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Charlton Heston

Charlton Heston (born John Charles Carter; October 4, 1923 – April 5, 2008) was an American actor and political activist. He gained stardom for his leading man roles in numerous Hollywood films including biblical epics, science-fiction films and action films. He won the Academy Award as well as nominations for three Golden Globe Awards, and three Primetime Emmy Awards. He won numerous honorary accolades including the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award in 1978, the Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award in 1967, the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award in 1971, the Kennedy Center Honors in 1997, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2003.

Heston gained stardom for his leading roles as Moses in The Ten Commandments (1956), and as the title role of Ben-Hur (1959), the latter of which earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor. His other notable credits include The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), Secret of the Incas (1954), Touch of Evil (1958), The Big Country (1958), El Cid (1961), The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965), Khartoum (1966), Planet of the Apes (1968), Julius Caesar (1970), The Omega Man (1971), Antony and Cleopatra (1972), Soylent Green (1973), The Three Musketeers (1974), Airport 1975 (1974), Earthquake (1974), and Crossed Swords (1978). He later acted in Mother Lode (1982), Tombstone (1993), True Lies (1994), Alaska (1996), and Hamlet (1996).

In the 1950s and early 1960s, he was one of a handful of Hollywood actors who openly denounced racism and he was also an active supporter of the civil rights movement. In 1987, Heston left the Democratic Party and became a Republican, founding a conservative political action committee and supporting Ronald Reagan. Heston was a five-term president of the National Rifle Association (NRA), from 1998 to 2003. After announcing that he had Alzheimer's disease in 2002, he retired from acting and the NRA presidency.

Family
John Charles Carter was born on October 4, 1923, in Cook County, Illinois, to Lilla (née Baines; 1899–1994) and Russell Whitford Carter (1897–1966), a sawmill operator. His autobiography states that he was born in Wilmette, Illinois, while most sources state he was born in adjacent Evanston, Illinois. His birth certificate, registered when he was 11 days old, gives his name as Charlton Carter and says he was born in Evanston.

Heston said in a 1995 interview that he was not very good at remembering addresses or his early childhood. Heston was partially of Scottish descent, including from the Clan Fraser, but the majority of his ancestry was English. His earliest colonial ancestors arrived in America from England in the 1600s. His maternal great-grandparents and namesakes were Englishman William Charlton from Sunderland and Scotswoman Mary Drysdale Charlton. They emigrated to Canada, where his grandmother, Marian Emily Charlton, was born in 1872. In his autobiography Heston refers to his father participating in his family's construction business. When Heston was an infant, his father's work moved the family to St. Helen, Michigan. It was a rural, heavily forested part of the state, and Heston lived an isolated yet idyllic existence, spending much time hunting and fishing in the backwoods of the area.

When Heston was ten years old, his parents divorced after having three children. Shortly thereafter, his mother remarried and Charlton, with his younger sister Lilla and younger brother Alan, next moved to Wilmette. Heston and his two siblings took the surname of his mother’s new husband. The three children attended New Trier High School, which would become the high school also for the movie stars Rock Hudson and Ann-Margret. He recalled living there, "All kids play pretend games, but I did it more than most. Even when we moved to Chicago, I was more or less a loner. We lived in a North Shore suburb, where I was a skinny hick from the woods, and all the other kids seemed to be rich and know about girls". Contradictions on paper and in an interview surround when "Charlton" became Heston's first name. His birth certificate lists his name as Charlton Carter, and the 1930 United States Census record for Richfield, Michigan, in Roscommon County, shows his name as being Charlton J. Carter at age six. Later accounts and movie studio biographies say he was born John Charles Carter. When Russell Carter died in 1966, Charlton's brother and sister changed their surname from Carter to Heston the following year; Charlton did not.

Charlton was his maternal grandmother Marian's maiden name, not his mother Lilla's. This is contrary to how 20th-century references read and what Heston said. When Heston's maternal grandmother and his true maternal grandfather Charles Baines separated or divorced in the early 1900s, Marian (née Charlton) Baines married William Henry Lawton in 1907. Charlton Heston's mother, Lilla, and her sister May were adopted by their grandfather and changed their last name to Charlton in order to distance themselves from their biological father, Mr. Baines, who was an undesirable father figure. The Carters divorced in 1933 and Lilla Carter married Chester Heston. The newly married Mrs. Heston preferred her children use the same last name as hers. It was thus as Charlton Heston that he appeared in his first film with younger brother Alan Carter (small role), an adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's Peer Gynt (1941). His nickname was always Chuck.

Education
Heston frequently recounted that while growing up in northern Michigan in a sparsely populated area, he often wandered in the forest, "acting" out characters from books he had read. Later, in high school, he enrolled in New Trier's drama program, playing the lead role in the amateur silent 16 mm film adaptation of Peer Gynt, from the Ibsen play, by future film activist David Bradley released in 1941. From the Winnetka Community Theatre (or the Winnetka Dramatist's Guild, as it was then known) in which he was active, he earned a drama scholarship to Northwestern University. He attended college from 1941 to 1943 and among his acting teachers was Alvina Krause. Several years later, Heston teamed up with Bradley to produce the first sound version of William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, in which Heston played Mark Antony.

World War II service
In March 1944 Heston married Northwestern University student Lydia Marie Clarke at Grace Methodist Church in downtown Greensboro, North Carolina. That same year, he joined the military. Heston enlisted in the United States Army Air Forces and served for two years as a radio operator and aerial gunner aboard a B-25 Mitchell medium bomber stationed in the Alaskan Aleutian Islands with the 77th Bombardment Squadron of the Eleventh Air Force. He reached the rank of staff sergeant.

After his rise to fame, Heston narrated for highly classified U.S. Armed Forces and Department of Energy instructional films, particularly relating to nuclear weapons, and "for six years Heston [held] the nation's highest security clearance" or Q clearance. The Q clearance is similar to a DoD or DIA clearance of top secret.

1947–1955: Early theatre and film roles
After the war, the Hestons lived in Hell's Kitchen, New York City, where they worked as artists' models. Seeking a way to make it in theatre, they decided to manage a playhouse in Asheville, North Carolina, in 1947, making $100 a week. In 1948, they returned to New York, where Heston was offered a supporting role in a Broadway revival of Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, starring Katharine Cornell. In television, Heston played a number of roles in CBS's Studio One, one of the most popular anthology dramas of the 1950s. In 1949 Heston played Mark Antony in an independent film adaptation of Julius Caesar (1950). Film producer Hal B. Wallis spotted Heston in a 1950 television production of Wuthering Heights and offered him a contract. When his wife reminded Heston they had decided to pursue theater and television, he replied, "Well, maybe just for one film to see what it's like."

Heston's first professional movie appearance was the leading role at age 26 in Dark City, a 1950 film noir produced by Hal Wallis. His breakthrough came when Cecil B. DeMille cast him as a circus manager in The Greatest Show on Earth, which was named by the Motion Picture Academy as the Best Picture of 1952. It was also the most popular movie of that year. King Vidor used Heston in a melodrama with Jennifer Jones, Ruby Gentry (1952). He followed it with a Western at Paramount, The Savage (1952), playing a white man raised by Indians. 20th Century Fox used him to play Andrew Jackson in The President's Lady (1953) opposite Susan Hayward. Back at Paramount he was Buffalo Bill in Pony Express (1953). He followed this with another Western, Arrowhead (1953).

In 1953, Heston was Billy Wilder's first choice to play Sefton in Stalag 17. However, the role was given to William Holden, who won an Oscar for it. Hal Wallis reunited Heston with Lizabeth Scott in a melodrama Bad for Each Other (1953). In 1954, he made two adventure films for Paramount Pictures. The Naked Jungle had him battle a plague of killer ants. He played the lead in Secret of the Incas, which was shot on location at the archeological site Machu Picchu and has numerous similarities to Raiders of the Lost Ark, which appeared a quarter of a century later. Heston played William Clark, the explorer, in The Far Horizons (1955) alongside Fred MacMurray as Meriwether Lewis. He tried a comedy The Private War of Major Benson (1955) at Universal, then supported Jane Wyman in a drama Lucy Gallant (1955).

Heston became an icon for playing Moses in the hugely successful biblical epic The Ten Commandments (1956), selected by director Cecil B. DeMille, who thought Heston bore an uncanny resemblance to Michelangelo's statue of Moses. DeMille cast Heston's three-month-old son, Fraser Clarke Heston, as the infant Moses. The Ten Commandments became one of the greatest box office successes of all time and is the eighth-highest-grossing film adjusted for inflation. His portrayal of the Hebrew prophet and deliverer was praised by film critics. The Hollywood Reporter described him as "splendid, handsome and princely (and human) in the scenes dealing with him as a young man, and majestic and terrible as his role demands it". The New York Daily News wrote that he "is remarkably effective as both the young, princely Moses and as the Patriarchal savior of his people". His performance as Moses earned him his first nomination for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama and Spain's Fotogramas de Plata Award for Best Foreign Performer. When the Egyptian Theater reopened in December 1998, it screened Cecil B. DeMille's 1923 original The Ten Commandments, which had premiered there 75 years earlier. Charlton and Lydia Heston were honored guests at this opening showing and were seated with their longtime friends, brothers Charles Elias Disney and Daniel H. Disney.

Heston went back to Westerns with Three Violent People (1957). Universal tried to interest him in a thriller starring Orson Welles, Touch of Evil; Heston agreed to be in it if Welles directed. The film has come to be regarded as a classic masterpiece. He also played a rare supporting role in William Wyler's The Big Country opposite Gregory Peck and Burl Ives. Heston got another chance to play Andrew Jackson in The Buccaneer (1958), produced by De Mille and starring Yul Brynner.

1956–1970: Film stardom
After Marlon Brando, Burt Lancaster, and Rock Hudson turned down the title role in Ben-Hur (1959), Heston accepted the role, winning the Academy Award for Best Actor, one of the unprecedented 11 Oscars the film earned. After Moses and Ben-Hur, Heston became more identified with Biblical epics than any other actor. He later voiced Ben-Hur in an animated television production of the Lew Wallace novel in 2003. Heston followed it with The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959) co-starring Gary Cooper, which was a box office disappointment. Heston turned down the lead opposite Marilyn Monroe in Let's Make Love to appear in Benn W. Levy's play The Tumbler, directed by Laurence Olivier. Called a "harrowingly pretentious verse drama" by Time, the production went through a troubled out-of-town tryout period in Boston and closed after five performances on Broadway in February 1960. Heston, a great admirer of Olivier the actor, took on the play to work with him as a director. After the play flopped, Heston told columnist Joe Hyams, "I feel I am the only one who came out with a profit. ... I got out of it precisely what I went in for—a chance to work with Olivier. I learned from him in six weeks things I never would have learned otherwise. I think I've ended up a better actor."

Heston enjoyed acting on stage, believing it revivified him as an actor. He never returned to Broadway but acted in regional theatres. His most frequent stage roles included the title role in Macbeth, and Mark Antony in both Julius Caesar and Antony and Cleopatra. Heston considered himself to be a Shakespearean actor and collected significant works by and about William Shakespeare. He played Sir Thomas More in A Man for All Seasons in several regional productions in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, eventually playing it in London's West End. The play was a success and the West End production was taken to Aberdeen, Scotland, for a week, where it was staged at His Majesty's Theatre. Samuel Bronston pursued Heston to play the title role in an epic shot in Spain, El Cid (1961), which was a big success. He was in a war film for Paramount, The Pigeon That Took Rome (1962), and a melodrama shot in Hawaii, Diamond Head (1963). Bronston wanted him for another epic and the result was 55 Days at Peking (1963), which was a box office disappointment.

Heston focused on epics: he was John the Baptist in The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965); Michelangelo in The Agony and the Ecstasy (1965) opposite Rex Harrison; the title role in Major Dundee (1965), directed by Sam Peckinpah. The War Lord (1965), directed by Franklin J. Schaffner, was on a smaller scale and critically acclaimed, though commercially it fared poorly. In Khartoum (1966) Heston played General Charles Gordon. From 1965 until 1971, Heston served as president of the Screen Actors Guild. The Guild had been created in 1933 for the benefit of actors, who had different interests from the producers and directors who controlled the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He was more conservative than most actors and publicly clashed with outspoken liberal actors such as Ed Asner. Counterpoint (1968) was a war film that was not particularly successful at the box office. Neither was the Western Will Penny (1968), directed by Tom Gries; however, Heston received excellent reviews and it was one of his favorite films.

Heston had not been in a big hit for a number of years but in 1968 he starred in Planet of the Apes, directed by Schaffner, which was hugely popular. Less so was a football drama, Number One (1969) directed by Gries. Heston had a smaller supporting role in Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970), which was popular. However, The Hawaiians (1970), directed by Gries, was not. In 1970, he portrayed Mark Antony again in another film version of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. His co-stars included Jason Robards as Brutus, Richard Chamberlain as Octavius, Robert Vaughn as Casca, and English actors Richard Johnson as Cassius, John Gielgud as Caesar, and Diana Rigg as Portia.

1971–1984: Established star
In 1971, he starred in the post-apocalyptic science-fiction film The Omega Man, which has received mixed critical reviews, but was popular, and has become a cult film in the years since release. It was also during this time he became a gun rights advocate. In 1972, Heston made his directorial debut and starred as Mark Antony in an adaptation of the William Shakespeare play he had performed earlier in his theater career, Antony and Cleopatra. Hildegarde Neil was Cleopatra and English actor Eric Porter was Ahenobarbus. After receiving scathing reviews, the film was never released to theaters and is rarely seen on television.

His next film, Skyjacked (1972) was a hit. However The Call of the Wild (1972) was a flop, one of Heston's least favorite films. He quickly recovered with a string of memorable hits: Soylent Green (1973), another dystopian science fiction film that has achieved cult status; The Three Musketeers (1973), playing Cardinal Richelieu as part an all-star cast ensemble; two back-to-back disaster films, the hugely successful Earthquake (1974), and Airport 1975 (1974), also a success; and Midway (1976) a war film.

Heston's long run at the box office ended with Two-Minute Warning (1976), a suspense film, and The Last Hard Men (1976), a Western. He played King Henry VIII for The Prince and the Pauper (1977), from the Musketeers team, then starred in a disaster film, Gray Lady Down (1978). Heston was in a Western written by his son, The Mountain Men (1980), and a horror film, The Awakening (1980). He made his second film as a director Mother Lode (1982) also written by his son, and it was a commercial disappointment.

1985–2000: Later film roles
From 1985 until 1987, he starred in his only prime time stint on a television series in the soap, The Colbys. With his son Fraser, he produced and starred in several TV movies, including remakes of Treasure Island and A Man for All Seasons. In 1992, Heston appeared on the A&E cable network in a short series of videos, Charlton Heston Presents the Bible, reading passages from the King James version.

In 1993, Heston teamed up with John Anthony West and Robert M. Schoch in an Emmy Award-winning NBC special, The Mystery of the Sphinx. West and Schoch had proposed a much earlier date for the construction of the Great Sphinx than the one which is generally accepted. They had suggested that the main type of weathering evident on the Great Sphinx and surrounding enclosure walls could only have been caused by prolonged and extensive rainfall and that the whole structure was carved out of limestone bedrock by an ancient advanced culture (such as the Heavy Neolithic Qaraoun culture). Never taking himself too seriously, he also made a few appearances as "Chuck" in Dame Edna Everage's shows, both on stage and on television. Heston appeared in 1993 in a cameo role in Wayne's World 2, in a scene where Wayne Campbell (Mike Myers) requests casting a better actor for a small role. After the scene is reshot with Heston, Campbell weeps in awe. That same year, Heston hosted Saturday Night Live. He had cameos in the films Hamlet, Tombstone, and True Lies.

He starred in many theatre productions at the Los Angeles Music Center, where he appeared in Detective Story and The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial, and as Sherlock Holmes in The Crucifer of Blood, opposite Richard Johnson as Dr. Watson. In 2001, he made a cameo appearance as an elderly, dying chimpanzee in Tim Burton's remake of Planet of the Apes. His last film role was as Josef Mengele in Rua Alguem 5555: My Father, which had limited release (mainly to festivals) in 2003. Heston's distinctive voice landed him roles as a film narrator, including the opening scenes of Armageddon and Disney's Hercules. He played the title role in Mister Roberts three times and cited it as one of his favorite roles. In the early 1990s, he tried unsuccessfully to revive and direct the show with Tom Selleck in the title role. In 1998, Heston had a cameo role playing himself in the American television series Friends, in the episode "The One with Joey's Dirty Day". In 2000, he played Chief Justice Haden Wainwright in The Outer Limits episode "Final Appeal".

Acting credits and accolades
Richard Corliss wrote in Time magazine, "From start to finish, Heston was a grand, ornery anachronism, the sinewy symbol of a time when Hollywood took itself seriously, when heroes came from history books, not comic books. Epics like Ben-Hur or El Cid simply couldn't be made today, in part because popular culture has changed as much as political fashion. But mainly because there's no one remotely like Charlton Heston to infuse the form with his stature, fire, and guts." In his obituary for the actor, film critic Roger Ebert noted, "Heston made at least three movies that almost everybody eventually sees: Ben-Hur, The Ten Commandments and Planet of the Apes." Heston's cinematic legacy was the subject of Cinematic Atlas: The Triumphs of Charlton Heston, an 11-film retrospective by the Film Society of the Lincoln Center that was shown at the Walter Reade Theatre from August 29 to September 4, 2008.

On April 17, 2010, Heston was inducted into the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum's Hall of Great Western Performers. In his childhood hometown of St. Helen, Michigan, a charter (independent) school, Charlton Heston Academy, opened on September 4, 2012. It is housed in the former St. Helen Elementary School. Enrollment on the first day was 220 students in grades kindergarten through eighth.

Charlton Heston was commemorated on a United States postage stamp issued on April 11, 2014. Charlton Heston was inducted as a Laureate of the Lincoln Academy of Illinois and awarded the Order of Lincoln (the State's highest honor) by Illinois Governor James R. Thompson in 1977 in the area of Performing Arts.

Political views
Heston's political activism had four stages. In the first stage, 1955–1961, he endorsed liberal Democratic candidates for president and signed on to petitions for liberal political causes. From 1961 until 1972, the second stage, he continued to endorse Democratic candidates for president. Moving beyond Hollywood, he became nationally visible in 1963 in support of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. From 1965 until 1971, he served as the elected President of the Screen Actors Guild and clashed with his liberal rival Ed Asner. In 1968, he helped publicize gun control measures when he joined fellow Hollywood stars in support of the Gun Control Act of 1968.

The third stage began in 1972. Heston rejected the liberalism of George McGovern and supported Republican Richard Nixon in 1972 for president. In the 1980s, he gave strong support to Ronald Reagan during his conservative presidency. In 1995, Heston entered his fourth stage by establishing his own political action fund-raising committee and jumped into the internal politics of the National Rifle Association. He gave numerous culture wars speeches and interviews upholding the conservative position, blaming media and academia for imposing affirmative action, which he saw as unfair reverse discrimination.

Civil rights advocate
Heston campaigned for presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson in 1956, although he was unable to campaign for John F. Kennedy in 1960 because he was filming El Cid in Spain. Reportedly, when a segregated Oklahoma movie theater was showing his movie El Cid for the first time in 1961, he joined a picket line outside the movie theater. Heston made no reference to this incident in his autobiography but he described traveling to Oklahoma City to picket segregated restaurants, to the chagrin of the producers of El Cid, Allied Artists. During the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom held in Washington, D.C., in 1963, he accompanied Martin Luther King Jr. In later speeches, he said he helped the civil rights cause "long before Hollywood found it fashionable".

In the 1964 election, he endorsed Lyndon B. Johnson, who had masterminded the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 through Congress over the vociferous opposition of southern Democrats. That year, Heston publicly opposed California Proposition 14 that rolled back the state's fair housing law, the Rumford Fair Housing Act.

Conservative beliefs
In his 1995 autobiography, In the Arena, written after he became a conservative Republican, Heston wrote that while driving back from the set of The War Lord, he saw a "Barry Goldwater for President" billboard with his campaign slogan "In Your Heart You Know He's Right" and thought to himself, "Son of a bitch, he right." Heston later said that his support for Goldwater was the event that helped turn him against gun control laws. Following the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy in 1968, Heston, Gregory Peck, Kirk Douglas, and James Stewart issued a statement in support of President Johnson's Gun Control Act of 1968. The Johnson White House had solicited Heston's support. He endorsed Hubert Humphrey in the 1968 presidential election.

Vietnam war
Heston opposed the Vietnam War during its course (though he changed his opinion in the years following the war) and in 1969 was approached by the Democratic Party to run for the U.S. Senate against incumbent George Murphy. He agonized over the decision but ultimately determined he could never give up acting. He supported Richard Nixon in 1972, though Nixon is not mentioned in his autobiography.

Gun rights
By the 1980s, Heston supported gun rights and changed his political affiliation from Democratic to Republican. When asked why he changed political alliances, Heston replied "I didn't change. The Democratic Party changed." In 1987, he first registered as a Republican. He campaigned for Republicans and Republican presidents Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush.

Culture war
Heston resigned in protest from Actors Equity, saying the union's refusal to allow a white actor to play a Eurasian role in Miss Saigon was "obscenely racist". Heston charged that CNN's telecasts from Baghdad were "sowing doubts" about the allied effort in the 1990–1991 Gulf War. At a Time Warner stockholders' meeting, Heston castigated the company for releasing an Ice-T album which included a song "Cop Killer" about killing police officers. While filming The Savage, Heston was initiated by blood into the Miniconjou Lakota Nation, saying that he had no natural American Indian heritage, but elected to be "Native American" to salvage the term from exclusively referring to American Indians.

Heston's 1997 speech called "Fighting the Culture War in America", Heston rhetorically deplored a culture war he said was being conducted by a generation of media people, educators, entertainers, and politicians against. He stated, "The Constitution was handed down to guide us by a bunch of wise old dead white guys who invented our country! Now some flinch when I say that. Why! It's true ... they were white guys! So were most of the guys that died in Lincoln's name opposing slavery in the 1860s. So why should I be ashamed of white guys? Why is "Hispanic Pride" or "Black Pride" a good thing, while "White Pride" conjures shaven heads and white hoods? Why was the Million Man March on Washington celebrated by many as progress, while the Promise Keepers March on Washington was greeted with suspicion and ridicule? I'll tell you why: Cultural warfare!" In an address to students at Harvard Law School entitled "Winning the Cultural War", Heston said, "If Americans believed in political correctness, we'd still be King George's boys—subjects bound to the British crown." He said to the students: "You are the best and the brightest. You, here in this fertile cradle of American academia, here in the castle of learning on the Charles River. You are the cream. But I submit that you and your counterparts across the land are the most socially conformed and politically silenced generation since Concord Bridge. And as long as you validate that and abide it, you are, by your grandfathers' standards, cowards". During a speech at Brandeis University, he stated, "Political correctness is tyranny with manners". In a speech to the National Press Club in 1997, Heston said, "Now, I doubt any of you would prefer a rolled up newspaper as a weapon against a dictator or a criminal intruder."

NRA president
Heston was the president (a largely ceremonial position) and spokesman of the NRA from 1998 until he resigned in 2003. At the 2000 NRA convention, he raised a rifle over his head and declared that a potential Al Gore administration would take away his Second Amendment rights "from my cold, dead hands". In announcing his resignation in 2003, he again raised a rifle over his head, repeating the five famous words of his 2000 speech. Heston became an honorary life member.

In the 2002 film Bowling for Columbine, Michael Moore interviewed Heston at Heston's home, asking him about an April 1999 meeting the NRA held in Denver, Colorado, shortly after the Columbine High School massacre. Moore criticized Heston for the perceived thoughtlessness in the timing and location of the meeting. When Moore asked Heston for his thoughts on why gun-related homicide is so much higher in the United States than in other countries, Heston said it was because, "we have probably more mixed ethnicity" and/or that "we have a history of violence, perhaps more than most countries". Heston subsequently, on-camera, excused himself and walked away. Moore was later criticized for having conducted the interview in what some viewed as an ambush. The interview was conducted early in 2001, before Heston publicly announced his Alzheimer's diagnosis, but the film was released afterward, causing some to say that Moore should have cut the interview from the final film.

Iraq war
In April 2003, he sent a message of support to the American forces in the Iraq War, attacking opponents of the war as "pretend patriots".

Abortion views
Heston opposed abortion and introduced Bernard Nathanson's 1987 anti-abortion documentary, Eclipse of Reason, which focuses on late-term abortions. Heston served on the advisory board of Accuracy in Media, a conservative media watchdog group founded by Reed Irvine.

Marriage
In March 1944 Heston married Northwestern University student Lydia Marie Clarke at Grace Methodist Church in downtown Greensboro, North Carolina.

Religious beliefs
Heston was an Episcopalian, and he has been described as "a spiritual man" with an "earthy flair", who "respected religious traditions" and "particularly enjoyed the historical aspects of the Christian faith".

Illness and death
In 1996, Heston received a hip replacement. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1998. Following a course of radiation treatment, the cancer went into remission. In 2000, he publicly disclosed the fact that he had been treated for alcoholism at a Utah clinic in May–June of that year. On August 9, 2002, he publicly announced (via a taped message) that he had been diagnosed with symptoms which are consistent with Alzheimer's disease. In July 2003, in his final public appearance, Heston received the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House from President George W. Bush. In March 2005, various newspapers reported that family and friends were shocked by the progression of his illness and that he was sometimes unable to get out of bed.

Heston died on the morning of April 5, 2008, at his home in Beverly Hills, California, with Lydia, his wife of 64 years, by his side. He was 84 years old. Heston is also survived by their son, Fraser Clarke Heston, and their daughter, Holly Ann Heston. The cause of Heston's death was not disclosed by his family. A month later, media outlets reported his death was due to pneumonia.

Early tributes came in from leading figures; President George W. Bush called Heston "a man of character and integrity, with a big heart ... He served his country during World War II, marched in the civil rights movement, led a labor union and vigorously defended Americans' Second Amendment rights." Former First Lady Nancy Reagan said that she was "heartbroken" over Heston's death and released a statement, reading, "I will never forget Chuck as a hero on the big screen in the roles he played, but more importantly I considered him a hero in life for the many times that he stepped up to support Ronnie in whatever he was doing."

Heston's funeral was held a week later on April 12, 2008, in a ceremony which was attended by 250 people including Nancy Reagan and Hollywood stars such as California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Olivia de Havilland, Keith Carradine, Pat Boone, Tom Selleck, Oliver Stone (who had cast Heston in his 1999 movie Any Given Sunday), Rob Reiner, and Christian Bale.

The funeral was held at Episcopal Parish of St. Matthew's Church in Pacific Palisades, the church where Heston had regularly worshipped and attended Sunday services since the early 1980s. He was cremated and his ashes were given to his family.

title: Charlton Heston


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Lucca

Lucca is a city and comune in Tuscany, Central Italy, on the Serchio River, in a fertile plain near the Ligurian Sea. The city has a population of about 89,000, while its province has a population of 383,957.

Lucca is known as an Italian "Città d'arte" (City of Art) from its intact Renaissance-era city walls and its very well preserved historic center, where, among other buildings and monuments, are located the Piazza dell'Anfiteatro, which has its origins in the second half of the 1st century A.D., the Guinigi Tower, a 45 m tower that dates from the 1300s  and the Cathedral of San Martino.

The city is the birthplace of numerous world-class composers, including Giacomo Puccini, Alfredo Catalani, and Luigi Boccherini.

Toponymy
By the Romans, Lucca was known as Luca. From more recent and concrete toponymic studies, the name Lucca has references that lead to "sacred grove" (Latin: lucus), "to cut" (Latin: lucare) and "luminous space" (leuk, a term used by the first European populations). The origin apparently refers to a wooded area deforested to make room for light or to a clearing located on a river island of Serchio debris, in the middle of wooded areas.

Antiquity
The territory of present-day Lucca was certainly settled by the Etruscans, and it also has traces of a probable earlier Ligurian presence (called Luk meaning "marsh", which was previously speculated as a possible origin of the city's name), dating from the 3rd century BC. However, it was only with the arrival of the Romans that the area took on the appearance of a real town. It obtained the status of a Roman colony in 180 BC and of a municipality (municipium) in 89 BC.

The rectangular grid of its historical centre preserves the Roman street plan, and the Piazza San Michele occupies the site of the ancient forum. The outline of the Roman amphitheatre is still seen in the Piazza dell'Anfiteatro, and the outline of a Roman theater is visible in Piazza Sant'Augostino. Fragments of the Roman-era walls are incorporated into the church of Santa Maria della Rosa.

At the Lucca Conference, in 56 BC, Julius Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus reaffirmed their political alliance known as the First Triumvirate.

Middle Ages
Frediano, an Irish monk, was bishop of Lucca in the early sixth century. At one point, Lucca was plundered by Odoacer, the first Germanic King of Italy. Lucca was an important city and fortress even in the sixth century, when Narses besieged it for several months in 553. From 576 to 797, under the Lombards, it was the capital of a duchy, known as Duchy of Tuscia, which included a large part of today's Tuscany and the province of Viterbo, during this time the city also minted its own coins. The Holy Face of Lucca (or Volto Santo), a major relic supposedly carved by Nicodemus, arrived in 742.

Among the population that inhabited Lucca in the medieval era, there was also a significant presence of Jews. The first mention of their presence in the city is from a document from the year 859. The Jewish community was led by the Kalonymos family (which later became a major component of proto-Ashkenazic Jewry).

Thanks above all to the Holy Face and to the relics of important saints, such as San Regolo and Saint Fridianus, the city was one of the main destinations of the Via Francigena, the major pilgrimage route to Rome from the north.

The Lucca cloth was a silk fabric that was woven with gold or silver threads. It was a popular type of textile in Lucca throughout the mediaeval period.

Lucca became prosperous through the silk trade that began in the eleventh century, and came to rival the silks of Byzantium. During the tenth–eleventh centuries Lucca was the capital of the feudal margraviate of Tuscany, more or less independent but owing nominal allegiance to the Holy Roman Emperor.

In 1057, Anselm of Baggio (later Pope Alexander II) was appointed bishop of Lucca, a position he held also during the papacy. As bishop of Lucca he managed to rebuild the patrimony of the Church of Lucca, recovering alienated assets, obtaining numerous donations thanks to his prestige, and had the Cathedral of the city rebuilt. From 1073 to 1086, the bishop of Lucca was his nephew Anselm II, a prominent figure in the Investiture Controversy.

During the High Middle Ages, one of the most illustrious dynasties of Lucca was the noble Allucingoli family, who managed to forge strong ties with the Church. Among the family members were Ubaldo Allucingoli, who was elected to the Papacy as Pope Lucius III in 1181, and the Cardinals Gerardo Allucingoli and Uberto Allucingoli.

Republican period (12th to 19th century)
After the death of Matilda of Tuscany, the city began to constitute itself an independent commune with a charter in 1160. For almost 500 years, Lucca remained an independent republic. There were many minor provinces in the region between southern Liguria and northern Tuscany dominated by the Malaspina; Tuscany in this time was a part of feudal Europe. Dante's Divine Comedy includes many references to the great feudal families who had huge jurisdictions with administrative and judicial rights. Dante spent some of his exile in Lucca.

In 1273 and again in 1277, Lucca was ruled by a Guelph capitano del popolo (captain of the people) named Luchetto Gattilusio. In 1314, internal discord allowed Uguccione della Faggiuola of Pisa to make himself lord of Lucca. The Lucchesi expelled him two years later, and handed over the city to another condottiero, Castruccio Castracani, under whose rule it became a leading state in central Italy. Lucca rivalled Florence until Castracani's death in 1328. On 22 and 23 September 1325, in the battle of Altopascio, Castracani defeated Florence's Guelphs. For this he was nominated by Louis IV the Bavarian to become duke of Lucca. Castracani's tomb is in the church of San Francesco. His biography is Machiavelli's third famous book on political rule.

Occupied by the troops of Louis of Bavaria, the city was sold to a rich Genoese, Gherardino Spinola, then seized by John, king of Bohemia. Pawned to the Rossi of Parma, by them it was ceded to Mastino II della Scala of Verona, sold to the Florentines, surrendered to the Pisans, and then nominally liberated by the emperor Charles IV and governed by his vicar.

In 1408, Lucca hosted a convocation organized by Pope Gregory XII with his cardinals intended to end the schism in the papacy.

Lucca managed, at first as a democracy, and after 1628 as an oligarchy, to maintain its independence alongside of Venice and Genoa, and painted the word Libertas on its banner until the French Revolution in 1789.

Early modern period
Lucca had been the second largest Italian city state (after Venice) with a republican constitution ("comune") to remain independent over the centuries.

Between 1799 and 1800, it was contested by the French and Austrian armies. Finally the French prevailed and granted a democratic constitution in the 1801. However, already in 1805 the Republic of Lucca was converted into a monarchy by Napoleon, who installed his sister Elisa Bonaparte Baciocchi as "Princess of Lucca".

From 1815 to 1847, it was a Bourbon-Parma duchy. The only reigning dukes of Lucca were Maria Luisa of Spain, who was succeeded by her son Charles II, Duke of Parma in 1824. Meanwhile, the Duchy of Parma had been assigned for life to Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma, the second wife of Napoleon. In accordance with the Treaty of Vienna (1815), upon the death of Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma in 1847, Parma reverted to Charles II, Duke of Parma, while Lucca lost independence and was annexed to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. As part of Tuscany, it became part of the Kingdom of Sardinia in 1860 and finally part of the Italian State in 1861.

World War II internment camp
In 1942, during World War II, a prisoner-of-war camp was established at the village of Colle di Compito, in the municipality of Capannori, about 11 km from Lucca. Its official number was P.G. (prigionieri di guerra) 60, and it was usually referred to as PG 60 Lucca. Although it never had permanent structures and accommodation consisted of tents in an area prone to flooding, it housed more than 3,000 British and Commonwealth prisoners of war during the period of its existence. It was handed over to the Germans on 10 September 1943, not long after the signing of the Italian armistice. During the Italian Social Republic, as a puppet state of the Germans, political prisoners, foreigners, common law prisoners and Jews were interned there, and it functioned as a concentration camp. In June 1944, the prisoners were moved to Bagni di Lucca.

Culture
Lucca is the birthplace of composers Giacomo Puccini (La Bohème and Madama Butterfly), Nicolao Dorati, Francesco Geminiani, Gioseffo Guami, Luigi Boccherini, and Alfredo Catalani. It is also the birthplace of artist Benedetto Brandimarte. Since 2004, Lucca is home to IMT Lucca, a public research institution and a selective graduate school and part of the Superior Graduate Schools in Italy (Grandes écoles).

Events
Lucca hosts the annual Lucca Summer Festival. The 2006 edition featured live performances by Eric Clapton, Placebo, Massive Attack, Roger Waters, Tracy Chapman, and Santana at the Piazza Napoleone.

Lucca hosts the annual Lucca Comics and Games festival, Europe's largest festival for comics, movies, games and related subjects.

Other events include: Moreover, Lucca hosts Lucca Biennale Cartasia, an international biennial contemporary art exhibition focusing solely on Paper Art.
 * Lucca Film Festival
 * Lucca Digital Photography Fest
 * Procession of Santa Croce, on 13 September. Costume procession through the town's roads.
 * Lucca Jazz Donna
 * Lucca Classica Music Festival

Film and television
Mauro Bolognini's 1958 film Giovani mariti, with Sylva Koscina, is set and was filmed in Lucca.

Sergio Martino's 1993 miniseries Private Crimes, starring Edwige Fenech, is set and was filmed in Lucca.

Top Gear filmed the third episode of the 17th season here.

Architecture
Lucca is also known for its marble deposits. After a fire in the early 1900s, the West Wing of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario was rebuilt with marble sourced in Lucca. The floor mosaic in the West Wing was hand-laid and is constructed entirely of Italian, Lucca marble.

Walls, streets, and squares
The walls encircling the old town remain intact, even though the city has expanded and been modernised, which is unusual for cities in this region. These walls were built initially as a defensive rampart which, after losing their military importance, became a pedestrian promenade (the Passeggiata delle Mure Urbane) atop the walls which not only links the Bastions of Santa Croce, San Frediano, San Martino, San Pietro/Battisti, San Salvatore, La Libertà/Cairoli, San Regolo, San Colombano, Santa Maria, San Paolino/Catalani and San Donato but also passes over the gates (Porte) of San Donato, Santa Maria, San Jacopo, Elisa, San Pietro, and Sant'Anna. Each of the four principal sides of the structure is lined with a tree species different from the others.

The walled city is encircled by Piazzale Boccherini, Viale Lazzaro Papi, Viale Carlo Del Prete, Piazzale Martiri della Libertà, Via Batoni, Viale Agostino Marti, Viale G. Marconi (vide Guglielmo Marconi), Piazza Don A. Mei, Viale Pacini, Viale Giusti, Piazza Curtatone, Piazzale Ricasoli, Viale Ricasoli, Piazza Risorgimento (vide Risorgimento), and Viale Giosuè Carducci.

The town includes a number of public squares, most notably the Piazza dell'Anfiteatro, (site of the ancient Roman amphitheater), the Piazzale Verdi, the Piazza Napoleone, and the Piazza San Michele.

Palaces, villas, houses, offices, and museums

 * Ducal Palace: built on the site of Castruccio Castracani's fortress. Construction was begun by Ammannati in 1577–1582 and continued by Juvarra in the eighteenth century
 * Pfanner Palace
 * Villa Garzoni, noted for its water gardens
 * Casa di Puccini: House of the opera composer, at the nearby Torre del Lago, where the composer spent his summers. A Puccini opera festival takes place every July–August
 * Torre delle Ore: ("The Clock Tower")
 * Guinigi Tower and House: Panoramic view from tower-top balcony with oak trees
 * National Museum of Villa Guinigi
 * National Museum of Palazzo Mansi
 * Orto Botanico Comunale di Lucca: botanical garden dating from 1820
 * Academy of Sciences (1584)
 * Palazzo Cenami: Renaissance palace once owned by the Arnolfini family
 * Teatro del Giglio: nineteenth-century opera house

Churches
There are many medieval, a few as old as the eighth century, basilica-form churches with richly arcaded façades and campaniles
 * Duomo di San Martino: St Martin's Cathedral
 * San Michele in Foro: Romanesque church
 * San Giusto: Romanesque church
 * Basilica di San Frediano
 * SanSan Romano, Luccat'Alessandro an example of medieval classicism
 * Santa Giulia: Lombard church rebuilt in thirteenth century
 * San Michele: church at Antraccoli, founded in 777, it was enlarged and rebuilt in the twelfth century with the introduction of a sixteenth-century portico
 * San Giorgio church in the locality of Brancoli, built in the late twelfth century has a bell tower in Lombard-Romanesque style, the interior houses a massive ambo (1194) with four columns mounted on lion sculptures, a highly decorated Romanesque octagonal baptismal fount, and the altar is supported by six small columns with human figures
 * San Lorenzo di Moriano, a 12th century Romanesque style parish church
 * San Romano, erected by the Dominican order in the second half of the 13th century, is today a deconsecrated Roman Catholic Church located on Piazza San Romano in the center of Lucca

Museums

 * Museo della Cattedrale
 * Orto Botanico Comunale di Lucca

Education
Since 2005, Lucca hosts IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, a selective graduate and doctoral school which is part of the Italian superior graduate school system. Its main educational facilities are located at the San Francesco Convent Complex and Campus, and the former Renaissance-style Roman Catholic church of San Ponziano now hosts the university library.

Sports
Association football arrived in Lucca in 1905 and has its roots in Brazil, thanks to a number of fans that helped found the club who had learned the game in Brazil. The Lucchese 1905, or simply Lucchese, play in Serie C, the third tier of Italian football, having last been in top tier Serie A in 1952. The club plays their home games at Stadio Porta Elisa, just outside the northeast wall of the city.

Buses
Consorzio Lucchese Autotrasporti Pubblici, also known as CLAP, was established in 1969, as the main company in the Province of Lucca to manage the local public transport. In 2005, following the decision of the Region to assign the local public transport to a single operator for each of the 14 lots constituted, CLAP merged with the companies Lazzi and C.LU.B. Scpa to form the consortium VaiBus which was absorbed by the newly formed company CTT Nord in 2012. VaiBus was part of ONE Scarl the consortium holder of the two-year (2018-2019) contract for the management of the TPL throughout the Region.

Since 1 November 2021 the public local transport is managed by Autolinee Toscane.

Notable people

 * St. Anselm of Lucca (1036–1086), bishop of Lucca
 * Giovanni Arnolfini (1400–1472), merchant and patron of the arts
 * Pompeo Batoni (1708–1787), painter
 * Giovanni Antonio Bianchi (1686–1768), friar, theologian, and poet
 * Simone Bianchi (born 1972), comics artist
 * Luigi Boccherini (1743–1805), musician and composer
 * Elisa Bonaparte (1777–1820), ruler of Lucca
 * Anthony Bonvisi (1470s–1558), merchant and banker in London
 * Giulio Carmassi (born 1981), pop musician
 * Castruccio Castracani (1316–1328), ruler of Lucca
 * Alfredo Catalani (1854–1893), composer
 * Gusmano Cesaretti (born 1944), photographer and artist
 * Mario Cipollini (born 1967), cyclist
 * Alfredo Ciucci (born 1920), football player
 * Matteo Civitali (1436–1501), sculptor
 * Ivan Della Mea (1940–2009), singer-songwriter
 * Theodoric Borgognoni (1205–1296/8), medieval surgeon
 * Marco Antonio Franciotti (1592–1666), bishop of Lucca
 * Ernesto Filippi (born 1950), football referee
 * Saint Frediano (6th century), Irish prince and hermit, bishop of Lucca
 * St. Gemma Galgani, mystic and saint
 * Francesco Geminiani (1687–1762), musician and composer
 * Giovanni Battista Giusti (c.1624–c.1693), harpsichord maker
 * Gioseffo Guami (1542–1611), composer
 * Leo I (died 1079), saint
 * Pope Lucius III (1097–1185)
 * Vincenzo Lunardi (1754–1806), aeronautical pioneer aeronaut
 * Ludovico Marracci (1612–1700), priest and first translator of the Qur'an into Latin
 * Felice Matteucci (1808–1887), engineer
 * Mazzino Montinari (1928–1986), germanicist and Nietzsche scholar
 * Italo Meschi (1887–1957), harp guitarist, poet, anarchist-pacifist
 * Julian Niccolini, restaurateur
 * Leo Nomellini (1924–2000), athlete
 * Mario Pannunzio (1910–1968), journalist and politician
 * Marcello Pera (born 1943), politician and philosopher
 * Giacomo Puccini (1858–1924), composer
 * Eros Riccio (born 1977), chess player
 * Marco Rossi, footballer
 * Daniele Rugani (born 1994), footballer
 * Renato Salvatori (1933–1988), actor
 * Carlo Sforza (1872–1952), diplomat and politician
 * Rinaldo and Ezilda Torre, founded the Torani syrup company in San Francisco using Luccan recipes from their hometown
 * Nicola Fanucchi (born 1964), actor and director
 * Rolando Ugolini (1924–2014), athlete
 * Giuseppe Ungaretti (1888–1970), poet
 * Antonio Vallisneri (1661–1730), scientist and physician
 * Alfredo Volpi (1896–1988), painter
 * Hugh of Lucca (1160–c.1259), medieval surgeon
 * Saint Zita (c.1212–1272), saint

Sister cities
Lucca is twinned with:

 * 🏴 Abingdon, England, United Kingdom
 * 🇫🇷 Colmar, France
 * Gorinchem, The Netherlands
 * 🇫🇮 Hämeenlinna, Finland
 * 🇩🇪 Schongau, Germany
 * 🇧🇪 Sint-Niklaas, Belgium
 * 🇺🇸 South San Francisco, United States

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Lucca


text:
User:Spike2599

Hello. Welcome to Wikipedia. The "zbuffy" that you uploaded is a .gif. I'm curious what you're using it for, though--an article on the vampire slayer? Koyaanis Qatsi

Again, let me ask--why are you uploading this file? It seems completely irrelevant to our efforts to make an encyclopedia, which is what this site is about. Cheers, Koyaanis Qatsi, Sunday, June 23, 2002

title: User:Spike2599


text:
Siderno

Siderno (Sidernu or Siderni; ) is a town and comune in  the Metropolitan City of Reggio Calabria, Calabria, southern Italy, about 3 kilometres from Locri.

Siderno Marina is the newer town located on the Ionian coast. It is a destination for both Italian and foreign tourists and has a bathing beach.

Siderno Superiore is the old town, higher up on the flank of the coastal mountain range. It has historic palaces, old buildings and very narrow streets. Its population has largely relocated to the Marina which offers more job opportunities and services.

History
The early history of the town is unknown. The old town in the hilly inland was probably founded in the 10th century by some people from Locri, who had fled to the area to defend themselves from Saracen incursions; in the following century it became a hamlet of the county of Grotteria and was home to various feudal lords. Siderno Marina was built along the coast after the 1783 earthquake.

Emigration
Large-scale emigration abroad as well as to Northern Italy, which began to diminish only in the 1970s, has had a lasting effect on the demographic situation in the region. Emigrants from Siderno immigrated to the United States, Canada and Australia since the end of the 19th century to find employment.

Many moved to Canada settled in Schreiber, Ontario due to then-ongoing construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway. Half of Schreiber's 2,000 residents trace their roots to Siderno.

Economy
Siderno is a  tourist resort  on the Ionian coast of the province of Reggio Calabria, with wide, sandy beaches, and a clear sea.

The Siderno area is a center of production of bergamot orange, a citrus fruit that is used as an essence and fundamental ingredient in cosmetics, for its wound healing properties in the pharmaceutical industry, and for flavouring in the food industry.

Crime
The town is home to the 'Ndrangheta, a Mafia-type criminal organization based in Calabria. Several powerful criminal clans originate from the town. Siderno was the fiefdom of Antonio Macrì, the undisputed local boss until his demise in January 1975. Several of the criminal clans are sometimes involved in bloody feuds. The town is home to one of the 'Ndrangheta's biggest and most important clans, the Commisso 'ndrina, heavily involved in the global cocaine business and money laundering.

Several clans moved to Canada, in particular the Greater Toronto Area, home to what Canadian law enforcement call the Siderno Group, which has been here since at least the 1950s. "The criminal minds of Siderno are in Canada", according to the Siderno police force. One of them, Antonio Commisso, was arrested in June 2005. Individuals related to the so-called Siderno Group were still active in Southern Ontario in 2018.

People

 * Antonio Commisso (born 1956), 'Ndrangheta boss
 * Antonio Macrì (1902–1975), historical 'Ndrangheta boss
 * Francesco Panetta (born 1963), former long-distance runner
 * Nicola Zitara (born 1927), historian
 * Leon Panetta (born 1938) – who served in the Obama administration as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency from 2009 to 2011, and as Secretary of Defense from 2011 to 2013, as well as Chief of Staff in the Clinton administration from 1994 to 1997 –, is issued from a family native from Siderno. He was responsible for the operation that led to the Death of Osama bin Laden, the leader and founder of al-Qaeda and the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks
 * 'Ndrangheta, Italy's most powerful organized crime syndicate has their roots in Siderno, and continue to use this city as a base of operations.

Twin cities

 * 🇨🇦 Thunder Bay, Canada

Frazioni
Donisi (Διονυσση), Vennerello, Mirto (Μυρτώς), Campo, Lucis, Zammariti, Pellegrina, Arona, San Filippo, Leone, Grappidaro, Gonia (Γωνιά), Pergola, Lamia.

title: Siderno


text:
Fish and chips

Fish and chips is a hot dish consisting of fried fish in batter, served with chips. The dish originated in England, where these two components had been introduced from separate immigrant cultures; it is not known who combined them. Often considered Britain's national dish, fish and chips is a common takeaway food in numerous other countries, particularly English-speaking and Commonwealth nations.

Fish and chip shops first appeared in the UK in the 1860s, and by 1910 there were over 25,000 of them across the UK. This increased to over 35,000 by the 1930s, but eventually decreased to approximately 10,000 by 2009. The British government safeguarded the supply of fish and chips during the First World War and again in the Second World War. It was one of the few foods in the UK not subject to rationing during the wars, which further contributed to its popularity.

History
The British tradition of eating fish battered and fried in oil was introduced to the country by the Chuts: Spanish and Portuguese Jewish immigrants, who had lived in the Netherlands before settling in the UK. These immigrants arrived as early as the 16th century; the main immigration to London being during the 1850s. They prepared fried fish in a manner similar to pescado frito, which is coated in flour then fried in oil. Fish fried for Shabbat for dinner on Friday evenings could be eaten cold the following afternoon for shalosh seudot, palatable this way as liquid vegetable oil was used rather than a hard fat, such as butter. Charles Dickens mentions "fried fish warehouses" in Oliver Twist (1838), and in 1845 Alexis Soyer in his first edition of A Shilling Cookery for the People, gives a recipe for "fried fish, Jewish fashion", which is dipped in a batter mix of flour and water before frying.

The location of the first fish and chip shop is unclear. The earliest known shops were opened in London during the 1860s by Eastern European Jewish immigrant Joseph Malin, and by John Lees in Mossley, Lancashire. However, fried fish and chips had existed separately for at least 50 years prior to this, so the possibility that they had been combined at an earlier time cannot be ruled out. Fish and chips became a stock meal among the working classes in England as a consequence of the rapid development of trawl fishing in the North Sea, and the development of railways which connected the ports to major industrial cities during the second half of the 19th century, so that fresh fish could be rapidly transported to the heavily populated areas.

Deep-fried chips (slices or pieces of potato) as a dish may have first appeared in England in about the same period: the Oxford English Dictionary notes as its earliest usage of "chips" in this sense the mention in Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities (1859): "husky chips of potato, fried with some reluctant drops of oil".

The modern fish-and-chip shop ("chippy" in modern British slang) originated in the United Kingdom, although outlets selling fried food occurred commonly throughout Europe. Early fish-and-chip shops had only very basic facilities. Usually these consisted principally of a large cauldron of cooking fat, heated by a coal fire. The fish-and-chip shop later evolved into a fairly standard format, with the food served, in paper wrappings, to queuing customers, over a counter in front of the fryers. As a boy, Alfred Hitchcock lived above a fish and chip shop in London, which was the family business. According to Professor John Walton, author of Fish and Chips and the British Working Class, the British government made safeguarding supplies of fish and chips during the First World War a priority: "The cabinet knew it was vital to keep families on the home front in good heart, unlike the German regime that failed to keep its people well fed".

In 1928, Harry Ramsden opened his first fish and chip shop in Guiseley, West Yorkshire. On a single day in 1952, the shop served 10,000 portions of fish and chips, earning a place in the Guinness Book of Records. In George Orwell's The Road to Wigan Pier (1937), which documents his experience of working-class life in the North of England, the author considered fish and chips chief among the 'home comforts' which acted as a panacea to the working classes.

During the Second World War, fish and chips—a staple of the working class—remained one of the few foods in the United Kingdom not subject to rationing. Prime Minister Winston Churchill referred to the combination of fish and chips as "the good companions".

British fish and chips were originally served in a wrapping of old newspapers but this practice has now largely ceased, with plain paper, cardboard, or plastic being used instead. In the United Kingdom, the Fish Labelling Regulations 2003, and in the Republic of Ireland the European Communities (Labelling of Fishery and Aquaculture Products) Regulations 2003, respectively enact directive 2065/2001/EC, and generally mean that "fish" must be sold with the particular commercial name or species named; so, for example, "cod and chips" now appears on menus rather than the more vague "fish and chips". In the United Kingdom the Food Standards Agency guidance excludes caterers from this; but several local Trading Standards authorities and others do say it cannot be sold merely as "fish and chips".

United Kingdom
A prominent meal in British culture, fish and chips became popular in wider circles in London and South East England in the middle of the 19th century: Charles Dickens mentions a "fried fish warehouse" in Oliver Twist, first published in 1838, while in the north of England a trade in deep-fried chipped potatoes developed. It remains unclear exactly when and where these two trades combined to become the modern fish and chip shop industry. A Jewish immigrant, Joseph Malin, opened the first recorded combined fish-and-chip shop in Bow, East London, circa 1860; a Mr Lees pioneered the concept in the North of England, in Mossley, in 1863. A century later, the National Federation of Fish Friers, which made Malin's its first member, presented a plaque to Malin's as being the world's first fish and chip shop. A blue plaque is located at the other main contender for the first fish and chip shop, the present site of Oldham's Tommyfield Market. Located in Covent Garden, The Rock & Sole Plaice, dating from 1871, is London's oldest fish and chip shop still in operation.

The concept of a sit-down fish restaurant—as opposed to takeaway—was introduced by Samuel Isaacs, an entrepreneur from Whitechapel, East London who ran a thriving wholesale and retail fish business. Dubbed the 'Fish Restaurant King', Isaacs' first restaurant opened in Lambeth, South London in 1896 serving fish and chips, bread and butter, and tea for nine pence. It became instantly popular and led to a chain which comprised 22 restaurants. Isaacs' trademark was the phrase "This is the Plaice", combined with a picture of the punned-upon fish in question, which appeared in all of his restaurants. Isaacs' restaurants were carpeted, had table service, tablecloths, flowers, china and cutlery, and made the trappings of upmarket dining affordable to the working classes. They were located in the Strand and other London locations, as well as Brighton, Ramsgate, Margate and other seaside resorts in southern England. Menus were expanded in the early 20th century to include meat dishes and other variations. A glimpse of the old Brighton restaurant at No.1 Marine Parade can be seen in the background of Norman Wisdom's 1955 film One Good Turn just as Pitkin runs onto the seafront; this is now the site of a Harry Ramsden's fish and chips restaurant.

From their first appearance on the British High Street in the early 1860s, fish and chip shops spread rapidly in order to satisfy the needs of the growing industrial population. By 1910, there were over 25,000 fish and chip shops across the UK, a figure that grew to over 35,000 shops by the 1930s. Since then the trend has reversed, and in 2009 there were approximately 10,000 shops.

Scotland
Dundee City Council claims that chips were first sold by a Belgian immigrant, Edward De Gernier, in the city's Greenmarket in the 1870s. In Edinburgh and the surrounding area, a combination of Gold Star brown sauce and water or malt vinegar, known as "sauce", or more specifically as "chippy sauce", has great popularity; salt and vinegar is preferred elsewhere in Scotland, often prompting light-hearted debate on the merits of each option by those who claim to find the alternative a baffling concept.

Fish & Chips Awards
The annual National Fish & Chips Awards were set up in the UK in 1988. The 30th Annual Fish & Chips Awards ceremony was attended by Norwegian ambassador to the UK Mona Juul.

Australia
The first recorded owner of an Australian fish and chip shop is Greek migrant Athanasias Comino, who opened his shop in 1879 on Sydney's Oxford Street, though Comino's shop was inspired by an unknown Welshman's pre-existing fish and chip shop. In Australia today, there are an estimated 4000 fish and chip shops, as well as fish and chips being an essential menu offering in many Australian pubs and restaurants.

Canada
Fish and chips is a widely popular dish in Canada, sometimes using haddock or local lake-caught fish like perch or walleye. Most shops also sell poutine and other fried items. In the province of Newfoundland & Labrador, fish and chips made with cod fish are a staple food and the most common takeout meal.

Ireland
In Ireland, the first fish and chips were sold by an Italian immigrant, Giuseppe Cervi, who mistakenly stepped off a North America-bound ship at Queenstown (now Cobh) in County Cork in the 1880s and walked all the way to Dublin. He started by selling fish and chips outside Dublin pubs from a handcart. He then found a permanent spot in Great Brunswick Street (now Pearse Street). His wife Palma would ask customers "Uno di questa, uno di quella?" This phrase (meaning "one of this, one of that") entered the vernacular in Dublin as "one and one", which is still a way of referring to fish and chips in the city.

New Zealand
Fish and chips is the most popular takeaway food in New Zealand. Food historians have not been able to pinpoint exactly when the meal became an established part of New Zealand cuisine, but all recognise that the first fish and chips shops were introduced by British settlers before World War I. During the 20th century, nearly every small town and suburb in New Zealand had at least one fish-and-chip shop. As in Britain, Friday night has been the traditional night to eat fish.

Traditionally, fish and chips were served in wrappings of greaseproof paper and then newspaper as insulation. With the decline of the newspaper industry, this has become less common although plain, unprinted paper is still popular.

In 1980, four up-and-coming New Zealand Labour Party politicians, including David Lange, were nicknamed the "Fish and Chip Brigade" due to a picture published at the time with the group eating fish and chips.

United States
In the United States, the dish is most commonly sold as fish and chips, except in Upstate New York and Wisconsin and other parts of the Northeast and Upper Midwest, where this dish would be called a fish fry. While in the United States chips refers to potato chips ("crisps" in British English), the dish retains its native name. In the Southern United States, a common form of cuisine is fried catfish with french fries, accompanied by coleslaw, pickles, raw onion slices and lemon slices.

Other countries
The western Norwegian town of Kristiansund has had a tradition with fish and chips as street food since the 1940s. It is known locally as fishan.

Choice of fish
In Britain and Ireland, cod and haddock appear most commonly as the fish used for fish and chips, but vendors also sell many other kinds of fish, especially other white fish, such as pollock, hake or coley, plaice, skate, ray, and huss or rock salmon (a term covering several species of dogfish and similar fish). In traditional fish and chip shops several varieties of fish are offered by name ("haddock and chips"), but in some restaurants and stalls "fish and chips", unspecified, is offered; it is increasingly likely to be the much cheaper basa. In Northern Ireland, cod, plaice or whiting appear most commonly in 'fish suppers'—'supper' being Scottish and Northern Irish chip-shop terminology for a food item accompanied by chips. Suppliers in Devon and Cornwall often offer pollock and coley as cheap alternatives to haddock.

In Australia, reef cod and rock cod (a variety different from that used in the United Kingdom), barramundi or flathead (more expensive options), flake (a type of shark meat), King George whiting (little more expensive than other fish, but cheaper than barramundi or flathead) or snapper (cheaper options), are commonly used. From the early 21st century, farmed basa imported from Vietnam and hoki have become common in Australian fish and chip shops. Other types of fish are also used based on regional availability.

In New Zealand, snapper or gurnard was originally the preferred species for battered fillets in the North Island. As catches of this fish declined, it was replaced by hoki, shark (particularly rig) – marketed as lemon fish – and tarakihi. Bluefin gurnard and blue cod predominate in South Island fish and chips.

In the United States, the type of fish used depends on availability in a given region. Some common types are cod, halibut, flounder, tilapia or, in New England, Atlantic cod or haddock.

In India, the dish is usually based on pomfret fish and uses chilli paste, and more pepper than would be used in Britain.

In South Africa, hake and snoek are common choices.

Cooking
Traditional frying uses beef dripping or lard; however, vegetable oils, such as palm oil, rapeseed or peanut oil (used because of its relatively high smoke point) predominate, in part because it makes fried chips suitable for vegetarians and for adherents of certain faiths.

A minority of vendors in the North of England and Scotland, and the majority of vendors in Northern Ireland, still use dripping or lard, as it imparts a different flavour to the dish. Lard is used in some living industrial history museums, such as the Black Country Living Museum.

The fish part of the dish is filleted, and no bones should be found in the fish.

Batter
In Britain and Ireland, fish and chip shops traditionally use a simple water and flour batter, adding a little sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) and a little vinegar to create lightness, as they react to create bubbles in the batter. Other recipes may use beer or milk batter, where these liquids are often substitutes for water. The carbon dioxide in the beer lends a lighter texture to the batter. Beer also results in an orange-brown colour. A simple beer batter might consist of a 2:3 ratio of flour to beer by volume. The type of beer alters the taste of the batter; some prefer lager whereas others use stout or bitter.

Chips
British chips are usually considerably thicker than American-style French fries. Some U.S. restaurants and some people in their home cooking may use a thick type of chip, similar to the British variant, sometimes referred to as steak fries. In 2016, British chef Gordon Ramsay opened a British-themed fish-and-chip restaurant in the Las Vegas Strip.

Accompaniments
In chip shops in most parts of Britain and Ireland, salt and vinegar are traditionally sprinkled over fish and chips at the time it is served. Suppliers use malt vinegar, onion vinegar (used for pickling onions), or the cheaper non-brewed condiment. In a few places, notably Edinburgh, 'sauce' (as in 'salt and sauce') is more traditional than vinegar—with 'sauce' meaning a brown sauce. In England, a portion of mushy peas is a popular side dish, as are a range of pickles that typically include gherkins, onions and eggs. In table-service restaurants and pubs, the dish is usually served with a slice of lemon for squeezing over the fish and without any sauces or condiments, with salt, vinegar and sauces available at the customer's leisure. Ketchup is also a popular addition (a 2020 YouGov poll in the UK saw ketchup, curry sauce and mushy peas as the top three toppings after salt and vinegar).

In Ireland, Wales and England, many takeaways serve warm side portions of sauces such as curry sauce or gravy, if requested and normally for a small extra fee (curry sauce topped the poll in Wales with one in three using it as a topping). The sauces are usually poured over the chips. In the Midlands especially, chips with mushy peas or baked beans are known as a "pea mix" or a "bean mix". Other fried products include 'scraps' (also known as 'bits' in Southern England and "scrumps" in South Wales), originally a by-product of fish frying. Still popular in Northern England, they were given as treats to the children of customers. Portions prepared and sold today consist of loose blobs of batter, deep-fried to a crunchy golden crisp in the cooking fat. The potato scallop or potato cake consists of slices of potato dipped in fish batter and deep-fried until golden brown. These are often accompanied for dipping by the warm sauces listed above.

Nutrition information
An average serving of fish and chips consisting of 6 oz of fried fish with 10 oz of fried chips has approximately 1000 kcal calories and contains approximately 52 g of fat. The use of tartar sauce as a condiment adds more calories and fat to the dish.

Vendors
In the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa, fish and chips are usually sold by independent restaurants and take-aways known as fish and chip shops. Outlets range from small affairs to chain restaurants. Locally owned seafood restaurants are also popular in many places, as are mobile "chip vans". In Canada, the outlets may be referred to as "chip wagons".

In Ireland, the majority of traditional vendors are migrants or the descendants of migrants from southern Italy. A trade organisation exists to represent this tradition. In New Zealand and Australia, fish-and-chip vendors are a popular business and source of income among the Asian community, particularly Chinese migrants. In Indonesia, fish and chips are commonly found in western and seafood restaurants in large cities, as well as chain restaurants like The Manhattan Fish Market, Fish & Chips, etc.

Many British establishments have humorous or pun-based names, such as, "A Salt and Battery", "The Codfather", "The Frying Scotsman", "Oh My Cod", "Frying Nemo", "Rock and Sole" and "Jack the Chipper". The numerous competitions and awards for "best fish-and-chip shop" testify to the recognised status of this type of outlet in popular culture.

Fish and chips is a popular lunch meal eaten by families travelling to seaside resorts for day trips who do not bring their own picnic meals.

Fish-and-chip outlets sell roughly 25% of all the white fish consumed in the United Kingdom, and 10% of all potatoes.

Fish-and-chip shops traditionally wrapped their product in newspaper, or with an inner layer of white paper (for hygiene) and an outer layer of newspaper or blank newsprint (for insulation and to absorb grease), though the use of newspaper for wrapping has almost ceased on grounds of hygiene. , establishments usually use food-quality wrapping paper, or recyclable cardboard boxes.

The British National Federation of Fish Friers was founded in 1913. It promotes fish and chips and offers training courses. It has about 8,500 members from around the UK.

A previous world record for the "largest serving of fish and chips" was held by Gadaleto's Seafood Market in New Paltz, New York. This 2004 record was broken by Yorkshire pub Wensleydale Heifer in July 2011. An attempt to break this record was made by Doncaster fish and chip shop Scawsby Fisheries in August 2012, which served 33 lb of battered cod alongside 64 lb of chips. Current record is held by Resorts World Birmingham which served a fish and chips weighing 54.99 kg from a 27.83 kg raw filet of halibut on 9 February 2018.

Cultural impact
The long-standing Roman Catholic tradition of not eating meat on Fridays, especially during Lent, and of substituting fish for meat on that day continues to influence habits even in predominantly Protestant, semi-secular and secular societies. Friday night remains a traditional occasion for eating fish and chips; many cafeterias and similar establishments, while varying their menus on other days of the week, habitually offer fish and chips every Friday.

In 1967, inspired by the use of salt and vinegar as condiments for fish and chips in the UK, the Smiths Potato Crisps Company created Salt & Vinegar flavour crisps.

In Australia and New Zealand, the words "fish and chips" are often used as a shibboleth to highlight the difference in each country's short-i vowel sound. Australian English has a higher forward sound, close to the ee in see (but shorter), while New Zealand English has a lower backward sound akin to the a in Rosa's (but not in Rosa, which is typically lower ). Thus, New Zealanders hear Australians say "feesh and cheeps," while Australians hear New Zealanders say "fush and chups."

Environment
In the UK, waste oil from fish and chip shops has become a useful source of biodiesel. The German biodiesel company Petrotec has outlined plans to produce biodiesel in the UK using waste oil from the British fish-and-chip industry.

title: Fish and chips