title: Riot grrrl

text: The third issue of Vail's zine "Jigsaw", published in 1991 after she spent time in Washington D.C., was subtitled "angry grrrl zine". In spring 1991 Cheslow was living in San Francisco, and she received letters from Ian MacKaye and Nation of Ulysses' Tim Green informing her about Bikini Kill and "angry grrrl" zines. That spring 1991, Neuman and Wolfe spent spring break in DC and formed Bratmobile there with Erin Smith, Christina Billotte (of Autoclave), and Jen Smith. Bikini Kill toured with Nation of Ulysses in May/June 1991, converging in DC with Bratmobile that summer. It was here that Neuman and Wolfe created the first issue of "riot grrrl" zine. In August 1991 many of these individuals gathered at the International Pop Underground Convention in Olympia. The first night of the event became known as "Girl Night". Tucker played her first show that night, on guitar and vocals with Heavens to Betsy and Tracy Sawyer on drums. Writing later about that summer, Melissa Klein (Wolfe's housemate at the time) said, "Young women's anger and questioning fomented and smoldered until it became an all-out gathering of momentum toward action...Bikini Kill promoted 'Revolution Girl Style Now' and 'Stop the J-Word Jealousy From Killing Girl Love'." As this ideal spread via band tours, zines, and word of mouth, riot grrrl chapters sprang up around the country.


title: Riot grrrl

text: While Bikini Kill, amongst other bands, frequently avoided attention from mainstream media outlets due to the fear that riot grrrl would be co-opted by corporate enterprises, in the few interviews they did take, they often made the movement out to be bigger than it was, claiming the music scene existed in cities far beyond its actual scope. This encouraged feminists to seek out said scenes, and when they couldn't find them, they created them on their own, further broadening riot grrrl's scope. In July 1992, the first Riot Grrrl Convention brought people together in D.C. for a weekend of performances and workshops on topics such as rape, sexuality, racism, domestic violence, and self-defense. By 1994, riot grrrl had been discovered by the mainstream, and Bikini Kill were increasingly referred to as pioneers of the movement.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Kathleen Hanna, Tobi Vail, and Kathi Wilcox were all studying at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington during the late 1980s. Hanna worked at Reko Muse, a small collective art gallery that would frequently host local bands to play shows between art exhibitions. There she met Vail after booking her band, the Go Team. At the same time, Vail was writing "Jigsaw" zine and working with friend Wilcox. Vail wrote at the time in "Jigsaw":I feel completely left out of the realm of everything that is so important to me. And I know that this is partly because punk rock is for and by boys mostly and partly because punk rock of this generation is coming of age in a time of mindless career-goal bands.


title: Riot grrrl

text: With Billy Karren, Bikini Kill self-released a cassette of demos during summer 1991 titled "Revolution Girl Style Now". Hanna, Vail and Wilcox also began collaboration on "Bikini Kill" zine during their first tours in 1991. The band wrote songs collaboratively and encouraged a female-centric environment at their shows, urging women to come to the front of the stage and handing out lyric sheets. Bikini Kill made it their goal to inspire more women to join the male-dominated punk scene. Hanna would also stage dive into the crowds to personally remove male hecklers who would often verbally and physically assault her during shows. However, the band's reach did include a large male audience in addition to the female target audience.


title: Riot grrrl

text: After releasing the "Bikini Kill" EP on the indie label Kill Rock Stars in 1992, Bikini Kill began to establish their audience. Members of Bikini Kill also began to collaborate with other high-profile musicians, including Joan Jett, whose music Hanna has described as an early example of the riot grrrl aesthetic. Jett produced the single "New Radio"/"Rebel Girl" for the band after members of Bikini Kill heard “Activity Grrrl,” a song Jett wrote about the band. Bikini Kill's debut album "Pussy Whipped", released in 1993, included the song "Rebel Girl". "Rebel Girl" has become one of Bikini Kill's signature songs as well as a widely-recognized anthem for the riot grrrl movement While "the unforgettable anthem", as Robert Christgau calls it, never charted due to its independent release, it has received widespread critical acclaim. It has been called a "classic", and praised as part "of the most vital rock-n-roll of the era". Bikini Kill's second album "Reject All American" was released in 1996, and the band broke up the next year.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Despite retrospective acclaim, at the time the band was criticized for excluding men, and even Rolling Stone described Bikini Kill’s first album as “yowling and moronic nag-unto-vomit tantrums." "My joke is always like, I didn’t just hit the glass ceiling, I pressed my naked [breasts] up against it," Hanna said of that time. Bikini Kill eventually called for a "media blackout" due to their perceived misrepresentation of the movement by the media. Their pioneer reputation endures but, as Hanna recalls:[Bikini Kill was] very vilified during the '90s by so many people, and hated by so many people, and I think that that's been kind of written out of the history. People were throwing chains at our heads – people hated us – and it was really, really hard to be in that band.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Hailing from Eugene, Oregon, Bratmobile was a first-generation riot grrrl band that became the second-most prominent founding voice of the riot grrrl movement. In 1990, University of Oregon students Allison Wolfe and Molly Neuman collaborated on feminist zine "Girl Germs" with Washington, DC's Jen Smith, touching on sexism in their local music scenes.


title: Riot grrrl

text: We were very encouraged by people like Tobi and Kathleen in Olympia, and we were like, "Oh let's do a band, let's do radio—we wanna "[sic]" have an all-girl radio show!"


title: Riot grrrl

text: During spring 1991, Erin Smith, Christina Billotte (of Autoclave), and Jen Smith (no relation to Erin) joined Wolfe and Neuman in Bratmobile when the latter two temporarily relocated to Washington, DC. Neuman and Erin Smith were previously introduced at a Nation of Ulysses show in Washington, DC in December 1990 by mutual friend Calvin Johnson. Jen Smith had written in a letter to Wolfe, "We need to start a girl RIOT!" Jen Smith proposed they collaborate with members of Bikini Kill on a zine called "Girl Riot". When Neuman began the zine, she changed its title to "riot grrrl", providing a networking forum for young women in the wider music scene and giving the movement its name.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Erin Smith, Jen Smith, Billotte, Wolfe, and Neuman released only one tape together, titled "Bratmobile DC". Thereafter, Bratmobile became a trio with Wolfe, Neuman, and Erin Smith. They played their first show together as Bratmobile in July 1991, with Neuman on drums, Erin Smith on guitar, and Wolfe on vocals.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Between 1991 and 1994 Bratmobile released the album "Pottymouth" and EP "The Real Janelle" on Kill Rock Stars, as well as "The Peel Session". Bratmobile toured with Heavens to Betsy in 1992 and broke up in 1994. Exposure to Bikini Kill and then Bratmobile inspired other riot grrrl factions to spring up around the country. Women in other regional punk music scenes across North America were encouraged to form their own bands and start their own zines.


title: Riot grrrl

text: From August 20 – 25, 1991, K Records held an indie music festival called the International Pop Underground Convention. A promotional poster reads:


title: Riot grrrl

text: As the corporate ogre expands its creeping influence on the minds of industrialized youth, the time has come for the International Rockers of the World to convene in celebration of our grand independence. Hangman hipsters, new mod rockers, sidestreet walkers, scooter-mounted dream girls, punks, teds, the instigators of the Love Rock Explosion, the editors of every angry grrrl zine, the plotters of youth rebellion in every form, the midwestern librarians and Scottish ski instructors who live by night, all are setting aside August 20–25, 1991 as the time.


title: Riot grrrl

text: A mostly all-female bill on the first night, called "Love Rock Revolution Girl Style Now!" and later simply "Girl Night", signaled a major step in the movement. The night was organized by Lois Maffeo, KAOS DJ Michelle Noel (who later organized the first Yoyo A Go Go in 1994), and Margaret Doherty. The lineup featured Maffeo, Tobi Vail solo, Christina Billotte solo, Bratmobile, Heavens to Betsy, Nikki McClure, Jean Smith of Mecca Normal, 7 Year Bitch, Kicking Giant, Rose Melberg, Kreviss, I Scream Truck, the Spinanes, and two side projects of Kathleen Hanna: Suture, with Sharon Cheslow of Chalk Circle (DC's first all-women punk band) and Dug E. Bird of Beefeater, and the Wondertwins with Tim Green of Nation of Ulysses. It was here that so many zinester people who'd only known each other from networking, mail, or talking on the phone, finally met and were brought together by an entire night of music dedicated to, for, and by women.


title: Riot grrrl

text: The convention also featured bands such as Bikini Kill, Nation of Ulysses, Unwound, L7, the Fastbacks, Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet, Girl Trouble, The Pastels, Seaweed, Scrawl, Jad Fair, Thee Headcoats, Steve Fisk, Tsunami, Fugazi, Sleepyhead, The Mummies, and spoken-word artist Juliana Luecking. This convention demonstrated a new relationship between audience and performers, dismantling the power dynamic of the past, for instance voicing anger at people harassing the female performers.


title: Riot grrrl

text: As Bikini Kill's music and zines spread throughout England in 1991–92, bands formed and were quick to embrace riot grrrl. England had previously spawned such influential all-female or female-fronted punk bands as X-Ray Spex, The Slits, and The Raincoats that provided inspiration.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Huggy Bear formed in 1991, calling themselves "girl-boy revolutionaries" in reference to both their political philosophy and the gender makeup of their band, and were based in Brighton and London. Their debut EP was released in 1992, and in the same year they began working closely with Bikini Kill as riot grrrl's popularity peaked on both sides of the Atlantic. This culminated in a 1993 split album on Catcall Records (Huggy Bear) and Kill Rock Stars (Bikini Kill) called "Our Troubled Youth/Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah", the names of the Huggy Bear and Bikini Kill sides respectively. Huggy Bear received widespread national attention after performing their third single "Her Jazz", a split release between Catcall and Wiiija Records, on "The Word" in 1993. Kill Rock Stars had been co-founded in Olympia by Slim Moon and Tinuviel Sampson, while Catcall was founded by former Manchester punk zine "City Fun" writer Liz Naylor. Naylor had met Bikini Kill's Kathy Wilcox by chance while they were each traveling in Europe in 1991, and Wilcox sent Naylor music and the first issues of "Riot Grrrl" and "Jigsaw" zines during their subsequent correspondence.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Skinned Teen formed in London in 1992, when they were around 14 years old. They were included in British filmmaker Lucy Thane's documentary of the 1993 Bikini Kill/Huggy Bear UK tour titled "It Changed My Life: Bikini Kill In The U.K."; the film also included The Raincoats and queercore band Sister George. Thane, from Sheffield, had previously met the Raincoats' Ana da Silva at a Hole show after Hole covered a Raincoats song. Thane filmed Bikini Kill and Huggy Bear for the entirety of their 1993 tour using borrowed film and video equipment. Naylor was tour manager. "It Changed My Life" premiered in 1993 at The Kitchen in New York City, during a film program curated by filmmaker Jill Reiter.


title: Riot grrrl

text: By the mid-nineties, riot grrrl had severely splintered. Many within the movement felt that the mainstream media had completely misrepresented their message, and that the politically radical aspects of riot grrrl had been subverted by the likes of the Spice Girls and their "girl power" message, or co-opted by ostensibly women-centered bands (though sometimes with only one female performer per band) and festivals like Lilith Fair. Later waves of riot grrrl chapters opened in Latin America, North America, Asia, Europe, and Australia through to the 2010s.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Of the original riot grrrl bands, Bratmobile, Heavens to Betsy and Huggy Bear had split in 1994, Excuse 17 and most of the UK bands had split by 1995, and Bikini Kill and Emily's Sassy Lime (formed in Southern California in 1993) released their last records in 1996. However, Team Dresch were active as late as 1998, the Gossip were active from 1999, and Bratmobile reformed in 2000. Perhaps most prolific of all, Sleater-Kinney were active from 1994 to 2006, releasing seven albums. Corin Tucker (Heavens to Betsy) and Carrie Brownstein (Excuse 17) had formed Sleater-Kinney in Olympia.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Many of the women involved in riot grrrl are still active in creating politically charged music. Kathleen Hanna went on to found the electro-feminist post-punk "protest pop" group Le Tigre and later the Julie Ruin, Kathi Wilcox joined the Casual Dots with Christina Billotte of Slant 6, and Tobi Vail formed Spider and the Webs. Sleater-Kinney reformed the band in 2014 after an 8-year hiatus and have released three albums since, while Bratmobile reunited to release two albums, before Allison Wolfe began singing with other all-women bands, Cold Cold Hearts, and Partyline. Molly Neuman went on to play with New York punk band Love Or Perish and run her own indie label called Simple Social Graces Discos, as well as co-owning Lookout! Records and managing the Donnas, Ted Leo, Some Girls, and the Locust. Kaia Wilson of Team Dresch and multimedia artist Tammy Rae Carland went on to form the now-defunct Mr. Lady Records which released albums by the Butchies, the Need, Kiki and Herb, and Tracy + the Plastics. Bikini Kill played a string of shows in 2019.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Riot grrrl culture is often associated with third wave feminism, which also grew rapidly during the same early nineties timeframe. The movement of third-wave feminism focused less on laws and the political process and more on individual identity. The movement of third-wave feminism is said to have arisen out of the realization that women are of many colors, ethnicities, nationalities, religions and cultural backgrounds. While multiracial feminist movements have existed prior to the third wave, the proliferation of technology during the early nineties allowed for easier networking amongst feminist groups. Riot grrrls used media spectacle to their advantage, crafting works from oppositional technologies such as zines, videography, and music. The riot grrrl movement allowed women their own space to create music and make political statements about the issues they were facing in the punk rock community and in society. They used their music and publications to express their views on issues such as patriarchy, double standards against women, rape, domestic abuse, sexuality, and female empowerment.


title: Riot grrrl

text: An undated, typewritten Bikini Kill tour flier answers the question "What is Riot grrrl?" with: "[Riot Grrrl is ...] Because we girls want to create mediums that speak to US. We are tired of boy band after boy band, boy zine after boy zine, boy punk after boy punk after boy... Because we need to talk to each other. Communication and inclusion are key. We will never know if we don't break the code of silence... Because in every form of media we see ourselves slapped, decapitated, laughed at, objectified, raped, trivialized, pushed, ignored, stereotyped, kicked, scorned, molested, silenced, invalidated, knifed, shot, choked and killed. Because a safe space needs to be created for girls where we can open our eyes and reach out to each other without being threatened by this sexist society and our day to day bullshit."Like other third wave feminists, riot grrrls attempted to foster an acceptance of diversity within feminist expression. That relationship to feminism is evident through their use of lyrics, zines and publications, and taking back the meaning of derogatory terms. All three of these forms were claimed to be a source of empowerment for women in the movement.


title: Riot grrrl

text: The riot grrrl movement encouraged women to develop their own place in a male-dominated punk scene. Punk shows had come to be understood as places where "women could make their way to the front of the crowd into the mosh pit, but had to 'fight ten times harder' because they were female, and sexually charged violence such as groping and rape had been reported."


title: Riot grrrl

text: In contrast, riot grrrl bands would often actively invite members of the audience to talk about their personal experiences with sensitive issues such as sexual abuse, pass out lyric sheets to everyone in the audience, and often demand that the mosh boys move to the back or side to allow space in front for the girls in the audience. The bands weren't always enthusiastically received at shows by male audience members. "Punk Planet" editor Daniel Sinker wrote in "We Owe You Nothing":


title: Riot grrrl

text: The vehemence fanzines large and small reserved for riot grrrl – and Bikini Kill in particular – was shocking. The punk zine editors' use of 'bitches', 'cunts', 'man-haters', and 'dykes' was proof-positive that sexism was still strong in the punk scene.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Kathleen Hanna would later write: "It was also super schizo to play shows where guys threw stuff at us, called us cunts and yelled "take it off" during our set, and then the next night perform for throngs of amazing girls singing along to every lyric and cheering after every song."


title: Riot grrrl

text: Many men were supporters of riot grrrl culture and acts. Calvin Johnson and Slim Moon have been instrumental in publishing riot grrrl bands on the labels they founded, K Records and Kill Rock Stars respectively. Alec Empire of Atari Teenage Riot said, "I was totally into the riot grrrl music, I see it as a very important form of expression. I learned a lot from that, way more maybe than from 'male' punk rock." Dave Grohl and Kurt Cobain dated Kathleen Hanna and Tobi Vail (also respectively), and often played with Bikini Kill even after splitting with them; Kurt was a big fan of the Slits and even convinced the Raincoats to reform. He once said, "The future of rock belongs to women." Many riot grrrl bands included male band members, such as Billy Karren of Bikini Kill or Jon Slade and Chris Rawley of Huggy Bear.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Molly Neuman once summarized: "We're not anti-boy, we're pro-girl." Riot grrrl concerts provided a safe haven for women, and often addressed issues such as rape, domestic abuse, sexuality and female empowerment. For example, in Bikini Kill's "Don't Need You", they sing: "don’t need you to say we’re cute/don’t need you to say we’re alright/don’t need your protection/don’t need your kiss goodnight", rejecting stereotypical heterosexual relationship dynamics.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Influenced heavily by DIY culture, most bands' presentation subverted traditional or classically trained 'musicianship' in favor of raw, primitive, avant-lo-fi passion and fiercely deliberate amateurism: an idea growing rapidly in popularity, especially in the Olympia music scene, with bands like Beat Happening coining the slogans: "Learn how to NOT play your instrument" and "hey, you don't have to sound like the flavor of the month, all you have to do is sound like yourselves", arguing that traditional musical skill doesn't ultimately matter and should always be subservient to the passion, the fun and ideas in their music. This argument is similar to the ideological origins of punk rock itself, which started partially as an attempt to dissolve the growing division between audience and performer. These indie-punk bands (and riot grrrl bands in particular) were often ridiculed for "not being able to play their instruments", but fans are quick to counter that identical criticisms were often faced by the first-wave of punk rock bands in the 1970s, and that this DIY garage amateurism "play just 'cause you wanna, no matter what" attitude was one of the most appealing and liberating aspects of both movements.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Even as the Seattle-area rock scene came to international mainstream media attention, riot grrrl remained a willfully underground phenomenon. Most musicians shunned the major record labels, devotedly working instead with indie labels such as Kill Rock Stars, K Records, Slampt, Piao! Records, Simple Machines, Catcall, WIIIJA and Chainsaw Records. The movement also figured fairly prominently in cassette culture, with artists often starting their own DIY cassette labels by as basic and spartan means as recording their music onto cheap off-the-shelf boom-boxes and passing the cassettes out to friends, seldom charging anything beyond the cost of the actual tapes themselves.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Riot grrrl's momentum was also hugely supported by an explosion of creativity in homemade cut and paste, xeroxed, collage zines that covered a variety of feminist topics, frequently attempting to draw out the political implications of intensely personal experiences in a "privately public" space. Zines often described experiences with sexism, mental illness, body image and eating disorders, sexual abuse, racism, rape, discrimination, stalking, domestic violence, incest, homophobia, and sometimes vegetarianism. Grrrl zine editors are collectively engaged in forms of writing and writing instruction that challenge both dominant notions of the author as an individualized, bodiless space and notions of feminism as primarily an adult political project.


title: Riot grrrl

text: These zines were archived by zinewiki.com, and Riot Grrrl Press, started in Washington DC in 1992 by Erika Reinstein & May Summer. Others can be found anthologized in "A Girl's Guide to Taking over the World: Writings from the Girl Zine Revolution", for which actress/singer/musician/writer/performance artist Ann Magnuson of Bongwater fame wrote as a foreword:


title: Riot grrrl

text: When I think of how much benefit my teenage self could have gained from the multitude of zines that have proliferated over the past decade, I weep for all the lost potential. Except for Joan of Arc and Anne Frank, the thoughts of teenage girls have rarely been taken seriously.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Bands would often attempt to reappropriate derogatory phrases like "cunt", "bitch", "dyke", and "slut", writing them proudly on their skin with lipstick or fat markers. Kathleen Hanna was writing "slut" on her stomach at shows as early as 1992, intentionally fusing feminist art and activist practices. Riot grrrls making political statements to reclaim phrases is a common theme among third-wave feminists. Not only did their music address the same issues as third-wave feminism, but they took a political stance against the oppression they were feeling.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Many of the women involved with queercore were also interested in riot grrrl, and zines such as "Chainsaw" by Donna Dresch, "Sister Nobody", "Jane Gets A Divorce" and "I (heart) Amy Carter" by Tammy Rae Carland embody both movements. There were also national conventions like in Washington, D.C., or the Pussystock festival in New York City, as well as various subsequent indie-documentaries like "Don't Need You: the Herstory of Riot Grrrl".


title: Riot grrrl

text: Other riot grrrl zines such as Ramdasha Bikceem's "GUNK", started in 1990 when she was 15, focused on the intersections of punk, gender, and racism. Bikceem, from New Jersey, had found out about riot grrrl zines after a friend became Tobi Vail's roommate in Olympia. In "GUNK #4" Bikceem wrote about the politics of being a Black grrrl, "I'll go out somewhere with my friends who all look equally as weird as me, but say we get hassled by the cops for skating or something. That cop is going to remember my face a lot clearer than say one of my white girlfriends." Mimi Thi Nguyen's "Slant" and Sabrina Margarita Alcantara-Tan's "Bamboo Girl" critiqued riot grrrl from the perspective of Asian American girls. In 1997, Nguyen published the compilation zine "Evolution of a Race Riot".


title: Riot grrrl

text: In the mid-1990s, zines were also published on the Internet as e-zines. Websites such as Gurl.com and ChickClick were created out of dissatisfaction of media available to women and parodied content found in mainstream teen and women's magazines. Both Gurl.com and ChickClick had a message board and free web hosting services, where users could also create and contribute their own content, which in turn created a reciprocal relationship where women could also be seen as creators rather than consumers.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Starting during the fall of 2010, the "Riot Grrrl Collection" has been housed at New York University's Fales Library and Special Collections, as "The Fales Riot Grrrl Collection". The collection's primary mandate is "to collect unique materials that provide documentation of the creative process of individuals and the chronology of the [Riot Grrrl] movement overall". Kathleen Hanna, Molly Neuman, Allison Wolfe, Ramdasha Bikceem, Johanna Fateman, Becca Albee (co-founder of Excuse 17), Lucy Thane, Tammy Rae Carland, and Mimi Thi Nguyen have donated primary source material. The collection is the brainchild of Lisa Darms, Senior Archivist at the Fales Library. According to Jenna Freedman, a librarian who maintains a zine collection at Barnard College, "It's just essential to preserve the activist voices in their own unmediated work, especially because of the media blackout that they called for". Kathleen Hanna, while understanding no collection can replicate the concert experience, feels the collection is a safe place that will be "free from feminist erasure".


title: Riot grrrl

text: At first most Riot Grrrls were open to using the media as a way to spread the word to other girls. Shortly thereafter, however, feeling that they had been misrepresented, trivialized, commercialized, and made into a new fad and trend, the Riot Grrrls changed their minds.As media attention increasingly focused on the emerging grunge and alternative rock scene in the mid-nineties, the term "Riot Grrrl" was often used as a catchall for female-fronted bands and applied to less political alternative rock acts. While many female-centric or all-women rock bands, such as Frightwig, Hole, 7 Year Bitch, Babes in Toyland, the Breeders, the Gits, Lunachicks, Liz Phair, Veruca Salt, and L7, shared similar DIY tactics and feminist ideologies with the riot grrrl movement, not all of these acts self-identified with the riot grrrl label. "It used to frustrate me when posters would say 'all-girl band' or 'riot grrrl'," recalled L7's Donita Sparks. "We cheered loudly when we went to Italy: it said, 'Rock from the USA.'"


title: Riot grrrl

text: Courtney Love, in particular, felt the need to disassociate with Riot Grrrl as a whole:As supportive as I am of them, there's a faction that says, "We don't know how to play, but we're not going to follow your male-measured idea of what good is." Look, good is "Led Zeppelin II". That's fucking good. And I'm not going to sit here and say you're a good band when you suck. They're like, "But we're entitled to suck." Really? We work so hard to get good at what we do without covering up who we are as women.


title: Riot grrrl

text: To their chagrin, in 1992 riot grrrls found themselves in the media spotlight of magazines from "Seventeen" to "Newsweek". "Newsweek"'s headline was "Riot Girl is feminism with a loud happy face dotting the 'i'," and "USA Today" ran a headline saying "From hundreds of once pink, frilly bedrooms comes the young feminist revolution." Fallout from the media coverage led to resignations from the movement, including Jessica Hopper, a teenage music critic who was at the center of the "Newsweek" article. Hopper, later the author of "The First Collection of Criticism by a Living Female Rock Critic", said, "Some people were really upset because I talked to mainstream media about what I felt riot grrrl was...At the time there was much more of a chasm between the underground and the mainstream and people didn't want mainstream girls showing up to this, and I just thought, I didn't want to be part of something that wasn't for all women." To ease tension, Kathleen Hanna called a "media blackout" for that year.


title: Riot grrrl

text: In an essay from January 1994 that had been included in the double compact disc release of Bikini Kill's first two albums, Tobi Vail responded to media misrepresentation of Bikini Kill and riot grrrl in general:


title: Riot grrrl

text: One huge misconception for instance that has been repeated over and over again in magazines we have never spoken to and also by those who believe these sources without checking things out themselves is that Bikini Kill is the definitive 'riot girl band' ... We are not in anyway 'leaders of' or authorities on the 'Riot Girl' movement. In fact, as individuals we have each had different experiences with, feelings on, opinions of and varying degrees of involvement with 'Riot Girl' and though we totally respect those who still feel that label is important and meaningful to them, we have never used that term to describe ourselves AS A BAND. As individuals we respect and utilize and subscribe to a variety of different aesthetics, strategies, and beliefs, both political and punk-wise, some of which are probably considered 'riot girl.'


title: Riot grrrl

text: There were a lot of very important ideas that I think the mainstream media couldn't handle, so it was easier to focus on the fact that these were girls who were wearing barrettes in their hair or writing 'slut' on their stomach.


title: Riot grrrl

text: I think it was deliberate that we were made to look like we were just ridiculous girls parading around in our underwear. They refused to do serious interviews with us, they misprinted what we had to say, they would take our articles, and our fanzines, and our essays and take them out of context. We wrote a lot about sexual abuse and sexual assault for teenagers and young women. I think those are really important concepts that the media "never" addressed.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Other female-fronted punk bands, such as Spitboy, were less comfortable with the childhood-centered issues of much of the riot grrrl aesthetic, but nonetheless dealt explicitly with feminist and related issues as well. Lesbian-centric Queercore bands, such as Fifth Column, Tribe 8, Adickdid, the Third Sex, Excuse 17, and Team Dresch, wrote songs dealing with matters specific to women and their position in society, exploring issues such as both sexual and gender identity. A documentary film put together by a San Diego psychiatrist, Dr. Lisa Rose Apramian, "Not Bad for a Girl", explored some of these issues in interviews with many of the musicians in the riot grrrl scene at the time.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Other bands and artists associated with the United States riot grrrl movement include Slant 6, Sta-Prest, Jenny Toomey, Tattle Tale, Jack Off Jill, the Need, Nomy Lamm, Lucid Nation, the Frumpies, Bangs, and the Quails; and in the United Kingdom, Blood Sausage, Mambo Taxi, Voodoo Queens, Pussycat Trash, Frantic Spiders, Linus, Sister George and Lungleg.


title: Riot grrrl

text: The "Riot Grrrl" movement has received criticism for not being inclusive enough. Riot Girls are often accused of being separatists: they want to form a life away from men and invent "girl culture". One major argument is that the movement focuses on middle-class white women, alienating other kinds of women.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Riot grrrl calls for change, but I question who it's including ... I see Riot Grrrl growing very closed to a very few i.e. white middle class punk girls.Musician Courtney Love has criticized the movement for being too doctrinaire and censorious:


title: Riot grrrl

text: Look, you've got these highly intelligent imperious girls, but who told them it was their undeniable American right not to be offended? Being offended is part of being in the real world. I'm offended every time I see George Bush on TV!


title: Riot grrrl

text: Some have suggested that, while riot grrrl bands worked to ensure their shows were safe spaces in which women could find solidarity and create their own subculture, some higher-profile riot grrrl bands participated in the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, a trans-exclusionary events that had a "womyn-born womyn" policy. Former members of Le Tigre did see protests at their shows for having participated in the festival in 2001. However, Kathleen Hanna has stated directly that she supports trans rights on her own Twitter account and her regret of her decision to perform at that festival. Additionally, JD Samson, another former member of Le Tigre, is genderfluid. The Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, celebrated its last annual festival in 2015. "The Advocate" speculated that the decision was related to ongoing controversy over the festival's decision to not admit transgender women.


title: Riot grrrl

text: In the foreword to the 2007 book, "Riot Grrrl: Revolution Girl Style Now!", Beth Ditto writes of riot grrrl,


title: Riot grrrl

text: A movement formed by a handful of girls who felt empowered, who were angry, hilarious, and extreme through and for each other. Built on the floors of strangers' living rooms, tops of Xerox machines, snail mail, word of mouth and mixtapes, riot grrrl reinvented punk.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Additionally, Ditto writes about riot grrrl's influence on her personally and on her music. She muses on the meaning of the movement for her generation, Until I found riot grrrl, or riot grrrl found me I was just another Gloria Steinem NOW feminist trying to take a stand in shop class. Now I am a musician, a writer, a whole person.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Many women write to Hanna in hopes of reviving the Riot Grrrl Movement. Hanna says, "Don’t revive it, make something better". In 2010 "Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution" became the first published history of the riot grrrl movement. The author had also attended Riot Grrrl meetings herself. As of 2019 there were approximately ten weekly riot grrrl meetings held nationwide and bands multiplying faster than can be counted.In 2013 Astria Suparak and Ceci Moss curated "Alien She", an exhibition examining the impact of Riot Grrrl on artists and cultural producers. Alien She focuses on seven people whose visual art practices were informed by their contact with Riot Grrrl. Many of them work in multiple disciplines, such as sculpture, installation, video, documentary film, photography, drawing, printmaking, new media, social practice, curation, music, writing and performance—a reflection of the movement's artistic diversity and mutability. It opened September 2013 at the Miller Gallery at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, and ran through February the following year. It visited four subsequent art spaces (Vox Populi in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, March – April 2014; Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, October 2014 – January 2015; Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, California, February – May 2015; and Pacific Northwest College of Art: 511 Gallery and the Museum of Contemporary Craft in Portland, Oregon, September 3, 2015 – January 9, 2016).


title: Riot grrrl

text: The term "grrrl" (or "grrl") itself has since been co-opted or used by agencies as diverse as advocacy on behalf of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (GRRL POWER 1.0 5-PACK / Memetics for the Ladies) and a roller derby league in Singapore.


title: Riot grrrl

text: The resurgence of riot grrrl is clearly visible in fourth-wave feminists worldwide who cite the original movement as an interest or influence on their lives and/or their work. Some of them are self-proclaimed riot grrrls while others consider themselves simply admirers or fans. In an age where Internet is the most accessible platform for individuals to express themselves, the fourth-wave riot grrrl community has risen in popularity in recent years. Not only do these online platforms capture discussion regarding larger topics of intersectional oppression, but they also provide space for budding feminists to express smaller issues, such as the successes and challenges of their everyday lives. Young feminists have harnessed the internet as a forum for self-determinism and genuine, open expression: a core part of the riot grrrl message that allows young adults room to decide for themselves who they are. As both a purported musical genre and as a subculture, riot grrrl has been acclaimed as an influence on contemporary groups as varied as Kitten Forever, Skating Polly, the Shondes and the Ethical Debating Society. Additionally, the riot grrrl movement has influenced an eclectic array of music genres and art in modern times.


title: Riot grrrl

text: In January 2019, Bikini Kill announced their reunion tour for the first time since their last show in Tokyo 22 years ago. "The Guardian" stated in an article about reunion that the once-underground riot grrrl movement has gone mainstream due to word of mouth from celebrities and the increased attention to other modern feminist developments such as the Me Too movement. In the same article, drummer Tobi Vail stated her frustration with lack of social progress related to feminism.


title: Riot grrrl

text: These same issues still exist, being a woman in public is very intense, whether it’s in the public eye or just walking down the street at night by yourself.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Vail also explained the aims of their reunion, that women discover the band and understand their history, especially those who did not have the opportunity to hear them during the original riot grrrl movement.


title: Riot grrrl

text: We’re doing it because we want to be a part of this conversation about what feminism is in this moment.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Since its beginnings, the riot grrrl movement was attractive to many women in varied cultures. Its spread across the world established bands in Brazil, Paraguay, Israel, Australia, Malaysia, and Europe, and its globalization was also aided by the distribution of zines across Asia, Europe, and South America. The discovery of riot grrrl provided women across the globe with access to an outlet that challenged the dominant culture's attitudes toward the female body through a form of self-expression that previously was often inaccessible to women in non-western nations. In addition to becoming a vehicle of expression for equality, bands in the genre affected the status quo of the music industry by challenging the gender norms that favoured male musicians.


title: Riot grrrl

text: One of the most well-known bands to come out of the globalization of the riot grrrl movement is Pussy Riot, a Russian group formed in 2011 who self-identify as twenty-first century Russian riot grrrls. Pussy Riot first came to popular media attention in 2012 when they staged a protest performance of "Punk Prayer" at the altar of Moscow’s largest cathedral. The song includes an appeal to the Virgin Mary to banish Putin. All three members of Pussy Riot were convicted of hooliganism and sentenced two years' imprisonment.


title: Riot grrrl

text: Pussy Riot performs music with themes of feminism, LGBT rights, and opposition to the policies of Russian president Vladimir Putin, whom the group considers to be a dictator. Pussy Riot embraces the ideals of riot grrrls by challenging the political climate they personally experience as well as the homophobic and patriarchal elements of everyday Russian life.


title: TommyInnit

text: Thomas Simons (born 9 April 2004), better known as TommyInnit ( ), is an English YouTuber and Twitch streamer. He produces "Minecraft"-related videos and live streams, including collaborations with fellow YouTubers and streamers in the Dream SMP, which caused his YouTube and Twitch channels to increase in popularity. , his seven YouTube channels have collectively reached over million subscribers and over billion views; his two Twitch channels have reached over million followers, making him the most-followed "Minecraft" channel on Twitch, as well as the 14th most-followed overall.


title: TommyInnit

text: Simons created his first YouTube channel, "Channelnutpig", on 15 February 2013 and his TommyInnit channel on 24 December 2015. He uploaded his first video on his TommyInnit channel on 9 September 2018. Simons typically uploads videos consisting of him playing "Minecraft".


title: TommyInnit

text: On 6 August 2019, Simons uploaded his first video relating to "SkyBlock", a minigame on "Minecraft" server Hypixel. While consistently uploading "SkyBlock"-related content, his TommyInnit channel rapidly increased its subscriber count from 4,800 to 66,000. On 4 July 2020, Simons joined the Dream SMP, a roleplay-focused "Minecraft" server run by eponymous YouTuber Dream.


title: TommyInnit

text: On 20 August 2020, Simons uploaded a video of himself and a group of fellow "Minecraft" YouTubers, including Wilbur Soot, Tubbo, Ph1LzA, Niki Nihachu, and Fundy, visiting Brighton. , the video has amassed over 36 million views.


title: TommyInnit

text: On 1 April 2021, Simons created a new YouTube channel under his own name, uploading the first video onto it two months later.


title: TommyInnit

text: Simons began streaming on Twitch in late 2018, where he streamed "Minecraft", "PUBG", and "Fortnite".


title: TommyInnit

text: On 20 January 2021, Simons live streamed the finale of the Dream SMP, titled "The Dream SMP Finale", which peaked at over 650,000 viewers, making it the third-highest all-time concurrent viewer livestream on Twitch, overtaking Ninja's "Fortnite" collaboration with Drake.


title: TommyInnit

text: On 1 July 2022, Simons performed a live special titled "TommyInnit & Friends" at the Brighton Dome. The show included many other popular internet personalities, including DanTDM, Jacksepticeye, JackManifoldTV, Nihachu, and others, as well as a tribute to Technoblade, whose death was announced early the same day.


title: TommyInnit

text: On 4 August 2022, Simons announced a book that he had been writing with fellow YouTuber and Twitch streamer Wilbur Soot titled "TommyInnit Says...The Quote Book". The book was released on 13 October 2022, and Simons signed 3,000 copies of it. All of the sales money from the book is being donated to the Sarcoma Foundation of America in honour of Simons' and Gold's late friend Technoblade, to whom the book was also dedicated.


title: TommyInnit

text: On 19 November 2022, Simons released a video on his main YouTube channel, announcing to his audience that he has a girlfriend. Her face and real name were not revealed.


title: David M. Solomon

text: David Michael Solomon (born c. 1962) is an American investment banker, and the chief executive officer (CEO) of Goldman Sachs, a position he has held since October 2018. He has also been chairman of the bank since January 2019. Before assuming his role as CEO, Solomon was president and chief operating officer from January 2017 to September 2018, and was joint head of the investment banking division from July 2006 to December 2016. Solomon formally succeeded Lloyd Blankfein, the previous CEO, on October 1, 2018, and was named chairman after Blankfein's retirement.


title: David M. Solomon

text: Solomon also recreationally creates electronic dance music (EDM) records under the name "David Solomon" (previously known as DJ D-Sol ). He has performed at nightclubs and music festivals around New York, Miami, and The Bahamas.


title: David M. Solomon

text: David Michael Solomon was born circa 1962 in Hartsdale, New York. His father, Alan Solomon, was an executive vice president of a small publishing company, and his mother, Sandra, worked as an audiology supervisor. He grew up in Scarsdale, New York where he attended Edgemont Junior-Senior High School and worked at a local Baskin Robbins before working as a camp counselor in New Hampshire. He graduated from Hamilton College in Clinton, New York, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science and government. In college he played on the rugby team, enjoyed walking up the Hill, and chaired his social fraternity, Alpha Delta Phi. After graduating, he applied to Goldman Sachs for a two-year analyst position but was rejected, leading him to apply to Irving Trust, which he has referred to as a "graduate school at [a] bank".


title: David M. Solomon

text: After Irving Trust, he went to work for Drexel Burnham in 1986. At Drexel Burnham he first worked as a commercial paper salesman, but later transitioned to junk bonds. His exposure to high-yield debt prompted him to join Bear Stearns. At Bear Stearns he was charged with leading the junk bonds division and selling higher-risk bonds. On one occasion, he assisted a struggling movie theater company in Dallas, Texas, to raise money through a "complicated bond transaction".


title: David M. Solomon

text: He worked with a variety of Goldman Sachs managers during the late 1990s which inspired his move to the firm in 1999 to work with their leveraged finance team as a partner, aged 37. His move from Bear Stearns was "shocking" to contemporaries who believed him to be on the "leadership track at Bear". Starting in 2006, he was promoted to and spent the next ten years leading Goldman's investment banking division. In July 2007, he secured the initial public offering (IPO) of LuLulemon Athletica wearing a maroon blazer and sweatpants, a sampling of the company's clothing to "throw everyone off" in a suit-required meeting. During his time as head, he implemented "year-end compensation roundtables" where he would pepper the executives with questions about their business practices in order to "weed out under-performers". Upon his departure, he was credited with professionalizing the investment banking division and doubling profit margins from 11% to 22% with sales rising by 70%. In April 2014, Sheldon Adelson, a client of his from Drexel Burnham, offered Solomon operational control over the Las Vegas Sands casinos. Solomon declined the offer because Adelson "wasn’t willing to give up day-to-day control, and [he] didn’t want to be an understudy." Despite Goldman Sachs not disclosing his total compensation packages, SEC and IRS filings indicate that Solomon was paid a base salary of US$1.85 million with an award of restricted stock worth about $10 million in January 2015. After Gary Cohn resigned from Goldman to become the Chief Economic Advisor to Donald Trump, then President of the United States, Solomon was elevated to president and co-chief operating officer along with Harvey Schwartz in December 2016. In a series of interviews in October 2017, Solomon detailed his advice for students and future employees at Goldman: know how to write and speak publicly, know accounting, and never lose sight of what you are passionate about. Under Solomon's leadership, the bank has increased pay for programmers, loosened dress codes, modernized computer systems, instituted video interviews, and created a "real-time performance review" system for new employees. Solomon received $11.85 million compensation package in January 2017 and January 2018. It was estimated that Solomon holds 224,030 (0.059%) shares of Goldman Sachs Group (GS) which was valued at $58 million in January 2018. In March 2020, Solomon was granted some US$27.5 million in compensation. This was made up of his base pay which was a $2 million salary as well as a $7.65 million cash bonus. On top of that he also was granted $17.85 million in long-term incentive.


title: David M. Solomon

text: On March 12, 2018 Goldman announced that Schwartz, the company's co-chief operating officer and president would be resigning, leaving Solomon as the second-in-command. Hours after the announcement, media outlets–both domestic and international–informally designated Solomon as Lloyd Blankfein's sole heir apparent. At a board meeting on February 21, 2018 Blankfein expressed an interest and preference for Solomon to succeed him. Solomon has repeatedly advocated for a reformation of Goldman's company culture. He expressed an interest in lowering the maximum hours worked during normal business days from somewhere near 90 hours a week, to somewhere near 70 to 75 hours a week, when not actively engaged in closing a deal. Prior to assuming the company's presidency, he tracked the hours worked by his subordinates and frequently stepped in to send employees home. Solomon took office as the chief executive officer (CEO) of the firm on October 1, 2018.


title: David M. Solomon

text: In 2021, Goldman Sachs announced it would be slashing Solomon's pay in 2020 by 36% for the bank's admission due to the 1MDB scandal, causing Goldman to pay nearly $3 billion in October 2020 to government officials in four countries to close an investigation into the work the bank performed for 1MDB. Solomon received a $27.5 million compensation package in 2019 and was given a $17.5 million package for 2020.


title: David M. Solomon

text: Solomon is scheduled to speak at the November 2022 Global Financial Leaders' Investment Summit, with the Hong Kong Democracy Council claiming that his presence, along with other financial executives, legitimizes the Hong Kong government's whitewashing of the erosion of freedoms in the city. Several members of Congress also warned that US financial executives should not attend the Summit, saying "Their presence only serves to legitimise the swift dismantling of Hong Kong's autonomy, free press and the rule of law by Hong Kong authorities acting along with the Chinese Communist Party."


title: David M. Solomon

text: Solomon performs regularly as a disc jockey under the name "David Solomon" producing a variety of electronic dance music (EDM). He has performed at nightclubs and music festivals around New York, Miami, and the Bahamas. Solomon maintains the Instagram account "@davidsolomonmusic" to catalogue his projects as a music producer. In June 2018, he released a cover of the Fleetwood Mac song, "Don't Stop". The song was originally played on Sirius XM's BPM: Electronic Dance Music Hits the previous January. "Don't Stop" was listed in Spotify's 263,361-follower playlist "Happy Summer Beats". His Spotify profile has 550,000 monthly listeners with his debut single garnering 8 million listens. Shortly after his debut release Solomon opened a SoundCloud account where he posts extended musical sets and concert performances. His most recent release, "Someone Like You" peaked at #4 on the "Billboard" Dance Club Chart in November 2020.


title: David M. Solomon

text: Solomon founded Payback Records in December 2018 in partnership with Big Beat/Atlantic Records. All proceeds from the label are directed towards charitable causes relating to addiction, hunger relief, and fighting COVID-19. Solomon releases all of his original music through Payback Records.


title: David M. Solomon

text: Payback released the single "Break This Habit" featuring Kiko Bun by house DJ Oliver Heldens in partnership with Heldeep Records.


title: David M. Solomon

text: Solomon has performed at many events including the Electronic Music Awards in Los Angeles in 2017 and a 2020 Sports Illustrated Super Bowl Event in Miami along with Marshmello and Black Eyed Peas. On April 9, 2018, he performed a remix of "The Pink Panther Theme" at a charity event for the opioid epidemic hosted by Hamilton College. He has shared the stage with many notable DJs including Paul Oakenfold and Galantis. In 2020, he appeared as himself in a cameo on the Showtime series "Billions".


title: David M. Solomon

text: In May 2022, Solomon performed at the silent disco of Bottle Rock in Napa, CA. In July of the same year, Solomon took the stage at the Lollapalooza music festival. All proceeds from his appearances were donated to charity.


title: David M. Solomon

text: On July 25, 2020, Solomon was the opening act for the Chainsmokers at a charity concert, called "Safe & Sound" that was meant to be a future example of COVID-19 pandemic audience safety. The event was investigated by the state of New York health authorities for "rampant" violations of social distancing guidelines. A Goldman Sachs spokesperson said Solomon left before the show ended.


title: David M. Solomon

text: Solomon is of Jewish heritage. He married Mary Elizabeth Solomon (née Coffey) in 1989 when they were both 27 years old in Bernardsville, New Jersey. They divorced in early 2018. He has resided in The San Remo on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City from 2002 onward. He listed the apartment for $24 million in May 2016. He purchased a 13,000-square-foot estate in Aspen, Colorado in 2004 for $4 million and listed it for $36 million in July 2016.


title: David M. Solomon

text: In January 2018, Solomon discovered that a personal assistant had stolen around 500 bottles from his rare wine collection, among them seven from the French estate Domaine de la Romanee-Conti. The personal assistant, Nicolas DeMeyer, was arrested in late January and indicted for the theft of $1.2 million worth of wine. On October 9, 2018 Nicolas DeMeyer committed suicide by leaping to his death from the 33rd floor window of the Carlyle Hotel, minutes after he was scheduled to appear before a Manhattan judge in relation to the alleged wine theft.


title: David M. Solomon

text: Solomon has served on Hamilton College's board of trustees since 2005. He was elected as chairman of the board starting July 1, 2021. He is on the board of directors of the Robin Hood Foundation, a charitable organization which attempts to alleviate problems caused by poverty in New York City.


title: Rebar

text: Rebar (short for reinforcing bar), known when massed as reinforcing steel or reinforcement steel, is a steel bar used as a tension device in reinforced concrete and reinforced masonry structures to strengthen and aid the concrete under tension. Concrete is strong under compression, but has weak tensile strength. Rebar significantly increases the tensile strength of the structure. Rebar's surface features a continuous series of ribs, lugs or indentations to promote a better bond with the concrete and reduce the risk of slippage.


title: Rebar

text: The most common type of rebar is carbon steel, typically consisting of hot-rolled round bars with deformation patterns embossed into its surface. Steel and concrete have similar coefficients of thermal expansion, so a concrete structural member reinforced with steel will experience minimal differential stress as the temperature changes.


title: Rebar

text: Other readily available types of rebar are manufactured of stainless steel, and composite bars made of glass fiber, carbon fiber, or basalt fiber. The carbon steel reinforcing bars may also be coated in an epoxy resin designed to resist the effects of corrosion, especially when used in saltwater environments. Bamboo has been shown to be a viable alternative to reinforcing steel in concrete construction. These alternative types tend to be more expensive or may have lesser mechanical properties and are thus more often used in specialty construction where their physical characteristics fulfil a specific performance requirement that carbon steel does not provide.


title: Rebar

text: Reinforcing bars in masonry construction have been used since Antiquity, with Rome using iron or wooden rods in arch construction, later iron tie rods and anchor plates were employed across Medieval Europe, as a device to reinforce arches, vaults, and cupolas. 2,500 meters of rebar was used in the 14th Century Château de Vincennes.


title: Rebar

text: During the 18th century, rebar was used to form the carcass of the Leaning Tower of Nevyansk in Russia, built on the orders of the industrialist Akinfiy Demidov. The cast iron used for the rebar was of high quality, and there is no corrosion on the bars to this day. The carcass of the tower was connected to its cast iron tented roof, crowned with one of the first known lightning rods.


title: Rebar

text: However, it was not until the mid-19th century that rebar displayed its greatest strengths with the embedding of steel bars into concrete, thus producing modern reinforced concrete. Several people in Europe and North America developed reinforced concrete in the 1850s. These include Joseph-Louis Lambot of France, who built reinforced concrete boats in Paris (1854) and Thaddeus Hyatt of the United States, who produced and tested reinforced concrete beams. Joseph Monier of France is one of the most notable figures for the invention and popularization of reinforced concrete. As a French gardener, Monier patented reinforced concrete flower pots in 1867, before proceeding to build reinforced concrete water tanks and bridges.


title: Rebar

text: Ernest L. Ransome, an English engineer and architect who worked in the United States, made a significant contribution to the development of reinforcing bars in concrete construction. He invented twisted iron rebar, which he initially thought of while designing self-supporting sidewalks for the Masonic Hall in Stockton, California. His twisted rebar was, however, not initially appreciated and even ridiculed at the Technical Society of California, where members stated that the twisting would weaken the iron. In 1889, Ransome worked on the West Coast mainly designing bridges. One of these, the Alvord Lake Bridge in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, was the first reinforced concrete bridge built in the United States. He used twisted rebar in this structure.


title: Rebar

text: At the same time Ransome was inventing twisted steel rebar, C.A.P. Turner was designing his "mushroom system" of reinforced concrete floor slabs with smooth round rods and Julius Kahn was experimenting with an innovative rolled diamond-shaped rebar with flat-plate flanges angled upwards at 45° (patented in 1902). Kahn predicted concrete beams with this reinforcing system would bend like a Warren truss, and also thought of this rebar as shear reinforcement. Kahn's reinforcing system was built in concrete beams, joists, and columns. The system was both praised and criticized by Kahn's engineering contemporaries: Turner voiced strong objections to this system as it could cause catastrophic failure to concrete structures. He rejected the idea that Kahn's reinforcing system in concrete beams would act as a Warren truss and also noted that this system would not provide the adequate amount of shear stress reinforcement at the ends of the simply supported beams, the place where the shear stress is greatest. Furthermore, Turner warned that Kahn's system could result in a brittle failure as it did not have longitudinal reinforcement in the beams at the columns. This type of failure manifested in the partial collapse of the Bixby Hotel in Long Beach, California and total collapse of the Eastman Kodak Building in Rochester, New York, both during construction in 1906. It was, however, concluded that both failures were the consequences of poor quality labor. With the increase in demand of construction standardization, innovative reinforcing systems such as Kahn's were pushed to the side in favor of the concrete reinforcing systems seen today.


title: Rebar

text: Requirements for deformations on steel bar reinforcement were not standardized in U.S. construction until about 1950. Modern requirements for deformations were established in ""Tentative Specifications for the Deformations of Deformed Steel Bars for Concrete Reinforcement"", ASTM A305-47T. Subsequently, changes were made that increased rib height and reduced rib spacing for certain bar sizes, and the qualification of “tentative” was removed when the updated standard ASTM A305-49 was issued in 1949. The requirements for deformations found in current specifications for steel bar reinforcing, such as ASTM A615 and ASTM A706, among others, are the same as those specified in ASTM A305-49.


title: Rebar

text: Concrete is a material that is very strong in compression, but relatively weak in tension. To compensate for this imbalance in concrete's behavior, rebar is cast into it to carry the tensile loads. Most steel reinforcement is divided into primary and secondary reinforcement:


title: Rebar

text: Secondary applications include rebar embedded in masonry walls, which includes both bars placed horizontally in a mortar joint (every fourth or fifth course of block) or vertically (in the horizontal voids of cement blocks and cored bricks, which is then fixed in place with grout. Masonry structures held together with grout have similar properties to concrete - high compressive resistance but a limited ability to carry tensile loads. When rebar is added they are known as "reinforced masonry".


title: Rebar

text: A similar approach (of embedding rebar vertically in designed voids in engineered blocks) is also used in dry-laid landscape walls, at least pinning the lowest course in place into the earth, also employed securing the lowest course and/or deadmen in walls made of engineered concrete or wooden landscape ties.


title: Rebar

text: In unusual cases steel reinforcement may be embedded and partially exposed, as in the steel tie bars that constrain and reinforce the masonry Nevyansk Tower or ancient structures in Rome and the Vatican.


title: Rebar

text: Steel has a thermal expansion coefficient nearly equal to that of modern concrete. If this were not so, it would cause problems through additional longitudinal and perpendicular stresses at temperatures different from the temperature of the setting. Although rebar has ribs that bind it mechanically to the concrete, it can still be pulled out of the concrete under high stresses, an occurrence that often accompanies a larger-scale collapse of the structure. To prevent such a failure, rebar is either deeply embedded into adjacent structural members (40–60 times the diameter), or bent and hooked at the ends to lock it around the concrete and other rebar. This first approach increases the friction locking the bar into place, while the second makes use of the high compressive strength of concrete.


title: Rebar

text: Common rebar is made of unfinished tempered steel, making it susceptible to rusting. Normally the concrete cover is able to provide a pH value higher than 12 avoiding the corrosion reaction. Too little concrete cover can compromise this guard through carbonation from the surface, and salt penetration. Too much concrete cover can cause bigger crack widths which also compromises the local guard. As rust takes up greater volume than the steel from which it was formed, it causes severe internal pressure on the surrounding concrete, leading to cracking, spalling, and, ultimately, structural failure. This phenomenon is known as oxide jacking. This is a particular problem where the concrete is exposed to salt water, as in bridges where salt is applied to roadways in winter, or in marine applications. Uncoated, corrosion-resistant low carbon/chromium (microcomposite), silicon bronze, epoxy-coated, galvanized, or stainless steel rebars may be employed in these situations at greater initial expense, but significantly lower expense over the service life of the project. Extra care is taken during the transport, fabrication, handling, installation, and concrete placement process when working with epoxy-coated rebar, because damage will reduce the long-term corrosion resistance of these bars. Even damaged epoxy-coated bars have shown better performance than uncoated reinforcing bars, though issues from debonding of the epoxy coating from the bars and corrosion under the epoxy film have been reported. These epoxy-coated bars are used in over 70,000 bridge decks in the US, but this technology was slowly being phased out in favor of stainless steel rebar as of 2005 because of its poor performance.


title: Rebar

text: Requirements for deformations are found in US-standard product specifications for steel bar reinforcing, such as ASTM A615 and ASTM A706, and dictate lug spacing and height.


title: Rebar

text: Fibre-reinforced plastic rebar is also used in high-corrosion environments. It is available in many forms, such as spirals for reinforcing columns, common rods, and meshes. Most commercially available rebar is made from unidirectional fibers set in a thermoset polymer resin, and is often referred to as FRP.


title: Rebar

text: Some special construction such as research and manufacturing facilities with very sensitive electronics may require the use of reinforcement that is non-conductive to electricity, and medical imaging equipment rooms may require non-magnetic properties to avoid interference. FRP rebar, notably glass fibre types have low electrical conductivity and are non-magnetic which is commonly used for such needs. Stainless steel rebar with low magnetic permeability is available and is sometimes used to avoid magnetic interference issues.


title: Rebar

text: Reinforcing steel can also be displaced by impacts such as earthquakes, resulting in structural failure. The prime example of this is the collapse of the Cypress Street Viaduct in Oakland, California as a result of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, causing 42 fatalities. The shaking of the earthquake caused rebars to burst from the concrete and buckle. Updated building designs, including more circumferential rebar, can address this type of failure.


title: Rebar

text: US/Imperial bar sizes give the diameter in units of for bar sizes #2 through #8, so that #8 = inch = diameter.


title: Rebar

text: There are no fractional bar sizes in this system. The "#" symbol indicates the number sign, and thus "#6" is read as "number six". The use of the "#" sign is customary for US sizes, however "No." is sometimes used instead. Within the trades rebar is known by a shorthand utilizing the bar diameter as descriptor, such as "four-bar" for bar that is four-eighths (or one-half) of an inch.


title: Rebar

text: The cross-sectional area of a bar, as given by "πr"², works out to (bar size/9.027)², which is approximated as (bar size/9)² square inches. For example, the area of #8 bar is (8/9)² = 0.79 square inches.


title: Rebar

text: Bar sizes larger than #8 follow the -inch rule imperfectly and skip sizes #12-13, and #15-17 due to historical convention. In early concrete construction bars 1 inch and larger were only available in square sections, and when large format deformed round bars became available around 1957 the industry manufactured them to provide the cross-sectional area equivalent of standard square bar sizes that were formerly used. The diameter of the equivalent large format round shape is rounded to the nearest inch to provide the bar size. For example, #9 bar has a cross section of , and therefore a diameter of . #10, #11, #14, and #18 sizes correspond to 1 inch, 1, 1, and 2 inch square bars, respectively.


title: Rebar

text: Sizes smaller than #3 are no longer recognized as standard sizes. These are most commonly manufactured as plain round undeformed rod steel, but can be made with deformations. Sizes smaller than #3 are typically referred to as "wire" products and not "bar", and specified by either their nominal diameter or wire gage number. #2 bars are often informally called "pencil rod" as they are about the same size as a pencil.


title: Rebar

text: When US/Imperial sized rebar are used in projects with metric units, the equivalent metric size is typically specified as the nominal diameter rounded to the nearest millimeter. These are not considered standard metric sizes, and thus is often referred to as a soft conversion or the "soft metric" size. The US/Imperial bar size system recognizes the use of true metric bar sizes (No. 10, 12, 16, 20, 25, 28, 32, 36, 40, 50 and 60 specifically) which indicates the nominal bar diameter in millimeters, as an "alternate size" specification. Substituting a true metric size for a US/Imperial size is called a hard conversion, and sometimes results in the use of a physically different sized bar.


title: Rebar

text: Metric bar designations represent the nominal bar diameter in millimeters, rounded to the nearest 5 mm.


title: Rebar

text: Metric bar designations represent the nominal bar diameter in millimetres. Preferred bar sizes in Europe are specified to comply with Table 6 of the standard EN 10080, although various national standards still remain in force (e.g. BS 4449 in the United Kingdom). In Switzerland some sizes are different from European standard.


title: Rebar

text: Reinforcement for use in concrete construction is subject to the requirements of Australian Standards AS3600-2009 (Concrete Structures) and AS/NZS4671-2001 (Steel Reinforcing for Concrete). There are other standards that apply to testing, welding and galvanizing.


title: Rebar

text: Bars are typically abbreviated to simply 'N' (hot-rolled deformed bar), 'R' (hot-rolled round bar), 'RW' (cold-drawn ribbed wire) or 'W' (cold-drawn round wire), as the yield strength and ductility class can be implied from the shape. For example, all commercially available wire has a yield strength of 500 MPa and low ductility, while round bars are 250 MPa and normal ductility.


title: Rebar

text: Reinforcement for use in concrete construction is subject to the requirements of AS/NZS4671-2001 (Steel Reinforcing for Concrete). There are other standards that apply to testing, welding and galvanizing.


title: Rebar

text: Rebars are available in the following grades as per IS:1786-2008 FE 415/FE 415D/FE 415S/FE 500/FE 500D/FE 500S/FE 550, FE550D, FE 600. Rebars are quenched with water at a high level pressure so that the outer surface is hardened while the inner core remains soft. Rebars are ribbed so that the concrete can have a better grip. Coastal regions use galvanized rebars to prolong their life. BIS rebar sizes are 10, 12, 16, 20, 25, 28, 32, 36, 40 and 50 millimeters.


title: Rebar

text: Very large format rebar sizes are widely available and produced by specialty manufacturers. The tower and sign industries commonly use "jumbo" bars as anchor rods for large structures which are fabricated from slightly oversized blanks such that threads can be cut at the ends to accept standard anchor nuts. Fully threaded rebar is also produced with very coarse threads which satisfy rebar deformation standards and allow for custom nuts and couplers to be used. Note that these customary sizes while in common use, do not have consensus standards associated with them, and actual properties may vary by manufacturer.


title: Rebar

text: Rebar is available in grades and specifications that vary in yield strength, ultimate tensile strength, chemical composition, and percentage of elongation.


title: Rebar

text: The use of a grade by itself only indicates the minimum permissible yield strength, and it must be used in the context of a material specification in order to fully describe product requirements for rebar. Material specifications set the requirements for grades as well as additional properties such as, chemical composition, minimum elongation, physical tolerances, etc. Fabricated rebar must exceed the grade's minimum yield strength and any other material specification requirements when inspected and tested.


title: Rebar

text: In US use, the grade designation is equal to the minimum yield strength of the bar in ksi (1000 psi) for example grade 60 rebar has a minimum yield strength of 60 ksi. Rebar is most commonly manufactured in grades 40, 60, and 75 with higher strength readily available in grades 80, 100, 120 and 150. Grade 60 (420 MPa) is the most widely used rebar grade in modern US construction. Historic grades include 30, 33, 35, 36, 50 and 55 which are not in common use today.


title: Rebar

text: Some grades are only manufactured for specific bar sizes, for example under ASTM A615, Grade 40 (280 MPa) is only furnished for US bar sizes #3 through #6 (soft metric No.10 through 19). Sometimes limitations on available material grades for specific bar sizes is related to the manufacturing process used, as well as the availability of controlled quality raw materials used.


title: Rebar

text: Some material specifications cover multiple grades, and in such cases it is necessary to indicate both the material specification and grade. Rebar grades are customarily noted on engineering documents, even when there are no other grade options within the material specification, in order to eliminate confusion and avoid potential quality issues such as might occur if a material substitution is made. Note that "Gr." is the common engineering abbreviation for "grade", with variations on letter capitalization and the use of a period.


title: Rebar

text: In certain cases, such as earthquake engineering and blast resistant design where post-yield behavior is expected, it is important to be able to predict and control properties such as the maximum yield strength and minimum ratio of tensile strength to yield strength. ASTM A706 Gr. 60 is an example of a controlled property range material specification which has a minimum yield strength of 60 ksi (420 MPa), maximum yield strength of 78 ksi (540 MPa), minimum tensile strength of 80 ksi (550 MPa) and not less than 1.25 times the actual yield strength, and minimum elongation requirements that vary by bar size.


title: Rebar

text: In countries that use the metric system, the grade designation is typically the yield strength in megapascals MPa, for example "grade 400" (similar to US grade 60, however metric grade 420 is actually the exact substitution for the US grade).


title: Rebar

text: Historically in Europe, rebar is composed of mild steel material with a yield strength of approximately 250 MPa (36 ksi). Modern rebar is composed of high-yield steel, with a yield strength more typically 500 MPa (72.5 ksi). Rebar can be supplied with various grades of ductility. The more ductile steel is capable of absorbing considerably more energy when deformed - a behavior that resists earthquake forces and is used in design. These high yield strength ductile steels are usually produced using the TEMPCORE process, a method of thermomechanical processing. The manufacture of reinforcing steel by re-rolling finished products (e.g. sheets or rails) is not allowed. In contrast to structural steel, rebar steel grades are not harmonized yet across Europe, each country having their own national standards. However some standardization of specification and testing methods exist under EN 10080 and EN ISO 15630:


title: Rebar

text: Rebar cages are fabricated either on or off the project site commonly with the help of hydraulic benders and shears. However, for small or custom work a tool known as a Hickey, or hand rebar bender, is sufficient. The rebars are placed by steel fixers "rodbusters" or concrete reinforcing iron workers, with bar supports and concrete or plastic rebar spacers separating the rebar from the concrete formwork to establish concrete cover and ensure that proper embedment is achieved. The rebars in the cages are connected by spot welding, tying steel wire, sometimes using an electric rebar tier, or with mechanical connections. For tying epoxy-coated or galvanized rebars, epoxy-coated or galvanized wire is normally used, respectively.


title: Rebar

text: Stirrups form the outer part of a rebar cage. Stirrups are usually rectangular in beams, and circular


title: Rebar

text: in piers and are placed at regular intervals along a column or beam to secure the structural rebar and prevent it from shifting out of position during concrete placement. The main usage for stirrups or ties is to increase the shear capacity of reinforced concrete component it is included in.


title: Rebar

text: The American Welding Society (AWS) D 1.4 sets out the practices for welding rebar in the U.S. Without special consideration the only rebar that is ready to weld is "W grade" (Low-alloy — A706). Rebar that is not produced to the ASTM A706 specification is generally not suitable for welding without calculating the "carbon-equivalent". Material with a carbon-equivalent of less than 0.55 can be welded.


title: Rebar

text: ASTM A 616 & ASTM A 617 (now replaced by the combined standard A996) reinforcing bars are re-rolled rail steel and re-rolled rail axle steel with uncontrolled chemistry, phosphorus and carbon content. These materials are not common.


title: Rebar

text: Rebar cages are normally tied together with wire, although spot welding of cages has been the norm in Europe for many years, and is becoming more common in the United States. High strength steels for prestressed concrete cannot be welded.


title: Rebar

text: Roll reinforcement system is a remarkably fast and cost-efficient method for placing a large quantity of reinforcement over a short period of time. Roll reinforcement is usually prepared off-site and easily unrolled on site. Roll reinforcement placement has been applied successfully in slabs (decks, foundations), wind energy mast foundations, walls, ramps, etc.


title: Rebar

text: Also known as "mechanical couplers" or "mechanical splices", mechanical connections are used to connect reinforcing bars together. Mechanical couplers are an effective means to reduce rebar congestion in highly reinforced areas for cast-in-place concrete construction. These couplers are also used in precast concrete construction at the joints between members.


title: Rebar

text: The structural performance criteria for mechanical connections varies between countries, codes, and industries. As a minimum requirement, codes typically specify that the rebar to splice connection meets or exceeds 125% of the specified yield strength of the rebar. More stringent criteria also requires the development of the specified ultimate strength of the rebar. As an example, ACI 318 specifies either Type 1 (125% Fy) or Type 2 (125% Fy and 100% Fu) performance criteria.


title: Rebar

text: For concrete structures designed with ductility in mind, it is recommended that the mechanical connections are also capable of failing in a ductile manner, typically known in the reinforcing steel industry as achieving "bar-break". As an example, Caltrans specifies a required mode of failure (i.e., "necking of the bar").


title: Rebar

text: To prevent injury, the protruding ends of steel rebar are often bent over or covered with special steel-reinforced plastic caps.


title: Rebar

text: Reinforcement is usually tabulated in a "reinforcement schedule" on construction drawings. This eliminates ambiguity in the notations used around the world. The following list provides examples of the notations used in the architectural, engineering, and construction industry.


title: Rebar

text: Rebar is frequently recycled, and rebar is often made entirely from recycled steel. Nucor, the largest steel producer in the United States, claims its steel bar products are made from 97% recycled steel.


title: Drug lord

text: A drug lord, drug baron, kingpin or narcotrafficker is a high-ranking crime boss who controls a sizable network of people involved in the illegal drug trade. Such figures are often difficult to bring to justice, as they are normally not directly in possession of something illegal but are insulated from the actual trade in drugs by several layers of staff. The prosecution of drug lords is therefore usually the result of carefully planned infiltration into their networks, often using informants from within the organizations.


title: Drug lord

text: Since the 1970s, research on organized crime leadership (and, by extension, drug lords) has evolved. Where once studies emphasised the importance of the leader's human capital (e.g. individual traits), it has now developed to focus upon the leader's social capital (e.g. information and resource brokers, social status, access to information).


title: Drug lord

text: Known as "El Padrino" (The Godfather) and "El Jefe de Jefes" (The boss of bosses) was born in 1946, and is the founder and former leader of the Guadalajara Cartel, the first mexican super-cartel ever established. He had strong ties with the Cali Cartel and Escobar's Medellin Cartel as he distributed drugs for them. He controlled almost all of the drug trafficking in Mexico and the corridors along the Mexico–United States border in 1970s and the 80s. Until the end of the 1980s, Guadalajara Cartel headed by Félix Gallardo was one of the most powerful cartels in the world. He had a huge involvement in politics and bribed political authorities to protect himself and his business. After his capture in 1989 for the alleged murder of DEA agent Enrique Camarena, Félix and allegedly the Mexican Government decided to divide up the trade he controlled as it would be more efficient and less likely to be brought down by law enforcement.


title: Drug lord

text: Félix Gallardo instructed his lawyer to convene the nation's top drug narcos in 1989 at a house in the resort of Acapulco where he designated the plazas (turfs) or territories. The Tijuana route would go to his nephews, the Arellano Felix brothers. The Ciudad Juárez route would go to the Carrillo Fuentes family and to Rafael Aguilar Guajardo . Miguel Caro Quintero would run the Sonora corridor. Joaquín Guzmán Loera and Héctor Luis Palma Salazar were left the Pacific coast operations, with Ismael Zambada García joining them soon after and thus becoming the Sinaloa Cartel, who was not yet a party to the 1989 pact. Félix Gallardo still planned to oversee national operations and remained one of Mexico's major traffickers, maintaining his organization via mobile phone until he was transferred in the 1990s to the Altiplano maximum security prison and lost all remaining contacts with other drug lords. On 18 December 2014, federal authorities approved his request to transfer to a medium-security prison in Guadalajara (State of Jalisco), due to his declining health. He still strongly denies any involvement in the murder of Enrique Camarena. He was particularly known for using less violence and many even attribute the current bloodshed due to the turf war between rival cartels to the fall of Félix


title: Drug lord

text: Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria (December 1, 1949 – December 2, 1993) was a Colombian drug overlord. Often referred to as the "World's Greatest Outlaw", Escobar was perhaps the most elusive cocaine trafficker to have ever existed. He is considered the 'King of Cocaine' and is known as the boss of all drug lords In 1989, "Forbes" magazine declared Escobar as the seventh-richest man in the world, with an estimated personal fortune of US$30 billion. In 1986, he attempted to enter Colombian politics. It is said that Pablo Escobar once burnt two million dollars in cash to keep his daughter warm while on the run. Escobar was the boss of the famous Medellin Cartel, the most powerful drug empire to exist and is said to have had over twice the power and money as their rivals, the Cali Cartel. Pablo was known as paisa Robin Hood, for his contributions to the poor, but was also known for murdering anyone who got in his way. It took hundreds of thousands of men to kill him, and finally on 2 December, Search Bloc killed Pablo on a rooftop.


title: Drug lord

text: Guzman is the most notorious drug lord of all time, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). In the 1980s, he was a member of the Guadalajara Cartel and used to work for Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo. After Félix's arrest in 1989, Guzmán formed the Sinaloa Cartel along with Ismael Zambada García and Héctor Luis Palma Salazar. He is well known for his use of sophisticated tunnels—similar to the one located in Douglas, Arizona—to smuggle cocaine from Mexico into the United States in the early 1990s. In 1993, a 7.3-ton shipment of his cocaine, concealed in cans of chili peppers and destined for the United States, was seized in Tecate, Baja California. That same year he barely escaped an ambush by the Tijuana Cartel led by Ramon Arellano Felix and his gunmen. After being captured in Guatemala, he was jailed in 1993 and in 1995 he was moved to the maximum-security prison called Puente Grande, but paid his way out of prison and hid in a laundry van as it drove through the gates. On 22 February 2014, Guzmán was arrested again.


title: Drug lord

text: He is considered a folk hero in the narcotics world, celebrated by musicians who write and perform a "narcocorridos" (drug ballads) extolling his exploits. For example, Los Traviezos recorded a ballad extolling his life on the run. In July 2015, Guzman escaped a second time from a maximum-security prison through a hole in a shower floor that led to a mile-long tunnel, ending at a nearby house. A large-scale manhunt ensued. On 8 January 2016, Guzmán was captured by the Mexican Marines.


title: Drug lord

text: Osiel Cárdenas Guillén (born 18 May 1967) is a former Mexican drug lord who was the leader of the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas. Originally a mechanic in Matamoros, Tamaulipas, Guillén eventually became involved in the illegal drug trade the Gulf Cartel before becoming its leader in 1997 by assassinating drug lord Salvador Gómez Herrera. Guillén recruited over 30 deserters from the Mexican Army's special forces unit, the "Cuerpo de Fuerzas Especiales", to form the cartel's armed wing; this group would go on to be among the founding members of Los Zetas, another Mexican drug cartel. In 1999, Guillén and a group of Gulf Cartel gunmen threatened two U.S. federal agents at gunpoint, which triggered a massive combined effort from American and Mexican law enforcement agencies to crack down on the leadership structure of the Gulf Cartel and led to Guillén becoming one of the most wanted criminals in the world. Guillén was arrested in Mexico in 2003 and deported to the U.S. in 2007, where he remains incarcerated to this day.


title: Drug lord

text: Jorge Alberto Rodriguez, also known as Don Cholito, is a notorious Argentine-born, Puerto Rican and Colombian mixed drug lord from New York, who headed the 400 criminal organization, a dismantled secret cell of the Cali Cartel. Pulled into the drug trade at age 12, he left home at age 14 to begin working for his Father, Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela, who headed the Cali Cartel. Within six years he had amassed a fortune exceeding over US$300 million by shipping drugs from Colombia to nearly every state in the U.S. He was one of the most ruthless international drug lords unknown to law enforcement or governments. During that time, the murder rate and cocaine-related hospital emergencies in the United States doubled. He was arrested on July 6, 1990 in Tallahassee, Florida and sentenced to a 25-year prison term for a number of federal violations. Following his conviction, Rodriguez continued to operate his illicit business from behind bars, importing as much as 12,500 kilograms of cocaine into the U.S. each month and ordering numerous murders of informants, witnesses, in the U.S. and Colombia. He reigned and flourished while incarcerated until he was placed in court-ordered high-security isolation in 1994. According to the Bureau of Prisons, Rodriguez was released in 2012.


title: Drug lord

text: Born on April 13, 1968 in Osasco (a city located in the state of São Paulo, Brazil), Marcos Willians Herbas Camacho, known as "Marcola" is one of the founders and the current leader of Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC), the largest and the most powerful Brazilian criminal organization. A Brazilian with Bolivian origins, Marcola (whose criminal career began when he was a child, at the age of nine and currently serving a sentence of 234 years in prison for murder, drug trafficking and other crimes) is the current leader of PCC and commands this powerful crime syndicate from inside the Taubaté Prison, one of most infamous prisons in Brazil. Under the command of Marcola, the PCC expanded its influence outside Brazil (notoriously they are territories of the PCC: Bolivia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Paraguay and Peru). The PCC is notorious for its use of violence, for its numerous confrontations with police officers and because of their violent conflicts over territory control and the control of drug trafficking against another powerful Brazilian criminal organization, the Comando Vermelho (or CV), a powerful crime syndicate based in the city of Rio de Janeiro.


title: Drug lord

text: Griselda Blanco (1943–2012), known as the "Godmother of Cocaine", was a drug lady who operated between Miami and Colombia during the 1970s and 1980s. During the height of her operation, she smuggled nearly of cocaine into the U.S. every month through a network in south Florida. She was noted for her ruthlessness and use of extreme violence, employing tactics such as publicly assassinating people in broad daylight, bayoneting a rival trafficker inside Miami International Airport, and inventing the drive-by motorcycle shooting execution method. It was estimated that she was responsible for the homicides of 200 people in Colombia, Florida, New York, and California. Arrested in 1985 for drug-trafficking charges, she was subsequently convicted and spent almost 20 years in a U.S. prison. She was killed by motorcycle hitmen in Colombia on 3 September 2012 as she was coming out of a butcher's shop.


title: Drug lord

text: Pablo Escobar started to buy cocaine from Roberto Suárez in the 1970s when he had just created the Medellín cartel. Suárez started building cocaine laboratories in the middle of the Bolivian Amazon jungle and in the zone of "Los Yungas" in the end of the 1960s and created the first cocaine cartel in Bolivia called "La Corporación". At first, the Medellin cartel bought cocaine at $8,000 per kilogram ($3,600/lb). La Corporación then sold cocaine-based paste to Colombian cartels, and they finished and distributed it in the east of the United States. The finished cocaine was sold directly to Mexican cartels for distribution in the west of the United States. Suárez received untold amounts of money, but as detectives and journalists discovered the corruption between Bolivia and the U.S., the empire Suárez built began to fall. Suárez was arrested by the DEA in 1988, and Escobar took over of the production and distribution of 80% of the world's cocaine.


title: Drug lord

text: Rick Ross (born January 28, 1960), "Freeway" Ricky Ross, is a convicted drug-trafficker best known for the drug empire he presided over in Los Angeles in the early 1980s. The nickname "Freeway" came from Ross growing up next to the 110 Harbor Freeway. During the height of his drug dealing, Ross was said to have made "$2 million in one day." According to the "Oakland Tribune", "In the course of his rise, prosecutors estimate that Ross transported several tons of cocaine to New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and elsewhere, and made more than $600 million in the process."


title: Drug lord

text: In 1998, Ross was sentenced to life imprisonment after being convicted of purchasing more than 100 kilograms of cocaine from a federal agent during a sting operation. Ross became the subject of controversy later that year when a series of articles by journalist Gary Webb in the "San Jose Mercury News" revealed a connection between Ross's main cocaine source, Danilo Blandon, and the CIA as part of the Iran–Contra affair. Ross's case went before the federal court of appeals and his sentence was reduced to 20 years. He was later moved to a halfway house in March 2009 and released from custody on September 29, 2009.


title: Drug lord

text: In June 2014, Ross released his book, "Freeway Rick Ross: The Untold Autobiography", co-written by crime-writer Cathy Scott.


title: Drug lord

text: For more than a decade, Panamanian Manuel Noriega was a highly paid CIA asset and collaborator, despite knowledge by U.S. drug authorities as early as 1971 that the general was heavily involved in drug trafficking and money laundering. Noriega facilitated "guns-for-drugs" flights for the Nicaraguan Contras, whom the U.S. were heavily supporting: providing protection and pilots, safe havens for drug cartel officials, and discreet banking facilities. He was arrested in 1990.


title: Drug lord

text: As a top drug-trafficker in Mexico, Amado Carrillo (1956–1997) was transporting four times more cocaine to the U.S. than any other trafficker, building a fortune of over $25 billion. He was called El Señor de Los Cielos ("The Lord of the Skies") for his use of over 22 private 727 jet airliners to transport Colombian cocaine to municipal airports and dirt airstrips around Mexico, including Juárez. He was a member of the Guadalajara Cartel and worked for Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo. After Félix was arrested, Amado formed the Juarez Cartel. In the months before his death, the DEA described Carrillo as the most-powerful drug trafficker of his era, and many analysts claimed profits neared $25 billion, making him one of the world's wealthiest men.


title: Drug lord

text: Ramón Arellano Félix was a Mexican drug lord who was a founding member of the Tijuana drug cartel (a.k.a. the Arellano-Félix Organization) alongside his brothers. Arellano Félix was allegedly one of the most ruthless enforcers in the organization and was a suspect in various murders. He had been linked by Mexican police to the 1997 massacre of twelve members of a family outside of Ensenada, Baja California. The family was related to a drug dealer that had an unpaid debt to the Arellano Félix Cartel. On September 18, 1997, Arellano Félix was placed on the FBI's ten most-wanted list. In a sealed indictment in the United States District Court for the Southern District of California, he was charged with conspiracy to import cocaine and marijuana.. Ramon and his brothers, primarily Benjamin Arellano Felix were the undisputed leaders of the Tijuana Cartel and developed an intense rivalry with Joaquin Guzman Loera’s Sinaloa Cartel. The war between both organizations lasted more than 10 years until Ramón was killed in Mazatlán on February 10, 2002 by policemen allegedly on the payroll of the rival, Sinaloa Cártel.


title: Drug lord

text: Ismael Zambada García is a drug smuggler in Mexico. Mexico's top anti-drug prosecutor, José Santiago Vasconcelos, called Zambada "drug dealer No. 1" and said the fugitive has become more powerful as his fellow kingpins have fallen, including one who was allegedly killed on Zambada's orders.


title: Drug lord

text: Klaas Bruinsma (1953–1991) was a major Dutch drug lord, shot to death by mafia member and former police officer Martin Hoogland. Bruinsma was known as "De Lange" ("the tall one") and as "De Dominee" ("the preacher") because of his black clothing and his habit of lecturing others.


title: Drug lord

text: Marcos Arturo Beltrán Leyva (September 27, 1961 – December 16, 2009) was the leader of the Mexican drug-trafficking organization known as the Beltrán-Leyva Cartel, which is headed by the Beltrán Leyva brothers: Marcos Arturo, Carlos, Alfredo and Héctor. The cartel was engaged in cocaine, marijuana, heroin, and methamphetamine production, transportation, and wholesaling. It controlled numerous drug-trafficking corridors into the United States. and was also responsible for human smuggling, money laundering, extortion, kidnapping, murder, contract killing, torture, gun-running, and other acts of violence in Mexico. The organization was connected with the assassinations of numerous Mexican law-enforcement officials.


title: Drug lord

text: Frank Lucas was a former heroin dealer and organized crime boss who operated in Harlem, New York during the late 1960s and early 1970s. He was known for cutting out middlemen in the drug trade and buying heroin directly from his source in the Golden Triangle. Lucas boasted that he smuggled heroin using the coffins of dead American servicemen, but this claim is denied by his South Asian associate, Leslie "Ike" Atkinson. His career was dramatized in the 2007 feature film "American Gangster" starring Denzel Washington.


title: Drug lord

text: Leroy Antonio "Nicky" Barnes (born October 15, 1933) was a former drug lord and crime boss of the notorious African-American crime organization known as The Council, which controlled the heroin trade in Harlem, New York during the 1970s. In 2007 he released a book, "Mr Untouchable", written with Tom Folsom, and a documentary DVD of the same name, about his life. In the 2007 film "American Gangster", Barnes is portrayed by Cuba Gooding, Jr.


title: Drug lord

text: Zhenli Ye Gon (traditional Chinese: 葉真理; born January 31, 1963, Shanghai, People's Republic of China) is a Mexican businessman of Chinese origin accused of trafficking pseudoephedrine into Mexico from Asia. At the time of his arrest, he had $207 million in cash and 18 million Mexican pesos in his house. He claimed that he was forced by Javier Lozano Alarcón, putatively identified as the Secretary of Labor, to keep it at his home and that this money would be used during Felipe Calderón's presidential campaign in 2006. He is the legal representative of Unimed Pharm Chem México. The charges against him were dismissed with prejudice in August 2009 as a result of the efforts of his attorneys, Manuel J. Retureta and A. Eduardo Balarezo.


title: Drug lord

text: Michael Christopher Coke (born 13 March 1969), a.k.a. Dudus, is a Jamaican drug lord and the leader of the Shower Posse gang. He is the youngest son of drug lord Lester Lloyd Coke whose extradition had also, prior to his 1992 death in a Jamaican prison cell, been requested by the U.S. Until the younger Coke's handover to U.S. forces on 24 June 2010, "Dudus" served as the "de facto" leader of Tivoli Gardens in the city of Kingston; prior to his 2010 capture Jamaican police were unable to enter this neighborhood without community consent.


title: Drug lord

text: The son of a prominent drug lord, Coke grew up wealthy, going to school with children of the country's political elite. Ruling the gang where his father left off, he became a leader in the community of Tivoli Gardens, distributing money to the area's poor, creating employment, and setting up community centers.


title: Drug lord

text: In 2009, the U.S. began requesting his extradition, and in May 2010, a recalcitrant Government of Jamaica issued a warrant. That same month the government took steps to capture Coke. In a run-up to Coke's arrest, more than 70 people–all but one of them civilians–died in a 24 May 2010 raid of Tivoli Gardens. He was arrested at a Jamaican checkpoint on 22 June 2010.