Cecil Sebastian Afrika (born 3 March 1988) is a South African rugby sevens player for the South Africa national team, where he plays at flyhalf. He also plays for the San Diego Legion of Major League Rugby (MLR).

Afrika was a member of the South African Sevens team that won a bronze medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics.

Early life
Afrika attended Hentie Cilliers High School in Virginia. Afrika represented the South African Schoolboys in 2006. He was part of the South African under-20 squad in the 2008 IRB Junior World Championship that reached the third place playoffs.

National Sevens Team Summary
Afrika debuted for the South African sevens team during the Dubai leg of the 2009–10 IRB Sevens World Series. During the Las Vegas leg of the 2009–10 IRB Sevens World Series he was carried off the field on a stretcher after he was injured during the Plate Final match against Fiji, South Africa won 12–7. He was part of the sevens team that took Bronze at the 2010 Commonwealth Games held in Delhi, India in October.

Afrika missed out on the 2011 Wellington Sevens because of a broken jaw he suffered during the South African leg of the IRB Sevens Series. He was the top try and point-scorer for the 2010–11 IRB Sevens World Series; He scored 40 tries throughout the series with a total of 385 points.
In 2011 he won the IRB International Sevens Player of the Year award, pipping the great Tomasi Cama of New Zealand (NZ) who managed 299 points for the same year.

In 2013, Afrika was included in the squad for the 2013 Rugby World Cup Sevens.

2010 Commonwealth Games - Delhi
Afrika was instrumental in the team that represented South Africa Seven in Delhi. Helping the team to a third place finish overall. These are the games that highlighted the prowess of Africa on the main stage of rugby Sevens. From hereon, he was to join the main team for the world series.

2014 Commonwealth Games - Glasgow
Cecil was named in this most illustrious team to represent South Africa in their campaign to unseat New Zealand who had never lost a game at all Commonwealth Games since the inception of Sevens at the games in 1998. Rugby sevens at the 2014 Commonwealth Games was one of South Africa Sevens best tournaments where they ended up as champions winning GOLD.

2016 Summer Olympics
Afrika was included in a 12-man squad for the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. He was named in the starting line-up for their first match in Pool B of the competition against Spain and scored two tries and two conversions to help South Africa to a 24–0 victory. He started their second match against France, converting three of South Africa's tries in a 26–0 victory, and dropped to the bench for their final match against Australia. Despite a 5–12 defeat in this match, South Africa still finished top of Pool B to set up a quarter final rematch against Australia. Afrika was restored to the starting line-up for this match and converted one of South Africa's tries in a 22–5 victory. He started South Africa's semi-final match against Great Britain but could not prevent them losing 5–7 to be eliminated from gold medal contention. He also started their third-place play-off, scoring two tries and kicking five conversions in his side's 54–14 victory over Japan to help South Africa secure a bronze medal in the competition.

Honours
- Springboks Blitzbok colours from 2009 with 345 match appearances for South Africa

- Leading Record Points for South Africa as at 2023/10/10 with 1465 points

- 2010/2011 IRB International Sevens Player of the Year

- 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi - Bronze Medal winner

- 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow - Gold Medal winner

- 2016 Rio Olympics Summer Games - Bronze Medal winner

Retirement
Afrika retired from international sevens as South Africa's all time leading World Series scorer in June 2020.

Following on his long Sevens career and on his success in the 2011 HSBC Sevens World Series, he was in  2021 unveiled as the new International Rugby Board 'Keep Rugby Clean' Ambassador for sevens.

Club Rugby
Afrika came through at the South African Currie Cup side Griffons before transitioning into the South African 7s setup. In 2017 he has a brief stint with the Cheetahs in their first season in the Pro14.

In 2021 Afrika signed for American side San Diego Legion for the 2021 season as a fullback.

References

External links

1988 births
Living people
Rugby union players from Port Elizabeth
South African rugby union players
Rugby sevens players at the 2010 Commonwealth Games
Rugby sevens players at the 2014 Commonwealth Games
Rugby sevens players at the 2018 Commonwealth Games
Commonwealth Games bronze medallists for South Africa
World Rugby Awards winners
South Africa international rugby sevens players
South Africa Under-20 international rugby union players
Commonwealth Games gold medallists for South Africa
Rugby sevens players at the 2016 Summer Olympics
Olympic rugby sevens players for South Africa
Olympic bronze medalists for South Africa
Olympic medalists in rugby sevens
Medalists at the 2016 Summer Olympics
Commonwealth Games medallists in rugby sevens
Griffons (rugby union) players
Commonwealth Games rugby sevens players for South Africa
Rugby union wings
Rugby union fullbacks
Free State Cheetahs players
Cheetahs (rugby union) players
San Diego Legion players
Medallists at the 2010 Commonwealth Games
Medallists at the 2014 Commonwealth Games

Cecil Afrika


Dun Mikiel Xerri (Żebbuġ, 29 September 1737 – 17 January 1799) was a Maltese patriot. He was baptised Mikael Archangelus Joseph in the parish church of Zebbug on 30 September 1737, the son of Bartholomew Xerri and his wife Anne. Xerri studied at different universities in Europe. He lived under both the Knights of St. John during their time in Malta and the French when they took over the Maltese Islands. He was involved in an unsuccessful revolt to overthrow French rule under Napoleon Bonaparte for which he, together with other locals, was executed on 17 January 1799 at the age of 61.

Historical background and execution

In June 1798, French forces led by Napoleon Bonaparte took over the islands from the increasingly oppressive rule of the Knights of Malta. Initially, the populace accepted the change, believing in the possibility of having better government. However, in successive months, the French forces removed the rights of the Maltese nobility, and decided to stand against the Maltese church. Outraged by the plundering of their churches and faced by an unprecedented financial crisis that had been precipitated by the draining of most of the cash, on September 2, 1798, they rose against the French garrison in Notabile (Città Vecchia or Mdina). Soon both islands were in a state of full rebellion, and the Maltese formed a National Assembly. The French forces retreated in the fortified cities around the harbour, while the Maltese petitioned for help from the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies and Great Britain.

During the blockade of the cities, hundreds of people were dying from starvation and deprivation. Elements from within the fortress hence decided to risk their life in order to resolve the situation, and these were led by Xerri. The Maltese planned an attack against the French forces in Valletta and in Cottonera, but the French forces discovered the plot. Amongst the 49 persons captured in the ensuing investigation, there was Dun Mikiel Xerri.

In the morning of January 17, 1799, the archbishop of Malta, Labini, visited Xerri and his companions. The prisoners were taken from Fort Saint Elmo to Palace Square, where a platoon of soldiers were waiting for them. On their way to the square, Dun Mikiel encouraged his companions, and when they arrived in the square, he demanded a few minutes to talk to them. After they fortified themselves with prayers, and asking for remission of their sins, Xerri gave a silver watch to the official on duty and asked him to shoot him in the heart. Then he turned on the crowd in the square, and with the others he shouted; "May God have pity on us! Long live Malta!" They were then shot in the square, but they were then taken to the chapel of Saint Rocco, where they were finished off. The large part of these men were buried on the side of the church of Saint Publius in Floriana.

References

1737 births
1799 deaths
Executed Maltese people
People executed by the French First Republic
18th-century Maltese Roman Catholic priests
People executed by France by firing squad
Executed Roman Catholic priests
People from Żebbuġ
French occupation of Malta
Maltese rebels

Dun Mikiel Xerri


Albert Sidney Fleischman (born Avron Zalmon Fleischman; March 16, 1920 – March 17, 2010) was an American author of children's books, screenplays, novels for adults, and nonfiction books about stage magic. His works for children are known for their humor, imagery, zesty plotting, and exploration of the byways of American history. He won the Newbery Medal in 1987 for The Whipping Boy and the Boston Globe–Horn Book Award in 1979 for Humbug Mountain. For his career contribution as a children's writer he was U.S. nominee for the biennial, international Hans Christian Andersen Award in 1994. In 2003, the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators inaugurated the Sid Fleischman Humor Award in his honor, and made him the first recipient. The Award annually recognizes a writer of humorous fiction for children or young adults. He told his own tale in The Abracadabra Kid: A Writer's Life (1996).

Early years

Fleischman was born Avron Zalmon Fleischman in Brooklyn, New York in 1920. His parents were Ukrainian Jews and moved the family to San Diego, California when Fleischman was two years old. As a youngster, he beheld his first stage magic performance, launching a lifelong fascination that would find a place in many of his books. He learned magic from library books and the local fraternity of magicians, inventing new tricks along the way. He began performing professionally while still in high school, touring California with his friend Buddy Ryan, performing in nightclubs, and traveling the country with the Francisco Spook Show during the last days of vaudeville.

In 1941 Fleischman joined the U.S. Navy Reserve. He served as a Yeoman aboard the destroyer escort USS Albert T. Harris with service near the Philippines, Borneo, and China. until 1946. He graduated from San Diego State University with a Bachelor of Arts in 1949.

Career

Works for adults and the screen

At 19, Fleischman published his first book, Between Cocktails, a collection of magic tricks using paper matches. His college career at San Diego State College was interrupted by World War II, during which he served on a destroyer escort in the Pacific. After graduating with a degree in English, he worked as a reporter for the short-lived San Diego Daily Journal,<ref>Eisloeffel, Paul J. "The Cold War and Harry Steinmetz: A Case of Loyalty and Legislation", SanDiegoHistory.org.
"The liberal San Diego Daily Journal'''s circulation was small and its life-span short (1944–50) compared to the area's major daily, the conservative San Diego Union."</ref> covering everything from crime scenes to the political beat. After the newspaper folded, he turned to fiction. Drawing on his reporting experiences, his knowledge of magic, and his tour of the Pacific, he produced a series of novels of intrigue and adventure over the next 15 years, many set in the Far East. Nearly all have been recently reprinted in two-books-in-one format by Stark House Press.

When one of them—Blood Alley—caught the eye of director William Wellman, he hired Fleischman to adapt it to the screen. This both led to a move to Santa Monica, California, where Fleischman lived the rest of his life, and began a decades-long involvement with Hollywood. After Blood Alley was filmed, starring John Wayne and Lauren Bacall, Wellman used Fleischman on several other projects, including Lafayette Escadrille, based on Wellman's own experiences as a World War I pilot. Fleischman adapted his own novel Yellowleg for the screen, released as The Deadly Companions, the director Sam Peckinpah's first feature. Fleischman later worked on several projects with Kirk Douglas, including Scalawag. For children, he wrote teleplays for "The Bloodhound Gang" segments of the educational 3–2–1 Contact series, as well as the screenplay of The Whipping Boy (released as Prince Brat and the Whipping Boy).

Books for children

Using his three children as an audience for the first time, Fleischman wrote Mr. Mysterious & Company (1962), the adventures of a traveling magician's family in the old West. It was the first of many children's books that would draw on his background in magic and his interest in history. By the Great Horn Spoon! mined the California Gold Rush and was turned into the movie The Adventures of Bullwhip Griffin. The Ghost in the Noonday Sun, Chancy and the Grand Rascal, Jingo Django, and Humbug Mountain (1965 to 1978) spun fiction from the facts of East Coast pirates, Ohio River rafting, American Gypsies, and traveling printers. His series of books about Josh McBroom and his family's amazing one-acre farm made use of American tall tales. Later works looked farther afield, from England (The Whipping Boy) to Asia (The White Elephant) to Mexico (The Dream Stealer). Finding nonfiction to his liking after completing his autobiography, The Abracadabra Kid: A Writer's Life (1996), Fleischman went on to produce biographies of Harry Houdini, Mark Twain, and Charlie Chaplin.

Personal life

Fleischman and his wife Betty, who died in 1993, had three children. His son Paul Fleischman followed him into the world of children's books. They are the only parent and child who've both won the Newbery Medal, the venerable American Library Association award that annually recognizes the "most distinguished contribution to American literature for children".

Fleischman maintained an interest in magic all his life, hosting monthly meetings of Los Angeles magicians at his home, publishing occasional articles in magic journals, and summing up what he had learned in The Charlatan's Handbook (1993). For young magicians, he wrote Mr. Mysterious's Secrets of Magic (1975).

Fleischman's other interests included gardening, astronomy, hand-printing, radio, and classical guitar.

Fleischman died on March 17, 2010, one day after his 90th birthday.

Works

Fiction for children or young adults
 Mr. Mysterious & Company (1962), first children's book
 By the Great Horn Spoon! (1963)
 The Ghost in the Noonday Sun (1965)
 Chancy and the Grand Rascal (1966)
 McBroom Tells the Truth (1966)
 McBroom and the Big Wind (1967)
 McBroom's Ear (1970/1969)
 Longbeard the Wizard (1970)
 Jingo Django (1971)
 McBroom's Ghost (1971)
 McBroom's Zoo (1971/1972)
 The Wooden Cat Man (1972)
 McBroom the Rainmaker (1973)
 The Ghost on Saturday Night (1974)
 McBroom Tells a Lie (1976)
 Me and the Man on the Moon-Eyed Horse (1977); U.K. title, The Man on the Moon-Eyed HorseKate's Secret Riddle Book (1977)
 McBroom and the Beanstalk (1978)
 Humbug Mountain (1978)
 Jim Bridger's Alarm Clock (1978)
 The Hey Hey Man (1979)
 McBroom and the Great Race (1980)
 The Bloodhound Gang
 The Case of the Cackling Ghost (1981)
 The Case of the Flying Clock (1981)
 The Case of the Secret Message (1981)
 The Case of Princess Tomorrow (1981)
 The Case of the 264 Pound Burglar (1982)
 The Bloodhound Gang's Secret Code Book (1982)
 McBroom's Almanac (1982/1984)
 The Whipping Boy (1986)
 The Scarebird (1988)
 The Ghost in the Noonday Sun (1999/1989)
 The Midnight Horse (1990)
 Jim Ugly (1992)
 The 13th Floor: A ghost story (1995)
 Bandit's Moon (1998)
 A Carnival of Animals (2000)
 Bo and Mzzz Mad (2001)
 Disappearing Act (2003)
 The Giant Rat of Sumatra (2005)The White Elephant (2006)The Entertainer and the Dybbuk (2008)The Dream Stealer (2009)

Nonfiction
 The Abracadabra Kid: A Writer's Life (1996) ‡Escape! The Story of the Great Houdini (2006)The Trouble Begins at 8: A Life of Mark Twain in the Wild, Wild West (2008)Sir Charlie: Chaplin, the Funniest Man in the World (2010)

‡ For children and young adults.

Fiction for adults
 The Straw Donkey Case (1948), first novel
 Murder's No Accident (1949)
 Shanghai Flame (1951)
 Look Behind You, Lady (1952)
 Danger in Paradise (1953)
 Malay Woman (1954)
 Counterspy Express (1954)
 Blood Alley (1955)
 Yellowleg (1960)
 The Venetian Blonde (1963)

Books on magic
 Between Cocktails (1939), first bookReady, Aim, Magic! (with Bob Gunther, 1942)Call the Witness (with Bob Gunther, 1943)The Blue Bug (with Bob Gunther, 1947)Top Secrets (with Bob Gunther, 1947)
 Magic Made Easy, as Carl March (1953)
 Mr. Mysterious's Secrets of Magic (1975); U.K. title, Secrets of Magic ‡
 The Charlatan's Handbook (1993)

‡ For children and young adults.

Screenplays
 Blood Alley (1955)
 Goodbye, My Lady, based on a novel by James Street (1956)
 Lafayette Escadrille, Fleischman and William A. Wellman (1958)
 The Deadly Companions (1961)
 Scalawag, Fleischman and Albert Maltz (1973)
 Prince Brat and the Whipping Boy, as Max Brindle (1994)

Plays
 Prince Brat and the Whipping Boy (musical, Seattle Children's Theatre, 2000)

AdaptationsThe Adventures of Bullwhip Griffin (Disney, 1967) is an adaptation of Fleischman's western novel By the Great Horn Spoon!, starring Roddy McDowell as Bullwhip Griffin.Ghost in the Noonday Sun'' (Tyburn, 1973) is a loose adaptation of Fleischman's novel, starring Peter Sellers.

Notes

References

External links

 Sid Fleischman Honored by SDSU, Santa Monica Mirror, Mar 17–23, 2004
 Sid Fleischman's obituary

1920 births
2010 deaths
American children's writers
20th-century American novelists
American male screenwriters
Deaths from cancer in California
Newbery Medal winners
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Santa Monica, California
San Diego State University alumni
Jewish American novelists
American male novelists
21st-century American novelists
20th-century American male writers
21st-century American male writers
Novelists from New York (state)
Screenwriters from New York (state)
Screenwriters from California
United States Navy personnel of World War II
United States Navy sailors
United States Navy reservists
21st-century American Jews
Academy of Magical Arts Literature & Media Fellowship winners

Sid Fleischman


The Adventures of Champion is an American Western serial radio drama directed by William Burch about screen cowboy Gene Autry's horse Champion. Each 15-minute episode was broadcast weekday afternoons on the Mutual Broadcasting System in 1949 and 1950. (Another source says that the program ran "June to November 1949.")

Background
The radio series was a spin-off from Gene Autry's Melody Ranch, a CBS radio network Sunday-afternoon program featuring the singing cowboy from 1940 to 1956. Jack French and David S. Siegel, in their book Radio Rides the Range: A Reference Guide to Western Drama on the Air, 1929-1967, opined: "The Adventures of Champion was not a spin-off of [Autry's] popular radio show, Melody Ranch, even though both programs had the efforts of the same people. Just grasping the basic scenario of The Adventures of Champion required a substantial suspension of belief in what its juvenile listeners knew to be gospel. Champion was Autry's horse and had a major role in all of his movies, television programs, and personal appearances."

Format
Episodes focus on 12-year-old Ricky West, who is raised in the wilderness by his adoptive Uncle Smoky and his German Shepherd named Rebel. Champion is depicted as a wild horse who lets only Ricky ride him. While the series covered gold mines, rustlers, and Indian problems, the primary focus was on the faith and loyalty between a boy, a dog, and a horse. Stories ran in five installments each, beginning on Monday and ending on Friday.

Cast
Little is known about the cast of the program. French and Siegel wrote, "However, one of the most curious mysteries about this series was who played the leads of Ricky and Uncle Smoky; contemporary accounts of the program have been unsuccessful in unearthing their identities, and the vast Autry Library and Research Services in Los Angeles, CA, has no record of who the performers were." One participant who was identified was Dave Light, an animal imitator who provided sounds of all animals on the program.

Television adaption
A television series called The Adventures of Champion aired for 26 episodes on CBS during the 1955–1956 season and starred Barry Curtis and Jim Bannon.

See also
The Adventures of Champion (TV series)
Gene Autry's Melody Ranch

References

External links

 Matinee Classics

American radio dramas
1940s American radio programs
1950s American radio programs
Mutual Broadcasting System programs
Western (genre) radio series

The Adventures of Champion


The phenomena that can be seen in the atmosphere is at Aurora

Aurora was the ancient Roman equivalent of Eos. Eos was the ancient Greek goddess of the dawn. Aurora is the Latin word for dawn.

Aurora renews herself every morning at dawn and flies across the sky. She announces the morning's arrival. She has a brother and a sister. Her brother is the sun, and her sister is the moon. She also has many husbands and four sons, one for each cardinal direction: North, East, South, and West.

Aurora is comparable to Eos in Greek mythology and to Ushas in Hindu mythology.

One of her lovers was Tithonus. Aurora asked Zeus to grant immortality to Tithonus. However, she failed to ask him for eternal youth. As a result, Tithonus ended up aging eternally.

In Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet (i.i) Montague says of his lovesick son Romeo
But all so soon as the all-cheering sun
Should in the farthest east begin to draw
The shady curtains from Aurora's bed,
Away from the light steals home my heavy son...

In the poem "Tithonus" by Lord Alfred Tennyson, Aurora is described as folllows:

Once more the old mysterious glimmer steals
From thy pure brows, and from thy shoulders pure,
And bosom beating with a heart renewed.
Thy cheek begins to redden through the gloom,
Thy sweet eyes brighten slowly close to mine,
Ere yet they blind the stars, and the wild team
Which love thee, yearning for thy yoke, arise,
And shake the darkness from their loosened manes,
And beat the twilight into flakes of fire.

The asteroid 94 Aurora was named after her.

Other websites
 Aurora in Encyclopædia Mythica

Roman gods and goddesses

Aurora (mythology)


Franco Gentilini (Faenza (Ravenna), 1909 – Rome, 1981) was an Italian painter.

Biography
Franco Gentilini worked as a ceramist in Faenza and collaborated with Giovanni Romagnoli and Giorgio Morandi in Bologna. He took part in numerous editions of the Venice Biennale, beginning with the acceptance of his work for the 17th Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte della Città di Venezia in 1930, when he also visited Paris.

He moved to Rome in 1932 and held his first solo show at the Galleria di Roma with works in an archaic style inspired by pre-Renaissance Italian art. He also established himself as a fresco painter. He took part in the 5th Esposizione Internazionale delle Arti Decorative in Milan in 1933 and the 2nd Quadriennale Nazionale d'Arte in Rome in 1935, on which occasion the city's governing body bought one of his works. It was in the late 1930s that he began to associate with the artists of the Roman School. There was considerable demand for his work among private Italian collectors after World War II, not least because of his participation in numerous exhibitions.

References
 Antonella Crippa, Franco Gentilini, online catalogue Artgate by Fondazione Cariplo, 2010, CC BY-SA (source for the first revision of this article).

Other projects

20th-century Italian painters
Italian male painters
People from Faenza
1909 births
1981 deaths
20th-century Italian male artists

Franco Gentilini


The Court of St James's serves as the official royal court for the Sovereign of the United Kingdom. The court formally receives all ambassadors accredited to the United Kingdom. Likewise, ambassadors representing the United Kingdom are formally accredited from this court as they are direct representatives of the Crown.

The Marshal of the Diplomatic Corps, formerly known as Master of the Ceremonies prior to 1920, serves as the liaison between the British monarch and foreign diplomatic missions. The Marshal is stationed permanently at St James's Palace. As of 1886, there were merely six ambassadors in London, while 37 other countries were represented by ministers. (The custom developed in the 18th century was that only monarchies sent ambassadors, while others sent ministers; this distinction was abrogated toward the end of the 19th century)  By 2015, the number of foreign missions accredited to the Court of St James's had risen to 175, including 47 high commissions from Commonwealth countries and 128 embassies from non-Commonwealth countries.

Official meetings and receptions related to the court, such as Privy Council meetings or the annual Diplomatic Reception attended by 1,500 guests, typically take place wherever the monarch is in residence—usually at Buckingham Palace.

Origin of the name
The Court of St James's derives its name from St James's Palace, hence the possessive s at the end of the name. This nomenclature is due to St James's Palace being the most senior royal palace, despite Buckingham Palace being the primary metropolitan residence of all British sovereigns since the accession of Queen Victoria in 1837. The court's name is sometimes wrongly pronounced as the "Court of St James", excluding the appropriate "iz" pronunciation of the possessive "s" suffix.

See also
 Diplomatic rank
 His Majesty's Diplomatic Service
 List of diplomatic missions in the United Kingdom
 List of diplomatic missions of the United Kingdom

References

British monarchy
Diplomacy
Diplomatic services
Foreign relations of the United Kingdom
Foreign relations of Great Britain
Foreign relations of England
British royal court

Court of St James's


Assumption of the Virgin Mary and Roch's Church () is a Catholic church in the Sava neighborhood of the town of Jesenice, in the Upper Carniola region of Slovenia.

Originally dedicated only to the Assumption of the Virgin, the church was built by the ironworks owners Julius and Orfeus Bucelleni. It is the first example of Jesuit architecture in Slovenia. The nave, with a plaque dated 1606, still preserves its original features. The choir was expanded and raised in the late 17th century. Three altar pieces painted by the Venetian artist Nicola Grassi from the church (The Assumption of the Virgin, Mary of the Rosary with Saint Dominic and Saint Francis, Saint Anthony of the Desert with an unknown early Christian martyr) were all restored in 1961 and again in 1992. There are several other oil paintings in the church.

References

External links
 Jesenice museum site (in Slovene)
 Jesenice municipality site (in Slovene)

Jesenice, Jesenice
17th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in Slovenia

Assumption of the Virgin Mary and Roch's Church (Jesenice)


James Thomas Flexner (January 13, 1908 – February 13, 2003) was an American historian and biographer best known for the four-volume biography of George Washington that earned him a National Book Award
in Biography and a special Pulitzer Prize. His one-volume abridgment, Washington: the Indispensable Man (1974) was the basis of two television miniseries, George Washington (1984) and George Washington II: The Forging of a Nation (1986), starring Barry Bostwick as Washington.

Biography
James Thomas Flexner was born January 13, 1908, in Manhattan. His father was Simon Flexner, a sixth-grade dropout who became a self-taught microbiologist, pathologist, director of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research in New York City and discoverer of a cure for spinal meningitis. His mother was Helen Thomas [Flexner], a professor of English at Bryn Mawr whose sister was president of the college. In 1929, Flexner graduated cum laude from Harvard University, and found work as a reporter for the New York Herald Tribune. In 1931, he took a position at the New York City Department of Health as an executive secretary. The following year, he left his job to devote his full energies to writing. Although untrained in art history, he gravitated to art subjects as part of his interest in writing about American history.

Flexner is known best for George Washington, a four-volume biography published by Little, Brown from 1965 to 1972. He won a special Pulitzer Prize for the work in 1973. He wrote other historical biographies, including The Young Hamilton (on Alexander Hamilton), Mohawk Baronet (on Sir William Johnson, 1st Baronet), and The Traitor and the Spy: Benedict Arnold and John André. He wrote many books on the history of American art, including a highly regarded life of the American painter John Singleton Copley. He and his father, Simon Flexner, M.D., co-wrote William Henry Welch and the Heroic Age of American Medicine (1941). (His uncle, Abraham Flexner, was the educator whose 1910 report led to the reform of United States medical schools.)

James Thomas Flexner died February 13, 2003, at his apartment in New York City at the age of 95.

Works
 A Short History of American Painting. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1950.
 America's Old Masters: First Artists of the New World. New York: The Viking Press, 1939.
 An American Saga: The Story of Helen Thomas and Simon Flexner. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1984.
 Asher B. Durand: An Engraver's and a Farmer's Art. Yonkers: The Hudson River Museum, 1983.
 Doctors on Horseback: Pioneers of American Medicine. New York: Viking Press, 1937.
 George Washington, the Forge of Experience, 1732–1775. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1965.
 George Washington in the American Revolution, 1775–1783. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1968.
 George Washington and the New Nation, 1783–1793. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1970.
 George Washington, Anguish and Farewell, 1793–1799. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1972.
 Gilbert Stuart; a Great Life in Brief New York: Knopf, 1955.
 History of American Painting Volume 1: First Flowers of Our Wilderness. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1947.
 History of American Painting Volume 2: The Light of Distant Skies, 1760–1835. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1954.
 History of American Painting Volume 3: That Wilder Image; the Painting of America's Native School. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1962.
 John Singleton Copley. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1948.
 Lord of the Mohawks A Biography of Sir William Johnson. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1984.
 Maverick's Progress: An Autobiography. New York: Fordham University Press, 1996.
 Nineteenth Century American Painting. New York: Putnam, 1970.
 Paintings on the Century's Walls. New York: Century Association, 1963.
 Random Harvest. New York: Fordham University Press, 1998.
 States Dyckman: American Loyalist. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1980.
 Steamboats Come True: American Inventors in Action. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1978.
 The Double Adventure of John Singleton Copley. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1969.
 The Face of Liberty: Founders of the United States. Clarkson N. Potter, 1975.
 The Pocket History of American Painting. Pocket Library, 1957.
 The Traitor and the Spy: Benedict Arnold and John Andre. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1953.
 The World of Winslow Homer 1836–1910. New York: Time, Inc., 1966.
 The Young Hamilton: A Biography. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1978.
 Time-Life Library of Art: The World of Winslow Homer. New York: Time-Life Books, 1980.
 Washington: the Indispensable Man. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1974.

See also
Abraham Flexner (1866–1959), American educator
Charles Flexner (born 1956), American physician, clinical pharmaceutical scientist, academic, author and researcher
Simon Flexner (1863–1946), physician, scientist, administrator, and professor

References

External links
 Interview about Maverick's Progress: An Autobiography, Booknotes, June 2, 1996

James Thomas Flexner Papers at the New-York Historical Society.

1908 births
2003 deaths
American art historians
20th-century American historians
American male non-fiction writers
20th-century American journalists
American male journalists
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American biographers
Writers from Manhattan
American people of German-Jewish descent
Harvard University alumni
Historians of the United States
Jewish American historians
Journalists from New York City
American male biographers
National Book Award winners
New York Herald Tribune people
Pulitzer Prize winners
20th-century American Jews
21st-century American Jews
Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters

James Thomas Flexner