Christoph Eschenbach (; born 20 February 1940) is a German pianist and conductor.

Early life
Eschenbach was born on 20 February 1940 in Breslau, Germany (now Wrocław, Poland) as Christoph Ringmann. His parents were Margarethe (née Jaross), a singer and teacher of piano, and Heribert Ringmann, a conductor and musicologist in Breslau and Posen. He was orphaned during World War II. His mother died giving birth to him. His father continued to conduct until the very end of 1943, when he conducted the Brahms Requiem in Breslau, before being inducted into the German army. He was killed by Russian forces in Thuringen in 1945. His grandmother cared for him, but she died in the winter of 1945/46 at a refugee camp in Mecklenburg. As a result of this trauma, Eschenbach did not speak for a year, until he was asked if he wanted to play music. Wallydore Eschenbach (née Jaross), his mother's cousin, adopted him in 1946 and began to teach him to play the piano from 1948 through 1959. He lived with Wallydore and her husband Wolfram Eschenbach in Wismar, then in Neustadt in Holstein. At age 11, he attended a concert conducted by Wilhelm Furtwängler which had a great impact on him. In 1955, Eschenbach enrolled at the Musikhochschule in Cologne, studying piano with Hans-Otto Schmidt-Neuhaus and conducting with Wilhelm Brückner-Rüggeberg. He also completed his Abitur at the Einhard-Gymnasium in Aachen in 1959. He then pursued studies at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg with Eliza Hansen (piano) and Wilhelm Brückner-Rüggeberg (conducting).

Musical career
As a pianist, Eschenbach has won numerous first-place piano competition prizes, including first prize in the Clara Haskil Competition in Vevey, Switzerland in 1965. In 1964, he made his first recording (of Mozart) for Deutsche Grammophon and signed a contract with the label. Eschenbach continued to study conducting with George Szell, with whom he worked for more than three years. In addition, he counted Herbert von Karajan as a mentor. As a pianist, he is particularly known for his Schubert and Mozart recordings, the latter often together with Justus Frantz. With him as well as with Tzimon Barto he played piano music for four hands or two grand pianos.

In 1981, Eschenbach became principal guest conductor of the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, and was chief conductor from 1982 to 1986.  He was co-artistic director of the Pacific Music Festival from 1992 to 1998.  He was chief conductor of the NDR Symphony Orchestra, Hamburg from 1998 to 2004.  He was artistic director of the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival from 1999 until 2003, and became principal conductor of the Schleswig-Holstein Festival Orchestra in 2003. From 2000 to 2010, Eschenbach was music director of the Orchestre de Paris.

In the United States, Eschenbach was music director of the Houston Symphony Orchestra from 1988 to 1999.  The orchestra toured Japan and Europe under his tenure as well made several recordings with Koch International Classics and RCA.  In honour of his achievements and tenure with the Houston Symphony, the City of Houston placed a bronze commemorative star with his name in front of Jones Hall, the performance home of the Houston Symphony. He was music director of the Ravinia Festival from 1994 to 2005.

Eschenbach has made more than 80 recordings as piano soloist, conductor, or both, has appeared in several television documentaries, and has made many concert broadcasts for different European, Japanese and U.S. networks.  Eschenbach is credited with helping and supporting talented young musicians in their career development, including soprano Renée Fleming, pianists Tzimon Barto and Lang Lang, cellists , and Daniel Müller-Schott, and soprano Marisol Montalvo.

Philadelphia Orchestra
Eschenbach became the seventh music director of The Philadelphia Orchestra in 2003.  His appointment generated controversy because, at the time of the announcement, Eschenbach had not conducted the orchestra in over four years and there was a perceived lack of personal chemistry between him and the musicians prior to the appointment.  One musician from the orchestra had stated, after the announcement:

 "'When this announcement was proclaimed after a half-hour meeting with us, there wasn't applause; there was criticism,' recalled a musician with the Philadelphia Orchestra. 'One member of the search committee got up and said, "You'll see, you'll like him."

'The orchestra was taken aback by the attitude because there was no meeting to verify what we thought,' the musician said. 'There was no chemistry with Eschenbach. He hasn't conducted us in four or five years and 20 to 30 persons had never played with him.'"

In a 2004 article, Eschenbach tried to downplay such statements, and noted his own particular style of interpretation:

 "I prefer to have flexible tempos and not be fixed. Quicker tempos tend to court superficiality."

Partway into his tenure, his initial 3-year contract was renewed to 2008.

However, in October 2006, the orchestra and Eschenbach announced that he would conclude his tenure in Philadelphia at the close of the 2007–2008 season. In the weeks prior to his departure, Philadelphia Inquirer music critics Peter Dobrin and David Patrick Stearns produced contrasting articles whether or not he should be retained, with Dobrin suggesting that Eschenbach should move on and Stearns arguing that Eschenbach should remain. Other harsh criticism of Eschenbach's tenure in Philadelphia has been aired.

Following the announcement, Dobrin in the Inquirer wrote that Eschenbach's tenure in Philadelphia has been difficult for many musicians:

 "In three seasons, Eschenbach and the orchestra have produced a handful of brilliant concerts. More often, though, his rehearsals and performances have elicited a long list of complaints from musicians: getting lost in the score at concerts; leading disorganized rehearsals and then asking for overtime; and insisting on a peculiar rushing and slowing of tempos."

The paper also cited a number of accomplishments including a new recording contract and the appointment of nine musicians, four of whom were principals. In addition, Eschenbach has received praise for his work in fund-raising for the orchestra.

Following the announcement and Dobrin's Inquirer article, The Philadelphia Orchestra Association posted a letter on its website, dated 27 October 2006, which also was sent by e-mail to orchestra patrons. A quote from this letter condemned Dobrin's criticism:

 "We, and many in the community, feel that in recent press coverage there have been personal attacks on Maestro Eschenbach, along with negative innuendo about his relationship with The Philadelphia Orchestra. ...These types of comments about Maestro Eschenbach and our orchestra are ridiculous, offensive and defamatory. Our entire orchestra family is profoundly disappointed when reporters report the news in such an ungracious way."

Dobrin, in turn, responded in a 29 October 2006 Philadelphia Inquirer article by quoting one of his 2001 Inquirer articles around the time of the Eschenbach announcement:

 "....let me quote from something I wrote in March 2001 that might be an important reminder about how we got to this dangerous place:

 It hit many musicians like the dull thud of pragmatism, this decision in January to hire Eschenbach as the orchestra's seventh music director, starting in September 2003. At a meeting announcing the decision, players responded with silence. No applause, no excited stamping of feet. Silence. And then the resentment poured forth.

 One musician used the word "underwhelmed." Another said he felt "betrayed."...

This contrasts with earlier reports of how the musicians "had input" in the choice of the previous Philadelphia music director, Wolfgang Sawallisch.  In addition, the new orchestra president (as of 2006), James Undercofler, had spoken with orchestra musicians, and had told Eschenbach this summary of his discussions with them:

 "-that 80 percent of the musicians did not agree with his artistic interpretations;
 -that 80 percent of the musicians left concerts feeling great anger;
 -and that the orchestra was a "ticking time bomb."

In an article by Cragg Hines in the newspaper The Washingtonian on 1 December 2009 Eschenbach was quoted:

 "They said there was a survey of the whole orchestra and more than 80 percent of the orchestra was against me. I asked the management 'was that true?' and was told, 'Yes, it's true.' It was not true at all. As I found out a little later, this survey never happened [...] All of the musicians regretted very, very much that [it] was reported like this."

In a 2007 article, Mark Swed of the Los Angeles Times has written about the Eschenbach/Philadelphia Orchestra situation:

 "{Eschenbach} is one of the world's finest musicians and widely recognized as such. He has ideas. He has sophisticated tastes. He is cosmopolitan. He is an exciting interpreter. Colleagues speak of him warmly, and he is a favorite accompanist for singers.....So what's wrong? Just about everything. It is well known that the orchestra opposed the hiring of Eschenbach. He hadn't conducted in Philadelphia for five years when the appointment was made, and a memo was leaked to the press with 75 players' signatures asking management to hold off any decision until the orchestra got a chance to work with him. From the beginning, the relationship started off on the wrong foot...But the Philadelphia orchestra has not been exactly transformed by Eschenbach. I've been hearing reports of players looking bored onstage. Audiences walk out during performances. Even two years ago, at my last visit to Verizon Hall, the atmosphere was palpably unpleasant."

In a June 2007 article, Stearns reported Eschenbach as commenting on the Philadelphia Orchestra management as follows:

 "The management in both cases [Paris and Philadelphia], I'm sorry to say, is amateurish"...."The management knows what I think ... it's not a secret".

In a July 2007 article, Dobrin emphasized that the problems in the Eschenbach/Philadelphia Orchestra relationship were not related to personality, but rather to musical quality:

 "While many refuse to believe it, the factor that has undermined Christoph Eschenbach's tenure is not personality. He's a lovely guy; he and the players have a cordial off-stage relationship. The problem is the music. If 80 percent of the musicians leave concerts angry – as Eschenbach told players that president James Undercofler had told him – that's corrosive to the music and the institution."

In August 2007, the orchestra announced extended guest-conducting periods for Eschenbach with the ensemble in the 2008–2009 and 2009–2010 seasons, after the conclusion of his tenure as music director.

Later career
In September 2008, the National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) appointed Eschenbach as its sixth music director, effective with the 2010–2011 season, as well as the newly created music director of the Kennedy Center.  In September 2011, the NSO and the Kennedy Center announced the extension of Eschenbach's contract through the 2014–2015 season.  In March 2014, the organisations announced an extension of Eschenbach's contract through the 2016–2017 season.  In February 2015, the NSO announced that Eschenbach was to conclude his tenure as NSO music director at the end of the 2016–2017 season.  Eschenbach subsequently took the title of conductor laureate of the NSO.

In November 2017, the Konzerthausorchester Berlin announced the appointment of Eschenbach as its next chief conductor, effective with the 2019–2020 season, with an initial contract of 3 years.  In July 2021, the Konzerthausorchester Berlin announced the extension of Eschenbach's contract through the 2022–2023 season.  He stood down from the Konzerthausorchester Berlin post at the close of the 2022–2023 season.

Honours and awards
 1993: Pacific Music Festival, Leonard Bernstein Award
 August 2002: Knight Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
 October 2002: Legion d'honneur of France
 June 2006: Chevalier (knight) of the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres
 2010: Order of Merit of Schleswig-Holstein
 2015: Ernst von Siemens Music Prize

References

Further reading

External links
 Christoph Eschenbach official website
 Bruce Duffie, Interview with Christoph Eschenbach, 10 August 1990

German classical pianists
Male classical pianists
German male conductors (music)
20th-century German conductors (music)
20th-century German male musicians
21st-century German conductors (music)
21st-century German male musicians
Living people
Musicians from Wrocław
Texas classical music
Knights Commander of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
Chevaliers of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres
Knights of the Legion of Honour
Grammy Award winners
Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg alumni
Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln alumni
Ernst von Siemens Music Prize winners
Music directors of the Philadelphia Orchestra
Deutsche Grammophon artists
National Symphony Orchestra
1940 births

Christoph Eschenbach


Oirats (, Oirad, ) or Oirds (, Oird; ; ), also formerly Eluts and Eleuths (, Èlǔtè), are the westernmost group of the Mongols whose ancestral home is in the Altai region of Siberia, Xinjiang and western Mongolia.

Historically, the Oirats were composed of four major tribes: Dzungar (Choros or Olots), Torghut, Dörbet and Khoshut. The minor tribes include: Khoid, Bayads, Myangad, Zakhchin, Baatud.

The modern Kalmyks of Kalmykia on the Caspian Sea in southeastern Europe are Oirats.

Etymology

The name derives from Mongolic oi < *hoi ("forest, woods") and ard < *harad ("people"), and they were counted among the "forest people" in the 13th century. Similar to that is the Turkic ağaç eri ("woodman") that is found as a tribal name such as Akatziri, an ancient tribe among European Huns, and as a place name in many locales, including the corrupted name of the town of Aghajari in Iran. A second opinion believes the name derives from Mongolian word oirt (or oirkhon) meaning "close (as in distance)," as in "close/nearer ones."

The name Oirat may derive from a corruption of the group's original name Dörben Öörd, meaning "The Allied Four". Perhaps inspired by the designation Dörben Öörd, other Mongols at times used the term "Döchin Mongols" for themselves ("Döchin" meaning forty), but there was rarely as great a degree of unity among larger numbers of tribes as among the Oirats.

These views are challenged by Kempf 2010, who from a historical linguist's point of view argues that the name is a plural coming from *oyiran, and eventually from Turkic *ōy 'a word for a colour of a horse's coat' (oy + gir suffix for colours + (A)n collective suffix).

Writing system

In the 17th century, Zaya Pandita, a Gelug monk of the Khoshut tribe, devised a new writing system called Clear Script for use by Oirats. This system was developed on the basis of the older Mongolian script, but had a more developed system of diacritics to preclude misreading and reflected some lexical and grammatical differences of the Oirat language from Mongolian.

The Clear Script remained in use in Kalmykia until the mid-1920s when it was replaced by a Latin alphabet, and later the Cyrillic script. It can be seen in some public signs in the Kalmyk capital, Elista, and is superficially taught in schools. In Mongolia it was likewise replaced by the Cyrillic alphabet in 1941. Some Oirats in China still use the Clear Script as their primary writing system, as well as Mongolian script.

A monument of Zaya Pandita was unveiled on the 400th anniversary of Zaya Pandita's birth, and on 350th anniversary of his creation of the Clear Script.

History

The Oirats share some history, geography, culture and language with the Eastern Mongols, and were at various times united under the same leader as a larger Mongol entity, whether that ruler was of Oirat descent or of Chingissids.

Comprising the Khoshut (Mongolian: "хошууд", hošuud), Choros or Ölöt ("өөлд", Ööld), Torghut ("торгууд", Torguud), and Dörbet ("дөрвөд", Dörvöd) ethnic groups, they were dubbed Kalmyk or Kalmak, which means "remnant" or "to remain", by their western Turkic neighbours. Various sources also list the Bargut, Buzava, Keraites, and Naiman tribes as comprising part of the Dörben Öörd; some tribes may have joined the original four only in later years. This name may however reflect the Kalmyks' remaining Buddhist rather than converting to Islam; or the Kalmyks' remaining in the Altay region when the Turkic tribes migrated further west.

After the fall of the Yuan dynasty, Oirat and Eastern Mongols had developed separate identities to the point where Oirats called themselves "Four Oirats" while they used the term "Mongols" for those under the Khagans in the east.

Early history

One of the earliest mentions of the Oirat people, in a historical text, can be found in the Secret History of the Mongols, a 13th century chronicle of Genghis Khan's rise to power. In "The Secret History", the Oirats are counted among the "forest people", and are said to live under the rule of a shaman-chief known as bäki. They lived in Tuva and the Mongolian Khövsgöl Province; the Oirats moved south in the 14th century.

In one famous passage, the Oirat chief Qutuqa Beki used a yada, or 'thunder stone', to unleash a powerful storm on Genghis' army. The magical ploy backfired, however, when an unexpected wind blew the storm back towards him. During the early stages of Genghis' rise to power, the Oirats under Bäki fought against Genghis but were defeated. The Oirats would then fully submit to Mongol rule after their ally, Jamukha, Genghis' childhood friend and later rival, was killed.

Subject to the Khan, the Oirats turned themselves into a loyal and formidable faction of the Mongol war machine. In 1207, Jochi, the eldest son of Genghis, subjugated the forest tribes, including the Oirats and the Yenisei Kyrgyz; the Great Khan gave those peoples to his son, Jochi, and had one of his daughters, Checheygen, marry chief Bäki (or his son). There were notable Oirats in the Mongol Empire, such as Arghun Agha and his son, Nowruz.

In 1256, a group of the Oirats under Bukha-Temür (Mongolian: Буха-Төмөр, Бөхтөмөр) joined Hulagu's expedition against the Abbasids and participated in the Mongol campaign against the Nizaris in Iran. The Ilkhan Hulagu and his successor, Abagha, resettled them in Turkey. Then, they took part in the Second Battle of Homs, where the Mongols were defeated. The majority of the Oirats, who were left behind, supported Ariq Böke against Kublai in the Toluid Civil War. Kublai defeated his younger brother, and they entered the service of the victor.

In 1295, more than 10,000 Oirats under Targhai Khurgen, son-in-law of the Borjigin family, fled Syria, then under the Mamluks, as they were despised by both Muslim Mongols and local Turks. They were well-received by Egypt's Sultan, Al-Adil Kitbugha, himself of Oirat origin. Ali Pasha, the governor of Baghdad and head of an Oirat ruling family, went on to murder Ilkhan Arpa Keun, resulting in the disintegration of Mongol Persia. Since the Oirats were near both the Chagatai Khanate and the Golden Horde, they had strong ties with them, and many Mongol khans had Oirat wives.

After the expulsion of the Yuan dynasty from China, the Oirats reconvened as a loose alliance of the four major western Mongolian tribes (Mongolian: дөрвөн ойрд, дөрвөн ойрaд). The alliance grew, taking power in the remote region of the Altai Mountains, northwest of Hami oasis. Gradually, they spread eastwards, annexing territories then under the control of the Eastern Mongols. They hoped to reestablish a unified, nomadic rule under their banner of the Four Oirats (the Keraites, Naiman, Barghud, and old Oirats).

The only Borjigid ruling tribe was the Khoshuts; the others' rulers were not descendants of Genghis. The Ming dynasty of China had helped the Oirats' rise over the Mongols during the Yongle Emperor's reign after 1410, when the Ming defeated the Qubilaid Öljei Temür and the Borjigid power was weakened. The Borjigid Khans were displaced from power by the Oirats (with Ming help), ruling as puppet-khans until the alliance between the Ming and Oirats ended, and the Yongle Emperor launched a campaign against them.

The greatest ruler of the Oirat Confederacy was Esen Taishi; he led the Oirats from 1438 to 1454, a time in which he unified Mongolia (both Inner and Outer) under his puppet-khan Taisun Khan. In 1449, Esen Tayisi and Taisun Khan mobilised their cavalry along the Chinese border and invaded Ming China, defeating and destroying the Ming defences at the Great Wall, along with the reinforcements sent to intercept his cavalry. In the process, the Zhengtong Emperor was captured at Tumu. The following year, Esen returned the emperor after an unsuccessful ransom attempt. After claiming the title of Khan (something which only blood descendants of Genghis Khan could do), Esen was killed; shortly afterwards, Oirat power declined.

From the 14th until the middle of the 18th century, the Oirats were often at war with the Eastern Mongols, but reunited with them during the rule of Dayan Khan and Tümen Zasagt Khan.

The Khoshut Khanate

The Oirats converted to Tibetan Buddhism around 1615, and it was not long before they participated in the conflict between the Gelug and Karma Kagyu schools. At the request of the Gelug school, in 1637, Güshi Khan, the leader of the Khoshuts in Koko Nor, defeated Choghtu Khong Tayiji, the Khalkha prince who supported the Karma Kagyu school, and conquered Amdo (present-day Qinghai). The unification of Tibet followed in the early 1640s, with Güshi Khan proclaimed Khan of Tibet by the 5th Dalai Lama and the establishment of the Khoshut Khanate. The title "Dalai Lama" itself was bestowed upon the third lama of the Gelug tulku lineage by Altan Khan (not to be confused with the Altan Khans of the Khalkha), and means, in Mongolian, "Ocean of Wisdom".

Amdo, meanwhile, became home to the Khoshuts. In 1717, the Dzungars invaded Tibet and killed Lha-bzang Khan (or Khoshut Khan), a grandson of Güshi Khan and the fourth Khan of Tibet, and conquered the Khoshut Khanate.

The Qing Empire defeated the Dzungars in the 1750s and proclaimed rule over the Oirats through a Manchu-Mongol alliance (a series of systematic arranged marriages between princes and princesses of Manchu with those of Khalkha Mongols and Oirat Mongols, which was set up as a royal policy carried out over 300 years), as well as over Khoshut-controlled Tibet.

In 1723 Lobzang Danjin, another descendant of Güshi Khan, took control of Amdo and tried to assume rule over the Khoshut Khanate. He fought against a Manchu-Qing Dynasty army, and was defeated only in the following year and 80,000 people from his tribe were executed by Manchu army due to his "rebellion attempt". By that period, the Upper Mongolian population reached 200,000 and were mainly under the rule of Khalkha Mongol princes who were in a marital alliance with Manchu royal and noble families. Thus, Amdo fell under Manchu domination.

The Dzungar Khanate

The 17th century saw the rise of another Oirat empire in the east, known as the Khanate of Dzungaria, which stretched from the Great Wall of China to present-day eastern Kazakhstan, and from present-day northern Kyrgyzstan to southern Siberia. It was the last empire of nomads, and was ruled by Choros noblemen.

The Transition from Ming to Qing dynasties in China occurred in the mid-17th century, and the Qing sought to protect its northern border by continuing the divide-and-rule policy their Ming predecessors had successfully instituted against the Mongols. The Manchu consolidated their rule over the Eastern Mongols of Manchuria. They then persuaded the Eastern Mongols of Inner Mongolia to submit themselves as vassals. Finally, the Eastern Mongols of Outer Mongolia sought the protection of the Manchu against the Dzungars.

In the 17th century, the Dzungar pioneered the local manifestation of the 'Military Revolution' in central Eurasia after perfecting a process of manufacturing indigenously created gunpowder weapons. They also created a mixed agro-pastoral economy, as well as complementary mining and manufacturing industries on their lands. Additionally, the Zunghar managed to enact an empire-wide system of laws and policies to boost the use of the Oirat language in the region.

Some scholars estimate that about 80% of the Dzungar population was wiped out by a combination of warfare and disease during the Manchu-Qing conquest of Dzungaria in 1755–1757. The Zunghar population reached 600,000 in 1755.

Most of the Choros, Olot, Khoid, Baatud, and Zakhchin Oirats who battled against the Qing were killed by Manchu soldiers and, after the fall of the Dzungar Khanate, became small ethnic groups.

Kalmyks

Kho Orlok, tayishi of the Torghuts, and Dalai Tayishi of Dorbets, led their people (200,000–250,000 people, mainly Torghuts) west to the (Volga River) in 1607 where they established the Kalmyk Khanate. By some accounts this move was precipitated by internal divisions or by the Khoshut tribe; other historians believe it more likely that the migrating clans were seeking pastureland for their herds, scarce in the central Asian highlands. Some of the Khoshut and Ölöt tribes joined the migration almost a century later. The Kalmyk migration had reached as far as the steppes of southeastern Europe by 1630. At the time, that area was inhabited by the Nogai Horde. But under pressure from Kalmyk warriors, the Nogais fled to Crimea and the Kuban River. Many other nomadic peoples in the Eurasian steppes subsequently became vassals of the Kalmyk Khanate, part of which is in the area of present-day Kalmykia.

The Kalmyks became allies of Russia and a treaty to protect southern Russian borders was signed between the Kalmyk Khanate and Russia. Later they became nominal, then full subjects of the Russian Tsar. In 1724 the Kalmyks came under control of Russia. By the early 18th century, there were approximately 300,000–350,000 Kalmyks and 15,000,000 Russians. Russia gradually reduced the autonomy of the Kalmyk Khanate. Policies encouraged establishment of Russian and German settlements on pastures where the Kalmyks formerly roamed and fed their livestock. The Russian Orthodox church, by contrast, pressed Buddhist Kalmyks to adopt Orthodoxy. In January 1771 the oppression of czarist administration forced a larger part of Kalmyks (33,000 households or approximately 170,000 individuals) to migrate to Dzungaria.

200,000 (170,000) Kalmyks began the migration from their pastures on the left bank of the Volga River to Dzungaria, through the territories of their Bashkir and Kazakh enemies. The last Kalmyk khan Ubashi led the migration to restore the Dzungar Khanate and Mongolian independence. As C. D. Barkman notes, "It is quite clear that the Torghuts had not intended to surrender to the Chinese, but had hoped to lead an independent existence in Dzungaria". Ubashi Khan sent his 30,000 cavalry to the Russo-Turkish War in 1768–1769 to gain weapons before the migration. The Empress Catherine the Great ordered the Russian army, Bashkirs and Kazakhs to exterminate all migrants and Catherine the Great abolished the Kalmyk Khanate.

The Kazakhs attacked them near Balkhash Lake. About 100,000–150,000 Kalmyks who settled on the west bank of the Volga River could not cross the river because the river did not freeze in the winter of 1771 and Catherine the Great executed their influential nobles. After seven months of travel, only one third (66,073) of the original group reached Dzungaria (Balkhash Lake, western border of the Manchu Qing Empire). The Qing Empire resettled the Kalmyks in five different areas to prevent their revolt and several Kalmyk leaders were soon killed by the Manchus. Following the Russian revolution their settlement was accelerated, Buddhism stamped out and herds collectivised.

Kalmykian nationalists and Pan-Mongolists attempted to migrate from Kalmykia to Mongolia in the 1920s when a serious famine gripped Kalmykia. On January 22, 1922, Mongolia proposed to accept the immigration of the Kalmyks but the Russian government refused. Some 71–72,000 (around half of the population) Kalmyks died during the famine. The Kalmyks revolted against Russia in 1926, 1930 and 1942–1943. In March 1927, Soviets deported 20,000 Kalmyks to Siberia, and Karelia. The Kalmyks founded the sovereign Republic of Oirat-Kalmyk on March 22, 1930. The Oirat state had a small army and 200 Kalmyk soldiers defeated a force of 1,700 Soviet soldiers in Durvud province of Kalmykia, but the Oirat state was destroyed by the Soviet Army in 1930. The Mongolian government suggested to accept the Mongols of the Soviet Union, including Kalmyks, but the Soviets rejected the proposal.

In 1943, the entire population of 120,000 Kalmyks were deported to Siberia by Stalin, accused of supporting invading Axis armies attacking Stalingrad (Volgograd); a fifth of the population is thought to have perished during and immediately after the deportation. Around half (97–98,000) of the Kalmyk people deported to Siberia died before being allowed to return home in 1957. The government of the Soviet Union forbade teaching the Kalmyk language during the deportation. Mongolian leader Khorloogiin Choibalsan attempted to arrange migration of the deportees to Mongolia and he met them in Siberia during his visit to Russia. Under the Law of the Russian Federation of April 26, 1991 "On Rehabilitation of Exiled Peoples" repressions against Kalmyks and other peoples were qualified as an act of genocide, although many Russian historians treat this and similar deportations as an attempt to prevent local Russian populations and the Soviet army from lynching the entire ethnic group, many of whom supported Germany. Today Kalmyks are trying to revive their language and religion, but the shift towards the Russian language continues.

According to the Russian 2010 Census there were 176,800 Kalmyks, of whom only 80,546 could speak the Kalmyk language, a serious decline from the level of the 2002 Census, in which the number of speakers was 153,602 (with a total number of 173,996 people). The Soviet 1989 Census showed 156,386 Kalmyk-speakers with a total number of 173,821 Kalmyks.

Xinjiang Mongols
The Mongols of Xinjiang form a minority, principally in the northern part of the region, numbering 194,500 in 2010, about 50,000 of which are Dongxiangs. They are primarily descendants of the surviving Torghuts and Khoshuts who returned from Kalmykia, and of the Chakhar stationed there as garrison soldiers in the 18th century. The emperor had sent messages asking the Kalmyks to return, and erected a smaller copy of the Potala in Jehol (Chengde), (the country residence of the Manchu Emperors) to mark their arrival. A model copy of that "Little Potala" was made in China for the Swedish explorer Sven Hedin, and was erected at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. It is now in storage in Sweden, where there are plans to re-erect it. Some of the returnees did not come that far and still live, now as Muslims, at the southwestern end of Lake Issyk-kul in present-day Kyrgyzstan.

In addition to exiling Han criminals to Xinjiang to be slaves of the Banner garrisons there, the Qing also practiced reverse exile, exiling Inner Asian (Mongol, Russian and Muslim criminals from Mongolia and Inner Asia) to China proper where they would serve as slaves in Han Banner garrisons in Guangzhou. Russian, Oirats and Muslims (Oros. Ulet. Hoise jergi weilengge niyalma) such as Yakov and Dmitri were exiled to the Han banner garrison in Guangzhou. In the 1780s after the Muslim rebellion in Gansu started by Zhang Wenqing (張文慶) was defeated, Muslims like Ma Jinlu (馬進祿) were exiled to the Han Banner garrison in Guangzhou to become slaves to Han Banner officers. The Qing code regulating Mongols in Mongolia sentenced Mongol criminals to exile and slavery under Han bannermen in Han Banner garrisons in China proper.

Ethnic violence with Kazakhs

A Kazakh chief was skinned with his skin to be used as a religious implement and his heart was cut out of his chest by the Oirat Mongol Ja Lama. Another Kazakh was also skinned. A White Guard soldier's heart was eaten by the Mongol Choijon Lama. Mongol banner bloods were sprinkeled with Russian White Guard and Chinese blood from hearts according to A. V. Burdukov. The Kazakh chief who was skinned alive was named Khaisan. His skin along with another man's skin were found by Cossacks under Captain Bulatov in his ger in Muunjaviin Ulaan on 8 February 1914. Owen Lattimore used the words "a strange, romantic and sometimes savage figure" for the Mongol Sandagdorjiyn Magsarjav (1877-1927). Magsarjav had served under Ungern-Sternberg. In Uriankhai Kazakh bandits who were captured had their hearts cut out and sacrificed by Magsarjav.

Hui Tungan, Tibetan and Oirat Mongol claims against Kazakhs
The Kazakhs were plundering and robbing on the Tibetan-Kokonor plateau in Qinghai as they came through Gansu and northern Xinjiang. There were over 7,000 of them between 1938-1941. On the Kokonor plateau, Hui (Tungans), Tibetans and Kazakhs continued to battle each other despite the Kazakh nomads being settled in demarcated pasturelands under Ma Bufang's watch in 1941.

Oirat Mongol Buddhists in Qinghai were slaughtered and looted by Kazakhs (Moslem Khyber Khasaks) who invaded Tibet via the Nan Shan mountains in Xinjiang. The Salar and Hui Muslims of Qinghai told Office of Strategic Services agent Leonard Francis Clark that the Kazakhs slaughtered 8,000 Mongols.

The advance of the Communists under Li Bao (Lin Pao) forced the Hui general Ma Dei-bio to leave Qinghai to confront him, therefore some Kazakh bands were still going around stealing and murdering people. The Mongols were slaughtered by the Kazakhs since the Nationalist government of China disarmed the Mongols.

The Tibetan Rong-pa taught agriculture to former nomad Mongols who began using camels to plough their land in Tsaidam. Hui Muslim governor Ma Bufang appointed Hui Muslim colonel Ma Dei-bio as southern Qinghai's Amban. Me Dei-bio slaughtered Ngoloks by throwing them into the Yellow river after wrapping them in leather. 480 Ngolok families were killed in this manner.

As communists triumphed in China's northern and western periphery, Kazakhs stole Mongol horses from Clark's expedition and the Hui Muslim leader was told by a Tibetan scout that the Kazakhs did it.

Well armed Kazakhs over a period of eight years before Clark's expedition had slaughtered and devastated the Oirat Mongols in the Tsaidam Basin of Xinjiang, the thousand Kazakh families (Hussack) came to the Tsaidam via the Nan shan in Xinjiang and then came back to where they came from after eight years of war against the Mongols. Clark noted they dwelled in gers and they spoke Turki and were "fanatic Mohammedans, professional killers". Mongol Hoshun (banner) were divided into Sumon (arrow) and one arrow lost one thousand horses in a single night to the Kazakhs. Northern Qinghai (Amdo) still had twenty-six fragmented Mongol banners after the Kazakh slaughters of Mongols. These banner divisions were created by the Qing dynasty who scattered the Mongols on the western borders.

Some Tibetans in Qinghai claimed descent from the Tanguts of Khara Khoto in Western Xia and claimed that their ancestors fled to Qinghai after a Chinese army expelled them from Khara Khoto. The Oirat Mongol Prince Dorje told Leonard Francis Clark and the Tibetans and the Hui and Salar Muslims Abdul and Solomon Ma on how the Manchus committed the Dzungar genocide against his Oirat people and how they conquered Xinjiang from the Oirat Mongol Torgut West banner and destroying the south wing of the Mongols.

They took control of the four Khanates of the Khalkha in Outer Mongolia and the 5th Khanate (the Oirat Torgut horde). He also spoke about those Torgut Oirats who had earlier migrated to Kalmykia in Russia and then fought against the Ottoman Turkish Muslim empire, and then crushed the Swedish king Charles XII, and then how 400,0000 Torguts migrated back to Dzungaria in 1771, fighting against the Cossack armies of Tsarina of Russia Catherine the Great. They lost 300,000 children, women and men to the Cossacks as they returned to Xinjiang.

He mentioned how this had made Russia "lose" the support of Mongols. 50,000 Oirats survived after 300,000 Oirat Mongols were slaughtered by Russian Cossacks on Catherine's orders. Prince Dorje then proclaimed that the Oirat Torghut banners were ready for revenge against the "Slavic masses", by fighting against the Soviet Russian red army and asked Clark for America to help the western Mongols against the Slavic Russians. Clark said that the Pentagon and White House would decide and that he could do nothing about it since he was busy with inciting Muslims in Qinghai to jihad against communists and on the Amne Machin mountain to find radioactive material.

Alasha Mongols
The region bordering Gansu and west of the Irgay River is called Alxa or Alaša, Alshaa and Mongols who moved there are called Alasha Mongols.

Törbaih Güshi Khan's fourth son, Ayush, was opposed to the Khan's brother Baibagas. Ayush's eldest son is Batur Erkh Jonon Khoroli. After the battle between Galdan Boshigt Khan and Ochirtu Sechen Khan, Batur Erkh Jonon Khoroli moved to Tsaidam with his 10,000 households. The fifth Dalai Lama wanted land for them from the Qing government, thus in 1686, the Emperor permitted them to reside in Alasha.

In 1697, Alasha Mongols were administered in 'khoshuu' and 'sum' units. A khoshuu with eight sums was created, Batur Erkh Jonon Khoroli was appointed Beil (prince), and Alasha was thus a 'zasag-khoshuu'. Alasha was however like an 'aimag' and never administered under a 'chuulgan'.

In 1707, when Batur Erkh Jonon Khoroli died, his son Abuu succeeded him. He was in Beijing from his youth, served as bodyguard of the Emperor, and a princess (of the Emperor) was given to him, thus making him a 'Khoshoi Tavnan', i.e. Emperor's groom. In 1793, Abuu became Jün Wang. There are several thousand Muslim Alasha Mongols.

Ejine Mongols

Mongols who lived along the Ejin River (Ruo Shui) descended from Rabjur, a grandson of Torghut Ayuka Khan from the Volga River.

In 1698, Rabjur, with his mother, younger sister and 500 people, went to Tibet to pray. While they were returning via Beijing in 1704, the Qing ruler, the Kangxi Emperor, let them stay there for some years and later organized a 'khoshuu' for them in a place called Sertei, and made Rabjur the governor.

In 1716, the Kangxi Emperor sent him and his people to Hami, near the border of Qing China and the Zunghar Khanate, for intelligence-gathering purposes against the Oirats. When Rabjur died, his eldest son, Denzen, succeeded him. He was afraid of the Zunghar and wanted the Qing government to allow them to move away from the border. They were settled in Dalan Uul–Altan. When Denzen died in 1740, his son Lubsan Darjaa succeeded him and became Beil.

In 1753, they were settled on the banks of the Ejin River and the Ejin River Torghut 'khoshuu' was thus formed.

Culture

Origins and genetics

Haplogroup C2*-Star Cluster which was thought to be carried by likely male-line descendants of Genghis Khan and Niruns (original Mongols and descendants of Alan Gua) appears in only 1.6% of Oirats.

The Y-chromosome in 426 individuals mainly from three major tribes of the Kalmyks (the Torghut, Dörbet and Khoshut):

C-M48: 38.7

C-M407: 10.8

N1c: 10.1

R2: 7.7

O2: 6.8

C2 (not M407, not M48): 6.6

O1b: 5.2

R1: 4.9

Others: 9.2

Haplogroup C2*-Star Cluster appeared in only 2% (3% of Dörbet and 2.7% of the Torghut).

Tribes
Sart Kalmyks and Xinjiang Oirats are not Volga Kalmyks or Kalmyks, and the Kalmyks are a subgroup of the Oirats.

 Altai Uriankhai
 Baatud
 Bayads
 Chantuu
 Choros
 Dorbet
 Khoshut
 Khoid
 Khotons
 Kalmyks
 Myangad
 Olots
 Sart Kalmyks
 Torghut
 Zakhchin

See also
 Demographics of Mongolia
 Four Oirats
 Kalmyk people
 Dzungar
 Kalmykia
 Altay people
 Al-Adil Kitbugha (Oirat Sultan of Egypt)

References

Further reading
 Kempf, Béla: 'Ethnonyms and etymology - The case of Oyrat and beyond'. In: Ural-Altaische Jahrbücher. 24: 2010-11, pp. 189-203
Khoyt S.K. Last data by localisation and number of oyirad (oirat) (htm republication) - in Russian

 Wang Jinglan, Shao Xingzhou, Cui Jing et al. Anthropological survey on the Mongolian Tuerhute tribe in He shuo county, Xinjiang Uigur autonomous region // Acta anthropologica sinica. Vol. XII, № 2. May 1993. p. 137-146.
 Санчиров В. П. О Происхождении этнонима торгут и народа, носившего это название // Монголо-бурятские этнонимы: cб. ст. — Улан-Удэ: БНЦ СО РАН, 1996. C. 31—50. - in Russian
 Ovtchinnikova O., Druzina E., Galushkin S., Spitsyn V., Ovtchinnikov I. An Azian-specific 9-bp deletion in region V of mitochondrial DNA is found in Europe // Medizinische Genetic. 9 Tahrestagung der Gesellschaft für Humangenetik, 1997, p. 85.
 Galushkin S.K., Spitsyn V.A., Crawford M.H. Genetic Structure of Mongolic-speaking Kalmyks // Human Biology, December 2001, v.73, no. 6, pp. 823–834.
 Хойт С.К. Генетическая структура европейских ойратских групп по локусам ABO, RH, HP, TF, GC, ACP1, PGM1, ESD, GLO1, SOD-A // Проблемы этнической истории и культуры тюрко-монгольских народов. Сборник научных трудов. Вып. I. Элиста: КИГИ РАН, 2009. с. 146-183. - in Russian
 hamagmongol.narod.ru/library/khoyt_2008_r.htm Хойт С.К. Антропологические характеристики калмыков по данным исследователей XVIII-XIX вв. // Вестник Прикаспия: археология, история, этнография. № 1. Элиста: Изд-во КГУ, 2008. с. 220-243.
 Хойт С.К. Кереиты в этногенезе народов Евразии: историография проблемы. Элиста: Изд-во КГУ, 2008. – 82 с.  (Khoyt S.K. Kereits in enthnogenesis of peoples of Eurasia: historiography of the problem. Elista: Kalmyk State University Press, 2008. – 82 p. (in Russian))
 hamagmongol.narod.ru/library/khoyt_2012_r.htm Хойт С.К. Калмыки в работах антропологов первой половины XX вв. // Вестник Прикаспия: археология, история, этнография. № 3, 2012. с. 215-245.
 Boris Malyarchuk, Miroslava Derenko, Galina Denisova, Sanj Khoyt, Marcin Wozniak, Tomasz Grzybowski and Ilya Zakharov Y-chromosome diversity in the Kalmyks at the ethnical and tribal levels // Journal of Human Genetics (2013), 1–8.
 Хойт С.К. Этническая история ойратских групп. Элиста, 2015. 199 с. (Khoyt S.K. Ethnic history of oyirad groups. Elista, 2015. 199 p. in russian)
 Joo-Yup Lee Were the historical Oirats "Western Mongols"? An examination of their uniqueness in relation to the Mongols // Études mongoles & sibériennes, centrasiatiques & tibétaines (47/2016)
 Хойт С.К. Данные фольклора для изучения путей этногенеза ойратских групп // Международная научная конференция «Сетевое востоковедение: образование, наука, культура», 7-10 декабря 2017 г.: материалы. Элиста: Изд-во Калм. ун-та, 2017. с. 286-289. (in russian)
 Ли Чжиюань. О происхождении хойдского народа // Международная научная конференция «Сетевое востоковедение: образование, наука, культура», 7-10 декабря 2017 г.: материалы. Элиста: Изд-во Калм. ун-та, 2017. с. 436-445. (in Mongol)

External links
 Oirat community portal (archived 1 August 2015) (in Mongolian)

Kalmykia
Ethnic groups in China
Ethnic groups in Russia
History of Mongolia
Mongol peoples
Dzungar Khanate

Oirats


Paul Delaney is a senior lecturer and professor of physics and astronomy at York University in Toronto. He is also the director of the Division of Natural Science within the Faculty of Science at York, as well as the Master of Bethune College at York.

Delaney has his master's degree in science. He has taught at York University since 1986. He earned his Bachelor of Science in experimental physics at the Australian National University in Canberra and his master's degree in astronomy at the University of Victoria. Delaney has been the recipient of many faculty of science and engineering awards at York University. One of his classes deals with the possibility of life on Mars. Delaney is also the director of the observatory at the York University, and its outreach program. In the past, he has also worked as a nuclear physicist at the Atomic Energy of Canada, and a support astronomer with the McGraw-Hill Observatory in Tucson, Arizona.

He holds both Australian and Canadian citizenship, and resides in Simcoe County with his wife - whom he met while attending the University of Victoria - and their two sons.

References

Living people
Scientists from Ontario
Canadian nuclear physicists
Academic staff of York University
University of Victoria alumni
Sandford Fleming Award recipients
Australian National University alumni
20th-century Canadian astronomers
21st-century Canadian astronomers
Year of birth missing (living people)
Writers from Simcoe County

Paul Delaney (professor)


A Vaudeville was a French satirical poem or song in the 17th and 18th centuries. It was used a lot in French theatre where entertainments using such songs were called "comédie en vaudeville". Late in the 19th century, a type of variety show done in American theaters came to be called "vaudeville" which was popular from the early 1880s to the early 1930s. The typical American vaudeville performance was made up of a several different, unrelated performances which were grouped together into a single show. Entertainers typically traveled from town to town as arranged by a "vaudeville circuit". It became less popular after the rise of movies, cinema, and radio, which eventually took over as the main forms of public entertainment.

History
The earliest vaudeville was the vau de vire, a Norman song of the 15th century, named after the valley of Vire. During the 16th century a style grew in the towns in France called the voix de ville ( city voices), whose name may have been a pun on vau de vire. These were also satirical. The two styles came together and in the 17th and 18th century. The term 'vaudeville' came to be used for songs satirizing political and court events.

Growth
The comédie en vaudeville grew from the tradition of these simple songs. The Paris audiences in the late 17th and early 18th century enjoyed hearing the familiar vaudeville tunes to new words. These comedies then grew into opéra-comique.

References
Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Vaudeville.

Song forms
Opera genres

Vaudeville


Mount Spec Road and Little Crystal Creek Bridge is a heritage-listed road from Mutarnee to Paluma with a bridge over Little Crystal Creek at Crystal Creek, City of Townsville, Queensland, Australia. The bridge is  north of Townsville and provides access to the Paluma Range National Park. The road and the bridge were constructed between 1930 and 1936 under the Unemployment Relief Scheme during the Great Depression. They were added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 30 October 2008.

History
Mount Spec Road and Little Crystal Creek Bridge, Crystal Creek, are situated in north Queensland,  north of Townsville. Mount Spec Road stretches some  from its junction with the old Bruce Highway to the western outskirts of Paluma. It provides access from the coastal plain, just  wide in this area, to the Paluma Range, which rises some  above the Big Crystal Creek floodplain. The concrete arch bridge over Little Crystal Creek is a prominent feature of the landscape in this area, and is located about halfway along the Mount Spec Road. The bridge is a very common subject for photography by locals and visitors, and Little Crystal Creek is one of the most popular natural destinations for residents of the city of Townsville.

Lobbying to build the Mount Spec Road took place over some 30 or so years, against a background of philosophical ideas of "progress" and "settlement" and the need for access to the areas west of Paluma for tin miners, timber cutters and farmers ("farmers access roads"), to the Paluma/Crystal Creek area itself for tourists and as a water supply for Townsville. This lobbying and the prolonged debate over the eventual location and construction of the road were also linked with the need to preserve features of the natural landscape. It took place amongst considerable controversy.

The earliest European access to what is now Paluma probably followed Aboriginal pathways, and there were six tracks in the Herbert district in the 1880s and 1890s that provided direct access to Mount Spec. However, only a few of these tracks were suitable for horses; most were foot tracks, and the easiest access to the forest in this area of broken topography was from the west.

In 1875 tin was discovered west of Paluma. It was soon realised that a good access road was required not only for the tin miners but also for visitors to the ranges, as the scenic beauty and temperate climate of the Paluma Range had been noted since the early 1900s. The Paluma Range area had been promoted for tourism and as a health resort from as early as 1902, when a correspondent from the North Queensland Herald visited the Mount Spec tin mines. The North Queensland Register of 28 July 1913 suggested that a township be gazetted at Cloudy Clearing, the original name for the site of Paluma, that a sanitarium be established in the ranges, and that "the scrub" be protected.

Successful Townsville businessman, REA McKimmin, wrote in 1913 of the scenic attractions of Mount Spec: "...I have seen most of the Southern Beauty Spots...and have no hesitation in stating that Mount Spec would surpass them all in every way if properly opened up...the wonderful change of climate compared to Townsville during the summer months is difficult to describe...".

Similarly, Phillip Foxlee, a Mount Spec tin miner, wrote to Queensland Premier Ted Theodore in 1925:
"All the water comes pouring through this Gorge in one channel at the mouth...this Gorge [is] two miles wide for almost its entire length...and [is] crammed full of waterfalls on every side...I think eventually we will have people from all parts of the world through that Gorge and circle round back to Mount Spec...it is likely to be a National Park."

Public interest in mountain retreats had endured from colonial times, when the summer's heat was to be avoided and recuperation at higher, cooler altitudes was prescribed for diseases such as tuberculosis, a trend which continued during World War II, when patients of the disease were still privately recuperating in Paluma. Mount Spec had become a popular weekend destination for visitors from Townsville and Ingham after World War I, and a series of "ranches" and guesthouses had appeared long before the road was constructed. Most of these visitors walked in on foot, just as the tin miners had done.

By 1920, the need to provide all-weather roads was a priority for Queenslanders, a response to the increased number of motor vehicles on the roads, and to the need to provide suitable infrastructure for an expanding economy. Queensland roads were in a deplorable condition, the result of haphazard planning by the then responsible but under-funded local government authorities. In the development of a road network, Queensland lagged far behind the other states. In response, the Queensland Government established the Main Roads Board in 1920 to oversee the construction of connecting roads and bridges and to provide funding to the local authorities involved. In 1925, the Main Roads Board became the Main Roads Commission under John Robert Kemp as Commissioner and continued the overseeing of road and bridge construction throughout Queensland. The Main Roads Board quickly realised that road and bridge specifications and other standards were urgently required to improve the quality of construction and establish a uniformity of practice. Road standards were therefore established, introducing three classifications of roads in 1925 and a single standard bridge design in 1922-1923. Two years later alternative designs were added to cater for different loadings, labelled First Class (later A Class) and Second Class (B Class). These standards did not change significantly over the next 80 years.

The Main Roads Act 1920 provided that responsibility for roads and bridges be shared between local and state authorities, ensuring that road planning and building was coordinated beyond the scope of individual local authorities. Under the Act, roads could be gazetted as Main Roads outside towns if they were trunk roads joining towns which were not yet connected by railway; feeder roads linking farming areas to the existing rail network; and developmental roads, which were to open to closer settlement new areas of Crown Land. Under amendments to the Main Roads Act 1920, several new categories of declared roads were added, including in 1929-1930 Tourist Roads, which were intended to open up areas to tourist traffic. Seven Tourist Roads had been declared by June 1930, although limited work had been carried out on them, and these included the Mount Spec Road, which therefore is one of the earliest declared Tourist Roads in Queensland. The inclusion of Mount Spec Road as a Tourist Road was largely due to influential Townsville businessmen, who with varied commercial, political and personal motives had brought together the various stakeholders to lobby for the construction of the road.

The newly formed Main Roads Board and subsequent Commission were anxious to make a mark, a factor exploited by the various lobby groups around Townsville. These included organisations such as the Royal Automobile Club of Queensland (RACQ), which arose from the growth in motor vehicle traffic and had a particularly active membership in Townsville in the late 1920s, and the Townsville and District Development Association, which had been campaigning since the early years of the twentieth century for the Queensland Government to open Mount Spec to settlement.

Townsville City Council was a powerful advocate for the construction of the Mount Spec Road. Mayor William Herbert Green saw the potential of Mount Spec as a water catchment for Townsville, because in the 1920s Townsville's water supply could not meet demand, and access to a guaranteed supply was required for the growing population. Although the motivation to improve access to the ranges was both the quantity and quality of the water at Mount Spec, financial constraints and the location of the area outside Townsville City Council's jurisdiction within the Shires of Thuringowa and Hinchinbrook resulted in an unwillingness to commit Townsville City's own funds to the construction of the road. Many of Townsville City and neighbouring Councils' concerns' over financial responsibility for the proposed road were relieved by its gazettal as a Tourist Road in October 1929. Nevertheless, Mayor Green's vision for Mount Spec as a water supply for Townsville was not met until the end of 1954, with the official opening of the first pipeline from Big Crystal Creek to Townsville and later with the construction of the Paluma Dam in the 1960s.

The construction of the Mount Spec Road finally came down to the State Government's need to deliver unemployment relief during the Great Depression and to provide quick scenic access to the proposed township at Cloudy Clearing in the ranges, for which Townsville branches of the Country and Progressive National Party had lobbied the Minister for Lands in 1931. There was otherwise mixed support for the road and its perceived benefits compared to its potential costs, particularly following the release of the Report of the Royal Commission on the Development of North Queensland in 1931. The purported economic benefits of the road were not clearly demonstrated. For example, potential timber reserves could be accessed by the road, a point made forcefully by state foresters to the Royal Commission, but logging areas within the Mount Spec State Forest had only been gazetted in the 1920s, the full extent of the timber reserves was unknown and the timber industry was only just beginning. Furthermore, tin mining was suffering a downturn, and the possibilities for farming on the tableland around Mount Spec that had been promoted by the Townsville and District Development Association were not readily apparent, with the only evidence that it was viable being fruits and vegetables grown in miners' clearings.

Finally, after an expedition into the ranges in 1924 by Townsville City Council and the RACQ, a motion was passed to request the Main Roads Board to undertake a survey of a road to Mount Spec, which was eventually carried out between 1929 and 1931. In November 1930, construction of the Mount Spec Road began with the clearing of about  of track from the railway line to the base of the Paluma Range. The new Main Roads Commission was responsible for surveying, designing and supervising the construction of the road. Apart from a few contractors, the only permanent staff were Commission employees. Labour was mostly unskilled and drawn from the region's unemployed men under Unemployment Relief Scheme funds that the Government insisted the Main Roads Commission deploy as a way of easing unemployment. The construction of the Mount Spec Road was the largest Unemployment Relief project in the region.

The project was labour-intensive took five years to complete. Working conditions were hard and isolated. Initially, all workers were located in one large camp near the base of the range, No. 1 Camp, where a pipeworks was erected on Ollera Creek. There were four major campsites throughout the duration of the project, but it is difficult to determine the total number of camps accurately because, as work progressed, smaller satellite campsites were established near where significant work, such as the construction of concrete arch culverts, was being undertaken. Mango and lemon trees and passionfruit vines previously marked the locations of these campsites, but these have mostly been removed, so that it is now difficult to determine where the campsites were situated on the ground. The campsite at The Saddle, some  from the start of the road, was quite large, housing over 100 workers and being maintained over a period of three years. The camp was on level ground below the road on the right-hand side, and included the Main Roads Commission site office, a tool shed and a telephone. Three large ship's water tanks now mark the location of this campsite. These tanks stored water for the camp, being fed by a nearby creek. Water was transported to fill the tanks in dry weather.

Sand was dug from the creek bed near No. 1 Camp for the hundreds of concrete pipes forming most of the culverts under the road. The eucalypt forest and then the rainforest, marked on Main Roads working drawings as "vine scrub" or "jungle", had to be manually cleared. Initially, the only mechanical aids were a few trucks, two tractors and two air compressors, with cuttings being blasted through the granite with gelignite and most work being done with picks and shovels. After the trees were cleared, horse-drawn ploughs broke up the softer earth, while horse-drawn scoops, wheelbarrows or mining trolleys on portable lengths of track removed the overburden. "Tumbling tommies", small scoops that were towed behind the crawler tractors, were used later on.

The significance of the project to Queensland's unemployment relief efforts was so great that the Queensland Governor, Sir Leslie Wilson, even visited for lunch, viewing progress on the road at No. 3 Camp, after travelling by train to Moongobulla and then up to the site.

In keeping with one of the main purposes of the road and as construction continued, a series of guesthouses and camping grounds were established along its length due to the beauty of the scenery, with Barrett's Guesthouse providing for the single male workers and visitors to the construction site.

As visitation to the Paluma Range increased, lobbying for the gazettal of a township continued, and with the head of works on the road still  from Paluma, the first auctions of lots were held in December 1934. The establishment of a township at Cloudy Clearing, now known as Paluma, had begun.

The Mount Spec Tourist Road was opened by Cecil Jesson, MLA for Kennedy, on 18 July 1937, sponsored by the Townsville and District Development Association and some twelve months after the full length of the road had become trafficable by car.

The Main Roads Commission also assumed responsibility for the provision of a range of tourist facilities, and in conjunction with the construction of the Mount Spec Road, built picnic areas and shelter sheds at Little Crystal Creek, The Saddle and at the top of the range; surveyed and built a network of walking tracks, some of which formed the basis for the present National Parks track system; and constructed scenic lookouts at The Saddle, The Loop (now McClelland's Lookout in honour of the Officer-in-Charge of construction), Star Valley and Widt's Lookout. Another innovation was the establishment of a "motor camp" at Paluma in 1937, possibly the first motel in Australia, which continued to be managed by Main Roads for another twenty years.

It is clear from the available evidence that the aesthetic appeal of the road was considered by the Main Roads Commission throughout its construction. The aesthetically pleasing design of the concrete arch bridge across Little Crystal Creek constitutes the best example of this. The final design of the bridge also illustrates the long-term thinking of the local Main Roads overseer and engineers, who had successfully lobbied Main Roads' head office in Brisbane for a radical change from the more usual second-class timber bridge to a first-class concrete bridge. On 8 June 1931, the District Engineer Townsville had written to the Secretary Main Roads Commission in Brisbane that "from the aesthetic point of view a masonry arch should be considered, as it would harmonise with a rather picturesque spot." This variation was approved in January 1932 and contributed to an escalation in the final construction costs of the project. Four stonemasons were employed during the construction of the Little Crystal Creek Bridge. Wages for the stonemasons and "too much work dressing stone", as noted by the District Engineer Townsville in June 1933, contributed to the excessive cost of the bridge. However, overall approval of the final result using unskilled labour as well as that of the stonemasons is apparent in the words of the Commissioner of Main Roads, who wrote in 1933 that the bridge was "an illustration of the high quality of work which can be achieved by such labour skilfully directed." The Little Crystal Creek Bridge is reportedly the only concrete arch road bridge in Queensland that remains in service.

Other examples that illustrate the way in which the final aesthetic appeal of the road was taken into account during construction include the several smaller concrete arch culverts that still exist along the full length of the road, which are similar in construction to the bridge over Little Crystal Creek, and the sections of stone battering and stone-paved gutters that have survived despite subsequent road improvements and maintenance and natural weathering.

Description

The Mount Spec Road, Crystal Creek stretches approximately  from its junction with the old Bruce Highway to the western outskirts of Paluma, north Queensland. It includes the bridge over Little Crystal Creek, which is located about halfway along the Mount Spec Road.

Although originally a gravel road, the Mount Spec Road now has a bitumen surface and rises some  up the Range. The road is two way. It has never been widened, and the original route and character of the road has been retained.

The Little Crystal Creek Bridge comprises a single span arch, constructed of concrete but faced with stone. It spans the Little Crystal Creek Gorge in Paluma Range National Park. The bridge has an aesthetically pleasing design, and is particularly photogenic, being in a very scenic location.

The original Little Crystal Creek Main Roads campsite that was used for the construction of the Bridge is now a car park developed by Queensland Parks and Wildlife in the 1990s. The car park at Little Crystal Creek is located on the left-hand side of the road for visitors to Little Crystal Creek Bridge and swimming hole, and part of this lies outside the heritage boundary, which is restricted to the road reserve. There is a large interpretive historical sign, including photographs, which was erected by Thuringowa City Council and Queensland Parks and Wildlife. Although a large part of the original dry stone wall in this location was removed during development of the car park, some sections still remain within the road reserve. Many of the stones of the wall were taken away and reused to build the walking track to Witt's Lookout at Paluma, although a pile of unused stones remain adjacent to the Witt's Lookout track.

There are several smaller concrete arch culverts, similar in construction to the bridge over Little Crystal Creek, and sections of dry stone walling (battering) and stone-paved gutters at various points along the full length of the road. The sections of stone guttering range from  in length and were constructed only where needed to divert run-off into pipe culverts. Most of the stone guttering occurs on the left-hand side of the road on the drive up the range, although one section of guttering survives on the outside of the slope, some  from the beginning of the road. Over 200 reinforced concrete culverts, or "pipe culverts", occur along the road.

Although it is now difficult to determine where many of the campsites used by the road workers during construction of the Mount Spec Road were situated, the location of The Saddle Campsite, some  from the beginning of the road, is marked by three ship's water tanks located within the road reserve. The tanks are about  square and about  deep (approximately 1000L capacity each).

There is a Main Roads Commission Benchmark tree located  ASL, some  from the start of the road. The tree is above the sealed road but within the road reserve, and although now dead, the blazed benchmark is very clear, and includes a broad arrow with "MR 51/2" marked on it.

At Paluma itself, some of the original white-painted round timber Main Roads guideposts still exist, for example, on the turnouts to Lennox Crescent. Although there were similar timber guideposts along the full length of the Mount Spec Road until a few years ago, most of these have been removed and replaced with modern metal/plastic guideposts. One section of timber guard rail, however, remains at a location about  from the beginning of the road, providing evidence of the original post and rail construction.

There are extensive views of Halifax Bay and the coastal plain as the road twists and turns up the Paluma Range.

Heritage listing
Mount Spec Road and Little Crystal Creek Bridge was listed on the Queensland Heritage Register on 30 October 2008 having satisfied the following criteria.

The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history.

Mount Spec Road, which stretches approximately  from its junction with the old Bruce Highway to the western outskirts of Paluma and includes the concrete arch bridge over Little Crystal Creek, is important in demonstrating the evolution and pattern of North Queensland's history. The road was constructed between 1930 and 1936 and before the northern highway from Townsville to Ingham, at a time when Main Roads were still a new concept. It was constructed at the height of the Great Depression, using mostly unskilled labour and with the application of Unemployment Relief Scheme funds. Construction of Mount Spec Road was the largest Unemployment Relief project in the region. It was a difficult and ambitious project that eventually took six years to complete and is significant as a long-term regional project employing hundreds of men.

The place is also important in demonstrating transport and communication patterns in North Queensland, and in particular the opening up of the Paluma Range to tourists, tin miners, timber cutters and farmers. The place is one of Queensland's earliest declared Tourist Roads, a new category of Main Road established under 1929-1930 amendments to the Main Roads Act 1920, and constructed under the auspices of the newly formed Main Roads Commission, whose responsibility was to guide the planning and construction of roads in Queensland.

The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage.

Mount Spec Road remains substantially intact throughout the  of its length and demonstrates an extensive and now uncommon use of concrete arch culverts, dry stone walling and stone-paved gutters.

The Little Crystal Creek Bridge on Mount Spec Road is the only identified Main Roads concrete arch bridge dressed with stone remaining in service in Queensland.

The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places.

Mount Spec Road is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of an early declared Tourist Road designed to open scenic locations to tourist traffic and constructed in hilly terrain by a large depression-era labour force using limited mechanical assistance. These characteristics include the extensive use of concrete arch culverts, dry stone walling and stone-paved gutters; the inclusion of a substantial concrete arch bridge over Little Crystal Creek rather than a less substantial timber structure; and the facing of the bridge and the arch culverts with stone.

The place is important because of its aesthetic significance.

The concrete arch bridge over Little Crystal Creek is an aesthetically pleasing design in a picturesque location along the Mount Spec Road. The bridge spans the Little Crystal Creek gorge in the Paluma Range National Park, and has become representative of this scenic part of the landscape, being a very prominent feature commonly photographed by locals and visitors. The aesthetics of the stone-faced concrete bridge are repeated in the several smaller concrete arch culverts that are located along the full length of the road. The road affords spectacular views of Halifax Bay and the coastal plain.

See also

References

Attribution

External links

Queensland Heritage Register
Townsville
Roads in Queensland
Bridges completed in 1933
Buildings and structures in North Queensland
Arch bridges in Australia
Road bridges in Queensland
Concrete bridges in Australia
Articles incorporating text from the Queensland Heritage Register
1933 establishments in Australia
Historic trails and roads in Australia


The Black Spectacles (published in the US as The Problem of the Green Capsule, with the subtitle "Being the psychologist's murder case"), first published in 1939, is a detective story by John Dickson Carr featuring his series detective Gideon Fell.  This novel is a mystery of the type known as a locked room mystery (or more properly a subset of the locked room mystery called an "impossible crime" story).

Plot summary

In the small English village of Sodbury Cross, pretty Marjorie Wills is suspected of having poisoned some chocolates in the local tobacco-and-sweet shop, using a method pioneered by historical poisoner Christiana Edmunds.  Her uncle, wealthy Marcus Chesney, believes that eyewitnesses are unreliable.  He avers that to observe something, then to relate accurately what was just seen, is impossible.  In order to prove his statements, he sets up a test; three witnesses are invited to witness some staged events not only in their view but in that of a movie camera.  After the events, it is planned that they will answer a list of ten questions.  Marcus Chesney takes a principal role in the staged events and, during them, is fed a large green capsule containing poison by a masked and disguised figure wearing black spectacles.  Amazingly, the three witnesses cannot agree upon the answers to any of the questions and no one can identify the murderer.  It seems as though Chesney very carefully set up the ideal conditions for someone to murder him and escape, but Gideon Fell, upon viewing the movie footage, can answer all ten questions plus the eleventh—who is the murderer?

1939 American novels
Novels by John Dickson Carr
Locked-room mysteries
Hamish Hamilton books
Harper & Brothers books

The Black Spectacles


Eliza Howell Park is a public park in Brightmoor, Detroit, Michigan. Howell Park, east of Telegraph Road between Fenkell Avenue and Schoolcraft Avenue, has  of land, making it the fourth largest park in Detroit; this is about one fourth of the area of Belle Isle or . A greenway links Howell with Stoepel Park. Howell has a  nature trail that, in 2009, was recently constructed.

History
The family of Eliza Howell, a real estate developer in Metro Detroit, gave  of that land to the City of Detroit in the 1936. The 1936 deed restriction states that the city is required to maintain the land as a public park.

In the Spring of 2009 the City of Detroit stopped mowing Howell and other parks in order to save money.

In 2010 Chazz Miller, a Detroit artist, and several volunteers painted plywood cutouts of butterflies as part of the "Papillion Effect ("Papillon" is French for butterfly"), an anti-blight campaign. Miller added several butterflies to the nature trail at Howell Park.

Kenneth Cheyne lawsuit
In August 2008, Howell Park Properties, the family owned business of Kenneth "Ken" Cheyne; a 65-year-old developer from Beverly Hills, Michigan, and a grandson of Eliza Howell; filed a lawsuit against the City of Detroit in circuit court, stating that the city is violating the deed restriction by not maintaining the park. Cheyne further argued that the city had willfully abandoned the park. Therefore, the city would have to return the Howell ownership back to the family. Officials from the City of Detroit said that Howell is still a park open to the public. Cheyne planned to convert the park into commercial development. MacDonald said "But the 138 acres that Cheyne lays claim to are the most suitable for redevelopment, since much of the city's share is in a flood plain." One week after The Detroit News reported on the lawsuit, the City of Detroit placed concrete barricades around the park.

Cheyne said that he had proposed developing commercial and residential properties to the administration of the Mayor of Detroit Kwame Kilpatrick by releasing the deed restrictions. Cheyne said that he proposed keeping 70% of the park as parkland and developing 30% of the park. Cheyne said that the staff members suggested that he hire the consultant they had selected, but Cheyne ignored that suggestion. According to Cheyne, for several years, the city never called back.

By 2011 the City had won in the legal challenge. Cheyne said that he was going to appeal the verdict.

 In 2012 Cheyne was still maintaining the legal challenge. Cheyne said that "Last year, they mowed it once or twice. There are wild dogs that run in there. It isn't treated like a park. It's like a stepchild in a way. Nobody cared for it."

Composition
The park includes an American football field with goal posts. As of 2009 there is a lot of rusted and broken playground equipment. Wooded areas and vacant fields make up large portions of the park. That year, Christine MacDonald of The Detroit News said "Nature has reclaimed much of the park, turning it into a de facto preserve, and some say that's a beautiful thing."

The city had stopped mowing the park in 2009 to save money. Riet Schumack, a Brightmoor resident quoted in MacDonald's article, said that visitors often see coyotes, deer, foxes, blue herons, and great horned owls; and that Indian pipe and trillium grow in the park.

Naomi R. Patton of The Detroit News said that the park serves as an illegal dumping ground and has roads in disrepair. Kenneth Cheyne, a member of the family who had donated much of the park land, regularly patrolled the park in a Mercedes, looking for prostitutes and people who illegally dump waste. Cheyne argues that the park is in a highly derelict situation.

References

External links

 Friends of Eliza Howell Park
 Oosting, Jonathan. "Developer sues Detroit for family-donated land intended as park but not mowed since spring." Mlive.com. November 18, 2009.

Parks in Detroit
1936 establishments in Michigan

Eliza Howell Park


The Châtelaine de Vergy (or Chastelaine de Vergi) is an anonymous short 13th-century romance of courtly love in Old French.

Overview
The poem consists of approximately 958 lines of verse in 8 syllable rhymed couplets. The work is in the same poetic form as the majority of medieval French romans, although significantly shorter than the romances of Chrétien de Troyes.  The work has come down to us in 20 manuscripts, though manuscripts C and G are the ones most commonly referred to, with the Folio Classiques edition using the former, which has 958 lines, and the Livre de Poche edition using the latter of 965 verses.  The oldest extant version was written in the late 13th Century, in approximately 1288, and the presumed date for the composition of the work is the first half of that century.  Some critics believe that the romance (other than the ending) is a roman à clef and that elements are based on true events.

The Châtelaine de Vergy was apparently very popular in courtly circles.  There exists as well a 15th-century prose version of the tale, and the plot was reused by Marguerite de Navarre in one of her Heptameron short stories (tale LXX). There are also multiple examples of the tale being portrayed in art, including various chests depicting scenes from the poem.

Whether or not the text is part of the courtly love tradition has been widely debated, especially given Gaston Paris and C. S. Lewis' definitions of the concept.

Plot
The Châtelaine de Vergy tells the story of an unnamed knight in the service of the Duke of Burgundy who is the lover of the Châtelaine of Vergy, the Duke's niece.  The Châtelaine has accepted this knight's love on one condition: that he must keep their relationship secret from everyone, and that when he comes to visit her, he must wait for her little dog to come out to him in the garden, which signals that she is alone and the knight may come see her.

When the Duchess of Burgundy falls in love with the knight, he is forced to spurn her advances, citing his loyalty to the Duke and his love for another.  In her anger, the duchess then tells her husband that the knight is unfaithful and has tried to seduce her, and the Duke accuses the knight of treachery.  To save his honor, and to avoid being exiled (and thus forced to distance himself from his mistress), the knight, once the lord has promised to keep his secret, reveals to his lord where his heart truly lies, thus violating his promise to his mistress.

The Duke reveals the truth of the knight's love to his wife, trusting her to keep the secret; but, at the feast of Pentecoste, the Duchess makes a cruel inside joke to the Châtelaine about her lover and her "well-trained dog".  The Châtelaine realizes her lover has not kept his promise and she dies in despair.  The knight discovers her body and kills himself.  The Duke finds both bodies, and exacts vengeance on his wife by killing her with the knight's sword, and then becomes a knight Templar.

Notes

References
 Hasenohr, Geneviève and Michel Zink, eds. Dictionnaire des lettres françaises: Le Moyen Age.  Collection: La Pochothèque.  Paris: Fayard, 1992, pp. 260–261.
 Marguerite de Navarre.  Heptameron.  Paris: GF-Flammarion, 1982, p. 521 (notes).

Medieval French romances
Courtly love

Châtelaine de Vergy


Season 3 of 24 is known as Day 3. As usual, it lasts 24 hours. The narrative starts and ends at 1 PM and each episode corresponds to an hour within the day of the story.

Season Overview
Jack Bauer and President Palmer try to stop a biological weapon attack . At first, it seems that Samon Salaraz must be released to stop the virus. However, Jack, who works covertly with other agents, breaks him out to set up an auction for the actual virus. Jack first works with Hector and Samon Salaraz and later with Nina Meyers to buy the virus. The seller, Michael Amador tricks the buyers, as they get a fake virus with a bomb. After some of the virus is released in a hotel, agents learn that Stephen Saunders is behind the virus. Saunders makes demands using the remaining vials as leverage until he is captured, but not before Jack has to kill Ryan Chapelle. In a major side plot, Alan Milikan, a significant backer of Palmer, knows about an affair between his wife, Julia Miliken, and Palmer's brother. President Palmer asks Sherry to deal with him. She ends up killing Alan, and in revenge, Julia kills Sherry. Using his knowledge of these events, Senator John Keeler blackmails President Palmer not to run again for president.

Starring

 Kiefer Sutherland as Jack Bauer (24 episodes)
 Elisha Cuthbert as Kim Bauer (24 episodes)
 Carlos Bernard as Tony Almeida (24 episodes)
 Reiko Aylesworth as Michelle Dessler (24 episodes)
 James Badge Dale as Chase Edmunds (24 episodes)
 Dennis Haysbert as President David Palmer (24 episodes)

Special guest star

 Penny Johnson Jerald as Sherry Palmer (10 episodes)

Guest starring

 Mary Lynn Rajskub as Chloe O'Brian (24 episodes)
 D. B. Woodside as Wayne Palmer (24 episodes)
 Zachary Quinto as Adam Kaufman (23 episodes)
 Jesse Borrego as Gael Ortega (14 episodes)
 Paul Schulze as Ryan Chappelle (14 episodes)
 Joaquim de Almeida as Ramon Salazar (12 episodes)
 Vincent Laresca as Hector Salazar (12 episodes)
 Vanessa Ferlito as Claudia Hernandez (11 episodes)
 Paul Blackthorne as Stephen Saunders (10 episodes)
 Greg Ellis as Michael Amador (9 episodes)
 Glenn Morshower as Aaron Pierce (9 episodes)
 Wendy Crewson as Dr. Anne Packard (8 episodes)
 Gina Torres as Julia Milliken (7 episodes)
 Christina Chang as Dr. Sunny Macer (6 episodes)
 Sarah Clarke as Nina Myers (6 episodes)
 Geoff Pierson as Senator John Keeler (6 episodes)
 Riley Smith as Kyle Singer (6 episodes)
 Alexandra Lydon as Jane Saunders (5 episodes)
 Andrea Thompson as Dr. Nicole Duncan (5 episodes)
 Doug Savant as Craig Phillips (4 episodes)
 Albert Hall as Alan Milliken (4 episodes)
 Daniel Dae Kim as Tom Baker (3 episodes)
 Wilmer Calderon as Pedro (2 episodes)
 Sarah Wynter as Kate Warner (1 episode)
 Alan Dale as Vice President Jim Prescott (1 episode)

Reception
Season 3 received positive review from critics with a 93% on rotten tomatoes. It's site reads: "24's third day marks the series' most ruthless season yet with a breathless race to avert chemical catastrophe, a myriad of shocking surprises, and an unnerving disregard for treating any character as safe."

Television seasons

24 (season 3)


The 22nd Guards Brigade was an infantry brigade of the British Army that saw distinguished active service during the Second World War.

History
The 22nd Infantry Brigade was formed by the redesignation of the 29th Infantry Brigade on 3 September 1939 and in March 1940 became responsible for all the troops in the Mersa Matruh Garrison area. In February 1941 the unit was reformed and renamed the 22nd Guards Brigade on 20 March 1941. It was converted to the 200th Guards Brigade (14 January 1942) and then finally the 201st Guards Motor Brigade Group (25 May 1942).

The 201st Guards Brigade saw extensive service in the North African Campaign, in Operation Crusader in late 1941 and later the Battle of Gazala, where it was forced to surrender on 20 June 1942 when Tobruk was captured by German and Italian forces, although some men managed to escape capture. The brigade was reformed, as the 201st Guards Brigade, under the command of Brigadier Julian Gascoigne in Egypt on 14 August 1942 and spent the next few months training there, before being sent to Syria in September where it trained as a motorised infantry brigade, with each of the battalions (the 6th Grenadier Guards, fresh from England, and 3rd Coldstream Guards and 2nd Scots Guards, both veterans) composed of only three rifle companies.

In early February 1943 the brigade was ordered to Tunisia to become part of XXX Corps of the British Eighth Army. The brigade's first action in the Tunisian Campaign, which was nearing its end, was during the Battle of the Mareth Line in March. The battle, the first for the inexperienced 6th Grenadiers, was disastrous. Ordered to attack an objective named Horseshoe Ridge, which was believed to be lightly held, the Grenadiers, supported by a very heavy artillery barrage and advancing with all three companies, suffered 70% casualties, mainly from anti-personnel mines and mortars, but managed to take the ridge, and all three companies fired Very lights to announce the capture of their objective. In an attempt to reinforce the forward companies, and aware that his men had suffered very heavy losses in the minefields, the Grenadiers' commanding officer (CO), Lieutenant Colonel Clive, ordered the battalion's Universal Carriers to clear a way through the minefield, thus making it easier to reinforce the forward companies. This was a dismal failure, with all the Carriers being destroyed. The Germans launched numerous counterattacks, which forced the remnants of the Grenadiers' rifle companies to retreat back through the minefields, sustaining further casualties. The Coldstream Guards, in a similar attack, managed to obtain one of the hills but, like the Grenadiers, also suffered heavily and also lost all Carriers. Realising the dire situation faced by his troops, Brigadier Gascoigne ordered both battalions to be withdrawn. This was achieved under the cover of darkness with no further loss. In the relatively short battle both battalions suffered heavy losses, with the 6th Grenadiers sustaining 279 casualties, including 9 officers and 67 men being killed, 5 officers and 83 men wounded, with a further 5 officers and 104 men taken prisoner. The Coldstream suffered 136 casualties.

In July 1943 the brigade was attached to the 56th (London) Infantry Division to replace the 168th (London) Infantry Brigade of that division which was temporarily attached to the 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry Division during the Sicilian invasion. With the rest of the 56th Division, the brigade landed at Salerno, the first stage of the Italian Campaign, on 9 September 1943, where they were involved in heavy fighting and sustained heavy losses. During the battle 27-year-old Company Sergeant Major Peter Harold Wright of the 3rd Battalion, Coldstream Guards was awarded the Victoria Cross. The brigade continued to fight in Italy, crossing the Volturno Line in October and in November and December at the Bernhardt Line. In early 1944, due to heavy casualties and a lack of Guards replacements, the brigade was eventually sent back to the United Kingdom, where it became a training brigade for the whole Brigade of Guards for the rest of the war.

Order of battle
The brigade was composed as follows during the war:
 2nd Battalion, Scots Guards (from 28 February 1941, left 1 October 1941, rejoined 14 December 1941 and left 16 June 1942)
 1st Battalion, Durham Light Infantry (from 28 February 1941, left 23 May 1941)
 3rd Battalion, Coldstream Guards (from 11 March 1941, left 20 June 1942)
 22nd Guards Brigade Anti-Tank Company (formed 1 June 1941, disbanded 28 July 1941)
 1st Battalion, Buffs (Royal East Kent Regiment) (from 7 June 1941, left 21 September 1941)
 9th Battalion, Rifle Brigade (Tower Hamlets Rifles) (from 29 September 1941, left 14 December 1941, rejoined 14 January and left 4 June 1942)

Upon reforming in August 1942 the 201st Guards Motor Brigade was composed as follows:
 3rd Battalion, Coldstream Guards (from 25 August 1942, left 23 June 1943, rejoined 22 July 1943 and left 12 March 1944, rejoined again 1 April 1945, left 3 August 1945)
 2nd Battalion, Scots Guards (from 25 August 1942, left 27 June 1943)
 9th Battalion, Rifle Brigade (Tower Hamlets Rifles) (from 1 to 5 September 1942, then  disbanded)
 6th Battalion, Grenadier Guards (from 7 October 1942, disbanded 17 November 1944)
 1st Battalion, Irish Guards (from 13 March 1944)
 1st Battalion, Welsh Guards (from 11 April 1945, left 3 August 1945)

Commanders
 Lieutenant-Colonel E.G. Earle (3 October 1939 – 21 October 1939)
 Brigadier J.T. Leslie (21 October 1939 – 26 July 1940)
 Brigadier G. Dawes (26 July 1940 – 26 August 1940)
 Brigadier A.R. Selby (26 August 1940 – 1 September 1940)
 Brigadier I.D. Erskine (11 February 1941 – 5 October 1941)
 Brigadier J.C.O. Marriott (20 October 1941 – 17 June 1942)
 Brigadier G.F. Johnson (17 June 1942 – 20 June 1942)
 Brigadier J.A. Gascoigne (14 August 1942 – 13 November 1943)
 Brigadier R.B.R. Colvin (27 November 1942 – 5 January 1945)
 Brigadier H.R. Norman (5 January 1945 – 31 August 1945)

References

Bibliography

22 Guards
Guards Division (United Kingdom)
Military units and formations established in 1939
Military units and formations disestablished in 1946
Infantry brigades of the British Army

22nd Guards Brigade


Pyebaek () is a Korean wedding custom that is traditionally held a few days after the official ceremony, with only family members present. The ceremony begins with the older couple seated on cushions behind a table in front of a painted screen, with the newlyweds opposite them. The newlyweds perform a deep bow which begins standing and ends with the newlyweds pressing their foreheads to their hands while kneeling on the floor. The bride may present the groom's parents with jujubes (Korean dates) and chestnuts, which symbolize children. A variation will have the newlyweds offering cups of wine, usually cheongju. The bride offers the cup to the father, and the groom offers the cup to the mother. Sometimes the parents will then also offer the newlyweds cups of cheongju or soju. The older couple then shares some wisdom on marriage from their advanced experience. Finally they will throw the jujubes and chestnuts back at the bride, who has to try catching them with her wedding skirt.

In the United States, this ritual is held a few days before the ceremony. The bride may also receive gifts of money in white envelopes.

Modern Korean weddings have incorporated the Pyebaek ceremony after the reception. The original Pyebaek was exclusively for the groom's side of the family to be introduced to the new family member, the bride. In current day Korean weddings, they have also allowed for the Pyebaek ceremony to be with the brides side of the family also.

Commercial services exist to assist those unfamiliar with how the ceremony is performed.

Reverse acculturation
YoungHee Kim and Sung-Yeon Park, professors at Bowling Green State University, view the resurgence of this traditional wedding practice as an example of reverse acculturation and cultural integration in which individuals both adapt to a new culture while maintaining a connection to the native culture. By adding the Pyebaek ceremony to their wedding festivities, Korean Americans, whether they are marrying another individual of Korean heritage or not, have begun to introduce their heritage culture into the mainstream culture of the United States.

See also
 Marriage in Korea
 Culture of Korea
 Hanbok
 Korean-Americans

References

Korean culture
Wedding traditions

Pyebaek


The Greenphone was a smartphone developed by Trolltech with Qtopia Phone Edition, a GUI and application platform embedded in Linux using mostly free and open source software.

The proprietary software on the phone includes the communications stack and the package manager. However, Trolltech put these components under GPL in version 4.3 of Qtopia, making it possible to run the Greenphone with no proprietary components by updating its software to Qtopia 4.3.

On October 22, 2007, Trolltech announced that it had sold all inventory of Greenphones and would no longer continue production, having achieved its goal of promoting the Qtopia platform and gaining interest from developers. Focus was shifted to developing the Neo FreeRunner phone. Trolltech intends to continue supporting the Qtopia Greenphone community, and alternative hardware, such as the Neo 1973.

The Greenphone was named after Robert Green, an employee of Trolltech at the time, who jokingly suggested it when the company was having trouble agreeing on a name for the phone.

See also

Android (operating system), developed by Google
FIC Neo 1973 a smartphone developed by Openmoko
Openmoko, which can also run Qtopia
Qtopia

External links

Greenphone developer tutorials
Getting Started with the Trolltech Greenphone SDK

References

Open-source mobile phones
Smartphones
Discontinued smartphones

it:GreenPhone

Greenphone


The waterhole, or water hole, is an especially quiet band of the electromagnetic spectrum between 1420 and 1662 megahertz, corresponding to wavelengths of 21 and 18 centimeters, respectively. It is a popular observing frequency used by radio telescopes in radio astronomy.

The strongest hydroxyl radical spectral line radiates at 18 centimeters, and atomic hydrogen at 21 centimeters (the hydrogen line). These two molecules, which combine to form water, are widespread in interstellar gas, which means this gas tends to absorb radio noise at these frequencies. Therefore, the spectrum between these frequencies forms a relatively "quiet" channel in the interstellar radio noise background.

Bernard M. Oliver, who coined the term in 1971, theorized that the waterhole would be an obvious band for communication with extraterrestrial intelligence, hence the name, which is a pun: in English, a watering hole is a vernacular reference to a common place to meet and talk. Several programs involved in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, including SETI@home, search in the waterhole radio frequencies.

See also
BLC1
Wow! signal
Radio source SHGb02+14a
Schelling point

References

External links
SETI: The Radio Search (page 2)
"What Is the Water Hole" (has a cleaner diagram)
Planetary.org: A Blueprint for SETI
How SETI Works Discusses the water hole.
"waterhole" entry in The Encyclopedia of Astrobiology, Astronomy, and Spaceflight'
"The ABCs of SETI: the search for extraterrestrial intelligence"
"SETI: The water hole" from Astronomy Now
"SETI Observations" from SETI Institute

Electromagnetic spectrum
Search for extraterrestrial intelligence

Water hole (radio)


The Istanbul Jazz Festival, formerly Istanbul Festival, () is a cultural event held every July in Istanbul, Turkey. It offers a selection of jazz music performances with the participations of famous artists from all over the world. The festival was first held in 1994 and is organized by the Istanbul Foundation of Culture and Arts. Its main sponsor is Garanti BBVA.

The festival had its beginnings in a concert given by Chick Corea and Steve Kujala on July 8, 1984, as a part of Istanbul Music Festival. This concert ignited more and more jazz events during the following years. Beginning in 1986, jazz was on the program. Since 1994, the Istanbul Jazz Festival has also hosted musicians in rock, pop, blues, reggae and New-age music. The Istanbul Jazz Festival is a founding member of the International Jazz Festivals Organization (shortly IJFO), which it chaired from 1998 to 2001.

Musicians who have appeared at the festival include George Benson, Jane Birkin, Björk, Goran Bregovic, Nick Cave, Eric Clapton, Stanley Clarke, Billy Cobham, Ornette Coleman, Randy Crawford, Dead Can Dance, Miles Davis, Deep Forest, Al Di Meola, George Duke, Marianne Faithfull, Bryan Ferry, Jan Garbarek, Stan Getz, Astrud Gilberto, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Haden, Herbie Hancock, Roy Haynes, Al Jarreau, Keith Jarrett, Lenny Kravitz, Ute Lemper, Paco de Lucia, The Manhattan Transfer, Tania Maria, Wynton Marsalis, Massive Attack, Bobby McFerrin, Loreena McKennitt, Brad Mehldau, Pat Metheny, Raul Midón, Marcus Miller, Modern Jazz Quartet, Oscar Peterson, Lou Reed, Dianne Reeves, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Carlos Santana, John Scofield, Simply Red, Roni Size, Patti Smith, Mercedes Sosa, Spyro Gyra, Sting, and Suzanne Vega.

See also
İzmir European Jazz Festival
List of jazz festivals in Turkey

References

External links
Official website

Festivals in Istanbul
Jazz festivals in Turkey
Music festivals established in 1994
Annual events in Turkey
1986 establishments in Turkey
Summer events in Turkey

Istanbul Jazz Festival


Soo or SOO may refer to:

Places
 Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, a border city in Canada nicknamed "The Soo"
 Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, a border city in the United States also nicknamed "The Soo"
 Soo Locks, the locks between Lake Superior and the lower Great Lakes
 Soo Township, Michigan, United States
 Soo, Kagoshima, a city in Japan
 Soo District, Kagoshima, a district in Japan
Sóo, a village in the Canary Islands
Søo, a river in Norway
 Soo River, a tributary of the Green River in British Columbia, Canada
 Strood railway station, Kent, England (National Rail station code)

People
 Su (surname), a Chinese surname also spelled "Soo"
 Soo (Korean name), a Korean surname and given name
 Jack Soo (1917–1979; born Goro Suzuki), Japanese-American actor
 Janar Soo (born 1991), Estonian basketball player
 Phillipa Soo (born 1990), American actress
 Rezső Soó (1903–1980), Hungarian botanist
 "Soo", nickname of William Sousa Bridgeforth (1907–2004), American Black league baseball team owner

Other
 Soo language, the Kuliak language of the Tepes people of northeastern Uganda
 Soo (film), a 2007 South Korean film
 Soo (puppet), a British panda puppet and TV character
 Rugby League State of Origin (SOO), an Australian rugby league competition
 Soldiers of Odin (SOO), a street patrol group
 Soo Line (disambiguation), several railroads

See also
Sioux, a Native American and First Nations people in North America
Sioux (disambiguation)
Sault (disambiguation)
Sue (disambiguation)
Su (disambiguation)

Soo