Oskar Back (9 June 18793 January 1963) was a noted Austrian-born Dutch classical violinist and pedagogue. He taught at the Amsterdam Conservatory for 42 years, and also had a significant earlier teaching career in Belgium.

Biography
Oskar Back was born in Vienna, Austria, the son of Hungarian parents. He first studied with Jacob Grün at the Vienna Academy of Music, winning the Medal of Honour at age 16. He then went to Belgium for further study with Eugène Ysaÿe and César Thomson at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels.

Although he had a superb technique, he suffered from debilitating stage fright, which meant he was best suited to teaching. He only once ventured onto a public stage for a concerto performance, in Scheveningen on 17 January 1908, with the Hague Philharmonic Orchestra under Henri Viotta.

He first taught at the Brussels Conservatory in 1898, initially deputising for César Thomson, who was frequently concertising. Later he was appointed to a teaching post in his own right. He married Maria Anthonia Vermeer in 1906. They had a son and a daughter. They divorced in 1923.

He left Belgium in 1919, as he had found life difficult there in the First World War as an Austro-Hungarian citizen amid occupying German forces.  He settled in Amsterdam, Netherlands, where he coached the violinists of the Concertgebouw Orchestra, and even joined the orchestra himself on occasions. He taught at the Amsterdam Conservatory from 1921 until his death in 1963. He also taught at the Rotterdam Conservatory, and had private students. In 1935 he became a Dutch citizen.

During the German invasion  of the Netherlands in World War II, in order to rebut fake identity papers, he was forced to produce documents that demonstrated he had no Jewish heritage, and he was allowed to continue his activities.

His students included Alma Moodie, Herman Krebbers, Emmy Verhey, Theo Olof, Davina van Wely, and others. Queen Elisabeth of Belgium also had lessons with him.  He advocated the exercises of Otakar Ševčík but also encouraged his students to embrace a broad repertoire that did not limit itself to virtuosic pieces and concertos, but included sonatas, chamber music and orchestral repertoire.  He was also described as "very strict with his pupils ... passionate, short-tempered, extremely industrious, generous and charming", and had a formidable insight into human psychology.

Oskar Back participated in numerous competition juries, such as the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition and the Geneva International Music Competition.

He wrote his own cadenza for the Brahms Violin Concerto in D.

Oskar Back died in Anderlecht, Belgium in 1963, aged 83.

Legacy
Although he made no recordings, Oskar Back established a foundation to financially assist struggling young, talented violinists.  This led to Theo Olof co-founding the National Oskar Back Violin Competition in 1967, which has been held in the Netherlands every two years since then.  It is open to Dutch violinists aged between 17 and 26.  Winners have included Emmy Verhey, Jaap van Zweden and Vera Beths.

References

1879 births
1963 deaths
Musicians from Vienna
University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna alumni
Royal Conservatory of Brussels alumni
Academic staff of the Royal Conservatory of Brussels
Academic staff of the Conservatorium van Amsterdam
Austrian classical violinists
Belgian classical violinists
Dutch classical violinists
Male classical violinists
Austrian music educators
Belgian music educators
Dutch music educators
Violin pedagogues
Expatriates from Austria-Hungary
Expatriates in Belgium
Emigrants from Austria-Hungary
Immigrants to the Netherlands

Oskar Back


James Brogden (7 April 1832 – 26 January 1907) was a British businessman, the fourth son of John Brogden (1798–1869) of Manchester. He spent most of his adult life in Mid Glamorgan, first at Tondu and later at Porthcawl. He was the junior partner in John Brogden and Sons.

In 1853/4, Brogdens bought the iron and coal mining business at Tondu, Mid-Glamorgan of Sir Robert Price, 2nd Baronet. Price had got into difficulties during recessions in the iron trade in the 1840s. In February 1854, John Brogden sent his son James, then aged 22, to revive and run the business, which was very run down. In July 1854, John Brogden signed a new 99-year lease with Jane Nicholl. James rapidly reorganised the works and established his home at Tondu House, which he rebuilt. In the 1861 census, James said he was employing 900 men and farming  with 20 men.

In September 1859, James married Helen Dunbar Milne, a granddaughter of Lady Helen Dunbar of Tunbridge Wells, in St George's, Hanover Square. At first, the marriage was happy but in February 1864 an affair began between Helen and John Popkin Traherne, who lived at nearby Coytrahen House. Brogden petitioned for a divorce in February 1865 and this was granted.

When John Brogden Senior died in December 1869, Alexander assumed his father's position as head of John Brogden and Sons and came to Tondu to assume control. He took a lease on Coytrahen House – where Mrs Brogden had committed adultery - even though James had offered to vacate Tondu House for his use. This hurt James terribly and created a rift, which was bad for both the family and the business because it was hard for the two men to maintain cordial relations.

James went out to New Zealand on behalf of the family firm to negotiate the contracts with the government to build railways using emigrants from the UK. He left Liverpool in August 1871 and returned to England early in 1873. The diary that he kept during his journey shows that he was engaged in very difficult and protracted negotiations. It runs to over 100 pages of manuscript and offers a very readable account of the places he visited and the people he met.

James's companions on this journey were: "Dunny" (his son Duncan Dunbar Milne Brogden), "Fielding" (his servant) and "Llewellyn" (a friend). By "Llewellyn" he almost certainly meant Robert William Llewellyn (1849-1910). This gentleman was at the right age for such an adventure. He later inherited Baglan Hall and Court Colman Manor and Court Colman is close to Tondu.

In 1874 shortly after his return, James married as his second wife Mary Caroline Beete, daughter of John Picton Beete, a nephew of Gen. Sir Thomas Picton. While James was in New Zealand, Alexander had taken control of the South Wales business, forming a new company, the Llynvi, Tondu and Ogmore Coal and Iron Company. As he was no longer required at Tondu, James made his new home in Porthcawl.

After the dissolution of John Brogden and Sons, Mrs Brogden purchased approximately  adjoining the new Porthcawl dock that her husband had bought for the company in 1865, and by the end of the century, she had developed the early stages of the modern town of Porthcawl. In 1906, however, the Great Western Railway that then owned the dock, closed it because its trade had been diverted to newer docks at Port Talbot and Barry. This reduced the value of her properties, which were heavily mortgaged. This hastened James's death, which occurred at his home, the Esplanade Hotel, on 25 January 1907.

Afterwards, most of Mrs Brogden's property had to be sold and she moved to 72 Victoria Avenue where she died on 5 November 1927.
.

Notes and references

James Brogden
1832 births
1907 deaths
English civil engineering contractors
British railway pioneers
Businesspeople from Manchester
People of the Industrial Revolution
19th-century English businesspeople
English Methodists
History of Glamorgan
British people in rail transport
New Zealand people in rail transport

James Brogden (industrialist)


Captain Robert Henley (5 January 1783 – 7 October 1828) was an officer in the United States Navy during the Quasi-War with France, the War of 1812, and the Second Barbary War.  He was the brother of Captain John Dandridge Henley, USN (1781–1835), who served during the First Barbary War and the War of 1812.

Born in Williamsburg, Virginia and educated at the College of William and Mary, Robert Henley was the son of Leonard and Elizabeth Dandridge Henley and the nephew of Martha Dandridge Custis Washington. Henley was appointed a midshipman on 8 April 1799. Midshipman Henley then participated in the engagement on 2 February 1800 between Constellation and La Vengeance during the Quasi-War with France.

After service with Edward Preble's squadron in the Mediterranean and a cruise to the East Indies, Henley received his first command, Gunboat No. 5, at Baltimore, Maryland on 9 April 1808. Henley was in command of two divisions of 15 gunboats which drove three British frigates from Hampton Roads on 20 June 1813. Reporting to brig Eagle, he received the Thanks of Congress and a Congressional Gold Medal for valiant conduct in the Battle of Lake Champlain 11 September 1814.

With the end of the War of 1812, Henley filled a variety of billets before commanding Hornet against pirates in the West Indies. He captured the pirate schooner Moscow off Santo Domingo 29 October 1821. After serving as commandant of the Naval Rendezvous at Norfolk 1822 to 1824, he reported for similar duty at Charleston, South Carolina.

Captain Robert Henley died at Sullivan's Island, Charleston, after a short illness 7 October 1828. He was buried in St. Michael's Episcopal Church (Charleston, South Carolina).

See USS Henley for ships named in his honor.

1783 births
1828 deaths
United States Navy captains
American military personnel of the First Barbary War
American military personnel of the Quasi-War
United States Navy personnel of the War of 1812
Congressional Gold Medal recipients
People from Williamsburg, Virginia
American military personnel of the Second Barbary War

Robert Henley (naval officer)


Ioannis Karathanasis (alternate spelling: Giannis) (Greek: Γιάννης Καραθανάσης; born February 17, 1991) is a Greek former professional basketball player. At a height of 2.03 m (6'8") tall, he played at both the small forward or power forward positions, with small forward being his primary position.

Professional career
Karathanasis began his basketball career playing with the youth clubs of the Asteria Basketball Academy in Thessaloniki, Greece. He joined the Greek League power Olympiacos in the year 2008, and played with their youth clubs, before going on loan to the semi-pro Greek 3rd Division club Mantoulidis, for the 2009–10 season.

He began his pro career in 2010, when he joined the Greek League club Panellinios. In August 2011, he signed with the Greek League club Kavala. In September 2014, Karathanasis signed a contract with Aris for the 2014–15 season. On September 15, 2015, he was officially signed by Aries Trikala for the 2015–16 season.

National team career
With Greece's junior national teams, Karathanasis won the gold medal at the 2008 Albert Schweitzer Tournament, and the 2008 FIBA Europe Under-18 Championship, as well as the silver medal at the 2009 FIBA Under-19 World Cup.

References

External links
FIBA Profile
FIBA Europe Profile
EuroCup Profile
Eurobasket.com Profile
Greek League Profile

1991 births
Living people
Aries Trikala B.C. players
Aris B.C. players
Greek men's basketball players
Kavala B.C. players
Panellinios B.C. players
Power forwards (basketball)
Small forwards
Basketball players from Thessaloniki

Ioannis Karathanasis


Friedrich Maria "Fritz" Tarbuk von Sensenhorst (16 August 1896 – 1 March 1976), also known as Friedrich Maria von Tarbuk-Sensenhorst, was a lieutenant in the Imperial Austro-Hungarian Navy and captain in the Army, as well as an entrepreneur/businessman (founded F.M. Tarbuk & Co.), one of the most important businesses in the motor trade in Austria and CEE until the beginning of the 21st century.

Family
Tarbuk's family was of Austrian and Croatian descent, having been settled as military farmers on the Austrian border with the Ottoman Empire in the Balkans. His father, Johann Tarbuk von Sensenhorst was field marshal in the Austro-Hungarian Army; his mother was Mathilde Josefa Bayrhammer Edle von Sensenhorst.

"Fritz" had 4 brothers:
Karl Tarbuk von Sensenhorst (general in the Austrian Army, later field marshal in the German Wehrmacht)
Hans Tarbuk von Sensenhorst (Gen.-Colonel in the Austrian Army, later General in the German Wehrmacht)
Robert Tarbuk von Sensenhorst (Colonel in the German Wehrmacht)
Felix Tarbuk von Sensenhorst, (Colonel in the German Wehrmacht and Counter-Intelligence Officer)

The brothers had two sisters.

Marriage
"Fritz" Tarbuk von Sensenhorst was married to Maria Librowicz (a native of Warsaw), the daughter of   Aleksandr Librowicz and Bronisława von Lublinska.  Fritz and Maria had no children.

Business life
In 1920 Tarbuk founded the motor trading-house F. M. Tarbuk & Co. starting distribution in Austria for the German brands DKW, Horch, Audi and Wanderer of the German Auto Union AG as well as Mathis. In the 1930s he used his personal contacts with officers, diplomats and politicians to open a sales and workshop network in Austria and Slovakia.

In 1938 his partner Peter Pflaum joined the business. During World War II the Tarbuk-workshops in Vienna and Bratislava/Pressburg were working for the German Wehrmacht. During the time of petroleum shortage F. M. Tarbuk & Co. was the leading business in modifying motorcars to wood-gas burning (using the patented system of Georges Imbert).

After World War II, Tarbuk & Co. started sales and service networks for Aero, Praga, Škoda Auto, Tatra, Simca, Talbot, Rootes, Humber, Hillman, Sunbeam, Chrysler Corporation, Plymouth, Fargo, Dodge, Isuzu, Jensen Motors, Saab, Datsun/Nissan, MG Rover Group, Austin Motor Company, MG, Land Rover, Range Rover and Jaguar in Austria.

From 1950 a group of companies in Austria and her neighboring countries was built up with affiliated companies, workshops and sales outlets for 48 brands of the motor industry: Fiat, Lancia, Alfa Romeo, Ford, Volvo, Subaru, Mazda, Suzuki, Opel, Daewoo, Chevrolet, Messerschmitt-Fendt, Harley Davidson, Vespa, Ducati, Hiab, Atlas Weyhausen, Massey Ferguson, Deutz-Fahr, Fiat, Zetor, JCB, Case, Kubota, SAME, Mercedes-Benz Trac and Landini.

Death
Friedrich Maria "Fritz" Tarbuk von Sensenhorst died in 1976, aged 79.

Posthumous
After his death the business continued to flourish under the management by Peter Pflaum and Tarbuk's two   nephews. The group of companies was later structured into the shareholding company TARBUK/AG in 1992 under Dr Mario Seiller-Tarbuk. Until the late 1990s the  Tarbuk Group had 40 affiliated companies with over 1000 employees, and was one of the largest and most successful Austrian businesses.

Downturn
Later it was hit by structural changes, the downturn of the motor industry and management mistakes by the end of the 1990s.

In 2003, Erhard F. Grossnigg joined as partner and troubleshooter, but it was possible only to keep a handful of car-dealerships, workshops and parts of the agricultural machine business (Deutz-Fahr Austria, Austro Diesel) open.

References

1896 births
1976 deaths
People from Brixen
Austrian military personnel
20th-century Austrian businesspeople
Austrian people of Croatian descent

Fritz Tarbuk von Sensenhorst


John George Pappageorge (born July 19, 1931) is a former member of the Michigan State Senate.

Biography
John Pappageorge was born to a Greek family on the east side of Detroit, Michigan.

Pappageorge entered the United States Army after graduating from high school in Detroit, enrolling in the United States Military Academy at West Point. From West Point he received a B.S. in engineering in 1954. He later obtained a M.A. in Government and Politics from the University of Maryland in 1971 and attended the U.S. Army War College in 1973.

Pappageorge served 30 years of active duty in the Infantry, including two combat tours in Vietnam. During the second tour, he served as a battalion commander. There he was highly decorated, including receiving the Distinguished Service Medal, Superior Service Medal, four Legions of Merit, the Bronze Star, nine Air Medals, the Combat Infantryman Badge, and the Vietnam Gallantry Cross. He is also Airborne, Ranger, and Pathfinder qualified.

While in the Army, Pappageorge served as Special Assistant to General Alexander Haig, who was then the Commander in Chief, U.S. European Command (CinCUSEUR) and Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) (and later U.S. Secretary of State). Pappageorge conducted shuttle diplomacy between Greece and Turkey that returned Greek forces to NATO's integrated military structure.  He spent his last four years in the Army, 1981–1984, as a member of the Secretary of State's Policy Planning Council.

He retired as a colonel in 1984, settling in Troy, Michigan in Oakland County.  After retirement from the Army, Pappageorge became Director of Business and Strategic Planning at General Dynamics Land Systems Division. From 1989 to 1992, Pappageorge served as an Oakland county commissioner. He was the Republican candidate for Congress in Michigan's 12th congressional district in 1992, 1994, and 1996. In 1995, he served as First Vice-Chair of the Republican Party of Michigan.

Pappageorge was married for thirty-five years to his first wife, Helen. She died in 1993 of pancreatic cancer. He married Cristina Burnard (now Cristina Pappageorge) in 1997. Pappageorge has a son and two daughters.  His son George is an Army reserve Lieutenant Colonel who has served in Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Congressional campaigns

1992 election
In 1992, he ran for the United States House of Representatives against Sander Levin. This was the first serious Republican opposition against Levin, after his congressional district absorbed a Republican-leaning spur of Oakland County in redistricting. Levin won by 7%.

1994 election
Pappageorge ran against Levin for the second time in 1994, this time managing to pull within 5%, despite being outspent more than 3-to-1. Pappageorge benefitted from Newt Gingrich's Contract with America and the 1994 Republican Revolution.

1996 election
In his third consecutive run against Levin, he was not able to shore up as much support, losing 57.4%-40.5%.

Michigan House of Representatives
Pappageorge served in the Michigan State House of Representatives from 1999 to 2004, when he retired due to term limits.  He spent four years on the House Appropriations Committee, and served his final two years as Chair of the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules and as a member of the Employment Relations, Training and Safety Committee, the Judiciary Committee, the Senior Health, Security, and Retirement Committee, and the Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security Committee.

1998 election
In 1998, he ran for the Michigan State House 41st District seat, which then encompassed southern Troy, Clawson and northern Royal Oak in Oakland County. He defeated Troy City Councilmember Matt Pryor in the Republican Primary. He went on to defeat Democrat David Richards in the November general election. .

2000 election
In 2000, he was re-elected facing nominal opposition with no primary challengers.

2002 election
He was again re-elected again to his final term under term-limits in 2002 in the newly created 41st District (through decennial redistricting), a district which composed roughly the same area.  He faced nominal opposition and no primary challengers.

2004 election remarks
In 2004, Pappageorge was quoted in the Detroit Free Press as saying "If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we're going to have a tough time in this election cycle." The New York Times cited this comment in an editorial on the "suppression of minority votes."  Detroit's population is more than 80 percent African American, and tends to vote heavily Democratic.

2006 State Senate campaign
Pappagoerge was persuaded by the Michigan Republican Party to run for the 13th District State Senate seat after Congressman Sander Levin's son, Andy Levin announced he was going to enter the race.
After Pappageorge joined the race, Gosselin dropped out in order to run for County Commissioner in Troy. Pappageorge won the August Republican primary 58.5% to Taub's 41.5%.

Charges of mudslinging and dirty politics continued in the general election between Pappageorge and Levin. The race became hotly contested, with over $2 million spent by the two campaigns, and with negative television ads from each side (a rarity in State Senate races in metro-Detroit).

The Michigan Republican Party, on behalf of Pappageorge's campaign, distributed flyers alleging that Levin had stances on issues, including same-sex marriage, illegal immigration and gun control, that were too liberal for the district. They also accused Levin of being a carpetbagger, as Levin had recently moved back to Michigan after working for the AFL-CIO in Washington, D.C. Levin's campaign fired back, claiming that Pappageorge cut more than $500 million from schools in Michigan and was fired from the Bush Presidential campaign in 2004.

Pappageorge defeated Levin in November by a slim margin, 776 votes. Pappageorge's margin of victory was less than the number of votes obtained by Green Party candidate Kyle McBee, who received 3,118 votes.

2010 State Senate campaign
In the 2010 election, Pappageorge was the only incumbent in Oakland County to seek re-election.  He defeated two challengers in the August 3 primary.

In the general election, Pappageorge was challenged by newcomer Aaron Bailey, a West Point graduate and Afghanistan veteran.  Days before the election, Bailey received the endorsement of the Detroit Free Press.

On election day, Pappageorge defeated Bailey.

Notes

External links
Michigan Votes information on Pappageorge

1931 births
Living people
Military personnel from Michigan
United States Army personnel of the Vietnam War
American people of Greek descent
County commissioners in Michigan
Republican Party members of the Michigan House of Representatives
Republican Party Michigan state senators
Politicians from Detroit
People from Troy, Michigan
University of Maryland, College Park alumni
United States Military Academy alumni
Recipients of the Air Medal
Recipients of the Legion of Merit
20th-century American politicians
21st-century American politicians

John Pappageorge


Fewston is a village and civil parish in the Harrogate
district of North Yorkshire, England. It is situated north of Otley and close to Swinsty and Fewston reservoirs.

The Church of St Michael and St Lawrence is the village church. The majority of the building was constructed in 1697, although the tower dates from the 14th century. The Washburn Heritage Centre, adjacent to the church, opened in February 2011.

History
Fewston was an ancient parish in the Forest of Knaresborough in the West Riding of Yorkshire.  It covered a wide area, and included the townships of Blubberhouses, Clifton with Norwood, Great Timble, and Thruscross.  All these places became separate civil parishes in 1866.  Fewston was transferred to the new county of North Yorkshire in 1974.

The poet Edward Fairfax lived at nearby New Hall, now submerged under the waters of Fewston Reservoir, as did Ferdinando Fairfax, 2nd Lord Fairfax of Cameron. Edward's daughters Elizabeth and Anne were baptised in the village church in 1606 and 1621 respectively, while Ferdinando's daughter Mary and son Charles were baptised there in 1606 and 1615.

References

External links

Fewston with Blubberhouses church website

Villages in North Yorkshire
Civil parishes in North Yorkshire

Fewston


The First Presbyterian Church is a historic church building in Columbia, South Carolina.  Constructed in 1854, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on January 25, 1971.

History
Although the first meetings of what would become the First Presbyterian Church were held in 1795, the congregation did not have a building of its own until 1813, having met in the South Carolina State House and on the campus of the South Carolina College until then. In 1813, the South Carolina Legislature incorporated the church as the "First Presbyterian Church of the Town of Columbia"

The current site of the church was a shared cemetery with the local Episcopal congregation from 1794 to 1813.  The legislature gave the cemetery and other lands to be shared between the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians.  A local legend says that First Presbyterian and the now-nearby Trinity Episcopal Cathedral drew lots to determine which congregation would get what lot, with First Presbyterian receiving the cemetery, located at the corner of Lady and Marion Streets.

The 1813 building still exists, and is now known as Jackson Hall.  A new, larger English Gothic structure was built in 1853.  Though spared the torch during Sherman's march to the sea, the building's original 180-foot spire was destroyed in an 1875 hurricane, and rebuilt in 1888.  The spire was again damaged in a 1910 fire, and rebuilt to be eight feet taller.  A remodelling in 1925 increased the capacity of the building to 1,250 from 800, increasing the length of the building by 40 feet. At the same time, classrooms were built at the sides, a choir loft added in the rear, and the organ loft rebuilt.

Formerly a member of the Presbyterian Church in the United States, it seceded in 1983 and joined the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church. The current pastor is Derek Thomas.  Among the notable people buried in the church's cemetery are the parents of Woodrow Wilson; Henry William de Saussure, second director of the United States Mint; Jonathan Maxcy, the first president of South Carolina College; and Martha Thomas Fitzgerald, first woman elected in a general election to the South Carolina House of Representatives.

References

External links
Church website

Historic American Buildings Survey in South Carolina
Churches completed in 1854
19th-century Presbyterian church buildings in the United States
Presbyterian churches in South Carolina
Protestant Reformed cemeteries
Churches on the National Register of Historic Places in South Carolina
National Register of Historic Places in Columbia, South Carolina
1813 establishments in the United States
Churches in Columbia, South Carolina
Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church

First Presbyterian Church (Columbia, South Carolina)


Lawton R. Nuss (born December 30, 1952) is a former Kansas Supreme Court justice appointed by Governor Bill Graves in August 2002. By virtue of tenure, he became chief justice upon Robert E. Davis's resignation. Nuss announced his decision to retire, effective December 17, 2019.

Personal life
Lawton R. Nuss was born in Salina, Kansas in 1952. After graduating from Salina High School in 1970, he attended the University of Kansas on a Naval Reserve Officers' Training Corps scholarship. He graduated in January 1975 with Bachelor of Arts in English and history and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps. He then served as a combat engineering officer with the Fleet Marine Force Pacific. After his discharge in 1979, he entered law school at the University of Kansas, earning a Juris Doctor in May 1982.

Professional life
Nuss began his law practice with the Salina law firm of Clark, Mize and Linville, Chartered in August 1982. For the next 20 years, he was involved in a wide range of legal issues and proceedings. He represented corporations and individuals as plaintiffs as well as defendants in civil cases. He also represented the government as well as defendants in criminal cases.  Based upon surveys of judges and fellow lawyers, during this time he was awarded an AV" rating from Martindale-Hubbell, that organization's highest rating for legal ability and professional ethics.

Nuss' professional activities while a lawyer included serving as chairman of the board of editors for the Journal of the Kansas Bar Association; as president of the Kansas Association of Defense Counsel, where he also received the Distinguished Service Award and the Defense Research Institute Exceptional Performance Citation; as president of the Saline-Ottawa County Bar Association; and as a mediator for the United States District Court for the District of Kansas. Nuss also served as chairman of the Salvation Army advisory board, and as a member of the board of trustees of St. John's Military School, the board of directors of the Salina Child Care Association, the board of directors of the Friends of the Salina Public Library, the board of advisors of the Coronado Area Council of Boy Scouts. and the Site Council for Roosevelt-Lincoln Middle School. He was appointed to the supreme court by Governor Bill Graves in August 2002, becoming the first court member in more than 20 years to move directly from the practice of law to the bench.

Nuss served as chairman of the Kansas Judicial Council, an organization created in 1927 by the Kansas Legislature. The Judicial Council, whose members include the chairpersons of the judiciary committees of the Kansas Senate and Kansas House of Representatives, is authorized by the legislature to study any area of law and to recommend improvements in the administration of justice.  It may accept assignments from the legislature or the Supreme Court in fulfilling those responsibilities.

Nuss further served as the Departmental Justice for Kansas' First Judicial Department, an area stretching approximately from Salina north to the Nebraska border and west to the Colorado border. Additionally, he is the supreme court liaison to the Kansas Client Protection Fund Commission. The Commission's goal is to promote public confidence in the administration of justice and the integrity of the legal profession by reimbursing losses to clients caused by the dishonest conduct of lawyers. Justice Nuss is also the Court liaison to the Kansas Board of Law Examiners, which tests lawyers for their abilities to practice law in the state, and to the Kansas Board of Court Reporters which licenses court reporters.

Nuss also served as co-chair of the State and Federal Courts Committee of the Kansas Bar Association. He is a member of the board of editors for the Journal of the Kansas Bar Association, the advisory board for the Topeka-Shawnee County Youth Court, the United States Supreme Court Historical Society, the Dwight D. Opperman Institute of Judicial Administration at New York University School of Law, the American Judges Association, and the Kansas Bar Association.

Nuss is a graduate of the Appellate Judges School at New York University School of law and the United States Naval Justice School of Newport, Rhode Island. He is also the author of several published legal and historical articles and is a frequent presenter for legal and lay audiences.

Nuss has five grown children. He and his wife, Barbara reside in Topeka.

Awards
 Distinguished Service Award from the Kansas Association of Defense Counsel
 Defense Research Institute Exceptional Performance Citation
 "AV" rating from Martindale-Hubbell, that organization's highest rating for legal ability and professional ethics.

References

External links
 Official Biography

|-

1952 births
21st-century American judges
Chief Justices of the Kansas Supreme Court
Kansas lawyers
Justices of the Kansas Supreme Court
Living people
People from Salina, Kansas
Politicians from Topeka, Kansas
United States Marine Corps officers
University of Kansas alumni

Lawton Nuss


Archibald Harley (October 10, 1824 – May 19, 1904) was a farmer and political figure in Ontario, Canada. He represented Oxford South in the House of Commons of Canada from 1882 to 1887 as a Liberal member.

He was born in Newcastle, New Brunswick, the son of William Harley, a land surveyor, and was educated in Hamilton, Ontario. In 1847, he married Elizabeth Stewart. For a time, he was involved in the lumber business in Ancaster with his brother-in-law James F. Wilson. Harley served as a member of the council for Burford Township, also serving as deputy reeve and reeve for the township and warden for Brant County.

References

The Canadian parliamentary companion, 1883 JA Gemmill

1824 births
1904 deaths
Members of the House of Commons of Canada from Ontario
Liberal Party of Canada MPs

Archibald Harley


Mick Dorney (1884 - 17 March 1952) was an Irish hurler who played as a forward for the Cork senior team.

Dorney joined the team during the 1905 championship and became a regular player over the next decade. During that time he failed to secure an All-Ireland winner's medal, however, he did win a Munster winner's medal.

At club level, Dorney enjoyed a successful career with Blackrock, winning six county club championship winners' medals.

References

1884 births
1952 deaths
Blackrock National Hurling Club hurlers
Cork inter-county hurlers

Mick Dorney


Moorehead Circle was a triple woodhenge constructed about two millennia ago at the Fort Ancient Earthworks in the U.S. state of Ohio.

The outer circle, discovered in 2005 by Jarrod Burks, is about  in diameter. Robert Riordan, Professor of Archaeology at Wright State University and lead archaeologist investigating the site, estimates that about two hundred wooden posts were set in the outer circle. Following the 2009 Field Season though, this estimate will likely be reevaluated given a huge number of tightly spaced post-molds found on the geographic south of the feature.

Thirty post-molds in all, were found in an eight meter long area excavated on the border of the circle. "A radiocarbon date on charcoal from a remnant trace of a post suggests it was built between 40 BC and AD 130. Burned timber fragments from the pit were dated AD 250 to AD 420."  Both dates fall into the time period of the Hopewell culture, preceding the Fort Ancient culture occupation that predominates the site. The use or uses of the circles has not been determined, although it was likely ceremonial.

Dr. Riordan named the circle in honor of Warren K. Moorehead, first curator of archaeology for the Ohio Historical Society and a leading North American archaeologist around the turn of the twentieth century, who was largely responsible for preservation of the Fort Ancient site.

Other woodhenges have been found in the central part of the United States, including the Cahokia Woodhenge and Mound 72 Woodhenges (both located at the Cahokia site in western Illinois) and the Stubbs Earthworks, which is also a Hopewell culture site located in Warren County, Ohio.

See also
 Cahokia Woodhenge
 List of Hopewell sites

References

 Riordan, Robert. "Report on the Excavations of the Moorehead Circle at Fort Ancient, 2007." Wright State University Laboratory of Anthropology: Fairborn, Ohio 2008.
 Cowan, Frank L.  "An Ohio Hopewell 'Woodhenge,'" in Ohio Archaeology: An Illustrated Chronicle of Ohio's Ancient American Indian Cultures. Orange Frazer Press: Wilmington, Ohio.

External links

 Fort Ancient Archaeological Park
 Fort Ancient, Ancient Ohio Trail
 Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks UNESCO World Heritage Nomination

Ohio Hopewell
Fort Ancient culture
Buildings and structures in Warren County, Ohio

Moorehead Circle


Feeling Yes, Feeling No () is a film series produced and distributed by the National Film Board of Canada to teach children between the ages of six and twelve to avoid being sexually assaulted by people they trust, family members, and strangers. The films consist of recordings of a play that began development in 1980 in Vancouver, British Columbia, by Green Thumb Theatre. Dennis Foon, Wendy Van Reisen, and Fran Gebhard finished writing the play in 1982. Initially performed in workshops with children, the play was very successful. The filmed version of the play consists of four films directed by Moira Simpson and released in 1984 along with accompanying printed matter intended to be used together as a sexual assault prevention program. The program is six hours long and explains the difference between good and bad physical intimacy. The series uses the terms 'yes' feelings and 'no' feelings and focuses on role-playing. The program was first implemented in primary schools in British Columbia and later spread to other Canadian provinces. In a 1991 study, 286 children in grades three and four went through the program and another 113 children were used as a control group. The study found that the children who went through the program had greater knowledge about sexual assault than the control children, and that the children who went through the program were slightly better than the control children at distinguishing between safe and unsafe situations.

References

Bibliography

External links

1984 direct-to-video films
National Film Board of Canada series
1982 plays
Social guidance films
Canadian short documentary films
1984 short films
Anti-pedophile activism
Films about pedophilia
Films about child sexual abuse
Sex education
Sexuality in Canada
Short film series
Direct-to-video film series
Canadian plays
Sexuality in plays
Films based on Canadian plays
French-language Canadian films
1980s English-language films
1980s Canadian films

Feeling Yes, Feeling No


Hawkley Hall was a mansion house in Pemberton, about 1.5 miles from Wigan and to the east of Goose Green.
The hall was demolished in 1970 and a housing estate occupies the site today known as the "Hawkley Hall Estate".

Education
Hawkley Hall estate has one school, Hawkley Hall High School. It is a fairly large school that was graded "Outstanding" overall in 2009.

References

Houses in Greater Manchester
Buildings and structures in the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan
Buildings and structures demolished in 1970

Hawkley Hall


The Trent and Mersey Canal is a 931⁄2-mile (150 km) canal in Derbyshire, Staffordshire and Cheshire.  It was made to link the River Trent in Derbyshire to the River Mersey, connecting the ports of Hull and Liverpool.

The plan was made by the  canal engineer James Brindley. It was agreed by an Act of Parliament in 1766 and the first sod was cut by Josiah Wedgwood in July that year at Burslem. In 1777, the canal was completed, including more than 70 locks and five tunnels.  Wedgwood used the canal to bring clay into his potteries and to send the finished products to Liverpool. He built his factory village called Etruria on the outskirts of Stoke-on-Trent, close to the canal.

Between Middlewich and the northern end of the canal in Preston Brook Tunnel, is the Victorian Anderton Boat Lift, which lowers boats fifty feet from the canal to the River Weaver.  Just North of Stoke  is the Harecastle Tunnel. Brindley built the first tunnel which was 2,880 yards (2,630 m) long, and boats were moved through by men lying on their backs and pushing against the roof with their feet.   Thomas Telford built a second, wider, parallel tunnel with a towpath in 1827.  The first tunnel was later closed because the land sank.

References

1777 establishments
Canals in England

Trent & Mersey Canal


Diary of the Dead (promoted as George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead) is a 2007 found footage horror film written and directed by George A. Romero. Although independently produced, it was distributed theatrically by The Weinstein Company and was released in cinemas on February 15, 2008 and on DVD by Dimension Extreme and Genius Products on May 20, 2008.

Diary of the Dead is the fifth installment in Romero's Night of the Living Dead series of zombie films, taking place at the start of the outbreak.

Plot
Film footage from a news crew shows a story about an immigrant man killing his wife and son before committing suicide. The son and wife turn into zombies and kill several medical personnel and police officers, but leave one medic and a reporter bitten before being killed. The narrator, Debra, explains that most of the footage, which was recorded by the cameraman, was never broadcast.

A group of young film studies students from the University of Pittsburgh are in the woods making a horror film along with their faculty advisor, Andrew Maxwell, when they hear news of apparent mass-rioting and mass murder. Two of the students, Ridley and Francine, decide to leave the group, while the project director Jason goes to pick up his girlfriend Debra (the narrator) from her university dorm. When she cannot contact her family, they travel to Debra's parents' house in Scranton, Pennsylvania. En route, the group consisting of Jason, Debra, Professor Maxwell, Eliot, cameraman Tony, Mary and couple Gordo and Tracy run over a reanimated Pennsylvania State Trooper and three other zombies. The group stops and Mary attempts to kill herself. Her friends take her to a hospital, where they find the dead becoming zombies, and thereafter fight to survive while traveling to Debra's parents.

Mary becomes a zombie and is slain by Maxwell, and the group dispatch several reanimated patients and staff, including Debra killing one with a defibrillator. Whilst escaping Gordo is bitten by a zombie and soon afterward dies from it. His girlfriend Tracy begs the others not to shoot him immediately but later is forced to shoot him herself when he reanimates. Soon they are stranded when their RV's fuel line breaks. They are attacked by zombies but are rescued by a deaf Amish man named Samuel, who blows them up with dynamite. Tracy then repairs the broken fuel line with the aid of Samuel, but before escaping, he is bitten and kills himself and his attacker with a scythe.

Passing a city, they are stopped by an armed group of survivors, the leader being a member of the National Guard. They are taken to their compound where Jason uploads his footage and Tony kills a zombified guard with acid. Whilst there, Debra receives a message from her younger brother, who informs her that he and their parents were camping in West Virginia at the time of the initial attacks and are now on their way home. The students then leave for Debra's house. Their only reliable source of information is now the Internet, aided by bloggers.

When they arrive at Debra's house, they find her reanimated mother and brother feeding on her father and Maxwell kills them with a bow and arrow. They escape from the house and are stopped by different National Guardsmen, who rob them, leaving them only their weapons and their two cameras. They arrive at Ridley's mansion, where Ridley explains that his parents, the staff, and Francine were killed and he buried them out back. Ridley shows Debra and Tony that he "buried" his parents, the staff and Francine by dumping their bodies into his family's swimming pool.

Ridley then abandons Debra and Tony and is revealed to have been bitten by a zombie himself, explaining his odd behavior. Ridley soon dies and reanimates, then kills and infects Eliot and attacks Tracy and Jason. Jason is able to distract Ridley long enough for Tracy to escape at the last minute. Mad at Jason for not leaving the camera to help her, Tracy leaves the group in the group's RV. The remaining survivors hide in an enclosed shelter within the house, with the exception of Jason, who left the group to continue filming and is subsequently attacked and infected by Ridley. Maxwell kills Ridley with an antique sword and Debra euthanizes Jason, while continuing to film. Later, a large number of zombies begin to attack the mansion, including a reanimated Eliot. This forces Debra, Tony and Professor Maxwell to take shelter in the mansion's panic room.

Debra watches Jason's recording of a hunting party shooting people who were left to die and be reanimated as shooting targets, and wonders if the human race is worth saving.

Cast

 Michelle Morgan as Debra Moynihan
 Joshua Close as Jason Creed
 Shawn Roberts as Tony Ravello
 Amy Lalonde as Tracy Thurman
 Joe Dinicol as Eliot Stone
 Scott Wentworth as Andrew Maxwell
 Philip Riccio as Ridley Wilmott
 George Buza as Biker
 Tatiana Maslany as Mary Dexter
 R. D. Reid as Samuel
 Tino Monte as Newscaster
 Megan Park as Francine Shane
 Martin Roach as Stranger
 Alan van Sprang as Sergeant "Nicotine" Crockett
 Matt Birman as Zombie Trooper
 Laura de Carteret as Bree
 Janet Lo as Asian Woman
 Rebuka Hoye as Zombie
 Todd William Schroeder as Brody
 Alexandria DeFabiis as Zombie
 Nick Alachiotis as Fred
 George A. Romero as Chief of Police
 Boyd Banks as Armorist
 Gregory Nicotero as Zombie Surgeon
 Chris Violette as Gordo Thorsen

Quentin Tarantino, Wes Craven, Guillermo del Toro, Simon Pegg, and Stephen King lend their voices as newsreaders in the film.

Production

Development
Even before releasing Land of the Dead, Romero wanted to do a film about "emerging media". After releasing Land, which he felt was "big" in scope, he wanted to go back to make a relatively low-budget film to relate back to the "origins of the thing" and felt that his "Emerging Media" idea could easily fulfill it.

Casting
Even though the film is shot in a cinema verite style, Romero still chose to use a cinematographer, as opposed to letting the cast film the movie themselves. Romero would state: "I had this idea that I could use film students out shooting a school project and zombies begin to walk and they document it. I wanted to do this subjective camera thing before I knew anybody else was working on it. I didn't know about Cloverfield or anything else. I thought we were going to be the first guys out there with one of these". In his decision he cited what he saw as the failings of The Blair Witch Project, which he found "dizzying", also noting that "it didn't quite make sense."

Filming
Romero stated that the movie overall was more difficult to shoot than a traditional one as "It really needed to be choreographed down to the shoelaces". He made an extensive use of computer-generated imagery because it allowed him to shoot the film quickly and add the effects later. Also, the film's style, as if shot with hand-held cameras, necessitated a shift from his usual method of working, which involves filming multiple camera angles and assembling scenes in the editing room. Instead, Romero filmed much of the action in long, continuous takes: "The camera was 360, so everybody was an acrobat, ducking under the lens when the camera came past you," said Romero. "The cast was great. They had a lot of theater experience. I think they could have gone from scene one all the way to the end of the movie, all in a single shot." The whole film was shot in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

The film is the fifth film in Romero's Dead series and there are some notable references to earlier Romero films, as when the news track from 1968's Night of the Living Dead is used in the scene where the cast is in Ben's garage. The film is a reboot rather than a continuation of Land of the Dead. The film takes place on a separate timeline than the previous Living Dead films. It was partially based on a practical concern as Romero thought that if the film took place too far into the zombie apocalypse, schools would have been closed and thus it would not make sense to have student filmmakers as a focal point. He was also inspired partially by the Book of the Dead anthology series which depicts other events that happened during the same time frame. Even though the fourth film, Land of the Dead, was studio-produced through Universal Studios, Diary of the Dead was produced by Romero-Grunwald Productions, formed by Romero and his producer friend Peter Grunwald, with Artfire Films.

Home media releases
The DVD was released by The Weinstein Company and Genius Entertainment on May 20, 2008. Special features include a feature-length documentary, an audio commentary, deleted scenes, a behind the scenes featurette, and five short films that came about via a MySpace contest. It was released the same day as a new authorized edition of Night of the Living Dead on DVD was released by The Weinstein Company.

The film was released on Region 2 on June 29, 2008, in single disc, double disc and Blu-ray editions. The double-disc and Blu-ray both contained a UK exclusive interview from Frightfest 08, and a feature-length documentary entitled One for the Fire - The Legacy of Night of the Living Dead. The double-disc edition was released in limited, numbered steelbook packaging, and online retailer Play.com sold an exclusive edition in a slipcase. On October 21, 2008, a Blu-ray version was released in the US.

Reception
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a rating of 61% based on reviews from 131 critics. The website's consensus reads, "As Diary of the Dead proves, time hasn't subdued George A. Romero's affection for mixing politics with gore, nor has it given him cinematic grace or subtlety." On Metacritic, the film has a score of 66 out of 100 based on reviews from 29 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

Beth Accomando of KPBS called the film "bloody fun, bloody smart and just plain bloody good" and felt that it was more credible than the similar found-footage film Cloverfield. Manohla Dargis of The New York Times called it the "loosest, goosiest chapter" in Romero's zombie oeuvre and while the film has "some striking filmmaking" ultimately Dargis found that the film "just isn't scary." Kim Newman of Empire gave the film 4 out of 5 stars. Newman compared the film to The Zombie Diaries and •REC saying Romero matched them in horror and "trumps them in crazy inventiveness and humour."

Jim Emerson of RogerEbert.com gave the film 3 stars. Nathan Rabin of The A.V. Club gave the film a C+ and said Romero's "heavy-handed intellectual concerns get in the way of a perfectly good fright flick." Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian gave the film 2 out of 5 stars and said "what more is there to say about the zombie genre and its metaphors for our undead society?"

George Romero won a 2008 Critics Award for Diary of the Dead at the Festival international du film fantastique de Gérardmer.

References

External links

 Review of Diary of the Dead at Internal Bleeding
 Dairy of The Dead  [sic] at Top Found Footage Films
 Interview: George Romero on Diary of the Dead

2007 films
2007 horror films
2007 independent films
American independent films
Camcorder films
Films directed by George A. Romero
Films set in abandoned houses
Films set in country houses
Films set in Pennsylvania
Films shot in Toronto
Found footage films
American mockumentary films
Reboot films
Night of the Living Dead (film series)
The Weinstein Company films
Films about deserters
2000s English-language films
2000s American films

Diary of the Dead


Highgate Wood is a 28 hectare (70 acre) area  of ancient woodland in North London, lying between East Finchley, Highgate and Muswell Hill. It was originally part of the ancient Forest of Middlesex which covered much of London, Hertfordshire and Essex and was mentioned in the Domesday Book. It lies in the London Borough of Haringey, but is owned and managed by the City of London Corporation.

The London Borough of Haringey contains four ancient woods: Highgate Wood, Queen's Wood, Coldfall Wood and Bluebell Wood. Highgate Wood is shown on the Ordnance Survey map of Middlesex in 1886 more or less in its present formation, but known by the name "Gravelpit Wood".

Flora and fauna
The flora and fauna in the wood have been managed to varying degrees by humans through the ages.

Predominantly an oak, hornbeam and holly wood, Highgate Wood is also home to more than 50 other tree and shrub species which have self-seeded there. The wild service tree, a rare deciduous tree with brown berries, can be found in Highgate Wood. Presence of the wild service tree is commonly taken as an indicator of ancient woodland.

71 different species of bird have been recorded, alongside foxes, grey squirrels, bat species including pipistrelle, Natterer's bat, common noctule and the rare Leisler's bat, 180 species of moth, 12 species of butterfly and 80 species of spider.

History

Human artefacts

Prehistoric flints have been found in the wood. Excavations on the ridge at the northern end of the wood established that Romano-Britons were producing pottery from local materials between AD 50–100.

An ancient earthwork runs across the wood. This may have formed part of an enclosure for deer during the Medieval period, when the Bishop of London owned the wood; however, it could also be a prehistoric boundary or defensive work.
During the Medieval period, the wood formed part of the Bishop of London's hunting estate. Between the 16th and 18th centuries, the wood, known then as "Brewer's Fell", was leased to various tenants who managed it by 'coppicing with standards'. This involved regularly cutting down areas of Hornbeams to a stump ('coppicing') to encourage new growth which could be used for fuel or fencing, whilst allowing oak and other tree species to grow to maturity ('standards'). Remnants of wood banks dividing these areas can still be seen. Many of these oaks were then used by the Crown to construct ships and by the Church to construct buildings.

In the 1880s, the last tenant gave up his lease. In 1886, the City of London Corporation acquired what was by then known as Gravelpit Wood (so named in 1863 on account of a gravel pit used to source gravel for roads in the district) from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners at no charge on condition that it was "maintained in perpetuity for the benefit of Londoners". It was renamed Highgate Wood; it has been owned and managed by the Corporation ever since.

Care and management
The City of London Corporation's maintenance of the wood was not always sympathetic to its historical origins. On acquisition, asphalt paths were laid, ornamental trees were planted and dead wood was assiduously removed and burned. Highgate Wood was managed more as an urban park than ancient woodland. In 1968 the Conservation Committee of the London Natural History Society expressed its concern at the planting of exotic conifers as being inappropriate for ancient woodland. As a consequence of this protest the planting programme was halted and has not been continued.

More recently management practices have been much more sympathetic to the Wood's indigenous flora and fauna. Certain areas have been fenced to allow the regeneration of the vegetation free of trampling, and dead wood is allowed to decay ''in situ'' — to the great benefit of saprotrophic fungi and a wide range of invertebrates.

Nature reserve
Highgate Wood is a Site of Metropolitan Importance for Nature Conservation. It is also listed as one of only eight Green Heritage Sites in London.

Facilities and access
Highgate Wood can be reached easily from Highgate station on the Northern line of the London Underground. It is adjacent to the A1 road and is situated approximately 6 miles (10 km) north of Charing Cross, well inside London's metropolitan area.

As well as a football pitch and a cricket field, Highgate Wood has a children's playground, a café and an information centre.

References

Sources
City of London website on Highgate Wood
The Natural History of Haringey's Ancient Woodlands, by David Bevan
Wild Service Tree
"Distribution and Status of Bats in the London Area", Mickleburgh (1987)
Middlesex: 012 Ordnance Survey 1:10,560: Epoch 1

External links
Highgate Wood pages on the City of London website
Highgate Wood on the VisitWoods website

Parks and open spaces in the London Borough of Haringey
Parks and open spaces of the City of London Corporation
Ancient woods of London
Nature reserves in the London Borough of Haringey

Highgate Wood


Interview with the Vampire is a 1994 American gothic vampire film directed by Neil Jordan, based on Anne Rice's 1976 novel of the same name, and starring Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt. It focuses on Lestat (Cruise) and Louis (Pitt), beginning with Louis's transformation into a vampire by Lestat in 1791. The film chronicles their time together, and their turning of ten-year-old Claudia (Kirsten Dunst) into a vampire. The narrative is framed by a present-day interview, in which Louis tells his story to a San Francisco reporter (Christian Slater). The supporting cast features Antonio Banderas and Stephen Rea.

The film was released in November 1994 to generally positive reviews and was a commercial success. It received two Oscar nominations for Best Art Direction and Best Original Score. Kirsten Dunst was additionally nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress for her role in the film. A stand-alone sequel, Queen of the Damned, was released in 2002, with Stuart Townsend replacing Cruise as Lestat.

Plot
In modern-day San Francisco, reporter Daniel Molloy interviews Louis de Pointe du Lac, who claims to be a vampire. Louis describes his human life as a wealthy plantation owner in 1791 Spanish Louisiana. Despondent following the death of his wife and unborn child, he drunkenly wanders the waterfront of New Orleans one night and is attacked by the vampire Lestat de Lioncourt. Lestat senses Louis's dissatisfaction with life and offers to turn him into a vampire. Louis accepts, but quickly comes to regret it. While Lestat revels in the hunt and killing of humans, Louis resists his instinct to kill, instead drinking animal blood to sustain himself.

Eventually, amid an outbreak of plague in New Orleans, Louis feeds on a little girl whose mother died in the plague. To entice Louis to stay with him, Lestat turns the dying girl, Claudia, into a vampire. Together, they raise her as a daughter. Louis has a love for Claudia, while Lestat spoils and treats her more as a pupil, training her to become a merciless killer. Thirty years pass, and Claudia matures psychologically but remains a little girl in appearance and continues to be treated as such by Lestat. When she realizes that she will never grow older or become a mature woman, she is furious with Lestat and tells Louis that they should leave him. She tricks Lestat into drinking the "dead blood" of twin boys whom she killed by overdose with laudanum, which weakens Lestat, and then she slits his throat. Though Louis is shocked and upset, he helps Claudia dump Lestat's body in a  swamp. They spend weeks planning a voyage to Europe to search for other vampires, but Lestat returns on the night of their departure, having survived on the blood of swamp creatures. Lestat attacks them, but Louis sets him on fire, allowing them to escape to their ship and depart.

After traveling around Europe and the Mediterranean but finding no other vampires, Louis and Claudia settle in Paris in September 1870. Louis encounters vampires Santiago and Armand by chance. Armand invites Louis and Claudia to his coven, the Théâtre des Vampires, where vampires stage theatrical horror shows for humans. On their way out of the theater, Santiago reads Louis's mind and suspects that Louis and Claudia murdered Lestat. Armand warns Louis to send Claudia away for her own safety, and Louis stays with Armand to learn about the meaning of being a vampire. Claudia demands that Louis turn a human woman, Madeleine, into a vampire to be her new protector and companion, and he reluctantly complies. Shortly thereafter, the Parisian vampires abduct the three of them and punish them for Lestat's murder, imprisoning Louis in a coffin and trapping Claudia and Madeleine in a chamber, where sunlight burns them to ash. Armand does nothing to prevent this, but the next day he frees Louis. Seeking revenge, Louis returns to the theater at dawn and sets it on fire, killing all the vampires including Santiago. Armand arrives in time to help Louis escape the sunrise, and again offers him a place by his side. Louis rejects Armand and leaves, unable to accept Armand's way of life which involve forgetting the past and knowing Armand had allowed Claudia's murder.

As decades pass, Louis never recovers from the loss of Claudia and dejectedly explores the world alone. He returns to New Orleans in 1988 and one night encounters a decayed, weakened Lestat, living as a recluse in an abandoned mansion and surviving on rat blood as Louis once had. Lestat expresses regret for having turned Claudia into a vampire and asks Louis to rejoin him, but Louis declines and leaves. Louis concludes his interview with Molloy, prompting Molloy to beseech Louis to make him his new vampire companion. Louis is outraged that Molloy has not understood the tale of suffering he has related and attacks Molloy to scare him into abandoning the idea. Molloy runs to his car and takes off while playing the cassette tapes of Louis's interview. On the Golden Gate Bridge, Lestat appears and attacks Molloy, taking control of the car. Revived by Molloy's blood, Lestat offers him the choice that he "never had"—whether or not to become a vampire—and laughing, continues driving.

Cast

 Tom Cruise as Lestat de Lioncourt
 Brad Pitt as Louis de Pointe du Lac
 Antonio Banderas as Armand
 Stephen Rea as Santiago
 Christian Slater as Daniel Molloy
 Kirsten Dunst as Claudia
 Domiziana Giordano as Madeleine
 Thandiwe Newton (credited as Thandie Newton) as Yvette
 Indra Ové as New Orleans Whore
 Laure Marsac as Mortal Woman on Stage
 George Kelly as Dollmaker
 Marcel Iureş as Paris Vampire
 Sara Stockbridge as Estelle

Production

Development
The rights to Rice's novel were initially purchased by Paramount Pictures in April 1976, shortly before the book was published. However, the script lingered in development hell for years, with the rights being sold to Lorimar before finally ending up with Warner Bros. Director Neil Jordan was approached by Warner Bros. to direct after the huge success of his movie The Crying Game (1992). Jordan was intrigued by the script, calling it "really interesting and slightly theatrical", but was especially interested after reading Rice's novel. He agreed to direct on the condition that he be allowed to write his own script, though he did not gain a writing credit. The themes of Catholic guilt which pervade the novel attracted Jordan, who called the story "the most wonderful parable about wallowing in guilt that I'd ever come across. But these things are unconscious, I don't have an agenda."

With David Geffen producing, the movie was given a $70 million budget, unprecedented for a film in the vampire genre. Jordan stated that:

Casting
Author Anne Rice adapted her 1976 novel Interview with the Vampire into a screenplay with French actor Alain Delon in mind for the role of Louis. Later on, when Interview entered the casting stage, British actor Julian Sands was championed by Anne Rice and fans of the novel to play Lestat, but because Sands was not a well-known name at the time (being only famed for his performance in A Room with a View), he was rejected and the role was given to Tom Cruise. Because of his star power, Cruise received a record $10 million salary and a percentage of the profits. The casting was initially criticized by Anne Rice, who said that Cruise was "no more my vampire Lestat than Edward G. Robinson is Rhett Butler", and the casting was "so bizarre; it's almost impossible to imagine how it's going to work". She recommended a number of other actors including John Malkovich, Peter Weller, Jeremy Irons, and Alexander Godunov. She suggested that Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise switch roles, stating that "I tried for a long time to tell them that they should just reverse these roles—have Brad Pitt play Lestat and have Tom Cruise play Louis. Of course, they don't listen to me."

Eventually, Rice became satisfied with Cruise's performance after seeing the completed film, saying that "from the moment he appeared, Tom was Lestat for me" and "that Tom did make Lestat work was something I could not see in a crystal ball." She called Cruise to compliment him and admit that she was wrong.

Due to Rice's perception of Hollywood's homophobia, at one point she rewrote the part of Louis, changing his sex to female, in order to specifically heterosexualize the character's relationship with Lestat. At the time, Rice felt it was the only way to get the film made, and singer-actress Cher was considered for the part. A song titled "Lovers Forever", which Cher wrote along with Shirley Eikhard for the film's soundtrack, got rejected as Pitt was ultimately cast for the role, though a dance-pop version of the song was released on Cher's 2013 album, Closer to the Truth.

Originally, River Phoenix was cast for the role of Daniel Molloy (as Anne Rice liked the idea), but he died four weeks before he was due to begin filming. When Christian Slater was cast in his place as Molloy, he donated his entire salary to Phoenix's favorite charitable organizations. The film has a dedication to Phoenix after the end credits. Ten-year-old actress Kirsten Dunst was spotted by talent scouts and was the first girl tested for the role of Claudia. Julia Stiles also auditioned for Claudia but Neill Jordan considered her "too old".

Filming
Filming took place primarily in New Orleans and in London, with limited location shooting done in San Francisco and Paris. Louis's plantation was a combination of primarily Destrehan Plantation, just west of New Orleans, and Oak Alley Plantation in nearby Vacherie. The depiction of 18th- and early-19th-century New Orleans was achieved with a combination of location shooting in the French Quarter of New Orleans and filming on a purpose-built waterfront set along the Mississippi river. Production then moved to London, where interior sets were constructed at Pinewood Studios. The sets designed by Dante Ferretti included the interiors of Louis, Lestat and Claudia's New Orleans townhouse, Claudia and Louis's Paris hotel suite, the Théâtre des Vampires (built on Pinewood's 007 Stage), and the catacombs where the Parisian vampires live. Shooting took place in San Francisco, mainly on the Golden Gate Bridge, with the external façade of Louis's hotel located at the intersection of Taylor Street, Market Street, and Golden Gate Avenue. In Paris the exterior and lobby of the Opera Garnier were dressed to film Louis and Claudia's arrival at their hotel in Paris.

Brad Pitt admitted in a 2011 interview with Entertainment Weekly that he was "miserable" while making the film and even tried to buy himself out of his contract at one point. Pitt called the production "six-months of f---king darkness" because of the almost-exclusive night shoots, filmed mostly in London in the depths of winter, which sent him into a depression. The script, which he received only two weeks prior to filming, was also a source of disappointment. He unfavorably contrasted the character of Louis which he had admired in the book to that presented in the script:

Special effects
Visual effects were overseen by Stan Winston and his team, while the newly founded Digital Domain was responsible for creating the digital effects under Visual Effects Supervisor Robert Legato. Director Neil Jordan was initially hesitant to use Stan Winston Studios, because they had gained a reputation for specializing in large-scale animatronics and CGI with Jurassic Park and Terminator 2: Judgment Day; Interview with the Vampire was going to require mostly makeup effects. Winston designed the characters' vampire appearances and makeup effects, including a technique for stenciling translucent blue veins on the actors' faces. This required the actors to hang upside down for 30 minutes, so that the blood would rush to their heads and cause their veins to protrude, enabling the makeup artists to trace realistic patterns.

Digital effects were used mainly to add small details or to enhance certain physical effects, like the burning of the New Orleans set or the burning of Louis's plantation, whereby CGI flames were imposed on a miniature of the house. The most difficult digital effects to illustrate were Louis and Claudia's transformations into vampires, which were technologically very advanced for the time. The scene where Claudia cuts Lestat's throat was achieved by transferring from Tom Cruise bleeding from a prosthetic wound to an animatronic model designed to "wither" as it bled out, enhanced with CGI blood. Winston also sculpted the rough model for the charred remains of Claudia and Madeleine, using archival photographs of victims from Hiroshima for inspiration.

Pre-screening
A rough-cut of Interview with the Vampire was shown to test audiences, who according to producer David Geffen felt "there was a little too much blood and violence." The screenings were held over the objection of Neil Jordan, who was planning on further paring down the length of the film before previewing it, but Geffen wanted to show the longer version in order to "get a feel for what the audience wanted." Eventually about 20 minutes' worth of footage was either cut or re-arranged before the theatrical version was ready.

Release

Box office
Interview with the Vampire was a box office success. The film opened on November 11, 1994 (Veterans Day) and opening weekend grosses amounted to $36.4 million, surpassing Home Alone 2: Lost in New York to achieve a November record, placing it in the number one position at the US box office above The Santa Clause, which opened with $19.3 million. However, some in the industry disputed the figure and the range of estimates by others were from $34 to $37 million. At that time, Interview with the Vampire had the fifth-highest three-day opening weekend of all time, behind Jurassic Park, Batman Returns, The Lion King and Batman. Its opening was at that time the biggest non-summer opening and the biggest R-rated opening weekend ever, with the latter surpassing Lethal Weapon 3. The film would hold this record until 1997 when it was surpassed by Air Force One. Moreover, Interview with the Vampire held the record for having the highest opening weekend for a Brad Pitt film until it was taken by Ocean's Eleven in 2001. In subsequent weeks, it struggled against Star Trek Generations and The Santa Clause. Its total gross in the United States was $105 million, while the worldwide gross was $224 million, with an estimated budget of $60 million.

Critical reception

On Rotten Tomatoes the film holds an approval rating of 64% based on 58 reviews, with a rating average of 5.9/10. The site's consensus reads: "Despite lacking some of the book's subtler shadings, and suffering from some clumsy casting, Interview with the Vampire benefits from Neil Jordan's atmospheric direction and a surfeit of gothic thrills." On Metacritic the film holds a score of 59 out of 100 based on reviews from 19 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.

Praise from The New York Times Janet Maslin and the Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert was tempered by negative reviews by The Washington Post's Rita Kempley and Desson Howe and Time magazine's Richard Corliss.

Oprah Winfrey walked out of an advance screening of the movie only 10 minutes in, because of the gore and dark themes. She considered cancelling an interview with Tom Cruise promoting the film, stating, "I believe there are forces of light and darkness in the world, and I don't want to be a contributor to the force of darkness".

Awards and nominations

Year-end lists
 4th – Sandi Davis, The Oklahoman
 6th – David Stupich, The Milwaukee Journal
 Top 10 (listed alphabetically, not ranked) – Steve Murray, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
 Top 5 runners-up (not ranked) – Scott Schuldt, The Oklahoman
 Top 10 runner-ups (not ranked) – Janet Maslin, The New York Times
 Honorable mention – Mike Clark, USA Today
 Honorable mention –  Glenn Lovell, San Jose Mercury News
 Honorable mention – Betsy Pickle, Knoxville News-Sentinel
 Honorable mention – Dan Craft, The Pantagraph
 1st worst – John Hurley, Staten Island Advance
 1st worst – Jeff Simon, The Buffalo News
 Dishonorable mention – William Arnold, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Home media
The film was released on VHS and LaserDisc on June 6, 1995, DVD in 1997 and on Blu-ray Disc on October 7, 2008.

Soundtrack

The film's musical score was written by Elliot Goldenthal. It received an Oscar nomination for Best Original Score, but lost to The Lion King. The score opens with the Catholic hymn Libera Me slightly rewritten to reflect Louis's character. The opening line "Libera me, Domine, de morte æterna" ("Save me, Lord, from eternal death") was changed to "Libera me, Domine, de vita æterna" ("Save me, Lord, from eternal life").

"Sympathy for the Devil" was performed by Guns N' Roses. This was the band's last major release before the departure of Slash and Duff McKagan.

Sequel

Almost a decade after this film, an adaptation for the third book in the series, The Queen of the Damned, was produced and distributed once again by Warner Bros. Cruise and Pitt did not reprise their roles as Lestat and Louis. Many characters and important plotlines were written out of the film, which actually combined elements of The Vampire Lestat with The Queen of the Damned. The film was negatively received by critics, and Rice dismissed it completely as she felt the filmmakers had "mutilated" her work. During preproduction, Rice had pleaded with the studio not to produce a film of the book just yet since she believed her readers wanted a film based on the second book in the series, The Vampire Lestat. Rice was refused the cooperation of the studio.

In February 2012, a film adaptation of The Tale of the Body Thief, the fourth book in the series, entered development with Brian Grazer and Ron Howard's film production company, Imagine Entertainment. It was reported that screenwriter Lee Patterson was going to pen the screenplay. However, Rice's son, Christopher, apparently had drafted a screenplay based on the novel that was met with praise from those involved in the developmental stage. Rice later confirmed that creative differences that were beyond those involved resulted in the dismissal of the project in April 2013.

In August 2014, Universal Pictures acquired the rights to the entire Vampire Chronicles series. Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci were named as producers, and the deal included the aforementioned screenplay for The Tale of the Body Thief written by Christopher Rice.

A new film adaptation of the book was written by Josh Boone and was announced in May 2016, with Boone suggesting actor Jared Leto play the role of Lestat. In November 2016, all plans for a theatrical reboot were scrapped, with Rice announcing she had regained the rights to her novels and intends to create a television series starting with The Vampire Lestat.

Television series

On June 24, 2021, AMC announced a television adaptation of Interview with the Vampire, giving a series order consisting of seven episodes. The series was created by Rolin Jones, who executive produced alongside Mark Johnson, Alan Taylor, Anne Rice, and Christopher Rice.

See also
 Vampire films

Notes

References

External links

1994 films
1994 horror films
1994 romantic drama films
Supernatural drama films
American epic films
American supernatural horror films
American romantic drama films
BAFTA winners (films)
1990s English-language films
Films based on American horror novels
Films based on works by Anne Rice
Films directed by Neil Jordan
Films scored by Elliot Goldenthal
Films set in 1993
Films set in Louisiana
Films set in New Orleans
Films set in Paris
Films set in San Francisco
Films set in 1791
Films set in 1870
Films set in 1988
Films shot at Pinewood Studios
Films shot in London
Films shot in New Orleans
Films shot in San Francisco
Films shot in Surrey
Golden Raspberry Award winning films
Gothic horror films
The Geffen Film Company films
American horror drama films
American romantic horror films
Southern Gothic films
American vampire films
Warner Bros. films
Works based on The Vampire Chronicles
Films produced by David Geffen
1990s American films

Interview with the Vampire (film)


A Firing Offense is a 1992 crime novel and the debut from author George Pelecanos. It is set in Washington, D.C., and focuses on marketing executive Nick Stefanos as he investigates the disappearance of a colleague. It is the first of several Pelecanos novels to feature the character and the first of a trilogy with Stefanos as the main character. The other books in this series are Nick's Trip and Down by the River Where the Dead Men Go.

Plot introduction
Nick Stefanos is a marketing executive for electrical goods chain Nutty Nathan's. When a stock boy from the company disappears he is convinced to locate the boy by his grandfather.

Explanation of the novel's title
Stefanos is fired from his job at Nutty Nathan's but the reason for his dismissal does not become clear until the end of the book.

Characters
Nick Stefanos is a marketing executive and one time process server. He works for a chain of electrical goods stores. He was once a floor salesman. He remains friends with his old sales colleague Johnny McGinnes. Both Stefanos and McGinnes drink heavily and abuse recreational drugs.

Major themes
The novel is concerned with substance abuse both by the main characters and facilitated by the drug distributors.

Literary significance and reception
The novel was positively compared to Charles Willeford and Daniel Woodrell by a reviewer. The reviewer commented that the plot was perfunctory and that the novel was more concerned with examining the lives of the salesmen. He praised the book for drawing such interest from a seemingly mundane profession. The reviewer commented on Pelecanos frequent use of music references.

The series as a whole has been described as tightly plotted with "intricacies to rival Hammett or Chandler".

Footnotes

1992 American novels
Novels by George Pelecanos
Novels set in Washington, D.C.

A Firing Offense


The Freeport City Hall, located at 230 West Stephenson Street, was the historic city hall of Freeport, Illinois.

History
The city hall was built in 1899 to replace the previous city hall, which the city built in 1868 and had outgrown. The city hall served the city continuously from its opening until 2011, when city government moved elsewhere due to safety issues; it also held the city's police and fire departments for a time. It was also the site of several civil rights milestones for the city, as its first African-American alderman was elected and its first African-American police officer hired during the building's tenure.

The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 7, 2016.

After moving out of the city hall the local government attempted to sell the property but was unsuccessful. In December 2018, the building was demolished. It was delisted from the National Register in 2020.

Design and construction
Architect David S. Schureman designed the Richardsonian Romanesque building; his design included a red stone exterior, a barrel ceiling decorated with frescoes, and a main staircase with an iron balustrade. The building's frieze lists the names of important figures in science and literature; the first letters of each name spell out Schureman's name, a loophole he exploited when city leaders denied his request to put his name on the cornerstone.

References

City and town halls on the National Register of Historic Places in Illinois
Government buildings completed in 1899
Romanesque Revival architecture in Illinois
National Register of Historic Places in Stephenson County, Illinois
City and town halls in Illinois
Former National Register of Historic Places in Illinois

Freeport City Hall


Chill Factor is a 1999 American buddy action comedy thriller film directed by Hugh Johnson (in his directorial debut) and starring Cuba Gooding Jr. and Skeet Ulrich. The film centers on two unwitting civilians who are forced to protect a deadly chemical weapon from the hands of a group of mercenaries planning to sell the weapon to the highest bidder. The film had negative reviews from film critics, and was one of the biggest box office flops in history, grossing $11.8 million worldwide on an estimated $34–70 million budget.

Plot
Ten years after one of Dr. Richard Long's military experiments went wrong and killed eighteen US servicemen and a medical assistant, he has become a recluse in the small town of Jerome, Montana. Long still conducts scientific experiments at the local base, but his only social activity is going fly-fishing with Tim Mason, a cook in the local greasy spoon.

Long is murdered by Colonel Andrew Brynner, a former Army officer who took the blame and served 10 years in prison for Long's experiment. Now a free man with a score to settle with the government, Brynner has assembled a team of mercenaries, and plans to steal and then sell "Elvis"—Long's highly volatile, blue crystal substance—to the highest bidder, thus having his revenge against the government for covering up its existence, and making him a patsy for their handling of the weapon.

Brynner and his team attack the US Army research center where the chemical weapon is being stored, killing some of the Army MP's who were stationed at the base.

Unfortunately for Brynner, Long has already delivered "Elvis" to Tim, along with the directions that the substance must remain below 50 degrees, or it will detonate, causing enormous casualties.

After Mason and Arlo, an ice cream delivery man, have a run-in with Brynner, they set off en route for Fort Magruder, some 90 miles away. The two don't get along with each other—Arlo only agrees to transport the substance in his ice cream truck because Mason held a gun on him—but they find a common bond in trying to avoid Brynner and his team.

With the help of Colonel Leo Vitelli, Arlo and Mason try to survive Brynner's attacks, avoid the local deputy, Pappas, and keep "Elvis" below fifty degrees.

Arlo and Mason finally reach the base, but get ambushed by Brynner and his team who plan on detonating the device in an abandoned weapons test facility. Brynner does not want to leave witnesses, and decides to kill both of them. The military arrives and rescues Arlo and Mason before the device explodes, killing Brynner and his men.

Colonel Vitelli arrives and congratulates them on a job well done, but Arlo and Mason threaten to expose the U.S. government for using unstable nuclear weapons for the past decade. Vitelli decides to pay them both to keep them silent, but also threatens to have them killed if they say a word about what had happened. All three of them leave the area in a helicopter.

Cast
 Cuba Gooding Jr. as Arlo
 Skeet Ulrich as Tim Mason
 Peter Firth as Colonel Andrew Brynner
 David Paymer as Dr. Richard Long
 Hudson Leick as Vaughn
 Daniel Hugh Kelly as Colonel Leo Vitelli
 Kevin J. O'Connor as Telstar
 Rhoda Griffis as Pregnant Woman
 Jordan Mott as Carl
 Judson Mills as Dennis
 David "Shark" Fralick as Blonde Biker
 Geoff Palmer as Vitelli's Helicopter Pilot
 Ray McCort as Helicopter Pilot

Production

Ulrich and Gooding were both cast in September 1998. Principal photography began on October 5, 1998. Although the film is set in Montana, most of the film was shot in Liberty, South Carolina for the diner sequences. and parts of Northeastern Utah, in particular the Flaming Gorge Dam. Production was completed on December 22, 1998.

Release
Chill Factor was released on September 1, 1999 in 2,558 theatres, and it made $5,810,531 in its opening weekend. The film was a critical and commercial failure at the box office, grossing a total of $11,788,676, well below its estimated $34–70 million budget.

Reception

Box office
Chill Factor was a box office bomb, grossing only $11.2 million on a budget of $34–70 million.

Critical reception
The film generally received negative reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes, it has an approval rating of 10% based on 79 reviews, with an average rating of 3.6/10. The site's consensus states: "Claiming it fails on every level, critics had almost nothing good to say about this movie." Metacritic reports a score of 33 out of 100 based on 25 reviews, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews." Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.

Roger Ebert described the film as "cliché" in every sense of the word. Total Film, however, reviewed the film favourably, awarding it 3 stars out of 5.

References

External links

1999 films
1999 action thriller films
1999 directorial debut films
American action thriller films
Films scored by Hans Zimmer
Films scored by John Powell
Films set in Montana
Films shot in South Carolina
Films shot in Utah
Morgan Creek Productions films
Warner Bros. films
1990s English-language films
1990s American films
Films shot in Monument Valley

Chill Factor (film)


Vector quantization (VQ) is a classical quantization technique from signal processing that allows the modeling of probability density functions by the distribution of prototype vectors. It was originally used for data compression.  It works by dividing a large set of points (vectors) into groups having approximately the same number of points closest to them. Each group is represented by its centroid point, as in k-means and some other clustering algorithms. In simpler terms, vector quantization chooses a set of points to represent a larger set of points.

The density matching property of vector quantization is powerful, especially for identifying the density of large and high-dimensional data. Since data points are represented by the index of their closest centroid, commonly occurring data have low error, and rare data high error.  This is why VQ is suitable for lossy data compression. It can also be used for lossy data correction and density estimation.

Vector quantization is based on the competitive learning paradigm, so it is closely related to the self-organizing map model and to sparse coding models used in deep learning algorithms such as autoencoder.

Training
The simplest training algorithm for vector quantization is:
 Pick a sample point at random
 Move the nearest quantization vector centroid towards this sample point, by a small fraction of the distance
 Repeat

A more sophisticated algorithm reduces the bias in the density matching estimation, and ensures that all points are used, by including an extra sensitivity parameter :
 Increase each centroid's sensitivity  by a small amount
 Pick a sample point  at random
 For each quantization vector centroid , let  denote the distance of  and
 Find the centroid  for which  is the smallest
 Move  towards  by a small fraction of the distance
 Set  to zero
 Repeat

It is desirable to use a cooling schedule to produce convergence: see Simulated annealing.  Another (simpler) method is LBG which is based on K-Means.

The algorithm can be iteratively updated with 'live' data, rather than by picking random points from a data set, but this will introduce some bias if the data are temporally correlated over many samples.

Applications

Vector quantization is used for lossy data compression, lossy data correction, pattern recognition, density estimation and clustering.

Lossy data correction, or prediction, is used to recover data missing from some dimensions. It is done by finding the nearest group with the data dimensions available, then predicting the result based on the values for the missing dimensions, assuming that they will have the same value as the group's centroid.

For density estimation, the area/volume that is closer to a particular centroid than to any other is inversely proportional to the density (due to the density matching property of the algorithm).

Use in data compression

Vector quantization, also called "block quantization" or "pattern matching quantization" is often used in lossy data compression.  It works by encoding values from a multidimensional vector space into a finite set of values from a discrete subspace of lower dimension. A lower-space vector requires less storage space, so the data is compressed.  Due to the density matching property of vector quantization, the compressed data has errors that are inversely proportional to density.

The transformation is usually done by projection or by using a codebook. In some cases, a codebook can be also used to entropy code the discrete value in the same step, by generating a prefix coded variable-length encoded value as its output.

The set of discrete amplitude levels is quantized jointly rather than each sample being quantized separately.  Consider a k-dimensional vector  of amplitude levels.  It is compressed by choosing the nearest matching vector from a set of n-dimensional vectors , with n < k.

All possible combinations of the n-dimensional vector  form the vector space to which all the quantized vectors belong.

Only the index of the codeword in the codebook is sent instead of the quantized values. This conserves space and achieves more compression.

Twin vector quantization (VQF) is part of the MPEG-4 standard dealing with time domain weighted interleaved vector quantization.

Video codecs based on vector quantization

 Bink video
 Cinepak
 Daala is transform-based but uses pyramid vector quantization on transformed coefficients
 Digital Video Interactive: Production-Level Video and Real-Time Video
 Indeo
 Microsoft Video 1
 QuickTime: Apple Video (RPZA) and Graphics Codec (SMC)
 Sorenson SVQ1 and SVQ3
 Smacker video
 VQA format, used in many games
The usage of video codecs based on vector quantization has declined significantly in favor of those based on motion compensated prediction combined with transform coding, e.g. those defined in MPEG standards, as the low decoding complexity of vector quantization has become less relevant.

Audio codecs based on vector quantization

 AMR-WB+
 CELP
 CELT (now part of Opus) is transform-based but uses pyramid vector quantization on transformed coefficients
 Codec 2
 DTS
 G.729
 iLBC
 Ogg Vorbis
 TwinVQ

Use in pattern recognition
VQ was also used in the eighties for speech  and speaker recognition.
Recently it has also been used for efficient nearest neighbor search

and on-line signature recognition.
In pattern recognition applications, one codebook is constructed for each class (each class being a user in biometric applications) using acoustic vectors of this user. In the testing phase the quantization distortion of a testing signal is worked out with the whole set of codebooks obtained in the training phase. The codebook that provides the smallest vector quantization distortion indicates the identified user.

The main advantage of VQ in pattern recognition is its low computational burden when compared with other techniques such as dynamic time warping (DTW) and hidden Markov model (HMM). The main drawback when compared to DTW and HMM is that it does not take into account the temporal evolution of the signals (speech, signature, etc.) because all the vectors are mixed up. In order to overcome this problem a multi-section codebook approach has been proposed. The multi-section approach consists of modelling the signal with several sections (for instance, one codebook for the initial part, another one for the center and a last codebook for the ending part).

Use as clustering algorithm
As VQ is seeking for centroids as density points of nearby lying samples, it can be also directly used as a prototype-based clustering method: each centroid is then associated with one prototype.
By aiming to minimize the expected squared quantization error and introducing a decreasing learning gain fulfilling the Robbins-Monro conditions, multiple iterations over the whole data set with a concrete but fixed number of prototypes converges to the solution of k-means clustering algorithm in an incremental manner.

Generative Adversarial Networks (GAN)
VQ has been used to quantize a feature representation layer in the discriminator of Generative adversarial networks. The feature quantization (FQ) technique performs implicit feature matching. It improves the GAN training, and yields an improved performance on a variety of popular GAN models: BigGAN for image generation, StyleGAN for face synthesis, and U-GAT-IT for unsupervised image-to-image translation.

See also
Subtopics

 Linde–Buzo–Gray algorithm (LBG)
 Learning vector quantization
 Lloyd's algorithm
 Growing Neural Gas, a neural network-like system for vector quantization

Related topics

 Speech coding
 Ogg Vorbis
 Voronoi diagram
 Rate-distortion function
 Data clustering
 Centroidal Voronoi tessellation
 Image segmentation
 K-means clustering
 Autoencoder
 Deep Learning

Part of this article was originally based on material from the Free On-line Dictionary of Computing and is used with permission under the GFDL.

References

External links
 http://www.data-compression.com/vq.html
 QccPack — Quantization, Compression, and Coding Library (open source)
 VQ Indexes Compression and Information Hiding Using Hybrid Lossless Index Coding, Wen-Jan Chen and Wen-Tsung Huang

Lossy compression algorithms
Unsupervised learning

es:Cuantificación digital#Cuantificación vectorial
ru:Векторное квантование

Vector quantization


"Everyday" is a song written by Buddy Holly and Norman Petty, recorded by Buddy Holly and the Crickets on May 29, 1957, and released on September 20, 1957, as the B-side of "Peggy Sue", which went to number three on the Billboard Top 100 chart in 1957. The song is ranked number 238 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the "500 Greatest Songs of All Time".

On the original single the Crickets are not mentioned, but it is known that Holly plays acoustic guitar; drummer Jerry Allison slaps his knees for percussion; Joe B. Mauldin plays a standup acoustic bass; Vi Petty played the celesta on the recording.

Personnel
The Crickets
 Buddy Holly - vocals, guitar
 Joe B. Mauldin - bass
 Jerry Allison - drums

Additional personnel
 Vi Petty - celesta

Cover versions

Tina Robin recorded a version of the song, also for Coral Records, in 1958.

In 1960, Bobby Vee released a version as the B-side of his hit song "Rubber Ball".

John Denver recorded this song for his 1971 album Aerie and released it as a single, which peaked at number 81 on the Billboard pop singles chart and number 21 on the Adult Contemporary chart in 1972. Upon its release Record World said it was the best of several recent covers of the song.

Bridget St. John recorded this song for her 1972 album Thank You For..., published by Dandelion and marketed by Polydor. Produced by Bridget St. John and Jerry Boys.

Don McLean recorded this song for his 1973 album Playin' Favorites and released it as a single, which peaked at number 38 in the UK.

The English teen pop singer Nikki Richards recorded the song as the B-side of his first single in 1978.

A version recorded by James Taylor was released in 1985, rising to number 3 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart in the US and number 1 on the Canadian Adult Contemporary chart; it also reached number 61 on the Billboard Pop chart and number 26 on the Billboard Country chart. The song is included on his 1985 album "That's Why I'm Here" and his two-CD career retrospective, The Essential James Taylor, released in 2013.  Cash Box called Taylor's version "a perfect showcase for Taylor's mellow-rocking delivery" with "nice melodic changes and a touching sentiment."  Billboard said it has "the wit and style he applied to 'Handy Man."

Erasure recorded it for their 2002 album Other People's Songs. The Trashmen and the indie rock band Rogue Wave also recorded it. The rock band Pearl Jam performed a rendition live in Lubbock, Texas, Holly's birthplace. It has also been performed live by Deep Purple. A version was recorded by hellogoodbye and released on their 2008 EP, Ukulele recordings. Phil Ochs used a portion of the song as part of his "Buddy Holly Medley", which was included on his album Gunfight at Carnegie Hall in 1974.

Elliott Murphy recorded this song for a French tribute, Every Day Is a Holly Day, in 1989.

In 1990, the British guitarist Peter White recorded it for the album Reveillez-Vous.

Pearl Jam covered the song in Lubbock, Texas, on October 18, 2000.

Rogue Wave recorded a cover version for the covers compilation soundtrack released in support of video game Stubbs the Zombie in 2005.

Fiona Apple recorded a cover version for the Buddy Holly tribute album Rave On Buddy Holly in 2011.

Patrick Stump contributed a cover version to the Buddy Holly tribute album Listen to Me: Buddy Holly in 2011.

The song is also on the 2012 Japanese CD Levi Dexter & Gretsch Brothers, featuring Rockabilly Hall of Fame inductee Levi Dexter.

In popular culture
The song was used in the 1985 comedy Mischief, the 1986 film Stand by Me, the 2003 fantasy drama Big Fish, the 2009 romantic film Love Happens, the 2011 thriller drama We Need to Talk About Kevin, the 2009 science fiction film Mr. Nobody, and in the 1997 art film Gummo.

The song is played in a 2009 episode of Family Guy during a parody of Stand by Me.

The 2010 AT&T/Blackberry Torch commercial used "Everyday".

The song is played at the beginning of the eleventh episode of the fourth season of Lost ("Cabin Fever"), as well as during the closing credits of the penultimate episode of Mad Men ("The Milk and Honey Route").

The song is played in the sixth episode of the third season of Hulu's The Handmaid's Tale. It was also used in season three of Hulu's Future Man.

The song is covered in the end credits of the seventh episode of the second season of HBO's Crashing, sung by Fiona Apple.

The song is also sung in Party of Five (season 1, episode 7) by the character Julia, played by actress Neve Campbell.

The song is featured in the NBC show Lincoln Rhyme: Hunt for the Bone Collector.

The song is used as the opening song for Ryan Reynolds' and Rob McElhenney's docuseries Welcome to Wrexham from episode 3 onwards.

The song is heavily featured and a key plot point in the second season of the Amazon series Good Omens. Showrunner Neil Gaiman also used its lyrics in Issue #51 of the DC Comics series The Sandman.

References

1957 singles
1972 singles
1985 singles
Buddy Holly songs
Bobby Vee songs
James Taylor songs
Songs written by Buddy Holly
Songs written by Norman Petty
John Denver songs
1957 songs
Song recordings produced by Norman Petty
Coral Records singles
RCA Records singles
Columbia Records singles

Everyday (Buddy Holly song)