Waddy Butler Wood (1869 – January 25, 1944) was a prominent American architect of the early 20th century and resident of Washington, D.C. Although Wood designed and remodeled numerous private residences, his reputation rested primarily on his larger commissions, such as banks, commercial offices, and government buildings. His most famous works include the Woodrow Wilson House and the Main Interior Building.

Early life and education
Waddy Wood was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1869 to Captain Charles Wood, a Virginian who had relocated west to seek better opportunities. His father had been a Confederate States Army soldier during the American Civil War. Shortly after his birth, the Woods returned to Virginia and settled in Albemarle County, Virginia. He grew up at "Nutwood," Ivy, Virginia near the Wood family state, "Spring Hill," the home of his grandfather, John Wood, Jr. until leaving to receive his advanced education at Virginia Polytechnic Institute.

Early career
In 1892, Wood began working as an architect in Washington, D.C. His first important commissions were on two streetcar barns. The first was Metropolitan Railroad's East Capitol Street Car Barn, which he helped to design with engineer A.N. Connett in 1896. The following year he designed the Georgetown Car Barn, then known as Union Station, for the Capital Traction Company. During this time, Wood also designed several homes in what was then known as Kalorama Heights (now Adams Morgan).

Wood, Donn & Deming

In 1902, he began an association with Edward Donn, Jr. and William I. Deming, forming the firm of Wood, Donn and Deming. The firm was highly successful in Washington, D.C. providing services to various branches of government. Their designs can be found throughout the United States, including the expansion of the Portsmouth Naval Hospital in Portsmouth, Virginia. They also had a strong residential client base designing houses for prominent citizens such as Mrs. Phil Sheridan, General Charles Lane Fitzhugh and Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet; as well as public residences such as the Bachelor Apartment House located near the White House.

In 1906, Wood, Donn & Deming became the first Washington, D.C. architectural firm to design a bank high-rise in their city when they designed the Union Trust Building, now home to the New America Foundation and Joe's, the DC location of a high end steak and seafood chain. The building is also listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In the past, the city's largest banks had each retained nationally renowned architects while local architects were only chosen to design bank branches or remodel existing buildings. By choosing Wood's firm, Union Trust began a trend of the city's banks choosing local architects to design their buildings.

Wood's partnership with Donn and Deming is best known for the firm's work in 1907 on the Masonic temple located at the intersection of 13th Street, H Street, and New York Avenue NW, which is now the National Museum of Women in the Arts. The  building, a specimen of neo-Renaissance and Renaissance Revival styles, was declared a Washington, D.C. Historic Landmark in 1984 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.

In addition to the Masonic lodge hall, the building originally housed professional offices, the George Washington University law library, and a movie theater. The exterior has never been altered substantially. As the Temple Association envisioned, the building's location at the tip of a wedge-shaped block provides an aesthetic buffer zone which "permits of no future building being erected sufficiently near to mar [the Temple's] monumental effect ... ."

Despite the successes of Wood, Donn and Deming, his use of occult masonic symbolism and features was not universally appreciated and the firm was dissolved in 1912.

Personal practice

Waddy Wood's most famous buildings were created after he left Wood, Donn & Deming. In 1915, he built a home for Henry Parker Fairbanks, which was purchased by Woodrow Wilson in 1920 and became the Woodrow Wilson House (or the Fairbanks-Wilson house). As his reputation grew, his client list became quite prominent. In addition to President Wilson, he designed a home for Howe P. Corcoran and remodeled the interior of Senator Oscar Underwood's home in Fairfax County - Woodlawn, a home originally designed by William Thornton, which Wood had worked on previously during his association with Donn and Deming.

In the late 1910s, Wood was featured in an exhibition - at the famous Octagon - of architectural drawings by Washington architects. In 1920 after the Octagon exhibit, Wood was selected to present drawings for the National Architectural Exhibition at the Corcoran Galleries. The drawings selected were a mix of works between 1914 and 1920. A larger number were drawings of United States Housing Corporation buildings that he designed to house World War I workers. He also featured commercial buildings, such as the Shoreham Hotel and Commercial National Bank. His residential work featured at the exhibit included the Lawrence Lee Residence.

During the World War I period, Wood designed many temporary wartime buildings in Washington. He did not take a fee for the cost of designing the buildings and as a result was praised by Franklin D. Roosevelt, then a partner of the law firm Roosevelt and O'Connor of New York City. Roosevelt and Wood first became associated when Wood designed a house for Roosevelt's uncle, Frederic Delano. Wood was active in the Democratic Party and their relationship continued after Roosevelt became President. Wood was commissioned to design the inauguration court of honor for President Roosevelt, as he had done for Roosevelt's predecessor, Woodrow Wilson.

Wood was a proponent of the Colonial Revival style. In a 1922 article authored by Wood and published in Country Life magazine, he stated that architecture was "frozen history" and evidence of our past. His romantic view of buildings and architecture had its source in the days of the Colonial period, when craftsmen considered their buildings an art form. His promotion of the Colonial Revival extended beyond the romantic view of the link between our past and present to the economic sensibilities of the early 20th century. He argued that the heavy articulation of the Craftsman style was much more costly than the Colonial Revival which is more delicate and simplified.

While many urban architects of the early 20th century applied classical design values with little adaptation, Wood spoke for an emerging school that regarded classical design as an accent to inspire and punctuate modern design.

Though his government buildings are his most prominent, Wood was also recognized for his housing design. His former partner, William I. Deming, was skilled in the restoration of old homes, and during Wood's association with Deming he was exposed to numerous renovations of historic houses in Virginia. He designed housing largely in Washington, DC, but also in Virginia for private clients, and some government clients. In addition, he designed school buildings for the Washington, DC school system.

His greatest work is the Department of the Interior Headquarters Building in Washington, DC. Then Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes personally selected Waddy Wood as architect and worked very closely with him to ensure comfort and efficiency in the innovative new building. He was so involved with the design and construction of the Interior building that when the building opened, it was referred to as "Ickes new home."

The Interior building is seven stories with a basement (an additional floor between the fifth and sixth stories is devoted entirely to mechanical equipment). Above the central axis is a setback eighth story. The building is arranged into six east–west wings connected by a central north–south spine. This massing creates ten U-shaped courts, allowing each of the 2200 rooms an exterior exposure.

The Interior building featured a number of 'firsts' for Federal buildings: the first to have a central vacuum cleaning system, one of the earliest to be air-conditioned, and one of the first to incorporate a parking garage in the building. The somewhat austere 'Moderne' exterior belies the interior's abundant artwork and ornamentation. The building's  of corridors are lined with many murals and sculpture. Six Native American artists painted more than  of murals.

The central corridor contains the Grand Staircase and has a checkered marble floor, bronze railings and a coffered plaster ceiling. A pair of marble bas reliefs by Boris Gilbertson adorn the walls: one of moose and the other of buffalo. The buffalo motif is found throughout the building including in the Departmental Seal and on the doorknobs of the Secretary of the Interior's Executive Suite. The Executive Suite has oak paneling with a marble fireplace. Besides offices, the building contains an auditorium, museum, Indian arts and crafts gift shop, library, post office and gymnasium-all part of the original design.

In addition to his work, Waddy Wood served as the president of the Washington Chapter of the American Institute of Architects. In that capacity, he said in a 1928 speech "We will eventually build up a modern style of architecture based on evolution and not revolution, which has to rest, as all civilization does, on a foundation of precedent."

He died at his home near Warrenton, Virginia, January 25, 1944.

Personal life
Wood was married to Elizabeth Lindsay Lomax, the daughter of Lunsford L. Lomax. Together they had two children. His daughter Virginia Hargraves Wood (1873–1941; married name, Goddard) was a noted painter in New York City.

Works
Many of the works are listed in the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP), and are noted in this list.

Waddy Wood, early works

 2121 Bancroft Place, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1895; Five-story brick town home, Wood's former residence
 East Capitol Street Car Barn, 1400 E. Capitol St., NE, Washington, D.C.; 1896, Romanesque design also known as the Metropolitan Car Barn 1974; NRHP-listed
 Georgetown Car Barn, 3600 M Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1897
 1790–1796 Columbia Road, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1897–1898, Wood lived in the house at 1796 Columbia Road from 1899 to 1900 and at 1794 Columbia Road from 1900 to 1902, 1790 has been razed
 3100 Newark Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1897; introduced the Shingle style to Cleveland Park
 3432 Newark Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1897; introduced the Mission Revival to Cleveland Park
 2437–2445 18th Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1897, 2455 has been razed
 2481–2483 18th Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1899
 1743 N Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1896; Italian Renaissance; restored as part of 1745n.com residences project. (2016–2018)
 1745 N Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1902; Georgian Revival; restored as part of 1745n.com residences project (2016–2018)

Wood, Donn & Deming

 Expansion of Portsmouth Naval Hospital, on Hospital Point at Washington and Crawford Sts., Portsmouth, Virginia; 1902, also known as Norfolk Naval Hospital, 1972; NRHP-listed
 Armstrong Manual Training School, Jct. of 1st and P Sts., NW, Washington, D.C.; 1902, 1996; NRHP-listed
 Chinese Legation, 2001 19th Street, NW, Washington, D.C; 1902; now condominiums
 Thomas P. Morgan Elementary School, 1773 California Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1902; the "Morgan" of Adams Morgan, razed prior to 1971
 Alice Pike Barney Studio House, 2306 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1902; now the Embassy of Latvia, 1995; NRHP-listed
 Rectory and school building at St. Patrick's Church, 619 Tenth Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1904 in English gothic style
 1810–1820 19th Street, NW, Washington, D.C. which includes the L. Ron Hubbard House (and part of the Dupont Circle Historic District); NRHP-listed
 Enlarge and remodel Old Providence Hospital, Folger Square, SE, Washington, D.C.; 1904, razed 1964
 Bachelor Apartment House (aka "The Bachelor"), 1737 H Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1905, 1978; NRHP-listed
 Douglas House, Washington, D.C.; 1905, built for Charles A. Douglas, razed in 1949
 The Cordova (now the President Madison Apartments), 1908 Florida Avenue NW; 1905
 Emmanuel Church, US 250, Greenwood, Virginia; 1905–1915, 1982; NRHP-listed
 Geophysical Laboratory of the Carnegie Institution, 2801 Upton Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1906; now the Levine School of Music, 1994; NRHP-listed
 Capital Traction Company Car Barn, 4615 14th Street, NW, Washington DC; 1906, also known as the Decatur Street Car Barn; NRHP-listed
 Union Trust Building, 740 15th St. NW, Washington, D.C.; 1907; Also known as First American Bank Building, 1984, currently the American Bar Association Building; NRHP-listed
 1904 T Street NW, Washington, DC; 1907, annexed by Gunston Hall School in 1926, razed in 1965
 Masonic Temple, 1250 New York Avenue, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1907; now the National Museum of Women in the Arts, 1987; NRHP-listed
 Enlarge and remodel the Faulkner House for Senator Thomas S. Martin, 2201 Old Ivy Road, Charlottesville, Virginia; 1907, also known as Seymour, Montesano, Garallen or Old Ivy Inn, 1984; NRHP-listed
 1845 Belmont Road, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1907, razed
 2001 19th Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1908
 1929–1933 19th Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1908, built for Charles H. Davidson (1929 & 1931) (1931 & 1933)
 Norfolk YMCA building, Norfolk, VA; 1908–1910
 Edgewood, Rt 231, Cash Corner, Keswick, Virginia; 1911, built for ambassador George Barclay Rives, served as home for singer-songwriter Art Garfunkel, and movie director Hugh Wilson
 Remodel Woodlawn Plantation, W of junction of U.S. 1 and Rte. 235, Fairfax, Virginia; 1970; NRHP-listed
 Ellwood (Leesburg, Virginia), Leesburg, Virginia (1911–1912); NRHP-listed

Waddy Wood, late works

 Meadowbrook School, Leesburg, Virginia; 1912–1913
 Providence Hospital, 1150 Varnum St., NE, Washington, D.C.; 1912–1918
 Tucker House, 2320 S Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1913; was the Textile Museum, now the home of Jeff Bezos 1973; NRHP-listed
 Greystone, 2325 Porter Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1913
 Carnegie Institute, Dept. of Terrestrial Magnetism Laboratory, 5241 Broad Branch Road, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1913–1914
 Washington Baseball Club, Washington, D.C.; 1914–1921
 9134 Grant Avenue, Manassas, Virginia; 1915
 Woodrow Wilson House; 2340 S Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1915, also known as the Fairbanks-Wilson House, 1966; NRHP-listed
 Bushfield Manor renovation and addition, 367 Club House Loop, Mount Holly, Virginia; 1916, 2004; NRHP-listed
 Council of National Defense building, Washington, D.C.; 1917–1918
 Food Administration building, Washington, D.C.; 1918–1919
 War Industries Board and War Trade Board buildings, Washington, D.C.; 1918–1919
 United States Housing Corp., Washington, D.C.; 1918–1921
 Commercial National Bank Building, 700 14th St, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1919, 1991; NRHP-listed
 Martha Jefferson House, 1600 Gordon Ave, Charlottesville, Virginia; 1920–21, previously known as Ackley, then converted into a retirement home
 Thomas Balch Library, 208 W. Market St., Leesburg, Virginia; 1922
 Delano, Frederic A., residence, Washington, D.C.; 1922–1928
 2449 Tracy Place NW, Washington, D.C.; 1923
 Gunston Hall (Biltmore Forest, North Carolina), 324 Vanderbilt Rd., Biltmore Forest, NC; 1923, 1991; NRHP-listed
 Blue Ridge Farm, Rt 637 & Rt 691, Greenwood, Virginia; 1923–1927, 1991; NRHP-listed
 The Glenn Building, 110 Marietta Street, Atlanta, Georgia; 1923, now the Glenn Hotel
 All States Hotel for Women Government Employees, now William Mitchell Hall, an undergraduate residence hall at The George Washington University, 514 19th Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1925.
 The Victor Building Addition, 724–726 9th Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1925
 Brightwood Elementary School, 1300 Nicholson St., NW, Washington, D.C.; 1926
 Methodist Home for Aged, Washington, D.C.; 1926
 Chevy Chase Club and homes nearby, Chevy Chase, Maryland; 1926
 Southern Railway Building, 1500 K Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1928
 Handford MacNidor residence, Mason City, Iowa, 1929
 1901 23rd Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1929; Neo-classical and Georgian Revival
 1909 23rd Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1929; Neo-classical and Georgian Revival - built for his daughter.
 Fauquier County Hospital, Warrenton, Virginia; 1932
 The Diplomatic and Consular Officers Memorial - now in the State Department Building; 1933
 U. S. Department of the Interior headquarters building, 1849 C Street, NW, Washington, D.C.; 1934–1938, 1986; NRHP-listed
 National Training School for Girls, 605 50th Street, NE Washington, D.C.; 1936; now the Nannie Helen Burroughs School

Notes

External links

 Article on Bushfield Manor
 Residential Architecture of Washington, D.C.
 Intensive Level Survey of the Washington Heights Area of Washington, D.C.

1869 births
1944 deaths
Architects from St. Louis
Architects from Washington, D.C.
Virginia Tech alumni
People from Ivy, Virginia
Architects from Virginia
19th-century American architects
20th-century American architects
People from Warrenton, Virginia
People from Dupont Circle

Waddy Butler Wood


Nadezhda Strait (Russian: Proliv Nadezhda; Japanese: Rashowa Kaikyo) is a strait that separates the islands of Matua and Rasshua. It is 25.8 km (about 16 mi) wide. The flood tidal current in the strait sets northwest, while the ebb flows to the southeast. These currents create tide rips and may reach over five knots.

It is named after the sloop Nadezhda.

References

Straits of the Kuril Islands

Nadezhda Strait


Pincers are a hand tool used in many situations where a mechanical advantage is required. They are used to pinch, cut or pull an object. Pincers are first-class levers. Pincers differ from pliers in that the concentration of force is either to a point, or to an edge at a right angle to the handle of the tool. This allows pincers to be brought close to a surface. This is often helpful when removing nails from wood. Pincers are often called end-nippers or end-cutters. Carpenter's pincers are very well suited to these tasks. Pincers are primarily used for removing objects out of a material.

Pincers, often red-hot, have been used as an instrument of torture since the middle ages or earlier.

Pliers are a similar tool with a different type of head used for squeezing, rather than cutting and pulling.

References

Cutting tools

Pincer


The Great Cannon of China is an Internet attack tool that is used by the Chinese government to launch distributed denial-of-service attacks on websites by performing a man-in-the-middle attack on large amounts of web traffic and injecting code which causes the end-user's web browsers to  flood traffic to targeted websites. According to the researchers at the Citizen Lab, the International Computer Science Institute, and Princeton University's Center for Information Technology Policy, who coined the term, the Great Cannon hijacks foreign web traffic intended for Chinese websites and re-purposes them to flood targeted web servers with enormous amounts of traffic in an attempt to disrupt their operations. While it is co-located with the Great Firewall, the Great Cannon is "a separate offensive system, with different capabilities and design."

Besides launching denial-of-service attacks, the tool is also capable of monitoring web traffic and distributing malware in targeted attacks in ways that are similar to the Quantum Insert system used by the U.S. National Security Agency.

Mechanism

The Great Cannon hijacks insecure traffic inbound to servers within the Great Firewall, and injects JavaScript that redirects that traffic to the target. These attacks fail when websites have HTTPS encryption.

Known uses

The first known targets of the Great Cannon (in late March 2015) were websites hosting censorship-evading tools, including GitHub, a web-based code hosting service, and GreatFire, a service monitoring blocked websites in China.

In 2017, the Great Cannon was used to attack the Mingjing News website.

, the Great Cannon was being used to attempt to take down the Hong Kong-based LIHKG online forum, even though the Basic Law of Hong Kong clearly states that Hong Kong's internet is the affairs of Hong Kong and Hong Kong only.

Reaction
Quartz reported that the 2015, GitHub attack caused "severe" political problems for China, including the United States Department of State viewing it as "an attack against US infrastructure".

See also
 Internet censorship in China

References

Cyberwarfare
Denial-of-service attacks
Internet censorship in China
Political repression in China
Hacking (computer security)
Espionage
Botnets

Great Cannon


Femme Fatales is an anthology television series, inspired by the men's magazine of the same name, produced by and aired on Cinemax from 2011 to 2012. Each episode features an antiheroic woman, intercut with softcore pornographic scenes. Lilith (Tanit Phoenix) introduces each episode Rod Serling-style and occasionally appears within the narrative. Some characters make encore appearances in later episodes. Unlike most shows that feature porn actors, Femme Fatales features mainstream actors, such as Richard Kind, Adam Goldberg, Paul Mazursky, Ryan Bittle, Robert LaSardo, Stephen Macht, William Gregory Lee, Dean Haglund, Charlie O'Connell,  Daniel Bess, Angus Scrimm, Carrie Genzel, Ellie Cornell, Neil Hopkins in season 1; and Antonio Sabàto Jr., Kyle Gass, Leilani Sarelle, Chris Mulkey, Scheana Shay, John Enos III, Vivica A. Fox, Sandra McCoy, Jeffrey Combs, Robert Picardo, Ashley Hamilton, Nikki Griffin, Eric Roberts, Kate Luyben, Steve Railsback, Paul Rae, Jes Macallan, Casper Van Dien, Jeff Fahey, and Betsy Rue in season 2.

Premise
Women find extraordinary ways of coping with their problems, channeling their survival instincts and bringing out their inner guile. The show is inspired by and styled in the tradition of pulp stories, film noir and graphic novels, and takes place in contemporary settings. Each episode is introduced by a mysterious and enigmatic host Lilith and features different casts and storylines, some of which are intertwined.

Cast

Main cast
 Tanit Phoenix as Lilith

Notable guest stars
 Ariauna Albright as Dream Woman
 Ana Alexander as Camille Gardner
 Sadie Alexandru as Janelle
 Crystal Allen as Rhonda Temple
 Mark A. Altman as the Voice of the Desk Clerk
 Catherine Annette as Tiffany
 Domiziano Arcangeli as Chaka
 Scott Bailey as Greg Cooper
 Carlee Baker as Beth Odets
 Cameron Bender as Tom Lomax
 Daniel Bess as Logan Cale
 Ryan Bittle as Archie Becker
 Philip Boyd as Nick
 Walker Brandt as Amy
 J.C. Brandy as Maxine
 Tiffany Brouwer as Holly Brown
 David Bygrave as Boyfriend
 Daniel Capellaro as Todd Voight
 Tina Casciani as Barbara
 Jeffrey Combs as the Voice of the Interrogator
 Rick Copp as Richard Hollis / Teacher
 Ellie Cornell as Detective Janet Wright
 Mark Costello as Detective Mitchum
 Marc Crumpton as Foster Prentiss
 Stephanie Danielson as Emily
 Kristen DeLuca as Beverly Dietrich
 Asher Deva as Ricardo
 James Devoti as Cam
 Andrew Dickler as R.J.
 Casper Van Dien as Joe Hallenbeck
 Danica Dillon as Caroline / Virginia
 Charles Divins as Dr. Troy
 Christine Donlon as Violet MacReady
 Sean Douglas as Pressman
 Daphnée Duplaix as Alexis
 Madison Dylan as Alexis
 Kiko Ellsworth as Detective Carter Judson
 John Enos III as Gil Flood
 Jeff Fahey as Detective McAllister
 Tammy Felice as Kim
 Gigi Feshold as Bebe
 Chanon Finley as Lisa Bannion
 Jon Fleming as Aaron
 Raymond Forchion as Judge Aldrich
 Bren Foster as Howard
 Vivica A. Fox as Dean Vera Rutledge
 Kyle Gass as Willoughby Flagler
 Carrie Genzel as Dr. Marlowe
 Diana Gettinger as Laurie
 Paul Green as Marvin Widmark
 Anne Lee Greene as Kendra Banks
 Ian Gregory as Charles McKendrick
 Nikki Griffin as Nicole Ryan
 Dean Haglund as Kip
 Ashley Hamilton as Devlin Grant
 Steve Richard Harris as Lex
 Jules Hartley as Molly Trevor
 Reggie Hayes as Kevin Freeman
 Erin Marie Hogan as Emily
 Neil Hopkins as Charles Solomon
 Stacy Stas Hurst as Jessica
 Adam Huss as Max Bailey
 Heidi James as Big Aggie
 Preston Jones as Aaron
 Tom Kirlin as Guard
 Kerry Knuppe as Daphne
 Joe Kraemer as Officer Taylor
 Steve Kriozere as Doctor
 Robert LaSardo as Laz Swan
 William Gregory Lee as Jimmy
 Kimo Leopoldo as Bodyguard
 Christian Levantino as Pete Greene
 Crystle Lightning as Candela
 Vedette Lim as Agent Pam
 Scott Logan as Jake Rutledge
 Sierra Love as Isabella Cregar
 Kate Luyben as Mary Mason
 Jes Macallan as Susan Voight
 Stephen Macht as Leland Ryan
 Jordan Madley as Rachel Worth
 Janelle Marra as Gloria
 Michael Masini as Chris Gunden
 Brady Matthews as Chris Wade
 Paul Mazursky as Warden Jeffries
 Sandra McCoy as Professor Kelsey Williams
 Geoff Meed as O'Brien
 Cristin Michele as Cynthia
 Mirtha Michelle as Lauren Coleston
 Anya Monzikova as Darla McKendrick
 Nikki Moore as Abigail Strauss
 Chris Mulkey as Bendix Darby
 Isaiah Mustafa as Raven
 Jo Newman as Jess Russell
 Ashley Noel as Matilda West / Dark Matilda West
 Charlie O'Connell as Jay Roma
 Ho-Sung Pak as Superstar Assassin (aka The Ghost) / Fight Trainer
 Melissa Paulo as Erida
 Moniqua Plante as Sara
 Robert Picardo as Hieronymus Hawks
 Will Poston as Rafe Daniels
 Shani Pride as Tatiana
 Nick Principe as Killer
 Tara Radcliffe as Joanne Terranova
 Paul Rae as Guard
 Steve Railsback as Dr. Daniel Duryea
 Geoff Reeves as Steve Mason
 Arloa Reston as Sharon
 Makinna Ridgway as Angelica
 Jennifer Roa as Norma Swanson
 Eric Roberts as David Bannion
 Tobi Rodriguez as Lucky Starr
 Annie Ruby as Susan
 Betsy Rue as Libra
 Joel Rush as Pecs
 Joe Sabatino as Iggy Bacardi
 Antonio Sabàto Jr. as Bart
 Leilani Sarelle as Veronica Flood
 Bryan Sato as Kentaro
 Donna W. Scott as Alicia Ryan
 Angus Scrimm as Dr. Chandler
 Scheana Shay as Angel Tomlin
 Justin Shilton as Robinson McGraw
 Mark Simich as Davis Bennett
 Aiden Simko as Chaz
 Joe Slaughter as Roger Reynolds
 Melissa Soso as Girl coming out of the elevator
 Hollie Stenson as Abby
 Robin Sydney as Lindsey
 Colin Tary as Andy
 Jennifer Thompson as Ace's New Girl
 Diana Elizabeth Torres as Lydia Gonzales / El Jefe
 Elena Tovar as Elena Machado
 Tyson Turrou as Doug
 Tiffany Tynes as Tina Hendricks
 Ilia Volok as Dimitri Uzi Olesky
 Jasmine Waltz as Tara
 Heidi Marie Wanser as Max's Girlfriend
 Christopher Warner as Detective Brody
 Drew Waters as Robert Burke
 Charlie Weber as Ace
 Kit Willesee as Lacey Rivers
 Jason Wishnov as Man on Couch

Episodes

Season 1 (2011)

Season 2 (2012)

Home media
Entertainment One released Femme Fatales: The Complete 1st Season in a 3-disc DVD set on January 29, 2013. The set's featurettes also included footage from Season 2, which in turn was released in a 3-disc DVD set on July 16, 2013.

Soundtrack
A soundtrack album for the series, with music composed and conducted by Joe Kraemer, was released on May 29, 2012, by MovieScore Media.

References

External links

2011 American television series debuts
2012 American television series endings
2010s American mystery television series
2010s American anthology television series
Cinemax original programming
Television series by Warner Bros. Television Studios
Erotic television series
American thriller television series

Femme Fatales (TV series)


Sniper: Ghost Warrior is a tactical shooter video game developed and published by City Interactive for Microsoft Windows, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. It is the second entry in the Sniper: Ghost Warrior series and is the sequel to Sniper: Art of Victory.

The game is based on the role of the military sniper. The player takes on the role of an elite sniper team sent into a hostile area in an attempt to help the rebels of Isla Trueno, a fictitious Latin American country, fight against the force who has toppled their government in a coup d'état.

Gameplay
The game is a tactical shooter played from a first-person perspective. As the title suggests, a large portion of the game consists of stealth, staking out targets and firing sniper rifles. As is the case with Sniper Elite, the game incorporates the element of realistic ballistics. Bullet trajectories are subject to wind strength, gravity, breathing and flight time, all of which players must account for when taking shots. To simplify this procedure, easier difficulty settings contain indicators that highlight enemies and show precisely where a bullet will hit.

The main weapons used in the game are silenced pistols, knives and various types of sniper rifles. In missions that are played with characters who are not snipers, the stealth aspect is dropped in favor of faster-paced "run and gun" scenarios. An exception to this are spotting missions, in which the primary objective consists of marking targets for a computer-controlled sniper character.

Most of the game takes place in a dense jungle environment. Waypoint overlays at all times display the correct routes through the areas players must traverse. While these routes need not be followed exactly, the level design usually ensures an overall linear path due to obstacle placement and invisible walls. Many waypoints trigger scripted mission events, and some waypoints act as checkpoints, which automatically save the game.

The single player campaign of Sniper: Ghost Warrior is made up of four separate acts, each of which deals with a different conflict. All acts are split up into various missions, which usually depict the same event from different points of view. For example, in one segment players may be participating in an infantry assault on an enemy camp, while the next segment has them assuming the role of a supporting sniper who backs up the assault. There is downloadable content available for the title that seamlessly continues the story line with three additional campaign missions.

Plot
In the game, players take the role of various characters for different missions. Among them are a sniper, Sergeant Tyler "Razor Six-Four" Wells, for long range missions and stealth assignments, a Delta Force operator, Private Anderson, as well as a rebel leader, El Tejon, for missions involving direct firefights. The main plot involves a highly trained special ops unit that is sent into the fictional country of Isla Trueno, whose democratic government has been overthrown by a hostile force.

Undercover CIA Agent Mike Rodriguez infiltrates the entourage of General Vasquez in order to set up a shot for the sniper-spotter team Alpha Nine. Killing the general would put an end to the regime on Isla Trueno. During the assassination attempt, Agent Rodriguez is compromised and captured, and General Vasquez escapes. After a series of missions, the assault team Delta Three, supported by sniper unit Razor Six Four, manages to free Agent Rodriguez from an enemy camp.

With Vasquez on the loose, Delta Three and Razor Six-Four are sent to set up an air strike on a cocaine plantation. After the successful destruction of the plantation, the evacuation chopper comes under attack and has to leave. Razor Six Four makes his way through enemy territory in order to reach the new evacuation point from where he is extracted.

Agent Rodriguez teams up with Sergeant Tyler Wells to steal plans of a nuclear warhead from an enemy camp. The mission is a success, but Agent Rodriguez turns out to be a traitor. He takes the data and leaves Sergeant Wells to be shot by the enemy. A rebel leader called El Tejon rescues Sergeant Wells, who then tracks down Rodriguez, kills him and retrieves the data.

Because the data files are incomplete, the Alpha Nine sniper-spotter team steals the rest of the data from the enemy. Together with Razor Six Four, Alpha Nine then eliminates Ernesto Salazar, General Vasquez' advisor. Decryption of the stolen data uncovers the location of a secret uranium mine on Isla Trueno. Delta Three and Razor Six-Four enter the mine facilities in an enemy truck, free the civilian workers and destroy the compound. To fully dissolve the now weakened regime, a second attempt is made to kill General Vasquez. Razor Six-Four completes the assignment successfully, and the game ends the moment Vasquez is struck by the bullet.

Development

Sniper: Ghost Warrior takes advantage of the Chrome Engine, which had previously been used on Techland's Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood. The engine renders lush jungles with large draw distances. Several missions in the game take place during rainfall or nighttime, and various types of animals, such as crocodiles or cows, populate the tropical environment.

The artificial intelligence of enemies attempts to simulate a human field of vision. This allows players to crawl through tall grass or hide behind bush without being spotted.

Reception

Sniper: Ghost Warrior received "mixed or average" and "generally unfavorable" reviews, according to review aggregator Metacritic.

GameSpot gave the Xbox 360 version a 6.0/10 and the PC version a 5.5/10, praising the game's visuals and satisfying sniper cams, but criticizing the game's absurd difficulty in some areas particularly the enemy AI "that ranges from mindless to so magical it can spot you instantly".

IGN gave the PC and Xbox 360 version a 5.0/10, praising the game's sniping mechanics but criticising the game's design and running-and-gunning scenarios. They gave the PlayStation 3 version a lower score of 4.5/10, stating that it looks and runs worse, and fails to address the hyper-linear level design that doomed the original release to the bargain bin.

References

External links

2010 video games
Multiplayer and single-player video games
PlayStation 3 games
Sniper video games
Stealth video games
Tactical shooter video games
Sniper: Ghost Warrior
Video games about Delta Force
Video games developed in Poland
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CI Games games

Sniper: Ghost Warrior (video game)


Zachary Hicks (1739 – 25 May 1771) was a Royal Navy officer, second-in-command on Lieutenant James Cook's first voyage to the Pacific and the first among Cook's crew to sight mainland Australia. A dependable officer who had risen swiftly through the ranks, Hicks conducted liaison and military duties for Cook, including command of shore parties in Rio de Janeiro and the kidnapping of a Tahitian chieftain in order to force indigenous assistance in the recovery of deserters. Hicks' quick thinking while in temporary command of  also saved the lives of Cook, Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander when they were attacked by Māori in New Zealand in November 1769.

Yet despite his vigorous service Hicks was dogged by ill health, which worsened as the voyage progressed. He died in May 1771 of a consumptive illness likely contracted before sailing from England, and his remains were buried at sea off the Atlantic island of Saint Helena. New Zealand's Hicks Bay and eastern Australia's Point Hicks are named in his honour.

Zachary's surname was usually, but not always, spelt Hicks in the journals of Cook and Banks.  The family used the spelling Hickes, and Zachary's commission has that spelling.

Early life and naval service
Hicks was born in Stepney in 1739. He enlisted or was pressed into military service at Ripon and first appears in navy muster-books as serving as able seaman and master's mate aboard  from 1766. A skilled seaman, he was promoted to midshipman aboard the sloop  in August 1767, and to acting lieutenant on the same vessel in March 1768. His officer's commission was formalised on 26 May 1768 with a transfer to James Cook's  as second lieutenant and second-in-command.

Aboard Endeavour

Outward voyage

Hicks' early months aboard Endeavour were uneventful. He is not mentioned in the journals of either Cook or the Royal Society supernumeraries Joseph Banks and Sydney Parkinson until Endeavour reached the Portuguese port of Rio de Janeiro on 13 November 1768. There Hicks was given his first specific duties by Cook: to put ashore in command of the ship's pinnace, to make contact with local authorities and to seek permission to replenish the ship's supplies. The engagement did not go well, as the Portuguese viceroy Antônio Rolim de Moura refused to believe that Endeavour was on a scientific mission. Instead, Hicks and master's mate Charles Clerke were detained on shore while answers were sought from Cook regarding his vessel, armaments and number of crew. The pinnace was returned to Endeavour without Hicks, and he and Clerke were only permitted to return to their ship after some hours' delay.

On 19 November Hicks was again sent ashore, to present a letter from Cook to the viceroy. On arrival at Rio's docks he objected when a Portuguese soldier boarded his boat and refused to leave, at which point he and his crew were arrested and taken under guard from the shore. Portuguese authorities confiscated Endeavours pinnace and imprisoned the crew, sending Hicks back to his ship alone. After formal protests from Cook, Hicks' crew was released and the vessel returned but without its ensign flag which the Portuguese suggested had been lost. Portuguese authorities accused Hicks of threatening their soldiers' lives and of displaying "petulancy and imprudence"; they asked that he be confined to Endeavour and not return to shore. However Cook considered that Hicks had offered no provocation to Portuguese authorities that would justify their depriving him of his boat and command.

Pacific exploration

Departing Rio, Endeavour rounded Cape Horn and continued westward across the Pacific to reach Tahiti in April 1769. Hicks' abilities as a leader were tested when, three days before Endeavour was due to depart, two of her marines deserted to the mountains to stay with their Tahitian "wives". Cook deputised Hicks to secure their return, ordering him to kidnap local chief Tootaha and three others in order to force the Tahitians to reveal where the deserters were hiding. The kidnapping was a success but the stratagem failed; the Tahitians responded by abducting Endeavours surgeon William Monkhouse and four of her crew, and holding them hostage near the shore. Again Cook turned to Hicks, who led a strong detachment of marines to the shore and threatened that "the Chiefs would suffer for it" if the hostages were not freed. Hicks' threat succeeded – Monkhouse and the sailors were released, the Tahitians found and returned the deserters, and all were restored to Endeavour along with a peace offering of four pigs.

On 3 June Cook chose Hicks as one of the six men designated to record the Transit of Venus upon which Endeavours voyage was ostensibly based. Hicks joined First Mate Richard Pickersgill and Second Mate Charles Clerke on the eastward side of the island to time the beginning and end of the transit, but their figures did not match those of other observers. A disappointed Cook was forced to record the differing figures and settle on an average between them.

Departing Tahiti, Hicks travelled onward with Endeavour into the uncharted waters of the South Pacific. He was credited with locating Hicks Bay in New Zealand, and then with being the first to see the mainland of Australia near today's Point Hicks (land was sighted on his morning watch). Cook recorded both those names after him.

Endeavour made landfall in Botany Bay in eastern Australia on 29 April 1770. After the initial landing by Cook, Hicks was given command of the shore party with responsibility for collecting water and wood to resupply the ship. In this role Hickes made the expedition's first sustained contact with indigenous Australians when more than a dozen gathered on the beach to watch his men collect water. Cook observed in his journal that "Mister Hicks did all in his power to entice them to him by offering them presents and company but it was to no purpose, all they seem'd to want was for us to be gone." Hickes nonetheless persisted, with sufficient interaction over the following days for him to interpret a few words of the indigenous language.

Death

Hickes died of a consumptive lung infection on 26 May 1771, the third anniversary of his commission as lieutenant aboard Endeavour. As Cook recorded in his journal, the cause of Hickes' death was "a Consumption of which he was not free from when we saild from England so that it may be truly said that he hath been dieing ever sence, though he held out tolerable well until we got to Batavia." His remains were buried at sea off the South Atlantic island of Saint Helena, with what Cook described as "the usual ceremonies."

Memorials

As an officer, Hicks was well regarded but not exceptional. Historian J. C. Beaglehole describes him as "a man of ability" but without "the chance to shine ... an invaluable man, probably, on any expedition; but perhaps born to be a lieutenant."

He is memorialised in the inscription on a monument at Point Hicks, which reads, "Lieutenant James Cook, R.N. of the Endeavour, first sighted Australia near this point
which he named Point Hicks, after Lieutenant Zachary Hicks who first saw the land." A matching inscription is affixed to the monument at the site of Cook's former cottage in Great Ayton in North Yorkshire. A street crescent in the Melbourne suburb of Endeavour Hills bears the name Zachary Hicks Crescent.

Notes

Footnotes

In a note dated 2 May 1770, Isaac Smith, able seaman aboard Endeavour, recorded that Hicks had given him the following translations of indigenous speech: "boorwee" meaning three; "warregal" meaning dog; "mareeyang" meaning large bird; "mayanga" meaning to fly; "gong" meaning sun; "eednarda" meaning moon; "padoo" meaning water; "bemalle" meaning earth; and "gooiyong" meaning fire.

Citations

References

Further reading
 Ray Parkin, H. M. Bark Endeavour, Miegunyah Press, second edition 2003,

1729 births
1771 deaths
People from Stepney
Royal Navy officers
Burials at sea
James Cook
English explorers of the Pacific
Military personnel from London

Zachary Hickes


Adam Fortunate Eagle L.H.D. (born Adam Nordwall), hereditary member of the Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians, is a Native American activist and was the principal organizer of the 1969–1971 Occupation of Alcatraz by "Indians of All Tribes".

Early life
Born in the missionary section of the Red Lake Indian Reservation in 1929, Nordwall was the son of a Swedish man and an Ojibwe woman. When he was five, his father died, leaving his mother no choice but to send him and four other children away to boarding school. He attended the Pipestone Indian School in Minnesota and the Haskell Institute in Kansas, where he took advantage of the time to improve many skills that would help him later in life as well as escape the Great Depression, famine, and disease that was running rampant on reservations at the time. There he met his future wife, the Shoshone Indian Bobbie.

California years
After their marriage, the Nordwalls moved to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1951. Nordwall worked as a licensed termite inspector and by the late 1960s owned his own company in San Leandro, the First American Termite Company. Although living a comfortable life, Nordwall felt that he and his family needed to learn more about who they were as Native Americans. He became more involved in local Indian affairs and became chairman of the United Bay Area Council of American Indian Affairs. It was at this time that he proposed the takeover of Alcatraz.

In 1968, at the Bay Area Italian-Americans' annual San Francisco reenactment of Columbus' landing in America, having successfully lobbied to have the Indians portrayed by genuine Indians rather than costumed Boy Scouts, Nordwall flicked the wig off Joe Cervetto, playing Columbus, with his ceremonial staff in a symbolic scalping.

After he donated an 18-foot totem pole to the city of Livermore in 1969, the city shortened it before installing it in a park, and Nordwall placed a curse on their sewer system until they restored the cut off section.

Nordwall began to plan publicity movement involving a boat ride around Alcatraz, and he met with Richard Oakes, a local student activist, at a Halloween party at Tim Findley's house in 1969. He proposed the date of November 9 during the day and Oakes agreed to get as many students as he could. Nordwall took care of providing transportation around the island during the day of November 9. However, on the date, none of the ships were there and the press were wary of the Indians all dressed up in their tribal wear. Nordwall found a captain who seemed interested in the events of the day and talked him into providing transportation. He agreed but said he would not dock on the island, to which Nordwall agreed. Once near shore, Oakes seized the moment and jumped overboard. Nordwall stayed behind and watched as Oakes and his band struggled to reach the shore, later having to be rescued by the Coast Guard. The captain returned to shore a little while later. Nordwall was satisfied with just having been around the island because the press took notice. Oakes and his fellow students were returned by the Coast Guard, and Nordwall asked if they were ok.  On the day of the actual takeover and occupation, November 20, 1969, Nordwall was out of town, but on Thanksgiving when everyone was invited to the Island he came riding across the bay standing on the prow of a ship exactly like George Washington, being the only day he was ever on the island during the 19 month Occupation of Alcatraz. Although he never lived on the island, Nordwall helped from the shores and was able to assist those on the island and keep the press reporting on the occupation while at the same time bringing to light the plight of the Native Americans. Nordwall was still active in Native American affairs after the Alcatraz occupation. He served mostly as an unappointed liaison between the Bay Area Council and the press.

Nordwall later taught Native American studies at California State University, Hayward. In September 1973, on his way to the International Conference of World Futures, he descended from the plane in Rome in full tribal regalia and claimed the country "by right of discovery" in the manner Columbus had claimed America. Invited for an audience with Pope Paul VI, instead of kissing the papal ring, he offered his own ringed hand in return; the Pope grinned and clasped his hand.

Nordwall filed for bankruptcy and left the Bay Area in 1975 after his pest control business incurred fines for environmental code violations and underpayment of taxes.

Writing and film
He wrote "The Alcatraz Proclamation to the Great White Father and his People", which states that the goal of the occupiers was to create a center for Native American studies, an American Indian spiritual center, an Indian center of ecology, and a great Indian training school. While the occupation of Alcatraz seemed a failure on the surface, the federal policy of termination of all tribes ended in 1971, and self-determination became the new policy. Many consider the Alcatraz occupation the beginning of the "Red Power" movement. His 2008 book Heart of the Rock is the story of that "invasion".

Fortunate Eagle performed the voice of Sitting Bull in the feature-length documentary Sitting Bull: A Stone in My Heart. He is also the subject of a feature-length documentary called Contrary Warrior: The Life and Times of Adam Fortunate Eagle and wrote a book on his experiences as an Indian boarding school titled Pipestone: My Life in An Indian Boarding School.

His most recent work, Scalping Columbus, is a compilation of his own anecdotes.

He is the father of poet nila northSun.

Later life
Nordwall received his Indian name Fortunate Eagle from a Crow Indian when he was 42. He now lives on the Paiute-Shoshone Reservation, where his wife was born; he has built a roundhouse out of tires and other recycled materials. In the 1980s he won awards for his sculpture; he also makes ceremonial pipes and headdresses, and in 1987 was jailed and tried for selling eagle feathers. His criminal trial ended in a hung jury but he was found guilty and fined in a civil trial.

Bibliography
Alcatraz! Alcatraz! The Indian Occupation of 1969-1971 (1992)
Heart of the Rock: The Indian Invasion of Alcatraz (2008)
Pipestone: My Life in an Indian Boarding School (2010)

References

External links

 streaming video of "Contrary Warrior: The Life and Times of Adam Fortunate Eagle"
 info about Pipestone: My Life in An Indian Boarding School
 info about the films Sitting Bull: A Stone in My Heart and Contrary Warrior: The Life and Times of Adam Fortunate Eagle

Living people
Red Lake Band of Chippewa people
Native American activists
20th-century Native Americans
1929 births
American people of Swedish descent
People from Red Lake, Minnesota
Activists from Minnesota

Adam Fortunate Eagle


The National Airline History Museum is an aviation museum located at the Kansas City Downtown Airport in Kansas City, Missouri focused on the history of airlines in the United States.

History

Founded in 1986 by aviation enthusiasts Larry A. Brown and Dick McMahon, the Airline History Museum was originally known as Save-A-Connie. Brown and McMahon were joined by a number of other enthusiasts, including (then) current and former TWA employees.

The group began by highlighting commercial aviation in the propeller age but has since moved into the jet age with the acquisition of a Lockheed Tristar aircraft. They hope to further expand the museum's collection of vintage passenger aircraft.

The museum leased a hangar at the Kansas City Downtown Airport in 2000 from Beechcraft.

The museum's director was convicted of embezzlement in 2010.

In January 2011 the Airline History Museum began its 25th year of operation, entering its silver anniversary with a new vision for the next quarter century: The museum announced a commitment to meeting or exceeding the "Characteristics of Excellence" standards established by the American Alliance of Museums. To that end, the museum immediately began a reorganization plan, which included a complete rebranding effort to include a new membership structure, new website, new corporate logo, and a new exhibit structure within the museum building.

In March 2011 the museum announced that in the continuation of its reorganization and restructure, it was being renamed the National Airline History Museum. This name change allowed it to be better positioned to receive Federal grants and other national funding. The museum announced in March, 2011 that it had teamed up with Kansas City's Roasterie Coffee Shop, with the Roasterie brand being known as "The Official Coffee of the National Airline History Museum" and carrying an image of the museum's DC-3 on its coffee products.

In 2013, the museum announced plans to restore its Lockheed Constellation to flight.

In 2014, the museum acquired a Douglas DC-8 and attempted to have it ferried to the museum. However, the plan to store it on the ramp outside the hangar was rejected by the owner of the property.

In 2016, the museum acquired a Boeing 727 in storage at Boeing Field in Seattle, Washington. However, it was scrapped in 2021 after the museum was unable to move it.

The same year, the museum announced plans to partner with the owner of a Northrop Delta to have it restored.

In 2020, the museum acquired a Ryan PT-22 Recruit that belonged to actor Harrison Ford.

The museum was threatened with eviction in 2019, when the airport required the owner of the hangar, Signature Flight Support, to start paying rent. The museum was served an eviction notice in 2022. The following year the museum was locked out of their hangar.

Exhibits

The museum maintains five aircraft at the site; two are in flying condition and one is undergoing restoration. An additional corporate mock-up is also on display.

Martin 4-0-4

There were only 103 Martin 4-0-4s built. TWA operated 40 in their fleet along the U. S. east coast, while strong competitor Eastern Airlines operated the largest 4-0-4 fleet, flying 60 aircraft along that airline's eastern seaboard route, including in and around Florida. The museum's Martin 4-0-4 has not flown in years. As part of the National Airline History Museum's reorganization plan, which began in 2011, a maintenance inspection of the Martin 4-0-4 was completed in August 2011 to determine the feasibility of returning the aircraft to flying status. Rumors of extensive corrosion and insurmountable mechanical problems were found to be untrue, and a maintenance program is being developed to return the aircraft to flying condition.

Douglas DC-3

The museum's DC-3 is currently being made airworthy. One of its two engines has been overhauled, while its second is still undergoing a rebuild; the exterior and interior restoration of the aircraft is nearing completion, while the installation of new carpeting and restored seats has been completed. This Douglas DC-3-G202A, registration number NC1945, serial number 3294, was built in Santa Monica, California in February 1941. It was delivered to Transcontinental and Western Airlines at Kansas City, Missouri, on March 4, 1941, and now resides in its original home city again.

Lockheed Super "G" Constellation

The Lockheed Super "G" Constellation ("Super-Connie"), which holds the distinction of being the first Constellation ever to be fully restored to flying condition, has not been flown to air shows in recent years.  Originally donated to Save-A-Connie by Paul Pristo in 1986, maintenance is still ongoing, with the goal being to get the Connie back in the air. The aircraft has completed several successful four engine test runs and is well on the way to becoming airworthy once again. Nicknamed "Star of America", this Constellation appeared in television and movie releases, as well as in several television commercials. It was featured in the Arts and Entertainment cable channel documentary First Flights, narrated by Astronaut Neil Armstrong, and the motion picture, Voyager released in the U. S. in 1992. The Connie's interior was also used in scenes for the 1995 movie Ace Ventura When Nature Calls, starring actor Jim Carrey. It also appeared in the 2004 movie The Aviator, directed by Martin Scorsese, which depicts the early years (late 1920s to the mid-1940s) of legendary film director and aviator Howard Hughes; the film starred Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Beckinsale, and Cate Blanchett.

TWA's corporate "Moonliner II" replica

In 1956, after TWA became the corporate sponsor of Disneyland's TWA Moonliner attraction in Anaheim, CA, Howard Hughes added a  reproduction of Disney's one-third scale Moonliner, known as the TWA Moonliner II, atop the southwest corner of Kansas City's TWA Corporate Headquarters' Building, located at 18th Street and Baltimore, near downtown Kansas City. Disneyland's TWA Moonliner was a promotional concept of what a TWA atomic-powered spaceliner would look like in the faraway year of 1986. When Hughes and Disney ended their business partnership in 1962 after Hughes sold TWA, the airline's new management removed the Moonliner II reproduction from its roof and sold it to a local travel-trailer company called SpaceCraft.

When SpaceCraft moved to Concordia, Missouri, in 1970, the now all-white Moonliner II landed on the south side of Interstate 70 (between Kansas City and St. Louis) where SpaceCraft operated a campground near its trailer manufacturing plant. It slowly rusted on that spot for more than 25 years. In 1997 a Columbia lawyer who collected Disney memorabilia bought the deteriorating Moonliner II. He then began a long, careful restoration process, eventually bringing it back to its 1956 condition and sporting its original red and white TWA paint scheme. It is currently on loan to the museum for display to both airliner and TWA enthusiasts. The Moonliner II is located about five miles from its original TWA rooftop location.

Lockheed L-1011 Tristar

The museum announced in April 2009 that it was acquiring one of the last six remaining operational Lockheed L-1011 Tristar aircraft in the U.S., its donation to the museum made possible by Paul Pristo.

FAA approval was granted to ferry the aircraft from Roswell, New Mexico, (ROW) to Kansas City, Missouri, (MKC). The aircraft arrived safely on January 30, 2010, shortly after 3:00 pm. This aircraft first flew in 1972 under the red-and-white colors of hometown airline TWA. Due to its large size, it is parked south of the museum's hangar at Wheeler Airport, the large tail hanging beyond the fence line surrounding the downtown airport's apron. The aircraft is currently, slowly being restored to operational service.

As the engines were already sold prior to the purchase of the Tristar, it currently sits without engines on the apron outside the museum. Attempts to source mid-life engines are underway, so it is hoped will at least be a complete, operational example. It is possible to see it fly again, but maintenance needed to keep it in a certifiable flying condition is very time-consuming and expensive.

Although it can be easily viewed by the public, it is open for public access for special events only.

Simulators

Lockheed L-1011 Tristar Simulator
A full-motion, working Lockheed L-1011 Tristar simulator was donated to the museum by Orbital Sciences Corporation; it was never installed and later removed from the museum's possession and transferred to a site in California.

Lockheed L-1011 Tristar Cockpit Procedures Trainer
The museum also has a cockpit procedures trainer for the Lockheed L-1011 Tristar, originally belonging to Trans World Airlines.

General Purpose
A general purpose, custom-built flight simulator occupies part of the main foyer of the museum.

See also
 National Museum of Commercial Aviation

References

External links

 Flight of the Connie: historic aviation flight museum Kansas City

Aerospace museums in Missouri
Museums in Kansas City, Missouri
Museums in Clay County, Missouri
Museums established in 1986

National Airline History Museum


Oyumi were ancient Japanese artillery pieces that first appeared in the seventh century (during the Asuka Period). It is unknown exactly what kind of weapon the Oyumi was or how it looked, as there are no surviving examples or illustrations, but the Oyumi is thought to have been a type of siege crossbow.

History and use
According to Japanese records, the Oyumi was different from the hand held crossbow also in use during the same time period. A quote from a seventh-century source seems to suggest that the Oyumi may have able to fire multiple arrows at once: "the Oyumi were lined up and fired at random, the arrows fell like rain". A ninth century Japanese artisan named Shimaki no Fubito claimed to have improved on a version of the weapon used by the Chinese; his version could rotate and fire projectiles in multiple directions. The last recorded use of the Oyumi was in 1189.

References

Samurai weapons and equipment
Archery equipment of Japan
Crossbows

Oyumi


Dendroctonus pseudotsugae, the Douglas-fir beetle, is a species of bark beetle found in western North America. Three subspecies exist that correspond to the subspecies of Douglas-fir. The beetles also infest downed Larch trees. Outbreaks often occur in conjunction with drought, root rot diseases, overcrowding, damage by insects that damage foliage, and environmental disturbance. This insect is part of the western forest ecosystem, playing a role in thinning weak trees in a stand.

Adult Douglas-fir beetles are light brown when young and become dark brown or black with reddish wing covers. They are somewhat hairy and range in size from 4.4 to 7 mm. The larvae are small, legless, the size of grains of rice, and white. Pupae are white to cream colored. Visible evidence of infestation includes patches of orange to reddish-brown boring dust in the bark or at the base of the tree. Resin streamers from attacks higher in the tree may also be present. Inside the bark, 6 to 30 inch egg galleries run parallel with the grain. Eggs are laid on either side of the gallery and when they hatch, the larvae mine perpendicular to the galleries.

References

External links
 http://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/stelprdb5187396.pdf
 http://www.barkbeetles.org/douglasfir/dfb.html

Beetles of North America
Scolytinae
Insect pests of temperate forests
Woodboring beetles

Dendroctonus pseudotsugae


Serbuni, short for Serikat Buruh Unilever Indonesia ('Unilever Workers Union of Indonesia'), was a trade union of workers at the factories of Unilever in Indonesia. During the late 1950s and early 1960s, Serbuni was the largest of the four trade unions at the Unilever factories in the country. Serbuni was affiliated to the trade union centre SOBSI, which was linked to the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI). K. Werdojo was the general secretary of Serbuni.

From 1956 onwards unions at the four Unilever factories in Indonesia (three in Jakarta, one in Surabaya) became increasingly active, particularly Serbuni. The unions demands shares of the profits of the factories. Serbuni initiated militant agitations at the time of the 1963/1964 Konfrontasi, following similar attacks at the British Embassy and Shell Oil installations. In December 1963 the organization began picketing Unilever factories. In the latter half of January 1964, the union tried to capture the Djakarta head office and factories of Unilever. On 18 January 1964 Serbuni seized control over the Angke factory in Djakarta. A statement issued by Serbuni claimed that the occupation was a reaction to Konfrontasi, British imperialism, seizure of two Hajj ships and statements made by president Sukarno. The unionists were however expelled by local police. The union tried to occupy the Colibri factory in Surabaya on 25 January 1964, but were evicted by police. At Angke a joint supervisory committee with Serbuni representation was instituted by the police, whilst at Colibri control was handed back to the Unilever management.

David Kenneth Fieldhouse argues that Serbuni did not formally seize control of the Unilever factories, as foreign enterprises taken over by unions were nationalized by presidential decree. In the nationalized industries independent unions were banned, a move that would have threatened the position of Serbuni. Thus Fieldhouse states that Serbuni's actions at the time of Konfrontasi actually sought to prevent nationalization.

References

Central All-Indonesian Workers Organization
Unilever
1966 disestablishments in Indonesia

Serbuni


The Boring Billion, otherwise known as the Mid Proterozoic and Earth's Middle Ages, is the time period between 1.8 and 0.8 billion years ago (Ga) spanning the middle Proterozoic eon, characterized by more or less tectonic stability, climatic stasis, and slow biological evolution. It is bordered by two different oxygenation and glacial events, but the Boring Billion itself had very low oxygen levels and no evidence of glaciation.

The oceans may have been oxygen- and nutrient-poor and sulfidic (euxinia), populated by mainly anoxygenic purple bacteria, a type of chlorophyll-based photosynthetic bacteria which uses hydrogen sulfide (H2S) instead of water and produces sulfur instead of oxygen. This is known as a Canfield ocean. Such composition may have caused the oceans to be black- and milky-turquoise instead of blue.  (By contrast, during the much earlier Purple Earth phase the photosynthesis was retinal-based.)

Despite such adverse conditions, eukaryotes may have evolved around the beginning of the Boring Billion, and adopted several novel adaptations, such as various organelles, multicellularity, and possibly sexual reproduction, and diversified into plants, animals, and fungi at the end of this time interval. Such advances may have been important precursors to the evolution of large, complex life later in the Ediacaran and Phanerozoic. Nonetheless, prokaryotic cyanobacteria were the dominant lifeforms during this time, and likely supported an energy-poor food-web with a small number of protists at the apex level. The land was likely inhabited by prokaryotic cyanobacteria and eukaryotic proto-lichens, the latter more successful here probably due to the greater availability of nutrients than in offshore ocean waters.

Description
In 1995, geologists Roger Buick, Davis Des Marais, and Andrew Knoll reviewed the apparent lack of major biological, geological, and climatic events during the Mesoproterozoic era 1.6 to 1 billion years ago (Ga), and, thus, described it as "the dullest time in Earth's history". The term "Boring Billion" was coined by paleontologist Martin Brasier to refer to the time between about 2 and 1 Ga, which was characterized by geochemical stasis and glacial stagnation. In 2013, geochemist Grant Young used the term "Barren Billion" to refer to a period of apparent glacial stagnation and lack of carbon isotope excursions from 1.8 to 0.8 Ga. In 2014, geologists Peter Cawood and Chris Hawkesworth called the time between 1.7 and 0.75 Ga "Earth's Middle Ages" due to a lack of evidence of tectonic movement.

The Boring Billion is now largely cited as spanning about 1.8 to 0.8 Ga, contained within the Proterozoic eon, mainly the Mesoproterozoic. The Boring Billion is characterized by geological, climatic, and by-and-large evolutionary stasis, with low nutrient abundance.

In the time leading up to the Boring Billion, Earth experienced the Great Oxygenation Event due to the evolution of oxygenic photosynthetic cyanobacteria, and the resultant Huronian glaciation (Snowball Earth), formation of the UV-blocking ozone layer, and oxidation of several metals. Oxygen levels during the Boring Billion are thought to have been markedly lower than during the Great Oxidation Event, perhaps 0.1 to 10% of modern levels. It was ended by the breakup of the supercontinent Rodinia during the Tonian (1000–720 Ma) period, a second oxygenation event, and another Snowball Earth in the Cryogenian period.

Tectonic stasis

The evolution of Earth's biosphere, atmosphere, and hydrosphere has long been linked to the supercontinent cycle, where the continents aggregate and then drift apart. The Boring Billion saw the evolution of two supercontinents: Columbia (or Nuna) and Rodinia.

The supercontinent Columbia formed between 2.0 and 1.7 Ga and remained intact until at least 1.3 Ga. Geological and paleomagnetic evidence suggest that Columbia underwent only minor changes to form the supercontinent Rodinia from 1.1 to 0.9 Ga. Paleogeographic reconstructions suggest that the supercontinent assemblage was located in equatorial and temperate climate zones, and there is little or no evidence for continental fragments in polar regions.

Due to the lack of evidence of sediment build-up (on passive margins) which would occur as a result of rifting, the supercontinent probably did not break up, and rather was simply an assemblage of juxtaposed proto-continents and cratons. There is no evidence of rifting until the formation of Rodinia, 1.25 Ga in North Laurentia, and 1 Ga in East Baltica and South Siberia. Breakup did not occur until 0.75 Ga, marking the end of the Boring Billion. This tectonic stasis may have been related in ocean and atmospheric chemistry.

It is possible the asthenosphere—the molten layer of Earth's mantle that tectonic plates essentially float and move around upon—was too hot to sustain modern plate tectonics at this time. Instead of vigorous plate recycling at subduction zones, plates were linked together for billions of years until the mantle cooled off sufficiently. The onset of this component of plate tectonics may have been aided by the cooling and thickening of the crust that, once initiated, made plate subduction anomalously strong, occurring at the end of the Boring Billion.

Nonetheless, major magmatic events still occurred, such as the formation (via magma plume) of the  central Australian Musgrave Province from 1.22 to 1.12 Ga, and the  Canadian Mackenzie Large Igneous Province 1.27 Ga. Plate tectonics were still active enough to build mountains, with several orogenies, including the Grenville orogeny, occurring at the time.

Climatic stability

There is little evidence of significant climatic variability during this time period.  Climate was likely not primarily dictated by solar luminosity because the Sun was 5–18% less luminous than it is today, but there is no evidence that Earth's climate was significantly cooler. In fact, the Boring Billion seems to lack any evidence of prolonged glaciations, which can be observed at regular periodicity in other parts of Earth's geologic history. High CO2 could not have been a main driver for warming because levels would have needed to be 30 to 100 times greater than pre-industrial levels and produced substantial ocean acidification to prevent ice formation, which also did not occur. Mesoproterozoic CO2 levels may have been comparable to those of the Phanerozoic eon, perhaps 7 to 10 times higher than modern levels. The first record of ice from this time period was reported in 2020 from the 1 Ga Scottish Diabaig Formation in the Torridon Group, where dropstone formations were likely formed by debris from ice rafting; the area, then situated between 35–50°S, was a (possibly upland) lake which is thought to have frozen over in the winter and melted in the summer, rafting occurring in the spring melt.

A higher abundance of other greenhouse gases, namely methane produced by prokaryotes, may have compensated for the low CO2 levels; a largely ice-free world achieved by an atmospheric methane concentration of 140 parts per million (ppm). Methanogenic prokaryotes could not have produced so much methane, implying some other greenhouse gas, probably nitrous oxide, was elevated, perhaps to 3 ppm (10 times today's levels). Based on presumed greenhouse gas concentrations, equatorial temperatures during the Mesoproterozoic may have been about , in the tropics , at 60° , and the poles ; and the global average temperature about , which is 4 °C (7.2 °F) warmer than today. Temperatures at the poles dropped below freezing in winter, allowing for temporary sea ice formation and snowfall, but there were likely no permanent ice sheets.

It has also been proposed that, because the intensity of cosmic rays has been shown to be positively correlated to cloud cover, and cloud cover reflects light into space and reduces global temperatures, lower rates of bombardment during this time due to reduced star formation in the galaxy caused less cloud cover and prevented glaciation events, maintaining a warm climate. Also, some combination of weathering intensity which would have reduced CO2 levels by oxidation of exposed metals, cooling of the mantle and reduced geothermal heat and volcanism, and increasing solar intensity and solar heat may have reached an equilibrium, barring ice formation.

Conversely, glacial movements over a billion years ago may not have left many remnants today, and an apparent lack of evidence could be due to the incompleteness of the fossil record rather than absence. Further, the low oxygen and solar intensity levels may have prevented the formation of the ozone layer, preventing greenhouse gasses from being trapped in the atmosphere and heating the Earth via the greenhouse effect, which would have caused glaciation. Though not much oxygen is necessary to sustain the ozone layer, and levels during the Boring Billion may have been high enough for it, the Earth may have been more heavily bombarded by UV radiation than today.

Oceanic composition
The oceans seem to have had low concentrations of key nutrients thought to be necessary for complex life, namely molybdenum, iron, nitrogen, and phosphorus, in large part due to a lack of oxygen and resultant oxidation necessary for these geochemical cycles. Nutrients could have been more abundant in terrestrial environments, such as lakes or nearshore environments closer to continental runoff.

In general, the oceans may have had an oxygenated surface layer, a sulfidic middle layer, and suboxic bottom layer. The predominantly sulfidic composition may have caused the oceans to be a black- and milky-turquoise color instead of blue.

Oxygen
Earth's geologic record indicates two events associated with significant increases in oxygen levels on Earth, with one occurring between 2.4 and 2.1 Ga, known as the Great Oxidation Event (GOE), and the second occurring an approximate 0.8 Ga, known as the Neoproterozoic Oxygenation Event (NOE). The intermediary period, during the Boring Billion, is thought have had low oxygen levels (with minor fluctuations), leading to widespread anoxic waters.

The oceans may have been distinctly stratified, with surface water being oxygenated and deep water being suboxic (less than 1 μM oxygen), the latter possibly maintained by lower levels of hydrogen (H2) and H2S output by deep sea hydrothermal vents which otherwise would have been chemically reduced by the oxygen. Even in the shallowest waters, significant quantities of oxygen may have been restricted mainly to areas near the coast. The decomposition of sinking organic matter would have also leached oxygen from deep waters.

The sudden drop in O2 after the Great Oxygenation Event—indicated by δ13C levels to have been a loss of 10 to 20 times the current volume of atmospheric oxygen—is known as the Lomagundi-Jatuli Event, and is the most prominent carbon isotope event in Earth's history. Oxygen levels may have been less than 0.1 to 1% of modern-day levels, which would have effectively stalled the evolution of complex life during the Boring Billion. However, a Mesoproterozoic Oxygenation Event (MOE), during which oxygen rose transiently to about 4% PAL at various points in time, is proposed to have occurred from 1.59 to 1.36 Ga. In particular, some evidence from the Gaoyuzhuang Formation suggests a rise in oxygen around 1.57 Ga, while the Velkerri Formation in the Roper Group of the Northern Territory of Australia, the Kaltasy Formation of the Volga-Ural region of Russia, and the Xiamaling Formation in the northern North China Craton indicate noticeable oxygenation around 1.4 Ga, although the degree to which this represents global oxygen levels is unclear. Oxic conditions would have become dominant at the NOE causing the proliferation of aerobic activity over anaerobic, but widespread suboxic and anoxic conditions likely lasted until about 0.55 Ga corresponding with Ediacaran biota and the Cambrian explosion.

Sulfur

In 1998, geologist Donald Canfield proposed what is now known as the Canfield ocean hypothesis. Canfield claimed that increasing levels of oxygen in the atmosphere at the Great Oxygenation Event would have reacted with and oxidized continental iron pyrite (FeS2) deposits, with sulfate (SO42−) as a byproduct, which was transported into the sea. Sulfate-reducing microorganisms converted this to hydrogen sulfide (H2S), dividing the ocean into a somewhat oxic surface layer, and a sulfidic layer beneath, with anoxygenic bacteria living at the border, metabolizing the H2S and creating sulfur as a waste product. This created widespread euxinic conditions in middle-waters, an anoxic state with a high sulfur concentration, which was maintained by the bacteria. However, more systematic geochemical study of the Mid-Proterozoic indicates that the oceans were largely ferruginous with a thin surface layer of weakly oxygenated waters, and euxinia may have occurred over relatively small areas, perhaps less than 7% of the seafloor.

Iron
Among rocks dating to the Boring Billion, there is a conspicuous lack of banded iron formations, which form from iron in the upper water column (sourced from the deep ocean) reacting with oxygen and precipitating out of the water. They seemingly cease around the world after 1.85 Ga. Canfield argued that oceanic SO42− reduced all the iron in the anoxic deep sea. Iron could have been metabolized by anoxygenic bacteria. It has also been proposed that the 1.85 Ga Sudbury meteor impact mixed the previously stratified ocean via tsunamis, interaction between vaporized seawater and the oxygenated atmosphere, oceanic cavitation, and massive runoff of destroyed continental margins into the sea. Resultant suboxic deep waters (due to oxygenated surface water mixing with previously anoxic deep water) would have oxidized deep-water iron, preventing it from being transported and deposited on continental margins.

Nonetheless, iron-rich waters did exist, such as the 1.4 Ga Xiamaling Formation of Northern China, which perhaps was fed by deep water hydrothermal vents. Iron-rich conditions also indicate anoxic bottom water in this area, as oxic conditions would have oxidized all the iron.

Lifeforms
Low nutrient abundance may have facilitated photosymbiosis—where one organism is capable of photosynthesis and the other metabolizes the waste product—among prokaryotes (bacteria and archaea), and the emergence of eukaryotes. Bacteria, Archaea, and Eukaryota are the three domains, the highest taxonomic ranking. Eukaryotes are distinguished from prokaryotes by a nucleus and membrane-bound organelles, and almost all multicellular organisms are eukaryotes.

Prokaryotes

Prokaryotes were the dominant lifeforms throughout the Boring Billion. Microfossils indicate the presence of cyanobacteria, green and purple sulfur bacteria, methane-producing archaea, sulfate-metabolizing bacteria, methane-metabolizing archaea or bacteria, iron-metabolizing bacteria, nitrogen-metabolizing bacteria, and anoxygenic photosynthetic bacteria.

Anoxygenic cyanobacteria are thought to have been the dominant photosynthesizers, metabolizing the abundant H2S in the oceans. In iron-rich waters, cyanobacteria may have suffered from iron poisoning, especially in offshore waters where iron-rich deep water mixed with surface waters, and thus were outcompeted by other bacteria which could metabolize both iron and H2S. However, iron poisoning could have been abated by silica-rich waters or biomineralization of iron within the cell.

Unicellular planktonic lineages of cyanobacteria evolved in freshwater during the middle of the Mesoproterozoic, and during the Neoproterozoic both benthic marine and some freshwater ancestors gave rise to marine planktonic cyanobacteria (both nitrogen-fixing and non-nitrogen fixing), contributing to the oxygenation of the Pre-Cambrian oceans.

Research on cyanobacteria in the laboratory has shown that the enzyme nitrogenase, which is used to fix atmospheric nitrogen, stops working when the oxygen levels is higher than 10% of current atmospheric levels. The absence of nitrogen due to an increased amount of oxygen would have created a negative feedback loop where atmospheric oxygen levels stabilised at 2%. Which began to change about 600 million years ago when landplants started releasing oxygen. By 408 million years ago, nitrogen fixating cyanobacteria had evolved heterocysts to protect their nitrogenase from oxygen.

Eukaryotes
Eukaryotes may have arisen around the beginning of the Boring Billion, coinciding with the accretion of Columbia, which could have somehow increased oceanic oxygen levels. Although there have been claimed records of eukaryotes as early as 2.1 billion years ago, these have been considered questionable, with the oldest unambiguous eukaryote remains dating to around 1.8-1.6 billion years ago in China. Following this, eukaryotic evolution was rather slow, possibly due to the euxinic conditions of the Canfield ocean and a lack of key nutrients and metals which prevented large, complex life with high energy requirements from evolving. Euxinic conditions would have also decreased the solubility of iron and molybdenum, essential metals in nitrogen fixation. A lack of dissolved nitrogen would have favored prokaryotes over eukaryotes, as the former can metabolize gaseous nitrogen. An alternative hypothesis for the lack of diversification among eukaryotes implicates high temperatures during the Boring Billion rather than low oxygen levels, positing that the fact that oxygenation events prior to the Late Neoproterozoic did not kickstart eukaryotic evolution suggests it was not the main limiting factor inhibiting it.

Nonetheless, the diversification of crown group eukaryotic macroorganisms seems to have started about 1.6–1 Ga, seemingly coinciding with an increase in key nutrient concentrations. According to molecular clock analysis, plants diverged from animals and fungi about 1.6 Ga; animals and fungi about 1.5 Ga; Bilaterians and cnidarians (animals respectively with and without bilateral symmetry) about 1.3 Ga; sponges 1.35 Ga; and Ascomycota and Basidiomycota (the two divisions of the fungus subkingdom Dikarya) 0.97 Ga.  The paper's authors state that their time estimates disagree with the scientific consensus.

Fossils from the late Palaeoproterozoic and early Mesoproterozoic of the Vindhyan sedimentary basin of India, the Ruyang Group of China, and the Kotuikan Formation of the Anabar Shield of Siberia indicate high rates (by pre-Ediacaran standards) of eukaryotic diversification between 1.7 and 1.4 Ga, although much of this diversity is represented by previously unknown, no longer existing clades of eukaryotes. The earliest known red algae mats date to 1.6 Ga. The earliest known fungus dates to 1.01–0.89 Ga from Northern Canada. Multicellular eukaryotes, thought to be the descendants of colonial unicellular aggregates, had probably evolved about 2–1.4 Ga. Likewise, early multicellular eukaryotes likely mainly aggregated into stromatolite mats.

The red alga Bangiomorpha is the earliest known sexually reproducing and meiotic lifeform, and evolved by 1.047 Ga. Based on this, these adaptations evolved between ca. 2–1.4 Ga. Alternatively, these may have evolved well before the last common ancestor of eukaryotes given that meiosis is performed using the same proteins in all eukaryotes, perhaps stretching to as far back as the hypothesized RNA world.

Cell organelles probably originated from free-living cyanobacteria (symbiogenesis) possibly after the evolution of phagocytosis (engulfing other cells) with the removal of the rigid cell wall which was only necessary for asexual reproduction. Mitochondria had already evolved in the Great Oxygenation Event, but plastids used in primoplants for photosynthesis are thought to have appeared about 1.6–1.5 Ga. Histones likely appeared during the Boring Billion to help organize and package the increasing amount of DNA in eukaryotic cells into nucleosomes. Hydrogenosomes used in anaerobic activity may have originated in this time from an archaeon.

Given the evolutionary landmarks achieved by eukaryotes, this time period could be considered an important precursor to the Cambrian explosion about 0.54 Ga, and the evolution of relatively large, complex life.

Ecology
Due to the marginalization of large food particles, such as algae, in favor of cyanobacteria and prokaryotes which do not transmit as much energy to higher trophic levels, a complex food web likely did not form, and large lifeforms with high energy demands could not evolve. Such a food web probably only sustained a small number of protists as, in a sense, apex predators.

The presumably oxygenic photosynthetic eukaryotic acritarchs, perhaps a type of microalga, inhabited the Mesoproterozoic surface waters. Their population may have been largely limited by nutrient availability rather than predation because species have been reported to have survived for hundreds of millions of years, but after 1 Ga, species duration dropped to about 100 Ma, perhaps due to increased herbivory by early protists. This is consistent with species survival dropping to 10 Ma just after the Cambrian explosion and the expansion of herbivorous animals.

The relatively low concentrations of molybdenum in the ocean throughout the Boring Billion have been suggested as a major limiting factor that kept populations of open ocean nitrogen fixing microorganisms, which require molybdenum to produce nitrogenases, low, although freshwater and coastal environments close to riverine sources of dissolved molybdenum may have still hosted significant communities of nitrogen fixers. The low rate of nitrogen fixation, which only ended during the Cryogenian with the evolution of planktonic nitrogen fixers, meant that free ammonium was in short supply across this time interval, severely constraining the evolution and diversification of multicellular biota.

Life on land
Some of the earliest evidence of the prokaryotic colonization of land dates to before 3 Ga, possibly as early as 3.5 Ga. During the Boring Billion, land may have been inhabited mainly by cyanobacterial mats. Dust would have supplied an abundance of nutrients and a means of dispersal for surface-dwelling microbes, though microbial communities could have also formed in caves and freshwater lakes and rivers. By 1.2 Ga, microbial communities may have been abundant enough to have affected weathering, erosion, sedimentation, and various geochemical cycles, and expansive microbial mats could indicate biological soil crust was abundant.

The earliest terrestrial eukaryotes may have been lichen fungi about 1.3 Ga, which grazed on the microbial mats. Abundant eukaryotic microfossils from the freshwater Scottish Torridon Group seems to indicate eukaryotic dominance in non-marine habitats by 1 Ga, probably due to increased nutrient availability in areas closer to the continents and continental runoff. These lichen may have later facilitated plant colonization 0.75 Ga in some manner. A massive increase in terrestrial photosynthetic biomass seems to have occurred about 0.85 Ga, indicated by a flux in terrestrially-sourced carbon, which may have increased oxygen levels enough to support an expansion of multicellular eukaryotes.

See also

 The natural nuclear fission reactors at what is now Oklo, Gabon were active in this era

External links
Earth's 'boring billion' years of stagnant, stinking oceans might actually have been rather dynamic

Astrobiology

References

Proterozoic
Plate tectonics
Geological periods
1995 in science

Boring Billion


Matthew Ashton (born June 8, 1988) is a professional poker player from Liverpool, England, best known for winning the $50,000 Poker Player's Championship at the 2013 World Series of Poker.

Highlights
Ashton began playing poker in 2003. Playing under the name "MUSTAFABET", he won a World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) event in 2009 in Pot-Limit Omaha for $86,000. His first World Series of Poker cash came in 2011, when he finished in 6th place in the $10,000 H.O.R.S.E. Championship. In 2013, he made 4 WSOP final tables, finishing in 2nd ($5,000 Seven Card Stud Hi-Low Split-8 or Better event #13), 3rd ($2,500 Omaha/Seven Card Stud Hi-Low 8-or Better event #5) and 7th ($2,500 Seven Card Stud event #23) before winning the $50,000 The Poker Players Championship (event #55). By winning this late event, he took over the lead in the WSOP Player of the Year race lead. He is the youngest champion in that event's 8-year history and the first non-American champion. His first three final tables in 2013 were in stud poker variants. His second-place finish in $5,000 Seven Card Stud Hi-Low came to Mike Matusow. His Poker Player's Championship came at a final table that included bracelet winners John Hennigan, David Benyamine, Mike Wattel, and Jonathan Duhamel as well as Minh Ly. The Championship was contested using an eight-game mix that included No Limit Hold'em, Limit Hold'em, Pot Limit Omaha, Omaha Hi-Lo, Seven card Stud, Seven card Stud Hi-Lo, Razz, and Deuce-to-Seven Triple Draw.

As of 2013, his total career live tournament winnings exceed $2,300,000. His 8 WSOP cashes account for $2,185,000 of those winnings. After winning the World Series of Poker bracelet for the $50,000 Poker Players Championship, he became the leader in the 2013 World Series of Poker Player of the Year race, but Daniel Negreanu reclaimed the lead at the end of the 2013 World Series of Poker Europe.

World Series of Poker

Notes

External links
Matthew Ashton at Hendonmob.com
Matthew Ashton at Bluff Magazine
Matthew Ashton at Card Player
Matthew Ashton at WSOP.com

English poker players
World Series of Poker bracelet winners
Living people
People from Liverpool
1988 births
Game players from Merseyside

Matthew Ashton


Pablo Ocampo Street, also known simply as Ocampo Street and formerly and still referred to as Vito Cruz Street, is an inner city main road in Manila, Philippines. It runs west–east for about  connecting the southern districts of Malate and San Andres southeast to the adjacent city of Makati.

Originally called Vito Cruz Street after Hermógenes Vito Cruz, the 19th century mayor of Pineda (present-day Pasay), the street was renamed in 1989 in honor of the Filipino statesman and lawyer Pablo Ocampo. Its section in south central Malate was known as Calle Lico and Calle Connor, respectively, when it was then a short street in the district before extending towards the Manila South Cemetery.

The Manila section runs from Roxas Boulevard near the Cultural Center of the Philippines heading east through the city's southern limits in Malate district. It crosses Harrison Avenue, Adriatico Street, and Taft Avenue passing beneath LRT Line 1. From there, it continues for another kilometer past the Singalong area and southwestern San Andres district toward Osmeña Highway. Upon entering Makati east of Osmeña Highway, the road turns east at Kamagong Street where it becomes Ocampo Street Extension or Vito Cruz Street Extension. It passes through barangays La Paz, San Antonio, and Santa Cruz in northwestern Makati until it meets its eastern terminus at South Avenue, west of the Manila South Cemetery. The street carries two-way traffic, except for its section from Taft to Arellano Avenues that carries one-way eastbound traffic and from Arellano Avenue to Chino Roces Avenue that carries one-way westbound traffic.

Pablo Ocampo Street is served by the Vito Cruz LRT Station along Taft Avenue and the Vito Cruz railway station along Osmeña Highway. It also extends into the Bay City area west of Roxas Boulevard as Pedro Bukaneg Street.

Landmarks

Pablo Ocampo Street is the site of the Rizal Memorial Sports Complex with the art deco-style Rizal Memorial Baseball Stadium fronting the intersection with Adriatico Street, and the Rizal Memorial Coliseum just behind it. On the opposite corner of Adriatico is Century Park Hotel and Harrison Plaza, one of Manila's first modern shopping centers. Across the street from the plaza is the Embassy of Vietnam, Fo Guang Shan Mabuhay Temple and Orchid Garden Suites. The street also hosts the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas headquarters at the junction with Roxas Boulevard where Legaspi Towers 300 is also located. Near the intersection with Taft Avenue stand several condominium towers, such as the Cityland Vito Cruz Towers and Torre Lorenzo.

The street also provides access to the De La Salle University and De La Salle–College of Saint Benilde campuses located just north of the intersection with Taft Avenue. Arellano University School of Law is also accessible via Donada Street, a street connected to Vito Cruz. It is also the site of Saint Scholastica's College and School of Arts and Design of De La Salle–College of Saint Benilde, which houses the Museum of Contemporary Art and Design. In the San Andres and Makati areas east of Osmeña Highway, the street hosts the Rafael Palma Elementary School, Kingswood Towers, Savana Market, Shopwise Makati, the relocated Mapúa University Makati Campus, and the Manila South Cemetery at its terminus.

See also
 Major roads in Manila
 List of renamed streets in Manila

References

Streets in Manila
Malate, Manila
San Andres, Manila

Pablo Ocampo Street