The St. Louis Municipal Opera Theatre (commonly known as The Muny) is an amphitheater located in St. Louis, Missouri. The theatre seats 11,000 people with about 1,500 free seats in the last nine rows that are available on a first come, first served basis.

The Muny seasons run every year from mid-June to mid-August. It is run by a nonprofit organization. The current president and chief executive is Kwofe Coleman. The current artistic director and executive producer is Mike Isaacson.

History

In 1914, Luther Ely Smith began staging pageant-masques on Art Hill in Forest Park. In 1916, a grassy area between two oak trees on the present site of The Muny was chosen for a production of As You Like It produced by Margaret Anglin and starring Sydney Greenstreet with a local cast of "1,000 St. Louis folk dancers and folk singers" in connection with the tercentenary of Shakespeare's death. The audience sat in portable chairs on a gravel floor.

Soon after, the Convention Board of the St. Louis Advertising Club was looking for an entertainment feature for its 13th annual convention, which was to take place June 3, 1917. Mayor Henry Kiel, attorney Guy Golterman, and Parks Commissioner Nelson Cunliff stepped in and, in 49 days (not counting seven lost to rain), created the first municipally owned outdoor theatre in the United States. On June 5, 1917, the opera Aida was presented on what would become the Muny stage.

In 1919, the new theatre received a name: St. Louis Municipal Opera Theatre, or "The Muny" for short. The first show under the Muny banner was Robin Hood, which opened on June 16, 1919, and featured Mayor Kiel as King Richard. Concerts were performed here prior to the opening of Riverport Amphitheatre in 1991.

By the beginning of the 1921 season, the facility had a new permanent stage. Its base was concrete to prevent damage from floods, such as one that damaged the theater's equipment on opening night in 1919. Improvements for 1922 included a new pergola, 750 permanent opera chairs, 500 parking spaces for automobiles, and the addition of "comfort stations". Additions for 1923 included 1,800 permanent seats, an extra stage for rehearsals, and a sound amplifier to enable people in the back of the audience to hear as well as those in the front.

On January 4, 1923, the Municipal Theater Association opened a free school for people who aspired to sing in the chorus for that summer's productions. Of 420 applicants, 239 had been accepted as of the class's beginning, with 45 remaining to be examined. Classes met two nights a week until May 1, when rehearsals began.

Keil stepped down from being president of the Municipal Theater Association in 1924, saying that the enterprise should be headed by businessmen, and Cunliff simultaneously left his position as chairman of the group's Executive Productions Committee. H. J. Pettengill, chairman of Southwest Bell Telephone Company's board of directors, was elected the new president.

Reserved seats for all paid admissions were instituted in 1925, after 2,400 numbered chairs were installed in the previously unreserved 25-cent section.

In 1930, the stage was equipped with a turntable for performance purposes. It was reconstructed in 1997 due to dilapidation. As part of the Second Century Capital Campaign/2018-19 renovations, the turntable was replaced. In 1994, The Muny's board of directors founded the Muny Kids, a select group of performers between the ages of 7 and 13 who traveled around St. Louis performing, and in the summer gave preview shows prior to the production. In 1998, the Muny Teens group was formed for the same purpose, featuring teen performers between the ages of 14 and 18.

The chairman of the board of the Muny in 2005-2006 was William H. T. Bush (younger brother of former President George H. W. Bush). The current Chairman of the Board is John W. Lemkemeier.

Production
The Muny produces all of its musicals (typically seven) in the season and operates only in the summer. During the winter, a full-time staff of 35 people prepare for the next summer season. During the season itself, the summer staff expands to include more than 500 people in various positions. All shows are rehearsed within the course of 11 days, with two technical rehearsals (one costumed, one not) being held in the two to three days before the show's opening. Shows run 7 days, although exceptions to this have occurred, particularly in recent years, when each season has had at least one production with an extended run. There is a two-three day break between shows to allow for tech and set, boom, and floor change.

In 2015, The Muny began producing Muny Magic at The Sheldon, bi-annual concerts at the Sheldon Concert Hall. They are cabaret-style concerts featuring artists who have appeared on the Muny stage. In recent years, Muny Artistic Director and Executive Producer Mike Isaacson has announced the lineup for the upcoming summer season at the spring installments of Muny Magic at the Sheldon.

See also
 List of The Muny repertory
 List of contemporary amphitheatres

References

External links

Ruth M. Howland Collection (Muny) finding aid at the St. Louis Public Library

Theatre companies in Missouri
Theatres in St. Louis
Organizations based in St. Louis
Non-profit organizations based in St. Louis
Amphitheaters in the United States
Outdoor theatres
Tourist attractions in St. Louis
Forest Park (St. Louis)
Theatres completed in 1917
Arts organizations established in 1919
1919 establishments in Missouri
Music venues completed in 1917
Musical theatre companies

The Muny


Matthew Wilkinson is a British actor, playwright and director.

Acting
Wilkinson trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and has performed in theatre, film, television and animation.

Early theatre work included Alan Bennett's The Wind in the Willows (Old Vic, 1996) directed by Jeremy Sams, and in 1997 The Warp for Ken Campbell (Barnet), Take Away (Lyric Hammersmith) and The Birds (The Gate). He was also seen in The Gift (BBC) directed by Danny Hiller.

In 1998 he played Torvald in A Doll's House (Harrogate) and performed in Playing Hide and Seek with Jesus by Richard Herring (Pleasance, Edinburgh) directed by Jeremy Herrin. More film work included The Avengers (Warner Bros),  The Jolly Boys' Last Stand with Andy Serkis and Sacha Baron Cohen and The Tichborne Claimant directed by David Yates, both with Bigger Picture Company.

In 1999 David Hayman directed him in Harbour Lights II (BBC) and over the next few years Wilkinson took roles in The Mystery of Men (BBC), It's a Girl Thing (Channel 4), Shackleton (Channel 4), Ali G Inda House and About a Boy (both Working Title).

In 2003 he performed in Hideki Noda's play Red Demon (Young Vic, London). Parts followed in V for Vendetta (Warner Bros. 2005), The Message (BBC 2006) and Finkle in Finkle's Odyssey (Large Films, 2006).

In 2011 he played Trigorin in The Seagull at the Arcola Theatre, London with Geraldine James.

Voice
Since 2009, Wilkinson has contributed over 20 characters to Thomas & Friends (HIT Entertainment) including Rocky, Spencer, Kevin, Charlie, Stanley, Scruff, Cranky, Butch and Farmer McColl in the UK dub as well as Rusty, Diesel 10, Merrick, Winston and Ben (since Season 22) in both dubs.

His first animation was playing Weasel on Watership Down (CITV, 1999). Other work includes Empire Square (Channel 4, 2006) created and directed by Dave Rowntree from Blur, The Adventures of Bottle Top Bill and His Best Friend Corky (Channel 5, 2007), Boris, Zed et al. in 64 Zoo Lane (CBBC, 2009), Bunny Maloney in Bunny Maloney (MoonScoop, 2009), Trust Me I'm A Genie (Millimages, 2011), Justin and the Knights of Valor (Kandor, 2013), rude-boy Stevie in The Unbeatables (Universal, 2014) and Mr. Fuzzy in 101 Dalmatian Street (Disney, 2018).

He has narrated Cops With Cameras (ITV) and voiced Scott in Blizzard: Race to the Pole (BBC, 2006).

Wilkinson is probably best known to gamers as Murmur in EA's Hellgate:London, Frida in LittleBigPlanet (PS4), Alexander the Great in Total War: Arena and Felix and Gor-Rok in Total War: Warhammer II (both Creative Assembly).

Wilkinson's break in the ad world came when he signed to voice the Be The Best army campaigns of the late 1990s. Since then he has voiced numerous commercials for TV and radio including the iconic If Carlsberg did...

Writing
In 2002 Wilkinson wrote and directed his first play Sun is Shining about a turbulent love affair between a British Chinese city boy and a Glaswegian painter. A sell-out at the Kings Head Theatre, London and BAC Time Out Critics' Choice season (2003), it transferred to the Brits Off Broadway Festival at 59E59 Theaters in New York City in 2004.

In 2003 Wilkinson co-adapted physical theatre piece Red Demon for Japanese performer auteur Hideki Noda. It played at the Young Vic and Theatre Cocoon, Tokyo.

In 2005 he directed Jake Broder in His Royal Hipness Lord Buckley at the Zam Zam Room, Broder's tribute to the legendary swing imposter (PizzaExpress Jazz Club, London).

In 2006 he wrote and directed a short film Lion which screened at festivals in Berlin, Paris and Nashville.

Red Sea Fish (Brighton Dome Studio Theatre and Brits Off Broadway, 59E59 Theaters, New York) was staged in 2009 and a female monologue Just Let Go (Chisenhale Dance Space) in 2012.

In 2015 he wrote and directed  at the Finborough Theatre. Starring Cal MacAninch and Thusitha Jayasundera it was nominated for three Off West End Awards including Best Play. The production transferred to the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh 2016 and 59E59 Theaters New York 2017.

In 2021 he wrote and directed Psychodrama as a pop-up in North London co-produced with Pádraig Cusack. Nominated for OffWestEnd Awards for Lead Performance in a Play: Emily Bruni and Sound Design: Gareth Fry. Psychodrama transferred to the Traverse Theatre for the Edinburgh Fringe 2022. Nominated for an OffFest Award for Best Theatre.

References

External links

Year of birth missing (living people)
Living people
Alumni of RADA
British male television actors
British male film actors
British male voice actors

Matt Wilkinson


Eriogonum marifolium is a species of wild buckwheat known by the common name marumleaf buckwheat. It is native to the Sierra Nevada and Klamath Mountains of California and the ranges' extensions into Oregon and Nevada.

Description
This is a dioecious mat-forming sub-shrub which grows on sandy mountain soils. It forms patches of wavy-edged pale green leaves and has erect, branching inflorescences reaching heights of anywhere from 10 to 40 centimeters.

The male and female plants are often so different in appearance that they look like separate species. The male plant produces clusters of tiny pale yellow staminate flowers and the female individuals produce clusters of much larger bright yellow or red pistillate flowers.

External links
Jepson Manual Treatment
Photo gallery

marifolium
Flora of California
Flora of Nevada
Flora of Oregon
Flora of the Sierra Nevada (United States)
Dioecious plants
Flora without expected TNC conservation status

Eriogonum marifolium


SafePeak Technologies  is a software company founded in 2007 in Israel. It markets products for big data related to relational database management systems.

History
SafePeak Technologies, originally DCF Technologies Ltd, was founded in 2007 by Vladi Vexler. It operated in stealth mode until 2009.

Between  2009 and 2013 the company partnered with distributors and technology partners from Israel (Ness, Valinor), Greece, USA and Hong-Kong.
In 2013 SafePeak partnered with Amazon Web Services on Microsoft SQL Server databases.

In January 2014 SafePeak Technologies entered into a technology IP acquisition agreement with a USA Boston based company ScaleBase, led by Ram Metser.

Technology
SafePeak Technologies  developed  technology for resolving databases scalability and performance of relational databases such as  such as the SQL Server and MySQL - automated dynamic caching. The Dynamic Database Caching technology was invented, patented and developed by the SafePeak Technologies.

SafePeak technology is designed to transform existing, working applications and databases into scalable, mostly-in-memory, high performance, low latency, high-load database systems running on commodity hardware. The software seamlessly integrated in the architecture and works both in private, public and hybrid cloud environments. The software resolves data access bottlenecks and latency without any change to existing applications or databases.

SafePeak caching is focused on caching of queries and stored procedures result-sets, storing the data entirely in RAM based special cache; no disk I/O is required for query operations. The Dynamic Cache nature of the system makes it: a) Application agnostic, as it does not require application or database code changes or additions; b) Any read-oriented queries and stored procedures are cacheable; b) Never stale cache = automated transaction ACID level data correctness.

After installation, the application connection string set the SafePeak hostname or server IP as the data source. SafePeak works with any standard Ado.Net, ODBC, JDBC or other database connection drivers.

SafePeak fully fits 3rd party applications or platforms as it requires no code changes in the application and database levels.

Principles of operation
 Reverse Proxy: SafePeak acts as a reverse proxy for database connectivity, implementing the database networking level protocol, like TDS (Tabular Data Stream) in SQL Server. Client applications create standard connections to SafePeak and the received results are expected database answers.
 Metadata learning: SafePeak analyses the structure of the database schema, parses all types of schema objects (tables, views, triggers, functions, stored procedures, foreign keys) and creates an internal map of dependencies. On DDL commands, or schema changes, SafePeak automatically re-analyzes the modified objects and applies required changes to its object definitions and SQL Patterns configuration.
 SQL Patterns Identification: Application queries and stored procedure calls are transformed into patterns of similar queries, analyzed and then used as rules for automated dynamic caching.
 Dynamic Caching: Queries arriving to SafePeak matched for existing cached response item in memory. If not found, the commands are passed for execution in the database. If the query is matching an allowed for caching pattern, then the result is stored in memory for future repetitive requests. On arrival of DML commands (inserts, updates, deletes, etc.) or arrival of stored procedures calls that were identified as containing DML commands - the relevant items in cache memory are cleaned and the command is passed to the database server for execution.
 100% Data Integrity: All features of ACID are supported. The data returned is always correct.

References

External links
 SafePeak website

Transaction processing
Software companies of Israel
Companies based in Tel Aviv
Israeli companies established in 2007

SafePeak


State Route 152 (SR 152) is a  east-west state highway traversing the flat farmland of West Tennessee.

Route description
SR 152 begins in Crockett County in Cairo at an interchange with US 412/SR 20, where the road continues west 1.75 miles as Reynolds Road to SR 189. Some maps erroneously label this as Nichols Road, even though this is incorrect. It goes east to have an intersection with SR 188 before leaving the community and continuing through rural areas, where it has an intersection with SR 54, before crossing into Gibson County. The highway crosses over the Middle Fork of the Forked Deer River to enter Humboldt along McLin Street to have an intersection with US 70A Bypass/US 79 Bypass/SR 366. It passes through neighborhoods as it turns south onto N 9th Avenue before turning east along Mitchell Street to have an intersection with US 45W Business/SR 5 (N Central Avenue). It continues east through neighborhoods to have an intersection with US 70A/US 79/SR 76 (Eastend Drive) before having an intersection with US 45W/SR 366. The highway now leaves Humboldt and passes through rural areas to have an intersection with SR 186 before entering Medina and having an intersection with US 45E/SR 43. SR 152 passes through downtown along W Church Avenue, then Main Street, and finally E Foster Avenue, before leaving Medina and continuing east through farmland to cross into Madison County. It turns southeast to cross the Middle Fork of the Forked Deer River, for a second time, to pass through Spring Creek, where it has a short 70 feet concurrency with US 70/SR 1, before turning completely south and having an interchange with I-40 (Exit 93). The highway then comes to an end shortly afterwards at an intersection with US 412/SR 20. The entire route of SR 152 is a two-lane highway.

Major intersections

References

152
Transportation in Crockett County, Tennessee
Transportation in Gibson County, Tennessee
Transportation in Madison County, Tennessee

Tennessee State Route 152


Eberhard III of Württemberg, called der Milde ('the Clement') (1364 – 16 May 1417, in Göppingen), ruled from 1392 to 1417 as the Count of Württemberg, then a part of the Holy Roman Empire.

Life

He was a son of Count Ulrich of Württemberg and Elisabeth of Bavaria (who was the daughter of the emperor Louis IV), and the grandson and successor of Eberhard II. His reign was noted by a peace-preserving policy of alliances with the neighboring principalities and imperial towns. Examples are an alliances with 14 Upper-Swabian towns, concluded 27 August 1395 and the Marbachs alliance in 1405. An important military success was the victory against the Schlegel-Gesellschaft in 1395 near Heimsheim. Eberhard's most significant territorial acquisition was the county of Mömpelgard (now Montbéliard), which he secured through the engagement of his son, the later count Eberhard IV with Henriette, Countess of Montbéliard. Henriette was the granddaughter and heiress of Stephen of Montfaucon, count of Mömpelgard. Eberhard III governed the county of Mömpelgard till 1409, when he handed it over to his son Eberhard IV.

Family and children
He was married twice. Firstly, in Urach on 27 October 1380 with Antonia Visconti, daughter of Bernabò Visconti. They had had 3 sons: Eberhard IV and two others, who died young.

Secondly, he married Elisabeth of Nuremberg (1391–1429), the daughter of John III, Burgrave of Nuremberg. The marriage agreement was dated 27 March 1406, and the marriage itself on 22 November 1412. In this marriage he had one daughter, Elisabeth (d. after 29 April 1476), who, though engaged to Albert III, Duke of Bavaria, eloped and married Count John IV of Werdenberg (before 2 August 1429 ) who had served as a page at her father's court.

See also
 History of Baden-Württemberg
 List of monarchs of Württemberg

Notes

1364 births
1417 deaths
14th-century counts of Württemberg
15th-century counts of Württemberg
Burials at Stiftskirche, Stuttgart

Eberhard III, Count of Württemberg


Spessard Lindsey Holland (July 10, 1892 – November 6, 1971) was an American lawyer and politician. He served as the 28th Governor of Florida from 1941 to 1945, and later as a US senator for Florida from 1946 to 1971. He was the first person born in Florida to serve as Governor and US Senator for the state. While serving as a US Senator he would notably introduce the 24th Amendment.

During his tenure as governor, he was mainly preoccupied with the preparations for World War II and the actual war itself. With the death of United States Senator Charles O. Andrews he was be appointed by Governor Millard F. Caldwell on September 25, 1946, to serve out the rest of his term which was set to expire next January. However, he was be reelected in 1946 and continued to seek reelection during every opportunity available serving as a Senator until he retired in January 1971.

Early life and education
Holland was born at his family's home on 390 East Church Street in Bartow, Florida on July 10, 1892. He was the son of Benjamin Franklin and Fannie Virginia Spessard. Spessard was one of three children in his family. Benjamin was a veteran of the American Civil War serving under the Confederacy as a member of the Georgia State Line under Company I of the 2nd Regiment. Benjamin's father was the orderly sergeant for his son's unit. Benjamin was born in Carroll County, Georgia in 1846 and was 17 when he joined the Georgia State Line in January 1864. He participated in the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain where he was wounded. He moved to Bartow in 1882 where he created the first abstract company in Polk County. Holland's father eventually served as a member of the school board, a county commissioner, and as the county treasurer.

His mother moved to Bartow in 1889 and was originally a teacher at the Summerlin Institute (now Bartow High School) prior to being married. Benjamin and Virginia married in September 1890 in Monroe County, West Virginia.

He attended public schools, graduating from the Summerlin Institute in 1909. Holland graduated magna cum laude from Emory College (currently Emory University) in 1912, where he was a member of the Alpha Tau Omega fraternity. Holland went go on to teach high school in Warrenton, Georgia from 1912-14.

In 1916, Holland began attending law school at the University of Florida. There he taught in the "sub-freshman department" (high school) of the university. He also became the first elected student body president and a member of the debating society. During his time at Emory and UF, he participated in track and field, football, basketball, and baseball. On one occasion, he played so well as a pitcher in an exhibition game against the Philadelphia Athletics that Connie Mack (the grandfather of Connie Mack III, who later the Senate seat Holland once occupied) offered him a contract that Holland ultimately declined.

World War I service
Holland qualified to be a Rhodes Scholar, and was already a junior partner with R.B. Huffaker in the Huffaker & Holland law firm, but his plans were interrupted by World War I. Holland volunteered for service and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Coast Artillery Corps, where he was transferred to France and served in the brigade's JAG Corps as an assistant adjutant. At his request, Holland was later transferred to the 24th Aero Squadron, Signal Corps of the Army Air Corps. Here he served with Lt. George E. Goldwaithe as a gunner and aerial observer, gathering information and taking photographs in reconnaissance missions behind enemy lines. At various times he took part in battles at Meuse-Argonne, Champagne, St. Mihiel, and Lunéville, where he downed two enemy planes. On one mission, Holland's plane crash-landed in a crater; on December 11, 1918, Holland was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. The citation, signed by John J. Pershing, noted:

First Lieutenant Spessard L. Holland, C.A.C. Observer 24th, Aero Squadron, distinguished himself by extra-ordinary heroism in connection with military operations against an armed enemy of the United States at Bois de Banthville, France, on October 15, 1918 and in recognition of his gallant conduct I have awarded him in the name of the President the Distinguished Service Cross."

Upon resigning his commission in July 1919, Holland was promoted to captain. Once back in the U.S., he toured for the Victory Loan Drive. After that, he went to Fort Monroe, staying there until he resigned his commission in the army. After that he resumed his law practice in Bartow.

Early political career
After the war, Holland resumed his law practice in Bartow. However, this was short-lived because Holland accepted an appointment as the Polk County prosecutor later that year. He served two years in the prosecutor's office and then left after being elected to a four-year term as a county judge in 1920. Holland was reelected in 1924, but left after the end of his second term in 1929. Holland returned to private law practice later that year, joining William F. Bevis in the law firm of Holland & Bevis. The firm grew rapidly, eventually becoming a large international law firm that still exists today as Holland & Knight.

In 1932, Holland was elected to the Florida Senate, where he served eight years. During his term, Holland was noted for his strong advocacy for public schools; as a member of the school committee, he drafted and cosponsored the Florida School Code and supported legislation that raised teachers' pay and retirement benefits. Holland also supported worker's compensation, tax cuts, and unemployment insurance. He was strongly opposed to both the sales tax and the poll tax, the latter of which he worked with Senator Ernest R. Graham to repeal in 1937.

Although Holland supported discrimination against African-American voters, he opposed the poll tax because he viewed it as a form of wealth discrimination that made voting difficult for both poor whites and poor African-Americans. Publicly, Holland cited two reasons for his opposition to the poll tax. The first being that he thought it would allow politicians to "buy" their way into office through political machines. Secondly, he thought that eliminating the poll tax would increase the amount of voter turnout in elections.

Gubernatorial campaign
Holland announced that he was running to be governor on December 4, 1939. He considered running for US Senator but decided not to. His campaign platform called for: expanding assistance to the elderly through increasing a tax on horse and dog tracks, making highways safer, continuing a ban on poll taxes for state elections, creating the Everglades National Park, giving state financial aid for economic development, regulating salary buyers, repealing the gross receipts tax, and improving working conditions in the state. He also pitched himself as being hard on crime but for tourism in the state.

During the first Democratic Party primary for governor, he finished in first place. Advancing to the second primary, he faced Francis P. Whitehair. Whitehair attacked Holland throughout the second primary and said in a speech that he was a candidate for "'an invisible government' of duPont interests, chain stores, and a fertilizer trust." Holland on the other hand charged that Whitehair was a product of a political machine. Whitehair accused him of the same thing. Holland ended up winning the second primary. When the general election approached, the Republican Party nominated John F. Walter as their candidate for governor to oppose Holland but ended up dropping out though. Holland did end up winning the general election in the end.

Governorship

Overview
While serving as governor, Holland promoted the establishment of military bases in his state. He also supported the state public school system's financial condition. A variety of financial reforms were also undertaken during his tenure as governor.

1941
Holland officially became governor of Florida on January 7, 1941. While serving as governor, his abilities were limited. Under the 1885 Florida Constitution, the governor could only serve for one four year term and the governorship was described as being weak position. Holland also had to compete with the influence of cabinet members who could be re-elected.

Concerns about World War II were dominant with his audience when becoming governor saying he wished for peace but said that preparations should be made in the case of war. His preparations began when he decided to review $7 million in State Road Department contracts made during the tenure of the Cone administration. He and his wife attended Franklin Delano Roosevelt's third inauguration and while in Washington D.C. he spoke with federal authorities and the Floridian congressional delegation to try to get more money for defense road construction which he was successful in getting. Florida saw an influx of military activities in it during the mobilization prior to entering World War II.

When Holland became governor, he attempted to improve Florida's lynching record. Florida, like the rest of the Southern U.S., faced pressure to take action on lynching during the 1940s. Holland's first challenge came on May 12, 1941, when a 22-year-old African-American man named A.C. Williams, who was accused of raping a 12-year-old girl and committing a robbery, was abducted from a jail in Marianna and lynched. Afterwards, there was pressure on the local government to act as they feared it would result in the federal government responding and pressure was also seen from the Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching (ASWPL) who wrote letters to Holland. In response, Holland called for an investigation into the death of Williams and named Maurice Tripp as the special investigator. A spokesperson for him said he "would be able to reach a decision on whether any action by him against Quincy law enforcement authorities was justified. The pressure of legislative business on the governor was heavy, and the inquest transcript is long." to give the impression that he was stalling when in reality he was shifting responsibility of the investigation. Tripp submitted a report to Governor Holland on May 25, 1941, and the case was given to the United States Department of Justice in July 1942, which reviewed it. The identities of those who killed Williams were never found.

When American involvement in World War II began with the attack on Pearl Harbor, Holland promoted new military bases in Florida and coordinated state defenses with the federal government. Governor Holland ordered the Florida Highway Patrol to be on standby to assist the Federal Bureau of Investigation with putting Japanese and other foreigners into custody.

The impact of World War II was felt at a more personal level in Spessard Holland's life as well. One of his sons, Spessard Holland Jr., served as a Marine in the South Pacific. The family planted a victory garden and set up a chicken coop at the Governor's Mansion. His daughter Mary volunteered as an aircraft spotter, while his daughter Craney his wife Mary sewed squares to be used in quilts sent to US troops. The Mansion was opened to visitation by British soldiers who were training in the area. Mary Holland even corresponded with the mothers of the soldiers.

1942
When the United States entered World War II, German Admiral Karl Dönitz launched Operation Drumbeat starting in January 1942, in an effort to cause significant damage to American shipping along the Eastern seaboard and the Gulf Coast. U-boat activity on Florida's coasts lasted until April but did have a brief lull period in March. As a result of the U-boat activity, tourism declined in the state, and the idea of building the Cross Florida Barge Canal was revived. Holland was neutral on the canal compared to Senators Charles O. Andrews and Claude Pepper who were strongly in support of it. Holland said the reason behind his neutrality was because of the canal itself being incredibly controversial.

During the 1942 general elections, Holland participated despite not being up for re-election. Holland participated by travelling throughout the state making public appearances in an attempt to generate interest in the election, trying to get a gas tax amendment passed. Holland made a statewide radio address urging people to vote. That year nine amendments were on the ballot, and Holland backed three of them: an amendment that would streamline the process for amending the state constitution, the gas tax amendment and another that would create a state freshwater fish & game commission. All nine amendments passed that year with almost no opposition

1943
During 1943 there were calls for a special session of the state legislature. State senator Wallace Sturgis, from Ocala, wanted a special session of the legislature to revise a 1943 absentee voting law to allow Floridians who were serving in the military outside of the state to register to vote. Sturgis later got the backing of the president pro-tempore of the Senate, Ernest F. Householder. Those wanting to repeal the cigarette tax also joined in with calling for a special session. Holland reacted to this by attempting to reduce enthusiasm towards a special session. In regards to the absentee voting law, Holland thought that it did a good job when it came to the first primary except in instances of those who became 21 prior to leaving the state. However, he thought it was not practical with a second primary as he thought it was very close in time to the first one along with being able to give and receive ballots as well. In terms of the cigarette tax, he thought that it would be safe to not repeal the cigarette tax in the case that if other taxes were to decrease it could serve as a supplement. Holland also cited potential changes in wartime restrictions. Having a special session became a significant issue in the 1944 Democratic gubernatorial primaries.

During a conference sometime during 1943 in Denver, Colorado, Holland promoted new railroad freight prices, helping the Florida economy.

1944 & 1945
Holland was also an outdoorsman and environmentalist. Holland's negotiation of the purchase of Everglades wetland and marshland in 1944 helped lead to the establishment of the Everglades National Park in 1947.

Holland's term ended on January 2, 1945, when Millard F. Caldwell took office.

U.S. senator

Holland, like many Southern Democrats, was a conservative who was pro-business, supported racial segregation, staunchly opposed the civil rights movement and labor unions, and believed in a limited federal government and states' rights. He opposed Harry Truman's proposals for national health insurance and the Fair Employment Practices Commission, and voted to override Truman's veto of the Taft-Hartley Act. However, he accepted the elements of the New Deal that benefited Florida economically, much like other Southern politicians of his time. Holland's views contrasted with those of Senator Claude Pepper, the senior Senator from Florida during his first four years, who was a more outspoken liberal. Holland had bad relations with Daniel McCarthy who he described as being "cold or thorny" while Leroy Collins openly disliked his record in the Senate.

1st term
On September 25, 1946 Holland assumed the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Charles O. Andrews, who had died a week earlier after being nominated by Governor Caldwell. In November 1946 he defeated Republican J. Harry Schad to win a full six-year term.

As he had in the Florida Senate, Holland supported abolishing the poll tax for federal elections during his time in the U.S. Senate, making an attempt to ban it during every session for a dozen years after arriving in Congress. During the 80th Congress, he introduced H.R. 29, which passed the House of Representatives in a 290-112 vote on July 21, 1947, but was filibustered in the Senate. During the following 81st Congress he introduced H.R. 3199 which also passed the House on July 26, 1949, in a 273-116 vote but got stuck in the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration. On other issues, Holland remained a segregationist who supported discrimination against Black voters, but maintained his view that the poll tax should be repealed because it was a form of wealth discrimination.

Second term
In 1952, he ran again for re-election winning a significantly larger margin of the vote (99.82%) than in the previous race in 1946 (78.65%). He, along with all other senators from the former Confederate states (except Lyndon B. Johnson, Estes Kefauver, and Albert Gore, Sr.), signed the 1956 "Southern Manifesto", which condemned the Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education (1954), declaring that segregation of public schools was unconstitutional, and promised to resist its implementation. Holland was in favor of Alaskan and Hawaiian statehood. Holland was the first southerner to support statehood for Hawaii. He also voted for Alaska Statehood Act and the Hawaii Admission Act. Along with Alaska's statehood, he introduced the two Senators-elect of the Alaska's congressional delegation that were produced as a result of the Alaska-Tennessee Plan to the US Senate: Ernest Gruening and Bill Egan.

Third term
Up for re-election in 1958, Holland was challenged by his former colleague Claude Pepper in the Democratic primary. After fending off Pepper's challenge, he easily defeated his Republican opponent, Leland Hyzer, in November to win a third term.

During the 87th Congress, Holland finally succeeded in his long-standing quest to ban the poll tax federally. Holland introduced a constitutional amendment that would prohibit states from conditioning the right to vote in federal elections on payment of a poll tax or other types of tax. The amendment was approved by the required two-thirds majority of both houses of Congress in August 1962, was quickly ratified by the required three-fourths of the states (38), and in January 1964 became the Twenty-fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Described as being a Conservative Democrat, he believed in maintaining the filibuster and believed that civil rights were something that was a matter for the states. Speaking in opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Holland said "We'll stand up and fight as long as we can".

On November 22, 1963, in the absence of Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson, Senator Edward Kennedy was presiding over a routine session of the Senate. Senators were debating a bill about federal library services, and it was almost time for a lunch break before Richard Reidell came running into the chamber where he bumped into Holland whispering that President Kennedy had been shot and Holland was the first senator to be informed of it. Reidell repeated his message to Senator Wayne Morse before telling Senator Kennedy of the news. After hearing this he left and went to the lobby where he called the White House and his brother Robert F. Kennedy before going to his office in the Senate Office Building. Holland replaced Kennedy as the presiding officer in the Senate when he left and  Holland took up the chair of the Senate Majority Leader, Mike Mansfield.

Fourth term
He won a fourth term in 1964, this time defeating Republican Claude R. Kirk, Jr. Then, in November 1969, at the age of 77, Holland announced that he would not seek re-election in 1970. He actively campaigned for Democrat Lawton Chiles, who defeated U.S. Representative William C. Cramer in the November 1970 election. Cramer had the endorsement of U.S. President Richard Nixon, and had handily defeated G. Harrold Carswell (whom Nixon had earlier nominated unsuccessfully to the United States Supreme Court) in the Republican primary.

Personal life
Holland married Mary Agnes Groover on February 8, 1919, and they were together until his death. Together they had four children: Spessard Lindsey Holland Jr., Mary Grover Holland, William Benjamin Holland and Ivanhoe Elizabeth Holland. As of 2016 their youngest daughter, Ivanhoe Craney, is the only one that is still alive, and she currently lives in Bartow. Mary Holland died after having a stroke in March 1975. In 1974, the city of Bartow dedicated Mary Holland Park in honor of her.

Holland was also a member of several fraternities during his life: Phi Beta Kappa, Alpha Tau Omega and Phi Delta Phi. His son Spessard Lindsey Holland, Jr. would be a nonregistered member of Phi Delta Phi. He was involved with Freemasonry being a 33rd degree Shriner. Along with freemasonry, Holland was a member of Sons of the American Revolution, American Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Bartow's Kiwanis club and the Elks. General James Van Fleet was a personal friend of Holland and did support him running for governor.

He was described as being a conservationist and enjoyed doing birdwatching. Holland also liked hunting and fishing as well. Holland was a fan of baseball and football and played tennis. He enjoyed collecting books on Florida history. While teaching in Georgia, he was known to have owned a motorcycle and crashed it many times; once he was flung 60 feet from it and landed scraping much of the skin from his back.

Holland left office in January 1971. Holland died of a heart attack at his Bartow home on November 6, 1971, at age 79.

Honors and degrees
He received several honorary degrees:
Rollins College (Bachelor of Laws, 1941)
Florida Southern College (Bachelor of Laws, 1941)
Florida State University (Bachelor of Laws, 1941)
Emory University (Bachelor of Laws, 1941)
Florida State University (Bachelor of Laws, 1956)
University of Miami (Bachelor of Laws, 1962)
University of Florida (Doctor of Comparative/Civil Law, 1953)
University of Tampa (HHD, 1956)
Stetson University College of Law (Doctor of Laws, 1970)

Several buildings and public facilities are named after Holland:
The Spessard L. Holland Law Center, the administrative building at the University of Florida Law School;
The Holland Building in Tallahassee;
The Spessard Holland Golf Course, Park, and Community Center, and the Spessard Holland Beaches, North and South, in Melbourne Beach;
The Spessard L. Holland Elementary School in his hometown of Bartow;
The Spessard L. Holland Elementary School in Satellite Beach, "Home of the Holland Hornets";
The Spessard Holland East-West Expressway (State Road 408); and
The section of U.S. Highway 17 in Holland's hometown of Bartow is known as the Spessard Holland Parkway.

References

Finley, Keith M. Delaying the Dream: Southern Senators and the Fight Against Civil Rights, 1938–1965 (Baton Rouge, LSU Press, 2008).

External links

Guide to the Spessard L. Holland Papers at the University of Florida

1892 births
1971 deaths
United States Army personnel of World War I
Democratic Party United States senators from Florida
Florida state court judges
Democratic Party Florida state senators
Democratic Party governors of Florida
People from Bartow, Florida
Recipients of the Distinguished Service Cross (United States)
United States Army officers
Fredric G. Levin College of Law alumni
Bartow High School alumni
People from Warrenton, Georgia
20th-century American judges
Military personnel from Florida
Holland & Knight partners
Signatories of the Southern Manifesto

Spessard Holland


Reunion (2001) is a science fiction novel by American writer Alan Dean Foster. The book is the seventh chronologically in the Pip and Flinx series.

Plot summary

Flinx has returned to Earth for only the second time in his life to search out the records of the extensive computer network known as the Shell that is maintained by the Unified Church. To do so he uses his empathic Talent to seduce Elena Carolles, a security guard in the Shell, and convinces her to allow him direct access to the most secure databanks. In the Shell he discovers a new bit of data about his mysterious past, information about the Meliorare Society, but the file containing this data has already been stolen by an operative hiding behind the front company Larnaca Nutrition.

The agent has absconded with the file to the bleak desert planet Pyrassis deep in AAnn held territory. Flinx has no recourse but to pursue in his own space ship, Teacher, leaving Elena in an emotional lurch. Once he reaches Pyrassis he finds the agent's ship, the Crotase, in orbit and apparently abandoned. A search of the ship for the missing file turns up nothing, so Flinx must pursue the ship's crew to the planet surface. On his trip down to confront the thief, he discovers that his shuttle has been sabotaged by the Crotase's AI. He crash lands far from his target, the camp of the ship's crew. Now forced to march across the desert with few supplies and only Pip, his minidrag, for company Flinx discovers the strange flora and fauna that exist on the harsh world.

The difficulty of his journey results in Flinx losing most of his supplies and being captured by a mated pair of AAnn scientists. They inadvertently reveal to him that the strange terrain over which he had been traveling wasn't just the broken lands of a desert, but was in fact an ancient alien transmitter. During Flinx's struggle to escape the reptilian scientist before members of the AAnn military take him into custody, they accidentally activate the transmitter revealing a secret on the outermost planet of the Pyrassis system, a brown dwarf star.

After escaping on a shuttle thoughtfully provided by Teacher's AI, Flinx follows both the Crotase and the transmitter's signal to the brown dwarf where an alien construct is found. He pursues the missing file into the construct where he finds the other ship's crew and his long lost sister Mahnahmi Lynx who is intent on killing him.

Flinx manages to use his mental Talent to defend himself when the Qwarm that Mahnahmi has hired attacks him. After binding the Qwarm and holding Mahnahmi at bay with a weapon, the two siblings exchange information confirming to Flinx's satisfaction and surprise, that Mahnahmi is indeed his sister and she was the one who stole the sybfile. Their reunion is broken up by a troop of AAnn soldiers hunting for the humans who had infiltrated their territory. The Qwarm is killed aiding in the siblings' flight while Mahnahmi breaks the tentative truce the pair had struck up, attacking him and stealing the transport Flinx had used to reach the alien construct.

His only means of returning to Teacher now gone, Flinx flees from the AAnn back into the depths of the construct which he discovers to be another Krang apparently also made by the Tar-Aiym, a long dead alien race. Using the Krang he fights off the AAnn and takes the shuttle that had belonged to Mahnahmi's ship, Crotase to return to Teacher.

It is revealed to the reader that the Krang wasn't communicating directly with Flinx, but with the plants that he had been given from the planet Midworld, plants that have achieved sentience and had been assisting Flinx in his adventure.

Characters
Flinx – protagonist
Elena Carolles – a security guard in the Shell
Krang  – a self-aware doomsday device left behind by the Tar-Aiym race
Qwarm  – a society of assassins
Pip – his minidrag

External links

Alan Dean Foster homepage

2001 American novels
2001 science fiction novels
American science fiction novels
Humanx Commonwealth
Novels by Alan Dean Foster
Sequel novels
Del Rey books

Reunion (Foster novel)


Józef Ludwik Zając (pron. Za-YANTz) (1891–1963) was a Polish general and pilot.

Biography
Born on 14 March 1891 in Rzeszów, Józef Zając studied at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, graduating with a PhD in philosophy in 1915. He joined the Polish pro-independence organization of that time; in 1912 he joined the Riflemen's Association where he took the course to gain the qualifications of a military officer.

In 1914 he joined the Polish Legions in First World War; he commanded the 3rd, 6th, 5th and again 3rd regiments (pułks). In 1918 he joined the Blue Army of general Józef Haller; until mid-1920 he spent most of his time in France (among other things, he attended the École Supérieure de Guerre). He took part in the last phase of the Polish-Soviet War: on 17 August 1920 he became the chief of staff of an Operational Group 'Wisła' of the Polish 5th Army, later, Operational Group 'North' of the 2nd Army, and finally, of the 3rd Army.

In the interwar period he continued his military career. In 1922 he became the chief of staff of the First Department of General Staff; in 1924 he was promoted to brigade general; in 1925 he became the First Deputy of the Chief of General Staff; in 1926 he became the commander of the Polish 26th Infantry Division. In 1936 he became the commander of the Kraków Military District and Inspector of the Polish Air Force. In 1937 he began aircraft pilot training and became the Commander of Air Defence. In 1939 he was the Deputy Chairman of the Polish Scouting and Guiding Association.

In February 1939 he succeeded General Ludomił Rayski as the Commander of Polish Air Force. Józef Zając was a strong supporter of the air superiority doctrine which emphasized strong fighter forces at the expense of a bomber force; however he had little time to implement his plans. After the German and Soviet conquest of Poland, he escaped to France, where he again became the commander of the recreated Polish Air Force as well as resuming his duties in the Polish Scouting and Guiding Association (ZHP).

After the fall of France he evacuated to Great Britain. In September 1940 he became the deputy commander of Polish I Corps. Next year he became the commander of the Polish Air Force in the Middle Eastern theatre and was promoted to division general. After Anders Army passed to Western command, he became the deputy commander of the Polish Army in the Middle Eastern theatre until March 1943. Later, until 1946 he was the Inspector of Training of the Polish Armed Forces in the West.

After the end of the Second World War, he elected not to return to communist Poland. He settled in Edinburgh, where he received another PhD in philosophy and worked in academia. During his life, he published several works - academic works in the areas of psychology and military science as well as his own memoirs from the war.

Zając died in Ottawa on 12 December 1963. His name was taken by the 21 Brygada Strzelców Podhalańskich (21 Brigade of Podhale Riflemen).

Honours and awards
 Silver Cross of the Order of Virtuti Militari
 Commander's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta, previously awarded the Officer's Cross
 Cross of Independence
 Cross of Valour (four times),
 Gold Cross of Merit with Swords
 Merit of the Forces in Central Lithuania
 Military Merit Cross, Austro-Hungary
 Military Merit Medal "Signum Laudis", Austro-Hungary
 Companion of the Order of the Bath, (United Kingdom)
 Chevalier of the Legion of Honour, (France)
 Iron Cross, Second Class (Germany)

External links

  Short bio

1891 births
1963 deaths
People from Rzeszów
Polish Austro-Hungarians
Polish generals
Polish legionnaires (World War I)
Polish Auxiliary Corps personnel
Blue Army (Poland) personnel
Polish aviators
Polish male writers
Jagiellonian University alumni
Recipients of the Silver Cross of the Virtuti Militari
Commanders of the Order of Polonia Restituta
Recipients of the Cross of Independence
Recipients of the Cross of Valour (Poland)
Recipients of the Cross of Merit with Swords (Poland)
Honorary Companions of the Order of the Bath
Knights of the Legion of Honour
Recipients of the Iron Cross (1914), 2nd class

Józef Zając


Gradski stadion (, ) is a multi-purpose stadium in Ruse, Bulgaria. It is used for football matches and concerts. It hosts the home games of Dunav Ruse and Lokomotiv Ruse. The stadium holds a capacity of 13,000 spectators, of which 2,000 places are designated for away fans.

Renovations

2013
The stadium was renovated in early 2013, as navy-blue seats were put on the main seven sectors. In December, roof covers were added over the main stand.

2017
Following Dunav's promotion to Bulgarian First League in 2016, the stadium was renovated to meet the licensing criteria of the Bulgarian Football Union. A new drainage system and an automatic watering system were installed, the renovation also included replacing the grass surface of the stadium and constructing floodlights. On the 24th of April, the Bulgarian Football Union licensed the stadium. Prior to the event, Dunav played their home matches on Ludogorets Arena in Razgrad, Bulgaria.

References

FC Dunav Ruse
Football venues in Bulgaria
Multi-purpose stadiums in Bulgaria
Buildings and structures in Ruse, Bulgaria

Gradski stadion (Ruse)


Sherlock Holmes and the Servants of Hell is a Sherlock Holmes pastiche by Paul Kane. The book thrusts Sherlock Holmes into the world of Clive Barker's Hellraiser.

Premise
After the death of his nemesis, Professor Moriarty, Holmes finds himself bored without someone with whom to match wits. He stirs from his malaise when an interesting case presents itself: Laurence Cotton's brother Francis has gone missing with only his screams from behind a locked door a clue to his whereabouts. Soon enough the trail leads Holmes to a particular puzzle box.

Reception
Niall Alexander of Tor.com called the book "a whole bunch of bloody fun". Steve Dillon of Dread Central enjoyed the "parallels with the established Hellraiser mythos" such as "the tie-ins to the Cotton family and the address on Lodovico street". Scream magazine praised the book: "The dynamic between Holmes and Watson, our narrator for the majority of the book, is wonderful" and the "setting and time period are perfect". Phil Lunt of The British Fantasy Society said that "Kane gambled with an intricate recipe—but triumphed in blending unorthodox ingredients with finesse and expertise to produce one hellishly tasty cocktail!"

References

2016 British novels
Crossover novels
Sherlock Holmes novels
Sherlock Holmes pastiches
Novels set in England
Hellraiser mass media
Solaris Books books


West Texas is a loosely defined region in the U.S. state of Texas, generally encompassing the arid and semiarid lands west of a line drawn between the cities of Wichita Falls, Abilene, and Del Rio.

No consensus exists on the boundary between East Texas and West Texas. While most Texans understand these terms, no boundaries are officially recognized and any two people are likely to describe the boundaries of these regions differently. The historian and geographer Walter Prescott Webb has suggested that the 98th meridian separates East and West Texas; writer A.C. Greene proposed that West Texas extends west of the Brazos River.  Use of a single line, though, seems to preclude the use of other separators, such as an area—Central Texas. Texas is part of the American South and the American Southwest at the same time, while the semiarid and desert climates of West Texas are clearly characteristic of the American Southwest.

West Texas is often subdivided according to distinct physiographic features. The portion of West Texas that lies west of the Pecos River is often called "Far West Texas" or the "Trans-Pecos", a term introduced in 1887 by geologist Robert T. Hill. The Trans-Pecos lies within the Chihuahuan Desert and is the aridest part of the state. Another part of West Texas is the Llano Estacado, a vast region of high, level plains extending into Eastern New Mexico and the Texas Panhandle. East of the Llano Estacado lies the "redbed country" of the Rolling Plains, and south of the Llano Estacado lies the Edwards Plateau. The Rolling Plains and Edwards Plateau subregions act as transitional zones between eastern and western Texas.

Climate
West Texas receives much less rainfall than the rest of Texas and has an arid or semiarid climate, requiring most of its scant agriculture to depend heavily on irrigation. Northern portions of the area are irrigated with water from underground sources, such as the Ogallala Aquifer. Irrigation withdrawal, and water taken out farther north for the needs of El Paso and Juarez, Mexico, have reduced the Rio Grande to a stream in some places, even dry at times.

Parts of West Texas have rugged terrain, including many small mountain ranges, while most parts of the state are closer to sea level. The northern parts of West Texas (notably the Panhandle) and the higher elevations of the mountain ranges of the Trans-Pecos region are prone to occasional heavy snowfall during winter, whereas snow is less common in other areas of West Texas.

Counties
The counties included in any Texas region vary depending on the organization compiling the list. Texas Counties.net acknowledges the variations while including 70 counties in its definition of West Texas. Within these broad boundaries, encompassing some of the Panhandle, are six principal metropolitan areas: El Paso, Midland/Odessa, Lubbock, Abilene, Amarillo, and San Angelo.

The counties included are Andrews, Bailey, Borden, Brewster, Brown, Callahan, Castro, Cochran, Coke, Coleman, Comanche, Concho, Crane, Crockett, Crosby, Culberson, Dawson, Deaf Smith, Dickens, Eastland, Ector, El Paso, Fisher, Floyd, Gaines, Garza, Glasscock, Hale, Haskell, Hockley, Howard, Hudspeth, Irion, Jeff Davis, Jones, Kent, Kimble, King, Knox, Lamb, Loving, Lubbock, Lynn, Martin, Mason, McCulloch, Menard, Midland, Mitchell, Motley, Nolan, Parmer, Potter, Pecos, Presidio, Randall, Reagan, Reeves, Runnels, Schleicher, Scurry, Shackelford, Stephens, Sterling, Stonewall, Sutton, Taylor, Terrell, Terry, Throckmorton, Tom Green, Upton, Ward, Winkler, and Yoakum.

Major cities

Smaller West Texas cities and towns include Alpine, Andrews, Anthony, Brownfield, Canutillo, Canyon, Coyanosa, Crane, Dalhart, Fort Davis, Fabens, Fort Bliss, San Elizario, Fort Stockton, Hale Center, Hereford, Iraan, Kermit, Lamesa, Levelland, Littlefield, Marathon, Marfa, McCamey, Mertzon, Monahans, Muleshoe, Ozona, Pampa, Pecos, Horizon City, Post, Rankin, Seminole, Slaton, Snyder, Sweetwater, and Van Horn.

Economy
Major industries include livestock, petroleum and natural gas production, textiles such as cotton, grain, and because of very large military installations such as Fort Bliss, the defense industry. West Texas has become notable for its numerous wind turbines producing clean and alternative electricity.

As of 2018, the West Texan economy was in a prosperous economic period, which has been described as the "West Texas oil boom".

Sports
West Texas does not have major league sports teams. Instead, the region has college teams such as Texas Tech Red Raiders, UTEP Miners, and Abilene Christian University Wildcats, which play in NCAA Division I, and NCAA Division II teams of the West Texas A&M Buffaloes, the Texas–Permian Basin Falcons, and the Lubbock Christian Chaparrals and Lady Chaps. El Paso also hosts the El Paso Chihuahuas, a AAA baseball team, and  El Paso Locomotive FC which plays in the USL Championship, the second tier of the American soccer pyramid. The Midland RockHounds and Amarillo Sod Poodles represent the region in double-A baseball. In 2019, the West Texas Rumbleweeds of the U.S. Arena Professional Soccer League began play. Junior hockey is also present in the region, with the Odessa Jackalopes of the Tier II North American Hockey League.

Politics
Except for the Trans-Pecos region, West Texas has become well known as a stronghold for conservative politics. Some of the most heavily Republican counties in the United States are in the region. Former U.S. President George W. Bush spent most of his childhood in West Texas.

The Panhandle and several counties in the Midland-Odessa area were some of the first parts of Texas to abandon the state's "Solid South" Democratic roots; nine counties have not supported a Democrat for president since 1948. The Rolling Plains to the east remained Democratic substantially longer: although Walter Mondale's 1984 campaign lost Texas by 27.50%, he won five counties in this region. Since 2000, this region swung very rapidly toward the Republican Party due to its population's intransigent opposition to the liberal social policies of the Democratic Party, and by 2016, it had nearly the same Cook PVI as the Panhandle.

West of the Pecos in popular culture

"West of the Pecos" has become a metaphor for the universe of Westerns. "Fastest draw west of the Pecos" and similar superlatives are a cliche, and the title character of Chisum observed "There's no law west of Dodge, and no God west of the Pecos".

See also

List of geographical regions in Texas
Llano Estacado
Beach Mountains
Chalk Mountains
Chamizal National Memorial
Davis Mountains
Franklin Mountains State Park
Palo Duro Canyon
Hueco Tanks State Historic Site
Guadalupe Mountains
McKittrick Canyon
Big Bend National Park
Ysleta del Sur Pueblo
Mount Blanco
Wind power in Texas
Farm to Market Road 669
West Texas Intermediate
Wyler Aerial Tramway

References

We Wanna Know: Where Does West Texas Begin?

Notes

External links
 West Texas Vacation Guide - Texas Outside

Regions of Texas

West Texas


CR7 Motorsports (also sometimes known as Grant County Mulch Racing) is an American professional stock car racing team that currently competes in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, fielding the No. 9 Chevrolet Silverado for Colby Howard and the No. 97 part-time for Codie Rohrbaugh. As well as in the ARCA Menards Series with the No. 97 Chevrolet part-time for Jason Kitzmiller. The team has also competed in the ARCA Menards Series East in the past.

The team is not named after Association football/soccer player Cristiano Ronaldo.

History

NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series

Rohrbaugh did qualify for the race in his and the team's first Truck Series attempt, at Bristol in 2018. As Korbin Forrister's team was already using the No. 7, they picked the No. 9 to use for their Truck Series team. They finished with a top-20 in their first race (16th) in No. 9 Chevrolet Silverado. Returning for the race at Texas in November, now driving a Ford truck, Rohrbaugh was able to make the race again, and he impressively picked up another top-20, finishing 17th. The team did announce they would be attempting Homestead, but they changed their mind to focus on preparing for the ARCA season-opener at Daytona in 2019.

Returning in 2019, CR7M attempted twelve races, about half of the season, and all with Rohrbaugh as the driver. The team used Silverados in all races they attempted. Rohrbaugh qualified for nine of twelve races. His DNQs came at Daytona, Martinsville in March, and Bristol. He crashed in each of the first three races he did qualify for, which were at both Texas races (in March and June) and Charlotte. His other DNF that year came when he was involved in the big one at Talladega. Despite not qualifying for some of his races and not finishing in others, he scored a top-10 finish in the second Martinsville race in October. Also in 2019, the team worked with three different crew chiefs. They started the year with Michael Shelton before he left to crew chief the No. 46 Kyle Busch Motorsports team. Their general manager and ARCA team crew chief Mark Huff worked with the truck team for the first Martinsville race. They then picked up Doug George, who came over after starting the season with the Niece Motorsports No. 44 team.
Rohrbaugh returned and ran 17 races in 2020. The season started with him finishing third in the NextEra Energy 250. Other than that, Rohrbaugh posted 5 top 20 finishes, including a 5th-place finish at Talladega Superspeedway and a 6th-place finish at Richmond Raceway. In 2021, Rohrbaugh got another top-10 in the season opener NextEra Energy 250, finishing 8th. Grant Enfinger drove the No. 9 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, finishing 7th. At the end of the year Colby Howard would make 3 starts for the team. In 2022, Blaine Perkins would drive the No. 9 truck full-time.

Truck No. 9 results

Truck No. 97 results

ARCA Menards Series
In addition to their K&N East races in 2016, Rohrbaugh's team made their ARCA debut that year, running the last two races of the year at Kentucky and Kansas. The same as how he did in his first East Series start, Rohrbaugh finished 13th in his ARCA Series debut. However, Rohrbaugh did not finish the race at Kansas due to electrical issues and ended up 32nd.

For 2017, Rohrbaugh and his No. 7 team attempted an expanded schedule of eight races in ARCA after dropping their K&N program. The team ran Chevrolets in all races, except for Daytona and Talladega that they ran Dodges. Rohrbaugh finished every race no worse than 16th except for when he crashed out at Chicago, finishing 29th.  His best finishes were a pair of 8th-place runs at Michigan and Kansas.

The team started out the 2018 season now driving a Chevrolet SS but crashed at Daytona and rebuilt the same car in time to attempt Talladega.

At the ARCA Daytona test in January 2019, Rohrbaugh announced he would compete in all the speedway races that year. However, Rohrbaugh eventually decided to focus on the Truck Series team, and they cut back their ARCA schedule for the rest of the 2019 season. Eric Caudell bought the team's owner points and switched his team's car number from the No. 2 to the No. 7, which Rohrbaugh's team had been running.

For 2020, the team returned to ARCA, entering a car in the series' testing at January in January with newcomer Jason Kitzmiller driving the No. 97 (since Caudell was continuing to use the No. 7). The team then filed an entry for the race there in February. The team has yet to announce whether they will attempt more races throughout the year after Daytona.

ARCA Menards Series East
Rohrbaugh's family team made their first NASCAR starts in 2014 in what was then the K&N Pro Series East while also competing full-time in the X-1R Pro Cup Series that year. With his grandfather Larry Berg as the listed owner, the team fielded the No. 05 Toyota in three races: Five Flags, New Hampshire, and Dover. Their best finish was in their debut at Five Flags, where Rohrbaugh finished 13th.

They returned for another part-time schedule in 2015, switching numbers from the No. 05 to the No. 7 and manufacturers from Toyota to Chevrolet. The team ran New Hampshire and Dover again, and also for the first time attempted New Smyrna, Bristol, and Richmond. The other race they entered that year was the East Series' first and to-date only race at Motordrome Speedway, where Rohrbaugh and his team earned their first top-10 with a 9th place finish.

The team attempted five East Series races the following year. They attempted mostly the same schedule, but with Motordrome and Richmond off the schedule for 2016, they attempted the new race at Mobile instead. Rohrbaugh crashed out in two of his five starts and finished in the top-20 (two 19ths and a 13th) in his remaining races.

References

External links

NASCAR teams
ARCA Menards Series teams

CR7 Motorsports


Goldengirl is a 1979 American drama sci-fi sports film directed by Joseph Sargent, based on the 1977 science fiction novel of the same title by Peter Lear, a pseudonym of Peter Lovesey. The screenplay was by John Kohn, with music by Bill Conti. The film is the screen debut of Susan Anton, who starred in the title role opposite James Coburn.

Plot
A scientist and neo-Nazi doctor named Serafin has developed a way to create a physically superior human being. He tests it out on his adopted daughter, Goldine.

From childhood, Goldine's father has injected her with vitamins and hormones. Now that she is grown, it is time to give her a test run. Serafin declares that his "Goldengirl" will enter and win three races at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow.

To subsidize his work, Serafin sells shares in his daughter's future to a syndicate of businessmen, who send merchandising expert Dryden to look out for their interests. Goldine's personal and emotional development, meanwhile, is left in the hands of a psychologist, Dr. Sammy Lee.

Goldine competes in Moscow, with unexpected results.

Cast
 James Coburn as Dryden
 Susan Anton as Goldine
 Curt Jurgens as Serafin
 Harry Guardino as Valenti
 Ward Costello as Cobb
 Michael Lerner as Stenberg
 Leslie Caron as Dr. Sammy Lee
 James A. Watson Jr. Winters
 John Newcombe as Armitage
 Julianna Fjeld as Ingrid
 Robert Culp as Esselton
 Nicolas Coster as Dr. Dalton
 Sheila Wills as Jackson (as Sheila DeWindt)
 Annette Tannader as Krull
 Mischa Hausserman as Pilot
 Tony Brande as Vince
 Michelle Hooper as Muratova
 Jeff Vanderstock as Starter #1 (as Geoff Vanderstock)
 Ben Pollock as Starter #2
 Nazaret Khodiquian as Starter #3
 Elliott Mason as Makepeace
 Jenny Sullivan as Dr. Walsh
 Karen Werner as Kansas Girl
 Andrea Brown as Teammate
 Casey MacDonald as Reporter
 Theresa Aldrich Fagundes as Reporter (as Theresa Aldrich)
 Gilbert Green as Dr. Hatrwig
 Darren Dublin as Reporter
 Joyce Danelen as Reporter
 Gil Smith as Reporter
 Bob Beamon as Colorman
 Dwight E. Stones as Philip

Production
Susan Anton was a winner of Miss California and second runner-up in the 1969 Miss America pageant. She was best known for starring and singing in TV commercials for Muriel Cigars. Anton earned a 1980 Golden Globe nomination for Best New Star of the Year in a Motion Picture—Female.

Olympic track-and-field stars Dwight Stones and Bob Beamon make cameo appearances in the film, as does Australian tennis player John Newcombe.

The film raised two-thirds of its $7 million budget by pre-selling the TV rights; NBC planned to broadcast an expanded 184-minute, two-part miniseries version that would air in conjunction with the network's exclusive coverage of the 1980 Moscow Olympics. After US participation was canceled in protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, NBC postponed the broadcast until January 8, 1981 when it aired a 117-minute version in a three-hour timeslot.

Reception
Vincent Canby of The New York Times, called the film "a very intelligent movie of its kind, written and directed in the same brisk style that marked Mr. Sargent's earlier Colossus: The Forbin Project," as well as "a wittily conceived and executed movie that, with the straightest of faces, manage to satirize the kind of big business that surrounds so-called amateur sports today."  A review in Variety said, "'Goldengirl' is amusingly poor ... Central fault to film is Anton's character, who seems to alternate between robot, country girl and schizophrenic. Her screen debut is at best, forgettable, with Anton doing little to clear up the mystifying script." Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune gave the film 1 star out of 4 and wrote, "The idea isn't a bad one; it's even plausible. But the script is laughable. The doctor and businessman are fearful, cartoon figures; they never are particularly slick or menacing. Only James Coburn as an advertising agent brings any credibility to a role. And this is not accomplished by anything written for Coburn; he simply earns our good will through his infectious smile." Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times wrote that the film "starts out promisingly enough but falls apart halfway through ... The film is extremely uneven, achieving a punchy scene here and there only to have its effect nullified by an unintentionally funny line of dialogue or an inconsistent characterization." Gary Arnold of The Washington Post wrote that "the continuity is so punchy that one can't be certain what the filmmakers wanted the story to mean. The smartest lines and most effective situations suggest an entertaining polemic about unscrupulous, ruinous exploitation. But the concept seems to have been victimized by a combination of cold feet, cross-purposes and desperate last-minute editing, which eliminated substantial pieces of exposition along with one major player, Jessica Walter, who is still listed in the credits." Jack Kroll wrote in Newsweek, "Goldengirl fumbles a good story idea, or several good story ideas ... A film that might have had the excitement of Olympic competition and the fun of clever science-fiction founders in dump scenes, Joseph Sargent's heavy-handed direction and some awkward editing which apparently eliminated a pivotal scene showing Serafin's background in Nazi-like medical experimentation."

The film was a box office flop, earning $3 million in North American rentals against a $7 million budget.

See also
The Bionic Woman, a 1976-1978 television series
 List of films about the sport of athletics

References

External links

1979 films
1970s science fiction drama films
American science fiction drama films
1970s sports films
American sports drama films
Running films
Embassy Pictures films
1970s English-language films
Films scored by Bill Conti
Films about the 1980 Summer Olympics
Films about Olympic track and field
Films based on science fiction novels
Films directed by Joseph Sargent
Films set in 1980
Films set in Moscow
1979 drama films
Films produced by Elliott Kastner
1970s American films

Goldengirl


Delta is a horizontally scrolling shooter released for the Commodore 64 by Thalamus Ltd in 1987. It was programmed by Stavros Fasoulas and the music was written by Rob Hubbard.  The game was published  as Delta Patrol in the United States by Electronic Arts, for its Amazing Software line, in 1987 on the Commodore 64. It was also released for the ZX Spectrum in 1990 as Delta Charge.

The menu-music is based on the theme of Koyaanisqatsi by Philip Glass and the in-game-music is based on Pink Floyd's "On the Run".

Plot
Delta is a game in which the player character is a member of the Delta Patrol, an elite squadron of police in the Delta Sector, and has command of a battle cruiser. The dangers of the Delta Sector include lost ships and alien bandits among other unknown destructive forces, and the character must terminate the alien enemy forces that use these hazards to hide. Destroying an entire wave of enemies earns credits that the player may use to purchase weapons and ship modifications.

Gameplay
The player controls a spaceship and gains power-up points by destroying formations of enemies. Some enemy formations instead subtract power-up points for the player, so the player must take note of which formations to destroy. Periodically blocks containing the power-ups (higher speed, faster rate of fire) appear and the player can pick one of them up: The more points the player has collected, the more powerful are the power-ups that can be chosen. Unavailable power-ups are gray and kill the player if he flies into them, making them part of the obstacles in the game. The effects of the power-ups are lost over time and must therefore be regained. The player gets a choice between in-game music or in-game sound effects. There is also a high score table but no way to save it when the game is turned off.

Reception
Delta Patrol was reviewed in 1987 in Dragon #128 by Hartley, Patricia, and Kirk Lesser in "The Role of Computers" column. The reviewers gave the game 4 out of 5 stars. Computer Gaming World stated "the graphics are not especially exciting and the game reminds this reviewer of the old Atari 2600 game, Megamania". Zzap!64 saw reviewers Julian Rignall, Gary Penn and Steve Jarratt divided by the game; none disliking it, but some not thinking it was as good as its predecessor Sanxion. The game received a 74% overall rating in the April 1987 issue.

References

External links

Delta Charge at World of Spectrum

1987 video games
Commodore 64 games
Europe-exclusive video games
Thalamus Ltd games
Video games about police officers
Video games scored by Rob Hubbard
Video games developed in Finland
ZX Spectrum games
Multiplayer and single-player video games

Delta (video game)


The electron neutrino ( ν ) is an elementary particle which has zero electric charge and a spin of 1⁄2. Together with the electron, it forms the first generation of leptons. It was first guessed by Wolfgang Pauli in 1930. It was accounted for missing momentum and missing energy in beta decay. Later it was discovered in 1956 by a team led by Clyde Cowan and Frederick Reines (see Cowan–Reines neutrino experiment).

Elementary particles

Electron neutrino


A Cool Million: The Dismantling of Lemuel Pitkin is Nathanael West's third novel, published in 1934. It is a brutal satire of Horatio Alger's novels and their eternal optimism.

Plot summary
A Cool Million, as its subtitle suggests, presents "the dismantling of Lemuel Pitkin," piece by piece. As a satire of the Horatio Alger myth of success, the novel is evocative of Voltaire's Candide, which satirized the philosophical optimism of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and Alexander Pope.  Pitkin is a typical 'Schlemiel', stumbling from one situation to the next; he gets robbed, cheated, unjustly arrested, frequently beaten and exploited. In a parallel plot Betty Prail, Pitkin's love interest, is raped, abused, and sold into prostitution. Over the course of the novel Pitkin manages to lose an eye, his teeth, his thumb, his scalp and his leg, but nevertheless retains his optimism and gullibility to the inevitably bitter end.

Pitkin's troubles, however, don't end with his death. Even after his death he is exploited as a martyr by the 'National Revolutionary Party', a political organization led by Shagpoke Whipple, a manipulative former American president. Pitkin's birthday becomes a national holiday and American youths march down the streets singing songs in his honor.  Whipple speaks out against aliens and calls for a rejection of "sophistication, Marxism and International Capitalism."  The novel ends with a series of roaring "hails" from the crowd.

Literary significance and criticism

Pitkin's pathetic inability to conform to society's standards, or to the 'American' way of life, is the main cause of his repeated failures. Nevertheless, there is something admirable in Pitkin's naïve persistence, as West wrote in a letter to S. J. Perelman:
Suppose he had the Horatio Alger slant and was a guy who was trying to get one foot on the ladder of success and they were always moving the ladder on him, but they couldn't touch the dream.

West not only parodies Alger by mimicking his prose style, he also lifted several passages directly from a number of different Alger novels. In A Cool Million, West presents Italian slavers, Chinese pimps, brutal Irish cops, and greedy Jewish lawyers. Though most of the early criticism dismissed the novel as too direct a parody to have any real literary merit, it is seen by some as an early example of postmodernism. Harold Bloom includes A Cool Million in his list of canonical works of the period he names the Chaotic Age (1900–present) in The Western Canon. Bloom also deems the rhetoric used by Shagpoke Whipple as prophetic of such presidents as Ronald Reagan.

Publication history
West began writing A Cool Million in the fall of 1933. A handwritten first draft was completed in November.  Though Harcourt, Brace rejected the novel, West continued to work on it until it was finally accepted by Covici-Friede in March 1934. The novel was published in New York City in an edition of 3,000 copies to mixed reviews and poor sales; it was not reprinted in West's lifetime. The novel later appeared in several reprints starting from 1940, following West's renewed fame, and was collected in a single volume edition of the complete novels, as well as in the Library of America edition of West's collected works.

A Cool Million – a screen story
In September 1940 West wrote an original screen story in collaboration with Boris Ingster. They used A Cool Million as their title, though the story had nothing to do with the novel, hoping that a studio would pay more for a story allegedly based on a published book. West was certain that no one would actually read the book to check whether the screen story had any relation to the novel. On September 24, 1940 Columbia Pictures bought the story for $10,000 and assigned it to screenwriter Sidney Buchman. However, the studio soon abandoned the project and A Cool Million was never filmed. The text of the screen story appears in the Library of America's edition of West's work.

References

1934 American novels
American comedy novels
American satirical novels
Parody novels
Novels by Nathanael West
Films with screenplays by Nathanael West
Covici-Friede books

A Cool Million


The Northern Silk Road is a historic inland trade route in Northwest China and Central Asia (historically known as the Western Regions), originating in the ancient Chinese capital of Chang'an (modern day Xi'an), westwards through the Hexi Corridor (in what is the modern Gansu province) into the Tarim Basin, going around north of the Taklamakan Desert along the two sides of the Tianshan Mountains, and then past the Pamir Mountains to reach the ancient kingdoms of Bactria, Sogdia, Kushan, Parthia and eventually the eastern provinces of the Roman Empire. It is the northernmost branch of the several Silk Roads providing trade, cultural exchanges and military mobilizations between China and the outside world.

The route was first developed by the Han dynasty in the latter part of the 1st century BC to secure diplomatic alliance against the Xiongnu confederacy, with whom China had been having escalating conflicts, and was progressively transformed into a major trade route during the subsequent dynasties to project Chinese influence towards the west.

Route
The route started at Chang'an, the capital of the Western Han and Tang dynasty, which was moved further east to Luoyang during the Eastern Han dynasty.

The route travels northwest through the Chinese province of Gansu from Shaanxi Province, and splits into three further routes, two of them following the mountain ranges to the north and south of the Taklimakan Desert to rejoin at Kashgar; and the other going north of the Tian Shan mountains through Turpan, Talgar and Almaty (in what is now southeast Kazakhstan).

The routes split west of Kashgar with one branch heading down the Alay Valley towards Termez and Balkh, while the other traveled through Kokand in the Fergana Valley, and then west across the Karakum Desert towards Merv, joining the southern route briefly.

One of the branch routes turned northwest to the north of the Aral and Caspian seas and                                                                           then on to the Black Sea.

See also
Hexi Corridor
Kashgar
Dunhuang

References

External links
 Pictures from the Northern Silk Road

History of transport in China
Sites along the Silk Road

Northern Silk Road


Steve Poindexter (born 1965) is an American house producer and DJ. He is best known for his 1989 track "Work That Mutha Fucker", which is considered to be one of the first Chicago ghetto house tracks.

Early life
Poindexter was born in 1965. His father was a jazz drummer and his mother was a backup singer for Mahalia Jackson.

In 1975, at the age of ten, Poindexter started DJing for Saturday night parties held at Mendel High School on the South Side of Chicago.

Career
Inspired by Jesse Saunders' "On and On", Poindexter and his cousin John Hunt started experimenting with drum machines and began creating edits to play at parties.

Poindexter's first record, the Work That Mutha Fucker EP, came out in 1989 as the first release on his and Armando's label Muzique Records. The title track, built on the Casio RZ-1 drum machine and featuring Poindexter's repeated "work that motherfucker" vocal sample, is considered to be an iconic ghetto house track and hugely influential on the genre. Ghetto house producer DJ Deeon listed "Computer Madness" from the EP as one of his five top ghetto house tracks, describing Poindexter as "a leading legend in this shit" for his generation of house producers.

Discography
Albums
 Man at Work (1996)
EPs
 Work That Mutha Fucker (1989)
 Short Circuit (1989)
 Phase II (1991)
 Chaotic Nation (1991)
 190 Octane (1993)
 Demolition Man (1997)
 Rise (1999)
 The State of Shock EP (2010)
 Street Fighter EP  (2015)
 Classic Collection, Vol 1 (2016)

References

External links

House musicians
DJs from Chicago
American DJs
1965 births
Living people
Electronic dance music DJs

Steve Poindexter


Observatory Inlet is an inlet on the North Coast of British Columbia. It is a northward extension of Portland Inlet, other branches of which include the Portland Canal. The entrance of Observatory Inlet, from Portland Inlet, lies between Ramsden Point and Nass Point. Ramsden Point also marks, to the west, the entrance of Portland Canal. Observatory Inlet was named by George Vancouver in 1793, because he set up his observatory on the shore of the inlet, at Salmon Cove, in order to calibrate his chronometers. His two vessels, HMS Discovery and HMS Chatham, stayed in Salmon Cove from July 23 to August 17, 1793. During this time a boat surveying expedition under Vancouver himself explored Behm Canal. Vancouver also named three headlands at the entrance of Observatory Inlet: Maskelyne Point, for Nevil Maskelyne,  the Astronomer Royal, Wales Point, for William Wales, the mathematical master who sailed with James Cook, and Ramsden Point, after the famed mathematical instrument-maker Jesse Ramsden.

Geography
Observatory Inlet has two main arms, the northwest and longer one being named Hastings Arm, fed by the Kshwan River, and Alice Arm, an east arm, fed by the Kitsault River. Hastings Arm is approximately  in length, and runs on a nearly true north–south axis, Alice Arm is approximately  in length and bends sharply, running on a roughly northeast–southwest axis. From their merger to the mouth of Observatory Inlet is approximately  in length, running south-southwest to its merger with the Portland Canal just southwest of Nass Bay, which is an arm of Observatory Inlet and the saltwater outer estuary of the Nass River.

Of many islands in the inlet, Granby Island and Brooke Island are located at the intersection of the Hastings and Alice Arms. Granby Island and Granby Bay are named for Granby Consolidated Mining, Smelting and Power Company, which built and operated the mining town of Anyox, located on Granby Bay.

Settlements
At the aperture of Nass Bay is the community of Arrandale on its southern point, with the community of Ging̱olx (Kincolith) located on its northern shore just inside the bay at the mouth of the Kincolith River.  Also entering the Nass estuary just to its east is the Iknouk River.

The smelter ghost town of Anyox is located on the west side of the inlet at Granby Bay, which marks the beginning of Hastings Arm.

The locality of Alice Arm, which is a former steamer landing and on the west bank of the mouth of the Kitsault River, is located at the head of the inlet's Alice Arm projection.

The former mining town of Kitsault is located  due south of Alice Arm, on the far side of the inlet's shoreline. With no rail nor road connection to the rest of British Columbia, these mining towns relied on shipping through Observatory Inlet.

Adjacent to the community of Alice Arm, but on the east side of the Kitsault River, is the Nisga'a village of Gits'oolh (formerly Gitzault Indian Reserve No. 24).

References

External links

Fjords of British Columbia
North Coast of British Columbia
Inlets of British Columbia

Observatory Inlet


Thai Post () is a daily Thai-language newspaper in Thailand. It is owned by the Thai Journal Group Co. Its circulation is in the 100,000-150,000 range. Currently the HQ is in Klong Toei, Bangkok.

Political Stance
Thai Post has a biased political reporting in favor of Thai conservatism and nationalism. The newspaper often publishes news with oversensational and misleading headlines, and often using disinformation tactics to attack government opposition and critics.

On 16 July 2003, the newspaper published comments from media rights advocate Supinya Klangnarong, who said that the Shin Corporation, then majority-owned by the family of Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, had benefited because of favorable policies by the Thaksin government. The newspaper was named as a co-defendant, along with Supinya, in a criminal libel lawsuit brought by Shin Corp. A civil suit sought 400 million baht in compensation. After the Thaksin family sold its shares in Shin Corp to Singapore's Temasek Holdings, the company offered to drop the lawsuit on the condition that Supinya apologized for her comments. Supinya refused the offer. On 14 March 2006, the Criminal Court threw out the criminal lawsuit, saying the article in the Thai Post was presented in good faith and in the public's best interest. On 8 May 2006, Shin Corp. asked that the civil lawsuit be withdrawn. Neither Supinya nor Thai Post had any objections, so the court withdrew the civil suit.

See also
 Media of Thailand

References

External links
 ThaiPost.net

1996 establishments in Thailand
Mass media in Bangkok
Newspapers published in Thailand
Newspapers established in 1996
Thai news websites
Thai-language newspapers

Thai Post


We Care a Lot is the debut studio album by American rock band Faith No More, originally released in 1985 and distributed through Mordam Records. On the original vinyl release, the band is credited as Faith. No More. on the album's liner notes, back cover, and on the record itself.

Album information
The title track "We Care a Lot" was rerecorded for their follow-up album Introduce Yourself and released as their first single. This later version of the song was incorrectly listed as the original and the album Introduce Yourself was listed as the début in the sleeve notes for some subsequent releases, such as the 1998 compilation Who Cares a Lot?.

The band is known to have re-recorded only one song from We Care a Lot in the studio with current singer Mike Patton on vocals. "As the Worm Turns" was recorded during the Angel Dust sessions.

However, a number of live recordings of songs from this album with Patton on vocals have been released over the years.

 "We Care a Lot"
 various "Falling to Pieces" singles
 Live at the Brixton Academy
 "We Care a Lot" (contains Patton's live version from Live At The Brixton Academy and Mosley's studio version from Introduce Yourself)
 "I'm Easy/Be Aggressive" CD2 single
 "We Care a Lot/I Started a Joke" (contains Patton's live version from Live At The Brixton Academy and Mosley's studio version from Introduce Yourself)
 various "I Started a Joke" singles
 "Mark Bowen"
 "I'm Easy/Be Aggressive" CD1 single
 "As the Worm Turns"
 various "Epic" CD singles
 Live at the Brixton Academy
 Angel Dust (Japanese edition)

A later recording of "We Care a Lot" (from the album Introduce Yourself) is used as the theme song for the show Dirty Jobs.

Production
The band initially started recording the album without backing from a record label and, after pooling their money, recorded five songs. This gained the attention of Ruth Schwartz (who was then forming the independent label Mordam Records) under which the band (after receiving the finances to do so) finished and released the album. It was the first official release for both the band and the label.

The album was recorded in a short space of time on a low budget. In a 2015 interview, bassist Billy Gould reflected, "There are probably things we could have done better, but at the same time I think that the performances were pretty damned good. And that had to do with us keeping focused and needing to work within those budget restrictions. We rehearsed quite a lot before we went in to record, so we were ready."

Release history

While released on vinyl and cassette in 1985, this album would not be released to buy as a CD until 1995 in Australia (on Mushroom Records) as a pink disc for the first pressing, and black disc for the second, to coincide with the tour for their fifth studio album King for a Day... Fool for a Lifetime, released that year. In 1996, it was reissued on CD, vinyl and cassette in the UK and Japan with slightly modified artwork, one being a purple disc. The CD reissue version of the album can be seen during a scene at a record store in the 1997 film Chasing Amy.

2016 reissue
The album was reissued by Koolarrow Records on August 19, 2016, and includes nine additional tracks, including three remixes, four demos and two live recordings from a 1986 show at the I-Beam, San Francisco. It was remastered by Maor Appelbaum

Music and lyrics
The third track "Mark Bowen" was titled after an early Faith No More/Faith No Man guitarist of the same name.

Critical reception

Select magazine, while also mentioning the roughness of production, said that the music is inexorable and "a lustful marriage of mutoid metal and dancefloor verve that owed nothing to anybody". AllMusic made repeated reference to the absence of future front man Mike Patton and criticized Chuck Mosley's vocals, calling him "often off-key, fairly monotonous, and colorless" but credited the album for having "lots of attitude", comparing it to early Public Image Ltd works.

Mike Patton labelled the album as "bad hippie music". However, his Mr. Bungle bandmate Trey Spruance was a fan. When Spruance joined Faith No More for their 1995 album King for a Day... Fool for a Lifetime, he suggested that the band return to the sound they had on We Care a Lot.

Track listing

2016 reissue bonus tracks

We Care a Lot - Deluxe Band Edition - Remastered by Maor Appelbaum

Personnel

Faith No More
 Mike Bordin – drums
 Roddy Bottum – keyboard
 Bill Gould – bass
 James B. Martin – guitar
 Chuck Mosley – vocals

Production
 Matt Wallace – producer
 Olga Gerrard – artwork, cover, graphics

Footnotes

1985 debut albums
Albums produced by Matt Wallace
Faith No More albums
Post-punk albums by American artists

We Care a Lot


The North-south regional rapid railway is a railway construction plan in Budapest, modelled on the Paris RER or German S-Bahn systems. Its aim is to connect three of the Budapest Helyiérdekű Vasút (BHÉV) suburban train lines, from Szentendre, Ráckeve and Csepel. The plan is also called Metro 5.

History
In the '90s, the growth of the suburbs was not accompanied by public transportation. Population growth was especially strong in Buda and in Csepel island region, but the HÉV lines end at the boundaries of the downtown area, where passengers have to change to go into the city. Hence the idea was born to connect the HÉV lines underground. Lord Mayor Gábor Demszky first spoke of plans in 2002.

In 2005 the city council set aside a first 100 million forint for the project. The council proposed to implement the investment between 2007 and 2010 with European Union funding, but this was rejected. In 2007 deputy mayor Miklós Hagyó stated the council wanted to begin construction of the railway, and in February 2008, the Urban and Suburban Transport Association (VEKE) designed a four-track version of the metro line, now proposing to build the railway line from European Union sources between 2014 and 2020.

From 1 September 2019 the H5 suburban railway line was renamed line M5.

On 14 April 2021 test excavations began as part of preparations for the first section between Közvágóhíd and Kálvin tér.

Planning
The proposal is for a rapid rail system which will include the Budapest-Esztergom heavy railway line northward, and the Budapest-Kunszentmiklós line  southward.

The Csepel and Ráckeve HÉV lines will be connected on the surface, near the National Theatre. In Boráros Square, the metro goes underground, and at Kálvin Square it crosses Metro line 3 and line 4. At Astoria the line crosses line 2. The rail heads to Oktogon, and crosses line 1. Finally, at Lehel tér, the line again crosses Metro line 3 before heading to Margaret Island and Buda side.

Proposed stations
Metro line 5, Észak-déli Regionális Gyorsvasút (North-South Regional Rapid Railway; provisional name), is planned to be a suburban railways' connector line, meant to replace and connect the lines of the existing suburban railways between Szentendre (currently served by HÉV Line 5), Ráckeve (currently served by HÉV Line 6) and Csepel (currently served by HÉV Line 7). It will cross Budapest downtown, and provide connection for the railway stations in the city. It will probably have the following stations (except for the termini, only those within Budapest are included):

 Szentendre
 ...
 Békásmegyer
 Petőfi tér
 Csillaghegy
 Rómaifürdő
 Aquincum
 Záhony u.
 Kaszásdűlő
 Bogdáni út
 Flórián tér
 Amfiteátrum
 Szépvölgyi út
 Margitsziget
 Szent István park
 Lehel tér
 Oktogon
 Klauzál tér
 Astoria
 Kálvin tér
 Boráros tér
 Könyves Kálmán körút
 Beöthy u.
 Kén u.
 Timót u.
 Határ út
 Pesterzsébet – városközpont
 Nagysándor József u.
 Klapka Gy. u.
 Wesselényi u.  (or Akácfa u. instead of the latter two)
 Vörösmarty tér
 Könyves u.
 Tárcsás u.
 Soroksári vasútállomás
 BILK (logisztikai központ)
 ...
 Csepel, Ráckeve

Branching at Könyves u.:
 Soroksár felső
 Soroksár – Hősök tere
 Szent István u.
 Millennium-telep
 ...

See the map.

References

Budapest Metro
Proposed rail infrastructure in Hungary
Underground commuter rail

Metro Line M5 (Budapest Metro)


The district of Aarberg is a district of the canton of Bern, Switzerland. The capital is the town of Aarberg. There are 12 municipalities in the district covering an area of 153 km²:
 CH-3270 Aarberg
 CH-3282 Bargen
 CH-3257 Grossaffoltern
 CH-3283 Kallnach
 CH-3273 Kappelen
 CH-3250 Lyss
 CH-3045 Meikirch
 CH-3283 Niederried bei Kallnach
 CH-3271 Radelfingen
 CH-3255 Rapperswil
 CH-3054 Schüpfen
 CH-3267 Seedorf

Former districts of Bern

Aarberg District


A series of major earthquakes struck Central Italy between the Marche and Umbria regions in October 2016. The third quake on 30 October was the largest in Italy in 36 years, since the 1980 Irpinia earthquake.

Earthquakes
A magnitude 5.5 earthquake struck  east southeast of Sellano on 26 October at 19:11 local time (17:11 UTC) at a depth of . The earthquake was also felt in the city of Rome. In the region of Marche some houses collapsed, Italian media reported. There were also power failures and the telephone lines were interrupted.

A magnitude 6.1 intraplate earthquake struck  west of Visso on 26 October at 21:18 local time (19:18 UTC). The earthquake, which occurred two months after a magnitude 6.2 earthquake in August, struck about  to the northwest of the August earthquake's epicenter. The civil protection, however, estimated the consequences less dramatically than feared. According to official data, a man died because he had suffered a heart attack as a result of the quake.

A third large, shallow earthquake of USGS preliminary magnitude 6.6 struck  north of Norcia at 07:40 local time (06:40 UTC) on 30 October. Early news and social media reports showed heavy damage to some structures. The village of Arquata del Tronto was destroyed, as were several heritage buildings. These include the Basilica of Saint Benedict in Norcia, the Church of San Salvatore and other churches in Campi. Two women died of sudden heart attacks during the quake.

Shocks

Geological aspects
The quakes occurred in a seismic gap which is located between the areas hit by the 2016 August earthquake and the one in Umbria and Marche of 1997. In that gap no strong earthquake happened for more than 100 years until 2016.

As the process of faulting along the chain of the Apennine Mountains is a relatively recent one in geological terms, starting 500,000 years ago, the faults are more irregular, so more shaking occurs due to foreshocks according to seismologist Ross Stein from Stanford University. In this case the destructive shock on 26 October was preceded by the foreshock by two hours, causing people to leave their homes and be safer when the larger shock occurred.

Comparisons with August 2016 earthquake

See also
 August 2016 Central Italy earthquake
 January 2017 Central Italy earthquakes
 List of earthquakes in Italy
 List of earthquakes in 2016

References

External links
 Earthquake in Italy  on Earthquake Report Website
 EMSR190: Earthquake in Central Italy (damage grading maps) – Copernicus Emergency Management Service

2016 earthquakes
2016 disasters in Italy
2016-10
History of le Marche
October 2016 events in Italy
Earthquake clusters, swarms, and sequences
History of Umbria

October 2016 Central Italy earthquakes