touched it.\n\nItaly\n\nAccording to some Italian ufologists, the first documented case of a UFO sighting in Italy dates back to April 11, 1933, to Varese. Documents of the time show that an alleged UFO crashed or landed near Vergiate. Following this, Benito Mussolini created a secret group to look at it, called Cabinet RS/33. \n\nAlleged UFO sightings gradually increased since the war, peaking in 1978 and 2005. The total number of sightings since 1947 are 18,500, of which 90% are identifiable. \n\nIn 2000, Italian ufologist Roberto Pinotti published material regarding the so-called \"Fascist UFO Files\", which dealt with a flying saucer that had crashed near Milan in 1933 (some 14 years before the Roswell, New Mexico, crash), and of the subsequent investigation by a never mentioned before Cabinet RS/33, that allegedly was authorized by Benito Mussolini, and headed by the Nobel scientist Guglielmo Marconi. A spaceship was allegedly stored in the hangars of the SIAI Marchetti in Vergiate near Milan. \n\nJulius Obsequens was a Roman writer who is believed to have lived in the middle of the fourth century AD. The only work associated with his name is the Liber de prodigiis (Book of Prodigies), completely extracted from an epitome, or abridgment, written by Livy; De prodigiis was constructed as an account of the wonders and portents that occurred in Rome between 249 BC-12 BC. An aspect of Obsequens' work that has inspired much interest in some circles is that references are made to things moving through the sky. These have been interpreted as reports of UFOs, but may just as well describe meteors, and, since Obsequens, probably, writes in the 4th century, that is, some 400 years after the events he describes, they hardly qualify as eye-witness accounts. \n\nNotable cases\n\n*A UFO sighting in Florence, October 28, 1954, followed by a fall of angel hair. \n*In 1973, an Alitalia airplane left Rome for Naples sighted a mysterious round object. Two Italian Air Force planes from Ciampino confirmed the sighting. In the same year there was another sighting at Caselle airport near Turin. \n*In 1978, two young hikers, while walking on Monte Musinè near Turin, saw a bright light; one of them temporarily disappeared and, after a while, was found in a state of shock and with a noticeable scald on one leg. After regaining consciousness, he reported having seen an elongated vehicle and that some strangely shaped beings descended from it. Both the young hikers suffered from conjunctivitis for some time.\n*A close encounter reported in September 1978 in Torrita di Siena in the Province of Siena. A young motorist saw in front of him a bright object, two beings of small stature who wore suits and helmets, the two approached the car, and after watching it carefully went back and rose again to the UFO. A boy who lived with his family in a country house not far from there said he had seen at the same time \"a kind of small reddish sun\".Viberti 2010\n*Yet in 1978, there has been also the story of Pier Fortunato Zanfretta, the best known and most controversial case of an Italian alleged alien abduction. Zanfretta said to have been kidnapped on the night of 6 December and 7 December while he was performing his job at Marzano, in the municipality of Torriglia in the Province of Genoa. \n\nUruguay\n\nThe Uruguayan Air Force has conducted UFO investigations since 1989 and reportedly analyzed 2,100 cases of which they regard approximately 2% as lacking explanation. \n\nAstronomer reports\n\nThe USAF's Project Blue Book files indicate that approximately 1% of all unknown reports came from amateur and professional astronomers or other users of telescopes (such as missile trackers or surveyors). In 1952, astronomer J. Allen Hynek, then a consultant to Blue Book, conducted a small survey of 45 fellow professional astronomers. Five reported UFO sightings (about 11%). In the 1970s, astrophysicist Peter A. Sturrock conducted two large surveys of the AIAA and American Astronomical Society (AAS). About 5% of the members polled indicated that they had had UFO sightings.\n\nAstronomer Clyde Tombaugh, who admitted to six UFO sightings, including three green fireballs, supported the Extraterrestrial hypothesis for UFOs and stated he thought scientists who dismissed it without study were being \"unscientific.\" Another astronomer was Lincoln LaPaz, who had headed the Air Force's investigation into the green fireballs and other UFO phenomena in New Mexico. LaPaz reported two personal sightings, one of a green fireball, the other of an anomalous disc-like object. (Both Tombaugh and LaPaz were part of Hynek's 1952 survey.) Hynek himself took two photos through the window of a commercial airliner of a disc-like object that seemed to pace his aircraft. \n\nIn 1980, a survey of 1800 members of various amateur astronomer associations by Gert Helb and Hynek for CUFOS found that 24% responded \"yes\" to the question \"Have you ever observed an object which resisted your most exhaustive efforts at identification?\" \n\nClaims of increase in reports\n\nMUFON reports that UFO sightings to their offices have increased by 67% in the previous three years as of 2011. According to MUFON international director Clifford Clift in 2011, \"Over the past year, we've been averaging 500 sighting reports a month, compared to about 300 three years ago [67 percent],\". \n\nAccording to the annual survey of reports conducted by Canadian-based UFO research group Ufology Research, reported UFO sightings doubled in Canada from 2011-2012. \n\nIn 2013 the Peruvian government's Departamento de Investigación de Fenómenos Aéreos Anómalos (Anomalous Aerial Phenomena Research Department), or \"DIFAA\", was officially reactivated due to an increase in reported sightings. According to Colonel Julio Vucetich, head of the air force's aerospace interests division who himself claims to have seen an \"anomalous aerial object\", \"On a personal basis, it's evident to me that we are not alone in this world or universe.\" \n\nIn contrast, according to the UK-based Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena (ASSAP), reports of sightings in Britain to their office have declined by 96% since 1988. \n\nIdentification of UFOs\n\nStudies show that after careful investigation, the majority of UFOs can be identified as ordinary objects or phenomena. The most commonly found identified sources of UFO reports are:\n*Astronomical objects (bright stars, planets, meteors, re-entering man-made spacecraft, artificial satellites, and the Moon)\n*Aircraft (aerial advertising and other aircraft, missile launches)\n*Balloons (toy balloons, weather balloons, large research balloons)\n*Other atmospheric objects and phenomena (birds, unusual clouds, kites, flares)\n*Light phenomena mirages, Fata Morgana, ball lightning, moon dogs, searchlights and other ground lights, etc.\n*Hoaxes\n\nA 1952–1955 study by the Battelle Memorial Institute for the USAF included these categories as well as a \"psychological\" one.\n\nAn individual 1979 study by CUFOS researcher Allan Hendry found, as did other investigations, that only a small percentage of cases he investigated were hoaxes (\n\nConspiracy theories\n\nUFOs are sometimes an element of conspiracy theories in which governments are allegedly intentionally \"covering up\" the existence of aliens by removing physical evidence of their presence, or even collaborating with extraterrestrial beings. There are many versions of this story; some are exclusive, while others overlap with various other conspiracy theories.\n\nIn the U.S., an opinion poll conducted in 1997 suggested that 80% of Americans believed the U.S. government was withholding such information. Various notables have also expressed such views. Some examples are astronauts Gordon Cooper and Edgar Mitchell, Senator Barry Goldwater, Vice Admiral Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter (the first CIA director), Lord Hill-Norton (former British Chief of Defense Staff and NATO head), the 1999 French COMETA study by various French generals and aerospace experts, and Yves Sillard (former director of CNES, new director of French UFO research organization GEIPAN).\n\nIt has also been suggested by a few paranormal authors that all or most human technology and culture is based on extraterrestrial contact (see also ancient astronauts).\n\nFamous hoaxes\n\n* The Maury Island incident\n* The Ummo affair, a decades-long series of detailed letters and documents allegedly from extraterrestrials. The total length of the documents is at least 1,000 pages, and some estimate that further undiscovered documents may total nearly 4000 pages. A José Luis Jordan Pena came forward in the early 1990s claiming responsibility for the phenomenon, and most consider there to be little reason to challenge his claims. \n* George Adamski over the space of two decades made various claims about his meetings with telepathic aliens from nearby planets. He claimed that photographs of the far side of the Moon taken by the Soviet lunar probe Luna 3 in 1959 were fake, and that there were cities, trees and snow-capped mountains on the far side of the Moon. Among copycats was a shadowy British figure named Cedric Allingham.\n* Ed Walters, a building contractor, in 1987 allegedly perpetrated a hoax in Gulf Breeze, Florida. Walters claimed at first having seen a small UFO flying near his home and took some photographs of the craft. Walters reported and documented a series of UFO sightings over a period of three weeks and took several photographs. These sightings became famous and were called Gulf Breeze UFO incident. Three years later, in 1990, after the Walters family had moved, the new residents discovered a model of a UFO poorly hidden in the attic that bore an undeniable resemblance to the craft in Walters' photographs. Most investigators like the forensic photo expert William G. Hyzer now consider the sightings to be a hoax.\n\nIn popular culture\n\nUFOs constitute a widespread international cultural phenomenon of the last 60 years. Gallup Polls rank UFOs near the top of lists for subjects of widespread recognition. In 1973, a survey found that 95 percent of the public reported having heard of UFOs, whereas only 92 percent had heard of U.S. President Gerald Ford in a 1977 poll taken just nine months after he left the White House. A 1996 Gallup Poll reported that 71 percent of the United States population believed that the U.S. government was covering up information regarding UFOs. A 2002 Roper Poll for the Sci-Fi Channel found similar results, but with more people believing that UFOs are extraterrestrial craft. In that latest poll, 56 percent thought UFOs were real craft and 48 percent that aliens had visited the Earth. Again, about 70 percent felt the government was not sharing everything it knew about UFOs or extraterrestrial life. In the film Yellow Submarine, Ringo states that the yellow submarine that is following him \"must be one of them unidentified flying cupcakes.\" \nAnother effect of the flying saucer type of UFO sightings has been Earth-made flying saucer craft in space fiction, for example the United Planets Cruiser C57D in Forbidden Planet (1956), the Jupiter 2 in Lost in Space, and the saucer section of the USS Enterprise in Star Trek, and many others.\n\nUFOs and extraterrestrials have been featured in many movies." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "Spokane,_Washington.txt" ], "title": [ "Spokane, Washington" ], "wiki_context": [ "Spokane ( ) is a city in the state of Washington, in the northwestern United States. Spokane is the seat of Spokane County. It is located on the Spokane River, west of the Rocky Mountain foothills in eastern Washington, 92 mi south of the Canadian border, approximately 20 mi from the Washington–Idaho border, and 280 mi east of Seattle along Interstate 90. The city and wider Inland Northwest region is served by Spokane International Airport, 5 mi west of downtown Spokane. According to the 2010 Census, Spokane had a population of 208,916, making it the second largest city in Washington and the 102nd largest city in the United States.\n\nThe first humans to live in the area, the Spokane people (their name meaning \"children of the sun\" in Salishan), arrived between 13,000 and 8,000 years ago, living off plentiful game. Known as the birthplace of Father's Day, Spokane is officially nicknamed the \"Lilac City\". David Thompson explored the area with the westward expansion and establishment of the North West Company's Spokane House in 1810. This trading post was the first long-term European settlement in Washington. Completion of the Northern Pacific Railway in 1881 brought settlers to the Spokane area, and that same year it was officially incorporated as a city with the name \"Spokan Falls\". The \"e\" was added to Spokane in 1883, and \"Falls\" was dropped in 1891. In the late 19th century, gold and silver were discovered in the Inland Northwest. The local economy depended on mining, timber, and agriculture until the 1980s. Spokane hosted the first environmentally themed World's Fair at Expo '74.\n\nMany of the older Romanesque Revival-style buildings in the downtown area were designed by architect Kirtland Kelsey Cutter after the Great Fire of 1889. The city also features Riverfront and Manito parks, the Smithsonian-affiliated Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, the Davenport Hotel, and the Fox and Bing Crosby theaters. The Cathedral of Our Lady of Lourdes serves as the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Spokane with Thomas Daly as the newly appointed Bishop as of 2015. The Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist (Spokane, Washington) represents the Anglican community. The city is also the center of the Mormon Spokane Washington Temple District. Gonzaga University was established in 1887 by the Society of Jesus, and the private Presbyterian Whitworth University moved to north Spokane in 1914 from Tacoma, WA. In sports, the Gonzaga Bulldogs collegiate basketball team competes at the Division I level. Professional and semi-professional sports teams include the Spokane Indians in Minor League Baseball, Spokane Empire in arena football, and Spokane Chiefs in junior ice hockey. As of 2010, Spokane's only major daily newspaper, The Spokesman-Review, had a daily circulation of over 75,000.\n\nHistory\n\nThe first humans to live in the Spokane area arrived between 13,000 and 8,000 years ago and were hunter-gatherer societies that lived off plentiful game. The Spokane tribe, after which the city is named (the name meaning \"children of the sun\" Salishan), are believed to be either their direct descendants, or descendants of people from the Great Plains. When asked by early white explorers, the Spokanes said their ancestors came from \"up North\".\n\nEarly in the 19th century, the Northwest Fur Company sent two white fur trappers west of the Rocky Mountains to search for fur. These were the first white men met by the Spokanes, who believed they were sacred, and set the trappers up in the Colville River valley for the winter. \n\nTrading post\n\nThe explorer-geographer David Thompson, working as head of the North West Company's Columbia Department, became the first European to explore the Inland Empire (now called the Inland Northwest). Crossing what is now the U.S.–Canadian border from British Columbia, Thompson wanted to expand the North West Company further south in search of furs. After establishing the Kullyspell House and Saleesh House trading posts in what are now Idaho and Montana, Thompson then attempted to expand further west. He sent out two trappers, Jacques Raphael Finlay and Finan McDonald, to construct a fur trading post on the Spokane River in Washington and trade with the local Indians. This post was established in 1810, at the confluence of the Little Spokane and Spokane rivers, becoming the first enduring European settlement of significance in Washington state. Known as the Spokane House, or simply \"Spokane\", it was in operation from 1810 to 1826. Operations were run by the British North West Company and later the Hudson's Bay Company, and the post was the headquarters of the fur trade between the Rocky and Cascade mountains for 16 years. After the latter business absorbed the North West Company in 1821, the major operations at the Spokane House were eventually shifted north to Fort Colville, reducing the post's significance. \n\nIn 1836, Reverend Samuel Parker visited the area and reported that around 800 Native Americans were living in Spokane Falls. A medical mission was established by Marcus and Narcissa Whitman to cater for Cayuse Indians and hikers of the Oregon Trail at Walla Walla in the south. \nAfter the Whitmans were killed by Indians in 1847, Reverend Cushing Eells established Whitman College in the city of Walla Walla, WA in their memory. Rev. Eells built the first church in Spokane in 1881 Between 1881 and 1882 the first Baptist and Episcopal churches were started, and the first Presbyterian church in 1883. \n\nIn 1853, two years after the establishment of the Washington Territory, the first governor, Isaac Stevens, made an initial effort to make a treaty with Chief Garry and the Spokanes at Antoine Plantes' Ferry, not far from Millwood. \n\nAfter the last campaign of the Yakima Indian War, the Coeur d'Alene War of 1858 was brought to a close by the actions of Col. George Wright, who won decisive victories against a confederation of tribes in engagements at the battles of Four Lakes and Spokane Plains. The cessation of hostilities opened the inter-mountain valley of the Pacific Northwest to safe habitation by settlers. \n\nAmerican settlement\n\nJoint American–British occupation of Oregon Country, in effect since the Treaty of 1818, eventually led to the Oregon Boundary Dispute after a large influx of American settlers along the Oregon Trail. The first American settlers in what is now Spokane were J.J. Downing and S.R. Scranton, cattle ranchers who squatted and established a claim at Spokane Falls in 1871. Together they built a small sawmill on a claim near the south bank of the falls. James N. Glover and Jasper Matheney, Oregonians passing through the region in 1873, recognized the value of the Spokane River and its falls for the purpose of water power. They realized the investment potential and bought the claims of 160 acre and the sawmill from Downing and Scranton for a total of $4,000. Glover and Matheney knew that the Northern Pacific Railroad Company had received a government charter to build a main line across this northern route. Amid many delays in construction and uncertainty over the completion of the railroad and its exact course, Matheney sold his interest in the claim to Glover. Glover confidently held on to his claim and became a successful Spokane business owner and was the second mayor of Spokane in 1883. He later came to be known as the \"Father of Spokane\". When Spokane was officially incorporated in 1881 Robert W. Forrest was elected as the first mayor of the city, with a Council of seven-S.G. Havermale, A.M. Cannon, Dr. L.H.Whitehouse, L.W. Rima, F.R. Moore, George A. Davis, and W.C. Gray. The Mayor and Councilmen served without pay. \n\nIn 1880, Fort Spokane was established by U.S. Army troops under Lt. Col. Henry Clay Merriam 56 mi northwest of Spokane, at the junction of the Columbia and Spokane Rivers, to protect the construction of the Northern Pacific Railway and secure a place for U.S. settlement. By June 30, 1881, the railway reached the city, bringing major European settlement to the area. The city of Spokan Falls (the \"e\" was added in 1883 and \"Falls\" dropped in 1891) was officially incorporated as a city of about 1,000 residents on November 29, 1881. Note: The site is in betatest, so this link will have to be renamed soon. The marketing campaigns of transportation companies with affordable fertile land to sell along their trade routes lured many settlers into the region they dubbed \"Spokane Country\". \n\nThe 1883 discovery of gold, silver, and lead in the Coeur d'Alene region of northern Idaho lured prospectors. The Inland Empire erupted with numerous mining rushes from 1883 to 1892. Mining and smelting emerged as a major stimulus to Spokane. At the onset of the initial 1883 gold rush in the nearby Coeur d'Alene mining district, Spokane became popular with prospectors, offering low prices on everything \"from a horse to a frying pan\". It would keep this status for subsequent rushes in the region due to its trade center status and accessibility to railroad infrastructure. \n\nSpokane's growth continued unabated until August 4, 1889, when a fire, now known as The Great Fire (not to be confused with the Great Fire of 1910, which happened nearby), began just after 6:00 p.m. and destroyed the city's downtown commercial district. Due to technical problems with a pump station, there was no water pressure in the city when the fire started. In a desperate bid to starve the fire, firefighters began razing buildings with dynamite. Eventually the winds and the fire died down; 32 blocks of Spokane's downtown core had been destroyed and one person killed.\n\nDespite this catastrophe, and in part because of it, Spokane experienced a building boom. The downtown was rebuilt, and the city was reincorporated under the present name of \"Spokane\" in 1891. According to historian David H. Stratton, \"From the late 1890s to about 1912, a great flurry of construction created a modern urban profile of office buildings, banks, department stores, hotels and other commercial institutions,\" which stretched from the Spokane River to the site of the Northern Pacific railroad tracks below the South Hill. Yet the rebuilding and development of the city was far from smooth: between 1889 and 1896 alone, all six bridges over the Spokane River were destroyed by floods before their completion. In the 1890s the city was subject to intrastate migration by African-Americans from Roslyn, looking for work after the closure of the area's mines. Two African-American churches, Calvary Baptist and Bethel African Methodist Episcopal, were founded in 1890. Just three years after the fire, in 1892, James J. Hill's Great Northern Railway arrived in the chosen site for Hill's rail yards, the newly created township of Hillyard (annexed by Spokane in 1924). Spokane became an important rail shipping and transportation hub for the Inland Empire, connecting mines in the Silver Valley with agricultural areas around the Palouse region. The city's population ballooned to 19,922 in 1890, and to 36,848 in 1900 with the arrival of additional railroads. By 1910 the population had hit 104,000, and Spokane eclipsed Walla Walla as the commercial center of the Inland Empire. In time the city came to be known as the \"capital\" of the Inland Empire and the heart of a vast tributary region. After the arrival of the Northern Pacific, Union Pacific, Great Northern, and Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific railroads, Spokane became one of the most important rail centers in the western U.S. \n\nEarly 20th century\n\nExpansion abruptly stopped in the 1910s and was followed by a period of population decline, due in large part to Spokane's slowing economy. Control of regional mines and resources became increasingly dominated by national corporations rather than local people and organizations, diverting capital outside of Spokane and decreasing growth and investment opportunities in the city. During this time of stagnation, unrest was prevalent among the area's unemployed, who became victimized by \"job sharks\", who charged a fee for signing up workers in the logging camps. Job sharks and employment agencies were known to cheat itinerant workers, sometimes paying bribes to periodically fire entire work crews, thus generating repetitive fees for themselves. Crime spiked in the 1890s and 1900s, with eruptions of violent activity involving unions such as the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), or \"Wobblies\" as they were often known, whose free speech fights had begun to garner national attention. Now, with grievances concerning the unethical practices of the employment agencies, they initiated a free speech fight in September 1908 by purposely breaking a city ordinance on soapboxing. With IWW encouragement, union members from many western states came to Spokane to take part in what had become a publicity stunt. Many Wobblies were incarcerated, including feminist labor leader Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, who published her account in the local Industrial Worker.\n\nAfter mining declined at the turn of the 20th century, agriculture and logging became the primary influences in the Spokane economy. The population explosion and the building of homes, railroads, and mines in northern Idaho and southern British Columbia fueled the industry. Although overshadowed in importance by the vast timbered areas on the coastal regions west of the Cascades, and burdened with monopolistic rail freight rates and stiff competition, Spokane became a noted leader in the manufacture of doors, window sashes, blinds, and other planing mill products. Rail freight rates were much higher in Spokane than the rates in coastal seaport cities such as Seattle and Portland, so much so that Minneapolis merchants could ship goods first to Seattle and then back to Spokane for less than shipping directly to Spokane, even though the rail line ran through Spokane on the way to the coast. Local morale was affected for years by the collapse of the Division Street Bridge early in the morning on December 15, 1915, which killed five people and injured over 20, but a new bridge was built (eventually replaced in 1994). The 1920 census showed a net increase of just 35 individuals, which actually indicates that thousands left the city when considering the natural growth rate of a population. Growth in the 1920s and 1930s remained slow but less drastically so, forcing city boosters to market the city as a quiet, comfortable place suitable for raising a family rather than a dynamic community full of opportunity. The Inland Empire was heavily dependent on natural resources and extractive goods produced from mines, forests, and farms, which experienced a fall in demand. The situation improved slightly with the start of World War II as aluminum production commenced in Spokane due to the area's cheap electricity (produced from regional dams) and the increased demand for airplanes.\n\nSecond half of the 20th century\n\nAfter decades of stagnation and slow growth, Spokane businessmen formed Spokane Unlimited in the early 1960s, an organization that sought to revitalize downtown Spokane. A recreation park showcasing the Spokane Falls was the preferred option, and after successful negotiation to relocate the railroad facilities on Havermale Island, Spokane hosted the first environmentally themed World's Fair in Expo '74 on May 4, becoming the smallest city at the time to host a World's Fair. This event transformed Spokane's downtown, removing a century of railroad infrastructure and reinventing the urban core. After Expo '74, the fairgrounds became the 100 acre Riverfront Park. \n\nThe growth witnessed in the late 1970s and early 1980s was interrupted by another U.S. recession in 1981, in which silver, timber, and farm prices dropped. The period of decline for the city lasted into the 1990s and was also marked by a loss of many steady family-wage jobs in the manufacturing sector. Although this was a tough period, Spokane's economy had started to benefit from some measure of economic diversification; growing companies such as Key Tronic and other research, marketing, and assembly plants for technology companies helped lessen Spokane's dependence on natural resources.\n\n21st century\n\nAs of 2014, Spokane is still trying to make the transition to a more service-oriented economy in the face of a less prominent manufacturing sector. Developing the city's strength in the medical and health sciences fields has seen some success, resulting in the expansion of the University District with a medical school branch. The city faces challenges such as a scarcity of high-paying jobs, pockets of poverty, and areas of high crime.\n\nThe opening of the River Park Square Mall in 1999 sparked a downtown rebirth that included the building of the Spokane Arena and expansion of the Spokane Convention Center. Other major projects include the building of the Big Easy concert house (now the Knitting Factory) and renovation of the historic Montvale Hotel, the Kirtland Cutter-designed Davenport Hotel (after being vacant for over 20 years), and the Fox Theater (now home to the Spokane Symphony). The Kendall Yards development on the west side of downtown Spokane is one of the largest construction projects in the city's history. Directly across the Spokane River from downtown, it will blend residential and retail space with plazas and walking trails.\n\nIn August 2015, the city entered a legal battle with international agricultural giant Monsanto, alleging that the company has pumped harmful products into the Spokane River for decades, and insist the company be responsible for cleanup costs. The city also announced it will spend hundreds of millions of dollars to keep harmful products out of the river in the coming years.\n\nGeography\n\nTopography\n\nSpokane is located on the Spokane River in eastern Washington at an elevation of 1843 ft above sea level, about 20 mi from Idaho, 110 mi south of the Canadian border, 232 mi east of Seattle, and 277 mi southwest of Calgary. The lowest elevation in the city of Spokane is the northernmost point of the Spokane River within city limits (in Riverside State Park) at 1608 ft; the highest elevation is on the northeast side, near the community of Hillyard (though closer to Beacon Hill and the North Hill Reservoir) at 2591 ft. Spokane is part of the Inland Northwest region, consisting of eastern Washington, northern Idaho, northwestern Montana, and northeastern Oregon. \nAccording to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which is land and is water.\n\nSpokane lies in the Columbia Plateau ecoregion on the eastern edge of the basaltic Channeled Scablands steppe, a plain that then eventually rises sharply to the east towards the rugged, timbered Rocky Mountain foothills, the Selkirk Mountains. It is in a transition area between the barren landscape of the Columbia Basin and the coniferous forests to the east; to the south are the lush prairies and rolling hills of the Palouse. The highest peak in Spokane County is Mount Spokane, at an elevation of 5883 ft, located on the eastern side of the Selkirk Mountains. The most prominent water feature in the area is the Spokane River, a 111 mi tributary of the Columbia River, originating from Lake Coeur d'Alene in northern Idaho. The river flows west across the Washington state line through downtown Spokane, meeting Latah Creek, then turns to the northwest, where it is joined by the Little Spokane River on its way to the Columbia River, north of Davenport. The Channeled Scablands and many of the area's numerous large lakes, such as Lake Coeur d'Alene and Lake Pend Oreille, were formed by the Missoula Floods after the ice-dammed Glacial Lake Missoula ruptured at the end of the last ice age. The Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge south of Cheney is the closest natural reserve, and the closest national park is Glacier National Park, approximately a four-hour drive away from Spokane.\n\nClimate\n\nSpokane has a dry-summer continental climate (Dsb under the Köppen classification), a rare climate due to its elevation and significant winter precipitation; Spokane, however, is adjacent to and sometimes even classified as a cool-summer Mediterranean climate (Csb) because the average temperature for the coldest month is just over 27 °F. \n\nThe area typically has a hot, arid climate during the summer months, bracketed by short spring and fall seasons. On average, July and August are equally warm, and the coolest month is December; July averages while December averages . Daily temperature ranges are large during the summer, often exceeding 30 F-change, and small during the winter, with a range just above 10 F-change. The reason is the very opposite weather existing between the extremely sunny summers and the extremely overcast winters. The record high and low are 108 °F and , but temperatures of more than 100 °F or less than are rare. Temperatures above 90 °F occur an average of 19 days annually, Temperatures above 100 °F occur an average of only 1 day annually, and those below 0 °F average 3.5 days a year.\n\nSpokane's location, between the Cascades Range to the west and the Rocky Mountains to the east and north, protects it from weather patterns experienced in other parts of the Pacific Northwest. The Cascade Mountains form a barrier to the eastward flow of moist and relatively mild air from the Pacific Ocean in winter and cool air in summer. As a result of the rain shadow effect of the Cascades, the Spokane area has average annual precipitation, less than half of Seattle's 37 in. The most precipitation occurs in December, and summer is the driest time of the year. The Rockies shield Spokane from some of the winter season's coldest air masses traveling southward across Canada.\n\nAdministration and politics\n\nThe City of Spokane operates under a mayor–council form of government, with executive and legislative branches. In 2011, David Condon was elected mayor as a non-partisan candidate, taking office on the last business day of the year. The previous mayor was Mary Verner, who succeeded the recalled James \"Jim\" West. Spokane voters have not reelected a mayor since 1973, when incumbent David H. Rodgers was granted a second term. The city elected James Everett Chase as its first African-American mayor in 1981, and after his retirement, elected the city's first woman mayor, Vicki McNeil. Spokane is the county seat of Spokane County, a position it wrested from Cheney in 1886. \n\nDemocrat Jay Inslee was elected governor of Washington in 2012. Federally, Spokane is part of Washington's 5th congressional district, and has been represented by Republican Cathy McMorris Rodgers since 2004. Washington State is represented nationally in the Senate by Democrat Patty Murray and Democrat Maria Cantwell. In the 2012 general election, Spokane County favored Mitt Romney for President over Barack Obama by 51.5 to 45.7 percent; on the state ballot, the county supported the legalization of recreational marijuana ballot measure by 52.2 to 47.9 percent and opposed the legalization of same-sex marriage by 44.1 to 55.9 percent. Spokane native Tom Foley was a Democratic Speaker of the House and served as a representative of Washington's 5th district for 30 years, enjoying large support from Spokane, until his narrow defeat in the \"Republican Revolution\" of 1994, the only time U.S. voters have turned out a sitting Speaker of the House since 1860. Today, Spokane has a slight Democratic tilt, although the county and surrounding metropolitan area as a whole is staunchly conservative, and as a result, Spokane is governed by a strong amount of Republicans.\n\nCrime\n\nThe crime rate per 1,000 people in the Spokane metropolitan area (Spokane County) was 64.8 in 2012, higher than the Washington state average of 38.3; the violent crime rate of 3.8 and property crime rate of 61 also exceed the statewide averages of 2.5 and 35.8, respectively. Spokane's crime rate is also higher for both violent and property crime than in 98% of communities in the U.S. \n\nData shows that most crimes reported in the city tend to be focused around the downtown city center and its environs. Half of all property crimes are localized in about 6.5 percent of the city. An individual in Spokane has a 1 in 140 chance of becoming a victim of burglary, larceny, motor vehicle theft, or arson. Spokane had the fourth highest rate of auto theft in the U.S. in 2010 and 2011 according to the National Insurance Crime Bureau. Drive-by shootings and drug use, particularly crack cocaine use, became worse in the early 1990s, and four drive-by shootings were recorded in December 1993 alone. In the 1990s, a special gang unit within the Spokane Police Department was established, with an officer \"collecting intelligence on gang activity and disseminating it to street officers\". The 1990s also saw Spokane's most prolific serial killer, Robert Lee Yates, who killed thirteen prostitutes in Spokane's East Sprague red light district and confessed to two others in Tacoma, Washington. The transition of the Spokane Police Department to a community-policing precinct model has been successful in curbing crime rates since its introduction downtown, and has been expanded citywide. \n\nSpokane and the Spokane Police Department (SPD) have received national publicity and scrutiny in the 2000s and 2010s due to many officer-involved shootings and the use of excessive force. The most high-profile of these incidents was the 2006 death of Otto Zehm, a mentally challenged man who was initially suspected of theft at a convenience store. Zehm was later found to have committed no crime, but was struck with batons by several officers and tasered. The increased pressure on the SPD prompted an independent review by a commission of the organization's use-of-force policies, an internal culture audit, and the purchase of body cameras. \n\nSpokane's high crime rate is related to its being a major dumping ground for Washington state's prison system. \n\nUtilities\n\nThe City of Spokane provides municipal water, wastewater management, and solid waste management. Spokane operates Washington's only waste-to-energy plant as well as two solid waste transfer stations as part of the Spokane Regional Solid Waste System, a collaboration between the City of Spokane and Spokane County. Electricity generated by the waste-to-energy plant is used to operate the facility, with excess energy being sold to Puget Sound Energy. Spokane draws its water from the Spokane Valley – Rathdrum Prairie Aquifer; this 370 sqmi \"sole source aquifer\" is the only water supply for Spokane County in Washington, and for Kootenai and Bonner counties in Idaho. \n\nNatural gas and electricity are provided by the local utility, Avista Utilities, while CenturyLink and Comcast provide television, internet, and telephone service. Spokane hosts three hydroelectric generation facilities on the Spokane River: the Upriver Dam, the Upper Falls Dam, and the Monroe Street Dam. The Upriver Dam is owned and operated by the City of Spokane, and generates the electricity needed to operate the municipal water supply's pressure pumps. The power generated in excess of that is sold to Avista Utilities. The Upper Falls and Monroe Street dams are owned and operated by Avista Utilities, and have respective generation capacities of 10 and 15 MW. \n\nDemographics\n\nAccording to the American Community Survey, the median income for a household in Spokane in 2012 was $42,274, and the median income for a family was $50,268. Males had a median income of $42,693 and females had a median income of $34,795. The per capita income for the city was $24,034. About 13.3% of families and 18.7% of the population were below the poverty line, including 23.8% of those under the age of 18 and 10.8% of those aged 65 and older.\n\nAt the 2010 census, there were 208,916 people, 87,271 households, and 49,204 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 94,291 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 86.7% White, 2.29% African American, 2.0% Native American, 2.6% Asian, and 0.6% Pacific Islander, along with 1.3% from other races and 4.6% from two or more races. Hispanics and Latinos of any race were 5.0% of the population.\n\nThere were 87,271 households, of which 28.9% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 38.5% were married couples living together, 12.9% had a female householder with no husband present, 5.0% had a male householder with no wife present, and 43.6% were non-families. In 2010, 34.2% of all households were made up of individuals, and 11% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.31 and the average family size was 2.97.\n\nThe median age in the city was 35 years. In Spokane, 22.4% of residents were under the age of 18, 12.3% were between the ages of 18 and 24, 27.6% were from 25 to 44, 25.1% were from 45 to 64, and 12.8% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the city was 48.8% male and 51.2% female.\n\nAccording to the Association of Religion Data Archives' 2010 Metro Area Membership Report, the denominational affiliations of the Spokane MSA are 64,277 Evangelical Protestant, 682 Black Protestant, 24,826 Mainline Protestant, 754 Orthodox, 66,202 Catholic, 31,674 Other, and 339,338 Unclaimed. As of 2014, there are also at least three Jewish congregations. The Emanu-El congregation erected the first synagogue in Spokane and the state of Washington on September 14, 1892. The city's first mosque opened in 2009 as the Spokane Islamic Center. \n\nSpokane, like Washington and the Pacific Northwest region as a whole, is part of the Unchurched Belt, a region characterized by low church membership rates and religious participation. The city serves as the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Spokane, which was established in 1913, and the Mormon Spokane Washington Temple District. \n\nSpokane has been criticized and sometimes derided for its lack of diversity and multicultural offerings, but the city has become more diverse in recent decades. People from countries in the former Soviet Union (especially Russians and Ukrainians) form a comparatively large demographic in Spokane and Spokane County, the result of a large influx of immigrants and their families after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. According to the 2000 Census, the number of people of Russian or Ukrainian ancestry in Spokane County was reported to be 7,700 (4,900 residing in the city of Spokane), amounting to two percent of the county. Among the fastest-growing demographics in Spokane is the Pacific Islander ethnic group, which is estimated to be the third largest minority group in the county, after the Russian and Ukrainian community and Latinos. Spokane was once home to a sizable Asian community, mostly Japanese, centered in a district called Chinatown from the early days of the city until 1974. As in many western railway towns, the Asian community started off as an encampment for migrant laborers working on the railroads. The Chinatown Asian community thrived until the 1940s, after which its population decreased and became integrated and dispersed, losing its Asian character; urban blight and the preparations leading up to Expo '74 led to Chinatown's eventual demolition.\n\nMetropolitan area\n\nThe Spokane metropolitan area consists of Spokane, Stevens, and Pend Oreille counties. As of the 2013 census estimates, the Spokane metropolitan area had a population of 535,724. Directly east of Spokane County is the Coeur d'Alene Metropolitan Statistical Area, which consists of Kootenai County, Idaho, anchored by the city of Coeur d'Alene. The urban areas of the two MSAs largely follow the path of Interstate 90 between Spokane and Coeur d'Alene. The Spokane area has suffered from suburbanization and urban sprawl in past decades, despite Washington's use of urban growth boundaries; the city ranks low among major Northwest cities in population density and smart growth. The Spokane and Coeur d'Alene Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA) are now included in a single Combined Statistical Area (CSA) by the Office of Management and Budget. The Spokane–Coeur d'Alene CSA had around 679,989 residents in 2013.\n\nEconomy\n\nSpokane became an important rail and shipping center because of its location between mining and farming areas. In the early 1880s, gold and silver were discovered in the Inland Empire; as a regional shipping center, the city furnished supplies to the miners who passed through on their way to the mineral-rich Coeur d'Alene, Colville and Kootenay districts. The mining districts are still considered among the most productive in North America. \n\nNatural resources have historically been the foundation of Spokane's economy, with the mining, logging, and agriculture industries providing much of the region's economic activity. After mining declined at the turn of the 20th century, agriculture and logging replaced mining as the primary influences in the economy. Lumberjacks and millmen working in the hundreds of mills along the railroads, rivers, and lakes of northern Washington and Idaho were provisioning themselves in Spokane. Agriculture has always been an important sector in the local economy; the surrounding area, especially to the south, is the Palouse, a productive agricultural region that supports many vineyards and microbreweries as well. By the early 20th century Spokane was primarily a commercial center rather than an industrial center. \n\nIn Spokane, wood and food processing, printing and publishing, primary metal refining and fabrication, electrical and computer equipment, and transportation equipment are leaders in the manufacturing sector. Gold mining company Gold Reserve, and Fortune 1000 company Potlatch Corporation – a forest products company that operates as a real estate investment trust – are headquartered in the city proper. Mining, forestry, and agribusiness remain important to the local and regional economy, but Spokane's economy has diversified to include other industries, including the high-tech and biotech sectors. Spokane is becoming a more service-oriented economy in the face of a less prominent manufacturing sector, particularly as a medical and biotechnology center; Fortune 1000 technology company Itron, for instance, is headquartered in the area. Avista Corporation, the holding company of Avista Utilities, is the only company in Spokane that has been listed in the Fortune 500, ranked 299 on the list in 2002. Other companies with head offices in the Spokane area include technology company Key Tronic, hotelier Red Lion Hotels Corporation, and microcar maker Commuter Cars. \n\nAs of 2013, the top five employers in Spokane are the State of Washington, Spokane Public Schools, Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center and Children's Hospital, the 92d Air Refueling Wing, and Spokane County. The largest military facility and employer, the 92d Air Refueling Wing, is stationed at Fairchild Air Force Base near Airway Heights. The leading industries in Spokane for the employed population 16 years and older were educational services, health care, and social assistance (26.5 percent), retail trade (12.7 percent), and arts, entertainment, recreation, and accommodation food services (10.4 percent). As the metropolitan center of the Inland Northwest, as well as parts of southern British Columbia and Alberta, Spokane serves as a commercial, manufacturing, transportation, medical, shopping, and entertainment hub. In 2010, the Spokane–Spokane Valley MSA had a gross metropolitan product of $19.48 billion. \n\nAs of 2014, economic development in the Spokane area primarily focuses on promoting the following industries: manufacturing (especially aerospace manufacturing), health sciences, professional services, information science and technology, finance and insurance as well as clean technology, and digital media. To aid economic development, the eastern branch of Innovate Washington, a state-supported business incubator was placed in the city. \n\nDespite diversification to new industries, Spokane's economy has struggled in recent decades. Spokane was ranked the #1 \"Worst City For Jobs\" in America in both 2012 and 2015, while also ranking #4 in 2014. Additionally, Forbes named Spokane the \"Scam Capital of America\" in 2009 due to widespread business fraud. Trends of fraud were noted as far back as 1988, again in 2002, and continuing through 2011.\n\nCityscape\n\nNeighborhoods\n\nSpokane's neighborhoods range from the Victorian-style South Hill and Browne's Addition, to the Davenport District of Downtown, to the more contemporary neighborhoods of North Spokane. Spokane's neighborhoods are gaining attention for their history, as illustrated by the city being home to 18 recognized National Register Historical Districts. \n\nSome of Spokane's most prominent neighborhoods are Riverside, Browne's Addition, and Hillyard. The Riverside neighborhood consists primarily of downtown Spokane and is the central business district of Spokane. The neighborhoods south of downtown Spokane are generally known as the South Hill. Downtown Spokane contains many of the city's public facilities, including City Hall, Riverfront Park (site of Expo '74), and the Spokane Convention Center and INB Performing Arts Center, as well as the Spokane Arena and Spokane County Courthouse across the river in the historic West Central neighborhood. The Monroe Street Bridge, a city icon, connects the two areas. To the east of downtown is East Central and the adjacent University District and International District. To the west of downtown is one of Spokane's oldest and densest neighborhoods, Browne's Addition.\n\nA National Historic District west of Downtown, Browne's Addition was Spokane's first prestigious address, notable for its array of old mansions built by Spokane's early elite in the Queen Anne and early American Craftsman styles. The area houses the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture. In northeast Spokane, the Hillyard neighborhood began in 1892 as the chosen site for James J. Hill's Great Northern Railway yard, placed outside Spokane city limits to avoid \"burdensome taxes.\" The downtown Hillyard Business District, located on Market Street, was the Spokane neighborhood listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Many of the former town's houses were built to house railroad workers, mainly immigrant laborers working in the local yard, who gave Hillyard an independent, blue-collar character. Hillyard has become a home for much of Spokane's growing Russian, Ukrainian, and Southeast Asian communities.\n\nArchitecture\n\nCommercial and public buildings\n\nSpokane neighborhoods contain a patchwork of architectural styles that give them a distinct identity and illustrate the changes throughout the city's history. Most of Spokane's notable buildings and landmarks are in the Riverside neighborhood and the downtown commercial district, where many of the buildings were rebuilt following the Great Fire of 1889 in the Romanesque Revival style. Examples include the Great Northern clock tower, Review Building, Cathedral of Our Lady of Lourdes, First Congregational Church, Washington Water Power Post Street substation, Peyton Building, and The Carlyle. The principal architect of many buildings of this period was Kirtland Kelsey Cutter. Self-taught, he came to Spokane in 1886 and began by designing \"Chalet Hohenstein\" for himself and other residences for his family while also working as a bank teller. \nOther structures designed by Cutter include the Spokane Club, Washington Water Power Substation, Monroe Street Bridge (featured in the city seal), Central Steam Plant, and the Davenport Hotel. Built in renaissance and Spanish revival style, the Davenport Hotel cost two million dollars to complete, and included new technologies at the time of its opening in September 1914, such as chilled water, elevators, and air cooling.\n\nOther well-represented architectural styles downtown include art deco (Spokane City Hall, Paulsen Center, Fox Theater, City Ramp Garage), renaissance revival (Steam Plant Square, Thomas S. Foley Courthouse, San Marco), neoclassical (Masonic Center, Hutton Building, Bing Crosby Theater), and Chicago school (U.S. Bank Building, Liberty Building). The tallest building in the city, at 288 ft, is the modernist Bank of America Financial Center. Also of note is the Spokane County Courthouse in West Central (the building on the seal of Spokane County), the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist in Rockwood, the Benewah Milk Bottles in Riverside and Garland, Mount Saint Michael in Hillyard, and the Cambern Dutch Shop Windmill in South Perry.\n\nResidential\n\nAs an early affluent Spokane neighborhood, the Browne's Addition neighborhood and residences contain the largest variety of residential architecture in the city. These residences are lavish and personalized, featuring many architecture styles that were popular and trendy in the Pacific Northwest from the late 19th century to 1930, such as the Victorian and Queen Anne styles. In high demand following his firms' design of the Idaho Building at the Chicago World's Fair in 1893, Cutter found work constructing many mansions for mining and railroad tycoons such as Patrick \"Patsy\" Clark and Daniel and Austin Corbin. \n\nThe older neighborhoods of the early 20th century, such as West Central, East Central, Logan, Hillyard, and much of the lower South Hill, feature a large concentration of American Craftsman style bungalows. In Hillyard, the most architecturally intact neighborhood in Spokane, 85 percent of these buildings are historic. As the city expanded mainly to the north in the middle of the 20th century, the bungalows in the \"minimal traditional\" style commonplace from the 1930s to the 1950s tend to predominate in the Northwest, North Hill, and Bemiss neighborhoods. This architectural style occupies the neighborhoods where the integrity of Spokane's street grid pattern is largely intact (especially the areas north of downtown and south of Francis Ave.), and the houses have backyard alleys for carports, deliveries, and refuse collection. Contemporary suburbs and architecture are prevalent at the north and south edges of Spokane as well as in the new Kendall Yards neighborhood north of downtown. \n\nParks and recreation\n\nIn 1907, Spokane's board of park commissioners retained the services of the Olmsted Brothers to draw up a plan for Spokane's parks. Much of Spokane's park land was acquired by the city prior to World War I, establishing it early on as a leader among Western cities in the development of a city-wide park system. Spokane has a system of over 87 parks totaling 4100 acre and includes six neighborhood aquatic centers. Some of the most notable parks in Spokane's system are Riverfront Park, Manito Park and Botanical Gardens, Riverside State Park, Mount Spokane State Park, Saint Michael's Mission State Park, John A. Finch Arboretum, and the Dishman Hills Conservation Area.\n\nRiverfront Park, created after Expo '74 and occupying the same site, is 100 acre in downtown Spokane and the site of some of Spokane's largest events. The park has views of the Spokane Falls and holds a number of civic attractions, including a skyride, a rebuilt gondola lift that carries visitors across the falls from high above the river gorge. The park also includes the historic hand-carved Riverfront Park Looff carousel created in 1909 by Charles I. D. Looff. Manito Park and Botanical Gardens on Spokane's South Hill features the Duncan Gardens, a classical European Renaissance-style garden and the Nishinomiya Japanese Garden designed by Nagao Sakurai. Riverside State Park, close to downtown, is a site for outdoor activities such as hiking, mountain biking, and horseriding. \n\nThe Spokane area has many trails and rail trails, the most notable of which is the Spokane River Centennial Trail, which features over of paved trails running along the Spokane River from Spokane to the Idaho border. This trail continues on towards Coeur d'Alene for as the North Idaho Centennial Trail and is often used for alternative transportation and recreational use. In the summer, it has long been popular to visit North Idaho's \"Lake Country\", such as Lake Coeur d'Alene, Lake Pend Oreille, Priest Lake, or one of the other nearby bodies of water and beaches. In the winter, the public has access to five ski resorts within a couple hours of the city. The closest of these is the Mt. Spokane Ski and Snowboard Park, which has trails for cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, snowmobiling, and dog sledding. \n\nCulture\n\nArts and theater\n\nSpokane's main art districts are located in the Davenport Arts District, the Garland Business District, and East Sprague. The First Friday Artwalk, which occurs the first Friday of every month, is dedicated to local vendors and performers displaying art around downtown. The two most important Artwalk dates (the first Friday of February and October) attract large crowds to the art districts.\nThe Davenport Arts District has the largest concentration of art galleries and is home to many of Spokane's main performing arts venues, including the Knitting Factory, Fox Theater, and Bing Crosby Theater. The Knitting Factory is a concert house that serves as a setting for many mainstream touring musicians and acts. The Martin Woldson Theater at the Fox, restored to its original 1931 Art Deco state after years of being derelict, is home to the Spokane Symphony Orchestra. The Metropolitan Performing Arts Center was restored in 1988 and renamed the Bing Crosby Theater in 2006 to honor the former Spokanite. Theater is provided by Spokane's only resident professional company, The Modern Theater, though there are also the Spokane Civic Theatre and several other amateur community theaters and smaller groups. The INB Performing Arts Center is often host to large traveling exhibitions, shows, and tours. Spokane was awarded the All-America City Award by the National Civic League in 1974, 2004 and 2015. \n\nSpokane offers an array of musical performances catering to a variety of interests. Spokane's local music scene, however, is considered somewhat lacking by the Spokane All-Ages Music Initiative and other critics, who have identified a need for a legitimate all-ages venue for music performances. The Spokane Symphony presents a full season of classical music, and the Spokane Jazz Orchestra, a full season of jazz music. The Spokane Jazz Orchestra, formed in 1962, is a 70-piece orchestra and non-profit organization. \n\nMuseums\n\nThere are several museums in the city, most notably the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, located a few blocks from the center of downtown in Browne's Addition, amid the mansions of Spokane's late 19th-century \"Age of Elegance\". A Smithsonian affiliate museum, it houses a large collection of Native American artifacts as well as regional and national traveling art exhibits. \n\nThe Mobius Science Center and the related Mobius Kid's Museum in downtown Spokane seek to generate interest in science, technology, engineering, and math among the youth in a hands-on experience. The Jundt Art Museum at Gonzaga University features 2800 ft2 of exhibition space and contains sizable collections of prints from the Bolker, Baruch, Jacobs, and Corita Kent collections. The museum houses glass art by Dale Chihuly, bronze sculptures by Auguste Rodin, tapestries, paintings, ceramics, photographs, and a wide range of gifts, including from the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation and Collections. On the campus of Gonzaga University, the Crosby House, Bing Crosby's childhood home houses, the Bing Crosby Memorabilia Room, the world's largest Crosby collection with around 200 pieces. \n\nEvents and activities\n\nSpokane is known as the birthplace of the national movement started by Sonora Smart Dodd that led to the proposal and eventual establishment of Father's Day as a national holiday in the U.S. The first observation of Father's Day in Spokane was on June 19, 1910. Sonora conceived the idea in Spokane's Central Methodist Episcopal Church while listening to a Mother's Day sermon. \n\nThe Lilac Bloomsday Run, held in summer on the first Sunday of May, is a race for competitive runners as well as walkers that attracts international competition. Also in May is the Lilac Festival, which honors the military, celebrates youth, and showcases the region. Spokane's nickname, the \"Lilac City\", refers to a flowering shrub that has flourished since its introduction to the area in the early 20th century. In June the city hosts Spokane Hoopfest, a 3-on-3 basketball tournament, among the largest of its kind. One of Spokane's most popular local events is Pig Out in the Park, an annual six-day food and entertainment festival where attendees may eat a variety of foods and listen to free live music concerts featuring local, regional, and national recording artists in Riverfront Park. \n\nOther notable events in Spokane include the Spokane Interstate Fair, Spokane Comic-Con, and Japan Week. The Spokane Interstate Fair is held annually in September at the Spokane Fair and Expo Center. Japan Week is held in April and celebrates the sister-city relationship with Nishinomiya, Hyogo, demonstrating the many commonalities shared between the two cities. Students from the Spokane campus of Mukogawa Fort Wright Institute, Gonzaga, Whitworth, and other area schools organize an array of Japanese cultural events. The gay and lesbian Spokane Pride Parade is held each June. \n\nEducation\n\nServing the general educational needs of the local population are two public library districts, the Spokane Public Library (within city limits) and the Spokane County Library District. Founded in 1904 with funding from philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, the Spokane Public Library system comprises a downtown library overlooking the Spokane Falls and five branch libraries. Special collections focus on Inland Pacific Northwest history and include reference books, periodicals, maps, photographs, and other archival materials and government documents. \n\nSpokane Public Schools (District 81) is the largest public school system in Spokane and the second largest in the state as of 2014, serving roughly 30,000 students in six high schools, six middle schools, and thirty-four elementary schools. Other public school districts in the Spokane area include the Mead School District in north Spokane County, outside city limits. A variety of state-approved, independent charter schools and private and parochial elementary and secondary schools augment the public school system. The Roman Catholic Diocese of Spokane manages 11 such schools in Spokane. \n\nSpokane is home to many higher education institutions. They include the private universities Gonzaga and Whitworth University, and the public Community Colleges of Spokane system (Spokane Community College and Spokane Falls Community College) as well as a variety of technical institutes. Gonzaga University and Law School were founded by the Italian-born priest Joseph Cataldo and the Jesuits in 1887. Whitworth, founded in 1890, is affiliated with the Presbyterian Church, and had 2,500 students studying in 53 different undergraduate and degree programs as of 2011. While Spokane is one of the larger cities in the U.S. to lack a main campus of a state-supported university within its city limits, Eastern Washington University (EWU) and Washington State University (WSU) have operations at the Riverpoint Campus in the University District, just adjacent to downtown and across the Spokane River from the Gonzaga campus. Washington State University Spokane is WSU's health sciences campus and houses the school's College of Medical Sciences, College of Nursing, and College of Pharmacy. The main EWU campus is located 15 mi southwest of Spokane in nearby Cheney, and WSU is located 65 mi to the south in Pullman. In addition to WSU's health science presence in Spokane, there is also a four-year medical school branch affiliated with the University of Washington's WWAMI program. An international branch campus of the Mukogawa Women's University, the Mukogawa Fort Wright Institute, is located in Spokane. \n\nSports\n\nSpokane is close to dozens of lakes and rivers. People use these for swimming, boating, rafting, and fishing. Nearby mountains provide skiing, hiking, biking and sightseeing. \nSpokane's professional and semi-professional sports teams include the Spokane Indians in Minor League Baseball, Spokane Empire in indoor football, the Spokane Chiefs in junior ice hockey and Spokane Anarchy Wrestling. Collegiate sports in Spokane focus on the local teams such as the Gonzaga Bulldogs that compete in the NCAA's Division I West Coast Conference and the Whitworth Pirates playing in the Division III Northwest Conference as well as other regional teams, including the Washington State Cougars, Eastern Washington Eagles, and the Idaho Vandals.\n\nThe Spokane Indians are a Class-A-Short-Season baseball team in the Northwest League (NWL) and have been a farm team of the Texas Rangers since 2003. The Indians play their home games at the 6,803-seat Avista Stadium and have won seven NWL titles since their Short-Season-A debut in 1982. Prior to 1982, the Indians played at the Triple-A level. The team achieved considerable success in the early 1970s, winning the Pacific Coast League championship in 1970, and having a 94–52 record. In the 1920s and 1930s the Spokane City League, a semiprofessional baseball league of teams of the Inland Empire, reached its peak. \n\nThe Spokane Shock was an indoor football franchise awarded to the city in August 2005 in the AF2 league. The team was quickly placed into the Arena Football League (AFL) after winning championships in two of their four seasons in the Arenafootball2 league, all while setting league records for attendance. The Shock were crowned AFL champions in their inaugural season after defeating the Tampa Bay Storm 69–57 in ArenaBowl XXIII. After the 2015 season, the owner of the Shock, Nader Naini, decided to have the team leave the AFL to join the Indoor Football League in order to have a geographic rival in the Tri-Cities Fever. The AFL decided to retain the rights the Shock's franchise, so Naini was forced to rename the team and it became the Spokane Empire beginning with the 2016 season. \n\nThe Spokane Chiefs are a major junior ice hockey team that play in the Canadian Hockey League's Western Hockey League. They play their home games in the Spokane Arena and have a regional rivalry with the Tri-City Americans. They have won the CHL's top prize, the Memorial Cup, two times in club history, first in 1991 and again in 2008.\n\nThe Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena is the city's premier sports venue. In the years since the Spokane Arena opened, it has played host to several major sporting events. The first major event was the 1998 Memorial Cup, the championship game of the Canadian Hockey League. Four years later in 2002, the city hosted the 2002 Skate America figure skating competition and then the 2007 U.S. Figure Skating Championships in the Spokane Arena. The latter event set an attendance record, selling nearly 155,000 tickets. Spokane later hosted the 2010 U.S. Figure Skating Championships – ending eighteen days before the start of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia.\n\nTransportation\n\nCity streets\n\nSpokane's streets use a street grid that is oriented to the four cardinal directions; generally, the east–west roads are designated as avenues, and the north–south roads are referred to as streets. Major east–west thoroughfares in the city include Francis, Wellesley, Mission, Sprague, and 29th Avenues. Major north–south thoroughfares include Maple–Ash, Monroe, Division, Hamilton, Greene–Market (north of I-90), and Ray–Freya (south of I-90) Streets. Division Street divides the city into East and West, while Sprague Avenue splits the city into North and South. Division Street is Spokane's major retail corridor; Sprague Avenue serves the same purpose in Spokane Valley. With over 40,000 vehicles per day in average daily traffic from Interstate 90 north to the US 2–US 395 junction, North Division is Spokane's busiest corridor. \n\nWalkability\n\nSpokane has an average Walk Score of 45, indicating most errands require a car, and an average Transit Score of 36. The extensive skywalk system covers thirteen blocks in the downtown area and is among the largest in the United States; it is used for pedestrian travel in cold and inclement weather and retail space as well. \n\nFreeways and highways\n\nSpokane is primarily served by interstate freeway I-90 and highways US 195, US 395, and US 2.\n* Interstate 90 runs east–west from Seattle, through Spokane and suburban areas to the east, onward to Coeur d'Alene, Idaho and Montana. \n* US 195, also known as the Inland Empire Highway, connects Spokane with the Palouse region to the south and intersects Interstate 90 just west of Spokane near Latah Creek\n* US 395 enters Spokane from the west concurrently with I-90, splitting off at Division St., and continues northward to Deer Park, Colville and Canada. Its route designation will move from Division St. to the limited-access North Spokane Corridor upon completion of that project.\n* US 2, also enters Spokane from the west and runs concurrently US 395 until they reach \"The Y\" in north Spokane, where US 2 branches off to the northeast, continuing to Mead, Newport, and Sandpoint.\n\nThe Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) is tasked with improving local highways to keep up with the region's growth and to try to prevent congestion problems that plague many larger cities. The WSDOT is constructing the North Spokane Corridor. When completed, the corridor will be a limited-access highway that will run from I-90, in the vicinity of the Thor/Freya interchange, northward through Spokane, meeting the existing US 395 just south of the Wandermere Golf Course. \n\nMass transportation\n\nBefore the influx of automobiles, Spokane's electric streetcar and interurban lines played a dominant role in moving people and goods around Spokane. Streetcars were installed as early as 1888, when they were pulled by horses. Many older side streets in Spokane still have visible streetcar rails embedded in them. Streetcar service was reduced due to declining ridership beginning in 1922, and by August 1936, all lines had been abandoned or converted to motor buses. Mass transportation throughout the Spokane area is provided by the Spokane Transit Authority (STA), which operates a fleet of 156 buses. Its service area covers roughly 248 sqmi and reaches 85 percent of the county's population. A large percentage of STA bus routes originate from the central hub, the STA Plaza in downtown Spokane. Spokane has rail and bus service provided by Amtrak and Greyhound via the Spokane Intermodal Center. The city is a stop for Amtrak's Empire Builder on its way to and from Chicago's Union Station en route to Seattle and Portland. Amtrak's through service to Seattle and Portland is a legacy of BNSF Railway's old Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway trackage. Spokane is a major railway junction for the BNSF Railway and the Union Pacific Railroad and is the western terminus for the Montana Rail Link.\n\nAirports\n\nSpokane International Airport (IATA: GEG, ICAO: KGEG) serves as the primary commercial airport for Spokane, Eastern Washington, and Northern Idaho. It is the second largest airport in the state of Washington and is recognized by the Federal Aviation Administration as a small hub, with service from six airlines and two air cargo carriers. The 4800 acre airport is located 5 mi west of downtown Spokane and is approximately a 10-minute drive away. The international airport's three-letter designation is \"GEG\", a result and legacy of the Geiger Field days prior to 1960, when the airport was named after Army aviator Major Harold Geiger in 1941. \n\nFelts Field is a general aviation airport serving the Spokane area and is located in east Spokane along the south bank of the Spokane River. Aviation at Felts Field dates back to 1913 and the strip served as Spokane's primary airport until commercial air traffic was redirected to Geiger Field after World War II. In 1927, the strip was one of the first in the western U.S. to receive official recognition as an airport by the U.S. Department of Commerce and is now named in honor of James Buell Felts, a Washington Air National Guard pilot.\n\nHealthcare\n\nThe Spokane area has six major hospitals, four of which are full-service facilities. The healthcare industry is a large and increasingly important industry in Spokane; the city provides specialized care to many patients from the surrounding Inland Northwest and as far north as the Canadian border. The city's healthcare needs are served primarily by non-profit Seattle-based Providence Health & Services and for-profit Tennessee-based Community Health Systems, which run the two biggest hospitals, Sacred Heart Medical Center, and Deaconess Medical Center, respectively. These two hospitals, along with most of Spokane's major health care facilities, are located on Spokane's Lower-South Hill, just south of downtown, in what is known as the \"Medical District\" of Spokane. The Sacred Heart Hospital, opened originally, with just 31 beds, on Spokane Falls Boulevard on January 27, 1887, but later moved to its present location at 101 West Eighth Avenue. As of 2014 it had 642 beds, with 28,319 admissions, 71,543 emergency room visits, and 2,982 births annually, and a full-time staff of 29 doctors and dentists and 583 registered nurses. Deaconess Medical Center, the smaller of the two main hospitals, had 388 beds as of 2014. Other hospitals in the area include the Spokane Veterans Affairs Medical Center in the northwest part of town, Holy Family Hospital on the north side, and Valley Hospital and Medical Center in the Spokane Valley. One of 20 specialty orthopedic Shriners Hospitals in the U.S. is also located in Spokane. One of Washington's two state psychiatric hospitals, Eastern State Hospital, is located 15 mi away in Medical Lake. \n\nMedia\n\nNewspaper service in Spokane is provided by its only major daily newspaper, The Spokesman-Review, which has a daily circulation of 76,291 and Sunday circulation of 95,939. The Spokesman-Review was formed from the merger of the Spokane Falls Review (1883–1894) and the Spokesman (1890–1893) in 1893 and was first published under the present name on June 29, 1894. It later absorbed the competing afternoon paper The Spokane Daily Chronicle, a significant newspaper historically that existed from 1890 until the merger in 1982. More specialized publications include the weekly alternative newspaper The Pacific Northwest Inlander, the bi-weekly business journal The Spokane Journal of Business, the student-run The Gonzaga Bulletin, the monthly GLBT newsmagazine Q View Northwest, and a monthly newspaper for parents, Kids newspaper. The city also has several community magazines, such as the monthly paper covering the Garland neighborhood, The Garland Times, and Spokane Coeur d'Alene Living, a monthly home and lifestyle magazine. \n\nAccording to Arbitron, Spokane is the 94th largest radio market in the U.S., with 532,100 listeners aged 12 and over. There are 28 AM and FM radio stations broadcast in the city. The five most listened-to stations are KKZX-FM (classic rock), KQNT-AM (news/talk), KXLY-FM (country), KISC-FM (adult contemporary), and KZZU-FM (Hot AC). Spokane's primary sources of non-commercial and community radio include Spokane's NPR-affiliate station KPBX-FM and KYRS, a full-power community radio station. \n\nSpokane is the 73rd largest television market in the U.S., accounting for 0.366% of the total TV households in the U.S. The city has six television stations, representing the major commercial networks and public television. Spokane is the television broadcast center for much of eastern Washington (except the Yakima and Tri-Cities area), northern Idaho, northwestern Montana, northeastern Oregon, and parts of southern Canada (by cable television). Spokane receives broadcasts in the Pacific Time Zone, with weekday prime time beginning at 8 pm. Montana and Alberta, Canada are in the Mountain Time Zone and receive Spokane broadcasts one hour later by their local time. The major network television affiliates include KREM (TV) 2 (CBS), KXLY-TV 4 (ABC), KHQ-TV 6 (NBC; Spokane's first television station, on air on December 20, 1952), KAYU 28 (FOX), KSKN 22 (The CW), KSPS-TV 7 (PBS) and KCDT-TV 26 (PBS; operating out of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho).\n\nNotable people\n\nSister cities\n\n \n\n* Nishinomiya, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan – since September 1961 (Spokane's first sister city)\n* Jecheon, South Korea\n* Jilin City, China\n* Limerick, Ireland" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Almost_Live!.txt" ], "title": [ "Almost Live!" ], "wiki_context": [ "Almost Live! is a local sketch comedy television show in Seattle, Washington, USA, produced and broadcast by NBC affiliate KING-TV from 1984 to 1999. A re-packaged version of the show also aired on Comedy Central from 1992 to 1993, and episodes aired on WGRZ-TV in the late 1990s. The show was broadcast on Saturday nights at 11:30, pushing Saturday Night Live back to midnight.\n\nHistory\n\nOriginal format\n\nAlmost Live! began as a weekly half-hour talk and comedy sketch show created by then VP of Programming Bob Jones, and hosted by Ross Shafer and closely patterned after Late Night with David Letterman, airing at 6:00 p.m. on Sundays. From the beginning, it featured many spoofs and satires of local television, series such as Star Trek, and unique locales in and around the city such as Ballard, Green Lake, Lynnwood, and Kent. The show became so popular that it was expanded from a half hour to one hour and shown twice a week. After four years and nearly 40 local Emmy Awards and several national awards, Shafer left to host the Fox Network's The Late Show.\n\nJohn Keister and a change in format\n\nJohn Keister became the permanent replacement after Shafer left the program. Keister hosted for one season (1988) in the one hour, 6 p.m. Sunday slot, but, following the lead of a \"Greatest Hits\" special that aired at 11:30 Saturday, the show moved into that slot. Until he became host, Keister was a regular supporting performer. Many of the initial award winning elements of Almost Live were his efforts, so the program quickly changed formats to feature more of his abilities, as well as other cast members, in video sketches. The guest interviews and live band segments were dropped. The focus changed to sketch comedy and the show was shaved back to a half-hour format.\n\nThe format of the show during Keister's tenure as host always included an opening monologue. Much of the material had a local flavor to it. In addition to Seattle politicians and celebrities, regular targets of the show’s barbs were various Seattle sports teams, local stereotypes, Seattle neighborhoods such as Ballard (home of elderly Scandinavian Americans who parked their cars halfway onto sidewalks with the seat belts slammed in the doors), Fremont and Wallingford (home of middle-aged hippies and New Agers), and suburbs such as Renton, Kent (perceived by the show’s young, urban viewers as a low-income, white trash town) as well as Bellevue and Mercer Island (both of which have an upscale, snobby image). Other targets outside of Seattle proper included Olympia and Bellingham, both of which have hippie/pothead stereotypes. Most, but not all, of the local references were removed for the Comedy Central version. The show also had promos for fake TV shows billed as \"new shows on NBC for the upcoming season\".\n\nBesides Keister, regular cast members included Mike Neun, Pat Cashman, Tracey Conway, Nancy Guppy, Joe Guppy, Barb Klansnic, Joel McHale, Bob Nelson, Bill Nye, Bill Stainton, Andrea Stein, Lauren Weedman, Steve Wilson, Ed Wyatt and, Darrell Suto as Billy Quan. Writers included Scott Schaefer, who later went on to win three National Emmy Awards for writing on Bill Nye the Science Guy, and original Head Writer Jim Sharp, who is now Senior Vice President of Original Programming and Development for Comedy Central in Los Angeles. Later seasons occasionally featured Seattle-area comedian and voice actor David Scully who joined the core cast during the final season.\n\nCancellation\n\nAlmost Live! was canceled by KING-TV in 1999 because it was not making enough profit for Dallas-based Belo Corporation, which acquired the station's owner King Broadcasting Company two years earlier. As of June 2015, KING-TV (now owned by Tegna) has aired reruns of the show in the time slot following Up Late nw. In fall 2000, Keister created a new sketch comedy show for competing station KIRO-TV, titled The John Report with Bob, essentially a carry-over of the news report segment he had done on Almost Live!, with Bob Nelson in tow. The new show was canceled after 2 seasons, again because it was not making a profit.\n\nKING aired a reunion show on September 12, 2005, featuring the cast of the final ten years. KING-TV also aired \"Almost Live! Back At Ya\", a series of \"best of\" shows, on Sundays starting September 10, 2006 at 9 p.m.[http://www.patcashman.com/ Pat Cashman writer public speaker] The \"best of\" shows currently air Saturday nights at 2 a.m. on KING-TV's sister station, KONG-TV. Reruns of normal shows are broadcast on KING-TV in Seattle at 1:35 a.m., following Up Late NW.\n\nSequel\n\nIn July 2012, clips surfaced on YouTube that appeared to promote a sketch comedy show called The (206), referring to Seattle's area code. These clips featured John Keister and Pat Cashman and hinted strongly that the show would be a successor to Almost Live!. Subsequently, The Seattle Times published a blog article about the sequel which included behind-the-scenes glimpses at one of the sketches being filmed for the new show. Additionally, the new show has a presence on social networking Web sites such as Facebook. The show premiered on Sunday, January 6, 2013 on KING-TV after Saturday Night Live. \nThe show would be revamped as Up Late NW (pronounced Up Late Northwest) in September 2015.\n\nSketches\n\nSome of the recurring sketches featured on Almost Live included:\n\n*\"Bill Nye the Science Guy\". Ross Shafer is credited as the creator of Bill Nye the Science Guy, encouraging Boeing aircraft engineer Bill Nye to demonstrate science experiments on the show. Nye later turned it into the Bill Nye the Science Guy show on PBS as well as in first-run syndication.\n*\"Capable Woman\": a super heroine who \"rescues\" men too \"manly\" to admit they can't do everything\n*\"Jet Guy\": parody of Republic Pictures' 1950s serial character Commando Cody\n*\"Me\": a talk show hosted by an egotistical woman who acts as if she is smarter than everyone else\n*\"Mind Your Manners with Billy Quan\", a parody of Bruce Lee’s martial arts films, with staff cameraman Darrell Suto in the starring role. This later became a recurring segment on the PBS show, Bill Nye the Science Guy.\n*\"Nature Walk, with Chuck\": reckless alcoholic outdoorsman and naïve young assistant, JIMMIE!\n*\"Cops In...\": parody of Cops set in various Seattle neighborhoods\n*\"Speed Walker\": super hero, played by Nye, who fights crime while adhering to the standards of competitive speed-walking\n*\"High-Fivin' White Guys\": a gang of over-the-top exuberant young middle-class white guys hit the town all over Seattle and (once in Vancouver, BC, in the sketch High-Fiving White Guys go to Canada)\n*\"Ineffectual Middle-Management Suck-ups\"\n*\"A Woman's Place\": promos for a weekday talk show with Tracey Conway and Hollyce Phillips.\n*\"The John Report\" [1990-95]/\"The Late Report\" [1995-end of run]: weekly news-parody by Keister, similar to Weekend Update\n*\"The Lame List\", or \"What’s Weak This Week\": a parody of Grunge culture, featuring \"members of Seattle's heavy metal community\" reacting to a list of concepts—e.g. \"jobs that start in the morning\", \"girlfriends who won't give us beer money\"—by repeatedly yelling \"Lame!\". Each list includes one more highbrow item, such as \"Eastern European nations shifting to a free market economy\", to which the metalheads react with blank bewilderment. Participants included local DJ Jeff Gilbert, Kim Thayil of Soundgarden, Matt and Chris Fox of Bitter End, Tony Benjamins and Brad Hull of Forced Entry, Marty Chandler of Panic and other Seattle musicians.\n*\"Sluggy\": a parody of \"Lassie\" about a little boy and his pet slug\n*\"The Survivalist\": paranoid man with program from his underground bunker\n*\"This Here Place\": a parody of This Old House, featuring poorly done and lazy repair jobs\n*\"The Worst Girlfriend In The World\": dating \"horror stories\"\n*\"Uncle Fran's Musical Forest\": embittered children's show host. The same character later appeared on Bill Nye The Science Guy.\n*\"Urban Wildlife\"\n*\"Street Talk\": one-word clips from man on the street or local celeb interviews, played back in altered order to give a different question a funny answer. This bit was later used as the basis for a CBS pilot co-created and produced by Scott Schaefer and hosted by Bill Maher.\n*\"Qwik Fishin'\", which featured John Keister and Pat Cashman as red neck fishermen on Lake Washington.\n\nSome sketches were borrowed for the Fox TV series Haywire in 1990." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Scooby-Doo.txt" ], "title": [ "Scooby-Doo" ], "wiki_context": [ "Scooby-Doo is an American animated cartoon franchise, comprising several animated television series produced from 1969 to the present day. The original series, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, was created for Hanna-Barbera Productions by writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears in 1969. This Saturday-morning cartoon series featured four teenagers—Fred Jones, Daphne Blake, Velma Dinkley, and Norville \"Shaggy\" Rogers—and their talking brown Great Dane named Scooby-Doo, who solve mysteries involving supposedly supernatural creatures through a series of antics and missteps. \n\nFollowing the success of the original series, Hanna-Barbera and its successor Warner Bros. Animation have produced numerous follow-up and spin-off animated series and several related works, including television specials and made-for-TV movies, a line of direct-to-video films, and two Warner Bros.–produced theatrical feature films. Some versions of Scooby-Doo feature different variations on the show's supernatural theme, and include characters such as Scooby's cousin Scooby-Dum and nephew Scrappy-Doo in addition to or instead of some of the original characters.\n\nScooby-Doo was originally broadcast on CBS from 1969 to 1976, when it moved to ABC. ABC aired the show until canceling it in 1986, and presented a spin-off featuring the characters as children, A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, from 1988 until 1991. New Scooby-Doo series aired as part of Kids WB on The WB Network and its successor, The CW Network, from 2002 until 2008. Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated aired on Cartoon Network from 2010 to 2013, and Be Cool, Scooby-Doo! debuted on Cartoon Network in 2015. Repeats of the various Scooby-Doo series are broadcast frequently on Cartoon Network and its sister channel Boomerang in the United States as well as other countries.\n\nIn 2013, TV Guide ranked Scooby-Doo the fifth Greatest TV Cartoon of All Time. \n\nDevelopment\n\nIn 1968, parent-run organizations, particularly Action for Children's Television (ACT), began to protest about what they perceived as excessive violence in Saturday morning cartoons. Most of these shows were Hanna-Barbera action cartoons like Space Ghost, The Herculoids and Birdman and the Galaxy Trio, and virtually all of them were canceled by 1969 because of pressure from the parent groups. Members of these watchgroups served as advisers to Hanna-Barbera and other animation studios to ensure that their new programs would be safe for children.\n\nFred Silverman, executive in charge of daytime programming for the CBS network at the time, was looking for a show that would revitalize his Saturday morning line and please the watch groups at the same time. The result was The Archie Show, based upon Bob Montana's teenage humor comic book Archie. Also successful were the musical numbers The Archies performed during each program (one of which, \"Sugar, Sugar\", was the most successful Billboard number-one hit of 1969). Silverman was eager to build upon this success, and contacted producers William Hanna and Joseph Barbera about possibly creating another show based on a teenage rock group, this one featuring teens who solved mysteries in between gigs. Silverman envisioned the show as a cross between the popular I Love a Mystery radio serials of the 1940s and either the Archie characters or the popular early 1960s television series The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis. \n\nAfter attempting to develop his own version of the proposed show called House of Mystery, Joseph Barbera, who handled the development and sale of Hanna-Barbera shows while William Hanna handled production, passed the task along to story writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears and artist/character designer Iwao Takamoto. Their original treatment, based in part on The Archie Show, was titled Mysteries Five and featured five teenagers: Geoff, Mike, Kelly, Linda, Linda's brother W.W. and their bongo-playing dog, Too Much, who were all members of the band Mysteries Five. When The Mysteries Five were not performing at gigs, they were out solving spooky mysteries involving ghosts, zombies, and other supernatural creatures. Ruby and Spears were unable to decide whether Too Much would be a large cowardly dog or a small feisty dog. When the former was chosen, Ruby and Spears wrote Too Much as a Great Dane but revised the dog character to a large sheepdog (similar to the Archies' sheepdog, Hot Dog) just before their presentation to Silverman, as Ruby feared the character would be too similar to the comic strip character Marmaduke. Silverman rejected their initial pitch, and after consulting with Barbera on next steps, got Barbera's permission to go ahead with Too Much being a Great Dane instead of a sheepdog. \n\nLead character designer Takamoto, while designing the characters, consulted a studio colleague who happened to be a breeder of Great Danes. After learning the characteristics of a prize-winning Great Dane from her, Takamoto proceeded to break most of the rules and designed Too Much with overly bowed legs, a double chin, and a sloped back, among other abnormalities. \n\nRuby and Spears' second pass at the show used Dobie Gillis as the template for the teenagers rather than Archie. The treatment retained the dog Too Much, while reducing the number of teenagers to four, removing the Mike character and retaining Geoff, Kelly, Linda, and W.W. As their personalities were modified, so were the characters' names: Geoff became \"Ronnie\" – later renamed \"Fred\" (at Silverman's behest), Kelly became \"Daphne\", Linda \"Velma\", and W.W. \"Shaggy\". The teens were now based on four teenage characters from The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis: Dobie Gillis, Thalia Menninger, Zelda Gilroy and Maynard G. Krebs, respectively. \n\nThe revised show was re-pitched to Silverman, who liked the material but, disliking the title Mysteries Five, decided to call the show Who's S-S-Scared? Silverman presented Who's S-S-Scared? to the CBS executives as the centerpiece for the upcoming 1969–70 season's Saturday morning cartoon block. CBS president Frank Stanton felt that the presentation artwork was too scary for young viewers and, thinking the show would be the same, decided to pass on it. \n\nNow without a centerpiece for the upcoming season's programming, Silverman had Ruby, Spears, and the Hanna-Barbera staff revise the treatments and presentation materials to tone down the show and better reflect its comedy elements. The rock band element was dropped, and more attention was focused upon Shaggy and Too Much. According to Ruby and Spears, Silverman was inspired by Frank Sinatra's scat \"doo-be-doo-be-doo\" at the end of his recording of \"Strangers in the Night\" on a flight to one of the development meetings, and decided to rename the dog \"Scooby-Doo\" and re-rechristen the show Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! The revised show was re-presented to CBS executives, who approved it for production.\n\nOriginal television series run\n\nThe CBS years (1969–75)\n\nScooby-Doo, Where Are You!\n\nScooby-Doo, Where Are You! made its CBS network debut on Saturday, September 13, 1969 with its first episode, \"What a Night for a Knight.\" The original voice cast featured veteran voice actor Don Messick as Scooby-Doo, radio DJ Casey Kasem (later host of radio's syndicated American Top 40) as Shaggy, actor Frank Welker (later a veteran voice actor in his own right) as Fred, actress Nicole Jaffe as Velma, and musician Indira Stefanianna Christopherson as Daphne. Scooby's speech patterns closely resembled an earlier cartoon dog, Astro from The Jetsons (1962–63), also voiced by Messick. Seventeen episodes of Scooby-Doo Where are You! were produced in 1969-70. The series theme song was written by David Mook and Ben Raleigh, and performed by Larry Marks.\n\nEach of these episodes features Scooby and the four teenage members of Mystery, Inc., Fred, Shaggy, Daphne and Velma, arriving at a location in the \"Mystery Machine\", a van painted with psychedelic colors and flower power imagery. Encountering a ghost, monster, or other supernatural creature who is terrorizing the local populace, they decide to investigate. The kids split up to look for clues and suspects while being chased at turns by the monster. Eventually, the kids come to realize the ghost and other paranormal activity is actually an elaborate hoax, and—often with the help of a Rube Goldberg-like trap designed by Fred—they capture the villain and unmask him. Revealed as a flesh and blood crook trying to cover up crimes by using the ghost story and costume, the criminal is arrested and taken to jail, often repeating something nearly identical to \"... and I would have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn't been for you meddling kids!\"\n\nScheduled opposite another teenage mystery-solving show, ABC's The Hardy Boys, Scooby-Doo became a ratings success, with Nielsen ratings reporting that as many as 65% of Saturday morning audiences were tuned into CBS when Scooby-Doo was being broadcast. The show was renewed for a second season in 1970, for which eight episodes were produced. Seven of the second season episodes featured chase sequences set to bubblegum pop songs recorded by Austin Roberts, who also re-recorded the theme song for this season. With Stefanianna Christopherson having married and retired from voice acting, Heather North assumed the role of Daphne, and would continue to voice the character through 1997. \n\nThe influences of I Love a Mystery and Dobie Gillis were especially apparent in these early episodes. Of the similarities between the Scooby-Doo teens and the Dobie Gillis teens, the similarities between Shaggy and Maynard are the most noticeable; both characters share the same beatnik-style goatee, similar hairstyles, and demeanors. The core premise of Scooby-Doo, Where are You! was also similar to Enid Blyton's Famous Five books. Both series featured four youths with a dog, and the Famous Five stories would often revolve around a mystery which would invariably turn out not to be supernaturally based, but simply a ruse to disguise the villain's true intent.\n\nThe roles of each character are strongly defined in the series: Fred is the leader and the determined detective, Velma is the intelligent analyst, Daphne is danger-prone, Shaggy is a coward more motivated by hunger than any desire to solve mysteries, and Scooby is similar to Shaggy, save for a Bob Hope-inspired tendency towards temporary bravery. Later versions of the show would make slight changes to the characters' established roles, most notably in the character of Daphne, shown in 1990s and 2000s Scooby-Doo productions as knowing many forms of karate and having the ability to defend herself, and less of a tendency towards getting kidnapped.\n\nScooby-Doo itself would be an influence on many other Saturday morning cartoons of the 1970s. During that decade, Hanna-Barbera and its competitors produced several animated programs also featuring teenage detectives solving mysteries with a pet or mascot of some sort, including Josie and the Pussycats (1970–71), The Funky Phantom (1971–72), The Amazing Chan and the Chan Clan (1972–73), Speed Buggy (1973–74), Goober and the Ghost Chasers (1973–74), Jabberjaw (1976–78), Captain Caveman and the Teen Angels (1977–80), among others. \n\nThe New Scooby-Doo Movies\n\nIn 1972, new one-hour episodes under the title The New Scooby-Doo Movies were created; each episode featuring a real or fictitious guest star helping the gang solve mysteries, including characters from other Hanna-Barbera series such as Harlem Globetrotters, Josie and the Pussycats and Speed Buggy, the comic book characters Batman and Robin (later adapted into their own Hanna-Barbera series, Super Friends, a year later), and celebrities such as Sandy Duncan, The Addams Family, Cass Elliot, Phyllis Diller, Don Knotts and The Three Stooges. Hanna-Barbera musical director Hoyt Curtin composed a new theme song for this series, and Curtin's theme would remain in use for much of Scooby-Doo's original broadcast run. After two seasons and 24 episodes of the New Movies format from 1972 to 1974, CBS began airing reruns of the original Scooby-Doo, Where are You! series until its option on the series ran out in 1976.\n\nThe ABC years (1976–91)\n\nThe Scooby-Doo Show and Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics\n\nNow president of ABC, Fred Silverman made a deal with Hanna-Barbera to bring new episodes of Scooby-Doo to the ABC Saturday morning lineup, where the show went through almost yearly lineup changes. For their 1976–77 season, 16 new episodes of Scooby-Doo were joined with a new Hanna-Barbera show, Dynomutt, Dog Wonder, to create The Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Hour (the show became The Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Show when a bonus Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! rerun was added to the package in November 1976). Joe Ruby and Ken Spears, now working for Silverman as supervisors of the ABC Saturday morning programs, returned the program to its original Scooby-Doo, Where are You! format, with the addition of Scooby's dim-witted country cousin Scooby-Dum, voiced by Daws Butler, as a recurring character. The voice cast was held over from The New Scooby-Doo Movies save for Nicole Jaffe, who retired from acting in 1973. Pat Stevens took over her role as the voice of Velma.\n\nFor the 1977–78 season, The Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Show became the two-hour programming block Scooby's All-Star Laff-A-Lympics (1977–78) with the addition of Laff-a-Lympics and Captain Caveman and the Teen Angels. In addition to eight new episodes of Scooby-Doo and reruns of the 1969 show, Scooby-Doo also appeared during the All-Star block's Laff-a-Lympics series, which featured 45 Hanna-Barbera characters competing in Battle of the Network Stars-esque parodies of Olympic sporting events. Scooby was seen as the team captain of the Laff-a-Lympics \"Scooby Doobies\" team, which also featured Shaggy and Scooby-Dum among its members.\n\nScooby's All-Star Laff-a-Lympics was retitled Scooby's All Stars for the 1978–79 season, reduced to 90 minutes when Dynomutt was spun off into its own half-hour and the 1969 reruns were dropped. Scooby's All-Stars continued broadcasting reruns of Scooby-Doo from 1976 and 1977, while new episodes of Scooby-Doo aired during a separate half-hour under the Scooby-Doo, Where are You! banner. After nine weeks, the separate Where are You! broadcast was cancelled, and the remainder of the 16 new 1978 episodes debuted during the Scooby's All-Stars block. The 40 total Scooby-Doo episodes produced from 1976 to 1978 were later packaged together for syndication as The Scooby-Doo Show, under which title they continue to air.\n\nScooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo\n\nThe Scooby-Doo characters first appeared outside of their regular Saturday morning format in Scooby Goes Hollywood, an hour-long ABC television special aired in prime time on December 13, 1979. The special revolved around Shaggy and Scooby attempting to convince the network to move Scooby out of Saturday morning and into a prime-time series, and featured spoofs of then-current television series and films such as Happy Days, Superman: The Movie, Laverne & Shirley and Charlie's Angels.\n\nIn 1979, Scooby's tiny nephew Scrappy-Doo was added to both the series and the billing, in an attempt to boost Scooby-Doos slipping ratings. The 1979–80 episodes, aired under the new title Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo as an independent half-hour show, succeeded in regenerating interest in the show. Lennie Weinrib voiced Scrappy in the 1979–80 episodes, with Don Messick assuming the role thereafter. Marla Frumkin replaced Pat Stevens as the voice of Velma mid-season.\n\nScooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo shorts\n\nAs a result of Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo's success, the entire show was overhauled in 1980 to focus more upon Scrappy-Doo. At this time, Scooby-Doo started to walk and run anthropomorphically on two feet more often, rather than on four like a normal dog as he did previously. Fred, Daphne, and Velma were dropped from the series, and the new Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo format was now composed of three seven-minute comedic adventures starring Scooby, Scrappy, and Shaggy instead of one half-hour mystery. Most of the supernatural villains in the seven-minute Scooby and Scrappy cartoons, who in previous Scooby series had been revealed to be human criminals in costume, were now real within the context of the series.\n\nThis version of Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo first aired from 1980 to 1982 as part of The Richie Rich/Scooby-Doo Show, an hour-long program also featuring episodes of Hanna-Barbera's new Richie Rich cartoon, adapted from the Harvey Comics character. From 1982 to 1983, Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo were part of The Scooby-Doo/Scrappy-Doo/Puppy Hour, a co-production with Ruby-Spears Productions which featured two Scooby and Scrappy shorts, a Scrappy and Yabba-Doo short featuring Scrappy-Doo and his Western deputy uncle Yabba-Doo, and The Puppy's New Adventures, based on characters from a 1977 Ruby-Spears TV special.\n\nBeginning in 1980, a half-hour of reruns from previous incarnations of Scooby-Doo were broadcast on ABC Saturday mornings in addition to first-run episodes. Airing under the titles Scooby-Doo Classics, The Scary Scooby Funnies, The Best of Scooby-Doo, and Scooby's Mystery Funhouse, the rerun package remained on the air until the end of the 1986 season. \n\nThe New Scooby and Scrappy-Doo Show\n\nScooby-Doo was restored to a standalone half-hour in 1983 with The New Scooby and Scrappy-Doo Show in 1983, which comprised two 11-minute mysteries per episode in a format reminiscent of the original Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! mysteries. Heather North returned to the voice cast as Daphne, who in this incarnation solved mysteries with Shaggy, Scooby, and Scrappy while working undercover as a reporter for a teen magazine.\n\nThis version of the show lasted for two seasons, with the second season airing under the title The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries. The 1984–85 season episodes featured semi-regular appearances from Fred and Velma, with Frank Welker and Marla Frumkin resuming their respective roles for these episodes.\n\nThe 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo\n\n1985 saw the debut of The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo, which featured Daphne, Shaggy, Scooby, Scrappy, and new characters Flim-Flam (voiced by Susan Blu) and Vincent Van Ghoul (based upon and voiced by Vincent Price) traveling the globe to capture \"thirteen of the most terrifying ghosts upon the face of the earth.\" The final first-run episode of The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo aired in December 1985, and after its reruns were removed from the ABC lineup the following March, no new Scooby series aired on the network for the next two years.\n\nA Pup Named Scooby-Doo\n\nHanna-Barbera reincarnated the original Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! cast as junior high school students for a new series titled A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, which debuted on ABC in 1988. A Pup Named Scooby-Doo was an irreverent re-imagining of the series, heavily inspired by the classic cartoons of Tex Avery and Bob Clampett, and eschewed the quasi-reality of the original Scooby series for a more Looney Tunes-like style, including an episode where Scooby-Doo's parents show up and reveal his real name to be \"Scoobert\". The series also established \"Coolsville\" as the name of the gang's hometown; this setting was retained for several of the later Scooby productions. The retooled show was a success, remaining in production for four seasons and on ABC's lineup until 1991.\n\nA Pup Named Scooby-Doo was developed and produced by Tom Ruegger, who had been the head story editor on Scooby-Doo since 1983. Following the first season of A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, Ruegger and much of his unit defected from Hanna-Barbera to Warner Bros. Animation to develop Steven Spielberg Presents Tiny Toon Adventures and later Animaniacs, Pinky and the Brain, and Freakazoid!. \n\nReruns and revivals (1987–present)\n\nTV movies, reruns, and direct-to-video films\n\nFrom 1987 to 1988, Hanna-Barbera Productions produced Hanna-Barbera Superstars 10, a series of syndicated TV movie featuring their most popular characters, including Yogi Bear, Huckleberry Hound, The Flintstones and The Jetsons. Scooby-Doo, Scrappy-Doo and Shaggy starred in three of these movies: Scooby-Doo Meets the Boo Brothers (1987), Scooby-Doo and the Ghoul School (1988), and Scooby-Doo and the Reluctant Werewolf (1988). These three films took their tone from the early-1980s Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo entries, and featured the characters encountering actual monsters and ghosts rather than masqueraded people. Scooby-Doo and Shaggy later appeared as the narrators of the made-for-TV movie Arabian Nights, originally broadcast by TBS in 1994, Don Messick's final outing as the original voice of Scooby-Doo.\n\nReruns of Scooby-Doo have been in syndication since 1980, and have also been shown on cable television networks such as TBS Superstation (until 1989) and USA Network (as part of the USA Cartoon Express from 1990 to 1994). In 1993, A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, having just recently ended its network run on ABC, began reruns on the Cartoon Network. With Turner Broadcasting purchasing Hanna-Barbera in 1991, in 1994 the Scooby-Doo franchise became exclusive to the Turner networks: Cartoon Network, TBS Superstation, and TNT. Canadian network Teletoon began airing Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! in 1997, with the other Scooby series soon following. When TBS and TNT ended their broadcasts of H-B cartoons in 1998, Scooby-Doo became the exclusive property of both Cartoon Network and sister station Boomerang.\n\nWith Scooby-Doo's restored popularity in reruns on Cartoon Network, Warner Bros. Animation and Hanna-Barbera (by then a subsidiary of Warner Bros. following the merger of Time Warner and Turner Entertainment in 1996) began producing one new Scooby-Doo direct-to-video movie a year beginning in 1998. These movies featured a slightly older version of the original five-character cast from the Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! days. The first four DTV entries were Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island (1998), Scooby-Doo! and the Witch's Ghost (1999), Scooby-Doo and the Alien Invaders (2000), and Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase (2001). Frank Welker was the only original voice cast member to return for these productions. Don Messick had died in 1997 and Casey Kasem, a strict vegetarian, relinquished the role of Shaggy after having to provide the voice for a 1995 Burger King commercial. Therefore, Scott Innes took over as both Scooby-Doo and Shaggy (Billy West voiced Shaggy in Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island). B.J. Ward took over as Velma, and Mary Kay Bergman voiced Daphne until her death in November 1999, and was replaced by Grey DeLisle.\n\nThese first four direct-to-video films differed from the original series format by placing the characters in plots with a darker tone and pitting them against actual supernatural forces. Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island, featured the original 1969 gang, reunited after years of being apart, fighting voodoo-worshiping cat creatures in the Louisiana bayou. Scooby-Doo! and the Witch's Ghost featured an author (voice of Tim Curry) returning to his hometown with the gang, to find out that an event is being haunted by the author's dead great Aunt Sarah, who was an actual witch. The Witch's Ghost introduced a goth rock band known as The Hex Girls, who became recurring characters in the Scooby-Doo franchise.\n\nScooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase was the final production made by the Hanna-Barbera studio, which was absorbed into parent company Warner Bros. Animation following William Hanna's death in 2001. Warner Animation would continue production of the direct-to-video series while also producing new Scooby-Doo series for television.\n\nThe direct-to-video productions continued to be produced concurrently with at least one entry per year. Two of these entries, Scooby-Doo! and the Legend of the Vampire and Scooby-Doo! and the Monster of Mexico (both 2003) were produced in a retro-style reminiscent of the original series, and featured Heather North and Nicole Jaffe as the voices of Daphne and Velma, respectively. Later entries produced between 2004 and 2009 were done in the style of What's New, Scooby-Doo, using that show's voice cast. Entries from 2010 on use the original 1969 designs and feature Matthew Lillard as the voice of Shaggy, the character Lillard portrayed in the live-action theatrical Scooby-Doo films. There will be more Scooby movies until 2018. \n\nIn addition, a live-action TV movie, Scooby-Doo! The Mystery Begins, was released on DVD and simultaneously aired on Cartoon Network on September 13, 2009, the fortieth anniversary of the series' debut. The film starred Nick Palatas as Shaggy, Robbie Amell as Fred, Kate Melton as Daphne, Hayley Kiyoko as Velma, and Frank Welker as the voice of Scooby-Doo. A second live-action TV movie, Scooby-Doo! Curse of the Lake Monster, retained the same director and cast and aired on October 16, 2010.\n\nTheatrical films\n\nA feature-length live-action film version of Scooby-Doo was released by Warner Bros. on June 14, 2002. Directed by Raja Gosnell, the film starred Freddie Prinze, Jr., as Fred, Sarah Michelle Gellar as Daphne, Matthew Lillard as Shaggy, and Linda Cardellini as Velma. Scooby-Doo, voiced by Neil Fanning, was created on-screen by computer-generated special effects. Scooby-Doo was a financially successful release, with a domestic box office gross of over US$130 million. \n\nA sequel, Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, followed in March 2004 with the same cast and director. Scooby-Doo 2 earned US$84 (€55,98) million at the U.S. box office. A second sequel was planned, but later scrapped following Warner Bros.' disappointment at the returns from Scooby-Doo 2. \n\nOn August 26, 2013, it was announced that Warner Bros. is developing an animated Scooby-Doo feature film with Atlas Entertainment. Charles Roven and Richard Suckle, who produced the first two live-action films, are producing the animated film, and Matt Lieberman will be writing the film. On June 17, 2014, Warner Brothers studio announced that they will restart the film series with Randall Green writing a new movie. On August 17, 2015, Warner Bros announced that Tony Cervone will direct the animated film, with Allison Abbate as producer and Dan Povenmire as executive producer. The film is planned for a September 21, 2018 release. On April 13, 2016, it was announced that it would be titled S.C.O.O.B. and would be the first film in a Hanna-Barbera Cinematic Universe.\n\nThe Kids' WB years (2002–08)\n\nWhat's New, Scooby-Doo?\n\nIn 2002, following the successes of the Cartoon Network reruns, the direct to video franchise, and the first feature film, Scooby-Doo returned to Saturday morning for the first time in 17 years with What's New, Scooby-Doo?, which aired on Kids' WB from 2002 until 2006. Produced by Warner Bros. Animation, the show follows the format of the original series but places it in the 21st century, featuring a heavy promotion of modern technology (computers, DVD, the Internet, cell phones) and culture.\n\nBeginning with this series, Frank Welker took over as Scooby's voice actor, while continuing to provide the voice of Fred as well. Casey Kasem returned as Shaggy, on the condition that the character be depicted as a vegetarian like Kasem himself. Grey DeLisle continued to voice Daphne, and former Facts of Life star Mindy Cohn voiced Velma. The series was produced by Chuck Sheetz, who had worked on The Simpsons.\n\nShaggy & Scooby-Doo Get a Clue!\n\nAfter three seasons, What's New, Scooby-Doo was replaced in September 2006 with Shaggy & Scooby-Doo Get a Clue!, a major revamping of the series which debuted on The CW's Kids' WB Saturday morning programming block. In the new premise, Shaggy inherits money and a mansion from an uncle, an inventor who has gone into hiding from villains trying to steal his secret invention. The villains, led by \"Dr. Phibes\" (based primarily upon Dr. Evil from the Austin Powers series, and named after Vincent Price's character from The Abominable Dr. Phibes), then use different schemes to try to get the invention from Shaggy and Scooby, who handle the plots alone. Fred, Daphne, and Velma are normally absent, but do make appearances at times to help. The characters were redesigned and the art style revised for the new series. Scott Menville voiced Shaggy in the series, with Casey Kasem appearing as the voice of Shaggy's Uncle Albert. Shaggy & Scooby-Doo Get a Clue! ran for two seasons on The CW.\n\nThe Cartoon Network years (2010–present)\n\nScooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated\n\nThe next Scooby series, Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated, premiered on Cartoon Network on April 5, 2010. The first Scooby series produced for cable television, Mystery Incorporated is a reboot of the franchise, re-establishing the characters' relationships, personalities, and locations, and expanding their world to feature their parents, high school, and neighbors. The series also borrowed pieces from many parts of Scooby-Doo's long history, as well as characters and elements of other Hanna-Barbera shows to form its back story and the bases of some of its episodes. Matthew Lillard was brought over from the direct-to-video series as the new voice of Shaggy, while Welker, Cohn, and DeLisle continued in their respective roles. Patrick Warburton, Linda Cardellini, Lewis Black, Vivica A. Fox, Gary Cole, Udo Kier, Tim Matheson, Tia Carrere, and Kate Higgins were added as new semi-regular cast members. Casey Kasem appeared in a recurring role as Shaggy's father, one of his last roles before retiring due to declining health.\n\nThe series, while still following the basic mystery-solving format of its predecessors, was broadcast as a 52-chapter animated telenovela and included elements similar to live-action mystery/adventure shows such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Lost. An overarching mystery surrounding the gang's hometown of Crystal Cove, California became the series' main story arc, with pieces to the mystery unfolding episode by episode. Also featured were romantic entanglements and interpersonal conflict between the lead characters. The series ran for 52 episodes over two seasons, with a three-part finale airing across April 4 and 5, 2013 – exactly three years from the debut.\n\nBe Cool, Scooby-Doo!\n\nOn March 10, 2014, Cartoon Network announced several new series based on classic cartoons, including a new Scooby-Doo animated series titled Be Cool, Scooby-Doo!. The show features the gang \"living it up\" the summer after the gang's senior year of high school. Along the way, they run into monsters and mayhem.\"[http://www.bcdb.com/cartoons/Other_Studios/C/Cartoon_Network_Studios/Be_Cool_Scooby-Doo_/index.html Be Cool, Scooby-Doo!]\". www.bcdb.com, March 13, 2014 The series premiered October 5, 2015 on Cartoon Network. \n\nScooby-Doo! direct-to-video episodes\n\nBeginning in 2012, Warner Bros. Animation began producing direct-to-video special episodes in the style of the concurrently produced films for inclusion on Scooby-Doo compilation DVD sets otherwise including episodes from previous Scooby series. These include Scooby-Doo! Spooky Games, included on the July 2012 release Scooby-Doo! Laff-A-Lympics: Spooky Games, Scooby-Doo! Haunted Holidays, from the October 2012 release Scooby-Doo! 13 Spooky Tales: Holiday Chills and Thrills, and Scooby-Doo! and the Spooky Scarecrow and Scooby-Doo! Mecha Mutt Menace, from the September 2013 DVD releases Scooby-Doo! 13 Spooky Tales: Run for Your 'Rife! and Scooby-Doo! 13 Spooky Tales: Ruh-Roh Robot!. On May 13, 2014, another episode, Scooby-Doo! Ghastly Goals was released on the Scooby-Doo! 13 Spooky Tales: Field of Screams DVD. On May 5, 2015, Scooby-Doo! and the Beach Beastie, the sixth direct-to-video special, was released on the Scooby-Doo! 13 Spooky Tales: Surf's Up Scooby-Doo DVD. \n\nCast\n\n*Scooby-Doo: Don Messick was the original voice of Scooby-Doo from 1969 until 1997. Hadley Kay performed the voice for the Johnny Bravo episode \"Bravo Dooby Doo\" in 1997. Scott Innes was the voice of Scooby-Doo from 1998 to 2001. Neil Fanning voiced Scooby-Doo in the live-action Warner Bros. theatrical films produced in 2002 and 2004. Frank Welker is the current voice of Scooby-Doo, having taken over the role from Innes in 2002, although Innes voiced the character in Scooby-Doo video game projects until 2007.\n*Norville \"Shaggy\" Rogers: Casey Kasem was the original voice of Shaggy from 1969 until 1997. Billy West voiced Shaggy in the 1998 direct-to-video feature Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island, while Scott Innes voiced the character from 1999 to 2001 and he would continue to voice Shaggy in video games through 2009. Casey Kasem returned to the voice role in 2002 and continued as Shaggy until 2009. In 2006, Kasem continued to voice Shaggy only in the direct-to-video film series through 2009, while Scott Menville performed the voice of Shaggy in the 2006–08 CW series Shaggy & Scooby-Doo Get a Clue!. Matthew Lillard appeared as Shaggy in the live action 2002 and 2004 theatrical films, and took over as the voice of the animated character in 2010. He also voiced Shaggy in two stop-motion parody sketches for the Adult Swim show Robot Chicken. Nick Palatas appeared as Shaggy in the 2009 and 2010 live-action TV movies.\n*Fred Jones: Frank Welker has always performed the voice of the animated versions of Fred since 1969, with the exception of the 1988–91 ABC series A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, where Carl Steven performed the voice of preteen Fred. Freddie Prinze, Jr. appears as Fred in the live-action theatrical films and voiced the character in the Robot Chicken parodies. Robbie Amell played Fred in the live-action TV movies.\n*Daphne Blake: Stefanianna Christopherson was the voice of Daphne in the first season of Scooby-Doo, Where are You! in 1969–70. Heather North assumed the role for season two in 1970, and continued as Daphne through 1997, save for Kellie Martin's turn as pre-teen Daphne in A Pup Named Scooby-Doo. Mary Kay Bergman performed the voice of Daphne from 1997 to 2000, when Grey DeLisle assumed the role and continues to perform the voice to this day. North reprised her voice role for two 2003 direct-to-video films, Scooby-Doo! and the Legend of the Vampire and Scooby-Doo! and the Monster of Mexico. Sarah Michelle Gellar appears as Daphne in the live-action theatrical films and as Daphne's voice in the Robot Chicken parodies. Kate Melton played Daphne in the live-action TV movies.\n*Velma Dinkley: Nicole Jaffe was the original voice of Velma from 1969 to 1974. Pat Stevens assumed the role from 1976 to 1979, with Marla Frumkin taking over midseason on Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo that year. Frumkin returned to voice Velma on a recurring basis for The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries in 1984, and Christina Lange voiced pre-teen Velma in A Pup Named Scooby-Doo. B. J. Ward voiced Velma from 1997 to 2001, with Mindy Cohn assuming the role in 2002. As with North, Jaffe reprised her voice role for Scooby-Doo! and the Legend of the Vampire and Scooby-Doo! and the Monster of Mexico in 2003. Stephanie D'Abruzzo voiced Velma for the 2013 puppet film Scooby-Doo! Adventures: The Mystery Map. In 2015, Kate Micucci took on the role for Be Cool, Scooby-Doo! and Lego Scooby-Doo projects, though Cohn will continue to provide the voice in direct-to-DVD movies and games Linda Cardellini appears as Velma in the live-action theatrical films and as the voice of Velma in the Robot Chicken parodies. Hayley Kiyoko played Velma in the live-action TV movies.\n*Scrappy-Doo: Lennie Weinrib voiced Scrappy-Doo during the first season of Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo in 1979–80. Don Messick assumed the role in 1980 for the Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo segments of The Richie Rich/Scooby-Doo Show and continued as Scrappy through 1988. Scrappy has only appeared sporadically since 1988, with Scott Innes performing the voice in the 2002 live-action film, which portrays Scrappy as the main villain.\n\nScooby-Doo filmography\n\nTelevision series\n\nTheatrical films\n\nTelevision specials and animated TV movies\n\nLive-action TV movies\n\nDirect-to-video films\n\nDirect-to-video specials\n\nPuppet direct-to-video films (Scooby-Doo! Adventures)\n\nLego shorts\n\nA series of stop-motion shorts, animated with Lego have been uploaded to Lego's and WB Kids' YouTube channel. The first one is animated by Brotherhood Workshop, while the following are animated by Stoopid Buddy Stoodios.\n\n1Nice Ride was first uploaded on September 18, 2015 but then shortly removed. It was put back online on March 29, 2016.\n\nVideo games\n\nStage plays\n\nReception and legacy\n\nDuring its four decade broadcast history, Scooby-Doo has received two Emmy nominations: a 1989 Daytime Emmy nomination for A Pup Named Scooby Doo, and a 2003 Daytime Emmy nomination for What's New, Scooby-Doos Mindy Cohn in the \"Outstanding Performer in an Animated Program\" category. Science advocate Carl Sagan favorably compared the predominantly skeptic oriented formula to that of most television dealing with paranormal themes, and considered that an adult analogue to Scooby-Doo would be a great public service. \n\nScooby-Doo has maintained a significant fan base, which has grown steadily since the 1990s due to the show's popularity among both young children and nostalgic adults who grew up with the series. Several television critics have stated that the show's mix of the comedy-adventure and horror genres was the reason for its widespread success. As Fred Silverman and the Hanna-Barbera staff had planned when they first began producing the series, Scooby-Doo's ghosts, monsters and spooky locales tend more towards humor than horror, making them easily accessible to younger children. \"Overall, [Scooby-Doo is] just not a show that is going to overstimulate kids' emotions and tensions,\" offered American Center for Children and Media executive director David Kleeman in a 2002 interview. \"It creates just enough fun to make it fun without getting them worried or giving them nightmares. \n\nOlder teenagers and adults have admitted to enjoying Scooby-Doo because of presumed subversive themes which involve theories of drug use and sexuality, in particular that Shaggy is assumed to be a user of cannabis and Velma is assumed to be a lesbian. Such themes were pervasive enough in popular culture to find their way into Warner Bros.' initial Scooby-Doo feature film in 2002, though several of the scenes were edited before release to secure a family-friendly \"PG\" rating. Series creators Joe Ruby and Ken Spears reported that they \"took umbrage\" to the inclusion of such themes in the Scooby-Doo feature and other places, and denied intending their characters to be drug users in any way.\n\nLike many Hanna-Barbera shows, the early Scooby-Doo series have been criticized at times for its production values and storytelling. In 2002, Jamie Malanowski of the New York Times commented that \"[Scooby-Doo's] mysteries are not very mysterious, and the humor is hardly humorous. As for the animation—well, the drawings on your refrigerator may give it competition.\" \n\nBy the 2000s, Scooby-Doo had received recognition for its popularity by placing in a number of top cartoon or top cartoon character polls. The August 3, 2002, issue of TV Guide featured its list of the 50 Greatest Cartoon Characters of All Time, in which Scooby-Doo placed twenty-second Scooby also ranked thirteenth in Animal Planet's list of the 50 Greatest TV Animals. For one year from 2004 to 2005, Scooby-Doo held the Guinness World Record for having the most episodes of any animated television series ever produced, a record previously held by and later returned to The Simpsons. Scooby-Doo was published as holding this record in the 2006 edition of the Guinness Book of Records. \n\nIn January 2009, entertainment website IGN named Scooby-Doo #24 on its list of the Top 100 Best Animated TV Shows. \n\nComic books\n\nGold Key Comics began publication of Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! comic books in December 1969. The comics initially contained adaptations of episodes of the television show, and later moved to all-original stories until ending with issue #30 in 1974. Several of the issues were written by Mark Evanier and drawn by Dan Spiegle. Charlton published Scooby comics, many drawn by Bill Williams, for 11 issues in 1975. From 1977 to 1979, Marvel Comics published nine issues of Scooby-Doo, all written by Evanier and drawn by Spiegel. Harvey Comics published reprints of the Charlton comics, as well as a handful of special issues, between 1993 and 1994.\n\nIn 1995, Archie Comics began publishing a monthly Scooby-Doo comic book, the first year of which featured Scrappy-Doo among its cast. Evanier and Spiegel worked on three issues of the series, which ended after 21 issues in 1997 when Warner Bros.' DC Comics acquired the rights to publish comics based on Hanna-Barbera characters. DC's Scooby-Doo series continues publication to this day.\n\nMerchandising\n\nEarly Scooby-Doo merchandise included a 1973 Milton Bradley board game, decorated lunch boxes, iron-on transfers, coloring books, story books, records, underwear, and other such goods. When Scrappy-Doo was introduced to the series in 1979, he, Scooby, and Shaggy became the sole foci of much of the merchandising, including a 1983 Milton-Bradley Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo board game. The first Scooby-Doo video game appeared in arcades in 1986, and has been followed by a number of games for both home consoles and personal computers. Scooby-Doo multivitamins also debuted at this time, and have been manufactured by Bayer since 2001.\n\nScooby-Doo merchandising tapered off during the late 1980s and early 1990s, but increased after the series' revival on Cartoon Network in 1995. Today, all manner of Scooby-Doo-branded products are available for purchase, including Scooby-Doo breakfast cereal, plush toys, action figures, car decorations, and much more. Real \"Scooby Snacks\" dog treats are produced by Del Monte Pet Products. Hasbro has created a number of Scooby board games, including a Scooby-themed edition of the popular mystery board game Clue. In 2007, the Pressman Toy Corporation released the board game Scooby-Doo! Haunted House. Beginning in 2001, a Scooby-Doo children's book series was authorized and published by Scholastic. These books, written by Suzanne Weyn, include original stories and adaptations of Scooby theatrical and direct-to-video features.\n\nFrom 1990 to 2002, Shaggy and Scooby-Doo appeared as characters in the Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbera simulator ride at Universal Studios Florida. The ride was replaced in the early 2000s with a Jimmy Neutron attraction, and The Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbera instead became an attraction at several properties operated by Paramount Parks. Shaggy and Scooby-Doo are costumed characters at Universal Studios Florida, and can be seen driving the Mystery Machine around the park.\n\nIn 2001, Scooby-Doo in Stagefright, a live stage play based upon the series, began touring across the world. A follow-up, Scooby-Doo and the Pirate Ghost, followed in 2009.\n\nOther media\n\nAs with most popular franchises, Scooby-Doo has been parodied and has done parodies.\n* The cult television and comic book series Buffy the Vampire Slayer features a group of characters that refer to themselves as the \"Scooby Gang\", who similarly battle supernatural forces and solve supernatural monster mysteries. The show contains obvious influences of Scooby-Doo, where \"The Scoobies\" use books to look up monsters. Sarah Michelle Gellar, the actress who plays Buffy on the series, later went on to appear as Daphne Blake in the live-action Scooby-Doo and Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed.\n* Scooby-Doo and the Mystery Inc. gang (based on their classic 1972 incarnation as opposed to their more recent incarnations) appear in the second part of the Batman: The Brave and the Bold episode \"Bat-Mite Presents: Batman's Strangest Cases\" in which they team up with Batman and Robin to rescue Weird Al who was kidnapped by The Joker and The Penguin.\n* Scooby-Doo and the Snowmen Mystery, vinyl LP released 1972 in the United Kingdom, Stereo, 33 ⅓ RPM, LP, from the label Music for Pleasure – MFP 50086.\n* The film Wayne's World includes an alternate ending called the \"Scooby-Doo Ending\" in which a character in the film is revealed to have been wearing a mask. It also includes a reference to the iconic line \"Let's see who this really is\" before removing the mask.\n* Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back has a brief scene where friends ride in the back of a Mystery Machine van with Scooby and his gang.\n* The Filk band Ookla the Mok open their 2003 album Oh Okay LA with the song \"W.W.S.D?\" (\"What Would Scooby Do?) which proposes a deontological system of moral philosophy based on the actions of Scooby-Doo.\n* In October 1999, Cartoon Network made a Scooby-Doo spoof of The Blair Witch Project called The Scooby-Doo Project.\n* A Scooby-Doo parody has appeared in the Mad episode \"Kitchen Nightmares Before Christmas / How I Met Your Mummy\".\n* Scooby-Doo has been parodied on Futurama episode \"Saturday Morning Fun Pit\", where the characters from Planet Express take on the roles of the gang (Bender as Scooby, Hermes as Fred, Leela as Daphne, Amy as Velma and Fry as Shaggy).\n* The series is parodied in the animated music video for the song \"Ghost\" by Mystery Skulls.\n* On the animated series Arthur it has a parody of Scooby-Doo called \"Spooky-Poo\"." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "The_Prince_and_the_Pauper.txt", "A_Connecticut_Yankee_in_King_Arthur's_Court.txt" ], "title": [ "The Prince and the Pauper", "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" ], "wiki_context": [ "The Prince and the Pauper is a novel by American author Mark Twain. It was first published in 1881 in Canada, before its 1882 publication in the United States. The novel represents Twain's first attempt at historical fiction. Set in 1547, it tells the story of two young boys who are identical in appearance: Tom Canty, a pauper who lives with his abusive father in Offal Court off Pudding Lane in London, and Prince Edward, son of King Henry VIII.\n\nPlot\n\nTom Canty, youngest son of a poor family living in Offal Court, London, has always aspired to a better life, encouraged by the local priest (who has taught him to read and write). Loitering around the palace gates one day, he sees a prince (the Prince of Wales – Edward VI). Coming too close in his intense excitement, Tom is nearly caught and beaten by the Royal Guards; however, Edward stops them and invites Tom into his palace chamber. There the two boys get to know one another, fascinated by each other's life and their uncanny resemblance; they were born on the same day. They decide to switch clothes \"temporarily\". The Prince momentarily goes outside, quickly hiding an article of national importance (which the reader later learns is the Great Seal of England), but dressed as he is in Tom's rags, he is not recognized by the guards, who drive him from the palace, and he eventually finds his way through the streets to the Canty home. There he is subjected to the brutality of Tom's abusive father, from whom he manages to escape, and meets one Miles Hendon, a soldier and nobleman returning from war. Although Miles does not believe Edward's claims to royalty, he humors him and becomes his protector. Meanwhile, news reaches them that King Henry VIII has died and Edward is now the king.\n\nTom, posing as the prince, tries to cope with court customs and manners. His fellow nobles and palace staff think \"the prince\" has an illness which has caused memory loss and fear he will go mad. They repeatedly ask him about the missing \"Great Seal\", but he knows nothing about it; however, when Tom is asked to sit in on judgments, his common-sense observations reassure them his mind is sound.\n\nAs Edward experiences the brutish life of a pauper firsthand, he becomes aware of the stark class inequality in England. In particular, he sees the harsh, punitive nature of the English judicial system where people are burned at the stake, pilloried, and flogged. He realizes that the accused are convicted on flimsy evidence (and branded – or hanged – for petty offenses), and vows to reign with mercy when he regains his rightful place. When Edward unwisely declares to a gang of thieves that he is the king and will put an end to unjust laws, they assume he is insane and hold a mock coronation.\n\nAfter a series of adventures (including a stint in prison), Edward interrupts the coronation as Tom is about to celebrate it as King Edward VI. Tom is eager to give up the throne; however, the nobles refuse to believe that the beggarly child Edward appears to be is the rightful king until he produces the Great Seal that he hid before leaving the palace. Tom declares that if anyone had bothered to describe the seal he could have produced it at once, since he had found it inside a decorative suit of armor (where Edward had hidden it) and had been using it to crack nuts.\n\nEdward and Tom switch back to their original places and Miles is rewarded with the rank of earl and the family right to sit in the presence of the king. In gratitude for supporting the new king's claim to the throne, Edward names Tom the \"king's ward\" (a privileged position he holds for the rest of his life).\n\nThemes\n\nThe introductory quote is part of the \"quality of mercy\" speech from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. While written for children, The Prince and the Pauper is a criticism of judging others by appearances.\n\nHistory\n\nTwain wrote The Prince and the Pauper having already started The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Twain wrote, \"My idea is to afford a realizing sense of the exceeding severity of the laws of that day by inflicting some of their penalties upon the King himself and allowing him a chance to see the rest of them applied to others...\"[http://www.penguin.com/static/pdf/teachersguides/princepauper.pdf Cope, Jim and Cope, Wendy. A Teacher's Guide to the Signet Classic Edition of Mark Twain's The Prince and the Pauper] Having returned from a second European tour which formed the basis of A Tramp Abroad (1880), Twain read extensively English and French history. Initially intended as a play, it was originally set in Victorian England, before he decided to set it further back in time.[https://books.google.com/books?idSaCiA0JZcSgC&pg\nPA123&lpgPA123&dq\nthe+prince+and+the+pauper+theme&sourcebl&ots\nMlExCuNETO&sigWp5lE8bPL_7QvAyvc207KeGskI0&hl\nen&saX&ved\n0CFsQ6AEwDzgKahUKEwjOppnEiOjHAhWIaz4KHUE4BvM#vonepage&q\nthe%20prince%20and%20the%20pauper%20theme&f=false Emerson, Everett. Mark Twain, A Literary Life, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000, ISBN 9780812235166]\n\nThe \"whipping-boy story\" was published in the Hartfod Bazar Budget of July 4, 1880 before he deleted it from the novel at the suggestion of William Dean Howells. The book was published by subscription by James R. Osgoode of Boston, with illustrations by F.T. Merrill.\n\nThe book bears a dedication to his daughters, Susie and Clara Clemens and subtitled \"A Tale For Young People of All Ages\".\n\nAdaptations\n\nThe Prince and the Pauper was adapted for the stage, an adaptation which involved Twain in litigation with the playwright. It opened on Broadway in 1920 under the direction of William Faversham, with Ruth Findlay playing both Tom Canty and Prince Edward. In 1946, the story was adapted by Classic Comics to comic book format in issue 29.\n\nThe novel has also been the basis of several films. A much-abridged 1920 silent version was produced (as one of his first films) by Alexander Korda in Austria entitled Der Prinz und der Bettelknabe. The 1937 version starred Errol Flynn (as Hendon) and twins Billy and Bobby Mauch as Tom Canty and Edward Tudor, respectively.\n\nIn 1957 CBS' DuPont Show of the Month offered an adaptation of The Prince and the Pauper, with Johnny Washbrook of My Friend Flicka as Tom Canty and Rex Thompson as Prince Edward. A 1962 three-part Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color television adaptation featured Guy Williams as Miles Hendon. Both Prince Edward and Tom Canty were played by Sean Scully, using an early version of the split-screen technique which the Disney studios would later use in The Parent Trap with Hayley Mills. The Prince and the Pauper had been filmed in Shepperton, England, a year earlier. The 21st episode of The Monkees, aired on February 6, 1967, was entitled \"The Prince and the Paupers\".\n\nA 1975 BBC television adaptation started Nicholas Lyndhurst in the starring role.\n\nIn a 1976 ABC Afterschool Special, Lance Kerwin played the dual role in a modern American-based adaptation of the story entitled P.J. and the President's Son. The BBC produced a television adaptation by writer Richard Harris, consisting of six thirty-minute episodes, in 1976. Nicholas Lyndhurst played both Prince Edward and Tom Canty. It was adapted again in 1996.\n\nA 1977 film version of the story, starring Oliver Reed as Miles Hendon, co-starring Rex Harrison (as the Duke of Norfolk), Mark Lester and Raquel Welch and directed by Richard Fleischer, was released in the UK as The Prince and the Pauper and in the US as Crossed Swords.\n\nRingo, a 1978 TV special starring Ringo Starr, involves the former Beatles drummer trading places with talentless look-alike.\n\nWalt Disney Feature Animation made a 1990 animated 24-minute short film, inspired by the novel and starring Mickey Mouse. In this version, Mickey trades places with himself and is supported by other Disney characters.\n\nIn 1996, PBS aired a Wishbone adaptation titled The Pooch and the Pauper with Wishbone playing both Tom Canty and Edward VI.\n\nThe BBC produced a six-part dramatisation of the story in 1996 with Keith Michell reprising his role of Henry VIII.\n\nIn 2000, it was adapted again as a live-action version.\n\nIn 2004 it was adapted into an 85-minute CGI-animated musical, Barbie as the Princess and the Pauper, with Barbie playing the blonde Princess Anneliese and the brunette pauper Erika.\n\nIn 2006 Garfield's second live-action film, entitled Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties, was another adaptation of the classic story.\n\nIt Takes Two, starring twins Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, is a loose translation of this story in which two girls (one wealthy and the other an orphan, who resemble each other) switch places in order to experience each other's lives.\n\nIn 1996 C&E, a Taiwanese software company, released an RPG video game for Sega Genesis entitled Xin Qigai Wangzi (\"New Beggar Prince\"). Its story was inspired by the book, with the addition of fantastic elements such as magic, monsters and other RPG themes. The game was ported to PC in 1998. It was eventually licensed in an English translation and released in 2006 as Beggar Prince by independent game publisher Super Fighter Team. This was one of the first new games for the discontinued Sega platform since 1998, and is perhaps the first video-game adaptation of the book.\n\nA 2000 film directed by Giles Foster starred Aidan Quinn (as Miles Hendon), Alan Bates, Jonathan Hyde, Jonathan and Robert Timmins. An Off-Broadway musical with music by Neil Berg opened at Lamb's Theatre on June 16, 2002. The original cast included Dennis Michael Hall as Prince Edward, Gerard Canonico as Tom Canty, Rob Evan as Miles Hendon, Stephen Zinnato as Hugh Hendon, Rita Harvey as Lady Edith, Michael McCormick as John Canty, Robert Anthony Jones as the Hermit/Dresser, Sally Wilfert as Mary Canty, Allison Fischer as Lady Jane and Aloysius Gigl as Father Andrew. The musical closed August 31, 2003. A 2007 film, A Modern Twain Story: The Prince and the Pauper starred identical twins Dylan and Cole Sprouse. In some versions, Prince Edward carries identification when he assumes Tom's role. While animations such as the Mickey Mouse version retell the story, other cartoons employ parody (including an episode of Johnny Bravo in which Twain appears, begging cartoonists to \"let this tired story die\".\n\nA Hindi film version, Raja Aur Runk, was released in 1968 and directed by Kotayya Pratyagatma. The film \"Indianized\" many of the episodes in the original story. Raju Peda Telugu version adaptation of the novel was played by N. T. Rama Rao and it was directed by B. A. Subba Rao.\n\nThe BBC TV comedy series Blackadder the Third has an episode where the Prince Regent believes that the Duke of Wellington is after him. The prince swaps clothes with Blackadder (who is his butler) and says, \"This reminds of that story 'The Prince and the Porpoise'.\" Blackadder corrects him: \"Pauper. The Prince and the Pauper.\" Since Blackadder the Third is set during the early 1800s, this is an anachronism. An episode of Phineas and Ferb (\"Make Play\") follows a similar storyline, with Candace switching places with Princess Baldegunde of Duselstein and discovering that royal life is dull. Film critic Roger Ebert has suggested that Trading Places (starring Dan Aykroyd and Eddie Murphy) has similarities to Twain's tale due to the two characters' switching lives (although not by choice). \n\nIn 2012, a second CGI musical adaptation was released, entitled Barbie: The Princess and the Popstar. In it, Barbie plays a princess blonde named Victoria (Tori), and a brunette popstar named Keira. Both crave the life of another, one day they meet and magically change places.\n\nEnglish playwright Jemma Kennedy adapted the story into a musical drama which was performed at the Unicorn Theatre in London 2012–2013, directed by Selina Cartmell and starring twins Danielle Bird and Nichole Bird as the Prince and Pauper and Jake Harders as Miles Hendon. \n\nThe television series Once Upon a Time features a character named \"Prince Charming\" (portrayed by Josh Dallas) whose origin story is loosely based on The Prince and the Pauper. David, a poor shepherd, discovers his twin brother James was given to King George as his heir in a deal with Rumplestiltskin. When Prince James is killed in battle, David takes his place and name in exchange for the prosperity of his mother's farm.", "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is an 1889 novel by the American humorist and writer Mark Twain. The book was originally titled A Yankee in King Arthur's Court. Some early editions are titled A Yankee at the Court of King Arthur.\n\nIn the book, a Yankee engineer from Connecticut is accidentally transported back in time to the court of King Arthur, where he fools the inhabitants of that time into thinking he is a magician—and soon uses his knowledge of modern technology to become a \"magician\" in earnest, stunning the English of the Early Middle Ages with such feats as demolitions, fireworks and the shoring up of a holy well. He attempts to modernize the past, but in the end he is unable to prevent the death of Arthur and an interdict against him by the Catholic Church of the time, which grows fearful of his power.\n\nTwain wrote the book as a burlesque of Romantic notions of chivalry after being inspired by a dream in which he was a knight himself, and severely inconvenienced by the weight and cumbersome nature of his armor.\n\nPlot\n\nThe novel is a comedy that sees 6th-Century England and its medieval culture through Hank Morgan's view; he is a 19th-century resident of Hartford, Connecticut, who, after a blow to the head, awakens to find himself inexplicably transported back in time to early medieval England where he meets King Arthur himself. The fictional Mr. Morgan, who had an image of that time that had been colored over the years by romantic myths, takes on the task of analyzing the problems and sharing his knowledge from 1300 years in the future to modernize, Americanize, and improve the lives of the people.\n\nIn addition, many passages are quoted directly from Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur, a medieval Arthurian collection of legends and one of the earlier sources. The narrator who finds the Yankee in the \"modern times\" of Twain's nineteenth century is reading the book in the museum in which they both meet; later, characters in the story retell parts of it in Malory's original language. A chapter on medieval hermits also draws from the work of William Edward Hartpole Lecky.\n\nIntroduction to the \"stranger\"\n\nThe story begins as a first-person narrative in Warwick Castle, where a man details his recollection of a tale told to him by an \"interested stranger\" who is personified as a knight through his simple language and familiarity with ancient armor. \n\nAfter a brief tale of Sir Lancelot of Camelot and his role in slaying two giants from the third-person narrative—taken directly from Le Morte d'Arthur—the man named Hank Morgan enters and, after being given whiskey by the narrator, he is persuaded to reveal more of his story. Described through first-person narrative as a man familiar with the firearms and machinery trade, Hank is a man who had reached the level of superintendent due to his proficiency in firearms manufacturing, with two thousand subordinates. He describes the beginning of his tale by illustrating details of a disagreement with his subordinates, during which he sustained a head injury from a \"crusher\" to the head caused by a man named \"Hercules\" using a crowbar. After passing out from the blow, Hank describes waking up underneath an oak tree in a rural area of Camelot, where he soon encounters the knight Sir Kay, riding by. Kay challenges him to a joust, which is quickly lost by the unweaponed, unarmored Hank as he scuttles up a tree. Kay captures Hank and leads him towards Camelot castle. Upon recognizing that he has time-traveled to the sixth century, Hank realizes that he is the de facto smartest person on Earth, and with his knowledge he should soon be running things.\n\nHank is ridiculed at King Arthur's court for his strange appearance and dress and is sentenced by King Arthur's court (particularly the magician Merlin) to burn at the stake on 21 June. By a stroke of luck, the date of the burning coincides with a historical solar eclipse in the year 528, of which Hank had learned in his earlier life. (In reality, the solar eclipses nearest in time to 21 June, both partial, both in the Southern Hemisphere at maximum, in 528 occurred on 6 March and 1 August. ) While in prison, he sends the boy he christens Clarence (whose real name is Amyas le Poulet) to inform the King that he will blot out the sun if he is executed. Hank believes the current date to be 20 June; however, it is actually the 21st when he makes his threat, the day that the eclipse will occur at 12:03 p.m. When the King decides to burn him, the eclipse catches Hank by surprise. But he quickly uses it to his advantage and convinces the people that he caused the eclipse. He makes a bargain with the King, is released, and becomes the second most powerful person in the kingdom.\n\nHank is given the position of principal minister to the King and is treated by all with the utmost fear and awe. His celebrity brings him to be known by a new title, elected by the people — \"The Boss\". However, he proclaims that his only income will be taken as a percentage of any increase in the kingdom's gross national product that he succeeds in creating for the state as Arthur's chief minister, which King Arthur sees as fair. Although the people fear him and he has his new title, Hank is still seen as somewhat of an equal. The people might grovel to him if he were a knight or some form of nobility, but without that, Hank faces problems from time to time, as he refuses to seek to join such ranks.\n\nThe Takeover \n\nAfter being made \"the Boss\", Hank learns about medieval practices and superstitions. Having superior knowledge, he is able to outdo the alleged sorcerers and miracle-working church officials. At one point, soon after the eclipse, people began gathering, hoping to see Hank perform another miracle. Merlin, jealous of Hank having replaced him both as the king's principal adviser and as the most powerful sorcerer of the realm, begins spreading rumors that Hank is a fake and cannot supply another miracle. Hank secretly manufactures gunpowder and a lightning rod, plants explosive charges in Merlin's tower, then places the lightning rod at the top and runs a wire to the explosive charges. He then announces (during a period when storms are frequent) that he will soon call down fire from heaven and destroy Merlin's tower, then challenges Merlin to use his sorcery to prevent it. Of course, Merlin's \"incantations\" fail utterly to prevent lightning striking the rod, triggering the explosive charges and leveling the tower, further diminishing Merlin's reputation.\n\nHank Morgan, in his position as King's Minister, uses his authority and his modern knowledge to industrialize the country behind the back of the rest of the ruling class. His assistant is Clarence, a young boy he meets at court, whom he educates and gradually lets in on most of his secrets, and eventually comes to rely on heavily. Hank sets up secret schools, which teach modern ideas and modern English, thereby removing the new generation from medieval concepts, and secretly constructs hidden factories, which produce modern tools and weapons. He carefully selects the individuals he allows to enter his factories and schools, seeking to select only the most promising and least indoctrinated in medieval ideas, favoring selection of the young and malleable whenever possible.\n\nAs Hank gradually adjusts to his new situation, he begins to attend medieval tournaments. A misunderstanding causes Sir Sagramore to challenge Hank to a duel to the death; the combat will take place when Sagramore returns from his quest for the Holy Grail. Hank accepts, and spends the next few years building up 19th-century infrastructure behind the nobility's back. At this point, he undertakes an adventure with a wandering girl named the Demoiselle Alisande a la Carteloise—nicknamed \"Sandy\" by Hank in short order—to save her royal \"mistresses\" being held captive by ogres. On the way, Hank struggles with the inconveniences of plate armor (actually an anachronism, which would not be developed until the High Middle Ages or see widespread use until the Late Middle Ages), and also encounters Morgan le Fay. The \"princesses\", \"ogres\", and \"castles\" are all revealed to be actually pigs owned by peasant swineherds, although to Sandy they still appear as royalty. Hank buys the pigs from the peasants and the two leave.\n\nOn the way back to Camelot, they find a travelling group of pilgrims headed for the Valley of Holiness. Another group of pilgrims, however, comes from that direction bearing the news that the valley's famous fountain has run dry. According to legend, long ago the fountain had gone dry before as soon as the monks of the valley's monastery built a bath with it; the bath was destroyed and the water instantly returned, but this time it has stopped with no clear cause. Hank is begged to restore the fountain, although Merlin is already trying. When Merlin fails, he claims that the fountain has been corrupted by a demon, and that it will never flow again. Hank, in order to look good, agrees that a demon has corrupted the fountain but also claims to be able to banish it; in reality, the \"fountain\" is simply leaking. He procures assistants from Camelot trained by himself, who bring along a pump and fireworks for special effects. They repair the fountain and Hank begins the \"banishment\" of the demon. At the end of several long German language phrases, he says \"BGWJJILLIGKKK\", which is simply a load of gibberish, but Merlin agrees with Hank that this is the name of the demon. The fountain restored, Hank goes on to debunk another magician who claims to be able to tell what any person in the world is doing, including King Arthur. However, Hank knows that the King is riding out to see the restored fountain, and not \"resting from the chase\" as the \"false prophet\" had foretold to the people. Hank correctly states that the King will arrive in the valley.\n\nHank has an idea to travel amongst the poor disguised as a peasant to find out how they truly live. King Arthur joins him, but has extreme difficulty in acting like a peasant convincingly. Although Arthur is somewhat disillusioned about the national standard of life after hearing the story of a mother infected with smallpox, he still ends up getting Hank and himself hunted down by the members of a village after making several extremely erroneous remarks about agriculture. Although they are saved by a nobleman's entourage, the same nobleman later arrests them and sells them into slavery.\n\nHank steals a piece of metal in London and uses it to create a makeshift lockpick. His plan is to free himself, the king, beat up their slave driver, and return to Camelot. However, before he can free the king, a man enters their quarters in the dark. Mistaking him for the slave driver, Hank rushes after him alone and starts a fight with him. They are both arrested. Although Hank lies his way out, in his absence the real slave driver has discovered Hank's escape. Since Hank was the most valuable slave — he was due to be sold the next day — the man becomes enraged and begins beating his other slaves, who fight back and kill him. All the slaves, including the king, will be hanged as soon as the missing one — Hank — is found. Hank is captured, but he and Arthur are rescued by a party of knights led by Lancelot, riding bicycles. Following this, the king becomes extremely bitter against slavery and vows to abolish it when they get free, much to Hank's delight.\n\nSagramore returns from his quest, and fights Hank. Hank defeats him and seven others, including Galahad and Lancelot, using a lasso. When Merlin steals Hank's lasso, Sagramore returns to challenge him again. This time, Hank kills him with a revolver. He proceeds to challenge the knights of England to attack him en masse, which they do. After he kills nine more knights with his revolvers, the rest break and flee. The next day, Hank reveals his 19th century infrastructure to the country. With this fact he was called a wizard as he told Clarence to do so as well.\n\nThe Interdict \n\nThree years later, Hank has married Sandy and they have a baby. While asleep and dreaming, Hank says, \"Hello-Central\" — a reference to calling a 19th-century telephone operator — and Sandy believes that the mystic phrase a good name for the baby, and names it accordingly. However, the baby falls critically ill and Hank's doctors advise him to take his family overseas while the baby recovers. In reality, it is a ploy by the Catholic Church to get Hank out of the country, leaving the country without effective leadership. During the weeks that Hank is absent, Arthur discovers Guinevere's infidelity with Lancelot. This causes a war between Lancelot and Arthur, who is eventually killed by Sir Mordred.\n\nThe church then publishes \"The Interdict\" which causes all people to break away from Hank and revolt. Hank meets with his good friend Clarence who informs him of the war thus far. As time goes on, Clarence gathers 52 young cadets, from ages 14 to 17, who are to fight against all of England. Hank's band fortifies itself in Merlin's Cave with a minefield, electric wire and Gatling guns. The Catholic Church sends an army of 30,000 knights to attack them, but the knights are slaughtered by the cadets wielding Hank's modern weaponry.\n\nHowever, Hank's men are now trapped in the cave by a wall of dead bodies. Hank attempts to go offer aid to any wounded, but is stabbed by the first wounded man he tries to help, Sir Meliagraunce. He is not seriously injured, but is bedridden. Disease begins to set in amongst them. One night, Clarence finds Merlin weaving a spell over Hank, proclaiming that he shall sleep for 1,300 years. Merlin begins laughing deliriously, but ends up electrocuting himself on one of the electric wires. Clarence and the others all apparently die from disease in the cave.\n\nMore than a millennium later, the narrator finishes the manuscript and finds Hank on his deathbed having a dream about Sandy. He attempts to make one last \"effect\", but dies before he can finish it.\n\nCharacters\n\n*Hank Morgan\n*Clarence (Amyas le Poulet) \n*Sandy (Alisande)\n*King Arthur\n*Merlin\n*Sir Kay\n*Sir Lancelot\n*Queen Guinevere\n*Sir Sagramor le Desirous\n*Sir Dinadan\n*Sir Galahad\n*Morgan le Fay\n*Marco\n*Dowley\n*Hello-Central\n*Sir Maleagant\n*Giovanni\n\nPublication history and response\n\nTwain first conceived of the idea behind A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court in December 1884 and worked on it between 1885 and 1889. It was first published in England by Chatto & Windus under the title A Yankee at the Court of King Arthur in December 1889. Writer and critic William Dean Howells called it Twain's best work and \"an object-lesson in democracy\". \n\nAnalysis\n\nWhile the book pokes fun at contemporary society, the main thrust is a satire of romanticized ideas of chivalry, and of the idealization of the Middle Ages common in the novels of Sir Walter Scott and other 19th century literature. Twain had a particular dislike for Scott, blaming his kind of romanticism of battle for the southern states deciding to fight the American Civil War. He writes in Life on the Mississippi:\n\nFor example, the book portrays the medieval people as being very gullible, as when Merlin makes a \"veil of invisibility\", which according to him will make the wearer imperceptible to his enemies, though friends can still see him. The knight Sir Sagramor wears it to fight Hank, who pretends he cannot see Sagramor for effect to the audience.\n\nHank Morgan's opinions are also strongly denunciatory towards the Catholic Church of the medieval period; the Church is seen by the Yankee as an oppressive institution that stifles science and teaches meekness to peasants only as a means of preventing the overthrow of Church rule and taxation. The book also contains many depictions and condemnations of the dangers of superstition and the horrors of medieval slavery.\n\nIt is possible to see the book as an important transitional work for Twain, in that earlier, sunnier passages recall the frontier humor of his tall tales like The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, while the corrosive view of human behavior in the apocalyptic latter chapters is more akin to darker, later Twain works like The Mysterious Stranger and Letters from the Earth.\n\nGeorge Hardy notes that \"(...) The final scenes of 'Connecticut Yankee' depict a mass force attempting to storm a position defended by wire and machine guns - and getting massacred, none reaching their objective. Deduct the fantasy anachronism of the assailants being Medieval knights, and you get a chillingly accurate prediction of a typical First World War battle. (...) The modern soldiers of 1914 with their bayonets had no more chance to win such a fight than Twain's knights\". \n\nAs science fiction\n\nWhile Connecticut Yankee is sometimes credited as the foundational work in the time travel subgenre of science fiction, Twain's novel had several important immediate predecessors. Among them are H.G. Wells's story \"The Chronic Argonauts\" (1888), which was a precursor to The Time Machine (1895). Also published the year before Connecticut Yankee was Edward Bellamy's wildly popular Looking Backward (1888), in which the protagonist is put into a hypnosis-induced sleep and wakes up in the year 2000. Yet another American novel that could have served as a more direct inspiration to Twain was The Fortunate Island (1882) by Charles Heber Clark. In this novel, a technically proficient American is shipwrecked on an island that broke off from Britain during Arthurian times, and never developed any further. \n\nAdaptations and references\n\nSince the beginning of the 20th century, this famous story has been adapted many times for the stage, feature-length motion pictures, and animated cartoons. The earliest film version was Fox's 1921 silent version. In 1927, the novel was adapted into the musical A Connecticut Yankee by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart. A 1931 film, also called A Connecticut Yankee, starred Will Rogers. The story was adapted as an hour-long radio play on the October 5, 1947 broadcast of the Ford Theatre, starring Karl Swenson. A 1949 musical film featured Bing Crosby and Rhonda Fleming, with music by Jimmy Van Heusen and Victor Young. In 1960, Tennessee Ernie Ford starred in a television adaptation. In 1970, the book was adapted into a 74-minute animated TV special directed by Zoran Janjic with Orson Bean as the voice of the title character. In 1978 an episode of Once Upon a Classic, \"A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court\", was an adaptation, as was the Disney movie Unidentified Flying Oddball, also known as A Spaceman in King Arthur's Court. The TV series The Transformers had a second-season episode, \"A Decepticon Raider in King Arthur's Court\", that had a group of Autobots and Decepticons sent back to medieval times. In 1988, the Soviet variation called New adventures of a Yankee in King Arthur's Court. Fantasy over Mark Twain's theme appeared. More recently it was adapted into a 1989 TV movie by Paul Zindel which starred Keshia Knight Pulliam. \n\nIt has also inspired many variations and parodies, such as the 1979 Bugs Bunny special A Connecticut Rabbit In King Arthur's Court. In 1995, Walt Disney Studios adapted the book into the feature film A Kid in King Arthur's Court. Army of Darkness drew many inspirations from the novel. A 1992 cartoon series, King Arthur & the Knights of Justice, could also be seen as deriving inspiration from the novel. In 1998 Disney made another adaption with Whoopi Goldberg in A Knight in Camelot. The 2001 film Black Knight similarly transports a modern-day American to Medieval England while adding racial element to the time-traveler plotline.\n\nIn the Carl Sagan novel Contact, the protagonist, Eleanor Arroway, is reading A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, specifically the scene where Hank first approaches Camelot, when she finds out about her father's death. The quote \"'Bridgeport?' Said I. 'Camelot,' Said he.\" is also used later in the book, and the story is used as a metaphor for contact between civilizations at very different levels of technological and ethical advancement. \n\nOnce Upon a Time features Hank (called Sir Morgan) and his daughter (named Violet)." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Arboreal_locomotion.txt" ], "title": [ "Arboreal locomotion" ], "wiki_context": [ "Arboreal locomotion is the locomotion of animals in trees. In habitats in which trees are present, animals have evolved to move in them. Some animals may scale trees only occasionally, but others are exclusively arboreal. The habitats pose numerous mechanical challenges to animals moving through them and lead to a variety of anatomical, behavioral and ecological consequences as well as variations throughout different species.Cartmill, M. (1985). Climbing. In Functional Vertebrate Morphology, eds. M. Hildebrand D. M. Bramble K. F. Liem and D. B. Wake, pp. 73–88. Cambridge: Belknap Press. Furthermore, many of these same principles may be applied to climbing without trees, such as on rock piles or mountains.\n\nThe earliest known tetrapod with specializations that adapted it for climbing trees was Suminia, a synapsid of the late Permian, about 260 million years ago. \n\nSome invertebrate animals are exclusively arboreal in habitat, such as the tree snail.\n\nBiomechanics\n\nArboreal habitats pose numerous mechanical challenges to animals moving in them, which have been solved in diverse ways. These challenges include moving on narrow branches, moving up and down inclines, balancing, crossing gaps, and dealing with obstructions.\n\nDiameter\n\nMoving along a narrow surface poses special difficulties to animals. During locomotion on the ground, the location of the center of mass may swing from side to side, but during arboreal locomotion, this would result in the center of mass moving beyond the edge of the branch, resulting in a tendency to topple over. Additionally, foot placement is constrained by the need to make contact with the narrow branch. This narrowness severely restricts the range of movements and postures an animal can use to move.\n\nIncline\n\nBranches are frequently oriented at an angle to gravity in arboreal habitats, including being vertical, which poses special problems. As an animal moves up an inclined branch, they must fight the force of gravity to raise their body, making movement more difficult. Conversely, as the animal descends, it must also fight gravity to control its descent and prevent falling. Descent can be particularly problematic for many animals, and highly arboreal species often have specialized methods for controlling their descent.\n\nBalance\n\nDue to the height of many branches and the potentially disastrous consequences of a fall, balance is of primary importance to arboreal animals. On horizontal and gently sloped branches, the primary problem is tipping to the side due to the narrow base of support. The narrower the branch, the greater the difficulty in balancing a given animal faces. On steep and vertical branches, tipping becomes less of an issue, and pitching backwards or slipping downwards becomes the most likely failure. In this case, large-diameter branches pose a greater challenge, since the animal cannot place its forelimbs closer to the center of the branch than its hindlimbs.\n\nCrossing gaps\n\nBranches are not continuous, and any arboreal animal must be able to move between gaps in the branches, or even between trees. This can be accomplished by reaching across gaps, or by leaping across them.\n\nObstructions\n\nArboreal habitats often contain many obstructions, both in the form of branches emerging from the one being moved on and other branches impinging on the space the animal needs to move through. These obstructions may impede locomotion, or may be used as additional contact points to enhance it. While obstructions tend to impede limbed animals, they benefit snakes by providing anchor points. \n\nAnatomical specializations\n\nArboreal organisms display many specializations for dealing with the mechanical challenges of moving through their habitats.\n\nLimb length\n\nArboreal animals frequently have elongated limbs that help them cross gaps, reach fruit or other resources, test the firmness of support ahead, and in some cases, to brachiate. However, some species of lizard have reduced limb size that helps them avoid limb movement being obstructed by impinging branches.\n\nPrehensile tails\n\nMany arboreal species, such as tree porcupines, chameleons, Silky Anteaters, spider monkeys, and possums, use prehensile tails to grasp branches. In the spider monkey and crested gecko, the tip of the tail has either a bare patch or adhesive pad, which provide increased friction.\n\nClaws\n\nClaws can be used to interact with rough substrates and re-orient the direction of forces the animal applies. This is what allows squirrels to climb tree trunks that are so large as to be essentially flat, from the perspective of such a small animal. However, claws can interfere with an animal's ability to grasp very small branches, as they may wrap too far around and prick the animal's own paw.\n\nAdhesion\n\nAdhesion is an alternative to claws, which works best on smooth surfaces. Wet adhesion is common in tree frogs and arboreal salamanders, and functions either by suction or by capillary adhesion. Dry adhesion is best typified by the specialized toes of geckos, which use van der Waals forces to adhere to many substrates, even glass.\n\nGripping\n\nFrictional gripping is used by primates, relying upon hairless fingertips. Squeezing the branch between the fingertips generates frictional force that holds the animal's hand to the branch. However, this type of grip depends upon the angle of the frictional force, thus upon the diameter of the branch, with larger branches resulting in reduced gripping ability.\nAnimals other than primates that use gripping in climbing include the chameleon, which has mitten-like grasping feet, and many birds that grip branches in perching or moving about.\n\nReversible feet\n\nTo control descent, especially down large diameter branches, some arboreal animals such as squirrels have evolved highly mobile ankle joints that permit rotating the foot into a 'reversed' posture. This allows the claws to hook into the rough surface of the bark, opposing the force of gravity.\n\nLow center of mass\n\nMany arboreal species lower their center of mass to reduce pitching and toppling movement when climbing. This may be accomplished by postural changes, altered body proportions, or smaller size.\n\nSmall size\n\nSmall size provides many advantages to arboreal species: such as increasing the relative size of branches to the animal, lower center of mass, increased stability, lower mass (allowing movement on smaller branches), and the ability to move through more cluttered habitat. Size relating to weight affects gliding animals such as the reduced weight per snout-vent length for 'flying' frogs. \n\nHanging under perches\n\nSome species of primate, bat, and all species of sloth achieve passive stability by hanging beneath the branch. Both pitching and tipping become irrelevant, as the only method of failure would be losing their grip.\n\nBehavioral specializations\n\nArboreal species have behaviors specialized for moving in their habitats, most prominently in terms of posture and gait. Specifically, arboreal mammals take longer steps, extend their limbs further forwards and backwards during a step, adopt a more 'crouched' posture to lower their center of mass, and use a diagonal sequence gait.\n\nEcological consequences\n\nArboreal locomotion allows animals access to different resources, depending upon their abilities. Larger species may be restricted to larger-diameter branches that can support their weight, while smaller species may avoid competition by moving in the narrower branches.\n\nClimbing without trees\n\nMany animals climb in other habitats, such as in rock piles or mountains, and in those habitats, many of the same principles apply due to inclines, narrow ledges, and balance issues. However, less research has been conducted on the specific demands of locomotion in these habitats.\n\nPerhaps the most exceptional of the animals that move on steep or even near vertical rock faces by careful balancing and leaping are the various types of mountain dwelling caprid such as the Barbary sheep, markhor, yak, ibex, tahr, rocky mountain goat, and chamois. Their adaptations may include a soft rubbery pad between their hooves for grip, hooves with sharp keratin rims for lodging in small footholds, and prominent dew claws. The snow leopard, being a predator of such mountain caprids, also has spectacular balance and leaping abilities; being able to leap up to ~17m (~50 ft). Other balancers and leapers include the mountain zebra, mountain tapir, and hyraxes.\n\nBrachiation\n\nBrachiation is a specialized form of arboreal locomotion, used by primates to move very rapidly while hanging beneath branches. Arguably the epitome of arboreal locomotion, it involves swinging with the arms from one handhold to another. Only a few species are brachiators, and all of these are primates; it is a major means of locomotion among spider monkeys and gibbons, and is occasionally used by female orangutans. Gibbons are the experts of this mode of locomotion, swinging from branch to branch distances of up to 15 m (50 ft), and traveling at speeds of as much as 56 km/h (35 mph).\n\nGliding between trees\n\nTo bridge gaps between trees, many animals such as the flying squirrel have adapted membranes, such as patagia for gliding flight.\n\nLimbless climbing\n\nMany species of snake are highly arboreal, and some have evolved specialized musculature for this habitat. While moving in arboreal habitats, snakes move slowly along bare branches using a specialized form of concertina locomotion, but when secondary branches emerge from the branch being moved on, snakes use lateral undulation, a much faster mode. As a result, snakes perform best on small perches in cluttered environments, while limbed organisms seem to do best on large perches in uncluttered environments.\n\nArboreal animals\n\nMany species of animals are arboreal, far too many to list individually. This list is of prominently or predominantly arboreal species and higher taxa." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Winston_Churchill.txt", "Western_world.txt", "Eastern_Europe.txt", "Cold_War.txt", "Iron_Curtain.txt" ], "title": [ "Winston Churchill", "Western world", "Eastern Europe", "Cold War", "Iron Curtain" ], "wiki_context": [ "Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman who was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 and again from 1951 to 1955. Churchill was also an officer in the British Army, a non-academic historian, a writer (as Winston S. Churchill), and an artist. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature, and was the first person to be made an honorary citizen of the United States.\n\nChurchill was born into the family of the Dukes of Marlborough, a branch of the Spencer family. His father, Lord Randolph Churchill, was a charismatic politician who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer; his mother, Jennie Jerome, was an American socialite. As a young army officer, he saw action in British India, the Anglo–Sudan War, and the Second Boer War. He gained fame as a war correspondent and wrote books about his campaigns.\n\nAt the forefront of politics for fifty years, he held many political and cabinet positions. Before the First World War, he served as President of the Board of Trade, Home Secretary, and First Lord of the Admiralty as part of Asquith's Liberal government. During the war, he continued as First Lord of the Admiralty until the disastrous Gallipoli Campaign caused his departure from government. He then briefly resumed active army service on the Western Front as commander of the 6th Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers. He returned to government under Lloyd George as Minister of Munitions, Secretary of State for War, Secretary of State for Air, then Secretary of State for the Colonies. After two years out of Parliament, he served as Chancellor of the Exchequer in Baldwin's Conservative government of 1924–1929, controversially returning the pound sterling in 1925 to the gold standard at its pre-war parity, a move widely seen as creating deflationary pressure on the UK economy.\n\nOut of office and politically \"in the wilderness\" during the 1930s because of his opposition to increased home rule for India and his resistance to the 1936 abdication of Edward VIII, Churchill took the lead in warning about Nazi Germany and in campaigning for rearmament. At the outbreak of the Second World War, he was again appointed First Lord of the Admiralty. Following the resignation of Neville Chamberlain on 10 May 1940, Churchill became Prime Minister. His speeches and radio broadcasts helped inspire British resistance, especially during the difficult days of 1940–41 when the British Commonwealth and Empire stood almost alone in its active opposition to Adolf Hitler. He led Britain as Prime Minister until victory over Nazi Germany had been secured.\n\nAfter the Conservative Party lost the 1945 election, he became Leader of the Opposition to the Labour Government. He publicly warned of an \"Iron Curtain\" of Soviet influence in Europe and promoted European unity. After winning the 1951 election, Churchill again became Prime Minister. His second term was preoccupied by foreign affairs, including the Malayan Emergency, Mau Mau Uprising, Korean War, and a UK-backed coup d'état in Iran. Domestically his government laid great emphasis on house-building. Churchill suffered a serious stroke in 1953 and retired as Prime Minister in 1955, although he remained a Member of Parliament until 1964. Upon his death aged ninety in 1965, Elizabeth II granted him the honour of a state funeral, which saw one of the largest assemblies of world statesmen in history. Named the Greatest Briton of all time in a 2002 poll, Churchill is widely regarded as being among the most influential people in British history, consistently ranking well in opinion polls of Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom.\n\nFamily and early life\n\nBorn into the aristocratic family of the Dukes of Marlborough, a branch of the noble Spencer family, Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, like his father, used the surname \"Churchill\" in public life. His ancestor George Spencer had changed his surname to Spencer-Churchill in 1817 when he became Duke of Marlborough, to highlight his descent from John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough. Churchill's father, Lord Randolph Churchill, the third son of John Spencer-Churchill, 7th Duke of Marlborough, was a politician; and his mother, Lady Randolph Churchill ( Jennie Jerome) was the daughter of American millionaire Leonard Jerome. Churchill was born on 30 November 1874, two months prematurely, in a bedroom in Blenheim Palace, Woodstock, Oxfordshire. \n\nFrom age two to six, he lived in Dublin, where his grandfather had been appointed Viceroy and employed Churchill's father as his private secretary. Churchill's brother, John Strange Spencer-Churchill, was born during this time in Ireland. It has been claimed that the young Churchill first developed his fascination with military matters from watching the many parades pass by the Vice Regal Lodge (now Áras an Uachtaráin, the official residence of the President of Ireland). \n\nChurchill's earliest exposure to education occurred in Dublin, where a governess tried teaching him reading, writing, and arithmetic (his first reading book was called 'Reading Without Tears'). With limited contact with his parents, Churchill became very close to his nanny, 'Mrs' Elizabeth Ann Everest, whom he called 'Old Woom' (some references 'Woomany' ). She served as his confidante, nurse, and mother substitute. The two spent many happy hours playing in Phoenix Park. \n\nIndependent and rebellious by nature, Churchill generally had a poor academic record in school. He was educated at three independent schools: St. George's School, Ascot, Berkshire; Brunswick School in Hove, near Brighton (the school has since been renamed Stoke Brunswick School and relocated to Ashurst Wood in West Sussex); and at Harrow School from 17 April 1888. Within weeks of his arrival at Harrow, Churchill had joined the Harrow Rifle Corps. \n\nWhen young Winston started attending Harrow School, he was listed under the S's as Spencer Churchill. At that time Winston was a stocky boy with red hair who talked with a stutter and a lisp. Winston did so well in mathematics in his Harrow entrance exam that he was put in the top division for that subject. In his first year at Harrow he was recognized as being the best in his division for history. Winston entered the school, however, as the boy with the lowest grades in the lowest class, and he remained in that position. Winston never even made it into the upper school because he would not study the classics. Though he did poorly in his schoolwork, he grew to love the English language. He hated Harrow. His mother rarely visited him, and he wrote letters begging her either to come to the school or to allow him to come home. His relationship with his father was distant; he once remarked that they barely spoke to one another. His father died on 24 January 1895, aged 45, leaving Churchill with the conviction that he too would die young and so should be quick about making his mark on the world. \n\nAt age 18, while visiting his aunt Lady Wimborne in Bournemouth, Winston nearly died when he fell from a bridge over a seaside chine (either Branksome Dene or Alum Chine) at a height of 29 feet. As a result of injuries sustained in the fall, he was unconscious for three days and bedridden for three months. \n\nWinston Churchill was a member of the freemasons and a member of the Loyal Waterloo Lodge of the National Independent Order of Odd Fellows. \n\nSpeech impediment\n\nChurchill had a lateral lisp that continued throughout his career, reported consistently by journalists of the time and later. Authors writing in the 1920s and 1930s, before sound recording became common, also mentioned Churchill having a stutter, describing it in terms such as \"severe\" or \"agonising\". The Churchill Centre and Museum says the majority of records show his impediment was a lateral lisp, while Churchill's stutter is a myth. \n\nHis dentures were specially designed to aid his speech (Demosthenes' pebbles). After many years of public speeches carefully prepared not only to inspire, but also to avoid hesitations, he could finally state, \"My impediment is no hindrance\". \n\nMarriage and children\n\nChurchill met his future wife, Clementine Hozier, in 1904 at a ball in Crewe House, home of the Earl of Crewe and Crewe's wife Margaret Primrose (daughter of Archibald Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery, and Hannah Rothschild). In 1908, they met again at a dinner party hosted by Susan Jeune, Baroness St Helier. Churchill found himself seated beside Clementine, and they soon began a lifelong romance. He proposed to Clementine during a house party at Blenheim Palace on 10 August 1908, in a small Temple of Diana. \n\nOn 12 September 1908, he and Clementine were married in St. Margaret's, Westminster. The church was packed; the Bishop of St Asaph conducted the service. The couple spent their honeymoon at Highgrove House in Eastcote. In March 1909, the couple moved to a house at 33 Eccleston Square.\n\nTheir first child, Diana, was born in London on 11 July 1909. After the pregnancy, Clementine moved to Sussex to recover, while Diana stayed in London with her nanny. On 28 May 1911, their second child, Randolph, was born at 33 Eccleston Square. \n\nTheir third child, Sarah, was born on 7 October 1914 at Admiralty House. The birth was marked with anxiety for Clementine, as Churchill had been sent to Antwerp by the Cabinet to \"stiffen the resistance of the beleaguered city\" after news that the Belgians intended to surrender the town. \n\nClementine gave birth to her fourth child, Marigold Frances Churchill, on 15 November 1918, four days after the official end of the First World War. In the early days of August 1921, the Churchills' children were entrusted to a French nursery governess in Kent named Mlle. Rose. Clementine, meanwhile, travelled to Eaton Hall to play tennis with Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster, and his family. While still under the care of Mlle. Rose, Marigold had a cold, but was reported to have recovered from the illness. As the illness progressed with hardly any notice, it turned into septicaemia. Following advice from a landlady, Rose sent for Clementine. However the illness proved fatal on 23 August 1921, and Marigold was buried in the Kensal Green Cemetery three days later. \n\nOn 15 September 1922, the Churchills' last child, Mary, was born. Later that month, the Churchills bought Chartwell, which would be their home until Winston's death in 1965. \n\nMilitary service\n\nAfter Churchill left Harrow in 1893, he applied to attend the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. He tried three times before passing the entrance exam; he applied to be trained for the cavalry rather than the infantry because the required grade was lower and he was not required to learn mathematics, which he disliked. He graduated eighth out of a class of 150 in December 1894, and although he could now have transferred to an infantry regiment as his father had wished, chose to remain with the cavalry and was commissioned as a cornet (second lieutenant) in the 4th Queen's Own Hussars on 20 February 1895. In 1941, he received the honour of being appointed Regimental Colonel of the 4th Hussars, an honour which was increased after the Second World War when he was appointed as Colonel-in-Chief; this privilege is usually reserved for members of the royal family.\n\nChurchill's pay as a second lieutenant in the 4th Hussars was £300 annually. However, he believed that he needed at least a further £500 (equivalent to £55,000 in 2012 terms) to support a style of life equal to that of other officers of the regiment. His mother provided an allowance of £400 per year, but this was repeatedly overspent. According to biographer Roy Jenkins, this is one reason why he took an interest in war correspondence. He did not intend to follow a conventional career of promotion through army ranks, but rather to seek out all possible chances of military action, using his mother's and family influence in high society to arrange postings to active campaigns. His writings brought him to the attention of the public, and earned him significant additional income. He acted as a war correspondent for several London newspapers and wrote his own books about the campaigns.\n\nCuba\n\nIn 1895, during the Cuban War of Independence, Churchill, and fellow officer Reginald Barnes, travelled to Cuba to observe the Spanish fight the Cuban guerrillas; he had obtained a commission to write about the conflict from the Daily Graphic. He came under fire on his twenty-first birthday, the first of about 50 times during his life, and the Spanish awarded him his first medal. Churchill had fond memories of Cuba as a \"... large, rich, beautiful island ...\". While there, he soon acquired a taste for Havana cigars, which he would smoke for the rest of his life. While in New York, he stayed at the home of Bourke Cockran, an admirer of his mother. Bourke was an established American politician, and a member of the House of Representatives. He greatly influenced Churchill, both in his approach to oratory and politics, and encouraging a love of America. \n\nHe soon received word that his nanny, Mrs Everest, was dying; he then returned to England and stayed with her for a week until she died. He wrote in his journal, \"She was my favourite friend.\" In My Early Life he wrote: \"She had been my dearest and most intimate friend during the whole of the twenty years I had lived.\" \n\nIndia and self-education\n\nIn early October 1896, he was transferred to Bombay, British India. He was considered one of the best polo players in his regiment and led his team to many prestigious tournament victories. On arrival Churchill badly wrenched his shoulder while leaping from the boat, an injury which would plague him throughout his life and would later require him to play polo with his upper arm strapped to his side. \n\nChurchill came to Bangalore in 1896 as a young army officer. In his book, 'My Early Life', he describes Bangalore as a city with excellent weather, and his allotted house as ‘a magnificent pink and white stucco palace in the middle of a large and beautiful garden' with servants, dhobi (to wash clothes), gardener, watchman and a water-carrier. It was in Bangalore he met Pamela Plowden, daughter of a civil servant; she became his first love. He privately described most British women in India as “nasty” and scoffed at their belief in their own beauty. His letters home show him to have been obsessed with British politics, advocating a centrist coalition between Lord Rosebery and Joseph Chamberlain, and critical of Lord Lansdowne’s proposal for increased spending on the army (opposition to which had been one of Lord Randolph’s reasons for resigning in December 1886; Churchill preferred Britain to concentrate on keeping a strong Royal Navy).\n\nPartly at his mother’s urging, Churchill passed the long hot afternoons reading. He read multi-volume historical works by Gibbon (\"The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire\") and Macaulay (\"History of England”) as well as Plato’s \"Republic\" and works of economics. He toyed with the idea of studying for a degree in history, politics and economics, but regretted he did not have enough knowledge of Latin and Greek which were then a requirement of university entrance. He also read Winwood Reade’s work “The Martyrdom of Man”, writing to his mother that its critique of religion confirmed what he had reluctantly come to believe. Churchill believed that religion, although mostly not literally true, was a useful “crutch” until men were ready to rely on reason alone. He also wrote to his old headmaster James Welldon, now Bishop of Calcutta, opposing Christian missions in India. Churchill argued that the State was perfectly entitled to dictate the doctrines of the Established Church of England and advocated non-denominational teaching in schools, by secular teachers, based on the Bible and “Hymns Ancient and Modern”. Keith Robbins writes that Churchill’s opinions were largely formed at this time, and without the “scrutiny and criticism” to which they would have been subjected at a university, although he also suggests that Churchill’s love of the English language might not have flourished to the same degree under university conditions. John Charmley concurs, commenting that Churchill’s self-education had not given him any training in the weighing of arguments and the absorption of the views of others, although he also points out that Lord Moran, Churchill’s doctor in the 1940s, recorded Churchill's sympathy for adults who educated themselves later in life. \n\nWith some reluctance because of the weight and cost, his mother also sent out copies of Parliamentary debates of the last few generations. Churchill would write down his opinion of each issue (e.g. the Judicature Acts of 1873 and 1875) before reading the debate, and then record his opinion again. He was highly critical of Lord Salisbury’s Conservative-dominated Government, in power from the autumn of 1895, writing to his mother in March 1897, in an obvious echo of what he perceived his late father’s position to have been, that he was a Liberal in all but name, remaining a “Tory Democrat” solely because of the issue of Irish Home Rule. \n\nNorth-West Frontier\n\nIn 1897, Churchill attempted to travel to both report on and, if necessary, fight in the Greco-Turkish War, but this conflict effectively ended before he could arrive. Later, while preparing for a leave in England, he heard that three brigades of the British Army were going to fight against a Pashtun tribe in the North West Frontier of India and he asked his superior officer if he could join the fight. In 1899 he departed for the North West Frontier to fight in the Second Anglo-Afghan War. He fought under the command of General Jeffery, the commander of the second brigade operating in Malakand, in the Frontier region of British India. Jeffery sent him with fifteen scouts to explore the Mamund Valley; while on reconnaissance, they encountered an enemy tribe, dismounted from their horses and opened fire. After an hour of shooting, their reinforcements, the 35th Sikhs arrived, the firing gradually ceased and the brigade and the Sikhs marched on. Hundreds of tribesmen then ambushed them and opened fire, forcing them to retreat. As they were retreating, four men were carrying an injured officer, but the fierceness of the fight forced them to leave him behind. The man who was left behind was slashed to death before Churchill's eyes; afterwards he wrote of the killer, \"I forgot everything else at this moment except a desire to kill this man.\" However, the Sikhs' numbers were being depleted, so the next commanding officer told Churchill to get the rest of the men to safety.\n\nBefore he left, he asked for a note so that he would not be charged with desertion. He received the note, quickly signed, headed up the hill and alerted the other brigade, whereupon they then engaged the army. The fighting in the region dragged on for another two weeks before the dead could be recovered. He wrote in his journal: \"Whether it was worth it I cannot tell.\" An account of the Siege of Malakand was published in December 1900 as The Story of the Malakand Field Force. He received £600 for his account. During the campaign, he also wrote articles for the newspapers The Pioneer and The Daily Telegraph. His account of the battle was one of his first published stories, for which he received £5 per column from The Daily Telegraph. \n\nSudan\n\nChurchill was transferred to Egypt in 1898. He visited Luxor before joining an attachment of the 21st Lancers serving in the Sudan under the command of General Herbert Kitchener. During this time he encountered two military officers with whom he would work during the First World War: Douglas Haig, then a captain, and David Beatty, then a gunboat lieutenant. While in the Sudan, he participated in what has been described as the last meaningful British cavalry charge, at the Battle of Omdurman in September 1898. He also worked as a war correspondent for the Morning Post. By October 1898, he had returned to Britain and begun his two-volume work, The River War, an account of the conquest of the Sudan which was published the following year. Churchill resigned from the British Army effective from 5 May 1899.\n\nOldham\n\nHe soon had his first opportunity to begin a Parliamentary career, when he was invited by Robert Ascroft to be the second Conservative Party candidate in Ascroft's Oldham constituency. Ascroft's sudden death caused a double by-election and Churchill was one of the candidates. In the midst of a national trend against the Conservatives, both seats were lost; however, Churchill impressed by his vigorous campaigning.\n\nSouth Africa\n\nHaving failed at Oldham, Churchill looked about for some other opportunity to advance his career. On 12 October 1899, the Second Boer War between Britain and the Boer Republics broke out and he obtained a commission to act as war correspondent for The Morning Post with a salary of £250 per month. He rushed to sail on the same ship as the newly appointed British commander, Sir Redvers Buller. After some weeks in exposed areas, he accompanied a scouting expedition in an armoured train, leading to his capture and imprisonment in a POW camp in Pretoria (converted school building for Pretoria High School for Girls). His actions during the ambush of the train led to speculation that he would be awarded the Victoria Cross, Britain's highest award to members of the armed forces for gallantry in the face of the enemy, but this was not possible, as he was a civilian.\n\nHe escaped from the prison camp and, with the assistance of an English mine manager, travelled almost 300 mi to safety in Portuguese East Africa. His escape made him a minor national hero for a time in Britain though, instead of returning home, he rejoined General Buller's army on its march to relieve the British at the Siege of Ladysmith and take Pretoria. This time, although continuing as a war correspondent, he gained a commission in the South African Light Horse. He was among the first British troops into Ladysmith and Pretoria. He and his cousin, the Duke of Marlborough, were able to get ahead of the rest of the troops in Pretoria, where they demanded and received the surrender of 52 Boer prison camp guards. \n\nIn 1900, Churchill returned to England on the , the same ship on which he had set sail for South Africa eight months earlier. The same year he published London to Ladysmith via Pretoria and a second volume of Boer war experiences, Ian Hamilton's March. \n\nTerritorial Service and advancement\n\nIn 1900, he retired from the regular army, and in 1902 joined the Imperial Yeomanry, where he was commissioned as a Captain in the Queen's Own Oxfordshire Hussars on 4 January 1902. In that same year, he was initiated into Freemasonry at Studholme Lodge #1591, London, and raised to the Third Degree on 25 March 1902. In April 1905, he was promoted to Major and appointed to command of the Henley Squadron of the Queen's Own Oxfordshire Hussars. In September 1916, he transferred to the territorial reserves of officers, where he remained until retiring in 1924, at the age of fifty.\n\nWestern Front\n\nAfter his resignation from the government in 1915, Churchill rejoined the British Army, attempting to obtain an appointment as brigade commander, but settling for command of a battalion. After spending some time as a Major with the 2nd Battalion, Grenadier Guards, he was appointed Lieutenant-Colonel, commanding the 6th Battalion, Royal Scots Fusiliers (part of the 9th (Scottish) Division), on 1 January 1916. Correspondence with his wife shows that his intent in taking up active service was to rehabilitate his reputation, but this was balanced by the serious risk of being killed. During his period of command, his battalion was stationed at Ploegsteert but did not take part in any set battle. Although he disapproved strongly of the mass slaughter involved in many Western Front actions, he exposed himself to danger by making excursions to the front line or into No Man's Land. \n\nPolitical career to the Second World War, 1900–39\n\nEarly years in Parliament\n\nChurchill stood again for the seat of Oldham at the 1900 general election. After winning the seat, he went on a speaking tour throughout Britain and the United States, raising £10,000 for himself (about £ today). From 1903 until 1905, Churchill was also engaged in writing Lord Randolph Churchill, a two-volume biography of his father which was published in 1906 and received much critical acclaim. \n\nIn Parliament, he became associated with a faction of the Conservative Party led by Lord Hugh Cecil; the Hughligans. During his first parliamentary session, he opposed the government's military expenditure and Joseph Chamberlain's proposal of extensive tariffs, which were intended to protect Britain's economic dominance. His own constituency effectively deselected him, although he continued to sit for Oldham until the next general election. In the months leading up to his ultimate change of party from the Conservatives to the Liberals, Churchill made a number of evocative speeches against the principles of Protectionism; ‘to think you can make a man richer by putting on a tax is like a man thinking that he can stand in a bucket and lift himself up by the handle.' [Winston Churchill, Speech to the Free Trade League, 19 February 1904.] As a result of his disagreement with leading members of the Conservative Party over tariff reform, he made the decision to cross the floor. After the Whitsun recess in 1904, he crossed the floor to sit as a member of the Liberal Party. As a Liberal, he continued to campaign for free trade. When the Liberals took office with Henry Campbell-Bannerman as prime minister, in December 1905, Churchill became Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies, dealing mainly with South Africa after the Boer War. As Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies from 1905 to 1908, Churchill's primary focus was on settling the Transvaal Constitution, which was accepted by Parliament in 1907. This was essential for providing stability in South Africa. He campaigned in line with the Liberal Government to install responsible rather than representative government. This would alleviate pressure from the British government to control domestic affairs, including issues of race, in the Transvaal, delegating a greater proportion of power to the Boers themselves.\n\nFollowing his deselection in the seat of Oldham, Churchill was invited to stand for Manchester North West. He won the seat at the 1906 general election with a majority of 1,214 and represented the seat for two years. When Campbell-Bannerman was succeeded by H. H. Asquith in 1908, Churchill was promoted to the Cabinet as President of the Board of Trade. Under the law at the time, a newly appointed Cabinet Minister was obliged to seek re-election at a by-election; Churchill lost his seat but was soon back as a member for Dundee constituency. As President of the Board of Trade he joined newly appointed Chancellor Lloyd George in opposing First Lord of the Admiralty Reginald McKenna's proposed huge expenditure for the construction of Navy dreadnought warships, and in supporting the Liberal reforms. In 1908, he introduced the Trade Boards Bill setting up the first minimum wages in Britain. In 1909, he set up Labour Exchanges to help unemployed people find work. He helped draft the first unemployment pension legislation, the National Insurance Act of 1911. As a supporter of eugenics, he participated in the drafting of the Mental Deficiency Act 1913; however, the Act, in the form eventually passed, rejected his preferred method of sterilisation of the feeble-minded in favour of their confinement in institutions. \n\nChurchill also assisted in passing the People's Budget, becoming President of the Budget League, an organisation set up in response to the opposition's Budget Protest League. The budget included the introduction of new taxes on the wealthy to allow for the creation of new social welfare programmes. After the budget bill was passed by the Commons in 1909 it was vetoed by the House of Lords. The Liberals then fought and won two general elections in January and December 1910 to gain a mandate for their reforms. The budget was passed after the first election, and after the second election the Parliament Act 1911, for which Churchill also campaigned, was passed. In 1910, he was promoted to Home Secretary. His term was controversial after his responses to the Cambrian Colliery dispute, the Siege of Sidney Street and the suffragettes.\n\nThe People's Budget attempted to introduce a heavy tax on land value, inspired by the economist and philosopher Henry George. In 1909, Churchill made several speeches with strong Georgist rhetoric, stating that land ownership is at the source of all monopoly. Furthermore, Churchill emphasizes the difference between productive investment in capital (which he supports) and land speculation which gains an unearned income and has only negative consequences to society at large (\"an evil\"). \n\nIn 1910, a number of coal miners in the Rhondda Valley began what has come to be known as the Tonypandy Riot. The Chief Constable of Glamorgan requested troops be sent in to help police quell the rioting. Churchill, learning that the troops were already travelling, allowed them to go as far as Swindon and Cardiff, but blocked their deployment. On 9 November, The Times criticised this decision. In spite of this, the rumour persists that Churchill had ordered troops to attack, and his reputation in Wales and in Labour circles never recovered. \n\nIn early January 1911, Churchill made a controversial visit to the Siege of Sidney Street in London. There is some uncertainty as to whether he attempted to give operational commands, and his presence attracted much criticism. After an inquest, Arthur Balfour remarked, \"he [Churchill] and a photographer were both risking valuable lives. I understand what the photographer was doing, but what was the right honourable gentleman doing?\" A biographer, Roy Jenkins, suggests that he went simply because \"he could not resist going to see the fun himself\" and that he did not issue commands. Another account said the police had the miscreants—Latvian anarchists wanted for murder—surrounded in a house, but Churchill called in the Scots Guards from the Tower of London and, dressed in top hat and astrakhan collar greatcoat, directed operations. The house caught fire and Churchill prevented the fire brigade from dousing the flames so that the men inside were burned to death. \"I thought it better to let the house burn down rather than spend good British lives in rescuing those ferocious rascals.\" \n\nChurchill's proposed solution to the suffragette issue was a referendum on the issue, but this found no favour with Asquith and women's suffrage remained unresolved until after the First World War. \n\nFirst Lord of the Admiralty (1911–15)\n\nIn October 1911, Churchill was appointed First Lord of the Admiralty and continued in the post into the First World War. While serving in this position, he put strong emphasis on modernisation and was also in favour of using aeroplanes in combat. He undertook flying lessons himself. He launched a programme to replace coal power with oil power. When he assumed his position, oil was already being used on submarines and destroyers, but most ships were still coal-powered, though oil was sprayed on the coals to boost maximum speed. Churchill began this programme by ordering that the upcoming s were to be built with oil-fired engines. He established a Royal Commission chaired by Admiral Sir John Fisher, which confirmed the benefits of oil over coal in three classified reports, and judged that ample supplies of oil existed, but recommended that oil reserves be maintained in the event of war. The delegation then travelled to the Persian Gulf, and the government, largely through Churchill's advice, eventually invested in the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, bought most of its stock, and negotiated a secret contract for a 20-year supply. \n\nFirst World War and the Post-War Coalition\n\nOn 5 October 1914, Churchill went to Antwerp, which the Belgian government proposed to evacuate. The Royal Marine Brigade was there and at Churchill's urgings the 1st and 2nd Naval Brigades were also committed. Antwerp fell on 10 October with the loss of 2500 men. At the time he was attacked for squandering resources. It is more likely that his actions prolonged the resistance by a week (Belgium had proposed surrendering Antwerp on 3 October) and that this time saved Calais and Dunkirk. \n\nChurchill was involved with the development of the tank, which was financed from the Navy budget. He appointed the Landships Committee, which oversaw the design and production of the first British tanks. In 1915, he was one of the political and military engineers of the disastrous Gallipoli landings in the Dardanelles during the First World War. He took much of the blame for the fiasco, and when Prime Minister Asquith formed an all-party coalition government, the Conservatives demanded his demotion as the price for entry. \n\nFor several months Churchill served in the sinecure of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. However, on 15 November 1915 he resigned from the government, feeling his energies were not being used. Although remaining a member of parliament, on 5 January 1916 he was given the temporary British Army rank of lieutenant colonel and served for several months on the Western Front, commanding the 6th Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers. While in command at Ploegsteert he personally made 36 forays into no man's land. In March 1916, Churchill returned to England after he had become restless in France and wished to speak again in the House of Commons. Future prime minister David Lloyd George acidly commented: \"You will one day discover that the state of mind revealed in (your) letter is the reason why you do not win trust even where you command admiration. In every line of it, national interests are completely overshadowed by your personal concern.\" In July 1917, Churchill was appointed Minister of Munitions, and in January 1919, Secretary of State for War and Secretary of State for Air. He was the main architect of the Ten Year Rule, a principle that allowed the Treasury to dominate and control strategic, foreign and financial policies under the assumption that \"there would be no great European war for the next five or ten years\". \n\nA major preoccupation of his tenure in the War Office was the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War. Churchill was a staunch advocate of foreign intervention, declaring that Bolshevism must be \"strangled in its cradle\". He secured, from a divided and loosely organised Cabinet, intensification and prolongation of the British involvement beyond the wishes of any major group in Parliament or the nation—and in the face of the bitter hostility of Labour. In 1920, after the last British forces had been withdrawn, Churchill was instrumental in having arms sent to the Poles when they invaded Ukraine. He was also instrumental in having para-military forces (Black and Tans and Auxiliaries) intervene in the Irish War of Independence. He became Secretary of State for the Colonies in 1921 and was a signatory of the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921, which established the Irish Free State. Churchill was involved in the lengthy negotiations of the treaty and, to protect British maritime interests, he engineered part of the Irish Free State agreement to include three Treaty Ports—Queenstown (Cobh), Berehaven and Lough Swilly—which could be used as Atlantic bases by the Royal Navy. In 1938, however, under the terms of the Chamberlain-De Valera Anglo-Irish Trade Agreement, the bases were returned to Ireland.\n\nIn 1919, Churchill sanctioned the use of tear gas on Kurdish tribesmen in Iraq. Though the British did consider the use of non-lethal poison gas in putting down Kurdish rebellions, it was not used, as conventional bombing was considered effective.\n\nIn 1923, Churchill acted as a paid consultant for Burmah Oil (now BP plc) to lobby the British government to allow Burmah to have exclusive rights to Persian (Iranian) oil resources, which were successfully granted. \n\nIn September, the Conservative Party withdrew from the Coalition government, following a meeting of backbenchers dissatisfied with the handling of the Chanak Crisis, a move that precipitated the looming November 1922 general election. Churchill fell ill during the campaign, and had to have an appendectomy. This made it difficult for him to campaign, and a further setback was the internal division which continued to beset the Liberal Party. He came fourth in the poll for Dundee, losing to prohibitionist Edwin Scrymgeour. Churchill later quipped that he left Dundee \"without an office, without a seat, without a party and without an appendix\". He stood for the Liberals again in the 1923 general election, losing in Leicester.\n\nConstitutionalist\n\nIn January 1924, the first Labour Government had taken office amongst fears of threats to the Constitution. Churchill was noted at the time for being particularly hostile to socialism. He believed that the Labour Party as a socialist party, did not fully support the existing British Constitution. In March 1924 Churchill sought election at the Westminster Abbey by-election, 1924. He had originally sought the backing of the local Unionist association which happened to be called the Westminster Abbey Constitutional Association. He adopted the term 'Constitutionalist' to describe himself during the by-election campaign. After the by-election Churchill continued to use the term and talked about setting up a Constitutionalist Party. Any plans that Churchill may have had to create a Constitutionalist Party were shelved with the calling of another general election. Churchill and 11 others decided to use the label Constitutionalist rather than Liberal or Unionist. He was returned at Epping against a Liberal and with the support of the Unionists. After the election the seven Constitutionalist candidates, including Churchill, who were elected did not act or vote as a group. When Churchill accepted the post of Chancellor of the Exchequer in Stanley Baldwin's Unionist government the description 'Constitutionalist' dropped out of use.\n\nRejoining the Conservative Party\n\nChancellor of the Exchequer (1924–29)\n\nHe formally rejoined the Conservative Party, commenting wryly that \"anyone can rat, but it takes a certain ingenuity to re-rat.\" \nChurchill as Chancellor of the Exchequer oversaw Britain's disastrous return to the Gold Standard, which resulted in deflation, unemployment, and the miners' strike that led to the General Strike of 1926. His decision, announced in the 1924 Budget, came after long consultation with various economists including John Maynard Keynes, the Permanent Secretary to the Treasury, Sir Otto Niemeyer and the board of the Bank of England. This decision prompted Keynes to write The Economic Consequences of Mr. Churchill, arguing that the return to the gold standard at the pre-war parity in 1925 (£1=$4.86) would lead to a world depression. However, the decision was generally popular and seen as 'sound economics' although it was opposed by Lord Beaverbrook and the Federation of British Industries. \n\nChurchill later regarded this as the greatest mistake of his life; in discussions at the time with former Chancellor Reginald McKenna, Churchill acknowledged that the return to the gold standard and the resulting 'dear money' policy was economically bad. In those discussions he maintained the policy as fundamentally political—a return to the pre-war conditions in which he believed. In his speech on the Bill he said \"I will tell you what it [the return to the Gold Standard] will shackle us to. It will shackle us to reality.\" \n\nThe return to the pre-war exchange rate and to the Gold Standard depressed industries. The most affected was the coal industry, already suffering from declining output as shipping switched to oil. As basic British industries like cotton came under more competition in export markets, the return to the pre-war exchange was estimated to add up to 10% in costs to the industry. In July 1925, a Commission of Inquiry reported generally favouring the miners rather than the mine owners' position. \n\nBaldwin, with Churchill's support proposed a subsidy to the industry while a Royal Commission prepared a further report. That Commission solved nothing and the miners' dispute led to the General Strike of 1926. Churchill edited the Government's newspaper, the British Gazette. Churchill was one of the more hawkish members of the Cabinet and recommended that the route of food convoys from the docks into London should be guarded by tanks, armoured cars and hidden machine guns. This was rejected by the Cabinet. Exaggerated accounts of Churchill's belligerency during the strike soon began to circulate. Immediately afterwards the New Statesman claimed that Churchill had been leader of a \"war party\" in the Cabinet and had wished to use military force against the strikers. He consulted the Attorney-General Sir Douglas Hogg, who advised that although he had a good case for Criminal libel, it would be inadvisable to have confidential Cabinet discussions aired in open court. Churchill agreed to let the matter drop. \n\nLater economists, as well as people at the time, also criticised Churchill's budget measures. These were seen as assisting the generally prosperous rentier banking and salaried classes (to which Churchill and his associates generally belonged) at the expense of manufacturers and exporters which were known then to be suffering from imports and from competition in traditional export markets, and as paring the Armed Forces, and especially the Royal Navy, too heavily. \n\nPolitical isolation\n\nThe Conservative government was defeated in the 1929 general election. Churchill did not seek election to the Conservative Business Committee, the official leadership of the Conservative MPs. Over the next two years, Churchill became estranged from Conservative leadership over the issues of protective tariffs and Indian Home Rule, by his political views and by his friendships with press barons, financiers and people whose character was seen as dubious. When Ramsay MacDonald formed the National Government in 1931, Churchill was not invited to join the Cabinet. He was at the low-point in his career, in a period known as \"the wilderness years\".\n\nHe spent much of the next few years concentrating on his writing, works including Marlborough: His Life and Times—a biography of his ancestor John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough—and A History of the English Speaking Peoples (though the latter was not published until well after the Second World War), Great Contemporaries and many newspaper articles and collections of speeches. He was one of the best paid writers of his time. His political views, set forth in his 1930 Romanes Lecture and published as Parliamentary Government and the Economic Problem (republished in 1932 in his collection of essays \"Thoughts and Adventures\") involved abandoning universal suffrage, a return to a property franchise, proportional representation for the major cities and an economic 'sub parliament'. \n\nIndian independence\n\nChurchill opposed Gandhi's peaceful disobedience revolt and the Indian Independence movement in the 1920s and 30s, arguing that the Round Table Conference \"was a frightful prospect\". In response to Gandhi's civil disobedience campaign, Churchill proclaimed in 1920 that Gandhi \"ought to be lain bound hand and foot at the gates of Delhi, and then trampled on by an enormous elephant with the new Viceroy seated on its back.\" Later reports indicate that Churchill favoured letting Gandhi die if he went on a hunger strike. During the first half of the 1930s, Churchill was outspoken in his opposition to granting Dominion status to India. He was a founder of the India Defence League, a group dedicated to the preservation of British power in India. Churchill brooked no moderation. \"The truth is,\" he declared in 1930, \"that Gandhi-ism and everything it stands for will have to be grappled with and crushed.\" In speeches and press articles in this period, he forecast widespread unemployment in Britain and civil strife in India should independence be granted. The Viceroy Lord Irwin, who had been appointed by the prior Conservative Government, engaged in the Round Table Conference in early 1931 and then announced the Government's policy that India should be granted Dominion Status. In this the Government was supported by the Liberal Party and, officially at least, by the Conservative Party. Churchill denounced the Round Table Conference.\n\nAt a meeting of the West Essex Conservative Association, specially convened so that Churchill could explain his position, he said \"It is alarming and also nauseating to see Mr Gandhi, a seditious Middle Temple lawyer, now posing as a fakir of a type well known in the East, striding half-naked up the steps of the Vice-regal palace ... to parley on equal terms with the representative of the King-Emperor.\" He called the Indian National Congress leaders \"Brahmins who mouth and patter principles of Western Liberalism\". \n\nTwo incidents damaged Churchill's reputation greatly within the Conservative Party in this period. Both were taken as attacks on the Conservative front bench. The first was his speech on the eve of the St George by-election in April 1931. In a secure Conservative seat, the official Conservative candidate Duff Cooper was opposed by an independent Conservative. The independent was supported by Lord Rothermere, Lord Beaverbrook and their respective newspapers. Although arranged before the by-election was set, Churchill's speech was seen as supporting the independent candidate and as a part of the press baron's campaign against Baldwin. Baldwin's position was strengthened when Duff Cooper won, and when the civil disobedience campaign in India ceased with the Gandhi-Irwin Pact. The second issue was a claim by Churchill that Sir Samuel Hoare and Lord Derby had pressured the Manchester Chamber of Commerce to change evidence it had given to the Joint Select Committee considering the Government of India Bill, and in doing so had breached Parliamentary privilege. He had the matter referred to the House of Commons Privilege Committee which, after investigations in which Churchill gave evidence, reported to the House that there had been no breach. The report was debated on 13 June. Churchill was unable to find a single supporter in the House and the debate ended without a division.\n\nChurchill permanently broke with Stanley Baldwin over Indian independence and never again held any office while Baldwin was prime minister. Some historians see his basic attitude to India as being set out in his book My Early Life (1930). Another source of controversy about Churchill's attitude towards Indian affairs arises over what some historians term the Indian 'nationalist approach' to the Bengal famine of 1943, which has sought to place significant blame on Churchill's wartime government for the excessive mortality of up to four million people. While some commentators point to the disruption of the traditional marketing system and maladministration at the provincial level, Arthur Herman, author of Churchill and Gandhi, contends, 'The real cause was the fall of Burma to the Japanese, which cut off India's main supply of rice imports when domestic sources fell short ... [though] it is true that Churchill opposed diverting food supplies and transports from other theatres to India to cover the shortfall: this was wartime.' In response to an urgent request by the Secretary of State for India, Leo Amery, and Viceroy of India, Wavell, to release food stocks for India, Churchill responded with a telegram to Wavell asking, if food was so scarce, \"why Gandhi hadn't died yet.\" In July 1940, newly in office, he welcomed reports of the emerging conflict between the Muslim League and the Indian Congress, hoping \"it would be bitter and bloody\".\n\nGerman and Italian rearmament and conflicts in Afro-Eurasia\n\nBeginning in 1932, when he opposed those who advocated giving Germany the right to military parity with France, Churchill spoke often of the dangers of Germany's rearmament. He later, particularly in The Gathering Storm, portrayed himself as being for a time, a lone voice calling on Britain to strengthen itself to counter the belligerence of Germany. However Lord Lloyd was the first to so agitate. \n\nIn 1932, Churchill accepted the presidency of the newly founded New Commonwealth Society, a peace organisation which he described in 1937 as \"one of the few peace societies that advocates the use of force, if possible overwhelming force, to support public international law\". \n\nChurchill's attitude towards the fascist dictators was ambiguous. After the First World War defeat of Germany, a new danger occupied conservatives' political consciousness—the spread of communism. A newspaper article penned by Churchill and published on 4 February 1920, had warned that \"civilisation\" was threatened by the Bolsheviks, a movement which he linked through historical precedence to Jewish conspiracy. He wrote in part:\n\nThis movement among Jews is not new ... but a \"world-wide conspiracy for the overthrow of civilisation and for the reconstitution of society on the basis of arrested development, of envious malevolence, and impossible equality.\" \n\nIn 1931, he warned against the League of Nations opposing the Japanese in Manchuria: \"I hope we shall try in England to understand the position of Japan, an ancient state ... On the one side they have the dark menace of Soviet Russia. On the other the chaos of China, four or five provinces of which are being tortured under communist rule.\" In contemporary newspaper articles he referred to the Spanish Republican government as a communist front, and Franco's army as the \"Anti-red movement.\" He supported the Hoare-Laval Pact and continued up until 1937 to praise Benito Mussolini. He regarded Mussolini's regime as a bulwark against the perceived threat of communist revolution, going as far (in 1933) as to call Mussolini the \"Roman genius ... the greatest lawgiver among men.\" However, he stressed that the UK must stick with its tradition of Parliamentary democracy, not adopt fascism. \n\nSpeaking in the House of Commons in 1937, Churchill said, \"I will not pretend that, if I had to choose between communism and Nazism, I would choose communism.\" In a 1935 essay titled \"Hitler and his Choice\", which was republished in his 1937 book Great Contemporaries, Churchill expressed a hope that Hitler, if he so chose, and despite his rise to power through dictatorial action, hatred and cruelty, might yet \"go down in history as the man who restored honour and peace of mind to the great Germanic nation and brought it back serene, helpful and strong to the forefront of the European family circle.\" Churchill's first major speech on defence on 7 February 1934 stressed the need to rebuild the Royal Air Force and to create a Ministry of Defence; his second, on 13 July urged a renewed role for the League of Nations. These three topics remained his themes until early 1936. In 1935, he was one of the founding members of The Focus, which brought together people of differing political backgrounds and occupations who were united in seeking \"the defence of freedom and peace.\" The Focus led to the formation of the much wider Arms and the Covenant Movement in 1936.\n\nChurchill, holidaying in Spain when the Germans reoccupied the Rhineland in February 1936, returned to a divided Britain. The Labour opposition was adamant in opposing sanctions and the National Government was divided between advocates of economic sanctions and those who said that even these would lead to a humiliating backdown by Britain as France would not support any intervention. Churchill's speech on 9 March was measured, and praised by Neville Chamberlain as constructive. But within weeks Churchill was passed over for the post of Minister for Co-ordination of Defence in favour of Attorney General Sir Thomas Inskip. A. J. P. Taylor called this \"an appointment rightly described as the most extraordinary since Caligula made his horse a consul.\" In June 1936, Churchill organised a deputation of senior Conservatives who shared his concern to see Baldwin, Chamberlain and Halifax. He had tried to have delegates from the other two parties and later wrote, \"If the leaders of the Labour and Liberal oppositions had come with us there might have been a political situation so intense as to enforce remedial action.\" As it was, the meeting achieved little, Baldwin arguing that the Government was doing all it could, given the anti-war feeling of the electorate.\n\nOn 12 November, Churchill returned to the topic. Speaking in the Address in Reply debate, after giving some specific instances of Germany's war preparedness, he said \"The Government simply cannot make up their mind or they cannot get the prime minister to make up his mind. So they go on in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all powerful for impotency. And so we go on preparing more months more years precious perhaps vital for the greatness of Britain for the locusts to eat.\" \n\nR. R. James called this one of Churchill's most brilliant speeches during this period, Baldwin's reply sounding weak and disturbing the House. The exchange gave new encouragement to the Arms and the Covenant Movement. \n\nAbdication crisis\n\nIn June 1936, Walter Monckton told Churchill that the rumours that King Edward VIII intended to marry Mrs Wallis Simpson were true. Churchill then advised against the marriage and said he regarded Mrs Simpson's existing marriage as a 'safeguard'. In November, he declined Lord Salisbury's invitation to be part of a delegation of senior Conservative backbenchers who met with Baldwin to discuss the matter. On 25 November he, Attlee and Labour leader Archibald Sinclair met with Baldwin, were told officially of the King's intention, and asked whether they would form an administration if Baldwin and the National Government resigned should the King not take the Ministry's advice. Both Attlee and Sinclair said they would not take office if invited to do so. Churchill's reply was that his attitude was a little different but he would support the government. \n\nThe Abdication crisis became public, coming to a head in the first two weeks of December 1936. At this time, Churchill publicly gave his support to the King. The first public meeting of the Arms and the Covenant Movement was on 3 December. Churchill was a major speaker and later wrote that in replying to the Vote of Thanks, he made a declaration 'on the spur of the moment' asking for delay before any decision was made by either the King or his Cabinet. Later that night Churchill saw the draft of the King's proposed wireless broadcast and spoke with Beaverbrook and the King's solicitor about it. On 4 December, he met with the King and again urged delay in any decision about abdication. On 5 December, he issued a lengthy statement implying that the Ministry was applying unconstitutional pressure on the King to force him to make a hasty decision. On 7 December, he tried to address the Commons to plead for delay. He was shouted down. Seemingly staggered by the unanimous hostility of all Members, he left. \n\nChurchill's reputation in Parliament and England as a whole was badly damaged. Some such as Alistair Cooke saw him as trying to build a King's Party. Others like Harold Macmillan were dismayed by the damage Churchill's support for the King had done to the Arms and the Covenant Movement. Churchill himself later wrote \"I was myself so smitten in public opinion that it was the almost universal view that my political life was at last ended.\" Historians are divided about Churchill's motives in his support for Edward VIII. Some such as A. J. P. Taylor see it as being an attempt to 'overthrow the government of feeble men'. Others such as R. R. James see Churchill's motives as entirely honourable and disinterested, that he felt deeply for the King. \n\nReturn from exile\n\nChurchill later sought to portray himself as an isolated voice warning of the need to rearm against Germany. While it is true that he had a small following in the House of Commons during much of the 1930s, he was given privileged information by some elements within the Government, particularly by disaffected civil servants in the War Ministry. The \"Churchill group\" in the latter half of the decade consisted of only himself, Duncan Sandys and Brendan Bracken. It was isolated from the other main factions within the Conservative Party pressing for faster rearmament and a stronger foreign policy; one meeting of anti-Chamberlain forces decided that Churchill would make a good Minister of Supply. \n\nEven during the time Churchill was campaigning against Indian independence, he received official and otherwise secret information. From 1932, Churchill's neighbour, Major Desmond Morton, with Ramsay MacDonald's approval, gave Churchill information on German air power. From 1930 onwards Morton headed a department of the Committee of Imperial Defence charged with researching the defence preparedness of other nations. Lord Swinton as Secretary of State for Air, and with Baldwin's approval, in 1934 gave Churchill access to official and otherwise secret information.\n\nSwinton did so, knowing Churchill would remain a critic of the government, but believing that an informed critic was better than one relying on rumour and hearsay. Churchill was a fierce critic of Neville Chamberlain's appeasement of Adolf Hitler and in private letters to Lloyd George (13 August) and Lord Moyne (11 September) just before the Munich Agreement, he wrote that the government were faced with a choice between \"war and shame\" and that having chosen shame would later get war on less favourable terms. \n\nFirst term as prime minister (1940–45)\n\nReturn to the Admiralty\n\nOn 3 September 1939, the day Britain declared war on Germany following the outbreak of the Second World War, Churchill was appointed First Lord of the Admiralty, the same position he had held during the first part of the First World War. As such he was a member of Chamberlain's small War Cabinet. \n\nIn this position, he proved to be one of the highest-profile ministers during the so-called \"Phoney War,\" when the only noticeable action was at sea and the USSR's attack on Finland. Churchill advocated the pre-emptive occupation of the neutral Norwegian iron-ore port of Narvik and the iron mines in Kiruna, Sweden, early in the war. However, Chamberlain and the rest of the War Cabinet disagreed, and the operation was delayed until the successful German invasion of Norway.\n\n\"We shall never surrender\"\n\nOn 10 May 1940, hours before the German invasion of France by a lightning advance through the Low Countries, it became clear that, following failure in Norway, the country had no confidence in Chamberlain's prosecution of the war and so Chamberlain resigned. The commonly accepted version of events states that Lord Halifax turned down the post of prime minister because he believed he could not govern effectively as a member of the House of Lords instead of the House of Commons. Although the prime minister does not traditionally advise the King on the former's successor, Chamberlain wanted someone who would command the support of all three major parties in the House of Commons. A meeting between Chamberlain, Halifax, Churchill and David Margesson, the government Chief Whip, led to the recommendation of Churchill, and, as constitutional monarch, George VI asked Churchill to be prime minister. Churchill's first act was to write to Chamberlain to thank him for his support. \n\nIn June 1940, to encourage the neutral Irish state to join with the Allies, Churchill indicated to the Taoiseach Éamon de Valera that the United Kingdom would push for Irish unity, but believing that Churchill could not deliver, de Valera declined the offer. The British did not inform the Government of Northern Ireland that they had made the offer to the Dublin government, and De Valera's rejection was not publicised until 1970.\n\nChurchill was still unpopular among many Conservatives and the Establishment, who opposed his replacing Chamberlain; the former prime minister remained party leader until dying in November. Churchill probably could not have won a majority in any of the political parties in the House of Commons, and the House of Lords was completely silent when it learned of his appointment. An American visitor reported in late 1940 that, \"Everywhere I went in London people admired [Churchill's] energy, his courage, his singleness of purpose. People said they didn't know what Britain would do without him. He was obviously respected. But no one felt he would be Prime Minister after the war. He was simply the right man in the right job at the right time. The time being the time of a desperate war with Britain's enemies.\" \n\nAn element of British public and political sentiment favoured a negotiated peace with Germany, among them Halifax as Foreign Secretary, but Churchill refused to consider an armistice. Although at times personally pessimistic about Britain's chances for victory—Churchill told Hastings Ismay on 12 June 1940 that \"[y]ou and I will be dead in three months' time\" —his use of rhetoric hardened public opinion against a peaceful resolution and prepared the British for a long war. Coining the general term for the upcoming battle, Churchill stated in his \"finest hour\" speech to the House of Commons on 18 June, \"I expect that the Battle of Britain is about to begin.\" By refusing an armistice with Germany, Churchill kept resistance alive in the British Empire and created the basis for the later Allied counter-attacks of 1942–45, with Britain serving as a platform for the supply of the Soviet Union and the liberation of Western Europe.\n\nIn response to previous criticisms that there had been no clear single minister in charge of the prosecution of the war Churchill created and took the additional position of Minister of Defence, making him the most powerful wartime prime minister in British history. He immediately put his friend and confidant, industrialist and newspaper baron Lord Beaverbrook, in charge of aircraft production. It was Beaverbrook's business acumen that allowed Britain to quickly gear up aircraft production and engineering, which eventually made the difference in the war. \n\nThe war energised Churchill, who was 65 years old when he became Prime Minister. An American journalist wrote in 1941: \"The responsibilities which are his now must be greater than those carried by any other human being on earth. One would think such a weight would have a crushing effect upon him. Not at all. The last time I saw him, while the Battle of Britain was still raging, he looked twenty years younger than before the war began ... His uplifted spirit is transmitted to the people\". Churchill's speeches were a great inspiration to the embattled British. His first as prime minister was the famous, \"I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat\" speech. One historian has called its effect on Parliament as \"electrifying\". The House of Commons that had ignored him during the 1930s \"was now listening, and cheering\". Churchill followed that closely with two other equally famous ones, given just before the Battle of Britain. One included the words:\n\nThe other:\n\nAt the height of the Battle of Britain, his bracing survey of the situation included the memorable line \"Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few\", which engendered the enduring nickname The Few for the RAF fighter pilots who won it. He first spoke these famous words upon his exit from No. 11 Group's underground bunker at RAF Uxbridge, now known as the Battle of Britain Bunker on 16 August 1940. One of his most memorable war speeches came on 10 November 1942 at the Lord Mayor's Luncheon at Mansion House in London, in response to the Allied victory at the Second Battle of El Alamein. Churchill stated:\n\nWithout having much in the way of sustenance or good news to offer the British people, he took a risk in deliberately choosing to emphasise the dangers instead.\n\n\"Rhetorical power\", wrote Churchill, \"is neither wholly bestowed, nor wholly acquired, but cultivated.\" Not all were impressed by his oratory. Robert Menzies, prime minister of Australia and himself a gifted phrase-maker, said of Churchill during the Second World War: \"His real tyrant is the glittering phrase so attractive to his mind that awkward facts have to give way.\" Another associate wrote: \"He is ... the slave of the words which his mind forms about ideas ... And he can convince himself of almost every truth if it is once allowed thus to start on its wild career through his rhetorical machinery.\" \n\nMental and physical health\n\nSince the appearance in 1966 of Lord Moran's memoir of his years as Churchill's doctor, with its claim that \"Black Dog\" was the name Churchill gave to \"the prolonged fits of depression from which he suffered\", many authors have suggested that throughout his life Churchill was a victim of, or at risk from, clinical depression. Formulated in this way, Churchill's mental health history contains unmistakable echoes of the seminal interpretation of Lord Moran's Black Dog revelations made by Dr Anthony Storr. In drawing so heavily on Moran for what he took to be the latter's totally reliable, first-hand clinical evidence of Churchill's lifelong struggle with \"prolonged and recurrent depression\" and its associated \"despair\", Storr produced a seemingly authoritative and persuasive diagnostic essay that, in the words of John Ramsden, \"strongly influenced all later accounts.\" \n\nHowever, Storr was not aware that Moran, as Moran's biographer Professor Richard Lovell has shown and contrary to the impression created in Moran's book, kept no diary, in the dictionary sense of the word, during his years as Churchill's doctor. Nor was Storr aware that Moran's book as published was a much rewritten account which mixed together Moran's contemporaneous jottings with later material acquired from other sources. As Wilfred Attenborough has demonstrated, the key Black Dog 'diary' entry for 14 August 1944 was an arbitrarily dated pastiche in which the explicit reference to Black Dog—the first of the few in the book (with an associated footnote definition of the term)—was taken, not from anything Churchill had said to Moran, but from much later claims made to Moran by Brendan Bracken (a non-clinician, of course) in 1958. Although seemingly unnoticed by Dr Storr and those he influenced, Moran later on in his book retracts his earlier suggestion, also derived from Brendan Bracken, that, towards the end of the Second World War, Churchill was succumbing to \"the inborn melancholia of the Churchill blood\"; also unnoticed by Storr et al., Moran, in his final chapter, states that Churchill, before the start of the First World War, \"had managed to extirpate bouts of depression from his system\". \n\nDespite the difficulties with Moran's book, the many illustrations it provides of a Churchill understandably plunged into temporary low mood by military defeats and other severely adverse developments constitute a compelling portrait of a great man reacting to, but not significantly impeded by, worry and overstrain, a compelling portrait that is entirely consistent with the portraits of others who worked closely with Churchill. Moreover, it can be readily deduced from Moran's book that Churchill did not receive medication for depression—the amphetamine that Moran prescribed for special occasions, especially for big speeches from the autumn of 1953 onwards, was to combat the effects of Churchill's stroke of that year. \n\nChurchill himself seems, in a long life, to have written about Black Dog on one occasion only: the reference, a backward-looking one, occurs in a private handwritten letter to Clementine Churchill dated July 1911 which reports the successful treatment of a relative's depression by a doctor in Germany. His ministerial circumstances at that date, the very limited treatments available for serious depression pre-1911, the fact of the relative's being \"complete cured\", and, not least, the evident deep interest Churchill took in the fact of the complete cure, can be shown to point to Churchill's pre-1911 Black Dog depression's having been a form of mild (i.e. non-psychotic) anxiety-depression, as that term is defined by Professor Edward Shorter. \n\nThere is serious doubt about the reliability of the evidential foundations of the dominant, essentially Storrian, perception that Churchill's mental health was an open-and-shut case of clinical depression. Moran himself leaned strongly in the direction of his patient's being \"by nature very apprehensive\"; close associates of Churchill have disputed the idea that apprehension was a defining feature of Churchill's temperament, although they readily concede that he was noticeably worried and anxious about some matters, especially in the buildup to important speeches in the House of Commons and elsewhere. And Churchill himself all but openly acknowledged in his book 'Painting as a Pastime' that he was prey to the \"worry and mental overstrain [experienced] by persons who, over prolonged periods, have to bear exceptional responsibilities and discharge duties upon a very large scale\". The fact that he found a remedy in painting and bricklaying is a strong indicator that the condition as he defined it did not amount to 'clinical depression', certainly not as that term was understood during the lifetimes of himself and Lord Moran. \n\nAccording to Lord Moran, during the war years Churchill sought solace in his tumbler of whisky and soda and his cigar. Churchill was also a very emotional man, unafraid to shed tears when appropriate. During some of his broadcast speeches it was noticed that he was trying to hold back the tears. Nevertheless, although the fall of Tobruk was, by Churchill's own account \"one of the heaviest blows\" he received during the war, there seem to have been no tears. Certainly, the next day Moran found him animated and vigorous. Field Marshal Alanbrooke, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, who had been present when President Roosevelt broke the news of the tragedy to Churchill, focused afterwards in his diary on the superbly well judged manner in which the President made his offer of immediate military assistance, despite Alanbrooke's being ever ready to highlight what he perceived to be Churchill's contradictory motivations and flawed character during the war. For example, in his diary entry for 10 September 1944:\n\nAlanbrooke, in the words of Paul Reid, \"was egalitarian: he criticized everybody, American and British\". \n\nChurchill's physical health became more fragile during the war, as shown by a mild heart attack he suffered in December 1941 at the White House and also in December 1943 when he contracted pneumonia. Despite this, he travelled over 100000 mi throughout the war to meet other national leaders. For security, he usually travelled using the alias Colonel Warden. \n\nRelations with the United States\n\nChurchill's good relationship with US President Franklin D. Roosevelt—between 1939 and 1945 they exchanged an estimated 1700 letters and telegrams and met 11 times; Churchill estimated that they had 120 days of close personal contact —helped secure vital food, oil and munitions via the North Atlantic shipping routes. It was for this reason that Churchill was relieved when Roosevelt was re-elected in 1940. Upon re-election, Roosevelt immediately set about implementing a new method of providing military hardware and shipping to Britain without the need for monetary payment. Roosevelt persuaded Congress that repayment for this immensely costly service would take the form of defending the US; and so Lend-Lease was born. Churchill had 12 strategic conferences with Roosevelt which covered the Atlantic Charter, Europe first strategy, the Declaration by the United Nations and other war policies.\nAfter Pearl Harbor was attacked, Churchill's first thought in anticipation of US help was, \"We have won the war!\" On 26 December 1941, Churchill addressed a joint meeting of the US Congress, asking of Germany and Japan, \"What kind of people do they think we are?\" Churchill initiated the Special Operations Executive (SOE) under Hugh Dalton's Ministry of Economic Warfare, which established, conducted and fostered covert, subversive and partisan operations in occupied territories with notable success; and also the Commandos which established the pattern for most of the world's current Special Forces. The Russians referred to him as the \"British Bulldog\".\n\nChurchill was party to treaties that would redraw post-Second World War European and Asian boundaries. These were discussed as early as 1943. At the Second Quebec Conference in 1944 he drafted and, together with Roosevelt, signed a less-harsh version of the original Morgenthau Plan, in which they pledged to convert Germany after its unconditional surrender \"into a country primarily agricultural and pastoral in its character.\" Proposals for European boundaries and settlements were officially agreed to by President Harry S. Truman, Churchill, and Joseph Stalin at Potsdam. Churchill's strong relationship with Harry Truman was also of great significance to both countries. While he clearly regretted the loss of his close friend and counterpart Roosevelt, Churchill was enormously supportive of Truman in his first days in office, calling him, \"the type of leader the world needs when it needs him most.\" \n\nRelations with the Soviet Union\n\nWhen Hitler invaded the Soviet Union, Winston Churchill, a vehement anti-communist, famously stated \"If Hitler invaded Hell, I would at least make a favourable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons,\" regarding his policy toward Stalin. Soon, British supplies and tanks were flowing to help the Soviet Union. \n\nThe Casablanca Conference, a meeting of Allied powers held in Casablanca, Morocco, on 14 January through 23 January 1943, produced what was to be known as the \"Casablanca Declaration\". In attendance were Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt and Charles de Gaulle. Joseph Stalin had bowed out, citing the need for his presence in the Soviet Union to attend to the Stalingrad crisis. It was in Casablanca that the Allies made a unified commitment to continue the war through to the \"unconditional surrender\" of the Axis powers. In private, however, Churchill did not fully subscribe to the doctrine of \"unconditional surrender,\" and was taken by surprise when Franklin Roosevelt announced this to the world as Allied consensus. \n\nThe settlement concerning the borders of Poland, that is, the boundary between Poland and the Soviet Union and between Germany and Poland, was viewed as a betrayal in Poland during the post-war years, as it was established against the views of the Polish government in exile. It was Winston Churchill, who tried to motivate Mikołajczyk, who was prime minister of the Polish government in exile, to accept Stalin's wishes, but Mikołajczyk refused. Churchill was convinced that the only way to alleviate tensions between the two populations was the transfer of people, to match the national borders.\n\nAs he expounded in the House of Commons on 15 December 1944, \"Expulsion is the method which, insofar as we have been able to see, will be the most satisfactory and lasting. There will be no mixture of populations to cause endless trouble ... A clean sweep will be made. I am not alarmed by these transferences, which are more possible in modern conditions.\" However the resulting expulsions of Germans were carried out in a way which resulted in much hardship and, according to a 1966 report by the West German Ministry of Refugees and Displaced Persons, the death of over 2.1 million. Churchill opposed the effective annexation of Poland by the Soviet Union and wrote bitterly about it in his books, but he was unable to prevent it at the conferences. \n\nDuring October 1944, he and Eden were in Moscow to meet with the Russian leadership. At this point, Russian forces were beginning to advance into various eastern European countries. Churchill held the view that until everything was formally and properly worked out at the Yalta conference, there had to be a temporary, war-time, working agreement with regard to who would run what. The most significant of these meetings was held on 9 October 1944 in the Kremlin between Churchill and Stalin. During the meeting, Poland and the Balkan problems were discussed.Resis, Albert. The Churchill-Stalin Secret \"Percentages\" Agreement on the Balkans, Moscow, October 1944. The American Historical Review, Vol. 83, No. 2. (April 1978), pp. 368–87 [http://www.jstor.org/pss/1862322 in JSTOR] Churchill told Stalin:\n\nStalin agreed to this Percentages agreement, ticking a piece of paper as he heard the translation. In 1958, five years after the account of this meeting was published (in The Second World War), authorities of the Soviet Union denied that Stalin accepted the \"imperialist proposal\".\n\nOne of the conclusions of the Yalta Conference was that the Allies would return all Soviet citizens that found themselves in the Allied zone to the Soviet Union. This immediately affected the Soviet prisoners of war liberated by the Allies, but was also extended to all Eastern European refugees. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn called the Operation Keelhaul \"the last secret\" of the Second World War. The operation decided the fate of up to two million post-war refugees fleeing eastern Europe.\n\nDresden bombings controversy\n\nBetween 13–15 February 1945, British and US bombers attacked the German city of Dresden, which was crowded with German wounded and refugees. There were an unknown number of refugees in Dresden, so historians Matthias Neutzner, Götz Bergander and Frederick Taylor have used historical sources and deductive reasoning to estimate that the number of refugees in the city and surrounding suburbs was around 200,000 or less on the first night of the bombing. Because of the cultural importance of the city, and of the number of civilian casualties close to the end of the war, this remains one of the most controversial Western Allied actions of the war. Following the bombing Churchill stated in a top-secret telegram:\n\nOn reflection, under pressure from the Chiefs of Staff and in response to the views expressed by Sir Charles Portal (Chief of the Air Staff) and Sir Arthur Harris (AOC-in-C of RAF Bomber Command), among others, Churchill withdrew his memo and issued a new one. This final version of the memo completed on 1 April 1945, stated: \n\nUltimately, responsibility for the British part of the attack lay with Churchill, which is why he has been criticised for allowing the bombings to occur. German historian Jörg Friedrich claims that Churchill's decision was a \"war crime\", and writing in 2006 the philosopher A. C. Grayling questioned the whole strategic bombing campaign by the RAF, presenting the argument that although it was not a war crime it was a moral crime that undermines the Allies' contention that they fought a just war. On the other hand, it has also been asserted that Churchill's involvement in the bombing of Dresden was based on the strategic and tactical aspects of winning the war. The destruction of Dresden, while immense, was designed to expedite the defeat of Germany. As historian and journalist Max Hastings wrote in an article subtitled \"the Allied Bombing of Dresden\": \"I believe it is wrong to describe strategic bombing as a war crime, for this might be held to suggest some moral equivalence with the deeds of the Nazis. Bombing represented a sincere, albeit mistaken, attempt to bring about Germany's military defeat.\" British historian Frederick Taylor asserts that \"All sides bombed each other's cities during the war. Half a million Soviet citizens, for example, died from German bombing during the invasion and occupation of Russia. That's roughly equivalent to the number of German citizens who died from Allied raids.\" \n\nEnd of the Second World War \n\nIn June 1944, the Allied Forces invaded Normandy and pushed the Nazi forces back into Germany on a broad front over the coming year. After being attacked on three fronts by the Allies, and in spite of Allied failures, such as Operation Market Garden, and German counter-attacks, including the Battle of the Bulge, Germany was eventually defeated. On 7 May 1945 at the SHAEF headquarters in Rheims the Allies accepted Germany's surrender. On the same day in a BBC news flash John Snagge announced that 8 May would be Victory in Europe Day. On Victory in Europe Day, Churchill broadcast to the nation that Germany had surrendered and that a final cease fire on all fronts in Europe would come into effect at one minute past midnight that night. Afterwards, Churchill told a huge crowd in Whitehall: \"This is your victory.\" The people shouted: \"No, it is yours\", and Churchill then conducted them in the singing of \"Land of Hope and Glory\". In the evening he made another broadcast to the nation asserting the defeat of Japan in the coming months. The Japanese later surrendered on 15 August 1945.\n\nSoon after VE day there came a dispute with Britain over French mandates Syria and Lebanon known as the Levant which quickly developed into a major diplomatic incident. In May, Charles de Gaulle had sent more French troops to re-establish their presence provoking an outbreak of nationalism. On 20 May, French troops opened fire on demonstrators in Damascus with artillery and dropped bombs from the air. Finally, on 31 May, with the death toll exceeding a thousand Syrians Churchill decided to act and sent de Gaulle an ultimatum saying, \"In order to avoid a collision between British and French forces, we request you immediately to order French troops to cease fire and withdraw to their barracks\". This was ignored by both De Gaulle and the French forces and thus Churchill ordered British troops and armoured cars under General Bernard Paget to invade Syria from nearby Transjordan. The invasion went ahead and the British swiftly moved in cutting the French General Fernand Oliva-Roget's telephone line with his base at Beirut. Eventually, heavily outnumbered, Oliva-Roget ordered his men back to their bases near the coast who were then escorted by the British. A furious row then broke out between Britain and France.\n\nChurchill's relationship with de Gaulle was at this time rock bottom in spite of his efforts to preserve French interests at Yalta and a visit to Paris the previous year. In January he told a colleague that he believed that de Gaulle was \"a great danger to peace and for Great Britain. After five years of experience, I am convinced that he is the worst enemy of France in her troubles ... he is one of the greatest dangers to European peace.... I am sure that in the long run no understanding will be reached with General de Gaulle\". In France, there were accusations that Britain had armed the demonstrators and De Gaulle raged against 'Churchill's ultimatum', saying that \"the whole thing stank of oil\".\n\nAs Europe celebrated peace at the end of six years of war, Churchill was concerned with the possibility that the celebrations would soon be brutally interrupted. He concluded that the UK and the US must anticipate the Red Army ignoring previously agreed frontiers and agreements in Europe, and prepare to \"impose upon Russia the will of the United States and the British Empire.\" According to the Operation Unthinkable plan ordered by Churchill and developed by the British Armed Forces, the Third World War could have started on 1 July 1945 with a sudden attack against the allied Soviet troops. The plan was rejected by the British Chiefs of Staff Committee as militarily unfeasible.\n\nIn opposition, 1945–51\n\nCaretaker government and 1945 election\n\nWith a general election looming (there had been none for almost a decade), and with the Labour Ministers refusing to continue the wartime coalition, Churchill resigned as Prime Minister on 23 May. Later that day, he accepted the King's invitation to form a new government, known officially as the National Government, like the Conservative-dominated coalition of the 1930s, but in practice known as the Churchill caretaker ministry. The government contained Conservatives, National Liberals and a few non-party figures such as Sir John Anderson and Lord Woolton, but not Labour or Archibald Sinclair's Official Liberals. Although Churchill continued to carry out the functions of Prime Minister, including exchanging messages with the US administration about the upcoming Potsdam Conference, he was not formally reappointed until 28 May. \n\nAlthough polling day was 5 July, the results of the 1945 election did not become known until 26 July, owing to the need to collect the votes of those serving overseas. Clementine, who together with his daughter Mary had been at the count at Churchill's constituency in Essex (although unopposed by the major parties, Churchill had been returned with a much-reduced majority against an independent candidate) returned to meet her husband for lunch. To her suggestion that election defeat might be \"a blessing in disguise\" he retorted that \"at the moment it seems very effectively disguised\". That afternoon Churchill's doctor Lord Moran commiserated with him on the \"ingratitude\" of the British public, to which Churchill replied \"I wouldn't call it that. They have had a very hard time\". Having lost the election, despite enjoying much support amongst the British population, he resigned as Prime Minister that evening, this time handing over to a Labour Government. Many reasons for his defeat have been given, key among them being that a desire for post-war reform was widespread amongst the population and that the man who had led Britain in war was not seen as the man to lead the nation in peace. Although the Conservative Party was unpopular, many electors appear to have wanted Churchill to continue as Prime Minister whatever the outcome, or to have wrongly believed that this would be possible. \n\nOn the morning of 27 July, Churchill held a farewell Cabinet. On the way out of the Cabinet Room he told Eden \"Thirty years of my life have been passed in this room. I shall never sit in it again. You will, but I shall not\". However, contrary to expectations, Churchill did not hand over the Conservative leadership to Anthony Eden, who became his deputy but who was disinclined to challenge his leadership. It would be another decade before Churchill finally did hand over the reins. \n\nOpposition leader\n\nFor six years he was to serve as the Leader of the Opposition. During these years Churchill continued to influence world affairs. During his 1946 trip to the United States, Churchill famously lost a lot of money in a poker game with Harry Truman and his advisors. (He also liked to play Bezique, which he learned while serving in the Boer War.)\n\nDuring this trip he gave his Iron Curtain speech about the USSR and the creation of the Eastern Bloc. Speaking on 5 March 1946 at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, he declared:\n\nChurchill told the Irish Ambassador to London in 1946 \"I said a few words in parliament the other day about your country because I still hope for a united Ireland. You must get those fellows in the north in, though; you can't do it by force. There is not, and never was, any bitterness in my heart towards your country.\" He later said \"You know I have had many invitations to visit Ulster but I have refused them all. I don't want to go there at all, I would much rather go to southern Ireland. Maybe I'll buy another horse with an entry in the Irish Derby.\" \n\nHe continued to lead his party after losing the 1950 general election.\n\nEuropean unity\n\nIn the summer of 1930, inspired by the ideas being floated by Aristide Briand and by his recent tour of the US in the autumn of 1929, Churchill wrote an article lamenting the instability which had been caused by the independence of Poland and the disintegration of Austria-Hungary into petty states, and called for a \"United States of Europe\", although he wrote that Britain was \"with Europe but not of it\". \n\nIdeas about closer European union continued to circulate, driven by Paul-Henri Spaak, from 1942 onwards. As early as March 1943 a Churchill speech on postwar reconstruction annoyed the US administration not only by not mentioning China as a great power but by proposing a purely European \"Council of Europe\". Harry Hopkins passed on President Roosevelt's concerns, warning Eden that it would \"give free ammunition to (US) isolationists\" who might propose an American \"regional council\". Churchill urged Eden, on a visit to the US at the time, to \"listen politely\" but give \"no countenance\" to Roosevelt's proposals for the US, UK, USSR and Chiang Kai-Shek's China to act together to enforce \"Global Collective Security\" with the Japanese and French Empires taken into international trusteeship. \n\nNow out of office, Churchill gave a speech at Zurich on 19 September 1946 in which he called for \"a kind of United States of Europe\" centred around a Franco-German partnership, with Britain and the Commonwealth, and perhaps the US, as \"friends and sponsors of the new Europe\". \"The Times\" wrote of him \"startling the world\" with \"outrageous propositions\" and warned that there was as yet little appetite for such unity, and that he appeared to be assuming a permanent division between Eastern and Western Europe, and urged \"more humdrum\" economic agreements. The speech was praised by Leo Amery and by Count Coudenhove-Kalergi who wrote that it would galvanise governments into action. \n\nChurchill expressed similar sentiments at a meeting of the Primrose League at the Albert Hall on 18 May 1947. He declared \"let Europe arise\" but was \"absolutely clear\" that \"we shall allow no wedge to be driven between Britain and the United States\". Churchill's speeches helped to encourage the foundation of the Council of Europe. \n\nIn June 1950, Churchill was strongly critical of the Attlee Government's failure to send British representatives to Paris (to discuss the Schuman Plan for setting up the European Coal and Steel Community), declaring that les absents ont toujours tort and calling it \"a squalid attitude\" which \"derange(d) the balance of Europe\", and risked Germany dominating the new grouping. He called for world unity through the UN (against the backdrop of the communist invasion of South Korea), whilst stressing that Britain was uniquely placed to exert leadership through her links to the Commonwealth, the US and Europe. However, Churchill did not want Britain to actually join any federal grouping. Jenkins, p. 810 and pp. 819–14 In September 1951 a declaration of the American, French and British foreign ministers welcomed the Schuman plan, stressing that it would revive economic growth and encourage the development of a democratic Germany, part of the Atlantic community. \n\nAfter returning as Prime Minister, Churchill issued a note for the Cabinet on 29 November 1951. He listed British Foreign Policy priorities as Commonwealth unity and consolidation, \"fraternal association\" of the English-speaking world (i.e. the Commonwealth and the US), then thirdly \"United Europe, to which we are a closely—and specially-related ally and friend … (it is) only when plans for uniting Europe take a federal form that we cannot take part, because we cannot subordinate ourselves or the control of British policy to federal authorities\". \n\nIn 1956, after retiring as Prime Minister, Churchill went to Aachen to receive the Charlemagne Prize for his contribution to European Unity. Churchill is today listed as one of the \"Founding fathers of the European Union\", a claim which in Boris Johnson's view contains \"a very large dollop of truth\". However, Johnson suggests that if Churchill had been in power in 1950 he might have led Europe down the path of inter-governmental cooperation rather than federalism.\n\nIn July 1962 Field-Marshal Montgomery told the press that the aged Churchill, whom he had just visited in hospital where he was being treated for a broken hip, was opposed to Macmillan’s negotiations for Britain to enter the EEC (which would, in the event, be vetoed by the French President, General de Gaulle, the following January). Churchill told his granddaughter Edwina that Montgomery’s behaviour in leaking a private conversation was “monstrous”. \n\nSecond term as prime minister (1951–55)\n\nReturn to government\n\nDomestic policy\n\nAfter the general election of October 1951, Churchill again became prime minister, and his second government lasted until his resignation in April 1955. He also held the office of Minister of Defence from October 1951 until 1 March 1952, when he handed the portfolio to Field Marshal Alexander. \n\nIn domestic affairs, various reforms were introduced such as the Mines and Quarries Act of 1954 and the Housing Repairs and Rent Act of 1955. The former measure consolidated legislation dealing with the employment of young persons and women in mines and quarries, together with safety, health, and welfare. The latter measure extended previous housing Acts, and set out details in defining housing units as \"unfit for human habitation.\" In addition, tax allowances were raised, construction of council housing was accelerated, and pensions and national assistance benefits were increased. Controversially, however, charges for prescription medicines were introduced. \n\nHousing was an issue the Conservatives were widely recognised to have made their own, after the Churchill government of the early 1950s, with Harold Macmillan as Minister for Housing, gave housing construction far higher political priority than it had received under the Attlee administration (where housing had been attached to the portfolio of Health Minister Aneurin Bevan, whose attention was concentrated on his responsibilities for the National Health Service). Macmillan had accepted Churchill's challenge to meet the latter's ambitious public commitment to build 300,000 new homes a year, and achieved the target a year ahead of schedule. \n\nColonial affairs\n\nKenya and Malaya\n\nChurchill's domestic priorities in his last government were overshadowed by a series of foreign policy crises, which were partly the result of the continued decline of British military and imperial prestige and power. Being a strong proponent of Britain as an international power, Churchill would often meet such moments with direct action. One example was his dispatch of British troops to Kenya to deal with the Mau Mau rebellion. Trying to retain what he could of the Empire, he once stated that, \"I will not preside over a dismemberment.\"\n\nThis was followed by events which became known as the Malayan Emergency. In Malaya, a rebellion against British rule had been in progress since 1948. Once again, Churchill's government inherited a crisis, and Churchill chose to use direct military action against those in rebellion while attempting to build an alliance with those who were not. While the rebellion was slowly being defeated, it was equally clear that colonial rule from Britain was no longer sustainable.\n\nRelations with the US and the quest for a summit\n\nIn the early 1950s Britain was still attempting to remain a third major power on the world stage. This was \"the time when Britain stood up to the United States as strongly as she was ever to do in the postwar world\". However, Churchill devoted much of his time in office to Anglo-American relations and attempted to maintain the Special Relationship. He made four official transatlantic visits to America during his second term as prime minister. \n\nChurchill and Eden visited Washington in January 1952. The Truman Administration was supporting the plans for a European Defence Community (EDC), hoping that this would allow controlled West German rearmament and enable American troop reductions. Churchill affected to believe that the proposed EDC would not work, scoffing at the supposed difficulties of language. Churchill asked in vain for a US military commitment to support Britain's position in Egypt and Middle East (where the Truman Administration had recently pressured Attlee not to intervene against Mossadeq in Iran); this did not meet with American approval—the US expected British support to fight communism in Korea, but saw any US commitment to the Middle East as supporting British imperialism, and were unpersuaded that this would help prevent pro-Soviet regimes from coming to power. \n\nBy early 1953, the Cabinet's Foreign Policy priority was Egypt and nationalist, anti-imperialist Egyptian Revolution. After Stalin's death Churchill, the last of the wartime Big Three, wrote to Dwight D. Eisenhower, who had just assumed office as US President, on 11 March proposing a summit meeting with the Soviets; Eisenhower wrote back pouring cold water on the suggestions as the Soviets might use it for propaganda. \n\nSome of Churchill's colleagues hoped that he might retire after the Queen's Coronation in May 1953. Eden wrote to his son on 10 April \"W gets daily older & is apt to ... waste a great deal of time ... the outside world has little idea how difficult that becomes. Please make me retire before I am 80!\" However, Eden's serious illness (he nearly died after a series of botched operations on his bile duct) allowed Churchill to take control of foreign affairs from April 1953. \n\nAfter further discouragement from President Eisenhower (this was the McCarthy era in the US, in which Secretary of State Dulles took a Manichean view of the Cold War), Churchill announced his plans in the House of Commons on 11 May. The US Embassy in London noted that this was a rare occasion on which Churchill did not mention Anglo-American solidarity in a speech. Ministers like Lord Salisbury (acting Foreign Secretary) and Nutting were concerned at the irritation caused to the Americans and the French, although Selwyn Lloyd supported Churchill's initiative, as did most Conservatives. In his diary a year later, Eden wrote of Churchill's actions with fury. \n\nStroke and resignation\n\nChurchill had suffered a mild stroke while on holiday in the south of France in the summer of 1949. By the time he formed his next government he was slowing down noticeably enough for George VI, as early as December 1951, to consider inviting Churchill to retire in the following year in favour of Anthony Eden, but it is not recorded if the king made that approach before his own death in February 1952.\n\nThe strain of carrying the Premiership and Foreign Office contributed to his second stroke at 10 Downing Street after dinner on the evening of 23 June 1953. Despite being partially paralysed down one side, he presided over a Cabinet meeting the next morning without anybody noticing his incapacity. Thereafter his condition deteriorated, and it was thought that he might not survive the weekend. Had Eden been fit, Churchill's premiership would most likely have been over. News of this was kept from the public and from Parliament, who were told that Churchill was suffering from exhaustion. He went to his country home, Chartwell, to recuperate, and by the end of June he astonished his doctors by being able, dripping with perspiration, to lift himself upright from his chair. He joked that news of his illness had chased the trial of the serial killer John Christie off the front pages. \n\nChurchill was still keen to pursue a meeting with the Soviets and was open to the idea of a reunified Germany. He refused to condemn the Soviet crushing of East Germany, commenting on 10 July 1953 that \"The Russians were surprisingly patient about the disturbances in East Germany\". He thought this might have been the reason for the removal of Beria. Churchill returned to public life in October 1953 to make a speech at the Conservative Party conference at Margate. In December 1953 Churchill met Eisenhower in Bermuda. \n\nChurchill was cross about friction between Eden and Dulles (June 1954). On the trip home from another Anglo-American conference, the diplomat Pierson Dixon compared US actions in Guatemala to Soviet policy in Korea and Greece, causing Churchill to retort that Guatemala was a \"bloody place\" he'd \"never heard of\". Churchill was still keen for a trip to Moscow, and threatened to resign, provoking a crisis in the Cabinet when Lord Salisbury threatened to resign if Churchill had his way. In the end the Soviets proposed a five power conference, which did not meet until after Churchill had retired. By the autumn Churchill was again postponing his resignation. Eden, now partly recovered from his operations, became a major figure on the world stage in 1954, helping to negotiate peace in Indo-China, an agreement with Egypt and to broker an agreement between the countries of Western Europe after the French rejection of the EDC. \n\nAware that he was slowing down both physically and mentally, Churchill at last retired as prime minister in 1955 and was succeeded by Anthony Eden. He suffered another mild stroke in December 1956.\n\nRetirement and death (1955–65)\n\nElizabeth II offered to create Churchill Duke of London, but this was declined as a result of the objections of his son Randolph, who would have inherited the title on his father's death. He did, however, accept a knighthood as Garter Knight. After leaving the premiership, Churchill spent less time in parliament until he stood down at the 1964 general election.\nChurchill spent most of his retirement at Chartwell and at his home in Hyde Park Gate, in London, and became a habitué of high society on the French Riviera. \n\nAlthough publicly supportive, Churchill was privately scathing about Eden's Suez Invasion. His wife believed that he had made a number of visits to the US in the following years in an attempt to help repair Anglo-American relations. \n\nBy the time of the 1959 general election Churchill seldom attended the House of Commons. Despite the Conservative landslide, his own majority fell by more than a thousand. It is widely believed that as his mental and physical faculties decayed, he began to lose the battle he had supposedly fought for so long against the so-called \"Black Dog\" of depression. However, as was suggested in a previous section of this article, the nature, incidence and severity of Churchill's Black Dog is problematical. Anthony Montague Browne, Personal Secretary to Churchill during the latter's final ten years of life, wrote that he never heard Churchill make reference to Black Dog, and he vigorously contested the suggestion that the former prime minister, his health progressively ravaged by advanced old age, multiple strokes and other serious illness, was, independently of circumstances, afflicted also by inherent depression. \n\nThere was speculation that Churchill may have had Alzheimer's disease in his last years, although others maintain that his reduced mental capacity was simply the cumulative result of the ten strokes and the increasing deafness he suffered from during the period 1949–1963. In 1963, US President John F. Kennedy, acting under authorisation granted by an Act of Congress, proclaimed him an Honorary Citizen of the United States, but he was unable to attend the White House ceremony.\n\nDespite poor health, Churchill still tried to remain active in public life, and on St George's Day 1964, sent a message of congratulations to the surviving veterans of the 1918 Zeebrugge Raid who were attending a service of commemoration in Deal, Kent, where two casualties of the raid were buried in the Hamilton Road Cemetery. On 15 January 1965, Churchill suffered a severe stroke that left him gravely ill. He died at his London home nine days later, at age 90, on the morning of Sunday 24 January 1965, 70 years to the day after his father's death.Jenkins, p. 911\n\nFuneral\n\nChurchill's funeral plan had been initiated in 1953, after he suffered a major stroke, under the name Operation Hope Not. The purpose was to commemorate Churchill \"on a scale befitting his position in history\", as the Queen declared. The funeral was the largest state funeral in world history up to that time, with representatives from 112 nations; only China did not send an emissary. In Europe 350 million people, including 25 million in Britain, watched the funeral on television, and only Ireland did not broadcast it live. By decree of the Queen, his body lay in state in Westminster Hall for three days and a state funeral service was held at St Paul's Cathedral on 30 January 1965. One of the largest assemblages of statesmen in the world was gathered for the service. Unusually, the Queen attended the funeral because Churchill was the first commoner since William Gladstone to lie-in-State. As Churchill's lead-lined coffin passed up the River Thames from Tower Pier to Festival Pier on the , dockers lowered their crane jibs in a salute. \n\nThe Royal Artillery fired the 19-gun salute due a head of government, and the RAF staged a fly-by of sixteen English Electric Lightning fighters. The coffin was then taken the short distance to Waterloo station where it was loaded onto a specially prepared and painted carriage as part of the funeral train for its rail journey to , seven miles north-west of Oxford. \nThe funeral train of Pullman coaches carrying his family mourners was hauled by Battle of Britain class steam locomotive No. 34051 Winston Churchill. In the fields along the route, and at the stations through which the train passed, thousands stood in silence to pay their last respects. At Churchill's request, he was buried in the family plot at St Martin's Church, Bladon, near Woodstock, not far from his birthplace at Blenheim Palace. Churchill's funeral van—former Southern Railway van S2464S—is now part of a preservation project with the Swanage Railway, having been repatriated to the UK in 2007 from the US, to where it had been exported in 1965. \n\nLater in 1965 a memorial to Churchill, cut by the engraver Reynolds Stone, was placed in Westminster Abbey. \n\nArtist, historian, and writer\n\nChurchill was an accomplished artist and took great pleasure in painting, especially after his resignation as First Lord of the Admiralty in 1915. He found a haven in art to overcome the spells of depression which he suffered throughout his life. As William Rees-Mogg has stated, \"In his own life, he had to suffer the 'black dog' of depression. In his landscapes and still lives there is no sign of depression.\" Churchill was persuaded and taught to paint by his artist friend, Paul Maze, whom he met during the First World War. Maze was a great influence on Churchill's painting and became a lifelong painting companion. \n\nChurchill's best known paintings are impressionist landscapes, many of which were painted while on holiday in the South of France, Egypt or Morocco. Using the pseudonym \"Charles Morin\", he continued his hobby throughout his life and painted hundreds of paintings, many of which are on show in the studio at Chartwell as well as private collections. Most of his paintings are oil-based and feature landscapes, but he also did a number of interior scenes and portraits. In 1925 Lord Duveen, Kenneth Clark, and Oswald Birley selected his Winter Sunshine as the prize winner in a contest for anonymous amateur artists. Due to obvious time constraints, Churchill attempted only one painting during the Second World War. He completed the painting from the tower of the Villa Taylor in Marrakesh. \n\nSome of his paintings can today be seen in the Wendy and Emery Reves Collection at the Dallas Museum of Art. Emery Reves was Churchill's American publisher, as well as a close friend and Churchill often visited Emery and his wife at their villa, La Pausa, in the South of France, which had originally been built in 1927 for Gabrielle \"Coco\" Chanel by her lover Bendor, 2nd Duke of Westminster. The villa was rebuilt within the museum in 1985 with a gallery of Churchill paintings and memorabilia. \n\nDespite his lifelong fame and upper-class origins, Churchill always struggled to keep his income at a level which would fund his extravagant lifestyle. MPs before 1946 received only a nominal salary (and in fact did not receive anything at all until the Parliament Act 1911) so many had secondary professions from which to earn a living. From his first book in 1898 until his second stint as Prime Minister, Churchill's income while out of office was almost entirely made from writing books and opinion pieces for newspapers and magazines. The most famous of his newspaper articles are those that appeared in the Evening Standard from 1936 warning of the rise of Hitler and the danger of the policy of appeasement.\n\nChurchill was also a prolific writer of books, under the pen name \"Winston S. Churchill\", which he used by agreement with the American novelist of the same name to avoid confusion between their works. His output included a novel, two biographies, three volumes of memoirs, and several histories. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1953 \"for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values\". Two of his most famous works, published after his first premiership brought his international fame to new heights, were his six-volume memoir The Second World War and A History of the English-Speaking Peoples; a four-volume history covering the period from Caesar's invasions of Britain (55 BC) to the beginning of the First World War (1914). A number of volumes of Churchill's speeches were also published. the first of which, Into Battle, was published in the United States under the title Blood, Sweat and Tears, and was included in Life Magazine's list of the 100 outstanding books of 1924–1944. \n\nChurchill was also an amateur bricklayer, constructing buildings and garden walls at his country home at Chartwell, where he also bred butterflies. As part of this hobby Churchill joined the Amalgamated Union of Building Trade Workers, but was expelled because of his membership of the Conservative Party.\n\nHonours\n\nIn addition to the honour of a state funeral, Churchill received a wide range of awards and other honours, including the following, chronologically:\n* Churchill was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 1941\n* In 1945, while Churchill was mentioned by Halvdan Koht as one of seven appropriate candidates for the Nobel Prize in Peace, the nomination went to Cordell Hull. \n* In 1953, Churchill received the Nobel Prize in Literature for his numerous published works, especially his six-volume set The Second World War.\n* In a BBC poll of the \"100 Greatest Britons\" in 2002, he was proclaimed \"The Greatest of Them All\" based on approximately a million votes from BBC viewers. Churchill was also rated as one of the most influential leaders in history by TIME. Churchill College, Cambridge was founded in 1958 in his honour.\n* In 1963, Churchill was named an Honorary Citizen of the United States by Public Law 88-6/H.R. 4374 (approved/enacted 9 April 1963). \n* On 29 November 1995, during a visit to the United Kingdom, President Bill Clinton of the United States announced to both Houses of Parliament that an would be named the . This was the first United States warship to be named after a non-citizen of the United States since 1975.\n\nHonorary degrees\n\n* University of Rochester, Rochester, New York, United States (LLD) in 1941 \n* Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States (LLD) in 1943\n* McGill University in Montreal, Canada (LLD) in 1944\n* Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, United States 5 March 1946\n* Leiden University in Leiden, Netherlands, honorary doctorate in 1946 \n* University of Miami in Miami, Florida, United States in 1947\n* University of Copenhagen in Copenhagen, Denmark (PhD) in 1950\n\nAncestry\n\nPortrayal in film and television\n\nChurchill has been portrayed in film and television on multiple occasions. Portrayals of Churchill include Dudley Field Malone (An American in Paris, 1951); Peter Sellers (The Man Who Never Was, 1956); Richard Burton (Winston Churchill: The Valiant Years, 1961); Simon Ward (Young Winston, 1972); Warren Clarke (Jennie: Lady Randolph Churchill, 1974); Wensley Pithey (Edward and Mrs Simpson, 1978); Timothy West (Churchill and the Generals, 1979, Hiroshima, 1995); William Hootkins (The Life and Times of David Lloyd George, 1981); Robert Hardy (Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years, 1981, War and Remembrance, 1989); Bob Hoskins (World War II: When Lions Roared 1994); Albert Finney (The Gathering Storm 2002); Ian Mune (Ike: Countdown to D-Day, 2004); Rod Taylor (Inglourious Basterds, 2009); Brendan Gleeson (Into the Storm, 2009); Ian McNeice (Doctor Who: \"Victory of the Daleks\"; \"The Pandorica Opens\"; \"The Wedding of River Song\" in 2010 and 2011); Timothy Spall (The King's Speech, 2010),; Michael Gambon (Churchill's Secret, 2016) and John Lithgow (The Crown, 2016).", "The Western world or the West is a term usually referring to different nations, depending on the context, most often including at least part of Europe. There are many accepted definitions about what they all have in common. The Western world is also known as the Occident (from Latin: occidens \"sunset, West\", as contrasted with its pendant the Orient).\n\nThe concept of the Western part of the earth has its roots in Greco-Roman civilization in Europe, and the advent of Christianity. In the modern era, Western culture has been heavily influenced by the traditions of the Renaissance, Protestant Reformation, Age of Enlightenment—and shaped by the expansive imperialism and colonialism of the 15th to 20th centuries. Before the Cold War era, the traditional Western viewpoint identified Western Civilization with the Western Christian (Catholic-Protestant) countries and culture. Its political usage was temporarily changed by the antagonism during the Cold War in the mid-to-late 20th Century (1947–1991).\n\nThe term originally had a literal geographic meaning. It contrasted Europe with the cultures and civilizations of the Middle East and North Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia and the remote Far East, which early-modern Europeans saw as the East. In the contemporary cultural meaning, the phrase \"Western world\" includes Europe, as well as many countries of European colonial origin with substantial European ancestral populations in the Americas and Oceania.\n\nIntroduction \n\nWestern culture was influenced by many older great civilizations of the ancient Near East, such as Phoenicia, Minoan Crete, Sumer, Babylonia, and also Ancient Egypt. It originated in the Mediterranean basin and its vicinity; Greece and Rome are often cited as its originators. Over time, their associated empires grew first to the east and west to include the rest of Mediterranean and Black Sea coastal areas, conquering and absorbing. Later, they expanded to the north of the Mediterranean Sea to include Western, Central, and Southeastern Europe. Christianization of Ireland (5th century), Christianization of Bulgaria (9th century), Christianization of Kievan Rus' (Russia, Ukraine, Belarus; 10th century), Christianisation of Scandinavia (12th century) and Christianization of Lithuania (14th century) brought the rest of present-day European territory into Western civilisation.\n\nHistorians, such as Carroll Quigley in The Evolution of Civilizations, contend that Western civilization was born around 500 AD, after the total collapse of the Western Roman Empire, leaving a vacuum for new ideas to flourish that were impossible in Classical societies. In either view, between the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the Renaissance, the West (or those regions that would later become the heartland of the culturally \"western sphere\") experienced a period of first, considerable decline,[http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/195896/history-of-Europe Middle Ages] Of the three great civilizations of Western Eurasia and North Africa, that of Christian Europe began as the least developed in virtually all aspects of material and intellectual culture, well behind the Islamic states and Byzantium. and then readaptation, reorientation and considerable renewed material, technological and political development. This whole period of roughly a millennium is known as the Middle Ages, its early part forming the \"Dark Ages\", designations that were created during the Renaissance and reflect the perspective on history, and the self-image, of the latter period.\n\nThe knowledge of the ancient Western world was partly preserved during this period due to the survival of the Eastern Roman Empire and the institutions of the Catholic Church; it was also greatly expanded by the Arab importationH. G. Wells, The Outline of History, [http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/sherwood/Wells-Outline/Text/Part-II.htm Section 31.8, The Intellectual Life of Arab Islam] For some generations before Muhammad, the Arab mind had been, as it were, smouldering, it had been producing poetry and much religious discussion; under the stimulus of the national and racial successes it presently blazed out with a brilliance second only to that of the Greeks during their best period. From a new angle and with a fresh vigour it took up that systematic development of positive knowledge, which the Greeks had begun and relinquished. It revived the human pursuit of science. If the Greek was the father, then the Arab was the foster-father of the scientific method of dealing with reality, that is to say, by absolute frankness, the utmost simplicity of statement and explanation, exact record, and exhaustive criticism. Through the Arabs it was and not by the Latin route that the modern world received that gift of light and power. For many centuries the world of Islam was in the forefront of human civilization and achievement ... In the era between the decline of antiquity and the dawn of modernity, that is, in the centuries designated in European history as medieval, the Islamic claim was not without justification. of both the Ancient Greco-Roman and new technology through the Arabs from India and China to Europe. Since the Renaissance, the West evolved beyond the influence of the ancient Greeks and Romans and the Islamic world due to the Commercial, Scientific, and Industrial Revolutions, and the expansion of the peoples of Western and Central European empires, and particularly the globe-spanning empires of the 18th and 19th centuries. Numerous times, this expansion was accompanied by Christian missionaries, who attempted to proselytize Christianity.\n\nGenerally speaking, the current consensus would locate the West, at the very least, in the cultures and peoples of Europe, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and parts of Latin America. There is debate among some as to whether Latin America is in a category of its own. The Russian culture (particularly literature, music, painting, philosophy and architecture) is classified as a part of the Western culture.\n\nWestern culture\n\nThe term \"Western culture\" is used very broadly to refer to a heritage of social norms, ethical values, traditional customs, religious beliefs, political systems, and specific artifacts and technologies.\n\nSpecifically, Western culture may imply:\n*a Biblical Christian cultural influence in spiritual thinking, customs and either ethic or moral traditions, around the Post-Classical Era and after.\n*European cultural influences concerning artistic, musical, folkloric, ethic and oral traditions, whose themes have been further developed by Romanticism.\n*a Graeco-Roman Classical and Renaissance cultural influence, concerning artistic, philosophic, literary, and legal themes and traditions, the cultural social effects of migration period and the heritages of Celtic, Germanic, Slavic and other ethnic groups, as well as a tradition of rationalism in various spheres of life, developed by Hellenistic philosophy, Scholasticism, Humanisms, the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment.\n\nThe concept of Western culture is generally linked to the classical definition of the Western world. In this definition, Western culture is the set of literary, scientific, political, artistic and philosophical principles that set it apart from other civilizations. Much of this set of traditions and knowledge is collected in the Western canon. \n\nThe term has come to apply to countries whose history is strongly marked by European immigration or settlement, such as the Americas, and Oceania, and is not restricted to Europe.\n\nSome tendencies that define modern Western societies are the existence of political pluralism, laicism, generalization of middle class, prominent subcultures or countercultures (such as New Age movements), increasing cultural syncretism resulting from globalization and human migration. The modern shape of these societies is strongly based upon the Industrial Revolution and the societies' associated social and environmental problems, such as class and pollution, as well as reactions to them, such as syndicalism and environmentalism.\n\nHistorical divisions\n\nThe geopolitical divisions in Europe that created a concept of East and West originated in the Roman Empire. The Eastern Mediterranean was home to the highly urbanized cultures that had Greek as their common language (owing to the older empire of Alexander the Great and of the Hellenistic successors.), whereas the West was much more rural in its character and more readily adopted Latin as its common language. After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, Western and Central Europe were substantially cut off from the East where Byzantine Greek culture and Eastern Christianity became founding influences in the Arab/Muslim world and among the Eastern and Southern Slavic peoples. Roman Catholic Western and Central Europe, as such, maintained a distinct identity particularly as it began to redevelop during the Renaissance. Even following the Protestant Reformation, Protestant Europe continued to see itself as more tied to Roman Catholic Europe than other parts of the perceived civilized world.\n\nUse of the term West as a specific cultural and geopolitical term developed over the course of the Age of Exploration as Europe spread its culture to other parts of the world. In the past two centuries the term Western world has sometimes been used synonymously with Christian world because of the numerical dominance of Roman Catholicism and Protestantism compared to other Christian traditions, ancient Roman ideas, and heresies. As secularism rose in Europe and elsewhere during the 19th and 20th centuries, the term West came to take on less religious connotations and more political connotations, especially during the Cold War. Additionally, closer contacts between the West and Asia and other parts of the world in recent times have continued to cloud the use and meaning of the term.\n\nHellenic\n\nThe Hellenic division between the barbarians and the Greeks contrasted in many societies the Greek-speaking culture of the Greek settlements around the Mediterranean to the surrounding non-Greek cultures. Herodotus considered the Persian Wars of the early 5th century BC a conflict of Europa versus Asia (which he considered all land north and east of the Sea of Marmara, respectively). The terms \"West\" and \"East\" were not used by any Greek author to describe that conflict. The anachronistic application of those terms to that division entails a stark logical contradiction, given that, when the term \"West\" appeared, it was used in opposition to the Greeks and Greek-speaking culture.\n\nWestern society traces its cultural origins, at least partially, to Greek thought and Christian religion, thus following an evolution that began in ancient Greece and the Levant, continued through the Roman Empire, and spread throughout Europe. The inherently \"Greek\" classical ideas of history (which one might easily say they invented) and art may, however, be considered almost inviolate in the West, as their original spread of influence survived the Hellenic period of Roman classical antiquity, The Dark Ages, its resurgence during the Western Renaissance, and has managed somehow to keep and exert its pervasive influence down into the present age, with every expectation of it continuing to dominate any secular Western cultural developments.\n\nHowever, the conquest of the Western parts of the Roman Empire by Germanic peoples and the subsequent dominance by the Western Christian Papacy (which held combined political and spiritual authority, a state of affairs absent from Greek civilization in all its stages), resulted in a rupture of the previously existing ties between the Latin West and Greek thought, including Christian Greek thought. The Great Schism and the Fourth Crusade confirmed this deviation.\n\nOn the other hand, the Modern West, emerging after the Renaissance as a new civilization, has been greatly influenced by (its own interpretation of) Greek thought, which was preserved in the Roman Empire and the medieval Islamic world during the Medieval West's Dark Ages and transmitted from there by emigration of Greek scholars, courtly marriages, and Latin translations. The Renaissance in the West emerged partly from currents within the Roman (Byzantine) Empire.\n\nRoman Empire\n\nAncient Rome (510 BC-AD 476) was a civilization that grew from a city-state founded on the Italian Peninsula about the 9th century BC to a massive empire straddling the Mediterranean Sea. In its 12-century existence, Roman civilization shifted from a monarchy, to a republic, to an autocratic empire. It came to dominate Western, Central and Southeastern Europe and the entire area surrounding the Mediterranean Sea through conquest using the Roman legions and then through cultural assimilation by giving Roman privileges and eventually citizenship to the whole empire. Nonetheless, despite its great legacy, a number of factors led to the eventual decline of the Roman Empire.\n\nThe Western Roman Empire provinces eventually were replaced by Germanic ruled kingdoms in the 5th century AD due to civil wars, corruption, and devastating Germanic invasions from such tribes as the Goths, the Franks and the Vandals.\n\nThe Eastern Roman Empire, governed from Constantinople, is usually referred to as the Byzantine Empire after 476, the traditional date for the \"fall of the Western Roman Empire\" and for the beginning of the Early Middle Ages. The Eastern Roman Empire survived the fall of the West, and protected Roman legal and cultural traditions, combining them with Greek and Christian elements, for another thousand years. The name Byzantine Empire was used after the Byzantine Empire ended, the inhabitants of the Byzantine Empire continued to call themselves Romans.\n\nThe Roman Empire succeeded the approximately 500-year-old Roman Republic (510 BC - 1st century BC), which had been weakened by the conflict between Gaius Marius and Sulla and the civil war of Julius Caesar against Pompey and Marcus Brutus. During these struggles hundreds of senators were killed, and the Roman Senate had been refilled with loyalists of the First Triumvirate and later those of the Second Triumvirate.\n\nSeveral dates are commonly proposed to mark the transition from Republic to Empire, including the date of Julius Caesar's appointment as perpetual Roman dictator (44 BC), the victory of Caesar's heir Octavian at the Battle of Actium ( 2, 31 September BC), and the Roman Senate's granting to Octavian the honorific Augustus. ( 16, 27 January BC). Octavian/Augustus officially proclaimed that he had saved the Roman Republic and carefully disguised his power under republican forms: Consuls continued to be elected, tribunes of the plebeians continued to offer legislation, and senators still debated in the Roman Curia. However, it was Octavian who influenced everything and controlled the final decisions, and in final analysis, had the legions to back him up, if it became necessary.\n\nRoman expansion began long before the empire and reached its zenith under emperor Trajan with the conquest of Dacia in AD 106. During this territorial peak, the Roman Empire controlled about 5 900 000 km² (2,300,000 sq.mi.) of land surface and had a population of 100 million. From the time of Caesar to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, Rome dominated Western Eurasia (as well as the Mediterranean coast of northern Africa) comprising the majority of its population, and trading with population living outside it through trade (Amber Roads). Ancient Rome has contributed greatly to the development of law, war, art, literature, architecture, technology and language in the Western world, and its history continues to have a major influence on the world today. Latin language has been the base from which Roman languages evolved and it has been the official language of the Catholic Church and all Catholic religious ceremonies all over Europe until 1967, as well as an or the official language of countries such as Poland (9th–18th centuries). \n\nThe Roman Empire is where the idea of the \"West\" began to emerge. Due to Rome's central location at the heart of the Empire, \"West\" and \"East\" were terms used to denote provinces West and east of the capital itself. Therefore, Iberia (Portugal and Spain), Gaul (France), Mediterranean coast of North Africa (Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco) and Britannia were all part of the \"West\", while Greece, Cyprus, Anatolia, Lebanon, Syria, Israel, Palestine, Egypt and Libya were part of the \"East.\" Italy itself was considered central, until the reforms of Diocletian, with the idea of formally dividing the Empire into true two halves: Eastern and Western.\n\nIn 395, the Roman Empire formally split into a Western Roman Empire and an Eastern one, each with their own emperors, capitals, and governments, although ostensibly they still belonged to one formal Empire. The dissolution of the Western half (nominally in 476, but in truth a long process that ended by 500) left only the Eastern Roman Empire alive. For centuries, the East continued to call themselves Eastern Romans, while the West began to think in terms of Latins (those living in the old Western Empire) and Greeks (those inside the Roman remnant to the east).\n\nChristian schism\n\nIn the early 4th century, the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great established the city of Constantinople as the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. The Eastern Roman Empire included lands east of the Adriatic Sea and bordering on the Eastern Mediterranean and parts of the Black Sea. This division into Eastern and Western Roman Empires was reflected in the administration of the Roman Catholic and Eastern Greek Orthodox churches, with Rome and Constantinople debating over whether either city was the capital of Western religion.\n\nAs the Eastern (Orthodox) and Western (firstly Catholic, then Protestant as well) churches spread their influence, the line between Eastern and Western Christianity was moving. Its movement was affected by the influence of the Byzantine empire and the fluctuating power and influence of the Catholic church in Rome. Beginning in the Middle Ages religious cultural hegemony slowly waned in Europe generally. This process may have prompted the geographic line of religious division to approximately follow a line of cultural divide.\n\nThe influential American conservative political scientist, adviser and academic Samuel P. Huntington argued that this cultural division still existed during the Cold War as the approximate Western boundary of those countries that were allied with the Soviet Union. Others have fiercely criticized these views arguing they confuse the Eastern Roman Empire with Russia, especially considering the fact that the country that had the most historical roots in Byzantium, Greece, expelled communists and was allied with the West during the Cold War. Still, Russia accepted Eastern Christianity from the Byzantine Empire (by the Patriarch of Constantinople: Photios I) linking Russia very close to the Eastern Roman Empire world. Later on, in 16th century Russia created its own religious centre in Moscow. Religion survived in Russia beside severe persecution carrying values alternative to the communist ideology.\n\nUnder Charlemagne, the Franks established an empire that was recognized as the Holy Roman Empire by the Pope in Rome, offending the Roman Emperor in Constantinople. The crowning of the Emperor by the Pope led to the assumption that the highest power was the papal hierarchy, establishing, until the Protestant Reformation, the civilization of West Christendom. The Latin Rite Catholic Church of western and central Europe headed by the Pope split with the eastern, Greek-speaking Patriarchates during the Great Schism. Meanwhile, the extent of each expanded, as British Isles, Germanic peoples, Bohemia, Poland, Hungary, Scandinavia, Baltic peoples and the other non-Christian lands of the northwest were converted by the Western Church, while Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and Georgia were converted by the Eastern Church.\n\nIn this context, the Protestant reformation may be viewed as a schism within the Catholic Church. Martin Luther, in the wake of precursors, broke with the pope and with the emperor, backed by many of the German princes in an attempt to reform corruption within the church. These changes were adopted by the Scandinavian kings. Later, the commoner Jean Cauvin (John Calvin) assumed the religio-political leadership in Geneva, a former ecclesiastical city whose prior ruler had been the bishop. The English King later improvised on the Lutheran model, but subsequently many Calvinist doctrines were adopted by popular dissenters, leading to the English Civil War.\n\nBoth royalists and dissenters colonized North America, eventually resulting in an independent United States of America.\n\nColonial \"West\"\n\nThe Reformation, and consequent dissolution of West Christendom as even a theoretical unitary political body, resulted in the Thirty Years War. The war ended in the Peace of Westphalia, which enshrined the concept of the nation-state and the principle of absolute national sovereignty in international law.\n\nThese concepts of a world of nation-states, coupled with the ideologies of the Enlightenment, the coming of modernity, the Scientific Revolution, and the Industrial Revolution, produced powerful political and economic institutions that have come to influence (or been imposed upon) most nations of the world today. Historians agree that the Industrial Revolution was one of the most important events in history. \n\nThis process of influence (and imposition) began with the voyages of discovery, colonization, conquest, and exploitation of Portugal and Spain it continued with the rise of the Dutch East India Company, and the creation and expansion of the British and French colonial empires. Due to the reach of these empires, Western institutions expanded throughout the world. Even after demands for self-determination from subject peoples within Western empires were met with decolonization, these institutions persisted. One specific example was the requirement that post-colonial societies were made to form nation-states (in the Western tradition), which often created arbitrary boundaries and borders that did not necessarily represent a whole nation, people, or culture, and are often the cause of international conflicts and friction even to this day. Though the overt colonial era has passed, Western nations, as comparatively rich, well-armed, and culturally powerful states, still wield a large degree of influence throughout the world.\n\nAlthough not part of Western colonization process proper, Western culture entered Japan primarily in the so-called Meiji period (1868–1912), though earlier contact with the Portuguese, the Spaniards and the Dutch were also present in the recognition of European nations as strategically important to the Japanese. The traditional Japanese society was virtually overturned into an industrial and militarist power like Western countries such as the United Kingdom, the French Third Republic, and the German Empire.\n\nCold War context\n\nDuring the Cold War, a new definition emerged. Earth was divided into three \"worlds\". The First World, analogous in this context to what was called the West, was composed of NATO members and other countries aligned with the United States. The Second World was the Eastern bloc in the Soviet sphere of influence, including the Soviet Union (15 republics including presently independent Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) and Warsaw Pact countries like Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, East Germany (now united with Germany), Czechoslovakia (now split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia).\n\nThe Third World consisted of countries, many of which were unaligned with either, and important members included India, Yugoslavia, Finland (Finlandization) and Switzerland (Swiss Neutrality); some include the People's Republic of China, though this is disputed, since the People's Republic of China, as communist, had friendly relations—at certain times—with the Soviet bloc, and had a significant degree of importance in global geopolitics. Some Third World countries aligned themselves with either the US-led West or the Soviet-led Eastern bloc.\n\nA number of countries did not fit comfortably into this neat definition of partition, including Switzerland, Sweden, Austria, and Ireland, which chose to be neutral. Finland was under the Soviet Union's military sphere of influence (see FCMA treaty) but remained neutral, was not communist, nor was it a member of the Warsaw Pact or Comecon but a member of the EFTA since 1986, and was West of the Iron Curtain. In 1955, when Austria again became a fully independent republic, it did so under the condition that it remain neutral, but as a country to the West of the Iron Curtain, it was in the United States sphere of influence. Spain did not join the NATO until 1982, towards the end of the Cold War and after the death of the authoritarian Franco.\n\nModern definitions\n\nThe exact scope of the Western world is somewhat subjective in nature, depending on whether cultural, economic, spiritual or political criteria are employed.\n\nMany anthropologists, sociologists and historians oppose \"the West and the Rest\" in a categorical manner. The same has been done by Malthusian demographers with a sharp distinction between European and non-European family systems. Among anthropologists, this includes Durkheim, Dumont and Lévi-Strauss.\n\nAs the term \"Western world\" does not have a strict international definition, governments do not use the term in legislation of international treaties and instead rely on other definitions.\n\nCultural definition\n\nFrom a cultural and sociological approach the Western world is defined as including all cultures that are directly derived from and influenced by European cultures, i.e. Europe (at least the European Union member states, EFTA countries, European microstates); in the Americas (e.g. Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Mexico, United States of America, Uruguay, Venezuela), and in Oceania (Australia and New Zealand). Together these countries constitute Western society. \n\nIn the 20th century, Christianity declined in influence in many Western countries, mostly in the European Union where some member states have experienced falling church attendance and membership in recent years, and also elsewhere. Secularism (separating religion from politics and science) increased. However, while church attendance is in decline, in some western countries (i.e. Italy, Poland and Portugal) more than half the people state that religion is important, and most Westerners nominally identify themselves as Christians (e.g. 59% in the United Kingdom) and attend church on major occasions, such as Christmas and Easter. In the Americas, Christianity continues to play an important societal role, though in areas such as Canada, low level of religiosity is common as a result of experiencing processes of secularization similar to European ones. The official religions of the United Kingdom and some Nordic countries are forms of Christianity, even though the majority of European countries have no official religion. Despite this, Christianity, in its different forms, remains the largest faith in most Western countries. \n\nChristianity remains the dominant religion in the Western world, where 70% are Christians. A 2011 Pew Research Center survey found that 76.2% of Europeans, 73.3% in Oceania, and about 86.0% in the Americas (90% in Latin America and 77.4% in North America) described themselves as Christians. \n\nModern political definition\n\nCountries of the Western world are generally considered to share certain fundamental political ideologies, including those of liberal democracy, the rule of law, human rights and gender equality (although there are notable exceptions, especially in foreign policy). All of these are prerequisites, for example, for a state to become a full member of the European Union and therefore from modern political point of view all European Union member states from the Western, Central and Eastern Europe are considered part of the Western world.\n\nEconomic definition\n\nThough the Cold War has ended, and some members of the former Eastern Bloc make a general movement towards liberal democracy and other beliefs held in common by traditionally Western states, most of the former Soviet republics (except Baltic states) are not considered Western because of the small presence of social and political reform, as well as the significant cultural, economic and political differences to what is known today as described by the term \"The West\": United States of America and Canada, European Union and European Free Trade Association member states, Australia and New Zealand.\n\nThe term \"Western world\" is sometimes interchangeably used with the term First World or developed countries, stressing the difference between First World and the Third World or developing countries. This usage occurs despite the fact that many countries that may be culturally \"Western\" are developing countries - in fact, a significant percentage of the Americas are developing countries. It is also used despite many developed countries or regions not being Western (e.g., Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, Macao, Qatar, Israel), and therefore left out when \"Western world\" is used to denote developed countries.\n\nThe existence of \"The North\" implies the existence of \"The South\", and the socio-economic divide between North and South. The term \"the North\" has in some contexts replaced earlier usage of the term \"the West\", particularly in the critical sense, as a more robust demarcation than the terms \"West\" and \"East\". The North provides some absolute geographical indicators for the location of wealthy countries, most of which are physically situated in the Northern Hemisphere, although, as most countries are located in the northern hemisphere in general, some have considered this distinction equally unhelpful.\n\nThe 34 high-income countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which include: Australia, Canada, Iceland, Israel, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, South Korea, Switzerland, the United States and the countries of the EU (except for: Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta and Romania), are generally included in what used to be called developed world, although the OECD includes countries, namely, Chile, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Mexico, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia and Turkey, that are not yet fully industrial countries, but newly industrialised countries. Although Andorra, Cyprus, Hong Kong, Macau, Malta, Liechtenstein, Monaco, San Marino, Singapore, Taiwan and Vatican City, are not members of the OECD, they might also be regarded as developed countries, because of their high living standards, high per capita incomes, and their social, economic and political structure are quite similar to those of the high income OECD countries.\n\nOther views\n\nA series of scholars of civilization, including Arnold J. Toynbee, Alfred Kroeber and Carroll Quigley have identified and analyzed \"Western civilization\" as one of the civilizations that have historically existed and still exist today. Toynbee entered into quite an expansive mode, including as candidates those countries or cultures who became so heavily influenced by the West as to adopt these borrowings into their very self-identity; carried to its limit, this would in practice include almost everyone within the West, in one way or another. In particular, Toynbee refers to the intelligentsia formed among the educated elite of countries impacted by the European expansion of centuries past. While often pointedly nationalist, these cultural and political leaders interacted within the West to such an extent as to change both themselves and the West.\n\nThe theologian and paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin conceived of the West as the set of civilizations descended from the Nile Valley Civilization of Egypt. \n\nPalestinian-American literary critic Edward Said uses the term occident in his discussion of orientalism. According to his binary, the West, or Occident, created a romanticized vision of the East, or Orient to justify colonial and imperialist intentions. This Occident-Orient binary focuses on the Western vision of the East instead of any truths about the East. His theories are rooted in Hegel's Master-slave dialectic: The Occident would not exist without the Orient and vice versa. Further, Western writers created this irrational, feminine, weak \"Other\" to contrast with the rational, masculine, strong West because of a need to create a difference between the two that would justify imperialist ambitions, Said influenced Indian-American theorist Homi K. Bhabha.\n\nThe term the \"West\" may also be used pejoratively by certain tendencies and especially critical of the influence of the traditional West, due to the history of most of the members of the traditional West being previously involved, at one time or another, in outright imperialism and colonialism. Some of these critics also claim that the traditional West has continued to engage in what might be viewed as modern implementations of imperialism and colonialism, such as neoliberalism and globalization. (It should be noted that many Westerners who subscribe to a positive view of the traditional West are also very critical of neoliberalism and globalization, for their allegedly negative effects on both the developed and developing world.)\n\nAllegedly, definitions of the term \"Western world\" that some may consider \"ethnocentric\" others consider \"constructed\" around one or another Western culture. The British writer Rudyard Kipling wrote about this contrast: East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet, expressing his belief that somebody from the West \"can never understand the Asian cultures\" as the latter \"differ too much\" from the Western cultures. Some may view this alleged incompatibility as a precursor to Huntington's \"clash of civilizations\" theory.\n\nFrom a very different perspective, it has also been argued that the idea of the West is, in part, a non-Western invention, deployed in the non-West to shape and define non-Western pathways through or against modernity. \n\nViews on Latin America\n\nBy Huntington\n\nA controversial theory of the influential American conservative political scientist, adviser and academic Samuel P. Huntington is that he considered the possibility of Latin America being a separate civilization from the West, but also mused that it might become a third part (the first two being North America and Europe, forgetting Oceania) of the West in the future. The term Latin America in itself is a French invention to denote Pan-American countries of Iberian heritage to remember them in a way of their closest linguistic and cultural relatives in Europe. This approach would also diminish the growing influence of the Anglosphere countries in the region. Some countries, such as Brazil, which is Portuguese-speaking, self-identified (rather than latino-identified) and historically Francophile, and Cuba, which is historically Hispanophile and ruled by a Marxist–Leninist regime, do not necessarily, fit more in the group in relation to other Western nations in various factors.\n\nHuntington did not present any evidence that Latin Americans see themselves as foreign in comparison to other Western cultures, or even a probably existing Western point of view of Latin Americans as foreigners in relation to Europeans and their direct descendants (though hardly for reasons other than the mixed-race descent pervasive among them, as, just like in its ruling colonial powers, both the Renaissance and the Enlightenment were strongly felt in the region). With the Latin American racial whitening policies, reflecting a still living regional tendency to the preference of imitating or prizing not only European appearance, but also fashion, cultural taste and items, political values and even lexicon or given names (known as , \"colonized mentality\", in Portuguese), it seems more ludicrous that the reality is most often quite the reverse, i.e., that Latin Americans, especially those from Brazil and the Southern Cone, would be readily phobic about being otherized by Westerners and put in the same category as their often ridiculed or disparaged amerindian populations, or poorer neighboring nations, and thus, as a consequence, also phobic to being seen as collectively very \"different\" or \"especial\" in general.\n\nViews on who constitutes the West\n\nThe official statistics bureau of Norway, Statistics Norway, has used a definition of the \"West\" as \"EU28/EEA, United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand\", and a definition of the \"Rest of the World\" as \"Asia, Africa, Latin America, Oceania excluding Australia and New Zealand, and Europe outside EU/EEA\", for the purpose of immigration statistics.\n\nViews on Turkey\n\nBy Huntington\n\nAccording to Samuel P. Huntington, Turkey, whose political leadership has systematically tried to Westernize the predominantly Muslim country with only 3% of its territory within Europe since the 1920s, is his chief example of a \"torn country\" that is attempting to join Western civilization. The country's elite started the Westernization efforts, beginning with Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who took power as the first president of the modern Turkish nation-state in 1923, imposed western institutions and dress, removed the Arabic alphabet and embraced the Latin alphabet, joined NATO, and are seeking to join the European Union since the 1960s with very slow progress. \n\nBy others\n\nIn a 2012 interview with Zbigniew Brzezinski by the English-language Turkish daily newspaper, Today's Zaman, the former United States national security adviser also stated that Turkey is part of the West despite its religious diversity.", "Eastern Europe is the eastern part of the European continent. There is no consensus as to the precise area it refers to, partly because the term has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, cultural, and socioeconomic connotations. There are \"almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region\". A related United Nations paper adds that \"every assessment of spatial identities is essentially a social and cultural construct\". \nOne definition describes Eastern Europe as a cultural (and econo-cultural) entity: the region lying in Europe with main characteristics consisting in Byzantine, Orthodox, and some Turco-Islamic influences.This definition is fulfilled by Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Montenegro, Kosovo, Greece, Turkey, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. Another definition was created during the Cold War and used more or less synonymously with the term Eastern Bloc. A similar definition names the formerly communist European states outside the Soviet Union as Eastern Europe. Historians and social scientists increasingly view such definitions as outdated or relegating,\"The geopolitical conditions (...) are now a thing of the past, and some specialists today think that Eastern Europe has outlived its usefulness as a phrase.\" but they are still heard in everyday speech and used for statistical purposes. [http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/worldageing19502050/pdf/96annexii.pdf Population Division, DESA, United Nations: World Population Ageing 1950-2050]\n\nDefinitions\n\nSeveral definitions of Eastern Europe exist today, but they often lack precision or are extremely general. These definitions vary both across cultures and among experts, even political scientists, recently becoming more and more imprecise. \n\nGeographical\n\nThe Ural Mountains, Ural River, and the Caucasus Mountains are the geographical land border of the eastern edge of Europe. In the west, however, the cultural and religious boundaries of \"Eastern Europe\" are subject to considerable overlap and, most importantly, have undergone historical fluctuations, which make a precise definition of the western boundaries of Eastern Europe and the geographical midpoint of Europe somewhat difficult.\n\nInternational organisations\n\nUN Statistics Division\n\n* The United Nations Statistics Division developed a selection of geographical regions and groupings of countries and areas, which are or may be used in compilation of statistics. In this collection, the following ten countries were classified as Eastern Europe: Belarus, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, and Ukraine. The assignment of countries or areas to specific groupings is for statistical convenience and does not imply any assumption regarding political or other affiliation of countries or territories by the United Nations. The United Nations' definition encompasses most of the states which were once under the Soviet Union's realm of influence and were part of the Warsaw Pact.\n* Other agencies of the United Nations (like UNAIDS, UNHCR, ILO, or UNICEF ) divide Europe into different regions and variously assign various states to those regions.\n\nEuropean Union\n\nEurovoc, a multilingual thesaurus maintained by the Publications Office of the European Union, provides entries for \"23 EU languages\" (Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish and Swedish) plus Serbian. Of these, those in italics are classified as \"Eastern Europe\" in this source. Other official web-pages of the European Union classify some of the above-mentioned countries as strictly Central European (Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Slovenia). \n\nCentral Intelligence Agency\n\nCIA defines Eastern Europe as Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia (transcontinental), Turkey (transcontinental) and Ukraine.\n\nPolitical, military and economic\n\nHistorical\n\nOne view of the present boundaries of Eastern Europe came into being during the final stages of World War II. The area eventually came to encompass all the European countries which were under Soviet influence. Countries which had communist governments in the postwar era (1945-1991), and neutral countries were classified by the nature of their political regimes.\n\nThe Cold War increased the number of reasons for the division of Europe into two parts along the borders of NATO and Warsaw Pact states. (See: the Cold War section).\n\nThe economic organisation connecting the countries was the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance.\n\nContemporary\n\nIn recent years, after the fall of the USSR, a few political and economic organisations emerged in the region of Eastern Europe, including the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), and more recently the Eurasian Economic Union.\n\nFile:CIS (orthographic projection).svg|Commonwealth of Independent States\nFile:CISFTA (orthographic projection).svg|Commonwealth of Independent States Free Trade Area\nFile:Eurasian Economic Union (orthographic projection) - Crimea disputed.svg|Eurasian Economic Union\nFile:Union State (Crimea disputed).svg|Union State of Russia and Belarus\n\nFile:Baltic states.svg|Baltic Assembly\nFile:Europe location GUAM.png|\n\nCultural\n\nCultural view excludes from the definition of Eastern Europe states historically and culturally different, constituting part of the so-called Western world. This could potentially refer to various formerly communist countries of Central Europe, the Baltics, and the Balkans which have different political, religious, cultural, and economic histories from their eastern neighbors (e.g., Russia and Ukraine). (See: Classical antiquity and medieval origins section).\n\nFile:Grossgliederung Europas-en.svg|Cultural map of Europe by Ständiger Ausschuss für geographische Namen.\nFile:Cyrillic alphabet world distribution.svg|Distribution of the Cyrillic script worldwide.\nFile:Slavic europe.svg|\nFile:RussianLanguageMap2.png|Countries and regions where the Russian language is an official language or widely spoken.\n\nReligious\n\nThe East–West Schism is the break of communion and theology between what are now the Eastern (Orthodox) and Western (Roman Catholic, as well as from the 16h century also Protestant) churches which began in the 11th century and lasts until this very day. It divided Christianity in Europe, and consequently the world, into Western Christianity and Eastern Christianity.\n\nFile:Expansion of christianity.jpg|Division between the Eastern and Western Churches \nFile:Great Schism 1054 with former borders.png|Religious division in 1054 \nFile:Eastern Orthodoxy by country.png|Countries by percentage of Eastern Orthodox Christians (Eastern Church).\nFile:Distribution of Catholics.png|Countries by percentage of Catholics(Western Churches).\nFile:Countries by percentage of Protestants.svg|Countries by percentage of Protestants (Western Churches).\n\nContemporary developments\n\nThe fall of the Iron Curtain brought the end of the East–West division in Europe, but this geopolitical concept is sometimes still used for quick reference by the media. \n\nBaltic states\n\nMost sources place the Baltic states in Northern Europe whereas the CIA World Factbook places the region in Eastern Europe.\n* \n* \n* \n\nTranscaucasia\n\nThe Caucasus states are included in definitions of Eastern Europe or histories of Eastern Europe. They are located on or near the border of Europe and Asia. They participate in European Union's Eastern Partnership Program and are members of the Council of Europe which specifies that all three are geographically in Asia but have political and cultural connections to Turkey and Europe; Georgia has sought membership in NATO and EU. The World Factbook and National Geographic Society atlases and the United Nations Statistics Division have always listed and or shown the three states as in Asia. As with the Baltic states, the Transcaucasian republics differ somewhat, with Christian Georgia and Armenia oriented more toward Europe, and Shiite Muslim Azerbaijan toward Asia.\n* \n* \n* \n\nOther former Soviet states\n\nSeveral other former Soviet republics may be considered part of Eastern Europe\n* is a transcontinental country where the Western part is in Eastern Europe and the rest is in Asia.\n* is a transcontinental country in Asia, with a relatively small section in Europe.\n* \n* \n* \n\nCentral Europe\n\nThe term \"Central Europe\" is often used by historians to designate former Holy Roman Empire and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, including modern-day Belarus and Ukraine, and thus overlapping with \"Eastern Europe.\" The following countries are labeled Eastern European by some commentators and as Central European by others.Wallace, W. The Transformation of Western Europe London, Pinter, 1990Huntington, Samuel The Clash of Civilizations Simon & Schuster, 1996 \n* \n* \n* \n* \n* \n* \n* (most often placed in Central Europe but sometimes in Southeastern Europe) \n\nSoutheastern Europe\n\nMost Southeastern European states did not belong to the Eastern Bloc (save Bulgaria, Romania, and for a short time, Albania) although some of them were represented in the Cominform. Only some of them can be included in the classical former political definition of Eastern Europe. Some can be considered part of Southern Europe. However, most can be characterized as belonging to South-eastern Europe, but some of them may also be included in Central Europe or Eastern Europe. \n* belongs to Southeastern Europe.\n* \n* is in the central part of the Balkans; geographically belongs to Southern/Southeastern Europe and sometimes included in the North-Eastern Mediterranean, but can also be included in Eastern Europe in the Cold War.\n* is geographically situated in the eastern Mediterranean, off the coast of west Asian mainland, however due to its political, cultural, and historical ties to Europe, it is often regarded as part of Southern, and Southeastern Europe.\n* is a rather unusual case and may be included, variously, in Western, Southeastern or Southern Europe. \n* belongs to Southeastern Europe.\n* belongs to Southeastern Europe.\n* can be included in Eastern Europe in the Cold War context, but is commonly referred to as belonging to Southeastern Europe or Central Europe. \n* is included in notions of Southeastern, Southern and Central Europe\n* lies partially in Southeastern Europe: only the region known as East Thrace, which constitutes 3% of the country's total land mass, lies west of the Dardanelles, the Sea of Marmara, and the Bosphorus.\n\nDisputed states:\n* belongs to Southeastern Europe.\n* \n\nHistory\n\nClassical antiquity and medieval origins\n\nAncient kingdoms of the region included Orontid Armenia Albania, Colchis and Iberia. These kingdoms were either from the start, or later on incorporated into various Iranian empires, including the Achaemenid Persian, Parthian, and Sassanid Persian Empires. Parts of the Balkans and more northern areas were ruled by the Achaemenid Persians as well, including Thrace, Paeonia, Macedon, and most of the Black Sea coastal regions of Romania, Ukraine, and Russia. Owing to the rivalry between Parthian Iran and Rome, and later Byzantium and the Sassanid Persians, the former would invade the region several times, although it was never able to hold the region, unlike the Sassanids who ruled over most of the Caucasus during their entire rule. \n\nThe earliest known distinctions between east and west in Europe originate in the history of the Roman Republic. As the Roman domain expanded, a cultural and linguistic division appeared between the mainly Greek-speaking eastern provinces which had formed the highly urbanized Hellenistic civilization. In contrast the western territories largely adopted the Latin language. This cultural and linguistic division was eventually reinforced by the later political east–west division of the Roman Empire.\nThe division between these two spheres was enhanced during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages by a number of events. The Western Roman Empire collapsed starting the Early Middle Ages. By contrast, the Eastern Roman Empire, mostly known as the Byzantine Empire, managed to survive and even to thrive for another 1,000 years. The rise of the Frankish Empire in the west, and in particular the Great Schism that formally divided Eastern and Western Christianity, enhanced the cultural and religious distinctiveness between Eastern and Western Europe. Much of Eastern Europe was invaded and occupied by the Mongols.\n\nThe conquest of the Byzantine Empire, center of the Eastern Orthodox Church, by the Ottoman Empire in the 15th century, and the gradual fragmentation of the Holy Roman Empire (which had replaced the Frankish empire) led to a change of the importance of Roman Catholic/Protestant vs. Eastern Orthodox concept in Europe. Armour points out that the Cyrillic alphabet use is not a strict determinant for Eastern Europe, where from Croatia to Poland and everywhere in between, the Latin alphabet is used. Greece's status as the cradle of Western civilization and an integral part of the Western world in the political, cultural and economic spheres has led to it being nearly always classified as belonging not to Eastern, but to Southern and/or Western Europe. \n\nInterwar years\n\nA major result of the First World War was the breakup of the Russian, Austro-Hungarian, and Ottoman empires, as well as partial losses to the German Empire. A surge of ethnic nationalism created a series of new states in Eastern Europe, validated by the Versailles Treaty of 1919. Poland was reconstituted after the partitions of the 1790s had divided it between Germany, Austria, and Russia. New countries included Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine (which was \nsoon absorbed by the Soviet Union), Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia. Austria and Hungary had much reduced boundaries. Romania, Bulgaria and Albania likewise were independent. All the countries were heavily rural, with little industry and only a few urban centers. Nationalism was the dominant force but most of the countries had ethnic or religious minorities who felt threatened by majority elements. Nearly all became democratic in the 1920s, but all of them (except Czechoslovakia and Finland) gave up democracy during the depression years of the 1930s, in favor of autocratic or strong-man or single party states. The new states were unable to form stable military alliances, and one by one were too weak to stand up against Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union, which took them over between 1938 and 1945.\n\nWorld War II and the onset of the Cold War\n\nRussia, defeated in the First World War, lost territory as the Baltics and Poland made good their independence. The region was the main battlefield in the Second World War (1939–45), with German and Soviet armies sweeping back and forth, with millions of Jews killed by the Nazis, and millions of others killed by disease, starvation, and military action, or executed after being deemed as politically dangerous. During the final stages of WWII the future of Eastern Europe was decided by the overwhelming power of the Soviet Red Army, as it swept the Germans aside. It did not reach Yugoslavia and Albania however. Finland was free but forced to be neutral in the upcoming Cold War. The region fell to Soviet control and Communist governments were imposed. Yugoslavia and Albania had their own Communist regimes. The Eastern Bloc with the onset of the Cold War in 1947 was mostly behind the Western European countries in economic rebuilding and progress.\nWinston Churchill, in his famous \"Sinews of Peace\" address of March 5, 1946 at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, stressed the geopolitical impact of the \"iron curtain\":\n \n\nEastern Bloc during the Cold War to 1989\n\nThe Soviet secret police, the NKVD, working in collaboration with local communists, created secret police forces using leadership trained in Moscow. As soon as the Red Army had expelled the Germans, this new secret police arrived to arrest political enemies according to prepared lists. The national Communists then took power in a normally gradualist manner, backed by the Soviets in many, but not all, cases. They took control of the Interior Ministries, which controlled the local police. They confiscated and redistributed farmland. Next the Soviets and their agents took control of the mass media, especially radio, as well as the education system. Third the communists seized control of or replaced the organizations of civil society, such as church groups, sports, youth groups, trade unions, farmers organizations, and civic organizations. Finally they engaged in large scale ethnic cleansing, moving ethnic minorities far away, often with high loss of life. After a year or two, the communists took control of private businesses and monitored the media and churches. For a while, cooperative non-Communist parties were tolerated. The communists had a natural reservoir of popularity in that they had destroyed Hitler and the Nazi invaders. Their goal was to guarantee long-term working-class solidarity. \nEastern Europe after 1945 usually meant all the European countries liberated and then occupied by the Soviet army. It included the German Democratic Republic (also known as East Germany), formed by the Soviet occupation zone of Germany. All the countries in Eastern Europe adopted communist modes of control. These countries were officially independent from the Soviet Union, but the practical extent of this independence – except in Yugoslavia, Albania, and to some extent Romania – was quite limited.\nUnder pressure from Stalin these nations rejected grants from the American Marshall plan. Instead they participated in the Molotov Plan which later evolved into the Comecon (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance). When NATO was created in 1949, most countries of Eastern Europe became members of the opposing Warsaw Pact, forming a geopolitical concept that became known as the Eastern Bloc.\n\n* First and foremost was the Soviet Union (which included the modern-day territories of Russia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova). Other countries dominated by the Soviet Union were the German Democratic Republic, People's Republic of Poland, Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, People's Republic of Hungary, People's Republic of Bulgaria, and Socialist Republic of Romania.\n* The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY; formed after WWII and before its later dismemberment) was not a member of the Warsaw Pact. It was a founding member of the Non-Aligned Movement, an organization created in an attempt to avoid being assigned to either the NATO or Warsaw Pact blocs. The movement was demonstratively independent from both the Soviet Union and the Western bloc for most of the Cold War period, allowing Yugoslavia and its other members to act as a business and political mediator between the blocs.\n* The Socialist People's Republic of Albania broke with the Soviet Union in the early 1960s as a result of the Sino-Soviet split, aligning itself instead with China. Albania formally left the Warsaw pact in September 1968 after the suppression of the Prague spring. When China established diplomatic relations with the United States in 1978, Albania also broke away from China. Albania and especially Yugoslavia were not unanimously appended to the Eastern Bloc, as they were neutral for a large part of the Cold War period.\n\nSince 1989\n\nWith the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, the political landscape of the Eastern Bloc, and indeed the world, changed. In the German reunification, the Federal Republic of Germany peacefully absorbed the German Democratic Republic in 1990. In 1991, COMECON, the Warsaw Pact, and the Soviet Union were dissolved.\nMany European nations which had been part of the Soviet Union regained their independence (Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine, as well as the Baltic States of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia).\nCzechoslovakia peacefully separated into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. Many countries of this region joined the European Union, namely Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia.", "The Cold War was a state of political and military tension after World War II between powers in the Western Bloc (the United States, its NATO allies and others) and powers in the Eastern Bloc (the Soviet Union and its satellite states). Historians do not fully agree on the dates, but a common timeframe is the period between 1947, the year the Truman Doctrine (a U.S. policy pledging to aid nations threatened by Soviet expansionism) was announced, and 1991, the year the Soviet Union collapsed.\n\nThe term \"cold\" is used because there was no large-scale fighting directly between the two sides, although there were major regional wars, known as proxy wars, supported by the two sides. The Cold War split the temporary wartime alliance against Nazi Germany, leaving the Soviet Union and the United States as two superpowers with profound economic and political differences: the former being a single-party Marxist–Leninist empire ruled by a dictatorship operating a socialist economy and state-controlled press and owning exclusively the right to establish and govern communities, and the latter being a democratic republic with a capitalist economy state with free elections and press, the freedom of religion, which also granted freedom of expression and freedom of association to its citizens. A self-proclaimed neutral bloc arose with the Non-Aligned Movement founded by Egypt, India, Indonesia and Yugoslavia; this faction rejected association with either the American-led West or the Soviet-controlled East. The two superpowers never engaged directly in full-scale armed combat, but they were heavily armed in preparation for a possible all-out nuclear world war. Each side had a nuclear deterrent that deterred an attack by the other side, on the basis that such an attack would lead to total destruction of the attacker: the doctrine of mutually assured destruction (MAD). Aside from the development of the two sides' nuclear arsenals, and deployment of conventional military forces, the struggle for dominance was expressed via proxy wars around the globe, psychological warfare, massive propaganda campaigns and espionage, rivalry at sports events, and technological competitions such as the Space Race.\n\nThe first phase of the Cold War began in the first two years after the end of the Second World War in 1945. The USSR consolidated its control over the states of the Eastern Bloc, while the United States began a strategy of global containment to challenge Soviet power, extending military and financial aid to the countries of Western Europe (for example, supporting the anti-communist side in the Greek Civil War) and creating the NATO alliance. The Berlin Blockade (1948–49) was the first major crisis of the Cold War. With the victory of the communist side in the Chinese Civil War and the outbreak of the Korean War (1950–53), the conflict expanded. The USSR and USA competed for influence in Latin America, and the decolonizing states of Africa and Asia. Meanwhile, the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 was stopped by the Soviets. The expansion and escalation sparked more crises, such as the Suez Crisis (1956), the Berlin Crisis of 1961, and the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. Following the Cuban Missile Crisis, a new phase began that saw the Sino-Soviet split complicate relations within the communist sphere, while US allies, particularly France, demonstrated greater independence of action. The USSR crushed the 1968 Prague Spring liberalization program in Czechoslovakia, and the Vietnam War (1955–75) ended with a defeat of the US-backed Republic of South Vietnam, prompting further adjustments.\n\nBy the 1970s, both sides had become interested in accommodations to create a more stable and predictable international system, inaugurating a period of détente that saw Strategic Arms Limitation Talks and the US opening relations with the People's Republic of China as a strategic counterweight to the Soviet Union. Détente collapsed at the end of the decade with the Soviet war in Afghanistan beginning in 1979. The early 1980s were another period of elevated tension, with the Soviet downing of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 (1983), and the \"Able Archer\" NATO military exercises (1983). The United States increased diplomatic, military, and economic pressures on the Soviet Union, at a time when the communist state was already suffering from economic stagnation. In the mid-1980s, the new Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev introduced the liberalizing reforms of perestroika (\"reorganization\", 1987) and glasnost (\"openness\", c. 1985) and ended Soviet involvement in Afghanistan. Pressures for national independence grew stronger in Eastern Europe, especially Poland. Gorbachev meanwhile refused to use Soviet troops to bolster the faltering Warsaw Pact regimes as had occurred in the past. The result in 1989 was a wave of revolutions that peacefully (with the exception of the Romanian Revolution) overthrew all of the communist regimes of Central and Eastern Europe. The Communist Party of the Soviet Union itself lost control and was banned following an abortive coup attempt in August 1991. This in turn led to the formal dissolution of the USSR in December 1991 and the collapse of communist regimes in other countries such as Mongolia, Cambodia and South Yemen. The United States remained as the world's only superpower.\n\nThe Cold War and its events have left a significant legacy. It is often referred to in popular culture, especially in media featuring themes of espionage (e.g. the internationally successful James Bond movie franchise) and the threat of nuclear warfare.\n\nOrigins of the term\n\nAt the end of World War II, English writer George Orwell used cold war, as a general term, in his essay \"You and the Atomic Bomb\", published 19 October 1945 in the British newspaper Tribune. Contemplating a world living in the shadow of the threat of nuclear warfare, Orwell looked at James Burnham's predictions of a polarized world, writing:\n\nLooking at the world as a whole, the drift for many decades has been not towards anarchy but towards the reimposition of slavery....James Burnham's theory has been much discussed, but few people have yet considered its ideological implications—that is, the kind of world-view, the kind of beliefs, and the social structure that would probably prevail in a state which was at once unconquerable and in a permanent state of \"cold war\" with its neighbours. \n\nIn The Observer of 10 March 1946, Orwell wrote, \"after the Moscow conference last December, Russia began to make a 'cold war' on Britain and the British Empire.\" \n\nThe first use of the term to describe the specific post-war geopolitical confrontation between the USSR and the United States came in a speech by Bernard Baruch, an influential advisor to Democratic presidents, on 16 April 1947. The speech, written by journalist Herbert Bayard Swope, proclaimed, \"Let us not be deceived: we are today in the midst of a cold war.\" Newspaper columnist Walter Lippmann gave the term wide currency with his book The Cold War; when asked in 1947 about the source of the term, Lippmann traced it to a French term from the 1930s, la guerre froide. \n\nBackground\n\nThere is disagreement among historians regarding the starting point of the Cold War. While most historians trace its origins to the period immediately following World War II, others argue that it began with the October Revolution in Russia in 1917 when the Bolsheviks took power. Vladimir Lenin stated that the new Soviet Union was surrounded by a \"hostile capitalist encirclement\", and he viewed diplomacy as a weapon to keep Soviet enemies divided, beginning with the establishment of the Comintern, which called for revolutionary upheavals abroad. His successor Joseph Stalin viewed the USSR as a \"socialist island\", stating that it must see that \"the present capitalist encirclement is replaced by a socialist encirclement.\" \n\nVarious events before the Second World War demonstrated the mutual distrust and suspicion between the Western powers and the Soviet Union, apart from the general philosophical challenge communism posed towards capitalism. There was Western support of the anti-Bolshevik White movement in the Russian Civil War, the Soviet funding of the 1926 United Kingdom general strike causing Britain to break relations with the Soviet Union, Stalin's 1927 declaration of peaceful coexistence with capitalist countries \"receding into the past,\" conspiratorial allegations during the 1928 Shakhty show trial of a planned British- and French-led coup d'état, the American refusal to recognize the Soviet Union until 1933 and the Stalinist Moscow Trials of the Great Purge, with allegations of British, French, Japanese and Nazi German espionage. However, both the US and USSR were generally isolationist between the two world wars. \n\nThe Soviet Union initially signed a non-aggression pact with Germany. But after the German Army invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941 and the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in December 1941, the Soviet Union and the Allied powers formed an alliance of convenience. Britain signed a formal alliance and the United States made an informal agreement. In wartime, the United States supplied both Britain and the Soviets through its Lend-Lease Program. However, Stalin remained highly suspicious and believed that the British and the Americans had conspired to ensure the Soviets bore the brunt of the fighting against Nazi Germany. According to this view, the Western Allies had deliberately delayed opening a second anti-German front in order to step in at the last moment and shape the peace settlement. Thus, Soviet perceptions of the West left a strong undercurrent of tension and hostility between the Allied powers. \n\nEnd of World War II (1945–47)\n\nWartime conferences regarding post-war Europe\n\nThe Allies disagreed about how the European map should look, and how borders would be drawn, following the war. Each side held dissimilar ideas regarding the establishment and maintenance of post-war security. The western Allies desired a security system in which democratic governments were established as widely as possible, permitting countries to peacefully resolve differences through international organizations. \n\nThe Soviet Union sought to dominate the internal affairs of countries that bordered it. During the war, Stalin had created special training centers for communists from different countries so that they could set up secret police forces loyal to Moscow as soon as the Red Army took control. Soviet agents took control of the media, especially radio; they quickly harassed and then banned all independent civic institutions, from youth groups to schools, churches and rival political parties. Stalin also sought continued peace with Britain and the United States, hoping to focus on internal reconstruction and economic growth. \n\nThe Western Allies were divided in their vision of the new post-war world. Roosevelt's goals – military victory in both Europe and Asia, the achievement of global American economic supremacy over the British Empire, and the creation of a world peace organization – were more global than Churchill's, which were mainly centered on securing control over the Mediterranean, ensuring the survival of the British Empire, and the independence of Central and Eastern European countries as a buffer between the Soviets and the United Kingdom.\n\nIn the American view, Stalin seemed a potential ally in accomplishing their goals, whereas in the British approach Stalin appeared as the greatest threat to the fulfillment of their agenda. With the Soviets already occupying most of Central and Eastern Europe, Stalin was at an advantage and the two western leaders vied for his favors. The differences between Roosevelt and Churchill led to several separate deals with the Soviets. In October 1944, Churchill traveled to Moscow and agreed to divide the Balkans into respective spheres of influence, and at Yalta Roosevelt signed a separate deal with Stalin in regard of Asia and refused to support Churchill on the issues of Poland and the Reparations.\n\nFurther Allied negotiations concerning the post-war balance took place at the Yalta Conference in February 1945, albeit this conference also failed to reach a firm consensus on the framework for a post-war settlement in Europe. In April 1945, President Roosevelt died and was succeeded by Harry S. Truman, who distrusted Stalin and turned for advice to an elite group of foreign policy intellectuals. Both Churchill and Truman opposed, among other things, the Soviets' decision to prop up the Lublin government, the Soviet-controlled rival to the Polish government-in-exile in London, whose relations with the Soviets had been severed. \n\nFollowing the Allies' May 1945 victory, the Soviets effectively occupied Central and Eastern Europe, while strong US and Western allied forces remained in Western Europe. In Allied-occupied Germany, the Soviet Union, United States, Britain and France established zones of occupation and a loose framework for parceled four-power control. \n\nThe 1945 Allied conference in San Francisco established the multi-national United Nations (UN) for the maintenance of world peace, but the enforcement capacity of its Security Council was effectively paralyzed by individual members' ability to use veto power. Accordingly, the UN was essentially converted into an inactive forum for exchanging polemical rhetoric, and the Soviets regarded it almost exclusively as a propaganda tribune. \n\nPotsdam Conference and defeat of Japan\n\nAt the Potsdam Conference, which started in late July after Germany's surrender, serious differences emerged over the future development of Germany and the rest of Central and Eastern Europe. Moreover, the participants' mounting antipathy and bellicose language served to confirm their suspicions about each other's hostile intentions and entrench their positions. At this conference Truman informed Stalin that the United States possessed a powerful new weapon.\n\nStalin was aware that the Americans were working on the atomic bomb and, given that the Soviets' own rival program was in place, he reacted to the news calmly. The Soviet leader said he was pleased by the news and expressed the hope that the weapon would be used against Japan. One week after the end of the Potsdam Conference, the US bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Shortly after the attacks, Stalin protested to US officials when Truman offered the Soviets little real influence in occupied Japan. \n\nBeginnings of the Eastern Bloc\n\nDuring the opening stages of World War II, the Soviet Union laid the foundation for the Eastern Bloc by invading and then annexing several countries as Soviet Socialist Republics, by agreement with Nazi Germany in the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. These included eastern Poland (incorporated into two different SSRs), Latvia (which became the Latvian SSR), Estonia (which became the Estonian SSR), Lithuania (which became the Lithuanian SSR), part of eastern Finland (which became the Karelo-Finnish SSR) and eastern Romania (which became the Moldavian SSR). \n\nThe Central and Eastern European territories liberated from the Nazis and occupied by the Soviet armed forces were added to the Eastern Bloc by converting them into satellite states, such as East Germany, the People's Republic of Poland, the People's Republic of Bulgaria, the People's Republic of Hungary, the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, the People's Republic of Romania and the People's Republic of Albania. \n\nThe Soviet-style regimes that arose in the Bloc not only reproduced Soviet command economies, but also adopted the brutal methods employed by Joseph Stalin and Soviet secret police to suppress real and potential opposition. In Asia, the Red Army had overrun Manchuria in the last month of the war, and went on to occupy the large swathe of Korean territory located north of the 38th parallel. \n\nAs part of consolidating Stalin's control over the Eastern Bloc, the NKVD, led by Lavrentiy Beriya, supervised the establishment of Soviet-style secret police systems in the Bloc that were supposed to crush anti-communist resistance. When the slightest stirrings of independence emerged in the Bloc, Stalin's strategy matched that of dealing with domestic pre-war rivals: they were removed from power, put on trial, imprisoned, and in several instances, executed. \n\nBritish Prime Minister Winston Churchill was concerned that, given the enormous size of Soviet forces deployed in Europe at the end of the war, and the perception that Soviet leader Joseph Stalin was unreliable, there existed a Soviet threat to Western Europe. \n\nPreparing for a \"new war\"\n\nIn February 1946, George F. Kennan's \"Long Telegram\" from Moscow helped to articulate the US government's increasingly hard line against the Soviets, and became the basis for US strategy toward the Soviet Union for the duration of the Cold War. That September, the Soviet side produced the Novikov telegram, sent by the Soviet ambassador to the US but commissioned and \"co-authored\" by Vyacheslav Molotov; it portrayed the US as being in the grip of monopoly capitalists who were building up military capability \"to prepare the conditions for winning world supremacy in a new war\". \n\nOn 6 September 1946, James F. Byrnes delivered a speech in Germany repudiating the Morgenthau Plan (a proposal to partition and de-industrialize post-war Germany) and warning the Soviets that the US intended to maintain a military presence in Europe indefinitely. As Byrnes admitted a month later, \"The nub of our program was to win the German people ... it was a battle between us and Russia over minds ...\" \n\nA few weeks after the release of this \"Long Telegram\", former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill delivered his famous \"Iron Curtain\" speech in Fulton, Missouri. The speech called for an Anglo-American alliance against the Soviets, whom he accused of establishing an \"iron curtain\" from \"Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic\". \n\nBeginnings of the Cold War (1947–53)\n\nCominform and the Tito–Stalin split\n\nIn September 1947, the Soviets created Cominform, the purpose of which was to enforce orthodoxy within the international communist movement and tighten political control over Soviet satellites through coordination of communist parties in the Eastern Bloc. Cominform faced an embarrassing setback the following June, when the Tito–Stalin split obliged its members to expel Yugoslavia, which remained communist but adopted a non-aligned position. \n\nContainment and the Truman Doctrine\n\nBy 1947, US president Harry S. Truman's advisers urged him to take immediate steps to counter the Soviet Union's influence, citing Stalin's efforts (amid post-war confusion and collapse) to undermine the US by encouraging rivalries among capitalists that could precipitate another war. In February 1947, the British government announced that it could no longer afford to finance the Greek monarchical military regime in its civil war against communist-led insurgents (see Greek Civil War).\n\nThe American government's response to this announcement was the adoption of containment, the goal of which was to stop the spread of communism. Truman delivered a speech that called for the allocation of $400 million to intervene in the war and unveiled the Truman Doctrine, which framed the conflict as a contest between free peoples and totalitarian regimes. Even though the insurgents were helped by Josip Broz Tito's Yugoslavia, US policymakers accused the Soviet Union of conspiring against the Greek royalists in an effort to expand Soviet influence. \n\nEnunciation of the Truman Doctrine marked the beginning of a US bipartisan defense and foreign policy consensus between Republicans and Democrats focused on containment and deterrence that weakened during and after the Vietnam War, but ultimately persisted thereafter. Moderate and conservative parties in Europe, as well as social democrats, gave virtually unconditional support to the Western alliance, while European and American communists, paid by the KGB and involved in its intelligence operations, adhered to Moscow's line, although dissent began to appear after 1956. Other critiques of consensus politics came from anti-Vietnam War activists, the CND and the nuclear freeze movement. \n\nMarshall Plan and Czechoslovak coup d'état\n\nIn early 1947, Britain, France and the United States unsuccessfully attempted to reach an agreement with the Soviet Union for a plan envisioning an economically self-sufficient Germany, including a detailed accounting of the industrial plants, goods and infrastructure already removed by the Soviets. In June 1947, in accordance with the Truman Doctrine, the United States enacted the Marshall Plan, a pledge of economic assistance for all European countries willing to participate, including the Soviet Union.\n\nThe plan's aim was to rebuild the democratic and economic systems of Europe and to counter perceived threats to Europe's balance of power, such as communist parties seizing control through revolutions or elections. The plan also stated that European prosperity was contingent upon German economic recovery. One month later, Truman signed the National Security Act of 1947, creating a unified Department of Defense, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and the National Security Council (NSC). These would become the main bureaucracies for US policy in the Cold War.\n\nStalin believed that economic integration with the West would allow Eastern Bloc countries to escape Soviet control, and that the US was trying to buy a pro-US re-alignment of Europe. Stalin therefore prevented Eastern Bloc nations from receiving Marshall Plan aid. The Soviet Union's alternative to the Marshall plan, which was purported to involve Soviet subsidies and trade with central and eastern Europe, became known as the Molotov Plan (later institutionalized in January 1949 as the Comecon). Stalin was also fearful of a reconstituted Germany; his vision of a post-war Germany did not include the ability to rearm or pose any kind of threat to the Soviet Union. \n\nIn early 1948, following reports of strengthening \"reactionary elements\", Soviet operatives executed a coup d'état in Czechoslovakia, the only Eastern Bloc state that the Soviets had permitted to retain democratic structures. The public brutality of the coup shocked Western powers more than any event up to that point, set in a motion a brief scare that war would occur and swept away the last vestiges of opposition to the Marshall Plan in the United States Congress. \n\nThe twin policies of the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan led to billions in economic and military aid for Western Europe, Greece, and Turkey. With US assistance, the Greek military won its civil war. Under the leadership of Alcide De Gasperi the Italian Christian Democrats defeated the powerful Communist-Socialist alliance in the elections of 1948. At the same time there was increased intelligence and espionage activity, Eastern Bloc defections and diplomatic expulsions. \n\nBerlin Blockade and airlift\n\nThe United States and Britain merged their western German occupation zones into \"Bizonia\" (1 January 1947, later \"Trizonia\" with the addition of France's zone, April 1949). As part of the economic rebuilding of Germany, in early 1948, representatives of a number of Western European governments and the United States announced an agreement for a merger of western German areas into a federal governmental system. In addition, in accordance with the Marshall Plan, they began to re-industrialize and rebuild the German economy, including the introduction of a new Deutsche Mark currency to replace the old Reichsmark currency that the Soviets had debased. \n\nShortly thereafter, Stalin instituted the Berlin Blockade (24 June 1948 – 12 May 1949), one of the first major crises of the Cold War, preventing food, materials and supplies from arriving in West Berlin. The United States, Britain, France, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and several other countries began the massive \"Berlin airlift\", supplying West Berlin with food and other provisions. \n\nThe Soviets mounted a public relations campaign against the policy change. Once again the East Berlin communists attempted to disrupt the Berlin municipal elections (as they had done in the 1946 elections), which were held on 5 December 1948 and produced a turnout of 86.3% and an overwhelming victory for the non-communist parties. The results effectively divided the city into East and West versions of its former self. 300,000 Berliners demonstrated and urged the international airlift to continue, and US Air Force pilot Gail Halvorsen created \"Operation Vittles\", which supplied candy to German children. In May 1949, Stalin backed down and lifted the blockade. \n\nIn 1952, Stalin repeatedly proposed a plan to unify East and West Germany under a single government chosen in elections supervised by the United Nations if the new Germany were to stay out of Western military alliances, but this proposal was turned down by the Western powers. Some sources dispute the sincerity of the proposal. \n\nNATO beginnings and Radio Free Europe\n\nBritain, France, the United States, Canada and eight other western European countries signed the North Atlantic Treaty of April 1949, establishing the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). That August, the first Soviet atomic device was detonated in Semipalatinsk, Kazakh SSR. Following Soviet refusals to participate in a German rebuilding effort set forth by western European countries in 1948, the US, Britain and France spearheaded the establishment of West Germany from the three Western zones of occupation in April 1949. The Soviet Union proclaimed its zone of occupation in Germany the German Democratic Republic that October.\n\nMedia in the Eastern Bloc was an organ of the state, completely reliant on and subservient to the communist party, with radio and television organizations being state-owned, while print media was usually owned by political organizations, mostly by the local communist party. Soviet propaganda used Marxist philosophy to attack capitalism, claiming labor exploitation and war-mongering imperialism were inherent in the system. \n\nAlong with the broadcasts of the British Broadcasting Corporation and the Voice of America to Central and Eastern Europe, a major propaganda effort begun in 1949 was Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, dedicated to bringing about the peaceful demise of the communist system in the Eastern Bloc. Radio Free Europe attempted to achieve these goals by serving as a surrogate home radio station, an alternative to the controlled and party-dominated domestic press. Radio Free Europe was a product of some of the most prominent architects of America's early Cold War strategy, especially those who believed that the Cold War would eventually be fought by political rather than military means, such as George F. Kennan. \n\nAmerican policymakers, including Kennan and John Foster Dulles, acknowledged that the Cold War was in its essence a war of ideas. The United States, acting through the CIA, funded a long list of projects to counter the communist appeal among intellectuals in Europe and the developing world. The CIA also covertly sponsored a domestic propaganda campaign called Crusade for Freedom. \n\nIn the early 1950s, the US worked for the rearmament of West Germany and, in 1955, secured its full membership of NATO. In May 1953, Beria, by then in a government post, had made an unsuccessful proposal to allow the reunification of a neutral Germany to prevent West Germany's incorporation into NATO. \n\nChinese Civil War and SEATO\n\nIn 1949, Mao Zedong's People's Liberation Army defeated Chiang Kai-shek's United States-backed Kuomintang (KMT) Nationalist Government in China, and the Soviet Union promptly created an alliance with the newly formed People's Republic of China. According to Norwegian historian Odd Arne Westad, the communists won the Civil War because they made fewer military mistakes than Chiang Kai-Shek, and because in his search for a powerful centralized government, Chiang antagonized too many interest groups in China. Moreover, his party was weakened in the war against Japan. Meanwhile, the communists told different groups, such as peasants, exactly what they wanted to hear, and cloaked themselves in the cover of Chinese nationalism. \n\nChiang and his KMT government retreated to the island of Taiwan. Confronted with the communist revolution in China and the end of the American atomic monopoly in 1949, the Truman administration quickly moved to escalate and expand the containment policy. In NSC-68, a secret 1950 document, the National Security Council proposed to reinforce pro-Western alliance systems and quadruple spending on defense.\n\nUnited States officials moved thereafter to expand containment into Asia, Africa, and Latin America, in order to counter revolutionary nationalist movements, often led by communist parties financed by the USSR, fighting against the restoration of Europe's colonial empires in South-East Asia and elsewhere. In the early 1950s (a period sometimes known as the \"Pactomania\"), the US formalized a series of alliances with Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and the Philippines (notably ANZUS in 1951 and SEATO in 1954), thereby guaranteeing the United States a number of long-term military bases.\n\nKorean War\n\nOne of the more significant impacts of containment was the outbreak of the Korean War. In June 1950, Kim Il-sung's North Korean People's Army invaded South Korea. Joseph Stalin \"planned, prepared, and initiated\" the invasion, creating \"detailed [war] plans\" that were communicated to the North Koreans. To Stalin's surprise, the UN Security Council backed the defense of South Korea, though the Soviets were then boycotting meetings in protest that Taiwan and not Communist China held a permanent seat on the Council. A UN force of personnel from South Korea, the United States, the United Kingdom, Turkey, Canada, Colombia, Australia, France, South Africa, the Philippines, the Netherlands, Belgium, New Zealand and other countries joined to stop the invasion. \n\nAmong other effects, the Korean War galvanised NATO to develop a military structure. Public opinion in countries involved, such as Great Britain, was divided for and against the war. Many feared an escalation into a general war with Communist China, and even nuclear war. The strong opposition to the war often strained Anglo-American relations. For these reasons British officials sought a speedy end to the conflict, hoping to unite Korea under United Nations auspices and withdrawal of all foreign forces. \n\nEven though the Chinese and North Koreans were exhausted by the war and were prepared to end it by late 1952, Stalin insisted that they continue fighting, and the Armistice was approved only in July 1953, after Stalin's death. North Korean leader Kim Il Sung created a highly centralized, totalitarian dictatorship – which continues to date – according himself unlimited power and generating a formidable cult of personality. In the South, the American-backed strongman Syngman Rhee ran a significantly less brutal but deeply corrupt and authoritarian regime. After Rhee was overthrown in 1960, South Korea fell within a year under a period of military rule that lasted until the re-establishment of a multi-party system in the late 1980s.\n\nCrisis and escalation (1953–62)\n\nKhrushchev, Eisenhower and de-Stalinization\n\nIn 1953, changes in political leadership on both sides shifted the dynamic of the Cold War.Karabell, p. 916 Dwight D. Eisenhower was inaugurated president that January. During the last 18 months of the Truman administration, the American defense budget had quadrupled, and Eisenhower moved to reduce military spending by a third while continuing to fight the Cold War effectively.\n\nAfter the death of Joseph Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev became the Soviet leader following the deposition and execution of Lavrentiy Beriya and the pushing aside of rivals Georgy Malenkov and Vyacheslav Molotov. On 25 February 1956, Khrushchev shocked delegates to the 20th Congress of the Soviet Communist Party by cataloguing and denouncing Stalin's crimes. As part of a campaign of de-Stalinization, he declared that the only way to reform and move away from Stalin's policies would be to acknowledge errors made in the past.\n\nOn 18 November 1956, while addressing Western ambassadors at a reception at the Polish embassy in Moscow, Khrushchev used his famous \"Whether you like it or not, history is on our side. We will bury you\" expression, shocking everyone present. He later claimed that he had not been talking about nuclear war, but rather about the historically determined victory of communism over capitalism. In 1961, Khrushchev declared that even if the USSR was behind the West, within a decade its housing shortage would disappear, consumer goods would be abundant, and within two decades, the \"construction of a communist society\" in the USSR would be completed \"in the main\". \n\nEisenhower's secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, initiated a \"New Look\" for the containment strategy, calling for a greater reliance on nuclear weapons against US enemies in wartime. Dulles also enunciated the doctrine of \"massive retaliation\", threatening a severe US response to any Soviet aggression. Possessing nuclear superiority, for example, allowed Eisenhower to face down Soviet threats to intervene in the Middle East during the 1956 Suez Crisis. U.S. plans for nuclear war in the late 1950s included the \"systematic destruction\" of 1200 major urban centers in the Eastern Bloc and China, including Moscow, East Berlin and Beijing, with their civilian populations among the primary targets. \n\nWarsaw Pact and Hungarian Revolution\n\nWhile Stalin's death in 1953 slightly relaxed tensions, the situation in Europe remained an uneasy armed truce. The Soviets, who had already created a network of mutual assistance treaties in the Eastern Bloc by 1949, established a formal alliance therein, the Warsaw Pact, in 1955.\n\nThe Hungarian Revolution of 1956 occurred shortly after Khrushchev arranged the removal of Hungary's Stalinist leader Mátyás Rákosi. In response to a popular uprising, the new regime formally disbanded the secret police, declared its intention to withdraw from the Warsaw Pact and pledged to re-establish free elections. The Soviet army invaded.UN General Assembly Special Committee on the Problem of Hungary (1957) Thousands of Hungarians were arrested, imprisoned and deported to the Soviet Union, and approximately 200,000 Hungarians fled Hungary in the chaos. Hungarian leader Imre Nagy and others were executed following secret trials. \n\nFrom 1957 through 1961, Khrushchev openly and repeatedly threatened the West with nuclear annihilation. He claimed that Soviet missile capabilities were far superior to those of the United States, capable of wiping out any American or European city. However, Khrushchev rejected Stalin's belief in the inevitability of war, and declared his new goal was to be \"peaceful coexistence\". This formulation modified the Stalin-era Soviet stance, where international class struggle meant the two opposing camps were on an inevitable collision course where communism would triumph through global war; now, peace would allow capitalism to collapse on its own, as well as giving the Soviets time to boost their military capabilities, which remained for decades until Gorbachev's later \"new thinking\" envisioning peaceful coexistence as an end in itself rather than a form of class struggle. \n\nThe events in Hungary produced ideological fractures within the communist parties of the world, particularly in Western Europe, with great decline in membership as many in both western and communist countries felt disillusioned by the brutal Soviet response. The communist parties in the West would never recover from the effect the Hungarian Revolution had on their membership, a fact that was immediately recognized by some, such as the Yugoslavian politician Milovan Đilas who shortly after the revolution was crushed said that \"The wound which the Hungarian Revolution inflicted on communism can never be completely healed\".\n\nAmerica's pronouncements concentrated on American strength abroad and the success of liberal capitalism. However, by the late 1960s, the \"battle for men's minds\" between two systems of social organization that Kennedy spoke of in 1961 was largely over, with tensions henceforth based primarily on clashing geopolitical objectives rather than ideology. \n\nBerlin Ultimatum and European integration\n\nDuring November 1958, Khrushchev made an unsuccessful attempt to turn all of Berlin into an independent, demilitarized \"free city\", giving the United States, Great Britain, and France a six-month ultimatum to withdraw their troops from the sectors they still occupied in West Berlin, or he would transfer control of Western access rights to the East Germans. Khrushchev earlier explained to Mao Zedong that \"Berlin is the testicles of the West. Every time I want to make the West scream, I squeeze on Berlin.\" NATO formally rejected the ultimatum in mid-December and Khrushchev withdrew it in return for a Geneva conference on the German question. \n\nMore broadly, one hallmark of the 1950s was the beginning of European integration—a fundamental by-product of the Cold War that Truman and Eisenhower promoted politically, economically, and militarily, but which later administrations viewed ambivalently, fearful that an independent Europe would forge a separate détente with the Soviet Union, which would use this to exacerbate Western disunity. \n\nCompetition in the Third World\n\nNationalist movements in some countries and regions, notably Guatemala, Indonesia and Indochina were often allied with communist groups, or perceived in the West to be allied with communists. In this context, the United States and the Soviet Union increasingly competed for influence by proxy in the Third World as decolonization gained momentum in the 1950s and early 1960s; additionally, the Soviets saw continuing losses by imperial powers as presaging the eventual victory of their ideology. Both sides were selling armaments to gain influence. \n\nThe United States made use of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to do away with a string of unfriendly Third World governments and to support allied ones. In 1953, President Eisenhower's CIA implemented Operation Ajax, a covert operation aimed at the overthrow of the Iranian prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh. The popularly elected and non-aligned Mosaddegh had been a Middle Eastern nemesis of Britain since nationalizing the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in 1951. Winston Churchill told the United States that Mosaddegh was \"increasingly turning towards communism.\" The pro-Western shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, assumed control as an autocratic monarch. The shah's policies included the banning of the communist Tudeh Party and general suppression of political dissent by SAVAK, the shah's domestic security and intelligence agency.\n\nIn Guatemala, a CIA-backed military coup ousted the left-wing President Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán in 1954. The post-Arbenz government—a military junta headed by Carlos Castillo Armas—repealed a progressive land reform law, returned nationalized property belonging to the United Fruit Company, set up a National Committee of Defense Against Communism, and decreed a Preventive Penal Law Against Communism at the request of the United States. \n\nThe non-aligned Indonesian government of Sukarno was faced with a major threat to its legitimacy beginning in 1956, when several regional commanders began to demand autonomy from Jakarta. After mediation failed, Sukarno took action to remove the dissident commanders. In February 1958, dissident military commanders in Central Sumatera (Colonel Ahmad Hussein) and North Sulawesi (Colonel Ventje Sumual) declared the Revolutionary Government of the Republic of Indonesia-Permesta Movement aimed at overthrowing the Sukarno regime. They were joined by many civilian politicians from the Masyumi Party, such as Sjafruddin Prawiranegara, who were opposed to the growing influence of the communist Partai Komunis Indonesia party. Due to their anti-communist rhetoric, the rebels received arms, funding, and other covert aid from the CIA until Allen Lawrence Pope, an American pilot, was shot down after a bombing raid on government-held Ambon in April 1958. The central government responded by launching airborne and seaborne military invasions of rebel strongholds Padang and Manado. By the end of 1958, the rebels were militarily defeated, and the last remaining rebel guerilla bands surrendered by August 1961. \n\nIn the Republic of the Congo, newly independent from Belgium since June 1960, the CIA-cultivated President Joseph Kasa-Vubu ordered the dismissal of the democratically elected Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba and the Lumumba cabinet in September; Lumumba called for Kasa-Vubu's dismissal instead. In the ensuing Congo Crisis, the CIA-backed Colonel Mobutu quickly mobilized his forces to seize power through a military coup d'état.\n\nIn British Guiana, the leftist People's Progressive Party (PPP) candidate Cheddi Jagan won the position of chief minister in a colonially administered election in 1953, but was quickly forced to resign from power after Britain's suspension of the still-dependent nation's constitution. Embarrassed by the landslide electoral victory of Jagan's allegedly Marxist party, the British imprisoned the PPP's leadership and maneuvered the organization into a divisive rupture in 1955, engineering a split between Jagan and his PPP colleagues. Jagan again won the colonial elections in 1957 and 1961; despite Britain's shift to a reconsideration of its view of the left-wing Jagan as a Soviet-style communist at this time, the United States pressured the British to withhold Guyana's independence until an alternative to Jagan could be identified, supported, and brought into office. \n\nWorn down by the communist guerrilla war for Vietnamese independence and handed a watershed defeat by communist Viet Minh rebels at the 1954 Battle of Điện Biên Phủ, the French accepted a negotiated abandonment of their colonial stake in Vietnam. In the Geneva Conference, peace accords were signed, leaving Vietnam divided between a pro-Soviet administration in North Vietnam and a pro-Western administration in South Vietnam at the 17th parallel north. Between 1954 and 1961, Eisenhower's United States sent economic aid and military advisers to strengthen South Vietnam's pro-Western regime against communist efforts to destabilize it.\n\nMany emerging nations of Asia, Africa, and Latin America rejected the pressure to choose sides in the East-West competition. In 1955, at the Bandung Conference in Indonesia, dozens of Third World governments resolved to stay out of the Cold War. The consensus reached at Bandung culminated with the creation of the Belgrade-headquartered Non-Aligned Movement in 1961. Meanwhile, Khrushchev broadened Moscow's policy to establish ties with India and other key neutral states. Independence movements in the Third World transformed the post-war order into a more pluralistic world of decolonized African and Middle Eastern nations and of rising nationalism in Asia and Latin America.\n\nSino-Soviet split\n\nThe period after 1956 was marked by serious setbacks for the Soviet Union, most notably the breakdown of the Sino-Soviet alliance, beginning the Sino-Soviet split. Mao had defended Stalin when Khrushchev attacked him after his death in 1956, and treated the new Soviet leader as a superficial upstart, accusing him of having lost his revolutionary edge. For his part, Khrushchev, disturbed by Mao's glib attitude toward nuclear war, referred to the Chinese leader as a \"lunatic on a throne\". \n\nAfter this, Khrushchev made many desperate attempts to reconstitute the Sino-Soviet alliance, but Mao considered it useless and denied any proposal. The Chinese-Soviet animosity spilled out in an intra-communist propaganda war. Further on, the Soviets focused on a bitter rivalry with Mao's China for leadership of the global communist movement. \n\nHistorian Lorenz M. Lüthi argues:\nThe Sino-Soviet split was one of the key events of the Cold War, equal in importance to the construction of the Berlin Wall, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Second Vietnam War, and Sino-American rapprochement. The split helped to determine the framework of the Second Cold War in general, and influenced the course of the Second Vietnam War in particular. \n\nSpace race\n\nOn the nuclear weapons front, the United States and the USSR pursued nuclear rearmament and developed long-range weapons with which they could strike the territory of the other. In August 1957, the Soviets successfully launched the world's first intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and in October, launched the first Earth satellite, Sputnik. The launch of Sputnik inaugurated the Space Race. This culminated in the Apollo Moon landings, which astronaut Frank Borman later described as \"just a battle in the Cold War.\" \n\nCuban Revolution and the Bay of Pigs Invasion\n\nIn Cuba, the July 26 Movement seized power in January 1959, toppling President Fulgencio Batista, whose unpopular regime had been denied arms by the Eisenhower administration. \n\nDiplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States continued for some time after Batista's fall, but President Eisenhower deliberately left the capital to avoid meeting Cuba's young revolutionary leader Fidel Castro during the latter's trip to Washington in April, leaving Vice President Richard Nixon to conduct the meeting in his place. Cuba began negotiating arms purchases from the Eastern Bloc in March 1960. \n\nIn January 1961, just prior to leaving office, Eisenhower formally severed relations with the Cuban government. In April 1961, the administration of newly elected American President John F. Kennedy mounted an unsuccessful CIA-organized ship-borne invasion of the island at Playa Girón and Playa Larga in Las Villas Provincea failure that publicly humiliated the United States. Castro responded by publicly embracing Marxism–Leninism, and the Soviet Union pledged to provide further support.\n\nBerlin Crisis of 1961\n\nThe Berlin Crisis of 1961 was the last major incident in the Cold War regarding the status of Berlin and post–World War II Germany. By the early 1950s, the Soviet approach to restricting emigration movement was emulated by most of the rest of the Eastern Bloc. However, hundreds of thousands of East Germans annually emigrated to West Germany through a \"loophole\" in the system that existed between East and West Berlin, where the four occupying World War II powers governed movement. \n\nThe emigration resulted in a massive \"brain drain\" from East Germany to West Germany of younger educated professionals, such that nearly 20% of East Germany's population had migrated to West Germany by 1961. That June, the Soviet Union issued a new ultimatum demanding the withdrawal of Allied forces from West Berlin. The request was rebuffed, and on 13 August, East Germany erected a barbed-wire barrier that would eventually be expanded through construction into the Berlin Wall, effectively closing the loophole. \n\nCuban Missile Crisis and Khrushchev ouster\n\nContinuing to seek ways to oust Castro following the Bay of Pigs Invasion, Kennedy and his administration experimented with various ways of covertly facilitating the overthrow of the Cuban government. Significant hopes were pinned on a covert program named the Cuban Project, devised under the Kennedy administration in 1961.\n\nIn February 1962, Khrushchev learned of the American plans regarding Cuba: a \"Cuban project\"approved by the CIA and stipulating the overthrow of the Cuban government in October, possibly involving the American military—and yet one more Kennedy-ordered operation to assassinate Castro. Preparations to install Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba were undertaken in response.\n\nAlarmed, Kennedy considered various reactions, and ultimately responded to the installation of nuclear missiles in Cuba with a naval blockade and presented an ultimatum to the Soviets. Khrushchev backed down from a confrontation, and the Soviet Union removed the missiles in return for an American pledge not to invade Cuba again. Castro later admitted that \"I would have agreed to the use of nuclear weapons. ... we took it for granted that it would become a nuclear war anyway, and that we were going to disappear.\" \n\nThe Cuban Missile Crisis (October–November 1962) brought the world closer to nuclear war than ever before. The aftermath of the crisis led to the first efforts in the nuclear arms race at nuclear disarmament and improving relations, although the Cold War's first arms control agreement, the Antarctic Treaty, had come into force in 1961. \n\nIn 1964, Khrushchev's Kremlin colleagues managed to oust him, but allowed him a peaceful retirement. Accused of rudeness and incompetence, he was also credited with ruining Soviet agriculture and bringing the world to the brink of nuclear war. Khrushchev had become an international embarrassment when he authorized construction of the Berlin Wall, a public humiliation for Marxism–Leninism.\n\nConfrontation through détente (1962–79)\n\nIn the course of the 1960s and 1970s, Cold War participants struggled to adjust to a new, more complicated pattern of international relations in which the world was no longer divided into two clearly opposed blocs. From the beginning of the post-war period, Western Europe and Japan rapidly recovered from the destruction of World War II and sustained strong economic growth through the 1950s and 1960s, with per capita GDPs approaching those of the United States, while Eastern Bloc economies stagnated. \n\nAs a result of the 1973 oil crisis, combined with the growing influence of Third World alignments such as the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and the Non-Aligned Movement, less-powerful countries had more room to assert their independence and often showed themselves resistant to pressure from either superpower. Meanwhile, Moscow was forced to turn its attention inward to deal with the Soviet Union's deep-seated domestic economic problems. During this period, Soviet leaders such as Leonid Brezhnev and Alexei Kosygin embraced the notion of détente.\n\nFrench NATO withdrawal\n\nThe unity of NATO was breached early in its history, with a crisis occurring during Charles de Gaulle's presidency of France from 1958 onwards. De Gaulle protested at the United States' strong role in the organization and what he perceived as a special relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom. In a memorandum sent to President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Prime Minister Harold Macmillan on 17 September 1958, he argued for the creation of a tripartite directorate that would put France on an equal footing with the United States and the United Kingdom, and also for the expansion of NATO's coverage to include geographical areas of interest to France, most notably French Algeria, where France was waging a counter-insurgency and sought NATO assistance.\n\nConsidering the response given to be unsatisfactory, de Gaulle began the development of an independent French nuclear deterrent and in 1966 withdrew from NATO's military structures and expelled NATO troops from French soil. \n\nCzechoslovakia invasion\n\nIn 1968, a period of political liberalization in Czechoslovakia called the Prague Spring took place that included \"Action Program\" of liberalizations, which described increasing freedom of the press, freedom of speech and freedom of movement, along with an economic emphasis on consumer goods, the possibility of a multiparty government, limiting the power of the secret police and potentially withdrawing from the Warsaw Pact. \n\nIn answer to the Prague Spring, the Soviet army, together with most of their Warsaw Pact allies, invaded Czechoslovakia. The invasion was followed by a wave of emigration, including an estimated 70,000 Czechs and Slovaks initially fleeing, with the total eventually reaching 300,000. The invasion sparked intense protests from Yugoslavia, Romania and China, and from Western European communist parties. \n\nBrezhnev Doctrine\n\nIn September 1968, during a speech at the Fifth Congress of the Polish United Workers' Party one month after the invasion of Czechoslovakia, Brezhnev outlined the Brezhnev Doctrine, in which he claimed the right to violate the sovereignty of any country attempting to replace Marxism–Leninism with capitalism. During the speech, Brezhnev stated:\n\nThe doctrine found its origins in the failures of Marxism–Leninism in states like Poland, Hungary and East Germany, which were facing a declining standard of living contrasting with the prosperity of West Germany and the rest of Western Europe. \n\nThird World escalations\n\nUnder the Lyndon Johnson Administration, which gained power after the assassination of John Kennedy, the U.S. took a more hardline stance on Latin America—sometimes called the \"Mann Doctrine\".Walter LaFeber, \"Thomas C. Mann and the Devolution of Latin American Policy: From the Good Neighbor to Military Intervention\". In Behind the Throne: Servants of Power to Imperial Presidents, 1898–1968, ed. Thomas J. McCormick & Walter LaFeber. University of Wisconsin Press, 1993. ISBN 0-299-13740-6 In 1964, the Brazilian military overthrew the government of president João Goulart with U.S. backing. In late April 1965, the U.S. sent some 22,000 troops to the Dominican Republic for a one-year occupation in an invasion codenamed Operation Power Pack, citing the threat of the emergence of a Cuban-style revolution in Latin America. Héctor García-Godoy acted as provisional president, until conservative former president Joaquín Balaguer won the 1966 presidential election against non-campaigning former President Juan Bosch. Activists for Bosch's Dominican Revolutionary Party were violently harassed by the Dominican police and armed forces.\n\nIn Indonesia, the hardline anti-communist General Suharto wrested control of the state from his predecessor Sukarno in an attempt to establish a \"New Order\". From 1965 to 1966, the military led the mass killing of an estimated half-million members and sympathizers of the Indonesian Communist Party and other leftist organizations. \n\nEscalating the scale of American intervention in the ongoing conflict between Ngô Đình Diệm's South Vietnamese government and the communist National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam (NLF) insurgents opposing it, Johnson deployed some 575,000 troops in Southeast Asia to defeat the NLF and their North Vietnamese allies in the Vietnam War, but his costly policy weakened the US economy and, by 1975, ultimately culminated in what most of the world saw as a humiliating defeat of the world's most powerful superpower at the hands of one of the world's poorest nations. North Vietnam received Soviet approval for its war effort in 1959; the Soviet Union sent 15,000 military advisors and annual arms shipments worth $450 million to North Vietnam during the war, while China sent 320,000 troops and annual arms shipments worth $180 million. \n\nIn Chile, the Socialist Party candidate Salvador Allende won the presidential election of 1970, becoming the first democratically elected Marxist to become president of a country in the Americas. The CIA targeted Allende for removal and operated to undermine his support domestically, which contributed to a period of unrest culminating in General Augusto Pinochet's coup d'état on 11 September 1973. Pinochet consolidated power as a military dictator, Allende's reforms of the economy were rolled back, and leftist opponents were killed or detained in internment camps under the Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional (DINA).\n\nThe Middle East remained a source of contention. Egypt, which received the bulk of its arms and economic assistance from the USSR, was a troublesome client, with a reluctant Soviet Union feeling obliged to assist in both the 1967 Six-Day War (with advisers and technicians) and the War of Attrition (with pilots and aircraft) against pro-Western Israel. Despite the beginning of an Egyptian shift from a pro-Soviet to a pro-American orientation in 1972 (under Egypt's new leader Anwar El Sadat),Grenville, J.A.S. & Bernard Wasserstein (1987). [https://books.google.com/books?id\nRYyyAAAAIAAJ Treaties of the Twentieth Century: A History and Guide with Texts], Volume 2. London and New York: Methuen. ISBN 978-0-416-38080-4. rumors of imminent Soviet intervention on the Egyptians' behalf during the 1973 Yom Kippur War brought about a massive American mobilization that threatened to wreck détente. Although pre-Sadat Egypt had been the largest recipient of Soviet aid in the Middle East, the Soviets were also successful in establishing close relations with communist South Yemen, as well as the nationalist governments of Algeria and Iraq. Indirect Soviet assistance to the Palestinian side of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict included support for Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). According to historian Charles R. H. Tripp, the Iraqi Ba'athist coup of 1968 upset \"the US-sponsored security system established as part of the Cold War in the Middle East. It appeared that any enemy of the Baghdad regime was a potential ally of the United States.\" From 1973 to 1975, the CIA colluded with the Iranian government to finance and arm Kurdish rebels in the Second Kurdish–Iraqi War to weaken Iraq's Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr. \n\nIn Africa, Somali army officers led by Mohamed Siad Barre carried out a bloodless coup in 1969, creating the socialist Somali Democratic Republic. The Soviet Union vowed to support Somalia. Four years later, the pro-American Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie was overthrown in a 1974 coup by the Derg, a radical group of Ethiopian army officers led by the pro-Soviet Mengistu Haile Mariam, who built up relations with the Cubans and Soviets. When fighting between the Somalis and Ethiopians broke out in the 1977–1978 Somali-Ethiopian Ogaden War, Barre lost his Soviet support and turned to the Safari Club—a group of pro-American intelligence agencies including Iran, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia—for support and weapons. The Ethiopian military was supported by Cuban soldiers along with Soviet military advisors and armaments. Carter remained mostly neutral during the conflict, insisting that Somalia was violating Ethiopian sovereignty. Carter initiated military cooperation with Somalia in 1980.Ioannis Mantzikos, \"[http://www.academicjournals.org/AJPSIR/PDF/pdf2010/June/Mantzikos.pdf U. S. foreign policymaking toward Ethiopia and Somalia (1974–1980)]\", African Journal of Political Science and International Relations 4(6), June 2010.\n\nThe 1974 Portuguese Carnation Revolution against the authoritarian Estado Novo returned Portugal to a multi-party system and facilitated the independence of the Portuguese colonies Angola and East Timor. In Africa, where Angolan rebels had waged a multi-faction independence war against Portuguese rule since 1961, a two-decade civil war replaced the anti-colonial struggle as fighting erupted between the communist People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), backed by the Cubans and Soviets, and the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA), backed by the United States, the People's Republic of China, and Mobutu's government in Zaire. The United States, the apartheid government of South Africa, and several other African governments also supported a third faction, the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA). Without bothering to consult the Soviets in advance, the Cuban government sent a number of combat troops to fight alongside the MPLA. Foreign mercenaries and a South African armoured column were deployed to support UNITA, but the MPLA, bolstered by Cuban personnel and Soviet assistance, eventually gained the upper hand.\n\nDuring the Vietnam War, North Vietnam invaded and occupied parts of Cambodia to use as military bases, which contributed to the violence of the Cambodian Civil War between the pro-American government of Lon Nol and Maoist Khmer Rouge insurgents. Documents uncovered from the Soviet archives reveal that the North Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia in 1970 was launched at the request of the Khmer Rouge after negotiations with Nuon Chea. US and South Vietnamese forces responded to these actions with a bombing campaign and ground incursion, the effects of which are disputed by historians. Under the leadership of Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge would eventually kill 1–3 million Cambodians in the killing fields, out of a 1975 population of roughly 8 million. Martin Shaw described these atrocities as \"the purest genocide of the Cold War era.\" Vietnam deposed Pol Pot in 1979 and installed Khmer Rouge defector Heng Samrin, only to be bogged down in a guerilla war and suffer a punitive Chinese attack.\n\nSino-American rapprochement\n\nAs a result of the Sino-Soviet split, tensions along the Chinese–Soviet border reached their peak in 1969, and United States President Richard Nixon decided to use the conflict to shift the balance of power towards the West in the Cold War. The Chinese had sought improved relations with the Americans in order to gain advantage over the Soviets as well.\n\nIn February 1972, Nixon announced a stunning rapprochement with Mao's China by traveling to Beijing and meeting with Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai. At this time, the USSR achieved rough nuclear parity with the United States; meanwhile, the Vietnam War both weakened America's influence in the Third World and cooled relations with Western Europe. Although indirect conflict between Cold War powers continued through the late 1960s and early 1970s, tensions were beginning to ease.\n\nNixon, Brezhnev, and détente\n\nFollowing his China visit, Nixon met with Soviet leaders, including Brezhnev in Moscow. These Strategic Arms Limitation Talks resulted in two landmark arms control treaties: SALT I, the first comprehensive limitation pact signed by the two superpowers, and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which banned the development of systems designed to intercept incoming missiles. These aimed to limit the development of costly anti-ballistic missiles and nuclear missiles.\n\nNixon and Brezhnev proclaimed a new era of \"peaceful coexistence\" and established the groundbreaking new policy of détente (or cooperation) between the two superpowers. Meanwhile, Brezhnev attempted to revive the Soviet economy, which was declining in part because of heavy military expenditures. Between 1972 and 1974, the two sides also agreed to strengthen their economic ties, including agreements for increased trade. As a result of their meetings, détente would replace the hostility of the Cold War and the two countries would live mutually. \n\nMeanwhile, these developments coincided with the \"Ostpolitik\" of West German Chancellor Willy Brandt. Other agreements were concluded to stabilize the situation in Europe, culminating in the Helsinki Accords signed at the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe in 1975. \n\nLate 1970s deterioration of relations\n\nIn the 1970s, the KGB, led by Yuri Andropov, continued to persecute distinguished Soviet personalities such as Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Andrei Sakharov, who were criticising the Soviet leadership in harsh terms. Indirect conflict between the superpowers continued through this period of détente in the Third World, particularly during political crises in the Middle East, Chile, Ethiopia, and Angola. \n\nAlthough President Jimmy Carter tried to place another limit on the arms race with a SALT II agreement in 1979, his efforts were undermined by the other events that year, including the Iranian Revolution and the KGB-backed Nicaraguan Revolution, which both ousted pro-US regimes, and his retaliation against Soviet intervention in Afghanistan in December.\n\n\"Second Cold War\" (1979–85)\n\nThe term second Cold War refers to the period of intensive reawakening of Cold War tensions and conflicts in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Tensions greatly increased between the major powers with both sides becoming more militaristic. Diggins says, \"Reagan went all out to fight the second cold war, by supporting counterinsurgencies in the third world.\" Cox says, \"The intensity of this 'second' Cold War was as great as its duration was short.\" \n\nSoviet war in Afghanistan\n\nIn April 1978, the communist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) seized power in Afghanistan in the Saur Revolution. Within months, opponents of the communist government launched an uprising in eastern Afghanistan that quickly expanded into a civil war waged by guerrilla mujahideen against government forces countrywide. The Peshawar Seven insurgents received military training and weapons in neighboring Pakistan and China, as well as weapons and billions of dollars from the United States, the United Kingdom and Saudi Arabia, while the Soviet Union sent thousands of military advisers to support the PDPA government. Meanwhile, increasing friction between the competing factions of the PDPA the dominant Khalq and the more moderate Parcham resulted in the dismissal of Parchami cabinet members and the arrest of Parchami military officers under the pretext of a Parchami coup. By mid-1979, the United States had started a covert program to assist the mujahideen. \n\nIn September 1979, Khalqist President Nur Muhammad Taraki was assassinated in a coup within the PDPA orchestrated by fellow Khalq member Hafizullah Amin, who assumed the presidency. Distrusted by the Soviets, Amin was assassinated by Soviet special forces in December 1979. A Soviet-organized government, led by Parcham's Babrak Karmal but inclusive of both factions, filled the vacuum. Soviet troops were deployed to stabilize Afghanistan under Karmal in more substantial numbers, although the Soviet government did not expect to do most of the fighting in Afghanistan. As a result, however, the Soviets were now directly involved in what had been a domestic war in Afghanistan. \n\nCarter responded to the Soviet intervention by withdrawing the SALT II treaty from the Senate, imposing embargoes on grain and technology shipments to the USSR, and demanding a significant increase in military spending, and further announced that the United States would boycott the 1980 Moscow Summer Olympics. He described the Soviet incursion as \"the most serious threat to the peace since the Second World War\". \n\nReagan and Thatcher\n\nIn January 1977, four years prior to becoming president, Ronald Reagan bluntly stated, in a conversation with Richard V. Allen, his basic expectation in relation to the Cold War. \"My idea of American policy toward the Soviet Union is simple, and some would say simplistic,\" he said. \"It is this: We win and they lose. What do you think of that?\" In 1980, Ronald Reagan defeated Jimmy Carter in the 1980 presidential election, vowing to increase military spending and confront the Soviets everywhere. Both Reagan and new British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher denounced the Soviet Union and its ideology. Reagan labeled the Soviet Union an \"evil empire\" and predicted that Communism would be left on the \"ash heap of history\". \n\nBy early 1985, Reagan's anti-communist position had developed into a stance known as the new Reagan Doctrinewhich, in addition to containment, formulated an additional right to subvert existing communist governments. Besides continuing Carter's policy of supporting the Islamic opponents of the Soviet Union and the Soviet-backed PDPA government in Afghanistan, the CIA also sought to weaken the Soviet Union itself by promoting political Islam in the majority-Muslim Central Asian Soviet Union. Additionally, the CIA encouraged anti-communist Pakistan's ISI to train Muslims from around the world to participate in the jihad against the Soviet Union.\n\nPolish Solidarity movement and martial law\n\nPope John Paul II provided a moral focus for anti-communism; a visit to his native Poland in 1979 stimulated a religious and nationalist resurgence centered on the Solidarity movement that galvanized opposition and may have led to his attempted assassination two years later. \n\nIn December 1981, Poland's Wojciech Jaruzelski reacted to the crisis by imposing a period of martial law. Reagan imposed economic sanctions on Poland in response. Mikhail Suslov, the Kremlin's top ideologist, advised Soviet leaders not to intervene if Poland fell under the control of Solidarity, for fear it might lead to heavy economic sanctions, representing a catastrophe for the Soviet economy. \n\nSoviet and US military and economic issues\n\nMoscow had built up a military that consumed as much as 25 percent of the Soviet Union's gross national product at the expense of consumer goods and investment in civilian sectors. Soviet spending on the arms race and other Cold War commitments both caused and exacerbated deep-seated structural problems in the Soviet system, which saw at least a decade of economic stagnation during the late Brezhnev years.\n\nSoviet investment in the defense sector was not driven by military necessity, but in large part by the interests of massive party and state bureaucracies dependent on the sector for their own power and privileges. The Soviet Armed Forces became the largest in the world in terms of the numbers and types of weapons they possessed, in the number of troops in their ranks, and in the sheer size of their military–industrial base. However, the quantitative advantages held by the Soviet military often concealed areas where the Eastern Bloc dramatically lagged behind the West. \n\nBy the early 1980s, the USSR had built up a military arsenal and army surpassing that of the United States. Soon after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, president Carter began massively building up the United States military. This buildup was accelerated by the Reagan administration, which increased the military spending from 5.3 percent of GNP in 1981 to 6.5 percent in 1986, the largest peacetime defense buildup in United States history. \n\nTensions continued intensifying in the early 1980s when Reagan revived the B-1 Lancer program that was canceled by the Carter administration, produced LGM-118 Peacekeepers, installed US cruise missiles in Europe, and announced his experimental Strategic Defense Initiative, dubbed \"Star Wars\" by the media, a defense program to shoot down missiles in mid-flight. \n\nWith the background of a buildup in tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States, and the deployment of Soviet RSD-10 Pioneer ballistic missiles targeting Western Europe, NATO decided, under the impetus of the Carter presidency, to deploy MGM-31 Pershing and cruise missiles in Europe, primarily West Germany. This deployment would have placed missiles just 10 minutes' striking distance from Moscow. \n\nAfter Reagan's military buildup, the Soviet Union did not respond by further building its military because the enormous military expenses, along with inefficient planned manufacturing and collectivized agriculture, were already a heavy burden for the Soviet economy. At the same time, Saudi Arabia increased oil production, even as other non-OPEC nations were increasing production. These developments contributed to the 1980s oil glut, which affected the Soviet Union, as oil was the main source of Soviet export revenues. Issues with command economics, oil price decreases and large military expenditures gradually brought the Soviet economy to stagnation. \n\nOn 1 September 1983, the Soviet Union shot down Korean Air Lines Flight 007, a Boeing 747 with 269 people aboard, including sitting Congressman Larry McDonald, when it violated Soviet airspace just past the west coast of Sakhalin Island near Moneron Island—an act which Reagan characterized as a \"massacre\". This act increased support for military deployment, overseen by Reagan, which stood in place until the later accords between Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev. The Able Archer 83 exercise in November 1983, a realistic simulation of a coordinated NATO nuclear release, was perhaps the most dangerous moment since the Cuban Missile Crisis, as the Soviet leadership feared that a nuclear attack might be imminent. \n\nAmerican domestic public concerns about intervening in foreign conflicts persisted from the end of the Vietnam War. The Reagan administration emphasized the use of quick, low-cost counter-insurgency tactics to intervene in foreign conflicts. In 1983, the Reagan administration intervened in the multisided Lebanese Civil War, invaded Grenada, bombed Libya and backed the Central American Contras, anti-communist paramilitaries seeking to overthrow the Soviet-aligned Sandinista government in Nicaragua. While Reagan's interventions against Grenada and Libya were popular in the United States, his backing of the Contra rebels was mired in controversy. \n\nMeanwhile, the Soviets incurred high costs for their own foreign interventions. Although Brezhnev was convinced in 1979 that the Soviet war in Afghanistan would be brief, Muslim guerrillas, aided by the US, China, Britain, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, waged a fierce resistance against the invasion. The Kremlin sent nearly 100,000 troops to support its puppet regime in Afghanistan, leading many outside observers to dub the war \"the Soviets' Vietnam\". However, Moscow's quagmire in Afghanistan was far more disastrous for the Soviets than Vietnam had been for the Americans because the conflict coincided with a period of internal decay and domestic crisis in the Soviet system.\n\nA senior US State Department official predicted such an outcome as early as 1980, positing that the invasion resulted in part from a \"domestic crisis within the Soviet may be that the thermodynamic law of entropy up with the Soviet system, which now seems to expend more energy on simply maintaining its equilibrium than on improving itself. We could be seeing a period of foreign movement at a time of internal decay\". \n\nFinal years (1985–91)\n\nGorbachev reforms\n\nBy the time the comparatively youthful Mikhail Gorbachev became General Secretary in 1985, the Soviet economy was stagnant and faced a sharp fall in foreign currency earnings as a result of the downward slide in oil prices in the 1980s. These issues prompted Gorbachev to investigate measures to revive the ailing state. \n\nAn ineffectual start led to the conclusion that deeper structural changes were necessary and in June 1987 Gorbachev announced an agenda of economic reform called perestroika, or restructuring. Perestroika relaxed the production quota system, allowed private ownership of businesses and paved the way for foreign investment. These measures were intended to redirect the country's resources from costly Cold War military commitments to more productive areas in the civilian sector.\n\nDespite initial skepticism in the West, the new Soviet leader proved to be committed to reversing the Soviet Union's deteriorating economic condition instead of continuing the arms race with the West. Partly as a way to fight off internal opposition from party cliques to his reforms, Gorbachev simultaneously introduced glasnost, or openness, which increased freedom of the press and the transparency of state institutions. Glasnost was intended to reduce the corruption at the top of the Communist Party and moderate the abuse of power in the Central Committee. Glasnost also enabled increased contact between Soviet citizens and the western world, particularly with the United States, contributing to the accelerating détente between the two nations. \n\nThaw in relations\n\nIn response to the Kremlin's military and political concessions, Reagan agreed to renew talks on economic issues and the scaling-back of the arms race. The first was held in November 1985 in Geneva, Switzerland. At one stage the two men, accompanied only by an interpreter, agreed in principle to reduce each country's nuclear arsenal by 50 percent. A second Reykjavík Summit was held in Iceland. Talks went well until the focus shifted to Reagan's proposed Strategic Defense Initiative, which Gorbachev wanted eliminated. Reagan refused. The negotiations failed, but the third summit in 1987 led to a breakthrough with the signing of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF). The INF treaty eliminated all nuclear-armed, ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges between 500 and 5,500 kilometers (300 to 3,400 miles) and their infrastructure. \n\nEast–West tensions rapidly subsided through the mid-to-late 1980s, culminating with the final summit in Moscow in 1989, when Gorbachev and George H. W. Bush signed the START I arms control treaty. During the following year it became apparent to the Soviets that oil and gas subsidies, along with the cost of maintaining massive troops levels, represented a substantial economic drain. In addition, the security advantage of a buffer zone was recognised as irrelevant and the Soviets officially declared that they would no longer intervene in the affairs of allied states in Central and Eastern Europe. \n\nIn 1989, Soviet forces withdrew from Afghanistan and by 1990 Gorbachev consented to German reunification, the only alternative being a Tiananmen scenario. When the Berlin Wall came down, Gorbachev's \"Common European Home\" concept began to take shape. \n\nOn 3 December 1989, Gorbachev and Reagan's successor, George H. W. Bush, declared the Cold War over at the Malta Summit; a year later, the two former rivals were partners in the Gulf War against Iraq. \n\nEast Europe breaks away\n\nBy 1989, the Soviet alliance system was on the brink of collapse, and, deprived of Soviet military support, the communist leaders of the Warsaw Pact states were losing power. Grassroots organizations, such as Poland's Solidarity movement, rapidly gained ground with strong popular bases. In 1989, the communist governments in Poland and Hungary became the first to negotiate the organizing of competitive elections. In Czechoslovakia and East Germany, mass protests unseated entrenched communist leaders. The communist regimes in Bulgaria and Romania also crumbled, in the latter case as the result of a violent uprising. Attitudes had changed enough that US Secretary of State James Baker suggested that the American government would not be opposed to Soviet intervention in Romania, on behalf of the opposition, to prevent bloodshed. The tidal wave of change culminated with the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989, which symbolized the collapse of European communist governments and graphically ended the Iron Curtain divide of Europe. The 1989 revolutionary wave swept across Central and Eastern Europe peacefully overthrew all the Soviet-style communist states: East Germany, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Bulgaria; Romania was the only Eastern-bloc country to topple its communist regime violently and execute its head of state. \n\nSoviet republics break away\n\nIn the USSR itself, glasnost weakened the bonds that held the Soviet Union together and by February 1990, with the dissolution of the USSR looming, the Communist Party was forced to surrender its 73-year-old monopoly on state power. \nAt the same time freedom of press and dissent allowed by glasnost and the festering \"nationalities question\" increasingly led the Union's component republics to declare their autonomy from Moscow, with the Baltic states withdrawing from the Union entirely. \n\nSoviet dissolution\n\nGorbachev's permissive attitude toward Central and Eastern Europe did not initially extend to Soviet territory; even Bush, who strove to maintain friendly relations, condemned the January 1991 killings in Latvia and Lithuania, privately warning that economic ties would be frozen if the violence continued. The USSR was fatally weakened by a failed coup and a growing number of Soviet republics, particularly Russia, who threatened to secede from the USSR. The Commonwealth of Independent States, created on 21 December 1991, is viewed as a successor entity to the Soviet Union but, according to Russia's leaders, its purpose was to \"allow a civilized divorce\" between the Soviet Republics and is comparable to a loose confederation. The USSR was declared officially dissolved on 25 December 1991. \n\nAftermath\n\nAfter the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Russia drastically cut military spending, and restructuring the economy left millions unemployed. The capitalist reforms culminated in a recession in the early 1990s more severe than the Great Depression as experienced by the United States and Germany. \n\nThe Cold War continues to influence world affairs. The post-Cold War world is considered to be unipolar, with the United States the sole remaining superpower. The Cold War defined the political role of the United States after World War II—by 1989 the United States had military alliances with 50 countries, with 526,000 troops stationed abroad, with 326,000 in Europe (two-thirds of which in west Germany) and 130,000 in Asia (mainly Japan and South Korea). The Cold War also marked the zenith of peacetime military–industrial complexes, especially in the United States, and large-scale military funding of science. These complexes, though their origins may be found as early as the 19th century, snowballed considerably during the Cold War. \n\nCumulative U.S. military expenditures throughout the entire Cold War amounted to an estimated $8 trillion. Further nearly 100,000 Americans lost their lives in the Korean and Vietnam Wars. Although Soviet casualties are difficult to estimate, as a share of their gross national product the financial cost for the Soviet Union was much higher than that incurred by the United States. \n\nIn addition to the loss of life by uniformed soldiers, millions died in the superpowers' proxy wars around the globe, most notably in Southeast Asia. Most of the proxy wars and subsidies for local conflicts ended along with the Cold War; interstate wars, ethnic wars, revolutionary wars, as well as refugee and displaced persons crises have declined sharply in the post-Cold War years. Left over from the Cold War are numbers stations, which are shortwave radio stations thought to be used to broadcast covert messages, some of which can still be heard today.\n\nThe aftermath of Cold War conflict, however, is not always easily erased, as many of the economic and social tensions that were exploited to fuel Cold War competition in parts of the Third World remain acute. The breakdown of state control in a number of areas formerly ruled by communist governments produced new civil and ethnic conflicts, particularly in the former Yugoslavia. In Central and Eastern Europe, the end of the Cold War has ushered in an era of economic growth and an increase in the number of liberal democracies, while in other parts of the world, such as Afghanistan, independence was accompanied by state failure.\n\nIn popular culture\n\nDuring the Cold War itself, with the United States and the Soviet Union invested heavily in propaganda designed to influence the hearts and minds of people around the world, especially using motion pictures. \n\nThe Cold War endures as a popular topic reflected extensively in entertainment media, and continuing to the present with numerous post-1991 Cold War-themed feature films, novels, television, and other media. In 2013, a KGB-sleeper-agents-living-next-door action drama series, The Americans, set in the early 1980s, was ranked #6 on the Metacritic annual Best New TV Shows list and is in its second season. At the same time, movies like Crimson Tide (1995) are shown in their entirety to educate college students about the Cold War. \n\nHistoriography\n\nAs soon as the term \"Cold War\" was popularized to refer to post-war tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union, interpreting the course and origins of the conflict has been a source of heated controversy among historians, political scientists, and journalists. In particular, historians have sharply disagreed as to who was responsible for the breakdown of Soviet–US relations after the Second World War; and whether the conflict between the two superpowers was inevitable, or could have been avoided. Historians have also disagreed on what exactly the Cold War was, what the sources of the conflict were, and how to disentangle patterns of action and reaction between the two sides.\n\nAlthough explanations of the origins of the conflict in academic discussions are complex and diverse, several general schools of thought on the subject can be identified. Historians commonly speak of three differing approaches to the study of the Cold War: \"orthodox\" accounts, \"revisionism\", and \"post-revisionism\".\n\n\"Orthodox\" accounts place responsibility for the Cold War on the Soviet Union and its expansion further into Europe. \"Revisionist\" writers place more responsibility for the breakdown of post-war peace on the United States, citing a range of US efforts to isolate and confront the Soviet Union well before the end of World War II. \"Post-revisionists\" see the events of the Cold War as more nuanced, and attempt to be more balanced in determining what occurred during the Cold War. Much of the historiography on the Cold War weaves together two or even all three of these broad categories.", "The Iron Curtain formed the imaginary boundary dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War II in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991. The term symbolized efforts by the Soviet Union to block itself and its satellite states from open contact with the West and non-Soviet-controlled areas. On the east side of the Iron Curtain were the countries that were connected to or influenced by the Soviet Union. On either side of the Iron Curtain, states developed their own international economic and military alliances:\n\n* Member countries of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the Warsaw Pact, with the Soviet Union as the leading state\n* Member countries of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (commonly abbreviated to NATO) and with the United States as the pre-eminent power\n\nPhysically, the Iron Curtain took the form of border defenses between the countries of Europe in the middle of the continent. The most notable border was marked by the Berlin Wall and its Checkpoint Charlie, which served as a symbol of the Curtain as a whole. \n\nThe events that demolished the Iron Curtain started in discontent in Poland, and continued in Hungary, the German Democratic Republic (East Germany), Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, and Romania. Romania became the only communist state in Europe to overthrow its totalitarian government with violence. \n\nThe use of the term iron curtain as a metaphor for strict separation goes back at least as far as the early 19th century. It originally referred to fireproof curtains in theaters. Although its popularity as a Cold War symbol is attributed to its use in a speech Winston Churchill gave in March 1946 in Fulton, Missouri, Nazi Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels had already used the term in reference to the Soviet Union.\n\nPre–Cold War usage\n\nVarious usages of the term \"iron curtain\" (; ; ; ; ; , , , , ) pre-date Churchill's use of the phrase. The concept goes back to the Babylonian Talmud of the 3rd to 5th centuries CE, where Tractate Sota 38b refers to a \"mechitza shel barzel\", an iron barrier or divider: \"אפילו מחיצה של ברזל אינה מפסקת בין ישראל לאביהם שבשמים\" (Even an iron barrier cannot separate [the people of] Israel from their heavenly father).\n\nThe term \"iron curtain\" has since been used metaphorically in two rather different senses - firstly to denote the end of an era and secondly to denote a closed geopolitical border. \nThe source of these metaphors can refer to either the safety curtain deployed in theatres (the first one was installed by the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in 1794 ) or to roller shutters used to secure commercial premises. \n\nThe first metaphorical usage of \"iron curtain\", in the sense of an end of an era, perhaps should be attributed to British author Arthur Machen (1863–1947), who used the term in his 1895 novel The Three Impostors: \" . . . the door clanged behind me with the noise of thunder, and I felt that an iron curtain had fallen on the brief passage of my life\". It is interesting to note the English translation of a Russian text shown immediately below repeats the use of \"clang\" with reference to an \"iron curtain\", suggesting that the Russian writer, publishing 23 years after Machen, may have been familiar with the popular British author.\n\nQueen Elisabeth of the Belgians used the term \"Iron Curtain\" in the context of World War I to describe the political situation between Belgium and Germany in 1914. \n\nThe first recorded application of the term to Communist Russia, again in the sense of the end of an era, comes in Vasily Rozanov's 1918 polemic The Apocalypse of Our Times, and it is possible that Churchill read it there following the publication of the book's English translation in 1920. The passage runs:\n\nWith clanging, creaking, and squeaking, an iron curtain is lowering over Russian History. \"The performance is over.\" The audience got up. \"Time to put on your fur coats and go home.\" We looked around, but the fur coats and homes were missing. \n\n(Incidentally, this same passage provides a definition of nihilism adopted by Raoul Vaneigem, Guy Debord and other Situationists as the intention of situationist intervention.)\n\nThe first English-language use of the term iron curtain applied to the border of communist Russia in the sense of \"an impenetrable barrier\" was used in 1920 by Ethel Snowden, in her book Through Bolshevik Russia. \n\nG.K. Chesterton used the phrase in a 1924 essay in The Illustrated London News. Chesterton, while defending Distributism, refers to \"that iron curtain of industrialism that has cut us off not only from our neighbours' condition, but even from our own past\". \n\nThe term also appears in the 1933 satirical novel England, Their England; used there to describe the way an artillery barrage protected the infantry from an enemy assault: \"...the western sky was a blaze of yellow flame. The iron curtain was down\". Sebastian Haffner used the metaphor in his book Germany: Jekyll & Hyde, published in London in 1940, in introducing his discussion of the Nazi rise to power in Germany in 1933: \"Back then to March 1933. How, a moment before the iron curtain was wrung down on it, did the German political stage appear?\" \n\nAll German theatres had to install an iron curtain (eiserner Vorhang) as an obligatory precaution to prevent the possibility of fire spreading from the stage to the rest of the theatre. Such fires were rather common because the decor often was very flammable. In case of fire, a metal wall would separate the stage from the theatre, secluding the flames to be extinguished by firefighters. Douglas Reed used this metaphor in his book Disgrace Abounding: \"The bitter strife [in Yugoslavia between Serb unionists and Croat federalists] had only been hidden by the iron safety-curtain of the King's dictatorship\". \n\nA May 1943 article in Signal, a Nazi illustrated propaganda periodical published in many languages, bore the title \"Behind the Iron Curtain\". It discussed \"the iron curtain that more than ever before separates the world from the Soviet Union\". The German Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels wrote in his weekly newspaper Das Reich that if the Nazis should lose the war a Soviet-formed \"iron curtain\" would arise because of agreements made by Stalin, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill at the Yalta Conference: \"An iron curtain would fall over this enormous territory controlled by the Soviet Union, behind which nations would be slaughtered\". The first recorded oral intentional mention of an Iron Curtain in the Soviet context occurred in a broadcast by Lutz von Krosigk to the German people on 2 May 1945: \"In the East the iron curtain behind which, unseen by the eyes of the world, the work of destruction goes on, is moving steadily forward\". \n\nChurchill's first recorded use of the term \"iron curtain\" came in a 12 May 1945 telegram he sent to U.S. President Harry S. Truman regarding his concern about Soviet actions, stating \"[a]n iron curtain is drawn down upon their front. We do not know what is going on behind\". He was further concerned about \"another immense flight of the German population westward as this enormous Muscovite advance towards the centre of Europe\". Churchill concluded \"then the curtain will descend again to a very large extent, if not entirely. Thus a broad land of many hundreds of miles of Russian-occupied territory will isolate us from Poland\". \n\nChurchill repeated the words in a further telegram to President Truman on 4 June 1945, in which he protested against such a U.S. retreat to what was earlier designated as, and ultimately became, the U.S. occupation zone, saying the military withdrawal would bring \"Soviet power into the heart of Western Europe and the descent of an iron curtain between us and everything to the eastward\". At the Potsdam Conference, Churchill complained to Stalin about an \"iron fence\" coming down upon the British Mission in Bucharest.\n\nThe first American print reference to the \"Iron Curtain\" occurred when C.L. Sulzberger of The New York Times first used it in a dispatch published on 23 July 1945. He had heard the term used by Vladko Maček, a Croatian politician, a Yugoslav opposition leader who had fled his homeland for Paris in May 1945. Maček told Sulzberger, \"During the four years while I was interned by the Germans in Croatia I saw how the Partisans were lowering an iron curtain over Jugoslavia [Yugoslavia] so that nobody could know what went on behind it\". \n\nThe term was first used in the British House of Commons by Churchill on 16 August 1945 when he stated \"it is not impossible that tragedy on a prodigious scale is unfolding itself behind the iron curtain which at the moment divides Europe in twain\". \n\nAllen Dulles used the term in a speech on 3 December 1945, referring to only Germany, following his conclusion that \"in general the Russians are acting little better than thugs\", had \"wiped out all the liquid assets\", and refused to issue food cards to emigrating Germans, leaving them \"often more dead than alive\". Dulles concluded that \"[a]n iron curtain has descended over the fate of these people and very likely conditions are truly terrible. The promises at Yalta to the contrary, probably 8 to 10 million people are being enslaved\".\n\nDuring the Cold War\n\nBuilding antagonism\n\nThe antagonism between the Soviet Union and the West that came to be described as the \"iron curtain\" had various origins.\n\nThe Allied Powers and the Central Powers had backed the White movement against the Bolsheviks during the 1918–1920 Russian Civil War, and the Soviets had not forgotten the fact.\n\nDuring the summer of 1939, after conducting negotiations both with a British-French group and with Nazi Germany regarding potential military and political agreements, \nthe Soviet Union and Nazi Germany signed the German–Soviet Commercial Agreement (which provided for the trade of certain German military and civilian equipment in exchange for Soviet raw materials) \n and the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (signed in late August 1939), named after the foreign secretaries of the two countries (Vyacheslav Molotov and Joachim von Ribbentrop), which included a secret agreement to split Poland and Eastern Europe between the two states. \n\nThe Soviets thereafter occupied Eastern Poland (September 1939), Latvia (June 1940), Lithuania (1940), northern Romania (Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, late June 1940), Estonia (1940) and eastern Finland (March 1940). From August 1939, relations between the West and the Soviets deteriorated further when the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany engaged in an extensive economic relationship by which the Soviet Union sent Germany vital oil, rubber, manganese and other materials in exchange for German weapons, manufacturing machinery and technology. \nNazi-Soviet trade ended in June 1941 when Germany broke the Pact and invaded the Soviet Union in Operation Barbarossa.\n\nIn the course of World War II, Stalin determined to acquire a buffer area against Germany, with pro-Soviet states on its border in an Eastern bloc. Stalin's aims led to strained relations at the Yalta Conference (February 1945) and the subsequent Potsdam Conference (August 1945). \nPeople in the West expressed opposition to Soviet domination over the buffer states, and the fear grew that the Soviets were building an empire that might be a threat to them and their interests.\n\nNonetheless, at the Potsdam Conference, the Allies assigned parts of Poland, Finland, Romania, Germany, and the Balkans to Soviet control or influence. In return, Stalin promised the Western Allies that he would allow those territories the right to national self-determination. Despite Soviet cooperation during the war, these concessions left many in the West uneasy. In particular, Churchill feared that the United States might return to its pre-war isolationism, leaving the exhausted European states unable to resist Soviet demands. (President Franklin D. Roosevelt had announced at Yalta that after the defeat of Germany, U.S. forces would withdraw from Europe within two years.) \n\nIron Curtain speech\n\nWinston Churchill's \"Sinews of Peace\" address \nof 5 March 1946, at Westminster College, used the term \"iron curtain\" in the context of Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe:\n\nFrom Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an \"Iron Curtain\" has descended across the continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe. Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia; all these famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I must call the Soviet sphere, and all are subject, in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and in some cases increasing measure of control from Moscow.\n\nChurchill's geographical description of the Iron Curtain was ambiguous as to which side of the Iron Curtain the Soviet occupation zones of Germany and Austria were on – Churchill described Berlin and Vienna, then divided into American, British, French and Soviet occupation zones but also surrounded by their countries' respective Soviet zones, as being \"in... the Soviet sphere.\" But Churchill also defined the Baltic terminus of the Iron Curtain as being Stettin, which is on the Oder-Neisse Line, thus implying the Iron Curtain to run along the revised Polish-German border as opposed to the border between the British and Soviet occupation zones in Germany. Had Churchill wanted to imply the Soviet Zone of Germany to be on the eastern side of the Iron Curtain, he should have named Lübeck in place of Stettin. In any event, at the time of Churchill's speech the re-establishment of Austrian and German states with the latter encompassing Germany's pre-1938 territories west of the Oder-Neisse line was assumed to be part of an inevitable final peace settlement.\n\nMuch of the Western public still regarded the Soviet Union as a close ally in the context of the recent defeat of Nazi Germany and of Japan. Although not well received at the time, the phrase iron curtain gained popularity as a shorthand reference to the division of Europe as the Cold War strengthened. The Iron Curtain served to keep people in and information out, and people throughout the West eventually came to accept and use the metaphor. \n\nChurchill's “Sinews of Peace” address was to strongly criticise the Soviet Union's exclusive and secretive tension policies along with the Eastern Europe's state form, Police State (Polizeistaat). He expressed the Allied Nations’ distrust of the Soviet Union after the World War II.\nIn the same year September, US-Soviet Union cooperation line collapsed due to the disavowal of the Soviet Union's opinion on the German problem in the Stuttgart Council, and then followed the U.S. President Harry S. Truman’s announcement of enactment of hard anti-Soviet Union, anticommunism line policy. Since then, this phrase became popular and was widely used as anti-Soviet Union propaganda term in the Western countries. \n\nIn addition, Churchill mentioned in his speech that regions under the Soviet Union’s control were expanding their leverage and power without any restriction. He asserted that in order to put a brake on this ongoing phenomenon, the commanding force of and strong unity between the UK and the U.S. was necessary. \n\nStalin took note of Churchill's speech and responded in Pravda soon afterward. He accused Churchill of warmongering, and defended Soviet \"friendship\" with eastern European states as a necessary safeguard against another invasion. He further accused Churchill of hoping to install right-wing governments in eastern Europe with the goal of agitating those states against the Soviet Union. \n\nPolitical, economic and military realities\n\nEastern Bloc\n\nWhile the Iron Curtain remained in place, much of Eastern Europe and parts of Central Europe (except West Germany, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and Austria) found themselves under the hegemony of the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union annexed:\n\n* Estonia,\n* Latvia \n* Lithuania\nas Soviet Socialist Republics within the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.\n\nGermany effectively gave Moscow a free hand in much of these territories in the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of 1939, signed before Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941.\n\nOther Soviet-annexed territories included:\n\n* Eastern Poland (incorporated into Ukrainian and Byelorussian SSRs), \n* Part of eastern Finland (became part of the Karelo-Finnish SSR) \n* Northern Romania (part of which became the Moldavian SSR). \n*Kaliningrad Oblast, the northern half of East Prussia, taken in 1945.\n\nBetween 1945 and 1949 the Soviets converted the following areas into Soviet satellite states:\n\n* The German Democratic Republic \n* The People's Republic of Bulgaria\n* The People's Republic of Poland\n* The People's Republic of Hungary \n* The Czechoslovak Socialist Republic \n* The People's Republic of Romania\n* The People's Republic of Albania (which re-aligned itself in the 1960s away from the Soviet Union and towards the People's Republic of China)\n\nSoviet-installed governments ruled the Eastern Bloc countries, with the exception of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, which retained its full independence.\n\nThe majority of European states to the east of the Iron Curtain developed their own international economic and military alliances, such as COMECON and the Warsaw Pact.\n\nWest of the Iron Curtain\n\nTo the west of the Iron Curtain, the countries of Western Europe, Northern Europe and Southern Europe – along with Austria, West Germany, Liechtenstein and Switzerland – operated market economies. With the exception of a period of fascism in Spain (until the 1970s) and Portugal (until 1974) and military dictatorship in Greece (1967–1974), democratic governments ruled these countries.\n\nMost of the states of Europe to the west of the Iron Curtain – with the exception of neutral Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria, Sweden, Finland, Malta and Republic of Ireland – allied themselves with the United States and Canada within NATO. Economically, the European Community and the European Free Trade Association represented Western counterparts to COMECON. Most of the nominally neutral states were economically closer to the United States than they were to the Warsaw Pact.\n\nFurther division in the late 1940s\n\nIn January 1947 Harry Truman appointed General George Marshall as Secretary of State, scrapped Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) directive 1067 (which embodied the Morgenthau Plan) and supplanted it with JCS 1779, which decreed that an orderly and prosperous Europe requires the economic contributions of a stable and productive Germany.\" Administration officials met with Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov and others to press for an economically self-sufficient Germany, including a detailed accounting of the industrial plants, goods and infrastructure already removed by the Soviets. \n\nAfter five and a half weeks of negotiations, Molotov refused the demands and the talks were adjourned. Marshall was particularly discouraged after personally meeting with Stalin, who expressed little interest in a solution to German economic problems. The United States concluded that a solution could not wait any longer. In a 5 June 1947 speech, Marshall announced a comprehensive program of American assistance to all European countries wanting to participate, including the Soviet Union and those of Eastern Europe, called the Marshall Plan.\n\nStalin opposed the Marshall Plan. He had built up the Eastern Bloc protective belt of Soviet controlled nations on his Western border, and wanted to maintain this buffer zone of states combined with a weakened Germany under Soviet control. Fearing American political, cultural and economic penetration, Stalin eventually forbade Soviet Eastern bloc countries of the newly formed Cominform from accepting Marshall Plan aid. In Czechoslovakia, that required a Soviet-backed Czechoslovak coup d'état of 1948,Airbridge to Berlin, \"Eye of the Storm\" chapter the brutality of which shocked Western powers more than any event so far and set in a motion a brief scare that war would occur and swept away the last vestiges of opposition to the Marshall Plan in the United States Congress. \n\nRelations further deteriorated when, in January 1948, the U.S. State Department also published a collection of documents titled Nazi-Soviet Relations, 1939 – 1941: Documents from the Archives of The German Foreign Office, which contained documents recovered from the Foreign Office of Nazi Germany revealing Soviet conversations with Germany regarding the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, including its secret protocol dividing eastern Europe, the 1939 German-Soviet Commercial Agreement, and discussions of the Soviet Union potentially becoming the fourth Axis Power. In response, one month later, the Soviet Union published Falsifiers of History, a Stalin-edited and partially re-written book attacking the West. \n\nAfter the Marshall Plan, the introduction of a new currency to Western Germany to replace the debased Reichsmark and massive electoral losses for communist parties, in June 1948, the Soviet Union cut off surface road access to Berlin, initiating the Berlin Blockade, which cut off all non-Soviet food, water and other supplies for the citizens of the non-Soviet sectors of Berlin. Because Berlin was located within the Soviet-occupied zone of Germany, the only available methods of supplying the city were three limited air corridors. A massive aerial supply campaign was initiated by the United States, Britain, France and other countries, the success of which caused the Soviets to lift their blockade in May 1949.\n\nEmigration restrictions\n\nOne of the conclusions of the Yalta Conference was that the western Allies would return all Soviet citizens who found themselves in their zones to the Soviet Union. This affected the liberated Soviet prisoners of war (branded as traitors), forced laborers, anti-Soviet collaborators with the Germans, and anti-communist refugees. \n\nMigration from east to west of the Iron Curtain, except under limited circumstances, was effectively halted after 1950. Before 1950, over 15 million people (mainly ethnic Germans) emigrated from Soviet-occupied eastern European countries to the west in the five years immediately following World War II. However, restrictions implemented during the Cold War stopped most East-West migration, with only 13.3 million migrations westward between 1950 and 1990. More than 75% of those emigrating from Eastern Bloc countries between 1950 and 1990 did so under bilateral agreements for \"ethnic migration.\"\n\nAbout 10% were refugees permitted to emigrate under the Geneva Convention of 1951. Most Soviets allowed to leave during this time period were ethnic Jews permitted to emigrate to Israel after a series of embarrassing defections in 1970 caused the Soviets to open very limited ethnic emigrations. The fall of the Iron Curtain was accompanied by a massive rise in European East-West migration.\n\nAs a physical entity\n\nThe Iron Curtain took physical shape in the form of border defenses between the countries of western and eastern Europe. These were some of the most heavily militarised areas in the world, particularly the so-called \"inner German border\" – commonly known as die Grenze in German – between East and West Germany. The inner German border was marked in rural areas by double fences made of steel mesh (expanded metal) with sharp edges, while near urban areas a high concrete barrier similar to the Berlin Wall was built. The installation of the Wall in 1961 brought an end to a decade during which the divided capital of divided Germany was one of the easiest places to move west across the Iron Curtain. \n\nThe barrier was always a short distance inside East German territory to avoid any intrusion into Western territory. The actual borderline was marked by posts and signs and was overlooked by numerous watchtowers set behind the barrier. The strip of land on the West German side of the barrier – between the actual borderline and the barrier – was readily accessible but only at considerable personal risk, because it was patrolled by both East and West German border guards.\n\nSeveral villages, many historic, were destroyed as they lay too close to the border, for example Erlebach. Shooting incidents were not uncommon, and a total of 28 East German border guards and several hundred civilians were killed between 1948 – 1981 (some may have been victims of \"friendly fire\" by their own side).\n\nElsewhere along the border between West and East, the defense works resembled those on the intra-German border. During the Cold War, the border zone in Hungary started 15 km from the border. Citizens could only enter the area if they lived in the zone or had a passport valid for traveling out. Traffic control points and patrols enforced this regulation.\n\nThose who lived within the 15 km border-zone needed special permission to enter the area within 5 km of the border. The area was very difficult to approach and heavily fortified. In the 1950s and 1960s, a double barbed-wire fence was installed 50 m from the border. The space between the two fences were laden with land mines. The minefield was later replaced with an electric signal fence (about 1 km from the border) and a barbed wire fence, along with guard towers and a sand strip to track border violations.\n\nRegular patrols sought to prevent escape attempts. They included cars and mounted units. Guards and dog patrol units watched the border 24/7 and were authorised to use their weapons to stop escapees. The wire fence nearest the actual border was irregularly displaced from the actual border, which was marked only by stones. Anyone attempting to escape would have to cross up to 400 m before they could cross the actual border. Several escape attempts failed when the escapees were stopped after crossing the outer fence.\n\nIn parts of Czechoslovakia, the border strip became hundreds of meters wide, and an area of increasing restrictions was defined as the border was approached. Only people with the appropriate government permissions were allowed to get close to the border.\n\nIn Greece, a highly militarised area called the \"Επιτηρούμενη Ζώνη\" (\"Surveillance Area\") was created by the Greek Army along the Greek-Bulgarian border, subject to significant security-related regulations and restrictions. Inhabitants within this 25 km wide strip of land were forbidden to drive cars, own land bigger than 60 m2 and had to travel within the area with a special passport issued by Greek military authorities. Additionally, the Greek state used this area to encapsulate and monitor a non-Greek ethnic minority, the Pomaks, a Muslim and Bulgarian-speaking minority which was regarded as hostile to the interests of the Greek state during the Cold War because of its familiarity with their fellow Pomaks living on the other side of the Iron Curtain. \n\nThe Hungarian outer fence became the first part of the Iron Curtain to be dismantled. After the border fortifications were dismantled, a section was rebuilt for a formal ceremony. On 27 June 1989, the foreign ministers of Austria and Hungary, Alois Mock and Gyula Horn, ceremonially cut through the border defences separating their countries.\n\nThe creation of these highly militarised no-man's lands led to de facto nature reserves and created a wildlife corridor across Europe; this helped the spread of several species to new territories. Since the fall of the Iron Curtain, several initiatives are pursuing the creation of a European Green Belt nature preserve area along the Iron Curtain's former route. In fact, a long-distance cycling route along the length of the former border called the Iron Curtain Trail (ICT) exists as a project of the European Union and other associated nations. The trail is long and spans from Finland to Greece. \n\nThe term \"Iron Curtain\" was only used for the fortified borders in Europe; it was not used for similar borders in Asia between communist and capitalist states (these were, for a time, dubbed the Bamboo Curtain). The border between North Korea and South Korea is very comparable to the former inner German border, particularly in its degree of militarisation, but it has never conventionally been considered part of any Iron Curtain.\n\nHelmstedt-Marienborn crossing\n\nImage:Grensovergang-helmstedt-marienborn-paspoortcontrole-personenautos-04.JPG\nImage:Grensovergang-helmstedt-marienborn-paspoortcontrole-vrachtautos.JPG\nImage:Grensovergang-helmstedt-marienborn-lichtmast-commandotoren-brug.JPG\nImage:Grensovergang-helmstedt-marienborn-lichtmast-02.JPG\n\nFall of the Iron Curtain\n\nFollowing a period of economic and political stagnation under Brezhnev and his immediate successors, the Soviet Union decreased its intervention in Eastern Bloc politics. Mikhail Gorbachev (General Secretary from 1985) decreased adherence to the Brezhnev Doctrine, which held that if socialism were threatened in any state then other socialist governments had an obligation to intervene to preserve it, in favor of the \"Sinatra Doctrine\". He also initiated the policies of glasnost (openness) and perestroika (economic restructuring). A wave of Revolutions occurred throughout the Eastern Bloc in 1989. \n\nIn April 1989 the People's Republic of Poland legalised the Solidarity organisation, which captured 99% of available parliamentary seats in June. These elections, in which anti-communist candidates won a striking victory, inaugurated a series of peaceful anti-communist revolutions in Central and Eastern Europe \n\n that eventually culminated in the fall of communism. \n\nOn 19 August 1989, more than 600 East Germans attending the \"Pan-European Picnic\" on the Hungarian border broke through the Iron Curtain and fled into Austria. Hungarian border guards had threatened to shoot anyone crossing the border, but when the time came, they did not intervene and allowed the people to cross. In a historic session from 16 to 20 October, the Hungarian parliament adopted legislation providing for multi-party parliamentary elections and a direct presidential election. \n\nThe legislation transformed Hungary from a People's Republic into the Republic of Hungary, guaranteed human and civil rights, and created an institutional structure that ensured separation of powers among the judicial, legislative, and executive branches of government. In November 1989, following mass protests in East Germany and the relaxing of border restrictions in Czechoslovakia, tens of thousands of East Berliners flooded checkpoints along the Berlin Wall, crossing into West Berlin.\n\nIn the People's Republic of Bulgaria, the day after the mass crossings across the Berlin Wall, leader Todor Zhivkov was ousted. In the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, following protests of an estimated half-million Czechoslovaks, the government permitted travel to the west and abolished provisions guaranteeing the ruling Communist party its leading role, preceding the Velvet Revolution. \n\nIn the Socialist Republic of Romania, on 22 December 1989, the Romanian military sided with protesters and turned on Communist ruler Nicolae Ceauşescu, who was executed after a brief trial three days later. In the People's Socialist Republic of Albania, a new package of regulations went into effect on 3 July 1990 entitling all Albanians over the age of 16 to own a passport for foreign travel. Meanwhile, hundreds of Albanian citizens gathered around foreign embassies to seek political asylum and flee the country.\n\nThe Berlin Wall officially remained guarded after 9 November 1989, although the inter-German border had become effectively meaningless. The official dismantling of the Wall by the East German military did not begin until June 1990. In July 1990, the day East Germany adopted the West German currency, all border-controls ceased and West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl convinced Gorbachev to drop Soviet objections to a reunited Germany within NATO in return for substantial German economic aid to the Soviet Union.\n\nMonuments\n\nThere is an Iron Curtain monument in the southern part of the Czech Republic at approximately . A few hundred meters of the original fence, and one of the guard towers, has remained installed. There are interpretive signs in Czech and English that explain the history and significance of the Iron Curtain. This is the only surviving part of the fence in the Czech Republic, though several guard towers and bunkers can still be seen. Some of these are part of the Communist Era defences, some are from the never-used Czechoslovak border fortifications in defence against Adolf Hitler, and some towers were, or have become, hunting platforms.\n\nAnother monument is located in Fertőrákos, Hungary, at the site of the Pan-European Picnic. On the eastern hill of the stone quarry stands a metal sculpture by Gabriela von Habsburg. It is a column made of metal and barbed wire with the date of the Pan-European Picnic and the names of participants. On the ribbon under the board is the Latin text:” In necessariis unitas – in dubiis libertas – in omnibus caritas.” (Unity in unavoidable matters – freedom in doubtful matters – love in all things.) The memorial symbolises the iron curtain and recalls forever the memories of the border breakthrough in 1989.\n\nAnother monument is located in the village of Devín, now part of Bratislava, Slovakia, at the confluence of the Danube and Morava rivers.\n\nThere are several open air museums in parts of the former inner German border, as for example in Berlin and in Mödlareuth, a village that has been divided for several hundred years. The memory of the division is being kept alive in many other places along the Grenze.\n\nAnalogous terms\n\nThroughout the Cold War the term \"curtain\" would become a common euphemism for boundaries – physical or ideological – between communist and capitalist states.\n\n* An analogue of the Iron Curtain, the Bamboo Curtain, surrounded the People's Republic of China. As the standoff between the West and the countries of the Iron and Bamboo curtains eased with the end of the Cold War, the term fell out of any but historical usage.\n* The short distance between Russia and the U.S state of Alaska in the Bering Sea became known as the \"Ice Curtain\" during the Cold War.\n*A field of cacti surrounding the U.S. Naval station at Guantanamo Bay planted by Cuba was occasionally termed the \"Cactus Curtain\" . \n\nUse in video games \n\nThe Iron Curtain is a superweapon that appears in the Red Alert (series) games from the video game series Command and Conquer. In the games, it gives vehicles under your control invulnerability from damage for a short period of time." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Harry_Potter.txt", "Harry_Potter_and_the_Philosopher's_Stone.txt" ], "title": [ "Harry Potter", "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" ], "wiki_context": [ "Harry Potter is a series of fantasy novels written by British author J. K. Rowling. The novels chronicle the life of a young wizard, Harry Potter, and his friends Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The main story arc concerns Harry's struggle against Lord Voldemort, a dark wizard who intends to become immortal, overthrow the wizard governing body known as the Ministry of Magic, and subjugate all wizards and non-magical people (Muggles).\n\nSince the release of the first novel, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, on 30 June 1997, the books have found immense popularity, critical acclaim and commercial success worldwide. They have attracted a wide adult audience as well as younger readers, and are often considered cornerstones of modern young adult literature. The series has also had its share of criticism, including concern about the increasingly dark tone as the series progressed, as well as the often gruesome and graphic violence it depicts. , the books have sold more than 450 million copies worldwide, making them the best-selling book series in history, and have been translated into seventy-three languages. The last four books consecutively set records as the fastest-selling books in history, with the final instalment selling roughly eleven million copies in the United States within twenty-four hours of its release.\n\nThe series was originally published in English by two major publishers, Bloomsbury in the United Kingdom and Scholastic Press in the United States. A play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, based on a story by Rowling, premiered in London on 30 July 2016 at the Palace Theatre, and its script was published by Little, Brown as the eighth book in the series. The original seven books were adapted into an eight-part film series by Warner Bros. Pictures, which has become the second highest-grossing film series of all time . The franchise has also generated much tie-in merchandise, making the Harry Potter brand worth in excess of $15 billion. \n\nA series of many genres, including fantasy, drama, coming of age and the British school story (which includes elements of mystery, thriller, adventure, horror and romance), the world of Harry Potter explores numerous themes and includes many cultural meanings and references. According to Rowling, the main theme is death. Other major themes in the series include prejudice, corruption, and madness.\n\nThe success of the books and films has ensured that the Harry Potter franchise continues to expand, with numerous derivative works, a travelling exhibition that premièred in Chicago in 2009, a studio tour in London that opened in 2012, a digital platform on which J.K. Rowling updates the series with new information and insight, and a trilogy of spin-off films premièring in November 2016, among many other developments. Most recently, themed attractions, collectively known as The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, have been built at several Universal Parks & Resorts amusement parks around the world.\n\nPlot\n\nThe central character in the series is Harry Potter, an English orphan who discovers, at the age of eleven, that he is a wizard, though he lives in the ordinary world of non-magical people known as Muggles. The wizarding world exists parallel to the Muggle world, albeit hidden and in secrecy. His magical ability is inborn and children with such abilities are invited to attend exclusive magic schools that teach the necessary skills to succeed in the wizarding world. Harry becomes a student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, a wizarding academy in Scotland and it is here where most of the events in the series take place. As Harry develops through his adolescence, he learns to overcome the problems that face him: magical, social and emotional, including ordinary teenage challenges such as friendships, infatuation, romantic relationships, schoolwork and exams, anxiety, depression, stress, and the greater test of preparing himself for the confrontation, that lies ahead, in wizarding Britain's increasingly-violent second wizarding war. \n\nEach novel chronicles one year in Harry's life during the period from 1991 to 1998. The books also contain many flashbacks, which are frequently experienced by Harry viewing the memories of other characters in a device called a Pensieve.\n\nThe environment Rowling created is intimately connected to reality. The British magical community of the Harry Potter books is inspired by 1990s British culture, European folklore, classical mythology and alchemy, incorporating objects and wildlife such as magic wands, magic plants, potions, spells, flying broomsticks, centaurs and other magical creatures, the Deathly Hallows, and the Philosopher's Stone, beside others invented by Rowling. While the fantasy land of Narnia is an alternate universe and the Lord of the Rings Middle-earth a mythic past, the wizarding world of Harry Potter exists in parallel within the real world and contains magical versions of the ordinary elements of everyday life, with the action mostly set in Scotland (Hogwarts), the West Country, Devon, London and Surrey in southeast England. The world only accessible to wizards and magical beings comprises a fragmented collection of overlooked hidden streets, ancient pubs, lonely country manors and secluded castles invisible to the Muggle population. \n\nEarly years\n\nWhen the first novel of the series, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (published in America and other countries as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone) opens, it is apparent that some significant event has taken place in the wizarding world – an event so very remarkable, even the Muggles (non-magical people) notice signs of it. The full background to this event and Harry Potter's past is revealed gradually through the series. After the introductory chapter, the book leaps forward to a time shortly before Harry Potter's eleventh birthday, and it is at this point that his magical background begins to be revealed.\n\nHarry's first contact with the wizarding world is through a half-giant, Rubeus Hagrid, keeper of grounds and keys at Hogwarts. Hagrid reveals some of Harry's history. Harry learns that, as a baby, he witnessed his parents' murder by the power-obsessed Dark wizard Lord Voldemort, who subsequently attempted to kill him as well. For reasons not revealed until the fifth book, the spell with which Voldemort tried to kill Harry, rebounded. Harry survived with only a lightning-shaped scar on his forehead as a memento of the attack and Voldemort disappeared afterwards. As its inadvertent saviour from Voldemort's reign of terror, Harry has become a living legend in the wizarding world. However, at the orders of the venerable and well-known wizard Albus Dumbledore, the orphaned Harry had been placed in the home of his unpleasant Muggle relatives, the Dursleys, who kept him safe but treated him poorly, having him live in a cupboard and do chores while doting on their spoiled son Dudley. Petunia Dursley was jealous of her sister's magical abilities as a child, and later came to believe that all wizards were freaks. Therefore, the Dursleys hated wizards, so they hid Harry's true heritage from him, saying his parents died in a car crash in the hope that he would grow up \"normal\".\n\nWith Hagrid's help, Harry prepares for and undertakes his first year of study at Hogwarts. As Harry begins to explore the magical world, the reader is introduced to many of the primary locations used throughout the series. Harry meets most of the main characters and gains his two closest friends: Ron Weasley, a fun-loving member of an ancient, large, happy, but poor wizarding family, and Hermione Granger, a gifted and very hardworking witch of non-magical parentage. Harry also encounters the school's potions master, Severus Snape, who displays a conspicuously deep and abiding dislike for him, and the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Quirinus Quirrell, who later turns out to be controlled by Lord Voldemort. The first book concludes with Harry's second confrontation with Lord Voldemort, who, in his quest for immortality, yearns to gain the power of the Philosopher's Stone, a substance that bestows everlasting life.\n\nThe series continues with Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, describing Harry's second year at Hogwarts. He and his friends investigate a 50-year-old mystery that appears uncannily related to recent sinister events at the school. Ron's younger sister, Ginny Weasley, enrolls in her first year at Hogwarts, and finds an old notebook which turns out to be Voldemort's diary from his school days. Ginny becomes possessed by Voldemort through the diary and unconsciously opens the \"Chamber of Secrets\", unleashing an ancient monster, later revealed to be a basilisk, which begins attacking students at Hogwarts. The novel delves into the history of Hogwarts and a legend revolving around the Chamber that soon frightened everyone in the school. The book also introduces a new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Gilderoy Lockhart, a highly cheerful, self-conceited wizard who goes around as if he is the most wonderful person who ever existed, who knows absolutely every single thing there is to know about everything, who later turns out to be a fraud. Harry discovers that prejudice exists in the wizarding world, and learns that Voldemort's reign of terror was often directed at wizards who were descended from Muggles. Harry also learns that his ability to speak the snake language Parseltongue is rare and often associated with the Dark Arts. The novel ends after Harry saves Ginny's life by destroying the basilisk and the enchanted diary which has been the source of the problems.\n\nThe third novel, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, follows Harry in his third year of magical education. It is the only book in the series which does not feature Lord Voldemort. Instead, Harry must deal with the knowledge that he has been targeted by Sirius Black, his father's best friend, and, according to the Wizarding World, an escaped mass murderer who assisted in the deaths of Harry's parents. As Harry struggles with his reaction to the dementors – dark creatures with the power to devour a human soul, which feed on despair – which are ostensibly protecting the school, he reaches out to Remus Lupin, a Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher who is eventually revealed to be a werewolf. Lupin teaches Harry defensive measures which are well above the level of magic generally executed by people his age. Harry came to know that both Lupin and Black were best friends of his father and that Black was framed by their fourth friend, Peter Pettigrew. In this book, a recurring theme throughout the series is emphasised – in every book there is a new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, none of whom lasts more than one school year.\n\nVoldemort returns\n\nDuring Harry's fourth year of school (detailed in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire), Harry is unwillingly entered as a participant in the Triwizard Tournament, a dangerous contest where three \"champions\", one from each participating school, must compete with each other in three tasks in order to win the triwizard cup. This year, Harry must compete against a witch and a wizard \"champion\" from visiting schools Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, as well as another Hogwarts student, causing Harry's friends to distance themselves from him. Harry is guided through the tournament by their new Defence Against the Dark Arts professor, Alastor \"Mad-Eye\" Moody, who turns out to be an impostor – one of Voldemort's supporters named Barty Crouch, Jr. in disguise. The point at which the mystery is unravelled marks the series' shift from foreboding and uncertainty into open conflict. Voldemort's plan to have Crouch use the tournament to bring Harry to Voldemort succeeds. Although Harry manages to escape, Cedric Diggory, the other Hogwarts champion in the tournament, is killed by Peter Pettigrew and Voldemort re-enters the wizarding world with a physical body.\n\nIn the fifth book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry must confront the newly resurfaced Voldemort. In response to Voldemort's reappearance, Dumbledore re-activates the Order of the Phoenix, a secret society which works from Sirius Black's dark family home to defeat Voldemort's minions and protect Voldemort's targets, especially Harry. Despite Harry's description of Voldemort's recent activities, the Ministry of Magic and many others in the magical world refuse to believe that Voldemort has returned. In an attempt to counter and eventually discredit Dumbledore, who along with Harry is the most prominent voice in the wizarding world attempting to warn of Voldemort's return, the Ministry appoints Dolores Umbridge as the High Inquisitor of Hogwarts and the new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. She transforms the school into a dictatorial regime and refuses to allow the students to learn ways to defend themselves against dark magic.\n\nWith Ron and Hermione's suggestion, Harry forms \"Dumbledore's Army\", a secret study group aimed to teach his classmates the higher-level skills of Defence Against the Dark Arts that he has learned from his previous encounters with Dark wizards. An important prophecy concerning Harry and Lord Voldemort is revealed, and Harry discovers that he and Voldemort have a painful connection, allowing Harry to view some of Voldemort's actions telepathically. In the novel's climax, Harry and his friends face off against Voldemort's Death Eaters at the Ministry of Magic. Although the timely arrival of members of the Order of the Phoenix saves the children's lives, Sirius Black is killed in the conflict.\n\nIn the sixth book, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Voldemort begins waging open warfare. Harry and his friends are relatively protected from that danger at Hogwarts. They are subject to all the difficulties of adolescence – Harry eventually begins dating Ginny, Ron establishes a strong infatuation with fellow Hogwarts student Lavender Brown, and Hermione starts to develop romantic feelings toward Ron. Near the beginning of the novel, lacking his own book, Harry is given an old potions textbook filled with many annotations and recommendations signed by a mysterious writer; \"the Half-Blood Prince.\" This book is a source of scholastic success and great recognition from their new potions master, Horace Slughorn, but because of the potency of the spells that are written in it, becomes a source of concern. Harry takes private lessons with Dumbledore, who shows him various memories concerning the early life of Voldemort in a device called a Pensieve. These reveal that in order to preserve his life, Voldemort has split his soul into pieces, creating a series of horcruxes – evil enchanted items hidden in various locations, one of which was the diary destroyed in the second book. Harry's snobbish adversary, Draco Malfoy, attempts to attack Dumbledore, and the book culminates in the killing of Dumbledore by Professor Snape, the titular Half-Blood Prince.\n\nHarry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the last book in the series, begins directly after the events of the sixth book. Lord Voldemort has completed his ascension to power and gained control of the Ministry of Magic. Harry, Ron and Hermione drop out of school so that they can find and destroy Voldemort's remaining horcruxes. To ensure their own safety as well as that of their family and friends, they are forced to isolate themselves. As they search for the horcruxes, the trio learns details about Dumbledore's past, as well as Snape's true motives – he had worked on Dumbledore's behalf since the murder of Harry's mother. Snape is killed by Voldemort out of paranoia.\n\nThe book culminates in the Battle of Hogwarts. Harry, Ron and Hermione, in conjunction with members of the Order of the Phoenix and many of the teachers and students, defend Hogwarts from Voldemort, his Death Eaters, and various dangerous magical creatures. Several major characters are killed in the first wave of the battle, including Remus Lupin and Fred Weasley. After learning that he himself is a horcrux, Harry surrenders himself to Voldemort in the Forbidden Forest, who casts a killing curse (Avada Kedavra) at him. The defenders of Hogwarts do not surrender after learning of Harry's presumed death and continue to fight on. Harry awakens and faces Voldemort, whose horcruxes have all been destroyed. In the final battle, Voldemort's killing curse rebounds off Harry's defensive spell (Expelliarmus) killing Voldemort. Harry Potter marries and has children with Ginny Weasley and Hermione Granger marries and has children with Ronald Weasley.\n\nAn epilogue describes the lives of the surviving characters and the effects of Voldemort's death on the wizarding world. It also introduces the children of all the characters.\n\nSupplementary works\n\nHarry Potter and the Cursed Child\n\n \nHarry Potter and the Cursed Child is a two-part West End stage play, and the official eighth Harry Potter story. It was written by Jack Thorne and based on a story by author J. K. Rowling, Thorne and director John Tiffany. The play opened on July 30, 2016 at the Palace Theatre, London, England. The script was released July 31, 2016. The story is set nineteen years after the ending of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and follows Harry Potter, now a Ministry of Magic employee, and his youngest son Albus Severus Potter.\n\nThe play's official synopsis was released on 23 October 2015: \n\nIn-universe books\n\nRowling has expanded the Harry Potter universe with several short books produced for various charities. In 2001, she released Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (a purported Hogwarts textbook) and Quidditch Through the Ages (a book Harry reads for fun). Proceeds from the sale of these two books benefited the charity Comic Relief. In 2007, Rowling composed seven handwritten copies of The Tales of Beedle the Bard, a collection of fairy tales that is featured in the final novel, one of which was auctioned to raise money for the Children's High Level Group, a fund for mentally disabled children in poor countries. The book was published internationally on 4 December 2008. Rowling also wrote an 800-word prequel in 2008 as part of a fundraiser organised by the bookseller Waterstones. All three of these books contain extra information about the wizarding world not included in the original novels.\n\nPottermore website\n\nIn 2011, Rowling launched a new website announcing an upcoming project called Pottermore. Pottermore opened to the general public on 14 April 2012. Pottermore allows users to be sorted, be chosen by their wand and play various minigames. The main purpose of the website was to allow the user to journey though the story with access to content not revealed by JK Rowling previously, with over 18,000 words of additional content. \n\nIn September 2015 the website was completely overhauled and most of the features were removed. The site has been redesigned and it mainly focuses on the information already available, rather than exploration. \n\nStructure and genre\n\nThe Harry Potter novels are mainly directed at a young adult audience as opposed to an audience of middle grade readers, children, or adults. The novels fall within the genre of fantasy literature, and qualify as a unique type of fantasy called \"urban fantasy\", \"contemporary fantasy\", or \"low fantasy\". They are mainly dramas, and maintain a fairly serious and dark tone throughout, though they do contain some notable instances of tragicomedy and black humour. In many respects, they are also examples of the bildungsroman, or coming of age novel, and contain elements of mystery, adventure, horror, thriller, and romance. They can be considered part of the British children's boarding school genre, which includes Rudyard Kipling's Stalky & Co., Enid Blyton's Malory Towers, St. Clare's and the Naughtiest Girl series, and Frank Richards's Billy Bunter novels: the Harry Potter books are predominantly set in Hogwarts, a fictional British boarding school for wizards, where the curriculum includes the use of magic. In this sense they are \"in a direct line of descent from Thomas Hughes's Tom Brown's School Days and other Victorian and Edwardian novels of British public school life\", though they are, as many note, more contemporary, grittier, darker, and more mature than the typical boarding school novel, addressing serious themes of death, love, loss, prejudice, coming-of-age, and the loss of innocence in a 1990's British setting. \n\nThe books are also, in the words of Stephen King, \"shrewd mystery tales\", and each book is constructed in the manner of a Sherlock Holmes-style mystery adventure. The stories are told from a third person limited point of view with very few exceptions (such as the opening chapters of Philosopher's Stone, Goblet of Fire and Deathly Hallows and the first two chapters of Half-Blood Prince).\n\nIn the middle of each book, Harry struggles with the problems he encounters, and dealing with them often involves the need to violate some school rules. If students are caught breaking rules, they are often disciplined by Hogwarts professors. However, the stories reach their climax in the summer term, near or just after final exams, when events escalate far beyond in-school squabbles and struggles, and Harry must confront either Voldemort or one of his followers, the Death Eaters, with the stakes a matter of life and death–a point underlined, as the series progresses, by one or more characters being killed in each of the final four books. In the aftermath, he learns important lessons through exposition and discussions with head teacher and mentor Albus Dumbledore. In the final novel, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Harry and his friends spend most of their time away from Hogwarts, and only return there to face Voldemort at the dénouement. \n\nThemes\n\nAccording to Rowling, a major theme in the series is death: \"My books are largely about death. They open with the death of Harry's parents. There is Voldemort's obsession with conquering death and his quest for immortality at any price, the goal of anyone with magic. I so understand why Voldemort wants to conquer death. We're all frightened of it.\"\n\nAcademics and journalists have developed many other interpretations of themes in the books, some more complex than others, and some including political subtexts. Themes such as normality, oppression, survival, and overcoming imposing odds have all been considered as prevalent throughout the series. Similarly, the theme of making one's way through adolescence and \"going over one's most harrowing ordeals – and thus coming to terms with them\" has also been considered. Rowling has stated that the books comprise \"a prolonged argument for tolerance, a prolonged plea for an end to bigotry\" and that they also pass on a message to \"question authority and... not assume that the establishment or the press tells you all of the truth\". \n\nWhile the books could be said to comprise many other themes, such as power/abuse of power, violence and hatred, love, loss, prejudice, and free choice, they are, as Rowling states, \"deeply entrenched in the whole plot\"; the writer prefers to let themes \"grow organically\", rather than sitting down and consciously attempting to impart such ideas to her readers. Along the same lines is the ever-present theme of adolescence, in whose depiction Rowling has been purposeful in acknowledging her characters' sexualities and not leaving Harry, as she put it, \"stuck in a state of permanent pre-pubescence\". Rowling has also been praised for her nuanced depiction of the ways in which death and violence affects youth, and humanity as a whole. \n\nRowling said that, to her, the moral significance of the tales seems \"blindingly obvious\". The key for her was the choice between what is right and what is easy, \"because that … is how tyranny is started, with people being apathetic and taking the easy route and suddenly finding themselves in deep trouble.\" \n\nOrigins\n\nIn 1990, Rowling was on a crowded train from Manchester to London when the idea for Harry suddenly \"fell into her head\". Rowling gives an account of the experience on her website saying:\n\nRowling completed Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone in 1995 and the manuscript was sent off to several prospective agents. The second agent she tried, Christopher Little, offered to represent her and sent the manuscript to Bloomsbury.\n\nPublishing history\n\n \nAfter eight other publishers had rejected Philosopher's Stone, Bloomsbury offered Rowling a £2,500 advance for its publication. Despite Rowling's statement that she did not have any particular age group in mind when beginning to write the Harry Potter books, the publishers initially targeted children aged nine to eleven. On the eve of publishing, Rowling was asked by her publishers to adopt a more gender-neutral pen name in order to appeal to the male members of this age group, fearing that they would not be interested in reading a novel they knew to be written by a woman. She elected to use J. K. Rowling (Joanne Kathleen Rowling), using her grandmother's name as her second name because she has no middle name. \n\nHarry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was published by Bloomsbury, the publisher of all Harry Potter books in the United Kingdom, on 30 June 1997. It was released in the United States on 1 September 1998 by Scholastic – the American publisher of the books – as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, after Rowling had received US$105,000 for the American rights – an unprecedented amount for a children's book by a then-unknown author. Fearing that American readers would not associate the word \"philosopher\" with a magical theme (although the Philosopher's Stone is alchemy-related), Scholastic insisted that the book be given the title Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone for the American market.\n\nThe second book, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets was originally published in the UK on 2 July 1998 and in the US on 2 June 1999. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was then published a year later in the UK on 8 July 1999 and in the US on 8 September 1999. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire was published on 8 July 2000 at the same time by Bloomsbury and Scholastic. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is the longest book in the series at 766 pages in the UK version and 870 pages in the US version. It was published worldwide in English on 21 June 2003. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was published on 16 July 2005, and it sold 9 million copies in the first 24 hours of its worldwide release. The seventh and final novel, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, was published on 21 July 2007. The book sold 11 million copies in the first 24 hours of release, breaking down to 2.7 million copies in the UK and 8.3 million in the US.\n\nTranslations\n\nThe series has been translated into 67 languages, placing Rowling among the most translated authors in history. The books have seen translations to diverse languages such as Korean , Azerbaijani, Ukrainian, Arabic, Urdu, Hindi, Bengali, Welsh, Afrikaans, Albanian, Latvian and Vietnamese. The first volume has been translated into Latin and even Ancient Greek, making it the longest published work in Ancient Greek since the novels of Heliodorus of Emesa in the 3rd century AD. The second volume has also been translated into Latin. \n\nSome of the translators hired to work on the books were well-known authors before their work on Harry Potter, such as Viktor Golyshev, who oversaw the Russian translation of the series' fifth book. The Turkish translation of books two to seven was undertaken by Sevin Okyay, a popular literary critic and cultural commentator. For reasons of secrecy, translation on a given book could only start after it had been released in English, leading to a lag of several months before the translations were available. This led to more and more copies of the English editions being sold to impatient fans in non-English speaking countries; for example, such was the clamour to read the fifth book that its English language edition became the first English-language book ever to top the best-seller list in France. \n\nThe United States editions were adapted into American English to make them more understandable to a young American audience. \n\nCompletion of the series\n\nIn December 2005, Rowling stated on her web site, \"2006 will be the year when I write the final book in the Harry Potter series.\" Updates then followed in her online diary chronicling the progress of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, with the release date of 21 July 2007. The book itself was finished on 11 January 2007 in the Balmoral Hotel, Edinburgh, where she scrawled a message on the back of a bust of Hermes. It read: \"J. K. Rowling finished writing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in this room (552) on 11 January 2007.\" \n\nRowling herself has stated that the last chapter of the final book (in fact, the epilogue) was completed \"in something like 1990\". In June 2006, Rowling, on an appearance on the British talk show Richard & Judy, announced that the chapter had been modified as one character \"got a reprieve\" and two others who previously survived the story had in fact been killed. On 28 March 2007, the cover art for the Bloomsbury Adult and Child versions and the Scholastic version were released. \n\nIn September 2012, Rowling mentioned in an interview that she might go back to make a \"director's cut\" of two of the existing Harry Potter books. \n\nCover art\n\nFor cover art, Bloomsbury chose painted art in a classic style of design, with the first cover a watercolour and pencil drawing by illustrator Thomas Taylor showing Harry boarding the Hogwarts Express, and a title in the font Cochin Bold. The first releases of the successive books in the series followed in the same style but somewhat more realistic, illustrating scenes from the books. These covers were created by first Cliff Wright and then Jason Cockroft. \n\nDue to the appeal of the books among an adult audience, Bloomsbury commissioned a second line of editions in an 'adult' style. These initially used black-and-white photographic art for the covers showing objects from the books (including a very American Hogwarts Express) without depicting people, but later shifted to partial colourisation with a picture of Slytherin's locket on the cover of the final book.\n\nInternational and later editions have been created by a range of designers, including Mary GrandPré for U.S. audiences and Mika Launis in Finland. For a later American release, Kazu Kibuishi created covers in a somewhat anime-influenced style. \n\nAchievements\n\nCultural impact\n\nFans of the series were so eager for the latest instalment that bookstores around the world began holding events to coincide with the midnight release of the books, beginning with the 2000 publication of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. The events, commonly featuring mock sorting, games, face painting, and other live entertainment have achieved popularity with Potter fans and have been highly successful in attracting fans and selling books with nearly nine million of the 10.8 million initial print copies of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince sold in the first 24 hours. \n\nThe final book in the series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows became the fastest selling book in history, moving 11 million units in the first twenty-four hours of release. The series has also gathered adult fans, leading to the release of two editions of each Harry Potter book, identical in text but with one edition's cover artwork aimed at children and the other aimed at adults. Besides meeting online through blogs, podcasts, and fansites, Harry Potter super-fans can also meet at Harry Potter symposia.\n\nThe word Muggle has spread beyond its Harry Potter origins, becoming one of few pop culture words to land in the Oxford English Dictionary. The Harry Potter fandom has embraced podcasts as a regular, often weekly, insight to the latest discussion in the fandom. Both MuggleCast and PotterCast have reached the top spot of iTunes podcast rankings and have been polled one of the top 50 favourite podcasts.\n\nSome lessons identified in the series include diversity, acceptance, political tolerance, and equality. Surveys of over 1,000 college students in the United States show that those who read the books were significantly different than those who had not. Readers of the series were found to be more tolerant, more opposed to violence and torture, less authoritarian, and less cynical. Although we cannot know if this is a cause-and-effect relationship, there is a clear correlation, and it seems that Harry Potter's cultural impact may be stronger than just a fandom bond. \n\nAt the University of Michigan in 2009, StarKid Productions performed an original musical parodying the Harry Potter series called A Very Potter Musical. The musical was awarded Entertainment Weekly's 10 Best Viral Videos of 2009. \n\nCommercial success\n\nThe popularity of the Harry Potter series has translated into substantial financial success for Rowling, her publishers, and other Harry Potter related license holders. This success has made Rowling the first and thus far only billionaire author. The books have sold more than 400 million copies worldwide and have also given rise to the popular film adaptations produced by Warner Bros., all of which have been highly successful in their own right. The films have in turn spawned eight video games and have led to the licensing of more than 400 additional Harry Potter products . The Harry Potter brand has been estimated to be worth as much as $15 billion.\n\nThe great demand for Harry Potter books motivated the New York Times to create a separate best-seller list for children's literature in 2000, just before the release of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. By 24 June 2000, Rowling's novels had been on the list for 79 straight weeks; the first three novels were each on the hardcover best-seller list. On 12 April 2007, Barnes & Noble declared that Deathly Hallows had broken its pre-order record, with more than 500,000 copies pre-ordered through its site. For the release of Goblet of Fire, 9,000 FedEx trucks were used with no other purpose than to deliver the book. Together, Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble pre-sold more than 700,000 copies of the book. In the United States, the book's initial printing run was 3.8 million copies. This record statistic was broken by Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, with 8.5 million, which was then shattered by Half-Blood Prince with 10.8 million copies. 6.9 million copies of Prince were sold in the U.S. within the first 24 hours of its release; in the United Kingdom more than two million copies were sold on the first day. The initial U.S. print run for Deathly Hallows was 12 million copies, and more than a million were pre-ordered through Amazon and Barnes & Noble. \n\nAwards, honours, and recognition\n\nThe Harry Potter series has been recognised by a host of awards since the initial publication of Philosopher's Stone including four Whitaker Platinum Book Awards (all of which were awarded in 2001), three Nestlé Smarties Book Prizes (1997–1999), two Scottish Arts Council Book Awards (1999 and 2001), the inaugural Whitbread children's book of the year award (1999), the WHSmith book of the year (2006), among others. In 2000, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was nominated for a Hugo Award for Best Novel, and in 2001, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire won said award. Honours include a commendation for the Carnegie Medal (1997), a short listing for the Guardian Children's Award (1998), and numerous listings on the notable books, editors' Choices, and best books lists of the American Library Association, The New York Times, Chicago Public Library, and Publishers Weekly. \n\nA 2004 study found that books in the series were commonly read aloud in elementary schools in San Diego County, California. Based on a 2007 online poll, the U.S. National Education Association listed the series in its \"Teachers' Top 100 Books for Children\". Three of the books placed among the \"Top 100 Chapter Books\" of all time, or children's novels, in a 2012 survey published by School Library Journal: Sorcerer's Stone ranked number three, Prisoner of Azkaban 12th, and Goblet of Fire 98th.\n\nReception\n\nLiterary criticism\n\nEarly in its history, Harry Potter received positive reviews. On publication, the first book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, attracted attention from the Scottish newspapers, such as The Scotsman, which said it had \"all the makings of a classic\", and The Glasgow Herald, which called it \"Magic stuff\". Soon the English newspapers joined in, with more than one comparing it to Roald Dahl's work: The Mail on Sunday rated it as \"the most imaginative debut since Roald Dahl\", a view echoed by The Sunday Times (\"comparisons to Dahl are, this time, justified\"), while The Guardian called it \"a richly textured novel given lift-off by an inventive wit\".\n\nBy the time of the release of the fifth book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the books began to receive strong criticism from a number of literary scholars. Yale professor, literary scholar, and critic Harold Bloom raised criticisms of the books' literary merits, saying, \"Rowling's mind is so governed by clichés and dead metaphors that she has no other style of writing.\" A. S. Byatt authored a New York Times op-ed article calling Rowling's universe a \"secondary secondary world, made up of intelligently patchworked derivative motifs from all sorts of children's literature ... written for people whose imaginative lives are confined to TV cartoons, and the exaggerated (more exciting, not threatening) mirror-worlds of soaps, reality TV and celebrity gossip\". \n\nMichael Rosen, a novelist and poet, advocated the books were not suited for children, who would be unable to grasp the complex themes. Rosen also stated that \"J. K. Rowling is more of an adult writer.\" The critic Anthony Holden wrote in The Observer on his experience of judging Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban for the 1999 Whitbread Awards. His overall view of the series was negative – \"the Potter saga was essentially patronising, conservative, highly derivative, dispiritingly nostalgic for a bygone Britain\", and he speaks of \"a pedestrian, ungrammatical prose style\". Ursula K. Le Guin said, \"I have no great opinion of it. When so many adult critics were carrying on about the 'incredible originality' of the first Harry Potter book, I read it to find out what the fuss was about, and remained somewhat puzzled; it seemed a lively kid's fantasy crossed with a \"school novel\", good fare for its age group, but stylistically ordinary, imaginatively derivative, and ethically rather mean-spirited.\" \n\nBy contrast, author Fay Weldon, while admitting that the series is \"not what the poets hoped for\", nevertheless goes on to say, \"but this is not poetry, it is readable, saleable, everyday, useful prose\". The literary critic A. N. Wilson praised the Harry Potter series in The Times, stating: \"There are not many writers who have JK's Dickensian ability to make us turn the pages, to weep – openly, with tears splashing – and a few pages later to laugh, at invariably good jokes ... We have lived through a decade in which we have followed the publication of the liveliest, funniest, scariest and most moving children's stories ever written\". Charles Taylor of Salon.com, who is primarily a movie critic, took issue with Byatt's criticisms in particular. While he conceded that she may have \"a valid cultural point – a teeny one – about the impulses that drive us to reassuring pop trash and away from the troubling complexities of art\", he rejected her claims that the series is lacking in serious literary merit and that it owes its success merely to the childhood reassurances it offers. Taylor stressed the progressively darker tone of the books, shown by the murder of a classmate and close friend and the psychological wounds and social isolation each causes. Taylor also argued that Philosopher's Stone, said to be the most light-hearted of the seven published books, disrupts the childhood reassurances that Byatt claims spur the series' success: the book opens with news of a double murder, for example. \n\nStephen King called the series \"a feat of which only a superior imagination is capable\", and declared \"Rowling's punning, one-eyebrow-cocked sense of humor\" to be \"remarkable\". However, he wrote that despite the story being \"a good one\", he is \"a little tired of discovering Harry at home with his horrible aunt and uncle\", the formulaic beginning of all seven books. King has also joked that \"Rowling's never met an adverb she did not like!\" He does however predict that Harry Potter \"will indeed stand time's test and wind up on a shelf where only the best are kept; I think Harry will take his place with Alice, Huck, Frodo, and Dorothy and this is one series not just for the decade, but for the ages\". \n\nSocial impact\n\nAlthough Time magazine named Rowling as a runner-up for its 2007 Person of the Year award, noting the social, moral, and political inspiration she has given her fandom, cultural comments on the series have been mixed. Washington Post book critic Ron Charles opined in July 2007 that the large numbers of adults reading the Potter series but few other books may represent a \"bad case of cultural infantilism\", and that the straightforward \"good vs. evil\" theme of the series is \"childish\". He also argued \"through no fault of Rowling's\", the cultural and marketing \"hysteria\" marked by the publication of the later books \"trains children and adults to expect the roar of the coliseum, a mass-media experience that no other novel can possibly provide\". \n\nLibrarian Nancy Knapp pointed out the books' potential to improve literacy by motivating children to read much more than they otherwise would. The seven-book series has a word count of 1,083,594 (US edition). Agreeing about the motivating effects, Diane Penrod also praised the books' blending of simple entertainment with \"the qualities of highbrow literary fiction\", but expressed concern about the distracting effect of the prolific merchandising that accompanies the book launches. However, the assumption that Harry Potter books have increased literacy among young people is \"largely a folk legend.\" Research by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) has found no increase in reading among children coinciding with the Harry Potter publishing phenomenon, nor has the broader downward trend in reading among Americans been arrested during the rise in the popularity of the Harry Potter books. The research also found that children who read Harry Potter books were not more likely to go on to read outside the fantasy and mystery genres. NEA chairman Dana Gioia said the series, \"got millions of kids to read a long and reasonably complex series of books. The trouble is that one Harry Potter novel every few years is not enough to reverse the decline in reading.\"\n\nJennifer Conn used Snape's and Quidditch coach Madam Hooch's teaching methods as examples of what to avoid and what to emulate in clinical teaching, and Joyce Fields wrote that the books illustrate four of the five main topics in a typical first-year sociology class: \"sociological concepts including culture, society, and socialisation; stratification and social inequality; social institutions; and social theory\". \n\nJenny Sawyer wrote in Christian Science Monitor on 25 July 2007 that the books represent a \"disturbing trend in commercial storytelling and Western society\" in that stories \"moral center [sic] have all but vanished from much of today's pop culture ... after 10 years, 4,195 pages, and over 375 million copies, J. K. Rowling's towering achievement lacks the cornerstone of almost all great children's literature: the hero's moral journey\". Harry Potter, Sawyer argues, neither faces a \"moral struggle\" nor undergoes any ethical growth, and is thus \"no guide in circumstances in which right and wrong are anything less than black and white\". In contrast Emily Griesinger described Harry's first passage through to Platform 9¾ as an application of faith and hope, and his encounter with the Sorting Hat as the first of many in which Harry is shaped by the choices he makes. She also noted the \"deeper magic\" by which the self-sacrifice of Harry's mother protects the boy throughout the series, and which the power-hungry Voldemort fails to understand. \n\nIn an 8 November 2002 Slate article, Chris Suellentrop likened Potter to a \"trust-fund kid whose success at school is largely attributable to the gifts his friends and relatives lavish upon him\". Noting that in Rowling's fiction, magical ability potential is \"something you are born to, not something you can achieve\", Suellentrop wrote that Dumbledore's maxim that \"It is our choices that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities\" is hypocritical, as \"the school that Dumbledore runs values native gifts above all else\". In a 12 August 2007 New York Times review of Deathly Hallows, however, Christopher Hitchens praised Rowling for \"unmooring\" her \"English school story\" from literary precedents \"bound up with dreams of wealth and class and snobbery\", arguing that she had instead created \"a world of youthful democracy and diversity\". \n\nIn 2010, coinciding with the release of the film Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1, a series of articles were written about Private Harry Potter of the British army. This real-life Harry Potter was killed in the Arab Revolt near Hebron in 1939. His grave, located in the British cemetery in Ramla, Israel, began to receive curious visitors leading the Ramla Municipality to list it on their website. The Daily Mail interviewed siblings of Harry Potter who stated, \"We couldn't believe people visit his grave, but apparently they come from miles around to have their photo taken next to it.\" \n\nControversies\n\nThe books have been the subject of a number of legal proceedings, stemming from various conflicts over copyright and trademark infringements. The popularity and high market value of the series has led Rowling, her publishers, and film distributor Warner Bros. to take legal measures to protect their copyright, which have included banning the sale of Harry Potter imitations, targeting the owners of websites over the \"Harry Potter\" domain name, and suing author Nancy Stouffer to counter her accusations that Rowling had plagiarised her work. Various religious conservatives have claimed that the books promote witchcraft and religions such as Wicca and are therefore unsuitable for children, while a number of critics have criticised the books for promoting various political agendas. \n\nThe books also aroused controversies in the literary and publishing worlds. In 1997 to 1998, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone won almost all the UK awards judged by children, but none of the children's book awards judged by adults, and Sandra Beckett suggested the reason was intellectual snobbery towards books that were popular among children. In 1999, the winner of the Whitbread Book of the Year award children's division was entered for the first time on the shortlist for the main award, and one judge threatened to resign if Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was declared the overall winner; it finished second, very close behind the winner of the poetry prize, Seamus Heaney's translation of the Anglo-Saxon epic Beowulf. \n\nIn 2000, shortly before the publication of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the previous three Harry Potter books topped the New York Times fiction best-seller list and a third of the entries were children's books. The newspaper created a new children's section covering children's books, including both fiction and non-fiction, and initially counting only hardback sales. The move was supported by publishers and booksellers. In 2004, The New York Times further split the children's list, which was still dominated by Harry Potter books into sections for series and individual books, and removed the Harry Potter books from the section for individual books. The split in 2000 attracted condemnation, praise and some comments that presented both benefits and disadvantages of the move. Time suggested that, on the same principle, Billboard should have created a separate \"mop-tops\" list in 1964 when the Beatles held the top five places in its list, and Nielsen should have created a separate game-show list when Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? dominated the ratings. \n\nAdaptations\n\nFilms\n\nIn 1998, Rowling sold the film rights of the first four Harry Potter books to Warner Bros. for a reported £1 million ($1,982,900). Rowling demanded the principal cast be kept strictly British, nonetheless allowing for the inclusion of Irish actors such as the late Richard Harris as Dumbledore, and for casting of French and Eastern European actors in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire where characters from the book are specified as such. After many directors including Steven Spielberg, Terry Gilliam, Jonathan Demme, and Alan Parker were considered, Chris Columbus was appointed on 28 March 2000 as director for Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (titled \"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone\" in the United States), with Warner Bros. citing his work on other family films such as Home Alone and Mrs. Doubtfire and proven experience with directing children as influences for their decision.\n\nAfter extensive casting, filming began in October 2000 at Leavesden Film Studios and in London itself, with production ending in July 2001. Philosopher's Stone was released on 14 November 2001. Just three days after the film's release, production for Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, also directed by Columbus, began. Filming was completed in summer 2002, with the film being released on 15 November 2002. Daniel Radcliffe portrayed Harry Potter, doing so for all succeeding films in the franchise.\n\nColumbus declined to direct Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, only acting as producer. Mexican director Alfonso Cuarón took over the job, and after shooting in 2003, the film was released on 4 June 2004. Due to the fourth film beginning its production before the third's release, Mike Newell was chosen as the director for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, released on 18 November 2005. Newell became the first British director of the series, with television director David Yates following suit after he was chosen to helm Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Production began in January 2006 and the film was released the following year in July 2007. After executives were \"really delighted\" with his work on the film, Yates was selected to direct Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which was released on 15 July 2009. \n\nIn March 2008, Warner Bros. President and COO Alan F. Horn announced that the final instalment in the series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, would be released in two cinematic parts: Part 1 on 19 November 2010 and Part 2 on 15 July 2011. Production of both parts started in February 2009, with the final day of principal photography taking place on 12 June 2010. \n\nRowling had creative control on the film series, observing the filmmaking process of Philosopher's Stone and serving as producer on the two-part Deathly Hallows, alongside David Heyman and David Barron. The Harry Potter films have been top-rank box office hits, with all eight releases on the list of highest-grossing films worldwide. Philosopher's Stone was the highest-grossing Harry Potter film up until the release of the final instalment of the series, Deathly Hallows, while Prisoner of Azkaban grossed the least. As well as being a financial success, the film series has also been a success among film critics. \n\nOpinions of the films are generally divided among fans, with one group preferring the more faithful approach of the first two films, and another group preferring the more stylised character-driven approach of the later films. Rowling has been constantly supportive of all the films and evaluated Deathly Hallows as her \"favourite one\" in the series. She wrote on her website of the changes in the book-to-film transition, \"It is simply impossible to incorporate every one of my storylines into a film that has to be kept under four hours long. Obviously films have restrictions novels do not have, constraints of time and budget; I can create dazzling effects relying on nothing but the interaction of my own and my readers' imaginations\". \n\nAt the 64th British Academy Film Awards in February 2011, Rowling was joined by producers David Heyman and David Barron along with directors David Yates, Alfonso Cuarón and Mike Newell in collecting the Michael Balcon Award for Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema on behalf of all the films in the series. Actors Rupert Grint and Emma Watson, who play main characters Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, were also in attendance. \n\nSpin-off prequels\n\nA new trilogy of films, beginning with Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, will take place before the main series. The films will be released in November 2016, 2018 and 2020 respectively. Rowling wrote the screenplay for the first instalment, marking her first foray into screenwriting.\n\nGames\n\nThere are thirteen Harry Potter video games, eight of which correspond with the films and books, and five other spin-offs. The film/book based games are produced by Electronic Arts, as was Harry Potter: Quidditch World Cup, with the game version of the first entry in the series, Philosopher's Stone, being released in November 2001. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone went on to become one of the best selling PlayStation games ever. The video games are released to coincide with the films, containing scenery and details from the films as well as the tone and spirit of the books. Objectives usually occur in and around Hogwarts, along with various other magical areas. The story and design of the games follows the selected film's characterisation and plot; EA worked closely with Warner Brothers to include scenes from the films. The last game in the series, Deathly Hallows, was split with Part 1 released in November 2010 and Part 2 debuting on consoles in July 2011. The two-part game forms the first entry to convey an intense theme of action and violence, with the gameplay revolving around a third-person shooter style format. The spin-off games, Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4 and Lego Harry Potter: Years 5–7 are developed by Traveller's Tales and published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. The spin-off games Book of Spells and Book of Potions are developed by SCE London Studio and utilise the Wonderbook; an augmented reality book which is designed to be used in conjunction with the PlayStation Move and PlayStation Eye. \n\nA number of other non-interactive media games have been released; board games such as Cluedo Harry Potter Edition, Scene It? Harry Potter and Lego Harry Potter models, which are influenced by the themes of both the novels and films.\n\nAudiobooks\n\nAll seven Harry Potter books have been released in unabridged audiobook versions, with Stephen Fry reading the UK editions, and Jim Dale voicing the series for the American editions. \n\nStage production\n\nOn 20 December 2013, J. K. Rowling announced that she was working on a Harry Potter–based play for which she would be one of the producers. British theatre producers Sonia Friedman and Colin Callender will be the co-producers. \n\nOn 26 June 2015, on the anniversary of the debut of the first book, Rowling revealed via Twitter that the Harry Potter stage play would be called Harry Potter and The Cursed Child. The Production is expected to open in the summer of 2016 at London's Palace Theatre, London. The first four months of tickets for the June–September performances were sold out within several hours upon release. On 10 February 2016, it was announced via the Pottermore website, that the script would be released in book form, the day after the play's world premiere, making this the 8th book in the series, with events set nineteen years after the closing chapter of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. \n\nAttractions\n\nThe Wizarding World of Harry Potter\n\nAfter the success of the films and books, Universal and Warner Brothers announced they would create The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, a new Harry Potter-themed expansion to the Islands of Adventure theme park at Universal Orlando Resort in Florida. The land officially opened to the public on 18 June 2010. It includes a re-creation of Hogsmeade and several rides. The flagship attraction is Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey, which exists within a re-creation of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Other rides include Dragon Challenge, a pair of inverted roller coasters, and Flight of the Hippogriff, a family roller coaster.\n\nFour years later, on 8 July 2014, Universal opened a Harry Potter-themed area at the Universal Studios Florida theme park. It includes a re-creation of Diagon Alley and connecting alleys and a small section of Muggle London. The flagship attraction is Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts roller coaster ride. Universal also added a completely functioning recreation of the Hogwarts Express connecting Kings Cross Station at Universal Studios Florida to the Hogsmeade station at Islands of Adventure. Both Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley contain many shops and restaurants from the book series, including Weasley's Wizard Wheezes and The Leaky Cauldron.\n\nOn 15 July 2014, The Wizarding World of Harry Potter opened at the Universal Studios Japan theme park in Osaka, Japan. It includes the village of Hogsmeade, Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey ride, and Flight of the Hippogriff roller coaster.\n\nThere is also The Wizarding World of Harry Potter under construction at the Universal Studios Hollywood theme park near Los Angeles, California, with a planned opening in April 2016. \n\nUnited Kingdom\n\nIn March 2011, Warner Bros. announced plans to build a tourist attraction in the United Kingdom to showcase the Harry Potter film series. Warner Bros. Studio Tour London is a behind-the-scenes walking tour featuring authentic sets, costumes and props from the film series. The attraction is located at Warner Bros. Studios, Leavesden, where all eight of the Harry Potter films were made. Warner Bros. constructed two new sound stages to house and showcase the famous sets from each of the British-made productions, following a £100 million investment. It opened to the public in March 2012.", "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is the first novel in the Harry Potter series and J. K. Rowling's debut novel, first published in 1997 by Bloomsbury. It was published in the United States as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by Scholastic Corporation in 1998. The plot follows Harry Potter, a young wizard who discovers his magical heritage as he makes close friends and a few enemies in his first year at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. With the help of his friends, Harry faces an attempted comeback by the dark wizard Lord Voldemort, who killed Harry's parents, but failed to kill Harry when he was just a year old.\n\nThe novel won most of the British book awards that were judged by children and other awards in the US. The book reached the top of the New York Times list of best-selling fiction in August 1999 and stayed near the top of that list for much of 1999 and 2000. It has been translated into at least sixty-seven other languages and has been made into a feature-length film of the same name, as have all six of its sequels.\n\nMost reviews were very favourable, commenting on Rowling's imagination, humour, simple, direct style and clever plot construction, although a few complained that the final chapters seemed rushed. The writing has been compared to that of Jane Austen, one of Rowling's favourite authors, or Roald Dahl, whose works dominated children's stories before the appearance of Harry Potter, and of the Ancient Greek story-teller Homer. While some commentators thought the book looked backwards to Victorian and Edwardian boarding school stories, others thought it placed the genre firmly in the modern world by featuring contemporary ethical and social issues.\n\nHarry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, along with the rest of the Harry Potter series, has been attacked by several religious groups and banned in some countries because of accusations that the novels promote witchcraft, but other religious commentators have written that the book exemplifies important viewpoints, including the power of self-sacrifice and the ways in which people's decisions shape their personalities. The series has been used as a source of object lessons in educational techniques, sociological analysis and marketing.\n\nSynopsis\n\nPlot\n\nThe most evil and powerful dark wizard in history, Lord Voldemort, murdered married couple James and Lily Potter but mysteriously disappeared after failing to kill their infant son, Harry. While the wizarding world celebrates Voldemort's apparent downfall, Professor Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall and half-giant Rubeus Hagrid place the one-year-old orphan in the care of his surly and cold Muggle uncle and aunt, Vernon and Petunia Dursley, with their spoiled and bullying son, Dudley.\n\nTen years later while living at number Four Privet Drive, Harry is tormented by the Dursleys, treated more like a servant than a member of the family and forced to live in a cupboard under the stairs. Shortly before his eleventh birthday, a series of letters addressed to Harry arrive, but Vernon destroys them before Harry can read them, leading only to an influx of more letters. To evade the pursuit of the letters, Vernon first takes the family to a hotel, and, when the letters arrive there too, he hires a boat out to a small island. On Harry's eleventh birthday at midnight, Hagrid bursts through the door to deliver Harry's letter and tells him what the Dursleys have kept from him: Harry is a wizard and has been accepted into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Hagrid takes Harry to a hidden London street called Diagon Alley, where he is startled to discover how famous he is among the witches and wizards, who refer to him as \"the boy who lived.\" He also finds that his parents' inheritance is waiting for him at Gringotts Wizarding Bank. Guided by Hagrid, he buys the equipment he will need for his first year at Hogwarts and receives a pet owl.\n\nA month later, Harry leaves the Dursleys' home to catch the Hogwarts Express from King's Cross railway station. There he meets the Weasley family, who show him how to pass through the magic wall to Platform 9¾, where the train that will take them to Hogwarts is waiting. While on the train, Harry meets two fellow first years, Ron Weasley, who immediately becomes his friend, and Hermione Granger, with whom the ice is a bit slower to break. Harry also makes an enemy of yet another first-year, Draco Malfoy. Draco offers to advise Harry, but Harry dislikes Draco for his arrogance and prejudice and rejects his offer of \"friendship\".\n\nAt Hogwarts, the first-years are assigned by the magical Sorting Hat to houses that best suites their personality. While Harry is being sorted, the Hat suggests that he be placed into Slytherin which is known to house potential dark witches and wizards, but when Harry objects, the Hat sends him to Gryffindor. Ron and Hermione are also sorted into Gryffindor. Draco is sorted into Slytherin, like his whole family before him.\n\nHarry starts classes at Hogwarts School, with lessons including Transfiguration with Head of Gryffindor, Minerva McGonagall, Herbology with Head of Hufflepuff, Pomona Sprout, Charms with Head of Ravenclaw Filius Flitwick, and Defence Against the Dark Arts with Quirinus Quirrell. Harry's least favourite class is Potions, taught by Severus Snape, the vindictive Head of Slytherin who seems to loathe Harry. Harry, Ron, and Hermione become far more interested by extracurricular matters within and outside of the school, particularly after they discover that a huge three-headed dog is standing guard over a trapdoor in a condemned corridor. They also become suspicious of Snape's behaviour and become convinced that he is looking for ways to get past the trapdoor.\n\nHarry discovers an innate talent for flying on broomsticks and is appointed as Seeker on his House’s Quidditch team, a wizards's sport played in the air. His first game goes well until his broomstick wobbles in mid-air and almost throws him off. Ron and Hermione suspect foul play from Snape, whom they saw behaving oddly. For Christmas, Harry receives an invisibility cloak from an anonymous source and begins exploring the school at night and investigating the hidden object further. He discovers the Mirror of Erised, in which the viewer's sees his deepest desires becoming true. \n\nThanks to an indiscretion from Hagrid, Harry and his friends work out that the object kept at the school is a Philosopher's Stone, made by an old friend of Dumbledore named Nicolas Flamel. Harry is also informed by a centaur he meets in the forest that a plot to steal the Philosopher’s stone is being orchestrated by none other than Voldemort himself, who would use it to be restored to his body and come back to power. When Dumbledore is lured from Hogwarts under false pretences, Harry and his friends fear that the theft is imminent and descend through the trapdoor themselves. \n\nThey encounter a series of obstacles, each of which requires unique skills possessed by one of the three, and one of which requires Ron to sacrifice himself in a life-sized game of wizard's chess. In the final room, Harry, now alone, finds Quirrell, who admits that he had tried to kill Harry at his Quidditch match against Slytherin. He also admits that he let the troll into Hogwarts. Snape had been trying to protect Harry all along rather than to kill him, and his suspicious behaviour came from his own suspicions about Quirrell. \n\nQuirrell is one of Voldemort's followers, and is now partly possessed by him: Voldemort's face has sprouted on the back of his own head, hidden by his turban. Voldemort needs Harry's help to get past the final obstacle: the Mirror of Erised, but when Quirrell tries to grab the Stone from Harry his contact proves lethal for Quirrell. Harry passes out and awakes in the school hospital, where Dumbledore explains to him that he survived because his mother sacrificed her life to protect him, and this left a powerful protective charm on him. Voldemort left Quirrell to die and is likely to return by some other means. The Stone has now been destroyed. The school year ends at the final feast, during which Gryffindor wins the House Cup. Harry returns to the Dursleys' for the summer holiday but does not tell them that under-age wizards are forbidden to use magic outside of Hogwarts.\n\nMain characters\n\n* Harry Potter is an orphan whom Rowling imagined as a \"scrawny, black-haired, bespectacled boy who didn't know he was a wizard.\" She developed the series' story and characters to explain how Harry came to be in this situation and how his life unfolded from there. Apart from the first chapter, the events of this book take place just before and in the year following Harry's eleventh birthday. Voldemort's attack left a lightning bolt-shaped scar on Harry's forehead, which produces stabbing pains whenever Voldemort is present. Harry has a natural talent for Quidditch and became the first person to get on a team in their first year.\n* Ron Weasley is Harry's age and Rowling describes him as the ultimate best friend, \"always there when you need him.\" He is freckled, red-haired and quite tall. He grew up in a fairly large pure-blood family as the sixth born of seven children. Although his family is quite poor, they still live comfortably and happily. His loyalty and bravery in the face of a game of Wizards Chess plays a vital part in finding the Philosopher's Stone.\n* Hermione Granger, the daughter of an all-Muggle family, is a bossy girl who has apparently memorised most of the textbooks before the start of term. Rowling described Hermione as a \"very logical, upright and good\" character with \"a lot of insecurity and a great fear of failure beneath her swottiness\". Despite her nagging efforts to keep Harry and Ron out of trouble, she becomes a close friend of the two boys after they save her from a troll, and her magical and analytical skills play an important role in finding the Philosopher's Stone. She has bushy brown hair and rather large front teeth.\n* Neville Longbottom is a plump, diffident boy, so forgetful that his grandmother gives him a Remembrall, although he cannot remember why. Neville's magical abilities are weak and appeared just in time to save his life when he was eight. Despite his timidity, Neville will fight anyone after some encouragement or if he thinks it is right and important.\n* Rubeus Hagrid, a half-giant nearly 12 ft tall, with tangled black hair and beard, was expelled from Hogwarts and his wand was broken, but Professor Dumbledore let him stay on as the school's gamekeeper, a job which enables him to lavish affection and pet names on even the most dangerous of magical creatures. Hagrid is fiercely loyal to Dumbledore and quickly becomes a close friend of Harry, Ron and, later, Hermione, but his carelessness makes him unreliable.\n* Professor Dumbledore, a tall, thin man who wears half-moon spectacles and has silver hair and a beard that tucks into his belt, is the headmaster of Hogwarts, and thought to be the only wizard Voldemort fears. Dumbledore, while renowned for his achievements in magic, finds it difficult to resist sweets and has a whimsical sense of humour. Although he shrugs off praise, he is aware of his own brilliance. Rowling described him as the \"epitome of goodness\". \n* Professor McGonagall, a tall, severe-looking woman with black hair tied in a tight bun, teaches Transfiguration, and sometimes transforms herself into a cat. She is Deputy Headmistress, and Head of Gryffindor House and, according to the author, \"under that gruff exterior\" is \"a bit of an old softy\". \n* Petunia Dursley, the sister of Harry's mother Lily, is a thin woman with a long neck that she uses for spying on the neighbours. She regards her magical sister as a freak and tries to pretend that she never existed. Her husband Vernon is a heavily built man whose irascible bluster covers a narrow mind and a fear of anything unusual. Their son Dudley is an overweight, spoiled bully.\n* Draco Malfoy is a slim, pale boy who speaks in a bored drawl. He is arrogant about his skill in Quidditch, and despises anyone who is not a pure-blood wizard – and wizards who do not share his views. His parents had supported Voldemort, but changed sides after the dark wizard's disappearance, claiming they had been bewitched. Draco avoids direct confrontations, and tries to get Harry and his friends into trouble.\n* Professor Quirrell is a twitching, stammering man who teaches Defence Against the Dark Arts. Reputedly he was a brilliant scholar, but his nerve was shattered by an encounter with vampires. Quirrell wears a turban to conceal the fact that he is voluntarily possessed by Voldemort, whose face appears on the back of Quirrell's head.\n* Professor Snape, who has a hooked nose, sallow complexion and greasy black hair, teaches Potions, but would prefer to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts. Snape praises pupils in Slytherin, his own House but seizes every opportunity to humiliate others, especially Harry. Several incidents, beginning with the shooting pain in Harry's scar during the start-of-term feast, lead Harry and his friends to think Snape is a follower of Voldemort.\n* Filch, the school caretaker who knows the school's secret passages better than anyone else except, possibly, the Weasley twins. His cat, Mrs. Norris, aids his constant hunt for misbehaving pupils.\n\nOther members of staff include the dumpy Herbology teacher and Head of Hufflepuff House Professor Sprout, Professor Flitwick, the tiny and excitable Charms teacher, and Head of Ravenclaw House, the soporific History of Magic teacher, Professor Binns, a ghost who does not seem to have noticed his own death; and Madam Hooch, the Quidditch coach, who is strict, but a considerate and methodical teacher. The poltergeist Peeves wanders around the castle causing trouble wherever he can.\n\nIn the book, Rowling introduces an eclectic cast of characters. The first character to be introduced is Vernon Dursley, Harry's uncle. Most of the actions centre on the eponymous hero Harry Potter, an orphan who escapes his miserable childhood with the Dursley family. Rowling imagined him as a \"scrawny, black-haired, bespectacled boy who didn't know he was a wizard\", and says she transferred part of her pain about losing her mother to him. During the book, Harry makes two close friends, Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger. Ron is described by Rowling as the ultimate best friend, \"always there when you need him\". Rowling has described Hermione as a \"very logical, upright and good\" character with \"a lot of insecurity and a great fear of failure beneath her swottiness\".\n\nRowling also imagined a supporting cast of adults. The headmaster of Hogwarts is the powerful, but kind wizard Albus Dumbledore, who becomes Harry's confidant; Rowling described him as \"epitome of goodness\". His right hand is severe Minerva McGonagall, who according to the author \"under that gruff exterior\" is \"a bit of an old softy\", the friendly half-giant Rubeus Hagrid, who saved Harry from the Dursley family and the sinister Severus Snape. Professor Quirrell is also featured in the novel.\n\nThe main antagonists are Draco Malfoy, an elitist, bullying classmate and Lord Voldemort, the most powerful evil wizard who becomes disembodied when he tries to kill baby Harry. According to a 1999 interview with Rowling, the character of Voldemort was created as a literary foil for Harry, and his backstory was intentionally not fleshed-out at first:\n\nDevelopment, publication and reception\n\nDevelopment\n\nThe book, which was Rowling's debut novel, was written between approximately June 1990 and some time in 1995. In 1990 Jo Rowling, as she preferred to be known, wanted to move with her boyfriend to a flat in Manchester and in her words, \"One weekend after flat hunting, I took the train back to London on my own and the idea for Harry Potter fell into my head... A scrawny, little, black-haired, bespectacled boy became more and more of a wizard to me... I began to write Philosopher's Stone that very evening. Although, the first couple of pages look nothing like the finished product.\" Then Rowling's mother died and, to cope with her pain, Rowling transferred her own anguish to the orphan Harry. Rowling spent six years working on Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, and after it was accepted by Bloomsbury, she obtained a grant of £8,000 from the Scottish Arts Council, which enabled her to plan the sequels. She sent the book to an agent and a publisher, and then the second agent she approached spent a year trying to sell the book to publishers, most of whom thought it was too long at about 90,000 words. Barry Cunningham, who was building a portfolio of distinctive fantasies by new authors for Bloomsbury Children's Books, recommended accepting the book, and the eight-year-old daughter of Bloomsbury's chief executive said it was \"so much better than anything else\". \n\nPublication and reception in the United Kingdom\n\nBloomsbury accepted the book, paying Rowling a £2,500 advance, and Cunningham sent proof copies to carefully chosen authors, critics and booksellers in order to obtain comments that could be quoted when the book was launched. He was less concerned about the book's length than about its author's name, since the title sounded like a boys' book to him, and he believed boys preferred books by male authors. Rowling therefore adopted the nom de plume J.K. Rowling just before publication. In June 1997, Bloomsbury published Philosopher's Stone with an initial print-run of 500 copies in hardback, three hundred of which were distributed to libraries. Her original name, \"Joanne Rowling\", can be found in small print on the copyright page of this first British edition. (The 1998 first American edition would remove reference to \"Joanne\" completely.) The short initial print run was standard for first novels, and Cunningham hoped booksellers would read the book and recommend it to customers. Examples from this initial print run have become quite valuable, selling for as much as US$33,460 in a 2007 Heritage Auction. \n\nLindsey Fraser, who had supplied one of the blurb comments, wrote what is thought to be the first published review, in The Scotsman on 28 June 1997. She described Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone as \"a hugely entertaining thriller\" and Rowling as \"a first-rate writer for children\". Another early review, in The Herald, said, \"I have yet to find a child who can put it down.\" Newspapers outside Scotland started to notice the book, with glowing reviews in The Guardian, The Sunday Times and The Mail on Sunday, and in September 1997 Books for Keeps, a magazine that specialised in children's books, gave the novel four stars out of five. The Mail on Sunday rated it as \"the most imaginative debut since Roald Dahl\"; a view echoed by the Sunday Times (\"comparisons to Dahl are, this time, justified\"), while The Guardian called it \"a richly textured novel given lift-off by an inventive wit\" and The Scotsman said it had \"all the makings of a classic\".\n\nIn 1997 the UK edition won a National Book Award and a gold medal in the 9 to 11 year-olds category of the Nestlé Smarties Book Prize. The Smarties award, which is voted for by children, made the book well-known within six months of publication, while most children's books have to wait for years. The following year, Philosopher's Stone won almost all the other major British awards that were decided by children. It was also shortlisted for children's books awards adjudicated by adults, but did not win. Sandra Beckett comments that books which were popular with children were regarded as undemanding and as not of the highest literary standards – for example the literary establishment disdained the works of Roald Dahl, an overwhelming favourite of children before the appearance of Rowling's books. In 2003, the novel was listed at number 22 on the BBC's survey The Big Read. \n\nHarry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone won two publishing industry awards given for sales rather than literary merit, the British Book Awards Children's Book of the Year and the Booksellers' Association / Bookseller Author of the Year. By March 1999 UK editions had sold just over 300,000 copies, and the story was still the UK's best-selling title in December 2001. A Braille edition was published in May 1998 by the Scottish Braille Press. \n\nPlatform 9¾, from which the Hogwarts Express left London, was commemorated in the real-life King's Cross railway station with a sign and a trolley apparently passing through the wall. \n\nU.S. publication and reception\n\nScholastic Corporation bought the U.S. rights at the Bologna Book Fair in April 1997 for US$105,000, an unusually high sum for a children's book. They thought that a child would not want to read a book with the word \"philosopher\" in the title and, after some discussion, the American edition was published in September 1998 under the title Rowling suggested, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. Rowling claimed that she regretted this change and would have fought it if she had been in a stronger position at the time. Philip Nel has pointed out that the change lost the connection with alchemy, and the meaning of some other terms changed in translation, for example from UK English \"crumpets\" to US English \"muffin\". While Rowling accepted the change from both UK English \"mum\" and Seamus Finnigan's Irish variant \"mam\" to \"mom\" in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, she vetoed this change in the later books (this change was reversed in later editions of the book). However Nel considered that Scholastic's translations were considerably more sensitive than most of those imposed on UK English books of the time, and that some other changes could be regarded as useful copyedits. Since the UK editions of early titles in the series were published a few months earlier than the American versions, some American readers became familiar with the British English versions after buying them via the Internet. \n\nAt first the most prestigious reviewers ignored the book, leaving it to book trade and library publications such as Kirkus Reviews and Booklist, which examined it only by the entertainment-oriented criteria of children's fiction. However, more penetrating specialist reviews (such as one by Cooperative Children's Book Center Choices, which pointed out the complexity, depth and consistency of the world Rowling had built) attracted the attention of reviewers in major newspapers. Although The Boston Globe and Michael Winerip in The New York Times complained that the final chapters were the weakest part of the book, they and most other American reviewers gave glowing praise.\n\nA year later the US edition was selected as an American Library Association Notable Book, a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 1998, and a New York Public Library 1998 Best Book of the Year, and won Parenting Magazines Book of the Year Award for 1998, the School Library Journal Best Book of the Year, and the American Library Association Best Book for Young Adults.\n\nIn August 1999 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone topped the New York Times list of best-selling fiction, and stayed near the top of the list for much of 1999 and 2000, until the New York Times split its list into children's and adult sections under pressure from other publishers who were eager to see their books given higher placings. Publishers Weeklys report in December 2001 on cumulative sales of children's fiction placed Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone 19th among hardbacks (over 5 million copies) and 7th among paperbacks (over 6.6 million copies). \n\nIn May 2008, Scholastic announced the creation of a 10th Anniversary Edition of the book that was released on 1 October 2008 to mark the tenth anniversary of the original American release. For the fifteenth anniversary of the books, Scholastic re-released Sorcerer's Stone, along with the other six novels in the series, with new cover art by Kazu Kibuishi in 2013. \n\nTranslations\n\nBy mid-2008, official translations of the book were published in 67 languages. Bloomsbury have published translations in Latin and in Ancient Greek, and the latter was described as \"one of the most important pieces of Ancient Greek prose written in many centuries\". \n\nStyle and themes\n\nPhilip Nel highlighted the influence of Jane Austen, whom Rowling has greatly admired since the age of twelve. Both novelists encourage re-reading, because details that look insignificant foreshadow important events or characters much later in the story-line – for example Sirius Black is briefly mentioned near the beginning of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, and then becomes a major character in the third to fifth books. Like Austen's heroines, Harry often has to re-examine his ideas near the ends of books. Some social behaviour in the Harry Potter books is remininiscent of Austen, for example the excited communal reading of letters. Both authors satirise social behaviour and give characters names that express their personalities. However in Nel's opinion Rowling's humour is more based on caricature and the names she invents are more like those found in Charles Dickens's stories, and Amanda Cockrell noted that many of these express their owners' traits through allusions that run from ancient Roman mythology to eighteenth-century German literature. Rowling, like the Narnia series' author C.S. Lewis, thinks there is no rigid distinction between stories for children and for adults. Nel also noted that, like many good writers for children, Rowling combines literary genresfantasy, young-adult fiction, boarding school stories, Bildungsroman and many others.\n\nSome reviewers compared Philosopher's Stone to the stories of Roald Dahl, who died in 1990. Many writers since the 1970s had been hailed as his successor, but none had attained anything near his popularity with children and, in a poll conducted shortly after the launch of Philosopher's Stone, seven of the ten most popular children's books were by Dahl, including the one in top place. The only other really popular children's author of the late 1990s was an American, R. L. Stine. Some of the story elements in Philosopher's Stone resembled parts of Dahl's stories; for example, the hero of James and the Giant Peach lost his parents and had to live with a pair of unpleasant auntsone fat and one thin rather like Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, who treated Harry as a servant. However Harry Potter was a distinctive creation, able to take on the responsibilities of an adult while remaining a child inside.\n\nLibrarian Nancy Knapp and marketing professor Stephen Brown noted the liveliness and detail of descriptions, especially of shop scenes such as Diagon Alley. Tad Brennan commented that Rowling's writing resembles that of Homer: \"rapid, plain, and direct in expression.\" Stephen King admired \"the sort of playful details of which only British fantasists seem capable\" and concluded that they worked because Rowling enjoys a quick giggle and then moves briskly forward. \n\nNicholas Tucker described the early Harry Potter books as looking back to Victorian and Edwardian children's stories: Hogwarts was an old-style boarding school in which the teachers addressed pupils formally by their surnames and were most concerned with the reputations of the houses with which they were associated; characters' personalities were plainly shown by their appearances, starting with the Dursleys; evil or malicious characters were to be crushed rather than reformed, including Filch's cat Mrs Norris; and the hero, a mistreated orphan who found his true place in life, was charismatic and good at sports, but considerate and protective towards the weak. Several other commentators have stated that the books present a highly stratified society including many social stereotypes. However Karin Westerman drew parallels with 1990s Britain: a class system that was breaking down but defended by those whose power and status it upheld; the multi-ethnic composition of Hogwarts' students; the racial tensions between the various intelligent species; and school bullying. \n\nSusan Hall wrote that there is no rule of law in the books, as the actions of Ministry of Magic officials are unconstrained by laws, accountability or any kind of legal challenge. This provides an opportunity for Voldemort to offer his own horrific version of order. As a side-effect Harry and Hermione, who were brought up in the highly regulated Muggle world, find solutions by thinking in ways unfamiliar to wizards. For example, Hermione notes that one obstacle to finding the Philosopher's Stone is a test of logic rather than magical power, and that most wizards have no chance of solving it. \n\nNel suggested that the unflattering characterisation of the extremely conventional, status-conscious, materialistic Dursleys was Rowling's reaction to the family policies of the British government in the early 1990s, which treated the married heterosexual couple as the \"preferred norm\", while the author was a single mother. Harry's relationships with adult and juvenile wizards are based on affection and loyalty. This is reflected in his happiness whenever he is a temporary member of the Weasley family throughout the series, and in his treatment of first Rubeus Hagrid and later Remus Lupin and Sirius Black as father-figures.\n\nLegacy\n\nSequels\n\nThe second book, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, was originally published in the UK on 2 July 1998 and in the US on 2 June 1999. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was then published a year later in the UK on 8 July 1999 and in the US on 8 September 1999. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire was published on 8 July 2000 at the same time by Bloomsbury and Scholastic. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is the longest book in the series at 766 pages in the UK version and 870 pages in the US version. It was published worldwide in English on 21 June 2003. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was published on 16 July 2005 and sold 11 million copies in the first 24 hours of its worldwide release. The seventh and final novel, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, was published on 21 July 2007. The book sold 11 million copies within 24 hours of its release: 2.7 million copies in the UK and 8.3 million in the US. \n\nFilm version\n\nIn 1999, Rowling sold the film rights of the first four Harry Potter books to Warner Bros. for a reported £1 million ($1,982,900). Rowling demanded that the principal cast be kept strictly British but allowed for the casting of Irish actors such as the late Richard Harris as Dumbledore and of foreign actors as characters of the same nationalities in later books. After extensive casting, filming began in September 2000 at Leavesden Film Studios and in London, with production ending in July 2001. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was released in London on 14 November 2001. Reviewers' comments were positive, as reflected by an 80% Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes and by a score of 64% at Metacritic, representing \"generally favourable reviews\". \n\nVideo games\n\nFive unique video games by different developers were released between 2001 and 2003 by Electronic Arts, loosely based on the film and book:\n\nUses in education and business\n\nWriters on education and business subjects have used the book as an . Writing about clinical teaching in medical schools, Jennifer Conn contrasted Snape's technical expertise with his intimidating behaviour towards students; on the other hand Quidditch coach Madam Hooch illustrated useful techniques in the teaching of physical skills, including breaking down complex actions into sequences of simple ones and helping students to avoid common errors. Joyce Fields wrote that the books illustrate four of the five main topics in a typical first-year sociology class: \"sociological concepts including culture, society, and socialisation; stratification and social inequality; social institutions; and social theory\".\n\nStephen Brown noted that the early Harry Potter books, especially Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, were a runaway success despite inadequate and poorly organised marketing. Brown advised marketing executives to be less preoccupied with rigorous statistical analyses and the \"analysis, planning, implementation, and control\" model of management. Instead he recommended that they should treat the stories as \"a marketing masterclass\", full of enticing products and brand names. For example, a real-world analogue of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans was introduced under licence in 2000 by toymaker Hasbro. \n\nRelease history\n\nFootnotes\n\nNotes\n\n=" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Team.txt", "Game.txt", "Beach_volleyball.txt" ], "title": [ "Team", "Game", "Beach volleyball" ], "wiki_context": [ "A team is a group of people or other animals linked in a common purpose. Human teams are especially appropriate for conducting tasks that are high in complexity and have many interdependent subtasks.\n\nA group does not necessarily constitute a team. Teams normally have members with complementary skills and generate synergy through a coordinated effort which allows each member to maximize their strengths and minimize their weaknesses. Naresh Jain (2009) claims:\n\nTeam members need to learn how to help one another, help other team members realize their true potential, and create an environment that allows everyone to go beyond his or her limitations. Teams can be broken down into from a huge team or one big group of people, even if these smaller secondary teams are temporary. \n\nA team becomes more than just a collection of people when a strong sense of mutual commitment creates synergy, thus generating performance greater than the sum of the performance of its individual members.\n\nThus teams of game players can form (and re-form) to practise their craft/sport. Transport logistics executives can select teams of horses, dogs, or oxen for the purpose of conveying passengers or goods.\n\nTheorists in business in the late 20th century popularized the concept of constructing teams. Differing opinions exist on the efficacy of this new management fad. \nSome see \"team\" as a four-letter word: overused and under-useful. \nOthers see it as a panacea that realizes the human-relations movement's desire to integrate what that movement perceives as best for workers and as best for managers. Still others believe in the effectiveness of teams, but also see them as dangerous because of the potential for exploiting workers — in that team effectiveness can rely on peer pressure and peer surveillance. However, Hackman argued that team effectiveness should not be viewed only in terms of performance. While performance is an important outcome, a truly effective team will contribute to the personal well-being and adaptive growth of its members. \n\nCompare the more structured/skilled concept of a crew, the advantages of formal and informal partnerships, or the well-defined - but time-limited - existence of task forces.\n\nTeam size, composition, and formation\n\nTeam size and team composition affect team processes and team outcomes. The optimal size (and composition) of teams is debated and will vary depending on the task at hand. At least one study of problem-solving in groups showed an optimal size of groups at four members. Other works estimate the optimal size between 5-12 members or a number of members that can consume two pizzas. The following extract is taken from Chong (2007): \nThe interest in teams gained momentum in the 1980s with the publication of Belbin’s (1981) work on successful teams. The research into teams and teamwork followed two lines of inquiry. Writers such as Belbin (1981, 1993), Woodcock (1989), Margerison and McCann (1990), Davis et al. (1992), Parker (1990), and Spencer and Pruss (1992) focused on team roles and how these affected team performance. These studies suggested that team performance was a function of the number and type of roles team members played. The number of roles for optimal performance varied from 15 (Davis et al., 1992) to four (Parker, 1990). This variation has been attributed to how roles were defined. Lindgren (1997) believed that, in a social psychological sense, ‘roles’ were behaviours one exhibited within the constraints assigned by the outside world to one’s occupational position e.g. leader, manager, supervisor, worker etc. Personality traits, on the other hand, were internally driven and relatively stable over time and across situations. These traits affected behavioural patterns in predictable ways (Pervin, 1989) and, in varying degrees, become part of the ‘role’ definition as well.\nThe other line of inquiry focused on measuring the ‘effectiveness’ of teams. Writers such as Deihl and Stroebe (1987), Gersik (1988), Evenden and Anderson (1992), Furnham et al. (1993), Cohen and Ledford (1994) and Katzenbach (1998) were concerned with high performing teams and the objective measurement of their effectiveness. McFadzean (2002) believed that the appearance of a number of models of team effectiveness was indicative of a variety of variables such as personality, group size, work norms, status relationships, group structure etc. that can impact on team ‘effectiveness’ and its measurement.\n\nDavid Cooperrider suggests that the larger the group, the better. This is because a larger group is able to address concerns of the whole system. So while a large team may be ineffective at performing a given task, Cooperider says that the relevance of that task should be considered, because determining whether the team is effective first requires identifying what needs to be accomplished.\n\nRegarding composition, all teams will have an element of homogeneity and heterogeneity. The more homogeneous the group, the more cohesive it will be. The more heterogeneous the group, the greater the differences in perspective and increased potential for creativity, but also the greater potential for conflict.\n\nTeam members normally have different roles, like team leader and agents. Large teams can divide into subteams according to need.\n\nMany teams go through a life-cycle of stages, identified by Bruce Tuckman as: forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning.\n\nTypes\n\nOf particular importance is the concept of different types of teams.\n\nInterdependent and independent\n\nOne common distinction is drawn between interdependent and independent teams. The difference is determined by the actions that the team members take while working.\n\nInterdependent teams\n\nA rugby team provides a clear example of an interdependent team:\n* no significant task can be accomplished without the help and cooperation of every member;\n* within their team members typically specialize in different tasks (running the ball, goal kicking and scrum feeding), and\n* the success of every individual is inextricably bound to the success of the whole team. No rugby player, no matter how talented, has ever won a game by playing alone.\n\nIndependent teams\n\nOn the other hand, a track-and-field team is a classic example of an independent team: \n* races are run, or points are scored, by individuals or by partners\n* every person in a given job performs basically the same actions\n* how one player performs has no direct effect on the performance of the next player \nIf all team members each perform the same basic tasks, such as students working problems in a maths class, or outside sales employees making phone calls, then it is likely that this team is an independent team. They may be able to help each other—perhaps by offering advice or practice time, by providing moral support, or by helping in the background during a busy time—but each individual's success is primarily due to each individual's own efforts. Runners do not win their own races merely because the rest of their teammates did, and maths students do not pass tests merely because their neighbours know how to solve equations.\n\nIn the business environment, sales teams and traditional professionals (such as doctors, lawyers, and teachers), work in independent teams. Most teams in a business setting are independent teams.\n\nCoaching differences between interdependent and independent teams\n\nCoaching an interdependent team like a football team necessarily requires a different approach from coaching an independent team like a gymnastics team, because the costs and benefits to individual team members—and therefore the intrinsic incentives for positive team behaviors—differ markedly. An interdependent team benefits from members getting to know the other team members socially, from developing trust in each other, and from conquering artificial collective challenges (such as those offered in outdoors ropes courses). Interdependent teams respond well to collective rewards, and independent teams perform better with individual rewards. \n\nHybrid teams and hybrid rewards, which try to combine characteristics of both, are sometimes created in the hope of getting the best of both types. However, instead, they tend instead to produce the negative features of each and none of the benefits, and consequently under-perform.\n\nPressuring teams to become independent or interdependent, on the grounds that management has decided that one type is intrinsically better than the other, results in failure. The nature of the team is defined by the type of work that is done, and not by management's wishes or by the fashions of the latest management fad.\n\nMultidisciplinary and Interdisciplinary\n\nTeams in areas of work or study such as in the medical field, may be multidisciplinary or interdisciplinary.\n\nMultidisciplinary teams involve several professionals who independently treat various issues a patient may have, focusing on the issues in which they specialise. The problems that are being treated may or may not relate to other issues being addressed by individual team members.\n\nThe interdisciplinary team approach involves all members of the team working together towards the same goal. In an interdisciplinary team approach, members of the core team will often rôle-blend, taking on tasks usually filled by people in different roles on the team. A common interdisciplinary team approach popularized by IDEO is the Balanced Team. IDEO interprets the balanced team as a composition of three discrete factors: desirability, feasibility, and viability. These three factors are assumed through human/design-oriented resources, technical-oriented resources, and business-oriented resources. \n\nCategories by subject\n\nAlthough the concept of a team is relatively simple, social scientists have identified many different types of teams. In general, teams either act as information processors, or take on a more active role in the task and actually perform activities. Common categories and subtypes of teams include:\n\nExecutive team\n\nAn executive team is a management team that draws up plans for activities and then directs these activities (Devine, 2002). An example of an executive team would be a construction team designing blueprints for a new building, and then guiding the construction of the building using these blueprints.\n\nCommand team\n\nThe goal of the command team is to combine instructions and to coordinate action among management. In other words, command teams serve as the \"middle man\" in tasks (Devine, 2002). For instance, messengers on a construction site, conveying instructions from the executive team to the builders, would be an example of a command team.\n\nProject teams\n\nA team used only for a defined period of time and for a separate, concretely definable purpose, often becomes known as a project team. This category of team includes negotiation-, commission- and design-team subtypes. In general, these types of teams are multi-talented and composed of individuals with expertise in many different areas. Members of these teams might belong to different groups, but receive assignment to activities for the same project, thereby allowing outsiders to view them as a single unit. In this way, setting up a team allegedly facilitates the creation, tracking and assignment of a group of people based on the project in hand. The use of the \"team\" label in this instance often has no relationship to whether the employees work as a team.\n\nAdvisory teams\n\nAdvisory teams make suggestions about a final product (Devine, 2002). For instance, a quality-control group on an assembly line would be an example of an advisory team: they may examine the products produced and make suggestions about how to improve the quality of the items being made.\n\nWork teams\n\nWork teams are responsible for the actual act of creating tangible products and services (Devine, 2002). The actual workers on an assembly line would be an example of a production team, whereas waiters and waitresses at a diner would be an example of a service team.\n\nAction teams\n\nAction teams are highly specialized and coordinated teams whose actions are intensely focused on producing a product or service (Devine, 2002). An NFL football team would be an example of an action team. Other examples occur in the military, paramedics, and transportation (e.g., a flight crew on an airplane).\n\nSports teams\n\nA sports team is a group of people which play sports (often team sports) together. Members include all players (even those who are waiting their turn to play), as well as support members such as a team manager or coach.\n\nVirtual teams\n\nDevelopments in information and communications technology have seen the emergence of the virtual work-team. A virtual team is a group of people who work interdependently and with shared purpose across space, time, and organisational boundaries using technology to communicate and collaborate. Virtual team members can be located across a country or across the world, rarely meet face-to-face, and include members from different cultures. \n\nIn their 2009 literature-review paper, Ale Ebrahim, N., Ahmed, S. and Taha, Z. added two key issues to definition of a virtual team: \"as small temporary groups of geographically, organizationally and/ or time dispersed knowledge workers who coordinate their work predominantly with electronic information and communication technologies in order to accomplish one or more organization tasks\". Many virtual teams are cross-functional and emphasize solving customer problems or generating new work processes.\n\nThe United States Department of Labor reported that in 2001, 19 million people worked from home online or from another location, and that by the end of 2002, over 100 million people world-wide would work outside traditional offices. \n\nTeam cognition \n\nTeam cognition has been defined as an “emergent state that refers to the manner in which knowledge important to team functioning is organized, represented, and distributed within team.” This emergent state can manifest in two ways. Compositional emergence occurs when individual level cognition is similar in form and function to its manifestation at team-level. Compilational emergence, on the other hand, represents a greater degree of synergy among team members and represents a new-team level construct. As such, higher degrees of compilational emergence are more closely related to team process and performance than is compositional emergence.\n\nResearch into team cognition has focused on how teams develop mental models and transactive memory systems. Mental models refer to the degree in which team members have similar cognitive understanding of the situation and performance goals which include shared representations of the task. Transactive memory systems relate to how knowledge is distributed among team members and retrieved in a coordinated fashion, the way that team member rely on knowledge that is possessed by other members and how knowledge sets are differentiated within a team. The emergence of team cognition is thought to impact team effectiveness because it can positively affect a team’s behavioural process, motivational states, and performance.\n\nTeam cognition consists of two broad types of content. Task related models are related to knowledge of the major duties and resources possessed by the team. Team-related models refer to interactions and interdependence among the team members.\n\nTeam effectiveness \n\nThe formation of teams is most appropriate for tasks that are difficult, complex and important. These types of tasks are often beyond the skills and abilities of any single individual. However, the formation of a team to complete such tasks does not guarantee success. Rather, the proper implementation of teams is positively related to both member satisfaction and increased effectiveness. Organizations who want to receive the benefits afforded by teams need to carefully consider how teams are built and implemented. Often, teams are created without providing members any training to develop the skills necessary to perform well in a team setting. This is critical, because teamwork can be cognitively and interpersonally demanding. Even when a team consists of talented individuals, these individuals must learn to coordinate their actions and develop functional interpersonal interactions. In their review of the relevant scientific literature, Kozlowski and Ilgen demonstrated that such training can greatly benefit team effectiveness. Finally, teams are more likely to be successful when they are fully supported by the organization\n\nNot all groups are teams\n\nSome people use the word \"team\" when they mean \"employees\". A \"sales team\" is a common example of this loose or perhaps euphemistic usage, though inter-dependencies exist in organisations, and a sales group can be let down by poor performance in other parts of the organisation upon which sales depend, like delivery, after-sales service, etc. However \"sales staff\" is a more accurate description of the typical arrangement.\n\nGroups develop into teams in four stages: \n\n# dependency and inclusion\n# counter dependency and fighting\n# trust and structure\n# work\n\nIn the first stage, group development is characterized by members' dependency on the designated leader (identical to 'Forming' in Tuckman's model). In the second stage, the group seeks to free itself from its dependence on the leader and groups have conflicts about goals and procedures (identical to 'Storming' in Tuckman's model). In the third stage, the group manages to work through the conflicts (identical to 'Norming' in Tuckman's model). And in the last stage, groups focus on team productivity (identical to 'Performing' in Tuckman's model).\n\nOne aspect of teams that can set them apart from other groups is their level of autonomy. Hackman developed a hierarchical model of team autonomy which consists of four levels of team self-management. It is imagined along a continuum, starting with a manager-led team in which team members complete the required tasks but someone outside the team performs the executive functions. Next in the hierarchy are self-managing teams, followed by self-designing teams. Finally, at the top of the hierarchy, come self-governing teams. The model describes four different types of control that fully self-governing teams can possess. These include control over the execution of the task, monitoring and managing work processes, control over the design and performance of a team, and setting the overall direction of the team.", "A game is structured form of play, usually undertaken for enjoyment and sometimes used as an educational tool. Games are distinct from work, which is usually carried out for remuneration, and from art, which is more often an expression of aesthetic or ideological elements. However, the distinction is not clear-cut, and many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator sports or games) or art (such as jigsaw puzzles or games involving an artistic layout such as Mahjong, solitaire, or some video games).\n\nKey components of games are goals, rules, challenge, and interaction. Games generally involve mental or physical stimulation, and often both. Many games help develop practical skills, serve as a form of exercise, or otherwise perform an educational, simulational, or psychological role.\n\nAttested as early as 2600 BC, games are a universal part of human experience and present in all cultures. The Royal Game of Ur, Senet, and Mancala are some of the oldest known games. \n\nDefinitions \n\nLudwig Wittgenstein \n\nLudwig Wittgenstein was probably the first academic philosopher to address the definition of the word game. In his Philosophical Investigations, Wittgenstein argued that the elements of games, such as play, rules, and competition, all fail to adequately define what games are. From this, Wittgenstein concluded that people apply the term game to a range of disparate human activities that bear to one another only what one might call family resemblances. As the following game definitions show, this conclusion was not a final one and today many philosophers, like Thomas Hurka, think that Wittgenstein was wrong and that Bernard Suits' definition is a good answer to the problem.\n \n\nRoger Caillois \n\nFrench sociologist Roger Caillois, in his book Les jeux et les hommes (Games and Men), defined a game as an activity that must have the following characteristics:\n* fun: the activity is chosen for its light-hearted character\n* separate: it is circumscribed in time and place\n* uncertain: the outcome of the activity is unforeseeable\n* non-productive: participation does not accomplish anything useful\n* governed by rules: the activity has rules that are different from everyday life\n* fictitious: it is accompanied by the awareness of a different reality\n\nChris Crawford \n\nComputer game designer Chris Crawford, founder of The Journal of Computer Game Design, has attempted to define the term game using a series of dichotomies:\n#Creative expression is art if made for its own beauty, and entertainment if made for money.\n#A piece of entertainment is a plaything if it is interactive. Movies and books are cited as examples of non-interactive entertainment.\n#If no goals are associated with a plaything, it is a toy. (Crawford notes that by his definition, (a) a toy can become a game element if the player makes up rules, and (b) The Sims and SimCity are toys, not games.) If it has goals, a plaything is a challenge.\n#If a challenge has no \"active agent against whom you compete,\" it is a puzzle; if there is one, it is a conflict. (Crawford admits that this is a subjective test. Video games with noticeably algorithmic artificial intelligence can be played as puzzles; these include the patterns used to evade ghosts in Pac-Man.)\n#Finally, if the player can only outperform the opponent, but not attack them to interfere with their performance, the conflict is a competition. (Competitions include racing and figure skating.) However, if attacks are allowed, then the conflict qualifies as a game.\n\nCrawford's definition may thus be rendered as: an interactive, goal-oriented activity made for money, with active agents to play against, in which players (including active agents) can interfere with each other.\n\nOther definitions \n\n* \"A game is a system in which players engage in an artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome.\" (Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman)\n\n* \"A game is a form of art in which participants, termed players, make decisions in order to manage resources through game tokens in the pursuit of a goal.\" (Greg Costikyan)\n According to this definition, some \"games\" that do not involve choices, such as Chutes and Ladders, Candy Land, and War are not technically games any more than a slot machine is.\n* \"A game is an activity among two or more independent decision-makers seeking to achieve their objectives in some limiting context.\" (Clark C. Abt) \n* \"At its most elementary level then we can define game as an exercise of voluntary control systems in which there is an opposition between forces, confined by a procedure and rules in order to produce a disequilibrial outcome.\" (Elliot Avedon and Brian Sutton-Smith)\n\n* \"A game is a form of play with goals and structure.\" (Kevin J. Maroney)\n\n* \"to play a game is to engage in activity directed toward bringing about a specific state of affairs, using only means permitted by specific rules, where the means permitted by the rules are more limited in scope than they would be in the absence of the rules, and where the sole reason for accepting such limitation is to make possible such activity.\" (Bernard Suits)\n\n* \"When you strip away the genre differences and the technological complexities, all games share four defining traits: a goal, rules, a feedback system, and voluntary participation.\" (Jane McGonigal)\n\nGameplay elements and classification \n\nGames can be characterized by \"what the player does.\" This is often referred to as gameplay. Major key elements identified in this context are tools and rules that define the overall context of game.\n\nTools \n\nGames are often classified by the components required to play them (e.g. miniatures, a ball, cards, a board and pieces, or a computer). In places where the use of leather is well established, the ball has been a popular game piece throughout recorded history, resulting in a worldwide popularity of ball games such as rugby, basketball, football, cricket, tennis, and volleyball. Other tools are more idiosyncratic to a certain region. Many countries in Europe, for instance, have unique standard decks of playing cards. Other games such as chess may be traced primarily through the development and evolution of its game pieces.\n\nMany game tools are tokens, meant to represent other things. A token may be a pawn on a board, play money, or an intangible item such as a point scored.\n\nGames such as hide-and-seek or tag do not utilise any obvious tool; rather, their interactivity is defined by the environment. Games with the same or similar rules may have different gameplay if the environment is altered. For example, hide-and-seek in a school building differs from the same game in a park; an auto race can be radically different depending on the track or street course, even with the same cars.\n\nRules \n\nWhereas games are often characterized by their tools, they are often defined by their rules. While rules are subject to variations and changes, enough change in the rules usually results in a \"new\" game. For instance, baseball can be played with \"real\" baseballs or with wiffleballs. However, if the players decide to play with only three bases, they are arguably playing a different game. There are exceptions to this in that some games deliberately involve the changing of their own rules, but even then there are often immutable meta-rules.\n\nRules generally determine turn order, the rights and responsibilities of the players, and each player’s goals. Player rights may include when they may spend resources or move tokens. Common win conditions are being first to amass a certain quota of points or tokens (as in Settlers of Catan), having the greatest number of tokens at the end of the game (as in Monopoly), or some relationship of one’s game tokens to those of one’s opponent (as in chess's checkmate).\n\nSkill, strategy, and chance \n\nA game’s tools and rules will result in its requiring skill, strategy, luck, or a combination thereof, and are classified accordingly.\n\nGames of skill include games of physical skill, such as wrestling, tug of war, hopscotch, target shooting, and stake, and games of mental skill such as checkers and chess. Games of strategy include checkers, chess, go, arimaa, and tic-tac-toe, and often require special equipment to play them. Games of chance include gambling games (blackjack, mah-jongg, roulette, etc.), as well as snakes and ladders and rock, paper, scissors; most require equipment such as cards or dice. However, most games contain two or all three of these elements. For example, American football and baseball involve both physical skill and strategy while tiddlywinks, poker, and Monopoly combine strategy and chance. Many card and board games combine all three; most trick-taking games involve mental skill, strategy, and an element of chance, as do many strategic board games such as Risk, Settlers of Catan, and Carcassonne.\n\nSingle-player games \n\nMost games require multiple players. However, single-player games are unique in respect to the type of challenges a player faces. Unlike a game with multiple players competing with or against each other to reach the game's goal, a one-player game is a battle solely against an element of the environment (an artificial opponent), against one's own skills, against time, or against chance. Playing with a yo-yo or playing tennis against a wall is not generally recognized as playing a game due to the lack of any formidable opposition.\n\nIf the computer is merely record-keeping, then the game may be validly single-player.\n\nMany games described as \"single-player\" may be termed actually puzzles or recreations.\n\nTypes \n\nGames can take a variety of forms, from competitive sports to board games and video games.\n\nSports \n\nMany sports require special equipment and dedicated playing fields, leading to the involvement of a community much larger than the group of players. A city or town may set aside such resources for the organization of sports leagues.\n\nPopular sports may have spectators who are entertained just by watching games. A community will often align itself with a local sports team that supposedly represents it (even if the team or most of its players only recently moved in); they often align themselves against their opponents or have traditional rivalries. The concept of fandom began with sports fans.\n\nStanley Fish cited the balls and strikes of baseball as a clear example of social construction, the operation of rules on the game's tools. While the strike zone target is governed by the rules of the game, it epitomizes the category of things that exist only because people have agreed to treat them as real. No pitch is a ball or a strike until it has been labeled as such by an appropriate authority, the plate umpire, whose judgment on this matter cannot be challenged within the current game.\n\nCertain competitive sports, such as racing and gymnastics, are not games by definitions such as Crawford's (see above) – despite the inclusion of many in the Olympic Games – because competitors do not interact with their opponents; they simply challenge each other in indirect ways.\n\nLawn games \n\nLawn games are outdoor games that can be played on a lawn; an area of mowed grass (or alternately, on graded soil) generally smaller than a \"field\" or pitch. Variations of many games that are traditionally played on a pitch are marketed as \"lawn games\" for home use in a front or back yard. Common lawn games include horseshoes, sholf, croquet, bocce, lawn bowls, and stake.\n\nTabletop games \n\nA tabletop game generally refers to any game where the elements of play are confined to a small area and that require little physical exertion, usually simply placing, picking up and moving game pieces. Most of these games are, thus, played at a table around which the players are seated and on which the game's elements are located. A variety of major game types generally fall under the heading of tabletop games. It is worth noting that many games falling into this category, particularly party games, are more free-form in their play and can involve physical activity such as mime, however the basic premise is still that the game does not require a large area in which to play it, large amounts of strength or stamina, or specialized equipment other than what comes in the box (games sometimes require additional materials like pencil and paper that are easy to procure).\n\nDexterity and coordination games \n\nThis class of games includes any game in which the skill element involved relates to manual dexterity or hand-eye coordination, but excludes the class of video games (see below). Games such as jacks, paper football, and Jenga require only very portable or improvised equipment and can be played on any flat level surface, while other examples, such as pinball, billiards, air hockey, foosball, and table hockey require specialized tables or other self-contained modules on which the game is played. The advent of home video game systems largely replaced some of these, such as table hockey, however air hockey, billiards, pinball and foosball remain popular fixtures in private and public game rooms. These games and others, as they require reflexes and coordination, are generally performed more poorly by intoxicated persons but are unlikely to result in injury because of this; as such the games are popular as drinking games. In addition, dedicated drinking games such as quarters and beer pong also involve physical coordination and are popular for similar reasons.\n\nBoard games \n\nBoard games use as a central tool a board on which the players' status, resources, and progress are tracked using physical tokens. Many also involve dice or cards. Most games that simulate war are board games (though a large number of video games have been created to simulate strategic combat), and the board may be a map on which the players' tokens move. Virtually all board games involve \"turn-based\" play; one player contemplates and then makes a move, then the next player does the same, and a player can only act on their turn. This is opposed to \"real-time\" play as is found in some card games, most sports and most video games.\n\nSome games, such as chess and Go, are entirely deterministic, relying only on the strategy element for their interest. Such games are usually described as having \"perfect information\"; the only unknown is the exact thought processes of one's opponent, not the outcome of any unknown event inherent in the game (such as a card draw or die roll). Children's games, on the other hand, tend to be very luck-based, with games such as Candy Land and Chutes and Ladders having virtually no decisions to be made. By some definitions, such as that by Greg Costikyan, they are not games since there are no decisions to make which effect the outcome.\n Many other games involving a high degree of luck do not allow direct attacks between opponents; the random event simply determines a gain or loss in the standing of the current player within the game, which is independent of any other player; the \"game\" then is actually a \"race\" by definitions such as Crawford's.\n\nMost other board games combine strategy and luck factors; the game of backgammon requires players to decide the best strategic move based on the roll of two dice. Trivia games have a great deal of randomness based on the questions a person gets. German-style board games are notable for often having rather less of a luck factor than many board games.\n\nBoard game groups include race games, roll-and-move games, abstract strategy games, word games, and wargames, as well as trivia and other elements. Some board games fall into multiple groups or incorporate elements of other genres: Cranium is one popular example, where players must succeed in each of four \nskills: artistry, live performance, trivia, and language.\n\nCard games \n\nCard games use a deck of cards as their central tool. These cards may be a standard Anglo-American (52-card) deck of playing cards (such as for bridge, poker, Rummy, etc.), a regional deck using 32, 36 or 40 cards and different suit signs (such as for the popular German game skat), a tarot deck of 78 cards (used in Europe to play a variety of trick-taking games collectively known as Tarot, Tarock or Tarocchi games), or a deck specific to the individual game (such as Set or 1000 Blank White Cards). Uno and Rook are examples of games that were originally played with a standard deck and have since been commercialized with customized decks. Some collectible card games such as Magic: The Gathering are played with a small selection of cards that have been collected or purchased individually from large available sets.\n\nSome board games include a deck of cards as a gameplay element, normally for randomization or to keep track of game progress. Conversely, some card games such as Cribbage use a board with movers, normally to keep score. The differentiation between the two genres in such cases depends on which element of the game is foremost in its play; a board game using cards for random actions can usually use some other method of randomization, while Cribbage can just as easily be scored on paper. These elements as used are simply the traditional and easiest methods to achieve their purpose.\n\nDice games \n\nDice games use a number of dice as their central element. Board games often use dice for a randomization element, and thus each roll of the dice has a profound impact on the outcome of the game, however dice games are differentiated in that the dice do not determine the success or failure of some other element of the game; they instead are the central indicator of the person's standing in the game. Popular dice games include Yahtzee, Farkle, Bunco, Liar's dice/Perudo, and Poker dice. As dice are, by their very nature, designed to produce apparently random numbers, these games usually involve a high degree of luck, which can be directed to some extent by the player through more strategic elements of play and through tenets of probability theory. Such games are thus popular as gambling games; the game of Craps is perhaps the most famous example, though Liar's dice and Poker dice were originally conceived of as gambling games.\n\nDomino and tile games \n\nDomino games are similar in many respects to card games, but the generic device is instead a set of tiles called dominoes, which traditionally each have two ends, each with a given number of dots, or \"pips\", and each combination of two possible end values as it appears on a tile is unique in the set. The games played with dominoes largely center around playing a domino from the player's \"hand\" onto the matching end of another domino, and the overall object could be to always be able to make a play, to make all open endpoints sum to a given number or multiple, or simply to play all dominoes from one's hand onto the board. Sets vary in the number of possible dots on one end, and thus of the number of combinations and pieces; the most common set historically is double-six, though in more recent times \"extended\" sets such as double-nine have been introduced to increase the number of dominoes available, which allows larger hands and more players in a game. Muggins, Mexican Train, and Chicken Foot are very popular domino games. Texas 42 is a domino game more similar in its play to a \"trick-taking\" card game.\n\nVariations of traditional dominoes abound: Triominoes are similar in theory but are triangular and thus have three values per tile. Similarly, a game known as Quad-Ominos uses four-sided tiles.\n\nSome other games use tiles in place of cards; Rummikub is a variant of the Rummy card game family that uses tiles numbered in ascending rank among four colors, very similar in makeup to a 2-deck \"pack\" of Anglo-American playing cards. Mah-Jongg is another game very similar to Rummy that uses a set of tiles with card-like values and art.\n\nLastly, some games use graphical tiles to form a board layout, on which other elements of the game are played. Settlers of Catan and Carcassonne are examples. In each, the \"board\" is made up of a series of tiles; in Settlers of Catan the starting layout is random but static, while in Carcassonne the game is played by \"building\" the board tile-by-tile. Hive, an abstract strategy game using tiles as moving pieces, has mechanical and strategic elements similar to chess, although it has no board; the pieces themselves both form the layout and can move within it.\n\nPencil and paper games \n\nPencil and paper games require little or no specialized equipment other than writing materials, though some such games have been commercialized as board games (Scrabble, for instance, is based on the idea of a crossword puzzle, and tic-tac-toe sets with a boxed grid and pieces are available commercially). These games vary widely, from games centering on a design being drawn such as Pictionary and \"connect-the-dots\" games like sprouts, to letter and word games such as Boggle and Scattergories, to solitaire and logic puzzle games such as Sudoku and crossword puzzles.\n\nGuessing games \n\nA guessing game has as its core a piece of information that one player knows, and the object is to coerce others into guessing that piece of information without actually divulging it in text or spoken word. Charades is probably the most well-known game of this type, and has spawned numerous commercial variants that involve differing rules on the type of communication to be given, such as Catch Phrase, Taboo, Pictionary, and similar. The genre also includes many game shows such as Win, Lose or Draw, Password and $25,000 Pyramid.\n\nVideo games \n\nVideo games are computer- or microprocessor-controlled games. Computers can create virtual spaces for a wide variety of game types. Some video games simulate conventional game objects like cards or dice, while others can simulate environs either grounded in reality or fantastical in design, each with its own set of rules or goals.\n\nA computer or video game uses one or more input devices, typically a button/joystick combination (on arcade games); a keyboard, mouse or trackball (computer games); or a controller or a motion sensitive tool. (console games). More esoteric devices such as paddle controllers have also been used for input.\n\nThere are many genres of video game; the first commercial video game, Pong, was a simple simulation of table tennis. As processing power increased, new genres such as adventure and action games were developed that involved a player guiding a character from a third person perspective through a series of obstacles. This \"real-time\" element cannot be easily reproduced by a board game, which is generally limited to \"turn-based\" strategy; this advantage allows video games to simulate situations such as combat more realistically. Additionally, the playing of a video game does not require the same physical skill, strength or danger as a real-world representation of the game, and can provide either very realistic, exaggerated or impossible physics, allowing for elements of a fantastical nature, games involving physical violence, or simulations of sports. Lastly, a computer can, with varying degrees of success, simulate one or more human opponents in traditional table games such as chess, leading to simulations of such games that can be played by a single player.\n\nIn more open-ended computer simulations, also known as sandbox-style games, the game provides a virtual environment in which the player may be free to do whatever they like within the confines of this universe. Sometimes, there is a lack of goals or opposition, which has stirred some debate on whether these should be considered \"games\" or \"toys\". (Crawford specifically mentions Will Wright's SimCity as an example of a toy.)\n\nOnline games \n\nOnline games have been part of culture from the very earliest days of networked and time-shared computers. Early commercial systems such as Plato were at least as widely famous for their games as for their strictly educational value. In 1958, Tennis for Two dominated Visitor's Day and drew attention to the oscilloscope at the Brookhaven National Laboratory; during the 1980s, Xerox PARC was known mainly for Maze War, which was offered as a hands-on demo to visitors.\n\nModern online games are played using an Internet connection; some have dedicated client programs, while others require only a web browser. Some simpler browser games appeal to demographic groups (notably women and the middle-aged) that otherwise play very few video games.\n\nRole-playing games \n\nRole-playing games, often abbreviated as RPGs, are a type of game in which the participants (usually) assume the roles of characters acting in a fictional setting. The original role playing games—or at least those explicitly marketed as such—are played with a handful of participants, usually face-to-face, and keep track of the developing fiction with pen and paper. Together, the players may collaborate on a story involving those characters; create, develop, and \"explore\" the setting; or vicariously experience an adventure outside the bounds of everyday life. Pen-and-paper role-playing games include, for example, Dungeons & Dragons and GURPS.\n\nThe term role-playing game has also been appropriated by the video game industry to describe a genre of video games. These may be single-player games where one player experiences a programmed environment and story, or they may allow players to interact through the internet. The experience is usually quite different from traditional role-playing games. Single-player games include Final Fantasy, Fable, The Elder Scrolls, and Mass Effect. Online multi-player games, often referred to as Massively Multiplayer Online role playing games, or MMORPGs, include RuneScape, EverQuest 2, Guild Wars, MapleStory, Anarchy Online, and Dofus. , the most successful MMORPG has been World of Warcraft, which controls the vast majority of the market. \n\nBusiness games \n\nBusiness games can take a variety of forms, from interactive board games to interactive games involving different props (balls, ropes, hoops, etc.) and different kinds of activities. The purpose of these games is to link to some aspect of organizational performance and to generate discussions about business improvement. Many business games focus on organizational behaviors. Some of these are computer simulations while others are simple designs for play and debriefing. Team building is a common focus of such activities.\n\nSimulation \n\nThe term \"game\" can include simulation or re-enactment of various activities or use in \"real life\" for various purposes: e.g., training, analysis, prediction. Well-known examples are war games and roleplaying. The root of this meaning may originate in the human prehistory of games deduced by anthropology from observing primitive cultures, in which children's games mimic the activities of adults to a significant degree: hunting, warring, nursing, etc. These kinds of games are preserved in modern times.", "Beach volleyball is a team sport played by two teams of two players on a sand court divided by a net. It has been an Olympic discipline since the 1996 Games.\n\nAs in indoor volleyball, the object of the game is to send the ball over the net and to ground it on the opponent's court, and to prevent the same effort by the opponent. A team is allowed up to three touches to return the ball across the net. The ball is put in play with a serve —a hit by the server from behind the rear court boundary over the net to the opponents. The rally continues until the ball is grounded on the playing court, goes \"out\", or is not returned properly. \n\nThe team winning a rally scores a point and serves to start the following rally. The four players serve in the same sequence throughout the match, changing server each time a rally is won by the receiving team.\nBeach volleyball Originated at the Outrigger Canoe Club, on the shores of Waikiki Beach (in Hawaii, USA), and has achieved worldwide popularity.\n\nHistory\n\nThe true \"birth\" of \"beach volleyball\" apparently began on the beaches of Waikiki Beach in Hawaii, at the Outrigger Canoe Club in 1915. From the moment that this first recorded game in Hawaii took place, this outdoor game of volleyball has continued to be played and known as \"beach volleyball\" rather than just \"volleyball.\"\nThe Outrigger Canoe Club was founded in 1908 by a small group of Honolulu’s business and professional community. The Club’s original mission was to help perpetuate traditional Hawaiian sports. They began so that they could make sure \"the native and small-boy\" could \"doff their duds and mount their surf boards at will\" as they enjoyed the waves of Waikiki. It became a place where man could commune with the sun, the sand and the sea, along with good fellowship and the aloha spirit.\n\nThe Club’s story mirrors that of Waikiki and Hawaii. The 1908 clubhouse was two grass houses purchased from a defunct zoo. The grass houses were moved to leased land, on the beach, next to a lagoon. One (fronting the beach) was fitted out as a shed for canoes and surfboards. The other shed became the Club’s first bathhouse and dressing room. Both had spacious lanai. A sand floor pavilion was built a short time later and it became a popular gathering place for members. A new clubhouse was eventually built in 1941 on the same grounds. Then in 1964, when the Waikiki lease was lost, the club moved to its present Diamond Head location.\n\nThe Outrigger Beach and Canoe Club’s historical committee has produced written accounts, confirming that beach volleyball started there in early 1915. The written account is from an \"Oral History\" interview that is dated June 9, 1978. The interviewer, Kenneth Pratt interviewed Ronald Higgins, an original Outrigger Canoe Club member. Mr. Higgins recollects Club member, George David \"Dad\" Center, going out and buying a couple of volleyballs and a volleyball net, sometime at the start of 1915. Then \"Dad,\" along with other members, temporarily put the net up, in the sandy beach area parallel to the tide line, between the surfboard lockers and the canoe shed. This is where the first recorded game of \"Beach Volleyball\" took place. This moment in volleyball is historic, because the games at the Outrigger Club appropriately represent the legitimate birth of the game of \"Beach\" volleyball. In 1920, new jetties in Santa Monica, California created a large sandy area for public enjoyment, planting the seed for beach volleyball development in that region. The first permanent nets began to appear, and people soon began playing recreational games on public parts of the beach and in private beach clubs. Eleven such beach clubs appeared in the Santa Monica area, beginning in late 1922. The first inter-club competitions were staged in 1924.\n\nMost of these early beach volleyball matches were played with teams of at least six players per side, much like indoor volleyball. The concept of the modern two-man beach volleyball game is credited to Paul \"Pablo\" Johnson, an indoor player of Santa Monica Athletic Club. In the summer of 1930, while waiting for players to show up for a six-man game, Johnson decided to try playing with only the two people present. The game was forever changed. Though recreational games continue to be played with more players, the most widely played version of the game, and the only one contested at an elite level, has only two players per team.\n\nBeach volleyball began to appear in Europe in the 1930s. By the 1940s, doubles tournaments were being played on the beaches of Santa Monica for trophies. In 1948 the first tournament to offer a prize was held in Los Angeles, California. It awarded the best teams with a case of Pepsi, supplied by Dr. Caleb Mohrhauser, often noted as one of the most enthusiastic patrons of early beach volleyball. In the 1960s, an attempt to start a professional volleyball league was made in Santa Monica. It failed, but a professional tournament was held in France for 30,000 French francs. The first Manhattan Beach Open was held in 1960, a tournament which grew in prestige to become, in the eyes of some, the \"Wimbledon of Beach Volleyball\". \n\nIn the meanwhile, beach volleyball gained big popularity: in the 1960s The Beatles tried playing in Los Angeles and even US president John F. Kennedy was seen attending a match. \n\nIn 1974 there was an indoor tournament: \"The $1500.00 World Indoor Two-Man Volleyball Championship\" played in front of 4,000 volleyball enthusiast at the San Diego Sports Arena. Fred Zuelich teamed with Dennis Hare to defeat Ron Von Hagen and Matt Gage in the championship match, Winston Cigarettes was the sponsor. Dennis Hare went on to write the first book on the subject of Beach Volleyball: The Art of Beach Volleyball. \n\nThe first professional beach volleyball tournament was the Olympia World Championship of Beach Volleyball, staged on Labor Day weekend, 1976, at Will Rogers State Beach in Pacific Palisades, California. The event was organized by David Wilk of Volleyball Magazine, based in Santa Barbara. The winners, the first \"world champions\", were Greg Lee and Jim Menges. They split $2,500 out of a total prize purse of $5,000.\n\nVolleyball Magazine staged the event the next year at the same location, this time sponsored by Schlitz Light Beer. In 1978 Wilk formed a sports promotion company named Event Concepts with Craig Masuoka and moved the World Championship of Beach Volleyball to Redondo Beach. Jose Cuervo tequila signed on as sponsor and the prize purse. The event was successful and Cuervo funded an expansion the next year to three events. The California Pro Beach Tour debuted with events in Laguna Beach, Santa Barbara and the World Championship in Redondo.\n\nIn following years the tour expanded nationally and was renamed the Pro Beach Volleyball Tour. It consisted of five events in California and tournaments in Florida, Colorado, and Chicago. Top players included Karch Kiraly, Randy Stoklos, Singin Smith, Andy Fishburn, and Steve Obradovich. By 1984 the Pro Beach consisted of 16 events around the country and had a total prize purse of $300,000. At the end of the year, however, Event Concepts was forced out of the sport by a players' strike at the World Championship and the Association of Volleyball Professionals (AVP) was founded.\n\nAt the professional level, the sport remained fairly obscure until the 1980s when beach volleyball experienced a surge in popularity with high profile players such as Sinjin Smith, Randy Stoklos, and Karch Kiraly. Kiraly won an Olympic gold medal in beach volleyball in its first Olympic appearance in 1996, adding that to the two Olympic golds he won as part of the USA men's indoor team, and has won 142 titles. In 1987, the FIVB created the first World Beach Volleyball Championships, played in Rio Janeiro, Brazil won By Sinjin Smith and Randy Stoklos. The FIVB began organizing worldwide professional tournaments, and laid the groundwork for the sport's Olympic debut in 1996. \n\nDespite its increased popularity in the 1980s and 1990s, American beach volleyball suffered setbacks. In early 1998, the American women's professional tour – the WPVA – closed its doors and filed for bankruptcy. Later that same year, the American professional men's tour – the AVP – also filed for bankruptcy, plagued by problems as a player-run organization.\n\nIn 2001, the AVP reemerged as a for-profit, publicly traded company that combined the men's and women's professional tours, with equal prize money for both sexes. In 2010, the AVP shut its doors once again and filed bankruptcy.\n\nBeach volleyball has become a global sport, with international competition organized by the FIVB. Brazil and the USA are dominant, with 20 of the 30 Olympic medals awarded to date between them, and 16 of the 20 gold and silver medals. But the sport's popularity has spread to the rest of the world as well.\n\nRules and gameplay\n\nRule differences between beach and indoor\n\nBeach volleyball is fundamentally similar to indoor volleyball: a team scores points by grounding the ball on the opponents' court, or when the opposing team commits a fault (error or illegal action); consecutive contacts must be made by different players (except after a block touch, when any player may legally contact the ball).\n\nThe major differences between beach and indoor volleyball are:\n*Playing surface – sand rather than hard court\n*Bare feet are allowed for the players\n*The dimensions of the court are 16 by 8 meters, compared to 18 by 9 meters in the indoor game.\n*The beach court has no \"attack line\", unlike the indoor court, which has such a line 3 meters from the net. \n*Team size – two rather than six, with no substitutions allowed\n*Scoring system – best of 3 sets played to 21 (15 for a deciding set) rather than best of 5 to 25\n*Open hand touches, tips and dinks are illegal\n*A block at the net counts as one of the three allowed touches in the beach game, but not in the indoor game\n*Open-hand setting standards are different in the beach game – double hitting is called tighter but lifts are slightly more lenient\n*Coaching during matches is not allowed\n*There are no rotation errors on the beach – players may switch sides at will\n*It is legal to cross under the net in beach volleyball as long as it does not interfere with opponents' play\n*Teams switch ends of the court every seven points, rather than between sets\n*There is no Libero in beach like there is in indoor \n\nIn both indoor and beach versions, the height of the top of the net is 2.43 meters for men and 2.24 meters for women.\n\nSkills\n\nThere are several basic skills competitive players need to master: serving, passing, setting, attacking, blocking, and digging.\n\nServing is the act of putting the ball into play by striking it with the hand or arm from behind the rear court boundary. Serving can take the form of an underhand serve, overhand serve or a jump serve. The underhand and overhand serves are similar on the beach and indoors, with the exception that on the beach the wind often has a significant effect on the trajectory of the ball. Although the serve can be used as an offensive weapon, most rallies are won by the receiving team, as they have the first attack opportunity.\n\nThe pass is the first of a team's 3 allowed contacts, and is also very similar on the beach and indoors. However, the standards for hand setting (handling the ball overhand using finger action with the hands separated) are stricter on the beach. In practice, this means that players are effectively forbidden from setting the ball on serve receive; similarly, players seldom use a hand setting motion as the first (except on a hard driven attack) or last of the three allowed team contacts. Digging is a similar skill to passing, but the term is not used to describe receiving the serve or a free ball, but rather refers to an attempt to prevent an opponent's attack hit from touching the court.\n\nThe set is the second team contact, and its purpose is to position the ball for an attack on the third hit. A hand setting motion is often used, but bump setting, an underhand motion in which the ball bounces off the forearms, is also common. When using the hand motion contact for the setting the player's hands must contact the ball simultaneously. If a referee determines that a double-hit has occurred, the point will be given to the other team. Excessive spin after a ball has been set is often used as an indicator of a double contact fault, but causing a ball to spin while setting is not explicitly prohibited. After completing the contact, the setter typically turns his attention to the defense and communicates to his partner whether a blocker is up and which area of the court is open. The second contact can also be used to attack the ball.\n\nAttacking includes skills such as spiking—hitting the ball hard with one open hand on a downward trajectory from above the top of the net; rolling—a similar motion to spiking, but softer and with an arcing trajectory; and dinking—directing the ball very softly low over the net. Attack hits are also frequently made with a poking motion with the knuckles or stiff straight fingers.\n\nBlocking is an attempt to direct an attack hit by the opponents back into their court by reaching above the top of the net. Players often decide against blocking (if the pass and set are not in a good position to produce a spike attack) and instead opt to Peel off the net and dig. This peeling action is a skill almost exclusive to beach volleyball.\n\nParticipants\n\nA team is composed exclusively of two players, who must always be in play and who cannot be subjected to any substitutions or replacement. At the moment the ball is hit by the server, each team must be within its own court (with the exception of the server), but there are no determined positions on the court, such that no positional faults can be committed. The two players can switch at any point of the game; there is no set position that you must stay in like indoor.\n\nScoring system\n\nThe first to win two sets wins the match. A set is won by the first team to reach 21 points (15 points in the deciding final set) with a two-point advantage. Thus, if the score is 21–20 (or 15–14 in a final set) the set continues.\n\nWhenever a team fails to execute a legal service or to return the ball, or commits any other fault, the opposing team wins the rally, scores a point, and serves to start the following rally.\n\nTeams switch ends of the court after every 7 points (set 1 and 2) and 5 points (set 3) played. When the total points are 21 (adding the score of both teams) there is a technical time out.\n\nCharacteristics of a hit\n\nThe ball may touch any part of the body (except during the serve, when only the hand or arm may make contact), but must be hit, not caught or thrown. During a hit, a player may only make contact with the ball one time.\n\nWhen receiving a ball from a hit that is not hard driven, the ball must be contacted \"cleanly\"—if a player receives the ball open-handed, the contact of each hand with the ball must be exactly simultaneous. In practice, this means that serves are never received open-handed. When receiving an opponent's hard-driven attack, a double contact (provided both contacts occur in a single action) and/or a slight lift of the ball is allowed. In particular, in defensive action of a hard driven ball, the ball can be held momentarily overhand with the fingers.\n\nWhen employing an overhand pass (hands separated, ball handled with the fingers) as the second of three team touches (usually with the intent of \"setting\" the ball, so that the other player may make a more effective attack-hit), the standard for a double contact fault is more lenient than when receiving or attacking, though still much stricter than in indoor volleyball. The standard for a lift fault during an overhand pass is less strict than in indoor games—it is legal to allow the ball to come to rest for a small period of time.\n\nAttack-hits using an \"open-handed tip or dink\" directing the ball with the fingers are illegal, as are attack-hits using an overhand pass to direct the ball on a trajectory not perpendicular to the line of the shoulders (overhand passes which accidentally cross over the net are an exception). These differences between the rules of indoor volleyball and beach volleyball strongly affect tactics and techniques.\n\nBlock signals\n\nBeach volleyball players use hand signals to indicate the type of block they intend to make. Block signals are made behind the back to hide them from the opposing team. They are usually given with both hands by the serving player's partner prior to the serve, with each hand referring to the type of block that should be put up against an attack from the corresponding opponent. A player may also \"wiggle\" or \"flash\" one block signal to indicate which opponent to serve to.\n\nIf the server is the designated blocker, he or she may run up to the net to block after serving. Otherwise, the signaling player will perform the block.\n\nBlock signals may also be given during a rally while the opposing team is preparing their attack.\n\nCommon block signals\n\n*Closed fist\nNo block should be attempted for the opponent on that side of the court, also known as \"pull-off\"\n*One finger\nThe blocker should block an opponent's \"line\" attack, or a ball hit toward the nearest sideline\n*Two fingers\nThe blocker should block an opponent's \"angle\" attack, or a ball hit diagonally from the net and across the court\n*Open hand\nThe blocker should block \"ball\", deciding how to block based upon the opposing team's set, and the hitter's approach and arm-swing technique.\n\nNote: In Europe closed fist and open hand signals have the opposite meaning of blocking. If the partner is showing the closed fist the blocker should block \"ball\" and open hand means that the blocker should \"pull-off\" the net.\n\nGoverning bodies\n\nThe primary international governing body for beach volleyball is the Fédération Internationale de Volleyball (FIVB). The regional governing bodies are:\n\n*Asia – Asian Volleyball Confederation (AVC)\n*Africa – Confédération Africaine de Volleyball (CAV)\n*Europe – European Volleyball Confederation (CEV)\n*North and Central America – North, Central America and Caribbean Volleyball Confederation (NORCECA)\n*South America – Confederación Sudamericana de Voleibol (CSV)\n\nIn the United States, USA Volleyball is the governing body for beach volleyball, as well as indoor volleyball.\n\nNCAA beach volleyball\n\nIn the 2010–11 academic year, the NCAA began sponsoring beach volleyball, which it initially called \"sand volleyball\", as an \"emerging\" women's sport. Initially, it was sponsored only for Division II, with Division I added the following academic year. NCAA competition follows standard beach volleyball rules, with competitions involving five doubles teams from each participating school. \n\nBeach volleyball will become a fully sanctioned NCAA championship sport in the 2015–16 school year, following votes by leaders of all three NCAA divisions to launch a single all-divisions national championship. At the end of June 2015, the NCAA dropped the name of \"sand volleyball\" in favor of the more usual \"beach volleyball.\" \n\nUniform controversy\n\nIn 1999, the FIVB standardized beach volleyball uniforms, with the swimsuit becoming the required uniform both for men and women. This drew the ire of some athletes. \n\nAccording to FIVB rules, female beach volleyball players have the option of playing in shorts or a one-piece swimsuit. Most players, however, prefer the two-piece bikini. \n\nCompetitors such as Natalie Cook and Holly McPeak have confirmed the FIVB's claims that the uniforms are practical for a sport played on sand during the heat of summer, but British Olympian Denise Johns claimed that the regulation uniform is intended to be \"sexy\" and to draw attention. \n\nDuring the 2004 Summer Olympic Games, a study was conducted on the camera angles during the beach volleyball games. Twenty percent of the camera angles were focused on the chest area and seventeen percent of the angles were focused on the buttock area. The study concludes that this implies the look of the players is having a greater impact on fans than their actual athleticism. \n\nSome conservative cultures have expressed moral objections to the swimsuit as a uniform. At the 2007 South Pacific Games, rules were adjusted to require less revealing shorts and cropped sports tops. At the 2006 Asian Games, only one Muslim country fielded a team in the woman´s competition, amid concerns the uniform was inappropriate.\n\nIn early 2012, the International Volleyball Federation announced it would allow shorts (maximum length 3 cm above the knee) and sleeved tops at the London 2012 Olympics. Richard Baker, the federation spokesperson, said that \"many of these countries have religious and cultural requirements so the uniform needed to be more flexible\". And in fact the weather was so cold for the evening games at London 2012 that the players sometimes had to wear shirts and leggings. \n\nLifestyle and culture\n\nBeach volleyball culture includes the people, language, fashion and life surrounding the sport of modern beach volleyball. With its origins in Hawaii and California, beach volleyball is strongly associated with a casual, beach-centric lifestyle. As it developed nearly in parallel with modern surfing, beach volleyball culture shares some similarities with surf culture. The beach bum archetype is one such example.\n\nFashion often extends from the clothing worn during play, like the bikini or boardshorts. And much like surfers, beach volleyball players are at the mercy of the weather; patterns of play often develop based on weather conditions like sun and wind.\n\nNudist/naturist volleyball\n\nNudists were early adopters of the game. Records of regular games in clubs can be found as early as the 1920s. Given the outdoor nature of nudism/naturism, a beach version of volleyball was naturally adopted. By the 1960s, a volleyball court could be found in almost all nudist/naturist clubs. A large (over 70 teams) nude volleyball tournament has been held each fall since 1971 at White Thorn Lodge in western Pennsylvania, and several smaller tournaments occur each year throughout North America. \n\nCommon injuries\n\nThe most common injuries in beach volleyball are knee, ankle and finger injuries. Pain due to overuse of the knee, lower back, and especially shoulder is common as well. Many players use kinesiology tape. Interest in this tape has surged after American beach volleyball player and gold medallist Kerri Walsh wore it at the 2008 Beijing Olympics." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Lady_Justice.txt" ], "title": [ "Lady Justice" ], "wiki_context": [ "Iustitia, Justitia or Lady Justice (, the Roman goddess of Justice, who is equivalent to the Greek goddess Themis) is an allegorical personification of the moral force in judicial systems. Her attributes are a blindfold, a balance and a sword. She often appears as a pair with Prudentia, who holds a mirror and a snake.\n\nDepiction\n\nThe personification of justice balancing the scales dates back to the Goddess Maat, and later Isis, of ancient Egypt. The Hellenic deities Themis and Dike were later goddesses of justice. Themis was the embodiment of divine order, law, and custom, in her aspect as the personification of the divine rightness of law. However, a more direct connection is to Themis' daughter Dike, who was portrayed carrying scales.\n\n\"If some god had been holding level the balance of goddess which is Dike\" is a surviving fragment of Bacchylides' poetry. Ancient Rome adopted the image of a female goddess of justice, which it called Iustitia. Since Roman times, Iustitia has frequently been depicted carrying scales and a sword, and wearing a blindfold. Her modern iconography frequently adorns courthouses and courtrooms, and conflates the attributes of several goddesses who embodied Right Rule for Greeks and Romans, blending Roman blindfolded Fortuna (fate) with Hellenistic Greek Tyche (luck), and sword-carrying Nemesis (retribution).\n\nLady Justice is most often depicted with a set of scales typically suspended from her left hand, upon which she measures the strengths of a case's support and opposition. She is also often seen carrying a double-edged sword in her right hand, symbolizing the power of Reason and Justice, which may be wielded either for or against any party.\n\nBlindfold\n \n\nSince the 15th century, Lady Justice has often been depicted wearing a blindfold. The blindfold represents objectivity, in that justice is or should be meted out objectively, without fear or favour, regardless of money, wealth, fame, power, or identity; blind justice and impartiality. The earliest Roman coins depicted Justitia with the sword in one hand and the scale in the other, but with her eyes uncovered. Justitia was only commonly represented as \"blind\" since about the end of the 15th century. The first known representation of blind Justice is Hans Gieng's 1543 statue on the Gerechtigkeitsbrunnen (Fountain of Justice) in Berne. \n\nInstead of using the Janus approach, many sculptures simply leave out the blindfold altogether. For example, atop the Old Bailey courthouse in London, a statue of Lady Justice stands without a blindfold; the courthouse brochures explain that this is because Lady Justice was originally not blindfolded, and because her \"maidenly form\" is supposed to guarantee her impartiality which renders the blindfold redundant. Another variation is to depict a blindfolded Lady Justice as a human scale, weighing competing claims in each hand. An example of this can be seen at the Shelby County Courthouse in Memphis, Tennessee. \n\nThe cover of a 2006 issue of Rolling Stone proclaimed TIME TO GO!, focusing on the perceived corruption that dominated Congress. The drawing showed a bunch of figures evoking reactionary politics emerging from the Capitol. One of the figures was Lady Justice lifting her blindfold, implying that the then-composition of Congress had politicized the criminal justice system.\n\nScales\n\nIn her left hand, Lady Justice holds balance scales, which represent the weighing of evidence. When taken with the blindfold, the symbolism is that evidence must be weighed on its own merit.\n\nSword\n\nIn her right hand, Lady Justice is seen to have a sword that faces downward. This sword represents punishment.\n\nJustice in sculpture\n\nImage:Berner Iustitia.jpg|Lady Justice with sword, scales and blindfold on the Gerechtigkeitsbrunnen in Berne, Switzerland—1543\nImage:A Justica Alfredo Ceschiatti Brasilia Brasil.jpg|The Justice, in front of the Supreme Court of Brazil\n\nImage:Pediment courthouse, Rome, Italy.jpg | Lady Justice seated at the entrance of The Palace of Justice, Rome, Italy\nImage:Justitia1.jpg|Sculpture of Lady Justice on the ' in Frankfurt, Germany\nFile:Justicia Ottawa.jpg|Justitia, outside the Supreme Court of Canada, Ottawa, Canada\nImage:Statue of Justice, Central Criminal Court, London, UK - 20030311.jpg|The Central Criminal Court or Old Bailey, London, UK\nImage:Itojyuku themis.jpg|Themis, Itojyuku, Shibuya-ku, Japan\nImage:Justice statue.jpg|19th-century sculpture of the Power of Law at Olomouc, Czech Republic—lacks the blindfold and scales of Justice, replacing the latter with a book\nImage:Statue_of_Themis.jpg|Themis, Chuo University, Tama-shi, Japan\nImage:Chuo highschool themis.jpg|Themis, Chuo University Suginami high school, Suginami-ku, Japan\nImage:HK Central Statue Square Legislative Council Building n Themis s.jpg|Statue of Lady Justice depicted as Themis above the Old Supreme Court building in Hong Kong\nImage:Law place du Palais-Bourbon Paris.jpg|The Law, by Jean Feuchère\nImage:JMR-Memphis1.jpg|Shelby County Courthouse, Memphis, Tennessee, USA\nFile:Justice Statue Iran.jpg|Justitia, Tehran courthouse, Tehran, Iran\nImage:Goddess of justice.jpg|Themis, outside the Supreme Court of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia\nFile:NewarkJustice1.jpg|Justice by Diana Moore, Government Center, Newark, New Jersey\nFile:Justitia szobra a Kúria épületében.jpg|Justitia in the Superior Courts Building in Budapest, Hungary\n\nFile:Sala di costantino, giustizia.jpg|Fresco in the , Raphael Rooms, Raphael, circa 1520 \nGerechtigkeit-1537.jpg|Gerechtigkeit, Lucas Cranach the Elder, 1537\nLuca Giordano 013.jpg|Luca Giordano, Palazzo Medici Riccardi in Florence, 1684–1686\nFile:Spitzweg-justitia.jpg|, Carl Spitzweg, ca 1857\n\nLady Justice and her symbols are used in heraldry, especially in the arms of legal government agencies.\n\nFile:Wappen Ilshofen.png|Justitia in arms of Ilshofen in Baden-Württemberg\nFile:Svea hovrätt vapen.svg|Scales and sword in the arms of a Swedish court of law\n\nFile:US-Fractional (3rd Issue)-$0.50-Fr.1355.jpg|Justice holding scales, $0.50 U.S. Fractional currency." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Hybrid_(golf).txt", "Golf_club.txt", "Golf.txt", "Wood_(golf).txt", "Iron_(golf).txt" ], "title": [ "Hybrid (golf)", "Golf club", "Golf", "Wood (golf)", "Iron (golf)" ], "wiki_context": [ "A hybrid is a type of club used in the sport of golf with a design borrowing from both irons and woods while differing from both. The name \"hybrid\" comes from genetics to denote a mixture of two different species with desirable characteristics of both, and the term here has been generalized, combining the familiar swing mechanics of an iron with the more forgiving nature and better distance of a wood. \n\nFor many players, long irons (numbers 1-4) are difficult to hit well even with modern clubfaces, due to the low trajectory and very small face of the low-loft clubhead. Players tend to avoid these clubs in favor of fairway woods which have a larger \"sweet spot\" to hit with, but such woods, having longer shafts, have a different swing mechanic that is sometimes difficult to master. The long shaft of a fairway wood also requires lots of room to swing, making it unsuitable for tighter lies such as \"punching\" out from underneath trees. In addition, the fairway wood clubface is designed to skim over instead of cutting into turf, which makes it undesirable for shots from the rough. The answer to this dilemma for many players is to replace the 1-4 irons with hybrids.\n\nDesign\n\nA hybrid generally features a head very similar to a fairway wood; hollow steel or titanium with a shallow, slightly convex face. A hybrid head is usually marginally shallower and does not extend backwards from the face as far as a comparable fairway wood. The head must have an iron-like lie angle, and therefore also has a flatter sole than a fairway wood. The face incorporates the \"trampoline\" effect common to most modern woods, in which the clubface deforms slightly, then returns to its previous shape, increasing the impulse applied to the ball at launch. The hybrid's lie, length and weight is comparable to an iron.\n\nBeing a new class of club, there is no generally accepted principle governing design. So while a \"true\" hybrid is as described above, many manufacturers cut production costs by marketing irons as hybrids by adding one or more features to make it look like a hybrid. Some have a club face that looks very similar to an iron, but instead of the cavity-back or muscle-back design these clubs have a slightly bulging back to appear more wood-like in shape. These \"iron replacements\" swing and perform almost exactly like irons, except the difference in the added weight which slows clubhead speed but increases force applied at a given club speed, allowing a swing to cut through turf or sand with more momentum remaining at contact. These clubs are preferred by players with slower swing speeds. Other club manufacturers produce \"true\" hybrids as previously described. The first equipment manufacturer to produce a full set of these true hybrids, in both left and right hand, was [http://www.thomasgolf.com/Hybrids/ Thomas Golf]. Hybrids are now also available in traditional (teardrop) and square head shapes.\n\nBehavior\n\nThough generally similar to a wood of the same loft in performance, with slightly less carry distance (distance traveled before first impact) but similar launch trajectory, and generally similar to an iron in swing mechanics, hybrids have some behaviors different from either. Because the wood-like head design creates enormous impulse on the ball, the loft of a hybrid head is generally higher than either the wood or iron of the same number, so that the distance carried by the ball is similar to the comparable iron number. \n\nThis does two things; first, the angle of launch is increased so that the ball carries higher than the comparable iron. Second, the increased loft coupled with the tighter impulse also imparts increased backspin on the ball. This increased backspin is different from both the iron and the wood of the same number, and creates a flight path similar to a higher-loft iron but at a lower angle of launch; the backspinning ball will lift itself in the air along its flight line, \"stall\" when the lift generated by the spin coupled with the ball's momentum can no longer keep it in the air, and drop relatively sharply onto the turf. The sharp drop coupled with the continuing backspin creates \"bite\"; the ball's forward momentum will be arrested sharply at its point of impact and carry only a few yards thereafter. \n\nOnce this behavior is known to the player, it can be used to great effect. For instance, a player may be faced with a hole incorporating a hazard just in front of the green. A driver, low-loft fairway wood or long iron shot will roll significantly, and depending on the distance carried in the air the ball will either roll into the hazard with a resulting penalty, or roll past the green, which on many courses is difficult to recover from and may incorporate other hazards. Normally a player might hit a mid-iron shot designed to \"lay up\" in front of the hazard and then hit an \"approach\" shot with a wedge or short iron to carry over the hazard and onto the green. However, a hybrid with sufficient distance would allow the player to hit a shot that carries the full distance to the green in the air, but then \"sticks\" on the green relatively close to its impact point, allowing the player to make one stroke instead of two to get on the green.\n\nUsage\n\nA hybrid with a wood-like clubhead is often used for long shots from difficult rough and for nearly any shot where the golfer would normally use a long iron but feels uncomfortable doing so. They also are direct replacements for fairway woods in most situations, but a fairway wood will have greater club speed and more roll for better distance. Because hybrids can assist in getting the player out of tricky situations such as tight lies, TaylorMade Golf chose to market their hybrid clubs as Rescue clubs. The most common hybrid lofts are 3-iron and 4-iron equivalents (the 1- and 2-iron are usually omitted from the bag completely), though 5-iron equivalents are also seen in ladies' and seniors' sets. Hybrids generally replace rather than supplement long irons, but as a player is free to carry any set of 14 clubs that they wish, it is not unheard of for a player to carry both a 3-hybrid and a 3-iron, with the hybrid instead replacing the fairway wood; the higher-mass iron clubhead would be preferable to the hybrid for use in tall grass or soft lies.\n\nShots from deep within trees and in very high grass can still be difficult with a \"wood-faced\" hybrid, however, as the higher angle of flight can make \"punching\" out through low-hanging branches difficult, and the wider sole of the hybrid, similar to a wood, will still skim rather than cut into tall grass (similar to a wood but to a lesser degree). Here, the \"iron replacement\" form of hybrid is preferable as the trajectory and cut-through are similar to (sometimes even better than) a traditional long iron's while maintaining much of the power of a \"wood-faced\" hybrid.\n\nWhen a ball is lying near the green, a player can use a hybrid to perform a short \"bump and run\". By assuming the player's typical putting stance and grip, a ball can be \"bumped\" in the air over the taller rough onto the green, where it will then \"run\" (roll) like a putt. Other clubs, especially mid- and high-lofted irons, can make a similar stroke and are more commonly used.\n\nPopularity\n\nIn 2007 the Darrell Survey Company reported that over 30% of consumer golfers were using at least one hybrid club, up from a little over 7% in 2004. They also found 65% of professional golfers on the PGA Tour, and 80% on the Champions Tour now use at least one hybrid club, with many carrying more than one in their bags.", "A golf club is a club used to hit a golf ball in a game of golf. Each club is composed of a shaft with a grip and a club head. Woods are mainly used for long-distance fairway or tee shots; irons, the most versatile class, are used for a variety of shots; hybrids that combine design elements of woods and irons are becoming increasingly popular; putters are used mainly on the green to roll the ball into the hole. A standard set consists of 14 golf clubs, and while there are traditional combinations sold at retail as matched sets, players are free to use any combination of 14 or fewer legal clubs.\n\nAn important variation in different clubs is loft, or the angle between the club's face and the vertical plane. It is loft that is the primary determinant of the ascending trajectory of the golf ball, with the tangential angle of the club head's swing arc at impact being a secondary and relatively minor consideration (though these small changes in swing angle can nevertheless have a significant influence on launch angle when using low-lofted clubs). The impact of the club compresses the ball, while grooves on the club face give the ball backspin. Together, the compression and backspin create lift. The majority of woods and irons are labeled with a number; higher numbers indicate shorter shafts and higher lofts, which give the ball a higher and shorter trajectory.\n\nMaterials\n\nThe shafts of the woods were made of different types of wood before being replaced by hickory in the middle of the 19th century . The varieties of woods included ash, purpleheart, orangewood, and blue-mahoo. \nDespite the strength of hickory, the long-nose club of the mid nineteenth century was still prone to breaking at the top of the back swing. The club heads were often made from woods including apple, pear, dogwood, and beech in the early times until persimmon became the main material. Golf clubs have been improved and the shafts are now made of steel, titanium, other types of metals or carbon fiber. The shaft is a tapered steel tube or a series of stepped steel tubes in telescopic fashion. This has improved the accuracy of golfers. The grips of the clubs are made from leather or rubber.\n\nClub types\n\nWood \n\nWoods are long-distance clubs, meant to drive the ball a great distance down the fairway towards the hole. They generally have a large head and a long shaft for maximum club speed. Historically woods were made from persimmon wood although some manufacturers—notably Ping—developed laminated woods. In 1979, TaylorMade Golf introduced the first metal wood made of steel. Even more recently manufacturers have started using materials such as carbon fiber, titanium, or scandium. Even though most \"woods\" are made from different metals, they are still called \"woods\" to denote the general shape and their intended use on the golf course. Most woods made today have a graphite shaft and a mostly-hollow titanium, composite, or steel head, of relatively light weight allowing faster club-head speeds. Woods are the longest clubs and the most powerful of all the golf clubs. There are typically three to four woods in a set which are used from the tee box and, if on a long hole, possibly for the second or even third shot. The biggest wood, known as the driver or one wood, is often made of hollowed out titanium with feather-light shafts. The length of the woods has been increasing in recent decades, and a typical driver with a graphite shaft is now 45.5 inches (115.6 cm) long. The woods may also have very large heads, up to 460 cm³ in volume (the maximum allowed by the USGA in sanctioned events; drivers with even larger club-head volumes are available for long-drive competitions and informal games). The shafts range from senior to extra-stiff depending upon each player’s preference.\n\nIron \n\nIrons are clubs with a solid, all-metal head featuring a flat angled face, and a shorter shaft and more upright lie angle than a wood, for ease of access. Irons are designed for a variety of shots from all over the course, from the tee box on short or dog-legged holes, to the fairway or rough on approach to the green, to tricky situations like punching through or lobbing over trees, getting out of hazards, or hitting from tight lies requiring a compact swing. Most of the irons have a number from 1 to 9 (the numbers in most common use are from 3 to 9), corresponding to their relative loft angle within a matched set. Irons are typically grouped according to their intended distance (which also roughly corresponds to their shaft length and thus their difficulty to hit the ball); in the numbered irons, there are long irons (2–4), medium irons (5–7), and short irons (8–9), with progressively higher loft angles, shorter shafts, and heavier club heads.\n\nAs with woods, \"irons\" get their name because they were originally made from forged iron. Modern irons are investment-cast out of steel alloys, which allows for better-engineered \"cavity-back\" designs that have lower centers of mass and higher moments of inertia, making the club easier to hit and giving better distance than older forged \"muscle-back\" designs. Forged irons with less perimeter weighting are still seen, especially in sets targeting low-handicap and scratch golfers, because this less forgiving design allows a skilled golfer to intentionally hit a curved shot (a \"fade\" or \"draw\"), to follow the contour of the fairway or \"bend\" a shot around an obstacle.\n\nWedge \n\nWedges are a sub-class of irons with greater loft than the numbered irons (generally starting at 47°-48° of loft, above the 9-iron's 44°-45°), and other features such as high-mass club heads and wide soles that allow for easier use in tricky lies. Wedges are used for a variety of short-distance, high-altitude, high-accuracy \"utility\" shots, such as hitting the ball onto the green (\"approach\" shots), placing the ball accurately on the fairway for a better shot at the green (\"lay-up\" shots), or hitting the ball out of hazards or rough onto the green (chipping). There are five types of wedges, with lofts ranging from 45° to 64°: pitching wedge (PW, 48–50°), gap wedge (GW, also \"approach\", \"attack\", \"utility\", or \"dual\" wedge, typically 52–54°), sand wedge (SW, 55–56°), lob wedge (LW, 58°-60°), and ultra lob wedge (sometimes called the \"flop wedge\" or FW, 64°-68°).\n\nHybrid \n\nHybrids are a cross between a wood and an iron, giving these clubs the wood's long distance and higher launch, with the iron's familiar swing. The club head of a hybrid has a wood-inspired, slightly convex face, and is typically hollow like modern metal woods to allow for high impulse on impact and faster swing speeds. The head is usually smaller than true woods, however, not extending as far back from the face, and the lie and shaft length are similar to an iron giving similar swing mechanics. These clubs generally replace low-numbered irons in a men's set (between 2 and 5, most commonly 3–4), which are typically the hardest clubs in a player's bag to hit well. By doing so they also generally make higher-lofted woods redundant as well. However, some manufacturers produce \"iron replacement\" sets that use hybrid designs to replace an entire set of traditional irons, from 3 to pitching wedge. Ladies' and seniors' sets commonly feature a combination of high-lofted woods (up to 7w) and hybrids to replace the 5, 6 and 7-irons, allowing these players to get greater carry distances with slower swings.\n\nPutter \n\nPutters are a special class of clubs with a loft not exceeding ten degrees, designed primarily to roll the ball along the grass, generally from a point on the putting green towards the hole. Contrary to popular belief, putters do have a loft (often 5° from truly perpendicular at impact) that helps to lift the ball from any indentation it has made. Newer putters also include grooves on the face to promote roll rather than a skid off the impact. This increases rolling distance and reduces bouncing over the turf. Putters are the only class of club allowed to have certain features, such as two striking faces, non-circular grip cross-sections, bent shafts or hosels, and appendages designed primarily to aid players' aim.\n\nChipper\n\nPresent in some golfers' bags is the chipper, a club designed to feel like a putter but with a more lofted face, used with a putting motion to lift the ball out of the higher grass of the rough and fringe and drop it on the green, where it will then roll like a putt. This club replaces the use of a high-lofted iron to make the same shot, and allows the player to make the shot from a stance and with a motion nearly identical to a putt, which is more difficult with a lofted iron due to a difference in lie angle.\n\nMost chippers have a loft greater than 10 degrees, which is the maximum loft permitted by the Rules of Golf for a club to be classed as a putter, so these clubs are actually classed as irons. To be legal for sanctioned play, a chipper cannot have any feature that is defined in the rules as allowable only on putters, e.g. two striking faces or a flat-topped \"putter grip\". This disqualifies many chipper designs, but there are some USGA-conforming chippers, and non-conforming designs can still be used in non-sanctioned \"informal\" play.\n\nConstruction \n\nShaft \n\nThe shaft is a tapered tube made of metal (usually steel) or carbon fiber composite (referred to as graphite). The shaft is roughly in diameter near the grip and from 34 to in length. Shafts weigh from 45 to, depending on the material and length.\n\nShafts are quantified in a number of different ways. The most common is the shaft flex. Simply, the shaft flex is the amount that the shaft will bend when placed under a load. A stiffer shaft will not flex as much, which requires more power to flex and \"whip\" through the ball properly (which results in higher club speed at impact for more distance), while a more flexible shaft will whip with less power required for better distance on slower swings, but may torque and over-flex if swung with too much power causing the head not to be square at impact, resulting in lower accuracy. Most shaft makers offer a variety of flexes. The most common are: L/W (Lady/Women's), A/I (Soft Regular, Intermediate or Senior), R (Regular), S (Stiff), and X (Tour Stiff, Extra Stiff or Strong). A regular flex shaft is generally appropriate for those with an average head speed (80 -), while an A-Flex (or senior shaft) is for players with a slower swing speed (70 -), and the stiffer shafts, such as S-Flex and X-Flex (Stiff and Extra-Stiff shafts) are reserved only for those players with an above average swinging speed, usually above 100 mi/h. Some companies also offer a \"stiff-regular\" or \"firm\" flex for players whose club speed falls in the upper range of a Regular shaft (90 -), allowing golfers and club makers to fine-tune the flex for a stronger amateur-level player. \n\nAt impact, the club head can twist as a result of torque applied to the shaft, reducing accuracy as the face of the club is not square to the player's stance. The ability of a shaft to twist along its length due to this torque is fundamentally a function of the flex of the shaft itself; a stiffer shaft will also torque less. To counter torque in more flexible shafts, club makers design the shafts with varying degrees of torque through their length, particularly along the thinnest part of the shaft where it joins with the club head. This results in a point at which the shaft is most flexible, called the \"kick point\"; above that point the increasing diameter of the shaft makes it more rigid, while below that point the shaft is reinforced internally to reduce torquing of the club head. Shafts have typically been classified as having a low, medium or high kick; a low kick means the shaft will store energy closer to the club head, which means the club head can twist more but also allows for higher club head speeds. A high kick shaft will store energy closer to the grip; such a shaft will feel firmer when swinging it and will give better control over direction, but the same strength swing will flex the shaft less, which will reduce club-head speed.\n\nWidely overlooked as a part of the club, the shaft is considered by many to be the engine of the modern club head. Shafts range in price from a mere US$4 to over US$1200. Current graphite shafts weigh considerably less than their steel counterparts (sometimes weighing less than 50 g for a driver shaft), allowing for lighter clubs that can be swung at greater speed. Beginning in the late 1990s, custom shafts have been integrated into the club-making process. These shafts will, within a given flex rating, address specific criteria, such as to launch the ball higher or lower or to adjust for the timing of a player's swing to load and unload the shaft at the correct moments of the swing for maximum power. Whereas in the past each club could come with only one shaft, today's club heads can be fitted with dozens of different shafts, each with slight variation in behavior, creating the potential for a much better fit for the average golfer.\n\nGrip \n\nThe grip of the club is attached to the opposite end of the shaft from the club head, and is the part of the club the player holds on to while swinging. Originally, the grip was composed of one or more leather strips wrapped around the shaft. The leather outer wrap on a grip is still seen on some clubs, most commonly putters, but most modern grips are a one-piece \"sleeve\" made of rubber, synthetic or composite material that is slid over the shaft and secured with an adhesive. These sleeve grips allow club makers and golfers to customize the grip's diameter, consistency (softness/firmness) and texturing pattern to best fit the player. Clubs with an outer \"wrap\" of leather or leather-like synthetic still typically have a \"sleeve\" form underneath to add diameter to the grip and give it its basic profile.\n\nGrip rules\n\nAccording to the rules of golf, all club grips must have the same cross-section shape along their entire length (the diameter can vary), and with the exception of the putter, must have a circular cross-section. The putter may have any cross section that is symmetrical along the length of the grip through at least one plane; \"shield\" profiles with a flat top and curved underside are common. Grips may taper from thick to thin along their length (and virtually all do), but they are not allowed to have any waisting (a thinner section of the grip surrounded by thicker sections above and below it) or bulges (thicker sections of the grip surrounded by thinner sections). Minor variations in surface texture (such as the natural variation of a \"wrap\"-style grip) are not counted unless significant.\n\nRe-gripping\n\nAdvances in materials have resulted in more durable, longer-lasting soft grips, but nevertheless grips do eventually dry out, harden, or are otherwise damaged and must be replaced. Replacement grips sold as do-it-yourself kits are generally inexpensive and of high quality, although custom grips that are larger, softer, or textured differently from the everyday \"wrap\"-style grip are generally bought and installed by a clubsmith.\n\nRe-gripping used to require toxic, flammable solvents to soften and activate the adhesive, and a vise to hold the club steady while the grip was forced on. The newest replacement kits, however, use double-sided tape with a water-activated adhesive that is slippery when first activated, allowing easier installation. Once the adhesive cures, it creates a very strong bond between grip and shaft and the grip is usually impossible to remove without cutting it off.\n\nHosel \n\nThe hosel is the portion of the club head to which the shaft attaches. Though largely ignored by players, hosel design is integral to the balance, feel and power of a club. Modern hosels are designed to place as little mass as possible over the top of the striking face of the club, which lowers the center of gravity of the club for better distance.\n\nClub head \n\nEach head has one face which contacts the ball during the stroke. Putters may have two striking faces, as long as they are identical and symmetrical. Some chippers (a club similar in appearance to a double-sided putter but having a loft of 35-45 degrees) have two faces, but are not legal. Page 135 of the 2009 USGA rules of golf states: \n\nThe club head must have only one striking face, except that a putter may have two such faces if their characteristics are the same, and they are opposite each other.\n\nPage 127 of the USGA rules of golf states: \n\nA putter is a club with a loft not exceeding ten degrees designed primarily for use on the putting green.\n\nTherefore, any double sided club with a loft greater than 10 degrees is not legal.\n\nFerrule \n\nThe trim ring, usually black (It may have additional trim colors), that is found directly on top of the hosel on many woods and irons. The ferrule is mostly decorative, creating a continuous line between the shaft and the wider hosel, but in some cases it can form part of the securing mechanism between hosel and shaft. Ferrules of differing weights can fine-tune the center of mass of the overall club head, but for these minute adjustments, screw-in weighted inserts at specific points on the club head are usually used instead.\n\nClub sets \n\nThe rules of golf limit each player to a maximum of 14 clubs in their bag. Strict rules prohibit sharing of clubs between players that each have their own set (if two players share clubs, they may not have more than 14 clubs combined), and while occasional lending of a club to a player is generally overlooked, habitual borrowing of other players' clubs or the sharing of a single bag of clubs slows play considerably when both players need the same club.\n\nThe most common set of men's clubs is:\n\n* A driver, usually numbered a 1-wood regardless of actual loft, which varies from 8° up to 13°\n* A fairway wood, typically numbered a 3-wood and lofted about 15° (though 2- and 4-woods are sometimes seen)\n* A matched set of 7 numbered irons from 3 through 9, plus a pitching wedge or \"10-iron\"\n* A sand wedge\n* A putter\n\nThe above set is only 12 clubs; these (or equivalent hybrid substitutes) are found in virtually every golf bag. To this, players typically add two of the following:\n\n* Another fairway wood, often a 5-wood lofted around 18°, to allow other options besides long irons in the 180–250 yard range,\n* A hybrid, typically lofted for similar distance as a 3- or 4-iron and usually replacing instead of supplementing those clubs in the bag, and/or\n* An additional wedge, usually either: \n** A gap wedge lofted near 52° to fit between the modern pitching and sand wedges in loft, or \n** A lob wedge, typically lofted around 60°, used for tight approach shots from the rough or sand.\n\nWomen's club sets are similar in overall makeup, but typically have higher lofts and shorter, more flexible shafts in retail sets to accommodate the average female player's height and swing speed.\n\nVariations on this basic set abound; several club options usually exist for almost any shot depending on the player's skill level and playing style, and the only club universally considered to be indispensable is the putter. Some consider the modern deep-faced driver to be equally irreplaceable; this is cause for some debate, as professional players including Tiger Woods have played and won tournaments without using a driver, instead using a 3-wood for tee shots and making up the difference on the approach using a lower-lofted iron.\n\nThe most common omissions are the \"long irons\", numbered from 2 to 5, which are notoriously difficult to hit well. The player can supplement the gaps in distance with either higher-numbered woods such as the 5 and even the 7-wood, or may replace the long irons with equivalently-numbered hybrid clubs. If hybrids are used, higher-lofted woods are often omitted as redundant, but ladies' and seniors' sets commonly feature both hybrids and high-lofted woods, omitting the long irons entirely in favor of the lofted woods, and replacing the mid-irons (5–7) with hybrids. The combination allows for higher launch angles on the long-distance clubs, which gives better distance with slower swing speeds. Where a club is omitted and not replaced with a club of similar function, players may add additional clubs of a different function such as additional wedges.\n\nWhile 14 clubs is a maximum, it is not a minimum; players are free to use any lesser number of clubs they think will be useful, so substitutions for the common omissions above are not always made; a player may simply choose to play without a 5-wood or 2–4 irons, instead using a 4-wood and moving directly to their 5-iron as desired distance decreases (a 4-wood in a skilled golfer's hands averages 200 yards; a 5-iron in the same player's hands would be about 160, which is a large gap but not unplayable). Other clubs may be omitted as well. On courses where bags must be carried by the player, the player may take only the odd-numbered irons; without the 4, 6 or 8 irons (the 3 is sometimes removed instead of the 4) the bag's weight is considerably reduced. Carrying only a driver, 3-wood, 4-hybrid, 5-7-9 irons, pitching and sand wedges, and a putter reduces the number of clubs in the bag to 9; this is a common load-out for a \"Sunday bag\" taken to the driving range or to an informal game. A skilled player can usually overcome the lesser selection of club lofts by reducing their swing speed on a lower-loft iron and/or placing the ball further forward in their stance to get the same carry distance and/or launch angle as the next higher loft number.\n\nRegulations \n\nThe ruling authorities of golf, The R&A (an offshoot of The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews) and the United States Golf Association (USGA), reserve the right to define what shapes and physical characteristics of clubs are permissible in tournament play. The current rules for club design, including the results of various rulings on clubs introduced for play, are defined in Appendix II of the Rules of Golf.\n\nThe overarching principle of club design used by both authorities is defined in Appendix II-1a, which states: \"The club must not be substantially different from the traditional and customary form and make. The club must be composed of a shaft and a head and it may also have material added to the shaft to enable the player to obtain a firm hold (see 3 below). All parts of the club must be fixed so that the club is one unit, and it must have no external attachments.\" In addition, Appendix II-4a states, regarding club heads, that \"the club head must be generally plain in shape. All parts must be rigid, structural in nature and functional. The club head or its parts must not be designed to resemble any other object. It is not practicable to define 'plain in shape' precisely and comprehensively.\"\n\nThese two rules are used as the basis for most of the more specific rules of Appendix II, including that no club may have a concave face (1931) and various rules defining what is \"traditional\" about the shapes of specific clubs, while allowing for the progression of technology. The \"traditional and customary\" rule was originally used to ban the introduction of steel club shafts (patented in 1910), as that material was not traditional for shafts; that specific ban was rescinded in 1924 by the USGA (the R&A would continue to ban steel shafts until 1929), and steel would become universal until the development of graphite shafts whose introduction was less controversial. The \"plain in shape\" rule was more recently bent to allow for non-traditional driver club head shapes, such as squares, as a compromise to club-makers after imposing and enforcing a 460cc volume limit on these same club heads.\n\nMany recently developed woods have a marked \"trampoline effect\" (a large deformation of the face upon impact followed by a quick restoration to original dimensions, acting like a slingshot), resulting in very high ball speeds and great lengths of tee shots. As of 1 January 2008, the USGA and R&A have settled on a regulation that limits the acceptable \"trampoline effect\" to a coefficient of restitution (COR)—a measurement of the efficiency of the transfer of energy from the club head to the ball—of .830. \n\nOther large scale USGA rulings involve a 1990 lawsuit, and subsequent settlement, against Karsten Manufacturing, makers of the PING brand, for their use of square, or U-grooves in their immensely popular Ping Eye2 irons. The USGA argued that players who used the Eye2 had an unfair advantage in imparting spin on the ball, which helps to stop the ball on the putting greens. The USGA utilized John L. Saksun, founder of Canadian golf company Accuform Golf, as a consultant to set up methods of measuring the unique grooves and determining PING's compliance with the rulings. Saksun, by proposing a cost-effective solution to help PING change the design of subsequent Eye2s, saved PING hundreds of millions. PING subsequently withdrew their US$100 million lawsuit against the USGA. Ping’s older clubs were \"grandfathered in\" and allowed to remain in play as part of the settlement. Today, square grooves are considered perfectly legal under the Rules of Golf. However, the USGA has determined that square grooves are illegal in elite-level competition. According to the USGA, as January 1, 2010, professional golfers on one of the top tours, or those attempting to qualify for one of the three Open Championships, will need to use new conforming wedges (those without square grooves). Moreover, those who plan to qualify for any other USGA championship will need new conforming wedges by 2014. In addition, this regulation might include amateur events as well, as a \"condition of competition\". Casual golfers may use square groove wedges (and other square-grooved irons) until at least 2024. Wedges that conform to the new standard are often marketed as \"CC\" or \"Condition of Competition\" wedges; this moniker is likely to fall into disuse as players upgrade clubs and the use of non-conforming irons diminishes.", "Golf is a club and ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible.\n\nGolf is one of the few ball games that do not require a standardized playing area. The game is played on a course with an arranged progression of either nine or 18 holes. Each hole on the course must contain a tee box to start from, and a putting green containing the actual cup. There are other standard forms of terrain in between, such as the fairway, rough, and hazards, but each hole on a course is unique in its specific layout and arrangement.\n\nGolf is played for the lowest number of strokes by an individual, known as stroke play, or the lowest score on the most individual holes in a complete round by an individual or team, known as match play. Stroke play is the most commonly seen format at all levels.\n\nOrigin\n\nWhile the modern game of golf originated in 15th-century Scotland, the game's ancient origins are unclear and much debated. Some historians trace the sport back to the Roman game of paganica, in which participants used a bent stick to hit a stuffed leather ball. One theory asserts that paganica spread throughout Europe as the Romans conquered most of the continent, during the first century BC, and eventually evolved into the modern game. Others cite chuiwan (\"chui\" means striking and \"wan\" means small ball) as the progenitor, a Chinese game played between the eighth and 14th centuries. A Ming Dynasty scroll dating back to 1368 entitled \"The Autumn Banquet\" shows a member of the Chinese Imperial court swinging what appears to be a golf club at a small ball with the aim of sinking it into a hole. The game is thought to have been introduced into Europe during the Middle Ages. Another early game that resembled modern golf was known as cambuca in England and chambot in France. The Persian game chaugán is another possible ancient origin. In addition, kolven (a game involving a ball and curved bats) was played annually in Loenen, Netherlands, beginning in 1297, to commemorate the capture of the assassin of Floris V, a year earlier.\n\nThe modern game originated in Scotland, where the first written record of golf is James II's banning of the game in 1457, as an unwelcome distraction to learning archery. James IV lifted the ban in 1502 when he became a golfer himself, with golf clubs first recorded in 1503-1504: \"For golf clubbes and balles to the King that he playit with\". To many golfers, the Old Course at St Andrews, a links course dating to before 1574, is considered to be a site of pilgrimage. In 1764, the standard 18-hole golf course was created at St Andrews when members modified the course from 22 to 18 holes. Golf is documented as being played on Musselburgh Links, East Lothian, Scotland as early as 2 March 1672, which is certified as the oldest golf course in the world by Guinness World Records. The oldest surviving rules of golf were compiled in March 1744 for the Company of Gentlemen Golfers, later renamed The Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers, which was played at Leith, Scotland. The world's oldest golf tournament in existence, and golf's first major, is The Open Championship, which was first played on 17 October 1860 at Prestwick Golf Club, in Ayrshire, Scotland, with Scottish golfers winning the earliest majors. Two Scotsmen from Dunfermline, John Reid and Robert Lockhart, first demonstrated golf in the US by setting up a hole in an orchard in 1888, with Reid setting up America's first golf club the same year, St. Andrews Golf Club in Yonkers, New York. \n\nGolf course\n\nA golf course consists of either 9 or 18 holes, each with a teeing ground that is set off by two markers showing the bounds of the legal tee area, fairway, rough and other hazards, and the putting green surrounded by the fringe with the pin (normally a flagstick) and cup.\n\nThe levels of grass are varied to increase difficulty, or to allow for putting in the case of the green. While many holes are designed with a direct line-of-sight from the teeing area to the green, some holes may bend either to the left or to the right. This is commonly called a \"dogleg\", in reference to a dog's knee. The hole is called a \"dogleg left\" if the hole angles leftwards and \"dogleg right\" if it bends right. Sometimes, a hole's direction may bend twice; this is called a \"double dogleg\".\n\nA regular golf course consists of 18 holes, but nine-hole courses are common and can be played twice through for a full round of 18 holes. \n\nEarly Scottish golf courses were primarily laid out on links land, soil-covered sand dunes directly inland from beaches. This gave rise to the term \"golf links\", particularly applied to seaside courses and those built on naturally sandy soil inland.\n\nThe first 18-hole golf course in the United States was on a sheep farm in Downers Grove, Illinois, in 1892. The course is still there today. \n\nPlay of the game\n\nEvery round of golf is based on playing a number of holes in a given order. A \"round\" typically consists of 18 holes that are played in the order determined by the course layout. Each hole is played once in the round on a standard course of 18 holes; on a nine-hole course, players may play a \"short game\" playing each hole once, or a \"full round\" by playing each hole twice.\n\nPlaying a hole on a golf course is initiated by putting a ball into play by striking it with a club on the teeing ground (also called the tee box, or simply the tee). For this first shot on each hole, it is allowed but not required for the golfer to place the ball on a tee prior to striking it. A tee is a small peg that can be used to elevate the ball slightly above the ground up to a few centimetres high. Tees are commonly made of wood but may be constructed of any material, including plastic. Traditionally, golfers used mounds of sand to elevate the ball, and containers of sand were provided for the purpose. A few courses still require sand to be used instead of peg tees, to reduce litter and reduce damage to the teeing ground. Tees help reduce the interference of the ground or grass on the movement of the club making the ball easier to hit, and also places the ball in the very centre of the striking face of the club (the \"sweet spot\") for better distance.\n\nWhen the initial shot on a hole is intended to move the ball a long distance (typically more than 225 yd), the shot is commonly called a \"drive\" and is generally made with a long-shafted, large-headed wood club called a \"driver\". Shorter holes may be initiated with other clubs, such as higher-numbered woods or irons. Once the ball comes to rest, the golfer strikes it again as many times as necessary using shots that are variously known as a \"lay-up\", an \"approach\", a \"pitch\", or a \"chip\", until the ball reaches the green, where he or she then \"putts\" the ball into the hole (commonly called \"sinking the putt\" or \"holing out\"). The goal of getting the ball into the hole (\"holing\" the ball) in as few strokes as possible may be impeded by obstacles such as areas of longer grass called \"rough\" (usually found alongside fairways), which both slows any ball that contacts it and makes it harder to advance a ball that has stopped on it; \"doglegs\", which are changes in the direction of the fairway that often require shorter shots to play around them; bunkers (or sand traps); and water hazards such as ponds or streams.\n\nIn stroke play competitions played according to strict rules, each player plays his or her ball until it is holed no matter how many strokes that may take. In match play it is acceptable to simply pick up one's ball and \"surrender the hole\" after enough strokes have been made by a player that it is mathematically impossible for the player to win the hole. It is also acceptable in informal stroke play to surrender the hole after hitting three strokes more than the \"par\" rating of the hole (a \"triple bogey\" - see below); while technically a violation of Rule 3-2, this practice speeds play as a courtesy to others, and avoids \"runaway scores\", excessive frustration and injuries caused by overexertion.\n\nThe total distance from the first tee box to the 18th green can be quite long; total yardages \"through the green\" can be in excess of 7000 yd, and when adding in the travel distance between the green of one hole and the tee of the next, even skilled players may easily travel five miles or more during a round. At some courses, electric golf carts are used to travel between shots, which can speed-up play and allows participation by individuals unable to walk a whole round. On other courses players generally walk the course, either carrying their bag using a shoulder strap or using a \"golf trolley\" for their bag. These trolleys may or may not be battery assisted. At many amateur tournaments including U.S. high school and college play, players are required to walk and to carry their own bags, but at the professional and top amateur level, as well as at high-level private clubs, players may be accompanied by caddies, who carry and manage the players' equipment and who are allowed by the rules to give advice on the play of the course. A caddy's advice can only be given to the player or players for whom the caddy is working, and not to other competing players.\n\nRules and regulations\n\nThe rules of golf are internationally standardised and are jointly governed by The R&A, spun off in 2004 from The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews (founded 1754), and the United States Golf Association (USGA).\n\nThe underlying principle of the rules is fairness. As stated on the back cover of the official rule book:\nPlay the ball as it lies, play the course as you find it, and if you cannot do either, do what is fair.\n\nThere are strict regulations regarding the amateur status of golfers. Essentially, anybody who has ever received payment or compensation for giving instruction, or played golf for money, is not considered an amateur and may not participate in competitions limited solely to amateurs. However, amateur golfers may receive expenses that comply with strict guidelines and they may accept non-cash prizes within the limits established by the Rules of Amateur Status.\n\nIn addition to the officially printed rules, golfers also abide by a set of guidelines called golf etiquette. Etiquette guidelines cover matters such as safety, fairness, pace of play, and a player's obligation to contribute to the care of the course. Though there are no penalties for breach of etiquette rules, players generally follow the rules of golf etiquette in an effort to improve everyone's playing experience.\n\nPenalties\n\nPenalties are incurred in certain situations. They are counted towards a player's score as if there were extra swing(s) at the ball. Strokes are added for rule infractions or for hitting one's ball into an unplayable situation.\n\nA lost ball or a ball hit out of bounds result in a penalty of one stroke and distance (Rule 27–1). A one-stroke penalty is assessed if a player's equipment causes the ball to move or the removal of a loose impediment causes the ball to move (Rule 18–2). If a golfer makes a stroke at the wrong ball (Rule 19–2) or hits a fellow golfer's ball with a putt (Rule 19–5), the player incurs a two-stroke penalty. Most rule infractions lead to stroke penalties but also can lead to disqualification. Disqualification could be from cheating, signing for a lower score, or from rule infractions that lead to improper play. \n\nEquipment\n\nGolf clubs are used to hit the golf ball. Each club is composed of a shaft with a lance (or \"grip\") on the top end and a club head on the bottom. Long clubs, which have a lower amount of degree loft, are those meant to propel the ball a comparatively longer distance, and short clubs a higher degree of loft and a comparatively shorter distance. The actual physical length of each club is longer or shorter, depending on the distance the club is intended to propel the ball.\n\nGolf clubs have traditionally been arranged into three basic types. Woods are large-headed, long-shafted clubs meant to propel the ball a long distance from relatively \"open\" lies, such as the tee box and fairway. Of particular importance is the driver or \"1-wood\", which is the lowest lofted wood club, and in modern times has become highly specialized for making extremely long-distance tee shots, up to 300 yd or more in the hands of a professional golfer. Traditionally these clubs had heads made of a hardwood, hence the name, but virtually all modern woods are now made of metal such as titanium, or of composite materials. Irons are shorter-shafted clubs with a metal head primarily consisting of a flat, angled striking face. Traditionally the clubhead was forged from iron; modern iron clubheads are investment-cast from a steel alloy. Irons of varying loft are used for a variety of shots from virtually anywhere on the course, but most often for shorter-distance shots approaching the green, or to get the ball out of tricky lies such as sand traps. The third class is the putter, which evolved from the irons to create a low-lofted, balanced club designed to roll the ball along the green and into the hole. Putters are virtually always used on the green or in the surrounding rough/fringe. A fourth class, called hybrids, evolved as a cross between woods and irons, and are typically seen replacing the low-lofted irons with a club that provides similar distance, but a higher launch angle and a more forgiving nature.\n\nA maximum of 14 clubs is allowed in a player's bag at one time during a stipulated round. The choice of clubs is at the golfer's discretion, although every club must be constructed in accordance with parameters outlined in the rules. (Clubs that meet these parameters are usually called \"conforming\".) Violation of these rules can result in disqualification.\n\nThe exact shot hit at any given time on a golf course, and which club is used to accomplish the shot, are always completely at the discretion of the golfer; in other words, there is no restriction whatsoever on which club a golfer may or may not use at any time for any shot.\n\nGolf balls are spherical, usually white (although other colours are allowed), and minutely pock-marked by dimples that decrease aerodynamic drag by increasing air turbulence around the ball in motion, which delays \"boundary layer\" separation and reduces the drag-inducing \"wake\" behind the ball,\nthereby allowing the ball to fly farther. The combination of a soft \"boundary layer\" and a hard \"core\" enables both distance and spin.\n\nA tee is allowed only for the first stroke on each hole, unless the player must hit a provisional tee shot or replay his or her first shot from the tee.\n\nMany golfers wear golf shoes with metal or plastic spikes designed to increase traction, thus allowing for longer and more accurate shots.\n\nA golf bag is used to transport golf clubs and the player's other or personal equipment. Golf bags have several pockets designed for carrying equipment and supplies such as tees, balls, and gloves. Golf bags can be carried, pulled on a trolley or harnessed to a motorized golf cart during play. Golf bags have both a hand strap and shoulder strap for carrying, and sometimes have retractable legs that allow the bag to stand upright when at rest.\n\nStroke mechanics\n\nThe golf swing is outwardly similar to many other motions involving swinging a tool or playing implement, such as an axe or a baseball bat; however, unlike many of these motions, the result of the swing is highly dependent on several sub-motions being properly aligned and timed, to ensure that the club travels up to the ball in line with the desired path, the clubface is in line with the swing path, and the ball impacts the centre or \"sweet spot\" of the clubface. The ability to do this consistently, across a complete set of clubs with a wide range of shaft lengths and clubface areas, is a key skill for any golfer, and takes a significant effort to achieve.\n\nGolfers start with the non-dominant side of the body facing the target (for a right-hander, the target is to their left). At address, the player's body and the centerline of the club face are positioned parallel to the desired line of travel, with the feet either perpendicular to that line or slightly splayed outward. The feet are commonly shoulder-width apart for middle irons and putters, narrower for short irons and wider for long irons and woods. The ball is typically positioned more to the \"front\" of the player's stance (closer to the leading foot) for lower-lofted clubs, with the usual ball position for a drive being just behind the arch of the leading foot. The ball is placed further \"back\" in the player's stance (toward the trailing foot) as the loft of the club to be used increases. Most iron shots and putts are made with the ball roughly centered in the stance, while a few mid- and short-iron shots are made with the ball slightly behind the centre of the stance to ensure consistent contact between the ball and clubface, so the ball is on its way before the club continues down into the turf.\n\nThe golfer chooses a golf club, grip, and stroke appropriate to the distance:\n* The \"drive\" or \"full swing\" is used on the teeing ground and fairway, typically with a wood or long iron, to produce the maximum distance capable with the club. In the extreme, the windup can end with the shaft of the club parallel to the ground above the player's shoulders.\n* The \"approach\" or \"3/4 swing\" is used in medium- and long-distance situations where an exact distance and good accuracy is preferable to maximum possible distance, such as to place the ball on the green or \"lay up\" in front of a hazard. The windup or \"backswing\" of such a shot typically ends up with the shaft of the club pointing straight upwards or slightly towards the player.\n* The \"chip\" or \"half-swing\" is used for relatively short-distance shots near the green, with high-lofted irons and wedges. The goal of the chip is to land the ball safely on the green, allowing it to roll out towards the hole. It can also be used from other places to accurately position the ball into a more advantageous lie. The backswing typically ends with the head of the club between hip and head height.\n* The \"putt\" is used in short-distance shots on or near the green, typically made with the eponymous \"putter\", although similar strokes can be made with medium to high-numbered irons to carry a short distance in the air and then roll (a \"bump and run\"). the backswing and follow-through of the putt are both abbreviated compared to other strokes, with the head of the club rarely rising above the knee. The goal of the putt is usually to put the ball in the hole, although a long-distance putt may be called a \"lag\" and is made with the primary intention of simply closing distance to the hole or otherwise placing the ball advantageously.\n\nHaving chosen a club and stroke to produce the desired distance, the player addresses the ball by taking their stance to the side of it and (except when the ball lies in a hazard) grounding the club behind the ball. The golfer then takes their backswing, rotating the club, their arms and their upper body away from the ball, and then begins their swing, bringing the clubhead back down and around to hit the ball. A proper golf swing is a complex combination of motions, and slight variations in posture or positioning can make a great deal of difference in how well the ball is hit and how straight it travels. The general goal of a player making a full swing is to propel the clubhead as fast as possible while maintaining a single \"plane\" of motion of the club and clubhead, to send the clubhead into the ball along the desired path of travel and with the clubhead also pointing that direction.\n\nAccuracy and consistency is typically stressed over pure distance. A player with a straight drive that travels only 220 yd will nevertheless be able to accurately place the ball into a favourable lie on the fairway, and can make up for the lesser distance of any given club by simply using \"more club\" (a lower loft) on their tee shot or on subsequent fairway and approach shots. However, a golfer with a drive that may go 280 yd but often doesn't fly straight will be less able to position their ball advantageously; the ball may \"hook\", \"pull\", \"draw\", \"fade\", \"push\" or \"slice\" off the intended line and land out of bounds or in the rough or hazards, and thus the player will require many more strokes to hole out.\n\nMusculature\n\nA golf stroke uses muscles on core (especially erector spinae muscles and latissimus dorsi muscle when turning), hamstring, shoulder, and wrist. Stronger muscles on wrist can prevent wrists from being twisted at swings, while stronger shoulders increase the turning force. Weak wrists can also deliver the impacts to elbows and even neck and lead to injury of them. (When a muscle contracts, it pulls equally from both ends and, in order to have movement at only one end of the muscle, other muscles must come into play to stabilize the bone to which the other end of the muscle is attached.) Golf is a unilateral exercise that can break body balances, requiring exercises to keep the balance in muscles. \n\nTypes of putting\n\nPutting is considered to be the most important component of the game of golf. As the game of golf has evolved, there have been many different putting techniques and grips that have been devised to give golfers the best chance to make putts. When the game originated, golfers would putt with their dominate hand on the bottom of the grip and their weak hand on top of the grip. This grip and putting style is known as \"conventional\". There are many variations of conventional including overlap, where the golfer overlaps the off hand index finger onto off the dominant pinky; interlock, where the offhand index finger interlocks with the dominant pinky and ring finger; double or triple overlap and so on. Recently, \"cross handed\" putting has become a popular trend amongst professional golfers and amateurs. Cross handed putting is the idea that the dominant hand is on top of the grip where the weak hand is on the bottom. This grip restricts the motion in your dominant hand and eliminates the possibility of wrist breakdowns through the putting stroke. \n\nOther notable putting styles include \"the claw\", a style that has the grip directly in between the thumb and index finger of the dominant hand while the palm faces the target. The weak hand placed normally on the putter. Anchored putting, a style that requires a longer putter shaft that can be anchored into the players stomach or below the chin; the idea is to stabilize one end of the putter thus creating a more consistent pendulum stroke. This style will be banned in 2016 on the profession circuits. \n\nScoring and handicapping\n\nPar\n\nA hole is classified by its par, meaning the number of strokes a skilled golfer should require to complete play of the hole. The minimum par of any hole is 3 because par always includes a stroke for the tee shot and two putts. Pars of 4 and 5 strokes are ubiquitous on golf courses; more rarely, a few courses feature par-6 and even par-7 holes. Strokes other than the tee shot and putts are expected to be made from the fairway; for example, a skilled golfer expects to reach the green on a par-4 hole in two strokes—one from the tee (the \"drive\") and another, second, stroke to the green (the \"approach\")—and then roll the ball into the hole in two putts for par. Putting the ball on the green with two strokes remaining for putts is called making \"green in regulation\" or GIR. Missing a GIR does not necessarily mean a golfer won't make par, but it does make doing so more difficult as it reduces the number of putts available; conversely, making a GIR does not guarantee a par, as the player might require three or more putts to \"hole out\". Professional golfers typically make between 60% and 70% of greens in regulation. \n\nThe primary factor for classifying the par of a relatively straight, hazard-free hole is the distance from the tee to the green. A typical par-3 hole is less than 250 yards (225 m) in length, with a par-4 hole ranging between 251 and 475 yards (225–434 m), and a par-5 hole being longer than 475 yards (435 m). The rare par-6s can stretch well over 650 yd. These distances are based on the typical scratch golfer's drive distance of between 240 and; a green further than the average player's drive will require additional shots from the fairway. However, other considerations must be taken into account; the key question is \"how many strokes would a scratch golfer take to make the green by playing along the fairway?\". The grade of the land from the tee to the hole might increase or decrease the carry and rolling distance of shots as measured linearly along the ground. Sharp turns or hazards may require golfers to \"lay up\" on the fairway in order to change direction or hit over the hazard with their next shot. These design considerations will affect how even a scratch golfer would play the hole, irrespective of total distance from tee to green, and must be included in a determination of par. However, a par score never includes \"expected\" penalty strokes, as a scratch player is never \"expected\" to hit a ball into a water hazard or other unplayable situation. So, the placement of hazards only affect par when considering how a scratch golfer would avoid them.\n\nEighteen-hole courses typically total to an overall par score of 72 for a complete round; this is based on an average par of 4 for every hole, and so is often arrived at by designing a course with an equal number of par-5 and par-3 holes, the rest being par-4. Many combinations exist that total to par-72, and other course pars exist from 68 up to 76, and are not less worthy than courses of par-72. Additionally, in some countries including the United States, courses are classified according to their play difficulty, which may be used to calculate a golfer's playing handicap for a given course. \n\nThe two primary difficulty ratings in the U.S. are the Course Rating, which is effectively the expected score for a zero-handicap \"scratch golfer\" playing the course (and may differ from the course par), and the Slope Rating, which is a measure of how much worse a \"bogey golfer\" (with an 18 handicap) would be expected to play than a \"scratch golfer\". These two numbers are available for any USGA-sanctioned course, and are used in a weighted system to calculate handicaps (see below).\n\nScoring\n\nThe goal is to play as few strokes per round as possible. A golfer's score is usually expressed as the difference between the player's number of strokes and the par score. A hole in one (or an \"ace\") occurs when a golfer sinks his ball into the cup with his first stroke from the tee. Common scores for a hole also have specific terms.\n\nIn a typical professional tournament or among \"scratch\" amateur players, \"birdie-bogey\" play is common; a player will \"lose\" a stroke by bogeying a hole, then \"gain\" one by scoring a birdie. Eagles are uncommon but not rare; however, only 18 players have scored an albatross in a men's major championship.\n\nBasic forms of golf\n\nThere are two basic forms of golf play, match play and stroke play. Stroke play is more popular.\n\nMatch play\n\nTwo players (or two teams) play each hole as a separate contest against each other in what is called match play. The party with the lower score wins that hole, or if the scores of both players or teams are equal the hole is \"halved\" (or tied). The game is won by the party that wins more holes than the other. In the case that one team or player has taken a lead that cannot be overcome in the number of holes remaining to be played, the match is deemed to be won by the party in the lead, and the remainder of the holes are not played. For example, if one party already has a lead of six holes, and only five holes remain to be played on the course, the match is over and the winning party is deemed to have won \"6 & 5\". At any given point, if the lead is equal to the number of holes remaining, the party leading the match is said to be \"dormie\", and the match is continued until the party increases the lead by one hole or ties any of the remaining holes, thereby winning the match, or until the match ends in a tie with the lead player's opponent winning all remaining holes. When the game is tied after the predetermined number of holes have been played, it may be continued until one side takes a one-hole lead.\n\nStroke play\n\nThe score achieved for each and every hole of the round or tournament is added to produce the total score, and the player with the lowest score wins in stroke play. Stroke play is the game most commonly played by professional golfers. If there is a tie after the regulation number of holes in a professional tournament, a playoff takes place between all tied players. Playoffs either are sudden death or employ a pre-determined number of holes, anywhere from three to a full 18. In sudden death, a player who scores lower on a hole than all of his opponents wins the match. If at least two players remain tied after such a playoff using a pre-determined number of holes, then play continues in sudden death format, where the first player to win a hole wins the tournament.\n\nOther forms of play\n\nThe other forms of play in the game of golf are Bogey competition, Skins, 9-points, Stableford, team play, and Unofficial team variations.\n\nBogey competition\n\nA bogey competition is a scoring format sometimes seen in at informal tournaments. Its scoring is similar to match play, except each player compares their hole score to the hole's par rating instead of the score of another player. The player \"wins\" the hole if they score a birdie or better, they \"lose\" the hole if they score a bogey or worse, and they \"halve\" the hole by scoring par. By recording only this simple win-loss-halve score on the sheet, a player can shrug off a very poorly-played hole with a simple \"-\" mark and move on. As used in competitions, the player or pair with the best win-loss \"differential\" wins the competition.\n\nSkins\n\nA skins game is a variation on match play where each hole has an amount of money (the \"skin\") attached. This may be prize money at the professional level (the most famous event to use these rules was the \"LG Skins Game\", played at Indian Wells Golf Resort in California until 2008), or an amount wagered for each hole among amateur players. The player with the lowest score on the hole wins the skin for that hole; if two or more players tie for the lowest score, the skin carries over to the next hole. This continues until a player wins a hole outright, which may (and often does) result in a player receiving money for a previous hole that they hadn't tied for. If players tie the 18th hole, either all players or only the tying players repeat the 18th hole until an outright winner is decided for that hole (and all undecided skins).\n\n9-Points\n\nA nine-point game is another variant of match play typically played among threesomes, where each hole is worth a total of nine points. The player with the lowest score on a hole receives five points, the next-lowest score 3 and the next-lowest score 1. Ties are generally resolved by summing the points contested and dividing them among the tying players; a two-way tie for first is worth four points to both players, a two-way tie for second is worth two points to both players, and a three-way tie is worth three points to each player. The player with the highest score after 18 holes (in which there are 162 points to be awarded) wins the game. This format can be used to wager on the game systematically; players each contribute the same amount of money to the pot, and a dollar value is assigned to each point scored (or each point after 18) based on the amount of money in the pot, with any overage going to the overall winner. \n\nStableford\n\nThe Stableford system is a simplification of stroke play that awards players points based on their score relative to the hole's par; the score for a hole is calculated by taking the par score, adding 2, then subtracting the player's hole score, making the result zero if negative. Alternately stated, a double bogey or worse is zero points, a bogey is worth one point, par is two, a birdie three, an eagle four, and so on. The advantages of this system over stroke play are a more natural \"higher is better\" scoring, the ability to compare Stableford scores between plays on courses with different total par scores (scoring an \"even\" in stroke play will always give a Stableford score of 36), discouraging the tendency to abandon the entire game after playing a particularly bad hole (a novice playing by strict rules may score as high as an 8 or 10 on a single difficult hole; their Stableford score for the hole would be zero, which puts them only two points behind par no matter how badly they played), and the ability to simply pick up one's ball once it is impossible to score any points for the hole, which speeds play.\n\nThe USGA and R&A sanction a \"Modified Stableford\" system for scratch players, which makes par worth zero, a birdie worth 2, eagle 5 and double-eagle 8, while a bogey is a penalty of -1 and a double-bogey or worse -3. As with the original system, the highest score wins the game, and terrible scores on one or two holes won't wreck an entire game, but this system rewards \"bogey-birdie\" play more than the original, encouraging golfers to try to make the riskier birdie putt or eagle chipshot instead of simply parring each hole.\n\nTeam play\n\n* Foursome: defined in Rule 29, this is played between two teams of two players each, in which each team has only one ball and players alternate playing it. For example, if players \"A\" and \"B\" form a team, \"A\" tees off on the first hole, \"B\" will play the second shot, \"A\" the third, and so on until the hole is finished. On the second hole, \"B\" will tee off (regardless who played the last putt on the first hole), then \"A\" plays the second shot, and so on. Foursomes can be played as match play or stroke play. \n* Fourball: defined in Rules 30 and 31, this is also played between two teams of two players each, but every player plays their own ball and for each team, the lower score on each hole counts. Fourballs can be played as match play or stroke play. \n\nUnofficial team variations\n\n* Scramble: also known as ambrose or best-shot; each player in a team tees off on each hole, and the players decide which shot was best. Every player then plays their second shot from within a clublength of where the best shot has come to rest (and no closer to the hole), and the procedure is repeated until the hole is finished. This system is very common at informal tournaments such as for charity, as it speeds play (due to the reduced number of shots taken from bad lies), allows teams of varying sizes, and allows players of widely varying skill levels to participate without a profoundly negative impact on team score.\n* Champagne scramble: a combination of a scramble and best-ball, only the first shot of each hole is a scramble; all players tee off, decide on the best tee shot, then each player plays their own ball starting at that point until they hole out, without deciding any further \"best shots\". The best score amongst the team's players is counted. \n* Better ball or best-ball: like fourball, each player plays the hole as normal, but the lowest score of all the players on the team counts as the team's score for the hole. \n* Greensome (also known as Scotch Foursomes): also called modified alternate shot, this is played in pairs; both players tee off, and then pick the best shot as in a scramble. The player who did not shoot the best first shot plays the second shot. The play then alternates as in a foursome. A variant of greensome is sometimes played where the opposing team chooses which of their opponent's tee shots the opponents should use. The player who did not shoot the chosen first shot plays the second shot. Play then continues as a greensome.\n* Wolf (also known as Ship, Captain & Crew, Captain, Pig): a version of match play; with a foursome an order of play for each player is established for the duration of the round. The first player hits a ball from the tee, then waits for each successive player to hit (2nd, 3rd and 4th). After each player hits the 1st player has the option of choosing a partner for the hole (the 1st player is the Wolf for that hole) usually by calling Wolf before the next player hits. Once a partner is picked, each two-some (the Wolf and his or her partner vs the remaining two players) scores their total strokes and the winning two-some is awarded 1-point each for winning a hole and zero points for tying. The next hole, the rotation moves forward (e.g. the 2nd player is now hitting 1st and the Wolf and the previous Wolf hits last). A Wolf can decide to go alone to win extra points, but they must beat all other players in stroke play on that hole. If alone, the Wolf is awarded 2-points for going alone after everyone has hit or 4 points for declaring Lone Wolf before anyone else hits. If the Lone Wolf loses, to even one player, the 3 other players get 1-point each. The winner is the player with the most points at the end of the round. Strategically, care must be taken not to let a low-handicap player run away with all the points by being constantly paired with the Wolf. , \n\nShotgun starts are mainly used for amateur tournament play. In this variant, each of the groups playing starts their game on a different hole, allowing for all players to start and end their round at roughly the same time. All 18 holes are still played, but a player or foursome may, for instance, start on hole 5, play through to the 18th hole, then continue with hole 1 and end on hole 4. This speeds the completion of the entire event as players are not kept waiting for progressive tee times at the first hole. This form of play, as a minor variation to stroke or match play, is neither defined nor disallowed by strict rules and so is used according to local rules for an event.\n\nHandicap systems\n\nA handicap is a numerical measure of an amateur golfer's ability to play golf over the course of 18 holes. A player's handicap generally represents the number of strokes above par that the player will make over the course of an above-average round of golf. The better the player the lower their handicap is. Someone with a handicap of 0 or less is often called a scratch golfer, and would typically score or beat the course par on a round of play (depending on course difficulty).\n\nCalculating a handicap is often complicated, the general reason being that golf courses are not uniformly challenging from course to course or between skill levels. A player scoring even par on Course A might average four over par on course B, while a player averaging 20 over par on course A might average only 16 over on course B. So, to the \"scratch golfer\", Course B is more difficult, but to the \"bogey golfer\", Course A is more difficult. The reasons for this are inherent in the types of challenges presented by the same course to both golfers. Distance is often a problem for amateur \"bogey\" golfers with slower swing speeds, who get less distance with each club, and so typically require more shots to get to the green, raising their score compared to a scratch golfer with a stronger swing. However, courses are often designed with hazard placement to mitigate this advantage, forcing the scratch player to \"lay up\" to avoid bunkers or water, while the bogey golfer is more or less unaffected as the hazard lies out of their range. Finally, terrain features and fairway maintenance can affect golfers of all skill levels; narrowing the fairway by adding obstacles or widening the rough on each side will typically increase the percentage of shots made from disadvantageous lies, increasing the challenge for all players.\n\nBy USGA rules, handicap calculation first requires calculating a \"Handicap Differential\" for each round of play the player has completed by strict rules. That in itself is a function of the player's \"gross adjusted score\" (adjustments can be made to mitigate various deviations either from strict rules or from a player's normal capabilities, for handicap purposes only) and two course-specific difficulty ratings: the Course Rating, a calculated expected score for a hypothetical \"scratch golfer\": and the Slope Rating, a number based on how much worse a hypothetical 20-handicap \"bogey golfer\" would score compared to the \"scratch golfer\". The average Slope Rating of all USGA-rated courses as of 2012 is 113, which also factors into the Differential computation.\n\nThe most recent Differentials are logged, up to 20 of them, and then the best of these (the number used depends on the number available) are selected, averaged, multiplied by .96 (an \"excellence factor\" that reduces the handicap of higher-scoring players, encouraging them to play better and thus lower their handicap), and truncated to the tenths place to produce the \"Handicap Index\". Additional calculations can be used to place higher significance on a player's recent tournament scores. A player's Handicap Index is then multiplied by the Slope Rating of the course to be played, divided by the average Slope Rating of 113, then rounded to the nearest integer to produce the player's Course Handicap.\n\nOnce calculated, the Course Handicap is applied in stroke play by simply reducing the player's gross score by the handicap, to produce a net score. So, a gross score of 96 with a handicap of 22 would produce a net score of 74. In match play, the lower handicap is subtracted from the higher handicap, and the resulting handicap strokes are awarded to the higher handicapper by distributing them among the holes according to each hole's difficulty; holes are ranked on the scorecard from 1 to 18 (or however many holes are available), and one stroke is applied to each hole from the most difficult to the least difficult. So, if one player has a 9 handicap and another has a 25 handicap, the 25-handicap player receives one handicap stroke on each of the most difficult 16 holes (25-9). If the 25-handicapper were playing against a \"scratch golfer\" (zero handicap), all 25 strokes would be distributed, first by applying one stroke to each hole, then applying the remaining strokes, one each, to the most difficult 7 holes; so, the handicap player would subtract 2 strokes from each of the most difficult 7 holes, and 1 each from the remaining 11.\n\nHandicap systems have potential for abuse by players who may intentionally play badly to increase their handicap (\"throwing their 'cap\") before playing to their potential at an important event with a valuable prize. For this reason, professional golf associations do not use them, but they can be calculated and used along with other criteria to determine the relative strengths of various professional players. Touring professionals, being the best of the best, often have negative handicaps; they can be expected, on average, to score lower than the Course Rating on any course.\n\nPopularity\n\nIn 2005 Golf Digest calculated that the countries with most golf courses per capita, in order, were: Scotland, New Zealand, Australia, Ireland, Canada, Wales, United States, Sweden, and England (countries with fewer than 500,000 people were excluded).\n\nThe number of course in other territories increases, an example of this being the expansion of golf in China. The first golf course in China opened in 1984, but by the end of 2009 there were roughly 600 in the country. For much of the 21st century, development of new golf courses in China has been officially banned (with the exception of the island province of Hainan), but the number of courses had nonetheless tripled from 2004 to 2009; the \"ban\" has been evaded with the government's tacit approval simply by not mentioning golf in any development plans. \n\nIn the United States, the number of people who play golf twenty-five times or more per year decreased from 6.9 million in 2000 to 4.6 million in 2005, according to the National Golf Foundation. The NGF reported that the number who played golf at all decreased from 30 to 26 million over the same period.\n\nGolf courses worldwide\n\nNumber of golf courses by country in 2008 \n\nProfessional golf\n\nThe majority of professional golfers work as club or teaching professionals (\"pros\"), and only compete in local competitions. A small elite of professional golfers are \"tournament pros\" who compete full-time on international \"tours\". Many club and teaching professionals working in the golf industry start as caddies or with a general interest in the game, finding employment at golf courses and eventually moving on to certifications in their chosen profession. These programs include independent institutions and universities, and those that eventually lead to a Class A golf professional certification. Touring professionals typically start as amateur players, who attain their \"pro\" status after success in major tournaments that win them either prize money and/or notice from corporate sponsors. Jack Nicklaus, for example, gained widespread notice by finishing second in the 1960 U.S. Open to champion Arnold Palmer, with a 72-hole score of 282 (the best score to date in that tournament by an amateur). He played one more amateur year in 1961, winning that year's U.S. Amateur Championship, before turning pro in 1962.\n\nInstruction\n\nGolf instruction involves the teaching and learning of the game of golf. Proficiency in teaching golf instruction requires not only technical and physical ability but also knowledge of the rules and etiquette of the game. In some countries, golf instruction is best performed by teachers certified by the Professional Golfers Association. Some top instructors who work with professional golfers have become quite well known in their own right. Instructors use a combination of physical conditioning, mental visualization, classroom sessions, club fitting, driving range instruction, on-course play under real conditions, and review of videotaped swings in slow motion to teach golf.\n\nGolf tours\n\nThere are at least twenty professional golf tours, each run by a PGA or an independent tour organization, which is responsible for arranging events, finding sponsors, and regulating the tour. Typically a tour has \"members\" who are entitled to compete in most of its events, and also invites non-members to compete in some of them. Gaining membership of an elite tour is highly competitive, and most professional golfers never achieve it.\n\nPerhaps the most widely known tour is the PGA Tour, which tends to attract the strongest fields, outside the four Majors and the four World Golf Championships events. This is due mostly to the fact that most PGA Tour events have a first prize of at least 800,000 USD. The European Tour, which attracts a substantial number of top golfers from outside North America, ranks second to the PGA Tour in worldwide prestige. Some top professionals from outside North America play enough tournaments to maintain membership on both the PGA Tour and European Tour. In three of the four most recent golf seasons, both tours' money titles were claimed by the same individual, with Luke Donald doing so in 2011 and Rory McIlroy in 2012 and 2014. In 2013, Henrik Stenson won the FedEx Cup points race on the PGA Tour and the European Tour money title, but did not top the PGA Tour money list (that honour going to Tiger Woods).\n\nThe other leading men's tours include the Japan Golf Tour, the Asian Tour (Asia outside Japan), the PGA Tour of Australasia, and the Sunshine Tour (for southern Africa, primarily South Africa). The Japan, Australasian, Sunshine, PGA, and European Tours are the charter members of the trade body of the world's main tours, the International Federation of PGA Tours, founded in 1996. The Asian Tour became a full member in 1999. The Canadian Tour became an associate member of the Federation in 2000, and the Tour de las Américas (Latin America) became an associate member of the Federation in 2007. The Federation underwent a major expansion in 2009 that saw eleven new tours become full members – the Canadian Tour, Tour de las Américas, China Golf Association, the Korea Professional Golfers' Association, Professional Golf Tour of India, and the operators of all six major women's tours worldwide. The OneAsia Tour, founded in 2009, is not a member of the Federation, but was founded as a joint venture of the Australasia, China, Japan, and Korean tours. In 2011, the Tour de las Américas was effectively taken over by the PGA Tour, and in 2012 was folded into the new PGA Tour Latinoamérica. Also in 2012, the Canadian Tour was renamed PGA Tour Canada after it agreed to be taken over by the PGA Tour. All men's tours that are Federation members, except the India tour, offer points in the Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR) to players who place sufficiently high in their events. The OneAsia Tour also offers ranking points.\n\nGolf is unique in having lucrative competition for older players. There are several senior tours for men aged fifty and over, arguably the best known of which is the U.S.-based Champions Tour.\n\nThere are six principal tours for women, each based in a different country or continent. The most prestigious of these is the United States-based LPGA Tour. All of the principal tours offer points in the Women's World Golf Rankings for high finishers in their events.\n\nAll of the leading professional tours for under-50 players have an official developmental tour, in which the leading players at the end of the season will earn a tour card on the main tour for the following season. Examples include the Web.com Tour, which feeds to the PGA Tour, and the Challenge Tour, which is the developmental tour of the European Tour. The Web.com and Challenge Tours also offer OWGR points.\n\nMen's major championships\n\nThe major championships are the four most prestigious men's tournaments of the year. In chronological order they are: The Masters, the U.S. Open, The Open Championship (referred to in North America as the British Open) and the PGA Championship. \n\nThe fields for these events include the top several dozen golfers from all over the world. The Masters has been played at Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Georgia, since its inception in 1934. It is the only major championship that is played at the same course each year. The U.S. Open and PGA Championship are played at courses around the United States, while the Open Championship is played at courses around the United Kingdom. \n\nPrior to the advent of the PGA Championship and The Masters, the four Majors were the U.S. Open, the U.S. Amateur, the Open Championship, and the British Amateur.\n\nWomen's major championships\n\nWomen's golf does not have a globally agreed set of majors. The list of majors recognised by the dominant women's tour, the LPGA Tour in the U.S., has changed several times over the years, with the most recent changes occurring in 2001 and 2013. Like the PGA Tour, the (U.S.) LPGA tour long had four majors, but now has five: the ANA Inspiration (previously known by several other names, most recently the Kraft Nabisco Championship), the Women's PGA Championship (previously known as the LPGA Championship), the U.S. Women's Open, the Women's British Open (which replaced the du Maurier Classic as a major in 2001) and The Evian Championship (added as the fifth major in 2013). Only the last two are also recognised as majors by the Ladies European Tour. However, the significance of this is limited, as the LPGA is far more dominant in women's golf than the PGA Tour is in mainstream men's golf. For example, the BBC has been known to use the U.S. definition of \"women's majors\" without qualifying it. Also, the Ladies' Golf Union, the governing body for women's golf in Great Britain and Ireland, stated on its official website that the Women's British Open was \"the only Women's Major to be played outside the U.S.\" (this was before the elevation of The Evian Championship to major status). For many years, the Ladies European Tour tacitly acknowledged the dominance of the LPGA Tour by not scheduling any of its own events to conflict with the three LPGA majors played in the U.S., but that changed beginning in 2008, when the LET scheduled an event opposite the LPGA Championship. The second-richest women's tour, the LPGA of Japan Tour, does not recognise any of the U.S. LPGA or European majors as it has its own set of majors (historically three, since 2008 four). However, these events attract little notice outside Japan.\n\nSenior major championships\n\nSenior (aged fifty and over) men's golf does not have a globally agreed set of majors. The list of senior majors on the U.S.-based Champions Tour has changed over the years, but always by expansion. The Champions Tour now recognises five majors: the Senior PGA Championship, The Tradition, the Senior Players Championship, the United States Senior Open, and The Senior (British) Open Championship.\n\nOf the five events, the Senior PGA is by far the oldest, having been founded in 1937. The other events all date from the 1980s, when senior golf became a commercial success as the first golf stars of the television era, such as Arnold Palmer and Gary Player, reached the relevant age. The Senior British Open was not recognised as a major by the Champions Tour until 2003. The European Seniors Tour recognises only the Senior PGA and the two Senior Opens as majors. However, the Champions Tour is arguably more dominant in global senior golf than the U.S. LPGA is in global women's golf.\n\nInternational events\n\n* Golf at the Asian Games\n* Golf at the Pan American Games\n* Golf at the Summer Olympics\n* Golf at the Summer Universiade\n* Ryder Cup\n* Presidents Cup\n* Solheim Cup\n* International Crown\n* Seve Trophy\n* EurAsia Cup\n* Walker Cup\n* Curtis Cup", "A wood is a type of club used in the sport of golf. Woods have longer shafts and larger, rounder heads than other club types, and are used to hit the ball longer distances than other types.\n\nWoods are so called because, traditionally, they had a club head that was made from hardwood, generally persimmon, but modern clubs have heads made from metal, for example titanium, or composite materials, such as carbon fiber. Some golf enthusiasts refer to these as \"metals\" or \"metal woods\" but this change in terminology is not strictly necessary, because while the material has changed, the style and intended use has not. The change to stronger materials has allowed the design of the modern woods to incorporate significantly larger heads than in the past. Because of the increase in club head size, in 2004, the USGA created a new stipulation for the size of the club head. The legal maximum volume displacement of any clubhead (by the rules of golf) is 460 cc \n\nWoods are numbered in ascending order starting with the driver, or 1-wood, which has the lowest loft (usually between 9 and 13 degrees), and continuing with progressively higher lofts and numbers. Most modern woods are sold as individual clubs allowing the player to customize their club set, but matched sets of woods, especially as part of a complete club set, are readily available. Odd-numbered lofts are most common in players' bags, though 2- and 4-woods are available in many model lines. The number of the club is mainly a reference for the player to easily identify the clubs; the actual loft angle of a particular number varies between manufacturers, and there is often some overlap of lofts (one 3-wood might be higher-lofted than a 4-wood of a different brand or model). Other identifiers have been utilized such as \"strong\" and \"plus\" to differentiate various lofts within a line of clubs.\n\nWoods generally fall into two classes, drivers and fairway woods, with a traditional set of clubs including a driver and one or two fairway woods (usually numbered 3 and 5). Many modern sets tend to include hybrid clubs, which combine some of the characteristics of a wood and an iron, to replace the 5 wood and low-lofted irons.\n\nA recent trend is to produce woods and hybrids that can be adjusted by the player to provide different lofts and other settings.\n\nDrivers\n\nThe 1-wood, or driver, is the lowest-lofted, longest, and often lightest club in a player's bag, and is meant to launch the ball the longest distance of any club. Originally, the driver was only slightly larger than any other wood and was designed to be used from the tee or the fairway, but with the advent of hollow metal clubhead construction, the driver has become highly specialized for use off the tee by incorporating an oversized head and a deep striking face to maximize the \"sweet spot\" that gives the best results. It is possible to hit a modern driver off the fairway turf, but it requires a high degree of skill and a certain amount of luck regarding the lie of the ball. Certain 2-woods are available with a similar deep-faced design but a higher loft, which can be used in situations when a player needs slightly less distance than their average drive, or must make a driver-distance shot from the fairway or rough. However, 2-woods of any kind are uncommon, as a player in these situations will more often opt for the 3-wood, and save the space in the bag for a less specialised club like a wedge or hybrid.\n\nThe driver has become the most expensive single club of the modern clubset, largely due to the high emphasis placed on a player's drive distance; a longer drive gets the ball closer to the green in fewer strokes allowing for better chances of a birdie or eagle. While drivers are available as cheaply as $20, these are mainly marketed at junior players; the price range for drivers marketed to adult amateur players is generally between $130–$500, with custom-made clubs for high-end players and touring professionals costing thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars (in the case of prototype or preproduction clubs supplied by a sponsor clubmaker). As a comparison, the upper end of the retail drivers, $500, is comparable to the price of an entire quality matched set of irons, and the next most expensive single clubs, the putter and the fairway woods, generally range from $100–$350.\n\nDriver customization\n\nWith such high emphasis on drive distance and accuracy by players wanting to \"play like the pros\", a large amount of customization is available in drivers in order to provide the club configuration that best matches the player's specific swing mechanics. Club-makers generally provide for selection and/or customization of five things: the shaft flex, which determines how energy is stored and released during the player's swing; the loft angle, which is a determinant of launch angle and backspin; the offset, which determines the angle the clubface will have to the ball at impact; the clubhead mass, which can \"fine-tune\" the clubhead behaviour for a player's swing tempo; and the centre of mass, which is also a factor in launch angle and backspin.\n\nThese customizations are typically grouped in certain common configurations. A player with a correct swing of average strength (clubhead speeds about 85–100 mph at impact) will generally want a driver with a regular-flex shaft, 10.5° loft, a low offset (0–2°) towards a \"closed\" face (angled toward the player), and a low centre of gravity. This has generally been shown to provide the best overall distance and flight behaviour from an average swing, and drivers with this configuration are widely available. Drivers with a low closed offset or no offset are often called \"game improvement\" drivers or simply \"regular\" drivers. Ladies and seniors typically have slower swing speeds (60–85 mph), and so to maximise distance, it is important to increase \"hang time\" so that the lower horizontal velocity at launch can carry the ball farther. These players generally benefit from a more flexible shaft and a higher loft angle; this combination \"times\" the release of stored energy in the shaft to the slower swing, and the increased loft will launch the ball higher and increase backspin to improve flight time. The standard women's driver has a 13° loft and \"Lady\"-flex shaft, while senior men's drivers average 11° and have an \"intermediate\"- or \"senior\"-flex shaft.\n\nPlayers with problems slicing their drive shots (for a right-hander, a slice starts straight and curves to the right) may benefit from an additional closed offset of 3–4°, which will help square the clubface to the ball during the swing. This is typically referred to as a \"max game improvement\" driver, sometimes as a \"draw driver\" because a player with a correct swing using such a driver will draw their shots (for a right-hander, a \"draw\" starts straight but curves left).\n\nA player with a stronger-than-average swing (>100 mph at impact) will typically want a stiff-flex shaft and a lower loft, around 9.5°, which will respond better to the faster swing tempo and will launch the ball lower so the energy is spent sending the ball outward instead of keeping it in the air. The same player might also benefit from a \"Tour driver\", which has a 1–2° offset to \"open\" the clubface (angle it away from the player), and a higher, further-rearward centre of mass. These changes can correct certain problems with a strong swing, such as torquing in the clubhead \"closing\" it at impact causing draws, and the normally low and forward centre of gravity causing excessive backspin which can make drives \"balloon\"; the shot will start low but curve upwards in flight, then \"stall\" and drop onto the turf, reducing total distance. Most stiff driver shafts are marked usually X-Stiff or even more. These are commonly professional-level stiffnesses due the rarity of amateur players capable of hitting swing speeds over 110 mph, although these also occur sometimes.\n\nThe furthest shooting drivers of all are long-drive-clubs, which may have a 48-inch shaft. This is the maximum legal shaft length in golf. Maximum length shafts are unpopular even in professional golf, due to the shot inconsistency and smaller error margin they provide.\n\nFairway woods\n\nHigher-number woods are generally known as fairway woods and, as their name suggests, are designed for shots from off the turf of the fairway that still require long distance, such as the second shot of a par-5 or a long par-4 hole. They have two important features: a higher loft to lift the ball out of the turf and over low obstacles like hills, and a shallower face height which allows a player to hit a ball from the ground using the exact center of the club, providing greater distance for such shots. These two design features enable players to hit fairway woods off the ground with greater ease than modern deep-faced drivers. Fairway woods are also useful off the tee depending on the hole; players may for instance wish to play their tee shot short (known as \"laying up\") due to a dogleg or a hazard in range of their driver, and will opt instead for their 3-wood. Fairway woods are typically made with a slightly shorter and stiffer shaft, a smaller clubhead and more loft than a driver or 2-wood.\n\nWhile the most common modern clubset includes only one fairway wood, the 3-wood, woods are typically available from major brands in lofts up to a 9-wood. A 4-wood is sometimes seen instead of a 3-wood (to fine-tune range differences between a player's driver and fairway wood), while a 5-wood is a common addition to the 3-wood for players who prefer fairway woods to long irons for play through the green. 7-woods are rarer in men's clubs but more common in ladies' and seniors' sets, again as a substitute for lower-lofted irons which are difficult to hit well and whose low launch angle can be risky on a hilly or undulating fairway. Some custom clubmakers offer woods in lofts up to 55° (a \"25-wood\" equivalent to a sand wedge); these can be used to replace the entire standard set of irons with woods, for players who prefer the swing mechanics and behavior of woods to that of irons and wedges.\n\nDesign\n\nThe head of a wood is roughly spherical in shape with a slightly bulging clubface and a generally flattened sole that slides over the ground without digging in during the swing. Traditional \"wood\" clubheads were made of wood, hence the name; beech wood or ash were common prior to the twentieth century, and later persimmon or maple became preferable. Modern club heads are usually hollow steel, titanium or composite materials, and are sometimes called \"metalwoods\" or more recently \"fairway metals\". Pinseeker Golf Corp. innovated the first stainless steel metalwood called the Bombshell in 1976. The design was somewhat untraditional and did not have the promotional success needed for profitable long term marketing - it was discontinued 3 years later. In 1979 Taylor Made produced a traditionally shaped stainless steel wood head called \"Pittsburgh Persimmon\" which achieved market acceptance by the mid-1980s. Oversized heads made from aluminum appeared in the mid-1980s but were slow to catch on since their introduction was via independent component manufacturers and not the larger endorsement based club manufacturers. Very large size drivers (300-500cc) arrived with titanium metallurgy which meant reasonable 'headweights' could be achieved with very large thin shelled but strong structures. By the mid-2000s, titanium heads could be made to 1000 cc (Golfsmith Inc made 1000 cc in the mid-2000s). Around this time the USGA decided to limit the size of driver heads to 460 cc since the rule requiring heads to be of a traditional shape was being unduly stretched. However, during this period the club-making business needed some financial help, so the USGA relaxed the \"traditional shape\" rule while enforcing the new 460cc limit, and new head shapes appeared, such as \"torpedo\" and square/rectangular shapes, to attract the buying public to potentially game improving designs particularly regarding better mishit outcomes. \n\nThe typical loft for woods ranges from 7.5 to 31 degrees. Driver lofts generally center around 10.5° but the desired loft is very dependent upon the player's swing speed (low swing speeds need higher lofts); men's lofts vary between 8 and 11 degrees while women's drivers are between 10 and 13 degrees, and seniors' lofts trend toward the upper range by gender. The average 3-wood has a 13-16 degree loft (typically 15°) and the average 5-wood has an 18-21 degree loft. Higher lofts than that overlap with irons in distance, but many players prefer high-number woods to low-number irons wherever they can be used as the wood is easier to hit than a \"long iron\". The loft of any given club number varies between manufacturers, model lines, and the target player.\n\nThe shaft length in woods varies from about 40 -, with the current standard length for the driver being 45 in, formerly . Graphite shafts are usually preferred for woods due to their light weight, which enables users to generate higher clubhead speeds and thus greater distance. The maximum legal length of a shaft by USGA and R&A rules is 48 in, though some woods used in long drive contests have been made with shaft lengths up to 50 in long.\n\nThe face of woods is slightly bulged to counteract the gear effect when the ball hits the face off center. The gear effect causes the ball to spin from hits that are away from the center of the face. The spin contributes a tendency for the ball to have a curved flight path away from the target. The slight bulge of the wood club face tends to counteract the gear effect by slightly changing the direction of the ball to make the flight path of the ball end up closer to the target.\n\nConstruction\n\nShaft\n\nThe shaft is the true engine of the wood. Widely overlooked, the proper shaft increases distance and accuracy, while a poor shaft can lead to inconsistent shots, slices, and reduced distance.\n\nThe oldest shafts for all golf clubs were made of Hickory wood. The shaft was whippy and light, but inconsistent in flex from club to club and quite fragile. Beginning in the 1920s, steel shafts started making an appearance, though the USGA and R&A did not allow their use in sanctioned tournaments until 1929. These shafts traded the lightness and flex of the wood shaft for vastly increased durability and consistency, and were the only type of shaft in general use on any club until the early 1990s. The modern \"graphite\" shaft (technically a carbon-fiber composite material) currently in use today combines advantages of the two older types of shafts; it is lighter and more flexible than either steel or Hickory, while having similar durability as steel, at the cost of slightly reduced shot consistency due to increased torque (though this has vastly improved on recent generations of shafts). Graphite shafts gained widespread popularity in the mid-1990s; although the carbon-fiber composite technology had been available since the early 1970s, it was very expensive to produce and nearly impossible to mass-market. Advances in producing, forming and curing composite materials have made carbon fiber much cheaper, and now virtually all new woods, regardless of price, have graphite shafts.\n\nShaft flex has a very pronounced effect on the power and accuracy of a wood. Every wood is somewhere in between the two extremes of flex, from the extra whippy, to the extra stiff. Whippy shafts are used by those who have low swing speeds and stiff by those who have faster swing speeds. The flex of a shaft allows it to store energy from a player's downswing, and release it as the head makes contact for increased club speed at impact. A shaft that is too stiff cannot be flexed by the golfer during their downswing, which reduces club speed at impact. A shaft that is too whippy will retain some of its stored flex at contact, wasting energy.\n\nShaft torque is also a concern. Flex and torque are generally related; the more a club can flex, the more it can also twist around its axis (though this is not always the case). A shaft that can torque easily is less forgiving of off-center shots as it will allow the head to twist, causing pulls and pushes. Low-torque shafts resist twisting for more forgiving behavior, but tend to be stiffer and require more power for proper distance. The latest generation of driver shafts combine a flexible shaft with a stiff tip, giving the golfer the required flex to \"whip\" into the ball while reducing clubhead twisting.\n\nHead\n\nWooden heads predominated until the late 1980s. They had evolved to include a metal sole and a metal or plastic faceplate. These wooden headed clubs were dense and heavy, and were generally much smaller than today's clubheads. Their smaller surface area also made consistent contact more difficult, as the sweet spot of these clubs was considerably smaller than today's models.\n\nGary Adams, founder of TaylorMade Golf, is considered the father of the modern metal wood. Adams began to market his club in the late 1970s, but it was nearly a decade until metal woods became more popular with most golfers. Callaway Golf is also largely responsible for the current design of metal woods; the original Big Bertha driver introduced players to the \"oversize\" driver with a larger and deeper clubhead (at the time it was 190cc in volume), giving maximum club face and a deeper center of gravity. Callaway Golf continued to expand the size of the clubhead to increase these effects, resulting in the Bigger Bertha, the Great Big Bertha, and others in the line. The current incarnation of the Big Bertha driver is 460cc, which is the maximum allowable clubhead volume according to USGA rules, though larger clubheads exist for long-drive contests and informal games.\n\nToday, many metal wood clubfaces (and most driver clubfaces) are constructed out of titanium. Titanium has a higher strength to weight ratio than steel and has better corrosion resistance, so it is an ideal metal for golf club construction. Manufacturers can also make clubheads with greater volume, which increases the hitting area, and thinner faces, which reduces the weight.\n\nHosel\n\nTraditional woods had a very thick hosel, often wrapped with thin cord, which provided a very secure joint between shaft and head at the cost of a higher center of gravity. Modern metalwoods have largely done away with the hosel altogether, instead anchoring the shaft within the clubhead. This allows as much mass as possible to be contained in the clubhead, lowering the center of gravity.", "An iron is a type of club used in the sport of golf to propel the ball towards the hole. Irons typically have shorter shafts and smaller clubheads than woods, the head is made of solid iron or steel, and the head's primary feature is a large, flat, angled face, usually scored with grooves. Irons are used in a wide variety of situations, typically from the teeing ground on shorter holes, from the fairway or rough as the player approaches the green, and to extract the ball from hazards, such as bunkers or even shallow water hazards.\n\nIrons are the most common type of club; a standard set of 14 golf clubs will usually contain between 7 and 11 irons, including wedges. Irons are customarily differentiated by a number from 1 to 10 (most commonly 3 to 9) that indicates the relative angle of loft on the clubface, although a set of irons will also vary in clubhead size, shaft length, and hence lie angle as the loft (and number) increase. Irons with higher loft than the numbered irons are called wedges, which are typically marked with a letter indicating their name, and are used for a variety of \"utility\" shots requiring short distance and/or a high launch angle.\n\nDesign and manufacture\n\nHistorically all irons were forged from a flat piece of metal, which produced a thin clubhead that resembled a blade. Modern investment casting processes enabled manufacturers to easily mass-produce clubs with consistent properties. This manufacturing process was first used by PING, and also made it possible to take weight out of the back of the clubhead and distribute it around the perimeter. These perimeter weighted, or cavity back, irons made it much easier to achieve consistent results even when striking the ball outside the \"sweet spot\", when compared with traditional bladed, or muscle back, irons.\n\nIn 1933, Willie Ogg – who at the time was serving as an advisory staff member for Wilson Staff – created a patented design for distributing weight away from the heel of the club head, moving it towards the “sweet spot” of the blade. This design feature was used in the Wilson \"Ogg-mented\" irons, the forerunner of perimeter-weighted or cavity back irons. \n\nAlthough most irons are now produced by investment casting, many high end iron sets are still produced by forging, as the resulting clubhead is easier to adjust by bending to adapt the set to a player's specific needs. The resulting club is also generally thought to have an improved \"feel\" due to the softer consistency of the forged metal as opposed to cast.\n\nManufacturers sometimes try to combine the characteristics of both muscle and cavity backed irons, which has resulted in terminology such as \"cut-muscle\", or \"split-cavity\" to describe these designs.\n\nThere are also many hybrid clubs, so-called because they combine some of the characteristics of irons and woods, that closely resemble standard irons. Indeed, many sets of clubs, especially those marketed for beginners, now include hybrids to replace the more traditional 3 and 4 irons.\n\nMuscle back\n\nA muscle back is the more traditional design and consists of a solid metal head, typically made of forged iron. The design of the club typically distributes the metal more evenly around the clubhead (though most designs still place more weight along the sole of the club), which makes the center of mass of the club higher and the moment of inertia (the clubhead's resistance to rotation) lower as compared to newer cavity-backed designs. As such, these clubs are said to have a smaller \"sweet spot\", requiring greater skill and a more consistent swing to make accurate, straight shots. Novice golfers with less consistent swing fundamentals can easily mis-hit these clubs, causing shots to launch and/or curve off of the intended line of play (such as \"pushing\", \"pulling\", \"slicing\" or \"hooking\").\n\nCavity back\n\nCavity back, or perimeter weighted, irons are usually made by investment casting, which creates a harder metal allowing thinner surfaces while retaining durability, and also allows for more precise placement of metal than forging techniques. Cavity backs are so called because of the cavity created in the rear of the clubhead due to the removal of metal from the center of the clubhead's back, which is then redistributed, most of it very low and towards the toe and heel of the clubhead. This has the general effect of lowering the clubhead's center of mass, placing it underneath that of the ball allowing for a higher launch angle for a given loft. The perimeter weighting also increases the moment of inertia, making the clubhead more resistant to twisting on impact with the ball. The end result is a clubhead with a larger \"sweet spot\" that is more forgiving of slight mis-hits.\n\nComparison and preference\n\nModern clubs generally borrow from both \"muscle-back\" and \"cavity-back\" design features, and fall into a gradient.\n\nClub sets with more extreme perimeter weighting, giving the clubhead a very wide sole, are typically known as \"game improvement irons\", because they allow novice and casual amateur players to get the ball up in the air more consistently, and make straighter and more accurate shots despite their less consistent ball-striking skill. This generally improves their final score as compared to a round played with harder-to-hit muscle-back designs causing more errant shots and thus more penalty strokes.\n\nHowever, these same forgiving characteristics can make game improvement irons harder for a skilled golfer to use well. The tendency of the clubs to correct mis-hits will frustrate a golfer's attempts to intentionally hit a curved shot (a \"fade\" or \"draw\"), for instance to avoid an obstacle lying along a straight flight path, or to counter a rightward or leftward slope to the fairway that would make a straight shot roll into the rough. This lack of ability to \"work the ball\" can frustrate a more skilled golfer attempting to place the ball more accurately on the fairway than a novice would normally be concerned with (the novice's primary concern being simply to keep the ball on the fairway in the first place). The increased clubhead mass and lower center of mass can also be incompatible with a more skilled player's stronger swing; the higher mass reduces clubhead speed, while the higher launch angle causes more backspin and wastes the golfer's energy sending the ball up into the air instead of out over the fairway.\n\nClubs intended for skilled amateurs and professionals, while still incorporating some perimeter-weighting characteristics, generally have less extreme weight distribution, instead placing more weight closer to the center and higher, and reducing overall clubhead mass slightly. This allows the golfer to \"work the ball\" while still giving some advantage based on the lower center of mass as compared to older designs. The slightly reduced mass of some sets also increases clubhead speed allowing for more variation in swing strength and thus carry distance than would be possible with the heavier mass of most game improvement irons.\n\nComponents\n\nClubhead\n\nInvestment casting, while allowing for a greater range of design options, produces a very stiff and inflexible head that can be difficult to adjust for a player's desired lie and loft. Forged irons, while they allow for easier and a greater range of adjustments are limited in the designs they may be achieved.\n\nThe shaft length of an iron decreases as the iron's number increases; therefore the iron number is inversely proportionate to its length. This reduced length means that a clubhead of the same mass traveling at the same angular velocity (degrees per second, as swung by a golfer) has lower momentum because the clubhead's speed is slower. To combat this, higher-numbered iron clubheads are heavier than lower-numbered iron heads; there is generally a 4oz increase in mass between one clubhead and the next higher number.\n\nDue to the average golfer's desire to hit the ball farther, the loft on modern irons is much less than that on irons from even the late 20th century. For example, a modern 9 iron has comparable loft to a 7 iron from the 1990s. Manufacturers have been able to reduce loft without compromising usability, by moving weight into the sole of the clubhead, thereby lowering the center of gravity and enabling the ball to be launched on a higher trajectory for a given loft than a design with a higher center of mass. Tour professionals now use these same de-lofted clubs, and so the gap in skill and thus in distance between a professional and casual golfer remains.\n\nOver the years, groove technology has changed the playability of irons. For the past 80 years, little has changed about grooves. However, a new rule by the USGA and the R&A has changed the way that grooves are to be made starting in 2010. In general, the deeper the groove, the more grass can be dispersed behind the ball at impact. This allows control over the amount of spin, which is crucial to flight characteristics of the shot as well as how well received the ball is on the green. The less that is between the ball and the club at impact, the more spin that will be produced which increases the flight trajectory and allows stopping quicker upon hitting the green. Better players benefit the most from deep, sharp grooves as the more clubhead speed is generated, the more spin the player is able to introduce. By forcing manufacturers to lessen the depth and cut on the grooves, the new rules will penalize shots from longer grass slightly more and put a premium on hitting the fairway.\n\nHosel\n\nFor irons, the hosel, an undefined part of the iron, is very noticeable, forming a barrel shape on the inside face of the club and the \"heel\" of the sole of the club. Many modern irons have a more offset hosel, integrated into the clubhead at a lower point and further from the hitting area of the club. This, combined with the perimeter weighting of modern irons, gives a club with the lowest possible center of gravity and the highest possible usable club face.\n\nA stroke in which the ball comes directly off the hosel is known as a \"shank\", and the ball will usually veer off almost at right angles to the intended target line.\n\nShaft\n\nThe shaft is the true engine of the iron. A shaft that is perfectly suited to the individual golfer increases distance and improves accuracy, while a poorly suited shaft can lead to inconsistent, wayward shots and reduced distance.\n\nAlthough graphite shafts, made from composite materials such as carbon fiber, are now standard in woods, especially drivers, shafts for irons are still most often made from steel, which has lower torque than graphite, allowing less clubhead twisting, which gives better accuracy. Graphite shafts are not uncommon for numbered irons however, as the increased distance conferred by the shaft is advantageous to many players, especially shorter hitters such as ladies and seniors. Wedges virtually always have steel shafts as the accuracy and consistency is of primary importance.\n\nThe higher the number of the iron, the shorter its shaft will be, allowing the player a more controlled and consistent swing. The resulting reduction in clubhead velocity is overcome by an increase in clubhead mass.\n\nGrip \n\nThe grip covers the top of the shaft enabling the golfer to hold the club comfortably. Modern grips are generally made from rubber, sometimes inlaid with cord, but some players still prefer a traditional leather wrap. Even though materials advances have resulted in more durable, longer-lasting soft grips, they still require frequent replacement as they wear, dry out or harden.\n\nBy the rules of golf, all iron grips must have a circular cross-section. They may taper from thick to thin along their length (and virtually all do), but are not allowed to have any waisting (a thinner section of the grip surrounded by thicker sections above and below it) or bulges (thicker sections of the grip surrounded by thinner sections). Minor variations in surface texture (such as the natural variation of a \"wrap\"-style grip) are not counted unless significant.\n\nTypes of irons\n\nNumbered irons\n\nMost irons in a player's bag are labelled with a number indicating their loft; the higher the number, the higher the loft. A matched set of irons will have a regular, progressive increase in loft through the irons, which may differ from set to set due to other design considerations that can affect launch angle and distance. Irons have been seen ranging in number from 0 through 12, but the most common number range in the modern iron set is 3 to 9.\n\nDriving Iron\n\nThe 1 iron, or driving iron, is the lowest lofted and longest iron (14 or 16 degrees of loft), although Wilson did make a 0 iron for John Daly. Often called a butter knife because of its looks, the 1 iron has the least surface area on its face and so is commonly regarded as the most difficult club in the bag to hit. The driving iron is virtually obsolete as its nominal range easily falls into that of the easier-to-hit fairway woods, although some sets still include one and it can be purchased separately as a custom club. Lee Trevino is famously quoted, after he had almost been struck by lightning at the 1975 Western Open, that if he were out on the course and it began to storm again he would take out his 1 iron and point it to the sky, \"because even God can't hit a 1 iron.\" By and large, the 1 iron is defunct, and is no longer being produced.\n\nLong irons\n\nThe irons from 2 to 4 are typically called the \"long irons\"; they have the lowest lofts and the longest shafts, and are designed to hit the ball long distances (180-260 yards) with a low launch angle. They are typically used from the fairway or rough, but are also useful in trouble spots such as when \"punching out\" from underneath a stand of trees.\n\nLong irons are traditionally regarded as the most difficult to hit, because their low loft gives them a very small striking face and \"sweet spot\" compared to higher-lofted irons. As such, they are less commonly seen in players' bags, usually replaced with higher-lofted fairway woods like the 5 and 7, or with hybrid clubs that have similar overall performance but are easier to hit. The 2-iron, like the driving iron, is virtually never seen in modern sets, due to both its difficulty and to a \"de-lofting\" of modern cavity-backed irons which increases the average distance of shorter irons. If the long irons are used, they are often seen with graphite shafts to add additional clubhead speed to the average golfer's swing by storing energy from the downswing and releasing it at impact. Hybrid clubs that replace these irons also often have graphite shafts for the same reason.\n\nThe 5-iron sits on the cusp between \"long\" and \"mid\" irons, and can be thought of as belonging to either class depending on the set and the player's preference; it is used more often and replaced with a hybrid less often than the 2-4, but is still commonly replaced with a hybrid club, especially in ladies' sets.\n\nMid irons\n\nThe irons from 5 to 7 are typically called the \"mid irons\", and are generally used from the fairway and rough for longer approach shots, between 130-210 yards depending on the club, player and course. They're also used on hillier fairways to avoid hitting a low rise, which is a risk with long irons. These irons are commonly needed for the second shot of a long par-4 or the second or third shot of a par-5, and whenever the player must \"lay up\" their tee or second shot to avoid a hazard in range of their woods or long irons. Lastly, mid irons are common \"bump and run\" clubs in close-in situations where the player doesn't wish to hit a more lofted chip shot, but needs more rolling distance than a pitch or bump-and-run with a short iron would produce.\n\nThese irons are typically easier to hit well than the long irons, owing to their higher loft which gives the clubs more surface area. These clubs are more often found as true irons in players' bags, meaning they're less often replaced with hybrid clubs or other \"iron replacements\". These irons often have graphite shafts in newer sets, even when shorter irons have steel; the graphite will give better distance for the average golfer at the cost of some loss of consistency due to shaft torquing.\n\nShort irons\n\nThe 8 and 9 irons are commonly called the \"short irons\". They have the highest-mass clubheads and the shortest shafts of the numbered irons, and are used for shots requiring high loft and/or moderate to short distance (typically between 130 and 150 yards with a full swing). Shots that must carry over tall and/or nearby obstacles such as a stand of trees, or approach shots from inside 140 yards of the pin, are common short iron situations. The short irons also make good \"bump and run\" clubs; used with a putting motion from the fringe around the green, the ball will carry in the air a few yards over the thick grass that would hamper a putt, then land softly on the green where it will then roll for a distance like a putt.\n\nThe short irons are traditionally regarded as the easiest to hit; however they are typically used in situations requiring very high accuracy, and so it becomes critical to minimize any effect of mis-hits. Short irons are often constructed using steel shafts, even if lower-lofted irons in the set have graphite; the steel minimizes clubhead torquing, increasing the consistency and thus accuracy of shots made at the cost of reduced flex which reduces distance (a secondary concern in most situations where these irons are used).\n\nThe pitching wedge is on the cusp between the short irons and the wedges, and has behaviors and uses falling into either class. Most matched iron sets include a pitching wedge, and it follows the normal loft progression of the iron set. In some sets, such as older sets produced by MacGregor Golf, it is labelled the 10-iron (MacGregor has since adopted the \"P\" terminology common to other manufacturers). In other sets such as Callaway Golf's \"Big Bertha\" line, the set includes a 10-iron in addition to a pitching wedge (simply labelled \"W\"), and the wedge's loft is increased from a nominal 45-48° to 50°, as a means to \"close the gap\" in lofts between a modern pitching wedge and a modern sand wedge.\n\nWedges\n\nWedges are a subclass of irons with higher loft than numbered irons, used for a variety of specialized \"utility\" shots that require short distance (typically less than 130 yards), high launch angle, and/or high backspin to reduce roll distance. The first wedge to have that name was the sand wedge, invented by Gene Sarazen in 1931, which features a wide sole that is angled complementary to the striking face to help prevent the clubhead \"digging in\" to soft turf such as sand. This wide sole was added to other high-lofted irons to add mass to the clubhead (compensating for the shorter shafts) and gives wedges their name, alluding to the clubs' appearance in profile.\n\nWedges are used for approach shots to the putting green, getting the ball out of tough situations, and to escape from hazards. They are designed to produce a high, short trajectory with a high degree of spin, all of which cuts down on the distance the ball will roll after landing. Most golfers will generally have at least two wedges, traditionally a pitching wedge and a sand wedge, with a lob wedge or a gap wedge commonly being added to provide additional options. Wedges are usually identified by a letter denoting their function (P, G, S, L, etc. sometimes with a \"W\" appended), or depending on the manufacturer, with a number denoting their loft angle (52°, 56°, 60°) and \"bounce angle\" (0-12°).\n\n* The pitching wedge is the lowest-lofted club to typically have the moniker. It lies on the cusp between the numbered irons and the wedges (sometimes even being labelled the \"10-iron\"), and is useful for a variety of short shots from firm or semi-soft lies. The traditional pitching wedge had a loft of about 50-52°, but the \"de-lofting\" of modern cavity back irons including the pitching wedge has resulted in a loft range centering on 48°.\n* The gap wedge was created to fill the gap that appeared between the pitching wedge and the sand wedge, as the numbered irons including the pitching wedge were de-lofted to compensate for cavity-backed irons' higher launch angle. The gap wedge has a loft similar to that of an older pitching wedge, around 52°, and can also be found labelled as an \"Approach\", \"Dual\", \"Utility\", or \"Attack\" wedge. Their use is generally similar to a pitching wedge, though some designs of gap wedge include additional \"bounce\" similar to a sand wedge for play from bunkers or other \"soft\" lies.\n* The sand wedge, or sand iron, is primarily designed for use out of sand bunkers and other soft lies. It is generally lofted between 55-56°, and has the widest sole of the wedges which provides the greatest amount of \"bounce\", allowing the clubhead to glide through sand and avoid digging in. \n* The lob wedge has a high degree of loft, around 60°, designed to produce shots with a very high arc, and are most often used for shots over hazards and other obstructions, or to accurately \"drop\" the ball into tight pin positions on modern elevated, undulating greens.\n** The ultra lob wedge, also called the flop wedge by some makers, is a highly specialized, extremely high-lofted lob wedge (up to 70°), that is designed for situations where an almost vertical launch is required, such as shots from the \"lip\" of a bunker. They are generally only made by specialty companies, and are not in common usage as many golfers prefer to instead \"open\" a sand or lob wedge to make a similar shot.\n\nGiven the choices available to the modern golfer, the traditional pair of pitching wedge and sand iron is starting to become less common as players opt for a selection of wedges with an array of different lofts and bounce angles. For example, a player may pick two \"gap wedges\", one with low bounce but slightly higher loft than a pitching wedge, and the other with similar bounce but less loft than a sand wedge, then add a lob wedge and forgo both of the traditional wedges.\n\nSpecifications\n\nThe following table provides a guide to the typical specifications of modern \"cavity-back\" irons. These can vary by 1-2° for a specific clubset depending on manufacturer and player preferences.\n\nThe following table provides a guide to the typical specifications of \"muscle-back\" irons and early cavity irons through to the mid-1990s." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Red_blood_cell.txt" ], "title": [ "Red blood cell" ], "wiki_context": [ "Red blood cells (RBCs), also called erythrocytes, are the most common type of blood cell and the vertebrate organism's principal means of delivering oxygen (O2) to the body tissues—via blood flow through the circulatory system. RBCs take up oxygen in the lungs or gills and release it into tissues while squeezing through the body's capillaries.\n\nThe cytoplasm of erythrocytes is rich in hemoglobin, an iron-containing biomolecule that can bind oxygen and is responsible for the red color of the cells. The cell membrane is composed of proteins and lipids, and this structure provides properties essential for physiological cell function such as deformability and stability while traversing the circulatory system and specifically the capillary network.\n\nIn humans, mature red blood cells are flexible and oval biconcave disks. They lack a cell nucleus and most organelles, in order to accommodate maximum space for hemoglobin; they can be viewed as sacks of hemoglobin, with a plasma membrane as the sack. Approximately 2.4 million new erythrocytes are produced per second in human adults. The cells develop in the bone marrow and circulate for about 100–120 days in the body before their components are recycled by macrophages. Each circulation takes about 20 seconds. Approximately a quarter of the cells in the human body are red blood cells. Nearly half of the blood's volume (40% to 45%) is red blood cells.\n\nRed blood cells are also known as RBCs, red cells, red blood corpuscles, haematids, erythroid cells or erythrocytes (from Greek erythros for \"red\" and kytos for \"hollow vessel\", with -cyte translated as \"cell\" in modern usage). Packed red blood cells (pRBC) are red blood cells that have been donated, processed, and stored in a blood bank for blood transfusion.\n\nHistory \n\nThe first person to describe red blood cells was the young Dutch biologist Jan Swammerdam, who had used an early microscope in 1658 to study the blood of a frog. Unaware of this work, Anton van Leeuwenhoek provided another microscopic description in 1674, this time providing a more precise description of red blood cells, even approximating their size, \"25,000 times smaller than a fine grain of sand\".\n\nIn 1901, Karl Landsteiner published his discovery of the three main blood groups—A, B, and C (which he later renamed to O). Landsteiner described the regular patterns in which reactions occurred when serum was mixed with red blood cells, thus identifying compatible and conflicting combinations between these blood groups. A year later Alfred von Decastello and Adriano Sturli, two colleagues of Landsteiner, identified a fourth blood group—AB.\n\nIn 1959, by use of X-ray crystallography, Dr. Max Perutz was able to unravel the structure of hemoglobin, the red blood cell protein that carries oxygen. \n\nThe oldest intact red blood cells ever discovered were found in Ötzi the Iceman, a natural mummy of a man who died around 3255 BCE. These cells were discovered in May 2012. \n\nVertebrate erythrocytes\n\nErythrocytes consist mainly of hemoglobin, a complex metalloprotein containing heme groups whose iron atoms temporarily bind to oxygen molecules (O2) in the lungs or gills and release them throughout the body. Oxygen can easily diffuse through the red blood cell's cell membrane. Hemoglobin in the erythrocytes also carries some of the waste product carbon dioxide back from the tissues; most waste carbon dioxide, however, is transported back to the pulmonary capillaries of the lungs as bicarbonate (HCO3−) dissolved in the blood plasma. Myoglobin, a compound related to hemoglobin, acts to store oxygen in muscle cells. \n\nThe color of erythrocytes is due to the heme group of hemoglobin. The blood plasma alone is straw-colored, but the red blood cells change color depending on the state of the hemoglobin: when combined with oxygen the resulting oxyhemoglobin is scarlet, and when oxygen has been released the resulting deoxyhemoglobin is of a dark red burgundy color. However, blood can appear bluish when seen through the vessel wall and skin. Pulse oximetry takes advantage of the hemoglobin color change to directly measure the arterial blood oxygen saturation using colorimetric techniques. Hemoglobin also has a very high affinity for carbon monoxide, forming carboxyhemoglobin which is a very bright red in color. Flushed, confused patients with a saturation reading of 100% on pulse oximetry are sometimes found to be suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning.\n\nThe sequestration of oxygen-carrying proteins inside specialized cells (as opposed to oxygen carriers being dissolved in body fluid) was an important step in the evolution of vertebrates as it allows for less viscous blood, higher concentrations of oxygen, and better diffusion of oxygen from the blood to the tissues. The size of erythrocytes varies widely among vertebrate species; erythrocyte width is on average about 25% larger than capillary diameter, and it has been hypothesized that this improves the oxygen transfer from erythrocytes to tissues.\n\nThe only known vertebrates without erythrocytes are the crocodile icefishes (family Channichthyidae); they live in very oxygen-rich cold water and transport oxygen freely dissolved in their blood. While they do not use hemoglobin anymore, remnants of hemoglobin genes can be found in their genome. \n\nNucleus\n\nErythrocytes in mammals are anucleate when mature, meaning that they lack a cell nucleus. In comparison, the erythrocytes of other vertebrates have nuclei; the only known exceptions are salamanders of the Batrachoseps genus and fish of the Maurolicus genus with closely related species. \n\nThe elimination of the nucleus in vertebrate erythrocytes has been offered as an explanation for the subsequent accumulation of non-coding DNA in the genome. The argument runs as follows: Efficient gas transport requires erythrocytes to pass through very narrow capillaries, and this constrains their size. In the absence of nuclear elimination, the accumulation of repeat sequences is constrained by the volume occupied by the nucleus, which increases with genome size.\n\nNucleated red blood cells in mammals consist of two forms: normoblasts, which are normal erythropoietic precurors to mature erythrocytes, and megaloblasts, which are abnormally large precursors that occur in megaloblastic anemias.\n\nSecondary functions\n\nWhen erythrocytes undergo shear stress in constricted vessels, they release ATP, which causes the vessel walls to relax and dilate so as to promote normal blood flow. \n\nWhen their hemoglobin molecules are deoxygenated, erythrocytes release S-nitrosothiols, which also act to dilate blood vessels, thus directing more blood to areas of the body depleted of oxygen.\n\nErythrocytes can also synthesize nitric oxide enzymatically, using L-arginine as substrate, as do endothelial cells. Exposure of erythrocytes to physiological levels of shear stress activates nitric oxide synthase and export of nitric oxide, which may contribute to the regulation of vascular tonus.\n\nErythrocytes can also produce hydrogen sulfide, a signalling gas that acts to relax vessel walls. It is believed that the cardioprotective effects of garlic are due to erythrocytes converting its sulfur compounds into hydrogen sulfide. \n\nErythrocytes also play a part in the body's immune response: when lysed by pathogens such as bacteria, their hemoglobin releases free radicals, which break down the pathogen's cell wall and membrane, killing it. \n\nMammalian erythrocytes\n\nMammalian erythrocytes are unique among the vertebrates as they are non-nucleated cells in their mature form. These cells have nuclei during early phases of erythropoiesis, but extrude them during development as they mature in order to provide more space for hemoglobin. The enucleated erythrocytes, called reticulocytes, go on to lose all other cellular organelles such as their mitochondria, Golgi apparatus and endoplasmic reticulum.\n\nAs a result of not containing mitochondria, these cells use none of the oxygen they transport; instead they produce the energy carrier ATP by the glycolysis of glucose and lactic acid fermentation on the resulting pyruvate.\n\nBecause of the lack of nuclei and organelles, mature red blood cells do not contain DNA and cannot synthesize any RNA, and consequently cannot divide and have limited repair capabilities. The inability to carry out protein synthesis means that no virus can evolve to target mammalian red blood cells. However, infection with parvoviruses (such as human parvovirus B19) can affect erythroid precursors, as recognized by the presence of giant pronormoblasts with viral particles and inclusion bodies, thus temporarily depleting the blood of reticulocytes and causing anemia. \n\nMammalian erythrocytes are typically shaped as biconcave disks: flattened and depressed in the center, with a dumbbell-shaped cross section, and a torus-shaped rim on the edge of the disk. This distinctive biconcave shape optimises the flow properties of blood in the large vessels, such as maximization of laminar flow and minimization of platelet scatter, which suppresses their atherogenic activity in those large vessels. However, there are some exceptions concerning shape in the artiodactyl order (even-toed ungulates including cattle, deer, and their relatives), which displays a wide variety of bizarre erythrocyte morphologies: small and highly ovaloid cells in llamas and camels (family Camelidae), tiny spherical cells in mouse deer (family Tragulidae), and cells which assume fusiform, lanceolate, crescentic, and irregularly polygonal and other angular forms in red deer and wapiti (family Cervidae). Members of this order have clearly evolved a mode of red blood cell development substantially different from the mammalian norm. Overall, mammalian erythrocytes are remarkably flexible and deformable so as to squeeze through tiny capillaries, as well as to maximize their apposing surface by assuming a cigar shape, where they efficiently release their oxygen load. \n\nIn large blood vessels, red blood cells sometimes occur as a stack, flat side next to flat side. This is known as rouleaux formation, and it occurs more often if the levels of certain serum proteins are elevated, as for instance during inflammation.\n\nThe spleen acts as a reservoir of red blood cells, but this effect is somewhat limited in humans. In some other mammals such as dogs and horses, the spleen sequesters large numbers of red blood cells which are dumped into the blood during times of exertion stress, yielding a higher oxygen transport capacity.\n\nHuman erythrocytes\n\nA typical human erythrocyte has a disk diameter of approximately 6.2–8.2 µm and a thickness at the thickest point of 2–2.5 µm and a minimum thickness in the centre of 0.8–1 µm, being much smaller than most other human cells. These cells have an average volume of about 90 fL with a surface of about 136 μm2, and can swell up to a sphere shape containing 150 fL, without membrane distension.\n\nAdult humans have roughly 20–30 × 1012 (20–30 trillion) red blood cells at any given time, comprising approximately 70% of the total human body cell number. Women have about 4 to 5 million erythrocytes per microliter (cubic millimeter) of blood and men about 5 to 6 million; people living at high altitudes with low oxygen tension will have more). Red blood cells are thus much more common than the other blood particles: there are about 4,000–11,000 white blood cells and about 150,000–400,000 platelets in each microliter of human blood.\n\nHuman red blood cells take on average 20 seconds to complete one cycle of circulation. \n\nAs red blood cells contain no nucleus, protein biosynthesis is currently assumed to be absent in these cells, although a recent study indicates the presence of all the necessary biomachinery in the cells to do so.\n\nThe blood's red color is due to the spectral properties of the hemic iron ions in hemoglobin. Each human red blood cell contains approximately 270 million of these hemoglobin biomolecules, each carrying four heme groups; hemoglobin comprises about a third of the total cell volume. This protein is responsible for the transport of more than 98% of the oxygen (the remaining oxygen is carried dissolved in the blood plasma). The red blood cells of an average adult human male store collectively about 2.5 grams of iron, representing about 65% of the total iron contained in the body. (See Human iron metabolism.)\n\nLife cycle\n\nHuman erythrocytes are produced through a process named erythropoiesis, developing from committed stem cells to mature erythrocytes in about 7 days. When matured, in a healthy individual these cells live in blood circulation for about 100 to 120 days (and 80 to 90 days in a full term infant). At the end of their lifespan, they become senescent, and are removed from circulation. In many chronic diseases, the lifespan of the erythrocytes is markedly reduced (e.g. patients requiring haemodialysis).\n\nErythropoiesis\n\nErythropoiesis is the development process by which new erythrocytes are produced; it lasts about 7 days. Through this process erythrocytes are continuously produced in the red bone marrow of large bones, at a rate of about 2 million per second in a healthy adult. (In the embryo, the liver is the main site of red blood cell production.) The production can be stimulated by the hormone erythropoietin (EPO), synthesised by the kidney. Just before and after leaving the bone marrow, the developing cells are known as reticulocytes; these comprise about 1% of circulating red blood cells.\n\nFunctional lifetime\n\nThe functional lifetime of an erythrocyte is about 100–120 days, during which time the erythrocytes are continually moved by the blood flow push (in arteries), pull (in veins) and a combination of the two as they squeeze through microvessels such as capillaries.\n\nSenescence\n\nThe aging erythrocyte undergoes changes in its plasma membrane, making it susceptible to selective recognition by macrophages and subsequent phagocytosis in the mononuclear phagocyte system (spleen, liver and lymph nodes), thus removing old and defective cells and continually purging the blood. This process is termed eryptosis, erythrocyte programmed cell death. This process normally occurs at the same rate of production by erythropoiesis, balancing the total circulating red blood cell count. Eryptosis is increased in a wide variety of diseases including sepsis, haemolytic uremic syndrome, malaria, sickle cell anemia, beta-thalassemia, glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase deficiency, phosphate depletion, iron deficiency and Wilson's disease. Eryptosis can be elicited by osmotic shock, oxidative stress, energy depletion as well as a wide variety of endogenous mediators and xenobiotics. Excessive eryptosis is observed in erythrocytes lacking the cGMP-dependent protein kinase type I or the AMP-activated protein kinase AMPK. Inhibitors of eryptosis include erythropoietin, nitric oxide, catecholamines and high concentrations of urea.\n\nMuch of the resulting breakdown products are recirculated in the body. The heme constituent of hemoglobin are broken down into Fe3+ and biliverdin. The biliverdin is reduced to bilirubin, which is released into the plasma and recirculated to the liver bound to albumin. The iron is released into the plasma to be recirculated by a carrier protein called transferrin. Almost all erythrocytes are removed in this manner from the circulation before they are old enough to hemolyze. Hemolyzed hemoglobin is bound to a protein in plasma called haptoglobin, which is not excreted by the kidney. \n\nMembrane composition\n\nThe membrane of the red blood cell plays many roles that aid in regulating their surface deformability, flexibility, adhesion to other cells and immune recognition. These functions are highly dependent on its composition, which defines its properties. The red blood cell membrane is composed of 3 layers: the glycocalyx on the exterior, which is rich in carbohydrates; the lipid bilayer which contains many transmembrane proteins, besides its lipidic main constituents; and the membrane skeleton, a structural network of proteins located on the inner surface of the lipid bilayer. Half of the membrane mass in human and most mammalian erythrocytes are proteins. The other half are lipids, namely phospholipids and cholesterol. \n\nMembrane lipids\n\nThe erythrocyte cell membrane comprises a typical lipid bilayer, similar to what can be found in virtually all human cells. Simply put, this lipid bilayer is composed of cholesterol and phospholipids in equal proportions by weight. The lipid composition is important as it defines many physical properties such as membrane permeability and fluidity. Additionally, the activity of many membrane proteins is regulated by interactions with lipids in the bilayer.\n\nUnlike cholesterol, which is evenly distributed between the inner and outer leaflets, the 5 major phospholipids are asymmetrically disposed, as shown below:\n\nOuter monolayer\n* Phosphatidylcholine (PC);\n* Sphingomyelin (SM).\n\nInner monolayer\n* Phosphatidylethanolamine (PE);\n* Phosphoinositol (PI) (small amounts).\n* Phosphatidylserine (PS);\n\nThis asymmetric phospholipid distribution among the bilayer is the result of the function of several energy-dependent and energy-independent phospholipid transport proteins. Proteins called “Flippases” move phospholipids from the outer to the inner monolayer, while others called “floppases” do the opposite operation, against a concentration gradient in an energy dependent manner. Additionally, there are also “scramblase” proteins that move phospholipids in both directions at the same time, down their concentration gradients in an energy independent manner. There is still considerable debate ongoing regarding the identity of these membrane maintenance proteins in the red cell membrane.\n\nThe maintenance of an asymmetric phospholipid distribution in the bilayer (such as an exclusive localization of PS and PIs in the inner monolayer) is critical for the cell integrity and function due to several reasons:\n\n* Macrophages recognize and phagocytose red cells that expose PS at their outer surface. Thus the confinement of PS in the inner monolayer is essential if the cell is to survive its frequent encounters with macrophages of the reticuloendothelial system, especially in the spleen.\n* Premature destruction of thallassemic and sickle red cells has been linked to disruptions of lipid asymmetry leading to exposure of PS on the outer monolayer.\n* An exposure of PS can potentiate adhesion of red cells to vascular endothelial cells, effectively preventing normal transit through the microvasculature. Thus it is important that PS is maintained only in the inner leaflet of the bilayer to ensure normal blood flow in microcirculation.\n* Both PS and phosphatidylinositol-4,5-bisphosphate (PIP2) can regulate membrane mechanical function, due to their interactions with skeletal proteins such as spectrin and protein 4.1R. Recent studies have shown that binding of spectrin to PS promotes membrane mechanical stability. PIP2 enhances the binding of protein band 4.1R to glycophorin C but decreases its interaction with protein band 3, and thereby may modulate the linkage of the bilayer to the membrane skeleton.\n\nThe presence of specialized structures named \"lipid rafts\" in the erythrocyte membrane have been described by recent studies. These are structures enriched in cholesterol and sphingolipids associated with specific membrane proteins, namely flotillins, stomatins (band 7), G-proteins, and β-adrenergic receptors. Lipid rafts that have been implicated in cell signaling events in nonerythroid cells have been shown in erythroid cells to mediate β2-adregenic receptor signaling and increase cAMP levels, and thus regulating entry of malarial parasites into normal red cells. \n\nMembrane proteins\n\nThe proteins of the membrane skeleton are responsible for the deformability, flexibility and durability of the red blood cell, enabling it to squeeze through capillaries less than half the diameter of the erythrocyte (7–8 μm) and recovering the discoid shape as soon as these cells stop receiving compressive forces, in a similar fashion to an object made of rubber.\n\nThere are currently more than 50 known membrane proteins, which can exist in a few hundred up to a million copies per erythrocyte. Approximately 25 of these membrane proteins carry the various blood group antigens, such as the A, B and Rh antigens, among many others. These membrane proteins can perform a wide diversity of functions, such as transporting ions and molecules across the red cell membrane, adhesion and interaction with other cells such as endothelial cells, as signaling receptors, as well as other currently unknown functions. The blood types of humans are due to variations in surface glycoproteins of erythrocytes. Disorders of the proteins in these membranes are associated with many disorders, such as hereditary spherocytosis, hereditary elliptocytosis, hereditary stomatocytosis, and paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria.\n\nThe red blood cell membrane proteins organized according to their function:\n\nTransport\n* Band 3 – Anion transporter, also an important structural component of the erythrocyte cell membrane, makes up to 25% of the cell membrane surface, each red cell contains approximately one million copies. Defines the Diego Blood Group; \n* Aquaporin 1 – water transporter, defines the Colton Blood Group;\n* Glut1 – glucose and L-dehydroascorbic acid transporter;\n* Kidd antigen protein – urea transporter;\n* RhAG – gas transporter, probably of carbon dioxide, defines Rh Blood Group and the associated unusual blood group phenotype Rhnull;\n* Na+/K+ – ATPase;\n* Ca2+ – ATPase;\n* Na+ K+ 2Cl− – cotransporter;\n* Na+-Cl− – cotransporter;\n* Na-H exchanger;\n* K-Cl – cotransporter;\n* Gardos Channel.\n\nCell adhesion\n* ICAM-4 – interacts with integrins;\n* BCAM – a glycoprotein that defines the Lutheran blood group and also known as Lu or laminin-binding protein.\n\nStructural role – The following membrane proteins establish linkages with skeletal proteins and may play an important role in regulating cohesion between the lipid bilayer and membrane skeleton, likely enabling the red cell to maintain its favorable membrane surface area by preventing the membrane from collapsing (vesiculating).\n* Ankyrin-based macromolecular complex – proteins linking the bilayer to the membrane skeleton through the interaction of their cytoplasmic domains with Ankyrin.\n** Band 3 – also assembles various glycolytic enzymes, the presumptive CO2 transporter, and carbonic anhydrase into a macromolecular complex termed a \"metabolon,\" which may play a key role in regulating red cell metabolism and ion and gas transport function);\n** RhAG – also involved in transport, defines associated unusual blood group phenotype Rhmod.\n* Protein 4.1R-based macromolecular complex – proteins interacting with Protein 4.1R.\n** Protein 4.1R – weak expression of Gerbich antigens;\n** Glycophorin C and D – glycoprotein, defines Gerbich Blood Group;\n** XK – defines the Kell Blood Group and the Mcleod unusual phenotype (lack of Kx antigen and greatly reduced expression of Kell antigens);\n** RhD/RhCE – defines Rh Blood Group and the associated unusual blood group phenotype Rhnull;\n** Duffy protein – has been proposed to be associated with chemokine clearance; \n** Adducin – interaction with band 3;\n** Dematin- interaction with the Glut1 glucose transporter.\n\nSurface electrostatic potential\n\nThe zeta potential is an electrochemical property of cell surfaces that is determined by the net electrical charge of molecules exposed at the surface of cell membranes of the cell. The normal zeta potential of the erythrocyte is −15.7 millivolts (mV).Tokumasu F, Ostera GR, Amaratunga C, Fairhurst RM (2012) Modifications in erythrocyte membrane zeta potential by Plasmodium falciparum infection. Exp Parasitol Much of this potential appears to be contributed by the exposed sialic acid residues in the membrane: their removal results in zeta potential of −6.06 mV.\n\nClinical notes\n\nSeparation and blood doping\n\nRed blood cells can be obtained from whole blood by centrifugation, which separates the cells from the blood plasma in a process known as blood fractionation. Packed red blood cells, which are made in this way from whole blood with the plasma removed, are used in transfusion medicine. During plasma donation, the red blood cells are pumped back into the body right away and only the plasma is collected.\n\nSome athletes have tried to improve their performance by blood doping: first about 1 litre of their blood is extracted, then the red blood cells are isolated, frozen and stored, to be reinjected shortly before the competition. (Red blood cells can be conserved for 5 weeks at ) This practice is hard to detect but may endanger the human cardiovascular system which is not equipped to deal with blood of the resulting higher viscosity. Another method of blood doping involves injection with erythropoietin in order to stimulate production of red blood cells. Both practices are banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency.\n\nArtificially grown red blood cells\n\nIn 2008 it was reported that human embryonic stem cells had been successfully coaxed into becoming erythrocytes in the lab. The difficult step was to induce the cells to eject their nucleus; this was achieved by growing the cells on stromal cells from the bone marrow. It is hoped that these artificial erythrocytes can eventually be used for blood transfusions. \n\nDiseases and diagnostic tools \n\nBlood diseases involving the red blood cells include:\n* Anemias (or anaemias) are diseases characterized by low oxygen transport capacity of the blood, because of low red cell count or some abnormality of the red blood cells or the hemoglobin.\n\n* Iron deficiency anemia is the most common anemia; it occurs when the dietary intake or absorption of iron is insufficient, and hemoglobin, which contains iron, cannot be formed\n\n* Sickle-cell disease is a genetic disease that results in abnormal hemoglobin molecules. When these release their oxygen load in the tissues, they become insoluble, leading to mis-shaped red blood cells. These sickle shaped red cells are less deformable and viscoelastic meaning that they have become rigid and can cause blood vessel blockage, pain, strokes, and other tissue damage.\n\n* Thalassemia is a genetic disease that results in the production of an abnormal ratio of hemoglobin subunits.\n\n*Hereditary spherocytosis syndromes are a group of inherited disorders characterized by defects in the red blood cell's cell membrane, causing the cells to be small, sphere-shaped, and fragile instead of donut-shaped and flexible. These abnormal red blood cells are destroyed by the spleen. Several other hereditary disorders of the red blood cell membrane are known. \n\n* Pernicious anemia is an autoimmune disease wherein the body lacks intrinsic factor, required to absorb vitamin B12 from food. Vitamin B12 is needed for the production of hemoglobin.\n\n* Aplastic anemia is caused by the inability of the bone marrow to produce blood cells.\n\n* Pure red cell aplasia is caused by the inability of the bone marrow to produce only red blood cells.\n\n* Hemolysis is the general term for excessive breakdown of red blood cells. It can have several causes and can result in hemolytic anemia.\n\n* The malaria parasite spends part of its life-cycle in red blood cells, feeds on their hemoglobin and then breaks them apart, causing fever. Both sickle-cell disease and thalassemia are more common in malaria areas, because these mutations convey some protection against the parasite.\n\n* Polycythemias (or erythrocytoses) are diseases characterized by a surplus of red blood cells. The increased viscosity of the blood can cause a number of symptoms.\n\n* In polycythemia vera the increased number of red blood cells results from an abnormality in the bone marrow.\n\n* Several microangiopathic diseases, including disseminated intravascular coagulation and thrombotic microangiopathies, present with pathognomonic (diagnostic) red blood cell fragments called schistocytes. These pathologies generate fibrin strands that sever red blood cells as they try to move past a thrombus.\n* Hemolytic transfusion reaction is the destruction of donated red blood cells after a transfusion, mediated by host antibodies, often as a result of a blood type mismatch.\n\nSeveral blood tests involve red blood cells, including the RBC count (the number of red blood cells per volume of blood), the hematocrit (percentage of blood volume occupied by red blood cells), and the erythrocyte sedimentation rate. Many diseases involving red blood cells are diagnosed with a blood film (or peripheral blood smear), where a thin layer of blood is smeared on a microscope slide. The blood type needs to be determined to prepare for a blood transfusion or an organ transplantation." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Iron.txt", "Chemical_element.txt" ], "title": [ "Iron", "Chemical element" ], "wiki_context": [ "Iron is a chemical element with symbol Fe (from , ultimately from ferre to bear or carry) and atomic number 26. It is a metal in the first transition series. It is by mass the most common element on Earth, forming much of Earth's outer and inner core. It is the fourth most common element in the Earth's crust. Its abundance in rocky planets like Earth is due to its abundant production by fusion in high-mass stars, where the production of nickel-56 (which decays to the most common isotope of iron) is the last nuclear fusion reaction that is exothermic. Consequently, radioactive nickel is the last element to be produced before the violent collapse of a supernova, which scatters this precursor radionuclide of stable iron into space.\n\nLike the other group 8 elements, ruthenium and osmium, iron exists in a wide range of oxidation states, −2 to +6, although +2 and +3 are the most common. Elemental iron occurs in meteoroids and other low oxygen environments, but is reactive to oxygen and water. Fresh iron surfaces appear lustrous silvery-gray, but oxidize in normal air to give hydrated iron oxides, commonly known as rust. Unlike the metals that form passivating oxide layers, iron oxides occupy more volume than the metal and thus flake off, exposing fresh surfaces for corrosion.\n\nIron metal has been used since ancient times, although copper alloys, which have lower melting temperatures, were used even earlier in human history. Pure iron is relatively soft, but is unobtainable by smelting. The material is significantly hardened and strengthened by impurities, in particular carbon, from the smelting process. A certain proportion of carbon (between 0.002% and 2.1%) produces steel, which may be up to 1000 times harder than pure iron. Crude iron metal is produced in blast furnaces, where ore is reduced by coke to pig iron, which has a high carbon content. Further refinement with oxygen reduces the carbon content to the correct proportion to make steel. Steels and iron alloys formed with other metals (alloy steels) are by far the most common industrial metals because they have a great range of desirable properties and iron-bearing rock is abundant.\n\nIron chemical compounds have many uses. Iron oxide mixed with aluminium powder can be ignited to create a thermite reaction, used in welding and purifying ores. Iron forms binary compounds with the halogens and the chalcogens. Among its organometallic compounds is ferrocene, the first sandwich compound discovered.\n\nIron plays an important role in biology, forming complexes with molecular oxygen in hemoglobin and myoglobin; these two compounds are common oxygen transport proteins in vertebrates. Iron is also the metal at the active site of many important redox enzymes dealing with cellular respiration and oxidation and reduction in plants and animals. A human male of average height has about 4 grams of iron in his body, a female about 3.5 grams. This iron is distributed throughout the body in hemoglobin, tissues, muscles, bone marrow, blood proteins, enzymes, ferritin, hemosiderin, and transport in plasma. \n\nCharacteristics\n\nMechanical properties\n\nThe mechanical properties of iron and its alloys can be evaluated using a variety of tests, including the Brinell test, Rockwell test and the Vickers hardness test. The data on iron is so consistent that it is often used to calibrate measurements or to compare tests. However, the mechanical properties of iron are significantly affected by the sample's purity: pure, single crystals of iron are actually softer than aluminium, and the purest industrially produced iron (99.99%) has a hardness of 20–30 Brinell. An increase in the carbon content will cause a significant increase in the iron's hardness and tensile strength. Maximum hardness of 65 Rc is achieved with a 0.6% carbon content, although the alloy has low tensile strength. Because of the softness of iron, it is much easier to work with than its heavier congeners ruthenium and osmium.Greenwood and Earnshaw, pp. 1074–5\n\nBecause of its significance for planetary cores, the physical properties of iron at high pressures and temperatures have also been studied extensively. The form of iron that is stable under standard conditions can be subjected to pressures up to ca. 15 GPa before transforming into a high-pressure form, as described in the next section.\n\nPhase diagram and allotropes\n\nIron represents an example of allotropy in a metal. There are at least four allotropic forms of iron, known as α, γ, δ, and ε; at very high pressures, some controversial experimental evidence exists for a phase β stable at very high pressures and temperatures. \n\nAs molten iron cools it crystallizes at 1538 °C into its δ allotrope, which has a body-centered cubic (bcc) crystal structure. As it cools further to 1394 °C, it changes to its γ-iron allotrope, a face-centered cubic (fcc) crystal structure, or austenite. At 912 °C and below, the crystal structure again becomes the bcc α-iron allotrope, or ferrite. Finally, at 770 °C (the Curie point, Tc) iron becomes magnetic. As the iron passes through the Curie temperature there is no change in crystalline structure, but there is a change in \"domain structure\", where each domain contains iron atoms with a particular electronic spin. In unmagnetized iron, all the electronic spins of the atoms within one domain have the same axis orientation; however, the electrons of neighboring domains have other orientations with the result of mutual cancellation and no magnetic field. In magnetized iron, the electronic spins of the domains are aligned and the magnetic effects are reinforced. Although each domain contains billions of atoms, they are very small, about 10 micrometres across. At pressures above approximately 10 GPa and temperatures of a few hundred kelvin or less, α-iron changes into a hexagonal close-packed (hcp) structure, which is also known as ε-iron; the higher-temperature γ-phase also changes into ε-iron, but does so at higher pressure. The β-phase, if it exists, would appear at pressures of at least 50 GPa and temperatures of at least 1500 K and have an orthorhombic or a double hcp structure.\n\nIron is of greatest importance when mixed with certain other metals and with carbon to form steels. There are many types of steel, all with different properties, and an understanding of the properties of the allotropes of iron is key to the manufacture of good quality steels.Greenwood and Earnshaw, pp. 1071–2\n\nα-iron, also known as ferrite, is the most stable form of iron at normal temperatures. It is a fairly soft metal that can dissolve only a small concentration of carbon (no more than 0.021% by mass at 910 °C). \n\nAbove 912 °C and up to 1400 °C α-iron undergoes a phase transition from bcc to the fcc configuration of γ-iron, also called austenite. This is similarly soft and metallic but can dissolve considerably more carbon (as much as 2.04% by mass at 1146 °C). This form of iron is used in the type of stainless steel used for making cutlery, and hospital and food-service equipment.\n\nThe high-pressure phases of iron are important as endmember models for the solid parts of planetary cores. The inner core of the Earth is generally presumed to be an iron-nickel alloy with ε (or β) structure. \n\nThe melting point of iron is experimentally well defined for pressures less than 50 GPa. For greater pressures, studies put the γ-ε-liquid triple point at pressures that differ by tens of gigapascals and 1000 K in the melting point. Generally speaking, molecular dynamics computer simulations of iron melting and shock wave experiments suggest higher melting points and a much steeper slope of the melting curve than static experiments carried out in diamond anvil cells. The melting and boiling points of iron, along with its enthalpy of atomization, are lower than those of the earlier 3d elements from scandium to chromium, showing the lessened contribution of the 3d electrons to metallic bonding; however, they are higher than the values for the previous element manganese because that element has a half-filled 3d subshell and consequently its d-electrons are not easily delocalized.\n\nIsotopes\n\nNaturally occurring iron consists of four stable isotopes: 5.845% of 54Fe, 91.754% of 56Fe, 2.119% of 57Fe and 0.282% of 58Fe. Of these stable isotopes, only 57Fe has a nuclear spin (−). The nuclide 54Fe theoretically can undergo double beta decay, but the process has never been observed and only a lower limit on the half-life of 3.1×1022 years has been established.\n\n60Fe is an extinct radionuclide of long half-life (2.6 million years). It is not found on Earth, but its ultimate decay product is its granddaughter, the stable nuclide nickel-60. Much of the past work on isotopic composition of iron has focused on the nucleosynthesis of 60Fe through studies of meteorites and ore formation. In the last decade, advances in mass spectrometry have allowed the detection and quantification of minute, naturally occurring variations in the ratios of the stable isotopes of iron. Much of this work is driven by the Earth and planetary science communities, although applications to biological and industrial systems are emerging. \n\nIn phases of the meteorites Semarkona and Chervony Kut, a correlation between the concentration of 60Ni, the granddaughter of 60Fe, and the abundance of the stable iron isotopes provided evidence for the existence of 60Fe at the time of formation of the Solar System. Possibly the energy released by the decay of 60Fe, along with that released by 26Al, contributed to the remelting and differentiation of asteroids after their formation 4.6 billion years ago. The abundance of 60Ni present in extraterrestrial material may bring further insight into the origin and early history of the Solar System. \n\nThe most abundant iron isotope 56Fe is of particular interest to nuclear scientists because it represents the most common endpoint of nucleosynthesis. It is often cited, falsely, as the isotope of highest binding energy, a distinction which actually belongs to nickel-62. Since 56Ni is easily produced from lighter nuclei in the alpha process in nuclear reactions in supernovae (see silicon burning process), nickel-56 (14 alpha particles) is the endpoint of fusion chains inside extremely massive stars, since addition of another alpha particle would result in zinc-60, which requires a great deal more energy. This nickel-56, which has a half-life of about 6 days, is created in quantity in these stars, but soon decays by two successive positron emissions within supernova decay products in the supernova remnant gas cloud, first to radioactive cobalt-56, and then to stable iron-56. This last nuclide is therefore common in the universe, relative to other stable metals of approximately the same atomic weight.\n\nNuclei of iron atoms have some of the highest binding energies per nucleon, surpassed only by the nickel isotope 62Ni. It is formed by nuclear fusion in stars. Although a further tiny energy gain could be extracted by synthesizing 62Ni, conditions in stars are unsuitable for this process. Element production in supernovas and distribution on Earth greatly favor iron over nickel. \n\nIron-56 is the heaviest stable isotope produced by the alpha process in stellar nucleosynthesis; elements heavier than iron and nickel require a supernova for their formation. Iron is the most abundant element in the core of red giants, and is the most abundant metal in iron meteorites and in the dense metal cores of planets such as Earth.Greenwood and Earnshaw, p. 12\n\nNucleosynthesis\n\nIron is created by extremely large stars with extremely hot (over 2.5 billion kelvin) cores through the silicon burning process. It is the heaviest stable element to be produced in this manner. The process starts with the second largest stable nucleus created by silicon burning, which is calcium. One stable nucleus of calcium fuses with one helium nucleus, creating unstable titanium. Before the titanium decays, it can fuse with another helium nucleus, creating unstable chromium. Before the chromium decays, it can fuse with another helium nucleus, creating unstable iron. Before the iron decays, it can fuse with another helium nucleus, creating unstable nickel-56. Any further fusion of nickel-56 consumes energy instead of producing energy, so after the production of nickel-56, the star does not produce the energy necessary to keep the core from collapsing. Eventually, the nickel-56 decays to unstable cobalt-56, which in turn decays to stable iron-56.\nWhen the core of the star collapses, it creates a supernova. Supernovas also create additional stable iron isotopes via the r-process. \n\nOccurrence\n\nPlanetary occurrence\n\nIron is the sixth most abundant element in the Universe, and the most common refractory element. It is formed as the final exothermic stage of stellar nucleosynthesis, by silicon fusion in massive stars.\n\nMetallic or native iron is rarely found on the surface of the Earth because it tends to oxidize, but its oxides are pervasive and represent the primary ores. While it makes up about 5% of the Earth's crust, both the Earth's inner and outer core are believed to consist largely of an iron-nickel alloy constituting 35% of the mass of the Earth as a whole. Iron is consequently the most abundant element on Earth, but only the fourth most abundant element in the Earth's crust. Most of the iron in the crust is found combined with oxygen as iron oxide minerals such as hematite (Fe2O3) and magnetite (Fe3O4). Large deposits of iron are found in banded iron formations. These geological formations are a type of rock consisting of repeated thin layers of iron oxides alternating with bands of iron-poor shale and chert. The banded iron formations were laid down in the time between and \n\nAbout 1 in 20 meteorites consist of the unique iron-nickel minerals taenite (35–80% iron) and kamacite (90–95% iron). Although rare, iron meteorites are the main form of natural metallic iron on the Earth's surface. \n\nThe red color of the surface of Mars is derived from an iron oxide-rich regolith. This has been proven by Mössbauer spectroscopy. \n\nStocks in use in society\n\nAccording to the International Resource Panel's Metal Stocks in Society report, the global stock of iron in use in society is 2200 kg per capita. Much of this is in more-developed countries (7000–14000 kg per capita) rather than less-developed countries (2000 kg per capita). \n\nChemistry and compounds\n\nIron forms compounds mainly in the +2 and +3 oxidation states. Traditionally, iron(II) compounds are called ferrous, and iron(III) compounds ferric. Iron also occurs in higher oxidation states, an example being the purple potassium ferrate (K2FeO4) which contains iron in its +6 oxidation state, although this is very easily reduced. Iron(IV) is a common intermediate in many biochemical oxidation reactions. Numerous organometallic compounds contain formal oxidation states of +1, 0, −1, or even −2. The oxidation states and other bonding properties are often assessed using the technique of Mössbauer spectroscopy. \nThere are also many mixed valence compounds that contain both iron(II) and iron(III) centers, such as magnetite and Prussian blue (Fe4(Fe[CN]6)3). The latter is used as the traditional \"blue\" in blueprints. \n\nIron is the first of the transition metals that cannot reach its group oxidation state of +8, although its heavier congeners ruthenium and osmium can, with ruthenium having more difficulty than osmium. While iron's most common oxidation states are +2 and +3, ruthenium's is +3 and osmium's is +4. Iron also commonly forms aqueous cations in the +2 and +3 oxidation states, which is possible for ruthenium but not osmium.\n\nThe iron compounds produced on the largest scale in industry are iron(II) sulfate (FeSO4·7H2O) and iron(III) chloride (FeCl3). The former is one of the most readily available sources of iron(II), but is less stable to aerial oxidation than Mohr's salt ((NH4)2Fe(SO4)2·6H2O). Iron(II) compounds tend to be oxidized to iron(III) compounds in the air.\n\nUnlike many other metals, iron does not form amalgams with mercury. As a result, mercury is traded in standardized 76 pound flasks (34 kg) made of iron. \n\nIron is by far the most reactive element in its group; it is pyrophoric when finely divided and dissolves easily in dilute acids, giving Fe2+. However, it does not react with concentrated nitric acid and other oxidizing acids due to the formation of an impervious oxide layer, which can nevertheless react with hydrochloric acid.\n\nThe standard reduction potentials in acidic aqueous solution for some common iron ions are given below:Greenwood and Earnshaw, pp. 1075–9\n\nThe red-purple ferrate(VI) anion is such a strong oxidizing agent that it oxidizes nitrogen and ammonia at room temperature, and even water itself in acidic or neutral solutions:Greenwood and Earnshaw, p. 1082–4\n4 + 10 → 4 + 20 + 3 O2\n\nBinary compounds\n\nIron reacts with oxygen in the air to form various oxide and hydroxide compounds; the most common are iron(II,III) oxide (Fe3O4), and iron(III) oxide (Fe2O3). Iron(II) oxide also exists, though it is unstable at room temperature. These oxides are the principal ores for the production of iron (see bloomery and blast furnace). They are also used in the production of ferrites, useful magnetic storage media in computers, and pigments. The best known sulfide is iron pyrite (FeS2), also known as fool's gold owing to its golden luster.\n\nThe binary ferrous and ferric halides are well-known, with the exception of ferric iodide. The ferrous halides typically arise from treating iron metal with the corresponding hydrohalic acid to give the corresponding hydrated salts.\nFe + 2 HX → FeX2 + H2\nIron reacts with fluorine, chlorine, and bromine to give the corresponding ferric halides, ferric chloride being the most common.\n2 Fe + 3 X2 → 2 FeX3 (X = F, Cl, Br)\nFerric iodide is an exception, being thermodynamically unstable due to the oxidizing power of Fe3+ and the high reducing power of I−.\n2 I− + 2 Fe3+ → I2 + 2 Fe2+ (E0 = +0.23 V)\n\nCoordination compounds\n\nMany coordination compounds of iron are known. A typical six-coordinate anions is hexachloroferrate(III), [FeCl6]3−, found in the mixed salt tetrakis(methylammonium) hexachloroferrate(III) chloride. Complexes with multiple bidentate ligands have geometric isomers. For example, the trans-chlorohydridobis(bis-1,2-(diphenylphosphino)ethane)iron(II) complex is used as a starting material for compounds with the Fe(dppe)2 moiety. The ferrioxalate ion with three oxalate ligands (shown at right) displays helical chirality with its two non-superposable geometries labelled Λ (lambda) for the left-handed screw axis and Δ (delta) for the right-handed screw axis, in line with IUPAC conventions. Potassium ferrioxalate is used in chemical actinometry and along with its sodium salt undergoes photoreduction applied in old-style photographic processes. The dihydrate of iron(II) oxalate has a polymeric structure with co-planar oxalate ions bridging between iron centres with the water of crystallisation located forming the caps of each octahedron, as illustrated below.\n\nPrussian blue, Fe4[Fe(CN)6]3 is the most famous of the cyanide complexes of iron. Its formation can be used as a simple wet chemistry test to distinguish between aqueous solutions of Fe2+ and Fe3+ as they react (respectively) with potassium ferricyanide and potassium ferrocyanide to form Prussian blue. It can be used as an antidote for thallium and radioactive caesium poisoning. Prussian blue can be used in laundry bluing to correct the yellowish tint left by ferrous salts in water.\n\nOrganometallic compounds\n\nCyanide complexes are technically organometallic but more important are carbonyl complexes and sandwich and half-sandwich compounds. The premier iron(0) compound is iron pentacarbonyl, Fe(CO)5, which is used to produce carbonyl iron powder, a highly reactive form of metallic iron. Thermolysis of iron pentacarbonyl gives the trinuclear cluster, triiron dodecacarbonyl. Collman's reagent, disodium tetracarbonylferrate, is a useful reagent for organic chemistry; it contains iron in the −2 oxidation state. Cyclopentadienyliron dicarbonyl dimer contains iron in the rare +1 oxidation state. \n\nFerrocene was first synthesised in 1951 during an attempt to prepare the fulvalene (C10H8) by oxidative dimerization of cyclopentadiene; the resultant product was found to have molecular formula C10H10Fe and reported to exhibit \"remarkable stability\". The discovery sparked substantial interest in the field of organometallic chemistry, in part because the structure proposed by Pauson and Kealy (shown at right) was inconsistent with then-existing bonding models and did not explain its unexpected stability. Consequently, the initial challenge was to definitively determine the structure of ferrocene in the hope that its bonding and properties would then be understood. The shockingly novel sandwich structure, [Fe(η5-C5H5)2], was deduced and reported independently by three groups in 1952: Robert Burns Woodward and Geoffrey Wilkinson investigated the reactivity in order to determine the structure and demonstrated that ferrocene undergoes similar reactions to a typical aromatic molecule (such as benzene), Ernst Otto Fischer deduced the sandwich structure and also began synthesising other metallocenes including cobaltocene; Eiland and Pepinsky provided X-ray crystallographic confirmation of the sandwich structure. Applying valence bond theory to ferrocene by considering an Fe2+ centre and two cyclopentadienide anions (C5H5−), which are known to be aromatic according to Hückel's rule and hence highly stable, allowed correct prediction of the geometry of the molecule. Once molecular orbital theory was successfully applied and the Dewar-Chatt-Duncanson model proposed, the reasons for ferrocene's remarkable stability became clear. Ferrocene was not the first organometallic compound known – Zeise's salt, K[PtCl3(C2H4)]·H2O was reported in 1831 and Mond's discovery of Ni(CO)4 occurred in 1888   but it was ferrocene's discovery that began organometallic chemistry as a separate area of chemistry. It was so important that Wilkinson and Fischer shared the 1973 Nobel Prize for Chemistry \"for their pioneering work, performed independently, on the chemistry of the organometallic, so called sandwich compounds\". Ferrocene itself can be used as the backbone of a ligand, e.g. dppf. Ferrocene can itself be oxidized to the ferrocenium cation (Fc+); the ferrocene/ferrocenium couple is often used as a reference in electrochemistry.\n\nMetallocenes like ferrocene can be prepared by reaction of Freshly-cracked cyclopentadiene with iron(II) chloride and a weak base. It is an aromatic substance and undergoes substitution reactions rather than addition reactions on the cyclopentadienyl ligands. For example, Friedel-Crafts acylation of ferrocene with acetic anhydride yields acetylferrocene just as acylation of benzene yields acetophenone under similar conditions.\nIron-centred organometallic species are used as catalysts. The Knölker complex, for example, is a transfer hydrogenation catalyst for ketones. \n\nHistory\n\nWrought iron\n\n \n\nIron has been worked, or wrought, for millennia. However, iron objects of great age are much rarer than objects made of gold or silver due to the ease of corrosion of iron. Beads made from meteoric iron in 3500 BCE or earlier were found in Gerzah, Egypt by G. A. Wainwright. The beads contain 7.5% nickel, which is a signature of meteoric origin since iron found in the Earth's crust has very little to no nickel content. Meteoric iron was highly regarded due to its origin in the heavens and was often used to forge weapons and tools or whole specimens placed in churches. Items that were likely made of iron by Egyptians date from 2500 to 3000 BCE. Iron had a distinct advantage over bronze in warfare implements. It was much harder and more durable than bronze, although susceptible to rust. However, this is contested. Hittitologist Trevor Bryce argues that before advanced iron-working techniques were developed in India, meteoritic iron weapons used by early Mesopotamian armies had a tendency to shatter in combat, due to their high carbon content. \n\nThe first iron production started in the Middle Bronze Age but it took several centuries before iron displaced bronze. Samples of smelted iron from Asmar, Mesopotamia and Tall Chagar Bazaar in northern Syria were made sometime between 2700 and 3000 BCE. The Hittites appear to be the first to understand the production of iron from its ores and regard it highly in their society. They began to smelt iron between 1500 and 1200 BCE and the practice spread to the rest of the Near East after their empire fell in 1180 BCE. The subsequent period is called the Iron Age. Iron smelting, and thus the Iron Age, reached Europe two hundred years later and arrived in Zimbabwe, Africa by the 8th century. In China, iron only appears circa 700–500 BCE. Iron smelting may have been introduced into China through Central Asia. The earliest evidence of the use of a blast furnace in China dates to the 1st century AD, and cupola furnaces were used as early as the Warring States period (403–221 BCE). Usage of the blast and cupola furnace remained widespread during the Song and Tang Dynasties. \n\nArtifacts of smelted iron are found in India dating from 1800 to 1200 BCE, and in the Levant from about 1500 BCE (suggesting smelting in Anatolia or the Caucasus). \n\nThe Book of Genesis, fourth chapter, verse 22 contains the first mention of iron in the Old Testament of the Bible; \"Tubal-cain, an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron.\" Other verses allude to iron mining (Job 28:2), iron used as a stylus (Job 19:24), furnace (Deuteronomy 4:20), chariots (Joshua 17:16), nails (I Chron. 22:3), saws and axes (II Sam. 12:31), and cooking utensils (Ezekiel 4:3). The metal is also mentioned in the New Testament, for example in Acts chapter 12 verse 10, \"[Peter passed through] the iron gate that leadeth unto the city\" of Antioch.\n\nIron working was introduced to Greece in the late 11th century BCE. The spread of ironworking in Central and Western Europe is associated with Celtic expansion. According to Pliny the Elder, iron use was common in the Roman era. The annual iron output of the Roman Empire is estimated at 84,750 t, while the similarly populous Han China produced around 5,000 t. \n\nDuring the Industrial Revolution in Britain, Henry Cort began refining iron from pig iron to wrought iron (or bar iron) using innovative production systems. In 1783 he patented the puddling process for refining iron ore. It was later improved by others, including Joseph Hall. \n\nCast iron\n\nCast iron was first produced in China during 5th century BCE, but was hardly in Europe until the medieval period. The earliest cast iron artifacts were discovered by archaeologists in what is now modern Luhe County, Jiangsu in China. Cast iron was used in ancient China for warfare, agriculture, and architecture. During the medieval period, means were found in Europe of producing wrought iron from cast iron (in this context known as pig iron) using finery forges. For all these processes, charcoal was required as fuel.\n\nMedieval blast furnaces were about 10 ft tall and made of fireproof brick; forced air was usually provided by hand-operated bellows. Modern blast furnaces have grown much bigger.\n\nIn 1709, Abraham Darby I established a coke-fired blast furnace to produce cast iron. The ensuing availability of inexpensive iron was one of the factors leading to the Industrial Revolution. Toward the end of the 18th century, cast iron began to replace wrought iron for certain purposes, because it was cheaper. Carbon content in iron was not implicated as the reason for the differences in properties of wrought iron, cast iron, and steel until the 18th century.\n\nSince iron was becoming cheaper and more plentiful, it also became a major structural material following the building of the innovative first iron bridge in 1778.Greenwood and Earnshaw, p. 1072\n\nSteel\n\nSteel (with smaller carbon content than pig iron but more than wrought iron) was first produced in antiquity by using a bloomery. Blacksmiths in Luristan in western Iran were making good steel by 1000 BCE. Then improved versions, Wootz steel by India and Damascus steel were developed around 300 BCE and 500 CE respectively. These methods were specialized, and so steel did not become a major commodity until the 1850s. \n\nNew methods of producing it by carburizing bars of iron in the cementation process were devised in the 17th century AD. In the Industrial Revolution, new methods of producing bar iron without charcoal were devised and these were later applied to produce steel. In the late 1850s, Henry Bessemer invented a new steelmaking process, involving blowing air through molten pig iron, to produce mild steel. This made steel much more economical, thereby leading to wrought iron no longer being produced. \n\nFoundations of modern chemistry\n\nAntoine Lavoisier used the reaction of water steam with metallic iron inside an incandescent iron tube to produce hydrogen in his experiments leading to the demonstration of the mass conservation. Anaerobic oxidation of iron at high temperature can be schematically represented by the following reactions:\n\nFe + H2O → FeO + H2\n\n2 Fe + 3 H2O → Fe2O3 + 3 H2\n\n3 Fe + 4 H2O → Fe3O4 + 4 H2\n\nProduction of metallic iron\n\nIndustrial routes\n\nThe production of iron or steel is a process consisting of two main stages, unless the desired product is cast iron. In the first stage pig iron is produced in a blast furnace. Alternatively, it may be directly reduced. In the second stage, pig iron is converted to wrought iron or steel.Greenwood and Earnshaw, p. 1073\n \n\nFor a few limited purposes when it is needed, pure iron is produced by reducing the pure oxide or hydroxide with hydrogen, or forming iron pentacarbonyl and heating it to 250 °C so that it decomposes to form pure iron powder.\n\nBlast furnace processing\n\nIndustrial iron production starts with iron ores, principally hematite, which has a nominal formula Fe2O3, and magnetite, with the formula Fe3O4. These ores are reduced to the metal in a carbothermic reaction, i.e. by treatment with carbon. The conversion is typically conducted in a blast furnace at temperatures of about 2000 °C. Carbon is provided in the form of coke. The process also contains a flux such as limestone, which is used to remove silicaceous minerals in the ore, which would otherwise clog the furnace. The coke and limestone are fed into the top of the furnace, while a massive blast of heated air, about 4 tons per ton of iron, is forced into the furnace at the bottom.\n\nIn the furnace, the coke reacts with oxygen in the air blast to produce carbon monoxide:\n2 C + O2 → 2 CO\n\nThe carbon monoxide reduces the iron ore (in the chemical equation below, hematite) to molten iron, becoming carbon dioxide in the process:\nFe2O3 + 3 CO → 2 Fe + 3 CO2\n\nSome iron in the high-temperature lower region of the furnace reacts directly with the coke:\n2 Fe2O3 + 3 C → 4 Fe + 3 CO2\n\nThe flux present to melt impurities in the ore is principally limestone (calcium carbonate) and dolomite (calcium-magnesium carbonate). Other specialized fluxes are used depending on the details of the ore. In the heat of the furnace the limestone flux decomposes to calcium oxide (also known as quicklime):\n\nCaCO3 → CaO + CO2\n\nThen calcium oxide combines with silicon dioxide to form a liquid slag.\nCaO + SiO2 → CaSiO3\n\nThe slag melts in the heat of the furnace. In the bottom of the furnace, the molten slag floats on top of the denser molten iron, and apertures in the side of the furnace are opened to run off the iron and the slag separately. The iron, once cooled, is called pig iron, while the slag can be used as a material in road construction or to improve mineral-poor soils for agriculture.\n\nDirect iron reduction\n\nOwing to environmental concerns, alternative methods of processing iron have been developed. \"Direct iron reduction\" reduces iron ore to a powder called \"sponge\" iron or \"direct\" iron that is suitable for steelmaking. Two main reactions comprise the direct reduction process:\n\nNatural gas is partially oxidized (with heat and a catalyst):\n2 CH4 + O2 → 2 CO + 4 H2\n\nThese gases are then treated with iron ore in a furnace, producing solid sponge iron:\nFe2O3 + CO + 2 H2 → 2 Fe + CO2 + 2 H2O\n\nSilica is removed by adding a limestone flux as described above.\n\nFurther processes\n\nPig iron is not pure iron, but has 4–5% carbon dissolved in it with small amounts of other impurities like sulfur, magnesium, phosphorus and manganese. As the carbon is the major impurity, the iron (pig iron) becomes brittle and hard. This form of iron, also known as cast iron, is used to cast articles in foundries such as stoves, pipes, radiators, lamp-posts and rails.\n\nAlternatively pig iron may be made into steel (with up to about 2% carbon) or wrought iron (commercially pure iron). Various processes have been used for this, including finery forges, puddling furnaces, Bessemer converters, open hearth furnaces, basic oxygen furnaces, and electric arc furnaces. In all cases, the objective is to oxidize some or all of the carbon, together with other impurities. On the other hand, other metals may be added to make alloy steels.\n\nAnnealing involves the heating of a piece of steel to 700–800 °C for several hours and then gradual cooling. It makes the steel softer and more workable.Verhoeven, J.D. Fundamentals of Physical Metallurgy, Wiley, New York, 1975, p. 326\n\nLaboratory methods\n\nMetallic iron is generally produced in the laboratory by two methods. One route is electrolysis of ferrous chloride onto an iron cathode. The second method involves reduction of iron oxides with hydrogen gas at about 500 °C. \n\nApplications\n\nMetallurgical\n\nIron is the most widely used of all the metals, accounting for over 90% of worldwide metal production. Its low cost and high strength make it indispensable in engineering applications such as the construction of machinery and machine tools, automobiles, the hulls of large ships, and structural components for buildings. Since pure iron is quite soft, it is most commonly combined with alloying elements to make steel.Greenwood and Earnshaw, pp. 1070–1\n\nCommercially available iron is classified based on purity and the abundance of additives. Pig iron has 3.5–4.5% carbon and contains varying amounts of contaminants such as sulfur, silicon and phosphorus. Pig iron is not a saleable product, but rather an intermediate step in the production of cast iron and steel. The reduction of contaminants in pig iron that negatively affect material properties, such as sulfur and phosphorus, yields cast iron containing 2–4% carbon, 1–6% silicon, and small amounts of manganese. It has a melting point in the range of 1420–1470 K, which is lower than either of its two main components, and makes it the first product to be melted when carbon and iron are heated together. Its mechanical properties vary greatly and depend on the form the carbon takes in the alloy.\n\n\"White\" cast irons contain their carbon in the form of cementite, or iron carbide (Fe3C). This hard, brittle compound dominates the mechanical properties of white cast irons, rendering them hard, but unresistant to shock. The broken surface of a white cast iron is full of fine facets of the broken iron-carbide, a very pale, silvery, shiny material, hence the appellation.\n\nIn gray iron the carbon exists as separate, fine flakes of graphite, and also renders the material brittle due to the sharp edged flakes of graphite that produce stress concentration sites within the material. A newer variant of gray iron, referred to as ductile iron is specially treated with trace amounts of magnesium to alter the shape of graphite to spheroids, or nodules, reducing the stress concentrations and vastly increasing the toughness and strength of the material.\n\nWrought iron contains less than 0.25% carbon but large amounts of slag that give it a fibrous characteristic. It is a tough, malleable product, but not as fusible as pig iron. If honed to an edge, it loses it quickly. Wrought iron is characterized by the presence of fine fibers of slag entrapped within the metal. Wrought iron is more corrosion resistant than steel. It has been almost completely replaced by mild steel for traditional \"wrought iron\" products and blacksmithing.\n\nMild steel corrodes more readily than wrought iron, but is cheaper and more widely available. Carbon steel contains 2.0% carbon or less, with small amounts of manganese, sulfur, phosphorus, and silicon. Alloy steels contain varying amounts of carbon as well as other metals, such as chromium, vanadium, molybdenum, nickel, tungsten, etc. Their alloy content raises their cost, and so they are usually only employed for specialist uses. One common alloy steel, though, is stainless steel. Recent developments in ferrous metallurgy have produced a growing range of microalloyed steels, also termed 'HSLA' or high-strength, low alloy steels, containing tiny additions to produce high strengths and often spectacular toughness at minimal cost.\n\nApart from traditional applications, iron is also used for protection from ionizing radiation. Although it is lighter than another traditional protection material, lead, it is much stronger mechanically. The attenuation of radiation as a function of energy is shown in the graph.\n\nThe main disadvantage of iron and steel is that pure iron, and most of its alloys, suffer badly from rust if not protected in some way, a cost amounting to over 1% of the world's economy. Painting, galvanization, passivation, plastic coating and bluing are all used to protect iron from rust by excluding water and oxygen or by cathodic protection. The mechanism of the rusting of iron is as follows:Greenwood and Earnshaw, p. 1076\n\nCathode: 3 O2 + 6 H2O + 12 e− → 12 (OH)−\nAnode: 4 Fe → 4 Fe2+ + 8 e−; 4 Fe2+ → 4 Fe3+ + 4 e−\nOverall: 4 Fe + 3 O2 + 6 H2O → 4 Fe3+ + 12 (OH)− → 4 Fe(OH)3 or 4 FeO(OH) + 4 H2O\n\nThe electrolyte is usually iron(II) sulfate in urban areas (formed when atmospheric sulfur dioxide attacks iron), and salt particles in the atmosphere in seaside areas.\n\nIron compounds\n\nAlthough its metallurgical role is dominant in terms of amounts, iron compounds are pervasive in industry as well being used in many niche uses. Iron catalysts are traditionally used in the Haber-Bosch Process for the production of ammonia and the Fischer-Tropsch process for conversion of carbon monoxide to hydrocarbons for fuels and lubricants. Powdered iron in an acidic solvent was used in the Bechamp reduction the reduction of nitrobenzene to aniline. \n\nIron(III) chloride finds use in water purification and sewage treatment, in the dyeing of cloth, as a coloring agent in paints, as an additive in animal feed, and as an etchant for copper in the manufacture of printed circuit boards. It can also be dissolved in alcohol to form tincture of iron. The other halides tend to be limited to laboratory uses.\n\nIron(II) sulfate is used as a precursor to other iron compounds. It is also used to reduce chromate in cement. It is used to fortify foods and treat iron deficiency anemia. These are its main uses. Iron(III) sulfate is used in settling minute sewage particles in tank water. Iron(II) chloride is used as a reducing flocculating agent, in the formation of iron complexes and magnetic iron oxides, and as a reducing agent in organic synthesis.\n\nBiological role\n\nIron is involved in numerous biological processes. Iron-proteins are found in all living organisms: archaeans, bacteria and eukaryotes, including humans. For example, the color of blood is due to the hemoglobin, an iron-containing protein. As illustrated by hemoglobin, iron is often bound to cofactors, e.g. in hemes. The iron-sulfur clusters are pervasive and include nitrogenase, the enzymes responsible for biological nitrogen fixation. Influential theories of evolution have invoked a role for iron sulfides in the iron-sulfur world theory.\n\nIron is a necessary trace element found in nearly all living organisms. Iron-containing enzymes and proteins, often containing heme prosthetic groups, participate in many biological oxidations and in transport. Examples of proteins found in higher organisms include hemoglobin, cytochrome (see high-valent iron), and catalase. \n\nBioinorganic compounds\n\nThe most commonly known and studied bioinorganic iron compounds (biological iron molecules) are the heme proteins: examples are hemoglobin, myoglobin, and cytochrome P450. These compounds participate in transporting gases, building enzymes, and transferring electrons.Greenwood and Earnshaw, pp. 1098–1104 Metalloproteins are a group of proteins with metal ion cofactors. Some examples of iron metalloproteins are ferritin and rubredoxin. Many enzymes vital to life contain iron, such as catalase, lipoxygenases, and IRE-BP.\n\nHealth and diet\n\nIron is pervasive, but particularly rich sources of dietary iron include red meat, lentils, beans, poultry, fish, leaf vegetables, watercress, tofu, chickpeas, black-eyed peas, blackstrap molasses, fortified bread, and fortified breakfast cereals. Iron in low amounts is found in molasses, teff, and farina. Iron in meat (heme iron) is more easily absorbed than iron in vegetables. Although some studies suggest that heme/hemoglobin from red meat has effects which may increase the likelihood of colorectal cancer, there is still some controversy with a few studies suggesting that such claims are not supported by sufficient evidence. \n\nIron provided by dietary supplements is often found as iron(II) fumarate, although iron sulfate is cheaper and is absorbed equally well. Elemental iron, or reduced iron, despite being absorbed at only one third to two thirds the efficiency (relative to iron sulfate), is often added to foods such as breakfast cereals or enriched wheat flour. Iron is most available to the body when chelated to amino acids and is also available for use as a common iron supplement. Glycine, the cheapest and most common amino acid is most often used to produce iron glycinate supplements. The Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) for iron varies considerably depending on age, sex, and source of dietary iron (heme-based iron has higher bioavailability). Infants may require iron supplements if they are bottle-fed cow's milk. Blood donors and pregnant women are at special risk of low iron levels and are often advised to supplement their iron intake. \n\nUptake and storage\n\nIron acquisition poses a problem for aerobic organisms because ferric iron is poorly soluble near neutral pH. Thus, bacteria have evolved high-affinity sequestering agents called siderophores. \n\nAfter uptake in cells, iron storage is carefully regulated; iron ions are never \"free\". A major component of this regulation is the protein transferrin, which binds iron ions absorbed from the duodenum and carries it in the blood to cells. In animals, plants, and fungi, iron is often incorporated into the heme complex. Heme is an essential component of cytochrome proteins, which mediate redox reactions, and of oxygen carrier proteins such as hemoglobin, myoglobin, and leghemoglobin.\n\nInorganic iron contributes to redox reactions in the iron-sulfur clusters of many enzymes, such as nitrogenase (involved in the synthesis of ammonia from nitrogen and hydrogen) and hydrogenase. Non-heme iron proteins include the enzymes methane monooxygenase (oxidizes methane to methanol), ribonucleotide reductase (reduces ribose to deoxyribose; DNA biosynthesis), hemerythrins (oxygen transport and fixation in marine invertebrates) and purple acid phosphatase (hydrolysis of phosphate esters).\n\nIron distribution is heavily regulated in mammals, partly because iron ions have a high potential for biological toxicity. \n\nRegulation of uptake\n\nIron uptake is tightly regulated by the human body, which has no regulated physiological means of excreting iron. Only small amounts of iron are lost daily due to mucosal and skin epithelial cell sloughing, so control of iron levels is primarily accomplished by regulating uptake. Regulation of iron uptake is impaired in some people as a result of a genetic defect that maps to the HLA-H gene region on chromosome 6. In these people, excessive iron intake can result in iron overload disorders, known medically as hemochromatosis. Many people have an undiagnosed genetic susceptibility to iron overload, and are not aware of a family history of the problem. For this reason, people should not take iron supplements unless they suffer from iron deficiency and have consulted a doctor. Hemochromatosis is estimated to be the a cause of 0.3 to 0.8% of all metabolic diseases of Caucasians. \n\nMRIfstudies show that iron accumulates in the hippocampus of the brains of those with Alzheimer's disease and in the substantia nigra of those with Parkinson disease. \n\nBioremediation\n\nIron-eating bacteria live in the hulls of sunken ships such as the Titanic. The acidophile bacteria Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans, Leptospirillum ferrooxidans, Sulfolobus spp., Acidianus brierleyi and Sulfobacillus thermosulfidooxidans can oxidize ferrous iron enzymically. A sample of the fungus Aspergillus niger was found growing from gold mining solution, and was found to contain cyano metal complexes such as gold, silver, copper iron and zinc. The fungus also plays a role in the solubilization of heavy metal sulfides. \n\nPermeable reactive barriers\n\nZerovalent iron is the main reactive material for permeable reactive barriers. \n\nToxicity\n\nOverdoses of ingested iron can cause excessive levels of iron in the blood. High blood levels of free ferrous iron react with peroxides to produce highly reactive free radicals that can damage DNA, proteins, lipids, and other cellular components. Iron toxicity occurs when the cell contains free iron, which generally occurs when iron levels exceed the availability of transferrin to bind the iron. Damage to the cells of the gastrointestinal tract can also prevent them from regulating iron absorption, leading to further increases in blood levels. Iron typically damages cells in the heart, liver and elsewhere, causing adverse effects that include coma, metabolic acidosis, shock, liver failure, coagulopathy, adult respiratory distress syndrome, long-term organ damage, and even death. Humans experience iron toxicity when the iron exceeds 20 milligrams for every kilogram of body mass; 60 milligrams per kilogram is considered a lethal dose. Overconsumption of iron, often the result of children eating large quantities of ferrous sulfate tablets intended for adult consumption, is one of the most common toxicological causes of death in children under six. The Dietary Reference Intake (DRI) sets the Tolerable Upper Intake Level (UL) for adults at 45 mg/day. For children under fourteen years old the UL is 40 mg/day.\n\nThe medical management of iron toxicity is complicated, and can include use of a specific chelating agent called deferoxamine to bind and expel excess iron from the body.", "A chemical element or element is a species of atoms having the same number of protons in their atomic nuclei (i.e. the same atomic number, Z). There are 118 elements that have been identified, of which the first 94 occur naturally on Earth with the remaining 24 being synthetic elements. There are 80 elements that have at least one stable isotope and 38 that have exclusively radioactive isotopes, which decay over time into other elements. Iron is the most abundant element (by mass) making up Earth, while oxygen is the most common element in the crust of Earth. \n\nChemical elements constitute all of the ordinary matter of the universe. However astronomical observations suggest that ordinary observable matter is only approximately 15% of the matter in the universe: the remainder is dark matter, the composition of which is unknown, but it is not composed of chemical elements. \nThe two lightest elements, hydrogen and helium were mostly formed in the Big Bang and are the most common elements in the universe. The next three elements (lithium, beryllium and boron) were formed mostly by cosmic ray spallation, and are thus more rare than those that follow. Formation of elements with from six to twenty six protons occurred and continues to occur in main sequence stars via stellar nucleosynthesis. The high abundance of oxygen, silicon, and iron on Earth reflects their common production in such stars. Elements with greater than twenty-six protons are formed by supernova nucleosynthesis in supernovae, which, when they explode, blast these elements far into space as supernova remnants, where they may become incorporated into planets when they are formed. \n\nThe term \"element\" is used for a kind of atoms with a given number of protons (regardless of whether they are or they are not ionized or chemically bonded, e.g. hydrogen in water) as well as for a pure chemical substance consisting of a single element (e.g. hydrogen gas). For the second meaning, the terms \"elementary substance\" and \"simple substance\" have been suggested, but they have not gained much acceptance in the English-language chemical literature, whereas in some other languages their equivalent is widely used (e.g. French corps simple, Russian простое вещество). One element can form multiple substances different by their structure; they are called allotropes of the element.\n\nWhen different elements are chemically combined, with the atoms held together by chemical bonds, they form chemical compounds. Only a minority of elements are found uncombined as relatively pure minerals. Among the more common of such \"native elements\" are copper, silver, gold, carbon (as coal, graphite, or diamonds), and sulfur. All but a few of the most inert elements, such as noble gases and noble metals, are usually found on Earth in chemically combined form, as chemical compounds. While about 32 of the chemical elements occur on Earth in native uncombined forms, most of these occur as mixtures. For example, atmospheric air is primarily a mixture of nitrogen, oxygen, and argon, and native solid elements occur in alloys, such as that of iron and nickel.\n\nThe history of the discovery and use of the elements began with primitive human societies that found native elements like carbon, sulfur, copper and gold. Later civilizations extracted elemental copper, tin, lead and iron from their ores by smelting, using charcoal. Alchemists and chemists subsequently identified many more, with almost all of the naturally-occurring elements becoming known by 1900.\n\nThe properties of the chemical elements are summarized on the periodic table, which organizes the elements by increasing atomic number into rows (\"periods\") in which the columns (\"groups\") share recurring (\"periodic\") physical and chemical properties. Save for unstable radioactive elements with short half-lives, all of the elements are available industrially, most of them in high degrees of purity.\n\nDescription\n\nThe lightest chemical elements are hydrogen and helium, both created by Big Bang nucleosynthesis during the first 20 minutes of the universe in a ratio of around 3:1 by mass (or 12:1 by number of atoms), along with tiny traces of the next two elements, lithium and beryllium. Almost all other elements found in nature were made by various natural methods of nucleosynthesis. On Earth, small amounts of new atoms are naturally produced in nucleogenic reactions, or in cosmogenic processes, such as cosmic ray spallation. New atoms are also naturally produced on Earth as radiogenic daughter isotopes of ongoing radioactive decay processes such as alpha decay, beta decay, spontaneous fission, cluster decay, and other rarer modes of decay.\n\nOf the 94 naturally occurring elements, those with atomic numbers 1 through 82 each have at least one stable isotope (except for technetium, element 43 and promethium, element 61, which have no stable isotopes). Isotopes considered stable are those for which no radioactive decay has yet been observed. Elements with atomic numbers 83 through 94 are unstable to the point that radioactive decay of all isotopes can be detected. Some of these elements, notably bismuth (atomic number 83), thorium (atomic number 90), uranium (atomic number 92) and plutonium (atomic number 94), have one or more isotopes with half-lives long enough to survive as remnants of the explosive stellar nucleosynthesis that produced the heavy elements before the formation of our solar system. For example, at over 1.9 years, over a billion times longer than the current estimated age of the universe, bismuth-209 (atomic number 83) has the longest known alpha decay half-life of any naturally occurring element. The very heaviest elements (those beyond plutonium, element 94) undergo radioactive decay with half-lives so short that they are not found in nature and must be synthesized.\n\nAs of 2010, there are 118 known elements (in this context, \"known\" means observed well enough, even from just a few decay products, to have been differentiated from other elements). Of these 118 elements, 94 occur naturally on Earth. Six of these occur in extreme trace quantities: technetium, atomic number 43; promethium, number 61; astatine, number 85; francium, number 87; neptunium, number 93; and plutonium, number 94. These 94 elements have been detected in the universe at large, in the spectra of stars and also supernovae, where short-lived radioactive elements are newly being made. The first 94 elements have been detected directly on Earth as primordial nuclides present from the formation of the solar system, or as naturally-occurring fission or transmutation products of uranium and thorium.\n\nThe remaining 24 heavier elements, not found today either on Earth or in astronomical spectra, have been produced artificially: these are all radioactive, with very short half-lives; if any atoms of these elements were present at the formation of Earth, they are extremely likely, to the point of certainty, to have already decayed, and if present in novae, have been in quantities too small to have been noted. Technetium was the first purportedly non-naturally occurring element synthesized, in 1937, although trace amounts of technetium have since been found in nature (and also the element may have been discovered naturally in 1925). This pattern of artificial production and later natural discovery has been repeated with several other radioactive naturally-occurring rare elements. \n\nLists of the elements are available by name, by symbol, by atomic number, by density, by melting point, and by boiling point as well as ionization energies of the elements. The nuclides of stable and radioactive elements are also available as a list of nuclides, sorted by length of half-life for those that are unstable. One of the most convenient, and certainly the most traditional presentation of the elements, is in the form of the periodic table, which groups together elements with similar chemical properties (and usually also similar electronic structures).\n\nAtomic number\n\nThe atomic number of an element is equal to the number of protons in each atom, and defines the element. For example, all carbon atoms contain 6 protons in their atomic nucleus; so the atomic number of carbon is 6. Carbon atoms may have different numbers of neutrons; atoms of the same element having different numbers of neutrons are known as isotopes of the element. \n\nThe number of protons in the atomic nucleus also determines its electric charge, which in turn determines the number of electrons of the atom in its non-ionized state. The electrons are placed into atomic orbitals that determine the atom's various chemical properties. The number of neutrons in a nucleus usually has very little effect on an element's chemical properties (except in the case of hydrogen and deuterium). Thus, all carbon isotopes have nearly identical chemical properties because they all have six protons and six electrons, even though carbon atoms may, for example, have 6 or 8 neutrons. That is why the atomic number, rather than mass number or atomic weight, is considered the identifying characteristic of a chemical element.\n\nThe symbol for atomic number is Z.\n\nIsotopes\n\nIsotopes are atoms of the same element (that is, with the same number of protons in their atomic nucleus), but having different numbers of neutrons. Most (66 of 94) naturally occurring elements have more than one stable isotope. Thus, for example, there are three main isotopes of carbon. All carbon atoms have 6 protons in the nucleus, but they can have either 6, 7, or 8 neutrons. Since the mass numbers of these are 12, 13 and 14 respectively, the three isotopes of carbon are known as carbon-12, carbon-13, and carbon-14, often abbreviated to 12C, 13C, and 14C. Carbon in everyday life and in chemistry is a mixture of 12C (about 98.9%), 13C (about 1.1%) and about 1 atom per trillion of 14C.\n\nExcept in the case of the isotopes of hydrogen (which differ greatly from each other in relative mass—enough to cause chemical effects), the isotopes of a given element are chemically nearly indistinguishable.\n\nAll of the elements have some isotopes that are radioactive (radioisotopes), although not all of these radioisotopes occur naturally. The radioisotopes typically decay into other elements upon radiating an alpha or beta particle. If an element has isotopes that are not radioactive, these are termed \"stable\" isotopes. All of the known stable isotopes occur naturally (see primordial isotope). The many radioisotopes that are not found in nature have been characterized after being artificially made. Certain elements have no stable isotopes and are composed only of radioactive isotopes: specifically the elements without any stable isotopes are technetium (atomic number 43), promethium (atomic number 61), and all observed elements with atomic numbers greater than 82.\n\nOf the 80 elements with at least one stable isotope, 26 have only one single stable isotope. The mean number of stable isotopes for the 80 stable elements is 3.1 stable isotopes per element. The largest number of stable isotopes that occur for a single element is 10 (for tin, element 50).\n\nIsotopic mass and atomic mass\n\nThe mass number of an element, A, is the number of nucleons (protons and neutrons) in the atomic nucleus. Different isotopes of a given element are distinguished by their mass numbers, which are conventionally written as a superscript on the left hand side of the atomic symbol (e.g., 238U). The mass number is always a simple whole number and has units of \"nucleons.\" An example of a referral to a mass number is \"magnesium-24,\" which is an atom with 24 nucleons (12 protons and 12 neutrons).\n\nWhereas the mass number simply counts the total number of neutrons and protons and is thus a natural (or whole) number, the atomic mass of a single atom is a real number for the mass of a particular isotope of the element, the unit being u. In general, when expressed in u it differs in value slightly from the mass number for a given nuclide (or isotope) since the mass of the protons and neutrons is not exactly 1 u, since the electrons contribute a lesser share to the atomic mass as neutron number exceeds proton number, and (finally) because of the nuclear binding energy. For example, the atomic mass of chlorine-35 to five significant digits is 34.969 u and that of chlorine-37 is 36.966 u. However, the atomic mass in u of each isotope is quite close to its simple mass number (always within 1%). The only isotope whose atomic mass is exactly a natural number is 12C, which by definition has a mass of exactly 12, because u is defined as 1/12 of the mass of a free neutral carbon-12 atom in the ground state.\n\nThe relative atomic mass (historically and commonly also called \"atomic weight\") of an element is the average of the atomic masses of all the chemical element's isotopes as found in a particular environment, weighted by isotopic abundance, relative to the atomic mass unit (u). This number may be a fraction that is not close to a whole number, due to the averaging process. For example, the relative atomic mass of chlorine is 35.453 u, which differs greatly from a whole number due to being made of an average of 76% chlorine-35 and 24% chlorine-37. Whenever a relative atomic mass value differs by more than 1% from a whole number, it is due to this averaging effect resulting from significant amounts of more than one isotope being naturally present in the sample of the element in question.\n\nChemically pure and isotopically pure\n\nChemists and nuclear scientists have different definitions of a pure element. In chemistry, a pure element means a substance whose atoms all (or in practice almost all) have the same atomic number, or number of protons. Nuclear scientists, however, define a pure element as one that consists of only one stable isotope. \n\nFor example, a copper wire is 99.99% chemically pure if 99.99% of its atoms are copper, with 29 protons each. However it is not isotopically pure since ordinary copper consists of two stable isotopes, 69% 63Cu and 31% 65Cu, with different numbers of neutrons. However, a pure gold ingot would be both chemically and isotopically pure, since ordinary gold consists only of one isotope, 197Au.\n\nAllotropes\n\nAtoms of chemically pure elements may bond to each other chemically in more than one way, allowing the pure element to exist in multiple structures (spatial arrangements of atoms), known as allotropes, which differ in their properties. For example, carbon can be found as diamond, which has a tetrahedral structure around each carbon atom; graphite, which has layers of carbon atoms with a hexagonal structure stacked on top of each other; graphene, which is a single layer of graphite that is very strong; fullerenes, which have nearly spherical shapes; and carbon nanotubes, which are tubes with a hexagonal structure (even these may differ from each other in electrical properties). The ability of an element to exist in one of many structural forms is known as 'allotropy'.\n\nThe standard state, also known as reference state, of an element is defined as its thermodynamically most stable state at 1 bar at a given temperature (typically at 298.15 K). In thermochemistry, an element is defined to have an enthalpy of formation of zero in its standard state. For example, the reference state for carbon is graphite, because the structure of graphite is more stable than that of the other allotropes.\n\nProperties\n\nSeveral kinds of descriptive categorizations can be applied broadly to the elements, including consideration of their general physical and chemical properties, their states of matter under familiar conditions, their melting and boiling points, their densities, their crystal structures as solids, and their origins.\n\nGeneral properties\n\nSeveral terms are commonly used to characterize the general physical and chemical properties of the chemical elements. A first distinction is between metals, which readily conduct electricity, nonmetals, which do not, and a small group, (the metalloids), having intermediate properties and often behaving as semiconductors.\n\nA more refined classification is often shown in colored presentations of the periodic table. This system restricts the terms \"metal\" and \"nonmetal\" to only certain of the more broadly defined metals and nonmetals, adding additional terms for certain sets of the more broadly viewed metals and nonmetals. The version of this classification used in the periodic tables presented here includes: actinides, alkali metals, alkaline earth metals, halogens, lanthanides, transition metals, post-transition metals, metalloids, polyatomic nonmetals, diatomic nonmetals, and noble gases. In this system, the alkali metals, alkaline earth metals, and transition metals, as well as the lanthanides and the actinides, are special groups of the metals viewed in a broader sense. Similarly, the polyatomic nonmetals, diatomic nonmetals and the noble gases are nonmetals viewed in the broader sense. In some presentations, the halogens are not distinguished, with astatine identified as a metalloid and the others identified as nonmetals.\n\nStates of matter\n\nAnother commonly used basic distinction among the elements is their state of matter (phase), whether solid, liquid, or gas, at a selected standard temperature and pressure (STP). Most of the elements are solids at conventional temperatures and atmospheric pressure, while several are gases. Only bromine and mercury are liquids at 0 degrees Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit) and normal atmospheric pressure; caesium and gallium are solids at that temperature, but melt at 28.4 °C (83.2 °F) and 29.8 °C (85.6 °F), respectively.\n\nMelting and boiling points\n\nMelting and boiling points, typically expressed in degrees Celsius at a pressure of one atmosphere, are commonly used in characterizing the various elements. While known for most elements, either or both of these measurements is still undetermined for some of the radioactive elements available in only tiny quantities. Since helium remains a liquid even at absolute zero at atmospheric pressure, it has only a boiling point, and not a melting point, in conventional presentations.\n\nDensities\n\nThe density at a selected standard temperature and pressure (STP) is frequently used in characterizing the elements. Density is often expressed in grams per cubic centimeter (g/cm3). Since several elements are gases at commonly encountered temperatures, their densities are usually stated for their gaseous forms; when liquefied or solidified, the gaseous elements have densities similar to those of the other elements.\n\nWhen an element has allotropes with different densities, one representative allotrope is typically selected in summary presentations, while densities for each allotrope can be stated where more detail is provided. For example, the three familiar allotropes of carbon (amorphous carbon, graphite, and diamond) have densities of 1.8–2.1, 2.267, and 3.515 g/cm3, respectively.\n\nCrystal structures\n\nThe elements studied to date as solid samples have eight kinds of crystal structures: cubic, body-centered cubic, face-centered cubic, hexagonal, monoclinic, orthorhombic, rhombohedral, and tetragonal. For some of the synthetically produced transuranic elements, available samples have been too small to determine crystal structures.\n\nOccurrence and origin on Earth\n\nChemical elements may also be categorized by their origin on Earth, with the first 94 considered naturally occurring, while those with atomic numbers beyond 94 have only been produced artificially as the synthetic products of man-made nuclear reactions.\n\nOf the 94 naturally occurring elements, 84 are considered primordial and either stable or weakly radioactive. The remaining 10 naturally occurring elements possess half lives too short for them to have been present at the beginning of the Solar System, and are therefore considered transient elements. (Plutonium is sometimes also considered a transient element because primordial plutonium has by now decayed to almost undetectable traces.) Of these 10 transient elements, 5 (polonium, radon, radium, actinium, and protactinium) are relatively common decay products of thorium, uranium, and plutonium. The remaining 5 transient elements (technetium, promethium, astatine, francium, and neptunium) occur only rarely, as products of rare decay modes or nuclear reaction processes involving uranium or other heavy elements.\n\nElements with atomic numbers 1 through 40 are all stable, while those with atomic numbers 41 through 82 (except technetium and promethium) are metastable. The half-lives of these metastable \"theoretical radionuclides\" are so long (at least 100 million times longer than the estimated age of the universe) that their radioactive decay has yet to be detected by experiment. Elements with atomic numbers 83 through 94 are unstable to the point that their radioactive decay can be detected. Four of these elements, bismuth (element 83), thorium (element 90), uranium (element 92), and plutonium (element 94), have one or more isotopes with half-lives long enough to survive as remnants of the explosive stellar nucleosynthesis that produced the heavy elements before the formation of our solar system. For example, at over 1.9 years, over a billion times longer than the current estimated age of the universe, bismuth-209 has the longest known alpha decay half-life of any naturally occurring element. The very heaviest elements (those beyond plutonium, element 94) undergo radioactive decay with short half-lives and do not occur in nature.\n\nThe periodic table\n\nThe properties of the chemical elements are often summarized using the periodic table, which powerfully and elegantly organizes the elements by increasing atomic number into rows (\"periods\") in which the columns (\"groups\") share recurring (\"periodic\") physical and chemical properties. The current standard table contains 118 confirmed elements as of 10 April 2010.\n\nAlthough earlier precursors to this presentation exist, its invention is generally credited to the Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev in 1869, who intended the table to illustrate recurring trends in the properties of the elements. The layout of the table has been refined and extended over time as new elements have been discovered and new theoretical models have been developed to explain chemical behavior.\n\nUse of the periodic table is now ubiquitous within the academic discipline of chemistry, providing an extremely useful framework to classify, systematize and compare all the many different forms of chemical behavior. The table has also found wide application in physics, geology, biology, materials science, engineering, agriculture, medicine, nutrition, environmental health, and astronomy. Its principles are especially important in chemical engineering.\n\nNomenclature and symbols\n\nThe various chemical elements are formally identified by their unique atomic numbers, by their accepted names, and by their symbols.\n\nAtomic numbers\n\nThe known elements have atomic numbers from 1 through 118, conventionally presented as Arabic numerals. Since the elements can be uniquely sequenced by atomic number, conventionally from lowest to highest (as in a periodic table), sets of elements are sometimes specified by such notation as \"through\", \"beyond\", or \"from ... through\", as in \"through iron\", \"beyond uranium\", or \"from lanthanum through lutetium\". The terms \"light\" and \"heavy\" are sometimes also used informally to indicate relative atomic numbers (not densities), as in \"lighter than carbon\" or \"heavier than lead\", although technically the weight or mass of atoms of an element (their atomic weights or atomic masses) do not always increase monotonically with their atomic numbers.\n\nElement names\n\nThe naming of various substances now known as elements precedes the atomic theory of matter, as names were given locally by various cultures to various minerals, metals, compounds, alloys, mixtures, and other materials, although at the time it was not known which chemicals were elements and which compounds. As they were identified as elements, the existing names for anciently-known elements (e.g., gold, mercury, iron) were kept in most countries. National differences emerged over the names of elements either for convenience, linguistic niceties, or nationalism. For a few illustrative examples: German speakers use \"Wasserstoff\" (water substance) for \"hydrogen\", \"Sauerstoff\" (acid substance) for \"oxygen\" and \"Stickstoff\" (smothering substance) for \"nitrogen\", while English and some romance languages use \"sodium\" for \"natrium\" and \"potassium\" for \"kalium\", and the French, Italians, Greeks, Portuguese and Poles prefer \"azote/azot/azoto\" (from roots meaning \"no life\") for \"nitrogen\".\n\nFor purposes of international communication and trade, the official names of the chemical elements both ancient and more recently recognized are decided by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC), which has decided on a sort of international English language, drawing on traditional English names even when an element's chemical symbol is based on a Latin or other traditional word, for example adopting \"gold\" rather than \"aurum\" as the name for the 79th element (Au). IUPAC prefers the British spellings \"aluminium\" and \"caesium\" over the U.S. spellings \"aluminum\" and \"cesium\", and the U.S. \"sulfur\" over the British \"sulphur\". However, elements that are practical to sell in bulk in many countries often still have locally used national names, and countries whose national language does not use the Latin alphabet are likely to use the IUPAC element names.\n\nAccording to IUPAC, chemical elements are not proper nouns in English; consequently, the full name of an element is not routinely capitalized in English, even if derived from a proper noun, as in californium and einsteinium. Isotope names of chemical elements are also uncapitalized if written out, e.g., carbon-12 or uranium-235. Chemical element symbols (such as Cf for californium and Es for einsteinium), are always capitalized (see below).\n\nIn the second half of the twentieth century, physics laboratories became able to produce nuclei of chemical elements with half-lives too short for an appreciable amount of them to exist at any time. These are also named by IUPAC, which generally adopts the name chosen by the discoverer. This practice can lead to the controversial question of which research group actually discovered an element, a question that delayed the naming of elements with atomic number of 104 and higher for a considerable amount of time. (See element naming controversy).\n\nPrecursors of such controversies involved the nationalistic namings of elements in the late 19th century. For example, lutetium was named in reference to Paris, France. The Germans were reluctant to relinquish naming rights to the French, often calling it cassiopeium. Similarly, the British discoverer of niobium originally named it columbium, in reference to the New World. It was used extensively as such by American publications prior to the international standardization.\n\nChemical symbols\n\nSpecific chemical elements\n\nBefore chemistry became a science, alchemists had designed arcane symbols for both metals and common compounds. These were however used as abbreviations in diagrams or procedures; there was no concept of atoms combining to form molecules. With his advances in the atomic theory of matter, John Dalton devised his own simpler symbols, based on circles, to depict molecules.\n\nThe current system of chemical notation was invented by Berzelius. In this typographical system, chemical symbols are not mere abbreviations—though each consists of letters of the Latin alphabet. They are intended as universal symbols for people of all languages and alphabets.\n\nThe first of these symbols were intended to be fully universal. Since Latin was the common language of science at that time, they were abbreviations based on the Latin names of metals. Cu comes from Cuprum, Fe comes from Ferrum, Ag from Argentum. The symbols were not followed by a period (full stop) as with abbreviations. Later chemical elements were also assigned unique chemical symbols, based on the name of the element, but not necessarily in English. For example, sodium has the chemical symbol 'Na' after the Latin natrium. The same applies to \"W\" (wolfram) for tungsten, \"Fe\" (ferrum) for iron, \"Hg\" (hydrargyrum) for mercury, \"Sn\" (stannum) for tin, \"K\" (kalium) for potassium, \"Au\" (aurum) for gold, \"Ag\" (argentum) for silver, \"Pb\" (plumbum) for lead, \"Cu\" (cuprum) for copper, and \"Sb\" (stibium) for antimony.\n\nChemical symbols are understood internationally when element names might require translation. There have sometimes been differences in the past. For example, Germans in the past have used \"J\" (for the alternate name Jod) for iodine, but now use \"I\" and \"Iod\".\n\nThe first letter of a chemical symbol is always capitalized, as in the preceding examples, and the subsequent letters, if any, are always lower case (small letters). Thus, the symbols for californium or einsteinium are Cf and Es.\n\nGeneral chemical symbols\n\nThere are also symbols in chemical equations for groups of chemical elements, for example in comparative formulas. These are often a single capital letter, and the letters are reserved and not used for names of specific elements. For example, an \"X\" indicates a variable group (usually a halogen) in a class of compounds, while \"R\" is a radical, meaning a compound structure such as a hydrocarbon chain. The letter \"Q\" is reserved for \"heat\" in a chemical reaction. \"Y\" is also often used as a general chemical symbol, although it is also the symbol of yttrium. \"Z\" is also frequently used as a general variable group. \"E\" is used in organic chemistry to denote an electron-withdrawing group. \"L\" is used to represent a general ligand in inorganic and organometallic chemistry. \"M\" is also often used in place of a general metal.\n\nAt least two additional, two-letter generic chemical symbols are also in informal usage, \"Ln\" for any lanthanide element and \"An\" for any actinide element. \"Rg\" was formerly used for any rare gas element, but the group of rare gases has now been renamed noble gases and the symbol \"Rg\" has now been assigned to the element roentgenium.\n\nIsotope symbols\n\nIsotopes are distinguished by the atomic mass number (total protons and neutrons) for a particular isotope of an element, with this number combined with the pertinent element's symbol. IUPAC prefers that isotope symbols be written in superscript notation when practical, for example 12C and 235U. However, other notations, such as carbon-12 and uranium-235, or C-12 and U-235, are also used.\n\nAs a special case, the three naturally occurring isotopes of the element hydrogen are often specified as H for 1H (protium), D for 2H (deuterium), and T for 3H (tritium). This convention is easier to use in chemical equations, replacing the need to write out the mass number for each atom. For example, the formula for heavy water may be written D2O instead of 2H2O.\n\nOrigin of the elements\n\nOnly about 4% of the total mass of the universe is made of atoms or ions, and thus represented by chemical elements. This fraction is about 15% of the total matter, with the remainder of the matter (85%) being dark matter. The nature of dark matter is unknown, but it is not composed of atoms of chemical elements because it contains no protons, neutrons, or electrons. (The remaining non-matter part of the mass of the universe is composed of the even more mysterious dark energy).\n\nThe universe's 94 naturally occurring chemical elements are thought to have been produced by at least four cosmic processes. Most of the hydrogen and helium in the universe was produced primordially in the first few minutes of the Big Bang. Three recurrently occurring later processes are thought to have produced the remaining elements. Stellar nucleosynthesis, an ongoing process, produces all elements from carbon through iron in atomic number, but little lithium, beryllium, or boron. Elements heavier in atomic number than iron, as heavy as uranium and plutonium, are produced by explosive nucleosynthesis in supernovas and other cataclysmic cosmic events. Cosmic ray spallation (fragmentation) of carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen is important to the production of lithium, beryllium and boron.\n\nDuring the early phases of the Big Bang, nucleosynthesis of hydrogen nuclei resulted in the production of hydrogen-1 (protium, 1H) and helium-4 (4He), as well as a smaller amount of deuterium (2H) and very minuscule amounts (on the order of 10−10) of lithium and beryllium. Even smaller amounts of boron may have been produced in the Big Bang, since it has been observed in some very old stars, while carbon has not. It is generally agreed that no heavier elements than boron were produced in the Big Bang. As a result, the primordial abundance of atoms (or ions) consisted of roughly 75% 1H, 25% 4He, and 0.01% deuterium, with only tiny traces of lithium, beryllium, and perhaps boron. Subsequent enrichment of galactic halos occurred due to stellar nucleosynthesis and supernova nucleosynthesis. However, the element abundance in intergalactic space can still closely resemble primordial conditions, unless it has been enriched by some means.\n\nOn Earth (and elsewhere), trace amounts of various elements continue to be produced from other elements as products of natural transmutation processes. These include some produced by cosmic rays or other nuclear reactions (see cosmogenic and nucleogenic nuclides), and others produced as decay products of long-lived primordial nuclides. For example, trace (but detectable) amounts of carbon-14 (14C) are continually produced in the atmosphere by cosmic rays impacting nitrogen atoms, and argon-40 (40Ar) is continually produced by the decay of primordially occurring but unstable potassium-40 (40K). Also, three primordially occurring but radioactive actinides, thorium, uranium, and plutonium, decay through a series of recurrently produced but unstable radioactive elements such as radium and radon, which are transiently present in any sample of these metals or their ores or compounds. Three other radioactive elements, technetium, promethium, and neptunium, occur only incidentally in natural materials, produced as individual atoms by natural fission of the nuclei of various heavy elements or in other rare nuclear processes.\n\nHuman technology has produced various additional elements beyond these first 94, with those through atomic number 118 now known.\n\nAbundance\n\nThe following graph (note log scale) shows the abundance of elements in our solar system. The table shows the twelve most common elements in our galaxy (estimated spectroscopically), as measured in parts per million, by mass. Nearby galaxies that have evolved along similar lines have a corresponding enrichment of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium. The more distant galaxies are being viewed as they appeared in the past, so their abundances of elements appear closer to the primordial mixture. As physical laws and processes appear common throughout the visible universe, however, scientist expect that these galaxies evolved elements in similar abundance.\n\nThe abundance of elements in the Solar System is in keeping with their origin from nucleosynthesis in the Big Bang and a number of progenitor supernova stars. Very abundant hydrogen and helium are products of the Big Bang, but the next three elements are rare since they had little time to form in the Big Bang and are not made in stars (they are, however, produced in small quantities by the breakup of heavier elements in interstellar dust, as a result of impact by cosmic rays). Beginning with carbon, elements are produced in stars by buildup from alpha particles (helium nuclei), resulting in an alternatingly larger abundance of elements with even atomic numbers (these are also more stable). In general, such elements up to iron are made in large stars in the process of becoming supernovas. Iron-56 is particularly common, since it is the most stable element that can easily be made from alpha particles (being a product of decay of radioactive nickel-56, ultimately made from 14 helium nuclei). Elements heavier than iron are made in energy-absorbing processes in large stars, and their abundance in the universe (and on Earth) generally decreases with their atomic number.\n\nThe abundance of the chemical elements on Earth varies from air to crust to ocean, and in various types of life. The abundance of elements in Earth's crust differs from that in the Solar system (as seen in the Sun and heavy planets like Jupiter) mainly in selective loss of the very lightest elements (hydrogen and helium) and also volatile neon, carbon (as hydrocarbons), nitrogen and sulfur, as a result of solar heating in the early formation of the solar system. Oxygen, the most abundant Earth element by mass, is retained on Earth by combination with silicon. Aluminum at 8% by mass is more common in the Earth's crust than in the universe and solar system, but the composition of the far more bulky mantle, which has magnesium and iron in place of aluminum (which occurs there only at 2% of mass) more closely mirrors the elemental composition of the solar system, save for the noted loss of volatile elements to space, and loss of iron which has migrated to the Earth's core.\n\nThe composition of the human body, by contrast, more closely follows the composition of seawater—save that the human body has additional stores of carbon and nitrogen necessary to form the proteins and nucleic acids, together with phosphorus in the nucleic acids and energy transfer molecule adenosine triphosphate (ATP) that occurs in the cells of all living organisms. Certain kinds of organisms require particular additional elements, for example the magnesium in chlorophyll in green plants, the calcium in mollusc shells, or the iron in the hemoglobin in vertebrate animals' red blood cells.\n\nHistory\n\nEvolving definitions\n\nThe concept of an \"element\" as an undivisible substance has developed through three major historical phases: Classical definitions (such as those of the ancient Greeks), chemical definitions, and atomic definitions.\n\nClassical definitions\n\nAncient philosophy posited a set of classical elements to explain observed patterns in nature. These elements originally referred to earth, water, air and fire rather than the chemical elements of modern science.\n\nThe term 'elements' (stoicheia) was first used by the Greek philosopher Plato in about 360 BCE in his dialogue Timaeus, which includes a discussion of the composition of inorganic and organic bodies and is a speculative treatise on chemistry. Plato believed the elements introduced a century earlier by Empedocles were composed of small polyhedral forms: tetrahedron (fire), octahedron (air), icosahedron (water), and cube (earth). \n\nAristotle, c. 350 BCE, also used the term stoicheia and added a fifth element called aether, which formed the heavens. Aristotle defined an element as:\n\nChemical definitions\n\nIn 1661, Robert Boyle proposed his theory of corpuscularism which favoured the analysis of matter as constituted by irreducible units of matter (atoms) and, choosing to side with neither Aristotle's view of the four elements nor Paracelsus' view of three fundamental elements, left open the question of the number of elements. The first modern list of chemical elements was given in Antoine Lavoisier's 1789 Elements of Chemistry, which contained thirty-three elements, including light and caloric. By 1818, Jöns Jakob Berzelius had determined atomic weights for forty-five of the forty-nine then-accepted elements. Dmitri Mendeleev had sixty-six elements in his periodic table of 1869.\n\nFrom Boyle until the early 20th century, an element was defined as a pure substance that could not be decomposed into any simpler substance. Put another way, a chemical element cannot be transformed into other chemical elements by chemical processes. Elements during this time were generally distinguished by their atomic weights, a property measurable with fair accuracy by available analytical techniques.\n\nAtomic definitions\n\nThe 1913 discovery by English physicist Henry Moseley that the nuclear charge is the physical basis for an atom's atomic number, further refined when the nature of protons and neutrons became appreciated, eventually led to the current definition of an element based on atomic number (number of protons per atomic nucleus). The use of atomic numbers, rather than atomic weights, to distinguish elements has greater predictive value (since these numbers are integers), and also resolves some ambiguities in the chemistry-based view due to varying properties of isotopes and allotropes within the same element. Currently, IUPAC defines an element to exist if it has isotopes with a lifetime longer than the 10−14 seconds it takes the nucleus to form an electronic cloud. \n\nBy 1914, seventy-two elements were known, all naturally occurring. The remaining naturally occurring elements were discovered or isolated in subsequent decades, and various additional elements have also been produced synthetically, with much of that work pioneered by Glenn T. Seaborg. In 1955, element 101 was discovered and named mendelevium in honor of D.I. Mendeleev, the first to arrange the elements in a periodic manner. Most recently, the synthesis of element 118 was reported in October 2006, and the synthesis of element 117 was reported in April 2010. \n\nDiscovery and recognition of various elements\n\nTen materials familiar to various prehistoric cultures are now known to be chemical elements: Carbon, copper, gold, iron, lead, mercury, silver, sulfur, tin, and zinc. Three additional materials now accepted as elements, arsenic, antimony, and bismuth, were recognized as distinct substances prior to 1500 AD. Phosphorus, cobalt, and platinum were isolated before 1750.\n\nMost of the remaining naturally occurring chemical elements were identified and characterized by 1900, including:\n* Such now-familiar industrial materials as aluminium, silicon, nickel, chromium, magnesium, and tungsten\n* Reactive metals such as lithium, sodium, potassium, and calcium\n* The halogens fluorine, chlorine, bromine, and iodine\n* Gases such as hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, helium, argon, and neon\n* Most of the rare-earth elements, including cerium, lanthanum, gadolinium, and neodymium.\n* The more common radioactive elements, including uranium, thorium, radium, and radon\n\nElements isolated or produced since 1900 include:\n* The three remaining undiscovered regularly occurring stable natural elements: hafnium, lutetium, and rhenium\n* Plutonium, which was first produced synthetically in 1940 by Glenn T. Seaborg, but is now also known from a few long-persisting natural occurrences\n* The three incidentally occurring natural elements (neptunium, promethium, and technetium), which were all first produced synthetically but later discovered in trace amounts in certain geological samples\n* Three scarce decay products of uranium or thorium, (astatine, francium, and protactinium), and\n* Various synthetic transuranic elements, beginning with americium and curium\n\nRecently discovered elements\n\nThe first transuranium element (element with atomic number greater than 92) discovered was neptunium in 1940. Since 1999 claims for the discovery of new elements have been considered by the IUPAC/IUPAP Joint Working Party. As of January 2016, all 118 elements have been confirmed as discovered by IUPAC. The discovery of element 112 was acknowledged in 2009, and the name copernicium and the atomic symbol Cn were suggested for it. The name and symbol were officially endorsed by IUPAC on 19 February 2010. The heaviest element that is believed to have been synthesized to date is element 118, ununoctium, on 9 October 2006, by the Flerov Laboratory of Nuclear Reactions in Dubna, Russia. Element 117 was the latest element claimed to be discovered, in 2009. IUPAC officially recognized flerovium and livermorium, elements 114 and 116, in June 2011 and approved their names in May 2012. In December 2015, IUPAC recognized elements 113, 115, 117 and 118, and announced the elements' proposed final names on 8 June 2016. The names, nihonium (113, Nh), moscovium (115, Mc), tennessine (117, Ts), and oganesson (118, Og), are expected to be approved by the end of 2016. \n\nList of the 118 known chemical elements\n\nThe following sortable table includes the 118 known chemical elements, with the names linking to the Wikipedia articles on each.\n* Atomic number, name, and symbol all serve independently as unique identifiers.\n* Names are those accepted by IUPAC; provisional names for recently produced elements not yet formally named are in parentheses.\n* Group, period, and block refer to an element's position in the periodic table. Group numbers here show the currently accepted numbering; for older alternate numberings, see Group (periodic table).\n* State of matter (solid, liquid, or gas) applies at standard temperature and pressure conditions (STP).\n* Occurrence distinguishes naturally occurring elements, categorized as either primordial or transient (from decay), and additional synthetic elements that have been produced technologically, but are not known to occur naturally.\n* Description summarizes an element's properties using the broad categories commonly presented in periodic tables: Actinide, alkali metal, alkaline earth metal, lanthanide, post-transition metal, metalloid, noble gas, polyatomic or diatomic nonmetal, and transition metal." ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "Iron (element)", "Iron rope", "Iron truss", "Ed-In-Sol", "Reduced iron", "Feostat", "Feratab", "Iron production", "Nephro-Fer", "Slow Fe", "Iron Essay", "Element 26", "Extraction of iron", "Mol-Iron", "Feronate", "Ferro-Time", "Ferric compounds", "Ferrousal", "Ferretts", "Fer-In-Sol", "Ferrum (element)", "Ferro-Caps", "Iron", "7439-89-6", "Iorn", "Siderol", "Iron compounds", "Vitedyn-Slo", "Fe-40", "Symbol of iron", "Yieronia", "Ferryl", "Ferrous compounds" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "nephro fer", "iorn", "fe 40", "reduced iron", "ferryl", "element 26", "iron compounds", "iron rope", "iron truss", "ferretts", "feratab", "ed in sol", "yieronia", "ferrousal", "extraction of iron", "7439 89 6", "siderol", "feostat", "iron essay", "ferrous compounds", "ferro time", "vitedyn slo", "iron production", "ferro caps", "ferrum element", "symbol of iron", "mol iron", "iron", "fer in sol", "slow fe", "iron element", "feronate", "ferric compounds" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "iron", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "Iron" }

{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Units_of_paper_quantity.txt" ], "title": [ "Units of paper quantity" ], "wiki_context": [ "Various measures of paper quantity have been and are in use. Although there are no S.I. units such as quires and bales, there are ISOISO 4046-3:2002 Paper, board, pulps and related terms – Vocabulary – Part 3: Paper-making terminology (2002), quoted in ISO 22414:2004(E) Paper – Cut-size office paper – Measurement of edge quality (2004) Geneva:ISO. and DINPapier und Pappe: DIN 6730:2011-02: Begriffe (Paper and board: vocabulary) (2011) (in German). Berlin: Beuth Verlag. standards for the ream. Expressions used here include U.S. Customary units.\n\nUnits\n\n; Writing paper measurements\n25 sheets = 1 quire\n500 sheets 20 quires \n 1 ream\n1,000 sheets 40 quires \n 2 reams = 1 bundle\n\n5,000 sheets 200 quires \n 10 reams 5 bundles \n 1 bale\n\n; 'Short' paper measurements \n24 sheets = 1 'short' quire\n480 sheets 20 'short' quires \n 1 'short' ream\n960 sheets 40 'short' quires \n 2 'short' reams = 1 'short' bundle\n4,800 sheets 200 'short' quires \n 10 'short' reams 5 'short' bundles \n 1 'short' bale\n\n; Posters and printing measurements\n516 sheets (21½ 'short' quires) \n 1 printer's ream\n1,032 sheets 2 printer's reams \n 1 printer's bundle\n5,160 sheets 5 printer's bundles \n 1 printer's bale\n\n; Cover and Index paper\n250 sheets = 1 ream\n\nQuire\n\nA quire of paper is a measure of paper quantity. The usual meaning is 25 sheets of the same size and quality: of a ream of 500 sheets. Quires of 25 sheets are often used for machine-made paper, while quires of 24 sheets are often used for handmade or specialised paper of 480-sheet reams. (As an old UK and US measure, in some sources, a quire was originally 24 sheets. ) Quires of 15, 18 or 20 sheets have also been used, depending on the type of paper. \n\nNomenclature\n\nThe current word \"quire\" derives from OE \"quair\" or \"guaer\", from OF \"quayer\", \"cayer\", (cf. modern Fr. cahier), from L. quaternum, \"by fours\", \"fourfold\". Later, when bookmaking switched to using paper and it became possible to easily stitch 5 to 7 sheets at a time, the association of \"quaire\" with \"four\" was quickly lost.\n\nHistory\n\nIn the Middle Ages, a quire (also called a \"gathering\") was most often formed of 4 folded sheets of vellum or parchment, i.e. 8 leaves, 16 sides. The term \"quaternion\" (or sometimes quaternum) designates such a quire. A quire made of a single folded sheet (i.e. 2 leaves, 4 sides) is a \"bifolium\" (plural \"bifolia\"); a \"binion\" is a quire of two sheets (i.e. 4 leaves, 8 sides); and a \"quinion\" is five sheets (10 leaves, 20 sides). This last meaning is preserved in the modern Italian term for quire, quinterno di carta.\n\nFormerly, when paper was packed at the paper mill, the top and bottom quires were made up of slightly damaged sheets (\"outsides\") to protect the good quires (\"insides\"). These outside quires were known as \"cassie quires\" (from Fr. cassée, \"broken\"), or \"cording quires\" and had only 20 sheets to the quire. The printer William Caslon in a book published in 1770 mentions both 24- and 25-sheet quires; he also details printer's wastage, and the sorting and recycling of damaged cassie quires. An 1826 French manual on typography complained that cording quires (usually containing some salvageable paper) from the Netherlands barely contained a single good sheet. A note on the flyleaf of this copy states that this edition was pirated from Didot's 1st ed. of 1825; see pp. 235–236, especially in respect of the examples of proof-reader's corrections on pp. 162–163\n\nIt also became the name for any booklet small enough to be made from a single quire of paper. Simon Winchester, in The Surgeon of Crowthorne, cites a specific number, defining quire as \"a booklet eight pages thick.\" Several European words for quire keep the meaning of \"book of paper\": Ger. Buch von Papier, Dan. bog papir, Du. bock papier.\n\nIn blankbook binding, quire is a term indicating 80 pages.\n\nReam\n\nA ream of paper is a quantity of sheets of the same size and quality. International standards organizations define the ream as 500 identical sheets.ISO 4046 (see References) defines the ream as \"a pack of 500 identical sheets of paper\" and appends a note: \"In many countries it is common practice to use the term \"ream\" for other quantities, for example 480 sheets, thus affecting the quire. For quantities other than 500 sheets, a different term, such as \"pack\", should be used.\" This ream of 500 sheets (20 quires of 25 sheets) is also known as a 'long' ream, and is gradually replacing the old value of 480 sheets, now known as a 'short' ream. Reams of 472 and 516 sheets are still current, but in retail outlets paper is typically sold in reams of 500. As an old UK and US unit, a perfect ream was equal to 516 sheets.\n\nCertain types of specialist papers such as tissue paper, greaseproof paper, handmade paper, and blotting paper are still sold (especially in the UK) in 'short' reams of 480 sheets (20 quires of 24 sheets). However, the commercial use of the word 'ream' for quantities of paper other than 500 is now deprecated by such standards as ISO 4046. In Europe, the DIN 6730 standard for Paper and Board includes a definition of 1 ream of A4 80gsm (80 g/m2) paper equals 500 sheets.\n\nNomenclature\n\nThe word 'ream' derives from Old French reyme, from Spanish resma, from Arabic rizmah \"bundle\" (of paper), from rasama, \"collect into a bundle\". (The Moors brought manufacture of cotton paper to Spain.) Early variant rym (late 15c.) suggests a Dutch influence.[http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=ream Online Etymology Dictionary] (cf. Du. riem), probably during the time of Spanish Habsburg control of the Netherlands.\n\nHistory\n\nThe number of sheets in a ream has varied locally over the centuries, often according to the size and type of paper being sold. Reams of 500 sheets (20 quires of 25 sheets) were known in England in c1594; in 1706 a ream was defined as 20 quires, either 24 or 25 sheets to the quire. In 18th- and 19th-century Europe, the size of the ream varied widely. In Lombardy a ream of music paper was 450 or 480 sheets; in Britain, Holland and Germany a ream of 480 sheets was common; in the Veneto it was more frequently 500. Some paper manufacturers counted 546 sheets (21 quires of 26 sheets). J.S. Bach's manuscript paper at Weimar was ordered by the ream of 480 sheets. In 1840, a ream in Lisbon was 17 quires and 3 sheets 428 sheets, and a double ream was 18 quires and 2 sheets \n 434 sheets; and in Bremen, blotting or packing paper was sold in reams of 300 (20 quires of 15 sheets). A mid-19th century Milanese-Italian dictionary has an example for a risma (ream) as being either 450 or 480 sheets. \n\nIn the UK in 1914, paper was sold using the following reams:\n\n*472 sheets – Mill ream (18 short quires of 24 sheets of 'insides', 2 cording quires of 20 sheets of 'outsides')\n*480 sheets – (20 short quires of 24 sheets) – now called 'short' ream (As an old UK and US measure, in some sources, a ream was previously equal to 480 sheets.)\n*500 sheets – (20 quires of 25 sheets) – now also called 'long' ream\n*504 sheets – Stationer's ream (21 short quires)\n*516 sheets – Printer's ream (21½ short quires) – also called 'perfect ream'\n\nReams of 500 sheets were mostly used only for newsprint. Since the late 20th century, the 500-sheet ream has become the de facto international standard.\n\nBale\n\nA paper bale is a quantity of sheets of paper, currently standardized as 5,000 sheets. A bale consists of 5 bundles, 10 reams or 200 quires. As an old UK and US measure, it was previously equal to 4800 sheets.\n\nBundle\n\nA paper bundle is a quantity of sheets of paper, currently standardized as 1,000 sheets. A bundle consists of 2 reams or 40 quires. As an old UK and US measure, it was previously equal to 960 sheets.\n\nWhen referring to chipboard, there are two standards in the US. \n\nIn general, a package of approximately 50 pounds of chipboard is called a bundle. Thus, a bundle of 22 point chipboard (0.022\" thick) 24\" × 38\", with each sheet weighing 0.556 pounds, contains 90 sheets. \n\nHowever, chipboard sold in size 11\" × 17\" and smaller is packaged and sold as bundles of 25 pounds." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "Percentage.txt" ], "title": [ "Percentage" ], "wiki_context": [ "In mathematics, a percentage is a number or ratio expressed as a fraction of 100. It is often denoted using the percent sign, \"%\", or the abbreviations \"pct.\", \"pct\"; sometimes the abbreviation \"pc\" is also used. A percentage is a dimensionless number (pure number).\n\nExamples \n\nFor example, 45% (read as \"forty-five percent\") is equal to fraction (mathematics)|, or 0.45. \nPercentages which are not ratios are expressed as a relationship of the part to the whole. For example, if the whole was the total number of students in a class, when 50% of the students in the class were male that means that 50 out of every 100 students were male. If there were 1000 students then 500 would be male. A related system which expresses a number as a fraction of 1,000 uses the terms \"per mil\" and \"millage\". Percentages are used as ratios to express how large or small one quantity is relative to another quantity. The first quantity usually represents a part of, or a change in, the second quantity. For example, an increase of $0.15 on a price of $2.50 is an increase by a fraction of = 0.06. Expressed as a percentage, this is therefore a 6% increase. While percentage values may often be limited to lie between 0 and 100, there is no mathematical restriction and percentages may take on other values. For example, it is common to refer to 111% or −35%, especially for percent changes and comparisons.\n\nHistory \n\nIn Ancient Rome, long before the existence of the decimal system, computations were often made in fractions which were multiples of . For example, Augustus levied a tax of on goods sold at auction known as centesima rerum venalium. Computation with these fractions was similar to computing percentages. As denominations of money grew in the Middle Ages, computations with a denominator of 100 became more standard and from the late 15th century to the early 16th century it became common for arithmetic texts to include such computations. Many of these texts applied these methods to profit and loss, interest rates, and the Rule of Three. By the 17th century it was standard to quote interest rates in hundredths. \n\nPercent sign\n\nThe term \"per cent\" is derived from the Latin per centum, meaning \"by the hundred\". \nThe sign for \"per cent\" evolved by gradual contraction of the Italian term per cento, meaning \"for a hundred\". The \"per\" was often abbreviated as \"p.\" and eventually disappeared entirely. The \"cento\" was contracted to two circles separated by a horizontal line, from which the modern \"%\" symbol is derived. \n\nCalculations \n\nThe percent value is computed by multiplying the numeric value of the ratio by 100. For example, to find 50 apples as a percentage of 1250 apples, first compute the ratio = 0.04, and then multiply by 100 to obtain 4%. The percent value can also be found by multiplying first, so in this example the 50 would be multiplied by 100 to give 5,000, and this result would be divided by 1250 to give 4%.\n\nTo calculate a percentage of a percentage, convert both percentages to fractions of 100, or to decimals, and multiply them. For example, 50% of 40% is:\nIt is not correct to divide by 100 and use the percent sign at the same time. (E.g. , not , which actually is . A term such as would also be incorrect, this would be read as 1 percent even if the intent was to say 100%.)\n\nWhenever we talk about a percentage, it is important to specify what it is relative to, i.e. what is the total that corresponds to 100%. The following problem illustrates this point.\n\nIn a certain college 60% of all students are female, and 10% of all students are computer science majors. If 5% of female students are computer science majors, what percentage of computer science majors are female?\n\nWe are asked to compute the ratio of female computer science majors to all computer science majors. We know that 60% of all students are female, and among these 5% are computer science majors, so we conclude that × or 3% of all students are female computer science majors. Dividing this by the 10% of all students that are computer science majors, we arrive at the answer: \n or 30% of all computer science majors are female.\n\nThis example is closely related to the concept of conditional probability.\n\nPercentage increase and decrease \n\nSometimes due to inconsistent usage, it is not always clear from the context what a percentage is relative to. When speaking of a \"10% rise\" or a \"10% fall\" in a quantity, the usual interpretation is that this is relative to the initial value of that quantity. For example, if an item is initially priced at $200 and the price rises 10% (an increase of $20), the new price will be $220. Note that this final price is 110% of the initial price (100% + 10% = 110%).\n\nSome other examples of percent changes:\n* An increase of 100% in a quantity means that the final amount is 200% of the initial amount (100% of initial + 100% of increase = 200% of initial); in other words, the quantity has doubled.\n* An increase of 800% means the final amount is 9 times the original (100% + 800% 900% \n 9 times as large).\n* A decrease of 60% means the final amount is 40% of the original (100% – 60% = 40%).\n* A decrease of 100% means the final amount is zero (100% – 100% = 0%).\n\nIn general, a change of percent in a quantity results in a final amount that is 100 +  percent of the original amount (equivalently, 1 + 0.01 times the original amount).\n\nCompounding percentages\n\nIt is important to understand that percent changes, as they have been discussed here, do not add in the usual way, if applied sequentially. For example, if the 10% increase in price considered earlier (on the $200 item, raising its price to $220) is followed by a 10% decrease in the price (a decrease of $22), the final price will be $198, not the original price of $200. The reason for the apparent discrepancy is that the two percent changes (+10% and −10%) are measured relative to different quantities ($200 and $220, respectively), and thus do not \"cancel out\".\n\nIn general, if an increase of percent is followed by a decrease of percent, and the initial amount was , the final amount is ; thus the net change is an overall decrease by percent of percent (the square of the original percent change when expressed as a decimal number). Thus, in the above example, after an increase and decrease of , the final amount, $198, was 10% of 10%, or 1%, less than the initial amount of $200. The net change is the same for a decrease of percent followed by an increase of percent; the final amount is .\n\nThis can be expanded for a case where you do not have the same percent change. If the initial percent change is and the second percent change is , and the initial amount was , then the final amount is . To change the above example, after an increase of and decrease of , the final amount, $209, is 4.5% more than the initial amount of $200.\n\nAs shown above, percent changes can be applied in any order and have the same effect.\n\nIn the case of interest rates, a very common but mathematically incorrect way to state that an interest rate rose from 10% to 15%, for example, is to say that the interest rate increased by 5 percent, when in fact what is meant is that the interest rate increased by 5 percentage points (pp). As a result, people often don't understand until later the shocking truth that their monthly payments on a loan will increase by 20 percent when banks or journalists (incorrectly) talk about a 2% increase when they actually mean an increase from 10% to 12%. The same confusion between the different concepts of percent(age) and percentage points causes major misunderstandings when journalists regularly incorrectly report about election results, for example. In talking about bonds, it is common to refer to an increase of one percentage point as an increase of 100 basis points.\n\nWord and symbol \n\nIn British English, percent is sometimes written as two words (per cent, although percentage and percentile are written as one word). In American English, percent is the most common variant (but cf. per mille written as two words).\n\nIn the early part of the twentieth century, there was a dotted abbreviation form \"per cent.\", as opposed to \"per cent\". The form \"per cent.\" is still in use as a part of the highly formal language found in certain documents like commercial loan agreements (particularly those subject to, or inspired by, common law), as well as in the Hansard transcripts of British Parliamentary proceedings. The term has been attributed to Latin per centum. The concept of considering values as parts of a hundred is originally Greek. The symbol for percent (%) evolved from a symbol abbreviating the Italian per cento. In some other languages, the form procent or prosent is used instead. Some languages use both a word derived from percent and an expression in that language meaning the same thing, e.g. Romanian procent and la sută (thus, 10 % can be read or sometimes written ten for [each] hundred, similarly with the English one out of ten). Other abbreviations are rarer, but sometimes seen.\n\nGrammar and style guides often differ as to how percentages are to be written. For instance, it is commonly suggested that the word percent (or per cent) be spelled out in all texts, as in \"1 percent\" and not \"1%\". Other guides prefer the word to be written out in humanistic texts, but the symbol to be used in scientific texts. Most guides agree that they always be written with a numeral, as in \"5 percent\" and not \"five percent\", the only exception being at the beginning of a sentence: \"Ten percent of all writers love style guides.\" Decimals are also to be used instead of fractions, as in \"3.5 percent of the gain\" and not \" percent of the gain\". It is also widely accepted to use the percent symbol (%) in tabular and graphic material.\n\nIn line with common English practice, style guides—such as The Chicago Manual of Style—generally state that the number and percent sign are written without any space in between. \nHowever, the International System of Units and the ISO 31-0 standard require a space. \n\nRelated units \n\n* Percentage point\n* Per mille (‰) 1 part in 1,000\n* Basis point (‱) 1 part in 10,000\n* Per cent mille (pcm) 1 part in 100,000\n* Parts-per notation\n* Grade (slope)\n* Per-unit system\n\nOther uses \n\nThe word \"percentage\" is often a misnomer in the context of sports statistics, when the referenced number is expressed as a decimal proportion, not a percentage: \"The Phoenix Suns' Shaquille O'Neal led the NBA with a .609 field goal percentage (FG%) during the 2008–09 season.\" (O'Neal made 60.9% of his shots, not 0.609%.) Likewise, the winning percentage of a team, the fraction of matches that the club has won, is also usually expressed as a decimal proportion; a team that has a .500 winning percentage has won 50% of their matches. The practice is probably related to the similar way that batting averages are quoted.\n\nAs \"percent\" it is used to describe the steepness of the slope of a road or railway, formula for which is 100 ×  which could also be expressed as the tangent of the angle of inclination times 100. This is the ratio of distances a vehicle would advance vertically and horizontally, respectively, when going up- or downhill, expressed in percent.\n\nPercentage is also used to express composition of a mixture by mass percent and mole percent.\n\nPractical applications \n\n* Baker percentage\n* Volume percent" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Green_tea.txt" ], "title": [ "Green tea" ], "wiki_context": [ "Green tea is made from Camellia sinensis leaves that have not undergone the same withering and oxidation applied when processing Camellia sinensis into oolong tea and black tea. Green tea originated in China, but its production has spread to many countries in Asia.\n\nSeveral varieties of green tea exist, which differ substantially due to growing conditions, horticulture, production processing, and time of harvest.\n\nHistory\n\nTea consumption has its legendary origins in China dating back to more than 4,000 years ago, making it the oldest plant-based tea known. According to legend, green tea was first brewed in 2737 BC during the reign of Emperor Shennong. \n\nA book written by Lu Yu in 600-900 AD (Tang Dynasty), \"Tea Classic\" (), is considered important in green tea history. The Kissa Yojoki (喫茶養生記 Book of Tea), written by Zen priest Eisai in 1191, describes how drinking green tea may affect five vital organs, the shapes of tea plants, flowers and leaves, and how to grow and process tea leaves.\n\nBrewing and serving\n\nSteeping is the process of making a cup of tea; it is also referred to as brewing. In general, two grams of tea per 100 ml of water, or about one teaspoon of green tea per five-ounce (150 ml) cup, should be used. With very high-quality teas like gyokuro, more than this amount of leaf is used, and the leaf is steeped multiple times for short durations.\n\nGreen tea steeping time and temperature vary with a different tea. The hottest steeping temperatures are 81 to water and the longest steeping times two to three minutes. The coolest brewing temperatures are 61 to and the shortest times about 30 seconds. In general, lower-quality green teas are steeped hotter and longer, whereas higher-quality teas are steeped cooler and shorter. Steeping green tea too hot or too long will result in a bitter, astringent brew, regardless of the initial quality, because it will result in the release of an excessive amount of tannins. High-quality green teas can be and usually are steeped multiple times; two or three steepings is typical. The steeping technique also plays a very important role in avoiding the tea developing an overcooked taste. The container in which the tea is steeped or teapot should also be warmed beforehand so that the tea does not immediately cool down. It is common practice for tea leaf to be left in the cup or pot and for hot water to be added as the tea is drunk until the flavor degrades.\n\nResearch and health effects\n\nRegular green tea is 99.9% water, provides 1 Calorie per 100 mL serving, is devoid of significant nutrient content (table) and contains phytochemicals, such as polyphenols and caffeine. Polyphenols found in green tea include epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), epicatechin gallate, epicatechins and flavanols.\n\nAlthough numerous claims have been made for the health benefits of green tea, human clinical research has not provided conclusive evidence of any effects. In 2011, a panel of scientists published a report on the claims for health effects at the request of the European Commission: in general they found that the claims made for green tea were not supported by sufficient scientific evidence. Although the mean content of flavonoids and catechins in a cup of green tea is higher than that in the same volume of other food and drink items that are traditionally considered to promote health, flavonoids and catechins have no proven biological effect in humans. \n\nCancer\n\nThere is no conclusive evidence that green tea helps to prevent or treat cancer in people. A review of existing studies concluded that while suggestive evidence existed, it did not amount to a clear indication of benefit.\n\nDaily consumption of black tea (but not green tea) has been associated with a significant reduction in death from all cancers. There is limited evidence to suggest that green tea consumption may be associated with a slightly lower risk of esophageal cancer in the Chinese population, a lower risk of lung cancer in women, and a lower risk of oral cancer in Asian people. A 2015 meta-analysis of nine prospective cohort studies concluded that a high amount of green tea consumption may be associated with a lower risk of liver cancer in Asian women. This association was not seen in Asian men or when one cup of green tea was consumed daily. Similarly, another analysis of observational data conducted in 2012 suggested that green tea consumption may have a favorable effect on lung cancer risk. The observed effect was strongest in those who consumed more than seven cups of green tea daily. A 2011 meta-analysis of epidemiological studies found limited evidence that green tea consumption may be associated with a moderately reduced risk of liver cancer in Chinese and Japanese people. \n\nLimited evidence suggests that green tea consumption is not associated with the risk of developing pancreatic cancer or prostate cancer. The link between green tea consumption and stomach cancer risk is unclear due to inconsistent evidence. \n\nGreen tea interferes with the chemotherapy drug bortezomib (Velcade) and other boronic acid-based proteasome inhibitors, and should be avoided by people taking these medications. \n\nCardiovascular disease\n\nDaily consumption of green tea has been associated with a lower risk of death from cardiovascular disease. In a 2015 meta-analysis of observational studies, an increase in one cup of green tea per day was associated with a 5% lower risk of death from cardiovascular causes. Green tea consumption may be associated with a reduced risk of stroke. A 2013 Cochrane review of randomized controlled trials concluded that green tea consumption for 3–6 months appears to lower systolic and diastolic blood pressures a small amount (about 3 mm Hg each). Additional analyses examining the effects of long-term green tea consumption on blood pressure have reached similar conclusions. \n\nGlycemic control\n\nGreen tea consumption lowers fasting blood sugar but in clinical studies the beverage's effect on hemoglobin A1c and fasting insulin levels was inconsistent. \n\nHyperlipidemia\n\nDrinking green tea or taking green tea supplements decreases the blood concentration of total cholesterol (about 7 mg/dL), LDL cholesterol (about 2 mg/dL), and does not affect the concentration of HDL cholesterol. A 2013 Cochrane review performed a meta-analysis of longer-term randomized controlled trials (>3 months duration) and concluded that green tea consumption lowers total and LDL cholesterol concentrations in the blood.\n\nInflammation\n\nA 2015 systematic review and meta-analysis of 11 randomized controlled trials found that green tea consumption was not significantly associated with lower plasma levels of C-reactive protein levels (a marker of inflammation). \n\nMortality risk\n\nDaily consumption of green tea is significantly associated with a lower risk of death from any cause; an increase of one cup of green tea per day is linked with a 4% lower risk of death from any cause. A separate analysis found an increase of three cups of green tea per day was associated with a lower risk of death from any cause.\n\nWeight loss\n\nThere is no conclusive evidence that green tea aids in weight loss.\n\nToxicity\n\nModerate, regular, and habitual consumption of green tea is safe; however, there are reports of liver toxicity in humans after consuming high doses (10–29 mg/kg/day) of green tea extract dietary supplements. \n\nProduction\n\nGrowing, harvesting and processing\n\nGreen tea is processed and grown in a variety of ways, depending on the type of green tea desired. As a result of these methods, maximum amounts of polyphenols and volatile organic compounds are retained, affecting aroma and taste. The growing conditions can be broken down into two basic types − those grown in the sun and those grown under the shade. The green tea plants are grown in rows that are pruned to produce shoots in a regular manner, and in general are harvested three times per year. The first flush takes place in late April to early May. The second harvest usually takes place from June through July, and the third picking takes place in late July to early August. Sometimes, there will also be the fourth harvest. It is the first flush in the spring that brings the best-quality leaves, with higher prices to match.\n\nGreen tea is processed using either artisanal or modern methods. Sun-drying, basket or charcoal firing, or pan-firing are common artisanal methods. Oven-drying, tumbling, or steaming are common modern methods. Processed green teas, known as aracha are stored under low humidity refrigeration in 30- or 60-kg paper bags at 0 -. This aracha has yet to be refined at this stage, with a final firing taking place before blending, selection and packaging take place. The leaves in this state will be re-fired throughout the year as they are needed, giving the green teas a longer shelf-life and better flavor. The first flush tea of May will readily store in this fashion until the next year's harvest. After this re-drying process, each crude tea will be sifted and graded according to size. Finally, each lot will be blended according to the blending order by the tasters and packed for sale. \n\nProduction by country\n\nImport of Japanese tea\n\nOn 17 June 2011, radioactive cesium of 1,038 becquerels per kilogram was detected at Charles de Gaulle airport in France in tea leaves imported from Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan, which was more than twice as much as the restricted amount of 500 becquerels per kilogram designated by the European Union, and the government of France announced that they rejected the tea leaves, which amounted to 162 kg. The governor of Shizuoka Prefecture Heita Kawakatsu stated that \"there is absolutely no problem when they [people] drink them because it will be diluted to about ten becquerels per kilogram when they steep them even if the leaves have 1,000 becquerels per kilogram,\" which was a consequence of own examinations of the prefecture. Minister for Consumer Affairs and Food Safety Renhō stated on 3 June 2011, that \"there are cases in which aracha are sold as furikake [condiments sprinkled on rice] and so on and they are eaten as they are, therefore we think that it is important to inspect tea leaves including aracha from the viewpoint of consumers' safety.\" \n\nGreen tea by country\n\nChina\n\nGreen tea is the most popular form of tea in China. Chinese green teas are made from over 600 different cultivars of the Camellia sinensis plant, giving plenty of variety and regional teas. Chinese green teas are traditionally pan-fired, unlike the Japanese steaming process. Other processes in China include oven-dried and sun-dried. Due to the different production process, Chinese teas are said to have a more \"earthy\" taste than Japanese teas. \n*Zhejiang Province is home to the most famous of all teas, Xi Hu Longjing (西湖龙井), as well as many other high-quality green teas.\n* 龙井 Longjing\n: Maybe the most well-known green tea in China; originates from Hangzhou (杭州), the capital of Zhejiang Province. Longjing in Chinese literally means dragon well. It is pan-fired and has a distinctive flat appearance. The tasteless frying oil is obtained from tea seeds and other plants. There are many fake Longjings on the market and in less-scrupulous tea houses around the country.\n* 景宁惠明茶 Huiming\n: Named after a temple in Zhejiang.\n* 开化龙顶 Kaihua Longding\n: A tea from Kaihua County known as Dragon Mountain.\n* 华顶云雾 Hua Ding\n: A tea from Tiantai County, named after a peak in the Tiantai mountain range.\n* 天目青顶 Qing Ding\n: A tea from Tian Mu, also known as Green Top.\n* 平水珠茶 Gunpowder\n: This popular tea is also known as zhuchá, originates in Zhejiang but is now grown elsewhere in China. This tea is also the quintessential ingredient in brewing Maghrebi mint tea, which is brewed green tea with fresh mint.\n\n*Jiangsu Province\n\n* 洞庭碧螺春 Bi Luo Chun\n: A Chinese famous tea also known as Green Snail Spring, from Dong Ting. As with Longjing, inauthentic Bi Luo Chun is common and most of the tea marketed under this name may, in fact, be grown in Sichuan.\n* 南京雨花茶 Rain Flower\n: A tea from Nanjing.\n* 金坛雀舌 Que She (Tongue of golden altar sparrow)\n: originate in Jin Tan city of Jiangsu Province.\n* 太湖白云 White Cloud\n\n*Fujian Province is known for mountain-grown organic green tea as well as white tea and oolong tea. The coastal mountains provide a perfect growing environment for tea growing. Green tea is picked in spring and summer seasons.\n* 茉莉花茶 Jasmine tea (Mo Li Hua Cha)\n: A tea with added jasmine flowers.\n* 毛峰 Mao Feng tea\n: Meaning \"furry peak\".\n* 翠剑 Cui Jian\n: Meaning \"jade sword\".\n\n*Hubei Province\n* 玉露 \n: A steamed tea also known as Gyokuro (Jade Dew) in Japanese, made in the Japanese style.\n\n*Henan Province\n\n* 信阳毛尖 Xin Yang Mao Jian\n: A Chinese famous tea also known as Green Tip, or Tippy Green.\n\n*Jiangxi Province\n* 珍眉 Chun Mee\n: Meaning \"precious eyebrows\"; from Jiangxi, it is now grown elsewhere.\n* 狗牯 Gou Gu Nao\n: A well-known tea within China and recipient of numerous national awards.\n* 云雾 Yun Wu\n: A tea also known as Cloud and Mist.\n\n*Anhui Province is home to several varieties of tea, including three Chinese famous teas. These are:\n* 大方 Da Fang\n: A tea from Huangshan also known as Big Square suneet.\n* 黄山毛峰 Huangshan Maofeng\n: A Chinese famous tea from Huangshan\n* 六安瓜片 Liuan Leaf\n: A Chinese famous tea also known as Melon Seed\n* 猴魁 Hou Kui\n: A Chinese famous tea also known as Monkey tea\n* 屯绿 Tun Lu\n: A tea from Tunxi District.\n* 火青 Huo Qing\n: A tea from Jing County, also known as Fire Green\n* 雾里青 Wuliqing\n: Wuliqing was known since the Song dynasty. Since 2002, Wuliqing is produced again according to the original processing methods by a company called Tianfang (天方). Zhan Luojiu a tea expert and professor at the Anhui Agricultural University who revived its production procedure.\n* Hyson\n: A medium-quality tea from many provinces, an early harvested tea.\n\n*Sichuan Province\n* 竹叶青茶 Zhu Ye Qing \n: Also known as Meng Ding Cui Zhu or Green Bamboo\n* 蒙顶甘露 Meng Ding Gan Lu\n: A yellowish-green tea with sweet after taste.\n* 百美绿茶 Baimei Green Tea\n\n*Shaanxi Province\n* 汉中仙毫 Han Zhong Xian Hao \n: A green tea from the Han Zhong.\n\n Japan\n\n is ubiquitous in Japan and is commonly known simply as . Tea was first used in China, and in 1191, was brought to Japan by Myōan Eisai, a Japanese Buddhist priest who also introduced the Rinzai school of Zen Buddhism. Teas from Japan may be referred to as .\n\nJapanese green teas are mainly made from Yabukita (やぶきた), a cultivar of the camellia sinensis plant. Unlike Chinese green teas which are pan-fired, Japanese green teas are steamed giving them a more \"vegetative\" or \"leafy\" taste. The exception is hōjicha, a Japanese roasted tea. Japanese green teas are categorized by the age of the leaves: young leaves are called sencha and the more mature, larger leaves are called bancha. Types of tea are commonly graded depending on the quality and the parts of the plant used as well as how they are processed. There are large variations in both price and quality within these broad categories, and there are many green teas that fall outside this spectrum. Here shows well-known tea-growing districts in Japan; Shizuoka Prefecture (Shizuoka-cha, the largest yield in Japan), Uji region of Kyoto Prefecture (Uji-cha), region of Fukuoka Prefecture (Yame-cha), Kagoshima Prefecture (Chiran-cha).\n\n* \nThe first and second flushes of green tea made from leaves that are exposed directly to sunlight. This is the most common green tea in Japan. The name describes the method for preparing the beverage.\n\n* \n: Sencha, which, in the processing of the leaves, has been steamed two times longer than usual Sencha, giving it a deeper color and producing a fuller flavor in the beverage.\n* \nGyokuro is a fine and expensive type that differs from Sencha (煎茶) in that it is grown under the shade rather than the full sun for approximately 20 days. The name \"Gyokuro\" translates as \"jade dew\" and refers to the pale green color of the infusion. The shading causes the amino acids (Theanine) and caffeine in the tea leaves to increase, while catechins (the source of bitterness in tea, along with caffeine) decreases, giving rise to a sweet taste. The tea also has a distinct aroma.\n* \nKabusecha is made from the leaves grown in the shade prior to harvest, although not for as long as Gyokuro. It has a more delicate flavor than Sencha. It is sometimes marketed as Gyokuro.\n* \nTamaryokucha has a tangy, berry-like taste, with a long almondy aftertaste and a deep aroma with tones of citrus, grass, and berries. It is also called Guricha.\n* \nLower grade of Sencha harvested as a third- or fourth flush tea between summer and autumn. Aki-Bancha (autumn Bancha) is not made from entire leaves, but from the trimmed unnecessary twigs of the tea plant.\n* \nKamairicha is a pan-fired green tea that does not undergo the usual steam treatments of Japanese tea and does not have the characteristic bitter taste of most Japanese tea.\n* By-product of Sencha or Gyokuro\n\n*\n: A tea made from stems, stalks, and twigs. Kukicha has a mildly nutty, and slightly creamy sweet flavor.\n\n*\n: Mecha is green tea derived from a collection of leaf buds and tips of the early crops. Mecha is harvested in spring and made as rolled leaf teas that are graded somewhere between Gyokuro and Sencha in quality.\n\n*\n: Konacha is the dust and smallest parts after processing Gyokuro or Sencha. It is cheaper than Sencha and usually served at Sushi restaurants. It is also marketed as or Gyokurokocha.\n* Other\n\n*\n: A fine ground tea made from Tencha. It has a very similar cultivation process as Gyokuro. It is expensive and is used primarily in the Japanese tea ceremony. Matcha is also a popular flavor of ice cream and other sweets in Japan.\n\n*\n: Half-finished products used for Matcha production. The name indicates its intended eventual milling into matcha. Because, like gyokuro, it is cultivated in shade, it has a sweet aroma. In its processing, it is not rolled during drying, and tencha, therefore, remains spread out like the original fresh leaf.\n\n*\n: Bancha (sometimes Sencha) and roasted genmai (brown rice) blend. It is often mixed with a small amount of Matcha to make the color better.\n\n*\n: A green tea roasted over charcoal (usually Bancha).\n\n*\n: Half-finished products used for Sencha and Gyokuro production. It contains all parts of the tea plant.\n\n*\n: First flush tea. The name is used for either Sencha or Gyokuro.\n\n*\n: Milled green tea, used just like instant coffee.　Another name for this recent style of tea is \"tokeru ocha,\" or \"tea that melts.\"\n\nKorea\n\n*Ujeoncha ()\n\n*Sejakcha ()\n\nOther countries\n\n* Green tea from Ceylon\n* Kahwah\n* New Zealand - Zealong" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Rosa_Parks.txt" ], "title": [ "Rosa Parks" ], "wiki_context": [ "Rosa Louise McCauley Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was an African American civil rights activist, whom the United States Congress called \"the first lady of civil rights\" and \"the mother of the freedom movement\". Her birthday, February 4, and the day she was arrested, December 1, have both become Rosa Parks Day, commemorated in California and Missouri (February 4), and Ohio and Oregon (December 1).\n\nOn December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Parks refused to obey bus driver James F. Blake's order to give up her seat in the colored section to a white passenger, after the white section was filled. Parks was not the first person to resist bus segregation. Others had taken similar steps, including Bayard Rustin in 1942, Irene Morgan in 1946, Sarah Louise Keys in 1952, and the members of the ultimately successful Browder v. Gayle 1956 lawsuit (Claudette Colvin, Aurelia Browder, Susie McDonald, and Mary Louise Smith) who were arrested in Montgomery for not giving up their bus seats months before Parks. NAACP organizers believed that Parks was the best candidate for seeing through a court challenge after her arrest for civil disobedience in violating Alabama segregation laws, although eventually her case became bogged down in the state courts while the Browder v. Gayle case succeeded. \n\nParks' act of defiance and the Montgomery Bus Boycott became important symbols of the modern Civil Rights Movement. She became an international icon of resistance to racial segregation. She organized and collaborated with civil rights leaders, including Edgar Nixon, president of the local chapter of the NAACP; and Martin Luther King, Jr., a new minister in town who gained national prominence in the civil rights movement.\n\nAt the time, Parks was secretary of the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP. She had recently attended the Highlander Folk School, a Tennessee center for training activists for workers' rights and racial equality. She acted as a private citizen \"tired of giving in\". Although widely honored in later years, she also suffered for her act; she was fired from her job as a seamstress in a local department store, and received death threats for years afterwards. Her situation also opened doors.\n\nShortly after the boycott, she moved to Detroit, where she briefly found similar work. From 1965 to 1988 she served as secretary and receptionist to John Conyers, an African-American US Representative. She was also active in the Black Power movement and the support of political prisoners in the US.\n\nAfter retirement, Parks wrote her autobiography and lived a largely private life in Detroit. In her final years, she suffered from dementia. Parks received national recognition, including the NAACP's 1979 Spingarn Medal, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal, and a posthumous statue in the United States Capitol's National Statuary Hall. Upon her death in 2005, she was the first woman and third non-US government official to lie in honor at the Capitol Rotunda.\n\nEarly years\n\nRosa Parks was born Rosa Louise McCauley in Tuskegee, Alabama, on February 4, 1913, to Leona (née Edwards), a teacher, and James McCauley, a carpenter. She was of African ancestry, though one of her great-grandfathers was Scots-Irish and one of her great-grandmothers was a slave of Native American descent. Webb, James. , Parade, October 3, 2004. Retrieved July 1, 2008. She was small as a child and suffered poor health with chronic tonsillitis. When her parents separated, she moved with her mother to Pine Level, just outside the state capital, Montgomery. She grew up on a farm with her maternal grandparents, mother, and younger brother Sylvester. They all were members of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME), a century-old independent black denomination founded by free blacks in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the early nineteenth century.\n\nMcCauley attended rural schools until the age of eleven. As a student at the Industrial School for Girls in Montgomery, she took academic and vocational courses. Parks went on to a laboratory school set up by the Alabama State Teachers College for Negroes for secondary education, but dropped out in order to care for her grandmother and later her mother, after they became ill. \n\nAround the turn of the 20th century, the former Confederate states had adopted new constitutions and electoral laws that effectively disfranchised black voters and, in Alabama, many poor white voters as well. Under the white-established Jim Crow laws, passed after Democrats regained control of southern legislatures, racial segregation was imposed in public facilities and retail stores in the South, including public transportation. Bus and train companies enforced seating policies with separate sections for blacks and whites. School bus transportation was unavailable in any form for black schoolchildren in the South, and black education was always underfunded.\n\nParks recalled going to elementary school in Pine Level, where school buses took white students to their new school and black students had to walk to theirs:\n\nI'd see the bus pass every day... But to me, that was a way of life; we had no choice but to accept what was the custom. The bus was among the first ways I realized there was a black world and a white world.\n\nAlthough Parks' autobiography recounts early memories of the kindness of white strangers, she could not ignore the racism of her society. When the Ku Klux Klan marched down the street in front of their house, Parks recalls her grandfather guarding the front door with a shotgun. The Montgomery Industrial School, founded and staffed by white northerners for black children, was burned twice by arsonists. Its faculty was ostracized by the white community.\n\nRepeatedly bullied by white children in her neighborhood, Parks often fought back physically. She later said that \"As far back as I remember, I could never think in terms of accepting physical abuse without some form of retaliation if possible.\" \n\nIn 1932, Rosa married Raymond Parks, a barber from Montgomery. He was a member of the NAACP, which at the time was collecting money to support the defense of the Scottsboro Boys, a group of black men falsely accused of raping two white women. Rosa took numerous jobs, ranging from domestic worker to hospital aide. At her husband's urging, she finished her high school studies in 1933, at a time when less than 7% of African Americans had a high school diploma. Despite the Jim Crow laws and discrimination by registrars, she succeeded in registering to vote on her third try.\n\nIn December 1943, Parks became active in the Civil Rights Movement, joined the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP, and was elected secretary. She later said, \"I was the only woman there, and they needed a secretary, and I was too timid to say no.\" She continued as secretary until 1957. She worked for the local NAACP leader Edgar Nixon, even though he maintained that \"Women don't need to be nowhere but in the kitchen.\" When Parks asked \"Well, what about me?\", he replied \"I need a secretary and you are a good one.\"\n\nIn 1944, in her capacity as secretary, she investigated the gang-rape of Recy Taylor, a black woman from Abbeville, Alabama. Parks and other civil rights activists organized the \"Committee for Equal Justice for Mrs. Recy Taylor\", launching what the Chicago Defender called \"the strongest campaign for equal justice to be seen in a decade.\" \n\nAlthough never a member of the Communist Party, she attended meetings with her husband. The notorious Scottsboro case had been brought to prominence by the Communist Party. \n\nIn the 1940s, Parks and her husband were members of the Voters' League. Sometime soon after 1944, she held a brief job at Maxwell Air Force Base, which, despite its location in Montgomery, Alabama, did not permit racial segregation because it was federal property. She rode on its integrated trolley. Speaking to her biographer, Parks noted, \"You might just say Maxwell opened my eyes up.\" Parks worked as a housekeeper and seamstress for Clifford and Virginia Durr, a white couple. Politically liberal, the Durrs became her friends. They encouraged—and eventually helped sponsor—Parks in the summer of 1955 to attend the Highlander Folk School, an education center for activism in workers' rights and racial equality in Monteagle, Tennessee. There Parks was mentored by the veteran organizer Septima Clark.\n\nIn August 1955, black teenager Emmett Till was brutally murdered after reportedly flirting with a young white woman while visiting relatives in Mississippi.[http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2004/May/04_crt_311.htm \"Justice Department to Investigate 1955 Emmett Till Murder\"], United States Department of Justice, May 2004, accessed May 27, 2007. R. Alexander Acosta, Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division, states, \"This brutal murder and grotesque miscarriage of justice outraged a nation and helped galvanize support for the modern American civil rights movement.\" On November 27, 1955, Rosa Parks attended a mass meeting in Montgomery that addressed this case as well as the recent murders of the activists George W. Lee and Lamar Smith. The featured speaker was T. R. M. Howard, a black civil rights leader from Mississippi who headed the Regional Council of Negro Leadership. The discussions concerned actions blacks could take to gain respect for their rights.\n\nParks and the Montgomery bus boycott\n\nMontgomery buses: law and prevailing customs\n\nIn 1900, Montgomery had passed a city ordinance to segregate bus passengers by race. Conductors were empowered to assign seats to achieve that goal. According to the law, no passenger would be required to move or give up his seat and stand if the bus was crowded and no other seats were available. Over time and by custom, however, Montgomery bus drivers adopted the practice of requiring black riders to move when there were no white-only seats left.\n\nThe first four rows of seats on each Montgomery bus were reserved for whites. Buses had \"colored\" sections for black people generally in the rear of the bus, although blacks composed more than 75% of the ridership. The sections were not fixed but were determined by placement of a movable sign. Black people could sit in the middle rows until the white section filled; if more whites needed seats, blacks were to move to seats in the rear, stand, or, if there was no room, leave the bus. Black people could not sit across the aisle in the same row as white people. The driver could move the \"colored\" section sign, or remove it altogether. If white people were already sitting in the front, black people had to board at the front to pay the fare, then disembark and reenter through the rear door.\n\nFor years, the black community had complained that the situation was unfair. Parks said, \"My resisting being mistreated on the bus did not begin with that particular arrest...I did a lot of walking in Montgomery.\"\n\nOne day in 1943, Parks boarded the bus and paid the fare. She then moved to her seat but driver James F. Blake told her to follow city rules and enter the bus again from the back door. Parks exited the vehicle and waited for the next bus, determined never to ride with Blake again. \n\nHer refusal to move\n\nAfter working all day, Parks boarded the Cleveland Avenue bus, a General Motors Old Look bus belonging to the Montgomery City Lines, around 6 p.m., Thursday, December 1, 1955, in downtown Montgomery. She paid her fare and sat in an empty seat in the first row of back seats reserved for blacks in the \"colored\" section. Near the middle of the bus, her row was directly behind the ten seats reserved for white passengers. Initially, she did not notice that the bus driver was the same man, James F. Blake, who had left her in the rain in 1943. As the bus traveled along its regular route, all of the white-only seats in the bus filled up. The bus reached the third stop in front of the Empire Theater, and several white passengers boarded.\nBlake noted that two or three white passengers were standing, as the front of the bus had filled to capacity. He moved the \"colored\" section sign behind Parks and demanded that four black people give up their seats in the middle section so that the white passengers could sit. Years later, in recalling the events of the day, Parks said, \"When that white driver stepped back toward us, when he waved his hand and ordered us up and out of our seats, I felt a determination to cover my body like a quilt on a winter night.\" \n\nBy Parks' account, Blake said, \"Y'all better make it light on yourselves and let me have those seats.\" linked at Three of them complied. Parks said, \"The driver wanted us to stand up, the four of us. We didn't move at the beginning, but he says, 'Let me have these seats.' And the other three people moved, but I didn't.\"[http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/10/24/parks.obit/ \"Civil rights icon Rosa Parks dies at 92\"], CNN, October 25, 2005. Retrieved July 4, 2008. The black man sitting next to her gave up his seat.\n\nParks moved, but toward the window seat; she did not get up to move to the redesignated colored section.Audio interview of Parks linked from [http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId\n4973548&sourceCode=gaw \"Civil Rights Icon Rosa Parks Dies\"], National Public Radio, October 25, 2005. Retrieved July 4, 2008. Parks later said about being asked to move to the rear of the bus, \"I thought of Emmett Till and I just couldn't go back.\" Blake said, \"Why don't you stand up?\" Parks responded, \"I don't think I should have to stand up.\" Blake called the police to arrest Parks. When recalling the incident for Eyes on the Prize, a 1987 public television series on the Civil Rights Movement, Parks said, \"When he saw me still sitting, he asked if I was going to stand up, and I said, 'No, I'm not.' And he said, 'Well, if you don't stand up, I'm going to have to call the police and have you arrested.' I said, 'You may do that.'\" \n\nDuring a 1956 radio interview with Sydney Rogers in West Oakland several months after her arrest, Parks said she had decided, \"I would have to know for once and for all what rights I had as a human being and a citizen.\" \n\nIn her autobiography, My Story she said:\n\nWhen Parks refused to give up her seat, a police officer arrested her. As the officer took her away, she recalled that she asked, \"Why do you push us around?\" She remembered him saying, \"I don't know, but the law's the law, and you're under arrest.\" She later said, \"I only knew that, as I was being arrested, that it was the very last time that I would ever ride in humiliation of this kind...\"\n\nParks was charged with a violation of Chapter 6, Section 11 segregation law of the Montgomery City code, although technically she had not taken a white-only seat; she had been in a colored section. Edgar Nixon, president of the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP and leader of the Pullman Porters Union, and her friend Clifford Durr bailed Parks out of jail the next evening. \n\nThe boycott\n\nNixon conferred with Jo Ann Robinson, an Alabama State College professor and member of the Women's Political Council (WPC), about the Parks case. Robinson believed it important to seize the opportunity and stayed up all night mimeographing over 35,000 handbills announcing a bus boycott. The Women's Political Council was the first group to officially endorse the boycott.\n\nOn Sunday, December 4, 1955, plans for the Montgomery Bus Boycott were announced at black churches in the area, and a front-page article in the Montgomery Advertiser helped spread the word. At a church rally that night, those attending agreed unanimously to continue the boycott until they were treated with the level of courtesy they expected, until black drivers were hired, and until seating in the middle of the bus was handled on a first-come basis.\n\nThe next day, Parks was tried on charges of disorderly conduct and violating a local ordinance. The trial lasted 30 minutes. After being found guilty and fined $10, plus $4 in court costs, Parks appealed her conviction and formally challenged the legality of racial segregation. In a 1992 interview with National Public Radio's Lynn Neary, Parks recalled:\n\nOn the day of Parks' trial — December 5, 1955 — the WPC distributed the 35,000 leaflets. The handbill read,\nWe are...asking every Negro to stay off the buses Monday in protest of the arrest and trial ... You can afford to stay out of school for one day. If you work, take a cab, or walk. But please, children and grown-ups, don't ride the bus at all on Monday. Please stay off the buses Monday.\n\nIt rained that day, but the black community persevered in their boycott. Some rode in carpools, while others traveled in black-operated cabs that charged the same fare as the bus, 10 cents. Most of the remainder of the 40,000 black commuters walked, some as far as 20 mi.\n\nThat evening after the success of the one-day boycott, a group of 16 to 18 people gathered at the Mt. Zion AME Zion Church to discuss boycott strategies. At that time Parks was introduced but not asked to speak, despite a standing ovation and calls from the crowd for her to speak; when she asked if she should say something, the reply was, \"Why, you've said enough.\" \n\nThe group agreed that a new organization was needed to lead the boycott effort if it were to continue. Rev. Ralph Abernathy suggested the name \"Montgomery Improvement Association\" (MIA). The name was adopted, and the MIA was formed. Its members elected as their president Martin Luther King, Jr., a relative newcomer to Montgomery, who was a young and mostly unknown minister of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. \n\nThat Monday night, 50 leaders of the African-American community gathered to discuss actions to respond to Parks' arrest. Edgar Nixon, the president of the NAACP, said, \"My God, look what segregation has put in my hands!\" Parks was considered the ideal plaintiff for a test case against city and state segregation laws, as she was seen as a responsible, mature woman with a good reputation. She was securely married and employed, was regarded as possessing a quiet and dignified demeanor, and was politically savvy. King said that Parks was regarded as \"one of the finest citizens of Montgomery—not one of the finest Negro citizens, but one of the finest citizens of Montgomery.\"\n\nParks' court case was being slowed down in appeals through the Alabama courts on their way to a Federal appeal and the process could have taken years. Holding together a boycott for that length of time would have been a great strain. In the end, black residents of Montgomery continued the boycott for 381 days. Dozens of public buses stood idle for months, severely damaging the bus transit company's finances, until the city repealed its law requiring segregation on public buses following the US Supreme Court ruling in Browder v. Gayle that it was unconstitutional. Parks was not included as a plaintiff in the Browder decision because the attorney Fred Gray concluded the courts would perceive they were attempting to circumvent her prosecution on her charges working their way through the Alabama state court system. \n\nParks played an important part in raising international awareness of the plight of African Americans and the civil rights struggle. King wrote in his 1958 book Stride Toward Freedom that Parks' arrest was the catalyst rather than the cause of the protest: \"The cause lay deep in the record of similar injustices.\" He wrote, \"Actually, no one can understand the action of Mrs. Parks unless he realizes that eventually the cup of endurance runs over, and the human personality cries out, 'I can take it no longer.'\"\n\nDetroit years\n\n1960s\n\nAfter her arrest, Parks became an icon of the Civil Rights Movement but suffered hardships as a result. Due to economic sanctions used against activists, she lost her job at the department store. Her husband quit his job after his boss forbade him to talk about his wife or the legal case. Parks traveled and spoke extensively about the issues.\n\nIn 1957, Raymond and Rosa Parks left Montgomery for Hampton, Virginia; mostly because she was unable to find work. She also disagreed with King and other leaders of Montgomery's struggling civil rights movement about how to proceed, and was constantly receiving death threats. In Hampton, she found a job as a hostess in an inn at Hampton Institute, a historically black college.\n\nLater that year, at the urging of her brother and sister-in-law in Detroit, Sylvester and Daisy McCauley, Rosa and Raymond Parks and her mother moved north to join them. The City of Detroit attempted to cultivate a progressive reputation, but Parks encountered numerous signs of discrimination against African-Americans. Schools were effectively segregated, and services in black neighborhoods substandard. In 1964, Mrs. Parks told an interviewer that, \"I don't feel a great deal of difference here...Housing segregation is just as bad, and it seems more noticeable in the larger cities.\" She regularly participated in the movement for open and fair housing.\n\nParks rendered crucial assistance in the first campaign for Congress by John Conyers. She persuaded Martin Luther King (who was generally reluctant to endorse local candidates) to appear with Conyers, thereby boosting the novice candidate's profile. When Conyers was elected, he hired her as a secretary and receptionist for his congressional office in Detroit. She held this position until she retired in 1988. In a telephone interview with CNN on October 24, 2005, Conyers recalled, \"You treated her with deference because she was so quiet, so serene — just a very special person ... There was only one Rosa Parks.\" Doing much of the daily constituent work for Conyers, Parks often focused on socio-economic issues including welfare, education, job discrimination, and affordable housing. She visited schools, hospitals, senior citizen facilities, and other community meetings and kept Conyers grounded in community concerns and activism.\n\nParks participated in activism nationally during the mid-1960s, traveling to support the Selma-to-Montgomery Marches, the Freedom Now Party, and the Lowndes County Freedom Organization. She also befriended Malcolm X, who she regarded as a personal hero.\n\nLike many Detroit blacks, Mrs. Parks remained particularly concerned about housing issues. She herself lived in a neighborhood, Virginia Park, which had been compromised by highway construction and urban renewal. By 1962, these policies had destroyed 10,000 structures in Detroit, displacing 43,096 people, 70 percent of them African-American. Parks lived just a mile from the epicenter of the riot that took place in Detroit in 1967, and she considered housing discrimination a major factor that provoked the disorder.\n\nIn the aftermath Mrs. Parks collaborated with members of the League of Revolutionary Black Workers and the Republic of New Afrika in raising awareness of police abuse during the conflict. She served on a \"people's tribunal\" investigating the killing of three young men in what was known as the Algiers Hotel Incident. She also helped form the Virginia Park district council to help rebuild the area. The council facilitated the building of the only black-owned shopping center in the country. Parks took part in the black power movement, attending the Philadelphia Black Power conference, and the Black Political Convention in Gary, Indiana. She also supported and visited the Black Panther school in Oakland. \n\n1970s\n\nIn the 1970s, Parks organized for the freedom of political prisoners in the United States, particularly cases involving issues of self-defense. She helped found the Joann Little Defense Committee, and also worked in support of Gary Tyler. Little soon became the first woman in United States history to be acquitted under the defense that she used deadly force to resist sexual assault. Gary Tyler has not been freed, but before Parks' death was recognized as a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International. \n\nThe 1970s were a decade of loss for Parks in her personal life. Her family was plagued with illness; she and her husband had suffered stomach ulcers for years and both required hospitalization. In spite of her fame and constant speaking engagements, Parks was not a wealthy woman. She donated most of the money from speaking to civil rights causes, and lived on her staff salary and her husband's pension. Medical bills and time missed from work caused financial strain that required her to accept assistance from church groups and admirers.\n\nHer husband died of throat cancer on August 19, 1977 and her brother, her only sibling, died of cancer that November. Her personal ordeals caused her to become removed from the civil rights movement. She learned from a newspaper of the death of Fannie Lou Hamer, once a close friend. Parks suffered two broken bones in a fall on an icy sidewalk, an injury which caused considerable and recurring pain. She decided to move with her mother into an apartment for senior citizens. There she nursed her mother Leona through the final stages of cancer and geriatric dementia until she died in 1979 at the age of 92.\n\nFinal years\n\nIn 1980, Parks—widowed and without immediate family—rededicated herself to civil rights and educational organizations. She co-founded the Rosa L. Parks Scholarship Foundation for college-bound high school seniors, to which she donated most of her speaker fees. In February 1987 she co-founded, with Elaine Eason Steele, the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self Development, an institute that runs the \"Pathways to Freedom\" bus tours which introduce young people to important civil rights and Underground Railroad sites throughout the country. Parks also served on the Board of Advocates of Planned Parenthood. Though her health declined as she entered her seventies, Parks continued to make many appearances and devoted considerable energy to these causes.\n\nIn 1992, Parks published Rosa Parks: My Story, an autobiography aimed at younger readers, which recounts her life leading to her decision to keep her seat on the bus. A few years later, she published Quiet Strength (1995), her memoir, which focuses on her faith.\n\nOn August 30, 1994, Joseph Skipper, an African-American drug addict, entered her home to rob it and attacked the 81-year-old Parks. The incident sparked outrage throughout the United States. After his arrest, Skipper said that he had not known he was in Parks' home but recognized her after entering. Skipper asked, \"Hey, aren't you Rosa Parks?\" to which she replied, \"Yes.\" She handed him $3 when he demanded money and an additional $50 when he demanded more. Before fleeing, Skipper struck Parks in the face. Skipper was arrested and charged with various breaking and entering offenses against Parks and other neighborhood victims. He admitted guilt and, on August 8, 1995, was sentenced to eight to 15 years in prison.\"Man Gets Prison Term For Attack on Rosa Parks\", San Francisco Chronicle, August 8, 1995. Suffering anxiety upon returning to her small central Detroit house following the ordeal, Parks moved into Riverfront Towers, a secure high-rise apartment building where she lived for the rest of her life.\n\nIn 1994 the Ku Klux Klan applied to sponsor a portion of United States Interstate 55 in St. Louis County and Jefferson County, Missouri, near St. Louis, for cleanup (which allowed them to have signs stating that this section of highway was maintained by the organization). Since the state could not refuse the KKK's sponsorship, the Missouri legislature voted to name the highway section the \"Rosa Parks Highway\". When asked how she felt about this honor, she is reported to have commented, \"It is always nice to be thought of.\" \n\nIn 1999 Parks filmed a cameo appearance for the television series Touched by an Angel. It was her last appearance on film; health problems made her increasingly an invalid.\n\nIn 2002 Parks received an eviction notice from her $1800 per month apartment due to non-payment of rent. Parks was incapable of managing her own financial affairs by this time due to age-related physical and mental decline. Her rent was paid from a collection taken by Hartford Memorial Baptist Church in Detroit. When her rent became delinquent and her impending eviction was highly publicized in 2004, executives of the ownership company announced they had forgiven the back rent and would allow Parks, by then 91 and in extremely poor health, to live rent free in the building for the remainder of her life. Her heirs and various interest organizations alleged at the time that her financial affairs had been mismanaged.\n\nIn popular culture\n\n*In 1979, the Supersisters trading card set was produced and distributed; one of the cards featured Parks's name and picture. \n*The Neville Brothers recorded a song about Parks called \"Sister Rosa\" on their 1989 album Yellow Moon. A music video for the song was also made.\n*The song \"Daybreak\" from The Stone Roses' 1994 album Second Coming pays tribute to Parks with the line \"Sister Rosa Lee Parks / Love forever her name in your heart\".\n*In March 1999, Parks filed a lawsuit (Rosa Parks v. LaFace Records) against American hip-hop duo OutKast and their record company, claiming that the duo's song \"Rosa Parks\", the most successful radio single of their 1998 album Aquemini, had used her name without permission. The lawsuit was settled on April 15, 2005 (six months and nine days before Parks' death); OutKast, their producer and record labels paid Parks an undisclosed cash settlement. They also agreed to work with the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute to create educational programs about the life of Rosa Parks. The record label and OutKast admitted to no wrongdoing. Responsibility for the payment of legal fees was not disclosed. \n*The documentary Mighty Times: The Legacy of Rosa Parks (2001) received a 2002 nomination for Academy Award for Documentary Short Subject. She collaborated on a TV movie of her life, The Rosa Parks Story (2002), starring Angela Bassett. \n*The film Barbershop (2002) featured a barber, played by Cedric the Entertainer, arguing with others that other African Americans before Parks had been active in bus integration, but she was renowned as an NAACP secretary. The activists Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton launched a boycott against the film, contending it was \"disrespectful\", but NAACP president Kweisi Mfume stated he thought the controversy was \"overblown.\" Parks was offended and boycotted the NAACP 2003 Image Awards ceremony, which Cedric hosted.\n*Grime musician Skepta's track \"Shutdown\" includes the lyrics \"Sittin' at the front, just like Rosa Parks\".\n\nDeath and funeral\n\nParks resided in Detroit until she died of natural causes at the age of 92 on October 24, 2005, in her apartment on the east side of the city. She and her husband never had children and she outlived her only sibling. She was survived by her sister-in-law (Raymond's sister), 13 nieces and nephews and their families, and several cousins, most of them residents of Michigan or Alabama.\n\nCity officials in Montgomery and Detroit announced on October 27, 2005, that the front seats of their city buses would be reserved with black ribbons in honor of Parks until her funeral. Parks' coffin was flown to Montgomery and taken in a horse-drawn hearse to the St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church, where she lay in repose at the altar on October 29, 2005, dressed in the uniform of a church deaconess. A memorial service was held there the following morning. One of the speakers, United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, said that if it had not been for Parks, she would probably have never become the Secretary of State. In the evening the casket was transported to Washington, D.C. and transported by a bus similar to the one in which she made her protest, to lie in honor in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol.\n\nSince the founding in 1852 of the practice of lying in state in the rotunda, Parks was the 31st person, the first American who had not been a U.S. government official, and the second private person (after the French planner Pierre L'Enfant) to be honored in this way. She was the first woman and the second black person to lie in state in the Capitol. [http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/resources/pdf/LyingState.pdf Memorial or Funeral Services in the Capitol Rotunda], senate.gov (United States Senate); content cited to Architect of the Capitol. Accessed . An estimated 50,000 people viewed the casket there, and the event was broadcast on television on October 31, 2005. A memorial service was held that afternoon at Metropolitan AME Church in Washington, DC. \n\nWith her body and casket returned to Detroit, for two days, Parks lay in repose at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History. Her funeral service was seven hours long and was held on November 2, 2005, at the Greater Grace Temple Church in Detroit. After the service, an honor guard from the Michigan National Guard laid the U.S. flag over the casket and carried it to a horse-drawn hearse, which was intended to carry it, in daylight, to the cemetery. As the hearse passed the thousands of people who were viewing the procession, many clapped, cheered loudly and released white balloons. Parks was interred between her husband and mother at Detroit's Woodlawn Cemetery in the chapel's mausoleum. The chapel was renamed the Rosa L. Parks Freedom Chapel in her honor.Esparza, Santiago. \"Parks to remain private in death\", Detroit News, November 3, 2005. . Retrieved July 5, 2008. Parks had previously prepared and placed a headstone on the selected location with the inscription \"Rosa L. Parks, wife, 1913–.\"\n\nLegacy and honors\n\n*1976, Detroit renamed 12th Street \"Rosa Parks Boulevard.\" \n*1979, the NAACP awarded Parks the Spingarn Medal,[http://www.naacp.org/index.php/pages/spingarn-medal-winners Springarn Medal Winners: 1915 to Today], NAACP, no date but list goes through 2010. Accessed . its highest honor,[http://www.naacp.org/news/press/2007-04-03/index.htm NAACP Honors Congressman Conyers With 92nd Spingarn Medal], NAACP press release, April 3, 2007. Retrieved July 9, 2008.\n*1980, she received the Martin Luther King Jr. Award. \n*1983, she was inducted into Michigan Women's Hall of Fame for her achievements in civil rights.\n*1990,\n**Parks was invited to be part of the group welcoming Nelson Mandela upon his release from prison in South Africa. \n**Parks was in attendance as part of Interstate 475 outside of Toledo, Ohio is named after Parks. \n*1992, she received the Peace Abbey Courage of Conscience Award along with Dr. Benjamin Spock and others at the Kennedy Library and Museum in Boston, Massachusetts.\n*1994, she received an honorary doctorate from Soka University in Tokyo, Japan. \n*1995, she received the Academy of Achievement's Golden Plate Award in Williamsburg, Virginia.\n*1996, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honor given by the US executive branch.\n*1998, she was the first to receive the International Freedom Conductor Award given by the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center.\n*1999,\n**she received the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest award given by the US legislative branch, the medal bears the legend \"Mother of the Modern Day Civil Rights Movement\"\n**she receives the Windsor–Detroit International Freedom Festival Freedom Award.\n**Time named Parks one of the 20 most influential and iconic figures of the 20th century.\n**President Bill Clinton honored her in his State of the Union address, saying, \"She's sitting down with the first lady tonight, and she may get up or not as she chooses.\" \n*2000,\n**her home state awarded her the Alabama Academy of Honor, \n**she receives the first Governor's Medal of Honor for Extraordinary Courage. \n**She was awarded two dozen honorary doctorates from universities worldwide\n**She is made an honorary member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority.\n**the Rosa Parks Library and Museum on the campus of Troy University in Montgomery was dedicated to her.\n*2002,\n**scholar Molefi Kete Asante listed Parks on his list of 100 Greatest African Americans. \n**A portion of the Interstate 10 freeway in Los Angeles is named in her honor.\n*2003, Bus No. 2857 on which Parks was riding is restored and placed on display in The Henry Ford\n*2004, In the Los Angeles County MetroRail system, the Imperial Highway/Wilmington station, where the Blue Line connects with the Green Line, has been officially named the \"Rosa Parks Station\". \n*2005,\n**On October 30, 2005 President George W. Bush issued a proclamation ordering that all flags on U.S. public areas both within the country and abroad be flown at half-staff on the day of Parks' funeral.\n**Metro Transit in King County, Washington placed posters and stickers dedicating the first forward-facing seat of all its buses in Parks' memory shortly after her death,[http://transit.metrokc.gov/up/archives/2005/rosaparks.html \"Rosa Parks Honored on Metro Bus Fleet]\", King County Metro Online. Retrieved July 5, 2008. \n**the American Public Transportation Association declared December 1, 2005, the 50th anniversary of her arrest, to be a \"National Transit Tribute to Rosa Parks Day\".\n**On that anniversary, President George W. Bush signed , directing that a statue of Parks be placed in the United States Capitol's National Statuary Hall. In signing the resolution directing the Joint Commission on the Library to do so, the President stated: \n**Portion of Interstate 96 in Detroit was renamed by the state legislature as the Rosa Parks Memorial Highway in December 2005. \n*2006,\n** At Super Bowl XL, played at Detroit's Ford Field, long-time Detroit residents Coretta Scott King and Parks were remembered and honored by a moment of silence. The Super Bowl was dedicated to their memory. Parks' nieces and nephews and Martin Luther King III joined the coin toss ceremonies, standing alongside former University of Michigan star Tom Brady who flipped the coin.\n**On February 14, Nassau County, New York Executive, Thomas Suozzi announced that the Hempstead Transit Center would be renamed the Rosa Parks Hempstead Transit Center in her honor.\n*2007, Nashville, Tennessee, renamed MetroCenter Boulevard (8th Avenue North) (US 41A and SR 12) in September 2007 as Rosa L. Parks Boulevard. \n*2009, On July 14, 2009, the Rosa Parks Transit Center opened in Detroit at the corner of Michigan and Cass Avenues. \n*2010, In Grand Rapids, Michigan, a plaza in the heart of the city is named Rosa Parks Circle.\n*2012, President Barack Obama visited the famous Rosa Parks bus at the Henry Ford Museum after an event in Dearborn, Michigan, April 18, 2012.\n*2012, A street in West Valley City, Utah (the state's second largest city), leading to the Utah Cultural Celebration Center was renamed Rosa Parks Drive. \n*2013,\n**On February 1, President Barack Obama proclaimed February 4, 2013, as the \"100th Anniversary of the Birth of Rosa Parks.\" He called \"upon all Americans to observe this day with appropriate service, community, and education programs to honor Rosa Parks's enduring legacy.\" \n**On February 4, to celebrate Rosa Parks' 100th birthday, the Henry Ford Museum declared the day a \"National Day of Courage\" with 12 hours of virtual and on-site activities featuring nationally recognized speakers, musical and dramatic interpretative performances, a panel presentation of Rosa's Story and a reading of the tale Quiet Strength. The actual bus on which Rosa Parks sat was made available for the public to board and sit in the seat that Rosa Parks refused to give up. \n**On February 4, 2,000 birthday wishes gathered from people throughout the United States were transformed into 200 graphics messages at a celebration held on her 100th Birthday at the Davis Theater for the Performing Arts in Montgomery, Alabama. This was the 100th Birthday Wishes Project managed by the Rosa Parks Museum at Troy University and the Mobile Studio and was also a declared event by the Senate.\n**During both events the USPS unveiled a postage stamp in her honor. \n**On February 27, Parks became the first African American woman to have her likeness depicted in National Statuary Hall. The monument, created by sculptor Eugene Daub, is a part of the Capitol Art Collection among nine other females featured in the National Statuary Hall Collection. \n*2014, the asteroid (284996) Rosaparks was named after Rosa Parks. \n*2015, \n** the papers of Rosa Parks were cataloged into the Library of Congress, after years of a legal battle. \n**On December 13, the new Rosa Parks Railway Station opened in Paris." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Kenny_Rogers.txt" ], "title": [ "Kenny Rogers" ], "wiki_context": [ "Kenneth Ray \"Kenny\" Rogers (born August 21, 1938) is an American singer, songwriter, actor and record producer. He is a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame.\n\nThough he has been most successful with country audiences, he has charted more than 120 hit singles across various music genres, topped the country and pop album charts for more than 200 individual weeks in the United States alone and has sold over 120 million records worldwide, certifying his position as one of the best-selling music artists of all time. On September 25, 2015 he announced on NBC's Today Show that he was retiring from show business after a final tour to spend more time with his wife and twin boys.\n\nTwo of his albums, The Gambler and Kenny, are featured in the About.com poll of \"The 200 Most Influential Country Albums Ever\". He was voted the \"Favorite Singer of All-Time\" in a 1986 joint poll by readers of both USA Today and People. He has received numerous such awards as the AMAs, Grammys, ACMs and CMAs, as well as a lifetime achievement award for a career spanning six decades in 2003. \n\nLater success includes the 2006 album release, Water & Bridges, an across the board hit, that hit the Top 5 in the Billboard Country Albums sales charts, also charting in the Top 15 of the Billboard 200. The first single from the album, \"I Can't Unlove You,\" was also a sizable chart hit. Remaining a popular entertainer around the world, the following year he completed a tour of the United Kingdom and Ireland, telling BBC Radio 2 DJ Steve Wright his favourite hit was \"The Gambler\". He has also acted in a variety of movies and television shows, most notably the title roles in Kenny Rogers as The Gambler and the MacShayne series as well as his appearance on The Muppet Show. \n\nPersonal life\n\nKenneth Ray Rogers was born in Houston, Texas, on August 21, 1938, the fourth of eight children, born to Lucille Lois (née Hester; b. 1910-d. 1991), a nurse's assistant, and Edward Floyd Rogers (b. 1904-d. 1975), a carpenter. Rogers has six children from four of his five marriages.\n\nMarriages\n\n* Wanda Miller, June 1, 1997 – present; 2 children\n* Marianne Gordon, October 1, 1977 – 1993, divorced; 1 child\n* Margo Anderson, October 1964 – 1976, divorced; 2 children\n* Jean Rogers, October 1960 – 1963, divorced\n* Janice Gordon, May 15, 1958 – April 1960, divorced; 1 child\n\nCareer\n\nEarly career\n\nIn a recording career dating back to 1950s, Rogers moved effortlessly from teenage rock'n'roll through psychedelic rock to become the consummate country-pop crossover artist of the 1970s and 1980s. Because of his career, he became one of the highest paid entertainers in the world. At the same time, on his own, Kenneth Rogers (as he was billed then) followed the breakup with his own single, a minor solo hit called \"That Crazy Feeling\" (1958). After sales slowed down, Rogers joined a jazz group called The Bobby Doyle Three, who got a lot of work in clubs thanks to a reasonable fan following and also recorded for Columbia Records. The group disbanded in 1965, and a 1966 jazzy rock single Rogers recorded for Mercury Records, called \"Here's That Rainy Day\" failed. Rogers also worked as a producer, writer and session musician for other performers; including country artists Mickey Gilley and Eddy Arnold. In 1966 he joined The New Christy Minstrels as a singer and double bass player.\n\nFeeling that the Minstrels were not offering the success they wanted, Rogers and fellow members Mike Settle, Terry Williams, and Thelma Camacho left the group. They formed The First Edition in 1967 (later renamed \"Kenny Rogers and The First Edition\"). They were later joined by Kin Vassy. They chalked up a string of hits on both the pop and country charts, including \"Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In),\" \"But You Know I Love You,\" \"Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town,\" \"Tell It All, Brother,\" \"Reuben James,\" and \"Something's Burning.\"\n\nWhen the First Edition disbanded in 1976, Rogers launched his solo career. Rogers soon developed a more middle of the road sound, with a somewhat rough but tuneful voiced style that sold to both pop and country audiences; to date, he has charted more than 60 top 40 hit singles (including two #1's--\"Lady\" and \"Islands In The Stream\") and 50 of his albums have charted. His music has also been featured in top selling movie soundtracks, such as Convoy, Urban Cowboy and The Big Lebowski. \n\nSolo career\n\nAfter leaving The First Edition in 1976, after almost a decade with the group, Rogers signed a solo deal with United Artists. Producer Larry Butler and Rogers began a partnership that would last four years. \n\nRogers first outing for his new label was Love Lifted Me. The album charted and two singles, \"Love Lifted Me\" and \"While the Feeling's Good,\" were minor hits. The song \"Runaway Girl\" was featured in the motion picture Trackdown. Later in 1976, Rogers issued his second album, the self-titled Kenny Rogers, whose first single, \"Laura (What's He Got That I Ain't Got),\" was another solo hit.\n\nThe single \"Lucille\" (1977) was a major hit, reaching number one on the pop charts in 12 countries, selling over five million copies, and firmly establishing Rogers' post-First Edition career. On the strength of \"Lucille,\" the album Kenny Rogers reached No. 1 in the Billboard Country Album Chart. More success was to follow, including the multi-million selling album The Gambler and another international Number 1 single, \"Coward of the County,\" taken from the equally successful album, Kenny. In 1980, the Rogers/Butler partnership came to an end, though they would occasionally reunite: in 1987 on the album I Prefer the Moonlight and again in 1993 on the album If Only My Heart Had a Voice.\n\nIn the late 1970s, Rogers teamed up with close friend and Country Music legend Dottie West for a series of albums and duets. Together the duo won 2 gold records (1 of which later went platinum), 2 CMA Awards, an ACM nomination, two Grammy nominations and 1 Music City News Award for their two hit albums \"Every Time Two Fools Collide\" (#1) and \"Classics\" (#3), selling out stadiums and arenas while on tour for several years, as well as appearing on several network television specials which showcased them. Their hits together \"Every Time Two Fools Collide\" (#1), \"Anyone Who Isn't Me Tonight\" (#2), \"What Are We Doin' in Love\" (#1), \"All I Ever Need Is You\" (#1) and \"Till I Can Make It On My Own\" (#3) all became Country standards. Of West, Rogers stated in a 1995 TNN interview: \"She, more than anybody else I ever worked with, sang with such emotion that you actually believed what she sang. A lot of people sing words, Dottie West sang emotions.\" In a 1978 press release for their album \"Every Time Two Fools Collide,\" Rogers credited West with further establishing and cementing his career with Country Music audiences. In the same release, West credited him with taking her career to new audiences. Rogers was with West only hours before she died at age 58 after sustaining injuries in a 1991 car accident, as discussed in his 2012 biography \"Luck Or Something Like It.\" In 1995 he starred as himself, alongside Michele Lee as West, in the CBS biographical film Big Dreams and Broken Hearts: The Dottie West Story.\n\nIn 1980, a selection he recorded as a duet with Kim Carnes, \"Don't Fall In Love With A Dreamer,\" became a major hit. (Rogers, Carnes, and Carnes's husband David Ellingson were all former members of \"The New Christy Minstrels.\" Carnes and Ellingson had written and composed the selections of Gideon, the source album of \"Don't Fall In Love With A Dreamer,\" specifically for Rogers himself.) Earlier that year, he sang a duet of \"You and Me\" with Lynda Carter in her television music special Lynda Carter Special (Rogers originally recorded this with Dottie West for the Every Time Two Fools Collide album). Later in 1980 came his partnership with Lionel Richie who wrote and produced Rogers' No. 1 hit \"Lady.\" Richie went on to produce Rogers's 1981 album Share Your Love, a chart topper and commercial favorite featuring hits such as \"I Don't Need You\" (Pop No. 3), \"Through the Years\" (Pop No. 13), and \"Share Your Love with Me\" (Pop No. 14). His first Christmas album was also released that same year. In 1982, Rogers released the album Love Will Turn You Around. The album's single of the same name reached No. 13 on the Billboard Hit 100 and topped the country and AC charts. It was the theme song of Rogers' 1982 film Six Pack. Shortly afterwards, he started working with producer David Foster in 1983 recording the smash Top 10 hit Bob Seger cover \"We've Got Tonight,\" a duet with Sheena Easton. Also a #1 single on the Country charts in the United States, it reached the Top 30 on the British charts.\n\nIn 1981 Kenny bought the old ABC Dunhill building and built one of the most popular and state of the art recording studios in Los Angeles. Many of the biggest artist and bands in the world including, Michael Jackson, Chicago, Lionel Richie, Rod Stewart and Kenny Rogers, recorded at Lion Share.\nThe song \"We Are The World\" was also recorded there. \n\nKenny went on to work with Barry Gibb of the Bee Gees who produced his 1983 hit album Eyes That See in the Dark, featuring the title track and yet another No. 1 hit \"Islands in the Stream,\" a duet with Dolly Parton. Gibb, along with his brothers, Robin and Maurice, originally wrote the song for Marvin Gaye in an R&B style, only later to change it for the Kenny Rogers album. The partnership with Gibb only lasted one album, which was not surprising considering that Rogers' original intentions was to work with Gibb on only one song. Gibb insisted on doing the entire album together.\n\n\"Islands in the Stream,\" Rogers' duet with Dolly Parton, was the first single to be released from Eyes That See in the Dark in the United States, and it quickly went to No. 1 in the Billboard Hot 100 (it would prove to be the last country single to reach No. 1 on that chart until \"Amazed\" by Lonestar did so in 2000), as well as topping Billboard's country and adult contemporary singles charts; it was certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America for shipping two million copies in the United States. Rogers would reunite with Parton in 1984 for a holiday album and TV special, Once Upon a Christmas, as well as a 1985 duet \"Real Love,\" which also topped the U.S. country singles chart. The two would continue to collaborate on occasional projects through subsequent years, including a 2013 duet single \"You Can't Make Old Friends\".\n\nDespite the success of \"Islands in the Stream,\" however, RCA insisted on releasing Eyes title track as the first UK single, and the song stalled at a disappointing No. 61 there, although it did stay in the top 100 for several weeks. (When it was eventually released in the United States, it was more successful, charting high on the Adult Contemporary chart and making the country top 30.) \"Islands in the Stream\" was issued as a follow-up single in Britain and sold well, making No. 7. The album itself reached No. 1 on the country charts on both sides of the Atlantic and enjoyed multi-million sales. \"Buried Treasure,\" \"This Woman\" and \"Evening Star\"/\"Midsummer Nights\" were also all successful singles from the album.\n\nShortly after came the album What About Me?, a hit whose title track, a trio performance with James Ingram and Kim Carnes, was nominated for a Grammy Award; the single \"Crazy\" (not to be confused with the Willie Nelson-penned Patsy Cline hit) topped the country charts. David Foster was to work again with Rogers in his 1985 album The Heart of the Matter, although this time Foster was playing backing music rather than producing, a role given to George Martin. This album was another success, going to No. 1, with the title track making to the top ten category in the singles charts.\n\nThe next few years saw Rogers scoring several top country hits on a regular basis, including \"Twenty Years Ago,\" \"Morning Desire,\" \"Tomb of the Unknown Love,\" among others. On January 28, 1985 Rogers was one of the 45 artists who recorded the worldwide charity song \"We Are the World\" to support hunger victims in Africa. The following year he played at Giants Stadium. \n\nIn 1988 Rogers won a Grammy Award for \"Best Country Collaboration with Vocals\" with Ronnie Milsap — \"Make No Mistake, She's Mine.\" In the 1990s Rogers continued to chart with singles such as \"The Factory\" and \"Crazy In Love,\" another selection that Kim Carnes provided him with, \"If You Want To Find Love,\" and \"The Greatest.\" His second Christmas album, titled Christmas in America, was released in 1989 for Reprise Records. From 1991–94, Rogers hosted The Real West on A&E, and on The History Channel since 1995 (Reruns only on The History Channel). He visited Miller's during this time period. From 1992–95, Rogers co-owned and headlined Branson, Missouri's 4,000 seat Grand Palace Theatre. In 1994, Rogers released his \"dream\" album titled Timepiece on Atlantic Records. It consisted of 1930s/40s jazz standards, the type of music he had performed in his early days with The Bobby Doyle Three in Houston. \n\nIn 1996 he released an album Vote For Love where the public requested their favorite love songs and Rogers performed the songs. (Several of his own hits were in the final verrsion.) The album was the first for the TV shopping channel QVC's record label, onQ Music. The album, sold exclusively by QVC, was a huge success and was later issued in stores under a variety of different titles. It reached No. 1 in the UK country charts under the title Love Songs (a title also used for various compilations) and also crossed over into the mainstream charts.\n\nIn 1999 Rogers scored with the single \"The Greatest,\" a song about life from a child's point of view (looked at through a baseball game). The song reached the top 40 of Billboard's Country singles chart and was a Country Music Television Number One video. It was on Rogers' album She Rides Wild Horses the following year (itself a top 10 success). In 1999, Rogers also produced a song, \"We've Got It All,\" specifically for the series finale of the ABC show Home Improvement. Not found on any album, the recording sells for a high sum at auction.\n\nAfter the 1990s\n\nIn the 21st century, Rogers was back at No. 1 for the first time in more than a decade with the 2000 single \"Buy Me a Rose\". In doing so, he broke a 26-year-old record held by Hank Snow (who, in April 1974, was aged 59 when he scored with \"Hello Love\"). Rogers held the record until 2003, when then 70-year-old Willie Nelson became the oldest artist to have a No. 1 on the country charts with his duet with Toby Keith, \"Beer for My Horses\".\n\nAlthough Rogers did not record new albums for a couple of years, he continued to have success in many countries with more greatest hits packages. In 2004 42 Ultimate Hits, which was the first hits collection to span his days with the First Edition to the present, reached Number 6 on the American country charts and went gold. It also featured two new songs, \"My World Is Over\" with Whitney Duncan and \"We Are the Same\". \"My World Is Over\" was released as a single and was a minor hit. In 2005 The Very Best of Kenny Rogers, a double album, sold well in Europe. It was the first new solo Kenny Rogers hits album to reach the United Kingdom for over a decade, despite many compilations there that were not true hits packages.\n\nRogers also signed with Capitol Records and had more success with the TV advertised release 21 Number Ones in January 2006. Although this CD did contain 21 chart-toppers as the title claims (recorded between 1976 and the present day), this was not a complete collection of Rogers' No. 1 singles, omitting such singles as \"Crazy in Love\" and \"What About Me?\"\n\nCapitol followed 21 Number Ones with Rogers' new studio album, Water & Bridges, in March 2006 on the Capitol Nashville Records label. The first single from the album was \"I Can't Unlove You,\" which peaked at No. 17 on the country charts, after spending over 6 months on the hit list, more than 50 years after he formed his first group and 38 years after his first major hit as leader of The First Edition; the song remains in recurrent airplay on some radio stations today. \"I Can't Unlove You\" was followed up with the second single from the album, \"The Last Ten Years (Superman)\", in September 2006. The third single, \"Calling Me,\" which features Don Henley, became popular in early 2007, and was nominated for a Grammy Award at the 2007 Grammy Awards. Also in 2007, the 1977 Kenny Rogers album was re-issued as a double CD, also featuring the 1979 Kenny album and this once again put Rogers' name into the sales charts worldwide. The following year, another compilation album (A Love Song Collection) also charted.\n\nRogers has recorded 65 albums and sold over 165 million records. \n\nOn August 26, 2008, Rogers released 50 Years exclusively at Cracker Barrel stores. The album includes some of Rogers' greatest hits, plus 3 new songs. The release is designed to celebrate Rogers' 50th year in the music business. In 2007 the England national rugby union team team adopted Rogers song \"The Gambler\" as their unofficial 2007 Rugby World Cup anthem, after hearing prop Matt Stevens playing it in the team hotel. Before the semi-final against France and the final against South Africa, Rogers sent video messages of support to the team in light of them choosing his song. He offered to come to England and party with the team if they won the World Cup.\n\nIn 2008 Rogers toured with his Christmas Show. He split the show up, making the first half his \"best of\" and the second half his Christmas songs. In 2009 he toured the United Kingdom. In 2009, Rogers embarked on his 50th Anniversary Tour. The tour went around the United States, Britain and Ireland.\n\nOn April 10, 2010, a TV special was taped, Kenny Rogers: The First 50 Years. Dolly Parton and Lionel Richie were among those set to perform with Rogers during a show celebrating his contribution to country, blues and pop music, It took place at the MGM Grand in Foxwoods. This special debuted on March 8, 2011 on Great American Country.\n\nOn June 10, 2012, Rogers appeared on stage with the musical group Phish to perform his hit song \"The Gambler\" at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival. Also in 2012, Rogers re-recorded the hit song \"Lady\", a duet with its songwriter Lionel Richie, on Richie's album Tuskegee. The pair also performed the song live at the 2012 ACM concert, \"Lionel Richie & Friends\".\n\nOn April 10, 2013, the CMA announced that Rogers would be a 2013 inductee into the Country Music Hall of Fame, along with Cowboy Jack Clement and Bobby Bare.\nIn June 2013 he performed at the Glastonbury Festival in the Sunday afternoon 'Legends' slot. \n\nIn 2013, Rogers recorded a new album with the name You Can't Make Old Friends. This album included the title track, a new duet with Dolly Parton, which was his first single released in six years.\n\nRetirement\n\nOn September 25, 2015, Rogers announced on NBC's Today show that he is releasing a Christmas album in 2015 and will embark on a farewell retirement tour for 2016. He said he planned to spend more time with his wife and twin boys and do more traveling. He added that his final tour appearance would be on Today. The tour, titled \"The Gambler's Last Deal\" will last for two years and includes dates in America, Ireland, The Philippines, Thailand and the UK.\n\nActing\n\nRogers also had success as an actor. His 1982 movie Six Pack, in which he played a race-car driver, took more than $20 million at the United States box office, while made-for-TV movies such as The Gambler, Christmas in America, and Coward of the County (based on hit songs of his) topped ratings lists. He also served as host & narrator for the A&E historical series The Real West.\n\nRogers says that photography was once his obsession, before it morphed into a passion. He has authored the photo books Kenny Rogers' America (1986) and Your Friends and Mine (1987). \n\nAs an entrepreneur, he collaborated with former Kentucky Fried Chicken CEO John Y. Brown, Jr. in 1991 to start up the restaurant chain Kenny Rogers Roasters. The chicken and ribs chain, which is similar to Boston Market, was famously featured in an episode of the NBC sitcom Seinfeld called \"The Chicken Roaster\". On the November 27, 1997, broadcast of Late Night with Conan O'Brien, Rogers could not pick his chicken out in a taste test, claiming he preferred \"greasy burgers.\"\n\nRogers and his restaurant were subjects of comedy from MADtv, especially the impersonation done by Will Sasso; the sketch of the faux-Rogers hosting Jackass became popular on the Internet.\n\nRogers put his name to the Gambler Chassis Co., a Sprint car racing manufacturer started by C. K. Spurlock in Hendersonville, Tennessee. The company used the name from Rogers' hit song The Gambler. During the 1980s/90s, Gambler was one of the fastest and widely used Sprintcars with such drivers as Steve Kinser, Sammy Swindell and Doug Wolfgang driving the cars to victory in the World of Outlaws and the famous Knoxville Nationals. Gambler sprintcars were also successful in Australia with drivers such as Garry Rush and Steve Brazier using Gamblers to win multiple Australian Sprintcar Championships. Rush also used a Gambler chassis to win the UNOFFICIAL 1987 World Sprintcar Championship at the Claremont Speedway in Perth, Western Australia.\n\nRogers appeared in a 2004 episode of Reno 911! as himself being subjected to incompetent security provided by starstruck sheriff's deputies to comical effect.\n\nIn October 2012, Rogers released a book Luck or Something Like it: A Memoir about his ups and downs in his musical career. With Mike Blakely, he has written a novel, What Are the Chances, that was released September 1, 2013.\n\nIn 2014, Rogers appeared as himself in a GEICO commercial, singing part of his song \"The Gambler\" a cappella while acting as the dealer in a card game.\n\nBloodline\n\nAlthough Rogers has used many session musicians to play instruments on his recordings, he has been backed on tours by the group Bloodline since 1976. The group originally started as a three piece [http://www.billdeyoung.com/archives/the-rise-and-fall-of-kenny-rogers/]. In The Journey (a 2006 documentary about his career) Rogers said he did not understand singers that changed their touring band every year, and that he sticks with Bloodline as they already \"know the songs\".\n\nDiscography\n\nFilmography\n\nAwards and honors\n\nRecord labels\n\nThe following is a list of record labels to which Rogers signed:\n\n*Cue (1957, with the band The Scholars and also as a solo singer)\n*Carlton (1958, solo deal)\n*KenLee (one single, label owned by Rogers and his brother Lelan)\n*Columbia (1960s, with jazz combo, The Bobby Doyle Three)\n*Reprise (1967, with The First Edition, all material recorded during this time has since been acquired by Universal Music)\n*Jolly Rogers (1973, with The First Edition, label was owned by Rogers)\n*United Artists (1975, solo deal)\n*Liberty (1980, United Artists merged into EMI/Capitol in 1980; some pressings of albums were issued on Capitol's imprint labels, EMI, EMI America, and EMI Manhattan.)\n*RCA Nashville (1983, solo deal)\n*Reprise (1989, solo deal)\n*Giant (1993, one solo album)\n*Atlantic (1994, one solo album)\n*onQ Music (1996, one solo album; onQ Music was created by the QVC Network to release exclusive albums for sale only on QVC. The first onQ release was Rogers' Vote for Love, a two-disc set that would later become available in standard retail stores.)\n*Magnatone (1996, solo deal)\n*Dreamcatcher (1998, solo deal; Dreamcatcher was owned and run by Rogers and Jim Mazza for the purpose of releasing Rogers albums and certain reissues of Rogers' catalog. Other artists such as Marshall Dyllon and Randy Dorman were released on Dreamcatcher Records, also. The label closed in 2004)\n*Capitol Nashville (2004, solo deal)" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Sex_and_the_City.txt", "Sex_and_the_City_(film).txt" ], "title": [ "Sex and the City", "Sex and the City (film)" ], "wiki_context": [ "Sex and the City is an American romantic comedy television series created by Darren Star and produced by HBO. Broadcast from 1998 until 2004, the original run of the show had a total of 94 episodes. Throughout its six-year run, the show received contributions from various producers, writers and directors, perhaps most significantly from Michael Patrick King.\n\nSet and filmed in New York City and based on the 1997 book of the same name by Candace Bushnell, the show follows the lives of a group of four women—three in their mid-thirties and one in her forties—who, despite their different natures and ever-changing sex lives, remain inseparable and confide in each other. Starring Sarah Jessica Parker (as Carrie Bradshaw), Kim Cattrall (as Samantha Jones), Kristin Davis (as Charlotte York), and Cynthia Nixon (as Miranda Hobbes), the quirky series had multiple continuing storylines that tackled relevant and modern social issues such as sexuality, safe sex, promiscuity and femininity, while exploring the difference between friendships and romantic relationships. The deliberate omission of the better part of the early lives of the four women was the writer's way of exploring social life - from sex to relationships - through each of their four very different, individual perspectives.\n\nThe series received both acclaim and criticism for its subjects and characters, and spawned two feature films, Sex and the City (2008) and its sequel Sex and the City 2 (2010), and a prequel series by The CW, The Carrie Diaries. It also won seven of its 54 Emmy Award nominations, eight of its 24 Golden Globe Award nominations, and three of its 11 Screen Actors Guild Award nominations. Sex and the City still airs in syndication worldwide and has been listed on Entertainment Weeklys end-of-the-decade \"best of\" list and as one of Time magazine's 100 Best TV Shows of All-TIME. The show placed #5 on Entertainment Weekly \"New TV Classics\" list. In 2013, TV Guide ranked it at #40 on its list of the Best Series of All Time. \n\nOrigins\n\nThe show was based in part on writer Candace Bushnell's 1997 book of the same name, compiled from her column with The New York Observer. Bushnell has stated in several interviews that the Carrie Bradshaw in her columns is her alter ego; when she wrote the \"Sex and the City\" essays, she used her own name initially; for privacy reasons, however, she created the character of Carrie Bradshaw, played by Sarah Jessica Parker. Carrie Bradshaw was a writer living in New York City. Carrie Bradshaw and Candace Bushnell have the same initials, a flourish emphasizing their connection. Moreover, just as Carrie Bradshaw eventually gets her articles for the fictional 'New York Star' published as a book in later series, the entire Sex and the City series is based on a compilation of Bushnell's own columns for the 'New York Observer'.\n\nCast and characters\n\nCarrie Bradshaw\n\nCarrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) is the narrator. Each episode is structured around her train of thought while writing her weekly column, \"Sex and the City\", for the fictitious newspaper the New York Star. A member of the New York glitterati, she is a club/bar/restaurant staple known for her unique fashion sense. Carrie lives in a one-room (studio) apartment in an Upper East Side brownstone. Stanford Blatch, a gay talent agent from an aristocratic family (played by Willie Garson), is Carrie's best friend outside of the other three women.\n\nCarrie is entangled with Mr. Big (Chris Noth), whose real name is revealed in the final episode to be John James Preston, in a tumultuous, on-and-off-again relationship. (In a running joke, whenever Carrie is about to introduce Mr. Big on-camera to another character, she is interrupted before she can say his name.) He is the reason for many of Carrie's breakdowns as he never seems ready to fully commit to her. He is once-divorced by the time the series opens and is a prominent businessman and an aficionado of jazz and cigars.\n\nCarrie and Big break up, when he leaves New York for a work secondment to Paris and does not show willingness for Carrie to accompany him or continue a long-distance relationship, citing commitment issues. Carrie is heartbroken and some months later she runs into Big at a party in the Hamptons; he is accompanied by his 20-something year old girlfriend, Natasha, whom he met in Paris. Despite this, Carrie attempts to be friends with Big, however this goes awry when he tells her that he and Natasha are getting married; something he'd never considered with Carrie.\n\nIn Season three, Carrie meets and is instantly attracted to up-and-coming Manhattan furniture designer Aidan Shaw (John Corbett) who becomes her boyfriend. Aidan is more traditional and patient about relationships than many of Carrie's other love interests and for a while they are happy together. At a furniture show, the pair run into Big and now-wife Natasha, where Mr. Big confides to Carrie that he made a mistake marrying Natasha and wants out. Soon after, Big and Carrie begin an affair, with it ending only when she is caught at Big's apartment by Natasha. Wracked with guilt, Carrie tells Aiden of the affair on the day of Charlotte's wedding to Trey, and the two break up. They reunite in Season four, when Aiden opens a bar with Miranda's ex, Steve. Carrie realizes she is still in love with Aiden and wins him back. He struggles to trust her, particularly as Mr. Big has gotten divorced from his wife and he and Carrie have a platonic friendship. Carrie stands firm on her friendship with Big, even inviting him up to Aiden's cabin after a girl had broken up with him. When Carrie's building goes co-op, Aiden offers to buy her apartment (and the one next door) so they can move in together. She agrees and later finds an engagement ring in his gym bag. Aiden later proposes and Carrie accepts.\n\nAiden is initially patient at Carrie's reluctance to set a wedding date, but soon begins to push her, suggesting they get married in Hawaii. Carrie has a panic attack whilst trying on wedding dresses with Miranda, and again when Aiden is knocking down the wall between her apartment and the one next door. She confesses to Aiden that she's not ready and needs more time. He agrees to slow things down but at a Black and White ball not long after, he pressures her to commit, making it clear that he still doesn't trust she's over Big. Carrie cannot commit and they break up soon after.\n\nAleksandr Petrovsky (Mikhail Baryshnikov) is a famous artist who becomes Carrie's lover in the final season. Despite their age difference, he sweeps her off her feet with huge romantic gestures and shows her the foreign pockets of New York she has never seen before. Carrie also makes plans to move to Paris with Aleksandr for his work. The rest of the women are not keen on Aleksandr, particularly Miranda who feel that he is controlling and that Carrie is different around him. On the night before she leaves, Mr. Big turns up at her home. The two argue in the street with Carrie accusing him of turning up whenever she's happy to ruin things for her. She tells him to leave her alone.\n\nWhen Carrie arrives in Paris, she finds Aleksandr to be frequently absent with work on his art show. She is left to wander the streets of Paris alone day after day and begins to regret her decision. She confides in Miranda during a phone conversation that she is lonely and that Aleks is neglecting her. Meanwhile, back in New York, Charlotte hears a message Mr. Big leaves Carrie on her answering machine admitting that he loves her. She invites Mr. Big to the coffee shop where he enlists the help of Carrie's friends, asking if they think he has a chance. Miranda, armed with the information from Carrie simply says \"go get our girl\" and Big goes to Paris to win her back. Carrie, having once again been abandoned by Aleksandr (having given up the opportunity to go to a party with some new friends to accompany him to a preview of his show) has it out with him in their hotel room and Aleksandr accidentally hits Carrie in the face.\n\nAs Carrie is in the lobby, trying to obtain a room for the night, Big walks in. They see each other and he tells her she's \"the one\" (something she's been waiting for their entire relationship) and he takes her home to New York.\n\nSamantha Jones\n\nThe oldest and most sexually confident of the foursome, Samantha Jones (Kim Cattrall) is an independent businesswoman with a career in public relations. She is confident, strong, and outspoken, and calls herself a \"try-sexual\" (meaning she'll try anything once). Early on in the show, Samantha declares she has given up on relationships and has decided to just have sex \"like a man\", that is without emotions or feelings and purely for physical gratification.\n\nSamantha has numerous, extremely brief sexual relationships throughout the show, including a lesbian relationship with an artist named Maria (Sônia Braga). This is her first stab at monogamy but she soon gets bored and goes back to her old ways. Later, she wins the PR business for hotel magnate Richard Wright (James Remar) who is the male equivalent of herself; good-looking, sexually carefree and not interested in long-term relationships. She and Richard soon end up together and Samantha feels herself falling for him and finds herself unattracted to other men. Scared of this, she attempts to hide her feelings but Richard is also falling for her and pursues her with expensive gifts and romantic gestures and despite her reluctance they begin a monogamous relationship. Not long after, Samantha becomes suspicious of Richard and catches him cheating on her which breaks her heart. They reunite not long after when Richard apologises, but Samantha develops jealousy and is unable to trust him around other women so breaks it off before he can break her heart again.\n\nIn the final season, Samantha seduces young waiter Jerry/Smith Jerrod (Jason Lewis), a much younger struggling actor whose career jump starts thanks to Samantha's PR connections. He mentions being a recovering alcoholic who attends AA. Smith manages to win Samantha's heart thanks to the strength of their physical connection and his patience with her issues with commitment. In the final season, Samantha is diagnosed with breast cancer and is subject to chemo. She loses her hair and Smith shaves his head to support her. They remain together and in the first movie, it is revealed that Samantha has moved to Los Angeles with Smith to further his career and become his manager/agent.\n\nCharlotte York\n\nCharlotte York (Kristin Davis) has had a conventional, privileged Episcopalian Connecticut upbringing and works in an art gallery. Charlotte is a classic over-achiever and perfectionist; a \"straight A\" student who attended Smith College, where she was a member of Kappa Kappa Gamma (note that there are no sororities at the real Smith College) majoring in art history with a minor in finance. During the series, it is also revealed that Charlotte was voted homecoming queen, prom queen, \"most popular\", student body president, and track team captain, in addition to being an active cheerleader and teen model.\n\nShe is the antithesis of Samantha; optimistic, hopelessly romantic and a believer in true love and soul mates. She places the most emphasis on emotional love as opposed to lust. From the beginning Charlotte is searching for her \"knight in shining armor\" and nothing shakes her belief of finding \"the one\" and getting married and starting a family. All her dating activity during the show is in pursuit of a long-term, monogamous boyfriend with a view to marriage and as such she typically dates men of 'pedigree' and money (bankers, lawyers, doctors etc.). Charlotte can be a dark horse and we learn that she once had a dalliance with an Orthodox Jewish artist, she dressed in drag for a portrait and allowed an artist to paint a picture of her vagina. She can be an 'East Side Princess' sometimes and she and Samantha occasionally come to blows over their differing opinions about love and sex.\n\nIn season three, Charlotte decides she will be married that year and sets about canvassing her married friends to set her up on dates. One married friend usurps her blind date to try and start an affair with her. Horrified, she dashes into the street and trips in front of a taxi, carrying Trey MacDougal (Kyle MacLachlan), an attractive, old-money, Scottish-American cardiologist with pedigree, a Park Avenue apartment and country estate in Connecticut. They fall in love at first sight and he appears to be everything she has always wanted. Things move quickly and Charlotte, convinced he is the one, suggests they marry, he agrees and they are married very shortly after (having enlisted the help of wedding planner Anthony Marentino; a gay, bitchy Sicilian who is as forceful as Charlotte is timid).\n\nWishing to 'do things the right way' Charlotte has withheld having sex with Trey, hoping for a romantic and traditional wedding night. On the evening before the big day, she gets drunk with the other women and goes to Trey for sex. Unfortunately it does not go well and Trey reveals he suffers from impotence. Whilst concerned, Charlotte presses ahead with the wedding, although she confides in Carrie just before walking down the aisle. As the marriage begins things do not get any better in their intimate relationship and Trey refuses to address matters either physically or psychologically, resisting their marriage counselor's advice. Matters are not helped by Trey's overbearing mother Bunny (Frances Sternhagen), a manipulative sort who intrudes on Trey and Charlotte's relationship and apartment on a regular basis. Not long into the marriage on a weekend trip to the MacDougal country estate, Charlotte is caught in a clinch with the hunky gardener and this seals the fate of her marriage to Trey. They separate and Charlotte moves back into her old apartment.\n\nWhile separated, they mend their sexual relationship and get back together. All seems to be well and Charlotte returns to live with Trey. To mark a new beginning and letting go of Bunny's control, she redecorates the apartment and they decide to create a baby room and try for a baby. Having no luck, Charlotte seeks fertility treatment and is told she has a very low chance of becoming pregnant. Seeking other options, she begins hormone injections and looks into adoption a Chinese baby girl. A combination of these factors once again ignite old tensions with Trey and Bunny, culminating in Trey deciding he no longer wants a family. This blow to her hopes and dreams proves too much for Charlotte and she finishes the marriage once and for all.\n\nWhen their marriage ends, she meets Harry Goldenblatt (Evan Handler), her Jewish divorce lawyer, at the beginning of season five. She is not attracted to him initially but spurred on by Anthony she starts a purely physical relationship with him. Harry is the opposite of Trey; short, bald, hairy, uncouth but funny, passionate and attentive. Their sexual relationship is fulfilling and eventually they begin dating properly. However, Harry says he cannot be serious with her because she isn't a Jew. Believing Harry to be her future, Charlotte converts to Judaism and this sees her struggle with losing her Christian faith and ideologies including Christmas and Easter. After her conversion, Charlotte celebrates her first Shabbat with Harry but loses her temper when he appears to not appreciate all her efforts. The row quickly evolves into Charlotte badgering Harry to propose and, feeling pressured, he storms out and they break up.\n\nCharlotte is heartbroken and some time later a singles event at the synagogue she bumps into Harry. She tells him she loves him and doesn't care if he never marries her as long as they can be together. Having missed her too, Harry proposes and they marry in a traditional Jewish ceremony. Charlotte, against all the odds, becomes pregnant after acupuncture therapy but loses the baby very early on. They later go on to adopt a baby girl, Lily, from China, and it is revealed during Sex and the City: The Movie that Charlotte later naturally conceives and gives birth to the couple's second daughter Rose.\n\nMiranda Hobbes\n\nMiranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon) is a career-minded lawyer with cynical views on relationships and men. A 1990 Harvard Law School graduate from the Philadelphia area, she is Carrie's confidante and voice of reason. In the early seasons she is somewhat portrayed as distrustful of men and this is something she struggles with throughout most of the show. Her main relationship is with bartender Steve Brady (David Eigenberg) who she meets by chance one night. They have a one-night stand but Steve pursues Miranda, eventually becoming her boyfriend. Steve and Miranda have a great relationship, but Steve feels uncomfortable with Miranda's success and money given that he makes a low wage. Things come to a head when Miranda attempts to buy Steve a suit to wear to an event at her law firm. He refuses, maxes out his credit cards to buy it, but then returns it, and breaks up with her, saying that she deserves someone who is more on her level.\n\nLater Miranda runs from Steve when she sees him on the street, but he goes to her house to confront her. They start hanging out as friends, but eventually end up getting back together, and Steve moves into Miranda's apartment. Steve is keen to move things forward in their relationship by having a baby, but Miranda cites her career as a barrier to this as she is on Partner track at her law firm. Instead they agree on a puppy which proves to be disaster as she feels she is doing all the work and Steve behaves like an overgrown child. They break up.\n\nSteve takes Miranda's criticisms to heart and later opens his own bar with Carrie's ex Aiden Shaw. Miranda runs into Steve who tells her about the bar and thanks her for spurring him on. They begin a friendship of sorts. In season four, we discover that Steve has testicular cancer and Miranda sets out to be a friend to Steve but realizes he is clueless and has not got the right healthcare. She helps him through his operation and subsequent treatment and they become close. Steve confides that he is depressed at losing a testicle and feeling sorry for him, Miranda has sex with him. Soon after Miranda discovers she is pregnant (something she thought was not possible as she had been diagnosed with a 'lazy ovary') with Steve's baby.\n\nAt the same time, Charlotte is struggling to get pregnant with Trey's baby and is furious when she discovers that Miranda is not only pregnant but is planning to have an abortion. At the clinic with Carrie, Miranda decides she cannot go through with the procedure and decides to keep the baby. She later gives birth to a son who she names Brady and she and Steve share custody (along with her hired housekeeper/nanny Magda, an older Ukrainian/Eastern European woman who remains a constant in Miranda's life). The show charts Miranda's struggle as a single mother and her feelings at losing her old life.\n\nMiranda later realizes she is still in love with Steve but he announces he has a new girlfriend, Debbie; a much younger girl from his native Queens area of New York. Not wishing to rock the boat, Miranda decides not to tell Steve and things remain platonic between them. Soon after, a new man moves into her building. Robert Leeds is an African-American doctor who works for the New York Knicks basketball team. He is divorced, handsome and makes it clear that he is interested in Miranda. They start a relationship that becomes serious when Robert tells Miranda he loves her (albeit by giving her a giant cookie with the words \"I Love You\" written on it in chocolate chips).\n\nMiranda feels unable to say it back to him though and in a moment of epiphany at Brady's first birthday party, she blurts out to Steve that she loves him and is sorry for losing him. Steve reassures her that he loves her too and soon after they break up with their respective partners and get back together. They eventually decide to marry in a low-key ceremony in a community garden. Living together in Miranda's one-bedroom apartment (still in the same building as now-hostile ex, Robert) proves to be cramped and they decide to buy a bigger place and eventually move to a house in Brooklyn (much to Miranda's initial dismay).\n\nIn the final shows of Season six, we see Miranda and Steve care for Steve's mother, Mary who is suffering with dementia/Alzheimer's.\n\nRecurring roles\n\n;List of notables recurring roles during series\n\nEpisodes\n\nPlot\n\nSeason 1 (1998)\n\nCarrie Bradshaw lives in Manhattan and writes a column called \"Sex and the City\". At a birthday party for Miranda, Carrie decides to start having sex \"like men\", meaning without all the emotional attachment. However, she realizes she cannot after getting brushed off by a man she has sex with one time later.\n\nCarrie has many chance encounters with a handsome businessman whom Samantha refers to as \"Mr. Big\". They begin to date, but Carrie is dismayed to find out he is still seeing other people. Although he eventually agrees to exclusivity, he doesn't introduce Carrie to his mother and won't refer to her as \"the one\", so rather than going on a planned vacation with him, Carrie breaks it off.\n\nCarrie sets up Miranda with her friend Skipper. Miranda and he date on and off; he is more laid back while Miranda is more forceful. After they break up, Miranda sees him with another woman and feels compelled to resume their relationship, but they again break up when he wants exclusivity and she does not.\n\nCharlotte dates a marriage-minded man but they clash over china patterns. She declines to have anal sex with another boyfriend and also consents to pose nude for a famous painter.\n\nSamantha sleeps with an artist who likes to videotape his encounters, with Charlotte's doorman, with a married couple, and with others. When she meets James, who seems utterly perfect for her, she's heartbroken to discover that he has an extremely small penis.\n\nSeason 2 (1999)\n\nCarrie dates a baseball player while on the rebound but breaks it off when she realizes she's not over Big. She then dates a sell-out filmmaker, a shoplifter, and a nice guy she scares away by snooping, and then takes up with Big again. She at first keeps this from her friends. Her and Big's relationship is rocky, and when he announces that he might have to move to Paris for a year but doesn't overtly invite Carrie to come with him, they break up a second time. Carrie then tries without success to convert a friend-with-benefits to something more, dates a writer with a great family but who is always \"early\" in bed, and then a recovering alcoholic who uses Carrie to replace his old addiction. She then runs into Big, returned from Paris, and his new 20-something fiancee, Natasha (played by Bridget Moynahan).\n\nMiranda dates a dirty talker, fakes it with an ophthalmologist, and tries to adjust to a guy who likes to watch porn during sex. By the time she meets Steve, the bartender, she's unwilling to believe he is as nice as he seems. They start dating but the differences in their schedules and their finances lead to a breakup. She winds up back in bed with Steve, but not before dating a guy who wants to get caught, a Peeping Tom in the next building, and a divorced dad.\n\nCharlotte encounters a legendary purveyor of cunnilingus, a handy actor next door, a widower on the make, a man who undergoes adult circumcision, a famous actor, a too-effeminate pastry chef, a shoe salesman with a foot fetish, and a 20-something guy who gives her crabs.\n\nDespite a brief attempt at couples therapy, Samantha breaks up with James. She then sleeps with a litigator, a salsa dancer, her personal trainer, a sports fan who can only rally when his team does well, and Charlotte's brother. She then meets a man whose penis is too big even for her.\n\nThe end of Season two also marks the end of characters' talking directly to the camera.\n\nSeason 3 (2000)\n\nCarrie starts off dating a politician, followed by a bisexual. Big marries Natasha, and Carrie meets Aidan, a furniture maker. They have a virtually flaw-free relationship until Carrie and Big begin an affair. When Natasha catches Carrie in Natasha and Big's apartment, Carrie and Big's affair ends as do eventually both Big's marriage and Carrie's relationship with Aidan.\n\nMiranda and Steve move in together. He tells Miranda he'd like them to have a baby, but a puppy purchase instead alerts Miranda to the fact that they're very different when it comes to maturity. Steve moves out and Miranda makes partner at her law firm. She also goes on to date a phone sex guy, a fake ER doctor, a guy who doesn't swallow his food, and a police detective.\n\nCharlotte, looking for a husband, dates an investment banker with an anger management problem, a photographer who gets her into menswear, a bad kisser, and a climax name caller. She then meets Trey MacDougal; despite an awkward \"proposal\", the discovery of his low libido and inability to perform sexually the night before their marriage, and conflict with his domineering mother, the two marry. They begin their marriage with a sexless honeymoon, and as sex remains an ongoing problem in their relationship, the two eventually separate.\n\nSamantha sleeps with a fireman, a short man, her assistant, a black guy with a disapproving sister, a recreational Viagra user, a guy who tastes bad, Trey's Scottish cousin, a dildo model, and a college-aged virgin. She also has a menopause scare, gets tested for HIV, and buys a new apartment in the Meatpacking District, where she has to make peace with the transgender women on her street.\n\nAfter Carrie's break-ups with Big and Aidan, she dates a guy who still lives at home, teaches a class at the Learning Annex on how to meet men, gets mugged, and tries to apologize to Natasha. She and Big also make an attempt at being friends.\n\nSeason 4 (2001–02)\n\nAfter a chance meeting with Aidan at the opening of a bar he co-owns, Carrie convinces him to restart their relationship. He moves into her apartment after purchasing it when her building goes co-op and then proposes. Despite her misgivings, Carrie accepts the proposal and then eventually realizes she's not ready for marriage. Despite discussing her concerns and initially agreeing to give her more time, Aidan soon pressures Carrie for marriage. She realizes this is because he does not trust her, given her past affair with Big. They break up and he moves out, and Carrie purchases her apartment after Charlotte lends her the down payment in the form of the engagement ring she received from Trey. At the end of Season Four, Carrie discovers that Big has sold his apartment and is moving to Napa, California.\n\nCharlotte and Trey are living apart but continuing to have marital relations; they eventually reconcile and Charlotte moves back into their shared apartment. They decide to try for a baby but realize Charlotte is reproductively challenged; after fertility treatments and discussing adoption, their marriage breaks apart under the strain and they decide to divorce.\n\nMiranda supports Steve through testicular cancer and surgery. Later, when he feels emasculated by the surgery, they have sex and Miranda gets pregnant. She initially considers an abortion, which is particularly distressing to Charlotte, as she deals with her struggles to get pregnant, but Miranda decides to keep the baby.\n\nSamantha flirts with a priest, has nude photos taken of herself, tries to have a relationship with a lesbian, and sleeps with a baby talker, a wrestling coach, and a farmer. She then lands a big PR account with resolutely single hotel magnate Richard Wright. They begin a relationship that starts out as purely sexual but becomes something more to both of them, and they attempt monogamy. However, she eventually catches him cheating, and they break up.\n\nSeason 5 (2002)\n\nCarrie spends time by herself in Season Five; she fears this means she will be fired from writing her sex column, but instead a publisher wants to turn the columns into a book. A book tour lands her in San Francisco, where she reunites briefly with Big. In New York, she meets Jack Berger, a fellow author with whom she feels sparks, but who is attached.\n\nSamantha tries again with Richard but cannot overcome her lack of trust in him, and she breaks it off for good.\n\nMiranda is now mother to son Brady and finds it difficult to work, date, and carry on her previous lifestyle. Steve is supportive, and she falls into bed with him one afternoon, making her question her feelings for him.\n\nCharlotte has a run-in with her former mother-in-law over the legalities of the apartment she shared with Trey, and she hires Harry Goldenblatt as her divorce attorney. Despite his physical shortcomings she finds herself attracted to him, and they begin a sexual relationship. She soon finds that she is developing real feelings for him. Harry, however, reveals that he must marry within his Jewish faith, causing Charlotte to actually consider conversion.\n\nSeason 6 (2003–04)\n\nCarrie begins dating Jack Berger, who is termed her best 'mental match' of all her relationships. However, his struggles as an author and her success with her upcoming book cause too much conflict between them, and they break up. Big returns to New York for angioplasty, and Carrie realizes she still has feelings for him; she also realizes he still cannot fully commit. After he returns to Napa, she meets Aleksandr, a famous Russian artist. Aleksandr seems to be attentive to her in a way that Big never was, and he asks her to come to Paris with him. She does, briefly, but realizes how inattentive he is when working, and she breaks it off with him just as Big arrives in Paris, looking for her, ready to finally commit to her being \"the one\".\n\nCharlotte decides that life with Harry, who accepts her fertility issues, would be worth converting to Judaism. After this process, she presses Harry to \"set the date\" in an insulting way and he breaks it off with her. However, they run into each other at a mixer and, after her tearful apology, rekindle their relationship and eventually marry. After fertility treatments fail, they decide to adopt, and eventually learn they have been approved to adopt a child from China.\n\nOnce Miranda realizes she's still in love with Steve, he begins a serious relationship with someone else (Debbie), and so she does the same with Robert (played by Blair Underwood). However, at their son Brady's first birthday party, they reveal their feelings for each other and renew their relationship. Miranda proposes to Steve and they marry in a community park. Needing more room for their growing family, she consents to moving to Brooklyn, where they buy a brownstone. After Steve's mother Mary (played by Anne Meara) is revealed to have suffered a stroke and subsequent memory loss, she moves in with the couple.\n\nSamantha begins a relationship with a much younger waiter, Jerry Jerrod, who turns out to be a struggling actor. She uses her PR skills to help his career, even changing his name to Smith Jerrod. Despite trying to keep their relationship as casual as her others, she develops true feelings for him. Smith supports her after she is diagnosed with breast cancer, shaving his own head in sympathy after catching her shaving her head when chemotherapy makes her hair fall out. He also insists on waiting for her when her treatment diminishes her sex drive. When he flies home from his movie shoot just to tell her that he loves her, she replies, \"You have meant more to me than any man I've ever known.\"\n\nThe season and the series concludes with the four girlfriends reunited in New York City, and with Carrie receiving a phone call from Big (which finally reveals his first name, John), telling her that his Napa house is up for sale and he is headed back to New York. Carrie's final voiceover states: \"The most exciting, challenging and significant relationship of all is the one you have with yourself. And if you find someone to love the you you love, well, that's just fabulous.\"\n\nReception\n\nSex and the City premiered on HBO, June 6, 1998, and was one of the highest-rated sitcoms of the season. The last original episode, \"An American Girl in Paris, Part Deux\", aired on February 22, 2004.\n\nAwards and recognition\n\nOver the course of its six seasons, Sex and the City was nominated for over 50 Emmy Awards, and won seven: two for Outstanding Casting for a Comedy Series (Jennifer McNamara), one for Costumes, one for Outstanding Comedy Series, one for Outstanding Directing for a Comedy Series, one for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series (Sarah Jessica Parker), and one for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series (Cynthia Nixon).\n\nThe show has also been nominated for 24 Golden Globe Awards, and won eight. In 2007, it was listed as one of TIME magazine's \"100 Best TV Shows of All-TIME\". Entertainment Weekly put it on its end-of-the-decade, \"best-of\" list, saying, \"The clothes from SATC raise your cosmos! A toast to the wonderful wardrobe from Sex and the City, which taught us that no flower is too big, no skirt too short, and no shoe too expensive.\" \n\nCriticism\n\nCriticism has been expressed about the influence the show has on adolescents and how the images displayed on the show affect the way women and young girls view themselves. Unplanned Pregnancy was a topic during episode 1:10 \"The Baby Shower\" when Carrie found herself in a potential unplanned pregnancy situation with Mr. Big (it was a false alarm). In the episode \"Coulda Woulda Shoulda\" (Episode #4-11), Miranda did find herself dealing with an unplanned pregnancy and potential abortion. Miranda opted against the abortion and throughout season #5-6 we saw how Miranda dealt with raising a child as a single mother. There were also two episodes that dealt with Sexually Transmitted Diseases. In season #3 \"Are we Sluts\", Miranda had to deal with a case of chlamydia along with contacting her former lovers so they could also be tested. In \"Running with Scissors\" (Episode #3-11), Samantha faced having an HIV Test after a partner refused to have sex with her until she gets tested.\n\nTanya Gold of The Daily Telegraph stated, \"Sex and the City is to feminism what sugar is to dental care. The first clue is in the opening credits of the television show. Carrie is standing in a New York street in a ballet skirt, the sort that toddlers wear. She is dressed, unmistakably, as a child. And, because she is sex columnist on a newspaper, a bus wearing a huge photo of her in a tiny dress trundles past. 'Carrie Bradshaw knows good sex,' says the bus. And there, before any dialogue hits your ears, you have the two woeful female archetypes that Sex and the City loves—woman as sex object and woman as child ... In another [episode], Carrie realizes she is homeless because she has spent $40,000 on shoes and does not have a deposit for an apartment. (In this crisis, she cries and borrows the money for the deposit—what child would do anything else?).\" \n\nJoan Swirsky, a New York–based journalist and author, wrote in 2003: \"Another example that feminism is dead is the popularity of Sex and the City, the HBO show that features 30- and 40-something women sending out the unmistakable messages to females both younger and older that careers, money, looks and, ostensibly, intelligence are nothing compared to doing anything to get a man, including endlessly obsessing about the subject, engaging in loveless or even like-less sexual encounters.\" \n\nIn retrospective analysis of the show, critics have generally reassessed Carrie Bradshaw as an unsympathetic protagonist, despite the show's portrayal of her as a positive figure. In 2013, Glamour magazine called Carrie \"the worst\" character on the show, saying that \"her brattiness and self-absorption eclipsed her redeeming qualities and even her awesome shoes.\" In a 2010 retrospective about the previous two decades in pop culture, ABC News named Carrie one of the ten worst characters of the past twenty years, calling her a \"snippy, self-righteous Manhattan snob\" and citing the character's actions in Sex and the City 2 as evidence that she was beyond personal growth or redemption. The New Yorker, looking back on the show a decade after it went off the air, felt that while the character began as a \"happy, curious explorer, out companionably smoking with modellizers[sic],\" from the second season on she \"spun out, becoming anxious, obsessive, and, despite her charm, wildly self-centered.\" \n\nBroadcast and distribution\n\nSeason one of Sex and the City aired on HBO from June to August 1998. Season two was broadcast from June until October,1999. Season three aired from June until October 2000. Season four was broadcast in two parts: from June until August 2001, and then in January and February 2002. Season five, truncated due to Parker's pregnancy, aired on HBO during the summer of 2002. The twenty episodes of the final season, season six, aired in two parts: from June until September 2003 and during January and February 2004.\n\nSyndication\n\nSex and the City is currently syndicated in the US by HBO corporate sibling (under Time Warner) Warner Bros. Television Distribution. CBS Television Studios (successors to Rysher Entertainment and Paramount Domestic Television) and their distribution arm own international rights.\n\nUnited States\n\nThe United States cable channel HBO was the original broadcaster. TBS and WGN were the first US channels to syndicate the show. As of 2015, the show is currently syndicated on E! quite frequently. The series has also gone into international syndication.\n\nAustralia\n\nIn Australia, the Nine Network aired the first run of the show Every Monday Between 9:30 pm and 11:00 pm. After 2004 the Cable Channel W aired it until summer 2008 when Arena started airing it in a block with Will & Grace with promos stating \"all the good guys are gay\". The series was repeated on Network Ten from 2005 until 2010, and on Eleven (a sub-channel of Network Ten) from February 2011.\n\nIreland (ROI)\n\nIn the Republic of Ireland, TV3 premiered Sex and the City in February in 1999. Since 2006, repeats of the series aired on 3e.\n\nUnited Kingdom\n\nChannel 4 originally aired the series in the UK with the first episode shown in early 1999. As of August 2009 a double bill of the show airs each weeknight at 10:30 pm on Comedy Central and a double bill airs on Wednesdays from 9 pm on 5*. From 2015, the show has been repeated on CBS Drama.\n\nDVD releases\n\nAll six seasons of Sex and the City have been released commercially on DVD, with season six being split into two parts. They have been released officially in region 1 (America's), region 2 (Europe & Middle East), region 3 (Korea), and region 4 (Oceania & South Pacific) formats. In addition to their region encoding, releases vary depending on the region in which they were released.\n\nIn addition to standard single-season DVD box sets of the show, limited edition collectors' editions have been released that include all six seasons in one complete set. These also vary among regions (and the regions are defined differently). While Europe got a complete set that came with special \"shoebox\" packaging (a reference to Carrie Bradshaw's love for shoes), the USA and Canada version came packaged in a more traditional fold-out suede case and with an additional bonus DVD that includes many special features. Mexico and Oceania's edition come packaged in a beauty case.\n\nAs well as missing out on some special features, many in Europe had trouble with the region 2 edition of the season 1 DVD. The season was not converted into a PAL video signal; it instead remained in its original American NTSC format, which caused compatibility problems with some European television sets and DVD players. All subsequent Region 2 DVD releases of the program were appropriately transferred to PAL video using the original film prints, and season 1 has since been re-released in PAL format.\n\nOutside the US, Sex and the City boxed sets were released through Paramount Pictures. American and Canadian DVDs were released through the program's original broadcasters, HBO. In Australia, single editions have been released, wherein each disc is sold separately. In South Korea, complete, six-season, special DVD shoebox sets were released. In Brazil, the first and fifth seasons were released on DVD Dual, but all other seasons were released in DVD box sets.\n\nSelected episodes are also available as part of the Sex and the City Essentials DVD collection. These are four separately-packaged discs containing three selected episodes that fit a common theme.\n* The Best of Lust: Contains the episodes \"The Fuck Buddy\", \"Running with Scissors\", and \"The Turtle and the Hare\".\n* The Best of Mr. Big: Contains the episodes \"Sex and the City\", \"Ex and the City\", and \"I Heart NY\".\n* The Best of Romance: Contains the episodes \"Baby, Talk is Cheap\", \"Hop, Skip and a Week\", and \"An American Girl in Paris (Part Deux)\".\n* The Best of Breakups: Contains the episodes \"Don't Ask, Don't Tell\", \"I Love a Charade\", and \"The Post-it Always Sticks Twice\".\n* The Best of Fashion: Contains the episodes \"Secret Sex\", \"The Real Me\", and \"Luck Be an Old Lady\". This DVD was only released to Target stores in the US and was the only DVD of the \"Essentials\" collection to have a colored cover instead of a black and white one like the other four.\n\nSoundtrack releases\n\nSeveral CDs have been released to accompany the Sex and the City series. Two of them (the albums from Irma Records) contain tracks used in the show's actual soundtrack.\n* Sex and the City – Soundtrack [Import]\n2000/2001/2002\nSire Records\nIncludes the main theme from the show, written by Douglas J. Cuomo.\n\n* Sex and the City – Official Soundtrack (Two disc set)\nMarch 1, 2004\nSony TV\n36 hits, including the songs of Kylie Minogue, Justin Timberlake, Beyoncé, Cyndi Lauper, Jamiroquai, and Aretha Franklin, among others.\n\nFilms\n\nSex and the City (2008)\n\nA feature film based on Sex and the City, written, produced and directed by Michael Patrick King, was released in 2008. The four lead actresses returned to reprise their roles, as did Chris Noth, Evan Handler, David Eigenberg, Jason Lewis, and Willie Garson. In addition, Jennifer Hudson appears in the film as Carrie's assistant. The film is set four years after the series finale. The film was released to mixed reviews by critics; at the box office, it was the highest-grossing romantic comedy of the year. The film was released on DVD on September 23, 2008. \n\nSex and the City 2 (2010)\n\nSex and the City 2 was released in May 2010. The film stars Sarah Jessica Parker, Cynthia Nixon, Kristin Davis, Kim Cattrall and Chris Noth, who reprised their roles again, as well as Evan Handler, David Eigenberg, Jason Lewis, and Willie Garson. It also features cameos from Liza Minnelli, Miley Cyrus, and Penélope Cruz. The film is set two years after the events of the first movie. It was critically panned but a commercial success at the box office.\n\nPrequel series\n\nThe Carrie Diaries is a prequel to the original series, based on the book of the same name by Candace Bushnell. The series premiered on The CW on January 14, 2013. AnnaSophia Robb plays the role of young Carrie Bradshaw. On May 8, 2014, The CW canceled The Carrie Diaries after two seasons.", "Sex and the City (advertised as Sex and the City: The Movie) is a 2008 American romantic comedy film written and directed by Michael Patrick King in his feature film directorial debut, and a sequel to the 1998-2004 HBO comedy series of the same name (itself based on the book of the same name by Candace Bushnell) about four female friends: Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker), Samantha Jones (Kim Cattrall), Charlotte York Goldenblatt (Kristin Davis), and Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon), dealing with their lives as single women in New York City. The series often portrayed frank discussions about romance and sexuality.\n\nThe world premiere took place at Leicester Square, London, on May 15, 2008, and premiered on May 28, 2008, in the United Kingdom and May 30, 2008, in the United States. Despite mixed reviews from critics, calling the film an extended episode of the series, it was a commercial success, grossing over $415 million worldwide from a $65 million budget.\n\nA sequel to the film, entitled Sex and the City 2, was released in 2010 to similar commercial success but even larger critical failure.\n\nPlot\n\nCarrie walks through the streets of New York City thinking about events that have happened to her and her friends during Sex and the City. Charlotte is now happily married to Harry Goldenblatt, but she had a hard time getting pregnant - so they adopted a Chinese girl named Lily; Miranda has settled down in Brooklyn with Steve (David Eigenberg) to raise their son Brady together; and Samantha has relocated her business to Los Angeles to be close to Smith (Jason Lewis), who is now a superstar, although she misses her old life and takes every opportunity to fly East to be with Carrie, Miranda and Charlotte.\n\nCarrie herself is now in a relationship with Big (Chris Noth), and they are viewing apartments with plans to move in together. Carrie falls in love with a penthouse far from their price range. Big immediately agrees to pay for it. Carrie offers to sell her own apartment, although she also voices her fear that she would have no legal rights to their home in case they separate, as they are not married. To quell her fears, Big suggests that they marry. Carrie announces the news to her friends. Charlotte and Miranda are happy at the news, but Samantha - as Carrie points out dryly - sounds more excited at the thought of Carrie \"finally getting Botox\". Charlotte suggests her longtime gay friend, Anthony Marantino, as the pushy wedding planner.\n\nMiranda confesses to her friends that she has been so busy she hasn’t had sex with Steve in six months. When Steve confesses he has cheated on her, Miranda is devastated and immediately separates from him. At Carrie and Big's rehearsal dinner, Steve tries to reconcile with Miranda, but she rebuffs him. Still upset with Steve, she tells Big bluntly that marriage ruins everything.\n\nOn the wedding day, (partially due to Miranda's words at the rehearsal dinner) Big is too fearful to go through with the ceremony. Carrie, devastated, flees the wedding. Samantha stays behind to clear the guests. Big changes his mind and catches up with Carrie in an attempt to reconcile in the middle of a one-way street. Carrie furiously attacks him with her bouquet while he earns scathing looks from Miranda and Charlotte, as well as from the crowds of New Yorkers watching the scene unfold. To console Carrie (who is depressed, and at the beginning of the holiday doesn't eat anything for two days), the four women take the honeymoon that Carrie had booked to Mexico, where they de-stress and collect themselves.\n\nUpon returning to New York, Carrie hires an assistant, Louise (Jennifer Hudson), to help her manage her life. Miranda eventually confesses to Carrie about what happened at the rehearsal dinner, and the two briefly fall out as Carrie storms out of a restaurant on Valentine's Day. After reflecting on the argument she had with Carrie, Miranda agrees to attend couples counseling with Steve, and they are eventually able to reconcile. Samantha finds her five-year-old relationship passionless, and begins over-eating to keep from cheating on Smith with a gorgeous neighbour, Dante. She eventually decides to say farewell to Smith and moves back to New York. Around the same time, Louise quits her job as Carrie's assistant to get married and move back permanently to her hometown of St Louis.\n\nCharlotte learns she is pregnant, and for most of her pregnancy is fearful that something might happen to her baby, so she stops her regular running around Central Park. Carrie puts her fear to rest by telling her that, since she already soiled herself in Mexico, her bad luck is finished. Later, Charlotte has a surprise encounter with Big that leaves her so outraged that her water breaks. Big takes her to the hospital and waits until baby Rose is born, hoping to see Carrie. Harry passes on the message that Big would like her to call him, and that he has written to her frequently, but never received a reply. Carrie searches her correspondence and finds in Louise's personal assistant file that he has sent her dozens of letters copied from the book she read him before their wedding, culminating with one of his own where he apologizes for screwing up and promises to love her forever.\n\nCarrie travels to the exquisite penthouse Big had bought for them to collect a pair of brand new Manolo Blahnik shoes (that later become one of the icons of the movie) that she had left there. She finds Big in the walk-in closet he had built for her, and the moment she sees him, her anger at his betrayal dissipates. They share a passionate kiss, and Big proposes to Carrie properly, using one of her diamond-encrusted shoes in place of a ring. They later marry alone, in a simple wedding in New York City Hall, with Carrie wearing the simple suit that she had intended to wear before being enticed away by the Vivienne Westwood dress that she had modelled in the bridal issue of Vogue. Miranda, Samantha, and Charlotte turn up to surprise Carrie, having been called by Big. The film ends with the four women sipping cosmopolitans, celebrating Samantha's fiftieth birthday, with Carrie making a toast to the next fifty.\n\nCast\n\nMain\n\n* Sarah Jessica Parker as Carrie Bradshaw\n* Kim Cattrall as Samantha Jones\n* Kristin Davis as Charlotte York Goldenblatt\n* Cynthia Nixon as Miranda Hobbes\n* Chris Noth as John James \"Mr. Big\" Preston\n\nSupporting\n\n* Jennifer Hudson as Louise, Carrie's assistant\n* David Eigenberg as Steve Brady\n* Jason Lewis as Smith Jerrod\n* Evan Handler as Harry Goldenblatt\n* Willie Garson as Stanford Blatch\n* Mario Cantone as Anthony Marantino\n* Lynn Cohen as Magda\n* Candice Bergen as Enid Frick\n* Annaleigh Ashford as Spoiled Label Queen\n* André Leon Talley (cameo) as Vogue magazine executive\n* Joseph Pupo as Brady Hobbes, Miranda and Steve's son\n* Alexandra and Parker Fong as Lily Goldenblatt, Charlotte and Harry's daughter\n* Gilles Marini as Dante\n* Monica Mayhem as Dante's Lover #1\n* Julie Halston as Bitsy von Muffling\n* Daphne Rubin-Vega as Baby-voiced girl\n* Ben Rindner as Waiter\n\nProduction\n\nDevelopment\n\nAt the end of Sex and the City's run in February 2004, there were indications of a movie being considered following the series. HBO announced that Michael Patrick King was working on a possible script for the movie which he would direct. Later that year, Kim Cattrall declined to work on the project citing reasons that the script and the start date were overly prolonged and she decided to take other offers at hand. As a result, the immediate follow-up idea for the movie were dropped.\n\nIt was in mid-2007 that the plans for making the movie were announced again. This reportedly resulted after Cattrall's conditions being accepted along with a future HBO series. \nIn May 2007 the project was halted after HBO decided it was no longer in a position to finance the movie on its own. The project was pitched within the Time Warner family (owners of HBO) and was picked by sister concern New Line Cinema.\n\nIn February 2009 it was officially announced that a sequel would be made including all four actresses and writer-director Michael Patrick King. \n\nFilming\n\nThe film was prominently shot in New York between September–December 2007. \nThe locations included a number of places around Manhattan and a certain portion was shot in Steiner Studios and Silvercup Studios. The shooting was continually interrupted by paparazzi and onlookers with the security and police authorities employed in order to control the crowd. \nEfforts were taken to keep the film's plot secret, including the shooting of multiple endings. \nAs a defense strategy, scenes shot in public or in presence of number of extras were termed by Ryan Jonathan Healy and the main cast as \"dream sequences.\" \n\nCostumes\n\nAs in the TV series, fashion played a significant role in plot and production of the movie. Over 300 ensembles were used over the course of entire film.\n\nPatricia Field, who created costume designs for the series, also undertook the job in the film. \nField has stated that she initially was ambivalent to do the film, for monetary and creative reasons. \nField rose to fame particularly after designing for the series from 1998 to 2004, wherein she popularized the concept of using designer clothes with day-to-day fashion.\n\nWhile dressing the characters for the film, Field decided to stay clear from the latest fashion trends defining the characters and instead focused on the evolution of individual character and the actor portraying it, over the last four years. While Samantha's dressing was influenced by American TV soap opera Dynasty (see Nolan Miller), Jackie Kennedy was the inspiration for Charlotte's clothes. Miranda, according to Field, has evolved the most from the series in terms of fashion. This was influenced significantly by development in actress Cynthia Nixon in past years. \n* The iconic and glamorous wedding dress was made by Vivienne Westwood. \n* The tutu outfit that Carrie models for the other girls is the same outfit she wears on the show's credits.\n* Carrie's assistant, Louise, rents her designer handbags from [http://www.bagborroworsteal.com/specialty-shops/sex-and-the-city/ Bag Borrow or Steal].\n* Hats for Vivienne Westwood in the film are made by Prudence Millinery.\n* H. Stern lent more than 300 pieces of jewelry to the film.\n* Costumes were also selected from collections by haute couture designer Gilles Montezin. \n\nMusic\n\nSoundtrack\n\nThe soundtrack was released May 27, 2008, by New Line Records. The soundtrack includes new songs by Fergie and Jennifer Hudson (who plays Carrie's assistant in the film).\n\nThe film's soundtrack debuted at #2 on the Billboard 200, the highest debut for a multi-artist theatrical film soundtrack since 2005's Get Rich or Die Tryin', and debuting at #6 on the UK Albums Chart, selling to date more than 55,000 copies.\n\nA second soundtrack, Sex and the City: Volume 2, was released on September 23, 2008, coinciding with the film's DVD release, featuring the British singers Estelle, Craig David, Mutya Buena and Amy Winehouse. It also featured Janet Jackson, Ciara, and Elijah Kelley.\n\nScore\n\nIn December 2008, the orchestral score for the film was released, Sex And The City - The Score, containing 18 tracks of original score composed, co-orchestrated, and conducted by Aaron Zigman. Whilst the order of the tracks does not correspond directly to the order that the score is heard in the film, the score soundtrack contains almost every single piece of score that is present in the film.\n\nRelease\n\nPremiere\n\nThe film's international premiere took place on Monday, May 12, 2008, at Odeon West End in London's Leicester Square to the audience of 1700. \nIt was next premiered at Sony Center at Potsdamer Platz in Berlin on May 15. \nThe film had its New York City premiere at Radio City Music Hall on Tuesday, May 27, 2008. \n\nReception\n\nBox office\n\nThe film was a commercial success. Opening in 3,285 theaters, the film made $26.93 million in the US and Canada on its first day. The three-day opening weekend total was $57,038,404, aggregating $17,363 per theater. \nThe film recorded the biggest opening ever for an R-rated comedy and for a romantic comedy, and also for a film starring all women. As of March 2010, the film had grossed $152,647,258 at the US and Canadian box office, and $262,605,528 in other markets, bringing the worldwide total gross revenue to $415,252,786, making it the highest-grossing romantic comedy of 2008.\n\nCritical response\n\nSex and the City received mixed reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a rating of 49%, based on 176 reviews, with the site's critical consensus reading, \"Sex and the City loses steam in the transition to the big screen, but will still thrill fans of the show.\" \nMetacritic gave the film a normalized average score of 53 out of 100, based on 38 critics, indicating \"mixed or average reviews\". \n\nBrian Lowry of Variety said the film \"...feels a trifle half-hearted\", while Carina Chocano of the Los Angeles Times stated \"the film tackles weighty issues with grace but is still very funny\". She praised Michael Patrick King's work saying very few movies \"are willing to go to such dark places while remaining a comedy in the Shakespearean sense\". \nColin Bertram of the New York Daily News dubbed the film a \"great reunion\", and was happy with the return of \"The 'Oh, my God, they did not just do that!' moments, the nudity, the swearing, the unabashed love of human frailty and downright wackiness\". \nThe Chicago Tribunes Jessica Reeves described it as \"Witty, effervescent and unexpectedly thoughtful.\" \nMichael Rechtshaffen at The Hollywood Reporter praised the performances of the four leading ladies and said the film kept the essence of the series, but resembled a super-sized episode.\n\nManohla Dargis of The New York Times found the film \"a vulgar, shrill, deeply shallow — and, at 2 hours and 22 turgid minutes, overlong — addendum to a show\", while The Daily Telegraphs Sukhdev Sandhu panned the film saying \"the ladies have become frozen, Spice Girls-style types - angsty, neurotic, predatory, princess - rather than individuals who might evolve or surprise us\". Rick Groen of The Globe and Mail slammed the film commenting on lack of script and adding that the characters \"don't perform so much as parade, fixed in their roles as semi-animated clothes hangers on a cinematic runway\". He gave the film zero stars out of four. Anthony Lane, a film critic for The New Yorker, called the film a \"superannuated fantasy posing as a slice of modern life\"; he noted that \"almost sixty years after All About Eve, which also featured four major female roles, there is a deep sadness in the sight of Carrie and friends defining themselves not as Bette Davis, Anne Baxter, Celeste Holm, and Thelma Ritter did—by their talents, their hats, and the swordplay of their wits—but purely by their ability to snare and keep a man....All the film lacks is a subtitle: \"The Lying, the Bitch, and the Wardrobe.\" \n\nRamin Setoodeh of Newsweek speculated that some of the criticism for the film is derived possibly from sexism: \"when you listen to men talk about it (and this is coming from the perspective of a male writer), a strange thing happens. The talk turns hateful. Angry. Vengeful. Annoyed...Is this just poor sportsmanship? I can't help but wonder—cue the Carrie Bradshaw voiceover here—if it's not a case of 'Sexism in the City.' Men hated the movie before it even opened...Movie critics, an overwhelmingly male demographic, gave it such a nasty tongue lashing you would have thought they were talking about an ex-girlfriend...The movie might not be Citizen Kane—which, for the record, is a dude flick—but it's incredibly sweet and touching.\"\n\nThe movie featured on worst of 2008 lists including that of The Times, Mark Kermode, The New York Observer, The Tart and The Daily Telegraph. \n\nMedia releases\n\nNew Line Home Entertainment released a DVD and Blu-ray release of Sex and the City: The Movie on September 23, 2008. There are two versions of the film released in the US on home video. There is a standard, single disc theatrical cut (the version seen in theaters) which comes in fullscreen or widescreen (in separate editions). Both discs are the same, except for the movie presentation. The only features are an audio commentary, deleted scenes, and a digital copy of the film. Also released on the same day as the standard edition is the two-disc special edition, which adds six minutes of footage to the film, along with the commentary from the standard edition DVD and a second disc that contains bonus features, as well as a digital copy of the widescreen theatrical version of the film. The only version of the film released on Blu-Ray is the two-disc extended cut, which is identical to the DVD version of the extended cut.\n\nOn December 9, 2008, New Line Home Entertainment released a third edition of Sex and the City: The Movie. This edition is a 4-disc set entitled Sex and the City: The Movie (The Wedding Collection). The 4-disc set features the previously released extended cut of the film on the first disc, the second disc has the bonus features from the extended cut and three additional featurettes, the third disc holds even more special features, and the fourth is a music CD with songs inspired by the movie, including the alternative mix of Fergie's \"Labels or Love\" from the beginning of the film. The set also comes with an exclusive hardcover book, featuring photos and quotes from the movie, and a numbered certificate of authenticity in a pink padded box.\n\nA fourth edition was also released in Australia. This set contained the two discs from the Sex and the City: The Movie Special Edition and a bonus 'Sex and the City Inspired' Clutch Bag. This clutch being black in color in a tile or snake skin material.\n\nThe DVD has reached the #1 on the UK DVD Top Chart and is the fastest selling DVD release of 2008 in the UK, selling over 920,000 copies in one week. It is way ahead of the 700,000 copies sold for Ratatouille which was, prior to Sex and the City's release, the best selling DVD of 2008 in the UK. Although the record has since been beaten by Mamma Mia!\n\nSequel\n\nSex and the City 2 was released in cinemas on May 27, 2010, in the United States and May 28, 2010, in the United Kingdom. It was co-written, produced and directed by Michael Patrick King. The DVD was available for purchase in the United Kingdom on November 29, 2010. The film stars Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis, Cynthia Nixon, and Chris Noth, who reprised their roles from the previous film and television series. It also features cameos from Liza Minnelli, Miley Cyrus, Tim Gunn, Ron White, Omid Djalili, and Penélope Cruz, as well as Broadway actors Norm Lewis, Kelli O'Hara, and Ryan Silverman.\n\nAwards and nominations\n\n;MTV Movie Awards\n* 2008: Best Summer Movie So Far \n;Teen Choice Awards\n* 2008: Choice Movie Actress: Comedy \n* 2008: Choice Movie: Chick Flick \n;Satellite Awards\n* 2008: Best Costume Design \n;People's Choice Awards\n* 2008: Favorite Cast \n* 2008: Favorite Song from a Soundtrack \n;National Movie Awards\n* 2008: Best Comedy \n* 2008: Best Female Performance \n;Golden Trailer Awards\n* 2008: Best Summer 2008 Blockbuster Poster \n;Costume Designers Guild Awards\n* 2009: Excellence in Costume Design for Film - Contemporary \n;BET Award\n*2009: Best Actress \n\nFootnotes\n\n# The film's distribution rights were transferred to Warner Bros. in 2008." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Alaska.txt" ], "title": [ "Alaska" ], "wiki_context": [ "Alaska is a U.S. state situated in the northwest extremity of the Americas. The Canadian administrative divisions of British Columbia and Yukon border the state to the east; it has a maritime border with Russia to the west across the Bering Strait. To the north are the Chukchi and Beaufort seas–the southern parts of the Arctic Ocean. The Pacific Ocean lies to the south and southwest. Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area, the 3rd least populous and the least densely populated of the 50 United States. Approximately half of Alaska's residents (the total estimated at 738,432 by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2015) live within the Anchorage metropolitan area. Alaska's economy is dominated by the fishing, natural gas, and oil industries, resources which it has in abundance. Military bases and tourism are also a significant part of the economy.\n\nThe United States purchased Alaska from the Russian Empire on March 30, 1867, for 7.2 million U.S. dollars at approximately two cents per acre ($4.74/km2). The actual transfer of sovereignty took place on the 6th October 1867 (Julian calendar), which was equivalent to the 18th October in the Gregorian one. To complicate matters further, the time zone changed from 14 hours ahead of Greenwich to 10 hours behind, which meant that Alaska had two Fridays in succession, the only place to have ever done so. The area went through several administrative changes before becoming organized as a territory on May 11, 1912. It was admitted as the 49th state of the U.S. on January 3, 1959. \n\nEtymology\n\nThe name \"Alaska\" (Аляска) was introduced in the Russian colonial period when it was used to refer to the peninsula. It was derived from an Aleut, or Unangam idiom, which figuratively refers to the mainland of Alaska. Literally, it means object to which the action of the sea is directed., at pp. 49 (Alaxsxi-x \n mainland Alaska), 50 (alagu-x sea), 508 (-gi \n suffix, object of its action). It is also known as Alyeska, the \"great land\", an Aleut word derived from the same root.\n\nGeography\n\nAlaska is the northernmost and westernmost state in the United States and has the most easterly longitude in the United States because the Aleutian Islands extend into the eastern hemisphere. Alaska is the only non-contiguous U.S. state on continental North America; about 500 mi of British Columbia (Canada) separates Alaska from Washington. It is technically part of the continental U.S., but is sometimes not included in colloquial use; Alaska is not part of the contiguous U.S., often called \"the Lower 48\". The capital city, Juneau, is situated on the mainland of the North American continent but is not connected by road to the rest of the North American highway system.\n\nThe state is bordered by Yukon and British Columbia in Canada, to the east, the Gulf of Alaska and the Pacific Ocean to the south and southwest, the Bering Sea, Bering Strait, and Chukchi Sea to the west and the Arctic Ocean to the north. Alaska's territorial waters touch Russia's territorial waters in the Bering Strait, as the Russian Big Diomede Island and Alaskan Little Diomede Island are only 3 mi apart. Alaska has a longer coastline than all the other U.S. states combined. \n\nAlaska is the largest state in the United States in land area at , over twice the size of Texas, the next largest state. Alaska is larger than all but 18 sovereign countries. Counting territorial waters, Alaska is larger than the combined area of the next three largest states: Texas, California, and Montana. It is also larger than the combined area of the 22 smallest U.S. states.\n\nRegions\n\nThere are no officially defined borders demarcating the various regions of Alaska, but there are six widely accepted regions:\n\nSouth Central\n\nThe most populous region of Alaska, containing Anchorage, the Matanuska-Susitna Valley and the Kenai Peninsula. Rural, mostly unpopulated areas south of the Alaska Range and west of the Wrangell Mountains also fall within the definition of South Central, as do the Prince William Sound area and the communities of Cordova and Valdez.\n\nSoutheast\n\nAlso referred to as the Panhandle or Inside Passage, this is the region of Alaska closest to the rest of the United States. As such, this was where most of the initial non-indigenous settlement occurred in the years following the Alaska Purchase. The region is dominated by the Alexander Archipelago as well as the Tongass National Forest, the largest national forest in the United States. It contains the state capital Juneau, the former capital Sitka, and Ketchikan, at one time Alaska's largest city. The Alaska Marine Highway provides a vital surface transportation link throughout the area, as only three communities (Haines, Hyder and Skagway) enjoy direct connections to the contiguous North American road system.\n\nInterior\n\nThe Interior is the largest region of Alaska; much of it is uninhabited wilderness. Fairbanks is the only large city in the region. Denali National Park and Preserve is located here. Denali is the highest mountain in North America.\n\nSouthwest\n\nSouthwest Alaska is a sparsely inhabited region stretching some 500 mi inland from the Bering Sea. Most of the population lives along the coast. Kodiak Island is also located in Southwest. The massive Yukon–Kuskokwim Delta, one of the largest river deltas in the world, is here. Portions of the Alaska Peninsula are considered part of Southwest, with the remaining portions included with the Aleutian Islands (see below).\n\nNorth Slope\n\nThe North Slope is mostly tundra peppered with small villages. The area is known for its massive reserves of crude oil, and contains both the National Petroleum Reserve–Alaska and the Prudhoe Bay Oil Field. Barrow, the northernmost city in the United States, is located here. The Northwest Arctic area, anchored by Kotzebue and also containing the Kobuk River valley, is often regarded as being part of this region. However, the respective Inupiat of the North Slope and of the Northwest Arctic seldom consider themselves to be one people.\n\nAleutian Islands\n\nMore than 300 small volcanic islands make up this chain, which stretches over 1200 mi into the Pacific Ocean. Some of these islands fall in the Eastern Hemisphere, but the International Date Line was drawn west of 180° to keep the whole state, and thus the entire North American continent, within the same legal day. Two of the islands, Attu and Kiska, were occupied by Japanese forces during World War II.\n\nNatural features\n\nWith its myriad islands, Alaska has nearly 34000 mi of tidal shoreline. The Aleutian Islands chain extends west from the southern tip of the Alaska Peninsula. Many active volcanoes are found in the Aleutians and in coastal regions. Unimak Island, for example, is home to Mount Shishaldin, which is an occasionally smoldering volcano that rises to 10000 ft above the North Pacific. It is the most perfect volcanic cone on Earth, even more symmetrical than Japan's Mount Fuji. The chain of volcanoes extends to Mount Spurr, west of Anchorage on the mainland. Geologists have identified Alaska as part of Wrangellia, a large region consisting of multiple states and Canadian provinces in the Pacific Northwest, which is actively undergoing continent building.\n\nOne of the world's largest tides occurs in Turnagain Arm, just south of Anchorage – tidal differences can be more than 35 ft. \n\nAlaska has more than three million lakes. Marshlands and wetland permafrost cover 188320 sqmi (mostly in northern, western and southwest flatlands). Glacier ice covers some 16000 sqmi of land and 1200 sqmi of tidal zone. The Bering Glacier complex near the southeastern border with Yukon covers 2250 sqmi alone. With over 100,000 glaciers, Alaska has half of all in the world.\n\nLand ownership\n\nAccording to an October 1998 report by the United States Bureau of Land Management, approximately 65% of Alaska is owned and managed by the U.S. federal government as public lands, including a multitude of national forests, national parks, and national wildlife refuges. Of these, the Bureau of Land Management manages 87 e6acre, or 23.8% of the state. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is managed by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. It is the world's largest wildlife refuge, comprising 16 e6acre.\n\nOf the remaining land area, the state of Alaska owns 101 e6acre, its entitlement under the Alaska Statehood Act. A portion of that acreage is occasionally ceded to organized boroughs, under the statutory provisions pertaining to newly formed boroughs. Smaller portions are set aside for rural subdivisions and other homesteading-related opportunities. These are not very popular due to the often remote and roadless locations. The University of Alaska, as a land grant university, also owns substantial acreage which it manages independently.\n\nAnother 44 e6acre are owned by 12 regional, and scores of local, Native corporations created under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) of 1971. Regional Native corporation Doyon, Limited often promotes itself as the largest private landowner in Alaska in advertisements and other communications. Provisions of ANCSA allowing the corporations' land holdings to be sold on the open market starting in 1991 were repealed before they could take effect. Effectively, the corporations hold title (including subsurface title in many cases, a privilege denied to individual Alaskans) but cannot sell the land. Individual Native allotments can be and are sold on the open market, however.\n\nVarious private interests own the remaining land, totaling about one percent of the state. Alaska is, by a large margin, the state with the smallest percentage of private land ownership when Native corporation holdings are excluded.\n\nClimate\n\nThe climate in Southeast Alaska is a mid-latitude oceanic climate (Köppen climate classification: Cfb) in the southern sections and a subarctic oceanic climate (Köppen Cfc) in the northern parts. On an annual basis, Southeast is both the wettest and warmest part of Alaska with milder temperatures in the winter and high precipitation throughout the year. Juneau averages over 50 in of precipitation a year, and Ketchikan averages over 150 in. This is also the only region in Alaska in which the average daytime high temperature is above freezing during the winter months.\n\nThe climate of Anchorage and south central Alaska is mild by Alaskan standards due to the region's proximity to the seacoast. While the area gets less rain than southeast Alaska, it gets more snow, and days tend to be clearer. On average, Anchorage receives 16 in of precipitation a year, with around 75 in of snow, although there are areas in the south central which receive far more snow. It is a subarctic climate (Köppen: Dfc) due to its brief, cool summers.\n\nThe climate of Western Alaska is determined in large part by the Bering Sea and the Gulf of Alaska. It is a subarctic oceanic climate in the southwest and a continental subarctic climate farther north. The temperature is somewhat moderate considering how far north the area is. This region has a tremendous amount of variety in precipitation. An area stretching from the northern side of the Seward Peninsula to the Kobuk River valley (i. e., the region around Kotzebue Sound) is technically a desert, with portions receiving less than 10 in of precipitation annually. On the other extreme, some locations between Dillingham and Bethel average around 100 in of precipitation. \n\nThe climate of the interior of Alaska is subarctic. Some of the highest and lowest temperatures in Alaska occur around the area near Fairbanks. The summers may have temperatures reaching into the 90s °F (the low-to-mid 30s °C), while in the winter, the temperature can fall below . Precipitation is sparse in the Interior, often less than 10 in a year, but what precipitation falls in the winter tends to stay the entire winter.\n\nThe highest and lowest recorded temperatures in Alaska are both in the Interior. The highest is 100 °F in Fort Yukon (which is just 8 mi inside the arctic circle) on June 27, 1915, making Alaska tied with Hawaii as the state with the lowest high temperature in the United States. The lowest official Alaska temperature is in Prospect Creek on January 23, 1971, one degree above the lowest temperature recorded in continental North America (in Snag, Yukon, Canada). \n\nThe climate in the extreme north of Alaska is Arctic (Köppen: ET) with long, very cold winters and short, cool summers. Even in July, the average low temperature in Barrow is 34 °F. Precipitation is light in this part of Alaska, with many places averaging less than 10 in per year, mostly as snow which stays on the ground almost the entire year.\n\nHistory\n\nAlaska Natives\n\nNumerous indigenous peoples occupied Alaska for thousands of years before the arrival of European peoples to the area. Linguistic and DNA studies done here have provided evidence for the settlement of North America by way of the Bering land bridge. The Tlingit people developed a society with a matrilineal kinship system of property inheritance and descent in what is today Southeast Alaska, along with parts of British Columbia and the Yukon. Also in Southeast were the Haida, now well known for their unique arts. The Tsimshian people came to Alaska from British Columbia in 1887, when President Grover Cleveland, and later the U.S. Congress, granted them permission to settle on Annette Island and found the town of Metlakatla. All three of these peoples, as well as other indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast, experienced smallpox outbreaks from the late 18th through the mid-19th century, with the most devastating epidemics occurring in the 1830s and 1860s, resulting in high fatalities and social disruption. \n\nThe Aleutian Islands are still home to the Aleut people's seafaring society, although they were the first Native Alaskans to be exploited by Russians. Western and Southwestern Alaska are home to the Yup'ik, while their cousins the Alutiiq ~ Sugpiaq lived in what is now Southcentral Alaska. The Gwich'in people of the northern Interior region are Athabaskan and primarily known today for their dependence on the caribou within the much-contested Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The North Slope and Little Diomede Island are occupied by the widespread Inupiat people.\n\nColonization\n\nSome researchers believe that the first Russian settlement in Alaska was established in the 17th century. According to this hypothesis, in 1648 several koches of Semyon Dezhnyov's expedition came ashore in Alaska by storm and founded this settlement. This hypothesis is based on the testimony of Chukchi geographer Nikolai Daurkin, who had visited Alaska in 1764–1765 and who had reported on a village on the Kheuveren River, populated by \"bearded men\" who \"pray to the icons\". Some modern researchers associate Kheuveren with Koyuk River. \n\nThe first European vessel to reach Alaska is generally held to be the St. Gabriel under the authority of the surveyor M. S. Gvozdev and assistant navigator I. Fyodorov on August 21, 1732 during an expedition of Siberian cossak A. F. Shestakov and Belorussian explorer Dmitry Pavlutsky (1729—1735). \n\nAnother European contact with Alaska occurred in 1741, when Vitus Bering led an expedition for the Russian Navy aboard the St. Peter. After his crew returned to Russia with sea otter pelts judged to be the finest fur in the world, small associations of fur traders began to sail from the shores of Siberia toward the Aleutian Islands. The first permanent European settlement was founded in 1784.\n\nBetween 1774 and 1800, Spain sent several expeditions to Alaska in order to assert its claim over the Pacific Northwest. In 1789 a Spanish settlement and fort were built in Nootka Sound. These expeditions gave names to places such as Valdez, Bucareli Sound, and Cordova. Later, the Russian-American Company carried out an expanded colonization program during the early-to-mid-19th century.\n\nSitka, renamed New Archangel from 1804 to 1867, on Baranof Island in the Alexander Archipelago in what is now Southeast Alaska, became the capital of Russian America. It remained the capital after the colony was transferred to the United States. The Russians never fully colonized Alaska, and the colony was never very profitable. Evidence of Russian settlement in names and churches survive throughout southeast Alaska.\n\nWilliam H. Seward, the United States Secretary of State, negotiated the Alaska Purchase (also known as Seward's Folly) with the Russians in 1867 for $7.2 million. Alaska was loosely governed by the military initially, and was administered as a district starting in 1884, with a governor appointed by the President of the United States. A federal district court was headquartered in Sitka.\n\nFor most of Alaska's first decade under the United States flag, Sitka was the only community inhabited by American settlers. They organized a \"provisional city government,\" which was Alaska's first municipal government, but not in a legal sense. Legislation allowing Alaskan communities to legally incorporate as cities did not come about until 1900, and home rule for cities was extremely limited or unavailable until statehood took effect in 1959.\n\nU.S. Territory\n\nStarting in the 1890s and stretching in some places to the early 1910s, gold rushes in Alaska and the nearby Yukon Territory brought thousands of miners and settlers to Alaska. Alaska was officially incorporated as an organized territory in 1912. Alaska's capital, which had been in Sitka until 1906, was moved north to Juneau. Construction of the Alaska Governor's Mansion began that same year. European immigrants from Norway and Sweden also settled in southeast Alaska, where they entered the fishing and logging industries.\n\nDuring World War II, the Aleutian Islands Campaign focused on the three outer Aleutian Islands – Attu, Agattu and Kiska  – that were invaded by Japanese troops and occupied between June 1942 and August 1943. Unalaska/Dutch Harbor became a significant base for the U.S. Army Air Forces and Navy submariners.\n\nThe U.S. Lend-Lease program involved the flying of American warplanes through Canada to Fairbanks and thence Nome; Soviet pilots took possession of these aircraft, ferrying them to fight the German invasion of the Soviet Union. The construction of military bases contributed to the population growth of some Alaskan cities.\n\nStatehood\n\nStatehood for Alaska was an important cause of James Wickersham early in his tenure as a congressional delegate. Decades later, the statehood movement gained its first real momentum following a territorial referendum in 1946. The Alaska Statehood Committee and Alaska's Constitutional Convention would soon follow. Statehood supporters also found themselves fighting major battles against political foes, mostly in the U.S. Congress but also within Alaska. Statehood was approved by Congress on July 7, 1958. Alaska was officially proclaimed a state on January 3, 1959.\n\nIn 1960, the Census Bureau reported Alaska's population as 77.2% White, 3% Black, and 18.8% American Indian and Alaska Native. \n\nOn March 27, 1964, the massive Good Friday earthquake killed 133 people and destroyed several villages and portions of large coastal communities, mainly by the resultant tsunamis and landslides. It was the second-most-powerful earthquake in the recorded history of the world, with a moment magnitude of 9.2. It was over one thousand times more powerful than the 1989 San Francisco earthquake. The time of day (5:36 pm), time of year and location of the epicenter were all cited as factors in potentially sparing thousands of lives, particularly in Anchorage.\n\nThe 1968 discovery of oil at Prudhoe Bay and the 1977 completion of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System led to an oil boom. Royalty revenues from oil have funded large state budgets from 1980 onward. That same year, not coincidentally, Alaska repealed its state income tax.\n\nIn 1989, the Exxon Valdez hit a reef in the Prince William Sound, spilling over 11 MUSgal of crude oil over 1100 mi of coastline. Today, the battle between philosophies of development and conservation is seen in the contentious debate over oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the proposed Pebble Mine.\n\nAlaska Heritage Resources Survey\n\nThe Alaska Heritage Resources Survey (AHRS) is a restricted inventory of all reported historic and prehistoric sites within the state of Alaska; it is maintained by the Office of History and Archaeology. The survey's inventory of cultural resources includes objects, structures, buildings, sites, districts, and travel ways, with a general provision that they are over 50 years old. As of January 31, 2012, over 35,000 sites have been reported. \n\nDemographics\n\nThe United States Census Bureau estimates that the population of Alaska was 738,432 on July 1, 2015, a 3.97% increase since the 2010 United States Census.\n\nIn 2010, Alaska ranked as the 47th state by population, ahead of North Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming (and Washington, D.C.) Alaska is the least densely populated state, and one of the most sparsely populated areas in the world, at , with the next state, Wyoming, at . Alaska is the largest U.S. state by area, and the tenth wealthiest (per capita income). As of November 2014, the state's unemployment rate was 6.6%. \n\nRace and ancestry\n\nAccording to the 2010 United States Census, Alaska had a population of 710,231. In terms of race and ethnicity, the state was 66.7% White (64.1% Non-Hispanic White), 14.8% American Indian and Alaska Native, 5.4% Asian, 3.3% Black or African American, 1.0% Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, 1.6% from Some Other Race, and 7.3% from Two or More Races. Hispanics or Latinos of any race made up 5.5% of the population. \n\n, 50.7% of Alaska's population younger than one year of age belonged to minority groups (i.e., did not have two parents of non-Hispanic white ancestry). \n\nLanguages\n\nAccording to the 2011 American Community Survey, 83.4% of people over the age of five speak only English at home. About 3.5% speak Spanish at home. About 2.2% speak another Indo-European language at home and about 4.3% speak an Asian language at home. About 5.3% speak other languages at home. \n\nThe Alaska Native Language Center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks claims that at least 20 Alaskan native languages exist and there are also some languages with different dialects. Most of Alaska's native languages belong to either the Eskimo–Aleut or Na-Dene language families however some languages are thought to be isolates (e.g. Haida) or have not yet been classified (e.g. Tsimshianic).\n nearly all of Alaska's native languages were classified as either threatened, shifting, moribund, nearly extinct, or dormant languages. \n\nA total of 5.2% of Alaskans speak one of the state's 20 indigenous languages, known locally as \"native languages\".\n\nIn October 2014, the governor of Alaska signed a bill declaring the state's 20 indigenous languages as official languages. This bill gave the languages symbolic recognition as official languages, though they have not been adopted for official use within the government. The 20 languages that were included in the bill are:\n# Inupiaq\n# Siberian Yupik\n# Central Alaskan Yup’ik\n# Alutiiq\n# Unangax\n# Dena’ina\n# Deg Xinag\n# Holikachuk\n# Koyukon\n# Upper Kuskokwim\n# Gwich’in\n# Tanana\n# Upper Tanana\n# Tanacross\n# Hän\n# Ahtna\n# Eyak\n# Tlingit\n# Haida\n# Tsimshian\n\nReligion\n\nAccording to statistics collected by the Association of Religion Data Archives from 2010, about 34% of Alaska residents were members of religious congregations. 100,960 people identified as Evangelical Protestants, 50,866 as Roman Catholic, and 32,550 as mainline Protestants. Roughly 4% are Mormon, 0.5% are Jewish, 1% are Muslim, 0.5% are Buddhist, and 0.5% are Hindu. The largest religious denominations in Alaska were the Catholic Church with 50,866 adherents, non-denominational Evangelical Protestants with 38,070 adherents, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with 32,170 adherents, and the Southern Baptist Convention with 19,891 adherents. Alaska has been identified, along with Pacific Northwest states Washington and Oregon, as being the least religious states of the USA, in terms of church membership. \n\nIn 1795, the First Russian Orthodox Church was established in Kodiak. Intermarriage with Alaskan Natives helped the Russian immigrants integrate into society. As a result, an increasing number of Russian Orthodox churches gradually became established within Alaska. Alaska also has the largest Quaker population (by percentage) of any state. In 2009 there were 6,000 Jews in Alaska (for whom observance of halakha may pose special problems). Alaskan Hindus often share venues and celebrations with members of other Asian religious communities, including Sikhs and Jains. \n\nEstimates for the number of Muslims in Alaska range from 2,000 to 5,000. The Islamic Community Center of Anchorage began efforts in the late 1990s to construct a mosque in Anchorage. They broke ground on a building in south Anchorage in 2010 and were nearing completion in late 2014. When completed, the mosque will be the first in the state and one of the northernmost mosques in the world. \n\nEconomy\n\nThe 2007 gross state product was $44.9 billion, 45th in the nation. Its per capita personal income for 2007 was $40,042, ranking 15th in the nation. According to a 2013 study by Phoenix Marketing International, Alaska had the fifth-largest number of millionaires per capita in the United States, with a ratio of 6.75 percent. The oil and gas industry dominates the Alaskan economy, with more than 80% of the state's revenues derived from petroleum extraction. Alaska's main export product (excluding oil and natural gas) is seafood, primarily salmon, cod, Pollock and crab.\n\nAgriculture represents a very small fraction of the Alaskan economy. Agricultural production is primarily for consumption within the state and includes nursery stock, dairy products, vegetables, and livestock. Manufacturing is limited, with most foodstuffs and general goods imported from elsewhere.\n\nEmployment is primarily in government and industries such as natural resource extraction, shipping, and transportation. Military bases are a significant component of the economy in the Fairbanks North Star, Anchorage and Kodiak Island boroughs, as well as Kodiak. Federal subsidies are also an important part of the economy, allowing the state to keep taxes low. Its industrial outputs are crude petroleum, natural gas, coal, gold, precious metals, zinc and other mining, seafood processing, timber and wood products. There is also a growing service and tourism sector. Tourists have contributed to the economy by supporting local lodging.\n\nEnergy\n\nAlaska has vast energy resources, although its oil reserves have been largely depleted. Major oil and gas reserves were found in the Alaska North Slope (ANS) and Cook Inlet basins, but according to the Energy Information Administration, by February 2014 Alaska had fallen to fourth place in the nation in crude oil production after Texas, North Dakota, and California. Prudhoe Bay on Alaska's North Slope is still the second highest-yielding oil field in the United States, typically producing about 400000 oilbbl/d, although by early 2014 North Dakota's Bakken Formation was producing over 900000 oilbbl/d. Prudhoe Bay was the largest conventional oil field ever discovered in North America, but was much smaller than Canada's enormous Athabasca oil sands field, which by 2014 was producing about of unconventional oil, and had hundreds of years of producible reserves at that rate. \n\nThe Trans-Alaska Pipeline can transport and pump up to of crude oil per day, more than any other crude oil pipeline in the United States. Additionally, substantial coal deposits are found in Alaska's bituminous, sub-bituminous, and lignite coal basins. The United States Geological Survey estimates that there are of undiscovered, technically recoverable gas from natural gas hydrates on the Alaskan North Slope. Alaska also offers some of the highest hydroelectric power potential in the country from its numerous rivers. Large swaths of the Alaskan coastline offer wind and geothermal energy potential as well. \n\nAlaska's economy depends heavily on increasingly expensive diesel fuel for heating, transportation, electric power and light. Though wind and hydroelectric power are abundant and underdeveloped, proposals for statewide energy systems (e.g. with special low-cost electric interties) were judged uneconomical (at the time of the report, 2001) due to low (less than 50¢/gal) fuel prices, long distances and low population. The cost of a gallon of gas in urban Alaska today is usually 30–60¢ higher than the national average; prices in rural areas are generally significantly higher but vary widely depending on transportation costs, seasonal usage peaks, nearby petroleum development infrastructure and many other factors.\n\nPermanent Fund\n\nThe Alaska Permanent Fund is a constitutionally authorized appropriation of oil revenues, established by voters in 1976 to manage a surplus in state petroleum revenues from oil, largely in anticipation of the then recently constructed Trans-Alaska Pipeline System. The fund was originally proposed by Governor Keith Miller on the eve of the 1969 Prudhoe Bay lease sale, out of fear that the legislature would spend the entire proceeds of the sale (which amounted to $900 million) at once. It was later championed by Governor Jay Hammond and Kenai state representative Hugh Malone. It has served as an attractive political prospect ever since, diverting revenues which would normally be deposited into the general fund.\n\nThe Alaska Constitution was written so as to discourage dedicating state funds for a particular purpose. The Permanent Fund has become the rare exception to this, mostly due to the political climate of distrust existing during the time of its creation. From its initial principal of $734,000, the fund has grown to $50 billion as a result of oil royalties and capital investment programs. Most if not all the principal is invested conservatively outside Alaska. This has led to frequent calls by Alaskan politicians for the Fund to make investments within Alaska, though such a stance has never gained momentum.\n\nStarting in 1982, dividends from the fund's annual growth have been paid out each year to eligible Alaskans, ranging from an initial $1,000 in 1982 (equal to three years' payout, as the distribution of payments was held up in a lawsuit over the distribution scheme) to $3,269 in 2008 (which included a one-time $1,200 \"Resource Rebate\"). Every year, the state legislature takes out 8% from the earnings, puts 3% back into the principal for inflation proofing, and the remaining 5% is distributed to all qualifying Alaskans. To qualify for the Permanent Fund Dividend, one must have lived in the state for a minimum of 12 months, maintain constant residency subject to allowable absences, and not be subject to court judgments or criminal convictions which fall under various disqualifying classifications or may subject the payment amount to civil garnishment.\n\nThe Permanent Fund is often considered to be one of the leading examples of a \"Basic Income\" policy in the world. \n\nCost of living\n\nThe cost of goods in Alaska has long been higher than in the contiguous 48 states. Federal government employees, particularly United States Postal Service (USPS) workers and active-duty military members, receive a Cost of Living Allowance usually set at 25% of base pay because, while the cost of living has gone down, it is still one of the highest in the country.\n\nRural Alaska suffers from extremely high prices for food and consumer goods compared to the rest of the country, due to the relatively limited transportation infrastructure.\n\nAgriculture and fishing\n\nDue to the northern climate and short growing season, relatively little farming occurs in Alaska. Most farms are in either the Matanuska Valley, about 40 mi northeast of Anchorage, or on the Kenai Peninsula, about 60 mi southwest of Anchorage. The short 100-day growing season limits the crops that can be grown, but the long sunny summer days make for productive growing seasons. The primary crops are potatoes, carrots, lettuce, and cabbage.\n\nThe Tanana Valley is another notable agricultural locus, especially the Delta Junction area, about 100 mi southeast of Fairbanks, with a sizable concentration of farms growing agronomic crops; these farms mostly lie north and east of Fort Greely. This area was largely set aside and developed under a state program spearheaded by Hammond during his second term as governor. Delta-area crops consist predominately of barley and hay. West of Fairbanks lies another concentration of small farms catering to restaurants, the hotel and tourist industry, and community-supported agriculture.\n\nAlaskan agriculture has experienced a surge in growth of market gardeners, small farms and farmers' markets in recent years, with the highest percentage increase (46%) in the nation in growth in farmers' markets in 2011, compared to 17% nationwide. The peony industry has also taken off, as the growing season allows farmers to harvest during a gap in supply elsewhere in the world, thereby filling a niche in the flower market. \n\nAlaska, with no counties, lacks county fairs. However, a small assortment of state and local fairs (with the Alaska State Fair in Palmer the largest), are held mostly in the late summer. The fairs are mostly located in communities with historic or current agricultural activity, and feature local farmers exhibiting produce in addition to more high-profile commercial activities such as carnival rides, concerts and food. \"Alaska Grown\" is used as an agricultural slogan.\n\nAlaska has an abundance of seafood, with the primary fisheries in the Bering Sea and the North Pacific. Seafood is one of the few food items that is often cheaper within the state than outside it. Many Alaskans take advantage of salmon seasons to harvest portions of their household diet while fishing for subsistence, as well as sport. This includes fish taken by hook, net or wheel. \n\nHunting for subsistence, primarily caribou, moose, and Dall sheep is still common in the state, particularly in remote Bush communities. An example of a traditional native food is Akutaq, the Eskimo ice cream, which can consist of reindeer fat, seal oil, dried fish meat and local berries.\n\nAlaska's reindeer herding is concentrated on Seward Peninsula, where wild caribou can be prevented from mingling and migrating with the domesticated reindeer. \n\nMost food in Alaska is transported into the state from \"Outside\", and shipping costs make food in the cities relatively expensive. In rural areas, subsistence hunting and gathering is an essential activity because imported food is prohibitively expensive. Though most small towns and villages in Alaska lie along the coastline, the cost of importing food to remote villages can be high, because of the terrain and difficult road conditions, which change dramatically, due to varying climate and precipitation changes. The cost of transport can reach as high as 50¢ per pound ($1.10/kg) or more in some remote areas, during the most difficult times, if these locations can be reached at all during such inclement weather and terrain conditions. The cost of delivering a 1 USgal of milk is about $3.50 in many villages where per capita income can be $20,000 or less. Fuel cost per gallon is routinely 20–30¢ higher than the continental United States average, with only Hawaii having higher prices. \n\nTransportation\n\nRoads\n\nAlaska has few road connections compared to the rest of the U.S. The state's road system covers a relatively small area of the state, linking the central population centers and the Alaska Highway, the principal route out of the state through Canada. The state capital, Juneau, is not accessible by road, only a car ferry, which has spurred several debates over the decades about moving the capital to a city on the road system, or building a road connection from Haines. The western part of Alaska has no road system connecting the communities with the rest of Alaska.\n\nOne unique feature of the Alaska Highway system is the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel, an active Alaska Railroad tunnel recently upgraded to provide a paved roadway link with the isolated community of Whittier on Prince William Sound to the Seward Highway about 50 mi southeast of Anchorage at Portage. At , the tunnel was the longest road tunnel in North America until 2007. The tunnel is the longest combination road and rail tunnel in North America.\n\nRail\n\nBuilt around 1915, the Alaska Railroad (ARR) played a key role in the development of Alaska through the 20th century. It links north Pacific shipping through providing critical infrastructure with tracks that run from Seward to Interior Alaska by way of South Central Alaska, passing through Anchorage, Eklutna, Wasilla, Talkeetna, Denali, and Fairbanks, with spurs to Whittier, Palmer and North Pole. The cities, towns, villages, and region served by ARR tracks are known statewide as \"The Railbelt\". In recent years, the ever-improving paved highway system began to eclipse the railroad's importance in Alaska's economy.\n\nThe railroad played a vital role in Alaska's development, moving freight into Alaska while transporting natural resources southward (i.e., coal from the Usibelli coal mine near Healy to Seward and gravel from the Matanuska Valley to Anchorage). It is well known for its summertime tour passenger service.\n\nThe Alaska Railroad was one of the last railroads in North America to use cabooses in regular service and still uses them on some gravel trains. It continues to offer one of the last flag stop routes in the country. A stretch of about 60 mi of track along an area north of Talkeetna remains inaccessible by road; the railroad provides the only transportation to rural homes and cabins in the area. Until construction of the Parks Highway in the 1970s, the railroad provided the only land access to most of the region along its entire route.\n\nIn northern Southeast Alaska, the White Pass and Yukon Route also partly runs through the state from Skagway northwards into Canada (British Columbia and Yukon Territory), crossing the border at White Pass Summit. This line is now mainly used by tourists, often arriving by cruise liner at Skagway. It was featured in the 1983 BBC television series Great Little Railways.\n\nThe Alaska Rail network is not connected to Outside. In 2000, the U.S. Congress authorized $6 million to study the feasibility of a rail link between Alaska, Canada, and the lower 48. \n\nAlaska Rail Marine provides car float service between Whittier and Seattle.\n\nMarine transport\n\nMany cities, towns and villages in the state do not have road or highway access; the only modes of access involve travel by air, river, or the sea.\n\nAlaska's well-developed state-owned ferry system (known as the Alaska Marine Highway) serves the cities of southeast, the Gulf Coast and the Alaska Peninsula. The ferries transport vehicles as well as passengers. The system also operates a ferry service from Bellingham, Washington and Prince Rupert, British Columbia in Canada through the Inside Passage to Skagway. The Inter-Island Ferry Authority also serves as an important marine link for many communities in the Prince of Wales Island region of Southeast and works in concert with the Alaska Marine Highway.\n\nIn recent years, cruise lines have created a summertime tourism market, mainly connecting the Pacific Northwest to Southeast Alaska and, to a lesser degree, towns along Alaska's gulf coast. The population of Ketchikan may rise by over 10,000 people on many days during the summer, as up to four large cruise ships at a time can dock, debarking thousands of passengers.\n\nAir transport\n\nCities not served by road, sea, or river can be reached only by air, foot, dogsled, or snowmachine, accounting for Alaska's extremely well developed bush air services—an Alaskan novelty. Anchorage and, to a lesser extent Fairbanks, is served by many major airlines. Because of limited highway access, air travel remains the most efficient form of transportation in and out of the state. Anchorage recently completed extensive remodeling and construction at Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport to help accommodate the upsurge in tourism (in 2012-2013, Alaska received almost 2 million visitors). \n\nRegular flights to most villages and towns within the state that are commercially viable are challenging to provide, so they are heavily subsidized by the federal government through the Essential Air Service program. Alaska Airlines is the only major airline offering in-state travel with jet service (sometimes in combination cargo and passenger Boeing 737-400s) from Anchorage and Fairbanks to regional hubs like Bethel, Nome, Kotzebue, Dillingham, Kodiak, and other larger communities as well as to major Southeast and Alaska Peninsula communities.\n\nThe bulk of remaining commercial flight offerings come from small regional commuter airlines such as Ravn Alaska, PenAir, and Frontier Flying Service. The smallest towns and villages must rely on scheduled or chartered bush flying services using general aviation aircraft such as the Cessna Caravan, the most popular aircraft in use in the state. Much of this service can be attributed to the Alaska bypass mail program which subsidizes bulk mail delivery to Alaskan rural communities. The program requires 70% of that subsidy to go to carriers who offer passenger service to the communities.\n\nMany communities have small air taxi services. These operations originated from the demand for customized transport to remote areas. Perhaps the most quintessentially Alaskan plane is the bush seaplane. The world's busiest seaplane base is Lake Hood, located next to Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport, where flights bound for remote villages without an airstrip carry passengers, cargo, and many items from stores and warehouse clubs. In 2006 Alaska had the highest number of pilots per capita of any U.S. state. \n\nOther transport\n\nAnother Alaskan transportation method is the dogsled. In modern times (that is, any time after the mid-late 1920s), dog mushing is more of a sport than a true means of transportation. Various races are held around the state, but the best known is the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, a 1150 mi trail from Anchorage to Nome (although the distance varies from year to year, the official distance is set at 1049 mi). The race commemorates the famous 1925 serum run to Nome in which mushers and dogs like Togo and Balto took much-needed medicine to the diphtheria-stricken community of Nome when all other means of transportation had failed. Mushers from all over the world come to Anchorage each March to compete for cash, prizes, and prestige. The \"Serum Run\" is another sled dog race that more accurately follows the route of the famous 1925 relay, leaving from the community of Nenana (southwest of Fairbanks) to Nome. \n\nIn areas not served by road or rail, primary transportation in summer is by all-terrain vehicle and in winter by snowmobile or \"snow machine,\" as it is commonly referred to in Alaska.\n\nData transport\n\nAlaska's internet and other data transport systems are provided largely through the two major telecommunications companies: GCI and Alaska Communications. GCI owns and operates what it calls the Alaska United Fiber Optic system and as of late 2011 Alaska Communications advertised that it has \"two fiber optic paths to the lower 48 and two more across Alaska. In January 2011, it was reported that a $1 billion project to run connect Asia and rural Alaska was being planned, aided in part by $350 million in stimulus from the federal government. \n\nLaw and government\n\nState government\n\nLike all other U.S. states, Alaska is governed as a republic, with three branches of government: an executive branch consisting of the Governor of Alaska and the other independently elected constitutional officers; a legislative branch consisting of the Alaska House of Representatives and Alaska Senate; and a judicial branch consisting of the Alaska Supreme Court and lower courts.\n\nThe state of Alaska employs approximately 16,000 people statewide. \n\nThe Alaska Legislature consists of a 40-member House of Representatives and a 20-member Senate. Senators serve four-year terms and House members two. The Governor of Alaska serves four-year terms. The lieutenant governor runs separately from the governor in the primaries, but during the general election, the nominee for governor and nominee for lieutenant governor run together on the same ticket.\n\nAlaska's court system has four levels: the Alaska Supreme Court, the Alaska Court of Appeals, the superior courts and the district courts. The superior and district courts are trial courts. Superior courts are courts of general jurisdiction, while district courts only hear certain types of cases, including misdemeanor criminal cases and civil cases valued up to $100,000.\n\nThe Supreme Court and the Court of Appeals are appellate courts. The Court of Appeals is required to hear appeals from certain lower-court decisions, including those regarding criminal prosecutions, juvenile delinquency, and habeas corpus. The Supreme Court hears civil appeals and may in its discretion hear criminal appeals.\n\nState politics\n\nAlthough in its early years of statehood Alaska was a Democratic state, since the early 1970s it has been characterized as Republican-leaning. Local political communities have often worked on issues related to land use development, fishing, tourism, and individual rights. Alaska Natives, while organized in and around their communities, have been active within the Native corporations. These have been given ownership over large tracts of land, which require stewardship.\n\nAlaska was formerly the only state in which possession of one ounce or less of marijuana in one's home was completely legal under state law, though the federal law remains in force.\n\nThe state has an independence movement favoring a vote on secession from the United States, with the Alaskan Independence Party. \n\nSix Republicans and four Democrats have served as governor of Alaska. In addition, Republican Governor Wally Hickel was elected to the office for a second term in 1990 after leaving the Republican party and briefly joining the Alaskan Independence Party ticket just long enough to be reelected. He subsequently officially rejoined the Republican party in 1994.\n\nAlaska's voter initiative making marijuana legal takes effect 24 February 2015, placing Alaska alongside Colorado and Washington as the three U.S. states where recreational marijuana is legal. The new law means people over age 21 can consume small amounts of pot — if they can find it. Commercial sales await implementation of Alaska Measure 2 (2014). \n\nTaxes\n\nTo finance state government operations, Alaska depends primarily on petroleum revenues and federal subsidies. This allows it to have the lowest individual tax burden in the United States. It is one of five states with no state sales tax, one of seven states that do not levy an individual income tax, and one of the two states that has neither. The Department of Revenue Tax Division reports regularly on the state's revenue sources. The Department also issues an annual summary of its operations, including new state laws that directly affect the tax division.\n\nWhile Alaska has no state sales tax, 89 municipalities collect a local sales tax, from 1.0–7.5%, typically 3–5%. Other local taxes levied include raw fish taxes, hotel, motel, and bed-and-breakfast 'bed' taxes, severance taxes, liquor and tobacco taxes, gaming (pull tabs) taxes, tire taxes and fuel transfer taxes. A part of the revenue collected from certain state taxes and license fees (such as petroleum, aviation motor fuel, telephone cooperative) is shared with municipalities in Alaska.\n\nFairbanks has one of the highest property taxes in the state as no sales or income taxes are assessed in the Fairbanks North Star Borough (FNSB). A sales tax for the FNSB has been voted on many times, but has yet to be approved, leading law makers to increase taxes dramatically on goods such as liquor and tobacco.\n\nIn 2014 the Tax Foundation ranked Alaska as having the fourth most \"business friendly\" tax policy, behind only Wyoming, South Dakota, and Nevada. \n\nFederal politics\n\nAlaska regularly supports Republicans in presidential elections and has done so since statehood. Republicans have won the state's electoral college votes in all but one election that it has participated in (1964). No state has voted for a Democratic presidential candidate fewer times. Alaska was carried by Democratic nominee Lyndon B. Johnson during his landslide election in 1964, while the 1960 and 1968 elections were close. Since 1972, however, Republicans have carried the state by large margins. In 2008, Republican John McCain defeated Democrat Barack Obama in Alaska, 59.49% to 37.83%. McCain's running mate was Sarah Palin, the state's governor and the first Alaskan on a major party ticket. Obama lost Alaska again in 2012, but he captured 40% of the state's vote in that election, making him the first Democrat to do so since 1968.\n\nThe Alaska Bush, central Juneau, midtown and downtown Anchorage, and the areas surrounding the University of Alaska Fairbanks campus and Ester have been strongholds of the Democratic Party. The Matanuska-Susitna Borough, the majority of Fairbanks (including North Pole and the military base), and South Anchorage typically have the strongest Republican showing. , well over half of all registered voters have chosen \"Non-Partisan\" or \"Undeclared\" as their affiliation, despite recent attempts to close primaries to unaffiliated voters.\n\nBecause of its population relative to other U.S. states, Alaska has only one member in the U.S. House of Representatives. This seat is held by Republican Don Young, who was re-elected to his 21st consecutive term in 2012. Alaska's At-large congressional district is one of the largest parliamentary constituencies in the world.\n\nIn 2008, Governor Sarah Palin became the first Republican woman to run on a national ticket when she became John McCain's running mate. She continued to be a prominent national figure even after resigning from the governor's job in July 2009. \n\nAlaska's United States Senators belong to Class 2 and Class 3. In 2008, Democrat Mark Begich, mayor of Anchorage, defeated long-time Republican senator Ted Stevens. Stevens had been convicted on seven felony counts of failing to report gifts on Senate financial discloser forms one week before the election. The conviction was set aside in April 2009 after evidence of prosecutorial misconduct emerged.\n\nRepublican Frank Murkowski held the state's other senatorial position. After being elected governor in 2002, he resigned from the Senate and appointed his daughter, State Representative Lisa Murkowski as his successor. She won full six-year terms in 2004 and 2010.\n\nFile:Bill Walker inauguration speech.jpg|Bill Walker, Governor\nFile:Byron Mallott inaugural speech.jpg|Byron Mallott, Lieutenant Governor\nFile:Lisa Murkowski.jpg|Lisa Murkowski, senior United States Senator\nFile:Senator_Dan_Sullivan_official.jpg|Dan Sullivan, junior United States Senator\nFile:Don Young, official photo portrait, color, 2006.jpg|Don Young, at-large United States Representative\n\nCities, towns and boroughs\n\nAlaska is not divided into counties, as most of the other U.S. states, but it is divided into boroughs. Many of the more densely populated parts of the state are part of Alaska's 16 boroughs, which function somewhat similarly to counties in other states. However, unlike county-equivalents in the other 49 states, the boroughs do not cover the entire land area of the state. The area not part of any borough is referred to as the Unorganized Borough.\n\nThe Unorganized Borough has no government of its own, but the U.S. Census Bureau in cooperation with the state divided the Unorganized Borough into 11 census areas solely for the purposes of statistical analysis and presentation. A recording district is a mechanism for administration of the public record in Alaska. The state is divided into 34 recording districts which are centrally administered under a State Recorder. All recording districts use the same acceptance criteria, fee schedule, etc., for accepting documents into the public record.\n\nWhereas many U.S. states use a three-tiered system of decentralization—state/county/township—most of Alaska uses only two tiers—state/borough. Owing to the low population density, most of the land is located in the Unorganized Borough. As the name implies, it has no intermediate borough government but is administered directly by the state government. In 2000, 57.71% of Alaska's area has this status, with 13.05% of the population.\n\nAnchorage merged the city government with the Greater Anchorage Area Borough in 1975 to form the Municipality of Anchorage, containing the city proper and the communities of Eagle River, Chugiak, Peters Creek, Girdwood, Bird, and Indian. Fairbanks has a separate borough (the Fairbanks North Star Borough) and municipality (the City of Fairbanks).\n\nThe state's most populous city is Anchorage, home to 278,700 people in 2006, 225,744 of whom live in the urbanized area. The richest location in Alaska by per capita income is Halibut Cove ($89,895). Yakutat City, Sitka, Juneau, and Anchorage are the four largest cities in the U.S. by area.\n\nCities and census-designated places (by population)\n\nAs reflected in the 2010 United States Census, Alaska has a total of 355 incorporated cities and census-designated places (CDPs). The tally of cities includes four unified municipalities, essentially the equivalent of a consolidated city–county. The majority of these communities are located in the rural expanse of Alaska known as \"The Bush\" and are unconnected to the contiguous North American road network. The table at the bottom of this section lists the 100 largest cities and census-designated places in Alaska, in population order.\n\nOf Alaska's 2010 Census population figure of 710,231, 20,429 people, or 2.88% of the population, did not live in an incorporated city or census-designated place. Approximately three-quarters of that figure were people who live in urban and suburban neighborhoods on the outskirts of the city limits of Ketchikan, Kodiak, Palmer and Wasilla. CDPs have not been established for these areas by the United States Census Bureau, except that seven CDPs were established for the Ketchikan-area neighborhoods in the 1980 Census (Clover Pass, Herring Cove, Ketchikan East, Mountain Point, North Tongass Highway, Pennock Island and Saxman East), but have not been used since. The remaining population was scattered throughout Alaska, both within organized boroughs and in the Unorganized Borough, in largely remote areas.\n\nEducation\n\nThe Alaska Department of Education and Early Development administers many school districts in Alaska. In addition, the state operates a boarding school, Mt. Edgecumbe High School in Sitka, and provides partial funding for other boarding schools, including Nenana Student Living Center in Nenana and The Galena Interior Learning Academy in Galena. \n\nThere are more than a dozen colleges and universities in Alaska. Accredited universities in Alaska include the University of Alaska Anchorage, University of Alaska Fairbanks, University of Alaska Southeast, and Alaska Pacific University. Alaska is the only state that has no institutions that are part of the NCAA Division I.\n\nThe Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development operates AVTEC, Alaska's Institute of Technology. Campuses in Seward and Anchorage offer 1 week to 11-month training programs in areas as diverse as Information Technology, Welding, Nursing, and Mechanics.\n\nAlaska has had a problem with a \"brain drain\". Many of its young people, including most of the highest academic achievers, leave the state after high school graduation and do not return. , Alaska did not have a law school or medical school. The University of Alaska has attempted to combat this by offering partial four-year scholarships to the top 10% of Alaska high school graduates, via the Alaska Scholars Program. \n\nPublic health and public safety\n\nThe Alaska State Troopers are Alaska's statewide police force. They have a long and storied history, but were not an official organization until 1941. Before the force was officially organized, law enforcement in Alaska was handled by various federal agencies. Larger towns usually have their own local police and some villages rely on \"Public Safety Officers\" who have police training but do not carry firearms. In much of the state, the troopers serve as the only police force available. In addition to enforcing traffic and criminal law, wildlife Troopers enforce hunting and fishing regulations. Due to the varied terrain and wide scope of the Troopers' duties, they employ a wide variety of land, air, and water patrol vehicles.\n\nMany rural communities in Alaska are considered \"dry,\" having outlawed the importation of alcoholic beverages. Suicide rates for rural residents are higher than urban. \n\nDomestic abuse and other violent crimes are also at high levels in the state; this is in part linked to alcohol abuse. Alaska has the highest rate of sexual assault in the nation, especially in rural areas. The average age of sexually assaulted victims is 16 years old. In four out of five cases, the suspects were relatives, friends or acquaintances. \n\nCulture\n\nSome of Alaska's popular annual events are the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race that starts in Anchorage and ends in Nome, World Ice Art Championships in Fairbanks, the Blueberry Festival and Alaska Hummingbird Festival in Ketchikan, the Sitka Whale Fest, and the Stikine River Garnet Fest in Wrangell. The Stikine River attracts the largest springtime concentration of American bald eagles in the world.\n\nThe Alaska Native Heritage Center celebrates the rich heritage of Alaska's 11 cultural groups. Their purpose is to encourage cross-cultural exchanges among all people and enhance self-esteem among Native people. The Alaska Native Arts Foundation promotes and markets Native art from all regions and cultures in the State, using the internet. \n\nMusic\n\nInfluences on music in Alaska include the traditional music of Alaska Natives as well as folk music brought by later immigrants from Russia and Europe. Prominent musicians from Alaska include singer Jewel, traditional Aleut flautist Mary Youngblood, folk singer-songwriter Libby Roderick, Christian music singer/songwriter Lincoln Brewster, metal/post hardcore band 36 Crazyfists and the groups Pamyua and Portugal. The Man.\n\nThere are many established music festivals in Alaska, including the Alaska Folk Festival, the Fairbanks Summer Arts Festival, the [http://anchoragefolkfestival.org/ Anchorage Folk Festival], the Athabascan Old-Time Fiddling Festival, the Sitka Jazz Festival, and the Sitka Summer Music Festival. The most prominent orchestra in Alaska is the Anchorage Symphony Orchestra, though the Fairbanks Symphony Orchestra and Juneau Symphony are also notable. The Anchorage Opera is currently the state's only professional opera company, though there are several volunteer and semi-professional organizations in the state as well.\n\nThe official state song of Alaska is \"Alaska's Flag\", which was adopted in 1955; it celebrates the flag of Alaska.\n\nAlaska in film and on television\n\nAlaska's first independent picture entirely made in Alaska was The Chechahcos, produced by Alaskan businessman Austin E. Lathrop and filmed in and around Anchorage. Released in 1924 by the Alaska Moving Picture Corporation, it was the only film the company made.\n\nOne of the most prominent movies filmed in Alaska is MGM's Eskimo/Mala The Magnificent, starring Alaska Native Ray Mala. In 1932 an expedition set out from MGM's studios in Hollywood to Alaska to film what was then billed as \"The Biggest Picture Ever Made.\" Upon arriving in Alaska, they set up \"Camp Hollywood\" in Northwest Alaska, where they lived during the duration of the filming. Louis B. Mayer spared no expense in spite of the remote location, going so far as to hire the chef from the Hotel Roosevelt in Hollywood to prepare meals.\n\nWhen Eskimo premiered at the Astor Theatre in New York City, the studio received the largest amount of feedback in its history to that point. Eskimo was critically acclaimed and released worldwide; as a result, Mala became an international movie star. Eskimo won the first Oscar for Best Film Editing at the Academy Awards, and showcased and preserved aspects of Inupiat culture on film.\n\nThe 1983 Disney movie Never Cry Wolf was at least partially shot in Alaska. The 1991 film White Fang, based on Jack London's novel and starring Ethan Hawke, was filmed in and around Haines. Steven Seagal's 1994 On Deadly Ground, starring Michael Caine, was filmed in part at the Worthington Glacier near Valdez. The 1999 John Sayles film Limbo, starring David Strathairn, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, and Kris Kristofferson, was filmed in Juneau.\n\nThe psychological thriller Insomnia, starring Al Pacino and Robin Williams, was shot in Canada, but was set in Alaska. The 2007 film directed by Sean Penn, Into The Wild, was partially filmed and set in Alaska. The film, which is based on the novel of the same name, follows the adventures of Christopher McCandless, who died in a remote abandoned bus along the Stampede Trail west of Healy in 1992.\n\nMany films and television shows set in Alaska are not filmed there; for example, Northern Exposure, set in the fictional town of Cicely, Alaska, was filmed in Roslyn, Washington. The 2007 horror feature 30 Days of Night is set in Barrow, but was filmed in New Zealand.\n\nMany reality television shows are filmed in Alaska. In 2011 the Anchorage Daily News found ten set in the state. \n\nState symbols\n\n* State motto: North to the Future\n* Nicknames: \"The Last Frontier\" or \"Land of the Midnight Sun\" or \"Seward's Icebox\"\n* State bird: willow ptarmigan, adopted by the Territorial Legislature in 1955. It is a small (15 –) Arctic grouse that lives among willows and on open tundra and muskeg. Plumage is brown in summer, changing to white in winter. The willow ptarmigan is common in much of Alaska.\n* State fish: king salmon, adopted 1962.\n* State flower: wild/native forget-me-not, adopted by the Territorial Legislature in 1917. It is a perennial that is found throughout Alaska, from Hyder to the Arctic Coast, and west to the Aleutians.\n* State fossil: woolly mammoth, adopted 1986.\n* State gem: jade, adopted 1968.\n* State insect: four-spot skimmer dragonfly, adopted 1995.\n* State land mammal: moose, adopted 1998.\n* State marine mammal: bowhead whale, adopted 1983.\n* State mineral: gold, adopted 1968.\n* State song: \"Alaska's Flag\"\n* State sport: dog mushing, adopted 1972.\n* State tree: Sitka spruce, adopted 1962.\n* State dog: Alaskan Malamute, adopted 2010. \n* State soil: Tanana, adopted unknown." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Moby-Dick.txt" ], "title": [ "Moby-Dick" ], "wiki_context": [ "Moby-Dick; or, The Whale is a novel by American writer Herman Melville, published in 1851 during the period of the American Renaissance. Sailor Ishmael tells the story of the obsessive quest of Ahab, captain of the whaler Pequod, for revenge on Moby Dick, the white whale which on the previous whaling voyage destroyed his ship and severed his leg at the knee. The novel was a commercial failure and out of print at the time of the author's death in 1891, but during the 20th century, its reputation as a Great American Novel was established. William Faulkner confessed he wished he had written it himself, and D. H. Lawrence called it \"one of the strangest and most wonderful books in the world\", and \"the greatest book of the sea ever written\". \"Call me Ishmael\" is among world literature's most famous opening sentences. \n\nThe product of a year and a half of writing, the book draws on Melville's experience at sea, on his reading in whaling literature, and on literary inspirations such as Shakespeare and the Bible. The white whale is modeled on the notoriously hard to catch actual albino whale Mocha Dick, and the ending is based on the sinking of the whaler Essex by a whale. The detailed and realistic descriptions of whale hunting and of extracting whale oil, as well as life aboard ship among a culturally diverse crew, are mixed with exploration of class and social status, good and evil, and the existence of God. In addition to narrative prose, Melville uses styles and literary devices ranging from songs, poetry, and catalogs to Shakespearean stage directions, soliloquies, and asides.\n\nDedicated to Nathaniel Hawthorne, \"in token of my admiration for his genius\", the work was first published as The Whale in London in October 1851, and under its definitive title in New York in November. Hundreds of differences, mostly slight and some important, are seen between the two editions. The London publisher censored or changed sensitive passages and Melville made revisions, as well, including the last-minute change in the title for the New York edition. The whale, however, appears in both editions as \"Moby Dick\", with no hyphen. About 3,200 copies were sold during the author's life.\n\nPlot\n\nIshmael travels in December from Manhattan Island to New Bedford with plans to sign up for a whaling voyage. The inn where he arrives is so crowded, he must share a bed with the tattooed Polynesian Queequeg, a harpooneer whose father was king of the (fictional) island of Rokovoko. The next morning, Ishmael and Queequeg attend Father Mapple's sermon on Jonah, then head for Nantucket. Ishmael signs up with the Quaker ship-owners Bildad and Peleg for a voyage on their whaler Pequod. Peleg describes Captain Ahab: \"He's a grand, ungodly, god-like man\" who nevertheless \"has his humanities\". They hire Queequeg the following morning. A man named Elijah prophesies a dire fate should Ishmael and Queequeg join Ahab. While provisions are loaded, shadowy figures board the ship. On a cold Christmas Day, the Pequod leaves the harbor.\n\nIshmael discusses cetology (the zoological classification and natural history of the whale), and describes the crew members. The chief mate is 30-year-old Starbuck, a Nantucket Quaker with a realist mentality, whose harpooneer is Queequeg; second mate is Stubb, from Cape Cod, happy-go-lucky and cheerful, whose harpooneer is Tashtego, a proud, pure-blooded Indian from Gay Head, and the third mate is Flask, from Martha's Vineyard, short, stout, whose harpooneer is Daggoo, a tall African, now a resident of Nantucket.\n\nWhen Ahab finally appears on the quarterdeck, he announces he is out for revenge on the white whale which took one leg from the knee down and left him with a prosthesis fashioned from a whale's jawbone. Ahab will give the first man to sight Moby Dick a doubloon, a gold coin, which he nails to the mast. Starbuck objects that he has not come for vengeance but for profit. Ahab's purpose exercises a mysterious spell on Ishmael: \"Ahab's quenchless feud seemed mine\". Instead of rounding Cape Horn, Ahab heads for the equatorial Pacific Ocean via southern Africa. One afternoon, as Ishmael and Queequeg are weaving a mat — \"its warp seemed necessity, his hand free will, and Queequeg's sword chance\" — Tashtego sights a sperm whale. Immediately, five hidden figures appear whom Ahab has brought as his own boat crew. Their leader, Fedallah, a Parsee, is Ahab's harpooneer. The pursuit is unsuccessful.\n\nSoutheast of the Cape of Good Hope, the Pequod makes the first of nine sea-encounters, or \"gams\", with other ships: Ahab hails the Goney (Albatross) to ask whether they have seen the White Whale, but the trumpet through which her captain tries to speak falls into the sea before he can answer. Ishmael explains that because of Ahab's absorption with Moby Dick, he sails on without the customary \"gam\", which defines as a \"social meeting of two (or more) Whale-ships\", in which the two captains remain on one ship and the chief mates on the other. In the second gam off the Cape of Good Hope, with the Town-Ho, a Nantucket whaler, the concealed story of a \"judgment of God\" is revealed, but only to the crew: a defiant sailor who struck an oppressive officer is flogged, and when that officer led the chase for Moby Dick, he fell from the boat and was killed by the whale.\n\nIshmael digresses on pictures of whales, brit (microscopic sea creatures on which whales feed), squid and — after four boats lowered in vain because Daggoo mistook a giant squid for the white whale — whale-lines. The next day, in the Indian Ocean, Stubb kills a sperm whale, and that night Fleece, the Pequods black cook, prepares him a rare whale steak. Fleece delivers a sermon to the sharks that fight each other to feast on the whale's carcass, tied to the ship, saying that their nature is to be voracious, but they must overcome it. The whale is prepared, beheaded, and barrels of oil are tried out. Standing at the head of the whale, Ahab begs it to speak of the depths of the sea. The Pequod next encounters the Jeroboam, which not only lost its chief mate to Moby Dick, but also is now plagued by an epidemic.\n\nThe whale carcass still lies in the water. Queequeg mounts it, tied to Ishmael's belt by a monkey-rope as if they were Siamese twins. Stubb and Flask kill a right whale whose head is fastened to a yardarm opposite the sperm whale's head. Ishmael compares the two heads in a philosophical way: the right whale is Lockean, stoic, and the sperm whale as Kantean, platonic. Tashtego cuts into the head of the sperm whale and retrieves buckets of oil. He falls into the head, and the head falls off the yardarm into the sea. Queequeg dives after him and frees his mate with his sword.\n\nThe Pequod next gams with the Jungfrau from Bremen. Both ships sight whales simultaneously, with the Pequod winning the contest. The three harpooneers dart their harpoons, and Flask delivers the mortal strike with a lance. The carcass sinks, and Queequeg barely manages to escape. The Pequods next gam is with the French whaler Bouton de Rose, whose crew is ignorant of the ambergris in the head of the diseased whale in their possession. Stubb talks them out of it, but Ahab orders him away. Days later, an encounter with a harpooned whale prompts Pip, a little black cabin-boy from Alabama, to jump out of his whale boat. The whale must be cut loose, because the line has Pip so entangled in it. Furious, Stubb orders Pip to stay in the whale boat, but Pip later jumps again, and is left alone in the immense sea and has gone insane by the time he is picked up.\n\nCooled sperm oil congeals and must be squeezed back into liquid state; blubber is boiled in the try-pots on deck; the warm oil is decanted into casks, and then stowed in the ship. After the operation, the decks are scrubbed. The coin hammered to the main mast shows three Andes summits, one with a flame, one with a tower, and one a crowing cock. Ahab stops to look at the doubloon and interprets the coin as signs of his firmness, volcanic energy, and victory; Starbuck takes the high peaks as evidence of the Trinity; Stubb focuses on the zodiacal arch over the mountains; and Flask sees nothing of any symbolic value at all. The Manxman mutters in front of the mast, and Pip declines the verb \"look\".\n\nThe Pequod next gams with the Samuel Enderby of London, captained by Boomer, a down-to-earth fellow who lost his right arm to Moby Dick. Nevertheless, he carries no ill will toward the whale, which he regards not as malicious, but as awkward. Ahab puts an end to the gam by rushing back to his ship. The narrator now discusses the subjects of 1) whalers supply; 2) a glen in Tranque in the Arsacides islands full of carved whale bones, fossil whales, whale skeleton measurements; 3) the chance that the magnitude of the whale will diminish and that the leviathan might perish.\n\nLeaving the Samuel Enderby, Ahab wrenches his ivory leg and orders the carpenter to fashion him another. Starbuck informs Ahab of oil leakage in the hold. Reluctantly, Ahab orders the harpooneers to inspect the casks. Queequeg, sweating all day below decks, develops a chill and soon is almost mortally feverish. The carpenter makes a coffin for Queequeg, who fears an ordinary burial at sea. Queequeg tries it for size, with Pip sobbing and beating his tambourine, standing by and calling himself a coward while he praises Queequeg for his gameness. Yet Queequeg suddenly rallies, briefly convalesces, and leaps up, back in good health. Henceforth, he uses his coffin for a spare seachest, which is later caulked and pitched to replace the Pequods life buoy.\n\nThe Pequod sails northeast toward Formosa and into the Pacific Ocean. Ahab, with one nostril, smells the musk from the Bashee isles, and with the other, the salt of the waters where Moby Dick swims. Ahab goes to Perth, the blacksmith, with bag of racehorse shoenail stubs to be forged into the shank of a special harpoon, and with his razors for Perth to melt and fashion into a harpoon barb. Ahab tempers the barb in blood from Queequeg, Tashtego, and Daggoo.\n\nThe Pequod gams next with the Bachelor, a Nantucket ship heading home full of sperm oil. Every now and then, the Pequod lowers for whales with success. On one of those nights in the whaleboat, Fedallah prophesies that neither hearse nor coffin can be Ahab's, that before he dies, Ahab must see two hearses — one not made by mortal hands and the other made of American wood — that Fedallah will precede his captain in death, and finally that only hemp can kill Ahab.\n\nAs the Pequod approaches the Equator, Ahab scolds his quadrant for telling him only where he is and not where he will be. He dashes it to the deck. That evening, an impressive typhoon attacks the ship. Lightning strikes the mast, setting the doubloon and Ahab's harpoon aglow. Ahab delivers a speech on the spirit of fire, seeing the lightning as a portent of Moby Dick. Starbuck sees the lightning as a warning, and feels tempted to shoot the sleeping Ahab with a musket. Next morning, when he finds that the lightning disoriented the compass, Ahab makes a new one out of a lance, a maul, and a sailmaker's needle. He orders the log be heaved, but the weathered line snaps, leaving the ship with no way to fix its location.\n\nThe Pequod is now heading southeast toward Moby Dick. A man falls overboard from the mast. The life buoy is thrown, but both sink. Now Queequeg proposes that his superfluous coffin be used as a new life buoy. Starbuck orders the carpenter take care it is lidded and caulked. Next morning, the ship meets in another truncated gam with the Rachel, commanded by Captain Gardiner from Nantucket. The Rachel is seeking survivors from one of her whaleboats which had gone after Moby Dick. Among the missing is Gardiner's young son. Ahab refuses to join the search. Twenty-four hours a day, Ahab now stands and walks the deck, while Fedallah shadows him. Suddenly, a sea hawk grabs Ahab's slouched hat and flies off with it. Next, the Pequod, in a ninth and final gam, meets the Delight, badly damaged and with five of her crew left dead by Moby Dick. Her captain shouts that the harpoon which can kill the white whale has yet to be forged, but Ahab flourishes his special lance and once more orders the ship forward. Ahab shares a moment of contemplation with Starbuck. Ahab speaks about his wife and child, calls himself a fool for spending 40 years on whaling, and claims he can see his own child in Starbuck's eye. Starbuck tries to persuade Ahab to return to Nantucket to meet both their families, but Ahab simply crosses the deck and stands near Fedallah.\n\nOn the first day of the chase, Ahab smells the whale, climbs the mast, and sights Moby Dick. He claims the doubloon for himself, and orders all boats to lower except for Starbuck's. The whale bites Ahab's boat in two, tosses the captain out of it, and scatters the crew. On the second day of the chase, Ahab leaves Starbuck in charge of the Pequod. Moby Dick smashes the three boats that seek him into splinters and tangles their lines. Ahab is rescued, but his ivory leg and Fedallah are lost. Starbuck begs Ahab to desist, but Ahab vows to slay the white whale, even if he would have to dive through the globe itself to get his revenge.\n\nOn the third day of the chase, Ahab sights Moby Dick at noon, and sharks appear, as well. Ahab lowers his boat for a final time, leaving Starbuck again on board. Moby Dick breaches and destroys two boats. Fedallah's corpse, still entangled in the fouled lines, is lashed to the whale's back, so Moby Dick turns out to be the hearse Fedallah prophesied. \"Possessed by all the fallen angels\", Ahab plants his harpoon in the whale's flank. Moby Dick smites the whaleboat, tossing its men into the sea. Only Ishmael survives. The whale now fatally attacks the Pequod. Ahab then realizes that the destroyed ship is the hearse made of American wood in Fedallah's prophesy. The whale returns to Ahab, who stabs at him again. The line loops around Ahab's neck, and as the stricken whale swims away, the captain is drawn with him out of sight. Queequeg's coffin comes to the surface, the only thing to escape the vortex when Pequod sank. For an entire day, Ishmael floats on it, and then the Rachel, still looking for its lost seamen, rescues him.\n\nStructure\n\nPoint of view \n\nCritic Walter Bezanson points out that Ishmael is the narrator, shaping his story with use of many different genres including sermons, stage plays, soliloquies, and emblematical readings. Repeatedly, Ishmael refers to his writing of the book: \"'But how can I hope to explain myself here; and yet, in some dim, random way, explain myself I must, else all these chapters might be naught.'\" Scholar John Bryant calls Ishmael the novel's \"central consciousness and narrative voice.\" Bezanson distinguishes Ishmael as narrator from Ishmael as character, whom he calls \"forecastle Ishmael\", the younger Ishmael of some years ago. Narrator Ishmael, then, is \"merely young Ishmael grown older.\" Bezanson further distinguishes Ishmael from the sailor and author Herman Melville. Neither Ishmael must be equated with Melville himself, Bezanson warns readers to \"resist any one-to-one equation of Melville and Ishmael.\" \n\nChapter structure \n\nAccording to critic Walter Bezanson, the chapter structure can be divided into \"chapter sequences\", \"chapter clusters\", and \"balancing chapters\". The simplest sequences are of narrative progression, then sequences of theme such as the three chapters on whale painting, and sequences of structural similarity, such as the five dramatic chapters beginning with \"The Quarter-Deck\" or the four chapters beginning with \"The Candles\". Chapter clusters are the chapters on the significance of the colour white, and those on the meaning of fire. Balancing chapters are chapters of opposites, such as \"Loomings\" versus the \"Epilogue,\" or similars, such as \"The Quarter-Deck\" and \"The Candles\". \n\nScholar Lawrence Buell describes the arrangement of the non-narrative chapters as structured around three patterns: first, the nine meetings of the Pequod with ships that have encountered Moby Dick. Each has been more and more severely damaged, foreshadowing the Pequods own fate. Second, the increasingly impressive encounters with whales. In the early encounters, the whaleboats hardly make contact; later there are false alarms and routine chases; finally, the massive assembling of whales at the edges of the China Sea in \"The Grand Armada\". A typhoon near Japan sets the stage for Ahab's confrontation with Moby Dick. The third pattern is the cetological documentation, so lavish that it can be divided into two subpatterns. These chapters start with the ancient history of whaling and a bibliographical classification of whales, getting closer with second-hand stories of the evil of whales in general and of Moby Dick in particular, a chronologically ordered commentary on pictures of whales. The climax to this section is chapter 57, \"Of whales in paint etc.\", which begins with the humble (a beggar in London) and ends with the sublime (the constellation Cetus). The next chapter (\"Brit\"), thus the other half of this pattern, begins with the book's first description of live whales, and next the anatomy of the sperm whale is studied, more or less from front to rear and from outer to inner parts, all the way down to the skeleton. Two concluding chapters set forth the whale's evolution as a species and claim its eternal nature. \n\nSome \"ten or more\" of the chapters on whale killings, beginning at two-fifths of the book, are developed enough to be called \"events\". As Bezanson writes, \"in each case a killing provokes either a chapter sequence or a chapter cluster of cetological lore growing out of the circumstance of the particular killing,\" thus these killings are \"structural occasions for ordering the whaling essays and sermons\". \n\nBuell observes that the \"narrative architecture\" is an \"idiosyncratic variant of the bipolar observer/hero narrative\", that is, the novel is structured around the two main characters, Ahab and Ishmael, who are intertwined and contrasted with each other, with Ishmael the observer and narrator. As the story of Ishmael, remarks Robert Milder, it is a \"narrative of education\". \n\nBryant and Springer find that the book is structured around the two consciousnesses of Ahab and Ishmael, with Ahab as a force of linearity and Ishmael a force of digression. While both have an angry sense of being orphaned, they try to come to terms with this hole in their beings in different ways: Ahab with violence, Ishmael with meditation. And while the plot in Moby-Dick may be driven by Ahab's anger, Ishmael's desire to get a hold of the \"ungraspable\" accounts for the novel's lyricism. Buell sees a double quest in the book: Ahab's is to hunt Moby Dick, Ishmael's is \"to understand what to make of both whale and hunt\".\n\nOne of the most distinctive features of the book is the variety of genres. Bezanson mentions sermons, dreams, travel account, autobiography, Elizabethan plays, and epic poetry. He calls Ishmael's explanatory footnotes to establish the documentary genre \"a Nabokovian touch\". \n\nThe meetings with other ships \n\nA significant structural device is the series of nine meetings with other ships, important in three ways, first of all their distribution over the narrative. The first two meetings, as well as the last two, are close together. The central group of five are \"well spaced\" by about 12 chapters with reasonably limited divergences. This \"somewhat mechanical\" pattern makes for \"a stiffening element\" in the book, as if the encounters are \"bones to the book's flesh\". Second, Ahab's response to the sequence of meetings shows the \"rising curve of his passion\" so that the meetings form a diagram of the climactic development of his monomania. Third, in contrast to Ahab, Ishmael's response is to take each ship individually: \"each ship is a scroll which the narrator unrolls and reads.\" For Bezanson, there is no single systematic way to account for the meaning of all of these ships. Instead, they may be interpreted variously as \"a group of metaphysical parables, a series of biblical analogues, a masque of the situation confronting man, a pageant of the humors within men, a parade of the nations, and so forth,'as well as concrete and symbolic ways of thinking about the White Whale\". \n\nScholar Nathalia Wright divides the meetings with the vessels along other lines, singling out \"four vessels met by the Pequod which have already encountered Ahab's quarry\". The first of these, the Jeroboam, is named after the predecessor of the biblical King Ahab. Her \"prophetic\" fate is \"a message of warning to all who follow, articulated by Gabriel and vindicated by the Samuel Enderby, the Rachel, the Delight, and at last the Pequod\". None of the other ships has been completely destroyed, because none of the captains shared Ahab's monomania, so the fate of the Jeroboam reinforces the structural parallel between Ahab and his biblical namesake: \"Ahab did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him\" (I Kings 16:33). \n\nThemes\n\nOne of the early critics of the Melville Revival, British author E. M. Forster, remarked in 1927: \"Moby-Dick is full of meanings: its meaning is a different problem.\" Yet he saw as \"the essential\" in the book \"its prophetic song\", which flows \"like an undercurrent\" beneath the surface action and morality. \n\nEditors Bryant and Springer suggest perception is a central theme, the difficulty of seeing and understanding, which makes deep reality hard to discover and truth hard to pin down. Ahab explains that, like all things, the evil whale wears a disguise: \"All visible objects, man, are but pasteboard masks\" — and Ahab is determined to \"strike through the mask! How can the prisoner reach outside, except by thrusting through the wall? To me, the white whale is that wall\" (Ch. 36, \"The Quarter-Deck\"). This theme pervades the novel, perhaps never so emphatically as in \"The Doubloon\" (Ch. 99), where each crewmember perceives the coin in a way shaped by his own personality. Later, the American edition has Ahab \"discover no sign\" (Ch. 133) of the whale when he is staring into the deep. In fact, Moby Dick is then swimming up at him. In the British edition, Melville changed the word \"discover\" to \"perceive\", and with good reason, for \"discovery\" means finding what is already there, but \"perceiving\", or better still, perception, is \"a matter of shaping what exists by the way in which we see it\". The point is not that Ahab would discover the whale as an object, but that he would perceive it as a symbol of his making.\n\nMelville biographer Delbanco cites race as an example of this search for truth beneath surface differences. All races are represented among the crew members of the Pequod. Although Ishmael initially is afraid of Queequeg as a tattooed cannibal, he soon decides, \"Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian.\" While it may be rare for a mid-19th century American book to feature black characters in a nonslavery context, slavery is frequently mentioned. The theme of race is primarily carried by Pip, the diminutive black cabin boy. When Pip has almost drowned, Ahab, genuinely touched by Pip's suffering, questions him gently, Pip \"can only parrot the language of an advertisement for the return of a fugitive slave: 'Pip! Reward for Pip!'\". \n\nYet Melville does not offer easy solutions. Ishmael and Queequeg's sensual friendship initiates a kind of racial harmony that is shattered when the crew's dancing erupts into racial conflict in \"Midnight, Forecastle\" (Ch. 40). Fifty chapters later, Pip suffers mental disintegration after he is reminded that as a slave he would be worth less money than a whale. Commodified and brutalized, \"Pip becomes the ship's conscience.\" His views of property are another example of wrestling with moral choice. In Chapter 89, Ishmael expounds the concept of the fast-fish and the loose-fish, which gives right of ownership to those who take possession of an abandoned fish or ship, and observes that the British Empire took possession of American Indian lands in colonial times in just the way that whalers take possession of an unclaimed whale. \n\nStyle\n\nAn incomplete inventory of the language of Moby-Dick by editors Bryant and Springer includes \"nautical, biblical, Homeric, Shakespearean, Miltonic, cetological\" influences, and his style is \"alliterative, fanciful, colloquial, archaic, and unceasingly allusive\": Melville tests and exhausts the possibilities of grammar, quotes from a range of well-known or obscure sources, and swings from calm prose to high rhetoric, technical exposition, seaman's slang, mystic speculation, or wild prophetic archaism. \n\nThe superabundant vocabulary of the work can be broken down into strategies used individually and in combination. First, the original modification of words as \"Leviathanism\" and the exaggerated repetition of modified words, as in the series \"pitiable\", \"pity\", \"pitied\" and \"piteous\" (Ch. 81, \"The Pequod Meets the Virgin\"), Second, the use of existing words in new ways, as when the whale \"heaps\" and \"tasks\". Third, words lifted from specialized fields, as \"fossiliferous\". Fourth, the use of unusual adjective-noun combinations, as in \"concentrating brow\" and \"immaculate manliness\" (Ch. 26, \"Knights and Squires\"). Fifth, using the participial modifier to emphasize and to reinforce the already established expectations of the reader, as the words \"preluding\" and \"foreshadowing\" (\"so still and subdued and yet somehow preluding was all the scene ...\", \"In this foreshadowing interval ...\").\n\nCharacteristic stylistic elements of another kind are the echoes and overtones. Responsible for this are both Melville's imitation of certain distinct styles and his habitual use of sources to shape his own work. His three most important sources, in order, are the Bible, Shakespeare, and Milton. \n\nAnother notable stylistic element are the several levels of rhetoric, the simplest of which is \"a relatively straightfoward expository style\" that is evident of many passages in the cetological chapters, though they are \"rarely sustained, and serve chiefly as transitions\" between more sophisticated levels. One of these is the \"poetic\" level of rhetoric, which Bezanson sees \"well exemplified\" in Ahab's quarter-deck soliloquy, to the point that it can be set as blank verse. Set over a metrical patern, the rhythms are \"evenly controlled--too evenly perhaps for prose,\" Bezanson suggests. A third level of rhetoric is the idiomatic, and just as the poetic it hardly is present in pure form. Examples of this are \"the consistently excellent idiom\" of Stubb, such as in the way he encourages the rowing crew in a rhythm of speech that suggests \"the beat of the oars takes the place of the metronomic meter\". The fourth and final level of rhetoric is the composite, \"a magnificent blending\" of the first three and possible other elements:\n\nThe Nantucketer, he alone resides and riots on the sea; he alone, in Bible language, goes down to it in ships; to and fro ploughing it as his own special plantation. There is his home; there lies his buisiness, which a Noah's flood would not interrupt, though it overwhelmed all the millions in China. He lives on the sea, as praisie cocks in the prairie; he hides among the waves, he climbs them as chamois hunters climb the Alps. For years he knows not the land; so that when he comes to it at last, it smells like another world, more strangely than the moon would to an Earthsman. With the landless gull, that at sunset folds her wings and is rocked to sleep between billows; so at nightfall, the Nantucketer, out of sight of land, furls his sails, and lays him to his rest, while under his very pillow rush herds of walruses and whales.\n(\"Nantucket,\" Ch. 14).\n\nThis passage, from a chapter that Bezanson calls a comical \"prose poem\", blends \"high and low with a relaxed assurance\". Similar great passages include the \"marvelous hymn to spiritual democracy\" that can be found in the middle of \"Knights and Squires\". \n\nThe elaborate use of the Homeric simile may not have been learned from Homer himself, yet Matthiessen finds the writing \"more consistently alive\" on the Homeric than on the Shakespearean level, especially during the final chase the \"controlled accumulation\" of such similes emphasizes Ahab's hubris through a succession of land-images, for instance: \"The ship tore on; leaving such a furrow in the sea as when a cannon-ball, missent, becomes a ploughshare and turns up the level field\" (\"The Chase - Second Day,\" Ch. 134). One paragraph-long simile describes how the 30 men of the crew became a single unit:\n\nFor as the one ship that held them all; though it was put together of all contrasting things--oak, and maple, and pine wood; iron, and pitch, and hemp--yet all these ran into each other in the one concrete hull, which shot on its way, both balanced and directed by the long central keel; even so, all the individualities of the crew, this man's valor, that man's fear; guilt and guiltiness, all varieties were welded into oneness, and were all directed to that fatal goal which Ahab their one lord and keel did point to.\n(\"The Chase - Second Day,\" Ch. 134).\n\nThe final phrase fuses the two halves of the comparison, the men become identical with the ship, which follows Ahab's direction. The concentration only gives way to more imagery, with the \"mastheads, like the tops of tall palms, were outspreadingly tufted with arms and legs\". All these images contribute their \"startling energy\" to the advance of the narrative. When the boats are lowered, the imagery serves to dwarf everything but Ahab's will in the presence of Moby Dick. These similes, with their astonishing \"imaginative abundance,\" are not only invaluable in creating the dramatic movement, Matthiessen observes: \"They are no less notable for breadth; and the more sustained among them, for an heroic dignity.\" \n\nAssimilation of Shakespeare\n\nThe influence of Shakespeare on the book has been analyzed by F.O. Matthiessen in his 1941 study of the American Renaissance with such results that almost a half century later Bezanson still considered him \"the richest critic on these matters.\" According to Matthiesen, then, Melville's \"possession by Shakespeare went far beyond all other influences\" in that it made Melville discover his own full strength \"through the challenge of the most abundant imagination in history\". Especially the influence of King Lear and Macbeth has attracted scholarly attention. On almost every page debts to Shakespeare can be discovered, whether hard or easy to recognize. Matthiessen points out that the \"mere sounds, full of Leviathanism, but signifying nothing\" at the end of \"Cetology\" (Ch.32) echo the famous phrase in Macbeth: \"Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.\" As Matthiessen demonstrates, Ahab's first extended speech to the crew, in the \"Quarter-Deck\" (Ch.36), is \"virtually blank verse, and can be printed as such\":\n\nBut look ye, Starbuck, what is said in heat,\nThat thing unsays itself. There are men\nFrom whom warm words are small indignity.\nI mean not to incense thee. Let it go.\nLook! see yonder Turkish cheeks of spotted tawn--\nLiving, breathing pictures painted by the sun.\nThe pagan leopards--the unrecking and\nUnworshipping things, that live; and seek and give\nNo reason for the torrid life they feel! \n\nMost importantly, through Shakespeare, Melville infused Moby-Dick with a power of expression he had not previously possessed. Reading Shakespeare, Matthiessen observes, had been \"a catalytic agent\" for Melville, one that transformed his writing \"from limited reporting to the expression of profound natural forces\". The extent to which Melville was in full possession of his powers is demonstrated by Matthiessen through the description of Ahab, which ends in language \"that suggests Shakespeare's but is not an imitation of it: 'Oh, Ahab! what shall be grand in thee, it must needs be plucked from the skies and dived for in the deep, and featured in the unbodied air!' The imaginative richness of the final phrase seems particularly Shakespearean, \"but its two key words appear only once each in the plays ... and to neither of these usages is Melville indebted for his fresh combination.\" Melville's assimilation of Shakespeare, Matthiessen concludes, gave Moby-Dick \"a kind of diction that depended upon no source\", and that could, as D.H. Lawrence put it, convey something \"almost superhuman or inhuman, bigger than life.\" The prose is not based on anybody else's verse but on \"a sense of speech rhythm\". \n\nIn addition to this sense of rhythm, Melville acquired verbal resources which for Matthiessen showd that he \"now mastered Shakespeare's mature secret of how to make language itself dramatic\". He had learned three essential things, Matthiessen sums up:\n* To rely on verbs of action, \"which lend their dynamic pressure to both movement and meaning.\" The effective tension caused by the contrast of \"thou launchest navies of full-freighted worlds\" and \"there's that in here that still remains indifferent\" in \"The Candles\" (Ch. 119) makes the last clause lead to a \"compulsion to strike the breast\", which suggests \"how thoroughly the drama has come to inhere in the words;\" \n* The Shakespearean energy of verbal compounds was not lost on him (\"full-freighted\");\n* And, finally, Melville learned how to handle \"the quickened sense of life that comes from making one part of speech act as another – for example, 'earthquake' as an adjective, or the coining of 'placeless', an adjective from a noun.\" \n\nBackground\n\nAutobiographical elements\n\nMoby-Dick is based on Melville's actual experience on a whaler. On December 30, 1840, he signed on as a green hand for the maiden voyage of the Acushnet, planned to last for 52 months. Its owner, Melvin O. Bradford, resembled Bildad, who signed on Ishmael, in that he was a Quaker: on several instances when he signed documents, he erased the word \"swear\" and replaced it with \"affirm\". Its captain was Valentine Pease, Jr., who was 43 years old at the start of the voyage. Although 26 men signed up as crew members, two did not show up for the ship's departure and were replaced by one new crew member. Five of the crew were foreigners, four of them Portuguese. The Scottish carpenter was one of the two who did not show for the ship's departure. Three black men were in the crew, two seamen and the cook. Fleece, the cook of the Pequod, was also black, so probably modeled on this Philadelphia-born William Maiden, who was 38 years old when he signed for the Acushnet. \n\nOnly 11 of the 26 original crew members completed the voyage. The others either deserted or were regularly discharged. The First Officer, Frederic Raymond, left the ship after a \"fight\" with the captain. A first mate, actually called Edward C. Starbuck, was on an earlier voyage with Captain Pease, in the early 1830s, and was discharged at Tahiti under mysterious circumstances. The second mate on the Acushnet was John Hall, English-born but a naturalized American. He is identified as Stubb in an annotation in the book's copy of crew member Henry Hubbard, who, like Melville, had joined the voyage as a green hand. Hubbard also identified the model for Pip: John Backus, a little black man added to the crew during the voyage. Hubbard's annotation appears in the chapter \"The Castaway\" and reveals that Pip's falling into the water was authentic; Hubbard was with him in the same boat when the incident occurred.\n\nAhab seems to have had no model in real life, though his death may have been based on an actual event. On May 18, 1843, Melville was aboard The Star, which sailed for Honolulu. Aboard were two sailors from the Nantucket who could have told him that they had seen their second mate \"taken out of a whaleboat by a foul line and drowned\". The model for the Whaleman's Chapel of chapter 7 is the Seamen's Bethel on Johnny Cake Hill. Melville attended a service there shortly before he shipped out on the Acushnet, and he heard a sermon by the chaplain, 63-year-old Reverend Enoch Mudge, who is at least in part the model for Father Mapple. Even the topic of Jonah and the Whale may be authentic, for Mudge was a contributor to Sailor's Magazine, which printed in December 1840 the ninth of a series of sermons on Jonah. \n\nMelville's sources\n\nIn addition to his own experience on the whaling ship Acushnet, two actual events served as the genesis for Melville's tale. One was the sinking of the Nantucket ship Essex in 1820, after a sperm whale rammed her 2,000 miles (3,200 km) from the western coast of South America. First mate Owen Chase, one of eight survivors, recorded the events in his 1821 Narrative of the Most Extraordinary and Distressing Shipwreck of the Whale-Ship Essex.\n\nThe other event was the alleged killing in the late 1830s of the albino sperm whale Mocha Dick, in the waters off the Chilean island of Mocha. Mocha Dick was rumored to have 20 or so harpoons in his back from other whalers, and appeared to attack ships with premeditated ferocity. One of his battles with a whaler served as subject for an article by explorer Jeremiah N. Reynolds in the May 1839 issue of The Knickerbocker or New-York Monthly Magazine. Melville was familiar with the article, which described: Significantly, Reynolds writes a first-person narration that serves as a frame for the story of a whaling captain he meets. The captain resembles Ahab and suggests a similar symbolism and single-minded motivation in hunting this whale, in that when his crew first encounters Mocha Dick and cowers from him, the captain rallies them: \n\nMocha Dick had over 100 encounters with whalers in the decades between 1810 and the 1830s. He was described as being gigantic and covered in barnacles. Although he was the most famous, Mocha Dick was not the only white whale in the sea, nor the only whale to attack hunters. \n\nWhile an accidental collision with a sperm whale at night accounted for sinking of the Union in 1807, it was not until August 1851 that the whaler Ann Alexander, while hunting in the Pacific off the Galápagos Islands, became the second vessel since the Essex to be attacked, holed, and sunk by a whale. Melville remarked, \"Ye Gods! What a commentator is this Ann Alexander whale. What he has to say is short & pithy & very much to the point. I wonder if my evil art has raised this monster.\" \n\nWhile Melville had already drawn on his different sailing experiences in his previous novels, such as Mardi, he had never focused specifically on whaling. The 18 months he spent as an ordinary seaman aboard the whaler Acushnet in 1841–42, and one incident in particular, now served as inspiration. During a mid-ocean \"gam\" (rendezvous at sea between ships), he met Chase's son William, who lent him his father's book. Melville later wrote: \n\nThe book was out of print, and rare. Melville let his interest in the book be known to his father-in-law, Lemuel Shaw, whose friend in Nantucket procured an imperfect but clean copy which Shaw gave to Melville in April 1851. Melville read this copy avidly, made copious notes in it, and had it bound, keeping it in his library for the rest of his life. \n\nMoby-Dick contains large sections—most of them narrated by Ishmael—that seemingly have nothing to do with the plot, but describe aspects of the whaling business. Although a successful earlier novel about Nantucket whalers had been written, Miriam Coffin or The Whale-Fisherman (1835) by Joseph C. Hart, which is credited with influencing elements of Melville's work, most accounts of whaling tended to be sensational tales of bloody mutiny, and Melville believed that no book up to that time had portrayed the whaling industry in as fascinating or immediate a way as he had experienced it. Early Romantics also proposed that fiction was the exemplary way to describe and record history, so Melville wanted to craft something educational and definitive.\n\nComposition\n\nThe earliest surviving mention of the composition of what became Moby-Dick is the final paragraph of the letter Melville wrote to Richard Henry Dana, Jr. on May 1, 1850:\n\nSome scholars have concluded that Melville composed Moby-Dick in two or even three stages. Reasoning from a series of inconsistencies and structural developments in the final version, they hypothesize that the work he mentioned to Dana was, in the words of Lawrence Buell, a \"relatively straightforward\" whaling adventure, but that reading Shakespeare and his encounters with Hawthorne inspired him to rewrite it as \"an epic of cosmic encyclopedic proportions\". Bezanson objects that the letter contains too many ambiguities to assume \"that Dana's 'suggestion' would obviously be that Melville do for whaling what he had done for life on a man-of-war in White-Jacket\". In addition, Dana had experienced how incomparable Melville was in dramatic story telling when he met him in Boston, so perhaps \"his 'suggestion' was that Melville do a book that captured that gift\". And the long sentence in the middle of the above quotation simply acknowledges that Melville is struggling with the problem, not of choosing between fact and fancy but of how to interrelate them. The most positive statements are that it will be a strange sort of a book and that Melville means to give the truth of the thing, but what thing exactly is not clear.\n\nMelville may have found the plot before writing or developed it after the writing process was underway. Considering his elaborate use of sources, \"it is safe to say\" that they helped him shape the narrative, its plot included. Scholars John Bryant and Haskell Springer cite the development of the character Ishmael as another factor which prolonged Melville's process of composition and which can be deduced from the structure of the final version of the book. Ishmael, in the early chapters, is simply the narrator, just as the narrators in Melville's earlier sea adventures had been, but in later chapters becomes a mystical stage manager who is central to the tragedy. \n\nLess than two months after mentioning the project to Dana, Melville reported in a letter of June 27 to Richard Bentley, his English publisher:\n\nNathaniel Hawthorne and his family had moved to a small red farmhouse near Lenox, Massachusetts, at the end of March 1850. He became friends with Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. and Melville beginning on August 5, 1850, when the authors met at a picnic hosted by a mutual friend. Melville wrote an unsigned review of Hawthorne's short story collection Mosses from an Old Manse titled \"Hawthorne and His Mosses\", which appeared in the The Literary World on August 17 and 24. Bezanson finds the essay \"so deeply related to Melville's imaginative and intellectual world while writing Moby-Dick\" that it could be regarded as a virtual preface and should be \"everybody's prime piece of contextual reading\". In the essay, Melville compares Hawthorne to Shakespeare and Dante, and his \"self-projection\" is evident in the repeats of the word \"genius\", the more than two dozen references to Shakespeare, and in the insistence that Shakespeare's \"unapproachability\" is nonsense for an American.\n\nThe most intense work on the book was done during the winter of 1850–1851, when Melville had changed the noise of New York City for a farm in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. The move may well have delayed finishing the book. During these months, he wrote several excited letters to Hawthorne, including one of June 1851 in which he summarizes his career: \"What I feel most moved to write, that is banned, — it will not pay. Yet, altogether, write the other way I cannot. So the product is a final hash, and all my books are botches.\" This is the stubborn Melville who stood by Mardi and talked about his other, more commercial books with contempt. The letter also reveals how Melville experienced his development from his 25th year: \"Three weeks have scarcely passed, at any time between then and now, that I have not unfolded within myself. But I feel that I am now come to the inmost leaf of the bulb, and that shortly the flower must fall to the mould.\" One other theory holds that getting to know Hawthorne first inspired him to write Ahab's tragic obsession into the book, but Bryant and Springer object that Melville already had experienced other encounters which could just as well have triggered his imagination, such as the Bible's Jonah and Job, Milton's Satan, Shakespeare's King Lear, Byron's heroes.\n\nTheories of the composition of the book have been harpooned in three ways, first by raising objections against the use of evidence and the evidence itself. Scholar Robert Milder sees \"insufficient evidence and doubtful methodology\" at work. John Bryant finds \"little concrete evidence, and nothing at all conclusive, to show that Melville radically altered the structure or conception of the book\". A second type of objection is based upon Melville's intellectual development. Bezanson is not convinced that before he met Hawthorne, \"Melville was not ready for the kind of book Moby-Dick became\", because in his letters from the time Melville denounces his last two \"straight narratives, Redburn and White-Jacket, as two books written just for the money, and he firmly stood by Mardi as the kind of book he believed in. His language is already \"richly steeped in 17th-century mannerisms\", characteristics of Moby-Dick. A third type calls upon the literary nature of passages used as evidence. According to Milder, the cetological chapters cannot be leftovers from an earlier stage of composition and any theory that they are \"will eventually founder on the stubborn meaningfulness of these chapters\", because no scholar adhering to the theory has yet explained how these chapters \"can bear intimate thematic relation to a symbolic story not yet conceived\". Buell finds that theories based on a combination of selected passages from letters and what are perceived as \"loose ends\" in the book not only \"tend to dissolve into guesswork\", but he also suggests that these so-called loose ends may be intended by the author: repeatedly the book mentions \"the necessary unfinishedness of immense endeavors\". Despite all this, Buell finds the evidence that Melville changed his ambitions during writing \"on the whole convincing\".\n\nPublication history\n\nMelville first proposed the English publication in a 27 June 1850 letter to Richard Bentley, London publisher of his earlier works. Textual scholar G. Thomas Tanselle explains that for these earlier books, American proof sheets had been sent to the English publisher and that publication in the United States had been held off until the work had been set in type and published in England. This procedure was intended to provide the best (though still uncertain) claim for the English copyright of an American work. In the case of Moby-Dick, Melville had taken almost a year longer than promised, and could not rely on Harpers to prepare the proofs as they had done for the earlier books. Indeed, Harpers had denied him an advance, and since he was already in debt to them for almost $700, he was forced to borrow money and to arrange for the typesetting and plating himself. John Bryant suggests that he did so \"to reduce the number of hands playing with his text\". \n\nThe final stages of composition overlapped with the early stages of publication. In June 1851, Melville wrote to Hawthorne that he was in New York to \"work and slave on my 'Whale' while it is driving through the press\". By the end of the month, \"wearied with the long delay of printers\", Melville came back to finish work on the book in Pittsfield. Three weeks later, the typesetting was almost done, as he announced to Bentley on 20 July: \"I am now passing thro' the press, the closing sheets of my new work\". While Melville was simultaneously writing and proofreading what had been set, the corrected proof would be plated, that is, the type fixed in final form. Since earlier chapters were already plated when he was revising the later ones, Melville must have \"felt restricted in the kinds of revisions that were feasible\". \n\nOn 3 July 1851, Bentley offered Melville ₤150 and \"half profits\", that is, half the profits that remained after the expenses of production and advertising. On 20 July, Melville accepted, after which Bentley drew up a contract on 13 August. Melville signed and returned the contract in early September, and then went to New York with the proof sheets, made from the finished plates, which he sent to London by his brother Allan on 10 September. For over a month, these proofs had been in Melville's possession, and because the book would be set anew in England, he could devote all his time to correcting and revising them. He still had no American publisher, so the usual hurry about getting the English publication to precede the American was not present. Only on 12 September was the Harper publishing contract signed. Bentley received the proof sheets with Melville's corrections and revisions marked on them on September 24. He published the book less than four weeks later.\n\nOn 18 October, the English edition, The Whale, was published in a printing of only 500 copies, fewer than Melville's previous books. Their slow sales had convinced Bentley that a smaller number was more realistic. The London Morning Herald on October 20 printed the earliest known review. On 14 November, the American edition, Moby-Dick, was published and the same day reviewed in both the Albany Argus and the Morning Courier and New-York Enquirer. On 19 November, Washington received the copy to be deposited for copyright purposes. The first American printing of 2,915 copies was almost the same as the first of Mardi, but the first printing of Melville's other three Harper books had been a thousand copies more. \n\nMelville's revisions and British editorial revisions\n\nThe English edition, set by Bentley's printers from the American page proofs with Melville's revisions and corrections, differs from the American edition in over 700 wordings and thousands of punctuation and spelling changes.\n\nExcluding the preliminaries and the one extract, the three volumes of the English edition came to 927 pages and the single American volume to 635 pages. Accordingly, the dedication to Hawthorne in the American edition — \"this book is inscribed to\"— became \"these volumes are inscribed to\" in the English. The table of contents in the English edition generally follows the actual chapter titles in the American edition, but 19 titles in the American table of contents differ from the titles above the chapters themselves. This list was probably drawn up by Melville himself: the titles of chapters describing encounters of the Pequod with other ships had—apparently to stress the parallelisms between these chapters—been standardized to \"The Pequod meets the...,\" with the exception of the already published 'The Town-Ho's Story'. For unknown reasons, the \"Etymology\" and \"Extracts\" were moved to the end of the third volume. An epigraph from Paradise Lost, taken from the second of the two quotations from that work in the American edition, appears on the title page of each of the three English volumes. Melville's involvement with this rearrangement is not clear: if it was Bentley's gesture toward accommodating Melville, as Tanselle suggests, its selection put an emphasis on the quotation Melville may not have agreed with.\n\nThe largest of Melville's revisions is the addition to the English edition of a 139-word footnote in Chapter 87 explaining the word \"gally\". The edition also contains six short phrases and some 60 single words lacking in the American edition. In addition, about 35 changes produce genuine improvements, as opposed to mere corrections: \"Melville may not have made every one of the changes in this category, but it seems certain that he was responsible for the great majority of them.\" \n\nBritish censorship and missing \"Epilogue\"\n\nThe British publisher hired one or more revisers who were, in the evaluation of scholar Steven Olsen-Smith, responsible for \"unauthorized changes ranging from typographical errors and omissions to acts of outright censorship\". The expurgations fall into four categories, ranked according to the apparent priorities of the censor:\n# Sacrilegious passages, more than 1200 words: Attributing human failures to God was grounds for excision or revision, as was comparing human shortcomings to divine ones. For example, in chapter 28, \"Ahab\", Ahab stands with \"a crucifixion\" in his face\" was revised to \"an apparently eternal anguish\"; \n# Sexual matters, including the sex life of whales and even Ishmael's worried anticipation of the nature of Queequeg's underwear, as well as allusions to fornication or harlots, and \"our hearts' honeymoon\" (in relation to Ishmael and Queequeg) Chapter 95, however, \"The Cassock\", referring to the whale's genital organ, was untouched, perhaps because of Melville's indirect language.\n# Remarks \"belittling royalty or implying a criticism of the British\": This meant the exclusion of the complete chapter 25, a \"Postscript\" on the use of sperm oil at coronations; \n# Perceived grammatical or stylistic anomalies were treated with \"a highly conservative interpretation of rules of 'correctness'\". \nThese expurgations also meant that any corrections or revisions Melville may have marked upon these passages are now lost.\n\nThe final difference in the material not already plated is that the \"Epilogue\", thus Ishmael's miraculous survival, is omitted from the British edition. Obviously, the epilogue was not an afterthought supplied too late for the English edition, for it is referred to in \"The Castaway\": \"in the sequel of the narrative, it will then be seen what like abandonment befell myself.\" Why the \"Epilogue\" is missing is unknown. Since nothing objectionable was in it, most likely it was somehow lost by Bentley's printer when the \"Etymology\" and \"Extracts\" were moved. \n\nLast-minute change of title\n\nAfter the sheets had been sent, Melville changed the title. Probably late in September, Allan sent Bentley two pages of proof with a letter of which only a draft survives which informed him that Melville \"has determined upon a new title & dedication—Enclosed you have proof of both—It is thought here that the new title will be a better selling title\". After expressing his hope that Bentley would receive this change in time, Allan said that \"Moby-Dick is a legitimate title for the book, being the name given to a particular whale who if I may so express myself is the hero of the volume\". Biographer Hershel Parker suggests that the reason for the change was that Harper's had two years earlier published a book with a similar title, The Whale and His Captors. \n\nChanging the title was not a problem for the American edition, since the running heads throughout the book only showed the titles of the chapters, and the title page, which would include the publisher's name, could not be printed until a publisher was found. In October Harper's New Monthly Magazine printed chapter 54, \"The Town-Ho's Story\", with a footnote saying: \"From The Whale. The title of a new work by Mr. Melville\". The one surviving leaf of proof, \"a 'trial' page bearing the title 'The Whale' and the Harper imprint,\" shows that at this point, after the publisher had been found, the original title still stood. When Allan's letter arrived, no sooner than early October, Bentley had already announced The Whale in both the Athenaem and the Spectator of 4 and 11 October. Probably to accommodate Melville, Bentley inserted a half-title page in the first volume only, which reads \"The Whale; or, Moby Dick\".\n\nSales and earnings\n\nThe British printing of 500 copies sold fewer than 300 within the first four months. In 1852, some remaining sheets were bound in a cheaper casing, and in 1853, enough sheets were still left to issue a cheap edition in one volume. Bentley lost half on Melville's advance of ₤150. Harper's first printing was 2,915 copies, including the standard 125 review copies. The selling price was $1.50, about a fifth of the price of the British three-volume edition. About 1,500 copies were sold within 11 days, and then sales slowed down to less than 300 the next year. After three years, the first edition was still available, almost 300 copies of which were lost when a fire broke out at the firm in December 1853. In 1855, a second printing of 250 copies was issued, in 1863, a third of 253 copies, and finally in 1871, a fourth printing of 277 copies, which sold so slowly that no new printing was ordered. Moby-Dick was out of print during the last four years of Melville's life, having sold 2,300 in its first year and a half and on average 27 copies a year for the next 34 years, totaling 3,215 copies.\n\nMelville's earnings from the book add up to $1,260: the ₤150 advance from Bentley was equivalent to $703, and the American printings earned him $556, which was $100 less than he earned from any of his five previous books. Melville's widow received another $81 when the United States Book Company issued the book and sold almost 1,800 copies between 1892 and 1898.\n\nReception\n\nThe reception of The Whale in Britain and of Moby-Dick in the United States differ in two ways, according to Parker. First, British literary criticism was more sophisticated and developed than in the still young republic, with British reviewing done by \"professional literary men and women\" who were \"experienced critics and trenchant prose stylists\", while American reviewing on the contrary mostly delegated to \"newspaper staffers\" or else by \"amateur contributors more noted for religious piety than critical acumen.\" Second, the differences between the two editions caused \"two distinct critical receptions.\" \n\nBritish \n\nTwenty-one reviews appeared in London, and later one in Dublin. The British reviewers mostly regarded The Whale as \"a phenomenal literary work, a philosophical, metaphysical, and poetic romance\". The Morning Advertiser for October 24 was in awe of Melville's learning, of his \"dramatic ability for producing a prose poem\", and of the whale adventures which were \"powerful in their cumulated horrors.\" To its surprise, John Bull found \"philosophy in whales\" and \"poetry in blubber\", and concluded that few books that claimed to be either philosophical or literary works \"contain as much true philosophy and as much genuine poetry as the tale of the Pequods whaling expedition\", making it a work \"far beyond the level of an ordinary work of fiction\". The Morning Post found it \"one of the cleverest, wittiest, and most amusing of modern books\", and predicted that it was a book \"which will do great things for the literary reputation of its author\". \n\nMelville himself never saw these reviews, and Parker calls it a \"bitter irony\" that the reception overseas was \"all he could possibly have hoped for, short of a few conspicuous proclamations that the distance betwen him and Shakespeare was by no means immeasurable.\" \n\nThe review in the highly regarded London Athenaeum, which described it as \n\nOne problem was that since the English edition omitted the epilogue, British reviewers read a book with a first-person narrator who apparently did not survive to tell the tale. The reviewer in the Spectator objected that \"nothing should be introduced into a novel which it is physically impossible for the writer to have known: thus, he must not describe the conversation of miners in a pit if they all perish.\" The Dublin University Magazine asked \"how does it happen that the author is alive to tell the story?\" and the Literary Gazette declared that how the writer, \"who appears to have been drowned with the rest, communicated his notes for publication to Mr. Bentley is not explained\".\n\nAmerican \n\nSome sixty reviews appeared in America, the criterion for counting as a review being more than two lines of comment. The weekly magazine Literary World, which had printed Melville's \"Mosses\" essay the preceding year, ran an anonymous review in two installments, on 15 and 22 November. The reviewer described Moby-Dick as three books rolled into one: he was pleased with the book as far as it was a thorough account of the sperm whale, less so with it as far as the adventures of the Pequod crew were considered, perceiving the characters as unrealistic and expressing inappropriate opinions on religions, and condemned the essayistic rhapsodizing and moralizing with what he thought was little respect of what \"must be to the world the most sacred associations of life violated and defaced.\" \n\nIn a letter to Evert Duyckinck—identified by scholars as the reviewer—of December 1, Hawthorne praised the book and criticized the review:\n\nWhat a book Melville has written! It gives me an idea of much greater power than his preceding ones. It hardly seemed to me that the review of it, in the Literary World, did justice to its best points. \n\nLegacy and adaptations\n\nWithin a year after Melville's death, Moby-Dick, along with Typee, Omoo, and Mardi, was reprinted by Harper & Brothers, giving it a chance to be rediscovered. However, only New York's literary underground seemed to take much interest, just enough to keep Melville's name circulating for the next 25 years in the capital of American publishing. During this time, a few critics were willing to devote time, space, and a modicum of praise to Melville and his works, or at least those that could still be fairly easily obtained or remembered. Other works, especially the poetry, went largely forgotten. \n\nIn 1917, American author Carl Van Doren became the first of this period to proselytize about Melville's value. His 1921 study, The American Novel, called Moby-Dick a pinnacle of American Romanticism.\n\nIn his 1923 idiosyncratic but influential Studies in Classic American Literature, novelist, poet, and short story writer D. H. Lawrence celebrated the originality and value of American authors, among them Melville. Perhaps surprisingly, Lawrence saw Moby-Dick as a work of the first order despite his using the expurgated original English edition which also lacked the epilogue.\n\nThe Modern Library brought out Moby-Dick in 1926 and the Lakeside Press in Chicago commissioned Rockwell Kent to design and illustrate a striking three-volume edition which appeared in 1930. Random House then issued a one-volume trade version of Kent's edition, which in 1943 they reprinted as a less expensive Modern Library Giant. \n\nThe novel has been adapted or represented in art, film, books, cartoons, television, and more than a dozen versions in comic-book format. The first adaptation was the 1926 silent movie The Sea Beast, starring John Barrymore, in which Ahab kills the whale and returns to marry his fiancée. The most famous adaptation was the John Huston 1956 film produced from a screenplay by author Ray Bradbury. The long list of adaptations, as Bryant and Springer put it, demonstrates that \"the iconic image of an angry embittered American slaying a mythic beast seemed to capture the popular imagination\", showing how \"different readers in different periods of popular culture have rewritten Moby-Dick\" to make it a \"true cultural icon\".\n\nAmerican author Ralph Ellison wrote a tribute to the book in the prologue of his 1952 novel Invisible Man. According to Ellison biographer Arnold Rampersad, the character of the narrator \"resembles no one else in previous fiction so much as he resembles Ishmael of Moby-Dick\". Ellison acknowledges his debt in the prologue to the novel, where the narrator remembers a moment of truth under the influence of marijuana, and evocates a church service: \"Brothers and sisters, my text this morning is the 'Blackness of Blackness.' And the congregation answers: 'That blackness is most black, brother, most black ...'\" In this scene Ellison \"reprises a moment in the second chapter of Moby-Dick\", where Ishmael wanders around New Bedford looking for a place to spend the night, and momentarily joins a congregation: \"It was a negro church; and the preacher's text was about the blackness of darkness, and the weeping and wailing and teeth-gnashing there.\" According to Rampersad, it was Melville who \"empowered Ellison to insist on a place in the American literary tradition\" by his example of \"representing the complexity of race and racism so acutely and generously in his text\". \n\nEditions\n\n* Melville, H. The Whale. London: Richard Bentley, 1851 3 vols. (viii, 312; iv, 303; iv, 328 pp.) Published October 18, 1851.\n* Melville, H., Moby-Dick; or, The Whale. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1851. xxiii, 635 pages. Published probably on November 14, 1851.\n* Melville, H., [http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?idmdp.39015046801760;view\n1up;seq=20 Moby-Dick; or, The Whale.] Edited by Luther S. Mansfield and Howard P. Vincent. New York: Hendricks House, 1952. Includes a 25-page Introduction and over 250 pages of Explanatory Notes with an Index.\n* Melville, H., Moby-Dick; or, The Whale: An Authoritative Text, Reviews and Letters by Melville, Analogues and Sources, Criticism. A Norton Critical Edition. Edited by Harrison Hayford and Hershel Parker. New York: W.W. Norton, 1967. ISBN 039309670X\n* Melville, H. Moby-Dick, or The Whale. Northwestern-Newberry Edition of the Writings of Herman Melville 6. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern U. Press, 1988. A critical text with appendices on the history and reception of the book. The text is in the public domain.\n* Parker, Hershel, and Harrison Hayford (eds). (2001). Herman Melville, Moby-Dick. A Norton Critical Edition. Second Edition, New York and London: W.W. Norton & Company. ISBN 9780393972832\n* [http://www.pearsonhighered.com/educator/product/Moby-Dick-A-Longman-Critical-Edition/9780321228000.page Moby-Dick: A Longman Critical Edition], Edited by John Bryant and Haskell Springer. New York: Longman, 2007 and 2009. ISBN 978-0-321-22800-0\n\nFootnotes" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Roses_Are_Red.txt" ], "title": [ "Roses Are Red" ], "wiki_context": [ "\"Roses Are Red\" can refer to a specific poem, or a class of poems inspired by that poem. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 19798. It is most commonly used as a love poem.\n\nLyrics\n\nThe most common modern form of the poem is:\n\nRoses are red,\nViolets are blue,\nSugar is sweet,\nAnd so are you.\n\nOrigins\n\nThe origins of the poem may be traced at least as far back as to the following lines written in 1590 by Sir Edmund Spenser from his epic The Faerie Queene (Book Three, Canto 6, Stanza 6): \n\nIt was upon a Sommers shynie day,\nWhen Titan faire his beames did display,\nIn a fresh fountaine, farre from all mens vew,\nShe bath'd her brest, the boyling heat t'allay;\nShe bath'd with roses red, and violets blew,\nAnd all the sweetest flowres, that in the forrest grew.\n\nA nursery rhyme significantly closer to the modern cliché Valentine's Day poem can be found in Gammer Gurton's Garland, a 1784 collection of English nursery rhymes:\n\nThe rose is red, the violet's blue,\nThe honey's sweet, and so are you.\nThou are my love and I am thine;\nI drew thee to my Valentine:\nThe lot was cast and then I drew,\nAnd Fortune said it shou'd be you. \n\nVictor Hugo was likely familiar with Spenser, but may not have known the English nursery rhyme when, in 1862, he published the novel Les Misérables. Hugo was a poet as well as a novelist, and within the text of the novel are many songs. One sung by the character, Fantine, contains this refrain, in the 1862 English translation:\n\nWe will buy very pretty things\nA-walking through the faubourgs.\nViolets are blue, roses are red,\nViolets are blue, I love my loves.\n\nThe last two lines in the original French are:\n\nLes bleuets sont bleus, les roses sont roses,\nLes bleuets sont bleus, j'aime mes amours.\n\n(Les Misérables, Fantine, Book Seven, Chapter Six) \n\nFolklore\n\nNumerous satirical versions have long circulated in children's lore. Among them:\n\nRoses are red. \nViolets are blue. \nOnions stink. \nAnd so do you.\"[http://www.hopscotch.com.au/hopscotch-articles/2005/5/18/jill-still-playing-jacks-and-hopscotch-endures/ Jill Still Playing Jacks And Hopscotch Endures]\", retrieved 17 September 2009.\n\nThe Marx Brothers' film Horse Feathers has Chico Marx describing the symptoms of cirrhosis thus:-\n\nCirrhosis are red,\nso violets are blue,\nso sugar is sweet,\nso so are you. \n\nBenny Hill version:-\n\nRoses are reddish\nViolets are bluish\nIf it weren't for Christmas\nWe'd all be Jewish \n\nNotes" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Miami.txt", "Fast_food_restaurant.txt" ], "title": [ "Miami", "Fast food restaurant" ], "wiki_context": [ "Miami (; ) is a seaport city on the Atlantic Ocean in south Florida. As the seat of Miami-Dade County, the municipality is the principal, central, and most populous of its metropolitan area and part of the second-most populous metropolis in the southeastern United States. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Miami's metro area is the eighth-most populous and fourth-largest urban area in the U.S., with a population of around 5.5 million. \n\nMiami is a major center, and a leader in finance, commerce, culture, media, entertainment, the arts, and international trade. In 2012, Miami was classified as an Alpha−World City in the World Cities Study Group's inventory. In 2010, Miami ranked seventh in the United States in terms of finance, commerce, culture, entertainment, fashion, education, and other sectors. It ranked 33rd among global cities. In 2008, Forbes magazine ranked Miami \"America's Cleanest City\", for its year-round good air quality, vast green spaces, clean drinking water, clean streets, and city-wide recycling programs. According to a 2009 UBS study of 73 world cities, Miami was ranked as the richest city in the United States, and the world's fifth-richest city in terms of purchasing power. Miami is nicknamed the \"Capital of Latin America\" and is the largest city with a Cuban-American plurality. \n\nDowntown Miami is home to the largest concentration of international banks in the United States, and many large national and international companies. The Civic Center is a major center for hospitals, research institutes, medical centers, and biotechnology industries. For more than two decades, the Port of Miami, known as the \"Cruise Capital of the World\", has been the number one cruise passenger port in the world. It accommodates some of the world's largest cruise ships and operations, and is the busiest port in both passenger traffic and cruise lines. \n\nHistory\n\nThe Miami area was inhabited for thousands of years by indigenous cultures. The Tequestas occupied the area for a thousand years before encountering Europeans. An Indian village of hundreds of people dating to 500–600 B.C. was located at the mouth of the Miami River. \n\nIn 1566 the explorer, Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, claimed it for Spain. A Spanish mission was constructed one year later in 1567. Spain and Great Britain successively \"controlled\" Florida, and Spain ceded it to the United States in 1821. In 1836, the US built Fort Dallas as part of its development of the Florida Territory and attempt to suppress and remove the Seminole. The Miami area subsequently became a site of fighting during the Second Seminole War.\n\nMiami is noted as \"the only major city in the United States conceived by a woman, Julia Tuttle\", a local citrus grower and a wealthy Cleveland native. The Miami area was better known as \"Biscayne Bay Country\" in the early years of its growth. In the late 19th century, reports described the area as a promising wilderness. The area was also characterized as \"one of the finest building sites in Florida.\" The Great Freeze of 1894–95 hastened Miami's growth, as the crops of the Miami area were the only ones in Florida that survived. Julia Tuttle subsequently convinced Henry Flagler, a railroad tycoon, to expand his Florida East Coast Railway to the region, for which she became known as \"the mother of Miami.\"Muir, Helen. (1953) Miami, USA Henry Holt and Company. p. 55 Miami was officially incorporated as a city on July 28, 1896 with a population of just over 300. It was named for the nearby Miami River, derived from Mayaimi, the historic name of Lake Okeechobee. \n\nBlack labor played a crucial role in Miami's early development. During the beginning of the 20th century, migrants from the Bahamas and African-Americans constituted 40 percent of the city's population. Whatever their role in the city's growth, their community's growth was limited to a small space. When landlords began to rent homes to African-Americans in neighborhoods close to Avenue J (what would later become NW Fifth Avenue), a gang of white man with torches visited the renting families and warned them to move or be bombed. \n\nDuring the early 20th century, northerners were attracted to the city, and Miami prospered during the 1920s with an increase in population and infrastructure. The legacy of Jim Crow was embedded in these developments. Miami's chief of police, H. Leslie Quigg, did not hide the fact that he, like many other white Miami police officers, was a member of the Ku Klux Klan. Unsurprisingly, these officers enforced social codes far beyond the written law. Quigg, for example, \"personally and publicly beat a colored bellboy to death for speaking directly to a white woman.\" \n\nThe collapse of the Florida land boom of the 1920s, the 1926 Miami Hurricane, and the Clutch Plague in the 1930s slowed development. When World War II began, Miami, well-situated on the southern coast of Florida, became a base for US defense against German submarines. The war brought an increase in Miami's population; by 1940, 172,172 people lived in the city.\n\nAfter Fidel Castro rose to power in Cuba in 1959, many wealthy Cubans sought refuge in Miami, further increasing the population. The city developed businesses and cultural amenities as part of the New South. In the 1980s and 1990s, South Florida weathered social problems related to drug wars, immigration from Haiti and Latin America, and the widespread destruction of Hurricane Andrew. Racial and cultural tensions were sometimes sparked, but the city developed in the latter half of the 20th century as a major international, financial, and cultural center. It is the second-largest U.S. city (after El Paso, Texas) with a Spanish-speaking majority, and the largest city with a Cuban-American plurality.\n\nMiami and its metropolitan area grew from just over one thousand residents to nearly five and a half million residents in just 110 years (1896–2006). The city's nickname, The Magic City, comes from this rapid growth. Winter visitors remarked that the city grew so much from one year to the next that it was like magic.\n\nGeography\n\nMiami and its suburbs are located on a broad plain between the Florida Everglades to the west and Biscayne Bay to the east, which also extends from Florida Bay north to Lake Okeechobee. The elevation of the area never rises above 40 ft and averages at around 6 ft above mean sea level in most neighborhoods, especially near the coast. The highest undulations are found along the coastal Miami Rock Ridge, whose substrate underlies most of the eastern Miami metropolitan region. The main portion of the city lies on the shores of Biscayne Bay which contains several hundred natural and artificially created barrier islands, the largest of which contains Miami Beach and South Beach. The Gulf Stream, a warm ocean current, runs northward just 15 mi off the coast, allowing the city's climate to stay warm and mild all year.\n\nGeology\n\nThe surface bedrock under the Miami area is called Miami oolite or Miami limestone. This bedrock is covered by a thin layer of soil, and is no more than 50 ft thick. Miami limestone formed as the result of the drastic changes in sea level associated with recent glaciations or ice ages. Beginning some 130,000 years ago the Sangamonian Stage raised sea levels to approximately 25 ft above the current level. All of southern Florida was covered by a shallow sea. Several parallel lines of reef formed along the edge of the submerged Florida plateau, stretching from the present Miami area to what is now the Dry Tortugas. The area behind this reef line was in effect a large lagoon, and the Miami limestone formed throughout the area from the deposition of oolites and the shells of bryozoans. Starting about 100,000 years ago the Wisconsin glaciation began lowering sea levels, exposing the floor of the lagoon. By 15,000 years ago, the sea level had dropped to 300 to below the contemporary level. The sea level rose quickly after that, stabilizing at the current level about 4000 years ago, leaving the mainland of South Florida just above sea level.\n\nBeneath the plain lies the Biscayne Aquifer, a natural underground source of fresh water that extends from southern Palm Beach County to Florida Bay, with its highest point peaking around the cities of Miami Springs and Hialeah. Most of the Miami metropolitan area obtains its drinking water from this aquifer. As a result of the aquifer, it is not possible to dig more than 15 to beneath the city without hitting water, which impedes underground construction, though some underground parking garages exist. For this reason, the mass transit systems in and around Miami are elevated or at-grade.\n\nMost of the western fringes of the city extend into the Everglades, a subtropical marshland located in the southern portion of the U.S. state of Florida. Alligators have ventured into Miami communities and on major highways.\n\nIn terms of land area, Miami is one of the smallest major cities in the United States. According to the US Census Bureau, the city encompasses a total area of . Of that area, is land and is water. That means Miami comprises over 400,000 people in 35 sqmi, making it one of the most densely populated cities in the United States, along with New York City, San Francisco, Boston, Chicago, and Philadelphia.\n\nCityscape\n\nNeighborhoods\n\nMiami is partitioned into many different sections, roughly into North, South, West and Downtown. The heart of the city is Downtown Miami and is technically on the eastern side of the city. This area includes Brickell, Virginia Key, Watson Island, and PortMiami. Downtown is South Florida's central business district, and Florida's largest and most influential central business district. Downtown has the largest concentration of international banks in the U.S. along Brickell Avenue. Downtown is home to many major banks, courthouses, financial headquarters, cultural and tourist attractions, schools, parks and a large residential population. East of Downtown, across Biscayne Bay is South Beach. Just northwest of Downtown, is the Civic Center, which is Miami's center for hospitals, research institutes and biotechnology with hospitals such as Jackson Memorial Hospital, Miami VA Hospital, and the University of Miami's Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine.\n\nThe southern side of Miami includes Coral Way, The Roads and Coconut Grove. Coral Way is a historic residential neighborhood built in 1922 connecting Downtown with Coral Gables, and is home to many old homes and tree-lined streets. Coconut Grove was established in 1825 and is the location of Miami's City Hall in Dinner Key, the Coconut Grove Playhouse, CocoWalk, many nightclubs, bars, restaurants and bohemian shops, and as such, is very popular with local college students. It is a historic neighborhood with narrow, winding roads, and a heavy tree canopy. Coconut Grove has many parks and gardens such as Villa Vizcaya, The Kampong, The Barnacle Historic State Park, and is the home of the Coconut Grove Convention Center and numerous historic homes and estates.\n\nThe western side of Miami includes Little Havana, West Flagler, and Flagami, and is home to many of the city's traditionally immigrant neighborhoods. Although at one time a mostly Jewish neighborhood, today western Miami is home to immigrants from mostly Central America and Cuba, while the west central neighborhood of Allapattah is a multicultural community of many ethnicities.\n\nThe northern side of Miami includes Midtown, a district with a great mix of diversity with many West Indians, Hispanics, European Americans, bohemians, and artists. Edgewater, and Wynwood, are neighborhoods of Midtown and are made up mostly of high-rise residential towers and are home to the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts. The wealthier residents usually live in the northeastern part, in Midtown, the Design District, and the Upper East Side, with many sought after 1920s homes and home of the MiMo Historic District, a style of architecture originated in Miami in the 1950s. The northern side of Miami also has notable African American and Caribbean immigrant communities such as Little Haiti, Overtown (home of the Lyric Theater), and Liberty City.\n\nClimate\n\nMiami has a tropical monsoon climate (Köppen climate classification Am) with hot and humid summers and short, warm winters, with a marked drier season in the winter. Its sea-level elevation, coastal location, position just above the Tropic of Cancer, and proximity to the Gulf Stream shapes its climate. With January averaging , winter features warm temperatures; highs generally ranging between 73 -. Cool air usually settles after the passage of a cold front, which produces much of the little amount of rainfall during the season. Lows fall below 50 F, a few nights during the winter season, during or after cold fronts.\n\nThe wet season begins some time in May, ending in mid-October. During this period, temperatures are in the mid 80s to low 90s (29–35 °C), accompanied by high humidity, though the heat is often relieved by afternoon thunderstorms or a sea breeze that develops off the Atlantic Ocean, which then allow lower temperatures, but conditions still remain very muggy. Much of the year's of rainfall occurs during this period. Dewpoints in the warm months range from in June to in August.\n\nExtremes range from 27 °F on February 3, 1917 to 100 °F on July 21, 1940. Miami has never recorded any snowfall although there were disputed claims of snow flurries on January 19, 1977. \n\nHurricane season officially runs from June 1 through November 30, although hurricanes can develop beyond those dates. The most likely time for Miami to be hit is during the peak of the Cape Verde season, which is mid-August through the end of September. Although tornadoes are uncommon in the area, one struck in 1925 and again in 1997.\n\nMiami falls under the USDA 10b/11a Plant Hardiness zone. \n\nDemographics\n\nThe city proper is home to less than one-thirteenth of the population of South Florida. Miami is the 42nd-most populous city in the United States. The Miami metropolitan area, which includes Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties, had a combined population of more than 5.5 million people, ranked seventh largest in the United States, and is the largest metropolitan area in the Southeastern United States. , the United Nations estimates that the Miami Urban Agglomeration is the 44th-largest in the world. \n\nThe 2010 US Census file for Hispanic or Latino origin reports that 34.4% of the population were of Cuban origin, 15.8% shared a Central American background (7.2% Nicaraguan, 5.8% Honduran, 1.2% Salvadoran, and 1.0% Guatemalan), 8.7% were of South American descent (3.2% Colombian, 1.4% Venezuelan, 1.2% Peruvian, 1.2% Argentinean, and 0.7% Ecuadorian), 4.0% had other Hispanic or Latino origins (0.5% Spaniard), 3.2% descended from Puerto Ricans, 2.4% were Dominican, and 1.5% had Mexican ancestry.\n\n, those of African ancestry accounted for 19.2% of Miami's population, which includes African Americans. Out of the 19.2%, 5.6% were West Indian or Afro-Caribbean American (4.4% Haitian, 0.4% Jamaican, 0.4% Bahamian, 0.1% British West Indian, and 0.1% Trinidadian and Tobagonian, 0.1% Other or Unspecified West Indian), 3.0% were Black Hispanics, and 0.4% were Subsaharan African.\n\n, those of (non-Hispanic white) European ancestry accounted for 11.9% of Miami's population. Out of the 11.9%, 1.7% were German, 1.6% Italian, 1.4% Irish, 1.0% English, 0.8% French, 0.6% Russian, and 0.5% were Polish.\n\n, those of Asian ancestry accounted for 1.0% of Miami's population. Out of the 1.0%, 0.3% were Indian (1,206 people), 0.3% Chinese (1,804 people), 0.2% Filipino (647 people), 0.1% were other Asian (433 people), 0.1% Japanese (245 people), 0.1% Korean (213 people), and 0.0% were Vietnamese (125 people).\n\nIn 2010, 1.9% of the population considered themselves to be of only American ancestry (regardless of race or ethnicity.) And 0.5% were of Arab ancestry, .\n\n, there were 158,317 households of which 14.0% were vacant. 22.7% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 31.3% were married couples living together, 18.1% have a female head of household with no husband present, and 43.1% were non-families. 33.3% of all households were made up of individuals and 11.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older (4.0% male and 7.3% female.) The average household size was 2.47 and the average family size was 3.15.\n\nIn 2010, the city population was spread out with 18.8% under the age of 18, 9.4% from 18 to 24, 33.1% from 25 to 44, 25.0% from 45 to 64, and 13.6% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38.8 years. For every 100 females there were 99.2 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 98.1 males.\n\n, the median income for a household in the city was $29,621, and the median income for a family was $33,379. Males had a median income of $27,849 versus $24,518 for females. The per capita income for the city was $19,745. About 22.2% of families and 27.3% of the population were below the poverty line, including 37.1% of those under age 18 and 32.8% of those aged 65 or over. \n\nIn 2010, 58.1% of the county's population was foreign born, with 41.1% being naturalized American citizens. Of foreign-born residents, 95.4% were born in Latin America, 2.4% were born in Europe, 1.4% born in Asia, 0.5% born in Africa, 0.2% in North America, and 0.1% were born in Oceania.\n\nIn 2004, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) reported that Miami had the highest proportion of foreign-born residents of any major city worldwide (59%), followed by Toronto (50%).\n\nIn 1960, non-Hispanic whites represented 80% of Miami-Dade county's population. In 1970, the Census Bureau reported Miami's population as 45.3% Hispanic, 32.9% non-Hispanic White, and 22.7% Black. Miami's explosive population growth has been driven by internal migration from other parts of the country, primarily up until the 1980s, as well as by immigration, primarily from the 1960s to the 1990s. Today, immigration to Miami has slowed significantly and Miami's growth today is attributed greatly to its fast urbanization and high-rise construction, which has increased its inner city neighborhood population densities, such as in Downtown, Brickell, and Edgewater, where one area in Downtown alone saw a 2,069% increase in population in the 2010 Census. Miami is regarded as more of a multicultural mosaic, than it is a melting pot, with residents still maintaining much of, or some of their cultural traits. The overall culture of Miami is heavily influenced by its large population of Hispanics and blacks mainly from the Caribbean islands.\n\nLanguages\n\n, 70.2% of Miami's population age five and over spoke only Spanish at home while 22.7% of the population spoke English at home. About 6.3% spoke other Indo-European languages at home. About 0.4% spoke Asian languages or Pacific Islander languages/Oceanic languages at home. The remaining 0.3% of the population spoke other languages at home. In total, 77.3% spoke another language other than English.\n\nAs of 2000, 66.75% of residents spoke Spanish at home, while those who only spoke English made up 25.45%. Speakers of Haitian Creole (French-based) were 5.20%, French speakers comprised 0.76% of the population, and Portuguese at 0.41%. Among U.S. cities, Miami has one of the highest proportions of residents who speak languages other than English at home (74.55% in 2000).\n\nDue to English-speakers moving away from the area, the percentage of residents who speak only English is expected to continue to decline. \n\nReligion\n\nChristianity is the most prevalently practiced religion in Miami (68%), according to a 2014 study by the Pew Research Center, with 39% professing attendance at a variety of churches that could be considered Protestant, and 27% professing Roman Catholic beliefs. followed by Judaism (8%); Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and a variety of other religions have smaller followings; atheism or no self-identifying organized religious affiliation was practiced by 24%.\n\nThere has been a Norwegian Seamen's church in Miami since the early 1980s. In November 2011, Crown Princess Mette-Marit opened a new building for the church. The church was built as a center for the 10,000 Scandinavians that live in Florida. Around 4,000 of them are Norwegian. The church is also an important place for the 150 Norwegians that work at Disney World. \n\nCivic engagement\n\nOrganizations such as the Miami-Dade Salvation Army and its iconic Red Kettle Christmas Campaign, Hands On Miami, City Year Miami, Human Services Coalition of South Florida, and Citizens for a Better South Florida, among many other organizations have been working to engage Miamians in volunteerism.\n\nEconomy\n\nMiami is a major center of commerce, finance, and boasts a strong international business community. According to the ranking of world cities undertaken by the Globalization and World Cities Study Group & Network (GaWC) in 2010 and based on the level of presence of global corporate service organizations, Miami is considered a \"Alpha minus world city\". Miami has a Gross Metropolitan Product of $257 billion and is ranked 20th worldwide in GMP, and 11th in the United States. \n\nSeveral large companies are headquartered in or around Miami, including but not limited to: Akerman Senterfitt, Alienware, Arquitectonica, Arrow Air, Bacardi, Benihana, Brightstar Corporation, Burger King, Celebrity Cruises, Carnival Corporation, Carnival Cruise Lines, Crispin Porter + Bogusky, Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company, Espírito Santo Financial Group, Fizber.com, Greenberg Traurig, Holland & Knight, Inktel Direct, Interval International, Lennar, Navarro Discount Pharmacies, Norwegian Cruise Lines, Oceania Cruises, Perry Ellis International, RCTV International, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, Ryder Systems, Seabourn Cruise Line, Sedano's, Telefónica USA, UniMÁS, Telemundo, Univision, U.S. Century Bank, Vector Group, and World Fuel Services. Because of its proximity to Latin America, Miami serves as the headquarters of Latin American operations for more than 1400 multinational corporations, including AIG, American Airlines, Cisco, Disney, Exxon, FedEx, Kraft Foods, LEO Pharma Americas, Microsoft, Yahoo, Oracle, SBC Communications, Sony, Symantec, Visa International, and Wal-Mart. \n\nMiami is a major television production center, and the most important city in the U.S. for Spanish language media. Univisión, Telemundo and UniMÁS have their headquarters in Miami, along with their production studios. The Telemundo Television Studios produces much of the original programming for Telemundo, such as their telenovelas and talk shows. In 2011, 85% of Telemundo's original programming was filmed in Miami. Miami is also a major music recording center, with the Sony Music Latin and Universal Music Latin Entertainment headquarters in the city, along with many other smaller record labels. The city also attracts many artists for music video and film shootings.\n\nSince 2001, Miami has been undergoing a large building boom with more than 50 skyscrapers rising over 400 ft built or currently under construction in the city. Miami's skyline is ranked third-most impressive in the U.S., behind New York City and Chicago, and 19th in the world according to the Almanac of Architecture and Design. The city currently has the eight tallest (as well as thirteen of the fourteen tallest) skyscrapers in the state of Florida, with the tallest being the 789 ft Four Seasons Hotel & Tower.\n\nDuring the mid-2000s, the city witnessed its largest real estate boom since the Florida land boom of the 1920s. During this period, the city had well over a hundred approved high-rise construction projects in which 50 were actually built. In 2007, however, the housing market crashed causing lots of foreclosures on houses. This rapid high-rise construction, has led to fast population growth in the city's inner neighborhoods, primarily in Downtown, Brickell and Edgewater, with these neighborhoods becoming the fastest-growing areas in the city. The Miami area ranks 8th in the nation in foreclosures. In 2011, Forbes magazine named Miami the second-most miserable city in the United States due to its high foreclosure rate and past decade of corruption among public officials. In 2012, Forbes magazine named Miami the most miserable city in the United States because of a crippling housing crisis that has cost multitudes of residents their homes and jobs. The metro area has one of the highest violent crime rates in the country and workers face lengthy daily commutes. Like other metro areas in the United States, crime in Miami is localized to specific neighborhoods. \n\nMiami International Airport and PortMiami are among the nation's busiest ports of entry, especially for cargo from South America and the Caribbean. The Port of Miami is the world's busiest cruise port, and MIA is the busiest airport in Florida, and the largest gateway between the United States and Latin America. Additionally, the city has the largest concentration of international banks in the country, primarily along Brickell Avenue in Brickell, Miami's financial district. Due to its strength in international business, finance and trade, many international banks have offices in Downtown such as Espírito Santo Financial Group, which has its U.S. headquarters in Miami. Miami was also the host city of the 2003 Free Trade Area of the Americas negotiations, and is one of the leading candidates to become the trading bloc's headquarters.\n\n, PortMiami accounts for 176,000 jobs and has an annual economic impact in Miami of $18 billion. It is the 11th-largest cargo container port in the United States. In 2010, a record 4.33 million passengers traveled through PortMiami. One in seven of all the world's cruise passengers start from Miami.\n\nTourism is also an important industry in Miami. Along with finance and business, the beaches, conventions, festivals and events draw over 38 million visitors annually into the city, from across the country and around the world, spending $17.1 billion. The Art Deco District in South Beach, is reputed as one of the most glamorous in the world for its nightclubs, beaches, historical buildings, and shopping. Annual events such as the Sony Ericsson Open, Art Basel, Winter Music Conference, South Beach Wine & Food Festival, and Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Miami attract millions to the metropolis every year.\n\nMiami is the home to the National Hurricane Center and the headquarters of the United States Southern Command, responsible for military operations in Central and South America. In addition to these roles, Miami is also an industrial center, especially for stone quarrying and warehousing. These industries are centered largely on the western fringes of the city near Doral and Hialeah.\n\nAccording to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2004, Miami had the third highest incidence of family incomes below the federal poverty line in the United States, making it the third poorest city in the USA, behind only Detroit, Michigan (ranked #1) and El Paso, Texas (ranked #2). Miami is also one of the very few cities where its local government went bankrupt, in 2001. However, since that time, Miami has experienced a revival: in 2008, Miami was ranked as \"America's Cleanest City\" according to Forbes for its year-round good air quality, vast green spaces, clean drinking water, clean streets and city-wide recycling programs. In a 2009 UBS study of 73 world cities, Miami was ranked as the richest city in the United States (of four U.S. cities included in the survey) and the world's fifth-richest city, in terms of purchasing power.\n\nCulture\n\nEntertainment and performing arts\n\nIn addition to such annual festivals like Calle Ocho Festival and Carnaval Miami, Miami is home to many entertainment venues, theaters, museums, parks and performing arts centers. The newest addition to the Miami arts scene is the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, the second-largest performing arts center in the United States after the Lincoln Center in New York City, and is the home of the Florida Grand Opera. Within it are the Ziff Ballet Opera House, the center's largest venue, the Knight Concert Hall, the Carnival Studio Theater and the Peacock Rehearsal Studio. The center attracts many large-scale operas, ballets, concerts, and musicals from around the world and is Florida's grandest performing arts center. Other performing arts venues in Miami include the Gusman Center for the Performing Arts, Coconut Grove Playhouse, Colony Theatre, Lincoln Theatre, New World Center, Actor's Playhouse at the Miracle Theatre, Jackie Gleason Theatre, Manuel Artime Theater, Ring Theatre, Playground Theatre, Wertheim Performing Arts Center, the Fair Expo Center and the Bayfront Park Amphitheater for outdoor music events.\n\nThe city attracts a large number of musicians, singers, actors, dancers, and orchestral players. Miami has numerous orchestras, symphonies and performing art conservatories. Some of these include the Florida Grand Opera, FIU School of Music, Frost School of Music, Miami City Ballet, Miami Conservatory, Miami Wind Symphony, New World School of the Arts, New World Symphony Orchestra, as well as the music, theater and art schools of the city's many universities and schools.\n\nMiami is also a major fashion center, home to models and some of the top modeling agencies in the world. Miami is also host to many fashion shows and events, including the annual Miami Fashion Week and the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Miami held in the Wynwood Art District. \n\nMuseums and art\n\nThe city is home to numerous museums as well, many of which are in Downtown. These include the Frost Art Museum, HistoryMiami, Miami Art Museum, Miami Children's Museum, Miami Science Museum, Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, and the Miami-Dade Cultural Center, home of the Miami Main Library. Miami is also the home of the world's largest art exhibition, dubbed the \"Olympics of Art\", Art Basel Miami. The event is held annually in December, and attracts thousands of visitors from around the world.\n\nMusic\n\nMiami music is varied. Cubans brought the conga and rumba, while Haitians and the rest of the French West Indies have brought kompa and zouk to Miami from their homelands instantly popularizing them in American culture. Dominicans brought bachata, and merengue, while Colombians brought vallenato and cumbia, and Brazilians brought samba. West Indians and Caribbean people have brought, reggae, soca, calypso, and steel pan to the area as well. \n\nIn the early 1970s, the Miami disco sound came to life with TK Records, featuring the music of KC and the Sunshine Band, with such hits as \"Get Down Tonight\", \"(Shake, Shake, Shake) Shake Your Booty\" and \"That's the Way (I Like It)\"; and the Latin-American disco group, Foxy (band), with their hit singles \"Get Off\" and \"Hot Number\". Miami-area natives George McCrae and Teri DeSario were also popular music artists during the 1970s disco era. The Bee Gees moved to Miami in 1975 and have lived here ever since then. Miami-influenced, Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine, hit the popular music scene with their Cuban-oriented sound and had hits in the 1980s with \"Conga\" and \"Bad Boys\". \n\nMiami is also considered a \"hot spot\" for dance music, Freestyle, a style of dance music popular in the 1980s and 90s was heavily influenced by Electro, hip-hop, and disco. Many popular Freestyle acts such as Pretty Tony, Debbie Deb, Stevie B, and Exposé, originated in Miami. Indie/folk acts Cat Power and Iron & Wine are based in the city, while alternative hip hop artist Sage Francis, electro artist Uffie, and the electroclash duo Avenue D were born in Miami, but musically based elsewhere. Also, ska punk band Against All Authority is from Miami, and rock/metal bands Nonpoint and Marilyn Manson each formed in neighboring Fort Lauderdale. Cuban American female recording artist, Ana Cristina, was born in Miami in 1985. \n\nThe 1980s and '90s also brought the genre of high energy Miami Bass to dance floors and car subwoofers throughout the country. Miami Bass spawned artists like 2 Live Crew (featuring Uncle Luke), 95 South, Tag Team, 69 Boyz, Quad City DJ's, and Freak Nasty. Examples of these songs are \"Whoomp! (There It Is)\" by Tag Team in 1993, \"Tootsee Roll\" by 69 Boyz in 1994, and \"C'mon N' Ride It (The Train)\" by the Quad City DJ's in 1996. \n\nThis was also a period of alternatives to nightclubs, the warehouse party, acid house, rave and outdoor festival scenes of the late 1980s and early 1990s were havens for the latest trends in electronic dance music, especially house and its ever-more hypnotic, synthetic offspring techno and trance, in clubs like the infamous Warsaw Ballroom better known as Warsaw and The Mix where DJs like David Padilla (who was the resident DJ for both) and radio. The new sound fed back into mainstream clubs across the country. The scene in SoBe, along with a bustling secondhand market for electronic instruments and turntables, had a strong democratizing effect, offering amateur, \"bedroom\" DJs the opportunity to become proficient and popular as both music players and producers, regardless of the whims of the professional music and club industries. Some of these notable DJs are John Benetiz (better known as JellyBean Benetiz), Danny Tenaglia, and David Padilla. \n\nMiami is also home to a vibrant techno and dance scene and hosts the Winter Music Conference, the largest dance event in the world, Ultra Music Festival and many electronica music-themed celebrations and festivals.\n\nThere are also several rap and hip hop artists out of Miami. They include Trick Daddy, Trina, Pitbull, Pretty Ricky, and the Miami Bass group 2 Live Crew.\n\nCuisine\n\nThe cuisine of Miami is a reflection of its diverse population, with a heavy influence especially from Caribbean cuisine and from Latin American cuisine. By combining the two with American cuisine, it has spawned a unique South Florida style of cooking known as Floribbean cuisine. Floribbean cuisine is widely available throughout Miami and South Florida, and can be found in restaurant chains such as Pollo Tropical.\n\nCuban immigrants in the 1960s brought the Cuban sandwich, medianoche, Cuban espresso, and croquetas, all of which have grown in popularity to all Miamians, and have become symbols of the city's varied cuisine. Today, these are part of the local culture, and can be found throughout the city in window cafés, particularly outside of supermarkets and restaurants. Restaurants such as Versailles restaurant in Little Havana are landmark eateries of Miami. Located on the Atlantic Ocean, and with a long history as a seaport, Miami is also known for its seafood, with many seafood restaurants located along the Miami River, and in and around Biscayne Bay. Miami is also the home of restaurant chains such as Burger King, Tony Roma's and Benihana.\n\nDialect\n\nThe Miami area has a unique dialect, (commonly called the \"Miami accent\") which is widely spoken. The dialect developed among second- or third-generation Hispanics, including Cuban-Americans, whose first language was English (though some non-Hispanic white, black, and other races who were born and raised the Miami area tend to adopt it as well.) It is based on a fairly standard American accent but with some changes very similar to dialects in the Mid-Atlantic (especially the New York area dialect, Northern New Jersey English, and New York Latino English.) Unlike Virginia Piedmont, Coastal Southern American, and Northeast American dialects and Florida Cracker dialect (see section below), \"Miami accent\" is rhotic; it also incorporates a rhythm and pronunciation heavily influenced by Spanish (wherein rhythm is syllable-timed). \nHowever, this is a native dialect of English, not learner English or interlanguage; it is possible to differentiate this variety from an interlanguage spoken by second-language speakers in that \"Miami accent\" does not generally display the following features: there is no addition of before initial consonant clusters with, speakers do not confuse of with, (e.g., Yale with jail), and /r/ and /rr/ are pronounced as Alveolar approximant|alveolar approximant [] instead of alveolar tap or alveolar trill [r] in Spanish. \n\nIn popular culture\n\nIn film and television\n\nMiami is a center for television and film production. The city has acted as the backdrop for many movies, and many television shows, telenovelas, and awards shows have been set or filmed in Miami. In the mid-2000s, Miami started to become a popular backdrop for reality television shows. Additionally, Miami is a major center, worldwide, for Spanish-language television and film production.\n\nIn music\n\nMiami has inspired the names of musical groups as well as of numerous albums and song titles. For example, the late country singer Keith Whitley (1955–1989) sang a song called \"Miami, My Amy\", about a special woman from Miami; the song is one of his biggest hits to this day. \n\nIn video games\n\nThe video games, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (which became one of the best selling video games in 2002) and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories, take place in Vice City, a fictional city inspired by Miami, which includes some of the same architecture and geography. The game also includes characters who speak Haitian Creole and Spanish, as do many people found in Miami.\n\nThe video game Scarface: The World Is Yours takes place in Miami. The game is based on and is a quasi-sequel to the 1983 motion picture Scarface starring Al Pacino reprising his role as Tony Montana, with André Sogliuzzo providing Montana's voice. The game begins in the film's final scene, with Tony Montana's mansion being raided by Alejandro Sosa's (Robert Davi) assassins. \n\nSports\n\nMiami's main four sports teams are the Miami Dolphins of the National Football League, the Miami Heat of the National Basketball Association, the Miami Marlins of Major League Baseball, and the Florida Panthers of the National Hockey League. As well as having all four major professional teams, Miami is also home to the Major League Soccer expansion team led by David Beckham, Sony Ericsson Open for professional tennis, numerous greyhound racing tracks, marinas, jai alai venues, and golf courses. The city streets has hosted professional auto races, the Miami Indy Challenge and later the Grand Prix Americas. The Homestead-Miami Speedway oval hosts NASCAR national races.\n\nThe Heat and the Marlins play within Miami's city limits. The Heat play at the American Airlines Arena in Downtown Miami. The Miami Marlins home ballpark is Marlins Park, located in Little Havana on the site of the old Orange Bowl stadium.\n\nThe Miami Dolphins play at New Miami Stadium in suburban Miami Gardens. The Florida Panthers play in nearby Sunrise at the BB&T Center. Miami FC of the North American Soccer League, the second tier of the American soccer pyramid, play at FIU Stadium, and the Fort Lauderdale Strikers play at Lockhart Stadium in nearby Fort Lauderdale, also in the North American Soccer League. Miami is also home to Paso Fino horses, where competitions are held at Tropical Park Equestrian Center.\n\nThe Orange Bowl, a member of the Bowl Championship Series, hosts their college football championship games at New Miami Stadium. The stadium has also hosted the Super Bowl; the Miami metro area has hosted the game a total of ten times (five Super Bowls at the current New Miami Stadium, including Super Bowl XLI and five at the Miami Orange Bowl), tying New Orleans for the most games.\n\nMiami is also the home of many college sports teams. The two largest are the University of Miami Hurricanes, whose football team plays at New Miami Stadium, and Florida International University Panthers whose football team plays at FIU Stadium.\n\nThe following table shows the Miami area major professional teams and Division I teams with an average attendance of more than 10,000:\n\nParks\n\nMiami's tropical weather allows for year-round outdoors activities. The city has numerous marinas, rivers, bays, canals, and the Atlantic Ocean, which make boating, sailing, and fishing popular outdoors activities. Biscayne Bay has numerous coral reefs which make snorkeling and scuba diving popular. There are over 80 parks and gardens in the city. The largest and most popular parks are Bayfront Park and Bicentennial Park (located in the heart of Downtown and the location of the American Airlines Arena and Bayside Marketplace), Tropical Park, Peacock Park, Morningside Park, Virginia Key, and Watson Island.\n\nOther popular cultural destinations in or near Miami include Zoo Miami, Jungle Island, Miami Seaquarium, Monkey Jungle, Coral Castle, St. Bernard de Clairvaux Church, Charles Deering Estate, Fairchild Botanical Gardens, and Key Biscayne.\n\nGovernment\n\nThe government of the City of Miami (proper) uses the mayor-commissioner type of system. The city commission consists of five commissioners which are elected from single member districts. The city commission constitutes the governing body with powers to pass ordinances, adopt regulations, and exercise all powers conferred upon the city in the city charter. The mayor is elected at large and appoints a city manager. The City of Miami is governed by Mayor Tomás Regalado and 5 City commissioners which oversee the five districts in the City. The commission's regular meetings are held at Miami City Hall, which is located at 3500 Pan American Drive on Dinner Key in the neighborhood of Coconut Grove .\n\nCity Commission\n\n*Tomás Regalado – Mayor of the City of Miami\n*Wifredo \"Willy\" Gort – Miami Commissioner, District 1\n:Allapattah and Grapeland Heights\n*Ken Russell – Miami Commissioner, District 2 (Vice-Chairman)\n:Brickell, Coconut Grove, Coral Way, Downtown Miami, Edgewater, Midtown Miami, Omni, Park West and the Upper Eastside\n*Frank Carollo – Miami Commissioner, District 3\n:Coral Way, Little Havana and The Roads\n*Francis Suárez – Miami Commissioner, District 4\n:Coral Way, Flagami and West Flagler\n*Keon Hardemon – Miami Commissioner, District 5 (Chairman)\n:Buena Vista, Design District, Liberty City, Little Haiti, Little River, Lummus Park, Overtown, Spring Garden and Wynwood\n*Daniel J. Alfonso – City Manager\n*Victoria Méndez – City Attorney\n*Todd B. Hannon- City Clerk\n\nEducation\n\nPublic schools\n\nPublic schools in Miami are governed by Miami-Dade County Public Schools, which is the largest school district in Florida and the fourth-largest in the United States. As of September 2008 it has a student enrollment of 385,655 and over 392 schools and centers. The district is also the largest minority public school system in the country, with 60% of its students being of Hispanic origin, 28% Black or West Indian American, 10% White (non-Hispanic) and 2% non-white of other minorities.\n\nMiami is home to some of the nation's best high schools, such as Design and Architecture High School, ranked the nation's best magnet school, MAST Academy, Coral Reef High School, ranked 20th-best public high school in the U.S., Miami Palmetto High School, and the New World School of the Arts. M-DCPS is also one of a few public school districts in the United States to offer optional bilingual education in Spanish, French, German, Haitian Creole, and Mandarin Chinese.\n\nPrivate schools\n\nMiami is home to several well-known Roman Catholic, Jewish and non-denominational private schools. The Archdiocese of Miami operates the city's Catholic private schools, which include: St. Hugh Catholic School, St. Agatha Catholic School, St. Theresa School, Immaculata-Lasalle High School, Monsignor Edward Pace High School, Archbishop Curley-Notre Dame High School, St. Brendan High School, amongst numerous other Catholic elementary and high schools.\n\nCatholic preparatory schools operated by religious orders are Christopher Columbus High School and Belen Jesuit Preparatory School for boys and Carrollton School of the Sacred Heart and Our Lady of Lourdes Academy for girls.\n\nNon-denominational private schools in Miami are Ransom Everglades, Gulliver Preparatory School, and Miami Country Day School. Other schools in the area include Samuel Scheck Hillel Community Day School, Dade Christian School, Palmer Trinity School, and Westminster Christian School.\n\nColleges and universities\n\nMiami has over 200,000 students enrolled in local colleges and universities, placing it seventh in the nation in per capita university enrollment. In 2010, the city's four largest colleges and universities (MDC, FIU, UM, and Barry) graduated 28,000 students. \n\nColleges and universities in and around Miami:\n*Barry University (private)\n*Carlos Albizu University (private)\n*Florida International University (FIU) (public)\n*Florida Memorial University (private)\n*Johnson and Wales University (private)\n*Keiser University (private)\n*Manchester Business School (satellite location, UK public)\n*Miami Culinary Institute (public)\n*Miami Dade College (public)\n*Miami International University of Art & Design (private)\n*Nova Southeastern University (private)\n*St. Thomas University (private)\n*Talmudic University (private)\n*University of Miami (private)\n\nOverall, amongst Miamians 25 years and older, 67% had a high school diploma, and 22% had a bachelor's degree or higher. \n\nIn 2011, Miami was ranked as the sixth-most-read city in the U.S. with high book sales. \n\nProfessional training programs\n\nMiami is also home to both for-profit and nonprofit organizations that offer a range of professional training and other, related educational programs. Per Scholas, for example is a nonprofit organization that offers free professional certification training directed towards successfully passing CompTIA A+ and Network+ certification exams as a route to securing jobs and building careers. \n\nMedia\n\nMiami has one of the largest television markets in the nation and the second largest in the state of Florida. Miami has several major newspapers, the main and largest newspaper being The Miami Herald. El Nuevo Herald is the major and largest Spanish-language newspaper. The Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald are Miami's and South Florida's main, major and largest newspapers. The papers left their longtime home in downtown Miami in 2013. The newspapers are now headquartered at the former home of U.S. Southern Command in Doral. \n\nOther major newspapers include Miami Today, headquartered in Brickell, Miami New Times, headquartered in Midtown, Miami Sun Post, South Florida Business Journal, Miami Times, and Biscayne Boulevard Times. An additional Spanish-language newspapers, Diario Las Americas also serve Miami. The Miami Herald is Miami's primary newspaper with over a million readers and is headquartered in Downtown in Herald Plaza. Several other student newspapers from the local universities, such as the oldest, the University of Miami's The Miami Hurricane, Florida International University's The Beacon, Miami-Dade College's The Metropolis, Barry University's The Buccaneer, amongst others. Many neighborhoods and neighboring areas also have their own local newspapers such as the Aventura News, Coral Gables Tribune, Biscayne Bay Tribune, and the Palmetto Bay News.\n\nA number of magazines circulate throughout the greater Miami area, including Miami Monthly, Southeast Florida's only city/regional; Ocean Drive, a hot-spot social scene glossy, and South Florida Business Leader.\n\nMiami is also the headquarters and main production city of many of the world's largest television networks, record label companies, broadcasting companies and production facilities, such as Telemundo, TeleFutura, Galavisión, Mega TV, Univisión, Univision Communications, Inc., Universal Music Latin Entertainment, RCTV International and Sunbeam Television. In 2009, Univisión announced plans to build a new production studio in Miami, dubbed 'Univisión Studios'. Univisión Studios is currently headquartered in Miami, and will produce programming for all of Univisión Communications' television networks. \n\nMiami is the twelfth largest radio market and the seventeenth largest television market in the United States. Television stations serving the Miami area include: WAMI (Telefutura), WBFS (My Network TV), WSFL (The CW), WFOR (CBS), WHFT (TBN), WLTV (Univision), WPLG (ABC), WPXM (Ion), WSCV (Telemundo), WSVN (Fox), WTVJ (NBC), WPBT (PBS), and WLRN (also PBS).\n\nTransportation\n\nAirports\n\nMiami International Airport serves as the primary international airport of the Greater Miami Area. One of the busiest international airports in the world, Miami International Airport caters to over 35 million passengers a year. The airport is a major hub and the single largest international gateway for American Airlines. Miami International is the busiest airport in Florida, and is the United States' second-largest international port of entry for foreign air passengers behind New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, and is the seventh-largest such gateway in the world. The airport's extensive international route network includes non-stop flights to over seventy international cities in North and South America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.\n\nAlternatively, nearby Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport also serves commercial traffic in the Miami area. Opa-locka Airport in Opa-locka and Kendall-Tamiami Airport in an unincorporated area serve general aviation traffic in the Miami area.\n\nPortMiami\n\nMiami is home to one of the largest ports in the United States, the PortMiami. It is the largest cruise ship port in the world. The port is often called the \"Cruise Capital of the World\" and the \"Cargo Gateway of the Americas\". It has retained its status as the number one cruise/passenger port in the world for well over a decade accommodating the largest cruise ships and the major cruise lines. In 2007, the port served 3,787,410 passengers. Additionally, the port is one of the nation's busiest cargo ports, importing 7.8 million tons of cargo in 2007. Among North American ports, it ranks second only to the Port of South Louisiana in New Orleans in terms of cargo tonnage imported/exported from Latin America. The port is on 518 acre and has 7 passenger terminals. China is the port's number one import country, and Honduras is the number one export country. Miami has the world's largest amount of cruise line headquarters, home to: Carnival Cruise Lines, Celebrity Cruises, Norwegian Cruise Line, Oceania Cruises, and Royal Caribbean International. In 2014, the Port of Miami Tunnel was completed and will serve the PortMiami. \n\nPublic transportation\n\nPublic transportation in Miami is operated by Miami-Dade Transit and SFRTA, and includes commuter rail (Tri-Rail), heavy-rail rapid transit (Metrorail), an elevated people mover (Metromover), and buses (Metrobus). Miami has Florida's highest transit ridership as about 17% of Miamians use transit on a daily basis. \n\nMiami's heavy-rail rapid transit system, Metrorail, is an elevated system comprising two lines and 23 stations on a -long line. Metrorail connects the urban western suburbs of Hialeah, Medley, and inner-city Miami with suburban The Roads, Coconut Grove, Coral Gables, South Miami and urban Kendall via the central business districts of Miami International Airport, the Civic Center, and Downtown. A free, elevated people mover, Metromover, operates 21 stations on three different lines in greater Downtown Miami, with a station at roughly every two blocks of Downtown and Brickell. Several expansion projects are being funded by a transit development sales tax surcharge throughout Miami-Dade County.\n\nTri-Rail, a commuter rail system operated by the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority (SFRTA), runs from Miami International Airport northward to West Palm Beach, making eighteen stops throughout Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach counties.\n\nConstruction is currently underway on the Miami Intermodal Center and Miami Central Station, a massive transportation hub servicing Metrorail, Amtrak, Tri-Rail, Metrobus, Greyhound Lines, taxis, rental cars, MIA Mover, private automobiles, bicycles and pedestrians adjacent to Miami International Airport. Completion of the Miami Intermodal Center is expected to be completed by winter 2011, and will serve over 150,000 commuters and travelers in the Miami area. Phase I of Miami Central Station is scheduled to begin service in the spring of 2012, and Phase II in 2013.\n\nTwo new light rail systems, Baylink and the Miami Streetcar, have been proposed and are currently in the planning stage. BayLink would connect Downtown with South Beach, and the Miami Streetcar would connect Downtown with Midtown.\n\nRail\n\nMiami is the southern terminus of Amtrak's Atlantic Coast services, running two lines, the Silver Meteor and the Silver Star, both terminating in New York City. The Miami Amtrak Station is located in the suburb of Hialeah near the Tri-Rail/Metrorail Station on NW 79 St and NW 38 Ave. Current construction of the Miami Central Station will move all Amtrak operations from its current out-of-the-way location to a centralized location with Metrorail, MIA Mover, Tri-Rail, Miami International Airport, and the Miami Intermodal Center all within the same station closer to Downtown. The station was expected to be completed by 2012, but experienced several delays and was later expected to be completed in late 2014, again pushed back to early 2015. \n\nFlorida High Speed Rail was a proposed government backed high-speed rail system that would have connected Miami, Orlando, and Tampa. The first phase was planned to connect Orlando and Tampa and was offered federal funding, but it was turned down by Governor Rick Scott in 2011. The second phase of the line was envisioned to connect Miami. By 2014, a private project known as All Aboard Florida by a company of the historic Florida East Coast Railway began construction of a higher-speed rail line in South Florida that is planned to eventually terminate at Orlando International Airport. \n\nRoad\n\nMiami's road system is based along the numerical \"Miami Grid\" where Flagler Street forms the east-west baseline and Miami Avenue forms the north-south meridian. The corner of Flagler Street and Miami Avenue is in the middle of Downtown in front of the Downtown Macy's (formerly the Burdine's headquarters). The Miami grid is primarily numerical so that, for example, all street addresses north of Flagler Street and west of Miami Avenue have \"NW\" in their address. Because its point of origin is in Downtown, which is close to the coast, therefore, the \"NW\" and \"SW\" quadrants are much larger than the \"SE\" and \"NE\" quadrants. Many roads, especially major ones, are also named (e.g., Tamiami Trail/SW 8th St), although, with exceptions, the number is in more common usage among locals.\n\nWith few exceptions, within this grid north/south roads are designated as Courts, Roads, Avenues or Places (often remembered by their acronym), while east/west roads are Streets, Terraces, Drives or occasionally Ways. Major roads in each direction are located at one mile intervals. There are 16 blocks to each mile on north/south avenues, and 10 blocks to each mile on east/west streets. Major north/south avenues generally end in \"7\" - e.g., 17th, 27th, 37th/Douglas Aves., 57th/Red Rd., 67th/Ludlam, 87th/Galloway, etc., all the way west beyond 177th/Krome Avenue. (One prominent exception is 42nd Avenue, LeJeune Road, located at the half-mile point instead.) Major east/west streets to the south of downtown are multiples of 16, though the beginning point of this system is at SW 8th St, one half mile south of Flagler (\"zeroth\") Street. Thus, major streets are at 8th St. + 16 24th St./Coral Way, + 16 \n 40th St./Bird, +16 56th/Miller, + 16 \n 72nd/ Sunset, + 16 88th/N. Kendall, + 16 \n 104th (originally S. Kendall), + 16 120th/Montgomery, + 16 \n 136th/Howard, + 16 152nd/Coral Reef, + 16 \n 168th/Richmond, + 16 184th/Eureka, + 16 \n 200th/Quail Roost, + 16 216th/Hainlin Mill, + 16 \n 232nd/Silver Palm, + 16 = 248th/Coconut Palm, etc., well into the 300's. Within the Grid, odd-numbered addresses are generally on the north or east side, and even-numbered addresses are on the south or west side. This makes even unfamiliar addresses and distances easy - If one must travel from, say 1709 SW 8th St. to 24832 SW 157th Avenue, one knows it will be 140 blocks (157-17) / 20 miles to the west and 240 blocks (248-8) / 15 miles to the south, and that the destination will be on the south side of 248th St. Remarkably, even Miami natives are often unaware of this pattern.\n\nAll streets and avenues in Miami-Dade County follow the Miami Grid, with a few exceptions, most notably Coral Gables, Hialeah, Coconut Grove and Miami Beach. One neighborhood, The Roads, is thusly named because its streets run off the Miami Grid at a 45-degree angle, and therefore are all named roads.\n\nMiami-Dade County is served by four Interstate Highways (I-75, I-95, I-195, I-395) and several U.S. Highways including U.S. Route 1, U.S. Route 27, U.S. Route 41, and U.S. Route 441.\n\nSome of the major Florida State Roads (and their common names) serving Miami are:\n*SR 112 (Airport Expressway): Interstate 95 to MIA\n*Homestead Extension of Florida's Turnpike (SR 821): Florida's Turnpike mainline (SR 91)/Miami Gardens to U.S. Route 1/Florida City\n*SR 826 (Palmetto Expressway): Golden Glades Interchange to U.S. Route 1/Pinecrest\n*SR 836 (Dolphin Expressway): Downtown to SW 137th Ave via MIA\n*SR 874 (Don Shula Expressway): 826/Bird Road to Homestead Extension of Florida's Turnpike/Kendall\n*SR 878 (Snapper Creek Expressway): SR 874/Kendall to U.S. Route 1/Pinecrest & South Miami\n*SR 924 (Gratigny Parkway) Miami Lakes to Opa-locka\n\nMiami has six major causeways that span over Biscayne Bay connecting the western mainland, with the eastern barrier islands along the Atlantic Ocean. The Rickenbacker Causeway is the southernmost causeway and connects Brickell to Virginia Key and Key Biscayne. The Venetian Causeway and MacArthur Causeway connect Downtown with South Beach. The Julia Tuttle Causeway connects Midtown and Miami Beach. The 79th Street Causeway connects the Upper East Side with North Beach. The northernmost causeway, the Broad Causeway, is the smallest of Miami's six causeways, and connects North Miami with Bal Harbour.\n\nIn 2007, Miami was identified as having the rudest drivers in the United States, the second year in a row to have been cited, in a poll commissioned by automobile club AutoVantage. Miami is also consistently ranked as one of the most dangerous cities in the United States for pedestrians. \n\nBicycling\n\nIn recent years the city government, under Mayor Manny Diaz, has taken an ambitious stance in support of bicycling in Miami for both recreation and commuting. Every month, the city hosts \"Bike Miami\", where major streets in Downtown and Brickell are closed to automobiles, but left open for pedestrians and bicyclists. The event began in November 2008, and has doubled in popularity from 1,500 participants to about 3,000 in the October 2009 Bike Miami. This is the longest-running such event in the US. In October 2009, the city also approved an extensive 20-year plan for bike routes and paths around the city. The city has begun construction of bike routes as of late 2009, and ordinances requiring bike parking in all future construction in the city became mandatory as of October 2009. \n\nIn 2010, Miami was ranked as the 44th-most bike-friendly city in the US according to Bicycling Magazine. \n\nWalkability\n\nA 2011 study by Walk Score ranked Miami the eighth-most walkable of the fifty largest cities in the United States, but a 2013 survey by Travel + Leisure ranked Miami 34th for \"public transportation and pedestrian friendliness.\" \n\nNotable people\n\nInternational relations\n\nTwin and sister cities\n\n* Bogotá, Colombia (since 1971)\n* Buenos Aires, Argentina (since 1979)\n* Kagoshima, Japan (since 1990) \n* Lima, Peru (since 1977)\n* Madrid, Spain (since 2014) \n* Port-au-Prince, Haiti (since 1991)\n* Qingdao, China (since 2005)\n* Salvador do Bahia, Brazil (since 2006)\n* Santiago, Chile (since 1986)\n* Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic (since 1987)\n\nCooperation agreements\n\n* Lisbon, Portugal", "A fast food restaurant, also known as a quick service restaurant (QSR) within the industry, is a specific type of restaurant characterized both by its fast food cuisine and by minimal table service. Food served in fast food restaurants typically caters to a \"meat-sweet diet\" and is offered from a limited menu; is cooked in bulk in advance and kept hot; is finished and packaged to order; and is usually available ready to take away, though seating may be provided. Fast food restaurants are typically part of a restaurant chain or franchise operation, which provisions standardized ingredients and/or partially prepared foods and supplies to each restaurant through controlled supply channels. The term \"fast food\" was recognized in a dictionary by Merriam–Webster in 1951. \n\nArguably, the first fast food restaurants originated in the United States with A&W in 1919 and White Castle in 1921. Today, American-founded fast food chains such as McDonald's and KFC are multinational corporations with outlets across the globe.\n\nVariations on the fast food restaurant concept include fast casual restaurants and catering trucks. Fast casual restaurants have higher sit-in ratios, and customers can sit and have their orders brought to them. Catering trucks often park just outside worksites and are popular with factory workers.\n\nHistory\n\nUnited States\n\nSome trace the modern history of fast food in America to July 7, 1912, with the opening of a fast food restaurant called the Automat in New York. The Automat was a cafeteria with its prepared foods behind small glass windows and coin-operated slots. Joseph Horn and Frank Hardart had already opened the first Horn & Hardart Automat in Philadelphia in 1902, but their \"Automat\" at Broadway and 13th Street, in New York City, created a sensation. Numerous Automat restaurants were built around the country to deal with the demand. Automats remained extremely popular throughout the 1920s and 1930s. The company also popularized the notion of \"take-out\" food, with their slogan \"Less work for Mother\".\n\nSome historians and secondary school textbooks concur that A&W, which opened in 1919 and began franchising in 1921, was the first fast food restaurant (E. Tavares). Thus, the American company White Castle is generally credited with opening the second fast-food outlet in Wichita, Kansas in 1921, selling hamburgers for five cents apiece from its inception and spawning numerous competitors and emulators. What is certain, however, is that White Castle made the first significant effort to standardize the food production in, look of, and operation of fast-food hamburger restaurants. William Ingram's and Walter Anderson's White Castle System created the first fast food supply chain to provide meat, buns, paper goods, and other supplies to their restaurants, pioneered the concept of the multistate hamburger restaurant chain, standardized the look and construction of the restaurants themselves, and even developed a construction division that manufactured and built the chain's prefabricated restaurant buildings. The McDonalds' Speedee Service System and, much later, Ray Kroc's McDonald's outlets and Hamburger University all built on principles, systems and practices that White Castle had already established between 1923 and 1932.\n\nThe hamburger restaurant most associated by the public with the term \"fast food\" was created by two brothers originally from Nashua, New Hampshire. Richard and Maurice McDonald opened a barbecue drive-in in 1940 in the city of San Bernardino, California. After discovering that most of their profits came from hamburgers, the brothers closed their restaurant for three months and reopened it in 1948 as a walk-up stand offering a simple menu of hamburgers, french fries, shakes, coffee, and Coca-Cola, served in disposable paper wrapping. As a result, they could produce hamburgers and fries constantly, without waiting for customer orders, and could serve them immediately; hamburgers cost 15 cents, about half the price at a typical diner. Their streamlined production method, which they named the \"Speedee Service System\" was influenced by the production line innovations of Henry Ford.\n\nBy 1954, The McDonald brothers' stand was restaurant equipment manufacturer [http://www.princecastle.com/ Prince Castle]'s biggest purchaser of milkshake blending machines. Prince Castle salesman Ray Kroc traveled to California to discover why the company had purchased almost a dozen of the units as opposed to the normal one or two found in most restaurants of the time. Enticed by the success of the McDonald's concept, Kroc signed a franchise agreement with the brothers and began opening McDonald's restaurants in Illinois. By 1961, Kroc had bought out the brothers and created what is now the modern McDonald's Corporation. One of the major parts of his business plan was to promote cleanliness of his restaurants to growing groups of Americans that had become aware of food safety issues. As part of his commitment to cleanliness, Kroc often took part in cleaning his own Des Plaines, Illinois outlet by hosing down the garbage cans and scraping gum off the cement. Another concept Kroc added was great swaths of glass which enabled the customer to view the food preparation, a practice still found in chains such as Krispy Kreme. A clean atmosphere was only part of Kroc's grander plan which separated McDonald's from the rest of the competition and attributes to their great success. Kroc envisioned making his restaurants appeal to suburban families. \n\nAt roughly the same time as Kroc was conceiving what eventually became McDonald's Corporation, two Miami, Florida businessmen, James McLamore and David Edgerton, opened a franchise of the predecessor to what is now the international fast food restaurant chain Burger King. McLamore had visited the original McDonald's hamburger stand belonging to the McDonald brothers; sensing potential in their innovative assembly line-based production system, he decided he wanted to open a similar operation of his own. The two partners eventually decided to invest their money in Jacksonville, Florida-based Insta-Burger King. Originally opened in 1953, the founders and owners of the chain, Kieth J. Kramer and his wife's uncle Matthew Burns, opened their first stores around a piece of equipment known as the Insta-Broiler. The Insta-Broiler oven proved so successful at cooking burgers, they required all of their franchises to carry the device. By 1959 McLamore and Edgarton were operating several locations within the Miami-Dade area and were growing at a fast clip. Despite the success of their operation, the partners discovered that the design of the insta-broiler made the unit's heating elements prone to degradation from the drippings of the beef patties. The pair eventually created a mechanized gas grill that avoided the problems by changing the way the meat patties were cooked in the unit. After the original company began to falter in 1959, it was purchased by McLamore and Edgerton who renamed the company Burger King. \n\nWhile fast food restaurants usually have a seating area in which customers can eat the food on the premises, orders are designed to be taken away, and traditional table service is rare. Orders are generally taken and paid for at a wide counter, with the customer waiting by the counter for a tray or container for their food. A \"drive-through\" service can allow customers to order and pick up food from their cars.\n\nNearly from its inception, fast food has been designed to be eaten \"on the go\" and often does not require traditional cutlery and is eaten as a finger food. Common menu items at fast food outlets include fish and chips, sandwiches, pitas, hamburgers, fried chicken, french fries, chicken nuggets, tacos, pizza, and ice cream, although many fast food restaurants offer \"slower\" foods like chili, mashed potatoes, and salads.\n\nCuisine\n\nModern commercial fast food is highly processed and prepared on a large scale from bulk ingredients using standardized cooking and production methods and equipment. It is usually rapidly served in cartons or bags or in a plastic wrapping, in a fashion which reduces operating costs by allowing rapid product identification and counting, promoting longer holding time, avoiding transfer of bacteria, and facilitating order fulfillment. In most fast food operations, menu items are generally made from processed ingredients prepared at a central supply facilities and then shipped to individual outlets where they are cooked (usually by grill, microwave, or deep-frying) or assembled in a short amount of time either in anticipation of upcoming orders (i.e., \"to stock\") or in response to actual orders (i.e., \"to order\"). Following standard operating procedures, pre-cooked products are monitored for freshness and disposed of if holding times become excessive. This process ensures a consistent level of product quality, and is key to delivering the order quickly to the customer and avoiding labor and equipment costs in the individual stores.\n\nBecause of commercial emphasis on taste, speed, product safety, uniformity, and low cost, fast food products are made with ingredients formulated to achieve an identifiable flavor, aroma, texture, and \"mouth feel\" and to preserve freshness and control handling costs during preparation and order fulfillment. This requires a high degree of food engineering. The use of additives, including salt, sugar, flavorings and preservatives, and processing techniques may limit the nutritional value of the final product.\n\nValue meals\n\nA value meal is a group of menu items offered together at a lower price than they would cost individually. A hamburger, side of fries, and drink commonly constitute a value meal—or combo depending on the chain. Value meals at fast food restaurants are common as a merchandising tactic to facilitate bundling, up-selling, and price discrimination. Most of the time they can be upgraded to a larger side and drink for a small fee. The perceived creation of a \"discount\" on individual menu items in exchange for the purchase of a \"meal\" is also consistent with the loyalty marketing school of thought. \n\nTechnology\n\nTo make quick service possible and to ensure accuracy and security, many fast food restaurants have incorporated hospitality point of sale systems. This makes it possible for kitchen crew people to view orders placed at the front counter or drive through in real time. Wireless systems allow orders placed at drive through speakers to be taken by cashiers and cooks. Drive through and walk through configurations will allow orders to be taken at one register and paid at another. Modern point of sale systems can operate on computer networks using a variety of software programs. Sales records can be generated and remote access to computer reports can be given to corporate offices, managers, troubleshooters, and other authorized personnel.\n\nFood service chains partner with food equipment manufacturers to design highly specialized restaurant equipment, often incorporating heat sensors, timers, and other electronic controls into the design. Collaborative design techniques, such as rapid visualization and computer-aided design of restaurant kitchens are now being used to establish equipment specifications that are consistent with restaurant operating and merchandising requirements. \n\nBusiness\n\nConsumer spending\n\nIn the United States, consumers spent about US$110 billion on fast food in 2000 (which increased from $6 billion in 1970). The National Restaurant Association forecasts that fast food restaurants in the US will reach $142 billion in sales in 2006, a 5% increase over 2005. In comparison, the full-service restaurant segment of the food industry is expected to generate $173 billion in sales. Fast food has been losing market share to so-called fast casual restaurants, which offer more robust and expensive cuisines.\n\nMajor international brands\n\nMcDonald's, a fast food supplier, opened its first franchised restaurant in the US in 1955 (1974 in the UK). It has become a phenomenally successful enterprise in terms of financial growth, brand-name recognition, and worldwide expansion. Ray Kroc, who bought the franchising license from the McDonald brothers, pioneered concepts which emphasized standardization. He introduced uniform products, identical in all respects at each outlet, to increase sales. Kroc also insisted on cutting food costs as much as possible, eventually using the McDonald's Corporation's size to force suppliers to conform to this ethos.\n\nOther prominent international fast food companies include Burger King, the number two hamburger chain in the world, known for promoting its customized menu offerings (Have it Your Way). Another international fast food chain is KFC, which sells Chicken-related products and is the number 1 Fast Food company in the People's Republic of China.\n\nMultinational corporations typically modify their menus to cater to local tastes, and most overseas outlets are owned by native franchisees. McDonald's in India, for example, uses chicken and paneer rather than beef and pork in their burgers because Hinduism traditionally forbids eating beef. In Israel some McDonald's restaurants are kosher and respect the Jewish Shabbat; there is also a kosher McDonald's in Argentina. In Egypt, Indonesia, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Singapore, all menu items are halal.\n\nNorth America\n\nMany fast food operations have more local and regional roots, such as White Castle in the Midwest United States, along with Hardee's (owned by CKE Restaurants, which also owns Carl's Jr., whose locations are primarily on the United States West Coast); Krystal, Bojangles' Famous Chicken 'n Biscuits, Cook Out, and Zaxby's restaurants in the American Southeast; Raising Cane's in Louisiana and other mostly Southern states; Hot 'n Now in Michigan and Wisconsin; In-N-Out Burger (in California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and Texas) and Original Tommy's chains in Southern California; Dick's Drive-In in Seattle, Washington and Arctic Circle in Utah and other western states; Halo Burger around Flint, Michigan and Burgerville in the Portland, Oregon area. Also, Whataburger is a popular burger chain in the American South, and Jack in the Box is located in the West and South. Canada pizza chains Topper's Pizza and Pizza Pizza are primarily located in Ontario. Coffee chain Country Style operates only in Ontario, and competes with the famous coffee and donut chain Tim Hortons. Maid-Rite restaurant is one of the oldest chain fast food restaurants in the United States. Founded in 1926, their specialty is a loose meat hamburger. Maid-Rites can be found in the midwest - mainly Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois, and Missouri.\n\nInternational brands dominant in North America include McDonald's, Burger King and Wendy's, the number three burger chain in the USA; Dunkin' Donuts, a New England-based chain; automobile oriented Sonic Drive-In's from Oklahoma City; Starbucks, Seattle-born coffee-based fast food beverage corporation; KFC and Taco Bell, which are both part of the largest restaurant conglomerate in the world, Yum! Brands; and Domino's Pizza, a pizza chain known for popularizing home delivery of fast food.\n\nSubway is known for their sub sandwiches and are the largest restaurant chain to serve such food items. Quiznos a Denver-based sub shop is another fast-growing sub chain, yet with over 6,000 locations it is still far behind Subway's 34,000 locations. Other smaller sub shops include Blimpie, Jersey Mike's Subs, Mr. Goodcents, Jimmy John's, and Firehouse.\n\nA&W Restaurants was originally a United States and Canada fast food brand, but it is currently an International fast food corporation in several countries.\n\nIn Canada the majority of fast food chains are American owned or were originally American owned but have since set up a Canadian management/headquarters locations such as Panera Bread, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Five Guys, and Carl's Jr.. Although the case is usually American fast food chains expanding into Canada, Canadian chains such as Tim Hortons have expanded into 22 states in the United States, but are more prominent in border states such as New York and Michigan. Tim Hortons has started to expand to other countries outside of North America. The Canadian Extreme Pita franchise sells low fat and salt pita sandwiches with stores in the larger Canadian cities. Other Canadian fast food chains such as Manchu Wok serve North American style Asian foods; this company is located mainly in Canada and the USA, with other outlets on US military bases on other continents. Harvey's is a Canadian-only burger restaurant chain, present in every province.\n\nAustralia\n\nAustralia's fast food market began in the early 1970s, with the opening of several American franchises including McDonald's and KFC. Pizza Hut was introduced in the 1980s, and Burger King followed. However, the Burger King market found that this name was already a registered trademark to a takeaway food shop in Adelaide. Thus, the Burger King Australian market was forced to pick another name, selecting the Hungry Jack's brand name. Prior to this, the Australian fast food market consisted primarily of imports from the UK, fish and chips takeaway.\n\nUnited Kingdom\n\nIn the United Kingdom, many home based fast food operations were closed in the 1970s and 1980s after McDonald's became the number one outlet in the market. However, brands like Wimpy still remain, although the majority of branches became Burger King in 1989.\n\nThe Republic of Ireland\n\nIn addition to home-grown chains such as Supermac's, numerous American chains such as McDonald's and Burger King have also established a presence in Ireland. In 2015, a study developed by Treated.com was published in the Irish Times, which named Swords in County Dublin as Ireland's 'fast food capital'. \n\nJapan\n\nTraditional ramen and sushi restaurants still dominate fast food culture in Japan, although American outlets like Pizza Hut, McDonald's, and KFC are also popular, along with Japanese chains like MOS Burger.\n\nIndia\n\nThe major fast food chains in India are KFC, McDonalds, Starbucks, Burger King, Subway, Pizza Hut, and Dominos. These chains provide mostly western products. However most Indians prefer the local cuisine such as samosas, panipuri, pav Bhaji, vada pav etc. Major emerging food chains include Haldiram's, Faaso's, Chick King, Pitstop and Café Coffee Day.\n\nNigeria\n\nIn Nigeria, Mr. Bigg's, Chicken Republic, Tantalizers, and Tastee Fried Chicken are the predominant fast food chains. KFC and Domino's Pizza have recently entered the country.\n\nPakistan\n\nFast food In Pakistan varies. There are many international chains serving fast food, including Nandos, Burger King, KFC, McDonalds, Domino's Pizza, Fatburger, Dunkin' Donuts, Subway, Pizza Hut, Hardees, Telepizza, Steak Escape and Gloria Jean's Coffees. In addition to the international chains, in local cuisine people in Pakistan like to have biryani, bun kebabs, Nihari, kebab rolls etc. as fast food.\n\nRussia\n\nMost international fast food chains like Subway, McDonalds, Burger King etc. are represented in major Russian cities. There are also local chains like Teremok specializing in Russian cuisine or having elements of it added into their menu.\n\nSouth Africa\n\nKFC is the most popular fast food chain in South Africa according to a 2010 Sunday Times survey. Chicken Licken, Wimpy and Ocean Basket along with Nando's and Steers are examples of homegrown franchises that are highly popular within the country. McDonalds, Subway and Pizza Hut have a significant presence within South Africa.\n\nHong Kong\n\nIn Hong Kong, although McDonald's and KFC are quite popular, 3 major local fast food chains provide Hong Kong Chinese style fast food, namely Café de Coral, Fairwood Fast Food, and Maxim MX.\n\nIsrael\n\nIn Israel, local burger chain Burger Ranch is popular as are McDonald's and Burger King. Domino's Pizza is also a popular fast food restaurant. Chains like McDonalds offer kosher branches. Non-kosher foods such as cheeseburgers are rare in Israeli fast food chains, even in non-kosher branches. There are many small local fast food chains that serve pizza, hamburgers, sushi and local foods such as hummus, falafel and shawarma.\n\nNew Zealand\n\nIn New Zealand, the fast food market began in the 1970s with KFC (opened 1971), Pizza Hut (1974), and McDonald's (1976), and all three remain popular today. Burger King and Domino's entered the market later in the 1990s. Australian pizza chains Eagle Boys and Pizza Haven also entered the market in the 1990s, but their New Zealand operations were later sold to Pizza Hut and Domino's.\n\nA few fast food chains have been founded in New Zealand, including Burger Fuel (founded 1995), Georgie Pie (founded 1977, but closed 1998 after falling into financial trouble and being bought out by McDonald's) and Hell Pizza (founded 1996).\n\nPhilippines\n\nIn the Philippines, fast-food is the same as in the US. However, the only difference is that they serve Filipino dishes and a few American products being served Filipino-style.\n\nFranchising\n\nA fast food chain restaurant is generally owned either by the parent company of the fast food chain or a franchisee – an independent party given the right to use the company's trademark and trade name. In the latter case, a contract is made between the franchisee and the parent company, typically requiring the franchisee to pay an initial, fixed fee in addition to a continual percentage of monthly sales. Upon opening for business, the franchisee oversees the day-to-day operations of the restaurant and acts as a manager of the store. Once the contract expires, the parent company may choose to \"renew the contract, sell the franchise to another franchisee, or operate the restaurant itself.\" In most fast food chains, the number of franchised locations exceeds the number of company owned locations.\n\nFast food chains rely on consistency and uniformity, in internal operations and brand image, across all of their restaurant locations in order to convey a sense of reliability to their customers. This sense of reliability coupled with a positive customer experience brings customers to place trust in the company. This sense of trust leads to increased customer loyalty which gives the company a source of recurring business. When a person is presented with a choice of different restaurants to eat at, it is much easier for them to stick with what they know, rather than to take a gamble and dive into the unknown. \n\nDue to the importance of consistency, most companies set standards unifying their various restaurant locations with a set of common rules and regulations. Parent companies often rely on field representatives to ensure that the practices of franchised locations are consistent with the company's standards. However, the more locations a fast food chain has, the harder it is for the parent company to guarantee that these standards are being followed. Moreover, it is much more expensive to discharge a franchisee for noncompliance with company standards, than it is to discharge an employee for that same reason. As a consequence, parent companies tend to deal with franchisee violations in a more relaxed manner.\n\nFor the most part, someone visiting a McDonald's in the United States will have the same experience as someone visiting a McDonald's in Japan. The interior design, the menu, the speed of service, and the taste of the food will all be very similar. However, some differences do exist to tailor to particular cultural differences. For example, in October 2005 during a midst of plummeting sales in Japan, McDonald's added a shrimp burger to the Japanese menu. The choice to introduce a shrimp burger was no coincidence, as a 1989 study stated that world consumption of shrimp was \"led by Japan.\" \n\nIn March 2010, Taco Bell opened their first restaurant in India. Because non-consumption of beef is a cultural norm in light of India's Dharmic beliefs, Taco Bell had to tailor its menu to the dietary distinctions of Indian culture by replacing all of the beef with chicken. By the same token, completely meatless options were introduced to the menu due to the prevalence of vegetarianism throughout the country. \n\nTrends\n\nHealth concerns\n\nSome of the large fast food chains are beginning to incorporate healthier alternatives in their menu, e.g., white meat, snack wraps, salads, and fresh fruit. However, some people see these moves as a tokenistic and commercial measure, rather than an appropriate reaction to ethical concerns about the world ecology and people's health. McDonald's announced that in March 2006, the chain would include nutritional information on the packaging of all of its products. \n\nIn September and October 2000, during the Starlink corn recalls, up to $50 million worth of corn-based foods were recalled from restaurants as well as supermarkets. The products contained Starlink genetically modified corn that was not approved for human consumption. It was the first-ever recall of a genetically modified food. The environmental group Friends of the Earth that had first detected the contaminated shells was critical of the FDA for not doing its own job.\n\nConsumer appeal\n\nFast food outlets have become popular with consumers for several reasons. One is that through economies of scale in purchasing and producing food, these companies can deliver food to consumers at a very low cost. In addition, although some people dislike fast food for its predictability, it can be reassuring to a hungry person in a hurry or far from home \n\nIn the post-World War II period in the United States, fast food chains like McDonald's rapidly gained a reputation for their cleanliness, fast service, and a child-friendly atmosphere where families on the road could grab a quick meal, or seek a break from the routine of home cooking. Prior to the rise of the fast food chain restaurant, people generally had a choice between greasy spoon diners where the quality of the food was often questionable and service lacking, or high-end restaurants that were expensive and impractical for families with children. The modern, stream-lined convenience of the fast food restaurant provided a new alternative and appealed to Americans' instinct for ideas and products associated with progress, technology, and innovation. Fast food restaurants rapidly became the eatery \"everyone could agree on\", with many featuring child-size menu combos, play areas, and whimsical branding campaigns, like the iconic Ronald McDonald, designed to appeal to younger customers. Parents could have a few minutes of peace while children played or amused themselves with the toys included in their Happy Meal. There is a long history of fast food advertising campaigns, many of which are directed at children.\n\nFast food marketing largely focuses on children and teenagers. Popular methods of advertising include television, product placement in toys, games, educational materials, songs, and movies, character licensing and celebrity endorsements, and websites. Advertisements targeting children mainly focus on free toys, movie tie-ins and other giveaways. Fast food restaurants use kid's meals with toys, kid friendly mascots, vibrant colors, and play areas to draw children toward their products. . Children's power over their parents' purchases is estimated to total $300 to $500 billion every year. Fast food has become a part of American culture as a reward for children. To deny a child \"desirable things\" such as the advertised fast food restaurant can cause stigmatization of parents as the \"mean parent\" when it is common among other parents to comply with their child's desires.\n\nThe major focus on children by the fast food industry has created controversy due to the rising issue of children obesity in America. As a result of this focus, in 2008 a coalition was created and run by the Council of Better Business Bureaus called Children's Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative(CFBAI), to stop ads aimed at children or to promote only what the council dubs \"better-for- you\" products in ads directed towards children. However, it was not until 2011 that Congress requested guidelines be put in place by the CFBAI, FDA, Agriculture Department, and Centers for Disease Control. There are two basic requirements identified in the guidelines for foods that are advertised for children: (1) The food has to include healthful ingredients; (2) The food can't contain unhealthful amounts of sugar, Saturated fat, Trans fat, and salt. The guidelines are voluntary but companies experience heavy pressure to comply. Once a company complies they have 5–10 years to comply with the guidelines. Many fast food industries have started to comply with the guidelines. Although many companies have ways to go. In 2012 the fast food industry spent $4.6 billion to advertise unhealthy products to children and teens according to a report by the Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity. There are points of progress that include healthier sides and beverages in most fast food restaurant kids' meals. The guidelines are interested in a healthier lifestyle for children and the growing problem of American obesity.\n\nIn other parts of the world, American and American-style fast food outlets have been popular for their quality, customer service, and novelty, even though they are often the targets of popular anger towards American foreign policy or globalization more generally. Many consumers nonetheless see them as symbols of the wealth, progress, and well-ordered openness of Western society and they therefore become trendy attractions in many cities around the world, particularly among younger people with more varied tastes. \n\nImpact of fast food restaurant availability\n\nOver time, fast food restaurants have been growing rapidly, especially in urban neighborhoods. According to US research, low-income and predominantly African-American neighborhoods have greater exposure to fast food outlets than higher income and predominantly white areas. This has put into question whether urbanized neighborhoods were targeted, which causes a more unhealthy group of people compared to people from a higher socioeconomic status. It has also been shown that there is a lower chance of finding a fast food restaurant in a suburban neighborhood. In a study of selected US locations, Morland et al. (2002) found the number of fast food restaurants and bars was inversely proportional to the wealth of the neighborhood, and that predominantly African-American residential areas were four times less likely to have a supermarket near them than predominantly white areas. \n\nInnovations timeline\n\n* 1872: Walter Scott of Providence, RI outfitted a horse-drawn lunch wagon with a simple kitchen, bringing hot dinners to workers \n* 1902: First Horn & Hardart Automat opened in Philadelphia\n* 1912: Horn & Hardart opens a second Automat in Manhattan\n* 1916: Walter Anderson built the first White Castle in Wichita, KS in 1916, introducing the limited menu, high volume, low cost, high speed hamburger restaurant\n* 1919: A&W Root Beer took its product out of the soda fountain and into a roadside stand\n* 1921: A&W Root Beer began franchising its syrup\n* 1921: White Castle opens its first restaurant\n* 1926: Maid-Rite opened its first restaurant in Muscatine, Iowa.\n* 1930s: Howard Johnson's pioneered the concept of franchising restaurants, formally standardizing menus, signage, and advertising\n* 1948: In-N-Out Burger begins drive-through service utilizing call-box technology\n* 1967: McDonald's opens its first restaurants outside the US. \n* 1971: McDonald's begins serving breakfast, test-marketing the Egg McMuffin in the US.\n* 1971: The first Starbucks store opens in Seattle, Washington in Pike Place Market to sell high-quality coffee beans and equipment\n* 1980: 7-Eleven introduces the 32 USfloz Big Gulp\n* 1981: Arby's offers nutritional information\n* 1987: Howard Schultz leads purchase of the Starbucks brand from its founders (who adopted the name Peet's) and begins offering coffee drinks modeled after those sold in Italian coffee bars\n* 1994: McDonald's begins \"supersizing\" Extra Value Meals\n* 1994: Arctic Circle becomes the first fast food restaurant to sell Angus beef exclusively.\n* 1994: Arby's is first fast food restaurant to implement a no-smoking policy\n* 2002: McDonald's cuts back on the amount of trans fat by 48 percent on french fries\n* 2006: Arby's begins elimination of trans fat oils in french fries\n\nHalal\n\nThe introduction of the halal option by some fast food companies saw the expansion of fast food chains into Muslim majority countries has resulted in a rise of restaurant options in non-western nations and has also increased revenue for some western restaurant chains. Some outlets offering Halal options include KFC, Nando's, Pizza Express, and Subway. McDonald's did a trial but decided that the cost of operations would be too high. There have also been court cases involving start-up businesses during attempts to alter the halal-certified method by machine killing, which is against the beliefs of some Muslims. However, the trend towards halal has been unpopular in some communities which have at times resulted in internet petitions. \n\nCriticisms\n\nThe fast food industry is a popular target for critics, from anti-globalization activists like José Bové to vegetarian activist groups such as PETA as well as the workers themselves. A number of fast food worker strikes occurred in the United States in the 2010s.\n\nIn his best-selling 2001 book Fast Food Nation, investigative journalist Eric Schlosser leveled a broad, socioeconomic critique against the fast food industry, documenting how fast food rose from small, family-run businesses (like the McDonald brothers' burger joint) into large, multinational corporate juggernauts whose economies of scale radically transformed agriculture, meat processing, and labor markets in the late twentieth century. Schlosser argues that while the innovations of the fast food industry gave Americans more and cheaper dining options, it has come at the price of destroying the environment, economy, and small-town communities of rural America while shielding consumers from the real costs of their convenient meal, both in terms of health and the broader impact of large-scale food production and processing on workers, animals, and land.\n\nThe fast food industry is popular in the United States, the source of most of its innovation, and many major international chains are based there. Seen as symbols of US dominance and perceived cultural imperialism, American fast food franchises have often been the target of Anti-globalization protests and demonstrations against the US government. In 2005, for example, rioters in Karachi, Pakistan, who were initially angered because of the bombing of a Shiite mosque, destroyed a KFC restaurant. \n\nLegal issues\n\nIn 2003, McDonald's was sued in a New York court by a family who claimed that the restaurant chain was responsible for their teenage daughter's obesity and attendant health problems. By manipulating food's taste, sugar and fat content, and directing their advertising to children, the suit argued that the company purposely misleads the public about the nutritional value of its product. A judge dismissed the case, but the fast food industry disliked the publicity of its practices, particularly the way it targets children in its advertising. Although further lawsuits have not materialized, the issue is kept alive in the media and political circles by those promoting the need for tort reform. \n\nIn response to this, the \"Cheeseburger Bill\" was passed by the US House of Representatives in 2004; it later stalled in the US Senate. The law was reintroduced in 2005, only to meet the same fate. This law was claimed to \"[ban] frivolous lawsuits against producers and sellers of food and non-alcoholic drinks arising from obesity claims.\"\nThe bill arose because of an increase in lawsuits against fast food chains by people who claimed that eating their products made them obese, disassociating themselves from any of the blame." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Skeet_shooting.txt", "Clay_pigeon_shooting.txt" ], "title": [ "Skeet shooting", "Clay pigeon shooting" ], "wiki_context": [ "Skeet shooting is a recreational and competitive activity where participants, using shotguns, attempt to break clay targets mechanically flung into the air from two fixed stations at high speed from a variety of angles.\n\nSkeet is one of the three major disciplines of competitive clay pigeon shooting. The others are trap shooting and sporting clays. There are several types of skeet, including one with Olympic status (often called Olympic skeet or international skeet) and many with only national recognition.\n\nGeneral principles \n\nFor the American version of the game, the clay discs are in diameter, thick, and fly a distance of 62 yards.\n\nThe international version of skeet uses a target that is slightly larger in diameter [(110±1) mm vs. 109.54 mm], thinner in cross section [(25.5±.5) mm vs. 28.58 mm], and has a thicker dome center, making it harder to break. International targets are also thrown a longer distance from similar heights (over 70 yards), resulting in a faster target speed.\n\nThe firearm of choice for this task is usually a high-quality, double-barreled over and under shotgun with 26- to 30-inch barrels and very open chokes. Often, shooters will choose an improved cylinder choke (one with a tighter pattern) or a skeet choke (one with a wider pattern), but this is a matter of preference. Some gun shops refer to this type of shotgun as a skeet gun. Skeet chokes are designed to be a 30-inch circle at 21 yards distance. Alternatively a sporting gun or a trap gun is sometimes used. These have longer barrels (up to 34 inches) and tighter choke. Many shooters of American skeet and other national versions use semi-automatic and pump-action shotguns. The use of clay targets to simulate hunting scenarios is one reason the targets are called clay pigeons.\n\nThe event is in part meant to simulate the action of bird hunting. The shooter shoots from seven positions on a semicircle with a radius of 21 yd, and an eighth position halfway between stations 1 and 7. There are two houses that hold devices known as \"traps\" that launch the targets, one at each corner of the semicircle. The traps launch the targets to a point 15 feet above ground and 18 feet outside of station 8. One trap launches targets from 10 feet above the ground (\"high\" house) and the other launches it from 3 feet above ground (\"low\" house).\n\nAt stations 1 and 2 the shooter shoots at single targets launched from the high house and then the low house, then shoots a double where the two targets are launched simultaneously but shooting the high house target first. At stations 3, 4, and 5 the shooter shoots at single targets launched from the high house and then the low house. At stations 6 and 7 the shooter shoots at single targets launched from the high house and then the low house, then shoots a double, shooting the low house target first then the high house target. At station 8 the shooter shoots one high target and one low target.\n\nThe shooter must then re-shoot his first missed target or, if no targets are missed, must shoot his 25th shell at the low house station 8. This 25th shot was once referred to as the shooter's option, as he was able to take it where he preferred. Now, to speed up rounds in competition, the shooter must shoot the low 8 twice for a perfect score.\n\nHistory \n\nSkeet shooting was invented by Charles Davis of Andover, Massachusetts, an avid grouse hunter, in the 1920s as a sport called Clock Shooting.Shotgun games by JeffJohnston Managing Editor American Hunter magazine July 2013 pages 40,41 The original course was a circle with a radius of 25 yards with its circumference marked off like the face of a clock and a trap set at the 12 o’clock position. The practice of shooting from all directions had to cease, however, when a chicken farm started next door. The game evolved to its current setup by 1923 when one of the shooters, William Harnden Foster, solved the problem by placing a second trap at the 6 o’clock position and cutting the course in half. Foster quickly noticed the appeal of this kind of competition shooting, and set out to make it a national sport. The game was introduced in the February 1926 issue of National Sportsman and Hunting and Fishing magazines, and a prize of 100 dollars was offered to anyone who could come up with a name for the new sport. The winning entry was \"skeet\" chosen by Gertrude Hurlbutt. The word \"skeet\" was said to be derived from the Norwegian word for \"shoot\" (skyte). During World War II, skeet was used in the American military to teach gunners the principle of leading and timing on a flying target. The first National Skeet Championship was held in 1926. Shortly thereafter, the National Skeet Shooting Association was formed.\n\nOlympic skeet\n\n \n\nOlympic and international skeet is one of the ISSF shooting events. It has had Olympic status since 1968, and, until 1992, was open to both sexes. After that year, all ISSF events have been open to only one sex, and so women were disallowed to compete in the Olympic skeet competitions. This was controversial because the 1992 Olympic Champion was a woman, Zhang Shan of China. However, women had their own World Championships, and in 2000, a female skeet event was introduced to the Olympic program.\n\nIn Olympic skeet, there is a random delay of between 0 and 3 seconds after the shooter has called for the target. Also, the shooter must hold his gun so that the buttstock is at mid-torso level until the target appears.\n\nAnother difference with American skeet is that the sequence to complete the 25 targets in a round of Olympic skeet requires shooters to shoot at doubles, not only in stations 1, 2, 6, and 7, as in American skeet, but also on 3, 4, and 5. This includes a reverse double (low house first) on station 4. This last double was introduced in the sequence starting in 2005.\n\nWith her victory in women's skeet shooting at the 2012 London Olympic games, Kim Rhode became the first American to medal in 5 successive Olympic games. Her prior Olympic medals were for trap shooting in 1996, 2000 and 2004 and for skeet shooting in 2008.\n\nUS and the UK national variants \n\nAmerican skeet is administered by the National Skeet Shooting Association (NSSA). The targets are shot in a different order and are slower than in Olympic skeet. There is also no delay after the shooter has called for them, and the shooter may do this with the gun held \"up\", i.e. pre-mounted on the shoulder (as is allowed in trap shooting).\n\nA full tournament is typically conducted over the course of five events. These include four events each shot with a different maximum permissible gauge. These maximum gauges are 12, 20, 28 and .410 bore. The fifth event, usually shot first in a five event competition, is Doubles, during which a pair of targets is thrown simultaneously at stations 1 through 7, and then from station 6 back through either station 2 or 1, depending on the round. The maximum gauge permitted in Doubles is 12. Each of the five events usually consists of 100 targets (four standard boxes of ammunition). All ties in potential winning scores are broken by shoot offs, usually sudden death by station, and usually shot as doubles, from stations 3, 4 and 5. Tournament management has the right to change the shoot format with respect to the order in which events are conducted, the number of events in a given shoot, and the rules governing shoot offs.\n\nEach event normally constitutes a separate championship. In addition, the scores in the four singles events are combined to crown a High Over All (\"HOA\") champion for the tournament, a coveted title. On occasion, the scores for all five events are also combined, to determine the High All Around (\"HAA\") champion.\n\nThe requisite use of the small bore shotguns, including the difficult .410, is a major differentiation between the American version of the sport and the International version. Some would argue that it makes the American version at least as difficult as the International version, though perhaps at greater expense, given the necessity of one or more guns capable of shooting in all events.\n\nFor practical purposes, there are three types of shotguns if the shooter must have two shots in rapid succession, a requirement for American skeet. The types are: the pump gun, the automatic and a two barrel gun. Pumps operate with one hand on the grip and trigger, and the other on a sliding wooden or composite forearm. In turn, the forearm is attached to one or two bars that operate the action, both to load the chamber with the first round and to cycle the action after firing, putting another round in the chamber for the second shot. The power is supplied by the shooter pulling the forearm back and then pushing it forward: a process prone to error on the skeet field because it requires speed, consistency, and precision from the shooter. However, pumps are the least expensive repeating shotgun. Further, the pumping action, when well executed, is a joy to watch and a pleasure for the shooter.\n \nA semi-automatic gun has a fixed forearm: it relies on either the burning, expanding, gas from the first fired round, or the recoil from the same fired round, to cycle the action. Such a gun cycles \"automatically\" each time it is fired: ejecting the just fired, now empty, shell casing, and ramming a new round into the chamber for a second shot. One sees semi-automatics in tournaments, occasionally, now. They shoot well when clean, but are prone to jamming when dirty, when fouled by debris, or when there is something unusual about the rounds in gun. Just how prone to jamming varies by brand, design and shooter maintenance. They largely supplanted pump guns in skeet tournaments during the 1960s, because, even if they jam from time to time, semi-automatics still invite less error than all the activity the shooter must control with a pump gun. Further, semi-automatics usually offer a softer recoil, a real benefit given all the rounds fired in a skeet tournament. Automatics are most reliable with 12 ga. rounds, and are thus most used in the 12 ga. skeet events. \n \nA two barrel gun is just that: two single shot barrels and hammer sets attached to the same receiver and trigger assembly. The barrels are attached to each other and are aimed to hit the same spot a given distance: say, 21 yards or so at skeet (though the shot pattern from both barrels will still be very close both before and after that yardage, because the barrels are very close together). The barrel set hinges on the bottom of the gun’s receiver and is locked in place by lever on top of the action. When the lever is pushed, it releases the barrels, allowing them to swing down from the hinge, exposing the chambers for each barrel. The shooter drops one round into each chamber and then swings the barrels back up, closing and locking the breech. The act of opening and closing the gun cocks both hammers, each of which are activated, in a modern gun, by a single trigger: once the action is closed, the gun will fire two shots as fast as a person can pull the trigger twice. A two barrel gun can have the two barrels side by side or one on top of the other (stacked). All serious skeet tournament two barrel guns are stacked (the narrow sighting picture is an advantage), and are most commonly referred to as \"over and under\" shotguns. Two barrel guns are the least fussy about ammunition and surest method of getting two fast shots from a shotgun. These guns also permit the shooter to recover every just-fired shotgun shell, to be reloaded and used again, a convenient and valuable characteristic.\n\nRegardless of the type of gun employed, tournament skeet shooters have a problem. American skeet tournaments consist of at least four events: the 12 ga., the 20 ga., the 28 ga. and the .410 bore. These are four different sized shotgun shells (diminishing in size, in the order listed), requiring four different sets of chambers. Historically, that required four different guns, each weighing, balancing and presenting, differently, undermining a shooter's consistency. There is relatively little manufacturer interest in a cure for the problem with pumps and automatics. However, double guns present opportunities. One solution is to build four matched weight sets of barrels to fit one action (a \"four barrel set\"). This is expensive, but in the 1970s to early 1990s, four barrel sets reigned supreme in American skeet, and they remain thoroughly competitive. Beyond the expense, the principal criticism is that the four barrel set can still present a different sight picture for each gauge, because each barrel set, in diminishing gauge, is narrower than the prior set. \n \nThe answer was to build barrel inserts for 12 ga. two barrel guns: these allow the shooter to switch out matching sets of full length light weight aluminum tubes (10-12 oz. per set) chambered for 20, 28 and .410, in almost any 12 ga. double gun. One could then use one gun to shoot the 20, 28 and .410 events with the same weight, balance and sight picture for each of these gauges. However, with tubes removed to shoot 12 ga. rounds, the gun will be 10-12 oz. lighter, and thus will swing faster and kick harder, undermining some of the consistency intrinsic to the concept. The solutions are: to stop shooting 12 ga. rounds at all in tournaments, thus always shooting through the inserts; buying a second, pre-weighted 12 ga. barrel (the latter makes the combination a \"two barrel tube set\"); or, three, adding removable weights to the 12 ga. barrels when shooting without the sub-gauge tubes, to try to match the weight and balance of the gun when tubed. All three solutions are employed, depending upon shooter preferences and/or resources, and tubed over and under shoguns now dominate American skeet tournaments.\n\nSo effective is the tubed gun solution that perfect scores are often required to win the open title in individual events, and combined scores of 395 to 400 may be required to win the open HOA in a major shoot, depending on the weather (though a perfect score of 400 remains a rare and noteworthy event). For example, the HOA title at the 2007 U.S. Open tournament, shot in Albuquerque, New Mexico between September 6 and 9, was won in a shoot off between two competitors, each of whom shot a combined score of 399 out of a possible 400.\n\nRecognizing that a high level of perfection is beyond the skill, interest, or time available to most shooters, NSSA competitions are subdivided into several classes, each based on the running average score shot over the last 5 most recent events shot in each gauge, prior to any given competition. This permits shooters of roughly equal ability at the relevant point in time to compete against each other for the individual and HOA titles in their class.\n\nOther national versions of skeet (e.g., English skeet) typically make similar changes to the rules to make them easier.", "Clay pigeon shooting, also known as clay target shooting, and formally known as Inanimate Bird Shooting, is the art of shooting a firearm at special flying targets, known as clay pigeons or clay targets.\n\nThe terminology commonly used by clay shooters often relates to times past, when live-pigeon competitions were held. Although such competitions were made illegal in the UK in 1921, a target may still be called a \"bird\", a hit may be referred to as a \"kill\", and a missed target as a \"bird away\"; the machine which projects the targets is still known as a \"trap\".\n\nDisciplines \n\nClay pigeon shooting has at least 20 different forms of regulated competition called disciplines, although most can be grouped under the main headings of trap, skeet, and sporting.\n\nSporting Clays\n\nThe English Sporting discipline has the sport's biggest following. While the other disciplines only use standard targets, in Sporting almost anything goes. Targets are thrown in a great variety of trajectories, angles, speeds, elevations and distances and the discipline was originally devised to simulate live quarry shooting, hence some of the names commonly used on sporting stands: springing teal, driven pheasant, bolting rabbit, crossing pigeon, dropping duck, etc. Disciplines in this group include English sporting, international (FITASC) sporting, super sporting sportrap, and Compak sporting.\n\nThis discipline can have an infinite variety of \"stands\". English sporting is the most popular form of clay shooting in the UK, and a course or competition will feature a given number of stands each of which has a predetermined number of targets, all traveling along the same path and speed, either as singles or doubles.\n\nEach stand will feature a different type of target; e.g., crosser, driven, quartering, etc. International (FITASC) sporting gives a much greater variety of targets in terms of trajectory and speed, and is shot by squads of six competitors in rounds of 25 targets at a time. Super Sporting is a hybrid of the two preceding varieties. There are also other formats such as Compak sporting and sportap in which five cages are surrounded by a number of traps, and shooters fire a specific combinations or singles from each stand according to a program displayed in front of the cage.\n\nMaze clays shooting\n\nThis is a new shotgun game that offers sporting clays and FITASC target presentations on a skeet/trap or open field. This is possible by using a movable support system that carries the release buttons (wired or wireless setup) from 6 to 9 traps and the dual safety screen in any place on the field. As a result, the shooter can shoot in safe conditions upon target presentations in varying range (10 to 60 yards) and varying angles (sharp to wide).\n\nTrap shooting\n\nTargets are thrown either as singles or doubles from one or more traps situated some 15 m in front of the shooter, and are generally going away from the firing point at varying speeds, angles and elevations. The most common disciplines in this group are:\n*Down-The-Line (DTL) Single Barrel\n*Double Rise\n*Automatic Ball Trap (ABT)\n*Olympic Trap\n*Double Trap\n*Universal Trench\n*Helice (or ZZ)\n\nDown-The-Line\n\nAlso known as DTL, this is a popular trap shooting discipline. Targets are thrown to a distance of 45 to 50 metres at a fixed height of approximately 2.75 m and with a horizontal spread of up to 22 degrees either side of the centre line. Each competitor shoots at a single target in turn, but without moving from the stand until all have shot five targets. Then they all move one place to the right, and continue to do so until they have all completed a standard round of 25 birds. Scoring of each target is 3 points for a first barrel kill, 2 points for a second barrel kill and 0 for a miss (maximum 75 points per round). Variations of this discipline are single barrel, double rise, and handicap-by-distance.\n\nOlympic trap\n\nAs its name indicates, this is one of the disciplines which form part of the shooting programme at the Olympic Games. A trench in front of the shooting stands conceals 15 traps arranged in five groups of three. Shooters take turns to shoot at a target each, before moving in a clockwise direction to the next stand in the line. Targets for each shooter are thrown immediately upon his call and are selected by a shooting scheme (program) that ensures all competitors receive exactly the same target selection, but in an unpredictable randomised order to the extent that there will be one straight, two left and two right targets for each stand from any one of the three traps directly in front of him/her; guessing which one is next is impossible unless the shooter is on his/her last five targets.\n\nOlympic trap targets are set to travel 76 metres (+/-1m) at the top of trench level marker peg, unless the terrain is dead flat, at varying elevations and with a maximum horizontal angle of 45 degrees either side of the centre line (being where the target exits the trench). Scoring is on the basis of one point per target killed, regardless of whether this is achieved with the first or with the second barrel unless it is a final where the top six scorers shoot off as a single barrel event, regardless of local club grades if any.\n\nA simpler and cheaper to install variation of this discipline is known as automatic ball trap (ABT) where only one trap is used and target variation is obtained by the continuous oscillation of the trap in both horizontal and vertical directions in order to give the same spread of targets as in Olympic trap. Similarly, the targets are also thrown to a maximum of 76 metres.\n\nAlso known at Bunker Trap, and International Trap\n\nUniversal trench\n\nA variation on the theme of trap shooting, sometimes known as five trap. Five traps are installed in a trench in front of the shooting stands, all set at different angles, elevations and speeds, and upon the call of \"Pull!\" by the shooter any one of the five machines, selected at random, will be released.\n\nHorizontal angles can vary from 0 degrees to 45 degrees either side of the centre line and target distance is between 60 and 70 metres. Elevations can vary, as in other trap disciplines (except DTL), between 1.5 and 3.5 metres above ground level.\n\nThere are 10 different schemes available.\n\nSkeet shooting\n\nSkeet is a word of Scandinavian origin, though the discipline originated in America. Targets are thrown in singles and doubles from 2 trap houses situated some 40 metres apart, at opposite ends of a semicircular arc on which there are seven shooting positions. The targets are thrown at set trajectories and speeds. The main disciplines in this group are English skeet, Olympic skeet and American (NSSA) skeet.\n\nIn NSSA discipline, targets are released in a combination of singles and doubles, adding up to a total of 25 targets per round, from the High and Low trap houses on a fixed trajectory and speed. Variety is achieved by shooting round the seven stations on the semicircle, followed by an eighth station, located between stations one and seven. Scoring is on the basis of 1 point per target killed, up to a maximum of 25.\n\nIn English skeet (by far the most popular of the skeet disciplines), the gun position is optional (i.e., pre-mounted or out-of-shoulder when the target is called) and the targets are released immediately upon the shooter's call.\n\nIn Olympic skeet, the targets travel at a considerably faster speed, the release of the target can be delayed up to 3 seconds after calling and the gun-down position is compulsory. There is also an eighth shooting station, midway between the two houses.\n\nElectrocibles or helice shooting\n\nOriginating in Belgium during the 1960s, Electrocibles is similar to trap shooting, but the clays are equipped with a helice that will give the clay an erratic and unpredictable flight. The helice is composed of two winged plastic propellers with a white clay in the centre.\n\nPlastic propellers holding a detachable centre piece are rotated at high speed and released randomly from one of five traps. They fly out in an unpredictable way; so-said buzzing through the air. It is designed specifically to simulate as closely as possible the old sport of live pigeon shooting. Its original name of ZZ comes from the inventor who made them out of zinc, and had previously shot a specific breed of pigeon called a zurito; hence the term the zinc zurito. World and European Championships are held every year.\n\nTargets \n\nThe targets used for the sport are usually in the shape of an inverted saucer, made from a mixture of pitch and pulverized limestone rock designed to withstand being thrown from traps at very high speeds, but at the same time being easily broken when hit by just a very few lead or steel pellets from a shotgun.\n\nThe targets are usually fluorescent orange or black, but other colours such as white, or yellow are frequently used in order that they can be clearly seen against varying backgrounds and/or light conditions.\n\nTargets are made to very exacting specifications with regard to their weight and dimensions and must conform to set international standards.\n\nThere are several types of targets that are used for the various disciplines, with a standard 108 mm size being the most common used in American Trap, Skeet, and Sporting Clays while International disciplines of these same games use a slightly larger 110 mm diameter size. Only the standard 108/110 mm target is used in all of the trap and skeet disciplines. Sporting shoots feature the full range of targets (except ZZ) to provide the variety that is a hallmark of the discipline.\n\nAll three sports use a shotgun, and in the sporting disciplines are sub-classified by the type of game the clay target represents (pigeon, rabbit, etc.). The two primary methods of projecting clay targets are airborne and ground (rolling).\n\nNaturally, the simplest method of throwing a clay target is by hand, either into the air or along the ground. This method is the simplest, and many \"trick shot\" shooters throw their own targets (some able to throw as many as ten birds up and hit each individually before any land). However, a multitude of devices have been developed to throw the birds more easily and with more consistency. A plastic sling-like device is the simplest, though modern shooting ranges will usually have machines that throw the clay targets in consistent arcs at the push of a button.\n\n;Standard: The most commonly used target of all, must weigh 105 g and be of 110 mm overall diameter and 25–26 mm in height for International competitions and for American competitions they must weigh approximately 100 g and be of 108 mm overall diameter and in height.\n;Midi: Same saucer shape as the standard but with a diameter of only 90 mm; these targets are faster than the standard types.\n;Mini: This target is sometimes likened to a flying bumblebee at only 60 mm in diameter and 20 mm in height.\n;Battue: A very thin target measuring about 108–110 mm in diameter, it flies very fast and falls off very suddenly simulating a duck landing. They are generally more expensive than other targets.\n;Rabbit: A thicker, but standard 108–110 mm diameter flat target in the shape of a wheel designed to run along the ground.\n;ZZ: This is a plastic, standard sized target attached to the center of a two-blade propeller of different color designed to zigzag in flight in a totally unpredictable manner.\n\nTraps \n\nTraps are purpose-made, spring-loaded, flywheel or rotational devices especially designed to launch the different types of targets in singles or pairs at distances of up to 100 metres.\n\nThese machines vary from the very simple hand-cocked, hand-loaded and hand-released types to the highly sophisticated fully automatic variety, which can hold up to 600 targets in their own magazine and are electrically or pneumatically operated. Target release is by remote control, either by pressing a button or by an acoustic system activated by the shooter's voice.\n\nTarget speeds and trajectories can be easily modified and varied to suit the discipline or type of shooting required.\n\nGuns \n\nClay pigeon shooting is performed with a shotgun. The type of shotgun used is often a matter of taste and affected by local laws as well as the governing body of the sport in competitive cases.\n\nAll types of shotguns are suitable for clay pigeon shooting, however the ability to fire multiple shots in quick succession is generally considered important. Some skilled shooters will use a single shot firearm in order to add to the challenge. Traditionally Over and Under and Side by Side shotguns have been popular, however semi-automatic and to a lesser extent pump-action have been making gains, particularly as the cost of reliable, accurate semi-automatics have come down over the last decade.\n\n;Over And Under: (sometimes shortened to OAU or O/U) As its name indicates this gun has two barrels aligned horizontally and stacked vertically. There is usually one trigger however some models have two. Within this type there are three sub-groups of specification: trap, skeet, and sporting. Trap guns are generally heavier and longer barreled (normally 30 or) with tight choking and designed to shoot slightly above the point of aim. Skeet guns are usually lighter and faster handling with barrel length from 26 to and with fairly open chokes. Sporting models most often come with an interchangeable choke facility and barrel lengths of 28 in, 30 in, and 32 in according to preference.\n\n;Semi-auto: This is a single barreled gun that chambers a new shell from a magazine automatically after each shot, but which requires the shooter to press the trigger for each shot. This design combines reduced recoil and relatively low weight with quick follow up shots.\n\n;Side-by-side: (sometimes shortened to SS or SXS) Like the over and under, there are two barrels, however instead of being arranged in a vertical stack they are next to each other on a horizontal plane. Side-by-sides are harder to aim for new shooters, as the two barrels does not provide the same instinctive feedback as the single visible barrel of a semi-automatic or O/U. Modern production of SXS weapons is limited, in favor of O/U, and older weapons are usually not rated for steel shot, preventing their use on many shooting ranges.\n\n;Pump-action: This is a single barreled gun that reloads from a tubular magazine when the user slides a grip towards and then away from themselves. Pump-actions are popular with casual shooters in the US. It is far less common in Europe. The pump-action is inherently slower than all but the single barrel break action and thus follow up shots are more difficult. In addition to this they have the mechanical complexity similar to the semi-automatic but lacks the recoil reduction.\n\n;Single-shot: Virtually all single shot shotguns are break action; they operate similarly to the over and under and the side-by-side except they have only one barrel and can hold only one shot. They are very inexpensive, and not popular for clay pigeon shooting. Also their low weight and solid actions result in excessive recoil which further diminishes their appeal for high volume clay shooting.\n\nCartridges \n\nShotgun cartridges are readily available in gun shops and at shooting grounds, and within limitations as to the shot size and the weight of the shot load are suitable for clay shooting at CPSA affiliated grounds and for use in events coming under CPSA rules. Though home loaded cartridges allow the user to customize the ballistic characteristics of their shells, they are generally not allowed at clay pigeon shooting events unless specified otherwise.\n\nThe instructions and specifications are printed on the boxes. For clay competition, shot size must not exceed 2.6 mm/English No. 6.[http://www.cpsa.co.uk/cartridges Cartridges], Clay Pigeon Shooting Association rules. The shot load must be a maximum 28 g for all domestic disciplines; or 24 g for Olympic trap, Olympic skeet, and double trap; up to 28 g for FITASC sporting (from 2005); and 36 g for helice.\n\nLasers\n\nLaser Clay Pigeon Shooting, also known as Laser Clay Shooting or even Laser Shooting, is a variation on the traditional sport of Clay Pigeon Shooting where the shotguns are disabled and fitted with laser equipment that can detect hits on specially modified reflective clays. Laser clay pigeon shooting offers a safe alternative for beginners.\n\nThe rules and disciplines are normally the same as the traditional sport using live weapons.\n\nThe activity can be done indoors. In most equipment the register of hits and misses is recorded electronically, and the sounds of the shotgun firing and the clay being hit can be played from simulated sounds. It is intended as a fun sport and can be played by children." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Angostura_bitters.txt" ], "title": [ "Angostura bitters" ], "wiki_context": [ "Angostura bitters is a concentrated bitters, or botanically infused alcoholic mixture, made of water, 44.7% ethanol, gentian, herbs and spices, by House of Angostura in Trinidad and Tobago. It is typically used for flavouring beverages or (less often) food. The bitters were first produced in the town of Angostura (Ciudad Bolívar, Venezuela) (hence the name), and do not contain angostura bark. The bottle is easily recognisable by its distinctive oversized label.\n\nHistory \n\nThe recipe was developed as a tonic by a German, Johann Gottlieb Benjamin Siegert (1796–1870), surgeon general in Simón Bolívar's army in Venezuela. Siegert began to sell it in 1824 and established a distillery for the purpose in 1830. Siegert was based in the town of Angostura, now Ciudad Bolívar, and used locally available ingredients, perhaps aided by botanical knowledge of the local Amerindians. The product was sold abroad from 1853 and in 1875 the plant was moved from Ciudad Bolivar to Port of Spain, Trinidad, where it remains. Angostura won a medal at the Weltausstellung 1873 Wien. The medal is still depicted on the oversized label, along with reverse which shows Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria in profile.\n\nThe exact formula is a closely guarded secret, with only five people knowing the whole recipe. \n\nAngostura bitters are extremely concentrated and are an acquired taste; though 44.7% alcohol by volume, bitters are not normally ingested undiluted, but instead are used in small amounts as flavouring.[http://www.herbcompanion.com/herbs-in-the-kitchen/in-the-news-angostura-bitters-shortage.aspx In the News: Angostura Bitters shortage, and typical recipes for drinks and foods]\n\nAngostura bitters are a key ingredient in many cocktails. Originally used to help with upset stomachs of the soldiers in the Simón Bolívar army, it later became popular in soda water and was usually served with gin. The mix stuck in the form of a pink gin, and is also used in many other alcoholic cocktails such as long vodka, consisting of vodka, Angostura bitters, and lemonade. In the United States, it is best known for its use in whiskey cocktails: the Old Fashioned, made with whiskey, bitters, sugar, and water, and the Manhattan, made usually with rye whiskey and sweet vermouth. In a Pisco Sour a few drops are sprinkled on top of the foam, both for aroma and decoration. In a Champagne Cocktail a few drops of bitters are added to a sugar cube. Though not in the classic recipe, bartenders sometimes add more flavour to the Mojito cocktail by sprinkling a few drops of Angostura bitter on top. Bitters can also be used in \"soft\" drinks; a common drink served in Australian and New Zealand pubs is lemon lime and bitters. \n\nAngostura Bitters Drink Guide, a promotional booklet of 1908, was reprinted in 2008 with a new introduction by Ross Bolton.\n\nMedicinal properties\n\nAngostura bitters are alleged to have restorative properties. It was reported to be a remedy for hiccups, and also can be used as a cure for an upset stomach. \n\nAngostura bitters is often incorrectly believed to have poisonous qualities because it is associated with angostura bark (although it does not actually contain any), which, although not toxic, during its use as a medicine was often adulterated by unscrupulous sellers who padded out the sacks of bark with cheaper poisonous Strychnos nux-vomica or copalchi bark. \n\nOrange bitters \n\nSince 2007, Angostura have also produced Angostura Orange, an orange bitters.\n\nShortage of 2009\n\nThere was a shortage of Angostura bitters in 2009; the company reported that this was primarily caused by a problem in their supply of bottles. There were incorrect rumours of a product recall, or that production of the bitters had stopped at the plant in Trinidad. The shortage was the subject of many news articles and blogs, particularly in the cocktail industry.[http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/19/AR2010011900877.html/ Spirits: The Angostura Bitters Shortage calls for creativity]\n\nCocktails with Angostura bitters\n\n* Angostura Fizz\n* Bourbon Lancer\n* Brandy Sour\n* Brut Cocktail\n* La Katrina\n* Champagne cocktail\n* Corn N' Oil\n* Cuba Libre Preparado\n* Fallen Angel\n* Gin pahit\n* Gunner\n* Lemon, Lime and Bitters\n* Long vodka\n* Manhattan\n* Old Fashioned\n* Peanut punch\n* Pink Gin\n* Pisco Sour\n* Planter's Punch\n* Prince of Wales\n* Rob Roy\n* Rock Shandy\n* Rum punch\n* Rum Swizzle\n* Singapore Sling\n* Zombie" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "International_Court_of_Justice.txt" ], "title": [ "International Court of Justice" ], "wiki_context": [ "The International Court of Justice (; commonly referred to as the World Court or ICJ) is the primary judicial branch of the United Nations (UN). Seated in the Peace Palace in The Hague, Netherlands, the court settles legal disputes submitted to it by states and provides advisory opinions on legal questions submitted to it by duly authorized international branches, agencies, and the UN General Assembly.\n\nActivities\n\nEstablished in 1945 by the UN Charter, the Court began work in 1946 as the successor to the Permanent Court of International Justice. The Statute of the International Court of Justice, similar to that of its predecessor, is the main constitutional document constituting and regulating the Court. \n\nThe Court's workload covers a wide range of judicial activity. After the court ruled that the United States's covert war against Nicaragua was in violation of international law (Nicaragua v. United States), the United States withdrew from compulsory jurisdiction in 1986 to accept the court's jurisdiction only on a case-by-case basis. Chapter XIV of the United Nations Charter authorizes the UN Security Council to enforce Court rulings. However, such enforcement is subject to the veto power of the five permanent members of the Council, which the United States used in the Nicaragua case.\n\nComposition\n\nThe ICJ is composed of fifteen judges elected to nine-year terms by the UN General Assembly and the UN Security Council from a list of people nominated by the national groups in the Permanent Court of Arbitration. The election process is set out in Articles 4–19 of the ICJ statute. Elections are staggered, with five judges elected every three years to ensure continuity within the court. Should a judge die in office, the practice has generally been to elect a judge in a special election to complete the term.\n\nNo two judges may be nationals of the same country. According to Article 9, the membership of the Court is supposed to represent the \"main forms of civilization and of the principal legal systems of the world\". Essentially, that has meant common law, civil law and socialist law (now post-communist law).\n\nThere is an informal understanding that the seats will be distributed by geographic regions so that there are five seats for Western countries, three for African states (including one judge of francophone civil law, one of Anglophone common law and one Arab), two for Eastern European states, three for Asian states and two for Latin American and Caribbean states. The five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (France, Russia, China, the United Kingdom, and the United States) always have a judge on the Court, thereby occupying three of the Western seats, one of the Asian seats and one of the Eastern European seats. The exception was China, which did not have a judge on the Court from 1967 to 1985 because it did not put forward a candidate.\n\nArticle 6 of the Statute provides that all judges should be \"elected regardless of their nationality among persons of high moral character\" who are either qualified for the highest judicial office in their home states or known as lawyers with sufficient competence in international law. Judicial independence is dealt with specifically in Articles 16–18. Judges of the ICJ are not able to hold any other post or act as counsel. In practice, Members of the Court have their own interpretation of these rules and allow them to be involved in outside arbitration and hold professional posts as long as there is no conflict of interest. A judge can be dismissed only by a unanimous vote of the other members of the Court. Despite these provisions, the independence of ICJ judges has been questioned. For example, during the Nicaragua case, the United States issued a communiqué suggesting that it could not present sensitive material to the Court because of the presence of judges from Eastern bloc states. \n\nJudges may deliver joint judgments or give their own separate opinions. Decisions and Advisory Opinions are by majority, and, in the event of an equal division, the President's vote becomes decisive, which occurred in the Legality of the Use by a State of Nuclear Weapons in Armed Conflict (Opinion requested by WHO), [1996] ICJ Reports 66. Judges may also deliver separate dissenting opinions.\n\nAd hoc judges\n\nArticle 31 of the statute sets out a procedure whereby ad hoc judges sit on contentious cases before the Court. The system allows any party to a contentious case if it otherwise does not have one of that party's nationals sitting on the Court to select one additional person to sit as a judge on that case only. It is thus possible that as many as seventeen judges may sit on one case.\n\nThe system may seem strange when compared with domestic court processes, but its purpose is to encourage states to submit cases. For example, if a state knows that it will have a judicial officer who can participate in deliberation and offer other judges local knowledge and an understanding of the state's perspective, it may be more willing to submit to the jurisdiction of the court. Although this system does not sit well with the judicial nature of the body, it is usually of little practical consequence. Ad hoc judges usually (but not always) vote in favor of the state that appointed them and thus cancel each other out. \n\nChambers\n\nGenerally, the Court sits as full bench, but in the last fifteen years, it has on occasion sat as a chamber. Articles 26–29 of the statute allow the Court to form smaller chambers, usually 3 or 5 judges, to hear cases. Two types of chambers are contemplated by Article 26: firstly, chambers for special categories of cases, and second, the formation of ad hoc chambers to hear particular disputes. In 1993, a special chamber was established, under Article 26(1) of the ICJ statute, to deal specifically with environmental matters (although it has never been used).\n\nAd hoc chambers are more frequently convened. For example, chambers were used to hear the Gulf of Maine Case (Canada/US). In that case, the parties made clear they would withdraw the case unless the Court appointed judges to the chamber acceptable to the parties. Judgments of chambers may either less authority than full Court judgments or diminish the proper interpretation of universal international law informed by a variety of cultural and legal perspectives. On the other hand, the use of chambers might encourage greater recourse to the court and thus enhance international dispute resolution. \n\nCurrent composition\n\nAs of 9 February 2015, the composition of the Court is as follows: \n\nJurisdiction\n\nAs stated in Article 93 of the UN Charter, all UN members are automatically parties to the Court's statute. Non-UN members may also become parties to the Court's statute under the Article 93(2) procedure. For example, before becoming a UN member state, Switzerland used this procedure in 1948 to become a party, and Nauru became a party in 1988. Once a state is a party to the Court's statute, it is entitled to participate in cases before the Court. However, being a party to the statute does not automatically give the Court jurisdiction over disputes involving those parties. The issue of jurisdiction is considered in the two types of ICJ cases: contentious issues and advisory opinions.\n\nContentious issues\n\nIn contentious cases (adversarial proceedings seeking to settle a dispute), the ICJ produces a binding ruling between states that agree to submit to the ruling of the court. Only states may be parties in contentious cases. Individuals, corporations, parts of a federal state, NGOs, UN organs and self-determination groups are excluded from direct participation in cases although the Court may receive information from public international organizations. That does not preclude non-state interests from being the subject of proceedings if a state brings the case against another. For example, a state may, in cases of \"diplomatic protection\", bring a case on behalf of one of its nationals or corporations. \n\nJurisdiction is often a crucial question for the Court in contentious cases. (See Procedure below.) The key principle is that the ICJ has jurisdiction only on the basis of consent. Article 36 outlines four bases on which the Court's jurisdiction may be founded:\n* First, 36(1) provides that parties may refer cases to the Court (jurisdiction founded on \"special agreement\" or \"compromis\"). This method is based on explicit consent rather than true compulsory jurisdiction. It is, perhaps, the most effective basis for the Court's jurisdiction because the parties concerned have a desire for the dispute to be resolved by the Court and are thus more likely to comply with the Court's judgment.\n* Second, 36(1) also gives the Court jurisdiction over \"matters specifically provided for... in treaties and conventions in force\". Most modern treaties contain a compromisory clause, providing for dispute resolution by the ICJ. Cases founded on compromissory clauses have not been as effective as cases founded on special agreement since a state may have no interest in having the matter examined by the Court and may refuse to comply with a judgment. For example, during the Iran hostage crisis, Iran refused to participate in a case brought by the US based on a compromissory clause contained in the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and did not comply with the judgment. Since the 1970s, the use of such clauses has declined. Many modern treaties set out their own dispute resolution regime, often based on forms of arbitration. \n* Third, Article 36(2) allows states to make optional clause declarations accepting the Court's jurisdiction. The label \"compulsory\" sometimes placed on Article 36(2) jurisdiction is misleading since declarations by states are voluntary. Furthermore, many declarations contain reservations, such as exclusion from jurisdiction certain types of disputes (\"ratione materia\"). The principle of reciprocity may further limit jurisdiction. As of February 2011, sixty-six states had a declaration in force. Of the permanent Security Council members, only the United Kingdom has a declaration. In the Court's early years, most declarations were made by industrialized countries. Since the Nicaragua Case, declarations made by developing countries have increased, reflecting a growing confidence in the Court since the 1980s. Industrialized countries, however, have sometimes increased exclusions or removed their declarations in recent years. Examples include the United States, as mentioned previously, and Australia, which modified its declaration in 2002 to exclude disputes on maritime boundaries (most likely to prevent an impending challenge from East Timor, which gained their independence two months later). \n* Finally, 36(5) provides for jurisdiction on the basis of declarations made under the Permanent Court of International Justice's statute. Article 37 of the Statute similarly transfers jurisdiction under any compromissory clause in a treaty that gave jurisdiction to the PCIJ.\n* In addition, the Court may have jurisdiction on the basis of tacit consent (forum prorogatum). In the absence of clear jurisdiction under Article 36, jurisdiction is established if the respondent accepts ICJ jurisdiction explicitly or simply pleads on the merits. The notion arose in the Corfu Channel Case (UK v Albania) (1949), in which the Court held that a letter from Albania stating that it submitted to the jurisdiction of the ICJ was sufficient to grant the court jurisdiction.\n\nAdvisory opinions\n\n An advisory opinion is a function of the Court open only to specified United Nations bodies and agencies. On receiving a request, the Court decides which states and organizations might provide useful information and gives them an opportunity to present written or oral statements. Advisory opinions were intended as a means by which UN agencies could seek the Court's help in deciding complex legal issues that might fall under their respective mandates.\n\nIn principle, the Court's advisory opinions are only consultative in character but they are influential and widely respected. Certain instruments or regulations can provide in advance that the advisory opinion shall be specifically binding on particular agencies or states, but inherently, they are non-binding under the Statute of the Court. This non-binding character does not mean that advisory opinions are without legal effect because the legal reasoning embodied in them reflects the Court's authoritative views on important issues of international law and in arriving at them, the Court follows essentially the same rules and procedures that govern its binding judgments delivered in contentious cases submitted to it by sovereign states.\n\nAn advisory opinion derives its status and authority from the fact that it is the official pronouncement of the principal judicial organ of the United Nations. \n\nAdvisory opinions have often been controversial because the questions asked are controversial or the case was pursued as an indirect way of bringing what is really a contentious case before the Court. Examples of advisory opinions can be found in the section advisory opinions in the List of International Court of Justice cases article. One such well-known advisory opinion is the Nuclear Weapons Case.\n\nICJ and the Security Council\n\nArticle 94 establishes the duty of all UN members to comply with decisions of the Court involving them. If parties do not comply, the issue may be taken before the Security Council for enforcement action. There are obvious problems with such a method of enforcement. If the judgment is against one of the permanent five members of the Security Council or its allies, any resolution on enforcement would then be vetoed. That occurred, for example, after the Nicaragua case, when Nicaragua brought the issue of US' noncompliance with the Court's decision before the Security Council. Furthermore, if the Security Council refuses to enforce a judgment against any other state, there is no method of forcing the state to comply. Furthermore, the most effective form to take action for the Security Council, coercive action under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, can be justified only if international peace and security are at stake. The Security Council has never done that so far.\n\nThe relationship between the ICJ and the Security Council, and the separation of their powers, was considered by the Court in 1992 in the Pan Am case. The Court had to consider an application from Libya for the order of provisional measures to protect its rights, which, it alleged, were being infringed by the threat of economic sanctions by the United Kingdom and United States. The problem was that these sanctions had been authorized by the Security Council, which resulted in a potential conflict between the Chapter VII functions of the Security Council and the judicial function of the Court. The Court decided, by eleven votes to five, that it could not order the requested provisional measures because the rights claimed by Libya, even if legitimate under the Montreal Convention, could not be prima facie regarded as appropriate since the action was ordered by the Security Council. In accordance with Article 103 of the UN Charter, obligations under the Charter took precedence over other treaty obligations. Nevertheless, the Court declared the application admissible in 1998. A decision on the merits has not been given since the parties (United Kingdom, United States, and Libya) settled the case out of court in 2003.\n\nThere was a marked reluctance on the part of a majority of the Court to become involved in a dispute in such a way as to bring it potentially into conflict with the Council. The Court stated in the Nicaragua case that there is no necessary inconsistency between action by the Security Council and adjudication by the ICJ. However, when there is room for conflict, the balance appears to be in favor of the Security Council.\n\nShould either party fail \"to perform the obligations incumbent upon it under a judgment rendered by the Court\", the Security Council may be called upon to \"make recommendations or decide upon measures\" if the Security Council deems such actions necessary. In practice, the Court's powers have been limited by the unwillingness of the losing party to abide by the Court's ruling and by the Security Council's unwillingness to impose consequences. However, in theory, \"so far as the parties to the case are concerned, a judgment of the Court is binding, final and without appeal,\" and \"by signing the Charter, a State Member of the United Nations undertakes to comply with any decision of the International Court of Justice in a case to which it is a party.\"\n\nFor example, the United States had previously accepted the Court's compulsory jurisdiction upon its creation in 1946 but in 1984, after Nicaragua v. United States, withdrew its acceptance following the court's judgment that called on the US to \"cease and to refrain\" from the \"unlawful use of force\" against the government of Nicaragua. The court ruled (with only the American judge dissenting) that the United States was \"in breach of its obligation under the Treaty of Friendship with Nicaragua not to use force against Nicaragua\" and ordered the United States to pay war reparations (see note 2).\n\nExamples of contentious cases\n\n* A complaint by the United States in 1980 that Iran was detaining American diplomats in Tehran in violation of international law. \n* A dispute between Tunisia and Libya over the delimitation of the continental shelf between them. \n* A complaint by Iran after the shooting down of Iran Air Flight 655 by the United States Navy guided missile cruiser. \n* A dispute over the course of the maritime boundary dividing the U.S. and Canada in the Gulf of Maine area. \n* A complaint by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia against the member states of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization regarding their actions in the Kosovo War. This was denied on 15 December 2004 because of lack of jurisdiction, the FRY not being a party to the ICJ statute at the time it made the application. \n* A complaint by the Republic of Macedonia (former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) that Greece is, by vetoing its accession to NATO, in violation of the Interim Accord of 13 September 1995 between the two countries, was decided in favor of Macedonia on 5 December 2011. \n*A complaint by the Democratic Republic of the Congo that the DRC's sovereignty had been violated by Uganda and that DRC had lost billions of dollars worth of resources, was decided in favor of the DRC. \n\nLaw applied\n\nWhen deciding cases, the Court applies international law as summarised in Article 38 of the ICJ Statute, which provides that in arriving at its decisions the Court shall apply international conventions, international custom and the \"general principles of law recognised by civilized nations.\" It may also refer to academic writing (\"the teachings of the most highly qualified publicists of the various nations\") and previous judicial decisions to help interpret the law although the Court is not formally bound by its previous decisions under the doctrine of stare decisis. Article 59 makes clear that the common law notion of precedent or stare decisis does not apply to the decisions of the ICJ. The Court's decision binds only the parties to that particular controversy. Under 38(1)(d), however, the Court may consider its own previous decisions.\n\nIf the parties agree, they may also grant the Court the liberty to decide ex aequo et bono (\"in justice and fairness\"), granting the ICJ the freedom to make an equitable decision based on what is fair under the circumstances. That provision has not been used in the Court's history. So far, the International Court of Justice has dealt with about 130 cases.\n\nProcedure\n\nThe ICJ is vested with the power to make its own rules. Court procedure is set out in the Rules of Court of the International Court of Justice 1978 (as amended on 29 September 2005).\n\nCases before the ICJ will follow a standard pattern. The case is lodged by the applicant that files a written memorial setting out the basis of the Court's jurisdiction and the merits of its claim. The respondent may accept the Court's jurisdiction and file its own memorial on the merits of the case.\n\nPreliminary objections\n\nA respondent that does not wish to submit to the jurisdiction of the Court may raise Preliminary Objections. Any such objections must be ruled upon before the Court can address the merits of the applicant's claim. Often, a separate public hearing is held on the Preliminary Objections and the Court will render a judgment. Respondents normally file Preliminary Objections to the jurisdiction of the Court and/or the admissibility of the case. Inadmissibility refers to a range of arguments about factors the Court should take into account in deciding jurisdiction, such as the fact that the issue is not justiciable or that it is not a \"legal dispute\".\n\nIn addition, objections may be made because all necessary parties are not before the Court. If the case necessarily requires the Court to rule on the rights and obligations of a state that has not consented to the Court's jurisdiction, the Court does not proceed to issue a judgment on the merits.\n\nIf the Court decides it has jurisdiction and the case is admissible, the respondent then is required to file a Memorial addressing the merits of the applicant's claim. Once all written arguments are filed, the Court holds a public hearing on the merits.\n\nOnce a case has been filed, any party (usually the applicant) may seek an order from the Court to protect the status quo pending the hearing of the case. Such orders are known as Provisional (or Interim) Measures and are analogous to interlocutory injunctions in United States law. Article 41 of the statute allows the Court to make such orders. The Court must be satisfied to have prima facie jurisdiction to hear the merits of the case before it grants provisional measures.\n\nApplications to intervene\n\nIn cases in which a third state's interests are affected, that state may be permitted to intervene in the case and participate as a full party. Under Article 62, a state \"with an interest of a legal nature\" may apply; however, it is within the Court's discretion whether or not to allow the intervention. Intervention applications are rare, and the first successful application occurred only in 1991.\n\nJudgment and remedies\n\nOnce deliberation has taken place, the Court issues a majority opinion. Individual judges may issue concurring opinions (if they agree with the outcome reached in the judgment of the court but differ in their reasoning) or dissenting opinions (if they disagree with the majority). No appeal is possible, but any party may ask for the court to clarify if there is a dispute as to the meaning or scope of the court's judgment. \n\nCriticisms\n\nThe International Court has been criticized with respect to its rulings, its procedures, and its authority. As with criticisms of the United Nations, many of these criticisms refer more to the general authority assigned to the body by member states through its charter than to specific problems with the composition of judges or their rulings. Major criticisms include the following: \n* \"Compulsory\" jurisdiction is limited to cases where both parties have agreed to submit to its decision, and so instances of aggression tend to be automatically escalated to and adjudicated by the Security Council. According to the sovereignty principle of international law, no nation is superior or inferior against another. Therefore, there is no entity that could force the states into practice of the law or punish the states in case any violation of international law occurs. Therefore, the absence of binding force means that the member states of the ICJ do not necessarily have to accept the jurisdiction. Moreover, membership in the UN and ICJ does not give the court automatic jurisdiction over the member states, but it is the consent of each state to follow the jurisdiction that matters.\n* Organizations, private enterprises, and individuals cannot have their cases taken to the International Court or appeal a national supreme court's ruling. UN agencies likewise cannot bring up a case except in advisory opinions (a process initiated by the court and non-binding). Only states can bring the cases and become the defendants of the cases. This also means that the potential victims of crimes against humanity, such as minor ethnic groups or indigenous peoples, may not have appropriate backing by a state.\n* Other existing international thematic courts, such as the ICC, are not under the umbrella of the International Court. Unlike ICJ, international thematic courts like ICC work independently from United Nations. Such dualistic structure between various international courts sometimes makes it hard for the courts to engage in effective and collective jurisdiction.\n* The International Court does not enjoy a full separation of powers, with permanent members of the Security Council being able to veto enforcement of cases, even those to which they consented to be bound. Because the jurisdiction does not have binding force itself, in many cases, the instances of aggression are adjudicated by Security Council by adopting a resolution, etc. There is, therefore, a likelihood for the permanent member states of Security Council to avoid the responsibility brought up by International Court of Justice, as shown in the example of Nicaragua v. United States." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Jeopardy!.txt", "Ken_Jennings.txt" ], "title": [ "Jeopardy!", "Ken Jennings" ], "wiki_context": [ "Jeopardy! is an American television game show created by Merv Griffin. The show features a quiz competition in which contestants are presented with general knowledge clues in the form of answers, and must phrase their responses in the form of questions. The original daytime version debuted on NBC on March 30, 1964, and aired until January 3, 1975. A weekly nighttime syndicated edition aired from September 1974 to September 1975, and a revival, The All-New Jeopardy!, ran on NBC from October 1978 to March 1979. The current version, a daily syndicated show produced by Sony Pictures Television, premiered on September 10, 1984 and is still airing, making it by far the program's most successful incarnation.\n\nBoth NBC versions and the weekly syndicated version were hosted by Art Fleming. Don Pardo served as announcer until 1975, and John Harlan announced for the 1978–79 show. Since its inception, the daily syndicated version has featured Alex Trebek as host and Johnny Gilbert as announcer.\n\nWith 7,000 episodes aired, the daily syndicated version of Jeopardy! has won a record 31 Daytime Emmy Awards and is the only post-1960 game show to be honored with the Peabody Award. In 2013, the program was ranked No. 45 on TV Guides list of the 60 greatest shows in American television history. Jeopardy! has also gained a worldwide following with regional adaptations in many other countries. The daily syndicated series' 32nd season premiered on September 14, 2015.\n\nGameplay \n\nThree contestants each take their place behind a lectern, with the returning champion occupying the leftmost lectern (from the viewer's perspective). The contestants compete in a quiz game comprising three rounds: Jeopardy!, Double Jeopardy!, and Final Jeopardy!. The material for the questions covers a wide variety of topics, including history and current events, the sciences, the arts, popular culture, literature, and languages. Category titles often feature puns, wordplay, or shared themes, and the host will regularly remind contestants of topics or place emphasis on category themes before the start of the round. \nFirst two rounds \n\nThe Jeopardy! and Double Jeopardy! rounds each feature six categories, each of which contains five clues, which are ostensibly valued by difficulty. The dollar values of the clues increased over time. On the original Jeopardy! series, clue values in the first round ranged from $10 to $50. On The All-New Jeopardy!, they ranged from $25 to $125. The current series' first round originally ranged from $100 to $500, and were doubled to $200 to $1,000 on November 26, 2001. On the Super Jeopardy! specials, clues were valued in points rather than in dollars, and ranged in the first round from 200 to 1,000 points.\n\nThe Jeopardy! round begins when the returning champion selects a clue, which may be from any position on the game board. The clue is revealed and read aloud by the host, after which any contestant may ring-in using a hand-held signaling device. The first contestant to ring-in successfully is prompted to provide a response to the clue, phrased in the form of a question. For example, if a contestant were to select \"Presidents for $200\", the resulting clue could be \"This 'Father of Our Country' didn't really chop down a cherry tree\", to which the correct response would be \"Who is/was George Washington?\" (Contestants are free to phrase the response in the form of any question; the traditional phrasing of \"who is/are\" for people or \"what is/are\" for things or words is almost always used.) If the contestant responds correctly, the clue's dollar value is added to the contestant's score, and they may select a new clue from the board. An incorrect response, or a failure to respond within five seconds, deducts the clue's value from the contestant's score and allows the other contestants the opportunity to ring-in and respond. If no contestant responds correctly, the host gives the correct response; the \"last correct questioner\" chooses the next clue. \n\nFrom the premiere of the original Jeopardy! until the end of the first season of the current syndicated series, contestants were allowed to ring-in as soon as the clue was revealed. Since September 1985, contestants are required to wait until the clue is read before ringing-in. To accommodate the rule change, lights were added to the game board (unseen by home viewers) to signify when it is permissible for contestants to signal; attempting to signal before the light goes on locks the contestant out for half of a second. The change was made to allow the home audience to play along with the show more easily and to keep an extremely fast contestant from potentially dominating the game. In pre-1985 episodes, a buzzer would sound when a contestant signaled; according to Trebek, the buzzer was eliminated because it was \"distracting to the viewers\" and sometimes presented a problem when contestants rang in while Trebek was still reading the clue. Contestants who are visually impaired or blind are given a card with the category names printed in Braille before each round begins, and an audible tone is played after the clue has been read aloud.\n\nThe second round, Double Jeopardy!, features six new categories of clues. Clue values are doubled from the Jeopardy! round (except in Super Jeopardy!, where Double Jeopardy! values ranged from 500 to 2,500 points). The contestant with the least money at the end of the Jeopardy! round makes the first selection in Double Jeopardy!; if there is a tie, the tied contestant standing at the leftmost lectern selects first.\n\nA \"Daily Double\" is hidden behind one clue in the Jeopardy! round, and behind two in Double Jeopardy! The name and inspiration were taken from a horse racing term. Only the contestant who uncovers a Daily Double may respond to that clue and need not use his/her signaling device to do so. Before the clue is revealed, the contestant must declare a wager, from a minimum of $5 to a maximum of his/her entire score (known as a \"true Daily Double\") or the highest clue value available in the round, whichever is greater. A correct response adds the value of the wager to the contestant's score, while an incorrect response deducts it. Whether or not the contestant responds correctly, he or she maintains control of the board.\n\nDuring the Jeopardy! round, except in response to the Daily Double clue, contestants are not penalized for forgetting to phrase their response in the form of a question, although the host will remind contestants to watch their phrasing in future responses. In the Double Jeopardy! round and in the Daily Double in the Jeopardy! round, the phrasing rule is followed more strictly, with a response not phrased in the form of a question counting as wrong if it is not re-phrased immediately. If it is determined that a previous response was wrongly ruled to be correct or incorrect, the scores are adjusted at the first available opportunity. If, after a game is over, a ruling change is made that would have significantly altered the outcome of the game, the affected contestant(s) are invited back to compete on a future show.\n\nContestants who finish Double Jeopardy! with $0 or a negative score are automatically eliminated from the game at that point and awarded the third place prize. On at least one episode hosted by Art Fleming, all three contestants finished Double Jeopardy! with $0 or less, and as a result, no Final Jeopardy! round was played. During Celebrity Jeopardy! games, contestants with a $0 or negative score are given $1,000 for the Final Jeopardy! round.\n\nFinal Jeopardy! \n\nThe Final Jeopardy! round features a single clue. At the end of the Double Jeopardy! round, the host announces the Final Jeopardy! category, and a commercial break follows. During the break, barriers are placed between the contestant lecterns, and each contestant makes a final wager between $0 and his/her entire score. Contestants enter their wagers using a light pen to write on an electronic display on their lectern. After the break, the Final Jeopardy! clue is revealed and read by the host. The contestants have 30 seconds to write their responses on the electronic display, while the show's iconic \"Think!\" music plays in the background. In the event that either the display or the pen malfunctions, contestants can use an index card and a marker to manually write their response and wager. Visually impaired or blind contestants use a Braille keyboard to type in a wager and response.\n\nContestants' responses are revealed in order of their pre-Final Jeopardy! scores, from lowest to highest. A correct response adds the amount of the contestant's wager to his/her score, while a miss, failure to respond, or failure to phrase the response as a question (even if correct) deducts it. The contestant with the highest score at the end of the round is that day's winner. If there is a tie for second place, consolation prizes are awarded based on the scores going into the Final Jeopardy! round. If all three contestants finish with $0, no one returns as champion for the next show, and based on scores going into the Final Jeopardy! round, the two contestants who were first and second will receive the second-place prize, and the contestant in third will receive the third-place prize.\n\nWinnings \n\nThe top scorer(s) in each game retain the value of their winnings in cash, and return to play in the next match. Non-winners receive consolation prizes. Since May 16, 2002, consolation prizes have been $2,000 for the second-place contestant(s) and $1,000 for the third-place contestant. Since the show does not generally provide airfare or lodging for contestants, cash consolation prizes alleviate contestants' financial burden. An exception is provided for returning champions who must make several flights to Los Angeles.\n\nBefore 1984, all three contestants received their winnings in cash (contestants who finished with $0 or a negative score received consolation prizes). This was changed in order to make the game more competitive, and avoid the problem of contestants who would stop participating in the game, or avoid wagering in Final Jeopardy!, rather than risk losing the money they had already won. From 1984 to 2002, non-winning contestants on the Trebek version received vacation packages and merchandise, which were donated by manufacturers as promotional consideration. The current cash consolation prize is provided by Aleve.\n\nReturning champions \n\nThe winner of each episode returns to compete against two new contestants on the next episode. Originally, a contestant who won five consecutive days retired undefeated and was guaranteed a spot in the Tournament of Champions; the five-day limit was eliminated at the beginning of season 20 on September 8, 2003. \n\nTies for first place following Final Jeopardy! are broken with a tie-breaker clue, resulting in only a single champion being named, keeping their winnings, and returning to compete in the next show. Previously, if two or all three contestants tied for first place, they were declared \"co-champions\", and each retained his or her winnings and returned on the following episode. A tie occurred on the January 29, 2014 episode when Arthur Chu, leading at the end of Double Jeopardy!, wagered to tie challenger Carolyn Collins rather than winning; Chu followed Jeopardy! College Champion Keith Williams's advice to wager for the tie to increase the leader's chances of winning. A three-way tie for first place has only occurred once on the Trebek version, on March 16, 2007, when Scott Weiss, Jamey Kirby, and Anders Martinson all ended the game with $16,000. \n\nIf no contestant finishes Final Jeopardy! with a positive total, there is no winner. This has happened on several episodes, most recently on January 18, 2016. Three new contestants appear on the next episode. A triple zero has also occurred twice in tournament play (1990 Seniors and 2013 Teen), and also once in a Celebrity Week episode in 1998. In Celebrity play, the full first, second, and third place prize money for charities is given based on the score before the round. In tournament play, an additional high scoring non-winner will advance to the next round.\n\nSpecial considerations have been given for contestants who were unable to return as champion because of circumstances beyond their control, especially when there is a considerable time between taping of episodes. This occurred for the first time in season 25, when Priscilla Ball, who won on January 16, 2009, was unable to attend the taping of the next episode because of illness; as a result, three new contestants appeared on the next episode. Ball returned as a co-champion to play on the episode airing April 9, 2009. On the episode aired December 21, 2015, the returning champion, Claudia Corriere, could not return as champion because of a job offered in the weeks between tapings, so three new contestants played that day as well. Corriere returned as a co-champion on the January 18, 2016 episode, but was eliminated in a three-way loss.\n\nTypically, the two challengers participate in a backstage draw to determine lectern positions. In all situations with three new contestants, the draw will also determine who will take the champion's position and select first to start the game.\n\nVariations for tournament play \n\nTournaments generally run for 10 consecutive episodes and feature 15 contestants. The first five episodes, the quarter-finals, feature three new contestants each day. The winners of these five games, and the four highest scoring non-winners (\"wild cards\"), advance to the semi-finals, which run for three days. The winners of these three games advance to play in a two-game final match, in which the scores from both games are combined to determine the overall standings. This format has been used since the first Tournament of Champions in 1985 and was devised by Trebek himself.\n\nIf there is a tie for the final wild card position, the non-winner that advances will be based on the same regulations as two contestants who tie for second; the tie-breaker is the contestant's score after the Double Jeopardy! round, and if further tied, the score after the Jeopardy! round determines the contestant who advances as the wild card. In the rare case after the first round of the tournament, fewer than four non-winners have a positive score to advance to the second round, then the contestants who have a zero score after Final Jeopardy! will be ranked in the same procedure.\n\nIf two or more contestants have the same positive score at the end of match (first round, semi-final game, or end of a two-game final), a one-clue tiebreaker is used. The tied contestants are given a category, and then the clue. The first contestant to ring-in and respond correctly becomes that game's winner. Contestants are not eliminated for providing an incorrect response, and cannot win by default. If it takes multiple attempts to determine a winner, only the final clue will air.\n\nIf none of the contestants in a quarter-final or semi-final game end with a positive score, all three are provisionally eliminated and an additional wild card contestant advances instead. This occurred in the quarter-finals of the 1991 Seniors Tournament and the semi-finals of the 2013 Teen Tournament.\n\nIf a finalist finishes Double Jeopardy! with a $0 or negative score on either day, that contestant is eliminated from Final Jeopardy! as usual for that leg of the two-legged tie only, and their score for that leg is recorded as $0. If any game of the finals ends in which no finalist finishes with a positive score, all scores for that day are recorded as $0. If, at the end of the finals, no finalist finishes with a positive score after combining the totals from the first and second games, the one-clue tiebreaker is played.\n\nConception and development \n\nIn a 1964 Associated Press profile released shortly before the original Jeopardy! series premiered, Merv Griffin offered the following account of how he created the quiz show:\n\nGriffin's first conception of the game used a board comprising ten categories with ten clues each, but after finding that this board could not easily be shown on camera, he reduced it to two rounds of thirty clues each, with five clues in each of six categories. He originally intended the show to require grammatically correct phrasing (e.g., only accepting \"Who is...\" for a person), but after finding that grammatical correction slowed the game down, he decided that the show should instead accept any correct response that was in question form. Griffin discarded his initial title for the show, What's the Question?, when skeptical network executive Ed Vane rejected his original concept of the game, claiming, \"It doesn't have enough jeopardies.\"\n\nJeopardy! was not the first game show to give contestants the answers and require the questions. That format had previously been used by the Gil Fates-hosted program CBS Television Quiz, which aired from July 1941 until May 1942.\n\nPersonnel \n\nHosts and announcers \n\n \nThe first three versions of the show were hosted by Art Fleming. Don Pardo served as announcer for the original NBC version and weekly syndicated version, but when NBC's revival The All-New Jeopardy! launched in 1978, Pardo's announcing duties were taken over by John Harlan.\n\nAlex Trebek has served as host of the daily syndicated version since it premiered in 1984, except when he switched places with Wheel of Fortune host Pat Sajak as an April Fool's joke on the episode aired April 1, 1997. His most recent contract renewal, from March 2015, takes his tenure through the 2017–18 season. In the daily syndicated version's first pilot, from 1983, Jay Stewart served as the show's announcer, but Johnny Gilbert took over the role when that version was picked up as a series and has held it since then.\n\nClue Crew \n\nThe Jeopardy! Clue Crew, introduced on September 24, 2001, is a team of roving correspondents who appear in videos, recorded around the world, to narrate some clues. Explaining why the Clue Crew was added to the show, executive producer Harry Friedman said, \"TV is a visual medium, and the more visual we can make our clues, the more we think it will enhance the experience for the viewer.\"\n\nFollowing the initial announcement of auditions for the team, over 5,000 people applied for Clue Crew posts. The original Clue Crew members were Cheryl Farrell, Jimmy McGuire, Sofia Lidskog, and Sarah Whitcomb. Lidskog departed the Clue Crew in 2004 to become an anchor on the high school news program Channel One News, and a search was held to replace her in early 2005. The winners were Jon Cannon and Kelly Miyahara, who formally joined the crew starting in season 22, which premiered on September 12, 2005. Farrell continued to record clues for episodes aired as late as October 2008, and Cannon continued to appear until July 2009. \n\nThe Clue Crew has traveled to 280 cities worldwide, spanning all 50 of the United States and 44 other countries. In addition to appearing in Jeopardy! clue videos, the team's members also travel to meet fans of the show and future contestants. Occasionally, they visit schools to showcase the educational game Classroom Jeopardy! Miyahara also serves as announcer for the Sports Jeopardy! spin-off series. \n\nProduction staff \n\nRobert Rubin served as the producer of the original Jeopardy! series for most of its run, and later became its executive producer. Following Rubin's promotion, the line producer was Lynette Williams.\n\nGriffin was the daily syndicated version's executive producer until his retirement in 2000. Trebek served as producer as well as host until 1987, when he began hosting NBC's Classic Concentration for the next four years. At that time, he handed producer duties to George Vosburgh, who had formerly produced The All-New Jeopardy!. In the 1997–98 season, Vosburgh was succeeded as producer by Harry Friedman, Lisa Finneran, and Rocky Schmidt. Beginning in 1999, Friedman became executive producer, and Gary Johnson became the show's new third producer. In the 2006–07 season, Deb Dittmann and Brett Schneider became the producers, and Finneran, Schmidt, and Johnson were promoted to supervising producers.\n\nThe original Jeopardy! series was directed at different times by Bob Hultgren, Eleanor Tarshis, and Jeff Goldstein. Dick Schneider, who directed episodes of The All-New Jeopardy!, returned as director for the Trebek version's first eight seasons. Since 1992, the show has been directed by Kevin McCarthy, who had previously served as associate director under Schneider.\n\nThe current version of Jeopardy! employs nine writers and five researchers to create and assemble the categories and clues. Billy Wisse and Michele Loud, both longtime staff members, are the editorial producer and editorial supervisor, respectively. Previous writing and editorial supervisors have included Jules Minton, Terrence McDonnell, Harry Eisenberg, and Gary Johnson.\n\nThe show's production designer is Naomi Slodki. Previous art directors have included Henry Lickel, Dennis Roof, Bob Rang, and Ed Flesh (who also designed sets for other game shows such as The $25,000 Pyramid, Name That Tune, and Wheel of Fortune). \n\nProduction \n\nThe daily syndicated version of Jeopardy! is produced by Sony Pictures Television (previously known as Columbia TriStar Television, the successor company to original producer Merv Griffin Enterprises). The copyright holder is Jeopardy Productions, which, like SPT, operates as a subsidiary of Sony Pictures Entertainment. The rights to distribute the program on television in the United States are owned by CBS Television Distribution, which absorbed original distributor King World Productions in 2007.\n\nThe original Jeopardy! series was taped in Studio 6A at NBC Studios at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York City, and The All-New Jeopardy! was taped in Studio 3 at NBC's Burbank Studios at 3000 West Alameda Avenue in Burbank, California. The Trebek version was initially taped at Metromedia Stage 7, KTTV-TV, on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, but moved its production facilities to Hollywood Center Studios' Stage 9 in 1985. After the final shows of season 10 were recorded on February 15, 1994, the Jeopardy! production facilities were moved to Sony Pictures Studios' Stage 10 on Washington Boulevard in Culver City, California, where the show has been recorded ever since.\n\nSet \n\nVarious technological and aesthetic changes have been made to the Jeopardy! set over the years. The original game board was exposed from behind a curtain and featured clues printed on cardboard pull cards which were revealed as contestants selected them. The All-New Jeopardy!s game board was exposed from behind double-slide panels and featured flipping panels with the dollar amount on one side and the clue on the other. When the Trebek version premiered in 1984, the game board used individual television monitors for each clue within categories. The original monitors were replaced with larger and sleeker ones in 1991. In 2006, these monitors were discarded in favor of a nearly seamless projection video wall, which was replaced in 2009 with 36 high-definition flat-panel monitors manufactured by Sony Electronics.\n\nFrom 1985 to 1997, the sets were designed to have a background color of blue for the Jeopardy! round and red for the Double Jeopardy! and Final Jeopardy! rounds. At the beginning of season 8 in 1991, a brand new set was introduced that resembled a grid. On the episode aired November 11, 1996, two months after the start of season 13, Jeopardy! introduced the first of several sets designed by Naomi Slodki, who intended the set to resemble \"the foyer of a very contemporary library, with wood and sandblasted glass and blue granite\".\n\nShortly after the start of season 19 in 2002, the show switched to yet another new set, which was given slight modifications when Jeopardy! and sister show Wheel of Fortune transitioned to high-definition broadcasting in 2006. During this time, the show began to feature virtual tours of the set on its official web site. The various HD improvements for Jeopardy! and Wheel represented a combined investment of approximately $4 million, 5,000 hours of labor, and 6 mi of cable. Both shows had been shot using HD cameras for several years before beginning to broadcast in HD. On standard-definition television broadcasts, the shows continue to be displayed with an aspect ratio of 4:3.\n\nIn 2009, Jeopardy! updated its set once again. The new set debuted with special episodes taped at the 42nd annual International CES technology trade show, hosted at the Las Vegas Convention Center in Winchester (Las Vegas Valley), Nevada, and became the primary set for Jeopardy! when the show began taping its 26th season, which premiered on September 14, 2009. It was significantly remodeled when season 30 premiered in September 2013. \n\nTheme music \n\nSince the debut of Jeopardy! in 1964, several different songs and arrangements have served as the theme music for the show, most of which were composed by Griffin. The main theme for the original Jeopardy! series was \"Take Ten\", composed by Griffin's wife Julann. The All-New Jeopardy! opened with \"January, February, March\" and closed with \"Frisco Disco\", both of which were composed by Griffin himself. \n\nThe best-known theme song on Jeopardy! is \"Think!\", originally composed by Griffin under the title \"A Time for Tony\", as a lullaby for his son. \"Think!\" has always been used for the 30-second period in Final Jeopardy! when the contestants write down their responses, and since the syndicated version debuted in 1984, a rendition of that tune has been used as the main theme song. \"Think!\" has become so popular that it has been used in many different contexts, from sporting events to weddings. Griffin estimated that the use of \"Think!\" had earned him royalties of over $70 million throughout his lifetime. \"Think!\" led Griffin to win the Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) President's Award in 2003, and during GSN's 2009 Game Show Awards special, it was named \"Best Game Show Theme Song\". In 1997, the main theme and Final Jeopardy! recordings of \"Think!\" were rearranged by Steve Kaplan, who served as the show's music director until his December 2003 death. In 2008, Chris Bell Music and Sound Design overhauled the Jeopardy! music package for the show's 25th anniversary. \n\nAudition process \n\nProspective contestants of the original Jeopardy! series called the show's office in New York to arrange an appointment and to preliminarily determine eligibility. They were briefed and auditioned together in groups of ten to thirty individuals, participating in both a written test and mock games. Individuals who were successful at the audition were invited to appear on the program within approximately six weeks.\n\nAuditioning for the current version of the show begins with a written exam, comprising fifty questions in total. This exam is administered online periodically, as well as being offered at regional contestant search events. Since season 15 (1998–99), the show has used a Winnebago recreational vehicle called the \"Jeopardy! Brain Bus\" to conduct regional events throughout the United States and Canada. Participants who correctly answer at least 35 out of 50 questions advance in the audition process and are invited to compete in mock games. Those who are approved are notified at a later time and invited to appear on the show.\n\nIn 2016, producers disallowed Canadians from applying online, citing new Canadian privacy rules regarding personal information on the Internet. Trebek confirmed this to The Ottawa Citizen in an interview. Neither named a particular law or regulation, and The Toronto Star was unable to discern the exact problem. \n\nBroadcast history \n\nThe original Jeopardy! series premiered on NBC on March 30, 1964, and by the end of the 1960s was the second-highest-rated daytime game show, behind only The Hollywood Squares. The show was successful until 1974, when Lin Bolen, then NBC's Vice President of Daytime Programming, moved the show out of the noontime slot where it had been located for most of its run, as part of her effort to boost ratings among the 18–34 female demographic. After 2,753 episodes, the original Jeopardy! series ended on January 3, 1975; to compensate Griffin for its cancellation, NBC purchased Wheel of Fortune, another show that he had created, and premiered it the following Monday. A syndicated edition of Jeopardy!, distributed by Metromedia and featuring many contestants who were previously champions on the original series, aired in the primetime during the 1974–75 season. The NBC daytime series was later revived as The All-New Jeopardy!, which premiered on October 2, 1978 and aired 108 episodes, ending on March 2, 1979; this revival featured significant rule changes, such as progressive elimination of contestants over the course of the main game, and a bonus round instead of Final Jeopardy!\n\nThe daily syndicated version debuted on September 10, 1984, and was launched in response to the success of the syndicated version of Wheel and the installation of electronic trivia games in pubs and bars. This version of the program has met with greater success than the previous incarnations; it has outlived 300 other game shows and become the second most popular game show in syndication (behind Wheel), averaging 25 million viewers per week. The show's most recent renewal, in April 2015, extends it through the 2017–18 season. \n\nJeopardy! has spawned versions in many foreign countries throughout the world, including Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Sweden, Russia, Denmark, Israel, and Australia. The American syndicated version of Jeopardy! is also broadcast throughout the world, with international distribution rights handled by CBS Studios International. \n\nThree spin-off versions of Jeopardy! have been created. Rock & Roll Jeopardy! debuted on VH1 in 1998 and ran until 2001; the show centered around post-1950s popular music trivia and was hosted by Jeff Probst. Jep!, which aired on GSN during the 1998–99 season, was a special children's version hosted by Bob Bergen and featured various rule changes from the original version. Sports Jeopardy!, a sports-themed version hosted by Dan Patrick, premiered in 2014 on the Crackle digital service and eventually moved to the cable sports network NBCSN in 2016. \n\nArchived episodes \n\nOnly a small number of episodes of the first three Jeopardy! versions survive. From the original NBC daytime version, archived episodes mostly consist of black-and-white kinescopes of the original color videotapes. Various episodes from 1967, 1971, 1973, and 1974 are listed among the holdings of the UCLA Film and Television Archive. The 1964 \"test episode\", Episode No. 2,000 (from February 21, 1972), and a June 1975 episode of the weekly syndicated edition exist at the Paley Center for Media. Incomplete paper records of the NBC-era games exist on microfilm at the Library of Congress. GSN holds The All-New Jeopardy!s premiere and finale in broadcast quality, and aired the latter on December 31, 1999, as part of its \"Y2Play\" marathon. The UCLA Archive holds a copy of a pilot taped for CBS in 1977, and the premiere exists among the Paley Center's holdings.\n\nGSN, which, like Jeopardy!, is an affiliate of Sony Pictures Television, has rerun ten seasons since the channel's launch in 1994. Copies of 43 Trebek-hosted syndicated Jeopardy! episodes aired between 1989 and 2004 have been collected by the UCLA Archive, and the premiere and various other episodes are included in the Paley Center's collection.\n\nReception \n\nJeopardy! has won a record 31 Daytime Emmy Awards since 1984. The show holds the record for the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Game/Audience Participation Show, with fourteen awards won in that category. Another five awards have been won by Trebek for Outstanding Game Show Host. Twelve other awards were won by the show's directors and writers in the respective categories of Outstanding Direction for a Game/Audience Participation Show and Outstanding Special Class Writing before these categories were removed in 2006. On June 17, 2011, Trebek shared the Lifetime Achievement Award with Sajak at the 38th Annual Daytime Emmy Awards ceremony. The following year, the show was honored with a Peabody Award for its role in encouraging, celebrating, and rewarding knowledge; as such, it holds the distinction of being the only game show since 1960 to win the Peabody Award.\n\nIn its April 17–23, 1993 issue, TV Guide named Jeopardy! the best game show of the 1970s as part of a celebration of its 40th anniversary. In January 2001, the magazine ranked the show number 2 on its \"50 Greatest Game Shows\" list—second only to The Price Is Right. It would later rank Jeopardy! number 45 on its list of the 60 Best TV Series of All Time, calling it \"habit-forming\" and saying that the program \"always makes [its viewers] feel smarter\". Also in 2013, the show ranked number 1 on TV Guides list of the 60 Greatest Game Shows. In the summer of 2006, the show was ranked number 2 on GSN's list of the 50 Greatest Game Shows of All Time, second only to Match Game. \n\nA hall of fame honoring Jeopardy! was added to the Sony Pictures Studios tour on September 20, 2011. It features the show's Emmy Awards as well as retired set pieces, classic merchandise, video clips, photographs, and other memorabilia related to Jeopardy!s history. \n\nTournaments and other events \n\nRegular events \n\nStarting in 1985, the show has held an annual Tournament of Champions featuring the top fifteen champions who have appeared on the show since the last tournament. The top prize awarded to the winner was originally valued at $100,000, and increased to $250,000 in 2003. Other regular tournaments include the Teen Tournament, with a $75,000 top prize; the College Championship, in which undergraduate students from American colleges and universities compete for a $100,000 top prize; and the Teachers Tournament, where educators compete for a $100,000 top prize. Each tournament runs for ten consecutive episodes in a format devised by Trebek himself, consisting of five quarter-final games, three semifinals, and a final consisting of two games with the scores totaled. Winners of the College Championship and Teachers Tournament are invited to participate in the Tournament of Champions.\n\nNon-tournament events held regularly on the show include Celebrity Jeopardy!, in which celebrities and other notable individuals compete for charitable organizations of their choice; and Kids Week, a special competition for school-age children aged 10 through 12. \n\nSpecial events \n\nThree International Tournaments, held in 1996, 1997, and 2001, featured one-week competitions among champions from each of the international versions of Jeopardy!. Each of the countries that aired their own version of the show in those years could nominate a contestant. The format was identical to the semifinals and finals of other Jeopardy! tournaments. In 1996 and 1997, the winner received $25,000; in 2001, the top prize was doubled to $50,000. The 1997 tournament was recorded in Stockholm on the set of the Swedish version of Jeopardy!, and is significant for being the first week of Jeopardy! episodes to be taped in a foreign country.\n\nThere have been a number of special tournaments featuring the greatest contestants in Jeopardy! history. The first of these \"all-time best\" tournaments, Super Jeopardy!, aired in the summer of 1990 on ABC, and featured 37 top contestants from the previous seasons of the Trebek version and one notable champion from the original Jeopardy! series competing for a top prize of $250,000. In 1993, that year's Tournament of Champions was followed by a Tenth Anniversary Tournament conducted over five episodes. In May 2002, to commemorate the Trebek version's 4,000th episode, the show invited fifteen champions to play for a $1 million prize in the Million Dollar Masters tournament, which took place at Radio City Music Hall in New York City. The Ultimate Tournament of Champions aired in 2005 and pitted 145 former Jeopardy! champions against each other, with two winners moving on to face Ken Jennings in a three-game final for $2,000,000, the largest prize in the show's history; overall, the tournament spanned 15 weeks and 76 episodes, starting on February 9 and ending on May 25. In 2014, Jeopardy! commemorated the 30th anniversary of the Trebek version with a Battle of the Decades tournament, in which 15 champions apiece from the first, second, and third decades of Jeopardy!s daily syndicated history competed for a grand prize of $1,000,000. \n\nIn November 1998, Jeopardy! traveled to Boston to reassemble 12 past Teen Tournament contestants for a special Teen Reunion Tournament. In 2008, the 25th season began with reuniting 15 contestants from the first two Kids Weeks to compete in a special reunion tournament of their own. During the next season (2009–10), a special edition of Celebrity Jeopardy!, called the Million Dollar Celebrity Invitational, was played in which twenty-seven contestants from past celebrity episodes competed for a grand prize of $1,000,000 for charity; the grand prize was won by Michael McKean. \n\nThe IBM Challenge aired February 14–16, 2011, and featured IBM's Watson computer facing off against Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter in a two-game match played over three shows. This was the first man-vs.-machine competition in Jeopardy!s history. Watson won both the first game and the overall match to win the grand prize of $1 million, which IBM divided between two charities (World Vision International and World Community Grid). Jennings, who won $300,000 for second place, and Rutter, who won the $200,000 third-place prize, both pledged to donate half of their winnings to charity. The competition brought the show its highest ratings since the Ultimate Tournament of Champions. \n\nRecord holders \n\nJeopardy!s record for the longest winning streak is held by Ken Jennings, who competed on the show from June 2 through November 30, 2004, winning 74 matches before being defeated by Nancy Zerg in his 75th appearance. He amassed $2,520,700 over his 74 wins and a $2,000 second-place prize in his 75th appearance. At the time, he held the record as the highest money-winner ever on American game shows, and his winning streak increased the show's ratings and popularity to the point where it became TV's highest-rated syndicated program. Jennings later won the $500,000 second-place prize in the Ultimate Tournament of Champions, the $300,000 second-place prize in the IBM Challenge, and the $100,000 second-place prize in the Battle of the Decades.\n\nThe highest-earning all-time Jeopardy! contestant is Brad Rutter, who has won a cumulative total of $4,355,102. He became an undefeated champion in 2000 and later won an unprecedented four Jeopardy! tournaments: the 2001 Tournament of Champions, the 2002 Million Dollar Masters Tournament, the 2005 Ultimate Tournament of Champions, and the 2014 Battle of the Decades. Rutter broke Jennings's record for all-time game show winnings when he defeated Jennings and Jerome Vered in the Ultimate Tournament of Champions finals. Jennings regained the record through appearances on various other game shows, culminating in an appearance on Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader? on October 10, 2008. In 2014, Rutter regained the title after winning $1,000,000 in the Battle of the Decades, defeating Jennings and Roger Craig in the finals.\n\nCraig is the holder of the all-time record for single-day winnings on Jeopardy!. On the episode that aired September 14, 2010, he amassed a score of $47,000 after the game's first two rounds, then wagered and won an additional $30,000 in the Final Jeopardy! round, finishing with $77,000. The previous single-day record of $75,000 had been set by Jennings.\n\nThe record-holder among female contestants on Jeopardy!—in both number of games and total winnings—is Julia Collins, who amassed $429,100 over 21 games between April 21 and June 2, 2014. She won $428,100 in her 20 games as champion, plus $1,000 for finishing third in her twenty-first game. Collins also achieved the second-longest winning streak on the show, behind Jennings. The streak, which was interrupted in May by the Battle of the Decades, was broken by Brian Loughnane. \n\nThe highest one-day score in a Celebrity Jeopardy! tournament was achieved by comedian Andy Richter during a first round game of the 2009–10 season's \"Million Dollar Celebrity Invitational\", in which he finished with $68,000 for his selected charity, the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. \n\nThree contestants on the Trebek version have won a game with the lowest amount possible ($1). The first was U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Darryl Scott, on the episode that aired January 19, 1993; the second was Benjamin Salisbury, on a Celebrity Jeopardy! episode that aired April 30, 1997; and the third was Brandi Chastain, on the Celebrity Jeopardy! episode that aired February 9, 2001. \n\nOther media \n\nPortrayals and parodies \n\nJeopardy! has been featured in a number of films, television shows and books over the years, mostly with one or more characters participating as contestants, or viewing and interacting with the game show from their own homes.\n*On \"Questions and Answers\", a season 7 episode of The Golden Girls aired February 8, 1992, Dorothy Zbornak (Bea Arthur) auditions for Jeopardy!, but despite her excellent show of knowledge, she is rejected by a contestant coordinator who feels that America would not root for her. In a dream sequence, Dorothy competes against roommate Rose Nylund (Betty White) and neighbor Charlie Deitz (David Leisure), in a crossover from Empty Nest. Trebek and Griffin appear as themselves in the dream sequence, and Gilbert provides a voice-over. \n*A 1988 episode of Mama's Family titled \"Mama on Jeopardy!\" features the titular Mama, Thelma Harper (Vicki Lawrence), competing on the show after her neighbor and friend Iola Boylan (Beverly Archer) is rejected. For most of the game the questions given by Mama are incorrect, but she makes a miraculous comeback near the end and barely qualifies for Final Jeopardy! Her final question given is also incorrect, but she finishes in second place by $1 and wins a trip to Hawaii for herself and her family. Again, Trebek guest stars and Gilbert provides a voice-over.\n*In the Cheers episode \"What Is... Cliff Clavin?\" (1990), the titular mailman, portrayed by John Ratzenberger, appears on the show and racks up an impressive $22,000 going into the Final Jeopardy! round, well ahead of his competitors. Despite having a total that his competitors cannot reach in Final Jeopardy!, Cliff risks all of his winnings on the final clue, which is revealed to be \"Archibald Leach, Bernard Schwartz and Lucille LeSueur\" (the real names of Cary Grant, Tony Curtis, and Joan Crawford, respectively). Cliff's response, \"Who are three people who've never been in my kitchen?\", is deemed incorrect, and he leaves with no money.\n*In \"I Take Thee Quagmire\", a season 4 episode of Family Guy aired March 12, 2006, Mayor Adam West appears as a contestant on Jeopardy!. He spells Trebek's name backwards (as \"Kebert Xela\"), \"sending him back\" to the fifth dimension, in reference to when Mister Mxyzptlk, a nemesis to DC Comics' Superman, is sent to the fifth dimension when someone makes him say his own name backwards. \n*Trebek appears as himself on \"Miracle on Evergreen Terrace\", a season 9 episode of The Simpsons in which Marge Simpson appears on a fictional version of the show, but performs very poorly, leaving with –$5,200. \n*From 1996 to 2002 and again in 2005, 2009, and 2015, Saturday Night Live featured a recurring Celebrity Jeopardy! sketch in which Trebek, portrayed by Will Ferrell, has to deal with the constant taunts of antagonists such as Sean Connery (played by Darrell Hammond) and Burt Reynolds (Norm Macdonald), the latter of which insists on being called \"Turd Ferguson\". \n*Jeopardy! is featured in a subplot of the 1992 film White Men Can't Jump, in which Gloria Clemente (Rosie Perez) attempts to pass the show's auditions. She succeeds, and ends up appearing on the show, winning over $14,000.\n*Other films and television series in which Jeopardy! has been portrayed over the years include The 'Burbs, Die Hard, Men in Black, Rain Man, Charlie's Angels, Dying Young, The Education of Max Bickford, The Bucket List, Groundhog Day, and Finding Forrester. \n*In the David Foster Wallace short story \"Little Expressionless Animals\", first published in The Paris Review and later reprinted in Wallace's collection Girl with Curious Hair, a character competes and wins on every Jeopardy! game for three years (a total of 700 episodes), using her winnings to pay for the care of her autistic brother. \n*The Ellen's Energy Adventure attraction at Epcot's Universe of Energy pavilion features a dream sequence in which Ellen DeGeneres plays a Jeopardy! game entirely focused on energy. \n*Fleming makes a cameo appearance reprising his role as host of Jeopardy! in the 1982 film Airplane II: The Sequel.\n*The music video \"I Lost on Jeopardy\", a parody of Greg Kihn's 1983 hit song \"Jeopardy\", was released by \"Weird Al\" Yankovic in 1984, a few months before Trebek's version debuted; the video featured cameos from Fleming, Pardo, Kihn, and Dr. Demento. \n\nMerchandise \n\nOver the years, the Jeopardy! brand has been licensed for various products. From 1964 through 1976, Milton Bradley issued annual board games based on the original Fleming version. The Trebek version has been adapted into board games released by Pressman Toy Corporation, Tyco Toys, and Parker Brothers. In addition, Jeopardy! has been adapted into a number of video games released on various consoles and handhelds spanning multiple hardware generations, starting with a Nintendo Entertainment System game released in 1987. The show has also been adapted for personal computers, Facebook, Twitter, Android, and the Roku Channel Store. \n\nA DVD titled Jeopardy!: An Inside Look at America's Favorite Quiz Show, released by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment on November 8, 2005, features five memorable episodes of the Trebek version (the 1984 premiere, Jennings' final game, and the three finals matches of the Ultimate Tournament of Champions) and three featurettes discussing the show's history and question selection process. Other products featuring the Jeopardy! brand include a collectible watch, a series of daily desktop calendars, and various slot machine games for casinos and the Internet.\n\nInternet\n\nJeopardy!s official website, active as early as 1998, receives over 400,000 monthly visitors. The website features videos, photographs, and other information related to each week's contestants, as well as mini-sites promoting remote tapings and special tournaments. As the show changes its main title card and corresponding graphics with every passing season, the Jeopardy! website is re-skinned to reflect the changes, and the general content of the site (such as online tests and promotions, programming announcements, \"spotlight\" segments, photo galleries, and downloadable content) is regularly updated to align with producers' priorities for the show. In its 2012 \"Readers Choice Awards\", About.com praised the official Jeopardy! website for featuring \"everything [visitors] need to know about the show, as well as some fun interactive elements\", and for having a humorous error page. \n\nIn November 2009, Jeopardy! launched a viewer loyalty program called the \"Jeopardy! Premier Club\", which allowed home viewers to identify Final Jeopardy! categories from episodes for a chance to earn points, and play a weekly Jeopardy! game featuring categories and clues from the previous week's episodes. Every three months, contestants were selected randomly to advance to one of three quarterly online tournaments; after these tournaments were played, the three highest scoring contestants would play one final online tournament for the chance to win $5,000 and a trip to Los Angeles to attend a taping of Jeopardy! The Premier Club was discontinued by July 2011. \n\nThere is an unofficial Jeopardy! fansite known as the \"J! Archive\" ([http://j-archive.com/ j-archive.com]), which transcribes games from throughout Jeopardy!s daily syndicated history. In the archive, episodes are covered by Jeopardy!-style game boards with panels which, when hovered over with a mouse, reveal the correct response to their corresponding clues and the contestant who gave the correct response. The site makes use of a \"wagering calculator\" that helps potential contestants determine what amount is safest to bet during Final Jeopardy!, and an alternative scoring method called \"Coryat scoring\" that disregards wagering during Daily Doubles or Final Jeopardy! and gauges one's general strength at the game. The site's main founding archivist is Robert Knecht Schmidt, a student from Cleveland, Ohio, who himself appeared as a Jeopardy! contestant in March 2010. Before J! Archive, there was an earlier Jeopardy! fansite known as the \"Jeoparchive\", created by season 19 contestant Ronnie O'Rourke, who managed and updated the site until Jennings' run made her disillusioned with the show.", "Kenneth Wayne \"Ken\" Jennings III (born May 23, 1974) is an American game show contestant and author. Jennings holds the record for the longest winning streak on the U.S. syndicated game show Jeopardy! and as being the second highest-earning contestant in game show history. In 2004, Jennings won 74 Jeopardy! games (in a row) before he was defeated by challenger Nancy Zerg on his 75th appearance. His total earnings on Jeopardy! are $3,196,300, consisting of $2,520,700 over his 74 wins, a $2,000 second-place prize in his 75th appearance, a $500,000 second-place prize in the Jeopardy! Ultimate Tournament of Champions, a $100,000 win for second-place prize in the Jeopardy Battle of the Decades, as well as half of a $300,000 prize in the IBM Challenge, when he competed against Watson.\n\nDuring his first run of Jeopardy! appearances, Jennings earned the record for the highest American game show winnings. His total was surpassed by Brad Rutter, who defeated Jennings in the finals of the Jeopardy! Ultimate Tournament of Champions (first aired on May 25, 2005), adding $2,000,000 to Rutter's existing Jeopardy! winnings. Jennings regained the record after appearing on several other game shows, culminating in an appearance on Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? (first aired on October 10, 2008), though Rutter retained the record for highest Jeopardy! winnings and would once again pass Jennings' total after his victory in the 2014 Jeopardy Battle of the Decades tournament.\n\nAfter his success on Jeopardy!, Jennings wrote about his experience and explored American trivia history and culture in his book Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs, published in 2006.\n\nEarly life \n\nBorn in Edmonds, Washington, Jennings grew up in Seoul, South Korea (1981–1992) and Singapore (1992–1996), where his father worked for an international law firm and then as Asia Pacific Division Counsel of Oracle Corporation. He watched Jeopardy! on American Forces Network television while growing up. \n\nJennings went to Seoul Foreign School where he completed an International Baccalaureate diploma and then graduated with a degree in Computer Science and English at Brigham Young University, where he played on the school's quizbowl team for three and a half years. Jennings attended the University of Washington during his freshman year. \n\nStreak on Jeopardy! \n\nBefore 2003, Jeopardy! contestants were limited to five consecutive games. At the beginning of the show's twentieth season (in 2003), the rules were changed to allow contestants to remain on the show as long as they continued to win. After this rule change, and until Jennings' run, the record winning streak was set by Tom Walsh, who won $186,900 in eight games in January 2004.\n\nBefore his Jeopardy! appearance, Jennings was a member of BYU's Quiz Bowl Team. Jennings' run began during Jeopardy!'s 20th season with the episode aired on Wednesday, June 2, 2004, in which he unseated two-time returning champion Jerry Harvey, and continued into season 21. In that first episode, Jennings's entire win streak nearly ended before it even began. The Final Jeopardy answer was \"She's the first female track & field athlete to win medals in 5 different events at a single Olympics.\" Jennings responded with \"Who is Jones?\", referring to Marion Jones (the shows were recorded before she was stripped of her medals as a result of admitted doping). Host Alex Trebek said, \"We will accept that, in terms of female athletes, there aren't that many.\" If the response had not been accepted, Jennings would have lost, and challenger Julia Lazarus would have won instead. Jennings' run was interrupted by the off-season break in July until September, 2004 Kids' Week, the Tournament of Champions (aired from September 20, 2004 through October 1, 2004), the 2004 U.S. Presidential Election (aired on Tuesday November 2, 2004, pushing his weeks of episodes to air from Wednesday to Saturday) and the College Championship (aired from November 10, 2004 through November 23, 2004). He did not participate in the Tournament of Champions, as invitations are only extended to champions who have already been defeated (with the exception of the winner(s) of the College Championship), which Jennings had not yet been.\n\nEnd of the streak \n\nOn November 30, 2004, Jennings' reign as Jeopardy! champion ended when he lost his seventy-fifth game to challenger Nancy Zerg. Jennings responded incorrectly to both Double Jeopardy! Daily Doubles, causing him to lose a combined $10,200 ($5,400 and $4,800, respectively) and leaving him with $14,400 at the end of the round. As a result, for only the tenth time in 75 games, Jennings did not have an insurmountable lead going into the Final Jeopardy! round. Only Jennings and Zerg, who ended Double Jeopardy! with $10,000, were able to play Final Jeopardy! as third-place contestant David Hankins failed to finish with a positive score after Double Jeopardy!.\n\nThe Final Jeopardy! category was Business & Industry, and the clue was \"Most of this firm's 70,000 seasonal white-collar employees work only four months a year\". Jennings appeared perplexed during the time allowed to write a response, while Zerg finished her response quickly. Zerg responded correctly with \"What is H&R Block?\" and wagered $4,401 of her $10,000, giving her a $1 lead over Jennings with his response still to be revealed. Jennings incorrectly responded with \"What is FedEx?\", and lost the game with a final score of $8,799 after his $5,601 wager was deducted from his score. After his response was revealed to be incorrect, the audience audibly gasped. He was awarded $2,000 for his second-place finish, which gave him a final total of $2,522,700 for his run on Jeopardy!. Zerg, whom Jennings called a \"formidable opponent\", finished in third place on the next show. The audience gave a standing ovation in honor of both contestants, and Trebek called Zerg a \"giant killer\" as Jennings embraced her.\n\nJennings' 75 matches took place over a span of 182 calendar days.\n\nEffect of the streak on Jeopardy! \n\nJeopardy! implemented some backstage changes during Jennings' run. Normally, players only get a short time to practice, but more rehearsal time was added so that the new players could get comfortable with the buzzers. Additionally, the person who managed the buzzer system was changed. In his book Brainiac, Jennings says that the consistency of the original manager's timing had given an increasing advantage to continuing players, and that the change made a noticeable difference in the second season that he was on the show. At one point, announcer Johnny Gilbert stopped announcing Jennings' total wins during the show's opening.\n\nOn December 1, 2004, the day after his defeat, Jeopardy! broke with tradition by having Jennings make a guest appearance at the start of the broadcast, during which host Alex Trebek acknowledged his success and enumerated the various game show records he had broken.\n\nJennings appeared in The Guinness Book of World Records under \"Most cash won on a game show.\"\n\nRatings Effect \n\nAccording to the Nielsen TV National People Meter, Jeopardy!'s ratings were 22% higher during Jennings' run than they were during the same period the previous year. For several weeks of the winnings streak, Jeopardy! was ranked as TV's highest-rated syndicated program. By the end of Jeopardy!'s 20th season several weeks later, the show had surpassed Wheel of Fortune in the ratings but Wheel, which is usually paired with Jeopardy! in programming, also benefited from Jennings' streak. \n\nMedia appearances and coverage during the streak \n\nJennings has received a good deal of American media coverage. After his 38th win on Jeopardy!, during the summer break between tapings, Jennings made a guest appearance on Live with Regis and Kelly. There Jennings revealed that he had failed to qualify for Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, once hosted by Regis Philbin. During that guest appearance, Jennings said, \"Jeopardy! is a man's game... it's not like Millionaire.\" \n\nJennings appeared on the Late Show with David Letterman to present Letterman's \"Top Ten List\" (Top ten ways to irritate Alex Trebek). He appeared again on the program on the night his final show was televised, in addition to interview segments airing that night on local late evening news programming and on Nightline. Barbara Walters selected Jennings as one of the \"Ten Most Fascinating People of 2004\" for her twelfth annual ABC News special, which aired on December 8, 2004. While on his media tour following his final game, Jennings taped a segment for Sesame Street. TV Guide featured a segment of \"The Top Ten TV Moments of 2004\", in which Ken Jennings' loss placed third. On December 1, 2004, A&E aired an episode of Biography on Jennings and other Jeopardy! notables, including Frank Spangenberg and Eddie Timanus.\n\nJeopardy! Tournaments \n\nOn December 28, 2004, Sony announced a 15-week, 75-show Jeopardy! Ultimate Tournament of Champions. It featured Tournament of Champions, College Championship, and Teen Tournament winners from the show's 21-year run, as well as over 100 five-time champions. Jeopardy!'s executive producer, Harry Friedman, explained:\n\n\"The 2003 rule change, which allows Jeopardy! players to keep playing until they're defeated, raised the question about how other five-time champions might have played under this rule. This tournament is an opportunity to give those past champions another chance to shine.\"\n\nThe field totaled 145 players including Jennings, who, unlike the other competitors, was automatically placed in the finals. The Ultimate Tournament of Champions offered substantial cash prizes; with a grand prize of $2,000,000 to the winner, $500,000 for the first runner-up, and $250,000 for the second runner-up. Guaranteed prize money was offered to all contestants.\n\nIn the final round of the Ultimate Tournament, Brad Rutter decisively defeated Jennings and Jerome Vered, with respective final scores of $62,000, $34,599, and $20,600. Jennings won the $500,000 prize for second place, but as a result of the Ultimate Tournament, Rutter temporarily displaced him as the highest overall winner of money on a game show. Jennings has said he is still happy with his second-place finish.\n\nIn February 2011, Jennings and Rutter returned to Jeopardy! to challenge IBM's Watson computer, to which they both lost.\n\nIn 2014, Jeopardy! aired a special 5-week Jeopardy! Battle of the Decades tournament. Jennings made it to the finals along with Brad Rutter and Roger Craig. Jennings placed second winning a $100,000 prize and Rutter won first place securing a $1,000,000 prize.\n\nAfter Jeopardy! \n\nTaking advantage of the notoriety that Jennings's losing Final Jeopardy! answer afforded, H&R Block offered Jennings free tax planning and financial services for the rest of his life. H&R Block senior vice president David Byers estimated that Jennings would owe approximately $1.04 million in taxes on his winnings. \n\nIn a 2011 Reddit IAmA, Jennings recalled how in 2004 the Democratic politicians Chuck Schumer and Harry Reid unsuccessfully asked Jennings to run for the United States Senate from Utah. Jennings commented, \"That was when I realized the Democratic Party was f@#$ed in '04.\" \n\nJennings has written several books. Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs details his experiences on Jeopardy! and his research into trivia culture conducted after the completion of his run. Ken Jennings's Trivia Almanac: 8,888 Questions in 365 Days, a hardcover book, is a compilation of trivia questions—with 3 categories and about 20 questions per day of the year. Maphead: Charting the Wide, Weird World of Geography Wonks explores the world of map and geography enthusiasts. Because I said so! is a humorous examination of 'The myths, tales & warnings every generation passes down to its kids'. He also has written five books for his children's series, Junior Genius Guides. \n\nJennings also had a column in Mental Floss magazine called \"Six Degrees of Ken Jennings\", in which readers submit two wildly different things and he has to connect them in exactly six moves, much in the same vein as the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game. The column ran from November 2005; to the September–October 2010 issue. \n\nAccording to Variety.com, Jennings and television producer Michael Davies teamed up as executive producers on a new game show format for Comedy Central. According to Comedy Central execs, it was planned that Jennings would co-host and participate. The series was planned to premiere late in 2005 or in the first quarter of 2006; as of April 2006, development had stalled, and the show's future remained uncertain. Jennings explained on his website that \"Stephen Colbert's show was doing so well in its post-Daily Show spot that Comedy Central decided they weren't in the market for a quiz show anymore.\" However, as of mid-2006, he was still shopping a potential game show titled, Ken Jennings vs. the Rest of the World. \n\nJennings appeared on The Colbert Report on September 13, 2006. During the interview, Colbert discussed Jennings's book, Brainiac, and mocked him not knowing the number of pages the book contained. After Colbert coined a word to describe intellectual nerdiness, \"poindexterity\", Jennings was going back and forth of what is the correct noun for \"poindexter.\" Jennings noted, as he had done earlier that day on NPR's Talk of the Nation, that since his streak, people \"seem to have an extra-hard trivia question\" in case they run into him. \n\nHe also appeared twice on NPR's Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! program. In his Feb. 25, 2006 appearance on the \"Not My Job\" segment, he answered all three questions correctly, winning for a listener Carl Kasell's voice on that person's answering machine. Jennings stated, \"This is the proudest moment of my game show life.\"[http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId35&agg\n0&prgDate02-25-2006&view\nstoryview Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me! : NPR] On June 1, 2013, Jennings made his debut as a panelist on Wait Wait Don't Tell Me.\n\nEntertainment Weekly put his performance on its end-of-the-decade \"best of\" list, saying, \"Answer: A software engineer from Utah, he dominated the quizfest for a record 74 shows in 2004, amassing $2,520,700. Question: Who is Ken Jennings?\" \n\nOther game show appearances \n\nJennings appeared on the first two episodes of the NBC game show 1 vs. 100 on October 13 and 20, 2006 as a mob member. He incorrectly answered the question, \"what color is the number 1 space on a standard roulette wheel?\" as \"black\" instead of \"red\" in his second episode, eliminating him from the game. (He explained that he did not know the answer because his Mormon faith prohibits gambling.) He left the show with $714.29, his share of a $35,000 prize shared among 49 Mob members. Jennings returned to the show for a special \"Last Man Standing\" episode aired on February 9, 2007. He was eliminated on the final question, which asked which of the three options had been married the most times; he answered King Henry VIII, while the correct answer was Larry King. This episode was the first time Jennings had a chance at a rematch against rival Brad Rutter, who was also part of the mob and was eliminated before Jennings.\n\nIn 2007, Jennings was invited to be a contestant on the game show Grand Slam hosted by Dennis Miller and Amanda Byram, also a Sony Pictures production. The show debuted on Game Show Network (GSN) on August 4, 2007, and featured sixteen former game-show winners in a single-elimination tournament. Jennings, seeded second behind Brad Rutter, won the tournament and became the 2007 Grand Slam Champion after defeating Ogi Ogas (a second-round winner against Rutter) in the finals. He earned $100,000 for his victory.\n\nJennings was a contestant on an episode of Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? that aired on October 10, 2008, which held the possibility of exceeding Rutter's total game show winnings. After winning $500,000, enough to surpass Rutter's total, Jennings chose not to attempt the final $1,000,000 question, which would have deducted $475,000 from his winnings if he missed it. As is customary on the show, Jennings was then shown the question to see what would have happened, and he provided the correct answer. Had he risked his winnings and correctly answered the question, he would have become the show's second $1,000,000 winner.\n\nFrom 2008 to 2009, Jennings appeared on GSN on Fridays for the trivia game Stump the Master. Home viewers send questions via the GSN website. Four callers are put on hold and Jennings selects from one of the categories. The caller for the category he picked comes on the line and reads the question. If Jennings does not answer or is incorrect, the caller wins $1,000 or more. Any time Jennings is right, the jackpot is increased by $1,000. All callers are given a small prize, whether they participate on the air or not.\n\nJennings has appeared on multiple episodes of Doug Loves Movies, hosted by Doug Benson, and has won a few times.\n\nJennings also appeared on two other Sony Pictures Television game shows, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, as a frequent expert for the lifeline \"Ask the Expert\", and also taped a pilot for the proposed 2009 CBS revival of Sony's The $25,000 Pyramid. \n\nJennings appeared on Millionaire in 2014 as a contestant during Guinness World Records Edition themed week, where he won $100,000 after deciding to walk away on his $250,000 question where if he had gone for it, he would have been right and would have won $250,000. \n\nJennings appeared on the second season premiere of 500 Questions on May 26, 2016 and was eliminated on the fourth question, leaving with no winnings.\n\nBlog entry misinterpreted as critical of Jeopardy! \n\nJennings made the news in July 2006 when an article in the New York Post by Michael Starr claimed that Jennings had been critical of Jeopardy!. Citing statements that Jennings wrote on his blog, Starr's article focuses on Jennings's \"criticism\" of the show and host Alex Trebek.\n\nJennings responded on his personal blog, saying, \"[Starr] knows there's no way I was genuinely calling for angry bees and ventriloquist's dummies to be added to the Jeopardy! format. It's a humor piece, and one which gets its laughs from the outrageous non sequiturs it proposes, not the ripeness of its target for criticism.\" Jennings had already posted a more serious comment defending Trebek that remains on his website. \n\nAmerican Crossword Puzzle Tournament \n\nJennings won the rookie division of the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament (ACPT) in 2006. In his first time competing, Jennings placed 37th overall. He also served as the award's presenter, becoming the first contestant to present an award to himself. He has not competed in the tournament since.\n\nKennections\n\nJennings had a weekly trivia column Kennections in Parade magazine. In it, five questions are posed and their answers are all connected to a mystery topic, which the readers are to guess. Parade ceased publishing the quiz in early 2015, and removed links to archived quizzes in March 2015. Kennections now appear in the online version of Mental Floss magazine.\n\nTuesday trivia emails\n\nEvery Tuesday, Ken sends an email out containing seven questions, one of which is designed to be Google-resistant. Subscribers respond with the answers to all 7 questions and the results are maintained on a scoreboard on Jennings' blog. At times he chooses to run multi-week tournaments, awarding the top responder with all 7 answers correct with such things as a signed copy of his newest book.\n\nTwitter \n\nPaste named his Twitter one of the \"The 75 Best Twitter Accounts of 2014\" ranking it at #10. \n\nJennings was the subject of some controversy for posting a tweet when he wrote \"Nothing sadder than a hot person in a wheelchair.\" \n\nJennings again faced controversy when on November 10, 2015 he tweeted a joke about the death of Daniel Fleetwood, a lifelong Star Wars fan who died of cancer. Fleetwood's dying wish was to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens fearing he likely would not live to see the film when it opened in theaters in December 2015. An online campaign was started on his behalf and his wish was granted only days before he died. Jennings said “It can’t be a good sign that every fan who has seen the new Star Wars movie died shortly thereafter.” \n\nJeopardy! Events and Further Tournaments \n\nFrom February 14–16, 2011, Jeopardys \"IBM Challenge\" featured the computer company's Watson against Jennings and Rutter in two matches played over three days. The winner of the competition was Watson, winning $1 million for two charities, while Jennings was second and Rutter was third, receiving $300,000 and $200,000, respectively. Jennings and Rutter each pledged to donate half of their winnings to charity.\n\nThis was the first ever man-versus-machine competition in the show's history. At the end of the first episode, in which only the first match's Jeopardy! Round was aired, Rutter was tied with Watson at $5,000, while Jennings was in third with $2,000. After the second episode in which the first game was completed, Jennings remained at third with $4,800 while Rutter at second had $10,400. The competition ended with Watson with $77,147, Jennings with $24,000, and Rutter with $21,600. Underneath his response during the Final Jeopardy! Round, Jennings wrote on his screen \"I for one welcome our new computer overlords.\" Although an exhibition, it was the first time Rutter has been defeated against any human player, although it does not count.\n\nJennings wrote about playing against Watson for Slate. \n\nIn the spring of 2014, Jennings participated in the Battle of the Decades, finishing in second place behind Brad Rutter and ahead of Roger Craig, winning $100,000.\n\nEndorsements \n\nJennings agreed to a deal with Microsoft to promote its Encarta encyclopedia software (which was later discontinued). He is also engaged in speaking deals through the Massachusetts-based speakers agency American Program Bureau. In 2005, Cingular Wireless (now AT&T) featured Jennings in commercials portraying him as having lots of \"friends and family\" (coming out of the woodwork, because he is now \"stinking rich\").\n\nUniversity Games produced a Can You Beat Ken? board game, in which players vie against each other and Jennings in an attempt to earn $2.6 million first. Each question in the game was asked to Jennings, and his answers, both correct and incorrect, are recorded on the cards. \n\nFamily and personal life \n\nHe and his wife Mindy (née Boam) have a son, Dylan, born in 2002, and a daughter, Caitlin, born in 2006. \n\nJennings is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.\n\nJennings currently resides in the Seattle metropolitan area. He has stated that he is an avid comic book and movie geek with a website listing his top 4,000 favorite movies. He also writes questions for, edits the literature and mythology categories of questions of, and is otherwise active in the National Academic Quiz Tournaments (NAQT), a quiz bowl organization;[http://naqt.com/biographies.html National Academic Quiz Tournaments, LLC] in particular, he moderated (i.e., read questions) at the 2005, 2006, and 2009 NAQT National High School Tournaments in Chicago.\n\nDuring his Jeopardy! winning streak, Jennings was a software engineer for CHG Healthcare Services, a healthcare-placement firm in Holladay, Utah. \n\nJennings regularly competes in LearnedLeague under the name \"JenningsK\"." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Montgomery,_Alabama.txt" ], "title": [ "Montgomery, Alabama" ], "wiki_context": [ "Montgomery is the capital of the U.S. state of Alabama and is the county seat of Montgomery County. Named for Richard Montgomery, it is located on the Alabama River, in the Gulf Coastal Plain. As of the 2010 Census, Montgomery had a population of 205,764. It is the second-largest city in Alabama, after Birmingham, and the 115th largest in the United States. The Montgomery Metropolitan Statistical Area had a 2010 estimated population of 374,536. It is the fourth-largest in the state and 136th among United States metropolitan areas. \n\nThe city was incorporated in 1819, as a merger of two towns situated along the Alabama River. It became the state capital in 1846, representing the shift of power to the south-central area with the growth of cotton as a commodity crop of the Black Belt and Mobile's rise as a mercantile port. In February 1861, Montgomery was selected as the first capital of the Confederate States of America, until the seat of government moved to Richmond, Virginia, in May of that year. During the mid-20th century, Montgomery was a major site of events in the Civil Rights Movement,Beito, David (2009-05-02) [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/orig8/beito6.html Something is Rotten in Montgomery], LewRockwell.com including the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Selma to Montgomery marches.\n\nIn addition to housing many Alabama government agencies, Montgomery has a large military presence due to Maxwell Air Force Base; public universities Alabama State University, Troy University (Montgomery campus), and Auburn University at Montgomery; private colleges/universities Faulkner University and Huntingdon College; high-tech manufacturing, including Hyundai Motor Manufacturing Alabama; and cultural attractions such as the Alabama Shakespeare Festival and Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts.\n\nTwo ships of the United States Navy have been named after the city, including USS Montgomery. \n\nMontgomery has won several national awards including being voted Best Historic City by USA Today, being named an All-America City in 2014 by the National Civic League, being named a \"Top City For Job Growth\" in 2014 by ziprecruiter.com, and being named the happiest city in Alabama. Montgomery has also been recognized nationally for its successful, and ongoing downtown revitalization and new urbanism projects with Montgomery having been one of the first cities in the nation to implement Smart Code Zoning.\n\nHistory\n\nPrior to European colonization, the left bank of the Alabama River was inhabited by the Alibamu tribe of Native Americans. The Alibamu and the Coushatta, who lived on the opposite side the river, were descended from the Mississippian culture, which had built massive earthwork mounds as part of their society about 950–1250 AD. They spoke mutually intelligible Muskogean languages, which were closely related. Present-day Montgomery is built on the site of two Alibamu towns: Ikanatchati (Ekanchattee or Ecunchatty or Econachatee), meaning \"red earth;\" and Towassa, built on a bluff called Chunnaanaauga Chatty. The first Europeans to travel through central Alabama were Hernando de Soto and his expedition, who went through Ikanatchati and camped for one week in Towassa in 1540.\n\nThe next recorded European encounter occurred more than a century later, when an expedition from Carolina went down the Alabama River in 1697. The first permanent European settler in the Montgomery area was James McQueen, a Scots trader who settled there in 1716. He married a high-status woman in the Coushatta or Alabama tribe. Their mixed-race children were considered Muskogean, as both tribes had a matrilineal system of property and descent. The children gained status in their mother's clan.\n\nIn 1785, Abraham Mordecai, a war veteran from a Sephardic Jewish family of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, established a trading post. The Coushatta and Alabama had gradually moved south and west after the French defeat by the British in 1763 in the Seven Years' War. They moved to parts of present-day Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, then areas of Spanish rule, which they thought more favorable than British-held areas. By the time Mordecai arrived, Creek had settled in the area, under pressure from Cherokee and Iroquois warfare to the north. Mordecai married a Creek woman. When her people had to cede most of their lands after the 1813-14 Creek War, she joined them in removal. Mordecai brought the first cotton gin to Alabama. \n\nThe Upper Creek were able to discourage most European-American immigration until after the conclusion of the Creek War. Following their defeat by General Andrew Jackson in August 1814, the Creek tribes were forced to cede 23 million acres to the United States, including remaining land in today's Georgia and most of today's central and southern Alabama. In 1816, the Mississippi Territory (1798–1817) organized Montgomery County, and its lands were sold off the next year at the federal land office in Milledgeville, Georgia.\n\nThe first group of European-American settlers to come to the Montgomery area was headed by General John Scott. The group founded Alabama Town about 2 mi downstream on the Alabama River from present-day downtown. In June 1818, county courts were moved from Fort Jackson to Alabama Town. Soon after, Andrew Dexter, Jr., founded New Philadelphia, the present-day eastern part of downtown. He envisioned a prominent future for his town; he set aside a hilltop known as \"Goat Hill\" as the future site of the state capitol building. New Philadelphia soon prospered, and Scott and his associates built a new town adjacent, calling it East Alabama Town. Originally rivals, the towns merged on December 3, 1819, and were incorporated as the town of Montgomery. \n\nDriven by the revenues of the cotton trade, the newly united Montgomery grew quickly. In 1822, the city became the county seat. A new courthouse was built at the present location of Court Square, at the foot of Market Street (now Dexter Avenue). The state capital was moved from Tuscaloosa to Montgomery, on January 28, 1846. \n\nAs state capital, Montgomery began to influence state politics, and it would also play a prominent role on the national stage. Beginning February 4, 1861, representatives from Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and South Carolina met in Montgomery, host of the Southern Convention, to form the Confederate States of America. Montgomery was named the first capital of the nation, and Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as President on the steps of the State Capitol. On April 12, 1865, following the Battle of Selma, Major General James H. Wilson captured Montgomery for the Union. \n\nIn 1886 Montgomery became the first city in the United States to install city-wide electric street cars along a system that was nicknamed the Lightning Route. The system made Montgomery one of the first cities to \"depopulate\" its residential areas at the city center through transit-facilitated suburban development.\n\nAccording to the historian David Beito of the University of Alabama, African Americans in Montgomery \"nurtured the modern civil rights movement.\" On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man, sparking the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Martin Luther King, Jr., then the pastor of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, and E.D. Nixon, a local civil rights advocate, founded the Montgomery Improvement Association to organize the boycott. In June 1956, the US District Court Judge Frank M. Johnson ruled that Montgomery's bus racial segregation was unconstitutional. After the US Supreme Court upheld the ruling in November, the city desegregated the bus system, and the boycott was ended. Opponents organized mob violence with police collaboration at the Greyhound Bus Station during the Freedom Ride of May 1961. Outraged national reaction resulted in the desegregation of interstate public transportation.\n\nMartin Luther King returned to Montgomery in 1965. Local civil rights leaders in Selma had been protesting Jim Crow laws that prevented blacks from registering to vote. Following the shooting of a man after a civil rights rally, the leaders decided to march to Montgomery to petition Governor George Wallace to allow free voter registration. The violence they encountered contributed to Congressional passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, to enforce the rights of African Americans and other minorities to vote.\n\nOn February 7, 1967, a devastating fire broke out at Dale's Penthouse, a restaurant and lounge on the top floor of the Walter Bragg Smith apartment building (now called Capital Towers) at 7 Clayton Street downtown. Twenty-six people lost their lives. \n\nIn recent years, Montgomery has grown and diversified its economy. Active in downtown revitalization, the city adopted a master plan in 2007; it includes the revitalization of Court Square and the riverfront. Many other projects under construction include the revitalization of Historic Dexter Avenue, pedestrian and infrastructure improvements along the Selma to Montgomery National Historic Trail, and the construction of a new environmental park on West Fairview Avenue.\n\nGeography\n\nMontgomery is located at . \nAccording to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which is land and (0.52%) is water. The city is built over rolling terrain at an elevation of about 220 ft above sea level \n\nCityscape\n\nDowntown Montgomery lies along the southern bank of the Alabama River, about 6 mi downstream from the confluence of the Coosa and Tallapoosa rivers. The most prominent feature of Montgomery's skyline is the 375 ft, RSA Tower, built in 1996 by the Retirement Systems of Alabama. Other prominent buildings include 60 Commerce Street, 8 Commerce Street, RSA Dexter Avenue Building, and many other structures(See Tallest Buildings in Montgomery, Alabama). Downtown also contains many state and local government buildings, including the Alabama State Capitol. The Capitol is located atop a hill at one end of Dexter Avenue, along which also lies the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, where Martin Luther King, Jr. was pastor. Both the Capitol and Dexter Baptist Church are listed as National Historic Landmarks by the U.S. Department of the Interior. Other notable buildings include RSA Dexter Avenue, RSA Headquarters, Alabama Center for Commerce, RSA Union, and the Renaissance Hotel and Spa. \n\nOne block south of the Capitol is the First White House of the Confederacy, the 1835 Italianate-style house in which President Jefferson Davis and family lived while the capital of the Confederacy was in Montgomery. Montgomery's third National Historic Landmark is Union Station. Passenger train service to Montgomery ceased in 1989, but today Union Station is part of the Riverfront park development, which includes an amphitheater, a riverboat dock, a river walk, and Riverwalk Stadium. Three blocks east of the Convention Center, Old Alabama Town showcases more than 50 restored buildings from the 19th century. The Riverwalk is part of a larger plan to revitalize the downtown area and connect it to the waterfront. The plan includes urban forestry, infill development, and façade renovation to encourage business and residential growth. A 112000 ft2 The Convention Center, completed in 2007, has encouraged growth and activity in the downtown area including more high-end retail and restaurants coming to the downtown area. Other downtown developments includes historic Dexter Avenue, which will soon be home to a Market District and is currently undergoing a six million dollar streetscape, Maxwell Boulevard which is home to the newly built Wright Brothers Park will soon be home to high-end apartments, and the Bell Building located across from the Rosa Parks Library and Museum will soon be home to retail and residential space. \n\nSouth of downtown, across Interstate 85, lies Alabama State University. ASU's campus was built in Colonial Revival architectural style from 1906 until the beginning of World War II. Surrounding ASU are the Garden District, and Cloverdale Historic District. Houses in these areas date from around 1875 until 1949, and are in Late Victorian and Gothic Revival styles. Huntingdon College is on the southwestern edge of Cloverdale. The campus was built in the 1900s in Tudor Revival and Gothic Revival styles. ASU, the Garden District, Cloverdale, and Huntingdon are all listed on the National Register of Historic Places as historic districts.\n\nMontgomery's east side is the fastest-growing part of the city. Development of the Dalraida neighborhood, along Atlanta Highway, began in 1909, when developers Cook and Laurie bought land from the Ware plantation. Georgie Laurie was a Scotsman, and named the area for Dál Riata; a subsequent misspelling in an advertisement led to the current spelling. The first lots were sold in 1914. The city's two largest shopping malls (Eastdale Mall and The Shoppes at Eastchase), as well as many big-box stores and residential developments are on the east side. The area is also home of the Wynton M. Blount Cultural Park, a 1 km2 park which contains the Alabama Shakespeare Festival and Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts. \n\nRevitalization\n\nMontgomery has been recognized nationally for its extremely successful and continuous downtown revitalization. The revitalization started in the early 2000s with the construction of the Montgomery Biscuits minor league baseball stadium and the construction of Riverfront Park. Following those developments hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent by various companies transforming old warehouses and buildings into high end loft apartments, restaurants, retail, hotels, and businesses. Currently there is vast demand for downtown living space and there are currently over 500 apartments under construction downtown including developments such as The Heights on Maxwell Boulevard, The Market District on Dexter Avenue, the Kress Building on Dexter Avenue, The Bell Building on Montgomery Street, and a new complex by the convention center.\n\nClimate\n\nMontgomery has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen Cfa), with short, mild winters, warm springs and autumns, and long, hot, humid summers. The daily average temperature in January is , and there are 3.4 days of sub-20 °F lows; 10 °F and below is extremely rare. The daily average in July is , with highs exceeding 90 °F on 86 days per year and 100 °F on 3.9. Summer afternoon heat indices, much more often than the actual air temperature, are frequently at or above 100 °F. The diurnal temperature variation tends to be large in spring and autumn. Rainfall is well-distributed throughout the year, though January through March are the wettest, and October is significantly drier than the other months. Snowfall occurs only during some winters, and even then is usually light. Substantial snowstorms are rare, but do occur approximately once every 10 years. Extremes range from on February 13, 1899 to 107 °F on July 7, 1881.\n\nThunderstorms bring much of Montgomery's rainfall. These are common during the summer months but occur throughout the year. Severe thunderstorms – producing large hail and damaging winds in addition to the usual hazards of lightning and heavy rain – can occasionally occur, particularly during the spring. Severe storms also bring a risk of tornadoes. Sometimes, tropical disturbances – some of which strike the Gulf Coast as hurricanes before losing intensity as they move inland – can bring very heavy rains.\n\nDemographics\n\nAs of the 2010 census, the population of the city was 205,764. There were 81,486 households, out of which 29% had children under the age of 18 living with them. The racial makeup of the city was 56.6% Black, 37.3% White, 2.2% Asian, 0.2% Native American, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 2.2% from other races, and 1.3% from two or more races. 3.9% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. Non-Hispanic Whites were 36.1% of the population in 2010, down from 66% in 1970. The population density varies in different parts of the city; East Montgomery (Taylor Rd and East), the non-Hispanic White population is 74.5%, 8.3% African American, Latino 3.2%, other non-white races carry 2.7% of the population.\n\nThe city population was spread out with 24.9% under the age of 18, 11.7% from 18 to 24, 27.3% from 25 to 44, 24.2% from 45 to 64, and 11.8% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 34 years. For every 100 females there were 88.6 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 84.5 males. The median income for a household in the city was $41,380, and the median income for a family was $53,125. Males had a median income of $40,255 versus $33,552 for females. The per capita income for the city was $23,139. About 18.2% of families and 21.6% of the population were below the poverty line, including 34.8% of those under age 18 and 8.4% of those age 65 or over.\n\nEconomy\n\nMontgomery's central location in Alabama's Black Belt makes it a processing hub for crops such as cotton, peanuts, and soybeans. In 1840 Montgomery County led the state in cotton production, and by 1911, the city processed 160,000–200,000 bales of cotton annually. Montgomery has long had large metal fabrication and lumber production sectors. Due to its location along the Alabama River and extensive rail connections, Montgomery has and continues to be a regional distribution hub for a wide range of industries and has diversified its economy in recent years with increased employment in sectors such as healthcare, business, government, and manufacturing. Today, the city's Gross Metropolitan Product is $12.15 billion, representing 8.7% of the gross state product of Alabama. \n\nAccording to Bureau of Labor Statistics data from October 2008, the largest sectors of non-agricultural employment were: Government, 24.3%; Trade, Transportation, and Utilities, 17.3% (including 11.0% in retail trade); Professional and Business Services, 11.9%; Manufacturing, 10.9%; Education and Health Services, 10.0% (including 8.5% in Health Care & Social Assistance); Leisure and Hospitality, 9.2%; Financial Activities, 6.0%, Natural Resources, Mining and Construction, 5.1%; Information, 1.4%; and Other services 4.0%. Unemployment for the same period was 5.7%, 2.5% higher than October 2007. The city also draws in workers from the surrounding area; Montgomery's daytime population rises 17.4% to 239,101.\n\nAs of January 2011, Montgomery's largest employers were Maxwell-Gunter Air Force Base (12,280 employees), the state of Alabama (9,500), Montgomery Public Schools (4,524), Baptist Health (4,300), Hyundai Motor Manufacturing Alabama (3,000), Alfa Insurance (2,568), the City of Montgomery (2,500), Jackson Hospital & Clinic (1,300), Rheem Water Heaters (1,147), and Regions (977). \n\nAccording to Pennsylvania State University's \"Living Wage Calculator\", the living wage for the city is US$8.02 per hour (or $16,691 per year) for an individual and $25.80 per hour ($53,662 per year) for a family of four. These are slightly higher than the state averages of $7.45 per hour for an individual and $25.36 for a family of four. \n\nHealth care\n\nMontgomery serves as a hub for healthcare in the central Alabama and Black Belt region. Hospitals located in the city include Baptist Medical Center South, located on the South East Boulevard, Baptist Medical Center East which is located next to the campus of Auburn University Montgomery on Taylor Road, and Jackson Hospital which is located next to Oak Park off of interstate 85. Montgomery is also home to two medical school campuses, one being located at Baptist Medical Center South (run by University of Alabama at Birmingham) and the other being located at Jackson Hospital (run by Alabama Medical Education Consortium).\n\nLaw and government\n\nMontgomery operates under a Mayor–council government system. The mayor and council members are elected to four-year terms. The current mayor is Todd Strange, who was elected mayor in a special election, held March 10, 2009, after then-mayor Bobby Bright was elected to U.S. Congress for the 2nd district. The city is served by a nine-member city council, elected from nine districts of equal size.\n\nAs the seat of Montgomery County, the city is the location of county courts and the county commission. Montgomery is the capital of Alabama, and hosts numerous state government offices, including the office of the Governor, the Alabama Legislature, and the Alabama Supreme Court.\n\nAt the federal level, Montgomery is part of Alabama's 2nd, 7th, and 3rd Congressional districts currently represented by Martha Roby, Terri Sewell, and Mike Rogers.\n\nCrime\n\nMontgomery's crime rates compare favorably to other large cities in the state. In 2009 Montgomery's violent crime rate was 429.4 per 100,000, well below Birmingham, Huntsville, and Mobile, below the state average, and similar to the national average. For property crimes, Montgomery's average is similar to Alabama's other large cities, but higher than the overall state and national averages.\n\nRecreation\n\nMontgomery boasts over 1600 acres of parkland that are maintained and operated by the City of Montgomery Parks and Recreation Department. The department also has 24 community centers, a skate park, two golf courses (Lagoon Park and Gateway Park), Cramton Bowl Stadium and Multiplex, two tennis centers (Lagoon Park and O'Conner), 65 playgrounds, 90 baseball/softball fields, 24 soccer fields including the Emory Folmar Soccer Facility, and one riverboat. Currently a new environmental park is under construction along West Fairview Avenue close to Interstate 65.\n\nCulture\n\nMontgomery has one of the biggest arts scenes of any mid-sized city in America. The Wynton M. Blount Cultural Park in east Montgomery is home to the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts. The Museum's permanent collections include American art and sculpture, Southern art, master prints from European masters, and collections of porcelain and glass works. The Society of Arts and Crafts operates a co-op gallery for local artists. Montgomery Zoo has over 500 animals, from five different continents, in 40 acre of barrier-free habitats. The Hank Williams Museum contains one of the largest collections of Williams memorabilia in the world. Also Montgomery is home to the Museum of Alabama which serves as the official state history museum and is located inside the Alabama Department of Archives and History building downtown. This museum recently over went an over 10 million dollar renovation and expansion, and features many new exhibits and displays.\n\nBlount Park also contains the Alabama Shakespeare Festival's Carolyn Blount Theatre. The Shakespeare Festival presents year-round performances of both classic plays and performances of local interest, in addition to works of William Shakespeare. The 1200-seat Davis Theatre for the Performing Arts, on the Troy University at Montgomery campus, opened in 1930 and was renovated in 1983. It houses the Montgomery Symphony Orchestra, Alabama Dance Theatre and Montgomery Ballet, as well as other theatrical productions. The Symphony has been performing in Montgomery since 1979. The Capri Theatre in Cloverdale was built in 1941, and today shows independent films. The 1800 seat state of the art Montgomery Performing Arts Center opened inside the newly renovated convention center downtown in 2007 and is host to everything from Broadway plays to concerts and has hosted big names such as BB King, Gregg Allman, and Merle Haggard.\n\nThere is a rich history of musical performers with roots in Montgomery. Grammy Award winning recording artist Toni Tennille of the famed duo The Captain and Tennille. Jazz singer and pianist Nat King Cole, country singer Hank Williams, blues singer Big Mama Thornton, Melvin Franklin of The Temptations, and guitarist Tommy Shaw of Styx are among the many musicians to get their start in Montgomery. Author and artist Zelda Sayre was born in Montgomery. In 1918, she met F. Scott Fitzgerald, who was a soldier stationed at an Army post nearby. The house where they lived is today used as the F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Museum. Poet Sidney Lanier lived in Montgomery and Prattville immediately after the Civil War, while writing his novel Tiger Lilies. \n\nIn addition to being the launching point of Hank Williams Sr.'s career, and the birthplace of Nat King Cole, Clarence Carter, and Tommy Shaw, Montgomery has also seen a few of its rock bands achieve national success in recent years. Locals artists Trust Company were signed to Geffen Records in 2002. Hot Rod Circuit formed in Montgomery in 1997 under the name Antidote, but achieved success with Vagrant Records after moving to Connecticut. The Ed Kemper Trio became well known in Montgomery's local rock music scene from 1997 to 2004, and was the focus of People Will Eat Anything, a music documentary shown at the Capri Theatre in 2004.\n\nSports\n\nMontgomery is home of the Montgomery Biscuits baseball team. The Biscuits play in the Class AA Southern League. They are affiliated with the Tampa Bay Rays, and play at Montgomery Riverwalk Stadium. Riverwalk Stadium hosted the NCAA Division II National Baseball Championship from 2004 until 2007. The championship had previously been played at Paterson Field in Montgomery from 1985 until 2003. Riverwalk Stadium has also been host to one Southern League All-Star game (2006) and is set to host the 2015 All-Star game.\n\nThe Yokohama Tire LPGA Classic women's golf event is held at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail at Capitol Hill in nearby Prattville. Garrett Coliseum was the home of the now-defunct Montgomery Bears indoor football team.\n\nMontgomery is also the site of sporting events hosted by the area's colleges and universities. The Alabama State University Hornets play in NCAA Division I competition in the Southwestern Athletic Conference (SWAC). The football team plays at Hornet Stadium, the basketball teams play at the Dunn-Oliver Acadome, and the baseball team plays at the ASU Baseball Complex, which recently opened on March 26, 2010. Auburn University at Montgomery also fields teams in NAIA competition. Huntingdon College participates at the NCAA Division III level and Faulkner University is a member of the NAIA and is a nearby rival of Auburn University at Montgomery. The Blue-Gray Football Classic was an annual college football all-star game held from 1938 until 2001. In 2009, the city played host to the first annual Historical Black College and University (HBCU) All-Star Football Bowl played at Cramton Bowl. Beginning in 2014 Montgomery will be host to the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference football national championship, this will take place in Cramton Bowl. Starting in December 2014, Montgomery will host the Camellia Bowl at the Cramton Bowl as part of the annual college football bowl game schedule. Montgomery annually hosts the Max Capital City Classic inside Riverwalk Stadium which is a baseball game between big rivals Auburn University and The University of Alabama.\n\nSeveral successful professional athletes hail from Montgomery, including Pro Football Hall of Famer Bart Starr and two-time Olympic gold medalist in track and field Alonzo Babers. \n\nThe city will be host to the 2015 World Firefighter Combat Challenge that will be aired on ESPN in October.\n\nIn 2016 Montgomery will be host city to the National Horseshoe Pitchers Association World Horseshoe Tournament.\n\nCivic organizations\n\nMontgomery has many active governmental and nonprofit civic organizations. City funded organizations include the Montgomery Clean City Commission (a Keep America Beautiful Affiliate) which works to promote cleanliness and environmental awareness. BONDS (Building Our Neighborhoods for Development and Success) which works to engage citizens about city/nonprofit programs, coordinates/assists neighborhood associations, and works promote neighborhood and civic pride amongst Montgomery residents.\n\nA number of organizations are focused on diversity relations and the city's rich civil rights history. Leadership Montgomery provides citizenship training. Bridge Builders Alabama works with high school youth to promote diversity and civic ingagement. The group One Montgomery was founded in 1983 and is a forum for networking of a diverse group of citizens active in civic affairs. Montgomery is also home to the Civil Rights Memorial, Freedom Rides Museum, and the Rosa Parks Library and Museum.\n\nEducation\n\nThe city of Montgomery and Montgomery County are served by the Montgomery Public Schools system. As of 2007, there were 32,520 students enrolled in the system, and 2,382 teachers employed. The system manages 32 elementary schools, 10 middle schools, and 5 high schools as well as 9 magnet schools, 1 alternative school, and 2 special education centers. Montgomery is one of the only cities in the southeast to host three public schools with International Baccalaureate programs. In 2007, Forest Avenue Academic Magnet Elementary School was named a National Blue Ribbon School. In 2014 LAMP High School was named the No. 7 magnet school in the United States and No. 1 high school in the state of Alabama on U.S. News & World Report's list. Three other Montgomery Public Schools high schools were also on the list, the most of any public school system in the state (BTW Magnet, Brewbaker Technology Magnet, and Carver High School). Montgomery is also home to 28 private schools. \n\nThe Montgomery City-County Public Library operates eleven public libraries in locations throughout the city and county.\n\nThe city is home to Alabama's oldest law library, the Supreme Court and State Law Library, founded in 1828. Located in the Heflin-Torbert Judicial Building, the Law Library owns a rare book collection containing works printed as early as 1605.\n\nMontgomery has been the home of Alabama State University, a historically black university, since the Lincoln Normal University for Teachers relocated from Marion in 1887. Today, ASU enrolls over 5,600 students from 42 U.S. states and 7 countries. The public Troy University maintains a 3,000 student population campus in downtown Montgomery that houses the Rosa Parks Library and Museum. Another public institution, Auburn University at Montgomery, with an enrollment of 4,900, is in the eastern part of the city. Montgomery's Baptist Medical Center South also hosts a branch of the University of Alabama Birmingham medical school on its campus on the Eastern Boulevard.\n\nMontgomery also is home to several private colleges: Faulkner University, which has an enrollment of 3,500, is a Church of Christ-affiliated school which is home to the Thomas Goode Jones School of Law. Huntingdon College, which has a current student population of 1,000 and is affiliated with the United Methodist Church; Virginia College and Amridge University.\n\nSeveral two-year colleges have campuses in Montgomery, including H. Councill Trenholm State Technical College \n\nMaxwell Air Force Base is the headquarters for Air University, the United States Air Force's center for professional military education. Branches of Air University based in Montgomery include the Squadron Officer School, the Air Command and Staff College, the Air War College, and the Community College of the Air Force. \n\nMedia\n\nThe morning newspaper, the Montgomery Advertiser, began publication as The Planter's Gazette in 1829. It is the principal newspaper of central Alabama and is affiliated with the Gannett Corporation. In 1970, then publisher Harold E. Martin won the Pulitzer Prize for special reporting while at the Advertiser. The Alabama Journal was a local afternoon paper from 1899 until April 16, 1993, when it published its last issue before merging with the morning Advertiser.\n\nMontgomery is served by seven local television stations: WNCF 32 (ABC), WSFA 12 (NBC), WCOV 20 (Fox), WBMM 22 (CW), WAIQ 26 (PBS), WMCF 45 (TBN), WFRZ-LD 34 (Religious and Educational). In addition, WAKA 8 (CBS), licensed to Selma but operating out of Montgomery, and WBIH 29 (independent) located in Selma, and WIYC 67 (AMV) is licensed to Troy. Montgomery is part of the Montgomery-Selma Designated Market Area (DMA), which is ranked 118th nationally by Nielsen Media Research. Charter Communications and Knology provide cable television service. DirecTV and Dish Network provide direct broadcast satellite television including both local and national channels to area residents.\n\nThe Montgomery area is served by nine AM radio stations: WMSP, WMGY, WNZZ, WTBF, WGMP, WAPZ, WIQR, WLWI, and WXVI; and nineteen FM stations: WJSP, WAPR, WELL, WLBF, WTSU, WVAS, WLWI, WXFX, WQKS, WWMG, WVRV, WJWZ, WBAM, WALX, WHHY, WMXS, WHLW, WZHT, and WMRK. Montgomery is ranked 150th largest by Arbitron. \n\nNOAA Weather Radio station KIH55 broadcasts Weather and Hazard information for Montgomery and Vicinity.\n\nThree major motion pictures have been filmed in Montgomery: The Long Walk Home, set during the Montgomery Bus Boycott; Selma, set during the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches; and Big Fish, partially shot at Huntingdon College. \n\nTransportation\n\nTwo interstate highways run through Montgomery. Interstate 65 is the primary north–south freeway through the city leading between Birmingham and Huntsville to the north and Mobile to the south. Montgomery is the southern terminus of Interstate 85, another north–south freeway (though running east–west in the city), which leads northeast to Atlanta. The major surface street thoroughfare is a loop consisting of State Route 152 in the north, U.S. Highway 231 and U.S. Highway 80 in the east, U.S. Highway 82 in the south, and U.S. Highway 31 along the west of the city. The Alabama Department of Transportation is planning the Outer Montgomery Loop to ease traffic congestion in the city. It is planned to connect Interstate 85 near Mt. Meigs to U.S. Highway 80 southwest of the city. Upon completion of the loop, it will carry the I-85 designation while the original I-85 into the city center will be redesignated I-685. Montgomery Transit (The M) provides public transportation with buses serving the city. The system has 32 buses providing an average of 4500 passenger trips daily. The M's ridership has shown steady growth since the system was revamped in 2000; the system served over 1 million passenger trips in 2007. Greyhound Lines operates a terminal in Montgomery for intercity bus travel; Megabus (North America) also operates in the city out of the downtown Intermodel Transit Facility. \n\nMontgomery Regional Airport, also known as Dannelly Field, is the major airport serving Montgomery. It serves primarily as an Air National Guard base and for general aviation, but commercial airlines fly to regional connections to Atlanta, Dallas-Fort Worth and Charlotte. \n\nPassenger rail service to Montgomery was enhanced in 1898 with the opening of Union Station. Service continued until 1979, when Amtrak terminated its Floridian route. Amtrak returned from 1989 until 1995 with the Gulf Breeze, an extension of the Crescent line. \n\nSister city\n\nMontgomery has one sister city:\n* Pietrasanta, Lucca, Tuscany, Italy" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "American_Bandstand.txt", "Dick_Clark.txt" ], "title": [ "American Bandstand", "Dick Clark" ], "wiki_context": [ "American Bandstand is an American music-performance show that aired in various versions from 1952 to 1989 and was hosted from 1956 until its final season by Dick Clark, who also served as producer. The show featured teenagers dancing to Top 40 music introduced by Clark; at least one popular musical act—over the decades, running the gamut from Jerry Lee Lewis to Run DMC—would usually appear in person to lip-sync one of their latest singles. Freddy \"Boom Boom\" Cannon holds the record for most appearances at 110.\n\nThe show's popularity helped Dick Clark become an American media mogul and inspired similar long-running music programs, such as Soul Train and Top of the Pops. Clark eventually assumed ownership of the program through his Dick Clark Productions company.\n\nBackground\n\nAmerican Bandstand premiered locally in late March 1950 as Bandstand on Philadelphia television station WFIL-TV Channel 6 (now WPVI-TV), as a replacement for a weekday movie that had shown predominantly British films. Hosted by Bob Horn as a television adjunct to his radio show of the same name on WFIL radio, Bandstand mainly featured short musical films produced by Snader Telescriptions and Official Films, with occasional studio guests. This incarnation was an early predecessor of sorts of the music video shows that became popular in the 1980s, featuring films that are themselves the ancestors of music videos.\n\nHorn, however, was disenchanted with the program, so he wanted to have the show changed to a dance program, with teenagers dancing along on camera as the records played, based on an idea that came from a radio show on WPEN, The 950 Club, hosted by Joe Grady and Ed Hurst. This more-familiar version of Bandstand debuted on October 7, 1952 in \"Studio 'B',\" which was located in their just-completed addition to the original 1947 building in West Philadelphia (4548 Market Street), and was hosted by Horn, with Lee Stewart as co-host until 1955. Stewart was the owner of a TV/Radio business in Philadelphia and even though he was an older gentleman, his advertising account was a large one for WFIL-TV at the time and was put on the program to appease the account. As WFIL grew financially and the account became less important, Stewart wasn't needed and was eventually dropped from the program. Tony Mammarella was the original producer with Ed Yates as director. The short Snader and Official music films continued in the short term, mainly to fill gaps as they changed dancers during the show—a necessity, as the studio could not fit more than 200 teenagers.\n\nOn July 9, 1956, Horn was fired after a drunk-driving arrest, as WFIL and dual owner Walter Annenberg's The Philadelphia Inquirer at the time were doing a series on drunken driving. He was also reportedly involved in a prostitution ring and brought up on morals charges. Horn was temporarily replaced by producer Tony Mammarella before the job went to Dick Clark permanently.\n\nIn late spring of 1956, the ABC television network asked their O&O's and affiliates for programming suggestions to fill their 3:30 p.m. (ET) time slot (WFIL had been pre-empting the ABC programming with Bandstand). Clark decided to pitch the show to ABC president Thomas W. Moore, and after some badgering the show was picked up nationally, becoming American Bandstand on August 5, 1957. One show from this first season (December 18, 1957, indicated as the \"Second National Telecast\") is now in the archives of Chicago's Museum Of Broadcast Communications.\n\n\"Studio 'B'\" measured 80'x42'x24', but appeared smaller due to the number of props, television cameras, and risers that were used for the show. It was briefly shot in color in 1958 when WFIL-TV began experimenting with the then-new technology. Due to a combination of factors that included the size of the studio, the need to have as much space available for the teenagers to dance, and the size of the color camera compared to the black-and-white models, it was only possible to have one RCA TK-41 where three RCA TK-10s had been used before. WFIL went back to the TK-10s two weeks later when ABC refused to carry the color signal and management realized that the show lost something without the extra cameras.\n\nProgram features\n\nRate-a-Record\n\nClark would often interview the teenagers about their opinions of the songs being played, most memorably through the \"Rate-a-Record\" segment. During the segment, two audience members each ranked two records on a scale of 35 to 98, after which the two opinions were averaged by Clark, who then asked the audience members to justify their scores. The segment gave rise, perhaps apocryphally, to the phrase \"It's got a good beat and you can dance to it.\" In one humorous segment broadcast for years on retrospective shows, comedians Cheech and Chong appeared as the record raters.\n\nFeatured artists typically performed their current hits by lip-synching to the released version of the song.\n\nHosts\n\nThe only person to ever co-host the show with Dick Clark was Donna Summer, who joined him to present a special episode dedicated to the release of the Casablanca film Thank God It's Friday on 27 May 1978. From the late 1950s and most of the 1960s, Clark's on-camera sidekick was announcer Charlie O'Donnell, who later went on to announce Wheel of Fortune and other programs hosted or produced by Clark, such as The $100,000 Pyramid. During this time, there were occasionally shows that were not hosted by Clark, in which case a substitute host (among them being Rick Azar) would be brought in to host in Clark's stead. \n\nTheme music\n\nBandstand originally used \"High Society\" by Artie Shaw as its theme song, but by the time the show went national, it had been replaced by various arrangements of Charles Albertine's \"Bandstand Boogie,\" including Larry Elgart's big-band recording remembered by viewers of the daily version. From 1969 to 1974, \"Bandstand Theme,\" a synthesized rock instrumental written by Mike Curb, opened each show. From 1974 to 1977, there was a newer, orchestral disco version of \"Bandstand Boogie,\" arranged and performed by Joe Porter, played during the opening and closing credits.\n\nFrom 1977 to the end of its ABC run in 1987, the show opened and closed with Barry Manilow's rendition of \"Bandstand Boogie,\" which he originally recorded for his 1975 album Tryin' to Get the Feeling. This version introduced lyrics written by Manilow and Bruce Sussman, referencing elements of the series. The previous theme was retained as bumper music.\n\nThe Manilow version was replaced by an updated instrumental arrangement of \"Bandstand Boogie\" when Bandstand went into syndication, arranged by David Russo.\n\nFrom 1974 to the end of the ABC run in 1987, Bandstand featured another instrumental at its mid-show break: Billy Preston's synth hit \"Space Race.\"\n\nChanges to Bandstand\n\nEarly changes\n\nWhen ABC picked up the game show Do You Trust Your Wife? from CBS in November 1957, they renamed the program as Who Do You Trust? and scheduled the program at 3:30PM ET—almost in the middle of Bandstand. Instead of shortening or moving Bandstand, ABC opted to just begin Bandstand at 3PM, cut away to Who Do You Trust? at 3:30PM, then rejoin Bandstand at 4PM. In Philadelphia, however, WFIL opted to tape-delay the game show for later broadcast in another time slot, and to continue on with Bandstand, though only for the local audience.\n\nA half-hour evening version of American Bandstand aired on Monday nights from 7:30 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. (ET), beginning on October 7, 1957. It preceded The Guy Mitchell Show. Both were ratings disasters. Dick Clark later stated that he knew the prime-time edition would fail because its core audience — teenagers and housewives — was occupied with other interests in the evenings. The Monday-night version aired its last program in December 1957, but ABC gave Clark a Saturday-night time slot for The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beech-Nut Show, which originated from the Little Theatre in Manhattan, beginning on February 15, 1958. The Saturday show would run until 1960.\n\nThe program was broadcast live, weekday afternoons and, by 1959, the show had a national audience of 20 million.Oldenburg, Ann. [http://www.usatoday.com/life/people/obit/story/2012-04-18/dick-clark-dies-at-82/54390716/1 \"TV legend Dick Clark dies at age 82\"], USA Today, April 18, 2012 In the fall of 1961, ABC truncated American Bandstands airtime from 90 to 60 minutes (4:00–5:00pm ET), then even further as a daily half-hour (4:00–4:30pm ET) program in September 1962; beginning in early 1963, all five shows for the upcoming week were videotaped the preceding Saturday. The use of videotape allowed Clark to produce and host a series of concert tours around the success of American Bandstand and to pursue other broadcast interests. On September 7, 1963, the program was moved from its weekday slot and began airing weekly every Saturday afternoon, restored to an hour, until 1989.\n\nMove from Philadelphia to Los Angeles\n\nProduction of the show moved from Philadelphia to the ABC Television Center in Los Angeles (now known as The Prospect Studios) on February 8, 1964, which coincidentally was the same weekend that WFIL-TV moved from 46th and Market to their then-new facility on City Line Avenue. Color broadcasts began for good on September 9, 1967. The typical production schedule consisted of videotaping three shows on a Saturday and three shows on a Sunday, every six weeks. The shows were usually produced in either Stage 54 or Stage 55 at ABC Television Center.\n\nFor a brief time in 1973, Bandstand alternated its time slot with Soul Unlimited, a show featuring soul music that was hosted by Buster Jones. Soul Unlimited was not well-received among its target audience of African-Americans, ostensibly due to its being created by a white man (Clark), and because of its alleged usage of deliberately racial overtones despite this fact. Don Cornelius, the creator and host of Soul Train, along with Jesse Jackson, entered into a dispute with Clark over this upstart program, and it was canceled within a few weeks. Set pieces from Soul Unlimited were utilized by Bandstand for its 1974–1978 set design. During the 1978 season of Bandstand, Donna Summer became the only music artist in Bandstand's history to co-host the program.\n\nMove from ABC to syndication and the USA Network\n\nAs Bandstand moved towards the 1980s, the ratings began to decline. Many factors were involved in this, particularly the launch of MTV and other music programs on television, and along with that, the number of ABC affiliates opting to pre-empt or delay the program. The increase in competition hurt Bandstand and the variety of options for music on TV decreased its relevance. The other reason was that American Bandstand was pre-empted on many occasions by televised college football games (which expanded greatly in number in the wake of a court-ordered deregulaton in 1984) which were becoming huge ratings successes, as well as occasional special presentations (i.e. unsold game show pilots).\n\nMaking matters worse, for the 1986–87 season, ABC reduced Bandstand from a full hour to 30 minutes; at Clark's request, the final ABC episode (with Laura Branigan performing \"Shattered Glass\") aired on September 5, 1987. Two weeks later, Bandstand moved to first-run syndication, restored to its former hour length, and videotaped at KCET studios. The show's new set was similar to that of Soul Train. Clark continued as host of the series, which primarily aired on NBC network affiliates (including KYW-TV, in the show's former Philadelphia base), from September 19, 1987, until June 4, 1988; it was distributed by LBS Communications.\n\nAfter a ten-month hiatus, Bandstand moved to USA Network on April 8, 1989, with comedian David Hirsch taking over hosting duties. In another format shift, it was shot outdoors at Universal Studios Hollywood. Clark remained as executive producer. This version was canceled after 26 weeks, and its final show (with The Cover Girls performing \"My Heart Skips a Beat\" and \"We Can't Go Wrong\") aired on October 7, 1989. \n\nCivil rights movement and social impact\n\nWith American Bandstand being originally located in Philadelphia, segregation easily affected the concentrated area. \"With Bandstand, WFIL resolved this tension by drawing on Philadelphia’s interracial music scene to create an entertaining and profitable television show, while refusing to allow the city’s black teenagers into the studio audience for fear of alienating viewers and advertisers. Like the white homeowners associations’ concerns about property values, WFIL’s version of defensive localism built on a belief that integration would hurt the station’s investment in Bandstand.\" WFIL defended these local associations in order to maintain support.\n\nOnce the program went national in Los Angeles, new host Dick Clark decided that integration was the most responsible move. History goes back and forth with the timing and motives of the integration, but nevertheless, American Bandstand socially impacted teenagers' opinions regarding race.\n\n50th anniversary\n\nIn 2002, Dick Clark hosted a special 50th anniversary edition. Michael Jackson, a frequent Bandstand guest, performed \n\"Dangerous\". The Village People performed their legendary song, \"YMCA\" for the audience in Pasadena, California. Other performers including Brandy, members of KISS, Dennis Quaid and his band The Sharks, Cher, and Stevie Wonder also performed to remember the iconic program. \n\nRevival plans\n\nIn 2004, Dick Clark, with the help of Ryan Seacrest, announced plans to revive the show in time for the 2005 season; although this did not occur (due in part to Clark suffering a severe stroke in late 2004), one segment of the revived Bandstand—a national dance contest—eventually became the series So You Think You Can Dance. Dick Clark Productions is credited as the show's co-producer, and longtime employee Allen Shapiro serves as co-executive producer. While the American series has aired thirteen seasons, its format was also replicated worldwide, from Norway (Dansefeber) to Australia (So You Think You Can Dance Australia).\n\nLegacy\n\nAmerican Bandstand played a crucial role in introducing Americans to artists like Prince, Jackson 5, Sonny and Cher, Aerosmith, and John Lydon’s PiL—all of whom made their American TV debuts on the show. American Bandstand was a daily ritual for many teenagers throughout the nation. The Top 40 hits that everyone heard were matched with fun routines performed by relatable teenagers. It became a staple in homes and heavily influenced American society culturally, musically, and socially. It also was a prototype for musical television like MTV and American Idol.\n\nReferences in popular culture\n\n* In his song Sweet Little Sixteen recorded 1957, Chuck Berry name-checks the show with the lyric \"Cause they'll be rocking on Bandstand in Philadelphia, PA\".\n*The show was featured prominently in the 2002–2005 NBC-TV drama series American Dreams, which like Bandstand was executive produced by Dick Clark. In a 2005 episode, Eddie Kelly and Bunny Gibson — one of the most famous couples to appear on American Bandstand in the Philadelphia years — were the only two to make cameo appearances on the acclaimed TV series. Along with that, Ed (Eddie) Kelly and Bunny Gibson were named a number of times in the script and Eddie Kelly referred to in the last episode. Actor Paul D. Roberts made frequent appearances as Dick Clark, while Michael Burger played announcer Charlie O'Donnell. Clark frequently provided voice-overs as his younger self.\n*In the film Escape from New York, the theme song is heard while in the cab and near the end when Snake Plisskin takes out the President's address and replaces it with the tape that had the American Bandstand theme.\n*In the animated TV show King of the Hill while Bobby is cleaning the gutters on the roof he is attacked by a bird, Hank hears him stomping around he shouts \"It's a roof, not American Bandstand!\"\n*The live national program National Bandstand in the musical Grease, was an ode to the American Bandstand.\n* Pam Tillis' video for her 1994 cover of \"When You Walk in the Room\" depicted a mid-1960s perforamnce on American Bandstand, and featured a voiceover by Dick Clark.", "Richard Augustus Wagstaff \"Dick\" Clark Jr. (November 30, 1929 – April 18, 2012) was an American radio and television personality, as well as a cultural icon who remains best known for hosting American Bandstand from 1957 to 1987. He also hosted the game show Pyramid and Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve, which transmitted Times Square's New Year's Eve celebrations. Clark was also well known for his trademark sign-off, \"For now, Dick Clark — so long!\", accompanied with a military salute.\n\nAs host of American Bandstand, Clark introduced rock & roll to many Americans. The show gave many new music artists their first exposure to national audiences, including Ike and Tina Turner, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, Stevie Wonder, Talking Heads and Simon & Garfunkel. Episodes he hosted were among the first in which blacks and whites performed on the same stage and among the first in which the live studio audience sat without racial segregation. Singer Paul Anka claimed that Bandstand was responsible for creating a \"youth culture.\" Due to his perennial youthful appearance and his fame as the host of American Bandstand, Clark was often referred to as \"America's oldest teenager\" or \"the world's oldest teenager\".\n\nIn his capacity as a businessman, Clark served as Chief Executive Officer of Dick Clark Productions, part of which he sold off in his later years. He also founded the American Bandstand Diner, a restaurant chain modeled after the Hard Rock Cafe. In 1973, he created and produced the annual American Music Awards show, similar to the Grammy Awards.\n\nClark suffered a stroke in December 2004. With speech ability still impaired, Clark returned to his New Year's Rockin' Eve show a year later on December 31, 2005. Subsequently, he appeared at the 58th Primetime Emmy Awards in 2006, and every New Year's Rockin' Eve show through the 2011–12 show. Clark died on April 18, 2012 of a heart attack at the age of 82 following a medical procedure. \n\nEarly life\n\nClark was born and raised in Mount Vernon, New York, the son of Richard Augustus Clark and Julia Fuller (née Barnard) Clark. His only sibling, older brother Bradley, was killed in the Battle of the Bulge during World War II.\n\nClark attended A.B. Davis High School (later renamed A.B. Davis Middle School) in Mount Vernon, where he was an average student. At age 10, Clark decided to pursue a career in radio. In pursuit of that goal, he attended Syracuse University in Syracuse, New York, graduating in 1951 with a degree in advertising and a minor in radio. While at Syracuse, he was a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity (Phi Gamma). \n\nRadio and television career\n\nIn 1945, Clark began his career working in the mailroom at WRUN, an AM radio station in Rome, New York, that was owned by his uncle and managed by his father. Almost immediately, he was asked to fill in for the vacationing weatherman, and within a few months he was announcing station breaks.\n\nWhile attending Syracuse, Clark worked at WOLF-AM, then a country music station. After graduation, he returned to WRUN for a short time where he went by the name Dick Clay. After that, Clark got a job at the television station WKTV in Utica, New York. His first television-hosting job was on Cactus Dick and the Santa Fe Riders, a country-music program. He would later replace Robert Earle (who would later host the GE College Bowl) as a newscaster.\n\nClark was principal in pro broadcasters operator of 1440 KPRO in Riverside, California, from 1962 to 1982. In the 1960s, he was owner of KGUD AM/FM (later KTYD AM/FM) in Santa Barbara, California.\n\nAmerican Bandstand\n\nIn 1952, Clark moved to Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Philadelphia, where he took a job as a disc jockey at radio station WFIL, adopting the Dick Clark handle. WFIL had an affiliated television station (now WPVI) with the same call sign, which began broadcasting a show called Bob Horn's Bandstand in 1952. Clark was responsible for a similar program on the company's radio station, and served as a regular substitute host when Horn went on vacation. In 1956, Horn was arrested for drunk driving and was subsequently dismissed. On July 9, 1956, Clark became the show's permanent host.\n\nBandstand was picked up by the ABC television network, renamed American Bandstand, and debuted nationally on August 5, 1957. The show took off, due to Clark's natural rapport with the live teenage audience and dancing participants as well as the non-threatening image he projected to television audiences. As a result, many parents were introduced to rock and roll music. According to Hollywood producer Michael Uslan, \"he was able to use his unparalleled communication skills to present rock 'n roll in a way that was palatable to parents.\"\n\nIn 1958, The Dick Clark Show was added to ABC's Saturday night lineup. By the end of year, viewership exceeded 20 million, and featured artists were \"virtually guaranteed\" large sales boosts after appearing. In a surprise television tribute to Clark in 1959 on This Is Your Life, host Ralph Edwards called him \"America’s youngest starmaker,\" and estimated the show had an audience of 50 million.\n\nClark moved the show from Philadelphia to Los Angeles in 1964. The move was related to the popularity of new \"surf\" groups based in Southern California, including The Beach Boys and Jan and Dean. The show ran daily Monday through Friday until 1963, then weekly on Saturdays until 1987. Bandstand was briefly revived in 1989, with Clark again serving as host. By the time of its cancellation, the show had become longest-running variety show in TV history.\n\nIn the 1960s, the show's emphasis changed from merely playing records to including live performers. During this period, many of the leading rock groups of the 1960s had their first exposure to nationwide audiences. A few of the many artists introduced were Ike and Tina Turner, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, The Beach Boys, Stevie Wonder, Simon and Garfunkel, Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddy Holly, Johnny Cash, Sam Cooke, Fats Domino and Chubby Checker. \n\nDuring an interview with Clark by Henry Schipper of Rolling Stone magazine in 1990, it was noted that \"over two-thirds of the people who've been initiated into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame had their television debuts on American Bandstand, and the rest of them probably debuted on other shows [they] produced.\"Schipper, Henry. \"Dick Clark\", Rolling Stone, April 19, 1990 pp. 67–70, 126. During the show's lifetime, it featured over 10,000 live performances, many by artists who would have been unable to appear anywhere else on TV, as the variety shows during much of this period were \"antirock.\" Schipper points out that Clark's performers were shocking to general audiences:\n\nClark was therefore considered to have a negative influence on youth, and was well aware of that impression held by most adults:\n\nIn 2002, many of the groups he introduced appeared at the 50th anniversary special to celebrate American Bandstand. Clark noted during the special that American Bandstand was listed in the Guinness Book of Records as \"the longest-running variety show in TV history.\" In 2010, American Bandstand and Clark himself were honored at the Daytime Emmy Awards. Hank Ballard, who wrote \"The Twist,\" described Clark's popularity during the early years of American Bandstand:\n\nAs a result of Clark's work on Bandstand, journalist Ann Oldenburg states \"he deserves credit for doing something bigger than just putting on a show.\"Oldenburg, Ann. [http://www.usatoday.com/life/people/obit/story/2012-04-18/dick-clark-dies-at-82/54390716/1 \"TV legend Dick Clark dies at age 82\"], USA Today, April 18, 2012. Los Angeles Times writer, Geoff Boucher, goes further, stating that \"with the exception of Elvis Presley, Clark was considered by many to be the person most responsible for the bonfire spread of rock 'n roll across the country in the late 1950s,\" making Clark a \"household name.\" He became a \"primary force in legitimizing rock 'n' roll,\" adds Uslan. Clark, however, simplified his contribution:\n\nShortly after taking over, Clark also ended the show's all-white policy by featuring black artists such as Chuck Berry. In time, blacks and whites performed on the same stage, and studio seating was desegregated.Milner, Andrew (ed.) Encyclopedia of Popular Culture, Vol. I, St. James Press (2000) pp. 525–527. During the late 1950s and 1960s, Clark produced and hosted a series of concert tours around the success of American Bandstand, which by 1959 had a national audience of 20 million. However, Clark was unable to get the Beatles to appear when they came to America.\n\nThe reason for Clark's impact on popular culture was partly explained by Paul Anka, a singer who appeared on the show early in his career: \"This was a time when there was no youth culture — he created it. And the impact of the show on people was enormous.\"[http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/18/dick-clark-dies-at-82/?emc\nna \"Reactions to Death of Dick Clark, New Year's Eve Icon\"] The New York Times blog, April 18, 2012. In 1990, a few years after the show had been off the air, Clark considered his personal contribution to the music he helped introduce:\n\nPayola hearings\n\nIn 1960, the United States Senate investigated payola, the practice of music-producing companies paying broadcasting companies to favor their product. As a result, Clark's personal investments in music publishing and recording companies were considered a conflict of interest, and he sold his shares in those companies. \n\nWhen asked about some of the causes for the hearings, Clark speculated about some of the contributing factors not mentioned by the press:\n\nGame show host\n\nBeginning in late 1963, Clark branched out into hosting game shows, presiding over The Object Is. The show was cancelled in 1964, and replaced by Missing Links, which had moved from NBC. Clark took over as host, replacing Ed McMahon.\n\nClark became the first host of The $10,000 Pyramid, which premiered on CBS March 26, 1973. The show — a word-association game created and produced by daytime television producer Bob Stewart — moved to ABC in 1974. Over the coming years, the top prize changed several times (and with it the name of the show), and several primetime spinoffs were created. As the program moved back to CBS in September 1982, Clark continued to host the daytime version through most of its history, winning three Emmy Awards for best game show host. In total, Pyramid won nine Emmy Awards for best game show during his run, a mark that is eclipsed only by the twelve won by the syndicated version of Jeopardy!. Clark's final Pyramid hosting gig, The $100,000 Pyramid, ended in 1988.\n\nClark subsequently returned to Pyramid as a guest in later incarnations. During the premiere of the John Davidson version in 1991, Clark sent a pre-recorded message wishing Davidson well in hosting the show. In 2002, Clark played as a celebrity guest for three days on the Donny Osmond version. Earlier, he was also a guest during the Bill Cullen version of The $25,000 Pyramid which aired simultaneously with Clark's daytime version of the show.\n\nEntertainment Weekly credited Clark's \"quietly commanding presence\" as a major factor in the game show's success.\n\nClark hosted the syndicated television game show The Challengers, during its only season (1990–91). The Challengers was a co-production between the production companies of Dick Clark and Ron Greenberg. Also during the 1990-91 season, Clark and Greenberg co-produced a revival of Let’s Make a Deal for NBC with Bob Hilton as the host. Hilton would later be replaced by original host Monty Hall. Clark would later host Scattergories on NBC in 1993; and The Family Channel's version of It Takes Two in 1997. In 1999, along with Bob Boden, he was one of the executive producers of Fox's TV game show Greed, which ran from November 5, 1999, to July 14, 2000, and was hosted by Chuck Woolery. At the same time, Clark also hosted the Stone-Stanley-created Winning Lines, which ran for six weeks on CBS from January 8 through February 12, 2000.\n\nDick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve\n\nIn 1972, Dick Clark first produced New Year's Rockin' Eve, a New Year's Eve music special for NBC which included coverage of the ball drop festivities in New York City. Clark aimed to challenge the dominance of Guy Lombardo's New Year's specials on CBS, as he believed its big band music skewed too old. After two years on NBC, and being hosted by Three Dog Night and George Carlin respectively, the program moved to ABC and Clark assumed hosting duties. Following Lombardo's death in 1977, Rockin' Eve experienced a surge in popularity, and would go on to become the most watched New Year's Eve broadcast yearly. Clark would also serve as a special correspondent for ABC News's ABC 2000 broadcast, covering the arrival of 2000. \n\nFollowing his stroke (which prevented him from appearing at all on the 2004–05 edition), Clark returned to make minimal appearances on the 2005–06 edition, while ceding the majority of hosting duties to Ryan Seacrest. Reaction to Clark's appearance was mixed. While some TV critics (including Tom Shales of The Washington Post, in an interview with the CBS Radio Network) felt that he was not in good enough shape to do the broadcast, stroke survivors and many of Clark's fans praised him for being a role model for people dealing with post-stroke recovery. Seacrest has remained host and an executive producer of the special ever since, taking over full duties after Clark's death.\n\nRadio programs\n\nClark's first love was radio, and in 1963 he began hosting a radio program called The Dick Clark Radio Show. It was produced by Mars Broadcasting of Stamford. Despite Clark's enormous popularity on American Bandstand, the show was only picked up by a few dozen stations and lasted less than a year. \n\nOn March 25, 1972, Clark hosted American Top 40, filling in for Casey Kasem. In 1981, he created The Dick Clark National Music Survey for the Mutual Broadcasting System. The program counted down the top 30 contemporary hits of the week in direct competition with American Top 40. Clark left Mutual in 1986, and Charlie Tuna took over the National Music Survey. Clark then launched his own radio syndication group with partners Nick Verbitsky and Ed Salamon called the United Stations Radio Network. That company later merged with the Transtar Network to become Unistar, and took over the countdown program Countdown America. The program ran until 1994, when Unistar was sold to Westwood One Radio. The following year, Clark and Verbitsky started over with a new version of the USRN, bringing into the fold Dick Clark's Rock, Roll & Remember, written and produced by Pam Miller (who also came up with the line used in the show and later around the world: \"the soundtrack of our lives\"), and a new countdown show: The U.S. Music Survey, produced by Jim Zoller. Clark served as its host until his 2004 stroke. United Stations Radio Networks continues in operation as of 2013.\n\nDick Clark's longest running radio show began on February 14, 1982. Rock, Roll & Remember was a four-hour oldies show named after Clark's 1976 autobiography. The first year, it was hosted by veteran Los Angeles disc jockey Gene Weed. Then in 1983, voiceover talent Mark Elliot co-hosted with Clark. By 1985, Clark hosted the entire show. Pam Miller wrote the program and Frank Furino served as producer. Each week, Clark would profile a different artist from the rock and roll era and count down the top four songs that week from a certain year in the 1950s, 1960s or early 1970s. The show ended production when Clark suffered his 2004 stroke. However, reruns from the 1995-2004 era continue to air in syndication and on Clark's website, dickclarkonline.com.\n\nBeginning in 2009, Clark merged elements of Rock, Roll and Remember with the syndicated oldies show, Rewind with Gary Bryan. The new show was called Dick Clark Presents Rewind with Gary Bryan. Bryan, a Los Angeles radio personality, serves as the main host. Clark contributed profile segments.\n\nOther television programs\n\nAt the peak of his American Bandstand fame, Clark also hosted a 30-minute Saturday night program called The Dick Clark Show (aka The Dick Clark Saturday Night Beech-Nut Show). It aired from February 15, 1958, until September 10, 1960, on the ABC television network. It was broadcast live from the \"Little Theater\" in New York City and was sponsored by Beech-Nut gum. It featured the rock and roll stars of the day lip-synching their hits, just as on American Bandstand. However, unlike the afternoon Bandstand program, which focused on the dance floor with the teenage audience demonstrating the latest dance steps, the audience of The Dick Clark Show sat in a traditional theater setting. While some of the musical numbers were presented simply, others were major production numbers. The high point of the show was Clark's unveiling, with great fanfare at the end of each program, of the top ten records of the coming week. This ritual became so embedded in American culture that it was imitated in many media and contexts, which in turn were satirized nightly by David Letterman on his own Top Ten lists.\n\nFrom September 27 to December 20, 1959, Clark hosted a 30-minute weekly talent/variety series entitled Dick Clark's World of Talent at 10:30 p.m. Sundays on ABC. A variation of producer Irving Mansfield's earlier CBS series, This Is Show Business (1949–1956), it featured three celebrity panelists, including comedian Jack E. Leonard, judging and offering advice to amateur and semi-professional performers. While this show was not a success during its nearly three-month duration, Clark was one of the few personalities in television history on the air nationwide seven days a week.\n\nOne of Clark's most well-known guest appearances was in the final episode (\"The Case of the Final Fade-Out\") of the original Perry Mason TV series, in which Clark was revealed to be the killer of an egomaniacal actor during a take of a television show. He also appeared as a drag-racing-strip owner in a 1973 episode of the procedural drama series Adam-12.\n\nClark attempted to branch into the realm of soul music with the series Soul Unlimited in 1973. The series, hosted by Buster Jones, was a more risqué and controversial imitator of the then-popular series Soul Train and alternated in the Bandstand time slot. The series lasted for only a few episodes. Despite a feud between Clark and Soul Train creator and host Don Cornelius, the two would later collaborate on several specials featuring black artists.\n\nClark hosted the short-lived Dick Clark's Live Wednesday in 1978. \n\nIn 1980, Clark served as host of the short-lived series The Big Show, an unsuccessful attempt by NBC to revive the variety show format of the '50s and '60s.\n\nIn 1984, Clark produced and hosted the NBC series TV's Bloopers & Practical Jokes with co-host with Ed McMahon. The series ran through 1988 and continued in specials hosted by Clark (sometimes joined by another TV personality) into the 21st century, first on NBC, later on ABC, and currently on TBS (the last version re-edited into 15-minute/filler segments airing at about 5:00 a.m.). Clark and McMahon were longtime Philadelphia acquaintances, and McMahon praised Clark for first bringing him together with future TV partner Johnny Carson when all three worked at ABC in the late 1950s. The \"Bloopers\" franchise stems from the Clark-hosted (and produced) NBC \"Bloopers\" specials of the early 1980s, inspired by the books, record albums and appearances of Kermit Schafer, a radio and TV producer who first popularized outtakes of broadcasts. For a period of several years in the 1980s, Clark simultaneously hosted regular programs on the three major American television networks: ABC (Bandstand), CBS (Pyramid) and NBC (Bloopers).\n\nIn July 1985, Clark hosted the ABC primetime portion of the historic Live Aid concert, an all star concert designed by Bob Geldof to end world hunger. \n\nClark also hosted various pageants from 1988 to 1993 on CBS.\n\nClark did a brief stint as announcer on The Jon Stewart Show in 1995. \n\nClark also created and hosted two Fox television specials in 2000 called Challenge of the Child Geniuses. This would be the last game show he would host.\n\nFrom 2001 to 2003, Clark was a co-host of The Other Half with Mario Lopez, Danny Bonaduce and Dorian Gregory, a syndicated daytime talk show intended to be the male equivalent of The View. Clark also produced the television series American Dreams about a Philadelphia family in the early 1960s whose daughter is a regular on American Bandstand. The series ran from 2002 to 2005.\n\nOther media appearances\n\nClark was featured in the 2002 documentary film Bowling for Columbine. He was criticized for hiring poor, unwed mothers to work long hours in his chain of restaurants for little pay. The mother featured is shown to work over 80 hours per week and is still unable to make her rent and then gets evicted which results in her having to have her son stay at his uncle's house. At his uncle's house the boy finds a gun and brings it to school where he shoots another first grader. In the documentary footage, Michael Moore, with cameraman in tow, approached Clark as he was pulling into his work parking space and attempted to question Clark about welfare policies that allow for those conditions. Moore tried to query him about the people he employed and the tax breaks he allegedly took advantage of, in employing welfare recipients; Clark refused to answer any of Moore's questions, shutting the car door and driving away. \n\nClark also appeared in interview segments of another 2002 film, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, which was based on the \"unauthorized autobiography\" of Chuck Barris. (Barris had worked at ABC as a standards-and-practices executive during American Bandstand run on that network.) \n\nIn the 2002 Dharma and Greg episode \"Mission: Implausible,\" Greg is the victim of a college prank, and devises an elaborate plan to retaliate, part of which involves his use of a disguise kit; the first disguise chosen is that of Dick Clark. During a fantasy sequence that portrays the unfolding of the plan, the real Clark plays Greg wearing his disguise. \n\nHe also made brief cameos in two episodes of the The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. In one episode he plays himself at a Philadelphia diner, and in the other he helps Will Smith's character host bloopers from past episodes of that sitcom. \n\nBusiness ventures\n\nIn 1965, Clark branched out from hosting, producing Where The Action Is, an afternoon television program shot at different locations every week featuring house band Paul Revere and the Raiders. In 1973, Clark began producing the highly-successful American Music Awards. In 1987, Dick Clark Productions went public. Clark remained active in television and movie production into the 1990s.\n\nClark had a stake in a chain of music-themed restaurants licensed under the names \"Dick Clark's American Bandstand Grill\", \"Dick Clark's AB Grill\", \"Dick Clark's Bandstand — Food, Spirits & Fun\" and \"Dick Clark's AB Diner\". There are currently two airport locations in Newark, New Jersey and Phoenix, Arizona, one location in the Molly Pitcher travel plaza on the New Jersey Turnpike in Cranbury, New Jersey, and one location at \"Dick Clark's American Bandstand Theater\" in Branson, Missouri. Until recently, Salt Lake City, Utah had an airport location. \n\n\"Dick Clark's American Bandstand Theater\" opened in Branson in April 2006, and nine months later, a new theater and restaurant entitled \"Dick Clark's American Bandstand Music Complex\" opened near Dolly Parton's Dollywood theme park in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. \n\nFrom 1979 to 1980, Clark reportedly owned the former scandal-ridden Westchester Premier Theatre in Greenburgh, NY and renamed it the Dick Clark Westchester Theatre. A recently opened Stop & Shop supermarket now stands at that location.\n\nPersonal life\n\nClark was married three times. His first marriage was to Barbara Mallery in 1952; the couple had one son, Richard Augustus Clark III (\"R.A.\", or \"Rac\"), and divorced in 1961. He married Loretta Martin in 1962; the couple had two children, Duane and Cindy, and divorced in 1971. His third marriage, to Kari Wigton, whom he married on July 7, 1977, lasted until his death. \n\nHealth issues\n\nDuring an interview on Larry King Live in April 2004, Clark revealed that he had type 2 diabetes. \n\nOn December 8, 2004, the then 75-year-old was hospitalized in Los Angeles after suffering what was initially termed a minor stroke. Although he was expected to be fine, it was later announced that Clark would be unable to host his annual New Year's Rockin' Eve broadcast. Clark returned to the series the following year, but the dysarthria that resulted from the stroke rendered him unable to speak clearly for the remainder of his life. He also suffered from coronary artery disease in his last years.\n\nDeath and legacy\n\nOn April 18, 2012, Clark died of a heart attack following a transurethral resection of the prostate, at Saint John's Health Center and the Pacific Urology Institute in Santa Monica, California. Clark's family did not immediately decide on whether there would be a public memorial service, but stated \"there will be no funeral\". Clark was cremated on April 20, and his ashes were scattered in the Pacific Ocean. \n\nFollowing his death, U.S. President Barack Obama praised Clark's career: \"With American Bandstand, he introduced decades' worth of viewers to the music of our times. He reshaped the television landscape forever as a creative and innovative producer. And, of course, for 40 years, we welcomed him into our homes to ring in the New Year.\" \nMotown founder Berry Gordy and singer Diana Ross spoke of Clark's impact on the recording industry: \"Dick was always there for me and Motown, even before there was a Motown. He was an entrepreneur, a visionary and a major force in changing pop culture and ultimately influencing integration,\" Gordy said. \"He presented Motown and the Supremes on tour with the \"Caravan of Stars\" and on American Bandstand, where I got my start.\" Ross said. \n\nCredits\n\nFilmography\n\n* Because They're Young (Paul Wendkos, 1960) - Neil Hendry\n* The Young Doctors (Phil Karlson, 1961) - Dr. Alexander\n* Killers Three (Bruce Kessler, 1968) - Roger\n* The Phynx (Lee H. Katzin, 1970) - Himself\n* Spy Kids (Robert Rodriguez, 2001) - Financier\n* Bowling For Columbine (Michael Moore, 2002) - Himself (Documentary)\n\nTelevision\n\n* ABC 2000 Today, Times Square correspondent\n* Adam-12, as drag strip owner Mr. J. Benson in the season 4 episode \"Who Won?\" (1972)\n* American Bandstand, host\n* The Challengers, host\n* Happening, producer (1968–69)\n* It Takes Two, host (1997)\n* The Krypton Factor, host (1981)\n* Lassie - (TV series) as J.H. Alpert in the episode \"The Untamed Land\" (1966)\n* Missing Links, host (1964)\n* Miss Teen USA, host (1988, 1991–1993)\n* Miss Universe, host (1990–1993)\n* Miss USA, host (1989–1993)\n* New Year's Rockin' Eve, host (1972–2004), co-host (2006–2012), producer\n* Perry Mason, Season 9, episode 30. The Case of the Final Fadeout.\n* The Object Is, host (1963–1964)\n* Pyramid, host (1973-1988; all versions sans The $25,000 Pyramid [1974-1979]), guest (The $25,000 Pyramid, 1970s; Pyramid, 2002)\n* The Saturday Night Beech-Nut Show, host (1958–1960)\n* Scattergories - host\n* Stoney Burke - Sgt. Andy Kincaid in the episode \"Kincaid\" (1963)\n* TV's Bloopers & Practical Jokes, co-host, producer\n* Where the Action Is — host (1965–67)\n* Winning Lines - Host\n* The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air - himself (two episodes)\n\nAlbums\n\n* Rock, Roll & Remember, Vol. 3 (CSP) (1983)\n\nHonors and awards\n\nClark received the following awards:\n* Emmy Awards (1979, 1983, 1985, and 1986)\n* Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia Person of the Year (1980)\n* Daytime Emmy Lifetime Achievement Award (1994)\n* Peabody Award (1999)\n\nHe was also an inductee at several Hall of Fame locations:\n* Hollywood Walk of Fame (1976)\n* National Radio Hall of Fame (1990)\n* Broadcasting Magazine Hall of Fame (1992)\n* Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia Hall of Fame (1992)\n* Television Hall of Fame (1992)\n* Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (1993)\n* Disney Legends (2013)" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Epidemiology_of_HIV_SpecialCharSlash_AIDS.txt" ], "title": [ "Epidemiology of HIV/AIDS" ], "wiki_context": [ "HIV/AIDS is a global pandemic. As of 2014, approximately 36.9 million people are living with HIV globally. In 2012, approximately 17.2 million are men, 16.8 million are women and 3.4 million are less than 15 years old.[http://www.unaids.org/en/media/unaids/contentassets/documents/unaidspublication/2011/jc2216_worldaidsday_report_2011_en.pdf UNAIDS 2011 pg. 1-10] There were about 1.8 million deaths from AIDS in 2010, down from 2.2 million in 2005.\n\nSub-Saharan Africa is the region most affected. In 2010, an estimated 68% (22.9 million) of all HIV cases and 66% of all deaths (1.2 million) occurred in this region. This means that about 5% of the adult population in this area is infected.UNAIDS 2011 pg. 40-50 Here, in contrast to other regions, women compose nearly 60% of cases. South Africa has the largest population of people with HIV of any country in the world, at 5.9 million. In Tanzania, HIV/AIDS was reported to have a prevalence of 6% among Tanzanian adults aged 15–49 in 2007-2008. This figure is lower than 2003 when the country's HIV/AIDS prevalence was 8.8%. \n\nSouth & South East Asia (a region with about 2 billion people as of 2010, over 30% of the global population) has an estimated 4 million cases (12% of all people living with HIV), with about 250,000 deaths in 2010. Approximately 2.5 million of these cases are in India, where however the prevalence is only about 0.3% (somewhat higher than that found in Western and Central Europe or Canada). Prevalence is lowest in East Asia at 0.1%.\n\nIn 2008 approximately 1.2 million people in the United States had HIV; 20% did not realize that they were infected. Over the 10-year period from 1999-2008 it resulted in about 17,500 deaths per year. In the United Kingdom, as of 2009, there were approximately 86,500 cases and 516 deaths. In Australia, as of 2009, there were about 21,171 cases and around 23 deaths. In Canada as of 2008 there were about 65,000 cases and 53 deaths. \n\nA reconstruction of its genetic history shows that the HIV pandemic almost certainly originated in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, around 1920. AIDS was first recognized in 1981 and by 2009 had caused nearly 30 million deaths. \n\nHIV in World\n\nHIV in World in 2014 - data from CIA World Factbook \n\nHIV in World - historical data for selected countries\n\nHIV/AIDS in World from 2001 to 2014 - adult prevalence rate - data from CIA World Factbook\n\nBy region\n\nThe pandemic is not homogeneous within regions, with some countries more afflicted than others. Even at the country level, there are wide variations in infection levels between different areas. The number of people infected with HIV continues to rise in most parts of the world, despite the implementation of prevention strategies, Sub-Saharan Africa being by far the worst-affected region, with an estimated 22.9 million at the end of 2010, 68% of the global total.\n\nSouth and South East Asia have an estimated 12% of the global total. The rate of new infections has fallen slightly since 2005 after a more rapid decline between 1997 and 2005. Annual AIDS deaths have been continually declining since 2005 as antiretroviral therapy has become more widely available.\n\nSub-Saharan Africa\n\nSub-Saharan Africa remains the hardest-hit region. HIV infection is becoming endemic in sub-Saharan Africa, which is home to just over 12% of the world’s population but two-thirds of all people infected with HIV. The adult HIV prevalence rate is 5.0% and between 21.6 million and 24.1 million total are affected. However, the actual prevalence varies between regions. Presently, Southern Africa is the hardest hit region, with adult prevalence rates exceeding 20% in most countries in the region, and 30% in Swaziland and Botswana.\n\nEastern Africa also experiences relatively high levels of prevalence with estimates above 10% in some countries, although there are signs that the pandemic is declining in this region. West Africa on the other hand has been much less affected by the pandemic.\nSeveral countries reportedly have prevalence rates around 2 to 3%, and no country has rates above 10%. In Nigeria and Côte d'Ivoire, two of the region's most populous countries, between 5 and 7% of adults are reported to carry the virus.\n\nAcross Sub-Saharan Africa, more women are infected with HIV than men, with 13 women infected for every 10 infected men. This gender gap continues to grow. Throughout the region, women are being infected with HIV at earlier ages than men. The differences in infection levels between women and men are most pronounced among young people (aged 15–24 years). In this age group, there are 36 women infected with HIV for every 10 men. The widespread prevalence of sexually transmitted diseases, the practice of scarification, unsafe blood transfusions, and the poor state of hygiene and nutrition in some areas may all be facilitating factors in the transmission of HIV-1 (Bentwich et al., 1995).\n\nMother-to-child transmission is another contributing factor in the transmission of HIV-1 in developing nations. Due to a lack of testing, a shortage in antenatal therapies and through the feeding of contaminated breast milk, 590,000 infants born in developing countries are infected with HIV-1 per year. In 2000, the World Health Organization estimated that 25% of the units of blood transfused in Africa were not tested for HIV, and that 10% of HIV infections in Africa were transmitted via blood.\n\nPoor economic conditions (leading to the use of dirty needles in healthcare clinics) and lack of sex education contribute to high rates of infection. In some African countries, 25% or more of the working adult population is HIV-positive. Poor economic conditions caused by slow onset-emergencies, such as drought, or rapid onset natural disasters and conflict can result in young women and girls being forced into using sex as a survival strategy. Worse still, research indicates that as emergencies, such as drought, take their toll and the number of potential 'clients' decreases, women are forced by clients to accept greater risks, such as not using contraceptives.\n\nAIDS-denialist policies have impeded the creation of effective programs for distribution of antiretroviral drugs. Denialist policies by former South African President Thabo Mbeki's administration led to several hundred thousand unnecessary deaths. UNAIDS estimates that in 2005 there were 5.5 million people in South Africa infected with HIV — 12.4% of the population. This was an increase of 200,000 people since 2003.\n\nAlthough HIV infection rates are much lower in Nigeria than in other African countries, the size of Nigeria's population meant that by the end of 2003, there were an estimated 3.6 million people infected. On the other hand, Uganda, Zambia, Senegal, and most recently Botswana have begun intervention and educational measures to slow the spread of HIV, and Uganda has succeeded in actually reducing its HIV infection rate.\n\nMiddle East and North Africa\n\nHIV/AIDS prevalence in the Middle East and North Africa is around 0.2% (0.1–0.7%), with between 230,000 and 1.4 million people infected. Among young people 15–24 years of age, 0.3% of women [0.1–0.8%] and 0.17% of men [0.1–0.3%] were living with HIV infection by the end of 2004.\n\nApproximately 500,000 people are living with HIV in the MENA region. This number is \nestimated at 470,000 (350,000–570,000) without Afghanistan and Pakistan (which are not \nconsidered by UNAIDS geographic definition as part of MENA region), and reaches 580,000 \n(430,000–810,000) if Pakistan and Afghanistan are included. \n\nDespite the low prevalence of HIV/AIDS in the MENA region, there are epidemics among vulnerable groups. As of 2012, the prevalence of HIV among men who have sex with men in Egypt is estimated to be 5.0%-9.9%. \n\nSouth and South-East Asia\n\nThe HIV prevalence rate in South and South-East Asia is less than 0.35 percent, with total of 4.2 – 4.7 million adults and children infected. More AIDS deaths (480,000) occur in this region than in any other except sub-Saharan Africa. The geographical size and human diversity of South and South-East Asia have resulted in HIV epidemics differing across the region. The AIDS picture in South Asia is dominated by the epidemic in India.\n\nIn South and Southeast Asia, the HIV epidemic remains largely concentrated in injecting drug users, men who have sex with men, sex workers, and clients of sex workers and their immediate sexual partners. In the Philippines, in particular, sexual contact between males comprise the majority of new infections. An HIV surveillance study conducted by Dr. Louie Mar Gangcuangco and colleagues from the University of the Philippines-Philippine General Hospital showed that out of 406 MSM tested for HIV in Metro Manila, HIV prevalence was 11.8% (95% confidence interval: 8.7- 15.0). \n\nMigrants, in particular, are vulnerable and 67% of those infected in Bangladesh and 41% in Nepal are migrants returning from India.Fiona Samuels and Sanju Wagle 2011. [http://www.odi.org.uk/resources/details.asp?id\n5733&titlehiv-aids-migration-emphasis-bangladesh-nepal-india Population mobility and HIV and AIDS: review of laws, policies and treaties between Bangladesh, Nepal and India]. London: Overseas Development Institute This is in part due to human trafficking and exploitation, but also because even those migrants who willingly go to India in search of work are often afraid to access state health services due to concerns over their immigration status.\n\nEast Asia\n\nThe national HIV prevalence levels in East Asia is 0.1% in the adult (15–49) group. However, due to the large populations of many East Asian nations, this low national HIV prevalence still means that large numbers of people are infected with HIV. The picture in this region is dominated by China. Much of the current spread of HIV in China is through injecting drug use and paid sex. In China, the number was estimated at between 430,000 and 1.5 million by independent researchers, with some estimates going much higher.\n\nIn the rural areas of China, where large numbers of farmers, especially in Henan province, participated in unclean blood transfusions; estimates of those infected are in the tens of thousands. In Japan, just over half of HIV/AIDS cases are officially recorded as occurring amongst homosexual men, with the remainder occurring amongst heterosexuals and also via drug abuse, in the womb or unknown means.\n\nAmericas\n\nCaribbean\n\nThe Caribbean is the second-most affected region in the world. Among adults aged 15–44, AIDS has become the leading cause of death. The region's adult prevalence rate is 0.9%. with national rates ranging up to 2.7%. HIV transmission occurs largely through heterosexual intercourse, with two-thirds of AIDS cases in this region attributed to this route. Sex between men is also a significant route of transmission, even though it is heavily stigmatised and illegal in many areas. HIV transmission through injecting drug use remains rare, except in Bermuda and Puerto Rico.\n\nCentral and South America\n\nIn these regions of the American continent, only Guatemala and Honduras have national HIV prevalence of over 1%. In these countries, HIV-infected men outnumber HIV-infected women by roughly 3:1.\n\nUnited States and Canada\n\nThe adult prevalence rate in this region is 0.7% with over 1 million people currently infected with HIV. In the United States from 2001–2005, the highest transmission risk behaviors were sex between men (40–49% of new cases) and high risk heterosexual sex (32–35% of new cases). In general, recent studies have shown that 1 in 5 gay and bisexual men were infected with HIV. Currently, rates of HIV infection in the US are highest in the eastern and southern regions, with the exception of California. Currently, 35,000–40,000 new infections occur in the USA every year. AIDS is one of the top three causes of death for African American men aged 25–54 and for African American women aged 35–44 years in the United States of America. In the United States, African Americans make up about 48% of the total HIV-positive population and make up more than half of new HIV cases, despite making up only 12% of the population. The main route of transmission for women is through unprotected heterosexual sex. African American women are 19 times more likely to contract HIV than other women. \n\nIn the United States in particular, a new wave of infection is being blamed on the use of methamphetamine, known as crystal meth. Research presented at the 12th Annual Retrovirus Conference in Boston in February 2005 concluded that using crystal meth or cocaine is the biggest single risk factor for becoming HIV+ among US gay men, contributing 29% of the overall risk of becoming positive and 28% of the overall risk of being the receptive partner in anal sex. \n\nIn addition, several renowned clinical psychologists now cite methamphetamine as the biggest problem facing gay men today, including Michael Majeski, who believes meth is the catalyst for at least 80% of seroconversions currently occurring across the United States, and Tony Zimbardi, who calls methamphetamine the number one cause of HIV transmission, and says that high rates of new HIV infection are not being found among non-crystal users. In addition, various HIV and STD clinics across the United States report anecdotal evidence that 75% of new HIV seroconversions they deal with are methamphetamine-related; indeed, in Los Angeles, methamphetamine is regarded as the main cause of HIV seroconversion among gay men in their late thirties. The chemical \"methamphetamine\", in and of itself, cannot infect someone with HIV.\n\nWashington, D.C., the nation's capital, also has the nation's highest rate of infection, at 3%. This rate is comparable to what is seen in west Africa, and is considered a severe epidemic. \n\nIn Canada, nearly 60,000 people were living with HIV/AIDS in 2005. The HIV-positive population continues to increase in Canada, with the greatest increases amongst aboriginal Canadians. As in Western Europe, the death rate from AIDS in North America fell sharply with the introduction of combination AIDS therapies (HAART).\n\nIn the United States, young African-American women are also at high risk for HIV infection. African Americans make up 10% of the population but about half of the HIV/AIDS cases nationwide. This is due in part to a lack of information about AIDS and a perception that they are not vulnerable, as well as to limited access to health-care resources and a higher likelihood of sexual contact with at-risk male sexual partners. There are also geographic disparities in AIDS prevalence in the United States, where it is most common in the large metropolitan areas of the East Coast and California and in urban areas of the Deep South. Rates are lower in Utah, Texas, and Northern Florida.\n\nSince 1985, the incidence of HIV infection among women has been steadily increasing. It is currently estimated that at least 27% of new HIV infections are in women. There has been increasing concern for the concurrency of violence surrounding women infected with HIV. In 2012, a meta-analysis showed that the rates of psychological trauma, including Intimate Partner Violence and PTSD in HIV positive women were more than five times and twice the national averages, respectively. In 2013, the White House commissioned an Interagency Federal Working Group to address the intersection of violence and women infected with HIV. \n\nA review of studies containing data regarding the prevalence of HIV in transgender women found that nearly 11.8% self-reported that they were infected with HIV. Along with these findings, recent studies have also shown that transgender women are 34 times more likely to have HIV than other women. In the National Transgender Discrimination Survey, 20.23% of black respondents reported being HIV-positive, with an additional 10% reporting that they were unaware of their status. \n\nEastern Europe and Central Asia\n\nThere is growing concern about a rapidly growing epidemic in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, where an estimated 1.23–3.7 million people were infected as of December 2011, though the adult (15–49) prevalence rate is low (1.1%). The rate of HIV infections began to grow rapidly from the mid-1990s, due to social and economic collapse, increased levels of intravenous drug use and increased numbers of prostitutes. By 2010 the number of reported cases in Russia was over 450,000 according to the World Health Organization, up from 15,000 in 1995 and 190,000 in 2002; some estimates claim the real number is up to eight times higher, well over 2 million. There are predictions that the infection rate in Russia will continue to rise quickly, since education there about AIDS is almost non-existent. \n\nUkraine and Estonia also have growing numbers of infected people, with estimates of 650,000 and 4,400 respectively in 2011. The disease is now officially epidemic in this region, which means that prevention strategies may not be able to halt and reverse its spread. Also, transmission of HIV is increasing through sexual contact and drug use among the young ([http://www.usaid.gov/our_work/global_health/aids/Countries/asia/papua_new_guinea_profile.pdf Health Profile: Papua New Guinea]. United States Agency for International Development (September 2008). Accessed 20 March 2009.\n\nAIDS and society \n\nIn June 2001, the United Nations held a Special General Assembly to intensify international action to fight the HIV/AIDS epidemic as a global health issue, and to mobilize the resources needed towards this aim, labelling the situation a \"global crisis\". \n\nRegarding the social effects of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, some sociologists suggest that AIDS has caused a \"profound re-medicalization of sexuality\". \n\nSocial factors also influence HIV/AIDS. A 2003 study states that HIV and AIDS are less prevalent in Muslim populations and speculates that this may be due to the effect of several Islamic tenets, such as the avoidance of extramarital affairs and the \"benefits arising from circumcision\"." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Denzel_Washington.txt", "Gene_Hackman.txt", "University_of_Alabama.txt" ], "title": [ "Denzel Washington", "Gene Hackman", "University of Alabama" ], "wiki_context": [ "Denzel Hayes Washington, Jr. (born December 28, 1954) is an American actor and filmmaker. He has received three Golden Globe awards, a Tony Award, and two Academy Awards: Best Supporting Actor for the historical war drama film Glory (1989) and Best Actor for his role as a corrupt cop in the crime thriller Training Day (2001). \n\nWashington has received much critical acclaim for his film work since the 1980s, including his portrayals of real-life figures such as South African anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko in Cry Freedom (1987), Muslim minister and human rights activist Malcolm X in Malcolm X (1992), boxer Rubin \"Hurricane\" Carter in The Hurricane (1999), football coach Herman Boone in Remember the Titans (2000), poet and educator Melvin B. Tolson in The Great Debaters (2007), and drug kingpin Frank Lucas in American Gangster (2007). He has been a featured actor in the films produced by Jerry Bruckheimer and has been a frequent collaborator of directors Spike Lee and the late Tony Scott. In 2016 he was selected as the recipient for the Cecil B. DeMille Lifetime Achievement Award at the 73rd Golden Globe Awards.\n\nEarly life and education\n\nWashington was born in Mount Vernon, New York. His father, Denzel Hayes Washington, Sr., a native of Buckingham County, Virginia, was an ordained Pentecostal minister, and also worked for the Water Department and at a local department store, S. Klein. His mother, Lennis \"Lynne\" (née Lowe), was a beauty parlor owner and operator born in Georgia and partly raised in Harlem. \n\nWashington attended Pennington-Grimes Elementary School in Mount Vernon until 1968. When he was 14, his parents divorced, and his mother sent him to a private preparatory school, Oakland Military Academy in New Windsor, New York. \"That decision changed my life,\" Washington later said, \"because I wouldn't have survived in the direction I was going. The guys I was hanging out with at the time, my running buddies, have now done maybe 40 years combined in the penitentiary. They were nice guys, but the streets got them.\" After Oakland, Washington next attended Mainland High School, a public high school in Daytona Beach, Florida, from 1970 to 1971. He was interested in attending Texas Tech University: \"I grew up in the Boys Club in Mount Vernon, and we were the Red Raiders. So when I was in high school, I wanted to go to Texas Tech in Lubbock just because they were called the Red Raiders and their uniforms looked like ours.\" Washington earned a B.A. in Drama and Journalism from Fordham University in 1977. At Fordham, he played collegiate basketball as a guard under coach P.J. Carlesimo. After a period of indecision on which major to study and dropping out of school for a semester, Washington worked as creative arts director at an overnight summer camp, Camp Sloane YMCA in Lakeville, Connecticut. He participated in a staff talent show for the campers and a colleague suggested he try acting. \n\nReturning to Fordham that fall with a renewed purpose, Washington enrolled at the Lincoln Center campus to study acting, and where he was given the title roles in Eugene O'Neill's The Emperor Jones and Shakespeare's Othello. He then attended graduate school at the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco, where he stayed for one year before returning to New York to begin a professional acting career. \n\nCareer\n\nEarly work\n\nWashington spent the summer of 1976 in St. Mary's City, Maryland, in summer stock theater performing Wings of the Morning, the Maryland State play, which was written for him by incorporating an African-American character/narrator based loosely on the historical figure from early colonial Maryland, Mathias Da Sousa. Shortly after graduating from Fordham, Washington made his screen acting debut in the 1977 made-for-television film Wilma, and his first Hollywood appearance in the 1981 film Carbon Copy. He shared a 1982 Distinguished Ensemble Performance Obie Award for playing Private First Class Melvin Peterson in the Off-Broadway Negro Ensemble Company production A Soldier's Play which premiered November 20, 1981. \n\nA major career break came when he starred as Dr. Phillip Chandler in NBC's television hospital drama St. Elsewhere, which ran from 1982 to 1988. He was one of only a few African-American actors to appear on the series for its entire six-year run. He also appeared in several television, motion picture and stage roles, such as the films A Soldier's Story (1984), Hard Lessons (1986) and Power (1986). In 1987, he starred as South African anti-apartheid political activist Steven Biko in Richard Attenborough's Cry Freedom, for which he received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. In 1989, Washington won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of a defiant, self-possessed ex-slave soldier in the film Glory. That same year, he appeared in the film The Mighty Quinn; and in For Queen and Country, where he played the conflicted and disillusioned Reuben James, a British soldier who, despite a distinguished military career, returns to a civilian life where racism and inner city life lead to vigilantism and violence.\n\n1990s\n\nIn 1990, Washington starred as Bleek Gilliam in the Spike Lee film Mo' Better Blues. In 1992, he starred as Demetrius Williams in the romantic drama Mississippi Masala. Washington was reunited with Lee to play one of his most critically acclaimed roles, the title character of 1992's Malcolm X. His performance as the black nationalist leader earned him another nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. The next year he played the lawyer of a gay man with AIDS in the 1993 film Philadelphia. During the early and mid-1990s, Washington starred in several successful thrillers, including The Pelican Brief and Crimson Tide, as well as in the movie of the Shakespearean comedy Much Ado About Nothing. In 1996, he played a U.S. Army officer who, despondent about a deadly mistake he made, investigates a female chopper commander's worthiness for the Medal of Honor in Courage Under Fire with Meg Ryan. In 1996, he appeared with Whitney Houston in the romantic drama The Preacher's Wife. \n\nIn 1998, Washington starred in Spike Lee's film He Got Game. Washington played a father serving a six-year prison term when the prison warden offers him a temporary parole to convince his top-ranked high-school basketball player son (Ray Allen) to sign with the governor's alma mater, Big State. The film was Washington's third collaboration with Lee. \n\nIn 1999, Washington starred in The Hurricane, a film about boxer Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter, whose conviction for triple murder was overturned after he spent almost 20 years in prison. A former reporter, who was angry that the film portrayed Carter as innocent despite the overturned conviction, began a campaign to pressure Academy Award voters not to vote for the film. Washington did receive a Golden Globe Award in 2000 and a Silver Bear Award at the Berlin International Film Festival for the role.\n\n2000s\n\nIn 2000, Washington appeared in the Disney film Remember the Titans which grossed over $100 million in the U.S.\n\nWashington won a Golden Globe award for Best Actor in a Dramatic Movie for his work in The Hurricane in 2000. He was the first black actor to win the award since Sidney Poitier in 1963. \n\nWashington won an Academy Award for Best Actor for the 2001 cop thriller Training Day, where he played Detective Alonzo Harris, a corrupt Los Angeles cop with questionable law-enforcement tactics. He was the second African-American performer to win an Academy Award for Best Actor. The first was Sidney Poitier, who was presented with an Honorary Academy Award the same night. Washington currently holds the records for most Oscar nominations (six) and the most wins (two) by an actor of African descent.\n\nAfter appearing in 2002's box office success, the healthcare-themed John Q., Washington directed his first film, a well-reviewed drama called Antwone Fisher, in which he also co-starred.\n\nBetween 2003 and 2004, Washington appeared in a series of thrillers that performed generally well at the box office, including Out of Time, Man on Fire, and The Manchurian Candidate. In 2006, he starred in Inside Man, a Spike Lee-directed bank heist thriller co-starring Jodie Foster and Clive Owen, released in March, and Déjà Vu.\n\nIn 2006, Washington worked alongside Irish rock band The Script on a project combining music and Hollywood. The hybrid of genres was critically acclaimed, but didn't receive much mainstream attention because of legal conflicts between The Script's record label and Denzel's studio commitments.\n\nIn 2007, Washington co-starred with Russell Crowe, for the second time after 1995's Virtuosity, in Ridley Scott's American Gangster. He also directed and starred in the drama The Great Debaters with Forest Whitaker. He next appeared in Tony Scott's 2009 film The Taking of Pelham 123 (a remake of the 1974 thriller of the same name), where he played New York City subway security chief Walter Garber opposite John Travolta's villain.[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1111422/ The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (2009) - IMDb]\n\nReturn to theater\n\nIn the summer of 1990, Washington appeared in the title role of the Public Theater's production of Shakespeare's Richard III. In 2005, he appeared onstage again as Marcus Brutus in a Broadway production of Julius Caesar. Despite mixed reviews, the production's limited run was a consistent sell-out. In the spring of 2010, Washington played Troy Maxson, opposite Viola Davis, in the Broadway revival of August Wilson's Fences, for which he won a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play on June 13, 2010. \n\nFrom April to June 2014, Washington played the leading role in the Broadway production of Lorraine Hansberry's classic drama A Raisin in the Sun, directed by Kenny Leon. The show received positive reviews and won the 2014 Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play. \n\n2010s\n\nIn 2010, Washington starred in The Book of Eli, a post-Apocalyptic drama set in the near future. Also in 2010, he starred as a veteran railroad engineer in the action film Unstoppable, about an unmanned, half-mile-long runaway freight train carrying dangerous cargo. The film was his fifth and final collaboration with director Tony Scott, following Crimson Tide (1995), Man on Fire (2004), Déjà Vu (2006) and The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (2009).\n\nIn 2012, Washington starred in Flight, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor. He co-starred with Ryan Reynolds in Safe House, where he prepared for his role by subjecting himself to a torture session that included waterboarding. \n\nIn 2013, Washington starred in 2 Guns, alongside Mark Walberg. In 2014 he starred in The Equalizer, an action thriller film directed by Antoine Fuqua and written by Richard Wenk, based on the television series of same name starring Edward Woodward.Schaefer, Sandy (October 25, 2012). [http://screenrant.com/denzel-washington-equalizer-directors \"Denzel Washington's 'Equalizer' Secures Start Date; Lining Up Directors\"]. Screen Rant.\n\nPersonal life\n\nOn June 25, 1983, Washington married Pauletta Pearson, whom he met on the set of his first screen work, the television film Wilma. The couple have four children: John David (b. July 28, 1984), a former football player with the United Football League's Sacramento Mountain Lions (and before that, college football at Morehouse); Katia (b. November 27, 1986) who graduated from Yale University with a Bachelor of Arts in 2010; and twins Olivia and Malcolm (b. April 10, 1991). Malcolm graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a degree in film studies, and Olivia played a role in Lee Daniels's film The Butler. In 1995, Denzel and Pauletta renewed their wedding vows in South Africa with Archbishop Desmond Tutu officiating. \n\nWashington is a devout Christian, and has considered becoming a preacher. He stated in 1999, \"A part of me still says, 'Maybe, Denzel, you're supposed to preach. Maybe you're still compromising.' I've had an opportunity to play great men and, through their words, to preach. I take what talent I've been given seriously, and I want to use it for good.\" In 1995, he donated to help build the new West Angeles Church of God in Christ facility in Los Angeles. Mikkelson, Barbara and David (December 27, 2012). [http://www.snopes.com/politics/military/denzel.asp \"Denzel Washington\"]. Snopes.com. December 28, 2012. Washington says he reads the Bible daily. \n\nWashington has served as the national spokesperson for Boys & Girls Clubs of America since 1993 and has appeared in public service announcements and awareness campaigns for the organization. In addition, he has served as a board member for Boys & Girls Clubs of America since 1995. Due to his philanthropic work with the Boys & Girls Club, PS 17X, a New York City Elementary School decided to officially name their school after Washington.\n\nIn mid-2004, Washington visited Brooke Army Medical Center (BAMC) at Fort Sam Houston, where he participated in a Purple Heart ceremony, presenting medals to three Army soldiers recovering from wounds they received while stationed in Iraq. He also visited the fort's Fisher House facilities, and after learning that it had exceeded its capacity, made a substantial donation to the Fisher House Foundation. Washington's other charitable contributions include to Nelson Mandela's Children's Fund in 1995 and to Wiley College to resuscitate the college's debate team. \n\nWashington is an Independent voter. He supported Barack Obama in 2008. \n\nThe Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia named Washington as one of three people (the others being directors Oliver Stone and Michael Moore) with whom they were willing to negotiate for the release of three defense contractors the group had held captive from 2003 to 2008. \n\nOn May 18, 1991, Washington was awarded an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, Fordham University, for having \"impressively succeeded in exploring the edge of his multifaceted talent\". In 2011, he donated $2 million to Fordham for an endowed chair of the theater department, as well as to establish a theater-specific scholarship at the school. He also received an honorary Doctorate of Humanities from Morehouse College on May 20, 2007. and an honorary Doctor of Arts degree from the University of Pennsylvania on May 16, 2011. \n\nIn 2008, Washington visited Israel with a delegation of African-American artists in honor of the state's 60th birthday. \n\nIn April 2014, Washington presented at Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS Easter Bonnet Competition with Bryan Cranston, Idina Menzel and Fran Drescher, after raising donations at his Broadway show Raisin in the Sun. \n\nFilmography \n\nAwards and nominations", "Eugene Allen \"Gene\" Hackman (born January 30, 1930) is a retired American actor and novelist. \n\nIn a career spanning five decades, Hackman has been nominated for five Academy Awards, winning Best Actor in The French Connection and Best Supporting Actor in Unforgiven. In addition, he has won three Golden Globes and two BAFTAs. He first came to fame in 1967 with his performance as Buck Barrow in Bonnie and Clyde, in which he gained his first Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. His major subsequent films include I Never Sang for My Father (1970), in which he gained his second Best Supporting Actor nomination; The French Connection (1971) and French Connection II (1975), in which he played Jimmy \"Popeye\" Doyle; The Poseidon Adventure (1972); The Conversation (1974); Superman: The Movie (1978), in which he played arch-villain Lex Luthor; Hoosiers (1986); Mississippi Burning (1988), in which he gained his second Best Actor nomination; Unforgiven (1992); The Firm (1993); Crimson Tide (1995); Get Shorty (1995); The Birdcage (1996); Enemy of the State (1998); Behind Enemy Lines (2001); and The Royal Tenenbaums (2001).\n\nEarly life and education\n\nHackman was born in San Bernardino, California, the son of Eugene Ezra Hackman and Anna Lyda Elizabeth (née Gray). He has one brother, Richard. He has Pennsylvania Dutch (German), English, and Scottish ancestry; his mother was born in Lambton, Ontario. According to a plaque in a city park, he worked for a time as a dog catcher for the local animal shelter. His family moved frequently, finally settling in Danville, Illinois, where they lived in the house of his English-born maternal grandmother, Beatrice. Hackman's father operated the printing press for the Commercial-News, a local paper. As a teenager, Hackman knew Dick Van Dyke, who was friends with his older brother Richard. His parents divorced in 1943 and his father subsequently left the family.\n\nHackman lived briefly in Storm Lake, Iowa and spent his sophomore year at Storm Lake High School. However, he left home at age 16 and lied about his age to enlist in the United States Marine Corps. He served four and a half years as a field radio operator.Stated on Inside the Actors Studio, 2001 He was stationed in China (Qingdao, and later in Shanghai). When the Communist Revolution conquered the mainland in 1949, Hackman was assigned to Hawaii and Japan. Following his discharge, he moved to New York and worked in several jobs. His mother died in 1962 as a result of a fire she accidentally set while smoking. \n\nCareer \n\n1960s \n\nIn 1956, he began pursuing an acting career; he joined the Pasadena Playhouse in California. It was there that he forged a friendship with another aspiring actor, Dustin Hoffman. Already seen as outsiders by their classmates, they were later voted \"The Least Likely To Succeed.\" Determined to prove them wrong, Hackman moved to New York City. A 2004 article in Vanity Fair described how Hackman, Hoffman and Robert Duvall were all struggling California born actors and close friends, sharing apartments in various two-person combinations while living in New York City in the 1960s. To support himself between acting jobs, he was working as a uniformed doorman at a Howard Johnson restaurant in New York when, as bad luck would have it, he ran into a despised Pasadena Playhouse instructor who once told him he was not good enough to be an actor. Reinforcing \"The Least Likely To Succeed\" vote, the man said to him, \"See, Hackman, I told you you wouldn't amount to anything.\" From then on, Hackman was determined to become the finest actor he possibly could. The three former roommates have since earned 19 Academy Award nominations for acting, with five wins.\n\nHackman got various bit roles, for example on the TV series Route 66 in 1963, and began performing in several Off-Broadway plays. In 1964, he had an offer to co-star in the play Any Wednesday with actress Sandy Dennis. This opened the door to film work. His first role was in Lilith, with Warren Beatty in the leading role. In 1967, he appeared in an episode of the television series The Invaders entitled The Spores. Another supporting role, Buck Barrow in 1967's Bonnie and Clyde, earned him an Academy Award nomination as Best Supporting Actor. In 1968, he appeared in an episode of I Spy, in the role of \"Hunter\", in the episode \"Happy Birthday... Everybody\". In 1968, he starred in the CBS Playhouse episode \"My Father and My Mother\". In 1969, he played a ski coach in Downhill Racer and an astronaut in Marooned. Also that year, he played a member of a barnstorming skydiving team that entertained mostly at county fairs: The Gypsy Moths. He nearly accepted the role of Mike Brady for the upcoming TV series, The Brady Bunch, but was advised by his agent to decline in exchange for a more promising role, which he did.\n\n1970s \n\nIn 1971, he was nominated for the Best Supporting Actor Academy Award again, this time for 1970's I Never Sang for My Father, working alongside Melvyn Douglas and Estelle Parsons. The next year, he won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance as New York City Detective Jimmy \"Popeye\" Doyle in The French Connection, marking his graduation to leading man status.\n\nHe followed this with leading roles in the disaster film The Poseidon Adventure (1972) and Francis Ford Coppola's The Conversation (1974), which was nominated for several Oscars. That same year, Hackman appeared in what became one of his most famous comedic roles as the blind hermit in Young Frankenstein.\n\nHe later appeared as one of Teddy Roosevelt's former Rough Riders in the Western horse-race saga Bite the Bullet (1975), as well as in that year's sequel French Connection II. In 1975 he also appeared in the highly regarded—but little viewed—film Night Moves, receiving a BAFTA nomination for lead actor. He appeared in the star-studded war film A Bridge Too Far (1977), as Polish General Stanisław Sosabowski. Hackman showed a talent for both comedy and the \"slow burn\" as criminal mastermind Lex Luthor in Superman: The Movie (1978), as he would in its 1980 and 1987 sequels.\n\n1980s \n\nBy the end of the 1980s, he alternated between leading and supporting roles, earning another Best Actor nomination for Mississippi Burning. He had a memorable part as a Secretary of Defense trying to cover up a homicide in 1987's No Way Out opposite Kevin Costner.\n\nDuring this decade, he also was in Reds, Under Fire, Hoosiers, Power, Uncommon Valor and Bat*21. A 2008 American Film Institute poll voted Hoosiers the fourth-greatest film of all time in the sports genre.\n\n1990s \n\nIn 1990, the actor underwent an angioplasty, which kept him from work for a while, although he found time for Narrow Margin—a remake of The Narrow Margin (1952). In 1992, he played the sadistic sheriff \"Little\" Bill Daggett in the western Unforgiven directed by Clint Eastwood and written by David Webb Peoples which earned him a second Oscar, this time for Best Supporting Actor. The film won Best Picture.\nIn 1993 he appeared in Geronimo: An American Legend as Brigadier General George Crook. He co-starred with Tom Cruise as a corrupt lawyer in The Firm (1993) and appeared in a second John Grisham story in 1996, playing a convict on death row in The Chamber.\n\nIn 1995, he played an inept Hollywood producer-director named Harry Zimm in Get Shorty and the villainous fast-draw champion John Herrod in The Quick and the Dead opposite Sharon Stone, Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe, as well as submarine Captain Frank Ramsey in the film Crimson Tide with Denzel Washington.\n\nIn 1996, he took a comedic turn as conservative Senator Kevin Keeley in The Birdcage with Robin Williams and Nathan Lane. He also co-starred with Will Smith in the 1998 film Enemy of the State, where his character was reminiscent of the one from The Conversation.\n\nHe played a President of the United States who is responsible for a killing in 1997's Absolute Power, re-teaming with director-star Clint Eastwood.\n\n2000s \n\nHackman starred in the David Mamet crime film Heist, as an aging professional thief of considerable skill who is forced into one final job and the comedy Heartbreakers alongside Sigourney Weaver, Ray Liotta and Jennifer Love Hewitt. He had a small part as Arnold Margolese in Gore Verbinski's The Mexican. He also had a leading role as the head of an eccentric family in the ensemble cast film The Royal Tenenbaums and in yet another Grisham legal drama, Runaway Jury, at long last getting to make a picture with his longtime friend Dustin Hoffman. Hackman's final film to date was Welcome to Mooseport (2004), a comedy with Ray Romano, in which he portrayed a former President of the United States.\n\nIn 2003 at the Golden Globes, Hackman was honored with the Cecil B. DeMille Award for his \"outstanding contribution to the entertainment field.\" \n\nRetirement from acting \n\nOn July 7, 2004, Hackman gave a rare interview to Larry King, in which he announced that he had no future film projects lined up and believed his acting career was over. In 2008, while promoting his third novel, he confirmed that he had retired from acting. When asked during a GQ interview in 2011 if he would ever come out of retirement to do one more film, he said he might consider it \"if I could do it in my own house, maybe, without them disturbing anything and just one or two people.\"\n\nCareer as a novelist \n\nTogether with undersea archaeologist Daniel Lenihan, Hackman has written three historical fiction novels: Wake of the Perdido Star (1999), a sea adventure of the 19th century; Justice for None (2004), a Depression-era tale of murder; and Escape from Andersonville (2008) about a prison escape during the Civil War. His first solo effort, a story of love and revenge set in the Old West titled Payback at Morning Peak, was released in 2011. A police thriller, Pursuit, followed in 2013.\n\nIn 2011, he appeared on the Fox Sports Radio show, The Loose Cannons, where he discussed his career and novels with Pat O'Brien, Steve Hartman, and Vic \"The Brick\" Jacobs.\n\nPersonal life \n\nHis first wife was Faye Maltese. They had three children, Christopher Allen, Elizabeth Jean and Leslie Anne Hackman. The couple divorced in 1986 after three decades of marriage. In 1991, he married Betsy Arakawa. They live in Santa Fe, New Mexico.\n\nHackman competed in Sports Car Club of America races driving an open wheeled Formula Ford in the late seventies. In 1983, he drove a Dan Gurney Team Toyota in the 24 Hours of Daytona Endurance Race. He also won the Long Beach Grand Prix Celebrity Race.\n\nHackman is an avid fan of the Jacksonville Jaguars and regularly attended Jaguars games as a guest of then-head coach Jack Del Rio. He is friends with Del Rio from Del Rio's playing days at the University of Southern California. \n\nTheater credits \n\n* Children From Their Games by Irwin Shaw at the Morosco Theatre (April 1963)\n* A Rainy Day in Newark by Howard Teichmann at the Belasco Theatre (October 1963)\n* Come to the Palace of Sin by Michael Shurtleff at the Lucille Lortel Theatre (1963)\n* Any Wednesday by Muriel Resnik at the Music Box Theatre and the George Abbott Theatre (1964–1966)\n* Poor Richard by Jean Kerr with Alan Bates and Shirley Knight at the Helen Hayes Theater (1964–1965)\n* The Natural Look by Leonora Thuna at the Longacre Theatre (1967)\n* Fragments and The Basement by Murray Schisgal at the Cherry Lane Theatre (1967)\n* Death and the Maiden by Ariel Dorfman with Glenn Close and Richard Dreyfuss, directed by Mike Nichols, at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre (1992)\n\nFilmography \n\nAccolades \n\nWorks or publications \n\n* Hackman, Gene, and Daniel Lenihan. [http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/42027535 Wake of the Perdido Star.] New York: Newmarket Press, 1999. ISBN 978-1-557-04398-6\n* Hackman, Gene, and Daniel Lenihan. [http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/54035033 Justice for None.] New York: St. Martins Press, 2004. ISBN 978-0-312-32425-4\n* Hackman, Gene, and Daniel Lenihan. [http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/191865890 Escape from Andersonville: A Novel of the Civil War.] New York: St. Martin's Press, 2008. ISBN 978-0-312-36373-4\n* Hackman, Gene. [http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/798634411 Payback at Morning Peak: A Novel of the American West.] New York: Simon & Schuster Inc, 2011. ISBN 978-1-451-62356-7\n* Hackman, Gene. [http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/857568111 Pursuit.] New York: Pocket Books, 2013. ISBN 978-1-451-62357-4", "The University of Alabama (Alabama or UA) is a public research university located in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, United States, and the flagship of the University of Alabama System. Founded in 1820, UA is the oldest and largest of the public universities in Alabama. UA offers programs of study in 13 academic divisions leading to bachelor's, master's, Education Specialist, and doctoral degrees. The only publicly supported law school in the state is at UA. Other academic programs unavailable elsewhere in Alabama include doctoral programs in anthropology, communication and information sciences, metallurgical engineering, music, Romance languages, and social work.\n\nAs one of the first public universities established in the early 19th century southwestern frontier of the United States, the University of Alabama has left a vast cultural imprint on the state, region and nation over the past two centuries. The school was a center of activity during the American Civil War and the African-American Civil Rights Movement. The University of Alabama varsity football program (nicknamed the Crimson Tide), which was inaugurated in 1892, ranks as one of 10 winningest programs in US history. In a 1913 speech then-president George H. Denny extolled the university as the \"capstone of the public school system in the state [of Alabama],\" lending the university its current nickname, The Capstone. The University of Alabama has consistently been ranked as one of the top 50 public universities in the nation by the U.S. News & World Report. \n\nHistory\n\nIn 1818, Congress authorized the newly created Alabama Territory to set aside a township for the establishment of a \"seminary of learning\". When Alabama was admitted to the Union on December 14, 1819, a second township was added to the land grant, bringing it to a total of 46,000 acres (186 km²). The General Assembly of Alabama established the seminary on December 18, 1820, named it \"The University of the State of Alabama\", and created a Board of Trustees to manage the construction and operation of the university. The board chose as the site of the campus a place which was then just outside the city limits of Tuscaloosa, the state capital at the time. The new campus was designed by William Nichols, also the architect of newly completed Alabama State Capitol building and Christ Episcopal Church. Influenced by Thomas Jefferson's plan at the University of Virginia, the Nichols-designed campus featured a 70 ft wide, 70 ft high domed Rotunda that served as the library and nucleus of the campus. The university's charter was presented to the first university president in the nave of Christ Episcopal Church. UA opened its doors to students on April 18, 1831, with the Reverend Alva Woods as President. \n\nAn academy-style institution during the Antebellum period, the university emphasized the classics and the social and natural sciences. There were around 100 students per year at UA in the 1830s. However, as Alabama was a frontier state and a sizable amount of its territory was still in the hand of various Native American tribes until the 1840s, it lacked the infrastructure to adequately prepare students for the rigors of university education. Consequently, only a fraction of students who enrolled in the early years remained enrolled for long and even fewer graduated. Those who did graduate, however, often had distinguished careers in Alabama and national politics. Early graduates included Benjamin F. Porter and Alexander Meek.\n\nAs the state and university matured, an active literary culture evolved on campus and in Tuscaloosa. UA had one of the largest libraries in the country on the eve of the Civil War with more than 7,000 volumes. There were several thriving literary societies, including the Erosophic and the Phi Beta Kappa societies, which frequently had lectures by such distinguished politicians and literary figures as United States Supreme Court Justice John A. Campbell, novelist William Gilmore Simms, and Professor Frederick Barnard (later president of Columbia University). The addresses to those societies reveal a vibrant intellectual culture in Tuscaloosa; they also illustrate the proslavery ideas that were so central to the University and the state. \n\nDiscipline and student behavior was a major issue at the university almost from the day it opened. Early presidents attempted to enforce strict rules regarding conduct. Students were prohibited from drinking, swearing, making unauthorized visits off-campus, or playing musical instruments outside a one-hour time frame. Yet riots and gunfights were not an uncommon occurrence. To combat the severe discipline problem, president Landon Garland lobbied and received approval from the legislature in 1860 to transform the university into a military school.\n\nMany of the cadets who graduated from the school went on to serve as officers in the Confederate Army during the Civil War. As a consequence of that role, Union troops burned down the campus on April 4, 1865 (only 5 days before Lee's surrender at Appomattox Court House on 9 April), which was unrelated to Sherman's March to the Sea several months earlier and farther east, in Georgia. Despite a call to arms and defense by the student cadet corps, only four buildings survived the burning: the President's Mansion (1841), Gorgas House (1829), Little Round House (1860), and Old Observatory (1844). The university reopened in 1871 and in 1880, Congress granted the university 40,000 acres (162 km²) of coal land in partial compensation for $250,000 in war damages.\n\nThe University of Alabama allowed female students beginning in 1892. The Board of Trustees allowed female students largely due to Julia S. Tutwiler, with the condition that they be over eighteen, and would be allowed to enter the sophomore class after completing their freshman year at another school and passing an exam. Ten women from Tutwiler's Livingston school enrolled for the 1893 fall semester. By 1897, women were allowed to enroll as freshmen. \n\nDuring World War II, UA was one of 131 colleges and universities nationally that took part in the V-12 Navy College Training Program which offered students a path to a Navy commission. \n\nThe first attempt to integrate the university occurred in 1956 when Autherine Lucy successfully enrolled on February 3 as a graduate student in library sciences after having secured a court order preventing the university from rejecting her application on the basis of race. In the face of violent protests against her attendance, Lucy was suspended (and later outright expelled) three days later by the board of trustees on the basis of being unable to provide a safe learning environment for her. The university was not successfully integrated until 1963 when Vivian Malone and James Hood registered for classes on June 11.\n\nGovernor George Wallace made his infamous \"Stand in the Schoolhouse Door\", standing in the front entrance of Foster Auditorium in a symbolic attempt to stop Malone and Hood's enrollment. When confronted by U.S. Deputy Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach and federal marshals sent in by Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, Wallace stepped aside. President John F. Kennedy had called for the integration of the University of Alabama, as well. Although Hood dropped out of school after two months, he subsequently returned and, in 1997, received his PhD in philosophy. Malone persisted in her studies and became the first African American to graduate from the university. In 2000, the university granted her a doctorate of humane letters. Autherine Lucy's expulsion was rescinded in 1980, and she successfully re-enrolled and graduated with a master's degree in 1992. Later in his life, Wallace apologized for his opposition at that time to racial integration. In 2010, the university formally honored Lucy, Hood and Malone by rechristening the plaza in front of Foster Auditorium as Malone-Hood Plaza and erecting a clock tower – Autherine Lucy Clock Tower – in the plaza.\n\nOn April 27, 2011, Tuscaloosa was hit by a tornado with a rating of at least EF4 on the Enhanced Fujita scale. The tornado left a large path of complete destruction but spared the campus. Six students who lived on off-campus premises were confirmed dead by the university. Due to the infrastructural damage of the city (approx. 12% of the city) and the loss of life, the university cancelled the rest of the spring semester and postponed graduation.\n\nCampus\n\nFrom a small campus of seven buildings in the wilderness on the main road between Tuscaloosa and Huntsville (now University Boulevard) in the 1830s, UA has grown to a massive 1970 acre campus in the heart of Tuscaloosa today. There are 297 buildings on campus containing some 10600000 sqft of space. The school recently added 168 acres to its campus after purchasing the Bryce Hospital property in 2010. It also plans to acquire more land to accommodate the continuing growth of the enrollment. \n\nThe university also maintains the University of Alabama Arboretum in eastern Tuscaloosa and the Dauphin Island Sea Lab on Dauphin Island, just off the Alabama gulf coast. In 2011, the Sustainable Endowments Institute gave the university a College Sustainability Report Card grade of \"B+\". \n\nLayout\n\nThe campus is anchored around the 22 acre Quad, which sits at the site of the original campus designed by William Nichols. The Quad is about the same size as that original campus and lies roughly at the geographic center of the modern campus (though recent asymmetrical expansion of the campus northward and eastward has shifted the exact geographic center away). It is cut in half by a line connecting the Gorgas Library on the north end and Denny Chimes, a campanile equipped with a 25-bell carillon, on the south. The west side of the Quad is filled by a grove of trees while the east side of the Quad is open field.\n\nAcademic buildings are grouped into smaller clusters and quads surrounding the main Quad itself. Woods Quad, lying immediately north of the main Quad, was the center of the rebuilt post-Civil War campus before the center shifted back to the Quad. Woods Quad is home to Clark Hall, the home of the College of Arts & Sciences, and the homes of several of the fine arts and humanities departments. East of Quad, the buildings historically housed the natural science and math departments, before more modern facilities opened in the northeast of the campus. (Today, only the physics & astronomy, math, and psychology departments called the Quad home.) Engineering Row, the traditional home of the departments of the College of Engineering, is located to the northeast. Northwest of the Quad are buildings housing humanities and social sciences departments. To the west of the Quad lie the buildings of the colleges of commerce and education. Finally, the College of Communication and Information Sciences, the College of Human Environmental Sciences, and the School of Social Work flank the Quad to the south from west to east, respectively.\n\nAs the university has grown more academic buildings have moved further out from the Quad. The Science and Engineering Complex on the northeast periphery of the campus will house many science and engineering departments. The facilities of the School of Law, the School of Music (a division of the College of Arts and Sciences), the College of Nursing, and the College of Community Health Sciences are located on the far eastern edges of campus. The College of Continuing Education is located in Parham Hall further south of the Quad.\n\nFurther out from the Quad are more student support services and research facilities that are not vital to the day-to-day needs of students. The Ferguson Center, commonly known as \"the Ferg\", is the student center on campus, and is located north of Woods Quad. The three main dining halls are located on the north and south sides of campus (Lakeside Dining Hall on the north and Burke Dining Hall on the south) and near Rodgers Library (Fresh Foods Dining). Most residence halls are located on the north and south sides of campus. Commuter parking decks on located on the periphery of campus, as are student recreational facilities, such as the intramural fields and the Campus Recreation Center.\n\nAthletic facilities generally flank the far southern and far eastern edges of campus. Bryant-Denny Stadium is in the southwestern edge of the campus and Coleman Coliseum is in the southeastern edge of campus, near the law school.\n\nThe entire campus has been served since 2007 by the CrimsonRide shuttle bus system. \n\nLandmarks\n\nUA is home to several museums, cultural facilities and historical landmarks.\n\nThe Alabama Museum of Natural History at Smith Hall exhibits Alabama's rich natural history. The oddest artifact there could be the Sylacauga meteorite, the largest known extraterrestrial object to strike a human being who survived. The Paul W. Bryant Museum houses memorabilia and exhibits on the history of UA athletic programs, most notably the tenure of football coach Paul \"Bear\" Bryant. Athletic trophies and awards are displayed at the Mal Moore Athletic Building near the Bryant Museum. The Sarah Moody Gallery of Art at Garland Hall hosts revolving exhibitions of contemporary art, including from the university's own permanent collection. The Ferguson Art Gallery at the Ferguson Center also hosts revolving art exhibitions. The Jones Archaeological Museum at Moundville exhibits the history of Mississippian culture in Alabama.\n\nNumerous historical landmarks dot the campus, including the President's Mansion, Denny Chimes, Foster Auditorium (a National Historical Landmark), the Gorgas–Manly Historic District, and Maxwell Observatory.\n\nA cemetery next to the Biology building includes the graves of two slaves who were owned by faculty members before the Civil War. Both men died in the 1840s, and their graves went unmarked until 2004. \n\nCampus culture facilities include the Bert Man Jrs. Theater, the Marion Gallaway Theater, Morgan Auditorium, and the Frank M. Moody Music Building, which houses the Tuscaloosa Symphony Orchestra and the UA Opera Theatre, as well as three resident choirs.\n\nOrganization and administration\n\nThe University of Alabama is an autonomous institution within the University of Alabama System, which is governed by the Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama and headed by Chancellor of the University of Alabama. The board was created by the state legislature to govern the operations of the university. Its responsibilities include setting policy for the university, determining the mission and scope of the university, and assuming ultimate responsibility for the university to the public and the legislature. The board is self-perpetuating and currently composed of 15 members and two ex officio members. The makeup of the board is dictated by the Constitution of the State of Alabama, and requires that the board be made up of three members from the congressional district that contains the Tuscaloosa campus, and two members from every other congressional district in Alabama. Board members are elected by the board and are confirmed by the Alabama State Senate. Board members may serve three consecutive six-year terms. \n\nThe President of the University of Alabama is the principal executive officer of the university and is appointed by the chancellor with approval of the Board of Trustees. The president reports directly to the chancellor, and is responsible for the daily operations of the university. The president's office is located on the third floor of the Rose Administration Building, and the president has the privilege of living in the President's Mansion on campus. Stuart R. Bell became the 29th university president on July 15, 2015. \n\nThe university faculty numbers 1,175 and the staff numbers 3,513. 829 held the rank of assistant professor or higher. 922 faculty members were full-time. 527 were tenured with 244 on tenure track. 13.8% (114) were minorities and 34.7% (287) were women.\n\nColleges and academic divisions\n\nThere are 13 academic divisions at the University of Alabama (see the table). Eight of those divisions (A&S, C&BA, C&IS, Education, Engineering, HES, Nursing, and Social Work) grant undergraduate degrees. Degrees in those eight divisions at the master's, specialist, and doctoral level are awarded through the Graduate School. The law school offers J.D. and LL.M. degree programs. CHS provides advanced studies in medicine and related disciplines and operates a family medicine residency program. Medical students are also trained in association with the University of Alabama School of Medicine, from which they receive their degree.\n\nThe College of Continuing Studies provides correspondence courses and other types of distance education opportunities for non-traditional students. It operates a distance education facility in Gadsden.\n\nFounded in 1971 and merged into the College of Arts and Sciences in 1996, the New College program allows undergraduate students more flexibility in choosing their curriculum while completing a Bachelor of Arts or Bachelor of Science degree. The program allows students to create a \"depth study\" in a particular field chosen by the student. The student completes approved independent studies alongside their normal coursework. The objective of New College is to inspire interdisciplinary learning at the undergraduate level.\n\nThe Honors College is a non-degree granting division that encompasses all the university's honors programs.\n\nEndowment\n\nThe University of Alabama System's financial endowment was valued at $995 million in the National Association of College and University Business Officers' (NACUBO) 2011 ranking, up 16.5% from its 2010 value. UA's portion of the system's endowment was valued at over $617.6 million in September 2013. \n\nIn 2002, the university embarked on a $500 million capital campaign entitled \"Our Students. Our Future.\" The focus of the campaign was stated to be \"student scholarships, faculty support, campus facilities and priority needs\" by adding $250 million to university endowment and an additional $250 to the non-endowed funds. The \"quiet phase\" (which lasted until 2006) of the campaign raised $299 million. In November 2007, the university announced that it had raised $428 million. The $500 million goal was surpassed in May 2008 and when the campaign officially concluded in 2009, it had raised $612 million. \n\nIt was recently reported that The University of Alabama's 2014 financial endowment was valued at $667,980,131. \n\nAcademics\n\nThe University of Alabama is a large, four-year primarily residential research university accredited by the South Association of Colleges and Schools. Full-time, four-year undergraduates comprise a large amount of the total university enrollment. The undergraduate instructional program emphasizes professional programs of study as well as the liberal arts, and there a high level of co-existence between the graduate and undergraduate program. The university has a \"high level\" of research activity (below the highest \"very high level\" classification) and has a \"comprehensive doctoral\" graduate instructional program in the liberal arts, humanities, social sciences and STEM fields, though it lacks health and veterinary sciences professional programs.\n\nUA was one of the first universities in the nation to offer an engineering degree. Over the last decade, UA has greatly expanded its science and engineering programs, in terms of numbers of students, faculty hired, and number and size of new academic/research facilities (almost 1 million in new square footage). UA now enrolls more undergraduate engineering students than any university in the state, though Auburn University still has the largest overall Engineering program, due to its larger Graduate program in Engineering. UA's freshman engineering classes have also had the highest average ACT score among all state of Alabama engineering programs for the last several years. \n\nUA conferred 6,003 degrees in academic year 2009–2010, including 4,284 bachelor's degrees, 1,339 master's degrees, 209 doctorates and 171 professional degrees. Latin honors are conferred on graduates completing a bachelor's degree for the first time (including at other universities) with an overall grade point average of at least 3.5. Cum laude honors are conferred to graduates with a GPA of 3.5 or greater and less than 3.7 (without rounding). Magna cum laude honors are conferred with a GPA of 3.7 or greater and less than 3.9. Summa cum laude honors are conferred with a GPA of 3.9 or higher. \n\nThe university follows a standard academic calendar based on the semester system, which divides the academic year, starting in mid-August, into two 15-week semesters (fall and spring) and the summer. The fall semester ends in December and the spring term lasts from January to early May. The summer, which lasts from mid-May to August, is divided into a 3-week \"mini-semester\" in May and two four-week sessions in June and July, respectively. \n\nOf UA's faculty, 6.55% are Black, which is one of the highest percentages among state flagships in the nation. In 2005, UA had the highest percentage of Black faculty of any state flagship The percentage of Alabamians that is Black is 25%, and the percentage of Black students at UA is 12.2%, which is one of the largest enrollments of Black students among state flagships. \n\nStudent body profile\n\nFall Freshman statistics\n\nIn fall 2015, the university had an enrollment of 37,098, consisting of 31,958 undergraduates, 4,649 graduate students, and 491 professional degree students from all 67 Alabama counties and all 50 states. Alabama residents comprised 46.3% of the undergraduate student body, out-of-state students were 49.6%, and international students 4.1%.\n\nThe five Alabama counties with the highest enrollment of students are Jefferson, Tuscaloosa, Madison, Shelby and Mobile, while the five states (beside Alabama) with the highest enrollment of students are Georgia, Florida, Texas, Tennessee and Virginia.\n\nIn fall 2015, the university received 36,203 applications for first-time freshman enrollment, from which 19,400 applications were accepted (53.6%) and 7,211 freshmen enrolled. Of the 78% of enrolled freshmen who submitted ACT scores; the middle 50 percent Composite score was between 22 and 31 (21–29 Math, 23–32 English, 7–8 Writing). Among the 2015 freshman class, 25% of students had an ACT score of 32 or higher. 36% of UA freshmen had an ACT of 30 or higher. Of the 21% of the incoming freshman class who submitted SAT scores; the middle 50 percent scores were 490-600 for Reading, 490–610 for Math, and 480–600 for Writing. The average high school GPA of incoming freshman was 3.66; 87% had a GPA of 3.00 or higher.\n\nThe University of Alabama ranked 1st in the nation among public universities in the enrollment of National Merit Scholars in 2013. \n\nUA graduates include 15 Rhodes Scholars, 29 Goldwater Scholars, 12 Truman Scholars, 13 Hollings Scholars, two Javits Fellows, one Gates Scholar, one Portz Scholar, and one Udall Scholar. Numbers of UA graduates have been named to the USA Today All-USA College Academic Team. \n\nRankings\n\nThe University of Alabama has consistently ranked as a top 50 public university in the nation by the U.S. News & World Report and has a selectivity rating of \"more selective\". The university has a relatively low acceptance rate of 51% as of 2014. \n\nIn the 2016 USN&WR rankings, UA was tied for 96th in the National Universities category (tied for 43rd among the public schools in the category, and 1st among universities in Alabama). Several of UA's schools are ranked individually. In the 2016 U.S. News ranking, the UA law school was tied for 22nd in the nation, the business school was tied for 58th, the nursing school tied for 61st, and the engineering school was tied for 104th.\n\nLibraries\n\nThe University of Alabama has 2.9 million document volumes, along with nearly 100,000 uncataloged government documents in its collection; of these 2.5 million volumes are held by the University Libraries. The University Libraries system has six separate libraries.\n\nThe Amelia Gayle Gorgas Library, which sits on the Main Quad, is the oldest and largest of the university libraries. Gorgas Library holds the university's collections in the humanities and social sciences, as well as the university's depository of US government documents. The library opened in 1939 as a four-story Greek Revival structure on the site of the original university Rotunda and was named after the long-time university librarian and wife of eighth university president Josiah Gorgas. A seven-story addition was built behind the library in the 1970s. \n\nThe Angelo Bruno Business Library, located in the Business Quad, is named after the co-founder of the Bruno's grocery chain who gave the university $4 million to create a library focusing on commerce and business studies. Opened in 1994, the 64000 sqft, three-story facility holds over 170,000 volumes. Bruno Library also houses the 9500 sqft Sloan Y. Bashinsky Sr. Computer Center. \n\nThe Eric and Sarah Rodgers Library for Science and Engineering, located in the Science and Engineering Quad, is named after two popular, long-time professors of engineering and statistics, respectively. It opened in 1990, combining the Science Library collection in Lloyd Hall and the Engineering Library collection in the Mineral Industries Building (now known as HM Comer Hall). Rodgers Library was designed with help from IBM to incorporate the latest in informatics. McLure Education Library was founded in 1954 in a remodeled student union annex (across the street from the old Student Union, now Reese Phifer Hall) and named in 1974 after John Rankin McLure, the longtime Dean of the College of Education. The William Stanley Hoole Special Collections Library, which holds the university's collection of rare and historical documents and books, is located in Mary Harmon Bryant Hall. The Library Annex holds seldom-used books and journals, as well as other volumes which need special protection, that would otherwise take up valuable space in the libraries.\n\nOther libraries on campus are independent of the University Libraries. The 66000 sqft Bounds Law Library, located at the Law Center, holds more than 300,000 volumes. Established in 1978, the Health Sciences Library, located at the University Medical Center, serves students at the College of Community Health Sciences. Its 20,000-volume collection include clinical medicine, family practice, primary care, medical education, consumer health, and related health care topics. Located in Farah Hall (home of the Department of Geography) the Map Library and Place Names Research Center holds over 270,000 maps and 75,000 aerial photographs. The William E. Winter Reading Room of the College of Communication and Information Sciences is located in Reese Phifer Hall and holds over 10,000 volumes. The School of Social Work Reading Room is located in Little Hall and just around 200 volumes. \n\nUA is one of the 126 members of the Association of Research Libraries, which yearly compiles internal rankings. In 2011, the University of Alabama ranked 56th among all criteria, a marked improvement over a 2003 ranking of 97th. \n\nIn the fall of 2011, the University of Alabama Trustees approved a resolution to expand Gorgas Library by 50000 sqft, doubling the seating capacity from 1,139 to 2,278. This expansion will also signal the beginning of the construction of an Academic Honors Plaza, between the library and Clark Hall. The plaza will include green-space, fountains, benches, and decorative lighting. \n\nResearch\n\nIn FY 2010, UA received $68.6 million in government research contracts and grants. The Alabama International Trade Center and the Center for Advanced Public Safety are two research centers at UA.\n\nSECU: SEC Academic Initiative\n\nThe University of Alabama is a member of the SEC Academic Consortium. Now renamed the SECU, the initiative was a collaborative endeavor designed to promote research, scholarship and achievement amongst the member universities in the Southeastern conference. The SECU formed its mission to serve as a means to bolster collaborative academic endeavors of Southeastern Conference universities. Its goals include highlighting the endeavors and achievements of SEC faculty, students and its universities and advancing the academic reputation of SEC universities. \n\nIn 2013, the University of Alabama participated in the SEC Symposium in Atlanta, Georgia which was organized and led by the University of Georgia and the UGA Bioenergy Systems Research Institute. The topic of the Symposium was titled, the \"Impact of the Southeast in the World's Renewable Energy Future.\" \n\nStudent life\n\nWith more than 30,000 students enrolled, the university has a substantial student life component. With enrollment increasing in the 2000s, faculty have been added to limit increases in student to instructor ratio.[http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/article/20070917/NEWS/709170305/1010/NEWS05 \"Pains will come with school's gains, but all will benefit\"]. Tuscaloosa News, September 17, 2007. Student housing, and other facilities are being added to accommodate the growth.\n\nResidential life\n\nThe board of trustees chose to locate the UA campus in a field a mile away from the center of the town of Tuscaloosa (a considerable distance in the early 19th century Alabama). The board consciously chose to make on-campus residence an integral part of the student experience at UA. Dormitories were among the first buildings erected at Alabama (the remains of one (Franklin Hall) is now the Mound on the Quad), and student residential life has been emphasized at UA ever since. Today nearly 30% of students live on campus, including over 90% of first-year freshmen.\n\nThe Office of Housing and Residential Communities manages 18 housing communities for undergraduate students. Housing options range from traditional dormitories with community bathroom to suite-style dorms to full-amenity apartments. Housing is clustered for the most part on the northern and southern sides of campus, with the newest housing on the northern side of campus. Due the rapid increase in enrollment in recent years and freshman residence requirement, most housing on campus is reserved for freshmen, with housing given to upperclassmen where room is available. Most upperclassmen, and all graduate students, married students and students with family live off campus.\n\nStudent government\n\nThe Student Government Association is the primary student advocacy organization at UA. The SGA is governed by the SGA Constitution and consists of a legislative branch, an executive branch and a judicial council. The legislative branch is composed of the Senate and the First Year Council. The Senate is composed of 50 members elected by proportional representation of the total student enrollment from each of the degree-granting colleges (i.e. all but Honors, Community Health Sciences, and Continuing Studies). The Senate is headed by a speaker that is chosen from among the membership of the Senate. The executive branch is composed of the Executive Council and the Executive Cabinet. The Executive Council is composed of the seven constitutional officers who are elected by the entirety of the student body and the appointed Chief of Staff while the Executive Cabinet is composed of non-constitutional appointed executive officers. The Executive Council is also empowered by the constitution to create, with the assent of the Senate, any number of appointed director positions to assist the council in the fulfillment of its duties.\n\nThe Student Judiciary is the judicial branch of the Student Government Association (SGA). Assisted by three clerks, the Chief Justice and the twenty-one Associate Justices have jurisdiction over a variety of cases, including parking ticket appeals, football ticket penalty appeals, and non-academic violations of the Code of Student Conduct. Though these three categories make up the majority of the judiciary's caseload, they also consider cases involving the SGA Constitution, SGA elections, and the impeachment of SGA officials.\n\nOther important student advocacy organizations include the Graduate Student Association, the Student Bar Association, and the Honors College Assembly.\n\nSGA controversy\n\nSince its founding in 1914, a secretive coalition of fraternities and sororities, commonly known as \"The Machine\", has wielded enormous influence over the Student Government Association. Occurrences of harassment, intimidation, and even criminal activities aimed at opposition candidates have been reported. Many figures in local, state, and national politics have come out of the SGA at the University of Alabama. Esquire devoted its April 1992 cover story to an exposé of The Machine. The controversy led to the university disbanding the SGA in 1993, which wasn't undone until 1996. \"Machine\" fraternities and sororities have traditionally accepted only white pledges, with only one documented case of an African American student being offered entry, in 2003. \n\nControversy surrounding The Machine reemerged in August 2013, when sororities and fraternities were mobilized to elect two former SGA presidents, Cason Kirby and Lee Garrison, in closely contested municipal school board races. Before election day, questions about illegal voter registration were raised when evidence emerged that indicated eleven fraternity members fraudulently claimed to be living in a single house in one district. And on election day, leaked emails suggested that sorority/fraternity members may have been provided incentives to vote—including free drinks at local bars. As a result of possible voter fraud, Kirby's opponent has filed a lawsuit challenging the election results and University of Alabama faculty have questioned whether The Machine has corrupted the democratic process in the City of Tuscaloosa. \n\nGreek life\n\nGreek letter organizations (GLOs) first appeared at the university in 1847 when two men visiting from Yale University installed a chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon. When DKE members began holding secret meetings in the old state capitol building that year, the administration strongly voiced its disapproval. Over a few more decades, 7 other fraternities appeared at UA: Alpha Delta Phi in 1850, Phi Gamma Delta in 1855, Sigma Alpha Epsilon in 1856 (this was the founding chapter), Kappa Sigma in 1867, Sigma Nu in 1874, Sigma Chi in 1876, and Phi Delta Theta in 1877. Anti-fraternity laws were imposed that year, but were lifted in the 1890s. Women at the university founded the Zeta Chapter of Kappa Delta sorority in 1903. Alpha Delta Pi soon followed.\n\nBetween 1974 and 1976, several Greek-letter Organizations affiliated with the National Pan-Hellenic Council (with African-American origins) established chapters at the University, and had chapter houses. Alpha Kappa Alpha was the first historically-Black sorority to have a house at the University's Sorority Row alongside the predominantly white sororities. The first Greek-letter organization to have a racially integrated roster was Zeta Phi Beta Sorority in 1986. One of the fraternities at the University maintained a diverse membership of Black, White, and Latino for over two decades, from 1987 to 2008 (Phi Beta Sigma, which was the first to integrate at Alabama in 1987).\n\nIn fall 2009, the university sanctioned 29 men's and 23 women's GLOs. Additionally, an unknown number of non-sanctioned GLOs also existed. Four governing boards oversee the operations of the university-sanctioned GLOs: the Interfraternity Council (IFC), the Panhellenic Association, the National Pan-Hellenic Council (NPHC) and the Unified Greek Council (UGC).\n\nIn 2012, 23% of male undergraduates were in university-sanctioned fraternities, including 28% of male freshman. 33% of women undergraduates, including 43% of female freshman were in university-sanctioned sororities.\n\nThe number of men in GLOs more than doubled from 2002 to 2009, with fifteen fraternities reporting active memberships of more than one hundred (where as recently as 2001 none reported memberships greater than 100). Following 2008 fall recruitment, almost all Panhellenic sororities participating through all rounds had potential new member class sizes of 80 or more; nearly all Panhellenic sororities also now have more than 200 total members. To accommodate growth in the student population since 2005, the university has sanctioned three new fraternities and two new sororities. Additionally, four new sorority houses will be added built behind the President's Mansion. \n\nDe facto voluntary segregation on the part of Alabama's Greek system has been considered problematic for many years. John P. Hermann, a now-retired English professor, tried in the 1990s and 2000s to end what he referred to as \"taxpayer-supported segregation\". Controversy erupted again in September 2013, when a story in the campus paper, The Crimson White, revealed that alumnae of Greek organizations had prevented a black student from being accepted in an all-white sorority. As a result, the Alabama Panhellenic Association allowed recruitment to continue through continuous open bidding. According to TIME, a deal that would allow black women to join white sororities was announced by the university as \"the first step toward ending more than a century of systematic segregation in the school's sorority system\". \n\nHonor societies\n\nSeveral honor societies are present at the University of Alabama. Some honor societies are national organizations with a local chapter while others are local organizations.\n\n* Alpha Epsilon Delta\n* Alpha Lambda Delta\n* Alpha Psi Omega\n* Arnold Air Society\n* Blue Key\n* Golden Key International Honour Society\n* Lambda Pi Eta\n* Lambda Sigma\n* Mallet Assembly\n* Mortar Board\n\n* National Society of Collegiate Scholars\n* Order of Omega\n* Omicron Delta Kappa\n* Phi Alpha Theta\n* Phi Beta Kappa\n* Phi Eta Sigma\n* Phi Kappa Phi\n* Pi Mu Epsilon\n* Sigma Alpha Lambda\n* Sigma Tau Delta\n* Who's Who\n\nStudent media\n\nNumerous media outlets are operated by or in conjunction with the university. Student-produced media outlets are all managed by the Office of Student Media, itself controlled by the university-sanctioned Media Planning Board. However, all student publications are editorially independent of the university. The OSM oversees the production of one newspaper, one yearbook, three scholarly publications, and the student-run radio station.\n\nThe Crimson White is the student-produced newspaper. Published two times a week during the academic year and weekly during the summer, the CW normally distributes 15,000 copies per publication. The CW received a 2010 Mark of Excellence Award for \"Best All-Around Daily Student Newspaper at a Four-Year College or University\" in the Southeast region by the Society of Professional Journalists. The CW won the Mark of Excellence Award again in 2011 and a Gold Crown Award from the Columbia Scholastic Press Association for its spring 2011 issues. The Crimson White was also inducted into the College Media Hall of Fame for its coverage of the April 2011 tornado that caused massive damage in Tuscaloosa. \n\nFirst published in 1892, Corolla is the official yearbook of the university. It is produced annually by students and is the oldest student-run publication on campus.\n\nThe Black Warrior Review is the university's widely distributed and influential literary journal managed and published by graduate students (primarily from the English and Creative Writing departments). Founded in 1974, BWR publishes local, regional, and nationally known writers, poets, and visual artists. Since 1990, UA has also published the Marr's Field Journal, an undergraduate literary journal published by and composed of material from UA 's undergraduates. Like its \"big brother,\" MFJ publishes fiction, poetry, and graphic art. The Southern Historian is a journal of Southern history written, edited, and produced entirely by graduate students in the Department of History. Southern Historian features articles on all aspects of Southern history, culture and book reviews in all fields of U.S. History.\n\nWVUA-FM, \"90.7 The Capstone\", formerly known as \"New Rock 90.7\", is one of the older college radio stations in the nation, tracing its roots back to 1940. It carries a variety of music programming and broadcasts the games of several of the university's sports teams.\n\nAthletics and traditions\n\nThe University of Alabama's intercollegiate athletic teams are known as the Alabama Crimson Tide (this name can be shortened to Alabama, the Crimson Tide, or even the Tide). The nickname Crimson Tide originates from a 1907 football game versus Auburn University in Birmingham where, after a hard-fought game in torrential rain in which Auburn had been heavily favored to win, Alabama forced a tie. Writing about the game, one sportswriter described the offensive line as a \"Crimson Tide\", in reference to their jerseys, stained red from the wet dirt.\n\nAlabama competes primarily in the Southeastern Conference (Western Division) of the NCAA's Division I. Alabama fields men's varsity teams in football, basketball, baseball, golf, cross country, swimming and diving, tennis, and track and field. Women's varsity teams are fielded in basketball, golf, cross country, gymnastics, rowing, soccer, softball, swimming and diving, tennis, track and field, and volleyball. The Athletic facilities on campus include the Bryant-Denny Stadium, named after legendary football coach Paul \"Bear\" Bryant and former UA President George Denny, and the 14,619-seat Coleman Coliseum. Alabama's women's rowing team competes in the Big 12 conference of the NCAA's Division I.\n\nAlabama maintains athletic rivalries with Auburn University and the University of Tennessee. The rivalry with Auburn is especially heated as it encompasses all sports. The annual Alabama-Auburn football game is nicknamed the Iron Bowl. While the rivalry with Tennessee is centered around football for the most part, there is no shortage of acrimony here, especially given the recent history between then-UT Coach Phillip Fulmer and his relationship to the Tide's most recent NCAA probation. There are also rivalries with Louisiana State University (football and baseball), University of Mississippi (football and men's basketball), Mississippi State University (football, men's basketball), University of Georgia (women's gymnastics), and the University of Florida (football, softball).\n\nFootball\n\nThe University of Alabama football program, started in 1892, has won 25 SEC titles and 16 national championships (including 9 awarded by the Associated Press and 8 by the Coaches Poll). The program has compiled 31 10-win seasons and 59 bowl appearances, winning 32 of them – all NCAA records. Alabama has produced 18 hall-of-famers, 97 All-Americans honored 105 times, and 2 Heisman trophy winners (Mark Ingram, Jr. and Derrick Henry).\n\nThe Crimson Tide's current home venue, Bryant-Denny Stadium, opened in 1929 with a capacity of around 12,000. The most recent addition of the stadium was completed in 2010. An upper deck was added in the south end zone, completing the upper deck around the stadium. The current official capacity of the stadium is 101,821. The previous addition was the north end zone expansion, completed 2006. The Tide has also played many games, including the Iron Bowl against rival Auburn University, at Legion Field in Birmingham.\n\nNearly synonymous with Alabama football is legendary coach Paul \"Bear\" Bryant whose record at the University of Alabama was 232–46–9. He led the Crimson Tide to 6 national titles in 1961, 1964, 1965, 1973, 1978, and 1979, which is tied with Notre Dame's legendary coach Knute Rockne. Additionally, the 1966 team was the only one in the country to finish with a perfect record, but poll voters denied the 12–0 Alabama team the three-peat as Michigan State and Notre Dame played each other to a 10–10 tie in what was considered the \"Game of the Century\" and subsequently split the national championship.\n\nOn December 12, 2009, sophomore running back Mark Ingram was awarded the Heisman Trophy as college football's best player. In being so named, Ingram became the first Heisman Trophy winner for the University of Alabama. Alabama defeated Texas 37–21 in the BCS Championship game on January 7, 2010, capping a perfect season, an SEC Championship, and winning its first national championship in the BCS era. Alabama defeated Louisiana State University 21-0 on January 9, 2012, to win its second BCS National Championship. Alabama won its third BCS National Championship in January 2013 defeating Notre Dame 42–14, becoming the first school to win three BCS Titles. On January 1, 2015 #1 Alabama lost to #4 Ohio St. in the second game of the first College Football Playoffs 42-35. On January 11, 2016, Alabama defeated Clemson to win the National Championship, 45-40.\n\nSchool songs\n\nThe school's fight song is \"Yea Alabama\", written in 1926 by Lundy Sykes, then editor of the campus newspaper. Sykes composed the song in response to a contest by the Rammer Jammer to create a fight song following Alabama's first Rose Bowl victory. The song as it currently played by the Million Dollar Band during games (the form known to most people) is simply the chorus of the larger song. While the opening line of song is taken to be Yea Alabama, Crimson Tide!, the correct opening line is Yea, Alabama! Drown 'em Tide! The Alabama Alma Mater is set to the tune of Annie Lisle, a ballad written in the 1850s. The lyrics are usually credited as, \"Helen Vickers, 1908\", although it is not clear whether that was when it was written or if that was her graduating class.\n\nNotable alumni" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Dirty_Harry_(character).txt" ], "title": [ "Dirty Harry (character)" ], "wiki_context": [ "Inspector Harold Francis \"Dirty Harry\" Callahan is a fictional character in the Dirty Harry film series, encompassing Dirty Harry (1971), Magnum Force (1973), The Enforcer (1976), Sudden Impact (1983) and The Dead Pool (1988). Callahan is portrayed by Clint Eastwood in each movie.\n\nFrom his debut, Callahan became the template for a new kind of movie cop: an antihero who does not hesitate to cross professional and ethical boundaries in pursuit of his own vision of justice, especially when the law is poorly served by an inept bureaucracy.\n\nCallahan is often considered a film icon, so much so that his nickname, \"Dirty Harry\", has entered the lexicon as slang for ruthless police officers. All of the Dirty Harry films feature Callahan killing criminals, mostly in gunfights. Phrases he utters in armed stand-offs,\" Go ahead, make my day \" and \" [...] you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do ya, punk? \" have become iconic. As the 1971 film was criticized for carrying fascist, or at least authoritarian, undertones, the sequels attempted to be more balanced by pitting Harry against villains from a broader ideological spectrum; notably in 1973's Magnum Force, in which Harry is shown fighting vigilantism. \n\nBiography\n\nCallahan is an Inspector with the San Francisco Police Department, usually with the Homicide department, although for disciplinary or political reasons he is occasionally transferred to other less prominent units, such as Personnel (in The Enforcer) or Stakeout (in Magnum Force) or just sent out of town on mundane research assignments (in Sudden Impact). Callahan's primary concern is protecting and avenging the victims of violent crime. Though proficient at apprehending criminals, his methods are often unconventional; while some claim that he is prepared to ignore the law and professional and ethical boundaries, regarding them as needless red tape hampering justice, his methods are usually within the law – he takes advantage of situations that justify his use of deadly force, sometimes almost creating those situations. When a group of men holding hostages in a liquor store in The Enforcer demand a getaway car, Callahan delivers one by driving the car through the store's plate glass window and then shooting the robbers. Rather than following the rules of the police department, Callahan inserts himself into the scene of the event at a time when the imminent use of deadly force by the criminals justifies his use of deadly force against the criminals. Conversely, in Sudden Impact when he finds out that Jennifer Spencer (Sondra Locke), the person responsible for a series of murders in San Francisco and San Paulo, was a rape victim killing her unpunished rapists, he lets her go free, indicating that he feels her retribution was justified. In The Dead Pool Callahan shoots a fleeing and unarmed Mafia assassin in the back and kills the villain in the end with a harpoon knowing that the man's pistol is out of ammunition. \n\nCallahan goes a step further in Dirty Harry, in which he shoots serial killer Charles \"Scorpio\" Davis after Davis surrenders and put his hands in the air. Determined to know the location of a 14-year-old girl that Davis has kidnapped and buried alive, Callahan then presses his foot onto Davis' leg wound, ignoring Davis's pleas for a doctor and a lawyer until Davis gives up the location of the kidnapped girl. Callahan is later informed by the District Attorney that because Callahan kicked in the door of Davis' residence without a warrant, and because Davis' confession of the girl's location was made under the duress of torture, the evidence against him is inadmissible, and Davis has been released without charges filed against him. Callahan explains his outlook to the Mayor of San Francisco, who asks how Callahan ascertains that a man he had shot was intending to commit rape; the inspector responds, \"When a naked man is chasing a woman through an alley with a butcher knife and a hard-on, I figure he isn't out collecting for the Red Cross.\"\n\nWhile his partners and many other officers respect and admire Callahan, others see him as unfit to serve on the police force. He often clashes with superiors who dislike Callahan's methods, and judges and prosecutors are wary of handling his cases because of frequent violations of the Fourth Amendment and other irregularities. A police commissioner admits that Callahan's \"unconventional methods ... get results\", but adds that his successes are \"more costly to the city and this department in terms of publicity and physical destruction than most other men's failures\". (The publicity makes him well known; in Sudden Impact, the police chief of another city calls him \"the famous Harry Callahan\".) Callahan is often reprimanded, suspended, and demoted to minor departments. At the start of Magnum Force Lt. Briggs transfers him to stakeout. In The Enforcer Captain McKay assigns him to personnel. In Sudden Impact he is threatened with a transfer to traffic and being fired, and in The Enforcer he begins a 180-day suspension imposed by McKay. According to film critic Roger Ebert, \"it would take an hour in each of these movies to explain why he's not in jail\". \n\nThe films routinely depict Callahan as being a skilled marksman and strong hand-to-hand combatant, killing at least one man with his bare hands. He is a multiple winner of the SFPD's pistol championship. In the five movies, Callahan is shown killing a combined total of 43 criminals, mostly with his trademark revolver, a Smith & Wesson Model 29 .44 Magnum, which he describes as \"the most powerful handgun in the world\". He refuses to join the secret police death squad in Magnum Force, as he prefers the present system, despite its flaws, to the vigilante alternative. In his fight against criminals, however, including the fellow officers on the death squad, Callahan is merciless and shows no hesitation or remorse at killing them.\n\nIn Dirty Harry, several explanations are suggested for his nickname. When his partner Chico Gonzalez asks of its origins, Frank DiGiorgio says that \"that's one thing about our Harry; [he] doesn't play any favorites. Harry hates everybody: Limeys, Micks, Hebes, Fat Dagos, Niggers, Honkies, Chinks, you name it.\" Even though Frank was lying and Callahan is not a racist. After being called to talk down a jumper, Callahan states he is known as Dirty Harry because he is assigned to \"every dirty job that comes along\". When Harry is ordered to deliver ransom money to Scorpio, Gonzalez opines \"no wonder they call him Dirty Harry; [he] always gets the shit end of the stick\". In Dirty Harry Gonzalez humorously suggests that Callahan's nickname may have an alternate origin given that he twice ends up peeking through a naked woman's window and later follows a suspect into a strip club.\n\nThe movies reveal little about Callahan's personal background. In the first film, Callahan tells his partner's wife that his wife was killed by a drunk driver. She appears in Magnum Force in an old photograph which Harry turns around. The doctor tending to him after the first film's bank robbery intimates that \"us Potrero Hill boys gotta stick together\". The first film's novelization explains that Callahan grew up in this neighborhood and describes a hostile relationship between the police and the residents. Callahan recalls once throwing a brick at a cop, who picked it up and threw it back at him. The following sequels show that Harry lives within the city limits in a small studio apartment on Jackson St. in the Nob Hill area, so unfamiliar with his neighbours that they refer to him only as 'the cop who lives upstairs'. In Magnum Force Harry's friend Charlie McCoy says \"We should have done our 20 in the Marines\", indicating that they served (or could/should have served) together in the armed forces. In The Dead Pool, a coffee mug on Harry's desk at the police station bears the United States Marine Corps seal and in The Enforcer he is already checked out on the LAWS rocket, a USMC weapon. His hobbies appear to consist of target shooting and playing pool (which we see him doing in The Enforcer). He appears to subsist on a diet of only hot dogs, hamburgers and strong black coffee which he takes without sugar and is so unchanging that he simply orders 'The usual' from the staff off his regular eateries (in The Dead Pool he samples his girlfriend's unknown dessert but doesn't have one himself). He drinks beer (and on one occasion apple juice) and both runs and weightlifts in the gym. In Sudden Impact he acquires a pet bulldog called 'Meathead' but there is no sign of him in The Dead Pool.\n\nWeapons\n\nCallahan's signature weapon is a Smith & Wesson Model 29 .44 Magnum revolver, which he describes as \"the most powerful handgun in the world\" and uses in all of the films. The gun's prominence in the films instantly popularized it. Callahan states the use of a \"Light Special\", .44 Special loads (a reference to the fact that .44 special cartridges can be fired in .44 magnum handguns), that he loads himself because it gives him \"better accuracy and control in a gun this size,\" like using wadcutters in a .357 Magnum. In the audio commentary on Magnum Force DVD (Warner Bros. Entertainment, 2001), John Milius (who wrote the story and co-wrote the screenplay), said that this was misinterpreted during filming, that \"it's really not supposed to be a light Special, it's just supposed to be a little lighter .44 Magnum load.\" implying he uses a specially prepared Magnum round firing a slightly less heavy bullet, in a slightly shorter case, the 44 Special being both lighter and shorter than the 44 magnum. This would corroborate his statement in The Enforcer that he favours the gun largely for penetration. In one film, Harry's partner Frank DiGiorgio, refers to Harry's gun as a \"pocket-cannon\".\n\nCallahan loses hold of his sidearm four times during the course of the series; first in Dirty Harry when Scorpio tells him to take it out and throw it when he is confronted at the cross in the park, in Magnum Force, second in Sudden Impact, then in The Dead Pool. In The Enforcer, Callahan doesn't lose it, however he doesn't employ it to kill the final villain (in favor of a portable rocket launcher). Additionally, in Sudden Impact, Callahan temporarily upgraded to a .44 Automag. Contrary to popular belief, it was not an AMT firearm, but an original AMP AutoMag built specifically for that film. \n\nIn Dirty Harry, he used a Winchester Model 70 bolt-action rifle in .458 Winchester Magnum for the night gunfight with the Scorpio Killer and used a switchblade during his second encounter with Scorpio. Harry also uses a Colt Python revolver to obtain ballistics evidence in Magnum Force. Other weapons Callahan uses initially in the final climax of other films include a bomb, an M72 LAW rocket launcher and a harpoon. \nIn Dirty Harry the San Francisco police chief comments on Callahan's fondness for overkill observing that he \"Likes an edge\". Callahan responds that \"I'll take all the edge I can get\".\n\nPartners\n\nIt is a recurring theme in the Dirty Harry movies that Callahan has a high turnover of partners; most are killed or wounded while working with him. In Dirty Harry, he mentions two unseen partners named Fanducci and Dietrich; Dietrich is in the hospital having been shot, while Fanducci is dead (in The Enforcer, it is referenced that Fanducci was killed in 1968). His partner in Dirty Harry, Chico Gonzalez, is shot by Scorpio and though he survives, he decides to quit the police (in Magnum Force, Harry remarks that Gonzalez became a college teacher after leaving the police force). His partner in Magnum Force, Earlington \"Early\" Smith is killed by a bomb planted in his mailbox. Kate Moore in The Enforcer is killed by terrorists while saving Callahan's life. She had previously cited to Harry the names of previous dead officers (Fanducci and Smith) to demonstrate that she is aware of the risks of being his partner. In Sudden Impact, Horace King is murdered by criminals who were waiting for Harry in his hotel room. Occasional Callahan partner Frank DiGiorgio was also killed, albeit whilst working with another officer. Of all Callahan's partners seen on screen, Al Quan and Gonzalez are the only two to survive.\n\nAnother theme explored in several movies is Callahan being assigned a partner he would instinctively resent being paired with, Chico Gonzalez because he is a rookie college graduate, and Kate Moore because she is a woman. However, they eventually earn his respect and both go on to save Harry's life.\n\nRelationships\n\nIn Dirty Harry we learn that Callahan's unnamed wife has recently died, her picture still on display in his apartment. In Magnum Force he begins a relationship with Sunny, an Asian woman who is one of his neighbours and asks to go to bed with him on their first meeting. In Sudden Impact he establishes a sexual relationship with vigilante Jennifer Spencer although it is uncertain if this goes any further, Spencer commenting 'Neither of us want to be alone tonight'. In The Dead Pool he romances news reporter Samantha Walker and they are last seen walking away together at the end of the film\n\nCultural recognition\n\nCallahan is considered a film icon, so much so that his nickname, \"Dirty Harry\", has entered the lexicon as slang for ruthless police officers. Harry Callahan was voted number 23 by Empire Magazine on their list of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters. Callahan was voted the 17th greatest movie hero on 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains. He was also named one of The 20 All Time Coolest Heroes in Pop Culture by Entertainment Weekly. He was also ranked 42nd by Premiere magazine on their list of the 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time. The character also received recognition from the American Film Institute. Callahan's trademark weapon, the Smith & Wesson Model 29 .44 Magnum revolver, was named the second greatest movie weapon of all time, behind the lightsaber from Star Wars. \n\nOn AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes, two of Dirty Harry's famous lines ranked 6th and 51st, respectively: \n\nThe former phrase was borrowed by US President Ronald Reagan in a March 1985 speech to the American Business Conference. Promising to veto any proposed tax rises, he challenged those who wanted them to: \"Go ahead, make my day.\" It has also given its name to a law in several US states, the Make My Day Law, which protects homeowners who use lethal force against intruders.\n\nCallahan actually delivers the \"I know what you're thinking\" speech twice in Dirty Harry - the first time near the beginning of the film, after single-handedly breaking up a bank robbery and the second time at the end, during his final showdown with the crazed serial killer Scorpio. In the first instance, he confronts a wounded robber who is reaching for a weapon, bluffing him into surrendering; the audience sees that despite Harry's claim to have \"kinda lost track\" of how many shots he has fired, he has done no such thing, as he scares the daylights out of the robber by playfully pulling the trigger after the man has surrendered, only to have the gun's hammer fall harmlessly on an empty chamber, as Harry smiles at the joke. In the second instance, Harry's tone has decidedly changed -- instead of the steady, even, matter-of-fact delivery that he used the first time he delivered the speech while toying with the wounded bandit, he now practically spits out the words through clenched teeth in a sarcastic, sneering manner, grimacing all the while, as he dares the wounded Scorpio to go for his own fallen pistol. This perfectly sets up the inevitable end of the showdown, as Harry, again knowing full well exactly how many shots he has fired, blows the killer away with his final bullet.\n\nIn popular culture\n \n*Callahan uses different pairs of sunglasses throughout the series. His sunglasses in Magnum Force are the Ray-Ban Balorama. In The Enforcer, he uses Ray-Ban B&L Aviator Style A. In Sudden Impact, he wears Gargoyles ANSI sunglasses. \n* British virtual band Gorillaz included the track \"Dirty Harry\" on their second album, Demon Days. The same band released a track called \"Clint Eastwood\" on their self-titled debut album.\n* During the New Beat craze in Belgium (New Beat being an early form of EDM and an ancestor of house music), one of the more popular artists was an act by the name \"Dirty Harry\" (stage name for Harry van Oekel)." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Playboy.txt", "Centerfold.txt" ], "title": [ "Playboy", "Centerfold" ], "wiki_context": [ "Playboy is an American men's lifestyle and entertainment magazine. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. Notable for its centerfolds of nude and semi-nude models (Playmates), Playboy played an important role in the sexual revolution and remains one of the world's best-known brands, having grown into Playboy Enterprises, Inc., with a presence in nearly every medium. In addition to the flagship magazine in the United States, special nation-specific versions of Playboy are published worldwide.\n\nThe magazine has a long history of publishing short stories by notable novelists such as Arthur C. Clarke, Ian Fleming, Vladimir Nabokov, Saul Bellow, Chuck Palahniuk, P. G. Wodehouse, Haruki Murakami, and Margaret Atwood. With a regular display of full-page color cartoons, it became a showcase for notable cartoonists, including Harvey Kurtzman, Jack Cole, Eldon Dedini, Jules Feiffer, Shel Silverstein, Erich Sokol, Roy Raymonde, Gahan Wilson, and Rowland B. Wilson. Playboy features monthly interviews of notable public figures, such as artists, architects, economists, composers, conductors, film directors, journalists, novelists, playwrights, religious figures, politicians, athletes and race car drivers. The magazine generally reflects a liberal editorial stance, although it often interviews conservative celebrities. \n\nPublication history\n\n1950s\n\nBy spring 1953, Hugh Hefner—a 1949 University of Illinois psychology graduate who had worked in Chicago for Esquire magazine writing promotional copy; Publisher's Development Corporation in sales and marketing; and Children's Activities magazine as circulation promotions manager—had planned out the elements of his own magazine, that he would call Stag Party. He formed HMH Publishing Corporation, and recruited his friend Eldon Sellers to find investors. Hefner eventually raised just over $8,000, including from his brother and mother. However, the publisher of an unrelated men's adventure magazine, Stag, contacted Hefner and informed him it would file suit to protect their trademark if he were to launch his magazine with that name. Hefner, his wife Millie, and Sellers met to seek a new name, considering \"Top Hat\", \"Gentleman\", \"Sir'\", \"Satyr\", \"Pan\" and \"Bachelor\" before Sellers suggested \"Playboy\".\n\nThe first issue, in December 1953, was undated, as Hefner was unsure there would be a second. He produced it in his Hyde Park kitchen. The first centerfold was Marilyn Monroe, although the picture used originally was taken for a calendar rather than for Playboy. Hefner chose what he deemed the \"sexiest\" image, a previously unused nude study of Marilyn stretched with an upraised arm on a red velvet background with closed eyes and mouth open. The heavy promotion centered around Marilyn's nudity on the already-famous calendar, together with the teasers in marketing, made the new Playboy magazine a success. \nThe first issue sold out in weeks. Known circulation was 53,991. The cover price was 50¢. Copies of the first issue in mint to near mint condition sold for over $5,000 in 2002.\n\nThe novel Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury, was serialized in the March, April and May 1954 issues of Playboy.\n\nAn urban legend started about Hefner and the Playmate of the Month because of markings on the front covers of the magazine. From 1955 to 1979 (except for a six-month gap in 1976), the \"P\" in Playboy had stars printed in or around the letter. The legend stated that this was either a rating that Hefner gave to the Playmate according to how attractive she was, the number of times that Hefner had slept with her, or how good she was in bed. The stars, between zero and 12, actually indicated the domestic or international advertising region for that printing.\n\n1960s–1990s\n\nFrom 1966 to 1976, Robie Macauley was the Fiction Editor at Playboy. During this period the magazine published fiction by Saul Bellow, Sean O'Faolain, John Updike, James Dickey, John Cheever, Doris Lessing, Joyce Carol Oates, Vladimir Nabokov, Michael Crichton, John le Carré, Irwin Shaw, Jean Shepherd, Arthur Koestler, Isaac Bashevis Singer, Bernard Malamud, John Irving, Anne Sexton, Nadine Gordimer, Kurt Vonnegut and J. P. Donleavy, as well as poetry by Yevgeny Yevtushenko. Macauley also contributed all of the popular Ribald Classics series published between January 1978 and March 1984.\n\nSince reaching its peak in the 1970s, Playboy saw a decline in circulation and cultural relevance due to competition in the field it founded—first from Penthouse, then Oui (which was published as a spin-off of Playboy) and Gallery in the 1970s; later from pornographic videos; and more recently from lad mags such as Maxim, FHM, and Stuff. In response, Playboy has attempted to re-assert its hold on the 18–35 male demographic through slight changes to content and focusing on issues and personalities more appropriate to its audience—such as hip-hop artists being featured in the \"Playboy Interview\".\n\nChristie Hefner, daughter of the founder Hugh Hefner, joined Playboy in 1975 and became head of the company in 1988. She announced in December 2008 that she would be stepping down from leading the company, effective in January 2009, and said that the election of Barack Obama as the next President had inspired her to give more time to charitable work, and that the decision to step down was her own. “Just as this country is embracing change in the form of new leadership, I have decided that now is the time to make changes in my own life as well,” she said. \n\nPost-2000\n\nThe magazine celebrated its 50th anniversary with the January 2004 issue. Celebrations were held at Las Vegas, Los Angeles, New York, and Moscow during the year to commemorate this event.\n\nThe magazine runs several annual features and ratings. One of the most popular is its annual ranking of the top \"party schools\" among all U.S. universities and colleges. For 2009, the magazine used five considerations: bikini, brains, campus, sex and sports in the development of its list. The top ranked party school by Playboy for 2009 was the University of Miami. \n\nIn June 2009, the magazine reduced its publication schedule to 11 issues per year, with a combined July/August issue and on August 11, 2009. London's Daily Telegraph newspaper reported that Hugh Hefner had sold his English Manor house (next door to the famous Playboy Mansion) for $18 m ($10 m less than the reported asking price) to another American Daren Metropoulos the President and co-owner of Pabst Blue Ribbon. Also that due to significant losses in the company's value (down from $1 billion in 2000 to $84 million in 2009) the Playboy publishing empire is up for sale for $300 million. In December 2009, they further reduced the publication schedule to 10 issues per year, with a combined January/February issue.\n\nOn July 12, 2010, Playboy Enterprises Inc. announced Hefner's $5.50 per share offer ($122.5 million based on shares outstanding on April 30 and the closing price on July 9) to buy the portion of the company he did not already own and take the company private with the help of Rizvi Traverse Management LLC. The company derives much of its income from licensing rather than the magazine. On July 15, Penthouse owner FriendFinder Networks Inc. offered $210 million (the company is valued at $185 million), though Hefner, who already owned 70 percent of voting stock, did not want to sell. In January 2011, the publisher of Playboy magazine agreed to an offer by Hefner to take the company private for $6.15 per share, an 18 percent premium over the price of the last previous day of trading. The buyout was completed in March 2011. \n\n2016 changes and ending of frontal nudity\n\nIn October 2015, Playboy announced that starting with their March 2016 issue, the magazine would no longer feature full frontal nudity. Playboy CEO Scott Flanders acknowledged the magazine's inability to compete with freely available Internet pornography and nudity; according to him, \"You're now one click away from every sex act imaginable for free. And so it’s just passé at this juncture\". Hefner agreed with the decision. The redesigned Playboy, however, would still feature a Playmate of the Month and pictures of women, but they would be rated as not appropriate for children under 13. The move would not affect PlayboyPlus.com (which features nudity at a paid subscription), but it is currently unknown what will happen to the \"special\" issues. Josh Horwitz of Quartz argues that the motivation for the decision to remove nudity from the magazine was to give Playboy Licensing a less deviant image in India and China, where the brand is a popular item on apparel and thus generates significant revenue. \n\nAmong other changes to the magazine included ending the popular jokes section and the various cartoons that appeared throughout the magazine. The redesign eliminated the use of jump copy (articles continuing on non-consecutive pages), which in turn eliminated most of the space for cartoons. Hefner, himself a former cartoonist, reportedly resisted dropping the cartoons more than the nudity, but ultimately obliged. Playboy plans to market itself as a competitor to Vanity Fair as opposed to more traditional competitors GQ and Maxim. \n\nCirculation history and statistics\n\nThe best-selling Playboy edition was the November 1972 edition, which sold 7,161,561 copies. One-quarter of all American college men were buying or subscribing to the magazine every month. On the cover was model Pam Rawlings, photographed by Rowland Scherman.\n\nPerhaps coincidentally, a cropped image of the issue's centerfold (which featured Lena Söderberg) became a de facto standard image for testing image processing algorithms. It is known simply as the \"Lenna\" (also \"Lena\") image in that field. \n\nIn 1970, Playboy became the first gentleman's magazine to be printed in braille. It is also one of the few magazines whose microfilm format was in color, not black and white. \n\nFeatures and format\n\nRabbit logo\n\nPlayboy's iconic and enduring mascot, a stylized silhouette of a rabbit wearing a tuxedo bow tie, was created by Playboy art director Art Paul for the second issue as an endnote, but was adopted as the official logo and has appeared ever since. A running joke in the magazine involves hiding the logo somewhere in the cover art or photograph. Hefner said he chose the rabbit for its \"humorous sexual connotation\", and because the image was \"frisky and playful\".\n\nIn an interview Hefner explained his choice of a rabbit as Playboy's logo to the Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci:\n\nThe jaunty rabbit was quickly a popular symbol of extroverted male culture, becoming a lucrative source of merchandizing revenue for Playboy. In the 1950s, it was adopted as military aircraft insignia for the Navy's VX-4 fighter-evaluation squadron.\n\nThe Playboy Interview\n\nBesides its centerfold, a major part of Playboy for much of its existence has been the Playboy Interview, an extensive (usually several thousand-word) discussion between a notable individual and an interviewer (historian Alex Haley, for example, served as a Playboy interviewer on a few occasions; one of his interviews was with Martin Luther King Jr.; he also interviewed Malcolm X and American Nazi Party founder George Lincoln Rockwell in the April 1966 issue, then coauthored his autobiography). One of the magazine's most notable interviews was a discussion with then-presidential candidate Jimmy Carter in the November 1976 issue in which he stated \"I've committed adultery in my heart many times.\" David Sheff's interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono appeared in the January 1981 issue, which was on newsstands at the time of Lennon's murder; the interview was later published in book format.\n\nAnother interview type section, entitled \"20Q\" (a play on the game of Twenty Questions), was added in October 1978. Cheryl Tiegs was the first interviewee for the section. \n\nRock the Rabbit\n\n\"Rock the Rabbit\" was an annual music news and pictorial feature published in the March edition. The pictorial featured images of rock bands photographed by music photographer Mick Rock. Fashion designers participated in the Rock the Rabbit event by designing T-shirts inspired by Playboy's rabbit head logo for each band. The shirts were sold at Playboy's retailers and auctioned off to raise money for AIDS at LIFEbeat: The Music Industry Fights AIDS. Notable bands who were featured include: MGMT, Daft Punk, Iggy Pop, Duran Duran, Flaming Lips, Snow Patrol, and The Killers. \n\nPhotographers\n\nMany notable photographers have contributed to Playboy, including Ken Marcus, Richard Fegley, Arny Freytag, Ron Harris, Tom Kelley, David Mecey, Russ Meyer, Pompeo Posar, Suze Randall, Herb Ritts, Stephen Wayda, Sam Wu, Mario Casilli, Annie Leibovitz, Helmut Newton, and Bunny Yeager. \n\nCelebrities\n\nFor a full listing, please see List of people in Playboy 1953–1959, 1960–1969, 1970–1979, 1980–1989, 1990–1999, 2000–2009, 2010–2019.\n\nMany celebrities (singers, actresses, models, etc.) have posed for Playboy over the years. This list is only a small portion of those who have posed. Some of them are:\n\nFilm:\n\n* Jayne Mansfield (February 1955)\n* Mara Corday (October 1958)\n* Ursula Andress (June 1965)\n* Carol Lynley (March 1965) \n* Margot Kidder (March 1975)\n* Kim Basinger (February 1983)\n* Terry Moore (August 1984)\n* Janet Jones (March 1987)\n* Drew Barrymore (January 1995)\n* Denise Richards (December 2004)\n\nMusic:\n\n* La Toya Jackson (March 1989/Nov 1991)\n* Fem2Fem (December 1993)\n* Nancy Sinatra (May 1995)\n* Samantha Fox (October 1996)\n* Joey Heatherton (April 1997)\n* Linda Brava (April 1998)\n* Belinda Carlisle (August 2001)\n* Tiffany (April 2002)\n* Carnie Wilson (August 2003)\n* Debbie Gibson (March 2005)\n\nSports:\n\n* Svetlana Khorkina (November 1997 Russian edition)\n* Katarina Witt (December 1998)\n* Tanja Szewczenko (April 1999 German Edition)\n* Joanie Laurer (November 2000 and January 2002)\n* Gabrielle Reece (January 2001)\n* Kiana Tom (May 2002)\n* Torrie Wilson (May 2003 and March 2004 [the latter with Sable])\n* Amy Acuff (September 2004)\n* Amanda Beard (July 2007)\n* Ashley Harkleroad (August 2008) \n\nTelevision:\n\n* Linda Evans (July 1971)\n* Suzanne Somers (February 1980 and December 1984)\n* Teri Copley (November 1990)\n* Dian Parkinson (December 1991 and May 1993)\n* Shannen Doherty (March 1994 and December 2003)\n* Farrah Fawcett (December 1995 and July 1997)\n* Women of Baywatch (June 1998)\n* Claudia Christian (October 1999)\n* Shari Belafonte (September 2000)\n* Brooke Burke (May 2001 and November 2004)\n* Susie Feldman (August 2008)\n* Karina Smirnoff (May 2011)\n\nOther editions\n\nPlayboy Special Editions\n\nThe success of Playboy magazine has led PEI to market other versions of the magazine, the Special Editions (formerly called Newsstand Specials), such as Playboy's College Girls and Playboy's Book of Lingerie, as well as the Playboy video collection.\n\nBraille\n\nThe National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS) has published a Braille edition of Playboy since 1970. The Braille version includes all the written words in the non-Braille magazine, but no pictorial representations. Congress cut off funding for the Braille magazine translation in 1985, but U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Hogan reversed the decision on First Amendment grounds. \n\nInternational editions\n\n(starting at the accompanying date, or during the accompanying date range)\n\nCurrent \n\nFormer \n\nOnline\n\nThe growth of the Internet prompted the magazine to develop an official web presence called Playboy Online or Playboy.com, which is the official website for Playboy Enterprises, and an online companion to Playboy magazine. The site has been available online since 1994. As part of the online presence, Playboy developed a pay web site called the Playboy Cyber Club in 1995 which features online chats, additional pictorials, videos of Playmates and Playboy Cyber Girls that are not featured in the magazine. Archives of past Playboy articles and interviews are also included. In September 2005, Playboy launched the online edition of the magazine Playboy Digital.\n\nIn 2010, Playboy introduced \"The Smoking Jacket\", a safe-for-work website designed to appeal to young men, while avoiding nude images or key words that would cause the site to be filtered or otherwise prohibited in the workplace. \n\nIn May 2011 Playboy introduced i.playboy.com, a complete, uncensored version of its near 700 issue archive, targeting the Apple iPad. By launching the archive as a web app, Playboy was able to circumvent both Apple's App Store content restrictions and their 30% subscription fee.\n\nLitigation and legal issues\n\nOn January 14, 2004, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that Playboy Enterprises Inc.'s (PEI) trademark terms \"Playboy\" and \"Playmate\" should be protected in the situation where a user typing \"Playboy\" or \"Playmate\" in a browser search was instead shown advertisements of companies that competed with PEI. (The decision reversed an earlier district court ruling.) The suit started on April 15, 1999, when Playboy sued Excite Inc. and Netscape for trademark infringement. \n\nCensorship\n\nMany in the American religious community opposed the publication of Playboy. The Louisiana pastor and author L. L. Clover wrote in his 1974 treatise Evil Spirits Intellectualism and Logic that Playboy encouraged young men to view themselves as \"pleasure-seeking individuals for whom sex is fun and women are play things.\" \n\nIn many parts of Asia, including India, mainland China, Myanmar, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and Brunei, sale and distribution of Playboy is banned. In addition, sale and distribution is banned in most Muslim countries (except Lebanon and Turkey) in Asia and Africa, including Iran, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. Despite the ban on the magazine in these countries, the official Playboy brand itself can still appear on various merchandise such as perfume and deodorants.\n\nWhile banned in mainland China, the magazine is sold in Hong Kong. In Japan, where genitals of models cannot be shown, a separate edition was published under license by Shueisha. An Indonesian edition was launched in April 2006, but controversy started before the first issue hit the stands. Though the publisher said the content of the Indonesian edition will be different from the original edition, the government tried to ban it by using anti-pornography rules. A Muslim organization, the Islamic Defenders Front (IDF), opposed Playboy on the grounds of pornography. On April 12, about 150 IDF members clashed with police and stoned the editorial offices. Despite this, the edition quickly sold out. On April 6, 2007 the chief judge of the case dismissed the charges because they had been incorrectly filed. \n\nIn 1986, the American convenience store chain 7-Eleven removed the magazine. The store returned Playboy to its shelves in late 2003. 7-Eleven had also been selling Penthouse and other similar magazines before the ban.\n\nIn 1995, Playboy was returned to shelves in Republic of Ireland after a 36-year ban, despite staunch opposition from many women's groups. \n\nPlayboy was not sold in the state of Queensland, Australia during 2004 and 2005 but returned as of 2006. Due to declining sales, the last Australia-wide edition of Playboy was the January 2000 issue.\n\nIn 2013, Playboy was cleared by the Pentagon of violating its rule against selling sexually explicit material on military property, but the base exchanges stopped selling it anyway. \n\nBooks\n\n;General compilations\n* Nick Stone, editor. The Bedside Playboy. Chicago: Playboy Press, 1963.\n\n;Anniversary collections\n* Jacob Dodd, editor. The Playboy Book: Forty Years. Santa Monica, California: General Publishing Group, 1994, ISBN 1-881649-03-2\n* Playboy: 50 Years, The Photographs. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2003, ISBN 0-8118-3978-8\n* Nick Stone, editor; Michelle Urry, cartoon editor. Playboy: 50 Years, The Cartoons. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2004. ISBN 0-8118-3976-1\n* Gretchen Edgren, editor. The Playboy Book: Fifty Years. Taschen, 1995. ISBN 3-8228-3976-0\n\n;Interview compilations\n* G. Barry Golson, editor. The Playboy Interview. New York: Playboy Press, 1981. ISBN 0-87223-668-4 (hardcover), ISBN 0-87223-644-7 (softcover)\n* G. Barry Golson, editor. The Playboy Interview Volume II. New York: Wideview/Perigee, 1983. ISBN 0-399-50768-X (hardcover), ISBN 0-399-50769-8 (softcover)\n* David Sheff, interviewer; G. Barry Golson, editor. The Playboy Interviews with John Lennon and Yoko Ono. New York: Playboy Press, 1981, ISBN 0-87223-705-2; 2000 edition, ISBN 0-312-25464-4\n* Stephen Randall, editor. The Playboy Interview Book: They Played the Game. New York: M Press, 2006, ISBN 1-59582-046-9", "The centerfold or centrefold of a magazine refers to a gatefolded spread, usually a portrait such as a pin-up or a nude, inserted in the middle of the publication, or to the model featured in the portrait. In saddle-stitched magazines (as opposed to those that are perfect-bound), the centerfold does not have any blank space cutting through the image.\n\nThe term was coined by Hugh Hefner, founder of Playboy magazine. The success of the first issue of Playboy has been attributed in large part to its centerfold: a nude of Marilyn Monroe. The advent of monthly centerfolds gave the pin-up a new respectability, and helped to sanitize the notion of \"sexiness\". Being featured as a centerfold could lead to film roles for models, and still occasionally does today.\n\nEarly on, Hefner required Playboy centerfolds to be portrayed in a very specific way, telling photographers in a 1956 memo that the \"model must be in a natural setting engaged in some activity 'like reading, writing, mixing a drink'...[and]... should have a 'healthy, intelligent, American look—a young lady that looks like she might be a very efficient secretary or an undergrad at Vassar.'\" Hefner later said that the ideal centerfold is one in which \"a situation is suggested, the presence of someone not in the picture\"; the goal was to transform \"a straight pinup into an intimate interlude, something personal and special.\"\n\nSome magazines later adopted the practice of having a trifold or quatrefold centerfold, using a longer sheet of paper at that spot and folding the extra length into the magazine. Racier adult magazines used this space to showcase more explicit imagery: \"In order to represent breasts, genitals, anus, and face all within the tri-fold frame of the centerfold, models were propped up, legs spread, raised, and then jack- knifed against their bodies, arms plunged between them to spread the labia.\" \n\nThough the term has become linked in the public consciousness with erotic material or models, many other magazines such as Life, Time and National Geographic have published fold-out spreads on other subjects.\n\nCenterfold titles\n\nSome magazines will refer to their centerfold models with a specific name, which may be connected to the magazine's brand or theme.\nWhen obtained from one of the more prestigious publications in the field, it can become a semi-formal personal title used in news articles and introductions long after the model's centerfold appearance. \n\nSome online-only media outlets maintain a monthly designation reminiscent of a print magazine centerfold; for example, the Twistys Treat." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Stage_name.txt", "Queen_(band).txt", "Lady_Gaga.txt" ], "title": [ "Stage name", "Queen (band)", "Lady Gaga" ], "wiki_context": [ "A stage name, also called a screen name, is a pseudonym used by performers and entertainers such as actors, wrestlers, comedians, and musicians.\n\nMotivation to use a stage name\n\nA performer will often take a stage name because his/her real name is considered unattractive, dull, or unintentionally amusing, is difficult to pronounce or spell, has been used by another notable individual, or projects an undesired image. Sometimes a performer adopts a name that is unusual or outlandish to attract attention. Other performers use a stage name in order to retain anonymity. The equivalent concept among writers is called a nom de plume or pen name, while the term ring name is used in professional wrestling. In radio, the term \"radio name\" or \"air name\" is used. \n\nFamily connection \n\nSome individuals who are related to a celebrity take a different last name so that they are not perceived to have received undue advantage from their family connection. Examples of these include Joan Fontaine (real name Joan de Havilland, sister of Olivia de Havilland), Luka Bloom (real name Kevin Barry Moore, brother of Christy Moore), and Mike McGear (brother of Paul McCartney). Sisters Loretta, Peggy, and Brenda Webb adopted the names Loretta Lynn, Peggy Sue, and Crystal Gayle, respectively. Actor Nicolas Cage, born Nicolas Coppola, chose a new last name to avoid comparisons with his uncle, director Francis Ford Coppola, who gave him his big break in the movie Peggy Sue Got Married. Conversely, individuals who wish to receive benefit from their family connections may take that person's first or last name. For example, Lon Chaney Sr.’s son Creighton spent a number of years appearing in minor roles before renaming himself Lon Chaney, Jr. Actress Rebecca Isabelle Laemmle rechristened herself Carla Laemmle in reference to her uncle, Universal Studios head Carl Laemmle. Emilio Estevez and his sister Renee chose not to take their father Martin Sheen’s professional name and use their birth names; however, their brother Carlos chose to use their father's professional name, and took the name Charlie Sheen. Pop singer Katy Perry changed her surname from Hudson to Perry, her mother's maiden name, as her stage name because her birth name Katy Hudson was too similar to the actress Kate Hudson. In some cases, the individual may adopt a stage name to avoid confusion with other family members who have similar names. Actor Mark Harmon (Thomas Mark Harmon) uses his middle name professionally to avoid confusion with his father Heisman Trophy winner and former broadcaster Tom Harmon (Thomas Dudley Harmon).\n\nGuild and association rules \n\nGuilds and associations that represent actors, such as the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) in the United States and British Actors' Equity Association in the United Kingdom, stipulate that no two members may have identical working names. An actor whose name has already been taken must choose a new name. Notable examples include David Tennant, born David McDonald, who said in an interview that he adopted the surname \"Tennant\" after seeing Neil Tennant in a copy of Smash Hits, Nathan Lane, whose birth name Joseph Lane was already in use, Stewart Granger, whose birth name was James Stewart, and Michael Keaton, born Michael Douglas. (The rumor that Michael Keaton changed his surname because of an attraction to actress Diane Keaton is incorrect. He chose Keaton because of an affinity for the physical comedy of Buster Keaton. ) Diane Keaton, whose birth name is Diane Hall, took her mother's maiden name as a stage name after learning that there was already a registered actress named Diane Hall in the Actors' Equity Association. Ugly Betty actress Vanessa Williams officially uses \"Vanessa L. Williams\" due to SAG guidelines, although the other actress with same first and last names (Vanessa A. Williams) is arguably less notable. Similarly, David Walliams changed one letter in his surname due to there being another \"David Williams\". Terry O'Quinn of Lost fame changed his surname from Quinn to O'Quinn as another registered actor already had the name Terrance Quinn. Long time writer for The Simpsons, David X. Cohen changed his middle initial from S to X because there was already a David S Cohen registered with the Writer's Guild of America. In other cases, a middle name may be adopted in preference to changing a name. Examples include comedian Hugh Dennis (born Peter Hugh Dennis), actor-comedian Hugh Laurie (born James Hugh Calum Laurie) and actor Timothy Carlton (Timothy Carlton Cumberbatch).\n\nA person hoping to become successful as an entertainer who has a name identical to a name already familiar to the public (in any field of endeavor) may change his/her name in order to not have his/her name evoke the other person with that name. By way of example, the actor/writer/director Albert Brooks was born \"Albert Einstein\" and changed his surname so that his name would not be a distraction that would evoke the renowned physicist of the same name. Singer Katy Perry, born Katheryn Elizabeth Hudson, released her self-titled album under the name Katy Hudson, but later used her mother's maiden name to avoid confusion with actress Kate Hudson. Singer David Bowie (born David Robert Jones) changed his name to avoid confusion with Davy Jones of The Monkees. Singer Ray Charles, born Ray Robinson, changed his name to avoid confusion with boxer Sugar Ray Robinson.\n\nInvoluntary name changes \n\nA performer may also have had their stage name chosen for them by their agent – such was the case with Barbara Eden, born Barbara Jean Huffman – or, in the heyday of the Hollywood studios, by a movie studio. Joan Rivers (born Joan Alexandra Molinsky) went one step further and named herself after a former agent, Tony Rivers, after he told her to change her name. In the non English-speaking world, an example is the Taiwanese Mandopop girl group S.H.E (composed of Selina Jen, Hebe Tian, and Ella Chen), whose members' English names were chosen by their manager after taking personality tests.\n\nFormer child star Patty Duke (whose real name is Anna Marie Duke) had her stage name chosen for her by her first managers. Their choice of the name \"Patty\" was inspired by another child actress named Patty McCormack (Patty Duke later entitled her autobiography Call Me Anna (ISBN 0-553-27205-5).\n\nCary Grant (born Archibald Leach) had his name selected for him by Paramount Pictures. He had been using the name \"Cary Lockwood\", but the studio decided against it, deeming it too similar to another actor working at the time. Cary and the studio eventually settled on \"Cary Grant\" (Grant thought the letters \"C\" and \"G\" to be lucky: they had brought previous success for both Clark Gable and Gary Cooper). Joan Crawford, born Lucille Fay LeSueur, had her name changed as a result of a magazine poll organised by her studio, MGM. In a similar vein, The Spice Girls (Sporty, Posh, Ginger, Scary, and Baby) had their names bestowed upon them by a British music magazine.\n\nEthnicity \n\nIn the past, a stage name was often used when a performer's real name was considered to denote a specific ethnicity that faced potential discrimination. In other cases, actors have reinvented themselves with a more ethnic identity, when that gave them an advantage in playing \"ethnic\" roles.\n\nAn example of this type of name change involved Freddie Mercury of the British rock band Queen, who was born Farrokh Bulsara to Parsi parents; his name change was partly intended to conceal his heritage. Italian-American actress Bernadette Peters, who was born Bernadette Lazzara, changed her last name to avoid being typecast as women who were Italian or of Italian heritage. Similarly, Steven Tyler of Aerosmith changed his name from the original Stephen Victor Tallarico \"for more promotional appeal\". The actor Kal Penn changed his name from Kalpen Modi for professional purposes; after changing his name, calls back increased by 50%. \n\nHistorically, Jews in Hollywood were encouraged to anglicize their names to avoid possible discrimination. This still happens to a degree (Jason Alexander, Brad Garrett, Jonah Hill, Frank Oz, and Winona Ryder for instance), but the growing acceptance of ethnic performers in the performing arts has made this occurrence less frequent. Jon Stewart, contrary to popular belief, didn't anglicize his name for his career but instead because of his estranged relationship with his father. Israeli-American Natalie Portman changed her name to protect her privacy. \n\nRamón Estévez changed his name to Martin Sheen as he felt it affected his job prospects due to racial discrimination and bias, although he maintains his birth name for legal documents such as his passport; his sons made divergent choices: Carlos Irwin Estévez is now Charlie Sheen, while Emilio Estevez left his name unchanged. German-born actor Hans Gudegast adopted the non-German stage name of Eric Braeden. Cherilyn Sarkisian, of Armenian descent, is now known to the world by the single name Cher.\n\nLegendary actors Anthony Quinn and Anne Bancroft were also advised to anglicize their names because 'Antonio Rodolfo Quinn Oaxaca' and 'Anna Maria Louisa Italiano', respectively, were considered too 'ethnic' for Hollywood and Broadway at the time. Eydie Gorme (born Edith Garmezano), Sophia Loren (born Sofia Villani Scicolone), and Rita Hayworth (born Margarita Carmen Cansino), are three more well known examples of this trend. Similarly, retired veteran broadcaster Dave Roberts was born David T. Boreanaz but is known professionally as Dave Thomas and later Dave Roberts as ethnic surnames were discouraged when he first began his career during the 1950s; however, his son actor David Boreanaz chose not to adopt a stage name. \n\nThe use of stage names for ethnic purposes may vary widely depending on the media market the personality is representing. For example, in Buffalo, New York, a city with a large Polish-American population, Polish-American media personalities typically work freely using their birth names (WIVB-TV has Mike Cejka as a longtime meteorologist and WKBW-TV employs a meteorologist named Aaron Mentkowski). However, when such personalities work in markets outside Western New York, they will often switch to less ethnic sounding stage names (Mentkowski, for example, uses the pseudonym \"Aaron Lawrence\" when forecasting for other areas of the United States). \n\nSicilian-American actor Espera Oscar de Corti, who built his film career portraying Native Americans, reinvented himself as Iron Eyes Cody. He not only took his stage name as his legal name, but eventually began insisting that he actually was Native American.\n\nEase of use \n\nAnother consideration in choosing a stage name is ease of use. The Actors' Equity Association (AEA) advises performers to select a name that is easy for others to pronounce, spell, and remember. Some performers while paying great attention to their skills and abilities give little thought to the difference that a well-thought-out name can make to their career. Often, it is only after the realization that a poorly chosen name results in an undesired impression that a person or group decides on a different name.\n\nActor Michael Caine was born Maurice Micklewhite and chose the name Michael because he preferred the sound of it to the less glamorous-sounding \"Maurice\". He chose the name Caine reputedly because at the precise instant he needed to decide upon his new stage name, he saw a cinema marquee for the then-current movie The Caine Mutiny and thought that it would make a good last name in conjunction with Michael. (\"Had I looked the other direction,\" he would later quip, \"I'd be known as Michael The One Hundred and One Dalmatians.\") Similarly, actor Pete Postlethwaite was advised to adopt a different surname by peers who quipped that his \"would never be put up in lights outside theaters because they couldn't afford the electricity\" (Postlethwaite rejected the advice). Conversely, Doris Kappelhoff heeded the suggestion of a bandleader who said that her name would never fit on the marquee; since \"Day By Day\" had become a signature song for her she became known to the public as Doris Day.\n\nRelevance to image \n\nCommonly in the music world, and especially those of heavy metal, punk rock, industrial, and hip hop, musicians will rename themselves with names more menacing or striking than their birth names. Rock music examples include Deuce, Davey Havok, Slash, Sting, Darby Crash, Marilyn Manson, Sid Vicious, Johnny Rotten, Zakk Wylde, Nikki Sixx, Spider One, Count Grishnackh, Necrobutcher, Blasphemer, Nivek Ogre, Rob Zombie, Dimebag Darrell, Trey Azagthoth, and Doyle Wolfgang von Frankenstein. Every member of the punk band Ramones took the pseudonymous \"Ramone\" surname as part of their collective stage persona. Being that those genres pride themselves on a larger-than-life quality, larger-than-life names are desirable.\n\nThat being said, there are other performers who go in the opposite direction; they seek to project images that are anything BUT larger-than-life. As adults, they may assume stage names as a means of distancing themselves from publicly known childhood names that could be considered professionally embarrassing, outlandish, or otherwise inappropriate. Film director Duncan Jones (son of singer David Bowie) was known publicly as a child as Zowie Bowie. The children of musician Frank Zappa have each gone in different directions professionally with regards to their names; daughters Moon Unit and Diva Muffin are now known professionally under the more sedate names Moon Zappa and Diva Zappa (his sons Dweezil and Ahmet, on the other hand, have seen fit to retain their childhood names as a means of projecting larger-than-life personas).\n\nPop musicians seeking to utilize catchy, marketable names include Madonna, Lady Gaga, Prince, Keith Sweat, Pink, as well as R&B musicians Jamie Foxx and Alicia Keys, though both Madonna and Prince were given those names at birth; Lady Gaga named herself after the song \"Radio Ga Ga\" by the band Queen.\n\nActor Marion Morrison adopted the stage name John Wayne because 'Marion' had come to be more common as a female name and he felt it was at odds with the masculine cowboy characters he portrayed. Similarly, Norma Jeane Baker changed her name to the far more glamorous-sounding Marilyn Monroe.\n\nHip Hop artists are known to use stage names but at times do advertise or bring out their real names such as rappers Jay-Z (born Shawn Carter), 50 Cent (born Curtis Jackson), Diddy (born Sean Combs), Ludacris (born Chris Bridges), Lil Wayne (born Dwayne Carter Jr.), and Soulja Boy (born DeAndre Way). Eminem has used his real name, Marshall Mathers, in various public events and as an alter ego as his real name gained recognition following the release of his multi-platinum album, The Marshall Mathers LP. Similarly, LL Cool J released the albums Mr. Smith and Todd Smith in 1995 and 2006, respectively, under his real name Todd Smith. Rapper-Singer-Actress Queen Latifah released The Dana Owens Album under her own given name, Dana Owens, after changing her musical focus from Hip Hop to Vocal Jazz.\n\nChing Lau Lauro (flourished 1827–1840) used a Chinese stage name to represent his stage image as a contortionist in Chinese costume. He was probably the first magician to dress in Chinese costume on stage. \n\nEuphony and ease of remembrance\n\nSome performers and artists may choose to simplify their name to make it easier to spell and pronounce, and easier for others to remember. For instance, Fall Out Boy vocalist and guitarist Patrick Stump removed the \"h\" from his original name, Stumph. It was still pronounced \"stump,\" but the change ensured his audience wouldn't think to pronounce it \"stumf.\" Singer Jason Derulo uses the phonetic spelling of his given name, Jason Desrouleaux.\n\nAndy Warhol dropped an \"a\" from his original name, Warhola, while couturier Yves Mathieu-Saint-Laurent dropped the first of his two surnames. Rodolfo Alfonso Raffaello Piero Filiberto Guglielmi adopted the stage name Rudolph Valentino in part because American casting directors found his original surname difficult to pronounce. Singer George Michael (the son of a Greek Cypriot restaurateur in North London) was born Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou.\n\nSome surnames may carry unfortunate connotations. Hal Linden, born Harold Lipshitz, adopted his stage name for fear that the embedded obscenity in his original surname could cost him work. Ralph Lauren's brother (who was his guardian) changed their family name from Lifshitz for a similar reason: fear of mockery. Duran Duran's Nick Rhodes, born Nicholas James Bates, changed his name to escape childhood ridicule (as a child, children would often tease him by calling him \"Master Bates\"; he adopted the surname \"Rhodes\" after a brand of keyboard). Diana Dors was born Diana Fluck (one letter away from a profanity); this prompted her to change her name to a more benign one in order to avoid an accidental obscenity (which could have been exacerbated by her status as a sex symbol).\n\nMusical use \n\nSome types of music are more associated with stage names than others. For example, hip hop and EDM artists almost always use stage names, whereas \"classical\" composers and performers virtually never do. Classical violinist Amadéus Leopold (born in South Korea as Yoo Hanbin) and opera singers Beverly Sills (born Belle Miriam Silverman) and Nellie Melba (born Helen Porter Mitchell) are rare exceptions.\n\nSome Algerian raï musicians use the prefix Cheb (for men) or Chaba (Chebba) for women. Both Arabic words mean \"young\" (e.g. as in Cheb Khaled, or \"Young Khaled\").\n\nSome performers take a series of different stage names. The British pop singer successful in the 1970s as Alvin Stardust previously went by the stage name of Shane Fenton in the 1960s. He had been born Bernard William Jewry. Some performers will use different names in different settings. Charles Thompson, singer/songwriter for the alternative band the Pixies, was known in that band as Black Francis. He was called Frank Black as a solo performer, and again called Black Francis in a reunited Pixies.\n\nMany performers refer to their stage name as their \"professional name\". In some cases, performers subsequently adopt their stage name as their legal name. For instance, the former Robert Allen Zimmerman's legal name has been Robert Dylan (Bob Dylan) since he changed it in New York City Supreme Court in August 1962. Elton John was born Reginald Kenneth Dwight but changed his name by deed poll, making Elton Hercules John his real name. When he was knighted, he became Sir Elton Hercules John rather than Sir Reginald Kenneth Dwight. Elvis Costello (born Declan MacManus), who had adopted his professional name as a legal name, changed it back to his birth name in 1986. Another example is Marvin Lee Aday, known by his stage name, Meat Loaf. In a similar way, actress and singer Miley Cyrus was born Destiny Hope Cyrus, but found \"Miley\" more comfortable, making it her legal name. \n\nEntire musical groups have been known to adopt a common stage surname, the most notable arguably being the Ramones. Recent examples include Those Darlins and Los Campesinos!..\n\nIn personal life \n\nBecause there are so few references to a celebrity's personal, private life it is hard to get solid sources. Some probably wholly use their stage name, others may go by their birth name privately. Family members probably use the star's birth names or nicknames.", "Queen are a British rock band that formed in London in 1970. Their classic line-up was Freddie Mercury (lead vocals, piano), Brian May (lead guitar, vocals), Roger Taylor (drums, vocals), and John Deacon (bass guitar). Queen's earliest works were influenced by progressive rock, hard rock and heavy metal, but the band gradually ventured into more conventional and radio-friendly works by incorporating further styles, such as arena rock and pop rock, into their music.\n\nBefore forming Queen, Brian May and Roger Taylor had played together in a band named Smile. Freddie Mercury (then known by his birth name of Farrokh \"Freddie\" Bulsara) was a fan of Smile and encouraged them to experiment with more elaborate stage and recording techniques. Mercury joined the band in 1970, suggested \"Queen\" as a new band name, and adopted his familiar stage name. John Deacon was recruited before the band recorded their eponymous debut album in 1973. Queen first charted in the UK with their second album, Queen II, in 1974, but it was the release of Sheer Heart Attack later that year and A Night at the Opera in 1975 which brought them international success. The latter featured \"Bohemian Rhapsody\", which stayed at number one in the UK for nine weeks and popularised the music video. Their 1977 album News of the World contained \"We Will Rock You\" and \"We Are the Champions\", which have become anthems at sporting events. By the early 1980s, Queen were one of the biggest stadium rock bands in the world. Their performance at the 1985 Live Aid concert has been ranked among the greatest in rock history by various music publications, and the best in a 2005 industry poll. In 1991, Mercury died of bronchopneumonia, a complication of AIDS, and Deacon retired in 1997. Since then, May and Taylor have occasionally performed together.\n\nThe band have released a total of 18 number-one albums, 18 number-one singles, and 10 number-one DVDs. Estimates of their record sales generally range from 150 million to 300 million records, making them one of the world's best-selling music acts. Queen received the Outstanding Contribution to British Music Award from the British Phonographic Industry in 1990. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001.\n\nHistory\n\n1968–74: Early days\n\nIn 1968, guitarist Brian May, a student at London's Imperial College, and bassist Tim Staffell decided to form a band. May placed an advertisement on a college notice board for a \"Mitch Mitchell/Ginger Baker type\" drummer; Roger Taylor, a young dental student, auditioned and got the job. The group called themselves Smile. \n\nWhile attending Ealing Art College, Tim Staffell became friends with Farrokh Bulsara, a fellow student who had assumed the English name of Freddie. Bulsara felt that he and the band had the same tastes and soon became a keen fan of Smile. In 1970, after Staffell left to join the band Humpy Bong, the remaining Smile members, encouraged by Bulsara, changed their name to \"Queen\" and performed their first gig on 18 July. The band had a number of bass players during this period who did not fit with the band's chemistry. It was not until February 1971 that they settled on John Deacon and began to rehearse for their first album. They recorded four of their own songs, \"Liar\", \"Keep Yourself Alive\", \"The Night Comes Down\" and \"Jesus\", for a demo tape; no record companies were interested. It was also around this time Freddie changed his surname to \"Mercury\", inspired by the line \"Mother Mercury, look what they've done to me\" in the song \"My Fairy King\". On 2 July 1971, Queen played their first show in the classic line-up of Mercury, May, Taylor and Deacon at a Surrey college outside London. \n\nHaving attended art college, Mercury also designed Queen's logo, called the Queen crest, shortly before the release of the band's first album. The logo combines the zodiac signs of all four members: two lions for Leo (Deacon and Taylor), a crab for Cancer (May), and two fairies for Virgo (Mercury). The lions embrace a stylised letter Q, the crab rests atop the letter with flames rising directly above it, and the fairies are each sheltering below a lion. There is also a crown inside the Q and the whole logo is over-shadowed by an enormous phoenix. The whole symbol bears a passing resemblance to the Royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom, particularly with the lion supporters. The original logo, as found on the reverse-side of the cover of the band's first album, was a simple line drawing. Later sleeves bore more intricate-coloured versions of the logo. \n\nIn 1972, Queen entered discussions with Trident Studios after being spotted at De La Lane Studios by John Anthony. After these discussions, Norman Sheffield offered the band a management deal under Neptune Productions, a subsidiary of Trident, to manage the band and enable them to use the facilities at Trident to record new material, whilst the management searched for a record label to sign Queen. This suited both parties, as Trident were expanding into management, and under the deal, Queen were able to make use of the hi-tech recording facilities used by other musicians such as the Beatles and Elton John to produce new material.\n\nIn 1973, Queen signed to a deal with Trident/EMI. By July of that year, they released their eponymous debut album, an effort influenced by heavy metal and progressive rock. The album was received well by critics; Gordon Fletcher of Rolling Stone called the \"superb\", and Chicago's Daily Herald called it an \"above average debut\". However, it drew little mainstream attention, and the lead single \"Keep Yourself Alive\" sold poorly. Retrospectively, \"Keep Yourself Alive\" is cited as the highlight of the album, and in 2008 Rolling Stone ranked it 31st in the \"100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time\", describing it as \"an entire album's worth of riffs crammed into a single song\". The album was certified gold in the UK and the US.\n\nThe group's second LP, Queen II, was released in 1974, and features rock photographer Mick Rock's iconic image of the band on the cover. This image would be used as the basis for the 1975 \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" music video production. The album reached number five on the British album chart and became the first Queen album to chart in the UK. The Freddie Mercury-written lead single \"Seven Seas of Rhye\" reached number ten in the UK, giving the band their first hit. The album is the first real testament to the band's distinctive layered sound, and features long complex instrumental passages, fantasy-themed lyrics, and musical virtuosity. Aside from its only single, the album also included the song \"The March of the Black Queen\", a six-minute epic which lacks a chorus. The Daily Vault described the number as \"menacing\". Critical reaction was mixed; the Winnipeg Free Press, while praising the band's debut album, described Queen II as an \"over-produced monstrosity\". Allmusic has described the album as a favourite among the band's hardcore fans, and it is the first of three Queen albums to feature in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.\n\n1974–76: Sheer Heart Attack to A Night at the Opera\n\nIn May 1974, a month into the band's first US tour opening for Mott the Hoople, Brian May collapsed and was diagnosed with hepatitis, forcing the cancellation of their remaining dates. While recuperating, May was initially absent when the band started work on their third album, but he returned midway through the recording process. Released in 1974, Sheer Heart Attack reached number two in the United Kingdom, sold well throughout Europe, and went gold in the United States. It gave the band their first real experience of international success, and was a hit on both sides of the Atlantic. The album experimented with a variety of musical genres, including British music hall, heavy metal, ballads, ragtime, and Caribbean. At this point, Queen started to move away from the progressive tendencies of their first two releases into a more radio-friendly, song-orientated style. Sheer Heart Attack introduced new sound and melody patterns that would be refined on their next album, A Night at the Opera.\n\nThe single \"Killer Queen\" from Sheer Heart Attack reached number two on the British charts, and became their first US hit, reaching number 12 on the Billboard Hot 100. It combines camp, vaudeville, and British music hall with May's guitar virtuosity. The album's second single, \"Now I'm Here\", a more traditional hard rock composition, was a number eleven hit in Britain, while the high speed rocker \"Stone Cold Crazy\" featuring May's uptempo riffs is a precursor to speed metal. In recent years, the album has received acclaim from music publications: In 2006, Classic Rock ranked it number 28 in \"The 100 Greatest British Rock Albums Ever\", and in 2007, Mojo ranked it No.88 in \"The 100 Records That Changed the World\". It is also the second of three Queen albums to feature in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.\n\nIn 1975, the band left for a world tour with each member in Zandra Rhodes-created costumes and accompanied with banks of lights and effects. They toured the US as headliners, and played in Canada for the first time. In September, after an acromonious split with Trident, the band negotiated themselves out of their Trident Studios contract and searched for new management. One of the options they considered was an offer from Led Zeppelin's manager, Peter Grant. Grant wanted them to sign with Led Zeppelin's own production company, Swan Song Records. The band found the contract unacceptable and instead contacted Elton John's manager, John Reid, who accepted the position. \n\nIn late 1975, Queen recorded and released A Night at the Opera, taking its name from the popular Marx Brothers movie. At the time, it was the most expensive album ever produced. Like its predecessor, the album features diverse musical styles and experimentation with stereo sound. In \"The Prophet's Song\", an eight-minute epic, the middle section is a canon, with simple phrases layered to create a full-choral sound. The Mercury penned ballad, \"Love of My Life\", featured a harp and overdubbed vocal harmonies. The album was very successful in Britain, and went triple platinum in the United States. The British public voted it the 13th greatest album of all time in a 2004 Channel 4 poll. It has also ranked highly in international polls; in a worldwide Guinness poll, it was voted the 19th greatest of all time, while an ABC poll saw the Australian public vote it the 28th greatest of all time. A Night at the Opera has frequently appeared in \"greatest albums\" lists reflecting the opinions of critics. Among other accolades, it was ranked number 16 in Q Magazine's \"The 50 Best British Albums Ever\" in 2004, and number 11 in Rolling Stone's \"The 100 Greatest Albums of All Time\" as featured in their Mexican edition in 2004. It was also placed at No. 230 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of \"The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time\" in 2003. A Night at the Opera is the third and final Queen album to be featured in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. \n\nThe album also featured the hit single \"Bohemian Rhapsody\", which was number one in the UK for nine weeks. Mercury's close friend and advisor, Capital London radio DJ Kenny Everett, played a pivotal role in giving the single exposure. It is the third-best-selling single of all time in the UK, surpassed only by Band Aid's \"Do They Know It's Christmas?\" and Elton John's \"Candle in the Wind 1997\", and is the best-selling commercial single in the UK. It also reached number nine in the United States (a 1992 re-release reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100 for five weeks). It is the only single ever to sell a million copies on two separate occasions, and became the Christmas number one twice in the UK, the only single ever to do so. \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" has been voted numerous times the greatest song of all time. The band decided to make a video to help go with the single and hired Trilion, a subsidiary of the former management company Trident Studios, using new technology to create the video; the result is generally considered to have been the first \"true\" music video ever produced, and popularised the medium. The album's first track \"Death on Two Legs\" is said to have been written by Mercury about Norman Sheffield and the former management at Trident who helped make the video so popular. Although other bands, including the Beatles, had made short promotional films or videos of songs before, most of those were specifically made to be aired on specific television shows. On the impact of \"Bohemian Rhapsody\", Rolling Stone states: \"Its influence cannot be overstated, practically inventing the music video seven years before MTV went on the air.\" The second single from the album, \"You're My Best Friend\", the second song composed by John Deacon, and his first single, peaked at number sixteen in the United States and went on to become a worldwide Top Ten hit. The band's A Night at the Opera Tour began in November 1975, and covered Europe, the United States, Japan, and Australia. \n\n1976–79: A Day at the Races to Live Killers\n\nBy 1976, Queen were back in the studio recording A Day at the Races, which is often regarded as a sequel album to A Night at the Opera. It again borrowed the name of a Marx Brothers movie, and its cover was similar to that of A Night at the Opera, a variation on the same Queen Crest. The most recognisable of the Marx Brothers, Groucho Marx, invited Queen to visit him in his Los Angeles home in March 1977; there the band thanked him in person, and performed \"'39\" a cappella. Musically, A Day at the Races was by both fans' and critics' standards a strong effort, reaching number one in the UK and Japan, and number five in the US. The major hit on the album was \"Somebody to Love\", a gospel-inspired song in which Mercury, May, and Taylor multi-tracked their voices to create a 100-voice gospel choir. The song went to number two in the UK, and number thirteen in the US. The album also featured one of the band's heaviest songs, May's \"Tie Your Mother Down\", which became a staple of their live shows. \n\nDuring 1976, Queen played one of their most famous gigs, a free concert in Hyde Park, London. A concert organised by the entrepreneur Richard Branson, it set an attendance record with 150,000 people confirmed in the audience. On 1 December 1976, Queen were the intended guests on London's early evening Today programme, but they pulled out at the last-minute, which saw their late replacement on the show, EMI labelmate the Sex Pistols, give their infamous expletive-strewn interview with Bill Grundy. During the A Day at the Races Tour in 1977, Queen performed sold-out shows at Madison Square Garden, New York, in February, and Earls Court, London, in June. \n\nThe band's sixth studio album News of the World was released in 1977, which has gone four times platinum in the United States, and twice in the UK. The album contained many songs tailor-made for live performance, including two of rock's most recognisable anthems, \"We Will Rock You\" and the rock ballad \"We Are the Champions\", both of which became enduring international sports anthems, and the latter reached number four in the US. Queen commenced the News of the World Tour in October 1977, and Robert Hilburn of the Los Angeles Times called this concert tour the band's \"most spectacularly staged and finely honed show\". \n\n In 1978, the band released Jazz, which reached number two in the UK and number six on the Billboard 200 in the US. The album included the hit singles \"Fat Bottomed Girls\" and \"Bicycle Race\" on a double-sided record. Queen rented Wimbledon Stadium for a day to shoot the video, with 65 naked female models hired to stage a nude bicycle race. Reviews of the album in recent years have been more favourable. Another notable track from Jazz, \"Don't Stop Me Now\", provides another example of the band's exuberant vocal harmonies. \n\nIn 1978, Queen toured the US and Canada, and spent much of 1979 touring in Europe and Japan. They released their first live album, Live Killers, in 1979; it went platinum twice in the US. Queen also released the very successful single \"Crazy Little Thing Called Love\", a rockabilly inspired song done in the style of Elvis Presley. The song made the top 10 in many countries, topped the Australian ARIA Charts for seven consecutive weeks, and was the band's first number one single in the United States where it topped the Billboard Hot 100 for four weeks. Having written the song on guitar and played rhythm on the record, Mercury played rhythm guitar while performing the song live, which was the first time he ever played guitar in concert. In December 1979, Queen played the opening night at the Concert for the People of Kampuchea in London, having accepted a request by the event's organiser Paul McCartney.\n\n1980–84: The Game to The Works\n\nQueen began their 1980s career with The Game. It featured the singles \"Crazy Little Thing Called Love\" and \"Another One Bites the Dust\", both of which reached number one in the US. After attending a Queen concert in Los Angeles, Michael Jackson suggested to Mercury backstage that \"Another One Bites the Dust\" be released as a single, and in October 1980 it spent three weeks at number one. The album topped the Billboard 200 for five weeks, and sold over four million copies in the US. It was also the first appearance of a synthesiser on a Queen album. Heretofore, their albums featured a distinctive \"No Synthesisers!\" sleeve note. The note is widely assumed to reflect an anti-synth, pro-\"hard\"-rock stance by the band, but was later revealed by producer Roy Thomas Baker to be an attempt to clarify that those albums' multi-layered solos were created with guitars, not synths, as record company executives kept assuming at the time. In September 1980, Queen performed three sold-out shows at Madison Square Garden. In 1980, Queen also released the soundtrack they had recorded for Flash Gordon. At the 1981 American Music Awards in January, \"Another One Bites the Dust\" won the award for Favorite Pop/Rock Single, and Queen were nominated for Favorite Pop/Rock Band, Duo, or Group. \n\nIn February 1981, Queen travelled to South America as part of The Game Tour, and became the first major rock band to play in Latin American stadiums. The tour included five shows in Argentina, one of which drew the largest single concert crowd in Argentine history with an audience of 300,000 in Buenos Aires and two concerts at the Morumbi Stadium in São Paulo, Brazil, where they played to an audience of more than 131,000 people in the first night (then the largest paying audience for a single band anywhere in the world) and more than 120,000 people the following night. In October of the same year, Queen performed for more than 150,000 fans on 9 October at Monterrey (Estadio Universitario) and 17 and 18 at Puebla (Estadio Zaragoza), Mexico. On 24 and 25 November, Queen played two sell out nights at the Montreal Forum, Quebec, Canada. One of Mercury's most notable performances of The Games final track, \"Save Me\", took place in Montreal, and the concert is recorded in the live album, Queen Rock Montreal. \n\nQueen worked with David Bowie on the single \"Under Pressure\". The first-time collaboration with another artist was spontaneous, as Bowie happened to drop by the studio while Queen were recording. Upon its release, the song was extremely successful, reaching number one in the UK and featuring at number 31 on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of the '80s. \n\nIn October that year, Queen released their first compilation album, titled Greatest Hits, which showcased the group's highlights from 1974–1981. It is the best-selling album in UK Chart history, and has spent 450 weeks in the UK Album Chart. The album is certified eight times platinum in the United States, and has sold over 25 million copies worldwide. Taylor became the first member of the band to release his own solo album in 1981, titled Fun in Space.\n\nIn 1982, the band released the album Hot Space, a departure from their trademark seventies sound, this time being a mixture of rock, pop rock, dance, funk, and R&B. Most of the album was recorded in Munich during the most turbulent period in the band's history, and Taylor and May lamented the new sound, with both being very critical of the influence Mercury's personal manager Paul Prenter had on the singer. May was also scathing of Prenter, who was Mercury's manager from the early 1980s to 1984, for being dismissive of the importance of radio stations, such as the US networks, and their vital connection between the artist and the community, and for denying them access to Mercury. The band stopped touring North America after their Hot Space Tour, as their success there had waned, although they would perform on American television for the only time during the eighth season premiere of Saturday Night Live. Queen left Elektra Records, their label in the United States, Canada, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand, and signed onto EMI/Capitol Records.\n\nAfter working steadily for over ten years, Queen decided that they would not perform any live shows in 1983. During this time, they recorded a new album at the Record Plant Studios, Los Angeles and Musicland Studios, Munich, and several members of the band explored side projects and solo work. Taylor released his second solo album, Strange Frontier. May released the mini-album, Star Fleet Project, collaborating with Eddie Van Halen. \n\nIn February 1984, Queen released their eleventh studio album, The Works, which included the successful singles \"Radio Ga Ga\", \"Hammer to Fall\" and \"I Want to Break Free\". Despite these hit singles, the album failed to do well in the US, while in the UK it went triple platinum and remained in the albums chart for two years. \n\nThat year, Queen began The Works Tour, the first tour to feature keyboardist Spike Edney as an extra live musician. The tour featured nine sold-out dates in October in Bophuthatswana, South Africa, at the arena in Sun City. Upon returning to England, they were the subject of outrage, having played in South Africa during the height of apartheid and in violation of worldwide divestment efforts and a United Nations cultural boycott. The band responded to the critics by stating that they were playing music for fans in South Africa, and they also stressed that the concerts were played before integrated audiences. Queen donated to a school for the deaf and blind as a philanthropic gesture but were fined by the British Musicians' Union and placed on the United Nations' blacklisted artists. \n\n1985–88: Live Aid and later years\n\nIn January 1985, the band headlined two nights of the first Rock in Rio festival at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and played in front of over 300,000 people each night. The Boston Globe described it as a \"mesmerising performance\". A selection of highlights of both nights was released on VHS with the title Queen: Live in Rio, and was later broadcast on MTV in the US. In April and May 1985, Queen completed the Works Tour with sold-out shows in Australia and Japan. \n\nAt Live Aid, held at Wembley on 13 July 1985, in front of the biggest-ever TV audience of 1.9 billion, Queen performed some of their greatest hits, during which the sold-out stadium audience of 72,000 people clapped, sang, and swayed in unison. The show's organisers, Bob Geldof and Midge Ure, other musicians such as Elton John, Cliff Richard and Dave Grohl, and music journalists writing for the BBC, CNN, Rolling Stone, MTV, The Telegraph among others, stated that Queen stole the show. [http://www.rollingstone.com/music/videos/flashback-queen-steal-the-show-at-live-aid-20130205 \"Flashback: Queen Steal the Show at Live Aid\"]. Rolling Stone. Retrieved 4 April 2013\n[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/rockandpopmusic/8785536/Queen-their-finest-moment-at-Live-Aid.html \"Queen: their finest moment at Live Aid\"]. The Telegraph. 24 September 2011\n[http://edition.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/Music/07/01/liveaid.memories/index.html \"Live Aid 1985: A day of magic\"]. CNN. Retrieved 17 July 2013\n[http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/features/live-aid-memories-it-was-lifechanging-my-life-was-not-all-about-just-me-anymore-2025079.html \"Live Aid Memories: 'It was life-changing: my life was not all about just me anymore' \"]. The Independent. Retrieved 13 September 2013\n[http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/jul/05/arts.artsnews1 \"Queen most loved band\"]. The Guardian. Retrieved 19 April 2009\nMiles, Barry (2008) [https://books.google.com/books?id-oBzTaoZciEC&pg\nPA159&dqlive+aid+queen+stole+the+show+massive+music+moments#v\nonepage&qthere%20was%20no%20beatles%20reunion&f\nfalse \"Massive Music Moments\"]. p. 159. Anova Books. Retrieved 21 May 2011 An industry poll in 2005 ranked it the greatest rock performance of all time. Mercury's powerful, sustained note during the a cappella section came to be known as \"The Note Heard Round the World\". \n\nWhen interviewed for Mojo magazine the band said the most amazing sight at Live Aid was to see the audience clapping to \"Radio Ga Ga\". Brian May stated: \"I'd never seen anything like that in my life and it wasn't calculated either. We understood our audience and played to them but that was one of those weird accidents because of the (music) video. I remember thinking 'oh great, they've picked it up' and then I thought 'this is not a Queen audience'. This is a general audience who've bought tickets before they even knew we were on the bill. And they all did it. How did they know? Nobody told them to do it.\"Mojo Magazine, August 1999, issue number 69. \"Their Britannic Majesties Request\" by David Thomas, page 87.\n\nThe band, now revitalised by the response to Live Aid – a \"shot in the arm\" Roger Taylor called it, — and the ensuing increase in record sales, ended 1985 by releasing the single \"One Vision\", which was the third time after \"Stone Cold Crazy\" and \"Under Pressure (with David Bowie)\" that all four bandmembers received a writing credit for the one song. Also, a limited-edition boxed set containing all Queen albums to date was released under the title of The Complete Works. The package included previously unreleased material, most notably Queen's non-album single of Christmas 1984, titled \"Thank God It's Christmas\". \n\nIn early 1986, Queen recorded the album A Kind of Magic, containing several reworkings of songs written for the fantasy action film Highlander. The album was very successful, producing a string of hits, including the title track, \"A Kind of Magic\". Also charting from the album were \"Friends Will Be Friends\", \"Who Wants to Live Forever\" (featuring an orchestra conducted by Michael Kamen), and the de facto theme from Highlander, \"Princes of the Universe\". \n\nIn summer of 1986, Queen went on their final tour with Freddie Mercury. A sold-out tour in support of A Kind of Magic, once again they hired Spike Edney. The Magic Tour's highlight was at Wembley Stadium in London and resulted in the live double album, Queen at Wembley, released on CD and as a live concert VHS/DVD, which has gone five times platinum in the US and four times platinum in the UK. Queen could not book Wembley for a third night, but they did play at Knebworth Park. The show sold out within two hours and over 120,000 fans packed the park for what was Queen's final live performance with Mercury. Queen began the tour at the Råsunda Stadium in Stockholm, Sweden, and during the tour the band performed a concert at Slane Castle, Ireland, in front of an audience of 95,000, which broke the venue's attendance record. The band also played behind the Iron Curtain when they performed to a crowd of 80,000 at the Népstadion in Budapest, in what was one of the biggest rock concerts ever held in Eastern Europe. More than one million people saw Queen on the tour—400,000 in the United Kingdom alone, a record at the time.\n\nAfter working on various solo projects during 1988 (including Mercury's collaboration with Montserrat Caballé, Barcelona), the band released The Miracle in 1989. The album continued the direction of A Kind of Magic, using a pop-rock sound mixed with a few heavy numbers. It spawned the European hits \"I Want It All\", \"Breakthru\", \"The Invisible Man\", \"Scandal\", and \"The Miracle\". The Miracle also began a change in direction of Queen's songwriting philosophy. Since the band's beginning, nearly all songs had been written by and credited to a single member, with other members adding minimally. With The Miracle, the band's songwriting became more collaborative, and they vowed to credit the final product only to Queen as a group. \n\n1988–92: Mercury: illness, death, and tribute\n\nAfter fans noticed Mercury's increasingly gaunt appearance in 1988, rumours began to spread that Mercury was suffering from AIDS. Mercury flatly denied this, insisting he was merely \"exhausted\" and too busy to provide interviews. The band decided to continue making albums, starting with The Miracle in 1989 and continuing with Innuendo in 1991. Despite his deteriorating health, the lead singer continued to contribute. For the last two albums made while Mercury was still alive, the band credited all songs to Queen, rather than specific members of the group, freeing them of internal conflict and differences. In 1990, Queen ended their contract with Capitol and signed with Disney's Hollywood Records, which has since remained the group's music catalogue owner in the United States and Canada. That same year, Mercury made his final public appearance when he joined the rest of Queen to collect the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music. \n\nInnuendo was released in early 1991 with an eponymous number 1 UK hit and other charting singles including, \"The Show Must Go On\". Mercury was increasingly ill and could barely walk when the band recorded \"The Show Must Go On\" in 1990. Because of this, May had concerns about whether he was physically capable of singing it. Recalling Mercury's successful performance May states; \"he went in and killed it, completely lacerated that vocal\". The rest of the band were ready to record when Mercury felt able to come in to the studio, for an hour or two at a time. May says of Mercury: “He just kept saying. 'Write me more. Write me stuff. I want to just sing this and do it and when I am gone you can finish it off.’ He had no fear, really.” The band's second greatest hits compilation, Greatest Hits II, followed in October 1991, which is the eighth best-selling album of all time in the UK and has sold 16 million copies worldwide. \n\nOn 23 November 1991, in a prepared statement made on his deathbed, Mercury confirmed that he had AIDS. Within 24 hours of the statement, he died of bronchial pneumonia, which was brought on as a complication of AIDS. His funeral service on 27 November in Kensal Green, West London was private, and held in accordance with the Zoroastrian religious faith of his family. \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" was re-released as a single shortly after Mercury's death, with \"These Are the Days of Our Lives\" as the double A-side. The music video for \"These Are the Days of Our Lives\" contains Mercury's final scenes in front of the camera. The single went to number one in the UK, remaining there for five weeks – the only recording to top the Christmas chart twice and the only one to be number one in four different years (1975, 1976, 1991, and 1992). Initial proceeds from the single – approximately £1,000,000 – were donated to the Terrence Higgins Trust. \n\nQueen's popularity was stimulated in North America when \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" was featured in the 1992 comedy film Wayne's World. Its inclusion helped the song reach number two on the Billboard Hot 100 for five weeks in 1992 (it remained in the Hot 100 for over 40 weeks), and won the band an MTV Award at the 1992 MTV Video Music Awards. The compilation album Classic Queen also reached number four on the Billboard 200, and is certified three times platinum in the US. Wayne's World footage was used to make a new music video for \"Bohemian Rhapsody\", with which the band and management were delighted. \n\nOn 20 April 1992, The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert was held at London's Wembley Stadium to a 72,000-strong crowd. Performers, including Def Leppard, Robert Plant, Guns N' Roses, Elton John, David Bowie, George Michael, Annie Lennox, Seal, Extreme, and Metallica performed various Queen songs along with the three remaining Queen members (and Spike Edney.) The concert is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as \"The largest rock star benefit concert\", as it was televised to over 1.2 billion viewers worldwide, and raised over £20,000,000 for AIDS charities.\n\n1995–03: Made in Heaven to 46664 Concert\n\nQueen's last album featuring Mercury, titled Made in Heaven, was finally released in 1995, four years after his death. Featuring tracks such as \"Too Much Love Will Kill You\" and \"Heaven for Everyone\", it was constructed from Mercury's final recordings in 1991, material left over from their previous studio albums and re-worked material from May, Taylor, and Mercury's solo albums. \nThe album also featured the song \"Mother Love\", the last vocal recording Mercury made, which he completed using a drum machine, over which May, Taylor and Deacon later added the instrumental track. After completing the penultimate verse, Mercury had told the band he \"wasn't feeling that great\" and stated, \"I will finish it when I come back, next time\"; however, he never made it back into the studio, so May later recorded the final verse of the song. Both stages of recording, before and after Mercury's death, were completed at the band's studio in Montreux, Switzerland. The album reached No. 1 on the UK charts immediately following its release, and has sold 20 million copies worldwide. On 25 November 1996, a statue of Mercury was unveiled in Montreux overlooking Lake Geneva, almost five years to the day since his death. \n\nIn 1997, Queen returned to the studio to record \"No-One but You (Only the Good Die Young)\", a song dedicated to Mercury and all those that die too soon. It was released as a bonus track on the Queen Rocks compilation album later that year. In January 1997, Queen performed \"The Show Must Go On\" live with Elton John and the Béjart Ballet in Paris on a night Mercury was remembered, and it marked the last performance and public appearance of John Deacon, who chose to retire. The Paris concert was only the second time Queen had played live since Mercury's death, prompting Elton John to urge them to perform again. \n\nBrian May and Roger Taylor performed together at several award ceremonies and charity concerts, sharing vocals with various guest singers. During this time, they were billed as Queen + followed by the guest singer's name. In 1998, the duo appeared at Luciano Pavarotti's benefit concert with May performing \"Too Much Love Will Kill You\" with Pavarotti, later playing \"Radio Ga Ga\", \"We Will Rock You\", and \"We Are the Champions\" with Zucchero. They again attended and performed at Pavarotti's benefit concert in Modena, Italy in May 2003. Several of the guest singers recorded new versions of Queen's hits under the Queen + name, such as Robbie Williams providing vocals for \"We Are the Champions\" for the soundtrack of A Knight's Tale (2001). \n\nIn 1999, a Greatest Hits III album was released. This featured, among others, \"Queen + Wyclef Jean\" on a rap version of \"Another One Bites the Dust\". A live version of \"Somebody to Love\" by George Michael and a live version of \"The Show Must Go On\" with Elton John were also featured in the album. By this point, Queen's vast amount of record sales made them the second best selling artist in the UK of all time, behind the Beatles. In 2002, Queen were awarded the 2,207th star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, which is located at 6358 Hollywood Blvd. On 29 November 2003, May and Taylor performed at the 46664 Concert hosted by Nelson Mandela at Green Point Stadium, Cape Town, to raise awareness of the spread of HIV/AIDS in South Africa. May and Taylor spent time at Mandela's home, discussing how Africa's problems might be approached, and two years later the band was made ambassadors for the 46664 cause. \n\n2004–09: Queen + Paul Rodgers\n\nAt the end of 2004, May and Taylor announced that they would reunite and return to touring in 2005 with Paul Rodgers (founder and former lead singer of Free and Bad Company). Brian May's website also stated that Rodgers would be \"featured with\" Queen as \"Queen + Paul Rodgers\", not replacing Mercury. The retired John Deacon would not be participating. In November 2004, Queen were among the inaugural inductees into the UK Music Hall of Fame, and the award ceremony was the first event at which Rodgers joined May and Taylor as vocalist. \n\nBetween 2005 and 2006, Queen + Paul Rodgers embarked on a world tour, which was the first time Queen toured since their last tour with Freddie Mercury in 1986. The band's drummer Roger Taylor commented; \"We never thought we would tour again, Paul [Rodgers] came along by chance and we seemed to have a chemistry. Paul is just such a great singer. He's not trying to be Freddie.\" The first leg was in Europe, the second in Japan, and the third in the US in 2006. Queen received the inaugural VH1 Rock Honors at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, Nevada, on 25 May 2006. The Foo Fighters paid homage to the band in performing \"Tie Your Mother Down\" to open the ceremony before being joined on stage by May, Taylor, and Paul Rodgers, who played a selection of Queen hits. \n\nOn 15 August 2006, Brian May confirmed through his website and fan club that Queen + Paul Rodgers would begin producing their first studio album beginning in October, to be recorded at a \"secret location\". Queen + Paul Rodgers performed at the Nelson Mandela 90th Birthday Tribute held in Hyde Park, London on 27 June 2008, to commemorate Mandela's ninetieth birthday, and again promote awareness of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The first Queen + Paul Rodgers album, titled The Cosmos Rocks, was released in Europe on 12 September 2008 and in the United States on 28 October 2008. Following the release of the album, the band again went on a tour through Europe, opening on Kharkiv's Freedom Square in front of 350,000 Ukrainian fans. The Kharkiv concert was later released on DVD. The tour then moved to Russia, and the band performed two sold-out shows at the Moscow Arena. Having completed the first leg of its extensive European tour, which saw the band play 15 sold-out dates across nine countries, the UK leg of the tour sold out within 90 minutes of going on sale and included three London dates, the first of which was The O2 on 13 October. The last leg of the tour took place in South America, and included a sold-out concert at the Estadio José Amalfitani, Buenos Aires.\n\nQueen and Paul Rodgers officially split up without animosity on 12 May 2009. Rodgers stated: \"My arrangement with [Queen] was similar to my arrangement with Jimmy [Page] in The Firm in that it was never meant to be a permanent arrangement\". Rodgers did not rule out the possibility of working with Queen again. \n\n2009–11: Departure from EMI, 40th anniversary\n\nOn 20 May 2009, May and Taylor performed \"We Are the Champions\" live on the season finale of American Idol with winner Kris Allen and runner-up Adam Lambert providing a vocal duet. In mid-2009, after the split of Queen + Paul Rodgers, the Queen online website announced a new greatest hits compilation named Absolute Greatest. The album was released on 16 November and peaked at number 3 in the official UK Chart. The album contains 20 of Queen's biggest hits spanning their entire career and was released in four different formats: single disc, double disc (with commentary), double disc with feature book, and a vinyl record. Before its release, Queen ran an online competition to guess the track listing as a promotion for the album. \n\nOn 30 October 2009, May wrote a fanclub letter on his website stating that Queen had no intentions to tour in 2010 but that there was a possibility of a performance. He was quoted as saying, \"The greatest debate, though, is always about when we will next play together as Queen. At the moment, in spite of the many rumours that are out there, we do not have plans to tour in 2010. The good news, though, is that Roger and I have a much closer mutual understanding these days—privately and professionally ... and all ideas are carefully considered. Music is never far away from us. As I write, there is an important one-off performance on offer, in the USA, and it remains to be decided whether we will take up this particular challenge. Every day, doors seem to open, and every day, we interact, perhaps more than ever before, with the world outside. It is a time of exciting transition in Rock music and in 'The Business'. It's good that the pulse still beats\". On 15 November 2009, May and Taylor performed \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" live on the British TV show The X Factor alongside the finalists.\n\nOn 7 May 2010, May and Taylor announced that they were quitting their record label, EMI, after almost 40 years. On 20 August 2010, Queen's manager Jim Beach put out a Newsletter stating that the band had signed a new contract with Universal Music. During an interview for Hardtalk on the BBC on 22 September, May confirmed that the band's new deal was with Island Records, a subsidiary of Universal Music Group. For the first time since the late 1980s, Queen's catalogue will have the same distributor worldwide, as their current North American label—Hollywood Records—is currently distributed by Universal (for a time in the late 1980s, Queen was on EMI-owned Capitol Records in the US). \n\nOn 14 March 2011, which marked the band's 40th anniversary, Queen's first five albums were re-released in the UK and some other territories as remastered deluxe editions (the US versions were released on 17 May). The second five albums of Queen's back catalogue were released worldwide on 27 June, with the exception of the US and Canada (27 September). The final five were released in the UK on 5 September. \n\nIn May 2011, Jane's Addiction vocalist Perry Farrell noted that Queen are currently scouting their once former and current live bassist Chris Chaney to join the band. Farrell stated: \"I have to keep Chris away from Queen, who want him and they're not gonna get him unless we're not doing anything. Then they can have him.\" In the same month, Paul Rodgers stated he may tour with Queen again in the near future. At the 2011 Broadcast Music, Incorporated (BMI) Awards held in London on 4 October, Queen received the BMI Icon Award in recognition for their airplay success in the US. At the 2011 MTV Europe Music Awards on 6 November, Queen received the Global Icon Award, which Katy Perry presented to Brian May. Queen closed the awards ceremony, with Adam Lambert on vocals, performing \"The Show Must Go On\", \"We Will Rock You\" and \"We Are the Champions\". The collaboration garnered a positive response from both fans and critics, resulting in speculation about future projects together.\n\n2011–present: Queen + Adam Lambert, Queen Forever\n\nOn 25 and 26 April, May and Taylor appeared on the eleventh series of American Idol at the Nokia Theatre, Los Angeles, performing a Queen medley with the six finalists on the first show, and the following day performed \"Somebody to Love\" with the 'Queen Extravaganza' band. Queen were scheduled to headline Sonisphere at Knebworth on 7 July 2012 with Adam Lambert before the festival was cancelled. Queen's final concert with Freddie Mercury was in Knebworth in 1986. Brian May commented, \"It's a worthy challenge for us, and I'm sure Adam would meet with Freddie's approval.\" Queen expressed disappointment at the cancellation and released a statement to the effect that they were looking to find another venue. Queen + Adam Lambert played two shows at the Hammersmith Apollo, London on 11 and 12 July 2012. Both shows sold out within 24 hours of tickets going on open sale. A third London date was scheduled for 14 July. On 30 June, Queen + Lambert performed in Kiev, Ukraine at a joint concert with Elton John for the Elena Pinchuk ANTIAIDS Foundation. Queen also performed with Lambert on 3 July 2012 at Moscow's Olympic Stadium, and on 7 July 2012 at the Municipal Stadium in Wroclaw, Poland. \n\nOn 12 August 2012, Queen performed at the closing ceremony of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. The performance at London's Olympic Stadium opened with a special remastered video clip of Mercury on stage performing his call and response routine during their 1986 concert at Wembley Stadium. Following this, May performed part of the \"Brighton Rock\" solo before being joined by Taylor and solo artist Jessie J for a performance of \"We Will Rock You\". \n\nOn 20 September 2013, Queen + Adam Lambert performed at the iHeartRadio Music Festival at the MGM Grand Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas. Queen + Adam Lambert toured North America in Summer 2014 and Australia and New Zealand in August/September 2014. In an interview with Rolling Stone, May and Taylor said that although the tour with Lambert is a limited thing, they are open to him becoming an official member, and cutting new material with him. \n\nIn November 2014 Queen released a new album Queen Forever. The album is largely a compilation of previously-released material but features three new Queen tracks featuring vocals from Mercury with backing added by the surviving members of Queen. One new track, \"There Must Be More To Life Than This\", is a duet between Mercury and the late Michael Jackson. \n\nIn 2016, the group embarked across Europe on the Queen + Adam Lambert 2016 Summer Festival Tour. This included closing the Isle of Wight Festival in England on 12 June where they performed \"Who Wants to Live Forever\" as a tribute to the victims of the mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida earlier that day. \n\nArtistry\n\nMusical style\n\nQueen drew artistic influence from British rock acts of the 1960s and early 1970s, such as the Beatles, the Kinks, Cream, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, the Who, Black Sabbath, Slade, Deep Purple, David Bowie, Genesis and Yes, in addition to American guitarist Jimi Hendrix, with Mercury also inspired by the gospel singer Aretha Franklin. May referred to the Beatles as being \"our bible in the way they used the studio and they painted pictures and this wonderful instinctive use of harmonies.\" At their outset in the early 1970s, Queen's music has been characterised as \"Led Zeppelin meets Yes\" due to its combination of \"acoustic/electric guitar extremes and fantasy-inspired multi-part song epics\". \n\nQueen composed music that drew inspiration from many different genres of music, often with a tongue-in-cheek attitude. The genres they have been associated with include progressive rock, symphonic rock, art rock, glam rock, hard rock, heavy metal, pop rock, and psychedelic rock. Queen also wrote songs that were inspired by diverse musical styles which are not typically associated with rock groups, such as opera, music hall, folk music, gospel, ragtime, and dance/disco. Several Queen songs were written with audience participation in mind, such as \"We Will Rock You\" and \"We Are the Champions\". Similarly, \"Radio Ga Ga\" became a live favourite because it would have \"crowds clapping like they were at a Nuremberg rally\". \n\nIn 1963, the teenage Brian May and his father custom-built his signature guitar Red Special, which was purposely designed to feedback. Sonic experimentation figured heavily in Queen's songs. A distinctive characteristic of Queen's music are the vocal harmonies which are usually composed of the voices of May, Mercury, and Taylor best heard on the studio albums A Night at the Opera and A Day at the Races. Some of the ground work for the development of this sound can be attributed to their former producer Roy Thomas Baker, and their engineer Mike Stone. Besides vocal harmonies, Queen were also known for multi-tracking voices to imitate the sound of a large choir through overdubs. For instance, according to Brian May, there are over 180 vocal overdubs in \"Bohemian Rhapsody\". The band's vocal structures have been compared with the Beach Boys, but May stated they were not \"much of an influence\". \n\nInfluence\n\nQueen have been recognised as having made significant contributions to such genres as hard rock, and heavy metal, among others. Hence, the band have been cited as an influence by many other musicians. Moreover, like their music, the bands and artists that have claimed to be influenced by Queen and have expressed admiration for them are diverse, spanning different generations, countries, and genres, including heavy metal: Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Metallica, Dream Theater, Trivium, Megadeth, Anthrax, Slipknot and Rage Against the Machine; hard rock: Guns N' Roses, Def Leppard, Van Halen, Mötley Crüe, Steve Vai, the Cult, the Darkness, Kid Rock and Foo Fighters; alternative rock: Nirvana, Radiohead, Trent Reznor, Muse, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Jane's Addiction, Faith No More, Melvins, the Flaming Lips, and The Smashing Pumpkins; pop rock: Meat Loaf, The Killers, My Chemical Romance, Fall Out Boy and Panic! at the Disco; and pop: Michael Jackson, George Michael, Robbie Williams, Adele, Lady Gaga and Katy Perry. \n\nIn the early 1970s, Queen helped spur the heavy metal genre's evolution by discarding much of its blues influence. Queen's 1974 song \"Stone Cold Crazy\" has been cited as a precursor of speed metal. Metallica recorded a cover version of \"Stone Cold Crazy\", which first appeared on the Rubáiyát: Elektra's 40th Anniversary album in 1990, and won their second Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance in 1991. \n\nThom Yorke of Radiohead received his first guitar at 7 years old, encouraged after seeing Brian May in a broadcast of a Queen concert. At 10 years old, Yorke made his own homemade guitar, trying to imitate what May had done with his Red Special, but he was not satisfied with the result. Subsequently, Queen was one of the first influences in the music of Radiohead.\n\nLegacy\n\nIn 2002, Queen's \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" was voted \"the UK's favourite hit of all time\" in a poll conducted by the Guinness World Records British Hit Singles Book. In 2004 the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. Many scholars consider the \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" music video ground-breaking, and credit it with popularising the medium. Rock historian Paul Fowles states the song is \"widely credited as the first global hit single for which an accompanying video was central to the marketing strategy\". It has been hailed as launching the MTV age. Acclaimed for their stadium rock, in 2005 an industry poll ranked Queen's performance at Live Aid in 1985 as the best live act in history. In 2007, they were also voted the greatest British band in history by BBC Radio 2 listeners. \n\nAs of 2005, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, Queen albums have spent a total of 1,322 weeks (twenty-six years) on the UK Album Charts, more time than any other musical act. Also in 2005, with the release of their live album with Paul Rodgers, Queen moved into third place on the list of acts with the most aggregate time spent on the British record charts. \n\nIn 2006, the Greatest Hits album was the all-time best-selling album in UK Chart history, with sales of 5,407,587 copies, over 604,295 more copies than its nearest competitor, the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Their Greatest Hits II album is the seventh best seller, with sales of 3,746,404 copies. \n\nThe band have released a total of eighteen number one albums, eighteen number one singles, and ten number one DVDs worldwide, making them one of the world's best-selling music artists. Queen have sold over 150 million records, with some estimates in excess of 300 million records worldwide, including 34.5 million albums in the US as of 2004. Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001, the band is the only group in which every member has composed more than one chart-topping single, and all four members were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2003. In 2009, \"We Will Rock You\" and \"We Are the Champions\" were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, and the latter was voted the world's favourite song in a 2005 Sony Ericsson global music poll. \n\nQueen are one of the most bootlegged bands ever, according to Nick Weymouth, who manages the band's official website. A 2001 survey discovered the existence of 12,225 websites dedicated to Queen bootlegs, the highest number for any band. Bootleg recordings have contributed to the band's popularity in certain countries where Western music is censored, such as Iran. In a project called Queen: The Top 100 Bootlegs, many of these have been made officially available to download for a nominal fee from Queen's website, with profits going to the Mercury Phoenix Trust. Rolling Stone ranked Queen at number 52 on its list of the \"100 Greatest Artists of All Time\", while ranking Mercury the 18th greatest singer, and May the twenty-sixth greatest guitarist. Queen were named 13th on VH1's 100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock list, and in 2010 were ranked 17th on VH1's 100 Greatest Artists of All Time list. In 2012, Gigwise readers named Queen the best band of the past 60 years. \n\nIn other media\n\nMusical theatre\n\nIn May 2002, a musical or \"rock theatrical\" based on the songs of Queen, titled We Will Rock You, opened at the Dominion Theatre on London's West End. The musical was written by British comedian and author Ben Elton in collaboration with Brian May and Roger Taylor, and produced by Robert De Niro. It has since been staged in many cities around the world. Following the Las Vegas premiere on 8 September 2004, Queen were inducted into the Hollywood RockWalk in Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles. \n\nThe original London production was scheduled to close on Saturday, 7 October 2006, at the Dominion Theatre, but due to public demand, the show ran until May 2014. We Will Rock You has become the longest running musical ever to run at this prime London theatre, overtaking the previous record holder, the Grease musical. Brian May stated in 2008 that they were considering writing a sequel to the musical. The musical toured around the UK in 2009, playing at Manchester Palace Theatre, Sunderland Empire, Birmingham Hippodrome, Bristol Hippodrome, and Edinburgh Playhouse. \n\nThe launch of the musical coincided with Queen Elizabeth II's Golden Jubilee. As part of the Jubilee celebrations, Brian May performed a guitar solo of \"God Save the Queen\", as featured on Queen's A Night at the Opera, from the roof of Buckingham Palace. The recording of this performance was used as video for the song on the 30th Anniversary DVD edition of A Night at the Opera. \n\nSean Bovim created \"Queen at the Ballet\", a tribute to Mercury, which uses Queen's music as a soundtrack for the show's dancers, who interpret the stories behind tracks such as \"Bohemian Rhapsody\", \"Radio Ga Ga\", and \"Killer Queen\". \n\nQueen's music also appears in the Off-Broadway production Power Balladz, most notably the song \"We Are the Champions\", with the show's two performers believing the song was \"the apex of artistic achievement in its day\". \n\nDigital realm\n\nIn conjunction with Electronic Arts, Queen released the computer game Queen: The eYe in 1998. The music itself—tracks from Queen's vast catalogue, in many cases remixed into new instrumental versions—was by and large well received, but the game experience was hampered by poor gameplay. Adding to the problem was an extremely long development time, resulting in graphic elements that already seemed outdated by the time of release. \n\nUnder the supervision of May and Taylor, numerous restoration projects have been under way involving Queen's lengthy audio and video catalogue. DVD releases of their 1986 Wembley concert (titled Live at Wembley Stadium), 1982 Milton Keynes concert (Queen on Fire – Live at the Bowl), and two Greatest Video Hits (Volumes 1 and 2, spanning the 1970s and 1980s) have seen the band's music remixed into 5.1 and DTS surround sound. So far, only two of the band's albums, A Night at the Opera and The Game, have been fully remixed into high-resolution multichannel surround on DVD-Audio. A Night at the Opera was re-released with some revised 5.1 mixes and accompanying videos in 2005 for the 30th anniversary of the album's original release (CD+DVD-Video set). In 2007, a Blu-ray edition of Queen's previously released concerts, Queen Rock Montreal & Live Aid, was released, marking their first project in 1080p HD. \n\nQueen have been featured multiple times in the Guitar Hero franchise: a cover of \"Killer Queen\" in the original Guitar Hero, \"We Are The Champions\", \"Fat Bottomed Girls\", and the Paul Rodgers collaboration \"C-lebrity\" in a track pack for Guitar Hero World Tour, \"Under Pressure\" with David Bowie in Guitar Hero 5, \"I Want It All\" in Guitar Hero: Van Halen, \"Stone Cold Crazy\" in Guitar Hero: Metallica, and \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" in Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock. On 13 October 2009, Brian May revealed there was \"talk\" going on \"behind the scenes\" about a dedicated Queen Rock Band game. \n\nQueen have also been featured multiple times in the Rock Band franchise: a track pack of 10 songs which are compatible with Rock Band, Rock Band 2, and Rock Band 3 (three of those are also compatible with Lego Rock Band). Their hit \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" was featured in Rock Band 3 with full harmony and keys support.\nThe band also appeared in the video game Lego Rock Band as playable Lego avatars. \n\nIn March 2009, Sony Computer Entertainment released a Queen branded version of the company's karaoke franchise, SingStar. The game, which is available on PlayStation 2 and PlayStation 3, is titled SingStar Queen and has 25 songs on the PS3 and 20 on the PS2. \"We Will Rock You\" and other songs by Queen also appear in DJ Hero. \n\n\"One Vision\" was featured on the successful video game Grand Theft Auto IV on the fictional radio station Liberty Rock Radio 97.8, while \"Radio Ga Ga\" features on Grand Theft Auto V character trailer for Michael and the game's soundtrack. \n\nFilm and television\n\nQueen contributed music directly to the films Flash Gordon (1980), with \"Flash\" as the theme song, and Highlander (the original 1986 film), with \"A Kind of Magic\", \"One Year of Love\", \"Who Wants to Live Forever\", \"Hammer to Fall\", and the theme \"Princes of the Universe\", which was also used as the theme of the Highlander TV series (1992–1998). In the United States, \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" was re-released as a single in 1992 after appearing in the comedy film Wayne's World. The single subsequently reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100 (with \"The Show Must Go On\" as the first track on the single) and helped rekindle the band's popularity in North America. \n\nSeveral films have featured their songs performed by other artists. A version of \"Somebody to Love\" by Anne Hathaway was in the 2004 film Ella Enchanted. In 2006, Brittany Murphy also recorded a cover of the same song for the 2006 film Happy Feet. In 2001, a version of \"The Show Must Go On\" was performed by Jim Broadbent and Nicole Kidman in the film musical Moulin Rouge!. The 2001 film A Knight's Tale has a version of \"We Are the Champions\" performed by Robbie Williams and Queen; the film also features \"We Will Rock You\" played by the medieval audience. \n\n\"I Was Born to Love You\" was used as the theme song of the Japanese television drama Pride on Fuji Television in 2004, starring Takuya Kimura and Yūko Takeuchi. The show's soundtrack also contained other songs by Queen. \"Don't Stop Me Now\" has featured in the BBC television show Top Gear, and in 2005 the song was voted as \"The Greatest Driving Song Ever\" by the shows viewers. \n\nKeeping in a tradition of naming each season's episodes after songs by 1970s rock bands, the eighth and final season of That '70s Show had episodes named after Queen songs. \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" served as the season premiere. – [http://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?hlen&lr\n&qintitle%3AEpisode+Guide&as_publication\n&as_ylo&as_yhi\n&btnG=Search Scholar search] The Simpsons has made storylines which have featured Queen songs such as \"We Will Rock You\", \"We Are the Champions\" (both sung by Homer), and \"You're My Best Friend\". \n\nOn 11 April 2006, Brian May and Roger Taylor appeared on the American singing contest television show American Idol. Each contestant was required to sing a Queen song during that week of the competition. Songs which appeared on the show included \"Bohemian Rhapsody\", \"Fat Bottomed Girls\", \"The Show Must Go On\", \"Who Wants to Live Forever\", and \"Innuendo\". Brian May later criticised the show for editing specific scenes, one of which made the group's time with contestant Ace Young look negative, despite it being the opposite. Taylor and May again appeared on the American Idol season 8 finale in May 2009, performing \"We Are the Champions\" with finalists Adam Lambert and Kris Allen. On 15 November 2009, Brian May and Roger Taylor appeared on the singing contest television show X Factor in the UK.\n\nIn the autumn of 2009, Glee featured the fictional high school's show choir singing \"Somebody to Love\" as their second act performance in the episode \"The Rhodes Not Taken\". The performance was included on the show's Volume 1 soundtrack CD. In June 2010, the choir performed \"Another One Bites the Dust\" in the episode \"Funk\". The following week's episode, \"Journey to Regionals\", features a rival choir performing \"Bohemian Rhapsody\" in its entirety. The song was featured on the episode's EP. In May 2012, the choir performed \"We Are the Champions\" in the episode \"Nationals\", and the song features in The Graduation Album. \n\nIn September 2010, Brian May announced in a BBC interview that Sacha Baron Cohen was to play Mercury in a film of the same name. Time commented with approval on his singing ability and visual similarity to Mercury. However, in July 2013, Baron Cohen dropped out of the role due to \"creative differences\" between him and the surviving band members. In December 2013, it was announced that Ben Whishaw, best known for playing Q in the James Bond film Skyfall, had been chosen to replace Cohen in the role of Mercury. The motion picture is being written by Peter Morgan, who had been nominated for Oscars for his screenplays The Queen and Frost/Nixon. The film, which is being co-produced by Robert De Niro's TriBeCa Productions, will focus on Queen's formative years and the period leading up to the celebrated performance at the 1985 Live Aid concert. \n\nBand members\n\n;Current members\n* Brian May – lead guitar, keyboards, vocals (1970–present)\n* Roger Taylor – drums, percussion, rhythm guitar, tambourine, vocals (1970–present)\n\n;Former members\n* Freddie Mercury – lead vocals, piano, rhythm guitar, tambourine (1970–1991; his death)\n* John Deacon – bass guitar, rhythm guitar, keyboards, backing vocals, triangle (1971–1997)\n\n;Long-term Queen + vocalists\n* Paul Rodgers (2004–2009)\n* Adam Lambert (2011–present)\n\n;Other guest vocalists\n* David Bowie (1981, 1992)\n* Annie Lennox (1992)\n* Lisa Stansfield (1992–1993)\n* George Michael (1992–1993)\n* Elton John (1992, 1997)\n* Zucchero (1992, 1998)\n* Robbie Williams (2001)\n* Kris Allen (2009)\n* Jessie J (2012)\n* Nate Ruess (2013)\n* Lady Gaga (2014) \n\n;Touring members\n* Morgan Fisher – keyboards, piano (1982)\n* Fred Mandel – keyboards, piano (1982)\n* Spike Edney – keyboards, piano, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (1984–present)\n* Jamie Moses – rhythm guitar, backing vocals (1998–2009)\n* Danny Miranda – bass guitar, backing vocals (2005–2009)\n* Rufus Tiger Taylor – percussion, drums, backing vocals (2011–present)\n* Neil Fairclough – bass guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)\n\n;Early members\n* Mike Grose – bass (1970)\n* Barry Mitchell – bass (1970–1971)\n* Doug Ewood Bogie – bass (1971)\n\n;Timeline\n\nDiscography\n\n*Queen (1973)\n*Queen II (1974)\n*Sheer Heart Attack (1974)\n*A Night at the Opera (1975)\n*A Day at the Races (1976)\n*News of the World (1977)\n*Jazz (1978)\n*The Game (1980)\n*Flash Gordon (1980) – soundtrack\n*Hot Space (1982)\n*The Works (1984)\n*A Kind of Magic (1986)\n*The Miracle (1989)\n*Innuendo (1991)\n*Made in Heaven (1995)", "Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta ( ; born March 28, 1986), known professionally as Lady Gaga, is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She performed initially in theater, appearing in high school plays, and studied at CAP21 through New York University's Tisch School of the Arts before dropping out to pursue a musical career. After leaving a rock band, participating in the Lower East Side's avant garde performance art circuit, and being dropped from a contract with Def Jam Recordings, Gaga worked as a songwriter for Sony/ATV Music Publishing. From there, recording artist Akon noticed her vocal abilities and helped her to sign a joint deal with Interscope Records and his own KonLive Distribution.\n\nHer debut album The Fame (2008) was a critical and commercial success that produced global chart-topping singles such as \"Just Dance\" and \"Poker Face\". A follow-up extended play (EP), The Fame Monster (2009), was met with a similar reception and \"Bad Romance\", \"Telephone\", and \"Alejandro\" were released becoming successful singles. Her second full-length album Born This Way was released in 2011, topping the charts in more than 20 countries, including the United States, where it sold over one million copies in its first week. The album produced the number-one single \"Born This Way\". Her third album Artpop, released in 2013, topped the US charts and included the successful single \"Applause\". In 2014, Gaga released a collaborative jazz album with Tony Bennett titled Cheek to Cheek, which became her third consecutive number one in the United States. For her work in the television series American Horror Story: Hotel, Gaga won a Golden Globe Award in 2016.\n\nWith global album and single sales of 27 million and 146 million respectively, as of January 2016, she is one of the best-selling musicians of all time. Her achievements include twelve Guinness World Records, three Brit Awards, and six Grammy Awards. She is also the first artist to win the Songwriters Hall of Fame's Contemporary Icon Award. Other accolades include a Fashion Icon lifetime achievement award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America (2011), regular appearances on Billboards Artists of the Year lists and Forbess power and earnings rankings. In 2013, Gaga finished second on Times readers' poll of the most influential people of the past ten years, while in 2015, she was named Billboards Woman of the Year. She is known for her philanthropic work and social activism, including LGBT rights and the Born This Way Foundation.\n\nLife and career\n\n1986–2004: Early life\n\nStefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta was born on March 28, 1986, at the Lenox Hill Hospital on Manhattan's Upper East Side to a Catholic family. She is the elder daughter of Cynthia Louise \"Cindy\" (Bissett) and Internet entrepreneur Joseph Anthony \"Joe\" Germanotta, Jr. Gaga is of 75 percent Italian descent, and also has French Canadian ancestry. Gaga's sister Natali is a fashion student. Despite her affluent upbringing on Manhattan's Upper West Side, she says that her parents \"both came from lower-class families, so we've worked for everything—my mother worked eight to eight out of the house, in telecommunications, and so did my father.\" From age eleven, she attended the Convent of the Sacred Heart, a private, all-girls Roman Catholic school on Manhattan's Upper East Side. She described her academic life in high school as \"very dedicated, very studious, very disciplined\" but also \"a bit insecure\". \"I used to get made fun of for being either too provocative or too eccentric, so I started to tone it down. I didn't fit in, and I felt like a freak.\" Gaga began playing the piano at the age of four, wrote her first piano ballad at thirteen, and started to perform at open mic nights by the age of fourteen. She performed lead roles in high school productions, including Adelaide in Guys and Dolls and Philia in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. She also appeared in a very small role as a mischievous classmate in the television drama series The Sopranos in a 2001 episode titled \"The Telltale Moozadell\". She auditioned for New York shows without success. She also studied method acting at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute for ten years.\n\nAfter high school, her mother encouraged her to apply for the Collaborative Arts Project 21 (CAP21), a musical theater training conservatory at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. One of 20 students to gain early admission, she, aged 17, lived in an NYU dorm on 11th Street. In addition to sharpening her songwriting skills, she composed essays and analytical papers on art, religion, social issues, and politics, including a thesis on pop artists Spencer Tunick and Damien Hirst. She also auditioned for various roles and won the part of an unsuspecting diner customer for MTV's Boiling Points, a prank reality television show. \n\n2005–07: Career beginnings\n\nAt age 19, Gaga withdrew from CAP21 in the second semester of her sophomore year, deciding to focus on her musical career. In the mid-2005, Gaga recorded a couple of songs with hip-hop singer Grandmaster Melle Mel, for an audio book accompanying Cricket Casey's children's book The Portal in the Park. She also formed a band called the Stefani Germanotta Band (SGBand) with some friends from NYU. The band played at gigs around New York becoming a local fixture of the downtown Lower East Side club scene. After the 2006 Songwriters Hall of Fame New Songwriters Showcase at The Cutting Room in June, Gaga was recommended to music producer Rob Fusari by talent scout Wendy Starland. Fusari collaborated with Gaga, who traveled daily to New Jersey, to work on songs she had written and to compose new material with him. According to the producer, they began dating in May 2006, and he claimed to have created the \"Lady Gaga\" moniker after the Queen song \"Radio Ga Ga\". The singer was in the process of trying to come up with a stage name when she received a text message from Fusari that read \"Lady Gaga\". He explained, \"Every day, when Stef came to the studio, instead of saying hello, I would start singing 'Radio Ga Ga'\". The text message was the result of a predictive text glitch that changed \"radio\" to \"lady\". Fusari said she texted back, \"That's it\", and declared, \"Don't ever call me Stefani again.\" \n\nFusari and Gaga established a company called Team Lovechild LLC to promote her career. They recorded and produced electropop tracks and sent them to music industry executives. Joshua Sarubin, the head of A&R at Def Jam Recordings, responded positively and after agreement from his boss, Antonio \"L.A.\" Reid, Gaga was signed to Def Jam in September 2006. However, she was dropped by the label after only three months – a period of her life that later inspired the music video of her 2011 single \"Marry the Night\". Devastated, Gaga returned to the solace of the family home for Christmas and the nightlife culture of the Lower East Side. She became increasingly experimental: fascinating herself with emerging neo-burlesque shows, go-go dancing at bars dressed in little more than a bikini, in addition to experimenting with drugs. Gaga explained her antics represented freedom: \"I went to a Catholic school but it was on the New York underground that I found myself.\" Her relationship with Fusari ended in January 2007 following which she became romantically involved with a heavy metal drummer. She compared this relationship and the subsequent breakup to the musical film Grease: \"I was his Sandy, and he was my Danny, and I just broke.\" \n\nDuring this time, she met performance artist Lady Starlight, who helped mold her onstage persona. Like SGBand, the pair soon began performing at many of the downtown club venues like the Mercury Lounge, The Bitter End, and the Rockwood Music Hall. Their live performance art piece was known as \"Lady Gaga and the Starlight Revue\" and, billed as \"The Ultimate Pop Burlesque Rockshow\", was a low-fi tribute to 1970s variety acts. Their performance at the 2007 Lollapalooza music festival was critically acclaimed.\n\nHaving initially focused on avant-garde electronic dance music, Gaga found her musical niche when she began to incorporate pop melodies and the glam rock of David Bowie and Queen into her music. While Gaga and Starlight were busy performing, Fusari continued to work on the songs he had created with Gaga. He sent these songs to his friend, producer and record executive Vincent Herbert. The latter was quick to sign her to his label Streamline Records, an imprint of Interscope Records, established in 2007. Gaga later credited Herbert as the man who discovered her, adding: \"I really feel like we made pop history, and we're gonna keep going.\" Having served as an apprentice songwriter during an internship at Famous Music Publishing, (later acquired by Sony/ATV Music Publishing), Gaga subsequently struck a music publishing deal with Sony/ATV. As a result, she was hired to write songs for Britney Spears and label mates New Kids on the Block, Fergie, and The Pussycat Dolls. At Interscope, singer-songwriter Akon recognized her vocal abilities when she sang a reference vocal for one of his tracks in studio. Akon then convinced Interscope Geffen A&M Chairman and CEO Jimmy Iovine to form a joint deal by having her also sign with his own label Kon Live, making her his \"franchise player\". \n\nTowards the end of 2007, Gaga met with songwriter and producer RedOne. Gaga collaborated with him in the recording studio for a week on her debut album, and also joined the roster of Cherrytree Records, an Interscope imprint established by producer and songwriter Martin Kierszenbaum; she also wrote four songs with Kierszenbaum. Despite her secure record deal, she admitted that there was fear about her being too \"racy\", \"dance-oriented\" and \"underground\" for the mainstream market. Her response: \"My name is Lady Gaga, I've been on the music scene for years, and I'm telling you, this is what's next.\"\n\n2008–10: The Fame and The Fame Monster\n\nBy 2008, Gaga relocated to Los Angeles in order to work extensively with her record label to complete her debut album, The Fame, and set up her own creative team called the Haus of Gaga, modeled on Andy Warhol's Factory. The Fame was released on August 19, 2008, with positive reception. Critics noted the album's combination of genres, \"from Def Leppard drums and hand claps to metal drums on urban tracks\", the inspiration drawn from 1980s synthpop and incorporation of dance music. The Fame went to number one in Austria, Canada, Germany, Ireland, Switzerland and the UK and appeared in the top five in Australia, the US and 15 other countries. Its first two singles, \"Just Dance\" and \"Poker Face\", became worldwide commercial successes. \"Poker Face\" won the award for Best Dance Recording at the 52nd Annual Grammy Awards while The Fame won Best Dance/Electronica Album at the same ceremony. Three other successful singles were released from the album—\"Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say)\", \"LoveGame\", and \"Paparazzi\".\n\nFollowing her opening act on The Pussycat Dolls' 2009 Doll Domination Tour in Europe and Oceania, Gaga embarked on her own worldwide The Fame Ball Tour, which ran from March to September 2009. While she traveled the globe, Gaga released The Fame Monster, an EP of eight songs, in November 2009. Each song dealt with the darker side of fame from personal experience, expressed through a monster metaphor. Lead single \"Bad Romance\" topped the charts in 18 countries and reached number two in the US, Australia and New Zealand; it won the Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance and Best Short Form Music Video. Two other singles were released from the EP, \"Telephone\" (featuring Beyoncé) and \"Alejandro\". The former became Gaga's fourth UK number one single, while the latter faced controversy for its music video, which was deemed blasphemous by the Catholic League. Despite the controversy surrounding her music videos, Gaga became the first artist to gain over one billion viral views on video-sharing website YouTube. At the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards, Gaga won 8 of her 13 nominations, including Video of the Year for \"Bad Romance\". In addition, The Fame Monster won the Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Album. Gaga also released, The Remix, which became her final record with Cherrytree Records. Forbes first listed Gaga on their 2010 Celebrity 100 and World's Most Powerful Women lists ranking her fourth and seventh, respectively. \n\nThe success of The Fame and The Fame Monster allowed Gaga to start her second worldwide concert tour, The Monster Ball Tour, just weeks after finishing The Fame Ball Tour. Critically and commercially successful, the tour began in November 2009 and ended in May 2011, and grossed $227.4 million, making it the highest-grossing for a debut headlining artist. Concerts performed at Madison Square Garden in New York City were filmed for an HBO television special titled Lady Gaga Presents the Monster Ball Tour: At Madison Square Garden. Gaga also performed songs from the albums at international events such as the 2009 Royal Variety Performance, 52nd Annual Grammy Awards, and the 2010 BRIT Awards. Other performances might have included her participation in Michael Jackson's This Is It concert series at London's O2 Arena had he not died of a drug overdose. Gaga clarified that she was: \"actually asked to open for Michael on his tour... We were going to open for him at the O2 and we were working on making it happen. I believe there was some talk about us, lots of the openers, doing duets with Michael on stage.\" \n\nDuring this era Gaga ventured into business, collaborating with consumer electronics company Monster Cable Products to create a pair of in-ear, jewel-encrusted, headphones titled Heartbeats. \"They are designed to be the first ever fashion accessories that double as the absolute best sonically sounding headphones in the world,\" she commented. Gaga also partnered with Polaroid in January 2010 as their Creative Director and revealed a trio of new photo capturing products called Grey Label. But her collaboration with past producer, and ex-boyfriend, Rob Fusari led to her production team, Mermaid Music LLC, being sued in March 2010 when he claimed that he was entitled to a 20% share of the company's earnings. The New York Supreme Court dismissed both the lawsuit and a countersuit by Gaga. In addition to such strife, Gaga was tested borderline positive for lupus, but claimed not to be affected by the symptoms. The singer addressed the matter in an interview with Larry King, saying she hopes to avoid symptoms by maintaining a healthy lifestyle. \n\n2011–14: Born This Way, Artpop and Cheek to Cheek\n\nIn February 2011, Gaga released the lead single \"Born This Way\" from her studio album of the same name. The song debuted atop the Billboard Hot 100, becoming the 1,000th number-one single in the history of the charts. Its second single \"Judas\" also peaked within the top ten in several major musical markets, while \"The Edge of Glory\", first a commercial success in digital outlets, was later released as a single to rave critical reviews. Born This Way, released on May 23, 2011, debuted atop the Billboard 200 with first-week sales of 1.108 million copies, and topped the charts in more than 20 other countries. The album sold eight million copies worldwide, and received three Grammy Award nominations, including her third Album of the Year listing. The album's following singles \"You and I\" and \"Marry the Night\" failed to match the international success. In July 2011, she started dating actor and model Taylor Kinney, whom she met while filming the \"You and I\" music video. The accompanying tour for Born This Way, titled the Born This Way Ball, began in April 2012 and concluded in February 2013. Some of the tour's shows were cancelled due to a labral tear of her right hip. Shortly thereafter Gaga confirmed that she had hip surgery, and was recovering. The tour earned $183 million globally. Gaga was ranked as the second most-played artist of 2011 in the United Kingdom by the PPL. She also topped the Celebrity 100 List, with earnings of US$90 million, and was the highest ranked entertainer on Forbes World's Most Powerful Women in the eleventh position. In March 2012, Gaga was ranked fourth on Billboards list of top moneymakers of 2011 with earnings of $25 million, which included sales from Born This Way and her Monster Ball Tour. \n\nDuring this period, Gaga recorded a jazz version of \"The Lady Is a Tramp\" with Tony Bennett and lent her vocals to a song with Elton John for the animated feature film, Gnomeo & Juliet. She held a concert at the Sydney Town Hall, Australia, to promote Born This Way, and at the celebration of former US president Bill Clinton's 65th birthday. Later that year, Gaga directed the critically acclaimed Thanksgiving Day television special, A Very Gaga Thanksgiving, which attained 5.749 million American viewers, and spawned the release of her fourth EP, A Very Gaga Holiday. In May 2012, Gaga guest-starred as an animated version of herself on the 23rd season finale of The Simpsons, titled \"Lisa Goes Gaga\". She also appeared n Tony Bennett's documentary film, The Zen of Bennett (2012). The following month, she announced her first fragrance in association with Coty, Inc., Lady Gaga Fame, which was released worldwide in September 2012. \n\nNew songs for Gaga's third studio album, Artpop, were beginning to take definite form as she worked with producer Fernando Garibay in early 2012. Work on the album continued well into the Born This Way Ball tour. She yearned to make audiences have \"a really good time\" with Artpop, crafting the album to mirror \"a night at the club\". Artpop was released in November 2013. Despite mixed reviews, it debuted atop the Billboard 200 chart, and has sold 2.5 million copies as of July 2014. The album spawned successful singles in \"Applause\" and \"Do What U Want\", featuring R&B singer R. Kelly. A third release, \"G.U.Y.\", became Gaga's weakest performing single to date. Gaga embarked on the accompanying ArtRave: The Artpop Ball tour several months later, building upon concepts from her ArtRave promotional event. Scooping up $83 million, the itinerary saw her visit new cities and several locations initially included in the Born This Way Ball tour. Meanwhile, Gaga split from longtime manager Troy Carter over \"creative differences\", and by June 2014, she and new manager Bobby Campbell joined Artist Nation, the artist management division of Live Nation Entertainment. She topped Forbes List of Top-Earning Celebs Under 30, and ranked second on the Celebrity 100 List and Time anniversary poll of the most influential people of the past ten years. \n\nGaga starred in Robert Rodriguez's Machete Kills (2013), a critical and commercial failure that earned her a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Supporting Actress nomination. The singer also hosted the November 16, 2013 episode of Saturday Night Live, where she performed \"Do What U Want\" (with Kelly) and an album cut, \"Gypsy\". Later that month, she held her second Thanksgiving Day television special on ABC, Lady Gaga and the Muppets' Holiday Spectacular. Gaga had a cameo in another Robert Rodriguez film, Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, released on August 22, 2014. She was confirmed as the Versace's spring-summer 2014 face with a campaign called \"Lady Gaga For Versace\". \n\nIn 2014, Gaga collaborated with American jazz singer Tony Bennett on the jazz album Cheek to Cheek. It debuted atop the Billboard 200, becoming Gaga's third consecutive number-one record in the United States. The album won a Grammy Award for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album. The duo recorded a concert special, called Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga: Cheek to Cheek Live!, and embarked on the Cheek to Cheek Tour, which began in December 2014 and concluded in August 2015. The same year, Gaga also had a seven-day residency show commemorating the final performance at New York's Roseland Ballroom before its closure. She also released her second fragrance in association with Coty Inc., named Eau de Gaga. \n\n2015–present: American Horror Story and fifth studio album\n\nIn February 2015, Gaga became engaged to Taylor Kinney. At the 87th Academy Awards, she performed a tribute to The Sound of Music, singing a medley of songs from the film. The performance triggered over 214,000 interactions per minute globally on Facebook. Gaga performed a piano version of John Lennon's \"Imagine\" at the opening ceremony of the 2015 European Games in Baku, Azerbaijan. Gaga and Diane Warren co-wrote a song titled \"Til It Happens to You\" for the documentary The Hunting Ground, which earned them the Satellite Award for Best Original Song and an Academy Award nomination in the same category. On October 2, 2015, a fashion film, directed by Nick Knight, was released for Tom Ford's 2016 spring campaign, which depicts Gaga among several models dancing around a catwalk. It featured a new version of Chic's \"I Want Your Love\", recorded by Gaga in collaboration with Nile Rodgers. The singer received other accolades in 2015, including the Contemporary Icon Award at the 2015 Annual Songwriters Hall of Fame Awards, the Young Artist Award at the 2015 National Arts Awards, and she ranked number 25 as the third female singer on the 2015 Forbes Celebrity 100 list, with earnings of US$59 million. Billboard also named Gaga its 2015 Woman of the Year. In November 2015, Gaga and Bennett were featured in a commercial for Barnes & Noble's 2015 holiday campaign, for which they recorded a rendition of \"Baby, It's Cold Outside\". \n\nGaga starred in American Horror Story: Hotel, the fifth season of American Horror Story, which ran from October 2015 to January 2016. She played Elizabeth, the owner of the titular hotel. Despite her performance receiving mixed reviews, she won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Miniseries or Television Film at the 2016 ceremony. Following her win, she signed with the Creative Artists Agency (CAA) having previously been signed with William Morris Endeavor (WME). Gaga told Entertainment Weekly that the experience with American Horror Story will influence the creative process of her fifth studio album, claiming: \"I have returned to something I've believed in so much, which is the art of darkness.\" She confirmed that the album will be released during 2016. In March 2016, she announced that she would return for the sixth season of American Horror Story. \n\nIn January 2016, Gaga was invited to be the guest editor for the V magazine for its 99th issue, which features sixteen different covers. She subsequently received the award for Editor of the Year for her work on the magazine in March during the Fashion Los Angeles Awards. Her live performances in 2016 included singing the US national anthem on February 7, at Super Bowl 50, partnering with Intel and Nile Rodgers for a tribute performance to the late David Bowie at the 58th Annual Grammy Awards, and singing \"Til It Happens to You\" at the 88th Academy Awards, where she was introduced by Joe Biden and accompanied on-stage by 50 sexual assault survivors. On April 4, 2016 she was honored at the Jane Ortner Education Award by The Grammy Museum, with the Jane Ortner Artist Award, which recognizes artists who has demonstrated passion and dedication to education through the arts. Gaga and Elton John released a clothing and accessories line on Macy's on May 9, 2016, to support their charities.\n\nArtistry\n\nMusical style\n\nContinually experimenting with new musical ideas and images, Gaga's musical and performance style is the subject of much analysis and scrutiny from critics. She professes that she is \"liberating\" herself by constantly reinventing her sound and image, insisting that she has been drawn to such a practice since her childhood. Refusing to lip sync, Gaga – whose range is frequently compared to those of Madonna and Gwen Stefani – has manipulated her vocal style over the course of her career yet considers Born This Way (2011) \"much more vocally up to par with what I've always been capable of.\" In summation of her voice, Entertainment Weekly wrote: \"There's an immense emotional intelligence behind the way she uses her voice. Almost never does she overwhelm a song with her vocal ability, recognizing instead that artistry is to be found in nuance rather than lung power.\" \n\nAlthough her early lyrics have been criticized for lacking intellectual stimulation, \"[Gaga] does manage to get you moving and grooving at an almost effortless pace.\" Gaga believes that \"all good music can be played on a piano and still sound like a hit.\" She has covered a wide variety of topics in her songs: while The Fame (2008) meditates on the lust for stardom, The Fame Monster (2009) expresses fame's dark side through monster metaphors. Born This Way (2011) is sung in English, French, German, and Spanish and includes common themes in Gaga's controversial songwriting such as: sex, love, religion, money, drugs, identity, liberation, sexuality, freedom, and individualism.\n\nHer music style has been described as electropop and as dance-pop and the structure of her music is said to be influenced by classic 1980s pop and 1990s Europop. Her debut album The Fame (2008) provoked The Sunday Times to assert \"in combining music, fashion, art and technology, [Gaga] evokes Madonna, Gwen Stefani circa 'Hollaback Girl', Kylie Minogue 2001 or Grace Jones right now\", and a critic from The Boston Globe to comment that she draws: \"obvious inspirations from Madonna to Gwen Stefani... in [her] girlish but sturdy pipes and bubbly beats.\" Music critic Simon Reynolds wrote that: \"Everything about Gaga came from electroclash, except the music, which wasn't particularly 1980s, just ruthlessly catchy naughties pop glazed with Auto-Tune and undergirded with R&B-ish beats.\" The follow-up The Fame Monster (2009), saw Gaga's taste for pastiche, drawing on \"Seventies arena glam, perky ABBA disco, and sugary throwbacks like Stacey Q\" while Born This Way (2011) also draws on the records of her childhood and still has the \"electro-sleaze beats and Eurodisco chorus chants\" of its predecessor but includes genres as diverse as opera, heavy metal, disco, and rock and roll. \"There isn't a subtle moment on the album, but even at its nuttiest, the music is full of wide-awake emotional details,\" wrote Rolling Stone, which concluded: \"The more excessive Gaga gets, the more honest she sounds.\" With 2014's Cheek to Cheek, Gaga dabbled in the jazz genre. Although critically appreciated for her love of the music, and the songs she recorded on the album, it was noted that Gaga's attempt to switch genres, with \"her rhythmically square, shouty delivery\", left her vocals sounding more like a Broadway singer than a real jazz musician. \n\nInfluences\n\nGaga grew up listening to artists such as: The Beatles, Stevie Wonder, Queen, Bruce Springsteen, Pink Floyd, Mariah Carey, The Grateful Dead, Led Zeppelin, Whitney Houston, Elton John, Blondie, and Garbage, who all influenced her. She has cited heavy metal bands as an influence, stating that Iron Maiden \"changed my life\" and describing herself as \"the biggest Black Sabbath fan on Earth\". Gaga's musical inspiration varies from dance-pop singers like Madonna and Michael Jackson to glam rock artists like David Bowie and Freddie Mercury, as well as the theatrics of the pop artist Andy Warhol and her own performance roots in musical theater. Gaga has often been compared to Madonna who admits that she sees herself reflected in Gaga. In response to the comparisons, Gaga stated in February 2011: \"I don't want to sound presumptuous, but I've made it my goal to revolutionize pop music. The last revolution was launched by Madonna 25 years ago\" in addition to commenting that: \"there is really no one that is a more adoring and loving Madonna fan than me.\" Like Madonna, Gaga has continued to reinvent herself and has drawn inspiration from the music and performances of a diverse mix of artists including: Whitney Houston, Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry, Lily Allen, Marilyn Manson, Yoko Ono, Beyoncé, Britney Spears, and Christina Aguilera. \n\nAnother spiritual influence on Gaga has been the Indian physician, public speaker, and writer Deepak Chopra. Labeling him a \"true inspiration\", she stated that \"he's always reminded me to work in a life of service to my fans and to fulfill my vision and my destiny\" in addition to thinking about Chopra when it comes to her work as a musician: \"I want so much for it to go beyond the music for my fans.\" Gaga also lifted a quote from Osho's book Creativity on Twitter. When asked about her connection to him, Gaga said she was influenced by his work and that, for her, \"the creativity is the greatest way of rebellion\": \"Equality\", she concluded, \"is one of the most important things in my life.\" \n\nGaga has identified fashion as a major influence and claimed that her interest in fashion came from her mother who was \"always very well kept and beautiful.\" Her musical endeavors are directly linked with fashion with the singer explaining: \"When I'm writing music, I'm thinking about the clothes I want to wear on stage. It's all about everything altogether—performance art, pop performance art, fashion.\" Gaga has been stylistically compared to Leigh Bowery, Isabella Blow, and Cher. She commented that as a child, she somehow absorbed Cher's out-there fashion sense and made it her own. Gaga considers Donatella Versace her muse, and the late English fashion designer and close friend Alexander McQueen as an inspiration, admitting that \"I miss Lee every time I get dressed\" while channeling him in some of her work. In turn, Versace calls Lady Gaga \"the fresh Donatella\". Modeled on Andy Warhol's Factory, Gaga has her own creative production team, which she handles personally, called the Haus of Gaga, who create many of her clothes, stage props, and hairdos. Other fashion influences came from Princess Diana: \"I love Princess Diana so much. She was an enormous influence on me when I was younger because my mother worshiped her so much. When she died, I'll never forget, my mother was crying. It was this very powerful moment in my childhood watching my mother so connected to someone\". \n\nVideos and stage\n\nWith constant costume changes and provocative visuals, Gaga's music videos are often described as short films. \"Being provocative is not just about getting people's attention. It's about saying something that really affects people in a real way, in a positive way,\" she professes. According to author Curtis Fogel, exploring bondage and sadomasochism in addition to highlighting prevalent feminist themes, \"the three central themes that shape Gaga's music videos are sex, violence, and power.\" While she labels herself \"a little bit of a feminist\" and asserts that she is \"sexually empowering women\", Gaga strives to empower young women to stand up for what they believe in. \"She not only reiterates her assertion of total originality,\" professed pop critic Ann Powers, \"but also finesses it until it's both a philosophical stance about how constructing a persona from pop-cultural sources can be an expression of a person's truth—a la those drag queens Gaga sincerely admires—and a bit of a feminist act.\" In summation of her videos, Rolling Stone used the rhetoric: \"does anyone look to a Lady Gaga video for restraint?\"\n\nHer performances are described as \"highly entertaining and innovative\"; the blood-spurting performance of \"Paparazzi\" at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards was described as \"eye-popping\" by MTV News. She continued the \"blood soaked\" theme during The Monster Ball Tour, and triggered protests in England from family groups and fans in the aftermath of a local tragedy, in which a taxi driver had murdered 12 people. Her unconventionality continued at the 2011 MTV Video Music Awards: appearing in drag as her male alter ego, Jo Calderone, and delivering a lovesick monologue before a performance of her song \"You and I\". As Gaga's choreographer and creative director, Laurieann Gibson provided material for her shows and videos for four years only to be replaced by Gibson's assistant Richard Jackson. Gaga admits to being a perfectionist when it comes to her elaborate shows. \"I'm very bossy. I can scream my head off if I see one light fixture out. I'm very detailed – every minute of the show has got to be perfect.\"\n\nPublic image\n\nPublic reception of Gaga's music, fashion sense and persona are polarized. Her status as a role model, self-esteem booster for her fans, trailblazer, and fashion icon who breathes new life into the industry is by turns affirmed and denied. Critics have pointed out her unique place in pop music, the need for new movements in popular culture, the attention Gaga brings to modern social issues, and the inherently subjective nature of her art. In view of her influence on modern culture and her rise to global fame, sociologist Mathieu Deflem of the University of South Carolina has offered a course titled \"Lady Gaga and the Sociology of the Fame\" since spring 2011 with the objective of unravelling: \"some of the sociologically relevant dimensions of the fame of Lady Gaga.\" When Gaga briefly met with US president Barack Obama at a Human Rights Campaign fundraiser, he described the interaction as \"intimidating\" as she was dressed in 16-inch heels making her undoubtedly the tallest woman in the room. \n\nTowards the end of 2008, comparisons were made between the fashions of Gaga and Aguilera, that noted similarities in their styling, hair, and make-up. Aguilera stated that she was \"completely unaware of [Gaga]\". Comparisons continued into 2010, when Aguilera released the music video of her single \"Not Myself Tonight\". Critics noted similarities between the song and its accompanying music video and Gaga's video for \"Bad Romance\". When interviewed by Barbara Walters for her annual ABC News special 10 Most Fascinating People in 2009, Gaga dismissed the claim that she is intersex as an urban legend. Responding to a question on this issue, she stated, \"At first it was very strange and everyone sorta said, 'That's really quite a story!' But in a sense, I portray myself in a very androgynous way, and I love androgyny.\" \n\nGaga's outlandish fashion sense has also been one of her characteristic aspects. The Global Language Monitor named \"Lady Gaga\" as the Top Fashion Buzzword with her trademark \"no pants\" a close third. Entertainment Weekly put her outfits on its end of the decade \"best-of\" list, saying: \"Whether it's a dress made of Muppets or strategically placed bubbles, Gaga's outré ensembles brought performance art into the mainstream.\" Time placed Gaga on their All-Time 100 Fashion Icons List amongst some of Gaga's inspirations such as Michael Jackson, Madonna, and The Beatles, stating: \"Lady Gaga is just as notorious for her outrageous style as she is for her pop hits. After all, Gaga, born Stefani Germanotta, has sported outfits made from plastic bubbles, Kermit the Frog dolls, and raw meat.\" \n\nGaga wore a dress made of raw beef to the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards which was supplemented by boots, a purse, and a hat also made out of raw beef. Partly awarded in recognition of the dress, Vogue named her one of the Best Dressed people of 2010 while Time named the dress the Fashion Statement of 2010. However, it promted divided opinions, attracting the attention of worldwide media but also invoking the fury of animal rights organization PETA. In 2012, Gaga became a feature of a temporary exhibition The Elevated: From the Pharaoh to Lady Gaga marking the 150th anniversary of the National Museum in Warsaw. Gaga was presented in a dress of raw meat, described by Polish weekly Wprost as: \"an icon of modernity elevated by the power which she exercises over mass media\". The meat dress was later displayed at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, and entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in September 2015. As Gaga appeared at the 87th Academy Awards and subsequent events, she changed her style and fashion, transforming into a more glamorous person; Vogue compared her to that of Marilyn Monroe and MTV News described the change as \"more acceptably 'natural' or 'classic'\". \n\nWhile devout followers call Gaga \"Mother Monster\", Gaga often refers to her fans as \"Little Monsters\" which she had tattooed on herself in dedication. To some, this dichotomy contravenes the concept of outsider culture. Camille Paglia, in her 2010 cover story \"Lady Gaga and the death of sex\" in The Sunday Times, asserts that Gaga: \"is more an identity thief than an erotic taboo breaker, a mainstream manufactured product who claims to be singing for the freaks, the rebellious and the dispossessed when she is none of those.\" Writing for The Guardian, Kitty Empire opined that the dichotomy: \"...allows the viewer to have a 'transgressive' experience without being required to think. At [her performance's] core, though, is the idea that Gaga is at one with the freaks and outcasts.\" In July 2012, Gaga also co-founded the website LittleMonsters.com with Silicon Valley entrepreneur Joseph Primiani, which became the first official social network devoted to fans of an artist. \n\nActivism\n\nPhilanthropy\n\nAlongside her music career, Gaga has contributed to various charities. For natural disasters, Gaga has helped various relief efforts. Although declining an invitation to appear on the single \"We Are the World 25\" to benefit victims of the 2010 Haiti earthquake, she donated the proceeds of her concert of January 24, 2010, at New York's Radio City Music Hall to the country's reconstruction relief fund. All profits from her official online store on that day were also donated. Gaga announced that an estimated total of US$500,000 was collected for the fund. Hours after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami hit Japan on March 11, 2011, Gaga tweeted a message and a link to Japan Prayer Bracelets. All revenue from a bracelet she designed in conjunction with the company was donated to relief efforts. As of March 29, 2011, the bracelets raised $1.5 million. However, attorney Alyson Oliver filed a lawsuit against Gaga in Detroit in June 2011, noting that the bracelet was subject to a sales tax and an extra $3.99 shipping charge was added to the price. She also believed that not all proceeds from the bracelets would go to the relief efforts, demanding a public accounting of the campaign and refunds for people who had bought the bracelet. Gaga's spokesperson called the lawsuit \"meritless\" and \"misleading\". On June 25, 2011, Gaga performed at MTV Japan's charity show in Makuhari Messe, which benefited the Japanese Red Cross. \n\nIn 2012, Gaga joined the anti fracking campaign Artists Against Fracking. In October 2012, Gaga was reported to have met the founder of Wikileaks, Julian Assange, at the Ecuadorean embassy in London. On October 9, 2012, Yoko Ono gave Gaga and four other activists the LennonOno Grant for Peace in Reykjavík, Iceland. On November 6, 2012, Gaga pledged to donate $1 million to the American Red Cross to help the victims of Hurricane Sandy. Gaga also contributes in the fight against HIV and AIDS, focusing on educating young women about the risks of the disease. In collaboration with Cyndi Lauper, Gaga joined forces with MAC Cosmetics to launch a line of lipstick under their supplementary cosmetic line, Viva Glam. In a press release, Gaga declared, \"I don't want Viva Glam to be just a lipstick you buy to help a cause. I want it to be a reminder when you go out at night to put a condom in your purse right next to your lipstick.\" The sales of Gaga-endorsed Viva Glam lipstick and lip gloss have raised more than $202 million to fight HIV and AIDS.\n\nOn April 7, 2016, Gaga joined Vice President Joe Biden at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, to support Biden's It's On Us campaign as he travels to colleges on behalf of the organization, which has seen 250,000 students from more than 530 colleges sign a pledge of solidarity and activation. On June 26, 2016, Gaga attended the 84th Annual US Conference of Mayors in Indianapolis where she joined with Dalai Lama to talk about the power of kindness and how to make the world a more compassionate place. The Chinese government added Gaga to list of hostile foreign forces, and Chinese websites and media organizations were ordered to stop uploading or distributing her songs. The Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CCPPD) also issued order for State-controlled media to condemn this meeting. On July 28, 2016, Gaga headlined a private concert in Camden, New Jersey, called Camden Rising, as part of the 2016 Democratic National Convention in support of Hillary Clinton. \n\nBorn This Way Foundation\n\nIn 2012, she launched the Born This Way Foundation (BTWF), a non-profit organization that focuses on youth empowerment and issues like self-confidence, well-being, anti-bullying, mentoring, and career development. It takes its name from the 2011 single and album. The foundation plans to work with a number of partners, including the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, The California Endowment, and the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. Media proprietor Oprah Winfrey, writer Deepak Chopra, and United States Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius spoke at the inauguration at Harvard University. The foundation's original funding included $1.2 million from Gaga, $500,000 from the MacArthur Foundation, and $850,000 from Barneys New York. The foundation works in partnership with the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, the MacArthur Foundation, the California Endowment, and, as lead media partner, Viacom. In July 2012, the BTWF partnered with Office Depot, which will donate 25% of the sales-a minimum of $1million-of a series of limited edition back-to-school products that promote the foundation's message The foundation's initiatives have included, in March–April 2012, a poster competition that asked participants to submit images that answer the question \"What does bravery mean to you?\"; the \"Born Brave Bus\" that would follow her on tour as a youth drop-in center as an initiative against bullying, and the \"Born Brave\" community and school groups. \n\nOn October 24, 2015, at the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, Gaga joined 200 high school students, top policy makers, and academic officials, including Yale President Peter Salovey, a pioneer in the study of emotional intelligence, to discuss ways to recognize and channel emotions for positive outcomes. In 2016, the foundation partnered with Intel, Vox Media and Re/code to fight online harassment. It was also announced that the sale of the cover of the 99th issue of the V magazine, which featured Gaga and Kinney, was donated to the foundation to bring cutting-edge, social-emotional intelligence research. Gaga and Elton John released a clothing and accessories line on Macy's on May 9, 2016, entitled Love Bravery, in which twenty-five percent of each purchase will support the Born This Way Foundation and the Elton John AIDS Foundation. \n\nLGBT advocacy\n\nGaga is an outspoken activist for LGBT rights worldwide. She attributes much of her early success as a mainstream artist to her gay fans and is considered a gay icon. Early in her career she had difficulty getting radio airplay, and stated, \"The turning point for me was the gay community.\" She thanked FlyLife, a Manhattan-based LGBT marketing company with whom her label Interscope works, in the liner notes of The Fame. One of her first televised performances was in May 2008 at the NewNowNext Awards, an awards show aired by the LGBT television network Logo. In June of the same year, she performed at the San Francisco Pride event. After The Fame was released, she revealed that the song \"Poker Face\" was about her bisexuality. In an interview with Rolling Stone, she spoke about how her boyfriends tended to react to her bisexuality, saying: \"The fact that I'm into women, they're all intimidated by it. It makes them uncomfortable. They're like, 'I don't need to have a threesome. I'm happy with just you'.\" When she appeared as a guest on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in May 2009, she praised DeGeneres for being: \"an inspiration for women and for the gay community\". \n\nGaga spoke at the 2009 National Equality March in Washington, D.C. in support of LGBT movement, and described the appearance as \"the single most important moment\" of her career. She attended the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards accompanied by four gay and lesbian former members of the United States Armed Forces who had been unable to serve openly under the U.S. military's \"Don't ask, don't tell\" (DADT) policy. Gaga released three videos on YouTube urging her fans to contact their Senators in an effort to overturn DADT. In September 2010 she spoke at a Servicemembers Legal Defense Network's rally in Portland, Maine. Following this event, editors of The Advocate commented that she had become a \"fierce advocate\" for gays and lesbians. Gaga appeared at Europride, a pan-European international event dedicated to LGBT pride, held in Rome in June 2011. She criticized the intolerant state of gay rights in many European countries and described gay people as \"revolutionaries of love\". Gaga was ordained as a minister by the Universal Life Church Monastery so that she could officiate the wedding of long-time friends, both of whom were women. In June 2016, during a vigil held in Los Angeles for victims of the attack at the gay nightclub Pulse in Orlando, Gaga read aloud the names of the 49 people killed in the attack, and also gave a supporting speech. Also in June 2016, the Human Rights Campaign released a video in tribute to the victims of that attack; in the video, Gaga and others told the stories of the people killed there. \n\nLegacy\n\nGaga has been regarded as a trail blazer throughout several points in her career, sometimes utilizing controversy to bring attention to various issues. With the meteoric success of The Fame, Gaga is credited as being one of the frontrunners of the rise in the popularity of synthpop in the late 2000s and early 2010s. Writer Brian Solis says, \"It's all about how you cultivate your community,\" Solis said. \"Celebs have never shied away from causes and in many ways it's expected that they will use their celebrity to gain attention for those causes. But it's what (Gaga) does over time and how her community responds that starts the lean-over into the influence factor. Polaroid CEO, after working with Gaga, said: \"she's a true artist who inspires her fans and the creative community. The relationship she has with her fans is exceptionally close and she is consistently in contact with them via social networks, making her messages accessible, authentic and far reaching.\" Named the \"Queen of Pop\" by Rolling Stone magazine, her work has influenced Miley Cyrus, Nicki Minaj, Ellie Goulding, Nick Jonas, Tyler Oakley, Lohanthony, Sam Smith, Greyson Chance, Debbie Harry of Blondie, and MGMT. \n\nGaga has been commemorated in the scientific names of several organisms. A new genus of ferns, Gaga, and two species, G. germanotta and G. monstraparva have been named in her honor. The name monstraparva alluded to Gaga's fans known as \"little monsters\" since their symbol is the outstretched \"monster claw\" hand, which resembles a tightly in-rolled young fern leaf prior to unfurling. Gaga also has an extinct mammal, Gagadon minimonstrum, and a parasitic wasp, Aleiodes gaga, named for her. \n\nAchievements\n\nAs of January 2016, Gaga had sold an estimated 27 million albums and 146 million singles worldwide; her singles are some of the best-selling worldwide, making her one of the best-selling music artists. She is also noted as a touring force as she has grossed more than $300 million in revenue from 3.2 million tickets for her first three worldwide concert tours. Her other achievements include six Grammy Awards, three Brit Awards, a Golden Globe Award, thirteen MTV Video Music Awards, twelve Guinness World Records, a Songwriters Hall of Fame's Contemporary Icon Award, which she was the first artist ever to win, a National Arts Awards' Young Artist Award, which honors individuals who have achieved incredible accomplishments and exemplary leadership while still early in their career, and honored at the Jane Ortner Education Award by The Grammy Museum, with the Jane Ortner Artist Award, which recognizes artists who has demonstrated passion and dedication to education through the arts.\nShe has also been recognized by the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) with the Fashion Icon lifetime achievement award, a special prize reserved for: \"an individual whose style has made a significant impact on popular culture on an international stage\". \n\nGaga has consecutively appeared on Billboard magazine's Artists of the Year (scoring the definitive title in 2010), and named as Woman of the Year in 2015, is the fourth best selling digital singles artist in the United States according to RIAA with a total of 59 million certified. She also became the first woman to receive the Digital Diamond Award from RIAA, and is the first and only artist to have two songs pass 7 million downloads (\"Poker Face\" and \"Just Dance\"). She is regularly placed on lists composed by Forbes magazine, including their list of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women from 2010 to 2014, named one of the most influential people in the world by Time magazine in 2010, and the \"second most influential people of the past ten years\" through a readers' poll in 2013.\n\nDiscography\n\n* The Fame (2008)\n* The Fame Monster (2009)\n* Born This Way (2011)\n* Artpop (2013)\n* Cheek to Cheek (2014)\n\nFilmography\n\n* The Zen of Bennett (2012)\n* Katy Perry: Part of Me (2012)\n* Machete Kills (2013)\n* Muppets Most Wanted (2014)\n* Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (2014)\n* Jeremy Scott: The People's Designer (2015)\n\nConcerts\n\n;Headlining tours\n* The Fame Ball Tour (2009)\n* The Monster Ball Tour (2009–11)\n* Born This Way Ball (2012–13)\n* ArtRave: The Artpop Ball (2014)\n\n;Co-headlining tours\n* Fame Kills: Starring Kanye West and Lady Gaga (2009–10; canceled)\n* Cheek to Cheek Tour (with Tony Bennett) (2014–15)\n\n;One-off shows\n* ArtRave (2013)\n* Lady Gaga Live at Roseland Ballroom (2014)" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Mandalay.txt", "Mandalay_Bay.txt", "SpongeBob_SquarePants.txt", "Lance_Armstrong.txt", "Tour_de_France.txt", "World_Trade_Organization.txt", "Seattle.txt" ], "title": [ "Mandalay", "Mandalay Bay", "SpongeBob SquarePants", "Lance Armstrong", "Tour de France", "World Trade Organization", "Seattle" ], "wiki_context": [ "Mandalay ( or; ) is the second-largest city and the last royal capital of Burma. Located 445 mi north of Yangon on the east bank of the Irrawaddy River, the city has a population of 1,225,553 (2014 census).\n\nMandalay is the economic centre of Upper Burma and considered the centre of Burmese culture. A continuing influx of Chinese immigrants, mostly from Yunnan, in the past twenty years, has reshaped the city's ethnic makeup and increased commerce with China. Despite Naypyidaw's recent rise, Mandalay remains Upper Burma's main commercial, educational and health center.\n\nEtymology\n\nThe city gets its name from the nearby Mandalay Hill. The name is probably a derivative of a Pali word, although the exact word of origin remains unclear. The root word has been speculated to be mandala, referring to circular plains or Mandara, a mountain from Hindu mythology. \n\nWhen it was founded in 1857, the royal city was officially named Yadanabon (,), a loan of the Pali name Ratanapūra () \"City of Gems.\" It was also called Lay Kyun Aung Myei (,, \"Victorious Land over the Four Islands\") and Mandalay Palace (,, \"Famed Royal Emerald Palace\").\n\nHistory\n\nEarly history\n\nLike most former (and present) capitals of Burma, Mandalay was founded on the wishes of the ruler of the day. On 13 February 1857, King Mindon founded a new royal capital at the foot of Mandalay Hill, ostensibly to fulfill a prophecy on the founding of a metropolis of Buddhism in that exact place on the occasion of the 2,400th jubilee of Buddhism. \n\nThe new capital city site was in area, surrounded by four rivers. The plan called for a 144-square block grid patterned citadel, anchored by a 16 square block royal palace compound at the center by Mandalay Hill. The 1020-acre (413-hectare) citadel was surrounded by four 6666 ft long walls and a moat 210 ft wide, 15 ft deep. At intervals of 555 ft along the wall, were turrets with gold-tipped spires for watchmen. The walls had three gates on each side, and five bridges to cross the moat. In addition, the king also commissioned the Kuthodaw Pagoda, the Pahtan-haw Shwe Thein upasampada hall, the Thudamma \"Good Dharma\" zayats or public houses for preaching Buddhism and a library for the Pāli Canon.\n\nIn June 1857, the former royal palace of Amarapura was dismantled and moved by elephants to the new location at the foot of Mandalay Hill, although construction of the palace compound was officially completed only two years later, on Monday, 23 May 1859.\n\nFor the next 26 years, Mandalay was to be the last royal capital of the Konbaung Dynasty, the last independent Burmese kingdom before its final annexation by the British Empire. Mandalay ceased to be the capital on 28 November 1885 when the conquering British sent Thibaw Min and his queen Supayalat into exile, ending the Third Anglo-Burmese War.\n\nColonial Mandalay (1885–1948)\n\nWhile Mandalay would continue to be the chief city of Upper Burma during the British colonial rule, the commercial and political importance had irreversibly shifted to Yangon. The British view on the development of Mandalay (and Burma) was mainly with commercial intentions. While rail transport reached Mandalay in 1889, less than four years after the annexation, the first college in Mandalay, Mandalay College, was not established until 40 years later, in 1925. The British looted the palace, with some of the treasures still on display in the Victoria and Albert Museum, also renaming the palace compound Fort Dufferin and used it to billet troops.\n\nThroughout the colonial years, Mandalay was the centre of Burmese culture and Buddhist learning, and as the last royal capital, was regarded by the Burmese as a primary symbol of sovereignty and identity. Between the two World Wars, the city was Upper Burma's focal point in a series of nationwide protests against the British rule. The British rule brought in many immigrants from India to the city. In 1904–05, a plague caused about one-third of the population to flee the city.\n\nDuring World War II, Mandalay suffered the most devastating air raids of the war. On April 3, 1942, during the Japanese conquest of Burma, the Imperial Japanese Army Air Service carried out an extensive assault on the city. As the city was defenseless and its firefighting were weak that had been lost in the earlier bombing and that they met no opposition from the British RAF as all its aircraft had by now been withdrawn to India, three-fifths of the houses were destroyed and 2,000 civilians were killed. Many again fled the city when the city was under Japanese occupation from May 1942 to March 1945. The palace citadel, turned into a supply depot by the Japanese, was burnt to the ground by Allied bombing; only the royal mint and the watch tower survived. (A faithful replica of the palace was rebuilt in the 1990s.)\n\nContemporary Mandalay (1948–present)\n\nAfter the country gained independence from Britain in 1948, Mandalay continued to be the main cultural, educational and economic hub of Upper Burma. Until the early 1990s, most students from Upper Burma went to Mandalay for university education. Until 1991, Mandalay University, the University of Medicine, Mandalay and the Defence Services Academy were the only three universities in Upper Burma. Only a few other cities had \"Degree Colleges\" affiliated with Mandalay University that offered a limited number of subjects. Today, the city attracts a fraction of students as the military government requires students to attend their local universities in order to reduce concentration of students in one place.\n\nIn November 1959, Mandalay celebrated its centennial with a festival at the foot of Mandalay Hill. Special commemorative stamps were issued. \n\nDuring Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–1988), the city's infrastructure deteriorated. By the early 1980s, the second largest city of Burma resembled a town with low-rise buildings and dusty streets filled mostly with bicycles. In the 1980s, the city was hit by two major fires. In May 1981, a fire razed more than 6,000 houses and public buildings, leaving more than 36,000 homeless. On 24 March 1984, another fire destroyed 2,700 buildings and made 23,000 people homeless. \n\nFires continue to plague the city. A major fire destroyed Mandalay's second largest market, Yadanabon Market, in February 2008, and another major fire in February 2009 destroyed 320 homes and left over 1600 people homeless. \n\nThe 1980s fires augured a significant change in the city's physical character and ethnic makeup. Huge swaths of land left vacant by the fires were later purchased, mostly by the ethnic Chinese, many of whom were recent immigrants from Yunnan. The Chinese influx accelerated after the current State Peace and Development Council came to power in 1988. With the Burmese government turning a blind eye, many Chinese immigrants from Yunnan (and also from Sichuan) poured into Upper Burma in the 1990s and many openly ended up in Mandalay. In the 1990s alone, about 250,000 to 300,000 Yunnanese are estimated to have migrated to Mandalay. Today, ethnic Chinese people are believed to make up about 30%–40% of the city's population, and are a major factor in the city's doubling of population from about 500,000 in 1980 to one million in 2008. Chinese festivals are now firmly embedded in the city's cultural calendar. It is a common Burmese complaint that Mandalay is becoming little more than a satellite of China and that the romance of old Mandalay is long gone\n\nThe Chinese are largely responsible for the economic revitalization of the city centre, now rebuilt with apartment blocks, hotels and shopping centres, and returning the city to its role as the trading hub connecting Lower Burma, Upper Burma, China and India. The Chinese dominance in the city center has pushed out the rest to the suburbs. The urban sprawl now encompasses Amarapura, the very city King Mindon left some 150 years ago. Mandalay celebrated its 150th birthday on 15 May 2009, at precisely 4:31:36 am.\n\nDespite the rise of Naypyidaw, the country's capital since 2006, Mandalay remains Upper Burma's main commercial, educational and health center.\n\nGeography\n\nLocation\n\nMandalay is located in the central dry zone of Burma by the Irrawaddy river at 21.98° North, 96.08° East, 80 meters (260 feet) above sea level. Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.\n\nMandalay lies along the Sagaing Fault, a tectonic plate boundary between the India and Sunda plates. (The biggest earthquake in its history, with a magnitude of 7, occurred in 1956. The devastation was greatest in nearby Sagaing, and it came to be known as the Great Sagaing Quake.)\n\nClimate\n\nMandalay features a tropical wet and dry climate under the Köppen climate classification. Mandalay features noticeably warmer and cooler periods of the year. Average temperatures in January, the coolest month, hovers around 21 °C while the warmest month, April, averages 31 °C. Mandalay is very hot in the months of April and May, with average high temperatures easily exceeding 35 °C. It is not uncommon to see high temperatures surpass 40 °C during these two months in the city. Mandalay also features wet and dry seasons of nearly equal length, with the wet season running from May through October and the dry season covering the remaining six months. The highest reliably recorded temperature in Mandalay is on April 24, 1975 while the lowest is on December 26, 1999.\n\nCityscape\n\nAround the city\n\n* Atumashi Monastery: The \"Atumashi kyaung\", which literally means \"inimitable vihara\", is also one of the well known sights. The original structure was destroyed by a fire in 1890 though the masonry plinth survived. It was indeed an inimitable one in its heyday. The reconstruction project was started by the government on 2 May 1995 and completed in June 1996.\n* Buddha's Replica Tooth Relic Pagoda: One of the Buddha's Sacred Replica Tooth Relics was enshrined in the Mandalay Swedaw Pagoda on Maha Dhammayanthi Hill in Amarapura Township. The pagoda was built with cash donations contributed by the peoples of Burma and Buddhist donors from around the world under the supervision of the State Peace and Development Council. The authorities and donors hoisted Buddha's Replica Tooth Relic Pagoda Mandalay's Shwe Htidaw (sacred golden umbrella), Hngetmyatnadaw (sacred bird perch vane) and Seinhpudaw (sacred diamond bud) on 13 December 1996.\n* Kuthodaw Pagoda (The World's Biggest Book): Built by King Mindon in 1857, this pagoda modeled on the Shwezigon Pagoda at Nyaung-U, is surrounded by 729 upright stone slabs on which are inscribed the entire Tipiṭaka as edited and approved by the Fifth Buddhist council. It is popularly known as \"World's largest book\" for its stone scriptures.\n* Kyauktawgyi Pagoda: Near the southern approach to Mandalay Hill stands the Kyauktawgyi Buddha image built by King Mindon in 1853–78. The Image was carved out of a huge single block of marble. Statues of 80 arahants are assembled around the Image, twenty on each side. The carving was completed in 1865.\n* Mahamuni Buddha Temple: The image of Gautama Buddha at Mahamuni Buddha Temple is said to have been cast in the life-time of the Gautama Buddha and that the Buddha embraced it seven times, thereby bringing it to life. Consequently, devout Buddhists hold it to be alive and refer to it as the Mahamuni Sacred Living Image. Revered as the holiest pagoda in Mandalay, It was built by King Bodawpaya in 1784. The image in a sitting posture is 12 feet and 7 inches (3.8 m) high. As the image was brought from Rakhine State, it was also called the Great Rakhine Buddha. The early morning ritual of washing the Face of Buddha Image draws a large crowd of devotees everyday. The Great Image is also considered as the greatest in Burma next to Shwedagon Pagoda. A visit to Mandalay is incomplete without a visit to Mahamuni Pagoda.\n* Mandalay Hill: The hill has for long been a holy mount. Legend has it that the Buddha, on his visit, had prophesied that a great city would be founded at its foot. Mandalay Hill, 230 metres in elevation, commands a magnificent view of the city and surrounding countryside. The construction of a motor road to reach the hill-top has already been finished.\n* Mandalay Palace: The whole magnificent palace complex was destroyed by a fire during World War II. However, the finely built palace walls, the city gates with their crowning wooden pavilions and the surrounding moat still represent an impressive scene of the Mandalay Palace, \"Mya-nan-san-kyaw Shwenandaw\", which has been rebuilt using forced labor. A model of the Mandalay Palace, Nanmyint-saung and Mandalay Cultural Museum are located inside the Palace grounds.\n* Shwenandaw Monastery: Famous for its intricate wood carvings, this monastery is a fragile reminder of the old Mandalay Palace. Actually, it was a part of the old palace later moved to its current site by King Thibaw in 1880.\n* The Chinese Temple of Mandalay: The Chinese Temple, well known for its old artistic architectures and cultural artifacts, reflects Mandalay's old history.\n* Yadanabon Zoological Gardens: A small zoo between the Mandalay Palace and Mandalay Hill. It has over 300 species and is notably the only zoo to have Burmese roofed turtles.\n\nAdministration\n\nThe Mandalay City Development Committee (MCDC) is the city government. The Mandalay District consists of seven townships.\n*Amarapura\n*Aungmyethazan\n*Chanayethazan (city centre)\n*Chanmyathazi\n*Maha Aungmye\n*Patheingyi\n*Pyigyidagun\n\nTransport\n\nMandalay's strategic location in Central Burma makes it an important hub for transport of people and goods. The city is connected to other parts of the country and to China and India by multiple modes of transportation.\n\nAir\n\nMandalay International Airport is one of the largest and most modern airports in Burma. Built at a cost of US$150 million in 2000, it is highly underused; it serves mostly domestic flights with the exception of those to Kunming and to/from Bangkok with daily flights on Air Asia and Bangkok Airways. The airport has come to represent the military regime's propensity for bad planning and penchant for white elephant projects. Myanmar recent opening stance on tourism means the airport is now receiving a growing number of visitors from Bangkok.\n\nThe airport is far from the city, 45 km on a modern highway. It costs US$8 to central Mandalay, US$6 from central Mandalay, and US$30 to/from Pyin U Lwin. Collective minibuses to Mandalay are US$5 each (stops where required).\n\nRiver\n\nThe Ayeyarwady River remains an important arterial route for transporting goods such as farm produce including rice, beans and pulses, cooking oil, pottery, bamboo and teak.\n\nRail\n\nMandalay Central Railway Station is the terminus of Myanmar Railways's main rail line from Yangon and the starting point of branch lines to Pyin U Lwin (Maymyo), Lashio, Monywa, Pakokku, Kalay, Gangaw, and to the north, Shwebo, Kawlin, Naba, Kanbalu, Mohnyin, Hopin, Mogaung and Myitkyina.\n\nMandalay does not have an intra-city metro rail system. The former electric tramway has been decommissioned.\n\nRoads\n\nMandalay literally is at the center of Burma's road network. The highway network includes roads towards:\n* Upper Burma and China—Mandalay–Tagaung–Bhamo–Myitkyina Road, Mandalay–Mogok–SiU–Bhamo Road, Mandalay–Lashio–Muse Road (part of Asian Highway route 14 or AH14)\n* Western Burma and India—Mandalay–Sagaing–Monywa–Kalewa–Tamu Road\n* Lower Burma– Yangon-Mandalay Expressway and AH1\n\nMost stretches of these highways are one-lane roads in poor condition.\n\nBuses and cars\n\nAs the government allows only a few thousands of vehicles to be imported each year, motor transportation in Burma is highly expensive for most of its citizens. Most people rely on bicycles, motorcycles and/or private and public buses to get around. The most popular car in Mandalay is the 1982/83 Nissan Sunny pickup truck. Because of its utility as a private bus or taxi, the two-and-a-half-decade old model still had strong demand and heady prices to match—from K10 million to K14 million (US$8,000 to US$11,000) in mid-2008. To get around severe import limits, people of Mandalay have turned to illegally imported and hence unregistered (called \"without\" in Burmese English) motorcycles and cars despite the government's periodic confiscation sprees. (The number of domestically made cars remains negligible. Mandalay's small car makers produced i.e. assembled only about 3000 cars in 2007.)\n\nIn March 2008, Mandalay had nearly 81,000 registered motor vehicles plus an unknown number of unregistered vehicles. Although the number of cars in a city of one million is low, traffic in Mandalay is highly chaotic as thousands of bicycles and (unregistered) motorbikes freely roam around all the lanes of the streets. Unlike in Yangon where motorbikes, cycle rickshaws and bicycles are prohibited from entering downtown and busy areas, in Mandalay it is anything goes. That many traffic lights in Mandalay do not work only adds to the chaos.\n\nDemographics\n\nA 2007 estimate by the UN puts Mandalay's population at nearly 1 million. The city's population is projected to reach nearly 1.5 million by 2025. While Mandalay has traditionally been the bastion of Bamar (Burman) culture and populace, the massive influx of ethnic Chinese in the last 20 years has effectively pushed the Bamar out of the city center. The foreign-born Chinese can easily obtain Burmese citizenship cards on the black market. Ludu Daw Amar of Mandalay, the revered writer and journalist who died in April 2008, had said it felt like \"an undeclared colony of Yunnan\". Today, the percentage of Chinese, estimated at 40% to 50% of the city (with the Yunnanese forming an estimated 30% of Mandalay's population), is believed to nearly rival that of the Bamar. A sizable community of Burmese Indians also resides in Mandalay.\n\nBurmese is still the principal language of the city although Standard Chinese is increasingly heard in the city's commerce centers such as Chinatown and Zegyo Market. English is a distant third language, spoken only by the urban elite.\n\nCulture\n\nMandalay is Burma's cultural and religious center of Buddhism, having numerous monasteries and more than 700 pagodas. At the foot of Mandalay Hill sits the world's official \"Buddhist Bible\", also known as the world's largest book, in Kuthodaw Pagoda. The styles of Mandalay Buddha Images and Buddha Statues were many since King Mandon, who was a devout Buddhist, and had filled Mandalay with them and through the years Mandalay Buddhist art became established as the pure art of Myanmar. There are 729 slabs of stone that together are inscribed with the entire Pāli canon, each housed in its own white stupa. The buildings inside the old Mandalay city walls, surrounded by a moat, which was repaired in recent times using prison labor, comprise the Mandalay Palace, mostly destroyed during World War II. İt is now replaced by a replica, Mandalay Prison and a military garrison, the headquarters of the Central Military Command.\n\nMedia\n\nMuch of the media in Mandalay – like elsewhere in Burma – comes from Yangon. The city's non-satellite TV programming comes from Yangon-based state-run TV Myanmar and military-run Myawaddy, both of which provide Burmese language news and entertainment. Since December 2006, MRTV-4, formerly a paid channel, has also been available in Mandalay. Mandalay has two radio stations. Naypyidaw-based Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Semi-state-run Mandalay City FM (87.9FM) is the Mandalay metropolitan area's pop culture oriented station.\n\nThe military government, which controls all daily newspapers in Burma, uses Mandalay to publish and distribute its three national newspapers, the Burmese language Myanmar Alin and Kyemon and the English language New Light of Myanmar. The state-run Yadanabon is published in Mandalay and serves the Upper Burma market. \nThe Mandalay Daily newspaper is published by Mandalay City Development Committee since 1997 November 30. \n\nSports\n\nMandalay's sporting facilities are quite poor by international standards but are still the best in Upper Burma. The 17,000 seat Bahtoo Stadium is largest in Upper Burma and hosts mainly local and regional association football and track-and-field tournaments. Since May 2009, professional football has arrived in Mandalay, with Yadanabon FC representing the city in the newly formed Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league.\n\nSport Climbing\n\nAt Waterfall Hill, the first bolted rock climbing site in Myanmar have been developed with the help of Mandalay climbers led by Steve, Tylor and Technical Climbing Club of Myanmar since 2010. \n \n \n \n\nEconomy\n\nMandalay is the major trading and communications center for northern and central Burma. Much of Burmese external trade to China and India goes through Mandalay.\n\nAmong the leading traditional industries are silk weaving, tapestry, jade cutting and polishing, stone and wood carving, making marble and bronze Buddha images, temple ornaments and paraphernalia, the working of gold leaves and of silver, the manufacture of matches, brewing and distilling.\n\nChinese immigrants have increasingly dominated Mandalay's economy since the imposition of sanctions by the United States and the European Union in the 1990s.\n\nEducation\n\nMandalay has the best educational facilities and institutions, after Yangon, in Burma where state spending on education is among the lowest in the world. Students in poor districts routinely drop out in middle school as schools have to rely on forced \"donations\" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries. Many wealthy Mandalay parents enroll their children in the city's English language private schools for primary and secondary education and Chinese and Singaporean universities for university education. Some wealthy Chinese families also send their children to \"cram schools\" where students study for entrance exams into Chinese universities from 6am to 8am, then to government high schools from 9am to 3pm, and finally preparation classes for Singapore GCE O levels from 4pm to 9pm.\n\nFor the rest of the students who cannot afford to go abroad for studies, Mandalay offers Upper Burma's best institutions of higher education. The city's University of Medicine, Mandalay, University of Dental Medicine, Mandalay, Mandalay Technological University and University of Computer Studies, Mandalay are among the nation's most selective universities. The vast majority of university students in Mandalay attend liberal arts universities: Mandalay University, the oldest university in Upper Burma, and Yadanabon University.\n\nHealth care\n\nThe general state of health care in Burma is poor. The military government spends anywhere from 0.5% to 3% of the country's GDP on health care, consistently ranking among the lowest in the world. In 2005, the public health care system of Mandalay Region with over 7.6 million people consisted of slightly over 1000 doctors and about 2000 nurses working in 44 hospitals and 44 health clinics. Over 30 of the so-called hospitals had less than 100 beds. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.\n\nNonetheless Mandalay remains the main health care center for Upper Burma as almost all of large public hospitals and private hospitals are in Mandalay. The city has ten public hospitals and one hospital specializing in traditional Burmese medicine. For a semblance of adequate health care, the well-to-do from Upper Burma go to private hospitals and clinics in Mandalay. For more advanced treatments, they have to go to Yangon or abroad. The wealthy Burmese routinely go abroad (usually Bangkok or Singapore) for treatment. \n\nTwin towns – Sister cities\n\nMandalay is twinned with:\n* Cirebon, Indonesia\n* Kunming, China\n* Phnom Penh, Cambodia\n\nMandalay in popular culture\n\nRudyard Kipling wrote a poem called \"Mandalay\" (1890), which is the origin of the phrase \"on the road to Mandalay\". In 1907, the poem was set to music by Oley Speaks as \"On the Road to Mandalay\". Speaks' version was widely recorded. Among the best known renditions is the one by Frank Sinatra on Come Fly With Me.\n\nGeorge Orwell was stationed at Mandalay for a time while working for the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, and his first novel, Burmese Days (1934), was based on his experiences in Burma. He also wrote a number of short non-fiction essays and short stories about Burma, such as \"A Hanging\" (1931) and \"Shooting an Elephant\" (1936). John Masters wrote a book about his wartime experiences in Burma called The Road Past Mandalay (1961).\n\nGallery\n\nFile:Mandalay Hill, Myanmar.JPG|Mandalay Hill\nFile:Mandalay Hill 2.jpg|Mandalay Hill \nFile:Maha aung mye bon zhan monastry in inwa.jpg|Maha aung mye bon zhan monastery in Inwa\nFile:View-from-Mandalay-Hill.JPG|A view from Mandalay Hill\nFile:Foot-of-Mandalay-Hill.JPG|Another view from Mandalay Hill\nFile:Mandalay-Palace-Watch-Tower.JPG|Mandalay Palace Watch Tower\nFile:Mandalay Hluttaw.JPG|The Hluttaw Hall inside Mandalay Palace\nFile:Mahamuni.JPG|Mahamuni Buddha, A Rakhine masterpiece\nFile:Birmanie 0005a.jpg|A Mandalay girl\nFile:Mandalay-Shwe-Kyaung.JPG|Shwe Kyaung, a famous monastery\nFile:Atumashi monastery.JPG|The Atumashi Monastery\nFile:View from Sutaunppyei Pagoda.jpg|View from Sutaunppyei Pagoda in the Mandalay Hill\nFile:MANDALAY PUENTE COLONIAL SOBRE EL RIO AYEYARWADY.jpg|Now defunct old Sagaing Bridge", "Mandalay Bay is a 43-story luxury resort and casino on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada. It is owned and operated by MGM Resorts International. One of the property's towers operates as the Delano, also the Four Seasons Hotel is independently operated within the Mandalay Bay tower, occupying 5 floors (35–39).\n\nMandalay Bay has 3,309 hotel rooms, 24 elevators and a casino of 135000 sqft. Adjacent to the hotel are the 2000000 sqft Mandalay Bay Convention Center and the 12,000-seat Mandalay Bay Events Center. The Mandalay Bay Tram connects the resort to its sister properties, Excalibur and Luxor, all three of which were constructed by Circus Circus Enterprises before its sale to MGM.\n\nHistory\n\nCircus Circus Enterprises bought the Hacienda for $80 million in 1995. They closed it on December 1, 1996, and imploded it on New Year's Eve, 1996. The Mandalay Bay project was introduced on December 31, 1996, as Hawaiian-themed, \"Project Paradise\" and had a cost of $950 million. In February 1998, the project was renamed Mandalay Bay, despite the fact there is no actual bay in the inland city of Mandalay in Myanmar (Burma).\n\nDuring construction engineers discovered vertical movements and particularly differential movements ('dishing') between the tower core and the wings. The tower core was sinking at a rate of per week and the wings were sinking at a slower rate causing differential distortion between the column bays. If these movements were not stopped, severe structural damage would occur and the building would have been at risk of eventual collapse. Construction was halted while a solution was developed and implemented. The solution proved to be the installation of micro-piles (formerly marketed as 'Pin Piles') filled with grout 200 ft deep below the structure each capped with a hydraulic jack to stabilize the structure at the desired vertical height to carry the weight. Since then, there have not been any reports of this problem recurring.\n\nThe resort opened on March 2, 1999, with actors Dan Aykroyd, James Belushi, and John Goodman headlining a parade of Harley-Davidson motorcycles through Mandalay Bay's front doors to celebrate the grand opening.\n\nIn June 1999, Circus Circus changed its name to Mandalay Resort Group.\n\nThe convention center was added in January 2003. When it opened, it was ranked as the fifth largest in the United States. It also offered the largest unobstructed ballroom in the country, at 100000 sqft.\n\nOn May 23, 2002, the Mandalay Resort Group announced a second 1,122-room hotel tower, with a cost of at least $200 million. Construction began on the tower in September 2002. The name of the tower, THEhotel at Mandalay Bay, was chosen in September 2003. The tower opened on December 17, 2003.\n\nIn February 2005, Mandalay Resort Group was sold to MGM Mirage, who currently own the resort. The acquisition was finalized on April 25, 2005.\n\nHotels\n\nThe gold coloring of the hotel is a result of gold leaf used on the windows. The top 3 floors (numbered as floors 40-42) are penthouses, with a penthouse lounge on level 42 for guests staying in the penthouses.\n\nDelano Las Vegas\n\nThe resort's second tower, with 45 stories and 1,117 suites, previously operated as THEhotel at Mandalay Bay, now operates as Delano Las Vegas. Each suite is at least 750 sqft.\n\nFour Seasons Hotel\n\nFive floors (floors 35–39) of the main hotel building are occupied by the five-star and AAA Five-Diamond Four Seasons Hotel Las Vegas. \n\nAttractions\n\nShows\n\nMamma Mia! was a long-running stage production at Mandalay Bay which closed in early January 2009. The show was replaced with Disney's The Lion King, which opened on May 15, 2009. Its run ended in 2011 to make way for Michael Jackson: One, by Cirque du Soleil, which opened May 2013. \n\nAnother popular attraction is the House of Blues, a venue for live music and a restaurant, with a capacity of approximately 1,800. On the top floor of the hotel is the House of Blues Foundation Room, featuring a dining room, private dining rooms, and a balcony looking down the Las Vegas Strip.\n\nMandalay Beach\n\nMandalay Beach is an 11 acre pool area with three heated pools, a wave pool with connecting pool for small children, and a lazy river that features a small waterfall. The wave pool features 1.6 million gallons of water and waves in 90-second intervals with heights ranging anywhere from two to four feet. Because of this, it has a strict 48\" height requirement. The European-style pool, called Moorea, features its own private bar as well as the allowance of female guests to bathe topless. Because of this, Moorea is separated from the rest of the pool by smoked glass windows and has an over-21 requirement. There are also two restaurants at the Beach. The pool area won the Las Vegas Review Journal's Reader's \"Best Pool of Las Vegas\" award for seven years in a row. One pool remains open throughout the winter months.\n\nShark Reef Aquarium\n\nIn keeping with the resort's tropical theme, it features a saltwater aquarium, the Shark Reef Aquarium, which contains the third largest tank in North America. Shark Reef Aquarium contains numerous other exhibits, including two tunnel-shaped, walk-through aquarium.\n\nMandalay Bay Events Center\n\nThe Mandalay Bay Events Center, a 12,000-seat arena, hosts major events including concerts, boxing matches, and Ultimate Fighting Championship events. It has played host to the Latin Grammy Awards several times, and the Miss Universe pageant.\n\nMandalay Bay Convention Center\n\nThis 1000000 sqft facility is one of the largest privately owned convention centers in the world. It has several ballrooms ranging in size up to 100000 sqft, and can support up to 75 breakout sessions.\n\nThe Shoppes at Mandalay Place\n\nThe Shoppes at Mandalay Place is a 310 ft- long retail sky bridge with retailers such as Urban Outfitters, minus5° Ice Lounge & Lodge, a Guinness Store and a Nike Golf store.\n\nRestaurants\n\nThere are 24 restaurants at the resort. Michael Mina, Alain Ducasse, Rick Moonen, Charlie Palmer, Hubert Keller, Wolfgang Puck, Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger are all associated with restaurants on the property.\n\nBars and lounges\n\n* [http://www.thelightvegas.com *LIGHT Nightclub]\n* [http://www.daylightvegas.com *Daylight Beach Club]\n* Evening Call\n* Eyecandy Lounge\n* Mix Lounge\n* O.N.E. Oasis Bar\n* Orchid Lounge\n* [http://www.fourseasons.com/lasvegas/dining/lounges/press/ *PRESS at Four Seasons]\n* Sports Book Lounge\n* Franklin\n*Foundation Room\n\nMedia references \n\nFilm and television \n\n* Play It to the Bone 1999\n* Ocean's Eleven 2001 - Foreground shot when the 'pinch' knocks out power\n* Las Vegas 2003–2005 - was the interior of the fictional Montecito casino\n* Fear Factor 2003\n* CSI: Crime Scene Investigation 2006–2008 - From opening credits as a symbol of Las Vegas.\n* Rocky Balboa 2006\n* Ocean's Thirteen 2007\n* Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List 2007\n* The Hangover 2009 - various background shots.\n* Wisin & Yandel - Te Siento (promotional video).\n* Top Chef 2009 - Bryan Voltaggio used the resort for his inspiration for his dish.\n* The Amazing Race 15 2009 - Team members had to rappel down the building.\n* What Happens in Vegas 2008 - The group heads off to Las Vegas.\n* Defiance (TV series) 2012 - supplementary material states that it was converted into a for-profit prison \n* Modern Family 2014 - setting of the episode \"Las Vegas\"\n* Dominion (TV series) 2014 - establishing shot of the city in the pilot episode shows it to be battle-damaged and outside the fortified protective wall\n\nMusic \n\n* \"Me and My Monkey\", from the album Escapology by Robbie Williams, 2002\n* \"No Beef\" Afrojack & Steve Aoki (Featuring Miss Palmer) 2011", "SpongeBob SquarePants is an American animated television series created by marine biologist and animator Stephen Hillenburg for Nickelodeon. The series chronicles the adventures and endeavors of the title character and his various friends in the fictional underwater city of Bikini Bottom. The series' popularity has made it a media franchise, as well as the highest rated series to ever air on Nickelodeon, and the most distributed property of MTV Networks. The media franchise has generated $8 billion in merchandising revenue for Nickelodeon. \n\nMany of the ideas for the series originated in an unpublished educational comic book titled The Intertidal Zone, which Hillenburg created in 1989. He began developing SpongeBob SquarePants into a television series in 1996 upon the cancellation of Rocko's Modern Life, and turned to Tom Kenny, who had worked with him on that series, to voice the title character. SpongeBob was originally going to be named SpongeBoy, and the series was to be called SpongeBoy Ahoy!, but these were both changed, as the name was already trademarked.\n\nNickelodeon held a preview for the series in the United States on May 1, 1999, following the television airing of the 1999 Kids' Choice Awards. The series officially premiered on July 17, 1999. It has received worldwide critical acclaim since its premiere and gained enormous popularity by its second season. A feature film, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, was released in theaters on November 19, 2004, and a sequel was released on February 6, 2015. On July 21, 2012, the series was renewed and aired its ninth season, beginning with the episode \"Extreme Spots\".\n\nThe series has won a variety of awards, including six Annie Awards, eight Golden Reel Awards, two Emmy Awards, 12 Kids' Choice Awards, and two BAFTA Children's Awards. Despite its widespread popularity, the series has been involved in several public controversies, including one centered on speculation over SpongeBob's intended sexual orientation, and another focusing on the perceived declining quality of the show's content since the release of the first film. In 2011, a newly described species of mushroom, Spongiforma squarepantsii, was named after the cartoon's title character.\n\nPremise\n\nCharacters\n\nThe series revolves around its title character and his various friends. SpongeBob SquarePants is an energetic and optimistic sea sponge (although his appearance more closely resembles a kitchen sponge) who lives in a sea pineapple and loves his job as a fry cook at the Krusty Krab. He has a pet snail, Gary, who meows like a cat. Living two houses down from SpongeBob is his best friend Patrick Star, a dim-witted yet friendly pink starfish who lives under a rock. Despite his \"mental setbacks\", Patrick still sees himself as intelligent. Squidward Tentacles is SpongeBob's next-door neighbor and co-worker at the Krusty Krab. Squidward is an arrogant and ill-tempered octopus who lives in an Easter Island moai and dislikes his neighbors (especially SpongeBob) for their childlike behavior. He enjoys playing the clarinet and painting self-portraits, but hates his job as a cashier.\n\nAnother close friend of SpongeBob is Sandy Cheeks, a squirrel from Texas. She is a scientist and an expert in karate. She lives in an underwater tree dome (a tree Sandy brought with her that is entrapped in a clear glass dome locked by a tight, hand-turned seal). When outside of her dwelling, she wears an astronaut-like suit because she cannot breathe underwater. Mr. Krabs, a miserly crab obsessed with money, is the owner of the Krusty Krab restaurant and SpongeBob's boss. His rival, Plankton, is a small green copepod who owns a low-rank fast-food restaurant called the Chum Bucket, located across the street from the Krusty Krab. Plankton spends most of his time planning to steal the secret recipe for Mr. Krabs' popular Krabby Patty burgers, so as to gain the upper hand and put the Krusty Krab out of business. \n\nOther recurring characters appear throughout the series, such as SpongeBob's ever-suffering driving teacher Mrs. Puff; Mr. Krabs' whiney teenage whale daughter Pearl; Plankton's intelligent yet sarcastic computer wife Karen; the muscular lifeguard of Goo Lagoon, Larry the Lobster; a pirate specter known as The Flying Dutchman; and retired superheroes Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy, who are idolized by SpongeBob and Patrick.\n\nSetting\n\nThe series predominantly takes place in the benthic underwater city of Bikini Bottom which, according to some third-party sources, is located in the Pacific Ocean beneath the real-life coral reef known as Bikini Atoll. In 2015, Tom Kenny confirmed that the fictitious city was named after Bikini Atoll, but denied an Internet fan theory that connected the series' characters to actual nuclear testing that occurred in the atoll. \n\nThe citizens live in mostly aquatic-themed buildings and use \"boatmobiles\", amalgamations of cars and boats, as a mode of transportation. Recurring establishments present in Bikini Bottom include two competing restaurants, the Krusty Krab and the Chum Bucket; Mrs. Puff's Boating School; and Shady Shoals Rest Home. Goo Lagoon, a popular beach hangout, is within the vicinity of the city, as is Jellyfish Fields. There are also a few episodes with businesses such as the grocery store, joke store, and mattress store. \n\nWhen the crew began production on the pilot, they were tasked with designing the stock locations where \"...the show would return to again and again, and in which most of the action would take place, such as the Krusty Krab and SpongeBob's pineapple house\". The idea for the series was \"to keep everything nautical\", so the crew used a great amount of rope, wooden planks, ships' wheels, netting, anchors, boilerplates, and rivets in creating the show's setting. Bubbles filing up the screen is also a nautical technique used to transition from scene to scene.\n\nThe series features \"sky flowers\" as a main setting material. They first appeared in the pilot and have since become a common feature throughout the series. When series background designer Kenny Pittenger was asked what they were, he answered, \"They function as clouds in a way, but since the show takes place underwater, they aren't really clouds\". Since the series was influenced by tiki, the background painters have to use a lot of pattern. Pittenger said that the sky flowers were meant to \"evoke the look of a flower-print Hawaiian shirt\".\n\nDevelopment\n\nEarly inspirations\n\nSeries creator Stephen Hillenburg first became fascinated with the ocean as a child. Also at a young age, he began developing his artistic abilities. However, these two interests would not coincide for a long time—the idea of drawing fish seemed boring to him. During college, he majored in marine biology and minored in art. After graduating in 1984, he joined the Ocean Institute, an organization in Dana Point, California, dedicated to educating the public about marine science and maritime history. \n\nWhile Hillenburg was there, he created a precursor to SpongeBob SquarePants: a comic book titled The Intertidal Zone, which was used by the institute to teach visiting students about the animal life of tide pools. The comic starred various anthropomorphic sea lifeforms, many of which would evolve into SpongeBob characters. Hillenburg tried to get the comic professionally published, but none of the companies to which he sent it were interested.\n\nConception\n\nDuring his time of employment at the Ocean Institute, Hillenburg attended an animation festival and determined that he wanted to pursue a career in that field. He had already been planning on returning to college for a master's degree in art. Instead, he chose to study experimental animation at the California Institute of the Arts. His thesis film, Wormholes, is about the theory of relativity. It was screened at festivals, and at one of these, Hillenburg met Joe Murray, creator of the popular Nickelodeon animated series, Rocko's Modern Life. Murray was impressed by the style of the film and offered Hillenburg a job. Hillenburg joined the series as a director and later, during the fourth season, he took on the roles of producer and creative director. \n\nMartin Olson, one of the writers for Rocko's Modern Life, read The Intertidal Zone and encouraged Hillenburg to create a television series with a similar concept. At that point, Hillenburg had not even considered creating his own series. However, he realized that if he ever did, this would be the best approach. He began to further develop some of the characters from The Intertidal Zone, including the comic's \"announcer\", Bob the Sponge. He wanted his series to stand out from most popular cartoons of the time, which he felt were exemplified by buddy comedies such as The Ren & Stimpy Show. As a result, Hillenburg decided to focus on one main character: the weirdest sea creature that he could think of. This led him to the sponge. Bob the Sponge resembles an actual sea sponge, and at first Hillenburg continued this design. In determining the new character's personality, Hillenburg drew inspiration from innocent, childlike figures that he enjoyed, such as Charlie Chaplin, Laurel and Hardy, Jerry Lewis, and Pee-wee Herman. He then considered modeling the character after a kitchen sponge and realized that this idea would perfectly match the character's square personality.\n\nTo voice the central character of the series, Hillenburg turned to Tom Kenny, whose career in animation had started alongside Hillenburg's on Rocko's Modern Life. Elements of Kenny's own personality were employed in further developing the character. Initially, Hillenburg wanted to use the name SpongeBoy — the character would have had no last name, and the series would have been called SpongeBoy Ahoy! However, the Nickelodeon legal department discovered — after voice acting had been completed for the original seven-minute pilot episode — that the name \"SpongeBoy\" was already in use for a mop product. Flaming Carrot Comics creator Bob Burden also owned the trademark to a character of the same name. In choosing a replacement name, Hillenburg felt that he still had to use the word \"Sponge\", so that viewers would not mistake the character for a \"Cheese Man\". He settled on the name \"SpongeBob\". \"SquarePants\" was then chosen as a family name after Kenny saw a picture of the character and remarked, \"Boy, look at this sponge in square pants, thinking he can get a job in a fast food place.\" Hillenburg loved the phrase upon hearing Kenny say it and felt that it would reinforce the character's nerdiness. \n\nPitching\n\nIn 1997, while pitching the cartoon to Nickelodeon executives, Hillenburg donned a Hawaiian shirt, brought along an \"underwater terrarium with models of the characters\", and played Hawaiian music to set the theme. The setup was described by Nickelodeon executive Eric Coleman as \"pretty amazing\". When they were given money and two weeks to write the pilot episode \"Help Wanted\", Derek Drymon, Stephen Hillenberg, and Nick Jennings returned with what was described by Nickelodeon official Albie Hecht as, \"a performance [he] wished [he] had on tape\". Although executive producer Derek Drymon described the pitch as stressful, he said it went \"very well\". Kevin Kay and Hecht had to step outside because they were \"exhausted from laughing\", which worried the cartoonists.\n\nIn an interview, Cyma Zarghami, the current president of Nickelodeon, said, \"their [Nickelodeon executives'] immediate reaction was to see it again, both because they liked it and it was unlike anything they'd ever seen before\". Zarghami was one of four executives in the room when SpongeBob SquarePants was screened for the first time.\n\nProduction\n\nExecutive producers and showrunners\n\nSeries creator Stephen Hillenburg has served as the executive producer over the course of the series' entire history, and functioned as the showrunner from the series' debut in 1999 until 2004. The series went on hiatus in 2002, after Hillenburg halted production to work on a feature film of the series, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie. Once the film was finalized and the third season finished, Hillenburg resigned as the series' showrunner. Although he no longer has a direct role in the production of the series, he still maintains an advisory role and reviews each episode. \n\nWhen the film was completed, Hillenburg intended for it to be the series finale, \"so [the show] wouldn't jump the shark.\" However, Nickelodeon wanted more episodes, so Hillenburg appointed Paul Tibbitt, who previously served on the show as a writer, director, and storyboard artist, to take over his role as showrunner and produce further seasons. Hillenburg considered Tibbitt one of his favorite members of the show's crew, and \"totally trusted him\". Tibbitt still holds the showrunner position, and has also functioned as a supervising producer since 2005 and an executive producer since 2008. \n\nOn December 13, 2014, it was announced that Hillenburg would return to the series in an unspecified position. \n\nWriting\n\nFor SpongeBob SquarePants a team of five outline and premise writers creates the initial storylines. Writer Luke Brookshier said, \"SpongeBob is written differently than many television shows\". Writing for an episode of the series starts with a two-page outline. A storyboard director then takes the outline and develops it into a full episode — jokes and dialogue are added during this stage. Another writer for the series, Merriwether Williams, described in an interview that she and Mr. Lawrence would write a draft for an episode in an afternoon and be done at 4 o'clock.\n\nHillenburg decided early on, prior to starting the production of the series, that he wanted SpongeBob SquarePants to be storyboard-driven, rather than script-driven. This required an approach in which artists \"would take a skeletal story outline and flesh it out with sight gags, dialogue and a structure that would strike a balance between narrative and whimsy\". Hillenburg originally wanted \"a team of young and hungry people\" to work on the series. The primary figures, who had previously worked with Hillenburg on Rocko's Modern Life, consisted of Alan Smart, Nick Jennings, and Derek Drymon. Head writer Steven Banks said, \"The writers come up with an idea and write premises and outlines describing the story, and the storyboarders (who are also writers) write the dialogue while they draw the storyboard panels. Most other shows are script-driven. We don't write scripts and that has made all the difference!\"\n\nThe writing staff often used their individual life experiences for inspirations to come up with the storylines of the series' episodes. For example, the episode \"Sailor Mouth\", in which SpongeBob and Patrick learn profanity, was inspired by creative director Derek Drymon's experience of getting in trouble as a child for using the f-word in front of his mother. Drymon said, \"The scene where Patrick is running to Mr. Krabs to tattle, with SpongeBob chasing him, is pretty much how it happened in real life\". The end of the episode, in which Mr. Krabs uses even more profanity than SpongeBob and Patrick, was inspired \"by the fact that my [Drymon's] mother has a sailor mouth herself\". The idea for the episode \"The Secret Box\" also came from one of Drymon's childhood experiences. Hillenburg explained, \"Drymon had a secret box [as a kid] and started telling us about it. We wanted to make fun of him and use it.\"\n\nAlmost every episode is divided into two 11-minute segments. Hillenburg explained that \"[I] never really wanted to deliberately try to write a half-hour show\". He added, \"I wrote the shows to where they felt right\". Each 11-minute segment takes about five months to produce. \n\nVoice actors\n\nSpongeBob SquarePants has six main cast members: Tom Kenny, Bill Fagerbakke, Rodger Bumpass, Clancy Brown, Carolyn Lawrence, and Mr. Lawrence.\n\nKenny provides the voices of SpongeBob SquarePants, his pet snail Gary, the French Narrator, Harold SquarePants, Patchy the Pirate, and the Dirty Bubble. Kenny previously worked with Hillenburg on Rocko's Modern Life and, when Hillenburg created SpongeBob SquarePants, he approached Kenny to voice the character. The voice of SpongeBob was originally used by Kenny for a minor background character in Rocko's Modern Life. Kenny says that SpongeBob's high-pitched laugh was specifically created to be unique. They wanted an annoying laugh in the tradition of Popeye and Woody Woodpecker. \n\nFagerbakke voices Patrick Star and other miscellaneous characters. At the same time when Hillenburg, Derek Drymon, and Tim Hill were writing the pilot \"Help Wanted\", Hillenburg was also conducting auditions to find voices for the characters. Fagerbakke auditioned for the role of Patrick after Kenny had been cast. In an interview, Fagerbakke compared himself to the character and said, \"It's extremely gratifying\". Fagerbakke modeled his performance whenever Patrick is angry after that of American actress Shelley Winters. \n\nBumpass performs the voice of Squidward Tentacles and other miscellaneous characters. Arthur Brown, author of Everything I Need to Know, I Learned from Cartoons!, has compared Squidward's voice to that of Jack Benny's, a similarity Bumpass says is mostly unintentional. Hillenburg originally had Mr. Lawrence in mind for the role of voicing Squidward.\n\nClancy Brown provides the voice of Mr. Krabs. \n\nCarolyn Lawrence provides the voice of Sandy Cheeks. Lawrence got the role of Sandy when she was in the Los Feliz neighborhood in Los Angeles. She met Donna Grillo, a casting director, on a sidewalk. Lawrence was with a friend who knew Grillo, and she said Lawrence had an interesting voice. Grillo brought in Lawrence to audition and she got the part of Sandy. Lawrence modeled her performance of Sandy after that of American actress Holly Hunter. \n\nMr. Lawrence voices Plankton. Drymon said, \"We knew Doug [Lawrence] from Rocko, where he was a storyboard director and where he also did the voice of Filburt. We were showing Doug the storyboard, and he started reading back to us in his Tony the Tiger/Gregory Peck voice. It was really funny, and we wound up having SpongeBob use a deep voice when he entered the Krusty Krab for the first time\". Hillenburg loved the voice and decided to give Lawrence the part of series villain, Plankton. Aside from Plankton, Mr. Lawrence also voices recurring characters like Larry Lobster. \n\nKaren, Mrs. Puff, Pearl, and the Flying Dutchman are voiced by Kenny's wife Jill Talley, Mary Jo Catlett, Lori Alan and Brian Doyle-Murray, respectively. Mr. Krabs' mother, Mama Krabs, who debuted in the episode \"Sailor Mouth\", was voiced by writer Paul Tibbitt. However, voice actress Sirena Irwin overtook Tibbitt's role as the character reappeared in the fourth season episode \"Enemy In-Law\" in 2005. Tom Kenny portrays Patchy the Pirate, the president of the fictional SpongeBob SquarePants fan club, while series creator Hillenburg voiced the character of Potty the Parrot. After Hillenburg's departure as showrunner in 2004, Tibbitt was given the role in voicing Potty the Parrot. \n\nIn addition to the regular cast, episodes feature guest voices from many ranges of professions, including actors, athletes, authors, musicians, and artists. Recurring guest voices include: Ernest Borgnine, who voiced Mermaid Man from 1999 until his death in 2012; Tim Conway as the voice of Barnacle Boy; and Marion Ross as Grandma SquarePants. Notable guests who have provided vocal cameo appearances includes David Bowie as Lord Royal Highness in the television film Atlantis SquarePantis, Johnny Depp as the voice of the surf guru, Jack Kahuna Laguna, in the episode \"SpongeBob SquarePants vs. The Big One\", and Victoria Beckham as the voice of Queen Amphitrite in the episode \"The Clash of Triton\". \n\nVoice recording sessions always include a full cast of actors, which Kenny describes as \"getting more unusual\". Kenny said, \"That's another thing that's given SpongeBob its special feel. Everybody's in the same room, doing it old radio-show style. It's how the stuff we like was recorded\". Series writer Jay Lender said, \"The recording sessions were always fun ...\" For the first three seasons, Hillenburg and Drymon sat in on the record studio, and they directed the actors. In the fourth season, Andrea Romano took over the role as the voice director. Wednesday is recording day, the same schedule followed by the crew since 1999. Casting supervisor Jennie Monica Hammond said, \"I loved Wednesdays\".\n\nAnimation\n\nApproximately 50 people work together in animating and producing an episode of SpongeBob SquarePants. Throughout its run, production of the series has been handled domestically at Nickelodeon Animation Studio in Burbank, California, while the finished animation has been created overseas at Rough Draft Studios in South Korea. Storyboarding for each episode is done by the crew in California. The storyboards are then used as templates by the crew in Korea, who animate by hand, color cels on computers, and paint backgrounds. Episodes are finished in California, where they are edited and have music added. Every season, character designs are updated or modified to solve technical issues in the animation. \n\nDuring the first season, the series used cel animation. A shift was made the following year to digital ink and paint animation. In 2009, executive producer Paul Tibbitt said \"The first season of SpongeBob was done the old-fashioned way on cells, and every cell had to be part-painted, left to dry, paint some other colours. It's still a time-consuming aspect of the process now, but the digital way of doing things means it doesn't take long to correct\".\n\nIn 2008, the crew shifted to using Wacom Cintiqs for the drawings instead of pencils. The fifth season episode \"Pest of the West\" was the first episode in the series to which the crew applied this method. Series background designer Kenny Pittenger said, \"The only real difference between the way we draw now and the way we drew then is that we abandoned pencil and paper during the fifth season\". The crew began the shift while they were working on the episode. Pittenger said, \"It was while we were working on 'Pest of the West', one of the half-hour specials, that we made the switch ... did you notice?\" The shift to Wacom Cintiqs let the designers and animators draw on computer screens and make immediate changes or undo mistakes. Pittenger said, \"Many neo-Luddites—er ... I mean, many of my cohorts—don't like working on them, but I find them useful. There's no substitute for the immediacy of drawing on a piece of paper, of course, but digital nautical nonsense is still pretty fun\".\n\nA stop-motion opening sequence for the series' 10th anniversary special was created by LA-based animation studio Screen Novelties. The group was re-enlisted a few years later to produce the eighth season episode \"It's a SpongeBob Christmas!\" This was the first full-length episode in the series to be produced in stop motion animation. Mark Caballero, Seamus Walsh, and Christopher Finnegan of Screen Novelties animated the episode, and Caballero and Walsh also served as its directors. \n\nMusic\n\nThe theme song was composed by Mark Harrison and Blaise Smith, while the lyrics to the song were written by series creator Stephen Hillenburg and the series' original creative director Derek Drymon. The melody was inspired by the sea shanty \"Blow the Man Down\". An old oil painting of a pirate is used in the opening sequence. It has been dubbed \"Painty the Pirate\", and according to Tom Kenny, Hillenburg found it in a thrift shop \"years ago\". Patrick Pinney gives voice to Painty the Pirate, singing the theme song as the character. Hillenburg's lips were imposed onto the painting and move along with the lyrics. Kenny joked that this is \"about as close of a glimpse as most SpongeBob fans are ever going to get of Steve Hillenburg\", because of Hillenburg's private nature.\n\nA cover of the song by Avril Lavigne can be found on the SpongeBob SquarePants Movie soundtrack. Another cover by the Violent Femmes aired on Nickelodeon as a promotion for the series moving to prime time. \n\nSteve Belfer, one of Hillenburg's friends from CalArts, wrote and performed the music that is played over the end credits. This theme includes ukulele music, per Hillenburg's request. Drymon said, \"It's so long ago, it's hard to be sure, but I remember Hillenburg having the Belfer music early on, maybe before the pilot\".\n\nThe series' music editor and main composer is Nicolas Carr. After working with Hillenburg on Rocko's Modern Life, Carr struggled to find a new job in his field. He had been considering a career change when Hillenburg offered him the job. The first season's score primarily featured selections from the Associated Production Music Library, which Carr has said includes \"lots of great old corny Hawaiian music and big, full, dramatic orchestral scores.\" Rocko's Modern Life also used music from this library. It was Hillenburg's decision to adopt the approach. The selections for SpongeBob SquarePants have been described by Carr as being \"more over-the-top\" than those for Rocko's Modern Life.\n\nHillenburg also felt that it was important for the series to develop its own music library, consisting of scores that could be reused and re-edited throughout the years. He wanted these scores to be composed by unknowns, and a group of twelve was assembled. They formed \"The Sponge Divers Orchestra\", which includes Carr and Belfer. This group went on to provide the majority of the music for later seasons, although Carr still draws from the Associated Production Music Library, as well as another library that he founded himself — Animation Music Inc.\n\nBroadcast\n\nEpisodes\n\nTenth anniversary\n\nNickelodeon began celebrating the 10th anniversary of the series on January 18, 2009 with a live cast reading of the episode \"SpongeBob vs. The Big One\". The reading — a first for the series — was held at that year's Sundance Film Festival. The episode, which would not premiere on TV until April 17, featured Johnny Depp as a guest star. Other celebratory actions taken by the network included the launching of a new website for the series (spongebob.com) and the introduction of new merchandising. A \"SpongeBob and water conservation-themed element\" was also added to Nickelodeon's pro-social campaign The Big Green Help. In an interview, Tom Kenny said, \"What I'm most proud of is that kids still really like [SpongeBob SquarePants] and care about it ... They eagerly await new episodes. People who were young children when it started 10 years ago are still watching it and digging it and think it's funny. That's the loving cup for me\". \n\nThree nights before the official anniversary date, an hour-long documentary of the series, Square Roots: The Story of SpongeBob SquarePants, premiered on VH1. Critically acclaimed duo Patrick Creadon and Christine O'Malley created the film as a followup to I.O.U.S.A. – a documentary on America's financial situation. Creadon remarked, \"After spending two years examining the financial health of the United States, Christine and I were ready to tackle something a little more upbeat. Telling the SpongeBob story feels like the perfect fit.\" On Friday July 17, Nickelodeon marked the official anniversary of the series, with a 50-hour television marathon titled \"The Ultimate SpongeBob SpongeBash Weekend\". The marathon began with a new episode, \"To SquarePants or Not to SquarePants\". Saturday saw a countdown of the top ten episodes as picked by fans, as well as an airing of The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie. The marathon finished on Sunday, which saw a countdown of episodes as picked by celebrities, as well as the premiere of ten new episodes. \n\nNickelodeon continued celebrating the anniversary through the rest of the year. An eight-episode DVD set featuring \"To SquarePants or Not to SquarePants\" shortly followed the marathon, with a July 21 release. Next a 2,200 minute, 14-disc DVD set titled The First 100 Episodes was released on September 22. Finally, on November 6, an hour-long television film, titled Truth or Square, debuted on Nickelodeon. The film is narrated by Ricky Gervais and features live action cameo appearances by Rosario Dawson, Craig Ferguson, Will Ferrell, Tina Fey, LeBron James, P!nk, Triumph the Insult Comic Dog, and Robin Williams. It was released as part of a five-episode DVD set on November 10. \n\nReception\n\nRatings and run-length achievements\n\nWithin its first month on air, SpongeBob SquarePants overtook Pokémons position as the highest rated Saturday-morning children's series. It held an average national Nielsen rating of 4.9 among children aged two through eleven, denoting 1.9 million viewers. Two years later, the series had firmly established itself as Nickelodeon's second highest rated children's program, after Rugrats. It had gained a significant adult audience by that point – nearly 40 percent of the series' 2.2 million viewers were aged 18 to 34. That year, 2001, Nickelodeon took the \"Saturday-morning ratings crown\" for the fourth straight season. In response to this weekend-found success, the studio gave SpongeBob SquarePants time slots at 6 PM and 8 PM, Monday through Thursday, to increase exposure of the series. By the end of that year SpongeBob SquarePants boasted the highest ratings for any children's series, not only on Nickelodeon, but on all of television. Weekly viewership of the series had reached around fifteen million, at least five million of which were adults.\n\nIn October 2002, another Nickelodeon series titled The Fairly OddParents ranked as the No. 2 program for children between 2 and 11 years old. Its ratings at that time were almost equal to SpongeBob SquarePants then-average of 2.2 million viewers per episode. The Fairly OddParents even briefly surpassed SpongeBob SquarePants, causing the latter series to drop into second place — at this time The Fairly OddParents had a 6.2 rating and nearly 2.5 million child viewers, while SpongeBob SquarePants had a 6.0 rating and 2.4 million kids 2–11. Nickelodeon \"recognized\" The Fairly OddParents for its climbing ratings and installed it into a new 8 P.M. time slot, previously occupied by SpongeBob SquarePants. In an interview, Cyma Zarghami, then-general manager and executive vice president of Nickelodeon, said, \"Are we banking on the fact that Fairly OddParents will be the next SpongeBob? ... We are hoping. But SpongeBob is so unique, it's hard to say if it will ever be repeated\".\n\nHowever, in 2012, it was reported that the series' ratings were declining. The average number of viewers aged 2 to 11 watching SpongeBob at any given time dropped 29% in the first quarter from a year earlier, according to Nielsen. Wall Street Journal business writer John Jannarone suggested that the age of the series and oversaturation of the series might be contributing to the decline of the series' ratings, and might also be directly responsible for the decline in Nickelodeon's overall ratings. Media analyst Todd Juenger directly attributes the decline in Nickelodeon's ratings to the availability of streaming video content on services like Netflix, a provider of on-demand Internet streaming media.\n\nPhilippe Dauman, the president and CEO of Viacom, contradicted the notion, saying he did not think \"the limited amount of Nick library content on Netflix ... has had a significant impact\". A Nickelodeon spokesman said SpongeBob is performing consistently well and remains the number one rated animated series in all of children's television. He added, \"There is nothing that we have seen that points to SpongeBob as a problem\". Dauman blamed the drop on \"some ratings systemic issues\" at Nielsen, citing extensive set-top-box data that \"does in no way reflect\" the Nielsen data.\n\nJuenger noted that SpongeBob could affect the ratings of other Nickelodeon programming because children often change channels to find their favorite programs, then stay tuned into that network. Nickelodeon recently reduced its exposure in television. In the first quarter of 2012, the network cut back on the number of episodes it aired by 16% compared with a year earlier.\n\nOn April 22, 2013, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings announced their intentions not to renew their existing deal with Viacom. Since then, Viacom's deal with Netflix expired, and shows such as SpongeBob and Dora the Explorer were removed. On June 4, 2013, Viacom announced a multi-year licensing agreement which would move its programs, such as SpongeBob and Dora the Explorer, to Amazon.com, Netflix's top competitor. Amazon agreed to pay more than $200 million to Viacom for the license, its largest subscription streaming transaction ever. \n\nSpongeBob SquarePants is one of the longest-running series on Nickelodeon. It became the Nickelodeon series with the most episodes, during its eighth season, surpassing the 172 episodes of Rugrats with 178. In its ninth season, a total of 26 episodes pushed the series over the 200th episode mark, reaching 204 produced episodes. In a statement, Brown Johnson, animation president for Nickelodeon, said, \"SpongeBobs success in reaching over 200 episodes is a testament to creator Stephen Hillenburg's vision, comedic sensibility and his dynamic, lovable characters. The series now joins the club of contemporary classic Nicktoons that have hit this benchmark, so we're incredibly proud\". \n\nCritical reception\n\nSpongeBob SquarePants has received generally positive reviews from critics, and it has been noted for its appeal towards different age groups. James Poniewozik of Time magazine described the title character as \"the anti-Bart Simpson, temperamentally and physically: his head is as squared-off and neat as Bart's is unruly, and he has a personality to match—conscientious, optimistic and blind to the faults in the world and those around him\". According to Laura Fries of Variety magazine, the series is \"a thoughtful and inventive cartoon about a hopelessly optimistic and resilient sea sponge ... Devoid of the double entendres rife in today's animated TV shows, this is purely kid's stuff ... However, that's not to say that SpongeBob is simplistic or even juvenile. It's charming and whimsical, but clever enough to appeal to teens and college-aged kids, as well\". The New York Times critic Joyce Millman said SpongeBob \"is clever without being impenetrable to young viewers and goofy without boring grown-ups to tears. It's the most charming toon on television, and one of the weirdest. And it's also good, clean fun, which makes sense because it is, after all, about a sponge\". Millman wrote, \"His relentless good cheer would be irritating if he weren't so darned lovable and his world so excellently strange ... Like Pee-wee's Playhouse, SpongeBob joyfully dances on the fine line between childhood and adulthood, guilelessness and camp, the warped and the sweet\". \n\nRobert Thompson, a professor of communications and director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University, told The New York Times, \"There is something kind of unique about [SpongeBob]. It seems to be a refreshing breath from the pre-irony era. There's no sense of the elbow-in-rib, tongue-in-cheek aesthetic that so permeates the rest of American culture–including kids' shows like the Rugrats. I think what's subversive about it is it's so incredibly naive–deliberately. Because there's nothing in it that's trying to be hip or cool or anything else, hipness can be grafted onto it\". In a 2007 interview, Barack Obama named SpongeBob his favorite TV character and admitted that SpongeBob SquarePants is \"the show I watch with my daughters\". British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has also said he watches the series with his children.\n\nAwards and accolades\n\nSpongeBob SquarePants has received many awards and nominations; among these are two Emmy Awards (\"Outstanding Special Class Animated Program\" in 2010 and \"Outstanding Sound Editing – Animation\" in 2014); six Annie Awards; and two BAFTA Children's Awards. In 2006, IGN ranked SpongeBob SquarePants 15th on its list, \"Top 25 Animated Series of All Time\", and in 2013, it ranked the series 12th on its list, \"The Top 25 Animated Series for Adults\". Additionally, the website's UK division ran a \"Top 100 Animated Series\" list, and like its US counterpart, ranked SpongeBob SquarePants 15th.\n\nThe series is among the \"All-TIME 100 TV Shows\" as chosen by Time television critic James Poniewozik in 2007. He said, \"It's the most funny, surreal, inventive example of the explosion in creative kids' (and adult) entertainment that Nick, Cartoon Network and their ilk made possible\". Viewers of the UK television network Channel 4 voted SpongeBob SquarePants the 28th \"Greatest Cartoon\" in a 2004 poll. TV Guide listed the character of SpongeBob SquarePants at No. 9 for its \"50 Greatest Cartoon Characters of All Time\". In 2013, the publication ranked SpongeBob SquarePants the eighth \"Greatest TV Cartoon of All Time\". In June 2010, Entertainment Weekly named SpongeBob one of the \"100 Greatest Characters of the Last 20 Years\". \n\nLegacy\n\nIn July 2009, Madame Tussauds wax museum in New York launched a wax sculpture of SpongeBob in celebration of the series' 10th anniversary. This made SpongeBob the first animated character to ever receive a statue made entirely out of wax. In May 2011, a new species of mushroom, Spongiforma squarepantsii, was described, named after the series' title character.\n\nThe character has also become a trend in Egypt at Cairo's Tahrir Square. After the Egyptian Revolution of 2011, SpongeBob became a fashion phenomenon, appearing on various items of merchandise from hijabs to boxer shorts. The phenomenon led to the creation of the Tumblr project called \"SpongeBob on the Nile\". The project was founded by American students Andrew Leber and Elisabeth Jaquette and attempts to document every appearance of SpongeBob in Egypt. Sherief Elkeshta cited the phenomenon in an essay about the incoherent state of politics in Egypt in an independent monthly paper titled Midan Masr. He wrote, \"Why isn't he [SpongeBob] at least holding a Molotov cocktail? Or raising a fist?\" The phenomenon has even spread to Libya, where a Libyan rebel in SpongeBob dress was photographed celebrating the revolution. Although The Guardian and Vice have asserted that the trend has little to no political significance, \"joke\" presidential campaigns have been undertaken for SpongeBob in Egypt and Syria.\n\nA clip was posted to YouTube in February 2013 that features soldiers in the Russian army and navy singing the SpongeBob SquarePants theme song as they march. According to the website that uploaded the video, this is one of the \"most popular marching songs\" in the Russian military. The video garnered nearly 50,000 views within its first week.\n\nCriticism and controversy\n\nIn 2005, a promotional video which showed SpongeBob and other characters from children's shows singing together to promote diversity and tolerance was attacked by an evangelical group in the United States because they saw SpongeBob as being used to \"advocate homosexuality\". James Dobson of Focus on the Family accused the video of promoting homosexuality, due to it being sponsored by a pro-tolerance group. The incident accentuated questions as to whether or not SpongeBob is gay. Although the character has enjoyed popularity with gay viewers, series creator Stephen Hillenburg had already denied the issue three years earlier, clarifying at the time that he considers the character to be \"somewhat asexual\". After Dobson's comments, Hillenburg reasserted his position, stating that sexual preference does not play a part in what they are \"trying to do\" with the series. Tom Kenny and other production members were distraught that such an issue had arisen. \n\nDobson later stated that his comments were taken out of context, and that his original complaints were not with SpongeBob, the video, or any of the characters in the video, but rather with the organization that sponsored the video, the We Are Family Foundation. Dobson indicated that the We Are Family Foundation posted pro-gay material on their website, but later removed it. After the controversy, John H. Thomas, the United Church of Christ's general minister and president, said they would welcome SpongeBob into their ministry. He said \"Jesus didn't turn people away. Neither do we\". \n\nJeffery P. Dennis, author of the journal article \"Queertoons\", argued that SpongeBob and Sandy are not romantically in love, while adding that he believed that SpongeBob and Patrick \"are paired with arguably erotic intensity\". Martin Goodman of Animation World Magazine described Dennis' comments regarding SpongeBob and Patrick as \"interesting\". Ukrainian website Family Under the Protection of the Holy Virgin, which has been described as a \"fringe Catholic\" group by The Wall Street Journal, levied criticism against SpongeBob SquarePants for its alleged \"promotion of homosexuality\". The group sought to have the series banned, along with several other popular children's properties. The National Expert Commission of Ukraine on the Protection of Public Morality took up the matter for review in August 2012.\n\nOn April 2009, Burger King released a SpongeBob-themed advertisement featuring a parody of Sir Mix-a-Lot's song \"Baby Got Back\". The Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood protested the ad for being sexist and inappropriately sexual, especially contemplating that SpongeBob's fan base includes young children. In official statements released by Burger King and Nickelodeon, both companies claimed that the campaign was aimed at parents.\n\nA 2011 study conducted at the University of Virginia and published in the journal Pediatrics suggested that allowing preschool-aged audiences to watch the series caused short-term disruptions in mental function and attention span due to frequent shot changes. A Nickelodeon executive responded in an interview that the series was not intended for an audience of that age and that the study used \"questionable methodology and could not possibly provide the basis for any valid findings that parents could trust\". \n\nCriticism of declining quality\n\nCritics' reviews of early SpongeBob episodes praised the show for its wit, clever humor, and \"uncanny brilliance\". However, in 2007, around the airing of season five, the tone and emphasis of the show began to change. Some fans \"began to turn away from the show\", causing online fansites to \"[become] deserted\". They pointed to a shift from clever humor to what they perceived as \"boring, unfunny humor [...] geared too much towards children\". \n\nPaul Tibbitt, showrunner from season four to the season 9 episode, \"Spongebob, You're Fired!\" has been the subject of criticism. While The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie was generally well received by fans of the show, it is also considered a turning point in the show's history, as many fans believe the decline occurred after the film's release,Berr, Jonathan (May 4, 2012). [http://money.msn.com/top-stocks/post.aspx?post942b02c6-e5b2-405d-bba8-277797fa7839 Viacom should pull the plug on SpongeBob]. MSN Money. Retrieved February 3, 2013. when Stephen Hillenburg resigned as showrunner and Tibbitt was appointed to replace him. Episodes produced since the movie have been variously categorized as \"kid-pandering attention-waster[s]\", \"tedious\", \"boring\" and \"dreck\", a \"depressing plateau of mediocrity\", and \"laugh-skimpy\". \n\nMany believe the show's ratings decline as of 2012 correlates with the alleged decline in quality, and \"whatever fan support [the show] enjoys is not enough\" to save it from its ratings slide.\n\nMany fans claimed that show quality increased after Paul Tibbitt resigned as showrunner/supervising producer. Vincent Waller, creative director for season 4 to the first half of season 9, and Marc Ceccareli, a writer and storyboard director for season 8, have taken Tibbitt's place as showrunner/supervising producers starting with the second half of season 9.\n\nOther media\n\nHome video\n\nComic books\n\nIn February 2011, creator Hillenburg first announced the release of the 32-page bimonthly comic book series, SpongeBob Comics, based on the show. The release marked the first time Hillenburg authored his own books. He said, \"I'm hoping that fans will enjoy finally having a SpongeBob comic book from me\". The comic book series is published by Hillenburg's production company, United Plankton Pictures, and distributed by Bongo Comics Group. Although the characters of the series had previously appeared in Nickelodeon Magazine and in Cine-Manga, the first issue of SpongeBob Comics marked the first time the characters have appeared in their own comic books in the United States. Hillenburg described the stories from the comic books as \"original and always true to the humor, characters, and universe of the SpongeBob SquarePants series\".\n\nChris Duffy, the former senior editor of Nickelodeon Magazine, serves as managing editor of SpongeBob Comics. Hillenburg and Duffy met with various comic book writers and artists—including James Kochalka, Hilary Barta, Graham Annable, Gregg Schigiel, and Jacob Chabot—to contribute to each issues. Retired horror comics writer and artist Stephen R. Bissette returned to write a special Halloween issue in 2012, with Tony Millionaire and Al Jaffee. In an interview with Tom Spurgeon, Bissette said, \"I've even broken my retirement to do one work-for-hire gig [for SpongeBob Comics] so I could share everything about that kind of current job\". \n\nIn the United Kingdom, Titan Magazines publishes comics based on SpongeBob SquarePants every four weeks. These comics were first published on February 3, 2005. Titan Magazines teamed-up with Lego to release a limited edition SpongeBob-themed comic. \n\nFilms\n\nParamount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies produced The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, an animated film adaptation of the series that was released on November 19, 2004. The film was directed by creator Stephen Hillenburg, and was written by long-time series writers comprising Hillenburg, Derek Drymon, Tim Hill, Kent Osborne, Aaron Springer, and Paul Tibbitt. Hillenburg and Julia Pistor produced the film, while the film score was composed by Gregor Narholz. The film is about Plankton's evil plan to steal King Neptune's crown and send it to Shell City. SpongeBob and Patrick must retrieve it and save Mr. Krabs' life from Neptune's raft and their home, Bikini Bottom, from Plankton's plan. The film features guest appearances by Jeffrey Tambor as King Neptune, Scarlett Johansson as the King's daughter Mindy, Alec Baldwin as Dennis, and David Hasselhoff as himself. It received positive critical reception, and grossed over $140 million worldwide.\n\nTwo television films were released. The two television films are SpongeBob's Atlantis SquarePantis released in 2007 and SpongeBob's Truth or Square released in 2009.\n\nA sequel to the 2004 film was released in theaters on February 6, 2015. The series' main cast members are reprise their roles, and the underwater parts are traditionally animated in the manner of the series and the live-action parts uses CGI animation with the SpongeBob characters. The film has a budget similar to the previous film and did not cost more than $100 million to produce. \n\nOn April 30, 2015, Viacom announced a third movie was in development. On August 3, 2015, via Twitter, Vincent Waller confirmed that the sequel is in pre-production and that Paul Tibbitt will once again direct. \n\nMusic\n\nCollections of original music featured in the series have been released on the albums SpongeBob SquarePants: Original Theme Highlights (2001), SpongeBob's Greatest Hits (2009), and The Yellow Album (2005). The first two charted on the US Billboard 200, reaching number 171 and 122, respectively. Several songs have been recorded with the purpose of a single or album release, and have not been featured on the show. For example, the song \"My Tidy Whities\" written by Tom Kenny and Andy Paley was released only for the album The Best Day Ever (2006). Kenny's inspiration for the song was \"underwear humor\". Kenny said, \"Underwear humor is always a surefire laugh-getter with kids ... Just seeing a character that odd wearing really prosaic, normal, Kmart, three-to-a-pack underwear is a funny drawing ... We thought it was funny to make a really lush, beautiful love song to his underwear\". The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie – Music from the Movie and More..., a soundtrack album featuring the score of The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, was released along with the feature-length film in November 2004. Various artists including the Flaming Lips, Wilco, Ween, Motörhead, the Shins, and Avril Lavigne contributed to the soundtrack that reached number 76 on the US Billboard 200. \n\nTheme park rides\n\nSpongeBob SquarePants 4-D film and ride opened in various locations, including Six Flags Over Texas, Flamingo Land Resort, and the Shedd Aquarium. The ride features water squirts, real bubbles, and other sensory enhancements. In 2012, Nickelodeon teamed up again with SimEx-Iwerks Entertainment and Super 78 to produce SpongeBob SquarePants 4-D: The Great Jelly Rescue. The attraction opened in early 2013 at the Mystic Aquarium & Institute for Exploration. The attraction was also released at the Nickelodeon Suites Resort Orlando in Orlando, Florida. The seven-minute film follows SpongeBob, Patrick and Sandy to their old hijinks while rescuing the jellyfish of Jellyfish Fields from Plankton's evil clutches.\n\nSpongeBob SquarePants appears at the Mall of America's Nickelodeon theme park re-branded from the Mall of America's Park at MOA, formerly Camp Snoopy, to Nickelodeon Universe in the Minneapolis-St. Paul suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota. The new theme park features a SpongeBob-themed Gerstlauer Euro-Fighter custom roller coaster, the SpongeBob SquarePants Rock Bottom Plunge, which has replaced the Mystery Mine Ride and Olde Time Photo store on the west end of the theme park, which opened March 15, 2008. \n\nOn May 23, 2015, an interactive 3D show titled \"SpongeBob SubPants Adventure\" opened in Texas at Moody Gardens. According to Moody Gardens President and CEO John Zendt, \"Visitors will be able to interact with the Nickelodeon characters on a digital stage as they have never been able to do before.\" \n\nVideo games\n\nNumerous video games based on the series have been produced. Some of the early games include Legend of the Lost Spatula (2001) and SpongeBob SquarePants: Battle for Bikini Bottom (2003). The 2003 video game was added to the Greatest Hits by Sony. It also served as the engine basis for a video game based on the The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie. Heavy Iron Studios, the game's developers, tweaked the graphics to give the game a sharper and more imaginative look than that of Battle for Bikini Bottom. They also increased the polygon count, added several racing levels, and incorporated many of the creatures seen in the film. In 2013, Nickelodeon published and distributed SpongeBob Moves In, a freemium city-building game app developed by Kung Fu Factory for iOS. \n\nSpongeBob SquareShorts\n\nNickelodeon launched the first global SpongeBob SquarePants-themed short film competition, SpongeBob SquareShorts: Original Fan Tributes, in 2013. The contest encourages fans and filmmakers around the world to create original short films inspired by SpongeBob for a chance to win a prize and a trip for four people to a screening event in Hollywood. The contest opened on May 6 and ran through June 28, 2013. On July 19, 2013, Nickelodeon announced the finalists for the competition, and, on August 13, 2013, the \"under 18 years of age\" category was won by David of the United States for his \"The Krabby Commercial\", while the \"Finally Home\" short by Nicole of South Africa won the \"18 and over\" category. \n\nMerchandise\n\nThe popularity of SpongeBob SquarePants inspired merchandise from T-shirts to posters. It was reported that the franchise generated an estimated $8 billion merchandising revenue for Nickelodeon. It is also the most distributed property of MTV Networks. SpongeBob is viewed in 170 countries speaking 24 languages, and has also become \"a killer merchandising app\". The title character and his friends have been used as a theme for special editions of well-known family board games, including Monopoly, Life, and Operation, as well as a SpongeBob SquarePants edition of Ants in the Pants, and Yahtzee. \n\nIn 2001, SpongeBob SquarePants signed a marketing deal with Target Corporation and Burger King, expanding its merchandising. The popularity of SpongeBob has translated well into sales figures. In 2002, SpongeBob SquarePants dolls sold at a rate of 75,000 per week, which was faster than Tickle Me Elmo dolls were selling at the time. SpongeBob has gained popularity in Japan, specifically with Japanese women. Nickelodeon's parent company Viacom purposefully targeted marketing at women in the country. Skeptics initially doubted that SpongeBob could be popular in Japan, as the character's design is very different from already popular designs for Hello Kitty and Pikachu. Ratings and merchandise sales showed SpongeBob SquarePants has caught on with parents and with college audiences. In a recent promotion, college-oriented website Music.com gave away 80,000 SpongeBob T-shirts, four times more than during a similar promotion for Comedy Central's South Park. \n\nKids' meal tie-ins have been released in snacks and fast food restaurants in many parts of the world, including Burger King in Europe and North America, as well as Wendy's in North America, and Hungry Jack's in Australia. A McDonald's Happy Meal tie-in with SpongeBob-themed Happy Meal boxes and toys was released in Europe and other international markets in the summer of 2007. In Australia, the advertisement for the McDonald's SpongeBob Happy Meal won the Pester Power Award because the ads are entice young children to want its food because of the free toy. As a tie-in beverage for the DVD release of The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, 7-Eleven released the limited edition \"Under-the-Sea Pineapple Slurpee\" in March 2004. Pirate's Booty released limited edition SpongeBob SquarePants Pirate's Booty snacks in 2013. \n\nIn 2007, high-end SpongeBob-themed electronics have been introduced by Imation Electronics Products under the Npower brand, including MP3 players, digital cameras, a DVD player, and a flatscreen television. Pictures of SpongeBob SquarePants also began to appear on the labels of 8 oz. cans of Green Giant cut green beans and frozen packages of Green Giant green beans and butter sauce, which featured free stickers in 2007 as part of an initiative to encourage kids to eat their vegetables. The Simmons Jewelry Co. released a $75,000 diamond pendant as part of a SpongeBob collection. In New Zealand, the UK-based Beechdean Group unveiled the SpongeBob SquarePants Vanilla Ice Cream character product as part of a licence deal with Nickelodeon. NZ Drinks launched the SpongeBob SquarePants bottled water. \n\nBuild-A-Bear Workshop introduced the new SpongeBob SqaurePants collection in stores and online in North America on May 17, 2013. Shoppers can dress their SpongeBob and Patrick plush in a variety of clothing and accessories. Sandy Cheeks and Gary the Snail are also available as pre-stuffed minis. Build-A-Bear Workshop stores nationwide celebrated the arrival of SpongeBob with a series of special events from May 17 through May 19. \n\nOn July 13, 2013, Toyota, with Nickelodeon, unveiled a SpongeBob-inspired Toyota Highlander. The 2014 Toyota Highlander was launched on SpongeBob Day at the San Diego's Giants v. Padres game. The SpongeBob Toyota Highlander visited seven U.S. locations during its release, including the Nickelodeon Suites Resort Orlando in Florida. \n\nFootnotes", "Lance Edward Armstrong (born September 18, 1971) is an American former professional road racing cyclist. He is the 1993 Elite Men's Road Race World Champion, and he had won the Tour de France seven consecutive times from 1999 to 2005, but was stripped of his Tour de France victories in 2012 after a protracted doping scandal.\n\nAt age 16, Armstrong began competing as a triathlete and was a national sprint-course triathlon champion in 1989 and 1990. In 1992, Armstrong began his career as a professional cyclist with the Motorola team. He had notable success between 1993 and 1996, including the World Championship in 1993, Clásica de San Sebastián in 95, Tour DuPont in 95 and 96, and a handful of stage victories in Europe, including stage 18 of the 1995 Tour de France. In 1996, he was diagnosed with a potentially fatal metastatic testicular cancer. After his recovery, he founded the Lance Armstrong Foundation (now the Livestrong Foundation) to assist other cancer survivors.\n\nBy January 1998, Armstrong had renewed serious cycling training, having signed a new racing contract with US Postal. He was a member of the US Postal/Discovery team between 1998 and 2005, in which he won his Tour de France titles, as well as a bronze medal in the 2000 Summer Olympics. In July 2005, Armstrong retired from racing at the end of the 2005 Tour de France, but returned to competitive cycling with the Astana team in January 2009, finishing third in the 2009 Tour de France later that year. Between 2010 and 2011, he raced with the UCI ProTeam he helped found, Team Radio Shack. He retired for a second time in 2011.\n\nArmstrong had been the subject of doping allegations ever since winning the 1999 Tour de France. In 2012, a United States Anti-Doping Agency investigation concluded that Armstrong had used performance-enhancing drugs over the course of his career and named him as the ringleader of \"the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen.\" Armstrong chose not to contest the charges, citing the potential toll on his family. As a result, he received a lifetime ban from competing in all sports that follow the World Anti-Doping Agency code—effectively ending his athletic career. He was also stripped of all of his achievements after 1998, including his seven Tour de France titles. On October 22, 2012, the Union Cycliste Internationale upheld USADA's decision. They also decided that his stripped wins would not be allocated to other riders. Armstrong chose not to appeal the decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. In a 2013 interview, Armstrong confessed that some of the allegations were true. He has declined to testify about the full extent of his use of the drugs. In the aftermath of his fall from grace, a CNN article wrote that \"The epic downfall of cycling's star, once an idolized icon of millions around the globe, stands out in the history of professional sports.\" \n\nEarly life\n\nArmstrong was born Lance Edward Gunderson on September 18, 1971, at Methodist Hospital in Plano, Texas, north of Dallas to Linda Gayle (née Mooneyham), a secretary, and Eddie Charles Gunderson, a route manager for The Dallas Morning News. His great-grandfather was the son of Norwegian immigrants. He was named after Lance Rentzel, a Dallas Cowboys wide receiver. His parents divorced in 1973 when Lance was two. The next year, his mother married Terry Keith Armstrong, a wholesale salesman, who adopted Lance that year. Eddie Gunderson died in 2012. \n\nCareer\n\nEarly career\n\nAt the age of 12, Armstrong started his sporting career as a swimmer at the City of Plano Swim Club and finished fourth in Texas state 1,500-meter freestyle. He stopped swimming-only races after seeing a poster for a junior triathlon, called the Iron Kids Triathlon, which he won at age 13.\n\nIn the 1987–1988 Tri-Fed/Texas (\"Tri-Fed\" was the former name of USA Triathlon), Armstrong was ranked the number-one triathlete in the 19-and-under group; second place was Chann McRae, who became a US Postal Service cycling teammate and the 2002 USPRO national champion. Armstrong's total points in 1987 as an amateur were better than those of five professionals ranked higher than he was that year. At 16, Lance Armstrong became a professional triathlete and became national sprint-course triathlon champion in 1989 and 1990 at 18 and 19, respectively.\n\nMotorola: 1992–96\n\nIn 1992 Armstrong turned professional with the Motorola Cycling Team, the successor of 7-Eleven team. In 1993, Armstrong won 10 one-day events and stage races, but his breakthrough victory was the World Road Race Championship held in Norway. Before his World Championships win, he took his first win at the Tour de France, in the stage from Châlons-sur-Marne to Verdun. He was 97th in the general classification when he retired after stage 12. He collected the Thrift Drug Triple Crown of Cycling: the Thrift Drug Classic in Pittsburgh, the K-Mart West Virginia Classic, and the CoreStates USPRO national championship in Philadelphia. He is alleged by another cyclist competing with in the CoreStates Road Race to have bribed that cyclist so that he would not compete with Armstrong for the win. \n\nIn 1994, he again won the Thrift Drug Classic and came second in the Tour DuPont in the United States. His successes in Europe occurred when he placed second in Liège–Bastogne–Liège and the Clásica de San Sebastián, where just two years before, he had finished in last place as his first all-pro event in Europe. He won the Clásica de San Sebastián in 1995, followed by an overall victory in the penultimate Tour DuPont and a handful of stage victories in Europe, including the stage to Limoges in the Tour de France, three days after the death of his teammate Fabio Casartelli, who crashed on the descent of the Col de Portet d'Aspet on the 15th stage. \n\nArmstrong's successes were much the same in 1996. He became the first American to win the La Flèche Wallonne and again won the Tour DuPont. However, he was able to compete for only five days in the Tour de France. In the 1996 Olympic Games, he finished 6th in the time trial and 12th in the road race. In August 1996 following the Leeds Classic, Armstrong signed a 2-year, $2m deal with the French Cofidis Cycling Team. Joining him in signing contracts with the French team were teammates Frankie Andreu and Laurent Madouas. Two months later, in October 1996, he was diagnosed with advanced testicular cancer. \n\nCancer diagnosis, treatment and recovery\n\nOn October 2, 1996, at age 25, Armstrong was diagnosed with stage three (advanced) testicular cancer (embryonal carcinoma). The cancer had spread to his brain, lungs and abdomen. He visited urologist Jim Reeves in Austin, Texas for diagnosis of his symptoms, including coughing up blood and a swollen testicle. On October 3, Armstrong had an orchiectomy to remove the diseased testicle. Asked in a later interview what he thought Armstrong's chances of survival were, Reeves said \"Almost none. We told Lance initially 20 to 50% chance, mainly to give him hope. But with the kind of cancer he had, with the x-rays, the blood tests, almost no hope.\"\n\nAfter receiving a letter from Steven Wolff, an oncologist at Vanderbilt University, Armstrong went to the Indiana University medical center in Indianapolis and decided to receive the rest of his treatment there. The standard treatment for Armstrong's cancer was a \"cocktail\" of the drugs bleomycin, etoposide, and cisplatin (or Platinol) (BEP). The first chemotheraphy cycle that Armstrong underwent included BEP, but for the three remaining cycles, he was given an alternative, vinblastine etoposide, ifosfamide, and cisplatin (VIP), to avoid lung toxicity associated with bleomycin. Armstrong credited this with saving his cycling career. At Indiana University, Lawrence Einhorn had pioneered the use of cisplatin to treat testicular cancer. Armstrong's primary oncologist there was Craig Nichols. On October 25, his brain lesions which were found to contain extensive necrosis, were surgically removed by Scott A. Shapiro, a professor of neurosurgery at Indiana University.\n\nArmstrong's final chemotherapy treatment took place on December 13, 1996. In February 1997, he was declared cancer-free. Shortly afterward he was told that his contract with the Cofidis team had been cancelled. A former boss at Subaru Montgomery offered him a contract with the US Postal team at a salary of $200,000 a year. By January 1998, Armstrong was engaged in serious training for racing, moving to Europe with the team.\n\nUS Postal/Discovery: 1998–2005\n\nBefore his cancer treatment, Armstrong had participated in four Tour de France races, winning two stages. In 1993, he won the eighth stage and in 1995; he took stage 18 which he dedicated to teammate Fabio Casartelli who had crashed and died on stage 15. Armstrong dropped out of the 1996 Tour after the fifth stage after becoming ill, a few months before his diagnosis.\n\nArmstrong's cycling comeback began in 1998 when he finished fourth in the Vuelta a España. In 1999 he won the Tour de France, including four stages. He beat the second place rider, Alex Zülle, by 7 minutes 37 seconds. However, the absence of Jan Ullrich (injury) and Marco Pantani (drug allegations) meant Armstrong had not yet proven himself against the biggest names in the sport. Stage wins included the prologue, stage eight, an individual time trial in Metz, an Alpine stage on stage nine, and the second individual time trial on stage 19. \n\nIn 2000, Ullrich and Pantani returned to challenge Armstrong. The race began a six-year rivalry between Ullrich and Armstrong and ended in victory for Armstrong by 6 minutes 2 seconds over Ullrich. Armstrong took one stage in the 2000 Tour, the second individual time trial on stage 19. In 2001, Armstrong again took top honors, beating Ullrich by 6 minutes 44 seconds. In 2002, Ullrich did not participate due to suspension, and Armstrong won by seven minutes over Joseba Beloki. \n\nThe pattern returned in 2003, Armstrong taking first place and Ullrich second. Only a minute and a second separated the two at the end of the final day in Paris. U.S. Postal won the team time trial on stage four, while Armstrong took stage 15, despite having been knocked off on the ascent to Luz Ardiden, the final climb, when a spectator's bag caught his right handlebar. Ullrich waited for him, which brought Ullrich fair-play honors.\n\nIn 2004, Armstrong finished first, 6 minutes 19 seconds ahead of German Andreas Klöden. Ullrich was fourth, a further 2 minutes 31 seconds behind. Armstrong won a personal-best five individual stages, plus the team time trial. He became the first biker since Gino Bartali in 1948 to win three consecutive mountain stages; 15, 16, and 17.\nThe individual time trial on stage 16 up Alpe d'Huez was won in style by Armstrong as he passed Ivan Basso on the way despite having set out two minutes after the Italian. He won sprint finishes from Basso in stages 13 and 15 and made up a significant gap in the last 250 m to nip Klöden at the line in stage 17. He won the final individual time trial, stage 19, to complete his personal record of stage wins. \n\nIn 2005, Armstrong was beaten by American David Zabriskie in the stage 1 time trial by two seconds, despite having passed Ullrich on the road. His Discovery Channel team won the team time trial, while Armstrong won the final individual time trial. In the mountain stages, Armstrong's lead was attacked multiple times mostly by Ivan Basso, but also by T-mobile leaders Jan Ullrich, Andreas Kloden and Alexandre Vinokourov and former teammate Levi Leipheimer. But still, the American champion handled them well, maintained his lead and, on some occasions, increased it. To complete his record-breaking feat, he crossed the line on the Champs-Élysées on July 24 to win his seventh consecutive Tour, finishing 4m 40s ahead of Basso, with Ullrich third. Another record achieved that year was that Armstrong completed the tour at the highest pace in the race's history: his average speed over the whole tour was 41.7 km/h (26 mph). On July 24, 2005, Armstrong announced his retirement from professional cycling.\n\nComeback\n\nAstana Pro Team: 2009\n\nArmstrong announced on September 9, 2008, that he would return to pro cycling with the express goal of participating in the 2009 Tour de France. VeloNews reported that Armstrong would race for no salary or bonuses and would post his internally tested blood results online.\n\nAustralian ABC radio reported on September 24, 2008, that Armstrong would compete in the UCI Tour Down Under through Adelaide and surrounding areas in January 2009. UCI rules say a cyclist has to be in an anti-doping program for six months before an event, but UCI allowed Armstrong to compete. He had to retire from the 2009 Vuelta a Castilla y León during the first stage after crashing in a rider pileup in Baltanás, Spain, and breaking his collarbone. Armstrong flew back to Austin, Texas, for corrective surgery, which was successful, and was back training on a bicycle within four days of his operation.\n\nOn April 10, 2009, a controversy emerged between the French anti-doping agency AFLD and Armstrong and his team manager, Johan Bruyneel, stemming from a March 17, 2009, encounter with an AFLD anti-doping official who visited Armstrong after a training ride in Beaulieu-sur-Mer. When the official arrived, Armstrong claims he asked—and was granted—permission to take a shower while Bruyneel checked the official's credentials. In late April, the AFLD cleared Armstrong of any wrongdoing. Armstrong returned to racing after his collarbone injury at the Tour of the Gila in New Mexico on April 29.\n\nOn July 7, in the fourth stage of the 2009 Tour de France, Armstrong narrowly failed to win the yellow jersey after his Astana team won the team time trial. His Astana team won the 39 km lap of Montpellier but Armstrong ended up just over two tenths of a second (0.22) outside Fabian Cancellara's overall lead. Armstrong finished the 2009 Tour de France in third place overall, 5:24 behind the overall winner, his Astana teammate Alberto Contador.\n\nTeam RadioShack: 2010–11\n\nOn July 21, 2009, Armstrong announced that he would return to the Tour de France in 2010. RadioShack was named as the main sponsor for Armstrong's 2010 team, named Team RadioShack. Armstrong made his 2010 season debut at the Tour Down Under where he finished 25th out of the 127 riders who completed the race. He made his European season debut at the 2010 Vuelta a Murcia finishing in seventh place overall. Armstrong was also set to compete in several classics such as the Milan–San Remo, Amstel Gold Race, Liège–Bastogne–Liège, and the Tour of Flanders, but bouts with gastroenteritis forced his withdrawal from three of the four races.\n\nArmstrong returned to the United States in mid-April to compete in the Tour of Gila and May's Tour of California, both as preparation for the Tour de France. However, he crashed outside Visalia early in stage 5 of the Tour of California and had to withdraw from the race. He showed fine shape after recovering from the Tour of California crash, placing second in the Tour of Switzerland and third in the Tour of Luxembourg.\n\nOn June 28, Armstrong announced via Twitter that the 2010 edition would be his final Tour de France. Armstrong put in an impressive performance in the Tour de France prologue TT, finishing third, but was plagued by crashes in later stages that put him out of general classification contention, especially a serious crash in stage 8. He rallied for the brutal Pyreneean stage 16, working as a key player in a successful break that included teammate Chris Horner. He finished his last tour in 23rd place, 39 minutes 20 seconds behind former winner Alberto Contador. He was also a key rider in helping Team RadioShack win the team competition, beating Caisse d'Epargne by 9 minutes, 15 seconds.\nIn October, he announced the end of his international career after the Tour Down Under in January 2011. He stated that after January 2011, he will race only in the U.S. with the Radioshack domestic team.\n\nArmstrong announced his retirement from competitive cycling 'for good' on February 16, 2011, while still facing a US federal investigation into doping allegations.\n\nPhysical attributes\n\nArmstrong has recorded an aerobic capacity of 83.8 mL/kg/min (VO2 max), much higher than the average person (40–50), but lower than some other Tour de France winners, such as Miguel Indurain (88.0, although reports exist that Indurain tested at 92–94) and Greg LeMond (92.5). At his peak, he had a resting heart rate of 32–34 beats per minute (bpm) with a maximum heart rate of 201 bpm.\n\nCollaboration of sponsors\n\nArmstrong revolutionized the support behind his well-funded teams, asking sponsors and suppliers to contribute and act as part of the team. For example, rather than having the frame, handlebars, and tires designed and developed by separate companies with little interaction, his teams adopted a Formula One relationship with sponsors and suppliers named \"F-One\", taking full advantage of the combined resources of several organizations working in close communication. The team, Trek, Nike, AMD, Bontrager (a Trek company), Shimano, Sram, Giro and Oakley, collaborated for an array of products. \n\nDoping allegations, investigation and confession\n\nFor much of his career, Armstrong faced persistent allegations of doping. Armstrong denied all such allegations until January 2013, often claiming that he never had any positive test in the drug tests he has taken over his cycling career. \n\nArmstrong has been criticized for his disagreements with outspoken opponents of doping such as Paul Kimmage and Christophe Bassons. Bassons was a rider for Festina at the time of the Festina affair and was widely reported by teammates as being the only rider on the team not to be taking performance-enhancing drugs. Bassons wrote a number of articles for a French newspaper during the 1999 Tour de France which made references to doping in the peloton. Subsequently, Armstrong had an altercation with Bassons during the 1999 Tour de France where Bassons said Armstrong rode up alongside on the Alpe d'Huez stage to tell him \"it was a mistake to speak out the way I (Bassons) do and he (Armstrong) asked why I was doing it. I told him that I'm thinking of the next generation of riders. Then he said 'Why don't you leave, then?'\"\n\nArmstrong confirmed the story. On the main evening news on TF1, a national television station, Armstrong said, \"His accusations aren't good for cycling, for his team, for me, for anybody. If he thinks cycling works like that, he's wrong and he would be better off going home\". Kimmage, a professional cyclist in the 1980s who later became a sports journalist, referred to Armstrong as a \"cancer in cycling\". He also asked Armstrong questions in relation to his \"admiration for dopers\" at a press conference at the Tour of California in 2009, provoking a scathing reaction from Armstrong. This spat continued and is exemplified by Kimmage's articles in The Irish Independent. \n\nArmstrong continued to deny the use of illegal performance-enhancing drugs for four more years, describing himself as the most tested athlete in the world. From his return to cycling in the fall of 2008 through March 2009, Armstrong claims to have submitted to 24 unannounced drug tests by various anti-doping authorities.\n\nWorking with Michele Ferrari\n\nArmstrong was criticized for working with controversial trainer Michele Ferrari. Ferrari claimed that he was introduced to Lance by Eddy Merckx in 1995. Greg LeMond described himself as \"devastated\" on hearing of them working together, while Tour de France organizer Jean-Marie Leblanc said, \"I am not happy the two names are mixed.\" Following Ferrari's later-overturned conviction for \"sporting fraud\" and \"abuse of the medical profession\", Armstrong claimed he suspended his professional relationship with him, saying that he had \"zero tolerance for anyone convicted of using or facilitating the use of performance-enhancing drugs\" and denying that Ferrari had ever \"suggested, prescribed or provided me with any performance-enhancing drugs.\"\n\nThough Ferrari was banned from practicing medicine with cyclists by the Italian Cycling Federation, according to Italian law enforcement authorities, Armstrong met with Ferrari as recently as 2010 in a country outside Italy. According to Cycling News, \"USADA reveals an intimate role played by Dr. Michele Ferrari in masterminding Armstrong's Tour de France success\". According to the USADA report, Armstrong paid Ferrari over a million dollars in payments from 1996 to 2006, countering Armstrong's claim that he severed his professional relationship with Ferrari in 2004. The report also includes numerous eyewitness accounts of Ferrari injecting Armstrong with EPO on a number of occasions. \n\nL.A. Confidentiel: 2004\n\nIn 2004, reporters Pierre Ballester and David Walsh published a book alleging Armstrong had used performance-enhancing drugs (L.A. Confidentiel – Les secrets de Lance Armstrong). Another figure in the book, Steve Swart, claims he and other riders, including Armstrong, began using drugs in 1995 while members of the Motorola team, a claim denied by other team members.\n\nAmong the allegations in the book were claims by Armstrong's former soigneur Emma O'Reilly that a backdated prescription for cortisone had been produced in 1999 to avoid a positive test. A 1999 urine sample at the Tour de France showed traces of corticosteroid. A medical certificate showed he used an approved cream for saddle sores which contained the substance. O'Reilly said she heard team officials worrying about Armstrong's positive test for steroids during the Tour. She said: \"They were in a panic, saying: 'What are we going to do? What are we going to do?'\"\n\nAccording to O'Reilly, the solution was to get one of their compliant doctors to issue a pre-dated prescription for a steroid-based ointment to combat saddle sores. He said she would have known if Armstrong had saddle sores as she would have administered any treatment for it. O'Reilly said that Armstrong told her: \"Now, Emma, you know enough to bring me down.\" O'Reilly said on other occasions she was asked to dispose of used syringes for Armstrong and pick up strange parcels for the team.\n\nAllegations in the book were reprinted in The Sunday Times (UK) by deputy sports editor Alan English in June 2004. Armstrong sued for libel, and the paper settled out of court after a High Court judge in a pre-trial ruling stated that the article \"meant accusation of guilt and not simply reasonable grounds to suspect.\" The newspaper's lawyers issued the statement: \"The Sunday Times has confirmed to Mr. Armstrong that it never intended to accuse him of being guilty of taking any performance-enhancing drugs and sincerely apologized for any such impression.\" The same authors (Pierre Ballester and David Walsh) subsequently published L.A. Official and Le Sale Tour (The Dirty Trick), further pressing their claims that Armstrong used performance-enhancing drugs throughout his career. \n\nOn March 31, 2005, Mike Anderson filed a brief in Travis County District Court in Texas, as part of a legal battle following his termination in November 2004 as an employee of Armstrong. Anderson worked for Armstrong for two years as a personal assistant. In the brief, Anderson claimed that he discovered a box of androstenone while cleaning a bathroom in Armstrong's apartment in Girona, Spain. Androstenone is not on the list of banned drugs. Anderson stated in a subsequent deposition that he had no direct knowledge of Armstrong using a banned substance. Armstrong denied the claim and issued a counter-suit. The two men reached an out-of-court settlement in November 2005; the terms of the agreement were not disclosed.\n\nIn November 2012, Times Newspapers republished all of Walsh's articles as well as the original \"LA Confidential\" article by Alan English in Lanced: The shaming of Lance Armstrong. The Times is said to be considering taking action to recoup money from Armstrong in relation to the settlement and court costs. \n\nIn December 2012 The Sunday Times filed suit against Armstrong for $1.5 million. In its suit, the paper is seeking a return of the original settlement, plus interest and the cost of defending the original case. \n\nIn August 2013, Armstrong and The Sunday Times reached an undisclosed settlement. \n\nTour de France urine tests: 2005\n\nOn August 23, 2005, L'Équipe, a major French daily sports newspaper, reported on its front page under the headline \"le mensonge Armstrong\" (\"The Armstrong Lie\") that 6 urine samples taken from the cyclist during the prologue and five stages of the 1999 Tour de France, frozen and stored since at \"Laboratoire national de dépistage du dopage de Châtenay-Malabry\" (LNDD), had tested positive for erythropoietin (EPO) in recent retesting conducted as part of a research project into EPO testing methods.\n\nArmstrong immediately replied on his website, saying, \"Unfortunately, the witch hunt continues and tomorrow's article is nothing short of tabloid journalism. The paper even admits in its own article that the science in question here is faulty and that I have no way to defend myself. They state: 'There will therefore be no counter-exam nor regulatory prosecutions, in a strict sense, since defendant's rights cannot be respected.' I will simply restate what I have said many times: I have never taken performance enhancing drugs.\"\n\nIn October 2005, in response to calls from the International Olympic Committee and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) for an independent investigation, the UCI appointed Dutch lawyer Emile Vrijman to investigate the handling of urine tests by the French national anti-doping laboratory, LNDD. Vrijman was head of the Dutch anti-doping agency for ten years; since then he has worked as a defense attorney defending high-profile athletes against doping charges. Vrijman's report cleared Armstrong because of improper handling and testing. The report said tests on urine samples were conducted improperly and fell so short of scientific standards that it was \"completely irresponsible\" to suggest they \"constitute evidence of anything.\"\n\nThe recommendation of the commission's report was no disciplinary action against any rider on the basis of LNDD research. It also called upon the WADA and LNDD to submit themselves to an investigation by an outside independent authority. The IOC Ethics Commission subsequently censured Dick Pound, the President of WADA and a member of the IOC, for his statements in the media that suggested wrongdoing by Armstrong. In April 2009, Michael Ashenden said \"the LNDD absolutely had no way of knowing athlete identity from the sample they're given. They have a number on them, but that's never linked to an athlete's name. The only group that had both the number and the athlete's name is the federation, in this case it was the UCI.\" He added \"There was only two conceivable ways that synthetic EPO could've gotten into those samples. One, is that Lance Armstrong used EPO during the '99 Tour. The other way it could've got in the urine was if, as Lance Armstrong seems to believe, the laboratory spiked those samples. Now, that's an extraordinary claim, and there's never ever been any evidence the laboratory has ever spiked an athlete's sample, even during the Cold War, where you would've thought there was a real political motive to frame an athlete from a different country. There's never been any suggestion that it happened.\"\n\nAshenden's statements are at odds with the findings of the Vrijman report. \"According to Mr. Ressiot, the manner in which the LNDD had structured the results table of its report – i.e. listing the sequence of each of the batches, as well as the exact number of urine samples per batch, in the same (chronological) order as the stages of the 1999 Tour de France they were collected at – was already sufficient to allow him to determine the exact stage these urine samples referred to and subsequently the identity of the riders who were tested at that stage.\" The Vrijman report also says \"Le Monde of July 21 and 23, 1999 reveal that the press knew the contents of original doping forms of the 1999 Tour de France\".\n\nSCA Promotions case: 2005-2015\n\nIn June 2006, French newspaper Le Monde reported claims by Betsy and Frankie Andreu during a deposition that Armstrong had admitted using performance-enhancing drugs to his physician just after brain surgery in 1996. The Andreus' testimony was related to litigation between Armstrong and SCA Promotions, a Texas company attempting to withhold a $5-million bonus; this was settled out of court with SCA paying Armstrong and Tailwind Sports $7.5 million, to cover the $5-million bonus plus interest and lawyers' fees. The testimony stated \"And so the doctor asked him a few questions, not many, and then one of the questions he asked was ... have you ever used any performance-enhancing drugs? And Lance said yes. And the doctor asked, what were they? And Lance said, growth hormone, cortisone, EPO, steroids and testosterone.\"\n\nArmstrong suggested Betsy Andreu may have been confused by possible mention of his post-operative treatment which included steroids and EPO that are taken to counteract wasting and red-blood-cell-destroying effects of intensive chemotherapy. The Andreus' allegation was not supported by any of the eight other people present, including Armstrong's doctor Craig Nichols, or his medical history. According to Greg LeMond (who has been embroiled with his own disputes with Armstrong), he (LeMond) had a recorded conversation, the transcript of which was reviewed by National Public Radio (NPR), with Stephanie McIlvain (Armstrong's contact at Oakley Inc.) in which she said of Armstrong's alleged admission 'You know, I was in that room. I heard it.' However, McIlvain has contradicted LeMond allegations on the issue and denied under oath that the incident in question ever occurred in her sworn testimony.\n\nIn July 2006, the Los Angeles Times published a story on the allegations raised in the SCA case. The report cited evidence at the trial including the results of the LNDD test and an analysis of these results by an expert witness. From the Los Angeles Times article: \"The results, Australian researcher Michael Ashenden testified in Dallas, show Armstrong's levels rising and falling, consistent with a series of injections during the Tour. Ashenden, a paid expert retained by SCA Promotions, told arbitrators the results painted a \"compelling picture\" that the world's most famous cyclist \"used EPO in the '99 Tour.\"\n\nAshenden's finding were disputed by the Vrijman report, which pointed to procedural and privacy issues in dismissing the LNDD test results. The Los Angeles Times article also provided information on testimony given by Armstrong's former teammate, Swart, Andreu and his wife Betsy, and instant messaging conversation between Andreu and Jonathan Vaughters regarding blood-doping in the peloton. Vaughters signed a statement disavowing the comments and stating he had: \"no personal knowledge that any team in the Tour de France, including Armstrong's Discovery team in 2005, engaged in any prohibited conduct whatsoever.\" Andreu signed a statement affirming the conversation took place as indicated on the instant messaging logs submitted to the court.\n\nThe SCA trial was settled out of court, and the Los Angeles Times reported: \"Though no verdict or finding of facts was rendered, Armstrong called the outcome proof that the doping allegations were baseless.\" The Los Angeles Times article provides a review of the disputed positive EPO test, allegations and sworn testimony against Armstrong, but notes that: \"They are filled with conflicting testimony, hearsay and circumstantial evidence admissible in arbitration hearings but questionable in more formal legal proceedings.\"\n\nIn October 2012, following the publication of the USADA reasoned decision, SCA Promotions announced its intention to recoup the monies paid to Armstrong totaling in excess of $7 million. Armstrong's legal representative Tim Herman stated in June: \"When SCA decided to settle the case, it settled the entire matter forever. No backs. No re-dos. No do-overs. SCA knowingly and independently waived any right to make further claims to any of the money it paid.\" SCA's Jeff Dorough stated that on October 30, 2012, Armstrong was sent a formal request for the return of $12m in bonuses. It is alleged that Armstrong's legal team has offered a settlement of $1 million. \n\nOn 4 February 2015 the arbitration panel decided 2-1 in SCA's favor and ordered Armstrong and Tailwind Sports Corp to pay SCA $10 million. The panel's decision was referred to the Texas 116th Civil District Court in Dallas on 16 February 2015 for confirmation. Panel members Richard Faulkner and Richard Chernick sided with SCA; Ted Lyon sided with Armstrong. Armstrong's attorney Tim Herman stated that the panel's ruling was contrary to Texas law and expected that the court would overturn it. The panel's decision said, in part, about Armstrong that, \"Perjury must never be profitable\" and \"it is almost certainly the most devious sustained deception ever perpetrated in world sporting history.\" \n\nOn September 27, 2015, Armstrong and SCA agreed to a settlement. Armstrong issued a formal, public apology and agreed to pay SCA an undisclosed sum. \n\nFederal investigation: 2010–2012\n\nIn a series of emails in May 2010, Floyd Landis admitted to doping and accused Armstrong and others of the same. Based on Landis's allegations, U.S. Justice Department federal prosecutors led an investigation into possible crimes conducted by Armstrong and the U.S.Postal Service Cycling Team. The Food and Drug Administration and federal agent Jeff Novitzky were also involved in the investigation. In June 2010, Armstrong hired a criminal defense attorney to represent him in the investigation. The hiring was first reported in July when Armstrong was competing in the 2010 Tour de France. \n\nOn February 3, 2012, federal prosecutors officially dropped their criminal investigation with no charges. The closing of the case was announced \"without an explanation\" by U.S. Attorney André Birotte, Jr. When Novitzky was asked to comment on it, he declined. \n\nIn February 2013, a month after Armstrong admitted to doping, rather than filing criminal charges, the Justice Department joined Landis's whistle-blower lawsuit against him, to recover government funding given to Armstrong's cycling team. \n\nUSADA investigation: 2011–2012\n\nIn June 2012, the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) accused Armstrong of doping and trafficking of drugs, based on blood samples from 2009 and 2010, and testimonies from witnesses including former teammates. Further, he was accused of putting pressure on teammates to take unauthorized performance-enhancing drugs as well. In October, USADA formally charged him with running a massive doping ring. It also sought to ban him from participating in sports sanctioned by WADA for life. Armstrong chose not to appeal the ban, saying it would not be worth the toll on his family.\n\nAfter years of public denials, Armstrong reversed course and admitted doping in an interview with Oprah Winfrey in January 2013. While admitting in the interview to the things he did, he also said it was \"absolutely not\" true that he was doping in 2009–10, and that the last time he \"crossed the line\" was in 2005. \n\nIn September 2013, he was asked by UCI's new president, Brian Cookson, to testify completely about his doping. Armstrong refused to testify until and unless he got a complete amnesty, which Cookson said is most unlikely to happen. \n\nAfter USADA's report, all of Armstrong's sponsors dropped him. He reportedly lost $75 million in a day. On May 28, 2013, Nike announced that it would be cutting all ties to Livestrong. \n\nWhistleblower lawsuit: 2010–present\n\nIn 2010, one of Armstrong's former teammates, the American Floyd Landis, whose 2006 Tour De France victory was nullified after a positive doping test, sent a series of emails to cycling officials and sponsors admitting to, and detailing, his systematic use of performance-enhancing drugs during his career. The emails also claimed that other riders and cycling officials participated in doping, including Armstrong. \n\nLandis filed a federal whistle-blower lawsuit against Armstrong under the federal False Claims Act. The False Claims Act allows citizens to sue on behalf of the government alleging the government has been defrauded. The existence of the lawsuit, initially filed under seal, was first revealed by The Wall Street Journal in 2010. In the lawsuit, Landis alleged that Armstrong and team managers defrauded the U.S. government when they accepted money from the U.S. Postal Service. In January 2013, Justice Department officials recommended joining the federal lawsuit aimed at clawing back money from Armstrong. \n\nIn February, the United States Department of Justice joined the whistleblower lawsuit, which also accuses former Postal Service team director Johan Bruyneel and Tailwind Sports, the firm that managed the Postal Service team, of defrauding the U.S. \n\nIn April 2014, documents from the AIC case were filed by lawyers representing Floyd Landis in relation to the whistleblower suit. In these documents, Armstrong stated under oath that Pepi Marti, Dr Pedro Celaya, Dr Luis Garcia del Moral and Dr Michele Ferrari had all provided him with doping products in the period up until 2005. He also named people who had transported or acted as couriers, as well as people that were aware of his doping practices. One week later, the USADA banned Johan Bruyneel from cycling for 10 years and Pedro Celaya and Jose \"Pepi\" Marti for eight years. \n\nIn June 2014, US district judge Robert Wilkins denied Armstrong's request to dismiss the government lawsuit stating \"The court denies without prejudice the defendants' motion to dismiss the government's action as time-barred.\" \n\nOther lawsuits: 2010 to present\n\nIn November 2013, Armstrong settled a lawsuit with Acceptance Insurance Company (AIC). AIC had sought to recover $3 million it had paid Armstrong as bonuses for winning the Tour de France from 1999 to 2001. The suit was settled for an undisclosed sum one day before Armstrong was scheduled to give a deposition under oath. \n\nPersonal life\n\nArmstrong owns homes in Austin, Texas, and Aspen, Colorado, as well as a ranch in the Texas Hill Country. He also has become a popular Twitter user, with almost 4 million followers as of January 2013. \n\nRelationships and children\n\nArmstrong met Kristin Richard in June 1997. They married on May 1, 1998, and had three children. The pregnancy was possible through sperm Armstrong banked three years earlier, before chemotherapy and surgery. The couple divorced in 2003. At Armstrong's request, his children flew to Paris for the Tour de France podium ceremony in 2005, where his son Luke helped his father hoist the trophy, while his daughters (in yellow dresses) held the stuffed lion mascot and bouquet of yellow flowers. \n\nLance and Kristin Armstrong announced their divorce in 2003, the same year that Lance began dating singer-songwriter Sheryl Crow. The couple announced their engagement in September 2005 and their split in February 2006. In March 2007, Armstrong began dating designer Tory Burch. They announced their breakup in October 2007. \n\nIn July 2008, Armstrong began dating Anna Hansen after meeting through Armstrong's charity work. In December 2008, Armstrong announced that Hansen was pregnant with the couple's first child. Although it was believed that Armstrong could no longer father children, due to having undergone chemotherapy for testicular cancer, this child was conceived naturally. Armstrong announced the birth of his fourth child via Twitter, just as he would do for his fifth child.\n\nPolitics\n\nIn a The New York Times article, teammate George Hincapie hinted that Armstrong would run for Governor of Texas after cycling. In the July 2005 issue of Outside magazine, Armstrong hinted at running for governor, although \"not in '06\". Armstrong and former president George W. Bush, a Republican and fellow Texan, call themselves friends. Bush called Armstrong in France to congratulate him after his 2005 victory in August 2005, The Times reported the President had invited Armstrong to his Prairie Chapel Ranch to go mountain biking. In a 2003 interview with The Observer, Armstrong said: \"He's a personal friend, but we've all got the right not to agree with our friends.\"\n\nIn August 2005, Armstrong hinted he had changed his mind about politics. In an interview with Charlie Rose on PBS on August 1, 2005, Armstrong pointed out that running for governor would require the commitment that led him to retire from cycling. Also, in August 2005, Armstrong said that he was no longer considering politics:\n\nArmstrong created a YouTube video in 2007 with former President George H. W. Bush to successfully pass Proposition 15, a US$3 billion taxpayer bond initiative which created the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas.Livestrong Foundation Press Release: \n\nArmstrong was co-chair of a California campaign committee to pass the California Cancer Research Act, a ballot measure defeated by California voters on June 5, 2012. Had it passed, the measure was projected to generate over $500 million annually for cancer research, smoking-cessation programs and tobacco law-enforcement by levying a $1-per-pack tax on tobacco products in California.\n\nOutside cycling\n\nIn 1997, Armstrong founded the Lance Armstrong Foundation, which supports people affected by cancer. The foundation raises awareness of cancer and has raised more than $325 million from the sale of yellow Livestrong bracelets. During his first retirement beginning after the 2005 season, he also maintained other interests. He was the pace car driver of the Chevrolet Corvette Z06 for the 2006 Indianapolis 500. In 2007, Armstrong with Andre Agassi, Muhammad Ali, Warrick Dunn, Jeff Gordon, Mia Hamm, Tony Hawk, Andrea Jaeger, Jackie Joyner-Kersee, Mario Lemieux, Alonzo Mourning, and Cal Ripken, Jr. founded Athletes for Hope, a charity that helps professional athletes become involved in charitable causes and aims to inspire non-athletes to volunteer and support the community.\n\nIn August 2009, Armstrong headlined the inaugural charity ride \"Pelotonia\" in Columbus, Ohio, riding over 100 miles on Saturday with the large group of cyclists. He addressed the riders the Friday evening before the two-day ride and helped the ride raise millions for cancer research. Armstrong ran the 2006 New York City Marathon with two friends. He assembled a pace team of Alberto Salazar, Joan Benoit Samuelson, and Hicham El Guerrouj to help him reach 3 hours. He finished in 2h 59m 36s, in 856th place. He said the race was extremely difficult compared to the Tour de France. The NYC Marathon had a dedicated camera on Armstrong throughout the event which, according to Armstrong, pushed him to continue through points in which he would have normally \"stopped and stretched\". He also helped raise $600,000 for his LiveStrong campaign during the run. Armstrong ran the 2007 NYC Marathon in 2h 46m 43s, finishing 232nd. On April 21, 2008, he ran the Boston Marathon in 2h 50m 58s, finishing in the top 500.\n\nArmstrong made a return to triathlon in 2011 by competing in the off-road XTERRA Triathlon race series. He took 4th at the XTERRA USA Nationals in Ogden, Utah and then competed in the XTERRA World Championships in Maui. At the Championships Armstrong led for a time before crashing out on the bike and finishing in 23rd place. The following year, in 2012, Armstrong began pursuing qualification into the 2012 Ironman World Championship. He made his return to long distance triathlon in the inaugural Ironman 70.3 Panama race, on February 12, 2012. He finished with a time of 3:50:55, second overall to Bevan Docherty. He also entered half-Ironman distance races in Texas (7th) and St. Croix (3rd) before breaking through with victories at Ironman 70.3 Florida and Ironman 70.3 Hawaii. He was scheduled to next participate in Ironman France on June 24. However, the June suspension by USADA and eventual ban by WADA prohibited Armstrong from further racing Ironman branded events to due World Triathlon Corporation anti-doping policies. \n\nIn July 2011 and July 2013, Armstrong participated in the non-competitive Register's Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa. \n\nBusiness and investments\n\nArmstrong owns a coffee shop in downtown Austin, Texas called \"Juan Pelota Cafe\". The name is a joking reference to his testicular cancer, with the name \"Juan\" being considered by some a homophone for \"one\" and \"Pelota\" being the Spanish word for \"ball\". Out of the same building, Armstrong owns and operates a bike shop named \"Mellow Johnny's\", after another nickname of his derived from the Tour term \"maillot jaune\", which is French for \"yellow jersey\".\n\nIn 2001, Armstrong provided funding to launch Wonders & Worries, a non-profit organization in Austin, Texas that provides counseling and support for children who have a parent with a serious or life-threatening disease. \n\nA line of cycling clothing from Nike, 10//2, was named after the date (October 2, 1996) that Armstrong was diagnosed with testicular cancer.\n\nIn 2008 Armstrong bought several million dollars of stock in the American bicycle component manufacturer SRAM Corporation, and has served as their technical advisor. SRAM bought those shares back from him in preparation for a public offering. Armstrong owns a small share of Trek Bicycle Corporation. \n\nPalmarès\n\n;1991\n1st National Junior Road Race Championships\n;1992 \n1st Stage 6 Settimana Bergamasca \n1st Stage 4a Vuelta a Galicia \n1st Stage 2 Trittico Premondiale \n1st First Union Grand Prix \n1st Overall Fitchburg-Longsjo Classic \n:1st Stage 2 \n2nd, Züri-Metzgete\n;1993 \n1st UCI World Road Race Championships\n1st National Road Race Championships\n1st Stage 8 Tour de France \n1st Overall Tour of America \n1st Trofeo Laigueglia\n1st Thrift Drug Classic\n1st Overall Kmart West Virginia Classic \n:1st Prologue\n:1st Stage 1\n2nd Overall Tour du Pont \n:1st Stage 5 \n3rd Overall Tour of Sweden \n:1st Stage 3\n;1994 \n1st Thrift Drug Classic\n1st Stage 7 Tour du Pont \n2nd Liège–Bastogne–Liège\n2nd Clásica de San Sebastián\n;1995\n1st Stage 18 Tour de France \n1st Clásica de San Sebastián\n1st Stage 5 Paris–Nice \n1st Overall Tour du Pont \n:1st Mountains Classifaction\n:1st Stages 4, 5 & 9\n1st Overall Kmart West Virginia Classic \n:1st Stage 4\n;1996 \n1st Overall Tour du Pont \n:1st Stages 2, 3b, 5, 6 & 12\n1st La Flèche Wallonne\n2nd Liège–Bastogne–Liège\n2nd Overall Paris–Nice\n;1998 \n1st Sprint 56K Criterium \n1st Overall Rheinland-Pfalz Rundfahrt \n1st Overall Tour de Luxembourg \n:1st Stage 1\n1st Cascade Cycling Classic\n\n4th Overall Vuelta a España\n4th World Road Race Championship\n\n;1999\n\n1st Overall Tour de France\n:1st Prologue\n:1st Stages 8, 9 & 19\n1st Prologue Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré\n1st Stage 4 Route du Sud\n1st Stage 4 ITT Circuit de la Sarthe\n1st RaboRonde Heerlen\n2nd Amstel Gold Race\n;2000\n\n1st Overall Tour de France\n:1st Stage 19 ITT\n1st GP des Nations\n1st Grand Prix Eddy Merckx\n1st Stage 3 ITT Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré\n3rd Individual Time Trial 2000 Summer Olympics\n;2001\n\n1st Overall Tour de France\n:1st Stages 10, 11, 13 & 18\n1st Overall Tour de Suisse\n:1st Stages 1 & 8\n2nd Amstel Gold Race\n;2002\n\n1st Overall Tour de France\n:1st Prologue\n:1st Stages 11, 12 & 19\n1st Overall Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré\n:1st Stage 6\n1st Overall GP du Midi Libre\n1st Profronde van Stiphout\n;2003\n\n1st Overall Tour de France\n:1st Stages 4 TTT & 15\n1st Overall Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré\n: 1st Stage 3 ITT\n;2004\n\n1st Overall Tour de France\n:1st Stages 4 TTT, 13, 15, 16 ITT, 17 & 19 ITT\n1st Overall Tour de Georgia\n:1st Stages 3 & 4\n1st Stage 5 Tour du Languedoc-Roussillon\n1st Stage 4 ITT Volta ao Algarve\n1st Profronde van Stiphout\n;2005\n\n1st Overall Tour de France\n:1st Stages 4 TTT & 20 ITT\n1st Points Classification Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré\n;2008\n\n2nd Leadville Trail 100 Mountain Bike Race\n1st 12 Hours of Snowmass\n1st Individual Time Trial Tour de Gruene\n1st TTT Tour de Gruene\n;2009\n\n1st Nevada City Classic\n1st Colorado Pro Cross-Country Championships\n1st Leadville Trail 100 Mountain Bike Race\n2nd Overall Tour of the Gila\n3rd Overall Tour de France\n:1st Stage 4 TTT\n12th Overall Giro d'Italia\n;2010\n\n2nd Overall Tour de Suisse\n3rd Overall Tour de Luxembourg\n7th Overall Vuelta a Murcia\n23rd Overall Tour de France\n\n;Triathlon & Ironman\n;2011\n5th XTERRA USA Championships\n;2012\n1st Ironman 70.3 Hawaii\n1st Ironman 70.3 Florida\n3rd Ironman 70.3 St. Croix\n7th Ironman 70.3 Texas\n2nd Ironman 70.3 Panama\n2nd Power of Four Mountain Bike Race\n\nGrand races overall results timeline\n\nWithdrew = WD; Voided results struck through.\n\nFilmography\n\n* Road to Paris (2001), documentary\n* DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story (2004), cameo appearance\n* You, Me and Dupree (2006), cameo appearance\n* The Armstrong Lie (2013), documentary\n* Stop at Nothing-The Lance Armstrong Story (2014), documentary\n* The Program (2015), biographical drama film\n\nAccolades\n\n* United States Olympic Committee (USOC) SportsMan of the Year (1999, 2001, 2002, 2003)\n* Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year (2002, 2003, 2004, 2005)\n* World's Most Outstanding Athlete Award, Jesse Owens International Trophy (2000)\n* Reuters Sportsman of the Year (2003)\n* Prince of Asturias Award in Sports (2000)\n* Sports Ethics Fellows by the Institute for International Sport (2003)\n* Vélo d'Or Award by Velo magazine in France (1999, 2000, 2001, 2003, 2004)\n* Mendrisio d'Or Award in Switzerland (1999)\n* Premio Coppi-Bici d'Oro Trophy by the Fausto Coppi foundation in conjunction with La Gazzetta dello Sport (1999, 2000)\n* Marca Legend Award by Marca, a Spanish sports daily in Madrid (2004)\n* ESPY Award for Best Male Athlete (2003, 2004, 2005, 2006)\n* ESPY Award for GMC Professional Grade Play Award (2005)\n* ESPY Award for Best Comeback Athlete (2000)\n* ESPN/Intersport's ARETE Award for Courage in Sport (Professional Division) (1999)\n* ABC's Wide World of Sports Athlete of the Year (1999)\n* Favorite Athlete award at Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards (2006)\n* Presidential Delegation to the XIX Olympic Winter Games (2002)\n* Sports Illustrated magazine's Sportsman of the Year (2002)\n* VeloNews magazine's International Cyclist of the Year (2000, 2001, 2003, 2004)\n* VeloNews magazine's North American Male Cyclist of the Year (1993, 1995, 1996, 1998, 1999, 2002, 2005)\n* William Hill Sports Book of the Year: It's Not About the Bike: My Journey Back to Life (2000)\n* Triathlon magazine's Rookie of the Year (1988)\n* Pace car driver for the Indianapolis 500 (2006)\n* An asteroid, 1994 JE9 was named 12373 Lancearmstrong in honor of him. \n* Six-mile Lance Armstrong Bikeway through downtown Austin, Texas, built by the city of Austin at a cost of $3.2 million. \n* Mildred \"Babe\" Didrikson Zaharias Courage Award presented by the United States Sports Academy (1999)\n* Samuel S. Beard Award for Greatest Public Service by an Individual 35 Years or Under, an award given out annually by Jefferson Awards (2001) \n\nRescinded awards\n* BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year Award (2003) \n* Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters, Tufts University (2006) \n* Key to the city of Adelaide, South Australia (2012) \n* Laureus World Sports Award for Sportsman of the Year Winner (2003)\n* Laureus World Sports Award for Comeback of the Year Winner (2000)\n* Laureus World Sports Award for Sportsman of the Year Nominated (2002, 2004, 2005, 2006)\n* Laureus World Sports Award for Comeback of the Year Nominated (2010)\n* Grand Prix Serge-Kampf de l'Académie des sports (France, 2004)\n* Légion d'honneur (France, 2005)", "The Tour de France is an annual multiple stage bicycle race primarily held in France, while also occasionally making passes through nearby countries. The race was first organized in 1903 to increase paper sales for the magazine L'Auto; it is currently run by the Amaury Sport Organisation. The race has been held annually since its first edition in 1903 except when it was stopped for the two World Wars. As the Tour gained prominence and popularity the race was lengthened and its reach began to extend around the globe. Participation expanded from a primarily French field, as riders from all over the world began to participate in the race each year. The Tour is a UCI World Tour event, which means that the teams that compete in the race are mostly UCI WorldTeams, with the exception of the teams that the organizers invite. \n\nThe Tour de France, the Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a España make up cycling's prestigious, three-week-long Grand Tours; the Tour is the oldest and generally considered the most prestigious of the three. Traditionally, the race is held primarily in the month of July. While the route changes each year, the format of the race stays the same with the appearance of time trials, the passage through the mountain chains of the Pyrenees and the Alps, and the finish on the Champs-Élysées in Paris. The modern editions of the Tour de France consist of 21 day-long segments (stages) over a 23-day period and cover around 3500 km. The race alternates between clockwise and counterclockwise circuits of France.\n\nThe number of teams usually varies between 20 and 22, with nine riders in each. All of the stages are timed to the finish; the riders' times are compounded with their previous stage times. The rider with the lowest aggregate time is the leader of the race and gets to don the coveted yellow jersey. While the general classification garners the most attention there are other contests held within the Tour: the points classification for the sprinters, the mountains classification for the climbers, young rider classification for riders under the age of 26, and the team classification for the fastest teams. Gaining a stage win is also a hotly contested competition, fought for by a specialist cycling sprinter on each team.\n\nHistory\n\nOrigins\n\nThe Tour de France was created in 1903. The roots of the Tour de France trace to the emergence of two rival sports newspapers in the country. On the one hand was Le Vélo, the first and the largest daily sports newspaper in France which sold 80,000 copies a day. On the other was L'Auto, which had been set-up by journalists and business-people including Comte Jules-Albert de Dion, Adolphe Clément and Édouard Michelin in 1899. The rival paper emerged following disagreements over the Dreyfus Affair, a cause célèbre (in which de Dion was implicated) that divided France at the end of the 19th century over the innocence of Alfred Dreyfus, a French army officer convicted—though later exonerated—of selling military secrets to the Germans. De Dion, Clément and Michelin were particularly concerned with Le Vélo—which reported more than cycling—because its financial backer was one of their commercial rivals, the Darracq company. De Dion believed Le Vélo gave Darracq too much attention and him too little. De Dion was a gentlemanly but outspoken man who already wrote columns for Le Figaro, Le Matin and others. He was also rich and could afford to indulge his whims, which included founding Le Nain Jaune (the yellow gnome), a publication that \"...answers no particular need.\" The new newspaper appointed Henri Desgrange as the editor. He was a prominent cyclist and owner with Victor Goddet of the velodrome at the Parc des Princes. De Dion knew him through his cycling reputation, through the books and cycling articles that he had written, and through press articles he had written for the Clément tyre company.\n\nL'Auto was not the success its backers wanted. Stagnating sales lower than the rival it was intended to surpass led to a crisis meeting on 20 November 1902 on the middle floor of L'Autos office at 10 Rue du Faubourg Montmartre, Paris. The last to speak was the most junior there, the chief cycling journalist, a 26-year-old named Géo Lefèvre. Desgrange had poached him from Giffard's paper. Lefèvre suggested a six-day race of the sort popular on the track but all around France. Long-distance cycle races were a popular means to sell more newspapers, but nothing of the length that Lefèvre suggested had been attempted.Desgrange had first attempted to copy and outdo races run by his rival. In 1901 he revived the Paris-Brest event after a decade's absence. Giffard was the first to suggest a race that lasted several days, new to cycling but established practice in car racing. Unlike other cycle races, it would also be run largely without pacers. If it succeeded, it would help L'Auto match its rival and perhaps put it out of business. It could, as Desgrange said, \"nail Giffard's beak shut.\" \nDesgrange and Lefèvre discussed it after lunch. Desgrange was doubtful but the paper's financial director, Victor Goddet, was enthusiastic. He handed Desgrange the keys to the company safe and said: \"Take whatever you need.\" L'Auto announced the race on 19 January 1903.\n\nThe first Tour de France\n\nThe first Tour de France was staged in 1903. The plan was a five-stage race from 31 May to 5 July, starting in Paris and stopping in Lyon, Marseille, Bordeaux and Nantes before returning to Paris. Toulouse was added later to break the long haul across southern France from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic. Stages would go through the night and finish next afternoon, with rest days before riders set off again. But this proved too daunting and the costs too great for most and only 15 competitors had entered. Desgrange had never been wholly convinced and he came close to dropping the idea. Instead, he cut the length to 19 days, changed the dates to 1 to 19 July, and offered a daily allowance to those who averaged at least 20 km/h on all the stages, equivalent to what a rider would have expected to earn each day had he worked in a factory. He also cut the entry fee from 20 to 10 francs and set the first prize at 12,000 francs and the prize for each day's winner at 3,000 francs. The winner would thereby win six times what most workers earned in a year. That attracted between 60 and 80 entrants – the higher number may have included serious inquiries and some who dropped out – among them not just professionals but amateurs, some unemployed, some simply adventurous.\n\nDesgrange seems not to have forgotten the Dreyfus Affair that launched his race and raised the passions of his backers. He announced his new race on 1 July 1903 by citing the writer Émile Zola, whose open letter in which every paragraph started\" J'accuse ...\" led to Dreyfus's acquittal, establishing the florid style he used henceforth.\n\nThe first Tour de France started almost outside the Café Reveil-Matin at the junction of the Melun and Corbeil roads in the village of Montgeron. It was waved away by the starter, Georges Abran, at 3:16 p.m. on 1 July 1903. L'Auto hadn't featured the race on its front page that morning.L'Auto preferred to concentrate on the Coupe Gordon-Bennett car race, even though it wasn't to start for another 48 hours. The choice reflects not only that the Tour de France was an unknown quantity – only after the first race had finished did it establish a reputation – but it hints at Desgrange's uncertainty. His position as editor depended on raising sales. That would happen if the Tour succeeded. But the paper and his employers would lose a lot of money if it didn't. Desgrange preferred to keep a distance. He didn't drop the flag at the start and he didn't follow the riders. Reporting was left to Lefèvre, whose idea it had been, who followed the race by bike and by train. Desgrange showed a personal interest in his race only when it looked a success.\n\nAmong the competitors were the eventual winner, Maurice Garin, his well-built rival Hippolyte Aucouturier, the German favourite Josef Fischer, and a collection of adventurers including one competing as \"Samson\".The use of false and often colourful names was not unusual. It reflected not only the daring of the enterprise but the slight scandal still associated with riding bicycle races, enough that some preferred to use a false name. The first city-to-city race, from Paris to Rouen, included many made-up names or simply initials. The first woman to finish had entered as \"Miss America\", despite not being American.\n\nMany riders dropped out of the race after completing the initial stages as the physical effort the tour required was just too much. Only a mere 24 entrants remained at the end of the fourth stage. The race finished on the edge of Paris at Ville d'Avray, outside the Restaurant du Père Auto, before a ceremonial ride into Paris and several laps of the Parc des Princes. Garin dominated the race, winning the first and last two stages, at 25.68 km/h. The last rider, Millocheau, finished 64h 47m 22s behind him.\n\nL'Auto's mission was accomplished as throughout the race circulation of the publication doubled, making the race something much larger than Desgrange had ever hoped for.\n\n1904–1939\n\nSuch was the passion that the first Tour created in spectators and riders that Desgrange said the 1904 Tour de France would be the last. Cheating was rife and riders were beaten up by rival fans as they neared the top of the col de la République, sometimes called the col du Grand Bois, outside St-Étienne. The leading riders, including the winner Maurice Garin, were disqualified, though it took the Union Vélocipèdique de France until 30 November to make the decision. McGann says the UVF waited so long \"...well aware of the passions aroused by the race.\" Desgrange's opinion of the fighting and cheating showed in the headline of his reaction in L'Auto: THE END. Desgrange's despair did not last. By the following spring he was planning another Tour, longer at 11 stages rather than 6 - and this time all in daylight to make any cheating more obvious. Stages in 1905 began between 3 am and 7:30 am. The race captured the imagination. L'Auto's circulation rose from 25,000 to 65,000; by 1908 it was a quarter of a million. The Tour returned after its suspension during World War One and continued to grow, with circulation of L'Auto reaching 500,000 by 1923. The record claimed by Desgrange was 854,000 during the 1933 Tour. Le Vélo, meanwhile, went out of business in 1904.\n\nDesgrange and his Tour invented bicycle stage racing. Desgrange experimented with different ways of judging the winner. Initially he used total accumulated time (as used in the modern Tour de France) but from 1906 to 1912 by points for placings each day.The formula in 1905 was a combination of both time and points. Riders had points deducted for each five minutes lost. Desgrange saw problems in judging both by time and by points. By time, a rider coping with a mechanical problem—which the rules insisted he repair alone—could lose so much time that it cost him the race. Equally, riders could finish so separated that time gained or lost on one or two days could decide the whole race. Judging the race by points removed over-influential time differences but discouraged competitors from riding hard. It made no difference whether they finished fast or slow or separated by seconds or hours, so they were inclined to ride together at a relaxed pace until close to the line, only then disputing the final placings that would give them points. \n\nThe format changed over time. The Tour originally ran around the perimeter of France. Cycling was an endurance sport and the organisers realised the sales they would achieve by creating supermen of the competitors. Night riding was dropped after the second Tour in 1904, when there had been persistent cheating when judges could not see riders. That reduced the daily and overall distance but the emphasis remained on endurance. Desgrange said his ideal race would be so hard that only one rider would make it to Paris. The first mountain stages (in the Pyrenees) appeared in 1910. Early tours had long multi-day stages, with the format settling on 15 stages from 1910 until 1924. After this stages were gradually shortened, such that by 1936 there were as many as three stages in a single day. Desgrange initially preferred to see the Tour as a race of individuals. The first Tours were open to whoever wanted to compete. Most riders were in teams that looked after them. The private entrants were called touriste-routiers – tourists of the road – from 1923 and were allowed to take part provided they make no demands on the organisers. Some of the Tour's most colourful characters have been touriste-routiers. One finished each day's race and then performed acrobatic tricks in the street to raise the price of a hotel. Until 1925 Desgrange forbade team members from pacing each other. The 1927 and 1928 Tours, however, consisted mainly of team time-trials, an unsuccessful experiment which sought to avoid a proliferation of sprint finishes on flat stages. Desgrange was a traditionalist with equipment. Until 1930 he demanded that riders mend their bicycles without help and that they use the same bicycle from start to end. Exchanging a damaged bicycle for another was allowed only in 1923. Desgrange stood against the use of multiple gears and for many years insisted riders use wooden rims, fearing the heat of braking while coming down mountains would melt the glue that held the tires on metal rims (they were finally allowed in 1937).\n\nBy the end of the 1920s, Desgrange believed he could not beat what he believed were the underhand tactics of bike factories. When the Alcyon team contrived to get Maurice De Waele to win even though he was sick, he said \"My race has been won by a corpse\". In 1930 Desgrange again attempted to take control of the Tour from teams, insisting competitors enter in national teams rather than trade teams and that competitors ride plain yellow bicycles that he would provide, without a maker's name. There was no place for individuals in the post-1930s teams and so Desgrange created regional teams, generally from France, to take in riders who would not otherwise have qualified. The original touriste-routiers mostly disappeared but some were absorbed into regional teams. In 1936 Desgrange had a prostate operation. At the time, two operations were needed; the Tour de France was due to fall between them. Desgrange persuaded his surgeon to let him follow the race. The second day proved too much and, in a fever at Charleville, he retired to his château at Beauvallon. Desgrange died at home on the Mediterranean coast on 16 August 1940. The race was taken over by his deputy, Jacques Goddet. The Tour was again disrupted by War after 1939, and did not return until 1947.\n\n1947–1969\n\nIn 1944, L'Auto was closed – its doors nailed shut – and its belongings, including the Tour, sequestrated by the state for publishing articles too close to the Germans. Rights to the Tour were therefore owned by the government. Jacques Goddet was allowed to publish another daily sports paper, L'Équipe, but there was a rival candidate to run the Tour: a consortium of Sports and Miroir Sprint. Each organised a candidate race. L'Équipe and Le Parisien Libéré had La Course du Tour de France and Sports and Miroir Sprint had La Ronde de France. Both were five stages, the longest the government would allow because of shortages. L'Équipes race was better organised and appealed more to the public because it featured national teams that had been successful before the war, when French cycling was at a high. L'Équipe was given the right to organise the 1947 Tour de France. However, L'Équipes finances were never sound and Goddet accepted an advance by Émilion Amaury, who had supported his bid to run the post-war Tour. Amaury was a newspaper magnate whose condition was that his sports editor, Félix Lévitan should join Goddet for the Tour. The two worked together, Goddet running the sporting side and Lévitan the financial.\n\nOn the Tour's return, the format of the race settled on between 20-25 stages. Most stages would last one day but the scheduling of 'split' stages continued well in to the 1980s. 1953 saw the introduction of the Green Jersey 'Points' competition. National teams contested the Tour until 1961. The teams were of different sizes. Some nations had more than one team and some were mixed in with others to make up the number. National teams caught the public imagination but had a snag: that riders might normally have been in rival trade teams the rest of the season. The loyalty of riders was sometimes questionable, within and between teams. Sponsors were always unhappy about releasing their riders into anonymity for the biggest race of the year, as riders in national teams wore the colours of their country and a small cloth panel on their chest that named the team for which they normally rode. The situation became critical at the start of the 1960s. Sales of bicycles had fallen and bicycle factories were closing. There was a risk, the trade said, that the industry would die if factories were not allowed the publicity of the Tour de France. The Tour returned to trade teams in 1962, although with further problems. Doping had become a problem culminating in the death of Tom Simpson in 1967, after which riders went on strike, though the organisers suspected sponsors provoked them. The Union Cycliste Internationale introduced limits to daily and overall distances, imposed rest days and tests were introduced for riders. It was then impossible to follow the frontiers, and the Tour increasingly zig-zagged across the country, sometimes with unconnected days' races linked by train, while still maintaining some sort of loop. The Tour returned to national teams for 1967 and 1968 as \"an experiment\". The Tour returned to trade teams in 1969 with a suggestion that national teams could come back every few years. This never happened.\n\n1969–1988\n\nIn the early 1970s the race was dominated by Eddy Merckx, who won the General Classification five times, the Mountains Classification twice, the Points Classification three times and a record 34 stages. \n\nDuring this era race director Felix Lévitan brought in a new commercial era of the Tour, beginning to recruit sponsors, sometimes accepting prizes in kind if he could not get cash. He introduced the finish of the Tour at the Avenue des Champs-Élysées in 1975, the same year the polka-dot jersey (in the colors of a sponsoring chocolate company) was introduced for the winner of the Mountains Classification. He helped drive an internationalization of the Tour de France, and cycling in general. In 1982 Sean Kelly of Ireland (points) and Phil Anderson of Australia (young rider) became the first winners of any Tour classifications from outside cycling's Continental Europe heartlands, while Lévitan was influential in facilitating the participation in the 1983 Tour de France by amateur riders from the Eastern Bloc and Colombia. Greg LeMond of the US became the first non-European winner in the 1986 race.\n\nWhile the global awareness and popularity of the Tour grew during this time, its finances became stretched. Goddet and Lévitan continued to clash over the running of the race. Lévitan launched the Tour of America, as a precursor to his plans to take the Tour de France to the US. The Tour of America lost a lot of money, and it appeared to have been cross-financed by the Tour de France. Lévitan insisted he was innocent, but he was fired from the tour in March 1987. Goddet retired the following year.\n\n1988–present\n\nIn 1988 the Tour was organised by Jean-Pierre Courcol, the director of L'Équipe, then in 1989 by Jean-Pierre Carenso and then by Jean-Marie Leblanc, who in 1989 had been race director. The former television presenter Christian Prudhomme — he commentated on the Tour among other events — replaced Leblanc in 2007, having been assistant director for three years. In 1993 ownership of L'Équipe moved to the Amaury Group, which formed Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO) to oversee its sports operations, although the Tour itself is operated by its subsidiary the Société du Tour de France. ASO employs around 70 people full-time, in an office facing but not connected to L'Équipe in the Issy-les-Moulineaux area of outer western Paris. That number expands to about 220 during the race itself, not including 500 contractors employed to move barriers, erect stages, signpost the route and other work. ASO now also operate several other major bike races throughout the year.\n\nClassifications\n\nThe oldest and main competition in the Tour de France is known as the 'general classification', for which the yellow jersey is awarded: the winner of this is said to have won the race. A few riders from each team aim to win overall but there are three further competitions to draw riders of all specialties: points, mountains, and a classification for young riders with general classification aspirations. The leader of each of the aforementioned classifications wears a distinctive jersey, with riders leading multiple classifications wearing the jersey of the most prestigious that he leads. In addition to these four classifications, there are several minor and discontinued classifications that are competed for during the race.\n\nGeneral classification\n\nThe oldest and most sought after classification in the Tour de France is the general classification. All of the stages are timed to the finish. The riders' times are compounded with their previous stage times; so the rider with the lowest aggregate time is the leader of the race. The leader is determined after each stage's conclusion. The leader of the race also has the privilege to wear the race leader's yellow jersey. The jersey is presented to the leader rider on a podium in the stage's finishing town. If a rider is leading more than one classification that awards a jersey, he wears the \"maillot jaune\", since the general classification is the most important one in the race. The lead can change after each stage. Between 1905 and 1912 inclusive, in response to concerns about rider cheating in the 1904 race, the general classification was awarded according to a point based system based on their placings in each stage, and the rider with the lowest total of points after the Tour's conclusion was the winner.\n\nThe leader in the first Tour de France was awarded a yellow armband. The color yellow was chosen as the magazine that created the Tour, L'Auto, printed its newspapers on yellow paper. The yellow jersey was added to the race in the 1919 edition and it has since become a symbol of the Tour de France. The first rider to wear the yellow jersey was Eugène Christophe. Each team brings multiple yellow jerseys in advance of the Tour in case one of their riders becomes the overall leader of the race. Riders usually try to make the extra effort to keep the jersey for as long as possible in order to get more publicity for the team and the sponsor(s) of the team. Eddy Merckx has worn the yellow jersey for 96 stages, which is more than any other rider in the history of the Tour de France. Four riders have won the general classification five times in their career: Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault, and Miguel Indurain.\n\nMountains classification\n\nThe mountains classification is the second oldest jersey awarding classification in the Tour de France. The mountains classification was added to the Tour de France in the 1933 edition and was first won by Vicente Trueba. Prizes for the classification were first awarded in 1934. During stages of the race containing climbs, points are awarded to the first riders to reach the top of each categorized climb, with points available for up to the first 10 riders, depending on the classification of the climb. Climbs are classified according to the steepness and length of that particular hill, with more points available for harder climbs. The classification was preceded by the meilleur grimpeur () which was awarded by the organising newspaper l'Auto to a cyclist who completed each race.\n\nThe classification awarded no jersey to the leader until the 1975 Tour de France, when the organizers decided to award a distinctive white jersey with red dots to the leader. The climbers' jersey is worn by the rider who, at the start of each stage, has the largest amount of climbing points. If a rider leads two or more of classifications, the climbers' jersey is worn by the rider in second, or third, place in that contest. At the end of the Tour, the rider holding the most climbing points wins the classification. Some riders may race with the aim of winning this particular competition, while others who gain points early on may shift their focus to the classification during the race. The Tour has five categories for ranking the mountains the race covers. The scale ranges from category 4, the easiest, to hors catégorie, the hardest. During his career Richard Virenque won the mountains classification a record seven times.\n\nThe point distribution for the mountains is as follows: \n\n* Points awarded are doubled for finishes that are of category two or above.\n\nPoints classification\n\nThe points classification is the third oldest of the currently awarded jersey classifications. It was introduced in the 1953 Tour de France and was first won by Fritz Schär. The classification was added to draw the participation of the sprinters as well as celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Tour. Points are given to the first 15 riders to finish a stage, with an additional set of points given to the first 15 riders to cross a pre-determined 'sprint' point during the route of each stage. The point classification leader green jersey is worn by the rider who at the start of each stage, has the greatest number of points.\n\nIn the first years, the cyclist received penalty points for not finishing with a high place, so the cyclist with the fewest points was awarded the green jersey. From 1959 on, the system was changed so the cyclists were awarded points for high place finishes (with first place getting the most points, and lower placings getting successively fewer points), so the cyclist with the most points was awarded the green jersey. The amount of points awarded varies depending on the type of stage, with flat stages awarding the most points at the finish and time trials and high mountain stages awarding the least amount of points at the finish. This increases the likelihood of a sprinter winning the points classification, though other riders can be competitive for the classification if they have a sufficient number of high-place finishes.\n\nThe winner of the classification is the rider with the most points at the end of the Tour. In case of a tie, the leader is determined by the number of stage wins, then the number of intermediate sprint victories, and finally, the rider's standing in the general classification. The classification has been won a record six times by Erik Zabel. The most recent winner, Peter Sagan, won it in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016.\n\nThe first year the points classification was used it was sponsored by La Belle Jardinière, a lawn mower producer, and the jersey was made green. In 1968 the jersey was changed to red to please the sponsor. However, the color was changed back the following year. For almost 25 years the classification was sponsored by Pari Mutuel Urbain, a state betting company. However they announced in November 2014 that they would not be continuing their sponsorship, and in March 2015 it was revealed that the green jersey would now be sponsored by Czech car manufacturer Skoda.\n\nAs of 2015, the points awarded stands as: \n\nYoung rider classification\n\nThe leader of the classification is determined the same way as the general classification, with the riders' times being added up after each stage and the eligible rider with lowest aggregate time is dubbed the leader. The Young rider classification is restricted to the riders that are under the age of 26. Originally the classification was restricted neo-professionals - riders that are in their first three years of professional racing - until 1983. In 1983, the organizers made it so that only first time riders were eligible for the classification. In 1987, the organizers changed the rules of the classification to what they are today.\n\nThis classification was added to the Tour de France in the 1975 edition, with Francesco Moser being the first to win the classification after placing seventh overall. The Tour de France awards a white jersey to the leader of the classification, although this was not done between 1989 and 2000. Four riders have won both the young rider classification and the general classification in the same year: Laurent Fignon (1983), Jan Ullrich (1997), Alberto Contador (2007), and Andy Schleck (2010). Two riders have won the young rider classification three times in their respective careers: Jan Ullrich and Andy Schleck.\n\nAs of 2015 Jersey sponsor is Optician company Krys, replacing Skoda who moved to the Green Jersey.\n\nMinor classifications and prizes\n\nThe prix de la combativité goes to the rider who most animates the day, usually by trying to break clear of the field. The most combative rider wears a number printed white-on-red instead of black-on-white next day. An award goes to the most aggressive rider throughout the Tour. Already in 1908 a sort of combativity award was offered, when Sports Populaires and L'Education Physique created Le Prix du Courage, 100 francs and a silver gilt medal for \"the rider having finished the course, even if unplaced, who is particularly distinguished for the energy he has used.\" The modern competition started in 1958. In 1959, a Super Combativity award for the most combative cyclist of the Tour was awarded. It was initially not rewarded every year, but since 1981 it has been given annually. Eddy Mercx has the most wins (4) for the overall award.\n\nThe team classification is assessed by adding the time of each team's best three riders each day. The competition does not have its own jersey but since 2006 the leading team has worn numbers printed black-on-yellow. Until 1990, the leading team would wear yellow caps. As of 2012, the riders of the leading team wear yellow helmets. During the era of national teams, France and Belgium won 10 times each. From 1973 up to 1988, there was also a team classification based on points (stage classification); members of the leading team would wear green caps.\n\nHistorical classifications\n\nThere has been an intermediate sprints classification, which from 1984 awarded a red jersey for points awarded to the first three to pass intermediate points during the stage. These sprints also scored points towards the points classification and bonuses towards the general classification. The intermediate sprints classification with its red jersey was abolished in 1989, but the intermediate sprints have remained, offering points for the points classification and, until 2007, time bonuses for the general classification.\n\nFrom 1968 there was a combination classification, scored on a points system based on standings in the general, points and mountains classifications. The design was originally white, then a patchwork with areas resembling each individual jersey design. This was also abolished in 1989.\n\nLanterne rouge\n\nThe rider who has taken most time is called the lanterne rouge (red lantern, as in the red light at the back of a vehicle so it can be seen in the dark) and in past years sometimes carried a small red light beneath his saddle. Such was sympathy that he could command higher fees in the races that previously followed the Tour. In 1939 and 1948 the organisers excluded the last rider every day, to encourage more competitive racing.Jacques Goddet said in his autobiography that teams were using the rule to eliminate rivals. A rider in last position knew he would be disqualified at the end of the stage. If he dropped out before or during the stage, another competitor became the last and he would leave the race as well. That weakened a rival team, which now had fewer helpers.\n\nPrizes\n\nPrize money has always been awarded. From 20,000 old francs the first year,\nprize money has increased each year, although from 1976 to 1987 the first prize was an apartment offered by a race sponsor. The first prize in 1988 was a car, a studio-apartment, a work of art and 500,000 francs in cash. Prizes only in cash returned in 1990.\n\nPrizes and bonuses are awarded for daily placings and final placings at the end of the race. In 2009, the winner received €450,000, while each of the 21 stage winners won €8,000 (€10,000 for the team time-trial stage). The winners of the points classification and mountains classification each win €25,000, the young rider competition and the combativity prize €20,000, and €50,000 for the winner of the team classification (calculated by adding the cumulative times of the best three riders in each team). \n\nThe Souvenir Henri Desgrange, in memory of the founder of the Tour, is awarded to the first rider over the Col du Galibier where his monument stands, or to the first rider over the highest col in the Tour. A similar award is made at the summit of the Col du Tourmalet, at the memorial to Jacques Goddet, Desgrange's successor.\n\nStages\n\nThe modern tour typically has 21 stages, one per day.\n\nMass-start stages\n\nRiders in most stages start together. The first kilometres, the départ fictif, are a rolling start without racing. The real start, the départ réel is announced by the Tour director waving a white flag. Riders are permitted to touch, but not push or nudge, each other. The first to cross the stage finish line wins the stage. Riders are given a time based on the group that they finish in. All riders in a group finish in the same time as the lead rider. This avoids dangerous mass sprints. It is not unusual for the entire field to finish in a group, taking time to cross the line but being credited with the same time. Since 2005, when riders fall or crash within the final 3 kilometres of a stage with a flat finish, they are awarded the same time as the group they were in. This change encourages riders to sprint to the finish for points awards without fear of losing time to the group. The final kilometre has been indicated since 1906 by a red triangle – the flamme rouge – above the road. The first photo-finish was in 1955.\n\nThe Tour directors categorize mass-stage starts into 'flat', 'hilly' or 'mountain'. This affects the points awarded in the sprint classification, whether the 3 kilometer rule is operational, and the permitted disqualification time in which riders must finish (which is the winners' time plus a pre-determined percentage of that time). Time bonuses of 10, 6 and 4 seconds are awarded to the first three finishers, though this was not done from 2008 to 2014. Bonuses were previously also awarded to winners of intermediate sprints.\n\nOn flat stages, most riders can stay in the peloton to the finish, and sprint finishes are common. Crosswinds, the difficulty of long cobbled sections or crashes are often the major challenges of these stages. On hilly and particularly mountain stages, there can be major shifts in the general classification, particularly where stages finish at the tops of climbs. It is not uncommon for riders to lose 30 minutes or to be eliminated after finishing outside the time limit.\n\nIndividual time trials\n\nRiders in a time trial compete individually against the clock, each starting at a different time. The first time trial was between La Roche-sur-Yon and Nantes (80 km) in 1934. The first stage in modern Tours is often a short trial, a prologue, to decide who wears yellow on the opening day. The first prologue was in 1967. The 1988 event, at La Baule, was called \"la préface\". There are usually two or three time trials. The final time trial has sometimes been the final stage, more recently often the penultimate stage. The launch ramp, a sloping start pad for riders, was first used in 1965, at Cologne.\n\nTeam time trial\n\nA team time trial (TTT) is a race against the clock in which each team rides alone. The time is that of the fifth rider of each team: riders more than a bike-length behind their team's fifth rider are awarded their own times. The TTT has been criticised for favouring strong teams and handicapping strong riders in weak teams. The prologue stage in 1971 was a team time trial.\n\nTime limits\n\nRiders completing a stage may be eliminated if their time exceeds the time limit for the stage. The limit is defined as the winner's time plus a percentage, which depends on the type of stage and the winner's average speed. The time limit can be extended or the elimination can be waived if more than 20% of riders exceed the limit or for other reasons such as collisions or foul weather. For example, for a stage classed as \"Coefficient 1: Stages with no particular difficulty\", the time limit is the winner's time plus 3% for an average speed of up to 36 km/h, increasing in 8 steps to 11% for a speed of over 50 km/h, while on a \"Coefficient 5: Very difficult short stages\" it varies from 11% (up to 30 km/h) to 22% (over 40 km/h). \n\nNotable stages\n\nThe race has finished since 1975 with laps of the Champs-Élysées. This stage rarely challenges the leader because it is flat and the leader usually has too much time in hand to be denied. But in 1987, Pedro Delgado broke away on the Champs to challenge the 40-second lead held by Stephen Roche. He and Roche finished in the peloton and Roche won the Tour. In modern times, there tends to be a gentlemen's agreement: while the points classification is still contended if possible, the overall classification is not fought over; because of this, it is not uncommon for the de facto winner of the overall classification to ride into Paris holding a glass of champagne.\n\nIn 1989 the last stage was a time trial. Greg LeMond overtook Laurent Fignon to win by eight seconds, the closest margin in the Tour's history.\n\nThe climb of Alpe d'Huez is a favourite, providing either a mass-start or individual time trial stage in most Tours. During the 2004 Tour de France, for example, Alpe d'Huez was the scene of an epic 15.5 km mountain time trial on the 16th stage. While the TV spectacle was overwhelming, the riders complained of abusive spectators who threatened their progress up the climb, and the time-trial on this stage may not be repeated. Mont Ventoux is often claimed to be the hardest in the Tour because of the harsh conditions. Another notable mountain stage frequently featured climbs the Col du Tourmalet, the most visited mountain in the history of the Tour. Col du Galibier is the most visited mountain in the Alps. The 2011 Tour de France stage to Galibier marked the 100th anniversary of the mountain in the Tour and also boasted the highest finish altitude ever: 2,645 m. Some mountain stages have become memorable because of the weather. An example is a stage in 1996 Tour de France from Val-d'Isère to Sestriere. A snowstorm at the start area led to a shortening of the stage from 190 to just 46 km.\n\nTo host a stage start or finish brings prestige and business to a town. The prologue and first stage (Grand Départ) are particularly prestigious. Usually one town hosts the prologue (too short to go between towns) and the start of stage 1. In 2007 director Christian Prudhomme said that \"in general, for a period of five years we have the Tour start outside France three times and within France twice.\" \n\nAdvertising caravan\n\nWhen switching to the use of national teams in 1930, the costs of accommodating riders fell to the organizers instead of the sponsors and Henri Desgrange raised the money by allowing advertisers to precede the race. The procession of often colourfully decorated trucks and cars became known as the publicity caravan. It formalised an existing situation, companies having started to follow the race. The first to sign to precede the Tour was the chocolate company, Menier, one of those who had followed the race. Its head of publicity, Paul Thévenin, had first put the idea to Desgrange. It paid 50,000 old francs. Preceding the race was more attractive to advertisers because spectators gathered by the road long before the race or could be attracted from their houses. Advertisers following the race found that many who had watched the race had already gone home. Menier handed out tons of chocolate in that first year of preceding the race, as well as 500,000 policemen's hats printed with the company's name. The success led to the caravan's existence being formalised the following year.\n\nThe caravan was at its height between 1930 and the mid-1960s, before television and especially television advertising was established in France. Advertisers competed to attract public attention. Motorcycle acrobats performed for the Cinzano apéritif company and a toothpaste maker, and an accordionist, Yvette Horner, became one of the most popular sights as she performed on the roof of a Citroën Traction Avant. The modern Tour restricts the excesses to which advertisers are allowed to go but at first anything was allowed. The writer Pierre BostPierre Bost was a journalist and playwright known for the prolific film and stage scripts he wrote in the 1940s. He died in 1975. lamented: \"This caravan of 60 gaudy trucks singing across the countryside the virtues of an apéritif, a make of underpants or a dustbin is a shameful spectacle. It bellows, it plays ugly music, it's sad, it's ugly, it smells of vulgarity and money.\" \n\nAdvertisers pay the Société du Tour de France approximately €150,000 to place three vehicles in the caravan.Le Tour Guide, France, 2000 Some have more. On top of that come the more considerable costs of the commercial samples that are thrown to the crowd and the cost of accommodating the drivers and the staff—frequently students—who throw them. The number of items has been estimated at 11 million, each person in the procession giving out 3,000 to 5,000 items a day. A bank, GAN, gave out 170,000 caps, 80,000 badges, 60,000 plastic bags and 535,000 copies of its race newspaper in 1994. Together, they weighed 32 tons. The vehicles also have to be decorated on the morning of each stage and, because they must return to ordinary highway standards, disassembled after each stage. Numbers vary but there are normally around 250 vehicles each year. Their order on the road is established by contract, the leading vehicles belonging to the largest sponsors.\n\nThe procession sets off two hours before the start and then regroups to precede the riders by an hour and a half. It spreads 20–25 km and takes 40 minutes to pass at between 20 and 60 km/h. Vehicles travel in groups of five. Their position is logged by GPS and from an aircraft and organised on the road by the caravan director—Jean-Pierre LachaudJean-Pierre Lachaud joined the Tour de France caravan in 1983 to distribute publicity for Crédit Lyonnais, the bank that sponsors the yellow jersey. The experience led to his starting his own company, Newsport, which now administers the caravan for the Société du Tour de France—an assistant, three motorcyclists, two radio technicians and a breakdown and medical crew. Six motorcyclists from the Garde Républicaine, the élite of the gendarmerie, ride with them.GAN Spécial Tour de France, 1994\n\nPolitics\n\nThe first three Tours stayed within France. The 1906 race went into Alsace-Lorraine, territory annexed by the German Empire in 1871 after the Franco-Prussian War. Passage was secured through a meeting at Metz between Desgrange's collaborator, Alphonse Steinès, and the German governor.\n\nNo teams from Italy, Germany or Spain rode in 1939 because of tensions preceding the Second World War (after German assistance to Franco in the Spanish Civil War it was widely expected Spain would join Germany in a European war, though this did not come to pass). Henri Desgrange planned a Tour for 1940, after war had started but before France had been invaded. The route, approved by military authorities, included a route along the Maginot Line. Teams would have been drawn from military units in France, including the British, who would have been organised by a journalist, Bill Mills. Then the Germans invaded and the race was not held again until 1947 (see Tour de France during the Second World War). The first German team after the war was in 1960, although individual Germans had ridden in mixed teams. The Tour has since started in Germany three times: in Cologne in 1965, in Frankfurt in 1980 and in West Berlin on the city's 750th anniversary in 1987. Plans to enter East Germany that year were abandoned.\n\nCorsica\n\nPrior to 2013, the Tour de France had visited every region of Metropolitan France except Corsica. Jean-Marie Leblanc, when he was organiser, said the island had never asked for a stage start there. It would be difficult to find accommodation for 4,000 people, he said.L'Équipe Magazine, France, 23 October 2004 The spokesman of the Corsican nationalist party Party of the Corsican Nation, François Alfonsi, said: \"The organisers must be afraid of terrorist attacks.Some Corsican nationalists have used terrorist methods. If they are really thinking of a possible terrorist action, they are wrong. Our movement, which is nationalist and in favour of self-government, would be delighted if the Tour came to Corsica.\" The opening three stages of the 2013 Tour de France were held on Corsica as part of the celebrations for the 100th edition of the race.\n\nThe start and finish of the Tour\n\nMost stages are in mainland France, although since the 1960s it has become common to visit nearby countries: Andorra, Belgium, Great Britain, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Monaco, Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland have all hosted stages or part of a stage. Since 1975 the finish has been on the Champs-Élysées in Paris; from 1903 to 1967 the race finished at the Parc des Princes stadium in western Paris and from 1968 to 1974 at the Piste Municipale south of the capital. Feliz Levitan, race organizer in the 1980s, was keen to host stages in the United States, but these proposals have never been developed. \n\nStarts abroad\n\nThe following editions of the Tour started, or are planned to start, outside France: \n\n* 1954: Amsterdam, Netherlands\n* 1958: Brussels, Belgium\n* 1965: Cologne, West Germany\n* 1973: Scheveningen, Netherlands\n* 1975: Charleroi, Belgium\n* 1978: Leiden, Netherlands\n* 1980: Frankfurt, West Germany\n* 1982: Basel, Switzerland\n* 1987: West Berlin, West Germany\n* 1989: Luxembourg, Luxembourg\n* 1992: San Sebastián, Spain\n* 1996: Den Bosch, Netherlands\n* 1998: Dublin, Ireland\n* 2002: Luxembourg, Luxembourg\n* 2004: Liège, Belgium\n* 2007: London, United Kingdom\n* 2009: Monte Carlo, Monaco\n* 2010: Rotterdam, Netherlands\n* 2012: Liège, Belgium\n* 2014: Leeds, United Kingdom\n* 2015: Utrecht, Netherlands\n* 2017: Düsseldorf, Germany\n\nBroadcasting\n\nThe Tour was first followed only by journalists from L'Auto, the organisers. The race was founded to increase sales of a floundering newspaper and its editor, Desgrange, saw no reason to allow rival publications to profit.\nThe first time papers other than L'Auto were allowed was 1921, when 15 press cars were allowed for regional and foreign reporters.\n\nThe Tour was shown first on cinema newsreels a day or more after the event. The first live radio broadcast was in 1929, when Jean Antoine and Alex Virot of the newspaper L'Intransigeant broadcast for Radio Cité. They used telephone lines. In 1932 they broadcast the sound of riders crossing the col d'Aubisque in the Pyrenees on 12 July, using a recording machine and transmitting the sound later.\n\nThe first television pictures were shown a day after a stage. The national TV channel used two 16mm cameras, a Jeep and a motorbike. Film was flown or taken by train to Paris. It was edited there and shown the following day.\nThe first live broadcast, and the second of any sport in France, was the finish at the Parc des Princes in Paris on 25 July 1948. Rik van Steenbergen of Belgium led in the bunch after a stage of 340 km from Nancy. The first live coverage from the side of the road was from the Aubisque on 8 July 1958. Proposals to cover the whole race were abandoned in 1962 after objections from regional newspapers whose editors feared the competition. The dispute was settled but not in time and the first complete coverage was the following year.\n\nThe leading television commentator in France was a former rider, Robert Chapatte. At first he was the only commentator. He was joined in following seasons by an analyst for the mountain stages and by a commentator following the competitors by motorcycle.\n\nBroadcasting in France was largely a state monopoly until 1982, when the socialist president François Mitterrand allowed private broadcasters and privatised the leading television channel. Competition between channels raised the broadcasting fees paid to the organisers from 1.5 per cent of the race budget in 1960 to more than a third by the end of the century. Broadcasting time also increased as channels competed to secure the rights. The two largest channels to stay in public ownership, Antenne 2 and FR3, combined to offer more coverage than its private rival, TF1. The two stations, renamed France 2 and France 3, still hold the domestic rights and provide pictures for broadcasters around the world.\n\nThe stations use a staff of 300 with four helicopters, two aircraft, two motorcycles, 35 other vehicles including trucks, and 20 podium cameras.A podium camera is not one focused on the winner's podium but a full-scale camera on a mount, or podium.\n\nDomestic television covers the most important stages of the Tour, such as those in the mountains, from mid-morning until early evening. Coverage typically starts with a survey of the day's route, interviews along the road, discussions of the difficulties and tactics ahead, and a 30-minute archive feature. The biggest stages are shown live from start to end, followed by interviews with riders and others and features such an edited version of the stage seen from beside a team manager following and advising riders from his car.\nRadio covers the race in updates throughout the day, particularly on the national news channel, France Info, and some stations provide continuous commentary on long wave. Other countries broadcast the Tour, including the United States, which has shown the Tour since 1999 on the network now known as NBCSN.\n\nThe combination of unprecedented rigorous doping controls and almost no positive tests helped restore fans' confidence in the 2009 Tour de France. This led directly to an increase in global popularity of the event. The most watched stage of 2009 was stage 20, from Montélimar to Mont Ventoux in Provence, with a global total audience of 44 million, making it the 12th most watched sporting event in the world in 2009. \n\nCulture\n\nThe Tour is important for fans in Europe. Millions line the route, some having camped for a week to get the best view. Crowds flanking the course are reminiscent of the community festivals that are part of another form of cycle racing in a different country - the Isle of Man TT. \n\nThe Tour de France appealed from the start not just for the distance and its demands but because it played to a wish for national unity, a call to what Maurice Barrès called the France \"of earth and deaths\" or what Georges Vigarello called \"the image of a France united by its earth.\" \n\nThe image had been started by the 1877 travel/school book Le Tour de la France par deux enfants.A school book written by Augustine Fouillée under the name G. Bruno and published in 1877, it sold six million by 1900, seven million by 1914 and 8,400,000 by 1976. It was used in schools until the 1950s and is still available. It told of two boys, André and Julien, who \"in a thick September fog left the town of Phalsbourg in Lorraine to see France at a time when few people had gone far beyond their nearest town.\"\n\nThe book sold six million copies by the time of the first Tour de France, the biggest selling book of 19th-century France (other than the Bible). It stimulated a national interest in France, making it \"visible and alive\", as its preface said. There had already been a car race called the Tour de France but it was the publicity behind the cycling race, and Desgrange's drive to educate and improve the population, that inspired the French to know more of their country.\n\nThe academic historians Jean-Luc Boeuf and Yves Léonard say most people in France had little idea of the shape of their country until L'Auto began publishing maps of the race.\n\nArts\n\nThe Tour has inspired several popular songs in France, notably P'tit gars du Tour (1932), Les Tours de France (1936) and Faire le Tour de France (1950). Kraftwerk had a hit with \"Tour de France\" in 1983 – described as a minimalistic \"melding of man and machine\"  – and produced an album, Tour de France Soundtracks in 2003, the centenary of the Tour.\n\nThe Tour and its first Italian winner, Ottavio Bottecchia, are mentioned at the end of Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises. \n\nIn films, the Tour was background for Five Red Tulips (1949) by Jean Stelli, in which five riders are murdered. A burlesque in 1967, Les Cracks by Alex Joffé, with Bourvil et Monique Tarbès, also featured him. Patrick Le Gall made Chacun son Tour (1996). The comedy, Le Vélo de Ghislain Lambert (2001), featured the Tour of 1974.\n\nIn 2005, three films chronicled a team. The German Höllentour, translated as Hell on Wheels, recorded 2003 from the perspective of Team Telekom. The film was directed by Pepe Danquart, who won an Academy Award for live-action short film in 1993 for Black Rider (Schwarzfahrer). The Danish film Overcoming by Tómas Gislason recorded the 2004 Tour from the perspective of Team CSC.\n\nWired to Win chronicles Française des Jeux riders Baden Cooke and Jimmy Caspar in 2003. By following their quest for the points classification, won by Cooke, the film looks at the working of the brain. The film, made for IMAX theaters, appeared in December 2005. It was directed by Bayley Silleck, who was nominated for an Academy Award for documentary short subject in 1996 for Cosmic Voyage. \n\nA fan, Scott Coady, followed the 2000 Tour with a handheld video camera to make The Tour Baby!, which raised $160,000 to benefit the Lance Armstrong Foundation, and made a 2005 sequel, Tour Baby Deux!. \n\nVive Le Tour by Louis Malle is an 18-minute short of 1962. The 1965 Tour was filmed by Claude Lelouch in Pour un Maillot Jaune. This 30-minute documentary has no narration and relies on sights and sounds of the Tour.\n\nIn fiction, the 2001 animated feature Les Triplettes de Belleville (The Triplets of Belleville) ties into the Tour de France.\n\nPost-Tour criteriums\n\nAfter the Tour de France there are criteriums in the Netherlands and Belgium. These races are public spectacles where thousands of people can see their heroes, from the Tour de France, race. The budget of a criterium is over 100,000 Euro, with most of the money going to the riders. Jersey winners or big name riders earn between 20 and 60 thousand euros per race in start money. \n\nDoping\n\nAllegations of doping have plagued the Tour almost since 1903. Early riders consumed alcohol and used ether, to dull the pain. Over the years they began to increase performance and the Union Cycliste Internationale and governments enacted policies to combat the practice.\n\nIn 1924, Henri Pélissier and his brother Charles told the journalist Albert Londres they used strychnine, cocaine, chloroform, aspirin, \"horse ointment\" and other drugs. The story was published in Le Petit Parisien under the title Les Forçats de la Route ('The Convicts of the Road') \n\nOn 13 July 1967, British cyclist Tom Simpson died climbing Mont Ventoux after taking amphetamine. In 1998, the \"Tour of Shame\", Willy Voet, soigneur for the Festina team, was arrested with erythropoietin (EPO), growth hormones, testosterone and amphetamine. Police raided team hotels and found products in the possession of the cycling team TVM. Riders went on strike. After mediation by director Jean-Marie Leblanc, police limited their tactics and riders continued. Some riders had dropped out and only 96 finished the race. It became clear in a trial that management and health officials of the Festina team had organised the doping.\n\nFurther measures were introduced by race organisers and the UCI, including more frequent testing and tests for blood doping (transfusions and EPO use). This would lead the UCI to becoming a particularly interested party in an International Olympic Committee initiative, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), created in 1999. In 2002, the wife of Raimondas Rumšas, third in the 2002 Tour de France, was arrested after EPO and anabolic steroids were found in her car. Rumšas, who had not failed a test, was not penalised. In 2004, Philippe Gaumont said doping was endemic to his Cofidis team. Fellow Cofidis rider David Millar confessed to EPO after his home was raided. In the same year, Jesus Manzano, a rider with the Kelme team, alleged he had been forced by his team to use banned substances. \n\nDoping controversy has surrounded Lance Armstrong. In August 2005, one month after Armstrong's seventh consecutive victory, L'Équipe published documents it said showed Armstrong had used EPO in the 1999 race. At the same Tour, Armstrong's urine showed traces of a glucocorticosteroid hormone, although below the positive threshold. He said he had used skin cream containing triamcinolone to treat saddle sores. Armstrong said he had received permission from the UCI to use this cream. Further allegations ultimately culminated in the United States Anti Doping Agency (USADA) disqualifying him from all his victories since 1 August 1998, including his seven consecutive Tour de France victories, and a lifetime ban from competing in professional sports. He chose not to appeal the decision and in January 2013 he admitted doping in a television interview conducted by Oprah Winfrey, despite having made repeated denials throughout his career. On 1 August 2013, Jan Ullrich—arguably Armstrong's biggest Tour de France rival—reportedly said that Armstrong should have his seven stripped wins reinstated, due to the prevalence of doping at the time. Ullrich had won the 1997 Tour and finished second to Armstrong three times—in 2000, 2001 and 2003—but declined to stake a claim for his rival's stripped titles. \n\nThe 2006 Tour had been plagued by the Operación Puerto doping case before it began. Favourites such as Jan Ullrich and Ivan Basso were banned by their teams a day before the start. Seventeen riders were implicated. American rider Floyd Landis, who finished the Tour as holder of the overall lead, had tested positive for testosterone after he won stage 17, but this was not confirmed until some two weeks after the race finished. On 30 June 2008 Landis lost his appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, and Óscar Pereiro was named as winner. \n\nOn 24 May 2007, Erik Zabel admitted using EPO during the first week of the 1996 Tour, when he won the points classification. Following his plea that other cyclists admit to drugs, former winner Bjarne Riis admitted in Copenhagen on 25 May 2007 that he used EPO regularly from 1993 to 1998, including when he won the 1996 Tour. His admission meant the top three in 1996 were all linked to doping, two admitting cheating. On 24 July 2007 Alexander Vinokourov tested positive for a blood transfusion (blood doping) after winning a time trial, prompting his Astana team to pull out and police to raid the team's hotel. The next day Cristian Moreni tested positive for testosterone. His Cofidis team pulled out. \n\nThe same day, leader Michael Rasmussen was removed for \"violating internal team rules\" by missing random tests on 9 May and 28 June. Rasmussen claimed to have been in Mexico. The Italian journalist Davide Cassani told Danish television he had seen Rasmussen in Italy. The alleged lying prompted Rasmussen's firing by Rabobank. \n\nOn 11 July 2008 Manuel Beltrán tested positive for EPO after the first stage. On 17 July 2008, Riccardo Riccò tested positive for continuous erythropoiesis receptor activator, a variant of EPO, after the fourth stage. In October 2008, it was revealed that Riccò's teammate and Stage 10 winner Leonardo Piepoli, as well as Stefan Schumacher  – who won both time trials – and Bernhard Kohl  – third on general classification and King of the Mountains – had tested positive.\n\nAfter winning the 2010 Tour de France, it was announced that Alberto Contador had tested positive for low levels of clenbuterol on the 21 July rest day. On 26 January 2011, the Spanish Cycling Federation proposed a 1-year ban but reversed its ruling on 15 February and cleared Contador to race. Despite a pending appeal by the UCI, Contador finished 5th overall in the 2011 Tour de France, but in February 2012, Contador was suspended and stripped of his 2010 victory. \n\nDuring the 2012 Tour, the 3rd placed rider from 2011, Fränk Schleck tested positive for the banned diuretic Xipamide and was immediately disqualified from the Tour. \n\nIn October 2012 USADA released a report on doping by the U.S. Postal Service cycling team, implicating, amongst others, Armstrong. The report contained affidavits from riders including Frankie Andreu, Tyler Hamilton, George Hincapie, Floyd Landis, Levi Leipheimer, and others describing widespread use of Erythropoietin (EPO), blood transfusion, testosterone, and other banned practices in several Tours. In October 2012 the UCI acted upon this report, formally stripping Armstrong of all titles since 1 August 1998, including all seven Tour victories, and announced that his Tour wins would not be reallocated to other riders. \n\nDeaths\n\nCyclists who have died during the Tour de France:\n\n* 1910: French racer Adolphe Helière drowned at the French Riviera during a rest day.\n* 1935: Spanish racer Francisco Cepeda plunged down a ravine on the Col du Galibier.\n* 1967: 13 July, Stage 13: Tom Simpson died of heart failure during the ascent of Mont Ventoux. Amphetamines were found in Simpson's jersey and blood.\n* 1995: 18 July, Stage 15: Fabio Casartelli crashed at 88 km/h while descending the Col de Portet d'Aspet.\n\nAnother seven fatal accidents have occurred:\n* 1934: A motorcyclist giving a demonstration in the velodrome of La Roche Sur Yon, to entertain the crowd before the cyclists arrived, died after he crashed at high speed. \n* 1957: 14 July: Motorcycle rider Rene Wagter and passenger Alex Virot, a journalist for Radio Luxembourg, went off a mountain road near Ax-les-Thermes.\n* 1958: An official, Constant Wouters, died from injuries received after sprinter André Darrigade collided with him at the Parc des Princes.\n* 1964: Nine people died when a supply van hit a bridge in the Dordogne region, resulting in the highest tour-related death toll. \n* 2000: A 12-year-old from Ginasservis, known as Phillippe, was hit by a car in the Tour de France publicity caravan.\n* 2002: A seven-year-old boy, Melvin Pompele, died near Retjons after running in front of the caravan.\n* 2009: 18 July, Stage 14: A spectator in her 60s was struck and killed by a police motorcycle while crossing a road along the route near Wittelsheim.\n\nRecords and statistics\n\nOne rider has been King of the Mountains, won the combination classification, combativity award, the points competition, and the Tour in the same year—Eddy Merckx in 1969, which was also the first year he participated. \n\nTwice the Tour was won by a racer who never wore the yellow jersey until the race was over. In 1947, Jean Robic overturned a three-minute deficit on a 257 km final stage into Paris. In 1968, Jan Janssen of the Netherlands secured his win in the individual time trial on the last day.\n\nThe Tour has been won three times by racers who led the general classification on the first stage and holding the lead all the way to Paris. Maurice Garin did it during the Tour's very first edition, 1903; he repeated the feat the next year, but the results were nullified by the officials as a response to widespread cheating. Ottavio Bottecchia completed a GC start-to-finish sweep in 1924. And in 1928, Nicolas Frantz held the GC for the entire race, and at the end, the podium consisted solely of members of his racing team. While no one has equalled this feat since '28, four times a racer has taken over the GC lead on the second stage and carried that lead all the way to Paris.\n\nThe most appearances have been by George Hincapie with 17. In light of Hincapie's suspension for use of performance-enhancing drugs, before which he held the mark for most consecutive finishes with sixteen, having completed all but his very first, Joop Zoetemelk holds the record for the most finishes, having completed all 16 of the Tours that he started.\n\nIn the early years of the Tour, cyclists rode individually, and were sometimes forbidden to ride together. This led to large gaps between the winner and the number two. Since the cyclists now tend to stay together in a peloton, the margins of the winner have become smaller, as the difference usually originates from time trials, breakaways or on mountain top finishes, or from being left behind the peloton. The smallest margins between the winner and the second placed cyclists at the end of the Tour is 8s between winner Greg LeMond and Laurent Fignon in 1989. The largest margin, by comparison, remains that of the first Tour in 1903: 2h 49m 45s between Maurice Garin and Lucien Pothier. \n\nThree riders have won 8 stages in a single year: Charles Pélissier (1930 ), Eddy Merckx (1970, 1974 ), Freddy Maertens (1976 ). Mark Cavendish has the most mass finish stage wins with 30 as of stage 14 in 2016, ahead of André Darrigade and André Leducq with 22, François Faber with 19 and Eddy Merckx with 18. The youngest Tour de France stage winner is Fabio Battesini, who was 19 when he won one stage in the 1931 Tour de France. \n\nThe fastest massed-start stage was in 1999 from Laval to Blois (194.5 km), won by Mario Cipollini at 50.4 km/h. The fastest time-trial is Rohan Dennis' stage 1 of the 2015 Tour de France in Utrecht, won at an average of . The fastest stage win was by the 2013 Orica GreenEDGE team in a team time-trial. It completed the 25 km in Nice (stage 5) at 57.8 km/h. \n\nThe longest successful post-war breakaway by a single rider was by Albert Bourlon in the 1947 Tour de France. In the stage Carcassone-Luchon, he stayed away for 253 km.Tour 09, Procycling (UK) summer 2009 It was one of seven breakaways longer than 200 km, the last being Thierry Marie's 234 km escape in 1991. Bourlon finished 16 m 30s ahead. This is one of the biggest time gaps but not the greatest. That record belongs to José-Luis Viejo, who beat the peloton by 22 m 50s in the 1976 stage Montgenèvre-Manosque. He was the fourth and most recent rider to win a stage by more than 20 minutes.\n\nThe only rider to win the Tour de France and an Olympic gold medal in the same year was Bradley Wiggins in 2012. Wiggins also has the record of being the only Tour de France champion to win an Olympic gold medal in the velodrome.\n\nRecord winners\n\nFour riders have won five times: Jacques Anquetil (FRA), Eddy Merckx (BEL), Bernard Hinault (FRA) and Miguel Indurain (ESP). Indurain achieved the mark with a record five consecutive wins.\n\nNotes", "The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization which regulates international trade. The WTO officially commenced on 1 January 1995 under the Marrakesh Agreement, signed by 123 nations on 15 April 1994, replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which commenced in 1948. The WTO deals with regulation of trade between participating countries by providing a framework for negotiating trade agreements and a dispute resolution process aimed at enforcing participants' adherence to WTO agreements, which are signed by representatives of member governments[http://www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/whatis_e/tif_e/understanding_e.pdf Understanding the WTO] Handbook at WTO official website. (Note that the document's printed folio numbers do not match the pdf page numbers.) and ratified by their parliaments. Most of the issues that the WTO focuses on derive from previous trade negotiations, especially from the Uruguay Round (1986–1994).\n\nThe WTO is attempting to complete negotiations on the Doha Development Round, which was launched in 2001 with an explicit focus on developing countries. , the future of the Doha Round remained uncertain: the work programme lists 21 subjects in which the original deadline of 1 January 2005 was missed, and the round is still incomplete. The conflict between free trade on industrial goods and services but retention of protectionism on farm subsidies to domestic agricultural sector (requested by developed countries) and the substantiation of fair trade on agricultural products (requested by developing countries) remain the major obstacles. This impasse has made it impossible to launch new WTO negotiations beyond the Doha Development Round. As a result, there have been an increasing number of bilateral free trade agreements between governments. As of July 2012, there were various negotiation groups in the WTO system for the current agricultural trade negotiation which is in the condition of stalemate. \n\nThe WTO's current Director-General is Roberto Azevêdo, who leads a staff of over 600 people in Geneva, Switzerland. A trade facilitation agreement known as the Bali Package was reached by all members on 7 December 2013, the first comprehensive agreement in the organization's history.[https://mc9.wto.org/ Ninth WTO Ministerial Conference | WTO - MC9][http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25274889 BBC News - WTO agrees global trade deal worth $1tn]\n\nHistory\n\nThe WTO's predecessor, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), was established after World War II in the wake of other new multilateral institutions dedicated to international economic cooperation – notably the Bretton Woods institutions known as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. A comparable international institution for trade, named the International Trade Organization was successfully negotiated. The ITO was to be a United Nations specialized agency and would address not only trade barriers but other issues indirectly related to trade, including employment, investment, restrictive business practices, and commodity agreements. But the ITO treaty was not approved by the U.S. and a few other signatories and never went into effect. \n\nIn the absence of an international organization for trade, the GATT would over the years \"transform itself\" into a de facto international organization. \n\nGATT rounds of negotiations\n\nThe GATT was the only multilateral instrument governing international trade from 1946 until the WTO was established on 1 January 1995. Despite attempts in the mid-1950s and 1960s to create some form of institutional mechanism for international trade, the GATT continued to operate for almost half a century as a semi-institutionalized multilateral treaty regime on a provisional basis. \n\nFrom Geneva to Tokyo\n\nSeven rounds of negotiations occurred under GATT. The first real GATT trade rounds concentrated on further reducing tariffs. Then, the Kennedy Round in the mid-sixties brought about a GATT anti-dumping Agreement and a section on development. The Tokyo Round during the seventies was the first major attempt to tackle trade barriers that do not take the form of tariffs, and to improve the system, adopting a series of agreements on non-tariff barriers, which in some cases interpreted existing GATT rules, and in others broke entirely new ground. Because these plurilateral agreements were not accepted by the full GATT membership, they were often informally called \"codes\". Several of these codes were amended in the Uruguay Round, and turned into multilateral commitments accepted by all WTO members. Only four remained plurilateral (those on government procurement, bovine meat, civil aircraft and dairy products), but in 1997 WTO members agreed to terminate the bovine meat and dairy agreements, leaving only two.\n\nUruguay Round\n\nWell before GATT's 40th anniversary, its members concluded that the GATT system was straining to adapt to a new globalizing world economy. In response to the problems identified in the 1982 Ministerial Declaration (structural deficiencies, spill-over impacts of certain countries' policies on world trade GATT could not manage etc.), the eighth GATT round – known as the Uruguay Round – was launched in September 1986, in Punta del Este, Uruguay.\n\nIt was the biggest negotiating mandate on trade ever agreed: the talks were going to extend the trading system into several new areas, notably trade in services and intellectual property, and to reform trade in the sensitive sectors of agriculture and textiles; all the original GATT articles were up for review. The Final Act concluding the Uruguay Round and officially establishing the WTO regime was signed 15 April 1994, during the ministerial meeting at Marrakesh, Morocco, and hence is known as the Marrakesh Agreement. \n\nThe GATT still exists as the WTO's umbrella treaty for trade in goods, updated as a result of the Uruguay Round negotiations (a distinction is made between GATT 1994, the updated parts of GATT, and GATT 1947, the original agreement which is still the heart of GATT 1994). GATT 1994 is not however the only legally binding agreement included via the Final Act at Marrakesh; a long list of about 60 agreements, annexes, decisions and understandings was adopted. The agreements fall into a structure with six main parts:\n* The Agreement Establishing the WTO\n* Goods and investment – the Multilateral Agreements on Trade in Goods including the GATT 1994 and the Trade Related Investment Measures (TRIMS)\n* Services — the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS)\n* Intellectual property – the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS)\n* Dispute settlement (DSU) \n* Reviews of governments' trade policies (TPRM) \n\nIn terms of the WTO's principle relating to tariff \"ceiling-binding\" (No. 3), the Uruguay Round has been successful in increasing binding commitments by both developed and developing countries, as may be seen in the percentages of tariffs bound before and after the 1986–1994 talks.\n\nMinisterial conferences\n\nThe highest decision-making body of the WTO is the Ministerial Conference, which usually meets every two years. It brings together all members of the WTO, all of which are countries or customs unions. The Ministerial Conference can take decisions on all matters under any of the multilateral trade agreements. \n*The inaugural ministerial conference (1996) was held in Singapore. Disagreements between largely developed and developing economies emerged during this conference over four issues initiated by this conference, which led to them being collectively referred to as the \"Singapore issues\". \n*The second ministerial conference (1998) was held in Geneva in Switzerland. \n*The third conference (1999) in Seattle, Washington ended in failure, with massive demonstrations and police and National Guard crowd-control efforts drawing worldwide attention. \n*The fourth ministerial conference (2001) was held in Doha in the Persian Gulf nation of Qatar. The Doha Development Round was launched at the conference. The conference also approved the joining of China, which became the 143rd member to join. \n*The fifth ministerial conference (2003) was held in Cancún, Mexico, aiming at forging agreement on the Doha round. An alliance of 22 southern states, the G20 developing nations (led by India, China, Brazil, ASEAN led by the Philippines), resisted demands from the North for agreements on the so-called \"Singapore issues\" and called for an end to agricultural subsidies within the EU and the US. The talks broke down without progress.\n*The sixth WTO ministerial conference (2005) was held in 13–18 December 2005 in Hong Kong. It was considered vital if the four-year-old Doha Development Round negotiations were to move forward sufficiently to conclude the round in 2006. In this meeting, countries agreed to phase out all their agricultural export subsidies by the end of 2013, and terminate any cotton export subsidies by the end of 2006. Further concessions to developing countries included an agreement to introduce duty-free, tariff-free access for goods from the Least Developed Countries, following the Everything but Arms initiative of the European Union — but with up to 3% of tariff lines exempted. Other major issues were left for further negotiation to be completed by the end of 2010. \nThe WTO General Council, on 26 May 2009, agreed to hold a seventh WTO ministerial conference session in Geneva from 30 November-3 December 2009. A statement by chairman Amb. Mario Matus acknowledged that the prime purpose was to remedy a breach of protocol requiring two-yearly \"regular\" meetings, which had lapsed with the Doha Round failure in 2005, and that the \"scaled-down\" meeting would not be a negotiating session, but \"emphasis will be on transparency and open discussion rather than on small group processes and informal negotiating structures\". The general theme for discussion was \"The WTO, the Multilateral Trading System and the Current Global Economic Environment\" \n\nDoha Round (Doha Agenda)\n\nThe WTO launched the current round of negotiations, the Doha Development Round, at the fourth ministerial conference in Doha, Qatar in November 2001. This was to be an ambitious effort to make globalization more inclusive and help the world's poor, particularly by slashing barriers and subsidies in farming. The initial agenda comprised both further trade liberalization and new rule-making, underpinned by commitments to strengthen substantial assistance to developing countries.\n\nThe negotiations have been highly contentious. Disagreements still continue over several key areas including agriculture subsidies, which emerged as critical in July 2006. According to a European Union statement, \"The 2008 Ministerial meeting broke down over a disagreement between exporters of agricultural bulk commodities and countries with large numbers of subsistence farmers on the precise terms of a 'special safeguard measure' to protect farmers from surges in imports.\" The position of the European Commission is that \"The successful conclusion of the Doha negotiations would confirm the central role of multilateral liberalisation and rule-making. It would confirm the WTO as a powerful shield against protectionist backsliding.\"European Commission [http://ec.europa.eu/trade/creating-opportunities/eu-and-wto/doha/index_en.htm The Doha Round] An impasse remains and, , agreement has not been reached, despite intense negotiations at several ministerial conferences and at other sessions. On 27 March 2013, the chairman of agriculture talks announced \"a proposal to loosen price support disciplines for developing countries’ public stocks and domestic food aid.\" He added: “...we are not yet close to agreement—in fact, the substantive discussion of the proposal is only beginning.” \n\nFunctions\n\nAmong the various functions of the WTO, these are regarded by analysts as the most important:\n* It oversees the implementation, administration and operation of the covered agreements. \n* It provides a forum for negotiations and for settling disputes. \nAdditionally, it is the WTO's duty to review and propagate the national trade policies, and to ensure the coherence and transparency of trade policies through surveillance in global economic policy-making. Another priority of the WTO is the assistance of developing, least-developed and low-income countries in transition to adjust to WTO rules and disciplines through technical cooperation and training. \n# The WTO shall facilitate the implementation, administration and operation and further the objectives of this Agreement and of the Multilateral Trade Agreements, and shall also provide the frame work for the implementation, administration and operation of the multilateral Trade Agreements.\n# The WTO shall provide the forum for negotiations among its members concerning their multilateral trade relations in matters dealt with under the Agreement in the Annexes to this Agreement.\n# The WTO shall administer the Understanding on Rules and Procedures Governing the Settlement of Disputes.\n# The WTO shall administer Trade Policy Review Mechanism.\n# With a view to achieving greater coherence in global economic policy making, the WTO shall cooperate, as appropriate, with the international Monetary Fund (IMF) and with the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and its affiliated agencies. \n\nThe above five listings are the additional functions of the World Trade Organization. As globalization proceeds in today's society, the necessity of an International Organization to manage the trading systems has been of vital importance. As the trade volume increases, issues such as protectionism, trade barriers, subsidies, violation of intellectual property arise due to the differences in the trading rules of every nation. The World Trade Organization serves as the mediator between the nations when such problems arise. WTO could be referred to as the product of globalization and also as one of the most important organizations in today's globalized society.\n\nThe WTO is also a center of economic research and analysis: regular assessments of the global trade picture in its annual publications and research reports on specific topics are produced by the organization. Finally, the WTO cooperates closely with the two other components of the Bretton Woods system, the IMF and the World Bank.\n\nPrinciples of the trading system\n\nThe WTO establishes a framework for trade policies; it does not define or specify outcomes. That is, it is concerned with setting the rules of the trade policy games. Five principles are of particular importance in understanding both the pre-1994 GATT and the WTO:\n# Non-discrimination. It has two major components: the most favoured nation (MFN) rule, and the national treatment policy. Both are embedded in the main WTO rules on goods, services, and intellectual property, but their precise scope and nature differ across these areas. The MFN rule requires that a WTO member must apply the same conditions on all trade with other WTO members, i.e. a WTO member has to grant the most favorable conditions under which it allows trade in a certain product type to all other WTO members. \"Grant someone a special favour and you have to do the same for all other WTO members.\" National treatment means that imported goods should be treated no less favorably than domestically produced goods (at least after the foreign goods have entered the market) and was introduced to tackle non-tariff barriers to trade (e.g. technical standards, security standards et al. discriminating against imported goods).\n# Reciprocity. It reflects both a desire to limit the scope of free-riding that may arise because of the MFN rule, and a desire to obtain better access to foreign markets. A related point is that for a nation to negotiate, it is necessary that the gain from doing so be greater than the gain available from unilateral liberalization; reciprocal concessions intend to ensure that such gains will materialise. \n# Binding and enforceable commitments. The tariff commitments made by WTO members in a multilateral trade negotiation and on accession are enumerated in a schedule (list) of concessions. These schedules establish \"ceiling bindings\": a country can change its bindings, but only after negotiating with its trading partners, which could mean compensating them for loss of trade. If satisfaction is not obtained, the complaining country may invoke the WTO dispute settlement procedures.\n# Transparency. The WTO members are required to publish their trade regulations, to maintain institutions allowing for the review of administrative decisions affecting trade, to respond to requests for information by other members, and to notify changes in trade policies to the WTO. These internal transparency requirements are supplemented and facilitated by periodic country-specific reports (trade policy reviews) through the Trade Policy Review Mechanism (TPRM). The WTO system tries also to improve predictability and stability, discouraging the use of quotas and other measures used to set limits on quantities of imports.\n# Safety valves. In specific circumstances, governments are able to restrict trade. The WTO's agreements permit members to take measures to protect not only the environment but also public health, animal health and plant health. \nThere are three types of provision in this direction:\n::* articles allowing for the use of trade measures to attain non-economic objectives;\n::* articles aimed at ensuring \"fair competition\"; members must not use environmental protection measures as a means of disguising protectionist policies. \n::* provisions permitting intervention in trade for economic reasons.\n:Exceptions to the MFN principle also allow for preferential treatment of developing countries, regional free trade areas and customs unions.\n\nOrganizational structure\n\nThe General Council has the following subsidiary bodies which oversee committees in different areas:\n\n;Council for Trade in Goods: There are 11 committees under the jurisdiction of the Goods Council each with a specific task. All members of the WTO participate in the committees. The Textiles Monitoring Body is separate from the other committees but still under the jurisdiction of Goods Council. The body has its own chairman and only 10 members. The body also has several groups relating to textiles. \n\n;Council for Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights: Information on intellectual property in the WTO, news and official records of the activities of the TRIPS Council, and details of the WTO's work with other international organizations in the field. \n\n;Council for Trade in Services: The Council for Trade in Services operates under the guidance of the General Council and is responsible for overseeing the functioning of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). It is open to all WTO members, and can create subsidiary bodies as required. \n\n;Trade Negotiations Committee: The Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC) is the committee that deals with the current trade talks round. The chair is WTO's director-general. the committee was tasked with the Doha Development Round. \n\nThe Service Council has three subsidiary bodies: financial services, domestic regulations, GATS rules and specific commitments. The council has several different committees, working groups, and working parties. There are committees on the following: Trade and Environment; Trade and Development (Subcommittee on Least-Developed Countries); Regional Trade Agreements; Balance of Payments Restrictions; and Budget, Finance and Administration. There are working parties on the following: Accession. There are working groups on the following: Trade, debt and finance; and Trade and technology transfer.\n\nDecision-making\n\nThe WTO describes itself as \"a rules-based, member-driven organization — all decisions are made by the member governments, and the rules are the outcome of negotiations among members\". The WTO Agreement foresees votes where consensus cannot be reached, but the practice of consensus dominates the process of decision-making. \n\nRichard Harold Steinberg (2002) argues that although the WTO's consensus governance model provides law-based initial bargaining, trading rounds close through power-based bargaining favouring Europe and the U.S., and may not lead to Pareto improvement. \n\nDispute settlement\n\nThe WTO's dispute-settlement system \"is the result of the evolution of rules, procedures and practices developed over almost half a century under the GATT 1947\". In 1994, the WTO members agreed on the Understanding on Rules and Procedures Governing the Settlement of Disputes (DSU) annexed to the \"Final Act\" signed in Marrakesh in 1994. Dispute settlement is regarded by the WTO as the central pillar of the multilateral trading system, and as a \"unique contribution to the stability of the global economy\". WTO members have agreed that, if they believe fellow-members are violating trade rules, they will use the multilateral system of settling disputes instead of taking action unilaterally. \n\nThe operation of the WTO dispute settlement process involves case-specific panels appointed by the Dispute Settlement Body (DSB), the Appellate Body, The Director-General and the WTO Secretariat, arbitrators, and advisory experts. \n\nThe priority is to settle disputes, preferably through a mutually agreed solution, and provision has been made for the process to be conducted in an efficient and timely manner so that \"If a case is adjudicated, it should normally take no more than one year for a panel ruling and no more than 16 months if the case is appealed... If the complainant deems the case urgent, consideration of the case should take even less time. WTO member nations are obliged to accept the process as exclusive and compulsory. \n\nAccession and membership\n\nThe process of becoming a WTO member is unique to each applicant country, and the terms of accession are dependent upon the country's stage of economic development and current trade regime. The process takes about five years, on average, but it can last longer if the country is less than fully committed to the process or if political issues interfere. The shortest accession negotiation was that of the Kyrgyz Republic, while the longest was that of Russia, which, having first applied to join GATT in 1993, was approved for membership in December 2011 and became a WTO member on 22 August 2012.[http://www.wto.org/english/news_e/news11_e/acc_rus_16dec11_e.htm Ministerial Conference approves Russia's WTO membership] WTO News Item, 16 December 2011 Kazakhstan also had a long accession negotiation process. The Working Party on the Accession of Kazakhstan was established in 1996 and was approved for membership in 2015. The second longest was that of Vanuatu, whose Working Party on the Accession of Vanuatu was established on 11 July 1995. After a final meeting of the Working Party in October 2001, Vanuatu requested more time to consider its accession terms. In 2008, it indicated its interest to resume and conclude its WTO accession. The Working Party on the Accession of Vanuatu was reconvened informally on 4 April 2011 to discuss Vanuatu's future WTO membership. The re-convened Working Party completed its mandate on 2 May 2011. The General Council formally approved the Accession Package of Vanuatu on 26 October 2011. On 24 August 2012, the WTO welcomed Vanuatu as its 157th member. An offer of accession is only given once consensus is reached among interested parties. \n\nAccession process\n\nA country wishing to accede to the WTO submits an application to the General Council, and has to describe all aspects of its trade and economic policies that have a bearing on WTO agreements. The application is submitted to the WTO in a memorandum which is examined by a working party open to all interested WTO Members.C. Michalopoulos, WTO Accession, 62–63\n\nAfter all necessary background information has been acquired, the working party focuses on issues of discrepancy between the WTO rules and the applicant's international and domestic trade policies and laws. The working party determines the terms and conditions of entry into the WTO for the applicant nation, and may consider transitional periods to allow countries some leeway in complying with the WTO rules.\n\nThe final phase of accession involves bilateral negotiations between the applicant nation and other working party members regarding the concessions and commitments on tariff levels and market access for goods and services. The new member's commitments are to apply equally to all WTO members under normal non-discrimination rules, even though they are negotiated bilaterally.\n\nWhen the bilateral talks conclude, the working party sends to the general council or ministerial conference an accession package, which includes a summary of all the working party meetings, the Protocol of Accession (a draft membership treaty), and lists (\"schedules\") of the member-to-be's commitments. Once the general council or ministerial conference approves of the terms of accession, the applicant's parliament must ratify the Protocol of Accession before it can become a member. Some countries may have faced tougher and a much longer accession process due to challenges during negotiations with other WTO members, such as Vietnam, whose negotiations took more than 11 years before it became official member in January 2007. \n\nMembers and observers\n\nThe WTO has 164 members and 20 observer governments. Liberia became the 163rd member on 14 July 2016, and Afghanistan became the 164th member on 29 July 2016. In addition to states, the European Union is a member. WTO members do not have to be fully independent states. Instead, they must be a customs territory with full autonomy in the conduct of their external commercial relations. Thus Hong Kong has been a member since 1995 (as \"Hong Kong, China\" since 1997) predating the People's Republic of China, which joined in 2001 after 15 years of negotiations. The Republic of China (Taiwan) acceded to the WTO in 2002 as \"Separate Customs Territory of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu\" (Chinese Taipei) despite its disputed status. The WTO Secretariat omits the official titles (such as Counselor, First Secretary, Second Secretary and Third Secretary) of the members of Chinese Taipei's Permanent Mission to the WTO, except for the titles of the Permanent Representative and the Deputy Permanent Representative. \n\nAs of 2007, WTO member states represented 96.4% of global trade and 96.7% of global GDP. Iran, followed by Algeria, are the economies with the largest GDP and trade outside the WTO, using 2005 data. With the exception of the Holy See, observers must start accession negotiations within five years of becoming observers. A number of international intergovernmental organizations have also been granted observer status to WTO bodies. 14 UN member states have no official affiliation with the WTO.\n\nAgreements\n\nThe WTO oversees about 60 different agreements which have the status of international legal texts. Member countries must sign and ratify all WTO agreements on accession. A discussion of some of the most important agreements follows. The Agreement on Agriculture came into effect with the establishment of the WTO at the beginning of 1995. The AoA has three central concepts, or \"pillars\": domestic support, market access and export subsidies. The General Agreement on Trade in Services was created to extend the multilateral trading system to service sector, in the same way as the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) provided such a system for merchandise trade. The agreement entered into force in January 1995. The Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights sets down minimum standards for many forms of intellectual property (IP) regulation. It was negotiated at the end of the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in 1994. \n\nThe Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures—also known as the SPS Agreement—was negotiated during the Uruguay Round of GATT, and entered into force with the establishment of the WTO at the beginning of 1995. Under the SPS agreement, the WTO sets constraints on members' policies relating to food safety (bacterial contaminants, pesticides, inspection and labelling) as well as animal and plant health (imported pests and diseases). The Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade is an international treaty of the World Trade Organization. It was negotiated during the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and entered into force with the establishment of the WTO at the end of 1994. The object ensures that technical negotiations and standards, as well as testing and certification procedures, do not create unnecessary obstacles to trade\". The Agreement on Customs Valuation, formally known as the Agreement on Implementation of Article VII of GATT, prescribes methods of customs valuation that Members are to follow. Chiefly, it adopts the \"transaction value\" approach.\n\nIn December 2013, the biggest agreement within the WTO was signed and known as the Bali Package. \n\nOffice of director-general\n\nThe procedures for the appointment of the WTO director-general were published in January 2003. Additionally, there are four deputy directors-general. , under director-general Roberto Azevêdo, the four deputy directors-general are Yi Xiaozhun of China, Karl-Ernst Brauner of Germany, Yonov Frederick Agah of Nigeria and David Shark of the United States. \n\nList of directors-general\n\nSource: Official website \n* Roberto Azevedo, 2013–\n* Pascal Lamy, 2005–13\n* Supachai Panitchpakdi, 2002–05\n* Mike Moore, 1999–2002\n* Renato Ruggiero, 1995–99\n* Peter Sutherland, 1995\n\n(Heads of the precursor organization, GATT):\n* Peter Sutherland, 1993–95\n* Arthur Dunkel, 1980–93\n* Olivier Long, 1968–80\n* Eric Wyndham White, 1948–68\n\nCriticism of the organization", "Seattle is a West Coast seaport city and the seat of King County, Washington. With an estimated 684,451 residents , Seattle is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest region of North America. In July 2013, it was the fastest-growing major city in the United States and remained in the Top 5 in May 2015 with an annual growth rate of 2.1%. The Seattle metropolitan area is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the United States with over 3.7 million inhabitants. The city is situated on an isthmus between Puget Sound (an inlet of the Pacific Ocean) and Lake Washington, about 100 mi south of the Canada–United States border. A major gateway for trade with Asia, Seattle is the third largest port in North America in terms of container handling . \n\nThe Seattle area was previously inhabited by Native Americans for at least 4,000 years before the first permanent European settlers. Arthur A. Denny and his group of travelers, subsequently known as the Denny Party, arrived from Illinois via Portland, Oregon, on the schooner Exact at Alki Point on November 13, 1851. The settlement was moved to the eastern shore of Elliott Bay and named it \"Seattle\" in 1852, after Chief Si'ahl of the local Duwamish and Suquamish tribes.\n\nLogging was Seattle's first major industry, but by the late-19th century, the city had become a commercial and shipbuilding center as a gateway to Alaska during the Klondike Gold Rush. By 1910, Seattle was one of the 25 largest cities in the country. However, the Great Depression severely damaged the city's economy. Growth returned during and after World War II partially due to the local Boeing company, which established Seattle as a center for aircraft manufacturing. The Seattle area developed as a technology center beginning in the 1980s, with companies like Microsoft becoming established in the region. In 1994, Internet retailer Amazon was founded in Seattle. The stream of new software, biotechnology, and Internet companies led to an economic revival, which increased the city's population by almost 50,000 between 1990 and 2000.\n\nSeattle has a noteworthy musical history. From 1918 to 1951, nearly two dozen jazz nightclubs existed along Jackson Street, from the current Chinatown/International District, to the Central District. The jazz scene developed the early careers of Ray Charles, Quincy Jones, Ernestine Anderson, and others. Seattle is also the birthplace of rock musician Jimi Hendrix and the alternative rock subgenre grunge.\n\nHistory\n\nFounding\n\nArchaeological excavations suggest that Native Americans have inhabited the Seattle area for at least 4,000 years. By the time the first European settlers arrived, the people (subsequently called the Duwamish tribe) occupied at least seventeen villages in the areas around Elliott Bay. \n\nThe first European to visit the Seattle area was George Vancouver, in May 1792 during his 1791–95 expedition to chart the Pacific Northwest.\nIn 1851, a large party led by Luther Collins made a location on land at the mouth of the Duwamish River; they formally claimed it on September 14, 1851. Thirteen days later, members of the Collins Party on the way to their claim passed three scouts of the Denny Party. Members of the Denny Party claimed land on Alki Point on September 28, 1851. The rest of the Denny Party set sail from Portland, Oregon and landed on Alki point during a rainstorm on November 13, 1851.\n\nDuwamps 1852–1853\n\nAfter a difficult winter, most of the Denny Party relocated across Elliott Bay and claimed land a second time at the site of present-day Pioneer Square, naming this new settlement Duwamps. Charles Terry and John Low remained at the original landing location and reestablished their old land claim and called it \"New York\", but renamed \"New York Alki\" in April 1853, from a Chinook word meaning, roughly, \"by and by\" or \"someday\". For the next few years, New York Alki and Duwamps competed for dominance, but in time Alki was abandoned and its residents moved across the bay to join the rest of the settlers. \n\nDavid Swinson \"Doc\" Maynard, one of the founders of Duwamps, was the primary advocate to name the settlement after Chief Sealth (\"Seattle\") of the Duwamish and Suquamish tribes.\n Includes bibliography. \n\nIncorporations\n\nThe name \"Seattle\" appears on official Washington Territory papers dated May 23, 1853, when the first plats for the village were filed. In 1855, nominal land settlements were established. On January 14, 1865, the Legislature of Territorial Washington incorporated the Town of Seattle with a board of trustees managing the city. The town of Seattle was disincorporated January 18, 1867 and remained a mere precinct of King County until late 1869, when a new petition was filed and the city was re-incorporated December 2, 1869 with a Mayor-council government. The corporate seal of the City of Seattle carries the date \"1869\" and a likeness of Chief Sealth in left profile. \n\nTimber town\n\nSeattle has a history of boom-and-bust cycles, like many other cities near areas of extensive natural and mineral resources. Seattle has risen several times economically, then gone into precipitous decline, but it has typically used those periods to rebuild solid infrastructure.\n Author has granted blanket permission for material from that paper to be reused in Wikipedia. Now at .\n\nThe first such boom, covering the early years of the city, rode on the lumber industry. (During this period the road now known as Yesler Way won the nickname \"Skid Road\", supposedly after the timber skidding down the hill to Henry Yesler's sawmill. The later dereliction of the area may be a possible origin for the term which later entered the wider American lexicon as Skid Row.)\n\n Like much of the American West, Seattle saw numerous conflicts between labor and management, as well as ethnic tensions that culminated in the anti-Chinese riots of 1885–1886. This violence originated with unemployed whites who were determined to drive the Chinese from Seattle (anti-Chinese riots also occurred in Tacoma). In 1900, Asians were 4.2% of the population. Authorities declared martial law and federal troops arrived to put down the disorder.\n\nSeattle achieved sufficient economic success that when the Great Seattle Fire of 1889 destroyed the central business district, a far grander city-center rapidly emerged in its place.\n\n Finance company Washington Mutual, for example, was founded in the immediate wake of the fire.\n\n However, the Panic of 1893 hit Seattle hard. \n\nGold Rush, World War I, and the Great Depression\n\nThe second and most dramatic boom and bust resulted from the Klondike Gold Rush, which ended the depression that had begun with the Panic of 1893; in a short time, Seattle became a major transportation center. On July 14, 1897, the S.S. Portland docked with its famed \"ton of gold\", and Seattle became the main transport and supply point for the miners in Alaska and the Yukon. Few of those working men found lasting wealth, however; it was Seattle's business of clothing the miners and feeding them salmon that panned out in the long run. Along with Seattle, other cities like Everett, Tacoma, Port Townsend, Bremerton, and Olympia, all in the Puget Sound region, became competitors for exchange, rather than mother lodes for extraction, of precious metals. The boom lasted well into the early part of the 20th century and funded many new Seattle companies and products. In 1907, 19-year-old James E. Casey borrowed $100 from a friend and founded the American Messenger Company (later UPS). Other Seattle companies founded during this period include Nordstrom and Eddie Bauer. Seattle brought in the Olmsted Brothers landscape architecture firm to design a system of parks and boulevards. \n\nThe Gold Rush era culminated in the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition of 1909, which is largely responsible for the layout of today's University of Washington campus.\n\nA shipbuilding boom in the early part of the 20th century became massive during World War I, making Seattle somewhat of a company town; the subsequent retrenchment led to the Seattle General Strike of 1919, the first general strike in the country. A 1912 city development plan by Virgil Bogue went largely unused. Seattle was mildly prosperous in the 1920s but was particularly hard hit in the Great Depression, experiencing some of the country's harshest labor strife in that era. Violence during the Maritime Strike of 1934 cost Seattle much of its maritime traffic, which was rerouted to the Port of Los Angeles. \n\nSeattle was also the home base of impresario Alexander Pantages who, starting in 1902, opened a number of theaters in the city exhibiting vaudeville acts and silent movies. His activities soon expanded, and the thrifty Greek went on and became one of America's greatest theater and movie tycoons. Between Pantages and his rival John Considine, Seattle was for a while the western United States' vaudeville mecca. B. Marcus Priteca, the Scottish-born and Seattle-based architect, built several theaters for Pantages, including some in Seattle. The theaters he built for Pantages in Seattle have been either demolished or converted to other uses, but many other theaters survive in other cities of the U.S., often retaining the Pantages name; Seattle's surviving Paramount Theatre, on which he collaborated, was not a Pantages theater.\n\nPost-war years: aircraft and software\n\nWar work again brought local prosperity during World War II, this time centered on Boeing aircraft. The war dispersed the city's numerous Japanese-American businessmen due to the Japanese American internment. After the war, the local economy dipped. It rose again with Boeing's growing dominance in the commercial airliner market. Seattle celebrated its restored prosperity and made a bid for world recognition with the Century 21 Exposition, the 1962 World's Fair. Another major local economic downturn was in the late 1960s and early 1970s, at a time when Boeing was heavily affected by the oil crises, loss of Government contracts, and costs and delays associated with the Boeing 747. Many people left the area to look for work elsewhere, and two local real estate agents put up a billboard reading \"Will the last person leaving Seattle – Turn out the lights.\" \n\nSeattle remained the corporate headquarters of Boeing until 2001, when the company separated its headquarters from its major production facilities; the headquarters were moved to Chicago. The Seattle area is still home to Boeing's Renton narrow-body plant (where the 707, 720, 727, and 757 were assembled, and the 737 is assembled today) and Everett wide-body plant (assembly plant for the 747, 767, 777, and 787). The company's credit union for employees, BECU, remains based in the Seattle area, though it is now open to all residents of Washington.\n\nAs prosperity began to return in the 1980s, the city was stunned by the Wah Mee massacre in 1983, when 13 people were killed in an illegal gambling club in the International District, Seattle's Chinatown. Beginning with Microsoft's 1979 move from Albuquerque, New Mexico to nearby Bellevue, Washington, Seattle and its suburbs became home to a number of technology companies including Amazon.com, RealNetworks, Nintendo of America, McCaw Cellular (now part of AT&T Mobility), VoiceStream (now T-Mobile), and biomedical corporations such as HeartStream (later purchased by Philips), Heart Technologies (later purchased by Boston Scientific), Physio-Control (later purchased by Medtronic), ZymoGenetics, ICOS (later purchased by Eli Lilly and Company) and Immunex (later purchased by Amgen). This success brought an influx of new residents with a population increase within city limits of almost 50,000 between 1990 and 2000, and saw Seattle's real estate become some of the most expensive in the country. In 1993, the movie Sleepless in Seattle brought the city further national attention. Many of the Seattle area's tech companies remained relatively strong, but the frenzied dot-com boom years ended in early 2001. \n\nSeattle in this period attracted widespread attention as home to these many companies, but also by hosting the 1990 Goodwill Games and the APEC leaders conference in 1993, as well as through the worldwide popularity of grunge, a sound that had developed in Seattle's independent music scene. Another bid for worldwide attention—hosting the World Trade Organization Ministerial Conference of 1999—garnered visibility, but not in the way its sponsors desired, as related protest activity and police reactions to those protests overshadowed the conference itself. The city was further shaken by the Mardi Gras Riots in 2001, and then literally shaken the following day by the Nisqually earthquake. \n\nYet another boom began as the city emerged from the Great Recession. Amazon.com moved its headquarters from North Beacon Hill to South Lake Union and began a rapid expansion. For the five years beginning in 2010, Seattle gained an average of 14,511 residents per year, with the growth strongly skewed toward the center of the city, as unemployment dropped from roughly 9 percent to 3.6 percent. The city has found itself \"bursting at the seams\", with over 45,000 households spending more than half their income on housing and at least 2,800 people homeless, and with the country's sixth-worst rush hour traffic.\n\nGeography\n\nWith a land area of 83.9 square miles (217.3 km²), Seattle is the northernmost city with at least 500,000 people in the United States, farther north than Canadian cities such as Toronto, Ottawa, and Montreal, at about the same latitude as Salzburg, Austria.\n\nThe topography of Seattle is hilly. The city lies on several hills, including Capitol Hill, First Hill, West Seattle, Beacon Hill, Magnolia, Denny Hill, and Queen Anne. The Kitsap and the Olympic peninsulas along with the Olympic mountains lie to the west of Puget Sound, while the Cascade Range and Lake Sammamish lie to the east of Lake Washington. The city has over 5540 acres of parkland.\n\nCityscape\n\nTopography\n\nSeattle is located between the saltwater Puget Sound (an arm of the Pacific Ocean) to the west and Lake Washington to the east. The city's chief harbor, Elliott Bay, is part of Puget Sound, which makes the city an oceanic port. To the west, beyond Puget Sound, are the Kitsap Peninsula and Olympic Mountains on the Olympic Peninsula; to the east, beyond Lake Washington and the eastside suburbs, are Lake Sammamish and the Cascade Range. Lake Washington's waters flow to Puget Sound through the Lake Washington Ship Canal (consisting of two man-made canals, Lake Union, and the Hiram M. Chittenden Locks at Salmon Bay, ending in Shilshole Bay on Puget Sound).\n\nThe sea, rivers, forests, lakes, and fields surrounding Seattle were once rich enough to support one of the world's few sedentary hunter-gatherer societies. The surrounding area lends itself well to sailing, skiing, bicycling, camping, and hiking year-round. \n\nThe city itself is hilly, though not uniformly so. Like Rome, the city is said to lie on seven hills; the lists vary but typically include Capitol Hill, First Hill, West Seattle, Beacon Hill, Queen Anne, Magnolia, and the former Denny Hill. The Wallingford, Mount Baker, and Crown Hill neighborhoods are technically located on hills as well. Many of the hilliest areas are near the city center, with Capitol Hill, First Hill, and Beacon Hill collectively constituting something of a ridge along an isthmus between Elliott Bay and Lake Washington. The break in the ridge between First Hill and Beacon Hill is man-made, the result of two of the many regrading projects that reshaped the topography of the city center. The topography of the city center was also changed by the construction of a seawall and the artificial Harbor Island (completed 1909) at the mouth of the city's industrial Duwamish Waterway, the terminus of the Green River. The highest point within city limits is at High Point in West Seattle, which is roughly located near 35th Ave SW and SW Myrtle St. Other notable hills include Crown Hill, View Ridge/Wedgwood/Bryant, Maple Leaf, Phinney Ridge, Mt. Baker Ridge, and Highlands/Carkeek/Bitterlake.\n\nNorth of the city center, Lake Washington Ship Canal connects Puget Sound to Lake Washington. It incorporates four natural bodies of water: Lake Union, Salmon Bay, Portage Bay, and Union Bay.\n\nDue to its location in the Pacific Ring of Fire, Seattle is in a major earthquake zone. On February 28, 2001, the magnitude 6.8 Nisqually earthquake did significant architectural damage, especially in the Pioneer Square area (built on reclaimed land, as are the Industrial District and part of the city center), but caused only one fatality. \nOther strong quakes occurred on January 26, 1700 (estimated at 9 magnitude), December 14, 1872 (7.3 or 7.4), April 13, 1949 (7.1), and April 29, 1965 (6.5). The 1965 quake caused three deaths in Seattle directly and one more by heart failure. Although the Seattle Fault passes just south of the city center, neither it nor the Cascadia subduction zone has caused an earthquake since the city's founding. The Cascadia subduction zone poses the threat of an earthquake of magnitude 9.0 or greater, capable of seriously damaging the city and collapsing many buildings, especially in zones built on fill. \n\nAccording to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which is land and , water (41.16% of the total area).\n\nClimate\n\nSeattle's climate is classified as oceanic or temperate marine, with cool, wet winters and warm, relatively dry summers. Like much of the Pacific Northwest, according to the Köppen climate classification it has a warm-summer Mediterranean climate (Csb). \nOther climate classification systems, such as Trewartha, place it in the Oceanic zone (Do), like much of Western Europe. The city and environs are part of USDA hardiness zone 8b, with isolated coastal pockets falling under 9a. \n\nHot temperature extremes are enhanced by dry, compressed wind from the west slopes of the Cascades, while cold temperatures are generated mainly from the Fraser Valley in British Columbia. \n\nTemperature extremes are moderated by the adjacent Puget Sound, greater Pacific Ocean, and Lake Washington. The region is largely shielded from Pacific storms by the Olympic Mountains and from Arctic air by the Cascade Range. Despite being on the margin of the rain shadow of the Olympic Mountains, the city has a reputation for frequent rain.\nThis reputation stems from the frequency of light precipitation in the fall, winter, and spring. In an average year, at least of precipitation falls on 150 days, more than nearly all U.S. cities east of the Rocky Mountains. It is cloudy 201 days out of the year and partly cloudy 93 days. Official weather and climatic data is collected at Seattle–Tacoma International Airport, located about 19 km south of downtown in the city of SeaTac, which is at a higher elevation, and records more cloudy days and fewer partly cloudy days per year.\n\nFrom 1981 to 2010, the average annual precipitation measured at Seattle–Tacoma International Airport was 37.49 inches (952 mm). Annual precipitation has ranged from in 1952 to in 1950; for water year (October 1 – September 30) precipitation, the range is in 1976–77 to in 1996–97. Due to local variations in microclimate, Seattle also receives significantly lower precipitation than some other locations west of the Cascades. Around 80 mi to the west, the Hoh Rain Forest in Olympic National Park on the western flank of the Olympic Mountains receives an annual average precipitation of 142 in. Sixty miles (95 km) to the south of Seattle, the state capital Olympia, which is out of the Olympic Mountains' rain shadow, receives an annual average precipitation of 50 in. The city of Bremerton, about 15 mi west of downtown Seattle, receives of precipitation annually.\n\nIn November, Seattle averages more rainfall than any other U.S. city of more than 250,000 people; it also ranks highly in winter precipitation. Conversely, the city receives some of the lowest precipitation amounts of any large city from June to September. Seattle is one of the five rainiest major U.S. cities as measured by the number of days with precipitation, and it receives some of the lowest amounts of annual sunshine among major cities in the lower 48 states, along with some cities in the Northeast, Ohio and Michigan. Thunderstorms are rare, as the city reports thunder on just seven days per year. By comparison, Fort Myers, Florida reports thunder on 93 days per year, Kansas City on 52, and New York City on 25.\n\nSeattle experiences its heaviest rainfall during the months of November, December and January, receiving roughly half of its annual rainfall (by volume) during this period. In late fall and early winter, atmospheric rivers (also known as \"Pineapple Express\" systems), strong frontal systems, and Pacific low pressure systems are common. Light rain & drizzle are the predominant forms of precipitation during the remainder of the year; for instance, on average, less than of rain falls in July and August combined when rain is rare. On occasion, Seattle experiences somewhat more significant weather events. One such event occurred on December 2–4, 2007, when sustained hurricane-force winds and widespread heavy rainfall associated with a strong Pineapple Express event occurred in the greater Puget Sound area and the western parts of Washington and Oregon. Precipitation totals exceeded 350 mm in some areas with winds topping out at 209 km/h along coastal Oregon. It became the second wettest event in Seattle history when a little over 130 mm of rain fell on Seattle in a 24-hour period. Lack of adaptation to the heavy rain contributed to five deaths and widespread flooding and damage. \n\nAutumn, winter, and early spring are frequently characterized by rain. Winters are cool and wet with December, the coolest month, averaging , with 28 annual days with lows that reach the freezing mark, and 2.0 days where the temperature stays at or below freezing all day; the temperature rarely lowers to 20 °F. Summers are sunny, dry and warm, with August, the warmest month, averaging , and with temperatures reaching 90 °F on 3.1 days per year, although 2011 is the most recent year to not reach 90, 2015 had 13days over 90 degrees.  °F. The hottest officially recorded temperature was 103 °F on July 29, 2009; the coldest recorded temperature was 0 °F on January 31, 1950; the record cold daily maximum is 16 °F on January 14, 1950, while, conversely, the record warm daily minimum is 71 °F the day the official record high was set. The average window for freezing temperatures is November 16 through March 10, allowing a growing season of 250 days.\n\nSeattle typically receives some snowfall on an annual basis but heavy snow is rare. Average annual snowfall, as measured at Sea-Tac Airport, is . Single calendar-day snowfall of six inches (15 cm) or greater has occurred on only 15 days since 1948, and only once since February 17, 1990, when of snow officially fell at Sea-Tac airport on January 18, 2012. This moderate snow event was officially the 12th snowiest calendar day at the airport since 1948 and snowiest since November 1985. Much of the city of Seattle proper received somewhat lesser snowfall accumulations. Locations to the south of Seattle received more, with Olympia and Chehalis receiving 14 to. Another moderate snow event occurred from December 12–25, 2008, when over one foot (30 cm) of snow fell and stuck on much of the roads over those two weeks, when temperatures remained below 32 °F, causing widespread difficulties in a city not equipped for clearing snow. The largest documented snowstorm occurred from January 5–9, 1880, with snow drifting to 6 ft in places at the end of the snow event. From January 31 to February 2, 1916, another heavy snow event occurred with 29 in of snow on the ground by the time the event was over. With official records dating to 1948, the largest single-day snowfall is on January 13, 1950. Seasonal snowfall has ranged from zero in 1991–92 to in 1968–69, with trace amounts having occurred as recently as 2009–10. The month of January 1950 was particularly severe, bringing of snow, the most of any month along with the aforementioned record cold.\n\nThe Puget Sound Convergence Zone is an important feature of Seattle's weather. In the convergence zone, air arriving from the north meets air flowing in from the south. Both streams of air originate over the Pacific Ocean; airflow is split by the Olympic Mountains to Seattle's west, then reunited to the east. When the air currents meet, they are forced upward, resulting in convection. Thunderstorms caused by this activity are usually weak and can occur north and south of town, but Seattle itself rarely receives more than occasional thunder and small hail showers. The Hanukkah Eve Wind Storm in December 2006 is an exception that brought heavy rain and winds gusting up to 69 mph, an event that was not caused by the Puget Sound Convergence Zone and was widespread across the Pacific Northwest.\n\nOne of many exceptions to Seattle's reputation as a damp location occurs in El Niño years, when marine weather systems track as far south as California and little precipitation falls in the Puget Sound area. Since the region's water comes from mountain snow packs during the dry summer months, El Niño winters can not only produce substandard skiing but can result in water rationing and a shortage of hydroelectric power the following summer. \n\nDemographics\n\nAccording to the 2010 United States Census, Seattle had a population of 608,660 with a racial and ethnic composition as follows: \n*White: 69.5% (Non-Hispanic Whites: 66.3%)\n*Asian: 13.8% (4.1% Chinese, 2.6% Filipino, 2.2% Vietnamese, 1.3% Japanese, 1.1% Korean, 0.8% Indian, 0.3% Cambodian, 0.3% Laotian, 0.2% Pakistanis, 0.2% Indonesian, 0.2% Thai)\n*Black or African American: 7.9%\n*Hispanic or Latino (of any race): 6.6% (4.1% Mexican, 0.3% Puerto Rican, 0.2% Guatemalan, 0.2% Salvadoran, 0.2% Cuban)\n*American Indian and Alaska Native: 0.8%\n*Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander: 0.4%\n*Other race: 2.4%\n*Two or more races: 5.1%\n\nSeattle's population historically has been predominantly white. The 2010 census showed that Seattle was one of the whitest big cities in the country, although its proportion of white residents has been gradually declining. In 1960, whites comprised 91.6% of the city's population, while in 2010 they comprised 69.5%. According to the 2006–2008 American Community Survey, approximately 78.9% of residents over the age of five spoke only English at home. Those who spoke Asian languages other than Indo-European languages made up 10.2% of the population, Spanish was spoken by 4.5% of the population, speakers of other Indo-European languages made up 3.9%, and speakers of other languages made up 2.5%.\n\nSeattle's foreign-born population grew 40% between the 1990 and 2000 censuses. The Chinese population in the Seattle area has origins in mainland China, Hong Kong, Southeast Asia, and Taiwan. The earliest Chinese-Americans that came in the late 19th and early 20th centuries were almost entirely from Guangdong Province. The Seattle area is also home to a large Vietnamese population of more than 55,000 residents, as well as over 30,000 Somali immigrants. The Seattle-Tacoma area is also home to one of the largest Cambodian communities in the United States, numbering about 19,000 Cambodian Americans, and one of the largest Samoan communities in the mainland U.S., with over 15,000 people having Samoan ancestry. Additionally, the Seattle area had the highest percentage of self-identified mixed-race people of any large metropolitan area in the United States, according to the 2000 United States Census Bureau. According to a 2012 HistoryLink study, Seattle's 98118 ZIP code (in the Columbia City neighborhood) was one of the most diverse ZIP Code Tabulation Areas in the United States.\n\nIn 1999, the median income of a city household was $45,736, and the median income for a family was $62,195. Males had a median income of $40,929 versus $35,134 for females. The per capita income for the city was $30,306. 11.8% of the population and 6.9% of families are below the poverty line. Of people living in poverty, 13.8% are under the age of 18 and 10.2% are 65 or older.\n\nIt is estimated that King County has 8,000 homeless people on any given night, and many of those live in Seattle. In September 2005, King County adopted a \"Ten-Year Plan to End Homelessness\", one of the near-term results of which is a shift of funding from homeless shelter beds to permanent housing.\n\nIn recent years, the city has experienced steady population growth, and has been faced with the issue of accommodating more residents. In 2006, after growing by 4,000 citizens per year for the previous 16 years, regional planners expected the population of Seattle to grow by 200,000 people by 2040. However, former mayor Greg Nickels supported plans that would increase the population by 60%, or 350,000 people, by 2040 and worked on ways to accommodate this growth while keeping Seattle's single-family housing zoning laws. The Seattle City Council later voted to relax height limits on buildings in the greater part of Downtown, partly with the aim to increase residential density in the city centre. As a sign of increasing inner-city growth, the downtown population crested to over 60,000 in 2009, up 77% since 1990. \n\nSeattle also has large lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender populations. According to a 2006 study by UCLA, 12.9% of city residents polled identified as gay, lesbian, or bisexual. This was the second-highest proportion of any major U.S. city, behind San Francisco Greater Seattle also ranked second among major U.S. metropolitan areas, with 6.5% of the population identifying as gay, lesbian, or bisexual. According to 2012 estimates from the United States Census Bureau, Seattle has the highest percentage of same-sex households in the United States, at 2.6 per cent, surpassing San Francisco. \n\nIn addition, Seattle has a relatively high number of people living alone. According to the 2000 U.S. Census interim measurements of 2004, Seattle has the fifth highest proportion of single-person households nationwide among cities of 100,000 or more residents, at 40.8%. \n\nEconomy\n\nSeattle's economy is driven by a mix of older industrial companies, and \"new economy\" Internet and technology companies, service, design and clean technology companies. The city's gross metropolitan product was $231 billion in 2010, making it the 11th largest metropolitan economy in the United States. The Port of Seattle, which also operates Seattle–Tacoma International Airport, is a major gateway for trade with Asia and cruises to Alaska, and is the 8th largest port in the United States in terms of container capacity. Though it was affected by the Great Recession, Seattle has retained a comparatively strong economy, and remains a hotbed for start-up businesses, especially in green building and clean technologies: it was ranked as America's No. 1 \"smarter city\" based on its government policies and green economy. In February 2010, the city government committed Seattle to becoming North America's first \"climate neutral\" city, with a goal of reaching zero net per capita greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. \n\nStill, very large companies dominate the business landscape. Four companies on the 2013 Fortune 500 list of the United States' largest companies, based on total revenue, are headquartered in Seattle: Internet retailer Amazon.com (#49), coffee chain Starbucks (#208), department store Nordstrom (#227), and freight forwarder Expeditors International of Washington (#428). Other Fortune 500 companies popularly associated with Seattle are based in nearby Puget Sound cities. Warehouse club chain Costco (#22), the largest retail company in Washington, is based in Issaquah. Microsoft (#35) is located in Redmond. Weyerhaeuser, the forest products company (#363), is based in Federal Way. Finally, Bellevue is home to truck manufacturer Paccar (#168). Other major companies in the area include Nintendo of America in Redmond, T-Mobile US in Bellevue, Expedia Inc. in Bellevue and Providence Health & Services — the state's largest health care system and fifth largest employer — in Renton. The city has a reputation for heavy coffee consumption; coffee companies founded or based in Seattle include Starbucks, Seattle's Best Coffee, and Tully's. There are also many successful independent artisanal espresso roasters and cafés.\n\nPrior to moving its headquarters to Chicago, aerospace manufacturer Boeing (#30) was the largest company based in Seattle. Its largest division is still headquartered in nearby Renton, and the company has large aircraft manufacturing plants in Everett and Renton, so it remains the largest private employer in the Seattle metropolitan area. Former Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels announced a desire to spark a new economic boom driven by the biotechnology industry in 2006. Major redevelopment of the South Lake Union neighborhood is underway, in an effort to attract new and established biotech companies to the city, joining biotech companies Corixa (acquired by GlaxoSmithKline), Immunex (now part of Amgen), Trubion, and ZymoGenetics. Vulcan Inc., the holding company of billionaire Paul Allen, is behind most of the development projects in the region. While some see the new development as an economic boon, others have criticized Nickels and the Seattle City Council for pandering to Allen's interests at taxpayers' expense. Also in 2006, Expansion Magazine ranked Seattle among the top 10 metropolitan areas in the nation for climates favorable to business expansion. In 2005, Forbes ranked Seattle as the most expensive American city for buying a house based on the local income levels. In 2013, however, the magazine ranked Seattle No. 9 on its list of the Best Places for Business and Careers. \n\nAlaska Airlines, operating a hub at Seattle–Tacoma International Airport, maintains its headquarters in the city of SeaTac, next to the airport. \n\nSeattle is a hub for global health with the headquarters of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, PATH, Infectious Disease Research Institute, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. In 2015, the Washington Global Health Alliance counted 168 global health organizations in Washington state, many are headquartered in Seattle. \n\nCulture\n\nNicknames\n\nFrom 1869 until 1982, Seattle was known as the \"Queen City\". Seattle's current official nickname is the \"Emerald City\", the result of a contest held in 1981; the reference is to the lush evergreen forests of the area. Seattle is also referred to informally as the \"Gateway to Alaska\" for being the nearest major city in the contiguous US to Alaska, \"Rain City\" for its frequent cloudy and rainy weather, and \"Jet City\" from the local influence of Boeing. The city has two official slogans or mottos: \"The City of Flowers\", meant to encourage the planting of flowers to beautify the city, and \"The City of Goodwill\", adopted prior to the 1990 Goodwill Games. Seattle residents are known as Seattleites.\n\nPerforming arts\n\nSeattle has been a regional center for the performing arts for many years. The century-old Seattle Symphony Orchestra is among the world's most recorded and performs primarily at Benaroya Hall. The Seattle Opera and Pacific Northwest Ballet, which perform at McCaw Hall (opened 2003 on the site of the former Seattle Opera House at Seattle Center), are comparably distinguished, with the Opera being particularly known for its performances of the works of Richard Wagner and the PNB School (founded in 1974) ranking as one of the top three ballet training institutions in the United States. The Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestras (SYSO) is the largest symphonic youth organization in the United States. The city also boasts lauded summer and winter chamber music festivals organized by the Seattle Chamber Music Society. \n\nThe 5th Avenue Theatre, built in 1926, stages Broadway-style musical shows featuring both local talent and international stars.Examples of local talent are Billy Joe Huels (lead singer of the Dusty 45s) starring in Buddy – The Buddy Holly Story and Sarah Rudinoff in Wonderful Town. National-level stars include Stephen Lynch in The Wedding Singer, which went on to Broadway and Cathy Rigby in Peter Pan\n Seattle has \"around 100\" theatrical production companies \"around 100 theater companies ... Twenty-eight have some sort of Actors' Equity contract ...\" and over two dozen live theatre venues, many of them associated with fringe theatre; Seattle is probably second only to New York for number of equity theaters (28 Seattle theater companies have some sort of Actors' Equity contract).\nIn addition, the 900-seat Romanesque Revival Town Hall on First Hill hosts numerous cultural events, especially lectures and recitals. \n\nBetween 1918 and 1951, there were nearly two dozen jazz nightclubs along Jackson Street, running from the current Chinatown/International District to the Central District. The jazz scene developed the early careers of Ray Charles, Quincy Jones, Bumps Blackwell, Ernestine Anderson, and others.\n\nEarly popular musical acts from the Seattle/Puget Sound area include the collegiate folk group The Brothers Four, vocal group The Fleetwoods, 1960s garage rockers The Wailers and The Sonics, and instrumental surf group The Ventures, some of whom are still active.\n\nSeattle is considered the home of grunge music, having produced artists such as Nirvana, Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam, and Mudhoney, all of whom reached international audiences in the early 1990s. The city is also home to such varied artists as avant-garde jazz musicians Bill Frisell and Wayne Horvitz, hot jazz musician Glenn Crytzer, hip hop artists Sir Mix-a-Lot, Macklemore, Blue Scholars, and Shabazz Palaces, smooth jazz saxophonist Kenny G, classic rock staples Heart and Queensrÿche, and alternative rock bands such as Foo Fighters, Harvey Danger, The Presidents of the United States of America, The Posies, Modest Mouse, Band of Horses, Death Cab for Cutie, and Fleet Foxes. Rock musicians such as Jimi Hendrix, Duff McKagan, and Nikki Sixx spent their formative years in Seattle.\n\nThe Seattle-based Sub Pop record company continues to be one of the world's best-known independent/alternative music labels.\n\nOver the years, a number of songs have been written about Seattle.\n\nSeattle annually sends a team of spoken word slammers to the National Poetry Slam and considers itself home to such performance poets as Buddy Wakefield, two-time Individual World Poetry Slam Champ; Anis Mojgani, two-time National Poetry Slam Champ; and Danny Sherrard, 2007 National Poetry Slam Champ and 2008 Individual World Poetry Slam Champ. Seattle also hosted the 2001 national Poetry Slam Tournament. The Seattle Poetry Festival is a biennial poetry festival that (launched first as the Poetry Circus in 1997) has featured local, regional, national, and international names in poetry. \n\nThe city also has movie houses showing both Hollywood productions and works by independent filmmakers. Among these, the Seattle Cinerama stands out as one of only three movie theaters in the world still capable of showing three-panel Cinerama films. \n\nTourism\n\nAmong Seattle's prominent annual fairs and festivals are the 24-day Seattle International Film Festival, Northwest Folklife over the Memorial Day weekend, numerous Seafair events throughout July and August (ranging from a Bon Odori celebration to the Seafair Cup hydroplane races), the Bite of Seattle, one of the largest Gay Pride festivals in the United States, and the art and music festival Bumbershoot, which programs music as well as other art and entertainment over the Labor Day weekend. All are typically attended by 100,000 people annually, as are the Seattle Hempfest and two separate Independence Day celebrations. \n\nOther significant events include numerous Native American pow-wows, a Greek Festival hosted by St. Demetrios Greek Orthodox Church in Montlake, and numerous ethnic festivals (many associated with Festál at Seattle Center). \n\nThere are other annual events, ranging from the Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair & Book Arts Show; an anime convention, Sakura-Con; Penny Arcade Expo, a gaming convention; a two-day, 9,000-rider Seattle to Portland Bicycle Classic; and specialized film festivals, such as the Maelstrom International Fantastic Film Festival, the Seattle Asian American Film Festival (formerly known as the Northwest Asian American Film Festival), Children's Film Festival Seattle, Translation: the Seattle Transgender Film Festival, the Seattle Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, and the Seattle Polish Film Festival. \n\nThe Henry Art Gallery opened in 1927, the first public art museum in Washington. The Seattle Art Museum (SAM) opened in 1933; SAM opened a museum downtown in 1991 (expanded and reopened 2007); since 1991, the 1933 building has been SAM's Seattle Asian Art Museum (SAAM). SAM also operates the Olympic Sculpture Park (opened 2007) on the waterfront north of the downtown piers. The Frye Art Museum is a free museum on First Hill.\n\nRegional history collections are at the Loghouse Museum in Alki, Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park, the Museum of History and Industry, and the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture. Industry collections are at the Center for Wooden Boats and the adjacent Northwest Seaport, the Seattle Metropolitan Police Museum, and the Museum of Flight. Regional ethnic collections include the Nordic Heritage Museum, the Wing Luke Asian Museum, and the Northwest African American Museum. Seattle has artist-run galleries, including ten-year veteran Soil Art Gallery, and the newer Crawl Space Gallery. \n\nThe Seattle Great Wheel, one of the largest Ferris wheels in the US, opened in June 2012 as a new, permanent attraction on the city's waterfront, at Pier 57, next to Downtown Seattle. The city also has many community centers for recreation, including Rainier Beach, Van Asselt, Rainier, and Jefferson south of the Ship Canal and Green Lake, Laurelhurst, Loyal Heights north of the Canal, and Meadowbrook. \n\nWoodland Park Zoo opened as a private menagerie in 1889 but was sold to the city in 1899. The Seattle Aquarium has been open on the downtown waterfront since 1977 (undergoing a renovation 2006). The Seattle Underground Tour is an exhibit of places that existed before the Great Fire. \n\nSince the middle 1990s, Seattle has experienced significant growth in the cruise industry, especially as a departure point for Alaska cruises. In 2008, a record total of 886,039 cruise passengers passed through the city, surpassing the number for Vancouver, BC, the other major departure point for Alaska cruises. \n\nProfessional sports\n\nSeattle has three major men's professional sports teams: the National Football League (NFL)'s Seattle Seahawks, Major League Baseball (MLB)'s Seattle Mariners, and Major League Soccer (MLS)'s Seattle Sounders FC. Other professional sports teams include the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA)'s Seattle Storm, who won the WNBA championship in 2004 and 2010, and the Seattle Reign of the National Women's Soccer League.\n\nThe Seahawks' CenturyLink Field has hosted NFL playoff games in 2006, 2008, 2011, 2014 and 2015. The Seahawks have advanced to the Super Bowl three times: 2005, 2013 and 2014. They defeated the Denver Broncos 43-8 to win their first Super Bowl championship in Super Bowl XLVIII, but lost 24-28 against the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XLIX.\nSeattle Sounders FC has played in Major League Soccer since 2009, sharing CenturyLink Field with the Seahawks, as a continuation of earlier teams in the lower divisions of American soccer. The Sounders have not won the MLS Cup but have, however, won the MLS Supporters' Shield in 2014 and the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup on four occasions: 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2014. \n\nSeattle's professional sports history began at the start of the 20th century with the PCHA's Seattle Metropolitans, which in 1917 became the first American hockey team to win the Stanley Cup. \nSeattle was also home to a previous Major League Baseball franchise in 1969: the Seattle Pilots. The Pilots relocated to Milwaukee, Wisconsin and became the Milwaukee Brewers for the 1970 season.\nFrom 1967 to 2008 Seattle was also home to an National Basketball Association (NBA) franchise: the Seattle SuperSonics, who were the 1978–79 NBA champions. The SuperSonics relocated to Oklahoma City and became the Oklahoma City Thunder for the 2008–09 season. \n\nThe Major League Baseball All-Star Game was held in Seattle twice, first at the Kingdome in 1979 and again at Safeco Field in 2001. That same year, the Seattle Mariners tied the all-time single regular season wins record with 116 wins. The NBA All-Star Game was also held in Seattle twice: the first in 1974 at the Seattle Center Coliseum and the second in 1987 at the Kingdome. \n\nThe Seattle Thunderbirds hockey team plays in the Canadian major-junior Western Hockey League and are based in the Seattle suburb of Kent. \nSeattle also boasts a strong history in collegiate sports. The University of Washington and Seattle University are NCAA Division I schools. The University of Washington's athletic program, nicknamed the Huskies, competes in the Pac-12 Conference, and Seattle University's athletic program, nicknamed the Redhawks, competes in the Western Athletic Conference.\n\nParks and recreation\n\nSeattle's mild, temperate, marine climate allows year-round outdoor recreation, including walking, cycling, hiking, skiing, snowboarding, kayaking, rock climbing, motor boating, sailing, team sports, and swimming. \n\nIn town, many people walk around Green Lake, through the forests and along the bluffs and beaches of 535 acre Discovery Park (the largest park in the city) in Magnolia, along the shores of Myrtle Edwards Park on the Downtown waterfront, along the shoreline of Lake Washington at Seward Park, along Alki Beach in West Seattle, or along the Burke-Gilman Trail.\n\nGas Works Park features the majestic preserved superstructure of a coal gasification plant closed in 1956. Located across Lake Union from downtown, the park provides panoramic views of the Seattle skyline.\n\nAlso popular are hikes and skiing in the nearby Cascade or Olympic Mountains and kayaking and sailing in the waters of Puget Sound, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and the Strait of Georgia. In 2005, Men's Fitness magazine named Seattle the fittest city in the United States.\n\nIn its 2013 ParkScore ranking, the Trust for Public Land reported that Seattle had the tenth best park system among the 50 most populous US cities. ParkScore ranks city park systems by a formula that analyzes acreage, access, and service and investment.\n\nGovernment and politics\n\nSeattle is a charter city, with a Mayor–Council form of government. From 1911 to 2013, Seattle's nine city councillors were elected at large, rather than by geographic subdivisions. For the 2015 election, this changed to a hybrid system of seven district members and two at large members as a result of a ballot measure passed on November 5, 2013. The only other elected offices are the city attorney and Municipal Court judges. All city offices are technically non-partisan. \n\nLike most parts of the United States, government and laws are also run by a series of ballot initiatives (allowing citizens to pass or reject laws), referenda (allowing citizens to approve or reject legislation already passed), and propositions (allowing specific government agencies to propose new laws/tax increases directly to the people). Federally, Seattle is part of Washington's 7th congressional district, represented by Democrat Jim McDermott, elected in 1988 and one of Congress's liberal members. Ed Murray is currently serving as mayor.\n\nSeattle's political culture is very liberal and progressive for the United States, with over 80% of the population voting for the Democratic Party. All precincts in Seattle voted for Democratic Party candidate Barack Obama in the 2012 presidential election. In partisan elections for the Washington State Legislature and United States Congress, nearly all elections are won by Democrats. Seattle is considered the first major American city to elect a female mayor, Bertha Knight Landes. It has also elected an openly gay mayor, Ed Murray, and a socialist councillor, Kshama Sawant. For the first time in United States history, an openly gay black woman was elected to public office when Sherry Harris was elected as a Seattle city councillor in 1991. The majority of the current city council is female, while white men comprise a minority. \n\nSeattle is widely considered one of the most liberal cities in the United States, even surpassing its neighbor, Portland, Oregon. Support for issues such as same-sex marriage and reproductive rights are largely taken for granted in local politics. In the 2012 U.S. general election, an overwhelming majority of Seattleites voted to approve Referendum 74 and legalize gay marriage in Washington state. In the same election, an overwhelming majority of Seattleites also voted to approve the legalization of the recreational use of cannabis in the state. Like much of the Pacific Northwest (which has the lowest rate of church attendance in the United States and consistently reports the highest percentage of atheism ), church attendance, religious belief, and political influence of religious leaders are much lower than in other parts of America. \n\nSeattle also has a thriving alternative press, with the Web-based daily Seattle Post-Intelligencer, several other online dailies (including Publicola and Crosscut), The Stranger (an alternative, left-leaning weekly), Seattle Weekly, and a number of issue-focused publications, including the nation's two largest online environmental magazines, Worldchanging and Grist.org.\n\nIn July 2012, Seattle banned plastic shopping bags. In June 2014 the city passed a local ordinance to increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour on a staged basis from 2015 to 2021. When fully implemented the $15 hourly rate will be the highest minimum wage in the nation. \n\nOn October 6, 2014, Seattle officially replaced Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples' Day, honoring Seattle's Native American community and controversies surrounding the legacy of Christopher Columbus. \n\nEducation\n\nOf the city's population over the age of 25, 53.8% (vs. a national average of 27.4%) hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and 91.9% (vs. 84.5% nationally) have a high school diploma or equivalent. A 2008 United States Census Bureau survey showed that Seattle had the highest percentage of college and university graduates of any major U.S. city. The city was listed as the most literate of the country's 69 largest cities in 2005 and 2006, the second most literate in 2007 and the most literate in 2008 in studies conducted by Central Connecticut State University. \n\nSeattle Public Schools desegregated without a court order but continue to struggle to achieve racial balance in a somewhat ethnically divided city (the south part of town having more ethnic minorities than the north). In 2007, Seattle's racial tie-breaking system was struck down by the United States Supreme Court, but the ruling left the door open for desegregation formulae based on other indicators (e.g., income or socioeconomic class). \n\nThe public school system is supplemented by a moderate number of private schools: five of the private high schools are Catholic, one is Lutheran, and six are secular. \n\nSeattle is home to the University of Washington, as well as the institution's professional and continuing education unit, the University of Washington Educational Outreach. A study by Newsweek International in 2006 cited the University of Washington as the twenty-second best university in the world. Seattle also has a number of smaller private universities including Seattle University and Seattle Pacific University, the former a Jesuit Catholic institution, the latter Free Methodist; universities aimed at the working adult, like City University and Antioch University; colleges within the Seattle Colleges District system, comprising North, Central, and South; seminaries, including Western Seminary and a number of arts colleges, such as Cornish College of the Arts, Pratt Fine Arts Center, and The Art Institute of Seattle. In 2001, Time magazine selected Seattle Central Community College as community college of the year, stating the school \"pushes diverse students to work together in small teams\". \n\nMedia\n\n, Seattle has one major daily newspaper, The Seattle Times. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, known as the P-I, published a daily newspaper from 1863 to March 17, 2009, before switching to a strictly on-line publication. There is also the Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce, and the University of Washington publishes The Daily, a student-run publication, when school is in session. The most prominent weeklies are the Seattle Weekly and The Stranger; both consider themselves \"alternative\" papers. The weekly LGBT newspaper is the Seattle Gay News. Real Change is a weekly street newspaper that is sold mainly by homeless persons as an alternative to panhandling. There are also several ethnic newspapers, including the The Facts, Northwest Asian Weekly and the International Examiner, and numerous neighborhood newspapers.\n\nSeattle is also well served by television and radio, with all major U.S. networks represented, along with at least five other English-language stations and two Spanish-language stations. Seattle cable viewers also receive CBUT 2 (CBC) from Vancouver, British Columbia.\n\nNon-commercial radio stations include NPR affiliates KUOW-FM 94.9 and KPLU-FM 88.5 (Tacoma), as well as classical music station KING-FM 98.1. Other stations include KEXP-FM 90.3 (affiliated with the UW), community radio KBCS-FM 91.3 (affiliated with Bellevue College), and high school radio KNHC-FM 89.5, which broadcasts an electronic dance music radio format and is owned by the public school system and operated by students of Nathan Hale High School. Many Seattle radio stations are also available through Internet radio, with KEXP in particular being a pioneer of Internet radio. Seattle also has numerous commercial radio stations. In a March 2012 report by the consumer research firm Arbitron, the top FM stations were KRWM (adult contemporary format), KIRO-FM (news/talk), and KISW (active rock) while the top AM stations were KOMO (AM) (all news), KJR (AM) (all sports), KIRO (AM) (all sports). \n\nSeattle-based online magazines Worldchanging and Grist.org were two of the \"Top Green Websites\" in 2007 according to TIME. \n\nSeattle also has many online news media websites. The two largest are The Seattle Times and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.\n\nInfrastructure\n\nHealth systems\n\nThe University of Washington is consistently ranked among the country's top leading institutions in medical research, earning special merits for programs in neurology and neurosurgery. Seattle has seen local developments of modern paramedic services with the establishment of Medic One in 1970. In 1974, a 60 Minutes story on the success of the then four-year-old Medic One paramedic system called Seattle \"the best place in the world to have a heart attack\". \n\nThree of Seattle's largest medical centers are located on First Hill. Harborview Medical Center, the public county hospital, is the only Level I trauma hospital in a region that includes Washington, Alaska, Montana, and Idaho. Virginia Mason Medical Center and Swedish Medical Center's two largest campuses are also located in this part of Seattle, including the Virginia Mason Hospital. This concentration of hospitals resulted in the neighborhood's nickname \"Pill Hill\". \n\nLocated in the Laurelhurst neighborhood, Seattle Children's, formerly Children's Hospital and Regional Medical Center, is the pediatric referral center for Washington, Alaska, Montana, and Idaho. The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center has a campus in the Eastlake neighborhood. The University District is home to the University of Washington Medical Center which, along with Harborview, is operated by the University of Washington. Seattle is also served by a Veterans Affairs hospital on Beacon Hill, a third campus of Swedish in Ballard, and Northwest Hospital and Medical Center near Northgate Mall.\n\nTransportation\n\nThe first streetcars appeared in 1889 and were instrumental in the creation of a relatively well-defined downtown and strong neighborhoods at the end of their lines. The advent of the automobile sounded the death knell for rail in Seattle. Tacoma–Seattle railway service ended in 1929 and the Everett–Seattle service came to an end in 1939, replaced by inexpensive automobiles running on the recently developed highway system. Rails on city streets were paved over or removed, and the opening of the Seattle trolleybus system brought the end of streetcars in Seattle in 1941. This left an extensive network of privately owned buses (later public) as the only mass transit within the city and throughout the region.\n\nKing County Metro provides frequent stop bus service within the city and surrounding county, as well as a South Lake Union Streetcar line between the South Lake Union neighborhood and Westlake Center in downtown. Seattle is one of the few cities in North America whose bus fleet includes electric trolleybuses. Sound Transit currently provides an express bus service within the metropolitan area, two Sounder commuter rail lines between the suburbs and downtown, and its Central Link light rail line between the University of Washington and Sea-Tac Airport. Washington State Ferries, which manages the largest network of ferries in the United States and third largest in the world, connects Seattle to Bainbridge and Vashon Islands in Puget Sound and to Bremerton and Southworth on the Kitsap Peninsula.\n\nAccording to the 2007 American Community Survey, 18.6% of Seattle residents used one of the three public transit systems that serve the city, giving it the highest transit ridership of all major cities without heavy or light rail prior to the completion of Sound Transit's Central Link line. The city has also been described by Bert Sperling as the fourth most walkable U.S. city and by Walk Score as the sixth most walkable of the fifty largest U.S. cities. \n\nSeattle–Tacoma International Airport, locally known as Sea-Tac Airport and located just south in the neighboring city of SeaTac, is operated by the Port of Seattle and provides commercial air service to destinations throughout the world. Closer to downtown, Boeing Field is used for general aviation, cargo flights, and testing/delivery of Boeing airliners.\n\nThe main mode of transportation, however, relies on Seattle's streets, which are laid out in a cardinal directions grid pattern, except in the central business district where early city leaders Arthur Denny and Carson Boren insisted on orienting their plats relative to the shoreline rather than to true North. Only two roads, Interstate 5 and State Route 99 (both limited-access highways), run uninterrupted through the city from north to south. State Route 99 runs through downtown Seattle on the Alaskan Way Viaduct, which was built in 1953. However, due to damage sustained during the 2001 Nisqually earthquake the viaduct will be replaced by a tunnel. The 2 mi Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement tunnel was originally scheduled to be completed in December 2015 at a cost of US$4.25 billion. Unfortunately, due to issues with the worlds largest tunnel boring machine (TBM), which is nicknamed \"Bertha\" and is 57 ft in diameter, the projected date of completion has been pushed back to 2017. Seattle has the 8th worst traffic congestion of all American cities, and is 10th among all North American cities. \n\nThe city has started moving away from the automobile and towards mass transit. From 2004 to 2009, the annual number of unlinked public transportation trips increased by approximately 21%. In 2006, voters in King County passed proposition 2 (Transit Now) which increased bus service hours on high ridership routes and paid for five bus rapid transit lines called RapidRide. After rejecting a roads and transit measure in 2007, Seattle-area voters passed a transit only measure in 2008 to increase ST Express bus service, extend the Link Light Rail system, and expand and improve Sounder commuter rail service. A light rail line from downtown heading south to Sea-Tac Airport began service on December 19, 2009, giving the city its first rapid transit line with intermediate stations within the city limits. An extension north to the University of Washington opened on March 19, 2016; and further extensions are planned to reach Lynnwood to the north, Des Moines to the south, and Bellevue and Redmond to the east by 2023. Former mayor Michael McGinn has supported building light rail from downtown to Ballard and West Seattle. \n\nUtilities\n\nWater and electric power are municipal services, provided by Seattle Public Utilities and Seattle City Light respectively. Other utility companies serving Seattle include Puget Sound Energy (natural gas, electricity); Seattle Steam Company (steam); Waste Management, Inc and CleanScapes, Inc. (curbside recycling and solid waste removal); and CenturyLink, Frontier Communications and Comcast (telecommunications and television).\n\nAbout 90% of Seattle's electricity is produced using hydropower. Less than 2% of electricity is produced using fossil fuels. \n\nNotable people\n\nSister cities\n\nSeattle is partnered with: \n\n* Beersheba, Israel (since 1977) \n* Bergen, Norway (since 1967)\n* Cebu, Philippines (since 1991)\n* Chongqing, China (since 1983)\n* Christchurch, New Zealand (since 1981)\n* Daejeon, South Korea (since 1989)\n* Galway, Ireland (since 1986)\n* Gdynia, Poland (since 1993)\n* Haiphong, Vietnam (since 1996)\n* Kaohsiung, Taiwan (since 1991)\n* Kobe, Japan (since 1957) \n* Limbe, Cameroon (since 1984)\n* Mazatlán, Mexico (since 1979)\n* Mombasa, Kenya (since 1981)\n* Nantes, France (since 1980)\n* Pécs, Hungary (since 1991)\n* Perugia, Italy (since 1993)\n* Reykjavík, Iceland (since 1986)\n* Sihanoukville, Cambodia (since 1999)\n* Surabaya, Indonesia (since 1992)\n* Tashkent, Uzbekistan (since 1973)" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Qualcomm_Stadium.txt", "NFL_on_CBS.txt" ], "title": [ "Qualcomm Stadium", "NFL on CBS" ], "wiki_context": [ "Qualcomm Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in San Diego, California, United States. The stadium opened in 1967 as San Diego Stadium and was later known for many years as Jack Murphy Stadium. Since 1997, the stadium's naming rights are owned by Qualcomm, a San Diego-based telecommunications equipment company.\n\nIt is the current home of the San Diego Chargers of the National Football League (NFL) and the San Diego State Aztecs football team from San Diego State University. Two college football bowl games, the Holiday Bowl and Poinsettia Bowl, are held in the stadium every December. The San Diego Padres of Major League Baseball (MLB) played home games at the stadium from their founding in 1969 through the 2003 season, after which they moved to Petco Park. \n\nThe stadium has hosted three Super Bowl games: Super Bowl XXII in 1988, Super Bowl XXXII in 1998, and Super Bowl XXXVII in 2003. It has also hosted the 1978 and 1992 Major League Baseball All-Star Games, as well as games of the 1996 and 1998 National League Division Series, the 1984 and 1998 National League Championship Series, and the 1984 and 1998 World Series. It is the only stadium ever to host both the Super Bowl and the World Series in the same year (1998) and is one of three stadiums to host the World Series, MLB All-Star Game, and Super Bowl, along with the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome in Minneapolis and Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.\n\nQualcomm Stadium is located immediately northwest of the interchange of Interstate 8 and Interstate 15. The neighborhood surrounding the stadium is known as Mission Valley, in reference to the Mission San Diego de Alcalá, which is located to the east, and its placement in the valley of the San Diego River. The stadium is served by the Qualcomm Stadium station of the San Diego Trolley, accessible via the Green Line running toward Downtown San Diego to the west, and Santee to the east.\n\nHistory\n\nIn the early 1960s, local sportswriter Jack Murphy, the brother of New York Mets broadcaster Bob Murphy, began to build up support for a multi-purpose stadium for San Diego. In November 1965, a $27 million bond was passed allowing construction to begin on a stadium, which was designed in the Brutalist style. Construction on the stadium began one month later. When completed, the facility was named San Diego Stadium.\n\nThe Chargers (then a member of the American Football League) played the first game ever at the stadium on August 20, 1967. San Diego Stadium had a capacity of around 50,000; the three-tier grandstand was in the shape of a horseshoe, with the east end low (consisting of only one tier, partially topped by a large scoreboard). The Chargers were the main tenant of the stadium until 1968, when the AAA Pacific Coast League San Diego Padres baseball team played its last season in the stadium, following their move from the minor league sized Westgate Park. Due to expansion of Major League Baseball, this team was replaced by the current San Diego Padres major-league team beginning in the 1969 season. (The Padres moved out of Qualcomm Stadium following the 2003 season.) The original scoreboard, a black-and-white scoreboard created by All American Scoreboards, was replaced in 1978 by one manufactured by American Sign and Indicator, which was the first full-color outdoor scoreboard ever built. This was replaced in 1987 by a White Way Sign scoreboard, in which the video screen is surrounded almost entirely by three messageboards. The original video board was replaced in 1996 by a Sony JumboTron, with a second JumboTron installed behind the opposite end zone (home plate in the stadium's baseball configuration).\n\nAfter Jack Murphy's passing in September 1980, San Diego Stadium was renamed San Diego–Jack Murphy Stadium by a 6–2 vote of the San Diego City Council on January 6, 1981. In 1983, over 9,000 bleachers were added to the lower deck on the open end of the stadium raising the capacity to 59,022. The most substantial addition was completed in 1997, when the stadium was fully enclosed, with the exception of where the scoreboard is located. Nearly 11,000 seats were added in readiness for Super Bowl XXXII in 1998, bringing the capacity to 70,561. Also in 1997, the facility was renamed Qualcomm Stadium after Qualcomm Corporation paid $18 million for the naming rights. The naming rights will belong to Qualcomm until 2017. In order to continue to honor Murphy, the city named the stadium site Jack Murphy Field. However, as part of the naming agreement Jack Murphy Field was not allowed to be used alongside Qualcomm Stadium. Some San Diegans, however, still refer to the stadium as \"Jack Murphy\" or simply \"The Murph\". Before his death in 2004, Bob Murphy still referred to it as Jack Murphy Stadium during New York Mets broadcasts, even after it was renamed. The stadium was temporarily renamed \"Snapdragon Stadium\" for 10 days in December 2011 as a marketing tie in for Qualcomm's Snapdragon brand. The legality of the temporary name change was challenged at the time, since it was agreed to unilaterally by San Diego's mayor, without approval from the City Council and against the advice of the City Attorney. \n\nThe stadium was the first of the square-circle \"octorad\" style, which was thought to be an improvement over the other cookie cutter stadiums of the time for hosting both football and baseball (the second and last of this style was the since-imploded Veterans Stadium). Despite the theoretical improvements of this style, most of the seats were still very far away from the action on the field, especially during baseball games. It is one of the few \"cookie-cutter\" stadiums to still remain active, along with Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium.\n\nSuper Bowls\n\nConfigurations\n\nIn order to accommodate the dimensions of both football and baseball fields, the stadium was constructed with half of the lower (Field Level) level seating built of permanent concrete (in the southern quadrant of the stadium), and the other half of portable modular construction using aluminum or steel framing.\n\nWhen the stadium was configured for baseball, the portable sections would be placed in the western quadrant of the stadium along the third base-left field side. Open bullpens were located along both foul lines just beyond the ends of the Field-level seats.\n\nIn the football configuration, the portable seating sections are placed in the northern quadrant of the stadium (covering what is used as left field in the baseball configuration) to allow for the football field to be laid out east–west (along the first base/right field foul line, with the western end zone placed in the area occupied by the portable seating sections in the baseball configuration, and the eastern end zone along the right-center field wall).\n\nDoorways are cut in the walls of the stadium in order to allow access to these seats from the tunnel below the Plaza level in both configurations (in baseball configuration, the football doors could be seen above the left field inner wall; in football configuration, the baseball doors are visible above the west end zone, opposite the scoreboard). These doors are rolling metal overhead doors, with the field side painted to match the surrounding walls facing the field.\n\nSeating capacity\n\nThe seating capacity for baseball was as follows:\n* 50,000 (1967–1972) \n* 44,790 (1973)\n* 47,634 (1974–1975)\n* 47,491 (1976)\n* 48,460 (1977–1978)\n* 51,362 (1979)\n* 48,443 (1980)\n* 51,362 (1981–1982)\n* 51,319 (1983)\n* 58,671 (1984)\n* 58,396 (1985) \n* 58,433 (1986–1988)\n* 59,022 (1989–1990)\n* 59,254 (1991)\n* 59,700 (1992)\n* 59,411 (1993) \n* 46,510 (1994)\n* 47,750 (1995) \n* 49,639 (1996) \n* 59,771 (1997)\n* 67,544 (1998)\n* 66,307 (1999–2002)\n* 63,890 (2003)\n\nThe seating capacity for football has been as follows:\n* 52,596 (1967–1983) \n* 60,100 (1984) \n* 60,750 (1985–1991) \n* 60,836 (1992–1996) \n* 71,350 (1997–1998) \n* 70,561 (1999–present) \n\nTenants\n\nThe Padres\n\nFrom their inception in 1969 until the end of 2003, when they moved into Petco Park in the downtown area, the National League's San Diego Padres called the stadium home.\n\nThe baseball field dimensions had varied slightly over the years. In 1969, the distance from home plate to the left and right field wall was 330 ft, the distance to the left- and right-center field power alleys was 375 ft, and the distance from home plate to the center field was 420 ft. A 19 ft wall, whose top was the rim of the Plaza level, surrounded the outfield, making home runs difficult to hit. Later, an eight-foot fence was erected, cutting the distances to 327, 368 and 405 ft, respectively. In 1996 a note of asymmetry was introduced when a 19 ft high scoreboard displaying out-of-town scores was erected along the right-field wall near the foul pole and deemed to be in play, and so the distances to right field and right-center field were 330 ft and 370 ft, respectively, while the remaining dimensions remained the same.\n\nOrel Hershiser broke Don Drysdale's scoreless inning streak at Jack Murphy Stadium on September 28, 1988 as the Los Angeles Dodgers played the San Diego Padres. Rickey Henderson collected his 3000th major league base hit here on October 7, 2001 as a Padre, in what was also the last major league game for Tony Gwynn, the eight-time National League batting champion and Hall of Famer who played his entire career with San Diego. It was also before a Padres game here where comedian Roseanne Barr gave her infamous rendition of \"The Star-Spangled Banner\" in 1990. \n\nThe Chargers\n\nThe San Diego Chargers teams that played football here in the 1970s and 1980s featured a high-scoring offense led by quarterback Dan Fouts and featuring running back Chuck Muncie, tight end Kellen Winslow, receiver Charlie Joiner and placekicker Rolf Benirschke; however, the first Chargers team to advance to the Super Bowl (in 1994, Super Bowl XXIX) featured a strong defense anchored by linebacker Junior Seau and an unspectacular but efficient offense led by quarterback Stan Humphries and running back Natrone Means.\n\nThe stadium played host to the 1980 AFC Championship Game, which the \"Bolts\" would lose to their AFC West and in-state rival, the Oakland Raiders, 34–27. The Chargers also hosted Wild Card and Divisional Playoff games here in 1980, 1992, 1994, 1995, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2009, going 5-5 in all playoff games held at the stadium. The Chargers are unbeaten at Qualcomm (and at home in franchise history) against the Detroit Lions (5–0) and Jacksonville Jaguars (3–0), but winless here against the Atlanta Falcons (0–6), Carolina Panthers (0–3), and Green Bay Packers (0–6).\n\nThe Aztecs\n\nSince its inception, the stadium, which is approximately five miles from campus, has been the home of San Diego State University Aztecs football. Before the building of the stadium, they had played their games at Balboa Stadium and their small, on-campus stadium, the Aztec Bowl (which is now the site of Viejas Arena, the home of the university's basketball teams). Traditionally, the team, clad in all-black uniforms and red helmets, has played its home games at night, a tradition started during the days of former head coach Don Coryell before the stadium was even opened. There have been attempts in the past to change from \"The Look\", but all have led to poor play by the Aztecs and a return to the traditional look.\n\nCollege bowl games\n\nFollowing the 1978 college football season, the stadium began hosting the Holiday Bowl, an annual bowl game held before New Year's Day. It originally hosted the Western Athletic Conference champion (at the time, the hometown Aztecs had just joined this conference) against a nationally ranked opponent. The game has traditionally been a high-scoring affair, and prior to 2009 no team had ever managed to score less than ten points (which occurred in the 2006 game, when the Texas A&M Aggies lost 45-10 to the California Golden Bears) and only ⅓ of the games have had a team even score less than 20 points. In the 2009 game, Arizona failed to score against Nebraska. The 1984 game is well known for it being the culmination of BYU's championship season, the last championship not won by a member of the current College Football Playoff alliance.\n\nOn December 22, 2005, a second bowl game came to San Diego when the inaugural San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl was played at Qualcomm, with Navy beating Colorado State.\n\nSoccer\n\nQualcomm Stadium has been a venue for many international soccer matches. The stadium has hosted FIFA tournaments, including the CONCACAF Gold Cup, and the U.S. Cup (an international invitational), as well as many international friendly matches involving the Mexico National Team. The most recent international friendly at Qualcomm set an all-time attendance record for the sport in the region. The match between Mexico and Argentina which was held on 4 June 2008 drew 68,498 spectators. The stadium has also hosted several international friendlies featuring teams such as Real Madrid, Chivas, Portsmouth F.C. and Club América. In addition, Qualcomm Stadium was part of the 18-stadium United States 2018 and 2022 FIFA World Cup bid, but the United States did not win either bid for the World Cup.\n\nThe San Diego Sockers of the North American Soccer League played at the stadium from 1978 to 1983. Qualcomm Stadium was the venue of Soccer Bowl '82 of the North American Soccer League and Major League Soccer's 1999 All-Star Game. \n\nOther sports\n\nIn October 1967, just weeks after the stadium opened, it hosted a SCCA event organized by San Diego Region. The event was not held in the stadium itself, but on a temporary course mapped out through the stadium's parking lot. In July 1968, the Region organized a SCCA National for the car park, now called the San Diego Stadium International Raceway, but the combination of a very small crowd and complaints about the noise ensured that the experiment was not repeated. \n \nCIF San Diego Section Finals for high school football are held at Qualcomm Stadium. These usually take place on a Friday in early December, and four games are played (with eight teams representing four separate divisions, which are determined by the enrollment sizes of the individual schools).\n\nQualcomm Stadium has also hosted rugby matches. In October 1980, the USA played New Zealand in a rugby match televised on ESPN. With 14,000 fans in attendance, this game at the time was the largest crowd ever to watch an international rugby game in the US. Old Mission Beach Athletic Club RFC play rugby union at the adjacent mini-stadium, so-called Little Q.\n\nQualcomm Stadium was home to a round of the AMA Supercross Championship each year, usually in early February, from 1980 to 2014. The stadium also hosted a round of Monster Jam, also ran and operated by Feld Entertainment. In 2015, both events were moved to Petco Park.\n\nESPN held their inaugural Moto X World Championships at Qualcomm in April 2008, and has previously used the stadium parking lot and surrounding streets as a venue in the X Games Street Luge competition.\n\nConcerts on the Green\n\nConcerts on the Green is a sports field converted into a music and entertainment venue, located on the southwest corner of the stadium parking lot. The field was originally used as a practice venue for the San Diego Chargers. After the team moved to Chargers Park about a mile north of the stadium, the area was used primarily for rugby. AEG leased the area and retrofit it into an open-air amphitheater for concerts and other entertainment shows. The venue had the capability to hold 12,500, making it the second biggest entertainment venue in the Greater San Diego area; only Cricket Wireless Amphitheatre seats more.\n\nOther uses\n\nMany concerts have also been held inside the stadium over the years, by famous artists of many different genres. Metallica and Guns N' Roses brought their co-headlining Guns N' Roses/Metallica Stadium Tour to the stadium on September 30, 1992, with Body Count as their opening act.\n\nBilly Graham hosted a crusade at the stadium in early May 2003.\n\nAmerican Idol (season 7) held auditions there in July 2007; a total of 30 people who auditioned there made it to the next round.\n\nDuring the Cedar Fire in October 2003 and the October 2007 California wildfires, the stadium served as an evacuation site for those living in affected areas. (This was similar to the use of the Houston Astrodome and the New Orleans Superdome during Hurricane Katrina.) The Cedar Fire forced the Chargers to move a contest with the Miami Dolphins to Arizona State University's Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Arizona.\n\nIn the 1980s and early 1990s, the San Diego County Council of the Boy Scouts of America used the stadium's concourse areas (between the rear of the grandstands and the freestanding wall which contains the entrance gates) as well as portions of the parking lots as the site of its annual Scout Fair. The San Diego County Council has since merged with the council representing Imperial County to form the Desert Pacific Council.\n\nIn a January 30, 2009 episode of Monk, Qualcomm Stadium was known as Summit Stadium in the episode Mr. Monk Makes the Playoffs with the fictitious San Francisco Condors as the home team.\n\nOn May 4 and 18, 2013, the stadium was used as a race course by the Stadium Super Trucks. \n\nAlso, May 12, 2016, the stadium hosted Beyonce as part of her Formation World Tour.\n\nThe Little Q\n\nThe Little Q is a sports field, used primarily for rugby located adjacent to Qualcomm Stadium; the Little Q is home to San Diego's Super League rugby team OMBAC and the College Premier Division San Diego State University Aztec rugby team.\n\nIn 1983 rock radio station (and still current) KGB 101.5 FM hosted the KGB Skyshow 8 with Uriah Heep, Eddie Money, Mötley Crüe and Def Leppard finishing the show.\n\nAlso, in 1982 the rock band The Who made an appearance in their \"Farewell Tour\" here.\n\nFuture\n\nWith the departure of the Padres following the 2003 season and even beforehand, there has been much talk of replacing the increasingly obsolete (by NFL standards) stadium with a more modern, football-only one. Also, the NFL has demanded a new stadium to host another Super Bowl. There have been many problems with this project, the most obvious one being the city's inability to fund such a stadium. \n\nThe team and city have both attempted to bring business partners in on the proposed $800 million project, which would be located in downtown San Diego's East Village and include upgrades to the area and infrastructure, but all efforts have failed so far. The Chargers had a clause in their contract, to the effect that if they paid off all debts to the city and county for the upgrades to the current stadium by 2007, then the team could pull out of its lease in 2008; however, the clause has not, as yet, been activated.\n\nOn February 19, 2015, the Chargers and the Oakland Raiders announced that they would build a privately financed $1.7 billion stadium in Carson, California if they were to move to the Los Angeles market. Both teams stated that they would continue to attempt to get stadiums built in their respective cities. \n\nOn April 22, 2015, the Carson City Council bypassed the option to put the stadium to public vote and approved the plan 3-0. The council voted without having clarified several issues, including who would finance the stadium, how the required three-way land swap would be performed, and how it would raise enough revenue if only one team moved in as tenant. \nOn January 4, 2016, the Rams, Raiders, and the Chargers all filed for relocation to Los Angeles and days later on January 12, 2016, NFL owners voted to approve the Rams relocation from St. Louis to the Greater Los Angeles Area and the Inglewood Stadium 30-2, with the Chargers given a one-year option to join (the Raiders also have this option should the Chargers option to join the Rams not be exercised before January 15, 2017 ). On January 29, 2016, Dean Spanos announced that the Chargers will stay in San Diego for the 2016 NFL season after the Chargers agreed to share a stadium with the Rams. On February 23, 2016, the Chargers announced that their stadium efforts will be focused on East Village in Downtown San Diego 1 month later on March 30, 2016, details of the intitative and the stadium proposal were unveiled to the media. On April 21, 2016, renderings of the downtown stadium were unveiled and on April 23, 2016, signature gathering for the Chargers downtown stadium began and on June 10, 2016, the Chargers intitative gathered 110,786 signatures were enough to put the proposal on ballot. On July 12, 2016, City Clerk Liz Malland announced the Chargers stadium intitative had enough valid signatures to be put to a vote on November and on July 18, 2016, the San Diego City Council voted 8-0 to put the Chargers stadium plan and the Citizens on the November ballot.", "The NFL on CBS is the branding used for broadcasts of National Football League (NFL) games that are produced by CBS Sports, the sports division of the CBS television network in the United States. The network has aired NFL game telecasts since 1956 (with exception of a hiatus from 1994 to 1997). Since 2014, CBS has also broadcast Thursday Night Football games during the first half of the NFL season, through a production partnership with the NFL Network.\n\nHistory\n\nCBS' coverage began on September 30, 1956 (the first regular season broadcast was a game between the visiting Washington Redskins against the Pittsburgh Steelers), before the 1970 AFL-NFL merger. Prior to 1968, CBS had an assigned crew for each NFL team. As a result, CBS became the first network to broadcast some NFL regular season games to selected television markets across the country. From 1970 until the end of the 1993 season, when Fox won the broadcast television contract to that particular conference, CBS aired NFL games from the National Football Conference. Since 1975, game coverage has been preceded by pre-game show The NFL Today, which features game previews, extensive analysis and interviews.\n\n1950s\n\nCBS's first attempts to broadcast the NFL on television were notable for there being no broadcasting contract with the league as a whole. Instead, CBS had to strike deals with individual teams to broadcast games into the teams' own markets, many of which were inherited from the defunct DuMont Television Network. Often the games would be broadcast with \"split audio\" – that is, a game between two franchises would have the same picture in both teams' \"networks\" (the visiting team's home city and affiliates of the home team's \"network\" beyond a 75-mile radius of the home team's television market). Each team's \"network\" had different announcers (usually those working in their home markets).\n\nThe New York Giants in particular were carried on the DuMont network, then CBS (airing locally on WCBS-TV, channel 2) in the early days of the NFL of the league's television broadcasts, when home games were blacked out within a 75-mile radius of New York City. Chris Schenkel was their play-by-play announcer in that early era when each team was assigned its own network voice on its regional telecasts. At the time, there were few if any true national telecasts until the NFL championship game, which was carried by NBC. Schenkel was joined by Jim McKay, later Johnny Lujack through the 1950s and the early 1960s. As Giants players retired to the broadcast booth in the early and 1960s, first Pat Summerall, then Frank Gifford took the color analyst slot next to Schenkel. As the 1970 merger of the NFL and AFL approached, CBS moved to a more generic announcer approach while Schenkel left to join ABC Sports.\n\nFrom 1956 to 1959, the Baltimore Colts, Pittsburgh Steelers and Philadelphia Eagles only had their away games telecast on CBS. When these three played at home, there was no need for the usage of split audio. Instead, the away team's telecasts were produced in a simple singular audio-video feed. In 1959, 1960 and 1961, NBC had the rights to televise Colts and Steelers home games. While the game broadcasts were blacked out (as per NFL policy) in those cities, they were available to other NBC-affiliated stations.\n\nThe Chicago Bears and Chicago Cardinals only produced home telecasts for their vast network. Because of this, if the Bears played the Colts in Baltimore or the Cardinals visited Forbes Field to play the Steelers during this period, it was likely that the games were not televised by CBS (although from 1959 to 1961, they might have been shown by NBC). Meanwhile, the Cleveland Browns had their own network, part of Sports Network Incorporated (SNI) and Carling Beer.\n\n1960s\n\nIn 1961, then-CBS affiliate WISN-TV (channel 12, now an ABC affiliate) in Milwaukee opted not to carry that year's annual telecast of The Wizard of Oz, running a Green Bay Packers football game instead. In contrast to the infamous Heidi telecast in 1968, the popularity of The Wizard of Oz as an annual television event at that time was such that the station ran the movie locally at a later date. On September 17, 1961, CBS Sports broadcast the first remote 15-minute pre-game show, the first of its kind on network sports television; Pro Football Kickoff originated from NFL stadiums around the country with a comprehensive look at all the day's games.\n\nIn 1962, the NFL followed the American Football League's (AFL) suit with its own revenue sharing plan after CBS agreed to telecast all regular season games for an annual fee of US$4.65 million. CBS also acquired the rights to the championship games for 1964 and 1965 for $1.8 million per game, on April 17, 1964.\n\nCBS executive vice president James T. Aubrey, Jr., who on May 9, 1963, warned the network's affiliates the high cost of rights for professional sports could price them off television, nevertheless in January 1964 agreed to pay $28.2 million to air National Football League games for two years, spanning 17 games each season. In an interview with The New York Times, Aubrey said regarding the package, \"We know how much these games mean to the viewing audience, our affiliated stations, and the nation's advertisers\". Along with obtaining the aforementioned rights to the NFL Championship Game, in April 1964, he agreed to extend the deal for another year for a total of $31.8 million. \n\nOn November 24, just two days after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the NFL played its normal schedule of games. Commissioner Pete Rozelle said about playing the games: \"It has been traditional in sports for athletes to perform in times of great personal tragedy. Football was Mr. Kennedy's game. He thrived on competition.\" No NFL games were telecast, since on the afternoon of the 22nd, just after the president had been pronounced dead, CBS President Frank Stanton ordered that all regular programming be pre-empted until after Kennedy was buried at his funeral procession. Normal programming, including the NFL, was replaced by non-stop news coverage, broadcast without commercials.\n\nIn 1964, CBS experimented with a \"half-and-half\" format for their announcers. The first half of each telecast would be called by the home teams' commentators while the second half would be done by the visitors' commentators (this practice would later be revived decades later by the NFL Network when replaying preseason games that were broadcast by local stations as opposed to a national network). Also in 1964, CBS ditched the concept of using pooled video and split audio feeds. In 1962 and 1963, CBS would provide separate audio for a telecast (for instance, if the Green Bay Packers hosted the Chicago Bears, the telecast would have the same video, Chicago area viewers watching on WBBM-TV would hear Red Grange and George Connor call the action; meanwhile, viewers in Milwaukee and other parts of Wisconsin (Green Bay itself was blacked out) would hear Ray Scott and Tony Canadeo describe the game). Ray Scott was not a fan of the separate audio concept and temporarily left CBS for a job calling a regional slate of college football games for NBC. Ultimately, CBS dumped the four-man crew and resumed the 1962–63 method for the great majority of games in 1965, 1966 and 1967.\n\nOn November 25, 1965 (Thanksgiving Day), CBS featured the first-ever color broadcast of a regular-season NFL game, the traditional Thanksgiving Day game at Detroit. It was only the second time that the network's first color mobile unit had been used (it had been used a month earlier to cover the attempted launch of an Atlas-Agena, which was to have been the rendezvous target for the Gemini 6 space mission). Only a handful of games during the rest of the season were shown in color, along with the NFL Western Conference Playoff, the NFL Championship Game, the Playoff Bowl and the Pro Bowl. In 1966, most of the network's NFL games were broadcast in color, and by 1968, all of the network's NFL telecasts were in color.\n\nOn December 29, 1965, CBS acquired the rights to the NFL regular season games in 1966 and 1967, with an option to extend the contract through 1968, for $18.8 million per year (in sharp contrast to the $14.1 million per year it paid for the rights in 1964). On February 14, 1966, the rights to the 1966 and 1967 NFL Championship Games (the Ice Bowl) were sold to CBS for $2 million per game. 1967 also marked the last year that CBS had separate commentator crews for each team for about 90% to 95% of their NFL games.\n\nThe first ever AFL-NFL World Championship Game was played on January 15, 1967. Because CBS held the rights to nationally televise NFL games and NBC had the rights to broadcast AFL games, it was decided by the newly merged league to have both of them cover that first game. Ray Scott, Jack Whitaker, Frank Gifford and Pat Summerall called the game for CBS. 39.9 million viewers would watch Bart Starr's performance in the game that earned him the MVP trophy. NBC did have some problems. The network did not return from a commercial break during halftime in time for the start of the second half; therefore, the first kickoff was stopped by the game's officials and was redone once NBC was back on the air. NBC was also forced to broadcast the game over CBS' feed and cameras (CBS received prerogative to use its feed and camera angles since the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum was home to the NFL's Rams). In other words, NBC's crew had little to no control over how the game was shot. The next three AFL-NFL World Championship Games, later renamed the Super Bowl, were then divided by the two networks: CBS televised Super Bowls II and IV while NBC covered Super Bowl III.\n\nWhen CBS decided to abandon its practice of using dedicated announcing crews for particular teams in 1968, the network instituted a semi-merit system in its place, with certain crews (such as Ray Scott and Paul Christman or Jack Buck and Pat Summerall) being assigned to each week's most prominent games regardless of the participating teams.\n\nOn December 22, 1968, CBS interrupted coverage of a Western Conference championship game between the Minnesota Vikings and Baltimore Colts in order to show a broadcast from inside the Apollo 8 spacecraft, headed towards the moon (the first manned space mission to orbit the moon, and a major step towards the lunar landing the following July). The interruption began approximately three minutes before halftime of the game, and lasted 17 minutes. CBS showed highlights of the missed action (in which neither team scored) when the network returned to football coverage; nonetheless, the network received approximately 3,000 complaints after the game.\n\nIn the 1960s and early 1970s, CBS used a marching band-like composition titled \"Confidence\" (taken from Leon Carr's score from the 1964 off-Broadway musical The Secret Life of Walter Mitty) as the theme for their NFL broadcasts.\n\nMonday night games on CBS\n\nDuring the early 1960s, NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle envisioned the possibility of playing at least one game weekly during prime time for a greater television audience. An early bid by ABC in 1964 to have the league play a weekly game on Friday nights was abandoned, with critics charging that such telecasts would damage the attendance at high school games. Undaunted, Rozelle decided to experiment with the concept of playing on Monday night, scheduling the Green Bay Packers and Detroit Lions for a game on September 28, 1964. While the game was not televised, it drew a sellout crowd of 59,203 spectators to Tiger Stadium, the largest crowd ever to watch a professional football game in Detroit up to that point.\n\nTwo years later, Rozelle would build on this success as the NFL began a four-year experiment of playing on Monday night, scheduling one game in prime time on CBS during the 1966 and 1967 seasons, and two contests during each of the next two years. NBC followed suit in 1968 and 1969 with games involving AFL teams.\n\nDuring subsequent negotiations on a television contract that would begin in 1970, Rozelle concentrated on signing a weekly Monday night deal with one of the three major networks. After sensing reluctance from both NBC and CBS in disturbing their regular programming schedules, Rozelle spoke with ABC.\n\nDespite the network's status as the lowest-rated network, ABC was also reluctant to enter the risky venture. Only after the independent Hughes Sports Network, an entity bankrolled by reclusive businessman Howard Hughes showed interest, did ABC sign a contract for the scheduled games. Speculation was that had Rozelle signed with Hughes, many ABC affiliates would have pre-empted the network's Monday lineup in favor of the games, severely damaging potential ratings. There was even talk that one or two ABC owned-and-operated stations would have ditched the network feed to carry the games.\n\n1970s\n\nWhen the AFL and the NFL officially merged in 1970, the combined league divided its teams into the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). It was then decided (officially announced on January 26, 1970) that CBS would televise all NFC teams (including playoff games) while NBC would carry games from all AFC teams. For interconference games, CBS would broadcast them if the visiting team was from the NFC and NBC would carry them when the visitors were from the AFC. This was in line with the NFL television blackout rules of the time, meaning that every televised game of a local NFL team would be on the same channel (at the time, home games were banned from local television regardless of sell-out status, while road games are required to be aired in the teams' primary media markets, and select neighboring markets as well, even if it is not the most popular team in the market). The two networks also divided up broadcast rights to the Super Bowl on a yearly rotation.\n\nBy 1971, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) introduced the Prime Time Access Rule, which freed local network affiliates in the top 50 markets (in practice, the entire network) to take a half-hour of prime time from the networks on Mondays through Saturdays and one full hour on Sundays. Because nearly all affiliates found production costs for the FCC's intended goal of increased public affairs programming very high and the ratings (and by association, advertising revenues) low, making it mostly unprofitable, the FCC created an exception for network-authored news and public affairs. After a six-month hiatus in late 1971, CBS would find a prime place for 60 Minutes in a portion of that displaced time, 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. (Eastern; 5:00 to 6:00 Central Time) on Sundays, in January 1972. This proved somewhat less than satisfactory, however, because in order to accommodate CBS' telecasts of late afternoon National Football League games, 60 Minutes went on hiatus during the fall from 1972 to 1975 (and the summer of 1972). This took place because football telecasts were protected contractually from interruptions in the wake of the infamous \"Heidi Game\" incident on NBC in November 1968.\n\nDue largely to CBS' live broadcast of NFL games, as well as other sports events aired by the network that run past their scheduled end time, 60 Minutes sometimes does not start until after 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time, with the program starting right after the conclusion of game coverage (however, on the West Coast, because the actual end of the live games is much earlier in the afternoon in comparison to the Eastern and Central Time Zones, 60 Minutes is always able to start at its normal 7:00 p.m. Pacific start time, leaving affiliates free to broadcast local newscasts, the CBS Evening News, and other local or syndicated programming leading up to 60 Minutes). The program's success has also led CBS Sports to schedule events leading into 60 Minutes and the rest of the network's primetime lineup, causing (again, except on the West Coast) the pre-emptions of the Sunday editions of the CBS Evening News and affiliates' local newscasts.\n\nOn January 16, 1972, the Dallas Cowboys defeated the Miami Dolphins 24–3 in Super Bowl VI in New Orleans. The CBS telecast had an estimated household viewership of 27,450,000 homes, the highest-rated single-day telecast ever at the time. Although Tulane Stadium was sold out for the game, unconditional blackout rules in the NFL prohibited the live telecast from being shown in the New Orleans market. This would be the last Super Bowl to be blacked out in the television market in which the game was played. The following year, the NFL allowed Super Bowl VII to be televised live in the host city (Los Angeles) when all tickets were sold. In 1973, the NFL changed its blackout policy to allow games to be broadcast in the home team's market if tickets are sold out 72 hours in advance (all Super Bowls since the second have sold out, as it is the main event on the NFL schedule, and there is high demand for Super Bowl tickets).\n\nOn November 4, 1973, local San Francisco CBS affiliate KPIX (now an owned-and-operated station of the network) experimented with a \"simulcast\" in which the station kept switching back and forth between the network's broadcasts of a San Francisco 49ers game (against the Detroit Lions) and an Oakland Raiders game (against the New York Giants) that were being played at the same time, with frequent cuts to studio host Barry Tompkins. The station received many complaints from viewers, however, and the experiment was not repeated. This resulted in the NFL instituting new rules for markets that had two teams, which basically state that teams televised in two markets must play their games at different times in the day or week, and one of the teams must be on the road (for example an NFL schedule for a given week in markets with two team franchises might look like this: Oakland at Kansas City, 1:00 p.m.; New York Giants at Philadelphia, 1:00 p.m.; San Diego at San Francisco, 4:15 p.m.; and New England at New York Jets, 8:00 p.m.).\n\nDuring the October 13, 1974, New Orleans Saints–Denver Broncos game, the broadcasting duo of play-by-play announcer Don Criqui and color commentator Irv Cross was supplemented by the contributions of the first woman ever on an NFL telecast, Jane Chastain. While providing limited commentary, Chastain was used on an irregular basis over the rest of the season.\n\nCBS' 1976 telecast of Super Bowl X between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Dallas Cowboys was viewed by an estimated 80 million people, the largest television audience in history at the time. CBS' telecast featured play-by-play announcer Pat Summerall (calling his first Super Bowl in that role) and color commentator Tom Brookshier. Towards the end of the game, Hank Stram took over for Brookshier, who had left the booth to head down to the locker room area to conduct the postgame interviews with the winning team.\n\nBy 1975, CBS used several themes (technically, CBS had different opening songs and graphics per crew) to open their broadcasts, ranging from David Shire's \"Manhattan Skyline\" from the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack to \"Fly, Robin, Fly\" by the Silver Convention.\n\nOn October 12, 1976, Commissioner Pete Rozelle negotiated contracts with the three television networks to televise all NFL regular-season and postseason games, as well as selected preseason games, for four years beginning with the 1978 season. ABC was awarded yearly rights to 16 Monday night games, four prime time games, the AFC-NFC Pro Bowl, and the Hall of Fame Games. CBS received the rights to all NFC regular season and postseason games (except those in the ABC package) and to Super Bowls XIV and XVI. NBC received the rights to all AFC regular season and postseason games (except those in the ABC package) and to Super Bowls XIII and XV. Industry sources considered it the largest single television package ever negotiated.\n\nAt the height of the disco fad, from 1977 to 1979, CBS used Meco's “Star Wars Theme/Cantina Band,” a disco arrangement of John Williams's theme from Star Wars, as a musical theme.\n\nOn January 15, 1978, the Dallas Cowboys defeated the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XII in front of the largest audience ever to watch a sporting event. CBS scored a 47.2/67 national household rating/share, the highest-rated Super Bowl to date.\n\nThe NFL Today debuts\n\nIn 1975, CBS debuted The NFL Today, a pre-game show originally hosted by journalist Brent Musburger and former NFL player Irv Cross, with former Miss America Phyllis George serving as one of the reporters. Jimmy Snyder, nicknamed \"The Greek\", joined the program in 1976. Snyder was dismissed by CBS Sports at the end of the 1987 season, one day after making comments about racial differences among NFL players on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day in January 1988. Phyllis George was replaced by Jayne Kennedy (who was crowned Miss Ohio USA in 1970) for the 1978 season, only for Kennedy to depart at the end of the following season. George would return in 1980 and stay on through the 1983 season; she was replaced by Charlsie Cantey. In 1979, the first year that the Sports Emmy Awards were awarded to sportscasts, The NFL Today was among the recipients.\n\n1980s\n\nIn 1980, CBS, with a record bid of US$12 million, was awarded the national radio rights to broadcast 26 NFL regular season games, including Monday Night Football, and all ten postseason games through the 1983 season. Starting with the 1980 season, CBS frequently used the beginning guitar riff of Heart's \"Crazy on You\" for commercial break tosses. Television ratings for season and playoff broadcasts in 1980 were the second-best in NFL history, trailing only the combined ratings of the 1976 season. All three networks posted gains, and NBC's 15.0 rating was its best ever. CBS and ABC had also experienced their best NFL ratings since 1977, with 15.3 and 20.8 ratings, respectively. CBS Radio reported a record audience of 7 million listeners for Monday night and special games.\n\nIn 1981, ABC and CBS set all-time ratings highs, with ABC finishing the season with a 21.7 rating and CBS with a 17.5 rating; NBC was down slightly to 13.9. On October 18, 1981, Game 5 of the National League Championship Series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Montreal Expos, which was supposed to be televised on NBC that Sunday afternoon, was postponed due to snow. The cancellation of that game allowed CBS to achieve record breaking television viewership levels for a regular-season professional football broadcast. It was rated as the most watched afternoon of regular-season NFL football broadcasts on a single network in television history.\n\nIn 1981, CBS introduced a new opening theme for the NFL games, a peppy, fanfare-styled theme that remained in use through the 1985 season. The patriotic-style opening title sequence showed the Stars and Stripes of the U.S. flag morphing into the words \"National Football League.\" For the network's coverage of Super Bowl XVI at the end of that season, CBS' theme music eventually became the theme for CBS Sports Saturday/Sunday. The music itself, could be considered a hybrid of the theme used for The NFL Today at the time and the original theme for its college basketball broadcast; CBS would use this particular theme again at least for the NFC Championship Game at the end of the 1982 season.\n\nGoing into the 1981 NFL season, CBS Sports executives decided that John Madden, who had joined the network in 1979 and had worked with Frank Glieber and Gary Bender (Pat Summerall and Madden were first teamed on a November 25, 1979 broadcast of a Minnesota Vikings–Tampa Bay Buccaneers game ) in his first two years, was going to be their star NFL color commentator – however, they had trouble figuring out who was going to be his play-by-play partner. At the time CBS had reshuffled their #1 team lineup as Summerall's longtime broadcast partner Tom Brookshier was moved into a play-by-play role, and it was not immediately clear if Summerall was going to keep his position or if #2 play-by-play man Vin Scully, whose contract was nearing expiration, was going to be promoted to take over. CBS elected to give both Summerall and Scully chances to work with Madden. Scully worked with Madden for four games in September while Summerall was busy covering the U.S. Open tennis tournament for CBS. Summerall then worked with Madden for four October games as Scully called Major League Baseball's National League Championship Series and World Series for the Los Angeles Dodgers Radio Network and CBS Radio respectively.\n\nAfter the eighth week of the NFL season, CBS Sports executives decided that the laconic, baritone-voiced Summerall's style was more in tune with the lively, verbose Madden than the elegant, poetic Scully. As a consolation prize, CBS Sports gave Scully the \"B\" team assignment and the right to call the NFC Championship Game telecast with Hank Stram. Meanwhile, Pat Summerall called that game on CBS Radio with Jack Buck while John Madden prepared to do the Super Bowl XVI with Summerall in Pontiac, Michigan. Vin Scully reportedly was not happy about the demotion as well as (in his eyes) having his intelligence be insulted (at least, according to CBS Sports producer Terry O'Neil in the book The Game Behind the Game ). As a result, Scully bolted to NBC (where he started a seven-year run as their lead Major League Baseball announcer) as soon as his contract with CBS was up.\n\nOn January 24, 1982, CBS Sports' broadcast of Super Bowl XVI – in which the San Francisco 49ers (led by quarterback Joe Montana) defeated the Cincinnati Bengals, 26–21 – became the highest rated Super Bowl of all time, with a 49.1 rating/73 share. Summerall and Madden called their first Super Bowl together as they went on to become one of the most popular NFL announcing teams ever. During the Super Bowl XVI telecast, the telestrator made its major network debut, which the network introduced as the \"CBS Chalkboard\" during their sports coverage. Madden utilized the device effectively to diagram football plays on-air to viewers. The telestrator is generally credited with popularizing the use of \"telestration\" during sports commentary.\n\nIn 1982, the NFL signed a five-year contract with the three television networks (ABC, CBS and NBC) to televise all NFL regular season and postseason games starting with the 1982 season. By this particular time, CBS decided that that instead of using the regular CBS Sports typeface of that period (a variant of Franklin Gothic), that it would instead use the Serifa typeface that began to be used a few months earlier on CBS News programs for their title graphics and lower-thirds. During the 1982 season, the NFL allowed CBS to rebroadcast Super Bowl XVI during the first Sunday of the strike. CBS also rebroadcast their most recent Super Bowl (XXI) telecast during the 1987 strike. Also during the 1982 strike, CBS' NCAA football contract required the network to show four Division III games; the network initially intended to show those games on Saturday afternoons, with the broadcasts being received only in markets that were interested in carrying them. However, with no NFL games to show on October 3, 1982 (on what would have been Week 5 of the NFL season) due to the strike, CBS decided to show all of its NCAA Division III games on a single Sunday afternoon in front of a mass audience. CBS also used their regular NFL crews (Pat Summerall and John Madden at Wittenberg–Baldwin-Wallace, Tom Brookshier and Wayne Walker at West Georgia–Millsaps, Tim Ryan and Johnny Morris at Wisconsin–Oshkosh – Wisconsin–Stout, and Dick Stockton and Roger Staubach at San Diego–Occidental) and aired The NFL Today instead of using their regular college football broadcasters.\n\nIn May 1985, shortly after calling after working the 17th hole at the Masters and calling Game 1 of the NBA Playoff series between Portland Trail Blazers and Los Angeles Lakers, play-by-play announcer Frank Glieber died of a heart attack. Tom Brookshier, who previously served as Summerall's color commentator prior to Madden, replaced Glieber in the NFL on CBS broadcast booth. For the 1985 season, the NFL showed a ratings increase on all three networks for the season, with viewership of CBS' telecasts increasing by 10%, NBC telecasts by 4%, and ABC telecasts by 16%.\n\nBeginning in Week 4 of the 1986 season, CBS adapted a theme for its game broadcast, an intense, kinetic, synthesizer-laced theme that has affectionately been referred to as \"Pots and Pans\" (because of the background notes that often resembled the banging of those particular cooking objects). In 1989, the \"Pots and Pans\" theme was revamped to give it a more smooth, electronic style. This theme was also known for integrating the play-by-play announcer's voice-over introduction into the theme, it integrated three voice-over segments, one for the visiting team, home team and game storyline to set the latter element into the broadcast; this practice was common with CBS Sports' themes of the 1980s.\n\nCBS' broadcast of Super Bowl XXI (at the end of the 1986 season) was the first NFL game to be broadcast in Dolby Surround sound and in stereo. The postgame show was supposed to feature the song \"One Shining Moment,\" but due to the extended length of the postgame interviews, CBS did not play it. The lyrics to the song, which is now played at the end of the network's NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship coverage, were ultimately changed from \"the ball is kicked\" to \"the ball is tipped\". CBS also debuted the theme music (composed by Lloyd Landesman) that ultimately became the theme used for CBS' college football coverage (which was also the case for the theme CBS used from 1984 to 1986 after debuting it for Super Bowl XVIII) for the 1987 season (this theme was actually loosely based on the Pots and Pans theme).\n\nAt the NFL's annual meeting in Maui, Hawaii on March 15, 1987, Commissioner Pete Rozelle and Broadcast Committee Chairman Art Modell announced new three-year television contracts with ABC, CBS, and NBC, effective with the 1987 season. Beginning in 1987, CBS started broadcasting NFL games in stereo. On December 8, 1987, Cathy Barreto became the first woman to direct an NFL game at the network television level for the Minnesota Vikings-Detroit Lions telecast. On April 18, 1989, the NFL and CBS Radio jointly announced agreement extending CBS' radio broadcast rights to an annual 40-game package through the 1994 season.\n\nFor the Thanksgiving game broadcasts on November 23, 1989, John Madden awarded the first \"Turkey Leg Award,\" for the annual game's most valuable player. Reggie White of the Philadelphia Eagles was the first recipient of the honor for his part in what would become known as Bounty Bowl I. The gesture was seen mostly as a humorous gimmick relating to Madden's famous multi-legged turkeys served on Thanksgiving. Since then, however, the award has gained subtle notoriety, and currently, each year an MVP has been chosen for both the CBS and Fox games. When CBS returned to the NFL in 1998, the network introduced their own award, the \"All-Iron Award.\"\n\n1990s\n\nFor CBS' coverage of Super Bowl XXIV at the end of the 1989 season, CBS introduced a brand new theme for its NFL broadcasts, using a considerably more traditional and standard (but still peppy and bombastic) theme than the one used the previous four seasons; the theme was used until the 1991 NFC Championship Game.\n\nOn March 12, 1990, at the NFL's annual meeting in Orlando, Florida, the league ratified new four-year television agreements with existing partners ABC, CBS and NBC, as well as newly struck cable agreements with ESPN and TNT, to take effect with the 1990–1993 seasons. The contracts involving the four networks totaled US$3.6 billion, the largest in television history.\n\nOn September 9, 1990, The NFL Today overhauled its talent lineup, consisting of Greg Gumbel, Terry Bradshaw, Pat O'Brien and Lesley Visser. Gumbel and Bradshaw replaced Brent Musburger, who was fired by CBS on April 1, 1990, and Irv Cross, who was demoted to the position of game analyst. During the 1990 season, Pat Summerall was hospitalized after vomiting on a plane during a flight after a Bears–Redskins game, and was out for a considerable amount of time. While Verne Lundquist replaced Summerall on games with Madden, Jack Buck (who was at CBS during the time as the network's lead Major League Baseball announcer) was added as a regular NFL broadcaster to fill-in.\n\nAt Super Bowl XXVI, Lesley Visser became the first female sportscaster to preside over the Vince Lombardi Trophy presentation ceremony. The network's telecast of Super Bowl XXVI on January 26, 1992 was seen by more than 123 million viewers nationally, second only to the 127 million that viewed Super Bowl XX. The ongoing 1990 television contract gave CBS rights to Super Bowl XXVI instead of Super Bowl XXVII, which was in the network's rotation of the champion game. The NFL swapped the years in which CBS and NBC held rights to the Super Bowl in an effort to give CBS enough lead-in programming for the upcoming 1992 Winter Olympics that were set to begin two weeks later. For this game, CBS debuted a new network-wide red, white and blue graphics package as well as a new theme song (composed by Frankie Vinci) for its NFL coverage that replaced the one CBS debuted for their coverage of Super Bowl XXIV two years earlier. The package lasted until the end of 1995, after which CBS discarded it in favor of an orange and yellow color scheme for its sports graphics. The new music lasted until CBS lost the NFL rights at the end of the 1993 season, but continued to be used by CBS Radio until 2002. Several remixed versions of the 1993 theme were used upon the return of the NFL to CBS until the end of the 2002 season, when CBS replaced its entire NFL music package with one composed by E.S. Posthumus.\n\nIn September 1993, The NFL Today celebrated its 19th season as a half-hour pre-game show. It held the distinction of being the highest-rated program in its time slot for 18 years, longer than any other program on television.\n\nLosing the NFL to Fox (1994–1997)\n\nThe steady downturn in programming fortunes that CBS experienced during the tenure of network president Laurence Tisch would precipitate in 1993. As the television contracts for both NFL conferences and for the Sunday and Monday prime time football packages came up for renewal, Fox – which made a failed attempt at acquiring the Monday Night Football package six years earlier – made an aggressive move to acquire the league television rights. Knowing that it would likely need to bid considerably more than the incumbent networks to acquire a piece of the package, Fox placed a then-record bid of US$1.58 billion for the four-year contract for the broadcast rights to the National Football Conference, significantly exceeding CBS' bid of $290 million for each year of the contract. The NFC was considered the more desirable conference at the time due to its presence in most of the largest U.S. markets, such as New York City, Chicago and Philadelphia.\n\nThe NFL accepted Fox's bid on December 18, 1993, giving that network rights to televise NFC regular season and playoff games effective with the 1994 season, as well as the exclusive U.S. television rights to Super Bowl XXXI (held in 1997) under the initial contract. This stripped CBS of National Football League telecasts following the 1993 season after 38 years, resulting in CBS not broadcasting any NFL games for the next four years. The Fox Broadcasting Company had only debuted seven years earlier and did not have an existing sports division; however it began building its own coverage by hiring many former CBS personalities (such as Pat Summerall, John Madden, James Brown, Terry Bradshaw, Dick Stockton and Matt Millen), management and production personnel.\n\nCBS televised its last game as the rights holder of the National Football Conference package on January 23, 1994 when the Dallas Cowboys defeated the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC Championship Game, 38–21. Before signing off one last time, CBS aired a photo montage of their most memorable moments during their 38 years of covering the NFL set to the song \"After the Sunrise\" by Yanni.\n\nThe acquisition of NFL rights by Fox made that network a major player in American television by giving it many new viewers (and affiliates) and a platform to advertise its other programs. In the meantime, CBS lost several affiliates, and ratings for its other programming languished. On May 23, 1994, News Corporation, then parent of Fox, struck an alliance with New World Communications, by now a key ownership group with several VHF affiliates of the three established major networks – most of which were CBS affiliates, almost all of which were located in NFC markets – and wary of a CBS without football. Through the deal, in which Fox purchased a 20% interest in New World, the company signed an agreement to affiliate the majority of its stations (including those that New World was in the process of acquiring from Argyle Communications and Citicasters) with Fox; twelve of New World's stations began switching their affiliations to Fox beginning in September 1994 and continuing through September 1996. \n\nTo this day, CBS admits that it has never fully recovered from the loss of key affiliates through the New World-Fox deal. It took a particularly severe hit in Atlanta, Detroit and Milwaukee, as the network found itself on the verge of having to import the signals of nearby affiliates via cable and satellite after being turned down for affiliation deals by other major network stations in those markets. Ultimately, the network was relegated to UHF stations with marginal signals in certain areas within their markets (because of satellite television, the NFL Sunday Ticket in local markets, and rules of the time, satellite subscribers were required to use antennas to pick up local affiliates). CBS purchased one of these stations, WWJ-TV (channel 62), only days before its longtime Detroit affiliate, WJBK (channel 2), was set to switch to Fox. The ratings impact in these three markets was significant; the former CBS affiliates were all considered to be ratings contenders, especially during the NFL season. With CBS ending up on UHF stations that had virtually no significant history as a former Fox or first-tier independent station (or former Big Three affiliate for that matter), ratings for CBS programming in these markets declined significantly. In Milwaukee, for instance, WITI (channel 6)'s switch from CBS to Fox resulted in several of CBS' remaining sports properties, most notably the Daytona 500, not being available to cable subscribers for much of 1995 until Weigel Broadcasting signed carriage agreements with providers to add new CBS station WDJT-TV (channel 58).\n\nCBS apparently underestimated the value of its rights with respect to its advertising revenues and to its promotional opportunities for other network programs. The vast resources of Fox founder Rupert Murdoch allowed that network to grow quickly, primarily to the detriment of CBS. The loss of the NFL came in part because CBS Sports suddenly went into cost-cutting mode in the wake of its money-bleeding, $1 billion deal with Major League Baseball (1990–1993). The network had already developed a stodgy and overly budgeted image under Laurence Tisch, who had become chief executive officer of CBS in 1985. Tisch was already notorious for having made deep cuts at the network's news division and for selling off major portions of the company (such as the 1988 sale of its Columbia Records division to Sony). When CBS lost the NFL to Fox, the \"Tiffany Network\" struggled to compete in the ratings with a slate of programming whose audiences skewed older than programs broadcast by the other networks, even though the network still finished ahead of Fox, whose programming at the time of the NFL deal was almost exclusively limited to primetime and children's programming. One of the few bright spots in terms of ratings and audience demographics for CBS in the Tisch era, the Late Show with David Letterman (which often dominated The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in its first two years) saw its ratings decline in large part due to the affiliation switches, at times even finishing third behind Nightline on ABC. \n\nAttempts at replacement programming\n\nThe replacement programming on Sunday afternoons in the fall of 1994 and 1995 involved mostly a package of encore made-for-TV movies, which were targeted towards women in an attempt to counterprogram NBC and Fox. However, they made very little headway (with some affiliates forgoing the movie package altogether and instead airing either, local and/or religious programs and infomercials) and by 1996, CBS picked up additional NASCAR Winston Cup, Busch Series and Craftsman Truck races in order to compete in some form.\n\nOne of the often cited reasons for the Canadian Football League's failed American experiment, and part of the reason why the CFL fell behind the NFL in terms of quality players, was the state of the league's American television contract. The league, which had held a U.S. network television contract in the 1950s and again briefly in 1982, was then being carried on ESPN2, at the time a nascent channel devoted to extreme sports that was not nearly as widely available as its parent network and only carried a limited number of the league's games (with ESPN itself airing some games to fill in airtime available due to the 1994 Major League Baseball strike, as well as the Grey Cup on tape delay). It was not until after the 1995 season that the CFL, mainly through the action of its American franchises, approached CBS to see if it could get coverage. However, by the time negotiations started, the CFL had decided to fold or relocate all of its American franchises, and the negotiations with CBS accordingly fell through. It would not be until several years later that the CFL reached a television contract in the United States, on a much smaller network (America One). Then in 1996, CBS added college football games featuring the Southeastern and Big East conferences on Saturday afternoons. It was the beginning of a rebuilding process that would eventually lead to the return of the NFL to the network.\n\nThe NFL returns\n\nIn November 1996, Sean McManus was named President of CBS Sports, and would lead CBS' efforts in re-acquiring broadcast rights to the NFL. On January 12, 1998, CBS agreed to a contract with the NFL to broadcast American Football Conference games effective with the 1998 season (taking over the rights from NBC), paying $4 billion over eight years ($500 million per season). The last year NBC had rights to the AFC saw the Denver Broncos, an original AFL team, defeat the Green Bay Packers in Super Bowl XXXII, which aired on NBC and ended a 13-year drought against the NFC in the Super Bowl. Around the time CBS took over the rights to the AFC saw the trend of the 1980s and 1990s reverse, in that the AFC became the dominant conference over the NFC (1998 also saw the Broncos win the Super Bowl). The New England Patriots dynasty in the 2000s in the only AFC-only top-ten market also contributed to the ratings surge. In fact, the primary stations for both the Broncos and Patriots are the same – KCNC-TV in Denver, and WBZ-TV in Boston, prior to the two stations switching to CBS in 1995 through the network's affiliation deal with Westinghouse – as when NBC carried the AFC (KUSA and WHDH-TV carried those teams' games from 1995 to 1998).\n\nIn addition, the current AFC deal also saw CBS indirectly acquire rights to air games played by the Pittsburgh Steelers, which air locally on KDKA-TV (which was a CBS O&O by the time NFL rights were re-acquired and has long been one of CBS's strongest stations) and often get the highest television ratings for an NFL franchise due to the team's rabid fanbase on a national level. Coincidentally, before the AFL-NFL merger (when the Steelers went to the AFC voluntarily to balance out the number of teams between conferences), Steelers road games had aired on KDKA-TV as part of the network's deal to air NFL games, while home games could not be televised at all during this period, even if they did sell out tickets.\n\nAfter acquiring the new package, CBS Sports then named former NFL Today host Greg Gumbel, as their lead play-by-play announcer (Gumbel had moved to NBC Sports, where he worked from 1994 to 1998 after CBS lost the NFL to Fox). Phil Simms (who at the time, was at NBC as part of the lead announcing team alongside Dick Enberg and Paul Maguire) was hired as the lead color commentator. On September 6, 1998, after 1,687 days since the last broadcast of The NFL Today, host Jim Nantz welcomed back viewers to CBS for its coverage of the National Football League.\n\nGiven the challenge of making its coverage of the American Football Conference different from that of NBC, CBS passed over longtime NBC veterans Charlie Jones and Bob Trumpy in favor of newcomers such as Ian Eagle and Steve Tasker. According to CBS Sports executive producer Terry Ewert, \"We wanted to forge our own way and go in a different direction. We wanted to make decisions on a new way of looking at things.\" In one stark difference from NBC, CBS used a score and clock graphic for its NFL games that was constant during the game broadcasts outside of break tosses, a la the FoxBox. CBS' contribution was dubbed the EyeBox.\n\nOn November 8, 1998, CBS televised the first NFL game to be broadcast in high-definition, between the New York Jets and Buffalo Bills at Giants Stadium. It was also the first time two Heisman Trophy winning quarterbacks started against each other in the NFL (Vinny Testaverde for the Jets and Doug Flutie for the Bills).\n\n2000s\n\nOn January 28, 2001, CBS Sports, Core Digital and Princeton Video Image introduced state-of-the-art, three-dimensional replay technology called \"EyeVision\" for its coverage of Super Bowl XXXV in Tampa (at Raymond James Stadium). The game, CBS Sports' first Super Bowl broadcast since 1992, drew 131.2 million viewers for the Baltimore Ravens win over the New York Giants. As a result, Super Bowl XXXV was the most watched television program that year. Play-by-play announcer Greg Gumbel became the first African-American announcer to call a major sports championship; he was joined in the broadcast booth with Phil Simms. Both of the Ravens' Super Bowl championships to date have been on CBS; the CBS-owned station in Baltimore, WJZ-TV, had been, as an ABC affiliate, one of the strongest TV stations for ABC Monday Night Football for most of the 1980s and early 1990s, due to Baltimore's previous NFL team, the Colts' move to Indianapolis.\n\nThe 2001-02 NFL playoffs marked the first time that the league scheduled prime time playoff games for the first two rounds, in an attempt to attract more viewers. Saturday wild card and divisional playoff games were moved from 12:30 and 4:00 p.m. Eastern Time to 4:30 and 8:00 p.m., respectively. As a result, the league abandoned its practice of scheduling playoff games held mainly in colder, northern regions for daylight hours only; any stadium, regardless of evening January temperatures, could host prime time playoff games.\n\nIn 2004, Jim Nantz and Greg Gumbel swapped roles on the network's NFL broadcasts. Nantz took Gumbel's place as the lead play-by-play announcer while Gumbel took Nantz's spot as the host of The NFL Today.\n\nThe next group of broadcast contracts, which began with the 2006–07 season, resulted in a sizeable increase in total rights fees. Both Fox and CBS renewed their Sunday afternoon broadcast packages through 2011, in both cases with modest increases. On February 6, 2006, CBS Sports announced the return of James Brown, who left CBS eleven years earlier to become studio host of Fox NFL Sunday, to the network as the host of The NFL Today. Greg Gumbel moved back to play-by-play, teaming with Dan Dierdorf. CBS decided to not feature sideline reports for the 2006 regular season. However, the network did use Lesley Visser, Sam Ryan, Solomon Wilcots and Steve Tasker to report from the sidelines and around the stadium for its telecast of Super Bowl XLI.\n\nIn 2006, CBS' coverage of the AFC Championship Game earned a 28.1 rating, which topped the season premiere of American Idol on Fox. Its Super Bowl XLI broadcast drew the third largest television audience in history, finishing behind only its broadcast of the M*A*S*H finale (\"Goodbye, Farewell and Amen\") in 1983 and NBC's broadcast of Super Bowl XXX (Dallas and Pittsburgh) from 1996. Super Bowl XLI was the second most watched Super Bowl broadcast of all-time, averaging 93.1 million viewers. \n\nFor the 2007 season, CBS announced the advent of \"CBS Eye-lert,\" a service that allows viewers to be notified via e-mail and text message when the start time of a program will be delayed. The \"Eye-lert\" was eventually extended on-air to a banner graphic that appears during the prime time lineup within sports broadcasts and segments of delayed regularly scheduled evening programs.\n\nHDTV coverage\n\nAs late as 2006, CBS aired only three of its NFL games in high-definition each week, the same number of games it had aired for the past few seasons. The other networks that held rights to broadcast NFL games – NBC, NFL Network and ESPN – broadcast all of their games in high definition, and Fox broadcast up to six in HD. Because of this, some fans accused CBS of being \"cheap.\" Beginning with the 2007 season, CBS began airing five of the Sunday games in high definition television on doubleheader weeks, and six on singleheader weeks. \n\nFormer CBS Sports Executive Vice President Tony Petitti (who left CBS in April 2008 to become the head of the MLB Network) claimed the network would probably air all of its NFL games in high definition by 2009. When asked about the move, Petitti commented that CBS was focused on building a new studio for The NFL Today pre-game show. However, another CBS executive had previously indicated that, because CBS was an \"early adopter\" with its first HD game in 1998, it is already \"at capacity\" and would have to replace newly purchased equipment in its network center with even more expensive equipment. However, CBS did carry its entire slate of games in 2009 in HD, though a few non-essential camera positions for some games (mainly used only in analysis situations) continued to be shot in 4:3 SD.\n\nBeginning with the 2013 season, CBS Sports switched to a 16:9 full widescreen presentation, which began requiring the use of the #10 Active Format Description tag to present the games in a letterboxed widescreen format for viewers watching on cable television through 4:3 television sets.\n\n2010s\n\nWith an average U.S. audience of 106.5 million viewers, Super Bowl XLIV on CBS was, at the time, the most-watched Super Bowl telecast in the championship game's history as well as the most-watched program of any kind in American television history, beating the record previously set 27 years earlier by the final episode of M*A*S*H, which was watched by 105.97 million viewers. The game telecast drew an overnight national Nielsen rating of 46.4 with a 68 share, the highest for a Super Bowl since Super Bowl XX in 1986; and drew a 56.3 rating in New Orleans and a 54.2 rating in Indianapolis, first and fourth respectively among local markets. Super Bowl XLV surpassed the record a year later and was itself topped by Super Bowl XLVI in 2012. \n\nOn November 28, 2010, CBS broadcast its 5,000th NFL game. The game in question involved the Miami Dolphins visiting the Oakland Raiders, with Gus Johnson and Steve Tasker calling play-by-play.\n\nOn December 14, 2011, the NFL, along with Fox, NBC and CBS, announced a nine-year extension of the league's rights deal with all three networks to the end of the 2022 season. The extended contract includes the continued rotation of the Super Bowl yearly among the three networks, meaning CBS would air Super Bowls XLVII (2013), 50 (2016), LIII (2019), and LVI (2022). \n\nFor the 2012 NFL season, CBS began providing Spanish play-by-play commentary of all game broadcasts via a secondary audio program feed. Also in 2012, to further prevent issues surrounding late games from delaying primetime programming on the east coast (also influenced by other recent changes slowing the pace of games, such as video reviews and the kickoff for late games being moved from 4:15 to 4:25 p.m. Eastern Time), CBS began to move the start of its primetime schedule to 7:30 p.m. on weeks that the network carries a 4:25 p.m. game.\n\nSuper Bowl XLVII was broadcast for free on the internet on the host network's website, in this case CBSSports.com. CBS charged an average of $4 million for a 30-second commercial during the game, the highest rate for any Super Bowl. According to Nielsen, Super Bowl XLVII was watched by an estimated average total audience of 108.69 million U.S. viewers, with a record 164.1 million tuning into at least six minutes of the game. \n\nThe late-afternoon regional games held on December 1, 2013 (Denver-Kansas City and Cincinnati-San Diego) drew a 16.7 household rating, a 29 share, and 28.106 million viewers from 4:25 to 7:47 p.m. Eastern Time. \n\n2014–present: Thursday night games\n\nIn January 2014, reports surfaced that the NFL was shopping a selection of up to eight games from its Thursday Night Football package to other broadcasters, including the league's existing broadcast partners, along with Turner Sports. While the league was seeking either a cable or broadcast outlet, they were strongly considering the latter.\n\nOn February 5, 2014, it was announced that CBS would air eight, early-season Thursday night games during the 2014 NFL season in simulcast with NFL Network, with the remainder airing on NFL Network exclusively. CBS's team of Jim Nantz and Phil Simms handled commentary for all of the games, and CBS Sports produces all of the games in the package, including those on NFL Network, which will be produced in the manner of CBS telecasts. As a part of the contract, CBS was also allowed to broadcast a Saturday game in Week 16 for the first time since 2005.\n\nOn January 18, 2015, the NFL announced that CBS and the NFL Network would again partner, with the same broadcast schedule, during the 2015 NFL season. The contract is again only for one year, while CBS's Sunday contract is 12 years long. CBS also partnered with Yahoo Sports during the 2015 season, with Yahoo live streaming a CBS-produced game around the globe. The game was not available on CBS except in the local markets of the teams (Jacksonville and Buffalo).\n\nMarket coverage and television policies\n\nAs with Fox's coverage, the network's stations are divided into different groups based on the most popular or closest team to that market or, if that does not apply, based on the allure of a particular game. Each football game is rated as an \"A\", \"B\" or \"C\" game, with \"A\" games likely being televised nationally and \"C\" games airing only in the home television markets of the two participating teams. Significantly more behind-the-scenes resources are dedicated to \"A\" game coverage.\n\nUnder NFL broadcasting rules, CBS must televise all regional games in the home market of the visiting team (and, if tickets are sold out, the city where the game is being played), in its entirety, regardless if the game has a close outcome or is a blowout. However, if the game is a blowout, the network is allowed to switch to a game with a more competitive outcome in a market that is within the 75-mile blackout radius without it being the home market of origin. If a local game is blacked out, the local CBS affiliate is not allowed to show any other football game during the scheduled time of one being played by the home team (as an example, if the Kansas City Chiefs are losing to the Houston Texans by over 20 points in the fourth quarter, most of the CBS stations carrying that game can be switched to another game; however, the stations in the markets whose local teams are playing – Houston television station KHOU and Kansas City affiliate KCTV – must carry the Kansas City-Houston game to its conclusion).\n\nFrom 1970 to 1993, CBS exclusively covered games involving only NFC opponents and interconference games in which the road team was a member of the NFC. From 1998 to 2013, CBS exclusively broadcast AFC-only games and interconference games featuring an AFC road team. With the 2014 season, while AFC-only games still form the bulk of CBS's coverage, the network now shows a limited slate of games involving two NFC opponents (mostly on Thursdays), and interconference games in which the road team is an NFC franchise (all on Sundays). However, it is forced to give up several AFC games to Fox, though not as many games as CBS takes from Fox (due to CBS's status as a holder of multiple television contracts). \n\nFor the past few decades, the NFL has always allowed CBS to be the \"singleheader\" network during the week it televises the Men's U.S. Open Tennis final at 4:05 p.m. Eastern Time around the country (CBS has said that it could not justify putting the Men's U.S. Open Final on Sunday night in terms of ratings; the women's final, broadcast on a Saturday night, often outrates the men's final by a considerable margin, except when at least one American plays in the men's final). However, due to weather delays occurring yearly since 2009, this ended up being the slot for the women's final on Sunday afternoons until CBS lost the U.S. Open rights to ESPN after the 2014 tournament.\n\nLocal preseason television coverage\n\nSince CBS re-obtained the NFL broadcast rights in 1998, a number of the network's local stations have televised preseason football games, mostly including the network's graphics and production that viewers would normally see during regular season national/regional broadcasts.\n\nA number of NFL teams and their broadcasting departments have teamed up with CBS Sports to produce games; , these teams include the San Diego Chargers (originating stations KCBS-TV in Los Angeles and KFMB-TV in San Diego), New York Jets (WCBS-TV in New York City) and Green Bay Packers (WGBA-TV in Green Bay and co-flagship WTMJ-TV in Milwaukee; since former CBS O&O WFRV-TV in Green Bay lost the local rights to the preseason games, Packers coverage on WGBA and WTMJ currently uses NBC's graphics package as both are affiliates of that network, although the telecasts continue to use a CBS technical and announcing team).\n\nHowever, there are some that used a few, but not all, elements of the NFL on CBS production presentations, and they are mostly in-house productions between the teams and their individual flagship station; these include the Pittsburgh Steelers (KDKA-TV), Miami Dolphins (WFOR-TV), San Francisco 49ers (KPIX and KOVR in Sacramento), Dallas Cowboys (KTVT), Cincinnati Bengals (WKRC-TV), Kansas City Chiefs (KCTV), New England Patriots (WBZ-TV), Atlanta Falcons (WGCL-TV) and the Jacksonville Jaguars (WJAX-TV). CBS O&O WWJ-TV in Detroit was the Detroit Lions' flagship station from 2008 to 2010 and used most of their graphics and music. In addition to WWJ, of the stations mentioned, WCBS; KCBS; KDKA; WFOR; KTVT; KPIX; KOVR and WBZ are all currently owned by CBS Corporation.\n\nOn-air staff\n\nAlphabetical list of past and present commentators\n\nNFL on CBS commentator pairings\n\nDigital on-screen graphics\n\n1992–1993\n\nCBS Sports debuted on-screen graphics (as opposed to simple text) for its event telecasts in 1991. These graphics used a small score graphic that contained the score and game clock, which was removed during plays. The graphics were gray, beveled edged rectangles, with logos shown in a beveled edged square.\n\n1998–2000\n\nFrom 1998 to 2000, the scoring bug had a half-capsule shape where the score was displayed in white text on a blue background (that contained the CBS eye), below the quarter and time in black text on a white background. The down and distance would pop out from the bottom of the bug in a white box when necessary; it would spin around to show the number of timeouts left. The standard graphics were blue, and individual team graphics were colored according to the team.\n\n2001\n\nStarting in Super Bowl XXXV, the bug took on a more rectangular shape, with the score and quarter/time positions flipped. The scores were now displayed in white text against an orange background, and the quarter and time beneath them in a white text on a blue background. The down and distance and ball location popped out in two separate boxes underneath the main bug. The team-specific colors for graphics were dropped, and would not be used again by CBS until 2013.\n\n2002–2005\n\nIn 2002, a new bug with more of a horizontal orientation was introduced. The CBS Sports logo that previously adorned the top of the bug was replaced with the CBS \"eye\" logo in blue and white. The bug was divided into two rectangles, the left one housing the time and quarter and the right the teams and scores, all in white text on blue. As in years past, the down and distance were contained in a pop-out box, also in the blue and white scheme.\n\nIn 2002, the graphics package itself remained the same as in 2000 and 2001. However, the look was updated in 2003 to more closely match the design of the score box. In 2004 and 2005, the top two games each week were presented in high definition. These HD broadcasts used a score box optimized for the 16:9 frame, the first time that a U.S. network had used graphics optimized for high definition.\n\nIn Week 3 of the 2004 season, CBS unveiled a constant scoring update bar on the bottom of the screen (the first of its kind). This was initially called \"Game Trax,\" and complimented \"Stat Trax,\" unveiled the year before which was the first system to show player statistics updates popping out of the score display after a play (now standard on all networks).\n\n2006–2008\n\nThe 2006 season introduced a new graphics package for The NFL on CBS, including a new logo (which also formed the base of SEC college football and NCAA college basketball logos) and new NFL Today studio set, as part of a network-wide overhaul of the graphics package. The digital on-screen graphics were also changed, with red and a light shade of blue introduced from the new logo. A more complex scoring bug included the new NFL on CBS logo and six circle segments stacked in columns of two emanating from the logo. The first two featured the quarter and time, the next two the team abbreviations (all in white text on the darker blue) and the last two each team's respective scores in black text on a white background. The entire bug was trimmed in the red and lighter blue; the down and distance pop-out changed to a half-ellipse shape.\n\nWhen a team scores a touchdown, the columns that emanate from the logo collapse into the logo. The logo then quickly spins around to show the scoring team's logo, a full bar the shape of the combined boxes quickly protruding showing the word \"TOUCHDOWN\", with the bug sparkling. After about three or four seconds of this graphic showing, the aforementioned animation takes place once more, this time with the bug returning to normal. In all instances of points scored, the changed score flashes a few times to indicate a change in score, with a touchdown score changing after the \"TOUCHDOWN\" graphic is shown. Notably, this score box was not optimized for high definition as the previous package was, even on HD games.\n\n2009–2013\n\nIn 2009, the score bug was changed to a top-screen banner, although the graphics package used from 2006 remains the same. This bug featured, horizontally left-to-right, the CBS \"eye\" logo, the down and distance against a white background, each team's logo, initials and points, and then the quarter and remaining time. When the down and distance was not displayed, that and the CBS \"eye\" logo were replaced by a blue and red \"NFL on CBS\" logo. When there was a penalty, the word \"FLAG\" replaced the down and distance on a yellow background, with the penalty description dropping down from below the team's initials; when there is an official review, the down and distance would be replaced by \"OFFICIAL REVIEW\" on a red background. For challenges, a drop-down below the teams initials with a dark red background shows with the word \"CHALLENGE.\" The play clock would flash red when it hit the 5-second mark and stays red until the play clock is reset. When a team scored a touchdown, the entire bar would change, displaying the scoring team's logo on the left and the team's main color as the background, with the word \"TOUCHDOWN\" with the letter spacing widening for a few moments before returning to normal. After such, the team's score will be highlighted their color, and the previous score will be replaced by the new score (this also happens when the team's PAT or 2-point conversion is ruled to be good). After this occurs, stats of players involved immediately appear in the bottom of the banner.\n\nA small white indicator showed on the top of the bar, on top of whatever team currently had possession of the ball. At times, at the bottom of the bar, various player statistics (such as quarterback ratings), game stats (such as drive summaries), and situational issues in the game (such as amount of timeouts remaining), would pop open for a few moments whenever it is needed. For Week 3 of the 2009 season, the possession indicator was changed to a small dot next to the team's logo due to the addition of timeout indicators across the top.\n\nBeginning with the NCAA football season in September 2011, college football broadcasts on CBS and the CBS Sports Network began using a scoring bug mirroring this one. CBS Sports Network's United Football League coverage in 2012 also used the same graphics package.\n\n2013–2015\n\nCBS debuted a new graphics package starting with the network's coverage of Super Bowl XLVII; the package was used for all CBS game telecasts beginning with the 2013 season. Originally optimized for a 4:3 display, the elements are now optimized for the 16:9 format as a result of the network's incorporation of the AFD #10 broadcast tag.\n\nThe lower third graphics adopt the column layout for player info graphics used by all other sports broadcasters, except for Fox. The portion containing the player's name is stacked on the left, with the team's primary color in the background of the name panel. Other statistics are shown on a gray background on panels to the right. The score banner is gray with team abbreviations listed over their primary color and next to their logo. For Sunday game broadcasts, the NFL on CBS logo is placed on the left; the \"NFL\" portion disappears and is replaced by the down and distance, \"Flag\", or \"Official Review\". Also for the Sunday broadcasts, challenges and statistics drop down from the bar. The only scoring play which used an animation is a touchdown, which involves the team logo and the word \"Touchdown\" appearing in place of the banner. Timeout indicators are located above the team abbreviations for Sunday broadcasts, and a possession indicator is located to the right of the abbreviation.\n\nSince the network began airing the evening games in 2014, Thursday Night Football games use a package with the usual CBS curved-edged graphics, however incorporating a generic \"TNF\" logo in lower thirds instead of the CBS logo because of the fact that Thursday broadcasts also air on the NFL Network. A \"TNF\" text logo is also used in the border of full screen graphics where the \"NFL on CBS\" text is usually seen. The score bar is located on the bottom of the screen instead of the top, with the \"NFL on CBS\" text replaced by a \"CBS TNF\" mark, and the \"TNF\" portion disappearing to show down and distance. The usual play clock location is instead home to an NFL Network logo, with the play clock moved next to the game clock for Thursdays only. Any information that drops down from the bar on Sundays instead pops up from the bar on the Thursday broadcasts, with timeout indicators flipped to the bottom.\n\nFor the game live-streamed on Yahoo in 2015, all silver \"CBS\" marks in the graphics package were replaced by purple \"Yahoo\" logos. The game used the top-screen version of the scoring banner.\n\n2016–present\n\nBeginning with the network's February 7, 2016 broadcast of Super Bowl 50, CBS Sports debuted a new logo along with a new on-air graphics package that is optimized for the 16:9 format. The new graphics will be rolled out on all of CBS Sports' other properties (including the network's joint production of NCAA March Madness with Turner Sports) in the coming months.\n\nThe score bar is now located at the bottom of the screen for all broadcasts, no matter what day they take place on. The CBS eye logo is at the far left. If there is no down and distance displayed, the word \"NFL\" accompanies the logo. It is expected that \"TNF\" will replace \"NFL\" for Thursday games as in the previous package. The down-and-distance display, which was previously shown on the left side of the bar, is now shown on the right side of the bar. When it appears, the \"NFL\" on the other side of the bar disappears. Possession of the ball is indicated by the background color in the down-and-distance display. The play clock is now located to the right of the game clock. The timeout indicators, which are now shown as white dash marks, are located below the team's abbreviation, both placed against the team's main color. The team logo is to the left of the abbreviation. The score is in a darker shade of the team's color to the right. Whenever a team scores a touchdown, the graphic displays the team's watermark, followed by \"TOUCHDOWN\" before the graphic returns to normal.\n\nMusic\n\nNielsen ratings\n\nThe Sunday afternoon, October 14, 2007 game between the New England Patriots and Dallas Cowboys on CBS, was viewed by 29.1 million people, making it the most-watched NFL Sunday game since the Dallas Cowboys–San Francisco 49ers game on November 10, 1996 on Fox (29.7 million viewers), according to Nielsen Media Research data. The game was also the most-watched television program for the week of October 8–14, drawing nine million viewers more than the CBS crime drama CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (19.8 million viewers), and was the most-watched program of the season.\n\nThe November 4, 2007, broadcast of a game between the New England Patriots and Indianapolis Colts drew a 20.1 rating and 33.8 million viewers for CBS.\n\nDuring the 17-week 2008 season (September 4–December 28, 2008), CBS' regular-season game telecasts were watched by an estimated cumulative audience of 150.9 million viewers, 14% higher than NBC's 132.4 million viewers, 3% higher than Fox's 146.9 million viewers, and 52% higher than ESPN's 99.4 million. The cumulative audience is based on the total amount of viewers (persons 2+) who watched at least six minutes of NFL game coverage since the start of the 2008 regular season.\n\nFor the 2009 season, the network's regular-season telecasts averaged 19.509 million viewers (counting only seven airings during the season by Nielsen). For the first thirteen weeks of the 2013 season, the CBS game telecasts averaged 26.5 million viewers." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Shoemaking.txt", "Scale_model.txt", "Human.txt" ], "title": [ "Shoemaking", "Scale model", "Human" ], "wiki_context": [ "Shoemaking is the process of making footwear. Originally, shoes were made one at a time by hand. Traditional handicraft shoemaking has now been largely superseded in volume of shoes produced by industrial mass production of footwear, but not necessarily in quality, attention to detail, or craftsmanship.\n\nShoemakers, also known as cobblers, may produce a range of footwear items, including shoes, boots, sandals, clogs and moccasins. Such items are generally made of leather, wood, rubber, plastic, jute or other plant material, and often consist of multiple parts for better durability of the sole, stitched to a leather upper.\n\nTrades that engage in shoemaking have included the cordwainer's and cobbler's trades. Today shoes are often made on a factory basis rather than a craft basis.\n\nHistory\n\nTraditional methods\n\nFor most of history, shoemaking has been a handicraft, limited to time consuming manufacture by hand. Traditional shoemakers used more than 15 different techniques of making shoes. Some of these were: pegged construction, English welted (machine-made versions are referred to as \"Goodyear welted\" after the inventor of the technique), goyser welted, Norwegian, stitchdown, turnout, German sewn, moccasin, bolognese stitched, and blake-stitched.\n\nThe most basic foot protection, used since ancient times in the Mediterranean area, was the sandal, which consisted of a protective sole, attached to the foot with leather thongs. Similar footwear worn in the Far East was made from plaited grass or palm fronds. In climates that required a full foot covering, a single piece of untanned hide was laced with a thong, providing full protection for the foot and so made a complete covering. \n\nThe production of wooden shoes, was widespread in medieval Europe. They were made from a single piece of wood roughly cut into shoe form. A variant of this form was the clog, which were wooden soles to which a leather upper was attached. The sole and heel were made from one piece of maple or ash two inches thick, and a little longer and broader than the desired size of shoe. The outer side of the sole and heel was fashioned with a long chisel-edged implement, called the clogger’s knife or stock; while a second implement, called the groover, made a groove around the side of the sole. With the use of a 'hollower', the inner sole's contours were adapted to the shape of the foot. The leather uppers were then fitted closely to the groove around the sole. Clogs were of great advantage to workers in muddy and damp conditions, keeping the feet dry and comfortable.\n\nBy the 1600s, leather shoes came in two main types. 'Turn shoes' consisted of one thin flexible sole, which was sewed to the upper while outside in and turned over when completed. This type was used for making slippers and similar shoes. The second type united the upper with an insole, which was subsequently attached to an out-sole with a raised heel. This was the main variety, and was used for most footwear, including standard shoes and riding boots.\n\nThe traditional shoemaker would measure the feet and cut out upper leathers according to the required size. These parts were fitted and stitched together. The sole was next assembled, consisting of a pair of inner soles of soft leather, a pair of outer soles of firmer texture, a pair of welts or bands about one inch broad, of flexible leather, and lifts and top-pieces for the heels. The insole was then attached to a last made of wood, which was used to form the shoe. Some lasts were straight, while curved lasts came in pairs: one for left shoes, the other for right shoes. The 'lasting' procedure then secured the leather upper to the sole with tacks. The soles were then hammered into shape; the heel lifts were then attached with wooden pegs and the worn out-sole was nailed down to the lifts. The finishing operation included paring, rasping, scraping, smoothing, blacking, and burnishing the edges of soles and heels, scraping, sand-papering, and burnishing the soles, withdrawing the lasts, and cleaning out any pegs which may have pierced through the inner sole.\n\nOther types of ancient and traditionally made shoes included furs wrapped around feet, and sandals wrapped over them: used by Romans fighting in northern Europe, and moccasins - simple shoes without the durability of joined shoes.\n\nIndustrial era\n\nShoemaking became more commercialized in the mid-18th century, as it expanded as a cottage industry. Large warehouses began to stock footwear in warehouses, made by many small manufacturers from the area.\n\nUntil the 19th century, shoemaking was a traditional handicraft, but by the century's end, the process had been almost completely mechanized, with production occurring in large factories. Despite the obvious economic gains of mass-production, the factory system produced shoes without the individual differentiation that the traditional shoemaker was able to provide.\n\nThe first steps towards mechanisation were taken during the Napoleonic Wars by the engineer, Marc Brunel. He developed machinery for the mass-production of boots for the soldiers of the British Army. In 1812 he devised a scheme for making nailed-boot-making machinery that automatically fastened soles to uppers by means of metallic pins or nails. With the support of the Duke of York, the shoes were manufactured, and, due to their strength, cheapness, and durability, were introduced for the use of the army. In the same year, the use of screws and staples was patented by Richard Woodman. Brunel's system was described by Sir Richard Phillips as a visitor to his factory in Battersea as follows:\n\n\"In another building I was shown his manufactory of shoes, which, like the other, is full of ingenuity, and, in regard to subdivision of labour, brings this fabric on a level with the oft-admired manufactory of pins. Every step in it is effected by the most elegant and precise machinery; while, as each operation is performed by one hand, so each shoe passes through twenty-five hands, who complete from the hide, as supplied by the currier, a hundred pairs of strong and well-finished shoes per day. All the details are performed by the ingenious application of the mechanic powers; and all the parts are characterised by precision, uniformity, and accuracy. As each man performs but one step in the process, which implies no knowledge of what is done by those who go before or follow him, so the persons employed are not shoemakers, but wounded soldiers, who are able to learn their respective duties in a few hours. The contract at which these shoes are delivered to Government is 6s. 6d. per pair, being at least 2s. less than what was paid previously for an unequal and cobbled article.\" \n\nHowever, when the war ended in 1815, manual labour became much cheaper, and the demand for military equipment subsided. As a consequence, Brunel's system was no longer profitable and it soon ceased business.\n\nSimilar exigencies at the time of the Crimean War stimulated a renewed interest in methods of mechanization and mass-production, which proved longer lasting. A shoemaker in Leicester, Tomas Crick, patented the design for a riveting machine in 1853. His machine used an iron plate to push iron rivets into the sole. The process greatly increased the speed and efficiency of production. He also introduced the use of steam-powered rolling-machines for hardening leather and cutting-machines, in the mid-1850s. \n\nThe sewing machine was introduced in 1846, and provided an alternative method for the mechanization of shoemaking. By the late 1850s, the industry was beginning to shift towards the modern factory, mainly in the US and areas of England. A shoe stitching machine was invented by the American Lyman Blake in 1856 and perfected by 1864. Entering in to partnership with McKay, his device became known as the McKay stitching machine and was quickly adopted by manufacturers throughout New England. As bottlenecks opened up in the production line due to these innovations, more and more of the manufacturing stages, such as pegging and finishing, became automated. By the 1890s, the process of mechanisation was largely complete.\n\nA process for manufacturing stitchless, that is glued, shoes, AGO, was developed in 1910.\n\nTraditional shoemakers still exist today, especially in poorer parts of the world, and create custom shoes. Current crafters, in developing regions or supply constrained areas may use surplus car or truck tire tread sections as an inexpensive and plentiful material resource with which to make strong soles for shoes or sandals. Generally, the modern machinery used includes die cutting tools to cut the shapes and grommet machines to punch holes for lacing.\n\nIn popular culture\n\nThe shoemaking profession makes a number of appearances in popular culture, such as in stories about shoemaker's elves, and the proverb \"The shoemaker's children go barefoot.\" The patron saint of shoemakers is Saint Crispin.\n\nChefs and cooks sometimes use the term \"shoemaker\" as an insult to others who have prepared sub-standard food, possibly by overcooking, implying that the chef in question has made his or her food as tough as shoe leather or hard leather shoe soles, and thus may be in the wrong profession.\n\nSimilarly, to \"cobble\" can mean not only to make or mend shoes, but \"to put together clumsily; to bungle.\" \n\nFamous shoemakers\n\n*Raymond Lewis Wildsmith, shoemaker who invented the loafer design. \n*Ravidas, Satguru of the Ravidassia religion, and member of the marginalized Chamar caste of cobblers and other leather workers.\n*Hans Sachs, German poet.\n*Salvatore Capezio, founder of the manufacturer of dance shoes Capezio.\n*Salvatore Ferragamo, an Italian shoe designer.\n*Jimmy Choo, a Malaysian Chinese fashion designer based in London.\n*Christian Louboutin, French footwear designer.\n*Daniel Day-Lewis, actor who apprenticed as a shoemaker.", "A scale model is most generally a physical representation of an object, which maintains accurate relationships between all important aspects of the model, although absolute values of the original properties need not be preserved. This enables it to demonstrate some behavior or property of the original object without examining the original object itself. The most familiar scale models represent the physical appearance of an object in miniature, but there are many other kinds.\n\nScale models are used in many fields including engineering, architecture, film making, military command, salesmanship and hobby model building. While each field may use a scale model for a different purpose, all scale models are based on the same principles and must meet the same general requirements to be functional. The detail requirements vary depending on the needs of the modeler.\n\nTo be a true scale model, all relevant aspects must be accurately modeled, such as material properties, so the model's interaction with the outside world is reliably related to the original object's interaction with the real world.\n\nRequirements for scale models \n\nIn general a scale model must be designed and built primarily considering similitude theory. However, other requirements concerning practical issues must also be considered.\n\nSimilitude requirements \n\nSimilitude is the theory and art of predicting prototype (original object) performance from scale model observations. The main requirement of similitude is all dimensionless quantities must be equal for both the scaled model and the prototype under the conditions the modeler desires to make observations. Dimensionless quantities are generally referred to as Pi terms, or π terms. In many fields the π terms are well established. For example, in fluid dynamics, a well known dimensionless number called the Reynolds number comes up frequently in scale model tests with fluid in motion relative to a stationary surface. Thus, for a scale model test to be reliable, the Reynolds number, as well as all other important dimensionless quantities, must be equal for both scale model and prototype under the conditions that the modeler wants to observe.\n\nAn example of the Reynolds number and its use in similitude theory satisfaction can be observed in the scale model testing of fluid flow in a horizontal pipe. The Reynolds number for the scale model pipe must be equal to the Reynolds number of the prototype pipe for the flow measurements of the scale model to correspond to the prototype in a meaningful way. This can be written mathematically, with the subscript m referring to the scale model and subscript p referring to the prototype, as follows:\n\n \\mathrm{Re}_m \n = \\mathrm{Re}_p\n\nwhere\n\n* {\\mathbf v} is the mean velocity of the object relative to the fluid (SI units: m/s)\n* {L} is a characteristic linear dimension, (travelled length of the fluid; hydraulic diameter when dealing with river systems) (m)\n* {\\mu} is the dynamic viscosity of the fluid (Pa·s or N·s/m² or kg/(m·s))\n* {\\rho}\\, is the density of the fluid (kg/m³).\n\nObserving the equation above it is clear to see that while the Reynolds numbers must be equal for the scale model and the prototype, this can be accomplished in many different ways, for example, in this problem by altering the scale of the dynamic viscosity of the model to work with the scale of the length. This means, the scales of different quantities, for example a material's elasticity in the scale model versus the prototype, are governed by equating the dimensionless quantities and the other quantity's scaling within the dimensionless quantity to ensure the dimensionless quantity of interest is of equal magnitude for the scale model and prototype.\n\nScaling \n\nWith the above understanding of similitude requirements, it becomes clear the scale often reported in scale models refers only to the geometric scale, \\mathrm{S}_L (L referring to length), and not the scale of the parameters potentially important to consider in the scale model design and fabrication. In general the scale of any quantity i, perhaps material density or viscosity, is defined as:\n\n \\mathrm{S}_i = \n\nwhere\n\n* i_p is the quantity value of the prototype \n* i_m is the quantity value of the scale model\n\nThis relationship must be applied to all quantities of interest in the prototype, observing similitude requirements—so the scale model can be built using dimensions and materials that make scale model testing results meaningful with respect to the prototype. \nOne method to determine the dimensionless quantities of concern for a given problem is to use dimensional analysis.\n\nPractical requirements \n\nPractical concerns include the cost to construct the model, available test facilities to condition and observe the model, the availability of certain materials, and even who will build it. Practical requirements are often very diverse depending on the purpose of the scale model and they all must be considered to have a successful scale model experience.\n\nAs an example, perhaps an aerospace company needs to test a new wing shape. According to the similitude requirements the test must be carried out in a wind tunnel that can drop the temperature of the air to , such as the Transonic Cryogenic Tunnel at NASA Langley Research Center. However, if a facility such as this one can't be used, perhaps due to cost constraints, the similitude requirements must be relaxed or the test redesigned to accommodate the limitation.\n\nClasses \n\nFor a scale model to represent a prototype in a perfectly true manner, all the dimensionless quantities, or π terms, must be equal for the scale model during the observational period and the prototype under the conditions the modeler desires to study. However, in many situations, designing a scale model that equates all the π terms to the prototype is simply not possible due to lack of materials, cost restrictions, or limitations of testing facilities. In this case, concessions must be made for practical reasons to the similitude requirements.\n\nDepending on the phenomena being observed, perhaps some dimensionless quantities aren't of interest and thus can be ignored by the modeler and the results of the scale model can still safely be assumed to correspond to the prototype. An example of this from fluid dynamics is flow of a liquid in a horizontal pipe. Possible π terms to consider in this situation are Reynolds number, Weber number, Froude number, and Mach number. For this flow configuration, however, no surface tension is involved, so the Weber number is inappropriate. Also, compression of the fluid is not applicable, so the Mach number can be disregarded. Finally, gravity is not responsible for the flow, so the Froude number can also be disregarded. This leaves the modeler with only the Reynolds number to worry about in terms of equating its values for the scale model and the prototype. \n\nIn general, scale models can be classified into three classes depending on the degree of similitude satisfaction they exhibit. To begin, a true model is one with complete similitude—that is, all π terms are equal for the scale model and the prototype. True models are difficult to realize in reality due to the many possible quantities the modeler must consider. As a result, modelers identify the important dimensionless quantities and construct a scale model that satisfies these. Important dimensionless quantities are called first-order dimensional requirements. A model that satisfies first-order similarity is called an adequate model. Finally, for scale models that fail to satisfy one or more of the first-order requirements, the name distorted model is given. \n\nExamples \n\nScale models are used by many fields for many different purposes. Some of the specific uses of scale models by specific fields are explained below in the examples.\n\nStructural scale model \n\nAlthough structural engineering has been a field of study for thousands of years and many of the great problems have been solved using analytical and numerical techniques, many problems are still too complicated to understand in an analytical manner or the current numerical techniques lack real world confirmation. When this is the case, for example a complicated reinforced concrete beam-column-slab interaction problem, scale models can be constructed observing the requirements of similitude to study the problem. Many structural labs exist to test these structural scale models such as the Newmark Civil Engineering Laboratory at the University of Illinois, UC. \n\nFor structural engineering scale models, it is important for several specific quantities to be scaled according to the theory of similitude. These quantities can be broadly grouped into three categories: loading, geometry, and material properties. A good reference for considering scales for a structural scale model under static loading conditions in the elastic regime is presented in Table 2.2 of the book Structural Modeling and Experimental Techniques. \n\nStructural engineering scale models can use different approaches to satisfy the similitude requirements of scale model fabrication and testing. A practical introduction to scale model design and testing is discussed in the paper \"Pseudodynamic Testing of Scaled Models\". \n\nModel aircraft \n\nModel aircraft are divided into two main groups: static and flying models.\n\nStatic model aircraft\n\nStatic model aircraft are commonly built using plastic, but wood, metal, card and paper can also be used. Models are sold painted and assembled, painted but not assembled (snap-fit), or unpainted and not assembled. The most popular types of aircraft to model are commercial airliners and military aircraft. Aircraft can be modeled in many \"scales\". The scale notation is the size of the model compared to the real, full-size aircraft called the \"prototype\". 1:8 scale will be used as an example; it is read as: \"1 inch (or whatever measurement) on the model is equal (: means equal) to 8 inches on the real (prototype) airplane\". Sometimes the scale notation is not used; it is simply stated: \"my model is one eighth (1/8) scale\", meaning \"my model is one eighth the size of the real airplane\" or \"my model is one eight as large as the real airplane\". Popular scales are, in order of size, 1:144, 1:72 (the most numerous), 1:48, 1:32, 1:24, 1:16, 1:8 and 1:4. Some European models are available at more metric scales such as 1:50. The highest quality models are made from injection-molded plastic or cast resin. Models made from Vacuum formed plastic are generally for the more skilled builder. More inexpensive models are made from heavy paper or card stock. Ready-made die-cast metal models are also very popular. As well as the traditional scales, die-cast models are available in 1:200, 1:250, 1:350, 1:400, and 1:600.\n\nThese scales are usually reserved for civil airliners. Static aircraft scale modeling falls broadly into three categories: kit assembly, scratch-building, and collection of ready-made models. Scratch-builders tend to be the top echelon in terms of skill and craftsmanship. They tend to be the most discerning when it comes to accuracy and detail and they spend far more time on far fewer models than a kit assembler.\n\nKit assemblers fall roughly into two categories: OOB (Out of box) and modified. Out of Box refers to the act of assembling a kit only from what is contained in the box supplied, whereas a Modifier employs after-market products such as alternative decals, photo-etched metal detail parts, and cast resin detail or conversion parts to enhance or change the model in some way. Collectors are concerned purely with the issue of theme, and are not really interested in personal construction as such.\n\nAircraft modelers often fall into more than one category, as fancy takes them. The overwhelming majority of aircraft modelers concern themselves with depiction of real-life aircraft, but there is a smaller cadre of modelers who derive additional fun by 'bending' history a little by making models of aircraft that either never actually flew or existed, or by painting them in a color scheme that did not actually exist. This is commonly referred to as 'What-if' or 'Alternative' modeling, and the most common theme is 'Luftwaffe 1946' or 'Luftwaffe '46'. This theme stems from the idea of modeling German secret projects that never saw the light of day due to the close of World War II. This concept has been extended to include British, Russian, and US experimental projects that never made it into production.\n\nFlying model aircraft\n\nFlying model aircraft are of two types: those constructed for aerodynamic research and those for recreation or aeromodeling.\n\nAerodynamic models may be constructed for use in a wind tunnel or in free flight. Small-scale piloted aircraft are even constructed to test some aspect of a proposed full-size design, but these are not considered as models even though they may be accurate to scale.\n\nRecreational models are often made to resemble some real type. However the aerodynamic requirements of a small model are different from those of a full-size craft, so flying models are seldom fully accurate to scale. Typically the wings and fuselage must be to different scales. Most flying model aircraft can be placed in one of three groups: free flight, control line and radio controlled. Flying models can be built from scratch or from kits. Some kits take many hours to put together and some kits are almost ready to fly or ready to fly.\n\nPlans-relief \n\nWith elements similar to miniature wargaming, building models and architectural models, a plan-relief is a means of geographical representation in relief as a scale model for military use, to visualise building projects on fortifications or campaigns involving fortifications.\n\nModel buildings \n\nMost hobbyists who build models of buildings do so as part of a diorama to enhance their other models, such as a model railroad or model war machines. As a stand-alone hobby, building models are probably most popular among enthusiasts of construction toys such as Erector, Lego and K'nex. Famous landmarks such as the Empire State Building, Big Ben and the White House are common subjects. Standard scales have not emerged in this hobby. Model railroaders use railroad scales for their buildings: H0 scale (1:87), OO scale (1:76), N scale (1:160), and O scale (1:43). Lego builders use miniland scale (1:20) and minifig scale (1:48) and micro scale (1:192)In the Lego community, micro scale can refer to anything smaller than minifig scale (1:48), but 1:192 is occasionally set as a standard micro scale. This ratio is arrived at by scaling a person (6 feet) to the height of a Lego brick (3/8 inches). See Generally, the larger the building, the smaller the scale. Model buildings are commonly made from plastic, foam, balsa wood or paper. Card models are published in the form of a book, and some models are manufactured like 3-D puzzles. Professionally, building models are used by architects and salesmen.\n\nArchitectural models\n\nArchitecture firms usually employ model makers or contract model making firms to make models of projects to sell their designs to builders and investors. These models are traditionally hand-made, but advances in technology have turned the industry into a very high tech process than can involve Class IV laser cutters, five-axis CNC machines as well as rapid prototyping or 3D printing. Typical scales are 1:12, 1:24, 1:48, 1:50, 1:100, 1:200, 1:500, etc.\n\nHouse portrait models\n\nTypically found in 1:50 scale and also called model house, model home or Display House, this type of model is usually found in stately homes or specially designed houses. Sometimes this kind of model is commissioned to mark a special date like an anniversary or the completion of the architecture, or these models might be used by salesmen selling homes in a new neighborhood.\n\nModel buses and trucks \n\nTypically found in 1:50 scale, most manufacturers of commercial vehicles and heavy equipment commission scale models made of die-cast metal as promotional items to give to prospective customers. These are also popular children's toys and collectibles. The major manufacturers of these items are Conrad and NZG in Germany. Corgi also makes some 1:50 models, as well as Dutch maker Tekno.\n\nTrucks are also found as diecast models in 1:43 scale and injection moulded kits (and children's toys) in 1:24 scale. Recently some manufacturers have appeared in 1:64 scale like Code 3.\n\nModel cars \n\nAlthough the British scale for 0 gauge was first used for model cars made of rectilinear and circular parts, it was the origin of the European scale for cast or injection moulded model cars. MOROP's specification of 1:45 scale for European 0 does not alter the series of cars in 1:43 scale, as it has the widest distribution in the world.\n\nIn America, a series of cars was developed from at first cast metal and later styrene models (\"promos\") offered at new-car dealerships to drum up interest. The firm Monogram, and later Tamiya, first produced them in a scale derived from the Architect's scale: 1:24 scale, while the firms AMT, Jo-Han, and Revell chose the scale of 1:25. Monogram later switched to this scale after the firm was purchased by Revell. Some cars are also made in 1:32 scale, and rolling toys are often made on the scale 1:64 scale. Chinese die-cast manufacturers have introduced 1/72 scale into their range. The smaller scales are usually die-cast cars and not the in the class as model cars. Except in rare occasions, Johnny Lightning and Ertl-made die-cast cars were sold as kits for buyers to assemble.\n\nModel cars are also used in car design.\n\nModel construction vehicles \n\nA model construction vehicle (or engineering vehicle) is a scale model or die-cast toy that represents a construction vehicle such as an excavator, crane, concrete pump, backhoe, etc.\n\nConstruction vehicle models are almost always made in 1:50 scale, particularly because the cranes at this scale are often three to four feet tall when extended and larger scales would be unsuited for display on a desk or table. These models are popular as children's toys in Germany. In the US they are commonly sold as promotional models for new construction equipment, commissioned by the manufacturer of the prototype real-world equipment. The major manufacturers in Germany are Conrad and NZG, with some competition from Chinese firms that have been entering the market.\n\nModel railways \n\nModel trains come in a variety of scales, from 1:8 on the large end and 1:450 (T scale) on the small. Each scale has its own strengths and weaknesses, and fills a different niche in the hobby. The largest models are as much as 3 m long, the smallest a few centimeters. The most popular size is H0 scale (1:87) and second is N scale (1:160).\n \nModel railways originally used the term gauge, which refers to the distance between the rails, just as full-size railways do. Although model railways were also built to different gauges, \"standard gauge\" in 1:1 scale railroads is 4' 8.5\". Therefore, a model railway reduces that standard to scale. An H0 scale model railway would have track that is 1/87 of 4' 8.5\", or about 0.65\" from rail to rail. Now it is more typical to refer to the scale of the model, and the term scale has replaced \"gauge\" in most usages. This is despite considerable confusion between countries as to the definition of 0 scale and N scale.\n\nConsiderable confusion often arises when referring to \"scale\" and \"gauge\", especially as some misinformed individuals tend to use the words interchangeably. The word \"scale\" only ever refers to the proportional size of the model; the word \"gauge\" only ever applies to the measurement between the inside faces of the rails. To highlight this difference, consider the various gauges used in H0 scale; A gauge of 16.5 mm is used to represent the \"standard gauge\" of (H0 scale), a gauge of 12 mm is used to represent gauge (H0m) and the gauge (H0n3-1/2) and a gauge of 9 mm is used to represent a prototype gauge of . It is completely incorrect to refer to the mainstream scales as \"H0 gauge\", \"N gauge\" or \"Z gauge\"\n\nThe most popular scale to go with a given gauge was often derived at by the following roundabout process. German artisans would take strips of metal of standard metric size to make things to blueprints whose dimensions were in inches: hence \"4 mm to the foot\" yields the 1:76.2 size of the \"00 scale\". This British scale is anomalously used on the standard H0/00 scale (16.5 mm gauge from 3.5 mm/foot scale) tracks, however, because early electric motors weren't available commercially in smaller sizes.\n\nThe Germans have a more developed terminology, which can explain this a bit better. Baugrösse (English: \"building size\") is the alphanumeric designation, which is used in place of a numeric scale ratio. It is used for scale, as in \"0 scale\", \"H0 scale\", or \"Z scale\". Maßstab (English: \"measure\") is the proportion, with a colon, as in the corresponding terms \"1:43\", \"1:87.1\", and \"1:220\". Spurweite (English: \"track width\") is the distance between the rails, or correspondingly \"32 mm\", \"16.5 mm\", and \"6.5 mm\", and again gauge is used for this in English. One might add to these the old use of the term scale, of \"7 mm to the foot\" and \"3.5 mm to the foot\" for the first two, while the last really isn't expressible in this manner. Early 20th century German mass-produced toys had a measured gauge from rail centre to rail centre of rolled tinplate rail, with much latitude between flange and rail.\n\nThere are three different standards for the \"0\" scale, each of which uses tracks of 32 mm for the standard gauge. The American version continues a dollhouse scale of 1:48. It is sometimes called \"quarter-gauge\", as in \"one-quarter-inch to the foot\". The British version continued the pattern of sub-contracting to Germans; so, at 7 mm to the foot, it works out to a scale of 1:43.5. Later, MOROP, the European authority of model railroad firms, declared that the \"0\" gauge (still 32 mm) must use the scale of 1:45. That is, in Europe the below-chassis dimensions must be slightly towards 4 feet 6 inches, to allow wheel/tyre/splasher clearance for smaller than realistic curved sections.\n\n\"Live steam\" railways, that people actually ride on, are built in many scales, such as 1-1/2\", 1\", and 3/4 inches to the foot. Common gauges are 7-1/2\" (Western US) and 7-1/4\" (Eastern US & rest of the world), 5\", 4-3/4\". Smaller live steam gauges do exist, but as the scale gets smaller, pulling power decreases. One of the smallest gauges on which a live steam engine can pull a passenger is the now almost defunct 2-1/2-inch gauge.\n\nModel robots \n\nJapanese firms have marketed toys and models of what are often called mecha, nimble humanoid fighting robots. The robots, which appear in animated shows (anime), are often depicted at a size between 15-20m in height, and so scales of 1:100 and 1:144 are common for these subjects, though other scales such as 1:72 are commonly used for robots and related subjects of different size.\n\nThe most prolific manufacturer of mecha models is Bandai, whose Gundam kit lines were a strong influence in the genre in the 1980s. Even today, Gundam kits are the most numerous in the mecha modeling genre, usually with dozens of new releases every year. The features of modern Gundam kits, such as color molding and snap-fit construction, have become the standard expectations for other mecha model kits.\n\nDue to the fantasy nature of most anime robots, and the necessary simplicity of cel-animated designs, mecha models lend themselves well to stylized work, improvisations, and simple scratchbuilds. One of Gundam's contributions to the genre was the use of a gritty wartime backstory as a part of the fantasy, and so it is almost equally fashionable to build the robots in a weathered, beaten style, as would often be expected for AFV kits as to build them in a more stylish, pristine manner.\n\nModel rockets and spacecraft \n\nModel rocket kits began as a development of model aircraft kits, yet the scale of 1:72 [V.close to 4 mm.::1foot] never caught on. Scales 1:48 and 1:96 are used. There are some rockets of scales 1:128, 1:144, and 1:200, but Russian firms put their large rockets in 1:288. Heller SA offers some models in the scale of 1:125.\n\nScience fiction space ships are heavily popular in the modeling community. Models based on ships from such franchises as Star Trek, Star Wars, and Battlestar Galactica are regularly sold and created in scales ranging from 1:24 to 1:1400 to 1:2500 to 1:10000 for the larger Star Wars ships (for especially objects like the Death Stars and Super Star Destroyers, even smaller scales are used). Finemolds in Japan have recently released a series of high quality injection molded Star Wars kits in 1:72, and this range is supplemented by resin kits from Fantastic Plastic.\n\nModel living creatures \n\nScale models of people and animals are found in a wide variety of venues, and may be either single-piece objects or kits that must be assembled, usually depending on the purpose of the model. For instance, models of people as well as both domestic and wild animals are often produced for display in model cities or railroads to provide a measure of detail or realism, and scaled relative to the trains, buildings, and other accessories of a certain line of models. If a line of trains or buildings does not feature models of living creatures, those who build the models often buy these items separately from another line so they can feature people or animals. In other cases, scale model lines feature living creatures exclusively, often focusing on educational interests.\n\nModels of living creatures requiring assembly are not as common as single-piece units, but certainly not unheard of. One of the most prolific kinds of kits requiring assembly that feature living creatures are models of human and animal skeletons. Like their single-piece counterparts, such kits are often touted as being educational activities. Skeleton kits often have unique features such as glow-in-the-dark pieces or attachable internal organs. Again, dinosaurs are a popular subject for such models. There are also garage kits, which are often figures of anime characters in multiple parts that require assembly.\n\nModel ships and naval wargaming \n\nIn the first half of the 20th century, navies used hand-made models of warships for identification and instruction in a variety of scales. That of 1:500 was called \"teacher scale.\" Besides models made in 1:1200 and 1:2400 scales, there were also ones made to 1:2000 and 1:5000. Some, made in Britain, were labelled \"1 inch to 110 feet\", which would be 1:1320 scale, but aren't necessarily accurate.\n\nMichele Morciano says small scale ship models were produced in about 1905 linked to the wargaming rules and other publications of Fred T. Jane. The company that standardised on 1:1200 was Bassett-Lowke in 1908. The British Admiralty subsequently contracted with Bassett-Lowke and other companies and individual craftsmen to produce large numbers of recognition models, to this scale, in 1914-18. \n\nJust before the Second World War, the American naval historian (and science fiction author) Fletcher Pratt published a book on naval wargaming as could be done by civilians using ship models cut off at the waterline to be moved on the floors of basketball courts and similar locales. The scale he used was non-standard (reported as 1:666), and may have been influenced by toy ships then available, but as the hobby progressed, and other rule sets came into use, it was progressively supplemented by the series 1:600, 1:1200, and 1:2400. In Britain, 1:3000 became popular and these models also have come into use in the USA. These had the advantage of approximating the nautical mile as 120 inches, 60 inches, and 30 inches, respectively. As the knot is based on this mile and a 60-minute hour, this was quite handy.\n\nAfter the war, firms emerged to produce models from the same white metal used to make toy soldiers. One British firm offered a tremendously wide line of merchant ships and dockyard equipment in the scale 1:1200. In the US, at least one manufacturer, of the wartime 1:1200 recognition models, Comet, made them available for the civilian market postwar, which also drove the change to this scale. In addition, continental European manufacturers and European ship book publishers had adopted the 1:1250 drawing scale because of its similar convenience in size for both models and comparison drawings in books.\n\nA prestige scale for boats, comparable to that of 1:32 for fighter planes, is 1:72, producing huge models, but there are very few kits marketed in this scale. There are now several clubs around the world for those who choose to scratch-build radio-controlled model ships and submarines in 1:72, which is often done because of the compatibility with naval aircraft kits. For the smaller ships, plank-on-frame or other wood construction kits are offered in the traditional shipyard scales of 1:96, 1:108, or 1:192 (half of 1:96). In injection-molded plastic kits, Airfix makes full-hull models in the scale the Royal Navy has used to compare the relative sizes of ships: 1:600. Revell makes some kits to half the scale of the US Army standard: 1:570. Some American and foreign firms have made models in a proportion from the Engineer's scale: \"one-sixtieth-of-an-inch-to-the-foot\", or 1:720.\n\nManned ship models \n\nMany research workers, hydraulics specialists and engineers have used scale models for over a century, in particular in towing tanks. Manned models are small scale models that can carry and be handled by at least one person on an open expanse of water. They must behave just like real ships, giving the shiphandler the same sensations. Physical conditions such as wind, currents, waves, water depths, channels and berths must be reproduced realistically.\n\nManned models are used for research (e.g. ship behaviour), engineering (e.g. port layout) and for training in shiphandling (e.g. maritime pilots, masters and officers). They are usually at 1:25 scale.\n\nModel tanks and wargaming \n\nJust before the 20th century, the British historian (and science fiction author and forgotten mainstream novelist) H. G. Wells published a book, Little Wars, on how to play at battles in miniature. His books use 54 mm lead figures, particularly those manufactured by Britains. His fighting system employed spring-loaded model guns that shot matchsticks.\n\nThis use of physical mechanisms was echoed in the later games of Fred Jane, whose rules required throwing darts at ship silhouettes; his collection of data on the world's fleets was later published and became renowned. Dice have largely replaced this toy mayhem for consumers.\n\nFor over a century, toy soldiers were made of white metal, a lead-based alloy, often in architect's scale-based ratios in the English-speaking countries, and called tin soldiers. After the Second World War, such toys were on the market for children but now made of a safe plastic softer than styrene. American children called these \"army men\". Many sets were made in the new scale of 1:40. A few styrene model kits of land equipment were offered in this and in 1:48 and 1:32 scales. However, these were swept away by the number of kits in the scale of 1:35.\n\nThose who continued to develop miniature wargaming preferred smaller scale models, the soldiers still made of soft plastic. Airfix particularly wanted people to buy 1:76 scale soldiers and tanks to go with \"00\" gauge train equipment. Roco offered 1:87 scale styrene military vehicles to go with \"H0\" gauge model houses. However, although there is no 1:72 scale model railroad, more toy soldiers are now offered in this scale because it is the same as the popular aircraft scale. The number of fighting vehicles in this scale is also increasing, although the number of auxiliary vehicles available is far fewer than in 1:87 scale.\n\nA more recent development, especially in wargaming of land battles, is 15 mm white metal miniatures, often referred to as 1:100. The use of 15 mm scale metals has grown quickly since the early 1990s as they allow a more affordable option over 28 mm if large battles are to be refought, or a large number of vehicles represented. The rapid rise in the detail and quality of castings at 15 mm scale has also helped to fuel their uptake by the wargaming community.\n\nArmies use smaller scales still. The US Army specifies models of the scale 1:285 for its sand table wargaming. There are metal ground vehicles and helicopters in this scale, which is a near \"one-quarter-inch-to-six-feet\" scale. The continental powers of NATO have developed the similar scale of 1:300, even though metric standardizers really don't like any divisors other than factors of 10, 5, and 2, so maps are not commonly offered in Europe in scales with a \"3\" in the denominator.\n\nConsumer wargaming has since expanded into fantasy realms, employing scales large enough to be painted in imaginative detail - so called \"heroic\" 28 mm figures, (roughly 1:64, or S scale). Firms that produce these make small production lots of white metal.\n\nAlternatively to the commercial models, some modelers also tend to use scraps to achieve home-made warfare models. While it doesn't always involve wargaming, some modelers insert realistic procedures, enabling a certain realism such as firing guns or shell deflection on small scale models.\n\nEngine models \n\nKits for building an engine model are available, especially for kids. The most popular are the internal combustion, steam, jet, and stirling model engine. Usually they move using an electric motor or a hand crank, and many of them have a transparent case to show the internal process in action.\n\nMiniatures in contemporary art \n\nMiniatures and model kits are used in contemporary art whereby artists use both scratch built miniaturizations or commercially manufactured model kits to construct a dialogue between object and viewer. The role of the artist in this type of miniature is not necessarily to re-create an historical event or achieve naturalist realism, but rather to use scale as a mode of articulation in generating conceptual or theoretical exploration. Political, conceptual, and architectural examples are provided by noted artists such as Bodys Isek Kingelez, Jake and Dinos Chapman (otherwise known as the Chapman Brothers), Ricky Swallow, Shaun Wilson, Sven Christoffersen, or the Psikhelekedana artists from Mozambique, James Casebere, Oliver Boberg, and Daniel Dorall.\n\nAdditional comments on scales \n\nFor a more complete list of scale model sizes, see List of scale model sizes and Rail transport modelling scales\n\nFor hydraulic models, specific scale rules are applied to obtain the correct reproduction of physical phenomena.\n\nTerminology \n\nThe terms and the means of writing them down have changed, and for model kits they are now standardized for the European Union. In English-speaking countries, such terms as \"1/72\" were used, but the format with a colon as \"1:72\" is often preferred and is used in this article. The slash format is usually avoided with decimal fractions: \"1/76.2\" is usually not used; it is instead written as \"1:76.2\".\n\nIn English units (feet and inches), scales are often expressed in terms such as \"one-foot-to-the-inch\" (1:12) or \"six-feet-to-the-inch\" (1:72).\n\nComparing scales \n\nPhrases used are those of \"larger\" and \"smaller\" scales. A larger model is made to a larger scale. You can remember this in that a full-size, or full-scale, model is larger than a half-size model. So for example 1:100 is a larger scale than 1:200, even though the denominator (100) is smaller.\n\nHistory \n\nOriginally, a \"scale\" was a physical measuring instrument, a notion that survives as concerns weight. First among scales are the rulers that are triangular in cross-section and called architect's scales or engineer's scales. The terminology used was of this manner: \"scale size to full size\", or the reverse.\n\nAn architect's scale was used to make scale models not only for design projects but also for the first affordable toy models: doll houses and their furniture. Popular scales for these miniatures were \"one inch to the foot\" (1:12) and \"one-half inch to the foot\" (1:24); there is also \"three-quarters inch to the foot\" (1:16).\n\nThe proportion of the model to the prototype was originally called \"size\", as in \"full-sized\" or \"half-sized\", as used on a blueprint for making something that would fit on a workbench.\n\nShipyards also used scales to make models. In the English system, scales such as \"one-foot-to-the-inch\" (1:12) through \"six-feet-to-the-inch\" (1:72) were common. During the Second World War, battleship models were made \"eight-foot-to-the-inch\" (1:96), in the later phrasing, \"one-eighth-inch to the foot.\" Maritime museums use these models to train workers. The model ship is referred to as one-ninety-sixth size, or 1/96th—but rarely, since there are few common scales. It would not be 1/98th scale, for example.\n\nThere were also rotary instruments in which one would line up marks on two dials to be able to translate measurements from units on the prototype to units on the model.\n\nRailway models\n\nRail transport modellings have unique scale/gauge designations, such as: Z; N; H0; 00; EM; P4; 0; S; 1. Model figure scales are usually expressed as the height of a six-foot (1.83 m) figure; for example: 54 mm. Other model scales are generally given as a ratio that expresses what a measurement on the model represents on the actual object. When buying a model train, scale sizes are referred to by letter name, not number ratio.\n\n00 gauge is a hybrid of two measurement systems. It can be expressed by explicitly using a mixed system of units as \"4 mm:1 ft\" or \"1 mm:3 in\", but the dimensionless form makes comparison with other scales easier.\n\nOrigins of the plastic model kit \n\nFor aircraft recognition in the Second World War, the RAF selected models to the scale of \"one-sixth inch to the foot\" (which was two British lines, a legal division of length that didn't make it to America, besides being a standard shipyard scale). These early models were produced by two firms; Frog and Skybirds. Although some consumer models were sold pre-war in Britain to this scale, the airmens' models were pressed out of ground-up old rubber tires. This is of course the still-popular 1:72 scale. It wasn't predestined to succeed; there were competitors.\n\nThe US Navy, in contrast, had metal models made to the proportion 1:432, which is nine-feet-to-the-quarter-inch. At this scale, a model six feet is about half a statute mile; and seven feet about half a nautical mile.\n\nAfter the war, firms that moulded models from polystyrene entered the consumer marketplace, the American firm Revell notably offering a model of the Royal Coach around the time of the 1953 Coronation. In the early years, firms offered models of aircraft and ships in \"fit-the-box\" size. A box that would make an impressive gift was specified, and a mould was crafted to make a model that wouldn't ludicrously slide around inside. Modellers could not compare models, nor switch parts from one kit to another. It was the British firm Airfix, whose first self-assembly model was a Ferguson tractor around 1950, that brought the idea of the constant scale to the marketplace, and they picked the RAF's scale.\n\nIn the 1960s, the company Monogram offered an aircraft actually labeled as ¼\" scale, which may have been a common contraction in factories. They meant \"one-quarter-inch to the foot\" (1:48). Shortly thereafter, hobbyists lost the ability to distinguish the two, and now the proportion is referred to as scale.\n\nAfter the production of kits to make plastic models became an industry, scales or rulers were produced in the popular model units.\n\nRational choice of scales \n\nThe nominal height of a man is simple in the inch-based system: six feet. Many traditional scales are derived so that a figure of such a height against the model can be readily imagined as a simple relation to an inch. Although the metric system has specified a limited series of scales for blueprints and maps, when it comes to models, there may be a problem with these scales for a readily imagined person of 180 cm. Model railways have the additional difficulty of having to present the rail gauge as a simple number, the height of a person being secondary. Trade authorities in metric countries are attempting to specify scales that are simple multiples of 2 and 5, but neither tracks nor people seem to fit. In such cases, rationalization may actually be invoked for competitive advantage, to prevent interoperability with products from another manufacturing country.\n\nOn the other hand, war-gaming scales have traditionally been traced to the metric system, named for the number of millimeters in the height of a human figure representing a 180 cm standard man. Therefore, 25 mm scale (popular in historical and fantasy wargaming) refers to 1:72 scale, whilst the 15 mm scale (nowadays the most popular scale in ancient, medieval and Renaissance wargaming) refers to 1:120 scale (Many manufacturers refer to 15 mm as 1:100 scale). Likewise, 50 mm scale is the same as 1:35 military model scale, and 5 mm equals 1:350 naval scale.\n\nRationalisation typically falls into 2 categories: Industrial Trade, and Hobbies. Industrial trade covers areas like building and maritime architecture, where universally accepted scales have been established and are conformed to both in the construction of models and drawings. This facilitates smoother co-operation between commercial parties.\n\nThe rationalisation of hobby scales has been more gradual and organic—largely driven by clubs lobbying industry, as well as tradition, and indirectly, consumer demand. A couple of artificial efforts to standardise have not been successful: i.e., Tamiya in the 1970s with aircraft models in 1/100 scale, and Heller with airline models in 1/125 scale. Even though rationalisation in hobby scales sounds appealing, it has not proved historically evident, though there may be some very gradual progress as consumer demand becomes more organised.", "Modern humans (Homo sapiens, primarily ssp. Homo sapiens sapiens) are the only extant members of Hominina clade (or human clade), a branch of the taxonomical tribe Hominini belonging to the family of great apes. They are characterized by erect posture and bipedal locomotion; manual dexterity and increased tool use, compared to other animals; and a general trend toward larger, more complex brains and societies. \n\nEarly hominins—particularly the australopithecines, whose brains and anatomy are in many ways more similar to ancestral non-human apes—are less often referred to as \"human\" than hominins of the genus Homo. Several of these hominins used fire, occupied much of Eurasia, and gave rise to anatomically modern Homo sapiens in Africa about 200,000 years ago. They began to exhibit evidence of behavioral modernity around 50,000 years ago. In several waves of migration, anatomically modern humans ventured out of Africa and populated most of the world. \n\nThe spread of humans and their large and increasing population has had a profound impact on large areas of the environment and millions of native species worldwide. Advantages that explain this evolutionary success include a relatively larger brain with a particularly well-developed neocortex, prefrontal cortex and temporal lobes, which enable high levels of abstract reasoning, language, problem solving, sociality, and culture through social learning. Humans use tools to a much higher degree than any other animal, are the only extant species known to build fires and cook their food, and are the only extant species to clothe themselves and create and use numerous other technologies and arts.\n\nHumans are uniquely adept at utilizing systems of symbolic communication (such as language and art) for self-expression and the exchange of ideas, and for organizing themselves into purposeful groups. Humans create complex social structures composed of many cooperating and competing groups, from families and kinship networks to political states. Social interactions between humans have established an extremely wide variety of values, social norms, and rituals, which together form the basis of human society. Curiosity and the human desire to understand and influence the environment and to explain and manipulate phenomena (or events) has provided the foundation for developing science, philosophy, mythology, religion, anthropology, and numerous other fields of knowledge.\n\nThough most of human existence has been sustained by hunting and gathering in band societies, increasing numbers of human societies began to practice sedentary agriculture approximately some 10,000 years ago, domesticating plants and animals, thus allowing for the growth of civilization. These human societies subsequently expanded in size, establishing various forms of government, religion, and culture around the world, unifying people within regions to form states and empires. The rapid advancement of scientific and medical understanding in the 19th and 20th centuries led to the development of fuel-driven technologies and increased lifespans, causing the human population to rise exponentially. By 2014, the global human population was estimated to be around 7.2 billion and rising. By February 2016, the United States Census Bureau had estimated that the world population had exceeded 7.3 billion. \n\nEtymology and definition\n\nIn common usage, the word \"human\" generally refers to the only extant species of the genus Homo — anatomically and behaviorally modern Homo sapiens.\n\nIn scientific terms, the meanings of \"hominid\" and \"hominin\" have changed during the recent decades with advances in the discovery and study of the fossil ancestors of modern humans. The previously clear boundary between humans and apes has blurred, resulting in now acknowledging the hominids as encompassing multiple species, and Homo and close relatives since the split from chimpanzees as the only hominins. There is also a distinction between anatomically modern humans and Archaic Homo sapiens, the earliest fossil members of the species.\n\nThe English adjective human is a Middle English loanword from Old French ', ultimately from Latin ', the adjective form of ' \"man.\" The word's use as a noun (with a plural: humans) dates to the 16th century. The native English term man can refer to the species generally (a synonym for humanity), and could formerly refer to specific individuals of either sex, though this latter use is now obsolete. \n\nThe species binomial Homo sapiens was coined by Carl Linnaeus in his 18th century work Systema Naturae. The generic name Homo is a learned 18th century derivation from Latin ' \"man,\" ultimately \"earthly being\" (Old Latin ' a cognate to Old English ' \"man,\" from PIE ', meaning \"earth\" or \"ground\"). The species-name sapiens means \"wise\" or \"sapient.\" Note that the Latin word homo refers to humans of either gender, and that sapiens is the singular form (while there is no such word as sapien). \n\nHistory\n\nEvolution and range\n\nThe genus Homo evolved and diverged from other hominins in Africa, after the human clade split from the chimpanzee lineage of the hominids (great apes) branch of the primates. Modern humans, defined as the species Homo sapiens or specifically to the single extant subspecies Homo sapiens sapiens, proceeded to colonize all the continents and larger islands, arriving in Eurasia 125,000–60,000 years ago, Australia around 40,000 years ago, the Americas around 15,000 years ago, and remote islands such as Hawaii, Easter Island, Madagascar, and New Zealand between the years 300 and 1280. \n\nEvidence from molecular biology\n\nThe closest living relatives of humans are chimpanzees (genus Pan) and gorillas (genus Gorilla). With the sequencing of both the human and chimpanzee genome, current estimates of similarity between human and chimpanzee DNA sequences range between 95% and 99%. By using the technique called a molecular clock which estimates the time required for the number of divergent mutations to accumulate between two lineages, the approximate date for the split between lineages can be calculated. The gibbons (Hylobatidae) and orangutans (genus Pongo) were the first groups to split from the line leading to the humans, then gorillas (genus Gorilla) followed by the chimpanzees (genus Pan). The splitting date between human and chimpanzee lineages is placed around 4–8 million years ago during the late Miocene epoch. During this split, chromosome 2 was formed from two other chromosomes, leaving humans with only 23 pairs of chromosomes, compared to 24 for the other apes. \n\nEvidence from the fossil record\n\nThere is little fossil evidence for the divergence of the gorilla, chimpanzee and hominin lineages. The earliest fossils that have been proposed as members of the hominin lineage are Sahelanthropus tchadensis dating from , Orrorin tugenensis dating from , and Ardipithecus kadabba dating to . Each of these species has been argued to be a bipedal ancestor of later hominins, but all such claims are contested. It is also possible that any one of the three is an ancestor of another branch of African apes, or is an ancestor shared between hominins and other African Hominoidea (apes). The question of the relation between these early fossil species and the hominin lineage is still to be resolved. From these early species the australopithecines arose around diverged into robust (also called Paranthropus) and gracile branches, possibly one of which (such as A. garhi, dating to ) is a direct ancestor of the genus Homo. \n\nThe earliest members of the genus Homo are Homo habilis which evolved around . Homo habilis is the first species for which there is clear evidence of the use of stone tools. The brains of these early hominins were about the same size as that of a chimpanzee, and their main adaptation was bipedalism as an adaptation to terrestrial living. During the next million years a process of encephalization began, and with the arrival of Homo erectus in the fossil record, cranial capacity had doubled. Homo erectus were the first of the hominina to leave Africa, and these species spread through Africa, Asia, and Europe between . One population of H. erectus, also sometimes classified as a separate species Homo ergaster, stayed in Africa and evolved into Homo sapiens. It is believed that these species were the first to use fire and complex tools. The earliest transitional fossils between H. ergaster/erectus and archaic humans are from Africa such as Homo rhodesiensis, but seemingly transitional forms are also found at Dmanisi, Georgia. These descendants of African H. erectus spread through Eurasia from ca. 500,000 years ago evolving into H. antecessor, H. heidelbergensis and H. neanderthalensis. The earliest fossils of anatomically modern humans are from the Middle Paleolithic, about 200,000 years ago such as the Omo remains of Ethiopia and the fossils of Herto sometimes classified as Homo sapiens idaltu. Later fossils of archaic Homo sapiens from Skhul in Israel and Southern Europe begin around 90,000 years ago. \n\nAnatomical adaptations\n\nHuman evolution is characterized by a number of morphological, developmental, physiological, and behavioral changes that have taken place since the split between the last common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees. The most significant of these adaptations are 1. bipedalism, 2. increased brain size, 3. lengthened ontogeny (gestation and infancy), 4. decreased sexual dimorphism (neoteny). The relationship between all these changes is the subject of ongoing debate. Other significant morphological changes included the evolution of a power and precision grip, a change first occurring in H. erectus.\n\nBipedalism is the basic adaption of the hominin line, and it is considered the main cause behind a suite of skeletal changes shared by all bipedal hominins. The earliest bipedal hominin is considered to be either Sahelanthropus or Orrorin, with Ardipithecus, a full bipedal, coming somewhat later. The knuckle walkers, the gorilla and chimpanzee, diverged around the same time, and either Sahelanthropus or Orrorin may be humans' last shared ancestor with those animals. The early bipedals eventually evolved into the australopithecines and later the genus Homo. There are several theories of the adaptational value of bipedalism. It is possible that bipedalism was favored because it freed up the hands for reaching and carrying food, because it saved energy during locomotion, because it enabled long distance running and hunting, or as a strategy for avoiding hyperthermia by reducing the surface exposed to direct sun.\n\nThe human species developed a much larger brain than that of other primates – typically 1,330 cm3 in modern humans, over twice the size of that of a chimpanzee or gorilla. The pattern of encephalization started with Homo habilis which at approximately 600 cm3 had a brain slightly larger than chimpanzees, and continued with Homo erectus (800–1100 cm3), and reached a maximum in Neanderthals with an average size of 1200–1900 cm3, larger even than Homo sapiens (but less encephalized). The pattern of human postnatal brain growth differs from that of other apes (heterochrony), and allows for extended periods of social learning and language acquisition in juvenile humans. However, the differences between the structure of human brains and those of other apes may be even more significant than differences in size. The increase in volume over time has affected different areas within the brain unequally – the temporal lobes, which contain centers for language processing have increased disproportionately, as has the prefrontal cortex which has been related to complex decision making and moderating social behavior. Encephalization has been tied to an increasing emphasis on meat in the diet, or with the development of cooking, and it has been proposed that intelligence increased as a response to an increased necessity for solving social problems as human society became more complex.\n\nThe reduced degree of sexual dimorphism is primarily visible in the reduction of the male canine tooth relative to other ape species (except gibbons). Another important physiological change related to sexuality in humans was the evolution of hidden estrus. Humans are the only ape in which the female is fertile year round, and in which no special signals of fertility are produced by the body (such as genital swelling during estrus). Nonetheless humans retain a degree of sexual dimorphism in the distribution of body hair and subcutaneous fat, and in the overall size, males being around 25% larger than females. These changes taken together have been interpreted as a result of an increased emphasis on pair bonding as a possible solution to the requirement for increased parental investment due to the prolonged infancy of offspring.\n\nRise of Homo sapiens\n\nBy the beginning of the Upper Paleolithic period (50,000 BP), full behavioral modernity, including language, music and other cultural universals had developed. As modern humans spread out from Africa they encountered other hominids such as Homo neanderthalensis and the so-called Denisovans. The nature of interaction between early humans and these sister species has been a long-standing source of controversy, the question being whether humans replaced these earlier species or whether they were in fact similar enough to interbreed, in which case these earlier populations may have contributed genetic material to modern humans. Recent studies of the human and Neanderthal genomes suggest gene flow between archaic Homo sapiens and Neanderthals and Denisovans. In March 2016, studies were published that suggest that modern humans bred with hominins, including Denisovans and Neanderthals, on multiple occasions. \n\nThis dispersal out of Africa is estimated to have begun about 70,000 years BP from Northeast Africa. Current evidence suggests that there was only one such dispersal and that it only involved a few hundred individuals. The vast majority of humans stayed in Africa and adapted to a diverse array of environments. Modern humans subsequently spread globally, replacing earlier hominins (either through competition or hybridization). They inhabited Eurasia and Oceania by 40,000 years BP, and the Americas at least 14,500 years BP. \n\nTransition to civilization\n\nUntil about 10,000 years ago, humans lived as hunter-gatherers. They gradually gained domination over much of the natural environment. They generally lived in small nomadic groups known as band societies, often in caves. The advent of agriculture prompted the Neolithic Revolution, when access to food surplus led to the formation of permanent human settlements, the domestication of animals and the use of metal tools for the first time in history. Agriculture encouraged trade and cooperation, and led to complex society. Because of the significance of this date for human society, it is the epoch of the Holocene calendar or Human Era.\n\nThe early civilisations of Mesopotamia, Egypt, India, China, Maya, Greece and Rome were some of the cradles of civilisation. The Late Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period saw the rise of revolutionary ideas and technologies. Over the next 500 years, exploration and European colonialism brought great parts of the world under European control, leading to later struggles for independence. The concept of the modern world as distinct from an ancient world is based on a rapid change progress in a brief period of time in many areas. Advances in all areas of human activity prompted new theories such as evolution and psychoanalysis, which changed humanity's views of itself. The Scientific Revolution, Technological Revolution and the Industrial Revolution up until the 19th century resulted in independent discoveries such as imaging technology, major innovations in transport, such as the airplane and automobile; energy development, such as coal and electricity. This correlates with population growth (especially in America) and higher life expectancy, the World population rapidly increased numerous times in the 19th and 20th centuries as nearly 10% of the 100 billion people lived in the past century. \n\nRecently a decline of slavery and religiousness is often observed, along with increases in human rights, mass literacy, access to goods and equalisation under law. With the advent of the Information Age at the end of the 20th century, modern humans live in a world that has become increasingly globalized and interconnected. As of 2010, almost 2 billion humans are able to communicate with each other via the Internet, and 3.3 billion by mobile phone subscriptions. Although interconnection between humans has encouraged the growth of science, art, discussion, and technology, it has also led to culture clashes and the development and use of weapons of mass destruction. Human civilization has led to environmental destruction and pollution significantly contributing to the ongoing mass extinction of other forms of life called the Holocene extinction event,* which may be further accelerated by global warming in the future. \n\nDistinction of civilised cultures is not always clear; monasticism for example is an attempt to avoid mainstream civilisation. Uncontacted peoples exist, while the Kardashev scale classifies civilisations based on their level of technological advancement. The concept of \"civilization\", used almost synonymously with culture has been used as a justification for colonialism, imperialism, genocide and coercive acculturation.\n\nHabitat and population\n\nEarly human settlements were dependent on proximity to water and, depending on the lifestyle, other natural resources used for subsistence, such as populations of animal prey for hunting and arable land for growing crops and grazing livestock. But humans have a great capacity for altering their habitats by means of technology, through irrigation, urban planning, construction, transport, manufacturing goods, deforestation and desertification. Deliberate habitat alteration is often done with the goals of increasing material wealth, increasing thermal comfort, improving the amount of food available, improving aesthetics, or improving ease of access to resources or other human settlements. With the advent of large-scale trade and transport infrastructure, proximity to these resources has become unnecessary, and in many places, these factors are no longer a driving force behind the growth and decline of a population. Nonetheless, the manner in which a habitat is altered is often a major determinant in population change.\n\nTechnology has allowed humans to colonize all of the continents and adapt to virtually all climates. Within the last century, humans have explored Antarctica, the ocean depths, and outer space, although large-scale colonization of these environments is not yet feasible. With a population of over seven billion, humans are among the most numerous of the large mammals. Most humans (61%) live in Asia. The remainder live in the Americas (14%), Africa (14%), Europe (11%), and Oceania (0.5%).\n\nHuman habitation within closed ecological systems in hostile environments, such as Antarctica and outer space, is expensive, typically limited in duration, and restricted to scientific, military, or industrial expeditions. Life in space has been very sporadic, with no more than thirteen humans in space at any given time. Between 1969 and 1972, two humans at a time spent brief intervals on the Moon. As of , no other celestial body has been visited by humans, although there has been a continuous human presence in space since the launch of the initial crew to inhabit the International Space Station on October 31, 2000. However, other celestial bodies have been visited by human-made objects. \n\nSince 1800, the human population has increased from one billion to over seven billion, In 2004, some 2.5 billion out of 6.3 billion people (39.7%) lived in urban areas. In February 2008, the U.N. estimated that half the world's population would live in urban areas by the end of the year. Problems for humans living in cities include various forms of pollution and crime,[http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/usrv98.pdf Urban, Suburban, and Rural Victimization, 1993–98] U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics,. Accessed 29 Oct 2006 especially in inner city and suburban slums. Both overall population numbers and the proportion residing in cities are expected to increase significantly in the coming decades.\n\nHumans have had a dramatic effect on the environment. Humans are apex predators, being rarely preyed upon by other species. Currently, through land development, combustion of fossil fuels, and pollution, humans are thought to be the main contributor to global climate change. If this continues at its current rate it is predicted that climate change will wipe out half of all plant and animal species over the next century. \n\nBiology\n\nAnatomy and physiology\n\nMost aspects of human physiology are closely homologous to corresponding aspects of animal physiology. The human body consists of the legs, the torso, the arms, the neck, and the head. An adult human body consists of about 100 trillion (1014) cells. The most commonly defined body systems in humans are the nervous, the cardiovascular, the circulatory, the digestive, the endocrine, the immune, the integumentary, the lymphatic, the muscoskeletal, the reproductive, the respiratory, and the urinary system.[https://books.google.com/books?id\nvhO8Ia2ik7oC&dqhuman+body+cells+trillion&source\ngbs_navlinks_s Page 21] Inside the human body: using scientific and exponential notation. Author: Greg Roza. Edition: Illustrated. Publisher: The Rosen Publishing Group, 2007. ISBN 1-4042-3362-8, ISBN 978-1-4042-3362-1. Length: 32pages \n\nHumans, like most of the other apes, lack external tails, have several blood type systems, have opposable thumbs, and are sexually dimorphic. The comparatively minor anatomical differences between humans and chimpanzees are a result of human bipedalism. One difference is that humans have a far faster and more accurate throw than other animals. Humans are also among the best long-distance runners in the animal kingdom, but slower over short distances. Humans' thinner body hair and more productive sweat glands help avoid heat exhaustion while running for long distances. \n\nAs a consequence of bipedalism, human females have narrower birth canals. The construction of the human pelvis differs from other primates, as do the toes. A trade-off for these advantages of the modern human pelvis is that childbirth is more difficult and dangerous than in most mammals, especially given the larger head size of human babies compared to other primates. This means that human babies must turn around as they pass through the birth canal, which other primates do not do, and it makes humans the only species where females require help from their conspecifics to reduce the risks of birthing. As a partial evolutionary solution, human fetuses are born less developed and more vulnerable. Chimpanzee babies are cognitively more developed than human babies until the age of six months, when the rapid development of human brains surpasses chimpanzees. Another difference between women and chimpanzee females is that women go through the menopause and become unfertile decades before the end of their lives. All species of non-human apes are capable of giving birth until death. Menopause probably developed as it has provided an evolutionary advantage (more caring time) to young relatives.\n\nApart from bipedalism, humans differ from chimpanzees mostly in smelling, hearing, digesting proteins, brain size, and the ability of language. Humans' brains are about three times bigger than in chimpanzees. More importantly, the brain to body ratio is much higher in humans than in chimpanzees, and humans have a significantly more developed cerebral cortex, with a larger number of neurons. The mental abilities of humans are remarkable compared to other apes. Humans' ability of speech is unique among primates. Humans are able to create new and complex ideas, and to develop technology, which is unprecedented among other organisms on Earth.\n\nIt is estimated that the worldwide average height for an adult human male is about , while the worldwide average height for adult human females is about . Shrinkage of stature may begin in middle age in some individuals, but tends to be typical in the extremely aged. Through history human populations have universally become taller, probably as a consequence of better nutrition, healthcare, and living conditions. The average mass of an adult human is 54–64 kg (120–140 lb) for females and 76–83 kg (168–183 lb) for males. Like many other conditions, body weight and body type is influenced by both genetic susceptibility and environment and varies greatly among individuals. (see obesity) \n\nAlthough humans appear hairless compared to other primates, with notable hair growth occurring chiefly on the top of the head, underarms and pubic area, the average human has more hair follicles on his or her body than the average chimpanzee. The main distinction is that human hairs are shorter, finer, and less heavily pigmented than the average chimpanzee's, thus making them harder to see. Humans have about 2 million sweat glands spread over their entire bodies, many more than chimpanzees, whose sweat glands are scarce and are mainly located on the palm of the hand and on the soles of the feet. \n\nThe dental formula of humans is: . Humans have proportionately shorter palates and much smaller teeth than other primates. They are the only primates to have short, relatively flush canine teeth. Humans have characteristically crowded teeth, with gaps from lost teeth usually closing up quickly in young individuals. Humans are gradually losing their wisdom teeth, with some individuals having them congenitally absent. \n\nGenetics\n\nLike all mammals, humans are a diploid eukaryotic species. Each somatic cell has two sets of 23 chromosomes, each set received from one parent; gametes have only one set of chromosomes, which is a mixture of the two parental sets. Among the 23 pairs of chromosomes there are 22 pairs of autosomes and one pair of sex chromosomes. Like other mammals, humans have an XY sex-determination system, so that females have the sex chromosomes XX and males have XY. \n\nOne human genome was sequenced in full in 2003, and currently efforts are being made to achieve a sample of the genetic diversity of the species (see International HapMap Project). By present estimates, humans have approximately 22,000 genes. The variation in human DNA is very small compared to other species, possibly suggesting a population bottleneck during the Late Pleistocene (around 100,000 years ago), in which the human population was reduced to a small number of breeding pairs. Nucleotide diversity is based on single mutations called single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). The nucleotide diversity between humans is about 0.1%, i.e. 1 difference per 1,000 base pairs. A difference of 1 in 1,000 nucleotides between two humans chosen at random amounts to about 3 million nucleotide differences, since the human genome has about 3 billion nucleotides. Most of these single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) are neutral but some (about 3 to 5%) are functional and influence phenotypic differences between humans through alleles.\n\nBy comparing the parts of the genome that are not under natural selection and which therefore accumulate mutations at a fairly steady rate, it is possible to reconstruct a genetic tree incorporating the entire human species since the last shared ancestor. Each time a certain mutation (SNP) appears in an individual and is passed on to his or her descendants, a haplogroup is formed including all of the descendants of the individual who will also carry that mutation. By comparing mitochondrial DNA, which is inherited only from the mother, geneticists have concluded that the last female common ancestor whose genetic marker is found in all modern humans, the so-called mitochondrial Eve, must have lived around 90,000 to 200,000 years ago. \n\nHuman accelerated regions, first described in August 2006, are a set of 49 segments of the human genome that are conserved throughout vertebrate evolution but are strikingly different in humans. They are named according to their degree of difference between humans and their nearest animal relative (chimpanzees) (HAR1 showing the largest degree of human-chimpanzee differences). Found by scanning through genomic databases of multiple species, some of these highly mutated areas may contribute to human-specific traits.\n\nThe forces of natural selection have continued to operate on human populations, with evidence that certain regions of the genome display directional selection in the past 15,000 years. \n\nLife cycle\n\nAs with other mammals, human reproduction takes place as internal fertilization by sexual intercourse. During this process, the male inserts his erect penis into the female's vagina and ejaculates semen, which contains sperm. The sperm travels through the vagina and cervix into the uterus or Fallopian tubes for fertilization of the ovum. Upon fertilization and implantation, gestation then occurs within the female's uterus.\n\nThe zygote divides inside the female's uterus to become an embryo, which over a period of 38 weeks (9 months) of gestation becomes a fetus. After this span of time, the fully grown fetus is birthed from the woman's body and breathes independently as an infant for the first time. At this point, most modern cultures recognize the baby as a person entitled to the full protection of the law, though some jurisdictions extend various levels of personhood earlier to human fetuses while they remain in the uterus.\n\nCompared with other species, human childbirth is dangerous. Painful labors lasting 24 hours or more are not uncommon and sometimes lead to the death of the mother, the child or both. This is because of both the relatively large fetal head circumference and the mother's relatively narrow pelvis. The chances of a successful labor increased significantly during the 20th century in wealthier countries with the advent of new medical technologies. In contrast, pregnancy and natural childbirth remain hazardous ordeals in developing regions of the world, with maternal death rates approximately 100 times greater than in developed countries.\n\nIn developed countries, infants are typically 3–4 kg (6–9 pounds) in weight and 50–60 cm (20–24 inches) in height at birth. However, low birth weight is common in developing countries, and contributes to the high levels of infant mortality in these regions. Helpless at birth, humans continue to grow for some years, typically reaching sexual maturity at 12 to 15 years of age. Females continue to develop physically until around the age of 18, whereas male development continues until around age 21. The human life span can be split into a number of stages: infancy, childhood, adolescence, young adulthood, adulthood and old age. The lengths of these stages, however, have varied across cultures and time periods. Compared to other primates, humans experience an unusually rapid growth spurt during adolescence, where the body grows 25% in size. Chimpanzees, for example, grow only 14%, with no pronounced spurt. The presence of the growth spurt is probably necessary to keep children physically small until they are psychologically mature. Humans are one of the few species in which females undergo menopause. It has been proposed that menopause increases a woman's overall reproductive success by allowing her to invest more time and resources in her existing offspring, and in turn their children (the grandmother hypothesis), rather than by continuing to bear children into old age.\n\nFor various reasons, including biological/genetic causes, women live on average about four years longer than men — as of 2013 the global average life expectancy at birth of a girl is estimated at 70.2 years compared to 66.1 for a boy. There are significant geographical variations in human life expectancy, mostly correlated with economic development — for example life expectancy at birth in Hong Kong is 84.8 years for girls and 78.9 for boys, while in Swaziland, primarily because of AIDS, it is 31.3 years for both sexes. The developed world is generally aging, with the median age around 40 years. In the developing world the median age is between 15 and 20 years. While one in five Europeans is 60 years of age or older, only one in twenty Africans is 60 years of age or older. The number of centenarians (humans of age 100 years or older) in the world was estimated by the United Nations at 210,000 in 2002. At least one person, Jeanne Calment, is known to have reached the age of 122 years; higher ages have been claimed but they are not well substantiated.\n\nDiet\n\nHumans are omnivorous, capable of consuming a wide variety of plant and animal material. Varying with available food sources in regions of habitation, and also varying with cultural and religious norms, human groups have adopted a range of diets, from purely vegetarian to primarily carnivorous. In some cases, dietary restrictions in humans can lead to deficiency diseases; however, stable human groups have adapted to many dietary patterns through both genetic specialization and cultural conventions to use nutritionally balanced food sources. The human diet is prominently reflected in human culture, and has led to the development of food science.\n\nUntil the development of agriculture approximately 10,000 years ago, Homo sapiens employed a hunter-gatherer method as their sole means of food collection. This involved combining stationary food sources (such as fruits, grains, tubers, and mushrooms, insect larvae and aquatic mollusks) with wild game, which must be hunted and killed in order to be consumed. It has been proposed that humans have used fire to prepare and cook food since the time of Homo erectus. Around ten thousand years ago, humans developed agriculture, which substantially altered their diet. This change in diet may also have altered human biology; with the spread of dairy farming providing a new and rich source of food, leading to the evolution of the ability to digest lactose in some adults. Agriculture led to increased populations, the development of cities, and because of increased population density, the wider spread of infectious diseases. The types of food consumed, and the way in which they are prepared, have varied widely by time, location, and culture.\n\nIn general, humans can survive for two to eight weeks without food, depending on stored body fat. Survival without water is usually limited to three or four days. About 36 million humans die every year from causes directly or indirectly related to hunger. Childhood malnutrition is also common and contributes to the global burden of disease. However global food distribution is not even, and obesity among some human populations has increased rapidly, leading to health complications and increased mortality in some developed, and a few developing countries. Worldwide over one billion people are obese, while in the United States 35% of people are obese, leading to this being described as an \"obesity epidemic.\" Obesity is caused by consuming more calories than are expended, so excessive weight gain is usually caused by a combination of an energy-dense high fat diet and insufficient exercise.\n\nBiological variation\n\nNo two humans—not even monozygotic twins—are genetically identical. Genes and environment influence human biological variation from visible characteristics to physiology to disease susceptibly to mental abilities. The exact influence of genes and environment on certain traits is not well understood. \n\nMost current genetic and archaeological evidence supports a recent single origin of modern humans in East Africa, with first migrations placed at 60,000 years ago. Compared to the great apes, human gene sequences—even among African populations—are remarkably homogeneous. On average, genetic similarity between any two humans is 99.9%. There is about 2–3 times more genetic diversity within the wild chimpanzee population, than in the entire human gene pool. \n\nThe human body's ability to adapt to different environmental stresses is remarkable, allowing humans to acclimatize to a wide variety of temperatures, humidity, and altitudes. As a result, humans are a cosmopolitan species found in almost all regions of the world, including tropical rainforests, arid desert, extremely cold arctic regions, and heavily polluted cities. Most other species are confined to a few geographical areas by their limited adaptability.\n\nThere is biological variation in the human species—with traits such as blood type, cranial features, eye color, hair color and type, height and build, and skin color varying across the globe. Human body types vary substantially. The typical height of an adult human is between 1.4 m and 1.9 m (4 ft 7 in and 6 ft 3 in), although this varies significantly depending, among other things, on sex and ethnic origin. Body size is partly determined by genes and is also significantly influenced by environmental factors such as diet, exercise, and sleep patterns, especially as an influence in childhood. Adult height for each sex in a particular ethnic group approximately follows a normal distribution. Those aspects of genetic variation that give clues to human evolutionary history, or are relevant to medical research, have received particular attention. For example, the genes that allow adult humans to digest lactose are present in high frequencies in populations that have long histories of cattle domestication, suggesting natural selection having favored that gene in populations that depend on cow milk. Some hereditary diseases such as sickle cell anemia are frequent in populations where malaria has been endemic throughout history—it is believed that the same gene gives increased resistance to malaria among those who are unaffected carriers of the gene. Similarly, populations that have for a long time inhabited specific climates, such as arctic or tropical regions or high altitudes, tend to have developed specific phenotypes that are beneficial for conserving energy in those environments—short stature and stocky build in cold regions, tall and lanky in hot regions, and with high lung capacities at high altitudes. Similarly, skin color varies clinally with darker skin around the equator—where the added protection from the sun's ultraviolet radiation is thought to give an evolutionary advantage—and lighter skin tones closer to the poles. \n\nThe hue of human skin and hair is determined by the presence of pigments called melanins. Human skin color can range from darkest brown to lightest peach, or even nearly white or colorless in cases of albinism. Human hair ranges in color from white to red to blond to brown to black, which is most frequent. Hair color depends on the amount of melanin (an effective sun blocking pigment) in the skin and hair, with hair melanin concentrations in hair fading with increased age, leading to grey or even white hair. Most researchers believe that skin darkening is an adaptation that evolved as protection against ultraviolet solar radiation, which also helps balancing folate, which is destroyed by ultraviolet radiation. Light skin pigmentation protects against depletion of vitamin D, which requires sunlight to make. Skin pigmentation of contemporary humans is clinally distributed across the planet, and in general correlates with the level of ultraviolet radiation in a particular geographic area. Human skin also has a capacity to darken (tan) in response to exposure to ultraviolet radiation. \n\nStructure of variation\n\nWithin the human species, the greatest degree of genetic variation exists between males and females. While the nucleotide genetic variation of individuals of the same sex across global populations is no greater than 0.1%, the genetic difference between males and females is between 1% and 2%. Although different in nature, this approaches the genetic differentiation between men and male chimpanzees or women and female chimpanzees. The genetic difference between sexes contributes to anatomical, hormonal, neural, and physiological differences between men and women, although the exact degree and nature of social and environmental influences on sexes are not completely understood. Males on average are 15% heavier and 15 cm taller than females. There is a difference between body types, body organs and systems, hormonal levels, sensory systems, and muscle mass between sexes. On average, there is a difference of about 40–50% in upper body strength and 20–30% in lower body strength between men and women. Women generally have a higher body fat percentage than men. Women have lighter skin than men of the same population; this has been explained by a higher need for vitamin D (which is synthesized by sunlight) in females during pregnancy and lactation. As there are chromosomal differences between females and males, some X and Y chromosome related conditions and disorders only affect either men or women. Other conditional differences between males and females are not related to sex chromosomes. Even after allowing for body weight and volume, the male voice is usually an octave deeper than the female voice. Women have a longer life span in almost every population around the world. \n\nMales typically have larger tracheae and branching bronchi, with about 30% greater lung volume per unit body mass. They have larger hearts, 10% higher red blood cell count, and higher hemoglobin, hence greater oxygen-carrying capacity. They also have higher circulating clotting factors (vitamin K, prothrombin and platelets). These differences lead to faster healing of wounds and higher peripheral pain tolerance. Females typically have more white blood cells (stored and circulating), more granulocytes and B and T lymphocytes. Additionally, they produce more antibodies at a faster rate than males. Hence they develop fewer infectious diseases and these continue for shorter periods. Ethologists argue that females, interacting with other females and multiple offspring in social groups, have experienced such traits as a selective advantage. According to Daly and Wilson, \"The sexes differ more in human beings than in monogamous mammals, but much less than in extremely polygamous mammals.\" But given that sexual dimorphism in the closest relatives of humans is much greater than among humans, the human clade must be considered to be characterized by decreasing sexual dimorphism, probably due to less competitive mating patterns. One proposed explanation is that human sexuality has developed more in common with its close relative the bonobo, which exhibits similar sexual dimorphism, is polygynandrous and uses recreational sex to reinforce social bonds and reduce aggression. \n\nHumans of the same sex are 99.9% genetically identical. There is extremely little variation between human geographical populations, and most of the variation that does occur is at the personal level within local areas, and not between populations. Of the 0.1% of human genetic differentiation, 85% exists within any randomly chosen local population, be they Italians, Koreans, or Kurds. Two randomly chosen Koreans may be genetically as different as a Korean and an Italian. Any ethnic group contains 85% of the human genetic diversity of the world. Genetic data shows that no matter how population groups are defined, two people from the same population group are about as different from each other as two people from any two different population groups. \n\nCurrent genetic research has demonstrated that humans on the African continent are the most genetically diverse. There is more human genetic diversity in Africa than anywhere else on Earth. The genetic structure of Africans was traced to 14 ancestral population clusters. Human genetic diversity decreases in native populations with migratory distance from Africa and this is thought to be the result of bottlenecks during human migration. Humans have lived in Africa for the longest time, which has allowed accumulation of a higher diversity of genetic mutations in these populations. Only part of Africa's population migrated out of the continent, bringing just part of the original African genetic variety with them. African populations harbor genetic alleles that are not found in other places of the world. All the common alleles found in populations outside of Africa are found on the African continent.\n\nGeographical distribution of human variation is complex and constantly shifts through time which reflects complicated human evolutionary history. Most human biological variation is clinally distributed and blends gradually from one area to the next. Groups of people around the world have different frequencies of polymorphic genes. Furthermore, different traits are non-concordant and each have different clinal distribution. Adaptability varies both from person to person and from population to population. The most efficient adaptive responses are found in geographical populations where the environmental stimuli are the strongest (e.g. Tibetans are highly adapted to high altitudes). The clinal geographic genetic variation is further complicated by the migration and mixing between human populations which has been occurring since prehistoric times. \n\nHuman variation is highly non-concordant: most of the genes do not cluster together and are not inherited together. Skin and hair color are not correlated to height, weight, or athletic ability. Human species do not share the same patterns of variation through geography. Skin color varies with latitude and certain people are tall or have brown hair. There is a statistical correlation between particular features in a population, but different features are not expressed or inherited together. Thus, genes which code for superficial physical traits—such as skin color, hair color, or height—represent a minuscule and insignificant portion of the human genome and do not correlate with genetic affinity. Dark-skinned populations that are found in Africa, Australia, and South Asia are not closely related to each other. Even within the same region, physical phenotype is not related to genetic affinity: dark-skinned Ethiopians are more closely related to light-skinned Armenians than to dark-skinned Bantu populations. Despite pygmy populations of South East Asia (Andamanese) having similar physical features with African pygmy populations such as short stature, dark skin, and curly hair, they are not genetically closely related to these populations.Liu, James J.Y. The Chinese Knight Errant. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1967 ISBN 0-226-48688-5. Genetic variants affecting superficial anatomical features (such as skin color)—from a genetic perspective, are essentially meaningless—they involve a few hundred of the billions of nucleotides in a person's DNA. Individuals with the same morphology do not necessarily cluster with each other by lineage, and a given lineage does not include only individuals with the same trait complex.\n\nDue to practices of group endogamy, allele frequencies cluster locally around kin groups and lineages, or by national, ethnic, cultural and linguistic boundaries, giving a detailed degree of correlation between genetic clusters and population groups when considering many alleles simultaneously. Despite this, there are no genetic boundaries around local populations that biologically mark off any discrete groups of humans. Human variation is continuous, with no clear points of demarcation. There are no large clusters of relatively homogeneous people and almost every individual has genetic alleles from several ancestral groups. \n\nPsychology\n\nThe human brain, the focal point of the central nervous system in humans, controls the peripheral nervous system. In addition to controlling \"lower,\" involuntary, or primarily autonomic activities such as respiration and digestion, it is also the locus of \"higher\" order functioning such as thought, reasoning, and abstraction. These cognitive processes constitute the mind, and, along with their behavioral consequences, are studied in the field of psychology.\n\nGenerally regarded as more capable of these higher order activities, the human brain is believed to be more \"intelligent\" in general than that of any other known species. While some non-human species are capable of creating structures and using simple tools—mostly through instinct and mimicry—human technology is vastly more complex, and is constantly evolving and improving through time.\n\nSleep and dreaming\n\nHumans are generally diurnal. The average sleep requirement is between seven and nine hours per day for an adult and nine to ten hours per day for a child; elderly people usually sleep for six to seven hours. Having less sleep than this is common among humans, even though sleep deprivation can have negative health effects. A sustained restriction of adult sleep to four hours per day has been shown to correlate with changes in physiology and mental state, including reduced memory, fatigue, aggression, and bodily discomfort. During sleep humans dream. In dreaming humans experience sensory images and sounds, in a sequence which the dreamer usually perceives more as an apparent participant than as an observer. Dreaming is stimulated by the pons and mostly occurs during the REM phase of sleep.\n\nConsciousness and thought\n\nHumans are one of the relatively few species to have sufficient self-awareness to recognize themselves in a mirror. Already at 18 months, most human children are aware that the mirror image is not another person. \n\nThe human brain perceives the external world through the senses, and each individual human is influenced greatly by his or her experiences, leading to subjective views of existence and the passage of time. Humans are variously said to possess consciousness, self-awareness, and a mind, which correspond roughly to the mental processes of thought. These are said to possess qualities such as self-awareness, sentience, sapience, and the ability to perceive the relationship between oneself and one's environment. The extent to which the mind constructs or experiences the outer world is a matter of debate, as are the definitions and validity of many of the terms used above.\n\nThe physical aspects of the mind and brain, and by extension of the nervous system, are studied in the field of neurology, the more behavioral in the field of psychology, and a sometimes loosely defined area between in the field of psychiatry, which treats mental illness and behavioral disorders. Psychology does not necessarily refer to the brain or nervous system, and can be framed purely in terms of phenomenological or information processing theories of the mind. Increasingly, however, an understanding of brain functions is being included in psychological theory and practice, particularly in areas such as artificial intelligence, neuropsychology, and cognitive neuroscience.\n\nThe nature of thought is central to psychology and related fields. Cognitive psychology studies cognition, the mental processes' underlying behavior. It uses information processing as a framework for understanding the mind. Perception, learning, problem solving, memory, attention, language and emotion are all well researched areas as well. Cognitive psychology is associated with a school of thought known as cognitivism, whose adherents argue for an information processing model of mental function, informed by positivism and experimental psychology. Techniques and models from cognitive psychology are widely applied and form the mainstay of psychological theories in many areas of both research and applied psychology. Largely focusing on the development of the human mind through the life span, developmental psychology seeks to understand how people come to perceive, understand, and act within the world and how these processes change as they age. This may focus on intellectual, cognitive, neural, social, or moral development.\n\nSome philosophers divide consciousness into phenomenal consciousness, which is experience itself, and access consciousness, which is the processing of the things in experience. Phenomenal consciousness is the state of being conscious, such as when they say \"I am conscious.\" Access consciousness is being conscious of something in relation to abstract concepts, such as when one says \"I am conscious of these words.\" Various forms of access consciousness include awareness, self-awareness, conscience, stream of consciousness, Husserl's phenomenology, and intentionality. The concept of phenomenal consciousness, in modern history, according to some, is closely related to the concept of qualia. Social psychology links sociology with psychology in their shared study of the nature and causes of human social interaction, with an emphasis on how people think towards each other and how they relate to each other. The behavior and mental processes, both human and non-human, can be described through animal cognition, ethology, evolutionary psychology, and comparative psychology as well. Human ecology is an academic discipline that investigates how humans and human societies interact with both their natural environment and the human social environment.\n\nMotivation and emotion\n\nMotivation is the driving force of desire behind all deliberate actions of humans. Motivation is based on emotion—specifically, on the search for satisfaction (positive emotional experiences), and the avoidance of conflict. Positive and negative is defined by the individual brain state, which may be influenced by social norms: a person may be driven to self-injury or violence because their brain is conditioned to create a positive response to these actions. Motivation is important because it is involved in the performance of all learned responses. Within psychology, conflict avoidance and the libido are seen to be primary motivators. Within economics, motivation is often seen to be based on incentives; these may be financial, moral, or coercive. Religions generally posit divine or demonic influences.\n\nHappiness, or the state of being happy, is a human emotional condition. The definition of happiness is a common philosophical topic. Some people might define it as the best condition that a human can have—a condition of mental and physical health. Others define it as freedom from want and distress; consciousness of the good order of things; assurance of one's place in the universe or society.\n\nEmotion has a significant influence on, or can even be said to control, human behavior, though historically many cultures and philosophers have for various reasons discouraged allowing this influence to go unchecked. Emotional experiences perceived as pleasant, such as love, admiration, or joy, contrast with those perceived as unpleasant, like hate, envy, or sorrow. There is often a distinction made between refined emotions that are socially learned and survival oriented emotions, which are thought to be innate. Human exploration of emotions as separate from other neurological phenomena is worthy of note, particularly in cultures where emotion is considered separate from physiological state. In some cultural medical theories emotion is considered so synonymous with certain forms of physical health that no difference is thought to exist. The Stoics believed excessive emotion was harmful, while some Sufi teachers felt certain extreme emotions could yield a conceptual perfection, what is often translated as ecstasy.\n\nIn modern scientific thought, certain refined emotions are considered a complex neural trait innate in a variety of domesticated and non-domesticated mammals. These were commonly developed in reaction to superior survival mechanisms and intelligent interaction with each other and the environment; as such, refined emotion is not in all cases as discrete and separate from natural neural function as was once assumed. However, when humans function in civilized tandem, it has been noted that uninhibited acting on extreme emotion can lead to social disorder and crime.\n\nSexuality and love\n\nFor humans, sexuality has important social functions: it creates physical intimacy, bonds and hierarchies among individuals, besides ensuring biological reproduction. Sexual desire or libido, is experienced as a bodily urge, often accompanied by strong emotions such as love, ecstasy and jealousy. The significance of sexuality in the human species is reflected in a number of physical features among them hidden ovulation, the evolution of external scrotum and penis suggesting sperm competition, the absence of an os penis, permanent secondary sexual characteristics and the forming of pair bonds based on sexual attraction as a common social structure. Contrary to other primates that often advertise estrus through visible signs, human females do not have a distinct or visible signs of ovulation plus they experience sexual desire outside of their fertile periods. These adaptations indicate that the meaning of sexuality in humans is similar to that found in the bonobo, and that the complex human sexual behavior has a long evolutionary history.\n\nHuman choices in acting on sexuality are commonly influenced by cultural norms which vary widely. Restrictions are often determined by religious beliefs or social customs. The pioneering researcher Sigmund Freud believed that humans are born polymorphously perverse, which means that any number of objects could be a source of pleasure. According to Freud humans then pass through five stages of psychosexual development and can fixate on any stage because of various traumas during the process. For Alfred Kinsey, another influential sex researcher, people can fall anywhere along a continuous scale of sexual orientation, with only small minorities fully heterosexual or homosexual. Recent studies of neurology and genetics suggest people may be born predisposed to various sexual tendencies.\n\nBehavior\n\nHumans are highly social beings and tend to live in large complex social groups. More than any other creature, humans are capable of utilizing systems of communication for self-expression, the exchange of ideas, and organization, and as such have created complex social structures composed of many cooperating and competing groups. Human groups range from the size of families to nations. Social interactions between humans have established an extremely wide variety of values, social norms, and rituals, which together form the basis of human society.\n\nCulture is defined here as patterns of complex symbolic behavior, i.e. all behavior that is not innate but which has to be learned through social interaction with others; such as the use of distinctive material and symbolic systems, including language, ritual, social organization, traditions, beliefs and technology.\n\nLanguage\n\nWhile many species communicate, language is unique to humans, a defining feature of humanity, and a cultural universal. Unlike the limited systems of other animals, human language is open – an infinite number of meanings can be produced by combining a limited number of symbols. Human language also has the capacity of displacement, using words to represent things and happenings that are not presently or locally occurring, but reside in the shared imagination of interlocutors. Language differs from other forms of communication in that it is modality independent; the same meanings can be conveyed through different media, auditively in speech, visually by sign language or writing, and even through tactile media such as braille.\nLanguage is central to the communication between humans, and to the sense of identity that unites nations, cultures and ethnic groups. The invention of writing systems at least five thousand years ago allowed the preservation of language on material objects, and was a major technological advancement. The science of linguistics describes the structure and function of language and the relationship between languages. There are approximately six thousand different languages currently in use, including sign languages, and many thousands more that are extinct.\n\nGender roles\n\nThe sexual division of humans into male and female has been marked culturally by a corresponding division of roles, norms, practices, dress, behavior, rights, duties, privileges, status, and power. Cultural differences by gender have often been believed to have arisen naturally out of a division of reproductive labor; the biological fact that women give birth led to their further cultural responsibility for nurturing and caring for children. Gender roles have varied historically, and challenges to predominant gender norms have recurred in many societies.\n\nKinship\n\nAll human societies organize, recognize and classify types of social relationships based on relations between parents and children (consanguinity), and relations through marriage (affinity). These kinds of relations are generally called kinship relations. In most societies kinship places mutual responsibilities and expectations of solidarity on the individuals that are so related, and those who recognize each other as kinsmen come to form networks through which other social institutions can be regulated. Among the many functions of kinship is the ability to form descent groups, groups of people sharing a common line of descent, which can function as political units such as clans. Another function is the way in which kinship unites families through marriage, forming kinship alliances between groups of wife-takers and wife-givers. Such alliances also often have important political and economical ramifications, and may result in the formation of political organization above the community level. Kinship relations often includes regulations for whom an individual should or shouldn't marry. All societies have rules of incest taboo, according to which marriage between certain kinds of kin relations are prohibited – such rules vary widely between cultures. Some societies also have rules of preferential marriage with certain kin relations, frequently with either cross or parallel cousins. Rules and norms for marriage and social behavior among kinsfolk is often reflected in the systems of kinship terminology in the various languages of the world. In many societies kinship relations can also be formed through forms of co-habitation, adoption, fostering, or companionship, which also tends to create relations of enduring solidarity (nurture kinship).\n\nEthnicity\n\nHumans often form ethnic groups, such groups tend to be larger than kinship networks and be organized around a common identity defined variously in terms of shared ancestry and history, shared cultural norms and language, or shared biological phenotype. Such ideologies of shared characteristics are often perpetuated in the form of powerful, compelling narratives that give legitimacy and continuity to the set of shared values. Ethnic groupings often correspond to some level of political organization such as the band, tribe, city state or nation. Although ethnic groups appear and disappear through history, members of ethnic groups often conceptualize their groups as having histories going back into the deep past. Such ideologies give ethnicity a powerful role in defining social identity and in constructing solidarity between members of an ethno-political unit. This unifying property of ethnicity has been closely tied to the rise of the nation state as the predominant form of political organization in the 19th and 20th century. \n\nSociety, government, and politics\n\nSociety is the system of organizations and institutions arising from interaction between humans. A state is an organized political community occupying a definite territory, having an organized government, and possessing internal and external sovereignty. Recognition of the state's claim to independence by other states, enabling it to enter into international agreements, is often important to the establishment of its statehood. The \"state\" can also be defined in terms of domestic conditions, specifically, as conceptualized by Max Weber, \"a state is a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the 'legitimate' use of physical force within a given territory.\" \n\nGovernment can be defined as the political means of creating and enforcing laws; typically via a bureaucratic hierarchy. Politics is the process by which decisions are made within groups; this process often involves conflict as well as compromise. Although the term is generally applied to behavior within governments, politics is also observed in all human group interactions, including corporate, academic, and religious institutions. Many different political systems exist, as do many different ways of understanding them, and many definitions overlap. Examples of governments include monarchy, Communist state, military dictatorship, theocracy, and liberal democracy, the last of which is considered dominant today. All of these issues have a direct relationship with economics.\n\nTrade and economics\n\nTrade is the voluntary exchange of goods and services, and is a form of economics. A mechanism that allows trade is called a market. Modern traders instead generally negotiate through a medium of exchange, such as money. As a result, buying can be separated from selling, or earning. Because of specialization and division of labor, most people concentrate on a small aspect of manufacturing or service, trading their labor for products. Trade exists between regions because different regions have an absolute or comparative advantage in the production of some tradable commodity, or because different regions' size allows for the benefits of mass production.\n\nEconomics is a social science which studies the production, distribution, trade, and consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on measurable variables, and is broadly divided into two main branches: microeconomics, which deals with individual agents, such as households and businesses, and macroeconomics, which considers the economy as a whole, in which case it considers aggregate supply and demand for money, capital and commodities. Aspects receiving particular attention in economics are resource allocation, production, distribution, trade, and competition. Economic logic is increasingly applied to any problem that involves choice under scarcity or determining economic value.\n\nWar\n\nWar is a state of organized armed conflict between states or non-state actors. War is characterized by the use of lethal violence against others – whether between combatants or upon non-combatants – to achieve military goals through force. Lesser, often spontaneous conflicts, such as brawls, riots, revolts, and melees, are not considered to be warfare. Revolutions can be nonviolent or an organized and armed revolution which denotes a state of war. During the 20th century, it is estimated that between 167 and 188 million people died as a result of war. A common definition defines war as a series of military campaigns between at least two opposing sides involving a dispute over sovereignty, territory, resources, religion, or other issues. A war between internal elements of a state is a civil war. Among animals, all-out war against fellow members of the same species occurs only among large societies of humans and ants.\n\nThere have been a wide variety of rapidly advancing tactics throughout the history of war, ranging from conventional war to asymmetric warfare to total war and unconventional warfare. Techniques include hand to hand combat, the use of ranged weapons, naval warfare, and, more recently, air support. Military intelligence has often played a key role in determining victory and defeat. Propaganda, which often includes information, slanted opinion and disinformation, plays a key role both in maintaining unity within a warring group and in sowing discord among opponents. In modern warfare, soldiers and combat vehicles are used to control the land, warships the sea, and aircraft the sky. These fields have also overlapped in the forms of marines, paratroopers, aircraft carriers, and surface-to-air missiles, among others. Satellites in low Earth orbit have made outer space a factor in warfare as well as it is used for detailed intelligence gathering, however no known aggressive actions have been taken from space.\n\nMaterial culture and technology\n\nStone tools were used by proto-humans at least 2.5 million years ago. The controlled use of fire began around 1.5 million years ago. Since then, humans have made major advances, developing complex technology to create tools to aid their lives and allowing for other advancements in culture. Major leaps in technology include the discovery of agriculture – what is known as the Neolithic Revolution, and the invention of automated machines in the Industrial Revolution.\n\nArchaeology attempts to tell the story of past or lost cultures in part by close examination of the artifacts they produced. Early humans left stone tools, pottery, and jewelry that are particular to various regions and times.\n\nBody culture\n\nThroughout history, humans have altered their appearance by wearing clothing and adornments, by trimming or shaving hair or by means of body modifications.\n\nBody modification is the deliberate altering of the human body for any non-medical reason, such as aesthetics, sexual enhancement, a rite of passage, religious reasons, to display group membership or affiliation, to create body art, shock value, or self-expression. In its most broad definition it includes plastic surgery, socially acceptable decoration (e.g. common ear piercing in many societies), and religious rites of passage (e.g. circumcision in a number of cultures). \n\nReligion and spirituality\n\nReligion is generally defined as a belief system concerning the supernatural, sacred or divine, and practices, values, institutions and rituals associated with such belief. Some religions also have a moral code. The evolution and the history of the first religions have recently become areas of active scientific investigation. However, in the course of its development, religion has taken on many forms that vary by culture and individual perspective. Some of the chief questions and issues religions are concerned with include life after death (commonly involving belief in an afterlife), the origin of life, the nature of the universe (religious cosmology) and its ultimate fate (eschatology), and what is moral or immoral. A common source for answers to these questions are beliefs in transcendent divine beings such as deities or a singular God, although not all religions are theistic. Spirituality, belief or involvement in matters of the soul or spirit, is one of the many different approaches humans take in trying to answer fundamental questions about humankind's place in the universe, the meaning of life, and the ideal way to live one's life. Though these topics have also been addressed by philosophy, and to some extent by science, spirituality is unique in that it focuses on mystical or supernatural concepts such as karma and God.\n\nAlthough the exact level of religiosity can be hard to measure, a majority of humans professes some variety of religious or spiritual belief, although many (in some countries a majority) are irreligious. This includes humans who have no religious beliefs or do not identify with any religion. Humanism is a philosophy which seeks to include all of humanity and all issues common to humans; it is usually non-religious. Most religions and spiritual beliefs are clearly distinct from science on both a philosophical and methodological level; the two are not generally considered mutually exclusive and a majority of humans hold a mix of both scientific and religious views. The distinction between philosophy and religion, on the other hand, is at times less clear, and the two are linked in such fields as the philosophy of religion and theology.\n\nPhilosophy and self-reflection\n\nPhilosophy is a discipline or field of study involving the investigation, analysis, and development of ideas at a general, abstract, or fundamental level. It is the discipline searching for a general understanding of reality, reasoning and values. Major fields of philosophy include logic, metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of mind, and axiology (which includes ethics and aesthetics). Philosophy covers a very wide range of approaches, and is used to refer to a worldview, to a perspective on an issue, or to the positions argued for by a particular philosopher or school of philosophy.\n\nScience\n\nAnother unique aspect of human culture and thought is the development of complex methods for acquiring knowledge through observation, quantification, and verification. The scientific method has been developed to acquire knowledge of the physical world and the rules, processes and principles of which it consists, and combined with mathematics it enables the prediction of complex patterns of causality and consequence. Some other animals are able to recognize differences in small quantities, but humans are able to understand and recognize much larger, even abstract, quantities, and to recognize and understand algorithmic patterns which enables infinite counting routines and algebra, something that is not found in any other species.\n\nArt, music, and literature\n\n Art is a cultural universal, and humans have been producing artistic works at least since the days of Cro Magnon. Art may be defined as a form of cultural expression and the usage of narratives of liberation and exploration (i.e. art history, art criticism, and art theory) to mediate its boundaries. This distinction may be applied to objects or performances, current or historical, and its prestige extends to those who made, found, exhibit, or own them. In the modern use of the word, art is commonly understood to be the process or result of making material works that, from concept to creation, adhere to the \"creative impulse\" of human beings. Art is distinguished from other works by being in large part unprompted by necessity, by biological drive, or by any undisciplined pursuit of recreation.\n\nMusic is a natural intuitive phenomenon based on the three distinct and interrelated organization structures of rhythm, harmony, and melody. Listening to music is perhaps the most common and universal form of entertainment, while learning and understanding it are popular disciplines. There are a wide variety of music genres and ethnic musics. Literature, the body of written—and possibly oral—works, especially creative ones, includes prose, poetry and drama, both fiction and non-fiction. Literature includes such genres as epic, legend, myth, ballad, and folklore." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Rahm_Emanuel.txt", "Illinois.txt" ], "title": [ "Rahm Emanuel", "Illinois" ], "wiki_context": [ "Rahm Israel Emanuel (; born November 29, 1959) is an American politician who serves as the 55th mayor of Chicago. A member of the Democratic Party, Emanuel was elected in 2011, becoming Chicago's first Jewish mayor. He was reelected on April 7, 2015.\n\nBorn in Chicago, Emanuel is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and Northwestern University. Working early in his career in Democratic politics, Emanuel was appointed as director of the finance committee for Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign. In 1993, he joined the Clinton administration, where he served as the assistant to the president for political affairs and as the senior advisor to the president for policy and strategy before resigning, in 1998. Beginning a career in finance, Emanuel worked at the investment bank Wasserstein Perella & Co. from 1998 for 2 1/2 years and served on the board of directors of Freddie Mac.\n\nIn 2002, Emanuel ran for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives vacated by Rod Blagojevich, who resigned to become governor of Illinois. Emanuel won the first of three terms representing Illinois's 5th congressional district, a seat he held from 2003 to 2009. During his tenure in the House, Emanuel held two Democratic leadership positions, serving as the chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee from 2005 to 2007 and as the chair of the House Democratic Caucus, from 2007 to 2009. After the 2008 presidential election, President Barack Obama appointed Emanuel to serve as White House chief of staff.\n\nIn October 2010, Emanuel resigned as chief of staff to run as a candidate in Chicago's 2011 mayoral election. Because of questions over his eligibility to run for mayor, Emanuel's candidacy was initially rejected by the Illinois First District Appellate Court, though he was later found eligible to run in a unanimous decision by the Supreme Court of Illinois. Emanuel won with 55% of the vote over five other candidates in the nonpartisan mayoral election, succeeding 22-year incumbent Richard M. Daley. Although Emanuel did not obtain an absolute majority in the February 2015 mayoral election, he defeated Cook County Board Commissioner Jesús \"Chuy\" García in the April 7 runoff election.\n\nSince November 2015 Emanuel's approval rating has plunged in response to a series of scandals, most directly the police shooting of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, the city's subsequent attempts to withhold a video of the shooting, and the lack of an investigation into the matter. In early December the federal Justice Department announced an investigation into the operations of the Chicago police department, a move which Emanuel initially opposed. By December over half of Chicagoans favored Emanuel's resignation, with highly critical evaluations of the mayor appearing in such sources as The New York Times and The New Yorker, and coming from such figures as the Reverend Al Sharpton. \n\nEarly life and family\n\nEmanuel's grandfather was a Romanian Jew from Moldova. The surname Emanuel (Hebrew: ), which means \"God with us\", was adopted by their family in honor of his father's brother Emanuel Auerbach, who was killed in 1933 in an altercation with Arabs in Jerusalem.\n\nEmanuel's father, Benjamin M. Emanuel, is a Jerusalem-born pediatrician at Michael Reese Hospital who was once a member of the Irgun, a Jewish paramilitary organization that operated in Mandate Palestine. His mother, Marsha (née Smulevitz), is the daughter of a West Side Chicago union organizer who worked in the civil rights movement, and briefly owned a local rock and roll club and later became an adherent of Benjamin Spock's writings. Emanuel's parents met during the 1950s in Chicago.\n\nEmanuel was born on November 29, 1959 in Chicago, Illinois. His first name, Rahm () means high or lofty in Hebrew. He has been described by his older brother Ezekiel, an oncologist and bioethicist at the University of Pennsylvania, as \"quiet and observant\" as a child. Ari, the youngest, is the co-CEO of William Morris Endeavor, a talent agency with headquarters in Beverly Hills, California; he also has a younger adopted sister, Shoshana.\n\nEducation and upbringing\n\nWhile he lived in Chicago, Emanuel attended the Bernard Zell Anshe Emet Day School. After his family moved to Wilmette, north of the city, Emanuel attended public schools: Romona School, Locust Junior High School, and New Trier West High School. He and his brothers attended summer camp in Israel, including the summer following the June 1967 Six-Day War. Ezekiel has written that their father \"did not believe in falsely building his sons' self-esteem by purposefully letting us win, or tolerating sloppy play.\" About Rahm, he also wrote, \n \nRahm was encouraged by his mother to take ballet lessons and is a graduate of the Evanston School of Ballet, as well as a student of The Joel Hall Dance Center, where his children later took lessons. He won a scholarship to the Joffrey Ballet, but turned it down to attend Sarah Lawrence College, a liberal arts school with a strong dance program. While an undergraduate, Emanuel was elected to the Sarah Lawrence Student Senate. He graduated from Sarah Lawrence in 1981 with a Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts, and went on to receive a Master of Arts in Speech and Communication from Northwestern University in 1985. \n\nEmanuel took part in a two-week civilian volunteer holiday, known as the Sar-El, where, as a civilian volunteer, he assisted the Israel Defense Forces during the 1991 Gulf War, helping to repair truck brakes in one of Israel's northern bases. \n\nWhile a high school student working part-time at an Arby's restaurant, Emanuel severely cut his right middle finger on a meat slicer, which was later infected from swimming in Lake Michigan. His finger was partially amputated due to the severity of the infection. \n\nPolitical staffer career\n\nEmanuel began his political career with the public interest and consumer rights organization Illinois Public Action. He went on to serve in a number of capacities in local and national politics, initially specializing in fundraising for Illinois campaigns, and then nationally.\n\nEmanuel worked for Democrat Paul Simon's 1984 election to the U.S. Senate. He also worked as the national campaign director for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 1988, and was senior advisor and chief fundraiser for Richard M. Daley's successful initial campaign for mayor of Chicago, in 1989.\n\nAt the start of then-Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton's presidential primary campaign, Emanuel was appointed to direct the campaign's finance committee. Emanuel insisted that Clinton schedule much time for fundraising and greatly delay campaigning in New Hampshire. Clinton embarked on an aggressive national fundraising campaign that allowed the campaign to keep buying television time as attacks on Clinton's character threatened to swamp the campaign during the New Hampshire primary. Clinton's primary rival, Paul Tsongas (the New Hampshire Democratic primary winner), later withdrew, citing a lack of campaign funds. Richard Mintz, a Washington public relations consultant who worked with Emanuel on the campaign, spoke about the soundness of the idea: \"It was that [extra] million dollars that really allowed the campaign to withstand the storm we had to ride out in New Hampshire [over Clinton's relationship with Gennifer Flowers and the controversy over his draft status during the Vietnam War].\" Emanuel's knowledge of the top donors in the country, and his rapport with \"heavily Jewish\" donors helped Clinton amass a then-unheard-of sum of $72 million. While working on the Clinton campaign Emanuel was a paid retainer of the investment bank Goldman Sachs. \n\nFollowing the campaign, Emanuel became a senior advisor to Clinton at the White House from 1993 to 1998. In the White House, Emanuel was initially Assistant to the President for Political Affairs and then Senior Advisor to the President for Policy and Strategy. He was a leading strategist in White House efforts to institute NAFTA and universal health care, among other Clinton initiatives. \n\nEmanuel is known for his \"take-no-prisoners style\" that has earned him the nickname \"Rahmbo.\" Emanuel sent a dead fish in a box to a pollster who was late delivering polling results. On the night after the 1992 election, angry at Democrats and Republicans who \"betrayed\" them in the 1992 election, Emanuel stood up at a celebratory dinner with colleagues from the campaign and began plunging a steak knife into the table and began rattling off names while shouting \"Dead! Dead! Dead!\". Before Tony Blair gave a pro-Clinton speech during the impeachment crisis, Emanuel reportedly screamed at Blair \"Don't fuck this up!\" while Clinton was present. Blair and Clinton both burst into laughter. However, by 2007 friends of Emanuel were saying that he has \"mellowed out\". Stories of his personal style have entered the popular culture, inspiring articles and websites that chronicle these and other quotes and incidents. The character Josh Lyman in The West Wing was said to be based on Emanuel, though executive producer Lawrence O'Donnell denied this. \n\nCareer in finance\n\nAfter serving as an advisor to Bill Clinton, in 1998 Emanuel resigned from his position in the Clinton administration and joined the investment banking firm Wasserstein Perella, where he worked for 2 1/2 years. Although he did not have an MBA degree or prior banking experience, he became a managing director at the firm’s Chicago office in 1999, and according to Congressional disclosures, made $16.2 million in his two-and-a-half-years as a banker. At Wasserstein Perella, he worked on eight deals, including the acquisition by Commonwealth Edison of Peco Energy and the purchase by GTCR Golder Rauner of the SecurityLink home security unit from SBC Communications.\n\nFreddie Mac\n\nEmanuel was named to the Board of Directors of Freddie Mac by President Clinton in 2000. He earned at least $320,000 during his time there, including later stock sales. During Emanuel's time on the board, Freddie Mac was plagued with scandals involving campaign contributions and accounting irregularities. The Obama Administration rejected a request under the Freedom of Information Act to review Freddie Mac board minutes and correspondence during Emanuel's time as a director. The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight later accused the board of having \"failed in its duty to follow up on matters brought to its attention.\" Emanuel resigned from the board in 2001 before his first bid for Congress. \n\nCongressional career\n\nElections\n\nIn 2002, Emanuel pursued the U.S. House seat in the 5th district of Illinois, previously held by Rod Blagojevich, who successfully ran for governor of Illinois. His strongest opponent in the crowded primary of eight was former Illinois state representative Nancy Kaszak. During the primary, Edward Moskal, president of the Polish American Congress, a political action committee endorsing Kaszak, called Emanuel a \"millionaire carpetbagger.\" Emanuel won the primary and defeated Republican candidate Mark Augusti in the general election. Emanuel's inaugural election to the House was the closest he ever had, as he won over 70% of the vote in all of his re-election bids.\n\nTenure\n\nEmanuel was elected after the October 2002 joint Congressional resolution authorizing the Iraq War, and so did not vote on it. However, in the lead up to the resolution, Emanuel spoke out strongly in support of the war, urging a United States' \"muscular projection of force\" in Iraq. Emanuel has been the focus of anti-war protests for his support of funding bills for the war in Iraq, and his support, during Democratic party primaries, of Democratic candidates that were more hawkish.\n\nIn January 2003, Emanuel was named to the House Financial Services Committee and sat on the subcommittee that oversaw Freddie Mac. A few months later, Freddie Mac Chief Executive Officer Leland Brendsel was forced out and the committee and subcommittee commenced more than a year of hearings into Freddie Mac. Emanuel skipped every hearing allegedly for reasons of avoiding any appearance of favoritism, impropriety, or conflict of interest. \n\nHouse leadership\n\nAfter his role in helping the Democrats win the 2006 elections, Emanuel was believed to be a leading candidate for the position of Majority Whip. Nancy Pelosi, who became the next Speaker of the House of Representatives, persuaded him not to challenge Jim Clyburn, but instead to succeed Clyburn in the role of Democratic Caucus Chairman. In return, Pelosi agreed to assign the caucus chair more responsibilities, including \"aspects of strategy and messaging, incumbent retention, policy development and rapid-response communications.\" Caucus vice-chair John Larson remained in his role instead of running for the chairman position.\n\nAfter Vice President Dick Cheney asserted that he did not fall within the bounds of orders set for the executive branch, Emanuel called for cutting off the $4.8 million the Executive Branch provides for the Vice President's office.\n\nPositions on political issues\n\n;Social issues\nEmanuel is generally liberal on social issues. He has maintained a 100-percent pro-choice voting record, supports LGBT rights including same-sex marriage, and is a strong supporter of gun control, rated \"F\" by the NRA in December 2003. He has also strongly supported the banning of numerous rifles based upon \"sporting purposes\" criteria.\n\nDuring his original 2002 campaign, Emanuel spoke in support of the goal of \"to help make health care affordable and available for all Americans\".\n\nIn his 2006 book, co-authored with Bruce Reed, The Plan: Big Ideas for America, Emanuel advocated a three-month compulsory universal service program for Americans between the ages of 18 and 25. An expanded version was later proposed by Barack Obama during his 2008 campaign.\n\n;Iraq war\nDuring his original 2002 campaign, Emanuel \"indicated his support of President Bush's position on Iraq, but said he believed the President needed to better articulate his position to the American people\".\n\nIn the 2006 congressional primaries, Emanuel, then head of the Democratic congressional campaign committee, helped organize a run by Tammy Duckworth, an Iraq war veteran with no political experience, against grassroots candidate Christine Cegelis in Illinois' 6th district. Expedited withdrawal from Iraq was a central point of Cegelis' campaign and Duckworth opposed a withdrawal timetable.\n\n;Middle east\nIn June 2007, Emanuel condemned an outbreak of Palestinian violence in the Gaza Strip and criticized Arab countries for not applying the same kind of pressure on the Palestinians as they have on Israel. At a 2003 pro-Israel rally in Chicago, Emanuel told the marchers that Israel was \"ready for peace\" but would not get there until Palestinians \"turn away from the path of terror\".\n\nDemocratic Party leadership\n\nDemocratic Congressional Campaign Committee chairman\n\nEmanuel assumed the position of Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chairman (DCCC) after the death of the previous chair, Bob Matsui. Emanuel led the Democratic Party's effort to capture the majority in the House of Representatives in the 2006 elections. The documentary HouseQuake, featuring Emanuel, chronicles those elections. After Emanuel's election as chairman of the Democratic Caucus, Chris Van Hollen became committee chair for the 110th Congress. Emanuel had disagreements over Democratic election strategy with Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean. Dean favored a \"fifty-state strategy\", building support for the Democratic Party over the long term, while Emanuel advocated a more tactical approach focusing attention on key districts.\n\nThe Democratic Party gained 30 seats in the House in the 2006 elections and Emanuel received considerable praise for his stewardship of the DCCC, even from Illinois Republican Rep. Ray LaHood who said \"He legitimately can be called the golden boy of the Democratic Party today. He recruited the right candidates, found the money and funded them, and provided issues for them. Rahm did what no one else could do in seven cycles.\" However, he also faced some criticism for his failure to support some progressive candidates, as Howard Dean advocated. \n\nEmanuel aligned himself with the Democratic Leadership Council.\n\n2008 Presidential election\n\nEmanuel declared in April 2006 that he would support Hillary Rodham Clinton should she pursue the presidency in 2008. Emanuel remained close to Clinton since leaving the White House, talking strategy with her at least once a month as chairman of the DCCC. However, Emanuel's loyalties came into conflict when his home-state Senator, Barack Obama, expressed interest in the race. Asked in January 2007, about his stance on the Democratic presidential nomination, he said: \"I'm hiding under the desk. I'm very far under the desk, and I'm bringing my paper and my phone.\" Emanuel remained neutral in the race until June 4, 2008, the day after the final primary contests, when he endorsed Obama. \n\nWhite House Chief of Staff\n\nOn November 6, 2008, Emanuel accepted the position of White House Chief of Staff for US President Barack Obama. He resigned his congressional seat effective January 2, 2009. A special primary to fill his vacated congressional seat was held on March 3, 2009, and the special general election on April 7. John Fritchey, a candidate for that seat, said at a forum that Emanuel had told him he may be interested in running for the seat again in the future. \n\nSome Republican leaders criticized Emanuel's appointment because they believed it went against Obama's campaign promises of less divisive politics, given Emanuel's reputation as a partisan Democrat. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham disagreed, saying: \"This is a wise choice by President-elect Obama. He's tough but fair, honest, direct and candid.\" Ira Forman, executive director of the National Jewish Democratic Council, said that the choice indicated that Obama would not listen to the \"wrong people\" regarding the U.S.–Israel relationship. Some commentators opined that Emanuel would be good for the Israeli–Palestinian peace process because if Israeli leaders made excuses for not dismantling settlements, Emanuel would be tough and pressure the Israelis to comply. Some Palestinians expressed dismay at Emanuel's appointment. \n\nWeeks after accepting the appointment, Emanuel participated on a panel of corporate chief executive officers sponsored by the Wall Street Journal and said, \"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste.\" The quote was taken out of context by some commentators as evidence \"...that the left supposedly wants to exploit circumstances to ram its agenda through.\" Emanuel explained later, \"...what I said was, never allow a good crisis to go to waste when it's an opportunity to do things that you had never considered, or that you didn't think were possible.\" \n\nIn a 2009 article in The New York Times, Emanuel was characterized as being \"perhaps the most influential chief of staff of a generation\". \n\nHe has a reputation for his no-holds-barred negotiation style that involves \"his share of shouting and cursing\". Ezekiel Emanuel has written, \"The impatient, pushy Emanuel style is so well known that during a recent job interview I was asked, point-blank, whether I had the level-headed temperament the position required..... [A]s obvious to our flaws are to others, it's difficult to recognize them in ourselves.\" At a January 2010 closed-door meeting in the White House with liberal activists, Emanuel called them \"fucking retarded\" for planning to run TV ads attacking conservative Democrats who didn't support Obama's health-care overhaul. After the remarks were quoted in a front-page story of the Wall Street Journal, and after he was criticized by Sarah Palin, Emanuel apologized to organizations for the mentally handicapped for using the word \"retarded.\" But he never apologized to liberals.\n\nAccording to Jonathan Alter's book, The Promise, Emanuel opposed Barack Obama's plan for a broad health care reform, but Obama overrode him. Emanuel advocated a smaller plan because it could get bipartisan support. Emanuel wanted to expand coverage for children, and increase the number of single mothers eligible for Medicaid. For that reason, it was called \"the Titanic plan.\" \n\nAs Chief of Staff, Emanuel would make his staff laugh. During a staff meeting, when Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra gave uniformly upbeat reports, Emanuel is said to have looked at him and said: \"Whatever you're taking, I want some.\" Emanuel had a hand in war strategy, political maneuvering, communications and economic policy. Bob Woodward wrote in Obama's Wars that Emanuel made a habit of telephoning CIA Director Leon Panetta and asking about the lethal drone strikes aimed at Al Qaeda, asking \"Who did we get today?\" \n\nIn 2010, Emanuel was reported to have conflicts with other senior members of the president's team and ideological clashes over policy. He was also the focal point of criticism from left-leaning Democrats for the administration's perceived move to the center. By September 2010, with the Democrats anticipating heavy losses in midterm elections, this was said to precipitate Emanuel's departure as Chief of Staff. \n\nMayor of Chicago \n\nElections \n\n2011 \n\nOn September 30, 2010, it was announced that Emanuel would leave his post as White House Chief of Staff to run for Mayor of Chicago. He was replaced by Pete Rouse on October 2, 2010.\n\nEmanuel's eligibility for office was challenged on the basis of his lack of residency in Chicago for one year prior to the election. The Board of Elections and the Cook County Circuit Court affirmed his eligibility. A divided Court of Appeals reversed the Circuit Court, holding on January 24, 2011, that residency for purposes of a candidate is different from residency for purposes of being a voter. A further appeal to the Illinois Supreme Court resulted in a unanimous decision reversing the Court of Appeals and affirming Emanuel's eligibility. \n\nEmanuel's mayoral campaign was the inspiration for a satirical Twitter account called MayorEmanuel, which received over 43,000 followers, more popular than Emanuel's actual Twitter account. Emanuel announced on February 28 that if the author would reveal himself, he would donate $5,000 to the charity of the author's choice. When Chicago journalist Dan Sinker revealed himself, Emanuel donated the money to Young Chicago Authors, a community organization which helps young people with writing and publishing skills. \n\nEmanuel was elected on February 22, 2011 with 55% of the vote and was sworn in as the 55th Mayor of Chicago on May 16, 2011 at the Pritzker Pavilion. At his inauguration were outgoing Mayor Richard M. Daley, Vice President Joe Biden, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, and William M. Daley, brother of the outgoing mayor and who would later serve as White House Chief of Staff. Emanuel is Chicago's first Jewish mayor. \n\n2015 \n\nAn August 2014, Chicago Tribune poll reported Emanuel had a 35% approval rating as mayor of Chicago. \n\nIn 2015, Emanuel won 56 percent of the vote in the run-off election against Jesús \"Chuy\" García held on April 7, 2015. He had been hurt by sharp neighborhood criticism of his decision to shut down 50 public schools in black and Latino neighborhoods and his installation of red light cameras, together with anger at the high level of gun violence on the streets. On the other hand, he was supported by the business community and most elements of the Democratic party. \n\nTenure \n\nEmanuel assembled a transition team from varied backgrounds. On November 16, the city council voted unanimously to adopt the mayor's first budget, which decreased the budget by $34 million and increased spending by $46.2 million, supported by increasing fees and fines. Despite most Aldermen opposing cuts to library workers and the closure of mental health clinics, they ultimately supported it, calling it \"honest\". At a news conference in November 2012, Emanuel listed his top three priorities for the state legislature as security and pension reform, adding a casino to Chicago, and equal marriage rights for same-sex couples. At a press conference with Illinois Governor Pat Quinn, who previously vetoed legislation to put a casino in Chicago, the two were \"very close\" to reaching a deal. \n\nPolice and community relations \n\nIn August 2012, a federal lawsuit was filed by eleven Chicago police officers alleging they were removed from the mayoral security detail and replaced with officers who worked on Emanuel's mayoral campaign, in violation of the 1983 Shakman Decree, which bars city officials from making political considerations in the hiring process. \n\nRahm Emanuel faced a great deal of criticism for his handling of the October 20, 2014 police shooting of Laquan McDonald. The dash-cam video of the shooting was initially withheld, and only was released after a judge ordered it on November 24, 2015. After the video release, Emanuel was condemned for covering up the incident and allowing Chicago police to use excessive force against minorities. Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass wrote that the Emanuel administration withheld from the public the police dashboard camera video of the shooting in order to secure the re-election. Emanuel responded to criticism of the shooting and how it was handled by firing police Superintendent Garry McCarthy. In early December, the federal Justice Department announced an investigation into the Chicago Police Department, a move which Emanuel initially called \"misguided.\" Illinois state legislator La Shawn Ford also introduced a bill to recall the mayor (an effort most pundits claim is more symbolic than practical). \n\nProtests erupted soon after the release of the video, and on Black Friday protesters shut down part of the city's Magnificent Mile. Public calls for resignation grew steadily over this period, including a well-circulated op-ed published in The New York Times. By early December, Emanuel's approval rating had sunk to 18%, with 67% of Chicagoans disapproving of his job performance and slightly more than half of those polled calling for his resignation. During the week of December 10, protestors blocked streets and continued to call for Emanuel to resign. Additional protests against Emanuel and Chicago's Police Department were held on the city's busy Michigan Avenue shopping area on December 24, 2015. \n\nOn December 26, 2015, a police officer killed two people in another shooting, including a woman whom the officer had shot by mistake. On December 28, Emanuel announced that he was cutting short his vacation in Cuba to deal with the crisis. Emanuel announced several changes to the Chicago police department on December 30, including doubling the number of Tasers issued to officers. On New Year's Eve the Emanuel administration released emails revealing they had sought to coordinate with independent agencies such as the Independent Police Review Authority regarding public relations after the shooting. The same day The New Yorker added to the wave of negative media attention surrounding the mayor by publishing \"The Sudden But Well-Deserved Fall of Rahm Emanuel\", an article critically reevaluating Emanuel's legacy as a political operative since the early 90s.\n\nPublic education \n\nIn 2012, during the contract negotiations between the city the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU), compromise could not be reached over issues like health insurance increases, teacher evaluations, and seniority pay increases. On August 8, 2012, the CTU voted 90% to authorize a strike. On September 10, the CTU began a strike after CTU President Lewis declared that negotiations with the city were not succeeding. On September 14, the CTU reached a tentative agreement with the city which included preferences for teachers who have been laid off due to a school closing to be hired in another school and student test scores having less of a role in teacher evaluations than the city had originally planned. This tentative agreement did not hold, and the strike continued, after which Emanuel announced his intention to seek a legal injunction, forcing teachers back to work. On September 17, Emanuel's efforts to end the strike stalled as the walkout went into the second week. Delegates from the CTU voted to end the strike on September 18, 2012, and students began their return to the schools the following day. \n\nOn September 17, 2013, Emanuel's appointed Chicago Board of Education announced the closing of 50 Chicago public schools, 49 elementary schools and a high school — the largest school closure in Chicago history. \n\nPublic health \n\nOn August 16, 2011, Emanuel unveiled \"Healthy Chicago,\" the city’s first-ever public health blueprint with the Chicago Department of Public Health's Commissioner Bechara Choucair. Emanuel initiated the consolidation of City Council committees from 19 to 16 in a cost control effort. On October 30, 2012, Emanuel voiced his support for the demolition of the abandoned Prentice Women's Hospital Building, in order for Northwestern University, which owns the property, to build a new facility. Preservationists supported historical landmark status. Days later, the Commission on Chicago Landmarks voted that the building met landmark status criteria then reversed their decision later in the same meeting. On November 15, a judge granted a temporary stay of the decision in order for a lawsuit filed by preservation coalitions against the landmark commission to be heard. \n\nTransparency \n\nEmanuel rejected requests under Illinois' Freedom of Information Act from The Chicago Tribune for various communication and information logs for himself and his staff, labelling it \"unduly burdensome.\" After a second request by the Tribune, they were informed that 90 percent of the emails had been deleted by Emanuel and his top aides. As a result, Emanuel came under fire for going against his campaign promise to create \"the most open, accountable, and transparent government that the City of Chicago has ever seen.\" \n\nTax-exempt status of Lollapalooza \n\nLollapalooza, an annual summer music festival in Grant Park, was exempt from taxation. Emanuel's brother Ari is the co-CEO of William Morris Endeavor, which co-owns the event. In 2011 Rahm Emanuel asked the City Council to appoint an independent third party negotiator, to avoid having the negotiation seen as biased. Although the deal was reached before Emanuel took office, tax breaks must be negotiated every year. It was later revealed that the festival received its tax exemption for 2011 in the final days of the Daley administration. In 2012, Lollapalooza paid taxes for the first time in seven years and extended its contract to host in Grant Park through 2021. \n\nElectoral history\n\n;Mayor of Chicago\n\n;US House of Representatives\n\n|-\n| colspan=10 |U.S. House, 5th District of Illinois (General Election)\n|-\n!Year\n!Winning candidate\n!Party\n!Pct\n!Opponent\n!Party\n!Pct\n!Opponent\n!Party\n!Pct\n|-\n|2002\n| |Rahm Emanuel\n| |Democratic\n| |67%\n| |Mark Augusti\n| |Republican\n| |29%\n| |Frank Gonzalez\n| |Libertarian\n| |4%\n|-\n|2004\n| |Rahm Emanuel (inc.)\n| |Democratic\n| |76%\n| |Bruce Best\n| |Republican\n| |24%\n|\n|\n|-\n|2006\n| |Rahm Emanuel (inc.)\n| |Democratic\n| |78%\n| |Kevin White\n| |Republican\n| |22%\n|\n|\n|\n|-\n|2008\n| |Rahm Emanuel (inc.)\n| |Democratic\n| |74%\n| |Tom Hanson\n| |Republican\n| |22%\n| |Alan Augustson\n| |Green\n| |4%\n\nPersonal life \n\nEmanuel and his wife, Amy Merritt Rule, have a son and two daughters and the family lives in the Ravenswood neighborhood on Chicago's north side. Rule converted to Judaism shortly before their wedding. Emanuel is a close friend of fellow Chicagoan David Axelrod, chief strategist for Obama's 2008 and 2012 presidential campaign, and Axelrod signed the ketuba, the Jewish marriage contract, at Emanuel's wedding. The Emanuels are members of the Chicago synagogue Anshe Sholom B'nai Israel. Rabbi Asher Lopatin of the congregation described Emanuel's family as \"a very involved Jewish family,\" adding that \"Amy was one of the teachers for a class for children during the High Holidays two years ago.\" Emanuel has said of his Judaism: \"I am proud of my heritage and treasure the values it has taught me.\" Emanuel's children attend the private University of Chicago Laboratory Schools in the Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's south side. \n\nEach year during the winter holidays, Emanuel takes a family trip where his children can be exposed to other cultures and parts of the world. Prior family trips have been to Vietnam, India, Kenya, Zambia, and South America. His 2015 holiday trip was scheduled for the island of Cuba. \n\nEmanuel trains for and participates in triathlons. In 2011, he scored 9th out of 80 competitors in his age group. A passionate cyclist, he rides a custom-built, state-of-the-art Parlee road bike. \n\nWorks\n\n* \n*", "Illinois ( ) is a state in the midwestern region of the United States. It is the 5th most populous state and 25th largest state in terms of land area, and is often noted as a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal, timber, and petroleum in the south, Illinois has a diverse economic base and is a major transportation hub. The Port of Chicago connects the state to other global ports from the Great Lakes, via the Saint Lawrence Seaway, to the Atlantic Ocean, as well as the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River, via the Illinois River. For decades, O'Hare International Airport has been ranked as one of the world's busiest airports. Illinois has long had a reputation as a bellwether both in social and cultural terms and politics.\n\nAlthough today the state's largest population center is around Chicago in the northern part of the state, the state's European population grew first in the west, with French Canadians who settled along the Mississippi River, and gave the area the name, Illinois. After the American Revolutionary War established the United States, American settlers began arriving from Kentucky in the 1810s via the Ohio River, and the population grew from south to north. In 1818, Illinois achieved statehood. After construction of the Erie Canal increased traffic and trade through the Great Lakes, Chicago was founded in the 1830s on the banks of the Chicago River, at one of the few natural harbors on southern Lake Michigan. John Deere's invention of the self-scouring steel plow turned Illinois' rich prairie into some of the world's most productive and valuable farmlands, attracting immigrant farmers from Germany and Sweden. Railroads carried immigrants to new homes, as well as being used to ship their commodity crops out to markets.\n\nBy 1900, the growth of industrial jobs in the northern cities and coal mining in the central and southern areas attracted immigrants from Eastern and Southern Europe. Illinois was an important manufacturing center during both world wars. The Great Migration from the South established a large community of African Americans in Chicago, who created the city's famous jazz and blues cultures. \n\nThree U.S. presidents have been elected while living in Illinois: Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, and Barack Obama. Additionally, Ronald Reagan, whose political career was based in California, was the only U.S. president born and raised in Illinois. Today, Illinois honors Lincoln with its official state slogan, Land of Lincoln, which has been displayed on its license plates since 1954. The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum is located in the state capital of Springfield.\n\nEtymology\n\n\"Illinois\" is the modern spelling for the early French Catholic missionaries and explorers' name for the Illinois Native Americans, a name that was spelled in many different ways in the early records. \n\nAmerican scholars previously thought the name \"Illinois\" meant \"man\" or \"men\" in the Miami-Illinois language, with the original iliniwek transformed via French into Illinois. This etymology is not supported by the Illinois language, as the word for 'man' is ireniwa and plural 'men' is ireniwaki. The name Illiniwek has also been said to mean \"tribe of superior men\", which is a false etymology. The name \"Illinois\" derives from the Miami-Illinois verb irenwe·wa \"he speaks the regular way\". This was taken into the Ojibwe language, perhaps in the Ottawa dialect, and modified into ilinwe· (pluralized as ilinwe·k). The French borrowed these forms, changing the /we/ ending to spell it as -ois, a transliteration for its pronunciation in French of that time. The current spelling form, Illinois, began to appear in the early 1670s, when French colonists had settled in the western area. The Illinois' name for themselves, as attested in all three of the French missionary-period dictionaries of Illinois, was Inoka, of unknown meaning and unrelated to the other terms. \n\nHistory\n\nPre-European\n\nAmerican Indians of successive cultures lived along the waterways of the Illinois area for thousands of years before the arrival of Europeans. The Koster Site has been excavated and demonstrates 7,000 years of continuous habitation. Cahokia, the largest regional chiefdom and urban center of the Pre-Columbian Mississippian culture, was located near present-day Collinsville, Illinois. They built an urban complex of more than 100 platform and burial mounds, a 50 acre plaza larger than 35 football fields, and a woodhenge of sacred cedar, all in a planned design expressing the culture's cosmology. Monks Mound, the center of the site, is the largest Pre-Columbian structure north of the Valley of Mexico. It is 100 ft high, 951 ft long, 836 ft wide and covers . It contains about 814000 cuyd of earth. It was topped by a structure thought to have measured about 105 ft in length and 48 ft in width, covered an area 5000 sqft, and been as much as 50 ft high, making its peak 150 ft above the level of the plaza. The finely crafted ornaments and tools recovered by archaeologists at Cahokia include elaborate ceramics, finely sculptured stonework, carefully embossed and engraved copper and mica sheets, and one funeral blanket for an important chief fashioned from 20000 shell beads. These artifacts indicate that Cahokia was truly an urban center, with clustered housing, markets, and specialists in toolmaking, hide dressing, potting, jewelry making, shell engraving, weaving and salt making. The civilization vanished in the 15th century for unknown reasons, but historians and archeologists have speculated that the people depleted the area of resources. Many indigenous tribes engaged in constant warfare. According to Suzanne Austin Alchon, \"At one site in the central Illinois River valley, one-third of all adults died as a result of violent injuries.\" \nThe next major power in the region was the Illinois Confederation or Illini, a political alliance. As the Illini declined during the Beaver Wars era, members of the Algonquian-speaking Potawatomi, Miami, Sauk, and other tribes including the Fox (Mesquakie), Ioway, Kickapoo , Mascouten, Piankashaw, Shawnee, Wea, and Winnebago (Ho-Chunk) came into the area from the east and north around the Great Lakes. \n\nEuropean exploration\n\nFrench explorers Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet explored the Illinois River in 1673. In 1680, other French explorers constructed a fort at the site of present-day Peoria, and in 1682, a fort atop Starved Rock in today's Starved Rock State Park. French Canadians came south to settle particularly along the Mississippi River, and Illinois was part of the French empire of La Louisiane until 1763, when it passed to the British with their defeat of France in the Seven Years' War. The small French settlements continued, although many French migrated west to Ste. Genevieve and St. Louis, Missouri to evade British rule.\n\nA few British soldiers were posted in Illinois, but few British or American settlers moved there, as the Crown made it part of the territory reserved for Indians west of the Appalachians. In 1778, George Rogers Clark claimed Illinois County for Virginia. In a compromise, Virginia ceded the area to the new United States in 1783 and it became part of the Northwest Territory, to be administered by the federal government and later organized as states. \n\n19th century\n\nThe Illinois-Wabash Company was an early claimant to much of Illinois. The Illinois Territory was created on February 3, 1809, with its capital at Kaskaskia, an early French settlement.\n\nDuring the discussions leading up to Illinois' admission to the Union, the proposed northern boundary of the state was moved twice. The original provisions of the Northwest Ordinance had specified a boundary that would have been tangent to the southern tip of Lake Michigan. Such a boundary would have left Illinois with no shoreline on Lake Michigan at all. However, as Indiana had successfully been granted a 10-mile northern extension of its boundary to provide it with a usable lakefront, the original bill for Illinois statehood, submitted to Congress on January 23, 1818, stipulated a northern border at the same latitude as Indiana's, which is defined as 10 mi north of the southernmost extremity of Lake Michigan. But the Illinois delegate, Nathaniel Pope, wanted more. Pope lobbied to have the boundary moved further north, and the final bill passed by Congress did just that; it included an amendment to shift the border to 42° 30' north, which is approximately 51 mi north of the Indiana northern border. This shift added 8500 sqmi to the state, including the lead mining region near Galena. More importantly, it added nearly 50 miles of Lake Michigan shoreline and the Chicago River. Pope and others envisioned a canal that would connect the Chicago and Illinois rivers, and thus, connect the Great Lakes to the Mississippi.\n\nIn 1818, Illinois became the 21st U.S. state. The capital remained at Kaskaskia, headquartered in a small building rented by the state. In 1819, Vandalia became the capital, and over the next 18 years, three separate buildings were built to serve successively as the capitol building. In 1837, the state legislators representing Sangamon County, under the leadership of state representative Abraham Lincoln, succeeded in having the capital moved to Springfield, where a fifth capitol building was constructed. A sixth capitol building was erected in 1867, which continues to serve as the Illinois capitol today.\n\nThough it was ostensibly a \"free state\", there was slavery in Illinois. The ethnic French had owned black slaves as late as the 1820s, and American settlers had already brought slaves into the area from Kentucky. Slavery was nominally banned by the Northwest Ordinance, but that was not enforced for those already holding slaves. When Illinois became a sovereign state in 1818, the Ordinance no longer applied, and about 900 slaves were held in the state. As the southern part of the state, later known as \"Egypt\"or \"Little Egypt\", was largely settled by migrants from the South, the section was hostile to free blacks. Settlers were allowed to bring slaves with them for labor but, in 1822, state residents voted against making slavery legal. Still, most residents opposed allowing free blacks as permanent residents. Some settlers brought in slaves seasonally or as house servants. The Illinois Constitution of 1848 was written with a provision for exclusionary laws to be passed. In 1853, John A. Logan helped pass a law to prohibit all African Americans, including freedmen, from settling in the state. \n\nIn 1832, the Black Hawk War was fought in Illinois and current-day Wisconsin between the United States and the Sauk, Fox (Meskwaki) and Kickapoo Indian tribes. It represents the end of Indian resistance to white settlement in the Chicago region. The Indians had been forced to leave their homes and move to Iowa in 1831; when they attempted to return, they were attacked and eventually defeated by U.S. militia. The survivors were forced back to Iowa. \n\nThe winter of 1830–1831 is called the \"Winter of the Deep Snow\"; a sudden, deep snowfall blanketed the state, making travel impossible for the rest of the winter, and many travelers perished. Several severe winters followed, including the \"Winter of the Sudden Freeze\". On December 20, 1836, a fast-moving cold front passed through, freezing puddles in minutes and killing many travelers who could not reach shelter. The adverse weather resulted in crop failures in the northern part of the state. The southern part of the state shipped food north and this may have contributed to its name: \"Little Egypt\", after the Biblical story of Joseph in Egypt supplying grain to his brothers. \n\nBy 1839, the Latter Day Saints had founded a utopian city called Nauvoo. Located in Hancock County along the Mississippi River, Nauvoo flourished and soon rivaled Chicago for the position of the state's largest city. But in 1844, the Latter Day Saint movement founder Joseph Smith was killed in the Carthage Jail, about 30 miles away from Nauvoo. Following a Succession crisis (Latter Day Saints), Brigham Young led most Latter Day Saints out of Illinois in a mass exodus to present-day Utah; after close to six years of rapid development, Nauvoo rapidly declined afterward.\n\nChicago gained prominence as a Great Lakes port and then as an Illinois and Michigan Canal port after 1848, and as a rail hub soon afterward. By 1857, Chicago was Illinois' largest city. With the tremendous growth of mines and factories in the state in the 19th century, Illinois was the ground for the formation of labor unions in the United States. The Pullman Strike and Haymarket Riot, in particular, greatly influenced the development of the American labor movement. From Sunday, October 8, 1871, until Tuesday, October 10, 1871, the Great Chicago Fire burned in downtown Chicago, destroying 4 sqmi. \n\nIn 1847, after lobbying by Dorothea L. Dix, Illinois became one of the first states to establish a system of state-supported treatment of mental illness and disabilities, replacing local almshouses.\n\nCivil War\n\nDuring the American Civil War, Illinois ranked fourth in men who served (more than 250,000) in the Union Army, a figure surpassed by only New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. Beginning with President Abraham Lincoln's first call for troops and continuing throughout the war, Illinois mustered 150 infantry regiments, which were numbered from the 7th to the 156th regiments. Seventeen cavalry regiments were also gathered, as well as two light artillery regiments. The town of Cairo, at the southern tip of the state at the confluence of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, served as a strategically important supply base and training center for the Union army. For several months, both General Grant and Admiral Foote had headquarters in Cairo.\n\n20th century\n\nAt the turn of the 20th century, Illinois had a population of nearly 5 million. Many people from other parts of the country were attracted to the state by employment caused by the then-expanding industrial base. Whites were 98% of the state's population. Bolstered by continued immigration from southern and eastern Europe, and by the African-American Great Migration from the South, Illinois grew and emerged as one of the most important states in the union. By the end of the century, the population had reached 12.4 million.\n\nThe Century of Progress World's Fair was held at Chicago in 1933. Oil strikes in Marion County and Crawford County lead to a boom in 1937, and, by 1939, Illinois ranked fourth in U.S. oil production. Illinois manufactured 6.1 percent of total United States military armaments produced during World War II, ranking seventh among the 48 states. Chicago became an ocean port with the opening of the Saint Lawrence Seaway in 1959. The seaway and the Illinois Waterway connected Chicago to both the Mississippi River and the Atlantic Ocean. In 1960, Ray Kroc opened the first McDonald's franchise in Des Plaines (which still exists as a museum, with a working McDonald's across the street).\n\nIllinois had a prominent role in the emergence of the nuclear age. In 1942, as part of the Manhattan Project, the University of Chicago conducted the first sustained nuclear chain reaction. In 1957, Argonne National Laboratory, near Chicago, activated the first experimental nuclear power generating system in the United States. By 1960, the first privately financed nuclear plant in the United States, Dresden 1, was dedicated near Morris. In 1967, Fermilab, a national nuclear research facility near Batavia, opened a particle accelerator, which was the world's largest for over 40 years. With eleven plants currently operating, Illinois leads all states in the amount of electricity generated from nuclear power. \n\nIn 1961, Illinois became the first state in the nation to adopt the recommendation of the American Law Institute and pass a comprehensive criminal code revision that repealed the law against sodomy. The code also abrogated common law crimes and established an age of consent of 18. The state's fourth constitution was adopted in 1970, replacing the 1870 document.\n\nThe first Farm Aid concert was held in Champaign to benefit American farmers, in 1985. The worst upper Mississippi River flood of the century, the Great Flood of 1993, inundated many towns and thousands of acres of farmland.\n\nGeography\n\nIllinois is located in the Midwest Region of the United States and is one of the eight states and Canadian Province of Ontario in the bi-national Great Lakes region of North America.\n\nBoundaries\n\nIllinois' eastern border with Indiana consists of a north-south line at 87° 31′ 30″ west longitude in Lake Michigan at the north, to the Wabash River in the south above Post Vincennes. The Wabash River continues as the eastern/southeastern border with Indiana until the Wabash enters the Ohio River. This marks the beginning of Illinois' southern border with Kentucky, which runs along the northern shoreline of the Ohio River. Most of the western border with Missouri and Iowa is the Mississippi River; Kaskaskia is an exclave of Illinois, lying west of the Mississippi and reachable only from Missouri. The state's northern border with Wisconsin is fixed at 42° 30' north latitude. The northeastern border of Illinois lies in Lake Michigan, within which Illinois shares a water boundary with the state of Michigan, as well as Wisconsin and Indiana. \n\nTopography\n\nThough Illinois lies entirely in the Interior Plains, it does have some minor variation in its elevation. In extreme northwestern Illinois, the Driftless Area, a region of unglaciated and therefore higher and more rugged topography, occupies a small part of the state. Charles Mound, located in this region, has the state's highest elevation above sea level at 1235 ft. Other highlands include the Shawnee Hills in the south, and there is varying topography along its rivers; the Illinois River bisects the state northeast to southwest. The floodplain on the Mississippi River from Alton to the Kaskaskia River is known as the American Bottom.\n\nDivisions\n\nIllinois has three major geographical divisions. Northern Illinois is dominated by Chicagoland, which is the city of Chicago and its suburbs, and the adjoining exurban area into which the metropolis is expanding. As defined by the federal government, the Chicago metro area includes several counties in Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin, and has a population of over 9.8 million people. Chicago itself is a cosmopolitan city, densely populated, industrialized, and the transportation hub of the nation, and settled by a wide variety of ethnic groups. The city of Rockford, Illinois' third largest city and center of the state's fourth largest metropolitan area, sits along Interstates 39 and 90 some 75 mi northwest of Chicago. The Quad Cities region, located along the Mississippi River in northern Illinois, had a population of 381,342 in 2011.\n\nThe midsection of Illinois is a second major division, called Central Illinois. It is an area of mostly prairie and known as the Heart of Illinois. It is characterized by small towns and medium-small cities. The western section (west of the Illinois River) was originally part of the Military Tract of 1812 and forms the conspicuous western bulge of the state. Agriculture, particularly corn and soybeans, as well as educational institutions and manufacturing centers, figure prominently in Central Illinois. Cities include Peoria; Springfield, the state capital; Quincy; Decatur; Bloomington-Normal; and Champaign-Urbana.\n\nThe third division is Southern Illinois, comprising the area south of U.S. Route 50, including Little Egypt, near the juncture of the Mississippi River and Ohio River. Southern Illinois is the site of the ancient city of Cahokia, as well as the site of the first state capital at Kaskaskia, which today is separated from the rest of the state by the Mississippi River. This region has a somewhat warmer winter climate, different variety of crops (including some cotton farming in the past), more rugged topography (due to the area remaining unglaciated during the Illinoian Stage, unlike most of the rest of the state), as well as small-scale oil deposits and coal mining. The Illinois suburbs of St. Louis, such as East St. Louis are located in this region and collectively they are known as the Metro-East. The other somewhat significant concentration of population in Southern Illinois is the Carbondale-Marion-Herrin, Illinois Combined Statistical Area centered on Carbondale and Marion, a two-county area that is home to 123,272 residents. A portion of southeastern Illinois is part of the extended Evansville, Indiana Metro Area, locally referred to as the Tri-State with Indiana and Kentucky. Seven Illinois counties are in the area.\n\nIn addition to these three, largely latitudinally defined divisions, all of the region outside of the Chicago Metropolitan area is often called \"downstate\" Illinois. This term is flexible, but is generally meant to mean everything outside the Chicago-area. Thus, some cities in Northern Illinois, such as DeKalb, which is west of Chicago, and Rockford—which is actually north of Chicago—are considered to be \"downstate\".\n\nClimate\n\nIllinois has a climate that varies widely throughout the year. Because of its nearly 400-mile distance between its northernmost and southernmost extremes, as well as its mid-continental situation, most of Illinois has a humid continental climate (Köppen climate classification Dfa), with hot, humid summers and cold winters. The southern part of the state, from about Carbondale southward, has a humid subtropical climate (Koppen Cfa), with more moderate winters. Average yearly precipitation for Illinois varies from just over 48 in at the southern tip to around 35 in in the northern portion of the state. Normal annual snowfall exceeds 38 in in the Chicago area, while the southern portion of the state normally receives less than 14 in. The all-time high temperature was 117 F, recorded on July 14, 1954, at East St. Louis, while the all-time low temperature was , recorded on January 5, 1999, at Congerville. A temperature of −37 °F (−39 °C), was recorded on January 15, 2009, at Rochelle. \n\nIllinois averages approximately 51 days of thunderstorm activity a year, which ranks somewhat above average in the number of thunderstorm days for the United States. Illinois is vulnerable to tornadoes with an average of 35 occurring annually, which puts much of the state at around five tornadoes per 10000 sqmi annually. While tornadoes are no more powerful in Illinois than other states, some of Tornado Alley's deadliest tornadoes on record have occurred in the state. The Tri-State Tornado of 1925 killed 695 people in three states; 613 of the victims died in Illinois. Other significant high-casualty tornadoes include the 1896 St. Louis – East St. Louis tornado, which killed 111 people in East St. Louis and a May 1917 tornado that killed 101 people in Charleston and Mattoon. Modern developments in storm forecasting and tracking have caused death tolls from tornadoes to decline dramatically, with the 1967 Belvidere – Oak Lawn tornado outbreak (58 fatalities) and 1990 Plainfield tornado (29 fatalities) standing out as exceptions. On November 18, 2013, tornadoes touched down and ripped through Washington, Illinois. There were seven fatalities.\n\nDemographics\n\nThe United States Census Bureau estimates that the population of Illinois was 12,859,995 on July 1, 2015, a 0.23% increase since the 2010 United States Census. Illinois is the most populous state in the Midwest region. Chicago, the third most populous city in the United States, is the center of the Chicago metropolitan area. Chicagoland, as this area is known locally, comprises only 8% of the land area of the state, but contains 65% of the state's residents.\n\nAccording to the 2010 Census, the racial composition of the state was:\n* 71.5% White American (63.7% non-Hispanic white, 7.8% White Hispanic)\n* 14.5% Black or African American\n* 0.3% American Indian and Alaska Native\n* 4.6% Asian American\n* 2.3% Multiracial American\n* 6.8% some other race\n\nIn the same year 15.8% of the total population was of Hispanic or Latino origin (they may be of any race). \n\nThe state's most populous ethnic group, non-Hispanic white, has declined from 83.5% in 1970 to 63.3% in 2011. As of 2011, 49.4% of Illinois's population younger than age 1 were minorities (note: children born to white Hispanics are counted as minority group). \n\nAt the 2007 estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau, there were 1,768,518 foreign-born inhabitants of the state or 13.8% of the population, with 48.4% from Latin America, 24.6% from Asia, 22.8% from Europe, 2.9% from Africa, 1.2% from Northern America and 0.2% from Oceania. Of the foreign-born population, 43.7% were naturalized U.S. citizens and 56.3% were not U.S. citizens. In 2007, 6.9% of Illinois' population was reported as being under age 5, 24.9% under age 18 and 12.1% were age 65 and over. Females made up approximately 50.7% of the population. \n\nAccording to the 2007 estimates, 21.1% of the population had German ancestry, 13.3% had Irish ancestry, 8% had British ancestry, 7.9% had Polish ancestry, 6.4% had Italian ancestry, 4.6% listed themselves as American, 2.4% had Swedish ancestry, 2.2% had French ancestry, other than Basque, 1.6% had Dutch ancestry, and 1.4% had Norwegian ancestry. Illinois also has large numbers of African Americans and Latinos (mostly Mexicans and Puerto Ricans).\n\nChicago, along the shores of Lake Michigan, is the nation's third largest city. In 2000, 23.3% of Illinois' population lived in the city of Chicago, 43.3% in Cook County, and 65.6% in the counties of the Chicago metropolitan area: Will, DuPage, Kane, Lake, and McHenry counties, as well as Cook County. The remaining population lives in the smaller cities and rural areas that dot the state's plains. As of 2000, the state's center of population was at , located in Grundy County, northeast of the village of Mazon. \n\nUrban areas\n\nChicago is the largest city in the state and the third most populous city in the United States, with its 2010 population of 2,695,598. The U.S. Census Bureau currently lists seven other cities with populations of over 100,000 within Illinois. Based upon the Census Bureau's official 2010 population: Aurora, a Chicago satellite town that eclipsed Rockford for the title of second most populous city in Illinois; its 2010 population was 197,899. Rockford, at 152,871, is the third largest city in the state, and is the largest city in the state not located within the Chicago suburbs. Joliet, located in metropolitan Chicago, is the fourth largest city in the state, with a population of 147,433. Naperville, a suburb of Chicago, is fifth with 141,853. Naperville and Aurora share a boundary along Illinois Route 59. Springfield, the state's capital, comes in as sixth most populous with 117,352 residents. Peoria, which decades ago was the second-most populous city in the state, is seventh with 115,007. The eighth largest and final city in the 100,000 club is Elgin, a northwest suburb of Chicago, with a 2010 population of 108,188.\n\nThe most populated city in the state south of Springfield is Belleville, with 44,478 people at the 2010 census. It is located in the Illinois portion of Greater St. Louis (often called the Metro-East area), which has a rapidly growing population of over 700,000 people.\n\nOther major urban areas include the Champaign-Urbana Metropolitan Area, which has a combined population of almost 230,000 people, the Illinois portion of the Quad Cities area with about 215,000 people, and the Bloomington-Normal area with a combined population of over 165,000.\n\nMajor cities and towns\n\nLanguages\n\nThe official language of Illinois is English, although between 1923 and 1969 state law gave official status to \"the American language.\" Nearly 80% of people in Illinois speak English natively, and most of the rest speak it fluently as a second language. A number of dialects of American English are spoken, ranging from Inland Northern American English and African American Vernacular English around Chicago, to Midland American English in Central Illinois to Southern American English in the far south.\n\nOver 20% of Illinoians speak a language other than English at home, of which Spanish is by far the most widespread at more than 12% of the total population.\n\nReligion\n\nRoman Catholics constitute the single largest religious denomination in Illinois; they are heavily concentrated in and around Chicago, and account for nearly 30% of the state's population. However, taken together as a group, the various Protestant denominations comprise a greater percentage of the state's population than do Catholics. In 2010 Catholics in Illinois numbered 3,648,907. The largest Protestant denominations were the United Methodist Church with 314,461, and the Southern Baptist Convention, with 283,519 members. Illinois has one of the largest concentrations of Missouri Synod Lutherans in the United States.\n\nChicago and its suburbs are also home to a large and growing population of Hindus, Muslims, Baha'is and Buddhists. Muslims constituted the largest non-Christian group with 359,264 adherents. Illinois has the largest concentration of Muslims by state in the country with 2800 Muslims per 100,000 citizens. The largest and oldest surviving Bahá'í House of Worship in the world is located in Wilmette, Illinois and the oldest standing mosque in the U.S. is the Al-Sadiq Mosque of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, located in the Bronzeville neighbourhood of Chicago. The Chicago area has a large Jewish community, particularly in the suburbs of Skokie and Morton Grove. Current Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is the Windy City's first Jewish Mayor.\n\nIllinois played an important role in the early Latter Day Saint movement, with Nauvoo, Illinois, becoming a gathering place for Mormons in the early 1840s. Nauvoo was the location of the succession crisis, which led to the separation of the Mormon movement into several Latter Day Saint sects. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the largest of the sects to emerge from the Mormon schism, has over 55,000 adherents in Illinois today. \n\nEconomy\n\nThe dollar gross state product for Illinois was estimated to be billion in 2010. The state's 2010 per capita gross state product was estimated to be , the state's per capita personal income was estimated to be in 2009. \n\n, the state's unemployment rate was 6%. \n\nTaxes\n\nIllinois' state income tax is calculated by multiplying net income by a flat rate. In 1990, that rate was set at 3%, but in 2010, the General Assembly voted in a temporary increase in the rate to 5%; the new rate went into effect on January 1, 2011; the personal income rate partially sunset on January 1, 2015 to 3.75%, while the corporate income tax fell to 5.25% There are two rates for state sales tax: 6.25% for general merchandise and 1% for qualifying food, drugs, and medical appliances. The property tax is a major source of tax revenue for local government taxing districts. The property tax is a local — not state — tax, imposed by local government taxing districts, which include counties, townships, municipalities, school districts, and special taxation districts. The property tax in Illinois is imposed only on real property.\n\nAgriculture\n\nIllinois' major agricultural outputs are corn, soybeans, hogs, cattle, dairy products, and wheat. In most years, Illinois is either the first or second state for the highest production of soybeans, with a harvest of 427.7 million bushels (11.64 million metric tons) in 2008, after Iowa's production of 444.82 million bushels (12.11 million metric tons). Illinois ranks second in U.S. corn production with more than 1.5 billion bushels produced annually. With a production capacity of 1.5 billion gallons per year, Illinois is a top producer of ethanol; ranking third in the United States in 2011. Illinois is a leader in food manufacturing and meat processing. Although Chicago may no longer be \"Hog Butcher for the World,\" the Chicago area remains a global center for food manufacture and meat processing, with many plants, processing houses, and distribution facilities concentrated in the area of the former Union Stock Yards. Illinois also produces wine, and the state is home to two American viticultural areas. In the area of The Meeting of the Great Rivers Scenic Byway, peach and apple are grown. The German immigrants from agricultural backgrounds who settled in Illinois in mid- to late 19th century are the in part responsible for the profusion of fruit orchards in that area of Illinois. Illinois' universities are actively researching alternative agricultural products as alternative crops.\n\nManufacturing\n\nIllinois is one of the nation's manufacturing leaders, boasting annual value added productivity by manufacturing of over $107 billion in 2006. As of 2011, Illinois is ranked as the 4th most productive manufacturing state in the country, behind California, Texas, and Ohio. About three-quarters of the state's manufacturers are located in the Northeastern Opportunity Return Region, with 38 percent of Illinois' approximately 18,900 manufacturing plants located in Cook County. As of 2006, the leading manufacturing industries in Illinois, based upon value-added, were chemical manufacturing ($18.3 billion), machinery manufacturing ($13.4 billion), food manufacturing ($12.9 billion), fabricated metal products ($11.5 billion), transportation equipment ($7.4 billion), plastics and rubber products ($7.0 billion), and computer and electronic products ($6.1 billion). \n\nServices\n\nBy the early 2000s, Illinois' economy had moved toward a dependence on high-value-added services, such as financial trading, higher education, law, logistics, and medicine. In some cases, these services clustered around institutions that hearkened back to Illinois' earlier economies. For example, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, a trading exchange for global derivatives, had begun its life as an agricultural futures market. Other important non-manufacturing industries include publishing, tourism, and energy production and distribution.\n\nEnergy\n\nIllinois is a net importer of fuels for energy, despite large coal resources and some minor oil production. Illinois exports electricity, ranking fifth among states in electricity production and seventh in electricity consumption. \n\nCoal\n\nThe coal industry of Illinois has its origins in the middle 19th century, when entrepreneurs such as Jacob Loose discovered coal in locations such as Sangamon County. Jacob Bunn contributed to the development of the Illinois coal industry, and was a founder and owner of the Western Coal & Mining Company of Illinois. About 68% of Illinois has coal-bearing strata of the Pennsylvanian geologic period. According to the Illinois State Geological Survey, 211 billion tons of bituminous coal are estimated to lie under the surface, having a total heating value greater than the estimated oil deposits in the Arabian Peninsula. However, this coal has a high sulfur content, which causes acid rain unless special equipment is used to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions. Many Illinois power plants are not equipped to burn high-sulfur coal. In 1999, Illinois produced 40.4 million tons of coal, but only 17 million tons (42%) of Illinois coal was consumed in Illinois. Most of the coal produced in Illinois is exported to other states and countries. In 2008, Illinois exported 3 million tons of coal and was projected to export 9 million tons in 2011, as demand for energy grows in places such as China, India, elsewise in Asia and Europe. As of 2010, Illinois was ranked third in recoverable coal reserves at producing mines in the Nation. Most of the coal produced in Illinois is exported to other states, while much of the coal burned for power in Illinois (21 million tons in 1998) is mined in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming.\n\nMattoon was recently chosen as the site for the Department of Energy's FutureGen project, a 275 megawatt experimental zero emission coal-burning power plant that the DOE just gave a second round of funding. In 2010, after a number of setbacks, the city of Mattoon backed out of the project. \n\nPetroleum\n\nIllinois is a leading refiner of petroleum in the American Midwest, with a combined crude oil distillation capacity of nearly 900000 oilbbl/d. However, Illinois has very limited crude oil proved reserves that account for less than 1% of U.S. crude oil proved reserves. Residential heating is 81% natural gas compared to less than 1% heating oil. Illinois is ranked 14th in oil production among states, with a daily output of approximately 28000 oilbbl in 2005. \n\nNuclear power\n\nNuclear power arguably began in Illinois with the Chicago Pile-1, the world's first artificial self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction in the world's first nuclear reactor, built on the University of Chicago campus. There are six operating nuclear power plants in Illinois: Braidwood; Byron; Clinton; Dresden; LaSalle; and Quad Cities. With the exception of the single-unit Clinton plant, each of these facilities has two reactors. Three reactors have been permanently shut down and are in various stages of decommissioning: Dresden-1 and Zion-1 and 2. Illinois ranked first in the nation in 2010 in both nuclear capacity and nuclear generation. Generation from its nuclear power plants accounted for 12 percent of the Nation's total. In 2007, 48% of Illinois' electricity was generated using nuclear power. The Morris Operation is the only de facto high-level radioactive waste storage site in the United States.\n\nWind power\n\nIllinois has seen growing interest in the use of wind power for electrical generation. Most of Illinois was rated in 2009 as \"marginal or fair\" for wind energy production by the U.S. Department of Energy, with some western sections rated \"good\" and parts of the south rated \"poor\". These ratings are for wind turbines with 50 m hub heights; newer wind turbines are taller, enabling them to reach stronger winds farther from the ground. As a result, more areas of Illinois have become prospective wind farm sites. As of September 2009, Illinois had 1116.06 MW of installed wind power nameplate capacity with another 741.9 MW under construction. Illinois ranked ninth among U.S. states in installed wind power capacity, and sixteenth by potential capacity. Large wind farms in Illinois include Twin Groves, Rail Splitter, EcoGrove, and Mendota Hills.\n\nAs of 2007, wind energy represented only 1.7% of Illinois' energy production, and it was estimated that wind power could provide 5–10% of the state's energy needs. Also, the Illinois General Assembly mandated in 2007 that by 2025, 25% of all electricity generated in Illinois is to come from renewable resources. \n\nBiofuels\n\nIllinois is ranked second in corn production among U.S. states, and Illinois corn is used to produce 40% of the ethanol consumed in the United States. The Archer Daniels Midland corporation in Decatur, Illinois is the world's leading producer of ethanol from corn.\n\nThe National Corn-to-Ethanol Research Center (NCERC), the world's only facility dedicated to researching the ways and means of converting corn (maize) to ethanol is located on the campus of Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. \n\nUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is one of the partners in the Energy Biosciences Institute (EBI), a $500 million biofuels research project funded by petroleum giant BP. \n\nArts and culture\n\nMuseums\n\nIllinois has numerous museums; the greatest concentration of these is in Chicago. Several museums in the city of Chicago are considered some of the best in the world. These include the John G. Shedd Aquarium, the Field Museum of Natural History, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Adler Planetarium, and the Museum of Science and Industry.\n\nThe modern Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield is the largest and most attended presidential library in the country. The Illinois State Museum boasts a collection of 13.5 million objects that tell the story of Illinois life, land, people, and art. The ISM is among only 5% of the nation's museums that are accredited by the American Alliance of Museums. Other historical museums in the state include the Polish Museum of America in Chicago; Magnolia Manor in Cairo; Easley Pioneer Museum in Ipava; the Elihu Benjamin Washburne; Ulysses S. Grant Homes, both in Galena; and the Chanute Air Museum, located on the former Chanute Air Force Base in Rantoul.\n\nThe Chicago metropolitan area also has two zoos: The very large Brookfield Zoo, located approximately 13 miles west of the city center in suburban Brookfield, contains over 2300 animals and covers 216 acre. The Lincoln Park Zoo is located in huge Lincoln Park on Chicago's North Side, approximately 3 mi north of the Loop. The zoo covers over 35 acre within the park.\n\nMusic\n\nIllinois is a leader in music education having hosted the Midwest Clinic: An International Band and Orchestra Conference since 1946, as well being home to the Illinois Music Educators Association (IMEA), one of the largest professional music educator's organizations in the country. Each summer since 2004, Southern Illinois University Carbondale has played host to the Southern Illinois Music Festival, which presents dozens of performances throughout the region. Past featured artists include the Eroica Trio and violinist David Kim.\n\nSports\n\nMajor league teams\n\nAs one of the United States' major metropolises, all major sports leagues have teams headquartered in Chicago.\n*Two Major League Baseball teams are located in the state. The Chicago Cubs of the National League play in the second-oldest major league stadium (Wrigley Field) and are widely known for having the longest championship drought in all of major American sport: not winning the World Series since 1908. The Chicago White Sox of the American League won the World Series in 2005, their first since 1917. They play on the city's south side at U.S. Cellular Field.\n*The Chicago Bears football team has won nine total NFL Championships, the last occurring in Super Bowl XX on January 26, 1986.\n*The Chicago Bulls of the NBA is one of the most recognized basketball teams in the world, due largely to the efforts of Michael Jordan, who led the team to six NBA championships in eight seasons in the 1990s.\n*The Chicago Blackhawks of the NHL began playing in 1926 as a member of the Original Six and have won six Stanley Cups, most recently in 2015.\n*The Chicago Fire soccer club is a member of MLS and has been one of the league's most successful and best-supported clubs since its founding in 1997, winning one league and four Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cups in that timespan.\n*The Chicago Sky of the Women's National Basketball Association, a franchise in the pro league since 2006.\n\nMinor league teams\n\nMany minor league teams also call Illinois their home. They include:\n*The Chicago Red Stars of the NWSL, previously of Women's Professional Soccer League (WPS) and Women's Premier Soccer League (WPSL) \n*The Chicago Wolves are an AHL team\n*The Chicago Bandits of the NPF, a female softball league; won first title in 2008\n*The Peoria Chiefs of the Midwest League\n*The Peoria Rivermen are an SPHL team\n*The Rockford IceHogs are an AHL team\n*The Kane County Cougars of the Midwest League\n*The Normal CornBelters of the Frontier League\n*The Bloomington Flex of the Midwest Professional Basketball Association\n*The Bloomington Edge of the X-League Indoor Football\n*The Joliet Slammers of the Frontier League\n*The Rockford Aviators of the Frontier League\n*The Schaumburg Boomers of the Frontier League\n*The Southern Illinois Miners based out of Marion in the Frontier League\n*The Chicago Carnage of the MLRH\n*The Gateway Grizzlies of the Frontier League in Sauget, Illinois\n\nCollege sports\n\nThe Illinois Fighting Illini and Northwestern Wildcats are rival college sports teams in the Big Ten Conference. The Fighting Illini football team has won five national championships and three Rose Bowl Games, whereas the men's basketball team has won 17 conference season and played five Final Fours. Meanwhile, the Wildcats has won eight football conference championships and one Rose Bowl Game. The Northern Illinois Huskies from DeKalb, Illinois compete in the Mid-American Conference winning 4 conference championships and earning a bid in the Orange Bowl along with producing Heisman candidate Jordan Lynch at quarterback.\n\nFormer Chicago sports franchises\n\nFolded teams\n\nThe city was formerly home to several other teams that either failed to survive, or that belonged to leagues that folded.\n*The Chicago Blitz, United States Football League 1982–84\n*The Chicago Sting, North American Soccer League 1975–84 and Major Indoor Soccer League\n*The Chicago Cougars, World Hockey Association 1972–75\n*The Chicago Rockers, Continental Basketball Association\n*The Chicago Skyliners, American Basketball Association 2000–01\n*The Chicago Bruisers, Arena Football League 1987–2008\n*The Chicago Power, National Professional Soccer League 1984–2001\n*The Chicago Blaze, National Women's Basketball League\n*The Chicago Machine, Major League Lacrosse\n*The Chicago Whales of the Federal Baseball League, a rival league to Major League Baseball from 1914–1916\n*The Chicago American Giants of the Negro baseball league, 1910–1952\n*The Chicago Bruins of the National Basketball League, 1939–42\n*The Chicago Studebaker Flyers of the NBL, 1942–43\n*The Chicago American Gears of the NBL, 1944–47\n*The Chicago Stags of the Basketball Association of America, 1946–50\n*The Chicago Majors of the American Basketball League, 1961–63\n*The Chicago Express of the ECHL\n*The Chicago Enforcers of the XFL pro football league\n*The Chicago Fire, World Football League 1974\n*The Chicago Winds, World Football League 1975\n*The Chicago Hustle, Women's Professional Basketball League 1978–81\n*The Chicago Mustangs, North American Soccer League 1966–67\n*The Chicago Storm, Ultimate Soccer League 2004–05\n*The Chicago Rush, Arena Football League 2001–13\n\nRelocated teams\n\nThe NFL's Arizona Cardinals, who currently play in Phoenix, Arizona, played in Chicago as the Chicago Cardinals, until moving to St. Louis, Missouri after the 1959 season. An NBA expansion team known as the Chicago Packers in 1961–62 and the Chicago Zephyrs the following year moved to Baltimore after the 1962–63 season. The franchise is now known as the Washington Wizards.\n\nProfessional sports teams outside of Chicago\n\nThe Peoria Chiefs and Kane County Cougars are minor league baseball teams affiliated with MLB. The Schaumburg Boomers and Lake County Fielders are members of the North American League, and the Southern Illinois Miners, Gateway Grizzlies, Joliet Slammers, Windy City ThunderBolts and Normal CornBelters belong to the Frontier League.\n\nIn addition to the Chicago Wolves, the AHL also has the Rockford IceHogs serving as the AHL affiliate of the Chicago Blackhawks. The second incarnation of the Peoria Rivermen plays in the SPHL.\n\nMotor racing\n\nMotor racing oval tracks at the Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, the Chicago Motor Speedway in Cicero and the Gateway International Raceway in Madison, near St. Louis, have hosted NASCAR, CART, and IRL races, whereas the Sports Car Club of America, among other national and regional road racing clubs, have visited the Autobahn Country Club in Joliet, the Blackhawk Farms Raceway in South Beloit and the former Meadowdale International Raceway in Carpentersville. Illinois also has several short tracks and dragstrips. The dragstrip at Gateway International Raceway and the Route 66 Raceway, which sits on the same property as the Chicagoland Speedway, both host NHRA drag races.\n\nGolf\n\nIllinois features several golf courses such as Olympia Fields, Medinah, Midlothian, Cog Hill and Conway Farms, which have often hosted the BMW Championship, Western Open and Women's Western Open.\n\nAlso, the state has hosted 13 editions of the U.S. Open (latest at Olympia Fields in 2003), six edition of the PGA Championship (latest at Medinah in 2006), three editions of the U.S. Women's Open (latest at The Merit Club), the 2009 Solheim Cup (at Rich Harvest Farms) and the 2012 Ryder Cup (at Medinah).\n\nThe John Deere Classic is a regular PGA Tour event played at Quad Cities since 1971, whereas the Encompass Championship is a Champions Tour event since 2013. Previously the LPGA State Farm Classic was an LPGA Tour event from 1976 to 2011.\n\nParks and recreation\n\nThe Illinois state parks system began in 1908 with what is now Fort Massac State Park, becoming the first park in a system encompassing over 60 parks and about the same number of recreational and wildlife areas.\n\nAreas under the protection and control of the National Park Service include: the Illinois and Michigan Canal National Heritage Corridor near Lockport; the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail; the Lincoln Home National Historic Site in Springfield; the Mormon Pioneer National Historic Trail; the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail; the American Discovery Trail, and the Pullman National Monument. The Federal government also manages the Shawnee National Forest and the Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie.\n\nLaw and government\n\nThe government of Illinois, under the Constitution of Illinois, has three branches of government: Executive, legislative and judicial. The executive branch is split into several statewide elected offices, with the Governor as chief executive. Legislative functions are granted to the Illinois General Assembly. The judiciary is composed of the Supreme Court and lower courts.\n\nThe Illinois General Assembly is the state legislature, composed of the 118-member Illinois House of Representatives and the 59-member Illinois Senate. The members of the General Assembly are elected at the beginning of each even-numbered year. The Illinois Compiled Statutes (ILCS) are the codified statutes of a general and permanent nature. \n\nThe executive branch is composed of six elected officers and their offices as well as numerous other departments. The six elected officers are the: Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General, Secretary of State, Comptroller, and Treasurer. The government of Illinois has numerous departments, agencies, boards and commissions, but the so-called code departments provide most of the state's services. \n\nThe Judiciary of Illinois is the unified court system of Illinois. It consists of the Supreme Court, Appellate Court, and Circuit Courts. The Supreme Court oversees the administration of the court system.\n\nThe administrative divisions of Illinois are counties, townships, precincts, cities, towns, villages, and special-purpose districts. The basic subdivision of Illinois are the 102 counties. 85 Of the 102 counties are in turn divided into townships and precincts. Municipal governments are the cities, villages, and incorporated towns. Some localities possess home rule, which allows them to govern themselves to a certain extent. \n\nPolitics\n\nParty balance\n\nHistorically, Illinois was a political swing state, with near-parity existing between the Republican and the Democratic parties. However, in recent elections, the Democratic Party has gained ground and Illinois has come to be seen as a solid \"blue\" state in presidential contests. Chicago and most of Cook County votes have long been strongly Democratic. However, the \"collar counties\" (the suburbs surrounding Chicago's Cook County, Illinois), can be seen as moderate voting districts. College towns like Carbondale, Champaign and Normal also lean Democratic.\n\nRepublicans continue to prevail in the outlying Chicago exurban areas, as well as rural northern and central Illinois; Republican support is also strong in southern Illinois, outside of the East St. Louis metropolitan area. From 1920 until 1972, the state was carried by the victor of each of these presidential elections – 14 elections. In fact, Illinois was long seen as a national bellwether, supporting the winner in every election in the 20th century except for 1916 and 1976. By contrast, Illinois has trended more toward the Democratic party and such, has voted for their presidential candidates in the last six elections; in 2000, George W. Bush became the first Republican to win the presidency without carrying Illinois or Vermont. Chicago resident and current president Barack Obama easily won the state's 21 electoral votes in 2008, with 61.9% of the vote. In 2010, incumbent Governor Pat Quinn was re-elected with 47% of the vote, while Republican Mark Kirk was elected to the Senate with 48% of the vote. In 2012, President Obama easily carried Illinois again with 58% to Republican Mitt Romney's 41%. In 2014, Republican Bruce Rauner defeated Governor Quinn 50% – 46% to become Illinois' first Republican governor in 12 years when he was sworn in on January 12, 2015, while Democratic Senator Dick Durbin was re-elected with 53% of the vote.\n\nHistory of corruption\n\nPolitics in the state have been infamous for highly visible corruption cases, as well as for crusading reformers, such as governors Adlai Stevenson and James R. Thompson. In 2006, former Governor George Ryan was convicted of racketeering and bribery, leading to a -year prison sentence. In 2008, then-Governor Rod Blagojevich was served with a criminal complaint on corruption charges, stemming from allegations that he conspired to sell the vacated Senate seat left by President Barack Obama to the highest bidder. Subsequently, on December 7, 2011, Rod Blagojevich was sentenced to 14 years in prison for those charges, as well as perjury while testifying during the case, totaling 18 convictions. In the late 20th century, Congressman Dan Rostenkowski was imprisoned for mail fraud; former governor and federal judge Otto Kerner, Jr. was imprisoned for bribery; Secretary of State Paul Powell was investigated and found to have gained great wealth through bribes, and State Auditor of Public Accounts (Comptroller) Orville Hodge was imprisoned for embezzlement. In 1912, William Lorimer, the GOP boss of Chicago, was expelled from the U.S. Senate for bribery and in 1921, Governor Len Small was found to have defrauded the state of a million dollars. \n\nU.S. Presidents from Illinois\n\nThree presidents have claimed Illinois as their political base: Lincoln, Grant, and Obama. Lincoln was born in Kentucky, but moved to Illinois at the age of 21; he served in the General Assembly and represented the 7th congressional district in the US House of Representatives before his election as President. Ulysses S. Grant was born in Ohio and had a military career that precluded settling down, but on the eve of the Civil War, and approaching middle age, Grant moved to Illinois and thus claimed it as his home when running for President. Barack Obama was born and raised in Hawaii (other than a four-year period of his childhood spent in Indonesia) and made Illinois his home and base after completing law school.\n\nOnly one person elected President of the United States was actually born in Illinois. Ronald Reagan was born in Tampico, raised in Dixon and educated at Eureka College. Reagan moved to Los Angeles as a young adult and later became Governor of California before being elected President.\n\nAfrican-American U.S. senators\n\nNine African-Americans have served as members of the United States Senate. Three of them have represented Illinois, the most of any single state: Carol Moseley-Braun, Barack Obama, and Roland Burris, who was appointed to replace Obama after his election to the presidency. Moseley-Braun was the first and, to date, only African-American woman to become a U.S. Senator.\n\nPolitical families\n\nTwo families from Illinois have played particularly prominent roles in the Democratic Party, gaining both statewide and national fame.\n\nStevensons\n\nThe Stevenson family, rooted in central Illinois, has provided four generations of Illinois elected leadership.\n*Adlai Stevenson I (1835–1914) was a Vice President of the United States, as well as a Congressman\n*Lewis Stevenson (1868–1932), son of Adlai, served as Illinois Secretary of State.\n*Adlai Stevenson II (1900–1965), son of Lewis, served as Governor of Illinois and as the US Ambassador to the United Nations; he was also the Democratic party's presidential nominee in 1952 and 1956, losing both elections to Dwight Eisenhower.\n*Adlai Stevenson III (1930– ), son of Adlai II, served ten years as a United States Senator.\n\nDaleys\n\nThe Daley family's powerbase was in Chicago.\n*Richard J. Daley (1902–1976) served as Mayor of Chicago from 1955 to his death.\n*Richard M. Daley (1942– ), son of Richard J, was Chicago's longest serving mayor, in office from 1989–2011.\n*William M. Daley (1948– ), another son of Richard J, is a former White House Chief of Staff and has served in a variety of appointed positions.\n\nEducation\n\nIllinois State Board of education\n\nThe Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) is autonomous of the governor and the state legislature, and administers public education in the state. Local municipalities and their respective school districts operate individual public schools but the ISBE audits performance of public schools with the Illinois School Report Card. The ISBE also makes recommendations to state leaders concerning education spending and policies.\n\nPrimary and secondary schools\n\nEducation is compulsory from ages 7 to 17 in Illinois. Schools are commonly but not exclusively divided into three tiers of primary and secondary education: elementary school, middle school or junior high school, and high school. District territories are often complex in structure. Many areas in the state are actually located in two school districts—one for high school, the other for elementary and middle schools. And such districts do not necessarily share boundaries. A given high school may have several elementary districts that feed into it, yet some of those feeder districts may themselves feed into multiple high school districts.\n\nColleges and universities\n\nUsing the criterion established by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, there are eleven \"National Universities\" in the state. , six of these rank in the \"first tier\" (that is, the top quartile) among the top 500 National Universities in the United States, as determined by the U.S. News & World Report rankings: the University of Chicago (4), Northwestern University (12), the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (41), Loyola University Chicago (99), the Illinois Institute of Technology (108), DePaul University (123), University of Illinois at Chicago (129), Illinois State University (149), Southern Illinois University Carbondale (153), and Northern Illinois University (194). \n\nThe University of Chicago is continuously ranked as one of the world's top ten universities on various independent university rankings, and its Booth School of Business, along with Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management consistently rank within the top 5 graduate business schools in the country and top 10 in the world. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is often ranked among the best engineering schools in the world and in United States.\n\nIllinois also has more than 20 additional accredited four-year universities, both public and private, and dozens of small liberal arts colleges across the state. Additionally, Illinois supports 49 public community colleges in the Illinois Community College System.\n\nInfrastructure\n\nTransportation\n\nBecause of its central location and its proximity to the Rust Belt and Grain Belt, Illinois is a national crossroads for air, auto, rail, and truck traffic.\n\nAirports\n\nFrom 1962 until 1998, Chicago's O'Hare International Airport (ORD) was the busiest airport in the world, measured both in terms of total flights and passengers. While it was surpassed by Atlanta's Hartsfield in 1998, with 59.3 million domestic passengers annually, along with 11.4 million international passengers in 2008, O'Hare remains one of the two or three busiest airports in the world, and some years still ranks number one in total flights. It is a major hub for United Airlines and American Airlines, and a major airport expansion project is currently underway. Chicago Midway International Airport (MDW), which had been the busiest airport in the world until supplanted by O'Hare in 1962, is now the secondary airport in the Chicago metropolitan area. For a time in the late 1960s and 1970s, Midway was nearly vacant except for general aviation, but growth in the area, combined with political deadlock over the building of a new major airport in the region, has caused a resurgence for Midway. It is now a major hub for Southwest Airlines, and services many other airlines as well. Midway served 17.3 million domestic and international passengers in 2008. \n\nRail\n\nIllinois has an extensive passenger and freight rail transportation network. Chicago is a national Amtrak hub and in-state passengers are served by Amtrak's Illinois Service, featuring the Chicago to Carbondale Illini and Saluki, the Chicago to Quincy Carl Sandburg and Illinois Zephyr, and the Chicago to St. Louis Lincoln Service. Currently there is trackwork on the Chicago–St. Louis line to bring the maximum speed up to 110 mi/h, which would reduce the trip time by an hour and a half. Nearly every North American railway meets at Chicago, making it the largest and most active rail hub in the country. Extensive commuter rail is provided in the city proper and some immediate suburbs by the Chicago Transit Authority's 'L' system. The largest suburban commuter rail system in the United States, operated by Metra, uses existing rail lines to provide direct commuter rail access for hundreds of suburbs to the city and beyond.\n\nIn addition to the state's rail lines, the Mississippi River and Illinois River provide major transportation routes for the state's agricultural interests. Lake Michigan gives Illinois access to the Atlantic Ocean by way of the Saint Lawrence Seaway.\n\nInterstate highway system\n\nIllinois is among many US states with a well developed interstate highway system. Illinois has the distinction of having the most primary (two-digit) interstates pass through it among all the 50 states with 13 (with the new addition of Interstate 41 near Wisconsin), as well as the 3rd most interstate mileage behind California and Texas. \n\nMajor U.S. Interstate highways crossing the state include: Interstate 24 (I-24), I-39, I-41, I-55, I-57, I-64, I-70, I-72, I-74, I-80, I-88, I-90, and I-94.\n\nU.S. highway system\n\nAmong the U.S. highways that pass through the state, the primary ones are: US 6, US 12, US 14, US 20, US 24, US 30, US 34, US 36, US 40, US 41, US 45, US 50, US 51, US 52, US 54, US 60, US 62, and US 67.\n\nGallery\n\nFile:Illinois 2002 series passenger plate sample 000 0000.gif|Current standard license plate introduced in 2001.\nFile:1987-Illinois-license-plate.png|Illinois license plate design used throughout the 1980s and 1990s, displaying the Land of Lincoln slogan that has been featured on the state's plates since 1954." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Web_search_engine.txt", "Microsoft.txt", "Google.txt", "Google_Search.txt" ], "title": [ "Web search engine", "Microsoft", "Google", "Google Search" ], "wiki_context": [ "A web search engine is a software system that is designed to search for information on the World Wide Web. The search results are generally presented in a line of results often referred to as search engine results pages (SERPs). The information may be a mix of web pages, images, and other types of files. Some search engines also mine data available in databases or open directories. Unlike web directories, which are maintained only by human editors, search engines also maintain real-time information by running an algorithm on a web crawler.\n\nHistory \n\nInternet search engines themselves predate the debut of the Web in December 1990. The Whois user search dates back to 1982 and the Knowbot Information Service multi-network user search was first implemented in 1989. The first well documented search engine that searched content files, namely FTP files was Archie, which debuted on 10 September 1990.\n\nPrior to September 1993 the World Wide Web was entirely indexed by hand. There was a list of webservers edited by Tim Berners-Lee and hosted on the CERN webserver. One historical snapshot of the list in 1992 remains, but as more and more web servers went online the central list could no longer keep up. On the NCSA site, new servers were announced under the title \"What's New!\" \n\nThe first tool used for searching content (as opposed to users) on the Internet was Archie.\n \"Internet History - Search Engines\" (from Search Engine Watch),\n Universiteit Leiden, Netherlands, September 2001, web:\n [http://www.internethistory.leidenuniv.nl/index.php3?c=7 LeidenU-Archie].\n\nThe name stands for \"archive\" without the \"v\". It was created by Alan Emtage, Bill Heelan and J. Peter Deutsch, computer science students at McGill University in Montreal. The program downloaded the directory listings of all the files located on public anonymous FTP (File Transfer Protocol) sites, creating a searchable database of file names; however, Archie Search Engine did not index the contents of these sites since the amount of data was so limited it could be readily searched manually.\n\nThe rise of Gopher (created in 1991 by Mark McCahill at the University of Minnesota) led to two new search programs, Veronica and Jughead. Like Archie, they searched the file names and titles stored in Gopher index systems. Veronica (Very Easy Rodent-Oriented Net-wide Index to Computerized Archives) provided a keyword search of most Gopher menu titles in the entire Gopher listings. Jughead (Jonzy's Universal Gopher Hierarchy Excavation And Display) was a tool for obtaining menu information from specific Gopher servers. While the name of the search engine \"Archie Search Engine\" was not a reference to the Archie comic book series, \"Veronica\" and \"Jughead\" are characters in the series, thus referencing their predecessor.\n\nIn the summer of 1993, no search engine existed for the web, though numerous specialized catalogues were maintained by hand. Oscar Nierstrasz at the University of Geneva wrote a series of Perl scripts that periodically mirrored these pages and rewrote them into a standard format. This formed the basis for W3Catalog, the web's first primitive search engine, released on September 2, 1993. \n\nIn June 1993, Matthew Gray, then at MIT, produced what was probably the first web robot, the Perl-based World Wide Web Wanderer, and used it to generate an index called 'Wandex'. The purpose of the Wanderer was to measure the size of the World Wide Web, which it did until late 1995. The web's second search engine Aliweb appeared in November 1993. Aliweb did not use a web robot, but instead depended on being notified by website administrators of the existence at each site of an index file in a particular format.\n\nJumpStation (created in December 1993 by Jonathon Fletcher) used a web robot to find web pages and to build its index, and used a web form as the interface to its query program. It was thus the first WWW resource-discovery tool to combine the three essential features of a web search engine (crawling, indexing, and searching) as described below. Because of the limited resources available on the platform it ran on, its indexing and hence searching were limited to the titles and headings found in the web pages the crawler encountered.\n\nOne of the first \"all text\" crawler-based search engines was WebCrawler, which came out in 1994. Unlike its predecessors, it allowed users to search for any word in any webpage, which has become the standard for all major search engines since. It was also the first one widely known by the public. Also in 1994, Lycos (which started at Carnegie Mellon University) was launched and became a major commercial endeavor.\n\nSoon after, many search engines appeared and vied for popularity. These included Magellan, Excite, Infoseek, Inktomi, Northern Light, and AltaVista. Yahoo! was among the most popular ways for people to find web pages of interest, but its search function operated on its web directory, rather than its full-text copies of web pages. Information seekers could also browse the directory instead of doing a keyword-based search.\n\nIn 1996, Netscape was looking to give a single search engine an exclusive deal as the featured search engine on Netscape's web browser. There was so much interest that instead Netscape struck deals with five of the major search engines: for $5 million a year, each search engine would be in rotation on the Netscape search engine page. The five engines were Yahoo!, Magellan, Lycos, Infoseek, and Excite.\n\nGoogle adopted the idea of selling search terms in 1998, from a small search engine company named goto.com. This move had a significant effect on the SE business, which went from struggling to one of the most profitable businesses in the internet. \n\nSearch engines were also known as some of the brightest stars in the Internet investing frenzy that occurred in the late 1990s. Several companies entered the market spectacularly, receiving record gains during their initial public offerings. Some have taken down their public search engine, and are marketing enterprise-only editions, such as Northern Light. Many search engine companies were caught up in the dot-com bubble, a speculation-driven market boom that peaked in 1999 and ended in 2001.\n\nAround 2000, Google's search engine rose to prominence. The company achieved better results for many searches with an innovation called PageRank, as was explained in the paper Anatomy of a Search Engine written by Sergey Brin and Larry Page, the later founders of Google. This iterative algorithm ranks web pages based on the number and PageRank of other web sites and pages that link there, on the premise that good or desirable pages are linked to more than others. Google also maintained a minimalist interface to its search engine. In contrast, many of its competitors embedded a search engine in a web portal. In fact, Google search engine became so popular that spoof engines emerged such as Mystery Seeker.\n\nBy 2000, Yahoo! was providing search services based on Inktomi's search engine. Yahoo! acquired Inktomi in 2002, and Overture (which owned AlltheWeb and AltaVista) in 2003. Yahoo! switched to Google's search engine until 2004, when it launched its own search engine based on the combined technologies of its acquisitions.\n\nMicrosoft first launched MSN Search in the fall of 1998 using search results from Inktomi. In early 1999 the site began to display listings from Looksmart, blended with results from Inktomi. For a short time in 1999, MSN Search used results from AltaVista instead. In 2004, Microsoft began a transition to its own search technology, powered by its own web crawler (called msnbot).\n\nMicrosoft's rebranded search engine, Bing, was launched on June 1, 2009. On July 29, 2009, Yahoo! and Microsoft finalized a deal in which Yahoo! Search would be powered by Microsoft Bing technology.\n\nHow web search engines work \n\nA search engine maintains the following processes in near real time:\n# Web crawling\n# Indexing\n# Searching\n\nWeb search engines get their information by web crawling from site to site. The \"spider\" checks for the standard filename robots.txt, addressed to it, before sending certain information back to be indexed depending on many factors, such as the titles, page content, JavaScript, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), headings, as evidenced by the standard HTML markup of the informational content, or its metadata in HTML meta tags.\n\nIndexing means associating words and other definable tokens found on web pages to their domain names and HTML-based fields. The associations are made in a public database, made available for web search queries. A query from a user can be a single word. The index helps find information relating to the query as quickly as possible.\n\nSome of the techniques for indexing, and cacheing are trade secrets, whereas web crawling is a straightforward process of visiting all sites on a systematic basis.\n\nBetween visits by the spider, the cached version of page (some or all the content needed to render it) stored in the search engine working memory is quickly sent to an inquirer. If a visit is overdue, the search engine can just act as a web proxy instead. In this case the page may differ from the search terms indexed. The cached page holds the appearance of the version whose words were indexed, so a cached version of a page can be useful to the web site when the actual page has been lost, but this problem is also considered a mild form of linkrot.\n\nTypically when a user enters a query into a search engine it is a few keywords. The index already has the names of the sites containing the keywords, and these are instantly obtained from the index. The real processing load is in generating the web pages that are the search results list: Every page in the entire list must be weighted according to information in the indexes. Then the top search result item requires the lookup, reconstruction, and markup of the snippets showing the context of the keywords matched. These are only part of the processing each search results web page requires, and further pages (next to the top) require more of this post processing.\n\nBeyond simple keyword lookups, search engines offer their own GUI- or command-driven operators and search parameters to refine the search results. These provide the necessary controls for the user engaged in the feedback loop users create by filtering and weighting while refining the search results, given the initial pages of the first search results.\nFor example, from 2007 the Google.com search engine has allowed one to filter by date by clicking \"Show search tools\" in the leftmost column of the initial search results page, and then selecting the desired date range. It's also possible to weight by date because each page has a modification time. Most search engines support the use of the boolean operators AND, OR and NOT to help end users refine the search query. Boolean operators are for literal searches that allow the user to refine and extend the terms of the search. The engine looks for the words or phrases exactly as entered. Some search engines provide an advanced feature called proximity search, which allows users to define the distance between keywords. There is also concept-based searching where the research involves using statistical analysis on pages containing the words or phrases you search for. As well, natural language queries allow the user to type a question in the same form one would ask it to a human. A site like this would be ask.com. \n\nThe usefulness of a search engine depends on the relevance of the result set it gives back. While there may be millions of web pages that include a particular word or phrase, some pages may be more relevant, popular, or authoritative than others. Most search engines employ methods to rank the results to provide the \"best\" results first. How a search engine decides which pages are the best matches, and what order the results should be shown in, varies widely from one engine to another. The methods also change over time as Internet usage changes and new techniques evolve. There are two main types of search engine that have evolved: one is a system of predefined and hierarchically ordered keywords that humans have programmed extensively. The other is a system that generates an \"inverted index\" by analyzing texts it locates. This first form relies much more heavily on the computer itself to do the bulk of the work.\n\nMost Web search engines are commercial ventures supported by advertising revenue and thus some of them allow advertisers to have their listings ranked higher in search results for a fee. Search engines that do not accept money for their search results make money by running search related ads alongside the regular search engine results. The search engines make money every time someone clicks on one of these ads. \n\nMarket share \n\nGoogle is the world's most popular search engine, with a marketshare of 67.49 percent as of September, 2015. Bing comes in at second place. \n\nThe world's most popular search engines are:\n\nEast Asia and Russia \n\nIn some East Asian countries and Russia, Google is not the most popular search engine since its algorithm searching has regional filtering, and hides most results.\n\nYandex commands a marketshare of 61.9 percent in Russia, compared to Google's 28.3 percent. In China, Baidu is the most popular search engine. South Korea's homegrown search portal, Naver, is used for 70 percent of online searches in the country. Yahoo! Japan and Yahoo! Taiwan are the most popular avenues for internet search in Japan and Taiwan, respectively. \n\nSearch engine bias \n\nAlthough search engines are programmed to rank websites based on some combination of their popularity and relevancy, empirical studies indicate various political, economic, and social biases in the information they provide and the underlying assumptions about the technology. These biases can be a direct result of economic and commercial processes (e.g., companies that advertise with a search engine can become also more popular in its organic search results), and political processes (e.g., the removal of search results to comply with local laws). For example, Google will not surface certain Neo-Nazi websites in France and Germany, where Holocaust denial is illegal.\n\nBiases can also be a result of social processes, as search engine algorithms are frequently designed to exclude non-normative viewpoints in favor of more \"popular\" results. Indexing algorithms of major search engines skew towards coverage of U.S.-based sites, rather than websites from non-U.S. countries.\n\nGoogle Bombing is one example of an attempt to manipulate search results for political, social or commercial reasons.\n\nSeveral scholars have studied the cultural changes triggered by search engines, and the representation of certain controversial topics in their results, such as terrorism in Ireland and conspiracy theories. \n\nCustomized results and filter bubbles \n\nMany search engines such as Google and Bing provide customized results based on the user's activity history. This leads to an effect that has been called a filter bubble. The term describes a phenomenon in which websites use algorithms to selectively guess what information a user would like to see, based on information about the user (such as location, past click behaviour and search history). As a result, websites tend to show only information that agrees with the user's past viewpoint, effectively isolating the user in a bubble that tends to exclude contrary information. Prime examples are Google's personalized search results and Facebook's personalized news stream. According to Eli Pariser, who coined the term, users get less exposure to conflicting viewpoints and are isolated intellectually in their own informational bubble. Pariser related an example in which one user searched Google for \"BP\" and got investment news about British Petroleum while another searcher got information about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and that the two search results pages were \"strikingly different\". The bubble effect may have negative implications for civic discourse, according to Pariser. Since this problem has been identified, competing search engines have emerged that seek to avoid this problem by not tracking or \"bubbling\" users, such as DuckDuckGo. Other scholars do not share Pariser's view, finding the evidence in support of his thesis unconvincing. \n\nChristian, Islamic and Jewish search engines \n\nThe global growth of the Internet and electronic media in the Arab and Muslim World during the last decade has encouraged Islamic adherents in the Middle East and Asian sub-continent, to attempt their own search engines, their own filtered search portals that would enable users to perform safe searches.\n\nMore than usual safe search filters, these Islamic web portals categorizing websites into being either \"halal\" or \"haram\", based on modern, expert, interpretation of the \"Law of Islam\".\n\nI’mHalal came online in September 2011. Halalgoogling came online in July 2013. These use haram filters on the collections from Google and Bing (and other). \n\nWhile lack of investment and slow pace in technologies in the Muslim World has hindered progress and thwarted success of an Islamic search engine, targeting as the main consumers Islamic adherents, projects like Muxlim, a Muslim lifestyle site, did receive millions of dollars from investors like Rite Internet Ventures, and it also faltered.\n\nOther religion-oriented search engines are Jewgle, the Jewish version of Google, and SeekFind.org, which is Christian. SeekFind filters sites that attack or degrade their faith. \n\nSearch engine submission \n\nSearch engine submission is a process in which a webmaster submits a website directly to a search engine. While search engine submission is sometimes presented as a way to promote a website, it generally is not necessary because the major search engines use web crawlers, that will eventually find most web sites on the Internet without assistance. They can either submit one web page at a time, or they can submit the entire site using a sitemap, but it is normally only necessary to submit the home page of a web site as search engines are able to crawl a well designed website. There are two remaining reasons to submit a web site or web page to a search engine: to add an entirely new web site without waiting for a search engine to discover it, and to have a web site's record updated after a substantial redesign.\n\nSome search engine submission software not only submits websites to multiple search engines, but also add links to websites from their own pages. This could appear helpful in increasing a website's ranking, because external links are one of the most important factors determining a website's ranking. However John Mueller of Google has stated that this \"can lead to a tremendous number of unnatural links for your site\" with a negative impact on site ranking.", "Microsoft Corporation (commonly referred to as Microsoft) is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Redmond, Washington, that develops, manufactures, licenses, supports and sells computer software, consumer electronics and personal computers and services. Its best known software products are the Microsoft Windows line of operating systems, Microsoft Office office suite, and Internet Explorer and Edge web browsers. Its flagship hardware products are the Xbox game consoles and the Microsoft Surface tablet lineup. It is the world's largest software maker by revenue, and one of the world's most valuable companies. \n\nMicrosoft was founded by Paul Allen and Bill Gates on April 4, 1975, to develop and sell BASIC interpreters for Altair 8800. It rose to dominate the personal computer operating system market with MS-DOS in the mid-1980s, followed by Microsoft Windows. The company's 1986 initial public offering, and subsequent rise in its share price, created three billionaires and an estimated 12,000 millionaires among Microsoft employees. Since the 1990s, it has increasingly diversified from the operating system market and has made a number of corporate acquisitions. In May 2011, Microsoft acquired Skype Technologies for $8.5 billion in its largest acquisition to date, and in June 2016 announced plans to acquire LinkedIn for $26.2 billion. \n\n, Microsoft is market dominant in both the IBM PC-compatible operating system (while it lost the majority of the overall operating system market to Android) and office software suite markets (the latter with Microsoft Office). The company also produces a wide range of other software for desktops and servers, and is active in areas including Internet search (with Bing), the video game industry (with the Xbox, Xbox 360 and Xbox One consoles), the digital services market (through MSN), and mobile phones (via the operating systems of Nokia's former phones and Windows Phone OS). In June 2012, Microsoft entered the personal computer production market for the first time, with the launch of the Microsoft Surface, a line of tablet computers.\n\nWith the acquisition of Nokia's devices and services division to form Microsoft Mobile Oy, the company re-entered the smartphone hardware market, after its previous attempt, Microsoft Kin, which resulted from their acquisition of Danger Inc. \n\nThe word \"Microsoft\" is a portmanteau of \"microcomputer\" and \"software\". \n\nHistory\n\n1972–84: Founding and company beginnings\n\nPaul Allen and Bill Gates, childhood friends with a passion for computer programming, sought to make a successful business utilizing their shared skills. In 1972 they founded their first company, named Traf-O-Data, which offered a rudimentary computer that tracked and analyzed automobile traffic data. Allen went on to pursue a degree in computer science at Washington State University, later dropping out of school to work at Honeywell. Gates began studies at Harvard. The January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics, which Allen bought at Out of Town News, featured Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems's (MITS) Altair 8800 microcomputer. Allen suggested that they could program a BASIC interpreter for the device; after a call from Gates claiming to have a working interpreter, MITS requested a demonstration. Since they didn't actually have one, Allen worked on a simulator for the Altair while Gates developed the interpreter. Although they developed the interpreter on a simulator and not the actual device, the interpreter worked flawlessly when they demonstrated the interpreter to MITS in Albuquerque, New Mexico in March 1975; MITS agreed to distribute it, marketing it as Altair BASIC. They officially established Microsoft on April 4, 1975, with Gates as the CEO. Allen came up with the original name of \"Micro-Soft,\" as recounted in a 1995 Fortune magazine article. In August 1977 the company formed an agreement with ASCII Magazine in Japan, resulting in its first international office, \"ASCII Microsoft\". The company moved to a new home in Bellevue, Washington in January 1979.\n\nMicrosoft entered the OS business in 1980 with its own version of Unix, called Xenix. However, it was MS-DOS that solidified the company's dominance. After negotiations with Digital Research failed, IBM awarded a contract to Microsoft in November 1980 to provide a version of the CP/M OS, which was set to be used in the upcoming IBM Personal Computer (IBM PC). For this deal, Microsoft purchased a CP/M clone called 86-DOS from Seattle Computer Products, branding it as MS-DOS, which IBM rebranded to PC DOS. Following the release of the IBM PC in August 1981, Microsoft retained ownership of MS-DOS. Since IBM copyrighted the IBM PC BIOS, other companies had to reverse engineer it in order for non-IBM hardware to run as IBM PC compatibles, but no such restriction applied to the operating systems. Due to various factors, such as MS-DOS's available software selection, Microsoft eventually became the leading PC operating systems vendor. The company expanded into new markets with the release of the Microsoft Mouse in 1983, as well as with a publishing division named Microsoft Press.\nPaul Allen resigned from Microsoft in 1983 after developing Hodgkin's disease.\n\n1984–94: Windows and Office\n\nWhile jointly developing a new OS with IBM in 1984, OS/2, Microsoft released Microsoft Windows, a graphical extension for MS-DOS, on November 20, 1985. Microsoft moved its headquarters to Redmond on February 26, 1986, and on March 13 the company went public; the ensuing rise in the stock would make an estimated four billionaires and 12,000 millionaires from Microsoft employees. Due to the partnership with IBM, in 1990 the Federal Trade Commission set its eye on Microsoft for possible collusion; it marked the beginning of over a decade of legal clashes with the U.S. Government. Microsoft released its version of OS/2 to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) on April 2, 1987; meanwhile, the company was at work on a 32-bit OS, Microsoft Windows NT, using ideas from OS/2; it shipped on July 21, 1993, with a new modular kernel and the Win32 application programming interface (API), making porting from 16-bit (MS-DOS-based) Windows easier. Once Microsoft informed IBM of NT, the OS/2 partnership deteriorated.\n\nIn 1990, Microsoft introduced its office suite, Microsoft Office. The software bundled separate office productivity applications, such as Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel. On May 22 Microsoft launched Windows 3.0 with a streamlined user interface graphics and improved protected mode capability for the Intel 386 processor. Both Office and Windows became dominant in their respective areas. Novell, a Word competitor from 1984–1986, filed a lawsuit years later claiming that Microsoft left part of its APIs undocumented in order to gain a competitive advantage. \n\nOn July 27, 1994, the U.S. Department of Justice, Antitrust Division filed a Competitive Impact Statement that said, in part:\n\"Beginning in 1988, and continuing until July 15, 1994, Microsoft induced many OEMs to execute anti-competitive \"per processor\" licenses. Under a per processor license, an OEM pays Microsoft a royalty for each computer it sells containing a particular microprocessor, whether the OEM sells the computer with a Microsoft operating system or a non-Microsoft operating system. In effect, the royalty payment to Microsoft when no Microsoft product is being used acts as a penalty, or tax, on the OEM's use of a competing PC operating system. Since 1988, Microsoft's use of per processor licenses has increased.\" \n\n1995–2007: Internet and the 32-bit era\n\nFollowing Bill Gates's internal \"Internet Tidal Wave memo\" on May 26, 1995, Microsoft began to redefine its offerings and expand its product line into computer networking and the World Wide Web. The company released Windows 95 on August 24, 1995, featuring pre-emptive multitasking, a completely new user interface with a novel start button, and 32-bit compatibility; similar to NT, it provided the Win32 API. Windows 95 came bundled with the online service MSN (which was at first intended to be a competitor to the Internet), and for OEMs Internet Explorer, a web browser. Internet Explorer was not bundled with the retail Windows 95 boxes because the boxes were printed before the team finished the web browser, and instead was included in the Windows 95 Plus! pack. Branching out into new markets in 1996, Microsoft and NBC Universal created a new 24/7 cable news station, MSNBC. Microsoft created Windows CE 1.0, a new OS designed for devices with low memory and other constraints, such as personal digital assistants. In October 1997, the Justice Department filed a motion in the Federal District Court, stating that Microsoft violated an agreement signed in 1994 and asked the court to stop the bundling of Internet Explorer with Windows.\n\nBill Gates handed over the CEO position on January 13, 2000, to Steve Ballmer, an old college friend of Gates and employee of the company since 1980, creating a new position for himself as Chief Software Architect. Various companies including Microsoft formed the Trusted Computing Platform Alliance in October 1999 to, among other things, increase security and protect intellectual property through identifying changes in hardware and software. Critics decry the alliance as a way to enforce indiscriminate restrictions over how consumers use software, and over how computers behave, a form of digital rights management; for example the scenario where a computer is not only secured for its owner, but also secured against its owner as well. On April 3, 2000, a judgment was handed down in the case of United States v. Microsoft, calling the company an \"abusive monopoly\"; it settled with the U.S. Department of Justice in 2004. On October 25, 2001, Microsoft released Windows XP, unifying the mainstream and NT lines under the NT codebase. The company released the Xbox later that year, entering the game console market dominated by Sony and Nintendo. In March 2004 the European Union brought antitrust legal action against the company, citing it abused its dominance with the Windows OS, resulting in a judgment of €497million ($613million) and to produce new versions of Windows XP without Windows Media Player, Windows XP Home Edition N and Windows XP Professional N. \n\n2007–11: Windows Vista, mobile, and Windows 7\n\nReleased in January 2007, the next version of Windows, Windows Vista, focused on features, security and a redesigned user interface dubbed Aero. Microsoft Office 2007, released at the same time, featured a \"Ribbon\" user interface which was a significant departure from its predecessors. Relatively strong sales of both titles helped to produce a record profit in 2007. The European Union imposed another fine of €899million ($1.4billion) for Microsoft's lack of compliance with the March 2004 judgment on February 27, 2008, saying that the company charged rivals unreasonable prices for key information about its workgroup and backoffice servers. Microsoft stated that it was in compliance and that \"these fines are about the past issues that have been resolved\". \n\n2007 also saw the creation of a multi-core unit at Microsoft, as they followed in the steps of server companies such as Sun and IBM. \n\nBill Gates retired from his role as Chief Software Architect on June 27, 2008, a decision announced in June 2006, while retaining other positions related to the company in addition to being an advisor for the company on key projects. Azure Services Platform, the company's entry into the cloud computing market for Windows, launched on October 27, 2008. On February 12, 2009, Microsoft announced its intent to open a chain of Microsoft-branded retail stores, and on October 22, 2009, the first retail Microsoft Store opened in Scottsdale, Arizona; the same day the first store opened, Windows 7 was officially released to the public. Windows 7's focus was on refining Vista with ease of use features and performance enhancements, rather than a large reworking of Windows. \n\nAs the smartphone industry boomed beginning in 2007, Microsoft struggled to keep up with its rivals Apple and Google in providing a modern smartphone operating system. As a result, in 2010, Microsoft revamped their aging flagship mobile operating system, Windows Mobile, replacing it with the new Windows Phone OS; along with a new strategy in the smartphone industry that has Microsoft working more closely with smartphone manufacturers, such as Nokia, and to provide a consistent user experience across all smartphones using Microsoft's Windows Phone OS. It used a new user interface design language, codenamed \"Metro\", which prominently used simple shapes, typography and iconography, and the concept of minimalism.\n\nMicrosoft is a founding member of the Open Networking Foundation started on March 23, 2011. Other founding companies include Google, HP Networking, Yahoo, Verizon, Deutsche Telekom and 17 other companies. The nonprofit organization is focused on providing support for a new cloud computing initiative called Software-Defined Networking. The initiative is meant to speed innovation through simple software changes in telecommunications networks, wireless networks, data centers and other networking areas. \n\n2011–2014: Rebranding, Windows 8, Surface and Nokia devices\n\nFollowing the release of Windows Phone, Microsoft underwent a gradual rebranding of its product range throughout 2011 and 2012—the corporation's logos, products, services and websites adopted the principles and concepts of the Metro design language. Microsoft previewed Windows 8, an operating system designed to power both personal computers and tablet computers, in Taipei in June 2011. A developer preview was released on September 13, and was replaced by a consumer preview on February 29, 2012. On May 31, 2012, the preview version was released.\n\nOn June 18, 2012, Microsoft unveiled the Surface, the first computer in the company's history to have its hardware made by Microsoft. On June 25, Microsoft paid US $1.2 billion to buy the social network Yammer. On July 31, 2012, Microsoft launched the Outlook.com webmail service to compete with Gmail. On September 4, 2012, Microsoft released Windows Server 2012. \n\nIn July 2012, Microsoft sold its 50% stake in MSNBC.com, which it had run as a joint venture with NBC since 1996. On October 1, Microsoft announced its intention to launch a news operation, part of a new-look MSN, at the time of the Windows 8 launch that was later in the month. On October 26, 2012, Microsoft launched Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface. Three days later, Windows Phone 8 was launched. To cope with the potential for an increase in demand for products and services, Microsoft opened a number of \"holiday stores\" across the U.S. to complement the increasing number of \"bricks-and-mortar\" Microsoft Stores that opened in 2012. \n\nOn March 29, 2013, Microsoft launched a Patent Tracker. The Kinect, the motion sensing input devices by Microsoft, which was first introduced in November 2010 was upgraded for the 2013 release of the eighth-generation Xbox One. Its capabilities were revealed in May 2013. The new Kinect uses an ultra-wide 1080p camera, it can function in the dark due to an infrared sensor, it employs higher-end processing power and new software, it can distinguish between fine movements (such as a thumb movements), and the device can determine a user's heart rate by looking at his/her face. Microsoft filed a patent application in 2011 that suggests that the corporation may use the Kinect camera system to monitor the behavior of television viewers as part of a plan to make the viewing experience more active. On July 19, 2013, Microsoft stocks suffered its biggest one-day percentage sell-off since the year 2000 after its fourth-quarter report raised concerns among the investors on the poor showings of both Windows 8 and the Surface tablet; with more than 11 percentage points declining Microsoft suffered a loss of more than US$32 billion. For the 2010 fiscal year, Microsoft had five product divisions: Windows Division, Server and Tools, Online Services Division, Microsoft Business Division and Entertainment and Devices Division.\n\nFile:Xbox One Console Set.jpg|Xbox One console\nFile:Xbox-360-Kinect-Standalone.png|Xbox 360 Kinect sensor\n\nOn September 3, 2013, Microsoft agreed to buy Nokia's mobile unit for $7 billion. Also in 2013, Amy Hood became the CFO of Microsoft. \n\nThe Alliance for Affordable Internet (A4AI) was launched in October 2013 and Microsoft is part of the coalition of public and private organizations that also includes Facebook, Intel and Google. Led by Tim Berners-Lee, the A4AI seeks to make Internet access more affordable so that access is broadened in the developing world, where only 31% of people are online. Google will help to decrease internet access prices so that they fall below the UN Broadband Commission's worldwide target of 5% of monthly income. \n\nIn line with the maturing PC business, in July 2013, Microsoft announced that it would reorganize the business into four new business divisions by function: Operating System, Apps, Cloud and Devices. All previous divisions will be diluted into new divisions without any workforce cut. \n\n2014–2016: Windows 10, Minecraft, HoloLens \n\nCEO succession\n\nOn February 4, 2014, Steve Ballmer stepped down as CEO of Microsoft and was succeeded by Satya Nadella, who previously led Microsoft's Cloud and Enterprise division. On the same day, John W. Thompson took on the role of chairman, with Bill Gates stepping down from the position to become more active within the company as Technology Advisor. \n\nNokia\n\nOn April 25, 2014, Microsoft acquired Nokia Devices and Services for $7.2 billion. The new subsidiary was renamed Microsoft Mobile Oy. \nIn May 2016 the company announced it will lay off 1,850 workers, taking an impairment and restructuring charge of $950 million. During the previous summer of 2015 the company wrote down $7.6 billion related to its mobile-phone business and fired 7,800 employees from those operations. \n\nMojang/Minecraft\n\nOn September 15, 2014, Microsoft acquired the video game development company Mojang, best known for its wildly popular flagship game Minecraft, for $2.5 billion. \n\nSurface Hub\n\nOn January 21, 2015, Microsoft announced the release of their first Interactive whiteboard, Microsoft Surface Hub (part of the Surface family.) \n\nWindows 10\n\nOn July 29, 2015, Microsoft released the next version of the Windows operating system, Windows 10. \n\nMobile phone sales\n\nIn Q1 2015, Microsoft was the third largest maker of mobile phones selling 33 million units (7.2% of all), while a large majority (at least 75%) of them do not run any version of Windows Phone – those other phones are not categorized as smartphones by Gartner – in the same time frame 8 million Windows smartphones (2.5% of all smartphones) were made by all manufacturers (but mostly by Microsoft). \n\nMicrosoft's share of the U.S. smartphone market in January 2016 was 2.7%. \n\nMerger of PC and Xbox divisions\n\nOn March 1, 2016, Microsoft announced the merger of its PC and Xbox divisions, with Phil Spencer announcing that Universal Windows Applications would be the focus for Microsoft's gaming in the future. \n\nAzure Information Protection\n\nIn June 2016, Microsoft announced a project named, Microsoft Azure Information Protection. It aims to help enterprises protect their data as it moves between servers and devices. \n\nOther\n\nIn July 2016, Microsoft launched a series of classes in data science through edX.org, the nonprofit online learning destination founded by Harvard University and MIT. The Data Science Curriculum is the first offering of the Microsoft Professional Degree program, a Microsoft-led initiative to help professionals grow their skills in critical fields. \n\nBusinesses\n\nWindows Division, Server and Tools, Online Services Division\n\nThe company's Client division produces the flagship Windows OS line such as Windows 8; it also produces the Windows Live family of products and services. Server and Tools produces the server versions of Windows, such as Windows Server 2008 R2 as well as a set of development tools called Microsoft Visual Studio, Microsoft Silverlight, a web application framework, and System Center Configuration Manager, a collection of tools providing remote-control abilities, patch management, software distribution and a hardware/software inventory. Other server products include: Microsoft SQL Server, a relational database management system, Microsoft Exchange Server, for certain business-oriented e-mail and scheduling features, Small Business Server, for messaging and other small business-oriented features; and Microsoft BizTalk Server, for business process management.\n\nMicrosoft provides IT consulting (\"Microsoft Consulting Services\") and produces a set of certification programs handled by the Server and Tools division designed to recognize individuals who have a minimal set of proficiencies in a specific role; this includes developers (\"Microsoft Certified Solution Developer\"), system/network analysts (\"Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer\"), trainers (\"Microsoft Certified Trainers\") and administrators (\"Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator\" and \"Microsoft Certified Database Administrator\"). Microsoft Press, which publishes books, is also managed by the division. The Online Services Business division handles the online service MSN and the search engine Bing.\n\nBusiness Division\n\nThe Microsoft Business Division produces Microsoft Office including Microsoft Office 2010, the company's line of office software. The software product includes Word (a word processor), Access (a relational database program), Excel (a spreadsheet program), Outlook (Groupware, frequently used with Exchange Server), PowerPoint (presentation software), Publisher (desktop publishing software) and Sharepoint. A number of other products were added later with the release of Office 2003 including Visio, Project, MapPoint, InfoPath and OneNote. The division also develops enterprise resource planning (ERP) software for companies under the Microsoft Dynamics brand. These include: Microsoft Dynamics AX, Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft Dynamics GP, and Microsoft Dynamics SL. They are targeted at varying company types and countries, and limited to organizations with under 7,500 employees. Also included under the Dynamics brand is the customer relationship management software Microsoft Dynamics CRM, part of the Azure Services Platform.\n\nEntertainment and Devices Division\n\nThe Entertainment and Devices Division produces the Windows CE OS for embedded systems and Windows Phone for smartphones. Microsoft initially entered the mobile market through Windows CE for handheld devices, eventually developing into the Windows Mobile OS and now, Windows Phone. Windows CE is designed for devices where the OS may not directly be visible to the end user, in particular, appliances and cars. The division also produces computer games, via its in-house game publisher Microsoft Studios, that run on Windows PCs and other systems including titles such as Age of Empires, Halo and the Microsoft Flight Simulator series, and houses the Macintosh Business Unit which produces Mac OS software including Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac. Microsoft's Entertainment and Devices Division designs, markets, and manufactures consumer electronics including the Xbox 360 game console, the handheld Zune media player, and the television-based Internet appliance MSN TV. Microsoft also markets personal computer hardware including mice, keyboards, and various game controllers such as joysticks and gamepads.\n\nFuture Decoded \n\nFuture Decoded is an event held every year by Microsoft that allows business partners of the company sharing their views on what the future holds for business, society, leadership, technology and more. \n\nCorporate affairs\n\nBoard of Directors\n\nThe company is run by a board of directors made up of mostly company outsiders, as is customary for publicly traded companies. Members of the board of directors as of January 2016 are John W. Thompson, Bill Gates, Teri L. List-Stoll, Mason Morfit, Satya Nadella, Charles Noski, Helmut Panke, Sandi Peterson, Charles W. Scharf, John W. Stanton, and Padmasree Warrior. Board members are elected every year at the annual shareholders' meeting using a majority vote system. There are five committees within the board which oversee more specific matters. These committees include the Audit Committee, which handles accounting issues with the company including auditing and reporting; the Compensation Committee, which approves compensation for the CEO and other employees of the company; the Finance Committee, which handles financial matters such as proposing mergers and acquisitions; the Governance and Nominating Committee, which handles various corporate matters including nomination of the board; and the Antitrust Compliance Committee, which attempts to prevent company practices from violating antitrust laws. \n\nFinancial\n\nWhen Microsoft went public and launched its initial public offering (IPO) in 1986, the opening stock price was $21; after the trading day, the price closed at $27.75. As of July 2010, with the company's nine stock splits, any IPO shares would be multiplied by 288; if one was to buy the IPO today given the splits and other factors, it would cost about 9cents. The stock price peaked in 1999 at around $119 ($60.928 adjusting for splits). The company began to offer a dividend on January 16, 2003, starting at eight cents per share for the fiscal year followed by a dividend of sixteen cents per share the subsequent year, switching from yearly to quarterly dividends in 2005 with eight cents a share per quarter and a special one-time payout of three dollars per share for the second quarter of the fiscal year. Though the company had subsequent increases in dividend payouts, the price of Microsoft's stock remained steady for years. \n\nStandard and Poor's and Moody's have both given a AAA rating to Microsoft, whose assets were valued at $41 billion as compared to only $8.5 billion in unsecured debt. Consequently, in February 2011 Microsoft released a corporate bond amounting to $2.25 billion with relatively low borrowing rates compared to government bonds. \n\nFor the first time in 20 years Apple Inc. surpassed Microsoft in Q1 2011 quarterly profits and revenues due to a slowdown in PC sales and continuing huge losses in Microsoft's Online Services Division (which contains its search engine Bing). Microsoft profits were $5.2 billion, while Apple Inc. profits were $6 billion, on revenues of $14.5 billion and $24.7 billion respectively. \n\nMicrosoft's Online Services Division has been continuously loss-making since 2006 and in Q1 2011 it lost $726 million. This follows a loss of $2.5 billion for the year 2010. \n\nOn July 20, 2012, Microsoft posted its first quarterly loss ever, despite earning record revenues for the quarter and fiscal year, with a net loss of $492 million due to a writedown related to the advertising company aQuantive, which had been acquired for $6.2 billion back in 2007. \n\nAs of January 2014, Microsoft's market capitalization stood at $314B, making it the 8th largest company in the world by market capitalization. \n\nOn November 14, 2014, Microsoft overtook Exxon Mobil to become the 2nd most valuable company by market capitalization, behind only Apple Inc. Its total market value was over $410B — with the stock price hitting $50.04 a share, the highest since early 2000. \n\nIn 2015, Reuters reported that Microsoft Corp had earnings abroad of $76.4 billion which were untaxed by the IRS. Under U.S. law corporations don't pay income tax on overseas profits until the profits are brought into the United States. \n\nMarketing\n\nIn 2004, Microsoft commissioned research firms to do independent studies comparing the total cost of ownership (TCO) of Windows Server 2003 to Linux; the firms concluded that companies found Windows easier to administrate than Linux, thus those using Windows would administrate faster resulting in lower costs for their company (i.e. lower TCO). This spurred a wave of related studies; a study by the Yankee Group concluded that upgrading from one version of Windows Server to another costs a fraction of the switching costs from Windows Server to Linux, although companies surveyed noted the increased security and reliability of Linux servers and concern about being locked into using Microsoft products. Another study, released by the Open Source Development Labs, claimed that the Microsoft studies were \"simply outdated and one-sided\" and their survey concluded that the TCO of Linux was lower due to Linux administrators managing more servers on average and other reasons. \n\nAs part of the \"Get the Facts\" campaign, Microsoft highlighted the .NET trading platform that it had developed in partnership with Accenture for the London Stock Exchange, claiming that it provided \"five nines\" reliability. After suffering extended downtime and unreliability the LSE announced in 2009 that it was planning to drop its Microsoft solution and switch to a Linux-based one in 2010. \n\nIn 2012, Microsoft hired a political pollster named Mark Penn, whom the New York Times called \"famous for bulldozing\" his political opponents as Executive Vice-President, Advertising and Strategy. Penn created a series of negative ads targeting one of Microsoft's chief competitors, Google. The ads, called \"Scroogled\", attempt to make the case that Google is \"screwing\" consumers with search results rigged to favor Google's paid advertisers, that Gmail violates the privacy of its users to place ad results related to the content of their emails and shopping results which favor Google products. Tech publications like Tech Crunch have been highly critical of the ad campaign, while Google employees have embraced it. \n\nLayoffs\n\nIn July 2014, Microsoft announced plans to lay off 18,000 employees. Microsoft employed 127,104 people as of June 5, 2014, making this about a 14 percent reduction of its workforce as the biggest Microsoft lay off ever. This included 12,500 professional and factory personnel. Previously, Microsoft has laid off 5,800 jobs in 2009 in line with US financial crisis. \n\nIn September 2014, Microsoft laid off 2,100 people, including 747 people in the Seattle-Redmond area, where the company is headquartered. The firings came as a second wave of the layoffs that were previously announced. This brings the total number to over 15,000 out of the 18,000 expected cuts. \n\nIn October 2014, Microsoft revealed that it was almost done with the elimination of 18,000 employees which was its largest ever layoff sweep. \n\nIn July 2015, Microsoft announced another 7,800 job cuts in the next several months. \n\nIn May 2016, Microsoft announced another 1,850 job cuts mostly in (Nokia) mobile phone division. As a result, the company will record an impairment and restructuring charge of approximately $950 million, of which approximately $200 million will relate to severance payments. \n\nUnited States government\n\nMicrosoft provides information about reported bugs in their software to intelligence agencies of the United States government, prior to the public release of the fix. A Microsoft spokesperson has stated that the corporation runs several programs that facilitate the sharing of such information with the U.S. government. \n\nFollowing media reports about PRISM, NSA's massive electronic surveillance program, in May 2013, several technology companies were identified as participants, including Microsoft. According to leaks of said program, Microsoft joined the PRISM program in 2007. However, in June 2013, an official statement from Microsoft flatly denied their participation in the program:\n\nWe provide customer data only when we receive a legally binding order or subpoena to do so, and never on a voluntary basis. In addition we only ever comply with orders for requests about specific accounts or identifiers. If the government has a broader voluntary national security program to gather customer data, we don't participate in it. \n\nDuring the first six months in 2013, Microsoft had received requests that affected between 15,000 and 15,999 accounts. In December 2013, the company made statement to further emphasis the fact that they take their customers' privacy and data protection very seriously, even saying that \"government snooping potentially now constitutes an \"advanced persistent threat,\" alongside sophisticated malware and cyber attacks\". The statement also marked the beginning of three-part program to enhance Microsoft's encryption and transparency efforts. On July 1, 2014, as part of this program they opened the first (of many) Microsoft Transparency Center, that provides \"participating governments with the ability to review source code for our key products, assure themselves of their software integrity, and confirm there are no \"back doors.\" \n\nMicrosoft has also argued that the United States Congress should enact strong privacy regulations to protect consumer data. In 2016, the company sued the U.S., arguing that secrecy orders were preventing the company from disclosing warrants to customers in violation of the company’s and customers’ rights.\n\nCorporate identity\n\nCorporate culture\n\nTechnical reference for developers and articles for various Microsoft magazines such as Microsoft Systems Journal (MSJ) are available through the Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN). MSDN also offers subscriptions for companies and individuals, and the more expensive subscriptions usually offer access to pre-release beta versions of Microsoft software. In April 2004 Microsoft launched a community site for developers and users, titled Channel 9, that provides a wiki and an Internet forum. Another community site that provides daily videocasts and other services, On10.net, launched on March 3, 2006. Free technical support is traditionally provided through online Usenet newsgroups, and CompuServe in the past, monitored by Microsoft employees; there can be several newsgroups for a single product. Helpful people can be elected by peers or Microsoft employees for Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) status, which entitles them to a sort of special social status and possibilities for awards and other benefits. \n\nNoted for its internal lexicon, the expression \"eating our own dog food\" is used to describe the policy of using pre-release and beta versions of products inside Microsoft in an effort to test them in \"real-world\" situations. This is usually shortened to just \"dog food\" and is used as noun, verb, and adjective. Another bit of jargon, FYIFV or FYIV (\"Fuck You, I'm [Fully] Vested\"), is used by an employee to indicate they are financially independent and can avoid work anytime they wish. The company is also known for its hiring process, mimicked in other organizations and dubbed the \"Microsoft interview\", which is notorious for off-the-wall questions such as \"Why is a manhole cover round?\". \n\nMicrosoft is an outspoken opponent of the cap on H1B visas, which allow companies in the U.S. to employ certain foreign workers. Bill Gates claims the cap on H1B visas makes it difficult to hire employees for the company, stating \"I'd certainly get rid of the H1B cap\" in 2005. Critics of H1B visas argue that relaxing the limits would result in increased unemployment for U.S. citizens due to H1B workers working for lower salaries. The Human Rights Campaign Corporate Equality Index, a report of how progressive the organization deems company policies towards LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual) employees, rated Microsoft as 87% from 2002 to 2004 and as 100% from 2005 to 2010 after they allowed gender expression. \n\nEnvironment\n\nIn 2011, Greenpeace released a report rating the top ten big brands in cloud computing on their sources of electricity for their data centers. At the time, data centers consumed up to 2% of all global electricity and this amount was projected to increase. Phil Radford of Greenpeace said \"we are concerned that this new explosion in electricity use could lock us into old, polluting energy sources instead of the clean energy available today,\" and called on \"Amazon, Microsoft and other leaders of the information-technology industry must embrace clean energy to power their cloud-based data centers.\" In 2013, Microsoft agreed to buy power generated by a Texas wind project to power one of its data centers. \n\nMicrosoft is ranked on the 17th place in Greenpeace's Guide to Greener Electronics (16th Edition) that ranks 18 electronics manufacturers according to their policies on toxic chemicals, recycling and climate change. \nMicrosoft's timeline for phasing out BFRs and phthalates in all products is 2012 but its commitment to phasing out PVC is not clear. As yet (January 2011) it has no products that are completely free from PVC and BFRs. \n\nMicrosoft's main U.S. campus received a silver certification from the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) program in 2008, and it installed over 2,000 solar panels on top of its buildings in its Silicon Valley campus, generating approximately 15 percent of the total energy needed by the facilities in April 2005. \n\nMicrosoft makes use of alternative forms of transit. It created one of the world's largest private bus systems, the \"Connector\", to transport people from outside the company; for on-campus transportation, the \"Shuttle Connect\" uses a large fleet of hybrid cars to save fuel. The company also subsidises regional public transport, provided by Sound Transit and King County Metro, as an incentive. In February 2010 however, Microsoft took a stance against adding additional public transport and high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes to the State Route 520 and its floating bridge connecting Redmond to Seattle; the company did not want to delay the construction any further. \n\nMicrosoft was ranked number 1 in the list of the World's Best Multinational Workplaces by the Great Place to Work Institute in 2011. \n\nHeadquarters\n\nThe corporate headquarters, informally known as the Microsoft Redmond campus, is located at One Microsoft Way in Redmond, Washington. Microsoft initially moved onto the grounds of the campus on February 26, 1986, weeks before the company went public on March 13. The headquarters has since experienced multiple expansions since its establishment.\n\nIt is estimated to encompass over 8 million ft2 (750,000 m2) of office space and 30,000-40,000 employees. Additional offices are located in Bellevue and Issaquah (90,000 employees world-wide).\n\nThe company is planning to upgrade its Mountain View, CA campus on a grand scale. The company has occupied this campus since 1981. The company is planning to buy the 32-acre campus. The plans submitted involve expanding the campus by 25%. It is expected that it will take three years to complete the expansion. If approved, construction will start in early 2017.\n\nFlagship stores \n\nOn October 26, 2015, the company opened its flagship retail location on Fifth Avenue in New York City. The location features a five-story glass storefront and is 22,270 square feet. As\nper company executives, Microsoft had been on the lookout for a flagship\nlocation since 2009. The company’s retail locations are part of a greater\nstrategy to help build a connection with its consumers. The\nopening of the store coincided with the launch of the Surface Book and Surface\nPro 4. Notably, the second floor has a large area designated for\nconsumers to play Xbox games. The third floor has been named the “Dell\nExperience at the Microsoft Store,” which showcases various Dell products. The\nfourth floor is for employees and administrative operations. The fifth floor\nhas been designed as a pseudo-conference center, as it will hold events and\nmeetings.\n\nOn November 12, 2015, Microsoft opened a second flagship store, located in Sydney’s Pitt Street Mall. The two-storey, 6000 sq ft location features Microsoft's flagship products including the Surface line and Xbox One, there is also an Answer Desk on site for customers to get product support. \n\nLogo\n\nMicrosoft adopted the so-called \"Pac-Man Logo\", designed by Scott Baker, in 1987. Baker stated \"The new logo, in Helvetica italic typeface, has a slash between the o and s to emphasize the \"soft\" part of the name and convey motion and speed.\" Dave Norris ran an internal joke campaign to save the old logo, which was green, in all uppercase, and featured a fanciful letter O, nicknamed the blibbet, but it was discarded. Microsoft's logo with the \"Your potential. Our passion.\" tagline below the main corporate name, is based on a slogan Microsoft used in 2008. In 2002, the company started using the logo in the United States and eventually started a TV campaign with the slogan, changed from the previous tagline of \"Where do you want to go today?\". During the private MGX (Microsoft Global Exchange) conference in 2010, Microsoft unveiled the company's next tagline, \"Be What's Next.\". They also had a slogan/tagline \"Making it all make sense.\". \n\nOn August 23, 2012, Microsoft unveiled a new corporate logo at the opening of its 23rd Microsoft store in Boston, indicating the company's shift of focus from the classic style to the tile-centric modern interface, which it uses/will use on the Windows Phone platform, Xbox 360, Windows 8 and the upcoming Office Suites. The new logo also includes four squares with the colors of the then-current Windows logo which have been used to represent Microsoft's four major products: Windows (blue), Office (red), Xbox (green) and Bing (yellow). The logo resembles the opening of one of the commercials for Windows 95. \n\n* 1975–1980: First Microsoft logo, in 1975.\n* 1980–1982: Second Microsoft logo, in 1980.\n* 1982–1987: Third Microsoft logo, in 1982.\n* 1987–2012: Microsoft \"Pac-Man\" logo, designed by Scott Baker and used from 1987 to 2012. \n* 2012–present: Introduced on August 23, 2012. \n\nSponsorship\n\nThe company was the official jersey sponsor of Finland's national basketball team at the 2015 EuroBasket.", "Google is an American multinational technology company specializing in Internet-related services and products that include online advertising technologies, search, cloud computing, and software. Most of its profits are derived from AdWords, an online advertising service that places advertising near the list of search results. \n\nGoogle was founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were Ph.D. students at Stanford University, California. Together, they own about 14 percent of its shares and control 56 percent of the stockholder voting power through supervoting stock. They incorporated Google as a privately held company on September 4, 1998. An initial public offering (IPO) took place on August 19, 2004, and Google moved to its new headquarters in Mountain View, California, nicknamed the Googleplex. \n\nIn August 2015, Google announced plans to reorganize its interests as a holding company called Alphabet Inc. When this restructuring took place on October 2, 2015, Google became Alphabet's leading subsidiary, as well as the parent for Google's Internet interests. \n\nRapid growth since incorporation has triggered a chain of products, acquisitions and partnerships beyond Google's core search engine (Google Search). It offers online productivity software (Google Docs) including email (Gmail), a cloud storage service (Google Drive) and a social networking service (Google+). Desktop products include applications for web browsing (Google Chrome), organizing and editing photos (Google Photos), and instant messaging and video chat (Hangouts). The company leads the development of the Android mobile operating system and the browser-only Chrome OS for a class of netbooks known as Chromebooks and desktop PCs known as Chromeboxes. Google has moved increasingly into communications hardware, partnering with major electronics manufacturers in the production of its \"high-quality low-cost\" Nexus devices. In 2012, a fiber-optic infrastructure was installed in Kansas City to facilitate a Google Fiber broadband service. \n\nGoogle has been estimated to run more than one million servers in data centers around the world (as of 2007). It processes over one billion search requests and about 24 petabytes of user-generated data each day (as of 2009). \nIn December 2013, Alexa listed Google.com as the most visited website in the world. Numerous Google sites in other languages figure in the top one hundred, as do several other Google-owned sites such as YouTube and Blogger. \n\nGoogle's mission statement from the outset was \"to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful,\" and its unofficial slogan was \"Don't be evil\". In October 2015, the motto was replaced in the Alphabet corporate code of conduct by the phrase: \"Do the right thing\". \n\nHistory\n\n Google began in January 1996 as a research project by Larry Page and Sergey Brin when they were both PhD students at Stanford University in Stanford, California. \n\nWhile conventional search engines ranked results by counting how many times the search terms appeared on the page, the two theorized about a better system that analyzed the relationships between websites. They called this new technology PageRank; it determined a website's relevance by the number of pages, and the importance of those pages, that linked back to the original site. \n\nPage and Brin originally nicknamed their new search engine \"BackRub\", because the system checked backlinks to estimate the importance of a site. Eventually, they changed the name to Google, originating from a misspelling of the word \"googol\", the number one followed by one hundred zeros, which was picked to signify that the search engine was intended to provide large quantities of information. Originally, Google ran under Stanford University's website, with the domains google.stanford.edu and z.stanford.edu. \n\nThe domain name for Google was registered on September 15, 1997, and the company was incorporated on September 4, 1998. It was based in the garage of a friend (Susan Wojcicki) in Menlo Park, California. Craig Silverstein, a fellow PhD student at Stanford, was hired as the first employee. \n\nIn May 2011, the number of monthly unique visitors to Google surpassed one billion for the first time, an 8.4 percent increase from May 2010 (931 million). In January 2013, Google announced it had earned in annual revenue for the year of 2012. This marked the first time the company had reached this feat, topping their 2011 total of $38 billion. \n\nThe company has reported fourth quarter (Dec 2014) Earnings Per Share (EPS) of $6.88 – $0.20 under projections. Revenue came in at $14.5 billion (16.9% growth year over year), also under expectations by $110 million. \n\nFinancing, 1998 and initial public offering, 2004\n\nThe first funding for Google was an August 1998 contribution of $100,000 from Andy Bechtolsheim, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, given before Google was incorporated. Early in 1999, while graduate students, Brin and Page decided that the search engine they had developed was taking up too much time and distracting their academic pursuits. They went to Excite CEO George Bell and offered to sell it to him for $1 million. He rejected the offer and later criticized Vinod Khosla, one of Excite's venture capitalists, after he negotiated Brin and Page down to $750,000. On June 7, 1999, a $25 million round of funding was announced, with major investors including the venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sequoia Capital.\n\nGoogle's initial public offering (IPO) took place five years later on August 19, 2004. At that time Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Eric Schmidt agreed to work together at Google for 20 years, until the year 2024. The company offered 19,605,052 shares at a price of $85 per share. Shares were sold in an online auction format using a system built by Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse, underwriters for the deal. The sale of $1.67 bn (billion) gave Google a market capitalization of more than $23bn. By January 2014, its market capitalization had grown to $397bn. The vast majority of the 271 million shares remained under the control of Google, and many Google employees became instant paper millionaires. Yahoo!, a competitor of Google, also benefited because it owned 8.4 million shares of Google before the IPO took place. \n\nThere were concerns that Google's IPO would lead to changes in company culture. Reasons ranged from shareholder pressure for employee benefit reductions to the fact that many company executives would become instant paper millionaires. As a reply to this concern, co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page promised in a report to potential investors that the IPO would not change the company's culture. In 2005, articles in The New York Times and other sources began suggesting that Google had lost its anti-corporate, no evil philosophy. In an effort to maintain the company's unique culture, Google designated a Chief Culture Officer, who also serves as the Director of Human Resources. The purpose of the Chief Culture Officer is to develop and maintain the culture and work on ways to keep true to the core values that the company was founded on: a flat organization with a collaborative environment. Google has also faced allegations of sexism and ageism from former employees. In 2013, a class action against several Silicon Valley companies, including Google, was filed for alleged \"no cold call\" agreements which restrained the recruitment of high-tech employees. \n\nThe stock performed well after the IPO, with shares hitting $350 for the first time on October 31, 2007, primarily because of strong sales and earnings in the online advertising market. The surge in stock price was fueled mainly by individual investors, as opposed to large institutional investors and mutual funds. GOOG shares split into GOOG Class C shares and GOOGL class A shares. The company is listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange under the ticker symbols GOOGL and GOOG, and on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol GGQ1. These ticker symbols now refer to Alphabet Inc., Google's holding company, since the fourth quarter of 2015. \n\nGrowth\n\nIn March 1999, the company moved its offices to Palo Alto, California, which is home to several prominent Silicon Valley technology start-ups. The next year, against Page and Brin's initial opposition toward an advertising-funded search engine, Google began selling advertisements associated with search keywords. In order to maintain an uncluttered page design and increase speed, advertisements were solely text-based. Keywords were sold based on a combination of price bids and click-throughs, with bidding starting at five cents per click.\n\nThis model of selling keyword advertising was first pioneered by Goto.com, an Idealab spin-off created by Bill Gross. When the company changed names to Overture Services, it sued Google over alleged infringements of the company's pay-per-click and bidding patents. Overture Services would later be bought by Yahoo! and renamed Yahoo! Search Marketing. The case was then settled out of court; Google agreed to issue shares of common stock to Yahoo! in exchange for a perpetual license. \n\nIn 2001, Google received a patent for its PageRank mechanism. The patent was officially assigned to Stanford University and lists Lawrence Page as the inventor. In 2003, after outgrowing two other locations, the company leased an office complex from Silicon Graphics at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway in Mountain View, California. The complex became known as the Googleplex, a play on the word googolplex, the number one followed by a googol zeroes. The Googleplex interiors were designed by Clive Wilkinson Architects. Three years later, Google bought the property from SGI for $319 million. By that time, the name \"Google\" had found its way into everyday language, causing the verb \"google\" to be added to the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary, denoted as \"to use the Google search engine to obtain information on the Internet\". \n\nThe immense popularity of the search engine has led its fans calling themselves 'Googlists' as they follow 'Googlism', the new religion. Devotees of Google have found a non-profit online organization The Church of Google, a website where they worship the search engine giant. The New York Times had discussed the topic \"Is Google God?\" under its 'opinion' category. \n\n2013 onward\n\nGoogle announced the launch of a new company called Calico on September 19, 2013, which will be led by Apple chairman Arthur Levinson. In the official public statement, Page explained that the \"health and well-being\" company will focus on \"the challenge of ageing and associated diseases\". \n\nAs of September 2013, Google operates 70 offices in more than 40 countries. Google celebrated its 15-year anniversary on September 27, 2013, although it has used other dates for its official birthday. The reason for the choice of September 27 remains unclear, and a dispute with rival search engine Yahoo! Search in 2005 has been suggested as the cause. \n\nThe Alliance for Affordable Internet (A4AI) was launched in October 2013 and Google is part of the coalition of public and private organisations that also includes Facebook, Intel and Microsoft. Led by Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the A4AI seeks to make Internet access more affordable so that access is broadened in the developing world, where only 31% of people are online. Google will help to decrease Internet access prices so that they fall below the UN Broadband Commission's worldwide target of 5% of monthly income. \n\nThe corporation's consolidated revenue for the third quarter of 2013 is reported in mid-October 2013 as $14.89 billion, a 12 percent increase compared to the previous quarter. Google's Internet business was responsible for $10.8 billion of this total, with an increase in the number of users' clicks on advertisements. \n\nIn November 2013, Google announced plans for a new 1-million-sq-ft (93,000 sq m) office in London, which is due to open in 2016. The new premises will be able to accommodate 4,500 employees and has been identified as one of the biggest ever commercial property acquisitions in Britain. \n\nIn October 2014, according to the Interbrand ranking, Google was the second most valuable brand in the world (behind Apple) with a valuation of $107.4 billion. A Millward Brown report from the same year puts the Google brand ahead of Apple's at #1. \n\nAcquisitions and partnerships\n\nGoogle went through three major periods of acquisitions, spanning 2000–2009, 2010–2012, and 2014–2015.\n\n2000–2009 \n\nSince 2001, Google has acquired many companies, primarily small venture capital-funded firms. In 2004, Google acquired Keyhole, Inc. The start-up company developed a product called Earth Viewer that gave a three-dimensional view of the Earth. Google renamed the service to Google Earth in 2005. Google acquired Urchin Software in April 2005, using their 'Urchin on Demand' product (along with ideas from Adaptive Path's 'Measure Map') to create Google Analytics in 2006.\n\nIn October 2006, Google announced that it had acquired the video-sharing site YouTube for $1.65 billion in Google stock, and the deal was finalized on November 13, 2006. Google does not provide detailed figures for YouTube's running costs, and YouTube's revenues in 2007 were noted as \"not material\" in a regulatory filing. In June 2008, a Forbes magazine article projected the 2008 YouTube revenue at $200 million, noting progress in advertising sales. \n\nOn April 13, 2007, Google reached an agreement to acquire DoubleClick for $3.1 billion, giving Google valuable relationships that DoubleClick had with Web publishers and advertising agencies. Later that same year, Google purchased GrandCentral for $50 million. The site would later be changed over to Google Voice. On August 5, 2009, Google bought out its first public company, purchasing video software maker On2 Technologies for $106.5 million. Google also acquired Aardvark, a social network search engine, for $50 million, and commented on its internal blog, \"we're looking forward to collaborating to see where we can take it\". In April 2010, Google announced it had acquired a hardware startup, Agnilux. \n\nIn addition to the many companies Google has purchased, the company has partnered with other organizations for research, advertising, and other activities. In 2005, Google partnered with NASA Ames Research Center to build 1000000 sqft of offices. The offices would be used for research projects involving large-scale data management, nanotechnology, distributed computing, and the entrepreneurial space industry. Google entered into a partnership with Sun Microsystems in October 2005 to help share and distribute each other's technologies. \n\nThe company also partnered with AOL to enhance each other's video search services. Google's 2005 partnerships also included financing the new .mobi top-level domain for mobile devices, along with other companies including Microsoft, Nokia, and Ericsson. Google would later launch \"AdSense for Mobile\", taking advantage of the emerging mobile advertising market. Increasing its advertising reach even further, Google and Fox Interactive Media of News Corporation entered into a $900 million agreement to provide search and advertising on the then-popular social networking site MySpace. \n\nIn 2007, Google began sponsoring NORAD Tracks Santa, displacing former sponsor AOL. NORAD Tracks Santa purports to follow Santa Claus' progress on Christmas Eve, using Google Earth to \"track Santa\" in 3-D for the first time. Google-owned YouTube gave NORAD Tracks Santa its own channel. \n\nIn 2008, Google developed a partnership with GeoEye to launch a satellite providing Google with high-resolution (0.41 m monochrome, 1.65 m color) imagery for Google Earth. The satellite was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base on September 6, 2008. Google also announced in 2008 that it was hosting an archive of Life Magazine's photographs. Some images in the archive were never published in the magazine. The photos were watermarked and originally had copyright notices posted on all photos, regardless of public domain status. \n\n2010–2012 \n\nIn 2010, Google Energy made its first investment in a renewable energy project, putting $38.8 million into two wind farms in North Dakota. The company announced the two locations will generate 169.5 megawatts of power, enough to supply 55,000 homes. The farms, which were developed by NextEra Energy Resources, will reduce fossil fuel use in the region and return profits. NextEra Energy Resources sold Google a twenty-percent stake in the project to get funding for its development. In February 2010, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission FERC granted Google an authorization to buy and sell energy at market rates. The order specifically states that Google Energy—a subsidiary of Google—holds the rights \"for the sale of energy, capacity, and ancillary services at market-based rates\", but acknowledges that neither Google Energy nor its affiliates \"own or control any generation or transmission\" facilities. The corporation exercised this authorization in September 2013 when it announced that it will purchase all the electricity produced by the not-yet-built 240-megawatt Happy Hereford wind farm. \n\nAlso in 2010, Google purchased Global IP Solutions, a Norway-based company that provides web-based teleconferencing and other related services. This acquisition enabled Google to add telephone-style services to its list of products. On May 27, 2010, Google announced it had also closed the acquisition of the mobile ad network AdMob. This occurred days after the Federal Trade Commission closed its investigation into the purchase. Google acquired the company for an undisclosed amount. In July 2010, Google signed an agreement with an Iowa wind farm to buy 114 megawatts of energy for 20 years. \n\nOn April 4, 2011, The Globe and Mail reported that Google bid $900 million for six thousand Nortel Networks patents. \n\nOn August 15, 2011, Google made its largest-ever acquisition to-date when it announced that it would acquire Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion subject to approval from regulators in the United States and Europe. In a post on Google's blog, Google Chief Executive and co-founder Larry Page revealed that the acquisition was a strategic move to strengthen Google's patent portfolio. The company's Android operating system has come under fire in an industry-wide patent battle, as Apple and Microsoft have sued Android device makers such as HTC, Samsung, and Motorola. The merger was completed on May 22, 2012, after the approval of People's Republic of China. \n\nThis purchase was made in part to help Google gain Motorola's considerable patent portfolio on mobile phones and wireless technologies to help protect it in its ongoing patent disputes with other companies, mainly Apple and Microsoft, and to allow it to continue to freely offer Android. After the acquisition closed, Google began to restructure the Motorola business to fit Google's strategy. On August 13, 2012, Google announced plans to lay off 4000 Motorola Mobility employees. On December 10, 2012, Google sold the manufacturing operations of Motorola Mobility to Flextronics for $75 million. As a part of the agreement, Flextronics will manufacture undisclosed Android and other mobile devices. On December 19, 2012, Google sold the Motorola Home business division of Motorola Mobility to Arris Group for $2.35 billion in a cash-and-stock transaction. As a part of this deal, Google acquired a 15.7% stake in Arris Group valued at $300 million. \n\nOn June 5, 2012, Google announced it acquired Quickoffice, a company widely known for their mobile productivity suite for both iOS and Android. Google plans to integrate Quickoffice's technology into its own product suite. \n\nOn February 6, 2013, Google announced it had acquired Channel Intelligence for $125 million. Channel Intelligence, a technology company that helps customers buy products online, is active globally in 31 different countries and works with over 850 retailers. Google will use this technology to enhance its e-commerce business. \n\nThe official confirmation of Google's acquisition of the Israel-based startup Waze occurred in June 2013. Waze is promoted as a \"community-based traffic and navigation app\". \n\nFollowing the acquisition of Waze, Google submitted a \"10-Q\" filing with the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) that revealed that the corporation spent $1.3 billion on acquisitions during the first half of 2013. The filing also revealed that the Waze acquisition cost Google $966 million, instead of the $1.1 billion figure that was initially presented in media sources. \n\nThe 2012 acquisition of WIMM Labs, a company that previously made an Android-powered smartwatch, was confirmed in August 2013. As of August 31, 2013, Google has not publicly commented on the news concerning WIMM Labs. The acquisition of Flutter, a creator of hand gesture recognition technology, was confirmed by the corporation in early October 2013. The reported price is $40 million and Google spokesperson stated: \"We're really impressed by the Flutter team's ability to design new technology based on cutting-edge research.\" Flutter's technology allows users to enact hand gestures to control navigation for apps such as iTunes, Windows Media Player, and Winamp. \n\n2014–2015 \n\nOn January 26, 2014, Google Inc. announced it had agreed to acquire DeepMind Technologies, a privately held artificial intelligence company from London. DeepMind describes itself as having the ability to combine the best techniques from machine learning and systems neuroscience to build general-purpose learning algorithms. DeepMind's first commercial applications were used in simulations, e-commerce and games. As of December 2013, it was reported that DeepMind had roughly 75 employees. The technology news website Re/code reported that the company was purchased for $400 million though it was not disclosed where the information came from. A Google spokesman would not comment of the price. The purchase of DeepMind aids in Google's recent growth in the artificial intelligence and robotics community. \n\nOn January 29, 2014, Google announced it was selling its Motorola Mobility unit to China-based Lenovo, for $2.91bn. The company kept the extensive patent collection used to develop Android products, considered the most valuable part of the original deal. Nonetheless, the sale price was significantly less than the $12.5 billion Google had bought Motorola Mobility for. The $2.91bn price tag consisted of $660 million in cash, $750 million in Lenovo ordinary shares, and a $1.5 billion 3-year promissory note. \n\nIn March 2014, Google confirmed it had purchased the remnants of gaming startup, Green Throttle Games, which developed a Bluetooth gaming controller for Android. \n\nIn May 2014, Google announced it had purchased Quest Visual, maker of the augmented reality translator app Word Lens. \n\nIn June 2014, Google purchased satellite imaging firm Skybox Imaging for $500 million. \n\nIn July 2014, Google purchased the online music service Songza. \n\nOn September 10, 2015, Google announced to form strategic partnership with Mobvoi to bring Android Wear to mainland China. \n\nIn October 2015, Google invested in a China-based artificial intelligence (AI) company, Mobvoi. The funding will enable the Company to further enhance its core AI technologies, and develop new consumer products empowered by AI. \n\nIn July 2016, Google announced that it had purchased Moodstocks, a startup which specializes in instant image recognition. \n\nGoogle data centers\n\n, Google Inc. owned and operated six Google Data Centers across the U.S., one in Chile, one in Finland, one in Ireland, one in Belgium, one in Singapore and one on Taiwan. In 2011, the company had announced plans to build three data centers at a cost of more than $200 million in Asia (Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan) and said they would be operational within two years. In December 2013, Google announced that it had scrapped the plan to build a data center in Hong Kong. \n\nIn October 2013, The Washington Post reported that the U.S. National Security Agency intercepted communications between Google's data centers, as part of a program named MUSCULAR. This wiretapping was made possible because Google did not encrypt data passed inside its own network. Google began encrypting data sent between data centers in 2013. \n\nGoogle’s most efficient data center runs at 95 F using only fresh air cooling, requiring no electrically powered air conditioning; the servers run so hot that humans cannot go near them for extended periods. \n\nAlphabet\n\nOn August 10, 2015, Google announced plans to reorganize its various interests as a holding company, Alphabet Inc., with Google as its leading subsidiary. Google will continue to be the umbrella company for Alphabet's Internet interests. Upon completion of the restructure, Sundar Pichai became CEO of Google. \n\nProducts and services\n\nAdvertising\n\nFor the 2006 fiscal year, the company reported $10.492 billion in total advertising revenues and only $112 million in licensing and other revenues. In 2011, 96% of Google's revenue was derived from its advertising programs. In addition to its own algorithms for understanding search requests, Google uses technology from the company DoubleClick, to project user interest and target advertising to the search context and the user history. \n\nGoogle Analytics allows website owners to track where and how people use their website, for example by examining click rates for all the links on a page. Google advertisements can be placed on third-party websites in a two-part program. Google's AdWords allows advertisers to display their advertisements in the Google content network, through either a cost-per-click or cost-per-view scheme. The sister service, Google AdSense, allows website owners to display these advertisements on their website and earn money every time ads are clicked. \n\nOne of the criticisms of this program is the possibility of click fraud, which occurs when a person or automated script clicks on advertisements without being interested in the product, causing the advertiser to pay money to Google unduly. Industry reports in 2006 claimed that approximately 14 to 20 percent of clicks were fraudulent or invalid. \n\nIn February 2003, Google stopped showing the advertisements of Oceana, a non-profit organization protesting a major cruise ship's sewage treatment practices. Google cited its editorial policy at the time, stating \"Google does not accept advertising if the ad or site advocates against other individuals, groups, or organizations.\" The policy was later changed. In June 2008, Google reached an advertising agreement with Yahoo!, which would have allowed Yahoo! to feature Google advertisements on its web pages. The alliance between the two companies was never completely realized because of antitrust concerns by the U.S. Department of Justice. As a result, Google pulled out of the deal in November 2008. \n\nIn an attempt to advertise its own products, Google launched a website called Demo Slam, developed to demonstrate technology demos of Google Products. \n\nSearch engine\n\nAccording to market research published by comScore in November 2009, Google Search is the dominant search engine in the United States market, with a market share of 65.6%. Google indexes billions of web pages, so that users can search for the information they desire through the use of keywords and operators.\n\nIn 2003, The New York Times complained about Google's indexing, claiming that Google's caching of content on its site infringed its copyright for the content. In this case, the United States District Court of Nevada ruled in favor of Google in Field v. Google and Parker v. Google. The publication 2600: The Hacker Quarterly has compiled a list of words that the web giant's new instant search feature will not search. \n\nGoogle Watch has criticized Google's PageRank algorithms, saying that they discriminate against new websites and favor established sites. The site has also alleged that there are connections between Google and the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). \n\nGoogle also hosts Google Books. The company began scanning books and uploading limited previews, and full books where allowed, into its new book search engine. The Authors Guild, a group that represents 8,000 U.S. authors, filed a class action suit in a New York City federal court against Google in 2005 over this service. Google replied that it is in compliance with all existing and historical applications of copyright laws regarding books. Google eventually reached a revised settlement in 2009 to limit its scans to books from the U.S., the UK, Australia, and Canada. Furthermore, the Paris Civil Court ruled against Google in late 2009, asking it to remove the works of La Martinière (Éditions du Seuil) from its database. In competition with Amazon.com, Google sells digital versions of new books. \n\nOn July 21, 2010, in response to Bing, Google updated its image search to display a streaming sequence of thumbnails that enlarge when pointed at. Though web searches still appear in a batch per page format, on July 23, 2010, dictionary definitions for certain English words began appearing above the linked results for web searches. \n\nThe \"Hummingbird\" update to the Google search engine was announced in September 2013. The update was introduced over the month prior to the announcement and allows users ask the search engine a question in natural language rather than entering keywords into the search box. \n\nProductivity tools\n\nGmail, a free webmail service provided by Google, was launched as an invitation-only beta program on April 1, 2004, and became available to the public on February 7, 2007. The service was upgraded from beta status on July 7, 2009, at which time it had 146 million users monthly. The service was the first online email service with one gigabyte of storage. It was also the first to keep emails from the same conversation together in one thread, similar to an Internet forum. The service offers over 15 GB of free storage, shared with other Google Apps, with additional storage ranging from 20 GB to 16 TB available for $0.25 per 1 GB per year. \n\nGmail uses AJAX, a programming technique that allows web pages to be interactive without refreshing the browser. Steve Ballmer (Microsoft's former CEO), Liz Figueroa, Mark Rasch, and the editors of Google Watch have criticised the privacy of Gmail, but Google claims that mail sent to or from Gmail is never read by a human being beyond the account holder and is only used to improve relevance of advertisements. \n\nIn 2004, Google started open source software project hosting, called Google Code, which allows developers to download in-development programs at no charge. Google Drive, another part of Google's productivity suite, allows users to create, edit, and collaborate on documents in an online environment, similar to Microsoft Word. The service was originally called Writely, but was obtained by Google on March 9, 2006, and was released as an invitation-only preview. On June 6 after the acquisition, Google created an experimental spreadsheet editing program, which was combined with Google Docs on October 10. \n\nGoogle for Work is a service from Google that provides customizable enterprise versions of several Google products using a domain name provided by the customer. It features several Web applications with similar functionality to traditional office suites, including Gmail, Hangouts, Google Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Groups, News, Play, Sites, and Vault. It was the vision of Rajen Sheth, a Google employee who later developed Chromebooks. \n\nCurrently, the company is testing a travel app called \"Trips\". \n\nEnterprise products\n\nGoogle Search Appliance was launched in February 2002, targeted toward providing search technology for larger organizations. Google launched the Mini three years later, which was targeted at smaller organizations. Late in 2006, Google began to sell Custom Search Business Edition, providing customers with an advertising-free window into Google.com's index. The service was renamed Google Site Search in 2008. \n\nGoogle Apps allows organizations to bring Google's web application offerings, Gmail and Google Docs, into their own domains. The service is available in several editions: a basic free edition (formerly known as Google Apps Standard edition), Google Apps for Business, Google Apps for Education, and Google Apps for Government. In the same year Google Apps was launched, Google acquired Postini and proceeded to integrate the company's security technologies into Google Apps under the name Google Postini Services. \n\nOn March 15, 2016, Google announced the introduction of Google Analytics 360 Suite, \"a set of integrated data and marketing analytics products, designed specifically for the needs of enterprise-class marketers.\" Among other things, the suite is designed to help \"enterprise class marketers\" see the complete customer journey, generate useful insights, not just more data, and deliver engaging experiences to the right people. \nSome see the suite as competing with existing marketing cloud offerings by companies like Adobe, Oracle, Salesforce and IBM. \n\nOther products\n\nGoogle Translate is a server-side machine translation service, which can translate between 80 different languages. For some languages, handwriting recognition, or speech recognition can be used as input, and translated text can be pronounced through speech synthesis. The software uses corpus linguistics techniques, where the program \"learns\" from professionally translated documents, specifically UN and European Parliament proceedings. \n\nGoogle launched its Google News service in 2002, an automated service which summarizes news articles from various websites. In March 2005, Agence France Presse (AFP) sued Google for copyright infringement in federal court in the District of Columbia, a case which Google settled for an undisclosed amount in a pact that included a license of the full text of AFP articles for use on Google News. \n\nGoogle currently offers free wi-fi access in its hometown of Mountain View, California. \n\nIn 2010, Google announced the Google Fiber project, with plans to build an ultra-high-speed broadband network for 50,000 to 500,000 customers in one or more American cities. On March 30, 2011, Google announced that Kansas City, Kansas would be the first community where the new network would be deployed. In July 2012, Google completed the construction of a fiber-optic broadband Internet network infrastructure in Kansas City, and after building an infrastructure, Google announced pricing for Google Fiber. The service will offer three options including a free broadband Internet option, a 1Gbit/s Internet option for $70 per month, and a version that includes television service for $120 per month.\n\nIn 2007, reports surfaced that Google was planning the release of its own mobile phone, possibly a competitor to Apple's iPhone. The project, called Android, turned out not to be a phone but an operating system for mobile devices, which Google acquired and then released as an open source project under the Apache 2.0 license. Google provides a software development kit for developers so applications can be created to be run on Android-based phones. In September 2008, T-Mobile released the G1, the first Android-based phone. On January 5, 2010, Google released an Android phone under its own company name called the Nexus One. A report in July 2013 stated that Google's share of the global smartphone market, led by Samsung products, was 64% in March 2013. \n\nOther projects Google has worked on include a new collaborative communication service, a web browser, and a mobile operating system. The first of these was first announced on May 27, 2009. The company described Google Wave as a product that helps users communicate and collaborate on the web. The service is Google's \"email redesigned\", with realtime editing, the ability to embed audio, video, and other media, and extensions that further enhance the communication experience. Google Wave was initially in a developer's preview, where interested users had to be invited to test the service, but was released to the public on May 19, 2010, at Google's I/O keynote. On September 1, 2008, Google pre-announced the upcoming availability of Google Chrome, an open source web browser, which was then released on September 2, 2008. On July 7, 2009, Google announced Google Chrome OS, an open source Linux-based operating system that includes only a web browser and is designed to log users into their Google account. \n\nGoogle Goggles is a mobile application available on Android and iOS used for image recognition and non-text-based search. In addition to scanning QR codes, the app can recognize historic landmarks, import business cards, and solve Sudoku puzzles. While Goggles could originally identify people as well, Google has limited that functionality as a privacy protection.\n\nIn 2011, Google announced Google Wallet, a mobile application for wireless payments. In late June 2011, Google soft-launched a social networking service called Google+. On July 14, 2011, Google announced that Google+ had reached 10 million users just two weeks after it was launched in this \"limited\" trial phase. After four weeks in operation, it reached 25 million users. \n\nAt a launch event on July 24, 2013, in San Francisco, a newer version of the Nexus 7 Google tablet device was released to the public, alongside the Chromecast dongle that allows users to stream YouTube and Netflix videos via smartphones. \n\nIn 2013, Google launched Google Shopping Express, a delivery service initially available only in San Francisco and Silicon Valley. \n\nOn February 3, 2014, Google released its first Chromecast SDK. \n\nGoogle Alerts is a content change detection and notification service, offered by the search engine company Google. The service sends emails to the user when it finds new results—such as web pages, newspaper articles, or blogs—that match the user's search term. \n\nGoogle Camera is a camera application developed by Google for Android. It is supported on Android 4.4 KitKat and higher versions of Android. It was released on the Google Play Store on April 16, 2014. \n\nProject Fi enables communication across Wi-Fi and cell networks. \n\nIn July 2015 Google released DeepDream, an image recognition software capable of creating psychedelic images using a convolutional neural network. \n\nIn 2016 Google also developed a product to compete with Amazon's Echo voice assistant known as Google Home. \n\nAPIs\n\nGoogle APIs are a set of application programming interfaces (APIs) developed by Google which allow communication with Google Services and their integration to other services. Examples of these include Search, Gmail, Translate or Google Maps. Third-party apps can use these APIs to take advantage of or extend the functionality of the existing services.\n\nOther websites\n\nGoogle Developers is Google's site for software development tools, APIs, and technical resources. The site contains documentation on using Google developer tools and APIs—including discussion groups and blogs for developers using Google's developer products.\n\nGoogle Labs was a page created by Google to demonstrate and test new projects.\n\nGoogle owns the top-level domain 1e100.net which is used for some servers within Google's network. The name is a reference to the scientific E notation representation for 1 googol, . \n\nCorporate affairs and culture\n\nOn Fortune magazine's list of the best companies to work for, Google ranked first in 2007, 2008 and 2012 and fourth in 2009 and 2010. Google was also nominated in 2010 to be the world's most attractive employer to graduating students in the Universum Communications talent attraction index. Google's corporate philosophy includes principles such as \"you can make money without doing evil,\" \"you can be serious without a suit,\" and \"work should be challenging and the challenge should be fun.\" \n\nEmployees\n\nAs of 2013, Google had 47,756 employees (in the fourth quarter, including the Motorola subsidiary), among them more than 10,000 software developers based in more than 40 offices. \n\nAfter the company's IPO in 2004, founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page and CEO Eric Schmidt requested that their base salary be cut to $1. Subsequent offers by the company to increase their salaries were turned down, primarily because their main compensation continues to come from owning stock in Google. Before 2004, Schmidt made $250,000 per year, and Page and Brin each received an annual salary of $150,000. \n\nIn 2007 and early 2008, several top executives left Google. In October 2007, former chief financial officer of YouTube Gideon Yu joined Facebook along with Benjamin Ling, a high-ranking engineer. In March 2008, Sheryl Sandberg, then vice-president of global online sales and operations, began her position as chief operating officer of Facebook. At the same time, Ash ElDifrawi, formerly head of brand advertising, left to become chief marketing officer of Netshops. \nOn April 4, 2011, Larry Page became CEO and Eric Schmidt became Executive Chairman of Google. In July 2012, Google's first female employee, Marissa Mayer, left Google to become Yahoo!'s CEO. \n\nAs a motivation technique, Google uses a policy often called Innovation Time Off, where Google engineers are encouraged to spend 20% of their work time on projects that interest them. Some of Google's newer services, such as Gmail, Google News, Orkut, and AdSense originated from these independent endeavors. In a talk at Stanford University, Marissa Mayer, Google's Vice President of Search Products and User Experience until July 2012, showed that half of all new product launches in the second half of 2005 had originated from the Innovation Time Off. \n\nOffice locations and headquarters\n\n;Mountain View\n\nGoogle's headquarters in Mountain View, California, is referred to as \"the Googleplex\", a play on words on the number googolplex and the headquarters itself being a complex of buildings. The lobby is decorated with a piano, lava lamps, old server clusters, and a projection of search queries on the wall. The hallways are full of exercise balls and bicycles. Many employees have access to the corporate recreation center. Recreational amenities are scattered throughout the campus and include a workout room with weights and rowing machines, locker rooms, washers and dryers, a massage room, assorted video games, table football, a baby grand piano, a billiard table, and ping pong. In addition to the recreation room, there are snack rooms stocked with various foods and drinks, with special emphasis placed on nutrition. Free food is available to employees 24/7, with the offerings provided by paid vending machines prorated based on and favoring those of better nutritional value. \n\nGoogle's extensive amenities are not available to all of its workers. Temporary workers such as book scanners do not have access to shuttles, Google cafes, or other perks. \n;New York City\nIn 2006, Google moved into 311000 sqft of office space in New York City, at 111 Eighth Avenue in Manhattan. The office was specially designed and built for Google and houses its largest advertising sales team, which has been instrumental in securing large partnerships. The New York headquarters is similar in design and functionality to its Mountain View headquarters, and includes a game room, micro kitchens, and a video game area. As of February 2012, a significant engineering team is based in New York City. As of September 2013, Google's East Coast office is located at 76 Ninth Ave, New York City, New York. \n\n;Other U.S. cities\nBy late 2006, Google established a new headquarters for its AdWords division in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In November 2006, Google opened offices on Carnegie Mellon's campus in Pittsburgh, focusing on shopping-related advertisement coding and smartphone applications and programs. Other office locations in the U.S. include Atlanta, Georgia; Austin, Texas; Boulder, Colorado; Cambridge, Massachusetts; San Francisco, California; Seattle, Washington; Reston, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. \nGoogle has several international offices.\n\nIn October 2006, the company announced plans to install thousands of solar panels to provide up to 1.6 megawatts of electricity, enough to satisfy approximately 30% of the campus' energy needs. The system will be the largest solar power system constructed on a U.S. corporate campus and one of the largest on any corporate site in the world. In addition, Google announced in 2009 that it was deploying herds of goats to keep grassland around the Googleplex short, helping to prevent the threat from seasonal bush fires while also reducing the carbon footprint of mowing the extensive grounds. The idea of trimming lawns using goats originated from Bob Widlar, an engineer who worked for National Semiconductor. In 2008, Google faced accusations in Harper's Magazine of being an \"energy glutton\". The company was accused of employing its \"Don't be evil\" motto and its public energy-saving campaigns to cover up or make up for the massive amounts of energy its servers require. \n\nOn May 12, 2015, Google announced the setting up of its largest campus outside the United States in Hyderabad, India. The proposed campus can accommodate 6500 employees. \n\nDoodles\n\nSince 1998, Google has been designing special, temporary alternate logos to place on their homepage intended to celebrate holidays, events, achievements and people. The first Google Doodle was in honor of the Burning Man Festival of 1998. The doodle was designed by Larry Page and Sergey Brin to notify users of their absence in case the servers crashed. Subsequent Google Doodles were designed by an outside contractor, until Larry and Sergey asked then-intern Dennis Hwang to design a logo for Bastille Day in 2000. From that point onward, Doodles have been organized and created by a team of employees termed \"Doodlers\". \n\nEaster eggs and April Fools' Day jokes\n\nGoogle has a tradition of creating April Fools' Day jokes. On April 1, 2000, Google MentalPlex allegedly featured the use of mental power to search the web. In 2007, Google announced a free Internet service called TiSP, or Toilet Internet Service Provider, where one obtained a connection by flushing one end of a fiber-optic cable down their toilet. Also in 2007, Google's Gmail page displayed an announcement for Gmail Paper, allowing users to have email messages printed and shipped to them. \nIn 2008, Google announced Gmail Custom time where users could change the time that the email was sent. \n\nIn 2010, Google changed its company name to Topeka in honor of Topeka, Kansas, whose mayor changed the city's name to Google for a short amount of time in an attempt to sway Google's decision in its new Google Fiber Project. In 2011, Google announced Gmail Motion, an interactive way of controlling Gmail and the computer with body movements via the user's webcam. \n\nGoogle's services contain easter eggs, such as the Swedish Chef's \"Bork bork bork,\" Pig Latin, \"Hacker\" or leetspeak, Elmer Fudd, Pirate, and Klingon as language selections for its search engine. The search engine calculator provides the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything from Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. When searching the word \"recursion\", the spell-checker's result for the properly spelled word is exactly the same word, creating a recursive link. \n\nWhen searching for the word \"anagram,\" meaning a rearrangement of letters from one word to form other valid words, Google's suggestion feature displays \"Did you mean: nag a ram?\" In Google Maps, searching for directions between places separated by large bodies of water, such as Los Angeles and Tokyo, results in instructions to \"kayak across the Pacific Ocean.\" During FIFA World Cup 2010, search queries including \"World Cup\" and \"FIFA\" caused the \"Goooo...gle\" page indicator at the bottom of every result page to read \"Goooo...al!\" instead. \n\natGoogleTalks\n\nAtGoogleTalks is a series of presentations by invited speakers sponsored by Google given at various Google offices throughout the world. The series has feature categories such as Authors@Google, Candidates@Google, Women@Google, Musicians@Google and others. For technical topics, there is Google Tech Talks (also known as EngEDU ) which is dedicated to exploring areas of technology and science. Guest speakers range from present and past world leaders to little-known poets and artists. Talks range from about 40 to 70 minutes. , there had been over 1700 guest speakers.\n\nCodeF \n\nGoogle CodeF is a career event and mentoring program organized by Google for female undergraduate computer scientists who have foundational coding skills in at least one of C++, Java or Python. It lasts 12 weeks and consists of eight mentoring meetings held in Google's offices and virtually. The initiative aims to develop female computer scientists and increase the number of women working in the technology industry.\n\nPhilanthropy\n\nIn 2004, Google formed the not-for-profit philanthropic Google.org, with a start-up fund of $1 billion. The mission of the organization is to create awareness about climate change, global public health, and global poverty. One of its first projects was to develop a viable plug-in hybrid electric vehicle that can attain 100 miles per gallon. Google hired Larry Brilliant as the program's executive director in 2004, and the current director is Megan Smith. \n\nIn 2008, Google announced its \"project 10100\" which accepted ideas for how to help the community and then allowed Google users to vote on their favorites. After two years of silence, during which many wondered what had happened to the program, Google revealed the winners of the project, giving a total of ten million dollars to various ideas ranging from non-profit organizations that promote education to a website that intends to make all legal documents public and online. \n\nIn 2011, Google donated 1 million euros to International Mathematical Olympiad to support the next five annual International Mathematical Olympiads (2011–2015). On July 2012, Google launched a \"Legalize Love\" campaign in support of gay rights. \n\nTax avoidance\n\nGoogle uses various tax avoidance strategies. Out of the five largest American technology companies, it pays the lowest taxes to the countries of origin of its revenues. The company accomplishes this partly by licensing technology through shell subsidiaries in Ireland, Bermuda, the Bahamas, and the Netherlands. This has reportedly sparked a French investigation into Google's transfer pricing practices. \n\nFollowing criticism of the amount of corporate taxes that Google paid in the United Kingdom, Chairman Eric Schmidt said, \"It's called capitalism. We are proudly capitalistic.\" During the same December 2012 interview, Schmidt \"confirmed that the company had no intention of paying more to the UK exchequer.\" In 2013, Schmidt responded to questions about taxes paid in the UK by pointing to the advertising fees Google charged UK companies as a source of economic growth. \n\nGoogle Vice President Matt Brittin testified to the Public Accounts Committee of the UK House of Commons that his UK sales team made no sales and hence owed no sales taxes to the UK. In January 2016, Google reached a settlement with the UK to pay £130m in back taxes plus higher taxes in future. \n\nEnvironment\n\nSince 2007, Google has aimed for carbon neutrality in regard to its operations. \nGoogle disclosed in September 2011 that it \"continuously uses enough electricity to power 200,000 homes\", almost 260 million watts or about a quarter of the output of a nuclear power plant. Total carbon emissions for 2010 were just under 1.5 million metric tons, most due to fossil fuels that provide electricity for the data centers. Google said that 25 percent of its energy was supplied by renewable fuels in 2010. An average search uses only 0.3 watt-hours of electricity, so all global searches are only 12.5 million watts or 5% of the total electricity consumption by Google. \n\nIn June 2013, The Washington Post reported that Google had donated $50,000 to the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a libertarian think tank that calls human carbon emissions a positive factor in the environment and argues that global warming is not a concern. \n\nIn July 2013, it was reported that Google had hosted a fundraising event for Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe, who has called climate change a \"hoax\". In 2014 Google cut ties with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) after pressure from the Sierra Club, major unions and Google's own scientists because of ALEC's stance on climate change and opposition to renewable energy.\n\nLobbying\n\nIn 2013, Google ranked 5th in lobbying spending, up from 213th in 2003. In 2012, the company ranked 2nd in campaign donations of technology and Internet sections.\n\nLitigation\n\nGoogle has been involved in a number of lawsuits including the High-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigation which resulted in Google being one of four companies to pay a $415 million settlement to employees. \n\nCriticism and controversy\n\nGoogle's market dominance has led to prominent media coverage, including criticism of the company over issues such as aggressive tax avoidance, search neutrality, copyright, censorship of search results and content, and privacy. Other criticisms include alleged misuse and manipulation of search results, its use of others' intellectual property, concerns that its compilation of data may violate people's privacy, and the energy consumption of its servers, as well as concerns over traditional business issues such as monopoly, restraint of trade, anti-competitive practices, and patent infringement.\n\nGoogle's stated mission \"to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful\", and the means employed to accomplish it, have raised concerns among the company's critics. Much of the criticism pertains to issues that have not yet been addressed by cyber law.", "Google Search, commonly referred to as Google Web Search or Google, is a web search engine owned by Google Inc. It is the most-used search engine on the World Wide Web, handling more than three billion searches each day. it is the most used search engine in the US with 64.0% market share. \n\nThe order of search on Google's search-results pages is based, in part, on a priority rank called a \"PageRank\". Google Search provides many different options for customized search, using Boolean operators such as: exclusion (\"-xx\"), alternatives (\"xx OR yy OR zz\"), and wildcards (\"Winston * Churchill\" returns \"Winston Churchill\", \"Winston Spencer Churchill\", etc.). The same and other options can be specified in a different way on an Advanced Search page.\n\nThe main purpose of Google Search is to hunt for text in publicly accessible documents offered by web servers, as opposed to other data, such as images or data contained in databases. It was originally developed by Larry Page and Sergey Brin in 1997. Google Search provides several features beyond searching for words. These include synonyms, weather forecasts, time zones, stock quotes, maps, earthquake data, movie showtimes, airports, home listings, and sports scores. There are special features for numbers, dates, and some specific forms, including ranges, prices, temperatures, money and measurement unit conversions, calculations, package tracking, patents, area codes, and language translation. In June 2011 Google introduced \"Google Voice Search\" to search for spoken, rather than typed, words. In May 2012 Google introduced a Knowledge Graph semantic search feature in the U.S.\n\nAnalysis of the frequency of search terms may indicate economic, social and health trends. Data about the frequency of use of search terms on Google can be openly inquired via Google Trends and have been shown to correlate with flu outbreaks and unemployment levels, and provide the information faster than traditional reporting methods and surveys.\n\nCompetitors of Google include Baidu and Soso.com in China; Naver.com and Daum.net in South Korea; Yandex in Russia; Seznam.cz in the Czech Republic; Yahoo in Japan, Taiwan and the US, as well as Bing and DuckDuckGo. Some smaller search engines offer facilities not available with Google, e.g. not storing any private or tracking information; one such search engine is Ixquick.\n\nSearch \n\nPageRank \n\nGoogle's rise to success was largely due to a patented algorithm called PageRank that helps rank web pages that match a given search string. When Google was a Stanford research project, it was nicknamed BackRub because the technology checks backlinks to determine a site's importance. Previous keyword-based methods of ranking search results, used by many search engines that were once more popular than Google, would rank pages by how often the search terms occurred in the page, or how strongly associated the search terms were within each resulting page. The PageRank algorithm instead analyzes human-generated links assuming that web pages linked from many important pages are themselves likely to be important. The algorithm computes a recursive score for pages, based on the weighted sum of the PageRanks of the pages linking to them. PageRank is thought to correlate well with human concepts of importance. In addition to PageRank, Google, over the years, has added many other secret criteria for determining the ranking of pages on result lists, reported to be over 250 different indicators, the specifics of which are kept secret to keep spammers at bay and help Google maintain an edge over its competitors globally.\n\nIn a potential hint of Google's future direction for their Search algorithm, Eric Schmidt, Google's then chief executive, said in a 2007 interview with the Financial Times: \"The goal is to enable Google users to be able to ask the question such as 'What shall I do tomorrow?' and 'What job shall I take?'\". Schmidt reaffirmed this during a 2010 interview with the Wall Street Journal: \"I actually think most people don't want Google to answer their questions, they want Google to tell them what they should be doing next.\" \n\nIn 2013 the European Commission found that Google Search favored Google's own products, instead of offering consumers the best result for their needs. In February 2015 Google announced a major change to its mobile search algorithm which would favor mobile friendly over other websites. Nearly 60% of Google's online search traffic comes from mobile phones. Google wants its users to have access to premium quality websites. Those websites which lack a mobile friendly interface would be demoted and it is expected that this update will cause a shake-up of ranks. Businesses who fail to update their websites accordingly could see a dip in their regular websites traffic. \n\nSearch products \n\nThe exact percentage of the total of web pages that Google indexes is not known, as it is very difficult to accurately calculate. Google presents a two-line summary and also a preview of each search result, which includes a link to a cached (stored), usually older version of the page.\n\nGoogle's cache link in its search results provides a way of retrieving information from websites that have recently gone down and a way of retrieving data more quickly than by clicking the direct link. This feature is still available, but many users are not aware of this because it has been moved to the previews of the search results presented next to these. \n\nGoogle not only indexes and caches web pages, but also takes \"snapshots\" of other file types, which include PDF, Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, Flash SWF, plain text files, and so on. Except in the case of text and SWF files, the cached version is a conversion to (X)HTML, allowing those without the corresponding viewer application to read the file. Users can customize the search engine, by setting a default language, using the \"SafeSearch\" filtering technology and set the number of results shown on each page. Google has been criticized for placing long-term cookies on users' machines to store these preferences, a tactic which also enables them to track a user's search terms and retain the data for more than a year. For any query, up to the first 1000 results can be shown with a maximum of 100 displayed per page. The ability to specify the number of results is available only if \"Instant Search\" is not enabled. If \"Instant Search\" is enabled, only 10 results are displayed, regardless of this setting.\n\nIn 2012, Google changed its rankings to demote sites that had been accused of piracy, except the Google-owned YouTube site. \n\nNon-indexable data \n\nDespite its immense index, there is also a considerable amount of data available in online databases which are accessible by means of queries but not by links. This so-called invisible or deep Web is minimally covered by Google and other search engines. The deep Web contains library catalogs, official legislative documents of governments, phone books, and other content which is dynamically prepared to respond to a query.\n\nGoogle optimization \n\nBecause Google is the most popular search engine, many webmasters have become eager to influence their website's Google rankings. An industry of consultants has arisen to help websites increase their rankings on Google and on other search engines. This field, called search engine optimization, attempts to discern patterns in search engine listings, and then develop a methodology for improving rankings to draw more searchers to their client's sites. Search engine optimization encompasses both \"on page\" factors (like body copy, title elements, H1 heading elements and image alt attribute values) and Off Page Optimization factors (like anchor text and PageRank). The general idea is to affect Google's relevance algorithm by incorporating the keywords being targeted in various places \"on page\", in particular the title element and the body copy (note: the higher up in the page, presumably the better its keyword prominence and thus the ranking). Too many occurrences of the keyword, however, cause the page to look suspect to Google's spam checking algorithms. Google has published guidelines for website owners who would like to raise their rankings when using legitimate optimization consultants. It has been hypothesized, and, allegedly, is the opinion of the owner of one business about which there have been numerous complaints, that negative publicity, for example, numerous consumer complaints, may serve as well to elevate page rank on Google Search as favorable comments. The particular problem addressed in The New York Times article, which involved DecorMyEyes, was addressed shortly thereafter by an undisclosed fix in the Google algorithm. According to Google, it was not the frequently published consumer complaints about DecorMyEyes which resulted in the high ranking but mentions on news websites of events which affected the firm such as legal actions against it. Google Webmaster Tools helps to check for websites that use duplicate or copyright content. \n\nUniversal search \n\nUniversal search was launched by Google on May 16, 2007. It was an idea which merged the results from different searches into one. Prior to Universal search, a standard Google search would consist of links to different websites. Universal search incorporates a wide variety of information such as websites, news, pictures, maps, blogs, videos, and more to display as search results. Marissa Mayer, VP of Search Products & User Experience during Universal search launch, described the goal of universal search, \"With Universal search, we're attempting to break down the walls that traditionally separated our various search properties and integrate the vast amounts of information available into one simple set of search results… We want to help you find the very best answer, even if you don't know where to look.\" \n\nFunctionality \n\nGoogle search consists of a series of localized websites. The largest of those, the google.com site, is the top most-visited website in the world. Some of its features include a definition link for most searches including dictionary words, the number of results you got on your search, links to other searches (e.g. for words that Google believes to be misspelled, it provides a link to the search results using its proposed spelling), and many more.\n\nSearch syntax \n\nGoogle's search engine normally accepts queries as a simple text, and breaks up the user's text into a sequence of search terms, which will usually be words that are to occur in the results, but one can also use Boolean operators, such as: quotations marks (\") for a phrase, a prefix such as \"+\", \"-\" for qualified terms (no longer valid, the '+' was removed from Google on October 19, 2011), or one of several advanced operators, such as \"site:\". The webpages of \"Google Search Basics\" describe each of these additional queries and options (see below: Search options).\nGoogle's Advanced Search web form gives several additional fields which may be used to qualify searches by such criteria as date of first retrieval.\n\nQuery expansion \n\nGoogle applies query expansion to the submitted search query, transforming it into the query that will actually be used to retrieve results. As with page ranking, the exact details of the algorithm Google uses are deliberately obscure, but certainly the following transformations are among those that occur:\n\n* Term reordering: in information retrieval this is a standard technique to reduce the work involved in retrieving results. This transformation is invisible to the user, since the results ordering uses the original query order to determine relevance.\n* Stemming is used to increase search quality by keeping small syntactic variants of search terms. \n* There is a limited facility to fix possible misspellings in queries.\n\n\"I'm Feeling Lucky\" \n\nGoogle's homepage includes a button labeled \"I'm Feeling Lucky\". Prior to a change in 2012, when a user typed in a search and clicked on the button the user would be taken directly to the first search result, bypassing the search engine results page. The idea was that if a user is \"feeling lucky\", the search engine would return the perfect match the first time without having to page through the search results. According to a study by Tom Chavez of \"Rapt\", this feature cost Google $110 million a year as 1% of all searches use this feature and bypass all advertising. \n\nWith the introduction of Google Instant, the functionality of the button behaves differently. Currently, the \"I'm Feeling Lucky\" button changes based on the user's settings and what webpage users are at. If Google Instant is turned off, the button will work as it previously did or, if the search box is empty, redirect to the Google Doodles gallery. If Google Instant is turned on and a user hovers over the button, the button text will spin and land on a phrase that starts with \"I'm feeling\" (e.g. \"I'm feeling hungry\" or \"I'm feeling smart\"). Each phrase links to a Google page related to the associated phrase.\n\nGoogle Chrome and Mozilla Firefox used \"I'm Feeling Lucky\" as the default search string when the user entered a query in the location bar; this functionality was deprecated in later versions. \n\nRich snippets \n\nOn May 12, 2009, Google announced that they would be parsing the hCard, hReview, and hProduct microformats and using them to populate search result pages with what they called \"Rich Snippets\". \n\nSpecial features \n\nBesides the main search-engine feature of searching for text, Google Search has more than 22 \"special features\" (activated by entering any of dozens of trigger words) when searching: \n* weather – The weather conditions, temperature, wind, humidity, and forecast, for many cities, can be viewed by typing \"weather\" along with a city for larger cities or city and state, U.S. zip code, or city and country for smaller cities (such as: weather Lawrence, Kansas; weather Paris; weather Bremen, Germany).\n* stock quotes – The market data for a specific company or fund can be viewed, by typing the ticker symbol (or include \"stock\"), such as: CSCO; MSFT; IBM stock; F stock (lists Ford Motor Co.); or AIVSX (fund). Results show inter-day changes, or 5-year graph, etc. This does not work for many stock names which are one letter long, such as Macy's (M), or are common words, such as Diamond Offshore (DO) or Majesco (COOL).\n* time – The current time in many cities (worldwide), can be viewed by typing \"time\" and the name of the city (such as: time Cairo; time Pratt, KS).\n* timer – set a countdown \n* sports scores – The scores and schedules, for sports teams, can be displayed by typing the team name or league name into the search box.\n* unit conversion – Measurements can be converted, by entering each phrase, such as: 10.5 cm in inches; or 90 km in miles\n* currency conversion – A money or currency converter can be selected, by typing the names or currency codes (listed by ISO 4217): 6789 Euro in USD; 150 GBP in USD; 5000 Yen in USD; 5000 Yuan in lira (the U.S. dollar can be USD or \"US$\" or \"$\", while Canadian is CAD, etc.).\n* calculator – calculation results can be determined, as it is calculated live, by entering a formula in numbers or words, such as: 6*77 +pi +sqrt(e^3)/888 plus 0.45. Search results for the formula are displayed after the calculation result. The caret \"^\" raises a number to an exponent power, and percentages are allowed (\"40% of 300\"). Following the convention used in discrete mathematics, Google's calculator evaluates 0^0 to 1. The calculator also uses the unit and currency conversion functions to allow unit-aware calculations. For example, \"(3 EUR/liter) / (40 miles/gallon) in USD / mile\" calculates the dollar cost per mile for a 40 mpg car with gas costing 3 euros a liter. The calculator also can calculate digital storage arithmetic (the calculation of bytes). For example, putting in 400 MB + 489 MB + 1.5GB yields the result 2425 MB, or 2.37GB. This is useful since bytes are binary (power of 2), and not decimal as regular numbers are (power of 10). Caveat: it doesn't offer arbitrary precision and is subject to floating point errors in queries like 4,000,000,000,000,000 – 3,999,999,999,999,999. \n* numeric ranges – A set of numbers can be matched by using a double-dot between range numbers (70..73 or 90..100) to match any positive number in the range, inclusive. Negative numbers are treated as using exclusion-dash to not match the number.\n* dictionary lookup – A definition for a word or phrase can be found, by entering \"define\" followed by a colon and the word(s) to look up (such as, \"define:philosophy\")\n* maps – Some related maps can be displayed, by typing in the name or U.S. ZIP code of a location and the word \"map\" (such as: New York map; Kansas map; or Paris map).\n* movie showtimes – Reviews or film showtimes can be listed for any movies playing nearby, by typing \"movies\" or the name of any current film into the search box. If a specific location was saved on a previous search, the top search result will display showtimes for nearby theaters for that movie.\n* public data – Trends for population (or unemployment rates) can be found for U.S. states and counties, by typing \"population\" or \"unemployment rate\" followed by a state or county name.\n* real estate and housing – Home listings in a given area can be displayed, using the trigger words \"housing\", \"home\", or \"real estate\" followed by the name of a city or U.S. zip code.\n* travel data/airports – The flight status for arriving or departing U.S. flights can be displayed, by typing in the name of the airline and the flight number into the search box (such as: American airlines 18). Delays at a specific airport can also be viewed (by typing the name of the city or three-letter airport code plus word \"airport\").\n* package tracking – Package mail can be tracked by typing the tracking number of a Royal Mail, UPS, FedEx or USPS package directly into the search box. Results will include quick links to track the status of each shipment.\n* patent numbers – U.S. patents can be searched by entering the word \"patent\" followed by the patent number into the search box (such as: Patent 5123123).\n* area code – The geographical location (for any U.S. telephone area code) can be displayed by typing a three-digit area code (such as: 650).\n* synonym search – A search can match words similar to those specified, by placing the tilde sign (~) immediately in front of a search term, such as:  ~fast food.\n* Six degrees of Kevin Bacon – A search to find the shortest path between an arbitrary actor and veteran Hollywood character actor Kevin Bacon. Simply search using 'bacon number actorname'.\n* Google Goggles – using the Google Goggles app on your smartphone you can take a photograph of anything and get quick results for your search. If you wish to pursue more detailed search results you can click the \"full results\" tab and get a full blown Google search of the object you photographed.\n* Knowledge graph – A search for things, people or places that Google knows about, such as landmarks, celebrities, cities, sports teams, buildings, geographical features, movies, celestial objects, works of art and more, and information that applies to the search term is shown in the upper right. It is rooted in public information such as Wikipedia, United States Census Bureau and the CIA World Factbook. \n* Metronome – Provides a metronome with an adjustable bpm.\n\nSearch options \n\nThe webpages maintained by the Google Help Center have text describing more than 15 various search options. \nThe Google operator\n* OR – Search for either one, such as \"price high OR low\" searches for \"price high\" or \"price low\".\n* - (minus sign) – Exclude a word or a phrase, such as \"apple -tree\" searches where word \"tree\" is not used.\n* \"\" – Force inclusion of a word or a phrase (Note that the original + operator was removed on October 19, 2011).\n* * – Wildcard operator to match any words between other specific words, e.g. \"type * blood\".\n* .. – Range operator, e.g. \"$50..$100\".\n\nSome of the query options are as follows:\n\n* define: – The query prefix \"define:\" will provide a definition of the words listed after it.\n* stocks: – After \"stocks:\" the query terms are treated as stock ticker symbols for lookup.\n* site: – Restrict the results to those websites in the given domain, such as, site:www.acmeacme.com. The option \"site:com\" will search all domain URLs named with \".com\" (no space after \"site:\").\n* intext: – Prefix to search in a webpage text, such as \"intext:google search\" will list pages with word \"google\" in the text of the page, and word \"search\" anywhere (no space after \"intext:\").\n* allintitle: – Only the page titles are searched (not the remaining text on each webpage).\n* intitle: – Prefix to search in a webpage title, such as \"intitle:google search\" will list pages with word \"google\" in title, and word \"search\" anywhere (no space after \"intitle:\").\n* allinurl: – Only the page URL address lines are searched (not the text inside each webpage).\n* inurl: – Prefix for each word to be found in the URL; others words are matched anywhere, such as \"inurl:acme search\" matches \"acme\" in a URL, but matches \"search\" anywhere (no space after \"inurl:\").\n\nThe page-display options (or query types) are:\n* cache: – Highlights the search-words within the cached document, such as \"cache:www.google.com xxx\" shows cached content with word \"xxx\" highlighted.\n* link: – The prefix \"link:\" will list webpages that have links to the specified webpage, such as \"link:www.google.com\" lists webpages linking to the Google homepage.\n* related: – The prefix \"related:\" will list webpages that are \"similar\" to a specified web page.\n* info: – The prefix \"info:\" will display some background information about one specified webpage, such as, info:www.google.com. Typically, the info is the first text (160 bytes, about 23 words) contained in the page, displayed in the style of a results entry (for just the 1 page as matching the search).\n* filetype: – results will only show files of the desired type (e.g. filetype:pdf will return pdf files)\n\nError messages \n\nSome searches will give a 403 Forbidden error with the text\n\nsometimes followed by a CAPTCHA prompt. \n\nThe screen was first reported in 2005, and was a response to the heavy use of Google by search engine optimization companies to check on ranks of sites they were optimizing. Google says the message is triggered only by high volumes of requests from a single IP address, however the use of the \"allintext\" operator a few times in a period of minutes has the same effect. Google apparently uses the Google cookie as part of its determination of refusing service.\n\nIn June 2009, after the death of pop superstar Michael Jackson, this message appeared to many internet users who were searching Google for news stories related to the singer, and was assumed by Google to be a DDoS attack, although many queries were submitted by legitimate searchers.\n\nJanuary 2009 malware bug \n\nGoogle flags search results with the message \"This site may harm your computer\" if the site is known to install malicious software in the background or otherwise surreptitiously. Google does this to protect users against visiting sites that could harm their computers. For approximately 40 minutes on January 31, 2009, all search results were mistakenly classified as malware and could therefore not be clicked; instead a warning message was displayed and the user was required to enter the requested URL manually. The bug was caused by human error.  The URL of \"/\" (which expands to all URLs) was mistakenly added to the malware patterns file.\n\nGoogle Doodles \n\nOn certain occasions, the logo on Google's webpage will change to a special version, known as a \"Google Doodle\". This is a picture, drawing, or animation that includes the logo. It is usually done for a special event or day although not all of them are well known. Clicking on the Doodle links to a string of Google search results about the topic. The first was a reference to the Burning Man Festival in 1998, and others have been produced for the birthdays of notable people like Albert Einstein, historical events like the interlocking Lego block's 50th anniversary and holidays like Valentine's Day. Some Google Doodles have interactivity beyond a simple search, such as the famous \"Google Pacman\" version that appeared on May 21, 2010.\n\nGoogle Caffeine \n\nIn August 2009, Google announced the rollout of a new search architecture, codenamed \"Caffeine\". \nThe new architecture was designed to return results faster and to better deal with rapidly updated information from services including Facebook and Twitter.\nGoogle developers noted that most users would notice little immediate change, but invited developers to test the new search in its sandbox. \nDifferences noted for their impact upon search engine optimization included heavier keyword weighting and the importance of the domain's age. \nThe move was interpreted in some quarters as a response to Microsoft's recent release of an upgraded version of its own search service, renamed Bing. \nGoogle announced completion of Caffeine on June 8, 2010, claiming 50% fresher results due to continuous updating of its index. \nWith Caffeine, Google moved its back-end indexing system away from MapReduce and onto BigTable, the company's distributed database platform. Caffeine is also based on Colossus, or GFS2, an overhaul of the GFS distributed file system. \n\nConversational search (OK Google) \n\nDuring the Google I/O conference in May 2013, Google's Amit Singhal presented on the future of search, explaining that a search engine's three primary functions will need to evolve and that search will need to: 1. Answer, 2. Converse, and 3. Anticipate. As part of his keynote talk, Singhal stated, \"A computer you can talk to? And it will answer everything you ask it? Little did I know, I would grow up to become the person responsible for building my dream for the entire world.\" Conversational search technology was then featured and Singhal introduced the term \"hot-wording\" to describe search without the need for an interface, whereby the user simply prompts the Google search engine by stating, \"OK Google.\" The I/O audience was then shown a demonstration in which a user asked a question and the search engine answered back in \"conversation,\" in addition to the presentation of results for the query. \n\nThe conversational search function was incorporated into the latest version of the Chrome browser during the week beginning May 20, 2013. The \"OK Google\" search prompt was not included into the upgrade and users are required to click on a microphone icon that appears on the right-hand side of the search box. Google displays its answer to the user's question in the form of \"cards\" at the top of the search results while the information is conveyed verbally—according to one search engine writer, Google continues to work through the feature's bugs. \n\nHummingbird update \n\nThe \"Hummingbird\" update was announced as part of Google's 15-year anniversary and a Guardian technology journalist described it as \"the biggest change to the inner workings of the world's most popular search engine since Google's \"Caffeine\" update in 2010.\" The update was progressively introduced over the month prior to the announcement and will benefit more modern forms of search, whereby users ask Google a question rather than entering keywords into the search box. \n\nPrivacy \n\nSearches made by search engines, including Google, leave traces. This raises concerns about privacy. In principle, if details of a user's searches are found, those with access to the information—principally state agencies responsible for law enforcement and similar matters—can make deductions about the user's activities. This has been used for the detection and prosecution of lawbreakers; for example a murderer was found and convicted after searching for terms such as \"tips with killing with a baseball bat\". \n\nA search may leave traces both on a computer used to make the search, and in records kept by the search provider. When using a search engine through a browser program on a computer, search terms and other information may be stored on the computer by default, unless the browser is set not to do this, or they are erased. Saved terms may be discovered on forensic analysis of the computer. An Internet Service Provider (ISP) or search engine provider (e.g., Google) may store records which relate search terms to an IP address and a time. Whether such logs are kept, and access to them by law enforcement agencies, is subject to legislation in different jurisdictions and working practices; the law may mandate, prohibit, or say nothing about logging of various types of information. Some search engines, located in jurisdictions where it is not illegal, make a feature of not storing user search information. \n\nEncrypted search \n\nVarious search engines provide encrypted Web search facilities. In May 2010 Google rolled out SSL-encrypted web search. The encrypted search can be accessed at encrypted.google.com \n\nFTC Fines \n\nIn 2012 the US Federal Trade Commission fined Google US$22.5 million for violating their agreement not to violate the privacy of users of the Apple Safari (web browser). The FTC was also continuing to investigate if Google's favoring of their own services in their search results violated antitrust regulations. \n\nSearch Suggestion \n\nIn 2008, Google started to give autocompleted search suggestions in a list below the search bar for incompletely entered queries.\n\nInstant Search \n\nGoogle Instant, a feature that displays suggested results while the user types, was introduced in the US on September 8, 2010. In concert with the Google Instant launch, Google disabled the ability of users to choose to see more than 10 search results per page. At the time of the announcement, Google expected Instant to save users 2 to 5 seconds in every search, collectively about 11 million seconds per hour. Search engine marketing experts speculated that Google Instant would have a great impact on local and paid search. Google Search is a turn from a static HTML page into an AJAX application. \n\nInstant Search can be disabled via Google's \"preferences\" menu, but autocomplete-style search suggestions cannot be disabled, by intention. \n\nThe publication 2600: The Hacker Quarterly compiled a list of words that Google Instant did not show. Most banned terms are those considered rude, but some apparently irrelevant searches including \"Myleak\" are removed.\n\nIn September 2012 several sources reported that Google had removed bisexual from the list of blacklisted terms for Instant Search. the word bisexual still did not autocomplete, and LGBT activists renewed efforts to have it whitelisted. \"bisexuality\" (but not \"bisexual\") and \"myleak\" were found.\n\nRedesign \n\nIn late June 2011, Google introduced a new look to the Google home page in order to boost the use of the Google+ social tools. \n\nOne of the major changes was replacing the classic navigation bar with a black one. Google's digital creative director Chris Wiggins explains: \"We're working on a project to bring you a new and improved Google experience, and over the next few months, you'll continue to see more updates to our look and feel.\" The new navigation bar has been negatively received by a vocal minority. \n\nIn November 2013, Google started testing yellow labels for advertisements displayed in search results, to improve user experience. The new labels, highlighted in yellow color, and aligned to the left of each sponsored link help users clearly differentiate between organic and sponsored results. \n\nSmartphone app \n\nA Google Search mobile app is available for Android, Windows Phone and iOS devices. In addition to allowing users to perform web searches, the app implements Google Now, Google's voice recognition and intelligent personal assistant software. Google Now uses a natural language user interface to answer questions, make recommendations, and perform actions by delegating requests to a set of web services. Along with answering user-initiated queries, Google Now passively delivers information to the user that it predicts they will want, based on their search habits. Google Search for Android was originally introduced in 2007, the same year the Android operating system was introduced. On January 11, 2012, Google introduced an update where they included an updated and simplified user interface, along with other improvements. \nAs of May 2016, around 20% of Google searches on Android used voice recognition. \n\nInternational \n\nGoogle is available in many languages and has been localized completely or partly for many countries. \n\nThe interface has also been made available in some languages for humorous purpose:\n\n* Bork, bork, bork!\n* Elmer Fudd\n* Klingon\n* Leetspeak\n* Pig Latin\n* Pirate\n\nIn addition to the main URL Google.com, Google Inc. owns 160 domain names for each of the countries/regions in which it has been localized.\n\nOn September 29, 2015, an Ex-Googler Sanmay Ved managed to buy the domain Google.com from Google via Google Domains, and gain full webmaster control. Google later acknowledged the purchase, and rewarded Ved who in turn requested that the reward be donated to charity. As a result, Google doubled the reward.\n\nSearch products \n\nIn addition to its tool for searching webpages, Google also provides services for searching images, Usenet newsgroups, news websites, videos, searching by locality, maps, and items for sale online. In 2012, Google has indexed over 30 trillion web pages, and received 100 billion queries per month. It also caches much of the content that it indexes. Google operates other tools and services including Google News, Google Shopping, Google Maps, Google Custom Search, Google Earth, Google Docs, Picasa, Panoramio, YouTube, Google Translate, Google Blog Search and Google Desktop Search.\n\nThere are also products available from Google that are not directly search-related. Gmail, for example, is a webmail application, but still includes search features; Google Browser Sync does not offer any search facilities, although it aims to organize your browsing time.\n\nAlso Google starts many new beta products, like Google Social Search or Google Image Swirl.\n\nEnergy consumption \n\nGoogle claims that a search query requires altogether about 1 kJ or 0.0003 kW·h, which is enough to raise the temperature of one liter of water by 0.24 °C.\n\nPossible misuse of search results \n\nIn 2007, a group of Austrian researchers observed a tendency to misuse the Google engine as a \"reality interface\". Ordinary users as well as journalists tend to rely on the first pages of Google search, assuming that everything not listed there is either not important or merely does not exist. The researchers say that \"Google has become the main interface for our whole reality. To be precise: with the Google interface the user gets the impression that the search results imply a kind of totality. In fact, one only sees a small part of what one could see if one also integrates other research tools\". \n\nPredicting behavior \n\nAt the 2016 New Hampshire primary, the top-searched Democratic candidate was Bernie Sanders with 72% of the searches and won with 60% of the vote, according to real-time results of Google's trending search queries, and Hillary Clinton received 28% of the queries and 38% of the vote. The top-searched Republican candidate was Donald Trump, who received 41% of the searches an hour before the polls closed and won with 35% of the vote and John Kasich got 16% of both the vote and the searches." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Bodybuilding.txt", "Charles_Atlas.txt", "Muscle_car.txt" ], "title": [ "Bodybuilding", "Charles Atlas", "Muscle car" ], "wiki_context": [ "Bodybuilding is the use of progressive resistance exercise to control and develop one's musculature. An individual who engages in this activity is referred to as a bodybuilder. In competitive amateur and professional bodybuilding, bodybuilders appear in lineups doing specified poses, and later perform individual posing routines, for a panel of judges who rank competitors based on criteria such as symmetry, muscularity and conditioning. Bodybuilders prepare for competition through a combination of dehydration, fat loss, oils, carb loading to achieve maximum vascularity, and tanning (or tanning lotions) which make their muscular definition more distinct.\n\nWell-known bodybuilders include Charles Atlas, Steve Reeves, Reg Park, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Juliana Malacarne, and Lou Ferrigno.\n\nThe winner of the annual IFBB Mr. Olympia contest is generally recognized as the world's top male professional bodybuilder. The title is currently held by Phil Heath of the United States. The winner of the Women's Physique portion of the competition is widely regarded as the world's top female professional bodybuilder. The 2015 title is currently held by Juliana Malacarne, a Brazilian-born American IFBB Pro fitness and figure competitor and Ladies All-Star Wrestling Professional. \nSince 1950, the NABBA Universe Championships has been considered the top amateur bodybuilding contest with many notable winners such as Steve Reeves, Bill Pearl, Reg Park, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Lee Priest.\n\nHistory \n\nEarly years \n\nStone-lifting traditions were practiced in ancient Greece and Egypt. Western weight lifting developed in Europe around 1880 to 1953, with strongmen displaying feats of strength for the public, and challenging each other. The focus was not on the make up of their physique, and these strongmen often had a large stomach and fatty limbs. \n\nEugen Sandow \n\nBodybuilding developed in the late 19th century, promoted in England by the 'Father of Modern Bodybuilding, German-born Eugen Sandow. He allowed audiences to enjoy viewing his physique in \"muscle display performances\". Although audiences were thrilled to see a well-developed physique, the men simply displayed their bodies as part of strength demonstrations or wrestling matches. Sandow had a stage show built around these displays through his manager, Florenz Ziegfeld. The Oscar-winning 1936 musical film The Great Ziegfeld, depicts this beginning of modern bodybuilding, when Sandow began to display his body for carnivals.\n\nSandow was so successful at flexing and posing his physique that he later created several businesses around his fame, and was among the first to market products branded with his name. He was credited with inventing and selling the first exercise equipment for the masses: machined dumbbells, spring pulleys and tension bands. Even his image was sold by the thousands in \"cabinet cards\" and other prints.\n\nSandow was a perfect \"gracilian\". This was a standard of ideal body proportions close to those of ancient Greek and Roman statues – see Golden Mean. Men were judged by how closely they matched these proportions,The Golden One represents some of these statues.\n\nFirst large-scale bodybuilding competition\n\nSandow organised the first bodybuilding contest on September 14, 1901 called the \"Great Competition\" which was held in the Royal Albert Hall, London, UK. Judged by himself, Sir Charles Lawes, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the contest was a great success and with a capacity crowd many bodybuilding enthusiasts were turned away. The trophy presented to the winner was a gold statue of Sandow sculpted by Frederick Pomeroy. The winner was William L. Murray of Nottingham, England. The silver or spelter Sandow Trophy was presented to the second-place winner, D. Cooper. The Bronze Sandow Trophy, the most famous of all, was presented to the third-place winner, A.C. Smythe. In 1950 this same bronze trophy was presented to Steve Reeves for winning the inaugural NABBA Mr. Universe. It would not resurface again until 1977 when the winner of the IFBB Mr. Olympia contest, Frank Zane, was presented with the Bronze Sandow Trophy, or at least a replica of it. Since then, Mr. Olympia winners have been awarded a replica of the bronze trophy.\n\nOn 16 January 1904, the first large-scale bodybuilding competition in America took place at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The competition was promoted by Bernarr Macfadden, the father of physical culture and publisher of the original bodybuidling magazines including Health & Strength. The winner was Al Treloar and he was declared \"The Most Perfectly Developed Man in the World\". Treloar won a $1,000 cash prize, a substantial sum at that time. Two weeks later, Thomas Edison made a film of Al Treloar's posing routine. Edison also made two films of Sandow a few years before. Those were the first three motion pictures featuring a bodybuilder. In the early 20th century, Bernarr Macfadden and Charles Atlas, continued to promote bodybuilding across the world. Alois P. Swoboda was an early pioneer in America.\n\nNotable early bodybuilders \n\nMany other important bodybuilders in the early history of bodybuilding prior to 1930 include: Bernarr Macfadden, Earle Liederman (writer of some of the earliest bodybuilding instruction books), Zishe Breitbart, Georg Hackenschmidt, Emy Nkemena, George F. Jowett, Finn Hateral (a pioneer in the art of posing), Frank Saldo, Monte Saldo, William Bankier, Launceston Elliot, Sig Klein, Sgt. Alfred Moss, Joe Nordquist, Lionel Strongfort (Strongfortism), Gustav Frištenský (the Czech champion), Ralph Parcaut, a champion wrestler who also authored an early book on \"physical culture,\" and Alan P. Mead, who became an impressive muscle champion despite the fact that he lost a leg in World War I. Actor Francis X. Bushman started his career as a bodybuilder and sculptor's model before beginning his famous silent movie career. Bushman was a disciple of Eugen Sandow.\n\n1950s and 1960s \n\nBodybuilding became more popular in the 1950s and 1960s with the emergence of strength and gymnastics champions joining the culture, and the simultaneous popularization of muscle training, most of all by Joe Weider, whose advertising in comic books and other publications encouraged many young men to undertake weight training to improve their physiques to resemble the comic books' muscular superheroes. Of notable athletes, US national and gymnastics champion and US Olympic weightlifting team competitor John Grimek and British strength athlete Reg Park as winners of newly created bodybuilding titles such as the Mr. Universe and Mr. America competitions paved the way for others. Magazines such as Strength & Health and Muscular Development were accompanied by the fame of Muscle Beach, in Santa Monica, California. The casting of some bodybuilders in movies was another major vehicle for the activity's popularization. Of bodybuilder-actors perhaps the most famous were Steve Reeves and Reg Park, who were featured in roles portraying Hercules, Samson and other legendary heroes. Dave Draper gained public fame through a role in Don't Make Waves, and in appearances in television series such as the Beverly Hillbillies and The Monkees. Other rising stars in this period were Larry Scott, Serge Nubret, and Sergio Oliva. The gym equipment and training supplement industries founded by Joe Weider were complemented by the growth of the International Federation of BodyBuilding & Fitness (IFBB), which was co-founded by Joe and his brother Ben. The IFBB eventually displaced the Amateur Athletic Union's Mr. Universe titles and also that of NABBA, the National Amateur Bodybuilders Association as the most important and notable contests.\n\n1970s onwards\n\nNew organizations \n\nIn the 1970s, bodybuilding had major publicity thanks to Arnold Schwarzenegger, Franco Columbu, Lou Ferrigno and others in the 1977 film Pumping Iron. By this time the International Federation of BodyBuilding & Fitness (IFBB) dominated the competitive bodybuilding landscape and the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) took a back seat.\n\nThe National Physique Committee (NPC) was formed in 1981 by Jim Manion, who had just stepped down as chairman of the AAU Physique Committee. The NPC has gone on to become the most successful bodybuilding organization in the U.S., and is the amateur division of the IFBB in the United States. The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the decline of AAU sponsored bodybuilding contests. In 1999, the AAU voted to discontinue its bodybuilding events.\n\nAnabolic/androgenic steroid use \n\nThis period also saw the rise of anabolic steroids used both in bodybuilding and many other sports. In bodybuilding lore, this is partly attributed to the rise of \"mass monsters\", beginning with Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sergio Oliva and Lou Ferrigno in the late 1960s and early 1970s and continuing in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s with Lee Haney, Dorian Yates, Ronnie Coleman and Markus Ruhl. Also the emergence of bodybuilders such as Greg Kovacs, Paul DeMayo and Victor Richards who, while not being particularly successful at the pro level, attained mass and size at levels that were not seen previously.\n\nArnold Schwarzenegger, at the time of shooting Pumping Iron, while never stating he used steroids, did say \"you have to do anything you can to get the advantage in competition\". But in later interviews acknowledged steroid use, saying he does not regret using anything. At the time Arnold was the face of bodybuilding, so this had a large impact . \n\nTo combat this, and in the hopes of becoming a member of the IOC, the IFBB introduced doping tests for both steroids and other banned substances. Although doping tests occurred, the majority of professional bodybuilders still used anabolic steroids for competition. During the 1970s the use of anabolic steroids was openly discussed partly due to the fact they were legal. However the U.S. Congress in the Anabolic Steroid Control Act of 1990 placed anabolic steroids into Schedule III of the Controlled substance act (CSA). Similarly in Canada, steroids were added to the Canadian Criminal Code as a Class IV controlled substance (that class was created expressly for steroids).\n\nWorld Bodybuilding Federation \n\nIn 1990, wrestling promoter Vince McMahon announced he was forming a new bodybuilding organization, the World Bodybuilding Federation (WBF). McMahon wanted to bring WWF-style showmanship and bigger prize money to the sport of bodybuilding. A number of IFBB stars were recruited but the roster was never very large, with the same athletes competing; the most notable winner and first WBF champion was Gary Strydom. McMahon formally dissolved the WBF in July 1992. Reasons for this probably included lack of income from the pay-per-view broadcasts of the WBF contests, slow sales of the WBF's magazine Bodybuilding Lifestyles (which later became WBF Magazine), and the expense of paying multiple 6-figure contracts as well as producing two TV shows and a monthly magazine.\n\nOlympic sport discussion \n\nIn the early 2000s, the IFBB was attempting to make bodybuilding an Olympic sport. It obtained full IOC membership in 2000 and was attempting to get approved as a demonstration event at the Olympics which would hopefully lead to it being added as a full contest. This did not happen. Olympic recognition for bodybuilding remains controversial since many argue that bodybuilding is not a sport. \n\nRecent developments \n\nIn 2003, Joe Weider sold Weider Publications to AMI, which owns The National Enquirer. The position of president of the IFBB was filled by Rafael Santonja following the death of Ben Weider in October 2008. In 2004, contest promoter Wayne DeMilia broke ranks with the IFBB and AMI took over the promotion of the Mr. Olympia contest. Other professional contests emerged in this period, such as the Arnold Classic, Night of Champions, and the European Grand Prix of Bodybuilding.\n\nIn the 1990s and the early 21st century, patterns of consumption and recreation similar to those of the United States became more widespread in Europe and especially in Eastern Europe following the collapse of the Soviet Union. This resulted in the emergence of whole new populations of bodybuilders emerged from former Eastern bloc states. In 2014 the FTM Fitness Conference hosted the FTM Fitness World Bodybuilding Competition, which was the first bodybuilding competition for transgender men. \n\nAreas \n\nProfessional bodybuilding \n\nIn the modern bodybuilding industry, \"professional\" generally means a bodybuilder who has won qualifying competitions as an amateur and has earned a \"pro card\" from their respective organization. Professionals earn the right to compete in competitions that include monetary prizes. Depending on the level of success, these bodybuilders may receive monetary compensation from sponsors, much like athletes in other sports.\n\nNatural bodybuilding \n\nDue to the growing concerns of the high cost, health consequences and illegal nature of steroids many organizations have formed in response and have deemed themselves \"natural\" bodybuilding competitions. In addition to the concerns noted, many promoters of bodybuilding have sought to shed the \"freakish\" reputation that the general public perceives of bodybuilding and have successfully introduced a more mainstream audience to the sport of bodybuilding by including competitors whose physiques appear much more attainable and realistic.\n\nIn natural contests the testing protocol ranges among organizations from polygraph testing (lie detection) to urinalysis. Penalties also range from organization to organization from suspensions to strict bans from competition. It is also important to note that natural organizations also have their own list of banned substances and it is important to refer to each organization's website for more information about which substances are banned from competition.\n\nThere are many natural bodybuilding organizations that exist. Some of the larger ones include MuscleMania, Ultimate Fitness Events (UFE), INBF/WNBF and INBA/PNBA. These organizations either have North American or worldwide presence and are not limited to the country in which they are headquartered.\n\nOther notable natural bodybuilding organization include the National Physique Committee (NPC) and the North American Natural Bodybuilding Federation (NANBF). NPC competitions screen competitors using a polygraph test to ensure fair practices. Though it is not fool-proof, competitors are selected at random and not all are tested. This is how the NPC differs from the NANBF. The NANBF takes a more direct approach by taking urine samples from all competitors that test for steroids and any other substances on the banned list. The NANBF differs from the NPC also when it comes to judging. The criteria of certain poses differs from organization to organization. The NANBF even has an elevated calf pose which is specifically unique for their competitions.\n\nFemale bodybuilding \n\nThe first U.S. Women's National Physique Championship, promoted by Henry McGhee and held in Canton, Ohio in 1978, is generally regarded as the first true female bodybuilding contest – that is, the first contest where the entrants were judged solely on muscularity. In 1980 the first Ms. Olympia (initially known as the \"Miss\" Olympia), the most prestigious contest for professionals, was held. The first winner was Rachel McLish who had also won the NPC's USA Championship earlier in the year. The contest was a major turning point for the sport of women's bodybuilding. McLish inspired many future competitors to start training and competing. In 1985, a movie called Pumping Iron II: The Women was released. This film documented the preparation of several women for the 1983 Caesars Palace World Cup Championship. Competitors prominently featured in the film were \nKris Alexander, Lori Bowen, Lydia Cheng, Carla Dunlap, Bev Francis, and Rachel McLish. At the time, Francis was actually a powerlifter, though she soon made a successful transition to bodybuilding, becoming one of the leading competitors of the late 1980s and early 1990s.\n\nIn recent years, the related areas of fitness and figure competition have gained in popularity, surpassing that of female bodybuilding, and have provided an alternative for women who choose not to develop the level of muscularity necessary for bodybuilding. Rachel McLish would closely resemble what is thought of today as a fitness and figure competitor instead of what is now considered a female bodybuilder. Fitness competitions also have a gymnastic element to them.\n\nA recent study by the Clinical Journal of Sport Medicine has found that female bodybuilders who are taking anabolic steroids are more likely to have qualified for substance-dependence disorder and have been diagnosed with a psychiatric illness and have a history of sexual abuse. \n\nCompetition \n\nIn competitive bodybuilding, bodybuilders aspire to develop and maintain an aesthetically pleasing body and balanced physique. In prejudging, competitors do a series of mandatory poses – the front lat spread, the rear lat spread, the front double biceps, the back double biceps, the side chest, the side triceps, the Most Muscular (men only), and the thigh-abdominal pose. Each competitor also performs a routine to display the physique. A posedown is usually held at the end of a posing round, while judges are finishing their scoring. Bodybuilders spend time practicing their posing, since they are judged on it.\n\nIn contrast to strongman or powerlifting competitions where physical strength is important, or to Olympic weightlifting, where the main point is equally split between strength and technique, bodybuilding competitions typically emphasize condition, size and symmetry. Different organizations emphasize particular aspects of competition, and sometimes have different categories in which to compete.\n\nPreparations \n\nCutting and bulking \n\nThe general strategy adopted by most present-day competitive bodybuilders is to make muscle gains for most of the year (known as the \"off-season\") and approximately 12–14 weeks from competition attempt to lose body fat (referred to as \"cutting\"). The bulking phase entails remaining in a net positive energy balance (calorie surplus). The amount of a surplus that a person remains in is based on the person's goals, as a bigger surplus and longer bulking phase will create more fat tissue. The surplus of calories relative to one's energy balance will ensure that muscles remain in a state of anabolism. The cutting phase entails remaining in a net negative energy balance (calorie deficit). The main goal of cutting is to oxidize fat while preserving as much muscle as possible. The larger the calorie deficit, the faster one will lose weight. However, a large calorie deficit will also create the risk of losing muscle tissue. \n\nThe precise effectiveness of the cutting and bulking strategy is unknown, with only limited observational case studies on the subject. No studies involving precise hypercaloric feeding combined with resistance exercise have been conducted.\n\nClean bulking \n\nMany non-competitive bodybuilders choose not to adopt the conventional strategy, as it often results in significant unwanted fat gain during the \"bulking\" phase. The attempt to increase muscle mass in one's body without any gain in fat is called clean bulking. Competitive bodybuilders focus their efforts to achieve a peak appearance during a brief \"competition season\".\n\nDirty bulking\n\n\"Dirty bulking\" is the process of eating at a caloric surplus, without finding the exact number of macronutrients (carbs, fats, and proteins). Weight lifters who are attempting to gain mass quickly often choose to use the \"dirty bulk\" method. \n\nPre-competition \n\nIn the week leading up to a contest, bodybuilders may decrease their consumption of water, sodium and carbohydrates, the former two to alter how water is retained by the body and the latter to reduce glycogen in the muscle. The day before the show, water is removed from the diet, and diuretics may be introduced, while carbohydrate loading to increase the size of the muscles through replenishment of their glycogen. The goal is to maximize leanness and increase the visibility of veins, or \"vascularity.\" The appearance of veins is further enhanced immediately before appearing on stage by darkening the skin through tanning products, and applying oils to the skin to increase shine. Some competitors will eat sugar-rich foods to increase the visibility of their veins. A final step is the use of weights to fill the muscles with blood and further increase their size.\n\nMuscle growth \n\nBodybuilders use three main strategies to maximize muscle hypertrophy:\n* Strength training through weights or elastic/hydraulic resistance\n* Specialized nutrition, incorporating extra protein and supplements when necessary\n* Adequate rest, including sleep and recuperation between workouts\n\nWeight training \n\nWeight training causes micro-tears to the muscles being trained; this is generally known as microtrauma. These micro-tears in the muscle contribute to the soreness felt after exercise, called delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS). It is the repair to these micro-trauma that result in muscle growth. Normally, this soreness becomes most apparent a day or two after a workout. However, as muscles become adapted to the exercises, soreness tends to decrease. \n\nWeight training aims to build muscle by prompting two different types of hypertrophy: sarcoplasmic hypertrophy and myofibrillar hypertrophy. Sarcoplasmic hypertrophy leads to larger muscles and so is favored by bodybuilders more than myofibrillar hypertrophy which builds athletic strength. Sarcoplasmic hypertrophy is triggered by increasing repetitions, whereas myofibrillar hypertrophy is triggered by lifting heavier weight. In either case, there is an increase in size and strength of the muscles (compared to if that same individual does not lift weights at all). However, the emphasis is different.\n\nMany trainees like to cycle between the two methods in order to prevent the body from adapting (maintaining a progressive overload), possibly emphasizing whichever method more suits their goals. I.e, a bodybuilder will use sarcoplasmic hypertrophy most of the time, but may change to myofibrillar hypertrophy temporarily in order to move past a plateau. However, no real evidence has been provided to show that trainees ever reach this plateau, and rather was more of a hype created from 'muscular confusion.'\n\nNutrition \n\nThe high levels of muscle growth and repair achieved by bodybuilders require a specialized diet. Generally speaking, bodybuilders require more calories than the average person of the same weight to provide the protein and energy requirements needed to support their training and increase muscle mass. A sub-maintenance level of food energy is combined with cardiovascular exercise to lose body fat in preparation for a contest. The ratios of calories from carbohydrates, proteins, and fats vary depending on the goals of the bodybuilder. \n\nCarbohydrates \n\nCarbohydrates play an important role for bodybuilders. Carbohydrates give the body energy to deal with the rigors of training and recovery. Carbohydrates also promote secretion of insulin, a hormone enabling cells to get the glucose they need. Insulin also carries amino acids into cells and promotes protein synthesis. Insulin has steroid-like effects in terms of muscle gains. It is impossible to promote protein synthesis without the existence of insulin, which means that without carbohydrates, it is impossible to add muscle mass. Bodybuilders seek out low-glycemic polysaccharides and other slowly digesting carbohydrates, which release energy in a more stable fashion than high-glycemic sugars and starches. This is important as high-glycemic carbohydrates cause a sharp insulin response, which places the body in a state where it is likely to store additional food energy as fat. However, bodybuilders frequently do ingest some quickly digesting sugars (often in form of pure dextrose or maltodextrin) after a workout. This may help to replenish glycogen stores within the muscle, and to stimulate muscle protein synthesis. \n\nProtein \n\nThe motor proteins actin and myosin generate the forces exerted by contracting muscles. Current advice says that bodybuilders should consume 25–30% of protein per total calorie intake to further their goal of maintaining and improving their body composition. This is a widely debated topic, with many arguing that 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight per day is ideal, some suggesting that less is sufficient, while others recommending 1.5, 2, or more. It is believed that protein needs to be consumed frequently throughout the day, especially during/after a workout, and before sleep. There is also some debate concerning the best type of protein to take. Chicken, turkey, beef, pork, fish, eggs and dairy foods are high in protein, as are some nuts, seeds, beans and lentils. Casein or whey are often used to supplement the diet with additional protein. Whey protein is the type of protein contained in many popular brands of protein supplements, and is preferred by many bodybuilders because of its high Biological Value (BV) and quick absorption rates. However, whey has a bigger effect than Casein on insulin levels. Whey triggers about double the amount of insulin release. That effect is somewhat overcome by combining Casein and whey. Bodybuilders are usually thought to require protein with a higher BV than that of soy, which is additionally avoided due to its claimed estrogenic properties. Still, some nutrition experts believe that soy, flax seeds and many other plants that contain the weak estrogen-like compounds or phytoestrogens can be used beneficially, as phytoestrogens compete with estrogens for receptor sites in the male body and can block its actions. This can also include some inhibition of pituitary functions while stimulating the P450 system (the system that eliminates hormones, drugs and metabolic waste product from the body) in the liver to more actively process and excrete excess estrogen. Cortisol decreases amino acid uptake by muscle, and inhibits protein synthesis. \n\nSome bodybuilders, such as Patrik Baboumian and Robert Cheeke follow a strict vegan diet.\n\nMeals \n\nBodybuilders often split their food intake for the day into 5 to 7 meals of roughly equal nutritional content and attempt to eat at regular intervals (e.g. every 2 to 3 hours). This method can serve two purposes: to limit overindulging in the cutting phase, and to physically allow for the consumption of large volumes of food during the bulking phase. Contrary to popular belief, eating more frequently does not increase basal metabolic rate when compared to the traditional 3 meals a day. While food does have a metabolic cost to digest, absorb, and store, called the thermic effect of food, it depends on the quantity and type of food, not how the food is spread across the meals of the day. Well-controlled studies using whole-body calorimetry and doubly labeled water have demonstrated that there is no metabolic advantage to eating more frequently. \n\nDietary supplements \n\nThe important role of nutrition in building muscle and losing fat means bodybuilders may consume a wide variety of dietary supplements. Various products are used in an attempt to augment muscle size, increase the rate of fat loss, improve joint health, increase natural testosterone production, enhance training performance and prevent potential nutrient deficiencies. There are three major macronutrients that the human body needs in order for muscle building. The major nutrients - protein, carbohydrate, and fat - provide the body with energy. \n\nPerformance-enhancing substances \n\nSome bodybuilders use drugs such as anabolic steroids and precursor substances such as prohormones to increase muscle hypertrophy. Anabolic steroids cause muscle hypertrophy of both types (I and II) of muscle fibers caused likely by an increased synthesis of muscle proteins and are accompanied with undesired side effects including hepatotoxicity, gynecomastia, acne, early onset male pattern baldness and a decline in the body's own testosterone production, which can cause testicular atrophy. Other performance-enhancing substances used by competitive bodybuilders include human growth hormone (HGH), which can cause acromegaly.\n\nMuscle growth is more difficult to achieve in older adults than younger adults because of biological aging, which leads to many metabolic changes detrimental to muscle growth; for instance, by diminishing growth hormone and testosterone. Some recent clinical studies have shown that low-dose HGH treatment for adults with HGH deficiency changes the body composition by increasing muscle mass, decreasing fat mass, increasing bone density and muscle strength, improves cardiovascular parameters, and affects the quality of life without significant side effects. \n\nRest \n\nAlthough muscle stimulation occurs in the gym (or home gym) when lifting weights, muscle growth occurs afterward during rest. Without adequate rest and sleep (7 to 8 hours), muscles do not have an opportunity to recover and build. About eight hours of sleep a night is desirable for the bodybuilder to be refreshed, although this varies from person to person. Additionally, many athletes find a daytime nap further increases their body's ability to build muscles. Some individual bodybuilders add a massage, sometimes by professional masseuse, massager or masseur at the end of each workout to their routine as a method of recovering. \n\nOvertraining \n\nOvertraining occurs when a bodybuilder has trained to the point where his workload exceeds his recovery capacity. There are many reasons that overtraining occurs, including lack of adequate nutrition, lack of recovery time between workouts, insufficient sleep, and training at a high intensity for too long (a lack of splitting apart workouts). Training at a high intensity too frequently also stimulates the central nervous system (CNS) and can result in a hyper-adrenergic state that interferes with sleep patterns. To avoid overtraining, intense frequent training must be met with at least an equal amount of purposeful recovery. Timely provision of carbohydrates, proteins, and various micronutrients such as vitamins, minerals, phytochemicals, even nutritional supplements are acutely critical.\n\nIt has been argued that overtraining can be beneficial. One article published by Muscle & Fitness magazine stated that you can \"Overtrain for Big Gains\". It suggested that if one is planning a restful holiday and they do not wish to inhibit their bodybuilding lifestyle too much, they should overtrain before taking the holiday, so the body can rest easily and recuperate and grow. Overtraining can be used advantageously, as when a bodybuilder is purposely overtrained for a brief period of time to super compensate during a regeneration phase. These are known as \"shock micro-cycles\" and were a key training technique used by Soviet athletes. \n\nNon muscle-developing methods \n\nSome bodybuilders, particularly at the professional level, inject substances such as \"site enhancement oil\", commonly known as synthol, to mimic the appearance of developed muscle where it may otherwise be disproportionate or lagging. This is known as \"fluffing\". Synthol is 85% oil, 7.5% lidocaine, and 7.5% alcohol. It is not restricted, and many brands are available on the Internet. The use of injected oil to enhance muscle appearance is common among bodybuilders, despite the fact that synthol can cause pulmonary embolisms, nerve damage, infections, sclerosing lipogranuloma, stroke, and the formation of oil-filled granulomas, cysts or ulcers in the muscle. Sesame oil is often used, which can cause allergic reactions such as vasculitis. An aesthetic issue is drooping of muscle under gravity.", "Charles Atlas (born Angelo Siciliano; October 30, 1892 – December 24, 1972) was the developer of a bodybuilding method and its associated exercise program that was best known for a landmark advertising campaign featuring Atlas's name and likeness; it has been described as one of the longest-lasting and most memorable ad campaigns of all time. \n\nAtlas trained himself to develop his body from that of a \"scrawny weakling\", eventually becoming the most popular muscleman of his day. He took the name Charles Atlas after a friend told him that he resembled the statue of Atlas on top of a hotel in Coney Island and legally changed his name in 1922. He marketed his first body building course with health and fitness writer Dr. Frederick Tilney in November 1922. Tilney wrote the original course \"Health & Strength by Charles Atlas,\" and the duo ran the company out of Tilney's home for the first six months. In 1929, Tilney sold his half of the business to advertising man Charles P. Roman and moved to Miami, Florida, where he operated a very successful health food business until his death in 1977. Charles Atlas Ltd. was founded in 1929 and, as of 2015, continues to market a fitness program for the \"97-pound weakling\" (44 kg). The company is now owned by Jeffrey C. Hogue.\n\nHistory\n\nAngelo Siciliano was born in Acri, Calabria, Italy, in 1892. Angelino, as he was also called, moved to Brooklyn, New York at the age of 11 and eventually became a leather worker. He tried many forms of exercise initially, using weights, pulley-style resistance, and gymnastic-style calisthenics. Atlas claimed that they did not build his body. He was inspired by other fitness and health advocates who preceded him, including world-renowned strongman Eugen Sandow and Bernarr MacFadden (a major proponent of \"Physical Culture\"). He was too poor to join the local YMCA, so he watched how exercises were performed, then performed them at home. He attended the strongman shows at Coney Island, and would question the strongmen about their diets and exercise regimens after the show. He would read Physical Culture magazine for further information on health, strength, and physical development, and finally developed his own system of exercises which was later called 'Dynamic Tension,' a phrase coined by Charles Roman.\n\nA bully kicked sand into Siciliano's face at a beach when he was a youth, according to the story that he always told. At this time in his life, also according to the story, he weighed only 97 lb. However, an early Atlas brochure from 1924 showed a 1903 picture of a small, thin Angelo Siciliano dressed in clothes for the period, including traditional knickerbockers. In later editions of the brochure, Angelo's age was changed to 15. According to several stories and claims, he was at the zoo watching a lion stretch when he thought to himself, \"Does this old gentleman have any barbells, any exercisers?...And it came over me....He's been pitting one muscle against another!\" \n\nNone of the exercises in the Dynamic tension course could be attributed to an African big cat, but other exercise courses of the time contained exercises similar to Atlas's course, particularly those marketed by Bernarr McFadden and Earle E. Liederman. Were they all inspired by stretching lions at the zoo? He concluded that lions and tigers became strong by pitting muscle against muscle. \n\nBernarr MacFadden, publisher of the magazine Physical Culture, dubbed Siciliano \"America's Most Handsome Man\" in 1921, and \"Americas Most Perfectly Developed Man\" in a 1922 contest held in Madison Square Garden He soon took the role of strongman in the Coney Island Circus Side Show. Nowhere did Atlas win a title proclaiming him to be the world's most perfectly developed man.\n\nIn 1922, 30-year-old Siciliano officially changed his name to Charles Atlas, as it sounded much more American. He met Dr. Frederick Tilney, a British homeopathic physician and course writer who was employed as publisher Bernarr MacFadden's \"ideas man.\" Atlas and Tilney met through MacFadden, who was using Atlas as a model for a short movie entitled \"The Road to Health.\" Atlas wrote a fitness course and then asked Tilney to edit it. Tilney agreed and Atlas went into business in 1922. Tilney himself had an extensive background in weight training.\n\nDynamic Tension \n\nAtlas' \"Dynamic Tension\" program consists of twelve lessons and one final perpetual lesson. Each lesson is supplemented with photos of Atlas demonstrating the exercises. Atlas' lesson booklets added commentary that referred to the readers as his friends and gave them an open invitation to write him letters to update him on their progress and stories. His products and lessons have sold millions, and Atlas became the face of fitness. Among the people who took Atlas' course were Max Baer, heavyweight boxing champion from 1934 to 1935; Rocky Marciano, heavyweight boxing champion from 1952 to 1956; Joe Louis, heavyweight boxing champion from 1937 to 1949; British heavyweight weightlifting champion and Darth Vader actor David Prowse; and Allan Wells, the 1980 Moscow Olympic Games 100 meter champion.\n\nWeightlifting \n\nAtlas was described as a student of Earle E. Liederman in several editions of a Liederman booklet, until shortly before the Dynamic Tension course was published. The 1918 edition of the booklet states that Atlas had performed a one-arm overhead press with 236 lb. The 1920 edition states a 266 lbs one-arm overhead press. However, Atlas/Siciliano was already a strong, well developed man before being featured in Liederman's magazine. \n\n;The American Continental Weight Lifting Association (ACWLA)\n\"In April of 1924, (David P.) Willoughby staged a \"National\" weightlifting championship, which was also supposed to serve as a basis for selecting an Olympic Team to represent the United States at the upcoming Paris Olympic Games (no team was ever sent to Paris). In the meantime, Jowett joined the staff of Calvert's Strength magazine and began, with Calvert, to push the ACWLA. The ACWLA was also reorganized, with Jowett as president, Coulter and Willoughby as vice presidents, and an advisory board that included Charles Atlas, Bernard, Calvert, Earle Leiderman, Charles MacMahon, Bernarr Macfadden and Henry Titus (many of the major players in the Iron Game at that time). Jowett was to be the editor of Strength magazine from 1924 to 1927 and that position, along with his energy in it, made him the most powerful voice for the organization of weightlifting in the United States at that time. He staged a number of competitions and the first ACWLA governance meeting (in late 1924). At that meeting, issues such as the lifts to be contested were agreed to.\" \n\nArtists' model \n\nBesides photographs, Atlas posed for many statues throughout his life. These included Alexander Stirling Calder's Washington at Peace (1917-18) on the Washington Square Arch, Manhattan; Pietro Montana's Dawn of Glory (1924) in Highland Park, Brooklyn (sometimes misreported as Prospect Park); and James Earle Frazer's Alexander Hamilton (1923) at the U.S. Treasury Building in Washington, D.C. \n\nDeath \n\nAtlas began to experience chest pains after exercising. In his final years, Atlas developed diabetes and was placed on a high protein diet by his doctors to offset the effects of the disease. This led to his arteries being clogged and resulted in his hospitalization. He died on December 24, 1972 in Long Island Memorial Hospital. He left behind a son, Charles Jr., and a daughter, Diana. His wife, Margaret, had predeceased him seven years before. There is no evidence of heart trouble in the Atlas family. Santos Siciliano, Atlas' father, who had returned to Italy shortly after arriving in the USA in 1903, lived into his 90s. Atlas' son, Charles Jr., died in August 2008 at the age of 89.\n\nThe print advertisements \n\nThe famous Charles Atlas print advertisements became iconic mostly because they were printed in many comic books from the 1940s onwards – in fact continuing long after Atlas' death. The typical scenario, usually expressed in comic strip form, presented a skinny young man (usually accompanied by a female companion) being threatened by a bully. The bully pushes down the \"97-pound weakling\" and the girlfriend joins in the derision. The young man goes home, gets angry (usually demonstrated by his kicking a chair), and sends away for the free Atlas book. Shortly thereafter, the newly muscled hero returns to the place of his original victimization, seeks out the bully, and beats him up. He is rewarded by the swift return of his girlfriend and the admiration of onlookers.\n\nThe ad was said to be based on an experience the real Atlas had as a boy. With variations, it was a mainstay of comic books and boys' magazines for decades. The ads usually conclude with the words \"As is true of all the exercises in Atlas's course, you can do these exercises almost anywhere.\" \n\n\"The Insult that Made a Man out of Mac\" \n\nIn this, the full-length version, the protagonist, \"Mac,\" is accosted on the beach by a sand-kicking bully while his date watches. Humiliated, the young man goes home and, after kicking a chair and gambling a three-cent stamp, subscribes to Atlas's \"Dynamic-Tension\" program. Later, the now muscular protagonist goes back to the beach and beats up the bully, becoming the \"hero of the beach.\" His girl returns while other women marvel at how big his muscles are. (An earlier but otherwise almost identical version, \"How Joe's Body Brought Him Fame Instead of Shame,\" debuted in the 1940s). \n\n\"The Insult That Turned a 'Chump' Into a Champ\" \n\nIn this version, which debuted in 1941, \"Joe\" is at a fair with his girl when the bully (who has just shown his strength with the \"Ring-the-Bell\" game) insults and pushes him. Joe goes home, slams his fist on the table, and orders the free Atlas book. Joe then returns to the fair, rings the bell, and pushes down the bully while his girlfriend reappears to compliment him on his new, powerful physique.\n\n\"Hey, Skinny! Yer Ribs Are Showing!\" \n\nThe condensed, four-panel version stars \"Joe,\" though it is otherwise identical to Mac's story. Instead of \"Hero of the beach,\" the words floating above Joe's head are \"What a man!\"\n\n\"How Jack the Weakling Slaughtered the Dance-Floor Hog\" \n\nAnother version of the ad presents a scenario in which \"Jack\" is dancing with his girl, Helen. They are bumped into by a bully, who comments on how puny Jack is, not even worth beating up. Jack goes home, kicks a chair, and sends away for Atlas's \"free book.\" Later, the muscular Jack finds the bully, punches him, and wins back the admiration of Helen. This time, the words \"Hit of the party\" float over his head as he basks in the admiration of the other dancers.\n\nIn popular culture\n\nLiterature\n\n* In the 1966 postmodern novel Beautiful Losers, written by Leonard Cohen, Charles Atlas is parodied as \"Charles Axis.\"\n* The short story \"Charles Atlas Also Dies\" by Sergio Ramirez centers on the main character, a follower of Atlas's exercise program, and his trip to the United States to meet Charles Atlas himself; written from an ironic and dark-humored perspective. Among the numerous references to Atlas's program/story/advertisements, the main character describes having sand kicked in his face by \"two big hefty guys\" in front of his girlfriend and later being compared to the mythological god Atlas after undergoing the program. The story juxtaposes the superhuman strength and notoriety of Charles Atlas—the symbol, with the fragile and mortal aspects of Charles Atlas—the man. The story begins with the quote: \"Charles Atlas swears that sand story is true. – Edwin Pope, The Miami Herald\". \n* In Kurt Vonnegut's novel Cat's Cradle, Charles Atlas is mentioned. When the narrator comes across the term \"Dynamic Tension\" in a book about the mysterious cult leader Bokonon, he laughs because he imagines the author does not know \"that the term was one vulgarised by Charles Atlas, a mail-order muscle-builder.\" However, as he reads on he finds that Bokonon is an alumnus of Atlas's training program, which has inspired his idea that \"good societies could be built only by pitting good against evil, and by keeping the tension between the two high at all times.\"\n* The children's book, Strong Man: The Story of Charles Atlas written and illustrated by Meghan McCarthy, tells the story how a \"97-pound weakling\" who was picked on by neighborhood bullies developed into Charles Atlas, \"the World's Most Perfectly Developed Man\". \n\nFilm and TV\n\n* In the 1978 Vietnam war film The Boys in Company C, Marine Vinnie Fazio complains during a force march that he is carrying too much ammunition and gear for the platoon, shouting out \"What am I? Charles Atlas?\".\n* In the Futurama episode \"When Aliens Attack,\" Fry gets sand kicked in his face by a \"professional beach bully\" who asks for payment for his services after Fry has won the girl, Leela. Leela hits on the bully, but the bully claims to be gay.\n* The title song of the 1964 film Muscle Beach Party features the lyric \"Cherry little woodies are the center of attention / Til the muscle men start the dynamic tension\"\n* In the Ren and Stimpy episode \"Ren's Pecs,\" Ren seeks counsel from the bodybuilder \"Charles Globe\", who inspires him to get plastic surgery. Charles Globe and the entire episode are obvious spoofs of the Charles Atlas story.\n*In the Seinfeld episode \"The English Patient\", the character of Izzy Mandelbaum is said to have worked out with Charles Atlas in the '50s to which Jerry wryly replies, \"1850s?\", poking fun at Izzy's age. \n*Rocky Horror Picture Show (film, 1975), a rock and roll musical, makes several references to Atlas:\n**In \"Charles Atlas Song / I Can Make You a Man\":\n*** The title line exploits the grammatical ambiguity of Atlas's slogan \"In just seven days, I can make you a man,\" between the meanings \"... cause you to become a 'real' man\" and \"... create a man for you.\"\n*** Both Charles Atlas and \"Dynamic-Tension\" are mentioned by name.\n*** It refers to a 98-pound weakling, a reference to Atlas' \"97-pound weakling.\"\n*** The second line refers to the Charles Atlas advertising campaign with \"Will get sand in his face when kicked to the ground.\"\n** The mad-scientist character (Dr. Frank N. Furter) claims that his Frankensteinian creation \"carries the Charles Atlas Seal of Approval.\"\n* A Spitting Image annual parodies the Charles Atlas advertisement, with the two protagonists competing not on muscular physique, but with their rhetorical skills and grasp of post-modernism.\n* In an episode of That '70s Show, Eric's sister accuses him of being weak by saying he ordered a Charles Atlas video to buff up.\n* In an episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus, Terry Gilliam creates an animation which is a visual spoof of Charles Atlas' ad campaign.\n* In an episode of Punky Brewster, Punky asks Henry if he still has his Charles Atlas books after being bullied at school.\n* In \"Mild Mannered\", an episode of Warehouse 13, a pair of Charles Atlas's trunks imbue a character with superhuman powers, including superstrength and the ability to alter his own density.\n* In \"The Missing Page\", an episode of Hancock's Half Hour, Hancock reads the fictional detective novel 'Lady, Don't Fall Backwards'. The final page has been removed, and Hancock reads the lines 'Men! Are you skinny?! Do bullies kick sand in your face?!', a parody of Atlas' advertising in pulp novels.\n* In an episode of the television show, What's My Line?, in 1956. Charles Atlas was the mystery guest, calling himself Mr. X. \n* In an episode of the television show, Red Dwarf, season 3, episode 4, called \"Bodyswap\", Rimmer claims Lister was no Charles Atlas to begin with. They had previously swapped bodies so that Rimmer could make Listers body fit. Instead, he abused the trust.\n* Robot Chicken has a sketch wherein a weakling gets sand kicked in his face by a bully. He then gets a shot of \"Barry McGwire's Super Happy Fun Time Anger Go Go Juice\" which turns him into a huge muscleman and he tears the bully in two.\n\nMusic\n\n*The song \"Sand in My Face\" by 10cc, on their debut album, is a detailed description of Atlas's legendary ads.\n*The band A.F.I. have a song called \"Charles Atlas\" on their album Very Proud of Ya.\n*The The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band song \"Mr Apollo\" is a parody that includes the lines \"Five years ago I was a four-stone apology ... Today I am two separate gorillas!\"\n*The Darling Pet Munkee song \"Charles Atlas (Hey Skinny...Yer Ribs Are Showing!)\" is specifically about the Atlas ads.\n*The Bob Dylan unreleased song \"She's Your Lover Now\" from 1965 contains the lyric: \"Why must I fall into this sadness? / Do I look like Charles Atlas? / Do you think I still got what you still got, baby?\"\n* The Faces song \"On the Beach\" contains the line \"though I may not be no Charlie Atlas, / Gonna take my shirt off anyway.\"\n*The Australian band The Fauves had a minor local hit with their song \"The Charles Atlas Way.\"\n* The Josef K song \"Sorry For Laughing\" (made popular in the U.S. by Propaganda) contains the line \"when we grooved on into town / Charles Atlas stopped to frown / cause he's not made like me and you\"\n*\"We Are The Champions\" by Queen includes the line, \"I've had my share of sand kicked in my face...\"\n*The Who song \"I Can't Reach You\", on the album The Who Sell Out, is preceded by a \"commercial\" for the Charles Atlas Course. (\"The Charles Atlas course with \"Dynamic Tension\" can turn you into a beast of a man.\") John Entwistle poses on the cover as a panther skin-clad Charles Atlas alumnus, as the more muscular Roger Daltrey was otherwise occupied in a bathtub filled with baked beans. (After this photo session Daltrey caught pneumonia through the beans being ice cold at the end of the shoot.)\n* Roger Waters' song \"Sunset Strip\" from his album Radio K.A.O.S., contains the line \"I like riding in my Uncle's car / Down to the beach where the pretty girls all parade / And movie stars and paparazzi play the Charles Atlas kicking-sand-in-the-face game.\"\n*In the song \"I Will Not Fall\" by Wiretrain/Wire, these lyrics appear: \"And Charles Atlas Stands, upon the beach, upon his head and says ... I will not fall.\"\n*The Statler Brothers song \"Do You Remember These\" contains the line \"Charles Atlas course, Roy Rogers' horse, and 'only the Shadow knows'...\"\n*The Rocky Horror Picture Show song \"I Can Make You a Man\" references both \"Charles Atlas\" and \"dynamic tension.\"\n*Gama Bomb CD titled \"Tales From The Grave in Space\" features a booklet in which several graphics with song lyrics were designed to resemble Charles Atlas'ads'...\"\n\nArt\n\n* The artist David Hockney, included a print entitled 'The Seven Stone Weakling' in his 1961-3 series, The Rake's Progress. \n\nMagazine and newspapers\n\n* A Canberra Times cartoon features the athletic Tony Abbott having his comeuppance against policy heavyweight Kevin Rudd. \n* An issue of Nickelodeon Magazine features a fake advertisement that parodies the Atlas body ads; the difference is that the product promises to make a person extremely smart. In this parody, a genius man picks on an incredibly strong yet slow-witted man for his lack of intelligence. The man gets his revenge by scientifically proving that the genius bully does not exist, making him disappear.\n* An article in The Onion spinoff Our Dumb Century portrays a feud between Adlai Stevenson and General William Westmoreland being carried out in the same vein as illustrated in the Charles Atlas advertisement.\n\nComics\n\n*In an issue of the DC Comics title Mystery in Space, the main character, Comet, referring to an army of super-powered clones, says, \"Physically those clones may make me look like a 98-pound-weakling, but psychically I'm the Charles Atlas of this beach.\"\n*The January 1974 issue of the satiric magazine National Lampoon was dedicated to animals: Pets, circus, wild beasts, evolution, law, etc. A fake advertisement in the article ‘’Popular Evolution’’, a parody of the magazine Popular Mechanics, presents in the three-stage comic strip manner a Charles Atlas-style commercial. A little skinny mouse suffers the humiliation of being kicked at the beach by a bully, some sort or medium-size carnivore. Little mouse, goes home, kicks a chair, fills the form and sends it to Mr. Charles Darwin, Galapagos Islands. “After a few millions years of evolutionary exercise” little mouse has developed fangs, and ugly scary face, wings, amongst other attributes; goes back to the beach, bites the bully predator in the neck, Count Dracula style and is declared the “heroe of the habitat” by the admiring females. Leider the issue is out of print and cannot be seen online anywhere. \n*The \"kicking sand in the face\" image has been used many times in Archie comics.\n*Flex Mentallo in Doom Patrol was supposed to be the character in the Charles Atlas ad. Several years later, Jeffrey C. Hogue, president of Charles Atlas, Ltd. sued DC Comics, particularly over issue #42, in which Mentallo's origin is told, in which the character literally arises straight from the ad. The court found that the statute of limitations had run out between the publication of the comic and the lawsuit, and that, because the comic book could not be considered an advertisement for something else, it was legally protected parody. \n*Marvel Comics' humor series What The--?! used Atlas parodies regularly, as in \"The Insult that Made Mac a Blood-Sucking Freak!\" (What The--?! #23, November 1992).\n*Minicomics pioneer Matt Feazell uses the sand-kicking bully to represent the Etruscan attack on Rome in Not Available Comics #25, 1993.\n*\"The Hold-Up that Made a Hero Out of Mac\", from Radioactive Man #1 (Bongo Comics, 1993), blends Mac's story with Batman's origin.\n*Cartoonist Chris Ware appropriated Mac's \"chair-kicking resolve\" in a Jimmy Corrigan story from Acme Novelty Library #1 (Fantagraphics, Winter 1993).\n*Cartoonist Josh Neufeld used the ad to spoof business writer David A. Vise in a piece done for Fortune Small Business magazine in 2002.\n*In the June 4, 2007, edition of \"This Modern World,\" Tom Tomorrow uses the ad to make a point about how President George W. Bush pushes around Congressional Democrats. \n*New Orleans cartoonist Caesar Meadows spoofed the ad—substituting zine-making for bodybuilding—while advertising the 2008 Alternative Media Expo. \n*The Strange Talent of Luther Strode by Justin Jordan and Tradd Moore features a dark parody of Atlas's Dynamic Tension regimen, one which bestows superhuman strength, durability and reflexes, but at the cost of gaining an aggressive nature and seeing people as their musculature.\n\nVideo games\n\n*In early versions of the game, The Secret of Monkey Island, there was a statue in a voodoo shop that when inspected would make the character say \"Looks like an emaciated Charles Atlas.\" The reference has since been removed due to Lucasfilm Games receiving a cease and desist letter. \n*Video game developer Valve released an update to their popular game, Team Fortress 2 that gave the sniper class a jar of urine called \"Jarate\". The comic strip that Valve used to advertise the update is a parody of the strip \"The Insult that Made a Man out of Mac\". A later update that introduced the ability for players to give and receive high fives was promoted with similar comic strip, this time spoofing the strip \"Hey, Skinny! Yer Ribs Are Showing!\" \n*The physically unimposing \"Little Mac\" character in Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! and the Punch-Out!! franchise is named in homage to the \"Mac\" of Atlas' best-known comic-book advertisement.\n*The game Kingdom of Loathing contains a reference to the sand-kicking campaign.", "Muscle car is an American term used to refer to a variety of high-performance automobiles. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines muscle cars as \"any of a group of American-made 2-door or 4-door sports cars with powerful engines designed for high-performance driving.\" A large V8 engine is fitted in a 2-door, rear wheel drive, family-style mid-size or full-size car designed for four or more passengers. Sold at an affordable price, muscle cars are intended for street use and occasional drag racing. They are distinct from two-seat sports cars and expensive 2+2 GTs intended for high-speed touring and road racing. \nEtymology \n\nAccording to Muscle Cars, a book written by Peter Henshaw, a \"muscle car\" is \"exactly what the name implies. It is a product of the American car industry adhering to the hot rodder's philosophy of taking a small car and putting a large-displacement engine in it. The Muscle Car is Charles Atlas kicking sand in the face of the 98 horsepower weakling.\" Henshaw further asserts that the muscle car was designed for straight-line speed, and did not have the \"sophisticated chassis\", \"engineering integrity\", or \"lithe appearance\" of European high-performance cars.\n\nIn the United States, lightweight cars featuring high-performance engines were termed \"supercar\" before the classification of muscle car became popular. For example, the 1957 Rebel's \"potent mill turned the lightweight Rambler into a veritable supercar.\" \"From the mid-sixties to the mid-seventies, what we now think of as muscle cars were more commonly called “Supercars,” often (though not always) spelled with a capital S.\" This term described the \"dragstrip bred\" affordable mid-size cars of the 1960s and early 1970s that were equipped with large, powerful V8 engines and rear-wheel-drive. \"In 1966, the supercar became an official industry trend\" as the four domestic automakers \"needed to cash in on the supercar market\" with eye-catching, heart-stopping cars. Examples of the use of the supercar description for the early muscle models include the May 1965 Car Life road test of the Pontiac GTO along with how \"Hurst puts American Motors into the Supercar club with the 390 Rogue\" (the SC/Rambler) to fight in \"the Supercar street racer gang\" market segment. Moreover, the \"SC\" in the model name stood for \"SuperCar\". \n\nThe supercar market segment in the U.S. at the time included special versions of regular production models that were positioned in several sizes and market segments (such as the \"economy supercar\" ), as well as limited edition, documented dealer-converted vehicles. However, the supercar term by that time \"had been diluted and branded with a meaning that did not respect the unique qualities of the 'muscle car'.\" \n\nOpinions vary as to whether high-performance full-size cars, compacts, and pony car qualify as muscle cars. \n\nHistory \n\nEarly production models\n\nOpinions on the origin of the muscle car vary, but the 1949 Oldsmobile Rocket 88, created in response to public interest in speed and power, is often cited as the first muscle car. It featured America's first high-compression overhead valve V8 in the smaller, lighter Oldsmobile 76/Chevy body for six-cylinder engines (as opposed to bigger Olds 98 luxury body).\n\nJack Nerrad wrote in Driving Today, \"the Rocket V-8 set the standard for every American V-8 engine that would follow it for at least three decades[...] With a displacement of 303 cubic inches and topped by a two-barrel carburetor, the first Rocket V-8 churned out 135 hp at 3,600 rpm and 263 lb·ft of torque at a lazy 1800 rpm [and] no mid-range car in the world, save the Hudson Hornet, came close to the Rocket Olds performance potential...\"\n\nNerad added that the Rocket 88 was \"the hit of NASCAR’s 1950 season, winning eight of the 10 races. Given its lightning-like success, one could clearly make the case that the Olds 88 with its 135 hp V-8 was the first 'musclecar'...\" \n\nSteve Dulcich, writing in Popular Hot Rodding, also cites Oldsmobile, concurrently with Cadillac, as having \"launched the modern era of the high-performance V-8 with the introduction of the 'Rocket 88' overhead-valve V8 in 1949.\" \n\nOther manufacturers showcased performance hardware in limited-edition models. Chrysler led the way with its 1955 C-300, an inspired blend of Hemi power and luxury-car trappings that became the new star of NASCAR. With 300 hp, it was advertised as \"America's Most Powerful Car\".\n\nCapable of accelerating from 0 to 60 mi/h in 9.8 seconds and reaching 130 mph, the 1955 Chrysler 300 is also recognized as one of the best-handling cars of its era. \n\nStudebaker entered the muscle car scene in 1956 with the Golden Hawk powered by a 352 CID Packard V8 with 275 bhp. For the 1957 model year, the Rambler Rebel was the fastest stock American sedan according to Motor Trend. Musclecar Enthusiast magazine describes this was \"what some people believe to be the very first muscle car.\" the compact-sized (for the era) 255 hp unibody 1957 Rebel might be \"better known had AMC been successful in their attempt to offer it with Bendix fuel injection.\"\n\nThe popularity and performance of muscle cars grew in the early 1960s, as Mopar (Dodge, Plymouth, and Chrysler) and Ford battled for supremacy in drag racing. The 1962 Dodge Dart 413 CID Max Wedge, for example, could run a 13-second 1/4-mile dragstrip at over 100 mph. In 1961 Chevrolet introduced the SS package on the Impala for $53.80, with included an optional 409 cu in v8 with 425 hp and upgraded brakes, tires, and suspension. By 1964, General Motors' lineup boasted Oldsmobile, Chevrolet, and Pontiac muscle cars, and Buick fielded a muscle car entry a year later. For 1964 and 1965, Ford had its 427 CID Thunderbolts, and Mopar unveiled the 426 CID Hemi engine. The Pontiac GTO was an option package that included Pontiac's 389 CID V8 engine, floor-shifted transmission with Hurst shift linkage, and special trim. In 1966 the GTO became a model in its own right. The project, led by Pontiac division president John DeLorean, technically violated GM's policy, limiting its smaller cars to 330 CID displacement, but the new model proved more popular than expected, and inspired GM and its competitors to produce numerous imitators.\n\nAmerican Motors, though late entering the 1960s muscle car market, produced \"an impressive array of performance cars in a relatively short time,\" said Motor Trend. \"The first stirrings of AMC performance came in 1965, when the dramatic, if ungainly, Rambler Marlin fastback was introduced to battle the Ford Mustang and Plymouth Barracuda.\" Although the Marlin was a flop in terms of sales and initial performance, AMC gained some muscle-car credibility in 1967, when it made both the Marlin and the \"more pedestrian\" Rebel available with its new 280 hp, 343 CID \"Typhoon\" V8. In 1968, the company offered two pony car muscle car contenders: the Javelin and its truncated two-seat variant, the AMX a sports car in the Grand Touring tradition. \n\nHorsepower and marketing wars\n\nAlthough the sales of true muscle cars were relatively modest by total Detroit production standards, they had value in publicity. Competition between manufacturers meant that buyers had the choice of ever-more powerful engines. A horsepower war was started that peaked in 1970, with some models advertising as much as 450 hp.\n\nMuscle cars attracted young customers into showrooms, and they bought the standard editions of these mid-size cars. To enhance the \"halo\" effect of these models, the manufacturers modified some of them into turn-key drag racers.\n\nFord built 200 lightweight Ford Galaxies for drag racing in 1963. All non-essential equipment was omitted. Modifications included fiberglass panels, aluminum bumpers, traction bars, and a competition-specification 427 CID engine factory rated at a conservative 425 hp. This full-size car could run the quarter mile in a little over 12 seconds. Also built in 1963 were 5,000 road-legal versions that could be used as every day drivers (Ford claimed 0-60 in less than 6 seconds for the similarly powered 1966 Galaxie 500XL 427).\n\nAnother Ford lightweight was the 1964 Ford Thunderbolt that utilized the mid-size Fairlane body. A stock Thunderbolt could run the quarter-mile (402 m) in 11.76 seconds at , and Gaspar \"Gas\" Ronda dominated the NHRA World Championship with his Thunderbolt with a best time of 11.6 seconds at 124 mph. The Thunderbolt included the 427 engine with special exhausts; though technically legal for street use, the car was too \"raucous\" for the public roads, according to a Hot Rod magazine quote, \"for driving to and from the strip, let alone on the street in everyday use\". Massive traction bars, asymmetrical rear springs, and a trunk-mounted 95 lb bus battery were intended to maximize traction for the 500 bhpcar. Sun visors, exterior mirror, sound-deadener, armrests, jack, and lug wrench were omitted to save weight. The car was given lightweight Plexiglass windows, and early versions had fiberglass front body panels and bumpers, later changed to aluminum to meet NHRA regulations. Base price was US$3,780. A total of 111 Thunderbolts were built, and Ford contracted Dearborn Steel Tubing to help with assembly. \n\nIn 1963, General Motors' Chevrolet division produced 57 full-size Impala coupes equipped with option package RPOZ-11, which added $1237.40 to the vehicle base price. They were the only automobiles the division ever built expressly for drag racing. The package included a specially modified W series 409 engine, now displacing 427 cubic inches, and was officially rated at 430 bhp. With a compression ratio of 13.5:1, the engine required high-octane fuel. The RPOZ-11 package had numerous modifications to reduce weight, including aluminum hood, fenders, fan shroud, and bumpers. Sound-deadening material was removed, as were non-essentials such as heater and radio. Other racing features included a two-piece intake manifold, special exhaust manifolds, cylinder heads and pistons, a deep-sump oil pan, and cowl-induction air cleaner. The RPOZ-11 package was discontinued when General Motors ceased involvement in racing in 1964.\n\nThe 1964 Dodge 426 Hemi Lightweight produced over 500 bhp. This \"top drag racer\" had an aluminium hood, lightweight front bumpers, fenders, doors and lower valance, magnesium front wheels, lightweight Dodge van seat, Lexan side windows, one windshield wiper, and no sun visors or sound deadening. Like other lightweights of the era, it came with a factory disclaimer: Designed for supervised acceleration trials. Not recommended for general everyday driving because of the compromises in the all-round characteristics which must be made for this type of vehicle.\n\nAlso too \"high-strung\" for the street was Chrysler’s small-volume-production 1965 drag racer, the 550 bhp Plymouth Satellite 426 Hemi. Although the detuned 1966 version (the factory rating underestimated it at 425 bhp) has been criticized for poor brakes and cornering, Car and Driver described it as \"the best combination of brute performance and tractable street manners we've ever driven.\" The car's understated appearance belied its performance: it could run a 13.8-second quarter mile at 104 mph. Base price was $3,850. \n\nLikewise, Chevrolet eschewed flamboyant stripes for their 1969 Chevelle COPO 427. The car could run a 13.3 sec. quarter-mile at108 mph. Chevrolet rated the engine at 425 hp, but the NHRA claimed a truer450 hp. The 1969 COPO Chevelles were \"among the most feared muscle cars of any day. And they didn't need any badges.\" Base price was US$3,800.\n\nFor 1970, Chevrolet offered the Chevelle SS 454, also at a base price of US$3,800. Its 454 cuin engine was rated at 450 hp, the highest factory rating at that time. Car Life magazine wrote: \"It's fair to say that the Supercar as we know it may have gone as far as it's going.\" \n\nThe general trend towards higher performance in factory-stock cars reflected the importance of the youth market. A key appeal of muscle cars was that they offered the American car culture relatively affordable and powerful street performance in models that could also be used for drag racing. But as size, optional equipment and luxury appointments increased, engines had to be more powerful to maintain performance levels, and the cars became more expensive.\n\nIn response to rising cost and weight, a secondary trend towards more basic \"budget\" muscle cars emerged in 1967 and 1968. These included the Plymouth Road Runner, the \"original budget Supercar\";Car Life January 1969. the Plymouth GTX, which at a base price of US$3,355 offered \"as much performance-per-dollar as anything on the market, and more than most\"; and the Dodge Super Bee. Manufacturers also offered bigger engines in their compact models, sometimes making them lighter, roomier, and faster than their own pony-car lines.\n\nThe 340 cuin-powered 1970 Plymouth Duster was one of these smaller, more affordable cars. Based on the compact-sized Plymouth Valiant and priced at US$2,547, the 340 Duster posted a 6.0-second 0-60 mphtime and ran the quarter mile in 14.7 seconds at . This \"reasonably fast\" compact muscle car had a stiff, slightly lowered suspension which, in the view of Hot Rod magazine at the time, let the car \"ride in an acceptable fashion\". However, a retrospective article by Consumer Guide referred to \"a punishing ride\" and trim that was \"obviously low-budget.\" The 1970 model came with front disc brakes and without hood scoops. The only high-performance cues were dual exhausts and modest decals. Tom Gale, former Chrysler vice president of design, described the car as \"a phenomenal success. It had a bulletproof chassis, was relatively lightweight, and had a good power train. These were 200000 mi cars.\" Hot Rod rated the Duster \"one of the best, if not the best, dollar buy in a performance car\" in 1970.\n\nAmerican Motors' mid-sized 1970 Rebel Machine, developed in consultation with Hurst Performance, was also built for normal street use. It had a 390 CID engine developing 340 hp—a \"moderate performer\" that gave a 0-60 mph time of 6.8 seconds and a quarter mile in 14.4 seconds at 99 mph. Early examples came in \"patriotic\" red, white, and blue. Jack Nerad wrote in Driving Today that it was \"a straight-up competitor to the GTO, et al. ... the engine was upgraded to 340 hp a four-barrel Motorcraft carburetor and other hot rod trickery. The torque figure was equally prodigious—430 pound-feet at a lazy 3600 rpm. In this car the engine was practically the entire story.\" With four-speed manual transmission, the car \"could spring from zero to 60 miles per hour in just 6.4 seconds...\" In Nerad's view, the car \"somehow, someway deserves to be considered among the Greatest Cars of All Time.\" An article in Mopar Muscle said, \"by far the most stunning thing for a car with this level of performance and standard equipment was the sticker of just US$3,475.\" \n\nThe \"plain wrapper\" 1969 Plymouth Road Runner, that was Motor Trend magazine's Car of the Year, was modified with the addition of a high-performance factory camshaft plus non-standard, high-performance induction and exhaust manifolds, carburetor, and slick tires to run a 14.7 quarter at with its 383 CID engine. In this customized form, the car cost US$3,893. In 1968, Dodge's $3,027 Super Bee ran a 15-second quarter at 100 mph on street tires with the same engine, only stock. \n\nHot Rod magazine categorized the 340 CID 1968 Plymouth Barracuda 4-seater as \"a supercar, without any doubt attached...also a 'pony car', a compact and a workhorse\" with enough rear seat leg- and head-room for \"passengers to ride back there without distress\", and \"a flip-up door to the trunk area for ferrying some pretty sizeable loads of cargo\". It could run a quarter mile in 13.33 seconds at on the drag strip. The base price was $2,796.00; the price as tested by Hot Rod was $3,652. \n\nMarket segment decline\n\nThe muscle car market segment was in high gear \"until shifting social attitudes, crippling insurance rates, the Clean Air Act and the fuel crisis removed the cars from the market in the early 1970s.\" The OPEC oil embargo led to price controls and gasoline rationing, as well as higher prices. \"Muscle cars quickly became unaffordable and impractical for many people.\" The automobile insurance industry also levied surcharges on all high-powered models, an added cost that put many muscle cars out of reach of their intended buyers. Simultaneously, efforts to combat air pollution focused Detroit's attention on emissions control.\n\nA majority of muscle cars came optioned with high-compression powerplants-some as high as 11:1. Prior to the oil embargo, 100-octane fuel was common (e.g. Sunoco 260, Esso Extra, Chevron Custom Supreme, Super Shell, Texaco Sky Chief, Phillips 66 Flite Fuel, Amoco Super Premium, Gulf No-nox); however, following the passage of the Clean Air Act of 1970, octane ratings were lowered to 91-due in part to the removal of tetraethyllead as a valve lubricant. Unleaded gasoline was phased in as a result.\n\nIn the mid-1970s, some of the muscle car market converged into personal luxury performance cars. Some nameplates, such as Chevrolet's SS or Oldsmobile's 442, would become sport appearance packages (known in the mid to late 1970s as the vinyl and decal option-Plymouth's Road Runner was an upscale decor package for their Volare coupes).\n\nAustralia \n\nAustralia developed its own muscle cars around the same period, the big three manufacturers being Ford Australia, Holden or Holden Dealer Team (by then part of General Motors), and Chrysler Australia. The cars were specifically developed to run in the Armstrong 500 (miles) (now the Supercheap Auto Parts 1000km). The demise of these cars was brought about by a change in racing rules requiring that 200 examples had to be sold to the general public before the car could qualify (homologation). In 1972, the government banned supercars from the streets after two notable cases. The first instance was a Wheels magazine journalist driving at 150 mi/h in a 1971 Ford XY Falcon GTHO Phase III 351 CID. While the car was getting exposure in the press, the second incident occurred in George Street, Sydney, when a young male was caught driving at an estimated 150 mi/h through the busy street in a 1971 Ford Falcon GTHO Phase III, drag racing a Holden Monaro GTS 350. This was known in Australia as \"The Supercar scare\". \n\nFord produced what is considered to be the first Australian muscle car in 1967, the 289 cuin Windsor – powered Ford Falcon GTXR. Months later, in 1968, Australia would see its first homegrown two-door muscle car, the Holden Monaro GTS 327. Ford continued to release faster models, culminating in the Ford Falcon GTHO Phase III of 1971, which was powered by a factory modified 351 Cleveland. Along with its GT and GTHO models, Ford, starting with the XW model in 1969, introduced a \"sporty\" GS model, available across the Falcon range. The basic GS came with a 188 CID six-cylinder engine, but the 302 CID and 351 CID Windsor (replaced by the Cleveland engines for the XY) V8 engines were optional. Ford's larger, more luxurious Fairlane was also available with these engines and some were allegedly made with the same 4V 300 bhp 351 CID Cleveland engine used in the XY GT.\n\nThe XA GT was available in sedan and coupe body styles and while the GTHO Phase IV never went into production, 250 GTs were made with RPO 83 package which featured a long list of race-oriented upgrades for homologation purposes, including an uprated 351 Cleveland making an estimated 254kW (340 hp). The GT continued through the XB series but was discontinued for the XC series of 1976, leaving the GS package as the sole sporting option, which was available across all body styles.\n\nGeneral Motors Holden produced the Holden Monaro with 161 CID, 186 CID (186 and 186S specification) 6-cylinder engines, 307 CID, 327 CID, and 350 CID Chevrolet smallblocks, and later 253 CID and 308 CID Holden V8. This was followed by the release of four high-performance Toranas, the LC GTR-XU1 (1970–1971), LJ GTR-XU1 (1972–1973), L34 (1975), and the A9X (1977).\n\nThe LC XU1 Torana was fitted with a 186 CID triple carbureted 6-cylinder engine, later increased with the release of the LJ model to 202 CID, as opposed to the 308 CID single q­-barrel carbureted V8 in the SL/R 5000 L34, and SLR5000/SS A9X. There were many homologation changes over the four or so years of XU-1 production culminating in a special \"Bathurst 1973\" specification LJ XU-1.\n\nThe L34 was primarily an engine option released in 1975 on the lesser specification LH SL/R 5000 sedan of 1974, with the initial engine development carried out by Repco, the company famous for designing the V8 engine that took Jack Brabham and Denny Hulme to the and Formula One World Championships; a factory HO pack providing an upgraded camshaft, Holley carb, and other race ready items was also available. The basic L34 also gained other homologation features such as improved brakes and wheel arch flares. The A9X was an option on the LX SLR5000 sedan and the LX SS hatchback (2-door) and unlike the L34 package was not an engine performance upgrade, but a suspension, differential, and brake upgrade, as the L34 engine was already homologated for Group C use. Hence, the A9X had a basically standard 308ci engine.\n\nChrysler produced the R/T Valiant Charger from 1971 to 1973, when the R/Ts were discontinued; the dominant R/T models were the E38 and E49 with high-performance 265 CID Hemi engines featuring triple Weber carburetors.\n\nChrysler apparently considered a high-performance V8 program importing 338 340 CID V8 engines from the U.S. This high-performance project never went ahead, and the engines were subsequently fitted to the upmarket 770 model Charger. Initially, this model was designated \"SE\" E55 340 (V8) and only available with automatic transmission; with a model change to the VJ in 1973, the engine became an option, and the performance was lessened. All Chrysler performance Chargers were discontinued in 1974 with the end of high-performance, the 265 Hemi, and 340 V8 engines.\n\nThe Australian muscle car era is considered to have ended with the release of the Australian Design Rule regarding emissions in ADR27a in 1976. An exception to this rule was the small number of factory-built Bathurst 1000 homologation specials that were constructed after 1976; these are considered to be muscle cars. Examples of these homologation specials include the Torana A9X and the Bathurst Cobras.\n\nSeveral highly modified high-performance road-going Commodores were produced by Peter Brock's HDT Special Vehicles through the early and mid-1980s. These \"homologation specials\" were produced to meet both Australian Group C and international Group A touring car racing regulations. Models included the VC Group C, the VH SS Group III with a 0–100 km/h of 8.6 seconds, the Blue VK SS Group A, and the burgundy VL SS Group A (the VK and VL Group A cars were powered by a slightly de-stroked 304 cu in (4.9 L) version of the Holden V8 engine to allow the car to run at a lighter weight in touring car racing. The HDT also produced several 5.0 L V8 powered WB Statesmans released under the name Magnum. They also looked at developing a 5.0 L V8 powered Opel Monza in the mid-1980s (to be named the HDT Monza), although as the Monza was a 1970s model car and resembled the outdated Torana A9X Hatchback it never passed the planning stage.\n\nRelated pickup trucks \n\nAnother related type of vehicle is the car-based pickup, known colloquially in Australia as a ute (short for utility). Holden and Ford Australia both make such vehicles, under the names Holden Ute and Ford Falcon Ute respectively. Examples of these in the U.S. were the performance versions of the Ford Ranchero, GMC Sprint / Caballero, and Chevrolet El Camino with high-output V8 engines, that are no longer in production.\n\nIn Australia, sport and recreation-oriented panel vans and utes were became immensely popular with younger buyers in the 1970s and played a part in the decline in the popularity of performance coupes there. By the middle of the decade, the manufacturers had caught onto this phenomenon and began marketing lifestyle-oriented vans and utilities from the factory. The Holden Sandman, introduced in 1974, is the most well-known of these cars; Ford competed with its Surferoo and Sundowner models, and the Sandman's popularity led to Chrysler introducing a panel van body style on the 1976 CL Valiant, with a range including sporting Drifter and Sports Pack models, although by this time the market for such vehicles had declined and relatively few Valiant panel vans were sold. Models were generally available with a range of six-cylinder and V8 engines, and often featured wild striping and graphics packages in addition to a wide variety of leisure-oriented options, and styling and trim borrowed from their muscle car counterparts. By the late 1970s, though, the van craze was in decline; a struggling Chrysler Australia discontinued its commercial vehicles altogether in 1978, and sales of the Sandman were in decline, with buyers often ordering their cars without the famous stripes and decals. Ford continued its Sundowner model in the new-generation XD Falcon in 1979 but few were sold.\n\nMuscle car revival\n\nPerformance-type cars began to make a return in the United States during the 1980s. Increases in production costs and tighter regulations governing pollution and safety, these vehicles were not designed to the formula of the traditional low-cost muscle cars. The introduction of electronic fuel injection and overdrive transmission for the remaining 1960s muscle car survivors, such as the Ford Mustang, Chevrolet Camaro, and Pontiac Firebird, helped sustain a market share for them alongside personal luxury coupes with performance packages, such as the Buick Regal T-Type or Grand National, Ford Thunderbird Turbo Coupe, and Chevrolet Monte Carlo SS circa 1983-88. GM's personal luxury coupes (known as the G-body which also included the Oldsmobile 442 and Pontiac Grand Prix 2 + 2 by the late 1980s) were phased out in 1987 and 1988 where its GM10 (W-body) front wheel drive mass market vehicles were phased into production signaling an end to the surviving midsized body-on-frame RWD platform dating back to 1964.\n\nGM's facelift of its B-platform vehicles in late 1990 (starting with the Chevrolet Caprice) resulted in the fusion of its then-9C1 police package repurposed into the short-lived 1994-96 Impala SS, using the LT1 engine from the Camaro and Corvette using cast iron heads. At the time of the revival of the Impala SS, sport utility vehicles were outselling passenger cars (from full sized body-on-frame passenger sedans to mass market vehicles) and GM phased out its B platform in late 1996. Ford Motor Company tested the waters by selling its version of the Mercury Grand Marquis (Mercury Marauder) in 2004, which was a slow seller. Like the Impala SS a decade earlier, the Marauder used the Crown Victoria Police Interceptor with a few body modifications fitted with 5-spoke alloy wheels.\n\nIn 2004, the Pontiac GTO was relaunched in the United States, a re-badged third generation Holden Monaro (considered as a captive import), and Chrysler debuted the 300C as a 2005 model. In 2005, Ford introduced the 'new' Mustang, designed to resemble the original 1964.5 model, it brought back the aggressive lines and colors of the original. In 2008, Chrysler re-introduced the Dodge Challenger, which features design links to the 1970 model. \"We haven’t seen this kind of spontaneous, passionate response to a car since we unveiled the Dodge Viper concept in 1989,\" CEO Tom LaSorda said, \"but it's easy to see what people like about the Dodge Challenger. It's bold, powerful and capable. It's a modern take on one of the most iconic muscle cars and sets a new standard for pure pony car.\" A year later, running on that same sentiment, Chevrolet released the new designed 2009 Camaro, which bears some resemblance to the 1969 model.\n\nThe blend between old and new has fueled the muscle car revival. The mid-1960s muscle car era came to define what baby-boom men would expect from their automobiles. \n\nWhile the aging baby boom generation inspired the modern demand for classic-type American Muscle cars, the consumer market is much more diverse than it was in the 1960s and 1970s. Looking at modern muscle as a social trend, Ford and GM are the \"innovators,\" followed by baby boom males in their 50s as \"early adopters.\" The big bulge or \"early majority\" in the modern muscle movement comes from the men in their teens and early 20s. For these non-baby boomer consumers, the \"cool\" image is key. In the 1960s \"a car was not quite a car unless punching the accelerator resulted in screaming tires and the landscape blurring around you…\" according to Brent Staples of The New York Times. Fuel was cheap and the staple of drag racing counterculture was to be fast and loud. Now being “cool,” fuel efficient, and cost effective is all a part of the package. Instead of fuel guzzling V8 engines, you see V6 or turbocharged I4 models. Despite the reduction in power, Detroit is successfully selling this package. The Camaro and Challenger saw a 13% and 11% spike in sales during June 2011, which \"outpaced\" the growth in sales of all other passenger cars, according to Autodata. \n\nAustralia \n\nFord Australia and Holden are currently producing high-performance vehicles. For instance, Holden has its SS and SSV Commodores and Utilities, and HSV has more powerful Holden-based versions and has produced a limited edition HSV W427 – a Commodore fitted with the seven litre LS7 V8 from the C6 Corvette Z06 from 2008–2009.\n\nFord Performance Vehicles produces enhanced versions of the Ford Falcon under the FPV name. As of 2012, current models include supercharged V8 powered GS sedan and utility, supercharged V8 powered GT sedans, and turbocharged inline 6 cylinder F6 sedans and utility.\n\nHolden Special Vehicles currently produces high-performance versions of various rear-drive Holden Commodore sedans. The HSV Clubsport R8 LSA currently has a 400 kW V8 engine and the HSV GTS a 430 kW V8 engine, with a 0 to 100 km/h time of 4.4 seconds. Vauxhall introduced the Monaro to the UK in 2004. This was a re-badged Holden Monaro fitted with a 5.7 L Chevrolet Corvette engine, or in VXR form with the engine bored out to 6.0 L. Sales were low and the model was withdrawn from the Vauxhall range in 2007.\n\nCollectibility \n\nThe original \"tire-burning\" cars, such as the Chevrolet Camaro, AMC Machine, Buick Gran Sport, Dodge Charger R/T, Ford Mustang, Oldsmobile 4-4-2, Plymouth GTX, and Pontiac GTO, are \"collector's items for classic car lovers\". Reproduction sheet metal parts and, in some cases, even complete body shells are available for purchase.\n\nList of muscle cars \n\nUnited States \n\nMotor Trend identified the following models as \"musclecars\" in 1965:\n\n* 1962–1965 Dodge Dart / Plymouth Fury 413/426 Max Wedge/426 Hemi\n* 1964–1965 Ford Thunderbolt 427\n* 1965–1972 Buick Skylark GSX/GS 400/Buick GS\n* 1965–1970 Dodge Coronet/Plymouth Belvedere 426-S\n* 1965 Chevrolet Chevelle Malibu SS\n* 1965–1967 Oldsmobile Cutlass 442\n\n* Road & Track identified the following models as \"musclecars\" in 1965:\n\n* 1964–1965 Pontiac Tempest Le Mans/GTO\n* 1965–1975 Buick Riviera Gran Sport\n* 1965–1969 Buick Skylark Gran Sport\n* 1965–1970 Dodge Coronet/Plymouth Belvedere 426-S\n* 1965 Chevrolet Chevelle Malibu SS\n* 1965–1967 Oldsmobile Cutlass 442\n\n* Car and Driver also created a list of the 10 Best muscle cars for its January 1990 issue. The magazine focused on the engines and included:\n\n* 1966–1967 Plymouth/Dodge intermediates with 426 Hemi\n* 1968–1969 Plymouth/Dodge intermediates with 426 Hemi\n* 1970–1971 Plymouth/Dodge intermediates with 426 Hemi\n* 1966–1967 Chevy II SS327\n* 1966–1969 Chevrolet Chevelle SS396\n* 1968–1969 Chevy II Nova SS396\n* 1969 Ford Torino Cobra 428\n* 1969 Plymouth Road Runner/Dodge Super Bee 440 Six Pack\n* 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle SS454\n* 1969 Pontiac GTO\n* 1984–1987 Buick Grand National\n* 1983–1987 Chevrolet Monte Carlo SS\n\n* Other muscle cars include the following:\n\nFull-size muscle models\n* 1965–1970 Buick Wildcat\n* 1966–1973 Buick Riviera GS & GS Stage One\n* 1965–1974 Chevrolet Impala SS & Custom Coupe\n* 1965–1974 Chevrolet Bel Air along with Chevrolet Biscayne and Chevrolet Caprice\n* 1965-1971 Chrysler 300 non-letter series\n* 1965–1973 Dodge Polara Super-Lite\n* 1965–1974 Ford Galaxie\n* 1966–1967 Mercury S-55 \n* 1969–1970 Mercury Marauder\n* 1965–1966 Oldsmobile Starfire\n* 1964–1965 Oldsmobile Jetstar I\n* 1969–1974 Plymouth Fury GT\n* 1966–1969 Pontiac Ventura\n* 1964–1972 Pontiac Grand Prix SJ\n\nMid-size muscle models\n* 1967–1970 AMC Rebel \n* 1970 AMC The Machine\n* 1971 AMC Matador Machine \n* 1965–1972 Buick Skylark Grand Sport & Buick GSX\n* 1965–1973 Chevrolet Chevelle SS\n* 1966–1974 Dodge Charger 500, R/T & SE\n* 1968–1971 Dodge Super Bee\n* 1969 Dodge Charger Daytona\n* 1966–1969 Ford Fairlane GT, GTA & Cobra\n* 1968–1974 Ford Torino GT, Cobra & Talladega\n* 1966–1972 Mercury Cyclone GT, Cobra Jet & Spoiler II\n* 1968–1973 Mercury Montego GT & MX Broughan\n* 1968–1972 Oldsmobile 4-4-2\n* 1968–1972 Oldsmobile Cutlass SX, Supreme & Hurst/Olds\n* 1967–1971 Plymouth GTX\n* 1968–1974 Plymouth Road Runner\n* 1970 Plymouth Superbird\n* 1964–1973 Pontiac GTO\n* 1968-1970 Pontiac Tempest GT-37\n* 1973-1975 Pontiac Grand Am\n\nCompact muscle models\n* 1969 AMC SC/Rambler\n* 1971 AMC Hornet SC 360\n* 1966–1974 Chevrolet Nova SS\n* 1967–1976 Dodge Dart GT, GTS, Swinger & Demon\n* 1970–1976 Plymouth Duster Gold Duster & Twister\n* 1966–1979 Ford Falcon Sports Coupe\n* 1970–1975 Ford Maverick Grabber\n* 1971–1975 Mercury Comet GT\n* 1973–1974 Oldsmobile Omega S\n* 1973–1974 Buick Apollo GSX\n* 1974 Pontiac GTO\n* 1975-1983 AMC Gremlin X\n\nPony car muscle models\n* 1968–1970 AMC AMX\n* 1968–1974 AMC Javelin SST\n* 1967–1974 Chevrolet Camaro RS, Z/28 & SS\n* 1967–1969 Yenko Camaro 427\n* 1969–1974 Dodge Challenger SE, R/T & T/A\n* 1964–1973 Ford Mustang Mach 1, Boss 429, Boss 302 & Boss 351\n* 1965–1970 Shelby Mustang GT350 & GT500\n* 1967–1973 Mercury Cougar GT, XR-7 & Eliminator\n* 1967–1974 Plymouth Barracuda BP, BS & 'Cuda\n* 1967–1981 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am\n\nMuscle trucks\n* 1966–1975 Chevrolet El Camino SS\n* 1967–1976 Ford Ranchero GT\n* 1971–1975 GMC Sprint SP\n\nAustralia \n\nChrysler\nVH model\n* 1971–1972 Charger R/T E37 (101 built)\n* 1971–1972 Charger R/T E38 (280 bhp)—3 Speed Gearbox (Track pack and Big tank were options and a fully blueprinted engine) (316 built)\n* 1972–1973 Charger R/T E48 (two built)\n* 1972–1973 Charger R/T E49 (302 bhp)—4 Speed Gearbox (Track pack and Big tank were options and a fully blueprinted engine) (149 built)\n* 1972–1973 Charger S/E E55 (275 bhp)—727 Torqueflite Auto (340 cubic inch Chrysler LA engine) (124 built)\n* 1969–1971 Valiant Hardtop (318 or 360ci V8s)\n\nVJ model (R/T nomenclature dropped) were:\n* 1973–1974 Charger E48 (169 built)\n* 1973 Charger E49 (4 built)\n* 1973–1974 Charger 770 E55 (212 built)\n\nFord\n\n* Ford Falcon\n* Ford Fairmont\n* FPV (Ford Performance Vehicles)\n* Ford Fusion\n* Ford Mustang\n\nHolden\n\n* Holden Calibra\n* Holden Commodore\n* Holden Cruze\n* Holden Monaro\n* HSV (Holden Special Vehicles)\n* Holden Torana\n* Holden Volt\n\nLeyland\n* P76 \"Force Seven\". This was a coupe version of the Leyland P76, and the company's answer to the Holden Monaro GTS, Ford Falcon GT and Chrysler Valiant Charger. The company ran into financial difficulties and ceased Australian production before the 3-door Force Seven could be released. The eight completed examples were sold at auction.\n\nBrazil \n\nChevrolet\n\n* 1971–1975 1st generation Opala SS with engine 250 I6\n* 1975–1979 2nd generation Opala SS with engine 250-S I6\n* 1979–1980 3rd generation Opala SS with engine 250-S I6\n* 1976–1979 1st generation Caravan SS\n* 1980 2nd generation Caravan SS\n\nFord\n\n* 1971–1975 1st generation Maverick GT 302 V8\n* 1975–1979 2nd generation Maverick GT 302 V8\n* 1966–1971 Galaxie 500 289 V8\n* 1971–1980 LTD Landau 302 V8\n* 1980–1983 Landau 302 V8\n\nDodge\n* 1969–1975 Dart 318 V8\n* 1971–1979 1st generation Charger R/T 318 V8 (1969 Dart modified sold under the name of Charger)\n* 1980 2nd generation Charger R/T 318 V8 (1976 Dart modified sold under the name of Charger)\n\nPuma\n* 1975–1979 GTB S1\n* 1980–1988 GTB S2\n* 1988–1994 AMV\n\nSanta-Matilde\n* 1979–1988 SM4.1" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Antonin_Scalia.txt", "Clarence_Thomas.txt", "Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg.txt", "John_Roberts.txt", "Sonia_Sotomayor.txt" ], "title": [ "Antonin Scalia", "Clarence Thomas", "Ruth Bader Ginsburg", "John Roberts", "Sonia Sotomayor" ], "wiki_context": [ "Antonin Gregory Scalia (; March 11, 1936 – February 12 / 13, 2016) was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1986 until his death in 2016. Appointed to the Court by President Ronald Reagan in 1986, Scalia was described as the intellectual anchor for the originalist and textualist position in the Court's conservative wing. \n\nScalia was born in Trenton, New Jersey. He attended public grade school, Xavier High School in Manhattan, and then college at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. He obtained his law degree from Harvard Law School and spent six years in a Cleveland law firm, before he became a law school professor at the University of Virginia. In the early 1970s, he served in the Nixon and Ford administrations, eventually as an Assistant Attorney General. He spent most of the Carter years teaching at the University of Chicago, where he became one of the first faculty advisers of the fledgling Federalist Society. In 1982, Ronald Reagan appointed him as judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. \nIn 1986, Reagan appointed him to the Supreme Court. Scalia was unanimously confirmed by the Senate, becoming the first Italian-American justice. \n\nScalia served on the Court for nearly thirty years, during which time he espoused a conservative jurisprudence and ideology, advocating textualism in statutory interpretation and originalism in constitutional interpretation. He was a strong defender of the powers of the executive branch, believing presidential power should be paramount in many areas. He opposed affirmative action and other policies that treated minorities as special groups. He filed separate opinions in many cases and often castigated the Court's majority in his minority opinions using scathing language.\n\nEarly life and education\n\nAntonin Scalia was born on March 11, 1936, in Trenton, New Jersey, and was an only child. His father, Salvatore Eugene Scalia (1903–1986), an Italian immigrant from Sommatino, Sicily, was a graduate student at Columbia University and clerk at the time of his son's birth. The elder Scalia would become a professor of Romance languages at Brooklyn College, where he was an adherent to the formalist New Criticism school of literary theory. His mother, Catherine Louise (née Panaro) Scalia (1905–1985), was born in Trenton to Italian immigrant parents and worked as an elementary school teacher. \n\nIn 1939, Scalia and his family moved to the Elmhurst section of Queens, New York, where he attended P.S. 13. After completing eighth grade in public school, he obtained an academic scholarship to Xavier High School, a Jesuit military school in Manhattan, where he graduated first in the class of 1953 and served as the valedictorian. He later stated that he spent much of his time on schoolwork, and admitted, \"I was never cool.\" While a youth, he was also active as a Boy Scout and was part of Scouting's national honor society the Order of the Arrow. \n\nClassmate and future New York State official William Stern remembered Scalia in his high school days:\n\nThis kid was a conservative when he was 17 years old. An archconservative Catholic. He could have been a member of the Curia. He was the top student in the class. He was brilliant, way above everybody else.\n\nIn 1953, Scalia enrolled at Georgetown University, where he graduated valedictorian and summa cum laude in 1957 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history. While in college, he was a champion collegiate debater in Georgetown's Philodemic Society and a critically praised thespian. He took his junior year abroad at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland. Scalia studied law at Harvard Law School, where he was a Notes Editor for the Harvard Law Review. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard in 1960, becoming a Sheldon Fellow of Harvard University. The fellowship allowed him to travel throughout Europe during 1960–1961. \n\nEarly legal career (1961–1982)\n\nScalia began his legal career at the international law firm Jones, Day, Cockley and Reavis in Cleveland, Ohio, where he worked from 1961 to 1967. He was highly regarded at the law firm and would most likely have been made a partner, but later stated he had long intended to teach. He became a Professor of Law at the University of Virginia in 1967, moving his family to Charlottesville.\n\nAfter four years in Charlottesville, Scalia entered public service in 1971. President Richard Nixon appointed him as the General Counsel for the Office of Telecommunications Policy, where one of his principal assignments was to formulate federal policy for the growth of cable television. From 1972 to 1974, he was the chairman of the Administrative Conference of the United States, a small independent agency that sought to improve the functioning of the federal bureaucracy. In mid-1974, Nixon nominated him as Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel. After Nixon's resignation, the nomination was continued by President Gerald Ford, and Scalia was confirmed by the Senate on August 22, 1974.\n\nIn the aftermath of Watergate, the Ford administration was engaged in a number of conflicts with Congress. Scalia repeatedly testified before congressional committees, defending Ford administration assertions of executive privilege regarding its refusal to turn over documents. Within the administration, Scalia advocated a presidential veto for a bill to amend the Freedom of Information Act, greatly increasing its scope. Scalia's view prevailed and Ford vetoed the bill, but Congress overrode it. In early 1976, Scalia argued his only case before the Supreme Court, Alfred Dunhill of London, Inc. v. Republic of Cuba. Scalia, on behalf of the U.S. government, argued in support of Dunhill, and that position was successful.\nFollowing Ford's defeat by President Jimmy Carter, Scalia worked for several months at the American Enterprise Institute. He then returned to academia, taking up residence at the University of Chicago Law School from 1977 to 1982, though he spent one year as a visiting professor at Stanford Law School. In 1981, he became the first faculty adviser for the University of Chicago's chapter of the newly founded Federalist Society. \n\nD.C. Circuit Court Judge and nomination to the Supreme Court (1982–1986)\n\nWhen Ronald Reagan was elected President in November 1980, Scalia hoped for a major position in the new administration. He was interviewed for the position of Solicitor General of the United States, but the position went to Rex E. Lee, to Scalia's great disappointment. Scalia was offered a seat on the Chicago-based United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in early 1982, but declined it, hoping to be appointed to the highly influential United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (D.C. Circuit). Later that year, Reagan offered Scalia a seat on the D.C. Circuit, which Scalia accepted. He was confirmed by the US Senate on August 5, 1982, and was sworn in on August 17, 1982. \n\nOn the D.C. Circuit, Scalia built a conservative record, while winning applause in legal circles for powerful, witty legal writing, which was often critical of the Supreme Court precedents he felt bound as a lower-court judge to follow. Scalia's opinions drew the attention of Reagan administration officials, who, according to The New York Times, \"liked virtually everything they saw and ... listed him as a leading Supreme Court prospect.\" In 1985, though there was then no vacancy on the Court, Reagan administration officials put Scalia on a short list with fellow D.C. Circuit Judge Robert Bork, to be considered if a justice left the Court. In 1986, Chief Justice Warren Burger informed the White House of his intent to retire. Reagan first decided to nominate Associate Justice William Rehnquist to become Chief Justice. This choice meant that Reagan would also have to choose a nominee to fill Rehnquist's seat as associate justice. Attorney General Edwin Meese, who advised Reagan on the choice, seriously considered only Bork and Scalia. Feeling that this might well be Reagan's last opportunity to pick a Supreme Court justice, the President and his advisers chose Scalia over Bork. Many factors influenced this decision. Reagan wanted to appoint the first Italian-American justice. In addition, Scalia was ten years younger, and would likely serve longer on the Court. Scalia also had the advantage of not having Bork's \"paper trail\"; the elder judge had written controversial articles about individual rights. Scalia was called to the White House, and accepted Reagan's nomination. \n\nWhen Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on Scalia's nomination opened in August 1986, he faced a committee that had just argued divisively over the Rehnquist nomination. Witnesses and Democratic senators contended that, before becoming a judge, Rehnquist had engaged in activities designed to discourage minorities from voting. Committee members had little taste for a second battle over Scalia and were in any event reluctant to oppose the first Italian-American Supreme Court nominee. The judge was not pressed heavily on controversial issues such as abortion or civil rights. Scalia, who attended the hearing with his wife and nine children seated behind him, found time for a humorous exchange with Democratic Ohio Senator Howard Metzenbaum, whom he had defeated in a tennis match in, as the nominee put it, \"a case of my integrity overcoming my judgment\".\n\nScalia met no opposition from the committee. The full Senate debated Scalia's nomination only briefly, and confirmed him 98–0 on September 17, 1986, creating the first Italian-American Justice. This vote followed Rehnquist's confirmation as Chief Justice by a vote of 65–33 on the same day. He took his seat on September 26, 1986. One committee member, Democratic Delaware Senator Joe Biden, later stated that he regretted not having opposed Scalia \"because he was so effective\".\n\nJurisprudence (1986–2016)\n\nGovernmental structure and powers\n\nSeparation of powers\n\nIt was Scalia's view that clear lines of separation among the legislative, executive, and judicial branches follow directly from the Constitution, with no branch allowed to exercise powers granted to another branch. In his early days on the Court, he authored a powerful—and solitary—dissent in 1988's Morrison v. Olson, in which the Court's majority upheld the Independent Counsel law. Scalia's thirty-page draft dissent surprised Justice Harry Blackmun for its emotional content; Blackmun felt \"it could be cut down to ten pages if Scalia omitted the screaming\". Scalia indicated that the law was an unwarranted encroachment on the Executive Branch by the Legislative. He warned, \"Frequently an issue of this sort will come before the Court clad, so to speak, in sheep's clothing ... But this wolf comes as a wolf.\"\n\nThe 1989 case of Mistretta v. United States challenged the United States Sentencing Commission, an independent body within the judicial branch whose members (some of whom were federal judges) were removable only for good cause. The petitioner argued that the arrangement violated separation of powers, and that the United States Sentencing Guidelines promulgated by the Commission were invalid. Eight justices joined in the majority opinion written by Blackmun, upholding the Guidelines as constitutional. Scalia dissented, stating that the issuance of the Guidelines was a lawmaking function that Congress could not delegate, and dubbed the Commission \"a sort of junior-varsity Congress\".\n\nIn 1996, Congress passed the Line Item Veto Act which allowed the President to cancel items from an appropriations bill (a bill authorizing spending) once passed into law. The statute was challenged the following year. The matter rapidly reached the Supreme Court, which struck down the law as violating the Presentment Clause of the Constitution, which governs what the President may do with a bill once it has passed both Houses of Congress. Scalia dissented, seeing no Presentment Clause difficulties and feeling that the act did not violate separation of powers. Scalia indicated that he felt that authorizing the President to cancel an appropriation was no different from allowing him to spend an appropriation at his discretion, which had long been accepted as constitutional.\n\nDetainee cases\n\nIn 2004, in Rasul v. Bush, the Court held that federal courts had jurisdiction to hear habeas corpus petitions brought by detainees at the Guantanamo Bay detainment camp. Scalia accused the majority of \"spring[ing] a trap on the Executive\" by ruling that it could hear cases involving persons at Guantanamo when no federal court had ever ruled that it had the authority to hear cases involving people there.\n\nScalia (joined by Justice John Paul Stevens) also dissented in the 2004 case of Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, involving Yaser Hamdi, an American citizen detained in the United States on the allegation he was an enemy combatant. The Court held that although Congress authorized Hamdi's detention, Fifth Amendment due process guarantees give a citizen held in the United States as an enemy combatant [Hamdi] the right to contest that detention before a neutral decision maker. Scalia wrote that the AUMF could not be read to suspend habeas corpus and that the Court, faced with legislation by Congress which did not grant the President power to detain Hamdi, was trying to \"Make Everything Come Out Right\".\n\nIn March 2006, Scalia gave a talk at the University of Fribourg, in Switzerland, where he was asked about detainee rights. He responded, \"Give me a break ... I had a son on that battlefield and they were shooting at my son, and I'm not about to give this man who was captured in a war a full jury trial. I mean it's crazy.\" Though Scalia was not referring to any particular individual, the Supreme Court was about to consider the case of Salim Ahmed Hamdan, supposed driver to Osama bin Laden, who was challenging the military commissions at Guantanamo Bay. A group of retired military officers that supported Hamdan's position asked Scalia to recuse himself, or step aside from hearing the case, which he declined to do. The Court held, 5–3, in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, that the federal courts had jurisdiction to consider Hamdan's claims; Scalia, in dissent, contended that any ability by the Court to consider Hamdan's petition had been eliminated by the jurisdiction stripping Detainee Treatment Act of 2005. \n\nFederalism\n\nIn federalism cases, pitting the powers of the federal government against those of the states, Scalia often took the states' positions. In 1997, the Supreme Court considered the case of Printz v. United States, a challenge to certain provisions of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act which required chief law enforcement officers of localities in states to perform certain duties. In Printz, Scalia wrote the Court's majority decision. The Supreme Court ruled the provision which imposed those duties unconstitutional as violating the Tenth Amendment, which reserves to the states and to the people those powers not granted to the federal government. In 2005, Scalia concurred in Gonzales v. Raich, which read the Commerce Clause to hold that Congress could ban the use of marijuana even where states approve its use for medicinal purposes. Scalia opined that the Commerce Clause, together with the Necessary and Proper Clause, permitted the regulation. In addition, Scalia felt that Congress may regulate intrastate activities if doing so is a necessary part of a more general regulation of interstate commerce. He based this decision on Wickard v. Filburn, which he now writes \"expanded the Commerce Clause beyond all reason.\" \n\nScalia rejected the existence of the negative Commerce Clause doctrine, calling it \"a judicial fraud\". \n\nScalia took a broad view of the Eleventh Amendment, which bars certain lawsuits against states in the federal courts. In his 1989 dissent in Pennsylvania v. Union Gas Co., Scalia stated that there was no intent on the part of the Framers to have the states surrender any sovereign immunity, and that the case that provoked the Eleventh Amendment, Chisholm v. Georgia, came as a surprise to them. Professor Ralph Rossum, who wrote a survey of Scalia's constitutional views, suggests that the justice's view of the Eleventh Amendment is actually contradictory to the language of the Amendment.\n\nIndividual rights\n\nAbortion\n\nScalia argued that there is no constitutional right to abortion, and that if the people desire legalized abortion, a law should be passed to accomplish it. Scalia wrote in his dissenting opinion in the 1992 case of Planned Parenthood v. Casey,\n\nThe States may, if they wish, permit abortion on demand, but the Constitution does not require them to do so. The permissibility of abortion, and the limitations upon it, are to be resolved like most important questions in our democracy: by citizens trying to persuade one another and then voting.\n\nScalia repeatedly called upon his colleagues to strike down Roe v. Wade. Scalia hoped to find five votes to strike down Roe in the 1989 case of Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, but was not successful in doing so. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor authored the decision of the Court, allowing the abortion regulations at issue in the case to stand, but not overriding Roe. Scalia concurred only in part. Scalia wrote that, \"Justice O'Connor's assertion, that a 'fundamental rule of judicial restraint' requires us to avoid reconsidering Roe, cannot be taken seriously.\" He noted, \"We can now look forward to at least another Term of carts full of mail from the public, and the streets full of demonstrators.\"\n\nThe Court returned to the issue of abortion in the 2000 case of Stenberg v. Carhart, in which it invalidated a Nebraska statute outlawing partial-birth abortion. Justice Stephen Breyer wrote for the Court that the law was unconstitutional as it did not allow an exception for the health of the mother. Scalia dissented, comparing the Stenberg case with two of the most reviled cases in Supreme Court history: \"I am optimistic enough to believe that, one day, Stenberg v. Carhart will be assigned its rightful place in the history of this Court's jurisprudence beside Korematsu and Dred Scott. The method of killing a human child ... proscribed by this statute is so horrible that the most clinical description of it evokes a shudder of revulsion.\"\n\nIn 2007, the Court upheld a federal statute banning partial-birth abortion in Gonzales v. Carhart. University of Chicago law professor Geoffrey R. Stone, a former colleague of Scalia's, criticized Gonzales, stating that religion had influenced the outcome as all five justices in the majority were Catholic, whereas the dissenters were Protestant or Jewish. This angered Scalia to such an extent that he stated he would not speak at the University of Chicago as long as Stone is there.\n\nRace, gender, and sexual orientation\n\nScalia generally voted to strike down laws that make distinctions by race, gender, or sexual orientation. In 1989, he concurred with the Court's judgment in City of Richmond v. J.A. Croson Co., in which the Court applied strict scrutiny to a city program requiring a certain percentage of contracts to go to minorities, and struck down the program. Scalia did not join the majority opinion, however. He disagreed with O'Connor's opinion, for the Court, that states and localities could institute race-based programs, if they identified past discrimination, and if the program was designed to remedy the past racism. Five years later, in Adarand Constructors, Inc. v. Peña he concurred in the Court's judgment and in part with the opinion which extended strict scrutiny to federal programs. Scalia noted in that matter his view that government can never have a compelling interest in making up for past discrimination by racial preferences,\n\nTo pursue the concept of racial entitlement—even for the most admirable and benign of purposes—is to reinforce and preserve for future mischief the way of thinking that produced race slavery, race privilege and race hatred. In the eyes of government, we are just one race here. It is American.\n\nIn the 2003 case of Grutter v. Bollinger, involving racial preferences in the University of Michigan's law school, Scalia mocked the Court majority's finding that the school was entitled to continue using race as a factor in admissions to promote diversity, and to increase \"cross-racial understanding\". Scalia noted,\nThis is not, of course, an \"educational benefit\" on which students will be graded on their Law School transcript (Works and Plays Well with Others: B+) or tested by the bar examiners (Q: Describe in 500 words or less your cross-racial understanding). For it is a lesson of life rather than law—essentially the same lesson taught to (or rather learned by, for it cannot be \"taught\" in the usual sense) people three feet shorter and twenty years younger than the full-grown adults at the University of Michigan Law School, in institutions ranging from Boy Scout troops to public-school kindergartens.\n\nScalia argued that laws that make distinctions between genders should be subjected to intermediate scrutiny, requiring that the gender classification be substantially related to important government objectives. When, in 1996, the Court upheld a suit brought by a woman who wished to enter the Virginia Military Institute in the case of United States v. Virginia, Scalia filed a lone, lengthy dissent. Scalia felt that the Court, in requiring Virginia to show an \"extremely persuasive justification\" for the single-sex admissions policy, had redefined intermediate scrutiny in such a way \"that makes it indistinguishable from strict scrutiny\".\n\nIn one of the final decisions of the Burger Court, the Court ruled in 1986 in Bowers v. Hardwick that homosexual sodomy was not protected by the right of privacy and could be criminally prosecuted by the states. In 1995, however, that ruling was effectively gutted by Romer v. Evans, which struck down a Colorado state constitutional amendment, passed by popular vote, which forbade anti-discrimination laws being extended to sexual orientation. Scalia dissented from the opinion by Justice Kennedy, believing that Bowers had protected the right of the states to pass such measures, and that the Colorado amendment was not discriminatory, but merely prevented homosexuals from gaining favored status under Colorado law. Scalia later said of Romer, \"And the Supreme Court said, 'Yes, it is unconstitutional.' On the basis of—I don't know, the Sexual Preference Clause of the Bill of Rights, presumably. And the liberals loved it, and the conservatives gnashed their teeth.\"\n\nIn 2003, Bowers was formally overruled by Lawrence v. Texas, from which Scalia dissented. According to Mark V. Tushnet in his survey of the Rehnquist Court, during the oral argument in the case, Scalia seemed so intent on making the state's argument for it that the Chief Justice intervened. According to his biographer, Joan Biskupic, Scalia \"ridiculed\" the majority in his dissent for being so ready to cast aside Bowers when many of the same justices had refused to overturn Roe in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. In March 2009, openly gay Congressman Barney Frank described him as a \"homophobe\". Maureen Dowd described Scalia in a 2003 column as \"Archie Bunker in a high-backed chair\". In an op-ed for The New York Times, federal appeals judge Richard Posner and Georgia State University law professor Eric Segall described as radical Scalia's positions on homosexuality, reflecting an apparent belief that the religious stances supposedly held by the majority of US citizens should take precedence over the Constitution and characterizing Scalia's \"political ideal as verg[ing] on majoritarian theocracy.\" \n\nCriminal law\n\nScalia believed that the death penalty is constitutional. He dissented in decisions that hold the death penalty unconstitutional as applied to certain groups, such as those who were under the age of 18 at the time of offense. In Thompson v. Oklahoma (1988), he dissented from the Court's ruling that the death penalty could not be applied to those aged 15 at the time of the offense, and the following year authored the Court's opinion in Stanford v. Kentucky sustaining the death penalty for those who killed at age 16. However, in 2005, the Court overturned Stanford in Roper v. Simmons and Scalia again dissented, mocking the majority's claims that a national consensus had emerged against the execution of those who killed while underage, and noted that less than half of the states that permitted the death penalty prohibited it for underage killers. He castigated the majority for including in their count states that had abolished the death penalty entirely, stating that doing so was \"rather like including old-order Amishmen in a consumer-preference poll on the electric car. Of course they don't like it, but that sheds no light whatever on the point at issue.\" In 2002, in Atkins v. Virginia, the Court ruled the death penalty unconstitutional as applied to the mentally retarded. Scalia dissented, stating that it would not have been considered cruel or unusual to execute the mildly mentally retarded at the time of the 1791 adoption of the Bill of Rights, and that the Court had failed to show that a national consensus had formed against the practice.\n\nScalia strongly disfavored the Court's ruling in Miranda v. Arizona, which held that a confession by an arrested suspect who had not been advised of his rights was inadmissible in court, and voted to overrule Miranda in the 2000 case of Dickerson v. United States, but was in a minority of two with Justice Clarence Thomas. Calling the Miranda decision a \"milestone of judicial overreaching\", Scalia stated that the Court should not fear to correct its mistakes.\n\nAlthough, in many areas, Scalia's approach was unfavorable to criminal defendants, he took the side of defendants in matters involving the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment, which guarantees defendants the right to confront their accusers. In multiple cases, Scalia wrote against laws that allowed alleged victims of child abuse to testify behind screens or by closed-circuit television. In a 2009 case, Scalia wrote the majority opinion in Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, holding that defendants must have the opportunity to confront lab technicians in drug cases; a certificate of analysis is not enough to prove a substance was drugs.\n\nScalia maintained that every element of an offense that helps determine the sentence must be either admitted by the defendant or found by a jury under the Sixth Amendment's jury guarantee. In the 2000 case of Apprendi v. New Jersey, Scalia wrote the Court's majority opinion that struck down a state statute that allowed the trial judge to increase the sentence if he found the offense was a hate crime. Scalia found the procedure impermissible because whether it was a hate crime had not been decided by the jury. In 2004, he wrote for the Court in Blakely v. Washington, striking down Washington state's sentencing guidelines on similar grounds. The dissenters in Blakely foresaw that Scalia would use the case to attack the federal sentencing guidelines (which he had failed to strike down in Mistretta), and they proved correct, as Scalia led a five-member majority in United States v. Booker, which made those guidelines no longer mandatory for federal judges to follow (they remained advisory). \n\nIn the 2001 case of Kyllo v. United States, Scalia wrote the Court's opinion in a 5–4 decision that cut across ideological lines. That decision found thermal imaging of a home to be an unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment. The Court struck down a conviction for marijuana manufacture based on a search warrant issued after such scans were conducted, which showed that the garage was considerably hotter than the rest of the house because of indoor growing lights. Applying that Fourth Amendment prohibition on unreasonable search and seizure to arrest, Scalia dissented from the Court's 1991 decision in County of Riverside v. McLaughlin, allowing a 48-hour delay before a person arrested without a warrant is taken before a magistrate, on the ground that at the time of the adoption of the Fourth Amendment, an arrested person was to be taken before a magistrate as quickly as practicable. In a 1990 First Amendment case, R.A.V. v. St. Paul, Scalia wrote the Court's opinion striking down a St. Paul, Minnesota, hate speech ordinance in a prosecution for burning a cross. Scalia noted, \"Let there be no mistake about our belief that burning a cross in someone's front yard is reprehensible. But St. Paul has sufficient means at its disposal to prevent such behavior without adding the First Amendment to the fire.\"\n\nLitigation and \"Standing\"\n\nFollowing the death of Scalia, Paul Barrett writing for Bloomberg News Weekly, reported that: \"Translating into liberal argot: Scalia changed the rules for who could sue.\" The issue elevated the recognition of Scalia as a notable influence on establishing and determining the conditions under which cases could be brought to trial and for litigation, and by whom such litigation could take place. David Rivkin, from the conservative standpoint, stated that: \"He (Scalia) did more to clarify and limit the bounds and scope of judicial power than any Supreme Court Justice in history, particularly in the area of standing and class actions.\" Scalia indicated his long held position from the time his 1983 law review article titled \"The Doctrine of Standing as an Essential Element of the Separation of Powers\". As summarized by Barrett, \"He (Scalia) wrote that courts had misappropriated authority from other branches of government by allowing too many people to sue corporations and government agencies, especially in environmental cases.\" In a practical sense, Scalia brought to the attention of the Court the ability to restrict \"standing\" in class action suits in which the litigants may be defined in descriptive terms rather than as well-defined and unambiguous litigants. \n\nOther cases\n\nScalia concurred in the 1990 case of Cruzan v. Director, Missouri Department of Health in which the family of a woman in a vegetative state sought to have her feeding tube removed so she would die, believing that to have been her wish. The Court found for the State of Missouri, requiring clear and convincing evidence of such a desire. Scalia stated that the Court should have remained away from the dispute, and that the issues \"are [not] better known to the nine Justices of this Court any better than they are known to nine people picked at random from the Kansas City telephone directory\". \n\nScalia joined the majority per curiam opinion in the 2000 case of Bush v. Gore, which effectively ended recounts of ballots in Florida following the 2000 US Presidential election, and also both concurred separately and joined Rehnquist's concurrence. In 2007, he said of the case, \"I and my court owe no apology whatever for Bush v. Gore. We did the right thing. So there! ... get over it. It's so old by now.\" During an interview on the Charlie Rose show, he defended the Court's action:\n\nThe decision was not close, it was 7–2 on the principal issue of whether there had been a constitutional violation ... But what if it was unconstitutional to have that recount? You're going to let it continue and come to a conclusion? And then overturn it? The reason to stop it sooner was not, \"Ooh, we're worried that it's going to come out the wrong way.\"... you forget what was going on at the time. We were the laughingstock of the world. The world's greatest democracy that couldn't conduct an election. We didn't know who our next president was going to be. The lengthy transition that has become standard when you change from one president to another could not begin because you didn't know who the new president was going to be. It was becoming a very serious problem. The issue before the United States Supreme Court is: having decided the case, having decided this is unconstitutional, should we nonetheless let the election go on? Or is it time cut it off and let's move on? \n\nIn 2008, the Court considered a challenge to the gun laws in the District of Columbia. Scalia wrote the majority opinion in District of Columbia v. Heller, which found an individual right to own a firearm under the Second Amendment. Scalia traced the word \"militia\", found in the Second Amendment, as it would have been understood at the time of its ratification, and stated that it then meant \"the body of all citizens\". The Court upheld Heller's claim to own a firearm in the District.\n\nScalia's opinion for the Heller Court was widely criticized by liberals, and applauded by conservatives. However, Seventh Circuit judge Richard Posner disagreed with Scalia's opinion, stating that the Second Amendment \"creates no right to the private possession of guns\". Posner called Scalia's opinion \"faux originalism\" and a \"historicizing glaze on personal values and policy preferences\". In October 2008 Scalia stated that the court's originalists only needed to show that at the time the Second Amendment was ratified, the right to bear arms did not have an exclusively military context, and that they were successful in so showing. \n\nLegal philosophy and approach\n\nJudicial performance\n\nDuring oral argument before the Court, Scalia asked more questions and made more comments than any other justice —and a 2005 study found that he provoked laughter more often than any of his colleagues. His goal during oral arguments was to get across his position to the other justices. \nUniversity of Kansas social psychologist Lawrence Wrightsman wrote of Scalia's style, \"he communicates a sense of urgency on the bench, and his style is forever forceful\". Since Chief Justice John Roberts joined the Court in 2005, he has taken to questioning counsel in a manner similar to Scalia's and sometimes the two questioned counsel in seeming coordination. Dahlia Lithwick of Slate described Scalia's technique:\n\nScalia doesn't come into oral argument all secretive and sphinxlike, feigning indecision on the nuances of the case before him. He comes in like a medieval knight, girded for battle. He knows what the law is. He knows what the opinion should say. And he uses the hour allocated for argument to bludgeon his brethren into agreement. \n\nScalia wrote numerous opinions from the start of his career on the Supreme Court. During his tenure, he wrote more concurring opinions than any other justice, and only two justices have written more dissents. According to Kevin Ring, who compiled a book of Scalia's dissenting and concurring opinions, \"His opinions are ... highly readable. His entertaining writing style can make even the most mundane areas of the law interesting.\" Conor Clarke of Slate comments on Scalia's written opinions, especially his dissents:\n\nHis writing style is best described as equal parts anger, confidence, and pageantry. Scalia has a taste for garish analogies and offbeat allusions—often very funny ones—and he speaks in no uncertain terms. He is highly accessible and tries not to get bogged down in abstruse legal jargon. But most of all, Scalia's opinions read like they're about to catch fire for pure outrage. He does not, in short, write like a happy man. \n\nAt the Supreme Court, justices meet after the case is briefed and argued, and vote on the result. The task of writing the opinion is assigned by the Chief Justice, or if they are in the minority or not participating, by the senior justice in the majority. After the assignment, the justices generally communicate about a case by sending notes and draft opinions to each other's chambers. In the give and take of opinion writing, Scalia did not compromise his views in order to attract five votes for a majority (unlike the late Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. who would accept less than he wanted in order to gain a partial victory). Scalia, known to his friends and colleagues as \"Nino\", attempted to influence his colleagues by sending them \"Ninograms\"—short memoranda aimed at trying to get them to include his views in their opinions.\n\nIn an October 2013 issue of New York magazine, Scalia revealed that he scanned the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Times, got most of his news from talk radio and did not read The New York Times or The Washington Post. The latter he described as \"shrilly liberal.\"\n\nStatutory and constitutional interpretation\n\nScalia was a textualist in statutory interpretation, believing that the ordinary meaning of the statute should govern. \nIn 1998, Scalia vociferously had opposed the idea of a living constitution, or the power of the judiciary to modify the meaning of constitutional provisions to adapt them to changing times. Scalia warned that if one accepted that constitutional standards should evolve with a maturing society, \"the risk of assessing evolving standards is that it is all too easy to believe that evolution has culminated in one's own views.\" He compared the Constitution with statutes, which he contended were not understood to change their meaning through time.\nConstitutional amendments, such as the 1868 Fourteenth Amendment, according to Scalia, were to be interpreted based on their meaning at the time of ratification. Scalia was often asked how this approach justified the result in the 1954 case of Brown v. Board of Education, which held that segregated schools were unconstitutional, and which relied on the Fourteenth Amendment for the result. \n\nIn interpreting statutes, Scalia did not look to legislative history. In the 2006 case of Zedner v. United States, he joined the majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito—all except one paragraph of the opinion, in which Alito cited legislative history. In a concurring opinion in that case, Scalia noted, \"The use of legislative history is illegitimate and ill advised in the interpretation of any statute.\" \nHis dislike of legislative history may have been a reason why other justices have become more cautious in its use. Gregory Maggs wrote in the Public Interest Law Review in 1995 that by the early 1990s, legislative history was being cited in only about forty percent of Supreme Court cases involving the interpretation of statutes, and no case of that era used legislative history as an essential reason for the outcome. Maggs suggested,\n\nWith Justice Scalia breathing down the necks of anyone who peeks into the Congressional Record or Senate reports, the other members of the Court may have concluded that the benefit of citing legislative history does not outweigh its costs. It is likely for this reason that the percentage of cases citing it has decreased dramatically. No one likes an unnecessary fight, especially not one with as formidable an opponent as Justice Scalia. \n\nScalia described himself as an originalist, meaning that he interpreted the United States Constitution as it would have been understood when it was adopted. According to Scalia in 2008, \"It's what did the words mean to the people who ratified the Bill of Rights or who ratified the Constitution.\" \nIn 2006, before George W. Bush appointees Roberts and Alito had time to make an impact, Rossum, wrote that Scalia had failed to win converts among his conservative colleagues for his use of originalism, whereas Roberts and Alito, as younger men with an originalist approach greatly admired Scalia battling for what he believed in.\n\nIn a 2009 public conversation, Justice Stephen Breyer questioned Scalia, indicating that those who ratified the Fourteenth Amendment did not intend to end school segregation. Scalia called this argument \"waving the bloody shirt of Brown\", and indicated that he would have joined the first Justice Harlan's solitary dissent in Plessy v. Ferguson, the 1896 case that Brown overruled. \n\nScalia's originalist approach came under attack from critics, who viewed it as \"a cover for what they see as Scalia's real intention: to turn back some pivotal court decisions of the 1960s and 70s\", reached by the Warren and Burger Courts. Ralph Nader argued in 2008 that Scalia's originalist philosophy was inconsistent with the justice's acceptance of the extension of certain constitutional rights to corporations when at the time of the Fourteenth Amendment's ratification, corporations were not commonly understood to possess constitutional rights. Nader's view preceded the Court's 2010 decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. Scalia, in his concurrence in that case, traced his understanding of the rights of groups of individuals at the time of the adoption of the Bill of Rights. His argument was based on the lack of an exception for groups such as corporations in the free speech guarantee in the Bill of Rights, and on several examples of corporate political speech from the time of the adoption of the Bill of Rights. Professor Thomas Colby of The George Washington University National Law Center argued that Scalia's votes in Establishment Clause cases do not stem from originalist views, but simply from conservative political convictions. Scalia responded to his critics that his originalism \"has occasionally led him to decisions he deplores, like his upholding the constitutionality of flag burning\", which according to Scalia was protected by the First Amendment.\n\nIn 2009, after nearly a quarter century on the Court, Scalia characterized his victories as \"damn few\". \n\nWriting in The Jewish Daily Forward in 2009, J.J. Goldberg described Scalia as \"the intellectual anchor of the court's conservative majority\". He traveled to the nation's law schools, giving talks on law and democracy. His appearances on college campuses were often standing room only. Ginsburg indicated that Scalia was \"very much in tune with the current generation of law students ... Students now put 'Federalist Society' on their resumes.\" John Paul Stevens, who served throughout Scalia's tenure until his 2010 retirement, said of Scalia's influence, \"He's made a huge difference. Some of it constructive, some of it unfortunate.\" Of the nine sitting justices, Scalia was most often the subject of law review articles. \n\nPublic attention\n\nRequests for recusals\n\nScalia recused himself from Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow (2004), a claim brought by atheist Michael Newdow alleging that the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance (including the words \"under God\") in school classrooms violated the rights of his daughter, who he said was also an atheist. Shortly after the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in Newdow's favor, but before the case came before the Supreme Court, Scalia spoke at a Knights of Columbus event in Fredericksburg, Virginia, stating that the Ninth Circuit decision was an example of how the courts were trying to excise God from public life. The school district requested that the Supreme Court review the case, and Newdow asked that Scalia recuse himself because of this prior statement, which he did without comment. \n\nScalia declined to recuse himself from Cheney v. United States District Court for the District of Columbia (2005), a case concerning whether Vice President Dick Cheney could keep secret the membership of an advisory task force on energy policy. Scalia was asked to recuse himself because he had gone on a hunting trip with various persons including Cheney, during which he traveled one way on Air Force Two. Scalia issued a lengthy in-chambers opinion refusing to recuse himself, stating that though Cheney was a longtime friend, he was merely being sued in his official capacity, and that were justices to step aside in the cases of officials who are parties because of official capacity, the Supreme Court would cease to function. Scalia indicated that it was far from unusual for justices to socialize with other government officials, recalling that the late Chief Justice Fred M. Vinson played poker with President Harry Truman, and that Justice Byron White went skiing with Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy. Scalia stated that he was never alone with Cheney during the trip, the two had not discussed the case, and the justice had saved no money since he had bought round-trip tickets, the cheapest available. Scalia was part of the 7–2 majority once the case was heard which generally upheld Cheney's position. \n\nReligious views\n\nScalia was a devout Roman Catholic, and his son Paul entered the priesthood. Uncomfortable with the changes brought about following Vatican II, Scalia drove long distances to parishes that he felt were more in accord with his beliefs, such as the Tridentine Latin Mass in both Chicago and Washington and also the Latin version of the Mass of Paul VI at St. Catherine of Siena in Great Falls, Virginia. In a 2013 interview with Jennifer Senior for New York magazine, Scalia was asked if his beliefs extended to the Devil, and he stated, \"Of course! Yeah, he's a real person. Hey, c'mon, that's standard Catholic doctrine! Every Catholic believes that\". When asked if he had seen recent evidence of the Devil, Scalia replied, \"You know, it is curious. In the Gospels, the Devil is doing all sorts of things. He's making pigs run off cliffs, he's possessing people and whatnot ... What he's doing now is getting people not to believe in him or in God. He's much more successful that way\". In another 2013 interview, Scalia stated that \"In order for capitalism to work, in order for it to produce a good and stable society, traditional Christian virtues are essential\". \n\nIn 2006, Scalia was asked by a reporter upon leaving church, if being a traditionalist Catholic had caused problems for him and responded by asking, \"You know what I say to those people?\", and with a gesture, cupping his hand under his chin and flicking his fingers out. The gesture, which was captured by a photographer, was initially reported by the Boston Herald as obscene. Scalia responded to the reports with a letter to the editor accusing the news staff of watching too many episodes of The Sopranos and stating that the gesture was a strong brush-off. Roger Axtell, an expert on body language, described the gesture as possibly meaning \"I've had enough, go away\" and noted, \"It's a fairly strong gesture\". The gesture would later be parodied by comedian Stephen Colbert during his performance at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner later that year, with the justice in attendance: cameras showed that unlike most of the butts of Colbert's jokes that evening, Scalia was laughing. \n\n1996 presidential election\n\nAccording to John Boehner, as chairman of the House Republican Conference, he sought to persuade Scalia to run for election as vice president with Bob Dole in 1996. As related by Boehner, Scalia listened to the proposal and dictated the same reply Justice Charles Evans Hughes had once given to a similar query: \"The possibility is too remote to comment upon, given my position.\" Dole did put Scalia on his list of potential running mates, but eventually settled on Jack Kemp. \n\nPersonal life\n\nOn September 10, 1960, Scalia married Maureen McCarthy at St. Pius X church in Yarmouth, Massachusetts. The two had met on a blind date while he was at Harvard Law School. Maureen was an undergraduate student at Radcliffe College when they met and subsequently obtained a degree in English from the school.\n\nThe couple raised nine children, five boys and four girls. Two of the sons, Eugene Scalia and John Scalia, are attorneys. Paul Scalia is a Catholic priest, Matthew had a career in the Army, and Christopher is a writer. All four daughters, Catherine, Ann, Margaret and Mary, have families. According to Scalia, Maureen raised all nine children \"with very little assistance from me.\" \n\nHe resided in McLean, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C.\n\nScalia enjoyed a warm relationship with fellow Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, considered a member of the court's liberal wing, with the two attending the opera together, and even appearing together onstage as supernumeraries in Washington National Opera's 1994 production of Ariadne auf Naxos. Ginsburg was a colleague of Scalia's on the D.C. Circuit, and the Scalias and Ginsburgs had dinner together every New Year's Eve.\n\nDeath\n\nScalia died in his sleep on the night of February 12 or the morning of February 13, 2016, following an afternoon of quail hunting and dining at the Cibolo Creek Ranch in Shafter, Texas. He was pronounced dead of apparent natural causes. His physician, Rear Admiral Brian P. Monahan, said that Scalia had a history of heart trouble, including high blood pressure, and had recently been deemed too weak to undergo surgery for a torn rotator cuff. \n\nFor the month following Scalia's death, his chair in the Supreme Court chamber and the front of the bench where he sat were draped with black wool crêpe, with more over the court's entrance, a tradition dating from the death of Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase in 1873. Flags on the Court's front plaza were flown at half-staff for 30 days. Scalia's body lay in repose in the Great Hall of the Supreme Court of the United States on February 19, 2016. His son, Fr. Paul Scalia, delivered the homily at a Catholic funeral Mass the next day at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C. The interment was private, at Fairfax Memorial Park, Fairfax, Virginia. \n\nSuccession \n\nScalia's death – only the second death of a serving justice in a span of sixty years – left eight justices remaining on the Supreme Court, split 4–4 between being fairly conservative and fairly liberal, during a presidential election year. Cases that were not decided before Scalia's death will be decided by the remaining eight members of the Court. When the Court issues a split 4–4 ruling, the ruling of the lower court will be upheld, but the Supreme Court's decision will have no precedential effect and the Court will not publish a written opinion with respect to the merits of the case. Citing the Court's practices following the death of Justice Robert H. Jackson in 1954, Tom Goldstein wrote that the Court is more likely to rehear evenly-divided cases after a new justice is appointed to the Court. \n\nIn a 2012 interview, Scalia said that he would prefer Judge Frank H. Easterbrook of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals as his successor. President Barack Obama said at the time of Scalia's death that he would nominate his successor in \"due time\". On March 16, 2016, he nominated Merrick Garland, Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, to fill Scalia's seat on the Court. \n\nBibliography \n\n* \n* \n*", "Clarence Thomas (born June 23, 1948) is an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Thomas succeeded Thurgood Marshall and is the second African American to serve on the court.\n\nThomas grew up in Savannah, Georgia, and was educated at the College of the Holy Cross and at Yale Law School. In 1974, he was appointed an Assistant Attorney General in Missouri and subsequently practiced law there in the private sector. In 1979, he became a legislative assistant to Senator John Danforth (R-MO) and in 1981 was appointed Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Education. In 1982, President Ronald Reagan appointed Thomas Chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).\n\nIn 1990, President George H. W. Bush nominated Thomas for a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He served in that role for 16 months and on July 1, 1991, was nominated by Bush to fill Marshall's seat on the United States Supreme Court. Thomas's confirmation hearings were bitter and intensely fought, centering on an accusation that he had sexually harassed—or engaged in unseemly behavior toward—attorney Anita Hill, a subordinate at the Department of Education and subsequently at the EEOC. The U.S. Senate ultimately confirmed Thomas by a vote of 52–48.\n\nSince joining the court, Thomas has taken a textualist approach, seeking to uphold the original meaning of the United States Constitution and statutes. He is generally viewed as the most conservative member of the court. A strong supporter of the Second and Tenth Amendments, Thomas has often approached federalism issues in a way that limits the power of the federal government and defends the rights of state and local governments. At the same time, Thomas' opinions have generally supported a strong executive branch within the federal government.\n\nEarly life\n\nClarence Thomas was born in 1948 in Pin Point, Georgia, a small, predominantly black community near Savannah founded by freedmen after the American Civil War. He was the second of three children born to M.C. Thomas, a farm worker, and Leola Williams, a domestic worker. They were descendants of American slaves, and the family spoke Gullah as a first language. Thomas' earliest-known ancestors were slaves named Sandy and Peggy who were born around the end of the 18th century and owned by wealthy Liberty County, Georgia planter Josiah Wilson. M.C. left his family when Thomas was two years old. Thomas' mother worked hard but was sometimes paid only pennies per day. She had difficulty putting food on the table and was forced to rely on charity. After a house fire left them homeless, Thomas and his younger brother Myers were taken to live with his maternal grandparents in Savannah, Georgia. Thomas was seven when the family moved in with his maternal grandfather, Myers Anderson, and Anderson's wife, Christine (née Hargrove), in Savannah. \n\nLiving with his grandparents, Thomas enjoyed amenities such as indoor plumbing and regular meals for the first time in his life. His grandfather Myers Anderson had little formal education, but had built a thriving fuel oil business that also sold ice. Thomas calls his grandfather \"the greatest man I have ever known.\" When Thomas was 10, Anderson started taking the family to help at a farm every day from sunrise to sunset. His grandfather believed in hard work and self-reliance; he would counsel Thomas to \"never let the sun catch you in bed.\" Thomas' grandfather also impressed upon his grandsons the importance of getting a good education.\n\nThomas was the only black person at his high school in Savannah, where he was an honor student. He was raised Roman Catholic. He considered entering the priesthood at the age of 16, and became the first black student to attend St. John Vianney's Minor Seminary (Savannah) on the Isle of Hope. He also briefly attended Conception Seminary College, a Roman Catholic seminary in Missouri. No one in Thomas's family had attended college. Thomas has said that during his first year in seminary, he was one of only \"three or four\" blacks attending the school. In a number of interviews, Thomas stated that he left the seminary in the aftermath of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. He had overheard another student say after the shooting, \"Good, I hope the son of a bitch died.\" He did not think the church did enough to combat racism.\n\nAt a nun's suggestion, Thomas attended the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts. While there, Thomas helped found the Black Student Union. Once he walked out after an incident in which black students were punished while white students went undisciplined for committing the same violation, and some of the priests negotiated with the protesting black students to re-enter the school.\n\nHaving spoken the Gullah language as a child, Thomas realized in college that he still sounded unpolished despite having been drilled in grammar at school, and he chose to major in English literature \"to conquer the language\". At Holy Cross, he was also a member of Alpha Sigma Nu and the Purple Key Society. Thomas graduated from Holy Cross in 1971 with an A.B. cum laude in English literature. \n\nThomas had a series of deferments from the military draft while in college at Holy Cross. Upon graduation, he was classified as 1-A and received a low lottery number, indicating he might be drafted to serve in Vietnam. Thomas failed his medical exam, due to curvature of the spine, and was not drafted. Thomas entered Yale Law School, from which he received a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree in 1974, graduating towards the middle of his class. \n\nThomas has recollected that his Yale law degree was not taken seriously by law firms to which he applied after graduating. He said that potential employers assumed he obtained it because of affirmative action policies. According to Thomas, he was \"asked pointed questions, unsubtly suggesting that they doubted I was as smart as my grades indicated.\" \n\nInfluences \n\nIn 1975, when Thomas read Race and Economics by economist Thomas Sowell, he found an intellectual foundation for his philosophy. The book criticized social reforms by government and instead argued for individual action to overcome circumstances and adversity. He was also influenced by Ayn Rand, particularly The Fountainhead, and would later require his staffers to watch the 1949 film version. Thomas later said that novelist Richard Wright had been the most influential writer in his life; Wright's books Native Son and Black Boy \"capture[d] a lot of the feelings that I had inside that you learn how to repress.\" Thomas acknowledges having \"some very strong libertarian leanings\". \n\nCareer \n\nEarly career \n\nThomas was admitted to the Missouri bar on September 13, 1974. From 1974 to 1977, Thomas was an Assistant Attorney General of Missouri under State Attorney General John Danforth, who met Thomas at Yale Law School. Thomas was the only black member of Danforth's staff. As Assistant Attorney General, Thomas first worked at the criminal appeals division of Danforth's office and moved on to the revenue and taxation division. Retrospectively, Thomas considers Assistant Attorney General the best job he has ever had. When Danforth was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1976, Thomas left to become an attorney with the Monsanto Chemical Company in St. Louis, Missouri. He moved to Washington, D.C. and returned to work for Danforth from 1979 to 1981 as a Legislative Assistant handling energy issues for the Senate Commerce Committee. The two men shared a common bond in that they had studied to be ordained (although in different denominations). Danforth was to be instrumental in championing Thomas for the Supreme Court.\n\nIn 1981, he joined the Reagan administration. From 1981 to 1982, he served as Assistant Secretary of Education for the Office for Civil Rights in the U.S. Department of Education. From 1982 to 1990, he was Chairman of the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (\"EEOC\"). Journalist Evan Thomas characterized Thomas as \"openly ambitious for higher office\" during his tenure at the EEOC. As Chairman, he promoted a doctrine of self-reliance, and halted the usual EEOC approach of filing class-action discrimination lawsuits, instead pursuing acts of individual discrimination. He also asserted in 1984 that black leaders were \"watching the destruction of our race\" as they \"bitch, bitch, bitch\" about President Reagan instead of working with the Reagan administration to alleviate teenage pregnancy, unemployment and illiteracy. \n\nFederal judge \n\nOn October 30, 1989, Thomas was nominated by President George H. W. Bush to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit vacated by Robert Bork, despite Thomas's initial protestations that he would not like to be a judge. Thomas gained the support of other African Americans such as former Transportation Secretary William Coleman, but said that when meeting white Democratic staffers in the United States Senate, he was \"struck by how easy it had become for sanctimonious whites to accuse a black man of not caring about civil rights.\"\n\nThomas's confirmation hearing was uneventful. He was confirmed by the United States Senate on March 6, 1990, and received his commission the same day. He developed warm relationships during his 19 months on the federal court, including with fellow federal judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg. \n\nSupreme Court nomination and confirmation \n\nAfter Justice William Brennan stepped down from the Supreme Court in July 1990, Thomas was one of five candidates on President Bush's shortlist for the position and Bush's favorite of the five. Ultimately, after consulting with his advisors, Bush decided to hold off on nominating Thomas, and nominated Judge David Souter of the First Circuit instead. Justice Thurgood Marshall announced his retirement, and on July 1, 1991 President Bush nominated Clarence Thomas to replace him. Marshall had been the only African-American justice on the court. In announcing his selection, Bush called Thomas the \"best qualified [nominee] at this time.\"\n\nU.S. presidents of that era submitted lists of potential federal court nominees to the American Bar Association (ABA) for a confidential rating of their judicial temperament, competence and integrity on a three-level scale of well qualified, qualified or unqualified. However, as noted by Adam Liptak of the New York Times, the ABA has historically taken generally liberal positions on divisive issues, and studies suggest that candidates nominated by Democratic presidents fare better in the group’s ratings than those nominated by Republicans. Anticipating that the ABA would rate Thomas more poorly than they thought he deserved, the White House and Republican Senators pressured the ABA for at least the mid-level qualified rating, and simultaneously attempted to discredit the ABA as partisan. The ABA did rate Thomas as qualified, although with one of the lowest levels of support for a Supreme Court nominee. Ultimately, the ABA rating ended up having little impact on Thomas' nomination. \n\nSome of the public statements of Thomas's opponents foreshadowed the confirmation fight that would occur. Both liberal interest groups and Republicans in the White House and Senate approached the nomination as a political campaign. \n\nAttorney General Richard Thornburgh had previously warned Bush that replacing Thurgood Marshall, who was widely revered as a civil rights icon, with any candidate who was not perceived to share Marshall's views would make the confirmation process difficult. Civil rights and feminist organizations opposed the appointment based partially on Thomas's criticism of affirmative action and suspicions that Thomas might not be a supporter of Roe v. Wade. \n\nThomas's formal confirmation hearings began on September 10, 1991. Thomas was reticent when answering Senators' questions during the appointment process, recalling what had happened to Robert Bork when Bork expounded on his judicial philosophy during his confirmation hearings four years prior. Thomas's earlier writings had frequently referenced the legal theory of natural law; during his confirmation hearings Thomas limited himself to the statement that he regards natural law as a \"philosophical background\" to the Constitution. \n\nAnita Hill allegations \n\nToward the end of the confirmation hearings, an FBI interview with Anita Hill was leaked. Hill, a black attorney, had worked for Thomas at the Department of Education and had subsequently moved with Thomas to the EEOC. After the leak, Hill was called to testify at Thomas's confirmation hearings. She testified that Thomas had subjected her to comments of a sexual nature, which she felt constituted sexual harassment or at least \"behavior that is unbefitting an individual who will be a member of the Court.\"[http://www.nytimes.com/1991/10/12/us/the-thomas-nomination-excerpts-from-senate-s-hearings-on-the-thomas-nomination.html?pagewanted=12 \"The Thomas Nomination; Excerpts From Senate's Hearings on the Thomas Nomination\"], The New York Times (1991-10-12):\"Q: Professor Hill, there's a big difference between your articulating your version of events, contrasted with your statement that Judge Thomas sexually harassed you. And in the transcript of your October 7 interview, you responded to a question saying that it was sexual harassment.\n\"A: In my opinion, based on my reading of the law, yes, it was. But later on, immediately following that response, I noted to the press that I did not raise a claim of sexual harassment in this complaint. It seems to me that the behavior has to be evaluated on its own with regard to the fitness of this individual to act as an Associate Justice. It seems to me that even if it does not rise to the level of sexual harassment, it is behavior that is unbefitting an individual who will be a member of the Court.\" Hill's testimony included lurid details, and some Senators aggressively questioned her. \n\nThomas denied the allegations, saying: \n\nHill was the only person to testify at the Senate hearings that there had been unsolicited sexual advances. Angela Wright, who worked under Thomas at the EEOC before he fired her, decided not to testify, but submitted a written statement alleging that Thomas had pressured her for a date and had made comments about the anatomy of women. However, she said she did not feel his behavior was intimidating nor did she feel sexually harassed, though she allowed that \"Some other women might have\". Also, Sukari Hardnett, a former Thomas assistant, wrote to the Senate committee that although Thomas had not harassed her, \"If you were young, black, female and reasonably attractive, you knew full well you were being inspected and auditioned as a female.\" \n\nOther former colleagues testified on Thomas's behalf. Nancy Altman, who shared an office with Thomas at the Department of Education, testified that she heard virtually everything Thomas said over the course of two years, and never heard any sexist or offensive comment. Altman did not find it credible that Thomas could have engaged in the conduct alleged by Hill, without any of the dozens of women he worked with noticing it. Senator Alan K. Simpson questioned why Hill met, dined, and spoke by phone with Thomas on various occasions after they no longer worked together. \n\nAccording to the Oyez Project, there was a lack of convincing proof produced at the Senate hearings. After extensive debate, the Judiciary Committee split 7–7 on September 27, sending the nomination to the full Senate without a recommendation. Thomas was confirmed by a 52–48 vote on October 15, 1991, the narrowest margin for approval in more than a century. The final floor vote was: 41 Republicans and 11 Democrats voted to confirm while 46 Democrats and two Republicans voted to reject the nomination.\n\nThomas received his commission and took the two required oaths several days after the Senate vote; this process was delayed by the death of Chief Justice Rehnquist's wife, but the delay was reduced at the request of Thomas. Greenhouse, Linda. [http://www.nytimes.com/1991/10/24/us/thomas-sworn-in-as-106th-justice.html Thomas Sworn in as 106th Justice\"], The New York Times (October 24, 1991). He indicated that he was eager to get to work, and an additional reason for reducing the delay was to end further media inquiry into Thomas's private life. Reporters largely stopped such inquiries after Thomas joined the court.Yorke, Jeffrey. [http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-1092488.html \"The Call-in People's Court\"], The Washington Post (October 29, 1991). Throughout this episode, Thomas defended his right to privacy, refused to describe discussions that he may have had outside the workplace regarding his personal life, and promised that he would not allow anyone to probe his private life. \n\nClarence Thomas wrote an autobiography addressing Anita Hill's allegations, and she also wrote an autobiography addressing her experience in the hearings. \n\nPublic perception \n\nThomas is seen as having joined the conservative wing of the court. Thomas has rarely given media interviews during his time on the court. He said in 2007: \"One of the reasons I don't do media interviews is, in the past, the media often has its own script.\" In 2007, Thomas received a $1.5 million advance for writing his memoir, My Grandfather's Son; it became a bestseller. \n\nThomas biographer Scott Douglas Gerber has opined that attacks against Thomas from critics such as Jeffrey Toobin have been unusually vitriolic. Gerber provides many reasons but the first and foremost was his skin color. Gerber has outlined other reasons. The second reason Gerber attributes in part to liberals' disappointment that Thomas has departed so much from the jurisprudence of the African American whom he succeeded, Thurgood Marshall.Gerber, Scott Douglas. [https://books.google.com/books?id\nLESvhXkbtBwC&pgPA30&lpg\nPA30&dq%22scott+douglas+gerber%22+Toobin&source\nbl&ots86P63OtkP5&sig\n5gaBDwU0fRVds8T2GihIWoEFVzI&hlen&ei\nbDrwS8C5BYG88gaC0fT9Cg&saX&oi\nbook_result&ctresult&resnum\n1&ved0CBIQ6AEwAA#v\nonepage&q&ffalse First principles: the jurisprudence of Clarence Thomas], pp. 30–3 (1999). Additional possible causes for the harsh criticism of Thomas may be the inherently explosive nature of sexual misconduct accusations, the suspicion among some people that Thomas was less than forthcoming during his confirmation hearings, and the belief in some circles that Thomas has benefited from affirmative action programs like ones he has criticized as a judge.\n\nThomas has said he has a preference for non-Ivy League clerks, although he has hired them. He is the only one among his colleagues who sometimes chooses clerks from law schools that are not top-rated—schools like Creighton, Rutgers, George Mason, and the University of Utah. \n\nIn 2006, Thomas had a 48% favorable, 36% unfavorable rating, according to Rasmussen Reports. \n\nJudicial philosophy \n\nConservatism and originalism \n\nThomas is often described as an originalist, or \"Textualist\", and a member of the conservative wing of the Supreme Court. He is also often described as the most conservative member of the Supreme Court, although others gave Justice Scalia that designation. Scalia and Thomas had similar but not identical judicial philosophies, and pundits speculate about the degree to which Scalia thought some of Thomas's views are implausible. \n\nThomas has also been described as a textualist whose jurisprudence is similar to that of Justice Hugo Black, who \"resisted the tendency to create social policy out of 'whole cloth.'\"Marzulla, Nancie. [http://www.wcl.american.edu/journal/genderlaw/10/10-2marzulla.PDF?rd\n1 \"The Textualism of Clarence Thomas: Anchoring the Supreme Court's Property Rights Jurisprudence to the Constitution\"], Journal of Gender, Social Policy & The Law (2002). According to the same commentator, Thomas generally declines to engage in judicial lawmaking, and instead views the constitutional role of the court as being the interpretation of law, rather than the making of law.\n\nVoting alignment \n\nThomas voted most frequently with Chief Justice Rehnquist and Justice Scalia in his early tenure on the Supreme Court. On average, from 1994 to 2004, Scalia and Thomas had an 87% voting alignment, the highest on the court, followed by Ginsburg and Souter (86%). Scalia and Thomas's agreement rate peaked in 1996, at 98%. By 2004, however, other pairs of justices were observed to be more closely aligned than Scalia and Thomas. \n\nThe conventional wisdom that Thomas's votes follow Antonin Scalia's is reflected by Linda Greenhouse's observation that Thomas voted with Scalia 91 percent of the time during October Term 2006, and with Justice John Paul Stevens the least, 36% of the time. Jan Crawford Greenburg asserts that to some extent, this is true in the other direction as well, that Scalia often joins Thomas instead of Thomas joining Scalia. Statistics compiled annually by Tom Goldstein of SCOTUSblog demonstrate that Greenhouse's count is methodology-specific, counting non-unanimous cases where Scalia and Thomas voted for the same litigant, regardless of whether they got there by the same reasoning. Goldstein's statistics show that the two agreed in full only 74% of the time, and that the frequency of agreement between Scalia and Thomas is not as outstanding as is often implied by pieces aimed at lay audiences. For example, in that same term, Souter and Ginsburg voted together 81% of the time by the method of counting that yields a 74% agreement between Thomas and Scalia. By the metric that produces the 91% Scalia/Thomas figure, Ginsburg and Breyer agreed 90% of the time. Roberts and Alito agreed 94% of the time. \n\nLegal correspondent Jan Crawford Greenburg wrote in her book on the Supreme Court that Thomas's forceful views moved \"moderates like [Sandra Day O'Connor] further to the left\", but frequently attracted votes from Rehnquist and Scalia. Mark Tushnet and Jeffrey Toobin both observe that Rehnquist rarely assigned important majority opinions to Thomas, because the latter's views made it difficult for him to persuade a majority of justices to join him. \n\nNumber of dissenting opinions \n\nFrom 1994 to 2004, on average, Thomas was the third most frequent dissenter on the court, behind Stevens and Scalia. Four other justices dissented as frequently in 2007. Three other justices dissented as frequently in 2006. One other justice dissented as frequently in 2005. \n\nStare decisis \n\nThomas spoke favorably about the concept of stare decisis during his confirmation hearings, stating that \"stare decisis provides continuity to our system, it provides predictability, and in our process of case-by-case decision making, I think it is a very important and critical concept.\" However, according to Antonin Scalia, Thomas \"doesn't believe in stare decisis, period.\" This assessment is consistent with Thomas's record on the bench: factoring in length of tenure, Thomas urged overruling and joined in overruling precedents more frequently than any other justice during the Rehnquist Court. \n\nAlso according to Scalia, Thomas is more willing to overrule constitutional cases than he is: \"If a constitutional line of authority is wrong, he would say let's get it right. I wouldn't do that.\" Law professor Michael Gerhardt, however, says that Scalia's characterization of Thomas may be incorrect, given that Thomas has supported leaving a broad spectrum of constitutional decisions intact. Thomas's belief in originalism is strong; he has said, \"When faced with a clash of constitutional principle and a line of unreasoned cases wholly divorced from the text, history, and structure of our founding document, we should not hesitate to resolve the tension in favor of the Constitution's original meaning.\" Thomas believes that an erroneous decision can and should be overturned, no matter how old it is.\n\nLaw professor Amy Barrett maintains that Thomas supports statutory stare decisis. Her cited examples include Thomas's concurring opinion in Fogerty v. Fantasy, . \n\nCommerce Clause \n\nThomas has consistently supported narrowing the court's interpretation of the constitution's Interstate Commerce Clause (which often is simply called the \"Commerce Clause\") to limit federal power. At the same time, Thomas has broadly interpreted states' sovereign immunity from lawsuits under the Commerce Clause. \n\nIn United States v. Lopez and United States v. Morrison, the court held that Congress lacked power under the Commerce Clause to regulate non-commercial activities. In these cases, Thomas wrote a separate concurring opinion arguing for the original meaning of the Commerce Clause. Subsequently, in Gonzales v. Raich, the court interpreted the Interstate Commerce Clause combined with the Necessary and Proper Clause to empower the federal government to arrest, prosecute, and imprison patients who used marijuana grown at home for medicinal purposes, even where the activity is legal in that particular state. Thomas dissented in Raich, again arguing for the original meaning of the Commerce Clause.\n\nThomas and Scalia had rejected the notion of a Dormant Commerce Clause, also known as the \"Negative Commerce Clause\". That doctrine bars state commercial regulation even if Congress has not yet acted on the matter. \n\nIn Lopez, Thomas expressed his view that federal regulation of either manufacturing or agriculture is unconstitutional; he sees both as outside the scope of the Commerce Clause. He believes federal legislators have overextended the Commerce Clause, while some of his critics argue that Thomas's position on congressional authority would invalidate much of the contemporary work of the federal government. According to Thomas, it is not the court's job to update the constitution. Proponents of broad national power such as Professor Michael Dorf deny that they are trying to update the constitution. Instead, they argue that they are merely addressing a set of economic facts that did not exist when the constitution was framed. \n\nExecutive power, federalism, and federal statutes \n\nExecutive power \n\nThomas has argued that the executive branch has broad authority under the constitution and federal statutes. In Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, he was the only justice who agreed with the Fourth Circuit that congress had power to authorize the president's detention of U.S. citizens who are enemy combatants. Thomas granted the federal government the \"strongest presumptions\" and said \"due process requires nothing more than a good-faith executive determination\" to justify the imprisonment of Hamdi, a U.S. citizen. \n\nThomas also was one of three justices who dissented in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, which held that the military commissions set up by the Bush administration to try detainees at Guantanamo Bay required explicit congressional authorization, and held that the commissions conflicted with both the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) and \"at least\" Common Article Three of the Geneva Convention. Thomas argued that Hamdan was an illegal combatant and therefore not protected by the Geneva Convention, and he agreed with Justice Scalia that the court was \"patently erroneous\" in its declaration of jurisdiction in this case.\n\nFederalism \n\nFederalism was a central part of the Rehnquist Court's constitutional agenda. Thomas consistently voted for outcomes that promoted state-governmental authority, in cases involving federalism-based limits on congress's enumerated powers. According to law professor Ann Althouse, the court has yet to move toward \"the broader, more principled version of federalism propounded by Justice Thomas.\" \n\nIn Foucha v. Louisiana, Thomas dissented from the majority opinion that required the removal from a mental institution of a prisoner who had become sane. The court held that a Louisiana statute violated the Due Process Clause \"because it allows an insanity acquittee to be committed to a mental institution until he is able to demonstrate that he is not dangerous to himself and others, even though he does not suffer from any mental illness.\" Dissenting, Thomas cast the issue as a matter of federalism. \"Removing sane insanity acquittees from mental institutions may make eminent sense as a policy matter,\" he concluded, \"but the Due Process Clause does not require the States to conform to the policy preferences of federal judges.\" In United States v. Comstock, Thomas' dissent argued for the release of a former federal prisoner from civil commitment, again on the basis of federalism. In U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton, he authored the dissent defending term limits on federal house and senate candidates as a valid exercise of state legislative power.\n\nFederal statutes \n\nAs of 2007, Thomas was the justice most willing to exercise judicial review of federal statutes, but among the least likely to overturn state statutes. \nAccording to a New York Times editorial, \"from 1994 to 2005 … Justice Thomas voted to overturn federal laws in 34 cases and Justice Scalia in 31, compared with just 15 for Justice Stephen Breyer.\" \n\nIn the 2009 Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District No. 1 v. Holder case, Thomas was the sole dissenter, voting in favor of throwing out Section Five of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Section Five requires states with a history of racial voter discrimination—mostly states from the old South—to get Justice Department clearance when revising election procedures. Although congress had reauthorized Section Five in 2006 for another 25 years, Thomas said the law was no longer necessary, pointing out that the rate of black voting in seven Section Five states was higher than the national average. Thomas said \"the violence, intimidation and subterfuge that led Congress to pass Section 5 and this court to uphold it no longer remains.\" He again took this position in Shelby County v. Holder, voting with the majority and concurring with the reasoning which struck down Section Five. \n\nBill of Rights \n\nFirst Amendment \n\nAmong the nine justices, Thomas was the second most likely to uphold free speech claims (tied with David Souter), as of 2002. He has voted in favor of First Amendment claims in cases involving a wide variety of issues, including pornography, campaign contributions, political leafleting, religious speech, and commercial speech.\n\nThomas has made public his belief, that all limits on federal campaign contributions are unconstitutional, and should be struck down. Thomas voted with the majority in Citizens United v. FEC.\n\nOn occasion, however, Thomas has disagreed with free speech claimants. For example, he dissented in Virginia v. Black, a case that struck down part of a Virginia statute that banned cross burning. Concurring in Morse v. Frederick, he argued that the free speech rights of students in public schools are limited. In Walker v. Texas Division, Sons of Confederate Veterans, he joined the majority opinion that Texas's decision to deny a request for a Confederate Battle Flag specialty license plate is constitutional. \n\nThomas authored the decision in Ashcroft v. ACLU, which held that the Child Online Protection Act might (or might not) be constitutional. The government was enjoined from enforcing it, pending further proceedings in the lower courts. \n\nThomas wrote concurrences in McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Commission, 514 U.S. 334 (1995)[http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby\nCASE&courtUS&vol\n514&page=334 514 U.S. 334] Full text of the opinion courtesy of Findlaw.com. and United States v. Playboy Entertainment Group (2000).\n\nLaw professor and former clerk to Thomas, John Yoo, says Thomas supports allowing religious groups more participation in public life. Thomas says that the First Amendment Establishment Clause (\"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion\") \"is best understood as a federalism provision—it protects state establishments from federal interference but does not protect any individual right.\"\n\nIn Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow and Cutter v. Wilkinson, Thomas wrote that he supported incorporation of the Free Exercise Clause, which he says \"clearly protects an individual right.\" He said that any law that would violate the Establishment Clause might also violate the Free Exercise Clause.\n\nThomas says \"it makes little sense to incorporate the Establishment Clause\" vis-à-vis the states by the Fourteenth Amendment. And in Cutter, he wrote: \"The text and history of the Clause may well support the view that the Clause is not incorporated against the States precisely because the Clause shielded state establishments from congressional interference.\"\n\nSecond Amendment \n\nThomas agreed with the judgment in McDonald v. Chicago (2010) that the right to keep and bear arms is applicable to state and local governments, but Thomas wrote a separate concurrence finding that an individual's right to bear arms is fundamental as a privilege of American citizenship under the Privileges or Immunities Clause rather than as a fundamental right under the due process clause. The four justices in the plurality opinion specifically rejected incorporation under the privileges or immunities clause, \"declin[ing] to disturb\" the holding in the Slaughter-House Cases, which, according to the plurality, had held that the clause applied only to federal matters. \n\nFourth Amendment \n\nIn cases regarding the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, Thomas often favors police over defendants. For example, his opinion for the court in Board of Education v. Earls upheld drug testing for students involved in extracurricular activities, and he wrote again for the court in Samson v. California, permitting random searches on parolees. He dissented in the case Georgia v. Randolph, which prohibited warrantless searches that one resident approves and the other opposes, arguing that the case was controlled by the court's decision in Coolidge v. New Hampshire. In Indianapolis v. Edmond, Thomas described the court's extant case law as having held that \"suspicionless roadblock seizures are constitutionally permissible if conducted according to a plan that limits the discretion of the officers conducting the stops.\" Although he expressed doubt that those cases were decided correctly, he concluded that since the litigants in the case at bar had not briefed or argued that the earlier cases be overruled, he believed that the court should assume their validity and rule accordingly. There are counterexamples, however: he was in the majority in Kyllo v. United States, which held that the use of thermal imaging technology to probe a suspect's home, without a warrant, violated the Fourth Amendment.\n\nIn cases involving schools, Thomas has advocated greater respect for the doctrine of in loco parentis, which he defines as \"parents delegat[ing] to teachers their authority to discipline and maintain order.\" His dissent in Safford Unified School District v. Redding illustrates his application of this postulate in the Fourth Amendment context. School officials in the Safford case had a reasonable suspicion that 13-year-old Savana Redding was illegally distributing prescription-only drugs. All the justices concurred that it was therefore reasonable for the school officials to search Redding, and the main issue before the court was only whether the search went too far by becoming a strip search or the like. All of the justices, except Thomas, concluded that this search violated the Fourth Amendment. The majority required a finding of danger or reason to believe drugs were hidden in a student's underwear in order to justify a strip search. In contrast, Thomas said, \"It is a mistake for judges to assume the responsibility for deciding which school rules are important enough to allow for invasive searches and which rules are not\" and that \"reasonable suspicion that Redding was in possession of drugs in violation of these policies, therefore, justified a search extending to any area where small pills could be concealed.\" Thomas said, \"[t]here can be no doubt that a parent would have had the authority to conduct the search.\"\n\nSixth Amendment \n\nIn Doggett v. United States, the defendant had technically been a fugitive from the time he was indicted in 1980 until his arrest in 1988. The court held that the delay between indictment and arrest violated Doggett's Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial, finding that the government had been negligent in pursuing him and that he was unaware of the indictment. Thomas dissented, arguing that the purpose of the Speedy Trial Clause was to prevent \"'undue and oppressive incarceration' and the 'anxiety and concern accompanying public accusation'\" and that the case implicated neither. He cast the case instead as, \"present[ing] the question [of] whether, independent of these core concerns, the Speedy Trial Clause protects an accused from two additional harms: (1) prejudice to his ability to defend himself caused by the passage of time; and (2) disruption of his life years after the alleged commission of his crime.\" Thomas dissented from the court's decision to, as he saw it, answer the former in the affirmative. Thomas wrote that dismissing the conviction \"invites the Nation's judges to indulge in ad hoc and result-driven second guessing of the government's investigatory efforts. Our Constitution neither contemplates nor tolerates such a role.\"\n\nIn a line of cases beginning with Crawford v. Washington, decided in 2004, Thomas has joined with Justice Scalia and several liberals on the court in reasserting the importance of the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment, by declaring testimonial statements inadmissible at trial unless the witness is unavailable and there has been ample opportunity for cross-examination, however, his decisions in these cases had not always aligned with Scalia's. In his concurring opinion in the 2011 case Michigan v. Bryant, for example, Thomas explains that in deciding whether a statement is testimonial, one must consider the formality of the circumstances in which it was given.\n\nEighth Amendment \n\nRegarding capital punishment, Thomas was among the dissenters in Atkins v. Virginia and Roper v. Simmons, which held that the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits the application of the death penalty to certain classes of persons. In Kansas v. Marsh. His opinion for the court indicated a belief that the constitution affords states broad procedural latitude in imposing the death penalty, provided they remain within the limits of Furman v. Georgia and Gregg v. Georgia, the 1976 case in which the court had reversed its 1972 ban on death sentences if states followed procedural guidelines.\n\nIn Hudson v. McMillian, a prisoner had been beaten, garnering a cracked lip, broken dental plate, loosened teeth, cuts, and bruises. Although these were not \"serious injuries\", the court believed, it held that \"the use of excessive physical force against a prisoner may constitute cruel and unusual punishment even though the inmate does not suffer serious injury.\" Dissenting, Thomas wrote that, in his view, \"a use of force that causes only insignificant harm to a prisoner may be immoral, it may be tortious, it may be criminal, and it may even be remediable under other provisions of the Federal Constitution, but it is not 'cruel and unusual punishment'. In concluding to the contrary, the Court today goes far beyond our precedents.\" Thomas's vote—in one of his first cases after joining the court—was an early example of his willingness to be the sole dissenter (Scalia later joined the opinion). Thomas's opinion was criticized by the seven-member majority of the court, which wrote that, by comparing physical assault to other prison conditions such as poor prison food, Thomas's opinion ignored \"the concepts of dignity, civilized standards, humanity, and decency that animate the Eighth Amendment\". According to historian David Garrow, Thomas's dissent in Hudson was a \"classic call for federal judicial restraint, reminiscent of views that were held by Felix Frankfurter and John M. Harlan II a generation earlier, but editorial criticism rained down on him\". Thomas would later respond to the accusation \"that I supported the beating of prisoners in that case. Well, one must either be illiterate or fraught with malice to reach that conclusion… no honest reading can reach such a conclusion.\"\n\nIn United States v. Bajakajian, Thomas joined with the court's more liberal bloc to write the majority opinion declaring a fine unconstitutional under the Eighth Amendment. The fine was for failing to declare more than $300,000 in a suitcase on an international flight. Under a federal statute, (a)(1), the passenger would have had to forfeit the entire amount. Thomas noted that the case required a distinction to be made between civil forfeiture and a fine exacted with the intention of punishing the respondent. He found that the forfeiture in this case was clearly intended as a punishment at least in part, was \"grossly disproportional\", and was a violation of the Excessive Fines Clause. \n\nEqual protection and affirmative action \n\nThomas believes that the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment forbids consideration of race, such as race-based affirmative action or preferential treatment. In Adarand Constructors v. Peña, for example, he wrote \"there is a 'moral [and] constitutional equivalence' between laws designed to subjugate a race and those that distribute benefits on the basis of race in order to foster some current notion of equality. Government cannot make us equal; it can only recognize, respect, and protect us as equal before the law. That [affirmative action] programs may have been motivated, in part, by good intentions cannot provide refuge from the principle that under our Constitution, the government may not make distinctions on the basis of race.\" \n\nIn Gratz v. Bollinger, Thomas said that, in his view, \"a State's use of racial discrimination in higher education admissions is categorically prohibited by the Equal Protection Clause.\" In Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1, Thomas joined the opinion of Chief Justice Roberts, who concluded that \"[t]he way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.\" Concurring, Thomas wrote that \"if our history has taught us anything, it has taught us to beware of elites bearing racial theories,\" and charged that the dissent carried \"similarities\" to the arguments of the segregationist litigants in Brown v. Board of Education. In Grutter v. Bollinger, he approvingly quoted Justice Harlan's Plessy v. Ferguson dissent: \"Our Constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens.\" In a concurrence in Missouri v. Jenkins (1995), he wrote that the Missouri District Court \"has read our cases to support the theory that black students suffer an unspecified psychological harm from segregation that retards their mental and educational development. This approach not only relies upon questionable social science research rather than constitutional principle, but it also rests on an assumption of black inferiority.\" \n\nAbortion \n\nThomas has contended that the Constitution does not address the issue of abortion. In Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992), the court reaffirmed Roe v. Wade. Thomas along with Justice Byron White joined the dissenting opinions of Chief Justice William Rehnquist and Justice Antonin Scalia. Rehnquist wrote that \"[w]e believe Roe was wrongly decided, and that it can and should be overruled consistently with our traditional approach to stare decisis in constitutional cases.\" Scalia's opinion concluded that the right to obtain an abortion is not \"a liberty protected by the Constitution of the United States.\" \"[T]he Constitution says absolutely nothing about it,\" Scalia wrote, \"and [ ] the longstanding traditions of American society have permitted it to be legally proscribed.\"\n\nIn Stenberg v. Carhart (2000), the court struck down a state ban on partial-birth abortion, concluding that it failed the \"undue burden\" test established in Casey. Thomas dissented, writing: \"Although a State may permit abortion, nothing in the Constitution dictates that a State must do so.\" He went on to criticize the reasoning of the Casey and Stenberg majorities: \"The majority's insistence on a health exception is a fig leaf barely covering its hostility to any abortion regulation by the States—a hostility that Casey purported to reject.\"\n\nIn Gonzales v. Carhart (2007), the court rejected a facial challenge to a federal ban on partial-birth abortion. Concurring, Thomas asserted that the court's abortion jurisprudence had no basis in the constitution, but that the court had accurately applied that jurisprudence in rejecting the challenge. Thomas added that the court was not deciding the question of whether congress had the power to outlaw partial birth abortions: [W]hether the Act constitutes a permissible exercise of Congress' power under the Commerce Clause is not before the Court [in this case] … the parties did not raise or brief that issue; it is outside the question presented; and the lower courts did not address it.\"\n\nGay rights \n\nIn Lawrence v. Texas (2003), Thomas issued a one-page dissent where he called the Texas anti-gay sodomy statute \"uncommonly silly.\" He then said that if he were a member of the Texas legislature he would vote to repeal the law, as it was not a worthwhile use of \"law enforcement resources\" to police private sexual behavior. Since he was not a member of the state legislature, but instead a federal judge, and the Due Process Clause did not (in his view) touch on the subject, he could not vote to strike it down. Accordingly, Thomas saw the issue as a matter for the states to decide for themselves. \n\nIn Romer v. Evans (1996), Thomas joined Scalia's dissenting opinion arguing that Amendment Two to the Colorado State Constitution did not violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Colorado amendment forbade any judicial, legislative, or executive action designed to protect persons from discrimination based on \"homosexual, lesbian, or bisexual orientation, conduct, practices or relationships.\" \n\nApproach to oral arguments \n\nThomas is well known for his reticence during oral argument. Beginning when he asked a question during a death penalty case on February 22, 2006, Thomas had not asked another question from the bench for more than ten years, finally asking a question on February 29, 2016, about a response to a question regarding whether persons convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence should be barred permanently from firearm possession. He also had a nearly seven-year streak of not speaking at all in any context, finally breaking that silence on January 14, 2013, when he was understood to have joked that a law degree from Yale may be proof of incompetence. \n\nThomas has given many reasons for his silence, including self-consciousness about how he speaks, a preference for listening to those arguing the case, and difficulty getting in a word. Thomas' speaking and listening habits also may have been influenced by his Gullah upbringing, during which time his English was relatively unpolished. \n\nIn 2000, he told a group of high school students that \"if you wait long enough, someone will ask your question.\" Although he rarely speaks from the bench, Thomas has acknowledged that sometimes, during oral arguments, he will pass notes to his friend and colleague Justice Stephen Breyer, who then asks questions on behalf of Thomas. \n\nIn November 2007, Thomas told an audience at Hillsdale College: \"My colleagues should shut up!\" He later explained, \"I don't think that for judging, and for what we are doing, all those questions are necessary.\" According to Amber Porter of ABC News, one of the most notable examples of a rare instance in which Thomas asked a question was in 2002 during oral arguments for Virginia v. Black, when he expressed concern to Michael Dreeben, who had been speaking on behalf of the U.S. Department of Justice, that he was \"actually understating the symbolism...and the effect of...the burning cross\" and its use as a symbol of the \"reign of terror\" of \"100 years of lynching and activity in the South by the Knights of Camellia...and the Ku Klux Klan\". \n\nThomas is not the first quiet justice. In the 1970s and 1980s, William J. Brennan, Thurgood Marshall, and Harry Blackmun generally were quiet, however, the silence of Thomas stood out in the 1990s as the other eight justices engaged in active questioning. The New York Times Supreme Court correspondent Adam Liptak has called it a \"pity\" that Thomas does not ask questions, saying that he has a \"distinctive legal philosophy and a background entirely different from that of any other justice\" and that those he asked in the 2001 and 2002 terms were \"mostly good questions, brisk and pointed.\" Conversely, Jeffrey Toobin, writing in The New Yorker, calls the silence of Thomas \"disgraceful\" behaviour that has \"gone from curious to bizarre to downright embarrassing, for himself and for the institution he represents\". He accused Thomas of \"not paying attention\" to the arguments and said that he is \"disrespectful\" to his fellow justices, \"demeaning\" the court and that the American people should have no confidence in him. \n\nPersonal life \n\nIn 1971, Thomas married his college sweetheart, Kathy Grace Ambush. They had one child, Jamal Adeen. In 1981 they separated and they divorced in 1984. In 1987, Thomas married Virginia Lamp, a lobbyist and aide to Republican Congressman Dick Armey. In 1997, they took in Thomas's then six-year-old great nephew, Mark Martin Jr., who had lived with his mother in Savannah public housing.\n\nThomas's second wife remained active in conservative politics, serving as a consultant to the Heritage Foundation, and as founder and president of Liberty Central. In 2011, she stepped down from Liberty Central to open a conservative lobbying firm, touting her \"experience and connections\", meeting with newly elected Republican congressmen and describing herself as an \"ambassador to the tea party\". Also in 2011, 74 Democratic members of the House of Representatives wrote that Thomas should recuse himself on cases regarding the Affordable Care Act, due to \"appearance of a conflict of interest\" based on the work of his wife. \n\nThomas was reconciled to the Catholic Church in the mid-1990s. In his 2007 autobiography, he criticized the church for its failure to grapple with racism in the 1960s during the civil rights movement, saying it was not so \"adamant about ending racism then as it is about ending abortion now\". Thomas is one of thirteen Catholic justices—out of 112 justices total—in the history of the Supreme Court, and one of five currently on the court. \n\nThomas has a reputation as an affable, good-humored man who personally, is extremely popular with his friends and colleagues. According to writer Jeffrey Toobin, \"Fellow justices, law clerks, police officers, cafeteria workers, janitors—all basked in Thomas's effusive good nature. His rolling basso laughter frequently pierced the silence of the Court's hushed corridors.\" He is particularly close to fellow justice (and ideological opponent) Stephen Breyer, and the two are frequently seen at the court's oral arguments whispering, laughing, and passing notes. \n\nIn January 2011, the liberal advocacy group Common Cause reported that between 2003 and 2007 Thomas failed to disclose $686,589 in income earned by his wife from the Heritage Foundation, instead reporting \"none\" where \"spousal noninvestment income\" would be reported on his Supreme Court financial disclosure forms. The following week, Thomas stated that the disclosure of his wife's income had been \"inadvertently omitted due to a misunderstanding of the filing instructions\". Thomas amended reports going back to 1989. \n\nWritings \n\n* \n* Thomas, Clarence. \"Why Federalism Matters,\" Drake Law Review, Volume 48, Issue 2, page 231 (2000).\n* Thomas, Clarence. \"Supreme Discomfort: The Divided Soul of Clarence Thomas\"", "Ruth Joan Bader Ginsburg (born March 15, 1933) is an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Ginsburg was appointed by President Bill Clinton and took the oath of office on August 10, 1993. She is the second female justice (after Sandra Day O'Connor) and one of three female justices currently serving on the Supreme Court (along with Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan).\n\nShe is generally viewed as belonging to the liberal wing of the Court. Before becoming a judge, Ginsburg spent a considerable portion of her legal career as an advocate for the advancement of women's rights as a constitutional principle. She advocated as a volunteer lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union and was a member of its board of directors and one of its general counsel in the 1970s. She was a professor at Rutgers School of Law–Newark and Columbia Law School. In 1980, President Jimmy Carter appointed her to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.\n\nEarly life and education\n\nBorn in Brooklyn, New York City, Ruth Joan Bader is the second daughter of Nathan and Celia (née Amster) Bader, Russian Jewish immigrants, who lived in the Flatbush neighborhood. The Baders' older daughter, Marylin, died at age 6 when Ruth was still young. The family nicknamed Ruth \"Kiki\". They belonged to the East Midwood Jewish Center. At age thirteen, Ruth acted as the \"camp rabbi\" at a Jewish summer program at Camp Che-Na-Wah in Minerva, New York.\n\nHer mother took an active role in her education, taking her to the library often. Celia had been a good student in her youth, graduating from high school at age 15, yet could not further her own education because her family chose to send her brother to college instead. Celia wanted to see her daughter get more of an education, which she thought would allow Bader to become a high school history teacher. Bader attended James Madison High School, whose law program later dedicated a courtroom in her honor. Her mother struggled with cancer throughout Bader's high school years and died the day before her graduation.\n\nBader attended Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, where she was a member of Alpha Epsilon Phi. While at Cornell she met Martin D. Ginsburg at age 17. She graduated from Cornell with a Bachelor of Arts degree in government on June 23, 1954. Bader married Martin Ginsburg a month after her graduation from Cornell, and followed her new husband to Fort Sill, Oklahoma where he was stationed as an ROTC Officer in the Army Reserve called up for active duty. At age 21, she worked for the Social Security office in Oklahoma where she was demoted after becoming pregnant with her first child. She gave birth to a daughter in 1955.\n\nIn fall 1956, she enrolled at Harvard Law School, where she was one of nine women in a class of about 500. Erwin Griswold, the Dean of Harvard Law reportedly asked the female law students, including Ginsburg, “How do you justify taking a spot from a qualified man?” When her husband took a job in New York City, she transferred to Columbia Law School and became the first woman to be on two major law reviews, the Harvard Law Review and the Columbia Law Review. In 1959 she earned her Bachelor of Laws at Columbia and tied for first in her class. \n\nEarly career\n\nAt the start of her legal career, Ginsburg faced difficulty finding employment being a wife, a mother of a five-year-old daughter, and Jewish. In 1960, despite a strong recommendation from Albert Martin Sacks, a professor and later dean of Harvard Law School, Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter turned down Ginsburg for a clerkship position because of her gender. Later that year, Ginsburg began a clerkship for Judge Edmund L. Palmieri of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, a position she held for two years.\n\nAcademia\n\nFrom 1961 to 1963, she was a research associate and then associate director of the Columbia Law School Project on International Procedure, learning Swedish to co-author a book with Anders Bruzelius on civil procedure in Sweden. Ginsburg conducted extensive research for her book at Lund University in Sweden. Ginsburg's time in Sweden also influenced her thinking on gender equality. Ginsburg was inspired observing the changes in Sweden where women were 20-25% of all law students and one of the judges Ginsburg watched for her research was eight-months pregnant and still working. \n\nHer first position as a professor came at Rutgers Law School in 1963. The position was not without its drawbacks; Ginsburg was informed she would be paid less than her male colleagues because she had a husband with a good paying job. At the time Ginsburg entered academia, she was one of less than twenty women law professors in the United States. She was a professor of law, mainly Civil Procedure, at Rutgers from 1963 to 1972, receiving tenure from the school in 1969. In 1970 she co-founded the Women's Rights Law Reporter, the first law journal in the U.S. to focus exclusively on women's rights. Ginsburg volunteered to write the brief for Reed v. Reed, 404 U.S. 71 (1971), wherein the Supreme Court Court extended the protections of the Equal Protection Clause to women for the first time. \n\nFrom 1972 until 1980, she taught at Columbia, where she became the first tenured woman and co-authored the first law school casebook on sex discrimination.\n\nLitigation and advocacy\n\nIn 1972, Ginsburg co-founded the Women's Rights Project at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and, in 1973, she became the ACLU's General Counsel. As the chief litigator for the Women's Rights Project, she briefed and argued several landmark cases in front of the Supreme Court. Having previously argued Reed v. Reed, she took on cases like Frontiero v. Richardson, 411 U.S. 677 (1973) and Weinberger v. Wiesenfeld, 420 U.S. 636 (1975), which supported the ultimate development and application of the intermediate scrutiny Equal Protection standard of review for legal classifications based on sex. She attained a reputation as a skilled oral advocate and her work directly led to the end of gender discrimination in many areas of the law. In 1977, she became a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University.\n\nHer last case as a lawyer before the Court was 1978's Duren v. Missouri, which challenged the validity of voluntary jury duty for women. In Ginsburg's view, women's participation in a government service as vital as jury duty should not be optional. At the end of Ginsburg's oral presentation, then-Associate Justice William Rehnquist asked Ginsburg, \"You won't settle for putting Susan B. Anthony on the new dollar, then?\"Von Drehle, David (July 19, 1993). [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/23/AR2007082300903_pf.html \"Redefining Fair With a Simple Careful Assault – Step-by-Step Strategy Produced Strides for Equal Protection\"]. The Washington Post. Retrieved August 24, 2009. Ginsburg said she considered responding \"We won't settle for tokens,\" but instead opted not to answer the question.\n\nJudicial career\n\nU.S. Court of Appeals\n\nPresident Jimmy Carter appointed Ginsburg to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on April 14, 1980, to the seat of recently deceased judge Harold Leventhal. She served there for 13 years, until joining the Supreme Court. During her tenure on the D.C. Circuit, Ginsburg made 57 hires for law clerk, intern, and secretary positions. At her Supreme Court confirmation hearing, it was revealed that none of those hired had been African-American, a fact for which Ginsburg (an \"aggressive support[er] [of] disparate-impact statistics as evidence of intentional discrimination\") was sharply criticized. \n\nSupreme Court\n\nNomination and confirmation\n\nPresident Bill Clinton nominated her as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court on June 14, 1993, to fill the seat vacated by retiring Justice Byron White. Ginsburg was recommended to Clinton by then-U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno after a suggestion by U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah). At the time of her nomination, Ginsburg was viewed as a moderate. President Clinton was reportedly looking to increase the Court's diversity, which Ginsburg did as the first Jewish justice since the 1969 retirement of Justice Abe Fortas and as only the second female appointee. The American Bar Association's Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary rated Ginsburg as \"well qualified,\" its highest possible rating for a prospective justice.\n\nDuring her subsequent testimony before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee as part of the confirmation hearings, she refused to answer questions regarding her view on the constitutionality of some issues, such as the death penalty. Ginsburg declined to give her view on the constitutionality of the death penalty, as it was an issue which she might have to vote on if it came before the court. Ginsburg refused to discuss her beliefs about the limits and proper role of jurisprudence, saying, \"Were I to rehearse here what I would say and how I would reason on such questions, I would act injudiciously.\"\n\nAt the same time, Ginsburg did answer questions relating to some potentially controversial issues. For instance, she affirmed her belief in a constitutional right to privacy and explicated at some length on her personal judicial philosophy and thoughts regarding gender equality. Ginsburg was more forthright in discussing her views on topics about which she had previously written. The U.S. Senate confirmed her by a 96 to 3 vote and she took her judicial oath on August 10, 1993.\n\nGinsburg's name was later invoked during the confirmation process of John Roberts. Ginsburg herself was not the first nominee to avoid answering certain specific questions before Congress, and as a young lawyer in 1981 John Roberts had advised against Supreme Court nominees giving specific responses. Nevertheless, some conservative commentators and Senators invoked the phrase \"Ginsburg precedent\" to defend Roberts demurrers. In a September 28, 2005, speech at Wake Forest University, Ginsburg said that Roberts' refusal to answer questions during his Senate confirmation hearings on some cases was \"unquestionably right\". \n\nSupreme Court jurisprudence\n\nGinsburg characterizes her performance on the Court as a cautious approach to adjudication. She argued in a speech shortly before her nomination to the Court that motions seem to me right, in the main, for constitutional as well as common law adjudication. Doctrinal limbs too swiftly shaped, experience teaches, may prove unstable.\" \n\nWith the retirement of Justice Stevens, Ginsburg became the senior member of what is sometimes referred to as the Court's \"liberal wing.\" When the Court splits 5-4 among ideological lines and the liberal justices are in the minority, Ginsburg has the authority to assign authorship of the dissenting opinion. Ginsburg has been a proponent of the liberal dissenters speaking \"with one voice\" and, where practicable, presenting a unified approach to which all of the dissenting justices can agree.\n\nAlthough Ginsburg has consistently supported abortion rights and joined in the Court's opinion striking down Nebraska's partial-birth abortion law in Stenberg v. Carhart , on the fortieth anniversary of the Court's ruling in Roe v. Wade , she criticized the decision as terminating a nascent democratic movement to liberalize abortion laws which might have built a more durable consensus in support of abortion rights. \n\nShe discussed her views on abortion rights and sexual equality in a 2009 New York Times interview, in which she said regarding abortion that \"[t]he basic thing is that the government has no business making that choice for a woman.\" One statement she made during the interview (\"Frankly, I had thought at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don't want to have too many of.\") was criticized by conservative commentator Michael Gerson as reflecting an \"attitude...that abortion is economically important to a 'woman of means' and useful in reducing the number of social undesirables.\" \n\nGinsburg has also been an advocate for using foreign law and norms to shape U.S. law in judicial opinions, in contrast to the textualist views of her colleagues Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Justice Antonin Scalia, Justice Clarence Thomas, and Justice Samuel Alito.\n\nSelected court opinions\n\n*United States v. Virginia, Court Opinion. Virginia Military Institute's male-only admission policy violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.\n*United States v. O'Hagan, Court Opinion\n*Olmstead v. L.C., Court Opinion\n*Friends of the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Environmental Services, Inc., Court Opinion\n*Bush v. Gore, Dissenting\n*Eldred v. Ashcroft, Court Opinion\n*Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Saudi Basic Industries Corp., Court Opinion\n*Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., Dissenting\n*Gonzales v. Carhart, Dissenting\n*Ricci v. DeStefano, 129 S. Ct. 2658 (2009) Dissenting\n*Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, 573 U.S. ___ (2014) Dissenting\n\nOther activities\n\nGinsburg administered, at his request, Vice President Al Gore's oath of office to a second term during the second presidential inauguration of Clinton on January 20, 1997. \n\nIn January 2012, Ginsburg went to Egypt for four days of discussions with judges, law school faculty, law school students, and legal experts. Part of the purpose of her visit was to \"listen and learn\" as Egypt began its constitutional transition to democracy. She also answered questions about the American justice system and the American Constitution. Ginsburg told students at Cairo University that she was \"inspired\" by the Egyptian revolution. \n\nIn an interview with Alhayat TV, she stated that the first requirement of a new constitution should be that it \"safeguard basic fundamental human rights, like our First Amendment\". Asked if Egypt should model its new constitution on those of other nations, she said Egypt should be \"aided by all Constitution-writing that has gone on since the end of World War II\", adding, \"I would not look to the U.S. Constitution, if I were drafting a Constitution in the year 2012. I might look at the Constitution of South Africa. That was a deliberate attempt to have a fundamental instrument of government that embraced basic human rights, had an independent judiciary. ... It really is, I think, a great piece of work that was done. Much more recent than the U.S. Constitution.\" She said the U.S. was fortunate to have a constitution authored by \"very wise\" men but pointed out that in the 1780s no women were able to participate in the process and slavery still existed in the U.S. \n\nOn August 31, 2013, Ginsburg officiated at the same-sex wedding of Kennedy Center President Michael Kaiser and John Roberts, a government economist. This is believed to be a first for a Supreme Court justice. \n\nOn July 8, 2016, in an interview with The New York Times, Ginsburg said she could not \"imagine what the country would be ... with Donald Trump as our president\". She later apologized for criticizing the presumptive Republican nominee, calling her remarks \"ill-advised\". \n\nPersonal life\n\nA few days after graduating from Cornell, Ruth Bader married Martin D. Ginsburg, later an internationally prominent tax lawyer, and then (after they moved from New York to Washington DC, upon her accession to the D.C. Circuit) professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center. Their daughter Jane Ginsburg (born 1955) is a professor at Columbia Law School. Their son James Steven Ginsburg (born 1965) is founder and president of Cedille Records, a classical-music recording company based in Chicago, Illinois. Ginsburg is also a grandmother of four. \n\nAfter the birth of their daughter, her husband was diagnosed with testicular cancer. During this period, Ginsburg attended class and took notes for both of them, typed her husband's papers to his dictation, and cared for their daughter and her sick husband – all while making the Harvard Law Review. They celebrated their 56th wedding anniversary on June 23, 2010. Martin Ginsburg died of complications from metastatic cancer on June 27, 2010. They spoke publicly of being in shared earning/shared parenting marriage, including in a speech Martin Ginsburg wrote and had intended to give prior to his death and Ruth Bader Ginsburg delivered posthumously. \n\nAlthough raised in a Jewish home, Ginsburg became non-observant when she was excluded from the minyan for mourners following the death of her mother. There was a \"house full of women,\" but Ginsburg, as a woman, was excluded. Orthodox Judaism requires that 10 Bar Mitzvahed men be present for a minyan and women are excluded from being counted. She notes that her attitude might be different now, following her attendance at a bat mitzvah ceremony in a more liberal stream of Judaism, where the rabbi and cantor were both women. In March 2015 Ginsburg, along with Rabbi Lauren Holtzblatt, released a feminist essay on Passover, \"The Heroic and Visionary Women of Passover\", highlighting the roles of five key women in the saga: \"These women had a vision leading out of the darkness shrouding their world. They were women of action, prepared to defy authority to make their vision a reality bathed in the light of the day. In addition, she decorates her chambers with the phrase from Deuteronomy: \"Tzedek, tzedek, tirdof\" (Justice, justice shall you pursue) as a reminder of her heritage and professional responsibility. \n\nGinsburg has a collection of lace jabots from around the world. She stated in 2014 that she has a particular jabot that she wears when issuing her dissents (black with gold embroidery and faceted stones), as well as another she wears when issuing majority opinions (crocheted yellow and cream with crystals) which was a gift from her law clerks. Her favorite jabot (woven with white beads) is from Cape Town, South Africa.\n\nDespite their fundamental differences, Ginsburg considered Scalia her closest colleague on the Court. The two justices had often dined and attended the opera together. \n\nHealth\n\nGinsburg was diagnosed with colon cancer in 1999 and underwent surgery followed by chemotherapy and radiation therapy. During the process, she did not miss a day on the bench. On February 5, 2009, she again underwent surgery related to pancreatic cancer. Ginsburg's tumor was discovered at an early stage. She was released from a New York City hospital, eight days after the surgery and heard oral arguments again four days later.\n\nOn September 24, 2009, Ginsburg was hospitalized in Washington DC for lightheadedness following an outpatient treatment for iron deficiency and was released the following day. \n\nOn November 26, 2014, she had a stent placed in her right coronary artery after experiencing discomfort while exercising in the Supreme Court gym with her personal trainer. \n\nFuture plans\n\nWith the retirement of John Paul Stevens in 2010, Ginsburg became, at age 77, the oldest justice on the Court. Despite rumors she would retire as a result of old age, poor health, and the death of her husband, she denied she was planning to step down. In an August 2010 interview, Ginsburg stated that the Court's work was helping her cope with the death of her husband and suggested she would serve at least until a painting that used to hang in her office was due to be returned to her in 2012. She also expressed a wish to emulate Justice Louis Brandeis' service of nearly 23 years, which would get her to April 2016. She has also stated that she has a new \"model\" to emulate, Justice Stevens, who retired after nearly 35 years on the bench at age 90.\n\nIn the years 2013 and 2014 of President Obama's presidency, some democrats and liberals called for Ginsburg to retire. They argued that Ginsburg's voluntary retirement would ensure that Obama would be able to appoint a like-minded successor, particularly while the Democratic Party held control of the senate. They pointed to Ginsburg's age and past health issues as factors making her longevity uncertain. Ginsburg rejected these pleas. Ginsburg affirmed her wish to remain a justice as long as she was mentally sharp enough to perform her duties. Moreover, Ginsburg said that the political climate would prevent Obama from appointing a jurist like herself. \n\nRecognition\n\nIn 2009 Forbes named Ginsburg among the 100 Most Powerful Women. Glamour Magazine named her one of their 'Women of the Year 2012.' In 2015, she was named by Time as one of the Time 100, as an Icon. \n\nIn 2009, Ginsburg was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Willamette University. In 2010 she was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Princeton University. In 2011 she was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Harvard University. \n\nIn 2013, a painting featuring Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, Sandra Day O'Connor, and Elena Kagan was unveiled at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. According to the Smithsonian at the time, the painting was on loan to the museum for three years. \n\nResearchers at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History gave a species of praying mantis the name Ilomantis ginsburgae after Ginsburg. The name was given because the neck plate of the Ilomantis ginsburgae bears a resemblance to a jabot, which Ginsburg is known for wearing. Moreover, the new species was identified based upon the female insect's genitalia instead of based upon the male of the species. The researchers noted that the name was a nod to Ginsburg's fight for gender equality. \n\nIn popular culture\n\nThe Cartoon Network television show Clarence featured a toy called Wrath Hover Ginsbot in the season 1 episode \"Jeff's New Toy\", which first aired on May 12, 2014. In 2015 Ginsburg was portrayed by Kate McKinnon on Saturday Night Live. McKinnon has repeatedly reprised the role, including during a Weekend Update sketch that aired from the 2016 Republican National Convention in Cleveland. \n\nGinsburg has been referred to as a \"pop culture icon\". Ginsburg's profile began to rise after Justice O'Connor's retirement in 2005 left Ginsburg as the only serving female justice. Ginsburg's increasingly fiery dissents, particularly in Shelby County v. Holder, led to the creation of the Notorious R.B.G Tumblr and meme comparing the justice to rapper The Notorious B.I.G.. \n\nIn February 2016 The Ruth Bader Ginsburg Coloring Book, by artist Tom F. O'Leary, was published.", "John Glover Roberts Jr. (born January 27, 1955) is the 17th and current Chief Justice of the United States. He took his seat on September 29, 2005, having been nominated by President George W. Bush after the death of Chief Justice William Rehnquist. He has been described as having a conservative judicial philosophy in his jurisprudence.\n\nRoberts grew up in northwest Indiana and was educated in a private school. He then attended Harvard College and Harvard Law School, where he was managing editor of the Harvard Law Review. After being admitted to the bar, he served as a law clerk for Judge Henry Friendly and then Justice Rehnquist before taking a position in the Attorney General's office during the Reagan Administration. He went on to serve the Reagan Administration and the George H. W. Bush administration in the Department of Justice and the Office of the White House Counsel, before spending 14 years in private law practice. During this time, he argued 39 cases before the Supreme Court. During his two-year tenure on the D.C. Circuit, Roberts authored 49 opinions, eliciting two dissents from other judges, and authoring three dissents of his own. Notably, he represented 19 states in United States v. Microsoft. \n\nIn 2003, Roberts was appointed as a judge of the D.C. Circuit by President George W. Bush, where he was serving when he was nominated to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, initially to succeed retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. When Chief Justice Rehnquist died before Roberts's confirmation hearings began, Bush instead nominated Roberts to fill the Chief Justice position.\n\nEarly years\n\nJohn Glover Roberts was born in Buffalo, New York, the son of Rosemary (née Podrasky) and John Glover \"Jack\" Roberts Sr. (1928–2008). His father was a plant manager with Bethlehem Steel. He has Irish, Welsh, and Czech ancestry. When Roberts was in fourth grade, his family moved to Long Beach, Indiana. He grew up with three sisters: Kathy, Peggy, and Barbara.\n\nRoberts attended Notre Dame Elementary School, a Roman Catholic grade school in Long Beach. In 1973, he graduated from La Lumiere School, a Roman Catholic boarding school in La Porte, Indiana, where he was an excellent student and athlete. He studied five years of Latin (in four years), some French, and was known generally for his devotion to his studies. He was captain of the football team (he later described himself as a \"slow-footed linebacker\"), and was a regional champion in wrestling. He participated in choir and drama, co-edited the school newspaper, and served on the athletic council and the executive committee of the student council.\n\nHe attended Harvard College, graduating in 1976 with an A.B. summa cum laude in history in three years. He then attended Harvard Law School where he was the managing editor of the Harvard Law Review. He graduated from law school with a J.D. magna cum laude in 1979. \n\nEarly legal career\n\nAfter graduating from law school, Roberts served as a law clerk for Judge Henry Friendly on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals for one year. Roberts frequently cites Judge Friendly in his opinions. From 1980 to 1981, he clerked for then-Associate Justice William Rehnquist on the United States Supreme Court. From 1981 to 1982, he served in the Reagan administration as a Special Assistant to U.S. Attorney General William French Smith. From 1982 to 1986, Roberts served as Associate Counsel to the President under White House Counsel Fred Fielding.\n\nRoberts entered private law practice in 1986 as an associate at the Washington, D.C.-based law firm of Hogan & Hartson, now known as Hogan Lovells. As part of Hogan & Hartson's pro bono work, he worked behind the scenes for gay rights advocates, reviewing filings and preparing arguments for the Supreme Court case Romer v. Evans (1996), which was described in 2005 as \"the movement's most important legal victory\". Roberts also argued on behalf of the homeless, a case which became one of Roberts' \"few appellate losses.\" Another pro bono matter was a death penalty case in which he represented John Ferguson, who was convicted of killing eight people in Florida. \n\nRoberts left Hogan & Hartson to serve in the George H. W. Bush administration as Principal Deputy Solicitor General from 1989 to 1993 and as Acting Solicitor General for the purposes of at least one case when Ken Starr had a conflict. \n\nIn 1992, President George H. W. Bush nominated Roberts to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, but no Senate vote was held, and Roberts's nomination expired at the end of the 102nd Congress. \n\nRoberts returned to Hogan & Hartson as a partner and became the head of the firm's appellate practice in addition to serving as an adjunct faculty member at the Georgetown University Law Center. During this time, Roberts argued 39 cases before the Supreme Court, prevailing in 25 of them. He represented 19 states in United States v. Microsoft. Those cases include:\n\nDuring the late 1990s, while working for Hogan & Hartson, Roberts served as a member of the steering committee of the Washington, D.C. chapter of the conservative Federalist Society. \n\nIn 2000, Roberts traveled to Tallahassee, Florida to advise Jeb Bush, then the Governor of Florida, concerning the latter's actions in the Florida election recount during the presidential election. \n\nOn the D.C. Circuit\n\nOn May 10, 2001, President George W. Bush nominated Roberts for a different seat on the D.C. Circuit, which had been vacated by James L. Buckley. The Senate at the time, however, was controlled by the Democrats, who were in conflict with Bush over his judicial nominees. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-VT, refused to give Roberts a hearing in the 107th Congress. The GOP regained control of the Senate on January 7, 2003, and Bush resubmitted Roberts's nomination that day. Roberts was confirmed on May 8, 2003, and received his commission on June 2, 2003. During his two-year tenure on the D.C. Circuit, Roberts authored 49 opinions, eliciting two dissents from other judges, and authoring three dissents of his own.\n\nNotable decisions on the D.C. Circuit include the following:\n\nFourth and Fifth Amendments\n\nHedgepeth v. Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, 386 F.3d 1148, involved a 12-year-old girl who was arrested, searched, handcuffed, driven to police headquarters, booked, and fingerprinted after she violated a publicly advertised zero tolerance \"no eating\" policy in a Washington Metro station by eating a single french fry. She was released to her mother three hours later. She sued, alleging that an adult would have only received a citation for the same offense, while children must be detained until parents are notified. The D.C. Circuit unanimously affirmed the district court's dismissal of the girl's lawsuit, which was predicated on alleged violations of the Fourth Amendment (unreasonable search and seizure) and Fifth Amendment (equal protection).\n\n\"No one is very happy about the events that led to this litigation,\" Roberts wrote, and noted that the policies under which the girl was apprehended had since been changed. Because age discrimination is evaluated using a rational basis test, however, only weak state interests were required to justify the policy, and the panel concluded they were present. \"Because parents and guardians play an essential role in that rehabilitative process, it is reasonable for the District to seek to ensure their participation, and the method chosen—detention until the parent is notified and retrieves the child—certainly does that, in a way issuing a citation might not.\" The court concluded that the policy and detention were constitutional, noting that \"the question before us... is not whether these policies were a bad idea, but whether they violated the Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution,\" language reminiscent of Justice Potter Stewart's dissent in Griswold v. Connecticut. \"We are not asked in this case to say whether we think this law is unwise, or even asinine,\" Stewart had written; \"[w]e are asked to hold that it violates the United States Constitution. And that, I cannot do.\"\n\nMilitary tribunals\n\nIn Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, Roberts was part of a unanimous Circuit panel overturning the district court ruling and upholding military tribunals set up by the Bush administration for trying terrorism suspects known as enemy combatants. Circuit Judge A. Raymond Randolph, writing for the court, ruled that Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a driver for al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, could be tried by a military court because:\n\n# the military commission had the approval of the United States Congress;\n# the Third Geneva Convention is a treaty between nations and as such it does not confer individual rights and remedies enforceable in U.S. courts;\n# even if the Convention could be enforced in U.S. courts, it would not be of assistance to Hamdan at the time because, for a conflict such as the war against Al-Qaeda (considered by the court as a separate war from that against Afghanistan itself) that is not between two countries, it guarantees only a certain standard of judicial procedure without speaking to the jurisdiction in which the prisoner must be tried.\n\nThe court held open the possibility of judicial review of the results of the military commission after the current proceedings ended. This decision was overturned on June 29, 2006 by the Supreme Court in a 5–3 decision, with Roberts not participating due to his prior participation in the case as a circuit judge. \n\nEnvironmental regulation\n\nRoberts wrote a dissent in Rancho Viejo, LLC v. Norton, [http://laws.lp.findlaw.com/dc/015373b.html 323 F.3d 1062], a case involving the protection of a rare California toad under the Endangered Species Act. When the court denied a rehearing en banc, [http://laws.lp.findlaw.com/dc/015373b.html 334 F.3d 1158] (D.C. Cir. 2003), Roberts dissented, arguing that the panel opinion was inconsistent with United States v. Lopez and United States v. Morrison in that it incorrectly focused on whether the regulation substantially affects interstate commerce rather than on whether the regulated activity does. In Roberts's view, the Commerce Clause of the Constitution did not permit the government to regulate activity affecting what he called \"a hapless toad\" that \"for reasons of its own, lives its entire life in California.\" He said that reviewing the panel decision would allow the court \"alternative grounds for sustaining application of the Act that may be more consistent with Supreme Court precedent.\" \n\nNomination and confirmation to the Supreme Court\n\nOn July 19, 2005, President Bush nominated Roberts to the U.S. Supreme Court to fill a vacancy that would be created by the retirement of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. Roberts was the first Supreme Court nominee since Stephen Breyer in 1994. Bush announced Roberts's nomination in a live, nationwide television broadcast from the East Room of the White House at 9 p.m. Eastern Time.\n\nChief Justice William H. Rehnquist died on September 3, 2005, while Roberts's confirmation was still pending before the Senate. Shortly thereafter, on September 5, Bush withdrew Roberts's nomination as O'Connor's successor and announced Roberts's new nomination to the position of Chief Justice. Bush asked the Senate to expedite Roberts's confirmation hearings to fill the vacancy by the beginning of the Supreme Court's session in early October.\n\nRoberts's testimony on his jurisprudence\n\nDuring his confirmation hearings, Roberts said that he did not have a comprehensive jurisprudential philosophy, and he did \"not think beginning with an all-encompassing approach to constitutional interpretation is the best way to faithfully construe the document\". Roberts analogized judges to baseball umpires: \"[I]t's my job to call balls and strikes, and not to pitch or bat.\" Roberts demonstrated an encyclopedic knowledge of Supreme Court precedent, which he discussed without notes. Among the issues he discussed were:\n\nCommerce Clause\n\nIn Senate hearings, Roberts has stated:\n\nFederalism\n\nRoberts stated the following about federalism in a 1999 radio interview:\n\nReviewing Acts of Congress\n\nAt a Senate hearing, Roberts stated:\n\nStare decisis\n\nOn the subject of stare decisis, referring to Brown v. Board, the decision overturning school segregation, Roberts said that \"the Court in that case, of course, overruled a prior decision. I don't think that constitutes judicial activism because obviously if the decision is wrong, it should be overruled. That's not activism. That's applying the law correctly.\" \n\nRoe v. Wade\n\nWhile working as a lawyer for the Reagan administration, Roberts wrote legal memos defending administration policies on abortion. At his nomination hearing Roberts testified that the legal memos represented the views of the administration he was representing at the time and not necessarily his own. \"Senator, I was a staff lawyer; I didn't have a position,\" Roberts said. As a lawyer in the George H. W. Bush administration, Roberts signed a legal brief urging the court to overturn Roe v. Wade. \n\nIn private meetings with senators before his confirmation, Roberts testified that Roe was settled law, but added that it was subject to the legal principle of stare decisis, meaning that while the Court must give some weight to the precedent, it was not legally bound to uphold it.\n\nIn his Senate testimony, Roberts said that, while sitting on the Appellate Court, he had an obligation to respect precedents established by the Supreme Court, including the right to an abortion. He stated: \"Roe v. Wade is the settled law of the land. ... There is nothing in my personal views that would prevent me from fully and faithfully applying that precedent, as well as Casey.\" Following the traditional reluctance of nominees to indicate which way they might vote on an issue likely to come before the Supreme Court, he did not explicitly say whether he would vote to overturn either.\n\nConfirmation\n\nOn September 22, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved Roberts's nomination by a vote of 13–5, with Senators Ted Kennedy, Richard Durbin, Charles Schumer, Joe Biden and Dianne Feinstein casting the dissenting votes. Roberts was confirmed by the full Senate on September 29 by a margin of 78–22. All Republicans and the one Independent voted for Roberts; the Democrats split evenly, 22–22. Roberts was confirmed by what was, historically, a narrow margin for a Supreme Court justice. However, all subsequent confirmation votes have been even narrower, and the nomination of Harriet Miers was never voted on.\n\nOn the U.S. Supreme Court\n\nRoberts took the Constitutional oath of office, administered by Associate Justice John Paul Stevens at the White House, on September 29. On October 3, he took the judicial oath provided for by the Judiciary Act of 1789 at the United States Supreme Court building, prior to the first oral arguments of the 2005 term. Ending weeks of speculation, Roberts wore a plain black robe, dispensing with the gold sleeve-bars added to the Chief Justice's robes by his predecessor. Then 50, Roberts became the youngest member of the Court, and the third-youngest person to have ever become Chief Justice (John Jay was appointed at age 44 in 1789 while John Marshall was appointed at age 45 in 1801). However, many Associate Justices, such as Clarence Thomas (appointed at age 43) and William O. Douglas (appointed at age 40 in 1939), have joined the Court at a younger age than Roberts.\n\nJustice Antonin Scalia has said that Roberts \"pretty much run[s] the show the same way\" as Rehnquist, albeit \"let[ting] people go on a little longer at conference ... but [he'll] get over that.\" Roberts has been portrayed as a consistent advocate for conservative principles by analysts such as Jeffrey Toobin. \n\nSeventh Circuit Judge Diane Sykes, surveying Roberts's first term on the court, concluded that his jurisprudence \"appears to be strongly rooted in the discipline of traditional legal method, evincing a fidelity to text, structure, history, and the constitutional hierarchy. He exhibits the restraint that flows from the careful application of established decisional rules and the practice of reasoning from the case law. He appears to place great stock in the process-oriented tools and doctrinal rules that guard against the aggregation of judicial power and keep judicial discretion in check: jurisdictional limits, structural federalism, textualism, and the procedural rules that govern the scope of judicial review.\" The Chief Justice is currently ranked 65th in the Forbes ranking of \"The World's Most Powerful People.\" \n\nEarly decisions\n\nOn January 17, 2006, Roberts dissented along with Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas in Gonzales v. Oregon, which held that the Controlled Substances Act does not allow the United States Attorney General to prohibit physicians from prescribing drugs for the assisted suicide of the terminally ill as permitted by an Oregon law. The point of contention in the case was largely one of statutory interpretation, not federalism.\n\nOn March 6, 2006, Roberts wrote the unanimous decision in Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights that colleges accepting federal money must allow military recruiters on campus, despite university objections to the Clinton administration-initiated \"don't ask, don't tell\" policy.\n\nFourth Amendment\n\nRoberts wrote his first dissent in Georgia v. Randolph (2006). The majority's decision prohibited police from searching a home if both occupants are present but one objected and the other consented. Roberts criticized the majority opinion as inconsistent with prior case law and for partly basing its reasoning on its perception of social custom. He said the social expectations test was flawed because the Fourth Amendment protects a legitimate expectation of privacy, not social expectations. \n\nIn Utah v. Strieff (2016), Roberts joined the majority in ruling (5-3) that a person with an outstanding warrant may be arrested and searched, and that any evidence discovered based on that search is admissible in court; the majority opinion held that this remains true even when police act unlawfully by stopping a person without probable cause, before learning of the existence of the outstanding warrant. \n\nNotice and opportunity to be heard\n\nAlthough Roberts has often sided with Scalia and Thomas, Roberts provided a crucial vote against their position in Jones v. Flowers. In Jones, Roberts sided with liberal justices of the court in ruling that, before a home is seized and sold in a tax-forfeiture sale, due diligence must be demonstrated and proper notification needs to be sent to the owners. Dissenting were Anthony Kennedy along with Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. Samuel Alito did not participate, while Roberts's opinion was joined by David Souter, Stephen Breyer, John Paul Stevens, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.\n\nAbortion\n\nOn the Supreme Court, Roberts has indicated he supports some abortion restrictions. In Gonzales v. Carhart (2007), he voted with the majority to uphold the constitutionality of the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act. Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for a five-justice majority, distinguished Stenberg v. Carhart, and concluded that the court's previous decision in Planned Parenthood v. Casey did not prevent Congress from banning the procedure. The decision left the door open for future as-applied challenges, and did not address the broader question of whether Congress had the authority to pass the law. Justice Clarence Thomas filed a concurring opinion, contending that the Court's prior decisions in Roe v. Wade and Casey should be reversed; Roberts declined to join that opinion.\n\nEqual protection clause\n\nRoberts opposes the use of race in assigning students to particular schools, including for purposes such as maintaining integrated schools. He sees such plans as discrimination in violation of the constitution's equal protection clause and Brown v. Board of Education. In Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1, the court considered two voluntarily adopted school district plans that relied on race to determine which schools certain children may attend. The court had held in Brown that \"racial discrimination in public education is unconstitutional,\" and later, that \"racial classifications, imposed by whatever federal, state, or local governmental actor, ... are constitutional only if they are narrowly tailored measures that further compelling governmental interests,\" and that this \"[n]arrow tailoring ... require[s] serious, good faith consideration of workable race-neutral alternatives.\" Roberts cited these cases in writing for the Parents Involved majority, concluding that the school districts had \"failed to show that they considered methods other than explicit racial classifications to achieve their stated goals.\" In a section of the opinion joined by four other Justices, Roberts added that \"[t]he way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.\"\n\nFree speech\n\nRoberts authored the 2007 student free speech case Morse v. Frederick, ruling that a student in a public school-sponsored activity does not have the right to advocate drug use on the basis that the right to free speech does not invariably prevent the exercise of school discipline. \n\nOn April 20, 2010, in United States v. Stevens, the Supreme Court struck down an animal cruelty law. Roberts, writing for an 8–1 majority, found that a federal statute criminalizing the commercial production, sale, or possession of depictions of cruelty to animals, was an unconstitutional abridgment of the First Amendment right to freedom of speech.\nThe Court held that the statute was substantially overbroad; for example, it could allow prosecutions for selling photos of out-of-season hunting. \n\nHealth care reform\n\nOn June 28, 2012, Roberts delivered the majority opinion in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, which upheld the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act by a 5–4 vote. The Court indicated that although the \"individual mandate\" component of the Act could not be upheld under the Commerce Clause, the mandate could be construed as a tax and was therefore ruled to be valid under Congress's authority to \"lay and collect taxes.\" The Court overturned a portion of the law related to the withholding of funds from states that did not comply with the expansion of Medicaid; Roberts wrote that \"Congress is not free ... to penalize states that choose not to participate in that new program by taking away their existing Medicaid funding.\"\nSources within the Supreme Court state that Roberts switched his vote regarding the individual mandate sometime after an initial vote and that Roberts largely wrote both the majority and minority opinions. This extremely unusual circumstance has also been used to explain why the minority opinion was also unsigned, itself a rare phenomenon from the Supreme Court.\n\nComparison to other Court members\n\nRoberts has been compared and contrasted to other court members by commentators.Marcia Coyle, The Roberts Court: The Struggle for the Constitution, 2013 Although Roberts is identified as having a conservative judicial philosophy, his vote in Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) caused the press to contrast him with the Rehnquist court. Roberts is seen as having a more moderate conservative orientation, particularly when Bush v. Gore is compared to Roberts' vote for the ACA. Roberts' judicial philosophy is seen as more moderate and conciliatory than Antonin Scalia's and Clarence Thomas'. Roberts is identified with his attempt to re-establish the centrist orientation of the Court. Roberts' voting pattern is most closely aligned to Samuel Alito's. \n\nNon-judicial duties of the Chief Justice\n\nAs Chief Justice, Roberts also serves in a variety of non-judicial roles, including Chancellor of the Smithsonian Institution and leading the Judicial Conference of the United States. Perhaps the best known of these is the custom of the Chief Justice administering the oath of office at Presidential inaugurations. Roberts debuted in this capacity at the inauguration of Barack Obama on January 20, 2009. (As a Senator, Obama had voted against Roberts's confirmation to the Supreme Court, making the event doubly a first: the first time a president was sworn in by someone whose confirmation he opposed. ) Things did not go smoothly. According to columnist Jeffrey Toobin:\n\n Part of the difficulty was that Roberts did not have the text of the oath with him but relied on his memory. On later occasions when Roberts has administered an oath, he has taken the text with him.\n\nThe Associated Press reported that \"[l]ater, as the two men shook hands in the Capitol, Roberts appeared to say the mistake was his fault.\" The following evening in the White House Map Room with reporters present, Roberts and Obama repeated the oath correctly. This was, according to the White House, done in \"an abundance of caution\" to ensure that the constitutional requirement had been met.\n\nPersonal life\n\nRoberts is one of thirteen Catholic justices—out of 111 justices total—in the history of the Supreme Court. Of those thirteen justices, five (Roberts, Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Sonia Sotomayor) are currently serving. Roberts married Jane Sullivan in Washington in 1996. She is an attorney, a Catholic, and a trustee (along with Clarence Thomas) at her alma mater, the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts. The couple adopted two children, John (Jack) and Josephine (Josie).\n\nHealth\n\nRoberts suffered a seizure on July 30, 2007, while at his vacation home on Hupper Island off the village of Port Clyde in St. George, Maine. As a result of the seizure he fell 5 to on a dock near his house but suffered only minor scrapes. He was taken by private boat to the mainland (which is several hundred yards from the island) and then by ambulance to Penobscot Bay Medical Center in Rockport, where he stayed overnight, according to Supreme Court spokesperson Kathy Arberg. Doctors called the incident a benign idiopathic seizure, which means there was no identifiable physiological cause.\n\nRoberts had suffered a similar seizure in 1993. After this first seizure, Roberts temporarily limited some of his activities, such as driving. According to Senator Arlen Specter, who chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee during Roberts's nomination to be Chief Justice in 2005, senators were aware of this seizure when they were considering his nomination, but the committee did not think it was significant enough to bring up during his confirmation hearings. Federal judges are not required by law to release information about their health.\n\nAccording to neurologist Marc Schlosberg of Washington Hospital Center, who has no direct connection to the Roberts case, someone who has had more than one seizure without any other cause is by definition determined to have epilepsy. After two seizures, the likelihood of another at some point is greater than 60 percent. Steven Garner of New York Methodist Hospital, who is also uninvolved with the case, said that Roberts's previous history of seizures means that the second incident may be less serious than if this were a newly emerging problem. \n\nThe Supreme Court said in a statement that Roberts has \"fully recovered from the incident\" and that a neurological evaluation \"revealed no cause for concern.\" Sanjay Gupta, a CNN contributor and a neurosurgeon not involved in Roberts's case, said that when an otherwise healthy person has a seizure his doctor would investigate whether the patient had started any new medications and had normal electrolyte levels. If those two things were normal, then a brain scan would be performed. If Roberts does not have another seizure within a relatively short time period, Gupta said that he was unsure if Roberts would be given the diagnosis of epilepsy. He said the Chief Justice may need to take an anti-seizure medication. \n\nPersonal finances\n\nAccording to a 16-page financial disclosure form Roberts submitted to the Senate Judiciary Committee prior to his Supreme Court confirmation hearings, his net worth was more than $6 million, including $1.6 million in stock holdings. At the time Roberts left private practice to join the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2003, he took a pay cut from $1 million a year to $171,800; as Chief Justice, his salary is $255,500 as of 2014. Roberts also holds a one-eighth interest in a cottage in Knocklong, an Irish village in County Limerick. \n\nIn August 2010, Roberts sold his stock in Pfizer, which allows him to participate in two pending cases involving the pharmaceutical maker. Justices are required to recuse themselves in cases in which they own stock of a party. \n\nBibliography of articles by John G. Roberts Jr.\n\nThe University of Michigan Law Library (External Links, below) has compiled fulltext links to these articles and a number of briefs and arguments.\n* Developments in the Law—Zoning, \"The Takings Clause\", 91 Harv. L. Rev. 1462 (1978). (Section III of a longer article beginning on p. 1427)\n* Comment, \"Contract Clause—Legislative Alteration of Private Pension Agreements: Allied Structural Steel Co. v. Spannaus,\" 92 Harv. L. Rev. 86 (1978). (Subsection C of a longer article beginning on p. 57)\n* New Rules and Old Pose Stumbling Blocks in High Court Cases, Legal Times, February 26, 1990, co-authored with E. Barrett Prettyman Jr.\n* \n* Riding the Coattails of the Solicitor General, Legal Times, March 29, 1993.\n* The New Solicitor General and the Power of the Amicus, The Wall Street Journal, May 5, 1993.\n* \n* Forfeitures: Does Innocence Matter?, New Jersey Law Journal, October 9, 1995.\n* Thoughts on Presenting an Effective Oral Argument, School Law in Review (1997). [http://www.nsba.org/site/docs/36400/36316.pdf Link]\n* The Bush Panel, 2003 BYU L. Rev. 62 (2003). (Part of a tribute to Rex. E. Lee beginning on p. 1. \"The Bush Panel\" contains a speech by Roberts.)\n* \n* \n*", "Sonia Maria Sotomayor (,; born June 25, 1954) is an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, serving since August 2009. She has the distinction of being its first justice of Hispanic heritage, the first Latina, its third female justice, and its twelfth Roman Catholic justice. Sotomayor, along with John Roberts and Elena Kagan, is one of the youngest justices on the Supreme Court.\n\nSotomayor was born in The Bronx, New York City, to Puerto Rican-born parents. Her father died when she was nine, and she was subsequently raised by her mother. Sotomayor graduated summa cum laude from Princeton University in 1976 and received her J.D. from Yale Law School in 1979, where she was an editor at the Yale Law Journal. She was an advocate for the hiring of Latino faculty at both schools. She worked as an assistant district attorney in New York for four and a half years before entering private practice in 1984. She played an active role on the boards of directors for the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, the State of New York Mortgage Agency, and the New York City Campaign Finance Board.\n\nSotomayor was nominated to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York by President George H. W. Bush in 1991; confirmation followed in 1992. In 1997, she was nominated by President Bill Clinton to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Her nomination was slowed by the Republican majority in the United States Senate, but she was eventually confirmed in 1998. On the Second Circuit, Sotomayor heard appeals in more than 3,000 cases and wrote about 380 opinions. Sotomayor has taught at the New York University School of Law and Columbia Law School.\n\nIn May 2009, President Barack Obama nominated Sotomayor to the Supreme Court following the retirement of Justice David Souter. Her nomination was confirmed by the Senate in August 2009 by a vote of 68–31. Sotomayor has supported, while on the court, the informal liberal bloc of justices when they divide along the commonly perceived ideological lines. During her tenure on the Supreme Court, Sotomayor has been identified with concern for the rights of defendants, calls for reform of the criminal justice system, and making impassioned dissents on issues of race, gender and ethnic identity.\n\nEarly life\n\nSonia Maria Sotomayor was born in the New York City borough of The Bronx. Her father was Juan Sotomayor (born c. 1921), from the area of Santurce, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and her mother was Celina Báez (born 1927), an orphan from the neighborhood of Santa Rosa in Lajas, a still mostly rural area on Puerto Rico's southwest coast. \n\nThe two left Puerto Rico separately, met, and married during World War II after Celina served in the Women's Army Corps. Juan Sotomayor had a third-grade education, did not speak English, and worked as a tool and die worker; Celina Baez worked as a telephone operator and then a practical nurse. Sonia's younger brother, Juan Sotomayor (born c. 1957), later became a physician and university professor in the Syracuse, New York, area. \n\nSotomayor was raised a Catholic and grew up in Puerto Rican communities in the South Bronx and East Bronx; she self-identifies as a \"Nuyorican\". The family lived in a South Bronx tenement before moving in 1957 to the well-maintained, racially and ethnically mixed, working-class Bronxdale Houses housing project in Soundview (which has over time been thought as part of both the East Bronx and South Bronx). Her relative proximity to Yankee Stadium led to her becoming a lifelong fan of the New York Yankees. The extended family got together frequently and regularly visited Puerto Rico during summers. \n\nSonia grew up with an alcoholic father and a mother who was emotionally distant; she felt closest to her grandmother, who she later said gave her a source of \"protection and purpose\". \nSonia was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at age seven, and began taking daily insulin injections. Her father died of heart problems at age 42, when she was nine years old. After this, she became fluent in English. Sotomayor has said that she was first inspired by the strong-willed Nancy Drew book character, and then after her diabetes diagnosis led doctors to suggest a different career from detective, she was inspired to go into a legal career and become a judge by watching the Perry Mason television series. She reflected in 1998: \"I was going to college and I was going to become an attorney, and I knew that when I was ten. Ten. That's no jest.\"\n\nCelina Sotomayor put great stress on the value of education; she bought the Encyclopædia Britannica for her children, something unusual in the housing projects. Despite the distance between the two, which became even worse after her father's death and which was not fully reconciled until decades later, Sotomayor has credited her mother with being her \"life inspiration\". For grammar school, Sotomayor attended Blessed Sacrament School in Soundview, where she was valedictorian and had a near-perfect attendance record. Although underage, Sotomayor worked at a local retail store and a hospital. Sotomayor passed the entrance tests for and then attended Cardinal Spellman High School in the Bronx. Meanwhile, the Bronxdale Houses had fallen victim to increasing heroin use, crime, and the emergence of the Black Spades gang. In 1970, the family found refuge by moving to Co-op City in the Northeast Bronx. At Cardinal Spellman, Sotomayor was on the forensics team and was elected to the student government. She graduated as valedictorian in 1972.\n\nCollege and law school\n\nSotomayor entered Princeton University on a full scholarship, by her own later description gaining admission in part due to her achievements in high school and in part because affirmative action made up for her standardized test scores not being fully comparable to those of other applicants. She would later say that there are cultural biases built into such testing and praise affirmative action for fulfilling \"its purpose: to create the conditions whereby students from disadvantaged backgrounds could be brought to the starting line of a race many were unaware was even being run.\" \n\nShe would describe her time at Princeton as a life-changing experience. Initially, she felt like \"a visitor landing in an alien country\" as her exposure had been limited to the Bronx and Puerto Rico. Princeton had few women students and fewer Latinos (about 20). She was too intimidated to ask questions during her freshman year; her writing and vocabulary skills were weak, and she lacked knowledge in the classics. She put in long hours in the library and over summers, worked with a professor outside of class, and gained skills, knowledge, and confidence. She became a moderate student activist and co-chair of the Acción Puertorriqueña organization, which served as a social and political hub and sought more opportunities for Puerto Rican students. She worked in the admissions office, traveling to high schools and lobbying on behalf of her best prospects. \n\nAs an activist, Sotomayor focused on faculty hiring and curriculum, since Princeton did not have a single full-time Latino professor nor any class on Latin American studies. A meeting with university president William G. Bowen in her sophomore year saw no results, leading to Sotomayor's saying in a New York Times story at the time that \"Princeton is following a policy of benign neutrality and is not making substantive efforts to change.\" So, Acción Puertorriqueña filed a formal letter of complaint in April 1974 with the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, saying the school discriminated in its hiring and admission practices. Sotomayor wrote opinion pieces for the Daily Princetonian with the same theme. The university began to hire Latino faculty, and Sotomayor established an ongoing dialogue with Bowen. Sotomayor also successfully persuaded historian Peter Winn to create a seminar on Puerto Rican history and politics. Sotomayor joined the governance board of Princeton's Third World Center and served on the university's student–faculty Discipline Committee, which issued rulings on student infractions. She also ran an after-school program for local children and volunteered as an interpreter for Latino patients at Trenton Psychiatric Hospital.\n\nA history major, Sotomayor received almost all A's in her final two years of college. Sotomayor wrote her senior thesis at Princeton on Luis Muñoz Marín, the first democratically elected governor of Puerto Rico, and on the territory's struggles for economic and political self-determination. The 178-page work, \"La Historia Ciclica de Puerto Rico: The Impact of the Life of Luis Muñoz Marin on the Political and Economic History of Puerto Rico, 1930–1975\", won honorable mention for the Latin American Studies Thesis Prize. As a senior, Sotomayor won the Pyne Prize, the top award for undergraduates, which reflected both strong grades and extracurricular activities. In 1976, she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and awarded an A.B. from Princeton, graduating summa cum laude. She was influenced by the then-fashionable critical race theory, which would be reflected in her later speeches and writings. \n\nOn August 14, 1976, just after graduating from Princeton, Sotomayor married Kevin Edward Noonan, whom she had dated since high school, in a small chapel at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York. She used the married name Sonia Sotomayor de Noonan. He became a biologist and a patent lawyer.\n\nSotomayor entered Yale Law School in the fall of 1976, once more on a scholarship. While she believes she again benefited from affirmative action to compensate for somewhat lower standardized test scores, a former dean of admissions at Yale has said that given her record at Princeton, it probably had little effect. At Yale she fit in well although she found there were again few Latino students. She was known as a hard worker but she was not considered among the star students in her class. Yale General Counsel and professor José A. Cabranes acted as an early mentor to her to successfully transition and work within \"the system\". She became an editor of the Yale Law Journal and was also managing editor of the student-run Yale Studies in World Public Order publication (later known as the Yale Journal of International Law). Sotomayor published a law review note on the effect of possible Puerto Rican statehood on the island's mineral and ocean rights. She was a semi-finalist in the Barristers Union mock trial competition. She was co-chair of a group for Latin, Asian, and Native American students, and her advocacy to hire more Hispanic faculty was renewed.\n\nFollowing her second year, she gained a job as a summer associate with the prominent New York law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison. By her own later evaluation, her performance there was lacking. She did not receive an offer for a full-time position, an experience that she later described as a \"kick in the teeth\" and one that would bother her for years. In her third year, she filed a formal complaint against the established Washington, D.C., law firm of Shaw, Pittman, Potts & Trowbridge for suggesting during a recruiting dinner that she was at Yale only via affirmative action. Sotomayor refused to be interviewed by the firm further and filed her complaint with a faculty–student tribunal, which ruled in her favor. Her action triggered a campus-wide debate, and news of the firm's subsequent December 1978 apology made the Washington Post.\n\nIn 1979, Sotomayor was awarded a J.D. from Yale Law School. She was admitted to the New York Bar the following year. \n\nEarly legal career\n\nOn the recommendation of Cabranes, Sotomayor was hired out of law school as an assistant district attorney under New York County District Attorney Robert Morgenthau starting in 1979. She said at the time that she did so with conflicted emotions: \"There was a tremendous amount of pressure from my community, from the third world community, at Yale. They could not understand why I was taking this job. I'm not sure I've ever resolved that problem.\" It was a time of crisis-level crime rates and drug problems in New York, Morgenthau's staff was overburdened with cases, and like other rookie prosecutors, Sotomayor was initially fearful of appearing before judges in court. Working in the trial division, she handled heavy caseloads as she prosecuted everything from shoplifting and prostitution to robberies, assaults, and murders. She also worked on cases involving police brutality. She was not afraid to venture into tough neighborhoods or endure squalid conditions in order to interview witnesses. In the courtroom, she was effective at cross examination and at simplifying a case in ways to which a jury could relate. In 1983 in her highest profile case she helped convict the \"Tarzan Murderer\" (who acrobatically entered apartments, robbed them, and shot residents for no reason). She felt lower-level crimes were largely products of socioeconomic environment and poverty, but she had a different attitude about serious felonies: \"No matter how liberal I am, I'm still outraged by crimes of violence. Regardless of whether I can sympathize with the causes that lead these individuals to do these crimes, the effects are outrageous.\" Hispanic-on-Hispanic crime was of particular concern to her: \"The saddest crimes for me were the ones that my own people committed against each other.\" In general, she showed a passion for bringing law and order to the streets of New York, displaying special zeal in pursuing child pornography cases, unusual for the time. She worked 15-hour days and gained a reputation for being driven and for her preparedness and fairness. One of her job evaluations labelled her a \"potential superstar\". Morgenthau later described her as \"smart, hard-working, [and having] a lot of common sense,\" and as a \"fearless and effective prosecutor.\" She stayed a typical length of time in the post and had a common reaction to the job: \"After a while, you forget there are decent, law-abiding people in life.\" \n\nSotomayor and Noonan divorced amicably in 1983; they did not have children. She has said that the pressures of her working life were a contributing factor, but not the major factor, in the breakup. From 1983 to 1986, Sotomayor had an informal solo practice, dubbed Sotomayor & Associates, located in her Brooklyn apartment. She performed legal consulting work, often for friends or family members.\n\nIn 1984, she entered private practice, joining the commercial litigation practice group of Pavia & Harcourt in Manhattan as an associate. One of 30 attorneys in the law firm, she specialized in intellectual property litigation, international law, and arbitration. She later said, \"I wanted to complete myself as an attorney.\" Although she had no civil litigation experience, the firm recruited her heavily, and she learned quickly on the job. She was eager to try cases and argue in court, rather than be part of a larger law firm. Her clients were mostly international corporations doing business in the United States; much of her time was spent tracking down and suing counterfeiters of Fendi goods. In some cases, Sotomayor went on-site with the police to Harlem or Chinatown to have illegitimate merchandise seized, in the latter instance pursuing a fleeing culprit while riding on a motorcycle. She said at the time that Pavia & Harcourt's efforts were run \"much like a drug operation\", and the successful rounding up of thousands of counterfeit accessories in 1986 was celebrated by \"Fendi Crush\", a destruction-by-garbage-truck event at Tavern on the Green. At other times, she dealt with dry legal issues such as grain export contract disputes. In a 1986 appearance on Good Morning America that profiled women ten years after college graduation, she said that the bulk of law work was drudgery, and that while she was content with her life, she had expected greater things of herself coming out of college. In 1988 she became a partner at the firm; she was paid well but not extravagantly. She left in 1992 when she became a judge.\n\nIn addition to her law firm work, Sotomayor found visible public service roles. She was not connected to the party bosses that typically picked people for such jobs in New York, and indeed she was registered as an independent. Instead, District Attorney Morgenthau, an influential figure, served as her patron. In 1987, Governor of New York Mario Cuomo appointed Sotomayor to the board of the State of New York Mortgage Agency, which she served on until 1992. As part of one of the largest urban rebuilding efforts in American history, the agency helped low-income people get home mortgages and to provide insurance coverage for housing and AIDS hospices. Despite being the youngest member of a board composed of strong personalities, she involved herself in the details of the operation and was effective. She was vocal in supporting the right to affordable housing, directing more funds to lower-income home owners, and in her skepticism about the effects of gentrification, although in the end she voted in favor of most of the projects. \n\nSotomayor was appointed by Mayor Ed Koch in 1988 as one of the founding members of the New York City Campaign Finance Board, where she served for four years. There she took a vigorous role in the board's implementation of a voluntary scheme wherein local candidates received public matching funds in exchange for limits on contributions and spending and agreeing to greater financial disclosure. Sotomayor showed no patience with candidates who failed to follow regulations and was more of a stickler for making campaigns follow those regulations than some of the other board members. She joined in rulings that fined, audited, or reprimanded the mayoral campaigns of Koch, David Dinkins, and Rudy Giuliani.\n\nBased upon another recommendation from Cabranes, Sotomayor was a member of the board of directors of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund from 1980 to 1992. There she was a top policy maker who worked actively with the organization's lawyers on issues such as New York City hiring practices, police brutality, the death penalty, and voting rights. The group achieved its most visible triumph when it successfully blocked a city primary election on the grounds that New York City Council boundaries diminished the power of minority voters.\n\nDuring 1985 and 1986, Sotomayor served on the board of the Maternity Center Association, a Manhattan-based non-profit group which focused on improving the quality of maternity care. \n\nFederal district judge\n\nNomination and confirmation\n\nSotomayor had wanted to become a judge since she was in elementary school, and in 1991 she was recommended for a spot by Democratic New York senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Moynihan had an unusual bipartisan arrangement with his fellow New York senator, Republican Al D'Amato, whereby he would get to choose roughly one out of every four New York district court seats even though a Republican was in the White House. Moynihan also wanted to fulfill a public promise he had made to get a Hispanic judge appointed for New York. When Moynihan's staff recommended her to him, they said \"Have we got a judge for you!\" Moynihan identified with her socio-economic and academic background and became convinced she would become the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice. D'Amato became an enthusiastic backer of Sotomayor, who was seen as politically centrist at the time. Of the impending drop in salary from private practice, Sotomayor said: \"I've never wanted to get adjusted to my income because I knew I wanted to go back to public service. And in comparison to what my mother earns and how I was raised, it's not modest at all.\"\n\nSotomayor was thus nominated on November 27, 1991, by President George H. W. Bush to a seat on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York vacated by John M. Walker, Jr. Senate Judiciary Committee hearings, led by a friendly Democratic majority, went smoothly for her in June 1992, with her pro bono activities winning praise from Senator Ted Kennedy and her getting unanimous approval from the committee. Then a Republican senator blocked her nomination and that of three others for a while in retaliation for an unrelated block Democrats had put on another nominee. D'Amato objected strongly; some weeks later, the block was dropped, and Sotomayor was confirmed by unanimous consent of the full United States Senate on August 11, 1992, and received her commission the next day.\n\nSotomayor became the youngest judge in the Southern District and the first Hispanic federal judge in New York State. She became the first Puerto Rican woman to serve as a judge in a U.S. federal court. She was one of seven women among the district's 58 judges. She moved from Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, back to the Bronx in order to live within her district.\n\nJudgeship\n\nSotomayor generally kept a low public profile as a district court judge. She showed a willingness to take anti-government positions in a number of cases, and during her first year in the seat, she received high ratings from liberal public-interest groups. Other sources and organizations regarded her as a centrist during this period. In criminal cases, she gained a reputation for tough sentencing and was not viewed as a pro-defense judge. A Syracuse University study found that in such cases, Sotomayor generally handed out longer sentences than her colleagues, especially when white-collar crime was involved. Fellow district judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum was an influence on Sotomayor in adopting a narrow, \"just the facts\" approach to judicial decision-making.\n\nAs a trial judge, she garnered a reputation for being well-prepared in advance of a case and moving cases along a tight schedule. Lawyers before her court viewed her as plain-spoken, intelligent, demanding, and sometimes somewhat unforgiving; one said, \"She does not have much patience for people trying to snow her. You can't do it.\"\n\nNotable rulings\n\nOn March 30, 1995, in Silverman v. Major League Baseball Player Relations Committee, Inc., Sotomayor issued a preliminary injunction against Major League Baseball, preventing it from unilaterally implementing a new collective bargaining agreement and using replacement players. Her ruling ended the 1994 baseball strike after 232 days, the day before the new season was scheduled to begin. The Second Circuit upheld Sotomayor's decision and denied the owners' request to stay the ruling. The decision raised her profile, won her the plaudits of baseball fans, and had a lasting effect on the game. In the preparatory phase of the case, Sotomayor informed the lawyers of both sides that, \"I hope none of you assumed ... that my lack of knowledge of any of the intimate details of your dispute meant I was not a baseball fan. You can't grow up in the South Bronx without knowing about baseball.\" \n\nIn Dow Jones v. Department of Justice (1995), Sotomayor sided with the Wall Street Journal in its efforts to obtain and publish a photocopy of the last note left by former Deputy White House Counsel Vince Foster. Sotomayor ruled that the public had \"a substantial interest\" in viewing the note and enjoined the U.S. Justice Department from blocking its release.\n\nIn New York Times Co. v. Tasini (1997), freelance journalists sued the New York Times Company for copyright infringement for the New York Times' inclusion in an electronic archival database (LexisNexis) of the work of freelancers it had published. Sotomayor ruled that the publisher had the right to license the freelancers' work. This decision was reversed on appeal, and the Supreme Court upheld the reversal; two dissenters (John Paul Stevens and Stephen Breyer) took Sotomayor's position. \n\nIn Castle Rock Entertainment, Inc. v. Carol Publishing Group (also in 1997), Sotomayor ruled that a book of trivia from the television program Seinfeld infringed on the copyright of the show's producer and did not constitute legal fair use. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit upheld Sotomayor's ruling.\n\nCourt of Appeals judge\n\nNomination and confirmation\n\nOn June 25, 1997, Sotomayor was nominated by President Bill Clinton to a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which was vacated by J. Daniel Mahoney. Her nomination was initially expected to have smooth sailing, with the American Bar Association Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary giving her a \"well qualified\" professional assessment. However, as The New York Times described, \"[it became] embroiled in the sometimes tortured judicial politics of the Senate.\" Some in the Republican majority believed Clinton was eager to name the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice and that an easy confirmation to the appeals court would put Sotomayor in a better position for a possible Supreme Court nomination (despite there being no vacancy at the time nor any indication the Clinton administration was considering nominating her or any Hispanic). Therefore, the Republican majority decided to slow her confirmation. Radio commentator Rush Limbaugh weighed in that Sotomayor was an ultraliberal who was on a \"rocket ship\" to the highest court.\n\nDuring her September 1997 hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sotomayor parried strong questioning from some Republican members about mandatory sentencing, gay rights, and her level of respect for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. After a long wait, she was approved by the committee in March 1998, with only two dissensions. However, in June 1998, the influential Wall Street Journal editorial page opined that the Clinton administration intended to \"get her on to the Second Circuit, then elevate her to the Supreme Court as soon as an opening occurs\"; the editorial criticized two of her district court rulings and urged further delay of her confirmation. The Republican block continued. \n\nRanking Democratic committee member Patrick Leahy objected to Republican use of a secret hold to slow down the Sotomayor nomination, and Leahy attributed that anonymous tactic to GOP reticence about publicly opposing a female Hispanic nominee. The prior month, Leahy had triggered a procedural delay in the confirmation of fellow Second Circuit nominee Chester J. Straub—who, although advanced by Clinton and supported by Senator Moynihan, was considered much more acceptable by Republicans—in an unsuccessful effort to force earlier consideration of the Sotomayor confirmation. \n\nDuring 1998, several Hispanic organizations organized a petition drive in New York State, generating hundreds of signatures from New Yorkers to try to convince New York Republican senator Al D'Amato to push the Senate leadership to bring Sotomayor's nomination to a vote. D'Amato, a backer of Sotomayor to begin with and additionally concerned about being up for re-election that year, helped move Republican leadership. Her nomination had been pending for over a year when Majority Leader Trent Lott scheduled the vote. With complete Democratic support, and support from 25 Republican senators including Judiciary chair Orrin Hatch, Sotomayor was confirmed on October 2, 1998, by a 67–29 vote. She received her commission on October 7. The confirmation experience left Sotomayor somewhat angry; she said shortly afterwards that during the hearings, Republicans had assumed her political beliefs based on her being a Latina: \"That series of questions, I think, were symbolic of a set of expectations that some people had [that] I must be liberal. It is stereotyping, and stereotyping is perhaps the most insidious of all problems in our society today.\"\n\nJudgeship\n\nOver her ten years on the Second Circuit, Sotomayor heard appeals in more than 3,000 cases and wrote about 380 opinions where she was in the majority. The Supreme Court reviewed five of those, reversing three and affirming two—not high numbers for an appellate judge of that many years and a typical percentage of reversals. \n\nSotomayor's circuit court rulings led to her being considered a political centrist by the ABA Journal and other sources and organizations. Several lawyers, legal experts, and news organizations identified her as someone with liberal inclinations. In any case, the Second Circuit's caseload typically skewed more toward business and securities law rather than hot-button social or constitutional issues. Sotomayor tended to write narrow, practiced rulings that relied on close application of the law to the facts of a case rather than import general philosophical viewpoints. A Congressional Research Service analysis found that Sotomayor's rulings defied easy ideological categorization, but did show an adherence to precedent and an avoidance of overstepping the circuit court's judicial role. Unusually, Sotomayor read through all the supporting documents of cases under review; her lengthy rulings explored every aspect of a case and tended to feature leaden, ungainly prose. Some legal experts have said that Sotomayor's attention to detail and re-examination of the facts of a case came close to overstepping the traditional role of appellate judges. \n\nAcross some 150 cases involving business and civil law, Sotomayor's rulings were generally unpredictable and not consistently pro-business or anti-business. Sotomayor's influence in the federal judiciary, as measured by the number of citations of her rulings by other judges and in law review articles, increased significantly during the length of her appellate judgeship and was greater than that of some other prominent federal appeals court judges. Two academic studies showed that the percentage of Sotomayor's decisions that overrode policy decisions by elected branches was the same as or lower than that of other circuit judges. \n\nSotomayor was a member of the Second Circuit Task Force on Gender, Racial and Ethnic Fairness in the Courts. In October 2001, she presented the annual Judge Mario G. Olmos Memorial Lecture at UC Berkeley School of Law; titled \"A Latina Judge's Voice\"; it was published in the Berkeley La Raza Law Journal the following spring. In the speech, she discussed the characteristics of her Latina upbringing and culture and the history of minorities and women ascending to the federal bench. She said the low number of minority women on the federal bench at that time was \"shocking\". She then discussed at length how her own experiences as a Latina might affect her decisions as a judge. In any case, her background in activism did not necessarily influence her rulings: in a study of 50 racial discrimination cases brought before her panel, 45 were rejected, with Sotomayor never filing a dissent. An expanded study showed that Sotomayor decided 97 cases involving a claim of discrimination and rejected those claims nearly 90 percent of the time. Another examination of Second Circuit split decisions on cases that dealt with race and discrimination showed no clear ideological pattern in Sotomayor's opinions. \n\nIn the Court of Appeals seat, Sotomayor gained a reputation for vigorous and blunt behavior toward lawyers appealing before her, sometimes to the point of brusque and curt treatment or testy interruptions. She was known for extensive preparation for oral arguments and for running a \"hot bench\", where judges ask lawyers plenty of questions. Unprepared lawyers suffered the consequences, but the vigorous questioning was an aid to lawyers seeking to tailor their arguments to the judge's concerns. The 2009 Almanac of the Federal Judiciary, which collected anonymous evaluations of judges by lawyers who appear before them, contained a wide range of reactions to Sotomayor. Comments also diverged among lawyers willing to be named. Attorney Sheema Chaudhry said, \"She's brilliant and she's qualified, but I just feel that she can be very, how do you say, temperamental.\" Defense lawyer Gerald B. Lefcourt said, \"She used her questioning to make a point, as opposed to really looking for an answer to a question she did not understand.\" In contrast, Second Circuit Judge Richard C. Wesley said that his interactions with Sotomayor had been \"totally antithetical to this perception that has gotten some traction that she is somehow confrontational.\" Second Circuit Judge and former teacher Guido Calabresi said his tracking showed that Sotomayor's questioning patterns were no different from those of other members of the court and added, \"Some lawyers just don’t like to be questioned by a woman. [The criticism] was sexist, plain and simple.\"\nSotomayor's law clerks regarded her as a valuable and strong mentor, and she said that she viewed them like family. \n\nIn 2005, Senate Democrats suggested Sotomayor, among others, to President George W. Bush as an acceptable nominee to fill the seat of retiring Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. \n\nNotable rulings\n\n;Abortion\nIn the 2002 decision Center for Reproductive Law and Policy v. Bush, Sotomayor upheld the Bush administration's implementation of the Mexico City Policy, which states that \"the United States will no longer contribute to separate nongovernmental organizations which perform or actively promote abortion as a method of family planning in other nations.\" Sotomayor held that the policy did not constitute a violation of equal protection, as \"the government is free to favor the anti-abortion position over the pro-choice position, and can do so with public funds.\"\n\n;First Amendment rights\nIn Pappas v. Giuliani (2002), Sotomayor dissented from her colleagues' ruling that the New York Police Department could terminate from his desk job an employee who sent racist materials through the mail. Sotomayor argued that the First Amendment protected speech by the employee \"away from the office, on [his] own time\", even if that speech was \"offensive, hateful, and insulting\", and that therefore the employee's First Amendment claim should have gone to trial rather than being dismissed on summary judgment. \n\nIn 2005, Sotomayor wrote the opinion for United States v. Quattrone.United States v. Quattrone, [http://openjurist.org/402/f3d/304/united-states-v-quattrone-abc-lp-lllp-lp 402 F.3d 304] (2d Cir. 2005). Frank Quattrone had been on trial on charges of obstructing investigations related to technology IPOs. Some members of the media had wanted to publish the names of the jurors deciding Quattrone's case, and a district court had issued an order to forbid the publication of the juror's names. In United States v. Quattrone, Sotomayor wrote the opinion for the Second Circuit panel striking down this order on First Amendment grounds, stating that the media should be free to publish the names of the jurors. The first trial ended in a deadlocked jury and a mistrial, and the district court ordered the media not to publish the names of jurors, even though those names had been disclosed in open court. Sotomayor held that although it was important to protect the fairness of the retrial, the district court's order was an unconstitutional prior restraint on free speech and violated the right of the press \"to report freely on events that transpire in an open courtroom\".\n\nIn 2008, Sotomayor was on a three-judge panel in Doninger v. NiehoffDoninger v. Niehoff, [http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data2/circs/2nd/073885p.pdf Doninger v. Niehoff, 527 F.3d 41] (2d Cir. 2008). that unanimously affirmed, in an opinion written by Second Circuit Judge Debra Livingston, the district court's judgment that Lewis S. Mills High School did not violate the First Amendment rights of a student when it barred her from running for student government after she called the superintendent and other school officials \"douchebags\" in a blog post written while off-campus that encouraged students to call an administrator and \"piss her off more\". Judge Livingston held that the district judge did not abuse her discretion in holding that the student's speech \"foreseeably create[d] a risk of substantial disruption within the school environment\", which is the precedent in the Second Circuit for when schools may regulate off-campus speech. Although Sotomayor did not write this opinion, she has been criticized by some who disagree with it. \n\n;Second Amendment rights\nSotomayor was part of the three-judge Second Circuit panel that affirmed the district court's ruling in Maloney v. Cuomo (2009). Maloney was arrested for possession of nunchucks, which are illegal in New York; Maloney argued that this law violated his Second Amendment right to bear arms. The Second Circuit's per curiam opinion noted that the Supreme Court has not, so far, ever held that the Second Amendment is binding against state governments. On the contrary, in Presser v. Illinois, a Supreme Court case from 1886, the Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment \"is a limitation only upon the power of Congress and the national government, and not upon that of the state\". With respect to the Presser v. Illinois precedent, the panel stated that only the Supreme Court has \"the prerogative of overruling its own decisions,\" and the recent Supreme Court case of District of Columbia v. Heller (which struck down the district's gun ban as unconstitutional) did \"not invalidate this longstanding principle\". The panel upheld the lower court's decision dismissing Maloney's challenge to New York's law against possession of nunchucks. On June 2, 2009, a Seventh Circuit panel, including the prominent and heavily cited judges Richard Posner and Frank Easterbrook, unanimously agreed with Maloney v. Cuomo, citing the case in their decision turning back a challenge to Chicago's gun laws and noting the Supreme Court precedents remain in force until altered by the Supreme Court itself.\n\n;Fourth Amendment rights\nIn N.G. & S.G. ex rel. S.C. v. Connecticut (2004),N.G. & S.G. ex rel. S.C. v. Connecticut, [http://openjurist.org/382/f3d/225/ng-sg-sc-v-connecticut 382 F.3d. 225] (2d Cir. 2004). Sotomayor dissented from her colleagues’ decision to uphold a series of strip searches of \"troubled adolescent girls\" in juvenile detention centers. While Sotomayor agreed that some of the strip searches at issue in the case were lawful, she would have held that due to \"the severely intrusive nature of strip searches\", they should not be allowed \"in the absence of individualized suspicion, of adolescents who have never been charged with a crime\". She argued that an \"individualized suspicion\" rule was more consistent with Second Circuit precedent than the majority's rule.\n\nIn Leventhal v. Knapek (2001),Leventhal v. Knapek, [http://openjurist.org/266/f3d/64 266 F.3d 64] (2d Cir. 2001). Sotomayor rejected a Fourth Amendment challenge by a U.S. Department of Transportation employee whose employer searched his office computer. She held that, \"Even though [the employee] had some expectation of privacy in the contents of his office computer, the investigatory searches by the DOT did not violate his Fourth Amendment rights\" because here \"there were reasonable grounds to believe\" that the search would reveal evidence of \"work-related misconduct\".\n\n;Alcohol in commerce\nIn 2004, Sotomayor was part of the judge panel that ruled in Swedenburg v. Kelly that New York's law prohibiting out-of-state wineries from shipping directly to consumers in New York was constitutional even though in-state wineries were allowed to. The case, which invoked the 21st Amendment, was appealed and attached to another case. The case reached the Supreme Court later on as Swedenburg v. Kelly and was overruled in a 5–4 decision that found the law was discriminatory and unconstitutional. \n\n;Employment discrimination\nSotomayor was involved in the high-profile case Ricci v. DeStefano that initially upheld the right of the City of New Haven to throw out its test for firefighters and start over with a new test, because the City believed the test had a \"disparate impact\" on minority firefighters. (No black firefighters qualified for promotion under the test, whereas some had qualified under tests used in previous years.) The City was concerned that minority firefighters might sue under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The City chose not to certify the test results and a lower court had previously upheld the City's right to do this. Several white firefighters and one Hispanic firefighter who had passed the test, including the lead plaintiff who has dyslexia and had put much extra effort into studying, sued the City of New Haven, claiming that their rights were violated. A Second Circuit panel that included Sotomayor first issued a brief, unsigned summary order (not written by Sotomayor) affirming the lower court's ruling. Sotomayor's former mentor José A. Cabranes, by now a fellow judge on the court, objected to this handling and requested that the court hear it en banc. Sotomayor voted with a 7–6 majority not to rehear it and a slightly expanded ruling was issued, but a strong dissent by Cabranes led to the case reaching the Supreme Court in 2009. There it was overruled in a 5–4 decision that found the white firefighters had been victims of racial discrimination when they were denied promotion. \n\n;Business\nIn Clarett v. National Football League (2004), Sotomayor upheld the National Football League's eligibility rules requiring players to wait three full seasons after high school graduation before entering the NFL draft. Maurice Clarett challenged these rules, which were part of the collective bargaining agreement between the NFL and its players, on antitrust grounds. Sotomayor held that Clarett's claim would upset the established \"federal labor law favoring and governing the collective bargaining process\". \n\nIn Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, Inc. v. Dabit (2005), Sotomayor wrote a unanimous opinion that the Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act of 1998 did not preempt class action claims in state courts by stockbrokers alleging misleading inducement to buy or sell stocks. The Supreme Court handed down an 8–0 decision stating that the Act did preempt such claims, thereby overruling Sotomayor's decision.\n\nIn Specht v. Netscape Communications Corp. (2001), she ruled that the license agreement of Netscape's Smart Download software did not constitute a binding contract because the system didn't give \"sufficient notice\" to the user. \n\n;Civil rights\nIn Correctional Services Corp. v. Malesko (2000), Sotomayor, writing for the court, supported the right of an individual to sue a private corporation working on behalf of the federal government for alleged violations of that individual's constitutional rights. Reversing a lower court decision, Sotomayor found that an existing Supreme Court doctrine, known as \"Bivens\"—which allows suits against individuals working for the federal government for constitutional rights violations—could be applied to the case of a former prisoner seeking to sue the private company operating the federal halfway house facility in which he resided. The Supreme Court reversed Sotomayor's ruling in a 5–4 decision, saying that the Bivens doctrine could not be expanded to cover private entities working on behalf of the federal government. Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer dissented, siding with Sotomayor's original ruling.\n\nIn Gant v. Wallingford Board of Education (1999), the parents of a black student alleged that he had been harassed due to his race and had been discriminated against when he was transferred from a first grade class to a kindergarten class without parental consent, while similarly situated white students were treated differently. Sotomayor agreed with the dismissal of the harassment claims due to lack of evidence, but would have allowed the discrimination claim to go forward. She wrote in dissent that the grade transfer was \"contrary to the school's established policies\" as well as its treatment of white students, which \"supports the inference that race discrimination played a role\".\n\n;Property rights\nIn Krimstock v. Kelly (2002), Sotomayor wrote an opinion halting New York City's practice of seizing the motor vehicles of drivers accused of driving while intoxicated and some other crimes and holding those vehicles for \"months or even years\" during criminal proceedings. Noting the importance of cars to many individuals' livelihoods or daily activities, she held that it violated individuals' due process rights to hold the vehicles without permitting the owners to challenge the City's continued possession of their property.\n\nIn Brody v. Village of Port Chester (2003 and 2005), a takings case, Sotomayor first ruled in 2003 for a unanimous panel that a property owner in Port Chester, New York was permitted to challenge the state's Eminent Domain Procedure Law. A district court subsequently rejected the plaintiff's claims and upon appeal the case found itself again with the Second Circuit. In 2005, Sotomayor ruled with a panel majority that the property owner's due process rights had been violated by lack of adequate notice to him of his right to challenge a village order that his land should be used for a redevelopment project. However, the panel supported the village's taking of the property for public use. \n\nIn Didden v. Village of Port Chester (2006), an unrelated case brought about by the same town's actions, Sotomayor joined a unanimous panel's summary order to uphold a trial court's dismissal – due to a statute of limitations lapse – of a property owner's objection to his land being condemned for a redevelopment project. The ruling further said that even without the lapse, the owner's petition would be denied due to application of the Supreme Court's recent Kelo v. City of New London ruling. The Second Circuit's reasoning drew criticism from libertarian commentators. \n\nSupreme Court justice\n\nNomination and confirmation\n\nSince President Barack Obama's election there was speculation that Sotomayor could be a leading candidate for a Supreme Court seat. New York Senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand wrote a joint letter to Obama urging him to appoint Sotomayor, or alternatively Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, to the Supreme Court if a vacancy should arise during his term. The White House first contacted Sotomayor on April 27, 2009, about the possibility of her nomination. On April 30, 2009, Justice David Souter's retirement plans leaked to the media, and Sotomayor received early attention as a possible nominee for Souter's seat to be vacated in June 2009. On May 25, Obama informed Sotomayor of his choice; she later said, \"I had my [hand] over my chest, trying to calm my beating heart, literally.\" On May 26, 2009, Obama nominated her. She became only the second jurist to be nominated to three different judicial positions by three different presidents. The selection appeared to closely match Obama's presidential campaign promise that he would nominate judges who had \"the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it's like to be a teenage mom. The empathy to understand what it's like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old.\" \n\nSotomayor's nomination won praise from Democrats and liberals, and Democrats appeared to have sufficient votes to confirm her. The strongest criticism of her nomination came from conservatives and some Republican senators regarding a line she had used in similar forms in a number of her speeches, particularly in a 2001 Berkeley Law lecture: \"I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.\" Sotomayor had made similar remarks in other speeches between 1994 and 2003, including one she submitted as part of her confirmation questionnaire for the Court of Appeals in 1998, but they had attracted little attention at the time. The remark now became widely known. The rhetoric quickly became inflamed, with radio commentator Rush Limbaugh and former Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives Newt Gingrich calling Sotomayor a \"racist\" (although the latter later backtracked from that claim), while John Cornyn and other Republican senators denounced such attacks but said that Sotomayor's approach was troubling. Backers of Sotomayor offered a variety of explanations in defense of the remark, and White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs stated that Sotomayor's word choice in 2001 had been \"poor\". Sotomayor subsequently clarified her remark through Senate Judiciary Committee chair Patrick Leahy, saying that while life experience shapes who one is, \"ultimately and completely\" a judge follows the law regardless of personal background. Of her cases, the Second Circuit rulings in Ricci v. DeStefano received the most attention during the early nomination discussion, motivated by the Republican desire to focus on the reverse racial discrimination aspect of the case. In the midst of her confirmation process the Supreme Court overturned that ruling on June 29. A third line of Republican attack against Sotomayor was based on her ruling in Maloney v. Cuomo and was motivated by gun ownership advocates concerned about her interpretation of Second Amendment rights. Some of the fervor with which conservatives and Republicans viewed the Sotomayor nomination was due to their grievances over the history of federal judicial nomination battles going back to the 1987 Robert Bork Supreme Court nomination. \n\nA Gallup poll released a week after the nomination showed 54 percent of Americans in favor of Sotomayor's confirmation compared with 28 percent in opposition. A June 12 Fox News poll showed 58 percent of the public disagreeing with her \"wise Latina\" remark but 67 percent saying the remark should not disqualify her from serving on the Supreme Court. The American Bar Association gave her a unanimous \"well qualified\" assessment, its highest mark for professional qualification. Following the Ricci overruling, Rasmussen Reports and CNN/Opinion Research polls showed that the public was now sharply divided, largely along partisan and ideological lines, as to whether Sotomayor should be confirmed. \n\nSotomayor's confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee began on July 13, 2009, during which she backed away from her \"wise Latina\" remark, declaring it \"a rhetorical flourish that fell flat\" and stating that \"I do not believe that any ethnic, racial or gender group has an advantage in sound judgment.\" When Republican senators confronted her regarding other remarks from her past speeches, she pointed to her judicial record and said she had never let her own life experiences or opinions influence her decisions. Republican senators said that while her rulings to this point might be largely traditional, they feared her Supreme Court rulings – where there is more latitude with respect to precedent and interpretation – might be more reflective of her speeches. Sotomayor defended her position in Ricci as following applicable precedent. When asked whom she admired, she pointed to Justice Benjamin N. Cardozo. In general, Sotomayor followed the hearings formula of recent past nominees by avoiding stating personal positions, declining to take positions on controversial issues likely to come before the Court, agreeing with senators from both parties, and repeatedly affirming that as a justice she would just apply the law. On July 28, 2009, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved Sotomayor's nomination; the 13–6 vote was almost entirely along party lines, with no Democrats opposing her and only one Republican supporting her. On August 6, 2009, Sotomayor was confirmed by the full Senate by a vote of 68–31. The vote was largely along party lines, with no Democrats opposing her and nine Republicans supporting her. \n\nPresident Obama commissioned Sotomayor on the day of her confirmation; Sotomayor was sworn in on August 8, 2009, by Chief Justice John Roberts. Sotomayor is the first Hispanic to serve on the Supreme Court. Some attention has been given to Justice Benjamin Cardozo – a Sephardic Jew believed to be of distant Portuguese descent – as the first Hispanic on the court when appointed in 1932, but his roots were uncertain, the term \"Hispanic\" was not in use as an ethnic identifier at the time, and the Portuguese are generally excluded from its meaning. Sotomayor is among four women to have historically served on the Court, together with Sandra Day O'Connor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Elena Kagan, the last of whom won confirmation a year after Sotomayor by a comparable 63–37 vote. Sotomayor's appointment gives the Court a record six Roman Catholic justices serving at the same time. Sotomayor became one of the three youngest of the justices sitting on the Court, along with John Roberts and Elena Kagan. \n\nJusticeship\n\nSotomayor cast her first vote as an associate Supreme Court justice on August 17, 2009, in a stay of execution case. She was given a warm welcome onto the Court and was formally invested in a September 8 ceremony. Sotomayor's inaugural case in which she heard arguments was on September 9 during a special session, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. It involved the controversial aspect of the First Amendment and the rights of corporations in campaign finance; Sotomayor dissented. In her vigorous examination of Floyd Abrams, representing the First Amendment issues in the case, Sotomayor challenged him, questioning 19th century rulings of the Court and saying, \"What you are suggesting is that the courts, who created corporations as persons, gave birth to corporations as persons, and there could be an argument made that that was the Court's error to start with ... [imbuing] a creature of State law with human characteristics.\" \n\nSotomayor's first major written opinion was a dissent in the Berghuis v. Thompkins case dealing with Miranda rights. As her first year neared completion, Sotomayor said she felt swamped by the intensity and heavy workload of the job. During the oral arguments for National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, Sotomayor showed her increasing familiarity with the Court and its protocols by directing the opening questions of the arguments to Donald Verrilli, the Solicitor General who was representing the government's position. \n\nIn succeeding Justice Souter, Sotomayor had done little to change the philosophical and ideological balance of the Court. While many cases are decided unanimously or with different voting coalitions, Sotomayor has continued to be a reliable member of the liberal bloc of the court when the justices divide along the commonly perceived ideological lines. Specifically, her voting pattern and judicial philosophy has been in close agreement with that of Justices Breyer, Ginsburg and Kagan. During her first couple of years there, Sotomayor voted with Ginsburg and Breyer 90 percent of the time, one of the highest agreement rates on the Court. In a 2015 article titled \"Ranking the Most Liberal Modern Supreme Court Justices\", Alex Greer identified Sotomayor as representing a more liberal voting pattern than both Elena Kagan and Ruth Bader Ginzberg. Greer placed Sotomayor as having the most liberal voting history of all the current sitting Justices, and slightly less liberal than her predecessors Thurgood Marshall and John Marshall Harlan II on the Court.\n\nJustices Roberts, Kennedy, Thomas, and Alito (and former Justice Scalia) have comprised the identifiable conservative wing of the Court. Although, five of the justices on the Supreme Court self-identify themselves as having Roman Catholic affiliation, Sotomayor's voting history identifies her singly among them with the liberal bloc of the Court. However, there is a wide divergence among Catholics in general in their approaches to the law. Due to her upbringing and her past jobs and positions, Sotomayor has brought one of the more diverse set of life experiences to the court. \n\nThere have been some deviations from the ideological pattern. In a 2013 book on the Roberts Court, author Marcia Coyle assessed Sotomayor's position on the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment as a strong guarantee of the right of a defendant to confront his or her accusers. Sotomayor's judicial philosophy on the issue is seen as being in parity with Elena Kagan and, unexpectedly for Sotomayor, also in at least partial agreement with the originalist reading of Antonin Scalia when applied to the clause.\n\nOn January 20 and 21, 2013, Sotomayor administered the oath to Vice President Joe Biden for the inauguration of his second term. Sotomayor became the first Hispanic and fourth woman to administer the oath to a president or vice president. \n\nBy the end of her fifth year on the court, Sotomayor had become especially visible in oral arguments and in passionate dissents from various majority rulings, especially those involving issues of race, gender and ethnic identity. Sotomayor has shown her individuality on the Court in a number of decisions. In her reading of the constitutionality of the Obama health care law favoring the poor and disabled, she sided with Ginsburg against fellow liberals Breyer and Kagan. In dealing with the Chief Justice, Sotomayor had no difficulty in responding to his statement that \"the way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discrimination on the basis of race,\" by stating, \"I don't borrow Chief Justice Roberts's description of what color-blindness is... Our society is too complex to use that kind of analysis.\" In the manufacturer liability case of Williamson v. Mazda, which the court decided unanimously, she wrote a separate concurring opinion. Sotomayor's rapport with her clerks is seen as more formalistic than some of the other justices as she requires detailed and rigorous evaluations of cases she is considering with a table of contents attached. When compared to Kagan directly, one of their colleagues stated, \"Neither of them is a shrinking violet\". Coyle, in her 2013 book on the Roberts Court stated that: \"Both women are more vocal during arguments than the justices whom they succeeded, and they have energized the moderate-liberal side of the bench.\" \n\nDuring her tenure on the court, Sotomayor has also become recognizable as being among the court's strongest voices in supporting the rights of the accused. She has been identified by Laurence Tribe as the foremost voice on the court calling for reforming criminal justice adjudication – in particular as it relates misconduct by police and prosecutors, abuses in prisons, concerns about how the death penalty is used, and the potential for loss of privacy – and Tribe has compared her will to reform in general to that of past Chief Justice Earl Warren. \n\nNotable rulings\n\nJ.D.B. v. North Carolina was a 2011 case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that age is relevant when determining police custody for Miranda purposes. Sotomayor was assigned to write the majority opinion in the case. J.D.B. was a 13-year-old student enrolled in special education classes whom police had suspected of committing two robberies. A police investigator visited J.D.B. at school, where he was interrogated by the investigator, a uniformed police officer, and school officials. J.D.B. subsequently confessed to his crimes and was convicted. J.D.B. was not given a Miranda warning during the interrogation, nor an opportunity to contact his legal guardian. During the trial, attempts to suppress the statements given by J.D.B. because he was not given a Miranda warning were denied on the grounds that J.D.B. was not in police custody. The case was appealed and the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case. Sotomayor's opinion for the Court held that a child's age properly informs the Miranda custody analysis. Her opinion underscored the dangers of not applying age to the custody analysis, writing: \"to hold... that a child's age is never relevant to whether a suspect has been taken into custody— and thus to ignore the very real differences between children and adults— would be to deny children the full scope of the procedural safeguards that Miranda guarantees to adults\".J.D.B. v. North Carolina, [http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/10pdf/09-11121.pdf 564 U.S. ___], (U.S.S.C. 2011) The opinion cited Stansbury v. California where the Court held that a child's age \"would have affected how a reasonable person\" in the suspect's position \"would perceive his or her freedom to leave\". Yarborough v. Alvarado was also cited, where the Court wrote that a child's age \"generates commonsense conclusions about behavior and perception\". Finally, Sotomayor's opinion pointed out that the law reflects the idea that a child's judgment is not the same as an adult's, in the form of legal disqualifications on children as a class (e.g. limitations on a child's ability to marry without parental consent). Sotomayor's opinion was challenged by Associate Justice Samuel Alito who wrote a dissenting opinion for four Justices.\n\nA particularly fractious United States Supreme Court case was 2012's United States v. Alvarez, involving judicial review in which the Court struck down the Stolen Valor Act, a federal law that criminalized false statements about having a military medal. The law had been passed as an effort to stem instances where people falsely claimed to have won the medal in an attempt to protect the \"valor\" of those who really had. While a 6-3 majority of the Supreme Court agreed that the law was unconstitutional under the First Amendment's free speech protections, it could not agree on a single rationale. Sotomayor was among four justices, along with Justices Roberts, Ginsburg and Kennedy, who concluded that a statement's falsity is not enough, by itself, to exclude speech from First Amendment protection. Justices Breyer and Kagan concluded that while false statements were entitled to some protection, the Stolen Valor Act was invalid because it could have achieved its objectives in less restrictive ways. Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito were in dissent. \n\nMost visibly during the 2012 term, in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, Sotomayor was part of a landmark 5–4 majority that upheld most of the provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (while being part of a dissent against the reliance upon the Constitution's Taxing and Spending Clause rather than Commerce Clause in arriving at the support). Legal writer Jeffrey Toobin wrote, \"Sotomayor's concerns tended toward the earthbound and practical. Sometimes, during oral arguments, she would go on tangents involving detailed questions about the facts of cases that would leave her colleagues stupefied, sinking into their chairs. This time, though, she had a simple line of inquiry. States require individuals to buy automobile insurance (implicitly suggesting the unavoidable comparison to health insurance and the fairness of the applying the same principle to health insurance as well).\" Sotomayor concluded with the incisive rhetorical flourish in the Court directed at the attorneys: \"Do you think that if some states decided not to impose an insurance requirement that the federal government would be without power to legislate and require every individual to buy car insurance?\" For Toobin, this distinction drawn by Sotomayor was the heart of the argument for the case in which she was part of the prevailing majority opinion.\n\nIn another high-profile June 2012 decision at the end of her third term, Sotomayor was part of a 5–3 majority in Arizona v. United States that struck down several aspects of the Arizona SB 1070 anti-illegal immigration law. The Arizona case was decided as a compromise verdict with Sotomayor joining Justices Roberts, Kennedy, Ginsburg and Breyer in the majority, with Justice Kagan not participating. \n\nIn 2013, Sotomayor's unjoined concurrence in the prior year's United States v. Jones decision, in which she said that in the digital age, \"It may be necessary to reconsider the premise that an individual has no reasonable expectation of privacy in information voluntarily disclosed to third parties,\" was cited by federal judge Richard Leon in his ruling that the National Security Agency's bulk collection of Americans' telephony records likely violated the Fourth Amendment. Law professors Adam Winkler and Laurence Tribe were among those who said that Sotomayor's Jones concurrence had been influential in calling out the need for a new basis in understanding privacy requirements in a world, as she wrote, \"in which people reveal a great deal of information about themselves to third parties in the course of carrying out mundane tasks.\"\n\nOn July 3, 2014, six justices ordered an injunction that allowed Wheaton College of Illinois, a religiously affiliated university, an exemption from complying with Affordable Care Act's mandate on contraception. It came in the immediate wake of the Court's 5–4 decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, in which the conservative bloc had prevailed, and was opposed by the court's three female members: Sotomayor, Ginsburg and Kagan. They suggested that the Hobby Lobby decision was not the Court's conclusive opinion on birth control. In her dissent to the injunction, Sotomayor wrote that, \"Those who are bound by our decisions usually believe they can take us at our word ... Not today.\" Sotomayor stated further her opinion that the decision compromised \"hundreds of Wheaton's employees and students of their legal entitlement to contraceptive coverage.\"\n\nOther activities\n\nSotomayor was an adjunct professor at New York University School of Law from 1998 to 2007. There she taught trial and appellate advocacy as well as a federal appellate court seminar. Beginning in 1999, she was also a lecturer in law at Columbia Law School in a paying, adjunct faculty position. While there she created and co-taught a class called the Federal Appellate Externship each semester from 2000 until her departure; it combined classroom, moot court, and Second Circuit chambers work. She became a member of the Board of Trustees of Princeton University in 2006, concluding her term in 2011. In 2008, Sotomayor became a member of the Belizean Grove, an invitation-only women's group modeled after the men's Bohemian Grove. On June 19, 2009, Sotomayor resigned from the Belizean Grove after Republican politicians voiced concerns over the group's membership policy. \n\nSotomayor has maintained a public presence, mostly through making speeches, since joining the federal judiciary and throughout her time on the Supreme Court. She gave over 180 speeches between 1993 and 2009, about half of which either focused on issues of ethnicity or gender or were delivered to minority or women's groups. While on the Supreme Court she has been invited to give commencement addresses at a number of universities including New York University (2012), Yale University (2013), and the University of Puerto Rico (2014). Her speeches have tended to give a more defined picture of her worldview than her rulings on the bench. The themes of her speeches have often focused on ethnic identity and experience, the need for diversity, and America's struggle with the implications of its diverse makeup. She has also presented her career achievements as an example of the success of affirmative action policies in university admissions, saying \"I am the perfect affirmative action baby\" in regard to her belief that her admission test scores were not comparable to those of her classmates. During 2012 while already on the Supreme Court, Sotomayor made two appearances as herself on the children's television program Sesame Street, explaining what a vocational career is in general and then demonstrating how a judge hears a case. \n\nSotomayor long lived in Greenwich Village in New York City and had few financial assets other than her home. She enjoys shopping, traveling, and giving gifts and helps support her mother and her mother's husband in Florida. Regarding her short financial disclosure reports prior to her Supreme Court nomination, she has said, \"When you don't have money, it's easy. There isn't anything there to report.\" As a federal judge, she is entitled to a pension equal to her full salary upon retirement. Upon joining the Supreme Court, she took up residence in Washington but sorely missed the faster-paced life of New York. After renting in the Cleveland Park neighborhood for three years, in 2012 she purchased a condominium in the U Street Corridor. She said, \"I picked [that area] because it's mixed. I walk out and I see all kinds of people, which is the environment I grew up in and the environment I love.\"\n\nShe takes several daily insulin injections, and her diabetes is considered to be well controlled. Sotomayor does not belong to a Catholic parish or attend Mass, but does attend church for important occasions. She has said, \"I am a very spiritual person [though] maybe not traditionally religious in terms of Sunday Mass every week, that sort of thing. The trappings are not important to me, but, yes, I do believe in God. And, yes, I do believe in the commandments.\"\n\nShe maintains ties with Puerto Rico, visiting once or twice a year, speaking there occasionally, and visiting cousins and other relatives who still live in the Mayagüez area. She has long stressed her ethnic identity, saying in 1996, \"Although I am an American, love my country and could achieve its opportunity of succeeding at anything I worked for, I also have a Latina soul and heart, with the magic that carries.\"\n\nSotomayor said of the years following her divorce, that \"I have found it difficult to maintain a relationship while I've pursued my career.\" She has talked of herself as \"emotionally withdrawn\" and lacking \"genuine happiness\" when living by herself; after becoming a judge, she said she would not date lawyers. In 1997, she was engaged to New York construction contractor Peter White, but the relationship had ended by 2000. \n\nIn July 2010, Sotomayor signed a contract with Alfred A. Knopf to publish a memoir about the early part of her life. She received an advance of nearly $1.2 million for the work, which was published in January 2013 and titled My Beloved World (Mi mundo adorado in the simultaneously published Spanish edition). It focuses on her life up to 1992, with recollections of growing up in housing projects in New York and descriptions of the challenges she faced. It received good reviews, with Michiko Kakutani of the New York Times describing it as \"a compelling and powerfully written memoir about identity and coming of age. ... It's an eloquent and affecting testament to the triumph of brains and hard work over circumstance, of a childhood dream realized through extraordinary will and dedication.\" She staged a book tour to promote the work, and it debuted atop the New York Times Best Seller List. \n\nOn December 31, 2013, Sotomayor pressed the ceremonial button and led the final 60-second countdown at the Times Square New Year's Eve ball drop, being the first United States Supreme Court justice to perform the task. \n\nAwards and honors\n\nSotomayor has received honorary law degrees from Lehman College (1999), Princeton University (2001), Brooklyn Law School (2001), Pace University School of Law (2003), Hofstra University (2006), Northeastern University School of Law (2007), Howard University (2010), St. Lawrence University (2010), New York University (2012), Yale University (2013), and the University of Puerto Rico (2014). \n\nShe was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 2002. She was given the Outstanding Latino Professional Award in 2006 by the Latino/a Law Students Association. In 2008, Esquire magazine included Sotomayor on its list of \"The 75 Most Influential People of the 21st Century\". In 2013, Sotomayor won the Woodrow Wilson Award at her alma mater Princeton University. \n\nIn June 2010, the Bronxdale Houses development, where Sotomayor grew up, was renamed after her. The Justice Sonia Sotomayor Houses and Justice Sonia Sotomayor Community Center comprise 28 buildings with some 3,500 residents. While many New York housing developments are named after well-known people, this was only the second to be named after a former resident. In 2011, the Sonia M. Sotomayor Learning Academies, a public high school complex in Los Angeles, was named after her. \n\nIn 2013, a painting featuring her, Sandra Day O'Connor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Elena Kagan was unveiled at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. According to the Smithsonian at the time, the painting was on loan to the museum for three years.\n\nIn May 2015 she received the Katharine Hepburn medal from Bryn Mawr College. The Katharine Hepburn Medal recognizes women who change their worlds: those whose lives, work, and contributions embody the intelligence, drive, and independence of the four-time Oscar winner and her namesake mother, an early feminist activist.\n\nPublications\n\n;Books\n* My Beloved World. Alfred A. Knopf (2013) ISBN 0-307-59488-2.\n;Articles\n* \"[http://www.judiciary.senate.gov/nominations/SupremeCourt/Sotomayor/upload/Question-12-a-No-4-Note-Statehood-and-the-Equal-Footing-D.pdf Statehood and the Equal Footing Doctrine: The Case for Puerto Rican Seabed Rights]\", 88 Yale Law Journal 825 (1979)\n* \"[http://www.judiciary.senate.gov/nominations/SupremeCourt/Sotomayor/upload/Question-12-a-No-5-Returning-Majesty-to-the-Law-and-Politi.pdf Returning Majesty to the Law and Politics: A Modern Approach]\" (with Nicole A. Gordon), 30 Suffolk University Law Review 35 (1996)\n* \"La Independencia Judicial: Que Necessitamos Para Conservarla\" 60 Revista Colegio de Abogados de Puerto Rico 59 (1999) \n;Forewords\n* [https://books.google.com/books?idqViXyy_58LsC&pg\nPR9 \"Foreword\"], The International Judge: An Introduction to the Men and Women Who Decide the World's Cases by Daniel Terris, Cesare P. R. Romano, and Leigh Swigart, University Press of New England (2007)\n;Speeches\n* \"[http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2009/05/26_sotomayor.shtml A Latina Judge's Voice]\" (Judge Mario G. Olmos Memorial Lecture), in symposium \"Raising the Bar: Latino and Latina Presence in the Judiciary and the Struggle for Representation\", Berkeley La Raza Law Journal (Spring 2002)\n* [http://www1.law.nyu.edu/pubs/annualsurvey/documents/60%20N.Y.U.%20Ann.%20Surv.%20Am.%20L.%2023%20(2004).pdf \"Tribute to John Sexton\"] 60 NYU Annual Survey of American Law 23 (2004)" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "Rodney_King.txt" ], "title": [ "Rodney King" ], "wiki_context": [ "Rodney Glen King III (April 2, 1965 – June 17, 2012) was an American taxi driver who became nationally known after being beaten by Los Angeles Police Department officers following a high-speed car chase while drunk on March 3, 1991. A witness, George Holliday, videotaped much of the beating from his balcony, and sent the footage to local news station KTLA. The footage shows four officers surrounding King, several of them striking him repeatedly, while other officers stood by. Parts of the footage were aired around the world, and raised public concern about police treatment of minorities in the United States.\n\nFour officers were charged with assault with a deadly weapon and use of excessive force. Three were acquitted of all charges. The jury acquitted the fourth of assault with a deadly weapon but failed to reach a verdict on the use of excessive force. The jury deadlocked at 8–4 in favor of acquittal at the state level. The acquittals are generally considered to have triggered the 1992 Los Angeles riots, in which 55 people were killed and over 2,000 were injured, ending only when the California national guard was called in.\n\nThe acquittals also led to the federal government's obtaining grand jury indictments for violations of King's civil rights. The trial of the four in a federal district court ended on April 16, 1993, with two of the officers being found guilty and subsequently imprisoned. The other two were acquitted again.\n\nEarly life\n\nKing was born in Sacramento, California, the son of Ronald King and Odessa King. He and his four siblings grew up in Altadena, California. King's father died in 1984 at the age of 42.\n\nIn November 1989, King robbed a store in Monterey Park, California. He threatened to hit the Korean store owner with an iron bar, then hit him with a pole. King stole two hundred dollars in cash during the robbery and was caught, convicted and sentenced to two years imprisonment. He was released after serving one year of the sentence.\n\nKing had three daughters: one by Carmen Simpson, when he was a teenager, and one by each of his two wives. Both of King's marriages, to Danetta Lyles and Crystal Waters, ended in divorce. \n\nIncident\n\nHigh-speed chase\n\nEarly on the morning of March 3, 1991, King, with two passengers, Bryant Allen and Freddie Helms, were driving a 1987 Hyundai Excel or a Mitsubishi Precis west on the Foothill Freeway (Interstate 210) in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles. Prior to driving onto the Foothill Freeway, the three men had spent the night watching a basketball game and drinking at a friend's house in Los Angeles. Five hours after the incident, King's blood-alcohol level was found to be slightly below the legal limit. This suggests that his blood alcohol level may have fallen from 0.19% while he was driving, in which case it would have been more than twice the legal driving limit in California. At 12:30 am, officers Tim and Melanie Singer, husband-and-wife members of the California Highway Patrol, noticed King's car speeding on the freeway. The officers pursued King, and the pursuit attained high speeds, while King refused to pull over. King would later admit he attempted to outrun the police at dangerously high speeds because a charge of driving under the influence would violate his parole for a previous robbery conviction. \n\nKing exited the freeway near the Hansen Dam Recreation Center and the pursuit continued through residential surface streets, at speeds ranging from 55 to. By this point, several police cars and a police helicopter had joined in this pursuit. After approximately 8 mi, officers cornered King in his car at the corner of Foothill Boulevard and Osborne Street (). The first five LAPD officers to arrive at the scene were Stacey Koon, Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind, Theodore Briseno, and Rolando Solano. \n\nConfrontation\n\nOfficer Tim Singer ordered King and his two passengers to exit the vehicle and to lie face down on the ground. Bryant Allen was manhandled, kicked, stomped, taunted and threatened. Freddie Helms was hit in the head while lying on the ground. Helms was treated for a laceration on the top of his head. His bloody baseball cap was turned over to police. King remained in the car. When he finally did emerge, he was reported to have giggled, patted the ground, and waved to the police helicopter overhead. King then grabbed his buttocks which Officer Melanie Singer took to mean King reaching for a weapon. King was later found to be unarmed. She drew her pistol and pointed it at King, ordering him to lie on the ground. Singer approached, gun drawn, preparing to effect an arrest.\n\nAt that point LAPD Sergeant, Stacey Koon, the ranking officer at the scene, told Singer that the LAPD was taking tactical command of the situation. He ordered all officers to holster their weapons. \n\nLAPD officers are taught to approach a suspect without his/her gun drawn, as there is a risk that any suspect may gain control of it if an officer gets too close. Koon then ordered the four other LAPD officers at the scene—Briseno, Powell, Solano, and Wind—to subdue and handcuff King using a technique called a \"swarm.\" This involves multiple officers grabbing a suspect with empty hands, in order to quickly overcome potential resistance. As four officers attempted to restrain King, King resisted by standing to remove Officers Powell and Briseno from his back. The officers later testified that they believed King was under the influence of the dissociative drug phencyclidine (PCP), although King's toxicology tested negative for the drug. \n\nBeating with batons: the Holliday video\n\n King was twice Tasered by Koon. This marks the approximate start of the George Holliday videotape of the incident. In the tape, King is seen on the ground. He rises and rushes toward Powell—as argued in court, either to attack Powell or to flee—but regardless King and Powell both collided in the rush. Taser wire can be seen on King's body. Officer Powell strikes King with his baton, and King is knocked to the ground. Powell strikes King several more times with his baton. Briseno moves in, attempting to stop Powell from striking again, and Powell stands back. Koon reportedly said, \"That's enough.\" King then rises again, to his knees; Powell and Wind are then seen hitting King with their batons.\n\nKoon acknowledged ordering the continued use of batons, directing Powell and Wind to strike King with \"power strokes.\" According to Koon, Powell and Wind used \"bursts of power strokes, then backed off.\" In the videotape, King continues to try to stand again. Koon orders the officers to \"hit his joints, hit the wrists, hit his elbows, hit his knees, hit his ankles.\" Officers Wind, Briseno, and Powell attempted numerous baton strikes on King resulting in some misses but with 33 blows hitting King, plus six kicks. The officers again \"swarm\" King but this time a total of eight officers are involved in the swarm. King is then placed in handcuffs and cordcuffs, restraining his arms and legs. King is dragged on his abdomen to the side of the road to await the arrival of emergency medical rescue.\n\nGeorge Holliday's videotape of the incident was shot from his apartment near the intersection of Foothill Blvd and Osborne St. in Lake View Terrace. Two days later Holliday contacted the police about his videotape of the incident, but they ignored him. He then went to KTLA television with his videotape, although the station edited out ten seconds of the video, before the image was in focus, that showed an extremely blurry shot of King charging at the officers; the cut footage would later be cited by members of the jury as essential to the acquittal of the officers. The footage as a whole became an instant media sensation. Portions of it were aired numerous times, and it \"turned what would otherwise have been a violent, but soon forgotten, encounter between the Los Angeles police and an uncooperative suspect into one of the most widely watched and discussed incidents of its kind.\" \n\nThe Holliday video of the Rodney King arrest is a fairly early example of modern sousveillance, wherein private citizens, assisted by increasingly sophisticated, affordable video equipment, record significant, sometimes historic events. Several \"copwatch\" organizations subsequently appeared throughout the United States to safeguard against police abuse, including an umbrella group, October 22 Coalition to Stop Police Brutality.[http://www.pbs.org/speaktruthtopower/issue_police.html PBS.org] and the ACLU [http://www.aclu.org/police/gen/14614pub19971201.html#credits] draw connections between the event and the subsequent activities of many organizations.\n\nPost-arrest events\n\nAftermath \n\nKing was taken to Pacifica Hospital after his arrest, where he was found to have suffered a fractured facial bone, a broken right ankle, and multiple bruises and lacerations. In a negligence claim filed with the city, King alleged he had suffered \"11 skull fractures, permanent brain damage, broken [bones and teeth], kidney failure [and] emotional and physical trauma\". Blood and urine samples taken from King five hours after his arrest showed that he would have been intoxicated under California law at the time of his arrest. The tests also showed traces of marijuana (26 ng/ml). Pacifica Hospital nurses reported that the officers who accompanied King (including Wind) openly joked and bragged about the number of times King had been hit. Officers also obtained King's identification from his clothes pockets at that time. King sued the city and a jury awarded him $3.8 million as well as $1.7 million in attorney's fees. Charges against King for driving while intoxicated and evading arrest were never pursued. District Attorney Ira Reiner felt there was insufficient evidence for prosecution and successor Gil Garcetti felt that too much time had passed to charge King with evading arrest while also mentioning that the statute of limitations on drunk driving had passed. \n\nCriminal charges against police officers\n\nAfter four days of grand jury testimony, the Los Angeles district attorney charged officers Koon, Powell, Briseno and Wind with use of excessive force on March 14, 1991. Sergeant Koon, only having deployed the Taser was, as the supervisory officer at the scene, charged with \"willfully permitting and failing to take action to stop the unlawful assault\".\n\nOn August 22, 1991, the California Court of Appeals removed the initial judge, Bernard Kamins, after it was proved Kamins told prosecutors, \"You can trust me.\" The Court also later granted a change of venue to the city of Simi Valley in neighboring Ventura County, citing potential contamination due to saturated media coverage.\n\nChristopher Commission \n\nLos Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley created the Independent Commission on the Los Angeles Police Department, also known as the Christopher Commission, in April 1991. Led by attorney Warren Christopher, it was created to conduct 'a full and fair examination of the structure and operation of the LAPD,' including its recruitment and training practices, internal disciplinary system, and citizen complaint system.\" \n\nLos Angeles riots and the aftermath\n\nThough few people at first considered race an important factor in the case, including Rodney King's attorney, Steven Lerman, the sensitizing effect of the Holliday videotape was at the time stirring deep resentment in Los Angeles, as well as other major cities in the United States. The officers' jury consisted of Ventura County residents: ten white; one Latino; one Asian. Lead prosecutor Terry White was African American. On April 29, 1992, the jury acquitted three of the officers, but could not agree on one of the charges against Powell.\n\nLos Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley said, \"The jury's verdict will not blind us to what we saw on that videotape. The men who beat Rodney King do not deserve to wear the uniform of the LAPD.\" President George H. W. Bush said, \"Viewed from outside the trial, it was hard to understand how the verdict could possibly square with the video. Those civil rights leaders with whom I met were stunned. And so was I and so was Barbara and so were my kids.\" \n\nThe acquittals are considered to have triggered the Los Angeles riots of 1992. By the time the police, the U.S. Army, Marines and National Guard restored order, the riots had caused 53 deaths, 2,383 injuries, more than 7,000 fires, damage to 3,100 businesses, and nearly $1 billion in financial losses. Smaller riots occurred in other cities such as San Francisco, Las Vegas in neighboring Nevada and as far east as Atlanta, Georgia. A minor riot erupted on Yonge Street in Toronto, Ontario, Canada as a result of the acquittals.\n\nDuring the riots, King made a television appearance in which he said \"Can we all get along?\" The widely quoted line has been often misquoted as, \"Can we all just get along?\" or \"Can't we all just get along?\"\n\nFederal trial of officers\n\nAfter the acquittals and the riots, the United States Department of Justice sought indictments for violations of King's civil rights. On May 7, federal prosecutors began presenting evidence to a Los Angeles [federal] grand jury. On August 4, the grand jury returned indictments against the three officers for '...willfully and intentionally using unreasonable force...' and against Sergeant Koon for '...willfully permitting and failing to take action to stop the unlawful assault...' on King.\" Based on these indictments a trial of the four officers in the United States District Court for the Central District of California began on February 25, 1993. The federal trial focused more on the incident. On March 9 of the 1993 trial, King took the witness stand and described to the jury the events as he remembered them. The jury found Officer Laurence Powell and Sergeant Stacey Koon guilty, and they were subsequently sentenced to 32 months in prison, while Timothy Wind and Theodore Briseno were acquitted of all charges.\n\nDuring the three-hour sentencing hearing, the Federal trial judge, John Davies, accepted much of the defense version of the beating. He strongly criticized King, who he said provoked the officers' initial actions. Judge Davies stated that only the final six or so baton blows by Powell were unlawful. The first 55 seconds of the videotaped portion of the incident, during which the vast majority of the blows were delivered, was within the law because the officers were attempting to subdue a suspect who was resisting efforts to take him into custody.\n\nDavies found that King's provocative behavior began with his \"remarkable consumption of alcoholic beverage\" and continued through a high-speed chase, refusal to submit to police orders and an aggressive charge toward Powell. Davies made several findings in support of the officers' version of events. He concluded that Officer Powell never intentionally struck King in the head, and \"Powell's baton blow that broke King's leg was not illegal because King was still resisting and rolling around on the ground, and breaking bones in resistant suspects is permissible under police policy.\"\n\nMitigation cited by the judge in determining the length of the prison sentence included the suffering the officers had undergone because of the extensive publicity their case had received, heavy legal bills that were still unpaid, the impending loss of their careers as police officers, their higher risks of abuse while in prison and their having already been subjected to two trials. The judge acknowledged that having two such trials did not legally constitute double jeopardy, but nonetheless it \"raised the specter of unfairness.\"\n\nThese mitigations were critical to the validity of the sentences imposed, because Federal sentencing guidelines called for much longer prison terms in the range of 70 to 87 months. The low sentences were controversial, and were appealed. In a 1994 ruling, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit rejected all the grounds cited by Judge Davies and extended the terms. The case was then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. Both Mr. Koon and Mr. Powell were released from prison while they appealed the Ninth Circuit's ruling, having served their original 30-month sentences with time off for good behavior. On June 14, 1996, the high court reversed the lower court in a ruling, unanimous in its most important aspects, which gave a strong endorsement to judicial discretion, even under sentencing guidelines intended to produce uniformity. \n\nLater life\n\nKing successfully sued the city and won $3.8 million. King invested a portion of his settlement in a record label, Straight Alta-Pazz Records, which went out of business. He later went on to write a book and make a movie about his life.\n\nKing was subject to further arrests and convictions for driving violations after the 1991 incident. On August 21, 1993, he crashed his car into a block wall in downtown Los Angeles. He was convicted of driving under the influence of alcohol, fined, entered a rehabilitation program and was placed on probation. In July 1995, he was arrested by Alhambra police after hitting his wife with his car and knocking her to the ground. He was sentenced to 90 days in jail after being convicted of hit and run. On August 27, 2003, King was arrested again for speeding and running a red light while under the influence of alcohol. He failed to yield to police officers and slammed his vehicle into a house, breaking his pelvis. On March 3, 2011, the 20th anniversary of the beating, the LAPD stopped King for driving erratically and issued him a citation for driving with an expired license. This arrest led to his February 2012 misdemeanor conviction for reckless driving. \n\nOn November 29, 2007, while riding home on his bicycle, King was shot in the face, arms, and back with pellets from a shotgun. He reported that the attackers were a man and a woman who demanded his bicycle and shot him when he rode away. Police described the wounds as looking as if they came from birdshot. \n\nIn May 2008, King checked into the Pasadena Recovery Center in Pasadena, California, where he filmed as a cast member of season 2 of Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew, which premiered in October 2008. Dr. Drew Pinsky, who runs the facility, showed concern for King's lifestyle and said King would die unless his addiction was treated. He also appeared on Sober House, a Celebrity Rehab spin-off focusing on a sober living environment, \n\nDuring his time on Celebrity Rehab and Sober House, King worked on his addiction and what he said was lingering trauma of the beating. He and Pinsky physically retraced King's path from the night of his beating, eventually reaching the spot where it happened, the site of the Children's Museum of Los Angeles. \n\nKing won a celebrity boxing match against ex–Chester City (Delaware County, Pennsylvania) police officer Simon Aouad on Friday, September 11, 2009, at the Ramada Philadelphia Airport in Essington, Pennsylvania. \n\nIn 2009, King and other Celebrity Rehab alumni appeared as panel speakers to a new group of addicts at the Pasadena Recovery Center, marking 11 months of sobriety for him. His appearance was aired in the third season episode \"Triggers\".\n\nOn September 9, 2010, it was confirmed that King was going to marry Cynthia Kelly, who had been a juror in the civil suit he brought against the City of Los Angeles.\n\nThe BBC quoted King commenting on his legacy. \"Some people feel like I'm some kind of hero. Others hate me. They say I deserved it. Other people, I can hear them mocking me for when I called for an end to the destruction, like I'm a fool for believing in peace.\" \n\nDeath\n\nOn the morning of June 17, 2012, King's fiancée Cynthia Kelly found him lying at the bottom of his swimming pool. Police in Rialto received a 911 call from Kelly at about 5:25 a.m. (PDT). Responding officers found King at the bottom of the pool, removed him, and attempted to revive him. He was transferred by ambulance to Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in Colton, California and was pronounced dead at the hospital at 6:11 a.m. (PDT) The Rialto Police Department began a standard drowning investigation and stated there did not appear to be any foul play. On August 23, 2012, King's autopsy results were released, stating he died of accidental drowning, and that a combination of alcohol, cocaine, marijuana, and PCP found in his system were contributing factors. \"The effects of the drugs and alcohol, combined with the subject's heart condition, probably precipitated a cardiac arrhythmia and the subject, thus incapacitated in the water, was unable to save himself.\" King had been a user of PCP. \n\nKing is interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills), Los Angeles, California." ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "George Holliday (witness)", "The beating of Rodney King", "Beating of Rodney King", "Straight Alta-Pazz Recording Company", "Can't we all just get along%3F", "Glen King", "Rodney King case", "Why can't we all just get along", "Rodney king beatings", "King, Rodney", "Rodney King beating", "Rodney G. King", "Can't we all just get along", "Rodney King incident", "Rodney King", "Rodney Glen King" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "george holliday witness", "beating of rodney king", "rodney king beatings", "rodney g king", "can t we all just get along", "straight alta pazz recording company", "glen king", "rodney king incident", "why can t we all just get along", "rodney glen king", "rodney king", "can t we all just get along 3f", "king rodney", "rodney king case", "rodney king beating" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "beating of rodney king", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "The beating of Rodney King" }

{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Dr._Hibbert.txt" ], "title": [ "Dr. Hibbert" ], "wiki_context": [ "Dr. Julius M. Hibbert, usually referred to as Dr. Hibbert, is a recurring character on the animated series The Simpsons. His speaking voice is provided by Harry Shearer and his singing voice was by Thurl Ravenscroft, and he first appeared in the episode \"Bart the Daredevil\". Dr. Hibbert is Springfield's most prominent and competent doctor, though he sometimes makes no effort to hide or makes light of his high prices. Dr. Hibbert is very good-natured, and is known for finding a reason to laugh at nearly every situation.\n\nRole in The Simpsons\n\nPersonality\n\nDr. Hibbert is the Simpsons' (usually) kind-hearted family doctor, a near-genius (with an IQ of 155), a Mensa member, a graduate of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and a former stripper. Hibbert is noticeably less dysfunctional than just about everyone else on the show, though he does have a bizarre tendency to chuckle at inappropriate moments. It is mentioned in Make Room for Lisa, that \"Before I learned to chuckle mindlessly, I was headed to an early grave.\" He reacts questionably to certain medical problems. For example, when Maggie saved Homer from drowning, he attributed it to common cases of superhuman strength in children whose parents' lives are in danger. Likewise, he expressed only mild surprise when both of Abraham Simpson's kidneys were revealed to have exploded. In a Treehouse of Horror episode, Dr. Hibbert discusses the possibility of Bart being a \"genetic chosen one\" who can cure a zombie apocalypse over the phone with the Simpsons while under siege from the aforementioned zombies. Though he manages to dispatch several with various medical equipment (taking down a nurse with an expertly-thrown syringe to the forehead), he is eventually overwhelmed and bitten after requesting that the Simpsons tell his wife that he loves her if they should encounter her.\n\nThere are hints though, that Dr. Hibbert is not above dubious medical practices. After Marge talks him out of buying an unsuitable house, he suggests repaying her with black-market prescriptions. When he realized that Marge Simpson was initially unenthusiastic about having a third child, he implied that a healthy baby could bring in as much as $60,000 on the black market. Hibbert covered for himself against Marge's horrified reaction by saying that if she had replied any other way, she would be sent to prison, claiming that it was \"just a test\". It was also suggested in the episode \"Wild Barts Can't Be Broken\" that he does not in fact have a medical license. \n\nDespite his seemingly honest and good-hearted personality, there is evidence that he is, at heart, a committed mercenary. In \"Homer's Triple Bypass\", Hibbert announces to Homer that his heart operation will cost $30,000. When Homer has a heart attack in front of him in response to this news, he says, unmoved, that the cost is now $40,000 - hinting the heart attack made him now require a quadruple bypass. In \"Bye Bye Nerdie\", after Homer's baby-proofing business eliminates child injuries in Springfield, Hibbert complains that he is behind in his boat payments because of this. He is a committed Republican and attends Springfield's Republican meetings alongside Mr Burns, Rainier Wolfcastle, and a Nosferatu-like creature. Hibbert also freely wears fur coats, believing that while fur itself may not be murder, \"paying for it sure is!\" \n \nHibbert is often seen in flashbacks (for example, Lisa's birth, or Bart's accidents as a toddler), and each time has a different hairstyle (afro, dreadlocks, Mr. T-style Mohawk, etc.) appropriate for the time period.\n\nFamily\n\nDr. Hibbert is married; he and his wife Bernice have at least three children, two boys and a girl. When his entire family is seen together, they appear to be a spoof of The Cosby Show. Bernice is known to be something of a heavy drinker; this has been joked about on at least one occasion (in \"Homer vs. the Eighteenth Amendment\", she faints upon reading the news that Prohibition has been introduced in Springfield) and laughs exactly like her husband. Despite apparent marriage problems, Dr. Hibbert still requests that the Simpsons tell Bernice that he loves her during a zombie apocalypse, though Homer misinterprets the message and resolves to just give her a high-five.\n\nIn the sixth season episode 'Round Springfield, it is implied that he and Bleeding Gums Murphy are long-lost brothers; Hibbert says he has a long-lost brother who is a jazz musician, and Murphy says he has a brother who is a doctor that chuckles at inappropriate times, but somehow the two do not put these clues together. However, Murphy later dies, so it will never be known for certain if they are brothers or not. Hibbert also bears a striking resemblance to the director of the Shelbyville orphanage, who mentions a personal quest to find his long-lost twin to an indifferent Homer. In the 1999 episode \"The Grift of the Magi\" we learn that Dr. Hibbert lives next door to Police Chief Wiggum. \n\nCharacter\n\nIn writers Jay Kogen and Wallace Wolodarsky's original script for \"Bart the Daredevil\", Hibbert was a woman, named \"Julia Hibbert\", who they named after comedic actress Julia Sweeney (Hibbert was her married last name at the time). When Fox moved The Simpsons to prime time on Thursdays against NBC's top-rated The Cosby Show, the writing staff decided to make Hibbert a parody of Bill Cosby's character Dr. Cliff Huxtable.Groening, Matt; Jean, Al; Kogen, Jay; Reiss, Mike; Wolodarsky, Wallace (2004). Commentary for \"Bart the Daredevil\", in The Simpsons: The Complete Second Season [DVD]. 20th Century Fox. Hibbert is usually shown wearing sweaters when not on duty, a reference to Huxtable. He is one of the few competent characters in the show, and was originally shown as being sympathetic to his patients' conditions, but that was eventually changed to him being less caring about his patients.\n\nDr. Hibbert/Dr. Nick comparison\n\nA tongue-in-cheek analysis in the Canadian Medical Association Journal compares the services of Dr. Hibbert and Dr. Nick Riviera, a quack physician often used by The Simpsons as an alternative source of medical advice. While Hibbert is praised for his sense of humor and quality of care, it concludes that Riviera is a better role model for physicians; Hibbert is a paternalistic and wasteful physician, unlike Riviera, who strives to cut costs and does his best to avoid the coroner. In the twelfth season episode \"Trilogy of Error\", in which Marge accidentally severs Homer's thumb, she expresses disappointment with how Hibbert handles Homer's plight and attempts to go to Riviera instead." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Columbo.txt" ], "title": [ "Columbo" ], "wiki_context": [ "Columbo is an American television series starring Peter Falk as Columbo, a homicide detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. The character and show, created by William Link and Richard Levinson, popularized the inverted detective story format, which begins by showing the commission of the crime and its perpetrator; the series therefore has no \"whodunit\" element. The plot revolves around how a perpetrator whose identity is already known to the audience will finally be caught and exposed (which the show's writers called a \"howcatchem\", rather than a \"whodunit\").\n\nColumbo is a friendly, verbose, working-class, disheveled police detective of Italian descent, whose trademarks include wearing a rumpled, beige raincoat over his suit, and smoking a cigar. He is consistently underestimated by his suspects, who are initially reassured and distracted by his circumstantial speech, then increasingly annoyed by his pestering behavior. Despite his unassuming appearance and apparent absentmindedness, he is extremely intelligent and shrewdly solves all of his cases and secures all evidence needed for a conviction. His formidable eye for detail and relentlessly dedicated approach, often become clear to the killer (and even the viewer) only late in the story line.\n\nThe episodes are all movie-length, between 73 and 100 minutes long, and have been broadcast in forty-four countries. In 1997, \"Murder by the Book\", directed by Steven Spielberg, was ranked No. 16 on TV Guides 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time and in 1999, the magazine ranked Lt. Columbo No. 7 on its 50 Greatest TV Characters of All Time list. In 2012, the program was chosen as the third-best cop or legal show on Best in TV: The Greatest TV Shows of Our Time. In 2013, TV Guide included it in its list of The 60 Greatest Dramas of All Time and ranked it at #33 on its list of the 60 Best Series. Also in 2013, the Writers Guild of America ranked it No. 57 in the list of 101 Best Written TV Series. \n\nSeries format\n\nIn almost every episode the audience sees the crime unfold at the beginning and knows the identity of the culprit, typically an affluent member of society. Once Columbo enters the story, viewers watch him solve the case by sifting through the contradictions between the truth and the version presented to him by the killer. This style of mystery is sometimes referred to as a \"howcatchem\", in contrast to the traditional whodunit.\n\nEpisodes tend to be driven by their characters, the audience observing the criminal's reaction to Columbo's increasingly intrusive presence. In some cases, the killer's arrogance and dismissive attitude allow Columbo to manipulate his suspects into self-incrimination. While details of the murderer's actions are shown to the viewer, Columbo's true thoughts and intentions are almost never revealed until near the end of the episode. Columbo generally maintains a friendly relationship with the murderer until the end. The point at which the detective first begins to suspect the murderer is generally not revealed, leaving the true motivations for his actions for the viewer to decide. In some instances, such as Ruth Gordon's avenging mystery writer in \"Try and Catch Me\", Faye Dunaway's mother avenging her abused daughter in \"It's All in the Game,\" Janet Leigh's terminally ill actress in \"Forgotten Lady\", or Donald Pleasence's vintner in \"Any Old Port in a Storm\", the killer is more sympathetic than the victim or victims. \n\nEach case is generally concluded in a similar style, with Columbo dropping any pretense of uncertainty, and sharing details of his conclusion of the killer's guilt. Following the killer's reaction, the episode generally ends, with the killer confessing or going quietly and no following or concluding scenes. \n\nThere are few attempts to deceive the viewer or provide a twist in the tale. One exception is \"Last Salute to the Commodore\", where Robert Vaughn is seen elaborately disposing of a body, but is proved later to be covering for his alcoholic wife, who he mistakenly thought to be the murderer. \n\nDevelopment and character profile\n\nThe character of Columbo was created by William Link, who said that Columbo was partially inspired by the Crime and Punishment character Porfiry Petrovich as well as G. K. Chesterton's humble cleric-detective Father Brown. Other sources claim Columbo's character is also influenced by Inspector Fichet from the French suspense-thriller film Les Diaboliques (1955). \n\nThe character first appeared in a 1960 episode of the television-anthology series The Chevy Mystery Show, titled \"Enough Rope\". This was adapted by Levinson and Link from their short story \"May I Come In\", which had been published as \"Dear Corpus Delicti\" in an issue of Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine. The short story did not include Columbo as a character. The first actor to portray Columbo, character actor Bert Freed, was a stocky character actor with a thatch of grey hair. Freed's Columbo wore a rumpled suit and smoked a cigar, but he otherwise had few of the other now-familiar Columbo mannerisms. However, the character is still recognizably Columbo, and uses some of the same methods of misdirecting and distracting his suspects. During the course of the show, the increasingly frightened murderer brings pressure from the district attorney's office to have Columbo taken off the case, but the detective fights back with his own contacts. Although Freed received third billing, he wound up with almost as much screen time as the killer and appeared immediately after the first commercial. This delayed entry of the character into the narrative of the screen play became a defining characteristic of the structure of the Columbo series. This teleplay is available for viewing in the archives of the Paley Center for Media in New York City and Los Angeles.\n\nLevinson and Link then adapted the TV drama into the stage play Prescription: Murder. This was first performed at the Curran Theatre in San Francisco on January 2, 1962, with Oscar-winning character actor Thomas Mitchell in the role of Columbo. Mitchell was 70 years old at the time. The stage production starred Joseph Cotten as the murderer and Agnes Moorehead as the victim. Mitchell died of cancer while the play was touring in out-of-town tryouts; Columbo was his last role.\n\nIn 1968, the same play was made into a two-hour television movie that aired on NBC. The writers suggested Lee J. Cobb and Bing Crosby for the role of Columbo, but Cobb was unavailable and Crosby turned it down because he felt it would take too much time away from the golf links. Director Richard Irving convinced Levinson and Link that Falk, who wanted the role, could pull it off even though he was much younger than the writers had in mind. \n\nOriginally a one-off TV-Movie-of-the-Week, Prescription: Murder has Falk's Columbo pitted against a psychiatrist (Gene Barry). Due to the success of this film, NBC requested that a pilot for a potential series be made to see if the character could be sustained on a regular basis, leading to the 1971 hour and a half film, Ransom for a Dead Man, with Lee Grant playing the killer. The popularity of the second film prompted the creation of a regular series on NBC, that premiered in the fall of 1971 as part of The NBC Mystery Movie wheel series rotation: McCloud, McMillan & Wife, and other whodunits. According to TV Guide, the original plan was that a new Columbo episode would air every week, but as a motion picture star, Peter Falk refused to commit to such an arduous schedule, which would have meant shooting an episode every five days. The network arranged for the Columbo segments to air once a month on Wednesday nights. The high quality of Columbo, McMillan & Wife, and McCloud was due in large part to the extra time spent on each episode. The term wheel show was coined to describe this format, and additional such series were attempted by NBC, but the astounding success of The NBC Mystery Movie series was not repeated, and the term is now considered archaic.\n\nColumbo was an immediate hit in the Nielsen ratings and Falk won an Emmy Award for his role in the show's first season. In its second year the Mystery Movie series was moved to Sunday nights, where it then remained during its seven-season run. The show became the anchor of NBC's Sunday night line up. Columbo aired regularly from 1971–78 on NBC. After its cancellation by NBC in 1978 Columbo was revived on ABC between 1989 and 2003 in several new seasons and a few made-for-TV movie \"specials\". \n\nColumbo's wardrobe was personally provided by Peter Falk; they were his own clothes, including the high-topped shoes and the shabby raincoat, which made its first appearance in Prescription: Murder. Falk would often ad lib his character's idiosyncrasies (fumbling through his pockets for a piece of evidence and discovering a grocery list, asking to borrow a pencil, becoming distracted by something irrelevant in the room at a dramatic point in a conversation with a suspect, etc.), inserting these into his performance as a way to keep his fellow actors off-balance. He felt it helped to make their confused and impatient reactions to Columbo's antics more genuine.\n\nA few years prior to his death, Falk had expressed interest in returning to the role. In 2007 he claimed he had chosen a script for one last Columbo episode, \"Columbo: Hear No Evil\". The script was renamed \"Columbo's Last Case\". ABC declined the project. In response, producers for the series announced that they were attempting to shop the project to foreign production companies. However, Falk was diagnosed with dementia in late 2007. During a 2009 court trial over Falk's care, Dr Stephen Read stated that the actor's condition had deteriorated so badly that Falk could no longer remember playing a character named Columbo, nor could he identify who Columbo was. Falk died on June 23, 2011, aged 83. \n\nSeasons and broadcast history\n\nAfter two pilot episodes, the show originally aired on NBC from 1971 to 1978 as one of the rotating programs of The NBC Mystery Movie. Columbo then aired less regularly on ABC beginning in 1989 under the umbrella of The ABC Mystery Movie. The last film was broadcast in 2003 as part of ABC Thursday Night at the Movies. See List of Columbo episodes for more details. Since 2011, reruns of Columbo have aired on Me-TV; the series currently airs Sunday nights and as part of the nightly \"MeTV Mystery Movie\" block, which features Columbo and four other film series rotating in the slot from week to week. The series also airs weekday mornings on the Hallmark Channel. \n\nDVD releases\n\nAs of January 10, 2012, Universal Studios Home Entertainment had released all 69 episodes of Columbo on DVD. The episodes are released in the same chronological order as they were originally broadcast. On October 16, 2012, Universal released Columbo — The Complete Series on DVD in Region 1. \n\nBecause the Columbo episodes from 1989 to 2003 were aired very infrequently, different DVD sets have been released around the world. In many Region 2 and Region 4 countries, all episodes have now been released as ten seasons, with the tenth season covering the last 14 shows from \"Columbo Goes to College\" (1990) to the most recent \"Columbo Likes the Nightlife\" (2003). However, in France, and The Netherlands (also Region 2), the DVDs were grouped differently and released as twelve seasons.\n\nIn Region 1, all episodes from seasons 8 are grouped differently; all the episodes that were originally aired on ABC were released under the title COLUMBO: The Mystery Movie Collection. Many other sites such as IMDb, had grouped the Columbo episodes into 13 seasons. To avoid confusion, all episodes here will be arranged as it is in the R2/R4 release and only episode name will be referred in this article.\n\nBlu-ray release\n\nTo commemorate the death of Peter Falk, the complete series was released on Blu-ray in Japan as a ten-season set, taken from new HD masters and original 1.33:1 (4:3) aspect ratio (1989–2003 episodes are presented in 1.78:1 (16:9)). The set contains 35 discs and is presented in a faux-wooden cigar box. It features a brochure with episode details, and a script for the Japanese version of Prescription: Murder. Special features include the original 96-minute version of Étude In Black and the original NBC Mystery Movie title sequence. In addition, many episodes include isolated music and sound-effects tracks. Before the release of this set, only the episodes up to Murder, a Self-Portrait were released on DVD in Japan.\n\nOther media\n\nSeasons one through seven are available for streaming from Netflix.\n\nContributors\n\nDirectors and writers\n\nThe first season première \"Murder by the Book\" was written by Steven Bochco and directed by Steven Spielberg. Jonathan Demme directed the seventh season episode \"Murder Under Glass\". Jonathan Latimer was also a writer. Actor Ben Gazzara, a friend of Falk's, directed the episodes \"A Friend in Deed\" (1974) and \"Troubled Waters\" (1975).\n\nFalk himself directed the last episode of the first season, \"Blueprint for Murder\". Actor Nicholas Colasanto, best known for playing Coach on Cheers, directed two episodes, \"Swan Song\" with Johnny Cash, and \"Étude in Black\".\n\nPatrick McGoohan directed five episodes (including three of the four in which he played the murderer) and wrote and produced two (including one of these). Vincent McEveety was a frequent director, and homage was paid to him by a humorous mention of a character with his surname in the episode \"Undercover\" (which he directed).\n\nTwo episodes, \"No Time to Die\" and \"Undercover\", were based on the 87th Precinct novels by Ed McBain, and thus do not strictly follow the standard Columbo/inverted detective story format.\n\nScore composers\n\nColumbo episodes contain a variety of music that contributes to the uniqueness of each. The score becomes of particular importance during turning points of the plots. \"The Mystery Movie Theme\" by Henry Mancini written for the NBC Mystery Movie was used extensively in the whole of 38 episodes, from 1971 to 1977. Unlike the other elements of the Mystery Movie wheel, Columbo never had an official theme as such, although some composers did write their own signature pieces (such as Dick DeBenedictis and Gil Mellé). Several composers created original music for the series, that was often used along with \"The Mystery Movie Theme\":\n\n* Dick DeBenedictis (23 episodes, 1972–2003)\n* Patrick Williams (9 episodes, 1977–92)\n* Bernardo Segall (10 episodes, 1974–76)\n* Billy Goldenberg (7 episodes, 1971–74)\n* Gil Mellé (4 episodes, 1971–72)\n* Jeff Alexander (1 episode, 1975)\n* Oliver Nelson (1 episode, 1972)\n* Dave Grusin (1 episode, 1968)\n* Bob Prince (1 episode, 1977) \n* Jonathan Tunick (1 episode, 1978)\n* John Cacavas (3 episodes, 1989–91)\n* James Di Pasquale (2 episodes, 1990)\n* Steve Dorff (2 episodes, 1991)\n* Dennis Dreith (1 episode, 1990)\n* Richard Markowitz (1 episode, 1990)\n* David Michael Frank (1 episode, 1990)\n* Ken Jordan (1 episode, 2003)\n* Jim Latham (1 episode, 2003)\n\nSeries Music department included:\n* Henry Mancini — composer: \"Mystery Movie\" theme / \"Sunday Mystery Movie\" theme (38 episodes, 1971–77)\n* Hal Mooney — music supervisor (27 episodes, 1972–76)\n* Mike Post — composer: \"Mystery Movie\" theme (9 episodes, 1989–90)\n\nPatrick Williams received two Emmy nominations for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series in 1978 (for \"Try and Catch Me\") and 1989 (for \"Murder, Smoke and Shadows\"). Billy Goldenberg was nominated in the same category in 1972 for \"Lady in Waiting\".\n\nColumbo also featured an unofficial signature tune, the children's song \"This Old Man\". It was introduced in the episode \"Any Old Port in a Storm\" in 1973 and the detective can be heard humming or whistling it often in subsequent films. Peter Falk admitted that it was a melody he personally enjoyed and one day it became a part of his character. The tune was also used in various score arrangements throughout the three decades of the series, including opening and closing credits. A version of it, entitled \"Columbo\", was created by one of the show's composers, Patrick Williams. \n\nAwards and nominations\n\nColumbo received numerous awards and nominations from 1971 to 2005, including 13 Emmys, two Golden Globes, two Edgar Awards and a TV Land Award nomination in 2005 for Peter Falk. \n\nOther appearances\n\nFilm\n\nIn Wim Wenders' 1987 film Wings of Desire, Falk portrays \"himself\" and muses about his previous role as Columbo. He is addressed affectionately as \"Lieutenant\" by some people in the film, illustrating the character's popularity in Germany. In one scene, the character Marion played by Solveig Dommartin speaks to Falk as if he is Lt. Columbo, though they are only joking. Of course, Falk's character is eventually revealed to be a former angel, so this character may also be considered to be fictional.\n\nWriter Gary Whitta has expressed interest in writing a crime drama film with Mark Ruffalo in mind as Columbo.\n\nIn the 1979 Romanian movie Uncle Marin, the Billionaire, Lt.Columbo is portrayed by Puiu Călinescu.\n\nStage\n\nThe Columbo character first appeared on stage in 1962 in \"Prescription: Murder\" with Thomas Mitchell in the role of Columbo.\n\nIn 2010, Prescription: Murder, was revived for a tour of the United Kingdom with Dirk Benedict and later John Guerrasio as Columbo. \n\nTelevision\n\nFalk appeared as Columbo in a faux episode of Alias produced for a 2003 TV special celebrating the 50th anniversary of ABC.\n\nFalk appeared in character as Columbo in 1977 at The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast of Frank Sinatra.\n\nBooks\n\nA Columbo series of books was published by MCA Publishing in 1972 by authors Alfred Lawrence, Henry Clements and Lee Hays, mostly adapted from the TV series. \n\nColumbo was also used as the protagonist for a series of novels published between 1994 and 1999 by Forge Books, an imprint of Tor Books. All of these books were written by William Harrington.\n\nWilliam Link, the co-creator of the series, has written a collection of Columbo short stories, entitled The Columbo Collection, which was published in May 2010 by Crippen & Landru, the specialty mystery publisher. \n\nThe Columbo character is highlighted in volume 7 of the Detective Conan manga edition of Gosho Aoyama's Mystery Library. Columbo was briefly mentioned in the anime adaptation in the episode \"The Forgotten Cellphone Part 2\" when Conan said one of Columbo's lines: \"You know, my wife says...\".\n\nColumbo was briefly mentioned in a 1990 chapter of the long-running manga, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, where the main character Jotaro Kujo begins to suspect the actions of a suspicious old woman. He mentions to her that he couldn't sleep at night if he had doubts, because he frequently watched Columbo as a child.\n\nSculpture\n\nA statue of Lieutenant Columbo and his dog was unveiled in 2014 on Miksa Falk Street in Budapest, Hungary. According to Antal Rogán, then-district mayor of the city, Peter Falk may have been related to Hungarian writer and politician Miksa Falk, although there is no evidence yet to prove it. \n\nPodcast\n\nA podcast about Columbo was launched in 2014, primarily considering episodes of the television series. \n\nMrs. Columbo spin-off\n\nMrs. Columbo, a spin-off TV series starring Kate Mulgrew, aired in 1979 and was canceled after only thirteen episodes. Lt. Columbo was never seen on Mrs. Columbo; each episode featured the resourceful Mrs. Columbo solving a murder mystery she encountered in her work as a newspaper reporter. Connections with the original Columbo series were made obvious: the glaring presence of Columbo's car in the driveway, Dog, and Mrs. Columbo emptying ashtrays containing the famous green cigar butts—all featured in the show's opening sequence. References were also made to Kate's husband being a police lieutenant." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Erotic_asphyxiation.txt" ], "title": [ "Erotic asphyxiation" ], "wiki_context": [ "Erotic asphyxiation or breath control play is the intentional restriction of oxygen to the brain for the purposes of sexual arousal. This sexual practice is variously called asphyxiophilia, autoerotic asphyxia, hypoxyphilia. The term autoerotic asphyxiation is used when the act is done by a person to themselves. Colloquially, a person engaging in the activity is sometimes called a gasper. The erotic interest in asphyxiation is classified as a paraphilia in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association.\n\nPhysiology\n\nAuthor John Curra wrote, \"The carotid arteries (on either side of the neck) carry oxygen-rich blood from the heart to the brain. When these are compressed, as in strangulation or hanging, the sudden loss of oxygen to the brain and the accumulation of carbon dioxide can increase feelings of giddiness, lightheadness, and pleasure, all of which will heighten masturbatory sensations.\" \n\nAuthor George Shuman describes the effect as such, \"When the brain is deprived of oxygen, it induces a lucid, semi-hallucinogenic state called hypoxia. Combined with orgasm, the rush is said to be no less powerful than cocaine, and highly addictive.\" \n\nConcerning hallucinogenic states brought about by chronic hypoxia, Dr. E L Lloyd notes that they may be similar to the hallucinations experienced by climbers at altitude. He further notes that no such state occurs in hypoxia brought about by sudden aircraft decompression at altitude. These findings suggest to him that they do not arrive purely from a lack of oxygen. Upon examining the studies on hypoxia he found that \"abnormalities in the cerebral neurochemistry involving one or more of the interconnected neurotransmitters, dopamine, 5-hydroxytryptamine, and β-endorphin had been reported in all the conditions associated with hallucinations.\" \n\nHistory \n\nHistorically, the practice of autoerotic asphyxiation has been documented since the early 17th century. It was first used as a treatment for erectile dysfunction. The idea for this most likely came from subjects who were executed by hanging. Observers at public hangings noted that male victims developed an erection, sometimes remaining after death (a death erection), and occasionally ejaculated when being hanged. However, post-mortem ejaculation occurs in hanging victims after death because of disseminated muscle relaxation; this is a different mechanism from that sought by autoerotic asphyxiation practitioners.\n\nPractice\n\nVarious methods are used to achieve the level of oxygen depletion needed, such as a hanging, suffocation with a plastic bag over the head, self-strangulation such as with a ligature, gas or volatile solvents, chest compression, or some combination of these. Sometimes, complicated devices are used to produce the desired effects. The practice can be dangerous even if performed with care and has resulted in a significant number of accidental deaths. Uva (1995) writes “Estimates of the mortality rate of autoerotic asphyxia range from 250 to 1000 deaths per year in the United States.” Cases have also been reported in Scandinavia and Germany. Autoerotic asphyxiation may often be mistaken for suicide, which is a major cause of death in teenagers. \n\nAccidental death \n\nDeaths often occur when the loss of consciousness caused by partial asphyxia leads to loss of control over the means of strangulation, resulting in continued asphyxia and death. While often asphyxiophilia is incorporated into sex with a partner, others enjoy this behaviour by themselves, making it potentially more difficult to get out of dangerous situations. \n\nIn some fatality cases, the body of the asphyxiophilic individual is discovered naked or with genitalia in hand, with pornographic material or sex toys present, or with evidence of having orgasmed prior to death. Bodies found at the scene of an accidental death often show evidence of other paraphilic activities, such as fetishistic cross-dressing and masochism. In cases involving teenagers at home, families may disturb the scene by \"sanitizing\" it, removing evidence of paraphilic activity. This can have the consequence of making the death appear to be a deliberate suicide, rather than an accident. \n\nThe great majority of known erotic asphyxial deaths are male; among all known cases in Ontario and Alberta from 1974 to 1987, only one out of 117 cases was female. Some individual cases of women with erotic asphyxia have been reported. The mean age of accidental death is mid-20s, but deaths have been reported in adolescents and in men in their 70s.\n\nAutoerotic asphyxiation has at times been incorrectly diagnosed as murder and especially so when a partner is present.\n\nLawyers and insurance companies have brought cases to the attention of clinicians because some life insurance claims are payable in the event of accidental death, but not suicide. \n\nFamous cases\n\n* Peter Anthony Motteux, English author, playwright, translator, publisher and editor of The Gentleman's Journal, \"the first English magazine,\" from 1692 to 1694, died from apparent autoerotic asphyxiation in 1718, which is probably the first recorded case.\n* Frantisek Kotzwara, composer, died from erotic asphyxiation in 1791.\n* Sada Abe killed her lover, Kichizo Ishida, through erotic asphyxiation in 1936, proceeding to cut off his penis and testicles and carry them around with her in her handbag for a number of days. The case caused a sensation in 1930s Japan and has remained one of the most famous Japanese murder cases of all time.\n\n* Albert Dekker, stage and screen actor, was found dead in his bathroom in 1968 with his body graffitied and a noose around his neck.\n* Vaughn Bodé, artist, died from this cause in 1975.\n* In 1990s Herceg v. Hustler, Diane Herceg sued Hustler magazine, accusing it of causing the death of her 14-year-old son, Troy D., who had experimented with autoerotic asphyxia after reading about it in that publication. \n* Stephen Milligan, a British politician and Conservative MP for Eastleigh, died from autoerotic asphyxiation combined with self-bondage in 1994. \n* Kevin Gilbert, a musician and songwriter, died of apparent autoerotic asphyxiation in 1996. \n* Michael Hutchence, Australian singer-songwriter and member of rock band INXS. His death was in 1997 ruled as suicide by the coroner but was believed by his family and partner to be the result of autoerotic asphyxia. \n* Kristian Etchells, British National Front party member, in 2005. \n*Reverend Gary Aldridge, of Montgomery's Thorington Road Baptist Church, died June 24, 2007 from \"accidental mechanical asphyxia\"; he was \"found hogtied, wearing two complete wet suits, including a face mask, diving gloves and slippers, rubberized underwear, and a head mask.\" \n* David Carradine died on June 4, 2009 from accidental asphyxiation, according to the medical examiner who performed a private autopsy on the actor. His body was found hanging by a rope in a closet in his room in Thailand, and there was evidence of a recent orgasm; two autopsies were conducted and concluded that his death was not suicide, and the Thai forensic pathologist who examined the body stated that his death may have been due to autoerotic asphyxiation. Two of Carradine's ex-wives, Gail Jensen and Marina Anderson, stated publicly that his sexual interests included the practice of self-bondage.\n* Iván Heyn, Argentinian economist died in Uruguay in December 20, 2011. \n\nIn fiction \n\nThe sensational nature of autoerotic asphyxiation often makes it the subject of urban legends. It has also been mentioned specifically in a number of works of fiction.\n* In Marquis de Sade's famous novella Justine, or The Misfortunes of the Virtue, Justine is subjected to this by one of her captors. She survives the encounter.\n* In the Guts short story in Chuck Palahniuk's novel Haunted, one the characters discusses parents who discover the accidental deaths of their sons to autoerotic asphyxiation. They are said to cover up the deaths before police or coroners arrive to save the family from shame.\n* In the novel (and later movie adaptation) Rising Sun, death as a result of this type of sexual arousal is explained when it is offered as a possible cause for a murder victim's death.\n* In the film World's Greatest Dad, the protagonist's teenage son accidentally kills himself with asphyxiation whilst sexually aroused. The protagonist then staged his son's death as a suicide, which consequently gave him the opportunity to rise to infamy via a literary hoax.\n* In the film Ken Park a character named Tate practices autoerotic asphyxia.\n* Autoerotic asphyxiation occurs in the cold open of Six Feet Under episode Back to the Garden. \n* Kenny from South Park dies from suffocating while wearing a Batman costume and practicing autoerotic asphyxia in the episode Sexual Healing. \n* In the season four episode of Californication, Monkey Business, the character Zig Semetauer is found dead in his bathroom by Hank, Charlie and Stu after suffocating due to autoerotic asphyxia, to which Hank quips \"I'm not averse to the occasional choke-n'-stroke, but this is a prime example of why one must always use a buddy system.\"\n* A character in the film Knocked Up offers to be a \"spotter\" for a friend if he intends on performing autoerotic asphyxiation." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "Operation_(game).txt" ], "title": [ "Operation (game)" ], "wiki_context": [ "Operation is a battery-operated game of physical skill that tests players' hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills. The game's prototype was invented in 1964 by John Spinello, a University of Illinois industrial design student at the time, who sold his rights to the game to Milton Bradley for a sum of USD $500 and the promise of a job upon graduation. Initially produced by Milton Bradley in 1965, Operation is currently made by Hasbro, with an estimated franchise worth of USD $40 million. \n\nThe game is a variant on the old-fashioned electrified wire loop game popular at funfairs around the United States. It consists of an \"operating table\", lithographed with a comic likeness of a patient (nicknamed \"Cavity Sam\") with a large red lightbulb for his nose. In the surface are a number of openings, which reveal cavities filled with fictional and humorously named ailments made of plastic. The general gameplay requires players to remove these plastic ailments with a pair of tweezers without touching the edge of the cavity opening.\n\nGameplay\n\nOperation includes two sets of cards: The Specialist cards are dealt out evenly amongst the players at the beginning of the game.\n\nIn the U.S. version, players take turns picking Doctor cards, which offer a cash payment for removing each particular ailment, using a pair of tweezers connected with wire to the board. Successfully removing the ailment is rewarded according to the dollar amount shown on the card. However, if the tweezers touch the metal edge of the opening during the attempt (thereby closing a circuit), a buzzer sounds, Sam's nose lights up red, and the player loses the turn. The player holding the Specialist card for that piece then has a try, getting double the fee if he or she succeeds.\n\nSince there will be times when the player drawing a certain Doctor card also holds the matching Specialist card, that player can purposely botch the first attempt in order to attempt a second try for double value.\n\nThe game can be difficult, due to the shapes of the plastic ailments and the fact the openings are barely larger than the pieces themselves.\n\n*Adam's Apple: an apple in the throat ($100). \"Adam's apple\" is a colloquial term referring to the thyroid cartilage surrounding the larynx that becomes more visually prominent during puberty.\n*Broken Heart: a heart shape with a crack through it on the right side of the chest ($100). The phrase \"broken heart\" refers to an emotional feeling in which someone is very sad for a reason such as a breakup with a romantic partner.\n*Wrenched Ankle: a wrench in the right ankle ($100). \"Wrenched ankle\" is an alternative term for a sprained ankle.\n*Butterflies in Stomach: a large butterfly in the middle of the torso ($100). The name comes from the feeling in the stomach when nervous, excited or afraid.\n*Spare Ribs: two ribs fused together as one piece ($150). \"Spare Ribs\" are a cut of meat or a dish prepared from that cut.\n*Water on the Knee: a pail of water in the knee ($150). Colloquialism for fluid accumulation around the knee joint.\n*Funny Bone: a cartoon-style bone ($200). A reference to the colloquial name of the ulnar nerve which is itself thought to be a play on the anatomical name for the upper arm bone (the humerus).\n*Charley Horse: a small horse resting near the hip joint ($200). A \"charley horse\" is a sudden spasm in the leg or foot that can be cured by massage or stretching.\n*Writer's Cramp: a pencil in the forearm ($200). A \"writer's cramp\", which is a soreness in the wrist that can be cured by resting it.\n*The Ankle Bone Connected to the Knee Bone: A rubber band that must be stretched between two pegs at the left ankle and knee. This is the only non-plastic piece in the game and the only card that requires the player to insert rather than remove something ($200). The name is taken from the African American spiritual \"Dem Bones\".\n*Wish Bone: a wishbone similar to that of a chicken located on the left side of the chest ($300). A \"wish bone\" is a colloquial name for the Furcula which is a bone found in birds and some other animals. Traditionally, the Furcula of a chicken may be used by two people for making competing wishes.\n*Bread Basket: a slice of bread, with a small notch taken out of the top for grip ($1,000). The word \"breadbasket\" is slang for the stomach.\n*Brain Freeze: an ice-cream cone located in the brain ($600). Refers to the experience of \"brain freeze\", a headache felt after eating frozen desserts and iced drinks too quickly.\n\n\"Brain Freeze\" was added in 2004, when Milton Bradley allowed fans a chance to vote on a new piece to be added to the original game during the previous year. Voters were given three choices and could make their selection via the company's official website or by phone for a chance to win a $5,000 shopping spree. The winning piece beat out tennis elbow and growling stomach.\n\nOther versions\n\nThe 1964-1965 Saturday morning children's game show Shenanigans had a life sized, three-dimensional Operation game as one of its challenges.\n\nAside from the traditional board game version, Milton Bradley also produced a hand-held version which had a screen in Sam's tummy.\n\nThis also had a PC game produced in 1998.\n\nIn 2002, a brain surgery version was released, requiring the player to pull pieces out of a wisecracking Cavity Sam's head, within 15 seconds. Sam's nose lights up after time runs out.\n \nIn May 2004, a Shrek version of the game was released.\n\n2005 saw the release of a Simpsons version of the game, featuring a talking Homer Simpson being operated on by doctors Julius Hibbert and Nick Riviera. Items in the game include Bowler's Thumb, Foot in Mouth, and Rubber Neck. When a player misses, Homer screams or says one of his trademark lines such as \"D'oh! or \"This is not good!\".\n\nIn December 2006, a Spider-Man version was released in which the player operates on the Marvel superhero Spider-Man. In early 2008, Hasbro featured another Marvel superhero when it released an Incredible Hulk edition of the game to promote The Incredible Hulk feature film. In 2010, Hasbro also released an Iron Man version of the game to promote Iron Man 2.\n\nIn early 2007, a SpongeBob SquarePants version was introduced, featuring game pieces such as a \"shoehorn\" and a \"Krabby Patty pleasure center\".\n\nLater in 2007, Hasbro released a different version of the original game called OPERATION Rescue Kit in which the participant plays four different timed games with three skill levels. Each skill level reduces the starting amount of time. Cavity Sam has a heart monitor in this version, and the player can pump oxygen into him to gain more time.\n\nIn August 2008, Hasbro released a \"Silly Skill Game\" version which features 13 different sound effects for each of the different parts. Here the winner of the game is the player who removes most parts successfully.\n\nA Doctor Who version of the game was released in Great Britain, where players get to \"operate\" on a Dalek.\n\nIn 2010, Hasbro released a Toy Story 3 version featuring Buzz Lightyear as the patient. This followed the release of the Toy Story 3 feature film into theaters. Another Pixar film was promoted in 2011, when Hasbro made a Cars 2 edition including Mater the tow truck.\n\nUSAopoly released a Family Guy version of the game featuring Peter Griffin as the patient. USAopoly also released a The Nightmare Before Christmas version of the game (featuring Oogie Boogie as the patient) and a Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer version of the game (featuring the Abominable Snow Monster as the patient, with Rudolph's nose lighting up when the player hits the sides).\n\nOn The Hub's television game show Family Game Night hosted by Todd Newton, a segment called Operation Relay is played, where two families compete one after the other. Family members take turns pulling pieces out of an oversized Operation gameboard, and then running through an obstacle course to eventually place them in a container at the end of the course. If a player fails to pull a piece without touching the side, or drops it while going through the obstacle course, they must move to the back of the line, and it's the next person's turn. Each piece is worth a specific amount of points, and whichever team has earned the highest score when time expires wins. Also on the show is Operation Sam Dunk, in which families play skee ball to collect the most points possible. Each family gets two turns and the team with the highest score wins the game. For the show's third season, Operation is introduced, in which one family can win money for a shopping spree by removing pieces to earn up to four rolls and then play skee ball in a same manner as in Operation Sam Dunk.\n\nIn 2013 Hasbro introduced Doc McStuffins and Despicable Me 2 versions of the game." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Slasher_film.txt", "Freddy_Krueger.txt" ], "title": [ "Slasher film", "Freddy Krueger" ], "wiki_context": [ "Slasher films are a subgenre of horror films, typically involving a violent psychopath murdering several victims, usually with bladed tools. Although the term \"slasher\" is sometimes used informally as a generic term for any horror movie involving murder, analysts of the genre cite an established set of characteristics which allegedly set these films apart from other horror subgenres, such as splatter films and psychological horror films. \n\nSome critics cite Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) as an early influential \"slasher\" film, and most believe that the genre's peak occurred in American films released during the 1970s and 1980s. These classic slasher films include Tobe Hooper's The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), John Carpenter's Halloween (1978), Victor Miller and Sean S. Cunningham's Friday the 13th (1980), Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), and Don Mancini and Tom Holland's Child's Play (1988). Wes Craven's satirical film Scream (1996) revived public interest in the genre, and several of the original slasher franchises were rebooted in the years following the release of Scream.\n\nMany films in the slasher genre continue to attract cult followings.\n\nDefinition\n\nIn Games of Terror: Halloween, Friday the 13th and the Films of the Stalker Cycle, Vera Dika defines the slasher as having a repeated plot structure, theorizing that all slasher films adhere to the following formula in one way or another. According to Dika, the plot of a slasher film is always influenced by a past event in which the film's community, often teenage characters, commits a wrongful action, or the killer experiences some sort of severe trauma. The present day plot typically involves the opposing objectives of both a killer and a hero/heroine. Slasher films often begin with a commemoration of this important past event - an anniversary that somehow reactivates or re-inspires the killer. Often, the victim in a slasher film survives, but is maimed somehow by their experience with the film's killer. Dika also believes that the genre's appeal is rooted in the audience's feelings of catharsis, recreation, and displacement, which is related to sexual pleasure.\n\nCommon tropes\n\nCommon tropes often featured in slasher films include the final girl character, and the anti-heroic characterization of the film's villain. The subject of the final girl has become a topic often discussed in introductory film courses. The prototypical character often cited as the genre's first final girl is Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) in Halloween (1978). Final girls, who typically escape the killer's advances by a film's end, are often virgins and have at least one female friend who is portrayed as sexually active.\n\nPopular slasher franchises tend to follow the continued efforts of each film's villain, rather than the killer's victims, who do not often reappear in sequels. The idolization of each film's killer arguably creates antiheroes of slasher film villains. Notable examples of these killer-icons include: Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, Chucky and Leatherface.\n\nOrigins\n\nSome critics refer to horror plays produced at the Grand Guignol in the late 19th century as having influenced the contemporary slasher genre. Others reference the visceral images of violence in films such as Maurice Tourneur's The Lunatics (1912), a silent film adaptation of a Grand Guignol play. Public outcry in the United States over films like The Lunatics led to the passing of the Hays Code in 1930, one of the entertainment industry's earliest set of guidelines restricting what could be shown on film. Under the Hays Code, even mild references to sexuality and brutality were deemed unacceptable.\n\nCrime writer Mary Roberts Rinehart was a major influence on the emerging horror genre. Her novel The Circular Staircase (1908), later adapted into film as The Bat (1926), tells the story of guests in a remote mansion who are menaced by a killer in a grotesque bat mask. Its success led to a series of \"old dark house\" films produced in the late 1920s including: The Cat and the Canary (1927), based on John Willard's 1922 stage play of the same name, and Universal Pictures' The Old Dark House (1932), based on the novel by J.B. Priestley. Both films employed the theme of town dwellers pitted against strange country folk, a recurring theme in later horror films. As well as the \"madman on the loose\" plot, several key elements featured in these films would come to be employed in the slasher genre, including lengthy point of view shots and utilizing the \"sins of the father\" as a catalyst for the plot's violent mayhem.\n\nEarly film influences\n\nForerunners\n\nGeorge Archainbaud's Thirteen Women (1932) tells the story of a college sorority whose former members are set against one another by a vengeful peer. As they die, the culprit crosses out their yearbook photo, a device used in subsequent slasher films such as Prom Night (1980) and Graduation Day (1981). The movie's climax takes place on a train, something echoed in Terror Train (1980) and Terror on Tour (1980). Other early examples of the \"maniac seeking revenge\" trope include The Terror (1928), based on the play by Edgar Wallace.\n\nVal Lewton produced Jacques Tourneur's The Leopard Man (1943), a film about a murderer covering up his crimes against women in a small town by framing an escaped show leopard. Basil Rathbone's The Scarlet Claw (1944) is a Sherlock Holmes story revolving around murders committed with a garden weeder that features shots of the killer raising the weapon in the air and bringing it down repeatedly, an editing technique that became familiar in the genre. Robert Siodmak's The Spiral Staircase (1946), based on Ethel White's novel Some Must Watch, stars Ethel Barrymore as a woman who fears that her mute maid is the next victim of a killer. The helpless but sympathetic heroine became commonplace in later horror films, along with black-gloved killers, point of view shots, and jump scares.\n\nParticularly influential was British writer Agatha Christie, whose successful 1939 novel Ten Little Indians was first adapted in And Then There Were None (1945). The story centers around a group of people, each of whom has committed a secret past crime, who are killed one-by-one on an isolated island. Each of the murders mirrored a verse from a nursery rhyme, allowing the themes of childhood innocence and murder to merge, something that would become popular in later films of the genre.\n\nSuccessful films released in the 1950s featuring early examples of tropes used in later slasher films included: the remake House of Wax (1953), mystery thriller The Bad Seed (1956), Screaming Mimi (1958), British B-movie Jack the Ripper (1959), and Terry Bishop's Cover Girl Killer (1959).\n\n1960s\n\nIn 1960, Alfred Hitchcock released Psycho, a horror film that features an iconic score often imitated in later slasher films. Psycho uses visual content which had been deemed unacceptable by production companies previously, including images of violence, sexuality, and interior visuals of a bathroom.\n\nAlso in 1960, British director Michael Powell released Peeping Tom, which features a young photographer murdering young women in order to photograph their dying expressions. The film allows the viewer to experience the killer's perspective, a technique that effectively questioned the audience's role as viewer of violence.\n\nWilliam Castle's Homicidal (1961) features visual gore in its murder scenes, and Richard Hillard's Violent Midnight (1963) includes many elements which became ubiquitous in slasher films, including a point of view shot of the killer pulling down a branch to look at a potential victim, a villain wearing black gloves and a fedora, and a skinny-dipping scene. Crown International's Terrified (1963) features a masked killer who stalks his victims.\n\nFrancis Ford Coppola's debut film, Dementia 13 (1963), follows an ax murderer who stalks relatives gathered at an Irish castle to commemorate a death in the family. The film was influenced by Italian giallo thrillers. Joan Crawford starred in William Castle's Strait-Jacket (1964) and in Jim O'Connolly's Berserk (1967), both of which feature slasher-genre elements. In MGM's Night Must Fall (1964), a remake of the 1937 British film, Albert Finney plays a psychopath who keeps a severed head in a box. Corruption (1968) stars Peter Cushing as a mild-mannered serial killer.\n\nPsycho influenced films shot outside the U.S. as well. Britain's Taste of Fear (1961), from Hammer Studios, was followed by: Maniac (1963), Paranoiac (1963), Nightmare (1964), Fanatic (1965), The Nanny (1965), Hysteria (1965), and Crescendo (1970). Amicus, a rival of Hammer Studios, had Psycho author Robert Bloch write the script Psychopath (1968). The Spanish film The House That Screamed (1969) features violent murders that thematically preempted later campus-based slashers.\n\nInfluential subgenres\n\nOther violent film genres include splatter films, German Krimi films, and Italian giallo films. Each of these utilizes some of the tactics employed in slasher films.\n\nSplatter films typically feature thin plots with static characters, and focus instead on realistic or gratuitous gore. Herschell Gordon Lewis's Blood Feast (1963), which features campy devices, and was a hit at drive-in theaters, is often considered the first splatter film. Lewis' later films, Two-Thousand Maniacs! (1964), Color Me Blood Red (1965), The Gruesome Twosome (1967) and The Wizard of Gore (1971), are similar. Other successful 1960s splatter films include: Andy Milligan's The Ghastly Ones in 1969, Twisted Nerve in 1968, Lewis J. Force's Night After Night After Night and Tigon Productions' The Haunted House of Horror (1969).\n\nKrimi films are German adaptations of British writer Edgar Wallace's violent crime novels and were popular from the end of the 1950s through the mid-1960s; they continued to be made into the early 1970s. Filmed in Germany, these pictures fetishize England and provide a very post-World War II German viewpoint of Englishness, producing an almost otherworldly alternative reality. The stories are given a contemporary edge and have musical scores by jazz composers such as Martin Böttcher and Peter Thomas. The films also feature villains in bold costumes.\n\nThe film that launched the Krimi-craze in America was Fellowship of the Frog (1959), which features a murderous villain terrorizing London. The film's success led to similar adaptations and imitations, including The Green Archer (1961) and Dead Eyes of London (1961). The Rialto Studio produced 32 Krimi films.\n\nItalian giallo films feature a crime procedural plot, but unlike American slasher films, the protagonists of gialli are adults sporting the latest fashions and jetting off to exotic destinations. Much like Krimi films, the plots of gialli films are filled with outlandish and often improbable twists, increasingly mixing horror and thriller genres which emphasize detective work to uncover the killer's identity.\n\nSergio Martino's The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh (1971) includes a scene where the heroine is menaced by the killer in an underground parking lot, a device used by many American slasher films, from Happy Birthday to Me (1981) to Scream 4 (2011). Martino's Torso (1973) is possibly the giallo that most influenced the slasher film. In Torso, a masked killer, often shown using point of view shots, preys on co-eds. It includes the theme of a past crime with retribution motivating the killings in the present. And, like teenagers in slasher films, the young victims do drugs, enjoy premarital sex, and taunt authority. The singling out of a \"final girl\" had the largest impact, as horror filmmakers continued studying the climactic scene decades later, with Alexandre Aja's extreme French splatter film High Tension (2003) paying homage to the end chase. Also highly influential was Bava's A Bay of Blood (1971) which features explicit scenes of murder and creative death sequences. Several death scenes in A Bay of Blood have been directly imitated by American slasher films, the most famous being Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981). The lakeside setting, and whodunit mystery, also inspired Sean S. Cunningham and Victor Miller to create the original Friday the 13th (1980).\n\nThe cross-pollination of giallo films allowed them to play in American cinemas and at drive-in theaters, contributing to the melting pot of genres that helped create the slasher film. Spanish and Turkish filmmakers made movies such as A Dragonfly for Each Corpse (1974) that have been termed gialli. Many gialli were released in British cinemas with ads that promoted the films' sex and nudity over the thriller and mystery aspects. The British thriller Assault (1971) shares many traits with the giallo genre. Even Alfred Hitchcock, whose own films inspired the genre, was influenced by the giallo in his later career as evidenced by his penultimate film, Frenzy (1972). The genre's familiarity and conventions also inspired spoofs such as Death Steps in the Dark (1977).\n\nEven with hits like Deep Red (1975), Tenebre (1982), or The Blood-Stained Shadow (1978) the giallo never recaptured its mainstream success of the early 1970s. By the mid-1970s, the giallo had all but fallen out of fashion. Budgets and production values began to plummet. Some films, such as Play Motel (1979) and Giallo a Venezia (1979), tried to draw in audiences with the promise of hardcore pornographic scenes.\n\nThe exploitation film\n\nWhile the giallo dominated the European market, Britain and the United States saw an increase in exploitation films developing into what would eventually emerge as the slasher film. The more sensational aspects of Psycho led to movies that exploited sex and violence to lure the audience. Many of these films played in Grindhouse and drive-in theaters specializing in B-movies. Creaky plot devices were largely jettisoned, and madness was celebrated, with villains given the most cursory of motives for their heinous actions. The exploitation film was frequented largely by teenage moviegoers which led to teenage protagonists being added to the plots.\n\nBritish director Robert Fuest's low-budget shocker And Soon the Darkness (1970) kickstarted the exploitation wave of the 1970s. The film moved away from the Gothic feel of 1960s horror by unraveling the sinister action in daytime. Similarly, Fright (1971), based on the \"babysitter and the man upstairs\" urban legend, sees the protagonist not only stalked but also humiliated by the killer. Tower of Evil (1972) features teenage murders at a remote island lighthouse, cementing the tradition of partying teens in danger.\n\nPerhaps the most influential filmmaker of the exploitation genre was Pete Walker, the English director of The Flesh and Blood Show (1972). He set out to satisfy the audience's desire for both sex and gore, following it with Frightmare (1974). This film broke many taboos at the time and, upon its initial release, advertised its negative reviews to attract viewers. Walker's aim was to court controversy since big headlines resulted in increased box office revenues. In House of Mortal Sin (1976), he tackled Catholicism with a killer priest using sacred objects as murder weapons. In Schizo (1976), an ice skater thinks she is being stalked by a serial killer. Walker's last psycho-thriller, The Comeback (1978), features a hag-masked killer. By the time of its release, its plot seemed old fashioned compared to emerging films like Halloween(1978).\n\nAmerican films attracted bad press as well. Blood and Lace (1971) was dubbed by the Psychotronic Encyclopedia of Film as the \"sickest PG-rated movie ever made!\" William Girdler's Three on a Meathook was a loose remake of Psycho, with a higher body-count and more nudity. Scream Bloody Murder (1973) advertised that it was the first motion picture to be labeled \"gore-nography.\" High profile films sometimes reflected popular themes in low-budget productions. In Westworld (1973), a theme park with lifelike robots turns deadly when the robots begin to kill people. While owing more to westerns and science fiction films than psycho-thrillers, the main villain of Westworld is cited by John Carpenter as one of his inspirations for the character of Michael Myers in Halloween.\n\nBy 1974, exploitation films were beginning to show their age. The Single Girls (1974) attempted to spoof genre conventions that had not been entirely established with the viewing public, and the ultra low-budget Have a Nice Weekend (1975) did not exploit the sex, nudity, drugs, or violence that audiences expected. The Love Butcher (1975) was released at the beginning of the punk movement and tested the boundaries of political correctness, yet it failed to attract an audience not yet familiar with the movement. In The Redeemer: Son of Satan (1976), a school reunion turns bloody when ex-students are stalked by a vengeful maniac dressing in different costumes. The film's villain murders the targets because of the sins they've committed, including one woman for being a lesbian. The use of masks was a central gimmick in the poorly received Savage Weekend (1976), which was shelved for several years before a small re-release in 1981 to capitalize on the success of post-Halloween slasher films.\n\nThe Texas Chain Saw Massacre\n\nTobe Hooper's low-budget The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) was a major hit and the most commercially successful horror film since 1973's The Exorcist. The story concerns a violent clash of cultures and ideals, including the death of late 1960's counter-culture, and the darkly conservative values of a rural family. The film's main antagonist is Leatherface, a squealing man who carries a chainsaw, wears the skin of past victims, and eats human flesh. While Norman Bates was the first iconic cinematic serial killer, Leatherface was the first bonafide boogeyman that impacted the American horror film's portrayal of villains through both his appearance and mental state.\n\nThe film's success spawned several imitators and its false \"based on a true story\" advertisements gave birth to films whose central premise was a violent reenactment of a real-life crime. The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1976), based on the true unsolved Phantom Killer case, centers on a killer stalking lovelorn teens wearing a mask that directly inspired the look of Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981). In the same vein Another Son of Sam (1977), cashed-in on the public's fascination with the then-recent Son of Sam slayings in New York City.\n\nWes Craven, who had directed the successful-yet-controversial low-budget revenge film The Last House on the Left (1972), returned to the genre with The Hills Have Eyes (1977). Like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, the film featured suburban \"fish-out-of-water\" protagonists facing inbred cannibals. The film was a financial success, and helped launch Craven's career after the controversy surrounding the violence in The Last House on the Left nearly destroyed it.\n\nBlack Christmas\n\nBlack Christmas is a holiday-themed horror film. The TV movie Home for the Holidays (1972) sees a Christmas family reunion turn deadly when a killer starts dispatching guests with a pitchfork. The And All Through the House segment of the anthology film Tales from the Crypt (1972) features Joan Collins who murders her husband on Christmas Eve and, because of this crime, cannot call police when an escaped psychopath in a Santa costume terrorizes her. In the low-budget Silent Night, Bloody Night (1973), a series of murders occurs on the site of an old asylum.\n\nBob Clark's Black Christmas (1974) utilizes a Christmas setting and creepy phone calls that were later popular in films such as When a Stranger Calls (1979) and Scream (1996). The film is often cited for its masterful tension and suspense, and plays on societal taboos of the time, including abortion and alcoholism. Both visually and thematically, Black Christmas is a precursor to Halloween, as it features young women being terrorized by a killer, in a previously safe environment, during an iconic holiday. Like Halloween, Clark's film opens with a lengthy point of view shot, however the films' antagonists are different; whereas the killer in Black Christmas is unseen, yet raves like a lunatic through phone calls, the killer in Halloween is often seen yet never speaks. Black Christmas differs from later slasher films in that the killer is never revealed or defeated by a final girl.\n\nUpon its initial release, Black Christmas was heavily criticized. Variety complained that it was a \"bloody, senseless kill-for-kicks\" flick that exploited unnecessary violence. Despite being a modest hit in its initial run, the film has since garnered much more acclaim, with film historians noting its undeniable importance in the modern horror film genre; many cite it as the original slasher film.\n\nGolden age\n\nThe period from 1978 to 1984, when the slasher was at its height, is often cited as the Golden Age of Slasher films. The film that jumpstarted the period was John Carpenter's Halloween. Its enormous success, and the subsequent success of Sean S. Cunningham's Friday the 13th in the spring of 1980 launched a slew of imitators, rip-offs, and riffs on the same theme, and by 1984 over 100 such films had been released. Despite initial negative reviews, which often compared the films to seminal works such as Psycho (1960) and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), many of these films have gone on to establish their own cult followings.\n\nDuring this six-year period, the appeal of the slasher for producers was its ability to earn significant amounts of money at the box office, with a small budget that did not rely on the added cost of bankable talent. In total, the films released in the Golden Age made hundreds of millions of dollars at the box office, and most films easily made a profit, even if they did not pull in the record-breaking numbers of Halloween. When adjusted for the box office rate of 2015, many of the figures are even more impressive: Halloween would have pulled in over $200 million and Friday the 13th would have made nearly $150 million. Even films such as When a Stranger Calls (1979) and Graduation Day (1981) would have made nearly $100 million.\n\nMany of these slashers were Halloween imitators, reusing the simple template of teens being stalked by a murderous figure, which filmmakers put their own spin on, with varying degrees of success. Subsequently filmmakers exploited and expanded on what had been done before, featuring more gore, nudity, and higher body counts than Halloween. Whereas critics praised Halloween for its restraint, its more exploitative elements were enhanced by filmmakers, mixing blood, nudity, and scares in a crowd-pleasing manner. The explosion of the slasher film in the entertainment market was mainly a North American phenomenon. The films used American imagery, and were often set in high schools, college dorms, summer camps, night schools, or suburbia.\n\nHalloween\n\nInfluenced by a myriad of sources as diverse as the French New Wave film Eyes Without a Face (1960), the science fiction film Westworld (1971), and the slasher film Black Christmas (1974), Halloween became a genre-defining film with the simple yet effective plot of an escaped mental patient stalking unsuspecting teens. Wanting to keep costs to a minimum, producers decided the film should take place at only a few locations, over a brief period of time, an approach that would be copied by almost every slasher film to follow.\n\nJohn Carpenter, fresh from directing the TV thriller Someone's Watching Me! (1978), accepted the offer to write and direct the film, and to compose its score, with his then girlfriend, Debra Hill, who would also produce the film. It was budgeted at a modest $300,000, with Carpenter agreeing to a fee of $10,000 and a percentage of the profits. Moustapha Akkad, an Arab film producer, backed the project, and continued to influence the Halloween franchise until his death in 2005. Jamie Lee Curtis was chosen to play heroine Laurie Strode, an homage to her mother Janet Leigh, whose iconic shower scene in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho made her synonymous with the horror genre. The role of Dr. Sam Loomis, the doctor hunting the killer, was first offered to Peter Cushing then Christopher Lee; both turned it down. Instead, Donald Pleasence joined the cast as Loomis. Carpenter's personal friend, Nick Castle, played the killer Michael Myers, in a menacing performance that would be imitated in countless villain portrayals from Jason Voorhees to the Terminator.\n\nOne of the film's most famous scenes is the opening shot where six-year-old Michael Myers stalks his sister and her boyfriend, seen through his point of view. This shot would be mimicked in dozens of other slasher films, and became such a common convention that it was spoofed in films such as Blow Out (1981). Another convention the film became known for was the killing of sexually active teens while allowing virginal \"final girls\" to survive. Carpenter denies that there is a conservative political agenda in Halloween and states that sex-obsessed teenagers were easier targets for Myers because they were paying less attention to their surroundings. However, subsequent filmmakers copied what appeared to be the \"sex-equals-death\" mantra, because sex and violence are the two key selling points of the genre.\n\nHalloween almost did not become a break-out, genre-defining film. Every major American studio (the same studios that would rush to imitate it in the wake of its success) declined to distribute it. Carpenter showed it to an executive at 20th Century Fox, although this cut did not yet have the now-famous musical score, and she remarked that it was not scary. He quickly realized that his minimal, yet soon to be iconic, electronic music score was the magic ingredient that perfectly complimented the visuals, helping generate and build suspense.\n\nDistributed in Kansas City through Compass International Pictures in October 1978, the film opened in four theaters, causing only a few ripples at the box office. However, word-of-mouth proved to be the film's strongest marketing tool, and the movie became one of the original sleeper hits. When it opened at the Chicago Film Festival in November 1978, it exploded both critically and commercially. While initial critical reaction was mixed, the country's major critics saw the film as a masterpiece. Tom Allen of Village Voice said the film stands alongside classics such as Psycho and Night of the Living Dead (1968). Roger Ebert of The Chicago Sun Times praised the film as \"terrifying and creepy.\" Halloween became a box office phenomenon, ultimately becoming the most profitable independent release of all time (only to be surpassed by Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in 1990). The film grossed over $70 million worldwide, although some reports go as high as $100 million.\n\n1978\n\nBecause Halloween was released at the end of 1978, filmmakers had not yet had the chance to imitate it. The TV Movie Are You in the House Alone? was first screened just prior to Halloween. It was another \"babysitter in peril\" flick, however the phantom phone calls suggest Black Christmas as the inspiration. As with most films from the era, its slasher elements would often catch audiences off guard, as the template for the genre had not yet been established.\n\nReleased two months before Halloween was Eyes of Laura Mars, which starred Faye Dunaway and Tommy Lee Jones, and is often said to be an American version of the giallo. Even though the giallo had started falling out of favor by the late 70s, Eyes of Laura Mars was a success at the box office, garnering $20 million from a $7 million budget.\n\nThe Toolbox Murders went into production following the success of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Hills Have Eyes at the drive-in and Grindhouse circuits. The film is set in a Los Angeles apartment complex where a deranged manager kills women with instruments from a toolbox. Only the first act of the film, where numerous women are dispatched, could be regarded as a slasher film; the remainder of the film concerns a kidnapping plot. Killer's Delight is a San Francisco-set serial killer opus that claimed to take its inspiration from the exploits of Ted Bundy and the Zodiac Killer. America was, at the time, in the throes of a love-hate relationship with real-life killers — outwardly condemning them but almost seeming to celebrate them through the constant glare of the media.\n\n1979\n\nThe opportunity to capitalize on the popularity of Halloween(1978) was not taken up by would-be slasher filmmakers as quickly as expected. Although many slashers went into production in 1979, they would not be released until 1980 and later.\n\nOne of the unique slashers 1979 was David Schmoeller's Tourist Trap, which emulated plots in films such as The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) and The Hills Have Eyes (1977). However, while the teens are pursued by a masked killer (an influence of Halloween), there is a supernatural twist of a killer with telekinesis, suggesting an inspiration as diverse as Stephen King's Carrie or Jean Cocteau's surrealist fairytale La belle et la bête (1946). More akin to Halloween was Fred Walton's When a Stranger Calls, based on the urban legend of \"the babysitter and the man upstairs\" (on which Fright (1971) and Black Christmas (1974) were also based). The film became famous for its opening scene, in which a babysitter (Carol Kane) is taunted by a killer, lurking in the house, who repeatedly calls her to ask, \"Have you checked the children?\" \n\nLess successful was Ray Dennis Steckler's burlesque slasher The Hollywood Strangler Meets the Skid Row Slasher, which lacked any Halloween influence, having an almost documentary-like approach to the on-screen violence against the homeless. The violence against vagabonds was repeated in Abel Ferrara's The Driller Killer, which has more in common with Roman Polanski's Repulsion (1965) than it does with Halloween. Ferrara's film focuses on the internal turmoil of the killer rather than on his murderous deeds, a theme that translated into Maniac (1980) and Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986). The Driller Killer is so bloody that it became one of the most infamous \"video nasties\" in Britain. Another slasher, Savage Water, was also made in 1979 but was never released in North America due to lack of interest from distributors.\n\n1980\n\n1980 was the year that the slasher film exploded into the public consciousness, largely because of the success of Friday the 13th as well as hits like Silent Scream and Prom Night. With the election of Ronald Reagan as the 40th President of the United States, a new age of conservatism was ushered into America. Growing concern about rising violence, as well as the debate about the depiction of violence against women in entertainment, manifested into protests and boycotts. The slasher film, at the height of its commercial power, also unwittingly found itself at the center of a political and cultural maelstrom.\n\nAmong the first successes was Silent Scream, which made $15.8 million at the box office. The team behind Halloween (1978), including John Carpenter, Debra Hill, Jamie Lee Curtis, Nancy Loomis, and Charles Cyphers, returned for The Fog, a ghost story that was not directly a slasher, but features murderous specters that kill residents of a small seaside town. A box office smash, The Fog received positive reviews, cementing Carpenter and Hill as Hollywood heavyweights. Dario Argento followed up on his 1977 smash hit Suspiria with Inferno, the second installment in The Three Mothers trilogy. Inferno had a limited theatrical release and received mixed reviews.\n\nTwo high-profile and thematically similar slasher-thrillers opened in early 1980; William Friedkin's Cruising starring Al Pacino as a vice cop investigating a series of murders against gay men in leather bars, and Windows, which equated lesbianism with psychosis as a divorcee suffers at the hands of psychotic Sapphic neighbor. Cruising drew protests from gay rights groups, who were unhappy with its portrayal of homosexuals. Although the film pre-dates the AIDS crisis, it could be argued that the film's negative portrayal of the gay community fueled the subsequent backlash when the virus broke out. Windows only played for one week before being pulled from theaters due to its homophobia.\n\nDon't Answer the Phone! kicked off the \"Don't\" cycle of films, although none of these films were related. While Don't Answer the Phone! alludes to something along the lines of When a Stranger Calls (1979), it was criticized for being misogynistic by dwelling on, and attempting to be titillating, by using the suffering of females exclusively. Also in the \"Don't\" cycle was Joseph Ellison's Don't Go in the House, a video nasty film that also depicted graphic scenes of female suffering. New Year's Evil attempted to sugarcoat its misogynistic undertones with New Wave music and a novel plot, although the film was ultimately unsuccessful critically and commercially. Brian De Palma paid homage to Psycho in Dressed to Kill, a film that initiated a wave of protest from women's groups for its misogyny; the National Organization for Women (NOW) picketed when it was shown on the University of Iowa campus. Despite controversy, the film was a success and took in $32 million at the box office.\n\nHoliday-themed slashers also appeared, including Christmas Evil which received a limited release and was poorly received by audiences which were expecting something faster-paced than a slow-burn psychological study about a man's deadly obsession with Santa Claus. Also targeting Christmas was David Hess' directorial debut To All a Goodnight, which foreshadowed the popularity of campus-set slashers coming the following year. Hess also added to his acting resume in The House on the Edge of the Park, playing the role of rapist/serial killer, similar to his role in 1972's The Last House on the Left. The rock slasher Terror on Tour, from the producing team behind To All a Goodnight, was also released in 1980, proving that producers were trying to sell as many low-budget horror films as possible in the shortest amount of time, with no concern for quality.\n\nSlashers were mainly hits at drive-in and Grindhouse theaters. The Italian horror movie Antropophagus, directed by Joe D'Amato, included a murdered woman's unborn baby being ripped out and eaten, and the killer eating his own innards as he dies. The Bigfoot horror Night of the Demon, was a splatter-slasher film hybrid that featured graphic scenes such as a man being whipped with his own intestines and two girls being forced to stab each other in a ritualistic dance. German director Ulli Lommel, known for the acclaimed The Tenderness of Wolves (1973), directed The Boogeyman, one of the first slashers include in supernatural elements. The film, playing on the success of both Halloween and The Amityville Horror (1979), was a box office smash, earning $25 million. Supernatural elements were also in The Ghost Dance, which involves the spirit of the shaman Nahalla being resurrected and possessing an Indian medicine man. David Paulson, director of the rarely seen Savage Weekend (1976), returned with Schizoid. Another low-budget slasher released in 1980 was The Unseen, which was notably less exploitative but still lured audiences with the promise of beautiful women in peril. Australian actor Gary Sweet made his feature film debut in Nightmares. \n\nHollywood offered major talent to the slasher craze. Academy Award winner John Huston directed Phobia, although the film was both a critical and commercial failure. Fade to Black provides a meta social commentary on cinematic violence and its effects on youth culture. Jack Palance and Martin Landau, who would go on to star in Alone In The Dark two years later, played lead roles in alien slasher Without Warning. The influences of Halloween are seen in MGM's He Knows You're Alone, a movie with an soundtrack similar to that of Carpenter's film, similar location and characters, and even similar \"jump scares.\"\n\nCanada saw a boom of slasher productions, likely due to tax incentives. Jamie Lee Curtis starred in Paul Lynch's Prom Night, a Halloween-cash-in released just a few months after Friday the 13th. It was a sizable hit with a $15 million box office. Curtis returned for another Canadian slasher, Terror Train, also featuring Ben Johnson, David Copperfield, and Hart Bochner. Released by 20th Century Fox, the film was a meager success. Also from Canada, Funeral Home, a tamer update of Psycho was a massive box office success in Mexico.\n\nThe end of 1980 saw the release of one of the most controversial slashers of its time: William Lustig's Maniac (1980). Featuring Joe Spinell as a schizophrenic serial killer in New York, Maniac was inspired by the public's fascination with real-life serial killers such as Ted Bundy and Son of Sam. The film was attacked by critics; Vincent Canby of The New York Times said that watching the film was like \"watching someone else throw up.\" Tom Savini, who also worked on Dawn of the Dead (1978) and Friday the 13th, provided graphic gore effects for the film, which mainly depicted violence against women. The film was so nihilistic and violent that Lustig released it unrated on American screens, thereby sidestepping the MPAA. The film's controversy paid off, as it brought in $6 million at the box office.\n\nFriday the 13th\n\nAfter Halloween (1978), Friday the 13th is the best known slasher from the Golden Age. The film was commercially successful, bringing in nearly $40 million at the box office. Despite this success, its distributor, Paramount Pictures, was criticized for \"lowering\" itself to release such a violent movie. Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert despised the film, and Siskel, in his Chicago Tribune review, revealed the identity of the film's killer his fate in an attempt to hurt its box office, even providing the address of the chairman of Paramount Pictures in case viewers of the film wanted to complain. \n\nThe MPAA was criticized for allowing the film to pass with an R rating. The film's violence would be replicated in subsequent slasher films hoping to cash in on its success, as it set the bar for acceptable levels of on-screen violence. The criticisms that began with Friday the 13th would lead to the genre's eventual decline in subsequent years.\n\n1981\n\nBy 1981, release of slasher films reached a saturation point. Films such as the heavily advertised My Bloody Valentine and The Burning were box office failures. Slashers were still cheap to make, and the search for the next Halloween and Friday the 13th continued, while sequels to those films began to hit screens.\n\nJust Before Dawn (1981), one of the first releases of the year, celebrates nature through its cinematography and the atmosphere of the Silver Falls, Oregon location, and a memorable score by Brad Fiedel. Australia's Roadgames, starring Jamie Lee Curtis, was unsuccessful at the box office, something that director Richard Franklin blamed on its marketing as a slasher. Madhouse follows a teacher of deaf children who suffers childhood trauma inflicted by her deranged twin sister, who has a connection to a Rottweiler dog that is killing her friends and neighbors. \n\nAfter the major box office success of Friday the 13th, Paramount Pictures picked up My Bloody Valentine, hoping that it would achieve similar success. The film became the subject of intense scrutiny by the MPAA in the wake of the murder of John Lennon, and was released heavily edited. Lacking the draw of gore, My Bloody Valentine made only $6 million at the box office, much less than Paramount had hoped for. The similar themed The Prowler hoped to lure the Friday the 13th audience with suspenseful sequences and gore effects by Tom Savini, but it was heavily edited for theatrical release. This contributed to its failure to find a distributor, and, as a regional release, affected its total profit. Suffering similar censorship was The Burning, which also used Savini's effects. Thematically similar to Friday the 13th it did not make much of a box office impact despite being the launching point for heavyweight film producers Bob Weinstein, Harvey Weinstein, and Brad Grey, as well as actors Holly Hunter, Jason Alexander, and Fisher Stevens.\n\nStudio interest in potential slasher films grew after the success of Friday the 13th. Eyes of a Stranger was acquired by Warner Bros. and, while not quite as mean-spirited as the previous year's Don't Answer the Phone! (1980), it was similarly violent and sadistic, although much of the gore was cut. Warner Bros. also distributed Night School, a film heavily influenced by the giallo genre, especially Andrea Bianchi's Strip Nude for Your Killer (1975). Screen legends Lauren Bacall and James Garner starred in The Fan, which was unsuccessful both critically and commercially for distributor Paramount Pictures. Universal Pictures, known for its monster movies of the 1930s and 1940s, released Tobe Hooper's The Funhouse, which scored a modest success of $8 million. Columbia Pictures picked up independent Canadian whodunit Happy Birthday to Me, directed by J. Lee Thompson, the man behind Cape Fear (1962). Promoted as a \"psychological mystery shocker\" with \"six of the most bizarre murders you'll ever see\", Happy Birthday to Me underwent cuts ordered by the MPAA but still made $10 million. Slashers translated to television, with CBS releasing Dark Night of the Scarecrow.\n\nIndependent companies also released low-budget slashers with varying degrees of success. Bloody Birthday, about killer children, was aesthetically and thematically similar to Halloween, proving that John Carpenter's hit had not lost steam. Linda Blair, star of The Exorcist (1973), continued her career in Hell Night. That film's director, Tom DeSimone, was well aware of the MPAA's backlash against the slasher genre, so he de-emphasized gore in favor of suspense. Deadly Blessing (1981) marked Wes Craven's first stab at the genre three years before he would revolutionize it with A Nightmare on Elm Street. The year's most surprising success was Herb Freed's Graduation Day, a film that revels in its gratuitous violence, featuring everything that has become synonymous with the genre. The film was a hit, making $25 million at the box office against a $200,000 budget. 1981 also saw the release of Absurd (Joe D'Amato's follow-up to 1980's Antropophagus) and Jesus Franco's German slasher Bloody Moon.\n\nThin plots allowed cheap budgets. Final Exam marked a point where redundancy was becoming commonplace, as it copied Halloween in numerous ways, from a motiveless killer hiding under the window of the final girl, to the similar sounding synthesizer soundtrack. Thanksgiving-set Home Sweet Home relied on little-to-no plot, only featuring a PCP-fueled psychopath on a killing spree at a family dinner. Also released was backwoods slasher Scream. Among other oddities of 1981 was Christian morality tale A Day of Judgement and Romano Scavolini's \"video nasty\" Nightmare in a Damaged Brain. Strangest was Don't Go in the Woods... Alone!, a film that embraced its inept plot, cheap gore effects, and grating score.\n\nThe slasher film began to use fantasy and other supernatural elements, leading to A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). GhostKeeper, based on the Native American legend of the Wendigo, was Canada's answer to Stanley Kubrick's The Shining (1980). Despite its relative obscurity, the film has enjoyed a healthy resurgence in later years, as fans have found its emphasis on atmosphere to be refreshing. Evilspeak involved a social outcast using his computer to summon demons and cast spells on his tormenters.\n\n1981 also saw the start of slasher film sequels. Steve Miner's Friday the 13th Part 2 is perhaps the quintessential 80's slasher movie: fast-paced, gory, and fun. Despite being heavily trimmed by order of the MPAA, the film was a huge success. Even more successful was Halloween II. While John Carpenter and Debra Hill were reluctant to return to the genre they launched, they agreed to write the screenplay. Aware that the horror landscape had changed since the release of the first film, they added more gore and a higher body count, showing how Friday the 13th had equally affected the subgenre. This Universal Pictures film premiered on October 30, 1981 and had a final domestic take of over $25 million, making it the second highest-grossing horror film of 1981, behind An American Werewolf in London (1981).\n\n1982\n\nThe slasher craze had peaked, and 1982 marked the beginning of its descent into straight-to-video production, the main method of release from the mid-1980s onward.\n\nSlasher film budgets dropped drastically. One of 1982's first slasher films was Madman, which made the top 10 Variety list the week of its New York city release and did especially well on home video. Death Valley was picked up and distributed nationwide by Universal Pictures. Death Screams focused largely on small town teenage drama rather than slasher deaths to keep costs to a minimum. Other low-budget films included The Dorm That Dripped Blood, made for just $90,000, and Honeymoon Horror, made for a minuscule $50,000. Like Madman, both films found a strong audience on home video, and became successful sellers in the early days of VHS.\n\nOther independent productions were not as fortunate and had trouble finding distribution. Girls Nite Out had a very limited release in 1982 through Aries International, but was re-released in 1984 to more theaters, before achieving modest success on home video. Paul Lynch's Humongous was released through AVCO Embassy Pictures, but a change in management at the company severely limited the film's theatrical release. Cheap shockers like Dark Sanity, The Forest, Unhinged, Trick or Treats, and Island of Blood quickly fell into obscurity, barely getting theatrical releases and receiving only sub-par video transfers.\n\nFilmmakers attempted to make slashers that poked fun at the conventions and controversy surrounding them. Alone in the Dark, starring veteran actors Donald Pleasence, Martin Landau, and Jack Palance, acts as a self-aware parody employing jokes without becoming farce. In The Last Horror Film, Joe Spinell reunited with his Maniac (1980) co-star Caroline Munro in a gory commentary on the nature of horror films and the audience they attract. Feminists Amy Holden Jones and Rita Mae Brown acted as director and writer respectively on another parody of the genre, The Slumber Party Massacre. Despite featuring exploitative violence against men, feminists did not get the joke their colleagues Jones and Brown were playing and criticized the film.\n\nThe success of Halloween II (1981) flowed into more hospital-set slashers. Among them was Visiting Hours, controversial for pitting liberal feminism against macho right-wing bigotry, a battle that was actually happening in America at the time. Also utilizing the setting was Hospital Massacre, in which Playboy Bunny Barbi Benton and gory hospital-themed set-pieces were the main draws. Australia's Next of Kin opted to use a retirement home. Like Visiting Hours, slashers attempted to take on political issues throughout the early 80s. William Asher's Night Warning is an atypical take on the genre that tackles subjects such as incest and homophobia in subtle yet effective ways while alluding to classic literature, borrowing from Sophocles tragedy Oedipus Rex. Goofy fun carried into Friday the 13th Part III, which became a landmark of the genre. The film marks the first time that the horror genre saw a full franchise, not just one sequel. An enormous financial success, grossing over $36 million, $14 million more than its predecessor, guaranteed more films in the series to follow. In its opening weekend alone, it earned a record-setting $9 million, being the first film of the summer to unseat E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial (1982) as box office champ. Most importantly, the film is the first in which Jason Voorhees donned his iconic hockey mask, an image that would not only come to represent the franchise but the entire horror genre as well. The exploitation film Pieces, starring Lynda Day George and Christopher George is a film making mash up. It was a Puerto Rican production, filmed in Boston and Madrid, by an Italian-based American producer, and a Spanish director with tons of gore, bad acting, memorable dialogue, and disco music. Italian giallos also continued to see output in 1982, with releases like Lucio Fulci's The New York Ripper and Dario Argento's Tenebrae. \n\nHollywood continued its output of slashers, although new approaches moved in different directions. The Seduction mixed erotic thrills, selling itself as a thriller rather than a horror film. It was a surprise hit, generating $11 million in its run and predating blockbusters like Fatal Attraction (1987) and Basic Instinct (1992). Deadly Games, about a journalist who returns home after the mysterious death of her sister, saw slasher elements inserted into an otherwise routine thriller purely because the film's backers assumed audiences wanted them. Silent Rage stars Chuck Norris, showcasing his talent for martial arts.\n\nSupernatural and fantasy continued to be themes in slasher movies. The Slayer surely influenced Wes Craven's film by finding a woman dreaming of a boogeyman as her friends disappear, blurring the lines between the dream world and reality. Demons appeared in The Incubus, based on Ray Russell's novel about an evil creature raping and murdering women in a small town, while supernatural themes were also the driving force behind Blood Song and Don't Go To Sleep . The haunted house opus Superstition takes a formula established by The Amityville Horror (1979) and adds a body-count with gory deaths. The Halloween franchise had also ventured into the supernatural with the release of Halloween III: Season of the Witch, a stark departure from the stalk-and-slash plots of the first two films. \n\n1983\n\nBy 1983, the Golden Age of Slasher Films was fast coming to an end. What had once been cutting-edge entertainment was now old-fashioned. Still, the low-budgets, and potentially high profits, meant that there were filmmakers willing to risk new enterprises, or simply to release slasher films that had been sitting, unseen, on the shelf for several years.\n\nClassic plots and settings continued to appear in 1983. Mark Rosman's The House on Sorority Row has a similar plot to Prom Night (1980) and Terror Train (1980), where teen protagonists accidentally commit a crime and try to cover it up, only to have a witness seek vengeance. Lamberto Bava's A Blade in the Dark follows a composer who has to figure out the identity of a killer who is stalking victims at the Tuscany villa he is staying at. The Final Terror, a backwoods slasher in the vein of The Burning (1981), sees park rangers terrorized by a forest-dwelling woman. Co-eds were, as always, nubile prey. The TV thriller Deadly Lessons finds a group of school girls terrorized by a killer at a private school. Slashers continued to take on political issues, as seen in Sweet Sixteen, where a rash of crimes are blamed on local Native Americans, highlighting racism and prejudice in the American Southwest. \n\nThe most successful slasher of 1983 was Psycho II, an ambitious attempt at following Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. Reuniting original cast members Anthony Perkins and Vera Miles, the film continued the legacy of the tormented Norman Bates, who may or may not be behind a new series of slayings. His victims now include pot-smoking teenagers rather than the adult characters of the original. It scored $34.7 million at the box office, a success that led to the production of two more sequels; Psycho III (1986) and the TV movie Psycho IV: The Beginning (1990).\n\nCanada continued its output of slasher films, most notably Curtains, produced by Peter Simpson, who was behind Prom Night and Humongous (1982) and the low-budget thriller American Nightmare which follows a man as he delves into the seedy urban underground of prostitutes, drug addicts, and pornography addicts.\n\nThe genre's eventual transition from theatrical releases to home video began in 1983, with the release of Sledgehammer, the first slasher made directly for home video. Produced for just $40,000, Sledgehammer features a climax with a gender reversal, as former Playgirl model Ted Prior takes off his shirt to fight the killer for no other reason than to reveal his six-pack abdomen. 1983 had a few sexualized home-video slashers, including Blood Beat, about a woman who conjures up a seven-foot-tall samurai serial killer while masturbating, and Double Exposure, where female nudity is on display as a photographer Michael Callan, (who also produces) dreams of murdering models and is shocked to discover that they are really dying. Prolific B-movie director Fred Olen Ray released Scalps, which became one of the most censored films in history, largely due to its graphic rape scene where the spirit possesses one of the student's and proceeds to rape his girlfriend and then scalp her.\n\nPerhaps the best remembered slasher of 1983 is Robert Hiltzik's Sleepaway Camp, a Friday the 13th-clone featuring victims who appear barely pubescent and also featuring a mix of themes, including paedophilia and transvestism, as well as homosexual scenes, which were taboo at the time. A cult classic, Sleepaway Camp launched a series.\n\nSome releases attempted to distance themselves from the genre, despite being plotted after slasher films. Mortuary featured a poster in which a hand is bursting from the grave, an image that has nothing to do with the film itself. This indicates that distributors were aware of the fading box office attraction of the slasher, and were attempting to hoodwink audiences into thinking they were seeing something else entirely. J. Lee Thompson, director of Happy Birthday to Me (1981), returned to the genre to with 10 to Midnight starring Charles Bronson, inspired by the real-life crimes of Richard Speck. The film promoted Bronson's justice-for-all character above any slasher elements, as Bronson's career had become defined by vigilante films such as Death Wish (1974) and its sequels.\n\n1984\n\nBy 1984, the public had largely lost interest in theatrically released slashers. Production of slashers plummeted, and a whiff of desperation surrounded the few new releases. Major studios all but abandoned the genre that, only a few years earlier, had been very profitable. Although it was rare to see slasher films on the big screen in 1984, reissues and new video productions brought the genre to a whole new generation.\n\nMany films had very brief theatrical runs in 1984 but would find varying degrees of success on home video. These include campus-themed Splatter University, supernatural-themed Satan's Blade, the micro-budgeted Blood Theatre, rock n' roll slasher Rocktober Blood, and athletes-in-peril slasher Fatal Games. The Prey and Evil Judgement were filmed years earlier and finally had small theatrical releases. Riding on the success of Friday the 13th Part III (1982) and its use of 3D was Silent Madness, which used the effect in an attempt to lure an audience for its short theatrical run; the 3D effects did not translate to its VHS release. Deadly Intruder was another TV slasher, but was not as successful as the small-screen runs of films like Halloween (1978) and Friday the 13th (1980). 1984 also saw the release of the Lucio Fulci dance academy giallo, Murder Rock. \n\nAlthough the box office returns of Friday the 13th Part III were extremely impressive, the filmmakers behind Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter decided it was time to bring the saga of Jason Voorhees to a close, using his demise as the main marketing tool for the film. Directed by Joseph Zito, the film was darker and more brutal than the three previous entries, and featured more graphic gore and death scenes. When The Final Chapter scored a massive $32 million at the box office, it was clear that the series would not end, however the death of Jason also meant the death of an era that he represented: the Golden Age of Slasher Films.\n\nThe real death of the Golden Age came with the controversy and box office failure of Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984). Protesters picketed theaters playing the film with placards reading, \"Deck the hall with holly -- not bodies!\" Despite earlier releases portraying a psychopath in a Santa suit, including the same year's Don't Open till Christmas, the promotional material for Silent Night, Deadly Night featured a killer Santa swinging an ax with the tagline: \"He Knows when you've been naughty!\" Released in November 1984, on the same day as A Nightmare on Elm Street, distributor TriStar Pictures found that not all publicity is good, as persistent carol-singing parents forced one Bronx cinema to pull the film a week into its run. Soon after, widespread outrage from the press led to the film being pulled from other cinemas across the country. The film was a box office bomb, making only $2.5 million for its entire run, as opposed to the enormous success of the more inventive horror fantasy, A Nightmare on Elm Street, signaling that audiences were ready for something a little more spectacular than low-budget horror.\n\nA Nightmare on Elm Street\n\nWhile interest in the slasher waned, Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street revitalized the genre, although its mix of fantasy and horror weeded out low-budget films that dominated the Golden Age. Craven had toyed with the genre before in Deadly Blessing (1981), however he was frustrated that the genre he had arguably helped create with The Last House on the Left (1972) and The Hills Have Eyes (1977) had not benefited him financially. Having worked on developing what would become A Nightmare on Elm Street since 1981, Craven knew that time was running out due to declining revenues from theatrical horror releases, and the slasher subgenre in particular looked to be all but dead within a year. He had little idea that his soon-to-be-iconic villain, Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund), would capture the imagination of audiences worldwide and shape a decade of horror films.\n\nA Nightmare on Elm Street, and especially Freddy, became a cultural phenomenon. On a budget of just $1.8 million the film grossed $25.5 million and launched one of the most successful film franchises in cinematic history. It also helped establish its studio, New Line Cinema, as a powerhouse in Hollywood; to this day, it is referred to as \"The House That Freddy Built.\" As well as launching Freddy and Craven, the movie also featured considerable talent from its well-versed leads, including a young Johnny Depp. Other films quickly attempted to cash in on its success, including The Initiation (1984), which also had a subplot of dreams and a horribly burned man.\n\nThe success of A Nightmare on Elm Street ended the low-budget phenomenon of the Golden Age, ushering in a new wave of horror films that relied heavily on special effects and strong acting, almost systematically silencing the simpler low-budget features that were modeled after John Carpenter's Halloween.\n\nVideo nasties\n\nVideo Nasty was a British tabloid term coined in the early 1980s to describe violent exploitation films. This category included some slasher films, including The Burning (1981), Bloody Moon (1981), Don't Go in the House (1980), and The Dorm That Dripped Blood (1982). During the early 1980s, the British market was flooded with uncensored films, publicly available due to a temporary loophole in the laws governing home video. These films created a moral panic, sensationalized by newspaper headlines as well as campaigning politicians and religious groups.\n\nVideo nasties were placed on the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) list, created after the Obscene Publications Act first appeared in 1983. The films on the list were subject to seizure by police, and, in the end, a total of 39 films were banned from Britain by law. The Video Recordings Act of 1984 was hurriedly assembled, ensuring that all video releases in Britain would be previewed and censored by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC). The hysteria resulted in many slasher films, even those not included on the DPP list, to be cut or to have their video release delayed.\n\nIn recent years, Britain has taken a more relaxed attitude toward film censorship, and some \"video nasties\" have received uncut releases on DVD.\n\nDecline\n\nBy 1985 audience fatigue had hit the slasher film and its popularity had declined substantially but not died out completely. The home video revolution, fueled by the popularity of VHS, provided new outlets for low-budget filmmaking. With the exception of a few franchises and mainstream thrillers, the slasher film was condemned to straight-to-video production. Without the backing of major studios or their willingness to pick up independent features for theatrical release, slasher films relied heavily on the home video, which brought new life to all genres and, with the exception pornography, horror was arguably the most popular. Although financial returns were down, there was still potential to turn a profit, especially on the new cheaper medium of video.\n\nA few holdover titles produced during the Golden Age were released during the genre's decline, largely due to the success of the home video market providing an outlet that the films' producers felt would generate money. Too Scared to Scream (1985) was originally filmed in 1982 but finally found distribution from Vestron Video. The Mutilator (1985) was filmed in the early 1980s, only to be released on video by Ocean King Releasing in the mid-80s. William Fruet's follow-up to Funeral Home (1980), Killer Party (1986), suffered major production problems; it was filmed partially in 1978 and not completed until 1984, then not released until 1986 when it received limited distribution from MGM. The campy Mountaintop Motel Massacre (1986) was filmed in 1983 and picked up for distribution from New World Pictures years later.\n\nMirroring the punk rock movement of the time, some novice filmmakers felt anyone could make a slasher movie. The results included Blood Cult (1985), which was wrongly advertised as being the first shot-on-video slasher. Another film that tried to make the \"first shot-on-video\" claim was The Ripper (1985). Other films that made their way directly to video stores included: Spine (1986), Truth or Dare? (1986), Killer Workout (1987), and Death Spa (1989), among dozens of others.\n\nThe mid-1980s also saw a fresh wave of sequels, with filmmakers opting to exploit already established titles rather than test new ideas. Wes Craven directed The Hills Have Eyes Part 2 (1985) for a paycheck, although he has repeatedly disowned the film. The Friday the 13th series continued with Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985), which attempted to revive the franchise that was supposed to have ended with Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter in 1984. While the film was profitable for distributor Paramount Pictures, it did not achieve the commercial success of earlier films in the series and fans reacted poorly to it, leading producers to re-think the entire direction of the series' overarching storyline. After A Nightmare on Elm Street became a sleeper hit, A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge (1985) was rushed into production. Freddy's Revenge distinguishes itself from other slasher films by having a male protagonist (Mark Patton) as well as overtly homoerotic undertones. However, it was widely criticized for losing much of the dream logic that had made the first film so interesting. Despite criticisms, the movie was a financial success, being the highest grossing horror film of that year and making more than Friday the 13th: A New Beginning or even the original A Nightmare on Elm Street. It also marked the point when fantasy slasher films became something that filmmakers saw potential profit in; Dreamaniac (1986), Bad Dreams (1988), Deadly Dreams (1988), and Dream Demon (1988) are just a handful of movies that attempted to capitalize on the supernatural fantasy horror trend.\n\nFred Walton's April Fool's Day was a parody of the slasher film, spoofing Agatha Christie's Ten Little Indians and many of the clichés in the subgenre. The film was a modest hit for Paramount, although it was not the start of a franchise as the studio had hoped. Also spoofing the genre was Evil Laugh (1986), released a full decade before the meta-humored Scream (1996), featuring characters who make self-referential remarks about surviving horror movies. Tobe Hooper's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) emphasized laughs over scares, but only brought in a meager sum of $8 million at the box office, showing that a franchise made famous on the terrifying reputation of the 1974 original didn't translate into slapstick comedy. The most popular among 1980s self-aware slasher comedy films was Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives, which took a more ironic approach to the fledgling franchise. Inspired by Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, the roles of the monster and Dr. Frankenstein were placed upon Jason Voorhees and Tommy Jarvis, and worked as both a straightforward sequel and a postmodern spin on the genre its predecessor helped define. It even featured a nod to the James Bond movies that, like the Friday the 13th films, had delved into ridiculous plots to keep afloat. Perhaps the wittiest part of the film is when one character breaks the fourth-wall and says to the audience, \"Some folks have a strange idea of entertainment,\" which not only calls out the filmmakers but the audience as well.\n\nOriginal Elm Street stars Heather Langenkamp and John Saxon returned for A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987), which brought in then-record breaking box office numbers of $44.8 million domestically. The following year, Renny Harlin's A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (1988) traded scares for laughs and catered to the MTV generation with a hip soundtrack and cross-promotion. The film was even more successful than Dream Warriors, bringing in nearly $50 million at the domestic box office and remaining the highest grossing slasher until the release of Scream eight years later. Acknowledging the monstrous success of the Elm Street franchise, Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood (1988) took its series into a supernatural, special-effects laden story with Stephen King's Carrie as its main inspiration. However, the film continued a decline of the Friday the 13th franchise's box office earnings, and, unlike the positively received Jason Lives, it received little critical acclaim. Marking the 10-year anniversary of John Carpenter's original Halloween (1978) was Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988), which was bolstered by the return of Donald Pleasence and released around the Halloween holiday. The film proved that audiences still had an interest in classic slasher films not reliant on special effects, as it was number one at the box office for two weeks in a row.\n\nVillains like Jason, Freddy, and Michael were challenged by a smaller competitor in Child's Play (1988), the first film to feature evil doll Chucky. Taking its lead from films such as Dead of Night (1945) and Trilogy of Terror (1975), Child's Play employs a clever mystery about a boy who claims that his new toy is responsible for a series of murders. Proving that audiences responded positively to well-made, fresh ideas, the film was a box office hit, grossing $33.2 million and spawning its own successful franchise, as well as the inevitable knock-offs. Child's Play 2 (1990) showed that good will toward the first continued, as it brought in nearly $30 million domestically, however series fatigue hit hard with the release of Child's Play 3 (1991), a film that managed to fail both critically and commercially.\n\nAs interest in the slasher film shrank in the United States, the same cannot be said for its international fan base. In Mexico, director Ruben Galindo Jr., released three slasher films in the late 1980s: Zombie Apocalypse (1985), Don't Panic (1988), and Grave Robbers (1990). Another Mexican release, Hell's Trap (1990), harkened back to films like The Prowler (1981) where teens are stalked by an ex-soldier. In Sweden, Blood Tracks (1985) recalled The Hills Have Eyes. The United Kingdom had the killer-priest opus Lucifer (1987), and Australia saw the release of Symphony of Evil (1987), Houseboat Horror (1989), and Bloodmoon (1990), although they were met with mixed results. Despite the popularity of American slasher films in Japan, the country only had one notable release in the late 1980s: Evil Dead Trap (1988). In Italy, the production of gialli decreased significantly from the heyday of the early 1970s, although the films would reappear with Dario Argento, Lamberto Bava, and Ruggero Deodato occasionally returning to the subgenre. Michele Soavi's giallo-slasher hybrid StageFright (1987) is often cited as the best film to come out of Italy's late 1980's horror wave. The movie's straightforward plot mirrored American slashers like Halloween, however its stylishness and operatic music would emulate Italian giallo. Deodato's backwoods slasher BodyCount (1987), on the other hand, ignored the Italian trademark style in a vein attempt to mimic American slashers like Friday the 13th (1980). In Spain, the surrealist Anguish (1987) echoed Italian horror films like Lamberto Bava's Demons (1985) by setting up two stories - one centered on the film-within-a-film, and the other being about the audience watching that film.\n\nThe final year of the 1980s would put the nail in the coffin of the slasher. Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989) was a box office failure, and provided Paramount Pictures with enough reason to sell the franchise rights to New Line Cinema in 1990. New Line's own A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child (1989) was unsuccessful, bringing it less than half of what the previous two films had made at the box office. Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers (1989) fared worst of all. It had been hurried into production after the surprise success of The Return of Michael Myers, but was panned by fans and critics alike, barely making $11 million at the box office and never receiving a theatrical release in Europe. With the three major slasher franchises all failing to generate much interest, the whole genre had fallen out of favor by the end of the 1980s, a decade that it had become synonymous with.\n\nBecause of the box office failures of 1989, the early 1990s produced few slasher films. In Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991), audiences found the once-terrifying Freddy Krueger needing the marketing draw of using 3D in the last 10 minutes of the film. While it was a commercial success, the film put an end to the once mighty franchise. After New Line Cinema acquired the rights to the Friday the 13th franchise, with an eye on the inevitable blockbuster Freddy vs. Jason in the making, it attempted to breathe new life into the story with Jason Goes to Hell (1993). The results were mixed, as the film was decidedly different than what fans had come to expect from the famous franchise. It had a mediocre box office intake, proving that the moviegoing audiences were still not interested in a return of the series. Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995) was famously troubled. Picking up six years after the events of The Revenge of Michael Myers, the film was one of the first distributed by Bob Weinstein's Dimension Films. Sections of the film were hurriedly re-shot after poor test screenings, yet it remains notable as being the last screen appearance of Donald Pleasence, who died during filming. The Curse of Michael Myers was also a mediocre success, drawing in $15 million and signaling that like the Elm Street and Friday the 13th franchises, the Halloween franchise was in desperate need of a revival.\n\nScream and revival\n\nBernard Rose's Candyman (1992), based on the short story by Clive Barker, saw its eponymous villain (Tony Todd), become the first black slasher film icon. The ghostly \"Candyman\" appears to kill those foolish enough to say his name in the mirror five times, borrowing from the Bloody Mary urban legend. The movie anticipated films that would take common folklore as their hook, notably Urban Legend (1998). The film's $25.8 million box office earnings were enough to generate two sequels, as well as arguably providing the impetus for revival of the slashers several years later in New Nightmare (1994) and Scream (1996).\n\nUnexpectedly, Wes Craven, who had retooled the slasher in 1984 with A Nightmare on Elm Street, returned for New Nightmare (1994), a spin-off of that franchise. With the concept of a spin-off from the Freddy Krueger films, Craven utilized characters from the Elm Street films, including Heather Langenkamp, John Saxon, Robert Englund, Johnny Depp and even himself, to play versions of their true personas targeted by a demon that had taken the form of the Freddy Krueger character. The film single-handedly led to the subgenre's postmodern revival in the coming years with the release of Craven's Scream. While New Nightmare was a meager success at the box office, it would help establish the meta self-referential irony that dominated the genre for the next decade.\n\nBy 1996, the slasher film was pretty much a fad of the 1980s that had not translated to the 1990s. The subgenre's surprising resurrection with Scream was proof that the slasher film, like many of its iconic villains, refused to stay dead. A box office smash at the tail end of 1996, Scream skillfully juggled the postmodern humor found in Quentin Tarantino's landmark film Pulp Fiction (1994) with visceral horror. The film played on nostalgia for those who had frequented theaters during the slasher's Golden Age, yet also appealed to a younger audience who saw their contemporary stars menaced and terrorized by homicidal maniacs for the first time. In a decade where pop culture was cannibalizing itself, Scream exploited this and worked as a straightforward slasher whodunit.\n\nScream was the brainchild of screenwriter Kevin Williamson, a self-confessed fan of slasher films including Halloween (1978). Prom Night (1980), and Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives (1986). Originally titled Scary Movie, the twist in Scream is that the victims are well versed in horror film lore and know all the clichés, comparing scenes for their favorite movies to a series of murders in their small town. The fact that the audience was also aware of those clichés added to the fun and helped propel the film to a gross of over $103 million, making it the first slasher film to cross $100 million at the domestic box office as well as being the most successful horror film since The Silence of the Lambs (1991). As the attraction of slasher films had been exhausted by 1996, Scream{'}s advertising distanced itself from the subgenre; posters for the film announced Scream as a \"new thriller\" from Craven, and played up the celebrity of star Drew Barrymore as well as other recognizable cast members from hit TV shows and films, a casting decision that differed from the unknown actors used in low-budget slashers of the early 1980s.\n\nThe stellar box-office of Williamson's follow-up I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997) silenced naysayers who assumed that Scream was a flash in the pan. Based loosely on the Lois Duncan novel, four teens find themselves targets of a killer after they cover up a hit-and-run. The film acknowledges the setup of films such as Prom Night and The House on Sorority Row (1983), where an accident is the catalyst for later mayhem. Despite the success of Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer played as a straight slasher film with little pop-culture trickery. Unlike the positive critical response that Scream received, I Know What You Did Last Summer was reviewed negatively, but proved to be \"critic proof\" as it grossed over $70 million at the domestic box office.\n\nFollowing in the success of the slasher revival was Urban Legend (1998), a thriller that uses the premise that a killer is targeting co-eds using methods described in American folklore. The film was widely criticized as being silly, earned only $38 million at the box office, and showed that the slasher film revival was losing momentum. The next year Canada, which had produced its fair share of slashers in the Golden Age, attempted a comeback with The Clown at Midnight (1999), but the film received little attention and was widely panned. Valentine (2001) brought to mind My Bloody Valentine (1981) and Hospital Massacre (1982), however despite starring Denise Richards and Katherine Heigl, it was a box office bomb, making just $20 million, not enough to cover its own production budget.\n\nScream and I Know What You Did Last Summer found popularity not only in America, but across the world, although their international success was not as immediate. Hong Kong's The Deadly Camp (1999) took inspiration from backwoods slashers of the 1980s, while South Korea had a string of prolific slasher film hits, starting with Bloody Beach (2000), The Record (2001), and Nightmare (2000), the latter mixing the slasher film with the supernatural chills of Japanese ghost films such as Ringu (1998). Australia's postmodern slasher film Cut (2000) cast Molly Ringwald, a 1980s icon from John Hughes films, as its heroine. India's Bollywood produced the first ever musical-slasher hybrid with Kucch To Hai (2003) as well as the more straightforward Dhund: The Fog (2003). Britain also had a release with Lighthouse (1999), and the Netherlands produced teen slashers School's Out (1999) and The Pool (2001).\n\nReturn of the sequel\n\nAfter the success of the first few Halloween and Friday the 13th films in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the slasher movie was built around setting up a familiar pattern, with sequels being made of the most successful films. Scream 2 (1997) followed just a year after the release of Scream, and scored big at the box office. The film had the highest grossing opening weekend of any R-rated film at the time, and brought in over $101 million at the domestic box office. Reuniting much of the surviving cast of the original, as well as bringing back creators Williamson and Craven, Scream 2 successfully combined straight scares with postmodern quips about the nature of sequels. Scream 2 took the campus slashers of the early 1980s, such as Final Exam (1981) and Graduation Day (1981), as inspiration. Along with its stellar box office, the sequel was also a critical hit. Scream 3 (2000) finished the trilogy with a distinct case of diminishing returns. In another self-referencing manner, murders are plaguing a Hollywood movie set. The film marked the first entry in the Scream series not written by Williamson, and was also the first film in the franchise not to break $100 million at the box office, however it did bring in $89 million and was a financial success. Released one year after its predecessor, I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (1998) was hated by critics and fans alike, yet was still a modest success with $40 million at the domestic box office. Profits continued to shrink with Urban Legends: Final Cut (2000), in which film students are attacked by a killer in a fencing mask - another postmodern reference to Graduation Day. The film starred Hart Bochner from Terror Train (1981), and made a meager profit of $21 million. Both the I Know What You Did Last Summer and Urban Legend franchises would find life in the direct-to-video market in later years.\n\nMichael Myers returned in Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998), spurred by the success of Scream and Scream 2. Steve Miner, who directed Friday the 13th Part 2 and Friday the 13th Part III, directed the film from a story by Williamson. It was a direct sequel of Halloween II, ignoring all the sequels between, to the annoyance of many fans. This allowed final girl Laurie Strode, once again played by Jamie Lee Curtis, to take on Myers. Despite John Carpenter's refusal to return, the film was a sizable hit, bringing in over $55 million at the box office and receiving some positive reviews. Curtis would return for a cameo in the sequel, Halloween: Resurrection (2002), which was inspired by the reality TV craze, as cameras placed around the infamous childhood home of Myers capture the killer's murderous deeds. It starred rapper Busta Rhymes and supermodel Tyra Banks, hoping to attract the black demographic. While not being the hit that Halloween H20 was, Resurrection still earned a respectable $30.3 million at the domestic box office, even if it was met with scathing reviews by critics and fans.\n\nChucky also made a comeback in the dark comedy Bride of Chucky (1998), featuring Jennifer Tilly as the titular bride with supporting roles by Brad Dourif, John Ritter, and Katherine Heigl. The film mixes genuine scares from the original Child's Play with the self-referencing humor of films such as Scream and was a hit, scoring a respectable $33 million at the domestic box office, enough to warrant Seed of Chucky (2004). Seed, directed by series creator Don Mancini, was a straight comedy with little emphasis on scares Compared to its predecessor its lack of success at the box office success was such the franchise was put on hold for nearly a decade.\n\nJason X (2002) did little to bolster the slasher film revival's fleeting appeal. Marked as the tenth film in the Friday the 13th franchise, the movie propelled Jason Voorhees (Kane Hodder) into the distant future where he kills teens aboard a spaceship. The film was a box office bomb, bringing in just $13 million, making it the lowest grossing film of the franchise. However, the following year's Freddy vs. Jason (2003) would prove to be a totally different case. An idea around since 1986, the battle of Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees came to fruition under director Ronny Yu, who had directed Bride of Chucky. The film featured Freddy (Robert Englund) and Jason (Ken Kirzinger) battling each other with an unlucky group of teens caught in the crossfire. As Scream had done, the film played off nostalgia as well as interest from new fans. The movie scored a massive $82.6 million at the domestic box office, however it was unable to regenerate the slasher genre, and instead acted as a send-off to the second slasher revival with its wink to the Golden Age.\n\nRemakes, reboots, and throwbacks\n\nBy 2002, the slasher film had all-but disappeared from mainstream Hollywood cinema, largely due to budgetary declines and more popular, diverse subject matter. Make a Wish (2002) distinguished itself as the first lesbian-centered slasher film. Because the genre typically aimed to lure men with the promise of female nudity, horror and homosexuality appeared to have no connection, however the genre's queer fan base is possibly its largest. Whereas it once steeped in allegory, Make a Wish was one of a number of horror films that emerged primarily for the gay audience in the early 2000s. It was followed by HellBent (2004), the first gay slasher film that features the famous West Hollywood Halloween Parade as the setting. There was even a gay porn version of Scream called Moan (1999). Slasher films were also being made primarily for black audiences, with all-black casts, including: Killjoy (2000), Holla If I Kill You (2003), Holla (2006), and Somebody Help Me (2007).\n\nAlthough the slasher film had seemingly died by 2002, it was once again jumpstarted by the success of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003), a loose remake of Tobe Hooper's 1974 The Texas Chain Saw Massacre Produced by Michael Bay and starring recognizable stars including Jessica Biel and R. Lee Ermey, the new Texas Chainsaw Massacre was a surprise sleeper hit, grossing over $100 million and signaling a significant change from the days of franchise sequels of the 80s and self-aware 90s slasher films. It was the success of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake that launched a string for remakes, reboots, and re-imaginings of classic horror that attempted to lure audiences in through familiarity. Like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake, these films added more slasher movie trappings to the retelling of the original film and only brought back key ingredients of their original counterparts, such as the lead villain being prominently featured or, in some cases, just the title and very basic premise. The margin of profit behind producing relatively inexpensive remakes that already had a built-in audience ensured that the trend would be long-lasting. As with most remakes, including Psycho (1998), these films diluted the original's more controversial aspects for maximum commercial appeal. The success of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre reboot was followed by a prequel, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning (2006) starring Matt Bomer and Jordana Brewster. Although the prequel didn't match the remake's financial success, it managed to make a respectable $39.5 million at the domestic box office.\n\nAmong the early films to ride on the success of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake was House of Wax (2005), a film marketed as a remake of House of Wax (1953), itself a remake of Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933), although it shares little in common with either of those earlier films. Typical of the remake trend, the film was more a re-imagining loosely based on the original's core premise, as the House of Wax remake shared more similarities with other films, such as Tourist Trap (1979). The film cast then-bankable upcoming television stars Chad Michael Murray, Jared Padalecki, Elisha Cuthbert, and Paris Hilton, and was marketed largely on showcasing Hilton's demise. Despite the recognizable faces and the promise for gruesome mayhem, House of Wax failed to generate as much buzz as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, bringing in only $32 million. Glen Morgan, the writer-producer behind Final Destination (2000), was tasked with writing and directing Black Christmas (2006), a remake of Bob Clark's influential 1974 film. Morgan changed the story into a black comedy, focusing on over-the-top gore more than the Gothic imagery and suspense of the original. The Black Christmas remake didn't connected with audiences, bringing in an unexceptional $16.2 million at the box office.\n\nOne of the most financially successful remakes was When a Stranger Calls (2006). Expanding the original film's first twenty minutes into a 90-minute feature that relied solely on the tale of the babysitter and the man upstairs, the film was a hit with younger audiences who could see it due to its PG-13 rating, bringing in a total of nearly $50 million at the box office. This was not the first, or the last, slasher film that attempted to capitalize on the PG-13 rating to lure the younger audience. In 2005 two PG-13 slashers were released, although neither were particularly successful critically or commercially. Cry_Wolf (2005), starring Jon Bon Jovi and Lindy Booth, arguably did not have the studio-backed marketing push to become as big a hit as When a Stranger Calls, but The Fog, a remake of John Carpenter's 1980 film, hailed from Sony Pictures and used the popularity of its TV stars Tom Welling and Maggie Grace to promote it. Both films, especially The Fog, were critical failures, as The Fog currently holds an embarrassing 4% on the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes. Following the success of When a Stranger Calls, the PG-13 slasher remake craze continued with Prom Night (2008), which was similar to the 1980 original only in title alone. It boasted a higher body count and was a more straightforward slasher film than When a Stranger Calls, yet its PG-13 restrictions led to negative reception from fans who did not find it gruesome enough to be a slasher. Still, it was a hit, pulling in nearly $44 million at the box office.\n\nOn the opposite end of the spectrum, several remakes exploited their original counterpart's notoriety, pushing ultra violence. Rob Zombie's Halloween (2007) took the simplicity of John Carpenter's 1978 film and added an extreme vision that, according to critics, systematically replaced everything that made the first film a success. Despite these criticisms, Zombie's remake was a financial success, pulling in $58 million and warranting a sequel. Halloween II (2009) featured more of the same ultra violence only now with surreal imagery. The negative reaction to the 2007 remake carried over to its sequel, as the film made less than half of what its predecessor made at the box office. In contrast, Alexandre Aja used modernized violence to enhance The Hills Have Eyes (2006), an update of Wes Craven's 1977 film. It followed the original's premise closely, adding a few sequences of violence and assault that would not have passed censors in the 1970s. The film was a hit, generating more than $44 million at the box office and getting its own sequel the following year. The Hills Have Eyes II (2007), much like Halloween II, was less fortunate than its predecessor, being a box office disappointment. The sequel upped the violence, gore, and sexual assault, yet was met with harsh reaction from fans who found its gratuitous violence to be too over-the-top, to the point of absurdity.\n\nThe remake craze stretched into 2009, when several updates were released, with varying degrees of success. From Lionsgate, the company responsible for the Saw franchise, came My Bloody Valentine (2009), a remake of the 1981 cult classic. The movie did not stick close to the original in terms of plot, but it had plenty of homages to it. To add to the roller-coaster, carnival feel of the film, it has impressive special 3D effects. The movie also generated enough interested to secure a re-release of the original film on DVD, this time completely uncut. The film made over $100 million. A month after the release of My Bloody Valentine came Friday the 13th (2009), made by the same team behind The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake. A reboot of the first three films of the franchise, this remake exploited the slasher film's fame for gruesome death scenes, oblivious partying, and gratuitous sex, all with a self-aware wink. The film was another successful remake, earning over $90 million at the box office. However, the reboot of Friday the 13th was poorly received by critics and fans who complained it brought nothing new or fresh to the franchise, arguably defeating the point of a reboot in the first place.\n\nWhile a slew of slasher remakes were hugely profitable, the remake craze declined in the late 2000s. On top of the disappointment of potential \"franchise-fuelers\" such as The Hills Have Eyes II and Halloween II, the Terror Train remake, Train (2008), failed to generate enough interest to obtain a theatrical release. The film was poorly received, owing more to Hostel than the 1980 original. Sorority Row (2009) is a loose remake of The House on Sorority Row (1983) and featured rising stars Audrina Patridge, Rumer Willis, and Jamie Chung, but made only $12 million at the domestic box office. April Fool's Day (2008) played it straighter than the 1986 horror-comedy, but received complaints from fans of the original film who criticized its lack of creativity and bad acting. The low-budget holiday-themed slasher films Silent Night (2012) and Silent Night, Bloody Night: The Homecoming (2013), remakes of Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984) and Silent Night, Bloody Night (1972), respectively, fared just as badly, generating little-to-no interest. The once high-profile Mothers Day (2010), directed by Darren Lynn Bousman of the Saw franchise, starring Rebecca De Mornay, changed the plot line of the 1980 Troma film, but production delays and distribution problems forced the film into a little-seen direct-to-video release.\n\nA Nightmare on Elm Street (2010), a remake of Wes Craven's 1984 film, starred Jackie Earle Haley as Freddy Krueger and Rooney Mara and Katie Cassidy as his teenage targets. The film returned the story to its darker, scarier roots, however it lacked the novelty and surprises that made the original so riveting. Despite its financial success, the movie was almost universally panned by fans and critics alike, with talks of a sequel quickly fading. Because of the negative reaction to films such as A Nightmare on Elm Street and Halloween, the popularity of the slasher remakes faded, as talks of further sequels and remakes were put on indefinite hold.\n\nNot all throwback slasher films of the time were remakes. Hoping to hark back to brutal films of the 1970s, movies such as Wrong Turn (2003), itself inspired by Just Before Dawn (1981) and The Hills Have Eyes, scored over $25 million worldwide and launched a franchise of straight-to-video films. The success of the Wrong Turn series on DVD helped in the production of a flurry of nostalgic slasher movies. That same year, Rob Zombie's directorial debut, House of 1000 Corpses (2003), hit theaters and was a modest success, although the film was greeted with mixed reviews. While some reviews praised its daring visual style, others thought it tried too hard to compete with classics such as the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre. House of 1000 Corpses was followed by a sequel two years later, The Devil's Rejects (2005), which mixed several exploitation genres, bringing to mind the harshest horror entries from the 1970s and 1980s. The film was a modest hit, bringing in over $15 million at the box office and gaining a strong cult following.\n\nDark Ride (2006) and Hatchet (2006) were both throwbacks to the high-energy slasher films from the Golden Age, using the setting of a theme park and a swamp, respectively. Hatchet was a minor success, generating two sequels. Simon Says (2006) and The Tripper (2006) were also released in the mid-2000s to DVD. In Simon Says, Crispin Glover returned to the genre 22-years after 1984's Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter, and in The Tripper, directed by David Arquette of the Scream trilogy, a killer in a Ronald Reagan mask slices his way through kids at a music festival. The use of the Reagan mask was a direct reference to the conservative era from which the Golden Age of Slasher Films hailed. WWE Films made its first feature starring wrestling phenomenon Kane as a monster who picks off juvenile delinquents in an abandoned hotel in See No Evil (2006). The film was followed by a sequel in 2014. The parody Gutterballs (2008) made several references to the early 1980s Golden Age, none more direct than its poster which played on the famous advertisements for Maniac (1980).\n\nRemembering what Scream accomplished in the late 1990s, some throwback slasher films attempted to put a unique twist on the familiar clichés. All the Boys Love Mandy Lane (2006) chose to go for a straight horror approach that showcased tragedy over the thrill, bringing to mind the Columbine High School massacre. The film had trouble finding a distributor, and sat on the shelf for over seven years in the United States, only to be released after cast member Amber Heard became a star. Placing a more fun, meta spin on the postmodernist slasher was Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006), in which a documentary crew follows a fledgling serial killer who models himself after slasher film icons of the 1980s. The film was unique for being a \"found footage\" slasher film, and also commenting on the audience's acceptance of serial killers for entertainment's sake. Independent film director Adam Wingard paid respects to horror film directors like John Carpenter with his movies You're Next (2011) and The Guest (2014), both of which added twists to the familiar genre conventions; in You're Next, the masked killers unknowingly pick a target in a final girl (Sharni Vinson) who is a survivalist expert prepared to fight back, while The Guest turns the hero (Dan Stevens) into the villain.\n\nInternationally, filmmakers tested extreme levels of tension and violence through slasher films. In France, an extreme new wave of horror began in the early 2000s, including Alexandre Aja's High Tension (2003), as well as the bloody Inside (2007) and the suspenseful Them (2006), which was remade in the United States as The Strangers (2008). Austria's Dead in 3 Days (2006) was a loose remake of I Know What You Did Last Summer, only with much more violent results. A large number of British films that embraced the violent new-wave of filmmaking included: Long Time Dead (2002), Creep (2004), Wilderness (2008), The Children (2008), and Tormented (2009). Britain would also see the release of slasher films that would achieve worldwide acclaim, including: The Descent (2005), the black comedy Severance (2006), and the disturbing Eden Lake (2008), starring Michael Fassbender. In Norway, the snow-set Cold Prey (2006) launched Europe's most successful slasher franchise of the decade. The film's popularity was overshadowed by the even-greater success of its sequel, Cold Prey 2 (2008). A third installment, Cold Prey 3 (2011), was released with less success. South Korea tested the limits of violence with films like Bloody Reunion (2006), and Taiwan followed suit with: Invitation Only (2009), Scared (2005), and Slice (2009).\n\nThere were also throwbacks to 1990s slasher films. The belated sequel I'll Always Know What You Did Last Summer (2006) bypassed cinemas and was released directly to DVD. The film takes on a similar premise as the 1997 original, however the characters, setting, and overall storyline are different. The movie was harshly received, ending the franchise. Curse of Chucky (2013) brought the killer doll back to the limelight after nearly a decade. It marked the first straight-to-video entry in the franchise, and was very well received, focusing on scares first but also not forgetting the series' comedic undertones. Fifteen years after the release of the original Scream came Scream 4 (2011). Proving to be possibly too meta, the film tackled the subject of reboots and remakes, where the killer attempts to recreate the original film's murders. The movie was met with mixed reviews, was disappointing at the box office, bringing in only $40 million, less than half of what the first three films in the franchise had made over a decade earlier.\n\nTransition to television and second film revival\n\nThe slasher film has also moved to television since the mid-2000s. The popular Showtime series Dexter tells the story of a serial killer who justifies his urge for murder by targeting other serial killers. Set in Miami, the series' darkly comedic undertones called attention to the 1980s serial killer thrillers. The first season of the HBO vampire series True Blood revolves around a small town being terrorized by a slasher targeting women who engage in sexual activities with vampires, a storyline that can easily be traced back to the misogynistic undertones of films like Don't Answer the Phone! (1980) and Dressed to Kill (1980). FX's American Horror Story: Asylum has a plot that centers on a slasher called \"Bloodyface\", who is obviously molded after Leatherface from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, MTV's Scream and American Horror Story: Freak Show features a slasher villain in the form of a deranged clown named Twisty. Even Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho provided inspiration for A&E's drama thriller Bates Motel, a prequel detailing teenager Norman Bates (Freddie Highmore) and his relationship with his mother (Vera Farmiga). ABC Family's teen thriller Pretty Little Liars, based on the series of novels by Sara Shepard, plays on themes established by films like Prom Night (1980), The House on Sorority Row (1983), and I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997). MTV has adapted the Scream films with Scream (TV series), Chiller has released the Slasher (TV series) and Emmett/Furla/Oasis Films is developing a Friday the 13th series for television.\nRyan Murphy and Brad Falchuk the creators of American Horror Story also developed in 2015 the Comedy Horror Slasher series Scream Queens which deals with a Red Devil masked and overall mascot costume masked killer murdering people of a fictional college campus in comical fashion.\nDespite the onslaught of slasher television, slasher films themselves began to make another startling comeback as in the case with Wes Craven and Kevin Williamson's meta horror classic Scream. In 2012 Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Firefly creator, Serenity and The Avengers and its blockbuster Marvel sequel Avengers: Age of Ultron in collaboration with former Buffy writer Drew Goddard created The Cabin In The Woods which featured Chris Hemsworth, Richard Jenkins, Bradley Whitford, Sigourney Weaver and Brian J. White in the commercially and critically acclaimed movie. The film concerns an ensemble cast of five freshmen college teenagers who are manipulated into going to a cabin in the forest and beset upon by a zombified, murderous family as their behavior is modified with pheromone changing narcotics. The film spirals on as the characters are killed one by one to reveal a worldwide ritual in which ancient, gigantic dormant gods beneath the earth's crust must be appeased with at least one nations' cultural sacrifice. The film chronicling the set sacrifice of the main character teens in accordance to horror archetypes of the Western Pop Culture stance. Prior to Cabin was Wes Craven's final film before his tragic death My Soul To Take which oversaw a group of high school teenagers set upon in a small fictional town by a costumed and masked killer out for vengeance as they are the remnants of his multiple souls. The film was presented in 3D in its theatrical run and was both a box office, critical and commercial failure. In 2014 Jason Blum of Blumhouse Productions released the ensemble cast starring supernatural teenage slasher horror Ouija which oversaw a group of high school students set upon by a grisly spirit after messing with a Ouija board following one friend and classmate's death. The film was a box office success premiering at number 1 and greenlighting a sequel although commercial and critical reception was poor for the film.\nIn 2015 Blumhouse productions oversaw the release of the teenage slasher horror Unfriended also starring Ouija's Shelley Hennig. The film continued on the popular wave of the slasher subgenre bending as a group of high school youths are set upon by the unseen apparition of a former classmate driven to suicide by their cyberbullying and viral video humiliation of her. The ghost in the machine concept was utilized in real time view through Hennig's lead character Blaire Lily's desktop as on the anniversary of the dead classmate Laura Barns' suicide, her boyfriend, best friend and a handful of others are targeted whilst on Skype to each other for exposure and death as their individual connection in the bullying is revealed. The film was a box office hit, commercial and critical success receiving mixed to mostly positive reviews praising the film for its innovative style and citing it as a solid addition to the slasher genre believed to be dying out with the conversion to remakes, reboots and television. A sequel for Unfriended was greenlit for 2016 and a German version was released by Warner Bros. entitled Friend Request.\n\nThe same year of 2015 Blumhouse also distributed the directorial debut of Wipeout contest winner Travis Cluff and Chris Lofing The Gallows. The movie was a box office success and was like Cabin heavily promoted and marketed to Western audiences, the film oversaw among a cast of unknown actors donning close names to their actual names the daughter of celebrities Frank Gifford and Kathy Lee Gifford Cassidy Gifford who is among four primary high school teenagers entrapped in their high school at night stalked by the murderous spirit of a Hangman costume and mask donning character by the title of Charlie Grimille. Presented in High Definition and quality found footage similar to the style of the box office hit comedy Project X the characters along with other supporting characters in different scenes are killed one by one via different means attributed to the antagonist of the film Charlie's hangman noose. Promotional trailers released for the film promoted Charlie as a new horror icon with a signature weapon like Jason Voorhees of the Friday The 13th franchise and Freddy Krueger of the A Nightmare On Elm Street franchise.", "Fred \"Freddy\" Krueger is the main antagonist of the A Nightmare on Elm Street film series. He first appeared in Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) as a burnt serial killer who uses a glove armed with razors to kill his victims in their dreams, causing their deaths in the real world as well. In the dream world, he is a powerful force and almost completely invulnerable to damage. However, whenever Freddy is pulled into the real world, he has normal human vulnerabilities. Krueger was created by Wes Craven, and had been consistently portrayed by Robert Englund since his first appearance. In the 2010 franchise reboot, he was portrayed by Jackie Earle Haley. In 2011, Freddy appeared as a playable character in the video game Mortal Kombat.\n\nFreddy is a nightmare-demon who attacks his victims from within their dreams. He is commonly identified by his burned, disfigured face, red-and-green striped sweater, brown fedora, and trademark metal-clawed brown leather glove only on his right hand. This glove was the product of Krueger's own imagination, the blade having been welded by himself. Robert Englund has said many times that he feels the character represents neglect, particularly that suffered by children. The character also more broadly represents subconscious fears.\n\nWizard magazine rated Freddy the 14th greatest villain, the British television channel Sky2 listed him 8th, and the American Film Institute ranked him 40th on its \"AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains\" list. In 2010, Freddy won an award for Best Villain (formerly Most Vile Villain) at the Scream Awards.\n\nAppearances\n\nFilm\n\nFreddy is introduced in A Nightmare on Elm Street as a child killer who is eventually discovered and captured by the law, but escapes due to a technicallity, someone forgot to sign the search warrent in the right place. He is hunted down by a mob of angry parents, and cornered in a boiler room where he used to take his victims. The mob douses the building with gasoline and sets it on fire, burning Krueger alive. While his body dies, his spirit lives on in the dreams of a group of teenagers living in his old neighborhood, whom he preys on by entering their dreams and killing them. He is apparently destroyed at the end of the film by protagonist Nancy Thompson, but the last scene reveals that he had survived. He went on to antagonize the teenage protagonists of the next five films in the series. After a hiatus, Krueger was brought back in Wes Craven's New Nightmare by Wes Craven, who had not worked on the film series since the third film, A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors.\n\nIn Dream Warriors, more of Freddy's backstory is revealed by the mysterious nun who repeatedly appears to Dr. Gordon. Freddy's mother, Amanda Krueger, was a nurse at the asylum featured in the film. At the time she worked there, a largely abandoned, run-down wing of the asylum was used to lock up entire hordes of the most insane criminals all at once. When Amanda was young, she was accidentally locked into the room with the criminals over a holiday weekend. They managed to keep her hidden for days, raping her repeatedly. When she was finally discovered, she was barely alive and was pregnant with the future Freddy Krueger.\n\nIn 2003, Freddy battled fellow horror icon Jason Voorhees from the Friday the 13th film series in the theatrical release Freddy vs. Jason, a film which officially resurrected both characters from their respective deaths and subsequently sent them to Hell. The ending of the film is left ambiguous as to whether or not Freddy is actually dead; despite being decapitated, he winks at the viewers. A sequel featuring Ash Williams from The Evil Dead franchise was planned, but never materialized on-screen. It was later turned into Dynamite Entertainment's comic book series Freddy vs. Jason vs. Ash.\n\nIn the 2010 remake of the original film, it is suggested that Freddy is a child molester who had sexually abused the teenage protagonists of the film when they were young children. When their parents found out, they trapped him in a building and set it on fire, killing him. He took his revenge on the teenagers for selling him out, causing him to be horrifically disfigured.\n\nTelevision\n\nRobert Englund continued his role as Krueger on October 9, 1988, in the television anthology series, Freddy's Nightmares. The show was hosted by Freddy, who did not take direct part in most of the episodes, but he did show up occasionally to influence the plot of particular episodes. Further, a consistent theme in each episode was characters having disturbing dreams. The series ran for two seasons, 44 episodes, ending March 10, 1990. Although most of the episodes did not feature Freddy taking a major role in the plot, the pilot episode, \"No More Mr. Nice Guy\", depicts the events of his trial, and his subsequent death at the hands of the parents of Elm Street after his acquittal. In \"No More Mr. Nice Guy\", though Freddy's case seems open and shut, a mistrial is declared based on the arresting officer, Lt. Tim Blocker, not reading Krueger his Miranda rights, which is different from the original Nightmare that stated he was released because someone forgot to sign a search warrant in the right place. The episode also reveals that Krueger used an ice cream van to lure children close enough so that he could kidnap and kill them. After the town's parents burn Freddy to death he returns to haunt Blocker in his dreams. Freddy gets his revenge when Blocker is put to sleep at the dentist's office, and Freddy shows up and kills him. The episode \"Sister's Keeper\" was a \"sequel\" to this episode, even though it was the seventh episode of the series. The episode follows Krueger as he terrorizes the Blocker twins, the identical twin daughters of Lt. Tim Blocker, and frames one sister for the other's murder. Season two's \"It's My Party And You'll Die If I Want You To\" featured Freddy attacking a high school prom date who stood him up twenty years earlier. He got his revenge with his desire being fulfilled in the process. \n\nVideo games\n\nFreddy's first video game appearance was in the Nintendo Entertainment System's 1989 game A Nightmare on Elm Street. The game was published by LJN Toys and developed by Rare.\n\nA second game for the Commodore 64 and DOS-based computers was also released in 1989 released by Monarch Software and developed by Westwood Associates.\n\nFreddy Krueger later appeared as an extra playable character for Mortal Kombat (2011). He has become the second non-Mortal Kombat character to appear in the game with the other being Kratos from the God of War series (who was an exclusive character for the PlayStation 3 version, while Freddy was available across all versions of the game). In the game, he was brought to the Mortal Kombat reality by Shao Kahn.\n\nHalloween Horror Nights\n\nFreddy Krueger appeared alongside Jason Voorhees and Leatherface as minor icons during Halloween Horror Nights 17: \"The Carnival of Carnage\" and again with Jason during Halloween Horror Nights 25: The Carnival Returns at Universal Orlando Resort and Universal Studios Hollywood in 2007, 2008, and as the main marketing icon in 2010.\n\nCharacterization\n\nWes Craven said his inspiration for the basis of Freddy Krueger's power stemmed from several stories in the Los Angeles Times about a series of mysterious deaths: All the victims had reported recurring nightmares and died in their sleep. Additionally, Craven's original script characterized Freddy as a child molester, which Craven said was the \"worst thing\" he could think of. The decision was made to instead make him a child murderer in order to avoid being accused of exploiting the spate of highly publicized child molestation cases in California around the time A Nightmare on Elm Street went into production. Craven's inspirations for the character included a bully from his school during his youth, a disfigured homeless man who had frightened him when he was 11, and the 1970s pop song \"Dream Weaver\" by Gary Wright. In an interview, he said, \"When I looked down there was a man very much like Freddy walking along the sidewalk. He must have sensed that someone was looking at him and stopped and looked right into my face. He scared the living daylights out of me, so I jumped back into the shadows. I waited and waited to hear him walk away. Finally I thought he must have gone, so I stepped back to the window. The guy was not only still looking at me but he thrust his head forward as if to say, 'Yes, I'm still looking at you.' The man walked towards the apartment building's entrance. I ran through the apartment to our front door as he was walking into our building on the lower floor. I heard him starting up the stairs. My brother, who is ten years older than me, got a baseball bat and went out to the corridor but he was gone.\" \n\nFreddy's back story is revealed gradually throughout the series. In A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, the protagonists learn that Freddy's mother, Amanda Krueger, was a nun who worked in Westin Hills mental hospital caring for the inmates. Freddy was conceived when she was accidentally locked inside over the Christmas holiday and gang-raped by a group of the inmates, thus making him \"the bastard son of 100 maniacs\". Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare depicts Freddy's traumatic childhood; he displayed sociopathic behavior at a young age and was often teased by classmates. He was adopted as a child by an abusive alcoholic named Mr. Underwood, who teaches him how to torture animals and inflict pain on himself. Freddy eventually murders him, with no apparent consequences, and becomes a serial killer. The film also reveals that when Freddy reached adulthood, he married a woman named Loretta, with whom he fathered a daughter named Katherine. After the birth of his daughter, he tried to lead a normal life, but his murderous nature eventually overcame him, and he murdered 20 children on Elm Street between 1963 and 1966. He later murdered his wife after she discovered the evidence of his child killings, which Katherine witnessed. She told the authorities and Freddy was arrested for the murder of his wife and the Elm Street children. In 1968, he was put on trial, but released on a technicality, leading to his death at the hands of the parents of his victims. In his dying moments, the Dream Demons came to him to offer him immortality in exchange for being their agent, which Freddy accepted. His daughter, Katherine, was later moved out of Springwood, adopted, and renamed Maggie Burroughs.\n\nIn Wes Craven's New Nightmare, Freddy is characterized as a symbol of something powerful and ancient, and is given more stature and muscles. Unlike the six movies before it, New Nightmare shows Freddy as closer to what Wes Craven originally intended, toning down his comedic side while strengthening the more menacing aspects of his character.\n\nThroughout the series, Freddy's potential victims often experience dreams of young children, jumping rope and chanting a rhyme to the tune of \"One, Two, Buckle My Shoe\" with the lyrics changed to \"One, Two, Freddy's coming for you\", often as an omen to Freddy's presence or a precursor to his attacks.\n\nRemake Version\n\nJackie Earle Haley played Freddy Krueger in the 2010 remake of A Nightmare On Elm Street (2010 film).\n\nAppearance\n\nFreddy Krueger's physical appearance has remained largely consistent throughout the film series, although minor changes were made in subsequent films. He wears a striped red-and-green sweater (solid red sleeves in the original film), a dark brown fedora, his bladed glove (see below), loose black trousers (brown in the original film), and worn working boots, in keeping with his blue collar background. His skin is scarred and burned as a result of being burned alive by the parents of Springwood, and he has no hair at all on his head as it presumably all burned off. In the original film, only Freddy's face was burned, while the scars have spread to the rest of his body from the second film onwards. His blood is occasionally a dark, oily color, or greenish in hue when he is in the Dreamworld. In the original film, Freddy remains in the shadows and under lower light much longer than he does in the later pictures. In the second film, there are some scenes where Freddy is shown without his glove, and instead with the blades protruding from the tips of his fingers. As the films began to emphasize the comedic, wise-cracking aspect of the character, he began to don various costumes and take on other forms, such as dressing as a waiter or wearing a Superman inspired version of his sweater with a cape (The Dream Child), appearing as a video game sprite (Freddy's Dead), a giant snake-like creature (Dream Warriors), and a Hookah smoking caterpillar (Freddy vs. Jason).\n\nIn New Nightmare, Freddy's appearance is updated considerably, giving him a green fedora that matched his sweater stripes, skin-tight leather pants, knee-high black boots, a turtleneck version of his trademark sweater, a dark blue trench coat, and a fifth claw on his glove, which also has a far more organic appearance, resembling the exposed muscle tissue of an actual hand. Freddy also has fewer burns on his face, though these are more severe, with his muscle tissue exposed in numerous places. Compared to his other incarnations, this Freddy's injuries are more like those of an actual burn victim. For the 2010 remake, Freddy is returned to his iconic attire, but the burns on his face are intensified with further bleaching of the skin and exposed facial tissue on the left cheek, reminiscent of actual third degree burns.\n\nClawed glove\n\nWes Craven claimed that part of the inspiration for Freddy's infamous glove was from his cat, as he watched it claw the side of his couch one night.[http://nightmareonelmstreetfilms.com/nightmareinterviewstheglove.html Nightmare Companion] Freddy's claw\n\nIn an interview he said, \"Part of it was an objective goal to make the character memorable, since it seems that every character that has been successful has had some kind of unique weapon, whether it be a chain saw or a machete, etc. I was also looking for a primal fear which is embedded in the subconscious of people of all cultures. One of those is the fear of teeth being broken, which I used in my first film. Another is the claw of an animal, like a saber-toothed tiger reaching with its tremendous hooks. I transposed this into a human hand. The original script had the blades being fishing knives.\" \n\nWhen Jim Doyle, the creator of Freddy's claw, asked Craven what he wanted, Craven responded, \"It's kind of like really long fingernails, I want the glove to look like something that someone could make who has the skills of a boilermaker.\" Doyle explained, \"Then we hunted around for knives. We picked out this bizarre-looking steak knife, we thought that this looked really cool, we thought it would look even cooler if we turned it over and used it upside down. We had to remove the back edge and put another edge on it, because we were actually using the knife upside down.\" Later Doyle had three duplicates of the glove made, two of which were used as stunt gloves in long shots.\n\nFor New Nightmare, Lou Carlucci, the effects coordinator, remodeled Freddy's glove for a more \"organic look\". He says, \"I did the original glove on the first Nightmare and we deliberately made that rough and primitive looking, like something that would be constructed in somebody's home workshop. Since this is supposed to be a new look for Freddy, Craven and everybody involved decided that the glove should be different. This hand has more muscle and bone texture to it, the blades are shinier and in one case, are retractable. Everything about this glove has a much cleaner look to it, it's more a natural part of his hand than a glove.\" The new glove has five claws.\n\nIn the 2010 remake, the glove is redesigned as a metal gauntlet with four finger bars, but it is patterned after its original design.\n\nFreddy's glove appeared in the 1987 horror-comedy Evil Dead II: Dead by Dawn above the door on the inside of a toolshed. This was Sam Raimi's response to Wes Craven showing footage of The Evil Dead in A Nightmare on Elm Street, which in turn was a response to Sam Raimi putting a poster of Craven's 1977 film The Hills Have Eyes in The Evil Dead. The glove also appears in the 1998 horror-comedy Bride of Chucky in an evidence locker room that also contains the remains of the film's villain Chucky, the chainsaw of Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and the masks of Michael Myers from Halloween and Jason Voorhees from Friday the 13th.\n\nAt the end of the movie Jason Goes To Hell: The Final Friday, the mask of the title character, Jason Voorhees, played by Kane Hodder, is dragged under the earth by Freddy's gloved hand, thus setting up Freddy vs. Jason. Freddy's gloved hand, in the ending, was played by Kane Hodder." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Attack_on_Pearl_Harbor.txt" ], "title": [ "Attack on Pearl Harbor" ], "wiki_context": [ "The attack on Pearl Harbor, also known as the Battle of Pearl Harbor, the Hawaii Operation or Operation AI by the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters, and Operation Z during planning, was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii Territory, on the morning of December 7, 1941. The attack led to the United States' entry into World War II.\n\nJapan intended the attack as a preventive action to keep the U.S. Pacific Fleet from interfering with military actions the Empire of Japan planned in Southeast Asia against overseas territories of the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and the United States. Over the next seven hours there were coordinated Japanese attacks on the U.S.-held Philippines, Guam and Wake Island and on the British Empire in Malaya, Singapore, and Hong Kong. \n\nThe attack commenced at 7:48 a.m. Hawaiian Time. The base was attacked by 353 Imperial Japanese fighter planes, bombers, and torpedo planes in two waves, launched from six aircraft carriers. All eight U.S. Navy battleships were damaged, with four sunk. All but were later raised, and six were returned to service and went on to fight in the war. The Japanese also sank or damaged three cruisers, three destroyers, an anti-aircraft training ship, and one minelayer. 188 U.S. aircraft were destroyed; 2,403 Americans were killed and 1,178 others were wounded. Important base installations such as the power station, shipyard, maintenance, and fuel and torpedo storage facilities, as well as the submarine piers and headquarters building (also home of the intelligence section) were not attacked. Japanese losses were light: 29 aircraft and five midget submarines lost, and 64 servicemen killed. One Japanese sailor, Kazuo Sakamaki, was captured.\n\nThe attack came as a profound shock to the American people and led directly to the American entry into World War II in both the Pacific and European theaters. The following day, December 8, the United States declared war on Japan. Domestic support for non-interventionism, which had been fading since the Fall of France in 1940, disappeared. Clandestine support of the United Kingdom (e.g., the Neutrality Patrol) was replaced by active alliance. Subsequent operations by the U.S. prompted Germany and Italy to declare war on the U.S. on December 11, which was reciprocated by the U.S. the same day.\n\nFrom the 1950s, several writers alleged that parties high in the U.S. and British governments knew of the attack in advance and may have let it happen (or even encouraged it) with the aim of bringing the U.S. into war. However, this advance-knowledge conspiracy theory is rejected by mainstream historians. \n\nThere were numerous historical precedents for unannounced military action by Japan. However, the lack of any formal warning, particularly while negotiations were still apparently ongoing, led President Franklin D. Roosevelt to proclaim December 7, 1941, \"a date which will live in infamy\". Because the attack happened without a declaration of war and without explicit warning, the attack on Pearl Harbor was judged by the Tokyo Trials to be a war crime. \n\nBackground to conflict\n\nDiplomatic background\n\nWar between Japan and the United States had been a possibility of which each nation had been aware (and developed contingency plans for) since the 1920s, though tensions did not begin to grow seriously until Japan's 1931 invasion of Manchuria. Over the next decade, Japan continued to expand into China, leading to all-out war between those countries in 1937. Japan spent considerable effort trying to isolate China and achieve sufficient resource independence to attain victory on the mainland; the \"Southern Operation\" was designed to assist these efforts. \n\nFrom December 1937, events such as the Japanese attack on USS Panay, the Allison incident, and the Nanking Massacre (the International Military Tribunal of the Far East concluded that more than 200,000 Chinese non-combatants were killed in indiscriminate massacres, though other estimates have ranged from 40,000 to more than 300,000) swung public opinion in the West sharply against Japan. Fearing Japanese expansion, the United States, the United Kingdom, and France provided loan assistance for war supply contracts to the Republic of China.\n\nIn 1940, Japan invaded French Indochina in an effort to control supplies reaching China. The United States halted shipments of airplanes, parts, machine tools, and aviation gasoline to Japan, which was perceived by Japan as an unfriendly act. The U.S. did not stop oil exports to Japan at that time in part because prevailing sentiment in Washington was that such an action would be an extreme step that Japan would likely consider a provocation, given Japanese dependence on U.S. oil. \n\nEarly in 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt moved the Pacific Fleet to Hawaii from its previous base in San Diego and ordered a military buildup in the Philippines in the hope of discouraging Japanese aggression in the Far East. Because the Japanese high command was (mistakenly) certain that any attack on the UK's Southeast Asian colonies would bring the U.S. into war, a devastating preventive strike appeared to be the only way to avoid U.S. naval interference. An invasion of the Philippines was also considered necessary by Japanese war planners. The U.S. War Plan Orange had envisioned defending the Philippines with a 40,000-man elite force. This was opposed by Douglas MacArthur, who felt that he would need a force ten times that size, and was never implemented. By 1941, U.S. planners anticipated abandonment of the Philippines at the outbreak of war and orders to that effect were given in late 1941 to Admiral Thomas Hart, commander of the Asiatic Fleet. \n\nThe U.S. ceased oil exports to Japan in July 1941, following Japanese expansion into French Indochina after the fall of France, in part because of new American restrictions on domestic oil consumption. This in turn caused the Japanese to proceed with plans to take the Dutch East Indies, an oil-rich territory. On August 17, Roosevelt warned Japan that the U.S. was prepared to take steps against Japan if it attacked \"neighboring countries\". The Japanese were faced with the option of either withdrawing from China and losing face or seizing and securing new sources of raw materials in the resource-rich, European-controlled colonies of Southeast Asia.\n\nJapan and the U.S. engaged in negotiations during the course of 1941 in an effort to improve relations. During these negotiations, Japan offered to withdraw from most of China and Indochina when peace was made with the Nationalist government, adopt an independent interpretation of the Tripartite Pact, and not to discriminate in trade provided all other countries reciprocated. Washington rejected these proposals. Japanese Prime Minister Konoye then offered to personally meet with Roosevelt, but Roosevelt insisted on coming to an agreement before any meeting. The U.S. ambassador to Japan repeatedly urged Roosevelt to accept the meeting, warning that it was the only way to preserve the conciliatory Konoye government and peace in the Pacific. His recommendation was not acted upon. The Konoye government collapsed the following month when the Japanese military refused to agree to the withdrawal of all troops from China. \n\nJapan's final proposal, on November 20, offered to withdraw their forces from southern Indochina and not to launch any attacks in Southeast Asia provided that the U.S., the UK, and the Netherlands ceased aiding China and lifted their sanctions against Japan. The American counter-proposal of November 26 (November 27 in Japan) (the Hull note) required Japan to evacuate all of China without conditions and conclude non-aggression pacts with Pacific powers. However the day before the Hull Note was delivered, on November 26 in Japan, the main Japanese attack fleet left port for Pearl Harbor.\n\nMilitary planning\n\nPreliminary planning for an attack on Pearl Harbor to protect the move into the \"Southern Resource Area\" (the Japanese term for the Dutch East Indies and Southeast Asia generally) had begun very early in 1941 under the auspices of Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, then commanding Japan's Combined Fleet. He won assent to formal planning and training for an attack from the Imperial Japanese Navy General Staff only after much contention with Naval Headquarters, including a threat to resign his command. Full-scale planning was underway by early spring 1941, primarily by Rear Admiral Ryunosuke Kusaka, with assistance from Captain Minoru Genda and Yamamoto's Deputy Chief of Staff, Captain Kameto Kuroshima. The planners studied the 1940 British air attack on the Italian fleet at Taranto intensively.\n\nOver the next several months, pilots trained, equipment was adapted, and intelligence collected. Despite these preparations, Emperor Hirohito did not approve the attack plan until November 5, after the third of four Imperial Conferences called to consider the matter. Final authorization was not given by the emperor until December 1, after a majority of Japanese leaders advised him the \"Hull Note\" would \"destroy the fruits of the China incident, endanger Manchukuo and undermine Japanese control of Korea.\" \n\nBy late 1941, many observers believed that hostilities between the U.S. and Japan were imminent. A Gallup poll just before the attack on Pearl Harbor found that 52% of Americans expected war with Japan, 27% did not, and 21% had no opinion. While U.S. Pacific bases and facilities had been placed on alert on many occasions, U.S. officials doubted Pearl Harbor would be the first target; instead, they expected the Philippines would be attacked first. This presumption was due to the threat that the air bases throughout the country and the naval base at Manila posed to sea lanes, as well as to the shipment of supplies to Japan from territory to the south. They also incorrectly believed that Japan was not capable of mounting more than one major naval operation at a time. \n\nEver since the Japanese attack, there has been debate as to how and why the United States had been caught unaware, and how much and when American officials knew of Japanese plans and related topics. Military officers including Gen. Billy Mitchell had pointed out the vulnerabiliy of Pearl to Air attack. At least two Naval War games, one in 1932 and another in 1936 proved that Pearl was vulnerable to such an attack. Adm. James Richardson was removed from command shortly after protesting President Roosevelt's decision to move the bulk of the Pacific fleet to Pearl Harbor. The decisions of military and political leadership to ignore these warnings has contributed to conspiracy theories. Several writers, including journalist Robert Stinnett and former United States rear admiral Robert Alfred Theobald, have argued that various parties high in the U.S. and British governments knew of the attack in advance and may even have let it happen or encouraged it in order to force the U.S. into war via the so-called \"back door\". However, this Pearl Harbor advance-knowledge conspiracy theory is rejected by mainstream historians. \n\nObjectives\n\nThe attack had several major aims. First, it intended to destroy important American fleet units, thereby preventing the Pacific Fleet from interfering with Japanese conquest of the Dutch East Indies and Malaya and to enable Japan to conquer Southeast Asia without interference. Second, it was hoped to buy time for Japan to consolidate its position and increase its naval strength before shipbuilding authorized by the 1940 Vinson-Walsh Act erased any chance of victory.. Third, to deliver a blow to America's ability to commit its forces in the Pacific, battleships were chosen as the main targets, since they were the prestige ships of any navy at the time. Finally, it was hoped that the attack would undermine American morale such that the U.S. government would drop its demands contrary to Japanese interests, and would seek a compromise peace with Japan. \n\nStriking the Pacific Fleet at anchor in Pearl Harbor carried two distinct disadvantages: the targeted ships would be in very shallow water, so it would be relatively easy to salvage and possibly repair them; and most of the crews would survive the attack, since many would be on shore leave or would be rescued from the harbor. A further important disadvantage—this of timing, and known to the Japanese—was the absence from Pearl Harbor of all three of the U.S. Pacific Fleet's aircraft carriers (, , and ). IJN top command was so imbued with Admiral Mahan's \"decisive battle\" doctrine—especially that of destroying the maximum number of battleships—that, despite these concerns, Yamamoto decided to press ahead. \n\nJapanese confidence in their ability to achieve a short, victorious war also meant other targets in the harbor, especially the navy yard, oil tank farms, and submarine base, were ignored, since—by their thinking—the war would be over before the influence of these facilities would be felt. \n\nApproach and attack\n\nOn November 26, 1941, a Japanese task force (the Striking Force) of six aircraft carriers—, , , , , and —departed northern Japan en route to a position northwest of Hawaii, intending to launch its 408 aircraft to attack Pearl Harbor: 360 for the two attack waves and 48 on defensive combat air patrol (CAP), including nine fighters from the first wave.\n\nThe first wave was to be the primary attack, while the second wave was to attack carriers as its first objective and cruisers as its second, with battleships as the third target. The first wave carried most of the weapons to attack capital ships, mainly specially adapted Type 91 aerial torpedoes which were designed with an anti-roll mechanism and a rudder extension that let them operate in shallow water. The aircrews were ordered to select the highest value targets (battleships and aircraft carriers) or, if these were not present, any other high value ships (cruisers and destroyers). First wave dive bombers were to attack ground targets. Fighters were ordered to strafe and destroy as many parked aircraft as possible to ensure they did not get into the air to intercept the bombers, especially in the first wave. When the fighters' fuel got low they were to refuel at the aircraft carriers and return to combat. Fighters were to serve CAP duties where needed, especially over U.S. airfields.\n\nBefore the attack commenced, two reconnaissance aircraft launched from cruisers and were sent to scout over Oahu and Maui and report on U.S. fleet composition and location. Reconnaissance aircraft flights risked alerting the U.S., and were not necessary. U.S. fleet composition and preparedness information in Pearl Harbor was already known due to the reports of the Japanese spy Takeo Yoshikawa. A report of the absence of the U.S. fleet in Lahaina anchorage off Maui was received from the fleet submarine . Another four scout planes patrolled the area between the Japanese carrier force (the Kido Butai) and Niihau, to detect any counterattack. \n\nSubmarines\n\nFleet submarines , , , , and each embarked a Type A midget submarine for transport to the waters off Oahu. The five I-boats left Kure Naval District on November 25, 1941. On December 6, they came to within 10 nmi of the mouth of Pearl Harbor and launched their midget subs at about 01:00 on December 7. At 03:42 Hawaiian Time, the minesweeper spotted a midget submarine periscope southwest of the Pearl Harbor entrance buoy and alerted the destroyer . The midget may have entered Pearl Harbor. However, Ward sank another midget submarine at 06:37 in the first American shots in the Pacific Theater. A midget submarine on the north side of Ford Island missed the seaplane tender with her first torpedo and missed the attacking destroyer with her other one before being sunk by Monaghan at 08:43.\n\nA third midget submarine, Ha-19, grounded twice, once outside the harbor entrance and again on the east side of Oahu, where it was captured on December 8. Ensign Kazuo Sakamaki swam ashore and was captured by Hawaii National Guard Corporal David Akui, becoming the first Japanese prisoner of war. A fourth had been damaged by a depth charge attack and was abandoned by its crew before it could fire its torpedoes. Japanese forces received a radio message from a midget submarine at 00:41 on December 8 claiming damage to one or more large warships inside Pearl Harbor. \n\nIn 1992, 2000, and 2001, Hawaii Undersea Research Laboratory's submersibles found the wreck of the fifth midget submarine lying in three parts outside Pearl Harbor. The wreck was in the debris field where much surplus U.S. equipment was dumped after the war, including vehicles and landing craft. Both of its torpedoes were missing. This correlates with reports of two torpedoes fired at the light cruiser at 10:04 at the entrance of Pearl Harbor, and a possible torpedo fired at destroyer at 08:21. \n\nJapanese declaration of war\n\nThe attack took place before any formal declaration of war was made by Japan, but this was not Admiral Yamamoto's intention. He originally stipulated that the attack should not commence until thirty minutes after Japan had informed the United States that peace negotiations were at an end. However, the attack began before the notice could be delivered. Tokyo transmitted the 5000-word notification (commonly called the \"14-Part Message\") in two blocks to the Japanese Embassy in Washington, but transcribing the message took too long for the Japanese ambassador to deliver it in time. (In fact, U.S. code breakers had already deciphered and translated most of the message hours before he was scheduled to deliver it.) The final part of the \"14 Part Message\" is sometimes described as a declaration of war. While it was viewed by a number of senior U.S government and military officials as a very strong indicator that negotiations were likely to be terminated and that war might break out at any moment, it neither declared war nor severed diplomatic relations. A declaration of war was printed on the front page of Japan's newspapers in the evening edition of December 8, but not delivered to the U.S. government until the day after the attack.\n\nFor decades, conventional wisdom held that Japan attacked without any official warning of a break in relations only because of accidents and bumbling that delayed the delivery of a document hinting at war to Washington. In 1999, however, Takeo Iguchi, a professor of law and international relations at International Christian University in Tokyo, discovered documents that pointed to a vigorous debate inside the government over how, and indeed whether, to notify Washington of Japan's intention to break off negotiations and start a war, including a December 7 entry in the war diary saying, \"our deceptive diplomacy is steadily proceeding toward success.\" Of this, Iguchi said, \"The diary shows that the army and navy did not want to give any proper declaration of war, or indeed prior notice even of the termination of negotiations ... and they clearly prevailed.\" \n\nFirst wave composition\n\nThe first attack wave of 183 planes was launched north of Oahu, led by Commander Mitsuo Fuchida. Six planes failed to launch due to technical difficulties. It included:\n* 1st Group (targets: battleships and aircraft carriers)\n** 49 Nakajima B5N Kate bombers armed with 800 kg (1760 lb) armor-piercing bombs, organized in four sections (1 failed to launch)\n** 40 B5N bombers armed with Type 91 torpedoes, also in four sections\n* 2nd Group – (targets: Ford Island and Wheeler Field)\n** 51 Aichi D3A Val dive bombers armed with 550 lb general-purpose bombs (3 failed to launch)\n* 3rd Group – (targets: aircraft at Ford Island, Hickam Field, Wheeler Field, Barber's Point, Kaneohe)\n** 43 Mitsubishi A6M \"Zero\" fighters for air control and strafing (2 failed to launch)\n\nAs the first wave approached Oahu, it was detected by the U.S. Army SCR-270 radar at Opana Point near the island's northern tip. This post had been in training mode for months, but was not yet operational. The operators, Privates George Elliot Jr. and Joseph Lockard, reported a target. But Lieutenant Kermit A. Tyler, a newly assigned officer at the thinly manned Intercept Center, presumed it was the scheduled arrival of six B-17 bombers from California. The Japanese planes were approaching from a direction very close (only a few degrees difference) to the bombers, and while the operators had never seen a formation as large on radar, they neglected to tell Tyler of its size. Tyler, for security reasons, could not tell the operators of the six B-17s that were due (even though it was widely known).\n\nAs the first wave planes approached Oahu, they encountered and shot down several U.S. aircraft. At least one of these radioed a somewhat incoherent warning. Other warnings from ships off the harbor entrance were still being processed or awaiting confirmation when the attacking planes began bombing and strafing. Nevertheless, it is not clear any warnings would have had much effect even if they had been interpreted correctly and much more promptly. The results the Japanese achieved in the Philippines were essentially the same as at Pearl Harbor, though MacArthur had almost nine hours warning that the Japanese had already attacked Pearl Harbor.\n\nThe air portion of the attack began at 7:48 a.m. Hawaiian Time (3:18 a.m. December 8 Japanese Standard Time, as kept by ships of the Kido Butai), with the attack on Kaneohe. A total of 353 Japanese planes in two waves reached Oahu. Slow, vulnerable torpedo bombers led the first wave, exploiting the first moments of surprise to attack the most important ships present (the battleships), while dive bombers attacked U.S. air bases across Oahu, starting with Hickam Field, the largest, and Wheeler Field, the main U.S. Army Air Forces fighter base. The 171 planes in the second wave attacked the Army Air Forces' Bellows Field near Kaneohe on the windward side of the island, and Ford Island. The only aerial opposition came from a handful of P-36 Hawks, P-40 Warhawks, and some SBD Dauntless dive bombers from the carrier .\n\nIn the first wave attack, about eight of the forty-nine 800 kg (1760 lb) armor-piercing bombs dropped hit their intended battleship targets. At least two of those bombs broke up on impact, another detonated before penetrating an unarmored deck, and one was a dud. Thirteen of the forty torpedoes hit battleships, and four torpedoes hit other ships. Men aboard U.S. ships awoke to the sounds of alarms, bombs exploding, and gunfire, prompting bleary-eyed men to dress as they ran to General Quarters stations. (The famous message, \"Air raid Pearl Harbor. This is not drill.\", was sent from the headquarters of Patrol Wing Two, the first senior Hawaiian command to respond.) The defenders were very unprepared. Ammunition lockers were locked, aircraft parked wingtip to wingtip in the open to prevent sabotage, guns unmanned (none of the Navy's 5\"/38s, only a quarter of its machine guns, and only four of 31 Army batteries got in action). Despite this low alert status, many American military personnel responded effectively during the attack. Ensign Joe Taussig Jr., aboard , commanded the ship's antiaircraft guns and was severely wounded, but continued to be on post. Lt. Commander F. J. Thomas commanded Nevada in the captain's absence and got her under way until the ship was grounded at 9:10 a.m. One of the destroyers, , got underway with only four officers aboard, all ensigns, none with more than a year's sea duty; she operated at sea for 36 hours before her commanding officer managed to get back aboard. Captain Mervyn Bennion, commanding , led his men until he was cut down by fragments from a bomb which hit , moored alongside.\n\nSecond wave composition\n\nThe second planned wave consisted of 171 planes: 54 B5Ns, 81 D3As, and 36 A6Ms, commanded by Lieutenant-Commander Shigekazu Shimazaki. Four planes failed to launch because of technical difficulties. This wave and its targets comprised:\n* 1st Group – 54 B5Ns armed with 550 lb and 132 lb general-purpose bombs\n** 27 B5Ns – aircraft and hangars on Kaneohe, Ford Island, and Barbers Point\n** 27 B5Ns – hangars and aircraft on Hickam Field\n* 2nd Group (targets: aircraft carriers and cruisers)\n** 78 D3As armed with 550 lb general-purpose bombs, in four sections (3 aborted)\n* 3rd Group – (targets: aircraft at Ford Island, Hickam Field, Wheeler Field, Barber's Point, Kaneohe)\n** 35 A6Ms for defense and strafing (1 aborted)\nThe second wave was divided into three groups. One was tasked to attack Kāneohe, the rest Pearl Harbor proper. The separate sections arrived at the attack point almost simultaneously from several directions.\n\nAmerican casualties and damages\n\nNinety minutes after it began, the attack was over. 2,008 sailors were killed and 710 others wounded; 218 soldiers and airmen (who were part of the Army until the independent U.S. Air Force was formed in 1947) were killed and 364 wounded; 109 marines were killed and 69 wounded; and 68 civilians were killed and 35 wounded. In total, 2,403 Americans died and 1,178 were wounded. Eighteen ships were sunk or run aground, including five battleships. All of the Americans killed or wounded during the attack were non-combatants, given the fact there was no state of war when the attack occurred. \n\nOf the American fatalities, nearly half were due to the explosion of 's forward magazine after it was hit by a modified 40 cm shell.\n\nAlready damaged by a torpedo and on fire amidships, Nevada attempted to exit the harbor. She was targeted by many Japanese bombers as she got under way and sustained more hits from 250 lb bombs, which started further fires. She was deliberately beached to avoid blocking the harbor entrance.\n\n was hit by two bombs and two torpedoes. The crew might have kept her afloat, but were ordered to abandon ship just as they were raising power for the pumps. Burning oil from Arizona and drifted down on her, and probably made the situation look worse than it was. The disarmed target ship was holed twice by torpedoes. West Virginia was hit by seven torpedoes, the seventh tearing away her rudder. was hit by four torpedoes, the last two above her belt armor, which caused her to capsize. was hit by two of the converted 40 cm shells, but neither caused serious damage.\n\nAlthough the Japanese concentrated on battleships (the largest vessels present), they did not ignore other targets. The light cruiser was torpedoed, and the concussion from the blast capsized the neighboring minelayer . Two destroyers in dry dock, and were destroyed when bombs penetrated their fuel bunkers. The leaking fuel caught fire; flooding the dry dock in an effort to fight fire made the burning oil rise, and both were burned out. Cassin slipped from her keel blocks and rolled against Downes. The light cruiser was holed by a torpedo. The light cruiser was damaged, but remained in service. The repair vessel , moored alongside Arizona, was heavily damaged and beached. The seaplane tender Curtiss was also damaged. The destroyer was badly damaged when two bombs penetrated her forward magazine. \n\nOf the 402 American aircraft in Hawaii, 188 were destroyed and 159 damaged, 155 of them on the ground. Almost none were actually ready to take off to defend the base. Eight Army Air Forces pilots managed to get airborne during the attack and six were credited with downing at least one Japanese aircraft during the attack: 1st Lt. Lewis M. Sanders, 2nd Lt. Philip M. Rasmussen, 2nd Lt. Kenneth M. Taylor, 2nd Lt. George S. Welch, 2nd Lt. Harry W. Brown, and 2nd Lt. Gordon H. Sterling Jr. Sterling was shot down by Lt. Fujita over Kaneohe Bay and is listed as Body Not Recovered (not Missing In Action). Lt. John L. Dains was killed by friendly fire returning from a victory over Kaawa. Of 33 PBYs in Hawaii, 24 were destroyed, and six others damaged beyond repair. (The three on patrol returned undamaged.) Friendly fire brought down some U.S. planes on top of that, including five from an inbound flight from . Japanese attacks on barracks killed additional personnel.\n\nAt the time of the attack, nine civilian aircraft were flying in the vicinity of Pearl Harbor. Of these, three were shot down.\n\nJapanese losses\n\nFifty-five Japanese airmen and nine submariners were killed in the attack, and one was captured. Of Japan's 414 available planes, 29 were lost during the battle (nine in the first attack wave, 20 in the second), with another 74 damaged by antiaircraft fire from the ground.\n\nPossible third wave\n\nSeveral Japanese junior officers including Fuchida and Genda urged Nagumo to carry out a third strike in order to destroy as much of Pearl Harbor's fuel and torpedo storage, maintenance, and dry dock facilities as possible. Genda, who had unsuccessfully advocated for invading Hawaii after the air attack, believed that without an invasion multiple strikes were necessary to disable the base as much as possible. The captains of the other five carriers in the task force reported they were willing and ready to carry out a third strike. Military historians have suggested the destruction of these shore facilities would have hampered the U.S. Pacific Fleet far more seriously than the loss of its battleships. If they had been wiped out, \"serious [American] operations in the Pacific would have been postponed for more than a year\"; according to Admiral Chester Nimitz, later Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet, \"it would have prolonged the war another two years.\" Nagumo, however, decided to withdraw for several reasons:\n* American anti-aircraft performance had improved considerably during the second strike, and two thirds of Japan's losses were incurred during the second wave. Nagumo felt if he launched a third strike, he would be risking three quarters of the Combined Fleet's strength to wipe out the remaining targets (which included the facilities) while suffering higher aircraft losses.\n* The location of the American carriers remained unknown. In addition, the admiral was concerned his force was now within range of American land-based bombers. Nagumo was uncertain whether the U.S. had enough surviving planes remaining on Hawaii to launch an attack against his carriers. \n* A third wave would have required substantial preparation and turnaround time, and would have meant returning planes would have had to land at night. At the time, only the (British) Royal Navy had developed night carrier techniques, so this was a substantial risk. \n* Weather had deteriorated notably since the first and second wave launching, and rough seas complicated takeoff and landing for a third wave attack.\n* The task force's fuel situation did not permit him to remain in waters north of Pearl Harbor much longer, since he was at the very limit of logistical support. To do so risked running unacceptably low on fuel, perhaps even having to abandon destroyers en route home. \n* He believed the second strike had essentially satisfied the main objective of his mission—the neutralization of the Pacific Fleet—and did not wish to risk further losses. Moreover, it was Japanese Navy practice to prefer the conservation of strength over the total destruction of the enemy. \n\nAt a conference aboard Yamato the following morning, Yamamoto initially supported Nagumo. In retrospect, sparing the vital dockyards, maintenance shops, and oil depots meant the U.S. could respond relatively quickly to Japanese activities in the Pacific. Yamamoto later regretted Nagumo's decision to withdraw and categorically stated it had been a great mistake not to order a third strike.\n\nPhotographs\n\nThe first aerial photographs of the attack on Pearl Harbor were taken by Lee Embree, who was aboard a Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress en route from Hamilton Field, California, to the Philippines. Lee's 38th Reconnaissance Squadron had scheduled a refueling stop at Hickam Field at the time of the attack.\n\nFile:Aboard a Japanese carrier before the attack on Pearl Harbor.jpg|Crew members aboard Shōkaku launching the attack.\nFile:Zero Akagi Dec1941.jpg|A Japanese Mitsubishi A6M2 \"Zero\" fighter airplane of the second wave takes off from the aircraft carrier Akagi on the morning of December 7, 1941.\nFile:Carrier shokaku.jpg|Zeroes of the second wave preparing to take off from Shōkaku for Pearl Harbor.\nFile:Japanese plane leaves Shokaku-Pearl Harbor.jpg|A Japanese Nakajima B5N2 \"Kate\" torpedo bomber takes off from Shōkaku.\nFile:Japanese planes preparing-Pearl Harbor.jpg|Japanese Aichi D3A1 \"Val\" dive bombers of the second wave preparing for take off. Aircraft carrier Sōryū in the background.\n\nFile:Akagi Aichi D3A Pearl Harbor.jpg|An Aichi D3A Type 99 kanbaku (dive bomber) launches from the Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carrier Akagi to participate in the second wave during the attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.\nFile:USS California sinking-Pearl Harbor.jpg|Battleship USS California sinking.\nFile:Pearlharborcolork13513.jpg|Battleship USS Arizona explodes.\nFile:USS SHAW exploding Pearl Harbor Nara 80-G-16871 2.jpg|Destroyer USS Shaw exploding after her forward magazine was detonated.\n\nFile:USS Nevada attempts escape from Pearl 80G32558.jpg|Battleship USS Nevada attempting to escape from the harbor.\nFile:USS West Virginia;014824.jpg|Battleship USS West Virginia took two aerial bombs, both duds, and seven torpedo hits, one of which may have come from a midget submarine.\nFile:NARA 28-1277a.gif|A destroyed B-17 after the attack on Hickam Field.\nFile:PLanes burning-Ford Island-Pearl Harbor.jpg|Hangar on Ford Island burns\nFile:Pearl harbour.png|Aftermath: USS West Virginia (severely damaged), USS Tennessee (damaged), and USS Arizona (sunk).\n\nShips lost or damaged\n\nBattleships\n\n* (RADM Kidd's flagship of Battleship Division One): hit by four armor-piercing bombs, exploded; total loss. 1,177 dead.\n* : hit by five torpedoes, capsized; total loss. 429 dead.\n* : hit by two bombs, seven torpedoes, sunk; returned to service July 1944. 106 dead.\n* : hit by two bombs, two torpedoes, sunk; returned to service January 1944. 100 dead.\n* : hit by six bombs, one torpedo, beached; returned to service October 1942. 60 dead.\n* (ADM Kimmel's flagship of the United States Pacific Fleet): in drydock with Cassin and Downes, hit by one bomb and debris from USS Cassin; remained in service. 9 dead.\n* : hit by two bombs; returned to service February 1942. 5 dead.\n* : hit by two bombs; returned to service February 1942. 4 dead (including floatplane pilot shot down).\n\nEx-battleship (target/AA training ship)\n\n* : hit by two torpedoes, capsized; total loss. 64 dead.\n\nCruisers\n\n* : hit by one torpedo; returned to service January 1942. 20 dead.\n* : hit by one torpedo; returned to service February 1942.\n* : Near miss, light damage; remained in service.\n\nDestroyers\n\n* : in drydock with Downes and Pennsylvania, hit by one bomb, burned; returned to service February 1944.\n* : in drydock with Cassin and Pennsylvania, caught fire from Cassin, burned; returned to service November 1943.\n* : hit by three bombs; returned to service June 1942.\n\nAuxiliaries\n\n* (minelayer): Damaged by torpedo hit on Helena, capsized; returned to service (as engine-repair ship) February 1944.\n* (repair ship): hit by two bombs, blast and fire from Arizona, beached; returned to service by August 1942.\n* (seaplane tender): hit by one bomb, one crashed Japanese aircraft; returned to service January 1942. 19 dead.\n\nSalvage\n\nAfter a systematic search for survivors, formal salvage operations began. Captain Homer N. Wallin, Material Officer for Commander, Battle Force, U.S. Pacific Fleet, was immediately ordered to lead salvage operations. \"Within a short time I was relieved of all other duties and ordered to full time work as Fleet Salvage Officer\". \n\nAround Pearl Harbor, divers from the Navy (shore and tenders), the Naval Shipyard, and civilian contractors (Pacific Bridge and others) began work on the ships that could be refloated. They patched holes, cleared debris, and pumped water out of ships. Navy divers worked inside the damaged ships. Within six months, five battleships and two cruisers were patched or refloated so they could be sent to shipyards in Pearl Harbor and on the mainland for extensive repair.\n\nIntensive salvage operations continued for another year, a total of some 20,000 man-hours under water. Oklahoma, while successfully raised, was never repaired, and capsized while under tow to the mainland in 1947. Arizona and the target ship Utah were too heavily damaged for salvage, though much of their armament and equipment was removed and put to use aboard other vessels. Today, the two hulks remain where they were sunk, with Arizona becoming a war memorial.\n\nAftermath\n\nIn the wake of the attack, 15 Medals of Honor, 51 Navy Crosses, 53 Silver Stars, four Navy and Marine Corps Medals, one Distinguished Flying Cross, four Distinguished Service Crosses, one Distinguished Service Medal, and three Bronze Star Medals were awarded to the American servicemen who distinguished themselves in combat at Pearl Harbor. Additionally, a special military award, the Pearl Harbor Commemorative Medal, was later authorized for all military veterans of the attack.\n\nThe day after the attack, Roosevelt delivered his famous Infamy Speech to a Joint Session of Congress, calling for a formal declaration of war on the Empire of Japan. Congress obliged his request less than an hour later. On December 11, Germany and Italy, honoring their commitments under the Tripartite Pact, declared war on the United States. The pact was an earlier agreement between Germany, Italy and Japan which had the principal objective of limiting U.S. intervention in any conflicts involving the three nations. Congress issued a declaration of war against Germany and Italy later that same day. The UK actually declared war on Japan nine hours before the U.S. did, partially due to Japanese attacks on Malaya, Singapore and Hong Kong, and partially due to Winston Churchill's promise to declare war \"within the hour\" of a Japanese attack on the United States. \n\nThe attack was an initial shock to all the Allies in the Pacific Theater. Further losses compounded the alarming setback. Japan attacked the Philippines hours later (because of the time difference, it was December 8 in the Philippines). Only three days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the battleships Prince of Wales and Repulse were sunk off the coast of Malaya, causing British Prime Minister Winston Churchill later to recollect \"In all the war I never received a more direct shock. As I turned and twisted in bed the full horror of the news sank in upon me. There were no British or American capital ships in the Indian Ocean or the Pacific except the American survivors of Pearl Harbor who were hastening back to California. Over this vast expanse of waters Japan was supreme and we everywhere were weak and naked\". \n\nThroughout the war, Pearl Harbor was frequently used in American propaganda. \n\nOne further consequence of the attack on Pearl Harbor and its aftermath (notably the Niihau Incident) was that Japanese American residents and citizens were relocated to nearby Japanese-American internment camps. Within hours of the attack, hundreds of Japanese American leaders were rounded up and brought to high-security camps such as Sand Island at the mouth of Honolulu harbor and Kilauea Military Camp on the island of Hawaii. Later, over 110,000 Japanese Americans, including United States citizens, were removed from their homes and transferred to internment camps in California, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Arkansas, and Texas. \n\nThe attack also had international consequences. The Canadian province of British Columbia, bordering the Pacific Ocean, had long had a large population of Japanese immigrants. Pre-war tensions were exacerbated by the Pearl Harbor attack, leading to a reaction from the Government of Canada. On February 24, 1942, Order-in-Council P.C. no. 1486 was passed under the War Measures Act allowing for the forced removal of any and all Canadians of Japanese descent from British Columbia, as well as the prohibiting from them returning to the province. The Japanese-Canadians were given a choice: either be moved into internment camps or be deported back to Japan. \n\nNiihau Incident\n\nThe Japanese planners had determined that some means was required for rescuing fliers whose aircraft were too badly damaged to return to the carriers. The island of Niihau, only 30 minutes flying time from Pearl Harbor, was designated as the rescue point.\n\nThe Zero flown by Petty Officer Shigenori Nishikaichi of Hiryu was damaged in the attack on Wheeler, so he flew to the rescue point on Niihau. The aircraft was further damaged on landing. Nishikaichi was helped from the wreckage by one of the native Hawaiians, who, aware of the tension between the United States and Japan, took the pilot's maps and other documents. The island's residents had no telephones or radio and were completely unaware of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Nishikaichi enlisted the support of three Japanese-American residents in an attempt to recover the documents. During the ensuing struggles, Nishikaichi was killed and a Hawaiian civilian was wounded; one collaborator committed suicide, and his wife and the third collaborator were sent to prison.\n\nThe ease with which the local ethnic Japanese residents had apparently gone to the assistance of Nishikaichi was a source of concern for many, and tended to support those who believed that local Japanese could not be trusted. \n\nStrategic implications\n\nAdmiral Hara Tadaichi summed up the Japanese result by saying, \"We won a great tactical victory at Pearl Harbor and thereby lost the war.\" While the attack accomplished its intended objective, it turned out to be largely unnecessary. Unbeknownst to Yamamoto, who conceived the original plan, the U.S. Navy had decided as far back as 1935 to abandon 'charging' across the Pacific towards the Philippines in response to an outbreak of war (in keeping with the evolution of Plan Orange). The U.S. instead adopted \"Plan Dog\" in 1940, which emphasized keeping the IJN out of the eastern Pacific and away from the shipping lanes to Australia, while the U.S. concentrated on defeating Nazi Germany. \n\nFortunately for the United States, the American aircraft carriers were untouched by the Japanese attack; otherwise the Pacific Fleet's ability to conduct offensive operations would have been crippled for a year or more (given no diversions from the Atlantic Fleet). As it was, the elimination of the battleships left the U.S. Navy with no choice but to rely on its aircraft carriers and submarines—the very weapons with which the U.S. Navy halted and eventually reversed the Japanese advance. While six of the eight battleships were repaired and returned to service, their relatively low speed and high fuel consumption limited their deployment, and they served mainly in shore bombardment roles (their only major action being the Battle of Surigao Strait). A major flaw of Japanese strategic thinking was a belief that the ultimate Pacific battle would be fought by battleships, in keeping with the doctrine of Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan. As a result, Yamamoto (and his successors) hoarded battleships for a \"decisive battle\" that never happened. \n\nThe Japanese confidence in their ability to achieve a short, victorious war meant that they neglected Pearl Harbor's navy repair yards, oil tank farms, submarine base, and old headquarters building. All of these targets were omitted from Genda's list, yet they proved more important than any battleship to the American war efforts in the Pacific. The survival of the repair shops and fuel depots allowed Pearl Harbor to maintain logistical support to the U.S. Navy's operations, such as the Battles of Coral Sea and Midway. It was submarines that immobilized the Imperial Japanese Navy's heavy ships and brought Japan's economy to a virtual standstill by crippling the transportation of oil and raw materials: by the end of 1942, import of raw materials was cut to half of what it had been, \"to a disastrous ten million tons\", while oil import \"was almost completely stopped\". Lastly, the basement of the Old Administration Building was the home of the cryptanalytic unit which contributed significantly to the Midway ambush and the Submarine Force's success. \n\nPresent day\n\n \nToday, the USS Arizona Memorial on the island of Oahu honors the dead. Visitors to the memorial reach it via boats from the naval base at Pearl Harbor. The memorial was designed by Alfred Preis, and has a sagging center but strong and vigorous ends, expressing \"initial defeat and ultimate victory\". It commemorates all lives lost on December 7, 1941. Although December 7 is known as Pearl Harbor Day, it is not a federal holiday in the United States. The nation does however pay homage remembering the thousands injured and killed when attacked by the Japanese in 1941. Ceremonies are held annually at Pearl Harbor itself, attended each year by some of the ever-dwindling number of elderly veterans who were there on the morning of the attack. Schools and other establishments in some places around the country lower the American flag to half-staff out of respect. The naval vessel where the war ended on September 2, 1945—the last U.S. Navy battleship ever built, —is now a museum ship moored in Pearl Harbor, with its bow barely 1,000 feet (300 meters) southwest of the Arizona memorial.\n\nMedia\n\nFilms set at or around the bombing of Pearl Harbor include:\n* Remember Pearl Harbor (1942) A Republic Pictures B-movie, starring Don \"Red\" Barry, one of the first motion pictures to respond to the events. (Online version requires subscription.)\n* Air Force, a 1943 propaganda film depicting the fate of the crew of the Mary-Ann, one of the B-17 Flying Fortress bombers that fly into Hickam Field during the attack.\n* December 7th, directed by John Ford for the U.S. Navy in 1943, is a film that recreates the attacks of the Japanese forces. CNN mistakenly ran footage of this as actual attack footage during an entertainment news report in 2003. One film historian believes two documentaries a decade earlier did also. \n* From Here to Eternity (1953), an adaptation of the James Jones novel set in Hawaii on the eve of the attack.\n* In Harm's Way (1965), director Otto Preminger's adaptation of the James Bassett novel, which opens on December 6, 1941, in Hawaii, and depicts the attack from the point of view of the men of a ship able to leave the harbor.\n* Storm Over the Pacific, also known as Hawai Middouei daikaikusen: Taiheiyo no arashi (Hawaii-Midway Battle of the Sea and Sky: Storm in the Pacific Ocean) and I Bombed Pearl Harbor (1961), produced by the Japanese studio Toho Company and starring Toshiro Mifune, tells the story of Japanese airmen who served in the Pearl Harbor Raid and the Battle of Midway. An edited version dubbed into English as I Bombed Pearl Harbor was given U.S. release in 1961.\n* The Time Tunnel, TV series; Season 1, Episode 4: The Day the Sky Fell In (1966). \n* Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970), a Japan-U.S. coproduction about the attack is \"meticulous\" in its approach to dissecting the situation leading up to the bombing. It depicts the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor from both American and Japanese points of view, with scrupulous attention to historical fact, including the U.S. use of Magic cryptanalysis.\n* Pearl (1978), a TV miniseries, written by Stirling Silliphant, about events leading up to the attack.\n* 1941 (1979), director Steven Spielberg comedy about a panicked Los Angeles immediately after the attack.\n* The Winds of War, a novel by American writer Herman Wouk, was written between 1963 and 1971. The novel finishes in December 1941 with the aftermath of the attack. The TV miniseries based on the book was produced by Dan Curtis, airing in 1984. It starred Robert Mitchum and Ali MacGraw, with Ralph Bellamy as President Roosevelt.\n* Pearl Harbor (2001), directed by Michael Bay, a love story set amidst the lead up to the attack and its aftermath.\n\nNon-fiction/historical\n\n* The Attack on Pearl Harbor: An Illustrated History by Larry Kimmett and Margaret Regis is a careful recreation of the \"Day of Infamy\" using maps, photos, unique illustrations, and an animated CD. From the early stages of Japanese planning, through the attack on Battleship Row, to the salvage of the U.S. Pacific fleet, this book provides a detailed overview of the attack.\n* At Dawn We Slept: The Untold Story of Pearl Harbor by Gordon W. Prange is an extremely comprehensive account of the events leading up to the Pearl Harbor attack and is considered by most scholars to be the best single work about the raid. It is a balanced account that gives both the Japanese and American perspectives. Prange spent 37 years researching the book by studying documents about Pearl Harbor and interviewing surviving participants to attempt the most exhaustive account of what happened: the Japanese planning and execution, why U.S. intelligence failed to warn of it, and why a peace agreement was not attained. The book is the first in the so-called \"Prange Trilogy\" of Pearl Harbor books co-written with Donald Goldstein and Katherine Dillon, the other two being:\n** Pearl Harbor: The Verdict of History – a dissection of the various revisionist theories surrounding the attack.\n** December 7, 1941: The Day The Japanese Attacked Pearl Harbor – a recollection of the attack as narrated by eyewitnesses.\n* Day of Infamy by Walter Lord was one of the most popular nonfiction accounts of the attack on Pearl Harbor. \n* Pearl Harbor: Final Judgment by Henry C. Clausen and Bruce Lee tells of Clausen's top-secret investigation of the events leading up to the Pearl Harbor attack. Much of the information in this book was still classified when previous books were published.\n* Pearl Harbor Countdown: Admiral James O. Richardson by Skipper Steely is an insightful and detailed account of the events leading up to the attack. Through his comprehensive treatment of the life and times of Admiral James O. Richardson, Steely explores four decades of American foreign policy, traditional military practice, U.S. intelligence, and the administrative side of the military, exposing the largely untold story of the events leading up to the Japanese attack.\n* Pearl Harbor Papers: Inside the Japanese Plans, released by Goldstein and Dillon in 1993, used materials from Prange's library to further flesh out the Japanese perspective of the attack, including diaries from some officers and ship logs.\n* [https://mises.org/books/pearl_harbor_greaves.pdf Pearl Harbor: The Seeds and Fruits of Infamy] by Percy L. Greaves, Jr. The first part provides a detailed history of pre-war U.S.-Japan relations, documenting the sources of rising tension. The second part suggests that the attack on Pearl Harbor was neither unexpected nor unprovoked.\n* The Last Zero Fighter, released in 2012, uses interviews conducted in Japanese, in Japan, with five Japanese aviators, three of whom participated in the Pearl Harbor strike: Kaname Harada, Haruo Yoshino and Takeshi Maeda. The aviators share their personal experiences (translated into English) in regards to their personal experiences training for and executing the raid on Pearl Harbor. \n\nAlternate history\n\n* The feature-length movie The Final Countdown (1980), in which the nuclear aircraft carrier travels through time to one day before the attack.\n* Days of Infamy is a novel by Harry Turtledove in which the Japanese attack on Hawaii a full-scale invasion (something one of the key planners of the attack, Commander Minoru Genda, wanted but the senior officers realized was impossible). \n* The airstrike and Hawaii-invasion premise of Days of Infamy was earlier used in the first episode of the anime OVA series Konpeki no Kantai.\n* William Sanders wrote the alternate history story \"Billy Mitchell's Overt Act\". In the variant history depicted in the story, Billy Mitchell managed to avoid the court-martial which ended his military career and was still alive and still an active service general in 1941, correctly guessing Japanese intentions." ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "Uss arizona", "U.S.S. Arizona", "USS Arizona" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "uss arizona", "u s s arizona" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "uss arizona", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "USS Arizona" }

{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Flash_freezing.txt" ], "title": [ "Flash freezing" ], "wiki_context": [ "Flash freezing refers to the process in various industries whereby objects are frozen in a few hours by subjecting them to cryogenic temperatures, or in direct contact with liquid nitrogen at .\n\nThe freezing process results in ice crystals formed from intra- and extracellular water, and subsequent crystal growth. Flash freezing is used in the food industry to quickly freeze perishable food items (see frozen food). In this case, food items are subjected to temperatures well below water's melting/freezing point. The freezing speed directly influences the nucleation process and ice crystal size. Decreased growth of the initially formed ice crystals is a result of a high heat removal rate and causes an increased rate of nucleation. Smaller, more ubiquitous ice crystals cause less damage to cell membranes. \n\nFlash freezing techniques are also used to freeze biological samples fast enough that large ice crystals cannot form and damage the sample. This rapid freezing is done by submerging the sample in liquid nitrogen or a mixture of dry ice and ethanol. \n\nA supercooled liquid will stay in a liquid state below the normal freezing point when it has little opportunity for nucleation; that is, if it is pure enough and has a smooth enough container. Once agitated it will rapidly become a solid.\n\nAmerican inventor Clarence Birdseye developed the quick-freezing process of food preservation in the 20th century. \n\nThis process was further developed by American inventor Daniel Tippmann by producing a vacuum and drawing the cold air through palletized food. His process has been sold and installed under the trade name \"QuickFreeze\" and enables blast freezing of palletized food in 35% less time than conventional blast freezing." ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "Clarence Frank Birdseye", "Birdseye Frozen Foods", "Clarence Birdseye" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "clarence frank birdseye", "birdseye frozen foods", "clarence birdseye" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "clarence birdseye", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "Clarence Birdseye" }

{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Myth.txt", "Oyster.txt" ], "title": [ "Myth", "Oyster" ], "wiki_context": [ "A myth is a traditional or legendary story, collection or study. It is derived from the Greek word mythos (μῦθος), which simply means \"story\". Mythology can refer either to the study of myths, or to a body or collection of myths. A myth also can be a story to explain why something exists.\n\nHuman cultures usually include a cosmogonical or creation myth, concerning the origins of the world, or how the world came to exist. The active beings in myths are generally gods and goddesses, heroes and heroines, or animals and plants. Most myths are set in a timeless past before recorded time or beginning of the critical history. A myth can be a story involving symbols that are capable of multiple meanings. \n\nA myth is a sacred narrative because it holds religious or spiritual significance for those who tell it. Myths also contribute to and express a culture's systems of thought and values. \n\nAcademic usage \n\nThe term is common in the academic fields of mythology, [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/mythography?s=t mythography] or folkloristics. Use of the term by scholars has no implication for the truth or falsity of the myth. While popular usage interchangeably employs the terms legend, fiction, fairy tale, folklore, fable and urban legend, each has a distinct meaning in academia.\n\nPopular usage \n\nIn popular use, a myth can be a collectively held belief that has no basis in fact. This usage, which is often pejorative, arose from labeling the religious myths and beliefs of other cultures as incorrect, but it has spread to cover non-religious beliefs as well. Because of this popular and subjective word usage, many people take offense when the narratives they believe to be true are called myths. \n\nTo the source culture a myth by definition is \"true\", in that it embodies beliefs, concepts and ways of questioning to make sense of the world.", "The word oyster is used as a common name for a number of different families of saltwater clams, bivalve molluscs that live in marine or brackish habitats. In some species the valves are highly calcified, and many are somewhat irregular in shape. Many, but not all, oysters are in the superfamily Ostreoidea.\n\nSome kinds of oysters are commonly consumed by humans, cooked or raw, the latter being a delicacy. Some kinds of pearl oysters are harvested for the pearl produced within the mantle. Windowpane oysters are harvested for their translucent shells, which are used to make various kinds of decorative objects.\n\nEtymology\n\nFirst attested in English during the 14th century, the word \"oyster\" comes from Old French oistre, in turn from Latin ostrea, the feminine form of ostreum, which is the latinisation of the Greek ὄστρεον (ostreon), \"oyster\". Compare ὀστέον (osteon), \"bone\". \n\nTypes\n\nTrue oysters\n\nTrue oysters are members of the family Ostreidae. This family includes the edible oysters, which mainly belong to the genera Ostrea, Crassostrea, Ostreola, and Saccostrea. Examples include the Belon oyster, eastern oyster, Olympia oyster, Pacific oyster, and the Sydney rock oyster.\n\nPearl oysters\n\nAlmost all shell-bearing mollusks can secrete pearls, yet most are not very valuable.\n\nPearl oysters are not closely related to true oysters, being members of a distinct family, the feathered oysters (Pteriidae). Both cultured pearls and natural pearls can be extracted from pearl oysters, though other molluscs, such as the freshwater mussels, also yield pearls of commercial value.\n\nThe largest pearl-bearing oyster is the marine Pinctada maxima, which is roughly the size of a dinner plate. Not all individual oysters produce pearls naturally. In fact, in a harvest of two and a half tons of oysters, only three to four oysters produce what commercial buyers consider to be absolute perfect pearls.\n\nIn nature, pearl oysters produce pearls by covering a minute invasive object with nacre. Over the years, the irritating object is covered with enough layers of nacre to become a pearl. The many different types, colours and shapes of pearls depend on the natural pigment of the nacre, and the shape of the original irritant.\n\nPearl farmers can culture a pearl by placing a nucleus, usually a piece of polished mussel shell, inside the oyster. In three to seven years, the oyster can produce a perfect pearl. These pearls are not as valuable as natural pearls, but look exactly the same. In fact, since the beginning of the 20th century, when several researchers discovered how to produce artificial pearls, the cultured pearl market has far outgrown the natural pearl market.\n\nOther types of oysters\n\nA number of bivalve molluscs (other than true oysters and pearl oysters) also have common names that include the word \"oyster\", usually because they either taste like or look somewhat like true oysters, or because they yield noticeable pearls. Examples include:\n\n*Thorny oysters in the genus Spondylus\n*Pilgrim oyster, another term for a scallop, in reference to the scallop shell of St. James\n*Saddle oysters, members of the Anomiidae family also known as jingle shells\n*Dimydarian oysters, members of the family Dimyidae\n*Windowpane oysters\n\nFile:Crassostrea_gigas_p1040847.jpg|Crassostrea gigas\nFile:Ostrea edulis Marennes p1050142.jpg|Crassostrea gigas, opened\n\nIn the Philippines, a local thorny oyster species known as Tikod Amo is a favorite seafood source in the southern part of the country. Because of its good flavor, it commands high prices.\n\nAnatomy\n\nOysters are filter feeders, drawing water in over their gills through the beating of cilia. Suspended plankton and particles are trapped in the mucus of a gill, and from there are transported to the mouth, where they are eaten, digested, and expelled as feces or pseudofeces. Oysters feed most actively at temperatures above 10 °C. An oyster can filter up to 5 L of water per hour. The Chesapeake Bay's once-flourishing oyster population historically filtered excess nutrients from the estuary's entire water volume every three to four days. Today, that would take nearly a year. Excess sediment, nutrients, and algae can result in the eutrophication of a body of water. Oyster filtration can mitigate these pollutants.\n\nIn addition to their gills, oysters can also exchange gases across their mantles, which are lined with many small, thin-walled blood vessels. A small, three-chambered heart, lying under the adductor muscle, pumps colorless blood to all parts of the body. At the same time, two kidneys, located on the underside of the muscle, remove waste products from the blood. Their nervous system includes two pairs of nerve cords and three pairs of ganglia.\n\nWhile some oysters have two sexes (European oyster and Olympia oyster), their reproductive organs contain both eggs and sperm. Because of this, it is technically possible for an oyster to fertilize its own eggs. The gonads surround the digestive organs, and are made up of sex cells, branching tubules, and connective tissue.\n\nOnce the female is fertilized, she discharges millions of eggs into the water. The larvae develop in about six hours and exist suspended in the water column as veliger larvae for two to three weeks before settling on a bed and maturing to sexual adulthood within a year.\n\nHabitat and behaviour\n\nA group of oysters is commonly called a bed or oyster reef.\n\nAs a keystone species, oysters provide habitat for many marine species.\nCrassostrea and Saccostrea live mainly in the intertidal zone, while Ostrea is subtidal. The hard surfaces of oyster shells and the nooks between the shells provide places where a host of small animals can live. Hundreds of animals, such as sea anemones, barnacles, and hooked mussels, inhabit oyster reefs. Many of these animals are prey to larger animals, including fish, such as striped bass, black drum and croakers.\n\nAn oyster reef can increase the surface area of a flat bottom 50-fold. An oyster's mature shape often depends on the type of bottom to which it is originally attached, but it always orients itself with its outer, flared shell tilted upward. One valve is cupped and the other is flat.\n\nOysters usually reach maturity in one year. They are protandric; during their first year, they spawn as males by releasing sperm into the water. As they grow over the next two or three years and develop greater energy reserves, they spawn as females by releasing eggs. Bay oysters usually spawn from the end of June until mid-August. An increase in water temperature prompts a few oysters to spawn. This triggers spawning in the rest, clouding the water with millions of eggs and sperm. A single female oyster can produce up to 100 million eggs annually. The eggs become fertilized in the water and develop into larvae, which eventually find suitable sites, such as another oyster's shell, on which to settle. Attached oyster larvae are called spat. Spat are oysters less than 25 mm long. Many species of bivalves, oysters included, seem to be stimulated to settle near adult conspecifics.\n\nOysters are considered to filter large amounts of water to feed and breathe (exchange O2 and CO2 with water) but they are not permanently open. They regularly shut their valves to enter a resting state, even when they are permanently submersed. In fact their behavior follows very strict circatidal and circadian rhythms according to the relative moon and sun positions. During neap tides, they exhibit much longer closing periods than during the spring tide The website [http://molluscan-eye.epoc.u-bordeaux1.fr/index.php?rubriqueaccueil&lang\nen MolluSCAN eye] is largely devoted to the online study of their daily valve behavior in Europe (France).\n\nSome tropical oysters, such as the mangrove oyster in the family Ostreidae, grow best on mangrove roots. Low tide can expose them, making them easy to collect. In Trinidad in the West Indies, tourists are often astounded when they are told, in the Caribbean, \"oysters grow on trees\".\n\nThe largest oyster-producing body of water in the United States is Chesapeake Bay, although these beds have decreased in number due to overfishing and pollution. Willapa Bay in Washington produces more oysters than any other estuary in the US.[http://depts.washington.edu/jlrlab/aboutthebay.php Ruesink Lab - About the Bay] Other large oyster farming areas in the US include the bays and estuaries along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico from Apalachicola, Florida in the east to Galveston, Texas in the west. Large beds of edible oysters are also found in Japan and Australia. In 2005, China accounted for 80% of the global oyster harvest. Within Europe, France remained the industry leader.\n\nCommon oyster predators include crabs, seabirds, starfish, and humans. Some oysters contain live crabs, known as oyster crabs.\n\nNutrient cycling\n\nBivalves, including oysters, are effective filter feeders and can have large effects on the water columns in which they occur. As filter feeders, oysters remove plankton and organic particles from the water column. Multiple studies have shown individual oysters are capable of filtering up to 50 gallons of water per day, and thus oyster reefs can significantly improve water quality and clarity. Oysters consume nitrogen-containing compounds (nitrates and ammonia), phosphates, plankton, detritus, bacteria, and dissolved organic matter, removing them from the water. What is not used for animal growth is then expelled as solid waste pellets, which eventually decompose into the atmosphere as nitrogen. In Maryland, the Chesapeake Bay Program plans to use oysters to reduce the amount of nitrogen compounds entering the Chesapeake Bay by 8600 MT per year by 2010. Several studies have shown that oysters and mussels have the capacity to dramatically alter nitrogen levels in estuaries. In the U.S., Delaware is the only East Coast state without aquaculture, but making aquaculture a state-controlled industry of leasing water by the acre for commercial harvesting of shellfish is being considered. Supporters of Delaware's legislation to allow oyster aquaculture cite revenue, job creation, and nutrient cycling benefits. It is estimated that one acre can produce nearly 750,000 oysters, which could filter between 57000 to of water daily. Also see nutrient pollution for an extended explanation of nutrient remediation.\n\nEcosystem services\n\nAs an ecosystem engineer oysters provide \"supporting\" ecosystem services, along with \"provisioning\", \"regulating\" and \"cultural\" services. Oysters influence nutrient cycling, water filtration, habitat structure, biodiversity, and food web dynamics. Oyster feeding and nutrient cycling activities could \"rebalance\" shallow, coastal ecosystems if restoration of historic populations could be achieved.Wikfors, Gary H. 2011. Trophic interactions between phytoplankton and bivalve aquaculture. In, Shellfish Aquaculture and the Environment. Ed: S.E. Shumway. John Wiley & Sons. Furthermore, assimilation of nitrogen and phosphorus into shellfish tissues provides an opportunity to remove these nutrients from the environment, but this benefit has only recently been recognized. In California's Tomales Bay, native oyster presence is associated with higher species diversity of benthic invertebrates but other ecosystem services have not been studied. As the ecological and economic importance of oyster reefs has become more widely acknowledged, creation of oyster reef habitat through restoration efforts has become more important- often with the goal of restoring multiple ecosystem services associated with natural oyster reefs. \n\nHuman history\n\nMiddens testify to the prehistoric importance of oysters as food, with some middens in New South Wales, Australia dated at ten thousand years. They have been cultivated in Japan from at least 2000 BC. In the United Kingdom, the town of Whitstable is noted for oyster farming from beds on the Kentish Flats that have been used since Roman times. The borough of Colchester holds an annual Oyster Feast each October, at which \"Colchester Natives\" (the native oyster, Ostrea edulis) are consumed. The United Kingdom hosts several other annual oyster festivals, for example Woburn Oyster Festival is held in September. Many breweries produce Oyster Stout, a beer intended to be drunk with oysters that sometimes includes oysters in the brewing process.\n\nThe French seaside resort of Cancale in Brittany is noted for its oysters, which also date from Roman times. Sergius Orata of the Roman Republic is considered the first major merchant and cultivator of oysters. Using his considerable knowledge of hydraulics, he built a sophisticated cultivation system, including channels and locks, to control the tides. He was so famous for this, the Romans used to say he could breed oysters on the roof of his house. \n\nIn the early 19th century, oysters were cheap and mainly eaten by the working class. Throughout the 19th century, oyster beds in New York Harbor became the largest source of oysters worldwide. On any day in the late 19th century, six million oysters could be found on barges tied up along the city's waterfront. They were naturally quite popular in New York City, and helped initiate the city's restaurant trade. New York's oystermen became skilled cultivators of their beds, which provided employment for hundreds of workers and nutritious food for thousands. Eventually, rising demand exhausted many of the beds. To increase production, they introduced foreign species, which brought disease; effluent and increasing sedimentation from erosion destroyed most of the beds by the early 20th century. Oysters' popularity has put ever-increasing demands on wild oyster stocks. This scarcity increased prices, converting them from their original role as working-class food to their current status as an expensive delicacy.\n\nIn the United Kingdom, the native variety (Ostrea edulis) requires five years to mature and is protected by an Act of Parliament during the May to August spawning season. The current market is dominated by the larger Pacific oyster and rock oyster varieties which are farmed year round.\n\nFishing from the wild\n\nOysters are harvested by simply gathering them from their beds. In very shallow waters, they can be gathered by hand or with small rakes. In somewhat deeper water, long-handled rakes or oyster tongs are used to reach the beds. Patent tongs can be lowered on a line to reach beds that are too deep to reach directly. In all cases, the task is the same: the oysterman scrapes oysters into a pile, and then scoops them up with the rake or tongs.\n\nIn some areas, a scallop dredge is used. This is a toothed bar attached to a chain bag. The dredge is towed through an oyster bed by a boat, picking up the oysters in its path. While dredges collect oysters more quickly, they heavily damage the beds, and their use is highly restricted. Until 1965, Maryland limited dredging to sailboats, and even since then motor boats can be used only on certain days of the week. These regulations prompted the development of specialized sailboats (the bugeye and later the skipjack) for dredging.\n\nSimilar laws were enacted in Connecticut before World War I and lasted until 1969. The laws restricted the harvesting of oysters in state-owned beds to vessels under sail. These laws prompted the construction of the oyster sloop-style vessel to last well into the 20th century. Hope is believed to be the last-built Connecticut oyster sloop, completed in 1948.\n\nOysters can also be collected by divers.\n\nIn any case, when the oysters are collected, they are sorted to eliminate dead animals, bycatch (unwanted catch), and debris. Then they are taken to market, where they are either canned or sold live.\n\nCultivating oysters\n\nOysters have been cultured for well over a century. The Pacific oyster (Crassostrea gigas) is presently the most widely grown bivalve around the world.[http://www.fao.org/fishery/species/3514/en FAO Fisheries & Aquaculture - Aquatic species] Two methods are commonly used, release and bagging. In both cases, oysters are cultivated onshore to the size of spat, when they can attach themselves to a substrate. They may be allowed to mature further to form 'seed oysters'. In either case, they are then placed in the water to mature. The release technique involves distributing the spat throughout existing oyster beds, allowing them to mature naturally to be collected like wild oysters. Bagging has the cultivator putting spat in racks or bags and keeping them above the bottom. Harvesting involves simply lifting the bags or rack to the surface and removing the mature oysters. The latter method prevents losses to some predators, but is more expensive. \n\nThe Pacific or Japanese oyster, Crassostrea gigas, has been grown in the outflow of mariculture ponds. When fish or prawns are grown in ponds, it takes typically 10 kg of feed to produce 1 kg of product (dry-dry basis). The other 9 kg goes into the pond and after mineralization, provides food for phytoplankton, which in turn feeds the oyster.\n\nTo prevent spawning, sterile oysters are now cultured by crossbreeding tetraploid and diploid oysters. The resulting triploid oyster cannot propagate, which prevents introduced oysters from spreading into unwanted habitats. \n\nRestoration and recovery\n\nIn many areas, non-native oysters have been introduced in attempts to prop up failing harvests of native varieties. For example, the eastern oyster (Crassostrea virginica) was introduced to California waters in 1875, while the Pacific oyster was introduced there in 1929. Proposals for further such introductions remain controversial.\n\nThe Pacific oyster prospered in Pendrell Sound, where the surface water is typically warm enough for spawning in the summer. Over the following years, spat spread out sporadically and populated adjacent areas. Eventually, possibly following adaptation to the local conditions, the Pacific oyster spread up and down the coast and now is the basis of the North American west coast oyster industry. Pendrell Sound is now a reserve that supplies spat for cultivation. \nNear the mouth of the Great Wicomico River in the Chesapeake Bay, five-year-old artificial reefs now harbor more than 180 million native Crassostrea virginica. That is far lower than in the late 1880s, when the bay's population was in the billions, and watermen harvested about 910000 m3 annually. The 2009 harvest was less than 7300 m3. Researchers claim the keys to the project were:\n* using waste oyster shells to elevate the reef floor 25 - to keep the spat free of bottom sediments\n* building larger reefs, ranging up to in size\n* disease-resistant broodstock\n\nThe \"oyster-tecture\" movement promotes the use of oyster reefs for water purification and wave attenuation. An oyster-tecture project has been implemented at Withers Estuary, Withers Swash, South Carolina, by Neil Chambers-led volunteers, at a site where pollution was affecting beach tourism. Currently, for the installation cost of $3000, roughly 4.8 million liters of water are being filtered daily. In New Jersey, however, the Department of Environmental Protection refused to allow oysters as a filtering system in Sandy Hook Bay and the Raritan Bay, citing worries that commercial shellfish growers would be at risk and that members of the public might disregard warnings and consume tainted oysters. New Jersey Baykeepers responded by changing their strategy for utilizing oysters to clean up the waterway, by partnering with Naval Weapons Station Earle. The Navy station is under 24/7 security and therefore eliminates any poaching and associated human health risk.[http://www.nynjbaykeeper.org/index.php?optioncom_content&view\narticle&id61&Itemid\n68 Welcome to BayKeeper] Oyster-tecture projects have been proposed to protect coastal cities, such as New York, from the threat of rising sea levels due to climate change. \n\nDepuration\n\nDepuration of oysters is a common industry practice and widely researched in the scientific community but is not commonly known by end consumers. The main objective of seafood depuration is to remove fecal contamination in seafood before being sold to end consumers. Oyster depuration is useful since they are generally eaten raw and in many countries, the requirement to process is government-regulated or mandatory. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) formally recognizes depuration and has published detailed documents on the process, whereas the Codex Alimentarius, encourages the application of seafood depuration. \n\nOyster depuration begins after the harvest of oysters from farmed locations. The oysters are transported and placed into tanks pumped with clean water for periods of 48 to 72 hours. The holding temperatures and salinity vary according to species. The seawater that the oysters were originally farmed in does not remain in the oyster, since the water used for depuration must be fully sterilized, plus the depuration facility would not necessarily be located near the farming location. Depuration of oysters can remove moderate levels of contamination of most bacterial indicators and pathogens. Well-known contaminants include Vibrio parahaemolyticus which is a bacterium found in seawater animals that is temperature sensitive, and Escherichia coli which is a bacterium found in coastal waters near highly populated cities having sewage systems discharging waste nearby, or from agricultural discharges. Depuration expands beyond oysters into many shellfish and other related products, especially in seafood that is known to come from potentially polluted areas; depurated seafood is effectively a product cleansed from inside-out to make it safe for human consumption.\n\nAs food\n\nJonathan Swift is quoted as having said, \"He was a bold man that first ate an oyster\", but evidence of oyster consumption goes back into prehistory, evidenced by oyster middens found worldwide. Oysters were an important food source in all coastal areas where they could be found, and oyster fisheries were an important industry where they were plentiful. Overfishing and pressure from diseases and pollution have sharply reduced supplies, but they remain a popular treat celebrated in oyster festivals in many cities and towns.\n\nIt was once assumed that oysters were only safe to eat in months with the letter 'r' in their English and French names. This myth is based in truth, in that in the Northern Hemisphere, oysters are much more likely to spoil in the warmer months of May, June, July, and August. In recent years, pathogens such as Vibrio parahaemolyticus have caused outbreaks in several harvesting areas of the eastern United States during the summer months, lending further credence to this belief.\n\nNutrition\n\nOysters are an excellent source of zinc, iron, calcium, and selenium, as well as vitamin A and vitamin B12. Oysters are low in food energy; one dozen raw oysters contains 110 kcal. They are rich in protein (approximately 9g in 100g of pacific oysters). \n\nTraditionally, oysters are considered to be an aphrodisiac, partially because they resemble female sex organs. A team of American and Italian researchers analyzed bivalves and found they were rich in amino acids that trigger increased levels of sex hormones. Their high zinc content aids the production of testosterone.\n\nDietary supplements may contain calcium carbonate from oyster shells, though no evidence shows this offers any benefits beyond what calcium may offer.\n\nSelection, preparation and storage\n\nUnlike most shellfish, oysters can have a fairly long shelf life of up to four weeks. However, their taste becomes less pleasant as they age. Oysters should be refrigerated out of water, not frozen, and in 100% humidity. Oysters stored in water under refrigeration will open, consume available oxygen, and die. Oysters must be eaten alive, or cooked alive. The shells of live oysters are usually tightly closed or snap shut given a slight tap. If the shell is open, the oyster is dead, and cannot be eaten safely. Cooking oysters in the shell kills the oysters and causes them to open by themselves. Traditionally, oysters that do not open have been assumed to be dead before cooking and therefore unsafe. However, according to at least one marine biologist, Nick Ruello, this advice may have arisen from an old, poorly researched cookbook's advice regarding mussels, which has now become an assumed truism for all shellfish. Ruello found 11.5% of all mussels failed to open during cooking, but when forced open, 100% were \"both adequately cooked and safe to eat.\" \n\nOysters can be eaten on the half shell, raw, smoked, boiled, baked, fried, roasted, stewed, canned, pickled, steamed, or broiled, or used in a variety of drinks. Eating can be as simple as opening the shell and eating the contents, including juice. Butter and salt are often added. In the case of oysters Rockefeller, preparation can be very elaborate. They are sometimes served on edible seaweed, such as brown algae.\n\nCare should be taken when consuming oysters. Purists insist on eating them raw, with no dressing save perhaps lemon juice, vinegar (most commonly shallot vinegar), or cocktail sauce. Upscale restaurants pair raw oysters with a home-made Mignonette sauce, which consists primarily of fresh chopped shallot, mixed peppercorn, dry white wine and lemon juice or sherry vinegar. Like fine wine, raw oysters have complex flavors that vary greatly among varieties and regions: salty, briny, buttery, metallic, or even fruity. The texture is soft and fleshy, but crisp on the palate. North American varieties include: Kumamoto and Yaquina Bay from Oregon, Duxbury and Wellfleet from Cape Cod, Massachusetts, Malpeque from Prince Edward Island, Canada, Blue Point from Long Island, New York, Pemaquid from Maine, and Cape May oysters from New Jersey. Variations in water salinity, alkalinity, and mineral/nutritional content influence their flavor profile.\n\nOysters can contain harmful bacteria. Oysters are filter feeders, so will naturally concentrate anything present in the surrounding water. Oysters from the Gulf Coast of the United States, for example, contain high bacterial loads of human pathogens in the warm months, most notably Vibrio vulnificus and Vibrio parahaemolyticus. In these cases, the main danger is for immunocompromised individuals, who are unable to fight off infection and can succumb to septicemia, leading to death. Vibrio vulnificus is the most deadly seafood-borne pathogen.\n\nOpening oysters\n\nFresh oysters must be alive just before consumption or cooking. There is only one criterion: the oyster must be capable of tightly closing its shell. Open oysters should be tapped on the shell; a live oyster will close up and is safe to eat. Oysters which are open and unresponsive are dead and must be discarded. Some dead oysters, or oyster shells which are full of sand may be closed. These make a distinctive noise when tapped, and are known as 'clackers'.\n\nOpening oysters, referred to as oyster-shucking, requires skill. The preferred method is to use a special knife (called an oyster knife, a variant of a shucking knife), with a short and thick blade about 5 cm long.\n\nWhile different methods are used to open an oyster (which sometimes depend on the type), the following is one commonly accepted oyster-shucking method. \n*Insert the blade, with moderate force and vibration if necessary, at the hinge between the two valves. \n*Twist the blade until there is a slight pop.\n*Slide the blade upward to cut the adductor muscle which holds the shell closed.\n\nInexperienced shuckers can apply too much force, which can result in injury if the blade slips. Heavy gloves are necessary; apart from the knife, the shell itself can be razor sharp. Professional shuckers require fewer than three seconds to open the shell.\n\nIf the oyster has a particularly soft shell, the knife can be inserted instead in the 'sidedoor', about halfway along one side where the oyster lips widen with a slight indentation.\n\nOpening or \"shucking\" oysters has become a competitive sport. Oyster-shucking competitions are staged around the world. Widely acknowledged to be the premiere event, the Guinness World Oyster Opening Championship is held in September at the Galway Oyster Festival. The annual Clarenbridge Oyster Festival 'Oyster Opening Competition' is also held in Galway, Ireland.\n\nDiseases\n\nOysters are subject to various diseases which can reduce harvests and severely deplete local populations. Disease control focuses on containing infections and breeding resistant strains, and is the subject of much ongoing research.\n\n*\"Dermo\" is caused by a protozoan parasite (Perkinsus marinus). It is a prevalent pathogen, causes massive mortality, and poses a significant economic threat to the oyster industry. The disease is not a direct threat to humans consuming infected oysters. Dermo first appeared in the Gulf of Mexico in the 1950s, and until 1978 was believed to be caused by a fungus. While it is most serious in warmer waters, it has gradually spread up the east coast of the United States. \n\n* Multinucleated sphere X (MSX) is caused by the protozoan Haplosporidium nelsoni, generally seen as a multinucleated Plasmodium. It is infectious and causes heavy mortality in the eastern oyster; survivors, however, develop resistance and can help propagate resistant populations. MSX is associated with high salinity and water temperatures. MSX was first noted in Delaware Bay in 1957, and is now found all up and down the East Coast of the United States. Evidence suggests it was brought to the US when Crassostrea gigas, a Japanese oyster variety, was introduced to Delaware Bay.\n\nSome oysters also harbor bacterial species which can cause human disease; of importance is Vibrio vulnificus, which causes gastroenteritis, which is usually self-limiting, and cellulitis. Cellulitis can be so severe and rapidly spreading, often it requires amputation. It is usually acquired when the contents of the oyster come in contact with a cut skin lesion, as when shucking an oyster." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "Barney_&_Friends.txt" ], "title": [ "Barney & Friends" ], "wiki_context": [ "Barney & Friends is an American children's television series aimed at children from ages 1 to 8, created by Sheryl Leach and produced by HIT Entertainment. It premiered on PBS Kids on April 6, 1992. The series features the title character Barney, a purple anthropomorphic tyrannosaurus rex who conveys educational messages through songs and small dance routines with a friendly, optimistic attitude. Production of new episodes originally ceased on September 18, 2009, although reruns of the series were still shown on several PBS stations in following years. From 2005 until 2015, reruns aired on Sprout. A revival of the series is set for a 2017 launch. \n\nOrigin and development\n\nBarney was created in 1987 by Sheryl Leach of Dallas, Texas. She came up with the idea for the program while considering TV shows that she felt would be educational and appeal to her son. Leach then brought together a team who created a series of home videos, Barney and the Backyard Gang, which also starred actress Sandy Duncan in the first three videos. Later, Barney was joined by the characters Baby Bop, B.J., and Riff.\n\nOne day in 1991, the daughter of Connecticut Public Television executive Larry Rifkin rented one of the videos and was mesmerized by it. Rifkin thought the concept could potentially be developed for PBS. Rifkin thought Barney had appeal because he wasn't nearly as neurotic as Big Bird. He pitched it to CPTV president Jerry Franklin, whose preschool son also fell in love with it. Franklin and Rifkin pitched the idea to all of their colleagues with preschoolers, and they all agreed that kids would love a potential Barney show. Franklin and Rifkin convinced Leach to let CPTV revamp the concept for television. The show debuted as Barney & Friends in 1992. The series was produced by CPTV and Lyrick Studios (bought by HIT Entertainment). \n\nAlthough the show was a runaway hit, PBS initially opted not to provide funding beyond the initial 30-episode run. When CPTV executives learned this, they wrote letters to their fellow PBS member stations urging them to get PBS to reconsider. The Lyons Group, meanwhile, sent out notices through the Barney Fan Club, telling parents to write letters and make phone calls to their local PBS stations to show their support for Barney & Friends. By the time of the yearly member stations' meeting, station executives across the country were up in arms over the prospect of one of their most popular shows being cancelled. Faced with an atmosphere that Rifkin later described as \"like an insurrection,\" PBS ultimately relented.\n\nFor several years, the show was taped at the Color Dynamics Studios facility at Greenville Avenue & Bethany Drive in Allen, Texas, after which it moved to The Studios at Las Colinas in Irving, Texas, and then Carrollton, a suburb of Dallas. The TV series and videos are currently distributed by HIT Entertainment and Lionsgate, while the TV series was produced by WNET from 2006 to 2009. Sheryl Leach left the show in 1998 after HIT Entertainment bought Lyrick Studios.\n\nEpisode format\n\nOpening sequence\n\nThe series opens with the theme song (over clips from various episodes) and the title card before it dissolves into the school. The children are seen doing an activity, occasionally relating to the episode's topic. The children imagine something and Barney comes to life from a plush doll, transforming into the \"real\" Barney, how he appears to the children while they're imagining.\n\nMain sequence\n\nHere, the main plot of the episode takes place. Barney and the children learn about the main topic of the episode, with Baby Bop, B.J., or Riff appearing during the episode and numerous songs themed relating to the subject featured in the series. The roles of Baby Bop, B.J., and Riff have grown larger in later seasons and later episodes venture outside of the school to other places within the neighborhood and to other countries around the world in Season 13.\n\nClosing sequence\n\nBarney concludes with \"I Love You\" before he dissolves back into his original stuffed form and winks to the audience. After the children discuss a bit about what they had learned, the sequence cuts to Barney Says where Barney, who is off-screen, narrates what he and his friends had done that day, along with still snapshots from the episode. Then Barney, himself, signs off before the credits roll. In Seasons 3-8, and 12, he later appeared on-screen by saying, \"And remember, I love you,\" and waves goodbye.\n\nCriticism\n\nAlthough several people, including Yale University researchers Dorothy and Jerome Singer, have concluded that episodes contain a great deal of age-appropriate educational material, calling the program a \"model of what preschool television should be\", the program has been criticized for a lack of educational value, as well as being repetitive in nature. \n\nThe show and its content is often cited as a contributing factor to the perceived sense of \"entitlement\" seen in the Millennial generation who grew up watching the show as children. One specific criticism is:\n\"His shows do not assist children in learning to deal with negative feelings and emotions. As one commentator puts it, the real danger from Barney is 'denial: the refusal to recognize the existence of unpleasant realities. For along with his steady diet of giggles and unconditional love, Barney offers our children a one-dimensional world where everyone must be happy and everything must be resolved right away.'\" \n\nBarney & Friends ranked #50 on TV Guide 2002 list of the 50 worst TV shows of all time. The show has also been parodied in many forms. (see Anti-Barney humor)\n\nCharacters and cast\n\nDinosaurs\n\n; \nThe main character is a purple and green Tyrannosaurus rex in stuffed animal likeness, who comes to life through a child's imagination. His theme song is \"Barney Is a Dinosaur,\" which is sung to the tune of \"Yankee Doodle\". Barney often quotes things as being \"Super dee-duper\". Episodes frequently end with the song \"I Love You\", sung to the tune of \"This Old Man\", which happens to be one of Barney's favorite songs. Despite being a carnivorous type dinosaur, Barney likes many different foods such as fruits and vegetables, but his main favorite is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with a glass of milk. He also loves marching bands and parades. He also has a slight northeastern accent.\n; \nA three-year-old green Triceratops. Baby Bop has been on the show since July 29, 1991. She made her debut in the video \"Barney in Concert\". She wears a pink bow and pink ballet slippers, and carries a yellow security blanket. She sings the song \"My Yellow Blankey\" to show how much her security blanket means to her. She likes to eat macaroni and cheese and pizza. She is B.J.'s little sister.\n; \nA seven-year-old yellow Protoceratops, B.J. has been on the show since September 27, 1993. He is Baby Bop's older brother. He sings the song \"B.J.'s Song\" about himself. He wears a red baseball cap and red sneakers. He lost his hat in the episode \"Hats Off to B.J.!\", and sometimes says things to hide his fears (for example, in the episode \"Barney's Halloween Party\", he was shocked by the paper spiders and after learning they were fake, he said \"I knew that, sort of\"). Pickles are his favorite food and he has tried them in various ways, such as on pizza.\n; \nAn orange six-year-old Hadrosaur, who is Baby Bop and B.J.'s cousin. Riff has been on the show since September 6, 2006. He wears green sneakers. His theme music is \"I Hear Music Everywhere.\" Riff loves music and it is in almost everything he does. In the episode \"Barney: Let's Go to the Firehouse\", it was revealed that Riff also likes to invent things; he created a four-sound smoke detector (the first three were different alarm sounds and the final one his own voice). He is shown to have an interest in marching bands and parades.\n\nAdults\n\nThe adults on the show often appear as teachers, storytellers, or other characters.\n\nMultiple appearances\n\nPuppets\n\nA lot of puppets appeared in many seasons. The most notable puppets were:\n\n* Scooter McNutty, a brown squirrel\n* Miss Etta Kette, a purple bird\n* Booker T. Bookworm, an orange worm who has interests in books\n\nChildren\n\nThroughout the series' run, over 100 children have appeared in the series, with most of them from the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. Only a small portion of these actors have made notable appearances in media since their roles, including:\n\n* Selena Gomez: played Gianna from Season 7 to Season 8\n* Demi Lovato: played Angela from Season 7 to Season 8\n* Tory Green: played Sarah in Barney's Colorful World\n* Madison Pettis: played Bridget in Season 10\n* Debby Ryan: played Debby in Season 10\n* Danielle Vega: played Kim from Season 3 to Season 6\n\nMovies and specials\n\n* Barney's Imagination Island (1994)\n* Barney Live in New York City (1994)\n* Barney's Great Adventure (1998) (Theatrical movie, starring Trevor Morgan and Kyla Pratt)\n* Barney's Big Surprise (1998)\n* Barney: Let's Go to the Zoo (2001)\n* Barney's Musical Castle (2001)\n* Barney's Colorful World (2004)\n\nAirings\n\nOther than the United States, the series has aired in Canada, Mexico and Latin America, France, Ireland, Italy, Malaysia, Spain, the United Kingdom, Japan (On English-based DVDs under the name \"\" and on television as simply \"\" ), the Philippines, Turkey, Australia, and New Zealand, among others. Two known co-productions of Barney & Friends have been produced outside of the US. The Israeli co-production ( Hachaverim shel Barney (The Friends of Barney) produced from 1997 to 1999 in Tel Aviv, Israel, was the first of these. Rather than dubbing the original American episodes from Seasons 1–3, the episodes are adapted with a unique set and exclusive child actors. The other co-production was one shot in South Korea from 2001–2003, airing on KBS (under the name \"바니와 친구들\" (Baniwa Chingudeul (Barney and Friends))). This one, however, adapted the first six seasons (including the first three that the Israel co-production did). It was done in a similar manner as the Israel production.\n\nMusic\n\nA majority of the albums of Barney & Friends feature Bob West's voice as the voice of Barney; however, the recent album The Land of Make-Believe has Dean Wendt's voice. Barney's song \"I Love You\" was one of those used by interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba to coerce the detainees. \n\nThe use of the theme song, as a means of inflicting psychological stress, on Iraqi prisoners-of-war, was examined by Jon Ronson in his 2004 book The Men Who Stare At Goats." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Zeus.txt", "Greek_mythology.txt", "Tartarus.txt", "Hades.txt" ], "title": [ "Zeus", "Greek mythology", "Tartarus", "Hades" ], "wiki_context": [ "Zeus (; , Zeús,; Modern , Días) was the sky and thunder god in ancient Greek religion, who ruled as king of the gods of Mount Olympus. His name is cognate with the first element of his Roman equivalent Jupiter.\n\nZeus is the child of Cronus and Rhea, the youngest of his siblings to be born, though sometimes reckoned the eldest as the others required disgorging from Cronus's stomach. In most traditions, he is married to Hera, by whom he is usually said to have fathered Ares, Hebe, and Hephaestus. At the oracle of Dodona, his consort was said to be Dione, by whom the Iliad states that he fathered Aphrodite. Zeus was also infamous for his erotic escapades. These resulted in many godly and heroic offspring, including Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Hermes, Persephone, Dionysus, Perseus, Heracles, Helen of Troy, Minos, and the Muses.\n\nHe was respected as an allfather who was chief of the gods and assigned the others to their roles: \"Even the gods who are not his natural children address him as Father, and all the gods rise in his presence.\" He was equated with many foreign weather gods, permitting Pausanias to observe \"That Zeus is king in heaven is a saying common to all men\". His symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull, and oak. In addition to his Indo-European inheritance, the classical \"cloud-gatherer\" (Greek: , Nephelēgereta) also derives certain iconographic traits from the cultures of the Ancient Near East, such as the scepter. Zeus is frequently depicted by Greek artists in one of two poses: standing, striding forward with a thunderbolt leveled in his raised right hand, or seated in majesty.\n\nName\n\nThe god's name in the nominative is Zeús. It is inflected as follows: vocative: ; accusative: ; genitive: ; dative: . Diogenes Laertius quotes Pherecydes of Syros as spelling the name, . \n\nZeus is the Greek continuation of *Dyeus|, the name of the Proto-Indo-European god of the daytime sky, also called *' (\"Sky Father\"). The god is known under this name in the Rigveda (Vedic Sanskrit Dyaus/Dyaus Pita), Latin (compare Jupiter, from Iuppiter, deriving from the Proto-Indo-European vocative *'), deriving from the root *dyeu- (\"to shine\", and in its many derivatives, \"sky, heaven, god\").\nZeus is the only deity in the Olympic pantheon whose name has such a transparent Indo-European etymology. \n\nThe earliest attested forms of the name are the Mycenaean Greek , di-we and , di-wo, written in the Linear B syllabic script. \n\nPlato, in his Cratylus, gives a folk etymology of Zeus meaning \"cause of life always to all things,\" because of puns between alternate titles of Zeus (Zen and Dia) with the Greek words for life and \"because of.\" This etymology, along with Plato's entire method of deriving etymologies, is not supported by modern scholarship. \n\nZeus in myth\n\nBirth\n\nCronus sired several children by Rhea: Hestia, Demeter, Hera, Hades, and Poseidon, but swallowed them all as soon as they were born, since he had learned from Gaia and Uranus that he was destined to be overthrown by his son as he had previously overthrown Uranus, his own father, an oracle that Rhea heard and wished to avert.\n\nWhen Zeus was about to be born, Rhea sought Gaia to devise a plan to save him, so that Cronus would get his retribution for his acts against Uranus and his own children. Rhea gave birth to Zeus in Crete, handing Cronus a rock wrapped in swaddling clothes, which he promptly swallowed. \n\nInfancy\n\nRhea hid Zeus in a cave on Mount Ida in Crete. According to varying versions of the story:\n# He was then raised by Gaia.\n# He was raised by a goat named Amalthea, while a company of Kouretes— soldiers, or smaller gods— danced, shouted and clashed their spears against their shields so that Cronus would not hear the baby's cry (see cornucopia). According to some versions of this story he was reared by Amalthea in a cave called Dictaeon Andron (Psychro Cave) in Lasithi plateau.\n# He was raised by a nymph named Adamanthea. Since Cronus ruled over the Earth, the heavens and the sea, she hid him by dangling him on a rope from a tree so he was suspended between earth, sea and sky and thus, invisible to his father.\n# He was raised by a nymph named Cynosura. In gratitude, Zeus placed her among the stars.\n# He was raised by Melissa, who nursed him with goat's milk and honey.\n# He was raised by a shepherd family under the promise that their sheep would be saved from wolves.\n\nKing of the gods\n\nAfter reaching manhood, Zeus forced Cronus to disgorge first the stone (which was set down at Pytho under the glens of Parnassus to be a sign to mortal men, the Omphalos) then his siblings in reverse order of swallowing. In some versions, Metis gave Cronus an emetic to force him to disgorge the babies, or Zeus cut Cronus's stomach open. Then Zeus released the brothers of Cronus, the Gigantes, the Hecatonchires and the Cyclopes, from their dungeon in Tartarus, killing their guard, Campe.\n\nAs a token of their appreciation, the Cyclopes gave him thunder and the thunderbolt, or lightning, which had previously been hidden by Gaia. Together, Zeus and his brothers and sisters, along with the Gigantes, Hecatonchires and Cyclopes overthrew Cronus and the other Titans, in the combat called the Titanomachy. The defeated Titans were then cast into a shadowy underworld region known as Tartarus. Atlas, one of the titans that fought against Zeus, was punished by having to hold up the sky.\n\nAfter the battle with the Titans, Zeus shared the world with his elder brothers, Poseidon and Hades, by drawing lots: Zeus got the sky and air, Poseidon the waters, and Hades the world of the dead (the underworld). The ancient Earth, Gaia, could not be claimed; she was left to all three, each according to their capabilities, which explains why Poseidon was the \"earth-shaker\" (the god of earthquakes) and Hades claimed the humans that died (see also Penthus).\n\nGaia resented the way Zeus had treated the Titans, because they were her children. Soon after taking the throne as king of the gods, Zeus had to fight some of Gaia's other children, the monsters Typhon and Echidna. He vanquished Typhon and trapped him under Mount Etna, but left Echidna and her children alive.\n\nZeus and Hera\n\nZeus was brother and consort of Hera. By Hera, Zeus sired Ares, Hebe and Hephaestus, though some accounts say that Hera produced these offspring alone. Some also include Eileithyia and Eris as their daughters. In the section of the Iliad known to scholars as the Deception of Zeus, the two of them are described as having begun their sexual relationship without their parents knowing about it. The conquests of Zeus among nymphs and the mythic mortal progenitors of Hellenic dynasties are famous. Olympian mythography even credits him with unions with Leto, Demeter, Dione and Maia. Among mortals were Semele, Io, Europa and Leda (for more details, see below) and with the young Ganymede (although he was mortal Zeus granted him eternal youth and immortality).\n\nMany myths render Hera as jealous of his amorous conquests and a consistent enemy of Zeus's mistresses and their children by him. For a time, a nymph named Echo had the job of distracting Hera from his affairs by talking incessantly, and when Hera discovered the deception, she cursed Echo to repeat the words of others.\n\nConsorts and children\n\nDivine offspring\n\nSemi-divine/mortal offspring\n\n1The Greeks variously claimed that the Moires/Fates were the daughters of Zeus and the Titaness Themis or of primordial beings like Chaos, Nyx, or Ananke.\n\n2The Charites/Graces were usually considered the daughters of Zeus and Eurynome but they were also said to be daughters of Dionysus and Aphrodite or of Helios and the naiad Aegle.\n\n3Some accounts say that Ares, Hebe and Hephaestus were born parthenogenetically.\n\n4According to one version, Athena is said to be born parthenogenetically.\n\n5Helen was either the daughter of Leda or Nemesis.\n\n6Tyche is usually considered a daughter of Aphrodite and Hermes.\n\nRoles and epithets\n\nZeus played a dominant role, presiding over the Greek Olympian pantheon. He fathered many of the heroes and was featured in many of their local cults. Though the Homeric \"cloud collector\" was the god of the sky and thunder like his Near-Eastern counterparts, he was also the supreme cultural artifact; in some senses, he was the embodiment of Greek religious beliefs and the archetypal Greek deity.\n\nAside from local epithets that simply designated the deity as doing something random at some particular place, the epithets or titles applied to Zeus emphasized different aspects of his wide-ranging authority:\n\n*Zeus Aegiduchos or Aegiochos: Usually taken as Zeus as the bearer of the Aegis, the divine shield with the head of Medusa across it, although others derive it from \"goat\" () and okhē () in reference to Zeus's nurse, the divine goat Amalthea. \n*Zeus Agoraeus: Zeus as patron of the marketplace (agora) and punisher of dishonest traders.\n*Zeus Horkios: Zeus as keeper of oaths. Exposed liars were made to dedicate a votive statue to Zeus, often at the sanctuary at Olympia\n*Zeus Olympios: Zeus as king of the gods and patron of the Panhellenic Games at Olympia\n*Zeus Panhellenios (\"Zeus of All the Greeks\"): worshipped at Aeacus's temple on Aegina\n*Zeus Xenios, Philoxenon, or Hospites: Zeus as the patron of hospitality (xenia) and guests, avenger of wrongs done to strangers\n\nAdditional names and epithets for Zeus are also:\n\n* Apemius: Zeus as the averter of ills\n* Apomyius Zeus as one who dispels flies\n* Astrapios (\"Lightninger\"): Zeus as a weather god\n* Bottiaeus: Worshipped at Antioch \n* Brontios (\"Thunderer\"): Zeus as a weather god\n* Diktaios: Zeus as lord of the Dikte mountain range, worshipped from Mycenaean times on Crete \n* Ithomatas: Worshipped at Mount Ithome in Messenia\n* Zeus Adados: A Hellenization of the Canaanite Hadad and Assyrian Adad, particularly his solar cult at Heliopolis.\n* Zeus Bouleus: Worshipped at Dodona, the earliest oracle, along with Zeus Naos\n* Zeus Georgos (, \"Zeus the Farmer\"): Zeus as god of crops and the harvest, worshipped in Athens\n* Zeus Helioupolites (\"Heliopolite\" or \"Heliopolitan Zeus\"): A Hellenization of the Canaanite Baʿal (probably Hadad) worshipped as a sun god at Heliopolis (modern Baalbek)\n* Zeus Kasios (\"Zeus of Jebel Aqra\"): Worshipped at a site on the Syrian–Turkish border, a Hellenization of the Canaanite mountain and weather god Baal Zephon\n* Zeus Labrandos (\"Zeus of Labraunda\"): Worshiped at Caria, depicted with a double-edged axe (labrys), a Hellenization of the Hurrian weather god Teshub\n*Zeus Meilichios (\"Zeus the Easily-Entreated\"): Worshipped at Athens, a form of the archaic chthonic daimon Meilichios\n* Zeus Naos: Worshipped at Dodona, the earliest oracle, along with Zeus Bouleus\n* Zeus Tallaios (\"Solar Zeus\"): Worshipped on Crete\n\nCults of Zeus\n\nPanhellenic cults\n\nThe major center where all Greeks converged to pay honor to their chief god was Olympia. Their quadrennial festival featured the famous Games. There was also an altar to Zeus made not of stone, but of ash, from the accumulated remains of many centuries' worth of animals sacrificed there.\n\nOutside of the major inter-polis sanctuaries, there were no modes of worshipping Zeus precisely shared across the Greek world. Most of the titles listed below, for instance, could be found at any number of Greek temples from Asia Minor to Sicily. Certain modes of ritual were held in common as well: sacrificing a white animal over a raised altar, for instance.\n\nZeus Velchanos\n\nWith one exception, Greeks were unanimous in recognizing the birthplace of Zeus as Crete. Minoan culture contributed many essentials of ancient Greek religion: \"by a hundred channels the old civilization emptied itself into the new\", Will Durant observed, and Cretan Zeus retained his youthful Minoan features. The local child of the Great Mother, \"a small and inferior deity who took the roles of son and consort\", whose Minoan name the Greeks Hellenized as Velchanos, was in time assumed as an epithet by Zeus, as transpired at many other sites, and he came to be venerated in Crete as Zeus Velchanos (\"boy-Zeus\") often simply the Kouros.\n\nIn Crete, Zeus was worshipped at a number of caves at Knossos, Ida and Palaikastro. In the Hellenistic period a small sanctuary dedicated to Zeus Velchanos was founded at the Hagia Triada site of a long-ruined Minoan palace. Broadly contemporary coins from Phaistos show the form under which he was worshiped: a youth sits among the branches of a tree, with a cockerel on his knees. On other Cretan coins Velchanos is represented as an eagle and in association with a goddess celebrating a mystic marriage. Inscriptions at Gortyn and Lyttos record a Velchania festival, showing that Velchanios was still widely venerated in Hellenistic Crete. \n\nThe stories of Minos and Epimenides suggest that these caves were once used for incubatory divination by kings and priests. The dramatic setting of Plato's Laws is along the pilgrimage-route to one such site, emphasizing archaic Cretan knowledge. On Crete, Zeus was represented in art as a long-haired youth rather than a mature adult, and hymned as ho megas kouros \"the great youth\". Ivory statuettes of the \"Divine Boy\" were unearthed near the Labyrinth at Knossos by Sir Arthur Evans. With the Kouretes, a band of ecstatic armed dancers, he presided over the rigorous military-athletic training and secret rites of the Cretan paideia.\n\nThe myth of the death of Cretan Zeus, localised in numerous mountain sites though only mentioned in a comparatively late source, Callimachus, together with the assertion of Antoninus Liberalis that a fire shone forth annually from the birth-cave the infant shared with a mythic swarm of bees, suggests that Velchanos had been an annual vegetative spirit. \nThe Hellenistic writer Euhemerus apparently proposed a theory that Zeus had actually been a great king of Crete and that posthumously his glory had slowly turned him into a deity. The works of Euhemerus himself have not survived, but Christian patristic writers took up the suggestion.\n\nZeus Lykaios\n\nThe epithet Zeus Lykaios (\"wolf-Zeus\") is assumed by Zeus only in connection with the archaic festival of the Lykaia on the slopes of Mount Lykaion (\"Wolf Mountain\"), the tallest peak in rustic Arcadia; Zeus had only a formal connection with the rituals and myths of this primitive rite of passage with an ancient threat of cannibalism and the possibility of a werewolf transformation for the ephebes who were the participants. Near the ancient ash-heap where the sacrifices took place was a forbidden precinct in which, allegedly, no shadows were ever cast. \n\nAccording to Plato, a particular clan would gather on the mountain to make a sacrifice every nine years to Zeus Lykaios, and a single morsel of human entrails would be intermingled with the animal's. Whoever ate the human flesh was said to turn into a wolf, and could only regain human form if he did not eat again of human flesh until the next nine-year cycle had ended. There were games associated with the Lykaia, removed in the fourth century to the first urbanization of Arcadia, Megalopolis; there the major temple was dedicated to Zeus Lykaios.\n\nAdditional cults of Zeus\n\nAlthough etymology indicates that Zeus was originally a sky god, many Greek cities honored a local Zeus who lived underground. Athenians and Sicilians honored Zeus Meilichios (\"kindly\" or \"honeyed\") while other cities had Zeus Chthonios (\"earthy\"), Zeus Katachthonios (\"under-the-earth\") and Zeus Plousios (\"wealth-bringing\"). These deities might be represented as snakes or in human form in visual art, or, for emphasis as both together in one image. They also received offerings of black animal victims sacrificed into sunken pits, as did chthonic deities like Persephone and Demeter, and also the heroes at their tombs. Olympian gods, by contrast, usually received white victims sacrificed upon raised altars.\n\nIn some cases, cities were not entirely sure whether the daimon to whom they sacrificed was a hero or an underground Zeus. Thus the shrine at Lebadaea in Boeotia might belong to the hero Trophonius or to Zeus Trephonius (\"the nurturing\"), depending on whether you believe Pausanias, or Strabo. The hero Amphiaraus was honored as Zeus Amphiaraus at Oropus outside of Thebes, and the Spartans even had a shrine to Zeus Agamemnon.\n\nNon-panhellenic cults\n\nIn addition to the Panhellenic titles and conceptions listed above, local cults maintained their own idiosyncratic ideas about the king of gods and men. With the epithet Zeus Aetnaeus he was worshiped on Mount Aetna, where there was a statue of him, and a local festival called the Aetnaea in his honor. Other examples are listed below. As Zeus Aeneius or Zeus Aenesius, he was worshiped in the island of Cephalonia, where he had a temple on Mount Aenos. \n\nOracles of Zeus\n\nAlthough most oracle sites were usually dedicated to Apollo, the heroes, or various goddesses like Themis, a few oracular sites were dedicated to Zeus. In addition, some foreign oracles, such as Baʿal's at Heliopolis, were associated with Zeus in Greek or Jupiter in Latin.\n\nThe Oracle at Dodona\n\nThe cult of Zeus at Dodona in Epirus, where there is evidence of religious activity from the second millennium BC onward, centered on a sacred oak. When the Odyssey was composed (circa 750 BC), divination was done there by barefoot priests called Selloi, who lay on the ground and observed the rustling of the leaves and branches. By the time Herodotus wrote about Dodona, female priestesses called peleiades (\"doves\") had replaced the male priests.\n\nZeus's consort at Dodona was not Hera, but the goddess Dione — whose name is a feminine form of \"Zeus\". Her status as a titaness suggests to some that she may have been a more powerful pre-Hellenic deity, and perhaps the original occupant of the oracle.\n\nThe Oracle at Siwa\n\nThe oracle of Ammon at the Siwa Oasis in the Western Desert of Egypt did not lie within the bounds of the Greek world before Alexander's day, but it already loomed large in the Greek mind during the archaic era: Herodotus mentions consultations with Zeus Ammon in his account of the Persian War. Zeus Ammon was especially favored at Sparta, where a temple to him existed by the time of the Peloponnesian War. \n\nAfter Alexander made a trek into the desert to consult the oracle at Siwa, the figure arose in the Hellenistic imagination of a Libyan Sibyl.\n\nZeus and foreign gods\n\nZeus was identified with the Roman god Jupiter and associated in the syncretic classical imagination (see interpretatio graeca) with various other deities, such as the Egyptian Ammon and the Etruscan Tinia. He, along with Dionysus, absorbed the role of the chief Phrygian god Sabazios in the syncretic deity known in Rome as Sabazius. The Seleucid ruler Antiochus IV Epiphanes erected a statue of Zeus Olympios in the Judean Temple in Jerusalem. Hellenizing Jews referred to this statue as Baal Shamen (in English, Lord of Heaven). \n\nZeus in philosophy\n\nIn Neoplatonism, Zeus's relation to the gods familiar from mythology is taught as the Demiurge or Divine Mind. Specifically within Plotinus's work the Enneads and the Platonic Theology of Proclus.\n\nZeus in the Bible\n\nZeus is mentioned in the New Testament two times, first in Acts 14:8–13: When the people living in Lystra saw the Apostle Paul heal a lame man, they considered Paul and his partner Barnabas to be gods, identifying Paul with Hermes and Barnabas with Zeus, even trying to offer them sacrifices with the crowd. Two ancient inscriptions discovered in 1909 near Lystra testify to the worship of these two gods in that city. One of the inscriptions refers to the \"priests of Zeus,\" and the other mentions \"Hermes Most Great\"\" and \"Zeus the sun-god.\" \n\nThe second occurrence is in Acts 28:11: the name of the ship in which the prisoner Paul set sail from the island of Malta bore the figurehead \"Sons of Zeus\" aka Castor and Pollux.\n\nThe deuterocanonical book of 2 Maccabees 6:1, 2 talks of King Antiochus IV (Epiphanes), who in his attempt to stamp out the Jewish religion, directed that the temple at Jerusalem be profaned and rededicated to Zeus (Jupiter Olympius). \n\nZeus in the Iliad\n\nThe Iliad is a poem by Homer about the Trojan war and the battle over the City of Troy. As God of the sky, lightning, thunder, law, order, justice, Zeus controlled Ancient Greece and all of the mortals and immortals living there. The Iliad covers the Trojan War, in which Zeus plays a major part. By controlling many of the character's fate, he is arguably the most important character in the text.\n\nNotable Scenes that include Zeus \n* Book 2: Zeus sends Agamemnon a dream and is able to partially control his decisions because of the effects of the dream\n* Book 4: Zeus promises Hera to ultimately destroy the City of Troy at the end of the war\n* Book 7: Zeus and Poseidon ruin the Achaeans fortress\n* Book 8: Zeus prohibits the other Gods from fighting each other and has to return to Mount Ida where he can think over his decision that the Greeks will lose the war\n* Book 14: Zeus is seduced by Hera and becomes distracted while she helps out the Greeks\n* Book 15: Zeus wakes up and realizes that Poseidon his own brother has been helping out the Greeks, while also sending Hector and Apollo to help fight the Trojans ensuring that the City of Troy will fall\n* Book 16: Zeus is upset that he couldn't help save Sarpedon's life because it would then contradict his previous decisions\n* Book 17: Zeus is emotionally hurt by the fate of Hector\n* Book 20: Zeus lets the other Gods help out their respective sides in the war\n* Book 24: Zeus demands that Achilles (his son) release the corpse of Hector to be buried honourably\n\nZeus's notable conflicts\n\nThe most notable conflict in Zeus's history was his struggle for power. Zeus's parents Cronus and Rhea ruled the Ancient World after taking control from Uranus, Cronus's father. When Cronus realized that he wanted power for the rest of time he started to eat his children, Hestia, Demeter, Hera, Hades, and Poseidon. When Rhea realized what was going on, she quickly saved their youngest child, Zeus. Having escaped, Zeus was spared because of the swiftness of Rhea tricking Cronus into thinking she consumed Zeus. She wrapped a stone in a blanket, and Cronus swallowed it thinking he was swallowing his last child. As a result of this, Zeus was shipped off to live on the island of Crete.\n\nWhen Zeus was atop Mount Olympus he grew upset with mankind and the sacrifices they were performing on one another. Furiously, he decided it would be smart to wipe out mankind with a gigantic flood using the help of his brother Poseidon, King of the Seas. Killing every human except Deucalion and Pyrrah, Zeus flooded the entire planet but then realized he then had to restore society with new people. After clearing all the water, he had Deucalion and Pyrrah create humans to repopulate the earth using stones that became humans. These stones represented the \"hardness\" of mankind and the man life. This story has been told different ways and in different time periods between Ancient Greek Mythology and The Bible, although the base of the story remains true. \n\nThroughout history Zeus has used violence to get his way, or even terrorize humans. As God of the sky he has the power to hurl lightning bolts as his weapon of choice. Since lightning is quite powerful and sometimes deadly, it is a bold sign when lightning strikes because it is known that Zeus most likely threw the bolt. \n\nIn modern culture\n\nDepictions of Zeus as a bull, the form he took when raping Europa, are found on the Greek 2-euro coin and on the United Kingdom identity card for visa holders. Mary Beard, professor of Classics at Cambridge University, has criticised this for its apparent celebration of rape. \n\nGenealogy of the Olympians\n\nArgive genealogy", "Greek mythology is the body of myths and teachings that belong to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. It was a part of the religion in ancient Greece. Modern scholars refer to and study the myths in an attempt to shed light on the religious and political institutions of Ancient Greece and its civilization, and to gain understanding of the nature of myth-making itself. \n\nGreek mythology is explicitly embodied in a large collection of narratives, and implicitly in Greek representational arts, such as vase-paintings and votive gifts. Greek myth attempts to explain the origins of the world, and details the lives and adventures of a wide variety of gods, goddesses, heroes, heroines and mythological creatures. These accounts initially were disseminated in an oral-poetic tradition; today the Greek myths are known primarily from Greek literature.\nThe oldest known Greek literary sources, Homer's epic poems Iliad and Odyssey, focus on the Trojan War and its aftermath. Two poems by Homer's near contemporary Hesiod, the Theogony and the Works and Days, contain accounts of the genesis of the world, the succession of divine rulers, the succession of human ages, the origin of human woes, and the origin of sacrificial practices. Myths are also preserved in the Homeric Hymns, in fragments of epic poems of the Epic Cycle, in lyric poems, in the works of the tragedians and comedians of the fifth century BC, in writings of scholars and poets of the Hellenistic Age, and in texts from the time of the Roman Empire by writers such as Plutarch and Pausanias.\n\nArchaeological findings provide a principal source of detail about Greek mythology, with gods and heroes featured prominently in the decoration of many artifacts. Geometric designs on pottery of the eighth century BC depict scenes from the Trojan cycle as well as the adventures of Heracles. In the succeeding Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic periods, Homeric and various other mythological scenes appear, supplementing the existing literary evidence. Greek mythology has had an extensive influence on the culture, arts, and literature of Western civilization and remains part of Western heritage and language. Poets and artists from ancient times to the present have derived inspiration from Greek mythology and have discovered contemporary significance and relevance in the themes. \n\nSources\n\nGreek mythology is known today primarily from Greek literature and representations on visual media dating from the Geometric period from c. 900–800 BC onward. In fact, literary and archaeological sources integrate, sometimes mutually supportive and sometimes in conflict; however, in many cases, the existence of this corpus of data is a strong indication that many elements of Greek mythology have strong factual and historical roots. \n\nLiterary sources\n\nMythical narration plays an important role in nearly every genre of Greek literature. Nevertheless, the only general mythographical handbook to survive from Greek antiquity was the Library of Pseudo-Apollodorus. This work attempts to reconcile the contradictory tales of the poets and provides a grand summary of traditional Greek mythology and heroic legends. Apollodorus of Athens lived from c. 180–125 BC and wrote on many of these topics. His writings may have formed the basis for the collection; however the \"Library\" discusses events that occurred long after his death, hence the name Pseudo-Apollodorus.\n\nAmong the earliest literary sources are Homer's two epic poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey. Other poets completed the \"epic cycle\", but these later and lesser poems now are lost almost entirely. Despite their traditional name, the \"Homeric Hymns\" have no direct connection with Homer. They are choral hymns from the earlier part of the so-called Lyric age. Hesiod, a possible contemporary with Homer, offers in his Theogony (Origin of the Gods) the fullest account of the earliest Greek myths, dealing with the creation of the world; the origin of the gods, Titans, and Giants; as well as elaborate genealogies, folktales, and etiological myths. Hesiod's Works and Days, a didactic poem about farming life, also includes the myths of Prometheus, Pandora, and the Five Ages. The poet gives advice on the best way to succeed in a dangerous world, rendered yet more dangerous by its gods.\n\nLyrical poets often took their subjects from myth, but their treatment became gradually less narrative and more allusive. Greek lyric poets, including Pindar, Bacchylides and Simonides, and bucolic poets such as Theocritus and Bion, relate individual mythological incidents. Additionally, myth was central to classical Athenian drama. The tragic playwrights Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides took most of their plots from myths of the age of heroes and the Trojan War. Many of the great tragic stories (e.g. Agamemnon and his children, Oedipus, Jason, Medea, etc.) took on their classic form in these tragedies. The comic playwright Aristophanes also used myths, in The Birds and The Frogs. \n\nHistorians Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus, and geographers Pausanias and Strabo, who traveled throughout the Greek world and noted the stories they heard, supplied numerous local myths and legends, often giving little-known alternative versions. Herodotus in particular, searched the various traditions presented him and found the historical or mythological roots in the confrontation between Greece and the East. Herodotus attempted to reconcile origins and the blending of differing cultural concepts.\n\nThe poetry of the Hellenistic and Roman ages was primarily composed as a literary rather than cultic exercise. Nevertheless, it contains many important details that would otherwise be lost. This category includes the works of:\n# The Roman poets Ovid, Statius, Valerius Flaccus, Seneca and Virgil with Servius's commentary.\n# The Greek poets of the Late Antique period: Nonnus, Antoninus Liberalis, and Quintus Smyrnaeus.\n# The Greek poets of the Hellenistic period: Apollonius of Rhodes, Callimachus, Pseudo-Eratosthenes, and Parthenius.\n\nProse writers from the same periods who make reference to myths include Apuleius, Petronius, Lollianus, and Heliodorus. Two other important non-poetical sources are the Fabulae and Astronomica of the Roman writer styled as Pseudo-Hyginus, the Imagines of Philostratus the Elder and Philostratus the Younger, and the Descriptions of Callistratus.\n\nFinally, a number of Byzantine Greek writers provide important details of myth, much derived from earlier now lost Greek works. These preservers of myth include Arnobius, Hesychius, the author of the Suda, John Tzetzes, and Eustathius. They often treat mythology from a Christian moralizing perspective. \n\nArchaeological sources\n\nThe discovery of the Mycenaean civilization by the German amateur archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann in the nineteenth century, and the discovery of the Minoan civilization in Crete by the British archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans in the twentieth century, helped to explain many existing questions about Homer's epics and provided archaeological evidence for many of the mythological details about gods and heroes. Unfortunately, the evidence about myths and rituals at Mycenaean and Minoan sites is entirely monumental, as the Linear B script (an ancient form of Greek found in both Crete and mainland Greece) was used mainly to record inventories, although certain names of gods and heroes have been tentatively identified.\n\nGeometric designs on pottery of the eighth century BC depict scenes from the Trojan cycle, as well as the adventures of Heracles. These visual representations of myths are important for two reasons. Firstly, many Greek myths are attested on vases earlier than in literary sources: of the twelve labors of Heracles, for example, only the Cerberus adventure occurs in a contemporary literary text. Secondly, visual sources sometimes represent myths or mythical scenes that are not attested in any extant literary source. In some cases, the first known representation of a myth in geometric art predates its first known representation in late archaic poetry, by several centuries. In the Archaic (c. 750–c. 500 BC), Classical (c. 480–323 BC), and Hellenistic (323–146 BC) periods, Homeric and various other mythological scenes appear, supplementing the existing literary evidence.\n\nSurvey of mythic history\n\nGreek mythology has changed over time to accommodate the evolution of their culture, of which mythology, both overtly and in its unspoken assumptions, is an index of the changes. In Greek mythology's surviving literary forms, as found mostly at the end of the progressive changes, it is inherently political, as Gilbert Cuthbertson has argued. \n\nThe earlier inhabitants of the Balkan Peninsula were an agricultural people who, using Animism, assigned a spirit to every aspect of nature. Eventually, these vague spirits assumed human forms and entered the local mythology as gods. When tribes from the north of the Balkan Peninsula invaded, they brought with them a new pantheon of gods, based on conquest, force, prowess in battle, and violent heroism. Other older gods of the agricultural world fused with those of the more powerful invaders or else faded into insignificance. \n\nAfter the middle of the Archaic period, myths about relationships between male gods and male heroes became more and more frequent, indicating the parallel development of pedagogic pederasty (eros paidikos, ), thought to have been introduced around 630 BC. By the end of the fifth century BC, poets had assigned at least one eromenos, an adolescent boy who was their sexual companion, to every important god except Ares and to many legendary figures. Previously existing myths, such as those of Achilles and Patroclus, also then were cast in a pederastic light. Alexandrian poets at first, then more generally literary mythographers in the early Roman Empire, often readapted stories of Greek mythological characters in this fashion.\n\nThe achievement of epic poetry was to create story-cycles and, as a result, to develop a new sense of mythological chronology. Thus Greek mythology unfolds as a phase in the development of the world and of humans. While self-contradictions in these stories make an absolute timeline impossible, an approximate chronology may be discerned. The resulting mythological \"history of the world\" may be divided into three or four broader periods:\n# The myths of origin or age of gods (Theogonies, \"births of gods\"): myths about the origins of the world, the gods, and the human race.\n# The age when gods and mortals mingled freely: stories of the early interactions between gods, demigods, and mortals.\n# The age of heroes (heroic age), where divine activity was more limited. The last and greatest of the heroic legends is the story of the Trojan War and after (which is regarded by some researchers as a separate fourth period). \n\nWhile the age of gods often has been of more interest to contemporary students of myth, the Greek authors of the archaic and classical eras had a clear preference for the age of heroes, establishing a chronology and record of human accomplishments after the questions of how the world came into being were explained. For example, the heroic Iliad and Odyssey dwarfed the divine-focused Theogony and Homeric Hymns in both size and popularity. Under the influence of Homer the \"hero cult\" leads to a restructuring in spiritual life, expressed in the separation of the realm of the gods from the realm of the dead (heroes), of the Chthonic from the Olympian. In the Works and Days, Hesiod makes use of a scheme of Four Ages of Man (or Races): Golden, Silver, Bronze, and Iron. These races or ages are separate creations of the gods, the Golden Age belonging to the reign of Cronos, the subsequent races the creation of Zeus. The presence of evil was explained by the myth of Pandora, when all of the best of human capabilities, save hope, had been spilled out of her overturned jar. In Metamorphoses, Ovid follows Hesiod's concept of the four ages. \n\nOrigins of the world and the gods\n\n\"Myths of origin\" or \"creation myths\" represent an attempt to explain the beginnings of the universe in human language. The most widely accepted version at the time, although a philosophical account of the beginning of things, is reported by Hesiod, in his Theogony. He begins with Chaos, a yawning nothingness. Out of the void emerged Gaia (the Earth) and some other primary divine beings: Eros (Love), the Abyss (the Tartarus), and the Erebus. Without male assistance, Gaia gave birth to Uranus (the Sky) who then fertilized her. From that union were born first the Titans—six males: Coeus, Crius, Cronus, Hyperion, Iapetus, and Oceanus; and six females: Mnemosyne, Phoebe, Rhea, Theia, Themis, and Tethys. After Cronus was born, Gaia and Uranus decreed no more Titans were to be born. They were followed by the one-eyed Cyclopes and the Hecatonchires or Hundred-Handed Ones, who were both thrown into Tartarus by Uranus. This made Gaia furious. Cronus (\"the wily, youngest and most terrible of Gaia's children\"), was convinced by Gaia to castrate his father. He did this, and became the ruler of the Titans with his sister-wife Rhea as his consort, and the other Titans became his court.\n\nA motif of father-against-son conflict was repeated when Cronus was confronted by his son, Zeus. Because Cronus had betrayed his father, he feared that his offspring would do the same, and so each time Rhea gave birth, he snatched up the child and ate it. Rhea hated this and tricked him by hiding Zeus and wrapping a stone in a baby's blanket, which Cronus ate. When Zeus was full grown, he fed Cronus a drugged drink which caused him to vomit, throwing up Rhea's other children and the stone, which had been sitting in Cronus's stomach all along. Zeus then challenged Cronus to war for the kingship of the gods. At last, with the help of the Cyclopes (whom Zeus freed from Tartarus), Zeus and his siblings were victorious, while Cronus and the Titans were hurled down to imprisonment in Tartarus. \n\nZeus was plagued by the same concern and, after a prophecy that the offspring of his first wife, Metis, would give birth to a god \"greater than he\"—Zeus swallowed her. She was already pregnant with Athena, however, and she burst forth from his head—fully-grown and dressed for war. \n\nThe earliest Greek thought about poetry considered the theogonies to be the prototypical poetic genre—the prototypical mythos—and imputed almost magical powers to it. Orpheus, the archetypal poet, also was the archetypal singer of theogonies, which he uses to calm seas and storms in Apollonius' Argonautica, and to move the stony hearts of the underworld gods in his descent to Hades. When Hermes invents the lyre in the Homeric Hymn to Hermes, the first thing he does is sing about the birth of the gods. Hesiod's Theogony is not only the fullest surviving account of the gods, but also the fullest surviving account of the archaic poet's function, with its long preliminary invocation to the Muses. Theogony also was the subject of many lost poems, including those attributed to Orpheus, Musaeus, Epimenides, Abaris, and other legendary seers, which were used in private ritual purifications and mystery-rites. There are indications that Plato was familiar with some version of the Orphic theogony. A silence would have been expected about religious rites and beliefs, however, and that nature of the culture would not have been reported by members of the society while the beliefs were held. After they ceased to become religious beliefs, few would have known the rites and rituals. Allusions often existed, however, to aspects that were quite public.\n\nImages existed on pottery and religious artwork that were interpreted and more likely, misinterpreted in many diverse myths and tales. A few fragments of these works survive in quotations by Neoplatonist philosophers and recently unearthed papyrus scraps. One of these scraps, the Derveni Papyrus now proves that at least in the fifth century BC a theogonic-cosmogonic poem of Orpheus was in existence.W. Burkert, Greek Religion, 236* G. Betegh, The Derveni Papyrus, 147\n\nThe first philosophical cosmologists reacted against, or sometimes built upon, popular mythical conceptions that had existed in the Greek world for some time. Some of these popular conceptions can be gleaned from the poetry of Homer and Hesiod. In Homer, the Earth was viewed as a flat disk afloat on the river of Oceanus and overlooked by a hemispherical sky with sun, moon, and stars. The Sun (Helios) traversed the heavens as a charioteer and sailed around the Earth in a golden bowl at night. Sun, earth, heaven, rivers, and winds could be addressed in prayers and called to witness oaths. Natural fissures were popularly regarded as entrances to the subterranean house of Hades and his predecessors, home of the dead.* K. Algra, The Beginnings of Cosmology, 45 Influences from other cultures always afforded new themes.\n\nGreek pantheon\n\nAccording to Classical-era mythology, after the overthrow of the Titans, the new pantheon of gods and goddesses was confirmed. Among the principal Greek gods were the Olympians, residing on Mount Olympus under the eye of Zeus. (The limitation of their number to twelve seems to have been a comparatively modern idea.) Besides the Olympians, the Greeks worshipped various gods of the countryside, the satyr-god Pan, Nymphs (spirits of rivers), Naiads (who dwelled in springs), Dryads (who were spirits of the trees), Nereids (who inhabited the sea), river gods, Satyrs, and others. In addition, there were the dark powers of the underworld, such as the Erinyes (or Furies), said to pursue those guilty of crimes against blood-relatives. In order to honor the Ancient Greek pantheon, poets composed the Homeric Hymns (a group of thirty-three songs). Gregory Nagy regards \"the larger Homeric Hymns as simple preludes (compared with Theogony), each of which invokes one god\". \n\nThe gods of Greek mythology are described as having essentially corporeal but ideal bodies. According to Walter Burkert, the defining characteristic of Greek anthropomorphism is that \"the Greek gods are persons, not abstractions, ideas or concepts\". Regardless of their underlying forms, the Ancient Greek gods have many fantastic abilities; most significantly, the gods are not affected by disease, and can be wounded only under highly unusual circumstances. The Greeks considered immortality as the distinctive characteristic of their gods; this immortality, as well as unfading youth, was insured by the constant use of nectar and ambrosia, by which the divine blood was renewed in their veins. \n\nEach god descends from his or her own genealogy, pursues differing interests, has a certain area of expertise, and is governed by a unique personality; however, these descriptions arise from a multiplicity of archaic local variants, which do not always agree with one another. When these gods are called upon in poetry, prayer or cult, they are referred to by a combination of their name and epithets, that identify them by these distinctions from other manifestations of themselves (e.g., Apollo Musagetes is \"Apollo, [as] leader of the Muses\"). Alternatively the epithet may identify a particular and localized aspect of the god, sometimes thought to be already ancient during the classical epoch of Greece.\n\nMost gods were associated with specific aspects of life. For example, Aphrodite was the goddess of love and beauty, Ares was the god of war, Hades the ruler of the underworld, and Athena the goddess of wisdom and courage. Some gods, such as Apollo and Dionysus, revealed complex personalities and mixtures of functions, while others, such as Hestia (literally \"hearth\") and Helios (literally \"sun\"), were little more than personifications. The most impressive temples tended to be dedicated to a limited number of gods, who were the focus of large pan-Hellenic cults. It was, however, common for individual regions and villages to devote their own cults to minor gods. Many cities also honored the more well-known gods with unusual local rites and associated strange myths with them that were unknown elsewhere. During the heroic age, the cult of heroes (or demi-gods) supplemented that of the gods.\n\nAge of gods and mortals\n\nBridging the age when gods lived alone and the age when divine interference in human affairs was limited was a transitional age in which gods and mortals moved together. These were the early days of the world when the groups mingled more freely than they did later. Most of these tales were later told by Ovid's Metamorphoses and they are often divided into two thematic groups: tales of love, and tales of punishment. \n\nTales of love often involve incest, or the seduction or rape of a mortal woman by a male god, resulting in heroic offspring. The stories generally suggest that relationships between gods and mortals are something to avoid; even consenting relationships rarely have happy endings. In a few cases, a female divinity mates with a mortal man, as in the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, where the goddess lies with Anchises to produce Aeneas. \n\nThe second type (tales of punishment) involves the appropriation or invention of some important cultural artifact, as when Prometheus steals fire from the gods, when Tantalus steals nectar and ambrosia from Zeus' table and gives it to his own subjects—revealing to them the secrets of the gods, when Prometheus or Lycaon invents sacrifice, when Demeter teaches agriculture and the Mysteries to Triptolemus, or when Marsyas invents the aulos and enters into a musical contest with Apollo. Ian Morris considers Prometheus' adventures as \"a place between the history of the gods and that of man\". An anonymous papyrus fragment, dated to the third century, vividly portrays Dionysus' punishment of the king of Thrace, Lycurgus, whose recognition of the new god came too late, resulting in horrific penalties that extended into the afterlife. The story of the arrival of Dionysus to establish his cult in Thrace was also the subject of an Aeschylean trilogy. In another tragedy, Euripides' The Bacchae, the king of Thebes, Pentheus, is punished by Dionysus, because he disrespected the god and spied on his Maenads, the female worshippers of the god. \n\nIn another story, based on an old folktale-motif, and echoing a similar theme, Demeter was searching for her daughter, Persephone, having taken the form of an old woman called Doso, and received a hospitable welcome from Celeus, the King of Eleusis in Attica. As a gift to Celeus, because of his hospitality, Demeter planned to make his son Demophon a god, but she was unable to complete the ritual because his mother Metanira walked in and saw her son in the fire and screamed in fright, which angered Demeter, who lamented that foolish mortals do not understand the concept and ritual. \n\nHeroic age\n\nThe age in which the heroes lived is known as the heroic age. The epic and genealogical poetry created cycles of stories clustered around particular heroes or events and established the family relationships between the heroes of different stories; they thus arranged the stories in sequence. According to Ken Dowden, \"There is even a saga effect: We can follow the fates of some families in successive generations\".\n\nAfter the rise of the hero cult, gods and heroes constitute the sacral sphere and are invoked together in oaths and prayers which are addressed to them. Burkert notes that \"the roster of heroes, again in contrast to the gods, is never given fixed and final form. Great gods are no longer born, but new heroes can always be raised up from the army of the dead.\" Another important difference between the hero cult and the cult of gods is that the hero becomes the centre of local group identity. \n\nThe monumental events of Heracles are regarded as the dawn of the age of heroes. To the Heroic Age are also ascribed three great events: the Argonautic expedition, the Theban Cycle and the Trojan War. \n\nHeracles and the Heracleidae\n\nSome scholars believe that behind Heracles' complicated mythology there was probably a real man, perhaps a chieftain-vassal of the kingdom of Argos. Some scholars suggest the story of Heracles is an allegory for the sun's yearly passage through the twelve constellations of the zodiac. Others point to earlier myths from other cultures, showing the story of Heracles as a local adaptation of hero myths already well established. Traditionally, Heracles was the son of Zeus and Alcmene, granddaughter of Perseus. His fantastic solitary exploits, with their many folk-tale themes, provided much material for popular legend. According to Burkert, \"He is portrayed as a sacrificer, mentioned as a founder of altars, and imagined as a voracious eater himself; it is in this role that he appears in comedy, while his tragic end provided much material for tragedy — Heracles is regarded by Thalia Papadopoulou as \"a play of great significance in examination of other Euripidean dramas\". In art and literature Heracles was represented as an enormously strong man of moderate height; his characteristic weapon was the bow but frequently also the club. Vase paintings demonstrate the unparalleled popularity of Heracles, his fight with the lion being depicted many hundreds of times. \n\nHeracles also entered Etruscan and Roman mythology and cult, and the exclamation \"mehercule\" became as familiar to the Romans as \"Herakleis\" was to the Greeks. In Italy he was worshipped as a god of merchants and traders, although others also prayed to him for his characteristic gifts of good luck or rescue from danger.\n\nHeracles attained the highest social prestige through his appointment as official ancestor of the Dorian kings. This probably served as a legitimation for the Dorian migrations into the Peloponnese. Hyllus, the eponymous hero of one Dorian phyle, became the son of Heracles and one of the Heracleidae or Heraclids (the numerous descendants of Heracles, especially the descendants of Hyllus — other Heracleidae included Macaria, Lamos, Manto, Bianor, Tlepolemus, and Telephus). These Heraclids conquered the Peloponnesian kingdoms of Mycenae, Sparta and Argos, claiming, according to legend, a right to rule them through their ancestor. Their rise to dominance is frequently called the \"Dorian invasion\". The Lydian and later the Macedonian kings, as rulers of the same rank, also became Heracleidae. \n\nOther members of this earliest generation of heroes such as Perseus, Deucalion, Theseus and Bellerophon, have many traits in common with Heracles. Like him, their exploits are solitary, fantastic and border on fairy tale, as they slay monsters such as the Chimera and Medusa. Bellerophon's adventures are commonplace types, similar to the adventures of Heracles and Theseus. Sending a hero to his presumed death is also a recurrent theme of this early heroic tradition, used in the cases of Perseus and Bellerophon. \n\nArgonauts\n\nThe only surviving Hellenistic epic, the Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes (epic poet, scholar, and director of the Library of Alexandria) tells the myth of the voyage of Jason and the Argonauts to retrieve the Golden Fleece from the mythical land of Colchis. In the Argonautica, Jason is impelled on his quest by king Pelias, who receives a prophecy that a man with one sandal would be his nemesis. Jason loses a sandal in a river, arrives at the court of Pelias, and the epic is set in motion. Nearly every member of the next generation of heroes, as well as Heracles, went with Jason in the ship Argo to fetch the Golden Fleece. This generation also included Theseus, who went to Crete to slay the Minotaur; Atalanta, the female heroine, and Meleager, who once had an epic cycle of his own to rival the Iliad and Odyssey. Pindar, Apollonius and the Bibliotheca endeavor to give full lists of the Argonauts. \n\nAlthough Apollonius wrote his poem in the 3rd century BC, the composition of the story of the Argonauts is earlier than Odyssey, which shows familiarity with the exploits of Jason (the wandering of Odysseus may have been partly founded on it). In ancient times the expedition was regarded as a historical fact, an incident in the opening up of the Black Sea to Greek commerce and colonization. It was also extremely popular, forming a cycle to which a number of local legends became attached. The story of Medea, in particular, caught the imagination of the tragic poets. \n\nHouse of Atreus and Theban Cycle\n\nIn between the Argo and the Trojan War, there was a generation known chiefly for its horrific crimes. This includes the doings of Atreus and Thyestes at Argos. Behind the myth of the house of Atreus (one of the two principal heroic dynasties with the house of Labdacus) lies the problem of the devolution of power and of the mode of accession to sovereignty. The twins Atreus and Thyestes with their descendants played the leading role in the tragedy of the devolution of power in Mycenae. \n\nThe Theban Cycle deals with events associated especially with Cadmus, the city's founder, and later with the doings of Laius and Oedipus at Thebes; a series of stories that lead to the eventual pillage of that city at the hands of the Seven Against Thebes and Epigoni. (It is not known whether the Seven Against Thebes figured in early epic.) As far as Oedipus is concerned, early epic accounts seem to have him continuing to rule at Thebes after the revelation that Iokaste was his mother, and subsequently marrying a second wife who becomes the mother of his children — markedly different from the tale known to us through tragedy (e.g. Sophocles' Oedipus the King) and later mythological accounts. \n\nTrojan War and aftermath\n\nGreek mythology culminates in the Trojan War, fought between Greece and Troy, and its aftermath. In Homer's works, such as the Iliad, the chief stories have already taken shape and substance, and individual themes were elaborated later, especially in Greek drama. The Trojan War also elicited great interest in the Roman culture because of the story of Aeneas, a Trojan hero whose journey from Troy led to the founding of the city that would one day become Rome, as recounted in Virgil's Aeneid (Book II of Virgil's Aeneid contains the best-known account of the sack of Troy). Finally there are two pseudo-chronicles written in Latin that passed under the names of Dictys Cretensis and Dares Phrygius. \n\nThe Trojan War cycle, a collection of epic poems, starts with the events leading up to the war: Eris and the golden apple of Kallisti, the Judgement of Paris, the abduction of Helen, the sacrifice of Iphigenia at Aulis. To recover Helen, the Greeks launched a great expedition under the overall command of Menelaus' brother, Agamemnon, king of Argos or Mycenae, but the Trojans refused to return Helen. The Iliad, which is set in the tenth year of the war, tells of the quarrel between Agamemnon and Achilles, who was the finest Greek warrior, and the consequent deaths in battle of Achilles' beloved comrade Patroclus and Priam's eldest son, Hector. After Hector's death the Trojans were joined by two exotic allies, Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons, and Memnon, king of the Ethiopians and son of the dawn-goddess Eos. Achilles killed both of these, but Paris then managed to kill Achilles with an arrow in the heel. Achilles' heel was the only part of his body which was not invulnerable to damage by human weaponry. Before they could take Troy, the Greeks had to steal from the citadel the wooden image of Pallas Athena (the Palladium). Finally, with Athena's help, they built the Trojan Horse. Despite the warnings of Priam's daughter Cassandra, the Trojans were persuaded by Sinon, a Greek who feigned desertion, to take the horse inside the walls of Troy as an offering to Athena; the priest Laocoon, who tried to have the horse destroyed, was killed by sea-serpents. At night the Greek fleet returned, and the Greeks from the horse opened the gates of Troy. In the total sack that followed, Priam and his remaining sons were slaughtered; the Trojan women passed into slavery in various cities of Greece. The adventurous homeward voyages of the Greek leaders (including the wanderings of Odysseus and Aeneas (the Aeneid), and the murder of Agamemnon) were told in two epics, the Returns (the lost Nostoi) and Homer's Odyssey. The Trojan cycle also includes the adventures of the children of the Trojan generation (e.g., Orestes and Telemachus).\n\nThe Trojan War provided a variety of themes and became a main source of inspiration for Ancient Greek artists (e.g. metopes on the Parthenon depicting the sack of Troy); this artistic preference for themes deriving from the Trojan Cycle indicates its importance to the Ancient Greek civilization. The same mythological cycle also inspired a series of posterior European literary writings. For instance, Trojan Medieval European writers, unacquainted with Homer at first hand, found in the Troy legend a rich source of heroic and romantic storytelling and a convenient framework into which to fit their own courtly and chivalric ideals. Twelfth-century authors, such as Benoît de Sainte-Maure (Roman de Troie [Romance of Troy, 1154–60]) and Joseph of Exeter (De Bello Troiano [On the Trojan War, 1183]) describe the war while rewriting the standard version they found in Dictys and Dares. They thus follow Horace's advice and Virgil's example: they rewrite a poem of Troy instead of telling something completely new. \n\nSome of the more famous heroes noted for their inclusion in the Trojan War were:\n\nOn the Trojan side:\n* Aeneas\n* Hector\n* Paris\nOn the Greek side:\n* Ajax (there were two Ajaxes)\n* Achilles\n* King Agamemnon\n* Menelaus\n* Odysseus\n\nGreek and Roman conceptions of myth\n\nMythology was at the heart of everyday life in Ancient Greece. Greeks regarded mythology as a part of their history. They used myth to explain natural phenomena, cultural variations, traditional enmities and friendships. It was a source of pride to be able to trace the descent of one's leaders from a mythological hero or a god. Few ever doubted that there was truth behind the account of the Trojan War in the Iliad and Odyssey. According to Victor Davis Hanson, a military historian, columnist, political essayist and former classics professor, and John Heath, a classics professor, the profound knowledge of the Homeric epos was deemed by the Greeks the basis of their acculturation. Homer was the \"education of Greece\" (Ἑλλάδος παίδευσις), and his poetry \"the Book\". \n\nPhilosophy and myth\n\nAfter the rise of philosophy, history, prose and rationalism in the late 5th century BC, the fate of myth became uncertain, and mythological genealogies gave place to a conception of history which tried to exclude the supernatural (such as the Thucydidean history). While poets and dramatists were reworking the myths, Greek historians and philosophers were beginning to criticize them.\n\nA few radical philosophers like Xenophanes of Colophon were already beginning to label the poets' tales as blasphemous lies in the 6th century BC; Xenophanes had complained that Homer and Hesiod attributed to the gods \"all that is shameful and disgraceful among men; they steal, commit adultery, and deceive one another\". This line of thought found its most sweeping expression in Plato's Republic and Laws. Plato created his own allegorical myths (such as the vision of Er in the Republic), attacked the traditional tales of the gods' tricks, thefts and adulteries as immoral, and objected to their central role in literature. Plato's criticism was the first serious challenge to the Homeric mythological tradition, referring to the myths as \"old wives' chatter\". For his part Aristotle criticized the Pre-socratic quasi-mythical philosophical approach and underscored that \"Hesiod and the theological writers were concerned only with what seemed plausible to themselves, and had no respect for us ... But it is not worth taking seriously writers who show off in the mythical style; as for those who do proceed by proving their assertions, we must cross-examine them\".\n\nNevertheless, even Plato did not manage to wean himself and his society from the influence of myth; his own characterization for Socrates is based on the traditional Homeric and tragic patterns, used by the philosopher to praise the righteous life of his teacher: \n\nHanson and Heath estimate that Plato's rejection of the Homeric tradition was not favorably received by the grassroots Greek civilization. The old myths were kept alive in local cults; they continued to influence poetry and to form the main subject of painting and sculpture.\n\nMore sportingly, the 5th century BC tragedian Euripides often played with the old traditions, mocking them, and through the voice of his characters injecting notes of doubt. Yet the subjects of his plays were taken, without exception, from myth. Many of these plays were written in answer to a predecessor's version of the same or similar myth. Euripides mainly impugns the myths about the gods and begins his critique with an objection similar to the one previously expressed by Xenocrates: the gods, as traditionally represented, are far too crassly anthropomorphic.\n\nHellenistic and Roman rationalism\n\nDuring the Hellenistic period, mythology took on the prestige of elite knowledge that marks its possessors as belonging to a certain class. At the same time, the skeptical turn of the Classical age became even more pronounced. Greek mythographer Euhemerus established the tradition of seeking an actual historical basis for mythical beings and events. Although his original work (Sacred Scriptures) is lost, much is known about it from what is recorded by Diodorus and Lactantius. \n\nRationalizing hermeneutics of myth became even more popular under the Roman Empire, thanks to the physicalist theories of Stoic and Epicurean philosophy. Stoics presented explanations of the gods and heroes as physical phenomena, while the Euhemerists rationalized them as historical figures. At the same time, the Stoics and the Neoplatonists promoted the moral significations of the mythological tradition, often based on Greek etymologies. Through his Epicurean message, Lucretius had sought to expel superstitious fears from the minds of his fellow-citizens. Livy, too, is skeptical about the mythological tradition and claims that he does not intend to pass judgement on such legends (fabulae). The challenge for Romans with a strong and apologetic sense of religious tradition was to defend that tradition while conceding that it was often a breeding-ground for superstition. The antiquarian Varro, who regarded religion as a human institution with great importance for the preservation of good in society, devoted rigorous study to the origins of religious cults. In his Antiquitates Rerum Divinarum (which has not survived, but Augustine's City of God indicates its general approach) Varro argues that whereas the superstitious man fears the gods, the truly religious person venerates them as parents. According to Varro, there have been three accounts of deities in the Roman society: the mythical account created by poets for theatre and entertainment, the civil account used by people for veneration as well as by the city, and the natural account created by the philosophers. The best state is, adds Varro, where the civil theology combines the poetic mythical account with the philosopher's. \n\nRoman Academic Cotta ridicules both literal and allegorical acceptance of myth, declaring roundly that myths have no place in philosophy. Cicero is also generally disdainful of myth, but, like Varro, he is emphatic in his support for the state religion and its institutions. It is difficult to know how far down the social scale this rationalism extended. Cicero asserts that no one (not even old women and boys) is so foolish as to believe in the terrors of Hades or the existence of Scyllas, centaurs or other composite creatures, but, on the other hand, the orator elsewhere complains of the superstitious and credulous character of the people. De Natura Deorum is the most comprehensive summary of Cicero's line of thought. \n\nSyncretizing trends\n\nIn Ancient Roman times, a new Roman mythology was born through syncretization of numerous Greek and other foreign gods. This occurred because the Romans had little mythology of their own and inheritance of the Greek mythological tradition caused the major Roman gods to adopt characteristics of their Greek equivalents. The gods Zeus and Jupiter are an example of this mythological overlap. In addition to the combination of the two mythological traditions, the association of the Romans with eastern religions led to further syncretizations. For instance, the cult of Sun was introduced in Rome after Aurelian's successful campaigns in Syria. The Asiatic divinities Mithras (that is to say, the Sun) and Ba'al were combined with Apollo and Helios into one Sol Invictus, with conglomerated rites and compound attributes. Apollo might be increasingly identified in religion with Helios or even Dionysus, but texts retelling his myths seldom reflected such developments. The traditional literary mythology was increasingly dissociated from actual religious practice. The worship of Sol as special protector of the emperors and of the empire remained the chief imperial religion until it was replaced by Christianity.\n\nThe surviving 2nd-century collection of Orphic Hymns (second century AD) and the Saturnalia of Macrobius Ambrosius Theodosius (fifth century) are influenced by the theories of rationalism and the syncretizing trends as well. The Orphic Hymns are a set of pre-classical poetic compositions, attributed to Orpheus, himself the subject of a renowned myth. In reality, these poems were probably composed by several different poets, and contain a rich set of clues about prehistoric European mythology. The stated purpose of the Saturnalia is to transmit the Hellenic culture Macrobius has derived from his reading, even though much of his treatment of gods is colored by Egyptian and North African mythology and theology (which also affect the interpretation of Virgil). In Saturnalia reappear mythographical comments influenced by the Euhemerists, the Stoics and the Neoplatonists.\n\nModern interpretations\n\nThe genesis of modern understanding of Greek mythology is regarded by some scholars as a double reaction at the end of the eighteenth century against \"the traditional attitude of Christian animosity\", in which the Christian reinterpretation of myth as a \"lie\" or fable had been retained. In Germany, by about 1795, there was a growing interest in Homer and Greek mythology. In Göttingen, Johann Matthias Gesner began to revive Greek studies, while his successor, Christian Gottlob Heyne, worked with Johann Joachim Winckelmann, and laid the foundations for mythological research both in Germany and elsewhere. \n\nComparative and psychoanalytic approaches\n\nThe development of comparative philology in the 19th century, together with ethnological discoveries in the 20th century, established the science of myth. Since the Romantics, all study of myth has been comparative. Wilhelm Mannhardt, James Frazer, and Stith Thompson employed the comparative approach to collect and classify the themes of folklore and mythology. In 1871 Edward Burnett Tylor published his Primitive Culture, in which he applied the comparative method and tried to explain the origin and evolution of religion.D. Allen, Structure and Creativity in Religion, 9* Robert A. Segal, Theorizing about Myth, 16 Tylor's procedure of drawing together material culture, ritual and myth of widely separated cultures influenced both Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell. Max Müller applied the new science of comparative mythology to the study of myth, in which he detected the distorted remains of Aryan nature worship. Bronisław Malinowski emphasized the ways myth fulfills common social functions. Claude Lévi-Strauss and other structuralists have compared the formal relations and patterns in myths throughout the world.\n\nSigmund Freud introduced a transhistorical and biological conception of man and a view of myth as an expression of repressed ideas. Dream interpretation is the basis of Freudian myth interpretation and Freud's concept of dreamwork recognizes the importance of contextual relationships for the interpretation of any individual element in a dream. This suggestion would find an important point of rapprochment between the structuralist and psychoanalytic approaches to myth in Freud's thought. Carl Jung extended the transhistorical, psychological approach with his theory of the \"collective unconscious\" and the archetypes (inherited \"archaic\" patterns), often encoded in myth, that arise out of it. According to Jung, \"myth-forming structural elements must be present in the unconscious psyche\". Comparing Jung's methodology with Joseph Campbell's theory, Robert A. Segal concludes that \"to interpret a myth Campbell simply identifies the archetypes in it. An interpretation of the Odyssey, for example, would show how Odysseus's life conforms to a heroic pattern. Jung, by contrast, considers the identification of archetypes merely the first step in the interpretation of a myth\". Karl Kerényi, one of the founders of modern studies in Greek mythology, gave up his early views of myth, in order to apply Jung's theories of archetypes to Greek myth. \n\nOrigin theories\n\nMax Müller attempted to understand an Indo-European religious form by tracing it back to its Indo-European (or, in Müller's time, \"Aryan\") \"original\" manifestation. In 1891, he claimed that \"the most important discovery which has been made during the nineteenth century with respect to the ancient history of mankind ... was this sample equation: Sanskrit Dyaus-pitar Greek Zeus \n Latin Jupiter = Old Norse Tyr\". The question of Greek mythology's place in Indo-European studies has generated much scholarship since Müller's time. For example, philologist Georges Dumézil draws a comparison between the Greek Uranus and the Sanskrit Varuna, although there is no hint that he believes them to be originally connected. In other cases, close parallels in character and function suggest a common heritage, yet lack of linguistic evidence makes it difficult to prove, as in the case of the Greek Moirai and the Norns of Norse mythology. \n\nArchaeology and mythography, on the other hand, have revealed that the Greeks were also inspired by some of the civilizations of Asia Minor and the Near East. Adonis seems to be the Greek counterpart — more clearly in cult than in myth — of a Near Eastern \"dying god\". Cybele is rooted in Anatolian culture while much of Aphrodite's iconography may spring from Semitic goddesses. There are also possible parallels between the earliest divine generations (Chaos and its children) and Tiamat in the Enuma Elish.L. Edmunds, Approaches to Greek Myth, 184* Robert A. Segal, A Greek Eternal Child, 64 According to Meyer Reinhold, \"near Eastern theogonic concepts, involving divine succession through violence and generational conflicts for power, found their way ... into Greek mythology\". In addition to Indo-European and Near Eastern origins, some scholars have speculated on the debts of Greek mythology to the pre-Hellenic societies: Crete, Mycenae, Pylos, Thebes and Orchomenus. Historians of religion were fascinated by a number of apparently ancient configurations of myth connected with Crete (the god as bull, Zeus and Europa, Pasiphaë who yields to the bull and gives birth to the Minotaur etc.) Martin P. Nilsson concluded that all great classical Greek myths were tied to Mycenaen centres and were anchored in prehistoric times. Nevertheless, according to Burkert, the iconography of the Cretan Palace Period has provided almost no confirmation for these theories. \n\nMotifs in Western art and literature\n\nThe widespread adoption of Christianity did not curb the popularity of the myths. With the rediscovery of classical antiquity in the Renaissance, the poetry of Ovid became a major influence on the imagination of poets, dramatists, musicians and artists.* L. Burn, Greek Myths, 75 From the early years of Renaissance, artists such as Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael, portrayed the Pagan subjects of Greek mythology alongside more conventional Christian themes. Through the medium of Latin and the works of Ovid, Greek myth influenced medieval and Renaissance poets such as Petrarch, Boccaccio and Dante in Italy.\n\nIn Northern Europe, Greek mythology never took the same hold of the visual arts, but its effect was very obvious on literature. The English imagination was fired by Greek mythology starting with Chaucer and John Milton and continuing through Shakespeare to Robert Bridges in the 20th century. Racine in France and Goethe in Germany revived Greek drama, reworking the ancient myths. Although during the Enlightenment of the 18th century reaction against Greek myth spread throughout Europe, the myths continued to provide an important source of raw material for dramatists, including those who wrote the libretti for many of Handel's and Mozart's operas. By the end of the 18th century, Romanticism initiated a surge of enthusiasm for all things Greek, including Greek mythology. In Britain, new translations of Greek tragedies and Homer inspired contemporary poets (such as Alfred Lord Tennyson, Keats, Byron and Shelley) and painters (such as Lord Leighton and Lawrence Alma-Tadema). Christoph Gluck, Richard Strauss, Jacques Offenbach and many others set Greek mythological themes to music. American authors of the 19th century, such as Thomas Bulfinch and Nathaniel Hawthorne, held that the study of the classical myths was essential to the understanding of English and American literature. In more recent times, classical themes have been reinterpreted by dramatists Jean Anouilh, Jean Cocteau, and Jean Giraudoux in France, Eugene O'Neill in America, and T. S. Eliot in Britain and by novelists such as James Joyce and André Gide.", "Tartarus (; Greek: Τάρταρος Tartaros), in ancient Greek mythology, is the deep abyss that is used as a dungeon of torment and suffering for the wicked and as the prison for the Titans. As far below Hades as the earth is below the heavens, Tartarus is the place where, according to Plato in Gorgias (c. 400 BC), souls were judged after death and where the wicked received divine punishment. Like other primal entities (such as the Earth, Night and Time), Tartarus was also considered to be a primordial force or deity.\n\nGreek mythology \n\nIn Greek mythology, Tartarus is both a deity and a place in the underworld. In ancient Orphic sources and in the mystery schools, Tartarus is also the unbounded first-existing entity from which the Light and the cosmos are born. \n\nIn the Greek poet Hesiod's Theogony, c. 700 BC, Tartarus was the third of the primordial deities, following after Chaos and Gaia (Earth), and preceding Eros, and was the father, by Gaia, of the monster Typhon. According to Hyginus, Tartarus was the offspring of Aether and Gaia. \n\nAs for the place, Hesiod asserts that a bronze anvil falling from heaven would fall nine days before it reached the earth. The anvil would take nine more days to fall from earth to Tartarus. In The Iliad (c. 700 BC), Zeus asserts that Tartarus is \"as far beneath Hades as heaven is high above the earth.\"\n\nWhile according to Greek mythology the realm of Hades is the place of the dead, Tartarus also has a number of inhabitants. When Kronos came to power as the King of the Titans, he imprisoned the one-eyed Cyclopes and the hundred-armed Hecatonchires in Tartarus and set the monster Campe as its guard. Zeus killed Campe and released these imprisoned giants to aid in his conflict with the Titans. The gods of Olympus eventually triumphed. Kronos and many of the other Titans were banished to Tartarus, though Prometheus, Epimetheus, Metis and most of the female Titans were spared (according to Pindar, Kronos somehow later earned Zeus' forgiveness and was released from Tartarus to become ruler of Elysium). Another Titan, Atlas, was sentenced to hold the sky on his shoulders to prevent it from resuming its primordial embrace with the Earth. Other gods could be sentenced to Tartarus as well. Apollo is a prime example, although Zeus freed him. The Hecatonchires became guards of Tartarus' prisoners. Later, when Zeus overcame the monster Typhon, he threw him into \"wide Tartarus\". \n\nOriginally, Tartarus was used only to confine dangers to the gods of Olympus. In later mythologies, Tartarus became the place where the punishment fits the crime. For example:\n\n* King Sisyphus was sent to Tartarus for killing guests and travelers to his castle in violation to his hospitality, seducing his niece, and reporting one of Zeus' sexual conquests by telling the river god Asopus of the whereabouts of his daughter Aegina (who had been taken away by Zeus). But regardless of the impropriety of Zeus' frequent conquests, Sisyphus overstepped his bounds by considering himself a peer of the gods who could rightfully report their indiscretions. When Zeus ordered Thanatos to chain up Sisyphus in Tartarus, Sisyphus tricked Thanatos by asking him how the chains worked and ended up chaining Thanatos; as a result there was no more death. This caused Ares to free Thanatos and turn Sisyphus over to him. Sometime later, Sisyphus had Persephone send him back to the surface to scold his wife for not burying him properly. Sisyphus was forcefully dragged back to Tartarus by Hermes when he refused to go back to the Underworld after that. In Tartarus, Sisyphus would be forced to roll a large boulder up a mountainside which when he almost reached the crest, rolled away from Sisyphus and rolled back down repeatedly. This represented the punishment of Sisyphus claiming that his cleverness surpassed that of Zeus, causing the god to make the boulder roll away from Sisyphus, binding Sisyphus to an eternity of frustration.\n* King Tantalus was also in Tartarus after he cut up his son Pelops, boiled him, and served him as food when he was invited to dine with the gods. He also stole the ambrosia from the Gods and told his people its secrets. Another story mentioned that he held onto a golden dog forged by Hephaestus and stolen by Tantalus' friend Pandareus. Tantalus held onto the golden dog for safekeeping and later denied to Pandareus that he had it. Tantalus' punishment for his actions (now a proverbial term for \"temptation without satisfaction\") was to stand in a pool of water beneath a fruit tree with low branches. Whenever he reached for the fruit, the branches raised his intended meal from his grasp. Whenever he bent down to get a drink, the water receded before he could get any. Over his head towered a threatening stone like that of Sisyphus.\n* Ixion was the king of the Lapiths, the most ancient tribe of Thessaly. Ixion grew to hate his father-in-law and ended up pushing him onto a bed of coal and woods committing the first kin-related murder. The princes of other lands ordered that Ixion be denied of any sin-cleansing. Zeus took pity on Ixion and invited him to a meal on Olympus. But when Ixion saw Hera, he fell in love with her and did some under-the-table caressing until Zeus signaled him to stop. After finding a place for Ixion to sleep, Zeus created a cloud-clone of Hera named Nephele to test him to see how much he loved Hera. Ixion made love to her, which resulted in the birth of Centaurus, who mated with some Magnesian mares on Mount Pelion and thus engendered the race of Centaurs (who are called the Ixionidae from their descent). Zeus drove Ixion from Mount Olympus and then struck him with a thunderbolt. He was punished by being tied to a winged flaming wheel that was always spinning: first in the sky and then in Tartarus. Only when Orpheus came down to the Underworld to rescue Eurydice did it stop spinning because of the music Orpheus was playing. Ixion being strapped to the flaming wheel represented his burning lust.\n* In some versions, the Danaides murdered their husbands and were punished in Tartarus by being forced to carry water in a jug to fill a bath which would thereby wash off their sins. But the tub was filled with cracks, so the water always leaked out. \n* The giant Tityos was slain by Apollo and Artemis after attempting to rape Leto on Hera's orders. As punishment, Tityos was stretched out in Tartarus and tortured by two vultures who fed on his liver. This punishment is extremely similar to that of the Titan Prometheus.\n* King Salmoneus was also mentioned to have been imprisoned in Tartarus after passing himself off as Zeus, causing the real Zeus to smite him with a thunderbolt.\n\nAccording to Plato (c. 427 BC), Rhadamanthus, Aeacus and Minos were the judges of the dead and chose who went to Tartarus. Rhadamanthus judged Asian souls, Aeacus judged European souls and Minos was the deciding vote and judge of the Greek.\n\nPlato also proposes the concept that sinners were cast under the ground to be punished in accordance with their sins in the Myth of Er. Cronus, the ruler of the Titans, was thrown down into the pits of Tartarus by his children.\n\nThere were a number of entrances to Tartarus in Greek mythology. One was in Aornum. \n\nRoman mythology\n\nIn Roman mythology, Tartarus is the place where sinners are sent. Virgil describes it in the Aeneid as a gigantic place, surrounded by the flaming river Phlegethon and triple walls to prevent sinners from escaping from it. It is guarded by a hydra with fifty black gaping jaws, which sits at a screeching gate protected by columns of solid adamantine, a substance akin to diamond – so hard that nothing will cut through it. Inside, there is a castle with wide walls, and a tall iron turret. Tisiphone, one of the Erinyes who represents revenge, stands guard sleepless at the top of this turret lashing a whip. There is a pit inside which is said to extend down into the earth twice as far as the distance from the lands of the living to Olympus. At the bottom of this pit lie the Titans, the twin sons of Aloeus, and many other sinners. Still more sinners are contained inside Tartarus, with punishments similar to those of Greek myth.\n\nBiblical Pseudepigrapha \n\nTartarus is only known in Hellenistic Jewish literature from the Greek text of 1 Enoch, dated to 400–200 BC. This states that God placed the archangel Uriel \"in charge of the world and of Tartarus\" (20:2). Tartarus is generally understood to be the place where 200 fallen Watchers (angels) are imprisoned. \n\nTartarus also appears in sections of the Jewish Sibylline Oracles. E.g. Sib. Or. 4:186.\n\nNew Testament \n\nIn the New Testament, the noun Tartarus does not occur but tartaroo (ταρταρόω, \"throw to Tartarus\"), a shortened form of the classical Greek verb kata-tartaroo (\"throw down to Tartarus\"), does appear in 2 Peter 2:4. Liddell Scott provides other sources for the shortened form of this verb, including Acusilaus (5th century BC), Joannes Laurentius Lydus (4th century AD) and the Scholiast on Aeschylus' Eumenides, who cites Pindar relating how the earth tried to tartaro \"cast down\" Apollo after he overcame the Python. In classical texts, the longer form kata-tartaroo is often related to the throwing of the Titans down to Tartarus. \n\nThe ESV is one of several English versions that gives the Greek reading Tartarus as a footnote:\nFor if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell [1] and committed them to chains [2] of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment;\"\n:Footnotes [1] 2:4 Greek Tartarus\n\nAdam Clarke reasoned that Peter's use of language relating to the Titans was an indication that the ancient Greeks had heard of a Biblical punishment of fallen angels. Some Evangelical Christian commentaries distinguish Tartarus as a place for wicked angels and Gehenna as a place for wicked humans on the basis of this verse. Other Evangelical commentaries, in reconciling that some fallen angels are chained in Tartarus, yet some not, attempt to distinguish between one type of fallen angel and another. \n\nIn popular culture\n\nTartarus is featured in Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson and the Olympians and The Heroes of Olympus novel series, where it serves its mythological role as a location in the Underworld. It is further noted as the place where the spirits of defeated monsters travel and undergo regeneration, allowing them to eventually return to Earth. As with the ancient Greeks, Riordan also personifies Tartarus as a sentient being; in this case as the husband of Gaea and father of the Giants. The rivers of the Underworld are revealed to be his circulatory system, and his actual form is the realm from Greek myth. He also displays the ability to \"project\" a humanoid form of considerable power. During the Mark of Athena, Nico di Angelo gets trapped in Tartarus and nearly goes insane. Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase end up trapped there at the end of the book and spend the House of Hades wandering Tartarus to find a way out. They succeed with the help of the Titan Iapetus and the Giant Damasen, but both sacrifice themselves to save them from Tartarus himself.\n\nTartarus is one of the major locations in Persona 3 but instead of an underground place, it is a high tower that only emerges in the middle of the night, known as the Dark Hour, where the main characters' school should be. It is the main location where you engage in combat, as well as being the place where many main story moments take place. Throughout the game you are climbing up the floors and fighting Shadows, the main monsters you fight in the game. Tartarus is also the location in which many main story segments take place, such as various fights with Strega (major antagonists of the game), and the final boss battle. It is the background for most of the story's plot. It also makes in appearance in Persona 4 Arena Ultimax as one of the main backgrounds of the game, emerging where the school the Persona 4 cast goes to is supposed to be, in a time similar to the Dark Hour.\n\nIn Bungie Studios' 2004 video game Halo 2, Tartarus is the main antagonists in the latter half of the campaign story. The character (voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson) is the chieftain of the Brutes, one of the alien species frequently combated in the game. He is easily recognized by his white fur, mohawk, and massive war hammer. His harsh, cruel, oppressive nature lends itself to his mythological underworld namesake. In the game's campaign, Tartarus shows consistent hostility and derision towards the race of Elites of which the protagonist, the Arbiter is a part. In the game's third act, he attempts to kill the Arbiter and leads the Brutes in a mutiny to usurp the leadership position of the Elites within the Covenant army. Following this betrayal, the player, fighting as the Arbiter, must track down Tartarus and in the final mission, defeat him to stop the firing of the Halo ring.", "Hades (; or , Háidēs) was the ancient Greek chthonic god of the underworld, which eventually took his name. \n\nIn Greek mythology, Hades was regarded as the oldest son of Cronus and Rhea, although the last son regurgitated by his father. He and his brothers Zeus and Poseidon defeated their father's generation of gods, the Titans, and claimed rulership over the cosmos. Hades received the underworld, Zeus the air, and Poseidon the sea, with the solid earth—long the province of Gaia—available to all three concurrently. Hades was often portrayed with his three-headed guard dog Cerberus and, in later mythological authors, associated with the Helm of Darkness and the bident.\n\nThe Etruscan god Aita and Roman gods Dis Pater and Orcus were eventually taken as equivalent to the Greek Hades and merged as Pluto, a Latinization of his euphemistic Greek name Plouton.\n\nName\n\nThe origin of Hades' name is uncertain, but has generally been seen as meaning \"The Unseen One\" since antiquity. An extensive section of Plato's dialogue Cratylus is devoted to the etymology of the god's name, in which Socrates is arguing for a folk etymology not from \"unseen\" but from \"his knowledge (eidenai) of all noble things\". Modern linguists have proposed the Proto-Greek form *Awides (\"unseen\"). The earliest attested form is Aḯdēs (), which lacks the proposed digamma. West argues instead for an original meaning of \"the one who presides over meeting up\" from the universality of death. \n\nIn Ionic and epic Greek, he was known as Áïdēs. Other poetic variations of the name include Aïdōneús () and the inflected forms Áïdos (, gen.), Áïdi (, dat.), and Áïda (, acc.), whose reconstructed nominative case *Áïs () is, however, not attested. The name as it came to be known in classical times was Háidēs (). Later the iota became silent, then a subscript marking (), and finally omitted entirely (). \n\nPerhaps from fear of pronouncing his name, around the 5th century BC, the Greeks started referring to Hades as Pluto (, Ploútōn), with a root meaning \"wealthy\", considering that from the abode below (i.e., the soil) come riches (e.g., fertile crops, metals and so on). Plouton became the Roman god who both rules the underworld and distributed riches from below. This deity was a mixture of the Greek god Hades and the Eleusinian icon Ploutos, and from this he also received a priestess, which was not previously practiced in Greece. More elaborate names of the same genre were Ploutodótēs () or Ploutodotḗr () meaning \"giver of wealth\". Epithets of Hades include Agesander () and Agesilaos (), both from ágō (, \"lead\", \"carry\" or \"fetch\") and anḗr (, \"man\") or laos (, \"men\" or \"people\"), describing Hades as the god who carries away all. Nicander uses the form Hegesilaus (). He was also referred to as Zeus Katachthonios (Ζευς καταχθονιος), meaning \"the Zeus of the Underworld\", by those avoiding his actual name, as he had complete control over the Underworld.\n\nGreek god of the underworld\n\nIn Greek mythology, Hades the god of the underworld, was a son of the Titans Cronus and Rhea. He had three sisters, Demeter, Hestia, and Hera, as well as two brothers, Zeus, the youngest of the three, and Poseidon.\nUpon reaching adulthood, Zeus managed to force his father to disgorge his siblings. After their release the six younger gods, along with allies they managed to gather, challenged the elder gods for power in the Titanomachy, a divine war. The war lasted for ten years and ended with the victory of the younger gods. Following their victory, according to a single famous passage in the Iliad (xv.187–93), Hades and his two brothers, Poseidon and Zeus, drew lots for realms to rule. Zeus received the sky, Poseidon received the seas, and Hades received the underworld, the unseen realm to which the souls of the dead go upon leaving the world as well as any and all things beneath the earth. Some myths suggest that Hades was dissatisfied with his turnout, but had no choice and moved to his new realm. The Underworld was Hades' eternal domain, meaning he would spend the majority of his time there . \n\nHades obtained his wife and queen, Persephone, through abduction at the behest of Zeus. This myth is the most important one Hades takes part in; it also connected the Eleusinian Mysteries with the Olympian pantheon, particularly as represented in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, which is the oldest story of the abduction, most likely dating back to the beginning of the 6th Century BC. Helios told the grieving Demeter that Hades was not unworthy as a consort for Persephone:\n\n\"Aidoneus, the Ruler of Many, is no unfitting husband among the deathless gods for your child, being your own brother and born of the same stock: also, for honor, he has that third share which he received when division was made at the first, and is appointed lord of those among whom he dwells.\"\n— Homeric Hymn to Demeter\n\nDespite modern connotations of death as evil, Hades was actually more altruistically inclined in mythology. Hades was often portrayed as passive rather than evil; his role was often maintaining relative balance. However he was depicted as cold, stern, and gave all his subjects equal treatment in regards to his laws. Any other individual aspects of his personality are not given, as Greeks refrained from giving him much thought to avoid attracting his attention. \n\nHades ruled the dead, assisted by others over whom he had complete authority. The House of hades was described as full of \"guests,\" though he rarely left the Underworld. He cared little about what happened in the Upperworld, as his primary attention was ensuring none of his subjects ever left. When he did venture above ground, he generally wore his helmet of invisibility, which he obtained from the Cyclopes. He strictly forbade his subjects to leave his domain and would become quite enraged when anyone tried to leave, or if someone tried to steal the souls from his realm. His wrath was equally terrible for anyone who tried to cheat death or otherwise crossed him, as Sisyphus and Pirithous found out to their sorrow. While usually indifferent to his subjects, Hades was very focused on the punishment of these two people; particularly Pirithous, as he entered the underworld in an attempt to steal Persephone for himself, and consequently was forced onto the \"Chair of Forgetfulness\". Another myth is about the Roman god Asclepius was originally a demigod, fathered by Apollo and birthed by Coronis, a Thessalian princess. During his lifetime, he became a famous and talented physician, who eventually was able to bring the dead back to life. Feeling cheated, Plouton persuaded Jupiter to kill him with a thunderbolt. After his death, he was brought to Olympus where he became a god. Hades was only depicted outside of the Underworld once in myth, and even that is believed to have been an instance where he had just left the gates of the Underworld, which was when Heracles shot him with an arrow as Hades was attempting to defend the city of Plyus. After he was shot, however, he traveled to Olympus to heal. Besides Heracles, the only other living people who ventured to the Underworld were all heroes: Odysseus, Aeneas (accompanied by the Sibyl), Orpheus, who Hades showed uncharacteristic mercy towards at Persephone's persuasion, who was moved by Orpheus' music, Theseus with Pirithous, and, in a late romance, Psyche. None of them were pleased with what they witnessed in the realm of the dead. In particular, the Greek war hero Achilles, whom Odysseus conjured with a blood libation, said:\n\"O shining Odysseus, never try to console me for dying.\nI would rather follow the plow as thrall to another\nman, one with no land allotted to him and not much to live on,\nthan be a king over all the perished dead.\"\n— Achilles' soul to Odysseus. Homer, Odyssey' 11.488-491\n\nCult \n\nHades, as the god of the dead, was a fearsome figure to those still living; in no hurry to meet him, they were reluctant to swear oaths in his name, and averted their faces when sacrificing to him. Since to many, simply to say the word \"Hades\" was frightening, euphemisms were pressed into use. Since precious minerals come from under the earth (i.e., the \"underworld\" ruled by Hades), he was considered to have control of these as well, and was referred to as Πλούτων (Plouton, related to the word for \"wealth\"), Latinized as Pluto. Sophocles explained referring to Hades as \"the rich one\" with these words: \"the gloomy Hades enriches himself with our sighs and our tears.\" In addition, he was called Clymenus (\"notorious\"), Polydegmon (\"who receives many\"), and perhaps Eubuleus (\"good counsel\" or \"well-intentioned\"), all of them euphemisms for a name that was unsafe to pronounce, which evolved into epithets.\n\nHe spent most of the time in his dark realm. Formidable in battle, he proved his ferocity in the famous Titanomachy, the battle of the Olympians versus the Titans, which established the rule of Zeus.\n\nFeared and loathed, Hades embodied the inexorable finality of death: \"Why do we loathe Hades more than any god, if not because he is so adamantine and unyielding?\" The rhetorical question is Agamemnon's. He was not, however, an evil god, for although he was stern, cruel, and unpitying, he was still just. Hades ruled the Underworld and was therefore most often associated with death and feared by men, but he was not Death itself — the actual embodiment of Death was Thanatos.\n\nWhen the Greeks propitiated Hades, they banged their hands on the ground to be sure he would hear them. Black animals, such as sheep, were sacrificed to him, and the very vehemence of the rejection of human sacrifice expressed in myth suggests an unspoken memory of some distant past. The blood from all chthonic sacrifices including those to propitiate Hades dripped into a pit or cleft in the ground. The person who offered the sacrifice had to avert his face. \n\nOne ancient source says that he possessed the Cap of invisibility. His chariot, drawn by four black horses, made for a fearsome and impressive sight. His other ordinary attributes were the narcissus and cypress plants, the Key of Hades and Cerberus, the three-headed dog.\n\nThe philosopher Heraclitus, unifying opposites, declared that Hades and Dionysus, the very essence of indestructible life (zoë), are the same god. Among other evidence Kerényi notes that the grieving goddess Demeter refused to drink wine, which is the gift of Dionysus, after Persephone's abduction, because of this association, and suggests that Hades may in fact have been a \"cover name\" for the underworld Dionysus. He suggests that this dual identity may have been familiar to those who came into contact with the Mysteries. One of the epithets of Dionysus was \"Chthonios\", meaning \"the subterranean\". \n\nArtistic representations\n\n Hades was depicted so infrequently in artwork, as well as mythology, because the Greeks were so afraid of him. His artistic representations, which are generally found in Archaic pottery, are not even concretely thought of as the deity; however at this point in time it is heavily believed that the figures illustrated are indeed Hades. He was later presented in the classical arts in the depictions of the Rape of Persephone. Within these illustrations, Hades was often young, yet he was also shown as varying ages in other works. Due to this lack of depictions, there weren't very strict guidelines when representing the deity. On pottery, he has a dark beard and is presented as a stately figure on an \"ebony throne.\" He has a few symbolic icons, such as a \"bird-tipped scepter,\" and a key, which both represented his control over the underworld and acted as a reminder that the gates of the Underworld were always locked so that souls could not leave. Even if the doors were open, Cerberus, the three-headed guard dog of the Underworld, ensured that while all souls were allowed to enter into The Underworld freely, none could ever escape. The dog is often portrayed next to the god as a means of easy identification, since no other deity relates to it so directly. Sometimes, artists painted Hades as looking away from the other gods, as he was disliked by them as well as humans.\n\nAs Plouton, he was regarded in a more positive light. He holds a cornucopia, representing the gifts he bestows upon people as well as fertility, which he becomes connected to. \n\nPersephone\n\nThe consort of Hades was Persephone, represented by the Greeks as the beautiful daughter of Demeter. \n\nPersephone did not submit to Hades willingly, but was abducted by him while picking flowers in the fields of Nysa. In protest of his act, Demeter cast a curse on the land and there was a great famine; though, one by one, the gods came to request she lift it, lest mankind perish, she asserted that the earth would remain barren until she saw her daughter again. Finally, Zeus intervened; via Hermes, he requested that Hades return Persephone. Hades complied,\n\"But he on his part secretly gave her sweet pomegranate seed to eat, taking care for himself that she might not remain continually with grave, dark-robed Demeter.\" \n\nDemeter questioned Persephone on her return to light and air:\n\n\"...but if you have tasted food, you must go back\nagain beneath the secret places of the earth, there to dwell a\nthird part of the seasons every year: yet for the two parts you\nshall be with me and the other deathless gods.\"\n\nThis bound her to Hades and the Underworld, much to the dismay of Demeter. It is not clear whether Persephone was accomplice to the ploy. Zeus proposed a compromise, to which all parties agreed: of the year, Persephone would spend one third with her husband. \n\nIt is during this time that winter casts on the earth \"an aspect of sadness and mourning.\" \n\nTheseus and Pirithous\n\nTheseus and Pirithous pledged to kidnap and marry daughters of Zeus. Theseus chose Helen and together they kidnapped her and decided to hold onto her until she was old enough to marry. Pirithous chose Persephone. They left Helen with Theseus' mother, Aethra and traveled to the Underworld. Hades knew of their plan to capture his wife, so he pretended to offer them hospitality and set a feast; as soon as the pair sat down, snakes coiled around their feet and held them there. Theseus was eventually rescued by Heracles but Pirithous remained trapped as punishment for daring to seek the wife of a god for his own.\n\nHeracles\n\nHeracles' final labour was to capture Cerberus. First, Heracles went to Eleusis to be initiated into the Eleusinian Mysteries. He did this to absolve himself of guilt for killing the centaurs and to learn how to enter and exit the underworld alive. He found the entrance to the underworld at Taenarum. Athena and Hermes helped him through and back from Hades. Heracles asked Hades for permission to take Cerberus. Hades agreed as long as Heracles didn't harm Cerberus. When Heracles dragged the dog out of Hades, he passed through the cavern Acherusia.\n\nMinthe\n\nAccording to Ovid, Hades pursued and would have won the nymph Minthe, associated with the river Cocytus, had not Persephone turned Minthe into the plant called mint.\n\nRealm of Hades\n\nIn older Greek myths, the realm of Hades is the misty and gloomy abode of the dead (also called Erebus), where all mortals go. Very few mortals could leave Hades once they entered. The exceptions, Heracles and Theseus, are heroic. Even Odysseus in his Nekyia (Odyssey, xi) calls up the spirits of the departed, rather than descend to them. Later Greek philosophy introduced the idea that all mortals are judged after death and are either rewarded or cursed.\n\nThere were several sections of the realm of Hades, including Elysium, the Asphodel Meadows, and Tartarus. Greek mythographers were not perfectly consistent about the geography of the afterlife. A contrasting myth of the afterlife concerns the Garden of the Hesperides, often identified with the Isles of the Blessed, where the blessed heroes may dwell.\n\nIn Roman mythology, the entrance to the Underworld located at Avernus, a crater near Cumae, was the route Aeneas used to descend to the realm of the dead. By synecdoche, \"Avernus\" could be substituted for the underworld as a whole. The di inferi were a collective of underworld divinities.\n\nFor Hellenes, the deceased entered the underworld by crossing the Styx, ferried across by Charon kair'-on), who charged an obolus, a small coin for passage placed in the mouth of the deceased by pious relatives. Paupers and the friendless gathered for a hundred years on the near shore according to Book VI of Vergil's Aeneid. Greeks offered propitiatory libations to prevent the deceased from returning to the upper world to \"haunt\" those who had not given them a proper burial. The far side of the river was guarded by Cerberus, the three-headed dog defeated by Heracles (Roman Hercules). Passing beyond Cerberus, the shades of the departed entered the land of the dead to be judged.\n\nThe five rivers of the realm of Hades, and their symbolic meanings, are Acheron (the river of sorrow, or woe), Cocytus (lamentation), Phlegethon (fire), Lethe (oblivion), and Styx (hate), the river upon which even the gods swore and in which Achilles was dipped to render him invincible. The Styx forms the boundary between the upper and lower worlds. See also Eridanos.\n\nThe first region of Hades comprises the Fields of Asphodel, described in Odyssey xi, where the shades of heroes wander despondently among lesser spirits, who twitter around them like bats. Only libations of blood offered to them in the world of the living can reawaken in them for a time the sensations of humanity.\n\nBeyond lay Erebus, which could be taken for a euphonym of Hades, whose own name was dread. There were two pools, that of Lethe, where the common souls flocked to erase all memory, and the pool of Mnemosyne (\"memory\"), where the initiates of the Mysteries drank instead. In the forecourt of the palace of Hades and Persephone sit the three judges of the Underworld: Minos, Rhadamanthus, and Aeacus. There at the trivium sacred to Hecate, where three roads meet, souls are judged, returned to the Fields of Asphodel if they are neither virtuous nor evil, sent by the road to Tartarus if they are impious or evil, or sent to Elysium (Islands of the Blessed) with the \"blameless\" heroes.\n\nIn the Sibylline oracles, a curious hodgepodge of Greco-Roman and Judaeo-Christian elements, Hades again appears as the abode of the dead, and by way of folk etymology, it even derives Hades from the name Adam (the first man), saying it is because he was the first to enter there. Owing to its appearance in the New Testament of the Bible, Hades also has a distinct meaning in Christianity.\n\nGenealogy\n\nPopular culture" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Steven_Van_Zandt.txt", "Nils_Lofgren.txt", "Patti_Scialfa.txt", "Bruce_Springsteen.txt" ], "title": [ "Steven Van Zandt", "Nils Lofgren", "Patti Scialfa", "Bruce Springsteen" ], "wiki_context": [ "Steven Van Zandt (born November 22, 1950) is an American musician, songwriter, arranger, record producer, actor, and radio disc jockey, who frequently goes by the stage names Little Steven or Miami Steve. He is a member of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, in which he plays guitar and mandolin. He has also acted in television dramas such as The Sopranos (1999–2007) and Lilyhammer (2012–2014). Van Zandt also had his own solo band called Little Steven and The Disciples of Soul in the 1980s. In 2014, Van Zandt was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the E Street Band.\n\nEarly years\n\nSteven Van Zandt was born on November 22, 1950, in Boston, Massachusetts. Steven Van Zandt was born as Steven Lento, is of South Italian descent (his grandfather was from Calabria and his grandmother's parents were Neapolitans). \n\nHis mother, Mary Lento, remarried when he was young and Steven took the last name of his stepfather, William Van Zandt. The family moved from Massachusetts to Middletown Township, New Jersey, when he was seven. \n\nSteven Van Zandt found his love for music at an early age, when he learned how to play the guitar. During the mid 1960s, Steven played in his first band as a teenager. Van Zandt later cites that Dave Clark Five was an early influence.\n\nActor/playwright/producer Billy Van Zandt is Steven's half-brother. \n\nCareer\n\nBand member\n\nVan Zandt grew up in the Jersey Shore music scene, and was an early friend and pre-E Street bandmate of Bruce Springsteen. In the early seventies, he was a journeyman guitarist working as a sideman for The Dovells and several of Bruce Springsteen's early bands.\n\nHe co-founded the band Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes. Van Zandt helped establish the rhythm and blues oriented style of music that the band performed. He also produced Southside's first three albums. Overall, Van Zandt wrote a significant bulk of Southside's music which helped provide them with the success that they achieved. \n\nVan Zandt then started to switch off between writing for the Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes and touring with the E Street Band. In 1975, during the recording sessions for Born to Run, Springsteen – at a loss (according to author Dave Marsh in the Springsteen biography Born To Run) for ideas on how to arrange the horn part for \"Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out\" – called on Van Zandt and his encyclopedic knowledge of soul music for help with the arrangement. In the Wings for Wheels documentary, Springsteen revealed that Van Zandt was partially responsible for the signature guitar line in \"Born to Run\"; \"Arguably Steve's greatest contribution to my music.\" Before this, Van Zandt had only been helping Springsteen write material for the band. Ultimately, Van Zandt ended up joining the E Street Band in the midst of their Born to Run tours.\n\nIn those early years, Van Zandt supplied a great deal of the lead guitar work for the band in concert, as can be seen on the 1975 concert DVD within Born to Run 30th Anniversary Edition (later released as the CD Hammersmith Odeon London '75). In 1984, Van Zandt left the E Street Band. He originally joined to see Bruce Springsteen rise in success, and once the band rose to that success he left. \n\n \nLater in life, Van Zandt returned to the E Street Band when it was reformed (briefly in 1995, and on an ongoing basis since 1999) and remains with it. By now, his guitar playing had mostly been reduced to a background rhythm role, due to Nils Lofgren's position in the band and his capability as a lead guitarist. In addition, Springsteen had begun taking many more of guitar solos as his music became more guitar-centered. Notwithstanding this, among E Street Band members he often had the second-most amount of \"face time\" in concert after Clarence Clemons, frequently mugging and posing for the audience and sometimes delivering his unpolished, nasal backing vocals while sharing a microphone with Springsteen. His playing or singing is most prominently featured on the songs \"Glory Days\", \"Two Hearts\", \"Long Walk Home\" (when featured a Van Zandt outro vocal solo) \"Land of Hope and Dreams\", \"Badlands\", \"Ramrod\", and \"Murder Incorporated\", among others like the live versions of \"Rosalita\". He often trades vocals with Springsteen in live versions of \"Prove it All Night\". He features prominently in the video for \"Glory Days\", sharing the spotlight with Springsteen during the choruses, while swapping lines with him during the (non)fade, and in live versions he does the same. During the E Street Band's performance at the Super Bowl in 2009, Van Zandt was the most prominently featured member of the band, playing a guitar solo on the final number of the set, \"Glory Days\" (although the solo could not be heard by the audience which was listening to a previously recorded audio track), as well as sharing lead vocals and exchanging humorous banter with Springsteen.\n\nSongwriter, arranger, producer\n\nVan Zandt became a songwriter and producer for fellow Jersey shore act Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes in the mid- to late-1970s, penning their signature song \"I Don't Wanna Go Home\", co-writing other songs for them with Springsteen, and producing their most-acclaimed record, Hearts of Stone. As such, Van Zandt became a key contributor to the Jersey Shore sound. Van Zandt then went on to share production credits on the classic Springsteen albums Darkness on the Edge of Town, The River, and Born in the U.S.A.. In 1989, Jackson Browne covered the 1983 Van Zandt composition \"I Am A Patriot\" for Browne's World in Motion album. Van Zandt has produced a number of other records, including an uncredited effort on the Iron City Houserockers' Have A Good Time (But Get Out Alive). Less successful was his work on Lone Justice's second album Shelter, which was a career-ending flop for the Los Angeles cowpunk band. \n\nIn 1989 Van Zandt wrote \"While You Were Looking at Me\" for Michael Monroe's album Not Fakin' It and co-wrote videohits \"Dead, Jail or Rock'n Roll\" and \"Smoke Screen\". He was an arranger and backing vocalist for a few songs on the album. In 1992, he produced Austin TX-based Arc Angels: two talented, young guitarists/vocalists Doyle Bramhall II and Charlie Sexton backed by the late Stevie Ray Vaughan's rhythm section of Chris Layton (drums) and Tommy Shannon (bass). In 1991 Van Zandt produced a successful album for Nigerian superstar and raggae icon, Majek Fashek. In 1993, Van Zandt wrote and produced \"All Alone on Christmas\" for the soundtrack of the Chris Columbus film Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, which yielded singer Darlene Love her first hit since \"A Fine, Fine Boy\" from 1963, thirty-one years earlier. \n\nIn 1994, Van Zandt produced the eponymous debut album of the punk rock band Demolition 23 which featured ex-Hanoi Rocks members Michael Monroe and Sami Yaffa. Van Zandt also co-wrote six songs for the album with Monroe and Jude Wilder. In 1995, Van Zandt aided Meat Loaf with the song \"Amnesty Is Granted\" off of his Welcome to the Neighborhood album. In 2004, he contributed the song \"Baby Please Don't Go\" to Nancy Sinatra's self-titled album. \n\nSolo artist\n\nVan Zandt officially left the E Street Band in 1984, but later rejoined in 1999. Since 1984 he has been involved in numerous solo musical projects and collaborations, ranging from soul music to hard rock to world music. In particular, he released four albums in the 1980s and one in 1999, sometimes fronting an on-and-off group known as Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul. Van Zandt has written that these albums are each elements in a five-part concept cycle. The first of them, 1982's Men Without Women, earned the most critical praise (Jay Cocks of TIME magazine dubbed it one of the ten best albums of the year), while its follow-up, 1984's Voice of America, did the best on the U.S. albums chart, although none of them were much of a commercial success. With Voice of America, his music became explicitly political, with the central theme being opposition to Ronald Reagan-era American foreign policy.\n\nContinuing his involvement in issues of the day, in 1985 he created the music-industry activist group Artists United Against Apartheid as an action against the Sun City resort in South Africa. Forty-nine recording artists, including Springsteen, U2, Bob Dylan, Pete Townshend, Joey Ramone, Tom Petty, Afrika Bambaataa and Run DMC, collaborated on a song called \"Sun City\" in which they pledged they would never perform at the resort. The song was modestly successful, and played a part in the broad international effort to overthrow apartheid. \n\nIn 1987, he released the album Freedom - No Compromise, which continued the political messaging. Some U.S. appearances in that year as opening act for U2's arena-and-stadium Joshua Tree Tour continued in the same vein – Oliver North was labeled a \"criminal motherfucker\" – but were not well received by some audiences. Both the record and his concerts were popular in Europe. \n\nHis fourth album, 1989's Revolution, attracted little attention. His next album, entitled Born Again Savage was released in 1999. Since then, Van Zandt has recorded another album, Nobody Loves and Leaves Alive with his garage band the Lost Boys. Although the album remains unreleased, three tracks from it were heard on the Sopranos television show: \"Nobody Loves and Leaves Alive\", \"Affection\", and \"Come for Me\". \"Affection\" appeared on The Sopranos: Peppers & Eggs (Music From the HBO Original Series). \n\nSteven's song \"Under The Gun\" was covered by Carla Olson & The Textones on their Detroit '85 Live & Unreleased album which was released in 2008. Another of Steven's songs, \"All I Needed Was You\", appeared on the 2013 Carla Olson album Have Harmony, Will Travel. \n\nActor\n\nUntil 1999, Steven Van Zandt never had any experience with acting. His main focus had always been music, whether it was the multiple bands he participated in, groups he composed pieces for, or music he wrote on his own. Then he decided to audition for a part in the show The Sopranos, and from there on, acting became a more common occurrence in Van Zandt's career.\n\nThe Sopranos\n\nIn 1999, Van Zandt took one of the core roles in The Sopranos, playing level-headed but deadly mob consigliere and strip club owner Silvio Dante. Van Zandt had no acting experience, and the unusual casting choice was made by series creator David Chase. As a guest on the Opie and Anthony Show, Van Zandt tells his casting story to his wide viewer audience on the show:\n\nVan Zandt was picked to induct The Rascals into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997. The original members of The Rascals had been feuding for a number of years and Van Zandt was concerned that the induction and subsequent band performance would result in a very public fiasco on live television. Wanting to defuse any confrontation, Van Zandt donned a Little Lord Fauntleroy-type costume for the event and delivered a humorous induction instead of the more traditional speech delivered for other inductees. The Rascals had worn this type of outfit when they debuted on the national scene in 1965. Chase, a fan of Van Zandt's music, saw this performance on VH1's broadcast of the event, thought Van Zandt was very funny, and contacted him a few days later. It was then that Chase discovered Van Zandt had no acting experience. Van Zandt was reluctant to audition for Chase but eventually relented. His first audition was for the role of the show's main character, Tony Soprano. However, Van Zandt wanted the role to go to a more experienced, \"real\" actor. The character of Silvio Dante was actually based on a character created for a short story written by Van Zandt. \n\nHis role on The Sopranos increased in importance in later seasons, with sixth season plot developments especially giving him prime focus. His real-life wife, Maureen Van Zandt, is an actress who made occasional appearances on The Sopranos playing Silvio's wife Gabriella Dante.\n\nVan Zandt gained acclaim for his performance as Silvio but had contended that he had no interest in acting beyond The Sopranos. However, he has appeared in several other screen projects.\n\nTussels in Brussels\n\nVan Zandt recorded the narration for The Hives biography on their concert DVD Tussles in Brussels (2004).\n\nHotel Cæsar\n\nIn 2010, Van Zandt appeared as himself in the Norwegian soap opera Hotel Cæsar, broadcast on Norway's biggest commercial channel TV2 Norway. He also appeared on Scandinavia's largest talkshow Skavlan.\n\nLilyhammer\n\nIn 2011, he starred in, co-wrote, and acted as executive producer on an English and Norwegian language series entitled Lilyhammer, a Netflix original program produced in collaboration with Norwegian broadcaster NRK. On the show, Van Zandt portrays a Sopranos-like role of an ex-mafioso who flees to Norway to escape a colleague against whom he testified. The show premiered on NRK television on January 25, 2012 with a record audience of 998,000 viewers (one fifth of Norway's population), and ran for three seasons before being cancelled in 2015. \n\nRadio host and entrepreneur\n\n;Radio Host\nSince 2002, Van Zandt has hosted Little Steven's Underground Garage, a weekly syndicated radio show that celebrates garage rock and similar rock subgenres from the 1950s to the present day. As of December 2006, the show is heard on over 200 US radio stations and in some international markets. For example, in Spain it has beamed through Rock & Gol since 2007 and later on Rock FM Radio in Finland; Radio Helsinki started beaming Little Steven's Underground Garage in August 2008. \n\nOn October 20, 2011, the program recorded its 500th show in front of a sold out crowd at the Hard Rock Cafe in New York's Times Square. The guests included the band Green Day; Steve Buscemi, star of The Sopranos and Boardwalk Empire; Vincent Pastore, aka \"Big Pussy Bonpensiero\" from the The Sopranos; actor and director Tim Robbins; and singer Debbie Harry of the group Blondie. \n\n;Program Director\nSteven is also the program director for two radio channels for the Sirius Satellite Radio network. The channels are heard continuously on satellite radio in the USA and worldwide on Sirius Internet Radio. One channel, named Underground Garage, has the same philosophy and musical mandate as his own radio show. On-air hosts on the channel include original Rolling Stones manager/producer Andrew Loog Oldham, singer/guitarist Joan Jett, former record executive Kid Leo, punk rock singer Handsome Dick Manitoba, and rock entrepreneur Kim Fowley. The second channel, named the Outlaw Country, presents the edgier side of country music, both roots and contemporary. On-air hosts for this channel include pop-culture satirist Mojo Nixon. \n\nRecord label\n\nIn December 2006, Little Steven launched his own record label, Wicked Cool Records. \n\nThe first set of records released by Wicked Cool were new albums from Underground Garage favorites the Charms, the Chesterfield Kings, and the Cocktail Slippers; and Fuzz for the Holidays, by Davie Allan and the Arrows, and CBGB Forever, a tribute to the famous, now-defunct venue. The label continues to release new albums from the next generation of garage rockers including the Cocktail Slippers as well as volumes of Little Steven's Underground Garage presents The Coolest Songs in the World, a compilation of selected songs from the Underground Garage radio show's popular feature, the \"Coolest Song in the World This Week\". In 2007, the label signed The Launderettes. 2008 marked the release of the label's first Halloween and Christmas themed compilations. Lost Cathedral is a subsidiary label of Wicked Cool Records and home to the band Crown of Thorns. \n\nRock and Roll Forever Foundation\n\nIn 2007, Van Zandt launched his Rock and Roll Forever Foundation. The first incentive of the foundation is Rock and Roll High School, a chronological anthology tracing the history of Rock and Roll from its roots to present day, highlighting the cultural impact and significance of each era of the genre as it relates to the events and changes that took place in the history of the country and of the world. The program, endorsed by Scholastic and by MENC: The National Association For Music Education has brought to fruition an entire rock n roll curriculum appropriate for middle and high schools. The curriculum is free and is called \"Rock and Roll: An American Story\", and materials are located at www.teachrock.org. \n\nMusical director\n\nIn September 2006, Van Zandt assembled and directed an all-star band to back Hank Williams Jr. on a new version of \"All My Rowdy Friends Are Coming Over Tonight\" for the season premiere (and formal ESPN debut) of Monday Night Football. The all-star lineup included Little Richard, Rick Nielsen (Cheap Trick), Joe Perry (Aerosmith), Questlove (The Roots), Charlie Daniels, Bootsy Collins, Chris Burney (Bowling for Soup), and Bernie Worrell.\n\nSince 2007, Van Zandt has been the director of a music selection committee for the video game Rock Band; he is in charge of selecting new music for the game. \n\nActivist career \n\nAfter leaving the E Street Band in 1984, Van Zandt used his celebrity as a musician to fight issues surrounding apartheid in South Africa by creating a group called the Artists United Against Apartheid.\n\nThis activist group was created in 1985 by Van Zandt and record producer Arthur Baker. Van Zandt and Baker got together over 54 different artists to record an album entitled Sun City in order to raise awareness about the apartheid policy in South Africa. The title referred to a resort in South Africa that catered to wealthy white tourists. The resort upheld racist apartheid policies, yet many famous entertainers chose to perform there. A few of the artists that took part in the making of this album were Bruce Springsteen, Peter Gabriel, Miles Davis, Bob Dylan, and Lou Reed.\n\nThe \"Sun City\" project was originally meant to only be one song, but other musicians contributed their own pieces which transformed it into a full-length album. \"Sun City\" was one of the very first musical collaborations among major recording starts to support a political cause rather than a social cause. The album ultimately ended up raising over $1 million in support of anti-apartheid efforts. Overall, the primary goal of this album and foundation was to draw attention to South Africa's racist policy of apartheid and to support a cultural boycott of the country. \n\nLater in his activism career, Steven Van Zandt worked to raise awareness about the US Military Interference in governments of Central America and other issues. \n\nTours with Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band\n\n*Born to Run tours, 1975–1977\n*Darkness Tour, 1978–1979\n*The River Tour, 1980–1981\n*Reunion Tour, 1999–2000\n*The Rising Tour, 2002–2003\n*Vote for Change Tour, 2004\n*Magic Tour, 2007–2008\n*Working on a Dream Tour, 2009\n*Wrecking Ball Tour, 2012–2013\n*High Hopes Tour, 2014\n*The River Tour 2016\n\nPersonal life\n\nVan Zandt is married to actress Maureen Van Zandt (formerly Maureen Santoro), who portrayed his wife Gabriella Dante in the TV series The Sopranos. They married in New York City on December 31, 1982. Bruce Springsteen was the best man at the ceremony, which was presided over by Reverend Richard Penniman (Little Richard). Singer Percy Sledge sang his classic \"When a Man Loves a Woman\" at the reception. \n\nPhilanthropy\n\nVan Zandt is an Honorary board member of Little Kids Rock, a national nonprofit that works to restore and revitalize music education programs in disadvantaged U.S. public schools. He was also awarded the fourth annual \"Big Man of the Year\" award at the organization's 2013 Right to Rock Benefit Event. \n\nDiscography\n\n*Little Steven\n** Men Without Women (1982)   US #118\n** Voice of America (1984)   US # 55\n** Freedom - No Compromise (1987)   US #80\n** Revolution (1989)\n** Born Again Savage (1999)\n** Greatest Hits (1999)\n* Bruce Springsteen\n** Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. (1973) – sound effects\n** Born to Run (1975)\n** Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978)\n** The River (1980)\n** Born in the U.S.A. (1984)\n** Live/1975-85 (1986)\n** Greatest Hits (1995)\n** Blood Brothers (1996)\n** Tracks (1998)\n** 18 Tracks (1999)\n** Live in New York City (2001)\n** The Rising (2002)\n** The Essential Bruce Springsteen (2003)\n** Hammersmith Odeon London '75 (2006)\n** Magic (2007)\n** Magic Tour Highlights (2008)\n** Working on a Dream (2009)\n** The Promise (2010)\n** Wrecking Ball (2012)\n** High Hopes (2014)\n* Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes\n** I Don't Want To Go Home (1976)\n** Live at the Bottom Line (1976)\n** This Time It's for Real (1977)\n** Hearts of Stone (1978)\n** Havin' a Party (1979)\n** Better Days (1991)\n** Jukebox (2007)\n*Ronnie Spector & The E Street Band\n**\"Say Goodbye To Hollywood\" / \"Baby Please Don't Go\" (1977)\n*Gary U.S. Bonds\n** Dedication (1981)\n** On the Line (1982)\n** Standing in the Line of Fire (1984)\n*Artists United Against Apartheid\n** Sun City (1985)\n*Iron City Houserockers\n** Have a Good Time but Get out Alive! (1980)\n*Meat Loaf\n** Welcome to the Neighborhood (1995)\n*Jimmy Barnes\n**For The Working Class Man (1985)\n*Davie Allan & The Arrows\n** Fuzz for the Holidays (2004)\n*Darlene Love\n** Introducing Darlene Love (2015)\n\nTelevision\n\n*Lilyhammer (2012–2014)[http://deadline.com/2015/07/lilyhammer-canceled-netflix-1201486351/ ‘Lilyhammer’ Canceled After 3 Seasons On Netflix | Deadline]\n*The Sopranos (1999–2007)", "Nils Hilmer Lofgren (born June 21, 1951 ) is an American rock musician, recording artist, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. Along with his work as a solo artist, he is a member of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band since 1984, a former member of Crazy Horse, and founder/frontman of the band Grin. Lofgren was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the E Street Band in 2014.\n\nBiography\n\nEarly life and career\n\nLofgren was born in Chicago in 1951 to an Italian mother and a Swedish father. When Lofgren was a young child, the family moved to the Washington D.C. suburb of Garrett Park, Maryland. Lofgren's first instrument was classical accordion, beginning at age 5, which he studied seriously for ten years. After studying classical music and jazz, throughout his youth, Lofgren switched his emphasis to rock music, and focused on the piano and the guitar.\nBy 1968, Lofgren formed the band Grin originally with bassist George Daly (later replaced by Bob Gordon), and drummer Bob Berberich, former players in the DC band The Hangmen. The group played in venues throughout the Washington, D.C. area.\nLofgren had been a competitive gymnast in high school, a skill that popped up later in his career. During this time, Lofgren met Neil Young and played for him. Young invited Lofgren to come to California and the Grin trio (Lofgren, Daly and Berberich) drove out west and lived for some months at a home Neil Young rented in Laurel Canyon.\n\nLofgren joined Neil Young's band at age 19, playing piano and guitar on the album After the Gold Rush. Lofgren worked on his parts around-the-clock when recording was not in session. Lofgren maintained a close musical relationship with Young, appearing on his Tonight's the Night album and tour among others. He was also briefly a member of Crazy Horse, appearing on their 1971 LP and contributing songs to their catalogue.\n\nGrin\n\nLofgren used the Neil Young album credits to land his band Grin a record deal in 1971. Lofgren had formed the band originally with bassist George Daly and drummer Bob Berberich, and the group played in venues throughout the Washington D.C. area before going to California. Daly left the band early on to become a Columbia Records A & R Executive and was replaced by bassist Bob Gordon, who remained through the release of four critically acclaimed albums of catchy, hard rock, from 1971 to 1974, with guitar as Lofgren's primary instrument. The single \"White Lies\" got heavy airplay on Washington, D.C.-area radio. Lofgren wrote the majority of the group's songs, and often shared vocal duties with other members of the band (primarily drummer Bob Berberich). After the second album Nils added brother Tom Lofgren as a rhythm guitarist. Grin failed to hit the big time, and were released by their record company.\n\nSolo career, part I\n\nIn 1974 Grin disbanded. Lofgren's eponymous debut solo album was a success with critics; a 1975 Rolling Stone review by Jon Landau labeled it one of the finest rock albums of the year, and NME ranked it 5th in its list of albums of the year. Subsequent albums did not always garner critical favor, although Cry Tough was voted number 10 in the 1976 NME Album round up; I Came to Dance in particular received a scathing review in the New Rolling Stone Record Guide. He achieved progressive rock radio hits in the mid-1970s with \"Back It Up\", \"Keith Don't Go\" and \"I Came to Dance\". His song \"Bullets Fever\", about the 1978 NBA champion Washington Bullets, would become a favorite in the Washington area. Throughout the 1970s, Lofgren released solo albums and toured extensively with a backing band that again usually included brother Tom on rhythm guitar. Lofgren's concerts displayed his reputation for theatrics, such as playing guitar while doing flips on a trampoline.\n\nIn 1971 he appeared on stage on the Roy Buchanan Special, PBS TV, with Bill Graham. In 1973 he appeared with Grin on NBC on Midnight Special, performing three songs live. In 1978 he wrote and sang the \"Nobody Bothers Me\" theme for a D.C. Jhoon Rhee Tae Kwon Do advertisement, and also appeared in the ill-received Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band movie. Nils is credited on two of Lou Gramm's (of Foreigner) solo albums: \"Ready or Not\" released in 1987 (Nils listed as lead guitarist) and \"Long Hard Look\" released in 1989 (Nils listed as one of the guitarists). In 1987 he contributed the TV Show theme arrangement for Hunter. In 1993 he contributed to The Simpsons, with two Christmas jingles with Bart. In 1995 he appeared on a PBS tribute to the Beatles along with Dr. John. From 1991–95 he was the CableAce Awards musical director and composer.\n\nE Street Band\n\nIn 1984, he joined Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band as the replacement for Steven Van Zandt on guitar and vocals, in time for Springsteen's massive Born in the U.S.A. Tour. Following the tour he appeared on Late Night with David Letterman, to promote his 1985 solo release Flip. The E Street Band toured again with Springsteen in 1988 on the Tunnel of Love Express and Human Rights Now!. In 1989 Springsteen broke up the E Street Band, but Lofgren and Van Zandt rejoined when Springsteen revived the band in 1999 for their Reunion Tour, followed by The Rising and another massive tour in 2002 and 2003, then again for the Magic album and world tour of 2007/2008, and most recently in 2012–2013 for the Wrecking Ball Tour and in 2014 for the High Hopes Tour.\n\nTours with Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band:\n*Born in the U.S.A. Tour, 1984–1985\n*Tunnel of Love Express Tour, 1988\n*Human Rights Now! Amnesty International Tour, 1988\n*Reunion Tour, 1999–2000\n*The Rising Tour, 2002–2003\n*Vote for Change Tour, 2004\n*Magic Tour, 2007–2008\n*Working on a Dream Tour, 2009\n*Wrecking Ball Tour, 2012–2013\n*High Hopes Tour, 2014\n*The River Tour 2016\n\nSolo career, part II\n\n \nLofgren continues to record and to tour as a solo act, with Patti Scialfa, with Neil Young, and as a two-time member of Ringo Starr's All-Starr Band. Many of the people he worked with on those tours appeared on his 1991 album, Silver Lining. During the 2000s he got his own \"Nils Lofgren Day\" in Montgomery County, Maryland (August 25). In 2006 Lofgren released Sacred Weapon, featuring guest appearances by David Crosby, Graham Nash, Willie Nelson and Martin Sexton. In 2006 he recorded a live DVD Nils Lofgren & Friends: Acoustic Live at the Legendary Birchmere Music Hall in Alexandria, Virginia.\n\nOn June 23, 2006, Lofgren performed at a benefit concert for Arthur Lee at New York's Beacon Theater, along with Robert Plant, Ian Hunter, Yo La Tengo and Garland Jeffreys. In 2007, he appeared playing guitar as part of Jerry Lee Lewis' backing band for Lewis' Last Man Standing Live concert DVD. He released The Loner – Nils Sings Neil, an album of acoustic covers of Neil Young songs, in 2008.\n\nIn September 2008, Lofgren had hip replacement surgery for both of his hips as a result of years of playing basketball, \"performance 'flips' on stage, and age.\" \n\nIn August 2014, a box set, Face the Music, was released on the Fantasy label. The career-spanning retrospective contains nine CD's and a DVD covering 45 years.\n\nOther work\n\nNovelist Clive Cussler lives close to Lofgren's Arizona home, and collaborated on a song with him, which they co-wrote and recorded, titled \"What Ever Happened to Muscatel?\" \n\nIn 2010, Lofgren – a self-described \"huge sports fan\" – wrote a long open letter to ESPN and the rest of the sports reporting community, condemning their favorable treatment of Michael Vick's return to football stardom. \n\nMusical equipment\n\nLofgren primarily uses a variety of Fender guitars and amplifiers. \n\nGuitars\n\n*Fender Stratocaster – Including two 1961 models which he often uses.\n*Fender Jazzmasters\n*Gibson Les Paul – 1952 Goldtop.\n*Gibson SG – Cherry red. Used on Johnny Bye Bye during the E Street Band's Magic Tour.\n*Gibson Flying V – Used during Grin's reunion tour in 2001.\n*B.C. Rich Mockingbird\n*Epiphone Les Paul – Used on tours with Ringo Starr.\n*Martin D-18 – Given to Lofgren by Neil Young.\n*Gretsch Black Penguin\n\n*Fender Telecaster\n*Fender Telecaster Black. Used on Born To Run during the \"Magic\" Tour.\n*Gibson L-10 acoustic\n*Spector ARC6\n*Takamine acoustic guitars\n*Owens/Zeta resonator guitars\n*Carter pedal steel guitars\n\nDuring performances of the song \"The River\" on The E Street Band's Working on a Dream Tour, Nils would use a custom Fender Stratocaster double-neck guitar, with one 12-string neck, and one standard six. The 12 string was tuned B-G-Bb-F-D-Eb, and the six string A-G#-Bb-Bb-Bb-F#.\n\nEffects\n\n*Vocoder\n*Electro-Harmonix POG\n*Barber Burn Unit overdrives\n*FullTone Fulldrive2\n*Line 6 DL4 delay\n*DigiTech Whammy\n*Digital Music GCX audio switcher\n*Furman power conditioner\n\n*Line 6 Pod Pro\n*BOSS OC-3\n*BOSS DD-3\n*Korg DTR tuner\n*Peterson AutoStrobe 490\n*Voodoo Lab Ground Control\n\nAmplifiers\n\n*Fender Twin Reverbs – Used most recently.\n*Fender blackface Super Reverbs – With four 10\" speakers.\n*Fender Hot Rod Deluxe\n\n*Fender Vibro Kings – With three 10\" speakers'\n*Fender Vibro King Custom\n*Fender Hot Rod DeVilles\n*Fuchs ODS 50 -used at 2012 Grammy's\n\nDiscography\n\nGrin discography\n\n* 1971: Grin (Spindizzy/Epic)\n* 1972: 1+1 (Spindizzy/Epic)\n* 1973: All Out (Spindizzy/Epic)\n* 1973: Gone Crazy (A&M)\n\nSolo discography\n\n* 1975: Nils Lofgren (A&M) US #141\n* 1975: Back It Up!! (Live) (A&M)\n* 1976: Cry Tough (A&M) US #32\n* 1977: I Came to Dance (A&M) US #36\n* 1977: Night After Night (A&M) US #44\n* 1979: Nils (A&M) US #54\n* 1981: Night Fades Away (Backstreet/MCA) US #99\n* 1981: Best of Nils Lofgren (A&M)\n* 1982: A Rhythm Romance (A&M)\n* 1983: Wonderland (Backstreet/MCA)\n* 1985: Flip (CBS) US #150\n* 1991: Silver Lining (Rykodisc) US #153\n* 1992: Crooked Line (Rykodisc)\n* 1993: Live on the Test, UK only (Windsong)\n* 1994: Every Breath (Crisis) Soundtrack album\n* 1995: Damaged Goods (Pure)\n* 1997: Acoustic Live (Vision)\n* 2001: Breakaway Angel (Vision)\n* 2002: Tuff Stuff-The Best of the All-Madden Team Band (Vision)\n* 2003: Nils Lofgren Band Live (Vision)\n* 2006: Sacred Weapon (Vision)\n* 2008: The Loner – Nils Sings Neil (Vision)\n* 2011: Old School (MvD)\n* 2014: Face the Music (Box Set) (Fantasy)\n* 2015: UK 2015 Face the Music Tour (Cattle Track Records)\n\nWith Crazy Horse\n\n*Crazy Horse (1971)\n\nWith Jerry Williams\n\n* Jerry Williams (Spindizzy) (1972) – Nils produced and played guitar for the album\n\nWith Neil Young\n\n*After the Gold Rush (1970)\n*Tonight's the Night (1975)\n*Trans (1982)\n*In Berlin (1983)\n*Unplugged (February 1993)\n\nWith Lou Reed (as co-writer)\n\n*The Bells (1979)\n\nWith Bruce Springsteen\n\n*Live/1975-85 (1986)\n*Tunnel of Love (1987)\n*Chimes of Freedom (1988)\n*Greatest Hits (1995)\n*Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band: Live in New York City (2001)\n*The Rising (2002)\n*Magic (2007)\n*Working on a Dream (2009)\n*Wrecking Ball (2012)\n*High Hopes (2014)", "Vivienne Patricia \"Patti\" Scialfa ( ;; born July 29, 1953) is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. Scialfa has been a member of the E Street Band since 1984 and has been married to Bruce Springsteen since 1991. In 2014, Scialfa was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the E Street Band.\n\nEarly life \n\nScialfa grew up in the Jersey Shore community of Deal, New Jersey.Stewart, Allison. [http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost/access/653243441.html?dids\n653243441:653243441&FMTABS&FMTS\nABS:FT&typecurrent&date\nJun+20%2C+2004&authorAllison+Stewart&pub\nThe+Washington+Post&descPatti+Scialfa's+Glory+Days%3B+With+'Lullaby%2C'+the+Boss's+Wife+Steps+Into+the+Spotlight&pqatl\ngoogle \"Patti Scialfa's Glory Days; With 'Lullaby,' the Boss's Wife Steps Into the Spotlight\"], The Washington Post, June 20, 2004. Retrieved July 18, 2012. \"Scialfa (pronounced SKAL-fah) grew up in the affluent suburb of Deal, N.J., and attended the prestigious jazz program at the University of Miami before moving to New York.\" She was the middle child of Joseph Scialfa and Patricia (née Morris) Scialfa. Her father was of Sicilian ancestry and her mother is from Belfast, Northern Ireland. She also has half-siblings from her father's second marriage. Her father was a successful local entrepreneur, who started with a single television store and became a real estate developer. \n\nScialfa graduated from Asbury Park High School in 1971. \n\nScialfa was writing songs from an early age and first worked professionally as a back-up singer for New Jersey bar bands after she completed high school. In 1994, she stated in a Lear's Magazine interview that she had little talent for anything but music and that she attended college as a way to further her ambitions as a performer while also satisfying parental expectations. She has a music degree from New York University, earned after she transferred from the University of Miami's jazz conservatory at the Frost School of Music.\n\nMusic career\n\nWhile in college, Scialfa was submitting original material to other artists in the hope that it would be recorded. However, none of her songs were recorded, and after graduating, Scialfa worked as a busker and waitress in Greenwich Village. Together with Soozie Tyrell and Lisa Lowell, she formed a street group known as Trickster. For many years, she struggled to make her way in the songwriting and recording industry in New York and New Jersey before playing at Folk City and Kenny's Castaways in Greenwich Village, as well as Asbury Park's The Stone Pony. Scialfa had a brief role in The Stone Pony's house band Cats on a Smooth Surface. These gigs won her notice and, eventually, recording work with Southside Johnny and David Johansen. \n\nIn 1984, Scialfa joined the E Street Band, three or four days before the opening show of the Born in the U.S.A. Tour. In 1986, she appeared on the Rolling Stones' Dirty Work album, leaving her unique vocal mark on \"One Hit (To the Body)\" as well as other tracks. She worked with Keith Richards on his first solo disc Talk is Cheap. Steve Jordan, who co-produced the Richards record, was a friend of Scialfa's from her Greenwich Village days. \n\nScialfa maintains her music industry friendships over many years. Her friendship with Soozie Tyrell and Lisa Lowell pre-date their mutual work as background vocalists and musicians on the Buster Poindexter 'aka' David Johansen album (featuring a Soca song by Arrow, \"Hot Hot Hot!\") in 1987; Lowell and Tyrell have since worked on various Springsteen-Scialfa recording projects and Tyrell, violinist, has recorded and toured with Springsteen and the E Street Band. \n\nScialfa has recorded three solo albums, 1993's Rumble Doll, 2004's 23rd Street Lullaby and 2007's Play It as It Lays. Her first two albums received four-star reviews from Rolling Stone, while the third got three and a half. Her records are a mix of confessional songwriting, impressive vocal range, and traditional country, folk and rock music. Springsteen and fellow E Street bandmates, like Lofgren and Roy Bittan, contributed backing work. Following the release of her second album, Scialfa played a series of club dates along the East Coast and she was also the opening act of the post-final night of the Vote for Change tour. \n\nWhen asked during the press conference for the NFL Super Bowl in 2009 whether she was working on a new album, she confirmed that she was. She confirmed again, during an interview on the radio show \"Bruce Brunch\" on 105.7 Hawk radio, on April 10, 2011 that she had written most of the songs for her 4th album and just needed to find time to record it. \n\nPersonal life \n\nScialfa first met Springsteen at the Stone Pony, a New Jersey bar, in the early 1980s. \n\nAlthough initially reluctant, Scialfa joined the 1988 Tunnel of Love Tour postponing the recording of a solo record. In the spring of 1987, Springsteen separated from his then wife, Julianne Phillips, and Scialfa and Springsteen started living together shortly afterwards. Springsteen and Phillips's divorce was finalized in 1989.\n\nScialfa and Springsteen first lived in New Jersey and later in New York for a short time, before moving to Los Angeles where they started a family. On July 25, 1990 Scialfa gave birth to the couple's first child, Evan James Springsteen. The couple married on June 8, 1991 at their Los Angeles home in a ceremony only attended by family and close friends. Their second child, Jessica Rae Springsteen, was born on December 30, 1991; and a third child, Samuel Ryan Springsteen, was born on January 5, 1994. The family returned to New Jersey in the early 1990s and now lives in Colts Neck, New Jersey. They also own homes in Rumson, New Jersey, Wellington, Florida, near West Palm Beach, and Los Angeles. \n\nDiscography \n\n* Rumble Doll (1993)\n** 1. Rumble Doll \t\n** 2. Come Tomorrow \t\n** 3. In My Imagination \t\n** 4. Valerie \t\n** 5. As Long as I (Can Be with You) \t\n** 6. Big Black Heaven \t\n** 7. Loves Glory\n** 8. Lucky Girl \t\n** 9. Charm Light\n** 10. Baby Don't \t\n** 11. Talk to Me Like the Rain \t\n** 12. Spanish Dancer\n* 23rd Street Lullaby (2004) – (#152, US Billboard 200)\n** 1. 23rd Street Lullaby\n** 2. You Can't Go Back\n** 3. Rose\n** 4. City Boys\n** 5. Love (Stand up)\n** 6. Yesterday's Child\n** 7. Stumbling to Bethlehem\n** 8. Each Other's Medicine\n** 9. Romeo\n** 10. State of Grace\n** 11. Chelsea Avenue\n** 12. Young in the City\n\n* Play It As It Lays (2007) – (#90, US Billboard 200)\n** 1. Looking for Elvis \t\n** 2. Like Any Woman Would \t\n** 3. Town Called Heartbreak \t\n** 4. Play Around \t\n** 5. Rainy Day Man \t\n** 6. The Word \t\n** 7. Bad for You \t\n** 8. Run, Run, Run \t\n** 9. Play It as It Lays \t\n** 10. Black Ladder\n* Contributed a song called \"Children's Song\" to the charity album Every Mother Counts, the song is a duet with her husband, Bruce Springsteen (2011) \n* \"Linda Paloma\" (Looking into You: A Tribute To Jackson Browne) a duet with her husband Bruce Springsteen (2014). \n\nNotes", "Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen (born September 23, 1949) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and humanitarian. He is best known for his work with his E Street Band. Nicknamed \"The Boss\", Springsteen is widely known for his brand of poetic lyrics, Americana, working class and sometimes political sentiments centered on his native New Jersey, his distinctive voice and his lengthy and energetic stage performances, with concerts from the 1970s to the present decade running over three hours in length.\n\nSpringsteen's recordings have included both commercially accessible rock albums and more somber folk-oriented works. His most successful studio albums, Born to Run (1975) and Born in the U.S.A. (1984), showcase a talent for finding grandeur in the struggles of daily American life. He has sold more than 64 million albums in the United States and more than 120 million records worldwide, making him one of the world's best-selling artists of all time. He has earned numerous awards for his work, including 20 Grammy Awards, two Golden Globes and an Academy Award as well as being inducted into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1999.\n\nEarly life\n\nSpringsteen was born on September 23, 1949, at Monmouth Medical Center in Long Branch, New Jersey. He was brought home from the hospital to Freehold Borough where he spent his childhood. He lived on South Street and attended Freehold Borough High School. His father, Douglas Frederick Springsteen, was of Dutch and Irish ancestry, and worked as a bus driver, among other vocations, although he was mostly unemployed. Springsteen said his mother, Adele Ann (née Zerilli), a legal secretary and of Italian ancestry, was the main breadwinner. His maternal grandfather was born in Vico Equense, a town near Naples. He has two younger sisters, Virginia and Pamela. Pamela had a brief film career, but left acting to pursue still photography full-time; she took photos for his Human Touch, Lucky Town and The Ghost of Tom Joad albums.\n\nSpringsteen's last name is topographic and of Dutch origin, literally translating to \"jumping stone\" but more generally meaning a kind of stone used as a stepping stone in unpaved streets or between two houses. \n\nRaised a Roman Catholic, Springsteen attended the St. Rose of Lima Catholic school in Freehold Borough, where he was at odds with the nuns and rejected the strictures imposed upon him, even though some of his later music reflects a Catholic ethos and includes a few rock-influenced, traditional Irish-Catholic hymns. In a 2012 interview, he explained that it was his Catholic upbringing rather than political ideology that most influenced his music. He noted in the interview that his faith had given him a \"very active spiritual life\", although he joked that this \"made it very difficult sexually.\" He added: \"Once a Catholic, always a Catholic.\" \n\nIn the ninth grade, he transferred to the public Freehold High School, but did not fit in there either. Former teachers have said he was a \"loner, who wanted nothing more than to play his guitar.\" He completed high school, but felt so uncomfortable that he skipped his own graduation ceremony. He briefly attended Ocean County College, but dropped out.\n\nCareer\n\n1964–72: Early years\n\nSpringsteen was inspired to take up music at the age of seven after seeing Elvis Presley on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1956 and growing up hearing fellow New Jersey singer, Frank Sinatra, on the radio. Sinatra also inspired Springsteen's style of songwriting, which was developed in his youth after his mother bought him his first guitar for $18. 1964 was also an important year for Springsteen, having seen The Beatles' appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. Thereafter he started playing for audiences, first at a trailer park on New Jersey Route 34 and then at a local Elks Lodge. In 1965, Springsteen's mother took out a loan to buy her 16-year-old son a $60 Kent guitar, an act he subsequently memorialized in his song \"The Wish\".\n\nIn the same year, he went to the house of Tex and Marion Vinyard, who sponsored young bands in town. They helped him become the lead guitarist and subsequently the lead singer of The Castiles. The Castiles recorded two original songs at a public recording studio in Brick Township and played a variety of venues, including Cafe Wha? in Greenwich Village. Marion Vinyard said that she believed the young Springsteen when he promised he would make it big. \n\nCalled for induction when he was 18, Springsteen failed his physical examination and did not serve in Vietnam. In an interview in Rolling Stone magazine in 1984, he said, \"When I got on the bus to go take my physical, I thought one thing: I ain't goin'.\" He had suffered a concussion in a motorcycle accident when he was 17, and this together with his \"crazy\" behavior at induction and not taking the tests was enough to get him a 4F. \n\nIn the late 1960s, Springsteen performed briefly in a power trio known as Earth, playing in clubs in New Jersey. Springsteen acquired the nickname \"The Boss\" during this period; when he played club gigs with a band he took on the task of collecting the band's nightly pay and distributing it amongst his bandmates. The nickname also reportedly sprang from games of Monopoly that Springsteen would play with other Jersey Shore musicians. Springsteen is not fond of this nickname, due to his dislike of bosses, but seems to have since given it a tacit acceptance. Previously he had the nickname \"Doctor\". \n\nFrom 1969 through early 1971, Springsteen performed with Steel Mill, which also featured Danny Federici, Vini Lopez, Vinnie Roslin and later Steve Van Zandt and Robbin Thompson. They went on to play the mid-Atlantic college circuit, and briefly in California. In January 1970 well-known San Francisco Examiner music critic Philip Elwood gave Springsteen credibility in his glowing assessment of Steel Mill: \"I have never been so overwhelmed by totally unknown talent.\" Elwood went on to praise their \"cohesive musicality\" and, in particular, singled out Springsteen as \"a most impressive composer\". During this time Springsteen also performed regularly at small clubs in Cambridge, Massachusetts; Richmond, Virginia; and Asbury Park and other points along the Jersey Shore, quickly gathering a cult following.\n\nOther acts followed over the next two years, as Springsteen sought to shape a unique and genuine musical and lyrical style: Dr. Zoom & the Sonic Boom (early- to mid-1971), Sundance Blues Band (mid-1971), and the Bruce Springsteen Band (mid-1971 to mid-1972). With the addition of pianist David Sancious, the core of what would later become the E Street Band was formed, with occasional temporary additions such as horn sections, \"The Zoomettes\" (a group of female backing vocalists for \"Dr. Zoom\") and Southside Johnny Lyon on harmonica. Musical genres explored included blues, R&B, jazz, church music, early rock 'n' roll, and soul. His prolific songwriting ability, with \"More words in some individual songs than other artists had in whole albums\", as his future record label would describe it in early publicity campaigns, brought his skill to the attention of several people who were about to change his life: new managers Mike Appel and Jim Cretecos, and Columbia Records talent scout John Hammond, who, under Appel's pressure, auditioned Springsteen in May 1972.\n\nEven after Springsteen gained international acclaim, his New Jersey roots showed through in his music, and he often praised \"the great state of New Jersey\" in his live shows. Drawing on his extensive local appeal, he routinely sold out consecutive nights in major New Jersey, Philadelphia and New York venues. He also made many surprise appearances at The Stone Pony and other shore nightclubs over the years, becoming the foremost exponent of the Jersey Shore sound.\n\n1972–74: Initial struggle for success\n\nSpringsteen signed a record deal with Columbia Records in 1972 with the help of John Hammond, who had signed Bob Dylan to the same label a decade earlier. Springsteen brought many of his New Jersey–based colleagues into the studio with him, thus forming the E Street Band (although it would not be formally named as such for several more years). His debut album Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J., released in January 1973, established him as a critical favorite though sales were slow.\n\nBecause of Springsteen's lyrical poeticism and folk rock–rooted music exemplified on tracks like \"Blinded by the Light\"\"Blinded by the Light\" would later be a hit for Manfred Mann and reach No. 1, making it the only time Springsteen had a No. 1 single as a songwriter. and \"For You\", as well as the Columbia and Hammond connections, critics initially compared Springsteen to Bob Dylan. \"He sings with a freshness and urgency I haven't heard since I was rocked by 'Like a Rolling Stone'\" wrote Crawdaddy magazine editor Peter Knobler in Springsteen's first interview/profile in March 1973. Photographs for that original profile were taken by photographer Ed Gallucci. Crawdaddy discovered Springsteen in the rock press and was his earliest champion. Knobler profiled him in Crawdaddy three times, in 1973, 1975 and 1978. (Springsteen and the E Street Band acknowledged by giving a private performance at the Crawdaddy 10th Anniversary Party in New York City in June 1976.) Music critic Lester Bangs wrote in Creem in 1975 that when Springsteen's first album was released \"... many of us dismissed it: he wrote like Bob Dylan and Van Morrison, sang like Van Morrison and Robbie Robertson, and led a band that sounded like Van Morrison's\". The track \"Spirit in the Night\" especially showed Morrison's influence, while \"Lost in the Flood\" was the first of many portraits of Vietnam veterans, and \"Growin' Up\", his first take on the recurring theme of adolescence.\n\nIn September 1973, his second album The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle was released, again to critical acclaim but no commercial success. Springsteen's songs became grander in form and scope, with the E Street Band providing a less folksy, more R&B vibe, and the lyrics often romanticized teenage street life. \"4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)\" and \"Incident on 57th Street\" would become fan favorites, and the long, rousing \"Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)\" continues to rank among Springsteen's most beloved concert numbers.\n\nIn the May 22, 1974 issue of Boston's The Real Paper music critic Jon Landau wrote, after seeing a performance at the Harvard Square Theater, \"I saw rock and roll future, and its name is Bruce Springsteen. And on a night when I needed to feel young, he made me feel like I was hearing music for the very first time.\" Landau subsequently became Springsteen's manager and producer, helping to finish the epic new album Born to Run. Given an enormous budget in a last-ditch effort at a commercially viable record, Springsteen became bogged down in the recording process while striving for a \"Wall of Sound\" production. But fed by the release of an early mix of \"Born to Run\" to progressive rock radio, anticipation built toward the album's release.\n\nThe album took more than 14 months to record, with six months alone spent on the song \"Born to Run\". During this time Springsteen battled with anger and frustration over the album, saying he heard \"sounds in [his] head\" that he could not explain to the others in the studio. It was during these recording sessions that \"Miami\" Steve Van Zandt would stumble into the studio just in time to help Springsteen organize the horn section on \"Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out\". Van Zandt, who would eventually join the E Street Band, had been a longtime friend of Springsteen, as well as a collaborator on earlier musical projects, and understood where he was coming from, which helped him to translate some of the sounds Springsteen was hearing. Still, by the end of the grueling recording sessions Springsteen was not satisfied, and upon first hearing the finished album, threw the record into the alley and told Jon Landau he would rather just cut the album live at The Bottom Line (a place he often played). \n\n1975–83: Breakthrough\n\nOn August 13, 1975, Springsteen and the E Street Band began a five-night, 10-show stand at New York's The Bottom Line club. The engagement attracted major media attention and was broadcast live on WNEW-FM. (Decades later, Rolling Stone magazine would name the stand as one of the 50 Moments That Changed Rock and Roll.) Oklahoma City rock radio station WKY, in association with Carson Attractions, staged an experimental promotional event that resulted in a sold out house at the (6,000 seat) Civic Center Music Hall. With the release of Born to Run on August 25, 1975, Springsteen finally found success. The album peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard 200, and while reception at US top 40 radio outlets for the album's two singles was not overwhelming (\"Born to Run\" reached a modest No. 23 on the Billboard charts, and \"Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out\" peaked at #83), almost every track on the album received album-oriented rock airplay, especially \"Born to Run\", \"Thunder Road\", \"Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out\" and \"Jungleland\", all of which remain perennial favorites on many classic rock stations.\n\nWith its panoramic imagery, thundering production and desperate optimism, Born to Run is considered to be among the best rock and roll albums of all time and Springsteen's finest work. Springsteen appeared on the covers of both Time and Newsweek in the same week, on October 27 of that year. So great did the wave of publicity become that Springsteen eventually rebelled against it during his first venture overseas, tearing down promotional posters before a concert appearance in London.\n\nA legal battle with former manager Mike Appel kept Springsteen out of the studio for nearly a year, during which time he kept the E Street Band together through extensive touring across the U.S. Despite the optimistic fervor with which he often performed, his new songs had taken a more somber tone than much of his previous work. Reaching settlement with Appel in 1977, Springsteen returned to the studio, and the subsequent sessions produced Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978). Musically, this album was a turning point in Springsteen's career. Gone were the raw, rapid-fire lyrics, outsized characters and long, multi-part musical compositions of the first three albums; now the songs were leaner and more carefully drawn and began to reflect Springsteen's growing intellectual and political awareness. The cross-country 1978 tour to promote the album would become legendary for the intensity and length of its shows. \n\nBy the late 1970s, Bruce Springsteen had earned a reputation in the pop world as a songwriter whose material could provide hits for other bands. Manfred Mann's Earth Band had achieved a US No. 1 pop hit with a heavily rearranged version of Greetings \"Blinded by the Light\" in early 1977. Patti Smith reached No. 13 with her take on Springsteen's unreleased \"Because the Night\" (with revised lyrics by Smith) in 1978, while The Pointer Sisters hit No. 2 in 1979 with Springsteen's also unreleased \"Fire\". Although not a critical success, long time friend Southside Johnny recorded \"The Fever\" in early 1976, \"Talk to Me\" in 1978, both contributions from Springsteen. The two of them along with Steve Van Zandt collaborated to produce \"Trapped Again\" in 1978.\n\nIn September 1979, Springsteen and the E Street Band joined the Musicians United for Safe Energy anti-nuclear power collective at Madison Square Garden for two nights, playing an abbreviated set while premiering two songs from his upcoming album. The subsequent No Nukes live album, as well as the following summer's No Nukes documentary film, represented the first official recordings and footage of Springsteen's fabled live act, as well as Springsteen's first tentative dip into political involvement.\n\nSpringsteen continued to consolidate his thematic focus on working-class life with the 20-song double album The River in 1980, which included an intentionally paradoxical range of material from good-time party rockers to emotionally intense ballads, and finally yielded his first hit Top Ten single as a performer, \"Hungry Heart\". Like the previous two albums, musical styles on The River were derived largely from rock music of the Fifties and Sixties, but with a more explicit pop-rock sound than earlier albums. This is apparent in the stylistic adoption of Eighties pop-rock hallmarks like the reverberating-tenor drums, very basic percussion/guitar and repetitive lyrics apparent in many of the tracks. The title song pointed to Springsteen's intellectual direction, while a couple of the lesser-known tracks presaged his musical direction. The album sold well, becoming his first topper on the Billboard Pop Albums chart, and a long tour in 1980 and 1981 followed, featuring Springsteen's first extended playing of Europe and ending with a series of multi-night arena stands in major cities in the U.S.\n\nThe River was followed in 1982 by the stark solo acoustic Nebraska. Recording sessions had been held to expand on a demo tape Springsteen had made at his home on a simple, low-tech four-track tape deck. However, during the recording process Springsteen and producer Jon Landau realized the songs worked better as solo acoustic numbers than full band renditions and the original demo tape was released as the album. Although the recordings of the E Street Band were shelved, other songs from these sessions would later be released, including \"Born in the U.S.A.\" and \"Glory Days\". According to the Marsh biographies, Springsteen was in a depressed state when he wrote this material, and the result is a brutal depiction of American life. While Nebraska did not sell as well as Springsteen's three previous albums, it garnered widespread critical praise (including being named \"Album of the Year\" by Rolling Stone magazine's critics) and influenced later significant works by other major artists, including U2's album The Joshua Tree. It helped inspire the musical genre known as lo-fi music, becoming a cult favorite among indie-rockers. Springsteen did not tour in conjunction with Nebraskas release.\n\n1984–91: Commercial and popular phenomenon\n\nSpringsteen is probably best known for his album Born in the U.S.A. (1984), which sold 15 million copies in the U.S., 30 million worldwide, and became one of the best-selling albums of all time with seven singles hitting the Top 10. The title track was a bitter commentary on the treatment of Vietnam veterans, some of whom were Springsteen's friends and bandmates. The lyrics in the verses were entirely unambiguous when listened to, but the anthemic music and the title of the song made it hard for many, from politicians to the common person, to get the lyrics—except those in the chorus, which could be read many ways. The song made a huge political impact, as he was advocating for the rights of the common working-class man. \n\nThe song was widely misinterpreted as jingoistic, and in connection with the 1984 presidential campaign became the subject of considerable folklore. In 1984, conservative columnist George Will attended a Springsteen concert and then wrote a column praising Springsteen's work ethic. Six days after the column was printed, in a campaign rally in Hammonton, New Jersey, Reagan said, \"America's future rests in a thousand dreams inside your hearts. It rests in the message of hope in the songs of a man so many young Americans admire—New Jersey's own, Bruce Springsteen.\" Two nights later, at a concert in Pittsburgh, Springsteen told the crowd, \"Well, the president was mentioning my name in his speech the other day and I kind of got to wondering what his favorite album of mine must’ve been, you know? I don’t think it was the Nebraska album. I don’t think he's been listening to this one.\" He then began playing \"Johnny 99\", with its allusions to closing factories and criminals. \n\nSpringsteen also turned down several million dollars offered by the Chrysler Corporation to use the song in a car commercial. In later years, to eliminate the bombast and make the song's original meaning more explicitly clear, Springsteen performed the song accompanied only by acoustic guitar, thus returning to how the song was originally conceived. The original acoustic version of the song, recorded in 1982 during the Nebraska sessions appeared on the 1998 archival release Tracks.\n\n\"Dancing in the Dark\" was the biggest of seven hit singles from Born in the U.S.A., peaking at No. 2 on the Billboard music charts. The music video for the song featured a young Courteney Cox dancing on stage with Springsteen, an appearance which helped kickstart the actress's career. The song \"Cover Me\" was written by Springsteen for Donna Summer, but his record company persuaded him to keep it for the new album. A big fan of Summer's work, Springsteen wrote another song for her, \"Protection\". Videos for the album were made by noted film directors Brian De Palma and John Sayles. Springsteen was featured on the \"We Are the World\" song and album in 1985. His live single \"Trapped\" from that album received moderate airplay on US Top 40 stations as well as reaching No. 1 on the Billboard Top Rock Tracks chart. \n\nDuring the Born in the U.S.A. Tour, Springsteen met actress Julianne Phillips, whom he would marry in 1985. He also that year took part in the recording of the USA For Africa charity song \"We Are The World\"; however he did turn down playing at Live Aid. He later stated that he \"simply did not realise how big the whole thing was going to be\". He has since expressed regret at turning down Bob Geldof's invitation stating that he could have played a couple of acoustic songs had there been no slot available for a full band performance.\n\nThe Born in the U.S.A. period represented the height of Springsteen's visibility in popular culture and the broadest audience demographic he would ever reach (aided by the release of Arthur Baker's dance mixes of three of the singles). From 15 June to 10 August 1985, all seven of his albums featured on the UK Albums Chart: the first time an artist had charted their entire back catalogue simultaneously. \n\nLive/1975–85, a five-record box set (also on three cassettes or three CDs), was released near the end of 1986 and became the first box set to debut at No. 1 on the U.S. album charts. It is one of the most commercially successful live albums of all time, ultimately selling 13 million units in the U.S. Live/1975–85 summed up Springsteen's career to that point and displayed some of the elements that made his shows so powerful to his fans: the switching from mournful dirges to party rockers and back; the communal sense of purpose between artist and audience; the long, intense spoken passages before songs, including those describing Springsteen's difficult relationship with his father; and the instrumental prowess of the E Street Band, such as in the long coda to \"Racing in the Street\". Despite its popularity, some fans and critics felt the album's song selection could have been better. Springsteen concerts are the subjects of frequent bootleg recording and trading among fans.\n\nDuring the 1980s, several Springsteen fanzines were launched, including Backstreets magazine, which started in Seattle and continues today as a glossy publication, now in communication with Springsteen's management and official website.\n\nAfter this commercial peak, Springsteen released the much more sedate and contemplative Tunnel of Love album (1987), a mature reflection on the many faces of love found, lost and squandered, which only selectively used the E Street Band. It presaged the breakup of his marriage to Julianne Phillips and described some of his unhappinesses in the relationship. Reflecting the challenges of love in \"Brilliant Disguise\", Springsteen sang:\n\nThe subsequent Tunnel of Love Express Tour shook up fans with changes to the stage layout, favorites dropped from the set list, and horn-based arrangements. During the European leg in 1988, Springsteen's relationship with backup singer Patti Scialfa became public. Phillips and Springsteen filed for divorce in 1988. \n\nOn July 19, 1988, Springsteen held a concert in East Germany that attracted 300,000 spectators. Journalist Erik Kirschbaum has called the concert \"the most important rock concert ever, anywhere\", in his 2013 book Rocking the Wall. Bruce Springsteen: The Berlin Concert That Changed the World. It had been conceived by the Socialist Unity Party's youth wing in an attempt to placate the youth of East Germany, who were hungry for more freedom and the popular music of the West. However, it is Kirschbaum's opinion that the success of the concert catalyzed opposition to the regime in the DDR, and helped contribute to the fall of the Berlin Wall the following year. \n\nLater in 1988, Springsteen headlined the worldwide Human Rights Now! tour for Amnesty International. In late 1989 he dissolved the E Street Band, and he and Scialfa relocated to California, marrying in 1991.\n\n1992–98: Artistic and commercial ups and downs and soundtrack work\n\nIn 1992, after risking fan accusations of \"going Hollywood\" by moving to Los Angeles (a radical move for someone so linked to the blue-collar life of the Jersey Shore) and working with session musicians, Springsteen released two albums at once. Human Touch and Lucky Town were even more introspective than any of his previous work and displayed a newly revealed confidence. As opposed to his first two albums, which dreamed of happiness, and his next four, which showed him growing to fear it, at points during the Lucky Town album, Springsteen actually claims happiness for himself.\n\nAn electric band appearance on the acoustic MTV Unplugged television program (later released as In Concert/MTV Plugged) was poorly received and further cemented fan dissatisfaction. Springsteen seemed to realize this a few years hence when he spoke humorously of his late father during his Rock and Roll Hall of Fame acceptance speech:\n\nA multiple Grammy Award winner, Springsteen also won an Academy Award in 1994 for his song \"Streets of Philadelphia\", which appeared on the soundtrack to the film Philadelphia. The music video for the song shows Springsteen's actual vocal performance, recorded using a hidden microphone, to a prerecorded instrumental track. This technique was developed on the \"Brilliant Disguise\" video.\n\nIn 1995, after temporarily re-organizing the E Street Band for a few new songs recorded for his first Greatest Hits album (a recording session that was chronicled in the documentary Blood Brothers), he released his second (mostly) solo guitar album, The Ghost of Tom Joad, inspired by John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath and by Journey to Nowhere: The Saga of the New Underclass, a book by Pulitzer Prize-winners author Dale Maharidge and photographer Michael Williamson. This was generally less well-received than the similar Nebraska, due to the minimal melody, twangy vocals, and political nature of most of the songs, although some praised it for giving voice to immigrants and others who rarely have one in American culture. The lengthy, worldwide, small-venue solo acoustic Ghost of Tom Joad Tour that followed successfully featured many of his older songs in drastically reshaped acoustic form, although Springsteen had to explicitly remind his audiences to be quiet and not to clap during the performances.\n\nIn April 1996, Springsteen gave a very forward-looking interview to The Advocate LGBT magazine's Judy Wieder, in which he spoke of the importance of fighting for gay marriage. \"You get your license, you do all the social rituals. It's part of your place in society, and in some way part of society's acceptance of you.\" \n\nFollowing the tour, Springsteen moved back to New Jersey with his family. In 1998, Springsteen released the sprawling, four-disc box set of out-takes, Tracks. Subsequently, Springsteen would acknowledge that the 1990s were a \"lost period\" for him: \"I didn't do a lot of work. Some people would say I didn't do my best work.\" \n\n1999–2007: Return to success\n\nSpringsteen was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1999 by Bono of U2, a favor he returned in 2005. \n\nIn 1999, Springsteen and the E Street Band reunited and began their extensive Reunion Tour, lasting over a year. Highlights included a record sold-out, 15-show run at Continental Airlines Arena in East Rutherford, New Jersey and a ten-night, sold-out engagement at New York City's Madison Square Garden, which ended the tour. The final two shows were recorded for HBO, with corresponding DVD and album releases as Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band: Live in New York City. A new song, \"American Skin (41 Shots)\", about the police shooting of Amadou Diallo, which was played at these shows proved controversial.\n\nIn 2002, Springsteen released his first studio effort with the full band in 18 years, The Rising, produced by Brendan O'Brien. The album, mostly a reflection on the September 11 attacks, was a critical and popular success. (Many of the songs were influenced by phone conversations Springsteen had with family members of victims of the attacks who in their obituaries had mentioned how his music touched their lives.) The title track gained airplay in several radio formats, and the record became Springsteen's best-selling album of new material in 15 years. Kicked off by an early-morning Asbury Park appearance on The Today Show, The Rising Tour commenced, barnstorming through a series of single-night arena stands in the U.S. and Europe to promote the album in 2002, then returning for large-scale, multiple-night stadium shows in 2003. While Springsteen had maintained a loyal hardcore fan base everywhere (and particularly in Europe), his general popularity had dipped over the years in some southern and midwestern regions of the U.S. because of his vocal endorsement of leftist, liberal politics. But it was still strong in Europe and along the U.S. coasts, and he played an unprecedented 10 nights in Giants Stadium in New Jersey, a ticket-selling feat to which no other musical act has come close. During these shows Springsteen thanked those fans who were attending multiple shows and those who were coming from long distances or another country; the advent of robust Springsteen-oriented online communities had made such practices more common. The Rising Tour came to a final conclusion with three nights in Shea Stadium, highlighted by renewed controversy over \"American Skin\" and a guest appearance by Bob Dylan.\n\nDuring the early 2000s, Springsteen became a visible advocate for the revitalization of Asbury Park, and played an annual series of winter holiday concerts there to benefit various local businesses, organizations, and causes. These shows were explicitly intended for the devoted fans, featuring numbers such as the E Street Shuffle outtake \"Thundercrack\", a rollicking group-participation song that would mystify casual Springsteen fans. He also frequently rehearses for tours in Asbury Park; some of his most devoted followers even go so far as to stand outside the building to hear what fragments they can of the upcoming shows. The song \"My City of Ruins\" was originally written about Asbury Park, in honor of the attempts to revitalize the city. Looking for an appropriate song for the America: A Tribute to Heroes telethon broadcast, he selected \"My City of Ruins\", which was immediately recognized as an emotional highlight of the broadcast, with its gospel themes and its heartfelt exhortations to \"Rise up!\" The song became associated with post-9/11 New York, and he chose it to close The Rising album and as an encore on the subsequent tour.\n\nAt the Grammy Awards of 2003, Springsteen performed The Clash's \"London Calling\" along with Elvis Costello, Dave Grohl, and E Street Band member Steven Van Zandt and No Doubt's bassist, Tony Kanal, in tribute to Joe Strummer; Springsteen and the Clash had once been considered multiple-album-dueling rivals at the time of the double The River and the triple Sandinista!. In 2004, Springsteen and the E Street Band participated in the Vote for Change tour, along with John Mellencamp, John Fogerty, the Dixie Chicks, Pearl Jam, R.E.M., Bright Eyes, the Dave Matthews Band, Jackson Browne, and other musicians. All concerts were to be held in swing states, to benefit the progressive political organization group America Coming Together and to encourage people to register and vote. A finale was held in Washington, D.C., bringing many of the artists together. Several days later, Springsteen held one more such concert in New Jersey, when polls showed that state surprisingly close. While in past years Springsteen had played benefits for causes in which he believed —against nuclear energy, for Vietnam veterans, Amnesty International, and the Christic Institute—he had always refrained from explicitly endorsing candidates for political office (indeed he had rejected the efforts of Walter Mondale to attract an endorsement during the 1984 Reagan \"Born in the U.S.A.\" flap). This new stance led to criticism and praise from the expected partisan sources. Springsteen's \"No Surrender\" became the main campaign theme song for John Kerry's unsuccessful presidential campaign; in the last days of the campaign, he performed acoustic versions of the song and some of his other old songs at Kerry rallies.\n\nDevils & Dust was released on April 26, 2005, and was recorded without the E Street Band. It is a low-key, mostly acoustic album, in the same vein as Nebraska and The Ghost of Tom Joad although with a little more instrumentation. Some of the material was written almost 10 years earlier during, or shortly after, the Ghost of Tom Joad Tour, with a few having been performed then but not released. The title track concerns an ordinary soldier's feelings and fears during the Iraq War. Starbucks rejected a co-branding deal for the album, due in part to some sexually explicit content but also because of Springsteen's anti-corporate politics. The album entered the album charts at No. 1 in 10 countries (United States, Austria, Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and Ireland). Springsteen began the solo Devils & Dust Tour at the same time as the album's release, playing both small and large venues. Attendance was disappointing in a few regions, and everywhere (other than in Europe) tickets were easier to get than in the past. Unlike his mid-1990s solo tour, he performed on piano, electric piano, pump organ, autoharp, ukulele, banjo, electric guitar, and stomping board, as well as acoustic guitar and harmonica, adding variety to the solo sound. (Offstage synthesizer, guitar, and percussion were also used for some songs.)\n\nOn August 4, 2005 Bruce Springsteen went on a tour known as \"Vote For Change Tour\" which supported the Democratic Party. \n\nIn November 2005, Sirius Satellite Radio started a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week radio station called E Street Radio. This channel featured commercial-free Bruce Springsteen music, including rare tracks, interviews, and daily concerts of Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band recorded throughout their career.\n\nIn April 2006, Springsteen released We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions, an American roots music project focused around a big folk sound treatment of 15 songs popularized by the radical musical activism of Pete Seeger. It was recorded with a large ensemble of musicians including only Patti Scialfa, Soozie Tyrell, and The Miami Horns from past efforts. In contrast to previous albums, this was recorded in only three one-day sessions, and frequently one can hear Springsteen calling out key changes live as the band explores its way through the tracks. A tour began the same month, featuring the 18-strong ensemble of musicians dubbed The Seeger Sessions Band (and later shortened to The Sessions Band). Seeger Sessions material was heavily featured, as well as a handful of (usually drastically rearranged) Springsteen numbers. The tour proved very popular in Europe, selling out everywhere and receiving some excellent reviews, but newspapers reported that a number of U.S. shows suffered from sparse attendance. By the end of 2006, the Seeger Sessions tour toured Europe twice and toured America for only a short span. Bruce Springsteen with The Sessions Band: Live in Dublin, containing selections from three nights of November 2006 shows at the Point Theatre in Dublin, Ireland, was released the following June.\n\nSpringsteen's next album, titled Magic, was released on October 2, 2007. Recorded with the E Street Band, it featured 10 new Springsteen songs plus \"Long Walk Home\", performed once with the Sessions band, and a hidden track (the first included on a Springsteen studio release), \"Terry's Song\", a tribute to Springsteen's long-time assistant Terry Magovern, who died on July 30, 2007. Magic debuted at No. 1 in Ireland and the UK. Greatest Hits reentered the Irish charts at No. 57, and Live in Dublin almost cracked the top 20 in Norway again. Sirius Satellite Radio also restarted E Street Radio on September 27, 2007, in anticipation of Magic. Radio conglomerate Clear Channel Communications was alleged to have sent an edict to its classic rock stations to not play any songs from the new album, while continuing to play older Springsteen material. However, Clear Channel Adult Alternative (or \"AAA\") station KBCO did play tracks from the album, undermining the allegations of a corporate blackout. \n\nThe Springsteen and E Street Band Magic Tour began at the Hartford Civic Center with the album's release and continued through North America and Europe.\n\nIt was announced on November 21, 2007, that Springsteen's longtime friend and founding E Street Band member, Danny Federici, would be taking a leave of absence from the Magic Tour to pursue treatment for melanoma. Charles Giordano filled in as Federici's replacement.\n\n2008–11: Deaths of Danny Federici and Clarence Clemons\n\nFederici returned to the stage on March 20, 2008, when he appeared for portions of a Springsteen and E Street Band performance at Conseco Fieldhouse in Indianapolis. Less than one month later, on April 17, 2008, Federici died at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, having suffered for three years with melanoma. \n\nSpringsteen supported Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign, announcing his endorsement in April 2008 and going on to appear at several Obama rallies as well as performing several solo acoustic performances in support of Obama's campaign throughout 2008, culminating with a November 2 rally at which he debuted the song \"Working on a Dream\" in a duet with Scialfa. At an Ohio rally, Springsteen discussed the importance of \"truth, transparency and integrity in government, the right of every American to have a job, a living wage, to be educated in a decent school, and a life filled with the dignity of work, the promise and the sanctity of home... \n\nFollowing Obama's electoral victory on November 4, Springsteen's song \"The Rising\" was the first song played over the loudspeakers after Obama's victory speech in Chicago's Grant Park. Springsteen was the musical opener for the Obama Inaugural Celebration on January 18, 2009, which was attended by over 400,000 people. He performed \"The Rising\" with an all-female choir. Later he performed Woody Guthrie's \"This Land Is Your Land\" with Pete Seeger.\n\nOn January 11, 2009, Springsteen won the Golden Globe Award for Best Song for \"The Wrestler\", from the Darren Aronofsky film by the same name. After receiving a heartfelt letter from lead actor Mickey Rourke, Springsteen supplied the song for the film for free. \n\nSpringsteen performed at the halftime show at Super Bowl XLIII on February 1, 2009, agreeing to do it after many previous offers. A few days before the game, Springsteen gave a rare press conference at which he promised a \"twelve-minute party.\" His 12-minute 45-second set, with the E Street Band and the Miami Horns, included abbreviated renditions of \"Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out\"\", \"Born to Run\", \"Working on a Dream\", and \"Glory Days\", the latter complete with football references in place of the original baseball-themed lyrics. The set of appearances and promotional activities led Springsteen to say, \"This has probably been the busiest month of my life.\" \n\nSpringsteen's Working on a Dream album, dedicated to the memory of Danny Federici, was released in late January 2009 and the supporting Working on a Dream Tour ran from April 2009 until November 2009. The tour featured few songs from the new album, with set lists dominated instead by classics and selections reflecting the ongoing late-2000s recession. The tour also featured Springsteen playing songs requested by audience members holding up signs, a practice begun during the final stages of the Magic Tour. Drummer Max Weinberg was replaced for some shows by his 18-year-old son Jay Weinberg, so that the former could serve his role as bandleader on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien. During this tour, Springsteen and the band made their first real foray in the world of music festivals, headlining nights at the Pinkpop Festival in the Netherlands, Festival des Vieilles Charrues in France, the Bonnaroo Music Festival in the United States and the Glastonbury Festival and Hard Rock Calling in the UK. Several shows on the tour featured full-album presentations of Born to Run, Darkness on the Edge of Town, or Born in the U.S.A. The band performed a stretch of five final shows at Giants Stadium, opening with a new song highlighting the historic stadium, and Springsteen's Jersey roots, named \"Wrecking Ball\". A DVD from the Working on a Dream Tour entitled London Calling: Live in Hyde Park was released in 2010.\n\nSpringsteen was among the recipients of the Kennedy Center Honors, an annual award to figures from the world of arts for their contribution to American culture, in December 2009. President Obama gave a speech in which he talked about how Springsteen has incorporated the life of regular Americans in his expansive palette of songs and how his concerts are beyond the typical rock-and-roll concerts, how, apart from being high-energy concerts, they are \"communions\". He ended the remark \"while I am the president, he is the Boss\". Tributes were paid by several well-known celebrities including Jon Stewart (who described Springsteen's \"unprecedented combination of lyrical eloquence, musical mastery and sheer unbridled, unadulterated joy\"). A musical tribute featured John Mellencamp, Ben Harper, Jennifer Nettles, Melissa Etheridge, Eddie Vedder, and Sting.\n\nThe 2000s ended with Springsteen being named one of eight Artists of the Decade by Rolling Stone magazine and with Springsteen's tours ranking him fourth among artists in total concert grosses for the decade. His 2010 tour included venues in the UK and Ireland.\n\nIn September 2010, a documentary about the making of Springsteen's 1978 album Darkness on the Edge of Town premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. The film, The Promise: The Making of Darkness on the Edge of Town, was included in a box set reissue of the album, entitled The Promise: The Darkness on the Edge of Town Story, released in November 2010. Also airing on HBO, the documentary explored Springsteen's making of the album and his role in the production and development of the tracks.\n\nClarence Clemons, the E Street Band's saxophonist and founding member, died on June 18, 2011, of complications from a stroke. \"Clarence lived a wonderful life\", Springsteen said in a statement. \"He carried within him a love of people that made them love him. He created a wondrous and extended family. He loved the saxophone, loved our fans and gave everything he had every night he stepped on stage.\" \n\n2012–13: Wrecking Ball\n\nSpringsteen's 17th studio album, Wrecking Ball, was released on March 6, 2012. The album consists of eleven tracks plus two bonus tracks. Three songs previously only available as live versions—\"Wrecking Ball\", \"Land of Hope and Dreams\", and \"American Land\"—appear on the album. Wrecking Ball became Springsteen's tenth No. 1 album in the United States, tying him with Elvis Presley for third most No. 1 albums of all-time. Only the Beatles (19) and Jay-Z (12) have more No. 1 albums. \n\nFollowing the release of the album, Springsteen and the E Street Band announced plans for the Wrecking Ball Tour, which began on March 18, 2012. As tickets for the first U.S. dates went on sale, many fans were unable to obtain tickets, much like for the 2009 Working on a Dream Tour, allegedly due to a heavy volume of ticket scalpers. Shows sold out within minutes and many tickets appeared, at much higher prices, on resale websites such as StubHub less than an hour after the onsale time. Ticketmaster said web traffic was 2.5 times the highest level of the past year during the online sales and suggested that scalpers played a big role.\n\nOn July 31, 2012, in Helsinki, Finland, Springsteen performed his longest concert ever at 4 hours and 6 minutes and 33 songs. Not included in this total time is a thirty-minute, five-song, solo acoustical set he did about two hours prior to the beginning of the show. \n\nSpringsteen was honored with the 2013 MusiCares Person of the Year award in recognition of his creative accomplishments as well as his charitable work and philanthropic activities. A ceremony was held on February 8, 2013, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, two days before the Grammy Awards. \n\nDespite saying he would sit out the 2012 presidential election, Springsteen campaigned for President Barack Obama's re-election in Ohio, Iowa, Virginia, Pittsburgh, and Wisconsin. At the rallies, Springsteen briefly spoke to the audience and performed a short acoustic set that included a newly written song titled \"Forward\". Obama also used \"We Take Care of Our Own\" as one of his top campaign songs. Use of the song helped boost sales of the song by 409%. \n\nOn October 29, 2012, the New Jersey area was hit hard by Hurricane Sandy. Two days following the storm, Springsteen dedicated his performance at the Blue Cross Arena in Rochester, New York, to those affected by the storm and those helping to recover. Springsteen and the E Street Band performed \"Land of Hope and Dreams\" at a one-hour televised telethon called Hurricane Sandy: Coming Together on November 2, 2012, which aired on NBC and at the same time many other channels. Springsteen also joined Billy Joel, Steven Tyler and Jimmy Fallon for a performance of \"Under the Boardwalk\". All money was donated to the American Red Cross. Springsteen and the E Street Band, along with many top names in the music industry, performed at Madison Square Garden on December 12, 2012, for 12-12-12: The Concert for Sandy Relief.\n\nAt year's end, the Wrecking Ball Tour was named Top Draw for having the top attendance out of any tour by the Billboard Touring Awards. The tour finished second to Roger Waters, who had the top grossing tour of 2012. Springsteen finished second only to Madonna as the top money maker of 2012 with $33.44 million. The Wrecking Ball album, along with the single \"We Take Care of Our Own\", was nominated for three Grammy Awards, including Best Rock Performance and Best Rock Song for \"We Take Care of Our Own\" and Best Rock Album. Rolling Stone named Wrecking Ball the number one album of 2012 on their Top 50 albums of 2012 list. \n\nIn March 2013, and for the first time since re-uniting with Springsteen in 1999, Steven Van Zandt was forced to miss the Australian leg of the band's tour due to acting commitments on his television show Lilyhammer. Van Zandt was replaced by guitarist Tom Morello for the leg. \n\nIn late July 2013, the documentary Springsteen & I, directed by Baillie Walsh and produced by Ridley Scott, was released simultaneously via a worldwide cinema broadcast in over 50 countries and in over 2000 movie theaters. \n\nThe Wrecking Ball Tour, which came to an end in September 2013, was one of Springsteen's most successful tours ever. A week after the tour ended, Springsteen announced a 2014 tour that would include dates in Australia and New Zealand. \n\nSpringsteen, along with friend and mentor Pete Seeger, as well as Herbie Hancock, Sally Field and Robert De Niro, were among a total of 198 class of 2013 inductees into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. The induction ceremony was held at the Academy's headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts in October 2013.\n\nSpringsteen released a letter in October 2013 through his website thanking fans of all ages for their support throughout the Wrecking Ball World Tour. A highlight video of the tour was also released featuring a new studio recording of the Suicide song, \"Dream Baby Dream\". \n\n2014–present: High Hopes, The Ties That Bind box set, The River 2016 tour, and upcoming solo studio album\n\nSpringsteen released his eighteenth studio album, High Hopes, on January 14, 2014. The first single and music video was a newly recorded version of the song \"High Hopes\", which Springsteen had previously recorded in 1995. The album was the first by Springsteen in which all songs are either cover songs, newly recorded outtakes from previous records, or newly recorded versions of songs previously released. The 2014 E Street Band touring lineup, along with deceased E Street Band members Clarence Clemons and Danny Federici, appears on the album along with guitarist Tom Morello. \n\nIt was announced on January 15, 2014 that Springsteen would start making professional recordings of all of his live shows available following each performance on his upcoming tour via download to a special USB wristband. In addition to the wristbands, shows will also be offered through Springsteen's website until June 30, 2014. Springsteen along with the E Street Band and guitarist Tom Morello, kicked off the High Hopes Tour on January 26, 2014. The tour was considered to be a continuation of the Wrecking Ball Tour.\n\nHigh Hopes became Springsteen's eleventh No. 1 album in the US. It was his tenth No. 1 in the UK, tying him for fifth all-time The Rolling Stones and U2. On April 4, 2014, HBO aired Bruce Springsteen's High Hopes a 30-minute documentary on the recording of High Hopes. \n\nAnnounced as inductees in December 2013, Springsteen inducted past and present members of the E Street Band into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on April 10, 2014, with each member giving speeches and Springsteen and the band performing a three song set of \"The E Street Shuffle\", \"The River\" and \"Kitty's Back\". \n\nAmerican Beauty, a limited edition four song EP on 12-inch vinyl that was released exclusively for Record Store Day on April 18, 2014. The EP contains four unreleased songs from the High Hopes sessions. A music video for the title track was also released. After 34 shows and 182 songs performed, the High Hopes Tour came to an end on May 18, 2014. Springsteen released a short film for the song \"Hunter of Invisible Game\" on July 9, 2014 through his website. It marked Springsteen's directorial debut. \n\nOn November 17, 2014, Springsteen released The Album Collection Vol. 1 1973-1984, an 8 disc set featuring remastered version of his first seven studio albums, some of which are being remastered for the first time. \n\nSpringsteen made his acting debut in the final episode of Season 3 of Van Zandt's show Lilyhammer, which was named \"Loose Ends\", after a Springsteen song on his album Tracks. Springsteen played Giuseppe Tagliano, the brother of Van Zandt's character, Frank Tagliano aka \"Giovanni \"Johnny\" Henrikssen\". Giuseppe is an undertaker and owner of a funeral parlor who occasionally works as a hitman for a mafia family which Frank is associated.\n\nRolling Stone named High Hopes the second best album of the year (behind only U2's Songs of Innocence) on their Top 50 Albums of 2014 list. \n\nIn November 2014, Springsteen announced that he would be opening the Bruce Springsteen Archives and will officially release live concerts from throughout his career including many shows which fans consider to be among some of his most essential performances and that were only previously available through bootlegs. Each show has been completely restored, remixed and remastered for the highest possible sound quality and are available for purchase through digital download or CD at live.brucespringsteen.net, the same website where fans can also purchase all of Springsteen's live recordings from the High Hopes Tour. \n\nOn August 6, 2015, Springsteen performed \"Land of Hope and Dreams\" and \"Born to Run\" on the final episode of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, as Stewart's final 'Moment of Zen'.\n\nOn October 16, 2015 to celebrate the 35th anniversary of The River, Springsteen announced the release of long anticipated The Ties That Bind: The River Collection box set. The set, which was released on December 4, 2015, contained 4 CDs (including many previously unreleased songs) and 3 DVDs (or 2 Blu-ray) along with a 148-page coffee table book.\n\nIn November 2015, \"American Skin (41 Shots)\" was performed with John Legend at Shining a Light: A Concert for Progress on Race in America.\n\nSpringsteen made his first appearance on Saturday Night Live since 2002 on December 19, 2015, performing \"Meet Me in the City\", \"The Ties That Bind\", and \"Santa Claus Is Coming to Town\". On December 4, 2015, Springsteen announced details for the The River Tour 2016, a three-month tour which will begin in January 2016 and will be in support of The Ties That Bind: The River Collection box set. All first leg shows in North America featured an in-sequence performance of the entire The River album along with other songs from Springsteen's catalog and will be recorded and available for purchase. More were eventually announced expanding the original three-month tour into a seven-month tour with dates in Europe in May 2016 and another North American leg starting in August 2016 ending the following month.\n\nIn a December 2015 interview with E Street Radio, Springsteen talked about his plans for a new solo album however plans were put on hold to tour with the E Street Band in support of The Ties That Bind: The River Collection. Springsteen said \"the project I've been working on is more of a solo project. It wasn't a project I was going to probably take the band out on. So I said, 'Gee, that's going to push the band playing again until a ways in the future. It'll be nice to get some playing in so you don't wind up being two or three years between E Street tours.\" \n\nAs of July 2016, The River 2016 Tour has been the highest grossing world-wide tour with 1.1 million tickets sold and over $135 million in box office revenue, according to Billboard Boxscore's mid-year report. Springsteen's manager, Jon Landau, discussed Springsteen's upcoming solo album, which is expected for release in 2017, saying “All I can say is that there is a solo record -- and when I say solo record, I’m not talking about an acoustic record. It is, in fact, a very expansive record, a very rich record. It’s one of Bruce’s very creative efforts. Stay tuned, and we’ll see exactly how that shapes up next year.” Landau also said it was too early to know a release day or plans for a supporting tour. \n\nOn September 23, 2016, Chapter and Verse a career-spanning compilation from throughout Springsteen's career dating back to 1966, will be released four days before the 500 page Simon & Schuster published autobiography, Born to Run. Five of the album’s eighteen tracks have not been previously released and will feature Springsteen's earliest recording from 1966, songs from his tenure in early 70's bands such as The Castiles, Steel Mill and The Bruce Springsteen Band along with a track from each studio album from his career. \n\nMusical style\n\nBruce Springsteen draws on many musical influences from the reservoir of traditional American popular music, folk, blues and country. From the beginning, rock and roll has been a dominant influence and Springsteen's musical and lyrical evocations, as well as public tributes, of artists such as Dylan, Presley, Roy Orbison, Gary \"U.S.\" Bonds, and many others helped to rekindle interest in their music. Springsteen's other preferred musical style is American folk, evident on his debut album, Greetings from Asbury Park, New Jersey, and more strongly on Nebraska and The Ghost of Tom Joad. Springsteen songs such as \"This Hard Land\" demonstrate the lyrical and musical influence of Woody Guthrie.\n\nElements of Latin American music, jazz, soul, and funk influences can be heard on Springsteen's second album, The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle; the song \"New York City Serenade\" is even reminiscent of the music of George Gershwin. These two records prominently featured pianist David Sancious, who left the band shortly into the recording of Springsteen's third album, Born To Run. This album, however, also emphasized the piano, the responsibility now of Roy Bittan.\n\nSubsequently in his career, Springsteen focused more on the rock elements of his music. He initially compressed the sound and developed Darkness on the Edge of Town just as straightforward as concise musical idiom, for the simple riffs, rock guitar solos and clearly recognizable song structures are dominant. His music has been categorized as heartland rock, a style typified by Springsteen, John Fogerty, Tom Petty, Bob Seger, and John Mellencamp. This music has a lyrical reference to the U.S. everyday and the music is kept rather simple and straightforward. This development culminated with Springsteen's hit album Born in the U.S.A., the title song of which has a constantly repeating, fanfare-like keyboard riff and a pounding drum beat. These sounds fit with Springsteen's voice: it cries to the listener the unsentimental story of a disenchanted angry figure. Even songs that can be argued to be album tracks proved to be singles that enjoyed some chart success, such as \"My Hometown\" and \"I'm on Fire\", in which the drum line is formed from subtle hi-hat and rim-clicks-shock (shock at the edge of the snare drum) accompanied by synthesizer and Springsteen's soft guitar line. The album, along with some previous records such as \"Cadillac Ranch\" showed clear rockabilly influences as is evident from his guitar solos, in-fills and vocal styles on these. Another clear influence of early rock n roll on Springsteen's music is evident on the song \"Light of Day\".\n\nIn recent years, Springsteen has changed his music further. There are more folk elements up to the gospel to be heard. His last solo album, Devils and Dust, drew rave reviews not only for Springsteen's complex songwriting, but also for his expressive and sensitive singing.\n\nOn the album We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions Springsteen performed folk classics with a folk band, rather than his usual E Street Band. On his ensuing tour he also interpreted some of his own rock songs in a folk style.\n\nOn his 2012 album, Wrecking Ball, Springsteen incorporated a variety of styles.\n\nLyrical themes\n\nOften described as cinematic in their scope, Springsteen's lyrics frequently explore highly personal themes such as individual commitment, dissatisfaction and dismay with life in a context of every day situations. \n\nIt has been recognized that there was a shift in his lyrical approach starting with the album Darkness on the Edge of Town, in which he focused on the emotional struggles of working class life. \n\nPersonal life\n\nIn the early 1980s Springsteen met Patti Scialfa at The Stone Pony, a bar in New Jersey where local musicians perform regularly. On that particular evening she was performing alongside one of Springsteen's pals, Bobby Bandiera, with whom she had written \"At Least We Got Shoes\" for Southside Johnny. Springsteen liked her voice and after the performance, introduced himself to her. Soon after that, they started spending time together and became friends. \n\nEarly in 1984 Springsteen asked Scialfa to join the E Street Band for the upcoming Born in the U.S.A. Tour. According to the book Bruce Springsteen on Tour 1969–2005 by Dave Marsh, it looked like Springsteen and Scialfa were on the brink of becoming a couple through the first leg of the tour. But before that could happen, Barry Bell introduced Julianne Phillips to Springsteen and on May 13, 1985, they were married. The two were opposites in background, had an 11-year age difference and his traveling took its toll on their relationship. In 1987, Springsteen wrote his next album, Tunnel of Love, on which many of the songs described his unhappiness in the relationship with Phillips.\n\nIn 1988 the Tunnel of Love Express Tour began and Springsteen convinced Scialfa to join the tour again. She expressed reluctance at first, since she wanted to start recording her first solo album, but after Springsteen told her that the tour would be short, she agreed to postpone her own solo record. Phillips and Springsteen separated in the spring of 1988, but it wasn’t made known to the press. Springsteen and Scialfa fell in love with each other during the Tunnel of Love Express Tour and started living together soon after his separation from Phillips. On August 30, 1988, Julianne filed for divorce. The Springsteen/Phillips divorce was finalized on March 1, 1989. Springsteen received press criticism for the hastiness in which he and Scialfa took up their relationship. In a 1995 interview with The Advocate, Springsteen told Judy Wieder about the negative publicity the couple subsequently received. \"It's a strange society that assumes it has the right to tell people whom they should love and whom they shouldn't. But the truth is, I basically ignored the entire thing as much as I could. I said, 'Well, all I know is, this feels real, and maybe I have got a mess going here in some fashion, but that's life.'\" He also told Wieder that, \"I went through a divorce, and it was really difficult and painful and I was very frightened about getting married again. So part of me said, 'Hey, what does it matter?' But it does matter. It's very different than just living together. First of all, stepping up publicly—which is what you do: You get your license, you do all the social rituals—is a part of your place in society and in some way part of society's acceptance of you ... Patti and I both found that it did mean something.\"\n\nSpringsteen and Scialfa lived in New Jersey, before moving to Los Angeles where they decided to start a family. \nOn July 25, 1990, Scialfa gave birth to the couple's first child, Evan James Springsteen. \nOn June 8, 1991, Springsteen and Scialfa married at their Los Angeles home in a very private ceremony, only attended by family and close friends.\nTheir second child, Jessica Rae Springsteen, was born on December 30, 1991; and their third child, Samuel Ryan Springsteen, was born on January 5, 1994. \n\nWhen the children reached school-age in the early 1990s, Springsteen and Scialfa moved back to New Jersey specifically to raise a family in a non-paparazzi environment. The grounds of his New Jersey home include a large swimming pool. The family owns and lives on a horse farm in Colts Neck, New Jersey. They also own homes in Wellington, Florida, Los Angeles and Rumson, New Jersey.\n\nTheir eldest son, Evan, graduated from Boston College. He writes and performs his own songs and won the 2012 Singer/Songwriter Competition held during the Boston College's Arts Festival. Their daughter Jessica is a nationally-ranked champion equestrian, and graduated from Duke University. She made her show-jumping debut with the Team USA in August 2014. Their youngest son, Sam, is a firefighter. \n\nIt has been reported that the press conference regarding the 2009 Super Bowl XLIII half-time show was Springsteen's first press conference in more than 25 years. However, he has appeared in a few radio interviews, most notably on NPR and BBC. 60 Minutes aired his last extensive interview on TV before his tour to support his album, Magic.\n\nSpringsteen is an activist for LGBT rights and has spoken out many times as a strong supporter of gay marriage. In 2009, he posted the following statement on his website: \"I've long believed in and have always spoken out for the rights of same sex couples and fully agree with Governor Corzine when he writes that 'The marriage-equality issue should be recognized for what it truly is—a civil rights issue that must be approved to assure that every citizen is treated equally under the law.'\" In 2012, he lent his support to an ad campaign for gay marriage called \"The Four 2012\". Springsteen noted in the ad, \"I couldn't agree more with that statement and urge those who support equal treatment for our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters to let their voices be heard now.\" In April 2016 he cancelled a show in Greensboro, North Carolina days before it was to take place to protest the state's newly passed Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act, also referred to as the \"bathroom law\". The law dictates which rest rooms transgender people are permitted to use and prevents LBGT citizens from suing over human rights violations in the workplace. Springsteen released an official statement on his website. The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) celebrated Springsteen's statement against intolerance and he has received much praise and gratitude from the LGBT community.\n \n\nBands\n\nBruce Springsteen has been a member of, or has been backed by, several bands during his career, most notably The E Street Band.\n\nPrior to signing his first record deal in 1972, Springsteen was a member of several bands, including Steel Mill. In October 1972 he formed a new band for the recording of his debut album Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J., which became known as The E Street Band, although the name was not introduced until September 1974. The E Street Band performed on all of Springsteen's recorded works from his debut until 1982's Nebraska, a solo album on which Springsteen himself played all the instruments. The full band returned for the next album Born in the USA, but there then followed a period from 1988 to 1999 in which albums were recorded with session musicians. The E Street Band were briefly reunited in 1995 for new contributions to the Greatest Hits compilation, and on a more permanent basis from 1999, since which time they have recorded more albums and performed a number of high-profile tours.\n\nThe 2005 album Devils & Dust was largely a solo recording, with some contribution from session musicians and the 2006 folk rock We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions album was recorded and toured with another band, known as The Sessions Band.\n\nEarlier bands include The Castiles, Earth, Child, Steel Mill, Sundance Blues Band, Dr Zoom and the Sonic Boom, and The Bruce Springsteen Band. \n\nDiscography\n\n*Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. (1973)\n*The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle (1973)\n*Born to Run (1975)\n*Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978)\n*The River (1980)\n*Nebraska (1982)\n*Born in the U.S.A. (1984)\n*Tunnel of Love (1987)\n*Human Touch (1992)\n*Lucky Town (1992)\n*The Ghost of Tom Joad (1995)\n*The Rising (2002)\n*Devils & Dust (2005)\n*We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions (2006)\n*Magic (2007)\n*Working on a Dream (2009)\n*Wrecking Ball (2012)\n*High Hopes (2014)\n\nConcert Tours \n\nHeadlining Tours\n*Born to Run tours (1974–77)\n*Darkness Tour (1978–79)\n*The River Tour (1980–81)\n*Born in the U.S.A. Tour (1984–85)\n*Tunnel of Love Express Tour (1988)\n*Bruce Springsteen 1992–1993 World Tour (1992–93)\n*Ghost of Tom Joad Tour (1995–97)\n*Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band Reunion Tour (1999–2000)\n*The Rising Tour (2002–03)\n*Devils & Dust Tour (2005)\n*Bruce Springsteen with The Seeger Sessions Band Tour (2006)\n*Magic Tour (Bruce Springsteen) (2007–08)\n*Working on a Dream Tour (2009)\n*Wrecking Ball World Tour (2012–13)\n*High Hopes Tour (2014)\n*The River Tour 2016 (2016)\n\nCo-Headlining Tours\n*Human Rights Now! (1988)\n*Vote for Change (2004)\n\nAwards \n\nGrammy Awards \n\nSpringsteen has won 20 Grammy Awards out of 49 Nominations.\n\nGolden Globe Awards\n\n* Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song for \"Streets of Philadelphia\" in 1994.\n* Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song for \"The Wrestler\" in 2009.\n\nAcademy Award \n\n* Academy Award for Best Original Song, 1994, \"Streets of Philadelphia\" from Philadelphia. \n\nOther recognition\n\n* Polar Music Prize in 1997 \n* Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, 1999 \n*Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band: Live in New York City won two Emmy Awards in 2001 \n* Inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, 1999 \n* Inducted into the New Jersey Hall of Fame, 2007 \n* \"Born to Run\" named \"The unofficial youth anthem of New Jersey\" by the New Jersey state legislature; something Springsteen always found to be ironic, considering that the song \"is about leaving New Jersey\"\n* The minor planet 23990, discovered September 4, 1999, by I. P. Griffin at Auckland, New Zealand, was named in his honor. \n* Ranked No. 23 on Rolling Stone magazine's 2004 list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time >\n* Made Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People of the Year 2008 list \n* Won Critics' Choice Movie Award for Best Song with \"The Wrestler\" in 2009 \n* 2009 Kennedy Center Honors recipient \n* Forbes ranked him 6th in The Celebrity 100 in 2009 \n* Named 2013 MusiCares Person of the Year" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "Magnesium.txt" ], "title": [ "Magnesium" ], "wiki_context": [ "Magnesium is a chemical element with symbol Mg and atomic number 12. It is a shiny gray solid which bears a close physical resemblance to the other five elements in the second column (Group 2, or alkaline earth metals) of the periodic table: all Group 2 elements have the same electron configuration in the outer electron shell and a similar crystal structure.\n\nMagnesium is the ninth most abundant element in the universe. It is produced in large, aging stars from the sequential addition of three helium nuclei to a carbon nucleus. When such stars explode as supernova, much of the magnesium is expelled into the interstellar medium where it may recycle into new star systems. Magnesium is the eighth most abundant element in the Earth's crust and the fourth most common element in the Earth (after iron, oxygen and silicon), making up 13% of the planet's mass and a large fraction of the planet's mantle. It is the third most abundant element dissolved in seawater, after sodium and chlorine. \n\nMagnesium occurs naturally only in combination with other elements, where it invariably has a +2 oxidation state. The free element (metal) can be produced artificially, and is highly reactive (though in the atmosphere, it is soon coated in a thin layer of oxide that partly inhibits reactivity — see passivation). The free metal burns with a characteristic brilliant-white light. The metal is now obtained mainly by electrolysis of magnesium salts obtained from brine, and is used primarily as a component in aluminium-magnesium alloys, sometimes called magnalium or magnelium. Magnesium is less dense than aluminium, and the alloy is prized for its combination of lightness and strength.\n\nMagnesium is the eleventh most abundant element by mass in the human body, and the ions are essential to all cells. Magnesium ions interact with polyphosphate compounds such as ATP, DNA, and RNA. Hundreds of enzymes require magnesium ions to function. Magnesium compounds are used medicinally as common laxatives, antacids (e.g., milk of magnesia), and to stabilize abnormal nerve excitation or blood vessel spasm in such conditions as eclampsia. Magnesium ions are sour to the taste, and in low concentrations they help impart a natural tartness to fresh mineral waters. Magnesium is the metallic ion at the center of chlorophyll, and is a common component in fertilizers. \n\nCharacteristics \n\nPhysical properties \n\nElemental magnesium is a gray-white lightweight metal, two-thirds the density of aluminium. It tarnishes slightly when exposed to air, although, unlike the other alkaline earth metals, an oxygen-free environment is unnecessary for storage because magnesium is protected by a thin layer of oxide that is fairly impermeable and difficult to remove. Magnesium has the lowest melting (923 K) and the lowest boiling point 1363 K of all the alkaline earth metals. \n\nMagnesium reacts with water at room temperature, though it reacts much more slowly than calcium, a similar group 2 metal. When submerged in water, hydrogen bubbles form slowly on the surface of the metal—though, if powdered, it reacts much more rapidly. The reaction occurs faster with higher temperatures (see #Precautions). Magnesium's reversible reaction with water can be harnessed to store energy and run a magnesium-based engine.\n\nMagnesium also reacts exothermically with most acids such as hydrochloric acid (HCl), producing the metal chloride and hydrogen gas, similar to the HCl reaction with aluminium, zinc, and many other metals.\n\nChemical properties \n\nFlammability\n\nMagnesium is highly flammable, especially when powdered or shaved into thin strips, though it is difficult to ignite in mass or bulk. Flame temperatures of magnesium and magnesium alloys can reach 3100 °C, although flame height above the burning metal is usually less than 300 mm. Once ignited, such fires are difficult to extinguish, with combustion continuing in nitrogen (forming magnesium nitride), carbon dioxide (forming magnesium oxide and carbon), and water (forming magnesium oxide and hydrogen). This property was used in incendiary weapons during the firebombing of cities in World War II, where the only practical civil defense was to smother a burning flare under dry sand to exclude atmosphere from the combustion.\n\nMagnesium may also be used as an igniter for thermite, a mixture of aluminium and iron oxide powder that ignites only at a very high temperature.\n\nSource of light\n\nWhen burning in air, magnesium produces a brilliant-white light that includes strong ultraviolet wavelengths. Magnesium powder (flash powder) was used for subject illumination in the early days of photography. Later, magnesium filament was used in electrically ignited single-use photography flashbulbs. Magnesium powder is used in fireworks and marine flares where a brilliant white light is required. It was also used for various theatrical effects, such as lightning, pistol flashes, and supernatural appearances. \n\nOccurrence \n\nMagnesium is the eighth-most-abundant element in the Earth's crust by mass and tied in seventh place with iron in molarity. It is found in large deposits of magnesite, dolomite, and other minerals, and in mineral waters, where magnesium ion is soluble.\n\nAlthough magnesium is found in more than 60 minerals, only dolomite, magnesite, brucite, carnallite, talc, and olivine are of commercial importance.\n\nThe cation is the second-most-abundant cation in seawater (about ⅛ the mass of sodium ions in a given sample), which makes seawater and sea salt attractive commercial sources for Mg. To extract the magnesium, calcium hydroxide is added to seawater to form magnesium hydroxide precipitate.\n+ → + \n\nMagnesium hydroxide (brucite) is insoluble in water and can be filtered out and reacted with hydrochloric acid to produced concentrated magnesium chloride.\n+ 2 HCl → + 2 \nFrom magnesium chloride, electrolysis produces magnesium.\n\nForms \n\nAlloy \n\nAs of 2013, magnesium alloy consumption was less than one million tons per year, compared with 50 million tons of aluminum alloys. Its use has been historically limited by its tendency to corrode, creep at high temperatures, and combust.\n\nCorrosion\n\nThe presence of iron, nickel, copper, and cobalt strongly activates corrosion. Greater than a very small percentage, these metals precipitate as intermetallic compounds, and the precipitate locales function as active cathodic sites that reduce water, causing the loss of magnesium. Controlling the quantity of these metals improves corrosion resistance. Sufficient manganese overcomes the corrosive effects of iron. This requires precise control over composition, increasing costs. Adding a cathodic poison captures atomic hydrogen within the structure of a metal. This prevents the formation of free hydrogen gas, an essential factor of corrosive chemical processes. The addition of about one in three hundred parts arsenic reduces its corrosion rate in a salt solution by a factor of nearly ten. \n\nHigh-temperature creep and flammability\n\nResearch showed that magnesium's tendency to creep at high-temperatures is eliminated by the adding scandium and gadolinium. Flammability is greatly reduced by a small amount of calcium in the alloy.\n\nCompounds \n\nMagnesium forms a variety of compounds important to industry and biology, including magnesium carbonate, magnesium chloride, magnesium citrate, magnesium hydroxide (milk of magnesia), magnesium oxide, magnesium sulfate, and magnesium sulfate heptahydrate (Epsom salts).\n\nIsotopes \n\nMagnesium has three stable isotopes: , and . All are present in significant amounts (see table of isotopes above). About 79% of Mg is . The isotope is radioactive and in the 1950s to 1970s was produced by several nuclear power plants for use in scientific experiments. This isotope has a relatively short half-life (21 hours) and its use was limited by shipping times.\n\nThe isomer has found application in isotopic geology, similar to that of aluminium. is a radiogenic daughter product of , which has a half-life of 717,000 years. Excessive quantities of stable have been observed in the Ca-Al-rich inclusions of some carbonaceous chondrite meteorites. This anomalous abundance is attributed to the decay of its parent in the inclusions, and researchers conclude that such meteorites were formed in the solar nebula before the had decayed. These are among the oldest objects in the solar system and contain preserved information about its early history.\n\nIt is conventional to plot / against an Al/Mg ratio. In an isochron dating plot, the Al/Mg ratio plotted is/. The slope of the isochron has no age significance, but indicates the initial / ratio in the sample at the time when the systems were separated from a common reservoir.\n\nProduction \n\nChina is the dominant supplier of magnesium, with approximately 80% of the world market share. China is almost completely reliant on the silicothermic Pidgeon process (the reduction of the oxide at high temperatures with silicon, often provided by a ferrosilicon alloy in which the iron is but a spectator in the reactions) to obtain the metal. The process can also be carried out with carbon at approx 2300 °C:\n+ + → + \n+ → + \n\nIn the United States, magnesium is obtained principally with the Dow process, by electrolysis of fused magnesium chloride from brine and sea water. A saline solution containing ions is first treated with lime (calcium oxide) and the precipitated magnesium hydroxide is collected:\n+ + → + \n\nThe hydroxide is then converted to a partial hydrate of magnesium chloride by treating the hydroxide with hydrochloric acid and heating of the product:\n+ 2 HCl → + 2\n\nThe salt is then electrolyzed in the molten state. At the cathode, the ion is reduced by two electrons to magnesium metal:\n+ 2 → Mg\n\nAt the anode, each pair of ions is oxidized to chlorine gas, releasing two electrons to complete the circuit:\n2 → (g) + 2 \n\nA new process, solid oxide membrane technology, involves the electrolytic reduction of MgO. At the cathode, ion is reduced by two electrons to magnesium metal. The electrolyte is Yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ). The anode is a liquid metal. At the YSZ/liquid metal anode is oxidized. A layer of graphite borders the liquid metal anode, and at this interface carbon and oxygen react to form carbon monoxide. When silver is used as the liquid metal anode, there is no reductant carbon or hydrogen needed, and only oxygen gas is evolved at the anode. It has been reported that this method provides a 40% reduction in cost per pound over the electrolytic reduction method. This method is more environmentally sound than others because there is much less carbon dioxide emitted.\n\nThe United States has traditionally been the major world supplier of this metal, supplying 45% of world production even as recently as 1995. Today, the US market share is at 7%, with a single domestic producer left, US Magnesium, a Renco Group company in Utah born from now-defunct Magcorp. \n\nHistory \n\nThe name magnesium originates from the Greek word for a district in Thessaly called Magnesia. It is related to magnetite and manganese, which also originated from this area, and required differentiation as separate substances. See manganese for this history.\n\nIn 1618, a farmer at Epsom in England attempted to give his cows water from a well there. The cows refused to drink because of the water's bitter taste, but the farmer noticed that the water seemed to heal scratches and rashes. The substance became known as Epsom salts and its fame spread. It was eventually recognized as hydrated magnesium sulfate, ·7.\n\nThe metal itself was first produced by Sir Humphry Davy in England in 1808. He used electrolysis on a mixture of magnesia and mercuric oxide. Antoine Bussy prepared it in coherent form in 1831. Davy's first suggestion for a name was magnium, but the name magnesium is now used.\n\nUses as a metal\n\nMagnesium is the third-most-commonly-used structural metal, following iron and aluminium. It is called the lightest useful metal by The Periodic Table of Videos. \n\nThe main applications of magnesium are, in order: aluminium alloys, die-casting (alloyed with zinc), removing sulfur in the production of iron and steel, and the production of titanium in the Kroll process. \n\nMagnesium is used in super-strong, lightweight materials and alloys. For example, when infused with silicon carbide nanoparticles, it has extremely high specific strength.\n\nHistorically, magnesium was one of the main aerospace construction metals and was used for German military aircraft as early as World War I and extensively for German aircraft in World War II.\n\nThe Germans coined the name \"Elektron\" for magnesium alloy, a term is still used today. In the commercial aerospace industry, magnesium was generally restricted to engine-related components, due fire and corrosion hazards. Currently, magnesium alloy use in aerospace is increasing, driven by the importance of fuel economy. Development and testing of new magnesium alloys continues, notably Elektron 21, which (in test) has proved suitable for aerospace engine, internal, and airframe components. The European Community runs three R&D magnesium projects in the Aerospace priority of Six Framework Program.\n\nIn the form of thin ribbons, magnesium is used to purify solvents; for example, preparing super-dry ethanol.\n\nAircraft\n\n* Wright Aeronautical used a magnesium crankcase in the WWII-era Wright Duplex Cyclone aviation engine. This presented a serious problem for the earliest models of the Boeing B-29 heavy bomber when an in-flight engine fire ignited the engine crankcase. The resulting combustion was as hot as 5,600 °F (3,100 °C) and could sever the wing spar from the fusilage. \n\nAutomotive\n\n* Mercedes-Benz used the alloy Elektron in the body of an early model Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR; these cars ran (with successes) at Le Mans, the Mille Miglia, and other world-class race events in 1955.\n* Porsche used magnesium alloy frames in the 917/053 that won Le Mans in 1971, and continues to use magnesium alloys for its engine blocks due to the weight advantage.\n* Volkswagen Group has used magnesium in its engine components for many years.\n* Mitsubishi Motors uses magnesium for its paddle shifters.\n* BMW used magnesium alloy blocks in their N52 engine, including an aluminium alloy insert for the cylinder walls and cooling jackets surrounded by a high-temperature magnesium alloy AJ62A. The engine was used worldwide between 2005 and 2011 in various 1, 3, 5, 6, and 7 series models; as well as the Z4, X1, X3, and X5.\n* Chevrolet used the magnesium alloy AE44 in the 2006 Corvette Z06.\nBoth AJ62A and AE44 are recent developments in high-temperature low-creep magnesium alloys. The general strategy for such alloys is to form intermetallic precipitates at the grain boundaries, for example by adding mischmetal or calcium. New alloy development and lower costs that make magnesium competitive with aluminium will increase the number of automotive applications.\n\nElectronics\n\nBecause of low weight and good mechanical and electrical properties, magnesium is widely used for manufacturing of mobile phones, laptop and tablet computers, cameras, and other electronic components.\n\nOther\n\nMagnesium, being readily available and relatively nontoxic, has a variety of uses:\n* Magnesium is flammable, burning at a temperature of approximately 3100 °C, and the autoignition temperature of magnesium ribbon is approximately 473 °C. It produces intense, bright, white light when it burns. Magnesium's high combustion temperature makes it a useful tool for starting emergency fires. Other uses include flash photography, flares, pyrotechnics, and fireworks sparklers. Magnesium is also often used to ignite thermite or other materials that require a high ignition temperature.\n* In the form of turnings or ribbons, to prepare Grignard reagents, which are useful in organic synthesis.\n* As an additive agent in conventional propellants and the production of nodular graphite in cast iron.\n* As a reducing agent to separate uranium and other metals from their salts.\n* As a sacrificial (galvanic) anode to protect boats, underground tanks, pipelines, buried structures, and water heaters.\n* Alloyed with zinc to produce the zinc sheet used in photoengraving plates in the printing industry, dry-cell battery walls, and roofing.\n* As a metal, this element's principal use is as an alloying additive to aluminium with these aluminium-magnesium alloys being used mainly for beverage cans, sports equipment such as golf clubs, fishing reels, and archery bows and arrows.\n* Specialty, high-grade car wheels of magnesium alloy are called \"mag wheels\", although the term is often misapplied to aluminium wheels. Many car and aircraft manufacturers have made engine and body parts from magnesium.\n* Magnesium batteries have been commercialized as primary batteries, and are an active topic of research for rechargeable secondary batteries.\n\nSafety precautions\n\nMagnesium metal and its alloys can be explosive hazards; they are highly flammable in their pure form when molten or in powder or ribbon form. Burning or molten magnesium reacts violently with water. When working with powdered magnesium, safety glasses with eye protection and UV filters (such as welders use) are employed because burning magnesium produces ultraviolet light that can permanently damage the retina of a human eye. \n\nMagnesium is capable of reducing water and releasing highly flammable hydrogen gas: \n\nMg (s) + 2 (l) → Magnesium hydroxide| (s) + (g)\n\nTherefore, water cannot extinguish magnesium fires. The hydrogen gas produced intensifies the fire. Dry sand is an effective smothering agent, but only on relatively level and flat surfaces.\n\nMagnesium reacts with carbon dioxide exothermically to form magnesium oxide and carbon: \n\n2 Mg + → 2 MgO + C (s)\n\nHence, carbon dioxide fuels rather than extinguishes magnesium fires.\n\nBurning magnesium can be quenched by using a Class D dry chemical fire extinguisher, or by covering the fire with sand or magnesium foundry flux to remove its air source.\n\nUseful compounds\n\nMagnesium compounds, primarily magnesium oxide (MgO), are used as a refractory material in furnace linings for producing iron, steel, nonferrous metals, glass, and cement. Magnesium oxide and other magnesium compounds are also used in the agricultural, chemical, and construction industries. Magnesium oxide from calcination is used as an electrical insulator in fire-resistant cables. \n\nMagnesium reacted with an alkyl halide gives a Grignard reagent, which is a very useful tool for preparing alcohols.\n\nMagnesium salts are included in various foods, fertilizers (magnesium is a component of chlorophyll), and microbe culture media.\n\nMagnesium sulfite is used in the manufacture of paper (sulfite process).\n\nMagnesium phosphate is used to fireproof wood used in construction.\n\nMagnesium hexafluorosilicate is used for moth-proofing textiles.\n\nBiological roles \n\nMechanism of action\n\nThe important interaction between phosphate and magnesium ions makes magnesium essential to the basic nucleic acid chemistry of all cells of all known living organisms. More than 300 enzymes require magnesium ions for their catalytic action, including all enzymes using or synthesizing ATP and those that use other nucleotides to synthesize DNA and RNA. The ATP molecule is normally found in a chelate with a magnesium ion. \n\nDietary sources, recommended intake, and supplementation\n\n Spices, nuts, cereals, cocoa and vegetables are rich sources of magnesium. Green leafy vegetables such as spinach are also rich in magnesium since they contain chlorophyll.\n\nIn the UK, the recommended daily values for magnesium is 300 mg for men and 270 mg for women. Reduced magnesium in the diet of modern Western countries (compared to earlier generations) may be related to food refining and modern fertilizers that contain no magnesium.\n\nNumerous pharmaceutical preparations of magnesium and dietary supplements are available. Magnesium oxide, one of the most common forms in magnesium dietary supplements because of its high magnesium content per weight, is the least bioavailable.\n\nMetabolism\n\nAn adult has 22–26 grams of magnesium, with 60% in the skeleton, 39% intracellular (20% in skeletal muscle), and 1% extracellular. Serum levels are typically 0.7–1.0 mmol/L or 1.8–2.4 mEq/L. Serum magnesium levels may be normal even when intracellular magnesium is deficient. The mechanisms for maintaining the magnesium level in the serum are varying gastrointestinal absorption and renal excretion. Intracellular magnesium is correlated with intracellular potassium. Increased magnesium lowers calcium and can either prevent hypercalcemia or cause hypocalcemia depending on the initial level. Both low and high protein intake conditions inhibit magnesium absorption, as does the amount of phosphate, phytate, and fat in the gut. Excess dietary magnesium is excreted in feces, urine, and sweat.\n\nDetection in serum and plasma \n\nMagnesium status may be assessed by measuring serum and erythrocyte magnesium concentrations coupled with urinary and fecal magnesium content, but intravenous magnesium loading tests are more accurate and practical. A retention of 20% or more of the injected amount indicates deficiency. No biomarker has been established for magnesium. \n\nMagnesium concentrations in plasma or serum may be monitored for efficacy and safety in those receiving the drug therapeutically, to confirm the diagnosis in potential poisoning victims, or to assist in the forensic investigation in a case of fatal overdose. The newborn children of mothers who received parenteral magnesium sulfate during labor may exhibit toxicity with normal serum magnesium levels. \n\nDeficiency\n\nMagnesium deficiency (hypomagnesemia) is common: it is found in 2.5–15% of the general population. The primary cause of deficiency is decreased dietary intake: only 32% of people in the United States meet the recommended daily allowance. Other causes are increased renal or gastrointestinal loss, an increased intracellular shift, and proton-pump inhibitor antacid therapy. Most are asymptomatic, but symptoms referable to neuromuscular, cardiovascular, and metabolic dysfunction may occur. Alcoholism is often associated with magnesium deficiency. Chronically low serum magnesium levels are associated with metabolic syndrome, diabetes mellitus type 2, fasciculation, and hypertension.\n\nTherapy\n\n*Intravenous magnesium is recommended by the ACC/AHA/ESC 2006 Guidelines for Management of Patients With Ventricular Arrhythmias and the Prevention of Sudden Cardiac Death for patients with ventricular arrhythmia associated with torsades de pointes who present with long QT syndrome; and for the treatment of patients with digoxin induced arrhythmias. \n*Magnesium is the drug of choice in the management of pre-eclampsia and eclampsia.\n*Hypomagnesemia, including that caused by alcoholism, is reversible by oral or parenteral magnesium administration depending on the degree of deficiency. \n*There is limited evidence that magnesium supplementation may play a role in the prevention and treatment of migraine.\n*Oral magnesium may be therapeutic for restless leg syndrome. \n \nSorted by type of magnesium salt, other therapeutic applications include:\n* Magnesium sulfate, as the heptahydrate called Epsom salts, is used as bath salts, a laxative, and a highly soluble fertilizer. \n* Magnesium hydroxide, suspended in water, is used in milk of magnesia antacids and laxatives.\n* Magnesium chloride, oxide, gluconate, malate, orotate, glycinate, ascorbate and citrate are all used as oral magnesium supplements. \n* Magnesium borate, magnesium salicylate, and magnesium sulfate are used as antiseptics.\n* Magnesium bromide is used as a mild sedative (this action is due to the bromide, not the magnesium).\n* Magnesium stearate is a slightly flammable white powder with lubricating properties. In pharmaceutical technology, it is used in pharmacological manufacture to prevent tablets from sticking to the equipment while compressing the ingredients into tablet form.\n* Magnesium carbonate powder is used by athletes such as gymnasts, weightlifters, and climbers to eliminate palm sweat, prevent sticking, and improve the grip on gymnastic apparatus, lifting bars, and climbing rocks.\n* Magnesium L–threonate has been studied as a possible treatment of mild cognitive impairment. \n\nOverdose\n\nOverdose from dietary sources alone is unlikely because excess magnesium in the blood is promptly filtered by the kidneys. Overdose with magnesium tablets is possible in the presence of impaired renal function. There is a single case report of hypermagnesemia in a woman with normal renal function using high doses of magnesium salts for catharsis. The most common symptoms of overdose are nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea; other symptoms include hypotension, confusion, slowed heart and respiratory rate, deficiencies of other minerals, coma, cardiac arrhythmia, and death from cardiac arrest.\n\nFunction in plants\n\nPlants require magnesium to synthesize chlorophyll, essential for photosynthesis. Magnesium in the center of the porphyrin ring in chlorophyll functions in a manner similar to the iron in the center of the porphyrin ring in heme. Magnesium deficiency in plants causes late-season yellowing between leaf veins, especially in older leaves, and can be corrected by applying to the soil either Epsom salts (which is rapidly leached), or crushed dolomitic limestone." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Death_of_Wolfgang_Amadeus_Mozart.txt" ], "title": [ "Death of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart" ], "wiki_context": [ "The composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart died on 5 December 1791 at the age of 35. The circumstances of his death have attracted much research and speculation. Some principal sources of contention are as follows.\n\n*Whether Mozart declined gradually, experiencing great fear and sadness, or whether he was fundamentally in good spirits toward the end of his life, then felled by a relatively sudden illness. The former hypothesis held sway for most of the history of Mozart biography, but the latter has been advanced by contemporary scholars.\n*The actual cause of his death: whether it was from disease or poisoning. The poisoning hypothesis is widely discredited. If a particular disease was the actual cause of death, then it remains unknown; only plausible conjectures can be offered.\n*His funeral arrangements, and whether they were the normal procedures for his day, or rather they were of a neglectful nature and the basis for pathos. Here, modern scholarship generally supports the view that the funeral arrangements were normal for Mozart's time.\n\nThe course of Mozart's final illness\n\nThe traditional narrative\n\nMozart scholarship long followed the accounts of early biographers, which proceeded in large part from the recorded memories of his widow Constanze and her sister Sophie Weber as they were recorded in the biographies by Franz Niemetschek and Georg Nikolaus von Nissen. For instance, the important biography by Hermann Abert (1923/2008:1305-9) largely follows this account. The following is a summary of this view.\n\nWhen in August 1791 Mozart arrived in Prague to supervise the performance of his new opera La clemenza di Tito (K. 621), he was \"already very ill\" (Abert, p. 1305). During this visit, Niemetschek wrote, \"he was pale and expression was sad, although his good humour was often shown in merry jest with his friends.\" Following his return to Vienna (mid September 1791), Mozart's condition gradually worsened. For a while, he was still able to work and completed his Clarinet Concerto (K. 622), worked toward the completion of his Requiem (K. 626), and conducted the premiere performance of The Magic Flute (K. 620) on 30 September. Still, he became increasingly alarmed and despondent about his health. An anecdote from Constanze is related by Niemetschek:\n\nOn his return to Vienna, his indisposition increased visibly and made him gloomily depressed. His wife was truly distressed over this. One day when she was driving in the Prater with him, to give him a little distraction and amusement, and they were sitting by themselves, Mozart began to speak of death, and declared that he was writing the Requiem for himself. Tears came to the eyes of the sensitive man: 'I feel definitely,' he continued, 'that I will not last much longer; I am sure I have been poisoned. I cannot rid myself of this idea.'\n\nConstanze attempted to cheer her husband by persuading him to give up work on the Requiem for a while, encouraging him instead to complete the \"Freimaurerkantate\" (K. 623), composed to celebrate the opening of a new Masonic temple for Mozart's own lodge. The strategy worked for a time – the cantata was completed and successfully premiered 18 November. He told Constanze he felt \"elated\" over the premiere. Mozart is reported to have stated, \"Yes I see I was ill to have had such an absurd idea of having taken poison, give me back the Requiem and I will go on with it.\"\n\nEven so, Mozart's worst symptoms of illness soon returned, together with the strong feeling that he was being poisoned. He became bedridden on 20 November, suffering from swelling, pain and vomiting.\n\nFrom this point on, scholars are all agreed that Mozart was indeed very sick, and he died about two weeks later, on December 5 (see below).\n\nRevisionist accounts\n\nThe view that Mozart was in near-steady decline and despair during the last several months of his life has met with skepticism in recent years. Cliff Eisen supervised the reissue of Abert's biography in 2008 in a new edition, supplementing it with numerous footnotes. While generally deferential to Abert, Eisen expresses sharp criticism in the footnoting of the section leading up to Mozart's death:\n\nIt should be noted that, in this context, the evidence cited by Abert is selective and suits the intended trajectory of his biography. With the exception of citations from Mozart's letters, all of the testimony is posthumous and prompted by complicated motives both personal and financial. Although it is 'authentic' in the sense that is derives from those who witnessed Mozart's death, or were close to him, it is not necessarily accurate. ... To be sure, Mozart was under the weather in Prague. But there is no evidence that he was 'very ill' and it is not true that his health 'continued to deteriorate'. As Abert himself notes later in this chapter, Mozart's health improved in October and early November (Abert/Eisen 2008:1305).\n\nIn the main biography article of the Cambridge Mozart Encyclopedia, Ruth Halliwell expresses her skepticism of the decline-and-despair account thus:\n\nWhile later sources describe [Mozart] as working feverishly on [his Requiem], filled with premonitions of his own death, these accounts are hard to reconcile with the high spirits of his letters from most of November. Constanze's earliest account, published in Niemetschek's biography of 1798, states that Mozart 'told her of ... his wish to try his hand at this type of composition, the more so as the higher forms of church music had always appealed to his genius.' There is no hint that the work was a burden to him.\n\nAs for why Constanze might have been \"prompted by complicated motives both personal and financial\" (Eisen), Halliwell contends that \"Constanze and Sophie were not objective witnesses, because Constanze's continuing quest for charity gave her reasons to disseminate sentimental and sensationalist views.\" By \"charity\" Halliwell may be referring to the many benefit concerts from which Constanze received income in the years following Mozart's death, as well as, perhaps, the pension she received from the Emperor; see discussion below as well as Constanze Mozart.\n\nChristoph Wolff, in a 2012 book entitled Mozart at the Gateway to his Fortune, likewise decries the view that Mozart's last years represented a steady slide to despair and the grave. As a corollary, he is critical of interpretations of the music as reflecting late-life despair (for example) \"the hauntingly beautiful autumnal world of [Mozart's] music written in 1791\". \n\nRemembrances of Mozart's death\n\nIndividuals present at the time of Mozart's death eventually committed their memories to writing, either on their own or through interviews by others. The stories they told are not entirely mutually compatible, which may be due in part to some of the events not being recorded until the 1820s, when the witnesses' memories might have faded.\n\nBenedikt Schack, Mozart's close friend for whom he wrote the role of Tamino in The Magic Flute, told an interviewer that on the last day of Mozart's life, he participated in a rehearsal of the Requiem in progress. Schack's questionable account appeared in an obituary for Schack which was published in the 25 July 1827 issue of the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung:\n\nOn the very eve of his death, [Mozart] had the score of the Requiem brought to his bed, and himself (it was two o'clock in the afternoon) sang the alto part; Schack, the family friend, sang the soprano line, as he had always previously done, Hofer, Mozart's brother-in-law, took the tenor, Gerl, later a bass singer at the Mannheim Theater, the bass. They were at the first bars of the Lacrimosa when Mozart began to weep bitterly, laid the score on one side, and eleven hours later, at one o'clock in the morning (of 5 December 1791, as is well known), departed this life. \n\nBiographer Niemetschek relates vaguely similar account, leaving out a rehearsal:\nOn the day of his death he asked for the score to be brought to his bedside. 'Did I not say before, that I was writing this Requiem for myself?' After saying this, he looked yet again with tears in his eyes through the whole work. \n\nThe widely repeated claim that, on his deathbed, Mozart dictated passages of the Requiem to his pupil Süssmayr is strongly discounted by Solomon, who notes that the earliest reference for this claim dates to 1856. Sophie Weber did claim to recall, however, that Mozart gave instructions to Süssmayr.\n\nAn 1840 letter from the composer Ignaz von Seyfried states that on his last night, Mozart was mentally occupied with the currently running opera The Magic Flute. Mozart is said to have whispered the following to Constanze in reference to her sister Josepha Hofer, the coloratura soprano who premiered the role of the Queen of the Night:\n\nSolomon, while noting that Mozart's biographers often left out the \"crueler memories\" surrounding his death, stated, \"Constanze Mozart told Nissen that just before the end Mozart asked her what [his physician] Dr. Closset had said. When she answered with a soothing lie, he said, 'It isn't true,' and he was very distressed: 'I shall die, now when I am able to take care of you and the children. Ah, now I will leave you unprovided for.' And as he spoke these words, 'suddenly he vomited —it gushed out of him in an arc— it was brown, and he was dead.'\" Mozart's older, seven-year-old son Karl was present at his father's death and later wrote, \"Particularly remarkable is in my opinion the fact that a few days before he died, his whole body became so swollen that the patient was unable to make the smallest movement, moreover, there was stench, which reflected an internal disintegration which, after death, increased to the extent that an autopsy was impossible.\"\n\nFuneral\n\nThe funeral arrangements were made by Mozart's friend and patron Baron Gottfried van Swieten. Describing his funeral, the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians states, \"Mozart was buried in a common grave, in accordance with contemporary Viennese custom, at the St. Marx Cemetery outside the city on 7 December.\" Otto Jahn wrote in 1856 that Salieri, Süssmayr, van Swieten and two other musicians were present. \n\nThe common belief that Mozart was buried in a pauper's grave is also without foundation. The \"common grave\" referred to above is a term for a grave belonging to a citizen not of the aristocracy. It was an individual grave, not a communal grave; but after ten years the city had the right to dig it up and use it for a later burial. The graves of the aristocracy were spared such treatment. \n\nAn element of poetry injected into the tale of Mozart's death and funeral is a winter storm. A memoir attributed to one Joseph Deiner, who was claimed to have been present, appeared in the Vienna Morgen-Post of 28 January 1856.\n\nAs Slonimsky (1960:12-14) notes, the tale was widely adopted and incorporated into Mozart biographies.\n\nDeiner's description of the weather is falsified by records kept at the time. The diarist Karl Zinzendorf recorded on 6 December that there had been \"mild weather and frequent mist\". The Vienna Observatory kept weather records and recorded for 6 December a temperature ranging from 37.9 to 38.8 degrees Fahrenheit (2.8 °C–3.8 °C), with \"a weak east wind at all ... times of the day\" (Slonimsky 1960:16).\n\nAftermath\n\nFollowing her husband's death, Constanze recovered from her despair and addressed the task of providing financial security for her family; the Mozarts had two young children, and Mozart had died with outstanding debts. She successfully appealed to the Emperor on 11 December 1791 for a widow's pension due to her as a result of Mozart's service to the Emperor as a part-time chamber composer. Additionally, she organized a series of concerts of Mozart's music and the publication of many of her husband's works. As a result, Constanze became financially secure over time. \n\nSoon after the composer's death a Mozart biography was started by Friedrich Schlichtegroll, who wrote an early account based on information from Mozart's sister, Nannerl. Working with Constanze, Franz Niemetschek wrote a biography as well. Much later, Constanze assisted her second husband, Georg Nikolaus von Nissen, on a more detailed biography published in 1826. See Biographies of Mozart.\n\nMozart's musical reputation rose following his death; 20th-century biographer Maynard Solomon describes an \"unprecedented wave of enthusiasm\" for his work after he died, and a number of publishers issued editions of his compositions.\n\nWhat may have been Mozart's skull was exhumed in 1801, and in 1989–1991 it was examined for identification by several scientists. \n\nCause of death\n\nTheories involving homicide\n\nAn early rumor addressing the cause of Mozart's death was that he was poisoned by his colleague Antonio Salieri. This rumor, however, was not proven to be true as the signs of illness Mozart displayed did not indicate poisoning. Despite denying the allegation, Salieri was greatly affected by the accusations that he had contributed to Mozart's death and contributed to his nervous breakdowns in later life. This theory is the subject of many literary works, such as Peter Shaffer's award-winning play \"Amadeus\", and the movie of the same name.\nBeyond the Salieri theory, other theories involving murder by poison have been put forth, blaming the Masons, Jews, or both. One such theory was the work of Mathilde Ludendorff, wife of the German general Erich Ludendorff. William Stafford (1991) forthrightly describes such accounts as outlandish conspiracy theories, giving supporting reasons. \n\nTheories involving disease\n\nStafford (1991:56) gives a gloomy characterization of the effort to determine what disease killed Mozart:\n\nWhat did he actually die of? Mozart's medical history is like an inverted pyramid: a small corpus of primary documentation supports a large body of secondary literature. There is a small quantity of direct eye-witness testimony concerning the last illness and death, and a larger quantity of reporting of what eye witnesses are alleged to have said. Altogether it would not cover ten pages; some of it is vague, and some downright unreliable. All too often later writers have used this data uncritically to support pet theories. They have invented new symptoms, nowhere recorded in the primary sources.\n\nIn the parish register, the entry concerning Mozart's death states he died of \"severe miliary fever\" – \"miliary\" referring to the appearance of millet-sized bumps on the skin. This does not name the actual disease.\n\nMozart had health problems throughout his life, suffering from smallpox, tonsillitis, bronchitis, pneumonia, typhoid fever, rheumatism, and gum disease. Whether these played any role in his demise cannot be determined.\n\nConjectures as to what killed Mozart are numerous. The following survey is arranged in rough chronological order.\n\nSome ascribe Mozart's death to malpractice on the part of his physician, Dr. Closset. His sister-in-law Sophie Weber, in her 1825 account, makes the implication. Borowitz summarizes:\n\nIn a journal article dated 1908, it was suggested that Vitamin D deficiency could have played a role in Mozart's underlying medical conditions leading to his death. \n\nA suggestion is that Mozart died as a result of his hypochondriasis and his predilection for taking patent medicines containing antimony. In his final days, this was compounded by further prescriptions of antimony to relieve the fever he clearly suffered. \n\nA 1994 article in Neurology suggests Mozart died of a subdural hematoma. A skull believed to be Mozart's was saved by the successor of the gravedigger who had supervised Mozart's burial, and later passed on to anatomist Josef Hyrtl, the municipality of Salzburg, and the Mozarteum museum (Salzburg). Forensic reconstruction of soft tissues related to the skull reveals substantial concordance with Mozart's portraits. Examination of the skull suggested a premature closure of the metopic suture, which has been suggested on the basis of his physiognomy. A left temporal fracture and concomitant erosions raise the question of a chronic subdural hematoma, which would be consistent with several falls in 1789 and 1790 and could have caused the weakness, headaches, and fainting Mozart experienced in 1790 and 1791. Additionally, aggressive bloodletting used to treat suspected rheumatic fever could have decompensated such a lesion, leading to his death. \n\nIn a 2000 publication, a team of two physicians (Faith T. Fitzgerald, Philip A. Mackowiak) and a musicologist (Neal Zaslaw) reviewed the historical evidence and tentatively opted for a diagnosis of rheumatic fever. \n\nThe hypothesis of trichinosis was put forth by Jan V. Hirschmann in 2001. \n\nIn 2009, British, Viennese and Dutch researchers performed epidemiological research combined with a study of other deaths in Vienna at the time of Mozart's death. They concluded that Mozart may have died of a streptococcal infection leading to an acute nephritic syndrome caused by poststreptococcal glomerulonephritis. This disease was also called \"Wassersucht\" in Austria. \n\nNotes" ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "Salieri", "Antoine Salieri", "Anton Salieri", "Antonio Salieri", "Antionio Salieri" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "antonio salieri", "anton salieri", "salieri", "antionio salieri", "antoine salieri" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "antonio salieri", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "Antonio Salieri" }

{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Alvah_Curtis_Roebuck.txt", "Richard_Warren_Sears.txt" ], "title": [ "Alvah Curtis Roebuck", "Richard Warren Sears" ], "wiki_context": [ "Alvah Curtis Roebuck (January 9, 1864 – June 18, 1948) was a manager at, Sears, Roebuck and Company with his partner Richard Warren Sears.\n\nEarly life\n\nAlvah Curtis Roebuck was born on January 9, 1864 in Lafayette, Indiana. He began work as a watchmaker in a Hammond, Indiana, jewelry store at age 12.\n\nCareer\n\nRoebuck co-founded Sears, Roebuck and Company with Richard Warren Sears in 1891. \n\nIn 1895, Roebuck asked Sears to buy him out for about $20,000. At Richard Sears' request, Roebuck took charge of a division that handled watches, jewelry, optical goods, and, later, phonographs, magic lanterns and motion picture machines. His business interests did not end with Sears. He later organized and financed two companies: a manufacturer and a distributor of motion picture machines and accessories. Roebuck also served as president (1909–1924) of Emerson Typewriter Company, where he invented an improved typewriter, called the \"Woodstock.\"\n\nAfter several years in semi-retirement in Florida, the financial losses he suffered in the stock market crash of 1929 forced Roebuck to return to Chicago. By 1933, Roebuck had rejoined Sears, Roebuck and Co., where he largely devoted his time to compiling a history of the company he helped found.\n\nIn September 1934, a Sears store manager asked Roebuck to make a public appearance at his store. After an enthusiastic public turnout, Roebuck went on tour, appearing at retail stores across the country for the next several years.\n\nPersonal life and death\n\nRoebuck married Sarah Blanche Lett. They resided in Tujunga, Los Angeles, California. They had a son, Alvah Curtis Roebuck, Jr., who also resided in Tujunga, and a daughter, who resided in Evanston, Illinois with her husband Raymond H. Keeler. \n\nRoebuck died on June 18, 1948 while visiting his daughter in Evanston, Illinois. He was 84 years old. He was buried at the Acacia Park Cemetery in Chicago, Illinois.", "Richard Warren Sears (December 7, 1863 – September 28, 1914) was a manager, businessman, and the founder of Sears, Roebuck and Company with his partner Alvah Curtis Roebuck.\n\nEarly life\n\nSears was born in Stewartville, Minnesota. His father was James Warren Sears, born circa 1828 in New York, a blacksmith and wagon-maker; his mother was Eliza Burton, born in Ohio circa 1843. The family was living in Spring Valley, Minnesota by June of 1870, where his father served as a city councilman and eventually sold his wagon shop in 1875. Both of his parents were of English descent. During his boyhood in Spring Valley, he befriended Almanzo Wilder, the future husband of Laura Ingalls Wilder. After learning telegraphy he entered the service of the railroad.\n\nIn 1880, he started working as a telegraph operator in the town of North Branch, Minnesota for the Minneapolis and St. Louis Railway, which was at the time leased from the St. Paul and Duluth Railroad. He eventually was transferred to North Redwood Falls, Minnesota for the same railroad, the Minneapolis and St. Louis Railway, to become station agent.[http://www.springvalleymnmuseum.org/wildersears.html Richard Sears], Spring Valley Methodist Church Museum, Accessed January 17, 2011.\n\nBusinessman\n\nIt was in 1886 at age 23, that his career path changed forever: A shipment of gold filled gold watches from a Chicago manufacturer was refused by a Minnesota retailer, Edward Stegerson.\n\nA common scam existing at the time involved wholesalers who would ship their products to retailers who had not ordered them. Upon refusal, the wholesaler would offer the already price-hiked items to the retailer at a lower consignment cost in the guise of alleviating the cost to ship the items back. The unsuspecting retailer would then agree to take this new-found bargain off the wholesaler's hands, mark up the items and sell them to the public, making a small profit in the transaction. \n\nBut Stegerson, a retailer savvy to the scam, flatly refused the watches. Young Sears jumped at the opportunity, and made an agreement with the wholesaler to keep any profit he reaped above $12, and then he set about offering his wares to other station agents along the railroad line for $14. The watches were considered an item of urban sophistication. Also because of the growth of railways, and the recent application of time zones, farmers needed to keep time accurately which had not been necessary until then. For those two reasons the station agents had no trouble selling the watches to passers-by.\n\nWithin six months, Sears had netted $5,000 and felt so confident in this venture that he moved to Minneapolis and founded the R. W. Sears Watch Company. He began placing advertisements in farm publications and mailing flyers to potential clients. From the beginning, it was clear that Sears had a talent for writing promotional copy. He took the personal approach in his ads, speaking directly to rural and small-town communities, persuading them to purchase by mail-order.\n\nChicago\n\nIn 1887 Sears moved his company to Chicago, an important transportation center for the Midwestern United States, and moved his residence to nearby Oak Park, Illinois. In 1887 he also hired watch repairman Alvah Curtis Roebuck to repair any watches being returned. Roebuck was Sears's first employee, and he later became co-founder of Sears, Roebuck & Company, which was formed in 1893 when Sears was 30 years old. In 1895 the company was short of cash and Roebuck had left the business. Sears sold one half of the company for $75,000.00 to Aaron Nusbaum and his brother-in-law, Julius Rosenwald. The company was incorporated in Illinois as Sears Roebuck & Co. of Illinois on September 7, 1895. Richard Sears retired in 1908 at age 44 and Julius Rosenwald became the President. \n\nThe first Sears catalog was published in 1893 and offered only watches. By 1897, items such as men’s and ladies clothing, plows, silverware, bicycles and athletic equipment had been added to the offering.\n\nThe 500-page catalog was sent to some 300,000 homes. Sears catered to the rural customer because, having been raised on a farm, he knew what the rural customer needed. He also had experience working with the railroad and he knew how to ship merchandise to remote areas.\n\nIn 1908 Sears made another move forward and began to sell mail order homes through the catalogs.\n\nDeath\n\nIn 1908 Sears retired and moved from Oak Park to Lake Bluff, Illinois, suffering from failing health. In 1914 he died in Waukesha, Wisconsin of Bright's disease. \n\nSears was survived by wife Anna Lydia Mechstroth (1868-1946, m. 1895), and 4 children (Sylvia Sears Gardner (b. 1896-1968), Richard Warren Sears Jr. (1896-1945), Wesley Sears (1898-1944), Serena Sears Griess (1900-1942)).\n\nLegacy\n\nSears' birthplace in Stewartville is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.\n\nSears was inducted into the Junior Achievement U.S. Business Hall of Fame in 1992.\n\nSears is one of America's oldest operating retailers.\n\nReferences in popular culture\n\nSears, along with James Cash Penney, is the flawed protagonist of the \"Get Besos!\" series of the Sleep With Me podcast." ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "R. W. Sears", "Richard W Sears", "Richard Warren Sears", "Sears, Richard Warren" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "sears richard warren", "richard w sears", "r w sears", "richard warren sears" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "richard warren sears", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "Richard Warren Sears" }

{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Equatorial_Guinea.txt" ], "title": [ "Equatorial Guinea" ], "wiki_context": [ "Equatorial Guinea (, , ), officially the Republic of Equatorial Guinea (, , ), is a country located in Central Africa, with an area of 28000 km2. Formerly the colony of Spanish Guinea, its post-independence name evokes its location near both the Equator and the Gulf of Guinea. Equatorial Guinea is the only sovereign African state in which Spanish is an official language. , the country has an estimated population of over 1.2 million.\n\nEquatorial Guinea consists of two parts, an insular and a mainland region. The insular region consists of the islands of Bioko (formerly Fernando Pó) in the Gulf of Guinea and Annobón, a small volcanic island south of the equator. Bioko Island is the northernmost part of Equatorial Guinea and is the site of the country's capital, Malabo. The island nation of São Tomé and Príncipe is located between Bioko and Annobón. The mainland region, Río Muni, is bordered by Cameroon on the north and Gabon on the south and east. It is the location of Bata, Equatorial Guinea's largest city, and Oyala, the country's planned future capital. Rio Muni also includes several small offshore islands, such as Corisco, Elobey Grande, and Elobey Chico.\n\nSince the mid-1990s, Equatorial Guinea has become one of sub-Saharan Africa's largest oil producers. With a population of almost three quarters of a million, it is the richest country per capita in Africa, and its gross domestic product (GDP) per capita ranks 69th in the world; However, the wealth is distributed very unevenly and few people have benefited from the oil riches. The country ranks 144th on the UN's 2014 Human Development Index. The UN says that less than half of the population has access to clean drinking water and that 20% of children die before reaching the age of five.\n\nThe country's authoritarian government has one of the worst human rights records in the world, consistently ranking among the \"worst of the worst\" in Freedom House's annual survey of political and civil rights. Reporters Without Borders ranks President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo among its \"predators\" of press freedom. Human trafficking is a significant problem, with the US Trafficking in Persons Report, 2012, stating that \"Equatorial Guinea is a source and destination for women and children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking.\" The report rates Equatorial Guinea as a \"Tier 3\" country, the lowest (worst) ranking: \"Countries whose governments do not fully comply with the minimum standards and are not making significant efforts to do so.\" \n\nThe country is a member of the African Union, Francophonie and the CPLP.\n\nGeography\n\nEquatorial Guinea is in west central Africa. The country consists of a mainland territory, Río Muni, which is bordered by Cameroon to the north and Gabon to the east and south, and five small islands, Bioko, Corisco, Annobón, Elobey Chico (Small Elobey), and Elobey Grande (Great Elobey). Bioko, the site of the capital, Malabo, lies about 40 km off the coast of Cameroon. Annobón Island is about 350 km west-south-west of Cape Lopez in Gabon. Corisco and the two Elobey islands are in Corisco Bay, on the border of Río Muni and Gabon.\n\nEquatorial Guinea lies between latitudes 4°N and 2°S, and longitudes 5° and 12°E. Despite its name, no part of the country's territory lies on the equator—it is in the northern hemisphere, except for the insular Annobón Province, which is about 155 km south of the equator.\n\nClimate\n\nEquatorial Guinea has a tropical climate with distinct wet and dry seasons. From June to August, Río Muni is dry and Bioko wet; from December to February, the reverse occurs. In between there is gradual transition. Rain or mist occurs daily on Annobón, where a cloudless day has never been registered. The temperature at Malabo, Bioko, ranges from 16 C to 33 C, though on the southern Moka Plateau normal high temperatures are only 21 C. In Río Muni, the average temperature is about 27 C. Annual rainfall varies from 1930 mm at Malabo to 10920 mm at Ureka, Bioko, but Río Muni is somewhat drier. \n\nEcology \n\nEquatorial Guinea spans several ecoregions. Río Muni region lies within the Atlantic Equatorial coastal forests ecoregion except for patches of Central African mangroves on the coast, especially in the Muni River estuary. The Cross-Sanaga-Bioko coastal forests ecoregion covers most of Bioko and the adjacent portions of Cameroon and Nigeria on the African mainland, and the Mount Cameroon and Bioko montane forests ecoregion covers the highlands of Bioko and nearby Mount Cameroon.\n\nThe São Tomé, Príncipe, and Annobón moist lowland forests ecoregion covers all of Annobón, as well as São Tomé and Príncipe.\n\nHistory \n\nPygmies likely formerly lived in the continental region that is now Equatorial Guinea, but only isolated pockets in southern Río Muni now remain of this people. Bantu migrations between the 18th and 19th centuries brought the coastal ethno-linguistic groups as well as the Fang. Elements of the latter may have generated the Bubi, who migrated from Cameroon to Río Muni and Bioko in several waves and succeeded former Neolithic populations. The Annobón population, native to Angola, was introduced by the Portuguese via São Tomé island.\n\nFirst European contact (1472) \n\nThe Portuguese explorer Fernando Pó, seeking a path to India, is credited as being the first European to discover the island of Bioko in 1472. He called it Formosa (\"Beautiful\"), but it quickly took on the name of its European discoverer. The islands of Fernando Pó and Annobón were colonized by Portugal in 1474.\n\nIn 1778, Queen Maria I of Portugal and King Charles III of Spain signed the Treaty of El Pardo which ceded Bioko, adjacent islets, and commercial rights to the Bight of Biafra between the Niger and Ogoue rivers to Spain. Spain thereby tried to gain access to a source of slaves controlled by British merchants. Between 1778 and 1810, the territory of Equatorial Guinea was administered by the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata, based in Buenos Aires.\n\nFrom 1827 to 1843, the United Kingdom had a base on Bioko to combat the slave trade that was moved to Sierra Leone upon agreement with Spain in 1843. In 1844, on restoration of Spanish sovereignty, the area became known as the \"Territorios Españoles del Golfo de Guinea.\" Spain had neglected to occupy the large area in the Bight of Biafra to which it had Treaty rights, and the French had been busily expanding their occupation at the expense of the area claimed by Spain. The treaty of Paris in 1900 left Spain with the continental enclave of Rio Muni, a mere 26,000 km2 out of the 300,000 stretching east to the Ubangi river which the Spaniards had initially claimed.Clarence-Smith, William Gervase (1986) [http://es.scribd.com/doc/63545279/The-Cambridge-History-of-Africa-Volume-7-From-1905-to-1940-0521225051-1986 \"Spanish Equatorial Guinea, 1898–1940\"], in The Cambridge History of Africa: From 1905 to 1940 Ed. J. D. Fage, A. D. Roberts, & Roland Anthony Oliver. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press \nAt the turn of the century, the plantations of Fernando Po were largely in the hands of a black Creole elite, later known as Fernandinos. The British had settled some 2,000 Sierra Leoneans and freed slaves during their brief occupation of the island in the early nineteenth century, and a small current of immigration from West Africa and the West Indies continued after the departure of the British. To this core of settlers were added Cubans, Filipinos and Spaniards of various colours deported for political or other crimes, as well as some assisted settlers.\n\nThere was also a trickle of immigration from the neighbouring Portuguese islands, in the form of escaped slaves and prospective planters. Although a few of the Fernandinos were Catholic and Spanish-speaking, about nine-tenths of them were Protestant and English-speaking on the eve of the First World War, and pidgin English was the lingua franca of the island. The Sierra Leoneans were particularly well placed as planters while labour recruitment on the Windward coast continued, for they kept family and other connections there and could easily arrange labour supplies.\n\nFrom the opening years of the twentieth century, the Fernandinos were put on the defensive by a new generation of Spanish immigrants. New land regulations in 1904-1905 favoured Spaniards, and most of the big planters of later years arrived in the islands from Spain following these new regulations. The Liberian labour agreement of 1914 favoured wealthy men with ready access to the state, and the shift in labour supplies from Liberia to Rio Muni increased this advantage. In 1940, it was estimated that only 20 per cent of the colony's cocoa production came from African land, nearly all of it in the hands of Fernandinos.\n\nThe greatest constraint to economic development was a chronic shortage of labour. Pushed into the interior of the island and decimated by alcohol addiction, venereal disease, smallpox, and sleeping sickness, the indigenous Bubi population of Bioko refused to work on plantations. Working their own little cocoa farms gave them a considerable degree of autonomy. Moreover, beginning in the late nineteenth century, the Bubi were protected from the demands of the planters by the Spanish Claretian missionaries, who were very influential in the colony and eventually organised the Bubi into little mission theocracies reminiscent of the famous Jesuit Reductions of Paraguay. Catholic penetration was furthered by two small insurrections protesting the conscription of forced labour for the plantations, in 1898 and 1910, which led to the Bubi being disarmed in 1917 and left them dependent on the missionaries.\n\nBetween 1926 and 1959 Bioko and Rio Muni were united as the colony of Spanish Guinea. The economy was based on large cacao and coffee plantations and logging concessions and the workforce was mostly immigrant contract labour from Liberia, Nigeria, and Cameroun. Between 1914 and 1930, an estimated 10,000 Liberians went to Fernando Po under a Labour Treaty that was stopped altogether in 1930. \nWith the ending of Liberian imports, the cocoa planters of Fernando Po turned to Rio Muni. It was no coincidence that campaigns were mounted to subdue the Fang people in the 1920s, at the time that Liberia was beginning to cut back on recruitment. There were garrisons of the colonial guard throughout the enclave by 1926, and the whole colony was considered 'pacified' by 1929. \n\nRio Muni had a small population, officially put at a little over 100,000 in the 1930s, and escape over the frontiers into Cameroun or Gabon was very easy. Moreover, the timber companies needed growing amounts of labour, and the spread of coffee cultivation offered an alternative means of paying taxes. Fernando Po thus continued to suffer from labour shortages. The French only briefly permitted recruitment in Cameroun, and the main source of labour came to be Igbo smuggled in canoes from Calabar, Nigeria. It really permitted Fernando Po to become one of Africa's most productive agricultural areas after the Second World War.\n\nPolitically, one can divide the post-war colonial history into three fairly distinct phases: up to 1959, when its status was raised from 'colonial' to 'provincial', taking a leaf out of the approach of the Portuguese Empire; between 1960 and 1968, when Madrid attempted a partial decolonisation which should, as it was hoped, conserve the territory as an integral segment of the Spanish system; and onwards from 1968, when the territory became an independent Republic. The first of these phases consisted of little more than a continuation of previous policies; these closely resembled the policies of Portugal and France, notably in dividing the population into a vast majority governed as 'natives' or non-citizens, and a very small minority (together with whites) admitted to civic status as emancipados, assimilation to the metropolitan culture being the only permissible means of advancement. \n\nThis 'provincial' phase saw the beginnings of nationalism, but chiefly among small groups who had taken refuge from the Caudillo's paternal hand in Cameroun and Gabon. They formed two bodies: the Movimiento Nacional de Liberación de la Guinea (MONALIGE), and the Idea Popular de la Guinea Ecuatorial (IPGE). Their pressures were weak, but the general trend in West Africa was not. A decision of 9 August 1963, approved by a referendum of 15 December 1963, introduced the territory to a measure of autonomy and the administrative promotion of a 'moderate' grouping, the Movimiento de Unión Nacional de la Guinea Ecuatorial (MUNGE). This proved a feeble instrument, and, with growing pressure for change from the UN, Madrid gave way to the currents of nationalism.\n\nIndependence (1968)\n\nIndependence was conceded on 12 October 1968 and the region became the Republic of Equatorial Guinea with Francisco Macías Nguema elected as president. \n\nIn July 1970, Macias Nguema created a single-party state and made himself president for life in 1972. He broke off ties with Spain and the West. In spite of his condemnation of Marxism, which he deemed \"neo-colonialist\", Equatorial Guinea maintained very special relations with socialist countries, notably China, Cuba, and the USSR. He signed a preferential trade agreement and a shipping treaty with the Soviet Union. The Soviets also granted loans to Equatorial Guinea. \n\nThe shipping agreement granted the Soviets permission to establish a pilot project of fishery development and a naval base at Luba. The USSR was in return to supply fish to Equatorial Guinea. China and Cuba also gave different forms on financial, military, and technical assistance to Equatorial Guinea, which gave them a measure of influence in Equatorial Guinea. For the USSR, despite the unsavoury background of Macias Nguema, there was an advantage to be gained in the War in Angola by having access to Luba base and later on to Malabo International Airport.\n\nTowards the middle 1970s the Macias regime came under grave accusations of being guilty of mass killings. In 1974 the World Council of Churches affirmed that large numbers of people had been murdered since 1968 in a 'reign of terror' which continued. The same body claimed that a quarter of the whole population had fled abroad, while 'the prisons are overflowing and to all intents and purposes form one vast concentration camp'. On Christmas 1975, Macías Nguema had 150 alleged coup plotters executed. Out of a population of 300,000, an estimated 80,000 were killed. Apart from allegedly committing genocide against the ethnic minority Bubi people, he ordered the deaths of thousands of suspected opponents, closed down churches and presided over the economy's collapse as skilled citizens and foreigners left the country. \n\nTeodoro Obiang deposed Macías Nguema on 3 August 1979, in a bloody coup d'état. Macias Nguema was tried and executed soon after. \n\nIn 1995 Mobil, an American oil company, discovered oil in Equatorial Guinea and the country has subsequently experienced rapid economic development. Nevertheless, the earnings from the country's oil wealth have not been distributed amongst the population and the country ranks low on the UN human development index, 20% of children die before age 5 and more than 50% of the population lack access to clean drinking water. President Teodoro Obiang is widely suspected of using the country's oil wealth to enrich himself and his associates and in 2006 Forbes estimated his personal wealth at $600 million. \n\nIn 2011, the government announced it was planning a new capital in the country, named Oyala. \n\nAs of February 2016, Obiang is Africa's longest serving dictator. \n\nPolitics \n\nThe current president of Equatorial Guinea is Teodoro Obiang. The 1982 constitution of Equatorial Guinea, written with help from the UN, gives him extensive powers, including naming and dismissing members of the cabinet, making laws by decree, dissolving the Chamber of Representatives, negotiating and ratifying treaties and serving as commander in chief of the armed forces. The Prime Minister, Vicente Ehate Tomi was appointed by Obiang and operates under powers designated by the President.\n\nDuring the three decades of his rule, Obiang has shown little tolerance for opposition. While the country is nominally a multiparty democracy, elections have generally been considered a sham. According to Human Rights Watch, the dictatorship of President Obiang has used an oil boom to entrench and enrich itself further at the expense of the country's people. Since August 1979 some 12 real and perceived unsuccessful coup attempts have occurred. The 'real' coup attempts were often perpetrated in an attempt by rival elites to seize the state's economic resources. \n\nAccording to a March 2004 BBC profile, politics within the country are currently dominated by tensions between Obiang's son, Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, and other close relatives with powerful positions in the security forces. The tension may be rooted in a power shift arising from the dramatic increase in oil production which has occurred since 1997.\n\nEquatorial Guinea hit the headlines in 2004 when a plane load of suspected mercenaries was intercepted in Zimbabwe while allegedly on the way to overthrow Obiang. A November 2004 report named Mark Thatcher as a financial backer of the 2004 Equatorial Guinea coup d'état attempt organized by Simon Mann. Various accounts also named the United Kingdom's MI6, the United States' CIA, and Spain as having been tacit supporters of the coup attempt. Nevertheless, the Amnesty International report released in June 2005 \non the ensuing trial of those allegedly involved highlighted the prosecution's failure to produce conclusive evidence that a coup attempt had actually taken place. Simon Mann was released from prison on 3 November 2009 for humanitarian reasons. \n\nA 2004 US Senate investigation into the Washington-based Riggs Bank found that President Obiang's family had received huge payments from US oil companies such as Exxon Mobil and Amerada Hess. Since 2005, Military Professional Resources Inc., a US-based international private military company, has worked in Equatorial Guinea to train police forces in appropriate human rights practices. In 2006, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice hailed Obiang as a \"good friend\" despite repeated criticism of his human rights and civil liberties record. The US Agency for International Development entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Obiang, in April 2006, to establish a Social Development Fund in the country, implementing projects in the areas of health, education, women's affairs and the environment. \n\nIn 2006, Obiang signed an anti-torture decree to ban all forms of abuse and improper treatment in Equatorial Guinea and he commissioned the renovation and modernization of Black Beach prison in 2007 to ensure the humane treatment of prisoners, However, human rights abuses have continued. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International among other non-governmental organizations have documented severe human rights abuses in prisons, including torture, beatings, unexplained deaths and illegal detention. \n\nThe anti-corruption lobby Transparency International has put Equatorial Guinea in the top 12 of its list of most corrupt states. Freedom House, a pro-democracy and human rights NGO, described Obiang as one of the world’s “most kleptocratic living autocrats,” and complained about the US government welcoming his administration and buying oil from it. Dismissing the international voices that call for more transparency, Obiang has for long held that oil revenues are a state secret. In 2008 the country became a candidate of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative – an international project meant to promote openness about government oil revenues – but failed to qualify by an April 2010 deadline. The advocacy group Global Witness has been lobbying the United States to act against Obiang's son, Teodorin, who is vice-president and a government minister. It says there is credible evidence that he spent millions buying a Malibu, California mansion and private jet using corruptly acquired funds – grounds for denying him a visa. In February 2010, Equatorial Guinea signed a contract with the MPRI subsidiary of the US defense corporation L3 Communications for coastal surveillance and maritime security in the Gulf of Guinea. \n\nObiang was re-elected to serve an additional term in 2009 in an election deemed by the African Union as \"in line with electoral law\". Obiang re-appointed Prime Minister Ignacio Milam Tang in 2010. \n\nUnder Obiang, the basic infrastructure of Equatorial Guinea has improved. Asphalt now covers more than 80% of the national roads and ports and airports are being built by Chinese, Moroccan and French contractors across much of the country. However, when a British parliamentary and press entourage toured the country as guests of the president in 2011, the The Guardian newspaper reported that very few of Equatorial Guinea's citizens seem to be benefiting from improvements, with reports of empty three-lane highways and many empty buildings. \n\nThe Obiang regime is an ally of the USA. During a meeting on the sidelines of the recent United Nations General Assembly, Obiang urged the US to strengthen the cooperation between the United States and Africa. President Barack Obama posed for an official photograph with President Obiang at a New York reception.\n\nIn November 2011, a new constitution was approved. This constitution was voted although the text to be approved was not distributed nor was its content revealed to the public before the vote. Under the new constitution the president was limited to a maximum of two seven-year terms and he would be both the head of state and head of the government, therefore eliminating the figure of prime minister. The new constitution also introduced the figure of a vice president and it also called for the creation of a 70-member senate with 55 elected by the people and the 15 remaining designated by the president. Surprisingly, during the following cabinet reshuffle it was announced that there would be two vice-presidents in clear violation of the constitution that was just taking effect. \n\nIn October 2012, during an interview with Christiane Ammanpour on CNN, Obiang was asked whether he would step down at the end of the current term (2009–2016) since the new constitution limited the number of terms to two and he has been reelected at least 4 times before. Obiang answered he refused to step aside because the new constitution was not retroactive and the two term limit would only become applicable from 2016. \n\nThe 26 May 2013 elections combined the senate, lower house and mayoral contests all in a single package. This, as all the previous elections, was denounced by the opposition and it too was won by Obiang's PDGE. During the electoral contest, the ruling party decided to have their own internal elections which were later scrapped as none of the president's favorite candidates was leading the internal lists. At the end, the ruling party and its satellites of the ruling coalition decided to run not based on the candidates but based on the party. This created a situation where during the election the ruling party's coalition did not provide the names of their candidates so effectively individuals were not running for office, instead the party was the one running for office.\n\nThe May 2013 elections were marked by a series of events including the popular protest planned by a group of activists from the MPP (Movement of Popular Protest) which included several social and political groups. The MPP called for a peaceful protest at the Plaza de la Mujer square on 15 May. The MPP coordinator Enrique Nsolo Nzo was arrested and the official state media portrayed him as an individual who was planning to destabilize the country and depose the president. However, and despite speaking under duress and with clear signs of torture, Enrique clearly stated that they were planning a peaceful protest and had indeed obtained all the legal authorizations required to carry out the peaceful protest. In addition to that, and despite the repeated attempts of the state media to link Enrique to an illegal political party, he firmly stated that he was not affiliated with any political parties in the country. The Plaza de la Mujer square in Malabo was occupied by the police from 13 May and it has been heavily guarded ever since. The government embarked on a censorship program that affected social sites including Facebook and other websites that were critical to the government of Equatorial Guinea. In their censorship efforts, they would redirect all the searches performed online to the official government website. \n \nShortly after the elections, the opposition party CPDS announced that they were going to protest peacefully against the 26 May elections on 25 June. The interior minister Clemente Engonga refused to authorize the protest on the grounds that such an event could \"destabilize\" the country and CPDS decided to go forward with the peaceful protest claiming it was a constitutional right. On the night of 24 June, the CPDS headquarters in Malabo were surrounded by heavily armed police officers in order to keep those inside from leaving and thus effectively blocking the protest. Several leading members of CPDS were detained in Malabo and others in Bata were kept from boarding several local flights to Malabo.\n\nAdministrative divisions\n\nEquatorial Guinea is divided into seven provinces (capitals appear in parentheses):\n\n# Annobón Province (San Antonio de Palé)\n# Bioko Norte Province (Malabo)\n# Bioko Sur Province (Luba)\n# Centro Sur Province (Evinayong)\n# Kié-Ntem Province (Ebebiyín)\n# Litoral Province (Bata)\n# Wele-Nzas Province (Mongomo)\n\nThe provinces are further divided into districts.\n\nEconomy \n\nPre-independence Equatorial Guinea exported cocoa, coffee and timber mostly to its colonial ruler, Spain, but also to Germany and the UK. On 1 January 1985, the country became the first non-Francophone African member of the franc zone, adopting the CFA franc as its currency. The national currency, the ekwele, was previously linked to the Spanish peseta. \n\nThe discovery of large oil reserves in 1996 and its subsequent exploitation have contributed to a dramatic increase in government revenue. , Equatorial Guinea is the third-largest oil producer in Sub-Saharan Africa. Its oil production has risen to 360000 oilbbl/d, up from 220,000 only two years earlier.\n\nForestry, farming, and fishing are also major components of GDP. Subsistence farming predominates. The deterioration of the rural economy under successive brutal regimes has diminished any potential for agriculture-led growth.\n\nIn July 2004, the United States Senate published an investigation into Riggs Bank, a Washington-based bank into which most of Equatorial Guinea's oil revenues were paid until recently, and which also banked for Chile's Augusto Pinochet. The Senate report, as to Equatorial Guinea, showed that at least $35 million were siphoned off by Obiang, his family and senior officials of his regime. The president has denied any wrongdoing. While Riggs Bank in February 2005 paid $9 million as restitution for its banking for Chile's Augusto Pinochet, no restitution was made with regard to Equatorial Guinea, as reported in detail in an Anti-Money Laundering Report from Inner City Press. \n\nEquatorial Guinea is a member of the Organization for the Harmonization of Business Law in Africa (OHADA). Equatorial Guinea tried to become validated as an Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI)–compliant country, working toward transparency in reporting of oil revenues and the prudent use of natural resource wealth. The country was one of thirty candidate countries and obtained candidate status on 22 February 2008. It was then required to meet a number of obligations to do so, including committing to working with civil society and companies on EITI implementation, appointing a senior individual to lead on EITI implementation, and publishing a fully costed Work Plan with measurable targets, a timetable for implementation and an assessment of capacity constraints. However, when Equatorial Guinea applied to extend the deadline for completing EITI validation, the EITI Board did not agree to the extension. \n\nAccording to the World Bank, Equatorial Guinea has the highest GNI (Gross National Income) per capita of any Sub-Saharan country. It is 83 times larger than the GNI per capita of Burundi which is the poorest country. \n\nTransportation \n\nDue to the large oil industry in the country, internationally recognized carriers fly to Malabo International Airport which, as of May 2014, had several direct connections to Europe and West Africa. There are three airports in Equatorial Guinea — Malabo International Airport, Bata Airport and the new Annobon Airport on the island of Annobon. Malabo International Airport is the only international one in the country.\n\nEvery airline registered in Equatorial Guinea appears on the list of air carriers prohibited in the European Union (EU) which means that they are banned from operating services of any kind within the EU. However freight carriers provide service from European cities to the capital.\n\nDemographics \n\nThe majority of the people of Equatorial Guinea are of Bantu origin. The largest ethnic group, the Fang, is indigenous to the mainland, but substantial migration to Bioko Island since the 20th century means the Fang population exceeds that of the earlier Bubi inhabitants. The Fang constitute 80% of the population and comprise around 67 clans. Those in the northern part of Río Muni speak Fang-Ntumu, while those in the south speak Fang-Okah; the two dialects have differences but are mutually intelligible. Dialects of Fang are also spoken in parts of neighboring Cameroon (Bulu) and Gabon. These dialects, while still intelligible, are more distinct. The Bubi, who constitute 15% of the population, are indigenous to Bioko Island. The traditional demarcation line between Fang and 'Beach' (inland) ethnic groups was the village of Niefang (limit of the Fang), east of Bata.\n\nIn addition, there are coastal ethnic groups, sometimes referred to as Ndowe or \"Playeros\" (Beach People in Spanish): Combes, Bujebas, Balengues, and Bengas on the mainland and small islands, and Fernandinos, a Krio community on Bioko Island. Together, these groups compose 5% of the population. Some Europeans (largely of Spanish or Portuguese descent, some with partial African ancestry) also live in the nation. Most ethnic Spaniards left after independence.\n\nA growing number of foreigners from neighboring Cameroon, Nigeria, and Gabon have immigrated to the nation. According to the Encyclopedia of the Stateless Nations (2002) 7% of Bioko islanders were Igbo, an ethnic group from southeastern Nigeria. Equatorial Guinea received Asians and black Africans from other countries as workers on cocoa and coffee plantations. Other black Africans came from Liberia, Angola, and Mozambique. Most of the Asian population is Chinese, with small numbers of Indians.\n\nEquatorial Guinea has also been a destination for fortune-seeking European settlers from Britain, France and Germany. Israelis and Moroccans also live and work here. Oil extraction since the 1990s has contributed to a doubling of the population in Malabo. After independence, thousands of Equatorial Guineans went to Spain. Another 100,000 Equatorial Guineans went to Cameroon, Gabon, and Nigeria because of the dictatorship of Francisco Macías Nguema. Some Equatorial Guinean communities are also found in Latin America, the United States, Portugal, and France.\n\nLanguages \n\nFor years, the official languages were Spanish (the local variant is Equatoguinean Spanish) and French, Portuguese also being adopted as an official language later. Spanish has been an official language since 1844. It is still the language of education and administration. 67.6% of Equatorial Guineans can speak it, especially those living in the capital, Malabo.[http://web.archive.org/web/20080216191116/http://actualidad.terra.es/internacional/articulo/obiang_comunidad_naciones_1710388.htm Obiang convierte al portugués en tercer idioma oficial para entrar en la Comunidad lusófona de Naciones], Terra. 13 July 2007\n\nAboriginal languages are recognized as integral parts of the \"national culture\" (Constitutional Law No. 1/1998 January 21). Indigenous languages include Fang, Bube, Benga, Ndowe, Balengue, Bujeba, Bissio, Gumu, Pichinglis, Fa d’Ambô and the nearly extinct Baseke. Most African ethnic groups speak Bantu languages.\" \n\nFa d’Ambô, a Portuguese creole, has vigorous use in Annobón Province, in Malabo (the capital), and among some speakers in Equatorial Guinea's mainland. Many residents of Bioko can also speak Spanish, particularly in the capital, and the local trade language Pichinglis, an English-based creole. Spanish is not spoken much in Annobón. In government and education Spanish is used. Noncreolized Portuguese is used as liturgical language by local Catholics. The Annobonese ethnic community tried to gain membership in the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP). The government financed an Instituto Internacional da Língua Portuguesa (IILP) sociolinguistic study in Annobón. It documented strong links with the Portuguese creole populations in São Tomé and Príncipe, Cape Verde and Guinea-Bissau.\n\nDue to historical and cultural ties, in 2010 the legislature amended article four of the Constitution of Equatorial Guinea, to establish Portuguese as an official language of the Republic. This was an effort by the government to improve its communications, trade, and bilateral relations with Portuguese-speaking countries. It also recognizes long historical ties with Portugal, and with Portuguese-speaking peoples of Brazil, São Tomé and Principe, and Cape Verde.\n\nIf accepted into the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP), Equatorial Guinea would be able to access several professional and academic exchange programs and the facilitate cross-border circulation of citizens. The adoption of Portuguese was one requirement to apply for CPLP acceptance. In addition, the nation has been told it has to adopt political reforms allowing for effective democracy and the respect for human rights. The national parliament discussed this law in October 2011. \n\nIn February 2012, Equatorial Guinea's foreign minister signed an agreement with the IILP on the promotion of Portuguese in the country. \n\nBut in July 2012 the CPLP again refused Equatorial Guinea full membership, primarily because of its continued serious violations of human rights. The government responded by legalizing political parties, declaring a moratorium on the death penalty, and starting a dialog with all political forces. IILP secured land from the government for the construction of Portuguese language cultural centers in Bata and Malabo. At its 10th summit in Dili in July 2014, Equatorial Guinea was admitted as a CPLP member. Abolition of the death penalty and the promotion of Portuguese as an official language were recommendations of that approval. \n\nReligion\n\nThe principal religion in Equatorial Guinea is Christianity, the faith of 93% of the population. Roman Catholics make up the majority (87%), while a minority are Protestants (5%). 2% of the population follows Islam (mainly Sunni). The remaining 5% practise Animism, Bahá'í Faith, and other beliefs. \n\nHealth \n\nEquatorial Guinea’s innovative malaria control programs in the early 21st century have achieved successes in reducing malaria infection, disease, and mortality in the population. Their program consists of twice-yearly indoor residual spraying (IRS), the introduction of artemisinin combination treatment (ACTs), the use of intermittent preventive treatment in pregnant women (IPTp), and the introduction of very high coverage with long-lasting insecticide-treated mosquito nets (LLINs). Their efforts resulted in a reduction in all-cause under-five mortality from 152 to 55 deaths per 1,000 live births (down 64%). The drop occurred rapidly and timed directly with the beginning of the program. \n\nIn June 2014 four cases of polio were reported, the country's first outbreak of the disease. \n\nEducation \n\nUnder the regime of dictator Francisco Macias, education had been significantly neglected, with few children receiving any type of education. Under President Obiang, the illiteracy rate dropped from 73% to 13%, and the number of primary school students has risen from 65,000 in 1986 to more than 100,000 in 1994. Education is free and compulsory for children between the ages of 6 and 14.\n\nThe Equatorial Guinea government has partnered with Hess Corporation and The Academy for Educational Development (AED) to establish a $20 million education program through which primary school teachers participate in a training program to teach modern child development techniques. There are now 51 Model Schools. The active pedagogy in the Model Schools will be a national reform.\n\nIn recent years, with change in economic/political climate and government social agendas, several cultural dispersion and literacy organizations have been founded in the country, chiefly with the financial support of the Spanish government. The country has one university, the Universidad Nacional de Guinea Ecuatorial (UNGE), with a campus in Malabo and a Faculty of Medicine located in Bata on the mainland. In 2009 the university produced the first 110 national doctors. The Bata Medical School is supported principally by the government of Cuba and staffed by Cuban medical educators and physicians. Equatorial Guinea predicts that it will have enough national doctors in the country to be self-sufficient within the next five years.\n\nCulture \n\nIn June 1984, the First Hispanic-African Cultural Congress was convened to explore the cultural identity of Equatorial Guinea. The congress constituted the center of integration and the marriage of the Hispanic culture with African cultures.\n\nTourism \n\nEquatorial Guinea currently has no UNESCO World Heritage Site nor any tentative sites for the World Heritage List. The country also has no documented heritage listed in the Memory of the World Programme of UNESCO nor any intangible cultural heritage listed in the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage List. \n\nMedia and communications \n\nThe principal means of communication within Equatorial Guinea are three state-operated FM radio stations. BBC World Service, Radio France Internationale and Gabon-based Africa No 1 broadcast on FM in Malabo. There are also five shortwave radio stations. Television Nacional, the television network, is state operated. The international TV programme RTVGE is available via satellites in Africa, Europa, and the Americas and worldwide via Internet. There are two newspapers and two magazines.\n\nEquatorial Guinea ranks at position 161 out of 179 countries in the 2012 Reporters Without Borders press freedom index. The watchdog says the national broadcaster obeys the orders of the information ministry. A \"news blackout\" was imposed on reporting of uprisings in Arab states in North Africa in 2011, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Most of the media companies practice heavy self-censorship, and are banned by law from criticising public figures. The state-owned media and the main private radio station are under the directorship of the president's son, Teodor Obiang.\n\nLandline telephone penetration is low, with only two lines available for every 100 persons. There is one GSM mobile telephone operator, with coverage of Malabo, Bata, and several mainland cities. , approximately 40% of the population subscribed to mobile telephone services. The only telephone provider in Equatorial Guinea is Orange.\n\nThere were more than 42,000 internet users by December 2011.\n\nMusic \n\nThere is little popular music coming out of Equatorial Guinea. Pan-African styles like soukous and makossa are popular, as are reggae and rock and roll. Acoustic guitar bands based on a Spanish model are the country's best-known indigenous popular tradition.\n\nSports \n\nEquatorial Guinea was chosen to co-host the 2012 African Cup of Nations in partnership with Gabon, and hosted the 2015 edition. The country was also chosen to host the 2008 Women's African Football Championship, which they won. The women's national team qualified for the 2011 World Cup in Germany.\n\nEquatorial Guinea is famous for the swimmers Eric Moussambani, nicknamed \"Eric the Eel\", and Paula Barila Bolopa, \"Paula the Crawler\", who had astoundingly slow times at the 2000 Summer Olympics." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Oklahoma.txt" ], "title": [ "Oklahoma" ], "wiki_context": [ "Oklahoma (Cherokee: Asgaya gigageyi / ᎠᏍᎦᏯ ᎩᎦᎨᏱ; or transliterated from English as ᎣᎦᎳᎰᎹ (òɡàlàhoma), Pawnee: Uukuhuúwa, Cayuga: Gahnawiyoˀgeh ) is a state located in the South Central United States. Oklahoma is the 20th most extensive and the 28th most populous of the 50 United States. The state's name is derived from the Choctaw words okla and humma, meaning \"red people\". It is also known informally by its nickname, The Sooner State, in reference to the non-Native settlers who staked their claims on the choicest pieces of land before the official opening date, and the Indian Appropriations Act of 1889, which opened the door for white settlement in America's Indian Territory. The name was settled upon statehood, Oklahoma Territory and Indian Territory were merged and Indian was dropped from the name. On November 16, 1907, Oklahoma became the 46th state to enter the union. Its residents are known as Oklahomans, or informally \"Okies\", and its capital and largest city is Oklahoma City.\n\nA major producer of natural gas, oil, and agricultural products, Oklahoma relies on an economic base of aviation, energy, telecommunications, and biotechnology. In 2007, it had one of the fastest-growing economies in the United States, ranking among the top states in per capita income growth and gross domestic product growth. Oklahoma City and Tulsa serve as Oklahoma's primary economic anchors, with nearly two-thirds of Oklahomans living within their metropolitan statistical areas. \n\nWith small mountain ranges, prairie, mesas, and eastern forests, most of Oklahoma lies in the Great Plains, Cross Timbers and the U.S. Interior Highlands—a region especially prone to severe weather. In addition to having a prevalence of English, German, Scottish, Scotch-Irish, and Native American ancestry, more than 25 Native American languages are spoken in Oklahoma, second only to California.\n\nOklahoma is located on a confluence of three major American cultural regions and historically served as a route for cattle drives, a destination for southern settlers, and a government-sanctioned territory for Native Americans.\n\nEtymology\n\nThe name Oklahoma comes from the Choctaw phrase okla humma, literally meaning red people. Choctaw Chief Allen Wright suggested the name in 1866 during treaty negotiations with the federal government regarding the use of Indian Territory, in which he envisioned an all-Indian state controlled by the United States Superintendent of Indian Affairs. Equivalent to the English word Indian, okla humma was a phrase in the Choctaw language used to describe Native American people as a whole. Oklahoma later became the de facto name for Oklahoma Territory, and it was officially approved in 1890, two years after the area was opened to white settlers. \n\nGeography\n\nOklahoma is the 20th largest state in the United States, covering an area of 69,898 square miles (181,035 km2), with 68,667 square miles (177847 km2) of land and 1,281 square miles (3,188 km2) of water. It is one of six states on the Frontier Strip and lies partly in the Great Plains near the geographical center of the 48 contiguous states. It is bounded on the east by Arkansas and Missouri, on the north by Kansas, on the northwest by Colorado, on the far west by New Mexico, and on the south and near-west by Texas.\n\nThe western edge of the Oklahoma panhandle is out of alignment with its Texas border. The Oklahoma/New Mexico border is actually 2.1 to 2.2 miles east of the Texas line. The border between Texas and New Mexico was set first as a result of a survey by Spain in 1819. It was then set along the 103rd Meridian. In the 1890s, when Oklahoma was formally surveyed using more accurate surveying equipment and techniques, it was discovered that the Texas line was not set along the 103rd Meridian. Surveying techniques were not as accurate in 1819, and the actual 103rd Meridian was approximately 2.2 miles to the east. It was much easier to leave the mistake as it was than for Texas to cede land to New Mexico to correct the original surveying error. The placement of the Oklahoma/New Mexico border represents the true 103rd Meridian.\n\nCimarron County in Oklahoma's panhandle is the only county in the United States that touches four other states: New Mexico, Texas, Colorado and Kansas.\n\nTopography\n\nOklahoma is between the Great Plains and the Ozark Plateau in the Gulf of Mexico watershed, generally sloping from the high plains of its western boundary to the low wetlands of its southeastern boundary. Its highest and lowest points follow this trend, with its highest peak, Black Mesa, at 4,973 feet (1,516 m) above sea level, situated near its far northwest corner in the Oklahoma Panhandle. The state's lowest point is on the Little River near its far southeastern boundary near the town of Idabel, OK, which dips to 289 feet (88 m) above sea level. \n\nAmong the most geographically diverse states, Oklahoma is one of four to harbor more than 10 distinct ecological regions, with 11 in its borders – more per square mile than in any other state. Its western and eastern halves, however, are marked by extreme differences in geographical diversity: Eastern Oklahoma touches eight ecological regions and its western half contains three. Although having fewer ecological regions Western Oklahoma contains many rare, relic species.\n\nOklahoma has four primary mountain ranges: the Ouachita Mountains, the Arbuckle Mountains, the Wichita Mountains, and the Ozark Mountains. Contained within the U.S. Interior Highlands region, the Ozark and Ouachita Mountains mark the only major mountainous region between the Rocky Mountains and the Appalachians. A portion of the Flint Hills stretches into north-central Oklahoma, and near the state's eastern border, Cavanal Hill is regarded by the Oklahoma Tourism & Recreation Department as the world's tallest hill; at 1,999 feet (609 m), it fails their definition of a mountain by one foot. \n\nThe semi-arid high plains in the state's northwestern corner harbor few natural\nforests; the region has a rolling to flat landscape with intermittent canyons and mesa ranges like the Glass Mountains. Partial plains interrupted by small, sky island mountain ranges like the Antelope Hills and the Wichita Mountains dot southwestern Oklahoma; transitional prairie and oak savannahs cover the central portion of the state. The Ozark and Ouachita Mountains rise from west to east over the state's eastern third, gradually increasing in elevation in an eastward direction.\n\nMore than 500 named creeks and rivers make up Oklahoma's waterways, and with 200 lakes created by dams, it holds the highest number of artificial reservoirs in the nation. Most of the state lies in two primary drainage basins belonging to the Red and Arkansas rivers, though the Lee and Little rivers also contain significant drainage basins.\n\nFlora and fauna\n\nForests cover 24 percent of Oklahoma and prairie grasslands composed of shortgrass, mixed-grass, and tallgrass prairie, harbor expansive ecosystems in the state's central and western portions, although cropland has largely replaced native grasses. Where rainfall is sparse in the western regions of the state, shortgrass prairie and shrublands are the most prominent ecosystems, though pinyon pines, red cedar (junipers), and ponderosa pines grow near rivers and creek beds in the far western reaches of the panhandle. Southwestern Oklahoma contains many rare, disjunct species including sugar maple, bigtooth maple, nolina and southern live oak.\n\nMarshlands, sabal minor, cypress forests and mixtures of shortleaf pine, loblolly pine and deciduous forests dominate the state's southeastern quarter, while mixtures of largely post oak, elm, red cedar (Juniperus virginiana) and pine forests cover northeastern Oklahoma. \n\nThe state holds populations of white-tailed deer, mule deer, antelope, coyotes, mountain lions, bobcats, elk, and birds such as quail, doves, cardinals, bald eagles, red-tailed hawks, and pheasants. In prairie ecosystems, American bison, greater prairie chickens, badgers, and armadillo are common, and some of the nation's largest prairie dog towns inhabit shortgrass prairie in the state's panhandle. The Cross Timbers, a region transitioning from prairie to woodlands in Central Oklahoma, harbors 351 vertebrate species. The Ouachita Mountains are home to black bear, red fox, grey fox, and river otter populations, which coexist with a total of 328 vertebrate species in southeastern Oklahoma. Also, in southeastern Oklahoma lives the American alligator. \n\nProtected lands\n\nOklahoma has 50 state parks, six national parks or protected regions, two national protected forests or grasslands, and a network of wildlife preserves and conservation areas. Six percent of the state's 10 million acres (40,000 km2) of forest is public land, including the western portions of the Ouachita National Forest, the largest and oldest national forest in the Southern United States. \n\nWith 39,000 acres (158 km2), the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in north-central Oklahoma is the largest protected area of tallgrass prairie in the world and is part of an ecosystem that encompasses only 10 percent of its former land area, once covering 14 states. In addition, the Black Kettle National Grassland covers 31,300 acres (127 km2) of prairie in southwestern Oklahoma. The Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge is the oldest and largest of nine national wildlife refuges in the state and was founded in 1901, encompassing 59,020 acres (238.8 km2). \n\nOf Oklahoma's federally protected park or recreational sites; the Chickasaw National Recreation Area is the largest, with 9,898.63 acres (18 km2). Other sites include the Santa Fe and Trail of Tears national historic trails, the Fort Smith and Washita Battlefield national historic sites, and the Oklahoma City National Memorial.\n\nClimate\n\nOklahoma is located in a humid subtropical region. Oklahoma lies in a transition zone between humid continental climate to the north, semi-arid climate to the west, and humid subtropical climate in the central, south and eastern portions of the state. Most of the state lies in an area known as Tornado Alley characterized by frequent interaction between cold, dry air from Canada, warm to hot, dry air from Mexico and the Southwestern U.S., and warm, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico. The interactions between these three contrasting air currents produces severe weather (severe thunderstorms, damaging thunderstorm winds, large hail and tornadoes) with a frequency virtually unseen anywhere else on planet Earth. An average 62 tornadoes strike the state per year—one of the highest rates in the world. \n\nBecause of Oklahoma's position between zones of differing prevailing temperature and winds, weather patterns within the state can vary widely over relatively short distances and can change drastically in a short time. As an example, on November 11, 1911, the temperature at Oklahoma City reached 83 °F in the afternoon (the record high for that date), then an Arctic cold front of unprecedented intensity slammed across the state, causing the temperature to crash 66 degrees, down to 17 °F at midnight (the record low for that date); thus, both the record high and record low for November 11 were set on the same date. This type of phenomenon is also responsible for many of the tornadoes in the area, such as the 1912 Oklahoma tornado outbreak, when a warm front traveled along a stalled cold front, resulting in an average of about one tornado per hour over the course of a day.\n\nThe humid subtropical climate (Koppen Cfa) of central, southern and eastern Oklahoma is influenced heavily by southerly winds bringing moisture from the Gulf of Mexico. Traveling westward, the climate transitions progressively toward a semi-arid zone (Koppen BSk) in the high plains of the Panhandle and other western areas from about Lawton westward, less frequently touched by southern moisture. Precipitation and temperatures decline from east to west accordingly, with areas in the southeast averaging an annual temperature of 62 °F (17 °C) and an annual rainfall of generally over 40 in and up to 56 in, while areas of the (higher-elevation) panhandle average 58 °F (14 °C), with an annual rainfall under 17 in. \n\nOver almost all of Oklahoma, winter is the driest season. Average monthly precipitation increases dramatically in the spring to a peak in May, the wettest month over most of the state, with its frequent and not uncommonly severe thunderstorm activity. Early June can still be wet, but most years see a marked decrease in rainfall during June and early July. Mid-summer (July and August) represents a secondary dry season over much of Oklahoma, with long stretches of hot weather with only sporadic thunderstorm activity not uncommon many years. Severe drought is common in the hottest summers, such as those of 1934, 1954, 1980 and 2011, all of which featured weeks on end of virtual rainlessness and high temperatures well over 100 F. Average precipitation rises again from September to mid-October, representing a secondary wetter season, then declines from late October through December.\n\nAll of the state frequently experiences temperatures above 100 °F (38 °C) or below 0 °F (−18 °C), though below-zero temperatures are rare in south-central and southeastern Oklahoma. Snowfall ranges from an average of less than 4 in in the south to just over 20 in on the border of Colorado in the panhandle. The state is home to the Storm Prediction Center, the National Severe Storms Laboratory, and the Warning Decision Training Branch, all part of the National Weather Service and located in Norman. Oklahoma's highest recorded temperature of 120 F was recorded at Tipton on June 27, 1994 and the lowest recorded temperature of was recorded at Nowata on February 10, 2011.\n\nHistory\n\nEvidence exists that native peoples traveled through Oklahoma as early as the last ice age. Ancestors of the Wichita and Caddo lived in what is now Oklahoma. The Panhandle culture peoples were precontact residents of the panhandle region. The westernmost center of the Mississippian culture was Spiro Mounds, in what is now Spiro, Oklahoma, which flourished between AD 850 and 1450. Spaniard Francisco Vásquez de Coronado traveled through the state in 1541, but French explorers claimed the area in the 1700s and it remained under French rule until 1803, when all the French territory west of the Mississippi River was purchased by the United States in the Louisiana Purchase.\n\nThe territory now known as Oklahoma was first a part of the Arkansas Territory from 1819 until 1828.\n\nDuring the 19th century, thousands of Native Americans were expelled from their ancestral homelands from across North America and transported to the area including and surrounding present-day Oklahoma. The Choctaw was the first of the Five Civilized Tribes to be removed from the southeastern United States. The phrase \"Trail of Tears\" originated from a description of the removal of the Choctaw Nation in 1831, although the term is usually used for the Cherokee removal.\n\nA total of 17,000 Cherokees and 2,000 of their black slaves were deported. The area, already occupied by Osage and Quapaw tribes, was called for the Choctaw Nation until revised Native American and then later American policy redefined the boundaries to include other Native Americans. By 1890, more than 30 Native American nations and tribes had been concentrated on land within Indian Territory or \"Indian Country\". \n\nAll Five Civilized Tribes supported and signed treaties with the [http://digital.library.okstate.edu/Chronicles/v031/v031p189.pdf Confederate] military during the American Civil War. The Cherokee Nation had an internal civil war.\n\n Slavery in Indian Territory was not abolished until 1866. \n\nIn the period between 1866 and 1899, cattle ranches in Texas strove to meet the demands for food in eastern cities and railroads in Kansas promised to deliver in a timely manner. Cattle trails and cattle ranches developed as cowboys either drove their product north or settled illegally in Indian Territory. In 1881, four of five major cattle trails on the western frontier traveled through Indian Territory. \n\nIncreased presence of white settlers in Indian Territory prompted the United States Government to establish the Dawes Act in 1887, which divided the lands of individual tribes into allotments for individual families, encouraging farming and private land ownership among Native Americans but expropriating land to the federal government. In the process, railroad companies took nearly half of Indian-held land within the territory for outside settlers and for purchase. \n\nMajor land runs, including the Land Run of 1889, were held for settlers where certain territories were opened to settlement starting at a precise time. Usually land was open to settlers on a first come first served basis. Those who broke the rules by crossing the border into the territory before the official opening time were said to have been crossing the border sooner, leading to the term sooners, which eventually became the state's official nickname. \n\nDeliberations to make the territory into a state began near the end of the 19th century, when the Curtis Act continued the allotment of Indian tribal land.\n\n20th and 21st centuries\n\nAttempts to create an all-Indian state named Oklahoma and a later attempt to create an all-Indian state named Sequoyah failed but the Sequoyah Statehood Convention of 1905 eventually laid the groundwork for the Oklahoma Statehood Convention, which took place two years later. On November 16, 1907, Oklahoma was established as the 46th state in the Union.\n\nThe new state became a focal point for the emerging oil industry, as discoveries of oil pools prompted towns to grow rapidly in population and wealth. Tulsa eventually became known as the \"Oil Capital of the World\" for most of the 20th century and oil investments fueled much of the state's early economy. In 1927, Oklahoman businessman Cyrus Avery, known as the \"Father of Route 66\", began the campaign to create U.S. Route 66. Using a stretch of highway from Amarillo, Texas to Tulsa, Oklahoma to form the original portion of Highway 66, Avery spearheaded the creation of the U.S. Highway 66 Association to oversee the planning of Route 66, based in his hometown of Tulsa. \n\nOklahoma also has a rich African American history. There were many black towns that thrived in the early 20th century because of black settlers moving from neighboring states, especially Kansas. The politician Edward P. McCabe encouraged black settlers to come to what was then Indian Territory. He discussed with President Theodore Roosevelt the possibility of making Oklahoma a majority-black state.\n\nBy the early 20th century, the Greenwood neighborhood of Tulsa was one of the most prosperous African-American communities in the United States. Jim Crow laws had established racial segregation since before the start of the 20th century, but the blacks had created a thriving area.\n\nSocial tensions were exacerbated by the revival of the Ku Klux Klan after 1915. The Tulsa Race Riot broke out in 1921, with whites attacking blacks. In one of the costliest episodes of racial violence in American history, sixteen hours of rioting resulted in 35 city blocks destroyed, $1.8 million in property damage, and a death toll estimated to be as high as 300 people. By the late 1920s, the Ku Klux Klan had declined to negligible influence within the state. \n\nDuring the 1930s, parts of the state began suffering the consequences of poor farming practices, extended drought and high winds. Known as the Dust Bowl, areas of Kansas, Texas, New Mexico and northwestern Oklahoma were hampered by long periods of little rainfall and abnormally high temperatures, sending thousands of farmers into poverty and forcing them to relocate to more fertile areas of the western United States. Over a twenty-year period ending in 1950, the state saw its only historical decline in population, dropping 6.9 percent as impoverished families migrated out of the state after the Dust Bowl.\n\nSoil and water conservation projects markedly changed practices in the state and led to the construction of massive flood control systems and dams; they built hundreds of reservoirs and man-made lakes to supply water for domestic needs and agricultural irrigation. By the 1960s, Oklahoma had created more than 200 lakes, the most in the nation. \n\nIn 1995, Oklahoma City was the site of one of the most destructive acts of domestic terrorism in American history. The Oklahoma City bombing of April 19, 1995, in which Timothy McVeigh detonated a large, crude explosive device outside the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, killed 168 people, including 19 children. For his crime, McVeigh was executed by the federal government on June 11, 2001. His accomplice, Terry Nichols, is serving life in prison without parole for helping plan the attack and prepare the explosive. \n\nOn May 31, 2016, several cities experienced record setting flooding. \n\nDemographics \n\nThe United States Census Bureau estimates that the population of Oklahoma was 3,911,338 on July 1, 2015, a 4.26% increase since the 2010 United States Census. \n\nAt the 2010 Census, 68.7% of the population was non-Hispanic White, down from 88% in 1970, 7.3% non-Hispanic Black or African American, 8.2% non-Hispanic American Indian and Alaska Native, 1.7% non-Hispanic Asian, 0.1% non-Hispanic Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, 0.1% from some other race (non-Hispanic) and 5.1% of two or more races (non-Hispanic). 8.9% of Oklahoma's population was of Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin (they may be of any race).\n\n, 47.3% of Oklahoma's population younger than age 1 were minorities, meaning that they had at least one parent who was not non-Hispanic white. \n\n Oklahoma had a population of 3,642,361 with an estimated 2005 ancestral makeup of 14.5% German, 13.1% American, 11.8% Irish, 9.6% English, 8.1% African American, and 11.4% Native American (including 7.9% Cherokee) though the percentage of people claiming American Indian as their only race was 8.1%. Most people from Oklahoma who self-identify as having American ancestry are of overwhelmingly English ancestry with significant amounts of Scottish and Welsh inflection as well. \n\nThe state had the second-highest number of Native Americans in 2002, estimated at 395,219, as well as the second highest percentage among all states. , 4.7% of Oklahoma's residents were foreign born, compared to 12.4% for the nation. The center of population of Oklahoma is located in Lincoln County near the town of Sparks. \n\nThe state's 2006 per capita personal income ranked 37th at $32,210, though it has the third fastest-growing per capita income in the nation and ranks consistently among the lowest states in cost of living index. The Oklahoma City suburb Nichols Hills is first on Oklahoma locations by per capita income at $73,661, though Tulsa County holds the highest average. In 2011, 7.0% of Oklahomans were under the age of 5, 24.7% under 18, and 13.7% were 65 or older. Females made up 50.5% of the population.\n\nLanguage\n\nThe English language has been official in the state of Oklahoma since 2010. The variety of North American English spoken is called Oklahoma English, and this dialect is quite diverse with its uneven blending of features of North Midland, South Midland, and Southern dialects. In 2000, 2,977,187 Oklahomans—92.6% of the resident population five years or older—spoke only English at home, a decrease from 95% in 1990. 238,732 Oklahoma residents reported speaking a language other than English in the 2000 census, about 7.4% of the total population of the state. Spanish is the second most commonly spoken language in the state, with 141,060 speakers counted in 2000. The most commonly spoken native North American language is Cherokee, with 10,000 speakers living within the Cherokee Nation tribal jurisdiction area of eastern Oklahoma. Cherokee is an official language in the Cherokee Nation tribal jurisdiction area and in the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians.\n\nGerman has 13,444 speakers representing about 0.4% of the total state population, and Vietnamese is spoken by 11,330 people, or about 0.4% of the population, many of whom live in the Asia District of Oklahoma City. Other languages include French with 8,258 speakers (0.3%), Chinese with 6,413 (0.2%), Korean with 3,948 (0.1%), Arabic with 3,265 (0.1%), other Asian languages with 3,134 (0.1%), Tagalog with 2,888 (0.1%), Japanese with 2,546 (0.1%), and African languages with 2,546 (0.1%). In addition to Cherokee, more than 25 Native American languages are spoken in Oklahoma, second only to California (though, it should be noted that only Cherokee exhibits language vitality at present).\n\nReligion\n\nOklahoma is part of a geographical region characterized by conservative and Evangelical Christianity known as the \"Bible Belt\". Spanning the southern and eastern parts of the United States, the area is known for politically and socially conservative views, even though Oklahoma has more voters registered with the Democratic Party than with any other party. Tulsa, the state's second largest city, home to Oral Roberts University, is sometimes called the \"buckle of the Bible Belt\". According to the Pew Research Center, the majority of Oklahoma's religious adherents are Christian, accounting for about 80 percent of the population. The percentage of Oklahomans affiliated with Catholicism is half of the national average, while the percentage affiliated with Evangelical Protestantism is more than twice the national average – tied with Arkansas for the largest percentage of any state. \n\nIn 2010, the state's largest church memberships were in the Southern Baptist Convention (886,394 members), the United Methodist Church (282,347), the Roman Catholic Church (178,430), and the Assemblies of God (85,926). Other religions represented in the state include Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam. \n\nIn 2000, there were about 5,000 Jews and 6,000 Muslims, with 10 congregations to each group. \n\nOklahoma religious makeup:\n* Evangelical Protestant – 53%\n* Mainline Protestant – 16%\n* Roman Catholic – 13%\n* Other – 6%\n* Unaffiliated – 12%\n\nEconomy\n\nOklahoma is host to a diverse range of sectors including aviation, energy, transportation equipment, food processing, electronics, and telecommunications. Oklahoma is an important producer of natural gas, aircraft, and food. The state ranks third in the nation for production of natural gas, is the 27th-most agriculturally productive state, and also ranks 5th in production of wheat. Four Fortune 500 companies and six Fortune 1000 companies are headquartered in Oklahoma, and it has been rated one of the most business-friendly states in the nation, with the 7th-lowest tax burden in 2007. \n\nIn 2010, Oklahoma City-based Love's Travel Stops & Country Stores ranked 18th on the Forbes list of largest private companies, Tulsa-based QuikTrip ranked 37th, and Oklahoma City-based Hobby Lobby ranked 198th in 2010 report. Oklahoma's gross domestic product grew from $131.9 billion in 2006 to $147.5 billion in 2010, a jump of 10.6 percent. Oklahoma's gross domestic product per capita was $35,480 in 2010, which was ranked 40th among the states. \n\nThough oil has historically dominated the state's economy, a collapse in the energy industry during the 1980s led to the loss of nearly 90,000 energy-related jobs between 1980 and 2000, severely damaging the local economy. Oil accounted for 35 billion dollars in Oklahoma's economy in 2007, and employment in the state's oil industry was outpaced by five other industries in 2007. , the state's unemployment rate is 4.4%. \n\nIndustry\n\nIn mid-2011, Oklahoma had a civilian labor force of 1.7 million and total non-farm employment fluctuated around 1.5 million. The government sector provides the most jobs, with 339,300 in 2011, followed by the transportation and utilities sector, providing 279,500 jobs, and the sectors of education, business, and manufacturing, providing 207,800, 177,400, and 132,700 jobs, respectively. Among the state's largest industries, the aerospace sector generates $11 billion annually.\n\nTulsa is home to the largest airline maintenance base in the world, which serves as the global maintenance and engineering headquarters for American Airlines. In total, aerospace accounts for more than 10 percent of Oklahoma's industrial output, and it is one of the top 10 states in aerospace engine manufacturing. Because of its position in the center of the United States, Oklahoma is also among the top states for logistic centers, and a major contributor to weather-related research.\n\nThe state is the top manufacturer of tires in North America and contains one of the fastest-growing biotechnology industries in the nation. In 2005, international exports from Oklahoma's manufacturing industry totaled $4.3 billion, accounting for 3.6 percent of its economic impact. Tire manufacturing, meat processing, oil and gas equipment manufacturing, and air conditioner manufacturing are the state's largest manufacturing industries. \n\nEnergy\n\nOklahoma is the nation's third-largest producer of natural gas, fifth-largest producer of crude oil, and has the second-greatest number of active drilling rigs, and ranks fifth in crude oil reserves. While the state ranked eighth for installed wind energy capacity in 2011, it is at the bottom of states in usage of renewable energy, with 94 percent of its electricity being generated by non-renewable sources in 2009, including 25 percent from coal and 46 percent from natural gas. Oklahoma has no nuclear power. Ranking 13th for total energy consumption per capita in 2009, Oklahoma's energy costs were 8th lowest in the nation. \n\nAs a whole, the oil energy industry contributes $35 billion to Oklahoma's gross domestic product, and employees of Oklahoma oil-related companies earn an average of twice the state's typical yearly income. In 2009, the state had 83,700 commercial oil wells churning of crude oil. Eight and a half percent of the nation's natural gas supply is held in Oklahoma, with being produced in 2009.\n\nAccording to Forbes magazine, Oklahoma City-based Devon Energy Corporation, Chesapeake Energy Corporation, and SandRidge Energy Corporation are the largest private oil-related companies in the nation, and all of Oklahoma's Fortune 500 companies are energy-related. Tulsa's ONEOK and Williams Companies are the state's largest and second-largest companies respectively, also ranking as the nation's second and third-largest companies in the field of energy, according to Fortune magazine. The magazine also placed Devon Energy as the second-largest company in the mining and crude oil-producing industry in the nation, while Chesapeake Energy ranks seventh respectively in that sector and Oklahoma Gas & Electric ranks as the 25th-largest gas and electric utility company. \n\nOklahoma Gas & Electric, commonly referred to as OG&E (NYSE: OGE) operates four base electric power plants in Oklahoma. Two of them are coal-fired power plants: one in Muskogee, and the other in Redrock. Two are gas-fired power plants: one in Harrah and the other in Konawa. OG&E was the first electric company in Oklahoma to generate electricity from wind farms in 2003. \n\nWind generation\n\nSource: \n\nAgriculture\n\nThe 27th-most agriculturally productive state, Oklahoma is fifth in cattle production and fifth in production of wheat. Approximately 5.5 percent of American beef comes from Oklahoma, while the state produces 6.1 percent of American wheat, 4.2 percent of American pig products, and 2.2 percent of dairy products.\n\nThe state had 85,500 farms in 2012, collectively producing $4.3 billion in animal products and fewer than one billion dollars in crop output with more than $6.1 billion added to the state's gross domestic product. Poultry and swine are its second and third-largest agricultural industries.\n\nCulture\n\nOklahoma is placed in the South by the United States Census Bureau, but lies fully or partially in the Midwest, Southwest, and southern cultural regions by varying definitions, and partially in the Upland South and Great Plains by definitions of abstract geographical-cultural regions. Oklahomans have a high rate of English, Scotch-Irish, German, and Native American ancestry, with 25 different native languages spoken. \n\nBecause many Native Americans were forced to move to Oklahoma when White settlement in North America increased, Oklahoma has much linguistic diversity. Mary Linn, an associate professor of anthropology at the University of Oklahoma and the associate curator of Native American languages at the Sam Noble Museum, notes that Oklahoma also has high levels of language endangerment. \n\nSix governments have claimed the area now known as Oklahoma at different times, and 67 Native American tribes are represented in Oklahoma, including 39 federally recognized tribes, who are headquartered and have tribal jurisdictional areas in the state. Western ranchers, Native American tribes, southern settlers, and eastern oil barons have shaped the state's cultural predisposition, and its largest cities have been named among the most underrated cultural destinations in the United States. \n\nResidents of Oklahoma are associated with traits of southern hospitality – the 2006 Catalogue for Philanthropy (with data from 2004) ranks Oklahomans 7th in the nation for overall generosity. The state has also been associated with a negative cultural stereotype first popularized by John Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath, which described the plight of uneducated, poverty-stricken Dust Bowl-era farmers deemed \"Okies\". However, the term is often used in a positive manner by Oklahomans.\n\nArts and theater\n\nIn the state's largest urban areas, pockets of jazz culture flourish, and Native American, Mexican American, and Asian American communities produce music and art of their respective cultures. The Oklahoma Mozart Festival in Bartlesville is one of the largest classical music festivals on the southern plains, and Oklahoma City's Festival of the Arts has been named one of the top fine arts festivals in the nation.\n\nThe state has a rich history in ballet with five Native American ballerinas attaining worldwide fame. These were Yvonne Chouteau, sisters Marjorie and Maria Tallchief, Rosella Hightower and Moscelyne Larkin, known collectively as the Five Moons. The New York Times rates the Tulsa Ballet as one of the top ballet companies in the United States. The Oklahoma City Ballet and University of Oklahoma's dance program were formed by ballerina Yvonne Chouteau and husband Miguel Terekhov. The University program was founded in 1962 and was the first fully accredited program of its kind in the United States. \n\nIn Sand Springs, an outdoor amphitheater called \"Discoveryland!\" is the official performance headquarters for the musical Oklahoma! Ridge Bond, native of McAlester, Oklahoma, starred in the Broadway and International touring productions of Oklahoma!, playing the role of \"Curly McClain\" in more than 2,600 performances. In 1953 he was featured along with the Oklahoma! cast on a CBS Omnibus television broadcast. Bond was instrumental in the title song becoming the Oklahoma state song and is also featured on the U.S. postage stamp commemorating the musical's 50th anniversary. Historically, the state has produced musical styles such as The Tulsa Sound and western swing, which was popularized at Cain's Ballroom in Tulsa. The building, known as the \"Carnegie Hall of Western Swing\", served as the performance headquarters of Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys during the 1930s. Stillwater is known as the epicenter of Red Dirt music, the best-known proponent of which is the late Bob Childers.\n\nProminent theatre companies in Oklahoma include, in the capital city, Oklahoma City Theatre Company, Carpenter Square Theatre, Oklahoma Shakespeare in the Park, and CityRep. CityRep is a professional company affording equity points to those performers and technical theatre professionals. In Tulsa, Oklahoma's oldest resident professional company is American Theatre Company, and Theatre Tulsa is the oldest community theatre company west of the Mississippi. Other companies in Tulsa include Heller Theatre and Tulsa Spotlight Theater. The cities of Norman, Lawton, and Stillwater, among others, also host well-reviewed community theatre companies.\n\nOklahoma is in the nation's middle percentile in per capita spending on the arts, ranking 17th, and contains more than 300 museums. The Philbrook Museum of Tulsa is considered one of the top 50 fine art museums in the United States, and the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History in Norman, one of the largest university-based art and history museums in the country, documents the natural history of the region. The collections of Thomas Gilcrease are housed in the Gilcrease Museum of Tulsa, which also holds the world's largest, most comprehensive collection of art and artifacts of the American West. \n\nThe Egyptian art collection at the Mabee-Gerrer Museum of Art in Shawnee is considered to be the finest Egyptian collection between Chicago and Los Angeles. The Oklahoma City Museum of Art contains the most comprehensive collection of glass sculptures by artist Dale Chihuly in the world, and Oklahoma City's National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum documents the heritage of the American Western frontier. With remnants of the Holocaust and artifacts relevant to Judaism, the Sherwin Miller Museum of Jewish Art of Tulsa preserves the largest collection of Jewish art in the Southwest United States. \n\nFestivals and events\n\nOklahoma's centennial celebration was named the top event in the United States for 2007 by the American Bus Association, and consisted of multiple celebrations saving with the 100th anniversary of statehood on November 16, 2007. Annual ethnic festivals and events take place throughout the state such as Native American powwows and ceremonial events, and include festivals (as examples) in Scottish, Irish, German, Italian, Vietnamese, Chinese, Czech, Jewish, Arab, Mexican and African-American communities depicting cultural heritage or traditions.\n\nDuring a 10-day run in Oklahoma City, the State Fair of Oklahoma attracts roughly one million people along with the annual Festival of the Arts. Large national pow-wows, various Latin and Asian heritage festivals, and cultural festivals such as the Juneteenth celebrations are held in Oklahoma City each year. The Tulsa State Fair attracts over one million people during its 10-day run, and the city's Mayfest festival entertained more than 375,000 people in four days during 2007. In 2006, Tulsa's Oktoberfest was named one of the top 10 in the world by USA Today and one of the top German food festivals in the nation by Bon Appetit magazine. \n\nNorman plays host to the Norman Music Festival, a festival that highlights native Oklahoma bands and musicians. Norman is also host to the Medieval Fair of Norman, which has been held annually since 1976 and was Oklahoma's first medieval fair. The Fair was held first on the south oval of the University of Oklahoma campus and in the third year moved to the Duck Pond in Norman until the Fair became too big and moved to Reaves Park in 2003. The Medieval Fair of Norman is Oklahoma's \"largest weekend event and the third largest event in Oklahoma, and was selected by Events Media Network as one of the top 100 events in the nation\". \n\nEducation\n\nWith an educational system made up of public school districts and independent private institutions, Oklahoma had 638,817 students enrolled in 1,845 public primary, secondary, and vocational schools in 533 school districts . Oklahoma has the highest enrollment of Native American students in the nation with 126,078 students in the 2009-10 school year. Ranked near the bottom of states in expenditures per student, Oklahoma spent $7,755 for each student in 2008, 47th in the nation, though its growth of total education expenditures between 1992 and 2002 ranked 22nd. \n\nThe state is among the best in pre-kindergarten education, and the National Institute for Early Education Research rated it first in the United States with regard to standards, quality, and access to pre-kindergarten education in 2004, calling it a model for early childhood schooling. High school dropout rate decreased from 3.1 to 2.5 percent between 2007 and 2008 with Oklahoma ranked among 18 other states with 3 percent or less dropout rate. In 2004, the state ranked 36th in the nation for the relative number of adults with high school diplomas, though at 85.2 percent, it had the highest rate among southern states. \n\nOklahoma State University, the University of Oklahoma, the University of Central Oklahoma, and Northeastern State University are the largest public institutions of higher education in Oklahoma, operating through one primary campus and satellite campuses throughout the state. The two state universities, along with Oklahoma City University and the University of Tulsa, rank among the country's best in undergraduate business programs. \n\nOklahoma City University School of Law, University of Oklahoma College of Law, and University of Tulsa College of Law are the state's only ABA accredited institutions. Both University of Oklahoma and University of Tulsa are Tier 1 institutions, with the University of Oklahoma ranked 68th and the University of Tulsa ranked 86th in the nation. \n\nOklahoma holds eleven public regional universities, including Northeastern State University, the second-oldest institution of higher education west of the Mississippi River, also containing the only College of Optometry in Oklahoma and the largest enrollment of Native American students in the nation by percentage and amount. Langston University is Oklahoma's only historically black college. Six of the state's universities were placed in the Princeton Review's list of best 122 regional colleges in 2007, and three made the list of top colleges for best value. The state has 55 post-secondary technical institutions operated by Oklahoma's CareerTech program for training in specific fields of industry or trade.\n\nIn the 2007–2008 school year, there were 181,973 undergraduate students, 20,014 graduate students, and 4,395 first-professional degree students enrolled in Oklahoma colleges. Of these students, 18,892 received a bachelor's degree, 5,386 received a master's degree, and 462 received a first professional degree. This means the state of Oklahoma produces an average of 38,278 degree-holders per completions component (i.e. July 1, 2007 – June 30, 2008). National average is 68,322 total degrees awarded per completions component. \n\nNon-English Education\n\nThe Cherokee Nation instigated a 10-year language preservation plan that involved growing new fluent speakers of the Cherokee language from childhood on up through school immersion programs as well as a collaborative community effort to continue to use the language at home. This plan was part of an ambitious goal that in 50 years, 80% or more of the Cherokee people will be fluent in the language. The Cherokee Preservation Foundation has invested $3 million into opening schools, training teachers, and developing curricula for language education, as well as initiating community gatherings where the language can be actively used. \nThere is a Cherokee language immersion school in Tahlequah, Oklahoma that educates students from pre-school through eighth grade. Graduates are fluent speakers of the language. Several universities offer Cherokee as a second language, including the University of Oklahoma and Northeastern State University.\n\nSports\n\nOklahoma has teams in basketball, football, arena football, baseball, soccer, hockey, and wrestling located in Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Enid, Norman, and Lawton. The Oklahoma City Thunder of the National Basketball Association (NBA) is the state's only major league sports franchise. The state had a team in the Women's National Basketball Association, the Tulsa Shock, from 2010 through 2015, but the team relocated to Dallas–Fort Worth after that season and became the Dallas Wings. Oklahoma supports teams in several minor leagues, including Minor League Baseball at the AAA and AA levels (Oklahoma City Dodgers and Tulsa Drillers, respectively), hockey's ECHL with the Tulsa Oilers, and a number of indoor football leagues. In the last-named sport, the state's most notable team was the Tulsa Talons, which played in the Arena Football League until 2012, when the team was moved to San Antonio. The Oklahoma Defenders replaced the Talons as Tulsa's only professional arena football team, playing the CPIFL. The Oklahoma City Blue, of the NBA Development League, relocated to Oklahoma City from Tulsa in 2014, where they were formerly known as the Tulsa 66ers. Tulsa is the base for the Tulsa Revolution, which plays in the American Indoor Soccer League. Enid and Lawton host professional basketball teams in the USBL and the CBA.\n\nThe NBA's New Orleans Hornets became the first major league sports franchise based in Oklahoma when the team was forced to relocate to Oklahoma City's Ford Center, now known as Chesapeake Energy Arena, for two seasons following Hurricane Katrina in 2005. In July 2008, the Seattle SuperSonics, a franchise owned by the Professional Basketball Club LLC, a group of Oklahoma City businessmen led by Clay Bennett, relocated to Oklahoma City and announced that play would begin at the Ford Center as the Oklahoma City Thunder for the , becoming the state's first permanent major league franchise. \n\nCollegiate athletics are a popular draw in the state. The state has four schools that compete at the highest level of college sports, NCAA Division I. The most prominent are the state's two members of the Big 12 Conference, one of the so-called Power Five conferences of the top tier of college football, Division I FBS. The University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State University average well over 50,000 fans attending their football games, and Oklahoma's football program ranked 12th in attendance among American colleges in 2010, with an average of 84,738 people attending its home games. The two universities meet several times each year in rivalry matches known as the Bedlam Series, which are some of the greatest sporting draws to the state. Sports Illustrated magazine rates Oklahoma and Oklahoma State among the top colleges for athletics in the nation. Two private institutions in Tulsa, the University of Tulsa and Oral Roberts University; are also Division I members. Tulsa competes in FBS football and other sports in the American Athletic Conference, while Oral Roberts, which does not sponsor football, is a member of The Summit League. In addition, 12 of the state's smaller colleges and universities compete in NCAA Division II as members of four different conferences, and eight other Oklahoma institutions participate in the NAIA, mostly within the Sooner Athletic Conference. \n\nRegular LPGA tournaments are held at Cedar Ridge Country Club in Tulsa, and major championships for the PGA or LPGA have been played at Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Oak Tree Country Club in Oklahoma City, and Cedar Ridge Country Club in Tulsa. Rated one of the top golf courses in the nation, Southern Hills has hosted four PGA Championships, including one in 2007, and three U.S. Opens, the most recent in 2001. Rodeos are popular throughout the state, and Guymon, in the state's panhandle, hosts one of the largest in the nation. \n\nCurrent teams\n\nHealth\n\nOklahoma was the 21st-largest recipient of medical funding from the federal government in 2005, with health-related federal expenditures in the state totaling $75,801,364; immunizations, bioterrorism preparedness, and health education were the top three most funded medical items. Instances of major diseases are near the national average in Oklahoma, and the state ranks at or slightly above the rest of the country in percentage of people with asthma, diabetes, cancer, and hypertension.\n\nIn 2000, Oklahoma ranked 45th in physicians per capita and slightly below the national average in nurses per capita, but was slightly over the national average in hospital beds per 100,000 people and above the national average in net growth of health services over a 12-year period. One of the worst states for percentage of insured people, nearly 25 percent of Oklahomans between the age of 18 and 64 did not have health insurance in 2005, the fifth-highest rate in the nation. \n\nOklahomans are in the upper half of Americans in terms of obesity prevalence, and the state is the 5th most obese in the nation, with 30.3 percent of its population at or near obesity. Oklahoma ranked last among the 50 states in a 2007 study by the Commonwealth Fund on health care performance. \n\nThe OU Medical Center, Oklahoma's largest collection of hospitals, is the only hospital in the state designated a Level I trauma center by the American College of Surgeons. OU Medical Center is located on the grounds of the Oklahoma Health Center in Oklahoma City, the state's largest concentration of medical research facilities. \n\nThe Cancer Treatment Centers of America at Southwestern Regional Medical Center in Tulsa is one of four such regional facilities nationwide, offering cancer treatment to the entire southwestern United States, and is one of the largest cancer treatment hospitals in the country. The largest osteopathic teaching facility in the nation, Oklahoma State University Medical Center at Tulsa, also rates as one of the largest facilities in the field of neuroscience. \n\nMedia\n\nOklahoma City and Tulsa are the 45th and 61st-largest media markets in the United States as ranked by Nielsen Media Research. The state's third-largest media market, Lawton-Wichita Falls, Texas, is ranked 149th nationally by the agency. Broadcast television in Oklahoma began in 1949 when KFOR-TV (then WKY-TV) in Oklahoma City and KOTV-TV in Tulsa began broadcasting a few months apart. Currently, all major American broadcast networks have affiliated television stations in the state. \n\nThe state has two primary newspapers. The Oklahoman, based in Oklahoma City, is the largest newspaper in the state and 54th-largest in the nation by circulation, with a weekday readership of 138,493 and a Sunday readership of 202,690. The Tulsa World, the second most widely circulated newspaper in Oklahoma and 79th in the nation, holds a Sunday circulation of 132,969 and a weekday readership of 93,558. Oklahoma's first newspaper was established in 1844, called the Cherokee Advocate, and was written in both Cherokee and English. In 2006, there were more than 220 newspapers located in the state, including 177 with weekly publications and 48 with daily publications. \n\nThe state's first radio station, WKY in Oklahoma City, signed on in 1920, followed by KRFU in Bristow, which later on moved to Tulsa and became KVOO in 1927. In 2006, there were more than 500 radio stations in Oklahoma broadcasting with various local or nationally owned networks. Five universities in Oklahoma operate non-commercial, public radio stations/networks. \n\nOklahoma has a few ethnic-oriented TV stations broadcasting in Spanish, Asian languages and sometimes have Native American programming. TBN, a Christian religious television network has a studio in Tulsa, and built their first entirely TBN-owned affiliate in Oklahoma City in 1980. \n\nTransportation\n\nTransportation in Oklahoma is generated by an anchor system of Interstate Highways, intercity rail lines, airports, inland ports, and mass transit networks. Situated along an integral point in the United States Interstate network, Oklahoma contains three interstate highways and four auxiliary Interstate Highways. In Oklahoma City, Interstate 35 intersects with Interstate 44 and Interstate 40, forming one of the most important intersections along the United States highway system.\n\nMore than 12000 mi of roads make up the state's major highway skeleton, including state-operated highways, ten turnpikes or major toll roads, and the longest drivable stretch of Route 66 in the nation. In 2008, Interstate 44 in Oklahoma City was Oklahoma's busiest highway, with a daily traffic volume of 123,300 cars. In 2010, the state had the nation's third highest number of bridges classified as structurally deficient, with nearly 5,212 bridges in disrepair, including 235 National Highway System Bridges. \n\nOklahoma's largest commercial airport is Will Rogers World Airport in Oklahoma City, averaging a yearly passenger count of more than 3.5 million (1.7 million boardings) in 2010. Tulsa International Airport, the state's second largest commercial airport, served more than 1.3 million boardings in 2010. Between the two, six airlines operate in Oklahoma. In terms of traffic, R. L. Jones Jr. (Riverside) Airport in Tulsa is the state's busiest airport, with 335,826 takeoffs and landings in 2008. In total, Oklahoma has over 150 public-use airports. \n\nOklahoma is connected to the nation's rail network via Amtrak's Heartland Flyer, its only regional passenger rail line. It currently stretches from Oklahoma City to Fort Worth, Texas, though lawmakers began seeking funding in early 2007 to connect the Heartland Flyer to Tulsa. \n\nTwo inland ports on rivers serve Oklahoma: the Port of Muskogee and the Tulsa Port of Catoosa. The only port handling international cargo in the state, the Tulsa Port of Catoosa is the most inland ocean-going port in the nation and ships over two million tons of cargo each year. Both ports are located on the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System, which connects barge traffic from Tulsa and Muskogee to the Mississippi River via the Verdigris and Arkansas rivers, contributing to one of the busiest waterways in the world. \n\nLaw and government\n\nOklahoma is a constitutional republic with a government modeled after the Federal Government of the United States, with executive, legislative, and judicial branches. The state has 77 counties with jurisdiction over most local government functions within each respective domain, five congressional districts, and a voting base with a plurality in the Democratic Party. State officials are elected by plurality voting in the state of Oklahoma.\n\nOklahoma is one of 32 states with capital punishment as a legal sentence, and the state has had (between 1976 through mid-2011) the highest per capita execution rate in the US. \n\nState government\n\nThe Legislature of Oklahoma consists of the Senate and the House of Representatives. As the lawmaking branch of the state government, it is responsible for raising and distributing the money necessary to run the government. The Senate has 48 members serving four-year terms, while the House has 101 members with two-year terms. The state has a term limit for its legislature that restricts any one person to a total of twelve cumulative years service between both legislative branches. \n\nOklahoma's judicial branch consists of the Oklahoma Supreme Court, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals, and 77 District Courts that each serves one county. The Oklahoma judiciary also contains two independent courts: a Court of Impeachment and the Oklahoma Court on the Judiciary. Oklahoma has two courts of last resort: the state Supreme Court hears civil cases, and the state Court of Criminal Appeals hears criminal cases (this split system exists only in Oklahoma and neighboring Texas). Judges of those two courts, as well as the Court of Civil Appeals are appointed by the Governor upon the recommendation of the state Judicial Nominating Commission, and are subject to a non-partisan retention vote on a six-year rotating schedule. \n\nThe executive branch consists of the Governor, their staff, and other elected officials. The principal head of government, the Governor is the chief executive of the Oklahoma executive branch, serving as the ex officio Commander-in-Chief of the Oklahoma National Guard when not called into Federal use and reserving the power to veto bills passed through the Legislature. The responsibilities of the Executive branch include submitting the budget, ensuring that state laws are enforced, and ensuring peace within the state is preserved. \n\nLocal government\n\nThe state is divided into 77 counties that govern locally, each headed by a three-member council of elected commissioners, a tax assessor, clerk, court clerk, treasurer, and sheriff. While each municipality operates as a separate and independent local government with executive, legislative and judicial power, county governments maintain jurisdiction over both incorporated cities and non-incorporated areas within their boundaries, but have executive power but no legislative or judicial power. Both county and municipal governments collect taxes, employ a separate police force, hold elections, and operate emergency response services within their jurisdiction. Other local government units include school districts, technology center districts, community college districts, rural fire departments, rural water districts, and other special use districts.\n\nThirty-nine Native American tribal governments are based in Oklahoma, each holding limited powers within designated areas. While Indian reservations typical in most of the United States are not present in Oklahoma, tribal governments hold land granted during the Indian Territory era, but with limited jurisdiction and no control over state governing bodies such as municipalities and counties. Tribal governments are recognized by the United States as quasi-sovereign entities with executive, judicial, and legislative powers over tribal members and functions, but are subject to the authority of the United States Congress to revoke or withhold certain powers. The tribal governments are required to submit a constitution and any subsequent amendments to the United States Congress for approval. \n\nOklahoma has 11 substate districts including the two large Councils of Governments, INCOG in Tulsa (Indian Nations Council of Governments) and ACOG (Association of Central Oklahoma Governments). For a complete list visit the [http://www.oarcok.org Oklahoma Association of Regional Councils].\n\nNational politics\n\nOklahoma has been politically conservative for much of its history, especially recently. During the first half century of statehood, it was considered a Democratic stronghold, being carried by the Republican Party in only two presidential elections (1920 and 1928). During this time, it was also carried by every winning Democratic candidate up to Harry Truman. However, Oklahoma Democrats were generally considered to be more conservative than Democrats in other states.\n\nAfter the 1948 election, the state turned firmly Republican. Although registered Republicans were a minority in the state until 2015, starting in 1952, Oklahoma has been carried by Republican presidential candidates in all but one election (1964). This is not to say that every election has been a landslide for Republicans: Jimmy Carter lost the state by less than 1.5% in 1976, while Michael Dukakis and Bill Clinton both won 40% or more of the state's popular vote in 1988 and 1996 respectively. Al Gore in 2000, though, was the last Democrat to even win any counties in the state. Oklahoma was the only state where Barack Obama failed to carry any of its counties in both 2008 and 2012.\n\nGenerally, Republicans are strongest in Oklahoma City and Tulsa and their suburbs, as well as the Panhandle. Democrats are strongest in the eastern part of the state and Little Dixie, as well as the most heavily African American parts of Oklahoma City and Tulsa. With a population of 8.6% Native American in the state, it is also worth noting that most Native American precincts vote Democratic in margins exceeded only by African Americans. \n\nFollowing the 2000 census, the Oklahoma delegation to the U.S. House of Representatives was reduced from six to five representatives, each serving one congressional district. For the 112th Congress (2011–2013), there were no changes in party strength, and the delegation included four Republicans and one Democrat. In the 112th Congress, Oklahoma's U.S. senators were Republicans Jim Inhofe and Tom Coburn, and its U.S. Representatives were John Sullivan (R-OK-1), Dan Boren (D-OK-2), Frank D. Lucas (R-OK-3), Tom Cole (R-OK-4), and James Lankford (R-OK-5).\n\nIn 2012, Dan Boren (D-OK-2) retired from Congress, therefore making the seat vacant. This district, which covers most of Little Dixie, is the Democrats' best region of the state, and has been represented by a Democrat for a dozen years. Republican Markwayne Mullin won the election, making the state's congressional delegation entirely Republican.\n\nMilitary\n\nCities and towns\n\nMajor cities\n\nOklahoma had 598 incorporated places in 2010, including four cities over 100,000 in population and 43 over 10,000. Two of the fifty largest cities in the United States are located in Oklahoma, Oklahoma City and Tulsa, and 65 percent of Oklahomans live within their metropolitan areas, or spheres of economic and social influence defined by the United States Census Bureau as a metropolitan statistical area. Oklahoma City, the state's capital and largest city, had the largest metropolitan area in the state in 2010, with 1,252,987 people, and the metropolitan area of Tulsa had 937,478 residents. Between 2000 and 2010, the cities that led the state in population growth were Blanchard (172.4%), Elgin (78.2%), Jenks (77.0%), Piedmont (56.7%), Bixby (56.6%), and Owasso (56.3%).\n\nIn descending order of population, Oklahoma's largest cities in 2010 were: Oklahoma City (579,999, +14.6%), Tulsa (391,906, −0.3%), Norman (110,925, +15.9%), Broken Arrow (98,850, +32.0%), Lawton (96,867, +4.4%), Edmond (81,405, +19.2%), Moore (55,081, +33.9%), Midwest City (54,371, +0.5%), Enid (49,379, +5.0%), and Stillwater (45,688, +17.0%). Of the state's ten largest cities, three are outside the metropolitan areas of Oklahoma City and Tulsa, and only Lawton has a metropolitan statistical area of its own as designated by the United States Census Bureau, though the metropolitan statistical area of Fort Smith, Arkansas extends into the state. \n\nUnder Oklahoma law, municipalities are divided into two categories: cities, defined as having more than 1,000 residents, and towns, with under 1,000 residents. Both have legislative, judicial, and public power within their boundaries, but cities can choose between a mayor-council, council-manager, or strong mayor form of government, while towns operate through an elected officer system. \n\nState symbols\n\nState law codifies Oklahoma's state emblems and honorary positions; the Oklahoma Senate or House of Representatives may adopt resolutions designating others for special events and to benefit organizations. Currently the State Senate is waiting to vote on a change to the state's motto. The House passed HCR 1024, which will change the state motto from \"Labor Omnia Vincit\" to \"Oklahoma-In God We Trust!\" The author of the resolution stated that a constituent researched the Oklahoma Constitution and found no \"official\" vote regarding \"Labor Omnia Vincit\", therefore opening the door for an entirely new motto.\n\nState symbols: \n* State cartoon: Gusty Created by Don Woods, Oklahoma's first professional meteorologist, used on KTUL-TV from 1954-1989. \n* State bird: Scissor-tailed flycatcher\n* State tree: Eastern redbud\n* State mammal: American bison\n* State beverage: Milk\n* State fruit: Strawberry \n* State vegetable: Watermelon \n* State game bird: Wild turkey\n* State fish: Sand bass\n* State floral emblem: Mistletoe\n* State flower: Oklahoma rose\n* State wildflower: Indian blanket (Gaillardia pulchella)\n* State grass: Indiangrass (Sorghastrum nutans)\n* State fossil: Saurophaganax maximus \n* State rock: Rose rock\n* State insect: Honeybee\n* State soil: Port Silt Loam\n* State reptile: Collared lizard\n* State amphibian: Bullfrog\n* State meal: Fried okra, squash, cornbread, barbecue pork, biscuits, sausage and gravy, grits, corn, strawberries, chicken fried steak, pecan pie, and black-eyed peas.\n* State folk dance: Square dance\n* State percussive instrument: Drum\n* State waltz: \"Oklahoma Wind\"\n* State butterfly: Black swallowtail\n* State song: \"Oklahoma!\"\n* State language: English; Cherokee and other Native American languages\n* State gospel song: \"Swing Low, Sweet Chariot\"\n* State rock song: \"Do You Realize??\" by The Flaming Lips" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Sperm_whale.txt", "Beluga_whale.txt" ], "title": [ "Sperm whale", "Beluga whale" ], "wiki_context": [ "The sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus), or cachalot, is the largest of the toothed whales and the largest toothed predator. It is the only living member of genus Physeter, and one of three extant species in the sperm whale family, along with the pygmy sperm whale and dwarf sperm whale of the genus Kogia.\n\nMature males average 16 m in length but some may reach , with the head representing up to one-third of the animal's length. Plunging to 2250 m, it is the second deepest diving mammal, following only the Cuvier's beaked whale. The sperm whale's clicking vocalization, a form of echolocation and communication, may be as loud as 230 decibels (re 1 µPa at 1 m) underwater. It has the largest brain of any animal on Earth, more than five times heavier than a human's. Sperm whales can live for more than 60 years.\n\nThe sperm whale can be found anywhere in the open ocean. Females and young males live together in groups while mature males live solitary lives outside of the mating season. The females cooperate to protect and nurse their young. Females give birth every four to twenty years, and care for the calves for more than a decade. A mature sperm whale has few natural predators, although calves and weakened adults are sometimes killed by pods of orcas.\n\nFrom the early eighteenth century through the late 20th, the species was a prime target of whalers. The head of the whale contains a liquid wax called spermaceti, from which the whale derives its name. Spermaceti was used in lubricants, oil lamps, and candles. Ambergris, a waste product from its digestive system, is still used as a fixative in perfumes. Occasionally the sperm whale's great size allowed it to defend itself effectively against whalers. The species is now protected by a whaling moratorium, and is currently listed as vulnerable by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN).\n\nTaxonomy and naming \n\nEtymology \n\nThe name sperm whale is a clip of spermaceti whale. Spermaceti, originally mistakenly identified as the whales' semen, is the semi-liquid, waxy substance found within the whale's head (see below). \nThe sperm whale is also known as the \"cachalot\", which is thought to derive from the archaic French for \"tooth\" or \"big teeth\", as preserved for example in ' in the Gascon dialect (a word of either Romance or Basque origin). The etymological dictionary of Corominas says the origin is uncertain, but it suggests that it comes from the Vulgar Latin ', plural of ', \"sword hilt\". The word cachalot came to English via French from Spanish or Portuguese ', perhaps from Galician/Portuguese ', \"big head\". The term is retained in the Russian word for the animal, ('), as well as in many other languages.\n\nThe scientific genus name Physeter comes from Greek ' (), meaning \"blowpipe, blowhole (of a whale)\", or – as a pars pro toto – \"whale\".\nThe specific name macrocephalus is Latinized from the Greek ' (, meaning \"big-headed\"), from ' (, \"large\") + ' (, \"head\").\n\nIts synonymous specific name catodon means \"down-tooth\", from the Greek elements ' (\"below\") and ' (\"tooth\"); so named because it has visible teeth only in its lower jaw. (See: Teeth)\nAnother synonym australasianus (\"Australasian\") was applied to sperm whales in the southern hemisphere. \n\nTaxonomy \n\nThe sperm whale belongs to the order Cetartiodactyla, the order containing all cetaceans and even-toed ungulates. It is a member of the unranked clade Cetacea, with all the whales, dolphins, and porpoises, and further classified into Odontoceti, containing all the toothed whales and dolphins. It is the sole extant species of its genus, Physeter, in the family Physeteridae. Two species of the related extant genus Kogia, the pygmy sperm whale Kogia breviceps and the dwarf sperm whale K. simus, are placed either in this family or in the family Kogiidae. In some taxonomic schemes the families Kogiidae and Physeteridae are combined as the superfamily Physeteroidea (see the separate entry on the sperm whale family).\n\nThe sperm whale is one of the species originally described by Linnaeus in 1758 in his eighteenth century work, Systema Naturae. He recognised four species in the genus Physeter. Experts soon realised that just one such species exists, although there has been debate about whether this should be named P. catodon or P. macrocephalus, two of the names used by Linnaeus. Both names are still used, although most recent authors now accept macrocephalus as the valid name, limiting catodons status to a lesser synonym.\n\nBiology\n\nExternal appearance\n\nThe sperm whale is the largest toothed whale, with adult males measuring up to long and weighing up to 57000 kg. By contrast, the second largest toothed whale, Baird's Beaked Whale measures and weighs up to 15 ST. The Nantucket Whaling Museum has a -long jawbone. The museum claims that this individual was 80 ft long; the whale that sank the Essex (one of the incidents behind Moby-Dick) was claimed to be 85 ft. A similar size is reported from a jawbone from the British Natural History Museum. A 67-foot specimen is reported from a Soviet whaling fleet near the Kurile Islands in 1950. There is disagreement on the claims of adult males approaching or exceeding 80 ft in length. \n\nExtensive whaling may have decreased their size, as males were highly sought, primarily after World War II. Today, males do not usually exceed in length or 51000 kg in weight. Another view holds that exploitation by overwhaling had virtually no effect on the size of the bull sperm whales, and their size may have actually increased in current times on the basis of density dependent effects. Old males taken at Solander Islands were recorded to be extremely large and unusually rich in blubbers. \n\nIt is among the most sexually dimorphic of all cetaceans. At birth both sexes are about the same size, but mature males are typically 30% to 50% longer and three times as massive as females.\n\nThe sperm whale's unique body is unlikely to be confused with any other species. The sperm whale's distinctive shape comes from its very large, block-shaped head, which can be one-quarter to one-third of the animal's length. The S-shaped blowhole is located very close to the front of the head and shifted to the whale's left. This gives rise to a distinctive bushy, forward-angled spray.\n\nThe sperm whale's flukes (tail lobes) are triangular and very thick. Proportionally, they are larger than that of any other cetacean, and are very flexible. The whale lifts its flukes high out of the water as it begins a feeding dive. It has a series of ridges on the back's caudal third instead of a dorsal fin. The largest ridge was called the 'hump' by whalers, and can be mistaken for a dorsal fin because of its shape and size.\n\nIn contrast to the smooth skin of most large whales, its back skin is usually wrinkly and has been likened to a prune by whale-watching enthusiasts. Albinos have been reported. \n\nSkeleton\n\nThe ribs are bound to the spine by flexible cartilage, which allows the ribcage to collapse rather than snap under high pressure. While sperm whales are well adapted to diving, repeated dives to great depths have long-term effects. Bones show the same pitting that signals decompression sickness in humans. Older skeletons showed the most extensive pitting, whereas calves showed no damage. This damage may indicate that sperm whales are susceptible to decompression sickness, and sudden surfacing could be lethal to them. \n\nLike all cetaceans, the spine of the sperm whale has reduced zygapophysial joints, of which the remnants are modified and are positioned higher on the vertebral dorsal spinous process, hugging it laterally, to prevent extensive lateral bending and facilitate more dorso-ventral bending. These evolutionary modifications make the spine more flexible but weaker than the spines of terrestrial vertebrates. \n\nAs with other toothed whales, the skull of the sperm whale is asymmetrical so as to aid echolocation. Sound waves that strike the whale from different directions will not be channeled in the same way. Within the basin of the cranium, the openings of the bony narial tubes (from which the nasal passages spring) are skewed towards the left side of the skull.\n\nJaws and teeth \n\nThe sperm whale's lower jaw is very narrow and underslung. The sperm whale has 18 to 26 teeth on each side of its lower jaw which fit into sockets in the upper jaw. The teeth are cone-shaped and weigh up to 1 kg each. The teeth are functional, but do not appear to be necessary for capturing or eating squid, as well-fed animals have been found without teeth or even with deformed jaws. One hypothesis is that the teeth are used in aggression between males. Mature males often show scars which seem to be caused by the teeth. Rudimentary teeth are also present in the upper jaw, but these rarely emerge into the mouth. Analyzing the teeth is the preferred method for determining a whale's age. Like the age-rings in a tree, the teeth build distinct layers of cementum and dentine as they grow. \n\nBrain\n\nThe brain is the largest known of any modern or extinct animal, weighing on average about , more than five times heavier than a human's, and has a volume of about 8,000 cm3. Although larger brains generally correlate with higher intelligence, it is not the only factor. Elephants and dolphins also have larger brains than humans.Whitehead, p. 323 The sperm whale has a lower encephalization quotient than many other whale and dolphin species, lower than that of non-human anthropoid apes, and much lower than humans'. \n\nThe sperm whale's cerebrum is the largest in all mammalia, both in absolute and relative terms. The olfactory system is reduced, suggesting that the sperm whale has a poor sense of taste and smell. By contrast, the auditory system is enlarged. The pyramidal tract is poorly developed, reflecting the reduction of its limbs.\n\nBiological systems\n\nThe sperm whale respiratory system has adapted to cope with drastic pressure changes when diving. The flexible ribcage allows lung collapse, reducing nitrogen intake, and metabolism can decrease to conserve oxygen. Between dives, the sperm whale surfaces to breathe for about eight minutes before diving again. Odontoceti (toothed whales) breathe air at the surface through a single, S-shaped blowhole, which is extremely skewed to the left. Sperm whales spout (breathe) 3–5 times per minute at rest, increasing to 6–7 times per minute after a dive. The blow is a noisy, single stream that rises up to 2 m or more above the surface and points forward and left at a 45° angle. On average, females and juveniles blow every 12.5 seconds before dives, while large males blow every 17.5 seconds before dives. A sperm whale killed 160 km south of Durban, South Africa after a 1-hour, 50-minute dive was found with two dogfish (Scymnodon sp.), usually found at the sea floor, in its belly. \n\nThe sperm whale has the longest intestinal system in the world, exceeding 300 m in larger specimens. Similar to ruminants the sperm whale has four stomachs. The first secretes no gastric juices and has very thick muscular walls to crush the food (since whales cannot chew) and resist the claw and sucker attacks of swallowed squid. The second stomach is larger and is where digestion takes place. Undigested squid beaks accumulate in the second stomach – as many as 18,000 have been found in some dissected specimens. Most squid beaks are vomited by the whale, but some occasionally make it to the hindgut. Such beaks precipitate the formation of ambergris.\n\nIn 1959, the heart of a 22 MT male taken by whalers was measured to be 116 kg, about 0.5% of its total mass. The circulatory system has a number of specific adaptations for the aquatic environment. The diameter of the aortic arch increases as it leaves the heart. This bulbous expansion acts as a windkessel, ensuring a steady blood flow as the heart rate slows during diving. The arteries that leave the aortic arch are positioned symmetrically. There is no costocervical artery. There is no direct connection between the internal carotid artery and the vessels of the brain. Their circulatory system has adapted to dive at great depths, as much as 2250 m. Myoglobin, which stores oxygen in muscle tissue, is much more abundant than in terrestrial animals. The blood has a high density of red blood cells, which contain oxygen-carrying haemoglobin. The oxygenated blood can be directed towards only the brain and other essential organs when oxygen levels deplete. The spermaceti organ may also play a role by adjusting buoyancy (see below). The arterial retia mirabilia are extraordinarily well-developed. The complex arterial retia mirabilia of the sperm whale are more extensive and larger than those of any other cetacean.\n\nSenses\n\nSpermaceti organ and melon\n\nAtop the whale's skull is positioned a large complex of organs filled with a liquid mixture of fats and waxes called spermaceti. The purpose of this complex is to generate powerful and focused clicking sounds, which the sperm whale uses for echolocation and communication. \n\nThe spermaceti organ is like a large barrel of spermaceti. Its surrounding wall, known as the case, is extremely tough and fibrous. The case can hold within it up to 1,900 litres of spermaceti. It is proportionately larger in males.Whitehead, p. 321 This oil is a mixture of triglycerides and wax esters. The proportion of wax esters in the spermaceti organ increases with the age of the whale: 38–51% in calves, 58–87% in adult females, and 71–94% in adult males.Perrin, p. 1164 The spermaceti at the core of the organ has a higher wax content than the outer areas. The speed of sound in spermaceti is 2,684 m/s (at 40 kHz, 36 °C), making it nearly twice as fast as in the oil in a dolphin's melon.\n\nBelow the spermaceti organ lies the \"junk\" which consists of compartments of spermaceti separated by cartilage. It is analogous to the melon found in other toothed whales. The structure of the junk redistributes physical stress across the skull and may have evolved to protect the head during ramming. \n\nRunning through the head are two air passages. The left passage runs alongside the spermaceti organ and goes directly to the blowhole, whilst the right passage runs underneath the spermaceti organ and passes air through a pair of phonic lips and into the distal sac at the very front of the nose. The distal sac is connected to the blowhole and the terminus of the left passage. When the whale is submerged, it can close the blowhole, and air that passes through the phonic lips can circulate back to the lungs. The sperm whale, unlike other odontocetes, has only one pair of phonic lips, whereas all other toothed whales have two, and it is located at the front of the nose instead of behind the melon.\n\nAt the posterior end of this spermaceti complex is the frontal sac, which covers the concave surface of the cranium. The posterior wall of the frontal sac is covered with fluid–filled knobs, which are about 4–13 mm in diameter and separated by narrow grooves. The anterior wall is smooth. The knobbly surface reflects sound waves that come through the spermaceti organ from the phonic lips. The grooves between the knobs trap a film of air that is consistent whatever the orientation or depth of the whale, making it an excellent sound mirror.\n\nThe spermaceti organs may also help adjust the whale's buoyancy. It is hypothesized that before the whale dives, cold water enters the organ, and it is likely that the blood vessels constrict, reducing blood flow, and, hence, temperature. The wax therefore solidifies and reduces in volume. The increase in specific density generates a down force of about 392 N and allows the whale to dive with less effort. During the hunt, oxygen consumption, together with blood vessel dilation, produces heat and melts the spermaceti, increasing its buoyancy and enabling easy surfacing. However, more recent work has found many problems with this theory including the lack of anatomical structures for the actual heat exchange. \n\nHerman Melville's fictional story Moby Dick suggests that the \"case\" containing the spermaceti serves as a battering ram for use in fights between males. Apart from a few famous instances such as the well-documented sinking of the ships Essex and Ann Alexander by attackers estimated to weigh only one-fifth as much as the ships, this hypothesis is not well supported in current scientific literature.\n\nFile:Sperm whale phonic lips (NASA).jpg|The phonic lips.\nFile:Sperm whale exposed frontal sac.jpg|The frontal sac, exposed. Its surface is covered with fluid-filled knobs.\nFile:Sperm whale frontal sac surface close-up.jpg|A piece of the posterior wall of the frontal sac. The grooves between the knobs trap a consistent film of air, making it an excellent sound mirror.\n\nEyes and vision\n\nThe sperm whale's eye does not differ greatly from those of other toothed whales except in size. It is the largest among the toothed whales, weighing about 170 g. It is overall ellipsoid in shape, compressed along the visual axis, measuring about 7×7×3 cm. The cornea is elliptical and the lens is spherical. The sclera is very hard and thick, roughly 1 cm anteriorly and 3 cm posteriorly. There are no ciliary muscles. The choroid is very thick and contains a fibrous tapetum lucidum. Like other toothed whales, the sperm whale can retract and protrude its eyes thanks to a 2-cm-thick retractor muscle attached around the eye at the equator.\n\nAccording to Fristrup and Harbison (2002), \nsperm whales eyes afford good vision and sensitivity to light. They conjectured that sperm whales use vision to hunt squid, either by detecting silhouettes from below or by detecting bioluminescence. If sperm whales detect silhouettes, Fristrup and Harbison suggested that they hunt upside down, allowing them to use the forward parts of the ventral visual fields for binocular vision.\n\nSleeping\n\nFor some time researchers have been aware that pods of sperm whales may sleep for short periods, assuming a vertical position with their heads just below or at the surface. A 2008 study published in Current Biology recorded evidence that whales may sleep with both sides of the brain. It appears that some whales may fall into a deep sleep for about 7 percent of the time, most often between 6 p.m. and midnight. \n\nGenetics\n\nSperm whales have 21 pairs of chromosomes (2n=42). The genome of live whales can be examined by recovering shed skin. \n\nVocalization complex\n\nMechanism\n\nWhen echolocating, the sperm whale emits a directionally focused beam of broadband clicks. Clicks are generated by forcing air through a pair of phonic lips (also known as \"monkey lips\" or \"museau de singe\") at the front end of the nose, just below the blowhole. The sound then travels backwards along the length of the nose through the spermaceti organ. Most of the sound energy is then reflected off the frontal sac at the cranium and into the melon, whose lens-like structure focuses it. Some of the sound will reflect back into the spermaceti organ and back towards the front of the whale's nose, where it will be reflected through the spermaceti organ a third time. This back and forth reflection which happens on the scale of a few milliseconds creates a multi-pulse click structure. This multi-pulse click structure allows researchers to measure the whale's spermaceti organ using only the sound of its clicks. Because the interval between pulses of a sperm whale's click is related to the length of the sound producing organ, an individual whale's click is unique to that individual. However, if the whale matures and the size of the spermaceti organ increases, the tone of the whale's click will also change. The lower jaw is the primary reception path for the echoes. A continuous fat-filled canal transmits received sounds to the inner ear.Whitlow, W. \"Echolocation\", pp. 359–367 in Perrin\n\nThe source of the air forced through the phonic lips is the right nasal passage. While the left nasal passage opens to the blow hole, the right nasal passage has evolved to supply air to the phonic lips. It is thought that the nostrils of the land-based ancestor of the sperm whale migrated through evolution to their current functions, the left nostril becoming the blowhole and the right nostril becoming the phonic lips. \n\nAir that passes through the phonic lips passes into the distal sac, then back down through the left nasal passage. This recycling of air allows the whale to continuously generate clicks for as long as it is submerged. \n\nTypes of vocalization\n\nA creak is a rapid series of high-frequency clicks that sounds somewhat like a creaky door hinge. It is typically used when homing in on prey.\n\nA coda is a short pattern of 3 to 20 clicks that is used in social situations. They were once thought to be a way by which individuals identified themselves, but individuals have been observed producing multiple codas, and the same codas are used by multiple individuals.Whitehead, p. 141 However, each click contains a physical signature which suggests that clicks can be used to identify individuals. Geographically separate pods exhibit distinct dialects.Whitehead, p. 131 Large males are generally solitary and rarely produce codas. In breeding grounds, codas are almost entirely produced by adult females. Despite evidence that sperm whales share similar codas, it is still unknown whether sperm whales possess individually specific coda repertoires or whether individuals make codas at different rates. \n\nSlow clicks are heard only in the presence of males (it is not certain whether females occasionally make them). Males make a lot of slow clicks in breeding grounds (74% of the time), both near the surface and at depth, which suggests they are primarily mating signals. Outside breeding grounds, slow clicks are rarely heard, and usually near the surface.Whitehead, p. 144\n\nEcology\n\nDistribution\n\nSperm whales are among the most cosmopolitan species. They prefer ice-free waters over 1000 m deep. Although both sexes range through temperate and tropical oceans and seas, only adult males populate higher latitudes.\n\nThey are relatively abundant from the poles to the equator and are found in all the oceans. They inhabit the Mediterranean Sea, but not the Black Sea, while their presence in the Red Sea is uncertain. The shallow entrances to both the Black Sea and the Red Sea may account for their absence. The Black Sea's lower layers are also anoxic and contain high concentrations of sulphur compounds such as hydrogen sulphide. \n\nPopulations are denser close to continental shelves and canyons. Sperm whales are usually found in deep, off-shore waters, but may be seen closer to shore, in areas where the continental shelf is small and drops quickly to depths of 310 to. Coastal areas with significant sperm whale populations include the Azores and Dominica. In Asian waters, whales are also observed regularly in coastal waters in places such as Commander and Kuril Islands, Shiretoko Peninsula, off Kinkasan, vicinity to Tokyo Bay and Boso Peninsula to Izu and Izu Islands, Volcano Islands, Yakushima and Tokara Islands to Ryukyu Islands, Taiwan, Northern Mariana Islands, and so forth. Historical catch records suggest there could have been smaller aggression grounds in the Sea of Japan as well. \n\nGrown males are known to enter surprisingly shallow bays to rest (whales will be in state of rest during these occasions). There are unique, coastal groups reported from various areas among the globe such as Scotland, Shiretoko Peninsula, off Kaikoura, in Davao Gulf. Such costal groups were more abundant in pre-whaling days. \n\nDiet\n\nSperm whales usually dive between 300 to, and sometimes 1 to, in search of food. Such dives can last more than an hour. They feed on several species, notably the giant squid, but also the colossal squid, octopuses, and fish like demersal rays, but their diet is mainly medium-sized squid. Some prey may be taken accidentally while eating other items. Most of what is known about deep sea squid has been learned from specimens in captured sperm whale stomachs, although more recent studies analysed feces. One study, carried out around the Galápagos, found that squid from the genera Histioteuthis (62%), Ancistrocheirus (16%), and Octopoteuthis (7%) weighing between 12 and were the most commonly taken. Battles between sperm whales and giant squid or colossal squid have never been observed by humans; however, white scars are believed to be caused by the large squid. One study published in 2010 collected evidence that suggests that female sperm whales may collaborate when hunting Humboldt squid. Tagging studies have shown that sperm whales hunt upside down at the bottom of their deep dives. It is suggested that the whales can see the squid silhouetted above them against the dim surface light. \n\nAn older study, examining whales captured by the New Zealand whaling fleet in the Cook Strait region, found a 1.69:1 ratio of squid to fish by weight. Sperm whales sometimes take sablefish and toothfish from long lines. Long-line fishing operations in the Gulf of Alaska complain that sperm whales take advantage of their fishing operations to eat desirable species straight off the line, sparing the whales the need to hunt. However, the amount of fish taken is very little compared to what the sperm whale needs per day. Video footage has been captured of a large male sperm whale \"bouncing\" a long line, to gain the fish. Sperm whales are believed to prey on the megamouth shark, a rare and large deep-sea species discovered in the 1970s. In one case, three sperm whales were observed attacking or playing with a megamouth. \n\nThe sharp beak of a consumed squid lodged in the whale's intestine may lead to the production of ambergris, analogous to the production of pearls. The irritation of the intestines caused by squid beaks stimulates the secretion of this lubricant-like substance. Sperm whales are prodigious feeders and eat around 3% of their body weight per day. The total annual consumption of prey by sperm whales worldwide is estimated to be about 91 e6t. In comparison, human consumption of seafood is estimated to be 115 e6t.\n\nSperm whales hunt through echolocation. Their clicks are among the most powerful sounds in the animal kingdom (see above). It has been hypothesised that it can stun prey with its clicks. Experimental studies attempting to duplicate this effect have been unable to replicate the supposed injuries, casting doubt on this idea. \n\nIt has been stated that sperm whales, as well as other large cetaceans, help fertilise the surface of the ocean by consuming nutrients in the depths and transporting those nutrients to the oceans' surface when they defecate, an effect known as the whale pump. This fertilises phytoplankton and other plants on the surface of the ocean and contributes to ocean productivity and the drawdown of atmospheric carbon. \n\nLife cycle\n\nSperm whales can live 70 years or more. They are a prime example of a species that has been K-selected, meaning their reproductive strategy is associated with stable environmental conditions and comprises a low birth rate, significant parental aid to offspring, slow maturation, and high longevity.\n\nHow they choose mates has not been definitively determined. Males will fight with each other over females, and males will mate with multiple females, making them polygynous, but they do not dominate the group like a harem.Whitehead, p. 276 Males do not provide paternal care to their offspring.Whitehead, p. 343\n\nFemales become fertile at around 9 years of age.Whitehead, p. 122 The oldest pregnant female ever recorded was 41 years old.Whitehead, p. 123 Gestation requires 14 to 16 months, producing a single calf. Sexually mature females give birth once every 4 to 20 years (pregnancy rates were higher during the whaling era). Birth is a social event, as the mother and calf need others to protect them from predators. The other adults may jostle and bite the newborn in its first hours.Whitehead, p. 185\n\nLactation proceeds for 19 to 42 months, but calves, rarely, may suckle up to 13 years. Like other whales, the sperm whale's milk has a higher fat content than that of terrestrial mammals: about 36%, compared to 4% in cow milk. This gives it a consistency similar to cottage cheese, which prevents it from dissolving in the water before the calf can eat it. It has an energy content of roughly 3,840 kcal/kg, compared to just 640 kcal/kg in cow milk. Calves may be allowed to suckle from females other than their mothers.\n\nMales become sexually mature at 18 years. Upon reaching sexual maturity, males move to higher latitudes, where the water is colder and feeding is more productive. Females remain at lower latitudes. Males reach their full size at about age 50.\n\nSocial behaviour\n\nRelations within the species\n\nAdult males who are not breeding live solitary lives, whereas females and juvenile males live together in groups. The main driving force for the sexual segregation of adult sperm whales is scramble competition for mesopelagic squid.Whitehead, p. 347 Females and their young remain in groups, while mature males leave their \"natal unit\" somewhere between 4 and 21 years of age. Mature males sometimes form loose bachelor groups with other males of similar age and size. As males grow older, they typically live solitary lives. Mature males have beached themselves together, suggesting a degree of cooperation which is not yet fully understood. The whales rarely, if ever, leave their group.Whitehead, p. 232\n\nA social unit is a group of sperm whales who live and travel together over a period of years. Individuals rarely, if ever, join or leave a social unit. There is a huge variance in the size of social units. They are most commonly between six and nine individuals in size but can have more than twenty.Whitehead, p. 233 Unlike orcas, sperm whales within a social unit show no significant tendency to associate with their genetic relatives.Whitehead, p. 235 Females and calves spend about three quarters of their time foraging and a quarter of their time socializing. Socializing usually takes place in the afternoon.Whitehead, p. 204\n\nWhen sperm whales socialize, they emit complex patterns of clicks called codas. They will spend much of the time rubbing against each other. Tracking of diving whales suggests that groups engage in herding of prey, similar to bait balls created by other species, though the research needs to be confirmed by tracking the prey. \n\nRelations with other species\n\nThe most common natural predator of sperm whales is the orca, but pilot whales and false killer whales sometimes harass them. Orcas prey on target groups of females with young, usually making an effort to extract and kill a calf. The adults will protect their calves or an injured adult by encircling them. They may face inwards with their tails out (the 'marguerite formation', named after the flower). The heavy and powerful tail of an adult whale can deliver lethal blows. Alternatively, they may face outwards (the 'heads-out formation'). Other than sperm whales, southern right whales had been observed to perform similar formations.Ponnampalam S.L., 2016, [https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B682wgTUA8QiWHFYYmhBdWJWWm8/view No Danger in Sight? An Observation of Sperm Whales (Physeter macrocephalus) in Marguerite Formation off Muscat, Sultanate of Oman] However, formations in non dangerous situations have been recorded as well. Early whalers exploited this behaviour, attracting a whole unit by injuring one of its members. If the orca pod is extremely large, its members may sometimes be able to kill adult female sperm whales. Solitary mature males are known to interfere and come to the aid of vulnerable groups nearby. Individual large mature male sperm whales have no non-human predators, and are believed to be too large, powerful and aggressive to be threatened by orcas. In addition, male sperm whales have been observed to attack and intimidate orca pods. An incident was filmed from a long-line trawler: an orca pod was systematically taking fish caught on the trawler's long lines (as the lines were being pulled into the ship) when a male sperm whale appeared to repeatedly charge the orca pod in an attempt to drive them away; it was speculated by the film crew that the sperm whale was attempting to access the same fish. The orcas employed a tail outward and tail slapping defensive position against the bull sperm whale similar to that used by female sperm whales against attacking orcas. \n\nSperm whales are not known for forging bonds with other species, but it was observed that a bottlenose dolphin with spinal deformity had been accepted into a pod of sperm whales. They are known to swim alongside other cetaceans such as humpback, fin, minke, pilot, and orca whales on occasion. \n\nEvolutionary history\n\nFossil record\n\nAlthough the fossil record is poor, several extinct genera have been assigned to the clade Physeteroidea, which includes the last common ancestor of the modern sperm whale, pygmy sperm whales, dwarf sperm whales, and extinct physeteroids. These fossils include Ferecetotherium, Idiorophus, Diaphorocetus, Aulophyseter, Orycterocetus, Scaldicetus, Placoziphius, Zygophyseter and Acrophyseter. Ferecetotherium, found in Azerbaijan and dated to the late Oligocene (about ), is the most primitive fossil that has been found which possesses sperm whale-specific features such as an asymmetric rostrum (\"beak\" or \"snout\"). Most sperm whale fossils date from the Miocene period, . Diaphorocetus, from Argentina, has been dated to the early Miocene. Fossil sperm whales from the Middle Miocene include Aulophyseter, Idiorophus and Orycterocetus, all of which were found on the west coast of the United States, and Scaldicetus, found in Europe and Japan. Orycterocetus fossils have also been found in the North Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea, in addition to the west coast of the United States. Placoziphius, found in Europe, and Acrophyseter, from Peru, are dated to the late Miocene.\n\nFossil sperm whales differ from modern sperm whales in tooth count and the shape of the face and jaws. For example, Scaldicetus had a tapered rostrum. Genera from the Oligocene and early and middle Miocene, with the possible exception of Aulophyseter, had teeth in their upper jaws. Acrophyseter, from the late Miocene, also had teeth in both the upper and lower jaws as well as a short rostrum and an upward curving mandible (lower jaw). These anatomical differences suggest that fossil species may not have necessarily been deep-sea squid eaters like the modern sperm whale, but that some genera mainly ate fish. Zygophyseter, dated from the middle to late Miocene and found in southern Italy, had teeth in both jaws and appears to have been adapted to feed on large prey, rather like the modern Orca (Killer Whale). Other fossil sperm whales with adaptations similar to this are collectively known as killer sperm whales.\n\nPhylogeny\n\nThe traditional view has been that Mysticeti (baleen whales) and Odontoceti (toothed whales) arose from more primitive whales early in the Oligocene period, and that the super-family Physeteroidea, which contains the sperm whale, dwarf sperm whale, and pygmy sperm whale, diverged from other toothed whales soon after that, over .Mchedlidze, G. \"Sperm whales, evolution\", pp. 1172–1174 in Perrin From 1993 to 1996, molecular phylogenetics analyses by Milinkovitch and colleagues, based on comparing the genes of various modern whales, suggested that the sperm whales are more closely related to the baleen whales than they are to other toothed whales, which would have meant that Odontoceti were not monophyletic; in other words, it did not consist of a single ancestral toothed whale species and all its descendants. However, more recent studies, based on various combinations of comparative anatomy and molecular phylogenetics, criticised Milinkovitch's analysis on technical grounds and reaffirmed that the Odontoceti are monophyletic. \n\nThese analyses also confirm that there was a rapid evolutionary radiation (diversification) of the Physeteroidea in the Miocene period. The Kogiidae (dwarf and pygmy sperm whales) diverged from the Physeteridae (true sperm whales) at least . \n\nRelationship with humans\n\nSperm whaling\n\nSpermaceti, obtained primarily from the spermaceti organ, and sperm oil, obtained primarily from the blubber in the body, were much sought after by eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth century whalers. These substances found a variety of commercial applications, such as candles, soap, cosmetics, machine oil, other specialised lubricants, lamp oil, pencils, crayons, leather waterproofing, rust-proofing materials and many pharmaceutical compounds. Ambergris, a solid, waxy, flammable substance produced in the digestive system of sperm whales, was also sought as a fixative in perfumery.\n\nPrior to the early eighteenth century, hunting was mostly by indigenous Indonesians. Legend has it that sometime in the early eighteenth century, around 1712, Captain Christopher Hussey, while cruising for right whales near shore, was blown offshore by a northerly wind, where he encountered a sperm whale pod and killed one. Although the story may not be true, sperm whales were indeed soon exploited by American whalers. Judge Paul Dudley, in his Essay upon the Natural History of Whales (1725), states that one Atkins, ten or twelve years in the trade, was among the first to catch sperm whales sometime around 1720 off the New England coast. \n\nThere were only a few recorded catches during the first few decades (1709–1730s) of offshore sperm whaling. Instead, sloops concentrated on Nantucket Shoals, where they would have taken right whales or went to the Davis Strait region to catch bowhead whales. By the early 1740s, with the advent of spermaceti candles (before 1743), American vessels began to focus on sperm whales. The diary of Benjamin Bangs (1721–1769) shows that, along with the bumpkin sloop he sailed, he found three other sloops flensing sperm whales off the coast of North Carolina in late May 1743. On returning to Nantucket in the summer 1744 on a subsequent voyage, he noted that \"45 spermacetes are brought in here this day,\" another indication that American sperm whaling was in full swing.\n\nAmerican sperm whaling soon spread from the east coast of the American colonies to the Gulf Stream, the Grand Banks, West Africa (1763), the Azores (1765), and the South Atlantic (1770s). From 1770 to 1775 Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, and Rhode Island ports produced 45,000 barrels of sperm oil annually, compared to 8,500 of whale oil. In the same decade, the British began sperm whaling, employing American ships and personnel. By the following decade, the French had entered the trade, also employing American expertise. Sperm whaling increased until the mid-nineteenth century. Spermaceti oil was important in public lighting (for example, in lighthouses, where it was used in the United States until 1862, when it was replaced by lard oil, in turn replaced by petroleum) and for lubricating the machines (such as those used in cotton mills) of the Industrial Revolution. Sperm whaling declined in the second half of the nineteenth century, as petroleum came into broader use. In that sense, petroleum use may be said to have protected whale populations from even greater exploitation. Sperm whaling in the eighteenth century began with small sloops carrying only one or two whaleboats. The fleet's scope and size increased over time, and larger ships entered the fishery. In the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century sperm whaling ships sailed to the equatorial Pacific, the Indian Ocean, Japan, the coast of Arabia, Australia and New Zealand. Hunting could be dangerous to the crew, since sperm whales (especially bulls) will readily fight to defend themselves against attack, unlike most baleen whales. When dealing with a threat, sperm whales will use their huge head effectively as a battering ram. Arguably the most famous sperm whale counter-attack occurred on 20 November 1820, when a whale claimed to be about long rammed and sank the Nantucket whaleship Essex. Only 8 out of 21 sailors survived to be rescued by other ships. This instance is popularly believed to have inspired Herman Melville's famous book Moby-Dick. \n\nThe sperm whale's ivory-like teeth were often sought by eighteenth- and nineteenth-century whalers, who used them to produce inked carvings known as scrimshaw. Thirty teeth of the sperm whale can be used for ivory. Each of these teeth, up to 20 cm and 8 cm across, are hollow for the first half of their length. Like walrus ivory, sperm whale ivory has two distinct layers. However, sperm whale ivory contains a much thicker inner layer. Though a widely practised art in the nineteenth century, scrimshaw using genuine sperm whale ivory declined substantially after the retirement of the whaling fleets in the 1880s. Currently the Endangered Species Act and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), prevents the sales of or trade in sperm whale ivory harvested after 1973 or scrimshaw crafted from it.\n\nModern whaling was more efficient than open-boat whaling, employing steam-powered ships and exploding harpoons. Initially, modern whaling activity focused on large baleen whales, but as these populations were taken, sperm whaling increased. Spermaceti, the fine waxy oil produced by sperm whales, was in high demand. In both the 1941 to 1942 and 1942 to 1943 seasons, Norwegian expeditions took over 3,000 sperm whales off the coast of Peru alone. After the war, whaling continued unabated to obtain oil for cosmetics and high-performance machinery, such as automobile transmissions.\n\nThe hunting led to the near extinction of large whales, including sperm whales, until bans on whale oil use were instituted in 1972. The International Whaling Commission gave the species full protection in 1985 but hunting by Japan in the northern Pacific Ocean continued until 1988.\n\nIt is estimated that the historic worldwide population numbered 1,100,000 before commercial sperm whaling began in the early eighteenth century. By 1880 it had declined by an estimated 29 percent. From that date until 1946, the population appears to have partially recovered as whaling activity decreased, and after World War II, the whale population increases to 33 percent of the pre-whaling population. Between 184,000 and 236,000 sperm whales were killed by the various whaling nations in the nineteenth century, while in the twentieth century, at least 770,000 were taken, the majority between 1946 and 1980. \n\nSperm whales increase levels of primary production and carbon export by depositing iron-rich faeces into surface waters of the Southern Ocean. The iron-rich faeces cause phytoplankton to grow and take up more carbon from the atmosphere. When the phytoplankton dies, it sinks to the deep ocean and takes the atmospheric carbon with it. By reducing the abundance of sperm whales in the Southern Ocean, whaling has resulted in an extra 2 million tonnes of carbon remaining in the atmosphere each year. \n\nRemaining sperm whale populations are large enough that the species' conservation status is rated as vulnerable rather than endangered. However, the recovery from centuries of commercial whaling is a slow process, particularly in the South Pacific, where the toll on breeding-age males was severe. \n\nCurrent conservation status\n\nThe total number of sperm whales in the world is unknown, but is thought to be in the hundreds of thousands. The conservation outlook is brighter than for many other whales. Commercial whaling has ceased, and the species is protected almost worldwide, though records indicate that in the eleven-year period starting from 2000, Japan has caught 51 sperm whales. Fishermen do not target the creatures sperm whales eat, but long-line fishing operations in the Gulf of Alaska have complained about sperm whales stealing fish from their lines.\n\nCurrently, entanglement in fishing nets and collisions with ships represent the greatest threats to the sperm whale population. Other threats include ingestion of marine debris, ocean noise, and chemical pollution. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) regards the sperm whale as being \"Vulnerable\". The species is listed as endangered on the United States Endangered Species Act. \n\nSperm whales are listed on Appendix I and Appendix II of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS). It is listed on Appendix I as this species has been categorized as being in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant proportion of their range and CMS Parties strive towards strictly protecting these animals, conserving or restoring the places where they live, mitigating obstacles to migration and controlling other factors that might endanger them. It is listed on Appendix II as it has an unfavourable conservation status or would benefit significantly from international co-operation organised by tailored agreements. It is also covered by the Agreement on the Conservation of Cetaceans in the Black Sea, Mediterranean Sea and Contiguous Atlantic Area (ACCOBAMS) and the Memorandum of Understanding for the Conservation of Cetaceans and Their Habitats in the Pacific Islands Region (Pacific Cetaceans MOU).\n\nCultural importance\n\nRope-mounted teeth are important cultural objects throughout the Pacific. In New Zealand, the Māori know them as \"rei puta\"; such whale tooth pendants were rare objects because sperm whales were not actively hunted in traditional Māori society. Whale ivory and bone were taken from beached whales. In Fiji the teeth are known as tabua, traditionally given as gifts for atonement or esteem (called sevusevu), and were important in negotiations between rival chiefs. Friedrich Ratzel in The History of Mankind reported in 1896 that, in Fiji, whales' or cachalots' teeth were the most-demanded article of ornament or value. They occurred often in necklaces. Today the tabua remains an important item in Fijian life. The teeth were originally rare in Fiji and Tonga, which exported teeth, but with the Europeans' arrival, teeth flooded the market and this \"currency\" collapsed. The oversupply led in turn to the development of the European art of scrimshaw. \n\nHerman Melville's novel Moby-Dick is based on a true story about a sperm whale that attacked and sank the whaleship Essex. Melville associated the sperm whale with the Bible's Leviathan. The fearsome reputation perpetuated by Melville was based on bull whales' ability to fiercely defend themselves from attacks by early whalers, occasionally resulting in the destruction of the whaling ships.\n\nThe sperm whale was designated as the Connecticut state animal by the CT General Assembly in 1975. It was selected because of its specific contribution to the state's history and because of its present-day plight as an endangered species. \n\nWatching sperm whales\n\nSperm whales are not the easiest of whales to watch, due to their long dive times and ability to travel long distances underwater. However, due to the distinctive look and large size of the whale, watching is increasingly popular. Sperm whale watchers often use hydrophones to listen to the clicks of the whales and locate them before they surface. Popular locations for sperm whale watching include the town of Kaikoura on New Zealand's South Island, Andenes and Tromsø in Arctic Norway; as well as the Azores, where the continental shelf is so narrow that whales can be observed from the shore, and Dominica where a long-term scientific research program, The Dominica Sperm Whale Project, has been in operation since 2005. \n\nPlastic waste\n\nThe introduction of plastic waste to the ocean environment by humans is new. Sperm whales are now occasionally found with pieces of plastic in their stomachs.", "The beluga whale or white whale (Delphinapterus leucas) is an Arctic and sub-Arctic cetacean. It is one of two members of the family Monodontidae, along with the narwhal, and the only member of the genus Delphinapterus. This marine mammal is commonly referred to as the beluga, melonhead, or sea canary due to its high-pitched twitter. \n\nIt is adapted to life in the Arctic, so has anatomical and physiological characteristics that differentiate it from other cetaceans. Amongst these are its unmistakable all-white colour and the absence of a dorsal fin. It possesses a distinctive protuberance at the front of its head which houses an echolocation organ called the melon, which in this species is large and plastic (deformable). The beluga's body size is between that of a dolphin's and a true whale's, with males growing up to long and weighing up to 1600 kg. This whale has a stocky body. A large percentage of its weight is blubber, as is true of many cetaceans. Its sense of hearing is highly developed and its echolocation (sonar) allows it to move about and find blowholes under sheet ice.\n\nBelugas are gregarious and form groups of up to 10 animals on average, although during the summer, they can gather in the hundreds or even thousands in estuaries and shallow coastal areas. They are slow swimmers, but can dive to 700 m below the surface. They are opportunistic feeders and their diets vary according to their locations and the season. They mainly eat fish, crustaceans, and other deep-sea invertebrates.\n\nThe majority of belugas live in the Arctic Ocean and the seas and coasts around North America, Russia and Greenland; their worldwide population is thought to number around 150,000. They are migratory and the majority of groups spend the winter around the Arctic ice cap; when the sea ice melts in summer, they move to warmer river estuaries and coastal areas. Some populations are sedentary and do not migrate over great distances during the year.\n\nThe native peoples of North America and Russia have hunted belugas for many centuries. They were also hunted commercially during the 19th century and part of the 20th century. Whale hunting has been under international control since 1973. Currently, only certain Inuit and Alaska Native groups are allowed to carry out subsistence hunting of belugas. Other threats include natural predators (polar bears and killer whales), contamination of rivers (e.g. with PCBs, which bioaccumulate up the food chain, and infectious diseases.\n\nFrom a conservation perspective, the beluga was placed on the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List in 2008 as being \"near threatened\"; the subpopulation from the Cook Inlet in Alaska is considered Critically Endangered and is under the protection of the United States' Endangered Species Act. Of seven Canadian beluga populations, the two inhabiting eastern Hudson Bay and Ungava Bay are listed as endangered.\n\nBelugas are one of the cetaceans most commonly kept in captivity in aquariums and wildlife parks in North America, Europe, and Asia; they are popular with the public due to their colour and expression.\n\nTaxonomy\n\nThe beluga was first described in 1776 by Peter Simon Pallas. It is a member of the Monodontidae family, which is in turn part of the toothed whale parvorder. The Irrawaddy dolphin was once placed in the same family; recent genetic evidence suggests these dolphins belong to the Delphinidae family. The narwhal is the only other species within the Monodontidae besides the beluga. A skull has been discovered with intermediate characteristics supporting the hypothesis that hybridization is possible between these two families. \n\nThe name of the genus, Delphinapterus, means \"dolphin without fin\" (from the Greek δελφίν (delphin), dolphin and απτερος (apteros), without fin) and the species name leucas means \"white\" (from the Greek λευκας (leukas), white). The Red List of Threatened Species gives both beluga and white whale as common names, though the former is now more popular. The English name comes from the Russian белуха (belukha), which derives from the word белый (bélyj), meaning \"white\". The name beluga in Russian refers to an unrelated species, a fish, beluga sturgeon.\n\nThe whale is also colloquially known as the sea canary on account of its high-pitched squeaks, squeals, clucks, and whistles. A Japanese researcher says he taught a beluga to \"talk\" by using these sounds to identify three different objects, offering hope that humans may one day be able to communicate effectively with sea mammals. A similar observation has been made by Canadian researchers, where a beluga which died in 2007 \"talked\" when he was still a subadult. Another example is NOC, a beluga whale that could mimic the rhythm and tone of human language. Beluga whales in the wild have been reported to imitate human voices. \n\nEvolution\n\nMitochondrial DNA studies have shown modern cetaceans last shared a common ancestor between 30 and 34 million years ago. The family Monodontidae separated relatively early from the other odontoceti; it split from the Delphinoidea between 11 and 15 million years ago, and from the Phocoenidae, its closest relatives in evolutionary terms, more recently still. \n\nThe beluga's earliest known ancestor is the prehistoric Denebola brachycephala from the late Miocene period (9–10 million years ago). A single fossil from the Baja California Peninsula indicates the family once inhabited warmer waters. The fossil record also indicates, in comparatively recent times, the beluga's range varied with that of the polar ice packs expanding during ice ages and contracting when the ice retreated. Counter-evidence to this theory comes from the finding in 1849 of fossilised beluga bones in Vermont in the United States, 240 km from the Atlantic Ocean. The bones were discovered during construction of the first railroad between Rutland and Burlington in Vermont, when workers unearthed the bones of a mysterious animal in Charlotte. Buried nearly 10 ft below the surface in a thick blue clay, these bones were unlike those of any animal previously discovered in Vermont. Experts identified the bones as those of a beluga. Because Charlotte is over 150 mi from the nearest ocean, early naturalists were at a loss to explain the presence of the bones of a marine mammal buried beneath the fields of rural Vermont.\nThe remains were found to be preserved in the sediments of the Champlain Sea, an extension of the Atlantic Ocean within the continent resulting from the rise in sea level at the end of the ice ages some 12,000 years ago. Today, the Charlotte whale is the official Vermont State Fossil (making Vermont the only state whose official fossil is that of a still extant animal).\n\nDescription\n\nIts body is round, particularly when well fed, and tapers less smoothly to the head than the tail. The sudden tapering to the base of its neck gives it the appearance of shoulders, unique among cetaceans. The tailfin grows and becomes increasingly and ornately curved as the animal ages. The flippers are broad and short—making them almost square-shaped.\n\nLongevity\n\nPreliminary investigations suggested a beluga's life expectancy was rarely more than 30 years. The method used to calculate the age of a beluga is based on counting the layers of dentin and dental cement in a specimen's teeth, which were originally thought to be deposited once or twice a year. The layers can be readily identified as one layer consists of opaque dense material and the other is transparent and less dense. It is therefore possible to estimate the age of the individual by extrapolating the number of layers identified and the estimated frequency with which the deposits are laid down. A 2006 study using radiocarbon dating of the dentine layers showed the deposit of this material occurs with a lesser frequency (once per year) than was previously thought. The study therefore estimated belugas can live for 70 or 80 years. \n\nSize\n\nThe species presents a moderate degree of sexual dimorphism, as the males are 25% longer than the females and are sturdier. Adult male belugas can range from , while the females measure 3 to. Males weigh between 1100 and, occasionally up to 1900 kg while females weigh between 700 and. They rank as mid-sized species among toothed whales. \n\nBoth sexes reach their maximum size by the time they are 10 years old. The beluga's body shape is stocky and fusiform (cone-shaped with the point facing backwards), and they frequently have folds of fat, particularly along the ventral surface. Between 40% and 50% of their body weight is fat, which is a higher proportion than for cetaceans that do not inhabit the Arctic, where fat only represents 30% of body weight. The fat forms a layer that covers all of the body except the head, and it can be up to 15 cm thick. It acts as insulation in waters with temperatures between 0 and 18 °C, as well as being an important reserve during periods without food. \n\nColor\n\nThe adult beluga is rarely mistaken for any other species, because it is completely white or whitish-grey in colour. Calves are usually born grey, and by the time they are a month old, have turned dark grey or blue grey. They then start to progressively lose their pigmentation until they attain their distinctive white colouration, at the age of seven years in females and 9 in males. The white colouration of the skin is an adaptation to life in the Arctic that allows belugas to camouflage themselves in the polar ice caps as protection against their main predators, polar bears and killer whales. Unlike other cetaceans, the belugas seasonally shed their skin. During the winter, the epidermis thickens and the skin can become yellowish, mainly on the back and fins. When they migrate to the estuaries during the summer, they rub themselves on the gravel of the riverbeds to remove the cutaneous covering.\n\nHead and neck\n\nLike most toothed whales, it has a compartment found at the centre of the forehead that contains an organ used for echolocation called a melon, which contains fatty tissue. The shape of the beluga's head is unlike that of any other cetacean, as the melon is extremely bulbous, lobed, and visible as a large frontal prominence. Another distinctive characteristic it possesses is the melon is malleable; its shape is changed during the emission of sounds. The beluga is able to change the shape of its head by blowing air around its sinuses to focus the emitted sounds. This organ contains fatty acids, mainly isovaleric acid (60.1%) and long-chain branched acids (16.9%), a very different composition from its body fat, and which could play a role in its echolocation system. \n\nUnlike many dolphins and whales, the seven vertebrae in the neck are not fused together, allowing the animal to turn its head laterally without needing to rotate its body. This gives the head a lateral manoeuvrability that allows an improved field of view and movement and helps in catching prey and evading predators in deep water. The rostrum has about eight to 10 small, blunt, and slightly curved teeth on each side of the jaw and a total of 36 to 40 teeth. Belugas do not use their teeth to chew, but for catching hold of their prey; they then tear them up and swallow them nearly whole. Belugas only have a single spiracle, which is located on the top of the head behind the melon, and has a muscular covering, allowing it to be completely sealed. Under normal conditions, the spiracle is closed and an animal must contract the muscular covering to open the spiracle. A beluga's thyroid gland is larger than that of terrestrial mammals – weighing three times more than that of a horse – which helps it to maintain a greater metabolism during the summer when it lives in river estuaries. It is the marine cetacean that most frequently develops hyperplastic and neoplastic lesions of the thyroid. \n\nFins\n\nThe fins retain the bony vestiges of the beluga's mammalian ancestors, and are firmly bound together by connective tissue. The fins are small in relation to the size of the body, rounded and oar-shaped, and slightly curled at the tips. These versatile extremities are mainly used as a rudder to control direction, to work in synchrony with the tailfin and for agile movement in shallow waters up to 3 m deep. The fins also contain a mechanism for regulating body temperature, as the arteries feeding the fin's muscles are surrounded by veins that dilate or contract to gain or lose heat. The tailfin is flat with two oar-like lobes, it does not have any bones, and is made up of hard, dense, fibrous connective tissue. The tailfin has a distinctive curvature along the lower edge. The longitudinal muscles of the back provide the ascending and descending movement of the tailfin, which has a similar thermoregulation mechanism to the pectoral fins.\n\nBelugas have a dorsal ridge, rather than a dorsal fin. The absence of the dorsal fin is reflected in the genus name of the species—apterus the Greek word for \"wingless\". The evolutionary preference for a dorsal ridge rather than a fin is believed to be an adaptation to under-ice conditions, or possibly as a way of preserving heat. The crest is hard and, along with the head, can be used to open holes in ice up to 8 cm thick.\n\nSenses\n\nThe beluga has a very specialized sense of hearing and its auditory cortex is highly developed. It can hear sounds within the range of 1.2 to 120 kHz, with the greatest sensitivity between 10 and 75 kHz, where the average hearing range for humans is 0.02 to 20 kHz. The majority of sounds are most probably received by the lower jaw and transmitted towards the middle ear. In the toothed whales, the lower jawbone is broad with a cavity at its base, which projects towards the place where it joins the cranium. A fatty deposit inside this small cavity connects to the middle ear. Toothed whales also possess a small external auditory hole a few centimetres behind their eyes; each hole communicates with an external auditory conduit and an eardrum. It is not known if these organs are functional or simply vestigial.\n\nBelugas are able to see within and outside of water, but their vision is relatively poor when compared to dolphins. Their eyes are especially adapted to seeing under water, although when they come into contact with the air, the crystalline lens and the cornea adjust to overcome the associated myopia (the range of vision under water is short). A beluga's retina has cones and rods, which also suggests they can see in low light. The presence of cone cells indicates they can see colours, although this suggestion has not been confirmed. Glands located in the medial corner of their eyes secrete an oily, gelatinous substance that lubricates the eye and helps flush out foreign bodies. This substance forms a film that protects the cornea and the conjunctiva from pathogenic organisms.\n\nStudies on captive animals show they seek frequent physical contact with other belugas. Areas in the mouth have been found that could act as chemoreceptors for different tastes, and they can detect the presence of blood in water, which causes them to react immediately by displaying typical alarm behaviour. Like the other toothed whales, their brains lack olfactory bulbs and olfactory nerves, which suggests they do not have a sense of smell.\n\nBehaviour\n\nThese cetaceans are highly sociable and they regularly form small groups, or pods, that may contain between two and 25 individuals, with an average of 10 members. Pods tend to be unstable, meaning individuals tend to move from pod to pod. Radio tracking has even shown belugas can start out in one pod and within a few days be hundreds of miles away from that pod. These pods contain animals of both sexes, and are led by a dominant male. Many hundreds and even thousands of individuals can be present when the pods join together in river estuaries during the summer. This can represent a significant proportion of the total population and is when they are most vulnerable to being hunted. \n\nThey are cooperative animals and frequently hunt in coordinated groups. The animals in a pod are very sociable and often chase each other as if they are playing or fighting, and they often rub against each other. \n\nIn captivity, they can be seen to be constantly playing, vocalizing, and swimming around each other. They show a great deal of curiosity towards humans and frequently approach the windows in the tanks to observe them. Belugas may also playfully spit at humans or other whales. It is not unusual for an aquarium handler to be drenched by one of his charges. Some researchers believe spitting originated with blowing sand away from crustaceans at the sea bottom.\n\nBelugas also show a great degree of curiosity towards humans in the wild, and frequently swim alongside boats. They also play with objects they find in the water; in the wild, they do this with wood, plants, dead fish, and bubbles they have created. During the breeding season, adults have been observed carrying objects such as plants, nets, and even the skeleton of a dead reindeer on their heads and backs. Captive females have also been observed displaying this behaviour, carrying items such as floats and buoys, after they have lost a calf; experts consider this interaction with the objects could be acting as a substitute behaviour. \n\nSwimming and diving\n\nBelugas are slower swimmers than the other toothed whales, such as the killer whale and the common bottlenose dolphin, because they are less hydrodynamic and have limited movement of their tailfins, which produce the greatest thrust. They frequently swim at between 3 and, although they are able to maintain a speed of 22 km/h for up to 15 min. Unlike most cetaceans, they are capable of swimming backwards. Belugas swim on the surface between 5% and 10% of the time, while for the rest of the time they swim at a depth sufficient to cover their bodies. They do not jump out of the water like dolphins or killer whales.\n\nThese animals usually only dive to depths to 20 m, although they are capable of diving to greater depths. Individual captive animals have been recorded at depths between 400 and 647 m below sea level, while animals in the wild have been recorded as diving to a depth of more than 700 m, with the greatest recorded depth being 872 m. A dive normally lasts 3 to 5 min, but can last up to 18 min. In the shallower water of the estuaries, a diving session may last around two minutes; the sequence consists of five or six rapid, shallow dives followed by a deeper dive lasting up to one minute. The average number of dives per day varies between 31 and 51.\n\nAll cetaceans, including belugas, have physiological adaptations designed to conserve oxygen while they are under water. During a dive, these animals will reduce their heart rate from 100 beats a minute to between 12 and 20. Blood flow is diverted away from certain tissues and organs and towards the brain, heart and lungs, which require a constant oxygen supply. The amount of oxygen dissolved in the blood is 5.5%, which is greater than that found in land-based mammals and is similar to that of Weddell seals (a diving marine mammal). One study found a female beluga had 16.5 l of oxygen dissolved in her blood. Lastly, the beluga's muscles contain high levels of the protein myoglobin, which stores oxygen in muscle. Myoglobin concentrations are several times greater than for terrestrial mammals, which help prevent oxygen deficiency during dives. \n\nBeluga whales often accompany bowhead whales, for curiosity and to secure polynya feasible to breathe as bowheads are capable of breaking through ice from underwater by headbutting. \n\nDiet\n\nBelugas play an important role in the structure and function of marine resources in the Arctic Ocean, as they are the most abundant toothed whales in the region. They are opportunistic feeders; their feeding habits depend on their locations and the season. For example, when they are in the Beaufort Sea, they mainly eat Arctic cod (Boreogadus saida) and the stomachs of belugas caught near Greenland were found to contain rose fish (Sebastes marinus), Greenland halibut (Reinhardtius hippoglossoides), and northern shrimp (Pandalus borealis), while in Alaska their staple diet is Pacific salmon (Oncorhynchus kisutch). In general, the diets of these cetaceans consist mainly of fish; apart from those previously mentioned, other fish they feed on include capelin (Mallotus villosus), smelt, sole, flounder, herring, sculpin, and other types of salmon. They also consume a great quantity of invertebrates, apart from shrimp, such as squid, crabs, clams, octopus, sea snails, bristle worms, and other deep-sea species. Animals in captivity eat 2.5% to 3.0% of their body weight per day, which equates to 18.2 to 27.2 kg. \n\nForaging on the seabed typically takes place at depths between 20 and 40 m, although they can dive to depths of 700 m in search of food. Their flexible necks provide a wide range of movement while they are searching for food on the ocean floor. Some animals have been observed to suck up water and then forcefully expel it to uncover their prey hidden in the silt on the seabed. As their teeth are neither large nor sharp, belugas must use suction to bring their prey into their mouths; it also means their prey has to be consumed whole, which in turn means it cannot be too large or the belugas run the risk of it getting stuck in their throats. They also join together into coordinated groups of five or more to feed on shoals of fish by steering the fish into shallow water, where the belugas then attack them. For example, in the estuary of the Amur River, where they mainly feed on salmon, groups of six or eight individuals join together to surround a shoal of fish and prevent their escape. Individuals then take turns feeding on the fish.\n\nReproduction\n\nEstimations of the age of sexual maturity for beluga whales vary considerably; the majority of authors estimate males reach sexual maturity when they are between four and seven years old, and females reach maturity when they are between four and nine years old. The average age at which females first give birth is 8.5 years and fertility begins to decrease when they are 25, with no births recorded for females older than 41.\n\nFemale belugas typically give birth to one calf every three years. Most mating occurs usually February through May, but some mating occurs at other times of year. The beluga may have delayed implantation. Gestation has been estimated to last 12.0 to 14.5 months, but information derived from captive females suggests a longer gestation period up to 475 days (15.8 months). \n\nCalves are born over a protracted period that varies by location. In the Canadian Arctic, calves are born between March and September, while in Hudson Bay, the peak calving period is in late June, and in Cumberland Sound, most calves are born from late July to early August. Births usually take place in bays or estuaries where the water is warm with a temperature of 10 to 15 °C. Newborns are about long, weigh about 80 kg, and are grey in colour. They are able to swim alongside their mothers immediately after birth. The newborn calves nurse under water and initiate lactation a few hours after birth; thereafter, they feed at intervals around an hour. Studies of captive females have indicated their milk composition varies between individuals and with the stage of lactation; it has an average content of 28% fat, 11% protein, 60.3% water, and less than 1% residual solids. The milk contains about 92 cal per ounce.\n\nThe calves remain dependent on their mothers for nursing for the first year, when their teeth appear. After this, they start to supplement their diets with shrimp and small fish. The majority of the calves continue nursing until they are 20 months old, although occasionally lactation can continue for more than two years, and lactational anoestrus may not occur. Alloparenting (care by females different from the mother) has been observed in captive belugas, including spontaneous and long-term milk production. This suggests this behaviour, which is also seen in other mammals, may be present in belugas in the wild. \n\nCommunication and echolocation\n\nBelugas use sounds and echolocation for movement, communication, to find breathing holes in the ice, and to hunt in dark or turbid waters. They produce a rapid sequence of clicks that pass through the melon, which acts as an acoustic lens to focus the sounds into a beam that is projected forward through the surrounding water. These sounds spread through the water at a speed of nearly 1.6 km per second, some four times faster than the speed of sound in the air. The sound waves rebound from objects in the water and return as echoes that are heard and interpreted by the animal. This enables them to determine the distance, speed, size, shape, and even the internal structure of the objects within the beam of sound. They also use this ability when moving around the thick ice sheets of the Arctic, to find areas of unfrozen water for breathing, or air pockets trapped under the frozen sheet ice.\n\nSome evidence indicates belugas are highly sensitive to the noise pollution produced by humans. In one study, the maximum frequencies produced by an individual located in San Diego Bay, California, were between 40 and 60 kHz. The same individual produced sounds with a maximum frequency of 100 to 120 kHz on being transferred to Kaneohe Bay in Hawaii. The difference in frequencies is thought to be a response to the difference in environmental noise in the two areas. \n\nThese cetaceans communicate using sounds of such high frequency; their calls sometimes sound like bird songs, so belugas have been given the nickname \"canaries of the sea\". Like the other toothed whales, belugas do not possess vocal cords and the sounds are probably produced by the movement of air between the nasal sacks, which are located near to the blowhole.\n\nBelugas are amongst the most vocal cetaceans. They use their vocalisations for echolocation, during mating, and in communication. They possess a large repertoire, as they can emit up to 11 different sounds, such as cackles, whistles, trills, and squawks. They also make sounds by grinding their teeth or splashing, but they rarely use body language to make visual displays with their pectoral fins or tailfins, nor do they perform somersaults or jumps in the way other species do, such as dolphins.\n\nDistribution\n\nThe beluga inhabits a discontinuous circumpolar distribution in Arctic and sub-Arctic waters. During the summer, they can mainly be found in the deep waters ranging from 76°N to 80°N, particularly along the coasts of Alaska, northern Canada, western Greenland, and northern Russia. The southernmost extent of their range includes isolated populations in the St. Lawrence River in the Atlantic, and the Amur River delta, the Shantar Islands, and the waters surrounding Sakhalin Island in the Sea of Okhotsk. \n\nMigration\n\nBelugas have a seasonal migratory pattern. When the summer sites become blocked with ice during the autumn, they move to spend the winter in the open sea alongside the pack ice or in areas covered with ice, surviving by using polynyas to surface and breathe. In summer after the sheet ice has melted, they move to coastal areas with shallower water (1–3 m deep), although sometimes they migrate towards deeper waters (>800 m). In the summer, they occupy estuaries and the waters of the continental shelf, and on occasion, they even swim up the rivers. A number of incidents have been reported where groups or individuals have been found hundreds or even thousands of kilometres from the ocean. One such example comes from 9 June 2006, when a young beluga carcass was found in the Tanana River near Fairbanks in central Alaska, nearly 1700 km from the nearest ocean habitat. Belugas sometimes follow migrating fish, leading Alaska state biologist Tom Seaton to speculate it had followed migrating salmon up the river at some point in the previous autumn. The rivers they most often travel up include: the Northern Dvina, the Mezen, the Pechora, the Ob and the Yenisei in Asia; the Yukon and the Kuskokwim in Alaska, and the Saint Lawrence in Canada. Spending time in a river has been shown to stimulate an animal's metabolism and facilitates the seasonal renewal of the epidermal layer. In addition, the rivers represent a safe haven for newborn calves where they will not be preyed upon by killer whales. Calves often return to the same estuary as their mother in the summer, meeting her sometimes even after becoming fully mature. \n\nThe migration season is relatively predictable, as it is basically determined by the amount of daylight and not by other variable physical or biological factors, such as the condition of the sea ice. Vagrants may travel further south to areas such as Irish and Scottish waters, islands of Orkney and Hebrides, and to Japanese waters. There had been several vagrant individuals demonstrated seasonal residencies at Volcano Bay, and a unique whale were used to return annually to areas adjacent to Shibetsu in Nemuro Strait in the 2000s. On rarer occasions, individuals of vagrancy can reach the Korean Peninsula. A few other individuals have been confirmed to return to the coasts of Hokkaido, including brackish waters such as Lake Notoro. \n\nSome populations are not migratory and certain resident groups will stay in well-defined areas, for example in Cook Inlet, the estuary of the Saint Lawrence River and Cumberland Sound. The population in Cook Inlet stays in the waters furthest inside the inlet during the summer and until the end of autumn, then during the winter, they disperse to the deeper water in the centre of the inlet, but without completely leaving it. \n\nIn April, the animals that spend the winter in the centre and southwest of the Bering Sea move to the north coast of Alaska and the east coast of Russia. The populations living in the Ungava Bay and the eastern and western sides of Hudson Bay overwinter together beneath the sea ice in Hudson Strait. The populations of the White Sea, the Kara Sea and the Laptev Sea overwinter in the Barents Sea. In the spring, the groups separate and migrate to their respective summer sites.\n\nHabitat\n\nBelugas exploit a varied range of habitats; they are most commonly seen in shallow waters close to the coast, but they have also been reported to live for extended periods in deeper water, where they feed and give birth to their young.\n\nIn coastal areas, they can be found in coves, fjords, canals, bays, and shallow waters in the Arctic Ocean that are continuously lit by sunlight. They are also often seen during the summer in river estuaries, where they feed, socialize, and give birth to young. These waters usually have a temperature between 8 and 10 °C. The mudflats of Cook Inlet in Alaska are a popular location for these animals to spend the first few months of summer. In the eastern Beaufort Sea, female belugas with their young and immature males prefer the open waters close to land; the adult males live in waters covered by ice near to the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, while the younger males and females with slightly older young can be found nearer to the ice shelf. Generally, the use of different habitats in summer reflects differences in feeding habits, risk from predators, and reproductive factors for each of the subpopulations.\n\nPopulation\n\nThe global beluga population is made up of a number of subpopulations. The scientific committee of the International Whaling Commission recognises these 29 subpopulations:\n\nThe estimate of population sizes is complicated because the boundaries for some of these groups overlap geographically or seasonally. The IUCN estimated the world beluga population in 2008 to be well in excess of 150,000.\n\nThreats\n\nHunting\n\nThe native populations of the Canadian, Alaskan, and Russian Arctic regions hunt belugas for their meat, blubber, and skin. The cured skin is the only cetacean skin that is sufficiently thick to be used as leather. Belugas were easy prey for hunters due to their predictable migration patterns and the high population density in estuaries and surrounding coastal areas during the summer.\n\nCommercial whaling by European and American whalers during the 18th and 19th centuries decreased beluga populations in the Canadian Arctic. The animals were hunted for their meat and blubber, while the Europeans used the oil from the melon as a lubricant for clocks, machinery, and lighting in lighthouses. Mineral oil replaced whale oil in the 1860s, but the hunting of these animals continued unabated. In 1863, the cured skin could be used to make horse harnesses, machine belts for saw mills, and shoelaces. These manufactured items ensured the hunting of belugas continued for the rest of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. Between 1868 and 1911, Scottish and American whalers killed more than 20,000 belugas in Lancaster Sound and Davis Strait.\n\nDuring the 1920s, fishermen in the Saint Lawrence River estuary considered belugas to be a threat to the fishing industry, as they eat large quantities of cod, salmon, tuna, and other fish caught by the local fishermen. The presence of belugas in the estuary was, therefore, considered to be undesirable; in 1928, the Government of Quebec offered a reward of 15 dollars for each dead beluga. The Quebec Department of Fisheries launched a study into the influence of these cetaceans on local fish populations in 1938. The unrestricted killing of belugas continued into the 1950s, when the supposed voracity of the belugas was found to be overestimated and did not adversely affect fish populations. L'Isle-aux-Coudres is the setting for the classic 1963 National Film Board of Canada documentary Pour la suite du monde, which depicts a one-off resurrection of the beluga hunt.\n\nThe Arctic's native peoples still carry out subsistence hunting of belugas to obtain food and raw materials. This practice is a part of their culture, but doubts still remain whether the number of whales killed may be sustainable. The number of animals killed is about 200 to 550 in Alaska and around 1,000 in Canada. However, in areas such as Cook Inlet, Ungava Bay, and western Greenland, previous levels of commercial whaling have put the species in danger of extinction, and continued hunting by the native peoples may mean some populations will continue to decline. The Canadian sites are the focus of discussions between the local communities and the Canadian government, with the objective of permitting sustainable hunting that does not put the species at risk of extinction. \n\nPredation\n\nDuring the winter, belugas commonly become trapped in the ice without being able to escape to open water, which may be several kilometres away. Polar bears take particular advantage of these situations and are able to locate the belugas using their sense of smell. The bears swipe at the belugas and drag them onto the ice to eat them. They are able to capture large individuals in this way; in one documented incident, a bear weighing between 150 and 180 kg was able to capture an animal that weighed 935 kg. \n\nKiller whales are able to capture both young and adult belugas. They live in all the seas of the world and share the same habitat as belugas in the sub-Arctic region. Attacks on belugas by killer whales have been reported in the waters of Greenland, Russia, Canada, and Alaska. A number of killings have been recorded in Cook Inlet, and experts are concerned the predation by killer whales will impede the recovery of this subpopulation, which has already been badly depleted by hunting. The killer whales arrive at the beginning of August, but the belugas are occasionally able to hear their presence and evade them. The groups near to or under the sea ice have a degree of protection, as the killer whale's large dorsal fin, up to 2 m in length, impedes their movement under the ice and does not allow them to get sufficiently close to the breathing holes in the ice.\n\nContamination\n\nThe beluga is considered an excellent sentinel species (indicator of environment health and changes), because it is long-lived, at the top of the food web, bears large amounts of fat and blubber, relatively well-studied for a cetacean, and still somewhat common.\n\nHuman pollution can be a threat to belugas' health when they congregate in river estuaries. Chemical substances such as DDT and heavy metals such as lead, mercury and cadmium have been found in individuals of the Saint Lawrence River population. Local beluga carcasses contain so many contaminants, they are treated as toxic waste. Levels of polychlorinated biphenyls between 240 and 800 ppm have been found in belugas' brains, liver and muscles, with the highest levels found in males. These levels are significantly greater than those found in Arctic populations. These substances have a proven adverse effect on these cetaceans, as they cause cancers, reproductive diseases, and the deterioration of the immune system, making individuals more susceptible to pneumonias, ulcers, cysts, tumours, and bacterial infections. Although the populations that inhabit the river estuaries run the greatest risk of contamination, high levels of zinc, cadmium, mercury, and selenium have also been found in the muscles, livers, and kidneys of animals that live in the open sea. \n\nFrom a sample of 129 beluga adults from the Saint Lawrence River examined between 1983 and 1999, a total of 27% had suffered cancer. This is a higher percentage than that documented for other populations of this species and is much higher than for other cetaceans and for the majority of terrestrial mammals; in fact, the rate is only comparable to the levels found in humans and some domesticated animals. For example, the rate of intestinal cancer in the sample is much higher than for humans. This condition is thought to be directly related to environmental contamination, in this case by polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and coincides with the high incidence of this disease in humans residing in the area. The prevalence of tumours suggests the contaminants identified in the animals that inhabit the estuary are having a direct carcinogenic effect or they are at least causing an immunological deterioration that is reducing the inhabitants' resistance to the disease. \n\nIndirect human disturbance may also be a threat. While some populations tolerate small boats, most actively try to avoid ships. Whale-watching has become a booming activity in the St. Lawrence and Churchill River areas, and acoustic contamination from this activity appears to have an effect on belugas. For example, a correlation appears to exist between the passage of belugas across the mouth of the Saguenay River, which has decreased by 60%, and the increase in the use of recreational motorboats in the area. A dramatic decrease has also been recorded in the number of calls between animals (decreasing from 3.4 to 10.5 calls/min to 0 or \n\nPapillomaviruses have been found in the stomachs of belugas in the Saint Lawrence River. Animals in this location have also been recorded as suffering infections caused by herpesviruses and in certain cases to be suffering from encephalitis caused by the protozoan Sarcocystis. Cases have been recorded of ciliate protozoa colonising the spiracle of certain individuals, but they not thought to be pathogens or at least they are not very harmful.\n\nThe bacterium Erysipelothrix rhusiopathiae, which probably comes from eating infected fish, poses a threat to belugas kept in captivity, causing anorexia and dermal plaques and lesions that can lead to septicemia. This condition can cause death if it is not diagnosed and treated in time with antibiotics such as ciprofloxacin. \n\nA study of infections caused by parasitic worms in a number of individuals of both sexes found the presence of larvae from a species from the Contracaecum genus in their stomachs and intestines, Anisakis simplex in their stomachs, Pharurus pallasii in their ear canals, Hadwenius seymouri in their intestines, and Leucasiella arctica in their rectums. \n\nRelationship with humans\n\nCaptivity\n\nBelugas were among the first whale species to be kept in captivity. The first beluga was shown at Barnum's Museum in New York City in 1861. For most of the 20th century, Canada was the predominant source for belugas destined for exhibition. Until the early 1960s, they were taken from the St. Lawrence River estuary (famously captured in the film documentary Pour la suite du monde) and from 1967 from the Churchill River estuary. This continued until 1992, when the practice was banned. Since Canada ceased to be the supplier of these animals, Russia has become the largest provider. Individuals are caught in the Amur River delta and the far eastern seas of the country, and then are either transported domestically to aquaria in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Sochi, or exported to foreign nations, including Canada.\n\nToday, it remains one of the few whale species kept at aquaria and marine parks across North America, Europe, and Asia. As of 2006, 30 belugas were in Canada and 28 in the United States, and 42 deaths in captivity had been reported up to that time. A single specimen can reportedly fetch up to US$100,000 on the market. The beluga's popularity with visitors reflects its attractive colour and its range of facial expressions. The latter is possible because while most cetacean \"smiles\" are fixed, the extra movement afforded by the beluga's unfused cervical vertebrae allows a greater range of apparent expression.\n\nTo provide some enrichment while in captivity, aquaria train belugas to perform behaviors for the public and for medical exams, such as blood draws and ultrasound, provide toys, and allow the public to play recorded or live music. \n\nMost belugas found in aquaria are caught in the wild, as captive-breeding programs have not had much success so far. For example, despite best efforts, as of 2010, only two male whales had been successfully used as stud animals in the Association of Zoos and Aquariums beluga population, Nanuq at SeaWorld San Diego and Naluark at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, USA. Nanuq has fathered 10 calves, five of which survived birth. Naluark at Shedd Aquarium has fathered four living offspring. Naluark has been relocated to Mystic Aquarium in the hope that he will breed with two of their females. The first beluga calf born in captivity in Europe was born in L'Oceanogràfic marine park in Valencia, Spain, in November 2006. However, the calf died 25 days later after suffering metabolic complications, infections, and not being able to feed properly. \n\nBetween 1960 and 1992, the United States Navy carried out a program that included the study of marine mammals' abilities with echolocation, with the objective of improving the detection of underwater objects. The program started with dolphins, but a large number of belugas were also used from 1975 on. The program included training these mammals to carry equipment and material to divers working under water, the location of lost objects, surveillance of ships and submarines, and underwater monitoring using cameras held in their mouths. A similar program was implemented by the Russian Navy during the Cold War, in which belugas were also trained for antimining operations in Arctic waters.\n\nIn 2009 during a free-diving competition in a tank of icy water in Harbin, China, a captive beluga brought a cramp-paralyzed diver from the bottom of the pool up to the surface by holding her foot in its mouth, saving the diver's life. \n\nWhale watching\n\nWhale watching has become an important activity in the recovery of the economies of towns in Hudson Bay near to the Saint Lawrence and Churchill Rivers. The best time to see belugas is during the summer, when they meet in large numbers in the estuaries of the rivers and in their summer habitats. The animals are easily seen due to their high numbers and their curiosity regarding the presence of humans.\n\nHowever, the boats' presence poses a threat to the animals, as it distracts them from important activities such as feeding, social interaction and reproduction. In addition, the noise produced by the motors has an adverse effect on their auditory function and reduces their ability to detect their prey, communicate, and navigate. To protect these marine animals during whale-watching activities, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has published a “Guide for observing marine life”. The guide recommends boats carrying the whale watchers keep their distance from the cetaceans and it expressly prohibits chasing, harassing, obstructing, touching, or feeding them. \n\nSome regular migrations do occur into Russian EEZ of Sea of Japan such as to Rudnaya Bay, where diving with wild belugas became a less-known but popular attraction. \n\nHuman speech\n\nMale belugas in captivity can mimic the pattern of human speech, several octaves lower than typical whale calls. It is not the first time a beluga has been known to sound human, and they often shout like children, in the wild. One captive beluga, after overhearing divers using an underwater communication system, caused one of the divers to surface by imitating their order to get out of the water. Subsequent recordings confirmed that the beluga had become skilled at imitating the patterns and frequency of human speech. After several years, this beluga ceased making these sounds. \n\nConservation status\n\nAs of 2008, the beluga is listed as \"near threatened\" by the IUCN due to uncertainty about threats to their numbers and the number of belugas over parts of its range (especially the Russian Arctic), and the expectation that if current conservation efforts cease, especially hunting management, the beluga population is likely to qualify for \"threatened\" status within five years. Prior to 2008, the beluga was listed as \"vulnerable\", a higher level of concern. IUCN cited the stability of the largest subpopulations and improved census methods that indicate a larger population than previously estimated.\n\nSubpopulations are subject to differing levels of threat and warrant individual assessment. The nonmigratory Cook Inlet subpopulation is listed as \"Critically Endangered\" by the IUCN as of 2006 and is listed as Endangered under the Endangered Species Act as of October 2008. \nThis was due to overharvesting of belugas prior to 1998. The population has failed to recover, though the reported harvest has been small. The most recently published estimate as of May 2008 was 302 (CV=0.16) in 2006. In addition, the National Marine Fisheries Service indicated the 2007 aerial survey's point estimate was 375.\n\nLegal protection\n\nThe US Congress passed the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 outlawing the persecution and hunting of all marine mammals within US coastal waters. The act has been amended a number of times to permit subsistence hunting by native peoples, temporary capture of restricted numbers for research, education and public display, and to decriminalise the accidental capture of individuals during fishing operations. The act also states that all whales in US territorial waters are under the jurisdiction of the National Marine Fisheries Service, a division of NOAA.\n\nTo prevent hunting, belugas are protected under the 1986 International Moratorium on Commercial Whaling; however, hunting of small numbers of belugas is still allowed. Since it is very difficult to know the exact population of belugas because their habitats include inland waters away from the ocean, they easily come in contact with oil and gas development centres. To prevent whales from coming in contact with industrial waste, the Alaskan and Canadian governments are relocating sites where whales and waste come in contact.\n\nThe beluga whale is listed on appendix II\"[http://www.cms.int/documents/appendix/Appendices_COP9_E.pdf Appendix II]\" of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS). As amended by the Conference of the Parties in 1985, 1988, 1991, 1994, 1997, 1999, 2002, 2005 and 2008. Effective: 5 March 2009. of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS). It is listed on Appendix II as it has an unfavourable conservation status or would benefit significantly from international co-operation organised by tailored agreements. All toothed whales are protected under the CITES that was signed in 1973 to regulate the commercial exploitation of certain species. \n\nThe isolated beluga population in the Saint Lawrence River has been legally protected since 1983. In 1988 Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans and Environment Canada, a governmental agency that supervises national parks, implemented the Saint Lawrence Action Plan with the aim of reducing industrial contamination by 90% by 1993; as of 1992, the emissions had been reduced by 59%.\n\nCultural references\n\nPour la suite du monde, is a Canadian documentary film released in 1963 about traditional beluga hunting carried out by the inhabitants of L'Isle-aux-Coudres on the Saint Lawrence River. \n\nWhite Whale Records was an American record company that operated between 1965 and 1971 in Los Angeles, California, it was the record company of The Turtles. The company's logo was the silhouette of a beluga with the words \"White Whale\" above it. \n\nThe children's singer Raffi released an album called Baby Beluga in 1980. The album starts with the sound of whales communicating, and includes songs representing the ocean and whales playing. The song \"Baby Beluga\" was composed after Raffi saw a recently born beluga calf in Vancouver Aquarium. \n\nYamaha's Beluga motorcycle (Riva 80/CV80) which had an 80-cc engine was produced from 1981 until 1987 and sold throughout the world, particularly in Canada, the USA, the Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, and Japan. \n\nThe Beluga class submarine (project 1710 Mackerel) was an experimental Russian submarine whose prototype operated until 1997, with the whole project being discontinued in the mid-2000s. \n\nThe fuselage design of the Airbus Beluga, one of the world's biggest cargo planes, is very similar to that of a beluga; it was originally called the Super Transporter, but the nickname Beluga became more popular and was then officially adopted. \n\nThe German company SkySails GmbH & Co. KG, a subsidiary of the Beluga Shipping group based in Hamburg, tested a new propulsion system for ships that involved a large wing similar to that used in paragliding and which has demonstrated a reduction in fuel use between 10% and 35%. The programme to prove the efficiency of the system was called Project Beluga, as it involved the ship MS Beluga Skysails. The company's insignia, a beluga's tailfin, was printed on the giant wing, which had a surface area of 160 m2. \n\nA 2002 episode of science fiction series Dark Angel titled \"Dawg Day Afternoon\" claims that beluga whales are the result of a hybridisation between a humpback whale and a dolphin.\n\nIn the Disney/Pixar film Finding Dory, the character Bailey is a beluga whale." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "J._D._Salinger.txt", "Mark_David_Chapman.txt", "Death_of_John_Lennon.txt" ], "title": [ "J. D. Salinger", "Mark David Chapman", "Death of John Lennon" ], "wiki_context": [ "Jerome David Salinger (; January 1, 1919 January 27, 2010) was an American writer who won acclaim early in life. He led a very private life for more than a half-century. He published his final original work in 1965 and gave his last interview in 1980.\n\nSalinger was raised in Manhattan and began writing short stories while in secondary school. Several were published in Story magazine in the early 1940s before he began serving in World War II. In 1948, his critically acclaimed story \"A Perfect Day for Bananafish\" appeared in The New Yorker magazine, which became home to much of his later work. In 1951, his novel The Catcher in the Rye was an immediate popular success. His depiction of adolescent alienation and loss of innocence in the protagonist Holden Caulfield was influential, especially among adolescent readers. The novel remains widely read and controversial, selling around 250,000 copies a year.\n\nThe success of The Catcher in the Rye led to public attention and scrutiny. Salinger became reclusive, publishing new work less frequently. He followed Catcher with a short story collection, Nine Stories (1953); a volume containing a novella and a short story, Franny and Zooey (1961); and a volume containing two novellas, Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction (1963). His last published work, a novella entitled \"Hapworth 16, 1924\", appeared in The New Yorker on June 19, 1965.\n\nAfterward, Salinger struggled with unwanted attention, including a legal battle in the 1980s with biographer Ian Hamilton and the release in the late 1990s of memoirs written by two people close to him: Joyce Maynard, an ex-lover; and Margaret Salinger, his daughter. In 1996, a small publisher announced a deal with Salinger to publish \"Hapworth 16, 1924\" in book form, but amid the ensuing publicity the release was indefinitely delayed. He made headlines around the globe in June 2009 when he filed a lawsuit against another writer for copyright infringement resulting from that writer's use of one of the characters from The Catcher in the Rye. Salinger died of natural causes on January 27, 2010, at his home in Cornish, New Hampshire. In November 2013, three unpublished stories by Salinger were briefly posted online. One of the stories, \"The Ocean Full of Bowling Balls\", is said to be a prequel to The Catcher in the Rye.\n\nEarly life and experiences\n\nJerome David Salinger was born in New York City, on New Year's Day, 1919. His father, Sol Salinger, sold kosher cheese, and was from a Jewish family of Lithuanian descent, his father having been the rabbi for the Adath Jeshurun congregation in Louisville, Kentucky. Salinger's mother, Marie (née Jillich), was born in Atlantic, Iowa, of Scottish, German, and Irish descent, but changed her name to Miriam and considered herself Jewish after marrying Salinger's father. Salinger did not learn that his mother was not of Jewish ancestry until just after he celebrated becoming a bar mitzvah. His only sibling was his older sister Doris (1911–2001). \n\nIn youth, Salinger attended public schools on the West Side of Manhattan. Then in 1932, the family moved to Park Avenue, and Salinger was enrolled at the McBurney School, a nearby private school. At McBurney, he managed the fencing team, wrote for the school newspaper and appeared in plays. He \"showed an innate talent for drama\", though his father opposed the idea of J.D.'s becoming an actor. \n Salinger had trouble fitting in at his new school and took measures to conform, such as calling himself Jerry. (His family called him Sonny. )\n\nHis parents then enrolled him at Valley Forge Military Academy in Wayne, Pennsylvania. Salinger began writing stories \"under the covers [at night], with the aid of a flashlight\". Salinger was the literary editor of the class yearbook, Cross Sabres. He also participated in the Glee Club, Aviation Club, French Club, and the Non-Commissioned Officers Club. Salinger's Valley Forge 201 file reveals that he was a \"mediocre\" student, and unlike the overachievement enjoyed by members of the Glass family he would go on to write about, his recorded IQ was far from that of a genius. He graduated in 1936.\n\nSalinger started his freshman year at New York University in 1936. He considered studying special education but dropped out the following spring. That fall, his father urged him to learn about the meat-importing business, and he went to work at a company in Vienna, Austria. He left Austria one month before it was annexed by Nazi Germany on March 12, 1938.\n\nIn the fall of 1938, Salinger attended Ursinus College in Collegeville, Pennsylvania, and wrote a column called \"skipped diploma\", which included movie reviews. He dropped out after one semester.\n\nIn 1939, Salinger attended a Columbia University School of General Studies evening writing class taught by Whit Burnett, longtime editor of Story magazine. According to Burnett, Salinger did not distinguish himself until a few weeks before the end of the second semester, at which point \"he suddenly came to life\" and completed three stories. Burnett told Salinger that his stories were skillful and accomplished, accepting \"The Young Folks\", a vignette about several aimless youths, for publication in Story. Salinger's debut short story was published in the magazine's March–April 1940 issue. Burnett became Salinger's mentor, and they corresponded for several years. \n\nWorld War II\n\nIn 1942, Salinger started dating Oona O'Neill, daughter of the playwright Eugene O'Neill. Despite finding the debutante self-absorbed (he confided to a friend that \"Little Oona's hopelessly in love with little Oona\"), he called her often and wrote her long letters. Their relationship ended when Oona began seeing Charlie Chaplin, whom she eventually married. In late 1941, Salinger briefly worked on a Caribbean cruise ship, serving as an activity director and possibly as a performer. \n\nThe same year, Salinger began submitting short stories to The New Yorker. Seven of Salinger's stories were rejected by the magazine that year, including \"Lunch for Three\", \"Monologue for a Watery Highball\", and \"I Went to School with Adolf Hitler\". In December 1941, however, the publication accepted \"Slight Rebellion off Madison\", a Manhattan-set story about a disaffected teenager named Holden Caulfield with \"pre-war jitters\". When Japan carried out the attack on Pearl Harbor that month, the story was rendered \"unpublishable\"; it did not appear in the magazine until 1946. In the spring of 1942, several months after the United States entered World War II, Salinger was drafted into the army, wherein he saw combat with the 12th Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Division. He was present at Utah Beach on D-Day, in the Battle of the Bulge, and the Battle of Hürtgen Forest. \n\nDuring the campaign from Normandy into Germany, Salinger arranged to meet with Ernest Hemingway, a writer who had influenced him and was then working as a war correspondent in Paris. Salinger was impressed with Hemingway's friendliness and modesty, finding him more \"soft\" than his gruff public persona. Hemingway was impressed by Salinger's writing and remarked: \"Jesus, he has a helluva talent.\" The two writers began corresponding; Salinger wrote Hemingway in July 1946 that their talks were among his few positive memories of the war. Salinger added that he was working on a play about Holden Caulfield, the protagonist of his story \"Slight Rebellion off Madison\", and hoped to play the part himself.\n\nSalinger was assigned to a counter-intelligence division, for which he used his proficiency in French and German to interrogate prisoners of war. In April 1945 he entered a liberated concentration camp, probably one of Dachau's sub-camps. Salinger earned the rank of Staff Sergeant and served in five campaigns. Salinger's experiences in the war affected him emotionally. He was hospitalized for a few weeks for combat stress reaction after Germany was defeated, and he later told his daughter: \"You never really get the smell of burning flesh out of your nose entirely, no matter how long you live.\" Both of his biographers speculate that Salinger drew upon his wartime experiences in several stories, such as \"For Esmé—with Love and Squalor\", which is narrated by a traumatized soldier. Salinger continued to write while serving in the army, publishing several stories in slick magazines such as Collier's and The Saturday Evening Post. He also continued to submit stories to The New Yorker, but with little success; it rejected all of his submissions from 1944 to 1946, a group of 15 poems in 1945 alone.\n\nPost-war years\n\nAfter Germany's defeat, Salinger signed up for a six-month period of \"Denazification\" duty in Germany for the Counterintelligence Corps. He lived in Weissenburg and, soon after, married Sylvia Welter. He brought her to the United States in April 1946, but the marriage fell apart after eight months and Sylvia returned to Germany. In 1972, Salinger's daughter Margaret was with him when he received a letter from Sylvia. He looked at the envelope, and without reading it, tore it apart. It was the first time he had heard from her since the breakup, but as Margaret put it, \"when he was finished with a person, he was through with them.\" \n\nIn 1946, Whit Burnett agreed to help Salinger publish a collection of his short stories through Story Press's Lippincott Imprint. Titled The Young Folks, the collection was to consist of twenty stories—ten, like the title story and \"Slight Rebellion off Madison\", were already in print; ten were previously unpublished. Though Burnett implied the book would be published and even negotiated Salinger a $1,000 advance on its sale, Lippincott overruled Burnett and rejected the book. Salinger blamed Burnett for the book's failure to see print, and the two became estranged. \n\nBy the late 1940s, Salinger had become an avid follower of Zen Buddhism, to the point that he \"gave reading lists on the subject to his dates\" and arranged a meeting with Buddhist scholar D. T. Suzuki.\n\nIn 1947, the author submitted a short story titled simply \"The Bananafish\" to The New Yorker. William Maxwell, the magazine's fiction editor, was impressed enough with \"the singular quality of the story\" that the magazine asked Salinger to continue revising it. He spent a year reworking it with New Yorker editors and the magazine accepted the story, now titled \"A Perfect Day for Bananafish\", and published it in the January 31, 1948 issue. The magazine thereon offered Salinger a \"first-look\" contract that allowed them right of first refusal on any future stories. The critical acclaim accorded \"Bananafish\", coupled with problems Salinger had with stories being altered by the \"slicks\", led him to publish almost exclusively in The New Yorker. \"Bananafish\" was also the first of Salinger's published stories to feature the Glasses, a fictional family consisting of two retired vaudeville performers and their seven precocious children: Seymour, Buddy, Boo Boo, Walt, Waker, Zooey, and Franny. Salinger eventually published seven stories about the Glasses, developing a detailed family history and focusing particularly on Seymour, the brilliant but troubled eldest child.\n\nIn the early 1940s, Salinger had confided in a letter to Whit Burnett that he was eager to sell the film rights to some of his stories in order to achieve financial security. According to Ian Hamilton, Salinger was disappointed when \"rumblings from Hollywood\" over his 1943 short story \"The Varioni Brothers\" came to nothing. Therefore, he immediately agreed when, in mid-1948, independent film producer Samuel Goldwyn offered to buy the film rights to his short story \"Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut\". Though Salinger sold his story with the hope—in the words of his agent Dorothy Olding—that it \"would make a good movie\", the film version of \"Wiggily\" was lambasted by critics upon its release in 1949. Renamed My Foolish Heart and starring Dana Andrews and Susan Hayward, the melodramatic film departed to such an extent from Salinger's story that Goldwyn biographer A. Scott Berg referred to it as a \"bastardization\". As a result of this experience, Salinger never again permitted film adaptations to be made from his work. When Brigitte Bardot wanted to buy the rights to \"A Perfect Day for Bananafish\", Salinger refused the request, but told his friend, Lillian Ross, longtime staff writer for The New Yorker, \"She's a cute, talented, lost enfante, and I'm tempted to accommodate her, pour le sport.\"\n\nThe Catcher in the Rye\n\nIn the 1940s, Salinger confided to several people that he was working on a novel featuring Holden Caulfield, the teenage protagonist of his short story \"Slight Rebellion off Madison\", and The Catcher in the Rye was published on July 16, 1951, by Little, Brown and Company. The novel's plot is simple, detailing 16-year-old Holden's experiences in New York City following his expulsion and departure from an elite college preparatory school. Not only was he expelled from his current school, he had also been expelled from three previous schools. The book is more notable for the persona and testimonial voice of its first-person narrator, Holden. He serves as an insightful but unreliable narrator who expounds on the importance of loyalty, the \"phoniness\" of adulthood, and his own duplicity. In a 1953 interview with a high school newspaper, Salinger admitted that the novel was \"sort of\" autobiographical, explaining, \"My boyhood was very much the same as that of the boy in the book ... [I]t was a great relief telling people about it.\" \n\nInitial reactions to the book were mixed, ranging from The New York Times hailing Catcher as \"an unusually brilliant first novel\" to denigrations of the book's monotonous language and the \"immorality and perversion\" of Holden, who uses religious slurs and freely discusses casual sex and prostitution. The novel was a popular success; within two months of its publication, The Catcher in the Rye had been reprinted eight times. It spent 30 weeks on the New York Times Bestseller list.\n\nThe book's initial success was followed by a brief lull in popularity, but by the late 1950s, according to Ian Hamilton, it had \"become the book all brooding adolescents had to buy, the indispensable manual from which cool styles of disaffectation could be borrowed.\" It has been compared to Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Newspapers began publishing articles about the \"Catcher Cult\", and the novel was banned in several countries—as well as some U.S. schools—because of its subject matter and what Catholic World reviewer Riley Hughes called an \"excessive use of amateur swearing and coarse language\". According to one angry parent's tabulation, 237 instances of \"goddamn,\" 58 uses of the synonym for a person of illegitimate birth, 31 \"Chrissakes,\"and one incident of flatulence constituted what was wrong with Salinger's book.\n\nIn the 1970s, several U.S. high school teachers who assigned the book were fired or forced to resign. A 1979 study of censorship noted that The Catcher in the Rye \"had the dubious distinction of being at once the most frequently censored book across the nation and the second-most frequently taught novel in public high schools\" (after John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men). The book remains widely read; in 2004, the novel was selling about 250,000 copies per year, \"with total worldwide sales over 10 million copies\". \n\nIn the wake of its 1950s success, Salinger received (and rejected) numerous offers to adapt The Catcher in the Rye for the screen, including one from Samuel Goldwyn. Since its publication, there has been sustained interest in the novel among filmmakers, with Billy Wilder, Harvey Weinstein, and Steven Spielberg among those seeking to secure the rights. Salinger stated in the 1970s that \"Jerry Lewis tried for years to get his hands on the part of Holden.\" Salinger repeatedly refused, though, and in 1999, Joyce Maynard definitively concluded: \"The only person who might ever have played Holden Caulfield would have been J. D. Salinger.\"\n\nWriting in the 1950s and move to Cornish\n\nIn a July 1951 profile in Book of the Month Club News, Salinger's friend and New Yorker editor William Maxwell asked Salinger about his literary influences. Salinger responded: \"A writer, when he's asked to discuss his craft, ought to get up and call out in a loud voice just the names of the writers he loves. I love Kafka, Flaubert, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Dostoevsky, Proust, O'Casey, Rilke, Lorca, Keats, Rimbaud, Burns, E. Brontë, Jane Austen, Henry James, Blake, Coleridge. I won't name any living writers. I don't think it's right.\" In letters written in the 1940s, Salinger had expressed his admiration of three living, or recently deceased, writers: Sherwood Anderson, Ring Lardner, and F. Scott Fitzgerald; Ian Hamilton wrote that Salinger even saw himself for some time as \"Fitzgerald's successor\". Salinger's \"A Perfect Day for Bananafish\" has an ending similar to that of Fitzgerald's earlier published short story \"May Day\". \n\nSalinger wrote friends of a momentous change in his life in 1952, after several years of practicing Zen Buddhism, while reading The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna about Hindu religious teacher Sri Ramakrishna. He became an adherent of Ramakrishna's Advaita Vedanta Hinduism, which advocated celibacy for those seeking enlightenment, and detachment from human responsibilities such as family. Salinger's religious studies were reflected in some of his writing. The story \"Teddy\" features a ten-year-old child who expresses Vedantic insights. He also studied the writings of Ramakrishna's disciple Vivekananda; in the story \"Hapworth 16, 1924\", the character of Seymour Glass describes him as \"one of the most exciting, original and best-equipped giants of this century.\"\n\nIn 1953, Salinger published a collection of seven stories from The New Yorker (\"Bananafish\" among them), as well as two that the magazine had rejected. The collection was published as Nine Stories in the United States, and \"For Esmé—with Love and Squalor\" in the UK, after one of Salinger's best-known stories. The book received grudgingly positive reviews, and was a financial success—\"remarkably so for a volume of short stories\", according to Hamilton. Nine Stories spent three months on the New York Times Bestseller list. Already tightening his grip on publicity, though, Salinger refused to allow publishers of the collection to depict his characters in dust jacket illustrations, lest readers form preconceived notions of them.\n\nAs the notoriety of The Catcher in the Rye grew, Salinger gradually withdrew from public view. In 1953, he moved from an apartment at\n300 East 57th Street, New York, to Cornish, New Hampshire. Early in his time at Cornish he was relatively sociable, particularly with students at Windsor High School. Salinger invited them to his house frequently to play records and talk about problems at school. One such student, Shirley Blaney, persuaded Salinger to be interviewed for the high school page of The Daily Eagle, the city paper. Nonetheless, after Blaney's interview appeared prominently in the newspaper's editorial section, Salinger cut off all contact with the high schoolers without explanation. He was also seen less frequently around town, meeting only one close friend—jurist Learned Hand—with any regularity. He also began to publish with less frequency. After the 1953 publication of Nine Stories, he published only four stories through the rest of the decade; two in 1955 and one each in 1957 and 1959.\n\nMarriage and family\n\nIn February 1955, at the age of 36, Salinger married Claire Douglas, a Radcliffe student (her father was the art critic Robert Langton Douglas). They had two children, Margaret (b. December 10, 1955) and Matthew (b. February 13, 1960). Margaret Salinger wrote in her memoir Dream Catcher that she believes her parents would not have married, nor would she have been born, had her father not read the teachings of Lahiri Mahasaya, a guru of Paramahansa Yogananda, which brought the possibility of enlightenment to those following the path of the \"householder\" (a married person with children). After their marriage, J.D. and Claire were initiated into the path of Kriya yoga in a small store-front Hindu temple in Washington, D.C., during the summer of 1955. They received a mantra and breathing exercises to practice for ten minutes twice a day.\n\nSalinger also insisted that Claire drop out of school and live with him, only four months shy of graduation, which she did. Certain elements of the story \"Franny\", published in January 1955, are based on his relationship with Claire, including her ownership of the book The Way of the Pilgrim. Because of their isolated location and Salinger's proclivities, they hardly saw other people for long stretches of time. Claire was also frustrated by Salinger's ever-changing religious beliefs. Though she committed herself to Kriya yoga, she remembered that Salinger would chronically leave Cornish to work on a story \"for several weeks only to return with the piece he was supposed to be finishing all undone or destroyed and some new 'ism' we had to follow.\" Claire believed \"it was to cover the fact that Jerry had just destroyed or junked or couldn't face the quality of, or couldn't face publishing, what he had created.\"\n\nAfter abandoning Kriya yoga, Salinger tried Dianetics (the forerunner of Scientology), even meeting its founder L. Ron Hubbard, but according to Claire he was quickly disenchanted with it. This was followed by an adherence to a number of spiritual, medical, and nutritional belief systems including an interest in Christian Science, Edgar Cayce, homeopathy, acupuncture, and macrobiotics. \n\nSalinger's family life was further marked by discord after the first child was born; according to Margaret's book, Claire felt that her daughter had replaced her in Salinger's affections. The infant Margaret was sick much of the time, but Salinger, having embraced the tenets of Christian Science, refused to take her to a doctor. According to Margaret, her mother admitted to her years later that she went \"over the edge\" in the winter of 1957 and had made plans to murder her and then commit suicide. Claire had supposedly intended to do it during a trip to New York City with Salinger, but she instead acted on a sudden impulse to take Margaret from the hotel and run away. After a few months, Salinger persuaded her to return to Cornish.\n\nLast publications and Maynard relationship\n\nSalinger published Franny and Zooey in 1961, and Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction in 1963. Each book contained two short stories or novellas, previously published in The New Yorker, about members of the Glass family. These four stories were originally published between 1955 and 1959, and were the only ones Salinger had published since Nine Stories. On the dust jacket of Franny and Zooey, Salinger wrote, in reference to his interest in privacy: \"It is my rather subversive opinion that a writer's feelings of anonymity-obscurity are the second most valuable property on loan to him during his working years.\" \n\nOn September 15, 1961, Time magazine devoted its cover to Salinger. In an article that profiled his \"life of recluse\", the magazine reported that the Glass family series \"is nowhere near completion ... Salinger intends to write a Glass trilogy.\" Nonetheless, Salinger published only one other story after that: \"Hapworth 16, 1924\", a novella in the form of a long letter from seven-year-old Seymour Glass while at summer camp. His first new work in six years, the novella took up most of the June 19, 1965, issue of The New Yorker, and was universally critically panned. Around this time, Salinger had isolated Claire from friends and relatives and made her—in the words of Margaret Salinger—\"a virtual prisoner\". Claire separated from him in September 1966; their divorce was finalized on October 3, 1967. \n\nIn 1972, at the age of 53, Salinger had a relationship with 18-year-old Joyce Maynard that lasted for nine months. Maynard, at this time, was already an experienced writer for Seventeen magazine. The New York Times had asked Maynard to write an article for them which, when published as \"An Eighteen-Year-Old Looks Back On Life\" on April 23, 1972, made her a celebrity. Salinger wrote a letter to her warning about living with fame. After exchanging 25 letters, Maynard moved in with Salinger the summer after her freshman year at Yale University. Maynard did not return to Yale that fall, and spent ten months as a guest in Salinger's Cornish home. The relationship ended, he told his daughter Margaret at a family outing, because Maynard wanted children, and he felt he was too old. Nevertheless, in her own autobiography, Maynard paints a different picture, saying Salinger abruptly ended the relationship and refused to take her back. She had dropped out of Yale to be with him, even forgoing a scholarship. Maynard later writes in her own memoir how she came to find out that Salinger had begun relationships with young women by exchanging letters. One of those letter recipients included Salinger's last wife, a nurse who was already engaged to be married to someone else when she met the author. \n\nWhile he was living with Maynard, Salinger continued to write in a disciplined fashion, a few hours every morning. According to Maynard, by 1972 he had completed two new novels. In a rare 1974 interview with The New York Times, he explained: \"There is a marvelous peace in not publishing ... I like to write. I love to write. But I write just for myself and my own pleasure.\" According to Maynard, he saw publication as \"a damned interruption\". In her memoir, Margaret Salinger describes the detailed filing system her father had for his unpublished manuscripts: \"A red mark meant, if I die before I finish my work, publish this 'as is,' blue meant publish but edit first, and so on.\" A neighbor said that Salinger told him that he had written 15 unpublished novels. \n\nSalinger's final interview was in June 1980 with Betty Eppes of The Baton Rouge Advocate, which has been represented somewhat differently, depending on the secondary source. By one account, Eppes was an attractive young woman who misrepresented herself as an aspiring novelist, and managed to record audio of the interview as well as take several photographs of Salinger, both without his knowledge or consent. In a separate account, emphasis is placed on her contact by letter writing from the local Post Office, and Salinger's personal initiative to cross the bridge to meet with the woman, who in the course of the interview made clear she was a reporter (and who did indeed, at the close, take pictures of Salinger as he departed). According to the first account, the interview ended \"disastrously\" when a local passer-by from Cornish attempted to shake the famous author's hand, at which point Salinger became enraged. A further account of the interview published later in The Paris Review, purportedly by Eppes as author, has been disowned by Eppes and separately ascribed as a derived work of Review Editor George Plimpton. \n\nLegal conflicts\n\nAlthough Salinger tried to escape public exposure as much as possible, he continued to struggle with unwanted attention from both the media and the public. Readers of his work and students from nearby Dartmouth College often came to Cornish in groups, hoping to catch a glimpse of him. In May 1986 Salinger learned that the British writer Ian Hamilton intended to publish a biography that made extensive use of letters Salinger had written to other authors and friends. Salinger sued to stop the book's publication. The court in Salinger v. Random House ruled that Hamilton's extensive use of the letters, including quotation and paraphrasing, was not acceptable since the author's right to control publication overrode the right of fair use.\nThe book was not published. \nLater, Hamilton published In Search of J.D. Salinger: A Writing Life (1935–65), but this book was more about his experience in tracking down information and the copyright fights over the planned biography than about Salinger himself. \n\nAn unintended consequence of the lawsuit was that many details of Salinger's private life, including that he had spent the last twenty years writing, in his words, \"Just a work of fiction ... That's all\", became public in the form of court transcripts. Excerpts from his letters were also widely disseminated, most notably a bitter remark written in response to Oona O'Neill's marriage to Charlie Chaplin:\n\nSalinger was romantically involved with television actress Elaine Joyce for several years in the 1980s. The relationship ended when he met Colleen O'Neill (b. June 11, 1959), a nurse and quiltmaker, whom he married around 1988. O'Neill, forty years his junior, once told Margaret Salinger that she and Salinger were trying to have a child. \n\nIn 1995, Iranian director Dariush Mehrjui released the film Pari, an unauthorized and loose adaptation of Salinger's Franny and Zooey. Though the film could be distributed legally in Iran since the country has no official copyright relations with the United States, Salinger had his lawyers block a planned screening of the film at the Lincoln Center in 1998. Mehrjui called Salinger's action \"bewildering\", explaining that he saw his film as \"a kind of cultural exchange\".\n\nIn 1996, Salinger gave a small publisher, Orchises Press, permission to publish \"Hapworth 16, 1924\", the previously uncollected novella. It was to be published that year, and listings for it appeared at Amazon.com and other book-sellers. After a flurry of articles and critical reviews of the story appeared in the press, the publication date was pushed back repeatedly before apparently being cancelled altogether. Amazon anticipated that Orchises would publish the story in January 2009, but at the time of his death it was still listed as \"currently unavailable\". \n\nIn June 2009, Salinger consulted lawyers about the upcoming publication in the US of an unauthorized sequel to The Catcher in the Rye written by Swedish book publisher Fredrik Colting under the pseudonym 'J. D. California'. California's book is called 60 Years Later: Coming Through the Rye, and appears to pick up the story of Salinger's protagonist Holden Caulfield. In Salinger's novel, Caulfield is 17 years old, wandering the streets of New York after being expelled from his private school; the California book features a 76-year-old man, \"Mr. C\", musing on having escaped his nursing home. Salinger's New York literary agent Phyllis Westberg told Britain's Sunday Telegraph: \"The matter has been turned over to a lawyer\". The fact that little was known about Colting and the book was set to be published by a new publishing imprint called 'Windupbird Publishing' gave rise to speculation in literary circles that the whole thing might be a stunt. District court judge Deborah A. Batts issued an injunction which prevents the book from being published within the U.S. The book's author filed an appeal on July 23, 2009; it was heard in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals on September 3, 2009. The case was settled in 2011 when Colting agreed not to publish or otherwise distribute the book, e-book, or any other editions of 60 Years Later in the U.S. or Canada until The Catcher in the Rye enters the public domain, while also refraining from using the title \"Coming through the Rye\", dedicating the book to Salinger or referring to the title \"The Catcher in the Rye\", while Colting remains free to sell the book in other international territories without fear of interference. \n\nLater publicity\n\nOn October 23, 1992, The New York Times reported], \"Not even a fire that consumed at least half his home on Tuesday could smoke out the reclusive J. D. Salinger, author of the classic novel of adolescent rebellion, 'The Catcher in the Rye.' Mr. Salinger is almost equally famous for having elevated privacy to an art form.\" \n\nIn 1999, 25 years after the end of their relationship, Joyce Maynard auctioned a series of letters Salinger had written her. Maynard's memoir of her life and her relationship with Salinger, At Home in the World: A Memoir, was published the same year. Among other topics, the book described how Maynard's mother had consulted with her on how to appeal to the aging author (who was dressing like a child), and described Joyce's relationship with him at length. In the ensuing controversy over both the memoir and the letters, Maynard claimed that she was forced to auction the letters for financial reasons; she would have preferred to donate them to the Beinecke Library. Software developer Peter Norton bought the letters for US$156,500 and announced his intention to return them to Salinger. \n\nA year later, Salinger's daughter Margaret, by his second wife Claire Douglas, published Dream Catcher: A Memoir. In her book, she described the harrowing control that Salinger had over her mother and dispelled many of the Salinger myths established by Ian Hamilton's book. One of Hamilton's arguments was that Salinger's experience with post-traumatic stress disorder left him psychologically scarred, and that he was unable to deal with the traumatic nature of his war service. Salinger allowed that \"the few men who lived through Bloody Mortain, a battle in which her father fought, were left with much to sicken them, body and soul\", but she also painted a picture of her father as a man immensely proud of his service record, maintaining his military haircut and service jacket, and moving about his compound (and town) in an old Jeep.\n\nBoth Margaret Salinger and Maynard characterized the author as a devoted film buff. According to Margaret, his favorite movies include Gigi (1958), The Lady Vanishes (1938), The 39 Steps (1935; Phoebe's favorite movie in The Catcher in the Rye), and the comedies of W.C. Fields, Laurel and Hardy, and the Marx Bros.. Predating VCRs, Salinger had an extensive collection of classic movies from the 1940s in 16 mm prints. Maynard wrote that \"he loves movies, not films\", and Salinger argued that her father's \"worldview is, essentially, a product of the movies of his day. To my father, all Spanish speakers are Puerto Rican washerwomen, or the toothless, grinning-gypsy types in a Marx Brothers movie\". Lillian Ross, a staff writer for The New Yorker and longtime friend of Salinger's, wrote following his death, \"Salinger loved movies, and he was more fun than anyone to discuss them with. He enjoyed watching actors work, and he enjoyed knowing them. (He loved Anne Bancroft, hated Audrey Hepburn, and said that he had seen Grand Illusion ten times.)\"\n\nMargaret also offered many insights into other Salinger myths, including her father's supposed long-time interest in macrobiotics, and involvement with \"alternative medicine\" and Eastern philosophies. A few weeks after Dream Catcher was published, Margaret's brother Matt discredited the memoir in a letter to The New York Observer. He disparaged his sister's \"gothic tales of our supposed childhood\" and stated: \"I can't say with any authority that she is consciously making anything up. I just know that I grew up in a very different house, with two very different parents from those my sister describes.\" \n\nDeath\n\nSalinger died of natural causes at his home in New Hampshire on January 27, 2010. He was 91. Salinger's literary representative told The New York Times that the writer had broken his hip in May 2009, but that \"his health had been excellent until a rather sudden decline after the new year.\" The representative believed that Salinger's death was not a painful one. His third wife and widow, Colleen O'Neill Zakrzeski Salinger, and Salinger's son Matt became the executors of his estate.\n\nLiterary style and themes\n\nIn a contributor's note Salinger gave to Harper's Magazine in 1946, he wrote: \"I almost always write about very young people\", a statement that has been referred to as his credo. Adolescents are featured or appear in all of Salinger's work, from his first published short story, \"The Young Folks\" (1940), to The Catcher in the Rye and his Glass family stories. In 1961, the critic Alfred Kazin explained that Salinger's choice of teenagers as a subject matter was one reason for his appeal to young readers, but another was \"a consciousness [among youths] that he speaks for them and virtually to them, in a language that is peculiarly honest and their own, with a vision of things that capture their most secret judgments of the world.\" For this reason, Norman Mailer once remarked that Salinger was \"the greatest mind ever to stay in prep school\". Salinger's language, especially his energetic, realistically sparse dialogue, was revolutionary at the time his first stories were published and was seen by several critics as \"the most distinguishing thing\" about his work. \n\nSalinger identified closely with his characters, and used techniques such as interior monologue, letters, and extended telephone calls to display his gift for dialogue. Such style elements also \"[gave] him the illusion of having, as it were, delivered his characters' destinies into their own keeping.\" Recurring themes in Salinger's stories also connect to the ideas of innocence and adolescence, including the \"corrupting influence of Hollywood and the world at large\", the disconnect between teenagers and \"phony\" adults, and the perceptive, precocious intelligence of children.\n\nContemporary critics discuss a clear progression over the course of Salinger's published work, as evidenced by the increasingly negative reviews received by each of his three post-Catcher story collections. Ian Hamilton adheres to this view, arguing that while Salinger's early stories for the \"slicks\" boasted \"tight, energetic\" dialogue, they had also been formulaic and sentimental. It took the standards of The New Yorker editors, among them William Shawn, to refine his writing into the \"spare, teasingly mysterious, withheld\" qualities of \"A Perfect Day for Bananafish\" (1948), The Catcher in the Rye, and his stories of the early 1950s. By the late 1950s, as Salinger became more reclusive and involved in religious study, Hamilton notes that his stories became longer, less plot-driven, and increasingly filled with digression and parenthetical remarks. Louis Menand agrees, writing in The New Yorker that Salinger \"stopped writing stories, in the conventional sense ... He seemed to lose interest in fiction as an art form—perhaps he thought there was something manipulative or inauthentic about literary device and authorial control.\" In recent years, some critics have defended certain post-Nine Stories works by Salinger; in 2001, Janet Malcolm wrote in The New York Review of Books that \"Zooey\" \"is arguably Salinger's masterpiece ... Rereading it and its companion piece \"Franny\" is no less rewarding than rereading The Great Gatsby.\"\n\nInfluence\n\nSalinger's writing has influenced several prominent writers, prompting Harold Brodkey (himself an O. Henry Award-winning author) to state in 1991: \"His is the most influential body of work in English prose by anyone since Hemingway.\" Of the writers in Salinger's generation, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist John Updike attested that \"the short stories of J. D. Salinger really opened my eyes as to how you can weave fiction out of a set of events that seem almost unconnected, or very lightly connected ... [Reading Salinger] stick[s] in my mind as really having moved me a step up, as it were, toward knowing how to handle my own material.\" The critic Louis Menand has observed that the early stories of Pulitzer Prize-winner Philip Roth were affected by \"Salinger's voice and comic timing\".\n\nNational Book Award finalist Richard Yates told The New York Times in 1977 that reading Salinger's stories for the first time was a landmark experience, and that \"nothing quite like it has happened to me since\". Yates describes Salinger as \"a man who used language as if it were pure energy beautifully controlled, and who knew exactly what he was doing in every silence as well as in every word.\" Gordon Lish's O. Henry Award-winning short story \"For Jeromé—With Love and Kisses\" (1977, collected in What I Know So Far, 1984), is a parody of Salinger's \"For Esmé—with Love and Squalor\". \n\nIn 2001, Louis Menand wrote in The New Yorker that \"Catcher in the Rye rewrites\" among each new generation had become \"a literary genre all its own\". He classed among them Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar (1963), Hunter S. Thompson's Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1971), Jay McInerney's Bright Lights, Big City (1984), and Dave Eggers's A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (2000). Writer Aimee Bender was struggling with her first short stories when a friend gave her a copy of Nine Stories; inspired, she later described Salinger's effect on writers, explaining: \"[I]t feels like Salinger wrote The Catcher in the Rye in a day, and that incredible feeling of ease inspires writing. Inspires the pursuit of voice. Not his voice. My voice. Your voice.\" Authors such as Stephen Chbosky, Jonathan Safran Foer, Carl Hiaasen, Susan Minot, Haruki Murakami, Gwendoline Riley, Tom Robbins, Louis Sachar, Joel Stein and John Green have cited Salinger as an influence. Musician Tomas Kalnoky of Streetlight Manifesto also cites Salinger as an influence, referencing him and Holden Caulfield, the main character of Catcher in the Rye, in the song \"Here's To Life\". Biographer Paul Alexander called Salinger \"the Greta Garbo of literature\". \n\nIn the mid-1960s, J. D. Salinger was himself drawn to Sufi mysticism through the writer and thinker Idries Shah's seminal work The Sufis, as were others writers such as Doris Lessing and Geoffrey Grigson, and the poets Robert Graves and Ted Hughes. As well as Idries Shah, Salinger also read the Taoist philosopher Lao Tse and the Hindu Swami Vivekananda who introduced the Indian philosophies of Vedanta and Yoga to the Western world. \n\nLegacy\n\nIn an oral biography titled Salinger, authors David Shields and Shane Salerno assert that the author had left specific instructions authorizing a timetable, to start between 2015 and 2020, for the release of several unpublished works. According to the authors and their sources, these include five new Glass-family stories; a novel based on Salinger's relationship with his first wife, Sylvia; a novella in the form of a WWII counterintelligence officer’s diary; a \"manual\" of stories about Vedanta; and other new or retooled stories that illuminate the life of Holden Caulfield.\n\nThe Salinger biography is also described as a companion volume to a film documentary of the same title. The directorial debut of writer Shane Salerno, Salinger was made over nine years and received a limited theatrical release on September 6, 2013.\n\nList of works\n\nBooks\n\n* The Catcher in the Rye (1951)\n* Nine Stories (1953)\n** \"A Perfect Day for Bananafish\" (1948)\n** \"Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut\" (1948)\n** \"Just Before the War with the Eskimos\" (1948)\n** \"The Laughing Man\" (1949)\n** \"Down at the Dinghy\" (1949)\n** \"For Esmé—with Love and Squalor\" (1950)\n** \"Pretty Mouth and Green My Eyes\" (1951)\n** \"De Daumier-Smith's Blue Period\" (1952)\n** \"Teddy\" (1953)\n* Franny and Zooey (1961)\n** \"Franny\" (1955)\n** \"Zooey\" (1957)\n* Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction (1963)\n** \"Raise High the Roof-Beam, Carpenters\" (1955)\n** \"Seymour: An Introduction\" (1959)\n* Three Early Stories (2014)\n** \"The Young Folks\" (1940)\n** \"Go See Eddie\" (1940)\n** \"Once a Week Won't Kill You\" (1944)\n\nPublished and anthologized stories\n\n* \"Go See Eddie\" (1940, republished in Fiction: Form & Experience, ed. William M. Jones, 1969 and in Three Early Stories, 2014)\n* \"The Young Folks\" (1940, republished in Three Early Stories, 2014)\n* \"The Hang of It\" (1941, republished in The Kit Book for Soldiers, Sailors and Marines, 1943)\n* \"The Long Debut of Lois Taggett\" (1942, republished in Stories: The Fiction of the Forties, ed. Whit Burnett, 1949)\n* \"Once a Week Won't Kill You\" (1944, republished in Three Early Stories, 2014)\n* \"A Boy in France\" (1945, republished in Post Stories 1942–45, ed. Ben Hibbs, 1946 and July/August 2010 issue of Saturday Evening Post magazine)\n* \"This Sandwich Has No Mayonnaise\" (1945, republished in The Armchair Esquire, ed. L. Rust Hills, 1959)\n* \"Slight Rebellion off Madison\" (1946, republished in Wonderful Town: New York Stories from The New Yorker, ed. David Remnick, 2000)\n* \"A Girl I Knew\" (1948, republished in Best American Short Stories 1949, ed. Martha Foley, 1949)\n\nPublished and unanthologized stories\n\n* \"The Heart of a Broken Story\" (1941)\n* \"Personal Notes of an Infantryman\" (1942)\n* \"The Varioni Brothers\" (1943)\n* \"Both Parties Concerned\" (1944)\n* \"Soft-Boiled Sergeant\" (1944)\n* \"Last Day of the Last Furlough\" (1944)\n* \"Elaine\" (1945)\n* \"The Stranger\" (1945)\n* \"I'm Crazy\" (1945)\n* \"A Young Girl in 1941 with No Waist at All\" (1947)\n* \"The Inverted Forest\" (1947)\n* \"Blue Melody\" (1948)\n* \"Hapworth 16, 1924\" (1965)\n\nUnpublished stories\n\n*\"Mrs. Hincher\" (1942)\n*\"The Last and Best of the Peter Pans\" (1942)\n*\"The Children's Echelon\" (1944)\n*\"Two Lonely Men\" (1944)\n*\"The Magic Foxhole\" (1944)\n*\"Birthday Boy\" (1946)\n*\"The Ocean Full of Bowling Balls\" (1947)\n*\"Paula\" (1948)\n\nMedia portrayals and references\n\n*J.D. Salinger appears as a character (voiced by Alan Arkin) in several episodes of Bojack Horseman (season 2 episodes 6, 7, 8, and 10), where he is said to have faked his own death to escape public attention (A Netflix Original Series, July 7, 2015). \n\nNotes\n\nCitations", "Mark David Chapman (born May 10, 1955) is an American prison inmate who murdered John Lennon on December 8, 1980. Chapman shot Lennon outside The Dakota apartment building in New York City. Chapman fired at Lennon five times, hitting him four times in the back. Chapman later remained at the crime scene reading J. D. Salinger's novel The Catcher in the Rye until the police arrived and arrested him. He repeatedly said that the novel was his statement.\n\nChapman's legal team put forward an insanity defense based on expert testimony that he was in a delusional psychotic state at the time, but nearing the trial, Chapman instructed his lawyer that he wanted to plead guilty, based on what he had decided was the will of God. The judge allowed the plea change without further psychiatric assessment after Chapman denied hearing voices, and sentenced him to a prison term of 20 years to life with a stipulation that mental health treatment be provided. Chapman was imprisoned in 1981 and has been denied parole eight times amidst campaigns against his release. \n\nPersonal background\n\nChapman was born in Fort Worth, Texas in 1955. His father, David Curtis Chapman, was a staff sergeant in the U.S. Air Force, and his mother, Diane Elizabeth (née Pease), was a nurse. His younger sister, Susan, was born seven years later. Chapman stated that as a boy, he lived in fear of his father, who he said was physically abusive towards his mother and unloving towards him. Chapman began to fantasize about having king-like power over a group of imaginary \"little people\" who lived in the walls of his bedroom. Chapman attended Columbia High School in Decatur, Georgia. By the time he was fourteen, Chapman was using drugs, skipping classes, and he once ran away from home to live on the streets of Atlanta for two weeks. He said that he was bullied at school because he was not a good athlete. \n\nIn 1971, Chapman became a born again Presbyterian and distributed Biblical tracts. He met his first girlfriend, Jessica Blankenship. He began work as a YMCA summer camp counselor; he was very popular with the children, who nicknamed him \"Nemo\". He won an award for Outstanding Counselor and was made assistant director. Those who knew him in the caretaking professions unanimously called him an outstanding worker. A friend recommended The Catcher in the Rye to Chapman, and the story eventually took on great personal significance for him, to the extent that he reportedly wished to model his life after its protagonist, Holden Caulfield. After graduating from Columbia High School, Chapman moved for a time to Chicago and played guitar in churches and Christian nightspots while his friend did impersonations. He worked successfully for World Vision with Vietnamese refugees at a resettlement camp at Fort Chaffee in Arkansas, after a brief visit to Lebanon for the same work. He was named an area coordinator and a key aide to the program director, David Moore, who later said that Chapman cared deeply for the children and worked hard. Chapman accompanied Moore to meetings with government officials, and President Gerald Ford shook his hand.\n\nChapman joined his girlfriend, Jessica Blankenship, as a student at Covenant College, an evangelical Presbyterian liberal arts college in Lookout Mountain, Georgia. However, Chapman fell behind in his studies and became obsessed with guilt over having an affair. He started having suicidal thoughts and began to feel like a failure. He dropped out of Covenant College, and his girlfriend broke off their relationship soon after. He returned to work at the resettlement camp, but left after an argument. Chapman worked as a security guard, eventually taking a week-long course to qualify as an armed guard. He again attempted college but dropped out. He went to Hawaii and then began contemplating suicide. In 1977, Chapman attempted suicide by carbon monoxide asphyxiation. He connected a hose to his car's exhaust pipe, but the hose melted and the attempt failed. A psychiatrist admitted him to Castle Memorial Hospital for clinical depression. Upon his release, he began working at the hospital. His parents began divorce proceedings, and his mother joined Chapman in Hawaii.\n\nIn 1978, Chapman went on a six-week trip around the world, inspired partly by the film Around the World in Eighty Days, visiting Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong, Singapore, Bangkok, Delhi, Beirut, Geneva, London, Paris and Dublin. He began a relationship with his travel agent, a Japanese-American woman named Gloria Abe. They married on June 2, 1979. Chapman went to work at Castle Memorial Hospital as a printer, working alone rather than with staff and patients. He was fired by the Castle Memorial Hospital, rehired, then got into a shouting match with a nurse and quit. He took a job as a night security guard and began drinking heavily. Chapman developed a series of obsessions, including artwork, The Catcher in the Rye, music, and John Lennon. In September 1980, he wrote a letter to a friend, Lynda Irish, in which he stated, \"I'm going nuts.\" He signed the letter, \"The Catcher in the Rye\". Chapman had no criminal convictions up to this point. \n\nPlan to murder John Lennon\n\nChapman allegedly started planning to kill Lennon three months prior to the murder.\n\nHe had been a big Beatles fan, idolizing Lennon, and played guitar himself, but turned against him after becoming a Christian; he was angered at Lennon's comment that the Beatles were \"more popular than Jesus.\" In the South, there were demonstrations, album burnings, boycotts, and projectiles were thrown. Some members of Chapman's prayer group made a joke \"It went, 'Imagine, imagine if John Lennon was dead.'\" Chapman's childhood friend Miles McManushe recalls his referring to the song as \"communist\". Jan Reeves, sister of one of Chapman's best friends, reports that Chapman \"seemed really angry toward John Lennon, and he kept saying he could not understand why John Lennon had said it [that the Beatles were more popular than Jesus]. According to Mark, there should be nobody more popular than the Lord Jesus Christ. He said it was blasphemy.\" \n\t \nChapman had later also been influenced by reading in a library book (John Lennon: One Day at a Time by Anthony Fawcett) about Lennon's life in New York. According to his wife Gloria, \"He was angry that Lennon would preach love and peace but yet have millions [of dollars].\" Chapman later said that \"He told us to imagine no possessions, and there he was, with millions of dollars and yachts and farms and country estates, laughing at people like me who had believed the lies and bought the records and built a big part of their lives around his music.\" \n\nHe said that he chose Lennon after seeing him on the cover of The Beatles' album, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. He also recalls having listened to Lennon's John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band album in the weeks before the murder and has stated: \"I would listen to this music and I would get angry at him, for saying that he didn't believe in God... and that he didn't believe in the Beatles. This was another thing that angered me, even though this record had been done at least 10 years previously. I just wanted to scream out loud, 'Who does he think he is, saying these things about God and heaven and the Beatles?' Saying that he doesn't believe in Jesus and things like that. At that point, my mind was going through a total blackness of anger and rage. So I brought the Lennon book home, into this The Catcher in the Rye milieu where my mindset is Holden Caulfield and anti-phoniness.\"\n\nChapman also said that he had a further list of people in mind, including Johnny Carson, Marlon Brando, Walter Cronkite, Elizabeth Taylor, George C. Scott, and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, but John Lennon seemed to be the easiest to find. He separately said that he was particularly infatuated by Lennon. Chapman's planning has been described as 'muddled'. Chapman went to New York in October 1980, intending to kill Lennon. He left in order to obtain ammunition from his unwitting friend in Atlanta, Dana Reeves, and returned to New York in November.\n\nAfter being inspired by the film Ordinary People, Chapman returned to Hawaii, telling his wife he had been obsessed with killing Lennon. He showed her the gun and bullets, but she did not inform the police or mental health services. He made an appointment to see a clinical psychologist, but before it occurred he flew back to New York, on December 6, 1980. At one point, he considered committing suicide by jumping from the Statue of Liberty. Chapman says that the message \"Thou Shalt Not Kill\" flashed on the TV at him, and was also on a wall hanging put up by his wife in their apartment; on the night before the murder, Chapman and his wife discussed on the phone about getting help with his problems by first working on his relationship with God.\n\nOn December 7, 1980, the day before the killing, Chapman accosted singer-songwriter James Taylor at the 72nd Street subway station. According to Taylor, \"The guy had sort of pinned me to the wall and was glistening with maniacal sweat and talking some freak speak about what he was going to do and his stuff with how John was interested, and he was going to get in touch with John Lennon.\" He also reportedly offered cocaine to a taxi driver.\n\nOn the day of the murder, David Bowie was appearing on Broadway in the play The Elephant Man. \"I was second on his list,\" Bowie later said. \"Chapman had a front-row ticket to The Elephant Man the next night. John and Yoko were supposed to sit front-row for that show, too. So the night after John was killed there were three empty seats in the front row. I can’t tell you how difficult that was to go on. I almost didn’t make it through the performance.” \n\nMurder of John Lennon\n\nOn December 8, 1980, Chapman left his room at the Sheraton Hotel, leaving personal items behind which the police would later find, and bought a copy of The Catcher in the Rye in which he wrote \"This is my statement\", signing it \"Holden Caulfield\". He then spent most of the day near the entrance to The Dakota apartment building where Lennon and Yoko Ono lived, talking to fans and the doorman. Early in the morning, a distracted Chapman missed seeing Lennon step out of a cab and enter the Dakota. Later in the morning, Chapman met Lennon's housekeeper who was returning from a walk with their five-year-old son Sean. Chapman reached in front of the housekeeper to shake Sean's hand and said that he was a beautiful boy, quoting Lennon's song \"Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)\".\nAround 5:00 p.m., Lennon and Ono left The Dakota for a recording session at Record Plant Studios. As they walked toward their limousine, Chapman shook hands with Lennon and asked for him to sign a copy of his album, Double Fantasy. Photographer Paul Goresh took a photo of Lennon signing Chapman's album. Chapman later said in an interview that he tried to get Goresh to stay, and that he asked another Lennon fan lingering at the building's entrance to go out with him that night. He suggested that if the girl had accepted his invitation, or the photographer had stayed, he would not have murdered Lennon that evening; but he probably would have tried another day. \n\nAround 10:50 p.m., the Lennons' limousine returned to the Dakota. Lennon and Ono got out, passed Chapman and walked toward the archway entrance of the building. From the street behind them, Chapman fired five shots from a .38 special revolver, four of which hit Lennon in the back and left shoulder, puncturing the left lung and left subclavian artery. \n\nAt the time, one newspaper reported that, before firing, Chapman softly called out \"Mr. Lennon\" and dropped into a crouched position. Chapman said that he does not recall saying anything and that Lennon did not turn around. \n\nChapman remained at the scene, appearing to be reading The Catcher in the Rye, until the police arrived. The New York City Police Department officers who first responded, recognizing that Lennon's wounds were severe, decided to transport him to Roosevelt Hospital. Chapman was arrested without incident. In his statement to police three hours later, Chapman stated, \"I’m sure the big part of me is Holden Caulfield, who is the main person in the book. The small part of me must be the Devil.\" Lennon was pronounced dead by Dr. Stephan Lynn at 11:07 p.m. at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center.\n\nLegal process \n\nChapman was charged with second degree murder. He told police that he had used hollow-point bullets \"because they are more deadly\" and\n\"to ensure Lennon's death\". Gloria Chapman, who had known of her husband's preparations for killing Lennon but took no action, was not charged. Chapman later said that he harbored a \"deep-seated resentment\" toward his wife, \"that she didn't go to somebody, even the police, and say, 'Look, my husband's bought a gun and he says he's going to kill John Lennon'.\" \n\nMental state assessment\n\nMore than a dozen psychologists and psychiatrists studied Chapman in the six months prior to trial—three for the prosecution, six for the defense, and several more on behalf of the court. A battery of standard diagnostic procedures and over 200 hours of clinical interviews were conducted. All six defense experts concluded that Chapman was psychotic; five diagnosed paranoid schizophrenia, while the sixth felt his symptoms were more consistent with manic depression. The three prosecution experts declared that his delusions fell short of psychosis, and instead diagnosed various personality disorders. The court-appointed experts concurred with the prosecution's examiners that he was delusional, yet competent to stand trial. The examinations were notable for the fact that Chapman was more cooperative with the prosecution's mental health experts than with those for the defense, possibly (according to one psychiatrist) because he did not wish to be considered \"crazy\", and persuaded himself that the defense experts only declared him insane because they were hired to do so.\n\nThe Rev. Charles McGowan, who had been pastor of Chapman's old church, Chapel Woods Presbyterian in Decatur, Ga., visited Chapman as well, and told him of his conviction that religion held the key to his crime. \"I believe there was a demonic power at work,\" he said. Chapman initially embraced his old religion with new fervor as a result; but after McGowan revealed information to the press that Chapman had told him in confidence, Chapman disavowed his renewed interest in Christianity and reverted to his initial explanation: that he had killed Lennon to promote the reading of The Catcher in the Rye. When asked why it was so important for people to read the book, Chapman said he \"didn't know\" and \"didn't really care either—that was not his job.\"\n\nPlea\n\nLawyer Herbert Adlerberg was assigned to represent Chapman but, amid threats of lynching, withdrew. Police feared that Lennon fans might storm the hospital so they transferred Chapman to Rikers Island. \n\nIn January 1981, at the initial hearing, Chapman's new lawyer, Jonathan Marks, entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity. In February, Chapman sent a handwritten statement to The New York Times urging everyone to read The Catcher in the Rye, calling it an \"extraordinary book that holds many answers.\" The defense team sought to establish witnesses as to Chapman's mental state at the time of the killing. It was reported they were confident he would be found not guilty by reason of insanity, in which case he would have been committed to a state mental hospital and received treatment.\n\nHowever, in June, Chapman told Marks he wanted to drop the insanity defense and plead guilty. Marks objected with \"serious questions\" over Chapman's sanity, and legally challenged his competence to make this decision. In the pursuant hearing on June 22, Chapman said that God had told him to plead guilty and that he would not change his plea or ever appeal, regardless of his sentence. Marks told the court that he opposed Chapman's change of plea but that Chapman would not listen to him. Judge Dennis Edwards refused a further assessment, saying that Chapman had made the decision of his own free will, and declared him competent to plead guilty. \n\nSentencing\n\nOn August 24, 1981, the sentencing hearing took place. Two experts gave evidence on Chapman's behalf. Judge Edwards interrupted Dorothy Otnow Lewis, a research psychiatrist then relatively inexperienced in the courtroom, indicating that the purpose of the hearing was to determine the sentence and that there was no question of Chapman's criminal responsibility. Lewis has maintained that Chapman's decision to change his plea did not appear reasonable or explicable, and she implies the judge did not want to allow an independent competency assessment. The district attorney argued that Chapman committed the murder as an easy route to fame. When Chapman was asked if he had anything to say, he rose and read the passage from The Catcher in the Rye, when Holden tells his little sister, Phoebe, what he wants to do with his life:\nAnyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody's around – nobody big, I mean – except me. And I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff – I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all.\nThe judge ordered psychiatric treatment in prison and sentenced Chapman to 20-years-to-life, 5 years less than the maximum sentence of 25-years-to-life. Chapman was given five years less than the maximum because he pleaded guilty to second degree murder, thereby avoiding the time and expense of a trial.\n\nImprisonment\n\nIn 1981, Chapman was imprisoned at Attica, outside of Buffalo, New York. After Chapman fasted for 26 days in February 1982, the New York State Supreme Court authorized the state to force feed him. Martin Von Holden, the director of the Central New York Psychiatric Center, said that Chapman still refused to eat with other inmates but agreed to take liquid nutrients. Chapman was confined to a Special Handling Unit (SHU) for violent and at-risk prisoners, in part due to concern that he might be harmed by Lennon's fans in the general population. There were 105 prisoners in the building who were \"not considered a threat to him,\" according to the New York State Department of Correctional Services. He had his own prison cell, but spent \"most of his day outside his cell working on housekeeping and in the library.\" \n\nChapman worked in the prison as a legal clerk and kitchen helper. He was barred from participating in the Cephas Attica workshops, a charitable organization which helps inmates to adjust to life outside prison. He was also prohibited from attending the prison's violence and anger management classes due to concern for his safety. Chapman reportedly likes to read and write short stories. At his parole board hearing in 2004, he described his plans; \"I would immediately try to find a job, and I really want to go from place to place, at least in the state, church to church, and tell people what happened to me and point them the way to Christ.\" He also said that he thought that there was a possibility he could find work as a farmhand or return to his previous trade as a printer. \n\nChapman is in the Family Reunion Program, and is allowed one conjugal visit a year with his wife, since he accepted solitary confinement. The program allows him to spend up to 42 hours alone with his wife in a specially built prison home. He also gets occasional visits from his sister, clergy, and a few friends. In 2004, James Flateau, a spokesman for the state's Department of Correctional Services, said that Chapman had been involved in three \"minor incidents\" between 1989 and 1994 for delaying an inmate count and refusing to follow an order. Chapman was transferred to the Wende Correctional Facility in Alden, New York, which is east of Buffalo, on May 15, 2012.\n\nParole applications and campaigns\n\nAs the result of his sentence of 20 years to life, Chapman first became eligible for parole in 2000, and is entitled to a hearing every two years. Since that time, Chapman has been denied parole eight times by a three-member board. Shortly before Chapman's first hearing, Yoko Ono sent a letter to the board opposing his release from prison. In addition, New York State Senator Michael Nozzolio, chairman of the Senate Crime Victims, Crime and Correction Committee, wrote to Parole Board Chairman Brion Travis saying: \"It is the responsibility of the New York State Parole Board to ensure that public safety is protected from the release of dangerous criminals like Chapman.\" \n\nAt the 50-minute hearing in 2000, Chapman said that he was not a danger to society. The parole board concluded that releasing Chapman would \"deprecate the seriousness of the crime and serve to undermine respect for the law\" and that Chapman's granting of media interviews represented a continued interest in \"maintaining your notoriety.\" They noted that although Chapman had a good disciplinary record while in prison, he had been in the SHU and didn't access \"anti-violence and/or anti-aggression programming.\" Robert Gangi, a lawyer for the Correctional Association of New York, said that he thought it unlikely Chapman would ever be freed because the board would not risk the \"political heat\" of releasing Lennon's killer. In 2002, the parole board stated again that releasing Chapman after 22 years in prison would \"deprecate the seriousness\" of the crime, and that while his behavioral record continued to be positive, it was no predictor of his potential community behavior. The parole board held a third hearing in 2004, and declined parole yet again. One of the reasons given by the board was having subjected Ono to \"monumental suffering by her witnessing the crime.\" Another factor was concern for Chapman's safety; several Lennon fans had threatened to kill him if he were released. Ono's letter opposing his release stated that Chapman would not be safe outside of prison. The board reported that its decision was based on the interview, a review of records and deliberation. Around 6,000 people had signed an online petition against Chapman's release by this time. \n\nIn October 2006, the parole board held a 16-minute hearing and concluded that his release would not be in the best interest of the community or his own personal safety. On December 8, 2006, the 26th anniversary of Lennon's death, Yoko Ono published a one-page advertisement in several newspapers saying that December 8 should be a \"day of forgiveness,\" and that she was not yet sure if she was ready to forgive Chapman. Chapman's fifth hearing was on August 12, 2008. He was denied parole \"due to concern for the public safety and welfare.\" On July 27, 2010, in advance of Chapman's scheduled sixth parole hearing, Ono said that she would again oppose parole for Chapman stating that her safety, that of John's sons, and Chapman's would be at risk. She added, \"I am afraid it will bring back the nightmare, the chaos and confusion [of that night] once again.\" On August 11, 2010, the parole board postponed the hearing until September, stating that it was awaiting the receipt of additional information to complete Chapman's record. On September 7, the board denied Chapman's latest parole application, with the panel stating \"release remains inappropriate at this time and incompatible with the welfare of the community.\"\n\nChapman's seventh parole hearing was held before a three-member board on August 22, 2012. The following day, the denial of his application was announced, with the board stating, “Despite your positive efforts while incarcerated, your release at this time would greatly undermine respect for the law and tend to trivialize the tragic loss of life which you caused as a result of this heinous, unprovoked, violent, cold and calculated crime.” Chapman's eighth parole application was denied in August 2014. At the hearing, Chapman said, \"I am sorry for being such an idiot and choosing the wrong way for glory.\" \"I found my peace in Jesus,\" he continued. \"I know him. He loves me. He has forgiven me. He has helped in my life like you wouldn't believe.\" Chapman's next parole hearing is scheduled for August 2016.\n\nImpact\n\nFollowing the murder, and for the first six years in Attica, Chapman refused all requests for interviews. James R. Gaines interviewed him and wrote a three-part, 18,000-word People magazine series in February and March 1987. Chapman told the parole board he regretted the interview. Chapman later gave a series of audio-taped interviews to Jack Jones of the Democrat and Chronicle. In 1992 Jones published a book, Let Me Take You Down: Inside the Mind of Mark David Chapman, the Man Who Killed John Lennon. \n\nAlso in 1992, Chapman gave two television interviews. On December 4, 1992, 20/20 aired an interview that he gave to Barbara Walters, his first television interview since the shooting. On December 17, 1992, Larry King interviewed Chapman on his program Larry King Live. In 2000, with his first parole hearing approaching, Jack Jones asked Chapman to tell his story for Mugshots, a CourtTV program. Chapman refused to go on camera but, after praying over it, consented to tell his story in a series of audiotapes.\n\nChapman's experiences during the weekend on which he committed the murder have been turned into a feature-length movie called Chapter 27, in which he is played by Jared Leto. The film was written and directed by Jarrett Schaefer and is based on the Jones book. The film's title is a reference to The Catcher in the Rye, which has 26 chapters. Chapter 27 premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2007 and received polarized reactions from critics. The film had a limited release in theaters in the United States in March 2008. Chapter 27 was released widely onto DVD on September 30, 2008. Another film was made before the feature film entitled The Killing of John Lennon starring Jonas Ball as Chapman, which documents Chapman's life before and up to the murder and portrays Chapman in a somewhat sympathetic light. The film features Ball as Chapman narrating the film and states that all the words are Chapman's own.\n\nA number of conspiracy theories have been published, based on CIA and FBI surveillance of Lennon due to his left-wing activism, and on the actions of Mark Chapman in the murder or subsequent legal proceedings. Barrister and journalist Fenton Bresler raised the idea in a book published in 1990. Liverpool playwright Ian Carroll, who has staged a drama conveying the theory that Chapman was manipulated by a rogue wing of the CIA, suggests Chapman wasn't so crazy that he couldn't manage a long trip from Hawaii to New York shortly prior to the murder. Claims include that Chapman was a Manchurian candidate, including speculation on links to the CIA's Project MKULTRA. At least one author has argued that forensic evidence proves Chapman did not commit the murder, while others have criticized the theories as based on possible or suspected connections and circumstances.\n\nIn 1982, Rhino Records released a compilation of Beatles-related novelty and parody songs, called Beatlesongs. It featured a cover caricature of Chapman by William Stout. Following its release, Rhino recalled the record and replaced it with another cover. New York-based band Mindless Self Indulgence released a track entitled \"Mark David Chapman\" on their album If. Irish band The Cranberries recorded a song called \"I Just Shot John Lennon\" for their 1996 album To the Faithful Departed. It cites events that took place outside the Dakota on the night of Lennon's murder. The title of the song comes from Chapman's own words.\n\nAustin, Texas-based art rock band ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead have also released a song called \"Mark David Chapman\" from their 1999 album Madonna. Julian Cope's 1988 album Autogeddon contains a song called \"Don't Call Me Mark Chapman\" whose lyrics suggest it is told from the point of view of Lennon's murderer. Filipino band Rivermaya released a song called \"Hangman (I Shot the Walrus)\" on their album Atomic Bomb (1997), supposedly written from Mark Chapman's point of view. \n\nChapman's obsession with the central character and message of the The Catcher in the Rye added to controversy about the novel. Some links have been drawn between Chapman's and the book's themes of adolescent sensitivity and depression on the one hand, and anti-social and violent thoughts on the other. This connection was made in the play Six Degrees of Separation and its film adaptation by the character played by Will Smith. \n\nLinks have sometimes been drawn between Chapman's actions and those of other killers or attempted killers. John Hinckley, who only months later tried to assassinate President Ronald Reagan, was also associated with The Catcher in the Rye. Furthermore, John Hinckley's father, John Hinckley, Sr, was president of World Vision, for whom Chapman was employed. A writer who experienced mental illness in the same city as Jared Loughner has suggested that examples such as Chapman's show the need to challenge stigma about mental health problems and ensure there are good community mental health services including crisis intervention.", "John Lennon was an English musician who gained worldwide fame as one of the members of the Beatles, for his subsequent solo career, and for his political activism and pacifism. On 8 December 1980, Lennon was shot by Mark David Chapman in the archway of the Dakota, his residence in New York City. Lennon had just returned from Record Plant Studio with his wife, Yoko Ono.\n\nAfter sustaining four major gunshot wounds, Lennon was pronounced dead on arrival at Roosevelt Hospital. At the hospital, it was stated that nobody could have lived for more than a few minutes after sustaining such injuries. Shortly after local news stations reported Lennon's death, crowds gathered at Roosevelt Hospital and in front of the Dakota. Lennon was cremated at the Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York two days after his death; the ashes were given to Ono, who chose not to hold a funeral for him. The first media report of Lennon's death to a US national audience was announced by Howard Cosell, on ABC's Monday Night Football.\n\nEvents preceding his death\n\n8 December 1980\n\nPhotographer Annie Leibovitz went to the Lennons' apartment to do a photo shoot for Rolling Stone magazine. Leibovitz promised Lennon that a photo with Ono would make the front cover of the magazine, even though she initially tried to get a picture with Lennon by himself. Leibovitz said, \"Nobody wanted [Ono] on the cover\". Lennon insisted that both he and his wife be on the cover, and after taking the pictures, Leibovitz left their apartment at 3:30 p.m. After the photo shoot, Lennon gave what would be his last interview, to San Francisco DJ Dave Sholin, for a music show to be broadcast on the RKO Radio Network. At 5:40 p.m., Lennon and Ono, delayed by a late limousine, left their apartment to mix the song \"Walking on Thin Ice\" (an Ono song featuring Lennon on lead guitar) at the Record Plant Studio. \n\nMark David Chapman\n\nAs Lennon and Ono walked to a limousine, shared with the RKO Radio crew, they were approached by several people seeking autographs. Among them was Mark David Chapman. It was common for fans to wait outside the Dakota to meet Lennon and ask for his autograph. Chapman, a 25-year-old security guard from Honolulu, Hawaii, had previously travelled to New York to murder Lennon in October (before the release of Double Fantasy), but had changed his mind and returned home. Chapman silently handed Lennon a copy of Double Fantasy, and Lennon obliged with an autograph. After signing the album, Lennon asked, \"Is this all you want?\" Chapman smiled and nodded in agreement. Photographer and Lennon fan Paul Goresh took a photo of the encounter. \nChapman had been waiting for Lennon outside the Dakota since mid-morning, and had even approached the Lennons' five-year-old son, Sean, who was with the family nanny, Helen Seaman, when they returned home in the afternoon. According to Chapman, he briefly touched the boy's hand.\n\nThe Lennons spent several hours at the Record Plant studio before returning to the Dakota, at approximately 10:50 pm. Lennon had decided against dining out so he could be home in time to say goodnight to his son, before going on to the Stage Deli restaurant with Ono. Lennon liked to oblige any fans who had been waiting for long periods of time to meet him with autographs or pictures, once saying during an interview with BBC Radio's Andy Peebles on 6 December 1980: \"People come and ask for autographs, or say 'Hi', but they don't bug you.\" The Lennons exited their limousine on 72nd Street instead of driving into the more secure courtyard of the Dakota. \n\nMurder\n\nThe Dakota's doorman, Jose Perdomo, and a nearby cab driver saw Chapman standing in the shadows by the archway. As Lennon passed by, he glanced briefly at Chapman, appearing to recognize him from earlier. Seconds later, Chapman took aim directly at the center of Lennon's back and fired five hollow-point bullets at him from a Charter Arms .38 Special revolver in rapid succession from a range of about nine or ten feet (about 3 m) away. Based on statements made that night by NYPD Chief of Detectives James Sullivan, numerous radio, television, and newspaper reports claimed at the time that, before firing, Chapman called out \"Mr. Lennon\" and dropped into a combat stance. Later court hearings and witness interviews did not include either \"Mr. Lennon\" or the \"combat stance\" description. Chapman has said he does not remember calling out to Lennon before he fired, but he claimed to have taken a \"combat stance\" in a 1992 interview with Barbara Walters. The first bullet missed, passing over Lennon's head and hitting a window of the Dakota building. Two of the next bullets struck Lennon in the left side of his back, and two more penetrated his left shoulder. \n\nLennon, bleeding profusely from external wounds and also from his mouth, staggered up five steps to the security/reception area, saying, \"I'm shot, I'm shot\". He then fell to the floor, scattering cassettes that he had been carrying. The concierge, Jay Hastings, first started to make a tourniquet, but upon ripping open Lennon's blood-stained shirt and realizing the severity of his multiple injuries, he covered Lennon's chest with his uniform jacket, removed his blood-covered glasses, and summoned the police.\n\nOutside, doorman Perdomo shook the gun out of Chapman's hand then kicked it across the sidewalk. Chapman then removed his coat and hat in preparation for the arrival of police—to show he was not carrying any concealed weapons—and sat down on the sidewalk. Perdomo shouted at Chapman, \"Do you know what you've just done?\" to which Chapman calmly replied, \"Yes, I just shot John Lennon.\" The first policemen to arrive were Steven Spiro and Peter Cullen, who were at 72nd Street and Broadway when they heard a report of shots fired at the Dakota. The officers arrived around two minutes later and found Chapman sitting \"very calmly\" on the sidewalk. They reported that Chapman had dropped the revolver to the ground and was holding a paperback book, J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. They immediately put Chapman in handcuffs and placed him in the back seat of their squad car. Chapman made no attempt to flee or resist arrest. \n\nThe second team, officers Herb Frauenberger and his partner, Tony Palma, arrived a few minutes later. They found Lennon lying face down on the floor of the reception area with Hastings attending to him, blood pouring from his mouth and his clothing already soaked with blood. Realizing the extent of his injuries, the policemen decided not to wait for an ambulance and immediately carried Lennon into their squad car and rushed him to St Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center. Officer James Moran said they placed Lennon in the back seat. Reportedly, Moran asked, \"Are you John Lennon?\" to which Lennon nodded and replied \"Yes.\" There are conflicting accounts of this, however. According to another account by officer Bill Gamble, Lennon nodded slightly and tried to speak, but could only manage to make a gurgling sound, and lost consciousness shortly thereafter. \n\nDr. Stephan Lynn, head of the Emergency Department, who had been called in again after having just returned home after a 13-hour-long work shift, received Lennon in the emergency room at Roosevelt Hospital a few minutes before 11:00 pm when Officers Frauenberger and Moran arrived, with Moran carrying Lennon on his back from their squad car and onto a gurney, into the emergency room demanding a doctor for a multiple gunshot wound victim. When Lennon arrived, he had no pulse and was not breathing. Dr. Lynn, two other doctors, a nurse and two or three other medical attendants worked on Lennon for ten to 15 minutes in a desperate attempt to resuscitate him. As a last resort, Dr. Lynn cut open Lennon's chest and attempted manual heart massage to restore circulation, but he quickly discovered that the damage to the blood vessels above and around Lennon's heart from the multiple bullet wounds was too great. Lennon was pronounced dead on arrival in the emergency room at the Roosevelt Hospital at 11:15 pm by Dr. Lynn, but the time of 11:07 pm has also been reported. Lennon's body was then taken to the city morgue at 520 First Avenue and autopsied. The cause of death was reported as \"hypovolemic shock, caused by the loss of more than 80% of blood volume due to multiple through-and-through gunshot wounds to the chest and aortic arch\". The pathologist who performed the autopsy on Lennon also stated in his report that even with prompt medical treatment, no person could have lived for more than a few minutes with such multiple bullet injuries to all of the major arteries and veins around the heart. \n\nThe surgeon also noted—as did other witnesses—that, at the moment Lennon was pronounced dead, a Beatles song (\"All My Loving\") came over the hospital's sound system. \n\nThree of the four bullets that struck Lennon's back passed completely through his body and out of his chest, one of which hit and became lodged in his upper left arm, while the fourth lodged itself in his aorta beside his heart; nearly all of them would have been fatal by themselves as each bullet hit vital arteries around the heart. As Lennon had been shot four times at close range with hollow-point bullets, Lennon's affected organs (particularly his left lung) and major blood vessels above his heart were virtually destroyed upon impact. Lynn later stated to reporters on the extent of Lennon's injuries: \"If he [Lennon] had been shot this way in the middle of the operating room with a whole team of surgeons ready to work on him... he still wouldn't have survived his injuries\". \n\nWhen told by Dr. Lynn of her husband's death, Ono started sobbing and said, \"Oh no, no, no, no ... tell me it's not true!\" Dr. Lynn remembers that Ono lay down and began hitting her head against the floor, but calmed down when a nurse gave Lennon's wedding ring to her. She was led away from Roosevelt Hospital by Geffen Records' president, David Geffen, in a state of shock. \n\nAnnouncements\n\nMonday Night Football\n\nOno asked the hospital not to report to the media that her husband was dead until she had informed their five-year-old son Sean, who was at home. Ono said he was probably watching television and did not want him to learn of his father's death from a TV announcement.\n\nMeanwhile, news producer Alan J. Weiss from WABC-TV had been waiting to be treated in the emergency room at Roosevelt Hospital due to having been involved in an accident earlier that evening while riding his motorcycle. Weiss recalled in an interview for the CNN series Crimes of the Century in 2013 that he had seen Lennon being wheeled into the room surrounded by several police officers. After he learned what happened, Weiss called back to the station to relay the information. Eventually, word made its way through the chain of command to ABC News president Roone Arledge, who was tasked with finding a way to bring this major development to the viewing audience. \n\nWhile all of this was happening Arledge, who was also the president of the network's sports division, was presiding over ABC's telecast of Monday Night Football in his capacity as its executive producer. At the exact moment he received word of Lennon's death, the game between the New England Patriots and the Miami Dolphins was tied with less than a minute left in the fourth quarter and the Patriots were driving toward the potential winning score.\n\nAs the Patriots tried to put themselves in position for a field goal, Arledge informed Frank Gifford and Howard Cosell of the shooting and suggested that they be the ones to report on the murder. Cosell, who had previously interviewed Lennon on a 1974 broadcast, was chosen to do so but was apprehensive of it at first, as he felt the game should take precedence and that it was not their place to break such a big story. Gifford convinced Cosell otherwise, saying that he should not \"hang on to (the news)\" as the significance of the event was much greater than the finish of the game.\n\nThe following exchange begins with thirty seconds left in the fourth quarter, shortly after Gifford and Cosell were informed of what had transpired. \n\nCosell: ... but (the game)'s suddenly been placed in total perspective for us; I'll finish this, they're in the hurry-up offense.Gifford: Third down, four. (Chuck) Foreman ... it'll be fourth down. (Matt) Cavanaugh will let it run down for one final attempt, he'll let the seconds tick off to give Miami no opportunity whatsoever. (Whistle blows.) Timeout is called with three seconds remaining, John Smith is on the line. And I don't care what's on the line, Howard, you have got to say what we know in the booth.Cosell: Yes, we have to say it. Remember this is just a football game, no matter who wins or loses. An unspeakable tragedy confirmed to us by ABC News in New York City: John Lennon, outside of his apartment building on the West Side of New York City, the most famous perhaps, of all of the Beatles, shot twice in the back, rushed to Roosevelt Hospital, dead on arrival. Hard to go back to the game after that news flash, which, in duty bound, we have to take. Frank?Gifford: (after a pause) Indeed, it is. \n\nOther announcements \n\nIt has been claimed that the first nationally-telecast bulletin about the shooting was made by Kathleen Sullivan as part of a standard newscast on Cable News Network; Sullivan reported that Lennon had been shot but his condition was not known at the time of the bulletin. NBC-TV momentarily broke into its East Coast feed of The Best of Carson for its bulletin of Lennon's death before returning in the middle of a comedy piece being performed by Johnny Carson. \n\nNew York rock station WNEW-FM 102.7 immediately suspended all programming and opened its lines to calls from listeners. Stations throughout the country switched to special programming devoted to Lennon and/or Beatles music. \n\nThe following day, Ono issued a statement: \"There is no funeral for John. John loved and prayed for the human race. Please do the same for him. Love, Yoko and Sean.\" \n\nAftermath\n\nLennon's murder triggered an outpouring of grief around the world on an unprecedented scale. Lennon's remains were cremated at Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, Westchester County, N.Y.; no funeral was held. Ono sent word to the chanting crowd outside the Dakota that their singing had kept her awake; she asked that they re-convene at Central Park's Naumburg Bandshell the following Sunday for ten minutes of silent prayer. On 14 December 1980, millions of people around the world responded to Ono's request to pause for ten minutes of silence to remember Lennon. Thirty thousand gathered in Liverpool, and the largest group—over 225,000—converged on New York's Central Park, close to the scene of the shooting. For those ten minutes, every radio station in New York City went off the air. \n\nAt least three Beatles fans committed suicide after the murder, leading Ono to make a public appeal asking mourners not to give in to despair. Ono released a solo album, Season of Glass, in 1981. The cover of the album is a photograph of Lennon's blood-spattered glasses. That same year she also released \"Walking on Thin Ice\", the song the Lennons had mixed at the Record Plant less than an hour before he was murdered, as a single. Chapman pleaded guilty in 1981 to murdering Lennon. Under the terms of his guilty plea, Chapman was sentenced to 20-years-to-life and later automatically became eligible for parole up until 2000.[http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/39037888/ns/today-entertainment/ John Lennon killer Chapman denied parole - Entertainment - Celebrities - TODAY.com] However, Chapman has been denied parole eight times and remains incarcerated at the Wende Correctional Facility. \n\nMemorials and tributes\n\nAnnie Leibovitz's photo of a naked Lennon embracing his wife, taken on the day of the murder, was the cover of Rolling Stones 22 January 1981 issue, most of which was dedicated to articles, letters and photographs commemorating Lennon's life and death. In 2005 the American Society of Magazine Editors ranked it as the top magazine cover of the last 40 years. \n\nGeorge Harrison released a tribute song, \"All Those Years Ago\", which featured Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney, in 1981. McCartney released his tribute, \"Here Today\", on his 1982 album, Tug of War. Elton John, who had recorded the number-one hit \"Whatever Gets You thru the Night\" with Lennon, teamed up with his lyricist Bernie Taupin and recorded a tribute to Lennon, entitled \"Empty Garden (Hey Hey Johnny).\" It appeared on his 1982 album, Jump Up!, and peaked at #13 on the US Singles Chart that year. When he performed the song at a sold-out concert in Madison Square Garden in August 1982, he was joined on stage by Ono and Sean. Queen, during their Game Tour, performed a cover of Lennon's solo song \"Imagine\" at concerts after Lennon's death. Queen also performed the song \"Life Is Real\", from the album Hot Space (1982), in his honour. It was written by singer Freddie Mercury.\n\nRoxy Music added a cover version of the song \"Jealous Guy\" to their set while touring in Germany, which they recorded and released in March 1981. The song was their only UK #1 hit, topping the charts for two weeks. It features on many Bryan Ferry/Roxy Music collections, though not always in its full-length version.\n\nPaul Simon's homage to Lennon, \"The Late Great Johnny Ace\", initially sings of the rhythm and blues singer Johnny Ace, who is said to have shot himself in 1954, then goes on to reference John Lennon, as well as President John F. Kennedy who was assassinated in 1963, the year Beatlemania started. Simon had actually premiered the song during Simon & Garfunkel's reunion Concert in Central Park in 1981; near the end of the song, a fan ran onto the stage, possibly in response to Simon mentioning Lennon in the lyrics. The man was dragged offstage by Simon's personnel, saying to Simon, \"I have to talk to you\"; all of which can be seen in the DVD of the concert. The song also appears on Simon's 1983 Hearts and Bones album.\n\nDavid Bowie, who befriended Lennon in the mid-1970s (Lennon co-wrote and performed on Bowie's US #1 hit \"Fame\" in 1975), performed a tribute to Lennon in the final show of his Serious Moonlight Tour at the Hong Kong Coliseum on 8 December 1983—the third anniversary of Lennon's death. Bowie announced that the last time he saw Lennon was in Hong Kong, and after announcing \"On this day, December the 8th 1980, John Lennon was shot and killed outside of his New York apartment,\" he performed Lennon's \"Imagine\".\n\nDavid Gilmour of Pink Floyd wrote and recorded the song \"Murder\" in response to Lennon's death; the song was released on Gilmour's solo album, About Face (1984).\n\nIn 1985, New York City dedicated an area of Central Park directly across from the Dakota as Strawberry Fields, where Lennon had frequently walked. In a symbolic show of unity, countries from around the world donated trees and the city of Naples, Italy, donated the Imagine mosaic centerpiece. A symbolic grave for Lennon was erected in Prague's Mala Strana square, which hosted demonstrations during the fall of the communist regime in Czechoslovakia. \n\nLennon was honoured with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1991. In 1994, the breakaway autonomous republic of Georgia, Republic of Abkhazia, issued two postage stamps featuring the faces of Lennon and Groucho Marx, rather than portraits of Vladimir Lenin and Karl Marx, spoofing Abkhazia's Communist past. On 8 December 2000, Cuba's President Fidel Castro unveiled a bronze statue of Lennon in a park in Havana. In 2000, the John Lennon Museum was opened at the Saitama Super Arena in the city of Saitama, Japan (but closed on 30 September 2010), and Liverpool renamed its airport Liverpool John Lennon Airport, adopting the motto, \"Above us only sky\", in 2002. The minor planet 4147 Lennon, discovered 12 January 1983 by B. A. Skiff at the Anderson Mesa Station of the Lowell Observatory, was named in memory of Lennon. On 9 December 2006, in the city of Puebla, Mexico, a plaque was revealed, honouring Lennon's contribution to music, culture and peace. On 9 October 2007, Ono dedicated a new memorial called the Imagine Peace Tower, located on the island of Viðey, off the coast of Reykjavík, Iceland. Each year, between 9 October and 8 December, it projects a vertical beam of light high into the sky in Lennon's memory. In 1990 a group of citizens came forward with an initiative to rename one of the streets of Warsaw in honour of John Lennon. The petition had approximately 5000 supporting signatures and passed through city council unchallenged. \n\nEvery 8 December a memorial ceremony is held in front of the Capitol Records building on Vine Street in Hollywood, California. People also light candles in front of Lennon's Hollywood Walk of Fame star, outside the Capitol Building. From 28 to 30 September 2007, Durness held the John Lennon Northern Lights Festival which was attended by Julia Baird (Lennon's half-sister), who read from Lennon's writings and her own books, and Stanley Parkes, Lennon's Scottish cousin. Parkes said, \"Me and Julia [Baird] are going to be going to the old family croft to tell stories\". Musicians, painters and poets from across the UK performed at the festival. \n\nIn 2009, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's New York City annexe hosted a special John Lennon exhibit, which included many mementos and personal effects from Lennon's life, as well as the clothes he was wearing when he was murdered, still in the brown paper bag from Roosevelt Hospital. Ono still places a lit candle in the window of Lennon's room in the Dakota on 8 December. In 2012, Bob Dylan released the Lennon tribute \"Roll on John\" on his Tempest album. \n\nOn film\n\nTwo films depicting the murder of Lennon were released close together more than 25 years after the event. The first of the two, The Killing of John Lennon, was released on 7 December 2007. Directed by Andrew Piddington, the movie had Jonas Ball play Mark David Chapman. The second film was Chapter 27, released on 28 March 2008. Directed by J. P. Schaefer, Mark David Chapman was played by Jared Leto. Lennon was portrayed by actor Mark Lindsay Chapman, who coincidentally has the same first and last name as the person who killed Lennon. Lindsay Chapman had previously been cast (and billed then as 'Mark Lindsay') in NBC Television's John & Yoko: A Love Story in 1985, but the role of Lennon was re-cast when it was revealed that the actor's real surname was Chapman." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "The_Waltons.txt" ], "title": [ "The Waltons" ], "wiki_context": [ "The Waltons is an American television series created by Earl Hamner, Jr., based on his book Spencer's Mountain, and a 1963 film of the same name. The show is centered on a family in a rural Virginia community during the Great Depression and World War II.\n\nThe series pilot aired as a television movie entitled The Homecoming: A Christmas Story and was broadcast on December 19, 1971. Beginning in September 1972, the series originally aired on CBS for a total of nine seasons. After the series was canceled by CBS in 1981, NBC aired three television movie sequels in 1982, with three more in the 1990s on CBS. The Waltons was produced by Lorimar Productions and distributed by Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution in syndication.\n\nPremise\n\nSetting\n\nThe main story takes place in Walton's Mountain, a fictional town at the foot of a mountain in fictitious Jefferson County, Virginia.\n\nThe actual place upon which the stories are based is in Nelson County, Virginia and is the community of Schuyler.\n\nThe time period is from 1933 to 1946, during the Great Depression and World War II, during the presidential administrations of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S Truman. The year 1933 is suggested by a reference to the opening of the Century of Progress exposition in Chicago, a brief shot of an automobile registration, and it is divulged in episode 18 that the date is in the spring of 1933. The last episode of season one, \"An Easter Story\", is set in February–April 1934. The year 1934 takes two seasons to cover, while some successive years are covered over the course of a few months. \n\nThe series finale, \"The Revel\", revolves around a party and the invitation date is given as June 4, 1946. A span of 13 years is therefore covered in nine seasons. There are some chronological errors, which ostensibly do not hinder the storyline.\n\nA Thanksgiving reunion show, A Walton Thanksgiving Reunion, filmed in 1993, takes place in 1963, and revolves around President John F. Kennedy's assassination; A Walton Wedding, made in 1995, is set in 1964; and, the latest reunion show, A Walton Easter, filmed in 1997, is set in 1969.\n\nThe series began relating stories that occurred 38 years in the past, and ended with its last reunion show set 28 years in the past.\n\nStory\n\nThe story is about the family of John Walton Jr. (known as John-Boy): his six siblings, his parents John and Olivia Walton, and the elder John's parents Zebulon \"Zeb\" and Esther Walton. John-Boy is the oldest of the children (17 years old in the beginning ), who becomes a journalist and novelist. Each episode is narrated at the opening and closing by a middle-aged John Jr. (voiced by author Earl Hamner on whom John-Boy is based). John Sr. manages to eke out a living for his family by operating a lumber mill with his sons' help as they grow older. The family income is augmented by some small-scale farming, and John occasionally hunts to put meat on the table.\n\nThe family shares hospitality with relatives and strangers as they are able. The small community named after their property is also home to folk of various income levels, ranging from the well-to-do Baldwin sisters, two elderly spinsters who distill moonshine that they call \"Papa's recipe\"; Ike Godsey, postmaster and owner of the general store with his somewhat snobbish wife Corabeth (a Walton cousin; she calls her husband \"Mr. Godsey\"); an African-American couple, Verdie and Harley Foster; Maude, a sassy octogenarian artist who paints on wood; Flossie Brimmer, a friendly though somewhat gossipy widow who runs a nearby boarding house; and Yancy Tucker, a good-hearted handyman with big plans but little motivation. Jefferson County sheriff Ep Bridges keeps law and order in Walton's Mountain. The entire family (except for John) attends a Baptist church, of which Olivia and Grandma Esther are the most regular attendees. The church that the Hamners actually attended was Schuyler Baptist Church, near the Hamner homeplace and is still in operation. The church has helped host several events honoring Earl Hamner, Jr., including one in 2014.\n\nIn the signature scene that closes almost every episode, the family house is enveloped in darkness, save for one, two or three lights in the upstairs bedroom windows. Through voice-overs, two or more characters make some brief comments related to that episode's events, and then bid each other goodnight, after which the lights go out.\n\nAfter completing high school, John-Boy attends fictional Boatwright University in the fictional nearby town of Westham. He later goes to New York City to work as a journalist.\n\nDuring the latter half of the 1976–77 season, Grandma Esther Walton suffers a stroke and returns home shortly before the death of her husband, Grandpa Zeb Walton (reflecting Ellen Corby's real-life stroke and the death of Will Geer, the actors who portrayed the characters).\n\nDuring the series' last few years, Mary Ellen and Ben start their own families; Erin, Jason and John Boy are married in later television movie sequels.\n\nWorld War II deeply affects the family. All four Walton boys enlist in the military. Mary Ellen's physician husband, Curtis \"Curt\" Willard, is sent to Pearl Harbor and is reported to have perished in the Japanese attack on December 7, 1941. Years later, Mary Ellen hears of sightings of her \"late\" husband, investigates and finds him alive (played by another actor), but brooding over his war wounds and living under an assumed name. She divorces him and later remarries.\n\nJohn-Boy's military plane is shot down, while Olivia becomes a volunteer at the VA hospital and is seen less and less; she eventually develops tuberculosis and enters an Arizona sanitarium. Olivia's cousin, Rose Burton, moves into the Walton house to look after the brood. Two years later, John Sr. moves to Arizona to be near Olivia. Grandma appears in only a handful of episodes during the eighth season (she was usually said to be visiting relatives in nearby Buckingham County).\n\nSix feature-length movies were made after the series' run; set from 1947 through 1969, they aired between 1982 and 1997.\n\nProduction\n\nPilot movie\n\nThe Homecoming: A Christmas Story (1971) was not originally intended to be a pilot for a series, but it became one because it was so popular. Except for the children and Grandma Walton, the actors for the movie were not the same as for the series. The musical score was by Oscar-winning composer Jerry Goldsmith (Goldsmith also scored several episodes of the first season, but the producers believed his TV movie theme was too gentle and requested he write a new theme for the series ) and was later released on an album by Film Score Monthly paired with James Horner's score for the 1982 TV movie Rascals and Robbers: The Secret Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn.\n\nPatricia Neal (as Olivia) won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Television Series Drama. The movie was also nominated for three Emmys: Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie (Neal), Outstanding Writing Achievement in Drama - Adaptation (Earl Hamner), and Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Drama - A Single Program (Fielder Cook). \n\nCharacters\n\nThe following is a brief summary of the main characters. See main article for a more complete list.\n\n* John \"John-Boy\" Walton Jr. (Richard Thomas, seasons 1–5, guest season 6, three movie sequels; Robert Wightman, seasons 8–9 and one movie sequel), the eldest of the seven children\n* John Walton Sr. (Ralph Waite), the family patriarch\n* Olivia Walton (Michael Learned, seasons 1–7, guest season 8, and four movies), the matriarch\n* Zebulon \"Grandpa\" Walton (Will Geer, seasons 1–6), John's father\n* Esther \"Grandma\" Walton (Ellen Corby, seasons 1–5 & 7, sporadically in other seasons, and in five movies), John's mother\n* Jason Walton (Jon Walmsley, entire series and six movies ), second-oldest brother; musically talented\n* Mary Ellen Walton (Judy Norton Taylor, entire series and six movies), headstrong oldest daughter; becomes a nurse \n* Erin Walton (Mary Elizabeth McDonough, entire series and six movies), second Walton daughter; works as a telephone operator and as manufacturing supervisor\n* Benjamin \"Ben\" Walton (Eric Scott, entire series and six movies), third Walton son; has an entrepreneurial spirit\n* James Robert \"Jim-Bob\" Walton (David W. Harper, entire series and six movies), youngest Walton son; mechanically inclined\n* Elizabeth Walton (Kami Cotler, entire series and six movies), youngest of the seven children\n* Cindy Walton (Leslie Winston), seasons 7-9 and four of the reunion movies, Ben's wife\n* Rose Burton (Peggy Rea, seasons 8–9 and one sequel), Olivia's matronly cousin who fills in as matriarch during Olivia's absence\n\nInspiration\n\nEarl Hamner's rural childhood growing up in the unincorporated community of Schuyler, Virginia, provided the basis for the setting and many of the storylines of The Waltons. His family and the community provided many life experiences which aided in the characters, values, area, and human-interest stories of his books, movies, and television series. Hamner provided the voice-over of the older John-Boy, usually heard at the beginning and end of each episode.\n\nJohn-Boy Walton's fictional alma mater, Boatwright University, is patterned after Richmond College, which became part of the University of Richmond on Boatwright Drive near Westham Station in The West End of Richmond, Virginia, about seventy miles east of Schuyler.\n\nFilming\n\nThe town of Walton's Mountain was built in the rear area of the Warner Bros. Studios, but the mountain itself was part of the range opposite Warner studios in Burbank, California. The Waltons' house facade was built in the back of the Warner Brothers lot. After the series concluded, the set was destroyed. For the reunion shows, a replica Waltons' house facade was built on the Here Come the Brides set on the Columbia Ranch studio, now part of the Warner Brothers studios. The Waltons' house is still used as scenery at Warner Brothers. For example, it served as the Dragonfly Inn on The Gilmore Girls.\n\nBroadcast and release\n\nSome sources indicate CBS put the show on its Fall 1972 schedule in response to congressional hearings on the quality of television. Backlash from a 1971 decision to purge most rural-oriented shows from the network lineup may have also been a factor. The network gave The Waltons an undesirable timeslot – Thursdays at 8 p.m., opposite two popular programs: The Flip Wilson Show on NBC and The Mod Squad on ABC. \"The rumor was that they put it against Flip Wilson and The Mod Squad because they didn't think it would survive. They thought, 'We can just tell Congress America doesn't want to see this',\" Kami Cotler, who played Elizabeth Walton, said in a 2012 interview. Ralph Waite was reluctant to audition for the part of John Walton because he didn't want to be tied to a long-running TV series, but his agent persuaded him by saying, \"It will never sell. You do the pilot. You pick up a couple of bucks and then you go back to New York.\"\n\nReception\n\nNielsen ratings\n\n*Season 1 (1972–73): #20 \n*Season 2 (1973–74): #2 \n*Season 3 (1974–75): #8 \n*Season 4 (1975–76): #14 \n*Season 5 (1976–77): #15 \n*Season 6 (1977–78): #21 \n*Season 7 (1978–79): Not in the Top 30 \n*Season 8 (1979–80): Not in the Top 30 \n*Season 9 (1980–81): #30 \n\nAccolades\n\nThe Waltons won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series in 1973. Also in 1973 Richard Thomas won the Emmy for Lead Actor in a Drama Series. Michael Learned won the Emmy for Lead Actress in a Drama Series three times (1973, 1974, and 1976). Ellen Corby was also a three-time winner in the Supporting Actress category, winning in 1973, 1975, and 1976. Will Geer was awarded the Supporting Actor Emmy in 1975. Veteran actress Beulah Bondi won an Emmy in 1977 for Lead Actress in a Single Performance for her guest appearance as Martha Corrine Walton in the episode \"The Pony Cart\" (Episode #111). She first appeared in The Waltons episode \"The Conflict\" (Episode #51) as the widow of Zeb Walton's brother.\n\nThe series also earned a Peabody Award for its first season. \n\nIn 2013, TV Guide ranked The Waltons No. 34 on its list of the 60 Best Series of All Time. \n\nHome media\n\nDVD releases\n\nWarner Home Video has released all nine seasons and six TV movies of The Waltons on DVD in Region 1. Seasons 1–4 have been released in Region 2. The pilot movie, The Homecoming: A Christmas Story, was released by Paramount Home Entertainment. Lorimar produced the series, CBS produced the pilot film, which is why Paramount, under CBS Home Entertainment, handles home video rights for The Homecoming.\n\nGerman-release DVDs provide German or English sound-track options, with dubbed German voices, or the original English soundtrack, although episode titles, in German, are not always either literal or precise translations of the original English-language titles. \n \n\nStreaming\n\nSeasons 1–9 are available via streaming through services such as Amazon Video. \n\nSyndication\n\nLorimar sold the distribution rights of The Waltons to Warner Bros. Television to avoid a lawsuit owing to the similarities between the series and the film Spencer's Mountain, which Warners owned. Warner Bros. acquired Lorimar in 1989, and has continued to syndicate the series ever since. Reruns currently air in the U.S. on INSP, the Hallmark Channel. In Canada, The Waltons airs on Vision TV and BookTelevision.\n\nIn the UK, the series was broadcast on BBC 1 and BBC 2 during the 1970s/1980s - the first three seasons were broadcast on BBC 2 from February 18, 1974 to May 17, 1976, on Mondays at 20.00 GMT, and seasons 4 and 5 were shown on BBC One from September 5, 1976 to August 30, 1977, on Sundays at 16.10 in 1976 and Tuesdays at 19.00 through 1977. After that, seasons 6-9 would be broadcast on BBC 2 again, starting on April 30, 1979 and concluding in April 1983. The three reunion TV movies filmed in 1982 were also shown on BBC 2 from December 21 to December 28, 1983. The show was repeated on Channel 4 in the 1990s; it currently airs on True Entertainment in the UK." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "GEICO.txt" ], "title": [ "GEICO" ], "wiki_context": [ "The Government Employees Insurance Company (GEICO) is an American auto insurance company headquartered in Chevy Chase, Maryland. It is the second largest auto insurer in the United States, after State Farm. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway that as of 2015 provided coverage for more than 22 million motor vehicles owned by more than 14 million policy holders. GEICO writes private passenger automobile insurance in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. GEICO sells its policies through local agents, called GEICO Field Representatives, and over the phone directly to the consumer, and through their website. Its mascot is a Gold dust day gecko with a Cockney accent, voiced by English actor Jake Wood. GEICO is well known in popular culture for its advertising, having made a large number of commercials intended\nto entertain viewers.\n\nHistory\n\nGEICO was founded in 1936 by Leo Goodwin Sr. and his wife Lillian Goodwin to provide auto insurance directly to federal government employees and their families. Since 1925, Goodwin had worked for USAA, an insurer which specialized in insuring only military personnel; he decided to start his own company after rising as far as a civilian could go in USAA's military-dominated hierarchy. Based on Goodwin's experience at USAA, GEICO's original business model was predicated on the assumption that federal employees as a group would constitute a less risky and more financially stable pool of insureds, as opposed to the general public. Despite the presence of the word \"government\" in its name, GEICO has always been a private corporation not affiliated with any government organization.\n\nIn 1937, the Goodwins relocated GEICO from San Antonio, Texas to Washington, D.C. and reincorporated the company as a D.C. corporation after realizing that their business model would work best in the place with the highest concentration of federal employees. \n\nAn important figure in GEICO's history is David Lloyd Kreeger, who became president of the company in 1964 and helped steer it into a major insurance enterprise. In 1948, he formed a group of investors who bought into GEICO right before it went public that year. He became senior vice president and general counsel of the company. Six years after becoming president of GEICO in 1964, he was named chairman and chief executive officer. He retained those titles until he retired in 1975. He continued as chairman of the executive committee until 1979, when he was named honorary chairman.\n\nIn 1974, under Kreeger's leadership, GEICO began to insure the general public, after real-time access to computerized driving records became available throughout the United States, and it was briefly the fifth-largest U.S. auto insurer. By 1975, it was clear that GEICO had expanded far too rapidly (during the 1973–75 recession) when it reported a $126.5 million loss. To prevent GEICO from collapsing, a consortium of 45 insurance companies agreed to take over a quarter of its policies, and it was forced to issue a stock offering (thus diluting existing stockholders) to raise money to pay claims. It took five years (during which the company shrank significantly) and a massive reorganization to set GEICO on the path to recovery.\n\nGEICO has also offered other types of insurance besides auto, including homeowner's insurance from 1962 to 1996. A sister company, the Government Employees Life Insurance Company (GELICO), offered life insurance from 1975 to 1985. Although GEICO has since focused on its core auto insurance competency (selling GELICO to Legal & General), it uses its established direct sales infrastructure to market homeowner's and other types of insurance underwritten by other companies.\n\nIn 1996, after many years as a publicly traded firm, GEICO became a wholly owned subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway. \n\nGEICO generally deals directly with consumers via telephone and internet; however, the local agent program has more than 150 offices countrywide. GEICO is now the second largest writer of private auto insurance in the United States.\n\nAfter several years of denying claims and even canceling policies for policyholders that used their personal car for ridesharing companies such as Uber and Lyft, GEICO began offering rideshare coverage in select states in 2015, including in high-population states such as Texas, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Georgia. The policy, which is issued through GEICO's commercial department, has received critical praise from insurance experts and quickly launched GEICO as the largest insurance provider for TNC drivers. \n\nAdvertising campaigns\n\nGEICO has many well-known ad campaigns. In 2012 GEICO spent over $1.1 billion in advertising, or 6.8% of its revenue. All are made and produced by The Martin Agency, which is based in Richmond, Virginia. GEICO ads have featured several well-known mascots, including:\n* The GEICO Gecko is the most prevalent spokesperson mascot and speaks with a Cockney accent. \n* The GEICO Cavemen (from ads claiming using their website is \"so easy, a caveman could do it\").\n* Maxwell, the GEICO \"Piggy\" who shouts a long \"Whee\" and appears in more radio and TV commercials.\n* Actor Mike McGlone, who uses film noir-style narration to compare the ease of GEICO to things, famous people, or idioms. (\"Could switching to GEICO really save you 15% or more on car insurance?...Is having a snowball fight with pitching great Randy Johnson a bad idea?\") The scene is then acted out, with typically humorous results. In addition to Johnson, other ads have included Charlie Daniels, Andrés Cantor, Foghorn Leghorn, Elmer Fudd, R. Lee Ermey, and Ed \"Too Tall\" Jones among others, including Maxwell the Piggy.\n* The \"money savers\" campaign enlisted actors to portray average consumers who have resorted to various humorous extremes in order to save money, such as teaching a dog to sing or teaching a group of Guinea pigs to row a boat and perform some mundane task for the consumer, and then presented switching to GEICO as an easy alternative to such endeavors with the common line \".... there's an easier way to save money.\"\n* The \"Happier Than....\" duo features Jimmy (actor Timothy Ryan Cole) and Ronnie (musician Alex Harvey) playing a guitar and a mandolin, respectively, on a small portable stage. They comment on a fictitious preceding event, such as a man dressed in 15th century attire laughing as he leads a trio of speed boats with the painted names Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria. After cutting to the duo, one says to the other \"You know, folks who save hundreds of dollars by switching to GEICO sure are happy.\" The other then replied, \"How happy are they, (Jimmy/Ronnie)?\" and in the case above, the response is \"Happier than Christopher Columbus with speedboats!\"\n* CASH, the stack of cash that represents the money you could have saved by switching to GEICO.\n\nThere are also GEICO ads that feature stories from GEICO customers about situations in which the company assisted them, but are translated by celebrities like Little Richard and Joan Rivers. Film trailer announcer Don LaFontaine appeared in one such ad, shortly before his death. The tag announcer for these spots was D.C. Douglas. GEICO is also an official sponsor of the National Hockey League and themed commercials for that always feature members of the hometown Washington Capitals.\n\nMotorsports\n\nGEICO has long been involved in motorsports sponsorships. Since 2008, the company has sponsored the Germain Racing team, first in the NASCAR Nationwide Series with Mike Wallace, and later in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series with Max Papis and Casey Mears. Mears has driven the #13 GEICO car since the fall of 2010.\n\nCompetition\n\nGEICO's major competitors include Amica Mutual Insurance, Liberty Mutual Insurance, State Farm, Allstate, 21st Century Insurance, Progressive, Nationwide Insurance, and United Services Automobile Association." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "Continental_Divide_of_the_Americas.txt", "Mountain_range.txt" ], "title": [ "Continental Divide of the Americas", "Mountain range" ], "wiki_context": [ "The Continental Divide of the Americas (also known as the Continental Gulf of Division, the Great Divide, or merely the Continental Divide) is the principal, and largely mountainous, hydrological divide of the Americas. The Continental Divide extends from the Bering Strait to the Strait of Magellan, and separates the watersheds that drain into the Pacific Ocean from (1) those river systems that drain into the Atlantic Ocean (including those that drain into the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea), and (2) along the northernmost reaches of the Divide, those river systems that drain into the Arctic Ocean.\n\nThough there are many other hydrological divides in the Americas, the Great Divide is by far the most prominent of these because it tends to follow a line of high peaks along the main ranges of the Rocky Mountains and Andes, at a generally much higher elevation than the other hydrological divisions.\n__TOC__\n\nGeography\n\n The Continental Divide of the Americas begins at Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska, the westernmost point on the mainland of the Americas. The Divide crosses northern Alaska into the Yukon, then zig-zags south into British Columbia via the Cassiar Mountains and Omineca Mountains and northern Nechako Plateau to Summit Lake, north of the city of Prince George and just south of the community of McLeod Lake. From there the Divide traverses the McGregor Plateau to the spine of the Rockies, following the crest of the Canadian Rockies southeast to the 120th meridian west, from there forming the boundary between southern British Columbia and southern Alberta.\n\nThe Divide crosses into the United States in northwestern Montana, at the boundary between Waterton Lakes National Park and Glacier National Park. In Canada, it forms the western boundary of Waterton Lakes National Park, and in the US bisects Glacier National Park. Further south, the Divide forms the backbone of the Rocky Mountain Front (Front Range) in the Bob Marshall Wilderness, heads south towards Helena and Butte, then west past the namesake community of Divide, Montana through the Anaconda-Pintler Wilderness to the Bitterroot Range, where it forms the eastern third of the state boundary between Idaho and Montana. The Divide crosses into Wyoming within Yellowstone National Park and continues southeast into Colorado where it reaches its highest point in North America at the summit of  Grays Peak at 4352 m . It crosses US Hwy 160 in southern Colorado at Wolf Creek Pass, where a line symbolizes the division. The Divide then proceeds south into western New Mexico, passing along the western boundary of the endorheic Plains of San Agustin. Although the Divide represents the height of land between watersheds, it does not always follow the highest ranges/peaks within each state or province.\n\nIn Mexico, it passes through Chihuahua, Durango, Zacatecas, Aguascalientes, Jalisco, Guanajuato, Querétaro, México, the Federal District, Morelos, Puebla, Oaxaca, and Chiapas. In Central America, it continues through southern Guatemala, southwestern Honduras, western Nicaragua, western/southwestern Costa Rica, and southern Panama. The divide reaches its lowest point in Central America at the Isthmus of Rivas at 47 m in Nicaragua.\n\nThe Divide continues into South America, where it follows the peaks of the Andes Mountains, traversing western Colombia, central Ecuador, western and southwestern Peru, and eastern Chile (essentially conforming to the Chile-Bolivia and Chile-Argentina boundaries), southward to the southern end of Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego.\n\nIn North America, another, mainly non-mountainous divide, the Laurentian Divide (or Northern Divide), further separates the Hudson Bay-Arctic Ocean drainage region from the Atlantic watershed region. Secondary divides separate the watersheds that flow into the Great Lakes and Saint Lawrence River (ultimately into the Atlantic) from watersheds that flow to the Atlantic via the Missouri-Mississippi complex. Another secondary divide follows the Appalachian chain, which separates those streams and rivers that flow directly into the Atlantic Ocean from those that exit via the Mississippi River.\n\nTriple points\n\nTriple Divide Peak in Glacier National Park, Montana, is the point where two of the principal continental divides in North America converge, the Great Divide and the Northern or Laurentian Divide. From this point, waters flow to the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean via the Gulf of Mexico, and the Arctic Ocean via Hudson Bay. Most geographers, geologists, meteorologists, and oceanographers consider this point the hydrological apex of North America. This is not the only place on earth where two oceanic divides meet, i.e., where waters from a single point area feed into three different oceans. This status of Triple Divide Peak is the main reason behind the designation of Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park as the \"Crown of the Continent\" of North America. Sources differ, however, on whether Hudson Bay is part of the Atlantic or Arctic Ocean. Hudson Bay's waters flow predominantly to the Atlantic and do not directly contribute to the Arctic Ocean. \n\nAnother triple divide or triple point occurs in Canada at an unimportant-looking hump on the border between Alberta and British Columbia, on the south slope of Snow Dome. At 2940 m, the point is higher than Triple Divide Peak. The exact location of the triple point is somewhat indeterminate because the Columbia Icefield and the snow on top of it shift from year to year. The snow that falls on it (about 10 m per year) doesn't really flow downhill as water, it creeps downhill in the form of glacial ice.\n\nIce flowing away from that point down the Athabasca Glacier goes to the Arctic Ocean, via the Athabasca and Mackenzie Rivers. Ice flowing west goes to the Pacific Ocean via Bryce Creek and the Bush and Columbia Rivers. Ice flowing down the Saskatchewan Glacier goes via the North Saskatchewan, Saskatchewan, and Nelson Rivers into Hudson Bay. Some people believe the point on the south slope of Snow Dome to be the hydrological apex of North America because they consider Hudson Bay an extension of the Atlantic Ocean. Despite the fact that many people think of it as being an Arctic water body, Hudson Bay lies entirely south of the Arctic Circle. The channels to the north of it are almost completely cut off by Baffin Island, so nearly all of the water that enters it flows out east via Hudson Strait into the North Atlantic Ocean rather than north into the Arctic Ocean.The result is that nearly all of the ice flowing down the Saskatchewan Glacier eventually ends up as water in the Atlantic Ocean \n. \n\nIn fact, there are such triple divide points wherever any two continental divides meet. North America can be considered to have five major drainage systems: into the Pacific, Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, plus Hudson Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. Within this system there are four continental divides and three triple points, the two mentioned previously and a third near Hibbing, Minnesota where the Northern Divide intersects the Saint Lawrence Seaway divide. Since there is no true consensus on what a continental divide is, there is no real agreement on where the triple points are. However, the main Continental Divide described in this article is a far more distinctive geological feature than the others and its two main triple points are much more prominent.\n\nHiking trail\n\nThe Continental Divide Trail (CDT) follows the Divide through the U.S. from the Mexican border to the Canadian border. The trail itself is a corridor of pathways - i.e. dedicated footpaths or back roads, either on or near the Continental Divide. A less-developed Canadian extension called the Great Divide Trail continues through five national parks and six provincial parks, ending at Kakwa Lake in east-central British Columbia. \n\nExceptions\n\nMany endorheic regions in North America complicate the simple view of east or west, \"ocean-bound\" water flow. Several endorheic basins appear to straddle the Continental Divide, including the Great Divide Basin in Wyoming, the Plains of San Agustin in New Mexico, the Guzmán Basin in New Mexico and Chihuahua, Mexico, and the Bolsón de Mapimí in Mexico. However, such a basin can be conceptually assigned to one side of the Divide or the other by its lowest perimeter pass; in other words, the proper assignment can be made by determining how the drainage would occur if the basin were to overflow. In line with this, USGS topographic maps show a unique path for the Divide even when a basin is adjacent.\n\nAnother kind of exception occurs when a stream falling onto the Divide splits and flows in both directions, or a lake straddling the divide overflows in both directions. Examples of these are, respectively, North Two Ocean Creek and Isa Lake, both located on the Continental Divide in Wyoming. The Panama Canal has this same feature, being man-made. Both the Chagres and Gatun rivers flow into Gatun Lake, which empties to both oceans.\n\nNumerous small lakes along the Divide in the Rocky Mountains between Alberta and British Columbia flow into both provinces and thus into both Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. An example is the \"Committee Punch Bowl\", a small lake named by Sir George Simpson, governor of the Hudson Bay Company, while touring his vast Canadian fur-trading empire in 1825. According to historical sources, \"The small circular basin of water at the summit, twenty yards in diameter, is dignified with the name of the 'Committee's Punch Bowl' in honour of which the Governor treated them (his fur traders) to a bottle of wine as they had 'neither time nor convenience to make a bowl of punch, although a glass of it would have been acceptable.'\" The reference is to the governing committee of the Hudson's Bay Company in London, England. \n\nThe Alpine Club of Canada's Abbot Pass Hut sits directly astride the Divide in Abbot Pass on the boundary between Banff National Park and Yoho National Park, and thus rainwater falling on the eastern half of the roof flows via Lake Louise into Hudson Bay, while rain falling on the western half flows via Lake O'Hara into the Pacific Ocean. Ski Resort Sunshine Village crosses the Divide, causing confusion about which province skiers should pay taxes to, Alberta or British Columbia. British Columbia has a 7% provincial sales tax which Alberta does not have.", "A mountain range (also mountain barrier, belt, or system) is a geographic area containing numerous geologically related mountains. A mountain system or system of mountain ranges, sometimes is used to combine several geological features that are geographically (regionally) related. On Earth, most significant mountain ranges are the result of plate tectonics, though mountain ranges are formed by a range of processes, are found on many planetary mass objects in the Solar System and are likely a feature of most terrestrial planets.\n\nMountain ranges are usually segmented by highlands or mountain passes and valleys. Individual mountains within the same mountain range do not necessarily have the same geologic structure or petrology. They may be a mix of different orogenic expressions and terranes, for example thrust sheets, uplifted blocks, fold mountains, and volcanic landforms resulting in a variety of rock types.\n\nMajor ranges \n\nMost geologically young mountain ranges on the Earth's land surface are associated with either the Pacific Ring of Fire or the Alpide Belt. The Pacific Ring of Fire includes the Andes of South America, extends through the North American Cordillera along the Pacific Coast, the Aleutian Range, on through Kamchatka, Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines, Papua New Guinea, to New Zealand. The Andes is 7000 km long and is often considered the world's longest mountain system. \n\nThe Alpide belt includes Indonesia and southeast Asia, through the Himalaya, and ends in the Alps, Spain and Atlas Mountains. The belt also includes other European and Asian mountain ranges. The Himalayas contain the highest mountains in the world, including Mount Everest, which is 8848 m high and traverses the border between China and Nepal. \n\nMountain ranges outside of these two systems include the Arctic Cordillera, the Urals, the Appalachians, the Scandinavian Mountains, the Altai Mountains and the Hijaz Mountains. If the definition of a mountain range is stretched to include underwater mountains, then the Ocean Ridges form the longest continuous mountain system on Earth, with a length of . \n\nDivisions and categories\n\nThe mountain systems of the earth are characterized by a tree structure, where mountain ranges can contain sub-ranges. The sub-range relationship is often expressed as a parent-child relationship. For example, the White Mountains of New Hampshire and the Blue Ridge Mountains are sub-ranges of the Appalachian Mountains. Equivalently, the Appalachians are the parent of the White Mountains and Blue Ridge Mountains, and the White Mountains and the Blue Ridge Mountains are children of the Appalachians.\n\nThe parent-child expression extends to the sub-ranges themselves: the Sandwich Range and the Presidential Range are children of the White Mountains, while the Presidential Range is parent to the Northern Presidential Range and Southern Presidential Range.\n\nClimate\n\nThe position of mountains influences climate, such as rain or snow. When air masses move up and over mountains, the air cools producing orographic precipitation (rain or snow). As the air descends on the leeward side, it warms again (in accordance with the adiabatic lapse rate) and is drier, having been stripped of much of its moisture. Often, a rain shadow will affect the leeward side of a range.\n\nErosion\n\nMountain ranges are constantly subjected to erosional forces which work to tear them down. Erosion is at work while the mountains are being uplifted and long after until the mountains are reduced to low hills and plains. The rugged topography of a mountain range is the product of erosion. The basins adjacent to an eroding mountain range are filled with sediments which are buried and turned into sedimentary rock.\n\nThe early Cenozoic uplift of the Rocky Mountains of Colorado provides an example. As the uplift was occurring some 10000 ft of mostly Mesozoic sedimentary strata were removed by erosion over the core of the mountain range and spread as sand and clays across the Great Plains to the east. This mass of rock was removed as the range was actively undergoing uplift. The removal of such a mass from the core of the range most likely caused further uplift as the region adjusted isostatically in response to the removed weight.\n\nExtraterrestrial \"Montes\"\n\nMountains on other planets and natural satellites of the Solar System are often isolated and formed mainly by processes such as impacts, though there are examples of mountain ranges (or \"Montes\") somewhat similar to those on Earth. Saturn's moon Titan and Pluto, in particular exhibit large mountain ranges in chains composed mainly of ices rather than rock. Examples include the Mithrim Montes and Doom Mons on Titan, and Norgay Montes and Hillary Montes on Pluto. Some terrestrial planets other than Earth also exhibit rocky mountain ranges, such as Maxwell Montes on Venus taller than any on Earth and Tartarus Montes on Mars, Jupiter's moon Io has mountain ranges formed from tectonic processes including Boösaule Montes, Dorian Montes, Hi'iaka Montes and Euboea Montes." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "Thailand.txt", "World_War_II.txt" ], "title": [ "Thailand", "World War II" ], "wiki_context": [ "Thailand ( or ; , );, officially the Kingdom of Thailand (, ;), formerly known as Siam (; ), is a country at the centre of the Indochinese peninsula. It is bordered to the north by Myanmar and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the west by the Andaman Sea and the southern extremity of Myanmar. Its maritime boundaries include Vietnam in the Gulf of Thailand to the southeast, and Indonesia and India on the Andaman Sea to the southwest. With a total area of approximately 513000 km2, Thailand is the world's 51st-largest country. It is the 20th-most-populous country in the world, with around 66 million people. The capital and largest city is Bangkok.\n\nThailand is governed by the National Council for Peace and Order that took power in the May 2014 coup d'état. Its monarchy is headed by King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who has reigned since 1946 as Rama IX, as he is the ninth monarch of the Chakri Dynasty. He is currently the world's longest-serving head of state and the country's longest-reigning monarch; he has reigned for .\n\nThailand experienced rapid economic growth between 1985 and 1996, becoming a newly industrialised country and a major exporter. Manufacturing, agriculture, and tourism are leading sectors of the economy. Among the ten ASEAN countries, Thailand ranks third in quality of life. and the country's HDI is rated as \"high\". Its large population and growing economic influence have made it a middle power in the region and around the world. \n\nEtymology\n\nEtymology of \"Siam\"\n\nThe country has always been called Mueang Thai by its citizens. By others, it is known by the exonym Siam ( ,, also spelled Siem, Syâm, or Syâma). The word Siam has been identified with the Sanskrit Śyāma (श्याम, meaning \"dark\" or \"brown\"). The names Shan and A-hom seem to be variants of the same word. The word Śyâma is possibly not its origin, but a learned and artificial distortion. \n\nThe signature of King Mongkut (r. 1851 – 1868) reads SPPM (Somdet Phra Poramenthra Maha) Mongkut King of the Siamese, giving the name \"Siam\" official status until 23 June 1939 when it was changed to Thailand. Thailand was renamed Siam from 1945 to 11 May 1949, after which it again reverted to Thailand.\n\nEtymology of \"Thailand\"\n\nAccording to George Cœdès, the word Thai (ไทย) means \"free man\" in the Thai language, \"differentiating the Thai from the natives encompassed in Thai society as serfs.\" A famous Thai scholar argued that Thai () simply means \"people\" or \"human being\", since his investigation shows that in some rural areas the word \"Thai\" was used instead of the usual Thai word \"khon\" (คน) for people. \n\nWhile Thai people will often refer to their country using the polite form prathet Thai (), they most commonly use the more colloquial term mueang Thai () or simply Thai, the word mueang, archaically a city-state, commonly used to refer to a city or town as the centre of a region. Ratcha Anachak Thai () means \"kingdom of Thailand\" or \"kingdom of Thai\". Etymologically, its components are: ratcha (Sanskrit raja \"king, royal, realm\") ; -ana- (Pali āṇā \"authority, command, power\", itself from an Old Indo-Aryan form ājñā of the same meaning) -chak (from Sanskrit cakra- \"wheel\", a symbol of power and rule). The Thai National Anthem (), written by Luang Saranupraphan during the extremely patriotic 1930s, refers to the Thai nation as: prathet Thai (Thai: ประเทศไทย). The first line of the national anthem is: prathet thai ruam lueat nuea chat chuea thai (), \"Thailand is the unity of Thai flesh and blood.\"\n\nHistory\n\nThere is evidence of human habitation in Thailand that has been dated at 40,000 years before the present, with stone artefacts dated to this period at Tham Lod Rockshelter in Mae Hong Son. Similar to other regions in Southeast Asia, Thailand was heavily influenced by the culture and religions of India, starting with the Kingdom of Funan around the 1st century CE to the Khmer Empire. Thailand in its earliest days was under the rule of the Khmer Empire, which had strong Hindu roots, and the influence among Thais remains even today.\n\nIndian influence on Thai culture was partly the result of direct contact with Indian settlers, but mainly it was brought about indirectly via the Indianized kingdoms of Dvaravati, Srivijaya, and Cambodia. E.A. Voretzsch believes that Buddhism must have been flowing into Siam from India in the time of the Indian Emperor Ashoka of the Maurya Empire and far on into the first millennium after Christ. Later Thailand was influenced by the south Indian Pallava dynasty and north Indian Gupta Empire.\n\nAccording to George Cœdès, \"The Thai first enter history of Farther India in the eleventh century with the mention of Syam slaves or prisoners of war in\" Champa epigraphy, and \"in the twelfth century, the bas-reliefs of Angkor Wat\" where \"a group of warriors\" are described as Syam. Additionally, \"the Mongols, after the seizure of Ta-li on January 7, 1253 and the pacification of Yunnan in 1257, did not look with disfavor on the creation of a series of Thai principalities at the expense of the old Indianized kingdoms.\" The Menam Basin was originally populated by the Mons, and the location of Dvaravati in the 7th century, followed by the Khmer Empire in the 11th. The History of the Yuan mentions an embassy from the kingdom of Sukhothai in 1282. In 1287, three Thai chiefs, Mangrai, Ngam Muang, and Ram Khamhaeng formed a \"strong pact of friendship\".\n\nAfter the fall of the Khmer Empire in the 13th century, various states thrived there, established by the various Tai peoples, Mons, Khmers, Chams and Ethnic Malays, as seen through the numerous archaeological sites and artefacts that are scattered throughout the Siamese landscape. Prior to the 12th century however, the first Thai or Siamese state is traditionally considered to be the Buddhist Sukhothai Kingdom, which was founded in 1238.\n\nFollowing the decline and fall of the Khmer empire in the 13th–15th century, the Buddhist Tai kingdoms of Sukhothai, Lanna, and Lan Xang (now Laos) were on the rise. However, a century later, the power of Sukhothai was overshadowed by the new Kingdom of Ayutthaya, established in the mid-14th-century in the lower Chao Phraya River or Menam area.\n\nAyutthaya's expansion centred along the Menam while in the northern valleys the Lanna Kingdom and other small Tai city-states ruled the area. In 1431, the Khmer abandoned Angkor after Ayutthaya forces invaded the city. Thailand retained a tradition of trade with its neighbouring states, from China to India, Persia, and Arab lands. Ayutthaya became one of the most vibrant trading centres in Asia. European traders arrived in the 16th century, beginning with the Portuguese, followed by the French, Dutch, and English. The Burmese–Siamese War (1765–1767) left Ayutthaya burned and sacked by King Hsinbyushin.\n\nAfter the fall of Ayutthaya in 1767 to the Burmese, Taksin moved the capital to Thonburi for approximately 15 years. The current Rattanakosin era of Thai history began in 1782 following the establishment of Bangkok as capital of the Chakri Dynasty under King Rama I the Great. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, \"A quarter to a third of the population of some areas of Thailand and Burma were slaves in the 17th through the 19th centuries.\" \n\nDespite European pressure, Thailand is the only Southeast Asian nation to never have been colonised. This has been ascribed to the long succession of able rulers in the past four centuries who exploited the rivalry and tension between French Indochina and the British Empire. As a result, the country remained a buffer state between parts of Southeast Asia that were colonised by the two colonial powers, Great Britain and France. Western influence nevertheless led to many reforms in the 19th century and major concessions, most notably the loss of a large territory on the east side of the Mekong to the French and the step-by-step absorption by Britain of the Shan and Karen people areas and Malay Peninsula.\n\n20th century \n\nAs part of the concessions which the Chakkri Dynasty offered to the British Empire in return for their support, Siam ceded four predominantly ethnic-Malay southern provinces to the British Empire in the Anglo-Siamese Treaty of 1909. These four provinces (Kelantan,Tringganu, Kedah, Perlis) would later became Malaysia's four northern states.\n\nIn 1917, Siam joined the Allies of World War I and is counted as one of the victors of World War I.\n\nIn 1932, a bloodless revolution carried out by the Khana Ratsadon group of military and civilian officials resulted in a transition of power, when King Prajadhipok was forced to grant the people of Siam their first constitution, thereby ending centuries of absolute monarchy.\n\nIn 1939, the name of the kingdom, \"Siam\", was changed to \"Thailand\".\n\nWorld War II\n\nDuring World War II, the Empire of Japan demanded the right to move troops across Thailand to the Malayan frontier. The Japanese invasion of Thailand on 8 December 1941 occurred in co-ordination with attacks throughout Asia and engaged the Royal Thai Army for six to eight hours before Plaek Phibunsongkhram ordered an armistice. Shortly thereafter, Japan was granted free passage, and on 21 December 1941, Thailand and Japan signed a military alliance with a secret protocol, wherein Tokyo agreed to help Thailand regain territories lost to the British and French.\n\nSubsequently, Thailand declared war on the United States and the United Kingdom on 25 January 1942, and undertook to \"assist\" Japan in its war against the Allies, while at the same time maintaining an active anti-Japanese Free Thai Movement. Approximately 200,000 Asian labourers (mainly romusha) and 60,000 Allied prisoners of war (POWs) worked on the Burma Railway, which is commonly known as the \"Death Railway\". \n\nAfter the war, Thailand emerged as an ally of the United States. As with many of the developing nations during the Cold War, Thailand then went through decades of political instability characterised by a number of coups d'état, as one military regime replaced another, but eventually progressed towards a stable, prosperous democracy in the 1980s.\n\nFile:BlackCeramicBanChiangCultureThailand1200-800BCE.jpg|Pottery discovered near Ban Chiang in Udon Thani Province, the earliest dating to 2100 BCE.\nFile:Pimai1.jpg|Phimai, Prasat Phimai is the largest temple in the country from the Khmer Empire.\nFile:วัดพนัญเชิงวรวิหาร by Pholtograph.jpg|The immense 19 m gilded statue of a seated Buddha in Wat Phanan Choeng, the latter from 1324, pre-dates the founding of the city of Ayutthaya\nFile:Wat Si Chum in Sukhothai.jpg|A 15 m Buddha image in Sukhothai, Phra Achana , built in the 13th century\nFile:Iudea-Ayutthaya.jpg|Painting of Ayutthaya, ordered by the Dutch East India Company, 1665.\nFile:Siamese envoys at Versailles.jpg|Kosa Pan present King Narai's letter to Louis XIV at Versailles, 1 September 1686.\n\nPolitics and government\n\nThe politics of Thailand is currently conducted within the framework of a constitutional monarchy, whereby the Prime Minister is the head of government and a hereditary monarch is head of state. The judiciary is supposed to be independent of the executive and the legislative branches, although judicial rulings are suspected of being based on political considerations rather than on existing law. \n\nConstitutional history\n\nSince the political reform of the absolute monarchy in 1932, Thailand has had 19 constitutions and charters. Throughout this time, the form of government has ranged from military dictatorship to electoral democracy, but all governments have acknowledged a hereditary monarch as the head of state. \n\n28 June 1932\n\nPrior to 1932, the Kingdom of Siam did not possess a legislature, as all legislative powers were vested in the person of the monarch. This had been the case since the foundation of the Sukhothai Kingdom in the 12th century as the king was seen as a \"Dharmaraja\" or \"king who rules in accordance with Dharma\", (the Buddhist law of righteousness). However, on 24 June 1932 a group of civilians and military officers, calling themselves the Khana Ratsadon (or People's Party) carried out a bloodless revolution in which the 150 years of absolute rule of the Chakri Dynasty ended. In its stead the group advocated a constitutional form of monarchy with an elected legislature.\n\nThe \"Draft Constitution\" of 1932 signed by King Prajadhipok created Thailand's first legislature, a People's Assembly with 70 appointed members. The assembly met for the first time on 28 June 1932, in the Ananta Samakhom Throne Hall. The Khana Ratsadon decided that the people were not yet ready for an elected assembly. They later changed their minds. By the time the \"permanent\" constitution came into force in December of that year, elections were scheduled for 15 November 1933. The new constitution changed the composition of the assembly to 78 directly elected and 78 appointed (by the Khana Ratsadon), together totalling 156 members.\n\n1932 to 1973\n\nThe history of Thailand from 1932 to 1973 was dominated by military dictatorships which were in power for much of the period. The main personalities of the period were the dictator Luang Phibunsongkhram (better known as Phibun), who allied the country with Japan during the Second World War, and the civilian politician Pridi Phanomyong, who founded Thammasat University and was briefly the prime minister after the war.\n\nJapan invaded Thailand on 8 December 1941. For events subsequent to the abdication of the king, including the name change of 1939, up to the coup d'état of 1957, see Plaek Pibulsonggram.\n\nA succession of military dictators followed Pridi's ousting — Phibun again, Sarit Dhanarajata and Thanom Kittikachorn — under whom traditional, authoritarian rule was combined with increasing modernisation and westernisation under the influence of the US. The end of the period was marked by Thanom's resignation, following a massacre of pro-democracy protesters led by Thammasat students. Thanom misread the situation as a coup d'état, and fled, leaving the country leaderless. HM appointed Thammasat University chancellor Sanya Dharmasakti PM by royal command.\n\nThailand helped the USA and South Vietnam in the Vietnam War between 1965–1971. The USAF based F-4 Phantom fighters at Udon and Ubon Air Base, and stationed B-52s at U-Tapao. Thai forces also saw heavy action in the covert war in Laos that occurred from 1964 to 1972.\n\n1973 to 1997\n\n1997 to 2001 \n\nThe 1997 Constitution was the first constitution to be drafted by popularly elected Constitutional Drafting Assembly, and was popularly called the \"people's constitution\". The 1997 Constitution created a bicameral legislature consisting of a 500-seat House of Representatives (สภาผู้แทนราษฎร, sapha phu thaen ratsadon) and a 200-seat Senate (วุฒิสภา, wutthisapha). For the first time in Thai history, both houses were directly elected.\n\nMany human rights were explicitly acknowledged, and measures were established to increase the stability of elected governments. The House was elected by the first past the post system, where only one candidate with a simple majority could be elected in one constituency. The Senate was elected based on the provincial system, where one province could return more than one senator depending on its population size.\n\nThe two houses of the National Assembly have two different terms. In accordance with the constitution the Senate is elected to a six-year term, while the House is elected to a four-year term. Overall the term of the National Assembly is based on that of the House. The National Assembly each year will sit in two sessions: an \"ordinary session\" and a \"legislative session\". The first session of the National Assembly must take place within thirty days after the general election of the House of Representatives. The first session must be opened by the king in person by reading a Speech from the Throne; this ceremony is held in the Ananta Samakhom Throne Hall. He may also appoint the crown prince or a representative to carry out this duty. It is also the duty of the king to prorogue sessions through a royal decree when the House term expires. The king also has the prerogative to call extraordinary sessions and prolong sessions upon advice of the House of Representatives.\n\nThe National Assembly may host a \"joint-sitting\" of both Houses under several circumstances. These include: The appointment of a regent, any alteration to the 1924 Palace Law of Succession, the opening of the first session, the announcement of policies by the Cabinet of Thailand, the approval of the declaration of war, the hearing of explanations and approval of a treaty and the amendment of the Constitution.\n\nMembers of the House of Representatives served four-year terms, while senators served six-year terms. The 1997 People's Constitution also promoted human rights more than any other constitution. The court system (ศาล, san) included a constitutional court with jurisdiction over the constitutionality of parliamentary acts, royal decrees, and political matters.\n\n2001 to 2008 \n\nThe January 2001 general election, the first election under the 1997 Constitution, was called the most open, corruption-free election in Thai history. \nThai Rak Thai Party, led by Thaksin Shinawatra won the election. The Thaksin government was the first in Thai history to complete a four-year term. The 2005 election had the highest voter turnout in Thai history, and Thai Rak Thai Party won an absolute majority. However, despite efforts to clean up the system, vote buying and electoral violence remained electoral problems in 2005. \n\nThe PollWatch Foundation, Thailand's most prominent election watchdog, declared that vote buying in this election, specifically in the north and the northeast, was more serious than in the 2001 election. The organisation also accused the government of violating the election law by abusing state power in presenting new projects in a bid to seek votes.\n\n2006 coup d'état \n\nWithout meeting much resistance, a military junta overthrew the interim government of Thaksin Shinawatra on 19 September 2006. The junta abrogated the constitution, dissolved Parliament and the Constitutional Court, detained and later removed several members of the government, declared martial law, and appointed one of the king's Privy Counselors, General Surayud Chulanont, as the Prime Minister. The junta later wrote a highly abbreviated interim constitution and appointed a panel to draft a new permanent constitution. The junta also appointed a 250-member legislature, called by some critics a \"chamber of generals\" while others claimed that it lacks representatives from the poor majority. \n\nIn this interim constitution draft, the head of the junta was allowed to remove the prime minister at any time. The legislature was not allowed to hold a vote of confidence against the cabinet and the public was not allowed to file comments on bills. This interim constitution was later surpassed by the permanent constitution on 24 August 2007. Martial law was partially revoked in January 2007. The ban on political activities was lifted in July 2007, following the 30 May dissolution of the Thai Rak Thai party. The new constitution was approved by referendum on 19 August, which led to a return to a democratic general election on 23 December 2007.\n\n2008–2010 political crisis \n\nThe People's Power Party (Thailand), led by Samak Sundaravej formed a government with five smaller parties. Following several court rulings against him in a variety of scandals, and surviving a vote of no confidence, and protesters blockading government buildings and airports, in September 2008, Sundaravej was found guilty of conflict of interest by the Constitutional Court of Thailand (due to being a host in a TV cooking program), and thus, ended his term in office.\n\nHe was replaced by PPP member Somchai Wongsawat. As of October 2008, Wongsawat was unable to gain access to his offices, which were occupied by protesters from the People's Alliance for Democracy. On 2 December 2008, Thailand's Constitutional Court in a highly controversial ruling found the Peoples Power Party guilty of electoral fraud, which led to the dissolution of the party according to the law. It was later alleged in media reports that at least one member of the judiciary had a telephone conversation with officials working for the Office of the Privy Council and one other. The phone call was taped and has since circulated on the Internet. In it, the callers discuss finding a way to ensure the ruling PPP party would be disbanded. Accusations of judicial interference were levelled in the media but the recorded call was dismissed as a hoax. However, in June 2010, supporters of the eventually disbanded PPP were charged with tapping a judge's phone.\n\nImmediately following what many media described as a \"judicial coup\", a senior member of the Armed Forces met with factions of the governing coalition to get their members to join the opposition and the Democrat Party was able to form a government, a first for the party since 2001. The leader of the Democrat party, and former leader of the opposition, Abhisit Vejjajiva was appointed and sworn-in as the 27th Prime Minister, together with the new cabinet on 17 December 2008.\n\nIn April 2009, protests by the National United Front of Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD, or \"Red Shirts\") forced the cancellation of the Fourth East Asia Summit after protesters stormed the Royal Cliff hotel venue in Pattaya, smashing the glass doors of the venue to gain entry, and a blockade prevented the Chinese premier at the time, Wen Jiabao, from attending. The summit was eventually held in Thailand in October 2009. \n\nAbout a year later, a set of new \"Red Shirts\" protests resulted in 87 deaths (mostly civilian and some military) and 1,378 injured. When the army tried to disperse the protesters on 10 April 2010, the army was met with automatic gunfire, grenades, and fire bombs from the opposition faction in the army, known as the \"watermelon\". This resulted in the army returning fire with rubber bullets and some live ammunition. During the time of the \"red shirt\" protests against the government, there have been numerous grenade and bomb attacks against government offices and the homes of government officials. Gas grenades were fired at \"yellow-shirt\" protesters, that were protesting against the \"red-shirts\" and in favour of the government, by unknown gunmen killing one pro-government protester, the government stated that the Red Shirts were firing the weapons at civilians. Red-shirts continued to hold a position in the business district of Bangkok and it was shut down for several weeks. \n\nOn 3 July 2011, the oppositional Pheu Thai Party, led by Yingluck Shinawatra (the youngest sister of Thaksin Shinawatra), won the general election by a landslide (265 seats in the House of Representatives, out of 500). She had never previously been involved in politics, Pheu Thai campaigning for her with the slogan 'Thaksin thinks, Pheu Thai acts'. Yingluck is the nation's first female prime minister and her role was officially endorsed in a ceremony presided over by King Bhumibol Adulyadej. The Pheu Thai Party is a continuation of Thaksin's Thai Rak Thai party. \n\n2013–2014 political crisis\n\nProtests recommenced in late 2013, as a broad alliance of protestors, led by former opposition deputy leader Suthep Thaugsuban, demanded an end to the so-called Thaksin regime. A blanket amnesty for people involved in the 2010 protests, altered at the last minute to include all political crimes – including all convictions against Thaksin – triggered a mass show of discontent, with numbers variously estimated between 98,500 (the police) and 400,000 (an aerial photo survey done by the Bangkok Post), taking to the streets. The Senate was urged to reject the bill to quell the reaction, but the measure failed. A newly named group, the People's Democratic Reform Committee (PDRC) along with allied groups, escalated the pressure, with the opposition Democrat party resigning en masse to create a parliamentary vacuum. Protesters demands variously evolved as the movement's numbers grew, extending a number of deadlines and demands that became increasingly unreasonable or unrealistic, yet attracting a groundswell of support. They called for the establishment of an indirectly elected “people’s council”—in place of Yingluck's government—that will cleanse Thai politics and eradicate the Thaksin regime. \n\nIn response to the intensive protests, Yingluck dissolved parliament on 9 December 2013 and proposed a new election for 2 February 2014, a date that was later approved by the election commission. The PDRC insisted that the prime minister stand down within 24 hours, regardless of her actions, with 160,000 protesters in attendance at Government House on 9 December. Yingluck insisted that she would continue her duties until the scheduled election in February 2014, urging the protesters to accept her proposal: \"Now that the government has dissolved parliament, I ask that you stop protesting and that all sides work towards elections. I have backed down to the point where I don't know how to back down any further.\" \n\nIn response to the Electoral Commission (EC)'s registration process for party-list candidates—for the scheduled election in February 2014—anti-government protesters marched to the Thai-Japanese sports stadium, the venue of the registration process, on 22 December 2013. Suthep and the PDRC led the protest, of which security forces claimed that approximately 270,000 protesters joined. Yingluck and the Pheu Thai Party reiterated their election plan and anticipate presenting a list of 125 party-list candidates to the EC. \n\nOn 7 May 2014, the Constitutional Court ruled that Yingluck would have to step down as the Prime Minister as she was deemed to have abused her power in transferring a high-level government official. On 21 August 2014 she was replaced by army chief General Prayut Chan-o-cha. \n\n2014 coup d'état\n\nOn 20 May 2014 the Thai army declared martial law and began to deploy troops in the capital, denying that it was a coup attempt. On 22 May, the army admitted that it was a coup and that it was taking control of the country and suspending the country's constitution. On the same day, the military imposed a curfew between the hours of 22:00–05:00, ordering citizens and visitors to remain indoors during this period. On 21 August 2014 the National Assembly of Thailand elected the army chief, General Prayut Chan-o-cha, as prime minister. Martial law was declared formally ended on 1 April 2015. \"Uniformed or ex-military men have led Thailand for 55 of the 83 years since absolute monarchy was overthrown in 1932,...\" observed one journalist in 2015. \n\n2014 to present\n\nThe ruling junta led by Prayuth Chan-o-cha promised to hold new elections, but wants to enact a new constitution before the elections are held. An initial draft constitution was rejected by government officials in 2015. A national referendum, the first since the 2014 coup, on a newly drafted constitution is scheduled for early August 2016. The new draft constitution would grant the constitutional court final authority in times of crisis, a power previously held by the King. The draft would also allow a person other than a member of parliament to be the prime minister, which would open the prime minister post to a military official. However, there remain deep disagreements regarding how much power should rest with the democratically elected government. There are indications that public debate in the run up to the referendum will be severely curtailed by the military government. The head of the Thai army, Gen. Theerachai Nakvanich, has announced the setting up of re-education camps for critics of the regime, \"aimed at people who are still unable to understand the workings of the government and the National Council for Peace and Order\". \n\nAdministrative divisions\n\nThailand is divided into 76 provinces (จังหวัด, changwat), which are gathered into five groups of provinces by location. There are also two specially-governed districts: the capital Bangkok (Krung Thep Maha Nakhon) and Pattaya. Bangkok is at provincial level and thus often counted as a province.\n\nEach province is divided into districts and the districts are further divided into sub-districts (tambons). there were 877 districts (อำเภอ, amphoe) and the 50 districts of Bangkok (เขต, khet). Some parts of the provinces bordering Bangkok are also referred to as Greater Bangkok (ปริมณฑล, pari monthon). These provinces include Nonthaburi, Pathum Thani, Samut Prakan, Nakhon Pathom and Samut Sakhon. The name of each province's capital city (เมือง, mueang) is the same as that of the province. For example, the capital of Chiang Mai Province (Changwat Chiang Mai) is Mueang Chiang Mai or Chiang Mai.\n\nSouthern region\n\nThailand controlled the Malay Peninsula as far south as Malacca in the 15th century and held much of the peninsula, including Temasek (Singapore), some of the Andaman Islands, and a colony on Java, but eventually contracted when the British used force to guarantee their suzerainty over the sultanate.\n\nMostly the northern states of the Malay Sultanate presented annual gifts to the Thai king in the form of a golden flower—a gesture of tribute and an acknowledgement of vassalage. The British intervened in the Malay State and with the Anglo-Siamese Treaty tried to build a railway from the south to Bangkok. Thailand relinquished sovereignty over what are now the northern Malay provinces of Kedah, Perlis, Kelantan, and Terengganu to the British. Satun and Pattani Provinces were given to Thailand.\n\nThe Malay peninsular provinces were occupied by the Japanese during World War II, and infiltrated by the Malayan Communist Party (CPM) from 1942 to 2008, when they sued for peace with the Malaysian and Thai governments after the CPM lost its support from Vietnam and China subsequent to the Cultural Revolution. Recent insurgent uprisings may be a continuation of separatist fighting which started after World War II with Sukarno's support for the PULO. Most victims since the uprisings have been Buddhist and Muslim bystanders.\n\nForeign relations\n\nThe foreign relations of Thailand are handled by the Minister of Foreign Affairs.\n\nThailand participates fully in international and regional organisations. It is a major non-NATO ally and Priority Watch List Special 301 Report of the United States. The country remains an active member of ASEAN Association of Southeast Asian Nations. Thailand has developed increasingly close ties with other ASEAN members: Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Brunei, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, and Vietnam, whose foreign and economic ministers hold annual meetings. Regional co-operation is progressing in economic, trade, banking, political, and cultural matters. In 2003, Thailand served as APEC (Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation) host. Dr. Supachai Panitchpakdi, the former Deputy Prime Minister of Thailand, currently serves as Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). In 2005 Thailand attended the inaugural East Asia Summit.\n\nIn recent years, Thailand has taken an increasingly active role on the international stage. When East Timor gained independence from Indonesia, Thailand, for the first time in its history, contributed troops to the international peacekeeping effort. Its troops remain there today as part of a UN peacekeeping force. As part of its effort to increase international ties, Thailand has reached out to such regional organisations as the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Thailand has contributed troops to reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.\n\nThaksin initiated negotiations for several free trade agreements with China, Australia, Bahrain, India, and the US. The latter especially was criticised, with claims that uncompetitive Thai industries could be wiped out. \n\nThaksin also announced that Thailand would forsake foreign aid, and work with donor countries to assist in the development of neighbours in the Greater Mekong Sub-region. Thaksin sought to position Thailand as a regional leader, initiating various development projects in poorer neighbouring countries like Laos. More controversially, he established close, friendly ties with the Burmese dictatorship. \n\nThailand joined the US-led invasion of Iraq, sending a 423-strong humanitarian contingent. It withdrew its troops on 10 September 2004. Two Thai soldiers died in Iraq in an insurgent attack.\n\nAbhisit appointed Peoples Alliance for Democracy leader Kasit Piromya as foreign minister. In April 2009, fighting broke out between Thai and Cambodian troops on territory immediately adjacent to the 900-year-old ruins of Cambodia's Preah Vihear Hindu temple near the border. The Cambodian government claimed its army had killed at least four Thais and captured 10 more, although the Thai government denied that any Thai soldiers were killed or injured. Two Cambodian and three Thai soldiers were killed. Both armies blamed the other for firing first and denied entering the other's territory. \n\nArmed forces\n\nThe Royal Thai Armed Forces ( constitute the military of the Kingdom of Thailand. It consists of the Royal Thai Army (กองทัพบกไทย), the Royal Thai Navy (กองทัพเรือไทย), and the Royal Thai Air Force (กองทัพอากาศไทย). It also incorporates various paramilitary forces.\n\nThe Thai Armed Forces have a combined manpower of 306,000 active duty personnel and another 245,000 active reserve personnel. The head of the Thai Armed Forces (จอมทัพไทย, Chom Thap Thai) is the king, although this position is only nominal. The armed forces are managed by the Ministry of Defence of Thailand, which is headed by the Minister of Defence (a member of the cabinet of Thailand) and commanded by the Royal Thai Armed Forces Headquarters, which in turn is headed by the Chief of Defence Forces of Thailand. In 2011, Thailand's known military expenditure totalled approximately US$5.1 billion. \n\nAccording to the constitution, serving in the armed forces is a duty of all Thai citizens. However, only males over the age of 21, who have not gone through reserve training of the Army Reserve Force Students, are given the option of volunteering for the armed forces, or participating in the random draft. The candidates are subjected to varying lengths of training, from six months to two years of full-time service, depending on their education, whether they have partially completed the reserve training course, and whether they volunteered prior to the draft date (usually 1 April every year).\n\nCandidates with a recognised bachelor's degree serve one year of full-time service if they are conscripted, or six months if they volunteer at their district office (สัสดี, satsadi). Likewise, the training length is also reduced for those who have partially completed the three-year reserve training course (ร.ด., ro do). A person who completed one year out of three will only have to serve full-time for one year. Those who completed two years of reserve training will only have to do six months of full-time training, while those who complete three years or more of reserve training will be exempted entirely.\n\nRoyal Thai Armed Forces Day is celebrated on 18 January, commemorating the victory of Naresuan of the Ayutthaya Kingdom in battle against the crown prince of the Taungoo Dynasty in 1593.\n\nGeography\n\nTotalling 513120 km2, Thailand is the world's 51st-largest country by total area. It is slightly smaller than Yemen and slightly larger than Spain.\n\nThailand comprises several distinct geographic regions, partly corresponding to the provincial groups. The north of the country is the mountainous area of the Thai highlands, with the highest point being Doi Inthanon in the Thanon Thong Chai Range at above sea level. The northeast, Isan, consists of the Khorat Plateau, bordered to the east by the Mekong River. The centre of the country is dominated by the predominantly flat Chao Phraya river valley, which runs into the Gulf of Thailand.\n\nSouthern Thailand consists of the narrow Kra Isthmus that widens into the Malay Peninsula. Politically, there are six geographical regions which differ from the others in population, basic resources, natural features, and level of social and economic development. The diversity of the regions is the most pronounced attribute of Thailand's physical setting.\n\nThe Chao Phraya and the Mekong River are the indispensable water courses of rural Thailand. Industrial scale production of crops use both rivers and their tributaries. The Gulf of Thailand covers 320000 km2 and is fed by the Chao Phraya, Mae Klong, Bang Pakong, and Tapi Rivers. It contributes to the tourism sector owing to its clear shallow waters along the coasts in the southern region and the Kra Isthmus. The eastern shore of the Gulf of Thailand is an industrial centre of Thailand with the kingdom's premier deepwater port in Sattahip and its busiest commercial port, Laem Chabang.\n\nThe Andaman Sea is a precious natural resource as it hosts the most popular and luxurious resorts in Asia. Phuket, Krabi, Ranong, Phang Nga, and Trang and their islands all lay along the coasts of the Andaman Sea and despite the 2004 tsunami, they are a tourist magnet for visitors from around the world.\n\nPlans have resurfaced for a canal which would connect the Andaman Sea to the Gulf of Thailand, analogous to the Suez and the Panama Canals. The idea has been greeted positively by Thai politicians as it would cut fees charged by the Ports of Singapore, improve ties with China and India, lower shipping times, and eliminate pirate attacks in the Strait of Malacca, and support the Thai government's policy of being the logistical hub for Southeast Asia. The canal, it is claimed, would improve economic conditions in the south of Thailand, which relies heavily on tourism income, and it would also change the structure of the Thai economy by making it an Asia logistical hub. The canal would be a major engineering project and has an expected cost of US$20–30 billion.\n\nClimate \n\nMost of Thailand has a \"tropical wet and dry or savanna climate\" type (Köppen's Tropical savanna climate). The south and the eastern tip of the east have a tropical monsoon climate.\n\nCountrywide, temperatures normally range from an average annual high of 38 °C to a low of 19 °C. During the dry season, the temperature rises dramatically in the second half of March, spiking to well over 40 °C in some areas by mid-April when the sun passes its zenith.\n\nSouthwest monsoons that arrive between May and July (except in the south) signal the advent of the rainy season (ruedu fon). This lasts into October and the cloud covering reduces the temperature again, with the high humidity experienced as 'hot and sticky'. November and December mark the onset of the dry season and night temperatures on high ground can occasionally drop to a light frost. Temperatures begin to climb again in January.\n\nWildlife \n\nThe elephant is Thailand's national symbol. Although there were 100,000 domesticated elephants in Thailand in 1850, the population of elephants has dropped to an estimated 2,000. Poachers have long hunted elephants for ivory, meat, and hides. Young elephants are often captured for use in tourist attractions or as work animals, although their use has declined since the government banned logging in 1989. There are now more elephants in captivity than in the wild, and environmental activists claim that elephants in captivity are often mistreated. \n\nPoaching of protected species remains a major problem. Hunters have decimated the populations of tigers, leopards, and other large cats for their valuable pelts. Many animals (including tigers, bears, crocodiles, and king cobras) are farmed or hunted for their meat, which is considered a delicacy, and for their supposed medicinal properties. Although such trade is illegal, the famous Bangkok market Chatuchak is still known for the sale of endangered species. \n\nThe practice of keeping wild animals as pets threatens several species. Baby animals are typically captured and sold, which often requires killing the mother. Once in captivity and out of their natural habitat, many pets die or fail to reproduce. Affected populations include the Asiatic black bear, Malayan sun bear, white-handed lar, pileated gibbon and binturong.\n\nEducation\n\nIn 2014 the literacy rate was 93.5%. Education is provided by a well-organized school system of kindergartens, primary, lower secondary and upper secondary schools, numerous vocational colleges, and universities. The private sector of education is well developed and significantly contributes to the overall provision of education which the government would not be able to meet with public establishments. Education is compulsory up to and including age 14, with the government providing free education through to age 17.\n\nTeaching relies heavily on rote learning rather than on student-centred methodology. The establishment of reliable and coherent curricula for its primary and secondary schools is subject to such rapid changes that schools and their teachers are not always sure what they are supposed to be teaching, and authors and publishers of textbooks are unable to write and print new editions quickly enough to keep up with the volatility. Issues concerning university entrance has been in constant upheaval for a number of years. Nevertheless, Thai education has seen its greatest progress in the years since 2001. Most of the present generation of students are computer literate. Thailand was ranked 54th out of 56 countries globally for English proficiency, the second-lowest in Asia. \n\nStudents in ethnic minority areas score consistently lower in standardised national and international tests.\n\n \nThis is likely due to unequal allocation of educational resources, weak teacher training, poverty, and low Thai language skill, the language of the tests.\n \n \n\nExtensive nationwide IQ tests were administered to 72,780 Thai students from December 2010 to January 2011. The average IQ was found to be 98.59, which is higher than previous studies have found. IQ levels were found to be inconsistent throughout the country, with the lowest average of 88.07 found in the southern region of Narathiwat Province and the highest average of 108.91 reported in Nonthaburi Province. The Ministry of Public Health blames the discrepancies on iodine deficiency and steps are being taken to require that iodine be added to table salt, a practice common in many Western countries. \n\nIn 2013, the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology announced that 27,231 schools would receive classroom-level access to high-speed internet. \n\nScience and technology\n\nThe National Science and Technology Development Agency is an agency of the government of Thailand which supports research in science and technology and its application in the Thai economy.\n\nThe Synchrotron Light Research Institute (SLRI) is a Thai synchrotron light source for physics, chemistry, material science, and life sciences. It is at the Suranaree University of Technology (SUT), in Nakhon Ratchasima, about 300 km northeast of Bangkok. The institute, financed by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), houses the only large scale synchrotron in Southeast Asia. It was originally built as the SORTEC synchrotron in Japan and later moved to Thailand and modified for 1.2 GeV operation. It provides users with regularly scheduled light.\n\nInternet\n\nIn Bangkok, there are 23,000 free public Wi-Fi Internet hotspots. The Internet in Thailand includes 10Gbit/s high speed fibre-optic lines that can be leased and ISPs such as KIRZ that provide residential Internet services.\n\nThe Internet is censored by the Thai government, making some sites unreachable. The organisations responsible are the Royal Thai Police, the Communications Authority of Thailand, and the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology (MICT).\n\nEconomy\n\nThailand is an emerging economy and is considered a newly industrialised country. Thailand had a 2013 GDP of US$673 billion (on a purchasing power parity [PPP] basis). Thailand is the 2nd largest economy in Southeast Asia after Indonesia. Thailand ranks midway in the wealth spread in Southeast Asia as it is the 4th richest nation according to GDP per capita, after Singapore, Brunei, and Malaysia.\n\nThailand functions as an anchor economy for the neighbouring developing economies of Laos, Myanmar, and Cambodia. In the third quarter of 2014, the unemployment rate in Thailand stood at 0.84% according to Thailand's National Economic and Social Development Board (NESDB). \n\nRecent economic history \n\nThailand experienced the world's highest economic growth rate from 1985 to 1996 – averaging 12.4% annually. In 1997 increased pressure on the baht, a year in which the economy contracted by 1.9%, led to a crisis that uncovered financial sector weaknesses and forced the Chavalit Yongchaiyudh administration to float the currency. Prime Minister Chavalit Yongchaiyudh was forced to resign after his cabinet came under fire for its slow response to the economic crisis. The baht was pegged at 25 to the US dollar from 1978 to 1997. The baht reached its lowest point of 56 to the US dollar in January 1998 and the economy contracted by 10.8% that year, triggering the Asian financial crisis.\n\nThailand's economy started to recover in 1999, expanding 4.2–4.4% in 2000, thanks largely to strong exports. Growth (2.2%) was dampened by the softening of the global economy in 2001, but picked up in the subsequent years owing to strong growth in Asia, a relatively weak baht encouraging exports, and increased domestic spending as a result of several mega projects and incentives of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, known as Thaksinomics. Growth in 2002, 2003, and 2004 was 5–7% annually.\n\nGrowth in 2005, 2006, and 2007 hovered around 4–5%. Due both to the weakening of the US dollar and an increasingly strong Thai currency, by March 2008 the dollar was hovering around the 33 baht mark. While Thaksinomics has received criticism, official economic data reveals that between 2001 and 2011, Isan's GDP per capita more than doubled to US$1,475, while, over the same period, GDP in the Bangkok area increased from US$7,900 to nearly US$13,000. \n\nWith the instability surrounding major 2010 protests, the GDP growth of Thailand settled at around 4–5%, from highs of 5–7% under the previous civilian administration. Political uncertainty was identified as the primary cause of a decline in investor and consumer confidence. The IMF predicted that the Thai economy would rebound strongly from the low 0.1% GDP growth in 2011, to 5.5% in 2012 and then 7.5% in 2013, due to the monetary policy of the Bank of Thailand, as well as a package of fiscal stimulus measures introduced by the incumbent Yingluck Shinawatra government. \n\nFollowing the Thai military coup of 22 May 2014, the AFP global news agency published an article that claimed that the nation was on the verge of recession. The article focused on the departure of nearly 180,000 Cambodians from Thailand due to fears of an immigration clampdown, but concluded with information on the Thai economy's contraction of 2.1% quarter-on-quarter, from January to the end of March 2014. \n\nExports and manufacturing \n\nThe economy of Thailand is heavily export-dependent, with exports accounting for more than two-thirds of gross domestic product (GDP). Thailand exports over US$105 billion worth of goods and services annually. Major exports include rice, textiles and footwear, fishery products, rubber, jewellery, cars, computers, and electrical appliances.\n\nSubstantial industries include electric appliances, components, computer components, and vehicles. Thailand's recovery from the 1997–1998 Asian financial crisis depended mainly on exports, among various other factors. , the Thai automotive industry was the largest in Southeast Asia and the 9th largest in the world. The Thailand industry has an annual output of near 1.5 million vehicles, mostly commercial vehicles.\n\nMost of the vehicles built in Thailand are developed and licensed by foreign producers, mainly Japanese and South Korean. The Thai car industry takes advantage of the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) to find a market for many of its products. Eight manufacturers, five Japanese, two US, and Tata of India, produce pick-up trucks in Thailand. Thailand is the second largest consumer of pick-up trucks in the world, after the US. In 2014, pick-ups accounted for 42% of all new vehicle sales in Thailand.\n\nTourism \n\nTourism makes up about 6% of the economy. Thailand was the most visited country in Southeast Asia in 2013, according to the World Tourism Organisation. \nEstimates of tourism receipts directly contributing to the Thai GDP of 12 trillion baht range from 9 percent (1 trillion baht) (2013) to 16 percent. When including the indirect effects of tourism, it is said to account for 20.2 percent (2.4 trillion baht) of Thailand's GDP.\n\nThe Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) uses the slogan \"Amazing Thailand\" to promote Thailand internationally. In 2015, this was supplemented by a \"Discover Thainess\" campaign.\n\nAsian tourists primarily visit Thailand for Bangkok and the historical, natural, and cultural sights in its vicinity. Western tourists not only visit Bangkok and surroundings, but in addition many travel to the southern beaches and islands. The north is the chief destination for trekking and adventure travel with its diverse ethnic minority groups and forested mountains. The region hosting the fewest tourists is Isan in the northeast. To accommodate foreign visitors, the Thai government established a separate tourism police with offices in the major tourist areas and its own central emergency telephone number. \n\nThailand's attractions include diving sites, sandy beaches, hundreds of tropical islands, nightlife, archaeological sites, museums, hill tribes, flora and bird life, palaces, Buddhist temples and several World Heritage sites. Many tourists follow courses during their stay in Thailand. Popular are classes in Thai cooking, Buddhism and traditional Thai massage. Thai national festivals range from Thai New Year Songkran to Loy Krathong. Many localities in Thailand also have their own festivals. Among the best-known are the \"Elephant Round-up\" in Surin, the \"Rocket Festival\" in Yasothon and the \"Phi Ta Khon\" festival in Dan Sai. Thai cuisine has become famous worldwide with its enthusiastic use of fresh herbs and spices.\n\nBangkok shopping malls offer a variety of international and local brands. Towards the north of the city, and easily reached by skytrain or underground, is the \"Chatuchak Weekend Market\". It is possibly the largest market in the world, selling everything from household items to live, and sometimes endangered, animals. The \"Pratunam Market\" specialises in fabrics and clothing. The night markets in the Silom area and on Khaosan Road are mainly tourist-oriented, selling items such as T-shirts, handicrafts, counterfeit watches and sunglasses. In the vicinity of Bangkok one can find several floating markets such as the one in Damnoen Saduak. The \"Sunday Evening Walking Street Market\", held on Rachadamnoen Road inside the old city, is a shopping highlight of a visit to Chiang Mai up in northern Thailand. It attracts many locals as well as foreigners. The \"Night Bazaar\" is Chiang Mai's more tourist-oriented market, sprawling over several city blocks just east of the old city walls towards the river.\n\nProstitution in Thailand and sex tourism also form a de facto part of the economy. Cultural milieu combined with poverty and the lure of money have caused prostitution and sex tourism in particular to flourish in Thailand. One estimate published in 2003 placed the trade at US$4.3 billion per year or about 3% of the Thai economy.[http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/11/26/1069825832486.html?oneclick\ntrue Thailand mulls legal prostitution.] The Age, 26 November 2003 According to research by Chulalongkorn University on the Thai illegal economy, prostitution in Thailand in the period between 1993 and 1995, made up around 2.7% of the GDP. It is believed that at least 10% of tourist dollars are spent on the sex trade. \n\nAgriculture \n\nForty-nine per cent of Thailand's labour force is employed in agriculture. This is down from 70% in 1980. Rice is the most important crop in the country and Thailand had long been the world's leading exporter of rice, until recently falling behind both India and Vietnam. Thailand has the highest percentage of arable land, 27.25%, of any nation in the Greater Mekong Subregion. About 55% of the arable land area is used for rice production.\n\nAgriculture has been experiencing a transition from labour-intensive and transitional methods to a more industrialised and competitive sector.Henri Leturque and Steve Wiggins 2010. [http://www.odi.org.uk/resources/details.asp?id\n5108&titlethailands-progress-agriculture-transition-sustained-productivity-growth Thailand's progress in agriculture: Transition and sustained productivity growth]. London: Overseas Development Institute Between 1962 and 1983, the agricultural sector grew by 4.1% per year on average and continued to grow at 2.2% between 1983 and 2007. The relative contribution of agriculture to GDP has declined while exports of goods and services have increased.\n\nEnergy\n\n75% of Thailand's electrical generation is powered by natural gas in 2014. Coal-fired power plants produce an additional 20% of electricity, with the remainder coming from biomass, hydro, and biogas.\n\nThailand produces roughly one-third of the oil it consumes. It is the second largest importer of oil in SE Asia. Thailand is a large producer of natural gas, with reserves of at least 10 trillion cubic feet. After Indonesia, it is the largest coal producer in SE Asia, but must import additional coal to meet domestic demand.\n\nTransportation\n\nDemographics\n\nThailand had a population of 66,720,153 . Thailand's population is largely rural, concentrated in the rice-growing areas of the central, northeastern, and northern regions. Thailand had an urban population of 45.7% , concentrated mostly in and around the Bangkok Metropolitan Area.\n\nThailand's government-sponsored family planning program resulted in a dramatic decline in population growth from 3.1% in 1960 to around 0.4% today. In 1970, an average of 5.7 people lived in a Thai household. At the time of the 2010 census, the average Thai household size was 3.2 people.\n\nEthnic groups \n\nAbout 75–95% of the population is ethnically Tai, which includes four major regional groups: central Thai, northeastern Thai (Khon [Lao] Isan), northern Thai (Khon Mueang); and southern Thai. Thai Chinese, those of significant Chinese heritage, are 14% of the population, while Thais with partial Chinese ancestry comprise up to 40% of the population. Thai Malays represent 3% of the population, with the remainder consisting of Mons, Khmers and various \"hill tribes\". The country's official language is Thai and the primary religion is Theravada Buddhism, which is practised by around 95% of the population.\n\nEthnic Thais make up the majority of Thailand's population, 95.9% in 2010. This number includes Thai Chinese, a historically and economically important minority. The remaining 4.1% of the population are Burmese (2.0%), others 1.3%, and unspecified 0.9%.\n\nThailand is home to a large immigrant community of around 200,000 foreigners. Some 41,000 Britons alone live in Thailand. Increasing numbers of migrants from neighbouring Myanmar, Laos, and Cambodia, as well as from Nepal and India, have pushed the total number of non-national residents to around 3.5 million , up from an estimated 2 million in 2008, and about 1.3 million in the year 2000. \n\nPopulation centres \n\nLanguage\n\nThe official language of Thailand is Thai, a Tai–Kadai language closely related to Lao, Shan in Myanmar, and numerous smaller languages spoken in an arc from Hainan and Yunnan south to the Chinese border. It is the principal language of education and government and spoken throughout the country. The standard is based on the dialect of the central Thai people, and it is written in the Thai alphabet, an abugida script that evolved from the Khmer alphabet. Several other dialects exist, and coincide with the regional designations. Southern Thai is spoken in the southern provinces, and Northern Thai is spoken in the provinces that were formerly part of the independent kingdom of Lan Na.\n\nThailand is also host to several other minority languages, the largest of which is the Lao dialect of Isan spoken in the northeastern provinces. Although sometimes considered a Thai dialect, it is a Lao dialect, and the region in where it is traditionally spoken was historically part of the Lao kingdom of Lan Xang. In the far south, Kelantan-Pattani Malay is the primary language of Malay Muslims. Varieties of Chinese are also spoken by the large Thai Chinese population, with the Teochew dialect best-represented.\n\nNumerous tribal languages are also spoken, including many Austroasiatic languages such as Mon, Khmer, Viet, Mlabri and Orang Asli; Austronesian languages such as Cham and Moken; Sino-Tibetan languages like Lawa, Akha, and Karen; and other Tai languages such as Tai Yo, Phu Thai, and Saek. Hmong is a member of the Hmong–Mien languages, which is now regarded as a language family of its own.\n\nEnglish is a mandatory school subject, but the number of fluent speakers remains low, especially outside cities.\n\nReligion\n\nThailand's prevalent religion is Theravada Buddhism, which is an integral part of Thai identity and culture. Active participation in Buddhism is among the highest in the world. According to the 2000 census, 94.6% of the country's population self-identified as Buddhists of the Theravada tradition. Muslims constitute the second largest religious group in Thailand, comprising 4.6% of the population. \n\nIslam is concentrated mostly in the country's southernmost provinces: Pattani, Yala, Satun, Narathiwat, and part of Songkhla Chumphon, which are predominantly Malay, most of whom are Sunni Muslims. Christians represent 0.7% of the population, with the remaining population consisting of Sikhs and Hindus, who live mostly in the country's cities. There is also a small but historically significant Jewish community in Thailand dating back to the 17th century.\n\nCulture\n\nThai culture has been shaped by many influences, including Indian, Lao, Burmese, Cambodian, and Chinese.\n\nIts traditions incorporate a great deal of influence from India, China, Cambodia, and the rest of Southeast Asia. Thailand's national religion, Theravada Buddhism, is central to modern Thai identity. Thai Buddhism has evolved over time to include many regional beliefs originating from Hinduism, animism, as well as ancestor worship. The official calendar in Thailand is based on the Eastern version of the Buddhist Era (BE), which is 543 years ahead of the Gregorian (Western) calendar. Thus the year 2015 is 2558 BE in Thailand.\n\nSeveral different ethnic groups, many of which are marginalised, populate Thailand. Some of these groups spill over into Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia and Malaysia and have mediated change between their traditional local culture, national Thai, and global cultural influences. Overseas Chinese also form a significant part of Thai society, particularly in and around Bangkok. Their successful integration into Thai society has allowed for this group to hold positions of economic and political power. Thai Chinese businesses prosper as part of the larger bamboo network, a network of overseas Chinese businesses operating in the markets of Southeast Asia that share common family and cultural ties. \n\nThe traditional Thai greeting, the wai, is generally offered first by the younger of the two people meeting, with their hands pressed together, fingertips pointing upwards as the head is bowed to touch face to fingertips, usually coinciding with the spoken words \"sawatdi khrap\" for male speakers, and \"sawatdi kha\" for females. The elder may then respond in the same way. Social status and position, such as in government, will also have an influence on who performs the wai first. For example, although one may be considerably older than a provincial governor, when meeting it is usually the visitor who pays respect first. When children leave to go to school, they are taught to wai their parents to indicate their respect. The wai is a sign of respect and reverence for another, similar to the namaste greeting of India and Nepal.\n\nAs with other Asian cultures, respect towards ancestors is an essential part of Thai spiritual practice. Thais have a strong sense of hospitality and generosity, but also a strong sense of social hierarchy. Seniority is paramount in Thai culture. Elders have by tradition ruled in family decisions or ceremonies. Older siblings have duties to younger ones.\n\nTaboos in Thailand include touching someone's head or pointing with the feet, as the head is considered the most sacred and the foot the lowest part of the body.\n\nCuisine \n\nThai cuisine blends five fundamental tastes: sweet, spicy, sour, bitter, and salty. Common ingredients used in Thai cuisine include garlic, chillies, lime juice, lemon grass, coriander, galangal, palm sugar, and fish sauce (nam pla). The staple food in Thailand is rice, particularly jasmine variety rice (also known as \"hom Mali\" rice) which forms a part of almost every meal. Thailand was long the world's largest exporter of rice, and Thais domestically consume over 100 kg of milled rice per person per year. Over 5,000 varieties of rice from Thailand are preserved in the rice gene bank of the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), based in the Philippines. The king of Thailand is the official patron of IRRI. \n\nMedia \n\nThai society has been influenced in recent years by its widely available multi-language press and media. There are some English and numerous Thai and Chinese newspapers in circulation. Most Thai popular magazines use English headlines as a chic glamour factor. Many large businesses in Bangkok operate in English as well as other languages.\n\nThailand is the largest newspaper market in Southeast Asia with an estimated circulation of over 13 million copies daily in 2003. Even upcountry, out of Bangkok, the media flourish. For example, according to Thailand's Public Relations Department Media Directory 2003–2004, the nineteen provinces of Isan, Thailand's northeastern region, hosted 116 newspapers along with radio, TV, and cable. Since then, another province, Bueng Kan, was incorporated, totalling twenty provinces. In addition, a military coup on 22 May 2014 led to severe state restrictions on all media and forms of expression.\n\nUnits of measurement \n\nThailand generally uses the metric system, but traditional units of measurement for land area are used, and imperial units of measurement are occasionally used for building materials, such as wood and plumbing fixtures. Years are numbered as B.E. (Buddhist Era) in educational settings, the civil service, government, and on contracts and newspaper datelines. In banking, and increasingly in industry and commerce, standard Western year (Christian or Common Era) counting is the standard practice. \n\nSports\n\nMuay Thai (, RTGS: Muai Thai,, lit. \"Thai boxing\") is a native form of kickboxing and Thailand's signature sport. It incorporates kicks, punches, knees and elbow strikes in a ring with gloves similar to those used in Western boxing and this has led to Thailand gaining medals at the Olympic Games in boxing.\n\nAssociation football has overtaken muay Thai as the most widely followed sport in contemporary Thai society. Thailand national football team has played the AFC Asian Cup six times and reached the semifinals in 1972. The country has hosted the Asian Cup twice, in 1972 and in 2007. The 2007 edition was co-hosted together with Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam. It is not uncommon to see Thais cheering their favourite English Premier League teams on television and walking around in replica kit. Another widely enjoyed pastime, and once a competitive sport, is kite flying.\n\nVolleyball is rapidly growing as one of the most popular sport. The Women team has often participated World Championship,World Cup,and World Grand Prix Asian Championship. They also won Asian Championship twice and Asian Cup once. By the success of the women team, the men team has been growing as well.\n \nTakraw (Thai: ตะกร้อ) is a sport native to Thailand, in which the players hit a rattan ball and are only allowed to use their feet, knees, chest, and head to touch the ball. Sepak takraw is a form of this sport which is similar to volleyball. The players must volley a ball over a net and force it to hit the ground on the opponent's side. It is also a popular sport in other countries in Southeast Asia. A rather similar game but played only with the feet is Buka ball.\n\nSnooker has enjoyed increasing popularity in Thailand in recent years, with interest in the game being stimulated by the success of Thai snooker player James Wattana in the 1990s. Other notable players produced by the country include Ratchayothin Yotharuck, Noppon Saengkham and Dechawat Poomjaeng. \n\nRugby is also a growing sport in Thailand with the Thailand national rugby union team rising to be ranked 61st in the world. Thailand became the first country in the world to host an international 80 kg welterweight rugby tournament in 2005. The national domestic Thailand Rugby Union (TRU) competition includes several universities and services teams such as Chulalongkorn University, Mahasarakham University, Kasetsart University, Prince of Songkla University, Thammasat University, Rangsit University, the Thai Police, the Thai Army, the Thai Navy and the Royal Thai Air Force. Local sports clubs which also compete in the TRU include the British Club of Bangkok, the Southerners Sports Club (Bangkok) and the Royal Bangkok Sports Club.\n\nThailand has been called the golf capital of Asia as it is a popular destination for golf. The country attracts a large number of golfers from Japan, Korea, Singapore, South Africa, and Western countries who come to play golf in Thailand every year. The growing popularity of golf, especially among the middle classes and immigrants, is evident as there are more than 200 world-class golf courses nationwide, and some of them are chosen to host PGA and LPGA tournaments, such as Amata Spring Country Club, Alpine Golf and Sports Club, Thai Country Club, and Black Mountain Golf Club.\n\nBasketball is a growing sport in Thailand, especially on the professional sports club level. The Chang Thailand Slammers won the 2011 ASEAN Basketball League Championship. The Thailand national basketball team had its most successful year at the 1966 Asian Games where it won the silver medal. \n\nOther sports in Thailand are slowly growing as the country develops its sporting infrastructure. The success in sports like weightlifting and taekwondo at the last two summer Olympic Games has demonstrated that boxing is no longer the only medal option for Thailand.\n\nSporting venues\n\nThammasat Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in Bangkok. It is currently used mostly for football matches. The stadium holds 25,000. It is on Thammasat University's Rangsit campus. It was built for the 1998 Asian Games by construction firm Christiani and Nielsen, the same company that constructed the Democracy Monument in Bangkok.\n\nRajamangala National Stadium is the biggest sporting arena in Thailand. It currently has a capacity of 65,000. It is in Bang Kapi, Bangkok. The stadium was built in 1998 for the 1998 Asian Games and is the home stadium of the Thailand national football team.\n\nThe well-known Lumpini Boxing Stadium will host its final Muay Thai boxing matches on 7 February 2014 after the venue first opened in December 1956. Managed by the Royal Thai Army, the stadium was officially selected for the purpose of muay Thai bouts following a competition that was staged on 15 March 1956. From 11 February 2014, the stadium will relocate to Ram Intra Road, due to the new venue's capacity to accommodate audiences of up to 3,500. Foreigners typically pay between 1,000–2,000 baht to view a match, with prices depending on the location of the seating. \n\nHost city\n\nUniversiade\n\n* 24th Summer Universiade, Bangkok 2007\n\nAsian Games\n\n* 5th Asian Games, Bangkok 1966\n* 6th Asian Games, Bangkok 1970\n* 8th Asian Games, Bangkok 1978\n* 13th Asian Games, Bangkok, 1998\nAsian Indoor and Martial Arts Games\n\n* 1st Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games, Bangkok 2005\n* 3rd Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games, Bangkok 2009\n\nAsian Beach Games\n\n* 4th Asian Beach Games, Phuket 2014\n\nSoutheast Asian Games\n\n* 1st Southeast Asian Games, Bangkok 1959\n* 4th Southeast Asian Games, Bangkok 1967\n* 8th Southeast Asian Games, Bangkok 1975\n* 13th Southeast Asian Games, Bangkok 1985\n* 18th Southeast Asian Games, Chiang Mai 1995\n* 24th Southeast Asian Games, Nakhon Ratchasima 2007\n\nASEAN Para Games\n\n* 4th ASEAN Para Games, Nakhon Ratchasima 2008\nASEAN University Games\n\n* 1st ASEAN University Games, Chiang Mai 1981\n* 5th ASEAN University Games, Pattaya 1988\n* 10th ASEAN University Games, Bangkok 1999\n* 15th ASEAN University Games, Chiang Mai 2010\n\nASEAN School Games\n\n* 1st ASEAN School Games, Suphanburi 2009\n* 8th ASEAN School Games, Chiang Mai 2016\n\nInternational rankings", "World War II (often abbreviated to WWII or WW2), also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. In a state of \"total war\", the major participants threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, erasing the distinction between civilian and military resources. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust (in which approximately 11 million people were killed) and the strategic bombing of industrial and population centres (in which approximately one million were killed, and which included the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki), it resulted in an estimated 50 million to 85 million fatalities. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history.\n\nThe Empire of Japan aimed to dominate Asia and the Pacific and was already at war with the Republic of China in 1937, but the world war is generally said to have begun on 1 September 1939 with the invasion of Poland by Germany and subsequent declarations of war on Germany by France and the United Kingdom. From late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, and formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. The war continued primarily between the European Axis powers and the coalition of the United Kingdom and the British Commonwealth, with campaigns including the North Africa and East Africa campaigns, the aerial Battle of Britain, the Blitz bombing campaign, the Balkan Campaign as well as the long-running Battle of the Atlantic. In June 1941, the European Axis powers launched an invasion of the Soviet Union, opening the largest land theatre of war in history, which trapped the major part of the Axis' military forces into a war of attrition. In December 1941, Japan attacked the United States and European territories in the Pacific Ocean, and quickly conquered much of the Western Pacific.\n\nThe Axis advance halted in 1942 when Japan lost the critical Battle of Midway, near Hawaii, and Germany was defeated in North Africa and then, decisively, at Stalingrad in the Soviet Union. In 1943, with a series of German defeats on the Eastern Front, the Allied invasion of Sicily and the Allied invasion of Italy which brought about Italian surrender, and Allied victories in the Pacific, the Axis lost the initiative and undertook strategic retreat on all fronts. In 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained all of its territorial losses and invaded Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in South Central China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy and captured key Western Pacific islands.\n\nThe war in Europe concluded with an invasion of Germany by the Western Allies and the Soviet Union, culminating in the capture of Berlin by Soviet and Polish troops and the subsequent German unconditional surrender on 8 May 1945. Following the Potsdam Declaration by the Allies on 26 July 1945 and the refusal of Japan to surrender under its terms, the United States dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 6 August and 9 August respectively. With an invasion of the Japanese archipelago imminent, the possibility of additional atomic bombings, and the Soviet Union's declaration of war on Japan and invasion of Manchuria, Japan surrendered on 15 August 1945. Thus ended the war in Asia, cementing the total victory of the Allies.\n\nWorld War II altered the political alignment and social structure of the world. The United Nations (UN) was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The victorious great powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, and France—became the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. The Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 46 years. Meanwhile, the influence of European great powers waned, while the decolonisation of Asia and Africa began. Most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery. Political integration, especially in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities and to create a common identity. \n\nChronology\n\nThe start of the war in Europe is generally held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland; Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or even the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. \n\nOthers follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously and the two wars merged in 1941. This article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935.; ; Yisreelit, Hevrah Mizrahit (1965). Asian and African Studies, p. 191.For 1941 see ; Kellogg, William O (2003). American History the Easy Way. Barron's Educational Series. p. 236 ISBN 0-7641-1973-7.There is also the viewpoint that both World War I and World War II are part of the same \"European Civil War\" or \"Second Thirty Years War\": ; . The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939.\n\nThe exact date of the war's end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945 (V-J Day), rather than the formal surrender of Japan (2 September 1945). A peace treaty with Japan was signed in 1951 to formally tie up any loose ends such as compensation to be paid to Allied prisoners of war who had been victims of atrocities. A treaty regarding Germany's future allowed the reunification of East and West Germany to take place in 1990 and resolved other post-World War II issues. \n\nBackground\n\nEurope\n\nWorld War I had radically altered the political European map, with the defeat of the Central Powers—including Austria-Hungary, Germany and the Ottoman Empire—and the 1917 Bolshevik seizure of power in Russia, which eventually led to the founding of the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, the victorious Allies of World War I, such as France, Belgium, Italy, Greece and Romania, gained territory, and new nation-states were created out of the collapse of Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman and Russian Empires.\n\nTo prevent a future world war, the League of Nations was created during the 1919 Paris Peace Conference. The organisation's primary goals were to prevent armed conflict through collective security, military and naval disarmament, and settling international disputes through peaceful negotiations and arbitration.\n\nDespite strong pacifist sentiment after World War I, its aftermath still caused irredentist and revanchist nationalism in several European states. These sentiments were especially marked in Germany because of the significant territorial, colonial, and financial losses incurred by the Treaty of Versailles. Under the treaty, Germany lost around 13 percent of its home territory and all of its overseas colonies, while German annexation of other states was prohibited, reparations were imposed, and limits were placed on the size and capability of the country's armed forces.\n\nThe German Empire was dissolved in the German Revolution of 1918–1919, and a democratic government, later known as the Weimar Republic, was created. The interwar period saw strife between supporters of the new republic and hardline opponents on both the right and left. Italy, as an Entente ally, had made some post-war territorial gains; however, Italian nationalists were angered that the promises made by Britain and France to secure Italian entrance into the war were not fulfilled with the peace settlement. From 1922 to 1925, the Fascist movement led by Benito Mussolini seized power in Italy with a nationalist, totalitarian, and class collaborationist agenda that abolished representative democracy, repressed socialist, left-wing and liberal forces, and pursued an aggressive expansionist foreign policy aimed at making Italy a world power, promising the creation of a \"New Roman Empire\".\n\nAdolf Hitler, after an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the German government in 1923, eventually became the Chancellor of Germany in 1933. He abolished democracy, espousing a radical, racially motivated revision of the world order, and soon began a massive rearmament campaign. It was at this time that political scientists began to predict that a second Great War might take place. Meanwhile, France, to secure its alliance, allowed Italy a free hand in Ethiopia, which Italy desired as a colonial possession. The situation was aggravated in early 1935 when the Territory of the Saar Basin was legally reunited with Germany and Hitler repudiated the Treaty of Versailles, accelerated his rearmament programme, and introduced conscription.\n\nHoping to contain Germany, the United Kingdom, France and Italy formed the Stresa Front; however, in June 1935, the United Kingdom made an independent naval agreement with Germany, easing prior restrictions. The Soviet Union, concerned by Germany's goals of capturing vast areas of eastern Europe, drafted a treaty of mutual assistance with France. Before taking effect though, the Franco-Soviet pact was required to go through the bureaucracy of the League of Nations, which rendered it essentially toothless. The United States, concerned with events in Europe and Asia, passed the Neutrality Act in August of the same year.\n\nHitler defied the Versailles and Locarno treaties by remilitarising the Rhineland in March 1936. He encountered little opposition from other European powers. In October 1936, Germany and Italy formed the Rome–Berlin Axis. A month later, Germany and Japan signed the Anti-Comintern Pact, which Italy would join in the following year.\n\nAsia\n\nThe Kuomintang (KMT) party in China launched a unification campaign against regional warlords and nominally unified China in the mid-1920s, but was soon embroiled in a civil war against its former Chinese communist allies. In 1931, an increasingly militaristic Japanese Empire, which had long sought influence in China as the first step of what its government saw as the country's right to rule Asia, used the Mukden Incident as a pretext to launch an invasion of Manchuria and establish the puppet state of Manchukuo.\n\nToo weak to resist Japan, China appealed to the League of Nations for help. Japan withdrew from the League of Nations after being condemned for its incursion into Manchuria. The two nations then fought several battles, in Shanghai, Rehe and Hebei, until the Tanggu Truce was signed in 1933. Thereafter, Chinese volunteer forces continued the resistance to Japanese aggression in Manchuria, and Chahar and Suiyuan. After the 1936 Xi'an Incident, the Kuomintang and communist forces agreed on a ceasefire to present a united front to oppose Japan.\n\nPre-war events\n\nItalian invasion of Ethiopia (1935)\n\nThe Second Italo–Abyssinian War was a brief colonial war that began in October 1935 and ended in May 1936. The war began with the invasion of the Ethiopian Empire (also known as Abyssinia) by the armed forces of the Kingdom of Italy (Regno d'Italia), which was launched from Italian Somaliland and Eritrea. The war resulted in the military occupation of Ethiopia and its annexation into the newly created colony of Italian East Africa (Africa Orientale Italiana, or AOI); in addition, it exposed the weakness of the League of Nations as a force to preserve peace. Both Italy and Ethiopia were member nations, but the League did nothing when the former clearly violated the League's own Article X. Germany was the only major European nation to support the invasion. Italy subsequently dropped its objections to Germany's goal of absorbing Austria.\n\nSpanish Civil War (1936–39)\n\nWhen civil war broke out in Spain, Hitler and Mussolini lent military support to the Nationalist rebels, led by General Francisco Franco. The Soviet Union supported the existing government, the Spanish Republic. Over 30,000 foreign volunteers, known as the International Brigades, also fought against the Nationalists. Both Germany and the USSR used this proxy war as an opportunity to test in combat their most advanced weapons and tactics. The bombing of Guernica by the German Condor Legion in April 1937 heightened widespread concerns that the next major war would include extensive terror bombing attacks on civilians..Tony Judt said that the \"communist strategy in Spain turns out to have been a dry run for the seizure of power in Eastern Europe after 1945.\" See \nThe Nationalists won the civil war in April 1939; Franco, now dictator, bargained with both sides during the Second World War, but never concluded any major agreements. He did send volunteers to fight on the Eastern Front under German command but Spain remained neutral and did not allow either side to use its territory.\n\nJapanese invasion of China (1937)\n\nIn July 1937, Japan captured the former Chinese imperial capital of Beijing after instigating the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, which culminated in the Japanese campaign to invade all of China. The Soviets quickly signed a non-aggression pact with China to lend materiel support, effectively ending China's prior co-operation with Germany. Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek deployed his best army to defend Shanghai, but, after three months of fighting, Shanghai fell. The Japanese continued to push the Chinese forces back, capturing the capital Nanking in December 1937. After the fall of Nanking, tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of Chinese civilians and disarmed combatants were murdered by the Japanese. Totten, Samuel. Dictionary of Genocide. 2008, 298–9.\n\nIn March 1938, Nationalist Chinese forces won their first major victory at Taierzhuang but then the city of Xuzhou was taken by Japanese in May. In June 1938, Chinese forces stalled the Japanese advance by flooding the Yellow River; this manoeuvre bought time for the Chinese to prepare their defences at Wuhan, but the city was taken by October. Japanese military victories did not bring about the collapse of Chinese resistance that Japan had hoped to achieve; instead the Chinese government relocated inland to Chongqing and continued the war.\n\nSoviet-Japanese border conflicts\n\nIn the mid-to-late 1930s, Japanese forces in Manchukuo had sporadic border clashes with the Soviet Union and Mongolia. The Japanese doctrine of Hokushin-ron, which emphasised Japan's expansion northward, was favoured by the Imperial Army during this time. With the devastating Japanese defeat at Khalkin Gol in 1939 and ally Nazi Germany pursuing neutrality with the Soviets, this policy would prove difficult to maintain. Japan and the Soviet Union eventually signed a Neutrality Pact in April 1941, and Japan adopted the doctrine of Nanshin-ron, promoted by the Navy, which took its focus southward, eventually leading to its war with the United States and the Western Allies. \n\nEuropean occupations and agreements\n\nIn Europe, Germany and Italy were becoming more aggressive. In March 1938, Germany annexed Austria, again provoking little response from other European powers. Encouraged, Hitler began pressing German claims on the Sudetenland, an area of Czechoslovakia with a predominantly ethnic German population; and soon Britain and France followed the counsel of British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and conceded this territory to Germany in the Munich Agreement, which was made against the wishes of the Czechoslovak government, in exchange for a promise of no further territorial demands. Soon afterwards, Germany and Italy forced Czechoslovakia to cede additional territory to Hungary and Poland.\n\nAlthough all of Germany's stated demands had been satisfied by the agreement, privately Hitler was furious that British interference had prevented him from seizing all of Czechoslovakia in one operation. In subsequent speeches Hitler attacked British and Jewish \"war-mongers\" and in January 1939 secretly ordered a major build-up of the German navy to challenge British naval supremacy. In March 1939, Germany invaded the remainder of Czechoslovakia and subsequently split it into the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia and a pro-German client state, the Slovak Republic. Hitler also delivered an ultimatum to Lithuania, forcing the concession of the Klaipėda Region.\n\nGreatly alarmed and with Hitler making further demands on the Free City of Danzig, Britain and France guaranteed their support for Polish independence; when Italy conquered Albania in April 1939, the same guarantee was extended to Romania and Greece. Shortly after the Franco-British pledge to Poland, Germany and Italy formalised their own alliance with the Pact of Steel. Hitler accused Britain and Poland of trying to \"encircle\" Germany and renounced the Anglo-German Naval Agreement and the German–Polish Non-Aggression Pact.\n\nIn August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, a non-aggression treaty with a secret protocol. The parties gave each other rights to \"spheres of influence\" (western Poland and Lithuania for Germany; eastern Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Bessarabia for the USSR). It also raised the question of continuing Polish independence. The agreement was crucial to Hitler because it assured that Germany would not have to face the prospect of a two-front war, as it had in World War I, after it defeated Poland.\n\nThe situation reached a general crisis in late August as German troops continued to mobilise against the Polish border. In a private meeting with the Italian foreign minister, Count Ciano, Hitler asserted that Poland was a \"doubtful neutral\" that needed to either yield to his demands or be \"liquidated\" to prevent it from drawing off German troops in the future \"unavoidable\" war with the Western democracies. He did not believe Britain or France would intervene in the conflict. On 23 August Hitler ordered the attack to proceed on 26 August, but upon hearing that Britain had concluded a formal mutual assistance pact with Poland and that Italy would maintain neutrality, he decided to delay it. \n\nIn response to British requests for direct negotiations to avoid war, Germany made demands on Poland, which only served as a pretext to worsen relations. On 29 August, Hitler demanded that a Polish plenipotentiary immediately travel to Berlin to negotiate the handover of Danzig, and to allow a plebiscite in the Polish Corridor in which the German minority would vote on secession. The Poles refused to comply with the German demands and on the night of 30–31 August in a violent meeting with the British ambassador Neville Henderson, Ribbentrop declared that Germany considered its claims rejected.\n\nCourse of the war\n\nWar breaks out in Europe (1939–40)\n\nOn 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland under the false pretext that the Poles had carried out a series of sabotage operations against German targets near the border. Two days later, on 3 September, after a British ultimatum to Germany to cease military operations was ignored, Britain and France, followed by the fully independent Dominions of the British Commonwealth—Australia (3 September), Canada (10 September), New Zealand (3 September), and South Africa (6 September)—declared war on Germany. However, initially the alliance provided limited direct military support to Poland, consisting of a cautious, half-hearted French probe into the Saarland.., observes that, while it is true that Poland was far away, making it difficult for the French and British to provide support, \"[f]ew Western historians of World War II ... know that the British had committed to bomb Germany if it attacked Poland, but did not do so except for one raid on the base of Wilhelmshafen. The French, who committed to attack Germany in the west, had no intention of doing so.\" The Western Allies also began a naval blockade of Germany, which aimed to damage the country's economy and war effort. Germany responded by ordering U-boat warfare against Allied merchant and warships, which was to later escalate into the Battle of the Atlantic.\n\nOn 17 September 1939, after signing a cease-fire with Japan, the Soviets invaded Poland from the east. The Polish army was defeated and Warsaw surrendered to the Germans on 27 September, with final pockets of resistance surrendering on 6 October. Poland's territory was divided between Germany and the Soviet Union, with Lithuania and Slovakia also receiving small shares. After the defeat of Poland's armed forces, the Polish resistance established an Underground State and a partisan Home Army. About 100,000 Polish military personnel were evacuated to Romania and the Baltic countries; many of these soldiers later fought against the Germans in other theatres of the war. Poland's Enigma codebreakers were also evacuated to France.\n\nOn 6 October Hitler made a public peace overture to Britain and France, but said that the future of Poland was to be determined exclusively by Germany and the Soviet Union. Chamberlain rejected this on 12 October, saying \"Past experience has shown that no reliance can be placed upon the promises of the present German Government.\" After this rejection Hitler ordered an immediate offensive against France, but bad weather forced repeated postponements until the spring of 1940. \n\nAfter signing the German–Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Demarcation, the Soviet Union forced the Baltic countries—Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania—to allow it to station Soviet troops in their countries under pacts of \"mutual assistance\". Finland rejected territorial demands, prompting a Soviet invasion in November 1939. The resulting Winter War ended in March 1940 with Finnish concessions. Britain and France, treating the Soviet attack on Finland as tantamount to its entering the war on the side of the Germans, responded to the Soviet invasion by supporting the USSR's expulsion from the League of Nations.\n\nIn June 1940, the Soviet Union forcibly annexed Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and the disputed Romanian regions of Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina and Hertza. Meanwhile, Nazi-Soviet political rapprochement and economic co-operation gradually stalled, and both states began preparations for war.\n\nWestern Europe (1940–41)\n\nIn April 1940, Germany invaded Denmark and Norway to protect shipments of iron ore from Sweden, which the Allies were attempting to cut off by unilaterally mining neutral Norwegian waters. Denmark capitulated after a few hours, and despite Allied support, during which the important harbour of Narvik temporarily was recaptured from the Germans, Norway was conquered within two months. British discontent over the Norwegian campaign led to the replacement of the British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, with Winston Churchill on 10 May 1940.\n\nGermany launched an offensive against France and, adhering to the Manstein Plan also attacked the neutral nations of Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg on 10 May 1940. That same day British forces landed in Iceland and the Faroes to preempt a possible German invasion of the islands. The U.S. in close co-operation with the Danish envoy to Washington D.C., agreed to protect Greenland, laying the political framework for the formal establishment of bases in April 1941. The Netherlands and Belgium were overrun using blitzkrieg tactics in a few days and weeks, respectively. The French-fortified Maginot Line and the main body the Allied forces which had moved into Belgium were circumvented by a flanking movement through the thickly wooded Ardennes region, mistakenly perceived by Allied planners as an impenetrable natural barrier against armoured vehicles. As a result, the bulk of the Allied armies found themselves trapped in an encirclement and were beaten. The majority were taken prisoner, whilst over 300,000, mostly British and French, were evacuated from the continent at Dunkirk by early June, although abandoning almost all of their equipment.\n\nOn 10 June, Italy invaded France, declaring war on both France and the United Kingdom. Paris fell to the Germans on 14 June and eight days later France signed an armistice with Germany and was soon divided into German and Italian occupation zones, and an unoccupied rump state under the Vichy Regime, which, though officially neutral, was generally aligned with Germany. France kept its fleet but the British feared the Germans would seize it, so on 3 July, the British attacked it.\n\nThe Battle of Britain began in early July with Luftwaffe attacks on shipping and harbours. On 19 July, Hitler again publicly offered to end the war, saying he had no desire to destroy the British Empire. The United Kingdom rejected this ultimatum. The main German air superiority campaign started in August but failed to defeat RAF Fighter Command, and a proposed invasion was postponed indefinitely on 17 September. The German strategic bombing offensive intensified as night attacks on London and other cities in the Blitz, but largely failed to disrupt the British war effort.\n\nUsing newly captured French ports, the German Navy enjoyed success against an over-extended Royal Navy, using U-boats against British shipping in the Atlantic. The British scored a significant victory on 27 May 1941 by sinking the German battleship Bismarck. Perhaps most importantly, during the Battle of Britain the Royal Air Force had successfully resisted the Luftwaffe's assault, and the German bombing campaign largely ended in May 1941.\n\nThroughout this period, the neutral United States took measures to assist China and the Western Allies. In November 1939, the American Neutrality Act was amended to allow \"cash and carry\" purchases by the Allies. In 1940, following the German capture of Paris, the size of the United States Navy was significantly increased. In September, the United States further agreed to a trade of American destroyers for British bases. Still, a large majority of the American public continued to oppose any direct military intervention into the conflict well into 1941.\n\nAlthough Roosevelt had promised to keep the United States out of the war, he nevertheless took concrete steps to prepare for war. In December 1940 he accused Hitler of planning world conquest and ruled out negotiations as useless, calling for the US to become an \"arsenal for democracy\" and promoted the passage of Lend-Lease aid to support the British war effort. In January 1941 secret high level staff talks with the British began for the purposes of determining how to defeat Germany should the US enter the war. They decided on a number of offensive policies, including an air offensive, the \"early elimination\" of Italy, raids, support of resistance groups, and the capture of positions to launch an offensive against Germany. \n\nAt the end of September 1940, the Tripartite Pact united Japan, Italy and Germany to formalise the Axis Powers. The Tripartite Pact stipulated that any country, with the exception of the Soviet Union, not in the war which attacked any Axis Power would be forced to go to war against all three. The Axis expanded in November 1940 when Hungary, Slovakia and Romania joined the Tripartite Pact. Romania would make a major contribution (as did Hungary) to the Axis war against the USSR, partially to recapture territory ceded to the USSR, partially to pursue its leader Ion Antonescu's desire to combat communism.\n\nMediterranean (1940–41)\n\nItaly began operations in the Mediterranean, initiating a siege of Malta in June, conquering British Somaliland in August, and making an incursion into British-held Egypt in September 1940. In October 1940, Italy started the Greco-Italian War because of Mussolini's jealousy of Hitler's success but within days was repulsed and pushed back into Albania, where a stalemate soon occurred. The United Kingdom responded to Greek requests for assistance by sending troops to Crete and providing air support to Greece. Hitler decided that when the weather improved he would take action against Greece to assist the Italians and prevent the British from gaining a foothold in the Balkans, to strike against the British naval dominance of the Mediterranean, and to secure his hold on Romanian oil. \n\nIn December 1940, British Commonwealth forces began counter-offensives against Italian forces in Egypt and Italian East Africa. The offensive in North Africa was highly successful and by early February 1941 Italy had lost control of eastern Libya and large numbers of Italian troops had been taken prisoner. The Italian Navy also suffered significant defeats, with the Royal Navy putting three Italian battleships out of commission by a carrier attack at Taranto, and neutralising several more warships at the Battle of Cape Matapan.\n\nThe Germans soon intervened to assist Italy. Hitler sent German forces to Libya in February, and by the end of March they had launched an offensive which drove back the Commonwealth forces which had been weakened to support Greece. In under a month, Commonwealth forces were pushed back into Egypt with the exception of the besieged port of Tobruk. The Commonwealth attempted to dislodge Axis forces in May and again in June, but failed on both occasions.\n\nBy late March 1941, following Bulgaria's signing of the Tripartite Pact, the Germans were in position to intervene in Greece. Plans were changed, however, because of developments in neighbouring Yugoslavia. The Yugoslav government had signed the Tripartite Pact on 25 March, only to be overthrown two days later by a British-encouraged coup. Hitler viewed the new regime as hostile and immediately decided to eliminate it. On 6 April Germany simultaneously invaded both Yugoslavia and Greece, making rapid progress and forcing both nations to surrender within the month. The British were driven from the Balkans after Germany conquered the Greek island of Crete by the end of May. Although the Axis victory was swift, bitter partisan warfare subsequently broke out against the Axis occupation of Yugoslavia, which continued until the end of the war.\n\nThe Allies did have some successes during this time. In the Middle East, Commonwealth forces first quashed an uprising in Iraq which had been supported by German aircraft from bases within Vichy-controlled Syria, then, with the assistance of the Free French, invaded Syria and Lebanon to prevent further such occurrences.\n\nAxis attack on the USSR (1941)\n\nWith the situation in Europe and Asia relatively stable, Germany, Japan, and the Soviet Union made preparations. With the Soviets wary of mounting tensions with Germany and the Japanese planning to take advantage of the European War by seizing resource-rich European possessions in Southeast Asia, the two powers signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1941. By contrast, the Germans were steadily making preparations for an attack on the Soviet Union, massing forces on the Soviet border.\n\nHitler believed that Britain's refusal to end the war was based on the hope that the United States and the Soviet Union would enter the war against Germany sooner or later. He therefore decided to try to strengthen Germany's relations with the Soviets, or failing that, to attack and eliminate them as a factor. In November 1940, negotiations took place to determine if the Soviet Union would join the Tripartite Pact. The Soviets showed some interest, but asked for concessions from Finland, Bulgaria, Turkey, and Japan that Germany considered unacceptable. On 18 December 1940, Hitler issued the directive to prepare for an invasion of the Soviet Union.\n\nOn 22 June 1941, Germany, supported by Italy and Romania, invaded the Soviet Union in Operation Barbarossa, with Germany accusing the Soviets of plotting against them. They were joined shortly by Finland and Hungary.. The primary targets of this surprise offensive were the Baltic region, Moscow and Ukraine, with the ultimate goal of ending the 1941 campaign near the Arkhangelsk-Astrakhan line, from the Caspian to the White Seas. Hitler's objectives were to eliminate the Soviet Union as a military power, exterminate Communism, generate Lebensraum (\"living space\") by dispossessing the native population and guarantee access to the strategic resources needed to defeat Germany's remaining rivals.\n\nAlthough the Red Army was preparing for strategic counter-offensives before the war, Barbarossa forced the Soviet supreme command to adopt a strategic defence. During the summer, the Axis made significant gains into Soviet territory, inflicting immense losses in both personnel and materiel. By the middle of August, however, the German Army High Command decided to suspend the offensive of a considerably depleted Army Group Centre, and to divert the 2nd Panzer Group to reinforce troops advancing towards central Ukraine and Leningrad. The Kiev offensive was overwhelmingly successful, resulting in encirclement and elimination of four Soviet armies, and made further advance into Crimea and industrially developed Eastern Ukraine (the First Battle of Kharkov) possible.\n\nThe diversion of three quarters of the Axis troops and the majority of their air forces from France and the central Mediterranean to the Eastern Front prompted Britain to reconsider its grand strategy. In July, the UK and the Soviet Union formed a military alliance against Germany The British and Soviets invaded Iran to secure the Persian Corridor and Iran's oil fields. In August, the United Kingdom and the United States jointly issued the Atlantic Charter.\n\nBy October Axis operational objectives in Ukraine and the Baltic region were achieved, with only the sieges of Leningrad and Sevastopol continuing. A major offensive against Moscow was renewed; after two months of fierce battles in increasingly harsh weather the German army almost reached the outer suburbs of Moscow, where the exhausted troops were forced to suspend their offensive. Large territorial gains were made by Axis forces, but their campaign had failed to achieve its main objectives: two key cities remained in Soviet hands, the Soviet capability to resist was not broken, and the Soviet Union retained a considerable part of its military potential. The blitzkrieg phase of the war in Europe had ended.\n\nBy early December, freshly mobilised reserves allowed the Soviets to achieve numerical parity with Axis troops. This, as well as intelligence data which established that a minimal number of Soviet troops in the East would be sufficient to deter any attack by the Japanese Kwantung Army, allowed the Soviets to begin a massive counter-offensive that started on 5 December all along the front and pushed German troops 100 - west. \n\nWar breaks out in the Pacific (1941)\n\nIn 1939 the United States had renounced its trade treaty with Japan and beginning with an aviation gasoline ban in July 1940 Japan had become subject to increasing economic pressure. During this time, Japan launched its first attack against Changsha, a strategically important Chinese city, but was repulsed by late September. Despite several offensives by both sides, the war between China and Japan was stalemated by 1940. To increase pressure on China by blocking supply routes, and to better position Japanese forces in the event of a war with the Western powers, Japan invaded and occupied northern Indochina. Afterwards, the United States embargoed iron, steel and mechanical parts against Japan. Other sanctions soon followed.\n\nIn August of that year, Chinese communists launched an offensive in Central China; in retaliation, Japan instituted harsh measures in occupied areas to reduce human and material resources for the communists. Continued antipathy between Chinese communist and nationalist forces culminated in armed clashes in January 1941, effectively ending their co-operation. In March, the Japanese 11th army attacked the headquarters of the Chinese 19th army but was repulsed during Battle of Shanggao. In September, Japan attempted to take the city of Changsha again and clashed with Chinese nationalist forces.\n\nGerman successes in Europe encouraged Japan to increase pressure on European governments in Southeast Asia. The Dutch government agreed to provide Japan some oil supplies from the Dutch East Indies, but negotiations for additional access to their resources ended in failure in June 1941. In July 1941 Japan sent troops to southern Indochina, thus threatening British and Dutch possessions in the Far East. The United States, United Kingdom and other Western governments reacted to this move with a freeze on Japanese assets and a total oil embargo.\n\nSince early 1941 the United States and Japan had been engaged in negotiations in an attempt to improve their strained relations and end the war in China. During these negotiations Japan advanced a number of proposals which were dismissed by the Americans as inadequate. At the same time the US, Britain, and the Netherlands engaged in secret discussions for the joint defence of their territories, in the event of a Japanese attack against any of them. Roosevelt reinforced the Philippines (an American protectorate scheduled for independence in 1946) and warned Japan that the US would react to Japanese attacks against any \"neighboring countries\".\n\nFrustrated at the lack of progress and feeling the pinch of the American-British-Dutch sanctions, Japan prepared for war. On 20 November it presented an interim proposal as its final offer. It called for the end of American aid to China and to supply oil and other resources to Japan. In exchange they promised not to launch any attacks in Southeast Asia and to withdraw their forces from their threatening positions in southern Indochina. The American counter-proposal of 26 November required that Japan evacuate all of China without conditions and conclude non-aggression pacts with all Pacific powers. That meant Japan was essentially forced to choose between abandoning its ambitions in China, or seizing the natural resources it needed in the Dutch East Indies by force;: \"The United States cut off oil exports to Japan in the summer of 1941, forcing Japanese leaders to choose between going to war to seize the oil fields of the Netherlands East Indies or giving in to U.S. pressure.\", listing various military and diplomatic developments, observes that \"the threat to Japan was not purely economic.\" the Japanese military did not consider the former an option, and many officers considered the oil embargo an unspoken declaration of war.\n\nJapan planned to rapidly seize European colonies in Asia to create a large defensive perimeter stretching into the Central Pacific; the Japanese would then be free to exploit the resources of Southeast Asia while exhausting the over-stretched Allies by fighting a defensive war. To prevent American intervention while securing the perimeter it was further planned to neutralise the United States Pacific Fleet and the American military presence in the Philippines from the outset. On 7 December 1941 (8 December in Asian time zones), Japan attacked British and American holdings with near-simultaneous offensives against Southeast Asia and the Central Pacific. These included an attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor, the Philippines, landings in Thailand and Malaya and the battle of Hong Kong.\n\nThese attacks led the United States, Britain, China, Australia and several other states to formally declare war on Japan, whereas the Soviet Union, being heavily involved in large-scale hostilities with European Axis countries, maintained its neutrality agreement with Japan. Germany, followed by the other Axis states, declared war on the United States in solidarity with Japan, citing as justification the American attacks on German war vessels that had been ordered by Roosevelt. \n\nAxis advance stalls (1942–43)\n\nIn January 1942, the Big Four (the United States, Britain, Soviet Union, China) and 22 smaller or exiled governments issued the Declaration by United Nations, thereby affirming the Atlantic Charter, and agreeing to not to sign a separate peace with the Axis powers.\n\nDuring 1942, Allied officials debated on the appropriate grand strategy to pursue. All agreed that defeating Germany was the primary objective. The Americans favoured a straightforward, large-scale attack on Germany through France. The Soviets were also demanding a second front. The British, on the other hand, argued that military operations should target peripheral areas to wear out German strength, lead to increasing demoralisation, and bolster resistance forces. Germany itself would be subject to a heavy bombing campaign. An offensive against Germany would then be launched primarily by Allied armour without using large-scale armies. Eventually, the British persuaded the Americans that a landing in France was infeasible in 1942 and they should instead focus on driving the Axis out of North Africa. \n\nAt the Casablanca Conference in early 1943, the Allies reiterated the statements issued in the 1942 Declaration by the United Nations, and demanded the unconditional surrender of their enemies.\nThe British and Americans agreed to continue to press the initiative in the Mediterranean by invading Sicily to fully secure the Mediterranean supply routes. Although the British argued for further operations in the Balkans to bring Turkey into the war, in May 1943, the Americans extracted a British commitment to limit Allied operations in the Mediterranean to an invasion of the Italian mainland and to invade France in 1944. \n\nPacific (1942–43)\n\nBy the end of April 1942, Japan and its ally Thailand had almost fully conquered Burma, Malaya, the Dutch East Indies, Singapore, and Rabaul, inflicting severe losses on Allied troops and taking a large number of prisoners. Despite stubborn resistance by Filipino and US forces, the Philippine Commonwealth was eventually captured in May 1942, forcing its government into exile. On 16 April, in Burma, 7,000 British soldiers were encircled by the Japanese 33rd Division during the Battle of Yenangyaung and rescued by the Chinese 38th Division. Japanese forces also achieved naval victories in the South China Sea, Java Sea and Indian Ocean, and bombed the Allied naval base at Darwin, Australia. In January 1942, the only Allied success against Japan was a Chinese victory at Changsha. These easy victories over unprepared US and European opponents left Japan overconfident, as well as overextended.\n\nIn early May 1942, Japan initiated operations to capture Port Moresby by amphibious assault and thus sever communications and supply lines between the United States and Australia. The planned invasion was thwarted when an Allied task force centered on two American fleet carriers fought Japanese naval forces to a draw in the Battle of the Coral Sea. Japan's next plan, motivated by the earlier Doolittle Raid, was to seize Midway Atoll and lure American carriers into battle to be eliminated; as a diversion, Japan would also send forces to occupy the Aleutian Islands in Alaska. In early June, Japan put its operations into action but the Americans, having broken Japanese naval codes in late May, were fully aware of the plans and force dispositions and used this knowledge to achieve a decisive victory at Midway over the Imperial Japanese Navy.\n\nWith its capacity for aggressive action greatly diminished as a result of the Midway battle, Japan chose to focus on a belated attempt to capture Port Moresby by an overland campaign in the Territory of Papua. The Americans planned a counter-attack against Japanese positions in the southern Solomon Islands, primarily Guadalcanal, as a first step towards capturing Rabaul, the main Japanese base in Southeast Asia. \n\nBoth plans started in July, but by mid-September, the Battle for Guadalcanal took priority for the Japanese, and troops in New Guinea were ordered to withdraw from the Port Moresby area to the northern part of the island, where they faced Australian and United States troops in the Battle of Buna-Gona. Guadalcanal soon became a focal point for both sides with heavy commitments of troops and ships in the battle for Guadalcanal. By the start of 1943, the Japanese were defeated on the island and withdrew their troops. In Burma, Commonwealth forces mounted two operations. The first, an offensive into the Arakan region in late 1942, went disastrously, forcing a retreat back to India by May 1943. The second was the insertion of irregular forces behind Japanese front-lines in February which, by the end of April, had achieved mixed results.\n\nEastern Front (1942–43)\n\nDespite considerable losses, in early 1942 Germany and its allies stopped a major Soviet offensive in central and southern Russia, keeping most territorial gains they had achieved during the previous year. In May the Germans defeated Soviet offensives in the Kerch Peninsula and at Kharkov, and then launched their main summer offensive against southern Russia in June 1942, to seize the oil fields of the Caucasus and occupy Kuban steppe, while maintaining positions on the northern and central areas of the front. The Germans split Army Group South into two groups: Army Group A advanced to the lower Don River and struck south-east to the Caucasus, while Army Group B headed towards the Volga River. The Soviets decided to make their stand at Stalingrad on the Volga.\n\nBy mid-November, the Germans had nearly taken Stalingrad in bitter street fighting when the Soviets began their second winter counter-offensive, starting with an encirclement of German forces at Stalingrad and an assault on the Rzhev salient near Moscow, though the latter failed disastrously. By early February 1943, the German Army had taken tremendous losses; German troops at Stalingrad had been forced to surrender, and the front-line had been pushed back beyond its position before the summer offensive. In mid-February, after the Soviet push had tapered off, the Germans launched another attack on Kharkov, creating a salient in their front line around the Russian city of Kursk.\n\nWestern Europe/Atlantic & Mediterranean (1942–43)\n\nExploiting poor American naval command decisions, the German navy ravaged Allied shipping off the American Atlantic coast. By November 1941, Commonwealth forces had launched a counter-offensive, Operation Crusader, in North Africa, and reclaimed all the gains the Germans and Italians had made. In North Africa, the Germans launched an offensive in January, pushing the British back to positions at the Gazala Line by early February, followed by a temporary lull in combat which Germany used to prepare for their upcoming offensives. Concerns the Japanese might use bases in Vichy-held Madagascar caused the British to invade the island in early May 1942. An Axis offensive in Libya forced an Allied retreat deep inside Egypt until Axis forces were stopped at El Alamein. On the Continent, raids of Allied commandos on strategic targets, culminating in the disastrous Dieppe Raid, demonstrated the Western Allies' inability to launch an invasion of continental Europe without much better preparation, equipment, and operational security.\n\nIn August 1942, the Allies succeeded in repelling a second attack against El Alamein and, at a high cost, managed to deliver desperately needed supplies to the besieged Malta. A few months later, the Allies commenced an attack of their own in Egypt, dislodging the Axis forces and beginning a drive west across Libya. This attack was followed up shortly after by Anglo-American landings in French North Africa, which resulted in the region joining the Allies. Hitler responded to the French colony's defection by ordering the occupation of Vichy France; although Vichy forces did not resist this violation of the armistice, they managed to scuttle their fleet to prevent its capture by German forces. The now pincered Axis forces in Africa withdrew into Tunisia, which was conquered by the Allies in May 1943.\n\nIn early 1943 the British and Americans began the Combined Bomber Offensive, a strategic bombing campaign against Germany. The goals were to disrupt the German war economy, reduce German morale, and \"de-house\" the civilian population. \n\nAllies gain momentum (1943–44)\n\nAfter the Guadalcanal Campaign, the Allies initiated several operations against Japan in the Pacific. In May 1943, Canadian and U.S. forces were sent to eliminate Japanese forces from the Aleutians. Soon after, the U.S. with support from Australian and New Zealand forces began major operations to isolate Rabaul by capturing surrounding islands, and to breach the Japanese Central Pacific perimeter at the Gilbert and Marshall Islands. By the end of March 1944, the Allies had completed both of these objectives, and additionally neutralised the major Japanese base at Truk in the Caroline Islands. In April, the Allies launched an operation to retake Western New Guinea.\n\nIn the Soviet Union, both the Germans and the Soviets spent the spring and early summer of 1943 preparing for large offensives in central Russia. On 4 July 1943, Germany attacked Soviet forces around the Kursk Bulge. Within a week, German forces had exhausted themselves against the Soviets' deeply echeloned and well-constructed defences and, for the first time in the war, Hitler cancelled the operation before it had achieved tactical or operational success. This decision was partially affected by the Western Allies' invasion of Sicily launched on 9 July which, combined with previous Italian failures, resulted in the ousting and arrest of Mussolini later that month. Also, in July 1943 the British firebombed Hamburg killing over 40,000 people.\n\nOn 12 July 1943, the Soviets launched their own counter-offensives, thereby dispelling any chance of German victory or even stalemate in the east. The Soviet victory at Kursk marked the end of German superiority, giving the Soviet Union the initiative on the Eastern Front. The Germans tried to stabilise their eastern front along the hastily fortified Panther-Wotan line, but the Soviets broke through it at Smolensk and by the Lower Dnieper Offensives.\n\nOn 3 September 1943, the Western Allies invaded the Italian mainland, following Italy's armistice with the Allies. Germany responded by disarming Italian forces, seizing military control of Italian areas, and creating a series of defensive lines. German special forces then rescued Mussolini, who then soon established a new client state in German occupied Italy named the Italian Social Republic, causing an Italian civil war. The Western Allies fought through several lines until reaching the main German defensive line in mid-November.\n\nGerman operations in the Atlantic also suffered. By May 1943, as Allied counter-measures became increasingly effective, the resulting sizeable German submarine losses forced a temporary halt of the German Atlantic naval campaign. In November 1943, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill met with Chiang Kai-shek in Cairo and then with Joseph Stalin in Tehran. The former conference determined the post-war return of Japanese territory, while the latter included agreement that the Western Allies would invade Europe in 1944 and that the Soviet Union would declare war on Japan within three months of Germany's defeat. \n\nFrom November 1943, during the seven-week Battle of Changde, the Chinese forced Japan to fight a costly war of attrition, while awaiting Allied relief. . In January 1944, the Allies launched a series of attacks in Italy against the line at Monte Cassino and tried to outflank it with landings at Anzio. By the end of January, a major Soviet offensive expelled German forces from the Leningrad region, ending the longest and most lethal siege in history.\n\nThe following Soviet offensive was halted on the pre-war Estonian border by the German Army Group North aided by Estonians hoping to re-establish national independence. This delay slowed subsequent Soviet operations in the Baltic Sea region. By late May 1944, the Soviets had liberated Crimea, largely expelled Axis forces from Ukraine, and made incursions into Romania, which were repulsed by the Axis troops. The Allied offensives in Italy had succeeded and, at the expense of allowing several German divisions to retreat, on 4 June, Rome was captured.; .The weeks after the fall of Rome saw a dramatic upswing in German atrocities in Italy (). The period featured massacres with victims in the hundreds at Civitella (; ), Fosse Ardeatine (), and Sant'Anna di Stazzema (), and is capped with the Marzabotto massacre.\n\nThe Allies had mixed success in mainland Asia. In March 1944, the Japanese launched the first of two invasions, an operation against British positions in Assam, India, and soon besieged Commonwealth positions at Imphal and Kohima. In May 1944, British forces mounted a counter-offensive that drove Japanese troops back to Burma, and Chinese forces that had invaded northern Burma in late 1943 besieged Japanese troops in Myitkyina. The second Japanese invasion of China aimed to destroy China's main fighting forces, secure railways between Japanese-held territory and capture Allied airfields. By June, the Japanese had conquered the province of Henan and begun a new attack on Changsha in the Hunan province. \n\nAllies close in (1944)\n\nOn 6 June 1944 (known as D-Day), after three years of Soviet pressure,: \"Stalin always believed that Britain and America were delaying the second front so that the Soviet Union would bear the brunt of the war.\" the Western Allies invaded northern France. After reassigning several Allied divisions from Italy, they also attacked southern France. These landings were successful, and led to the defeat of the German Army units in France. Paris was liberated by the local resistance assisted by the Free French Forces, both led by General Charles de Gaulle, on 25 August and the Western Allies continued to push back German forces in western Europe during the latter part of the year. An attempt to advance into northern Germany spearheaded by a major airborne operation in the Netherlands failed. After that, the Western Allies slowly pushed into Germany, but failed to cross the Rur river in a large offensive. In Italy, Allied advance also slowed due to the last major German defensive line. \n\nOn 22 June, the Soviets launched a strategic offensive in Belarus (\"Operation Bagration\") that destroyed the German Army Group Centre almost completely. Soon after that another Soviet strategic offensive forced German troops from Western Ukraine and Eastern Poland. The Soviet advance prompted resistance forces in Poland to initiate several uprisings against the German occupation. However, the largest of these in Warsaw where German soldiers massacred 200,000 civilians and a national uprising in Slovakia did not receive Soviet support and were subsequently suppressed by the Germans. The Red Army's strategic offensive in eastern Romania cut off and destroyed the considerable German troops there and triggered a successful coup d'état in Romania and in Bulgaria, followed by those countries' shift to the Allied side. \n\nIn September 1944, Soviet troops advanced into Yugoslavia and forced the rapid withdrawal of German Army Groups E and F in Greece, Albania and Yugoslavia to rescue them from being cut off. By this point, the Communist-led Partisans under Marshal Josip Broz Tito, who had led an increasingly successful guerrilla campaign against the occupation since 1941, controlled much of the territory of Yugoslavia and engaged in delaying efforts against German forces further south. In northern Serbia, the Red Army, with limited support from Bulgarian forces, assisted the Partisans in a joint liberation of the capital city of Belgrade on 20 October. A few days later, the Soviets launched a massive assault against German-occupied Hungary that lasted until the fall of Budapest in February 1945. Unlike impressive Soviet victories in the Balkans, bitter Finnish resistance to the Soviet offensive in the Karelian Isthmus denied the Soviets occupation of Finland and led to a Soviet-Finnish armistice on relatively mild conditions, although Finland later shifted to the Allied side.\n\nBy the start of July 1944, Commonwealth forces in Southeast Asia had repelled the Japanese sieges in Assam, pushing the Japanese back to the Chindwin River while the Chinese captured Myitkyina. In China, the Japanese had more successes, having finally captured Changsha in mid-June and the city of Hengyang by early August. Soon after, they invaded the province of Guangxi, winning major engagements against Chinese forces at Guilin and Liuzhou by the end of November and successfully linking up their forces in China and Indochina by mid-December. \n\nIn the Pacific, US forces continued to press back the Japanese perimeter. In mid-June 1944, they began their offensive against the Mariana and Palau islands, and decisively defeated Japanese forces in the Battle of the Philippine Sea. These defeats led to the resignation of the Japanese Prime Minister, Hideki Tojo, and provided the United States with air bases to launch intensive heavy bomber attacks on the Japanese home islands. In late October, American forces invaded the Filipino island of Leyte; soon after, Allied naval forces scored another large victory in the Battle of Leyte Gulf, one of the largest naval battles in history. \n\nAxis collapse, Allied victory (1944–45)\n\nOn 16 December 1944, Germany made a last attempt on the Western Front by using most of its remaining reserves to launch a massive counter-offensive in the Ardennes to split the Western Allies, encircle large portions of Western Allied troops and capture their primary supply port at Antwerp to prompt a political settlement. By January, the offensive had been repulsed with no strategic objectives fulfilled. In Italy, the Western Allies remained stalemated at the German defensive line. In mid-January 1945, the Soviets and Poles attacked in Poland, pushing from the Vistula to the Oder river in Germany, and overran East Prussia. On 4 February, US, British, and Soviet leaders met for the Yalta Conference. They agreed on the occupation of post-war Germany, and on when the Soviet Union would join the war against Japan. \n\nIn February, the Soviets entered Silesia and Pomerania, while Western Allies entered western Germany and closed to the Rhine river. By March, the Western Allies crossed the Rhine north and south of the Ruhr, encircling the German Army Group B, while the Soviets advanced to Vienna. In early April, the Western Allies finally pushed forward in Italy and swept across western Germany, while Soviet and Polish forces stormed Berlin in late April. American and Soviet forces joined on Elbe river on 25 April. On 30 April 1945, the Reichstag was captured, signalling the military defeat of Nazi Germany. \n\nSeveral changes in leadership occurred during this period. On 12 April, President Roosevelt died and was succeeded by Harry Truman. Benito Mussolini was killed by Italian partisans on 28 April. Two days later, Hitler committed suicide, and was succeeded by Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz. \n\nGerman forces surrendered in Italy on 29 April. Total and unconditional surrender was signed on 7 May, to be effective by the end of 8 May. German Army Group Centre resisted in Prague until 11 May. \n\nIn the Pacific theatre, American forces accompanied by the forces of the Philippine Commonwealth advanced in the Philippines, clearing Leyte by the end of April 1945. They landed on Luzon in January 1945 and recaptured Manila in March following a battle which reduced the city to ruins. Fighting continued on Luzon, Mindanao, and other islands of the Philippines until the end of the war. On the night of 9–10 March, B-29 bombers of the US Army Air Forces struck Tokyo with incendiary bombs, which killed 100,000 people within a few hours. Over the next five months, American bombers firebombed 66 other Japanese cities, causing the destruction of untold numbers of buildings and the deaths of between 350,000–500,000 Japanese civilians. \n\nIn May 1945, Australian troops landed in Borneo, over-running the oilfields there. British, American, and Chinese forces defeated the Japanese in northern Burma in March, and the British pushed on to reach Rangoon by 3 May. Chinese forces started to counterattack in Battle of West Hunan that occurred between 6 April and 7 June 1945. American naval and amphibious forces also moved towards Japan, taking Iwo Jima by March, and Okinawa by the end of June. At the same time American bombers were destroying Japanese cities, American submarines cut off Japanese imports, drastically reducing Japan's ability to supply its overseas forces. \n\nOn 11 July, Allied leaders met in Potsdam, Germany. They confirmed earlier agreements about Germany, and reiterated the demand for unconditional surrender of all Japanese forces by Japan, specifically stating that \"the alternative for Japan is prompt and utter destruction\". During this conference, the United Kingdom held its general election, and Clement Attlee replaced Churchill as Prime Minister. \n\nThe Allies called for unconditional Japanese surrender in the Potsdam declaration of 27 July, but the Japanese government was internally divided on whether to make peace and did not respond. In early August, the United States dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Like the Japanese cities previously bombed by American airmen, the US and its allies justified the atomic bombings as a military necessity, to avoid invading the Japanese home islands which would cost the lives of between 250,000–500,000 Allied troops and millions of Japanese troops and civilians. Between the two bombings, the Soviets, pursuant to the Yalta agreement, invaded Japanese-held Manchuria, and quickly defeated the Kwantung Army, which was the largest Japanese fighting force. The Red Army also captured Sakhalin Island and the Kuril Islands. On 15 August 1945, Japan surrendered, with the surrender documents finally signed aboard the deck of the American battleship USS Missouri on 2 September 1945, ending the war. \n\nAftermath\n\nThe Allies established occupation administrations in Austria and Germany. The former became a neutral state, non-aligned with any political bloc. The latter was divided into western and eastern occupation zones controlled by the Western Allies and the USSR, accordingly. A denazification program in Germany led to the prosecution of Nazi war criminals and the removal of ex-Nazis from power, although this policy moved towards amnesty and re-integration of ex-Nazis into West German society. \n\nGermany lost a quarter of its pre-war (1937) territory. Among the eastern territories, Silesia, Neumark and most of Pomerania were taken over by Poland, East Prussia was divided between Poland and the USSR, followed by the expulsion of the 9 million Germans from these provinces, as well as the expulsion of 3 million Germans from the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia to Germany. By the 1950s, every fifth West German was a refugee from the east. The Soviet Union also took over the Polish provinces east of the Curzon line, from which 2 million Poles were expelled; north-east Romania, parts of eastern Finland, and the three Baltic states were also incorporated into the USSR. \n\nIn an effort to maintain peace, the Allies formed the United Nations, which officially came into existence on 24 October 1945, and adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, as a common standard for all member nations..The UDHR is viewable here [http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/]. The great powers that were the victors of the war—the United States, Soviet Union, China, Britain, and France—formed the permanent members of the UN's Security Council. The five permanent members remain so to the present, although there have been two seat changes, between the Republic of China and the People's Republic of China in 1971, and between the Soviet Union and its successor state, the Russian Federation, following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The alliance between the Western Allies and the Soviet Union had begun to deteriorate even before the war was over. \n\nGermany had been de facto divided, and two independent states, the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic were created within the borders of Allied and Soviet occupation zones, accordingly. The rest of Europe was also divided into Western and Soviet spheres of influence. Most eastern and central European countries fell into the Soviet sphere, which led to establishment of Communist-led regimes, with full or partial support of the Soviet occupation authorities. As a result, Poland, Hungary, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Albania became Soviet satellite states. Communist Yugoslavia conducted a fully independent policy, causing tension with the USSR. \n\nPost-war division of the world was formalised by two international military alliances, the United States-led NATO and the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact; the long period of political tensions and military competition between them, the Cold War, would be accompanied by an unprecedented arms race and proxy wars. \n\nIn Asia, the United States led the occupation of Japan and administrated Japan's former islands in the Western Pacific, while the Soviets annexed Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands. Korea, formerly under Japanese rule, was divided and occupied by the US in the South and the Soviet Union in the North between 1945 and 1948. Separate republics emerged on both sides of the 38th parallel in 1948, each claiming to be the legitimate government for all of Korea, which led ultimately to the Korean War. \n\nIn China, nationalist and communist forces resumed the civil war in June 1946. Communist forces were victorious and established the People's Republic of China on the mainland, while nationalist forces retreated to Taiwan in 1949. In the Middle East, the Arab rejection of the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine and the creation of Israel marked the escalation of the Arab-Israeli conflict. While European colonial powers attempted to retain some or all of their colonial empires, their losses of prestige and resources during the war rendered this unsuccessful, leading to decolonisation. \n\nThe global economy suffered heavily from the war, although participating nations were affected differently. The US emerged much richer than any other nation; it had a baby boom and by 1950 its gross domestic product per person was much higher than that of any of the other powers and it dominated the world economy. The UK and US pursued a policy of industrial disarmament in Western Germany in the years 1945–1948.. Because of international trade interdependencies this led to European economic stagnation and delayed European recovery for several years. .\n\nRecovery began with the mid-1948 currency reform in Western Germany, and was sped up by the liberalisation of European economic policy that the Marshall Plan (1948–1951) both directly and indirectly caused. . The post-1948 West German recovery has been called the German economic miracle. Italy also experienced an economic boom and the French economy rebounded. By contrast, the United Kingdom was in a state of economic ruin, and although it received a quarter of the total Marshall Plan assistance, more than any other European country, continued relative economic decline for decades. \n\nThe Soviet Union, despite enormous human and material losses, also experienced rapid increase in production in the immediate post-war era. Japan experienced incredibly rapid economic growth, becoming one of the most powerful economies in the world by the 1980s. China returned to its pre-war industrial production by 1952. \n\nImpact\n\nCasualties and war crimes\n\nEstimates for the total number of casualties in the war vary, because many deaths went unrecorded. Most suggest that some 75 million people died in the war, including about 20 million military personnel and 40 million civilians. \nMany of the civilians died because of deliberate genocide, massacres, mass-bombings, disease, and starvation.\n\nThe Soviet Union lost around 27 million people during the war, including 8.7 million military and 19 million civilian deaths. The largest portion of military dead were 5.7 million ethnic Russians, followed by 1.3 million ethnic Ukrainians. A quarter of the people in the Soviet Union were wounded or killed. Germany sustained 5.3 million military losses, mostly on the Eastern Front and during the final battles in Germany. \n\nOf the total number of deaths in World War II, approximately 85 percent—mostly Soviet and Chinese—were on the Allied side and 15 percent were on the Axis side. Many of these deaths were caused by war crimes committed by German and Japanese forces in occupied territories. An estimated 11 to 17 million. civilians died either as a direct or as an indirect result of Nazi ideological policies, including the systematic genocide of around 6 million Jews during the Holocaust, along with a further 5 to 6 million ethnic Poles and other Slavs (including Ukrainians and Belarusians) —Roma, homosexuals, and other ethnic and minority groups. Hundreds of thousands (varying estimates) of ethnic Serbs, along with gypsies and Jews, were murdered by the Axis-aligned Croatian Ustaše in Yugoslavia, and retribution-related killings were committed just after the war ended.\n\nIn Asia and the Pacific, between 3 million and more than 10 million civilians, mostly Chinese (estimated at 7.5 million ), were killed by the Japanese occupation forces. The best-known Japanese atrocity was the Nanking Massacre, in which fifty to three hundred thousand Chinese civilians were raped and murdered. Mitsuyoshi Himeta reported that 2.7 million casualties occurred during the Sankō Sakusen. General Yasuji Okamura implemented the policy in Heipei and Shantung. \n\nAxis forces employed biological and chemical weapons. The Imperial Japanese Army used a variety of such weapons during its invasion and occupation of China (see Unit 731) and in early conflicts against the Soviets. Both the Germans and Japanese tested such weapons against civilians and, sometimes on prisoners of war. \n\nThe Soviet Union was responsible for the Katyn massacre of 22,000 Polish officers, and the imprisonment or execution of thousands of political prisoners by the NKVD, in the Baltic states, and eastern Poland annexed by the Red Army.\n\nThe mass-bombing of civilian areas, notably the cities of Warsaw, Rotterdam and London; including the aerial targeting of hospitals and fleeing refugees by the German Luftwaffe, along with the bombing of Tokyo, and German cities of Dresden, Hamburg and Cologne by the Western Allies may be considered as war crimes. The latter resulted in the destruction of more than 160 cities and the death of more than 600,000 German civilians. However, no positive or specific customary international humanitarian law with respect to aerial warfare existed before or during World War II. \n\nConcentration camps, slave labour, and genocide\n\nThe German government led by Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party was responsible for the Holocaust, the killing of approximately 6 million Jews, as well as 2.7 million ethnic Poles, and 4 million others who were deemed \"unworthy of life\" (including the disabled and mentally ill, Soviet prisoners of war, homosexuals, Freemasons, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Romani) as part of a programme of deliberate extermination. About 12 million, most of whom were Eastern Europeans, were employed in the German war economy as forced labourers. \n\nIn addition to Nazi concentration camps, the Soviet gulags (labour camps) led to the death of citizens of occupied countries such as Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, as well as German prisoners of war (POWs) and even Soviet citizens who had been or were thought to be supporters of the Nazis. Sixty percent of Soviet POWs of the Germans died during the war. Richard Overy gives the number of 5.7 million Soviet POWs. Of those, 57 percent died or were killed, a total of 3.6 million. Soviet ex-POWs and repatriated civilians were treated with great suspicion as potential Nazi collaborators, and some of them were sent to the Gulag upon being checked by the NKVD. \n\nJapanese prisoner-of-war camps, many of which were used as labour camps, also had high death rates. The International Military Tribunal for the Far East found the death rate of Western prisoners was 27.1 percent (for American POWs, 37 percent), seven times that of POWs under the Germans and Italians. While 37,583 prisoners from the UK, 28,500 from the Netherlands, and 14,473 from the United States were released after the surrender of Japan, the number of Chinese released was only 56. \n\nAccording to historian Zhifen Ju, at least five million Chinese civilians from northern China and Manchukuo were enslaved between 1935 and 1941 by the East Asia Development Board, or Kōain, for work in mines and war industries. After 1942, the number reached 10 million. The US Library of Congress estimates that in Java, between 4 and 10 million romusha (Japanese: \"manual laborers\"), were forced to work by the Japanese military. About 270,000 of these Javanese labourers were sent to other Japanese-held areas in South East Asia, and only 52,000 were repatriated to Java. \n\nOn 19 February 1942, Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, interning about 100,000 Japanese living on the West Coast. Canada had a similar program. In addition, 14,000 German and Italian citizens who had been assessed as being security risks were also interned..\n\nIn accordance with the Allied agreement made at the Yalta Conference millions of POWs and civilians were used as forced labour by the Soviet Union. In Hungary's case, Hungarians were forced to work for the Soviet Union until 1955. \n\nOccupation\n\nIn Europe, occupation came under two forms. In Western, Northern and Central Europe (France, Norway, Denmark, the Low Countries, and the annexed portions of Czechoslovakia) Germany established economic policies through which it collected roughly 69.5 billion reichmarks (27.8 billion US Dollars) by the end of the war, this figure does not include the sizeable plunder of industrial products, military equipment, raw materials and other goods. Thus, the income from occupied nations was over 40 percent of the income Germany collected from taxation, a figure which increased to nearly 40 percent of total German income as the war went on. \n\nIn the East, the much hoped for bounties of Lebensraum were never attained as fluctuating front-lines and Soviet scorched earth policies denied resources to the German invaders. Unlike in the West, the Nazi racial policy encouraged excessive brutality against what it considered to be the \"inferior people\" of Slavic descent; most German advances were thus followed by mass executions. Although resistance groups formed in most occupied territories, they did not significantly hamper German operations in either the East or the West until late 1943.\n\nIn Asia, Japan termed nations under its occupation as being part of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, essentially a Japanese hegemony which it claimed was for purposes of liberating colonised peoples. Although Japanese forces were originally welcomed as liberators from European domination in some territories, their excessive brutality turned local public opinion against them within weeks. During Japan's initial conquest it captured 4000000 oilbbl of oil (~5.5×105 tonnes) left behind by retreating Allied forces, and by 1943 was able to get production in the Dutch East Indies up to , 76 percent of its 1940 output rate. \n\nHome fronts and production\n\nIn Europe, before the outbreak of the war, the Allies had significant advantages in both population and economics. In 1938, the Western Allies (United Kingdom, France, Poland and British Dominions) had a 30 percent larger population and a 30 percent higher gross domestic product than the European Axis (Germany and Italy); if colonies are included, it then gives the Allies more than a 5:1 advantage in population and nearly 2:1 advantage in GDP. In Asia at the same time, China had roughly six times the population of Japan, but only an 89 percent higher GDP; this is reduced to three times the population and only a 38 percent higher GDP if Japanese colonies are included.\n\nThough the Allies' economic and population advantages were largely mitigated during the initial rapid blitzkrieg attacks of Germany and Japan, they became the decisive factor by 1942, after the United States and Soviet Union joined the Allies, as the war largely settled into one of attrition. While the Allies' ability to out-produce the Axis is often attributed to the Allies having more access to natural resources, other factors, such as Germany and Japan's reluctance to employ women in the labour force, Allied strategic bombing, and Germany's late shift to a war economy contributed significantly. Additionally, neither Germany nor Japan planned to fight a protracted war, and were not equipped to do so. To improve their production, Germany and Japan used millions of slave labourers; Germany used about 12 million people, mostly from Eastern Europe, while Japan used more than 18 million people in Far East Asia.\n\nAdvances in technology and warfare\n\nAircraft were used for reconnaissance, as fighters, bombers, and ground-support, and each role was advanced considerably. Innovation included airlift (the capability to quickly move limited high-priority supplies, equipment, and personnel); and of strategic bombing (the bombing of enemy industrial and population centres to destroy the enemy's ability to wage war). Anti-aircraft weaponry also advanced, including defences such as radar and surface-to-air artillery, such as the German 88 mm gun. The use of the jet aircraft was pioneered and, though late introduction meant it had little impact, it led to jets becoming standard in air forces worldwide. \n\nAdvances were made in nearly every aspect of naval warfare, most notably with aircraft carriers and submarines. Although aeronautical warfare had relatively little success at the start of the war, actions at Taranto, Pearl Harbor, and the Coral Sea established the carrier as the dominant capital ship in place of the battleship. \n\nIn the Atlantic, escort carriers proved to be a vital part of Allied convoys, increasing the effective protection radius and helping to close the Mid-Atlantic gap. Carriers were also more economical than battleships because of the relatively low cost of aircraft and their not requiring to be as heavily armoured. Submarines, which had proved to be an effective weapon during the First World War, were anticipated by all sides to be important in the second. The British focused development on anti-submarine weaponry and tactics, such as sonar and convoys, while Germany focused on improving its offensive capability, with designs such as the Type VII submarine and wolfpack tactics. Gradually, improving Allied technologies such as the Leigh light, hedgehog, squid, and homing torpedoes proved victorious.\n\nLand warfare changed from the static front lines of World War I to increased mobility and combined arms. The tank, which had been used predominantly for infantry support in the First World War, had evolved into the primary weapon. In the late 1930s, tank design was considerably more advanced than it had been during World War I, and advances continued throughout the war with increases in speed, armour and firepower.\n\nAt the start of the war, most commanders thought enemy tanks should be met by tanks with superior specifications. This idea was challenged by the poor performance of the relatively light early tank guns against armour, and German doctrine of avoiding tank-versus-tank combat. This, along with Germany's use of combined arms, were among the key elements of their highly successful blitzkrieg tactics across Poland and France. Many means of destroying tanks, including indirect artillery, anti-tank guns (both towed and self-propelled), mines, short-ranged infantry antitank weapons, and other tanks were utilised. Even with large-scale mechanisation, infantry remained the backbone of all forces, and throughout the war, most infantry were equipped similarly to World War I. \n\nThe portable machine gun spread, a notable example being the German MG34, and various submachine guns which were suited to close combat in urban and jungle settings. The assault rifle, a late war development incorporating many features of the rifle and submachine gun, became the standard postwar infantry weapon for most armed forces. \n\nMost major belligerents attempted to solve the problems of complexity and security involved in using large codebooks for cryptography by designing ciphering machines, the most well known being the German Enigma machine. Development of SIGINT (signals intelligence) and cryptanalysis enabled the countering process of decryption. Notable examples were the Allied decryption of Japanese naval codes and British Ultra, a pioneering method for decoding Enigma benefiting from information given to Britain by the Polish Cipher Bureau, which had been decoding early versions of Enigma before the war. Another aspect of military intelligence was the use of deception, which the Allies used to great effect, such as in operations Mincemeat and Bodyguard. Other technological and engineering feats achieved during, or as a result of, the war include the world's first programmable computers (Z3, Colossus, and ENIAC), guided missiles and modern rockets, the Manhattan Project's development of nuclear weapons, operations research and the development of artificial harbours and oil pipelines under the English Channel." ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "Muang Thai", "Taihland", "ISO 3166-1:TH", "Thai Empire", "Prathet Thai", "Muang-Thai", "Kingdom of Thailand", "Skateboarding in Thailand", "THAILAND", "Siam", "Sport in Thailand", "Etymology of Thailand", "Thayland", "Name of Thailand", "The Kingdom Of Thailand", "เมืองไทย", "Thailand", "ราชอาณาจักรไทย", "Sayam", "Thailande", "Siam (Thailand)", "ประเทศไทย", "Kingdom Of Thailand", "Tailand", "Thai Kingdom", "Ratcha Anachak Thai", "Kingdom of the Thai" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "thailand", "kingdom of thailand", "kingdom of thai", "เมืองไทย", "prathet thai", "name of thailand", "thayland", "taihland", "muang thai", "iso 3166 1 th", "skateboarding in thailand", "thai kingdom", "sport in thailand", "siam thailand", "sayam", "siam", "ratcha anachak thai", "ราชอาณาจักรไทย", "etymology of thailand", "tailand", "thailande", "ประเทศไทย", "thai empire" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "siam", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "Siam" }

{ "doc_source": [ "Search" ], "filename": [ "Winchester_rifle.txt" ], "title": [ "Winchester rifle" ], "wiki_context": [ "Winchester rifle is a comprehensive term describing a series of lever-action repeating rifles manufactured by the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. Evolved from the 1860 Henry rifle, Winchester rifles were among the earliest repeaters. The Model 1873 was particularly successful, being colloquially known as \"The Gun that Won the West\".\n\nMost popular of all was the Model 1894, a new design by John Browning widely adopted as a hunting rifle that saw production of over 6 million units before its domestic discontinuation 112 years later in 2006. It went back into production by Miroku Corp. in 2010.\n\nPredecessors\n\nIn 1848, Walter Hunt of New York patented his \"Volition Repeating Rifle\" incorporating a tubular magazine, which was operated by two levers and complex linkages. The Hunt rifle fired what he called the \"Rocket Ball\", an early form of caseless ammunition in which the powder charge was contained in the bullet's hollow base. Hunt's design was fragile and unworkable, but in 1849 Lewis Jennings purchased the Hunt patents and developed a functioning, if still complex, version which was produced in small numbers by Robbins & Lawrence of Windsor, Vermont until 1852. \n\nHorace Smith and Daniel Wesson of Norwich, Connecticut acquired the Jennings patent from Robbins & Lawrence, as well as shop foreman Benjamin Tyler Henry. Smith made several improvements to the Jennings design, and in 1855 Smith and Wesson together with several investors formed a corporation, the Volcanic Repeating Arms Company, to manufacture Smith's modification of the Hunt-Jennings, the Volcanic lever-action pistol and rifle. Its largest stockholder was Oliver Winchester.\n\nFor the Volcanic rifle, Smith added a primer charge to Hunt's \"Rocket Ball\" and thus created one of the first fixed metallic cartridges which incorporated bullet, primer and powder in one self-contained unit. While still with the company Smith went a step further and added a cylindrical copper case to hold the bullet and powder with the primer in the case rim, thus creating one of the most significant inventions in firearms history, the metallic rimfire cartridge. Smith's cartridge, the .22 Short, would be introduced commercially in 1857 with the landmark Smith & Wesson Model 1 revolver and is still manufactured today.\n\nThe Volcanic rifle had only limited success, which was partially attributable to the design and poor performance of the Hunt-derived Volcanic cartridge: a hollow conical ball filled with black powder and sealed by a cork primer. Although the Volcanic's repeater design far outpaced the rival technology, the unsatisfactory power and reliability of the .25 and .32 caliber \"Rocket Balls\" were little match for the competitors' larger calibers. Wesson had left Volcanic soon after it was formed and Smith followed eight months later, to create the Smith & Wesson Revolver Company. Volcanic moved to New Haven in 1856, but by the end of that year became insolvent. Oliver Winchester purchased the bankrupt firm's assets from the remaining stockholders, and reorganized it as the New Haven Arms Company in April 1857.\n\nBenjamin Henry continued to work with Smith's cartridge concept, and perfected the much larger, more powerful .44 Henry cartridge. Henry also supervised the redesign of the rifle to use the new ammunition, retaining only the general form of the breech mechanism and the tubular magazine. This became the Henry rifle of 1860, which was manufactured by the New Haven Arms Company, and used in considerable numbers by certain Union army units in the American Civil War. Confederates called the Henry \"that damned Yankee rifle that they load on Sunday and shoot all week!\" \n\nDevelopment\n\nAfter the war, Oliver Winchester renamed New Haven Arms the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. The company modified and improved the basic design of the Henry rifle, creating the first Winchester rifle: the Model 1866. It retained the .44 Henry cartridge, was likewise built on a bronze-alloy frame, and had an improved magazine and a wooden forearm. In 1873 Winchester introduced the steel-framed Model 1873 chambering the more potent .44-40 centerfire cartridge. In 1876, in a bid to compete with the powerful single-shot rifles of the time, Winchester brought out the Model 1876 (Centennial Model). While it chambered more powerful cartridges than the 1866 and 1873 models, the toggle link action was not strong enough for the popular high-powered rounds used in Sharps or Remington single-shot rifles.\n\nFrom 1883, John Moses Browning worked in partnership with Winchester, designing a series of rifles and shotguns, most notably the lever-action Winchester Model 1886, Model 1892, Model 1894, and Model 1895 rifles, along with the lever-action Model 1887/1901 shotgun, the pump-action Model 1890 rifle, and the pump-action Model 1893/1897 shotgun.\n\nWinchester lever-action repeating rifles\n\nModel 1866\n\nThe first Winchester rifle – the Winchester Model 1866 – was originally chambered for the rimfire .44 Henry. Nicknamed the \"Yellow Boy\" because of its receiver of a bronze/brass alloy called gunmetal, it was famous for its rugged construction and lever-action \"repeating rifle\" mechanism that allowed the user to fire a number of shots before having to reload. Nelson King's improved patent remedied flaws in the Henry rifle by incorporating a loading gate on the side of the frame and integrating a round, sealed magazine which was covered by a forestock.\n\nFrance purchased 6,000 Model 1866 rifles along with 4.5 million .44 Henry cartridges during the Franco-Prussian War. The Ottoman Empire purchased 45,000 Model 1866 muskets and 5,000 carbines in 1870 and 1871. These rifles were used in the 1877 Russo-Turkish War, causing much surprise when outnumbered Turks at the Siege of Plevna inflicted many times more casualties than their opponents armed with single-shot Krnka and Berdan rifles. The Model 1866 compelled Russians to develop a new rifle, the Mosin–Nagant, after the war.\n\nThe Swiss Army initially selected the Model 1866 to replace their existing single-shot Milbank-Amsler rifles. However, ensuing political pressure to adopt a domestic design resulted in the Vetterli Model 1867, a bolt-action design utilizing a copy of the Winchester's tubular magazine, being adopted instead.\n\nModel 1873\n\nThe Model 1873 was one of the most successful Winchester rifles of its day, gaining the reputation as \"The Gun that Won the West\". Still an icon in the modern day, it was manufactured between 1873 and 1919. Originally chambered for the .44-40 cartridge, it was later produced in .38-40 and .32-20, all of which were also popular handgun cartridges of the day, allowing users to carry just one type of ammunition. The Model 1873 was produced in three variations: a 24-inch barrel rifle, 20-inch barrel carbine, and a \"musket\" (a term that, at the time, denoted a full length military-style stock, not to be confused with a true smoothbore musket). The easy to transport and handle carbine was the most popular, while the musket accounted for less than 5–10 percent of total production.\n\nDue to feeding problems, the original Model 1873 was never offered in the military standard .45 Colt cartridge, although a number of modern reproductions are chambered for the round. The popularity of the original Model 1873 led Colt to manufacture a .44-40 version of the Single Action Army revolver called the \"Frontier Six Shooter\". \n\nTo both celebrate and enhance the Model 1873's prestige, Winchester established a coveted One of One Thousand grade in 1875. Barrels producing unusually small groupings during test-firing were fitted to rifles with set triggers and a special finish. Marked One of One Thousand, they sold for a then princely $100. A popular 1950 Western starring Jimmy Stewart, \"Winchester '73\", was based on the coveted gun. Promotions included a search for One of One Thousand rifles by Universal Studios, with advertisements in sporting magazines and posters in sporting goods stores.\n\nA second grade of Model 1873 barrels producing above average accuracy were fitted to rifles marked One of One Hundred, and sold for $20 over list. Approximately 136 One of One Thousand Model 1873s were sold, and only eight One of One Hundreds.Lewis, Edmund One of One Hundred October 2005 American Rifleman pp. 96, 129 & 134\n\nIn all, over 720,000 Model 1873s were produced. Long unavailable, the rifle returned to production under license from the Olin company in 2013, joining the Model 1892 and the Model 1894 being manufactured in Japan by the Miroku Corporation for FN/Browning. The new ten shot Model 1873 is only available with a 20\" round barrel chambered in .357 Magnum/.38 Special. Nearly faithful in design to the original, including the trigger disconnect safety, sliding dustcover, and a crescent-shaped buttplate. It incorporates two safety improvements: a firing pin block preventing it from moving forward unless the trigger is pulled, and a cartridge carrier modification to eject used casings away from the shooter. \n\nModel 1876\n\nThe Winchester Model 1876, or Centennial Model, was a heavier-framed rifle than the Models 1866 and 1873, chambered for full-powered centerfire rifle cartridges suitable for big-game hunting, rather than the handgun-size rimfire and rimfire rounds of its predecessors. While similar in design to the 1873, the 1876 was actually based on a prototype 1868 lever-action rifle that was never commercially produced by Winchester. \n\nIntroduced to celebrate the American Centennial Exposition, the Model 1876 earned a reputation as a durable and powerful hunting rifle. Four versions were produced: a 22 in barrel Carbine, a 26 in barrel Express Rifle with a half-length magazine, a 28 in barrel Sporting Rifle, and a 32 in barrel Musket. Standard rifles had a blued finish while deluxe models were casehardened. Collectors identify a first model with no dust cover, a second model with a dust cover rail fastened by a screw, and a third model with an integral dust cover. Total production was 63,871 including 54 One of One Thousand Model 1876s and only seven of the One of One Hundred grade.\n\nOriginally chambered for the new .45-75 Winchester Centennial cartridge (designed to replicate the .45-70 ballistics in a shorter case), versions in .40-60 Winchester, .45-60 Winchester and .50-95 Express followed; the '76 in the latter chambering is the only repeater known to have been in widespread use by professional buffalo hunters. The Canadian North-West Mounted Police used the '76 in .45-75 as a standard long arm for many years with 750 rifles purchased for the force in 1883; the Mountie-model '76 carbine was also issued to the Texas Rangers. Theodore Roosevelt used an engraved, pistol-gripped half-magazine '76 during his early hunting expeditions in the West and praised it. A '76 was also found in the possession of Apache warrior Geronimo after his surrender in 1886. \n\nThe Model 1876 toggle-link action receiver was too short to handle popular big-game cartridges, including the .45-70, and production ceased in 1897, as big-game hunters preferred the smoother Model 1886 action chambered for longer and more powerful cartridges.\n\nModel 1886\n\nThe Model 1886 continued the trend towards chambering heavier rounds, and had an all-new and considerably stronger locking-block action than the toggle-link Model 1876. It was designed by John Moses Browning, who had a long and profitable relationship with Winchester from the 1880s to the early 1900s. William Mason made some improvements to Browning's original design. In many respects the Model 1886 was a true American express rifle, as it could be chambered in the more powerful black powder cartridges of the day, such as the .45-70 Government, long a Winchester goal. The 1886 proved capable of handling not only the .45 Gov't but also .45-90 and the huge .50-110 Express \"buffalo\" cartridges, and in 1903 was chambered for the smokeless high-velocity .33 WCF. In 1935, Winchester introduced a slightly modified M1886 as the Model 71, chambered for the more powerful .348 Winchester cartridge.\n\nModel 1892\n\nWinchester returned to its roots with the Model 1892, which, like the first lever-action guns, was primarily chambered for shorter, lower-pressure handgun rounds. The Model 1892 incorporates a much stronger Browning action (based on the larger M1886) than the earlier Henry-derived arms of the 1860s and 1870s. 1,004,675 Model 1892 rifles were made by Winchester, and although the company phased them out in the 1930s, replicas are still being made by the Brazilian arms maker, Rossi, and by Chiappa Firearms, an Italian factory. In its modern form, using updated materials and production techniques, the Model 1892's action is strong enough to chamber high pressure handgun rounds, such as .357 Magnum, .44 Magnum, and .454 Casull. The Winchester '92 was commonly used in Hollywood Western movies and TV shows as a substitute for the Winchester '66 and '73 models because of its similar appearance, while being cheaper and easier to acquire. \n\nModel 1894\n\nThe John Browning-designed Winchester Model 1894 is the most prevalent of the Winchester repeating rifles. The Model 1894 was first chambered for the .32-40 cartridge, and later, a variety of calibers such as .25-35 WCF, .30-30, .32 Winchester Special, the .38-55 Winchester. Winchester was the first company to manufacture a civilian rifle chambered for the new smokeless propellants, and although delays prevented the .30-30 cartridge from appearing on the shelves until 1895, it remained the first commercially available smokeless powder round for the North American consumer market. Though initially it was too expensive for most shooters, the Model 1894 went on to become one of the best-selling hunting rifles of all time—it has the distinction of being the first sporting rifle to sell over one million units, ultimately selling over seven million before U.S.-production was discontinued in 2006. The Winchester .30-30 configuration is practically synonymous with \"deer rifle\" in the United States. In the early 20th century, the rifles designation was abbreviated to \"Model 94\", as was done with all older Winchester designs still in production (for example, Model 97, Model 12, etc.).\n\nModel 1895\n\nThe Winchester Model 1895 has the distinction of being the first Winchester lever-action rifle to load from a box magazine instead of a tube under the barrel. This allowed the Model 1895 to be chambered for military cartridges with spitzer (pointed) projectiles, and the rifle was used by the armed forces of a number of nations including the United States, Great Britain, and Imperial Russia. The Russian production models could also be loaded using charger clips, a feature not found on any other lever-action rifle. Calibers included .30-40 Krag (.30 US or .30 Army), .303 British, .30-03 Springfield, .30-06 Springfield, 7.62×54mmR, and .405 Winchester. Theodore Roosevelt used a Model 1895 in .405 on African safaris and called it his \"medicine gun\" for lions. In 1908 the 1895 Winchester became the first commercially produced sporting rifle chambered in .30-06 (then called \".30 Gov't 06\").\n\nModel 88\n\nIntroduced in 1955, 60 years after Winchester's last all-new lever-action design, the Model 88 was unlike any previous design. A short-throw lever operated a three-lug rotating bolt and rounds were fed vertically from a detachable box magazine. These bolt-action features in a lever-action permitted the use of high-powered modern short-case cartridges with spitzer bullets: .243 Winchester, .284 Winchester, .308 Winchester and .358 Winchester. The Model 88 was discontinued in 1973 and is the third best-selling lever-action rifle in Winchester's history, following only the M1894 and M1892. The later Sako Finnwolf and Browning BLR have similar actions.\n\nModel 9422\n\nWinchester's Model 9422 was introduced in 1972. It was designed to capture the image of the traditional lever-actions with exposed hammer, straight grip, tube magazine and barrel bands. Unlike older Winchester lever actions it came grooved for scope mounting. It was offered in .22 Long Rifle and .22 WMR, and was priced at the high end of the .22 LR sporting rifle market.\n\nThe 9422 action design was original and extremely reliable. The feed system handled the cartridge from the magazine to the breech face by its rim, and the slide cammed the rear of the breechblock up into the locking recess. A concealed polymer buffer above the breech gave a firm-feeling lockup and a very positive unlocking motion.\n\nThe 9422 had worldwide appeal to customers raised on Western fiction and to parents looking for a way to introduce their children to shooting. Over the course of production a higher-finished model called the 9422 XTR, a .17 rimfire model, and several commemorative models were offered. Production ended in 2005. \n\nWinchester Model 1885 single-shot rifle\n\nIn 1885, Winchester entered the single-shot market with the Model 1885 rifle, which John Browning had designed in 1878. The Winchester Single Shot, known to most shooters as either the \"Low-wall\" or \"High-wall\" depending on model, was produced to satisfy the demands of the growing sport of \"Match Shooting\", excelling at it, with Major Ned H. Roberts (inventor of the .257 Roberts cartridge) describing the Model 1885 Single Shot as \"the most reliable, strongest, and altogether best single shot rifle ever produced.\" Winchester produced nearly 140,000 Single Shot rifles from 1885 to 1920, and it was found that the falling-block Model 1885 had been built with one of the strongest actions known at that time. Winchester also produced a large number of Single Shots in .22 caliber rimfire for the US Army as a marksmanship training rifle, the \"Winder musket.\"\n\nWinchester bolt-action rifles\n\nWinchester lever-action rifles remained the most popular in the US through WWI and the interwar period. However, advances in the development of bolt-action rifles made them increasingly preferred over lever actions. These new rifles, such as Mauser's Gewehr 98 and the US M1903 Springfield, featured box magazines that could chamber pointed \"Spitzer\" bullets, which lever-action rifles with tubular magazines could not use for safety reasons (a pointed bullet can accidentally fire the round in front of it in a tubular magazine). The most influential bolt-action designs, as developed by Mauser and other military manufacturers, had front-locking lugs, which both stabilized the cartridge head and strengthened the action. This allowed for ammunition to reach unprecedented velocities, increasing long-range accuracy while not compromising operator safety. The bolt action was also simpler and cheaper to manufacture than high-powered lever-action guns like Winchester's 1886 and 1895 models, making them extremely competitive in the marketplace.\n\nIn response to the increasing competition from these bolt-action rifles, Winchester introduced the Winchester Model 54 in 1925. This was not Winchester's first bolt rifle (that being the Winchester-Hotchkiss rifle of 1878), but it was by-far their most successful to date. It was based indirectly on the Mauser Gewehr 98 design, but with modifications and popular North American chamberings such as the widely available .30-06 Springfield, which made it more appealing to American hunters than the European imports or sporterised military rifles. The Model 70 was developed from the Model 54, which it replaced in 1936. The Model 70, often dubbed the \"rifleman's rifle\", was produced continuously at New Haven (except during WWII) until 2006. Production was subsequently resumed at FN Herstal's plant in Columbia, South Carolina. In 2013, assembly was moved to Portugal.\n\nIn 1920 Winchester introduced the Model 52 .22 bolt-action target rifle, which from its inception and for years thereafter was America's reference standard smallbore match rifle. A sporter model of this action was also made from 1934–59. Starting in 1900, Winchester also manufactured inexpensive single-shot .22 bolt-action \"boy's rifles\", including the models 1900, 1902, 1904 and Thumb Trigger (99), and mid-range .22 bolt action repeaters including the Models 69, 72 and 75.\n\nWinchester semi-automatic rifles\n\nWinchester Models 1903 and 63\n\nThe Winchester Model 1903 was the first commercially available semi-automatic .22 rimfire caliber in the United States. Designed by T.C. Johnson, the Model 1903 was chambered for the unique .22 Winchester Automatic cartridge. In 1919, the Model 1903 moniker was shortened to Model 03, and following a partial redesign in the 1930s, was renamed the Model 63. The Model 63, introduced in 1933, was chambered for the popular and widely available .22 Long Rifle cartridge. It was initially made with a 20-inch barrel, then with a 23-inch barrel from 1936 until the end of production in 1958. About 175,000 Model 63 rifles were manufactured, with the last 10,000 having grooved receiver tops for scope mounting. Both the 1903/03 and the 63 have tubular magazines in the butt stock of the rifle and are loaded through a slot in the right side of the butt stock.\n\nWinchester Models 1905, 1907, and 1910\n\nThe early center fire Winchester self-loading series of rifles began with the Model 1905, chambered for the .32SL and .35SL cartridges. Following a demand for a higher-powered self-loading rifle, the Models 1907 and 1910 were introduced along with their respective cartridges, the .351SL and .401SL. \n\nWinchester repeating shotguns\n\nWinchester Model 1887/1901\n\nThe Winchester Model 1887 was the first successful repeating shotgun design, developed by John Browning and produced by Winchester from 1887–1920. Browning felt that a pump-action would be much more appropriate for a repeating shotgun, but as Winchester was primarily a lever-action firearms company they felt that their new shotgun must also be a lever-action for reasons of brand recognition. The M1887 was chambered for 12-gauge black powder shotshells, and after the switch to smokeless powder at the end of the 19th Century, the M1901 was introduced, being chambered for 10-gauge smokeless shells. Although a technically sound gun design, the market for lever-action shotguns waned considerably after the introduction of the Winchester 1897 and other contemporary pump-action shotguns. Modern reproductions of the gun have been manufactured by Norinco in China, ADI Ltd. in Australia and Chiappa Firearms in Italy. Reproductions have sold particularly well in Australia on account of the National Firearms Agreement ban on pump-action and self-loading shotguns.\n\nWinchester Model 1893/1897\n\nAnother Browning design, the Winchester Model 1893 was the first successful pump-action shotgun design; as strengthened in 1897 for smokeless-propellant shells, it remained in production until the mid-1950s. Unusual for a repeating shotgun, the Model 1897 could be taken apart for easier carriage/storage, and was available in a variety of barrel lengths from 20 to 36 inches. During World War I it was issued as a trench gun, with short barrel, heat shield and bayonet.\n\nWinchester Model 1911\n\nWinchester's long association with John Browning came to an end when the company refused to accept Browning's terms for the right to manufacture his revolutionary 1898 design for a self-loading shotgun; the landmark Browning Auto-5 was produced instead by Fabrique Nationale in Europe and later by Remington Arms in the US. However, Browning's semi-automatic patents had been so tightly drafted by Winchester's own lawyers that it took years for T. C. Johnson to develop a self-loading shotgun which didn't infringe them, resulting in the Model 1911 SL. The 1911 was a flawed and potentially dangerous design, and was not commercially successful; as a result, production ceased in 1925.\n\nWinchester Model 1912\n\nDesigned by T.C. Johnson as an internal-hammer modification of the Model 1897, the Model 1912 (later re dubbed the Model 12) was one of the most successful pump shotguns ever made, with nearly 2 million produced before its cancellation in 1963. Like the Model 1897 it came in take-down form, and likewise was issued in trench gun and combat versions during both World Wars, Korea and Vietnam. The Model 12 was popular with the military, law enforcement, hunters, and sporting clay competitors, the latter regarding it as having superior balance and \"point\" among pump-actions.\n\n1964 changes\n\nIn the mid-to late 1950s, a management change at Winchester led to an extensive and extremely controversial redesign of their firearms in 1964. This is regarded by many as the year the \"real\" Winchester ceased to be, and consequently \"pre-'64\" rifles command higher prices than those made afterwards. Winchester itself went on to have a troubled future as competition from both the US and abroad began to decrease its sales. Although in the 1970s the company attempted to recover its reputation by bringing out the well-received Super-X Model 1 semiautomatic shotgun, produced along pre-1964 lines, the cost of manufacture again proved unsustainable. In 1980, the company was split into parts and sold off. The name \"Winchester\" remained with the ammunition making side of the company, and this branch continues to be profitable. The arms making side and New Haven facilities went to U.S. Repeating Arms, which struggled to keep the company going under a variety of owners and management teams. It finally announced plans to close the New Haven facility, the producers of the Model 94, in 2006.\n\nOn August 15 of 2006, Olin Corporation, the owner of the Winchester trademarks, announced that it had gone into a new license agreement with Browning to make Winchester brand rifles and shotguns, but not at the closed Winchester plant in New Haven. Browning, based in Morgan, Utah, and the former licensee, U.S. Repeating Arms Company, are both subsidiaries of FN Herstal. Then, in 2008, FN Herstal announced plans to produce Model 70 rifles at its plant in Columbia, SC. In 2013, the assembly was moved to Portugal." ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe", "TagMe", "Search" ], "filename": [ "New_Orleans.txt", "Dixieland.txt", "Jazz.txt", "Louis_Armstrong.txt" ], "title": [ "New Orleans", "Dixieland", "Jazz", "Louis Armstrong" ], "wiki_context": [ "New Orleans (, ,, or; ) is a major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana. The population of the city was 343,829 as of the 2010 U.S. Census. The New Orleans metropolitan area (New Orleans–Metairie–Kenner Metropolitan Statistical Area) had a population of 1,167,764 in 2010 and was the 46th largest in the United States. The New Orleans–Metairie–Bogalusa Combined Statistical Area, a larger trading area, had a 2010 population of 1,452,502. \n\nThe city is named after the Duke of Orleans, who reigned as Regent for Louis XV from 1715 to 1723, as it was established by French colonists and strongly influenced by their European culture. It is well known for its distinct French and Spanish Creole architecture, as well as its cross-cultural and multilingual heritage.Cultures well represented in New Orleans' history include French, Native American, African, Spanish, Cajun, German, Irish, Italian, Jewish, Latino, and Vietnamese. New Orleans is also famous for its cuisine, music (particularly as the birthplace of jazz), and its annual celebrations and festivals, most notably Mardi Gras, dating to French colonial times. The city is often referred to as the \"most unique\"The term \"most unique\" is grammatically incorrect, as the word \"unique\" is a superlative. See for example:Merriam-Webster Dictionary of American Usage, Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, Inc., 1994.Fowler, Henry, A Dictionary of Modern English Usage, Oxford: Oxford University Press, USA, 2003.Nicholson, Margaret, A Dictionary of American English Usage, New York: Oxford University Press, 1957. in the United States. \n\nNew Orleans is located in southeastern Louisiana, straddling the Mississippi River. The city and Orleans Parish () are coterminous. The city and parish are bounded by the parishes of St. Tammany to the north, St. Bernard to the east, Plaquemines to the south, and Jefferson to the south and west. Lake Pontchartrain, part of which is included in the city limits, lies to the north and Lake Borgne lies to the east.\n\nBefore Hurricane Katrina, Orleans Parish was the most populous parish in Louisiana. It now ranks third in population, trailing neighboring Jefferson Parish, and East Baton Rouge Parish. \n\nHistory\n\nBeginnings through the 19th century\n\nLa Nouvelle-Orléans (New Orleans) was founded May 7, 1718, by the French Mississippi Company, under the direction of Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, on land inhabited by the Chitimacha. It was named for Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, who was Regent of the Kingdom of France at the time. His title came from the French city of Orléans.\n\nThe French colony was ceded to the Spanish Empire in the Treaty of Paris (1763). During the American Revolutionary War, New Orleans was an important port for smuggling aid to the rebels, transporting military equipment and supplies up the Mississippi River. Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, Count of Gálvez successfully launched a southern campaign against the British from the city in 1779. New Orleans () remained under Spanish control until 1803, when it reverted briefly to French oversight. Nearly all of the surviving 18th-century architecture of the Vieux Carré (French Quarter) dates from the Spanish period, the most notable exception being the Old Ursuline Convent. \n\nNapoleon sold Louisiana (New France) to the United States in the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. Thereafter, the city grew rapidly with influxes of Americans, French, Creoles, and Africans. Later immigrants were Irish, Germans, and Italians. Major commodity crops of sugar and cotton were cultivated with slave labor on large plantations outside the city.\n\nThe Haitian Revolution ended in 1804 and established the second republic in the Western Hemisphere and the first republic led by Black people. It had occurred over several years in what was then the French colony of Saint-Domingue. Thousands of refugees from the revolution, both whites and free people of color (affranchis or gens de couleur libres), arrived in New Orleans, often bringing African slaves with them. While Governor Claiborne and other officials wanted to keep out additional free Black men, the French Creoles wanted to increase the French-speaking population. As more refugees were allowed in Louisiana, Haitian émigrés who had first gone to Cuba also arrived. Many of the white Francophones had been deported by officials in Cuba in retaliation for Bonapartist schemes in Spain. \n\nNearly 90 percent of these immigrants settled in New Orleans. The 1809 migration brought 2,731 whites; 3,102 free persons of African descent; and 3,226 enslaved persons of African descent, doubling the city's population. The city became 63 percent black in population, a greater proportion than Charleston, South Carolina's 53 percent. \n\nDuring the final campaign of the War of 1812, the British sent a force of 11,000 soldiers, marines, and sailors, in an attempt to capture New Orleans. Despite great challenges, General Andrew Jackson, with support from the U.S. Navy on the river, successfully cobbled together a motley military force of: militia from Louisiana and Mississippi, including free men of color, U.S. Army regulars, a large contingent of Tennessee state militia, Kentucky riflemen, Choctaw fighters, and local privateers (the latter led by the pirate Jean Lafitte), to decisively defeat the British troops, led by Sir Edward Pakenham, in the Battle of New Orleans on January 8, 1815. The armies had not learned of the Treaty of Ghent which had been signed on December 24, 1814 however the treaty did not call for cessation of hostilities until after both governments had ratified the treaty and the US government did not ratify it until February 16, 1815. The fighting in Louisiana had begun in December 1814 and did not end until late January, after the Americans held off the British Navy during a ten-day siege of Fort St. Philip. (The Royal Navy went on to capture Fort Bowyer near Mobile, before the commanders received news of the peace treaty.)\n\nAs a principal port, New Orleans played a major role during the antebellum era in the Atlantic slave trade. Its port also handled huge quantities of commodities for export from the interior and imported goods from other countries, which were warehoused and transferred in New Orleans to smaller vessels and distributed the length and breadth of the vast Mississippi River watershed. The river in front of the city was filled with steamboats, flatboats, and sailing ships. Despite its role in the slave trade, New Orleans at the same time had the largest and most prosperous community of free persons of color in the nation, who were often educated and middle-class property owners. \n\nDwarfing in population the other cities in the antebellum South, New Orleans had the largest slave market in the domestic slave trade, which expanded after the United States' ending of the international trade in 1808. Two-thirds of the more than one million slaves brought to the Deep South arrived via the forced migration of the domestic slave trade. The money generated by the sale of slaves in the Upper South has been estimated at 15 percent of the value of the staple crop economy. The slaves represented half a billion dollars in property. An ancillary economy grew up around the trade in slaves—for transportation, housing and clothing, fees, etc., estimated at 13.5 percent of the price per person. All of this amounted to tens of billions of dollars (2005 dollars, adjusted for inflation) during the antebellum period, with New Orleans as a prime beneficiary. \n\nAccording to the historian Paul Lachance, \n\nAfter the Louisiana Purchase, numerous Anglo-Americans migrated to the city. The population of the city doubled in the 1830s and by 1840, New Orleans had become the wealthiest and the third-most populous city in the nation. Large numbers of German and Irish immigrants began arriving in the 1840s, working as laborers in the busy port. In this period, the state legislature passed more restrictions on manumissions of slaves, and virtually ended it in 1852.\n\nIn the 1850s, white Francophones remained an intact and vibrant community; they maintained instruction in French in two of the city's four school districts (all were white).Gitlin, The Bourgeois Frontier, p. 166 In 1860, the city had 13,000 free people of color (gens de couleur libres), the class of free, mostly mixed-race people that developed during French and Spanish rule. The census recorded 81 percent as mulatto, a term used to cover all degrees of mixed race. Mostly part of the Francophone group, they constituted the artisan, educated and professional class of African Americans. Most blacks were still enslaved, working at the port, in domestic service, in crafts, and mostly on the many large, surrounding sugar cane plantations.\n\nAfter growing by 45 percent in the 1850s, by 1860, the city had nearly 170,000 people The city was a destination for immigrants. It had grown in wealth, with a \"per capita income [that] was second in the nation and the highest in the South.\" The city had a role as the \"primary commercial gateway for the nation's booming mid-section.\" The port was the third largest in the nation in terms of tonnage of imported goods, after Boston and New York, handling 659,000 tons in 1859.\n\nAs the French Creole elite feared, during the Civil War their world changed. In 1862, following the occupation by the Navy after the Battle of Forts Jackson and St. Philip, Northern forces under Gen. Benjamin F. Butler, a respected state lawyer of the Massachusetts militia, occupied the City. Later New Orleans residents nicknamed him as \"Beast\" Butler, because of a military order he issued. After his troops had been assaulted and harassed in the streets by Southern women, his order warned that future such occurrences would result in his men treating such \"ladies\" as those \"plying their avocation in the streets,\" implying that they would treat the women like prostitutes. Accounts of this spread like wildfire across the South and the North. He also came to be called \"Spoons\" Butler because of the alleged looting that his troops did while occupying New Orleans.\n\nButler abolished French language instruction in city schools; statewide measures in 1864 and, after the war, 1868 further strengthened English-only policy imposed by federal representatives. With the predominance of English speakers in the city and state, that language had already become dominant in business and government. By the end of the 19th century, French usage in the city had faded significantly; it was also under pressure from new immigrants: English speakers such as the Irish, and other Europeans, such as the Italians and Germans. However, as late as 1902 \"one-fourth of the population of the city spoke French in ordinary daily intercourse, while another two-fourths was able to understand the language perfectly,\" and as late as 1945, one still encountered elderly Creole women who spoke no English. The last major French language newspaper in New Orleans, L'Abeille de la Nouvelle-Orléans (New Orleans Bee), ceased publication on December 27, 1923, after ninety-six years. According to some sources, Le Courrier de la Nouvelle Orleans continued until 1955. \n\nAs the city was captured and occupied early in the war, it was spared the destruction through warfare suffered by many other cities of the American South. The Union Army eventually extended its control north along the Mississippi River and along the coastal areas of the State. As a result, most of the southern portion of Louisiana was originally exempted from the liberating provisions of the 1863 \"Emancipation Proclamation\" issued by President Abraham Lincoln.\nLarge numbers of rural ex-slaves and some free people of color from the City volunteered for the first regiments of Black troops in the War. Led by Brig. Gen. Daniel Ullman (1810-1892), of the 78th Regiment of New York State Volunteers Militia, they were known as the \"Corps d'Afrique.\" While that name had been used by a militia before the war, that group was composed of free people of color. The new group was made up mostly of former slaves. They were supplemented in the last two years of the War by newly organized United States Colored Troops, who played an increasingly important part in the war. \n\nViolence throughout the South, especially the Memphis Riots of 1866 followed by the New Orleans Riot in July of that year, resulted in Congress passing the Reconstruction Act and the Fourteenth Amendment, to extend the protections of full citizenship to freedmen and free people of color. Louisiana and Texas were put under the authority of the \"Fifth Military District\" of the United States during Reconstruction. Louisiana was eventually readmitted to the Union in 1868; its Constitution of 1868 granted universal manhood suffrage and established universal public education. Both blacks and whites were elected to local and state offices. In 1872, lieutenant governor P.B.S. Pinchback, who was of mixed race, succeeded Henry Clay Warmouth for a brief period as Republican governor of Louisiana, becoming the first governor of African descent of an American state. The next African American to serve as governor was Douglas Wilder, elected in Virginia in 1989. For a time, New Orleans operated a racially integrated public school system. \n\nWartime damage to levees and cities along the Mississippi River adversely affected southern crops and trade for the port city for some time. The federal government contributed to restoring infrastructure, but it took time. The nationwide financial recession and Panic of 1873 also adversely affected businesses and slowed economic recovery.\n\nFrom 1868, elections in Louisiana were marked by violence, as white insurgents tried to suppress black voting and disrupt Republican gatherings. Violence continued around elections. The disputed 1872 gubernatorial election resulted in conflicts that ran for years. The \"White League\", an insurgent paramilitary group that supported the Democratic Party, was organized in 1874 and operated in the open, violently suppressing the black vote and running off Republican officeholders. In 1874, in the Battle of Liberty Place, 5,000 members of the White League fought with city police to take over the state offices for the Democratic candidate for governor, holding them for three days. By 1876, such tactics resulted in the white Democrats, the so-called Redeemers, regaining political control of the state legislature. The federal government gave up and withdrew its troops in 1877, ending Reconstruction.\n\nWhite Democrats passed Jim Crow laws, establishing racial segregation in public facilities. In 1889, the legislature passed a constitutional amendment incorporating a \"grandfather clause\" that effectively disfranchised freedmen as well as the propertied people of color free before the war. Unable to vote, African Americans could not serve on juries or in local office, and were closed out of formal politics for several generations in the state. It was ruled by a white Democratic Party. Public schools were racially segregated and remained so until 1960.\n\nNew Orleans' large community of well-educated, often French-speaking free persons of color (gens de couleur libres), who had been free prior to the Civil War, sought to fight back against Jim Crow. They organized the Comité des Citoyens (Citizens Committee) to work for civil rights. As part of their legal campaign, they recruited one of their own, Homer Plessy, to test whether Louisiana's newly enacted Separate Car Act was constitutional. Plessy boarded a commuter train departing New Orleans for Covington, Louisiana, sat in the car reserved for whites only, and was arrested. The case resulting from this incident, Plessy v. Ferguson, was heard by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1896. The court ruled that \"separate but equal\" accommodations were constitutional, effectively upholding Jim Crow measures. In practice, African-American public schools and facilities were underfunded in Louisiana and across the South. The Supreme Court ruling contributed to this period as the nadir of race relations in the United States. The rate of lynchings of black men was high across the South, as other states also disfranchised blacks and sought to impose Jim Crow to establish white supremacy.\n\nThroughout New Orleans' history, until the early 20th century when medical and scientific advances ameliorated the situation, the city suffered repeated epidemics of yellow fever and other tropical and infectious diseases.\n\n20th century\n\nNew Orleans' zenith as an economic and population center, in relation to other American cities, occurred in the decades prior to 1860. At this time New Orleans was the nation's fifth-largest city and was significantly larger than all other American South population centers. New Orleans continued to increase in population from the mid-19th century onward, but rapid economic growth shifted to other areas of the country, meaning that New Orleans' relative importance steadily declined. First to emerge in importance were the new industrial and railroad hubs of the Midwest, then the rapidly growing metropolises of the Pacific Coast in the decades before and after the turn of the 20th century. Construction of railways and highways decreased river traffic, diverting goods to other transportation corridors and markets. Thousands of the most ambitious blacks left New Orleans and the state in the Great Migration around World War II and after, many for West Coast destinations. In the post-war period, other Sun Belt cities in the South and West surpassed New Orleans in population.\n\nFrom the late 1800s, most U.S. censuses recorded New Orleans' slipping rank among American cities. Reminded every ten years of its declining relative importance, New Orleans would periodically mount attempts to regain its economic vigor and pre-eminence, with varying degrees of success.\n\nBy the mid-20th century, New Orleanians recognized that their city was being surpassed as the leading urban area in the South. By 1950, Houston, Dallas, and Atlanta exceeded New Orleans in size, and in 1960 Miami eclipsed New Orleans, even as the latter's population reached what would be its historic peak that year. As with other older American cities in the postwar period, highway construction and suburban development drew residents from the center city to newer housing outside. The 1970 census recorded the first absolute decline in the city's population since it joined the United States. \nThe New Orleans metropolitan area continued expanding in population, however, just not as rapidly as other major cities in the Sun Belt. While the port remained one of the largest in the nation, automation and containerization resulted in significant job losses. The city's relative fall in stature meant that its former role as banker to the South was inexorably supplanted by competing companies in larger peer cities. New Orleans' economy had always been based more on trade and financial services than on manufacturing, but the city's relatively small manufacturing sector also shrank in the post–World War II period. Despite some economic development successes under the administrations of DeLesseps \"Chep\" Morrison (1946–1961) and Victor \"Vic\" Schiro (1961–1970), metropolitan New Orleans' growth rate consistently lagged behind more vigorous cities.\n\nCivil Rights Movement\n\nDuring the later years of Morrison's administration, and for the entirety of Schiro's, the city was a center of the Civil Rights Movement. The Southern Christian Leadership Conference was founded in the city, lunch counter sit-ins were held in Canal Street stores, and a prominent and violent series of confrontations occurred in 1960 when the city attempted school desegregation, following the Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education (1954). When six-year-old Ruby Bridges integrated William Frantz Elementary School in the city's Ninth Ward, she was the first child of color to attend a previously all-white school in the South. The Civil Rights Movement's success in gaining federal passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 provided enforcement of constitutional rights, including voting for blacks. Together, these resulted in the most far-reaching changes in New Orleans' 20th century history. \n\nThough legal and civil equality were re-established by the end of the 1960s, a large gap in income levels and educational attainment persisted between the city's White and African-American communities. As the middle class and wealthier members of both races left the center city, its population's income level dropped, and it became proportionately more African American. From 1980, the African-American majority has elected officials from its own community. They have struggled to narrow the gap by creating conditions conducive to the economic uplift of the African-American community.\n\nNew Orleans became increasingly dependent on tourism as an economic mainstay by the administrations of Sidney Barthelemy (1986–1994) and Marc Morial (1994–2002). Relatively low levels of educational attainment, high rates of household poverty, and rising crime threatened the prosperity of the city in the later decades of the century. The negative effects of these socioeconomic conditions contrasted with the changes to the economy of the United States, which were based on a post-industrial, knowledge-based paradigm in which mental skills and education were far more important to advancement than manual skills.\n\nDrainage and flood control\n\nIn the 20th century, New Orleans' government and business leaders believed they needed to drain and develop outlying areas to provide for the city's expansion. The most ambitious development during this period was a drainage plan devised by engineer and inventor A. Baldwin Wood, designed to break the surrounding swamp's stranglehold on the city's geographic expansion. Until then, urban development in New Orleans was largely limited to higher ground along the natural river levees and bayous. Wood's pump system allowed the city to drain huge tracts of swamp and marshland and expand into low-lying areas. Over the 20th century, rapid subsidence, both natural and human-induced, resulted in these newly populated areas declining to several feet below sea level.\n\nNew Orleans was vulnerable to flooding even before the city's footprint departed from the natural high ground near the Mississippi River. In the late 20th century, however, scientists and New Orleans residents gradually became aware of the city's increased vulnerability. In 1965, flooding from Hurricane Betsy killed dozens of residents, although the majority of the city remained dry. The rain-induced flood of May 8, 1995, demonstrated the weakness of the pumping system. After that event, measures were undertaken to dramatically upgrade pumping capacity. By the 1980s and 1990s, scientists observed that extensive, rapid, and ongoing erosion of the marshlands and swamp surrounding New Orleans, especially that related to the Mississippi River – Gulf Outlet Canal, had the unintended result of leaving the city more exposed to hurricane-induced catastrophic storm surges than earlier in its history.\n\n21st century\n\nHurricane Katrina\n\nNew Orleans was catastrophically affected by what the University of California Berkeley's Dr. Raymond B. Seed called \"the worst engineering disaster in the world since Chernobyl,\" when the Federal levee system failed during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. By the time the hurricane approached the city at the end of August 2005, most residents had evacuated. As the hurricane passed through the Gulf Coast region, the city's federal flood protection system failed, resulting in the worst civil engineering disaster in American history. Floodwalls and levees constructed by the United States Army Corps of Engineers failed below design specifications and 80% of the city flooded. Tens of thousands of residents who had remained in the city were rescued or otherwise made their way to shelters of last resort at the Louisiana Superdome or the New Orleans Morial Convention Center. More than 1,500 people were recorded as having died in Louisiana, most in New Orleans, and others are still unaccounted for. Before Hurricane Katrina, the city called for the first mandatory evacuation in its history, to be followed by another mandatory evacuation three years later with Hurricane Gustav.\n\nHurricane Rita\n\nThe city was declared off-limits to residents while efforts to clean up after Hurricane Katrina began. The approach of Hurricane Rita in September 2005 caused repopulation efforts to be postponed, and the Lower Ninth Ward was reflooded by Rita's storm surge.\n\nPost-disaster recovery\n\nBecause of the scale of damage, many people settled permanently outside the city in other areas where they had evacuated, as in Houston. Federal, state, and local efforts have been directed at recovery and rebuilding in severely damaged neighborhoods. The Census Bureau in July 2006 estimated the population of New Orleans to be 223,000; a subsequent study estimated that 32,000 additional residents had moved to the city as of March 2007, bringing the estimated population to 255,000, approximately 56% of the pre-Katrina population level. Another estimate, based on data on utility usage from July 2007, estimated the population to be approximately 274,000 or 60% of the pre-Katrina population. These estimates are somewhat smaller than a third estimate, based on mail delivery records, from the Greater New Orleans Community Data Center in June 2007, which indicated that the city had regained approximately two-thirds of its pre-Katrina population. In 2008, the Census Bureau revised its population estimate for the city upward, to 336,644. Most recently, 2010 estimates show that neighborhoods that did not flood are near 100% of their pre-Katrina populations, and in some cases, exceed 100% of their pre-Katrina populations. \n\nSeveral major tourist events and other forms of revenue for the city have returned. Large conventions are being held again, such as those held by the American Library Association and American College of Cardiology. College football events such as the Bayou Classic, New Orleans Bowl, and Sugar Bowl returned for the 2006–2007 season. The New Orleans Saints returned that season as well, following speculation of a move. The New Orleans Hornets (now named the Pelicans) returned to the city fully for the 2007–2008 season, having partially spent the 2006–2007 season in Oklahoma City. New Orleans successfully hosted the 2008 NBA All-Star Game and the 2008 BCS National Championship Game. The city hosted the first and second rounds of the 2007 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament. New Orleans and Tulane University hosted the Final Four Championship in 2012. Additionally, the city hosted the Super Bowl XLVII on February 3, 2013 at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome.\n\nMajor annual events such as Mardi Gras and the Jazz & Heritage Festival were never displaced or canceled. Also, an entirely new annual festival, \"The Running of the Bulls New Orleans\", was created in 2007. \n\nGeography\n\nNew Orleans is located at (29.964722, −90.070556) on the banks of the Mississippi River, approximately 105 mi upriver from the Gulf of Mexico. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 350 sqmi, of which 169 sqmi is land and 181 sqmi (52%) is water. Orleans Parish is the smallest parish by land area in Louisiana.\n\nThe city is located in the Mississippi River Delta on the east and west banks of the Mississippi River and south of Lake Pontchartrain. The area along the river is characterized by ridges and hollows.\n\nNew Orleans was originally settled on the natural levees or high ground, along the Mississippi River. After the Flood Control Act of 1965, the US Army Corps of Engineers built floodwalls and man-made levees around a much larger geographic footprint that included previous marshland and swamp. Whether or not this human interference has caused subsidence is a topic of debate. A study by an associate professor at Tulane University claims:\n\nOn the other hand, a report by the American Society of Civil Engineers claims that \"New Orleans is subsiding (sinking)\": \n\nIn May 2016, NASA published a study that details the sinking rate of New Orleans.\n\nA recent study by Tulane and Xavier University notes that 51% of New Orleans is at or above sea level, with the more densely populated areas generally on higher ground. The average elevation of the city is currently between one and two feet (0.5 m) below sea level, with some portions of the city as high as 20 ft at the base of the river levee in Uptown and others as low as 7 ft below sea level in the farthest reaches of Eastern New Orleans. \n\nIn 2005, storm surge from Hurricane Katrina caused catastrophic failure of the federally designed and built levees, flooding 80% of the city. A report by the American Society of Civil Engineers says that \"had the levees and floodwalls not failed and had the pump stations operated, nearly two-thirds of the deaths would not have occurred\".\n\nNew Orleans has always had to consider the risk of hurricanes, but the risks are dramatically greater today due to coastal erosion from human interference. Since the beginning of the 20th century, it has been estimated that Louisiana has lost 2000 sqmi of coast (including many of its barrier islands), which once protected New Orleans against storm surge. Following Hurricane Katrina, the Army Corps of Engineers has instituted massive levee repair and hurricane protection measures to protect the city.\n\nIn 2006, Louisiana voters overwhelmingly adopted an amendment to the state's constitution to dedicate all revenues from off-shore drilling to restore Louisiana's eroding coast line. Congress has allocated $7 billion to bolster New Orleans' flood protection. \n\nAccording to a study by the National Academy of Engineering and the National Research Council, levees and floodwalls surrounding New Orleans—no matter how large or sturdy—cannot provide absolute protection against overtopping or failure in extreme events. Levees and floodwalls should be viewed as a way to reduce risks from hurricanes and storm surges, not as measures that completely eliminate risk. For structures in hazardous areas and residents who do not relocate, the committee recommended major floodproofing measures—such as elevating the first floor of buildings to at least the 100-year flood level. \n\nCityscape\n\nThe Central Business District of New Orleans is located immediately north and west of the Mississippi River, and was historically called the \"American Quarter\" or \"American Sector.\" It was developed after the heart of French and Spanish settlement. It includes Lafayette Square. Most streets in this area fan out from a central point in the city. Major streets of the area include Canal Street, Poydras Street, Tulane Avenue and Loyola Avenue. Canal Street functions as the street which divides the traditional \"downtown\" area from the \"uptown\" area.\n\nEvery street crossing Canal Street between the Mississippi River and Rampart Street, which is the northern edge of the French Quarter, has a different name for the \"uptown\" and \"downtown\" portions. For example, St. Charles Avenue, known for its street car line, is called Royal Street below Canal Street, though where it traverses the Central Business District between Canal and Lee Circle, it is properly called St. Charles Street. Elsewhere in the city, Canal Street serves as the dividing point between the \"South\" and \"North\" portions of various streets. In the local parlance downtown means \"downriver from Canal Street\", while uptown means \"upriver from Canal Street\". Downtown neighborhoods include the French Quarter, Tremé, the 7th Ward, Faubourg Marigny, Bywater (the Upper Ninth Ward), and the Lower Ninth Ward. Uptown neighborhoods include the Warehouse District, the Lower Garden District, the Garden District, the Irish Channel, the University District, Carrollton, Gert Town, Fontainebleau, and Broadmoor. However, the Warehouse and the Central Business District, despite being above Canal Street, are frequently called \"Downtown\" as a specific region, as in the Downtown Development District.\n\nOther major districts within the city include Bayou St. John, Mid-City, Gentilly, Lakeview, Lakefront, New Orleans East, and Algiers.\n\nHistoric and residential architecture\n\nNew Orleans is world-famous for its abundance of unique architectural styles which reflect the city's historical roots and multicultural heritage. Though New Orleans possesses numerous structures of national architectural significance, it is equally, if not more, revered for its enormous, largely intact (even post-Katrina) historic built environment. Twenty National Register Historic Districts have been established, and fourteen local historic districts aid in the preservation of this tout ensemble. Thirteen of the local historic districts are administered by the New Orleans Historic District Landmarks Commission (HDLC), while one—the French Quarter—is administered by the Vieux Carre Commission (VCC). Additionally, both the National Park Service, via the National Register of Historic Places, and the HDLC have landmarked individual buildings, many of which lie outside the boundaries of existing historic districts. \n\nMany styles of housing exist in the city, including the shotgun house and the bungalow style. Creole townhouses, notable for their large courtyards and intricate iron balconies, line the streets of the French Quarter. Throughout the city, there are many other historic housing styles: Creole cottages, American townhouses, double-gallery houses, and Raised Center-Hall Cottages. St. Charles Avenue is famed for its large antebellum homes. Its mansions are in various styles, such as Greek Revival, American Colonial and the Victorian styles of Queen Anne and Italianate architecture. New Orleans is also noted for its large, European-style Catholic cemeteries, which can be found throughout the city.\n\nTallest buildings\n\nFor much of its history, New Orleans' skyline consisted of only low- and mid- rise structures. The soft soils of New Orleans are susceptible to subsidence, and there was doubt about the feasibility of constructing large high rises in such an environment. Developments in engineering throughout the twentieth century eventually made it possible to build sturdy foundations to support high rise structures in the city, and in the 1960s, the World Trade Center New Orleans and Plaza Tower were built, demonstrating the viability of tall skyscrapers in New Orleans. One Shell Square took its place as the city's tallest building in 1972. The oil boom of the 1970s and early 1980s redefined New Orleans' skyline with the development of the Poydras Street corridor. Today, most of New Orleans' tallest buildings are clustered along Canal Street and Poydras Street in the Central Business District.\n\nClimate\n\nThe climate of New Orleans is humid subtropical (Köppen climate classification Cfa), with short, generally mild winters and hot, humid summers. The monthly daily average temperature ranges from in January to in July and August. The lowest recorded temperature was 6 F on February 13, 1899. The highest recorded temperature was 104 F on June 24, 2009. Dewpoints in the summer months are relatively high, ranging from to .\n\nThe average precipitation is annually; the summer months are the wettest, while October is the driest month. Precipitation in winter usually accompanies the passing of a cold front. On average, there are 77 days of 90 °F+ highs, 8.1 days per winter where the high does not exceed 50 °F, and 8.0 nights with freezing lows annually; in a typical year the coldest night will be around 30 °F. It is rare for the temperature to reach 100 °F or dip below 25 °F.\n\nHurricanes pose a severe threat to the area, and the city is particularly at risk because of its low elevation; because it is surrounded by water from the north, east, and south; and because of Louisiana's sinking coast. According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, New Orleans is the nation's most vulnerable city to hurricanes. Indeed, portions of Greater New Orleans have been flooded by: the Grand Isle Hurricane of 1909, the New Orleans Hurricane of 1915, 1947 Fort Lauderdale Hurricane, Hurricane Flossy in 1956, Hurricane Betsy in 1965, Hurricane Georges in 1998, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, and Hurricane Gustav in 2008, with the flooding in Betsy being significant and in a few neighborhoods severe, and that in Katrina being disastrous in the majority of the city. \nNew Orleans experiences snowfall only on rare occasions. A small amount of snow fell during the 2004 Christmas Eve Snowstorm and again on Christmas (December 25) when a combination of rain, sleet, and snow fell on the city, leaving some bridges icy. Before that, the last White Christmas was in 1964 and brought . Snow fell again on December 22, 1989, when most of the city received 1 –.\n\nThe last significant snowfall in New Orleans was on the morning of December 11, 2008.\n\nDemographics\n\nAccording to the 2010 Census, 343,829 people and 189,896 households were in New Orleans. The racial and ethnic makeup of the city was 60.2% African American, 33.0% White, 2.9% Asian (1.7% Vietnamese, 0.3% Indian, 0.3% Chinese, 0.1% Filipino, 0.1% Korean), 0.0% Pacific Islander, and 1.7% were people of two or more races. People of Hispanic or Latino origin made up 5.3% of the population; 1.3% of New Orleans is Mexican, 1.3% Honduran, 0.4% Cuban, 0.3% Puerto Rican, and 0.3% Nicaraguan. \n\nThe last population estimate before Hurricane Katrina was 454,865, as of July 1, 2005. A population analysis released in August 2007 estimated the population to be 273,000, 60% of the pre-Katrina population and an increase of about 50,000 since July 2006. A September 2007 report by The Greater New Orleans Community Data Center, which tracks population based on U.S. Postal Service figures, found that in August 2007, just over 137,000 households received mail. That compares with about 198,000 households in July 2005, representing about 70% of pre-Katrina population. More recently, the Census Bureau revised upward its 2008 population estimate for the city, to 336,644 inhabitants. In 2010, estimates showed that neighborhoods that did not flood were near 100% of their pre-Katrina populations, and in some cases, exceeded 100% of their pre-Katrina populations.\n\nA 2006 study by researchers at Tulane University and the University of California, Berkeley determined that there are as many as 10,000 to 14,000 illegal immigrants, many from Mexico, currently residing in New Orleans. Janet Murguía, president and chief executive officer of the National Council of La Raza, stated that there could be up to 120,000 Hispanic workers in New Orleans. In June 2007, one study stated that the Hispanic population had risen from 15,000, pre-Katrina, to over 50,000. \n\nA recent article released by The Times-Picayune indicated that the metropolitan area had undergone a recent influx of 5,300 households in the later half of 2008, bringing the population to around 469,605 households or 88.1% of its pre-Katrina levels. While the area's population has been on an upward trajectory since the storm, much of that growth was attributed to residents returning after Katrina. Many observers predicted that growth would taper off, but the data center's analysis suggests that New Orleans and the surrounding parishes are benefiting from an economic migration resulting from the global financial crisis of 2008–2009. \n, 90.31% of New Orleans residents age 5 and older spoke English at home as a primary language, while 4.84% spoke Spanish, 1.87% Vietnamese, and 1.05% spoke French. In total, 9.69% of New Orleans's population age 5 and older spoke a mother language other than English. \n\nReligion\n\nNew Orleans' colonial history of French and Spanish settlement has resulted in a strong Catholic tradition. Catholic missions administered to slaves and free people of color, establishing schools for them. In addition, many late 19th and early 20th century European immigrants, such as the Irish, some Germans, and Italians, were Catholic. In New Orleans and the surrounding Louisiana Gulf Coast area, the predominant religion is Catholicism. Within the Archdiocese of New Orleans (which includes not only the city but the surrounding Parishes as well), 35.9% percent of the population is Roman Catholic. The influence of Catholicism is reflected in many of the city's French and Spanish cultural traditions, including its many parochial schools, street names, architecture, and festivals, including Mardi Gras.\n\nNew Orleans also notably has a distinctive variety of Louisiana Voodoo, due in part to syncretism with African and Afro-Caribbean Roman Catholic beliefs. The fame of the voodoo practitioner Marie Laveau contributed to this, as did New Orleans' distinctly Caribbean cultural influences.New Orleans, \"now under the flag of the United States, is still very much a Caribbean city....\" \n Although the tourism industry has strongly associated Voodoo with the city, only a small number of people are serious adherents to the religion.\n\nJewish settlers, primarily Sephardim, were part of New Orleans from the early nineteenth century. some migrated from the communities established in the colonial years in Charleston, South Carolina and Savannah, Georgia. The merchant Abraham Cohen Labatt helped found the first Jewish congregation in Louisiana in the 1830s, which became known as the Portuguese Jewish Nefutzot Yehudah congregation (as he and some other members were Sephardic Jews, whose ancestors had lived in Portugal and Spain). Jews from eastern Europe came as immigrants in the late 19th and 20th centuries. By the 21st century, there were 10,000 Jews in New Orleans. This number dropped to 7,000 after the disruption of Hurricane Katrina. In the wake of Katrina, all New Orleans synagogues lost members, but most re-opened in their original locations. The exception was Congregation Beth Israel, the oldest and most prominent Orthodox synagogue in the New Orleans region. Beth Israel's building in Lakeview was destroyed by flooding. After seven years of holding services in temporary quarters, a rebuilt synagogue was consecrated in August 2012 on land purchased from its new neighbor, the Reform Congregation Gates of Prayer in Metairie.\n\nEthnic groups\n\n there had been increases in the Hispanic population in the New Orleans area, including in Kenner, central Metairie, and Terrytown in Jefferson Parish and eastern New Orleans and Mid-City in New Orleans proper.\"[http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2011/06/hispanic_population_booms_in_k.html Hispanic population booms in Kenner and elsewhere in New Orleans area]\" ([http://www.webcitation.org/6bLThfA9h Archive]). The Times-Picayune. June 15, 2011. Retrieved on September 7, 2015.\n\nPrior to Hurricane Katrina there were few persons of Brazilian origin in the city, but after Katrina and by 2008 a population emerged, with Portuguese speakers becoming the second most common English as a second language group in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans-sponsored ESL classes after the Spanish speakers. Many Brazilians worked in skilled trades such as tile and flooring, with fewer day laborers. Many of them moved from Brazilian communities in the Northeastern United States, Florida, and Georgia, and Brazilians settled throughout the New Orleans metropolitan area. Most of the Brazilians were illegal immigrants. In January 2008 Bruce Nolan of the Houston Chronicle stated that the midrange of the various estimations and guesses of the New Orleans Brazilian population wa 3,000 but that no entity or organization had determined exactly how many Brazilians resided in the city. By 2008 many small churches, shops, and restaurants catering to Brazilians in the New Orleans area opened. \n\nChanges in population\n\nThe city of New Orleans faced a decreasing population before and after Hurricane Katrina. Beginning in 1960, the population of the city decreased due to several factors such as the city's reliance on oil and tourism, nationwide increases in suburbanization, and a migration of jobs to surrounding parishes. This economic and population decline is linked to high levels of poverty, which in 1960 was the fifth highest of all US cities, and was almost twice the national average in 2005, at 24.5%. Furthermore, New Orleans experienced an increase in residential segregation from 1900 to 1980, leaving the poor, who were disproportionately African American in low-lying locations within the city's core, making them especially susceptible to flood and storm damage. \n\nHurricane Katrina, which displaced 800,000 people in total, contributed significantly to continue shrinking New Orleans' population. , the population of New Orleans was at 76% of what it was in 2005. African Americans, renters, the elderly, and people with low income were disproportionately impacted by Hurricane Katrina compared to affluent and white residents. In the aftermath of Katrina, city government commissioned groups such as Bring New Orleans Back Commission, the New Orleans Neighborhood Rebuilding Plan, the Unified New Orleans Plan, and the Office of Recovery Management to contribute to plans addressing depopulation. Their ideas included shrinking the city's footprint from before the storm, incorporating community voices into development plans, and creating green spaces, some of which incited controversy. \n\nFrom 2010 to 2014 the city grew by 12%, adding an average of more than 10,000 new residents each year following the 2010 Census.\n\nEconomy\n\nNew Orleans has one of the largest and busiest ports in the world, and metropolitan New Orleans is a center of maritime industry. The New Orleans region also accounts for a significant portion of the nation's oil refining and petrochemical production, and serves as a white-collar corporate base for onshore and offshore petroleum and natural gas production.\n\nNew Orleans is a center for higher learning, with over 50,000 students enrolled in the region's eleven two- and four-year degree granting institutions. A top-50 research university, Tulane University, is located in New Orleans' Uptown neighborhood. Metropolitan New Orleans is a major regional hub for the health care industry and boasts a small, globally competitive manufacturing sector. The center city possesses a rapidly growing, entrepreneurial creative industries sector, and is renowned for its cultural tourism. Greater New Orleans, Inc. (GNO, Inc.) acts as the first point-of-contact for regional economic development, coordinating between Louisiana's Department of Economic Development and the various parochial business development agencies.\n\nPort\n\nNew Orleans was developed as a strategically located trading entrepôt, and it remains, above all, a crucial transportation hub and distribution center for waterborne commerce. The Port of New Orleans is the 5th-largest port in the United States based on volume of cargo handled, and second-largest in the state after the Port of South Louisiana. It is the 12th-largest in the U.S. based on value of cargo. The Port of South Louisiana, also based in the New Orleans area, is the world's busiest in terms of bulk tonnage. When combined with the Port of New Orleans, it forms the 4th-largest port system in volume handled. Many shipbuilding, shipping, logistics, freight forwarding and commodity brokerage firms either are based in metropolitan New Orleans or maintain a large local presence. Examples include Intermarine, Bisso Towboat, Northrop Grumman Ship Systems, Trinity Yachts, Expeditors International, Bollinger Shipyards, IMTT, International Coffee Corp, Boasso America, Transoceanic Shipping, Transportation Consultants Inc., Dupuy Storage & Forwarding and Silocaf. The largest coffee-roasting plant in the world, operated by Folgers, is located in New Orleans East.\n\nLike Houston, New Orleans is located in proximity to the Gulf of Mexico and the many oil rigs that lie just offshore. Louisiana ranks fifth among states in oil production and eighth in reserves in the United States. It has two of the four Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) storage facilities: West Hackberry in Cameron Parish and Bayou Choctaw in Iberville Parish. Other infrastructure includes 17 petroleum refineries, with a combined crude oil distillation capacity of nearly , the second highest in the nation after Texas. Louisiana's numerous ports include the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port (LOOP), which is capable of receiving ultra large oil tankers. Given the quantity of oil importing, Louisiana is home to many major pipelines supplying the nation: Crude Oil (Exxon, Chevron, BP, Texaco, Shell, Scurloch-Permian, Mid-Valley, Calumet, Conoco, Koch Industries, Unocal, U.S. Dept. of Energy, Locap); Product (TEPPCO Partners, Colonial, Plantation, Explorer, Texaco, Collins); and Liquefied Petroleum Gas (Dixie, TEPPCO, Black Lake, Koch, Chevron, Dynegy, Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, Dow Chemical Company, Bridgeline, FMP, Tejas, Texaco, UTP). Several major energy companies have regional headquarters in the city or its suburbs, including Royal Dutch Shell, Eni and Chevron. Numerous other energy producers and oilfield services companies are also headquartered in the city or region, and the sector supports a large professional services base of specialized engineering and design firms, as well as an term office for the federal government's Minerals Management Service.\n\nBusiness\n\nThe city is the home to a single Fortune 500 company: Entergy, a power generation utility and nuclear powerplant operations specialist. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the city lost its other Fortune 500 company, Freeport-McMoRan, when it merged its copper and gold exploration unit with an Arizona company and relocated that division to Phoenix, Arizona. Its McMoRan Exploration affiliate remains headquartered in New Orleans. Other companies either headquartered or with significant operations in New Orleans include: Pan American Life Insurance, Pool Corp, Rolls-Royce, Newpark Resources, AT&T, TurboSquid, iSeatz, IBM, Navtech, Superior Energy Services, Textron Marine & Land Systems, McDermott International, Pellerin Milnor, Lockheed Martin, Imperial Trading, Laitram, Harrah's Entertainment, Stewart Enterprises, Edison Chouest Offshore, Zatarain's, Waldemar S. Nelson & Co., Whitney National Bank, Capital One, Tidewater Marine, Popeyes Chicken & Biscuits, Parsons Brinckerhoff, MWH Global, CH2M HILL, Energy Partners Ltd, The Receivables Exchange, GE Capital, and Smoothie King.\n\nTourist and convention business\n\nTourism is another staple of the city's economy. Perhaps more visible than any other sector, New Orleans' tourist and convention industry is a $5.5 billion juggernaut that accounts for 40 percent of New Orleans' tax revenues. In 2004, the hospitality industry employed 85,000 people, making it New Orleans' top economic sector as measured by employment totals. The city also hosts the World Cultural Economic Forum (WCEF). The forum, held annually at the New Orleans Morial Convention Center, is directed toward promoting cultural and economic development opportunities through the strategic convening of cultural ambassadors and leaders from around the world. The first WCEF took place in October 2008. \n\nOther\n\nFederal agencies and the Armed forces have significant facilities in the area. The U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals operates at the US Courthouse downtown. NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility is located in New Orleans East and is operated by Lockheed Martin. It is a large manufacturing facility that produced the external fuel tanks for the space shuttles. The Michoud facility lies within the enormous New Orleans Regional Business Park, also home to the National Finance Center, operated by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), and the Crescent Crown distribution center. Other large governmental installations include the U.S. Navy's Space and Naval Warfare (SPAWAR) Systems Command, located within the University of New Orleans Research and Technology Park in Gentilly, Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base New Orleans; and the headquarters for the Marine Force Reserves in Federal City in Algiers.\n\nTop employers\n\nAccording to the City's 2008 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report, the top employers in the city are:\n\nCulture and contemporary life\n\nTourism\n\nNew Orleans has many visitor attractions, from the world-renowned French Quarter; to St. Charles Avenue, (home of Tulane and Loyola Universities, the historic Pontchartrain Hotel, and many 19th-century mansions); to Magazine Street, with its boutique stores and antique shops.\n\nAccording to current travel guides, New Orleans is one of the top ten most-visited cities in the United States; 10.1 million visitors came to New Orleans in 2004. Prior to 2005's Hurricane Katrina, there were 265 hotels with 38,338 rooms in the Greater New Orleans Area. In May 2007, there were over 140 hotels and motels in operation with over 31,000 rooms. \n\nA 2009 Travel + Leisure poll of \"America's Favorite Cities\" ranked New Orleans first in ten categories, the most first-place rankings of the 30 cities included. According to the poll, New Orleans is the best U.S. city as a spring break destination and for \"wild weekends\", stylish boutique hotels, cocktail hours, singles/bar scenes, live music/concerts and bands, antique and vintage shops, cafés/coffee bars, neighborhood restaurants, and people watching. The city also ranked second for the following: friendliness (behind Charleston, South Carolina), gay-friendliness (behind San Francisco), bed and breakfast hotels/inns, and ethnic food. However, the city was voted last in terms of active [?] residents, and it placed near the bottom in cleanliness, safety, and as a family destination. \n\nThe French Quarter (known locally as \"the Quarter\" or Vieux Carré), which was the colonial-era city and is bounded by the Mississippi River, Rampart Street, Canal Street, and Esplanade Avenue, contains many popular hotels, bars, and nightclubs. Notable tourist attractions in the Quarter include Bourbon Street, Jackson Square, St. Louis Cathedral, the French Market (including Café du Monde, famous for café au lait and beignets), and Preservation Hall. Also in the French Quarter is the old New Orleans Mint, a former branch of the United States Mint which now operates as a museum, and The Historic New Orleans Collection, a museum and research center housing art and artifacts relating to the history of New Orleans and the Gulf South.\n\nClose to the Quarter is the Tremé community, which contains the New Orleans Jazz National Historical Park and the New Orleans African American Museum — a site which is listed on the Louisiana African American Heritage Trail.\n\nTo tour the port, one can ride the Natchez, an authentic steamboat with a calliope, which cruises the Mississippi the length of the city twice daily. Unlike most other places in the United States, New Orleans has become widely known for its element of elegant decay. The city's historic cemeteries and their distinct above-ground tombs are attractions in themselves, the oldest and most famous of which, Saint Louis Cemetery, greatly resembles Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.\n\nThe National WWII Museum, opened in the Warehouse District in 2000 as the \"National D-Day Museum,\" has undergone a major expansion. Nearby, Confederate Memorial Hall, the oldest continually-operating museum in Louisiana (although under renovation since Katrina), contains the second-largest collection of Confederate Civil War memorabilia in the world. Art museums in the city include the Contemporary Arts Center, the New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA) in City Park, and the Ogden Museum of Southern Art.\n\nNew Orleans also boasts a decidedly natural side. It is home to the Audubon Nature Institute (which consists of Audubon Park, the Audubon Zoo, the Aquarium of the Americas, and the Audubon Insectarium), and home to gardens which include Longue Vue House and Gardens and the New Orleans Botanical Garden. City Park, one of the country's most expansive and visited urban parks, has one of the largest stands (if not the largest stand) of oak trees in the world.\n\nThere are also various points of interest in the surrounding areas. Many wetlands are found in close proximity to the city, including Honey Island Swamp and Barataria Preserve. Chalmette Battlefield and National Cemetery, located just south of the city, is the site of the 1815 Battle of New Orleans.\n\nIn 2009, New Orleans ranked No. 7 on Newsmax magazine's list of the \"Top 25 Most Uniquely American Cities and Towns,\" a piece written by current CBS News travel editor Peter Greenberg. In determining his ranking, Greenberg cited the city's rebuilding effort post-Katrina as well as its mission to become eco-friendly. \n\nEntertainment and performing arts\n\nThe New Orleans area is home to numerous celebrations, the most popular of which is Carnival, often referred to as Mardi Gras. Carnival officially begins on the Feast of the Epiphany, also known as the \"Twelfth Night\". Mardi Gras (French for \"Fat Tuesday\"), the final and grandest day of festivities, is the last Tuesday before the Catholic liturgical season of Lent, which commences on Ash Wednesday.\n\nThe largest of the city's many music festivals is the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. Commonly referred to simply as \"Jazz Fest\", it is one of the largest music festivals in the nation, featuring crowds of people from all over the world, coming to experience music, food, arts, and crafts. Despite the name, it features not only jazz but a large variety of music, including both native Louisiana music and international artists. Along with Jazz Fest, New Orleans' Voodoo Experience (\"Voodoo Fest\") and the Essence Music Festival are both large music festivals featuring local and international artists.\n\nOther major festivals held in the city include Southern Decadence, the French Quarter Festival, and the Tennessee Williams/ New Orleans Literary Festival.\n\nIn 2002, Louisiana began offering tax incentives for film and television production. This led to a substantial increase in the number of films shot in the New Orleans area and brought the nickname \"Hollywood South.\" Films which have been filmed or produced in and around New Orleans include: Ray, Runaway Jury, The Pelican Brief, Glory Road, All the King's Men, Déjà Vu, Last Holiday, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, 12 Years a Slave, and numerous others. In 2006, work began on the Louisiana Film & Television studio complex, based in the Tremé neighborhood. Louisiana began to offer similar tax incentives for music and theater productions in 2007, leading many to begin referring to New Orleans as \"Broadway South.\" \n\nThe first theatre in New Orleans was the French-language Theatre de la Rue Saint Pierre, which opened in 1792. The first opera in New Orleans was given there in 1796. In the nineteenth century the city was the home of two of America's most important venues for the performance of French opera, the Théâtre d'Orléans and later the French Opera House. Today, opera is performed by the New Orleans Opera.\n\nNew Orleans has always been a significant center for music, showcasing its intertwined European, Latin American, and African cultures. The city's unique musical heritage was born in its colonial and early American days from a unique blending of European musical instruments with African rhythms. As the only North American city to have allowed slaves to gather in public and play their native music (largely in Congo Square, now located within Louis Armstrong Park), New Orleans gave birth to an indigenous music: jazz. Soon, brass bands formed, gaining popular attraction which continues today. The Louis Armstrong Park area, near the French Quarter in Tremé, contains the New Orleans Jazz National Historical Park. The city's music was later significantly influenced by Acadiana, home of Cajun and Zydeco music, and by Delta blues.\n\nNew Orleans' unique musical culture is further evident in its traditional funerals. A spin on military brass band funerals, New Orleans traditional funerals feature sad music (mostly dirges and hymns) on the way to the cemetery and happier music (hot jazz) on the way back. Such musical funerals are still held when a local musician, a member of a social club, krewe, or benevolent society, or a noted dignitary has passed. Until the 1990s, most locals preferred to call these \"funerals with music,\" but visitors to the city have long dubbed them \"jazz funerals.\"\n\nMuch later in its musical development, New Orleans was home to a distinctive brand of rhythm and blues that contributed greatly to the growth of rock and roll. An example of the New Orleans' sound in the 1960s is the #1 US hit \"Chapel of Love\" by the Dixie Cups, a song which knocked the Beatles out of the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100. New Orleans became a hotbed for funk music in the 1960s and 1970s, and by the late 1980s, it had developed its own localized variant of hip hop, called bounce music. While never commercially successful outside of the Deep South, it remained immensely popular in the poorer neighborhoods of the city throughout the 1990s.\n\nA cousin of bounce, New Orleans hip hop has seen commercial success locally and internationally, producing Lil Wayne, Master P, Birdman, Juvenile, Cash Money Records, and No Limit Records. Additionally, the wave of popularity of cowpunk, a fast form of southern rock, originated with the help of several local bands, such as The Radiators, Better Than Ezra, Cowboy Mouth, and Dash Rip Rock. Throughout the 1990s, many sludge metal bands started in the area. New Orleans' heavy metal bands like Eyehategod, Soilent Green, Crowbar, and Down have incorporated styles such as hardcore punk, doom metal, and southern rock to create an original and heady brew of swampy and aggravated metal that has largely avoided standardization.\n\nNew Orleans is the southern terminus of the famed Highway 61.\n\nFood\n\nNew Orleans is world-famous for its food. The indigenous cuisine is distinctive and influential. From centuries of amalgamation of the local Creole, haute Creole, and New Orleans French cuisines, New Orleans food has developed. Local ingredients, French, Spanish, Italian, African, Native American, Cajun, Chinese, and a hint of Cuban traditions combine to produce a truly unique and easily recognizable Louisiana flavor.\n\nNew Orleans is known for specialties like beignets (locally pronounced like \"ben-yays\"), square-shaped fried pastries that could be called \"French doughnuts\" (served with café au lait made with a blend of coffee and chicory rather than only coffee); and Po-boy and Italian Muffuletta sandwiches; Gulf oysters on the half-shell, fried oysters, boiled crawfish, and other seafood; étouffée, jambalaya, gumbo, and other Creole dishes; and the Monday favorite of red beans and rice. (Louis Armstrong often signed his letters, \"Red beans and ricely yours\".) Another New Orleans specialty is the praline, a candy made with brown sugar, granulated sugar, cream, butter, and pecans. The city also has notable street food including the Asian inspired beef Yaka mein.\n\nDialect\n\nNew Orleans has developed a distinctive local dialect of American English over the years that is neither Cajun nor the stereotypical Southern accent, so often misportrayed by film and television actors. It does, like earlier Southern Englishes, feature frequent deletion of the pre-consonantal \"r\". This dialect is quite similar to New York City area accents such as \"Brooklynese\", to people unfamiliar with either. There are many theories regarding how it came to be, but it likely resulted from New Orleans' geographic isolation by water and the fact that the city was a major immigration port throughout the 19th century. As a result, many of the ethnic groups who reside in Brooklyn also reside in New Orleans, such as the Irish, Italians (especially Sicilians), and Germans, among others, as well as a very sizable Jewish community. \n\nOne of the strongest varieties of the New Orleans accent is sometimes identified as the Yat dialect, from the greeting \"Where y'at?\" This distinctive accent is dying out generation by generation in the city itself, but remains very strong in the surrounding parishes.\n\nLess visibly, various ethnic groups throughout the area have retained their distinctive language traditions to this day. Although rare, languages still spoken are the Kreyol Lwiziyen by the Creoles; an archaic Louisiana-Canarian Spanish dialect spoken by the Isleño people and older members of the population; and Cajun.\n\nSports\n\nNew Orleans' professional sports teams include the 2009 Super Bowl XLIV champion New Orleans Saints (NFL), the New Orleans Pelicans (NBA), and the New Orleans Zephyrs (PCL). It is also home to the Big Easy Rollergirls, an all-female flat track roller derby team, and the New Orleans Blaze, a women's football team. A local group of investors began conducting a study in 2007 to see if the city could support a Major League Soccer team. New Orleans is also home to two NCAA Division I athletic programs, the Tulane Green Wave of the American Athletic Conference and the UNO Privateers of the Southland Conference.\n\nThe Mercedes-Benz Superdome is the home of the Saints, the Sugar Bowl, and other prominent events. It has hosted the Super Bowl a record seven times (1978, 1981, 1986, 1990, 1997, 2002, and 2013). The Smoothie King Center is the home of the Pelicans, VooDoo, and many events that are not large enough to need the Superdome. New Orleans is also home to the Fair Grounds Race Course, the nation's third-oldest thoroughbred track. The city's Lakefront Arena has also been home to sporting events.\n\nEach year New Orleans plays host to the Sugar Bowl, the New Orleans Bowl and the Zurich Classic, a golf tournament on the PGA Tour. In addition, it has often hosted major sporting events that have no permanent home, such as the Super Bowl, ArenaBowl, NBA All-Star Game, BCS National Championship Game, and the NCAA Final Four. The Rock ‘n’ Roll Mardi Gras Marathon and the Crescent City Classic are two road running events held annually in the city.\n\nNational protected areas\n\n*Bayou Sauvage National Wildlife Refuge\n*Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve (part)\n*New Orleans Jazz National Historical Park\n\nGovernment\n\nThe City of New Orleans is a political subdivision of the State of Louisiana. It has a mayor-council government according to a Home Rule Charter adopted in 1954, as later amended. The city council consists of seven council members, who are elected by district and two at-large councilmembers. The current mayor, Mitch Landrieu, was elected on February 6, 2010 and assumed office on May 3, 2010. \nThe Orleans Parish Civil Sheriff's Office serves papers involving lawsuits and provides security for the Civil District Court and Juvenile Courts. The Criminal Sheriff, Marlin Gusman, maintains the parish prison system, provides security for the Criminal District Court, and provides backup for the New Orleans Police Department on an as-needed basis. An ordinance in 2006 established an Office of Inspector General for city government.\n\nThe city of New Orleans and the parish of Orleans operate as a merged city-parish government. Before the city of New Orleans became co-extensive with Orleans Parish, Orleans Parish was home to numerous smaller communities. The original city of New Orleans was composed of what are now the 1st through 9th wards. The city of Lafayette (including the Garden District) was added in 1852 as the 10th and 11th wards. In 1870, Jefferson City, including Faubourg Bouligny and much of the Audubon and University areas, was annexed as the 12th, 13th, and 14th wards. Algiers, on the west bank of the Mississippi, was also annexed in 1870, becoming the 15th ward.\n\nNew Orleans' government is now largely centralized in the city council and mayor's office, but it maintains a number of relics from earlier systems when various sections of the city ran much of their affairs separately. For example, New Orleans has seven elected tax assessors, each with their own staff, representing various districts of the city, rather than one centralized office. A constitutional amendment passed on November 7, 2006, will consolidate the seven assessors into one by 2010. On February 18, 2010, Errol Williams was elected as the first city-wide assessor. The New Orleans government operates both a fire department and the New Orleans Emergency Medical Services.\n\nCrime and safety\n\nCrime has been recognized as an ongoing problem for New Orleans, although the issue is outside the view of most visitors to the city. As in other U.S. cities of comparable size, the incidence of homicide and other violent crimes is highly concentrated in certain impoverished neighborhoods, such as housing projects. \n\nIn 2012, Travel+Leisure named New Orleans the #2 \"America's Dirtiest City\", down from a #1 \"Dirtiest\" status of the previous year. The magazine surveyed both national readership and local residents, from a list of prominent cities having the most visible illegal littering, dumping, and other environmental crime conditions.\n\nAcross New Orleans, homicides peaked in 1994 at 86 murders per 100,000 residents. By 2009, despite a 17% decrease in violent crime in the city, the homicide rate remained among the highest in the United States, at between 55 and 64 per 100,000 residents. In 2010, New Orleans was 49.1 per 100,000, and in 2012, that number climbed to 53.2. This is the highest rate among cities of 250,000 population or larger. Offenders in New Orleans are almost exclusively black men, with 97% of the offenders being black and 95% being male. \n\nThe violent crime rate was also a key issue in the city's 2010 mayoral race. In January 2007, several thousand New Orleans residents marched through city streets and gathered at City Hall for a rally demanding police and city leaders tackle the crime problem. Then-Mayor Ray Nagin said he was \"totally and solely focused\" on addressing the problem. Later, the city implemented checkpoints during late night hours in problem areas. The murder rate climbed 14% higher in 2011 to 57.88 per 100,000 retaining its status as the 'Murder Capital of the United States' and rising to 21 in the world. \n\nEducation\n\nColleges and universities\n\nThere are several higher education institutions in the city:\n*Tulane University, a major research university founded in 1834.\n*Loyola University New Orleans, a Jesuit university founded in 1912.\n*University of New Orleans, a large public research university in the city.\n*Xavier University of Louisiana, the only historically black Catholic university in the United States.\n*Southern University at New Orleans, an historically black university in the Southern University System.\n*Dillard University, a private, historically black liberal arts college founded in 1869.\n*Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center\n*Our Lady of Holy Cross College, a Catholic liberal arts college founded in 1916.\n*Notre Dame Seminary\n*New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary\n*Delgado Community College, founded in 1921.\n*William Carey College School of Nursing\n*Herzing College\n*New Orleans Culinary Institute\n\nPrimary and secondary schools\n\nNew Orleans Public Schools (NOPS) is the name given to the city's public school system. Pre-Katrina, NOPS was one of the area's largest systems (along with the Jefferson Parish public school system). In the years leading up to Hurricane Katrina, the New Orleans public school system was widely recognized as the lowest performing school district in Louisiana. According to researchers Carl L. Bankston and Stephen J. Caldas, only 12 of the 103 public schools within the city limits of New Orleans showed reasonably good performance at the beginning of the 21st century. \n\nFollowing Hurricane Katrina, the state of Louisiana took over most of the schools within the system (all schools that fell into a nominal \"worst-performing\" metric); many of these schools, in addition to others that were not subject to state takeover, were subsequently granted operating charters giving them administrative independence from the Orleans Parish School Board, the Recovery School District and/or the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE). At the start of the 2014 school year, all public school students in the NOPS system will attend these independent public charter schools, making New Orleans \"the nation's first completely privatized public school district in the nation.\" \n\nThe last few years have witnessed significant and sustained gains in student achievement, as outside operators like KIPP, the Algiers Charter School Network, and the Capital One – University of New Orleans Charter School Network have assumed control of dozens of schools. The most recent release of annual school performance scores (October 2009) demonstrated continued growth in the academic performance of New Orleans' public schools. If the scores of all public schools in New Orleans (Orleans Parish School Board-chartered, Recovery School District-chartered, Recovery School District-operated, etc.) are considered, an overall school district performance score of 70.6 results. This score represents a 6% increase over an equivalent 2008 metric, and a 24% improvement when measured against an equivalent pre-Katrina (2004) metric, when a district score of 56.9 was posted. Notably, this score of 70.6 approaches the score (78.4) posted in 2009 by the adjacent, suburban Jefferson Parish public school system, though that system's performance score is itself below the state average of 91. \n\nThis longstanding pattern is changing, however, as the NOPS system is engaged in the most promising and far-reaching public school reforms in the nation, reforms aimed at decentralizing power away from the pre-Katrina school board central bureaucracy to individual school principals and independent public charter school boards, monitoring charter school performance by granting renewable, five-year operating contracts permitting the closure of those not succeeding, and vesting choice in parents of public schools students, allowing them to enroll their children in almost any school in the district. \n\nLibraries\n\nThere are numerous academic and public libraries and archives in New Orleans, including Monroe Library at Loyola University, Howard-Tilton Memorial Library at Tulane University, the Law Library of Louisiana, and the Earl K. Long Library at the University of New Orleans. \n\nThe New Orleans Public Library includes 13 locations, most of which were damaged by Hurricane Katrina. However, only four libraries remained closed in 2007. The main library includes a Louisiana Division housing city archives and special collections. \n\nOther research archives are located at the Historic New Orleans Collection and the Old U.S. Mint. \n\nAn independently operated lending library called Iron Rail Book Collective specializes in radical and hard-to-find books. The library contains over 8,000 titles and is open to the public. It was the first library in the city to re-open after Hurricane Katrina.\n\nThe Louisiana Historical Association was founded in New Orleans in 1889. It operated first at Howard Memorial Library. Then its own Memorial Hall was added to Howard Library. The design for the new building was undertaken by the New Orleans architect Thomas Sully. \n\nMedia\n\nHistorically, the major newspaper in the area was The Times-Picayune. The paper made headlines of its own in 2012 when owner Advance Publications cut its print schedule to three days each week, instead focusing its efforts on its website, NOLA.com. That action briefly the made New Orleans the largest city in the country without a daily newspaper, until the Baton Rouge newspaper The Advocate began a New Orleans edition in September 2012. In June 2013, the Times-Picayune resumed daily printing with a condensed newsstand tabloid edition, nicknamed TP Street, which is published on the three days each week that its namesake broadsheet edition is not printed. (The Picayune has not returned to daily delivery.) With the resumption of daily print editions from the Times-Picayune and the launch of the New Orleans edition of The Advocate, now The New Orleans Advocate, the city now has two daily newspapers for the first time since the afternoon States-Item ceased publication on May 31, 1980.\n\nIn addition to the daily newspapers, weekly publications include The Louisiana Weekly and Gambit Weekly. Also in wide circulation is the Clarion Herald, the newspaper of the Archdiocese of New Orleans.\n\nGreater New Orleans is the 54th largest Designated Market Area (DMA) in the U.S., serving 566,960 homes. Major television network affiliates serving the area include:\n\n*4 WWL (CBS)\n*6 WDSU (NBC)\n*8 WVUE (Fox)\n*12 WYES (PBS)\n*20 WHNO (LeSEA)\n*26 WGNO (ABC)\n*32 WLAE (PBS)\n*38 WNOL (The CW)\n*42 KGLA (Telemundo)\n*49 WPXL (ION)\n*54 WUPL (MyNetworkTV)\n\nTwo radio stations that were influential in promoting New Orleans-based bands and singers were 50,000-watt WNOE-AM (1060) and 10,000-watt WTIX (690 AM). These two stations competed head-to-head from the late 1950s to the late 1970s.\n\nWWOZ, the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Station, broadcasts, 24 hours per day, modern and traditional jazz, blues, rhythm and blues, brass band, gospel, cajun, zydeco, Caribbean, Latin, Brazilian, African, bluegrass, and Irish at 90.7 FM and at www.wwoz.org.\n\nWTUL, a local college radio station (Tulane University), broadcasts a wide array of programming, including 20th century classical, reggae, jazz, showtunes, indie rock, electronic music, soul/funk, goth, punk, hip hop, New Orleans music, opera, folk, hardcore, Americana, country, blues, Latin, cheese, techno, local, world, ska, swing and big band, kids shows, and even news programming from DemocracyNow. WTUL is listener supported and non-commercial. The disc jockeys are volunteers, many of them college students.\n\nLouisiana's film and television tax credits have spurred some growth in the television industry, although to a lesser degree than in the film industry. Many films and advertisements have in part or whole been filmed in the city, as have television programs such as The Real World: New Orleans in 2000,Thompson, Richard. [http://www.nola.com/tv/index.ssf/2010/03/real_world_dirty_business_gets.html \"Real World New Orleans: Toothbrush-as-toilet scrubber sickens housemate, triggers police action\"] Nola.com; March 21, 2010 The Real World: Back to New Orleans in 2009 and 2010 and Bad Girls Club: New Orleans in 2011. \n\nTransportation\n\nStreetcars\n\nNew Orleans has four active streetcar lines:\n* The St. Charles Streetcar Line is the oldest continuously operating streetcar line in America and each car is a historic landmark. It runs from Canal Street all the way to the other end of St. Charles Avenue, then turns right into South Carrolton Avenue to its terminal at Carrolton and Claiborne.\n* The Riverfront Streetcar Line runs parallel to the river from Esplanade Street through the French Quarter to Canal Street to the Convention Center above Julia Street in the Arts District.\n* The Canal Streetcar Line uses the Riverfront line tracks from the intersection of Canal Street and Poydras Street, down Canal Street, then branches off and ends at the cemeteries at City Park Avenue, with a spur running from the intersection of Canal and Carrollton Avenue to the entrance of City Park at Esplanade, near the entrance to the New Orleans Museum of Art.\n* The Loyola-UPT Streetcar Line, opened on 28 January 2013, runs along Loyola Avenue from New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal to Canal Street, then continues along Canal Street to the river, and on weekends on the Riverfront line tracks to French Market.\nMore lines are at the planning stage, and one is under construction in the French quarter, in approximate prolongation to the new section of the Loyola Avenue line, to begin service in 2015.\n\nThe city's streetcars were also featured in the Tennessee Williams play, A Streetcar Named Desire. The streetcar line to Desire Street became a bus line in 1948. There are proposals to revive a Desire streetcar line, running along the neutral grounds of North Rampart and St. Claude, as far downriver as Poland Avenue, near the Industrial Canal.\n\nHurricane Katrina destroyed the power lines supplying the St. Charles Avenue line. The associated levee failures flooded the Mid-City facility storing the red streetcars which normally run on the Riverfront and Canal Street lines. Restoration of service has been gradual, with vintage St. Charles line cars running on the Riverfront and Canal lines until the more modern Czech-built red cars are back in service; they are being individually restored at the RTA's facility between Willow and Jeannette streets in the Carrollton neighborhood. On December 23, 2007, streetcars were restored to running on the St. Charles line up to Carrolton Avenue. The much-anticipated re-opening of the second portion of the historic route, which continues until the intersection of Carrolton Avenue and Claiborne Avenue, was commemorated on June 28, 2008.[http://www.norta.com New Orleans Regional Transit Authority].\n\nBicycling\n\nThe city's flat landscape, simple street grid, and mild winters, facilitate bicycle ridership, helping to make New Orleans eighth among U.S. cities in its rate of bicycle and pedestrian transportation,[http://www.nola.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2010/05/bicycle_second_line_celebrates.html Nola.com] and sixth in terms of the percentage of bicycling commuters.[http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2010/10/biking_new_orleans_might_be_le.html Nola.com] The city's bicyclists benefit from being located at the start of the Mississippi River Trail, a 3000 mi bicycle path that stretches from the city's Audubon Park to Minnesota. The first 25 mi of the path, through Destrehan, is paved with a smooth macadam surface. Bicyclists looking to cross the river have access to the city's ferries. Since the 2005 levee-breach, the city has actively sought to promote bicycling by constructing a $1.5 million bike trail from Mid-City to Lake Pontchartrain, and by adding over 37 mi of bicycle lanes to various streets, including St. Charles Avenue. In 2009, Tulane University contributed to these efforts by converting the main street through its Uptown campus, McAlister Place, into a pedestrian mall opened to bicycle traffic. In 2010, work began to add a bicycle corridor from the French Quarter to Lakeview, and 14 mi of additional bike lanes on existing streets. New Orleans has also been recognized as a place with an abundance of uniquely decorated and uniquely designed bicycles. \n\nBuses\n\nPublic transportation in the city is operated by the New Orleans Regional Transit Authority (\"RTA\"). There are many bus routes connecting the city and suburban areas. The RTA lost 200+ buses due to Hurricane Katrina, this would mean that there would be a 30–60 minute waiting period for the next bus to come to the bus stop, and the streetcars took until 2008 to return, so the RTA placed an order for 38 Orion VII Next Generation clean diesel buses, which arrived in July 2008. The RTA has these new buses running on biodiesel. The Jefferson Parish Department of Transit Administration operates Jefferson Transit, which provides service between the city and its suburbs. \n\nRoads\n\nNew Orleans is served by Interstate 10, Interstate 610 and Interstate 510. I-10 travels east-west through the city as the Pontchartrain Expressway. In the far eastern part of the city, New Orleans East, it is known as the Eastern Expressway. I-610 provides a direct shortcut for traffic passing through New Orleans via I-10, allowing that traffic to bypass I-10's southward curve. In the future, New Orleans will have another interstate highway, Interstate 49, which will be extended from its current terminus in Lafayette to the city.\n\nIn addition to the interstate highways, U.S. 90 travels through the city, while U.S. 61 terminates in the city's downtown center. In addition, U.S. 11 terminates in the eastern portion of the city.\n\nNew Orleans is home to many bridges, the Crescent City Connection is perhaps the most notable. It serves as New Orleans' major bridge across the Mississippi River, providing a connection between the city's downtown on the eastbank and its westbank suburbs. Other bridges that cross the Mississippi River in the New Orleans area are the Huey P. Long Bridge, over which U.S. 90 travels, and the Hale Boggs Memorial Bridge, which carries Interstate 310.\n\nThe Twin Span Bridge, a five-mile (8 km) causeway in eastern New Orleans, carries I-10 across Lake Pontchartrain. Also in eastern New Orleans, Interstate 510/LA 47 travels across the Intracoastal Waterway/Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet Canal via the Paris Road Bridge, connecting New Orleans East and suburban Chalmette.\n\nThe tolled Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, consisting of two parallel bridges are, at 24 mi long, the longest bridges in the world. Built in the 1950s (southbound span) and 1960s (northbound span), the bridges connect New Orleans with its suburbs on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain via Metairie.\n\nAirports\n\nThe metropolitan area is served by the Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, located in the suburb of Kenner. New Orleans also has several regional airports located throughout the metropolitan area. These include the Lakefront Airport, Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base New Orleans (locally known as Callender Field) in the suburb of Belle Chasse and Southern Seaplane Airport, also located in Belle Chasse. Southern Seaplane has a 3200 ft runway for wheeled planes and a 5000 ft water runway for seaplanes. New Orleans International suffered some damage as a result of Hurricane Katrina, but as of April 2007, it contained the most traffic and is the busiest airport in the state of Louisiana and the sixth busiest in the Southeast.\n\nRail\n\nThe city is served by rail via Amtrak. The New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal is the central rail depot, and is served by three trains: the Crescent, operating between New Orleans and New York City; the City of New Orleans, operating between New Orleans and Chicago; and the Sunset Limited, operating through New Orleans between Orlando and Los Angeles. From late August 2005 to the present, the Sunset Limited has remained officially an Orlando-to-Los Angeles train, being considered temporarily truncated due to the lingering effects of Hurricane Katrina. At first (until late October 2005) it was truncated to a San Antonio-to-Los Angeles service; since then (from late October 2005 on) it has been truncated to a New Orleans-to-Los Angeles service. As time has passed, particularly since the January 2006 completion of the rebuilding of damaged tracks east of New Orleans by their owner, CSX Transportation, the obstacles to restoration of the Sunset Limited's full route have been more managerial and political than physical.\n\nWith the strategic benefits of both a major international port and one of the few double-track Mississippi River crossings, the city is served by six of the seven Class I railroads in North America: Union Pacific Railroad, BNSF Railway, Norfolk Southern Railway, Kansas City Southern Railway, CSX Transportation and Canadian National Railway. The New Orleans Public Belt Railroad provides interchange services between the railroads.\n\nRecently, many have proposed extending New Orleans' public transit system by adding light rail routes from downtown, along Airline Highway through the airport to Baton Rouge and from downtown to Slidell and the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Proponents of this idea claim that these new routes would boost the region's economy, which has been badly damaged by Hurricane Katrina, and serve as an evacuation option for hospital patients out of the city. \n\nFerries\n\nNew Orleans has had continuous ferry service since 1827, with three routes in current operation. The Canal Street Ferry (or Algiers Ferry) connects downtown New Orleans at the foot of Canal Street with the National Historic Landmark District of Algiers Point on the other side of the Mississippi River (\"West Bank\" in local parlance) and is popular with tourists and locals alike. This downtown ferry terminal also serves the Canal Street/Gretna Ferry, connecting Gretna, Louisiana. The Gretna Ferry serves pedestrians and bicyclists only. The Canal Street Ferry services passenger vehicles, bicycles and pedestrians, as does a third ferry miles downriver, connecting Chalmette, Louisiana and Lower Algiers.\n\nNotable people\n\nNicknames\n\nThe city's several nicknames are illustrative:\n\n* Crescent City alludes to the course of the Lower Mississippi River around and through the city. \n* The Big Easy was possibly a reference by musicians in the early 20th century to the relative ease of finding work there. It also may have originated in the Prohibition era, when the city was considered one big speak-easy due to the inability of the federal government to control alcohol sales in open violation of the 18th Amendment. The term was used by local columnist Betty Gillaud in the 1970s to contrast life in the city to that of New York City. The name also refers to New Orleans' status as a major city, at one time \"one of the cheapest places in America to live.\"\n* The City that Care Forgot has been used since at least 1938, and refers to the outwardly easy-going, carefree nature of many of the residents.\n* America's Most Interesting City appears on welcome signs at the city limits.\n* Hollywood South is a reference to the large number of films, big and small, shot in the city since 2002. Since 2005 the nickname has also frequently been applied to Shreveport, in northwestern Louisiana, which became an important location for movie and television production after Hurricane Katrina displaced shooting in New Orleans. \n* The Northernmost Caribbean City is a reference from The Boston Globe, as well as other travel guides due in part to the similarities of culture with the Caribbean islands.\n\nSister cities\n\nNew Orleans has ten sister cities: \n* Caracas, Venezuela\n* Durban, South Africa \n* Innsbruck, Austria\n* Juan-les-Pins, France\n* Maracaibo, Venezuela\n* Matsue, Shimane, Japan\n* Mérida, Yucatán, Mexico\n* Pointe-Noire, Republic of the Congo\n* San Miguel de Tucumán, Argentina\n* Tegucigalpa, Honduras\n\nTwinnings and Partnerships\n\n* Batumi, Georgia", "Dixieland, sometimes referred to as hot jazz or traditional jazz, is a style of jazz based on the music that developed in New Orleans at the start of the 20th century.\n\nThe first use of the term \"Dixieland\" with reference to music was in the name of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, whose 1917 recordings fostered popular awareness of the new style of music. At that time, there was no issue of subgenres of jazz, so \"Dixieland\" referred to the band and not the music. A revival movement for traditional jazz, formed in reaction to the orchestrated sounds of the swing era and the perceived chaos of the new bebop sounds of the 1940s (referred to as \"Chinese music\" by Louis Armstrong), pulled \"Dixieland\" out from the somewhat forgotten band's name for the music they championed. The revival movement included elements of the Chicago style that developed during the 1920s, such as the use of a string bass instead of a tuba, and chordal instruments, in addition to the original format of the New Orleans style. That reflected the fact that virtually all of the recorded repertoire of New Orleans musicians was from the period when the format was already evolving beyond the traditional New Orleans format. \"Dixieland\" may in that sense be regarded as denoting the jazz revival movement of the 1940s and 1950s as much as any particular subgenre of jazz. The essential elements that were accepted as within the style were the traditional front lines consisting of trumpets, trombones, and clarinets, and ensemble improvisation over a 2-beat rhythm.\n\nThe Dixieland revival renewed the audience for musicians who had continued to play in traditional jazz styles and revived the careers of New Orleans musicians who had become lost in the shuffle of musical styles that had occurred over the preceding 20 to 25 years. Younger black musicians largely shunned the revival, largely because of a distaste for tailoring their music to what they saw as nostalgia entertainment for white audiences with whom they did not share such nostalgia. The Jim Crow associations of the name \"Dixieland\" also did little to attract younger black musicians to the revival.\n\nThe Dixieland revival music during the 1940s and 1950s gained a broad audience that established traditional jazz as an enduring part of the American cultural landscape, and spawned revival movements in Europe. Well-known jazz standard tunes such as \"Basin Street Blues\" and \"When the Saints Go Marching In\" are known even to non-jazz fans thanks to the enduring popularity of traditional jazz. The Vietnam-era protest song \"Feel Like I'm Fixin' to Die Rag\" is based on tonal centers and the \"B\" refrain from the New Orleans standard \"Muskrat Ramble\". Traditional jazz is a major tourist attraction for New Orleans to the present day. It has been an influence on the styles of more modern players such as Charles Mingus and Steve Coleman.\n\nNew Orleans music combined earlier brass band marches, French quadrilles, biguine, ragtime, and blues with collective, polyphonic improvisation. The \"standard\" band consists of a \"front line\" of trumpet (or cornet), trombone, and clarinet, with a \"rhythm section\" of at least two of the following instruments: guitar or banjo, string bass or tuba, piano, and drums. The Dixieland sound is created when one instrument (usually the trumpet) plays the melody or a variation on it, and the other instruments improvise around that melody. This creates a more polyphonic sound than the heavily arranged big band sound of the 1930s or the straight melodies (with or without harmonizing) of bebop in the 1940s.\n\nThe \"West Coast revival\" began in the late 1930s in San Francisco which used banjo and tuba. The Dutch \"old-style jazz\" was played with trumpets, trombones and saxophones accompanied by a single clarinet, sousaphone and a section of Marching percussion usually including a washboard.\n\nHistory\n\nDixieland is the name given to early jazz styles by traditional jazz revivalists, starting in the 1940s and 1950s. The name is a reference to the \"Old South\", specifically anything south of the Mason-Dixon line. The term encompasses earlier brass band marches, French Quadrilles, biguine, ragtime, and blues with collective, polyphonic improvisation. While instrumentation and size of bands can be very flexible, the \"standard\" band consists of a \"front line\" of trumpet (or cornet), trombone, and clarinet, with a \"rhythm section\" of at least two of the following instruments: guitar or banjo, string bass or tuba, piano, and drums. Louis Armstrong's All-Stars was the band most popularly identified with Dixieland during the 1940s, although Armstrong's own influence was to move the music beyond the traditional New Orleans style.\n\nThe definitive Dixieland sound is created when one instrument (usually the trumpet) plays the melody or a recognizable paraphrase or variation on it, and the other instruments of the \"front line\" improvise around that melody. This creates a more polyphonic sound than the arranged ensemble playing of the big band sound or the straight \"head\" melodies of bebop.\n\nDuring the 1930s and 1940s, the earlier group-improvisation style fell out of favor with the majority of younger black players, while some older players of both races continued on in the older style. Though younger musicians developed new forms, many beboppers revered Armstrong and quoted fragments of his recorded music in their own improvisations.\n\nThe Dixieland revival in the late 1940s and 1950s brought many semi-retired musicians a measure of fame late in their lives as well as bringing retired musicians back onto the jazz circuit after years of not playing (e.g., Kid Ory and Red Nichols). Many Dixieland groups of the revival era consciously imitated the recordings and bands of decades earlier. Other musicians continued to create innovative performances and new tunes. For example, in the 1950s a style called \"Progressive Dixieland\" sought to blend polyphonic improvisation with bebop-style rhythm. Spike Jones & His New Band and Steve Lacy played with such bands. This style is sometimes called \"Dixie-bop\". Lacy went on to apply that approach to the music of Thelonious Monk, Charles Mingus, Duke Ellington, and Herbie Nichols.\n\nEtymology\n\nWhile the term Dixieland is still in wide use, the term's appropriateness is a hotly debated topic in some circles. For some it is the preferred label (especially bands on the USA's West coast and those influenced by the 1940s revival bands), while others would rather use terms like Classic jazz or Traditional jazz. Some of the latter consider Dixieland a derogatory term implying superficial hokum played without passion or deep understanding of the music and because \"Dixie\" is a reference to pre Civil War Southern States.\n\nDixieland is often today applied to bands playing in a traditional style. Bands such as those of Eddie Condon and Muggsy Spanier were tagged with the Dixieland label.\n\nModern Dixieland\n\nToday there are three main active streams of Dixieland jazz:\n\nChicago style\n\n\"Chicago style\" is often applied to the sound of Chicagoans such as Jimmy McPartland, Eddie Condon, Muggsy Spanier, and Bud Freeman. The rhythm sections of these bands substitute the string bass for the tuba and the guitar for the banjo. Musically, the Chicagoans play in more of a swing-style 4-to-the-bar manner. The New Orleanian preference for an ensemble sound is deemphasized in favor of solos. Chicago-style dixieland also differs from its southern origin by being faster paced, resembling the hustle-bustle of city life. Chicago-style bands play a wide variety of tunes, including most of those of the more traditional bands plus many of the Great American Songbook selections from the 1930s by George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, and Irving Berlin. Non-Chicagoans such as Pee Wee Russell and Bobby Hackett are often thought of as playing in this style. This modernized style came to be called Nicksieland, after Nick's Greenwich Village night club, where it was popular, though the term was not limited to that club.\n\nWest Coast revival\n\nThe \"West Coast revival\" is a movement that was began in the late 1930s by Lu Watters and his Yerba Buena Jazz Band in San Francisco and extended by trombonist Turk Murphy. It started out as a backlash to the Chicago style, which is closer in development towards swing. The repertoire of these bands is based on the music of Joe \"King\" Oliver, Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong, and W.C. Handy. Bands playing in the West Coast style use banjo and tuba in the rhythm sections, which play in a two-to-the-bar rhythmic style.\n\nFamous traditional Dixieland tunes include: \"When the Saints Go Marching In\", \"Muskrat Ramble\", \"Struttin' with Some Barbecue\", \"Tiger Rag\", \"Dippermouth Blues\", \"Milenberg Joys\", \"Basin Street Blues\", \"Tin Roof Blues\", \"At the Jazz Band Ball\", \"Panama\", \"I Found a New Baby\", \"Royal Garden Blues\" and many others. All of these tunes were widely played by jazz bands of the pre-WWII era, especially Louis Armstrong. They came to be grouped as Dixieland standards beginning in the 1950s.\n\nDutch \"Old-style jazz\"\n\nLargely occurring at the same time as the \"New Orleans Traditional\" revival movement in the United States, traditional jazz music made a come-back in the Low Countries. However, most Dutch jazz bands (such as The Ramblers) had long since evolved into the Swing-era while the few remaining traditional jazz bands (such as the Dutch Swing College Band) did not partake in the broader traditional revival movement, and continued to play ragtime and early jazz, greatly limiting the number of bands aspiring jazz musicians could join or (as they were using instruments unavailable to most Dutch musicians such as double basses and the piano) were forced to improvise, resulting in a new form of jazz ensemble generally referred to \"Oude Stijl\" (\"Old Style\") jazz in Dutch.\n\nInfluenced by the instrumentation of the two principal orchestral forms of the wind band in the Netherlands and Belgium, the \"harmonie\" and the \"fanfare\", traditional Dutch jazz bands do not feature a piano and contain no stringed instruments apart from the banjo. They include multiple trumpets, trombones and saxophones accompanied by a single clarinet, sousaphone and a section of Marching percussion usually including a washboard.\n\nThe music played by Dutch jazz bands includes both the original New Orleans tunes, as well as the songs of the revival era. In terms of playing style, Dutch jazz bands occupy a position between revivalist and original New Orleans jazz, with more solos than the latter but without abandoning the principle of ensemble playing. With the average band containing up to 15-players, Dutch jazz bands tend to be the largest ensembles to play traditional jazz music.\n\nStyles influenced by traditional jazz\n\nMusical styles showing influences from traditional jazz include later styles of jazz, rhythm and blues, and early rock and roll. Traditional New Orleans second-line drumming and piano playing are prominent in the music of Fats Domino. The New Orleans drummer Idriss Muhammed adapted second-line drumming to modern jazz styles and gained crossover influence on the R&B style of James Brown. Charles Mingus paid homage to traditional jazz styles with compositions such as Eat Dat Chicken and My Jellyroll Soul. The contemporary New Orleans Brass Band styles, such as the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, The Primate Fiasco, the Hot Tamale Brass Band and the Rebirth Brass Band have combined traditional New Orleans brass band jazz with such influences as contemporary jazz, funk, hip hop, and rap. The M-BASE (Multi-Basic Array of Synchronous Extemporization) improvisational concept used by ensembles including Cassandra Wilson, Geri Allen, Greg Osby, Steve Coleman, Graham Haynes, Kevin Eubanks and others is an extension of the polyphonic improvisation of New Orleans jazz.\n\nPartial list of Dixieland musicians\n\nSome of the artists historically identified with Dixieland are mentioned in List of jazz musicians. Some of the best-selling and famous Dixieland artists of the post-WWII era:\n* Louis Armstrong All-Stars, organized in the late 1940s, featured at various times Earl \"Fatha\" Hines, Barney Bigard, Edmond Hall, Jack Teagarden, Trummy Young, Arvell Shaw, Billy Kyle, Marty Napoleon, Big Sid Catlett, Cozy Cole, Barrett Deems and Danny Barcelona.\n* Kenny Ball, had a top-40 hit with \"Midnight in Moscow\" in the early 1960s, is a leader of the British Trad movement.\n* Eddie Condon, guitarist who led bands and ran a series of nightclubs in New York City and had a popular radio series. Successor bands played until the 1970s, and their mainstream style is still heard today, especially in touring bands led by cornetist Ed Polcer who was a co-owner of Condon's last nightclub in New York.\n* Jim Cullum Jazz Band, led by cornetist Jim Cullum, based in San Antonio, Texas. Founded in 1962 in partnership with his late father, was originally known as the Happy Jazz Band. The Jim Cullum Jazz Band is currently featured on the long-running USA public radio series, [http://www.riverwalk.org/ Riverwalk Jazz]. Cullum's [http://landing.com/ Landing Jazz Club] has been in continuous operation on the San Antonio Riverwalk since 1963.\n* The Mission City Hot Rhythm Cats, co-led by cornetist David Jellema and former Jim Cullum Jazz Band trombonist Mike Pittsley, is a relatively new 6-piece San Antonio-based traditional jazz band composed of many former JCJB members.\n* Steamboat Willie, a veteran musician of Dixieland, jazz and ragtime music still playing at the Cafe Beignet in New Orleans today.\n* The Dukes of Dixieland, the Assunto family band of New Orleans. A successor band continues on in New Orleans today.\n* Pete Fountain, clarinetist who led popular bands in New Orleans, retired recently.\n* Al Hirt, trumpeter who had a string of top-40 hits in the 1960s, led bands in New Orleans until his death.\n* Ward Kimball, leader of the Firehouse Five Plus Two based in Los Angeles.\n* George Lewis was a New Orleans clarinetist featured at Preservation Hall in the 1960s, also led his own band.\n* Turk Murphy, trombonist who led a band at Earthquake McGoons and other San Francisco venues from the late 1940s through the 1970s.\n* Chris Tyle, cornetist, trumpeter, drummer, clarinetist, saxophonist, leader of the Silver Leaf Jazz Band. Also known as a jazz writer and educator. A member of the Jazz Journalists Association.\n\nFestivals\n\n* In the United States, the largest traditional jazz festival, the Sacramento Jazz Jubilee, is held in Sacramento, California annually on Memorial Day weekend, with about 100,000 visitors and about 150 bands from all over the world. Other smaller festivals and jazz parties arose in the late 1960s as the rock revolution displaced many of the jazz nightclubs.\n* The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival in New Orleans, Louisiana features jazz and many other genres by local, national, and internationally known artists.\n* In Tarragona, Catalonia, the Tarragona International Dixieland Festival (Catalan: Festival Internacional Dixieland de Tarragona), Spain's only dixieland festival, has been held annually the week before Easter, since 1994, with 25 bands from all over the world and 100 performances in streets, theatres, cafés and hotels.\n* In Dresden, Germany, a week-long international Dixieland festival has been held every year since 1970. The event culminates in a parade with floats.\n* In Davenport, Iowa, the Bix Beiderbecke Memorial Jazz Festival is held on the Mississippi River waterfront each summer celebrating Dixieland music and the life of cornetist Bix Beiderbecke, a 1920s musician from Davenport. It is combined with a prestigious road race, the \"Bix 7\".\n* In Ghent, Belgium, every year during the second week of July there is an international Jazz festival\n\nPeriodicals\n\nThere are several active periodicals devoted to traditional jazz: The Mississippi Rag, the Jazz Rambler, and the American Rag published in the US; and to an extent Jazz Journal published in Europe.\n\nQuotations", "Jazz is a music genre that originated from African American communities of New Orleans in the United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It emerged in the form of independent traditional and popular musical styles, all linked by the common bonds of African American and European American musical parentage with a performance orientation. Jazz spans a period of over a hundred years, encompassing a very wide range of music, making it difficult to define. Jazz makes heavy use of improvisation, polyrhythms, syncopation and the swing note, as well as aspects of European harmony, American popular music, the brass band tradition, and African musical elements such as blue notes and African-American styles such as ragtime. Although the foundation of jazz is deeply rooted within the black experience of the United States, different cultures have contributed their own experience and styles to the art form as well. Intellectuals around the world have hailed jazz as \"one of America's original art forms\". \n\nAs jazz spread around the world, it drew on different national, regional, and local musical cultures, which gave rise to many distinctive styles. New Orleans jazz began in the early 1910s, combining earlier brass-band marches, French quadrilles, biguine, ragtime and blues with collective polyphonic improvisation. In the 1930s, heavily arranged dance-oriented swing big bands, Kansas City jazz, a hard-swinging, bluesy, improvisational style and Gypsy jazz (a style that emphasized musette waltzes) were the prominent styles. Bebop emerged in the 1940s, shifting jazz from danceable popular music toward a more challenging \"musician's music\" which was played at faster tempos and used more chord-based improvisation. Cool jazz developed in the end of the 1940s, introducing calmer, smoother sounds and long, linear melodic lines.\n\nThe 1950s saw the emergence of free jazz, which explored playing without regular meter, beat and formal structures, and in the mid-1950s, hard bop emerged, which introduced influences from rhythm and blues, gospel, and blues, especially in the saxophone and piano playing. Modal jazz developed in the late 1950s, using the mode, or musical scale, as the basis of musical structure and improvisation. Jazz-rock fusion appeared in the late 1960s and early 1970s, combining jazz improvisation with rock music's rhythms, electric instruments and the highly amplified stage sound. In the early 1980s, a commercial form of jazz fusion called smooth jazz became successful, garnering significant radio airplay. Other styles and genres abound in the 2000s, such as Latin and Afro-Cuban jazz.\n\nEtymology and definition\n\nThe question of the origin of the word jazz has resulted in considerable research, and its history is well documented. It is believed to be related to jasm, a slang term dating back to 1860 meaning \"pep, energy.\" The earliest written record of the word is in a 1912 article in the Los Angeles Times in which a minor league baseball pitcher described a pitch which he called a jazz ball \"because it wobbles and you simply can’t do anything with it.\" \n\nThe use of the word in a musical context was documented as early as 1915 in the Chicago Daily Tribune. Archived at Observatoire Musical Français, Paris-Sorbonne University. Its first documented use in a musical context in New Orleans was in a November 14, 1916 Times-Picayune article about \"jas bands.\" In an interview with NPR, musician Eubie Blake offered his recollections of the original slang connotations of the term, saying: \"When Broadway picked it up, they called it 'J-A-Z-Z.. It wasn't called that. It was spelled 'J-A-S-S.' That was dirty, and if you knew what it was, you wouldn't say it in front of ladies.\" The American Dialect Society named it the Word of the Twentieth Century. \n\nJazz has proved to be very difficult to define, since it encompasses such a wide range of music spanning a period of over 100 years, from ragtime to the 2010-era rock-infused fusion. Attempts have been made to define jazz from the perspective of other musical traditions, such as European music history or African music. But critic Joachim-Ernst Berendt argues that its terms of reference and its definition should be broader, defining jazz as a \"form of art music which originated in the United States through the confrontation of the Negro with European music\" and arguing that it differs from European music in that jazz has a \"special relationship to time defined as 'swing'\", involves \"a spontaneity and vitality of musical production in which improvisation plays a role\" and contains a \"sonority and manner of phrasing which mirror the individuality of the performing jazz musician\". In the opinion of Robert Christgau, \"most of us would say that inventing meaning while letting loose is the essence and promise of jazz.\" \n \nA broader definition that encompasses all of the radically different eras of jazz has been proposed by Travis Jackson: \"it is music that includes qualities such as swing, improvising, group interaction, developing an 'individual voice', and being open to different musical possibilities\". Krin Gibbard has provided an overview of the discussion on definitions, arguing that \"jazz is a construct\" that, while artificial, still is useful to designate \"a number of musics with enough in common to be understood as part of a coherent tradition\". In contrast to the efforts of commentators and enthusiasts of certain types of jazz, who have argued for narrower definitions that exclude other types, the musicians themselves are often reluctant to define the music they play. As Duke Ellington, one of jazz's most famous figures, said: \"It's all music\". \n\nElements and issues\n\nImprovisation\n\nAlthough jazz is considered highly difficult to define, at least in part because it contains so many varied subgenres, improvisation is consistently regarded as being one of its key elements. The centrality of improvisation in jazz is attributed to influential earlier forms of music: the early blues, a form of folk music which arose in part from the work songs and field hollers of the African-American slaves on plantations. These were commonly structured around a repetitive call-and-response pattern, but early blues was also highly improvisational. European classical music performance is evaluated by its fidelity to the musical score, with much less discretion over interpretation, ornamentation and accompaniment: the classical performer's primary goal is to play a composition as it was written. In contrast, jazz is often characterized as the product of group creativity, interaction, and collaboration, which places varying degrees of value on the contributions of composer (if there is one) and performers. In jazz, the skilled performer will interpret a tune in very individual ways, never playing the same composition the same way twice; depending on the performer's mood and personal experience, interactions with other musicians, or even members of the audience, a jazz musician may alter melodies, harmonies or time signature at will. \n\nThe approach to improvisation has developed enormously over the history of the music. In early New Orleans and Dixieland jazz, performers took turns playing the melody, while others improvised countermelodies. By the swing era, big bands were coming to rely more on arranged music: arrangements were either written or learned by ear and memorized, while individual soloists would improvise within these arrangements. Later, in bebop the focus shifted back toward small groups and minimal arrangements; the melody would be stated briefly at the start and end of a piece, but the core of the performance would be the series of improvisations. Later styles such as modal jazz abandoned the strict notion of a chord progression, allowing the individual musicians to improvise even more freely within the context of a given scale or mode. In many forms of jazz, a soloist is often supported by a rhythm section consisting of one or more chordal instruments (piano, guitar, etc.), double bass playing the basslines and drum kit. These performers provide accompaniment by playing chords and rhythms that outline the song structure and complement the soloist. In avant-garde and free jazz idioms, the separation of soloist and band is reduced, and there is license, or even a requirement, for the abandoning of chords, scales and rhythmic meters.\n\nTradition and race\n\nSince at least the emergence of bebop, forms of jazz that are commercially oriented or influenced by popular music have been criticized by purists. According to Bruce Johnson, there has always been a \"tension between jazz as a commercial music and an art form\". Traditional jazz enthusiasts have dismissed bebop, free jazz, the 1970s jazz fusion era and much else as periods of debasement of the music and betrayals of the tradition. An alternative viewpoint is that jazz is able to absorb and transform influences from diverse musical styles, and that, by avoiding the creation of 'norms', other newer, avant-garde forms of jazz will be free to emerge.\n\nTo some African Americans, jazz has highlighted their contribution to American society and helped bring attention to black history and culture, but for others, the music and term \"jazz\" are reminders of \"an oppressive and racist society and restrictions on their artistic visions\". Amiri Baraka argues that there is a distinct \"white jazz\" music genre expressive of whiteness. White jazz musicians appeared in the early 1920s in the Midwestern United States, as well as other areas. Bix Beiderbecke was one of the most prominent white jazz musicians. An influential style referred to as the Chicago School (or Chicago Style) was developed by white musicians including Bud Freeman, Jimmy McPartland. Frank Teschemacher, Dave Tough, and Eddie Condon. Others from Chicago such as Benny Goodman and Gene Krupa became leading members of big-band swing during the 1930s. \n\nRole of women\n\nWomen jazz performers and composers have contributed throughout jazz history. While women such as Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Dinah Washington, Ethel Waters, Betty Carter, Adelaide Hall, Abbey Lincoln, and Anita O'Day are famous for their jazz singing, women have achieved much less recognition for their contributions as composers, bandleaders, and instrumental performers. Other notable jazz women include piano player Lil Hardin Armstrong and jazz songwriters Irene Higginbotham (1918-1988) and Dorothy Fields (1905-1974). Women began playing instruments in jazz in the early 1920s, with the piano being one of the earliest instruments used which allowed female artists a degree of social acceptance. Some well known artists of the time include Sweet Emma Barrett, Mary Lou Williams, Billie Pierce, Jeanette Kimball and Lovie Austin.\n\nWhen the men were drafted for WWII, many all-women big band jazz bands took over. The International Sweethearts of Rhythm (founded 1937) was a well-known jazz group of this era, becoming the first all-women integrated band in the U.S., touring Europe in 1945 and becoming the first black women to travel with the USO. The dress codes of the era required women to wear strapless dresses and high heeled shoes, which was somewhat of a hindrance to the integration of women into the big bands of suit-wearing men. Nevertheless, women were hired into many of the big-league big bands such as Woody Herman and Gerald Wilson.\n\nHistory\n\nJazz originated in the late 19th to early 20th century as interpretations of American and European classical music entwined with African and slave folk songs and the influences of West African culture. Its composition and style have changed many times throughout the years with each performer's personal interpretation and improvisation, which is also one of the greatest appeals of the genre.\n\nOrigins\n\nBlended African and European music sensibilities\n\nBy 1866, the Atlantic slave trade had brought nearly 400,000 Africans to North America. The slaves came largely from West Africa and the greater Congo River basin, and brought strong musical traditions with them. The African traditions primarily make use of a single-line melody and call-and-response pattern, and the rhythms have a counter-metric structure and reflect African speech patterns.\n\nLavish festivals featuring African-based dances to drums were organized on Sundays at Place Congo, or Congo Square, in New Orleans until 1843. There are historical accounts of other music and dance gatherings elsewhere in the southern United States. Robert Palmer said of percussive slave music:\n\nUsually such music was associated with annual festivals, when the year's crop was harvested and several days were set aside for celebration. As late as 1861, a traveler in North Carolina saw dancers dressed in costumes that included horned headdresses and cow tails and heard music provided by a sheepskin-covered \"gumbo box\", apparently a frame drum; triangles and jawbones furnished the auxiliary percussion. There are quite a few [accounts] from the southeastern states and Louisiana dating from the period 1820–1850. Some of the earliest [Mississippi] Delta settlers came from the vicinity of New Orleans, where drumming was never actively discouraged for very long and homemade drums were used to accompany public dancing until the outbreak of the Civil War. \n\nAnother influence came from the harmonic style of hymns of the church, which black slaves had learned and incorporated into their own music as spirituals. The origins of the blues are undocumented, though they can be seen as the secular counterpart of the spirituals. However, as Gerhard Kubik points out, whereas the spirituals are homophonic, rural blues and early jazz \"was largely based on concepts of heterophony.\" \n\nDuring the early 19th century an increasing number of black musicians learned to play European instruments, particularly the violin, which they used to parody European dance music in their own cakewalk dances. In turn, European-American minstrel show performers in blackface popularized the music internationally, combining syncopation with European harmonic accompaniment. In the mid-1800s the white New Orleans composer Louis Moreau Gottschalk adapted slave rhythms and melodies from Cuba and other Caribbean islands into piano salon music. New Orleans was the main nexus between the Afro-Caribbean and African-American cultures.\n\nAfrican rhythmic retention\n\nThe \"Black Codes\" outlawed drumming by slaves, which meant that African drumming traditions were not preserved in North America, unlike in Cuba, Haiti, and elsewhere in the Caribbean. African-based rhythmic patterns were retained in the United States in large part through \"body rhythms\" such as stomping, clapping, and patting juba. \n\nIn the opinion of jazz historian Ernest Borneman, what preceded New Orleans jazz before 1890 was \"Afro-Latin music\", similar to what was played in the Caribbean at the time. A three-stroke pattern known in Cuban music as tresillo is a fundamental rhythmic figure heard in many different slave musics of the Caribbean, as well as the Afro-Caribbean folk dances performed in New Orleans Congo Square and Gottschalk's compositions (for example \"Souvenirs From Havana\" (1859)). Tresillo is the most basic and most prevalent duple-pulse rhythmic cell in sub-Saharan African music traditions and the music of the African Diaspora. \n\nTresillo is heard prominently in New Orleans second line music and in other forms of popular music from that city from the turn of the 20th century to present. \"By and large the simpler African rhythmic patterns survived in jazz ... because they could be adapted more readily to European rhythmic conceptions,\" the Jazz historian Gunther Schuller observed. \"Some survived, others were discarded as the Europeanization progressed.\" \n\nIn the post-Civil War period (after 1865), African Americans were able to obtain surplus military bass drums, snare drums and fifes, and an original African-American drum and fife music emerged, featuring tresillo and related syncopated rhythmic figures. This was a drumming tradition that was distinct from its Caribbean counterparts, expressing a uniquely African-American sensibility. \"The snare and bass drummers played syncopated cross-rhythms,\" observed the writer Robert Palmer (writer), speculating that \"this tradition must have dated back to the latter half of the nineteenth century, and it could have not have developed in the first place if there hadn't been a reservoir of polyrhythmic sophistication in the culture it nurtured.\" \n\n\"Spanish tinge\"—the Afro-Cuban rhythmic influence\n\nAfrican-American music began incorporating Afro-Cuban rhythmic motifs in the 19th century, when the habanera (Cuban contradanza) gained international popularity. Musicians from Havana and New Orleans would take the twice-daily ferry between both cities to perform, and the habanera quickly took root in the musically fertile Crescent City. John Storm Roberts states that the musical genre habanera \"reached the U.S. twenty years before the first rag was published.\" For the more than quarter-century in which the cakewalk, ragtime, and proto-jazz were forming and developing, the habanera was a consistent part of African-American popular music. \n\nHabaneras were widely available as sheet music, and were the first written music which was rhythmically based on an African motif (1803), From the perspective of African-American music, the habanera rhythm (also known as congo, tango-congo, or tango. ) can be thought of as a combination of tresillo and the backbeat. The habanera was the first of many Cuban music genres which enjoyed periods of popularity in the United States, and reinforced and inspired the use of tresillo-based rhythms in African-American music.\n\nNew Orleans native Louis Moreau Gottschalk's piano piece \"Ojos Criollos (Danse Cubaine)\" (1860) was influenced by the composer's studies in Cuba: the habanera rhythm is clearly heard in the left hand. In Gottschalk's symphonic work \"A Night in the Tropics\" (1859), the tresillo variant cinquillo appears extensively. The figure was later used by Scott Joplin and other ragtime composers.\n\nComparing the music of New Orleans with the music of Cuba, Wynton Marsalis observes that tresillo is the New Orleans \"clave\", a Spanish word meaning 'code' or 'key', as in the key to a puzzle, or mystery. Although technically the pattern is only half a clave, Marsalis makes the point that the single-celled figure is the guide-pattern of New Orleans music. Jelly Roll Morton called the rhythmic figure the Spanish tinge, and considered it an essential ingredient of jazz. \n\n1890s–1910s\n\nRagtime\n\nThe abolition of slavery in 1865 led to new opportunities for the education of freed African Americans. Although strict segregation limited employment opportunities for most blacks, many were able to find work in entertainment. Black musicians were able to provide entertainment in dances, minstrel shows, and in vaudeville, during which time many marching bands were formed. Black pianists played in bars, clubs and brothels, as ragtime developed. \n\nRagtime appeared as sheet music, popularized by African-American musicians such as the entertainer Ernest Hogan, whose hit songs appeared in 1895. Two years later, Vess Ossman recorded a medley of these songs as a banjo solo known as \"Rag Time Medley\". Also in 1897, the white composer William H. Krell published his \"Mississippi Rag\" as the first written piano instrumental ragtime piece, and Tom Turpin published his \"Harlem Rag\", the first rag published by an African-American.\n\nThe classically trained pianist Scott Joplin produced his \"Original Rags\" in 1898, and in 1899 had an international hit with \"Maple Leaf Rag\", a multi-strain ragtime march with four parts that feature recurring themes and a bass line with copious seventh chords. Its structure was the basis for many other rags, and the syncopations in the right hand, especially in the transition between the first and second strain, were novel at the time. \n\nAfrican-based rhythmic patterns such as tresillo and its variants, the habanera rhythm and cinquillo, are heard in the ragtime compositions of Joplin, Turpin, and others. Joplin's \"Solace\" (1909) is generally considered to be within the habanera genre: both of the pianist's hands play in a syncopated fashion, completely abandoning any sense of a march rhythm. Ned Sublette postulates that the tresillo/habanera rhythm \"found its way into ragtime and the cakewalk,\" whilst Roberts suggests that \"the habanera influence may have been part of what freed black music from ragtime's European bass.\" \n\nBlues\n\nAfrican genesis\n\nBlues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre, which originated in African-American communities of primarily the \"Deep South\" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from their spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants and rhymed simple narrative ballads. \n\nThe African use of pentatonic scales contributed to the development of blue notes in blues and jazz. As Kubik explains:\nMany of the rural blues of the Deep South are stylistically an extension and merger of basically two broad accompanied song-style traditions in the west central Sudanic belt:\n* A strongly Arabic/Islamic song style, as found for example among the Hausa. It is characterized by melisma, wavy intonation, pitch instabilities within a pentatonic framework, and a declamatory voice.\n* An ancient west central Sudanic stratum of pentatonic song composition, often associated with simple work rhythms in a regular meter, but with notable off-beat accents (1999: 94). \n\nW. C. Handy: early published blues\n\nW. C. Handy became intrigued by the folk blues of the Deep South whilst traveling through the Mississippi Delta. In this folk blues form, the singer would improvise freely within a limited melodic range, sounding like a field holler, and the guitar accompaniment was slapped rather than strummed, like a small drum which responded in syncopated accents, functioning as another \"voice\". Handy and his band members were formally trained African-American musicians who had not grown up with the blues, yet he was able to adapt the blues to a larger band instrument format, and arrange them in a popular music form.\n\nHandy wrote about his adopting of the blues:\n\nThe primitive southern Negro, as he sang, was sure to bear down on the third and seventh tone of the scale, slurring between major and minor. Whether in the cotton field of the Delta or on the Levee up St. Louis way, it was always the same. Till then, however, I had never heard this slur used by a more sophisticated Negro, or by any white man. I tried to convey this effect ... by introducing flat thirds and sevenths (now called blue notes) into my song, although its prevailing key was major ..., and I carried this device into my melody as well. \n\nThe publication of his \"Memphis Blues\" sheet music in 1912 introduced the 12-bar blues to the world (although Gunther Schuller argues that it is not really a blues, but \"more like a cakewalk\" ). This composition, as well as his later \"St. Louis Blues\" and others, included the habanera rhythm,W. C. Handy, Father of the Blues: An Autobiography, edited by Arna Bontemps: foreword by Abbe Niles. Macmillan Company, New York; (1941), pp. 99, 100 (no ISBN in this first printing). and would become jazz standards. Handy's music career began in the pre-jazz era, and contributed to the codification of jazz through the publication of some of the first jazz sheet music.\n\nWithin the context of Western harmony\n\nThe blues form which is ubiquitous in jazz is characterized by specific chord progressions, of which the twelve-bar blues progression is the most common. An important part of the sound are the blue notes which, for expressive purposes, are sung or played flattened, or gradually bent (minor 3rd to major 3rd) in relation to the pitch of the major scale. The blues were the key that opened up an entirely new approach to Western harmony, ultimately leading to a high level of harmonic complexity in jazz.\n\nNew Orleans\n\nThe music of New Orleans had a profound effect on the creation of early jazz. Many early jazz performers played in venues throughout the city, such as the brothels and bars of the red-light district around Basin Street, known as \"Storyville\". In addition to dance bands, there were numerous marching bands who played at lavish funerals (later called jazz funerals), which were arranged by the African-American and European American communities. The instruments used in marching bands and dance bands became the basic instruments of jazz: brass, reeds tuned in the European 12-tone scale, and drums. Small bands which mixed self-taught and well educated African-American musicians, many of whom came from the funeral-procession tradition of New Orleans, played a seminal role in the development and dissemination of early jazz. These bands travelled throughout Black communities in the Deep South and, from around 1914 onwards, Afro-Creole and African-American musicians played in vaudeville shows which took jazz to western and northern US cities.\n\nIn New Orleans, a white marching band leader named Papa Jack Laine integrated blacks and whites in his marching band. Laine was known as \"the father of white jazz\" because of the many top players who passed through his bands (including George Brunies, Sharkey Bonano and the future members of the Original Dixieland Jass Band). Laine was a good talent scout. During the early 1900s jazz was mostly done in the African-American and mulatto communities, due to segregation laws. The red light district of Storyville, New Orleans was crucial in bringing jazz music to a wider audience via tourists who came to the port city. Many jazz musicians from the African-American communities were hired to perform live music in brothels and bars, including many early jazz pioneers such as Buddy Bolden and Jelly Roll Morton, in addition to those from New Orleans other communities such as Lorenzo Tio and Alcide Nunez. Louis Armstrong also got his start in Storyville and would later find success in Chicago (along with others from New Orleans) after the United States government shut down Storyville in 1917. \n\nSyncopation\n\nThe cornetist Buddy Bolden led a band who are often mentioned as one of the prime originators of the style later to be called \"jazz\". He played in New Orleans around 1895–1906, before developing a mental illness; there are no recordings of him playing. Bolden's band is credited with creating the big four, the first syncopated bass drum pattern to deviate from the standard on-the-beat march. As the example below shows, the second half of the big four pattern is the habanera rhythm.\n\nAfro-Creole pianist Jelly Roll Morton began his career in Storyville. From 1904, he toured with vaudeville shows around southern cities, also playing in Chicago and New York. In 1905 he composed his \"Jelly Roll Blues\", which on its publication in 1915 became the first jazz arrangement in print, introducing more musicians to the New Orleans style. \n\nMorton considered the tresillo/habanera (which he called the Spanish tinge) to be an essential ingredient of jazz. In his own words: Now in one of my earliest tunes, \"New Orleans Blues,\" you can notice the Spanish tinge. In fact, if you can't manage to put tinges of Spanish in your tunes, you will never be able to get the right seasoning, I call it, for jazz.\n\nMorton was a crucial innovator in the evolution from the early jazz form known as ragtime to jazz piano, and could perform pieces in either style; in 1938, Morton made a series of recordings for the Library of Congress, in which he demonstrated the difference between the two styles. Morton's solos however were still close to ragtime, and were not merely improvisations over chord changes as in later jazz; but his use of the blues was of equal importance.\n\nSwing\n\nMorton loosened ragtime's rigid rhythmic feeling, decreasing its embellishments and employing a swing feeling. Swing is the most important and enduring African-based rhythmic technique used in jazz. An oft quoted definition of swing by Louis Armstrong is: \"if you don't feel it, you'll never know it.\" The New Harvard Dictionary of Music states that swing is: \"An intangible rhythmic momentum in jazz ... Swing defies analysis; claims to its presence may inspire arguments.\" The dictionary does nonetheless provide the useful description of triple subdivisions of the beat contrasted with duple subdivisions: swing superimposes six subdivisions of the beat over a basic pulse structure or four subdivisions. This aspect of swing is far more prevalent in African-American music than in Afro-Caribbean music. One aspect of swing, which is heard in more rhythmically complex Diaspora musics, places strokes in-between the triple and duple-pulse \"grids\". \n\nNew Orleans brass bands are a lasting influence, contributing horn players to the world of professional jazz with the distinct sound of the city whilst helping black children escape poverty. The leader of New Orleans' Camelia Brass Band, D'Jalma Ganier, taught Louis Armstrong to play trumpet; Armstrong would then popularize the New Orleans style of trumpet playing, and then expand it. Like Jelly Roll Morton, Armstrong is also credited with the abandonment of ragtime's stiffness in favor of swung notes. Armstrong, perhaps more than any other musician, codified the rhythmic technique of swing in jazz, and broadened the jazz solo vocabulary. \n\nThe Original Dixieland Jass Band made the music's first recordings early in 1917, and their \"Livery Stable Blues\" became the earliest released jazz record. That year, numerous other bands made recordings featuring \"jazz\" in the title or band name, but most were ragtime or novelty records rather than jazz. In February 1918 during World War I, James Reese Europe's \"Hellfighters\" infantry band took ragtime to Europe, then on their return recorded Dixieland standards including \"Darktown Strutters' Ball\".\n\nOther regions\n\nIn the northeastern United States, a \"hot\" style of playing ragtime had developed, notably James Reese Europe's symphonic Clef Club orchestra in New York, which played a benefit concert at Carnegie Hall in 1912. The Baltimore rag style of Eubie Blake influenced James P. Johnson's development of stride piano playing, in which the right hand plays the melody, while the left hand provides the rhythm and bassline. \n\nIn Ohio and elsewhere in the midwest the major influence was ragtime, until about 1919. Around 1912, when the four-string banjo and saxophone came in, musicians began to improvise the melody line, but the harmony and rhythm remained unchanged. A contemporary account states that blues could only be heard in jazz in the gut-bucket cabarets, which were generally looked down upon by the Black middle-class. \n\n1920s and 1930s\n\nJazz Age\n\n From 1920 to 1933 Prohibition in the United States banned the sale of alcoholic drinks, resulting in illicit speakeasies which became lively venues of the \"Jazz Age\", hosting popular music including current dance songs, novelty songs and show tunes. Jazz began to get a reputation as being immoral, and many members of the older generations saw it as threatening the old cultural values and promoting the new decadent values of the Roaring 20s. Professor Henry van Dyke of Princeton University wrote: \"... it is not music at all. It's merely an irritation of the nerves of hearing, a sensual teasing of the strings of physical passion.\" The media too began to denigrate jazz. The New York Times used stories and headlines to pick at jazz: Siberian villagers were said by the paper to have used jazz to scare off bears, when in fact they had used pots and pans; another story claimed that the fatal heart attack of a celebrated conductor was caused by jazz. \n\nIn 1919 Kid Ory's Original Creole Jazz Band of musicians from New Orleans began playing in San Francisco and Los Angeles, where in 1922 they became the first black jazz band of New Orleans origin to make recordings. That year also saw the first recording by Bessie Smith, the most famous of the 1920s blues singers. Chicago meanwhile was the main center developing the new \"Hot Jazz\", where King Oliver joined Bill Johnson. Bix Beiderbecke formed The Wolverines in 1924.\n\nDespite its Southern black origins, there was a larger market for jazzy dance music played by white orchestras. In 1918 Paul Whiteman and his orchestra became a hit in San Francisco, California, signing with Victor Talking Machine Company in 1920 and becoming the top bandleader of the 1920s, giving \"hot jazz\" a white component, hiring white musicians including Bix Beiderbecke, Jimmy Dorsey, Tommy Dorsey, Frankie Trumbauer, and Joe Venuti. In 1924 Whiteman commissioned Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, which was premiered by his orchestra. After the band successfully toured Europe, huge hot jazz orchestras in theater pits caught on with other whites, including Fred Waring, Jean Goldkette, and Nathaniel Shilkret. Whiteman's success was based on a \"rhetoric of domestication\" according to which he had elevated and rendered valuable (read \"white\") a previously inchoate (read \"black\") kind of music. \n\nWhiteman's success caused blacks to follow suit, including Earl Hines (who opened in The Grand Terrace Cafe in Chicago in 1928), Duke Ellington (who opened at the Cotton Club in Harlem in 1927), Lionel Hampton, Fletcher Henderson, Claude Hopkins, and Don Redman, with Henderson and Redman developing the \"talking to one another\" formula for \"hot\" Swing music. \n\nIn 1924 Louis Armstrong joined the Fletcher Henderson dance band for a year, as featured soloist. The original New Orleans style was polyphonic, with theme variation and simultaneous collective improvisation. Armstrong was a master of his hometown style, but by the time he joined Henderson's band, he was already a trailblazer in a new phase of jazz, with its emphasis on arrangements and soloists. Armstrong's solos went well beyond the theme-improvisation concept, and extemporized on chords, rather than melodies. According to Schuller, by comparison, the solos by Armstrong's bandmates (including a young Coleman Hawkins), sounded \"stiff, stodgy,\" with \"jerky rhythms and a grey undistinguished tone quality.\" The following example shows a short excerpt of the straight melody of \"Mandy, Make Up Your Mind\" by George W. Meyer and Arthur Johnston (top), compared with Armstrong's solo improvisations (below) (recorded 1924). (The example approximates Armstrong's solo, as it doesn't convey his use of swing.)\n\nAlso in the 1920s Skiffle, jazz played with homemade instruments such as washboard, jugs, musical saw, kazoos, etc. began to be recorded in Chicago, Ill., later merging with country music.\n\nArmstrong's solos were a significant factor in making jazz a true 20th-century language. After leaving Henderson's group, Armstrong formed his virtuosic Hot Five band, where he popularized scat singing. \n\nJelly Roll Morton recorded with the New Orleans Rhythm Kings in an early mixed-race collaboration, then in 1926 formed his Red Hot Peppers.\n\nBy 1930 the New Orleans-style ensemble was a relic, and jazz belonged to the world. \n\nSwing\n\nThe 1930s belonged to popular swing big bands, in which some virtuoso soloists became as famous as the band leaders. Key figures in developing the \"big\" jazz band included bandleaders and arrangers Count Basie, Cab Calloway, Jimmy and Tommy Dorsey, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Fletcher Henderson, Earl Hines, Glenn Miller, Artie Shaw, Harry James, and Jimmie Lunceford. Although it was a collective sound, swing also offered individual musicians a chance to \"solo\" and improvise melodic, thematic solos which could at times be very complex \"important\" music.\n\nSwing was also dance music. It was broadcast on the radio \"live\" nightly across America for many years, especially by Earl Hines and his Grand Terrace Cafe Orchestra broadcasting coast-to-coast from Chicago (well placed for \"live\" US time-zones).\n\nOver time, social strictures regarding racial segregation began to relax in America: white bandleaders began to recruit black musicians and black bandleaders white ones. In the mid-1930, Benny Goodman hired pianist Teddy Wilson, vibraphonist Lionel Hampton and guitarist Charlie Christian to join small groups. In the 1930s, Kansas City Jazz as exemplified by tenor saxophonist Lester Young (inventor of much of hipster jargon) marked the transition from big bands to the bebop influence of the 1940s. An early 1940s style known as \"jumping the blues\" or jump blues used small combos, uptempo music and blues chord progressions, drawing on boogie-woogie from the 1930s.\n\nBeginnings of European jazz\n\nAs only a limited number of American jazz records were released in Europe, European jazz traces many of its roots to American artists such as James Reese Europe, Paul Whiteman and Lonnie Johnson, who visited Europe during and after World War I. It was their live performances which inspired European audiences' interest in jazz, as well as the interest in all things American (and therefore exotic) which accompanied the economic and political woes of Europe during this time. The beginnings of a distinct European style of jazz began to emerge in this interwar period.\n\nBritish jazz began with a tour by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band in 1919. In 1926 Fred Elizalde and His Cambridge Undergraduates began broadcasting on the BBC.\n\nThis distinct style entered full swing in France with the Quintette du Hot Club de France, which began in 1934. Much of this French jazz was a combination of African-American jazz and the symphonic styles in which French musicians were well-trained; in this, it is easy to see the inspiration taken from Paul Whiteman, since his style was also a fusion of the two. Belgian guitar virtuoso Django Reinhardt popularized gypsy jazz, a mix of 1930s American swing, French dance hall \"musette\" and Eastern European folk with a languid, seductive feel; the main instruments are steel stringed guitar, violin, and double bass, and solos pass from one player to another as the guitar and bass play the role of the rhythm section. Some music researchers hold that it was Philadelphia's Eddie Lang and Joe Venuti who pioneered the guitar-violin partnership typical of the genre, which was brought to France after they had been heard live or on Okeh Records in the late 1920s. \n\n1940s and 1950s\n\n\"American music\"—the influence of Ellington\n\nBy the 1940s, Duke Ellington's music had transcended the bounds of swing, bridging jazz and art music in a natural synthesis. Ellington called his music \"American Music\" rather than jazz, and liked to describe those who impressed him as \"beyond category.\" These included many of the musicians who were members of his orchestra, some of whom are considered among the best in jazz in their own right, but it was Ellington who melded them into one of the most well-known jazz orchestral units in the history of jazz. He often composed specifically for the style and skills of these individuals, such as \"Jeep's Blues\" for Johnny Hodges, \"Concerto for Cootie\" for Cootie Williams (which later became \"Do Nothing Till You Hear from Me\" with Bob Russell's lyrics), and \"The Mooche\" for Tricky Sam Nanton and Bubber Miley. He also recorded songs written by his bandsmen, such as Juan Tizol's \"Caravan\" and \"Perdido\", which brought the \"Spanish Tinge\" to big-band jazz. Several members of the orchestra remained with him for several decades. The band reached a creative peak in the early 1940s, when Ellington and a small hand-picked group of his composers and arrangers wrote for an orchestra of distinctive voices who displayed tremendous creativity. \n\nBebop\n\nIn the early 1940s, bebop-style performers began to shift jazz from danceable popular music toward a more challenging \"musician's music.\" The most influential bebop musicians included saxophonist Charlie Parker, pianists Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk, trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie and Clifford Brown, and drummer Max Roach. Divorcing itself from dance music, bebop established itself more as an art form, thus lessening its potential popular and commercial appeal.\n\nComposer Gunther Schuller wrote:\n ... In 1943 I heard the great Earl Hines band which had Bird in it and all those other great musicians. They were playing all the flatted fifth chords and all the modern harmonies and substitutions and Dizzy Gillespie runs in the trumpet section work. Two years later I read that that was 'bop' and the beginning of modern jazz ... but the band never made recordings. \n\nDizzy Gillespie wrote:\n ... People talk about the Hines band being 'the incubator of bop' and the leading exponents of that music ended up in the Hines band. But people also have the erroneous impression that the music was new. It was not. The music evolved from what went before. It was the same basic music. The difference was in how you got from here to here to here ... naturally each age has got its own shit. \n\nRhythm\n\nSince bebop was meant to be listened to, not danced to, it could use faster tempos. Drumming shifted to a more elusive and explosive style, in which the ride cymbal was used to keep time while the snare and bass drum were used for accents. This led to a highly syncopated linear rhythmic complexity. \n\nHarmony\n\nBebop musicians employed several harmonic devices which were not previously typical in jazz, engaging in a more abstracted form of chord-based improvisation. Bebop scales are traditional scales with an added chromatic passing note; bebop also uses \"passing\" chords, substitute chords, and altered chords. New forms of chromaticism and dissonance were introduced into jazz, and the dissonant tritone (or \"flatted fifth\") interval became the \"most important interval of bebop\" Chord progressions for bebop tunes were often taken directly from popular swing-era songs and reused with a new and more complex melody to form new compositions, a practice which was already well-established in earlier jazz, but came to be central to the bebop style. Bebop made use of several relatively common chord progressions, such as blues (at base, I-IV-V, but infused with II-V motion) and 'rhythm changes' (I-VI-II-V) - the chords to the 1930s pop standard \"I Got Rhythm.\" Late bop also moved towards extended forms that represented a departure from pop and show tunes.\n\nThe harmonic development in bebop is often traced back to a transcendent moment experienced by Charlie Parker while performing \"Cherokee\" at Clark Monroe's Uptown House, New York, in early 1942:\n I'd been getting bored with the stereotyped changes that were being used, ... and I kept thinking there's bound to be something else. I could hear it sometimes. I couldn't play it.... I was working over 'Cherokee,' and, as I did, I found that by using the higher intervals of a chord as a melody line and backing them with appropriately related changes, I could play the thing I'd been hearing. It came alive—Parker. \n\nGerhard Kubik postulates that the harmonic development in bebop sprang from the blues and other African-related tonal sensibilities, rather than 20th-century Western art music as some have suggested:\n Auditory inclinations were the African legacy in [Parker's] life, reconfirmed by the experience of the blues tonal system, a sound world at odds with the Western diatonic chord categories. Bebop musicians eliminated Western-style functional harmony in their music while retaining the strong central tonality of the blues as a basis for drawing upon various African matrices. \n\nSamuel Floyd states that blues were both the bedrock and propelling force of bebop, bringing about three main developments:\n* A new harmonic conception, using extended chord structures that led to unprecedented harmonic and melodic variety.\n* A developed and even more highly syncopated, linear rhythmic complexity and a melodic angularity in which the blue note of the fifth degree was established as an important melodic-harmonic device.\n* The reestablishment of the blues as the music's primary organizing and functional principle.\n\nAs Kubik explained:\nWhile for an outside observer, the harmonic innovations in bebop would appear to be inspired by experiences in Western \"serious\" music, from Claude Debussy to Arnold Schoenberg, such a scheme cannot be sustained by the evidence from a cognitive approach. Claude Debussy did have some influence on jazz, for example, on Bix Beiderbecke's piano playing. And it is also true that Duke Ellington adopted and reinterpreted some harmonic devices in European contemporary music. West Coast jazz would run into such debts as would several forms of cool jazz, but bebop has hardly any such debts in the sense of direct borrowings. On the contrary, ideologically, bebop was a strong statement of rejection of any kind of eclecticism, propelled by a desire to activate something deeply buried in self. Bebop then revived tonal-harmonic ideas transmitted through the blues and reconstructed and expanded others in a basically non-Western harmonic approach. The ultimate significance of all this is that the experiments in jazz during the 1940s brought back to African-American music several structural principles and techniques rooted in African traditions \n\nThese divergences from the jazz mainstream of the time initially met with a divided, sometimes hostile, response among fans and fellow musicians, especially established swing players, who bristled at the new harmonic sounds. To hostile critics, bebop seemed to be filled with \"racing, nervous phrases\". But despite the initial friction, by the 1950s bebop had become an accepted part of the jazz vocabulary.\n\nAfro-Cuban jazz (cu-bop)\n\nMachito and Mario Bauza\n\nThe general consensus among musicians and musicologists is that the first original jazz piece to be overtly based in clave was \"Tanga\" (1943), composed by Cuban-born Mario Bauza and recorded by Machito and his Afro-Cubans in New York City. \"Tanga\" began as a spontaneous descarga (Cuban jam session), with jazz solos superimposed on top. \n\nThis was the birth of Afro-Cuban jazz. The use of clave brought the African timeline, or key pattern, into jazz. Music organized around key patterns convey a two-celled (binary) structure, which is a complex level of African cross-rhythm. Within the context of jazz however, harmony is the primary referent, not rhythm. The harmonic progression can begin on either side of clave, and the harmonic \"one\" is always understood to be \"one\". If the progression begins on the \"three-side\" of clave, it is said to be in 3-2 clave. If the progression begins on the \"two-side\", its in 2-3 clave. \n\nBobby Sanabria mentions several innovations of Machito's Afro-Cubans, citing them as the first band: to wed big band jazz arranging techniques within an original composition, with jazz oriented soloists utilizing an authentic Afro-Cuban based rhythm section in a successful manner; to explore modal harmony (a concept explored much later by Miles Davis and Gil Evans) from a jazz arranging perspective; and to overtly explore the concept of clave counterpoint from an arranging standpoint (the ability to weave seamlessly from one side of the clave to the other without breaking its rhythmic integrity within the structure of a musical arrangement). They were also the first band in the United States to publicly utilize the term Afro-Cuban as the band's moniker, thus identifying itself and acknowledging the West African roots of the musical form they were playing. It forced New York City's Latino and African-American communities to deal with their common West African musical roots in a direct way, whether they wanted to acknowledge it publicly or not. \n\nDizzy Gillespie and Chano Pozo\n\nIt was Mario Bauzá who introduced bebop innovator Dizzy Gillespie to the Cuban conga drummer and composer Chano Pozo. Gillespie and Pozo's brief collaboration produced some of the most enduring Afro-Cuban jazz standards. \"Manteca\" (1947) is the first jazz standard to be rhythmically based on clave. According to Gillespie, Pozo composed the layered, contrapuntal guajeos (Afro-Cuban ostinatos) of the A section and the introduction, while Gillespie wrote the bridge. Gillespie recounted: \"If I'd let it go like [Chano] wanted it, it would have been strictly Afro-Cuban all the way. There wouldn't have been a bridge. I thought I was writing an eight-bar bridge, but ... I had to keep going and ended up writing a sixteen-bar bridge.\" The bridge gave \"Manteca\" a typical jazz harmonic structure, setting the piece apart from Bauza's modal \"Tanga\" of a few years earlier.\n\nGillespie's collaboration with Pozo brought specific African-based rhythms into bebop. While pushing the boundaries of harmonic improvisation, cu-bop, as it was called, also drew more directly from African rhythmic structures. Jazz arrangements with a \"Latin\" A section and a swung B section, with all choruses swung during solos, became common practice with many \"Latin tunes\" of the jazz standard repertoire. This approach can be heard on pre-1980 recordings of \"Manteca\", \"A Night in Tunisia\", \"Tin Tin Deo\", and \"On Green Dolphin Street\".\n\nAfrican cross-rhythm\n\nCuban percussionist Mongo Santamaria first recorded his composition \"Afro Blue\" in 1959. \n\"Afro Blue\" was the first jazz standard built upon a typical African three-against-two (3:2) cross-rhythm, or hemiola. The song begins with the bass repeatedly playing 6 cross-beats per each measure of 12/8, or 6 cross-beats per 4 main beats—6:4 (two cells of 3:2). The following example shows the original ostinato \"Afro Blue\" bass line; the slashed noteheads indicate the main beats (not bass notes), where you would normally tap your foot to \"keep time.\"\n\nWhen John Coltrane covered \"Afro Blue\" in 1963, he inverted the metric hierarchy, interpreting the tune as a 3/4 jazz waltz with duple cross-beats superimposed (2:3). Originally a B pentatonic blues, Coltrane expanded the harmonic structure of \"Afro Blue.\"\n\nPerhaps the most respected Afro-cuban jazz combo of the late 1950s was vibraphonist Cal Tjader's band. Tjader had Mongo Santamaria, Armando Peraza, and Willie Bobo on his early recording dates.\n\nDixieland revival\n\nIn the late 1940s there was a revival of \"Dixieland\" music, harking back to the original contrapuntal New Orleans style. This was driven in large part by record company reissues of early jazz classics by the Oliver, Morton, and Armstrong bands of the 1930s. There were two types of musicians involved in the revival: the first group was made up of those who had begun their careers playing in the traditional style and were returning to it (or continuing what they had been playing all along), such as Bob Crosby's Bobcats, Max Kaminsky, Eddie Condon, and Wild Bill Davison. Most of these players were originally Midwesterners, although there were a small number of New Orleans musicians involved. The second group of revivalists consisted of younger musicians, such as those in the Lu Watters band, Conrad Janis, and Ward Kimball and his Firehouse Five Plus Two Jazz Band. By the late 1940s, Louis Armstrong's Allstars band became a leading ensemble. Through the 1950s and 1960s, Dixieland was one of the most commercially popular jazz styles in the US, Europe, and Japan, although critics paid little attention to it.\n\nCool jazz and West Coast jazz\n\nIn 1944 jazz impresario Norman Granz organized the first Jazz at the Philharmonic concert in Los Angeles, which helped make a star of Nat \"King\" Cole and Les Paul. In 1946 he founded Clef Records, discovering Canadian jazz pianist Oscar Peterson in 1949, and merging Clef Records with his new label Verve Records in 1956, which advanced the career of Ella Fitzgerald et al.\n\nBy the end of the 1940s, the nervous energy and tension of bebop was replaced with a tendency toward calm and smoothness with the sounds of cool jazz, which favored long, linear melodic lines. It emerged in New York City, and dominated jazz in the first half of the 1950s. The starting point was a collection of 1949 and 1950 singles by a nonet led by Miles Davis, released as the Birth of the Cool (1957). Later cool jazz recordings by musicians such as Chet Baker, Dave Brubeck, Bill Evans, Gil Evans, Stan Getz, the Modern Jazz Quartet, and Gerry Mulligan usually had a \"lighter\" sound that avoided the aggressive tempos and harmonic abstraction of bebop.\n\nCool jazz later became strongly identified with the West Coast jazz scene, as typified by singers Chet Baker, Mel Tormé, and Anita O'Day, but it also had a particular resonance in Europe, especially Scandinavia, where figures such as baritone saxophonist Lars Gullin and pianist Bengt Hallberg emerged. The theoretical underpinnings of cool jazz were laid out by the Chicago pianist Lennie Tristano, and its influence stretches into such later developments as bossa nova, modal jazz, and even free jazz.\n\nHard bop\n\nHard bop is an extension of bebop (or \"bop\") music which incorporates influences from rhythm and blues, gospel music and blues, especially in the saxophone and piano playing. Hard bop was developed in the mid-1950s, coalescing in 1953 and 1954; it developed partly in response to the vogue for cool jazz in the early 1950s, and paralleled the rise of rhythm and blues. Miles Davis' 1954 performance of \"Walkin'\" at the first Newport Jazz Festival announced the style to the jazz world. The quintet Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, fronted by Blakey and featuring pianist Horace Silver and trumpeter Clifford Brown, were leaders in the hard bop movement along with Davis.\n\nModal jazz\n\nModal jazz is a development which began in the later 1950s which takes the mode, or musical scale, as the basis of musical structure and improvisation. Previously, a solo was meant to fit into a given chord progression, but with modal jazz the soloist creates a melody using one (or a small number of) modes. The emphasis is thus shifted from harmony to melody: \"Historically, this caused a seismic shift among jazz musicians, away from thinking vertically (the chord), and towards a more horizontal approach (the scale),\" explained pianist Mark Levine.\n\nThe modal theory stems from a work by George Russell. Miles Davis introduced the concept to the greater jazz world with Kind of Blue (1959), an exploration of the possibilities of modal jazz which would become the best selling jazz album of all time. In contrast to Davis' earlier work with hard bop and its complex chord progression and improvisation, the entire Kind of Blue album was composed as a series of \"modal sketches\", in which each performer was given a set of scales that defined the parameters of their improvisation and style. \"I didn't write out the music for Kind of Blue, but brought in sketches for what everybody was supposed to play because I wanted a lot of spontaneity,\" recalled Davis. The track \"So What\" has only two chords: D-7 and E-7. \n\nOther innovators in this style include Jackie McLean, and two of the musicians who had also played on Kind of Blue: John Coltrane and Bill Evans.\n\nBy the 1950s, Afro-Cuban jazz had been using modes for at least a decade, as much of it borrowed from Cuban popular dance forms which are structured around multiple ostinatos with only a few chords. A case in point is Mario Bauza's \"Tanga\" (1943), the first Afro-Cuban jazz piece. Machito's Afro-Cubans recorded modal tunes in the 1940s, featuring jazz soloists such as Howard McGhee, Brew Moore, Charlie Parker and Flip Phillips. However, there is no evidence that Davis or other mainstream jazz musicians were influenced by the use of modes in Afro-Cuban jazz, or other branches of Latin jazz.\n\nFree jazz\n\nFree jazz, and the related form of avant-garde jazz broke through into an open space of \"free tonality\" in which meter, beat, and formal symmetry all disappeared, and a range of World music from India, Africa and Arabia were melded into an intense, even religiously ecstatic or orgiastic style of playing. While loosely inspired by bebop, free jazz tunes gave players much more latitude; the loose harmony and tempo was deemed controversial when this approach was first developed. The bassist Charles Mingus is also frequently associated with the avant-garde in jazz, although his compositions draw from myriad styles and genres.\n\nThe first major stirrings came in the 1950s with the early work of Ornette Coleman (whose 1960 album Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation coined the term) and Cecil Taylor. In the 1960s exponents included Albert Ayler, Gato Barbieri, Carla Bley, Don Cherry, Larry Coryell, John Coltrane, Bill Dixon, Jimmy Giuffre, Steve Lacy, Michael Mantler, Sun Ra, Roswell Rudd, Pharoah Sanders, and John Tchicai. In developing his late style, Coltrane was especially influenced by the dissonance of Ayler's trio with bassist Gary Peacock and drummer Sunny Murray, a rhythm section honed with Cecil Taylor as leader. In November 1961 Coltrane played a gig at the Village Vanguard, which resulted in the classic Chasin' the 'Trane, which Down Beat magazine panned as \"Anti-Jazz\". On his 1961 tour of France he was booed, but persevered, signing with the new Impulse! Records in 1960 and turning it into \"the house that Trane built\", while championing many younger free jazz musicians, notably Archie Shepp, who often played with trumpeter Bill Dixon, who organized the 4-day \"October Revolution in Jazz\" in Manhattan in 1964, the first free jazz festival.\n\nA series of recordings with the Classic Quartet in the first half of 1965 show Coltrane's playing becoming increasingly abstract, with greater incorporation of devices like multiphonics, utilization of overtones, and playing in the altissimo register, as well as a mutated return to Coltrane's sheets of sound. In the studio, he all but abandoned his soprano to concentrate on the tenor saxophone. In addition, the quartet responded to the leader by playing with increasing freedom. The group's evolution can be traced through the recordings The John Coltrane Quartet Plays, Living Space and Transition (both June 1965), New Thing at Newport (July 1965), Sun Ship (August 1965) and First Meditations (September 1965).\n\nIn June 1965 Coltrane and 10 other musicians recorded Ascension, a 40-minute long piece without breaks that included adventurous solos by young avante-garde musicians as well as Coltrane, and was controversial primarily for the collective improvisation sections that separated the solos. Dave Liebman later called it \"the torch that lit the free jazz thing.\". After recording with the quartet over the next few months, Coltrane invited Pharoah Sanders to join the band in September 1965. While Coltrane used over-blowing frequently as an emotional exclamation-point, Sanders would opt to overblow his entire solo, resulting in a constant screaming and screeching in the altissimo range of the instrument.\n\nFree jazz in Europe\n\nFree jazz quickly found a foothold in Europe, in part because musicians such as Ayler, Taylor, Steve Lacy and Eric Dolphy spent extended periods there, and European musicians Michael Mantler, John Tchicai et al. traveled to the U.S. to learn it firsthand. A distinctive European contemporary jazz (often incorporating elements of free jazz but not limited to it) also flourished because of the emergence of European musicians such as Peter Brötzmann, John Surman, Zbigniew Namysłowski, Albert Mangelsdorff, Kenny Wheeler, and Mike Westbrook, who were anxious to develop new approaches reflecting their national and regional musical cultures and contexts. Since the 1960s various creative centers of jazz have developed in Europe, such as the creative jazz scene in Amsterdam. Following the work of veteran drummer Han Bennink and pianist Misha Mengelberg, musicians started to explore free music by collectively improvising until a certain form (melody, rhythm, or even famous song) is found by the band. Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead documented the free jazz scene in Amsterdam and some of its main exponents such as the ICP (Instant Composers Pool) orchestra in his book New Dutch Swing. Since the 1990s Keith Jarrett has been prominent in defending free jazz from criticism by traditionalists.\n\n1960s and 1970s\n\nLatin jazz\n\nLatin jazz is the term used to describe jazz which employs Latin American rhythms, and is generally understood to have a more specific meaning than simply jazz from Latin America. A more precise term might be Afro-Latin jazz, as the jazz subgenre typically employs rhythms that either have a direct analog in Africa, or exhibit an African rhythmic influence beyond what is ordinarily heard in other jazz. The two main categories of Latin jazz are Afro-Cuban jazz and Brazilian jazz.\n\nIn the 1960s and 1970s many jazz musicians had only a basic understanding of Cuban and Brazilian music, and jazz compositions which used Cuban or Brazilian elements were often referred to as \"Latin tunes\", with no distinction between a Cuban son montuno and a Brazilian bossa nova. Even as late as 2000, in Mark Gridley's Jazz Styles: History and Analysis, a bossa nova bass line is referred to as a \"Latin bass figure.\" It was not uncommon during the 1960s and 1970s to hear a conga playing a Cuban tumbao while the drumset and bass played a Brazilian bossa nova pattern. Many jazz standards such as \"Manteca\", \"On Green Dolphin Street\" and \"Song for My Father\" have a \"Latin\" A section and a swung B section. Typically, the band would only play an even-eighth \"Latin\" feel in the A section of the head, and swing throughout all of the solos. Latin jazz specialists like Cal Tjader tended to be the exception. For example, on a 1959 live Tjader recording of \"A Night in Tunisia\", pianist Vince Guaraldi soloed through the entire form over an authentic mambo. \n\nAfro-Cuban jazz\n\nAfro-Cuban jazz often uses Afro-Cuban instruments such as congas, timbales, güiro and claves, combined with piano, double bass, etc. Afro-Cuban jazz began with Machito's Afro-Cubans in the early 1940s, but took off and entered the mainstream in the late 1940s when bebop musicians such as Dizzy Gillespie and Billy Taylor began experimenting with Cuban rhythms. Mongo Santamaria and Cal Tjader further refined the genre in the late 1950s.\n\nAlthough a great deal of Cuban-based Latin jazz is modal, Latin jazz is not always modal: it can be as harmonically expansive as post-bop jazz. For example, Tito Puente recorded an arrangement of \"Giant Steps\" done to an Afro-Cuban guaguancó. A Latin jazz piece may momentarily contract harmonically, as in the case of a percussion solo over a one or two-chord piano guajeo.\n\nGuajeos\n\nGuajeo is the name for the typical Afro-Cuban ostinato melodies which are commonly used motifs in Latin jazz compositions. They originated in the genre known as son. Guajeos provide a rhythmic and melodic framework that may be varied within certain parameters, whilst still maintaining a repetitive - and thus \"danceable\" - structure. Most guajeos are rhythmically based on clave (rhythm).\n\nGuajeos are one of the most important elements of the vocabulary of Afro-Cuban descarga (jazz-inspired instrumental jams), providing a means of tension and resolution and a sense of forward momentum, within a relatively simple harmonic structure. The use of multiple, contrapuntal guajeos in Latin jazz facilitates simultaneous collective improvisation based on theme variation. In a way, this polyphonic texture is reminiscent of the original New Orleans style of jazz.\n\nAfro-Cuban jazz renaissance\n\nFor most of its history, Afro-Cuban jazz had been a matter of superimposing jazz phrasing over Cuban rhythms. But by the end of the 1970s a new generation of New York City musicians had emerged who were fluent in both salsa dance music and jazz, leading to a new level of integration of jazz and Cuban rhythms. This era of creativity and vitality is best represented by the Gonzalez brothers Jerry (congas and trumpet) and Andy (bass). During 1974-1976 they were members of one of Eddie Palmieri's most experimental salsa groups: salsa was the medium, but Palmieri was stretching the form in new ways. He incorporated parallel fourths, with McCoy Tyner-type vamps. The innovations of Palmieri, the Gonzalez brothers and others led to an Afro-Cuban jazz renaissance in New York City.\n\nThis occurred in parallel with developments in Cuba The first Cuban band of this new wave was Irakere. Their \"Chékere-son\" (1976) introduced a style of \"Cubanized\" bebop-flavored horn lines that departed from the more angular guajeo-based lines which were typical of Cuban popular music and Latin jazz up until that time. It was based on Charlie Parker's composition \"Billie's Bounce\", jumbled together in a way that fused clave and bebop horn lines. In spite of the ambivalence of some band members towards Irakere's Afro-Cuban folkloric / jazz fusion, their experiments forever changed Cuban jazz: their innovations are still heard in the high level of harmonic and rhythmic complexity in Cuban jazz, and in the jazzy and complex contemporary form of popular dance music known as timba.\n\nAfro-Brazilian jazz\n\nBrazilian jazz such as bossa nova is derived from samba, with influences from jazz and other 20th-century classical and popular music styles. Bossa is generally moderately paced, with melodies sung in Portuguese or English, whilst he related term jazz-samba describes an adaptation of street samba into jazz.\n\nThe bossa nova style was pioneered by Brazilians João Gilberto and Antônio Carlos Jobim, and was made popular by Elizete Cardoso's recording of \"Chega de Saudade\" on the Canção do Amor Demais LP. Gilberto's initial releases, and the 1959 film Black Orpheus, achieved significant popularity in Latin America; this spread to North America via visiting American jazz musicians. The resulting recordings by Charlie Byrd and Stan Getz cemented bossa nova's popularity and led to a worldwide boom, with 1963's Getz/Gilberto, numerous recordings by famous jazz performers such as Ella Fitzgerald and Frank Sinatra, and the eventual entrenchment of the bossa nova style as a lasting influence in world music.\n\nBrazilian percussionists such as Airto Moreira and Naná Vasconcelos also influenced jazz internationally by introducing Afro-Brazilian folkloric instruments and rhythms into a wide variety of jazz styles, thus attracting a greater audience to them. \n\nPost-bop\n\nPost-bop jazz is a form of small-combo jazz derived from earlier bop styles. The genre's origins lie in seminal work by John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Bill Evans, Charles Mingus, Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock. Generally, the term post-bop is taken to mean jazz from the mid-sixties onwards that assimilates influences from hard bop, modal jazz, the avant-garde and free jazz, without necessarily being immediately identifiable as any of the above.\n\nMuch post-bop was recorded for Blue Note Records. Key albums include Speak No Evil by Shorter; The Real McCoy by McCoy Tyner; Maiden Voyage by Hancock; Miles Smiles by Davis; and Search for the New Land by Lee Morgan (an artist who is not typically associated with the post-bop genre). Most post-bop artists worked in other genres as well, with a particularly strong overlap with the later hard bop.\n\nSoul jazz\n\nSoul jazz was a development of hard bop which incorporated strong influences from blues, gospel and rhythm and blues to create music for small groups, often the organ trio of Hammond organ, drummer and tenor saxophonist. Unlike hard bop, soul jazz generally emphasized repetitive grooves and melodic hooks, and improvisations were often less complex than in other jazz styles. It often had a steadier \"funk\" style groove, which was different from the swing rhythms typical of much hard bop.\n\nHorace Silver had a large influence on the soul jazz style, with songs that used funky and often gospel-based piano vamps. Important soul jazz organists included Jimmy McGriff, Jimmy Smith and Johnny Hammond Smith, and influential tenor saxophone players included Eddie \"Lockjaw\" Davis and Stanley Turrentine.\n\nAfrican-inspired\n\nThemes\n\nThere was a resurgence of interest in jazz and other forms of African-American cultural expression during the Black Arts Movement and Black nationalist period of the 1960s and 1970s. African themes became popular, and many new jazz compositions were given African-related titles: \"Black Nile\" (Wayne Shorter), \"Blue Nile\" (Alice Coltrane), \"Obirin African\" (Art Blakey), \"Zambia\" (Lee Morgan), \"Appointment in Ghana\" (Jackie McLean), \"Marabi\" (Cannonball Adderley), \"Yoruba\" (Hubert Laws), and many more. Pianist Randy Weston's music incorporated African elements, such as in the large-scale suite \"Uhuru Africa\" (with the participation of poet Langston Hughes) and \"Highlife: Music From the New African Nations.\" Both Weston and saxophonist Stanley Turrentine covered the Nigerian Bobby Benson's piece \"Niger Mambo\", which features Afro-Caribbean and jazz elements within a West African Highlife style. Some musicians, including Pharoah Sanders, Hubert Laws and Wayne Shorter, began using African instruments such as kalimbas, bells, beaded gourds and other instruments which were not traditional to jazz.\n\nRhythm\n\nDuring this period there was an increased use of the typical African 12/8 cross-rhythmic structure in jazz. Herbie Hancock's \"Succotash\" on Inventions and Dimensions (1963) is an open-ended modal 12/8 improvised jam, in which Hancock's pattern of attack-points, rather than the pattern of pitches, is the primary focus of his improvisations, accompanied by Paul Chambers on bass, percussionist Osvaldo Martinez playing a traditional Afro-Cuban chekeré part and Willie Bobo playing an Abakuá bell pattern on a snare drum with brushes.\n\nThe first jazz standard composed by a non-Latino to use an overt African 12/8 cross-rhythm was Wayne Shorter's \"Footprints\" (1967). On the version recorded on Miles Smiles by Miles Davis, the bass switches to a 4/4 tresillo figure at 2:20. \"Footprints\" is not, however, a Latin jazz tune: African rhythmic structures are accessed directly by Ron Carter (bass) and Tony Williams (drums) via the rhythmic sensibilities of swing. Throughout the piece, the four beats, whether sounded or not, are maintained as the temporal referent. In the example below, the main beats are indicated by slashed noteheads, which do not indicate bass notes.\n\nPentatonic scales\n\nThe use of pentatonic scales was another trend associated with Africa. The use of pentatonic scales in Africa probably goes back thousands of years. \n\nMcCoy Tyner perfected the use of the pentatonic scale in his solos, and also used parallel fifths and fourths, which are common harmonies in West Africa. \n\nThe minor pentatonic scale is often used in blues improvisation, and like a blues scale, a minor pentatonic scale can be played over all of the chords in a blues. The following pentatonic lick was played over blues changes by Joe Henderson on Horace Silver's \"African Queen\" (1965). \n\nJazz pianist, theorist, and educator Mark Levine refers to the scale generated by beginning on the fifth step of a pentatonic scale as the V pentatonic scale. \n\nLevine points out that the V pentatonic scale works for all three chords of the standard II-V-I jazz progression. This is a very common progression, used in pieces such as Miles Davis' \"Tune Up.\" The following example shows the V pentatonic scale over a II-V-I progression. \n\nAccordingly, John Coltrane's \"Giant Steps\" (1960), with its 26 chords per 16 bars, can be played using only three pentatonic scales. Coltrane studied Nicolas Slonimsky's Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns, which contains material that is virtually identical to portions of \"Giant Steps\". The harmonic complexity of \"Giant Steps\" is on the level of the most advanced 20th-century art music. Superimposing the pentatonic scale over \"Giant Steps\" is not merely a matter of harmonic simplification, but also a sort of \"Africanizing\" of the piece, which provides an alternate approach for soloing. Mark Levine observes that when mixed in with more conventional \"playing the changes\", pentatonic scales provide \"structure and a feeling of increased space.\" \n\nJazz fusion\n\nIn the late 1960s and early 1970s, the hybrid form of jazz-rock fusion was developed by combining jazz improvisation with rock rhythms, electric instruments and the highly amplified stage sound of rock musicians such as Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa. Jazz fusion often uses mixed meters, odd time signatures, syncopation, complex chords and harmonies.\n\nAccording to AllMusic:\n...until around 1967, the worlds of jazz and rock were nearly completely separate. [However, ...] as rock became more creative and its musicianship improved, and as some in the jazz world became bored with hard bop and did not want to play strictly avant-garde music, the two different idioms began to trade ideas and occasionally combine forces.\" \n\nMiles Davis' new directions\n\nIn 1969 Davis fully embraced the electric instrument approach to jazz with In a Silent Way, which can be considered his first fusion album. Composed of two side-long suites edited heavily by producer Teo Macero, this quiet, static album would be equally influential to the development of ambient music.\n\nAs Davis recalls:\nThe music I was really listening to in 1968 was James Brown, the great guitar player Jimi Hendrix, and a new group who had just come out with a hit record, \"Dance to the Music\", Sly and the Family Stone... I wanted to make it more like rock. When we recorded In a Silent Way I just threw out all the chord sheets and told everyone to play off of that.\" \n\nTwo contributors to In a Silent Way also joined organist Larry Young to create one of the early acclaimed fusion albums: Emergency! by The Tony Williams Lifetime.\n\nPsychedelic-jazz\n\nBitches Brew\n\nDavis' Bitches Brew (1970) album was his most successful of this era. Although inspired by rock and funk, Davis' fusion creations were original, and brought about a new type of avant-garde, electronic, psychedelic-jazz, as far from pop music as any other Davis work.\n\nHerbie Hancock\n\nPianist Herbie Hancock (a Davis alumnus) released four albums in the short-lived (1970–1973) psychedelic-jazz subgenre: Mwandishi (1972), Crossings (1973) and Sextant (1973). The rhythmic background was a mix of rock, funk, and African-type textures.\n\nMusicians who had previously worked with Davis formed the four most influential fusion groups: Weather Report and Mahavishnu Orchestra emerged in 1971, and were soon followed by Return to Forever and The Headhunters.\n\nWeather Report\n\nWeather Report's self-titled electronic and psychedelic Weather Report debut album caused a sensation in the jazz world on its arrival in 1971, thanks to the pedigree of the group's members (including percussionist Airto Moreira), and their unorthodox approach to music. The album featured a softer sound than would be the case in later years (predominantly using acoustic bass with Shorter exclusively playing soprano saxophone, and with no synthesizers involved), but is still considered a classic of early fusion. It built on the avant-garde experiments which Joe Zawinul and Shorter had pioneered with Miles Davis on Bitches Brew, including an avoidance of head-and-chorus composition in favour of continuous rhythm and movement – but took the music further. To emphasise the group's rejection of standard methodology, the album opened with the inscrutable avant-garde atmospheric piece \"Milky Way\", which featured by Shorter's extremely muted saxophone inducing vibrations in Zawinul's piano strings while the latter pedalled the instrument. Down Beat described the album as \"music beyond category\", and awarded it Album of the Year in the magazine's polls that year.\n\nWeather Report's subsequent releases were creative funk-jazz works. \n\nJazz-rock\n\nAlthough some jazz purists protested against the blend of jazz and rock, many jazz innovators crossed over from the contemporary hard bop scene into fusion. As well as the electric instruments of rock (such as electric guitar, electric bass, electric piano and synthesizer keyboards), fusion also used the powerful amplification, \"fuzz\" pedals, wah-wah pedals and other effects that were used by 1970s-era rock bands. Notable performers of jazz fusion included Miles Davis, Eddie Harris, keyboardists Joe Zawinul, Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock, vibraphonist Gary Burton, drummer Tony Williams (drummer), violinist Jean-Luc Ponty, guitarists Larry Coryell, Al Di Meola, John McLaughlin and Frank Zappa, saxophonist Wayne Shorter and bassists Jaco Pastorius and Stanley Clarke. Jazz fusion was also popular in Japan, where the band Casiopea released over thirty fusion albums.\n\nAccording to jazz writer Stuart Nicholson, \"just as free jazz appeared on the verge of creating a whole new musical language in the 1960s ... jazz-rock briefly suggested the promise of doing the same\" with albums such as Williams' Emergency! (1970) and Davis' Agharta (1975), which Nicholson said \"suggested the potential of evolving into something that might eventually define itself as a wholly independent genre quite apart from the sound and conventions of anything that had gone before.\" This development was stifled by commercialism, Nicholson said, as the genre \"mutated into a peculiar species of jazz-inflected pop music that eventually took up residence on FM radio\" at the end of the 1970s. \n\nJazz-funk\n\nBy the mid-1970s the sound known as jazz-funk had developed, characterized by a strong back beat (groove), electrified sounds and, often, the presence of electronic analog synthesizers. Jazz-funk also draws influences from traditional African music, Afro-Cuban rhythms and Jamaican reggae, notably Kingston bandleader Sonny Bradshaw. Another feature is the shift of emphasis from improvisation to composition: arrangements, melody and overall writing became important. The integration of funk, soul and R&B music into jazz resulted in the creation of a genre whose spectrum is wide and ranges from strong jazz improvisation to soul, funk or disco with jazz arrangements, jazz riffs and jazz solos, and sometimes soul vocals.\n\nEarly examples are Herbie Hancock's Headhunters band and Miles Davis' On the Corner album, which in 1972 began Davis' foray into jazz-funk and was, he claimed, an attempt at reconnecting with the young black audience which had largely forsaken jazz for rock and funk. While there is a discernible rock and funk influence in the timbres of the instruments employed, other tonal and rhythmic textures, such as the Indian tambora and tablas and Cuban congas and bongos, create a multi-layered soundscape. The album was a culmination of sorts of the musique concrète approach that Davis and producer Teo Macero had begun to explore in the late 1960s.\n\nOther trends\n\nJazz continued to expand and change, influenced by other types of music such as world music, avant garde classical music and rock and pop. Jazz musicians began to improvise on unusual instruments, such as the jazz harp (Alice Coltrane), the electrically amplified and wah-wah pedaled jazz violin (Jean-Luc Ponty) and the bagpipes (Rufus Harley). In 1966 jazz trumpeter Don Ellis and Indian sitar player Harihar Rao founded the Hindustani Jazz Sextet. In 1971 guitarist John McLaughlin's Mahavishnu Orchestra began playing a mix of rock and jazz infused with East Indian influences. In the 1970s the ECM record label began in Germany with artists including Keith Jarrett, Paul Bley, the Pat Metheny Group, Jan Garbarek, Ralph Towner, Kenny Wheeler, John Taylor, John Surman, and Eberhard Weber, establishing a new chamber music aesthetic which featured mainly acoustic instruments, occasionally incorporating elements of world music and folk.\n\n1980s\n\nIn 1987, the United States House of Representatives and Senate passed a bill proposed by Democratic Representative John Conyers, Jr. to define jazz as a unique form of American music, stating:\n... that jazz is hereby designated as a rare and valuable national American treasure to which we should devote our attention, support and resources to make certain it is preserved, understood and promulgated.\nIt passed in the House of Representatives on September 23, 1987 and in the Senate on November 4, 1987.HR-57 Center [http://www.hr57.org/hconres57.html HR-57 Center for the Preservation of Jazz and Blues, with the six-point mandate.]\n\nResurgence of traditionalism\n\nThe 1980s saw something of a reaction against the Fusion and Free Jazz that had dominated the 1970s. Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis emerged early in the decade, and strove to create music within what he believed was the tradition, rejecting both fusion and free jazz and creating extensions of the small and large forms initially pioneered by artists such as Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington, as well as the hard bop of the 1950s. It's debatable whether Marsalis' critical and commercial success was a cause or a symptom of the reaction against Fusion and Free Jazz and the resurgence of interest in the kind of jazz pioneered in the 1960s (particularly Modal Jazz and Post-Bop); nonetheless there were many other manifestations of a resurgence of traditionalism, even if Fusion and Free Jazz were by no means abandoned and continued to develop and evolve.\n\nFor example, several musicians who had been prominent in the fusion genre during the 1970s began to record acoustic jazz once more, including Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock. Other musicians who had experimented with electronic instruments in the previous decade had abandoned them by the 1980s, for example Bill Evans, Joe Henderson and Stan Getz. Even the 1980s music of Miles Davis, although certainly still fusion, adopted a far more accessible and recognisably jazz-oriented approach than his abstract work of the mid-1970s, such as a return to a theme-and-solos approach.\n\nThe emergence of young jazz talent beginning to perform in older, established musicians' groups further impacted the resurgence of traditionalism in the jazz community. In the 1970s, the groups of Betty Carter and Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers retained their conservative jazz approaches in the midst of fusion and jazz- rock, and in addition to difficulty booking their acts, struggled to find younger generations of personnel to authentically play traditional styles such as hard bop and bebop. In the late 1970s, however, a resurgence of younger jazz players in Blakey's band began to occur. This movement included musicians such as Valery Ponomarev and Bobby Watson, Dennis Irwin and James Williams.\nIn the 1980s, in addition to Wynton and Branford Marsalis, the emergence of pianists in the Jazz Messengers such as Donald Brown, Mulgrew Miller, and later, Benny Green, bassists such as Charles Fambrough, Lonnie Plaxico (and later, Peter Washington and Essiet Essiet) horn players such as Bill Pierce, Donald Harrison and later Javon Jackson and Terence Blanchard emerged as talented jazz musicians, all of whom made significant contributions in later 1990s and 2000s jazz music. \n\n[http://www.jazzdiscography.com/Artists/Blakey/chron.htmJ Drummerworld: Art Blakey].\n\nThe young Jazz Messengers' contemporaries, including Roy Hargrove, Marcus Roberts, Wallace Roney and Mark Whitfield were also influenced by Wynton Marsalis's emphasis toward jazz tradition. These younger rising stars rejected avant-garde approaches and instead championed the acoustic jazz sound of Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk and early recordings of the first Miles Davis quintet. This group of \"Young Lions\" sought to reaffirm jazz as a high art tradition comparable to the discipline of European classical music.\n \n\nIn addition, Betty Carter's rotation of young musicians in her group foreshadowed many of New York's preeminent traditional jazz players later in their careers. Among these musicians were Jazz Messenger alumni Benny Green, Branford Marsalis and Ralph Peterson, Jr., as well as Kenny Washington, Lewis Nash, Curtis Lundy, Cyrus Chestnut, Mark Shim, Craig Handy, Greg Hutchinson and Marc Cary, Taurus Mateen and Geri Allen. \n\nBlue Note Records's O.T.B. ensemble featured a rotation of young jazz musicians such as Kenny Garrett, Steve Wilson, Kenny Davis, Renee Rosnes, Ralph Peterson, Jr., Billy Drummond and Robert Hurst.\n \n\nA similar reaction took place against free jazz. According to Ted Gioia:\n\nthe very leaders of the avant garde started to signal a retreat from the core principles of Free Jazz. Anthony Braxton began recording standards over familiar chord changes. Cecil Taylor played duets in concert with Mary Lou Williams, and let her set out structured harmonies and familiar jazz vocabulary under his blistering keyboard attack. And the next generation of progressive players would be even more accommodating, moving inside and outside the changes without thinking twice. Musicians such as David Murray or Don Pullen may have felt the call of free-form jazz, but they never forgot all the other ways one could play African-American music for fun and profit. \n\nPianist Keith Jarrett — whose bands of the 1970s had played only original compositions with prominent free jazz elements — established his so-called 'Standards Trio' in 1983, which, although also occasionally exploring collective improvisation, has primarily performed and recorded jazz standards. Chick Corea similarly began exploring jazz standards in the 1980s, having neglected them for the 1970s.\n\nSmooth jazz\n\nIn the early 1980s a commercial form of jazz fusion called \"pop fusion\" or \"smooth jazz\" became successful, garnering significant radio airplay in \"quiet storm\" time slots at radio stations in urban markets across the U.S. This helped to establish or bolster the careers of vocalists including Al Jarreau, Anita Baker, Chaka Khan and Sade, as well as saxophonists including Grover Washington, Jr., Kenny G, Kirk Whalum, Boney James and David Sanborn. In general, smooth jazz is downtempo (the most widely played tracks are of 90–105 beats per minute), and has a lead melody-playing instrument (saxophone, especially soprano and tenor, and legato electric guitar are popular).\n\nIn his Newsweek article \"The Problem With Jazz Criticism\", Stanley Crouch considers Miles Davis' playing of fusion to be a turning point that led to smooth jazz. Critic Aaron J. West has countered the often negative perceptions of smooth jazz, stating:\nI challenge the prevalent marginalization and malignment of smooth jazz in the standard jazz narrative. Furthermore, I question the assumption that smooth jazz is an unfortunate and unwelcomed evolutionary outcome of the jazz-fusion era. Instead, I argue that smooth jazz is a long-lived musical style that merits multi-disciplinary analyses of its origins, critical dialogues, performance practice, and reception. \n\nAcid jazz, nu jazz and jazz rap\n\nAcid jazz developed in the UK in the 1980s and 1990s, influenced by jazz-funk and electronic dance music. Acid jazz often contains various types of electronic composition (sometimes including Sampling (music) or a live DJ cutting and scratching), but it is just as likely to be played live by musicians, who often showcase jazz interpretation as part of their performance. Jazz-funk musicians such as Roy Ayers and Donald Byrd are often credited as the forerunners of acid jazz. \n\nNu jazz is influenced by jazz harmony and melodies, and there are usually no improvisational aspects. It can be very experimental in nature and can vary widely in sound and concept. It ranges from the combination of live instrumentation with the beats of jazz house (as exemplified by St Germain, Jazzanova and Fila Brazillia) to more band-based improvised jazz with electronic elements (for example The Cinematic Orchestra, Kobol and the Norwegian \"future jazz\" style pioneered by Bugge Wesseltoft, Jaga Jazzist and Nils Petter Molvær).\n\nJazz rap developed in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and incorporates jazz influences into hip hop. In 1988, Gang Starr released the debut single \"Words I Manifest\", which sampled Dizzy Gillespie's 1962 \"Night in Tunisia\", and Stetsasonic released \"Talkin' All That Jazz\", which sampled Lonnie Liston Smith. Gang Starr's debut LP No More Mr. Nice Guy (1989) and their 1990 track \"Jazz Thing\" sampled Charlie Parker and Ramsey Lewis. The groups which made up the Native Tongues Posse tended toward jazzy releases: these include the Jungle Brothers' debut Straight Out the Jungle (1988), and A Tribe Called Quest's People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm (1990) and The Low End Theory (1991). Rap duo Pete Rock & CL Smooth incorporated jazz influences on their 1992 debut Mecca and the Soul Brother. Rapper Guru's Jazzmatazz series began in 1993, using jazz musicians during the studio recordings.\n\nThough jazz rap had achieved little mainstream success, Miles Davis' final album Doo-Bop (released posthumously in 1992) was based around hip hop beats and collaborations with producer Easy Mo Bee. Davis' ex-bandmate Herbie Hancock also absorbed hip-hop influences in the mid-1990s, releasing the album Dis Is Da Drum in 1994.\n\nPunk jazz and jazzcore\n\nThe relaxation of orthodoxy which was concurrent with post-punk in London and New York City led to a new appreciation of jazz. In London, the Pop Group began to mix free jazz and dub reggae into their brand of punk rock. In New York, No Wave took direct inspiration from both free jazz and punk. Examples of this style include Lydia Lunch's Queen of Siam,Bangs, Lester. \"Free Jazz / Punk Rock\". Musician Magazine, 1979. [http://www.notbored.org/bangs.html] Access date: July 20, 2008. Gray, the work of James Chance and the Contortions (who mixed Soul with free jazz and punk) and the Lounge Lizards (the first group to call themselves \"punk jazz\").\n\nJohn Zorn took note of the emphasis on speed and dissonance that was becoming prevalent in punk rock, and incorporated this into free jazz with the release of the Spy vs. Spy album in 1986, a collection of Ornette Coleman tunes done in the contemporary thrashcore style. In the same year, Sonny Sharrock, Peter Brötzmann, Bill Laswell and Ronald Shannon Jackson recorded the first album under the name Last Exit (free jazz band), a similarly aggressive blend of thrash and free jazz. These developments are the origins of jazzcore, the fusion of free jazz with hardcore punk.\n\nM-Base\n\nThe M-Base movement started in the 1980s, when a loose collective of young African-American musicians in New York which included Steve Coleman, Greg Osby and Gary Thomas developed a complex but grooving sound.\n\nIn the 1990s most M-Base participants turned to more conventional music, but Coleman, the most active participant, continued developing his music in accordance with the M-Base concept. Coleman's audience decreased, but his music and concepts influenced many musicians, both in terms of music technique and of the music's meaning. Hence, M-Base changed from a movement of a loose collective of young musicians to a kind of informal Coleman \"school\", with a much advanced but already originally implied concept. Steve Coleman's music and M-Base concept gained recognition as \"next logical step\" after Charlie Parker, John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman. \n\n1990s–2010s\n\nSince the 1990s jazz has been characterized by a pluralism in which no one style dominates, but rather a wide range of active styles and genres are popular. Individual performers often play in a variety of styles, sometimes in the same performance. Pianist Brad Mehldau and power trio The Bad Plus have explored contemporary rock music within the context of the traditional jazz acoustic piano trio, recording instrumental jazz versions of songs by rock musicians. The Bad Plus have also incorporated elements of free jazz into their music. A firm avant-garde or free jazz stance has been maintained by some players, such as saxophonists Greg Osby and Charles Gayle, while others, such as James Carter, have incorporated free jazz elements into a more traditional framework.\n\nOn the other side, even a singer like Harry Connick, Jr. (who has ten number-1 US jazz albums) is sometimes called a jazz musician, although there are only a few elements from jazz history in his mainly pop oriented music. Other recent vocalists have achieved popularity with a mix of traditional jazz and pop/rock forms, such as Diana Krall, Norah Jones, Cassandra Wilson, Kurt Elling and Jamie Cullum.\n\nA number of players who usually perform in largely straight-ahead settings have emerged since the 1990s, including pianists Jason Moran and Vijay Iyer, guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel, vibraphonist Stefon Harris, trumpeters Roy Hargrove and Terence Blanchard, saxophonists Chris Potter and Joshua Redman, clarinetist Ken Peplowski and bassist Christian McBride.\n\nAlthough jazz-rock fusion reached the height of its popularity in the 1970s, the use of electronic instruments and rock-derived musical elements in jazz continued in the 1990s and 2000s. Musicians using this approach include Pat Metheny, John Abercrombie, John Scofield and the Swedish group e.s.t.\n\nIn 2001 Ken Burns's documentary Jazz was premiered on PBS, featuring Wynton Marsalis and other experts reviewing the entire history of jazz to that time.", "Louis Armstrong (August 4, 1901 – July 6, 1971), nicknamed Satchmo or Pops, was an American trumpeter, composer, singer and occasional actor who was one of the most influential figures in jazz. His career spanned five decades, from the 1920s to the 1960s, and different eras in jazz. \n\nComing to prominence in the 1920s as an \"inventive\" trumpet and cornet player, Armstrong was a foundational influence in jazz, shifting the focus of the music from collective improvisation to solo performance. With his instantly recognizable gravelly voice, Armstrong was also an influential singer, demonstrating great dexterity as an improviser, bending the lyrics and melody of a song for expressive purposes. He was also skilled at scat singing.\n\nRenowned for his charismatic stage presence and voice almost as much as for his trumpet-playing, Armstrong's influence extends well beyond jazz music, and by the end of his career in the 1960s, he was widely regarded as a profound influence on popular music in general. Armstrong was one of the first truly popular African-American entertainers to \"cross over\", whose skin color was secondary to his music in an America that was extremely racially divided. He rarely publicly politicized his race, often to the dismay of fellow African-Americans, but took a well-publicized stand for desegregation in the Little Rock Crisis. His artistry and personality allowed him socially acceptable access to the upper echelons of American society which were highly restricted for black men of his era.\n\nEarly life \n\nArmstrong often stated that he was born on July 4, 1900, a date that has been noted in many biographies. Although he died in 1971, it was not until the mid-1980s that his true birth date of August 4, 1901 was discovered by researcher Tad Jones through the examination of baptismal records. \n\nArmstrong was born into a poor family in New Orleans, Louisiana, and was the grandson of slaves. He spent his youth in poverty, in a rough neighborhood known as \"the Battlefield\", which was part of the Storyville legal prostitution district. His father, William Armstrong (1881–1922), abandoned the family when Louis was an infant and took up with another woman. His mother, Mary \"Mayann\" Albert (1886–1927), then left Louis and his younger sister, Beatrice Armstrong Collins (1903–1987), in the care of his grandmother, Josephine Armstrong, and at times, his Uncle Isaac. At five, he moved back to live with his mother and her relatives, and only saw his father in parades.\n\nHe attended the Fisk School for Boys, where he most likely had early exposure to music. He brought in some money as a paperboy and also by finding discarded food and selling it to restaurants, but it was not enough to keep his mother from prostitution. He hung out in dance halls close to home, where he observed everything from licentious dancing to the quadrille. For extra money he also hauled coal to Storyville, and listened to the bands playing in the brothels and dance halls, especially Pete Lala's, where Joe \"King\" Oliver performed as well as other famous musicians who would drop in to jam.\n\nAfter dropping out of the Fisk School at age eleven, Armstrong joined a quartet of boys who sang in the streets for money. He also started to get into trouble. Cornet player Bunk Johnson said he taught Armstrong (then 11) to play by ear at Dago Tony's Tonk in New Orleans, although in his later years Armstrong gave the credit to Oliver. Armstrong hardly looked back at his youth as the worst of times but drew inspiration from it instead: \"Every time I close my eyes blowing that trumpet of mine—I look right in the heart of good old New Orleans... It has given me something to live for.\" \n\nHe also worked for a Lithuanian-Jewish immigrant family, the Karnofskys, who had a junk hauling business and gave him odd jobs. They took him in and treated him like family; knowing he lived without a father, they fed and nurtured him. He later wrote a memoir of his relationship with the Karnofskys titled, Louis Armstrong + the Jewish Family in New Orleans, La., the Year of 1907. In it he describes his discovery that this family was also subject to discrimination by \"other white folks\" nationalities who felt that they were better than the Jewish race... \"I was only seven years old but I could easily see the ungodly treatment that the White Folks were handing the poor Jewish family whom I worked for.\" \nArmstrong wore a Star of David pendant for the rest of his life and wrote about what he learned from them: \"how to live—real life and determination.\"Teachout, Terry. [https://www.commentarymagazine.com/article/satchmo-and-the-jews/ \"Satchmo and the Jews\"] Commentary magazine, 1 November 2009. The influence of Karnofsky is remembered in New Orleans by the Karnofsky Project, a non-profit organization dedicated to accepting donated musical instruments to \"put them into the hands of an eager child who could not otherwise take part in a wonderful learning experience.\" \n\nArmstrong developed his cornet playing skills by playing in the band of the New Orleans Home for Colored Waifs, where he had been sent multiple times for general delinquency, most notably for firing his stepfather's pistol into the air at a New Year's Eve celebration, but it was only an empty shot, as police records confirm. Professor Peter Davis (who frequently appeared at the home at the request of its administrator, Captain Joseph Jones) instilled discipline in and provided musical training to the otherwise self-taught Armstrong. Eventually, Davis made Armstrong the band leader. The home band played around New Orleans and the thirteen-year-old Louis began to draw attention by his cornet playing, starting him on a musical career. At fourteen he was released from the home, living again with his father and new step-mother, Gertrude, and then back with his mother and thus back to the streets and their temptations. Armstrong got his first dance hall job at Henry Ponce's where Black Benny became his protector and guide. He hauled coal by day and played his cornet at night.\n\nHe played in the city's frequent brass band parades and listened to older musicians every chance he got, learning from Bunk Johnson, Buddy Petit, Kid Ory, and above all, Joe \"King\" Oliver, who acted as a mentor and father figure to the young musician. Later, he played in brass bands and riverboats of New Orleans, and began traveling with the well-regarded band of Fate Marable, which toured on a steamboat up and down the Mississippi River. He described his time with Marable as \"going to the University,\" since it gave him a much wider experience working with written arrangements.\n\nIn 1919, Joe Oliver decided to go north and resigned his position in Kid Ory's band; Armstrong replaced him. He also became second trumpet for the Tuxedo Brass Band, a society band. \n\nCareer \n\n \n\n1920s\n\nThroughout his riverboat experience, Armstrong's musicianship began to mature and expand. At twenty, he could read music and started to be featured in extended trumpet solos, one of the first jazz men to do this, injecting his own personality and style into his solo turns. He had learned how to create a unique sound and also started using singing and patter in his performances. In 1922, Armstrong joined the exodus to Chicago, where he had been invited by his mentor, Joe \"King\" Oliver, to join his Creole Jazz Band and where he could make a sufficient income so that he no longer needed to supplement his music with day labor jobs. It was a boom time in Chicago and though race relations were poor, the city was teeming with jobs available for black people, who were making good wages in factories and had plenty to spend on entertainment.\n\nOliver's band was among the most influential jazz bands in Chicago in the early 1920s, at a time when Chicago was the center of the jazz universe. Armstrong lived luxuriously in Chicago, in his own apartment with his own private bath (his first). Excited as he was to be in Chicago, he began his career-long pastime of writing nostalgic letters to friends in New Orleans. As Armstrong's reputation grew, he was challenged to \"cutting contests\" by hornmen trying to displace the new phenomenon, who could blow two hundred high Cs in a row. Armstrong made his first recordings on the Gennett and Okeh labels (jazz records were starting to boom across the country), including taking some solos and breaks, while playing second cornet in Oliver's band in 1923. At this time, he met Hoagy Carmichael (with whom he would collaborate later) who was introduced by friend Bix Beiderbecke, who now had his own Chicago band.\n\nArmstrong enjoyed working with Oliver, but Louis' second wife, pianist Lil Hardin Armstrong, urged him to seek more prominent billing and develop his newer style away from the influence of Oliver. Lil had her husband play classical music in church concerts to broaden his skill and improve his solo play and she prodded him into wearing more stylish attire to make him look sharp and to better offset his growing girth. Lil's influence eventually undermined Armstrong's relationship with his mentor, especially concerning his salary and additional moneys that Oliver held back from Armstrong and other band members. Armstrong and Oliver parted amicably in 1924. Shortly afterward, Armstrong received an invitation to go to New York City to play with the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra, the top African-American band of the time. Armstrong switched to the trumpet to blend in better with the other musicians in his section. His influence upon Henderson's tenor sax soloist, Coleman Hawkins, can be judged by listening to the records made by the band during this period.\n\nArmstrong quickly adapted to the more tightly controlled style of Henderson, playing trumpet and even experimenting with the trombone. The other members quickly took up Armstrong's emotional, expressive pulse. Soon his act included singing and telling tales of New Orleans characters, especially preachers. The Henderson Orchestra was playing in prominent venues for white-only patrons, including the famed Roseland Ballroom, featuring the arrangements of Don Redman. Duke Ellington's orchestra would go to Roseland to catch Armstrong's performances and young horn men around town tried in vain to outplay him, splitting their lips in their attempts.\n\nDuring this time, Armstrong made many recordings on the side, arranged by an old friend from New Orleans, pianist Clarence Williams; these included small jazz band sides with the Williams Blue Five (some of the most memorable pairing Armstrong with one of Armstrong's few rivals in fiery technique and ideas, Sidney Bechet) and a series of accompaniments with blues singers, including Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey, and Alberta Hunter.\n\nArmstrong returned to Chicago in 1925 due mostly to the urging of his wife, who wanted to pump up Armstrong's career and income. He was content in New York but later would concede that she was right and that the Henderson Orchestra was limiting his artistic growth. In publicity, much to his chagrin, she billed him as \"the World's Greatest Trumpet Player\". At first, he was actually a member of the Lil Hardin Armstrong Band and working for his wife. He began recording under his own name for Okeh with his famous Hot Five and Hot Seven groups, producing hits such as \"Potato Head Blues\", \"Muggles\", (a reference to marijuana, for which Armstrong had a lifelong fondness), and \"West End Blues\", the music of which set the standard and the agenda for jazz for many years to come.\n\nThe group included Kid Ory (trombone), Johnny Dodds (clarinet), Johnny St. Cyr (banjo), wife Lil on piano, and usually no drummer. Armstrong's band leading style was easygoing, as St. Cyr noted, \"One felt so relaxed working with him, and he was very broad-minded ... always did his best to feature each individual.\" Among the most notable of the Hot Five and Seven records were \"Cornet Chop Suey,\" \"Struttin' With Some Barbecue,\" \"Hotter Than that\" and \"Potato Head Blues,\", all featuring highly creative solos by Armstrong. His recordings soon after with pianist Earl \"Fatha\" Hines (most famously their 1928 \"Weatherbird\" duet) and Armstrong's trumpet introduction to and solo in \"West End Blues\" remain some of the most famous and influential improvisations in jazz history. Armstrong was now free to develop his personal style as he wished, which included a heavy dose of effervescent jive, such as \"whip that thing, Miss Lil\" and \"Mr. Johnny Dodds, Aw, do that clarinet, boy!\" \n\nArmstrong also played with Erskine Tate's Little Symphony, which played mostly at the Vendome Theatre. They furnished music for silent movies and live shows, including jazz versions of classical music, such as \"Madame Butterfly\", which gave Armstrong experience with longer forms of music and with hosting before a large audience. He began to scat sing (improvised vocal jazz using nonsensical words) and was among the first to record it, on the Hot Five recording \"Heebie Jeebies\" in 1926. The recording was so popular that the group became the most famous jazz band in the United States, even though they had not performed live to any great extent. Young musicians across the country, black or white, were turned on by Armstrong's new type of jazz. \n\nAfter separating from Lil, Armstrong started to play at the Sunset Café for Al Capone's associate Joe Glaser in the Carroll Dickerson Orchestra, with Earl Hines on piano, which was soon renamed Louis Armstrong and his Stompers, though Hines was the music director and Glaser managed the orchestra. Hines and Armstrong became fast friends and successful collaborators. \n\nArmstrong returned to New York, in 1929, where he played in the pit orchestra of the successful musical Hot Chocolate, an all-black revue written by Andy Razaf and pianist/composer Fats Waller. He also made a cameo appearance as a vocalist, regularly stealing the show with his rendition of \"Ain't Misbehavin'\", his version of the song becoming his biggest selling record to date. \n\n1930s\n\nArmstrong started to work at Connie's Inn in Harlem, chief rival to the Cotton Club, a venue for elaborately staged floor shows, and a front for gangster Dutch Schultz. Armstrong also had considerable success with vocal recordings, including versions of famous songs composed by his old friend Hoagy Carmichael. His 1930s recordings took full advantage of the new RCA ribbon microphone, introduced in 1931, which imparted a characteristic warmth to vocals and immediately became an intrinsic part of the 'crooning' sound of artists like Bing Crosby. Armstrong's famous interpretation of Carmichael's \"Stardust\" became one of the most successful versions of this song ever recorded, showcasing Armstrong's unique vocal sound and style and his innovative approach to singing songs that had already become standards.\n\nArmstrong's radical re-working of Sidney Arodin and Carmichael's \"Lazy River\" (recorded in 1931) encapsulated many features of his groundbreaking approach to melody and phrasing. The song begins with a brief trumpet solo, then the main melody is introduced by sobbing horns, memorably punctuated by Armstrong's growling interjections at the end of each bar: \"Yeah! ...\"Uh-huh\" ...\"Sure\" ... \"Way down, way down.\" In the first verse, he ignores the notated melody entirely and sings as if playing a trumpet solo, pitching most of the first line on a single note and using strongly syncopated phrasing. In the second stanza he breaks into an almost fully improvised melody, which then evolves into a classic passage of Armstrong \"scat singing\".\n\nAs with his trumpet playing, Armstrong's vocal innovations served as a foundation stone for the art of jazz vocal interpretation. The uniquely gritty coloration of his voice became a musical archetype that was much imitated and endlessly impersonated. His scat singing style was enriched by his matchless experience as a trumpet soloist. His resonant, velvety lower-register tone and bubbling cadences on sides such as \"Lazy River\" exerted a huge influence on younger white singers such as Bing Crosby.\n\nThe Great Depression of the early 1930s was especially hard on the jazz scene. The Cotton Club closed in 1936 after a long downward spiral, and many musicians stopped playing altogether as club dates evaporated. Bix Beiderbecke died and Fletcher Henderson’s band broke up. King Oliver made a few records but otherwise struggled. Sidney Bechet became a tailor and Kid Ory returned to New Orleans and raised chickens. \n\nArmstrong moved to Los Angeles in 1930 to seek new opportunities. He played at the New Cotton Club in Los Angeles with Lionel Hampton on drums. The band drew the Hollywood crowd, which could still afford a lavish night life, while radio broadcasts from the club connected with younger audiences at home. Bing Crosby and many other celebrities were regulars at the club. In 1931, Armstrong appeared in his first movie, Ex-Flame and was also convicted of marijuana possession but received a suspended sentence. He returned to Chicago in late 1931 and played in bands more in the Guy Lombardo vein and he recorded more standards. When the mob insisted that he get out of town,[http://riverwalkjazz.stanford.edu/program/louis-armstrong-30s-tribute-life-and-music-armstrong-30s Louis Armstrong in the 30s: A Tribute to the Life and Music of Armstrong in the 30s]. Retrieved May 5, 2015. Armstrong visited New Orleans, had a hero's welcome and saw old friends. He sponsored a local baseball team known as \"Armstrong's Secret Nine\" and had a cigar named after him. But soon he was on the road again and after a tour across the country shadowed by the mob, Armstrong decided to go to Europe to escape.\n\nAfter returning to the United States, he undertook several exhausting tours. His agent Johnny Collins' erratic behavior and his own spending ways left Armstrong short of cash. Breach of contract violations plagued him. Finally, he hired Joe Glaser as his new manager, a tough mob-connected wheeler-dealer, who began to straighten out his legal mess, his mob troubles, and his debts. Armstrong also began to experience problems with his fingers and lips, which were aggravated by his unorthodox playing style. As a result, he branched out, developing his vocal style and making his first theatrical appearances. He appeared in movies again, including Crosby's 1936 hit Pennies from Heaven. In 1937, Armstrong substituted for Rudy Vallee on the CBS radio network and became the first African American to host a sponsored, national broadcast. \n\n1940s\n\nAfter spending many years on the road, Armstrong settled permanently in Queens, New York in 1943 in contentment with his fourth wife, Lucille. Although subject to the vicissitudes of Tin Pan Alley and the gangster-ridden music business, as well as anti-black prejudice, he continued to develop his playing. He recorded Hoagy Carmichael's Rockin' Chair for Okeh Records.\n\nDuring the subsequent thirty years, Armstrong played more than three hundred gigs a year. Bookings for big bands tapered off during the 1940s due to changes in public tastes: ballrooms closed, and there was competition from television and from other types of music becoming more popular than big band music. It became impossible under such circumstances to support and finance a 16-piece touring band.\n\nThe All Stars\n\nDuring the 1940s, a widespread revival of interest in the traditional jazz of the 1920s made it possible for Armstrong to consider a return to the small-group musical style of his youth. Following a highly successful small-group jazz concert at New York Town Hall on May 17, 1947, featuring Armstrong with trombonist/singer Jack Teagarden, Armstrong's manager, Joe Glaser dissolved the Armstrong big band on August 13, 1947 and established a six-piece traditional jazz small group featuring Armstrong with (initially) Teagarden, Earl Hines and other top swing and Dixieland musicians, most of them ex-big band leaders. The new group was announced at the opening of Billy Berg's Supper Club.\n\nThis group was called Louis Armstrong and his All Stars and included at various times Earl \"Fatha\" Hines, Barney Bigard, Edmond Hall, Jack Teagarden, Trummy Young, Arvell Shaw, Billy Kyle, Marty Napoleon, Big Sid Catlett, Cozy Cole, Tyree Glenn, Barrett Deems, Joe Darensbourg, Eddie Shu and percussionist Danny Barcelona. During this period, Armstrong made many recordings and appeared in over thirty films. He was the first jazz musician to appear on the cover of Time magazine, on February 21, 1949. In 1948, he participated in the Nice Jazz Festival, where Suzy Delair sang \"C'est si bon\", by Henri Betti and André Hornez, for the first time in public.\n\n1950s–1970s\n\nWith the publishers' permission, Armstrong recorded the first American version of \"C'est si bon\" on June 26, 1950, in New York, with English lyrics by Jerry Seelen. When it was released, the disc garnered worldwide sales. In the 1960s, he toured Ghana and Nigeria, performing with Victor Olaiya during the Nigerian Civil war. \nIn 1964, he recorded his biggest-selling record, \"Hello, Dolly!\", a song by Jerry Herman, originally sung by Carol Channing. Armstrong's version remained on the Hot 100 for 22 weeks, longer than any other record produced that year, and went to No. 1 making him, at 62 years, 9 months and 5 days, the oldest person ever to accomplish that feat. In the process, he dislodged the Beatles from the No. 1 position they had occupied for 14 consecutive weeks with three different songs.[http://www.jazzhouse.org/gone/lastpost2.php3?edit\n1176392524 Hale, James (editor of Jazzhouse.org), Danny Barcelona (1929–2007), Drums, Armstrong All-Star, The Last Post, 2007]. Retrieved July 4, 2007.\nArmstrong made his last recorded trumpet performances on his 1968 album Disney Songs the Satchmo Way. \nArmstrong kept up his busy tour schedule until a few years before his death in 1971. He also toured Africa, Europe, and Asia under the sponsorship of the US State Department with great success, earning the nickname \"Ambassador Satch\" and inspiring Dave Brubeck to compose his jazz musical The Real Ambassadors. \n\nPersonal life \n\nPronunciation of name\n\nThe Louis Armstrong House Museum website states:\n\n In a memoir written for Robert Goffin between 1943 and 1944, Armstrong states, \"All white folks call me Louie,\" suggesting that he himself did not. That said, Armstrong was registered as \"Lewie\" for the 1920 U.S. Census. On various live records he's called \"Louie\" on stage, such as on the 1952 \"Can Anyone Explain?\" from the live album In Scandinavia vol.1. It should also be noted that \"Lewie\" is the French pronunciation of \"Louis\" and is commonly used in Louisiana.\n\nFamily\n\nOn March 19, 1918, at the age of 16, Louis married Daisy Parker, a prostitute from Gretna, Louisiana. They adopted a 3-year-old boy, Clarence Armstrong, whose mother, Louis' cousin Flora, died soon after giving birth. Clarence Armstrong was mentally disabled (the result of a head injury at an early age) and Louis would spend the rest of his life taking care of him. Louis' marriage to Parker failed quickly and they separated in 1923.\n\nOn February 4, 1924, Louis married Lil Hardin Armstrong, who was Oliver's pianist and had also divorced her first spouse only a few years earlier. His second wife was instrumental in developing his career, but in the late 1920s Hardin and Louis grew apart. They separated in 1931 and divorced in 1938, after which Louis married longtime girlfriend Alpha Smith. His marriage to his third wife lasted four years, and they divorced in 1942. Louis then married Lucille Wilson, a singer at the Cotton Club, to whom he was married until his death in 1971. \n\nArmstrong's marriages never produced any offspring, though he loved children. However, in December 2012, 57-year-old Sharon Preston-Folta claimed to be his daughter from a 1950s affair between Armstrong and Lucille \"Sweets\" Preston, a dancer at the Cotton Club. In a 1955 letter to his manager, Joe Glaser, Armstrong affirmed his belief that Preston's newborn baby was his daughter, and ordered Glaser to pay a monthly allowance of $400 to mother and child. \n\nPersonality \n\nArmstrong was noted for his colorful and charismatic personality. His autobiography vexed some biographers and historians, as he had a habit of telling tales, particularly of his early childhood when he was less scrutinized, and his embellishments of his history often lack consistency. \n\nIn addition to an entertainer, Armstrong was a leading personality of the day. He was beloved by an American public that gave even the greatest African American performers little access beyond their public celebrity, and he was able to live a private life of access and privilege afforded to few other African Americans during that era.\n\nHe generally remained politically neutral, which at times alienated him from members of the black community who looked to him to use his prominence with white America to become more of an outspoken figure during the Civil Rights Movement of U.S. history.\n\nNicknames \n\nThe nicknames Satchmo and Satch are short for Satchelmouth. Like many things in Armstrong's life, which was filled with colorful stories both real and imagined, many of his own telling, the nickname has many possible origins.\n\nThe most common tale that biographers tell is the story of Armstrong as a young boy dancing for pennies in the streets of New Orleans, who would scoop up the coins off of the streets and stick them into his mouth to avoid having the bigger children steal them from him. Someone dubbed him \"satchel mouth\" for his mouth acting as a satchel. Another tale is that because of his large mouth, he was nicknamed \"satchel mouth\" which became shortened to Satchmo.\n\nEarly on he was also known as Dipper, short for Dippermouth, a reference to the piece Dippermouth Blues. and something of a riff on his unusual embouchure.\n\nThe nickname Pops came from Armstrong's own tendency to forget people's names and simply call them \"pops\" instead. The nickname was soon turned on Armstrong himself. It was used as the title of a 2010 biography of Armstrong by Terry Teachout. \n\nRace \n\nArmstrong was largely accepted into white society, both on stage and off, a privilege reserved for very few African-American public figures, and usually those of either exceptional talent or fair skin tone. As his fame grew, so did his access to the finer things in life usually denied to African-Americans, even famous ones. His renown was such that he dined in reputable restaurants and stayed in hotels usually exclusively for whites. It was a power and privilege that he enjoyed, although he was very careful not to flaunt it with fellow performers of color, and privately, he shared what access that he could with friends and fellow musicians.\n\nThat still did not prevent members of the African-American community, particularly in the late 1950s to the early 1970s, from calling him an Uncle Tom, a black-on-black racial epithet for someone who kowtowed to white society at the expense of their own racial identity. Billie Holiday countered, however, \"Of course Pops toms, but he toms from the heart.\" He was criticized for accepting the title of \"King of The Zulus\" for Mardi Gras in 1949. In the New Orleans African-American community it is an honored role as the head of leading black Carnival Krewe, but bewildering or offensive to outsiders with their traditional costume of grass-skirts and blackface makeup satirizing southern white attitudes.\n\nSome musicians criticized Armstrong for playing in front of segregated audiences, and for not taking a strong enough stand in the American Civil Rights Movement. The few exceptions made it more effective when he did speak out. Armstrong's criticism of President Eisenhower, calling him \"two-faced\" and \"gutless\" because of his inaction during the conflict over school desegregation in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1957 made national news. As a protest, Armstrong canceled a planned tour of the Soviet Union on behalf of the State Department saying: \"The way they're treating my people in the South, the government can go to hell\" and that he could not represent his government abroad when it was in conflict with its own people. \n\nThe FBI kept a file on Armstrong for his outspokenness about integration. \n\nReligion \n\nWhen asked about his religion, Armstrong would answer that he was raised a Baptist, always wore a Star of David, and was friends with the Pope. Armstrong wore the Star of David in honor of the Karnofsky family, who took him in as a child and lent him the money to buy his first cornet. Louis Armstrong was, in fact, baptized as a Catholic at the Sacred Heart of Jesus Church in New Orleans, and he met popes Pius XII and Paul VI, though there is no evidence that he considered himself Catholic. Armstrong seems to have been tolerant towards various religions, but also found humor in them.\n\nPersonal habits \n\nArmstrong was concerned with his health. He used laxatives to control his weight, a practice he advocated both to acquaintances and in the diet plans he published under the title Lose Weight the Satchmo Way. Armstrong's laxative of preference in his younger days was Pluto Water, but he then became an enthusiastic convert when he discovered the herbal remedy Swiss Kriss. He would extol its virtues to anyone who would listen and pass out packets to everyone he encountered, including members of the British Royal Family. (Armstrong also appeared in humorous, albeit risqué, cards that he had printed to send out to friends; the cards bore a picture of him sitting on a toilet—as viewed through a keyhole—with the slogan \"Satch says, 'Leave it all behind ya!'\") The cards have sometimes been incorrectly described as ads for Swiss Kriss. In a live recording of \"Baby, It's Cold Outside\" with Velma Middleton, he changes the lyric from \"Put another record on while I pour\" to \"Take some Swiss Kriss while I pour.\" \n\nThe concern with his health and weight was balanced by his love of food, reflected in such songs as \"Cheesecake\", \"Cornet Chop Suey,\" though \"Struttin’ with Some Barbecue\" was written about a fine-looking companion, not about food. He kept a strong connection throughout his life to the cooking of New Orleans, always signing his letters, \"Red beans and ricely yours...\" \n\nWritings \n\nArmstrong’s gregariousness extended to writing. On the road, he wrote constantly, sharing favorite themes of his life with correspondents around the world. He avidly typed or wrote on whatever stationery was at hand, recording instant takes on music, sex, food, childhood memories, his heavy \"medicinal\" marijuana use—and even his bowel movements, which he gleefully described. He had a fondness for lewd jokes and dirty limericks as well.\n\nSocial organizations \n\nLouis Armstrong was not, as is often claimed, a Freemason. Although he is usually listed as being a member of Montgomery Lodge No. 18 (Prince Hall) in New York, no such lodge has ever existed. However, Armstrong stated in his autobiography that he was a member of the Knights of Pythias which is not a Masonic group. \n\nMusic \n\nHorn playing and early jazz \n\nIn his early years, Armstrong was best known for his virtuosity with the cornet and trumpet. The most lauded recordings on which Armstrong plays trumpet include the Hot Five and Hot Seven sessions, as well as those of the Red Onion Jazz Babies. Armstrong's improvisations, while unconventionally sophisticated for that era, were also subtle and highly melodic. The solo that Armstrong plays during the song Potato Head Blues has long been considered his best solo of that series. \n\nPrior to Armstrong, most collective ensemble playing in jazz, along with its occasional solos, simply varied the melodies of the songs. Armstrong was virtually the first to create significant variations based on the chord harmonies of the songs instead of merely on the melodies. This opened a rich field for creation and improvisation, and significantly changed the music into a soloist's art form.\n\nOften, Armstrong re-composed pop-tunes he played, simply with variations that made them more compelling to jazz listeners of the era. At the same time, however, his oeuvre includes many original melodies, creative leaps, and relaxed or driving rhythms. Armstrong's playing technique, honed by constant practice, extended the range, tone and capabilities of the trumpet. In his records, Armstrong almost single-handedly created the role of the jazz soloist, taking what had been essentially a collective folk music and turning it into an art form with tremendous possibilities for individual expression.\n\nArmstrong was one of the first artists to use recordings of his performances to improve himself. Armstrong was an avid audiophile. He had a large collection of recordings, including reel-to-reel tapes, which he took on the road with him in a trunk during his later career. He enjoyed listening to his own recordings, and comparing his performances musically. In the den of his home, he had the latest audio equipment and would sometimes rehearse and record along with his older recordings or the radio. \n\nVocal popularity \n\nAs his music progressed and popularity grew, his singing also became very important. Armstrong was not the first to record scat singing, but he was masterful at it and helped popularize it with the first recording on which he scatted, \"Heebie Jeebies\". At a recording session for Okeh Records, when the sheet music supposedly fell on the floor and the music began before he could pick up the pages, Armstrong simply started singing nonsense syllables while Okeh president E.A. Fearn, who was at the session, kept telling him to continue. Armstrong did, thinking the track would be discarded, but that was the version that was pressed to disc, sold, and became an unexpected hit. Although the story was thought to be apocryphal, Armstrong himself confirmed it in at least one interview as well as in his memoirs. On a later recording, Armstrong also sang out \"I done forgot the words\" in the middle of recording \"I'm A Ding Dong Daddy From Dumas.\"\n\nSuch records were hits and scat singing became a major part of his performances. Long before this, however, Armstrong was playing around with his vocals, shortening and lengthening phrases, interjecting improvisations, using his voice as creatively as his trumpet.\n\nComposing\n\nArmstrong was a gifted composer who wrote more than fifty songs, which in a number of cases have become jazz standards (e.g., “Gully Low Blues,” “Potato Head Blues,” and “Swing That Music”).\n\nColleagues and followers \n\nDuring his long career he played and sang with some of the most important instrumentalists and vocalists of the time; among them were Bing Crosby, Duke Ellington, Fletcher Henderson, Earl Hines, Jimmie Rodgers, Bessie Smith and perhaps most famously Ella Fitzgerald. His influence upon Crosby is particularly important with regard to the subsequent development of popular music: Crosby admired and copied Armstrong, as is evident on many of his early recordings, notably \"Just One More Chance\" (1931). The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz describes Crosby's debt to Armstrong in precise detail, although it does not acknowledge Armstrong by name:\n\nArmstrong recorded two albums with Ella Fitzgerald: Ella and Louis, and Ella and Louis Again for Verve Records, with the sessions featuring the backing musicianship of the Oscar Peterson Trio and drummers Buddy Rich (on the first album), and Louie Bellson (on the second). Norman Granz then had the vision for Ella and Louis to record Porgy and Bess which is the most famous and critically acclaimed version of the Gershwin brothers' work.\n\nHis recordings for Columbia Records, Louis Armstrong Plays W.C. Handy (1954) and Satch Plays Fats (all Fats Waller tunes) (1955) were both being considered masterpieces, as well as moderately well selling. In 1961 the All Stars participated in two albums - \"The Great Summit\" and \"The Great Reunion\" (now together as a single disc) with Duke Ellington. The albums feature many of Ellington's most famous compositions (as well as two exclusive cuts) with Duke sitting in on piano. His participation in Dave Brubeck's high-concept jazz musical The Real Ambassadors (1963) was critically acclaimed, and features \"Summer Song,\" one of Armstrong's most popular vocal efforts.\n\nIn 1964 his recording of the song \"Hello Dolly\" went to number one. An album of the same title was quickly created around the song, and also shot to number one (knocking The Beatles off the top of the chart). The album sold very well for the rest of the year, quickly going \"Gold\" (500,000). His performance of \"Hello Dolly\" won for best male pop vocal performance at the 1964 Grammy Awards.\n\nHits and later career \n\nArmstrong had nineteen \"Top Ten\" records including \"Stardust\", \"What a Wonderful World\", \"When The Saints Go Marching In\", \"Dream a Little Dream of Me\", \"Ain't Misbehavin'\", \"You Rascal You\", and \"Stompin' at the Savoy\". \"We Have All the Time in the World\" was featured on the soundtrack of the James Bond film On Her Majesty's Secret Service, and enjoyed renewed popularity in the UK in 1994 when it featured on a Guinness advert. It reached number 3 in the charts on being re-released.\n\nIn 1964, Armstrong knocked The Beatles off the top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart with \"Hello, Dolly!\", which gave the 63-year-old performer a U.S. record as the oldest artist to have a number one song. His 1964 song \"Bout Time\" was later featured in the film Bewitched.\n\nArmstrong performed in Italy at the 1968 Sanremo Music Festival where he sang \"Mi Va di Cantare\" alongside his friend, the Eritrean-born Italian singer Lara Saint Paul. In February 1968, he also appeared with Lara Saint Paul on the Italian RAI television channel where he performed \"Grassa e Bella,\" a track he sang in Italian for the Italian market and C.D.I. label. \n\nIn 1968, Armstrong scored one last popular hit in the United Kingdom with \"What a Wonderful World\", which topped the British charts for a month; however, the single did not chart at all in America. The song gained greater currency in the popular consciousness when it was used in the 1987 movie Good Morning, Vietnam, its subsequent re-release topping many charts around the world. Armstrong even appeared on the October 28, 1970, Johnny Cash Show, where he sang Nat King Cole's hit \"Rambling Rose\" and joined Cash to re-create his performance backing Jimmie Rodgers on \"Blue Yodel No. 9\".\n\nStylistic range \n\nArmstrong enjoyed many types of music, from blues to the arrangements of Guy Lombardo, to Latin American folksongs, to classical symphonies and opera. Armstrong incorporated influences from all these sources into his performances, sometimes to the bewilderment of fans who wanted him to stay in convenient narrow categories. Armstrong was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as an early influence. Some of his solos from the 1950s, such as the hard rocking version of \"St. Louis Blues\" from the WC Handy album, show that the influence went in both directions.\n\nLiterature, radio, films and TV \n\nArmstrong appeared in more than a dozen Hollywood films, usually playing a band leader or musician. His most familiar role was as the bandleader cum narrator in the 1956 musical, High Society, in which he sang the title song and performed a duet with Bing Crosby on \"Now You Has Jazz\". In 1947, he played himself in the movie New Orleans opposite Billie Holiday, which chronicled the demise of the Storyville district and the ensuing exodus of musicians from New Orleans to Chicago. In the 1959 film, The Five Pennies (the story of the cornetist Red Nichols), Armstrong played himself as well as singing and playing several classic numbers. With Danny Kaye Armstrong performed a duet of \"When the Saints Go Marching In\" during which Kaye impersonated Armstrong. Armstrong also had a part in the film alongside James Stewart in The Glenn Miller Story in which Glenn (played by Stewart) jammed with Armstrong and a few other noted musicians of the time.\n\nHe was the first African American to host a nationally broadcast radio show in the 1930s. In 1969, Armstrong had a cameo role in the film version of Hello, Dolly! as the bandleader, Louis, to which he sang the title song with actress Barbra Streisand. His solo recording of \"Hello, Dolly!\" is one of his most recognizable performances.\n\nHe was heard on such radio programs as The Story of Swing (1937) and This Is Jazz (1947), and he also made countless television appearances, especially in the 1950s and 1960s, including appearances on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.\n\nArgentine writer Julio Cortázar, a self-described Armstrong admirer, asserted that a 1952 Louis Armstrong concert at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris played a significant role in inspiring him to create the fictional creatures called Cronopios that are the subject of a number of Cortázar's short stories. Cortázar once called Armstrong himself \"Grandísimo Cronopio\" (The Great Cronopio).\n\nArmstrong appears as a minor fictionalized character in Harry Turtledove's Southern Victory Series. When he and his band escape from a Nazi-like Confederacy, they enhance the insipid mainstream music of the North. A young Armstrong also appears as a minor fictionalized character in Patrick Neate's 2001 novel Twelve Bar Blues, part of which is set in New Orleans, and which was a winner at that year's Whitbread Book Awards.\n\nThere is a pivotal scene in Stardust Memories (1980) in which Woody Allen is overwhelmed by a recording of Armstrong's \"Stardust\" and experiences a nostalgic epiphany. The combination of the music and the perfect moment is the catalyst for much of the film's action, prompting the protagonist to fall in love with an ill-advised woman. \n\nTerry Teachout wrote a one-man play about Armstrong called Satchmo at the Waldorf that was premiered in 2011 in Orlando, Fla., and has since been produced by Shakespeare & Company, Long Wharf Theater, and the Wilma Theater. The production ran off Broadway in 2014.\n\nA fledgling musician named \"Louis,\" who is obsessed with Buddy Bolden, appears in two of David Fulmer's Storyville novels: Chasing the Devil's Tail and Jass.\n\nDeath \n\nAgainst his doctor's advice, Armstrong played a two-week engagement in March 1971 at the Waldorf-Astoria's Empire Room. At the end of it he was hospitalized for a heart attack. He was released from the hospital in May, and died of a heart attack in his sleep on July 6, 1971, a month before his 70th birthday. He was residing in Corona, Queens, New York City, at the time of his death. He was interred in Flushing Cemetery, Flushing, in Queens, New York City. \nHis honorary pallbearers included Bing Crosby, Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Pearl Bailey, Count Basie, Harry James, Frank Sinatra, Ed Sullivan, Earl Wilson, Alan King, Johnny Carson and David Frost. Peggy Lee sang The Lord's Prayer at the services while Al Hibbler sang \"Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen\" and Fred Robbins, a long-time friend, gave the eulogy. \n\nAwards and honors \n\nGrammy Awards \n\nArmstrong was posthumously awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1972 by the Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. This Special Merit Award is presented by vote of the Recording Academy's National Trustees to performers who, during their lifetimes, have made creative contributions of outstanding artistic significance to the field of recording. \n\nGrammy Hall of Fame\n\nRecordings of Armstrong were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, which is a special Grammy award established in 1973 to honor recordings that are at least 25 years old, and that have \"qualitative or historical significance.\" \n\nRock and Roll Hall of Fame \n\nThe Rock and Roll Hall of Fame listed Armstrong's West End Blues on the list of 500 songs that shaped Rock and Roll. \n\nInductions and honors \n\nIn 1995, the U.S. Post Office issued a Louis Armstrong 32 cents commemorative postage stamp.\n\nFilm honors \n\nIn 1999 Armstrong was nominated for inclusion in the American Film Institute's 100 Years...100 Stars. \n\nLegacy \n\nThe influence of Armstrong on the development of jazz is virtually immeasurable. Yet, his irrepressible personality both as a performer, and as a public figure later in his career, was so strong that to some it sometimes overshadowed his contributions as a musician and singer.\n\nAs a virtuoso trumpet player, Armstrong had a unique tone and an extraordinary talent for melodic improvisation. Through his playing, the trumpet emerged as a solo instrument in jazz and is used widely today. Additionally, jazz itself was transformed from a collectively improvised folk music to a soloist's serious art form largely through his influence. He was a masterful accompanist and ensemble player in addition to his extraordinary skills as a soloist. With his innovations, he raised the bar musically for all who came after him.\n\nThough Armstrong is widely recognized as a pioneer of scat singing, Ethel Waters precedes his scatting on record in the 1930s according to Gary Giddins and others. Billie Holiday and Frank Sinatra are just two singers who were greatly indebted to him. Holiday said that she always wanted Bessie Smith's 'big' sound and Armstrong's feeling in her singing. Even special musicians like Duke Ellington have praised Armstrong through strong testimonials. Duke Ellington said, \"If anybody was a master, it was Louis Armstrong.\" In 1950, Bing Crosby, the most successful vocalist of the first half of the 20th century, said, \"He is the beginning and the end of music in America.\"\n\nIn the summer of 2001, in commemoration of the centennial of Armstrong's birth, New Orleans's main airport was renamed Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport.\n\nIn 2002, the Louis Armstrong's Hot Five and Hot Seven recordings (1925–1928) were preserved in the United States National Recording Registry, a registry of recordings selected yearly by the National Recording Preservation Board for preservation in the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress. \n\nThe US Open tennis tournament's former main stadium was named Louis Armstrong Stadium in honor of Armstrong who had lived a few blocks from the site. \n\nToday, there are many bands worldwide dedicated to preserving and honoring the music and style of Satchmo, including the Louis Armstrong Society located in New Orleans, Louisiana.\n\nHome turned into National Historic Landmark \n\nThe house where Armstrong lived for almost 28 years was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1977 and is now a museum. The Louis Armstrong House Museum, at 34-56 107th Street (between 34th and 37th Avenues) in Corona, Queens, presents concerts and educational programs, operates as a historic house museum and makes materials in its archives of writings, books, recordings and memorabilia available to the public for research. The museum is operated by the City University of New York's Queens College, following the dictates of Lucille Armstrong's will. The museum opened to the public on October 15, 2003. A new visitors center is planned. \n\nDiscography \n\nSingles \n\nOriginal albums \n\nThese LPs and EPs were released during Armstrong's lifetime and contained original studio and/or live recordings. The year and label information is for the first vinyl release, unless otherwise noted. Additional information such as number of tracks is given only when necessary to distinguish between different releases under the same title. In most cases, the number of CD releases listed is limited, with preference given to the label that originally released the album.\n\nPosthumous releases \n\nThese LPs and CDs were released after Armstrong's 1971 death.\n\n* Louis Armstrong Hot Five and Hot Seven Sessions\n** Hot Fives & Sevens (JSP, 1998)\n** The Complete Hot Five & Hot Seven Recordings (Columbia/Legacy)\n* Struttin' (Drive Archive, 1996) — 8 February 1947 concert with Edmond Hall's All-Stars\n* The Complete Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Armstrong on Verve (1997) — repackaging of Ella and Louis, Ella and Louis Again, and Porgy and Bess\n* rereleases of Together For The First Time and The Great Reunion\n** The Great Summit: The Master Takes (2001)\n** Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington: The Great Summit/Complete Sessions (2000) — includes additional CD of alternate takes\n* The Legendary Berlin Concert (Jazzpoint Records, 2000) — 22 March 1965 concert with Billy Kyle, Tyree Glenn, Eddie Shu, Arvell Shaw and Danny Barcelona\n\nList of songs recorded \n\nChronology of the recordings of Armstrong's songs:" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "United_Nations.txt" ], "title": [ "United Nations" ], "wiki_context": [ "The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization to promote international co-operation. A replacement for the ineffective League of Nations, the organization was established on 24 October 1945 after World War II in order to prevent another such conflict. At its founding, the UN had 51 member states; there are now 193. The headquarters of the United Nations is in Manhattan, New York City, and experiences extraterritoriality. Further main offices are situated in Geneva, Nairobi, and Vienna. The organization is financed by assessed and voluntary contributions from its member states. Its objectives include maintaining international peace and security, promoting human rights, fostering social and economic development, protecting the environment, and providing humanitarian aid in cases of famine, natural disaster, and armed conflict.\n\nThe United Nations Charter was drafted at a conference in April–June 1945; this charter took effect 24 October 1945, and the UN began operation. The UN's mission to preserve world peace was complicated in its early decades by the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union and their respective allies. The organization participated in major actions in Korea and the Congo, as well as approving the creation of the state of Israel in 1947. The organization's membership grew significantly following widespread decolonization in the 1960s, and by the 1970s its budget for economic and social development programmes far outstripped its spending on peacekeeping. After the end of the Cold War, the UN took on major military and peacekeeping missions across the world with varying degrees of success.\n\nThe UN has six principal organs: the General Assembly (the main deliberative assembly); the Security Council (for deciding certain resolutions for peace and security); the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) (for promoting international economic and social co-operation and development); the Secretariat (for providing studies, information, and facilities needed by the UN); the International Court of Justice (the primary judicial organ); and the United Nations Trusteeship Council (inactive since 1994). UN System agencies include the World Bank Group, the World Health Organization, the World Food Programme, UNESCO, and UNICEF. The UN's most prominent officer is the Secretary-General, an office held by South Korean Ban Ki-moon since 2007. Non-governmental organizations may be granted consultative status with ECOSOC and other agencies to participate in the UN's work.\n\nThe organization won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001, and a number of its officers and agencies have also been awarded the prize. Other evaluations of the UN's effectiveness have been mixed. Some commentators believe the organization to be an important force for peace and human development, while others have called the organization ineffective, corrupt, or biased.\n\nHistory\n\nBackground\n\nIn the century prior to the UN's creation, several international treaty organizations and conferences had been formed to regulate conflicts between nations, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907. Following the catastrophic loss of life in the First World War, the Paris Peace Conference established the League of Nations to maintain harmony between countries. This organization resolved some territorial disputes and created international structures for areas such as postal mail, aviation, and opium control, some of which would later be absorbed into the UN. However, the League lacked representation for colonial peoples (then half the world's population) and significant participation from several major powers, including the US, USSR, Germany, and Japan; it failed to act against the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931, the Second Italo-Ethiopian War in 1935, the Japanese invasion of China in 1937, and German expansions under Adolf Hitler that culminated in the Second World War.\n\n1942 \"Declaration of United Nations\" by the Allies of World War II\n\nThe earliest concrete plan for a new world organization began under the aegis of the US State Department in 1939. The text of the \"Declaration by United Nations\" was drafted by President Franklin Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Roosevelt aide Harry Hopkins, while meeting at the White House, 29 December 1941. It incorporated Soviet suggestions, but left no role for France. \"Four Policemen\" was coined to refer four major Allied countries, United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and China, which was emerged in Declaration by United Nations. Roosevelt first coined the term United Nations to describe the Allied countries. \"On New Year's Day 1942, President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill, Maxim Litvinov, of the USSR, and T. V. Soong, of China, signed a short document which later came to be known as the United Nations Declaration and the next day the representatives of twenty-two other nations added their signatures.\" The term United Nations was first officially used when 26 governments signed this Declaration. One major change from the Atlantic Charter was the addition of a provision for religious freedom, which Stalin approved after Roosevelt insisted. By 1 March 1945, 21 additional states had signed.\n\nA JOINT DECLARATION BY THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, THE UNITED KINGDOM OF GREAT BRITAIN AND NORTHERN IRELAND, THE UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS, CHINA, AUSTRALIA, BELGIUM, CANADA, COSTA RICA, CUBA, CZECHOSLOVAKIA, DOMINICAN REPUBLIC, EL SALVADOR, GREECE, GUATEMALA, HAITI, HONDURAS, INDIA, LUXEMBOURG, NETHERLANDS, NEW ZEALAND, NICARAGUA, NORWAY, PANAMA, POLAND, SOUTH AFRICA, YUGOSLAVIA\n\nThe Governments signatory hereto,\n\nHaving subscribed to a common program of purposes and principles embodied in the Joint Declaration of the President of the United States of America and the Prime Minister of Great Britain dated August 14, 1941, known as the Atlantic Charter,\n\nBeing convinced that complete victory over their enemies is essential to defend life, liberty, independence and religious freedom, and to preserve human rights and justice in their own lands as well as in other lands, and that they are now engaged in a common struggle against savage and brutal forces seeking to subjugate the world,\n\nDECLARE:\n\n(1) Each Government pledges itself to employ its full resources, military or economic, against those members of the Tripartite Pact and its adherents with which such government is at war.\n\n(2) Each Government pledges itself to cooperate with the Governments signatory hereto and not to make a separate armistice or peace with the enemies.\n\nThe foregoing declaration may be adhered to by other nations which are, or which may be, rendering material assistance and contributions in the struggle for victory over Hitlerism. \n\nDuring the war, the United Nations became the official term for the Allies. To join countries had to sign the Declaration and declare war on the Axis.\n\nFounding the UN 1945\n\nThe United Nations was formulated and negotiated among the delegations from the Soviet Union, the UK, the US and China at the Dumbarton Oaks Conference in 1944. After months of planning, the UN Conference on International Organization opened in San Francisco, 25 April 1945, attended by 50 governments and a number of non-governmental organizations involved in drafting the United Nations Charter. \"The heads of the delegations of the sponsoring countries took turns as chairman of the plenary meetings: Anthony Eden, of Britain, Edward Stettinius, of the United States, T. V. Soong, of China, and Vyacheslav Molotov, of the Soviet Union. At the later meetings, Lord Halifax deputized for Mr. Eden, Wellington Koo for T. V. Soong, and Mr Gromyko for Mr. Molotov.\" The UN officially came into existence 24 October 1945, upon ratification of the Charter by the five permanent members of the Security Council—France, the Republic of China, the Soviet Union, the UK and the US—and by a majority of the other 46 signatories.\n\nThe first meetings of the General Assembly, with 51 nations represented, and the Security Council took place in London beginning 6 January 1946. The General Assembly selected New York City as the site for the headquarters of the United Nations, and the facility was completed in 1952. Its site—like UN headquarters buildings in Geneva, Vienna, and Nairobi—is designated as international territory. The Norwegian Foreign Minister, Trygve Lie, was elected as the first UN Secretary-General.\n\nCold War era\n\nThough the UN's primary mandate was peacekeeping, the division between the US and USSR often paralysed the organization, generally allowing it to intervene only in conflicts distant from the Cold War. (A notable exception was a Security Council resolution in 1950 authorizing a US-led coalition to repel the North Korean invasion of South Korea, passed in the absence of the USSR.) In 1947, the General Assembly approved a resolution to partition Palestine, approving the creation of the state of Israel. Two years later, Ralph Bunche, a UN official, negotiated an armistice to the resulting conflict. In 1956, the first UN peacekeeping force was established to end the Suez Crisis; however, the UN was unable to intervene against the USSR's simultaneous invasion of Hungary following that country's revolution.\n\nIn 1960, the UN deployed United Nations Operation in the Congo (UNOC), the largest military force of its early decades, to bring order to the breakaway State of Katanga, restoring it to the control of the Democratic Republic of the Congo by 1964. While travelling to meet with rebel leader Moise Tshombe during the conflict, Dag Hammarskjöld, often named as one of the UN's most effective Secretaries-General, died in a plane crash; months later he was posthumously awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. In 1964, Hammarskjöld's successor, U Thant, deployed the United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus, which would become one of the UN's longest-running peacekeeping missions.\n\nWith the spread of decolonization in the 1960s, the organization's membership saw an influx of newly independent nations. In 1960 alone, 17 new states joined the UN, 16 of them from Africa. On 25 October 1971, with opposition from the United States, but with the support of many Third World nations, the mainland, communist People's Republic of China was given the Chinese seat on the Security Council in place of the Republic of China that occupied Taiwan; the vote was widely seen as a sign of waning US influence in the organization. Third World nations organized into the Group of 77 coalition under the leadership of Algeria, which briefly became a dominant power at the UN. In 1975, a bloc comprising the USSR and Third World nations passed a resolution, over strenuous US and Israeli opposition, declaring Zionism to be racism; the resolution was repealed in 1991, shortly after the end of the Cold War.\n\nWith an increasing Third World presence and the failure of UN mediation in conflicts in the Middle East, Vietnam, and Kashmir, the UN increasingly shifted its attention to its ostensibly secondary goals of economic development and cultural exchange. By the 1970s, the UN budget for social and economic development was far greater than its peacekeeping budget.\n\nPost-Cold War\n\nAfter the Cold War, the UN saw a radical expansion in its peacekeeping duties, taking on more missions in ten years than it had in the previous four decades. Between 1988 and 2000, the number of adopted Security Council resolutions more than doubled, and the peacekeeping budget increased more than tenfold. The UN negotiated an end to the Salvadoran Civil War, launched a successful peacekeeping mission in Namibia, and oversaw democratic elections in post-apartheid South Africa and post-Khmer Rouge Cambodia. In 1991, the UN authorized a US-led coalition that repulsed the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Brian Urquhart, Under-Secretary-General from 1971 to 1985, later described the hopes raised by these successes as a \"false renaissance\" for the organization, given the more troubled missions that followed.\n\nThough the UN Charter had been written primarily to prevent aggression by one nation against another, in the early 1990s the UN faced a number of simultaneous, serious crises within nations such as Somalia, Haiti, Mozambique, and the former Yugoslavia. The UN mission in Somalia was widely viewed as a failure after the US withdrawal following casualties in the Battle of Mogadishu, and the UN mission to Bosnia faced \"worldwide ridicule\" for its indecisive and confused mission in the face of ethnic cleansing. In 1994, the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda failed to intervene in the Rwandan Genocide amid indecision in the Security Council.\n\nBeginning in the last decades of the Cold War, American and European critics of the UN condemned the organization for perceived mismanagement and corruption. In 1984, the US President, Ronald Reagan, withdrew his nation's funding from UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, founded 1946) over allegations of mismanagement, followed by Britain and Singapore. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Secretary-General from 1992 to 1996, initiated a reform of the Secretariat, reducing the size of the organization somewhat. His successor, Kofi Annan (1997–2006), initiated further management reforms in the face of threats from the United States to withhold its UN dues.\n\nIn the late 1990s and 2000s, international interventions authorized by the UN took a wider variety of forms. The UN mission in the Sierra Leone Civil War of 1991–2002 was supplemented by British Royal Marines, and the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 was overseen by NATO.In 2003, the United States invaded Iraq despite failing to pass a UN Security Council resolution for authorization, prompting a new round of questioning of the organization's effectiveness. Under the current Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, the UN has intervened with peacekeepers in crises including the War in Darfur in Sudan and the Kivu conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo and sent observers and chemical weapons inspectors to the Syrian Civil War. In 2013, an internal review of UN actions in the final battles of the Sri Lankan Civil War in 2009 concluded that the organization had suffered \"systemic failure\". One hundred and one UN personnel died in the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the worst loss of life in the organization's history.\n\nStructure\n\nThe United Nations' system is based on five principal organs: the General Assembly, the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), the Secretariat, and the International Court of Justice. A sixth principal organ, the Trusteeship Council, suspended operations in 1994, upon the independence of Palau, the last remaining UN trustee territory.\n\nFour of the five principal organs are located at the main UN Headquarters in New York City. The International Court of Justice is located in The Hague, while other major agencies are based in the UN offices at Geneva, Vienna, and Nairobi. Other UN institutions are located throughout the world. The six official languages of the United Nations, used in intergovernmental meetings and documents, are Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish. On the basis of the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations, the UN and its agencies are immune from the laws of the countries where they operate, safeguarding the UN's impartiality with regard to the host and member countries. \n\nBelow the six organs sit, in the words of the author Linda Fasulo, \"an amazing collection of entities and organizations, some of which are actually older than the UN itself and operate with almost complete independence from it\". These include specialized agencies, research and training institutions, programmes and funds, and other UN entities.\n\nThe United Nations obey the Noblemaire principle, which is binding on any organization that belongs to the united nations system. This principle calls for salaries that will draw and keep citizens of countries where salaries are highest, and also calls for equal pay for work of equal value independent of the employee's nationality. Staff salaries are subject to an internal tax that is administered by the UN organizations. \n\nGeneral Assembly\n\nThe General Assembly is the main deliberative assembly of the United Nations. Composed of all United Nations member states, the assembly meets in regular yearly sessions, but emergency sessions can also be called. The assembly is led by a president, elected from among the member states on a rotating regional basis, and 21 vice-presidents. The first session convened 10 January 1946 in the Methodist Central Hall Westminster in London and included representatives of 51 nations.\n\nWhen the General Assembly votes on important questions, a two-thirds majority of those present and voting is required. Examples of important questions include recommendations on peace and security; election of members to organs; admission, suspension, and expulsion of members; and budgetary matters. All other questions are decided by a majority vote. Each member country has one vote. Apart from approval of budgetary matters, resolutions are not binding on the members. The Assembly may make recommendations on any matters within the scope of the UN, except matters of peace and security that are under consideration by the Security Council.\n\nDraft resolutions can be forwarded to the General Assembly by eight committees:\n*General Committee – a supervisory committee consisting of the assembly's president, vice-president, and committee heads\n*Credentials Committee – responsible for determining the credentials of each member nation's UN representatives\n*First Committee (Disarmament and International Security)\n*Second Committee (Economic and Financial)\n*Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian, and Cultural)\n*Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization)\n*Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary)\n*Sixth Committee (Legal)\n\nSecurity Council\n\nThe Security Council is charged with maintaining peace and security among countries. While other organs of the United Nations can only make \"recommendations\" to member states, the Security Council has the power to make binding decisions that member states have agreed to carry out, under the terms of Charter Article 25. The decisions of the Council are known as United Nations Security Council resolutions.\n\nThe Security Council is made up of fifteen member states, consisting of five permanent members—China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States—and ten non-permanent members—Angola (term ends 2016), Chad (2015), Chile (2015), Jordan (2015), Lithuania (2015), Malaysia (2016), New Zealand (2016), Nigeria (2015), Spain (2016), and Venezuela (2016). The five permanent members hold veto power over UN resolutions, allowing a permanent member to block adoption of a resolution, though not debate. The ten temporary seats are held for two-year terms, with member states voted in by the General Assembly on a regional basis. The presidency of the Security Council rotates alphabetically each month. \n\nSecretariat\n\nThe UN Secretariat is headed by the Secretary-General, assisted by a staff of international civil servants worldwide. It provides studies, information, and facilities needed by United Nations bodies for their meetings. It also carries out tasks as directed by the Security Council, the General Assembly, the Economic and Social Council, and other UN bodies.\n\nThe Secretary-General acts as the de facto spokesperson and leader of the UN. The position is defined in the UN Charter as the organization's \"chief administrative officer\". Article 99 of the charter states that the Secretary-General can bring to the Security Council's attention \"any matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security\", a phrase that Secretaries-General since Trygve Lie have interpreted as giving the position broad scope for action on the world stage. The office has evolved into a dual role of an administrator of the UN organization and a diplomat and mediator addressing disputes between member states and finding consensus to global issues.\n\nThe Secretary-General is appointed by the General Assembly, after being recommended by the Security Council, where the permanent members have veto power. There are no specific criteria for the post, but over the years it has become accepted that the post shall be held for one or two terms of five years, that the post shall be appointed on the basis of geographical rotation, and that the Secretary-General shall not originate from one of the five permanent Security Council member states. The current Secretary-General is Ban Ki-moon, who replaced Kofi Annan in 2007 and was elected for a second term to conclude at the end of 2016. \n\nInternational Court of Justice\n\nThe International Court of Justice (ICJ), located in The Hague, in the Netherlands, is the primary judicial organ of the UN. Established in 1945 by the UN Charter, the Court began work in 1946 as the successor to the Permanent Court of International Justice. The ICJ is composed of 15 judges who serve 9-year terms and are appointed by the General Assembly; every sitting judge must be from a different nation.\n\nIt is based in the Peace Palace in The Hague, sharing the building with the Hague Academy of International Law, a private centre for the study of international law. The ICJ's primary purpose is to adjudicate disputes among states. The court has heard cases related to war crimes, illegal state interference, ethnic cleansing, and other issues. The ICJ can also be called upon by other UN organs to provide advisory opinions.\n\nEconomic and Social Council\n\nThe Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) assists the General Assembly in promoting international economic and social co-operation and development. ECOSOC has 54 members, which are elected by the General Assembly for a three-year term. The president is elected for a one-year term and chosen amongst the small or middle powers represented on ECOSOC. The council has one annual meeting in July, held in either New York or Geneva. Viewed as separate from the specialized bodies it co-ordinates, ECOSOC's functions include information gathering, advising member nations, and making recommendations. Owing to its broad mandate of co-ordinating many agencies, ECOSOC has at times been criticized as unfocused or irrelevant.\n\nECOSOC's subsidiary bodies include the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, which advises UN agencies on issues relating to indigenous peoples; the United Nations Forum on Forests, which co-ordinates and promotes sustainable forest management; the United Nations Statistical Commission, which co-ordinates information-gathering efforts between agencies; and the Commission on Sustainable Development, which co-ordinates efforts between UN agencies and NGOs working toward sustainable development. ECOSOC may also grant consultative status to non-governmental organizations; by 2004, more than 2,200 organizations had received this status.\n\nSpecialized agencies\n\nThe UN Charter stipulates that each primary organ of the UN can establish various specialized agencies to fulfill its duties. Some best-known agencies are the International Atomic Energy Agency, the Food and Agriculture Organization, UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), the World Bank, and the World Health Organization (WHO). The UN performs most of its humanitarian work through these agencies. Examples include mass vaccination programmes (through WHO), the avoidance of famine and malnutrition (through the work of the WFP), and the protection of vulnerable and displaced people (for example, by UNHCR).\n\nMembership\n\nWith the addition of South Sudan 14 July 2011, there are United Nations member states, including all undisputed independent states apart from Vatican City. \nThe UN Charter outlines the rules for membership:\n\nIn addition, there are two non-member observer states of the United Nations General Assembly: the Holy See (which holds sovereignty over Vatican City) and the State of Palestine. The Cook Islands and Niue, both states in free association with New Zealand, are full members of several UN specialized agencies and have had their \"full treaty-making capacity\" recognized by the Secretariat.\n\nGroup of 77\n\nThe Group of 77 at the UN is a loose coalition of developing nations, designed to promote its members' collective economic interests and create an enhanced joint negotiating capacity in the United Nations. Seventy-seven nations founded the organization, but by November 2013 the organization had since expanded to 133 member countries. The group was founded 15 June 1964 by the \"Joint Declaration of the Seventy-Seven Countries\" issued at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The group held its first major meeting in Algiers in 1967, where it adopted the Charter of Algiers and established the basis for permanent institutional structures. \n\nObjectives\n\nPeacekeeping and security\n\nThe UN, after approval by the Security Council, sends peacekeepers to regions where armed conflict has recently ceased or paused to enforce the terms of peace agreements and to discourage combatants from resuming hostilities. Since the UN does not maintain its own military, peacekeeping forces are voluntarily provided by member states. These soldiers are sometimes nicknamed \"Blue Helmets\" for their distinctive gear. The peacekeeping force as a whole received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1988. \n\nIn September 2013, the UN had peacekeeping soldiers deployed on 15 missions. The largest was the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO), which included 20,688 uniformed personnel. The smallest, United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP), included 42 uniformed personnel responsible for monitoring the ceasefire in Jammu and Kashmir. UN peacekeepers with the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO) have been stationed in the Middle East since 1948, the longest-running active peacekeeping mission.\n\nA study by the RAND Corporation in 2005 found the UN to be successful in two out of three peacekeeping efforts. It compared efforts at nation-building by the United Nations to those of the United States, and found that seven out of eight UN cases are at peace, as compared with four out of eight US cases at peace. Also in 2005, the Human Security Report documented a decline in the number of wars, genocides, and human rights abuses since the end of the Cold War, and presented evidence, albeit circumstantial, that international activism—mostly spearheaded by the UN—has been the main cause of the decline in armed conflict in that period. Situations in which the UN has not only acted to keep the peace but also intervened include the Korean War (1950–53) and the authorization of intervention in Iraq after the Gulf War (1990–91).\n\nThe UN has also drawn criticism for perceived failures. In many cases, member states have shown reluctance to achieve or enforce Security Council resolutions. Disagreements in the Security Council about military action and intervention are seen as having failed to prevent the Bangladesh genocide in 1971, the Cambodian genocide in the 1970s, and the Rwandan genocide in 1994. Similarly, UN inaction is blamed for failing to either prevent the Srebrenica massacre in 1995 or complete the peacekeeping operations in 1992–93 during the Somali Civil War. UN peacekeepers have also been accused of child rape, soliciting prostitutes, and sexual abuse during various peacekeeping missions in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, Liberia, Sudan and what is now South Sudan, Burundi, and Ivory Coast. Scientists cited UN peacekeepers from Nepal as the likely source of the 2010–13 Haiti cholera outbreak, which killed more than 8,000 Haitians following the 2010 Haiti earthquake. \n\nIn addition to peacekeeping, the UN is also active in encouraging disarmament. Regulation of armaments was included in the writing of the UN Charter in 1945 and was envisioned as a way of limiting the use of human and economic resources for their creation. The advent of nuclear weapons came only weeks after the signing of the charter, resulting in the first resolution of the first General Assembly meeting calling for specific proposals for \"the elimination from national armaments of atomic weapons and of all other major weapons adaptable to mass destruction\". The UN has been involved with arms-limitation treaties, such as the Outer Space Treaty (1967), the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (1968), the Seabed Arms Control Treaty (1971), the Biological Weapons Convention (1972), the Chemical Weapons Convention (1992), and the Ottawa Treaty (1997), which prohibits landmines. Three UN bodies oversee arms proliferation issues: the International Atomic Energy Agency, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization Preparatory Commission.\n\nHuman rights\n\nOne of the UN's primary purposes is \"promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion\", and member states pledge to undertake \"joint and separate action\" to protect these rights.\n\nIn 1948, the General Assembly adopted a Universal Declaration of Human Rights, drafted by a committee headed by Franklin D. Roosevelt's widow, Eleanor, and including the French lawyer René Cassin. The document proclaims basic civil, political, and economic rights common to all human beings, though its effectiveness toward achieving these ends has been disputed since its drafting. The Declaration serves as a \"common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations\" rather than a legally binding document, but it has become the basis of two binding treaties, the 1966 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. In practice, the UN is unable to take significant action against human rights abuses without a Security Council resolution, though it does substantial work in investigating and reporting abuses.\n\nIn 1979, the General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, followed by the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1989. With the end of the Cold War, the push for human rights action took on new impetus. The United Nations Commission on Human Rights was formed in 1993 to oversee human rights issues for the UN, following the recommendation of that year's World Conference on Human Rights. Jacques Fomerand, a scholar of the UN, describes this organization's mandate as \"broad and vague\", with only \"meager\" resources to carry it out. In 2006, it was replaced by a Human Rights Council consisting of 47 nations. Also in 2006, the General Assembly passed a Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and in 2011 it passed its first resolution recognizing the rights of LGBT people. \n\nOther UN bodies responsible for women's rights issues include United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, a commission of ECOSOC founded in 1946; the United Nations Development Fund for Women, created in 1976; and the United Nations International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women, founded in 1979. The United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, one of three bodies with a mandate to oversee issues related to indigenous peoples, held its first session in 2002. \n\nEconomic development and humanitarian assistance\n\nAnother primary purpose of the UN is \"to achieve international co-operation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character\". Numerous bodies have been created to work towards this goal, primarily under the authority of the General Assembly and ECOSOC. In 2000, the 192 United Nations member states agreed to achieve eight Millennium Development Goals by 2015. \n\nThe UN Development Programme (UNDP), an organization for grant-based technical assistance founded in 1945, is one of the leading bodies in the field of international development. The organization also publishes the UN Human Development Index, a comparative measure ranking countries by poverty, literacy, education, life expectancy, and other factors. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), also founded in 1945, promotes agricultural development and food security. UNICEF (the United Nations Children's Fund) was created in 1946 to aid European children after the Second World War and expanded its mission to provide aid around the world and to uphold the Convention on the Rights of the Child. \n\nThe World Bank Group and International Monetary Fund (IMF) are independent, specialized agencies and observers within the UN framework, according to a 1947 agreement. They were initially formed separately from the UN through the Bretton Woods Agreement in 1944. The World Bank provides loans for international development, while the IMF promotes international economic co-operation and gives emergency loans to indebted countries.\n\nThe World Health Organization (WHO), which focuses on international health issues and disease eradication, is another of the UN's largest agencies. In 1980, the agency announced that the eradication of smallpox had been completed. In subsequent decades, WHO largely eradicated polio, river blindness, and leprosy. The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), begun in 1996, co-ordinates the organization's response to the AIDS epidemic. The UN Population Fund, which also dedicates part of its resources to combating HIV, is the world's largest source of funding for reproductive health and family planning services.\n\nAlong with the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, the UN often takes a leading role in co-ordinating emergency relief. The World Food Programme (WFP), created in 1961, provides food aid in response to famine, natural disasters, and armed conflict. The organization reports that it feeds an average of 90 million people in 80 nations each year. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), established in 1950, works to protect the rights of refugees, asylum seekers, and stateless people. UNHCR and WFP programmes are funded by voluntary contributions from governments, corporations, and individuals, though the UNHCR's administrative costs are paid for by the UN's primary budget.\n\nOther\n\nSince the UN's creation, over 80 colonies have attained independence. The General Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples in 1960 with no votes against but abstentions from all major colonial powers. The UN works toward decolonization through groups including the UN Committee on Decolonization, created in 1962. The committee lists seventeen remaining \"Non-Self-Governing Territories\", the largest and most populous of which is Western Sahara. \n\nBeginning with the formation of the UN Environmental Programme (UNEP) in 1972, the UN has made environmental issues a prominent part of its agenda. A lack of success in the first two decades of UN work in this area led to the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, which sought to give new impetus to these efforts. In 1988, the UNEP and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), another UN organization, established the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which assesses and reports on research on global warming. The UN-sponsored Kyoto Protocol, signed in 1997, set legally binding emissions reduction targets for ratifying states.\n\nThe UN also declares and co-ordinates international observances, periods of time to observe issues of international interest or concern. Examples include World Tuberculosis Day, Earth Day, and the International Year of Deserts and Desertification. \n\nFunding\n\nThe UN is financed from assessed and voluntary contributions from member states. The General Assembly approves the regular budget and determines the assessment for each member. This is broadly based on the relative capacity of each country to pay, as measured by its gross national income (GNI), with adjustments for external debt and low per capita income. The two-year budget for 2012–13 was $5.512 billion in total. \n\nThe Assembly has established the principle that the UN should not be unduly dependent on any one member to finance its operations. Thus, there is a \"ceiling\" rate, setting the maximum amount that any member can be assessed for the regular budget. In December 2000, the Assembly revised the scale of assessments in response to pressure from the United States. As part of that revision, the regular budget ceiling was reduced from 25% to 22%. For the least developed countries (LDCs), a ceiling rate of 0.01% is applied. In addition to the ceiling rates, the minimum amount assessed to any member nation (or \"floor\" rate) is set at 0.001% of the UN budget ($55,120 for the two year budget 2013-2014).\n\nA large share of the UN's expenditure addresses its core mission of peace and security, and this budget is assessed separately from the main organizational budget. The peacekeeping budget for the 2015–16 fiscal year was $8.27 billion, supporting 82,318 troops deployed in 15 missions around the world. UN peace operations are funded by assessments, using a formula derived from the regular funding scale that includes a weighted surcharge for the five permanent Security Council members, who must approve all peacekeeping operations. This surcharge serves to offset discounted peacekeeping assessment rates for less developed countries. In 2013, the top 10 providers of assessed financial contributions to United Nations peacekeeping operations were the United States (28.38%), Japan (10.83%), France (7.22%), Germany (7.14%), the United Kingdom (6.68%), China (6.64%), Italy (4.45%), the Russian Federation (3.15%), Canada (2.98%), and Spain (2.97%). \n\nSpecial UN programmes not included in the regular budget, such as UNICEF and the World Food Programme, are financed by voluntary contributions from member governments, corporations, and private individuals. \n\nEvaluations, awards, and criticism\n\nA number of agencies and individuals associated with the UN have won the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of their work. Two Secretaries-General, Dag Hammarskjöld and Kofi Annan, were each awarded the prize (in 1961 and 2001, respectively), as were Ralph Bunche (1950), a UN negotiator, René Cassin (1968), a contributor to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the US Secretary of State Cordell Hull (1945), the latter for his role in the organization's founding. Lester B. Pearson, the Canadian Secretary of State for External Affairs, was awarded the prize in 1957 for his role in organizing the UN's first peacekeeping force to resolve the Suez Crisis. UNICEF won the prize in 1965, the International Labour Organization in 1969, the UN Peace-Keeping Forces in 1988, the International Atomic Energy Agency (which reports to the UN) in 2005, and the UN-supported Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in 2013. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees was awarded in 1954 and 1981, becoming one of only two recipients to win the prize twice. The UN as a whole was awarded the prize in 2001, sharing it with Annan. \n\nSince its founding, there have been many calls for reform of the United Nations but little consensus on how to do so. Some want the UN to play a greater or more effective role in world affairs, while others want its role reduced to humanitarian work. There have also been numerous calls for the UN Security Council's membership to be increased, for different ways of electing the UN's Secretary-General, and for a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly. Jacques Fomerand states the most enduring divide in views of the UN is \"the North–South split\" between richer Northern nations and developing Southern nations. Southern nations tend to favor a more empowered UN with a stronger General Assembly, allowing them a greater voice in world affairs, while Northern nations prefer an economically laissez-faire UN that focuses on transnational threats such as terrorism.\n\nAfter World War II, the French Committee of National Liberation was late to be recognized by the US as the government of France, and so the country was initially excluded from the conferences that created the new organization. The future French president Charles de Gaulle criticized the UN, famously calling it a machin (\"contraption\"), and was not convinced that a global security alliance would help maintain world peace, preferring direct defence treaties between countries. Throughout the Cold War, both the US and USSR repeatedly accused the UN of favoring the other. In 1953, the USSR effectively forced the resignation of Trygve Lie, the Secretary-General, through its refusal to deal with him, while in the 1950s and 1960s, a popular US bumper sticker read, \"You can't spell communism without U.N.\" In a sometimes-misquoted statement, President George W. Bush stated in February 2003 (referring to UN uncertainty towards Iraqi provocations under the Saddam Hussein regime) that \"free nations will not allow the United Nations to fade into history as an ineffective, irrelevant debating society.\" In contrast, the French President, François Hollande, stated in 2012 that \"France trusts the United Nations. She knows that no state, no matter how powerful, can solve urgent problems, fight for development and bring an end to all crises... France wants the UN to be the centre of global governance.\" Critics such as Dore Gold, an Israeli diplomat, Robert S. Wistrich, a British scholar, Alan Dershowitz, an American legal scholar, Mark Dreyfus, an Australian politician, and the Anti-Defamation League consider UN attention to Israel's treatment of Palestinians to be excessive. In September 2015, Saudi Arabia's Faisal bin Hassan Trad has been elected Chair of the United Nations Human Rights Council panel that appoints independent experts, a move criticized by human rights groups. \n\nCritics have also accused the UN of bureaucratic inefficiency, waste, and corruption. In 1976, the General Assembly established the Joint Inspection Unit to seek out inefficiencies within the UN system. During the 1990s, the US withheld dues citing inefficiency and only started repayment on the condition that a major reforms initiative was introduced. In 1994, the Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) was established by the General Assembly to serve as an efficiency watchdog. In 1994, former Special Representative of the Secretary-General of the UN to Somalia Mohamed Sahnoun published \"Somalia: The Missed Opportunities\", a book in which he analyses the reasons for the failure of the 1992 UN intervention in Somalia, showing that, between the start of the Somali civil war in 1988 and the fall of the Siad Barre regime in January 1991, the UN missed at least three opportunities to prevent major human tragedies; when the UN tried to provide humanitarian assistance, they were totally outperformed by NGOs, whose competence and dedication sharply contrasted with the UN's excessive caution and bureaucratic inefficiencies. If radical reform was not undertaken, warned Mohamed Sahnoun, then the UN would continue to respond to such crisis with inept improvisation. In 2004, the UN faced accusations that its recently ended Oil-for-Food Programme—in which Iraq had been allowed to trade oil for basic needs to relieve the pressure of sanctions—had suffered from widespread corruption, including billions of dollars of kickbacks. An independent inquiry created by the UN found that many of its officials had been involved, as well as raising \"significant\" questions about the role of Kojo Annan, the son of Kofi Annan. \n\nIn evaluating the UN as a whole, Jacques Fomerand writes that the \"accomplishments of the United Nations in the last 60 years are impressive in their own terms. Progress in human development during the 20th century has been dramatic and the UN and its agencies have certainly helped the world become a more hospitable and livable place for millions.\" Evaluating the first 50 years of the UN's history, the author Stanley Meisler writes that \"the United Nations never fulfilled the hopes of its founders, but it accomplished a great deal nevertheless\", citing its role in decolonization and its many successful peacekeeping efforts. The British historian Paul Kennedy states that while the organization has suffered some major setbacks, \"when all its aspects are considered, the UN has brought great benefits to our generation and ... will bring benefits to our children's and grandchildren's generations as well.\"" ] }

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{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe", "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "President_of_the_United_States.txt", "Russo-Japanese_War.txt" ], "title": [ "President of the United States", "Russo-Japanese War" ], "wiki_context": [ "The President of the United States of America (POTUS) is the elected head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces.\n\nThe President of the United States is considered one of the world's most powerful people, leading the world's only contemporary superpower. The role includes being the commander-in-chief of the world's most expensive military with the largest nuclear arsenal and leading the nation with the largest economy by real and nominal GDP. The office of the president holds significant hard and soft power both in the United States and abroad.\n\nArticle II of the U.S. Constitution vests the executive power of the United States in the president. The power includes execution of federal law, alongside the responsibility of appointing federal executive, diplomatic, regulatory and judicial officers, and concluding treaties with foreign powers with the advice and consent of the Senate. The president is further empowered to grant federal pardons and reprieves, and to convene and adjourn either or both houses of Congress under extraordinary circumstances. The president is largely responsible for dictating the legislative agenda of the party to which the president is enrolled. The president also directs the foreign and domestic policy of the United States. Since the founding of the United States, the power of the president and the federal government has grown substantially. \n\nThe president is indirectly elected by the people through the Electoral College to a four-year term, and is one of only two nationally elected federal officers, the other being the Vice President of the United States. The Twenty-second Amendment, adopted in 1951, prohibits anyone from ever being elected to the presidency for a third full term. It also prohibits a person from being elected to the presidency more than once if that person previously had served as president, or acting president, for more than two years of another person's term as president. In all, 43 individuals have served 44 presidencies (counting Cleveland's two non-consecutive terms separately) spanning 56 full four-year terms. On January 20, 2009, Barack Obama became the 44th and current president. On November 6, 2012, he was re-elected and is currently serving the 57th term. The next presidential election is scheduled to take place on November 8, 2016; on January 20, 2017, the newly elected president will take office.\n\nOrigin\n\nIn 1776, the Thirteen Colonies, acting through the Second Continental Congress, declared political independence from Great Britain during the American Revolution. The new states, though independent of each other as nation states, recognized the necessity of closely coordinating their efforts against the British. Desiring to avoid anything that remotely resembled a monarchy, Congress negotiated the Articles of Confederation to establish a weak alliance between the states. As a central authority, Congress under the Articles was without any legislative power; it could make its own resolutions, determinations, and regulations, but not any laws, nor any taxes or local commercial regulations enforceable upon citizens. This institutional design reflected the conception of how Americans believed the deposed British system of Crown and Parliament ought to have functioned with respect to the royal dominion: a superintending body for matters that concerned the entire empire. Out from under any monarchy, the states assigned some formerly royal prerogatives (e.g., making war, receiving ambassadors, etc.) to Congress, while severally lodging the rest within their own respective state governments. Only after all the states agreed to a resolution settling competing western land claims did the Articles take effect on March 1, 1781, when Maryland became the final state to ratify them.\n\nIn 1783, the Treaty of Paris secured independence for each of the former colonies. With peace at hand, the states each turned toward their own internal affairs. By 1786, Americans found their continental borders besieged and weak, their respective economies in crises as neighboring states agitated trade rivalries with one another, witnessed their hard currency pouring into foreign markets to pay for imports, their Mediterranean commerce preyed upon by North African pirates, and their foreign-financed Revolutionary War debts unpaid and accruing interest. Civil and political unrest loomed.\n\nFollowing the successful resolution of commercial and fishing disputes between Virginia and Maryland at the Mount Vernon Conference in 1785, Virginia called for a trade conference between all the states, set for September 1786 in Annapolis, Maryland, with an aim toward resolving further-reaching interstate commercial antagonisms. When the convention failed for lack of attendance due to suspicions among most of the other states, the Annapolis delegates called for a convention to offer revisions to the Articles, to be held the next spring in Philadelphia. Prospects for the next convention appeared bleak until James Madison and Edmund Randolph succeeded in securing George Washington's attendance to Philadelphia as a delegate for Virginia.\n\nWhen the Constitutional Convention convened in May 1787, the 12 state delegations in attendance (Rhode Island did not send delegates) brought with them an accumulated experience over a diverse set of institutional arrangements between legislative and executive branches from within their respective state governments. Most states maintained a weak executive without veto or appointment powers, elected annually by the legislature to a single term only, sharing power with an executive council, and countered by a strong legislature. New York offered the greatest exception, having a strong, unitary governor with veto and appointment power elected to a three-year term, and eligible for reelection to an indefinite number of terms thereafter. It was through the closed-door negotiations at Philadelphia that the presidency framed in the U.S. Constitution emerged.\n\nPowers and duties\n\nArticle I legislative role\n\nThe first power the Constitution confers upon the president is the veto. The Presentment Clause requires any bill passed by Congress to be presented to the president before it can become law. Once the legislation has been presented, the president has three options:\n# Sign the legislation; the bill then becomes law.\n# Veto the legislation and return it to Congress, expressing any objections; the bill does not become law, unless each house of Congress votes to override the veto by a two-thirds vote.\n# Take no action. In this instance, the president neither signs nor vetoes the legislation. After 10 days, not counting Sundays, two possible outcomes emerge:\n#* If Congress is still convened, the bill becomes law.\n#* If Congress has adjourned, thus preventing the return of the legislation, the bill does not become law. This latter outcome is known as the pocket veto.\n\nIn 1996, Congress attempted to enhance the president's veto power with the Line Item Veto Act. The legislation empowered the president to sign any spending bill into law while simultaneously striking certain spending items within the bill, particularly any new spending, any amount of discretionary spending, or any new limited tax benefit. Congress could then repass that particular item. If the president then vetoed the new legislation, Congress could override the veto by its ordinary means, a two-thirds vote in both houses. In Clinton v. City of New York, , the U.S. Supreme Court ruled such a legislative alteration of the veto power to be unconstitutional.\n\nArticle II executive powers\n\nWar and foreign affairs powers\n\nPerhaps the most important of all presidential powers is the command of the United States Armed Forces as its commander-in-chief. While the power to declare war is constitutionally vested in Congress, the president has ultimate responsibility for direction and disposition of the military. The present-day operational command of the Armed Forces (belonging to the Department of Defense) is normally exercised through the Secretary of Defense, with assistance of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to the Combatant Commands, as outlined in the presidentially approved Unified Command Plan (UCP). The framers of the Constitution took care to limit the president's powers regarding the military; Alexander Hamilton explains this in Federalist No. 69: Congress, pursuant to the War Powers Resolution, must authorize any troop deployments longer than 60 days, although that process relies on triggering mechanisms that have never been employed, rendering it ineffectual. Additionally, Congress provides a check to presidential military power through its control over military spending and regulation. While historically presidents initiated the process for going to war, critics have charged that there have been several conflicts in which presidents did not get official declarations, including Theodore Roosevelt's military move into Panama in 1903, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the invasions of Grenada in 1983 and Panama in 1990.\n\nAlong with the armed forces, the president also directs U.S. foreign policy. Through the Department of State and the Department of Defense, the president is responsible for the protection of Americans abroad and of foreign nationals in the United States. The president decides whether to recognize new nations and new governments, and negotiates treaties with other nations, which become binding on the United States when approved by two-thirds vote of the Senate.\n\nAlthough not constitutionally provided, presidents also sometimes employ \"executive agreements\" in foreign relations. These agreements frequently regard administrative policy choices germane to executive power; for example, the extent to which either country presents an armed presence in a given area, how each country will enforce copyright treaties, or how each country will process foreign mail. However, the 20th century witnessed a vast expansion of the use of executive agreements, and critics have challenged the extent of that use as supplanting the treaty process and removing constitutionally prescribed checks and balances over the executive in foreign relations. Supporters counter that the agreements offer a pragmatic solution when the need for swift, secret, and/or concerted action arises.\n\nAdministrative powers\n\nThe president is the head of the executive branch of the federal government and is constitutionally obligated to \"take care that the laws be faithfully executed.\" The executive branch has over four million employees, including members of the military. \n\nPresidents make numerous executive branch appointments: an incoming president may make up to 6,000 before taking office and 8,000 more while serving. Ambassadors, members of the Cabinet, and other federal officers, are all appointed by a president with the \"advice and consent\" of a majority of the Senate. When the Senate is in recess for at least ten days, the president may make recess appointments. Recess appointments are temporary and expire at the end of the next session of the Senate.\n\nThe power of a president to fire executive officials has long been a contentious political issue. Generally, a president may remove purely executive officials at will. However, Congress can curtail and constrain a president's authority to fire commissioners of independent regulatory agencies and certain inferior executive officers by statute. \n\nThe president additionally possesses the ability to direct much of the executive branch through executive orders that are grounded in federal law or constitutionally granted executive power. Executive orders are reviewable by federal courts and can be superseded by federal legislation.\n\nTo manage the growing federal bureaucracy, Presidents have gradually surrounded themselves with many layers of staff, who were eventually organized into the Executive Office of the President of the United States. Within the Executive Office, the President's innermost layer of aides (and their assistants) are located in the White House Office.\n\nJuridical powers\n\nThe president also has the power to nominate federal judges, including members of the United States courts of appeals and the Supreme Court of the United States. However, these nominations do require Senate confirmation. Securing Senate approval can provide a major obstacle for presidents who wish to orient the federal judiciary toward a particular ideological stance. When nominating judges to U.S. district courts, presidents often respect the long-standing tradition of Senatorial courtesy. Presidents may also grant pardons and reprieves, as is often done just before the end of a presidential term, not without controversy.\n\nHistorically, two doctrines concerning executive power have developed that enable the president to exercise executive power with a degree of autonomy. The first is executive privilege, which allows the president to withhold from disclosure any communications made directly to the president in the performance of executive duties. George Washington first claimed privilege when Congress requested to see Chief Justice John Jay's notes from an unpopular treaty negotiation with Great Britain. While not enshrined in the Constitution, or any other law, Washington's action created the precedent for the privilege. When Richard Nixon tried to use executive privilege as a reason for not turning over subpoenaed evidence to Congress during the Watergate scandal, the Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Nixon, , that executive privilege did not apply in cases where a president was attempting to avoid criminal prosecution. When President Bill Clinton attempted to use executive privilege regarding the Lewinsky scandal, the Supreme Court ruled in Clinton v. Jones, , that the privilege also could not be used in civil suits. These cases established the legal precedent that executive privilege is valid, although the exact extent of the privilege has yet to be clearly defined. Additionally, federal courts have allowed this privilege to radiate outward and protect other executive branch employees, but have weakened that protection for those executive branch communications that do not involve the president. \n\nThe state secrets privilege allows the president and the executive branch to withhold information or documents from discovery in legal proceedings if such release would harm national security. Precedent for the privilege arose early in the 19th century when Thomas Jefferson refused to release military documents in the treason trial of Aaron Burr and again in Totten v. United States , when the Supreme Court dismissed a case brought by a former Union spy. However, the privilege was not formally recognized by the U.S. Supreme Court until United States v. Reynolds , where it was held to be a common law evidentiary privilege. Before the September 11 attacks, use of the privilege had been rare, but increasing in frequency. Since 2001, the government has asserted the privilege in more cases and at earlier stages of the litigation, thus in some instances causing dismissal of the suits before reaching the merits of the claims, as in the Ninth Circuit's ruling in Mohamed v. Jeppesen Dataplan, Inc. Critics of the privilege claim its use has become a tool for the government to cover up illegal or embarrassing government actions. \n\nLegislative facilitator\n\nThe Constitution's Ineligibility Clause prevents the President (and all other executive officers) from simultaneously being a member of Congress. Therefore, the president cannot directly introduce legislative proposals for consideration in Congress. However, the president can take an indirect role in shaping legislation, especially if the president's political party has a majority in one or both houses of Congress. For example, the president or other officials of the executive branch may draft legislation and then ask senators or representatives to introduce these drafts into Congress. The president can further influence the legislative branch through constitutionally mandated, periodic reports to Congress. These reports may be either written or oral, but today are given as the State of the Union address, which often outlines the president's legislative proposals for the coming year. Additionally, the president may attempt to have Congress alter proposed legislation by threatening to veto that legislation unless requested changes are made.\n\nIn the 20th century critics began charging that too many legislative and budgetary powers have slid into the hands of presidents that should belong to Congress. As the head of the executive branch, presidents control a vast array of agencies that can issue regulations with little oversight from Congress. One critic charged that presidents could appoint a \"virtual army of 'czars' – each wholly unaccountable to Congress yet tasked with spearheading major policy efforts for the White House.\" Presidents have been criticized for making signing statements when signing congressional legislation about how they understand a bill or plan to execute it. This practice has been criticized by the American Bar Association as unconstitutional. Conservative commentator George Will wrote of an \"increasingly swollen executive branch\" and \"the eclipse of Congress.\"\n\nAccording to Article II, Section 3, Clause 2 of the Constitution, the president may convene either or both houses of Congress. If both houses cannot agree on a date of adjournment, the president may appoint a date for Congress to adjourn.\n\nCeremonial roles\n\nAs head of state, the president can fulfill traditions established by previous presidents. William Howard Taft started the tradition of throwing out the ceremonial first pitch in 1910 at Griffith Stadium, Washington, D.C., on the Washington Senators' Opening Day. Every president since Taft, except for Jimmy Carter, threw out at least one ceremonial first ball or pitch for Opening Day, the All-Star Game, or the World Series, usually with much fanfare. \n\nThe President of the United States has served as the honorary president of the Boy Scouts of America since the founding of the organization. \n\nOther presidential traditions are associated with American holidays. Rutherford B. Hayes began in 1878 the first White House egg rolling for local children. Beginning in 1947 during the Harry S. Truman administration, every Thanksgiving the president is presented with a live domestic turkey during the annual national thanksgiving turkey presentation held at the White House. Since 1989, when the custom of \"pardoning\" the turkey was formalized by George H. W. Bush, the turkey has been taken to a farm where it will live out the rest of its natural life. \n\nPresidential traditions also involve the president's role as head of government. Many outgoing presidents since James Buchanan traditionally give advice to their successor during the presidential transition. Ronald Reagan and his successors have also left a private message on the desk of the Oval Office on Inauguration Day for the incoming president. \n\nDuring a state visit by a foreign head of state, the president typically hosts a State Arrival Ceremony held on the South Lawn, a custom begun by John F. Kennedy in 1961. This is followed by a state dinner given by the president which is held in the State Dining Room later in the evening. \n\nThe modern presidency holds the president as one of the nation's premier celebrities. Some argue that images of the presidency have a tendency to be manipulated by administration public relations officials as well as by presidents themselves. One critic described the presidency as \"propagandized leadership\" which has a \"mesmerizing power surrounding the office.\" Administration public relations managers staged carefully crafted photo-ops of smiling presidents with smiling crowds for television cameras. One critic wrote the image of John F. Kennedy was described as carefully framed \"in rich detail\" which \"drew on the power of myth\" regarding the incident of PT 109 and wrote that Kennedy understood how to use images to further his presidential ambitions. As a result, some political commentators have opined that American voters have unrealistic expectations of presidents: voters expect a president to \"drive the economy, vanquish enemies, lead the free world, comfort tornado victims, heal the national soul and protect borrowers from hidden credit-card fees.\"\n\nCritics of presidency's evolution\n\nMost of the nation's Founding Fathers expected the Congress, which was the first branch of government described in the Constitution, to be the dominant branch of government; they did not expect a strong executive. However, presidential power has shifted over time, which has resulted in claims that the modern presidency has become too powerful, unchecked, unbalanced, and \"monarchist\" in nature. Critic Dana D. Nelson believes presidents over the past thirty years have worked towards \"undivided presidential control of the executive branch and its agencies.\" She criticizes proponents of the unitary executive for expanding \"the many existing uncheckable executive powers – such as executive orders, decrees, memorandums, proclamations, national security directives and legislative signing statements – that already allow presidents to enact a good deal of foreign and domestic policy without aid, interference or consent from Congress.\" Activist Bill Wilson opined that the expanded presidency was \"the greatest threat ever to individual freedom and democratic rule.\"\n\nSelection process\n\nEligibility\n\nArticle II, Section 1, Clause 5 of the Constitution sets the following qualifications for holding the presidency:\n* be a natural-born citizen of the United States;Foreign-born American citizens who met the age and residency requirements at the time the Constitution was adopted were also eligible for the presidency. However, this allowance has since become obsolete.\n* be at least thirty-five years old;\n* be a resident in the United States for at least fourteen years.\n\nThe Twelfth Amendment precludes anyone ineligible to being the president from becoming the vice president.\n\nA person who meets the above qualifications is still disqualified from holding the office of president under any of the following conditions:\n* Under the Twenty-second Amendment, no person can be elected president more than twice. The amendment also specifies that if any eligible person serves as president or acting president for more than two years of a term for which some other eligible person was elected president, the former can only be elected president once. Scholars disagree over whether a person precluded by the Twenty-second Amendment to being elected president is also precluded to being vice president. \n* Under Article I, Section 3, Clause 7, upon conviction in impeachment cases, the Senate has the option of disqualifying convicted individuals from holding federal office, including that of president. \n* Under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment, no person who swore an oath to support the Constitution, and later rebelled against the United States, can become president. However, this disqualification can be lifted by a two-thirds vote of each house of Congress.\n\nCampaigns and nomination\n\nThe modern presidential campaign begins before the primary elections, which the two major political parties use to clear the field of candidates before their national nominating conventions, where the most successful candidate is made the party's nominee for president. Typically, the party's presidential candidate chooses a vice presidential nominee, and this choice is rubber-stamped by the convention. The most common previous profession by U.S. presidents is lawyer. \n\nNominees participate in nationally televised debates, and while the debates are usually restricted to the Democratic and Republican nominees, third party candidates may be invited, such as Ross Perot in the 1992 debates. Nominees campaign across the country to explain their views, convince voters and solicit contributions. Much of the modern electoral process is concerned with winning swing states through frequent visits and mass media advertising drives.\n\nElection and oath\n\nThe president is elected indirectly. A number of electors, collectively known as the Electoral College, officially select the president. On Election Day, voters in each of the states and the District of Columbia cast ballots for these electors. Each state is allocated a number of electors, equal to the size of its delegation in both Houses of Congress combined. Generally, the ticket that wins the most votes in a state wins all of that state's electoral votes and thus has its slate of electors chosen to vote in the Electoral College.\n\nThe winning slate of electors meet at its state's capital on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December, about six weeks after the election, to vote. They then send a record of that vote to Congress. The vote of the electors is opened by the sitting vice president—acting in that role's capacity as President of the Senate—and read aloud to a joint session of the incoming Congress, which was elected at the same time as the president.\n\nPursuant to the Twentieth Amendment, the president's term of office begins at noon on January 20 of the year following the election. This date, known as Inauguration Day, marks the beginning of the four-year terms of both the president and the vice president. Before executing the powers of the office, a president is constitutionally required to take the presidential oath:\n\nAlthough not required, presidents have traditionally palmed a Bible while swearing the oath and have added, \"So help me God!\" to the end of the oath. Further, although the oath may be administered by any person authorized by law to administer oaths, presidents are traditionally sworn in by the Chief Justice of the United States.\n\nTenure and term limits\n\nThe term of office for president and vice president is four years. George Washington, the first president, set an unofficial precedent of serving only two terms, which subsequent presidents followed until 1940. Before Franklin D. Roosevelt, attempts at a third term were encouraged by supporters of Ulysses S. Grant and Theodore Roosevelt; neither of these attempts succeeded. In 1940, Franklin D. Roosevelt declined to seek a third term, but allowed his political party to \"draft\" him as its presidential candidate and was subsequently elected to a third term. In 1941, the United States entered World War II, leading voters to elect Roosevelt to a fourth term in 1944. But Roosevelt died only 82 days after taking office for the fourth term on 12 April 1945.\n\nAfter the war, and in response to Roosevelt being elected to third and fourth terms, the Twenty-second Amendment was adopted. The amendment bars anyone from being elected president more than twice, or once if that person served more than half of another president's term. Harry S. Truman, president when this amendment was adopted, was exempted from its limitations and briefly sought a third (a second full) term before withdrawing from the 1952 election.\n\nSince the amendment's adoption, four presidents have served two full terms: Dwight D. Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush. Barack Obama has been elected to a second term, and will complete his term on 20 January 2017, if he does not die or resign before that date. Jimmy Carter and George H. W. Bush sought a second term, but were defeated. Richard Nixon was elected to a second term, but resigned before completing it. Lyndon B. Johnson was the only president under the amendment to be eligible to serve more than two terms in total, having served for only fourteen months following John F. Kennedy's assassination. However, Johnson withdrew from the 1968 Democratic Primary, surprising many Americans. Gerald Ford sought a full term, after serving out the last two years and five months of Nixon's second term, but was not elected.\n\nVacancy or disability\n\nVacancies in the office of President may arise under several possible circumstances: death, resignation and removal from office.\n\nArticle II, Section 4 of the Constitution allows the House of Representatives to impeach high federal officials, including the president, for \"treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.\" Article I, Section 3, Clause 6 gives the Senate the power to remove impeached officials from office, given a two-thirds vote to convict. The House has thus far impeached two presidents: Andrew Johnson in 1868 and Bill Clinton in 1998. Neither was subsequently convicted by the Senate; however, Johnson was acquitted by just one vote.\n\nUnder Section 3 of the Twenty-fifth Amendment, the president may transfer the presidential powers and duties to the vice president, who then becomes acting president, by transmitting a statement to the Speaker of the House and the President pro tempore of the Senate stating the reasons for the transfer. The president resumes the discharge of the presidential powers and duties upon transmitting, to those two officials, a written declaration stating that resumption. This transfer of power may occur for any reason the president considers appropriate; in 2002 and again in 2007, President George W. Bush briefly transferred presidential authority to Vice President Dick Cheney. In both cases, this was done to accommodate a medical procedure which required Bush to be sedated; both times, Bush returned to duty later the same day. \n\nUnder Section 4 of the Twenty-fifth Amendment, the vice president, in conjunction with a majority of the Cabinet, may transfer the presidential powers and duties from the president to the vice president by transmitting a written declaration to the Speaker of the House and the president pro tempore of the Senate that the president is unable to discharge the presidential powers and duties. If this occurs, then the vice president will assume the presidential powers and duties as acting president; however, the president can declare that no such inability exists and resume the discharge of the presidential powers and duties. If the vice president and Cabinet contest this claim, it is up to Congress, which must meet within two days if not already in session, to decide the merit of the claim.\n\nThe United States Constitution mentions the resignation of the president, but does not regulate its form or the conditions for its validity. Pursuant to federal law, the only valid evidence of the president's resignation is a written instrument to that effect, signed by the president and delivered to the office of the Secretary of State. This has only occurred once, when Richard Nixon delivered a letter to Henry Kissinger to that effect.\n\nSection 1 of the Twenty-fifth Amendment states that the vice president becomes president upon the removal from office, death or resignation of the preceding president. The Presidential Succession Act of 1947 provides that if the offices of President and Vice President are each either vacant or are held by a disabled person, the next officer in the presidential line of succession, the Speaker of the House, becomes acting president. The line then extends to the President pro tempore of the Senate, followed by every member of the Cabinet. These persons must fulfill all eligibility requirements of the office of President to be eligible to become acting president; ineligible individuals are skipped. There has never been a special election for the office of President.\n\nCompensation\n\nSince 2001, the president has earned a $400,000 annual salary, along with a $50,000 annual expense account, a $100,000 nontaxable travel account, and $19,000 for entertainment. The most recent raise in salary was approved by Congress and President Bill Clinton in 1999 and went into effect in 2001.\n\nThe White House in Washington, D.C., serves as the official place of residence for the president. As well as access to the White House staff, facilities available to the president include medical care, recreation, housekeeping, and security services. The government pays for state dinners and other official functions, but the president pays for personal, family and guest dry cleaning and food; the high food bill often amazes new residents. Naval Support Facility Thurmont, popularly known as Camp David, is a mountain-based military camp in Frederick County, Maryland, used as a country retreat and for high alert protection of the president and guests. Blair House, located next to the Eisenhower Executive Office Building at the White House Complex and Lafayette Park, is a complex of four connected townhouses exceeding 70000 sqft of floor space which serves as the president's official guest house and as a secondary residence for the president if needed. \n\nFor ground travel, the president uses the presidential state car, which is an armored limousine built on a heavily modified Cadillac-based chassis.[http://www.secretservice.gov/press/GPA02-09_Limo.pdf New Presidential Limousine enters Secret Service Fleet] U.S. Secret Service Press Release (January 14, 2009) Retrieved on January 20, 2009. One of two identical Boeing VC-25 aircraft, which are extensively modified versions of Boeing 747-200B airliners, serve as long distance travel for the president and are referred to as Air Force One while the president is on board (although any U.S. Air Force aircraft the President is aboard is designated as \"Air Force One\" for the duration of the flight). In-country trips are typically handled with just one of the two planes while overseas trips are handled with both, one primary and one backup. Any civilian aircraft the President is aboard is designated Executive One for the flight. The president also has access to a fleet of thirty-five U.S. Marine Corps helicopters of varying models, designated Marine One when the president is aboard any particular one in the fleet. Flights are typically handled with as many as five helicopters all flying together and frequently swapping positions as to disguise which helicopter the President is actually aboard to any would-be threats.\n\nThe U.S. Secret Service is charged with protecting the sitting president and the first family. As part of their protection, presidents, first ladies, their children and other immediate family members, and other prominent persons and locations are assigned Secret Service codenames. The use of such names was originally for security purposes and dates to a time when sensitive electronic communications were not routinely encrypted; today, the names simply serve for purposes of brevity, clarity, and tradition. \n\nFile:White House lawn (1).tif|The White House\n\nFile:Camp David 1959.jpg|Camp David\nFile:Blair House daylight.jpg|Blair House\nFile:GPA02-09 US SecretService press release 2009 Limousine Page 3 Image.jpg|State car\nFile:Air Force One over Mt. Rushmore.jpg|Air Force One\nFile:Marine One (1970).jpg|Marine One\n\nPost-presidency\n\nBeginning in 1959, all living former presidents were granted a pension, an office, and a staff. The pension has increased numerous times with Congressional approval. Retired presidents now receive a pension based on the salary of the current administration's cabinet secretaries, which was $199,700 each year in 2012. Former presidents who served in Congress may also collect congressional pensions. The Former Presidents Act, as amended, also provides former presidents with travel funds and franking privileges. Prior to 1997, all former presidents, their spouses, and their children until age 16 were protected by the Secret Service until the president's death. In 1997, Congress passed legislation limiting secret service protection to no more than 10 years from the date a president leaves office. On January 10, 2013, President Obama signed legislation reinstating lifetime secret service protection for him, George W. Bush, and all subsequent presidents. A spouse who remarries is no longer eligible for secret service protection.\n\nSome presidents have had significant careers after leaving office. Prominent examples include William Howard Taft's tenure as Chief Justice of the United States and Herbert Hoover's work on government reorganization after World War II. Grover Cleveland, whose bid for reelection failed in 1888, was elected president again four years later in 1892. Two former presidents served in Congress after leaving the White House: John Quincy Adams was elected to the House of Representatives, serving there for seventeen years, and Andrew Johnson returned to the Senate in 1875. John Tyler served in the provisional Congress of the Confederate States during the Civil War and was elected to the Confederate House of Representatives, but died before that body first met.\n\nPresidents may use their predecessors as emissaries to deliver private messages to other nations or as official representatives of the United States to state funerals and other important foreign events. Richard Nixon made multiple foreign trips to countries including China and Russia and was lauded as an elder statesman. Jimmy Carter has become a global human rights campaigner, international arbiter, and election monitor, as well as a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. Bill Clinton has also worked as an informal ambassador, most recently in the negotiations that led to the release of two American journalists, Laura Ling and Euna Lee, from North Korea. Clinton has also been active politically since his presidential term ended, working with his wife Hillary on her 2008 and 2016 presidential bids and President Obama on his reelection campaign.\n\nFile:Carter 2k14.tif|Jimmy Carter39th (1977–81)\nFile:President George H. W.tif|George H. W. Bush41st (1989–93)\nFile:Clinton 2k15.tif|Bill Clinton42nd (1993–2001)\nFile:Bush 2k14.tif|George W. Bush43rd (2001–09)\n\nPresidential libraries\n\nSince Herbert Hoover, each president has created a repository known as a presidential library for preserving and making available his papers, records and other documents and materials. Completed libraries are deeded to and maintained by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA); the initial funding for building and equipping each library must come from private, non-federal sources. There are currently thirteen presidential libraries in the NARA system. There are also presidential libraries maintained by state governments and private foundations and Universities of Higher Education, such as the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, which is run by the State of Illinois, the George H.W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum, which is run by Texas A&M University and the Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library and Museum, which is run by the University of Texas at Austin.\n\nAs many presidents live for many years after leaving office, several of them have personally overseen the building and opening of their own presidential libraries, some even making arrangements for their own burial at the site. Several presidential libraries therefore contain the graves of the president they document, such as the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in Yorba Linda, California and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California. The graves are viewable by the general public visiting these libraries.\n\nTimeline of Presidents", "The Russo-Japanese War (8 February 1904 – 5 September 1905) was fought between the Russian Empire and the Empire of Japan over rival imperial ambitions in Manchuria and Korea. The major theatres of operations were the Liaodong Peninsula and Mukden in Southern Manchuria and the seas around Korea, Japan and the Yellow Sea.\n\nRussia sought a warm-water port on the Pacific Ocean for their navy and for maritime trade. Vladivostok was operational only during the summer, whereas Port Arthur, a naval base in Liaodong Province leased to Russia by China, was operational all year. Since the end of the First Sino-Japanese War in 1895, negotiations between Russia and Japan proved impractical. Russia had demonstrated an expansionist policy in the Siberian Far East from the reign of Ivan the Terrible in the 16th century. Through threat of Russian expansion, Japan offered to recognize Russian dominance in Manchuria in exchange for recognition of Korea as being within the Japanese sphere of influence. Russia refused and demanded Korea north of the 39th parallel to be a neutral buffer zone between Russia and Japan. The Japanese government perceived a Russian threat to its strategic interests and chose to go to war. After negotiations broke down in 1904, the Japanese Navy opened hostilities by attacking the Russian Eastern Fleet at Port Arthur in a surprise attack.\n\nRussia suffered numerous defeats by Japan, but Tsar Nicholas II was convinced that Russia would win and chose to remain engaged in the war; at first, to await the outcomes of certain naval battles, and later to preserve the dignity of Russia by averting a \"humiliating peace\". The war concluded with the Treaty of Portsmouth, mediated by US President Theodore Roosevelt. The complete victory of the Japanese military surprised world observers. The consequences transformed the balance of power in East Asia, resulting in a reassessment of Japan's recent entry onto the world stage. Scholars continue to debate the historical significance of the war.\n\nHistorical background\n\nIn 1853 Commodore Perry of the US Navy arrived in Japan and brought an end to Japan's policy of self-isolation by forcing the Tokugawa shogunate to sign the Convention of Kanagawa the following year. This encounter with a modern Western power served to portray the West as having a confrontational and imperialist political agenda, which Japan viewed with respect through World War II. Japan sought to maintain its autonomy and resisted colonialism by Western nations. The Meiji Restoration in 1868 served as an early Japanese response to the challenges of the modern world.\n\nAfter the Meiji Restoration in 1868, the Meiji government endeavored to assimilate Western ideas, technological advances and customs. By the late 19th century, Japan had transformed itself into a modernized industrial state. The Japanese wanted to preserve their sovereignty and be recognized as equal with the Western powers.\n\nTsarist Russia, as a major imperial power, had ambitions in the East. By the 1890s it had extended its realm across Central Asia to Afghanistan, absorbing local states in the process. The Russian Empire stretched from Poland in the west to the Kamchatka Peninsula in the east. With its construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway to the port of Vladivostok, Russia hoped to further consolidate its influence and presence in the region. In the Tsushima incident of 1861 Russia had directly assaulted Japanese territory. Fearing Russian expansion, Japan regarded Korea (and to a lesser extent Manchuria) as a protective buffer.\n\nSino-Japanese War (1894–95)\n\nBetween the Meiji Restoration and its participation in World War I, the Empire of Japan fought in two significant wars. The first war Japan fought was the First Sino-Japanese War, fought in 1894 and 1895. The war revolved around the issue of control and influence over Korea under the rule of the Joseon dynasty. From the 1880s onward, there had been vigorous competition for influence in Korea between China and Japan. The Korean court was prone to factionalism, and was badly divided by a reformist faction that was pro-Japanese and a more conservative faction that was pro-Chinese. In 1884, a pro-Japanese coup attempt was put down by Chinese troops, and a \"residency\" under General Yuan Shikai was established in Seoul. A peasant rebellion led by the Tonghak religious movement led to a request by the Korean government for the Qing dynasty to send in troops to stabilize the country. The Empire of Japan responded by sending their own force to Korea to crush the Tonghak and installed a puppet government in Seoul. China objected and war ensued. Hostilities proved brief, with Japanese ground troops routing Chinese forces on the Liaodong Peninsula and nearly destroying the Chinese Navy in the Battle of the Yalu River. Japan and China signed the Treaty of Shimonoseki, which ceded the Liaodong Peninsula and the island of Taiwan to Japan. After the peace treaty, Russia, Germany, and France forced Japan to withdraw from the Liaodong Peninsula. The leaders of Japan did not feel that they possessed the strength to resist the combined might of Russia, Germany and France, and so gave in to the ultimatum presented by St. Petersburg, Berlin and Paris. At the same time, the Japanese did not abandon their attempts to force Korea into the Japanese sphere of influence. On 8 October 1895, Queen Min of Korea, the leader of the anti-Japanese and pro-Chinese faction at the Korean court was murdered by Japanese agents within the halls of the Gyeongbokgung palace, an act that backfired badly as it turned Korean public opinion against Japan. In early 1896, King Gojong of Korea fled to the Russian legation in Seoul under the grounds that his life was in danger from Japanese agents, and Russian influence in Korea started to predominate. In the aftermath of the flight of the king, a popular uprising overthrew the pro-Japanese government and several cabinet ministers were lynched on the streets.\n\nIn 1897, Russia occupied the Liaodong Peninsula, built the Port Arthur fortress, and based the Russian Pacific Fleet in the port. Russia's acquisition of Port Arthur was primarily an anti-British move to counter the British occupation of Wei-hai-Wei, but in Japan, this was perceived as an anti-Japanese move. Germany occupied Jiaozhou Bay, built the Tsingtao fortress, and based the German East Asia Squadron in this port. Between 1897–1903, the Russians built the Chinese Eastern Railway (CER) in Manchuria. The Chinese Eastern Railroad was owned jointly by the Russian and Chinese governments, but the company's management was entirely Russian, the line was built to the Russian gauge and Russian troops were stationed in Manchuria to protect rail traffic on the CER from bandit attacks. The headquarters of the CER company was located in the new Russian-built city of Harbin, the \"Moscow of the Orient\". From 1897 onwards, Manchuria-while still nominally part of the \"Great Qing Empire\"-started to resemble more and more a Russian province.\n\nRussian encroachment\n\nIn December 1897 a Russian fleet appeared off Port Arthur. After three months, in 1898, China and Russia negotiated a convention by which China leased (to Russia) Port Arthur, Talienwan and the surrounding waters. The two parties further agreed that the convention could be extended by mutual agreement. The Russians clearly expected such an extension, for they lost no time in occupying the territory and in fortifying Port Arthur, their sole warm-water port on the Pacific coast and of great strategic value. A year later, to consolidate their position, the Russians began to build a new railway from Harbin through Mukden to Port Arthur, the South Manchurian Railroad. The development of the railway became a contributory factor to the Boxer Rebellion, when Boxer forces burned the railway stations. \n\nThe Russians also began to make inroads into Korea. By 1898 they had acquired mining and forestry concessions near the Yalu and Tumen rivers, causing the Japanese much anxiety. Japan decided to attack before the Russians completed the Trans-Siberian Railway.\n\nBoxer Rebellion\n\nThe Russians and the Japanese both contributed troops to the eight-member international force sent in 1900 to quell the Boxer Rebellion and to relieve the international legations under siege in the Chinese capital, Beijing. Russia had already sent 177,000 soldiers to Manchuria, nominally to protect its railways under construction. The troops of the Qing Empire and the participants of the Boxer Rebellion could do nothing against such a massive army and were ejected from Manchuria. After the Boxer Rebellion, 100,000 Russian soldiers were stationed in Manchuria. The Russian troops settled in and despite assurances they would vacate the area after the crisis, by 1903 the Russians had not established a timetable for withdrawal and had actually strengthened their position in Manchuria.\n\nPre-war negotiations\n\nThe Japanese statesman Itō Hirobumi started to negotiate with the Russians. He regarded Japan as too weak to evict the Russian militarily, so he proposed giving Russia control over Manchuria in exchange for Japanese control of northern Korea. Meanwhile, Japan and Britain had signed the Anglo-Japanese Alliance in 1902, the British seeking to restrict naval competition by keeping the Russian Pacific seaports of Vladivostok and Port Arthur from their full use. The alliance with the British meant, in part, that if any nation allied itself with Russia during any war against Japan, then Britain would enter the war on Japan's side. Russia could no longer count on receiving help from either Germany or France without there being a danger of British involvement in the war. With such an alliance, Japan felt free to commence hostilities, if necessary.\n\nOn 28 July 1903, the Japanese minister in St. Petersburg was instructed to present his country's view opposing Russia's consolidation plans in Manchuria. On 12 August, the Japanese minister handed in the following document to serve as the basis for further negotiations: \n# Mutual engagement to respect the independence and territorial integrity of the Chinese and Korean empires and to maintain the principle of equal opportunity for the commerce and industry of all nations in those countries.\n# Reciprocal recognition of Japan's preponderating interests in Korea and Russia's special interests in railway enterprises in Manchuria, and of the right of Japan to take in Korea and of Russia to take in Manchuria such measures as may be necessary for the protection of their respective interests as above defined, subject, however, to the provisions of article I of this agreement.\n# Reciprocal undertaking on the part of Russia and Japan not to impede development of those industrial and commercial activities respectively of Japan in Korea and of Russia in Manchuria, which are not inconsistent with the stipulations of article I of this agreement. Additional engagement on the part of Russia not to impede the eventual extension of the Korean railway into southern Manchuria so as to connect with the East China and Shan-hai-kwan-Newchwang lines.\n# Reciprocal engagement that in case it is found necessary to send troops by Japan to Korea, or by Russia to Manchuria, for the purpose either of protecting the interests mentioned in article II of this agreement, or of suppressing insurrection or disorder calculated to create international complications, the troops so sent are in no case to exceed the actual number required and are to be forthwith recalled as soon as their missions are accomplished.\n# Recognition on the part of Russia of the exclusive right of Japan to give advice and assistance in the interest of reform and good government in Korea, including necessary military assistance.\n# This agreement to supplant all previous arrangements between Japan and Russia respecting Korea.\nOn 3 October, the Russian minister to Japan, Roman Rosen, presented to the Japanese government the Russian counterproposal as the basis of negotiations, as follows: \n# Mutual engagement to respect the independence and territorial integrity of the Korean Empire.\n# Recognition by Russia of Japan's preponderating interests in Korea and of the right of Japan to give advice and assistance to Korea tending to improve the civil administration of the empire without infringing the stipulations of article I.\n# Engagement on the part of Russia not to impede the commercial and industrial undertakings of Japan in Korea, nor to oppose any measures taken for the purpose of protecting them so long as such measures do not infringe the stipulations of article I.\n# Recognition of the right of Japan to send for the same purpose troops to Korea, with the knowledge of Russia, but their number not to exceed that actually required, and with the engagement on the part of Japan to recall such troops as soon as their mission is accomplished.\n# Mutual engagement not to use any part of the territory of Korea for strategical purposes nor to undertake on the coasts of Korea any military works capable of menacing the freedom of navigation in the Straits of Korea.\n# Mutual engagement to consider that part of the territory of Korea lying to the north of the 39th parallel as a neutral zone into which neither of the contracting parties shall introduce troops.\n# Recognition by Japan of Manchuria and its littoral as in all respects outside her sphere of interest.\n# This agreement to supplant all previous agreements between Russia and Japan respecting Korea.\n\nNegotiations then followed; although by early January 1904, the Japanese government had realised that Russia was neither interested in settling the Manchurian nor Korean issues. Instead, Russia's goal was buying time – via diplomacy – to further buildup militarily. Nevertheless, on 13 January 1904, Japan proposed a formula by which Manchuria would be outside the Japanese sphere of influence and, reciprocally, Korea outside Russia's. By 4 February 1904, no formal reply had been received and on 6 February Kurino Shinichiro, the Japanese minister, called on the Russian foreign minister, Count Lamsdorf, to take his leave. Japan severed diplomatic relations with Russia on 6 February 1904.\n\nPotential diplomatic resolution of territorial concerns between Japan and Russia failed; historians have argued that this directly resulted from the actions of Tsar Nicholas II. One crucial error of Nicholas was his mismanagement of government. Although certain scholars contend the situation arose from the determination of Tsar Nicholas II to use the war against Japan to spark a revival in Russian patriotism, no historical evidence supports this claim. The Tsar's advisors did not support the war, foreseeing problems in transporting troops and supplies from European Russia to the East. Convinced that his rule was divinely ordained and that he held responsibility to God, Nicholas II held the ideals of preserving the autocracy and defending the dignity, honor, and worth of Russia. This attitude by the Tsar led to repeated delays in negotiations with the Japanese government. The Japanese understanding of this can be seen from a telegram dated 1 December 1903 from Japanese minister of foreign affairs, Komura, to the minister to Russia, in which he stated:\n\n\"...the Japanese government have at all times during the progress of the negotiations made it a special point to give prompt answers to all propositions of the Russian government. The negotiations have now been pending for no less than four months, and they have not yet reached a stage where the final issue can with certainty be predicted. In these circumstances the Japanese government cannot but regard with grave concern the situation for which the delays in negotiations are largely responsible\". \n\nErrors by Nicholas II in managing the Russian government also led to his misinterpreting the type of situation in which Russia was to become involved in with Japan. Some scholars have suggested that Tsar Nicholas II dragged Japan into war intentionally, in hopes of reviving Russian nationalism. This notion is disputed by a comment made by Nicholas to Kaiser William of Germany, saying there would be no war because he \"did not wish it\". \nThis does not reject the claim that Russia played an aggressive role in the East, which it did; rather, it means that Russia unwisely calculated that Japan would not go to war against its far larger and seemingly superior navy and army. Nicholas held the Japanese in contempt as \"yellow monkeys\", and he took for granted that the Japanese would simply yield in the face of Russia's superior power, which thus explains his unwillingness to compromise. Evidence of Russia's false sense of security and superiority to Japan is seen by Russian reference to Japan as a big mistake. \n\nDeclaration of war \n\nJapan issued a declaration of war on 8 February 1904.Some scholarly researchers credit Enjiro Yamaza with drafting the text of the Japanese declaration of war – see Naval Postgraduate School (US) thesis: Na, Sang Hyung. [http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?LocationU2&doc\nGetTRDoc.pdf&AD=ADA475769 \"The Korean-Japanese Dispute over Dokdo/Takeshima,\" p. 62 n207] December 2007, citing Byang-Ryull Kim. (2006). Ilbon Gunbu'ui Dokdo Chim Talsa (The Plunder of Dokdo by the Japanese Military), p. 121. However, three hours before Japan's declaration of war was received by the Russian government, the Japanese Imperial Navy attacked the Russian Far East Fleet at Port Arthur. Tsar Nicholas II was stunned by news of the attack. He could not believe that Japan would commit an act of war without a formal declaration, and had been assured by his ministers that the Japanese would not fight. When the attack came, according to Cecil Spring Rice, first secretary at the British Embassy, it left the Tsar \"almost incredulous\". Russia declared war on Japan eight days later. Japan, in response, made reference to the Russian attack on Sweden in 1809 without declaration of war, and the requirement to declare war before commencing hostilities was not made international law until the Second Hague Peace Conference was held in October 1907. \n\nThe Qing Empire favoured the Japanese position and even offered military aid, but Japan declined it. However, Yuan Shikai sent envoys to Japanese generals several times to deliver foodstuffs and alcoholic drinks. Native Manchurians joined the war on both sides as hired troops. \n\nCampaign of 1904\n\nPort Arthur, on the Liaodong Peninsula in the south of Manchuria, had been fortified into a major naval base by the Russian Imperial Army. Since it needed to control the sea in order to fight a war on the Asian mainland, Japan's first military objective was to neutralize the Russian fleet at Port Arthur.\n\nBattle of Port Arthur\n\nOn the night of 8 February 1904, the Japanese fleet under Admiral Tōgō Heihachirō opened the war with a surprise torpedo boat destroyer attack on the Russian ships at Port Arthur. The attack heavily damaged the Tsesarevich and Retvizan, the heaviest battleships in Russia's far Eastern theater, and the 6,600 ton cruiser Pallada.\n These attacks developed into the Battle of Port Arthur the next morning. A series of indecisive naval engagements followed, in which Admiral Togo was unable to attack the Russian fleet successfully as it was protected by the shore batteries of the harbour, and the Russians were reluctant to leave the harbour for the open seas, especially after the death of Admiral Stepan Osipovich Makarov on 13 April 1904. Although the actual Battle of Port Arthur was indecisive, the initial attacks had a devastating psychological effect on Russia, which had been confident about the prospect of war. The Japanese had seized the initiative while the Russians waited in port. \n\nThese engagements provided cover for a Japanese landing near Incheon in Korea. From Incheon the Japanese occupied Seoul and then the rest of Korea. By the end of April, the Japanese Imperial Army under Kuroki Itei was ready to cross the Yalu River into Russian-occupied Manchuria.\n\nBlockade of Port Arthur\n\nThe Japanese attempted to deny the Russians use of Port Arthur. During the night of 13–14 February, the Japanese attempted to block the entrance to Port Arthur by sinking several concrete-filled steamers in the deep water channel to the port, but they sank too deep to be effective. A similar attempt to block the harbour entrance during the night of 3–4 May also failed. In March, the charismatic Vice Admiral Makarov had taken command of the First Russian Pacific Squadron with the intention of breaking out of the Port Arthur blockade.\n\nOn 12 April 1904, two Russian pre-dreadnought battleships, the flagship Petropavlovsk and the Pobeda, slipped out of port but struck Japanese mines off Port Arthur. The Petropavlovsk sank almost immediately, while the Pobeda had to be towed back to port for extensive repairs. Admiral Makarov, the single most effective Russian naval strategist of the war, perished on the battleship Petropavlovsk.\n\nOn 15 April 1904, the Russian government made overtures threatening to seize the British war correspondents who were taking the ship Haimun into warzones to report for the London-based Times newspaper, citing concerns about the possibility of the British giving away Russian positions to the Japanese fleet.\n\nThe Russians quickly learned, and soon employed, the Japanese tactic of offensive minelaying. On 15 May 1904, two Japanese battleships, the and the , were lured into a recently laid Russian minefield off Port Arthur, each striking at least two mines. The Hatsuse sank within minutes, taking 450 sailors with her, while the Yashima sank while under tow towards Korea for repairs. On 23 June 1904, a breakout attempt by the Russian squadron, now under the command of Admiral Wilgelm Vitgeft, failed. By the end of the month, Japanese artillery were firing shells into the harbour.\n\nSiege of Port Arthur\n\nThe Siege of Port Arthur commenced in April 1904. Japanese troops tried numerous frontal assaults on the fortified hilltops overlooking the harbour, which were defeated with Japanese casualties in the thousands. Eventually, though, with the aid of several batteries of 11-inch (280 mm) Krupp howitzers, the Japanese were able to capture the key hilltop bastion in December 1904. From this vantage point, the long-range artillery was able to shell the Russian fleet, which was unable to retaliate effectively against the land-based artillery and was unable or unwilling to sail out against the blockading fleet. Four Russian battleships and two cruisers were sunk in succession, with the fifth and last battleship being forced to scuttle a few weeks later. Thus, all capital ships of the Russian fleet in the Pacific were sunk. This is probably the only example in military history when such a scale of devastation was achieved by land-based artillery against major warships.\n\nMeanwhile, attempts to relieve the besieged city by land also failed, and, after the Battle of Liaoyang in late August, the northern Russian force that might have been able to relieve Port Arthur retreated to Mukden (Shenyang). Major General Anatoly Stessel, commander of the Port Arthur garrison, believed that the purpose of defending the city was lost after the fleet had been destroyed. \nIn general, the Russian defenders were suffering disproportionate casualties each time the Japanese attacked. In particular, several large underground mines were exploded in late December, resulting in the costly capture of a few more pieces of the defensive line.\nStessel, therefore, decided to surrender to the surprised Japanese generals on 2 January 1905. He made his decision without consulting either the other military staff present, or the Tsar and military command, who all disagreed with the decision. Stessel was convicted by a court-martial in 1908 and sentenced to death on account of an incompetent defense and for disobeying orders. He was later pardoned.\n\nAnglo-Japanese intelligence co-operation \n\nEven before the war, British and Japanese intelligence had co-operated against Russia. During the war, Indian Army stations in Malaya and China often intercepted and read wireless and telegraph cable traffic relating to the war, which was shared with the Japanese. In their turn, the Japanese shared information about Russia with the British with one British official writing of the \"perfect quality\" of Japanese intelligence. In particular, British and Japanese intelligence gathered much evidence that Germany was supporting Russia in the war as part of a bid to disturb the balance of power in Europe, which led to British officials increasingly perceiving that country as a threat to the international order. \n\nBattle of Yalu River\n\nIn contrast to the Japanese strategy of rapidly gaining ground to control Manchuria, Russian strategy focused on fighting delaying actions to gain time for reinforcements to arrive via the long Trans-Siberian railway, which was incomplete near Irkutsk at the time. On 1 May 1904, the Battle of Yalu River became the first major land battle of the war; Japanese troops stormed a Russian position after crossing the river. The defeat of the Russian Eastern Detachment removed the perception that the Japanese would be an easy enemy, that the war would be short, and that Russia would be the overwhelming victor. This battle was also the first battle in decades to be an Asian victory over a European power and marked Russia's inability to match Japan's military prowess. Japanese troops proceeded to land at several points on the Manchurian coast, and in a series of engagements, drove the Russians back towards Port Arthur. The subsequent battles, including the Battle of Nanshan on 25 May 1904, were marked by heavy Japanese losses largely from attacking entrenched Russian positions.\n\nBattle of the Yellow Sea\n\nWith the death of Admiral Stepan Makarov during the siege of Port Arthur in April 1904, Admiral Wilgelm Vitgeft was appointed command of the battle fleet and was ordered to make a sortie from Port Arthur and deploy his force to Vladivostok. Flying his flag in the French-built pre-dreadnought Tsesarevich, Vitgeft proceeded to lead his six battleships, four cruisers, and 14 torpedo boat destroyers into the Yellow Sea in the early morning of 10 August 1904. Waiting for him was Admiral Togo and his fleet of four battleships, 10 cruisers, and 18 torpedo boat destroyers.\n\nAt approximately 12:15, the battleship fleets obtained visual contact with each other, and at 13:00 with Togo crossing Vitgeft's T, they commenced main battery fire at a range of about eight miles, the longest ever conducted up to that time. For about thirty minutes the battleships pounded one another until they had closed to less than four miles and began to bring their secondary batteries into play. At 18:30, a hit from one of Togo's battleships struck Vitgeft's flagship's bridge, killing him instantly.\n\nWith the Tsesarevichs helm jammed and their admiral killed in action, she turned from her battle line, causing confusion among her fleet. However, Togo was determined to sink the Russian flagship and continued pounding her, being saved only by the gallant charge of the American-built Russian battleship Retvizan, whose captain successfully drew away Togo's heavy fire from the Russian flagship. Knowing of the impending battle with the battleship reinforcements arriving from Russia (the Baltic Fleet), Togo chose not to risk his battleships by pursuing his enemy as they turned about and headed back into Port Arthur, thus ending naval history's longest-range gunnery duel up to that time and the first modern clash of steel battleship fleets on the high seas.\n\nBaltic Fleet redeploys\n\nMeanwhile, the Russians were preparing to reinforce their Far East Fleet by sending the Baltic Fleet, under the command of Admiral Zinovy Rozhestvensky. After a false start caused by engine problems and other mishaps, the squadron finally departed on 15 October 1904, and sailed half way around the world from the Baltic Sea to the Pacific via the Cape of Good Hope in the course of a seven-month odyssey that was to attract worldwide attention. The fleet was forced to take this longer route after the Dogger Bank incident on 21 October 1904, where the Russian fleet fired on British fishing boats that they mistook for enemy torpedo boats. This caused the British to deny them access to the Suez Canal, thus forcing them around Africa, and nearly sparking a war with the United Kingdom (an ally of Japan, but neutral, unless provoked).\n\nCampaign of 1905 \n\nWith the fall of Port Arthur, the Japanese 3rd Army could continue northward to reinforce positions south of Russian-held Mukden. With the onset of the severe Manchurian winter, there had been no major land engagements since the Battle of Shaho the previous year. The two sides camped opposite each other along 60 to 70 mi of front lines south of Mukden.\n\nBattle of Sandepu \n\nThe Russian Second Army under General Oskar Gripenberg, between 25 and 29 January, attacked the Japanese left flank near the town of Sandepu, almost breaking through. This caught the Japanese by surprise. However, without support from other Russian units the attack stalled, Gripenberg was ordered to halt by Kuropatkin and the battle was inconclusive. The Japanese knew that they needed to destroy the Russian army in Manchuria before Russian reinforcements arrived via the Trans-Siberian railroad.\n\nBattle of Mukden \n\nThe Battle of Mukden commenced on 20 February 1905. In the following days Japanese forces proceeded to assault the right and left flanks of Russian forces surrounding Mukden, along a 50 mi front. Approximately half a million men were involved in the fighting. Both sides were well entrenched and were backed by hundreds of artillery pieces. After days of harsh fighting, added pressure from the flanks forced both ends of the Russian defensive line to curve backwards. Seeing they were about to be encircled, the Russians began a general retreat, fighting a series of fierce rearguard actions, which soon deteriorated in the confusion and collapse of Russian forces. On 10 March 1905, after three weeks of fighting, General Kuropatkin decided to withdraw to the north of Mukden. The Russians lost 90,000 men in the battle.\n\nThe retreating Russian Manchurian Army formations disbanded as fighting units, but the Japanese failed to destroy them completely. The Japanese themselves had suffered heavy casualties and were in no condition to pursue. Although the Battle of Mukden was a major defeat for the Russians and was the most decisive land battle ever fought by the Japanese, the final victory still depended on the navy.\n\nBattle of Tsushima \n\nAfter a stopover of several weeks at the minor port of Nossi-Bé, Madagascar, that had been reluctantly allowed by neutral France in order not to jeopardize its relations with its Russian ally, the Russian Baltic fleet proceeded to Cam Ranh Bay in French Indochina passing on its way through the Singapore Strait between 7 and 10 April 1905. The fleet finally reached the Sea of Japan in May 1905. The logistics of such an undertaking in the age of coal power was astounding. The squadron required approximately 500,000 tons of coal to complete the journey, yet by international law, it was not allowed to coal at neutral ports, forcing the Russian authorities to acquire a large fleet of colliers to supply the fleet at sea. The weight of the ships' stores needed for such a long journey was to be another major problem. \nThe Russian Second Pacific Squadron (the renamed Baltic Fleet) sailed 18,000 nautical miles (33,000 km) to relieve Port Arthur. The demoralizing news that Port Arthur had fallen reached the fleet while it was still at Madagascar. Admiral Rozhestvensky's only hope now was to reach the port of Vladivostok. There were three routes to Vladivostok, with the shortest and most direct passing through Tsushima Strait between Korea and Japan. However, this was also the most dangerous route as it passed between the Japanese home islands and the Japanese naval bases in Korea.\n\nAdmiral Togo was aware of Russian progress and understood that, with the fall of Port Arthur, the Second and Third Pacific squadrons would try to reach the only other Russian port in the Far East, Vladivostok. Battle plans were laid down and ships were repaired and refitted to intercept the Russian fleet.\n\nThe Japanese Combined Fleet, which had originally consisted of six battleships, was now down to four (two had been lost to mines), but still retained its cruisers, destroyers, and torpedo boats. The Russian Second Pacific Squadron contained eight battleships, including four new battleships of the Borodino class, as well as cruisers, destroyers and other auxiliaries for a total of 38 ships.\n\nBy the end of May, the Second Pacific Squadron was on the last leg of its journey to Vladivostok, taking the shorter, riskier route between Korea and Japan, and travelling at night to avoid discovery. Unfortunately for the Russians, while in compliance with the rules of war, the two trailing hospital ships had continued to burn their lights, which were spotted by the Japanese armed merchant cruiser Shinano Maru. Wireless communication was used to inform Togo's headquarters, where the Combined Fleet was immediately ordered to sortie. Still receiving naval intelligence from scouting forces, the Japanese were able to position their fleet so that they would \"cross the T\" of the Russian fleet. The Japanese engaged the Russians in the Tsushima Straits on 27–28 May 1905. The Russian fleet was virtually annihilated, losing eight battleships, numerous smaller vessels, and more than 5,000 men, while the Japanese lost three torpedo boats and 116 men. Only three Russian vessels escaped to Vladivostok. After the Battle of Tsushima, a combined Japanese Army and Navy operation occupied Sakhalin Island to force the Russians into suing for peace.\n\nPeace and aftermath \n\nTreaty of Portsmouth \n\nThe defeats of the Russian Army and Navy shook up Russian confidence. Throughout 1905, the Imperial Russian government was rocked by revolution. The population was against escalation of the war. The empire was certainly capable of sending more troops, but the poor state of the economy, the embarrassing defeats of the Russian Army and Navy by the Japanese, and the relative unimportance of the disputed land to Russia made the war extremely unpopular. Tsar Nicholas II elected to negotiate peace so he could concentrate on internal matters after the disaster of Bloody Sunday on 22 January 1905.\n\nBoth sides accepted the offer of Theodore Roosevelt, the President of the United States, to mediate; meetings were held in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, with Sergius Witte leading the Russian delegation and Baron Komura, a graduate of Harvard, leading the Japanese delegation. The Treaty of Portsmouth was signed on 5 September 1905 at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard on Seavey's Island, Kittery, Maine, while the delegates stayed in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Witte became Russian Prime Minister the same year.\n\nAfter courting the Japanese, Roosevelt decided to support the Tsar's refusal to pay indemnities, a move that policymakers in Tokyo interpreted as signifying that the United States had more than a passing interest in Asian affairs. Russia recognized Korea as part of the Japanese sphere of influence and agreed to evacuate Manchuria. Japan would annex Korea in 1910 (Japan–Korea Treaty of 1910), with scant protest from other powers. \n\nRussia also signed over its 25-year leasehold rights to Port Arthur, including the naval base and the peninsula around it, and ceded the southern half of Sakhalin Island to Japan. Both would be taken back by the Soviet Union following the defeat of the Japanese in World War II. \n\nRoosevelt earned the Nobel Peace Prize for his effort. George E. Mowry concludes that Roosevelt handled the arbitration well, doing an \"excellent job of balancing Russian and Japanese power in the Orient, where the supremacy of either constituted a threat to growing America.\" \n\nCasualties \n\nSources do not agree on a precise number of deaths from the war because of a lack of body counts for confirmation. The number of Japanese Army dead in combat is put at around 47,000 with around 27,000 additional casualties from disease, and between 6,000 and 12,000 wounded. Estimates of Russian Army dead range from around 40,000 to around 70,000 men. The total number of army dead is generally stated as around 130,000 to 170,000. China suffered 20,000 civilian deaths, and financially the loss amounted to over 69 million taels' worth of silver.\n\nDuring many of the battles at sea, several thousand soldiers being transported drowned after their ships went down. There was no consensus about what to do with transported soldiers at sea, and as a result, many of the ships failed or refused to rescue soldiers that were left shipwrecked. This led to the creation of the second Geneva Convention in 1906, which gave protection and care for shipwrecked soldiers in armed conflict.\n\nPolitical consequences \n\nThis was the first major military victory in the modern era of an Asian power over a European nation. Russia's defeat was met with shock in the West and across the Far East. Japan's prestige rose greatly as it came to be seen as a modern nation. Concurrently, Russia lost virtually its entire Pacific and Baltic fleets, and also much international esteem. This was particularly true in the eyes of Germany and Austria-Hungary before World War I. Russia was France's and Serbia's ally, and that loss of prestige had a significant effect on Germany's future when planning for war with France, and Austria-Hungary's war with Serbia.\n\nIn the absence of Russian competition, and with the distraction of European nations during World War I, combined with the Great Depression that followed, the Japanese military began efforts to dominate China and the rest of Asia, which eventually led to the Second Sino-Japanese War and the Pacific War theatres of World War II.\n\nEffects in Russia \n\nAlthough popular support for the war had existed following the Japanese attack on Port Arthur in 1904, discontent occurred following continued defeats at the hands of Japan. For many Russians, the immediate shock of unexpected humiliation at the hands of Japan caused the conflict to be viewed as a metaphor for the shortcomings of the Romanov autocracy. Popular discontent in Russia after the war added more fuel to the already simmering Russian Revolution of 1905, an event Nicholas II had hoped to avoid entirely by taking intransigent negotiating stances prior to coming to the table. Twelve years later, that discontent boiled over into the February Revolution of 1917. In Poland, which Russia partitioned in the late 18th century, and where Russian rule already caused two major uprisings, the population was so restless that an army of 250,000–300,000—larger than the one facing the Japanese—had to be stationed to put down the unrest. Some political leaders of the Polish insurrection movement (in particular, Józef Piłsudski) sent emissaries to Japan to collaborate on sabotage and intelligence gathering within the Russian Empire and even plan a Japanese-aided uprising.For Polish–Japanese negotiations and relations during the war, see:Bert Edström, The Japanese and Europe: Images and Perceptions, Routledge, 2000, ISBN 1-873410-86-7, [https://books.google.com/books?vidISBN1873410867&id\nltmXn9rUGD8C&pgPA126&lpg\nPA126&qPoles&vq\nPoles&dqrusso-japanese+war+Poles&sig\nd0-YuSdw_7PspjQ_Rva2S7a7JSo pp.126–133] Jerzy Lerski, \"A Polish Chapter of the Russo-Japanese War\", Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan, III/7 p. 69–96\n\nIn Russia, the defeat of 1905 led in the short term to a reform of the Russian military that allowed it to face Germany in World War I. However, the revolts at home following the war planted seeds that presaged the Russian Revolution of 1917. This was because Tsar Nicholas II issued the October Manifesto, which included only limited reforms such as the Duma and failed to address the societal problems of Russia at the time. \n\nEffects on Japan \n\nJapan had become the rising Asian power and had proven that its military could combat the major powers in Europe with success. Most Western powers were stunned that the Japanese not only prevailed but decisively defeated Russia. In the Russo-Japanese War, Japan had also portrayed a sense of readiness in taking a more active and leading role in Asian affairs, which in turn had led to widespread nationalism throughout the region.\n\nAlthough the war had ended in a victory for Japan, Japanese public opinion was shocked by the very restrained peace terms which were negotiated at the war's end.[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res\n9C01E5D8103AE733A25750C0A96F9C946497D6CF&scp5&sq\norder+of+meiji&st=p \"Japan's Present Crisis and Her Constitution; The Mikado's Ministers Will Be Held Responsible by the People for the Peace Treaty – Marquis Ito May Be Able to Save Baron Komura,\"] New York Times. 3 September 1905. Widespread discontent spread through the populace upon the announcement of the treaty terms. Riots erupted in major cities in Japan. Two specific requirements, expected after such a costly victory, were especially lacking: territorial gains and monetary reparations to Japan. The peace accord led to feelings of distrust, as the Japanese had intended to retain all of Sakhalin Island, but were forced to settle for half of it after being pressured by the United States, with President Roosevelt opting to support Nicholas II’s stance on not ceding territory or paying reparations. The Japanese had wanted reparations to help families recover from lost fathers and sons as well as heavy taxation from the government. Without them, they were at a loss.\n\nThe U.S held strength in the Asian region from aggravating European imperialist encroachment. To Japan, this represented a developing threat to the autonomy of the region. U.S.-Japanese relations would recover a bit in the early 20th century, but by the early 1920s, few in Japan believed that the United States meant anything positive for the future of Asia. By the 1930s, the U.S. presence in Asian affairs, along with the instability in China and the collapse of the Western economic order, Japan would act aggressively with respect to China, setting the precedent that would ultimately culminate in the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. Some scholars suggest that Japan's road to World War II had begun not upon winning the Russo-Japanese War, but when it lost the peace. \n\nTreatment of civilians \n\nDuring the fighting in Manchuria, Russian troops routinely looted and burned Chinese villages, raped the women and killed all who resisted or who were just in the way. The Russian justification for all this was that Chinese civilians, being Asian, must have been helping their fellow Asians, the Japanese, inflict defeat on the Russians, and therefore deserved to be punished. The Russian troops were gripped by the fear of the \"Yellow Peril\", and saw all Asians, not just the Japanese, as the enemy. All the Russian soldiers were much feared by the Chinese population of Manchuria, but it was the Cossacks whom they feared the most on the account of their brutality and insatiable desire to loot. Largely because of the more disciplined behavior of the Japanese, the Han and Manchu population of Manchuria tended to be pro-Japanese. Even the Japanese were much prone to looting, albeit in a considerably less brutal manner than the Russians and to summarily executing any Chinese or Manchu whom they suspected of being spies. The city of Liaoyang had the misfortune to be sacked three times within three days; first by the Russians, then by the Chinese police, and finally by the Japanese. The Japanese hired Chinese bandits known variously as the Chunguses, Chunchuse or khunhuzy to engage in guerrilla warfare by attacking Russian supply columns. Only once did the Chunguses attack Japanese forces, and that attack was apparently motivated by the Chunguses mistaking the Japanese forces for a Russian one. Zhang Zuolin, a prominent bandit leader and the future \"Old Marshal\" who would rule Manchuria as a warlord between 1916–28 worked as a Chunguse for the Japanese. Manchuria was still officially part of the Chinese Empire, and the Chinese civil servants tried their best to be neutral as Russian and Japanese troops marched across Manchuria. In the parts of Manchuria occupied by the Japanese, Tokyo appointed \"civil governors\" who worked to improve health, sanitation and the state of the roads. These activities were self-interested as improved roads lessened Japanese logistics problems while improved health amongst the Chinese lessened the dangers of diseases infecting the Japanese troops. By contrast, the Russian made no effort to improve sanitation or health amongst the Chinese they ruled over, and destroyed everything when they retreated. Many Chinese tended to see the Japanese as the lesser evil.\n\nHistorical significance \n\nThe effects and impact of the Russo-Japanese War introduced a number of characteristics that came to define 20th century politics and warfare. Many of the technological innovations brought on by the Industrial Revolution first became present on the battlefield in the Russo-Japanese War. Weapons and armaments were more technological than ever before. Technological developments of modern armaments, such as rapid firing artillery and machine guns, as well as more accurate carbine rifles, were first used on a mass scale in the Russo-Japanese War. The improved capability of naval forces was also demonstrated. Military operations on both sea and land demonstrated that warfare in a new age of technology had undergone a considerable change since the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71.\nMost army commanders had previously envisioned using these weapon systems to dominate the battlefield on an operational and tactical level but, as events played out, these technological advancements forever altered the capacity in which mankind would wage war. \nFor East Asia it was the first confrontation after thirty years involving two modern armed forces.\n\nThe advanced weaponry led to massive casualty counts. Neither Japan nor Russia had prepared for the number of deaths that would occur in this new kind of warfare, or had the resources to compensate for these losses. This also left its impression on society at large, with the emergence of transnational and nongovernmental organizations, like the Red Cross, becoming prominent after the war. The emergence of such organizations can be regarded as the beginning of a meshing together of civilizations through the identification of common problems and challenges; a slow process dominating much of the 20th century. \n\nDebate with respect to the Russo-Japanese War preluding World War II is a topic of interest to scholars today. Arguments that are favorable toward this perspective consider characteristics specific to the Russo-Japanese War to the qualities definitive of \"total war\". Numerous aspects of total war characterize the Russo-Japanese War. Encompassed on both ends was the mass mobilization of troops into battle. For both Russia and Japan, the war required extensive economic support in the form of production of equipment, armaments, and supplies at such a scale that required both domestic support as well as foreign aid. The conclusion of the Russo-Japanese War also demonstrated the need for world leaders to regard domestic response to foreign policy, which is argued by some scholars as setting in motion the dissolution of the Romanov dynasty by demonstrating the inefficiencies of tsarist Russia's government.\n\nReception around the world \n\nTo the Western powers, Japan's victory demonstrated the emergence of a new Asian regional power. With the Russian defeat, some scholars have argued that the war had set in motion a change in the global world order with the emergence of Japan as not only a regional power, but rather, the main Asian power. Rather more than the possibilities of diplomatic partnership were emerging, however. The Japanese success increased self-confidence among anti-colonial nationalists in colonised Asian countries – Vietnamese, Indonesians, Indians and Filipinos – and to those in countries like Turkey and Iran in immediate danger of being absorbed by the Western powers. It also encouraged the Chinese who, despite having been at war with the Japanese only a decade before, still considered Westerners the greater threat. \"We regarded that Russian defeat by Japan as the defeat of the West by the East. We regarded the Japanese victory as our own victory,\" declared Sun Yat-sen. And Jawaharlal Nehru, \"Japan's victory lessened the feeling of inferiority from which most of us suffered. A great European power had been defeated, thus Asia could still defeat Europe as it had done in the past.\" \n\nIn Europe too, subject populations were similarly encouraged. James Joyce's novel Ulysses, set in Dublin in 1904, contains hopeful Irish allusions as to the outcome of the war. And in partitioned Poland the artist Józef Mehoffer chose 1905 to paint his \"Europa Jubilans\" (Europe rejoicing), which portrays an aproned maid taking her ease on a sofa against a background of Eastern artefacts. Executed following demonstrations against the war and Russian cultural suppression, and in the year of Russia’s defeat, its subtly coded message looks forward to a time when the Tsarist masters will be defeated in Europe as they had been in Asia. \n\nThe significance of the war for oppressed classes as well as subject populations was clear too to the Socialist thinker Rosa Luxemburg: \"The Russo-Japanese War now gives to all an awareness that even war and peace in Europe – its destiny – isn't decided between the four walls of the European concert, but outside it, in the gigantic maelstrom of world and colonial politics. And it’s in this that the real meaning of the current war resides for social-democracy, even if we set aside its immediate effect: the collapse of Russian absolutism. This war brings the gaze of the international proletariat back to the great political and economic connectedness of the world, and violently dissipates in our ranks the particularism, the pettiness of ideas that form in any period of political calm.\" It was this realisation of the universal significance of the war that underlines the historical importance of the conflict and its outcome.\n\nAssessment of war results \n\nRussia had lost two of its three fleets. Only its Black Sea Fleet remained, and this was the result of an earlier treaty that had prevented the fleet from leaving the Black Sea. Japan became the sixth-most powerful naval force, while the Russian Navy declined to one barely stronger than that of Austria–Hungary. The actual costs of the war were large enough to affect the Russian economy and, despite grain exports, the nation developed an external balance of payments deficit. The cost of military re-equipment and re-expansion after 1905 pushed the economy further into deficit, although the size of the deficit was obscured. \n\nThe Japanese were on the offensive for most of the war and used massed infantry assaults against defensive positions, which would later become the standard of all European armies during World War I. The battles of the Russo-Japanese War, in which machine guns and artillery took a heavy toll on Russian and Japanese troops, were a precursor to the trench warfare of World War I. A German military advisor sent to Japan, Jakob Meckel, had a tremendous impact on the development of the Japanese military training, tactics, strategy, and organization. His reforms were credited with Japan's overwhelming victory over China in the First Sino-Japanese War of 1894–1895. However, his over-reliance on infantry in offensive campaigns also led to a large number of Japanese casualties.\n\nMilitary and economic exhaustion affected both countries. Japanese historians regard this war as a turning point for Japan, and a key to understanding the reasons why Japan may have failed militarily and politically later. After the war, acrimony was felt at every level of Japanese society and it became the consensus within Japan that their nation had been treated as the defeated power during the peace conference. As time went on, this feeling, coupled with the sense of \"arrogance\" at becoming a Great Power, grew and added to growing Japanese hostility towards the West, and fueled Japan's military and imperial ambitions. Only five years after the war, Japan de jure annexed Korea as part of its colonial empire. In 1931, 21 years later, Japan invaded Manchuria in the Mukden Incident. This culminated in the invasion of East, Southeast and South Asia in World War II, in an attempt to create a great Japanese colonial empire, the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. As a result, most Chinese historians consider the Russo-Japanese War as a key development of Japanese militarism.\n\nFollowing the victory of the Battle of Tsushima, Japan's erstwhile English ally presented a lock of Admiral Nelson's hair to the Imperial Japanese Navy, judging its performance then as on a par with Britain's victory at Trafalgar in 1805. It is still on display at Kyouiku Sankoukan, a public museum maintained by the Japan Self-Defense Force. Nevertheless, there was a consequent change in English strategic thinking, resulting in enlargement of its naval docks at Auckland, New Zealand; Bombay, British India; Fremantle and Sydney, Australia; Simon's Town, Cape Colony; Singapore and British Hong Kong. The naval war confirmed the direction of the British Admiralty's thinking in tactical terms even as it undermined its strategic grasp of a changing world. Tactical orthodoxy, for example, assumed that a naval battle would imitate the conditions of stationary combat and that ships would engage in one long line sailing on parallel courses; but more flexible tactical thinking would now be required as a firing ship and its target maneuvered independently. \n\nThe US and Australian reaction to the war had also been mixed, with fears of a Yellow Peril eventually shifting from China to Japan. American figures such as W. E. B. Du Bois and Lothrop Stoddard saw the victory as a challenge to white supremacy. A few Australian invasion literature novels appeared. \n\nMilitary attachés and observers \n\nMilitary and civilian observers from every major power closely followed the course of the war. Most were able to report on events from the perspective of embedded positions within the land and naval forces of both Russia and Japan. These military attachés and other observers prepared first-hand accounts of the war and analytical papers. In-depth observer narratives of the war and more narrowly focused professional journal articles were written soon after the war; and these post-war reports conclusively illustrated the battlefield destructiveness of this conflict. This was the first time the tactics of entrenched positions for infantry defended with machine guns and artillery became vitally important. Both would become dominant factors in World War I.\nEven though entrenched positions had already been a significant part of both the Franco-Prussian War and the American Civil War, it is now apparent that the high casualty counts, and the tactical lessons readily available to observer nations, were completely disregarded in preparations for war in Europe, and during much of the course of World War I. \n\nIn 1904–1905, Ian Standish Monteith Hamilton was the military attaché of the British Indian Army serving with the Japanese Army in Manchuria. As one of the several military attachés from Western countries, he was the first to arrive in Japan after the start of the war. \nHe therefore would be recognized as the dean of multi-national attachés and observers in this conflict, although out-ranked by British field marshal, William Gustavus Nicholson, 1st Baron Nicholson, who was later to become chief of the Imperial General Staff.\n\nFinancing \n\nDespite its gold reserves of 106.3 million pounds, Russia's pre-war financial situation was not enviable. The country had large budget deficits year after year, and was largely dependent on borrowed money. \n\nRussia's war effort was funded primarily by France, in a series of loans totalling 800 million francs (30.4 million pounds); another loan in the amount of 600 million francs was agreed upon, but later cancelled. These loans were extended within a climate of mass bribing of the French press (made necessary by Russia's precarious economic and social situation and poor military performance). Although initially reluctant to participate in the war, the French government and major banks were co-operative since it became clear that Russian and French economic interests were tied. In addition to French money, Russia secured a loan in the amount of 500 million marks (24.5 million pounds) from Germany, who also financed Japan's war effort.\n\nConversely, Japan's pre-war gold reserves were a modest 11.7 million pounds; a major portion of the total cost of the war was covered by money borrowed from the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States.\n\nDuring his canvassing expedition in London, the Japanese vice-governor of the Bank of Japan met Jacob Schiff, an American banker and head of Kuhn, Loeb & Co.. Schiff, in response to Russia's anti-Jewish pogroms and sympathetic to Japan's cause, extended a critical series of loans to the Empire of Japan, in the amount of 200 million US dollars (41.2 million pounds). \n\nJapan's total war expenditure was 2,150 million yen, of which 38%, or 820 million yen, was raised overseas.\n\nList of battles \n\n* 1904 Battle of Port Arthur, 8 February: naval battle inconclusive\n* 1904 Battle of Chemulpo Bay, 9 February: naval battle Japanese victory\n* 1904 Battle of Yalu River, 30 April to 1 May: Japanese victory\n* 1904 Battle of Nanshan, 25 to 26 May, Japanese victory\n* 1904 Battle of Te-li-Ssu, 14 to 15 June, Japanese victory\n* 1904 Battle of Motien Pass, 17 July, Japanese victory\n* 1904 Battle of Tashihchiao, 24 July, Japanese victory\n* 1904 Battle of Hsimucheng, 31 July, Japanese victory\n* 1904 Battle of the Yellow Sea, 10 August: naval battle Japanese victory strategically, tactically inconclusive\n* 1904 Battle off Ulsan, 14 August: naval battle Japanese victory\n* 1904–1905 Siege of Port Arthur, 19 August to 2 January: Japanese victory\n* 1904 Battle of Liaoyang, 25 August to 3 September: inconclusive\n* 1904 Battle of Shaho, 5 to 17 October: inconclusive\n* 1905 Battle of Sandepu, 26 to 27 January: inconclusive\n* 1905 Battle of Mukden, 21 February to 10 March: Japanese victory\n* 1905 Battle of Tsushima, 27 to 28 May naval battle: Japanese victory\n\nCultural legacy \n\nGraphic arts\n\nThe Russo-Japanese War was covered by dozens of foreign journalists who sent back sketches that were turned into lithographs and other reproducible forms. Propaganda images were circulated by both sides, often in the form of postcards and based on insulting racial stereotypes. These were produced not only by the combatants but by those from European countries who supported one or the other side or had a commercial or colonial stake in the area. War photographs were also popular, appearing in both the press and in book form. \n\nIn Russia, the war was covered by anonymous satirical graphic luboks for sale in markets, recording the war for the domestic audience. Around 300 were made before their creation was banned by the Russian government. Their Japanese equivalents were woodblock prints. These had been common during the Sino-Japanese war a decade earlier and celebrations of the new conflict tended to repeat the same imagery and situations. But by this time in Japan postcards had become the most common form of communication and they soon replaced prints as a medium for topographical imagery and war reportage. In some ways, however, they were still dependent on the print for their pictorial conventions, not least in issuing the cards in series that assembled into a composite scene or design, either as diptychs, triptychs or even more ambitious formats. However, captioning swiftly moved from the calligraphic side inscription to a printed title below, and not just in Japanese but in English and other European languages. There was a lively sense that these images served not only as mementoes but also as propaganda statements.\n\nWar artists were to be found on the Russian side and even figured among the casualties. Vasily Vereshchagin went down with the Petropavlovsk, Admiral Makarov’s flagship, when it was sunk by mines. However, his last work, a picture of a council of war presided over by the admiral, was recovered almost undamaged. Another artist, Mykola Samokysh, first came to notice for his reports during the war and the paintings worked up from his diary sketch-books. Other depictions appeared after the event. The two by the Georgian naïve painter Niko Pirosmani from 1906 must have been dependent on newspaper reports since he was not present. Then Yury Repin made an episode during the Battle of Yalu River the subject of a broad heroic canvas in 1914 at the outset of World War I. \n\nMusic\n\nOn either side, there were lyrics lamenting the necessity of fighting in a foreign land, far from home. One of the earliest of several Russian songs still performed today was the waltz \"Amur's Waves\" (Amurskie volny), which evokes the melancholy of standing watch on the frontier between Russia and Manchuria. \n\nTwo others grew out of incidents during the war. \"On the Hills of Manchuria\" (Na sopkah Manchzhurii) (1906) is another waltz composed by Ilya Shatrov, a decorated military musician whose regiment suffered badly in the battle of Mukden. Originally only the music was published, under the longer title \"The Mokshansky Regiment on the Hills of Manchuria\"; the words by Stepan Petrov were added later. These lyrics mourned the fallen lying in their graves and threatened revenge. Another song, Variag, commemorates the Battle of Chemulpo Bay in which that cruiser and the gunboat Korietz steamed out to confront an encircling Japanese squadron rather than surrender. That act of heroism was first celebrated in a German song by Rudolf Greintz in 1907 but was quickly translated into Russian and sung to a martial accompaniment. \n\nNikolai Rimsky-Korsakov also reacted to the war by composing the satirical opera The Golden Cockerel, completed in 1907. Although it was ostensibly based on a verse fairy tale by Alexander Pushkin written in 1834, the authorities quickly realised its true target and immediately banned it from performance. The opera was premiered in 1909, after Rimsky-Korsakov's death, and even then with modifications required by the censors.\n\nPoetry\n\nSome Japanese poetry dealing with the war still has a high profile. General Nogi Maresuke’s \"Outside the Goldland fortress\" was learned by generations of schoolchildren and valued for its bleak stoicism. The army surgeon Mori Ōgai kept a verse diary which tackled such themes as racism, strategic mistakes and the ambiguities of victory which can now be appreciated in historical hindsight. Nowadays too there is growing appreciation of Yosano Akiko’s parting poem to her brother as he left for the war, which includes the critical lines.\n:Never let them kill you, brother! \n:His Imperial Majesty would not come out to fight ... \n:How could He possibly make them believe \n:that it is honourable to die? \nEven the Emperor Meiji himself entered the poetic lists, writing in answer to all the lamentations about death in a foreign land that the patriotic soul returns to the homeland. \n\nEuropean treatments were similarly varied. Jane H. Oakley attempted an epic treatment of the conflict in the 86 cantos of her contemporary A Russo-Japanese War Poem (Brighton 1905). The French poet Blaise Cendrars was later to represent himself as on a Russian train on its way to Manchuria at the time in his La prose du Transsibérien et de la Petite Jehanne de France (1913) and energetically evoked the results of the war along the way:\nI saw the silent trains the black trains returning from the Far East and passing like phantoms…\nAt Talga 100,000 wounded were dying for lack of care\nI visited the hospitals of Krasnoyarsk\nAnd at Khilok we encountered a long convoy of soldiers who had lost their minds\nIn the pesthouses I saw gaping gashes wounds bleeding full blast\nAnd amputated limbs danced about or soared through the raucous air \nMuch later, the Scottish poet Douglas Dunn devoted an epistolary poem in verse to the naval war in The Donkey's Ears: Politovsky’s Letters Home (2000). This follows the voyage of the Russian Imperial Navy flagship Kniaz to its sinking at the battle of Tsushima. \n\nFiction\n\nFictional coverage of the war began even before it was over. An early example was Allen Upward’s The International Spy, being the secret history of the Russo-Japanese War (1904). Set in both Russia and Japan, it ends with the Dogger Bank incident involving the Baltic Fleet. The political thinking displayed there is typical of the time. There is great admiration for the Japanese, who were English allies. Russia is in turmoil, but the main impetus towards war is not imperialism as such but commercial forces. \"Every student of modern history has remarked the fact that all recent wars have been promoted by great combinations of capitalists. The causes which formerly led to war between nation and nation have ceased to operate\" (p. 40). The true villain plotting in the background, however, is the German Emperor, seeking to destabilise the European balance of power in his country’s favour. Towards the end of the novel, the narrator steals a German submarine and successfully foils a plot to involve the English in the war. The submarine motif reappeared in George Griffith’s science fiction novel, The Stolen Submarine (1904), although in this case it is a French super-submarine which its developer sells to the Russians for use against the Japanese in another tale of international intrigue. \n\nThough most English-language fiction of the period took the Japanese side, the Rev. W. W. Walker’s Canadian novella, Alter Ego (1907), is an exception. It features a Canadian volunteer in the Russian army who, on his return, agrees to talk about his experiences to an isolated upcountry community and relates his part in the battle of Mukden. Though this incident only occupies two of the book’s six chapters, it is used to illustrate the main message there, that war is \"anti-Christian and barbarous, except in a defensive sense\" (Ch.3).\n\nVarious aspects of the war were also common in contemporary children’s fiction. Categorised as Boys' Own adventure stories, they offer few insights into the conflict, being generally based on news articles and sharing unreflectingly in the contemporary culture of imperialism. Among these, Herbert Strang was responsible for two novels: Kobo: A Story of the Russo-Japanese War (1905), told from the Japanese side, and Brown of Moukden (1906), viewed from the Russian side. Three more were written by the prolific American author, Edward Stratemeyer: Under the Mikado's Flag, or Young Soldiers of Fortune (1904); At the Fall of Port Arthur, or a young American in the Japanese navy (1905); and Under Togo for Japan, or Three Young Americans on Land and Sea (1906). Two other English stories begin with the action at Port Arthur and follow the events thereafter: A Soldier of Japan: a tale of the Russo-Japanese War by Captain Frederick Sadleir Brereton, and The North Pacific (1905) by Willis Boyd Allen (1855–1938). Two more also involve young men fighting in the Japanese navy: Americans in For the Mikado, a Japanese Middy in Action (1905) by Kirk Munroe, and a temporarily disgraced English officer in Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun (1916) by Harry Collingwood, the pen-name of William Joseph Cosens Lancaster (1851–1922), whose speciality was naval fiction.\n\nRussian novelist Alexey Novikov-Priboy really did serve in the Baltic Fleet and wrote about the conflict on his return, but his early work was suppressed. It was not until the changed political climate under Soviet rule that he began writing his historical epic Tsushima, based on his personal experiences on board the battleship Orel as well as on testimonies of fellow sailors and government archives. The first part was published in 1932, the second in 1935, and the whole novel was later awarded the Stalin Prize. It describes the heroism of Russian sailors and certain officers whose defeat, in accordance with the new Soviet thinking, was due to the criminal negligence of the Imperial Naval command. A German novel by Frank Thiess, originally published as Tsushima in 1936 (and later translated as The Voyage of Forgotten Men), covered the same journey round the world to defeat.\n\nLater there appeared a first-hand account of the siege of Port Arthur by Alexander Stepanov (1892–1965). He had been present there as the 12-year-old son of a battery commander and his novel, Port Arthur: a historical narrative (1944), is based on his own diaries and his father's notes. The work is considered one of the best historical novels of the Soviet period. A later novel in which the war appears is Valentin Pikul’s The Three Ages of Okini-San (1981). Centred on the life of Vladimir Kokovtsov, who rose through the ranks to admiral of the Russian fleet, it covers the period from the Russo-Japanese War through to the February and October Revolutions. A much later Russian genre novel uses the period of the war as background. This is Boris Akunin's The Diamond Chariot (2003), in the first part of which the detective Erast Fandorin is charged with protecting the Trans-Siberian Railway from Japanese sabotage.\n\nThe main historical novel dealing with the war from the Japanese side is Shiba Ryōtarō's immense Clouds above the hill, published serially in several volumes between 1968–72. The closely researched story spans the decade from the Sino-Japanese War to the Russo-Japanese War and went on to become the nation’s favourite book. \n\nFilmography \n\nSee also film list about Russo-Japanese war\n\n* Port Arthur (1936)\n* Kreiser Varyag (1946)\n* Nichiro sensō shōri no hishi: Tekichū ōdan sanbyaku-ri (1957)\n* Meiji tennô to nichiro daisenso (1958)\n* The Battle of the Japan Sea (1969, 佐藤 勝: 日本海大海戦, Nihonkai-Daikaisen) depicts the naval battles of the war, the attacks on the Port Arthur highlands, and the subterfuge and diplomacy of Japanese agents in Sweden. Admiral Togo is portrayed by Toshiro Mifune.\n* The Battle of Tsushima (1975) [documentary], depiction of the naval Battle of Tsushima\n* The Battle of Port Arthur (1980, sometimes referred as 203 Kochi ) depiction of the Siege of Port Arthur\n* Nihonkai daikaisen: Umi yukaba (1983)\n* Reilly, Ace of Spies (1983). Russian-born British spy Sidney Reilly's role in providing intelligence that allowed the Japanese surprise attack that started the Siege of Port Arthur is dramatised in the second episode of this TV series \n* Bogatstvo (2004)\n* Saka no Ue no Kumo (2009)" ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "T Ros", "Feddy Roosevelt", "26th President of the United States", "Trust Buster", "The Cowboy President", "Teddy roosevelt", "Theodore Roosavelt", "President Theodore Roosevelt", "Theodor roosevelt", "Teddy Rose", "Teddy Roosevelt", "Theodore roosevelt", "T. Roosevelt", "Teodoro Roosevelt", "T. Roosevelt Administration", "Teddy Roosvelt", "Teddy Rosevelt", "Roosevelt, Theodore", "Teddy Roosevelt foreign policy", "T Roosevelt", "Cowboy of the Dakotas", "Teddy Roose", "Theodore Roosevelt" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "t ros", "cowboy president", "theodore roosavelt", "trust buster", "president theodore roosevelt", "teddy roosvelt", "teddy rosevelt", "t roosevelt", "roosevelt theodore", "feddy roosevelt", "cowboy of dakotas", "teddy rose", "26th president of united states", "teddy roosevelt foreign policy", "teddy roose", "teodoro roosevelt", "theodore roosevelt", "theodor roosevelt", "t roosevelt administration", "teddy roosevelt" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "teddy roosevelt", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "Teddy Roosevelt" }

{ "doc_source": [ "TagMe" ], "filename": [ "The_Curious_Case_of_Benjamin_Button_(short_story).txt" ], "title": [ "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (short story)" ], "wiki_context": [ "\"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button\" is a short story written by F. Scott Fitzgerald and first published in Colliers Magazine on May 27, 1922. It was subsequently anthologized in his book Tales of the Jazz Age, which is occasionally published as The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Other Jazz Age Stories. \n\nPlot\n\nIn 1860 Baltimore, Benjamin is born with the physical appearance of a 70-year-old man, already capable of speech. His father Roger invites neighborhood boys to play with him and orders him to play with children's toys, but Benjamin obeys only to please his father. At five, Benjamin is sent to kindergarten but is quickly withdrawn after he repeatedly falls asleep during child activities.\n\nWhen Benjamin turns 12, the Button family realizes that he is aging backwards. At the age of 18, Benjamin enrolls in Yale College, but is sent home by officials, who think he is a 50-year-old lunatic.\n\nIn 1880, when Benjamin is 20, his father gives him a control of Roger Button & Co. Wholesale Hardware. He meets the young Hildegarde Moncrief, a daughter of General Moncrief, and falls in love with her. Hildegarde mistakes Benjamin for a 50-year-old brother of Roger Button; she prefers older men and marries him six months later, but remains ignorant of his condition. Years later, Benjamin's business has been successful, but he is tired of Hildegarde because her beauty has faded and she nags him. Bored at home, he enlists in the Spanish–American War in 1898 and achieves great triumph in the military, rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel. He retires from the army to focus on his company, and receives a medal.\n\nIn 1910, Benjamin, now looking like a 20-year-old, turns over control of his company to his son, Roscoe, and enrolls at Harvard University. His first year there is a great success: he dominates in football and takes revenge against Yale for rejecting him years before. However, during his junior and senior years he is only 16 years old, too weak to play football and barely able to cope with the academic work. \n\nAfter graduation, Benjamin returns home, only to learn that his wife has moved to Italy. He lives with Roscoe, who treats him sternly, and forces Benjamin to call him \"uncle.\" As the years progress, Benjamin grows from a moody teenager into a child. Eventually, Roscoe has a child of his own who later attends kindergarten with Benjamin. After kindergarten, Benjamin slowly begins to lose memory of his earlier life. His memory fades away to the point where he cannot remember anything except his nurse. Everything fades to darkness shortly after.\n\nSimilar stories\n\nFitzgerald, in his introduction to the story, remarks that he came across a similar plot in Samuel Butler's Note-Books several weeks after publishing Benjamin Button.\n\nA story with a similar plot was published in 1921 by the Austrian author Roda Roda in Die sieben Leidenschaften (The seven tempers; Rikola Verlag, Vienna 1922) under the title \"Antonius de Padua Findling\".\n\nJ. G. Ballard's 1961 story \"Mr F. is Mr F.\" features a man who regresses from adulthood to infancy when his wife becomes pregnant. \n\nIn W. P. Kinsella's 1986 novel, The Iowa Baseball Confederacy, the character Marylyle Baron tells a tale about \"strange happenings\" in Johnson County Iowa: \"The Backwards Plague\" struck in the early 1900s. Young men and women in their late teens to early twenties suddenly started losing body mass. Eventually, they regressed to their birth weight, looking like new born babies. At that point the plague stopped, and its victims began to grow again. \n\nIn T. H. White's \"The Once and Future King\", an Arthurian fantasy novel published in 1958, Merlin the magician is depicted as growing younger.\n\nIn the comic 2000AD, issue 308, 19 March 1983, there is a story called \"The Reversible Man\" which starts with the man lying on the ground having died and he travels backwards through his life getting younger. He sees his children get 'unborn' and he 'unmeets' his wife and he regresses to babyhood and is eventually unborn himself. \n\nAnother story based on a similar plot is The Confessions of Max Tivoli, a novel by Andrew Sean Greer.\n\nFilm adaptation\n\nThe Curious Case of Benjamin Button was released as a motion picture late in 2008 starring Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett and directed by David Fincher. The screenplay differs greatly from the short story. Only the title, Benjamin's name, and most aspects of the aging process are retained in the screenplay." ] }

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{ "aliases": [ "Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald", "F. Fitzgerald", "F. (Francis) Scott Fitzgerald", "F Fitzgerald", "F.S.Fitzgerald", "Francis FitzGerald", "F Scott Fitzgerald", "F. Scott Fitzgerald", "Francis Fitzgerald", "Scott Fitzgerald", "Francis Scott Fitzgerald" ], "normalized_aliases": [ "francis scott fitzgerald", "f fitzgerald", "f scott fitzgerald", "scott fitzgerald", "f francis scott fitzgerald", "francis fitzgerald", "francis scott key fitzgerald", "f s fitzgerald" ], "matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_matched_wiki_entity_name": "", "normalized_value": "f scott fitzgerald", "type": "WikipediaEntity", "value": "F. Scott Fitzgerald" }