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Pope Caius

Pope Caius (died 22 April 296), also called Gaius, was the bishop of Rome from 17 December 283 to his death in 296. Little information on Caius is available except that given by the Liber Pontificalis, which relies on a legendary account of the martyrdom of Susanna of Rome for its information. According to legend, Caius baptized the men and women who had been converted by Tiburtius (who is venerated with Susanna) and Castulus. His legend states that Caius took refuge in the catacombs of Rome and died a martyr.

Pontificate
Christian tradition makes Caius a native of the Dalmatian city of Salona, the son of a man also named Caius, and a member of a noble family related to the Emperor Diocletian. About 280, an early Christian house of worship was established on the site of Santa Susanna, which, like many of the earliest Christian meeting places, was in a house (domus ecclesiae). The domus belonged, according to the sixth-century acta, to brothers named Caius and Gabinus, prominent Christians. Caius may be this pope, or Caius the Presbyter. Gabinus is the name given to the father of Susanna. Thus, sources state that Caius was the uncle of Susanna.

As pope, Caius decreed that before someone could assume the position of bishop, he must first be porter, lector, exorcist, acolyte, subdeacon, deacon, and priest. He also divided the districts of Rome among the deacons. During his pontificate, anti-Christian measures increased, although new churches were built and cemeteries were expanded. St Caius may not have been martyred: the Diocletianic Persecution of Christians began in 303 AD, after Caius’ alleged death, and Diocletian was not immediately hostile to Christianity upon becoming emperor.

Legacy
Caius is mentioned in the fourth-century Depositio Episcoporum (therefore not as a martyr): X kl maii Caii in Callisti.

Caius' tomb, with the original epitaph, was discovered in the catacomb of Callixtus and in it the ring with which he used to seal his letters (see Arringhi, Roma subterr., 1. iv. c. xlviii. p. 426). In 1631, his alleged residence in Rome was turned into a church. However, it was demolished in 1880 to make room for the Ministry of War, on the Via XX Settembre, and his relics were transferred to the chapel of the Barberini family.

Saint Caius's feast day is celebrated on 22 April, as is that of Pope Soter. They are celebrated jointly in the Tridentine calendar and in the successive versions of the General Roman Calendar until that of 1969, since when they are omitted. Both are mentioned under 22 April in the Roman Martyrology, the official list of recognized saints. The entry for Saint Caius is as follows: "At Rome, in the cemetery of Callistus on the Via Appia, the burial of Saint Caius, Pope, who, fleeing from the persecution of Diocletian, died as a confessor of the faith."

Saint Caius is portrayed in art wearing the papal tiara with Saint Nereus. He is venerated in Dalmatia and Venice. In Florence, the church of San Gaggio on the via Senese was dedicated to him; the term Gaggio is a corruption of the name Cajo. In 2003, plans were put into effect to turn it into residential council housing.

title: Pope Caius


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Plaid Cymru

Plaid Cymru (, lit. 'Party of Wales'; officially Plaid Cymru – the Party of Wales, and often referred to simply as Plaid) is a centre-left to left-wing, Welsh nationalist political party in Wales, committed to Welsh independence from the United Kingdom.

Plaid was formed in 1925 and won its first seat in the UK Parliament in 1966. The party holds 4 of 32 Welsh seats in the UK Parliament, 12 of 60 seats in the Senedd, and 202 of 1,231 principal local authority councillors. It is a member of the European Free Alliance (EFA).

Aims
In September 2008, a senior Plaid assembly member spelled out her party's continuing support for an independent Wales. The then Welsh Minister for Rural Affairs, Elin Jones, told delegates at Plaid's annual conference in Aberystwyth that the party would continue its commitment to independence under the coalition with Welsh Labour.

In 2014, the party's constitution included the following aims:

 * Securing Welsh independence in Europe
 * Economic prosperity, social justice and a healthy natural environment with decentralist socialism
 * A national community with equal citizenship and respect for diversity
 * Develop a bilingual society
 * Promote Wales to the world and achieve United Nations membership

While Wales remains part of the United Kingdom, Plaid Cymru want to see further powers devolved from the UK Government to Wales, including: broadcasting and communication powers, devolution of the Crown Estate, welfare and rail.

The party opposes nuclear power and nuclear weapons (including the UK's Trident nuclear weapons programme).

The party also favours lowering the voting age to 16 years old. The voting age has already been lowered to include 16- and 17-year-olds for both Senedd elections and local elections in Wales since 2020, but not for UK general elections or police and crime commissioner elections: 18 is the minimum voting age for both of these.

Plaid Cymru supports making social care "free at the point of need".

In 2022, Plaid Cymru's policies included in its co-operation agreement with Welsh Labour included:

 * Free school meals for all primary school children
 * Free childcare for all two-year-olds
 * Commitment to deal with second homes
 * Creation of a national care service
 * Long-term Senedd reform
 * Reforming council tax
 * Increased investment in flood defence and prevention

Beginnings
While both the Labour and Liberal parties of the early 20th century had accommodated demands for Welsh home rule, no political party existed for the purpose of establishing a Welsh government. Plaid Genedlaethol Cymru (The National Party of Wales) was formed on 5 August 1925, by Moses Gruffydd, H. R. Jones and Lewis Valentine, members of Byddin Ymreolwyr Cymru (The Home Rule Army of Wales); literally, "The Self-Rulers' Army of Wales"); and Fred Jones, Saunders Lewis of Y Mudiad Cymreig (The Welsh Movement) and D. Edmund Williams. Initially, home rule for Wales was not an explicit aim of the new movement; keeping Wales Welsh-speaking took primacy, with the aim of making Welsh the only official language of Wales.

In the 1929 general election, the party contested its first parliamentary constituency, Caernarvonshire, polling 609 votes, or 1.6% of the vote for that seat. The party contested few such elections in its early years, partly due to its ambivalence towards Westminster politics. Indeed, the candidate Lewis Valentine, the party's first president, offered himself in Caernarvonshire on a platform of demonstrating Welsh people's rejection of English dominion.

1930s
By 1932, the aims of self-government and Welsh representation at the League of Nations had been added to that of preserving Welsh language and culture. However, this move, and the party's early attempts to develop an economic critique, did not broaden its appeal beyond that of an intellectual and socially conservative Welsh language pressure group. The alleged sympathy of the party's leading members (including President Saunders Lewis) towards Europe's totalitarian regimes compromised its early appeal further.

Saunders Lewis, David John Williams and Lewis Valentine set fire to the newly constructed RAF Penyberth air base on the Llŷn Peninsula in Gwynedd in 1936, in protest at its siting in the Welsh-speaking heartland. The leaders' treatment, including the trial judge's dismissal of the use of Welsh and their subsequent imprisonment in Wormwood Scrubs, led to "The Three" becoming a cause célèbre. This heightened the profile of the party dramatically and its membership had doubled to nearly 2,000 by 1939.

1940s
Penyberth, and Plaid Cymru's neutral stance during the Second World War, prompted concerns within the UK Government that it might be used by Germany to insert spies or carry out other covert operations. In fact, the party adopted a neutral standpoint and urged (with only limited success) conscientious objection to war service.

In 1943, Saunders Lewis contested the University of Wales parliamentary seat at a by-election, gaining 1,330 votes, or 22%. In the 1945 general election, with party membership at around 2,500, Plaid Cymru contested seven seats, as many as it had in the preceding 20 years, including constituencies in south Wales for the first time. At this time Gwynfor Evans was elected president.

1950s
Gwynfor Evans's presidency coincided with the maturation of Plaid Cymru (as it now began to refer to itself) into a more recognisable political party. Its share of the vote increased from 0.7% in the 1951 general election to 3.1% in 1955 and 5.2% in 1959. In the 1959 election, the party contested a majority of Welsh seats for the first time. Proposals to flood the village of Capel Celyn in the Tryweryn valley in Gwynedd in 1957 to supply the city of Liverpool with water played a part in Plaid Cymru's growth. The fact that the parliamentary bill authorising the dam went through without support from any Welsh MPs showed that the MPs' votes in Westminster were not enough to prevent such bills from passing.

1960s
Support for the party declined slightly in the early 1960s, particularly as support for the Liberal Party began to stabilise from its long-term decline. In 1962 Saunders Lewis gave a radio talk entitled Tynged yr Iaith (The fate of the language) in which he predicted the extinction of the Welsh language unless action was taken. This led to the formation of Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg (the Welsh Language Society) the same year.

Labour's return to power in 1964 and the creation of the post of Secretary of State for Wales appeared to represent a continuation of the incremental evolution of a distinctive Welsh polity, following the Conservative government's appointment of a Minister of Welsh Affairs in the mid-1950s and the establishment of Cardiff as Wales' capital in 1955.

However, in 1966, less than four months after coming in third in the constituency of Carmarthen, Gwynfor Evans captured the seat from Labour at a by-election. This was followed by two further by-elections in Rhondda West in 1967 and Caerphilly in 1968 in which the party achieved massive swings of 30% and 40% respectively, coming within a whisker of victory. The results were caused partly by an anti-Labour backlash. Expectations in coal mining communities that the Wilson government would halt the long-term decline in their industry had been dashed by a significant downward revision of coal production estimates. However, particularly in Carmarthen, Plaid also successfully depicted Labour's policies as a threat to the viability of small Welsh communities.

1970s
In the 1970 general election, Plaid Cymru contested every seat in Wales for the first time and its vote share surged from 4.5% in 1966 to 11.5%. Gwynfor Evans lost Carmarthen to Labour, but regained the seat in October 1974, by which time the party had gained a further two MPs, representing the constituencies of Caernarfon and Merionethshire.

Plaid Cymru's emergence (along with the Scottish National Party) prompted the Wilson government to establish the Kilbrandon Commission on the constitution. The subsequent proposals for a Welsh Assembly were, however, heavily defeated in a referendum in 1979. Despite Plaid Cymru's ambivalence toward home rule (as opposed to outright independence) the referendum result led many in the party to question its direction.

Plaid campaigned to leave the Common Market in the 1975 referendum, feeling that the EC's regional aid policies would "reconcile places like Wales to their subordinate position". Nevertheless, 65% of Welsh voters voted to remain in the EC during a 1975 referendum. The EC was incorporated into the European Union (EU) in 1993.

At the 1979 general election, the party's vote share declined from 10.8% to 8.1% and Carmarthen was again lost to Labour, although Caernarfon and Merionethshire were held by the party.

1980s
Caernarfon MP Dafydd Wigley succeeded Gwynfor Evans as president in 1981, inheriting a party whose morale was at an all-time low. In 1981 the party adopted a policy of "community socialism". While the party embarked on a wide-ranging review of its priorities and goals, Gwynfor Evans fought a successful campaign (including the threat of a hunger strike) to oblige the Conservative government to fulfill its promise to establish S4C, a Welsh-language television station. In 1984, Dafydd Elis-Thomas was elected president, defeating Dafydd Iwan, a move that saw the party shift to the left. Ieuan Wyn Jones (later Plaid Cymru leader) captured Ynys Môn from the Conservatives in 1987. In 1989 Dafydd Wigley once again assumed the presidency of the party.

1990s
In the 1992 general election, the party added a fourth MP, Cynog Dafis, when he gained Ceredigion and Pembroke North from the Liberal Democrats. Dafis was endorsed by the local branch of the Green Party. The party's vote share recovered to 9.9% at the 1997 general election.

In 1997, following the election of a Labour government committed to devolution for Wales, a further referendum was narrowly won, establishing the National Assembly for Wales. Plaid Cymru became the main opposition to the ruling Labour Party, with 17 seats to Labour's 28. In doing so, it appeared to have broken out of its rural Welsh-speaking heartland, and gained seats in traditionally strong Labour areas in industrial South Wales.

Ahead of the 1999 National Assembly for Wales election, Plaid Cymru dropped its policy of Welsh independence in favour of continued membership in the European Union. These changes in policy were made as it was believed that the electorate in Wales did not view independence as an important issue. It also adopted social democracy for its economic policy in an attempt to weaken Labour. These changes in policy have been used to explain the party's subsequent electoral success in Labour's traditional South East Wales heartlands.

First National Assembly (1999–2003)
In the 1999 election, Plaid Cymru gained seats in traditional Labour areas such as Rhondda, Islwyn and Llanelli, achieving by far its highest share of the vote in any Wales-wide election. While Plaid Cymru regarded itself as the natural beneficiary of devolution, others attributed its performance in large part to the travails of the Labour Party, whose nomination for Assembly First Secretary, Ron Davies, was forced to stand down in an alleged sex scandal. The ensuing leadership battle, won by Alun Michael, did much to damage Labour, and thus aided Plaid Cymru, whose leader was the more popular and higher profile Dafydd Wigley. The Labour Party's UK national leadership was seen to interfere in the contest and deny the popular Rhodri Morgan victory. Less than two months later, in elections to the European parliament, Labour support slumped further, and Plaid Cymru came within 2.5% of achieving the largest share of the vote in Wales. Under the new system of proportional representation, the party also gained two MEPs.

Plaid Cymru then developed political problems of its own. Dafydd Wigley resigned, citing health problems but amid rumours of a plot against him. His successor, Ieuan Wyn Jones, struggled to impose his authority, particularly over controversial remarks made by a councillor, Seimon Glyn. At the same time, Labour leader and First Minister Alun Michael was replaced by Rhodri Morgan.

In the 2001 general election, notwithstanding Plaid Cymru recording its highest-ever vote share in a general election, 14.3%, the party lost Wyn Jones's former seat of Ynys Môn to Albert Owen, although it gained Carmarthen East and Dinefwr, where Adam Price was elected.

Second National Assembly (2003–07)
The Assembly elections of May 2003 saw the party's representation drop from 17 to 12, with the seats gained in the 1999 election falling again to Labour and the party's share of the vote declining to 21%. Plaid Cymru narrowly remained the second-largest party in the National Assembly ahead of the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats and Forward Wales.

On 15 September 2003, folk-singer and county councillor Dafydd Iwan was elected as Plaid Cymru's president. Ieuan Wyn Jones, who had resigned from his dual role as president and Assembly group leader following the losses in the 2003 Assembly election, was re-elected in the latter role. Elfyn Llwyd remained the Plaid Cymru leader in the Westminster Parliament. Under Iwan's presidency the party formally adopted a policy of independence for Wales within Europe. Plaid Cymru had historically supported Welsh independence but dropped this policy ahead of the 1999 devolved election.

The 2004 local election saw the party lose control of the two South Wales councils it gained in 1999, Rhondda Cynon Taff and Caerphilly, while retaining its stronghold of Gwynedd in the north-west. The results enabled the party to claim a greater number of ethnic minority councillors than all the other political parties in Wales combined, along with gains in authorities such as Cardiff and Swansea, where Plaid Cymru representation had been minimal. In the European Parliament elections of the same year, the party's vote share fell to 17.4%, and the reduction in the number of Welsh MEPs saw its representation reduced to one.

In the general election of 5 May 2005, Plaid Cymru lost the Ceredigion seat to the Liberal Democrats; this result was a disappointment to Plaid, who had hoped to gain Ynys Môn. Overall therefore, Plaid Cymru's Parliamentary representation fell to three seats, the lowest number for the party since 1992. The party's share of the vote fell to 12.6%.

Since Plaid Genedlaethol Cymru reformation to 'Plaid Cymru' in 1933, the logo representing the party was the green 'triban' (three peaks) which symbolically represented Plaid's three key goals; self-government, cultural prosperity and economic prosperity, 'anchored in the bedrock of Welsh identity and history that is the Welsh upland landscape', the logo would change in the late stages of 20th century to include the red dragon of Wales, however this version was short-lived. In 2006, the party voted constitutional changes to formally designate the party's leader in the assembly as its overall leader, with Ieuan Wyn Jones being restored to the full leadership and Dafydd Iwan becoming head of the voluntary wing of the party. The party unveiled a radical change of image in 2006. In that year, the party opted to use "Plaid" as the party's name, although "Plaid Cymru — the Party of Wales" would remain the official title. Plaid would abandon the triban (apart from the merchandise) and adopt the yellow Welsh poppy (Meconopsis cambrica).

Third National Assembly (2007–2011)
In the National Assembly election of 3 May 2007, Plaid Cymru increased its number of seats from 12 to 15, regaining Llanelli, gaining one additional list seat and winning the newly created constituency of Aberconwy. The 2007 election also saw Plaid Cymru's Mohammad Asghar become the first ethnic minority candidate elected to the Welsh Assembly. The party's share of the vote increased to 22.4%.

After weeks of negotiations involving all four parties in the Assembly, Plaid Cymru and Labour agreed to form a coalition government. Their agreed "One Wales" programme included a commitment for both parties to campaign for a Yes vote in a referendum on full law-making powers for the Assembly, to be held at a time of the Welsh Assembly Government's choosing. Ieuan Wyn Jones was subsequently confirmed as Deputy First Minister of Wales and Minister for the Economy and Transport. Rhodri Glyn Thomas was appointed Heritage Minister. He later stood down, and Alun Ffred Jones took over. Ceredigion AM Elin Jones was appointed to the Rural Affairs brief in the new 10-member cabinet. Jocelyn Davies became Deputy Minister for Housing, and later, Regeneration.

In the 2010 general election, Plaid returned three MPs to Westminster. They took part in the Yes for Wales cross-party campaign for the March 2011 referendum.

Fourth National Assembly (2011–16)
In the 2011 National Assembly election, Plaid slipped from second place to third, being overtaken by the Welsh Conservatives and losing its deputy leader Helen Mary Jones. The party held an inquiry into the election result. The internal investigation led to the adoption of wide-ranging changes to its constitution, including a streamlining of the leadership structure.

In May 2011, Ieuan Wyn Jones announced he would stand down as leader within the first half of the Assembly term. A leadership election was held in which three candidates eventually stood: Elin Jones, Dafydd Elis-Thomas and Leanne Wood; Simon Thomas withdrew his candidacy before ballots were cast.

On 15 March 2012, Plaid Cymru elected Leanne Wood as its new leader. She received 55% of the vote, over second-placed Elin Jones with 41%. Wood was the party's first female leader, and its first not to be a fluent Welsh speaker. Soon after her election as leader, she appointed former MP Adam Price to head an economic commission for the party "focussed on bringing together tailor-made policies in order to transform our economy". On 1 May 2012, it was confirmed Leanne Wood would not be taking the £23,000 pay increase that every other party leader in the Assembly receives.

On 12 November 2012, Wood announced she would aim to abandon her relatively safe list seat by winning a constituency at the 2016 National Assembly elections; she later confirmed she would contest the Rhondda. Adam Price was subsequently selected as the party's candidate for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr. Lindsay Whittle confirmed he would stand solely in Caerphilly.

On 20 June 2013, former party leader Ieuan Wyn Jones stood down from the Assembly as the member for Ynys Môn. Plaid Cymru's candidate Rhun ap Iorwerth was elected as the new Assembly Member for the constituency, receiving 12,601 votes (a 58% share) with a majority of 9,166 over the Labour candidate.

Fifth National Assembly/Senedd (2016–2021)
At the 2016 Welsh Assembly elections, Plaid Cymru gained one seat, became the Assembly's second-largest party and briefly became the official opposition to the Welsh Government with 12 seats. By January 2018 Plaid Cymru had been reduced to ten Assembly Members, following the resignation of Dafydd Elis-Thomas in 2016 and the permanent expulsion of Neil McEvoy from Plaid's Assembly group in 2018.

Despite campaigning to leave in 1975, Plaid campaigned for a Remain vote in the 2016 referendum on the UK's membership of the EU, spending £27,495 on the campaign. In the referendum Wales voted 52.5% in favour of Leave. Immediately after the referendum, Leanne Wood stated that voters 'must be respected' and criticised calls for a second EU referendum. Plaid Cymru later modified their policy to support a People's Vote.

In the 2017 United Kingdom general election, Plaid saw their popular vote fall, but narrowly gained Ceredigion and saw Arfon become highly marginal.

In September 2018, Adam Price won the party's leadership election, defeating the incumbent Leanne Wood and fellow challenger Rhun ap Iorwerth.

In the Brecon and Radnorshire by-election Plaid Cymru decided not to put up a candidate, but instead to support the Liberal Democrat candidate Jane Dodds in order to maximise the chance of an anti-Brexit candidate winning.

In the 2019 United Kingdom general election, Plaid stood aside in four seats to endorse Unite to Remain candidates. Plaid held their four seats but saw a decrease in their popular vote.

Sixth Senedd (2021–)
In the run-up to the 2021 Senedd election, polling suggested that Welsh Labour would win the highest number of seats but fall short of an overall majority. Pollsters and commentators suggested that the most likely outcome would be another Labour–Plaid Cymru coalition, an option First Minister Mark Drakeford said he would be open to. Price insisted that his party would not be Labour's "junior partner", nor would they work with the Conservatives under any circumstances. He stated that Plaid would be willing to join forces with Labour, but only if the former were the largest party or if it were an equal partnership. Price also said that he did not consider Welsh independence to be "a distraction or a constitutional abstraction", but rather "a practical necessity".

At the election, Plaid increased their seat total to thirteen, up one from the twelve they won in 2016, but lost out in their target constituencies, and lost Rhondda where former leader Leanne Wood lost her seat to Labour. Price said he would not resign, telling ITV Wales: "My job is to lead, its not to give up at a set back or disappointment. My job is to sustain the hope – all those young people who voted for Plaid because they were inspired by our message of the potential we believe is there in Wales to deliver a decent society for our people. I firmly believe that we have sown a lot of seed at this election. A lot of young people in particular who did come with us this time has laid the foundations for the future which I think will set us up for growth in the years to come."

On 22 November 2021, despite Price's earlier comments about refusing to work with Labour, the two parties announced a co-operation agreement consisting of almost 50 different policies, including providing free school meals for all primary school children, the establishment of a free-at-point-of-need national care system and building a railway between North and South Wales. Price called the agreement "a down-payment on independence" and claimed that the results of the Senedd election "confirmed Wales's status as an indy-curious nation. A curiosity that will give birth – sooner than many think – to an independent Wales." He went on to say, "For Wales to be free, we must first be united. And, that is what this Co-operation Agreement sets out to achieve. It launches us on a pathway to a united Wales, one that, sooner than we perhaps think, will find it both comfortable and natural, indeed essential, to join the world community of normal, independent nations."

The co-operation agreement was ratified by Plaid's conference, with 94% voting in favour. "This is a huge step forward for Wales and our democracy," Price said. "The co-operation agreement will bring immediate, tangible and long-term benefit for the people of Wales. All primary school children will now receive free school meals; there will be free childcare for all two-year-olds; and radical action to tackle the housing crisis. There will be stability payments to support family farms; exploration of an accelerated pathway to net zero by 2035; the creation of Ynni Cymru – a company to expand community-owned renewable energy generation; and a new and reformed Senedd – bigger, more diverse, and gender balanced in law. From feeding our children to caring for our elderly, this is a nation-building Programme for Government which will change the lives of thousands of people the length and breadth of our country for the better. And none of it would be happening without Plaid Cymru."

In May 2023, the publication of a report which detailed failings by the party to prevent sexual harassment and bullying led to media coverage suggesting that Price had agreed to resign the party leadership, and Price confirmed this in a statement on 10 May. Acknowledging that he "no longer had the united support of [his] colleagues", Price stated that he would step down officially at the start of the following week, once the process for electing a new interim leader was finalised. On 11 May Plaid Cymru announced that Llyr Gruffydd, Senedd member for North Wales, would replace him as interim party leader, and that this would be confirmed by the NEC on 13 May. On 16 June 2023 Rhun ap Iorwerth was announced as the new permanent leader after he was elected unopposed.

At party conference in Aberystwyth in October 2023, Rhun ap Iorwerth said the party was "not just for Welsh speakers". Accomplishments like free school meals with the Drakeford government were promoted.

Independence Commission 2020
Before the 2019 general election, Price announced that he would set up a commission to look at the practicality of Welsh independence, and how a Plaid Government would hold an independence referendum. The commission, led by former Plaid Dwyfor Meirionydd MP Elfyn Llwyd, released its report on 25 September 2020. It recommends five key aims for Plaid Cymru:

 * Says an independent Wales should seek membership of the European Union, with a possible intermediate step being membership of the European Free Trade Area.
 * Recommends that Wales explores a confederal relationship with England and Scotland.
 * Proposes improvements to the operation of the Welsh Government and civil service.
 * Points the way to drawing up a Welsh Constitution and sets out a framework for a Self-Determination Bill to take the independence process forward.
 * A statutory National Commission should provide the people of Wales with a clear understanding of the option for their political future – including through Citizens' Assemblies and an initial referendum to test a range of constitutional options.

It also recommends that there should be one multiple choice referendum to gauge views and to persuade a UK Westminster government to agree to a referendum on the preferred option.

The report was met with criticism from the Welsh Liberal Democrats, describing the report as a mix of "fanatical politics" and "pie in the sky economics".

In December 2020, Price stated that an independence referendum would be held in Plaid Cymru's first term in office, if the party won a majority at the 2021 Senedd election.

Undeb Credyd Plaid Cymru
Undeb Credyd Plaid Cymru Credit Union Limited is a savings and loans co-operative established for party members in 1986. Based in Roath, Cardiff, it is a member of the Association of British Credit Unions Limited. The credit union is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the PRA. Ultimately, like the banks and building societies, members' savings are protected against business failure by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme.

Leaders
The Party leader was referred to as the president until March 2000 when the separate role of Leader was created.

Senedd

 * Llyr Huws Gruffydd, MS for North Wales electoral region
 * Siân Gwenllian, MS for Arfon
 * Rhun ap Iorwerth, MS for Ynys Môn
 * Luke Fletcher, MS for South Wales West electoral region
 * Cefin Campbell, MS for Mid and West Wales electoral region
 * Elin Jones, MS for Ceredigion
 * Delyth Jewell, MS for South Wales East electoral region
 * Sioned Williams, MS for South Wales West electoral region
 * Adam Price, MS for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr
 * Mabon ap Gwynfor, MS for Dwyfor Meirionnydd
 * Peredur Owen Griffiths, MS for South Wales East
 * Heledd Fychan, MS for South Wales Central

Local councillors

 * 202 councillors in local government. They form the Plaid Cymru Councillors Association.

House of Commons
*Six seats (Blaenau Gwent, Ceredigion & Pembroke North, Islwyn, Monmouth, Newport West and Torfaen) contested on a joint Plaid Cymru/Green Party ticket

Local councils
* The 2012 figures exclude Anglesey, where the vote was delayed until 2013. The changes in seats and votes shown for 2012 are a direct comparison since the 2008 elections in the 21 councils up for election (i.e. excluding Anglesey).

In 2008, Plaid won 205 seats including six in Anglesey. For the purposes of this table the 205 figure has been reduced to 199 for the 2012 elections where the party lost 41 of the 199 seats it was defending on the night, leaving them with 158 seats.

In the 2013 elections in Anglesey, the party won 12 seats, up from the 6 it won in 2008 (although there were significant boundary changes and a reduction in the total number of seats from 40 to 30).

The 2017 figures are based on changes from the 2012 and 2013 elections. (Hence the slight discrepancy in the percentage increase.)

European Free Alliance
Plaid retains strong links with the Scottish National Party (SNP), with both parties' MPs co-operating closely with one another. They work as a single parliamentary group within Westminster, and were involved in joint campaigning, under the banner of a "Celtic alliance", during the 2001 and 2010 general elections. Both Plaid and the SNP, along with Mebyon Kernow of Cornwall, are members of the European Free Alliance (EFA), a pan-European political party for regionalist, autonomist and pro-independence political parties across Europe. The EFA co-operates with the larger European Green Party to form The Greens–European Free Alliance (Greens/EFA) political group in the European Parliament, although the UK is no longer a member of the European Union.

title: Plaid Cymru


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Puck (folklore)

In English folklore,  The Puck, also known as Goodfellows, are demons or fairies which can be domestic sprites or nature sprites.

Etymology
The etymology of puck was uncertain. The modern English word is attested already in Old English as puca (with a diminutive form pucel). Similar words are attested later in Old Norse (púki, with related forms including Old Swedish puke, Icelandic púki, and Frisian puk) but also in the Celtic languages (Welsh pwca, Cornish bucca and Irish púca). Most commentators think that the word was borrowed from one of these neighbouring north-west European languages into the others, but it is not certain in what direction the borrowing went, and all vectors have been proposed by scholars. The Oxford English Dictionary favoured a Scandinavian origin, while the scholarly study by Erin Sebo of Flinders University argues for an Irish origin, on the basis that the word is widely distributed in Irish place-names, whereas puck-place-names in English are rare and late in the areas showing Old Norse influence, and seem rather to radiate outwards from South West England, which she argues had Irish influence during the Early Middle Ages.

Alternative names
Puck may also be called The Goodfellows or Hobgoblin, in which Hob may substitute for Rob or Robin. This goes back to the character "Robin Goodfellow" and his name. The name Robin is Middle English in origin, deriving from Old French Robin, the pet form for the name Robert. Similar to the use of "the good folk" in describing fairies, it reflected a degree of wishful thinking and an attempt to appease the fairies, recognizing their fondness of flattery despite their mischievous nature.

The earliest reference to "Robin Goodfellow" cited by the Oxford English Dictionary is from 1531. Anthony Munday mentions Robin Goodfellow in his play The Two Italian Gentlemen, 1584, and he appears in Skialtheia, or a Shadowe of Truth in 1598. William Shakespeare may have had access to the manuscript of Lewes Lewkenor's translation of The Spanish Mandevile of Miracles, or, The Garden of Curious Flowers (1600), a translation of Antonio de Torquemada's Jardín de Flores Curiosas. The following passage from The Spanish Mandeville discusses the mischievous spirits:

"Luduvico: I pray you let me somewhat understand your opinion as concerning Robingoodfellowes and Hobgoblins, which are said to be so common, that there is scarcely any man but will tell you one tale or other of them, of which for my own part, I believe none, but do make reckoning that every man forgeth herein, what pleaseth him.

Antonio: Many of them without doubt are forged, and many also true, for these kinds of Spirits are more familiar and domestical than the others, and for some causes to us unknown, abide in one place, more than in another, so that some never almost depart from some particular houses, as though they were their proper mansions, making in them sundry noises, rumours, mockeries, gawdes and jests, without doing any harm at all: and though I am not myself witness thereof, yet I have heard many persons of credit affirm that they have heard them play as it were on Gyterns & Jews Harps, and ring Bells, and that they answer to those that call them, and speak with certain signs, laughters and merry gestures, so that those of the house come at last to be so familiar and well acquainted with them that they fear them not at all. But in truth, as I said before, if they had free power to put in practice their malicious desire, we should find these pranks of theirs, not to be jests, but earnest indeed, tending to the destruction of both our body and soul, but as I told you before, this power of theirs is so restrained and tied, that they can pass no farther than to jests and gawdes: and if they do any harm or hurt at all, it is certain very little, as by experience we daily see.''"

After Giacomo Meyerbeer's successful opera Robert le Diable (1831), neo-medievalists and occultists began to apply the name Robin Goodfellow to the Devil, with appropriately extravagant imagery.

Characteristics

According to Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898):

"[Robin Goodfellow is a] "drudging fiend", and merry domestic fairy, famous for mischievous pranks and practical jokes. At night-time he will sometimes do little services for the family over which he presides. The Scots call this domestic spirit a brownie; the Germans, Kobold or Knecht Ruprecht. Scandinavians called it Nissë God-dreng. Puck, the jester of Fairy-court, is the same."

Puck might do minor housework, quick fine needlework or butter-churning, which could be undone in a moment by his knavish tricks if displeased. A domestic spirit, he would assist housewives with their chores, in expectation of an offering of white bread and milk. If this were neglected he would steal that which he believed was owed.

Pucks are also known to be inherently solitary creatures. Shakespeare's characterization of "shrewd and knavish" Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream may have revived flagging interest in Puck.

16th–17th century

 * The character Robin Goodfellow, also referred to as "The puck, Robin Goodfellow" and Hobgoblin, appears as a vassal of the Fairy King Oberon in William Shakespeare's 1595/96 play A Midsummer Night's Dream, and is responsible for the mischief that occurs.
 * The character also appears in Grim the Collier of Croydon (1660, but perhaps based on an earlier play). It is unknown how Shakespeare's Puck appeared on the stage; but the figure in Grim was costumed "in a suit of leather close to his body; his face and hands coloured russet-coloured, with a flail."
 * A Robin Goodfellow play was performed at Hampton Court on 1 January 1604, followed by The Masque of Indian and China Knights.
 * An early 17th century broadside ballad The Mad Merry Pranks of Robin Goodfellow describes the character as the emissary of Oberon, the Fairy King of the Night, inspiring night-terrors in old women but also carding their wool while they sleep, leading travellers astray, taking the shape of animals, blowing out the candles to kiss the girls in the darkness, twitching off their bedclothes, or making them fall out of bed on the cold floor, tattling secrets, and changing babes in cradles with elflings.
 * Robin Goodfellow is the main speaker in Jonson's 1612 masque Love Restored.
 * John Milton, in L'Allegro tells "how the drudging Goblin swet / To earn his cream-bowle" by threshing a week's worth of grain in a night, and then, "Basks at the fire his hairy strength." Milton's Puck is not small and sprightly, but nearer to a Green Man or a hairy woodwose. An illustration of Robin Goodfellow from 1639 represents the influence of Pan imagery, giving Puck the hindquarters, cloven hooves and horns of a goat.

19th century

 * Robin Goodfellow appears in 'The Mad Pranks of Robin Goodfellow', Gammer Gurton's Pleasant Stories of Patient Grissel, The Princess Rosetta, & Robin Goodfellow, and Ballads of the Beggar's Daughter, The Babes in the Wood, and Fair Rosamond, 1845.
 * Robin Goodfellow appears in an 1856 speech by Karl Marx: "In the signs that bewilder the middle class, the aristocracy and the poor profits of regression, we recognize our brave friend Robin Goodfellow, the old mole that can work the earth so fast, that worthy pioneer – the Revolution."

20th century

 * The character of Puck frames the tales in Rudyard Kipling's short story cycles Puck of Pook's Hill (1906) and Rewards and Fairies (1910).
 * Dear Brutus is a 1917 fantasy play by J. M. Barrie, the host "Lob" is the aged Puck from A Midsummer Night's Dream
 * The 1976 play Robin Goodfellow by Aurand Harris retells A Midsummer Night's Dream from Puck's point of view.
 * The Sandman by Neil Gaiman includes Puck as a significant character.
 * The 1989 Manga series Berserk written and illustrated by Kentaro Miura. Set in a medieval Europe-inspired dark fantasy world features a character named Puck (パック, Pakku) who resembles a small fairy or pixie like creature (though he is technically an elf).
 * In the Disney cartoon Gargoyles, Puck is one of several Shakespearean characters with recurring roles. He is something of an antagonist, but his mischief can also help the heroes.

21st century

 * Puck is also a major character in Michael Buckley's 2005–2012 book series The Sisters Grimm.
 * Puck (Robin Goodfellow) is a character in Rob Thurman's Cal Leandros series of novels (2006–).
 * Puck is a main character in Julie Kagawa's 2010–2015 The Iron Fey Series, along with other characters from A Midsummer Night's Dream. Puck is also the main protagonist in Kagawa's The Iron Raven (2021), the first book in The Iron Fey: Evenfall series.
 * Puck is a major character in Chris Adrian's 2011 novel The Great Night.
 * In the 2019 Amazon series Carnival Row, the Puck are a race of fae.
 * Since 1998, a Canadian artist calling himself ElectricGecko has drawn a weekly comic strip called "Puck" in which the ancient fairy is incarnated as a young-appearing red-haired Canadian woman living in Hamilton, Ontario.
 * Puck (also known as Robin Goodfellow) joins the series The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina in its third and fourth seasons (2019–2020).
 * Puck also appears as a character in the God of War video games, synthesized with the character of Mímir from Norse Mythology. In these games, he is voiced by actor Alastair Duncan.
 * Puck is a hero in the Dota 2 video game.
 * 'Robyn Goodfellowe' is a young English girl in the Irish animated feature Wolfwalkers (2020)

title: Puck (folklore)


text:
Puck (A Midsummer Night's Dream)

Puck, or Robin Goodfellow, is a character in William Shakespeare's play, A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Based on the Puck of English mythology and the púca of Celtic mythology, Puck is a mischievous fairy, sprite, or jester. He is the first of the main fairy characters to appear, and he significantly influences events in the play. He delights in pranks such as replacing Nick Bottom's head with that of an ass.

Appearances in the play

The audience is introduced to Puck in 2.1:

FAIRY: Either I mistake your shape and making quite, Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite Call'd Robin Goodfellow: are you not he That frights the maidens of the villagery; Skim milk, and sometimes labour in the quern, And bootless make the breathless housewife churn; And sometime make the drink to bear no barm; Mislead night wanderers, laughing at their harm? Those that Hobgoblin call you and sweet Puck, You do their work, and they shall have good luck: Are you not he?

PUCK: Fairy, thou speak'st aright; I am that merry wanderer of the night. I jest to Oberon, and make him smile When I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile Neighing in likeness of a filly foal; And sometime lurk I in a gossip's bowl, In very likeness of a roasted crab; And, when she drinks, against her lips I bob And on her wither'd dewlap pour the ale. The wisest aunt, telling the saddest tale, Sometime for three-foot stool mistaketh me; Then slip I from her bum, down topples she, And 'tailor' cries, and falls into a cough; And then the whole quire hold their hips and laugh; And waxen in their mirth, and neeze, and swear A merrier hour was never wasted there [2.1.32-57]. Puck serves the fairy king Oberon. Oberon is angry with Titania, the fairy queen, because she will not let him have a particular "little changeling boy" (2.1.120). Oberon sends Puck to fetch a particular flower, whereof the juice "on sleeping eyelids laid / Will make or man or woman madly dote / Upon the next live creature that it sees" (2.1.170-72). Puck is told to apply some of it to the "disdainful youth" (2.1.261) in "Athenian garments" (2.1.264), but Puck mistakes Lysander for Demetrius and applies it to Lysander. Oberon applies some of the juice to Titania, and Titania is waked by a singing Nick Bottom, whose head Puck has changed to that of an ass. Later, Puck is ordered to rectify his mistake with Lysander and Demetrius, and he creates a black fog through which he separates the "testy rivals" (3.2.358), imitating their voices until they are asleep. Puck has the final lines of the play: If we shadows have offended, Think but this, and all is mended. That you have but slumber'd here While these visions did appear. And this weak and idle theme, No more yielding but a dream, Gentles, do not reprehend: If you pardon, we will mend. And, as I'm an honest Puck, If we have unearned luck Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue, We will make amends ere long; Else the Puck a liar call: So, good night unto you all. Give me your hands, if we be friends, And Robin shall restore amends [5.1.433-48].

Name of character
The original texts of Shakespeare's plays do not have cast-lists, and are not always consistent with characters' names. Puck's case is particularly awkward. Both the Quarto and the First Folio call the character "Robin Goodfellow" on the first entrance, but "Puck" later in the same scene, and they remain inconsistent. The Arden Shakespeare calls the character "Puck", and emends all stage directions (but not actual dialogue) that refer to the character as "Robin" or "Robin Goodfellow".

Film and TV

 * Mickey Rooney, in the Oscar-winning 1935 film.
 * Ian Holm, in the 1968 film.
 * Phil Daniels, in the 1981 BBC Shakespeare television production.
 * Razzak Khan, in the 1988 West End production.
 * Robert Sean Leonard plays Puck in a high-school production in the 1989 film Dead Poets Society.
 * Brent Spiner plays a version of Puck in Disney's Gargoyles, first appearing in the season two episode "The Mirror" in 1995.
 * Stanley Tucci, in the 1999 film.
 * Tanner Cohen, in a high-school production depicted in the 2008 film Were the World Mine.
 * Hiran Abeysekera in the 2016 film.
 * Avan Jogia, in the 2017 film.
 * Ken Nwosu, in Upstart Crow in 2018.
 * Jonathan Whitesell plays a version of Robin Goodfellow in The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina in 2020.

Theatre

 * Gertrud Eysoldt, first on 10 April, 1893 at the Riga City Theater, and later in Max Reinhardt's 1905 production in Berlin.
 * Frederick Peisley in Donald Wolfit's production in 1947.
 * Adam Darius, with the Stora Teatern in Göteborg, Sweden in 1961.
 * John Kane, with The Royal Shakespeare Company in 1970.
 * Puck is renamed "Dr. Wheelgood" in Diane Paulus's production The Donkey Show in 1999.
 * Karenssa LeGear in Schoenberg Hall's 2007 production.
 * Matthew Tennyson, with Shakespeare's Globe Theatre in 2013.
 * Kathryn Hunter in Julie Taymor's 2013 production for the Theatre for a New Audience.

School productions

 * Laurence Olivier, with St Edward's School, Oxford in 1923.
 * Sebastian de Souza, with St Edward's School, Oxford.

Painting and sculpture

 * Puck (1789), a painting by Joshua Reynolds
 * Puck (c. 1810–1820), a painting by Henry Fuseli.
 * Puck (c. 1855–1856), a marble sculpture by Harriet Hosmer
 * The Puck Building built in 1885–1888 in Nolita, New York City, features two naked statues of Puck by sculptor Henry Baerer. The building is named after and housed the 19th-century humor magazine Puck. The magazine was named after the character, and used a depiction and a quote of him as a logotype.
 * Sculpture Puck, by Carl Andersson, bronze, 1912, in the Stockholm suburb of Midsommarkransen in Sweden.
 * Puck by Brenda Putnam, marble, 1932, at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C.

Music

 * French pianist and composer Claude Debussy dedicated a prelude to Puck,  La danse de Puck.

Literature

 * In Neil Gaiman's comic-book The Sandman story "'A Midsummer Night's Dream" (1990), Puck and other fairies watch Shakespeare's company of actors perform A Midsummer Night's Dream. After the play, Puck decides to remain in the "mortal" world, and goes on to appear in later stories.

title: Puck (A Midsummer Night's Dream)


text:
Hockey puck

A hockey puck is either an open or closed disk used in a variety of sports and games. There are designs made for use on an ice surface, such as in ice hockey, and others for the different variants of floor hockey which includes the wheeled skate variant of inline hockey (a.k.a. roller hockey). They are all designed to serve the same function a ball does in ball games.

A closed disk hockey puck having the shape of a short cylinder made of vulcanized rubber is used in the sport of ice hockey. Hockey pucks are designed for use on either an ice surface, dry floor, or underwater, though open disk designs have only been used on floors.

Open disk hockey pucks have a hole, forming the shape of a toroid, for use in a particular style of floor hockey. They should not be confused with ringette rings, which are toruses, for use in the sport of ringette. This article deals chiefly with the sport and game pucks which are closed disks.

Etymology
The origin of the word puck is vague. The Oxford English Dictionary suggests the name is related to the verb to puck (a cognate of poke) used in the games of shinty and hurling for striking or pushing the ball, from the Scottish Gaelic puc or the Irish poc, meaning "to poke, punch or deliver a blow":

It is possible that settlers of Nova Scotia, many of whom were Scottish and Irish who played shinty and hurling, may have introduced the word to Canada. This is supported by the prevalent use in Canada of the word "shinny" for an informal or "pick-up" game of hockey, which is also derived from the Scottish game of shinty. The first known printed reference was in Montreal, in 1876 (Montreal Gazette of February 7, 1876), just a year after the first indoor game was played there.

A hockey puck is also referred to colloquially as a "biscuit". To put the "biscuit in the basket" (colloquial for the goal) is to score a goal.

In ice hockey
Ice hockey requires a hard disk of vulcanized rubber. A standard ice hockey puck is black, 1 in thick, 3 in in diameter, and weighs between 5.5 and 6 oz; some pucks are heavier or lighter than standard. Pucks are often marked with silkscreened team or league logos on one or both faces. Pucks are frozen before the game to reduce bouncing during play.

The first hockey pucks
The first hockey pucks were made from frozen cow dung and leather liver pads. These early pucks had a lifespan of about one game before they were too soft or too hard for playability, so they were replaced with wooden ones.

Ball games on ice
The sport of bandy, prior to its first official organization in Britain, had its informal variants spread to North America where they and game concepts from lacrosse, shinty and hurling served as precursors in some format to ice hockey. These informal games utilized various types of balls while being played on ice until the latter half of 19th century Canada, after which the game of ice hockey and the ice hockey puck began to take their official shape and form.

Shape and material
By the 1870s, flat pucks were made of wood as well as rubber. Records from the first indoor ice hockey game (1875) used a wooden puck, to prevent it from leaving the area of play though new evidence has shown that cuts from large corks have also been used.

At first, pucks (of either material) were made in the shape of a square. Rubber pucks were first made by slicing a rubber ball, then trimming the disk square. The original puck used first in the first organized games in Kingston on March 10, 1886 (on display at the Original Hockey Hall of Fame), was made from a cut-down lacrosse ball. It looks like a lump of coal, is made from soft rubber, and bounces far more than a modern hockey puck.

The Victoria Hockey Club of Montreal is credited with making and using the first round pucks, in the 1880s.

Variations
There are several variations on the standard black, 6 oz hockey puck. One of the most common is a blue, 4 oz puck that is used for training younger players who are not yet able to use a standard puck. Heavier 10 oz training pucks, typically reddish pink or reddish orange in colour, are also available for players looking to develop the strength of their shots or improve their stick handling skills. Players looking to increase wrist strength often practice with steel pucks that weigh 2 lb; these pucks are not used for shooting, as they could seriously harm other players. White pucks are used for technical handling and goaltender practice. These are regulation size and weight, but made from white rubber. The colour blend in with the ice and rink and requires higher focus on the puck, making handling of the black puck at later stage easier. A hollow, light-weight fluorescent orange puck is available for road or floor hockey. Other variants, some with plastic ball-bearings or glides, are available for use for road or roller hockey.

Two major developments have been devised to create better puck visibility on television broadcasts, but both were short-lived:

Firepuck
The use of a "Firepuck" in the early 1990s was the first attempt to improve the visibility of hockey pucks as seen on television. This invention incorporated coloured retro reflective materials of either embedded lens elements or prismatic reflectors laminated into recesses on the flat surfaces and the vertical edge of a standard hockey puck. Yellow was the preferred reflected colour. A spotlight was required to be positioned on the TV camera and focused at the centre of the viewing area.

A short demonstration tape of the Minnesota North Stars skating with the Firepuck was shown during the period break at the 1993 NHL All-Star Game in Montreal. The International Hockey League (IHL) pursued testing the Firepuck with its inventor, Donald Klassen. The next television viewing was the IHL All-Star Game in Fort Wayne, Indiana, January 1994, where the Firepuck was used for the entire game. The IHL tested the Firepuck in two more games, and finally the East Coast Hockey League used it January 17, 1997, for their all-star game.

The use of the Firepuck was discontinued because of these reasons:
 * The slight structural change increased the tendency for the puck to bounce on the ice. This made it more difficult for the goaltender and resulted in increased scoring.
 * The skaters objected to the use of camera spotlights which reflected off the ice.
 * The television viewing contrast of the Firepuck was not noticeably enhanced when the camera view was of the entire rink, this being the most common camera shot.

The Firepuck name was branded during the 1990s but has since been discontinued.

Smart puck
The FoxTrax "smart puck" was developed by the Fox television network when it held National Hockey League (NHL) broadcasting rights for the United States. The puck had integrated electronics to track its position on screen; a blue streak traced the path of the puck across the ice. The streak would turn red if the puck was shot especially hard. This was an experiment in broadcasting intended to help viewers unfamiliar with hockey to better follow the game by making the puck more visible. It was ill-received by many traditional hockey fans, but appreciated by many of the more casual viewers. The system debuted with much publicity in the NHL All-Star game at the Boston Fleet Center on January 20, 1996, but the system was shelved when Fox Sports lost the NHL broadcast rights three years later.

In game play
During a game, pucks can reach speeds of 100 mph or more when struck. The current world record is held by Denis Kulyash of KHL's Avangard Omsk, who slapped a puck at the 2011 KHL All-Star Game skills competition in St. Petersburg, Russia on 5 February 2011 with a speed of 110.3 mph. Zdeno Chára, whose slapshot clocked 108.8 mph in the 2013 NHL All-Star Game SuperSkills competition, broke his own earlier record.

Fast-flying pucks are potentially dangerous to players and spectators. Puck-related injuries at hockey games are not uncommon. This led to the evolution of various types of protective gear for players, most notably the goaltender mask. The most notable incident involving a spectator took place on March 18, 2002, when a 13-year-old girl, Brittanie Cecil, died two days after being struck on the head by a hockey puck deflected into the crowd at an NHL game between the Calgary Flames and Columbus Blue Jackets in Columbus. This is the only known incident of this type to have occurred in the history of the league. Partly as a result of this event, the glass or plexiglass panels that sit atop the boards of hockey rinks to protect spectators have been supplemented with mesh nets that extend above the upper edge of the glass.

Manufacture
NHL regulation pucks were not required for professional play until the 1990–91 season, but were standardized for consistent play and ease of manufacture half a century earlier, by Art Ross, in 1940. Major manufacturers of pucks exist in Canada, Russia, the Czech Republic, the People's Republic of China, and Slovakia.

The black rubber of the puck is made up of a mix of natural rubber, antioxidants, bonding materials and other chemicals to achieve a balance of hardness and resilience. This mixture is then turned in a machine with metal rollers, where workers add extra natural rubber, and ensure that the mixing is even. Samples are then put into a machine that analyses if the rubber will harden at the right temperature. An automated apparatus, called a pultrusion machine, extrudes the rubber into long circular logs that are 3 in in diameter and then cut into 1 in thick pieces while still soft. These pre-forms are then manually put into moulds that are the exact size of a finished puck. There are up to 200 mould cavities per moulding palette, capable of producing up to 5,000 pucks per week. The moulds are then compressed. This compression may be done cold or with the moulds heated to 300 °F for 18 minutes, depending on the proprietary methods of the manufacturer. They come out hard and then are allowed to sit for 24 hours. Each puck is manually cleaned with a trimmer machine to remove excess rubber. The moulding process adds a diamond cross-hatch texture around the edge of the puck for more friction between the stick and puck for better control and puck handling.

The practice pucks are made by a similar but faster process that uses larger pre-forms, 4 – thick, puts them into moulds automatically, and applies more pressure and heat over a shorter period of time to compress the puck into the standard size. This allows approximately twice as many pucks to be manufactured in the same time period as the more exacting production of NHL regulation pucks. People sometimes freeze pucks to prevent them from sticking to the ice.

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In roller hockey
Roller hockey pucks, a.k.a. in-line hockey pucks, are similar to ice-hockey pucks but are made from plastic and thus lighter. They have small ribs protruding from their tops and bottoms which limit contact with the surface, allowing better sliding motion and less friction. These pucks typically come in light, easily visible colors: mostly commonly red, but also sometimes orange, yellow, pink, or green. Roller hockey pucks were created so inline hockey and street hockey players could play with a puck instead of a ball on surfaces such as hardwood, concrete, and asphalt.

In underwater hockey
Underwater hockey uses a type of puck that while similar in appearance to an ice hockey puck, differs in that it has a lead core weighing approximately 3 lb within a teflon, plastic or rubber coating. This makes the puck dense enough to sink in a swimming pool, though it can be lofted during passes, while affording some protection to the pool tiles.

A smaller and lighter version of the standard puck exists for junior competition and is approximately 1 lb 12 oz (0.80–0.85 kg) and of similar construction to the standard puck.

While there are numerous regional variations in colour, construction and materials all must conform to international regulations stipulating overall dimensions and weight. The regulations state that pucks should be a bright distinctive colour, for example high-visibility pink or orange, and that for World Championships these are the only acceptable colours.

In spongee
Spongee a.k.a. "sponge hockey", is an organized recreational cult game that emerged in Canada around the 1950s and is played in the Canadian city of Winnipeg. It gets its name from the puck that is used: instead of the hard vulcanized rubber puck used in regular ice hockey, a softer sponge puck is used.<ref name="spongeepuck" At one point, some locals referred to it as "tweeter" based on the sound the original pucks made. The game is a variant of ice hockey and was influenced by Canadian road-hockey and ice-hockey players playing shinny on outdoor rinks in running shoes and winter boots. The game is played in winter strictly on outdoor rinks, does not use ice skates, and has codes involving less contact. Broomball shoes are sometimes used.

The spongee puck originated when someone took a toy red-white-and-blue handball and cut out the center, leaving a rude approximation of a standard hockey puck. Eventually manufactured types of sponge pucks came into use, some of which were developed in Slovakia and had a spring core. Spongee pucks are softer than ice hockey pucks and have more bounce.

In other sports and games
The term "puck" is sometimes also applied to similar (though often smaller) gaming discs in other sports and games, including novuss, shuffleboard, table shuffleboard, box hockey, floor hockey, and air hockey.

Alternative uses
Ice hockey pucks of regulation 3 in diameter and 1 in thickness may be used as mechanical vibration dampening isolators in places such as feet for light industrial air compressors, and air conditioning units because they are of regulation materials and therefore consistent manufacture, size, and shape, and are constructed of a repeatable and consistent vulcanized rubber material.

Since the material is rubber, it may be drilled out or milled easily to a fixed depth as rubber feet or used as rubber spacer or gasket material.

A very common use of a slotted hockey puck is as an adaptor between the metal foot of a trolley jack and the sill (rocker panel) of an automobile. The sill has a spot-welded lip which fits into the slot of the puck and would otherwise be bent or marked by the metal foot.

In November 2018, faculty of Oakland University in Michigan received hockey pucks and training to throw them as a possible last-ditch defense against active shooters. The American Association of University Professors distributed pucks to its 800 members, and is working with student groups to distribute an additional 1,700 pucks to students.

title: Hockey puck


text:
Puck (moon)

Puck the sixth-largest moon of Uranus. It was discovered in December 1985 by the Voyager 2 spacecraft. The name Puck follows the convention of naming Uranus's moons after characters from Shakespeare. The orbit of Puck lies between the rings of Uranus and the first of Uranus's large moons, Miranda. Puck is approximately spherical in shape and has diameter of about 162 km. It has a dark, heavily cratered surface, which shows spectral signs of water ice.

Discovery and naming
Puck—the largest inner moon of Uranus—was discovered from the images taken by Voyager 2 on 30 December 1985. It was given the temporary designation S/1985 U 1.

The moon was later named after the character Puck who appears in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, a little sprite who travels around the globe at night with the fairies. In Celtic mythology and English folklore, a Puck is a mischievous sprite, imagined as an evil demon by Christians.

It is also designated Uranus XV.

Physical characteristics

Puck is the largest inner moon of Uranus, orbiting inside the orbit of Miranda. It is intermediate in size between Portia (the second-largest inner moon) and Miranda (the smallest of the five major moons). Puck's orbit is located between the rings of Uranus and Miranda. Little is known about Puck aside from its orbit, radius of about 81 km, and geometric albedo in visible light of approximately 0.11.

Of the moons discovered by the Voyager 2 imaging team, only Puck was discovered early enough that the probe could be programmed to image it in some detail. Images showed that Puck has a shape of a slightly prolate spheroid (ratio between axes is 0.93–1). Its surface is heavily cratered and is grey in color. There are three named craters on the surface of Puck, the largest being about 45 km in diameter. Observations with the Hubble Space Telescope and large terrestrial telescopes found water-ice absorption features in the spectrum of Puck.

Little is known about the internal structure of Puck. It is probably made of a mixture of water ice, and may have been collisionally disrupted and reaccreted as a rubble pile. Its surface is coated with a dark material similar to that found in the main rings, The dark material is probably made of rocks or radiation-processed organics; it is possible that material spiralling inwards from Uranus's μ ring coats Puck's leading hemisphere as well. The absence of craters with bright rays implies that Puck is not differentiated, meaning that ice and non-ice components have not separated from each other into a core and mantle.

Named features
Puck has three craters named Bogle, Butz, and Lob, which are named after mischievous spirits from Scottish, German, and British folklore respectively. Details about these craters are currently unknown.

title: Puck (moon)


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Talk:Periods of Architecture

How about a rename to architectural period? This term can more easily be linked to within the text of an article. So instead of talking about something as being one of the Periods of Architecture you can just state that it is an architectural period. BTW, the current title is both improperly capitalized and pluralized -- see wikipedia naming conventions. I will change this after sometime tomorrow. --maveric149, Saturday, May 25, 2002

title: Talk:Periods of Architecture


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Place Charles de Gaulle

The Place Charles de Gaulle, historically known as the Place de l'Étoile , is a large road junction in Paris, France, the meeting point of twelve straight avenues (hence its historic name, which translates as "Square of the Star") including the Champs-Élysées. It was renamed in 1970, following the death of President Charles de Gaulle. It is still often referred to by its original name; the nearby Métro and RER station retains the designation Charles de Gaulle–Étoile. Paris's Axe historique ("historical axis") cuts through the Arc de Triomphe, which stands at the centre of the Place Charles de Gaulle.

History

The original name of the area was the Butte Chaillot ("Chaillot Mound", named after the locality). At the time, it was the point of convergence of several hunting trails. The Marquis de Marigny constructed monumental roadworks, completed in 1777, on the mound when he was establishing the plantations along the Champs-Élysées. The junction included paving of the road in the form of a star, as it still exists today and became known as the Place de l'Étoile.

In 1787, the Wall of the Ferme générale (Mur des Fermiers généraux), and the two buildings of the Barrière de l'Étoile (also known as the Barrière de Neuilly) were built to the design of Claude Nicolas Ledoux for the collection of the octroi tax at the entrance to Paris. They were located on either side of the Place de l'Étoile until their demolition after 1859.

Between 1806 and 1836, the Arc de Triomphe de l'Étoile was built to the design of Jean Chalgrin. It was originally commissioned by Emperor Napoleon I during the First French Empire and inaugurated three decades later by King Louis Philippe I under the July Monarchy.

The avenues radiating from the Place de l'Étoile were created during the Second French Empire of Emperor Napoleon III as part of Haussmann's renovation of Paris. The square was completely redesigned with avenues de Bezons (now Wagram), Joséphine (now Marceau), Kléber, de Saint-Cloud (now Victor-Hugo), Essling (now Carnot), Prince-Jérôme (now Mac-Mahon and Niel) forming with the Champs-Élysées and other existing avenues a star around the Arc de Triomphe.

In 1864, the circular street surrounding the Place de l'Étoile was named Rue de Presbourg (south of the Axe historique) and Rue de Tilsitt (north of the Axe historique), after the diplomatic successes of Napoleon which led to the signing of the Treaty of Presbourg in 1805 and the Treaties of Tilsit in 1807.

Since 1921, beneath the Arc de Triomphe lies the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. After the death of President Charles de Gaulle in 1970, the Place de l'Étoile was renamed the Place Charles de Gaulle.

Map

The Place Charles de Gaulle has a diameter of 241 m, giving it an area of approximately 4.55 hectare. It is the second largest square in Paris, after the Place de la Concorde (8.64 hectares). At the centre of the square stands the Arc de Triomphe, which is accessible via a pedestrian underpass, to avoid the confluence of vehicular traffic from the juncture of twelve radiating avenues.

Avenues

The twelve avenues, clockwise from the north, are the following:

 * 1) Avenue de Wagram (thus called since the Second Empire) and Boulevard de l'Étoile or Boulevard Bezons before
 * 2) Avenue Hoche: Avenue de la Reine-Hortense during the Second Empire and Boulevard Monceau before
 * 3) Avenue de Friedland since the Second Empire and Boulevard Beaujon before
 * 4) Avenue des Champs-Élysées
 * 5) Avenue Marceau: Avenue Joséphine during the Second Empire
 * 6) Avenue d'Iéna
 * 7) Avenue Kléber: Avenue du Roi-de-Rome during the Second Empire and Boulevard de Passy before
 * 8) Avenue Victor-Hugo: Avenue d'Eylau during the Second Empire and Avenue de Saint-Cloud before
 * 9) Avenue Foch: Avenue du Bois during the Third Republic and Avenue de l'Impératrice during the Second Empire
 * 10) Avenue de la Grande Armée during the Second Empire and Avenue de Neuilly before
 * 11) Avenue Carnot: Avenue d'Essling during the Second Empire
 * 12) Avenue Mac-Mahon: Avenue du Prince-Jérôme during the Second Empire

Axes

The Place Charles de Gaulle is symmetrical and thus has six axes:

 * 1) Axis Avenue de Wagram and Avenue Kléber
 * 2) Axis Avenue Hoche and Avenue Victor-Hugo
 * 3) Axis Avenue de Friedland and Avenue Foch
 * 4) Axis Avenue des Champs-Élysées and Avenue de la Grande Armée which is the Axe historique of Paris
 * 5) Axis Avenue Marceau and Avenue Carnot
 * 6) Axis Avenue d'Iéna and Avenue Mac-Mahon

Arrondissements
The Place Charles de Gaulle (as well as the Arc de Triomphe) is split between the 8th, 16th and 17th arrondissements of Paris. The 8th arrondissement encompasses the area between Avenue de Wagram and Avenue Marceau (to the east). The 16th arrondissement encompasses the area between Avenue Marceau and Avenue de la Grande Armée (to the south and west). The 17th arrondissement encompasses the area between Avenue de la Grande Armée and Avenue de Wagram (to the north).

Literature
La Place de l'Étoile is the title of a novel by French writer Patrick Modiano.

Transportation

 * Located near the Métro station: Charles de Gaulle–Étoile.

The Place Charles de Gaulle is served by Métro and RER services. Line 1, as well as RER A, run under the Avenue de la Grande Armée and Champs-Élysées and stop at the station. The station is also served by Line 2 and serves as the western terminus of Line 6.

title: Place Charles de Gaulle


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Satellite constellation

A satellite constellation is a group of artificial satellites working together as a system. Unlike a single satellite, a constellation can provide permanent global or near-global coverage, such that at any time everywhere on Earth at least one satellite is visible. Satellites are typically placed in sets of complementary orbital planes and connect to globally distributed ground stations. They may also use inter-satellite communication.

Other satellite groups
Satellite constellations should not be confused with:
 * satellite clusters, which are groups of satellites moving very close together in almost identical orbits (see satellite formation flying);
 * satellite series or satellite programs (such as Landsat), which are generations of satellites launched in succession;
 * satellite fleets, which are groups of satellites from the same manufacturer or operator that function independently from each other (not as a system).

Overview

Satellites in medium Earth orbit (MEO) and low Earth orbit (LEO) are often deployed in satellite constellations, because the coverage area provided by a single satellite only covers a small area that moves as the satellite travels at the high angular velocity needed to maintain its orbit. Many MEO or LEO satellites are needed to maintain continuous coverage over an area. This contrasts with geostationary satellites, where a single satellite, at a much higher altitude and moving at the same angular velocity as the rotation of the Earth's surface, provides permanent coverage over a large area.

For some applications, in particular digital connectivity, the lower altitude of MEO and LEO satellite constellations provide advantages over a geostationary satellite, with lower path losses (reducing power requirements and costs) and latency. The propagation delay for a round-trip internet protocol transmission via a geostationary satellite can be over 600ms, but as low as 125ms for a MEO satellite or 30ms for a LEO system.

Examples of satellite constellations include the Global Positioning System (GPS), Galileo and GLONASS constellations for navigation and geodesy in MEO, the Iridium and Globalstar satellite telephony services and Orbcomm messaging service in LEO, the Disaster Monitoring Constellation and RapidEye for remote sensing in Sun-synchronous LEO, Russian Molniya and Tundra communications constellations in highly elliptic orbit, and satellite broadband constellations, under construction from Starlink and OneWeb in LEO, and operational from O3b in MEO.

Walker Constellation
There are a large number of constellations that may satisfy a particular mission. Usually constellations are designed so that the satellites have similar orbits, eccentricity and inclination so that any perturbations affect each satellite in approximately the same way. In this way, the geometry can be preserved without excessive station-keeping thereby reducing the fuel usage and hence increasing the life of the satellites. Another consideration is that the phasing of each satellite in an orbital plane maintains sufficient separation to avoid collisions or interference at orbit plane intersections. Circular orbits are popular, because then the satellite is at a constant altitude requiring a constant strength signal to communicate.

A class of circular orbit geometries that has become popular is the Walker Delta Pattern constellation. This has an associated notation to describe it which was proposed by John Walker. His notation is:

 * i: t/p/f

where:
 * i is the inclination;
 * t is the total number of satellites;
 * p is the number of equally spaced planes; and
 * f is the relative spacing between satellites in adjacent planes. The change in true anomaly (in degrees) for equivalent satellites in neighbouring planes is equal to f × 360 / t.

For example, the Galileo navigation system is a Walker Delta 56°:24/3/1 constellation. This means there are 24 satellites in 3 planes inclined at 56 degrees, spanning the 360 degrees around the equator. The "1" defines the phasing between the planes, and how they are spaced. The Walker Delta is also known as the Ballard rosette, after A. H. Ballard's similar earlier work. Ballard's notation is (t,p,m) where m is a multiple of the fractional offset between planes.

Another popular constellation type is the near-polar Walker Star, which is used by Iridium. Here, the satellites are in near-polar circular orbits across approximately 180 degrees, travelling north on one side of the Earth, and south on the other. The active satellites in the full Iridium constellation form a Walker Star of 86.4°:66/6/2, i.e. the phasing repeats every two planes. Walker uses similar notation for stars and deltas, which can be confusing.

These sets of circular orbits at constant altitude are sometimes referred to as orbital shells.

Orbital shell
In spaceflight, an orbital shell is a set of artificial satellites in circular orbits at a certain fixed altitude. In the design of satellite constellations, an orbital shell usually refers to a collection of circular orbits with the same altitude and, oftentimes, orbital inclination, distributed evenly in celestial longitude (and mean anomaly). For a sufficiently high inclination and altitude the orbital shell covers the entire orbited body. In other cases the coverage extends up to a certain maximum latitude.

Several existing satellite constellations typically use a single orbital shell. New large megaconstellations have been proposed that consist of multiple orbital shells.

Broadcasting

 * Sirius Satellite Radio
 * XM Satellite Radio
 * SES
 * Othernet
 * Molniya (discontinued)

Monitoring

 * Spire (AIS, ADS-B)
 * Iridium (AIS, ADS-B, IoT)
 * Myriota (IoT)
 * Swarm Technologies (IoT)
 * Astrocast (IoT)
 * TDRSS

Internet access
Other Internet access systems are proposed or currently being developed:

Some systems were proposed but never realized:

 * Progress
 * Boeing Satellite is transferring the application to OneWeb
 * LeoSat shut down completely in 2019
 * The OneWeb constellation had 6 pilot satellites in February 2019, 74 satellites launched as of 21 March 2020 but filed for bankruptcy on 27 March 2020
 * Starlink: first mission (Starlink 0) launched on 24 May 2019; 955 satellites launched, 51 deorbited, 904 in orbit ; public beta test in limited latitude range started in November 2020
 * O3b mPOWER: first 2 satellites launched December 2022; 9 more in 2023–2024, with the initial service start expected in Q3 2023.
 * Telesat LEO: two prototypes: 2018 launch
 * CASIC Hongyun: prototype launched in December 2018
 * CASC Hongyan prototype launched in December 2018, might be merged with Hongyun
 * Project Kuiper: FCC filing in July 2019. Prototypes launched in October 2023.

Earth observation satellite constellations

 * RADARSAT Constellation
 * Planet Labs
 * Pléiades 1A and 1B
 * Satellogic
 * RapidEye
 * Disaster Monitoring Constellation
 * A-train
 * SPOT 6 and SPOT 7
 * Spire
 * Synspective

title: Satellite constellation


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Eero Saarinen

Eero Saarinen (, ; August 20, 1910 – September 1, 1961) was a Finnish-American architect and industrial designer who created a wide array of innovative designs for buildings and monuments, including the General Motors Technical Center in Warren, Michigan; the passenger terminal at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C.; the TWA Flight Center (now TWA Hotel) at John F. Kennedy International Airport; and the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. He was the son of Finnish architect Eliel Saarinen.

Early life and education
Eero Saarinen was born in Hvitträsk on August 20, 1910, to Finnish architect Eliel Saarinen and his second wife, Louise, on his father's 37th birthday. They migrated to the United States in 1923, when Eero was thirteen. He grew up in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, where his father taught and was dean of the Cranbrook Academy of Art, and he took courses in sculpture and furniture design there. He had a close relationship with fellow students, designers Charles and Ray Eames, and became good friends with architect Florence Knoll (née Schust).

Saarinen began studies in sculpture at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris, France, in September 1929. He then went on to study at the Yale School of Architecture, completing his studies in 1934. He subsequently toured Europe and North Africa for two years and then returned to the United States in 1936 to work in his father's architectural practice.

Career
After his tour of Europe and North Africa, Saarinen returned to Cranbrook to work for his father and teach at the academy. His father's firm, Saarinen, Swanson and Associates, was headed by Eliel Saarinen and Robert Swanson from the late 1930s until Eliel's death in 1950 and headquartered in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan until 1961 when the practice was moved to Hamden, Connecticut.

While still working for his father, Saarinen first gained recognition for his design capabilities for a chair he designed together with Charles Eames, which received first place in the Organic Design in Home Furnishings competition in 1940. The Tulip chair, like all other Saarinen chairs, was taken into production by the Knoll furniture company, founded by Hans Knoll, who married Saarinen family friend Florence (Schust) Knoll. Further attention came also while Saarinen was still working for his father when he took first prize in the 1948 competition for the design of the Gateway Arch National Park (then known as the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial) in St. Louis. The memorial was not completed until the 1960s. The competition award was mistakenly addressed to his father because both he and his father had entered the competition separately.

During his long association with Knoll he designed many important pieces of furniture, including the Grasshopper lounge chair and ottoman (1946), the Womb chair and ottoman (1948), the Womb settee (1950), side and arm chairs (1948–1950), and his most famous Tulip or Pedestal group (1956), which featured side and arm chairs, dining, coffee and side tables, as well as a stool. All of these designs were highly successful except for the Grasshopper lounge chair, which, although in production through 1965, was not a big success.

One of Saarinen's earliest works to receive international acclaim is the Crow Island School in Winnetka, Illinois (1940). The first major work by Saarinen, in collaboration with his father, was the General Motors Technical Center in Warren, Michigan, which follows the rationalist design Miesian style, incorporating steel and glass but with the addition of accent of panels in two shades of blue. The GM Technical Center was constructed in 1956, with Saarinen using models, which allowed him to share his ideas with others and gather input from other professionals.

With the success of this project, Saarinen was then invited by other major American corporations such as John Deere, IBM/IBM Rochester, and CBS to design their new headquarters or other major corporate buildings. Despite the overall rational design philosophy, the interiors usually contained dramatic sweeping staircases as well as furniture designed by Saarinen, such as the Pedestal series. In the 1950s he began to receive more commissions from American universities for campus designs and individual buildings. These include Birch Hall at Antioch College, the Noyes dormitory at Vassar and Hill College House at the University of Pennsylvania as well as the Ingalls ice rink, Ezra Stiles & Morse Colleges at Yale University, the MIT Chapel and neighboring Kresge Auditorium at MIT and the University of Chicago Law School building and grounds.

Saarinen served on the jury for the Sydney Opera House commission in 1957 and was crucial in the selection of the now internationally known design by Jørn Utzon. A jury which did not include Saarinen had discarded Utzon's design in the first round; Saarinen reviewed the discarded designs, recognized a quality in Utzon's design, and ultimately assured the commission of Utzon.

After his father's death in July 1950, Saarinen founded his own architect's office, Eero Saarinen and Associates. He was the principal partner from 1950 until his death. The firm carried out many of its most important works, including the Bell Labs Holmdel Complex in Holmdel Township, New Jersey; the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, Missouri; the Miller House in Columbus, Indiana; the TWA Flight Center at John F. Kennedy International Airport, which he worked on with Charles J. Parise; the main terminal of Washington Dulles International Airport; and the new East Air Terminal of the old Athens airport in Greece, which opened in 1967. Many of these projects use catenary curves in their structural designs.

In 1949–50, Saarinen was hired by the then-new Brandeis University to create a master plan for the campus. Saarinen's plan A Foundation for Learning: Planning the Campus of Brandeis University (1949; second edition 1951), developed with Matthew Nowicki, called for a central academic complex surrounded by residential quadrangles along a peripheral road. The plan was never built but was useful in attracting donors. Saarinen did build a few residential structures on the campus, including Ridgewood Quadrangle (1950), Sherman Student Center (1952) and Shapiro Dormitory at Hamilton Quadrangle (1952). These have all been either demolished or extensively remodeled.

One of his best known thin-shell concrete structures is the Kresge Auditorium at MIT. Another thin-shell structure is Ingalls Rink at Yale University, which has suspension cables connected to a single concrete backbone and is nicknamed "the whale". His most famous work is the TWA Flight Center at John F. Kennedy International Airport, which represents the culmination of his previous designs and his genius for expressing the ultimate purpose of each building, what he called the "style for the job". In 2019 the terminal was transformed into the TWA Hotel and features furniture designed by Saarinen.

Saarinen designed the Kleinhans Music Hall in Buffalo, New York, together with his father, Eliel Saarinen. He also designed the Embassy of the United States in London, which opened in 1960, and the former Embassy of the United States in Oslo.

Saarinen worked with his father, mother, and sister designing elements of the Cranbrook campus in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, including the Cranbrook School, Kingswood School, the Cranbrook Art Academy, and the Cranbrook Science Institute. Eero Saarinen's leaded-glass designs are a prominent feature of these buildings throughout the campus.

Non-architectural activities
Saarinen was recruited by Donal McLaughlin, an architectural school friend from his Yale days, to join the military service in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). Saarinen was assigned to draw illustrations for bomb disassembly manuals and to provide designs for the Situation Room in the White House. Saarinen worked full-time for the OSS until 1944.

Honors and awards
Eero Saarinen was elected a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects in 1952. He was elected a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1954. In 1962, he was posthumously awarded a gold medal by the American Institute of Architects.

In 1940, he received two first prizes together with Charles Eames in the furniture design competition of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. In 1948, he won the first prize in the Jefferson National Monument competition. The Boston Arts festival in 1953 gave him their Grand Architectural Award. He received the First Honor award of the American Institute of Architects twice, in 1955 and 1956, and their gold medal in 1962. In 1965 he took first prize in US Embassy competition in London.

Personal life
Saarinen became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1940.

In 1939, Saarinen married the sculptor Lilian Swann. They had two children, Eric and Susan Saarinen. Their marriage ended in divorce in 1954. That same year, Saarinen married Aline Bernstein Louchheim, an art critic at The New York Times. Saarinen met Louchheim when she came to Detroit to interview him for his contributions to the recently completed General Motors Technical Center. Saarinen and Louchheim had one son together, whom they named Eames after Saarinen's collaborator Charles Eames. In addition to their respective contributions to architecture, design, and criticism, Eero and Aline Saarinen are remembered for their affectionate and detailed personal papers, held at the Archives of American Art.

Death
Saarinen died on September 1, 1961, at the age of 51 while undergoing an operation in Ann Arbor, Michigan for a brain tumor. He was overseeing the completion of a new music building for the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance.

Legacy
By the 21st century, Saarinen was considered one of the masters of American 20th-century architecture. During that time, his work was the subject of a major exhibition and several books. This is partly because Roche-Dinkeloo, the successor to Saarinen's firm, donated its Saarinen archives to Yale University, but also because Saarinen's oeuvre can be said to fit in with present-day concerns about pluralism of styles. He was criticized in his own time—most vociferously by Yale's Vincent Scully—for having no identifiable style; one explanation for this is that Saarinen's vision was adapted to each individual client and project, which were never exactly the same. Scully also criticized him for designing buildings that were "packages," with "no connection with human use . . . at once cruelly inhuman and trivial, as if they had been designed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff."

The papers of Aline and Eero Saarinen, from 1906 to 1977, were donated in 1973 to the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution (by Charles Alan, Aline Saarinen's brother and executor of her estate ). In 2006, the bulk of these primary source documents on the couple were digitized and posted online on the Archives' website.

The Eero Saarinen collection at the Canadian Centre for Architecture documents eight built projects, including the old Athens airport in Greece, the former US Embassy Chanceries in Oslo, Norway and London, England, corporate projects for John Deere, CBS, and IBM, and the North Christian Church in Columbus, Indiana.

An exhibition of Saarinen's work, Eero Saarinen: Shaping the Future, was organized by the Finnish Cultural Institute in New York in collaboration with Yale School of Architecture, the National Building Museum, and the Museum of Finnish Architecture. The exhibition toured in Europe and the United States from 2006 to 2010, including a stint at the National Building Museum in Washington, DC. The exhibition was accompanied by the book Eero Saarinen: Shaping the Future.

In 2016, Eero Saarinen: The Architect Who Saw the Future, a film about Saarinen co-produced by his son Eric Saarinen, premiered on the American Masters series on PBS.

title: Eero Saarinen