Life.

Born in Colfax, California in 1935, Riley began performing as a solo pianist during the 1950s. During that decade, he studied composition at San Francisco State University, the San Francisco Conservatory, and University of California, Berkeley, studying with Seymour Shifrin and Robert Erickson. He was involved in the experimental San Francisco Tape Music Center, working with Morton Subotnick, Steve Reich, Pauline Oliveros, and Ramon Sender. Throughout the 1960s he also traveled frequently in Europe, taking in musical influences and supporting himself by playing in piano bars.  His most influential teacher was Pandit Pran Nath (1918–1996), a master of Indian classical voice who also taught La Monte Young, Marian Zazeela, and Michael Harrison. Riley made numerous trips to India over the course of their association to study and accompany him on tabla, tambura, and voice. In 1971 he joined the Mills College faculty to teach Indian classical music. Riley also cites John Cage and "the really great chamber music groups of John Coltrane and Miles Davis, Charles Mingus, Bill Evans, and Gil Evans" as influences on his work. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate Degree in Music at Chapman University in 2007.  Riley began his long-lasting association with the Kronos Quartet when he met their founder David Harrington while at Mills. Over the course of his career, Riley composed 13 string quartets for the ensemble, in addition to other works. He wrote his first orchestral piece, "Jade Palace", in 1991, and has continued to pursue that avenue, with several commissioned orchestral compositions following. He is also currently performing and teaching both as an Indian raga vocalist and as a solo pianist.  Riley continues to perform live, and was part of the All Tomorrow's Parties festival in May 2011.

Techniques.

Riley's music is usually based on improvising through a series of modal figures of different lengths. Works such as "In C" (1964) and the "Keyboard Studies" demonstrate this technique. The first performance of "In C" was given by Steve Reich, Jon Gibson, Pauline Oliveros and Morton Subotnick. Its form was an innovation: The piece consists of 53 separate modules of roughly one measure apiece, each containing a different musical pattern but each, as the title implies, in the key of C. One performer beats a steady pulse of "C"s on the piano to keep tempo. The others, in any number and on any instrument, perform these musical modules following a few loose guidelines, with the different musical modules interlocking in various ways as time goes on.  In the 1950s Riley was already working with tape loops, a technology still in its infancy at the time; he would later, with the help of a sound engineer, create what he called a "time-lag accumulator". He has continued manipulating tapes to musical effect, in the studio and in live performances throughout his career. An early tape loop piece titled "Music for the Gift" (1963) featured the trumpet playing of Chet Baker. It was during Riley's time in Paris, while composing this piece, that he conceived of and created the time-lag accumulator technique. He has composed using just intonation as well as microtones. In New York City in the mid-1960s he played with his longtime friend La Monte Young, as well as with John Cale and tabla player Angus MacLise, who were founding members of The Velvet Underground. Riley is credited as inspiring Cale's keyboard part on Lou Reed's composition "All Tomorrow's Parties", which was sung by German actress Nico and included on the album "The Velvet Underground and Nico", recorded in 1966.  Riley's famous overdubbed electronic album "A Rainbow in Curved Air" (recorded 1968, released 1969) inspired many later developments in electronic music. These include Pete Townshend's organ parts on The Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again" and "Baba O'Riley", the latter named in tribute to Riley as well as to Meher Baba. Charles Hazlewood, in his BBC documentary on Minimalism (Part 1) suggests that the album 'Tubular Bells' by Mike Oldfield was also inspired by Riley's example.  Riley's collaborators have included the Rova Saxophone Quartet, Pauline Oliveros, the ARTE Quartett, and, as mentioned, the Kronos Quartet. His 1995 "Lisbon Concert" recording features him in a solo piano format, improvising on his own works. In the liner notes Riley cites Art Tatum, Bud Powell and Bill Evans as his piano "heroes", illustrating the importance of jazz to his conceptions.

Personal life.

He has three children: one daughter, Colleen, and two sons, Gyan, who is a guitarist, and Shahn. He was married to Ann Riley until her death in 2015.

Terrence Mitchell Riley (born June 24, 1935) is an American composer and performing musician best known as a pioneer of the minimalist school of composition. Influenced by jazz and Indian classical music, his music became notable for its innovative use of repetition, tape music techniques, and delay systems.


Plant characteristics.

All species of the genus form upright growth supported by a weak, fibrous root system. The genus can be divided into two groups or "complexes": The "B. liniflora" complex and the "B. gigantea" complex (see below).

Leaves.

The leaves of all species are round in cross section and highly elongated, tapering at the end. The surface of the leaves is densely studded with glandular hairs which secrete a mucilaginous substance from their tip. These serve to attract small insects, which upon touching the sticky secretions are ensnared. Unless they are strong enough to escape, the insect prey either die of exhaustion or asphyxiate as the mucilage envelops them and clogs their spiracles. Unlike the sundews, however, "Byblis" can move neither their tentacles nor the leaves themselves to aid trapping or digestion. As a result, they are grouped among the "passive flypaper traps" along with "Pinguicula", "Drosophyllum", "Roridula", "Stylidium" and "Triphyophyllum peltatum".  Along with the stalked mucilaginous glands, the leaves are also equipped with sessile glands, which assumedly are responsible for the secretion of the digestive juices. Sessile glands are five to ten times as numerous as the stalked glands.

Flowers.

Flowers in this genus are born singly at the end of unbranching, leaf-like inflorescences which emerge from the leaf axes. The five-petaled flowers are generally purple to pale violet, though "B. gigantea" und "B. filifolia" can sometimes produce white flowers. Except for the self-fertile "B. liniflora", all species require pollen from other individuals for fertilization. The pollen release of "B. gigantea" and "B. lamellata" is only triggered by the resonance frequency of the wings of a landing pollinator, helping ensure cross-pollination with other individuals. The flowers of "Byblis" start to bloom in early spring and last until late summer.

Fruit and seeds.

Fertilized flowers mature to form an egg-shaped, two-parted seed capsule. As the seed capsule dries out it cracks open (dehisces), dropping the seed on the ground (see gravity dispersal). The black seeds are generally round and often bear webbed surface markings, although those of "B. lamellata" are strongly ridged (see ). The germination of many species is brought on by brush fires after the dry period; pyrogenic chemicals in the smoke are responsible for triggering germination.

Distribution and habitat.

All "Byblis" species are native to Australia. "B. gigantea" and "B. lamellata" are endemic to the Perth region of southwest Australia, while the species making up the "B. liniflora" complex are found only in north Australia. The exception here is "B. liniflora" itself, whose distribution extends into southern Indonesia and Papua New Guinea.  Like many carnivorous plants, "Byblis" species usually grow in bogs and marshes. They generally prefer seasonally wet sandy soil in partial or direct sunlight with temperatures between ~ 5-40 °C (40-105 °F).

Environmental status.

As native plants of Australia, all "Byblis" species are protected. Until the year 2000, they were also given international protection under CITES appendix II, but were removed from the list when Australia entered the CITES agreement. Since then trade of the genus has been unregulated outside of Australia. However, due to the sensitivity of the plant, interest in the genus has been restricted to a small portion of the carnivorous plant hobbyist community. The majority of plant material sold today is produced in cultivation, with the annual "B. filifolia" and "B. liniflora" being the most common. Most of the other species must be grown from seed, which is often collected from the wild for this purpose.  The West Australian species "B. gigantea" und "B. lamellata" are being threatened by habitat destruction for urban sprawl from cities such as Perth. Particularly damaging is the draining of wet habitats to produce arable land. "B. gigantea" is on the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species and is considered critically endangered.

Carnivorous or protocarnivorous.

The status of the genus as a truly carnivorous plant has been repeatedly put into question. In their natural habitat, all species have been observed playing host to live bugs of the genus "Setocoris", which nourished themselves by eating prey caught by the plants. Following this discovery it was assumed that, as with the genus "Roridula", the plants do not actually digest their prey themselves, rather relying on the bugs to do that. The plants, it was reasoned, benefited by absorbing nutrients from the excrements of the bugs, either through their leaves or through the ground. An indirect digestion of these nutrients by a chitinase producing fungus was even proposed. It was not until 2005 that direct digestion of insect prey by enzymes secreted by the sessile glands of "B. filifolia" was proven. Soon thereafter similar results were found with "B. liniflora". These results clearly place this genus among the true carnivorous plants.

Systematics.

Molecular genetics studies have placed the genus in the order Lamiales. While its placement within the order is still unclear, it is closely related to Martyniaceae, Lentibulariaceae as well as Gesneriaceae.  For a time, the genus "Roridula" was also assigned to the family Byblidaceae. Since that time, however, it has been placed into its own family, Roridulaceae.  Traditionally the genus was divided into only two species, namely "B. gigantea" and "B. liniflora". Further species were described in the 1980s, particularly through the work of the Australian botanist Allen Lowrie. Eight species are currently recognized:

Subdivision of the genus.

"Byblis liniflora" complex.

The four species of this complex, "B. liniflora", "B. rorida", "B. filifolia" and "B. aquatica", are annual herbaceous plants that reach a height of and a maximum leaf length of. These species grow from seedlings to flowering plants in only a few months, setting seed and dying with the onset of the dry season. The original haploid chromosome count of this complex is x=8. The diploid number is therefore 2n=16, whereas the tetraploid species "B. liniflora" is 2n=32.

"Byblis gigantea" complex.

The remaining two species, "B. lamellata" und "B. gigantea", make up what is known as the "B. gigantea" complex. These perennial species are both endemic to Southwest Australia, and reach heights of. Unlike the annual members of the "B. liniflora" complex, these species survive the dry season by dying back to an underground rhizome, out of which they emerge come fall. The leaves of this complex can reach in length. The base chromosome count of the complex is x=9; since both species are diploid, their chromosome count is 2n=18.

Paleobotany.

In the year 2004 a single fossil of a seed, resembling that of members of the modern day "B. liniflora" complex, was discovered in south Australia dating from the middle of the Eocene epoch. The species was assigned to the Byblidaceae as a parataxon of the genus.

Etymology.

The Latin generic name ""Byblis"" originates from a goddess from Greek mythology, of whom Ovid wrote in his "Metamorphoses" (IX, l. 454-664). Byblis, niece of Apollo, fell deeply in love with her twin brother Caunus. At his rejection of her advances, she let forth an endless stream of glistening tears, eventually literally transforming into a spring. The droplets lining the leaves of the "Byblis" are said to resemble those tears.  The English vernacular name - "rainbow plants" - also denotes the mucilaginous droplets which, under the right lighting conditions and viewing angle, sparkle in a rainbow of colors.

References.

Much of the content of this article comes from (retrieved 1 December 2006).

Byblis ( ) is a small genus of carnivorous plants, sometimes termed the rainbow plants for the attractive appearance of their mucilage-covered leaves in bright sunshine. Native to western Australia, it is the only genus in the family Byblidaceae. The first species in the genus was described by the English botanist Richard Anthony Salisbury in 1808. Eight species are now recognized (see below).


History.

Le Corbusier developed the Modulor in the long tradition of Vitruvius, Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man, the work of Leon Battista Alberti, and other attempts to discover mathematical proportions in the human body and then to use that knowledge to improve both the appearance and function of architecture. The system is based on human measurements, the double unit, the Fibonacci numbers, and the golden ratio. Le Corbusier described it as a "range of harmonious measurements to suit the human scale, universally applicable to architecture and to mechanical things".  With the Modulor, Le Corbusier sought to introduce a scale of visual measures that would unite two virtually incompatible systems: the Anglo Saxon foot and inch and the international metric system. Whilst he was intrigued by ancient civilisations who used measuring systems linked to the human body: elbow (cubit), finger (digit), thumb (inch) etc., he was troubled by the metre as a measure that was a forty-millionth part of the meridian of the earth.  In 1943, in response to the French National Organisation for Standardisation's (AFNOR) requirement for standardising all the objects involved in the construction process, Le Corbusier asked an apprentice to consider a scale based upon a man with his arm raised to 2.20 m in height. The result, in August 1943 was the first graphical representation of the derivation of the scale. This was refined after a visit to the Dean of the Faculty of Sciences in Sorbonne on 7 February 1945 which resulted in the inclusion of a golden section into the representation.  Whilst initially the Modulor Man's height was based on a French man's height of it was changed to 1.83 m in 1946 because "in English detective novels, the good-looking men, such as policemen, are always six feet tall!" The dimensions were refined to give round numbers and the overall height of the raised arm was set at 2.262 m.  Of the works leading to the creation of the Modulor, Robin Evans notes that the female body "was only belatedly considered and rejected as a source of proportional harmony".

Promotion.

On 10 January 1946 during a visit to New York, Le Corbusier met with Henry J. Kaiser, an American industrialist whose Kaiser Shipyard had built Liberty ships during World War II. Kaiser's project was to build ten thousand new houses a day, but he had changed his mind and decided to build cars instead. During the interview, Le Corbusier sympathised with Kaiser's problems of coordinating the adoption of equipment between the American and British armies because of the differences in units of length; and promoted his own "harmonious scale".  On the same trip he met with David E. Lilienthal of the Tennessee Valley Authority to promote the use of his "harmonious scale" on further civil engineering projects.  He also applied the principle of the Modulor to the efficient design of distribution crates in post war France.

Graphic representation.

The graphic representation of the Modulor, a stylised human figure with one arm raised, stands next to two vertical measurements, a red series based on the figure's navel height (1.08 m in the original version, 1.13 m in the revised version) and segmented according to Phi and a blue series based on the figure's entire height, double the navel height (2.16 m in the original version, 2.26 m in the revised), segmented similarly. A spiral, graphically developed between the red and blue segments, seems to mimic the volume of the human figure.  The Modulor 2 was drawn by André Maissonier and Justino Serralta.

Practical application.

Le Corbusier used his Modulor scale in the design of many buildings, including:

Unité d'Habitation à Marseille.

In his first book on the subject "The Modulor", Le Corbusier has a chapter on the use of the modular in the Unité d'Habitation. The modular governs: the plan, section and elevations; the brise-soleil; the roof; the supporting columns and the plan and section of the apartments. It was also used for the dimensions of the commemorative stone laid on 14 October 1947. A version of the Modulor Man was cast in concrete near the entrance.

Church of Sainte Marie de La Tourette.

In the Church of Sainte Marie de La Tourette Le Corbusier floors the majority of the church in pale concrete panels set to Modulor dimensions. Also, the engineer Iannis Xenakis applied the Modulor system to the design of the exterior vertical ventilators or "ondulatoires".

Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts.

In the Carpenter Center the Modulor system was used for the brise-soleil distances, the floor to floor heights, the bay distances and the column thicknesses. Le Corbusier conceived that the dimensioning of the entrance ramp would be ""visible essay on the mathematics of the human body"".

Publication.

Le Corbusier published "Le Modulor" in 1948, followed by "Modulor 2" in 1955. These works were first published in English as "The Modulor" in 1954 and "Modulor 2 (Let the User Speak Next)" in 1958.  The 2004 reprinted box set including both books was printed in a square format using the Modulor with the series twenty seven to one hundred and forty reduced in size to one tenth.

The Modulor is an anthropometric scale of proportions devised by the Swiss-born French architect Le Corbusier (1887–1965). It was developed as a visual bridge between two incompatible scales, the imperial and the metric system. It is based on the height of a man with his arm raised.


Career.

Born to an Italian American family, Peggy was discovered at age 13 singing at her cousin's wedding and was introduced to record producers Hugo & Luigi. They gave her the nickname Little Peggy March because she was only tall, she was only 13, the record she did with them was "Little Me," and her birthday was in March.  On April 24, 1963, her single "I Will Follow Him" soared to number one on the United States charts. She recorded the song in early January 1963 and it was released on January 22, when she was only 14. March became the youngest female artist with a number one hit, at 15, in late April 1963, a record that still stands for the "Billboard" Hot 100. The recording also reached number one in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Japan, and Scandinavia, although it failed to chart in the United Kingdom. It was a translation of the French song "Chariot" recorded a year earlier by Petula Clark. March also became the first white female solo artist to hit #1 on the "Billboard" R&B chart. March's success also came with financial trouble. She was a minor and the "Coogan Law" prevented her parents from managing her money. The responsibility was placed on her manager, Russell Smith. It was discovered in 1966 that he had squandered the fortune, leaving her with $500. Peggy graduated from Lansdale Catholic High School in 1966.  Although she is remembered in the United States by some as a one-hit wonder, her singles, "I Wish I Were a Princess" and "Hello Heartache, Goodbye Love". made the Top 30 in the United States, with the latter also reaching #29 on the UK Singles Chart. As with many American artists, March's career in her native United States was derailed in part by the British Invasion pushing many American acts out of popularity, and she had no hits there once the Invasion began in 1964. Recording for RCA Victor, March made 18 singles from 1964 to 1971. She also cut several albums, none of which sold well in the United States. She began having a strong presence in the European and Asian music markets and moved to Germany in 1969. She won the Deutscher Schlager Contest in 1965 and her song "Mit 17 hat man noch Träume" ("At 17 you still have dreams") placed No. 2 in the German Singles Chart. This was followed by German songs like "In der Carnaby Street", "Einmal verliebt — immer verliebt", "Hey, Romeo und Julia" ("On Carnaby Street, Once in Love-Always in Love, Hey, Romeo and Juliet"... No. 1 in German Charts), "Der Schuster macht schöne Schuhe" ("'The Cobbler Makes Beautiful Shoes"), "Telegramm aus Tennessee", "Die Maschen der Männer" and "Das sind die Träume, die man so träumt". Her commercial success in Germany continued through much of the 1970s; she tried her luck in representing Germany in the Eurovision Song Contest in 1969, only to be placed second in the national final with the song "Hey! Das ist Musik für mich". March made another Eurovision attempt in 1975, when she performed the Ralph Siegel composition "Alles geht vorüber" in the German national contest. Again, she was placed second.  In 1979, she experimented with disco on the album "Electrifying", but it failed to achieve commercial success. By 1981 record companies did not renew her contracts, and she moved back to the United States. In 1984, however, Jermaine Jackson and Pia Zadora achieved a major European hit single with the track "When the Rain Begins to Fall", co-written by March. Although not a hit in the UK or in the US, it went to #1 in Germany, France, the Netherlands and Switzerland. In 1998, the song entered the German Top 10 again when covered by rapper Pappa Bear. The cult film "Hairspray" featured "I Wish I Were a Princess" in 1988, and a retro fad in Germany brought her some continuing success starting in the mid-1990s with the album "Die Freiheit Frau zu sein" (1995). Her song "I Will Follow Him" was featured in the 1992 movie "Sister Act".  March currently works largely in Germany and in the Las Vegas music scene and has also performed at Dick Clark's American Bandstand Theater in Branson, Missouri. In 2004 she was the headliner in Riff Markowitz's Fabulous Palm Springs Follies at the Plaza Theater in Palm Springs, California. In 2005, she released an album of standards, "Get Happy", followed by the album "Meine Liebe ist stark genug" (2008).  In March 2010, March went into the recording studio to record her first album of new, original material in English in over 30 years. A collaboration with Scandinavian songwriter and producer Soren Jensen, the album "Always and Forever" was released on October 13, 2010. It was followed by a special edition for the German-speaking countries in April 2012, including two duets with the Dutch singer José Hoebee, one of them being a cover version of "I Will Follow Him"; which had also been a #1 single in the Netherlands and Belgium for Hoebee in 1982 (March further recorded a subsequent recording in 2012 for a 2013 release to commemorate the song's 50th anniversary). March also recorded another version of "When The Rain Begins To Fall", as a duet with the German singer Andreas Zaron.

Personal life.

In 1969, March married Arnie Harris, her longtime manager. They had one daughter, Sande Ann, born in 1974. In 2013, March's husband died. After living in Germany for some time, in 1999, March moved to Florida.

Peggy March (born Margaret Annemarie Battavio, March 8, 1948 in Lansdale, Pennsylvania) is an American pop singer. In the United States, she is primarily known for her 1963 million-selling song "I Will Follow Him". Although she is sometimes remembered as a one-hit wonder, she continued to have success in Europe well into the 1970s.


Networks.

There are two primary subway operators in Tokyo: , the combined subway network of the Tokyo and Toei metros comprises 278 stations and 13 lines covering a total system length of. The Tokyo Metro and Toei networks together carry a combined average of over eight million passengers daily. Despite being ranked first in worldwide subway usage, subways make up a small fraction of heavy rail rapid transit in Tokyo alone—only 274 out of 882 railway stations, as of 2007. The Tokyo subway at 8.7 million daily passengers only represents 22% of Tokyo's 40 million daily rail passengers (see Transport in Greater Tokyo). Other urban commuter rail systems include Keihin Electric Express Railway, Keio Corporation, Keisei Electric Railway, Odakyu Electric Railway, Seibu Railway, Tobu Railway and Tokyu Corporation.  In addition, but not formally designated as subways:  The Yokohama Subway and the Minatomirai Line also operate in the Greater Tokyo Area, but they are not directly connected to the Tokyo subway network. However, direct through services from the Tokyo Metro Fukutoshin Line regularly run into Yokohama's Minatomirai Line via the Tōkyū Tōyoko Line railway. On special occasions, typically around holidays, the Tokyo Metro Hibiya Line and Namboku Line operate special "Minatomirai" (みなとみらい号), formerly known as "Yokohama Mirai" (横浜みらい号), direct through services to the Minatomirai Line.

System administration.

Both the Tokyo Metro and Toei Subway systems are closely integrated with a unified system of line colors, line codes, and station numbers. However, the separate administration of metro systems has some ramifications:

Reciprocal operation.

As is common with Japanese subway systems, many above-ground and underground lines in the Greater Tokyo Area operate through services with the Tokyo Metro and Toei lines. In a broader sense they are considered a part of the Tokyo subway network, allowing it to reach farther out into the suburbs.

1995 sarin attack.

In 1995, Aum Shinri Kyo, a doomsday cult, attacked the subway system with sarin nerve gas at Kasumigaseki Station and a few others, leading to 13 deaths and over 5,000 people injured.

The is a part of the extensive rapid transit system that consists of Tokyo Metro and the Toei Subway in the Greater Tokyo area of Japan. While the subway system itself is largely within the city center, the lines extend far out via extensive through services onto suburban railway lines.


Contents.

Personal messages.

Every person is invited to contribute to the time capsule. The contribution deadline was originally 31 December 2009, but, it has been extended to end of 2014. Messages can be posted via the project's website or sent by postal mail. The organizers encourage everybody to gather messages from children, senior citizens, and the illiterate so that every culture and demographic on Earth is represented. The organization says, "All the messages received, without undergoing any censorship, will be embarked aboard KEO." The satellite has enough capacity to carry a four-page message from each of the more than six billion (as of the original 2009 deadline) inhabitants on the planet. Once the satellite is launched, the messages will be made freely available on the web.

Other contents.

KEO will also carry samples of air, sea water, earth, and a diamond that encases a drop of human blood chosen at random with the DNA of the human genome engraved on one of its facets. The satellite will also carry an astronomical clock that shows the current rotation rates of several pulsars, photographs of people of all cultures, and "the contemporary Library of Alexandria", an encyclopedic compendium of current human knowledge.

Technical aspects.

The messages and library will be encoded in glass-made radiation-resistant DVDs. Symbolic instructions in several formats will show the future finders how to build a DVD reader.  The satellite itself is a hollow sphere 80 cm in diameter. The sphere is engraved with a map of Earth and surrounded by an aluminium layer, a thermal layer and several layers of titanium and other heavy materials intertwined with vacuum. The sphere is resistant to cosmic radiation, atmosphere re-entry, space junk impacts, etc. For its first few years in orbit, KEO will sport a pair of wings 10 meters across that will aid in its spotting from Earth. As the satellite enters the atmosphere, the thermal layer will produce an artificial aurora to give a signal of the satellite's re-entry. The passive satellite will not carry any communications or propulsion systems. It will be launched by an Ariane 5 rocket into an orbit 1,800 km high, an altitude that will bring it back to Earth in 500 centuries, the same amount of time that has elapsed since early humans started to draw on cavern walls.

Project history.

The project KEO was conceived in 1994 by French artist-scientist Jean-Marc Philippe, a pioneer of space art.  Jean-Marc Philippe (died 12 November 2008) was the creator of KEO, a proposed space time capsule.  Philippe held a degree in geophysics and also worked as a painter. He was a member of the European Academy of Science, Art and Literature and of the International Society for Art, Science and Technology (Berkeley), and the winner of many international prizes.  After his death, messages began to be collected, and an initial launch date was set for 2001. Technical feasibility demonstration and other various delays have moved the launch date to 2019.

Similar projects.

Several previous spacecraft have included time capsules for humans (or aliens) in the far future. Part of the Apollo 11 Lunar Module, still on the moon, includes a plaque showing the arrangement of the Earth's continents in 1969. The LAGEOS satellite (which will re-enter the atmosphere in 8.4 million years) contains a plaque showing the arrangement of the Earth's continents in the past, present, and future. Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11 both contain plaques that give pictorial information about their time and place of origin. Most famously, the two Voyager spacecraft each contain a golden record that contains pictures and sounds of Earth, along with symbolic directions for playing the record and data detailing the location of Earth. The Pioneers and Voyagers have left the solar system for interstellar space. In 2004, the Long Now Foundation produced a nickel disk containing parallel texts in over a thousand languages, which was launched aboard the Rosetta.

KEO is the name of a proposed space time capsule which was to have been launched in 2003 carrying messages from the citizens of present Earth to humanity 50,000 years from now, when it would re-enter Earth's atmosphere. It was later delayed to 2006, then to 2007/2008, 2010/2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, followed by 2015/2016. Currently the KEO website cites 2019 as its launch, however, no actual date is set and information about its launch is vague.


History.

The "Bohemian Chronicle" of Václav Hájek records Slaný as having been founded in 750, at the site of a salt spring below Slaný Hill ("slaný" is Czech for "salty").  The town grew as a result of its location on the trade route between Prague and Saxony. The Benedictines established a hospital here in 1136, together with a church dedicated to St. Gotthard. It was this large presence of the church, and the unconsolidated state of landed property that went with it, that allowed king Wenceslas II to charter Slaný as a town and give his royal assent to its Magdeburg rights only sometime in the decade after 1295. In 1348, an earthquake damaged the now-fortified town; in 1371, a large fire broke out, and the church had to be rebuilt.  Slaný was captured by the Taborites in 1425 during the Hussite Wars, and remained in their hands until 1434. Not only did the Benedictine monks have to leave — this town by the hill was also one of Hussite holy cities, and their preachers expected it to survive the anticipated end of the world. Later, the Hussite king George of Poděbrady gave Slaný many privileges, after the town had supported his election to the throne. The town also participated in the Bohemian Revolt that opened the Thirty Years' War, housing the family of king Frederick I of the Palatinate. After the battle of White Mountain, that meant a defeat for the cause, the town suffered as a result of the ravages of war. Afterwards, the new Catholic possessors of Slaný, the Martinic, erected many a baroque church and edifice that, together with a new monastery, adorn the town to this day.  Since the middle of the 19th century, Czech has been the dominant language there. Industrial development was delayed until around 1860. An important engineering factory was built in 1872 and more followed. A factory producing batteries was founded in 1918. The infrastructure and amenities of a modern town have been gradually added since the second half of the 19th century.

Slaný today.

The villages of Dolín, Želevčice, Lotouš, Blahotice, Netovice, Kvíc, Kvíček, Trpoměchy and Otruby are all administrative parts of Slaný.  The town of Slaný is situated at the crossing of the Prague - Louny, Prague - Karlovy Vary roads. The Prague - Most railway also goes through the town.

Twin towns — sister cities.

Slaný is twinned with:

The Royal town of Slaný (; ) is a town in the Central Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic, located about 25 km northwest of Prague. The town is part of the Prague metropolitan area.


Description.

A study into the Taos Hum indicated that at least two percent could hear it; each hearer at a different frequency between 32 Hz and 80 Hz, modulated from 0.5 to 2 Hz. Similar results have been found in an earlier British study. It seems to be possible for hearers to move away from it, with one hearer of the Taos Hum reporting its range was. There are approximately equal percentages of male and female hearers. Age does appear to be a factor, with middle aged people being more likely to hear it.  In 2006, Tom Moir, then of Massey University in Auckland, New Zealand, believes he has made several recordings of the Auckland Hum. His previous research using simulated sounds had indicated that the hum was around 56 hertz.  There is skepticism as to whether it exists as a physical sound. In 2009, the head of audiology at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, David Baguley, said he believed people's problems with the hum were based on the physical world about one-third of the time, and stemmed from people focusing too keenly on innocuous background sounds the other two-thirds of the time. His current research focuses on using psychology and relaxation techniques to minimise distress, which can lead to a quieting or even removal of the noise.  Geoff Leventhall, a noise and vibration expert, has suggested cognitive behavioral therapy may be effective in helping those affected. "It's a question of whether you tense up to the noise or are relaxed about it. The CBT was shown to work, by helping people to take a different attitude to it."

History.

There has been little mainstream attention. Only a handful of articles have been published in scientific literature, including: Leventhall, 2004, 2003; Cowan, 2003; Mullins & Kelly, 1998, 1995; Broner, 1978; Vasudevan & Gordon, 1977. Other publications include: Fox, 1989; Wilson, 1979; Hanlon, 1973.  The Hum has been reported worldwide.

Possible explanations.

Mechanical devices.

Although an obvious candidate, given the common description of the hum as sounding like a diesel engine, the majority of reported hums have not been traced to a specific mechanical source.  In the case of Kokomo, Indiana, a city with heavy industry, the origin of the hum was thought to have been traced to two sources. The first was a 36-hertz tone from a cooling tower at the local DaimlerChrysler casting plant and the second was a 10-hertz tone from an air compressor intake at the Haynes International plant. After those devices were corrected, however, reports of the hum persisted.  Two hums have been linked to mechanical sources. The West Seattle Hum was traced to a vacuum pump used by CalPortland to offload cargo from ships. After CalPortland replaced the silencers on the machine, reports of the hum ceased. Likewise, the Wellington Hum is thought to have been due to the diesel generator on a visiting ship. A 35 Hz hum in Windsor, Ontario, is likely to have originated from a steelworks on the industrial zone of Zug Island near Detroit.  One hum in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina was suspected of originating at a Santee Cooper substation almost 2 miles away from the home of a couple who first reported it. The substation is home to the largest transformer in the state. One local couple sued the power company for the disruption the hum was causing them. The hum was louder inside their house than out, in part, they believed, because their house vibrated in resonance to the 60 Hz hum. The volume of the hum was measured at up to 64.1 dB in the couple's home.  Some sources claim that very low frequency radio waves or extremely low frequency radio waves that are used to communicate with submarines might be the source for the hum.

Tinnitus.

A suggested diagnosis of tinnitus, a self-reported disturbance of the auditory system, is used by some physicians in response to complaints about the Hum. Tinnitus is generated internally by the auditory and nervous systems, with no external stimulus.  While the Hum is hypothesized by some to be a form of low frequency tinnitus such as the venous hum, some report it is not internal, being worse inside their homes than outside. However, others insist that it is equally bad indoors and outdoors. Some people notice the Hum only at home, while others hear it everywhere they go. Some sufferers report that it is made worse by soundproofing (e.g., double glazing), which serves only to decrease other environmental noise, thus making the Hum more apparent.  Tinnitus is known to be exacerbated by allergens, which are regional and seasonal. Due to blockages, inflammation, and pressure inside the head, taking allergy medicine may help to mitigate the Hum.

Spontaneous otoacoustic emissions.

Human ears generate their own noises, called spontaneous otoacoustic emissions (SOAE). Various studies have shown that 38–60% of adults with normal hearing have them, although the majority are unaware of these sounds. The people who do hear these sounds typically hear a faint hissing (cicada insect like sound), buzzing or ringing, especially if they are otherwise in complete silence.  Researchers who looked at the Taos Hum considered otoacoustic emissions as a possibility.

Animals.

One of the many possible causes of the West Seattle Hum considered was that it was related to the midshipman fish, also known as a toadfish. A previous hum in Sausalito, California, also on the west coast of the United States, was determined to be the mating call of the male midshipman. However, in that case the hum was resonating through houseboat hulls and affecting the people living on those boats. In the West Seattle case, the University of Washington researcher determined that it would be impossible for any resonating hum, transmitted via tanker or boat hulls, to be transmitted very far inland; certainly not far enough to account for the reports.  The Scottish Association for Marine Science hypothesised that the nocturnal humming sound heard in Hythe, Hampshire in the UK could be produced by a similar "sonic" fish. The council believed this to be unlikely because such fish are not commonly found in inshore waters of the UK. As of February 2014, the source had not been located, although the sound has now been recorded.  A case of "hum" in a house, reported in the "Daily Telegraph"<nowiki>'</nowiki>s 'Letters from Readers' on 18 January 2018, proved to be a wasps' nest in a hollow wall.

Media coverage.

The Taos Hum was featured on the TV show "Unsolved Mysteries". It was also featured in "LiveScience"'s "Top Ten Unexplained Phenomena", where it took tenth place.  BBC Radio 4 in the UK featured an investigation of the Hum phenomena in their "Punt PI" fact-based comedy programme.

The Hum is a name often given to widespread reports of a persistent and invasive low-frequency humming, rumbling, or droning noise not audible to all people. Hums have been widely reported by national media in the UK and the United States, and sometimes named according to the locality where the problem has been particularly publicized: e.g., the "Bristol Hum", the "Taos Hum" and the "Windsor Hum."


History.

Hydroxylamine was first prepared as hydroxylamine hydrochloride in 1865 by the German chemist Wilhelm Clemens Lossen (1838-1906); he reacted tin and hydrochloric acid in the presence of ethyl nitrate. It was first prepared in pure form in 1891 by the Dutch chemist Lobry de Bruyn and by the French chemist Léon Maurice Crismer (1858-1944).

Production.

NHOH can be produced via several routes. The main route is via the Raschig process: aqueous ammonium nitrite is reduced by HSO and SO at 0 °C to yield a hydroxylamido-N,N-disulfonate anion: This anion is then hydrolyzed to give :  Solid NHOH can be collected by treatment with liquid ammonia. Ammonium sulfate,, a side-product insoluble in liquid ammonia, is removed by filtration; the liquid ammonia is evaporated to give the desired product.  The net reaction is:  Hydroxylammonium salts can then be converted to hydroxylamine by neutralization: Julius Tafel discovered that hydroxylamine hydrochloride or sulfate salts can be produced by electrolytic reduction of nitric acid with HCl or HSO respectively:  Hydroxylamine can also be produced by the reduction of nitrous acid or potassium nitrite with bisulfite:

Reactions.

Hydroxylamine reacts with electrophiles, such as alkylating agents, which can attach to either the oxygen or the nitrogen atoms:  The reaction of NHOH with an aldehyde or ketone produces an oxime. This reaction is useful in the purification of ketones and aldehydes: if hydroxylamine is added to an aldehyde or ketone in solution, an oxime forms, which generally precipitates from solution; heating the precipitate with an inorganic acid then restores the original aldehyde or ketone.  Oximes, e.g., dimethylglyoxime, are also employed as ligands.  NHOH reacts with chlorosulfonic acid to give hydroxylamine-"O"-sulfonic acid, a useful reagent for the synthesis of caprolactam. The hydroxylamine-"O"-sulfonic acid, which should be stored at 0 °C to prevent decomposition, can be checked by iodometric titration.  Hydroxylamine (NHOH), or hydroxylamines (R-NHOH) can be reduced to amines.  Hydroxylamine explodes with heat:  The high reactivity comes in part from the partial isomerisation of the NHOH structure to ammonia oxide (also known as azane oxide), with structure NHO.

Functional group.

Substituted derivatives of hydroxylamine are known. If the hydroxyl hydrogen is substituted, this is called an "O"-hydroxylamine, if one of the amine hydrogens is substituted, this is called an "N"-hydroxylamine. In general "N"-hydroxylamines are the more common. Similarly to ordinary amines, one can distinguish primary, secondary and tertiary hydroxylamines, the latter two referring to compounds where two or three hydrogens are substituted, respectively. Examples of compounds containing a hydroxylamine functional group are "N"-"tert"-butyl-hydroxylamine or the glycosidic bond in calicheamicin. "N","O"-Dimethylhydroxylamine is a coupling agent, used to synthesize Weinreb amides. The most common method for the synthesis of substituted hydroxylamines is the oxidation of an amine with benzoyl peroxide. Some care must be taken to prevent over-oxidation to a nitrone. Other methods include:

Uses.

Hydroxylamine and its salts are commonly used as reducing agents in myriad organic and inorganic reactions. They can also act as antioxidants for fatty acids. In the synthesis of nylon 6, cyclohexanone (1) is first converted to its oxime (2); treatment of this oxime with acid induces the Beckmann rearrangement to give caprolactam (3):  The nitrate salt, hydroxylammonium nitrate, is being researched as a rocket propellant, both in water solution as a monopropellant and in its solid form as a solid propellant.  This has also been used in the past by biologists to introduce random mutations by switching base pairs from G to A, or from C to T. This is to probe functional areas of genes to elucidate what happens if their functions are broken. Nowadays other mutagens are used.  Hydroxylamine can also be used to highly selectively cleave asparaginyl-glycine peptide bonds in peptides and proteins. It also bonds to and permanently disables (poisons) heme-containing enzymes. It is used as an irreversible inhibitor of the oxygen-evolving complex of photosynthesis on account of its similar structure to water. An alternative industrial synthesis of paracetamol developed by Hoechst–Celanese involves the conversion of ketone to a ketoxime with hydroxylamine.  Some non-chemical uses include removal of hair from animal hides and photographic developing solutions. In the semiconductor industry, hydroxylamine is often a component in the "resist stripper", which removes photoresist after lithography.

Safety and environmental concerns.

Hydroxylamine may explode on heating. The nature of the explosive hazard is not well understood. At least two factories dealing in hydroxylamine have been destroyed since 1999 with loss of life. It is known, however, that ferrous and ferric iron salts accelerate the decomposition of 50% NHOH solutions. Hydroxylamine and its derivatives are more safely handled in the form of salts.  It is an irritant to the respiratory tract, skin, eyes, and other mucous membranes. It may be absorbed through the skin, is harmful if swallowed, and is a possible mutagen.  Cytochrome P460, an enzyme found in the ammonia-oxidizing bacteria "Nitrosomonas europea", can convert hydroxylamine to nitrous oxide, a potent greenhouse gas.

Hydroxylamine is an inorganic compound with the formula NHOH. The pure material is a white, unstable crystalline, hygroscopic compound. However, hydroxylamine is almost always provided and used as an aqueous solution. It is used to prepare oximes, an important functional group. It is also an intermediate in biological nitrification. In biological nitrification, the oxidation of NH to hydroxylamine is mediated by the enzyme ammonia monooxygenase (AMO). Hydroxylamine oxidoreductase (HAO) further oxidizes hydroxylamine to nitrite.


Design.

Most volume-manager implementations share the same basic design. They start with physical volumes (PVs), which can be either hard disks, hard disk partitions, or Logical Unit Numbers (LUNs) of an external storage device. Volume management treats each PV as being composed of a sequence of chunks called physical extents (PEs). Some volume managers (such as that in HP-UX and Linux) have PEs of a uniform size; others (such as that in Veritas) have variably-sized PEs that can be split and merged at will.  Normally, PEs simply map one-to-one to logical extents (LEs). With mirroring, multiple PEs map to each LE. These PEs are drawn from a physical volume group (PVG), a set of same-sized PVs which act similarly to hard disks in a RAID1 array. PVGs are usually laid out so that they reside on different disks or data buses for maximum redundancy.  The system pools LEs into a "volume group" (VG). The pooled LEs can then be concatenated together into virtual disk partitions called logical volumes or LVs. Systems can use LVs as raw block devices just like disk partitions: creating mountable file systems on them, or using them as swap storage.  Striped LVs allocate each successive LE from a different PV; depending on the size of the LE, this can improve performance on large sequential reads by bringing to bear the combined read-throughput of multiple PVs.  Administrators can grow LVs (by concatenating more LEs) or shrink them (by returning LEs to the pool). The concatenated LEs do not have to be contiguous. This allows LVs to grow without having to move already-allocated LEs. Some volume managers allow the re-sizing of LVs in either direction while online. Changing the size of the LV does not necessarily change the size of a file system on it; it merely changes the size of its containing space. A file system that can be resized online is recommended in that it allows the system to adjust its storage on-the-fly without interrupting applications.  PVs and LVs cannot be shared between or span different VGs (although some volume managers may allow moving them at will between VGs on the same host). This allows administrators conveniently to bring VGs online, to take them offline or to move them between host systems as a single administrative unit.  VGs can grow their storage pool by absorbing new PVs or shrink by retracting from PVs. This may involve moving already-allocated LEs out of the PV. Most volume managers can perform this movement online; if the underlying hardware is hot-pluggable this allows engineers to upgrade or replace storage without system downtime.

Concepts.

Hybrid volume.

A hybrid volume is any volume that intentionally and opaquely makes use of two separate physical volumes. For instance, a workload may consist of random seeks so an SSD may be used to permanently store frequently used or recently written data, while using higher-capacity rotational magnetic media for long-term storage of rarely needed data. On Linux, bcache or dm-cache may be used for this purpose, while Fusion Drive may be used on OS X. ZFS also implements this functionality at the file system level, by allowing administrators to configure multi-level read/write caching.  Hybrid volumes present a similar concept as hybrid drives, which also combine solid-state storage and rotational magnetic media.

Snapshots.

Some volume managers also implement snapshots by applying copy-on-write to each LE. In this scheme, the volume manager will copy the LE to a "copy-on-write table" just before it is written to. This preserves an old version of the LV, the snapshot, which may be later reconstructed by overlaying the copy-on-write table atop the current LV. Unless the volume management supports both thin provisioning and discard, once an LE in the origin volume is written to, it is permanently stored in the snapshot volume. If the snapshot volume was made smaller than its origin, which is a common practice, this may render the snapshot inoperable.  Snapshots can be useful for backing up self-consistent versions of volatile data such as table files from a busy database, or for rolling back large changes (such as an operating system upgrade) in a single operation. Snapshots have a similar effect as rendering storage quiescent, and are similar to the shadow copy (VSS) service in Microsoft Windows.  Some Linux-based Live CDs also use snapshots to simulate read-write access to a read-only optical disc.

Disadvantages.

Logical volumes can suffer from external fragmentation when the underlying storage devices do not allocate their PEs contiguously. This can reduce I/O performance on slow-seeking media such as magnetic disks and other rotational media. Volume managers that use fixed-size PEs, however, typically make PEs relatively large (for example, Linux LVM uses 4 MB by default) in order to amortize the cost of these seeks.  With implementations that are solely volume management, such as Core Storage and Linux LVM, separating and abstracting away volume management from the file system loses the ability to easily make storage decisions for particular files or directories. For example, if a certain directory (but not the entire file system) is to be permanently moved to faster storage, both the file system layout and the underlying volume management layer need to be traversed. For example, on Linux it would be needed to manually determine the offset of a file's contents within a file system and then manually the extents (along with data not related to that file) to the faster storage. Having volume and file management implemented within the same subsystem, instead of having them implemented as separate subsystems, makes the overall process theoretically simpler.

In computer storage, logical volume management or LVM provides a method of allocating space on mass-storage devices that is more flexible than conventional partitioning schemes to store volumes. In particular, a volume manager can concatenate, stripe together or otherwise combine partitions (or block devices in general) into larger virtual partitions that administrators can re-size or move, potentially without interrupting system use.


History.

Vercellae (or "Vercelum") was the capital of the "Libici" or "Lebecili", a Ligurian tribe; it became an important municipium, near which Gaius Marius defeated the Cimbri and the Teutones in the Battle of Vercellae in 101 BC.  The imperial magister militum Flavius Stilicho annihilated the Goths there 500 years later. It was half ruined in St. Jerome's time ("olim potens, nunc raro habitatore semiruta" (1, 3.1)). After the Lombard invasion it belonged to the Duchy of Ivrea. From 885 it was under the jurisdiction of the prince-bishop, who was a Count of the Empire.  It became an independent commune in 1120, and joined the first and second Lombard leagues. Its statutes are among the most interesting of those of the medieval republics. In 1197 they abolished the servitude of the glebe. In 1228 the University of Pavia was transferred to Vercelli, where it remained till the fourteenth century, but without gaining much prominence; only a university school of law has been maintained.  In 1307, Fra Dolcino, the leader of the Dulcinian was tortured and burned at the stake.  During the troubles of the 13th century it fell into the power of the Della Torre of Milan (1263), of the Marquesses of Monferrato (1277), who appointed Matteo I Visconti captain (1290–1299). The Tizzoni (Ghibellines) and Avogadri (Guelphs) disputed the city from 1301 to 1334. The Guelphs were expelled several times, enabling the Marquess of Monferrato to take Vercelli (1328), which voluntarily placed itself under the Viscount of Milan in 1334. In 1373, Bishop Giovanni Fieschi expelled the Visconti, but Matteo reconquered the city. Facino Cane (1402), profiting by the strife between Giovanni Maria and Filippo Maria Visconti, took Vercelli, but was driven out by Theodore II of Montferrat (1404), from whom the city passed to the dukes of Savoy (1427).  In 1499 and 1553 Vercelli was captured by the French, and in 1616 and 1678 by the Spaniards. In 1704 it sustained an energetic siege by the French, who failed to destroy the fortress, after which it shared the fortunes of Savoy. In 1821 Vercelli rose in favour of the Constitution.

Main sights.

Vercelli is home to numerous relics of the Roman period, e.g. an amphitheatre, hippodrome, sarcophagi, and many important inscriptions, some of which are Christian.  There are seven noteworthy towers in the town, most important are the "Torre dell’Angelo", which rears up over the old market square, and the "Torre di Città "in Via Gioberti.  Vercelli Cathedral, formerly adorned with precious pillars and mosaics, was erected and enlarged by Saint Eusebius of Vercelli, to whom it was dedicated after his death. It was remodeled as of the ninth century, and radically changed in the eighteenth by Count Alfieri. Like the other churches in the city, it contains valuable paintings, especially those of Gaudenzio Ferrari, Gerolamo Giovenone and Bernardino Lanino, who were natives of Vercelli.  The cathedral's Capitulary Library contains valuable manuscripts. Its religious texts include the Codex Vercellensis, an evangelarium of the fourth century; hagiographical manuscripts, not all of which have been critically examined; and a very old copy of the "Imitation of Christ", which is relied upon as an argument for attributing the authorship to John Gersen. Its secular texts include the "Novels" of Justinian; and the 8th-century "Leges Langobardorum" (Laws of the Lombards - Germanic). Finally it contains the famous Vercelli Book — an Old English manuscript which includes the celebrated alliterative poem "The Dream of the Rood". The civil archives are not less important, and contain documents dating from 882.  The Basilica di Sant'Andrea was erected by Cardinal Guala Bicchieri in 1219. Together with the old Cistercian monastery, it is one of the most beautiful and best-preserved Romanesque monuments in Italy. Among other noteworthy churches in the city is the "Santa Maria Maggiore".  Vercelli's synagogue, an example of Moorish Revival architecture, is located at Via Foà 70 and the city's Jewish cemetery at Corso Randaccio 24. On 23 November 2013, after what was believed to be an antisemitic act, two swastikas were found sprayed on its walls.  The Institute of the Beaux-Arts contains paintings by Vercellese artists.  Ancient charitable institutions continue, such as the hospital founded by Cardinal Guala Bicchieri (1224), which has an annual revenue of more than 600,000 lire ($117,000); and the hospices for orphan girls (1553) and for boys (1542), and mendicant homes.  Vercelli is the seat of the Viotti International Music Competition.

Demographics.

In 2007, 44,475 people were recorded as residing in Vercelli, of whom 47.3% were male and 52.7% were female. Minors (children aged 18 and younger) totaled 14.41% of the population and pensioners 25.83%; the overall national averages are, respectively, 18.06% and 19.94%. The average age of a Vercelli resident was 47 (five years more than the national average of 42) and the birth rate was 8.69 births per 1,000 inhabitants (national average 9.45 births per 1,000 inhabitants). In the five years between 2002 and 2007, the population of Vercelli declined by 1.31% while the national population grew by 3.56%. , 92.38% of the population was Italian. The remainder were Albanian and Romanian (3.48%), North African (2.21%) and Sub-Saharan (0.64%). Approximately 1 in 6 babies born in Vercelli has a least one foreign parent.

Cuisine.

The typical dish is rice with beans, called "panissa" ("made with Arborio, Baldo or Maratelli rice"), the "tartufata" (cake) and the "bicciolani" a type of biscuits. The typical wine is Gattinara DOCG, a classic red wine of Piedmont made principally from the nebbiolo grape (known locally as "spanna") from the "comune" of Gattinara, where there is archaeological evidence of vines being grown in Roman times.

Sport.

Unione Sportiva Pro Vercelli that was one of the most successful football clubs in Italy in the early 20th century, winning the national championship seven times between 1908 and 1922. However, in the summer 2010 it was not admitted to the league due to heavy debt.  A.S. Pro Belvedere Vercelli to continue the glorious history of the club, has changed its name to the F.C. Pro Vercelli 1892. Currently it plays in the Serie C.

Vercelli (; ), is a city and "comune" of 46.552 inhabitants (1-1-2017) in the Province of Vercelli, Piedmont, northern Italy. One of the oldest urban sites in northern Italy, it was founded, according to most historians, around the year 600 BC.


Description.

The twin statues depict Amenhotep III (fl. 14th century BC) in a seated position, his hands resting on his knees and his gaze facing eastwards (actually ESE in modern bearings) towards the river. Two shorter figures are carved into the front throne alongside his legs: these are his wife Tiye and mother Mutemwiya. The side panels depict the Nile god Hapi.  The statues are made from blocks of quartzite sandstone which was quarried at el-Gabal el-Ahmar (near modern-day Cairo) and transported overland to Thebes (Luxor). The stones are believed to be too heavy to have been transported upstream on the Nile. The blocks used by later Roman engineers to reconstruct the northern colossus may have come from Edfu (north of Aswan). Including the stone platforms on which they stand – themselves about – the colossi reach a towering in height and weigh an estimated 720 tons each. The two figures are about apart.  Both statues are quite damaged, with the features above the waist virtually unrecognizable. The southern statue comprises a single piece of stone, but the northern figure has a large extensive crack in the lower half and above the waist consists of 5 tiers of stone. These upper levels consist of a different type of sandstone, and are the result of a later reconstruction attempt, which William de Wiveleslie Abney attributed to Septimus Severus. It is believed that originally the two statues were identical to each other, although inscriptions and minor art may have varied.  The original function of the Colossi was to stand guard at the entrance to Amenhotep's memorial temple (or mortuary temple): a massive construct built during the pharaoh's lifetime, where he was worshipped as a god-on-earth both before and after his departure from this world. In its day, this temple complex was the largest and most opulent in Egypt. Covering a total of, even later rivals such as Ramesses II's Ramesseum or Ramesses III's Medinet Habu were unable to match it in area; even the Temple of Karnak, as it stood in Amenhotep's time, was smaller. With the exception of the Colossi, however, very little remains today of Amenhotep's temple. It stood on the edge of the Nile floodplain, and successive annual inundations gnawed away at its foundations – a famous 1840s lithograph by David Roberts shows the Colossi surrounded by water – and it was not unknown for later rulers to dismantle, purloin, and reuse portions of their predecessors' monuments.

Earthquakes.

Soon after its construction the temple was destroyed by an earthquake, recently dated by the Armenian Institute of Seismology to around 1200 BC, which left only the 2 huge colossi at the entrance still standing. These were further destroyed by an earthquake in 27 BC, after which they were partly reconstructed by the Roman authorities.  The 1200 BC earthquake also opened numerous chasms in the ground which meant that many statues were buried, some in pristine condition. These have been the subject of extensive restoration and excavation conducted by the Armenian/German archaeologist Hourig Sourouzian, who has revealed that the complex consisted of three pylons, each fronted by colossal statues, while at the far end a rectangular Temple complex consisted of a peristyle court surrounded by columns. So far four of the statues have been re-erected, with 8 waiting to be re-erected, while some 200 statues or pieces of statues are in the Luxor Museum, some on display, others in store awaiting conservation.

Name.

The modern Arabic name is Kom el-Hatan, but it is generally known by the Roman name as the Temple of Memnon. Memnon was a hero of the Trojan War, a King of Ethiopia who led his armies from Africa into Asia Minor to help defend the beleaguered city but was ultimately slain by Achilles. Memnon (whose name means or ) was said to be the son of Eos, the goddess of dawn. He was associated with colossi built several centuries earlier, because of the reported cry at dawn of the northern statue (see below), which became known as the. Eventually, the entire Theban Necropolis became generally referred to as the Memnonium making him "Ruler of the west" as in the case of the god Osiris who was called chief of the west.  in the 19th century, William de Wiveleslie Abney noted that "(t)he Arabs called these statues 'Shama' and 'Tama', and when speaking of them together gave them the appelation of Sanamât, or the idols."

Sounds.

In 27 BC, a large earthquake reportedly shattered the northern colossus, collapsing it from the waist up and cracking the lower half. Following its rupture, the remaining lower half of this statue was then reputed to "sing" on various occasions – always within an hour or two of sunrise, usually right at dawn. The sound was most often reported in February or March, but this is probably more a reflection of the tourist season rather than any actual pattern. The earliest report in literature is that of the Greek historian and geographer Strabo, who claimed to have heard the sound during a visit in 20 BC, by which time it apparently was already well known. The description varied; Strabo said it sounded "like a blow", Pausanias compared it to "the string of a lyre" breaking, but it also was described as the striking of brass or whistling. Other ancient sources include Pliny (not from personal experience, but he collected other reports), Pausanias, Tacitus, Philostratus and Juvenal. In addition, the base of the statue is inscribed with about 90 surviving inscriptions of contemporary tourists reporting whether they had heard the sound or not.  The legend of the "Vocal Memnon", the luck that hearing it was reputed to bring, and the reputation of the statue's oracular powers became known outside of Egypt, and a constant stream of visitors, including several Roman Emperors, came to marvel at the statues. The last recorded reliable mention of the sound dates from 196. Sometime later in the Roman era, the upper tiers of sandstone were added (the original remains of the top half have never been found); the date of this reconstruction is unknown, but local tradition places it circa 199, and attributes it to the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus in an attempt to curry favour with the oracle (it is known that he visited the statue but did not hear the sound).  Various explanations have been offered for the phenomenon; these are of two types: natural or man-made. Strabo himself apparently was too far away to be able to determine its nature: he reported that he could not determine if it came from the pedestal, the shattered upper area, or "the people standing around at the base". If natural, the sound was probably caused by rising temperatures and the evaporation of dew inside the porous rock. Similar sounds, although much rarer, have been heard from some of the other Egyptian monuments (Karnak is the usual location for more modern reports). Perhaps the most convincing argument against it being the result of human agents is that it did cease, probably due to the added weight of the reconstructed upper tiers.  A few mentions of the sound in the early modern era (late 18th and early 19th centuries) seem to be hoaxes, either by the writers or perhaps by locals perpetuating the phenomenon.  The "Vocal Memnon" features prominently in one scene of Henrik Ibsen's "Peer Gynt".  They also show up in Oscar Wilde's fairy tale "The Happy Prince."

The Colossi of Memnon ( or "es-Salamat") are two massive stone statues of the Pharaoh Amenhotep III, who reigned in Egypt during the Dynasty XVIII. Since 1350 BCE, they have stood in the Theban Necropolis, located west of the River Nile from the modern city of Luxor.


Biography.

Early years.

Born in the village of Dilyalevo, Vologda Governorate Russian Empire as the youngest of 11 children in a peasant family, the largely self-taught Ilyushin left home at an early age. He worked as a factory laborer, ditch-digger at construction sites, and cleaner of gutters at a dye plant in Petrograd. In 1910, he learned that jobs were available at Kolomyazhsky Racetrack as a groundskeeper. The racetrack was also the site of the first All-Russia Festival of Ballooning in autumn of 1910, and Ilyushin assisted in unpacking crates and setting up equipment. He was also able to meet many of Russia's pioneer aviators, an event that awoke his interest in aviation.  In 1911 he returned to his native village to work as a carter of a dairy plant. The following year, he worked as a construction worker for the Amur Railway, and in 1913 he was in Tallinn as a worker in a shipyard.  With the outbreak of World War I in 1914, Ilyushin was conscripted into the Imperial Russian Army, serving with the infantry, and later (as he was literate) as a clerk in the military administration of Vologda. When a request came for seven volunteers to serve in the fledgling Aviation Section, he was quick to volunteer. He worked at first as a mechanic and member of the ground crew. In the summer of 1917, he was qualified as a pilot.  In March 1918, with the withdrawal of the Provisional Government from the war, Ilyushin was demobilized and sent back to his native village. He helped supervise the increasing nationalization of factories in the area and in October 1918 joined the Bolshevik party. With the Russian Civil War, Ilyushin was drafted into the Red Army in May 1919, working as aviation technician of VVS RKKA (Red Army). That autumn, a White Movement Avro 504 biplane made a forced landing near Petrozavodsk. Ilyushin led a team which dismantled it, and sent it to Moscow where it was reverse-engineered into the Soviet U-1 trainer, of which 737 examples were subsequently built.

Work in aviation.

In the autumn of 1921 Ilyushin left military service; he entered the Institute of Engineers of the Red Air Fleet (renamed the Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy on 9 September 1922) on 21 September 1921. During his student years he concentrated on the design of gliders, taking part in numerous competitions. In 1925 one of his designs was sent to a competition in Germany, where it took first prize for flight time. Ilyushin obtained a degree in engineering in 1926 and served until November 1931 as an aeroplanes section manager within the, with involvement in the development of the design requirements for the new aeroplanes of Nikolai Nikolaevich Polikarpov and Andrei Tupolev. This time he was also appointed Assistant Chief of the Air Force Research and Test Institute. Upon his own request in November 1931 he was reassigned to TsAGI Design Bureau and worked there till 1933. In 1933 Ilyushin became chief of the which later grew into the Ilyushin OKB (the bureau behind all Soviet aircraft abbreviated IL-#, a military- and civil-aviation supergiant and major global brand) in 1935.  His single-engined Ilyushin Il-2 ground-attack aircraft, the single most-produced combat aircraft design in history (with 36,183 examples), and the Ilyushin Il-4 twin-engined bomber (of which just over 5,200 examples were built) were used extensively in World War II, on all fronts where the Soviets fought.  After the war, Ilyushin concentrated primarily on commercial airliners, such as the Ilyushin Il-18 and Ilyushin Il-62, which saw extensive use with Aeroflot and with numerous Soviet client states. In 1967 he was given the honorary rank of General-Colonel of Engineering/Technical Service. He became an Academician of the USSR Academy of Science in 1968. He remained the chief designer at the Ilyushin OKB until his retirement due to illness in 1970.  From 1937 to 1970 Ilyushin also served as a deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. He died in 1977 in Moscow and was buried in the Novodevichy Cemetery.

Sergey Vladimirovich Ilyushin (; – 9 February 1977) was a Soviet aircraft designer who founded the Ilyushin aircraft design bureau. He designed the Il-2 Shturmovik, which made its maiden flight in 1939. It is the most produced warplane, and remains the second most-produced aircraft in history, with some 36,000+ built, behind the US Cessna-172.


History.

Přemyslid fort.

The history of the castle began in 870 when its first walled building, the Church of the Virgin Mary, was built. The Basilica of Saint George and the Basilica of St. Vitus were founded under the reign of Vratislaus I, Duke of Bohemia and his son St. Wenceslas in the first half of the 10th century.  The first convent in Bohemia was founded in the castle, next to the church of St. George. A Romanesque palace was erected here during the 12th century.  Thirteenth-century Venetian coins found there were studied by numismatist, Zdenka Nemeškalová-Jiroudková.

Medieval castle.

King Ottokar II of Bohemia improved fortifications and rebuilt the royal palace for the purposes of representation and housing. In the 14th century, under the reign of Charles IV the royal palace was rebuilt in Gothic style and the castle fortifications were strengthened. In place of rotunda and basilica of St. Vitus began building of a vast Gothic church, that were completed almost six centuries later.  During the Hussite Wars and the following decades, the castle was not inhabited. In 1485, King Vladislaus II Jagiellon began to rebuild the castle. The massive Vladislav Hall (built by Benedikt Rejt) was added to the Royal Palace. New defence towers were also built on the north side of the castle.  A large fire in 1541 destroyed large parts of the castle. Under the Habsburgs, some new buildings in Renaissance style were added. Ferdinand I built the Belvedere as a summer palace for his wife Anne. Rudolph II used Prague Castle as his main residence. He founded the northern wing of the palace, with the Spanish Hall, where his precious art collections were exhibited.  The Third Defenestration of Prague in 1618 took place at the castle and began the Bohemian Revolt. During the subsequent wars, the Castle was damaged and dilapidated. Many works from the collection of Rudolph II were looted by Swedes in 1648, in the Battle of Prague (1648) which was the final act of the Thirty Years' War.  The last major rebuilding of the castle was carried out by Empress Maria Theresa in the second half of the 18th century. Following his abdication in 1848, and the succession of his nephew, Franz Joseph, to the throne, the former emperor, Ferdinand I, made Prague Castle his home.

Presidential residence.

In 1918, the castle became the seat of the president of the new Czechoslovak Republic, T.G. Masaryk. The New Royal Palace and the gardens were renovated by Slovenian architect Jože Plečnik. In this period the St. Vitus Cathedral was finished (on September 28, 1929). Renovations continued in 1936 under Plečnik's successor Pavel Janák.  On March 15, 1939, shortly after the Nazi Germany forced Czech President Emil Hacha (who suffered a heart attack during the negotiations) to hand his nation over to the Germans, Adolf Hitler spent a night in the Prague Castle, "proudly surveying his new possession." During the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia in World War II, Prague Castle became the headquarters of Reinhard Heydrich, the Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia. According to a popular rumor, he is said to have placed the Bohemian crown on his head; old legends say a usurper who places the crown on his head is doomed to die within a year. Less than a year after assuming power, on May 27, 1942, Heydrich was ambushed during Operation Anthropoid, by British-trained Slovak and Czech resistance soldiers while on his way to the Castle, and died of his wounds - which became infected - a week later. Klaus, his firstborn son, died the next year in a traffic accident, also in line with the legend.  After the liberation of Czechoslovakia and the coup in 1948, the Castle housed the offices of the communist Czechoslovak government. After Czechoslovakia split in 1993 into the Czech Republic and Slovakia, the castle became the seat of the Head of State of the new Czech Republic. Similar to what Masaryk did with Plečnik, president Václav Havel commissioned Bořek Šípek to be the architect of post-communism Prague Castle's necessary improvements, in particular of the facelift of the castle's gallery of paintings.

Architectural styles of Prague Castle.

The castle buildings represent virtually every architectural style of the last millennium. Prague Castle includes Gothic St. Vitus Cathedral, Romanesque Basilica of St. George, a monastery and several palaces, gardens and defense towers. Most of the castle areas are open to tourists. The castle houses several museums, including the National Gallery collection of Bohemian baroque and mannerism art, exhibition dedicated to Czech history, Toy Museum and the picture gallery of Prague Castle, based on the collection of Rudolph II. The Summer Shakespeare Festival regularly takes place in the courtyard of Burgrave Palace.  The neighborhood around Prague Castle is called Hradčany.

In popular culture.

Prague Castle is the location in the second level of "Indiana Jones and the Emperor's Tomb" video game.  It is also mentioned in the video game "Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag" as a hidden file found in a hacked computer at Abstergo Entertainment.  It is briefly shown in the Japanese manga and its anime adaptation "Monster" when some of the main characters visit Prague.  Prague Castle served as a Pit Stop for both the fifteenth season of the American "Amazing Race" and the first season of the Australian "Amazing Race".

Prague Castle (; ) is a castle complex in Prague, Czech Republic, built in the 9th century. It is the official office of the President of the Czech Republic. The castle was a seat of power for kings of Bohemia, Holy Roman emperors, and presidents of Czechoslovakia. The Bohemian Crown Jewels are kept within a hidden room inside it.


Early life.

Béart was born Emmanuelle Béhart-Hasson in St. Tropez (some sources say Gassin), on the French Riviera, the daughter of Geneviève Galéa, a former model who is of Croatian, Greek and Maltese descent, and Guy Béart, a singer and poet. Her Egyptian-born father's family was Lebanese-Jewish.  In her late teens, she spent her summer vacation with the English-speaking family of a close friend of her father in Montreal. She stayed with Beverly Mellen and William Sofin and their two children Andrew and Sean Sofin, who took her in as their own. At the end of the summer, the family invited her to stay with them and complete her baccalauréat at Collège international Marie de France. They have remained close friends.

Career.

Béart got an acting role in 1976 film "Tomorrow's Children". In her teens she appeared in bit parts in television. Upon graduating from the Collège International Marie de France in Montreal, she returned to France to attend drama school in Paris. A short time later, she was cast in her first adult role in a film, and in 1986 she achieved fame with her role opposite Yves Montand, playing the avenging daughter in French hit "Manon des Sources". For her performance, she won the 1987 César Award for Best Supporting Actress. In 1995, she won the Silver St. George for Best Actress award at the 19th Moscow International Film Festival for her starring role in film "A French Woman".  In addition to her award for Best Supporting Actress, she has also been nominated for another seven César Awards for Most Promising Actress and Best Actress. Béart received Most Promising Actress nominations for "A Strange Passion" and "Love on the Quiet"; followed by Best Actress nominations for "Children of Chaos", "La Belle Noiseuse (The Beautiful Troublemaker)", "Un cœur en hiver (A Heart in Winter)", "Nelly et Monsieur Arnaud (Nelly and Mr Arnaud)", and "Les Destinées Sentimentales (Sentimental Destinies)"  In the 5 May 2003 issue of the French edition of "Elle" magazine, Béart, aged 39, appeared nude: The entire run of 550,000 copies sold out in just three days, making it the biggest-selling issue in the fashion glossy's long history.

Personal life.

In the mid-1980s, Béart began a relationship with Daniel Auteuil (her co-star in "Love on the Quiet", "Manon des Sources", "A Heart in Winter" and "A French Woman"); they married in 1993 and divorced in 1995. Béart was romantically linked to music producer David François Moreau (since c. 1995 after she separated from Auteuil) and to film producer Vincent Meyer for two years until his suicide in May 2003. She has three children: Nelly Auteuil (born c. 1993), and Johan Moreau (born c. 1996). She married actor Michaël Cohen on 13 August 2008 at Genappe in Belgium, and in 2009 they adopted a child from Ethiopia, named Surafel. Béart and Cohen separated in 2011. In 2011, she began a romantic relationship with director and cinematographer Frédéric Chaudier.  In addition to her screen work, Béart is known for her social activism. She is an ambassador for UNICEF, and has made news for her opposition to France's anti-immigration legislation. In 1996, she made headlines when, defending the rights of the "sans-papiers" ("without papers", meaning illegal immigrants), she was removed after her group’s occupation of a Parisian church.  In March 2012, Béart spoke out against plastic surgery in "Le Monde", saying that she regretted having an operation on her lips in 1990 when she was 27.

Emmanuelle Béart (born 14 August 1963) is a French film actress, who has appeared in over 60 film and television productions since 1972. An eight-time César Award nominee, she won the César Award for Best Supporting Actress for the 1986 film "Manon des Sources". Her other film roles include "La Belle Noiseuse" (1991), "A Heart in Winter" (1992), "Nelly and Mr. Arnaud" (1995), "" (1996) and "8 Women" (2002).


History.

1920s.

The company was founded by Donald Wills Douglas Sr. on July 22, 1921 in Santa Monica, California, following dissolution of the Davis-Douglas Company. An early claim to fame was the first circumnavigation of the world by air in Douglas airplanes in 1924. In 1923, the U.S. Army Air Service was interested in carrying out a mission to circumnavigate the Earth for the first time by aircraft, a program called "World Flight". Donald Douglas proposed a modified Douglas DT to meet the Army's needs. The two-place, open cockpit DT biplane torpedo bomber had previously been produced for the U.S. Navy. The DTs were taken from the assembly lines at the company's manufacturing plants in Rock Island, Illinois and Dayton, Ohio to be modified. The modified aircraft known as the Douglas World Cruiser (DWC), also was the first major project for Jack Northrop who designed the fuel system for the series. After the prototype was delivered in November 1923, upon the successful completion of tests on 19 November, the Army commissioned Douglas to build four production series aircraft. Due to the demanding expedition ahead, spare parts, including 15 extra Liberty L-12 engines, 14 extra sets of pontoons, and enough replacement airframe parts for two more aircraft were chosen. These were sent to airports along the route. The last of these aircraft was delivered to the U.S. Army on 11 March 1924.  The four aircraft left Seattle, Washington, on 6 April 1924, flying west, and returned there on 28 September to great acclaim, although one plane was forced down over the Atlantic and sank. After the success of this flight, the Army Air Service ordered six similar aircraft as observation aircraft. The success of the DWC established the Douglas Aircraft Company among the major aircraft companies of the world and led it to adopt the motto "First Around the World - First the World Around".  Douglas originally adopted a logo that showed aircraft circling a globe, replacing the original winged heart logo. The logo evolved into an aircraft, a rocket, and a globe. This logo was later adopted by McDonnell Douglas in 1967, and became the basis of Boeing's current logo after their merger in 1997.

Pre-war.

Douglas Aircraft designed and built a wide variety of aircraft for the U.S. military, including the Navy, Army Air Forces, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Coast Guard. The company initially built torpedo bombers for the U.S. Navy, but it developed a number of different versions of these aircraft, including reconnaissance planes and airmail aircraft. Within five years, the company was building about 100 aircraft annually. Among the early employees at Douglas were Ed Heinemann, "Dutch" Kindelberger, Carl Cover, and Jack Northrop, who later founded the Northrop Corporation.  The company retained its military market and expanded into amphibian airplanes in the late 1920s, also moving its facilities to Clover Field at Santa Monica, California. The Santa Monica complex was so large, the mail girls used roller skates to deliver the intracompany mail. By the end of World War II, Douglas had facilities at Santa Monica, El Segundo, Long Beach, and Torrance, California, Tulsa and Midwest City, Oklahoma, and Chicago, Illinois. In 1934, Douglas produced a commercial twin-engined transport plane, the Douglas DC-2, followed by the famous DC-3 in 1936. The wide range of aircraft produced by Douglas included airliners, light and medium bombers, fighter aircraft, transports, reconnaissance aircraft, and experimental aircraft.  The company is most famous for the "DC" (Douglas Commercial) series of commercial aircraft, including what is often regarded as the most significant transport aircraft ever made: the Douglas DC-3, which was also produced as a military transport known as the C-47 Skytrain or "Dakota" in British service. Many Douglas aircraft had long service lives.

World War II.

During World War II, Douglas joined the BVD (Boeing-Vega-Douglas) consortium to produce the B-17 Flying Fortress. After the war, Douglas built another Boeing design under license, the B-47 Stratojet turbojet-powered bomber, using a government-owned factory in Marietta, Georgia.  World War II was a major boost for Douglas. Douglas ranked fifth among United States corporations in the value of wartime production contracts. The company produced almost 30,000 aircraft from 1942 to 1945, and its workforce swelled to 160,000. The company produced a number of aircraft including the C-47 Skytrain, the DB-7 (known as the A-20, Havoc or Boston), the SBD Dauntless dive bomber, and the A-26 Invader.

Post-war.

Douglas Aircraft suffered cutbacks at the end of the war, with an end to government aircraft orders and a surplus of aircraft. It was necessary to cut heavily into its workforce, letting go of nearly 100,000 workers.  The United States Army Air Forces established 'Project RAND' (Research ANd Development) with the objective of looking into long-range planning of future weapons. In March 1946, Douglas Aircraft Company was granted the contract to research on intercontinental warfare. Project RAND later become the RAND Corporation.  Douglas continued to develop new aircraft, including the successful four-engined Douglas DC-6 (1946) and its last propeller-driven commercial aircraft, the Douglas DC-7 (1953). The company had moved into jet propulsion, producing its first for the U.S. Navy — the straight-winged F3D Skyknight in 1948 and then the more "jet age" style F4D Skyray in 1951. Douglas also made commercial jets, producing the Douglas DC-8 in 1958 to compete with the new Boeing 707.  Douglas was a pioneer in related fields, such as ejection seats, air-to-air missiles, surface-to-air missiles, and air-to-surface missiles, launch rockets, bombs, and bomb racks.  The company was ready to enter the new missile business during the 1950s. Douglas moved from producing air-to-air rockets and missiles to entire missile systems under the 1956 Nike missile program and became the main contractor for the Skybolt air-launched ballistic missile program and the Thor ballistic missile program. Douglas also earned contracts from NASA, most notably for designing the S-IVB stage of the Saturn IB and Saturn V rockets.

Mergers.

In 1967, the company was struggling to expand production to meet demand for DC-8 and DC-9 airliners and the A-4 Skyhawk military attack aircraft. The company was also struggling with quality and cash flow problems and DC-10 development costs, as well as shortages due to the Vietnam War. Under the circumstances, Douglas was very receptive to an offer from McDonnell Aircraft Corporation. The two companies seemed to be a good match for each other. Although McDonnell was a major defense contractor, its civil aircraft business was almost nonexistent. Douglas would give McDonnell the civilian contracts it needed to weather any downturns in military procurement.  On April 28, 1967, the two companies merged as McDonnell Douglas Corporation, headquartered at McDonnell's old facility in St. Louis, Missouri. Douglas Aircraft continued as a wholly owned subsidiary of McDonnell Douglas, while its space and missiles division became part of a new subsidiary called McDonnell Douglas Astronautics Company.  McDonnell Douglas later merged with its rival Boeing in 1997. Boeing merged Douglas Aircraft into the Boeing Commercial Airplanes division, and the Douglas Aircraft name was retired after 75 years. The last Long Beach-built commercial aircraft, the Boeing 717 (third generation version of the Douglas DC-9), ceased production in May 2006. By 2011, the Boeing C-17 Globemaster III was the last aircraft being assembled at the Long Beach facility; the final C-17 was assembled in late 2015. However, as mentioned above, Boeing uses Douglas' former logo.

Aircraft.

The Douglas Aircraft Company was an American aerospace manufacturer based in Southern California. It was founded in 1921 by Donald Wills Douglas Sr. and later merged with McDonnell Aircraft in 1967 to form McDonnell Douglas, when it then operated as a division of McDonnell Douglas. McDonnell Douglas later merged with Boeing in 1997.


Abjad order.

The Abjad order of the Arabic alphabet has two slightly different variants. The Abjad order is not a simple historical continuation of the earlier north Semitic alphabetic order, since it has a position corresponding to the Aramaic letter "samekh / semkat", yet no letter of the Arabic alphabet historically derives from that letter. Loss of'was compensated for by the split of'into two independent Arabic letters, (') and ('), which moved up to take the place of "".  The most common Abjad sequence, read from right to left, is: This is commonly vocalized as follows: Another vocalization is:  Another Abjad sequence (probably older, now mainly confined to the Maghreb), is:  which can be vocalized as:  Another vocalization is:  Modern dictionaries and other reference books do not use the Abjad order to sort alphabetically; instead, the newer " () order, which partially groups letters together by similarity of shape, is used:  Another kind of " order used to be widely used in the Maghreb until recently, when it was replaced by the Mashriqi order:  Persian dictionaries use a slightly different order, in which و comes before ه instead of after it.

Uses of the Abjad system.

Before the introduction of the Hindu–Arabic numeral system, the abjad numbers were used for all mathematical purposes. In modern Arabic, they are primarily used for numbering outlines, items in lists, and points of information. In English, points of information are sometimes referred to as "A", "B", and "C" (or perhaps use Roman numerals: I, II, III, IV), and in Arabic, they are "", then "", then "", not the first three letters of the modern " order.  The abjad numbers are also used to assign numerical values to Arabic words for purposes of numerology. The common Islamic phrase " ('In the name of Allah, the most merciful, the most compassionate' – see Basmala) has a numeric value of 786 (from a letter-by-letter cumulative value of 2+60+40+1+30+30+5+1+30+200+8+40+50+1+30+200+8+10+40). The name Allāh by itself has the value 66 (1+30+30+5).

Letter values.

A few of the numerical values are different in the alternative Abjad order: For four Persian letters these values are used:

Similar systems.

The Abjad numerals are equivalent to the earlier Hebrew numerals up to 400. The Hebrew numeral system is known as Gematria and is used in Kabbalistic texts and numerology. Like the Abjad order, it is used in modern times for numbering outlines and points of information, including the first six days of the week. The Greek numerals differ in a number of ways from the Abjad ones (for instance in the Greek alphabet there is no equivalent for, ""). The Greek language system of letters-as-numbers is called isopsephy. In modern times the old 27-letter alphabet of this system also continues to be used for numbering lists.

The Abjad numerals, also called Hisab al-Jummal (, ), are a decimal alphabetic numeral system/alphanumeric code, in which the 28 letters of the Arabic alphabet are assigned numerical values. They have been used in the Arabic-speaking world since before the eighth century when positional Arabic numerals were adopted. In modern Arabic, the word "" () means 'alphabet' in general.


Career.

Professional life.

After his education, Raymond Barre was professor of economics at the "Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris (Sciences Po)" as well as "École Centrale Paris".  From 1959 to 1962, he was director of Jean-Marcel Jeanneney's staff, in the ministry of Industry and Trade. Then, in 1967, President Charles de Gaulle chose him as vice-president of the European Commission for Economic & Financial Affairs. He stayed in Brussels until January 1973, serving in the Rey, Malfatti and Mansholt Commissions. Having come back to France, he joined the cabinet as minister of the External Trade in January 1976.

Premiership.

Seven months later, while mostly unknown at that time, President Giscard d'Estaing appointed him Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Finance. He presented him to the French people as "the best economist in France" (). Under the Fifth Republic, he was the only person to hold these two offices at the same time. He left the ministry of Economy and Finance in 1978, but stayed as Prime minister until the defeat of Giscard d'Estaing at the 1981 presidential election.  At the head of the cabinet, he was faced with the conflict which divided the parliamentary majority between the "Giscardians" and the neo-Gaullist Rally for the Republic (RPR) led by his predecessor Jacques Chirac. The right majority unexpectedly won the 1978 legislative election.  Barre was also confronted with an economic crisis. He advocated a strict policy to cut inflation and public spending, and the industrial "restructuring" ("Barre Plans"). In the face of trade union opposition, he did not use diplomatic language, mocking "the bearers of banners" () and he exhorted "instead of grousing, you should work hard".

Post-premiership.

After his departure from the head of the cabinet, he was elected deputy of Rhône "département" under the label of the Union for French Democracy (UDF). He held his parliamentary seat until 2002.  In the 1980s, he competed for the leadership of the right against Chirac. Believing that the "cohabitation" was incompatible with the "Fifth Republic", he let Chirac take the lead of the cabinet after the 1986 legislative election. He ran as UDF candidate for president in the 1988 election, but some components of his party supported covertly the other right-wing candidate, the Neo-Gaullist Prime Minister Jacques Chirac. In this, in spite of positive polls at the beginning of the campaign, he came the third behind the two protagonists of the "cohabitation": the Socialist President François Mitterrand and Jacques Chirac. For the second round, he called his voters to transfer to the RPR candidate, who was finally defeated.  After the failure of his presidential candidacy, he focused on his local tenures, in Lyon. In 1995, the RPR Mayor of Lyon Michel Noir could not compete for another term in due to a judicial indictment, and consequently, Barre was the right-wing candidate to the mayoralty. He was elected but he did not run for a second term in 2001. One year later, he finished his last parliamentary term in the French National Assembly and retired from politics.  Raymond Barre was probably the only French politician to have reached such high levels of responsibilities without having ever been an official member or leader of any political party. He always kept some distance with what he considered to be the political "microcosm".  Raymond Barre died on 25 August 2007 at age 83 at the Val-de-Grâce military hospital in Paris, where he was being treated for heart problems since his transfer from a hospital in Monaco on 11 April 2007.

Political career.

Governmental functions  Prime minister : 1976–1981.  Minister of Economy and Finance : 1976–1978.  Minister of Foreign Trade : January–August 1976.  Electoral mandates  National Assembly of France  Member of the National Assembly of France for Rhône (department) : 1981–2002. Elected in 1981, reelected in 1986, 1988, 1993, 1997.  Municipal Council  Mayor of Lyon : 1995–2001.  Municipal councillor of Lyon : 1995–2001.  Urban community Council  President of the Urban Community of Lyon : 1995–2001.  Member of the Urban Community of Lyon : 1995–2001.  Bilderberg Conference participant 1983

Allegations of antisemitism.

On several occasions, Raymond Barre made remarks that were interpreted as antisemitic, or at least supportive of antisemitism. In 1980, when he was prime minister, a bombing was attempted against the Union Libérale Israélite de France, a synagogue in the rue Copernic, Paris; however the bomb detonated in the street when the Jews attending shabbat were inside the synagogue, and not when they were out; but as a result some non-Jewish bystanders were killed. Raymond Barre then famously denounced:  In 2007, Barre argued on a radio show that "the Jewish lobby" had orchestrated criticism regarding his 1980 remarks. On this same show, Barre defended the collaborationist Maurice Papon at his trial, describing him as "a scapegoat." Barre was criticized for these remarks.

Governments.

Barre's Second Government, 30 March 1977 – 5 April 1978.

Changes

Barre's Third Government, 5 April 1978 – 22 May 1981.

Changes

Retirement.

Barre retired from active politics in June 2002. He was being treated at a hospital for a heart condition since April 2007 when he died on 25 August 2007. He was survived by his wife and two sons.

Raymond Octave Joseph Barre (; 12 April 192425 August 2007) was a French centre-right politician and economist. He was a Vice President of the European Commission and Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs under three Presidents (Rey, Malfatti and Mansholt) and later served as Prime Minister under Valéry Giscard d'Estaing from 1976 until 1981. As a candidate for the presidency in 1988, he came in third and was eliminated in the first round. He was born in Saint-Denis, in the French island of Réunion, then still a colony (it became an overseas department in 1946).