Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt (born 1 November 1966) is a British politician serving as Chancellor of the Exchequer since 2022. He previously served in the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport from 2010 to 2012, Secretary of State for Health and Social Care from 2012 to 2018 and Foreign Secretary from 2018 to 2019. A member of the Conservative Party, he has been Member of Parliament (MP) for South West Surrey since 2005.

The son of a senior officer in the Royal Navy, Hunt was born in Kennington and studied philosophy, politics and economics at Magdalen College, Oxford, where he was President of the Oxford University Conservative Association. He was first elected to the House of Commons in 2005 and was promoted to the Shadow Cabinet as Shadow Minister for Disabled People and later as Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. Hunt served in the Coalition Government as Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport from 2010 to 2012, where he led the drive for local TV, resulting in Ofcom awarding local TV broadcasting licences in respect of several cities and towns. Hunt also oversaw the 2012 London Olympics, which received widespread acclaim. His previous business interests have seen him become one of the UK's richest politicians.

Hunt served as Secretary of State for Health, later Health and Social Care, from 2012 to 2018. He served under both the Cameron premiership and May premiership and became the longest-serving Health Secretary in British political history. During his tenure, he oversaw the imposition of a controversial new junior doctors' contract in England after a dispute in which junior doctors undertook multiple strikes; the first such industrial action for 40 years.

Following the resignation of Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary over the Chequers Agreement, Hunt was appointed Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs in July 2018. He was a candidate for the Conservative Party leadership election in 2019, finishing second to Johnson, and resigned following Johnson's appointment as Prime Minister. He served as Chair of the Health and Social Care Select Committee from 2020 to 2022, a prominent role due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Following Johnson's resignation in July 2022, Hunt launched a second Conservative leadership bid, but was eliminated in the first ballot of Conservative MPs. On 14 October 2022, Hunt was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer by Liz Truss, following the dismissal of Kwasi Kwarteng, and retained his role as chancellor in Rishi Sunak's ministry following Truss' resignation.

Early life and education

Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt was born on 1 November 1966 in Lambeth Hospital, Kennington, and raised in Shere, Surrey, near the constituency he represents in Parliament.  He is the eldest son of Admiral Sir Nicholas Hunt, who was then a Commander in the Royal Navy assigned to work for the Director of Naval Plans inside the recently created Ministry of Defence, and his wife Meriel Eve Hunt, Lady Hunt (née Givan; 1937–2022), daughter of Major Henry Cooke Givan. The Hunt family were landed gentry, of Boreatton, Baschurch, Shropshire. A cousin was Dame Agnes Hunt, pioneer of orthopaedic nursing.

Through a paternal great-grandmother, Hunt is a descendant of Sir Streynsham Master, a pioneer of the East India Company. He is also a distant relative of Queen Elizabeth II and British Union of Fascists leader Sir Oswald Mosley. His father worked in NHS management after he retired from the navy and his mother was a nurse in the 1950s and 60s.

Hunt was educated at Charterhouse where he was Head of School. He then read philosophy, politics and economics at Magdalen College, Oxford, and took a first class honours Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree. He became involved in Conservative politics while at university, where David Cameron and Boris Johnson were contemporaries. He was active in the Oxford University Conservative Association (OUCA) and was elected to serve as president in 1987.

Early career
Following university, Hunt worked for two years as a management consultant at OC&C Strategy Consultants and then became an English language teacher in Japan. On his return to Britain, he tried his hand at a number of different entrepreneurial business ventures, with three failed start-ups including an attempt to export marmalade to Japan. In 1991, Hunt co-founded a public relations agency named Profile PR specialising in IT with Mike Elms, a childhood friend. Hunt and Elms later sold their interest in Profile PR to concentrate on directory publishing.

Hunt had been interested in creating a 'guide to help people who want to study rather than just travel abroad' and, together with Elms, founded a company known as Hotcourses in the 1990s, a major client of which is the British Council. Hunt stood down as director of the company in 2009; however, he still retained 48% of the shares in the company, which were held in a blind trust before Hotcourses was sold in January 2017 for over £30 million to Australian education organisation IDP Education. He personally gained over £14 million from the sale and in doing so became the richest member of Theresa May's Cabinet.

Political career

Early parliamentary career (2005–2010)
In the 2005 general election, Hunt was elected to represent the constituency of South West Surrey with a majority of 5,711.

After supporting David Cameron's bid for leadership of the Conservative Party, he was appointed Shadow Minister for Disabled People in December 2005. In the same year, he was a co-author of a policy pamphlet Direct Democracy: An Agenda For A New Model Party which included statements supporting denationalising the NHS and suggested replacing it with "a new system of health provision in which people would pay money into personal health accounts, which they could then use to shop around for care from public and private providers. Those who could not afford to save enough would be funded by the state". Hunt later denied that the policy pamphlet expresses his views. In David Cameron's reshuffle of 2 July 2007, Hunt joined the Shadow cabinet as Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport.

In 2009, Hunt was investigated by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards. The commissioner found: "Mr Hunt was in breach of the rules in not reducing his claims on the Additional Costs Allowance in that period to take full account of his agent's living costs. As a result, public funds provided a benefit to the constituency agent ... Mr Hunt received no real financial benefit from the arrangement and that the error was caused by his misinterpretation of the rules."

Hunt's offer to repay half the money (£9,558.50) was accepted. Hunt repaid £1,996 for claiming the expenses of his Farnham home while claiming the mortgage of his Hammersmith home. The commissioner said: "Mr Hunt has readily accepted that he was in error, and in breach of the rules of the House, in making a claim for utilities and other services on his Farnham home in the period during which it was still his main home. He has repaid the sum claimed, £1,996, in full. It is clear that, as a new Member in May 2005, his office arrangements were at best disorganised." The Legg Report showed no other issues.

Culture Secretary (2010–2012)

When the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats formed a coalition following the 2010 general election, Hunt was appointed Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (combining the roles of leading the Department for Culture, Media and Sport with that of Minister for the Olympics). He was consequently appointed a Privy Councillor on 13 May 2010.

In June 2010, Hunt attracted controversy for suggesting football hooliganism played a part in the death of 96 football fans in the Hillsborough disaster; when it has been established that a lack of police control and the presence of terraces and perimeter fences were the causes of the tragedy. Hunt later apologised.

In September 2010, The Observer reported "raised eyebrows" when Hunt's former parliamentary assistant, Naomi Gummer, was given a job within the Department for Culture, Media and Sport on a fixed-term civil service contract after Hunt had proposed departmental cuts of 35–50 per cent. The head of the Public and Commercial Services Union questioned Hunt's motives saying, "Political independence of the civil service is a fundamental part of our democracy and we would be deeply concerned if this was being put at risk by nepotism and privilege." Gummer is the daughter of a Conservative life peer, Lord Chadlington, who was a director of Hotcourses between 2000 and 2004.

As Culture Secretary, Hunt devised and championed a plan to give Britain the fastest broadband speeds in Europe. There was initial scepticism about his plans with concerns they could lead to BT regaining its monopoly. He also spearheaded the drive for local TV and as a result of this policy Ofcom awarded local television licences to Belfast, Birmingham, Brighton & Hove, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Grimsby, Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Newcastle, Norwich, Nottingham, Oxford, Plymouth, Preston, Sheffield, Southampton, and Swansea. In terms of culture policy, his main focus was to boost philanthropy given the spending cuts that the arts along with other sectors was experiencing. Changes were made to the inheritance tax – including measures to encourage private gifts to the arts.

During Hunt's tenure, competition and policy issues relating to media and telecommunications became the responsibility of the Culture Secretary; they were removed from the purview of the Business Secretary, Vince Cable, after Cable was recorded stating that he had "declared war" on Rupert Murdoch.

In April 2012, The Daily Telegraph disclosed that Hunt had reduced his tax bill by over £100,000 by receiving dividends from Hotcourses in the form of property which was promptly leased back to the company. The dividend in specie was paid just before a 10% rise in dividend tax and Hunt was not required to pay stamp duty on the property.

News Corporation attempted takeover of BSkyB and Leveson Inquiry
Hunt was given the quasi-judicial power to adjudicate over the News Corporation takeover bid for BSkyB. Hunt chose not to refer the deal to the Competition Commission, announcing on 3 March 2011 that he intended to accept a series of undertakings given by News Corporation, paving the way for the deal to be approved. Following a series of scandals concerning phone hacking, a House of Commons motion was planned that called on News Corporation to abandon the bid. The bid was eventually dropped. Hunt was alleged to have had improper contact with News Corp. Emails released to the Leveson Inquiry detailed contacts between Hunt's special advisor Adam Smith and Frédéric Michel, News Corp's director of public affairs and therefore a lobbyist for James Murdoch. The revelations led to calls from the Labour opposition and others for Hunt's resignation. Smith, Hunt's special adviser, resigned on 25 April shortly before Hunt made an emergency parliamentary statement in which he said that Smith's contact with Michel was "clearly not appropriate". Hunt said Lord Justice Leveson should be able to investigate and rule on the accusations and requested the earliest date possible to give evidence to the Inquiry to set out his side of the story.

Hunt appeared before the Leveson Inquiry on 31 May 2012, when it emerged that Hunt had himself been in text and private email contact with James Murdoch. Journalist Iain Martin claimed that at a 2010 event held at UCL which Murdoch attended he saw Hunt hide behind a tree to avoid being seen by journalists. Hunt later told the Leveson Inquiry that "I thought, this is not the time to have an impromptu interview, so I moved to a different part of the quadrangle... there may or may not have been trees!"

Lord Justice Leveson cleared Hunt of bias when the report was published, stating that "in some respects, there was much to commend in Mr Hunt's handling of the bid". He concluded: "What was not evident from the close consideration of events which the Inquiry undertook was any credible evidence of actual bias on the part of Mr Hunt. Whatever he had said, both publicly and in private, about News Corp or the Murdochs, as soon as he was given the responsibility for dealing with the bid the evidence demonstrates a real desire on his part to get it right. His actions as a decision maker were frequently adverse to News Corp's interests. He showed a willingness to follow Ofcom's advice and to take action, to the extent recommended by the regulators, in response to the consultation."

London 2012 Olympics
As Culture Secretary, Hunt was the government minister responsible for the 2012 London Olympics and 2012 London Paralympics. When it transpired that contractors G4S could not provide enough security staff for the Games, Hunt announced that soldiers would be drafted in and that he had been forced to "think again" about the default use of private contractors. Hunt took the decision to double the budget for the Danny Boyle-directed opening ceremony which received acclaim, and overall the Games were considered a huge success internationally. According to Danny Boyle, the artistic director for the opening ceremony, the Government initially suggested removing the section of the opening ceremony about the NHS, although Hunt denied this.

The Games received widespread acclaim for their organisation, with the volunteers, the British military and public enthusiasm praised particularly highly. In the aftermath, Hunt set up the school games as an Olympic Legacy project. Although there was criticism at the time of cuts in the school sports budget, 11,953 schools took part in the School Games in the first year. Hunt also campaigned to increase the emphasis on the importance of the tourism industry, especially the potential of the Chinese tourist market.

Health Secretary (2012–2018)

Hunt was appointed Secretary of State for Health in the 2012 cabinet reshuffle, succeeding Andrew Lansley. During his tenure, Hunt pursued an ambitious agenda to address patient safety, regional variations in premature deaths, health tourism
and A&E waiting times. He oversaw increased spending on the NHS but was criticised for controversial reforms, manipulating figures and increased privatisation. In a major break from a policy previously favoured by Conservative and Labour governments, Hunt declared patient choice was not key to improving NHS performance. He also defended the universal coverage provided by the NHS, including against US President Donald Trump. He has supported reducing the abortion limit from 24 weeks to 12 weeks and homoeopathy if recommended to patients by a doctor.

In 2012, Hunt attempted to downgrade casualty and maternity units in Lewisham. Hunt stated the cuts were necessary because neighbouring South London Healthcare NHS Trust had been losing more than £1m every week. But a campaign led by GP Louise Irvine defeated Hunt in court in 2012 on this issue, with the judge ruling that Hunt acted outside his powers when he announced casualty and maternity units at Lewisham Hospital would be downgraded.

In March 2014, Hunt announced that the Government would not give a recommended 1% pay rise to NHS non-medical staff receiving progression pay (around 55% of total non-medical staff). Following a pre-election report in April 2015 that hospital chiefs shared an average 6% pay rise totalling £35 million, Hunt promised to investigate if the Conservatives won the election.

In July 2015, Hunt became the subject of the first petition on a new UK Government website to reach the threshold of 100,000 signatures required for a petition to be considered for debate in Parliament. The petition called for a debate on a vote of "No Confidence" in Hunt as Health Secretary, and ultimately recorded 222,991 signatures leading to a debate on the motion being scheduled in September 2015. However, the Petitions Committee would not have had the power to initiate a vote of no confidence so instead debated the contracts and conditions of NHS staff.

In December 2015, an undercover Daily Telegraph investigation showed that in some cases locum agencies, Medicare and Team24 owned by Capita were charging some hospitals higher fees than others and giving false company details.  The agencies were charging up to 49% of the fee.  Hunt criticised those who sought "big profits" at the expense of the NHS and taxpayers and promised to "reduce the margins rip-off agencies are able to generate."

Hunt became the longest-serving Health Secretary in British political history on 3 June 2018.

Hunt supported Britain remaining in the European Union (EU) in the 2016 referendum. After the result which supported Brexit was announced, Hunt suggested a second referendum on the terms of any exit deal with him personally backing one in which the UK would stay in the Single Market.

In 2016, Hunt called for a reduction in the number of foreign doctors working in the NHS after the UK left the EU. At the Conservative Party Conference later in the month, Hunt pledged, by 2025, the NHS would be "self-sufficient in doctors". He announced an increase of up to 1,500 extra places at medical schools in the UK in 2018, partly funded by an increase in international medical student fees. Hunt also stated UK medical students would be forced to work in the NHS for at least four years or have to repay the cost of their training, around £220,000.

In 2017, Hunt stated he supported Brexit, citing the "arrogance of the EU Commission" in responding to the UK Government in the Brexit negotiations.

In April 2018, The Daily Telegraph revealed that Hunt breached anti-money laundering legislation by failing to declare his 50 per cent interest in a property firm to Companies House within the required 28 days. Hunt also failed to disclose his interest in the property firm on the Parliamentary Register of Members' interests within the required 28 days. Hunt later rectified the error. A spokesman for Hunt said that Hunt's "accountant made an error in the Companies House filing, which was a genuine oversight." In response, a spokesman for Downing Street agreed with the Cabinet Office that there was no breach of the ministerial code. The Labour Party referred Hunt to the parliamentary commissioner for standards.

NHS weekend cover
In July 2015, Hunt indicated he would be prepared to impose a new consultant contract on doctors in England which would remove the opt out for non-emergency work at weekends to prevent "about 6,000 avoidable deaths" resulting from "Monday to Friday culture" in the NHS and to reintroduce "a sense of vocation" in consultants. The comments angered doctors who responded by sharing photographs of themselves working at weekends via social media using the hashtag #ImInWorkJeremy. Hunt was criticised by statisticians David Spiegelhalter and David Craven, BMA council chair Mark Porter and Shadow Health Secretary Heidi Alexander for his claims not merely misrepresenting the facts but potentially causing patients to delay hospitals visits and put themselves at risk. His critics described the Hunt Effect where patients who needed medical attention at a weekend had been deterred from doing so because they were persuaded it would be better to wait until a Monday.

In October 2015, Hunt was accused by the editor of The BMJ Fiona Godlee of repeatedly misrepresenting a study published in the journal on the weekend effect. He had used the study as evidence when stating reduced staffing levels of doctors at weekends directly led to 11,000 excess deaths. Godlee asserted the study's authors did not specify the excess deaths were avoidable or staffing levels were the cause. The lead author of the study Nick Freemantle stated they did not identify a cause for excess deaths or establish the extent to which they were avoidable. Co-author NHS Medical Director Bruce Keogh in response to Hunt's comments in October stated "It is not possible to ascertain the extent to which these excess deaths may be preventable".

In January 2016, Hunt was criticised by stroke doctors for using out-of-date data to show stroke patients were more likely to die if admitted at weekends. They wrote there had been significant improvements since 2004–12, when Hunt's data came from, and new data showed there was "no longer any excess of hospital deaths in patients with stroke admitted at the weekend." Stroke specialist David Curtis said even the outdated statistics did not support Hunt's claims. In February, a leaked internal report by the Department of Health stated the department was unable to prove a link between increased consultant presence, availability of diagnostic tests, and reducing weekend mortality and length of stay. It highlighted the seven-day NHS could cost an additional £900 million each year, required the recruitment of 11,000 more staff including 4,000 doctors and 3,000 nurses, and community and social services could struggle to handle more discharges at the weekend.

In May 2016, another study also concluded there was no evidence people were more likely to die in hospitals at the weekend. In August, internal Department of Health risk management documents were leaked. They described 13 major risks in delivering the "truly seven-day NHS" pledge promised by the Conservatives prior to the 2015 general election. These included a lack of staff and funding for the policy. The documents also stated no advance impact assessments had been made to show how the policy would affect the delivery of NHS services. Chief executive of NHS Providers Chris Hopson described the seven-day NHS plan as "impossible to deliver" due to a lack of funding and staffing. He also highlighted pressures on the NHS with 80% of acute hospitals in England in financial deficit compared to 5% in 2013 and an increase of missed A&E waiting time targets from 10% to 90% in the same time period. In May 2016, a report by the House of Commons public accounts committee criticised Hunt's plan for a seven-day NHS, saying "no coherent attempt" had made to understand staffing needs, the plan was "completely uncosted", and contained "serious flaws".

Junior doctors' contracts and strikes

Under Hunt, the Department of Health announced a new junior doctors' contract in England which would increase doctors' basic pay but extend "normal hours" for which they would not be paid a premium. In September 2015, the British Medical Association (BMA) said they would not re-enter negotiations unless Hunt dropped his threat to impose the contract and balloted their members for industrial action. They argued the contract would include an increase in working hours with a relative pay cut of up to 40%. Hunt tried reassuring the BMA no junior doctor would face a pay cut, before admitting those who worked longer than 56 hours a week would face a fall in pay but said working these long hours was unsafe. In November 2015, he said he would offer a basic pay increase of 11%, but still removing compensation for longer hours.

On 19 November 2015, the result of a BMA strike ballot was announced, with 98% voting for full strike action. An agreement was not reached by the junior doctors committee's deadline, so the BMA announced a strike would go ahead.

The first day of strike action was in January 2016 and involved junior doctors only providing emergency care. A second day of strike action occurred in February 2016 where doctors again provided only emergency care. Following these strikes, Hunt announced he would unilaterally impose the new contract without agreement or further negotiation, with NHS trusts instructed to introduce it in August. In response, the BMA announced three 48-hour long strikes and issued a legal challenge over the contract.

Further talks after the strikes resulted in an agreement to be put to a referendum. In the July referendum, 58% of BMA members rejected the offer. Following this, Hunt rejected holding any further talks with the BMA and announced the imposition of the new contract on junior doctors starting from October.

In February 2016, Hunt was polled as the "most disliked" frontline British politician. He acknowledged there would be "considerable dismay" and announced an urgent inquiry led by Academy of Medical Royal Colleges chair Susan Bailey into junior doctors' morale and welfare. The Academy Trainee Doctors' Group voted unanimously not to participate in the review under the offered terms. He said he had lessons to learn but denied any personal responsibility for the dispute.

Also, in 2016, both Stephen Hawking and Robert Winston called for an inquiry into claims made by Hunt regarding whether the NHS had sufficient funding, with Hawking saying Hunt had "cherry-picked research, causing a devastating breakdown of trust between Government and the medical profession".

Foreign Secretary (2018–2019)
 Hunt was appointed Foreign Secretary in July 2018 following the resignation of Boris Johnson. Hunt said "My principal job at a time of massive importance for our country is to stand four square behind the Prime Minister so that we can get through an agreement with the European Union based on what was agreed by the Cabinet last week at Chequers." In July 2018, Hunt expressed fears over the UK potentially leaving the EU without a deal. He said that it would be "incredibly challenging economically" and that "It would lead to a fissure in relations which would be highly damaging for that great partnership that we have had for so many years, which has been so important in sustaining the international order."

Hunt supported the Saudi Arabian-led military intervention in Yemen and described Saudi Arabia as a "very, very important military ally". In August 2018, he defended Britain's alliance with Saudi Arabia after a bomb dropped on a school bus in Yemen killed 51 people, including 40 children, although he said he was "deeply shocked" at the deaths. Amid global outrage over the murder of Saudi dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul, Hunt rejected calls to end the UK's arms sales to Saudi Arabia, saying: "There are jobs in the UK ... at stake so when it comes to the issue of arms sales we have our procedures." In February 2019, he urged Germany to lift ban on arms sales to Saudi Arabia and warned that Germans are risking "a loss of confidence in Germany's credibility as a partner", although he admitted: "Over 80,000 children [in Yemen] have died of starvation, there are about a quarter of a million people starving at the moment, and around 20 million people don't have food security – they don't know whether they're going to be able to get the food they need in the days ahead." Andrew Smith, of Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT), said Hunt "played an utterly central and complicit role in arming and supporting the Saudi-led destruction of Yemen".

In July 2018, Hunt visited China and met China's foreign minister Wang Yi. Hunt said that the "UK-China Strategic Dialogue is an important opportunity to intensify our cooperation on shared challenges in international affairs, ranging from global free trade to non-proliferation and environmental challenges, under the UK-China Global Partnership and 'Golden Era' for UK-China relations". In October 2018, he criticised the Xinjiang re-education camps and human rights abuses against the Uyghur Muslim minority in China, saying: "British diplomats who visited Xinjiang have confirmed that reports of mass internment camps for Uighur Muslims were 'broadly true'."

Hunt was critical of Russia and Iran. On 23 August 2018, Hunt met US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to discuss the 'threat' from both countries. In April 2019, Hunt condemned the United States for recognising Israel's 1981 annexation of the Golan Heights, saying: "We should never recognise the annexation of territory by force. (...) We want Israel to be a success and we consider them to be a great friend but on this we do not agree." In June 2019, he stated he shared the US Government's assessment that Iran was to blame for two attacks on oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman.

Hunt supported the continued efforts of the UK Government to leave the European Union. During the September 2018 Conservative conference, Hunt likened the European Union to the former USSR, saying: "It was the Soviet Union that stopped people leaving. The lesson from history is clear: If you turn the EU club into a prison, the desire to get out won't diminish." This comment was strongly criticised. While on a February 2019 Brexit-related visit to Ljubljana, he caused anger by congratulating his hosts on "making really remarkable transformation from a Soviet vassal state to a modern European democracy." In fact Slovenia, as part of Yugoslavia, had previously been non-aligned.

In November 2018, Hunt threatened the United Arab Emirates with "serious diplomatic consequences" after it sentenced British research student Matthew Hedges to life in prison for allegedly spying for the UK. Hunt said that the verdict "is not what we expect from a friend and trusted partner of the United Kingdom and runs contrary to earlier assurances".  Hedges was released at the end of November, after intense negotiations.

Following the April 2019 arrest of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in London's Ecuadorian Embassy, Hunt thanked the Ecuadorean President Lenín Moreno for his cooperation.

Conservative Party leadership candidate (2019)

Hunt announced his campaign to become the leader of the Conservative Party on 24 May 2019, following the resignation of Prime Minister Theresa May. On 20 June 2019, he was named one of the final two candidates. Hunt was defeated by Boris Johnson, having secured only one third of the vote. His campaign was given £10,000 by a close associate to Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Following Boris Johnson's election as party leader, Hunt was offered the role of Secretary of State for Defence in Johnson's Cabinet but decided to turn it down.

Backbencher (2019–2022)
Returning to the backbenches, Hunt founded Patient Safety Watch in October 2019, with the charity seeking to establish data to report on patient safety and harm in care, continuing the work on safety he started as Health Secretary. He chairs the organisation and said he planned to invest considerable sums of money into it. However according to The Guardian two thirds of its income is spent on the salary of Hunt's former political advisor who was sacked over a previous lobbying scandal.

Hunt held his seat at the 2019 general election. He was elected as the new chair of the Health and Social Care Select Committee in January 2020, succeeding Sarah Wollaston. In February 2020, Hunt called for an inquiry into the National Health Service after the publishing of many reports regarding infant mortality in NHS hospitals.

In March 2020, Hunt expressed disapproval of the Government's response to the emerging COVID-19 pandemic, criticising the Government for still allowing "external visits to care homes" and "not preventing mass gatherings".

Hunt voted against Boris Johnson in the 2022 vote of confidence and urged other colleagues to do the same.

His book, Zero: Eliminating unnecessary deaths in a post-pandemic NHS, argues for "candour, a no-blame culture and a sincere determination to treat every mistake as an opportunity to learn how to do better next time". He writes that in the NHS there are 150 preventable deaths each week and draws on the experience of the airline industry to advocate a shift from a blame culture to a learning culture.

Conservative Party leadership candidate (2022)
Following the resignation of Boris Johnson, Hunt announced he would be standing in the subsequent Conservative Party leadership election. He criticised Johnson for investing in infrastructure instead of "wealth creation", and proposed policies including a moratorium on business rates in deprived areas and a cut to corporation tax to 15% instead of a proposed rise to 25%. He also said he would retain the rise in National Insurance rates and would not cut personal taxation until he "[got] the economy growing". Hunt said Esther McVey would be deputy prime minister if he were to become prime minister. He was eliminated in the first round of voting on 13 July, receiving 18 votes. He endorsed Rishi Sunak after being eliminated.

Chancellor of the Exchequer (2022–present)

Following the dismissal of Kwasi Kwarteng on 14 October 2022, following the poorly received September 2022 mini-budget, Hunt was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer by Prime Minister Liz Truss. He swiftly appointed four economic advisors to a panel to advise him, namely Rupert Harrison, Gertjan Vlieghe, Sushil Wadhwani, and former top advisor to Philip Hammond, Karen Ward.

On 18 October, Tory MP Sir Roger Gale stated "Jeremy Hunt is de facto prime minister at the moment". This was echoed by media, including The Guardian, with the Financial Times  writing that many MPs believe he is now the country's de facto leader. The Economist called him "chancellor in name but prime minister in practice" and "the most powerful person in Britain".

Following Truss' resignation, Hunt declined to stand in the party leadership election to replace her. Following Rishi Sunak's appointment as Prime Minister, it was confirmed that Hunt would continue as Chancellor.

His autumn statement took place on 17 November 2022 and retracted the majority of planned reforms from Kwarteng's mini-budget.

His 2023 spring budget, delivered on 15 March 2023, was the first full budget statement to be presented by Hunt since his appointment as chancellor. Announcements included a fuel duty freeze, an extension of the "Energy Price Guarantee" for 3 more months, investments in low-carbon energy projects and 30 hours of free childcare for working people in England.

In July 2023, Hunt outlined reforms to the pension industry with the aim of boosting pension pots and increasing investment in British businesses. In a speech to business leaders, Hunt claimed the Mansion House reforms could generate £75 billion of investment into high growth businesses and increase the average Brit's pension pot by 12% over the course of their career.

Personal life

Hunt's wife, Lucia Guo, comes from Xi'an in China. Hunt first met Guo in 2008, when she was working at Warwick University recruiting Chinese students for the university. They married in July 2009 and have a son and two daughters; Guo and the three children are low-profile and rarely appear in public. His wife presented a segment on Sky's China Hour, a show coproduced by state-owned broadcaster China International Television Corporation.

He owns a townhouse in Pimlico, central London as well as a home in Hambledon, Surrey. Hunt and his wife own Mare Pond Properties Ltd, a company which bought seven luxury flats in Alexandra Wharf, Southampton, with the help of a standard bulk discount from property developer and Conservative donor Nicholas James Roach.

Hunt speaks Japanese, having studied the language for two years while working in Japan as an English language teacher in the 1990s.

Hunt has named his personal political heroes as Margaret Thatcher and William Wilberforce. Hunt is a member of the Church of England.

Hunt has advocated for pro-active good mental health through actions including exercise, social contacts, gratitude and sleep.

In July 2023, he revealed that "every member of his family" has had cancer, and he himself has recovered from "a minor one". His younger brother, Charlie Hunt, died aged 53 on 2 August 2023, after being diagnosed with sarcoma in 2020.

Honours
 2010: Appointed to the Privy Council of the United Kingdom, giving him the honorific title "The Right Honourable" for life.
 2020:  Knight Grand Officer of the Equestrian Order of St Agatha of San Marino

Publications
 Zero: Eliminating Unnecessary Deaths in a Post-Pandemic NHS (London: Swift Press, 2022)

Notes

References

External links

Official website

Jeremy Hunt | Politics | The Guardian
Jeremy Hunt | Financial Times

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1966 births
Living people
20th-century English businesspeople
21st-century English businesspeople
Alumni of Magdalen College, Oxford
British Anglicans
British management consultants
British monarchists
Chancellors of the Exchequer of the United Kingdom
British Secretaries of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
Conservative Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies
English Anglicans
English expatriates in Japan
English public relations people
Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom
People educated at Charterhouse School
People from Godalming
People from Kennington
Presidents of the Oxford University Conservative Association
Secretaries of State for Health (UK)
Secretaries of State for Health and Social Care
UK MPs 2005–2010
UK MPs 2010–2015
UK MPs 2015–2017
UK MPs 2017–2019
UK MPs 2019–present

Jeremy Hunt


Mikhoel Felzenbaum (, ; born 1951 in Vasylkiv, Ukraine, USSR) is a postmodernist Yiddish novelist, poet and playwright.

He grew up in the Bessarabian city of Florești. He studied stage directing, theatre and art history in Leningrad and, from 1969 to 1973, worked as a director in the national theater of Bălți. In the mid-1980s, he began to publish his work in the Yiddish journal Sovetish Heymland. In 1988, he founded the Jewish theater of Bălți, for which he directed a number of plays in Yiddish. He was first chairman of the city's Jewish cultural society. His plays have been discussed in a conference in Alsace

After immigrating to Israel in 1991, Felsenbaum published several volumes of poetry and prose in Yiddish, and was co-founder of the almanac, Naye Vegn. He has had work published in various Yiddish journals: Di Goldene Keyt and ToplPunkt (Israel), Di Pen (Oxford), Oyfn Shvel and Yidishe Kultur (New York). His novel, Shabesdike Shvebelekh, is one of the only postmodern works written in Yiddish, and is about to be translated into Hebrew, English, German, Russian and French. It was discussed at a conference in Oxford

Mikhoel Felzenbaum has programmes on the weekly Yiddish language series broadcast on the Reka radio station based in Israel.

Bibliography

 עס קומט דער טאָג (Es kumt der tog: lider; Day arrives: Poems). Jerusalem; Tel-Aviv: Šmuel un Riwke Hurwitz Literatur-Fond, 1992.
 אַ ליבע-רעגן (A libe regn: lider; Rain of love: Poems). Tel Aviv: I. L. Peretz Farlag, 1995.
 דער נאַכט-מלאך (Der nakht-malekh; Angel of the night). Short stories and plays. Tel Aviv: I. L. Peretz Farlag, 1997.
 און איצט איך בין דײַן ניגון (Un itst ikh bin dayn nign; And now I am your melody). Poems. Bilingual edition in Yiddish and in Hebrew translation. Tel Aviv: H. Leyvik Farlag, 1998.
 Jiddische Texte: Solothurner Literaturtage, 10-12 Mai 2002. Conversation among Michael Felsenbaum, Lev Berinsky, and Gennady Estraikh. Edited and with an introduction ("Einführung zur Jiddischen Literatur") by Astrid Starck. Solothurn: Solothurner Literaturtage, 2002. In Yiddish and German. .
 שבתדיקע שװעבעלעך (Shabesdike shṿebelekh: roman; Sabbath matches: Novel). Tel Aviv: H. Leyvik Farlag, 2004.
 אין דרעזדען בײַ דער לאַבע (In Drezden, bay der Labe =Dresden an der Labe; In Dresden on the Elbe). Poems. Bilingual edition in Yiddish and in German translation. Tel Aviv: Menora Verlag, 2006.
 Субботние спички (роман, перевёл с идиша Вэлвл Чернин), РИЦ Медиа Формат: Moscow, 2006.
 בענקשאַפֿט (Benkshaft; Longing). Poems. Tel Aviv: Menora Verlag,  2007.

References

External links

   (Astrid Starck-Adler), Universite de Haute Alsace, May 2003

 Рецензия на русский перевод книги «Субботние спички»
 Рецензия на роман «Субботние спички» (иврит)
 Автобиографические заметки на идише,
 английском и французском языках

Israeli male dramatists and playwrights
Soviet dramatists and playwrights
Moldovan dramatists and playwrights
Male dramatists and playwrights
Yiddish-language playwrights
1951 births
Living people
People from Vasylkiv
Jewish Ukrainian writers
Soviet Jews
Moldovan Jews
Soviet emigrants to Israel
Moldovan emigrants to Israel
Moldovan male writers

Mikhoel Felsenbaum


Rōhai (鷺牌) meaning "image of a heron" or "sign of a heron" is a family of kata practiced in some styles of karate. The kata originated from the Tomari-te school of Okinawan martial arts. It was called Matsumora Rōhai, after Kosaku Matsumora, who was presumably its inventor (not to be confused with Sokon Matsumura). Ankō Itosu later took this kata and developed three kata from it: Rōhai shodan, Rōhai nidan, and Rōhai sandan. In Shorin-ryū and Matsubayashi-ryū this kata introduces Gedan Shotei Ate (Lower/Downward Palm Heel Smash) and Ippon Ashi Dachi. (One Leg Stance) It contains a sequence of Tomoe Zuki (Circular Punch) exactly the same as the one in Bassai, although the ending of the sequence chains into Hangetsu Geri/Uke (Half Moon Kick/Block).

Shito-ryu teaches all three of the Itosu Rohai kata as well as Matsumora Rohai. Some styles such as Wadō-ryū employ only one of Itosu's kata (Rōhai shodan or just Rōhai). While other styles such as Genseiryū and Shindō_jinen-ryū only teach Matsumora Rohai.

The Shotokan version of Rōhai (renamed Meikyo (明鏡), literally "bright mirror" by Gichin Funakoshi) is very distinct from either the Matsumora or Itosu versions. It is believed that Funakoshi being a much older and earlier student of Itosu than Kenwa Mabuni may have been taught a different version of Rohai from Itosu known as Gusukuma Rohai. Sometime in the early 1990s Tetsuhiko Asai introduced two new kata of his own design: Meikyo nidan and Meikyo sandan.

In Tang Soo Do and Soo Bahk Do unlike most of its forms which can be traced back to Shotokan, their version of Rohai was based on the Matsumora version. Over the years practitioners have made numerous changes to the form including the addition of a board (or brick) breaking element, which can be performed using either a downward punch or palm strike.

See also
 Karate kata

References

 Redmond, R. Kata: The Folk Dances of Shotokan, 2006 (https://bu-do.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/The_Kata_Book_2008-03-26op.pdf)

External links
 Akari-ki Karate: Rohai
 UNH Shotokan Karate club kata page
 Shotokan kata execution diagram

Karate kata

Rōhai


Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is a 2020 first-person shooter video game developed by Treyarch and Raven Software and published by Activision. It was released worldwide on November 13, 2020, for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S. It serves as the sixth installment in the Black Ops series and the seventeenth installment in the overall Call of Duty series. The game is the second Call of Duty title since 2011's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 to be co-developed by two studios.

Black Ops Cold Wars campaign is set during the early 1980s of the Cold War, taking place between Call of Duty: Black Ops (2010) and Call of Duty: Black Ops II (2012) chronologically. It is centered around a pursuit of the alleged Soviet spy Perseus, whose stated goal is to subvert the United States and tilt the balance of power toward the Soviet Union. For the campaign, the player takes control of "Bell", who is recruited by CIA officer Russell Adler into a multinational task force created to hunt down Perseus. The campaign also sees the return of Black Ops characters Alex Mason, Frank Woods, and Jason Hudson, with Mason also being the playable character in certain missions. The game's multiplayer introduced new game modes as well as new map dynamics and elements, carrying over several design choices introduced in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. It features a seasonal content system similar to Modern Warfare, which includes a battle pass as well as free maps and weapons added every season. Cold War also features narrative tie-ins to Modern Warfare via the campaign and multiplayer, establishing a shared universe across multiple Call of Duty sub-series.

The game was originally developed by Raven and Sledgehammer Games and not intended to be an entry in the Black Ops subseries. However, the development suffered from disagreements among the two teams, resulting in Activision placing Treyarch in charge of the game's development in 2019, with Raven acting as a co-developer to them. Marketing for the game began in August 2020 and was done in different forms, including certain content creators receiving slide projectors, puzzles made to be solved online by fans, and a website showcasing historical Cold War events. A public multiplayer beta for the game was also made live in October 2020. Black Ops Cold War received generally favorable reviews from critics, with praise for the campaign, multiplayer, and zombies, while criticizing its technical issues and lack of innovation. It became the best-selling game of 2020 in the US.

Gameplay

Campaign
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War campaign allows players to assume a custom character, codenamed "Bell", with the ability to choose their intelligence agency, skin tone, nationality, and gender; as well as different personality traits that provide in-game perks. For the first time since Call of Duty: Black Ops II, the campaign features multiple endings, dependent on player choice throughout the campaign.

Multiplayer
Multiplayer features new and returning game modes, as well as maps that accommodate both the traditional 6v6 format, as well as larger 12v12 combat. The game also introduced a new game mode named "Fireteam", which can support up to 40 players. The Create-a-Class system from Modern Warfare returns, with two major differences: field upgrades are implemented as part of class loadouts, and each class has a wildcard choice out of four possible ones: Gunfighter (allows up to 8 primary weapon attachments), Perk Greed (allows 2 perks from each perk type for a total of 6 usable perks), Danger Close (double grenade equipment), or Lawbreaker (allows mixing and matching any weapon/perk type in any slot). Like Modern Warfare, Cold War also support cross-platform play and cross-platform progression. Following an update, the progression system for multiplayer is integrated with Call of Duty: Warzone, allowing for a unified level system across Cold War, Warzone  and Modern Warfare. In addition, Operator characters and weapons from Cold War are also added to Warzone to be used alongside Modern Warfare Operators and weapons, though the multiplayer modes remain separated and do not share Operators and weapons.

Zombies
Zombies features a new storyline titled "Dark Aether" which expands on the original Aether story, concluded in Black Ops 4, while also staying true to the main narrative of the campaign. Instead of playing as predefined characters, players can take on the role of Operator characters from Multiplayer, as part of a CIA response team codenamed "Requiem". Progression from Multiplayer is shared with Zombies, as players are able to use any weapon to start a Zombies match, alongside Gunsmith, scorestreaks and field upgrades, in addition to returning mechanics such as wallbuys, the Mystery Box, Pack-a-Punch and past fan-favorite Perks. For the first time in Zombies, players can opt to "exfil" the map, which will put them in a difficult wave with increased enemy spawn that they must survive before they can escape. Collectible intels are also scattered around the playable maps, allowing players to keep track of and unfold the main story as they progress. A skill upgrade system is featured in the game, allowing players to enhance weapons, perks, ammo mods and field upgrades with Aetherium Crystals, a currency acquired from reaching round milestones. A new game mode, Onslaught, was introduced exclusively to PlayStation players until November 1, 2021. In this mode, which are played within Multiplayer maps, up to 2 players defend areas grounded off by the Dark Aether orb, which must be powered by zombie kills. Sufficient kills will move the orb to new positions, forcing the players to move or die outside of the orb's protection zone. The Season Two update introduces "Outbreak", a large-scale mode where players fight off zombie hordes and complete objectives in an open-world area, composed of locations featured in the larger Multiplayer modes.

Plot

Characters and settings
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is set during the Cold War in the early 1980s. The campaign follows Green Beret turned CIA SAD/SOG officer Russell Adler (Bruce Thomas) and his mission to stop an international espionage threat known as Perseus (William Salyers) in 1981. The story is inspired by actual events. Featured locations include the Netherlands, Turkey, West and East Berlin, South Vietnam, the Soviet Union, and Cuba. Adler is supported by returning Black Ops characters Alex Mason (Chris Payne Gilbert), Frank Woods (Damon Victor Allen) and Jason Hudson (Piotr Michael), alongside fellow former MACV-SOG operative Lawrence Sims (Reggie Watkins), Mossad fixer Eleazar "Lazar" Azoulay (Damon Dayoub), and MI6 intelligence officer Helen Park (Lily Cowles), with additional support from KGB Head of Security and undercover agent Dimitri Belikov (Mark Ivanir). Players take on the role of "Bell", a mysterious operative who assists Adler and his team in finding Perseus for the majority of the campaign; Mason and Belikov are also playable in certain segments. Perseus' inner circle consists of Iranian terrorists Arash Kadivar (Navid Negahban) and Qasim Javadi (Farshad Farahat), Russian mafia boss Anton Volkov (Rafael Petardi), rogue KGB Agent Major Vadim Rudnik, and ex-CIA officer Robert Aldrich. The campaign also features a brief appearance by Imran Zakhaev (Dan Donohue), father of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare antagonist Victor Zakhaev, and Colonel Lev Kravchenko (Andrew Divoff), a former nemesis of Mason and Woods whom they last encountered in Laos in 1968.

The multiplayer mode's seasonal story takes place from late 1983 to 1984, and follows Adler on a new mission to investigate the resurgence of Perseus and his agents, led by Vikhor "Stitch" Kuzmin (Chris Parson), who seeks vengeance on Adler for personal reasons. Stitch's followers and fellow Perseus operatives include Laotian warlord Kapano "Naga" Vang (Greg Chun), ex-NIS operative Freya "Wraith" Helvig, ex-MI6 agent Roman "Knight" Gray (Mark Sheppard), mercenary Owethu "Jackal" Mabuza (Gabe Kunda), ex-yakuza Kaori "Kitsune" Tanaka (Erika Ishii), and ex-Spanish Army demolitions expert Benito "Fuze" Ortega. Several NATO allies appear throughout the seasons assisting Adler and the CIA in fighting Stitch's forces, including: DGSE operative Zeyna Ossou (Mara Junot), SRT Marine Wyatt "Bulldozer" Jones (Jeff Schine), Delta Force sniper Terrell Wolf (Zeke Alton), guerrilla fighter Karla Rivas (Krizia Bajos), Unit 777 officer Jabari Salah (Ayman Samman), and CIA SAD/SOG operative Colton "Stryker" Greenfield (Christian Rummel). Captain Carver Butcher (Ron Bottitta), founder of Task Force Vanguard and a protagonist of the Call of Duty: Vanguard multiplayer seasonal story, makes an appearance in the final Cold War multiplayer season.

The Dark Aether story in Zombies mode takes place from late 1983 to 1985, and continues several narrative elements from its predecessor, the Aether story. The central protagonists of the story are Requiem, a classified CIA task force dedicated to studying and eradicating the global rising undead threat. Players take on the role of a four-person Strike Team, taking orders from CIA officer Grigori Weaver (Gene Farber), who coordinates Requiem's various operations. Other Requiem members include: Major Mackenzie Carver (Keston John), Head of Containment and Security Division; Doctor Elizabeth Grey (Amy Pemberton), Head of Unnatural Sciences; Doctor Oskar Strauss (Thure Riefenstein), Head of Energy Research; "Raptor One" (Derek Phillips), a pilot who is tasked with extracting the strike team from outbreak zones upon completion of their missions; and the enigmatic Director who monitors the strike team's activities. Opposing Requiem is Omega Group, a Soviet Union-backed organization lead by Colonel Kravchenko, who is largely responsible for the new undead outbreak threat. Through the course of the story, Requiem agents come into contact with Kravchenko and other Omega operatives, including: Doctor William Peck (Zeke Alton), an American scientist who betrayed the United States government to defect to Omega; Doctor Aleksandra Valentina (Sadie Alexandru), Lead Scientist in Psychotronics Research, whose secret identity is Angelika Vogel, daughter of Nazi scientist Ulrich Vogel (Michael Gough); Doctor Hugo Jager, Research Lead of Necro-Analytics department; and Commander Gorev (Zeke Alton), Kravchenko's right-hand man. Assisting Requiem in their battle against Omega Group and the undead are Samantha Maxis (Julie Nathanson), a former BND operative and acquaintance of Weaver with a mysterious past; and Sergei Ravenov (Andrew Morgado), an Omega Group soldier who lost faith in the organization's mission and acts as Maxis' mole. Both Requiem and Omega also regularly establish contact with Kazimir Zykov (Andrew Morgado), a Soviet engineer who is trapped in the Dark Aether dimension and wishes to escape with either group's help.

Synopsis

Campaign
In January 1981, CIA SAD/SOG operatives Russell Adler, Alex Mason, and Frank Woods are sent to target Qasim Javadi and Arash Kadivar for their roles in the Iran hostage crisis. With intelligence gained from interrogating Qasim, the team tracks Arash to Turkey, where the three witness him executing everyone in the vehicle he arrived in. Arash boasts that Perseus was the one responsible for organizing the hostage crisis before being executed. US President Ronald Reagan authorizes a black operation team to neutralize Perseus after being briefed of his threat by Jason Hudson and Adler.

Adler's team consists of CIA operative Lawrence Sims, American born Mossad operative Eleazar "Lazar" Azoulay, and MI6 intelligence officer Helen Park, with Mason and Woods providing tactical support. The final member of the team is an agent known only by the codename "Bell", who served with Adler and Sims in MACV-SOG during the Vietnam War. The team starts by asking Bell to recall Operation Fracture Jaw in 1968, where Adler believes he, Bell, and Sims first encountered Perseus. Afterwards, the team proceeds to East Berlin to apprehend/kill Anton Volkov, a Russian mafia boss with ties to Perseus.

Following an infiltration into a secret Spetsnaz training facility by Bell and Woods, the team discovers that Perseus had infiltrated Operation Greenlight, a top secret American program that secretly planted neutron bombs in every major European city to deny their use to the Soviets in the event of an invasion. Mason and Woods are deployed to Mount Yamantau in the Ural Mountains, where they infiltrate Nikita Dragovich's destroyed base in hopes of retrieving his list of sleeper agents. However, the team finds out that Perseus has wiped the data from the Yamantau base's mainframe, leaving their only option to infiltrate KGB Headquarters to retrieve the list. Enlisting the help of one of their KGB double agent allies, Dimitri Belikov, they manage to get Adler and Bell inside the Lubyanka Building. The team learns that an Operation Greenlight scientist is one of the sleeper agents and has fled to Cuba. Hoping to catch Perseus there, the team launches a raid. They learn that Perseus has managed to steal the detonation codes for every Operation Greenlight bomb, meaning he can devastate Europe and lay the blame on the United States. The team comes under heavy fire and Lazar and Park are injured in the process, leaving Bell only enough time to save one of them.

After rescuing Bell, Adler continues to press them by provoking their memories of Vietnam once more. At this point, Bell's true identity is revealed as an agent of Perseus, having been shot by Arash in Turkey out of jealousy. Bell was found by Adler and was brainwashed using Project MKUltra into believing they were his comrade. With Bell's memory returned, Adler interrogates them on the location of Perseus' headquarters. Bell can then either choose to remain loyal to Perseus and lie to Adler, or choose to betray Perseus and reveal his location.

 In the non-canonical endings where Bell chooses to stay loyal to Perseus, they lie by telling Adler to head to the Duga radar array, where the team will be too far away to stop Perseus from activating the nukes. If Bell has established contact with the Soviet Army beforehand, they will lure the team into a trap and kill them with the help of Perseus and the Soviet Army before they activate the nukes. If Bell refuses to kill the team, Bell is executed by Adler but the nukes will still go off. Europe is devastated by the explosions and public opinion of the United States plummets. The CIA is forced to erase the existence of Adler and his team in an effort to cover up the United States' involvement in Operation Greenlight. Perseus boasts that his agents in Europe will take advantage of the chaos to infiltrate every European government and turn them towards the Soviet Union, while his agents in the United States will continue to undermine the country.
 In the canonical ending where Bell decides to betray Perseus and help the CIA, they along with the team assault Perseus' headquarters in the Solovetsky Islands and destroy the transmitters needed to send the detonation signal. With the failure of Operation Greenlight, Perseus goes into hiding, though Adler swears to continue pursuing him and dismantle his spy network. Later, Adler takes Bell out for a private conversation, assuring them that their choice to turn against Perseus was of their own free will and that they are a hero. Adler then admits that Bell must be eliminated as a loose end and both draw their guns, with the scene fading to black as gunshots are heard.

Multiplayer/Warzone
Two years after Operation Greenlight's failure, a Perseus cell infiltrates the Cheyenne Mountain Complex and successfully hijacks a nuclear ICBM during military exercise Able Archer 83. Operators from NATO and Warsaw Pact countries are deployed to various hot zones, where Perseus activities are sighted. On January 20, 1984, a Perseus cell, led by Vikhor "Stitch" Kuzmin, raids a CIA safe house in West Berlin in order to gain intel on Adler. Stitch, who was in charge of Nova-6 production on Rebirth Island, vowed vengeance on Adler, who captured and tortured him during the CIA's assault on the island in 1968. Stitch leaves behind a message to taunt Adler that leads him to a mall in New Jersey. At the mall, Adler's team runs into an ambush by Stitch, who has also set up a cache of Nova-6. The team attempts to escape, but Adler is ultimately captured and taken away by Stitch and his men.

Three months later, Woods leads a squad to Laos where Adler was last sighted, only to learn that he has been transported to Verdansk. Hudson authorizes a search and rescue operation to retrieve Adler. On June 2, 1984, two Perseus operatives, Freya "Wraith" Helvig and Roman "Knight" Gray, infiltrate the Yamantau secret military base and retrieve data related to Dragovich's numbers program, which Stitch plans to use in order to create more sleeper agents across the nation. They then detonate the base, intending to shift the blame toward the U.S. and spark another war. Eight days later, Woods manages to locate Adler in Verdansk and rescue him.

Some times later, Stitch orders Perseus operative Owethu "Jackal" Mabuza to assault Jumpseat Satellite Ground Station in South Africa. The station's surviving specialist is forced to obey Stitch's order as he de-orbits two CIA satellites, which end up crashing in Verdansk and Algeria, respectively. Following his recovery, Adler immediately leads a squad to investigate the satellite crash in Algeria. As they approach the crash site, Adler recklessly charges in and eliminates Perseus agents, while secretly recovering a data recorder from the satellite debris. A month later, Woods leads a response team, accompanied by Colton "Stryker" Greenfield, to the ECHELON Listening Station in Teufelsburg, where they attempt to apprehend Perseus operative Kaori "Kitsune" Tanaka. Kitsune, who has just finished uploading the numbers protocol, activates the sequence, turning the response team against Woods and Stryker, who narrowly escape death. Afterwards, Hudson meets with Woods in private and reveals an inconsistency in Adler's statement about the data recorder from the Algeria satellite crash site, as well as his recent unmonitored activities in Verdansk. Recognizing that Adler may have been compromised due to the numbers program, Hudson orders Woods to contact Mason for help.

On August 2, 1984, Stitch and Perseus operative Benito "Fuze" Ortega attempt to defuse several explosive charges planted all across Verdansk by Adler. Meanwhile, Adler is put through extensive torture by Mason and Hudson in order to break his programming. Mason succeeds in deprogramming Adler, while Stitch's team fails to stop most of the charges from detonating. Woods, Adler, Mason and Hudson are deployed at a heavily destroyed Verdansk to confront Stitch for the final time. They eventually find Stitch in the woods, where Adler learns that he had taken over the mantle of Perseus, while the previous one passed away from cancer in 1983. Having finished his work, Stitch willingly surrenders his life, while taunting Adler of his actions. A gunshot is heard as the scene cuts to black.

A few days after, Adler, Mason, Woods and Hudson investigate an underground Nazi bunker in the ruins of Verdansk, where they meet Captain Carver Butcher, a retired Special Operations Executive agent and founder of Task Force Vanguard. Butcher begins telling Adler and the others of his mission in leading various special operations task forces to hunt down remnants of the Nazi empire in the Pacific.

Zombies
In 1983, CIA Special Officer Grigori Weaver is contacted by an acquaintance, former BND operative Samantha Maxis, who provides him with secret KGB intelligence. Weaver learns from Maxis that during World War II, the Nazis attempted an experiment in a secret bunker in Morasko, Poland where they managed to reanimate dead soldiers into zombies. Afterwards, the bunker was discovered and sealed by the Soviet Union, only to be recently uncovered by Omega Group, a KGB-Spetsnaz joint research team working in favor of the Soviet Union. As a result, several Dark Aether anomalies begin to appear around the world, unleashing zombies in their wake. A classified task force codenamed Requiem is assembled to combat the global undead threats as well as conduct research into the anomalies for technological advancement.

In November 1983, Requiem deploys a strike team to the bunker in Morasko, dubbed Projekt Endstation, where they discover a rift that acts as a gateway to the Dark Aether dimension, responsible for other global dimensional breaches. Upon further investigation, the strike team uncovers a device in the facility called Der Wechsler, which can restore a zombie's brain functionality. The strike team uses it on one of the roaming zombies in the facility, who was a former Omega Group member named Orlov. In turn, he agrees to help the team close the dimensional rift. Orlov successfully seals the rift, destroying Endstation and sacrificing himself in the process, while allowing the strike team to escape.

Following Endstation's destruction, Maxis investigates further into Omega Group's activities, and travels to Outpost 25, located in A Sầu Valley, Vietnam, but is captured by Omega forces and thrown into the Dark Aether dimension. In June 1984, the Requiem strike team arrives at Outpost 25, and makes contact with Captain Sergei Ravenov, Maxis' mole within Omega. Ravenov guides the strike team through the undead-infested facility, while also dealing with Doctor William Peck, an American scientist who defected to Omega. After learning from Peck of Maxis' current situation, the strike team attempts to open a portal and stabilize it long enough for Maxis to escape the dimension. They eventually succeed and exfiltrate with Maxis, while Ravenov elects to remain undercover as Omega continues their operations in the Ural Mountains. Following Requiem's success, Omega's leaders, Colonel Lev Kravchenko and Doctor Aleksandra Valentina, travel to Outpost 25 to confront Peck about his failure.

In an effort to catch up to Omega Group's progress, Requiem launches Operation Threshold, a large-scale mission across the Ural Mountains where the largest outbreak zones have been identified. Over the next several months, Requiem operators are deployed in multiple Ural regions in order to eliminate undead targets, capture specimen and commence further research on the mysterious Aetherium element. Meanwhile, Maxis is quarantined under isolation due to her time spent inside the Dark Aether dimension. In November 1984, Maxis secretly contacts the Requiem strike team during their mission, requesting them to meet with Ravenov. At the missile silo in Ruka, Ravenov reveals that Peck has been using Aetherium crystals to supercharge nuclear warheads, which would allow Omega Group to create new outbreak zones wherever they choose. Not wishing to let either side possess the warheads, Maxis instructs Ravenov and the strike team to work together and direct the warheads toward the Pacific Ocean where they can be safely dumped. After clearing out a massive zombie horde guarding the silo, the strike team succeeds in deploying the warheads and manages to exfil.

Afterwards, Ravenov contacts Weaver via Maxis' secret radio channel, and requests Requiem's help in extracting several Omega scientists who wish to defect from the group. Though angry at Ravenov and Maxis' secrecy, Weaver agrees to help him carry out the operation. Some times later, the strike team receives intel from Ravenov that he has lost contact with the scientists. The team is sent to the State Sanatorium U-23 to investigate a crash site and help extract the scientists; however, they were all murdered by Doctor Hugo Jager, an Omega scientist who was secretly a mole planted by Kravchenko to root out the defectors. The strike team attempts to exfil, but is captured by Kravchenko and Omega forces.

Amidst the operations at the Ural Mountains, both Requiem and Omega come into contact with Kazimir Zykov, a Soviet engineer who was originally sent to the Endstation bunker in 1945 to shut it down, and has been trapped inside the Dark Aether since then. Zykov, who wishes to escape the dimension, has attempted to reach out to the real world, giving both Requiem and Omega warnings of a mysterious entity commanding the undead forces from within. Meanwhile, Valentina continues to further her own agenda: to open a gateway to the Dark Aether in hopes of freeing her father, who seemingly has been communicating with her from the other side since her childhood. Omega Group eventually deduces Valentina's real identity as the daughter of Ulrich Vogel, a Nazi scientist who previously lead Projekt Endstation.

Two months after the strike team's capture, an outbreak occurs in East Berlin, where Valentina was last sighted. Having learned of her true allegiance, Kravchenko decides to deploy the Requiem strike team at the Berlin site to stop her, while overseeing their mission. Upon arriving in Berlin, Kravchenko and the strike team learn that Valentina has been mutated with Dark Aether energy by the Forsaken, the entity mentioned by Zykov, who was also masquerading as Vogel to trick Valentina into doing his bidding. The strike team reaches an abandoned CIA safehouse and reactivates Klaus, a combat robot customized with an artificial intelligence module created by the Director of Requiem. With Omega Group's instructions, the team constructs a miniature Aetherium warhead using components left onsite by the CIA. Valentina attempts to stop them, but is ultimately defeated, and her energy is used to refine the Aetherium for the warhead. As the Forsaken taunts Requiem of his imminent arrival, Klaus carries the warhead through the portal to complete the mission. Kravchenko attempts to betray the strike team at the last minute, but Maxis, using her Dark Aether power, manages to open a portal, allowing the team to return home safely. Meanwhile, the Director monitors Maxis, and sends a group memo to an unknown recipient, noting her growing power as a concern toward Project Janus.

As Operation Threshold expands into the North Atlantic Sea and Algeria, the Director continues to pressure Maxis in isolation, coercing her into using her powers. Meanwhile, Omega Group authorizes a new operation to free Zykov from the Dark Aether, intending to use this opportunity to take down the Forsaken with their own warheads. Requiem, after receiving intel on Omega's new operation from Ravenov, also intends to free Zykov by their own means. On June 4, 1985, the Requiem strike team is deployed to an Omega test site in Ukraine, where Kravchenko and Peck are conducting the final steps to open a Dark Aether gateway. They succeed in freeing Zykov, only to learn that he was the Forsaken all along. As Kravchenko and Peck attempt to escape the facility, Maxis and the strike team make their final stand against the Forsaken. Eventually, Maxis sacrifices herself by plunging into a Dark Aether portal, weakening the Forsaken enough for him to be captured by Omega's containment chamber. With the Forsaken defeated, all global outbreak zones are collapsed, and the undead threat is contained. The Director - revealed to be Edward "Eddie" Richtofen - orders Requiem to be shut down, and its department leads apprehended alongside the strike team, while the Forsaken's chamber is delivered to an unknown location. Five years later, Peck travels to Japan and charters a boat to the middle of the Pacific Ocean, claiming that he is looking for "some old friends".

Development
On May 18, 2019, Kotaku reported that the game was in upheaval as developers Sledgehammer Games and Raven Software had increasing tensions between the studios. Two sources described the game as a "mess". In response, Activision assigned Treyarch to lead development alongside Raven. This led to a shorter development period compared to previous entries as well as the two studios having different responsibilities, with Raven Software leading the development of the single-player campaign.

On August 4, 2020, Activision in their Q2 earnings call confirmed that a new Call of Duty title was planned to be released in 2020 and that Treyarch and Raven were developing the game. It is the first Call of Duty game since Modern Warfare 3 to be co-developed by two studios, as well as the first time Raven Software is a main developer, as in previous games they assisted on the multiplayer and extra features. Activision president Rob Kostich confirmed during the Q2 earnings call that Black Ops Cold War will be "tightly connected" to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019) and Call of Duty: Warzone.

Raven Software's Dan Vondrak said on the idea of multiple endings, "when we started creating the story, we had multiple endings in mind right away. And that really helped ... But we knew right away that we wanted to do that. I absolutely loved the idea that we could [have a] little bit of homage to Black Ops 2 by having these [multiple endings]."

Marketing
Announcements and marketing relating to a Call of Duty game have traditionally been around April or May prior to the game's fall release. However, Activision began teasing the game with an alternate reality game (ARG) in August 2020. Various YouTubers prevalent to the Call of Duty community on YouTube were shipped crates. Once authorized to open on August 10, 2020, they were greeted by a slide projector, 10 different slides per crate, and a manifest. Starting on August 14, 2020, the game was marketed, after initial ciphers solved, by enticing fans to solve ciphers and puzzles on pawntakespawn.com. The website allowed fans to watch VHS tapes containing news segments and footage that pertained to the corresponding year(s) throughout the Cold War. Throughout the VHS tapes, at random intervals, two-digit nixie tube combinations appeared, required to solve ciphers, in addition to one set of coordinates per VHS tape that led to a location in Warzone.

On August 19, 2020, once all ciphers were solved, the teaser trailer was revealed. The teaser trailer contains segments of a 1984 interview with former Soviet PGU KGB informant and defector Yuri Bezmenov discussing active measures, taken from a 1984 interview with conspiracy theorist G. Edward Griffin. The worldwide reveal was on August 26, 2020.

Starting on September 22, 2020, another alternate reality game (ARG) on pawntakespawn.com, teasing the Zombies mode, began when various Call of Duty YouTubers such as NoahJ456 and MrDalekJD were sent crates with 1980s technology and ciphers to solve. The official reveal for Zombies was on September 30.

Pre-orders of all Black Ops Cold War editions grant early access to the open-access beta, a weapons pack, and a Frank Woods operator pack in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and Call of Duty: Warzone. The Ultimate Edition grants access to three additional cosmetic skin packs, plus access to the Battle Pass of the current Season for Black Ops Cold War (dependent on time of purchase). The Cross-gen Bundle and Ultimate Edition grant console players two versions of the game for use on the current console generation (PlayStation 4 and Xbox One) and the next generation (PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series S or Xbox Series X) upon availability.

Controversies

CBR.com reported that the teaser trailer had been banned in China due to a one-second depiction of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests. An edited teaser was released worldwide instead. PC Gamer's Andy Chalk wrote: "There's also no mistaking the irony of active censorship in a promo trailer for a game whose tagline is, literally, 'Know your history'."

An editorial by Ian Walker in Kotaku accused Call of Duty of legitimating the views of Bezmenov when it included footage of his interview with Griffin in its August trailer. Among the complaints he had was that Bezmenov's views acted as a magnet for far-right conspiracy theories and personalities, that Activision presented Bezmenov's interview without the proper context and that Bezmenov himself held views that Walker argued were on the far right.

Post-launch content
All downloadable content (DLC) maps for the game, both for multiplayer and Zombies, were completely free. As with Modern Warfare, the game features post-launch microtransactions via the battle pass system and cosmetic bundles available via the in-game store.

In May 2021, for the mid-season update of Season 3, Activision and Treyarch announced a collaboration event, titled "'80s Action Heroes", featuring the addition of John Rambo and John McClane as playable characters, as well as new limited-time game modes inspired by the Rambo franchise and the Die Hard film series. Rambo and McClane's appearances are based on Rambo: First Blood Part II and Die Hard, respectively, with their voice lines adapted directly from the films.

In September 2021, Activision and Rebellion Developments announced a collaboration, bringing the character Judge Dredd of the 2000 AD comic book series into Cold War as a cosmetic outfit for the operator Ingo Beck. The Judge Dredd bundle was released September 14, 2021.

In October 2021, Activision and Treyarch announced The Haunting seasonal event as part of its sixth season content update, which would feature game modes and purchasable cosmetic items based on several horror movie franchises. Ahead of the event's release, details were leaked about some of the items, including a Ghostface operator character based on the Scream franchise, as well as a Frank the Bunny outfit based on the character from Donnie Darko.

Reception

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War received "generally favorable" reviews from critics, according to review aggregator Metacritic.

Game Informer gave the game a 8.75/10 rating, praising the campaign and saying: "If Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War excels at anything, it's options. This isn't uncommon for a Call of Duty title, but with a vast array of game modes for myriad player profiles and a fun campaign that retains a summer-blockbuster feel while getting weird and wild, the ride is a good one."

Sales

The PlayStation 4 version sold 84,475 physical copies within its first week on sale in Japan, making it the bestselling retail game of the week in the country. The PlayStation 5 version was the nineteenth bestselling retail game in Japan throughout the same week, with 6,045 copies being sold. In December 2020, it was confirmed that the game had sold 5.7 million digital units. Within its first six weeks of release, the game earned $678 million. The NPD Group named it the best selling game of 2020 and also ranked it as the twentieth bestselling video game in the United States by lifetime dollar sales by the end of 2020.

Notes

References

External links
 Official website

2020 video games
Activision games
Advertising and marketing controversies
Angolan Civil War video games
Alternate history video games
Call of Duty
Cold War video games
Cultural depictions of Mikhail Gorbachev
Cultural depictions of Ronald Reagan
Interquel video games
Multiplayer and single-player video games
PlayStation 4 games
PlayStation 5 games
Political video games
Raven Software games
Treyarch games
Video game sequels
Video games set in 1968
Video games set in 1981
Video games set in the 1980s
Video games set in Angola
Video games set in Cuba
Video games set in Germany
Video games set in East Germany
Video games set in Turkey
Video games set in Vietnam
Video games set in Los Angeles
Video games set in Moscow
Video games set in Miami
Video games set in Nevada
Video games set in New Jersey
Video games set in the Netherlands
Video games set in Ukraine
Video games set in Uzbekistan
Video games set in Berlin
Video games set in the Soviet Union
Video games set in Poland
Video games set in Nicaragua
Video games set in Laos
Video games set in New Mexico
Video games set in Kyrgyzstan
Video games set in Algeria
Video games set in Georgia (U.S. state)
Video games set in Panama
Video games set in Nebraska
Spy video games
Vietnam War video games
War video games set in the United States
World War III video games
Video games about nuclear war and weapons
Video games with gender-selectable protagonists
Windows games
Xbox One games
Xbox Series X and Series S games
Video games about zombies
Works about the Russian Mafia
Video games developed in the United States

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War


Santa Cruz High School (Liceo Santa Cruz) is a public high school in Santa Cruz, Chile.

History
On August 2, 1963 the Men's High School of Santa Cruz was created. Adriano Díaz donated land where the high school was going to be constructed. However, a sport complex was constructed there instead.

The high school opened on March 1, 1964 in an old house. It had at least 170 students. Many of these students already had finished their first or second grade in Humanities in the Pedro Aguirre Cerda High School, but it was not recognized officially.

The first principal was Osvaldo Castillo, who hired teachers. Almost all of the teachers had worked in the Pedro Aguirre High School.

A logo and a standard were designed. Both included palm trees, which were common in the city. The anthem of the high school was composed by Raúl Benavides.

References

Schools in Chile
O'Higgins Region

Liceo Santa Cruz


Abbott Memorial Library is the public library of Dexter, Maine.  It is located at 1 Church Street, in an architecturally sophisticated Renaissance Revival structure, built in 1894 as a gift from George Amos Abbott, a local mill owner.  The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.

Architecture and history
Abbott Memorial Library is located in the heart of Dexter's main village center, on a block bounded by Church, Hall, and Pleasant Streets, and Main Street Hill.  The sloping block is landscaped, with an open lawn raised from Church Street with benches in front of the library, and a small garden in the rear, along with memorials to the town's military.  The library is a T-shaped masonry structure, one story in height, with a brick exterior, granite foundation, and a hipped slate roof.  The main facade, facing west toward Church Street, is five bays wide, with a projecting gabled entry at the center.  The gable is fully pedimented, with a modillioned and dentillated cornice that continues around the building.  The pediment houses a floral design surrounding a central medallion.  The entrance below is set in a tall round-arch and keystoned opening, the arch supported by attached Ionic columns and flanked by floral motifs.  The building cornice is adorned with swags, and incised with the names of prominent European literary figures.  The projecting section at the rear is a later addition.

The building was built in 1894 to a design by J. Williams Beal, and is an unusually sophisticated work for its setting in the rural interior of Maine.  It, and the land on which it sits, were the gift of George Amos Abbott, owner of Amos Abbott and Company, a local woolen mill.  The land and building cost $32,000.

See also
 National Register of Historic Places listings in Penobscot County, Maine

References

External links
Abbott Memorial Library web site

Dexter, Maine
Libraries on the National Register of Historic Places in Maine
Library buildings completed in 1894
Libraries in Penobscot County, Maine
Renaissance architecture in the United States
National Register of Historic Places in Penobscot County, Maine

Abbott Memorial Library


Scipio Colombo (25 May 1910 – 13 April 2002) was an Italian dramatic baritone, and was known for his abilities as a musician and singing-actor.

Born in Vicenza, Italy, Colombo first studied philosophy at the University of Padua, before turning to music. He studied in Milan with Giuseppe Venturini and in Rome with Giuseppe de Luca, and made his debut in Alessandria, as Marcello in La bohème, in 1937.

Throughout World War II, he sang at most of the major opera houses of Italy, including the Teatro alla Scala. In 1947, he sang there in the Milan premiere of Prokofiev's The Love for Three Oranges, and of Britten's Peter Grimes, and later took part in the world premiere of Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmélites, as the Marquis de la Force, in 1957. He also sang in Mussorgski's Khovantchina, in 1949. He created roles in contemporary Italian works, notably in  Dallapiccola's Il prigioniero (Florence, 1950), and  Pizzetti's Cagliostro (La Scala, 1953).  He also sang in Dallapiccola's Volo di notte at the Scala (1964).

He made guest appearances at the Opéra de Monte-Carlo, Vienna State Opera (Il trovatore, Rigoletto, and Tosca, in 1955 and 1956), Arena di Verona, and Covent Garden (Tosca, in 1956 and 1958), as well as the Aix-en-Provence Festival and the Bregenz Festival.

Colombo also sang many of the great baritone roles of the Italian repertory:  Rigoletto, Count di Luna, Giorgio Germont, Count Almaviva, Don Giovanni, Guglielmo, Lescaut, Marcello, etc. In 1957, the singing-actor sang the Baron Scarpia to Magda Olivero's first Floria Tosca, for RAI (a performance published on Compact Discs, by Opera Depot).

In 1956, the baritone portrayed Ford in a film of Falstaff for RAI, with Giuseppe Taddei in the name part, Tullio Serafin conducting, and Herbert Graf directing.  In 2005, VAI published the film on DVD.

He was awarded the Order of Merit by the Emperor of Japan.

Beginning in 1963, he taught at the Musikhochschule in Karlsruhe. He died in Gernsbach, Germany.

Studio Discography
 Giordano: Fedora (Caniglia, Prandelli; Rossi, 1950) Cetra
 Verdi: Luisa Miller (Kelston, Lauri-Volpi; Rossi, 1951) Cetra
 Puccini: Tosca (dell'Argine, Scattolini; Quadri, 1951) Westminster
 Donizetti: Don Pasquale (Aimaro, Oncina, Luise; Quadri, 1952) Westminster

Videography
 Verdi: Falstaff (Carteri, Moffo, Barbieri, Alva, Taddei; Serafin, Graf, 1956) VAI

References

Further reading
 Operissimo.com

External links
 .

1910 births
2002 deaths
People from Vicenza
Italian operatic baritones
University of Padua alumni
Academic staff of the Hochschule für Musik Karlsruhe
20th-century Italian  male opera singers

Scipio Colombo


Slang Prostitution is the fifth studio album released by New York based rapper  and Wu-Tang Clan member Cappadonna. The only single of this album is "Somebody's Got To Go". The album was released on January 27, 2009.

Track list
 "You Can't Keep a Good Man Down (Part One)"
 "Savage Life" (prod by Todd Baker)
 "Three Knives" feat 3rd Digala & Lounge Lo (prod by Soul Professor)
 "Walk with Me" feat Joey Lee (prod by Digem Tracks Productions)
 "Do You Remember?"
 "That Staten Island Shit" feat Lounge Lo (prod by Digem Tracks Productions)
 "Stories" feat Jojo Pellegrino & 3rd Digala (prod by Digem Tracks Productions)
 "Life's a Gamble" feat Raekwon and Rachet (prod by Rush)
 "Hustle & Flow"
 "You Can't Keep a Good Man Down (Part Two)"
 "Pistachio" feat Lounge Lo, King Just & Mega Don(prod by Soul Professor)
 "Grungy" feat G-Clef Da Mad Komposa (prod by Q-Dini)
 "What's Really Up?"
 "Da Vorzon" feat Lounge Lo & 3rd Digala (prod by Blastah Beats)
 "Somebody Got to Go" feat Lounge Lo & Ghetto Philharmonic
 "Fire" feat Masta Killa (prod by Chicargo)
 "Speed Knots" feat Precise (prod by N.E.S.)
 "Stay Shining" feat 3rd Digala
 "You Can't Keep a Good Man Down (Part Three)"

References

2009 albums
Cappadonna albums

Slang Prostitution


Babb's Beach is a municipal public recreation area located at 435 Babbs Rd. in Suffield, Connecticut.  It is the former site of what was known as Babb's Beach Amusement Park, a small amusement park that was active in the first half of the 20th century.  At its height in the 1930s, the surviving dance hall hosted dances for up to 3,000 weekend patrons.  The property, owned by the town since 1977, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2006.

Description and history
Babb's Beach is located in northwestern Suffield, on the eastern shore of the Middle Pond of the Congamond Lakes, which separate Suffield from Southwick, Massachusetts.  The property is about  in size, and has  of shoreline that is mostly beaches.  The beach is separated from the balance of the property by a low bluff.  The remainder of the property is an open grassy area, with the surviving buildings of the amusement park era on the northern edge.  A split-rail fence separates the property from the road, with an opening and a short gravel drive leading to an informal parking area.

The most significant building is a large dance hall; other surviving buildings are an arcade, a shooting gallery, and a small generator shed.  The dance hall is a single-story wood frame structure, with a central hip-roofed element ringed on three sides by extensions for services, and with a smaller projection on the north side for the stage area.

The Congamond Lakes began to develop as a leisure and recreational destination beginning in the 1850s, following the construction of the New Haven and Northampton Railroad along the former route of the Farmington Canal, which had used the lakes as part of its route.  Curtis Babb capitalized on the increasing popularity of the lakes as a destination by building a series of small cabins on the lakefront, and offering steamship service to the train on the far shore.  Babb's son Nelson took over the property in the 1910s, and expanded its facilities.  He converted a horse barn into a dance hall, and also built a bathhouse and boathouse on the waterfront.  Facing competition from other lakefront amusement operators, he also offered a variety of rides, including a merry-go-round that was built on a platform in the lake.  The dance hall proved a major draw, and was eventually replaced by a larger structure.  Performers at the venue included Tommy Dorsey, Harry James, and Kay Kaiser.

Business declined during the Great Depression, which Nelson Babb sought to counter by offering more amusements.  He built an arcade, and adapted the dance hall to permit roller skating.  The hall became known as one of the region's finest for that activity.  Business declined after World War II, and was dealt a significant blow by Hurricane Diane, which destroyed the park's waterfront facilities in 1955.  Babb turned the property over to the town in 1977, but continued to operate the dance hall as a roller skating facility until 1997.

See also

National Register of Historic Places listings in Hartford County, Connecticut

References

External links
Babb's Beach - Town of Suffield

National Register of Historic Places in Hartford County, Connecticut
1898 establishments in Connecticut
Buildings and structures in Hartford County, Connecticut
Suffield, Connecticut
Defunct amusement parks in the United States

Babb's Beach


Walser German (Walserdeutsch) is the name for a number of Germanic dialects, which are spoken in the Swiss canton Valais, and in settlements the group called Walser founded.  They are part of a dialect group called Highest Alemannic German. There are about 80.000 speakers, most of them in the upper part of Valais (Oberwallis).

The  Germanic dialects spoken in the Italian Aosta Valley, parts of Piedmont, as well as parts of Ticino are almost the same. The differences to the language of the settlements in Grisons, Liechtenstein and Vorarlberg are bigger, but there are still a large number of common words and phrases.

German dialects

Walser German


Labrador tea is a common name for three closely related plant species in the genus Rhododendron as well as a herbal tea made from their leaves.

All three species are primarily wetland plants in the heath family. The herbal tea has been a favorite beverage among Athabaskan First Nations and Inuit.

Description
All three species used to make Labrador tea are low, slow-growing shrubs with evergreen leaves:
 Rhododendron tomentosum (northern Labrador tea, previously Ledum palustre),
 Rhododendron groenlandicum, (bog Labrador tea, previously Ledum groenlandicum or Ledum latifolium) and
 Rhododendron neoglandulosum, (western Labrador tea, or trapper's tea, previously Ledum glandulosum or Ledum columbianum).

The leaves are smooth on top with often wrinkled edges, and fuzzy white to red-brown underneath.

R. tomentosum, R. groenlandicum, and R. neoglandulosum can be found in wetlands and peat bogs.

Uses
The Athabaskans and other indigenous peoples brew the leaves as a beverage.  The Pomo, Kashaya, Tolowa and Yurok of Northern California boil the leaves of western Labrador tea similarly, to make a medicinal herbal tea to help with coughs and colds. Botanical extracts from the leaves have been used to create natural skin care products by companies in Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador. Others use Labrador tea to spice meat by boiling the leaves and branches in water and then soaking the meat in the decoction.

During the eighteenth century, German brewers used R. tomentosum while brewing beer to make it more intoxicating, but it became forbidden because it led to increased aggression.

Toxicology
There is no sufficient data that demonstrates Labrador tea is safe to consume as toxicity varies across species and localities. Excessive consumption  is not recommended due to diuresis, vomiting, dizziness, and drowsiness. Large doses can lead to cramps, convulsions, paralysis, and, in rare cases, death.

Toxicity occurs due to terpenoid ledol found in all Labrador tea species. R. groenlandicum has the lowest toxicity due to lower levels of ledol. Grayanotoxins are also present, but few lethal human cases of poisoning due to grayanotoxins in Labrador tea have been documented. However, lethal poisonings have been documented in livestock.

Harvesting
Labrador tea is slow-growing, so new single leaves are collected in spring from multiple plants to avoid damaging individual plants every other year.

See also
 Labrador tea doll

References

Herbal tea
Inuit cuisine
Plant common names
Plants used in traditional Native American medicine
Plants used in Native American cuisine

Labrador tea


An hidalgo (, ) or a fidalgo (, ) is a member of the Spanish or Portuguese nobility; the feminine forms of the terms are hidalga, in Spanish, and fidalga, in Portuguese and Galician. In  popular usage, the term hidalgo identifies a nobleman without a hereditary title. In practice, hidalgos were exempted from paying taxes, yet owned little real property.

Etymology
From the twelfth  century, the phrase fijo d'algo (lit. son of something) and its contraction, fidalgo, were used in the Kingdom of Castile and in the Kingdom of Portugal to identify a type of nobility. In Portugal, the cognate remained fidalgo, which identified nobles of a similar status to an hidalgo in Spain. In the Kingdom of Aragón, the infanzón was the noble counterpart of the Castilian hidalgo. The pronunciation changes in Spanish occurred during the late Middle Ages, the f- sound in the word-initial position developed into a h-sound, leading to the spelling of hidalgo. (see History of the Spanish language)

In time, the term included the lower-ranking gentry, the untitled, lower stratum of the nobility who were exempted from taxation. The Siete Partidas (Leyes de Partidas), suggests that the word hidalgo derives from itálico ("italic"), a man with full Roman citizenship.

In the previous Visigoth monarchies, the condition of the hidalgo was that of a freeman without land wealth, but with the nobleman's rights to bear arms and to be exempt from taxation, in compensation for military service; the military obligation and the social condition remained in force by the Fuero Juzgo law.

Origins
The hidalguía has its origins in fighting men of the Reconquista. By the tenth century the term infanzón appears in Asturian-Leonese documents as a synonym for the Spanish and Medieval Latin terms caballero and miles (both, "knight"). These infanzones were vassals of the great magnates and prelates and ran their estates for them as petty nobility. In these first centuries it was still possible to become a miles simply by being able to provide, and afford the costs of, mounted military service.

Only by the mid-twelfth century did the ranks of the knights begin to be—in theory—closed by lineage. In the frontier towns that were created as the Christian kingdoms pushed into Muslim land, the caballeros, and not the magnates who often were far away, came to dominate politics, society and cultural patronage. From their ranks were also drawn the representatives of the towns and cities when the cortes were convened by kings. It was in the twelfth century that this class, along with the upper nobility, began to be referred to as hidalgos.

Types
Hidalgos de sangre (by virtue of lineage) are "those for whom there is no memory of its origin and there is no knowledge of any document mentioning a royal grant, which obscurity is universally praised even more than those noblemen who know otherwise their origin", or in other words, an immemorial noble. When challenged, an hidalgo de sangre may obtain a judicial sentence validating his nobility from the Royal Chancillería of Valladolid or Granada, if he can prove that it has been accepted local society and custom. In this case, the resulting legal document that verifies his nobility is called a carta ejecutoria de hidalguia (letters patent of nobility).

To qualify as an hidalgo solariego ("ancestral hidalgo"), one had to prove that all four of one's grandparents were hidalgos. Hidalgos solariegos were regarded as the most noble and treated with the most respect.

Hidalgos de privilegio (by virtue of royal privilege) and hidalgos de Real Provision (by virtue of meritorious acts) entail a grant of nobility from His Majesty the King of Spain in his position as monarch, or from his position as protector of a military confraternity or hermandad.

Hidalgo de bragueta ("fly-of-the-trousers hidalgo") obtained tax exemption for having seven sons in lawful wedlock.

In Asturias, Cantabria and other regions of Spain every seven years the King ordered the creation of padrones ("registers") where the population was classified either as hidalgos nobles, and therefore, exempt from taxation due to their military status or pecheros (from an archaic verb, pechar, "to pay") who comprised the estado llano ("lower ranks") and were excluded from military service and had to pay taxes. These padrones constitute nowadays a source of information about population genealogy and distribution as well as proof of nobility in certain cases.

Over the years the title lost its significance, especially in Spain. Kings routinely awarded the title in exchange for personal favors. By the time of the reign of the House of Bourbon, over half a million people enjoyed tax exemptions, putting tremendous strain on the royal state which wasn't calling their services to arms but relied more on professional armies and costly mercenaries.

Attempts were made to reform the title and by the early nineteenth century with the forced levies to military service of all citizens by conscription without any minimum requirements of nobility or pay or loyalty by honour but by coercion on desertion, it had entirely disappeared, along with the social class it had originally signified and most of its centuries-old developed code of honour in the nation's social culture.

Influenced by policies in France, hidalgos all became 'pecheros' (taxpayers), without the privileges of the former title, and along with all citizens were also subject to conscription. Both estates of the realm (social classes) became combined, compulsorily contributing to the nation in service and taxes without exemption, while the titled nobility and royalty kept their former privileges and exemptions.

Literature
In literature the hidalgo is usually portrayed as a noble who has lost nearly all of his family's wealth but still held on to the privileges and honours of the nobility. The prototypical fictional hidalgo is Don Quixote, who was given the sobriquet 'the Ingenious Hidalgo' by his creator, Miguel de Cervantes. In the novel Cervantes has Don Quixote satirically present himself as an hidalgo de sangre and aspire to live the life of a knight-errant despite the fact that his economic position does not allow him to truly do so. Don Quixote's possessions allowed to him a meager life devoted to his reading obsession, yet his concept of honour led him to emulate the knights-errant.

The picaresque novel Lazarillo features an hidalgo so poor that he spreads breadcrumbs on his clothes, to simulate having eaten a meal.
His hidalgo honour forbids him manual work but does not provide him with subsistence.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's Tales of a Wayside Inn includes "The Theologian's Tale" which recounts the tragedy of Hidalgo who betrays his two daughters to the Grand Inquisitor.  Hidalgo himself lights the fires, then from a tower casts himself into the depths of despair.

See also
Cuban nobility
Hidalgo (disambiguation)
Principalía

References

Bibliography

External links

In Spanish: Hidalgos de España (Association of Spanish nobles)

Spanish noble titles
Spanish words and phrases
History of the Spanish language

Hidalgo (nobility)