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José Ferrer

José Vicente Ferrer de Otero y Cintrón (January 8, 1912 – January 26, 1992) was a Puerto Rican actor and director of stage, film and television. He was one of the most celebrated and esteemed Hispanic American actors—or, indeed, actors of any ethnicity—during his lifetime and after, with a career spanning nearly 60 years between 1935 and 1992. He achieved prominence for his portrayal of Cyrano de Bergerac in the play of the same name, which earned him the inaugural Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play in 1947. He reprised the role in a 1950 film version and won an Academy Award for Best Actor, making him the first Hispanic actor and the first Puerto Rican-born to win an Academy Award.

His other notable film roles include Charles VII in Joan of Arc (1948), Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec in Moulin Rouge (1952), defense attorney Barney Greenwald in The Caine Mutiny (1954), Alfred Dreyfus in I Accuse! (1958), which he also directed; the Turkish Bey in Lawrence of Arabia (1962), Siegfried Rieber in Ship of Fools (1965), and Emperor Shaddam IV in Dune (1984). Ferrer also maintained a prolific acting and directing career on Broadway, winning a second Best Actor Tony for The Shrike, and Best Director for The Shrike, The Fourposter, and Stalag 17.

Ferrer was the father of actor Miguel Ferrer, the brother of Rafael Ferrer, the grandfather of actress Tessa Ferrer, and the uncle of actor George Clooney. His contributions to American theatre were recognized in 1981 when he was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame. In 1985, he received the National Medal of Arts from President Reagan, becoming the first actor so honored.

Early life
Ferrer was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, the son of Rafael Ferrer, a local attorney and writer, and María Providencia Cintrón, of Yabucoa. He was the grandson of Gabriel Ferrer Hernández, a doctor and advocate of Puerto Rican independence from Spain. He had two younger sisters, Elvira and Leticia.

The family moved to New York in 1914, when Ferrer was two years old. He studied at the Swiss boarding school Institut Le Rosey. He was adept in several languages, including Spanish, English, French, and Italian.

In 1933, Ferrer completed his bachelor's degree in architecture at Princeton University, where he wrote his senior thesis on "French Naturalism and Pardo Bazán". Ferrer was also a member of the Princeton Triangle Club and played piano in a band, "José Ferrer and His Pied Pipers". Ferrer then studied Romance languages at Columbia University for 1934–35.

Theatre
Ferrer's first professional appearance as an actor was at a "showboat" theater on Long Island in the summer of 1934.

In 1935, Ferrer was the stage manager at the Suffern Country Playhouse, operated by Joshua Logan, whom Ferrer had known at Princeton. Ruth Gordon and Helen Hayes recommended him to Jed Harris. Ferrer made his Broadway debut in 1935 in A Slight Case of Murder which ran 69 performances.

He could also be seen in Stick-in-the-Mud (1935) and Spring Dance (1936). Ferrer's first big success was in Brother Rat (1936–38) which ran for 577 performances. In Clover only ran for three performances. How to Get Tough About It (1938) also had a short run, as did Missouri Legend (1938).

Mamba's Daughters (1939) ran for 163 performances. Ferrer followed it with Key Largo (1939–40) with Paul Muni and directed by Guthrie McClintic, which went for 105 shows and was later turned into a film.

Ferrer had a huge personal success in the title role of Charley's Aunt (1940–41), partly in drag, under the direction of Joshua Logan. It went for 233 performances.

Ferrer then replaced Danny Kaye in the musical Let's Face It! (1943).

Theatre director and Cyrano
Ferrer made his debut on Broadway as director with Vickie (1942) in which he also starred. It only had a short run.

He played Iago in Margaret Webster's Broadway production of Othello (1943–44), which starred Paul Robeson in the title role, Webster as Emilia, and Ferrer's wife, Uta Hagen, as Desdemona. That production still holds the record for longest-running repeat performance of a Shakespearean play presented in the United States, going for 296 performances (it would be revived in 1945).

Ferrer produced and directed, but did not appear in, Strange Fruit (1945–46), starring Mel Ferrer (no relation).

Among other radio roles, Ferrer starred as detective Philo Vance in a 1945 series of the same name.

Cyrano de Bergerac
Ferrer may be best remembered for his performance in the title role of Cyrano de Bergerac, which he first played on Broadway in 1946. Ferrer feared that the production would be a failure in rehearsals, due to the open dislike for the play by director Mel Ferrer (no relation), so he called in Joshua Logan (who had directed his star-making performance in Charley's Aunt) to serve as "play doctor" for the production. Logan wrote that he simply had to eliminate pieces of business which director Ferrer had inserted in his staging; they presumably were intended to sabotage the more sentimental elements of the play that the director considered to be corny and in bad taste. The production became one of the hits of the 1946/47 Broadway season, winning Ferrer the first Best Actor Tony Award for his depiction of the long-nosed poet/swordsman.

On January 9, 1949, Ferrer made his television debut when he starred in The Philco Television Playhouse's one-hour adaptation of the play.

Ferrer directed, but did not appear in, As We Forgive Our Debtors (1947), which ran 5 performances. There was another short run for Volpone (1947) which Ferrer adapted and played the title role.

Early films
Ferrer made his film debut in the Technicolor epic Joan of Arc (1948) as the weak-willed Dauphin opposite Ingrid Bergman as Joan. Ferrer's performance earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor.

At the City Center, he acted in revivals of Angel Street (1948) and The Alchemist (1948) and directed S. S. Glencairn (1948) and The Insect Comedy (1948) (also appearing in the latter).

Ferrer had another Broadway hit with The Silver Whistle (1948–49) which ran for 219 performances. He performed two shows for The Philco-Goodyear Television Playhouse on TV in 1949: Cyrano, playing the title role, and an adaptation of What Makes Sammy Run?, playing Sammy Glick (adapted by Paddy Chayefsky).

Ferrer returned to Hollywood to appear in Otto Preminger's Whirlpool (1950), supporting Gene Tierney, and Richard Brooks' Crisis (1950), opposite Cary Grant.

Film stardom
Ferrer then played the title role in Cyrano de Bergerac (1950), directed by Michael Gordon and produced by Stanley Kramer. Ferrer won the Best Actor Oscar, becoming the first actor to win the Oscar for the same role which won them the Tony. The film was widely seen although it lost money. Ferrer donated the Oscar to the University of Puerto Rico, and it was subsequently stolen in 2000. Ferrer returned to Broadway for a revival of Twentieth Century (1950–51) which he directed and starred in, opposite Gloria Swanson; it went for 233 performances. Immediately following, he produced and directed, but did not appear in, Stalag 17 (1951–52), a big hit running for 472 performances. Even more popular was The Fourposter (1951–53) in which he directed Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy; it ran for 632 performances.

Ferrer returned to cinema screens in the comedy Anything Can Happen (1952), directed by George Seaton, where Ferrer played an immigrant.

More popular was Moulin Rouge (1952) in which Ferrer played the role of Toulouse-Lautrec under John Huston's direction. Ferrer received 40% of the profits as well as his third and final Oscar nomination.

Back on Broadway, Ferrer directed and starred in The Shrike (1952), which ran for 161 performances.

His next two shows were as director only: Horton Foote's The Chase (1952) only had a short run but My Three Angels (1953–54), went for 344 performances.

Ferrer had another cinema hit with Miss Sadie Thompson (1953) starring Rita Hayworth. Ferrer briefly revived some of his shows at the City Centre in 1953: Cyrano, The Shrike, Richard III, Charley's Aunt.

He returned to films with The Caine Mutiny (1954) for Kramer, co-starring with Humphrey Bogart and Van Johnson, playing defense lawyer Barney Greenwald; the film was a huge hit. Greenwald's Jewish faith, so prominent in the novel that it informed his judgments of the U.S.S. Caine's officers, was downplayed in the film, as Ferrer, being Puerto Rican, was nominally Roman Catholic.

Also popular was Deep in My Heart (1955) where Ferrer played Sigmund Romberg, and which made a profit of over $1 million.

Film director
Ferrer made his debut as film director at Universal with an adaptation of The Shrike (1955), in which he also starred opposite June Allyson.

Ferrer then performed Cyrano in an episode of Producer's Showcase on television, directed by Mel Ferrer and co-starring Claire Bloom.

He went to England to star in and direct a war film for Warwick Productions, The Cockleshell Heroes (1955), alongside Trevor Howard; it was a success at the British box office.

Ferrer co-wrote, directed and starred in the film The Great Man (1956), at Universal. He directed and starred in two films for MGM: I Accuse! (1958), where he played Captain Alfred Dreyfus, and The High Cost of Loving (1958) a comedy with Gena Rowlands. Both flopped at the box office.

Back on Broadway, Ferrer co-wrote and directed the stage musical Oh, Captain! (1958) with Tony Randall, which only had a short run. He directed and starred in Edwin Booth (1958), playing the title role; it was not a success.

In 1958, Ferrer narrated the children's album Tubby the Tuba, which was nominated for the Best Recording For Children at the 1st Annual Grammy Awards.

Ferrer took over the direction of the troubled musical Juno (1959) from Vincent J. Donehue, who had himself taken over from Tony Richardson. The show, which starred Shirley Booth, folded after 16 performances and mixed-to extremely negative critical reaction.

However, he followed it directing the original stage production of Saul Levitt's The Andersonville Trial (1959–60), about the trial following the revelation of conditions at the infamous Civil War prison. It was a hit and featured George C. Scott, running for 179 performances.

Around this time, Ferrer also appeared in television in episodes of General Electric Theater and The United States Steel Hour.

20th Century Fox
Ferrer signed a contract with 20th Century Fox to direct films. He made Return to Peyton Place (1961) and State Fair (1962), both of which were commercial disappointments.

Ferrer had a key support role in the film Lawrence of Arabia (1962) which was a huge success. Although Ferrer's performance was only small he said it was his best on screen.

At Fox, he played an investigating police officer in Nine Hours to Rama (1963). He also guest starred on The Greatest Show on Earth.

Ferrer returned to Broadway to star in Noël Coward's musical The Girl Who Came to Supper (1963–64) which ran for 112 performances.

He narrated the first episode of the popular 1964 sitcom Bewitched, in mock documentary style.

Ferrer went to Germany to make Stop Train 349 (1963) with Sean Flynn. He appeared in the 1964 French film Cyrano et d'Artagnan directed by Abel Gance.

Back in Hollywood, Ferrer played Herod Antipas in The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965) and was in Ship of Fools (1965) for Stanley Kramer.

A notable performance of his later stage career was as Miguel de Cervantes and his fictional creation Don Quixote in the hit musical Man of La Mancha. Ferrer took over the role from Richard Kiley in 1966 and subsequently went on tour with it in the first national company of the show. Tony Martinez continued in the role of Sancho Panza under Ferrer, as he had with Kiley.

Ferrer starred in Carl Reiner's Enter Laughing (1967) and did a production of Kismet (1967) on TV. He went to Europe to do Cervantes (1967) and appeared in A Case of Libel (1968) for US TV. He also provided the voice of the evil Ben Haramed in the 1968 Rankin/Bass Christmas TV special The Little Drummer Boy. In 1968 the IRS sent him a tax bill of $122,000 going back to 1962.

1970s
Ferrer appeared in the television films The Aquarians (1970), Gideon (1971) and Crosscurrent (1971) and guest-starred on The Name of the Game and Banyon.

Ferrer directed The Web and the Rock (1972) on stage in New York and appeared in The Marcus-Nelson Murders (1973), Orson Welles Great Mysteries (1973), and Columbo.

Around 1973, he narrated A Touch of Royalty, a documentary on the life and death of Puerto Rico's baseball star Roberto Clemente. Ferrer voiced both versions, Spanish and English.

Ferrer voiced a highly truncated cartoon version of Cyrano for an episode of The ABC Afterschool Special in 1974.

Ferrer appeared in The Missing Are Deadly (1975), Forever Young, Forever Free (1975), Order to Assassinate (1975), Medical Story (1975), The Art of Crime (1975), Truman at Potsdam (1976) (playing Stalin), The Big Bus (1976), Paco (1976)., Voyage of the Damned (1976), Crash! (1976), The Sentinel (1977), Zoltan, Hound of Dracula (1977), Exo-Man (1977), Who Has Seen the Wind (1977), The Rhinemann Exchange, The Private Files of J. Edgar Hoover (1977), Fedora (1978) from Billy Wilder, The Amazing Captain Nemo (1978) (in the title role), and The Swarm. He guest starred on Starsky and Hutch and Tales of the Unexpected.

During the Bicentennial, Ferrer narrated the world premiere of Michael Jeffrey Shapiro's A Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776 for narrator and orchestra with Martin Rich leading the Philharmonic Symphony of Westchester.

Ferrer was a replacement cast member in a production of David Mamet's A Life in the Theatre (1977–78). He produced and starred in White Pelicans (1978) and directed Carmelina (1979) on stage but it only ran 17 performances.

He was in The Fifth Musketeer (1979), The Concorde ... Airport '79 (1979), Natural Enemies (1979), The French Atlantic Affair (1979), A Life of Sin, a 1979 film by Puerto Rican director Efraín López Neris which also starred Raul Julia, Míriam Colón and Henry Darrow, and Battles: The Murder That Wouldn't Die (1980). He did The Merchant on stage in Canada.

1980s
In 1980, he had a role as future Justice Abe Fortas in the made-for-television film version of Anthony Lewis' Gideon's Trumpet, opposite Henry Fonda in an Emmy-nominated performance as Clarence Earl Gideon.

He also appeared in Battle Creek Brawl (1980), Pleasure Palace (1980), The Dream Merchants (1980), Magnum, P.I., Evita Peron (1981), Berlin Tunnel 21 (1981), Peter and Paul (1981) with Anthony Hopkins, Bloody Birthday (1981), Woody Allen's A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy (1982) (a classy yet somewhat antagonistic university professor/author whose booming voice both begins and ends the film), Blood Tide (1982), Blood Feud (1982), This Girl for Hire (1983), The Being (1983) and Mel Brooks's version of To Be or Not to Be (1983).

From 1982 to 1985, he was artistic director of the Coconut Grove Theatre in Miami.

He guest-starred on Quincy, M.E., Another World, Fantasy Island, Hotel, The Love Boat, Bridges to Cross, and Murder, She Wrote.

Ferrer was in The Evil That Men Do (1984), Samson and Delilah (1984), and George Washington (1984). He was the Emperor in Dune (1984) and was in Hitler's SS: Portrait in Evil (1985), Seduced (1985), Covenant (1985), Blood & Orchids (1986), Young Harry Houdini, and The Wind in the Willows (1987).

Ferrer made his farewell to Cyrano by performing a short passage from the play for the 1986 Tony Awards telecast.

Although not the original actor to play the character, Ferrer, beginning in the third season, had a recurring role as Julia Duffy's WASPy father in the long-running television series Newhart in the 1980s.

In an interview given in the 1980s, he bemoaned the lack of good character parts for aging stars, and admitted that he now took on roles mostly for the money, such as his roles in the horror potboilers The Swarm, in which he played a doctor, and Dracula's Dog, in which he played a police inspector.

Ferrer's final performances include The Sun and the Moon (1987), American Playhouse ("Strange Interlude" with Kenneth Branagh), Mother's Day (1989), Matlock, Hired to Kill (1990), Old Explorers (1990) and The Perfect Tribute.

He was cast in a Broadway play Conversations with My Father (1991) but withdrew due to poor health.

Legacy

 * Ferrer was the first Hispanic actor to win an Academy Award.
 * In 2005, the Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors (HOLA) renamed its Tespis Award to the HOLA José Ferrer Tespis Award.
 * Ferrer was honored for his theatrical and cinematic works with an induction into the American Theatre Hall of Fame and a National Medal of Arts, becoming the first actor and Hispanic to be presented with the prestigious award.
 * Ferrer's sons Rafael Ferrer and Miguel Ferrer, his daughter (Letty Ferrer), and his granddaughter Tessa Ferrer also became actors and actresses.
 * Ferrer donated his Academy Award to the University of Puerto Rico. The award was stolen after being misplaced during the remodeling of the university's theater.
 * On April 26, 2012, the United States Postal Service issued a stamp in Ferrer's honor in its Distinguished Americans series.

Personal life
Ferrer was married five times and had six children:

Through his marriage to Clooney, Ferrer was the uncle of actor George Clooney, the father in law to singer Debby Boone and actress Leilani Sarelle, and the grandfather of actress Tessa Ferrer.
 * Uta Hagen (1938–1948): Ferrer and Hagen met while playing summer stock in Ridgefield, Connecticut in 1938. They had one child, Leticia (born October 15, 1940). They divorced in 1948, partly due to Hagen's long-concealed affair with Paul Robeson, with whom Hagen and Ferrer had co-starred in the Broadway production of Othello.
 * Phyllis Hill (1948–1953): Ferrer and Hill wed on May 27, 1948, and they moved to Burlington, Vermont in 1950. Ferrer returned to Puerto Rico because his mother died. They divorced on January 12, 1953.
 * Rosemary Clooney (1953–1961): Ferrer first married Clooney on July 13, 1953, in Durant, Oklahoma. They moved to Santa Monica, California, in 1954, and then to Los Angeles in 1958. Ferrer and Clooney had five children in quick succession: Miguel (February 7, 1955 – January 19, 2017), Maria (born August 9, 1956), Gabriel (born August 1, 1957), Monsita (born October 13, 1958) and Rafael (born March 23, 1960). They divorced for the first time in 1961.
 * Rosemary Clooney (1964–1967): Ferrer and Clooney remarried on November 22, 1964, in Los Angeles; however, the marriage again crumbled because Ferrer was carrying on an affair with the woman who would become his last wife, Stella Magee. Clooney found out about the affair, and she and Ferrer divorced again in 1967.
 * Stella Magee (1977–1992): They remained together until his death in 1992.

Death
Ferrer died of colorectal cancer in Coral Gables, Florida, on January 26, 1992, 18 days after his 80th birthday, and was interred in Santa María Magdalena de Pazzis Cemetery in Old San Juan in his native Puerto Rico.

title: José Ferrer


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Office of Strategic Influence

The Office of Strategic Influence, or OSI, was a department created by the United States Department of Defense on October 30, 2001, to support the War on Terrorism through psychological operations in targeted countries, which did not include the United States because the Pentagon is barred from PSYOPs in the U.S. However, BBC noted that "there is nothing to stop an American newspaper picking up a story carried abroad" in cases of news stories that were "black propaganda" with deliberately "misleading" information planted by the Pentagon under OSI.

Although the closure of the office was announced by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld soon after its existence became publicly known, later comments by Secretary Rumsfeld imply that the actual operations of the OSI have continued unabated. Some sources say OSI was authorized to use "military deception" against the public by "presenting false information, images, or statements", while other sources say "This type of action was not in OSI's charter, and [this] charge was never substantiated."

The OSI would have been a center for the creation of propaganda materials, but according to the leaked source, there were no plans to mislead enemy forces or foreign civilian populations. After information on the office spread through US and foreign media in mid February 2002, intense discussions on purpose and scope of the office were reported. Some argue that its secretive nature and stated purposes would make the existence of such an agency hard to determine. The office was closed by Rumsfeld because of the controversy. Some of its foreign responsibilities were moved to the Office of Information Activities.

Timeline

 * February 19, 2002: Major US news organizations report that the Department of Defense had set up the Office of Strategic Influence. These reports quote an unnamed official, who is discussing the advantages of and dangers in setting up such an office.
 * February 20, 2002: After discussions on the purpose of the Office in the US media, Douglas Feith, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, assures the public in an interview that Defense Department officials will not undermine the credibility of US institutions by lying to the public, and states that the exact mandate of the office is under review.
 * February 26, 2002: Rumsfeld announces the decision by Douglas Feith to close the Office of Strategic Influence.
 * November 18, 2002: Rumsfeld states in a press briefing that the Office of Strategic Influence was closed down only in name, that the activities of the office still continue. Rumsfeld:

"And then there was the office of strategic influence. You may recall that. And 'oh my goodness gracious isn't that terrible, Henny Penny the sky is going to fall.' I went down that next day and said fine, if you want to savage this thing fine I'll give you the corpse. There's the name. You can have the name, but I'm gonna keep doing every single thing that needs to be done and I have."

 * November–December 2005. It is disclosed that the US Army secretly paid some Iraqi journalists to publish upbeat stories about the US military operations. This is interpreted by some authors as Rumsfeld having kept his word. The Pentagon again announces that it would stop such practices.

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

title: Office of Strategic Influence


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Norma McCorvey

Norma Leah Nelson McCorvey (September 22, 1947 – February 18, 2017), also known by the pseudonym "Jane Roe", was the plaintiff in the landmark American legal case Roe v. Wade in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1973 that individual state laws banning abortion were unconstitutional.

Later in her life, McCorvey became an Evangelical Protestant and in her remaining years, a Roman Catholic, and took part in the anti-abortion movement. McCorvey stated then that her involvement in Roe was "the biggest mistake of [her] life". However, in the Nick Sweeney documentary AKA Jane Roe, McCorvey said, in what she called her "deathbed confession", that "she never really supported the anti-abortion movement" and that she had been paid for her anti-abortion sentiments.

Early life
McCorvey was born Norma Leah Nelson in Simmesport, Louisiana, and spent her early childhood at her family's residence in Lettsworth in Pointe Coupee Parish. Later in her childhood, the family moved to Houston. McCorvey's father, Olin Nelson, a TV repairman, left the family when McCorvey was 13 years old, and her parents subsequently divorced. She and her older brother were raised by their mother, Mary (née Gautreaux), a violent alcoholic. McCorvey's father died on December 28, 1995. McCorvey's mother was raised a Pentecostal but McCorvey's father led her and the family as Jehovah's Witnesses.

McCorvey had trouble with the law that began at the age of ten, when she robbed the cash register at a gas station and ran away to Oklahoma City with a friend. They tricked a hotel worker into letting them rent a room, and were there for two days when a maid walked in on her and her female friend kissing. McCorvey was arrested and taken to court, where she was declared a ward of the state and a judge sent her to a Catholic boarding school, though she did not become Catholic until 1998.

Later, McCorvey was sent to the State School for Girls in Gainesville, Texas, on and off from ages 11 to 15. She said this was the happiest time of her childhood, and every time she was sent home, would purposely do something bad to be sent back. After being released, McCorvey lived with her mother's cousin, who allegedly raped her every night for three weeks. When McCorvey's mother found out, her cousin said McCorvey was lying.

While working at a restaurant, Norma met Woody McCorvey (born 1940), and she married him at the age of 16 in 1963. She later left him after he allegedly assaulted her. She moved in with her mother and gave birth to her first child, Melissa, in 1965. After Melissa's birth, McCorvey developed a severe drinking and drug problem. Soon after, she began identifying as a lesbian. In her book, she stated that she went on a weekend trip to visit two friends and left her baby with her mother. When she returned, her mother replaced Melissa with a baby doll and reported Norma to the police as having abandoned her baby, and called the police to take her out of the house. She would not tell her where Melissa was for weeks, and finally let her visit her child after three months. She allowed McCorvey to move back in. One day, she woke McCorvey up after a long day of work; she told McCorvey to sign what were presented as insurance papers, and she did so without reading them. However, the papers she had signed were adoption papers, giving her mother custody of Melissa, and McCorvey was then kicked out of the house. Her mother disputed that version of the events, and said that McCorvey had agreed to the adoption.

The following year, McCorvey again became pregnant and gave birth to a baby, Jennifer, who was placed for adoption.

Roe v. Wade
In 1969, at the age of 21, McCorvey became pregnant a third time and returned to Dallas. According to McCorvey, friends advised her that she should assert falsely that she had been raped by a group of black men and that she could thereby obtain a legal abortion under Texas's law, which prohibited most abortion; sources differ over whether Texas law had such a rape exception. Due to a lack of police evidence or documentation, the scheme was not successful, and McCorvey later said it was a fabrication. She attempted to obtain an illegal abortion, but the recommended clinic had been closed down by authorities. Her doctor, Richard Lane, suggested that she consult Henry McCluskey, an adoption lawyer in Dallas. McCorvey stated that she was only interested in an abortion, but agreed to meet with McCluskey.

Eventually, McCorvey was referred to attorneys Linda Coffee and Sarah Weddington, who were looking for pregnant women who were seeking abortions. The case, Roe v. Wade (Henry Wade was the district attorney), took three years of trials to reach the Supreme Court of the United States, and McCorvey never attended a single trial. During the course of the lawsuit, McCorvey gave birth and placed the baby for adoption. McCorvey told the press that she was "Jane Roe" soon after the decision was reached, stating that she had sought an abortion because she was unemployable and greatly depressed. In 1983, McCorvey told the press that she had been raped; in 1987, she said the rape claim was untrue.

Baby at the center of the lawsuit
In 2021, Shelley Lynn Thornton was publicly revealed as the fetus at the center of the Roe case. Thornton became aware that McCorvey was her birth mother in 1989, after a journalist for the National Enquirer tracked down Thornton, then a teenager, and told her about her prenatal history. The National Enquirer journalist was motivated by McCorvey's appearance on the Today show, in which she spoke of her desire to meet her daughter. Finding out she was McCorvey's birth daughter greatly upset Thornton.

In 1991, Thornton became pregnant and did not have an abortion because, according to Thornton, abortion was "not part of who I was". By 2021, Thornton had met McCorvey's two other daughters (Thornton's half-siblings), but never met McCorvey. According to Thornton, she and McCorvey had a phone conversation in 1994, in which McCorvey told her that she should have thanked her for not having an abortion. Thornton's visceral reaction was "What! I'm supposed to thank you for getting knocked up... and then giving me away?" Thornton added that she "would never, ever thank [McCorvey] for not aborting [her]". She reflected that "when someone's pregnant with a baby, and they don't want that baby, that person develops knowing they're not wanted."

After her public revelation in 2021, Thornton stated she was "neither pro-life nor pro-choice".

Anti-abortion activism
In 1994, McCorvey published her autobiography, I Am Roe. At a book signing, McCorvey was befriended by Flip Benham, an evangelical minister and the national director of the anti-abortion organization Operation Rescue. She converted to Evangelical Protestantism and was baptized on August 8, 1995, by Benham, in a Dallas, Texas, backyard swimming pool—an event that was filmed for national television. Two days later, she announced that she had quit her job at an abortion clinic and had become an advocate of Operation Rescue's campaign to make abortion illegal. She voiced remorse for her part in the Supreme Court decision and said she had been a pawn for abortion activists.

On August 17, 1998, McCorvey was received into the Catholic Church in a Mass celebrated by Father Edward Robinson and concelebrated by Father Frank Pavone, director of Priests for Life, at Saint Thomas Aquinas Church in Dallas. McCorvey's second book, Won by Love, described her religious conversion and was published in 1998. In the book, she said that her change of heart occurred in 1995, when she saw a fetal development poster in an Operation Rescue office.

In 2004, McCorvey sought to have the U.S. Supreme Court overturn Roe v. Wade, saying that there was now evidence that the procedure harms women, but the case was ultimately dismissed in 2005. On January 22, 2008, McCorvey endorsed Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul because of his anti-abortion position.

McCorvey remained active in anti-abortion demonstrations, including one she participated in before President Barack Obama's commencement address to the graduates of the University of Notre Dame. McCorvey was arrested on the first day of U.S. Senate hearings for the confirmation to the Supreme Court of the United States of Sonia Sotomayor after McCorvey and another protester began shouting during Senator Al Franken's opening statement. McCorvey appeared in the 2013 film Doonby, in which she delivers an anti-abortion message. She is also the subject of Joshua Prager's 2021 book, The Family Roe: An American Story.

Relationship with Connie Gonzalez
Soon after giving birth a third time, as Roe v. Wade made its way through the courts, McCorvey met and began a long-term relationship with Connie Gonzalez. They lived together in Dallas for 35 years.

After converting to Catholicism, McCorvey continued to live with Gonzalez, though she described their relationship as platonic. Later in life, McCorvey stated that she was no longer a lesbian, although she later said that her religious conversion to Evangelical Christianity and renouncement of her sexuality were financially motivated. McCorvey moved out of the house she shared with Gonzalez in 2006, shortly after Gonzalez suffered a stroke.

Death
Norma McCorvey died of cardiac arrest in Katy, Texas, on February 18, 2017, at the age of 69.

AKA Jane Roe documentary
On May 22, 2020, a documentary titled AKA Jane Roe aired on FX, describing McCorvey's life and the financial incentives to change her views on abortion. In an interview conducted for the film shortly before her death, in what she referred to as her "deathbed confession", McCorvey said her anti-abortion activism had been "all an act", which she did because she was paid, stating that she did not care whether a woman got an abortion. "I was the big fish. I think it was a mutual thing. I took their money and they'd put me out in front of the cameras and tell me what to say. That's what I'd say," McCorvey said. "If a young woman wants to have an abortion, that's no skin off my ass. That's why they call it choice", she added.

Robert Schenck, a formerly anti-abortion evangelical pastor who worked with McCorvey, verified the claim made in the documentary of McCorvey receiving financial compensation. He acknowledged that his group paid McCorvey to speak against abortion, stating: "Her name and photo would command some of the largest windfalls of dollars for my group and many others, but the money we gave her was modest. More than once, I tried to make up for it with an added check, but it was never fair." According to tax documents, McCorvey received at least $450,000 from anti-abortion groups during her years as an activist. Schenck said that he was surprised that McCorvey said she favored abortion rights, although he said that he knew she "harboured doubts about the pro-life message she was telegraphing".

Pavone, who had a decades long association with McCorvey, said that she was not on the payroll of his organization, Priests for Life, and said that he did not believe that McCorvey's activism was disingenuous saying, "I can even see her being emotionally cornered to get those words out of her mouth, but the things that I saw in 22 years with her—the thousands and thousands of conversations that we had—that was real." He later wrote, "So abortion supporters are claiming Norma McCorvey, the Jane Roe of Roe v. Wade, wasn't sincere in her conversion. She was. I was her spiritual guide for 22 years, received her into the Catholic Church, kept regular contact, spoke with her the day she died, and conducted her funeral." Abby Johnson, who worked for Planned Parenthood before joining the anti-abortion movement, said that McCorvey called her on the phone days before her death to express remorse for abortion. Johnson said that she believed McCorvey was a damaged woman who should not have been thrust into the spotlight so quickly after turning against abortion saying, "I don't have any problem believing that in the last year of her life that she tried to convince herself abortion was OK. But I know at the end of her life, she did not believe that."

title: Norma McCorvey


text:
Pianissimo (disambiguation)

Pianissimo is a term in music dynamics meaning "to be played very softly."

Pianissimo may also refer to:

 * Pianissimo, a 1990 album by Suzanne Ciani
 * Pianissimo, a part of the Requiem trilogy by Virgin Black

title: Pianissimo (disambiguation)


text:
Omagh bombing

The Omagh bombing was a car bombing on 15 August 1998 in the town of Omagh in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It was carried out by the Real Irish Republican Army (Real IRA), a Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) splinter group who opposed the IRA's ceasefire and the Good Friday Agreement, signed earlier in the year. The bombing killed 29 people and injured about 220 others, making it the deadliest incident of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Telephoned warnings which did not specify the location had been sent almost forty minutes beforehand, and police inadvertently moved people toward the bomb.

The bombing caused outrage both locally and internationally, spurred on the Northern Ireland peace process,  and dealt a severe blow to the dissident Irish republican campaign. The Real IRA denied that the bomb was intended to kill civilians and apologised; shortly after, the group declared a ceasefire. The victims included people of many backgrounds and ages: Protestants, Catholics, six teenagers, six children, a woman pregnant with twins, two Spanish tourists and others on a day trip from the Republic of Ireland. Both unionists and Irish nationalists were killed and injured. As a result of the bombing, new anti-terrorism laws were swiftly enacted by the United Kingdom and Ireland.

British, Irish and US intelligence agencies allegedly had information which could have prevented the bombing, most of which came from double agents inside the Real IRA, but this information was not given to the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC). In 2008, the BBC reported that British intelligence agency GCHQ was monitoring conversations between the bombers as the bomb was being driven into Omagh.

A 2001 report by the Police Ombudsman said that the RUC Special Branch failed to act on prior warnings and criticised the RUC's investigation of the bombing. Police reportedly obtained circumstantial and coincidental evidence against some suspects, but were unable to convict. Colm Murphy was tried and convicted of conspiring to cause the bombing, but was released on appeal after it was revealed that the Garda Síochána forged interview notes used in the case. Murphy's nephew Sean Hoey was also tried but was acquitted. In June 2009, the victims' families won a £1.6 million civil action settlement against four defendants, who were found liable for the bombing. In 2014, Seamus Daly was charged with the murder of 29 people; the case against him was withdrawn in 2016.

Background
After negotiations to end the Troubles had failed in 1996, there was a resumption of political violence in Northern Ireland which peaked during the Drumcree crises. The peace process resumed in 1997. Sinn Féin accepted the Mitchell Principles in September 1997, which involved commitment to non-violence, as part of the peace process negotiations. Dissident members of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA), who considered this as a betrayal of the republican struggle for a united Ireland, left in October 1997 to form the Real Irish Republican Army (Real IRA).

The Real IRA's tactics were the same as those of the IRA before it. It targeted the British security forces and carried out bombings of symbolic or economic targets. The goal was to damage the economy and cause severe disruption, thereby putting pressure on the British government to withdraw from Northern Ireland. Warnings were sent before such bombings, along with a code word so that the authorities would know it was genuine. The Real IRA began its paramilitary campaign with an attempted car bombing in Banbridge, County Down, on 7 January 1998. The 300 lb explosive was defused by security forces. Over the following months, it mounted several car bomb and mortar attacks. There were also attacks or attempted attacks in Moira, Portadown, Armagh, Newry, Lisburn, Belfast, and Belleek, as well as another car bombing in Banbridge on 1 August, which caused thirty-five injuries but no deaths.

The Omagh bombing took place thirteen weeks after the Good Friday Agreement of April 1998 was signed. Intended to be a comprehensive solution to the Troubles, the agreement had broad support both in Ireland and internationally.

Preparation and warnings
On 13 August, a maroon 1991 Vauxhall Cavalier was stolen from outside a block of flats in Carrickmacross, County Monaghan, Republic of Ireland. At that time, it bore the County Donegal registration number 91-DL-2554. The bombers replaced its Republic of Ireland number plates with fake Northern Ireland plates (MDZ 5211), and loaded the car with about 500 lb of fertiliser-based explosives.

On Saturday 15 August, the bomb car was driven from County Monaghan across the Irish border to Omagh, County Tyrone, travelling north and west. A 'scout car' drove ahead of the bomb car to warn it of any checkpoints, and the two cars were in constant contact by mobile phone. At 14:19, the bomb car was parked outside S.D. Kells' clothes shop on Omagh's Market Street, at the eastern edge of the town centre, near the crossroads with Dublin Road. The driver could not find a parking space near the intended target, Omagh Courthouse. The two male bombers armed the bomb and set the timer to detonate it in forty minutes. They left the car and walked east down Market Street towards Campsie Road, before leaving Omagh in the scout car. A family of Spanish tourists happened to take photos next to the car; the man and child in the photograph survived but the photographer did not.

At around 14:30, three phone calls were made warning of a bomb in Omagh, using the same codeword that had been used in the Real IRA's bombing in Banbridge two weeks earlier: "Martha Pope". The calls were made from telephone boxes many miles away in southern County Armagh. The first warning was telephoned to Ulster Television saying, "There's a bomb, courthouse, Omagh, main street, 500lb, explosion thirty minutes." One minute later, the office received a second warning saying, "Bomb, Omagh town, fifteen minutes." The caller claimed the warning on behalf of "Óglaigh na hÉireann". The next minute, the Coleraine office of the Samaritans received a call stating that a bomb would go off on the "main street" of Omagh "about 200 yards" (180 m) from the courthouse. The recipients passed on the information to the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC).

BBC News stated that police "were clearing an area near the local courthouse, forty minutes after receiving a telephone warning, when the bomb detonated. But the warning was unclear and the wrong area was evacuated." The warnings mentioned "main street" when there was no street by that name in Omagh, although Market Street–High Street was the town's main shopping street. It runs for hundreds of yards east-west from the site of the bomb to the courthouse. Given the warnings, police believed the bomb was near the courthouse, so they evacuated the surrounding buildings and streets. As it happened, they moved people away from the courthouse and towards the site of the bomb, placing a cordon at Scarffe's Entry. The courthouse is roughly 365 yd from the spot where the car bomb was parked. During the later Special Criminal Court trial of Real IRA director Michael McKevitt, witnesses for the prosecution said that the inaccurate warnings were accidental. McKevitt was a former "quartermaster general" in the Provisional IRA.

Explosion and aftermath
The car bomb exploded at about 15:10 BST in the crowded shopping area. It tore the car into deadly shrapnel and created a fireball and shockwave. People were caught in "a storm" of glass, masonry and metal, as the blast destroyed shop fronts and blew the roofs off buildings. A thick cloud of dust and smoke filled the street. The blast was so strong that it tore up concrete and pipes burst; the water, running down the street, turned red from the blood of dead and wounded people. Within twenty-five minutes journalists were on the street taking pictures. Twenty-one people who had been standing near the bomb were killed outright. Eight more died on the way to or in a hospital.

Injured survivor Marion Radford described hearing an "unearthly bang", followed by "an eeriness, a darkness that had just come over the place", then screams as she saw "bits of bodies, limbs" on the ground while she searched for her 16-year-old son, Alan. She later discovered he had been killed yards away from her after the two became separated minutes before the blast.

BBC News said that survivors described scenes of "utter carnage," with the dead and dying "strewn across the street and other victims screaming for help". The injured were initially taken to two local hospitals, the Tyrone County Hospital and the Erne Hospital. A local leisure centre was set up as a casualty field centre, and the British Army's Lisanelly Barracks served as a makeshift morgue. According to the Conflict Archive on the Internet, rescue workers likened the scene to "battlefield conditions". Tyrone County Hospital became overwhelmed, and appealed for local doctors to come in to help.

Because of the stretched emergency services, buses, cars and helicopters were used to take the victims to other hospitals in Northern Ireland, including the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast and Altnagelvin Hospital in Derry. A Tyrone County Hospital spokesman stated that they treated 108 casualties, 44 of whom had to be transferred to other hospitals. Paul McCormick of the Northern Ireland Ambulance Service said, "The injuries are horrific, from amputees, to severe head injuries to serious burns, and among them are women and children." The morning after the bombing, a man was killed when his car collided with an ambulance ferrying bomb victims to hospitals in Belfast.

Omagh Leisure Centre was used as a base for relatives and friends of the victims. There they could receive news updates. Twenty-nine people were killed, eighteen Catholics (including two Spaniards), ten Protestants and one Mormon. The last victim to die, Seán McGrath, was in critical condition in hospital for three weeks before dying from his injuries on 5 September.

Reactions
There was a strong regional and international outcry against 'dissident' republicans and in favour of the Northern Ireland peace process. Prime Minister Tony Blair called the bombing an "appalling act of savagery and evil." Queen Elizabeth II expressed her sympathies to the victims' families, while the Prince of Wales paid a visit to the town and spoke with the families of some of the victims. Pope John Paul II and President Bill Clinton also expressed their sympathies. The Spanish Ambassador to Ireland visited some of the injured.

Churches across Northern Ireland called for a national day of mourning. Church of Ireland Archbishop of Armagh Robin Eames said on BBC Radio that, "From the Church's point of view, all I am concerned about are not political arguments, not political niceties. I am concerned about the torment of ordinary people who don't deserve this."

Social Democratic and Labour Party leader John Hume called the perpetrators of the bombing "undiluted fascists". Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness said, "This appalling act was carried out by those opposed to the peace process," while Gerry Adams said, "I am totally horrified by this action. I condemn it without any equivocation whatsoever." McGuinness mentioned that both Catholics and Protestants alike were injured and killed, saying, "All of them were suffering together. I think all them were asking the question 'Why?', because so many of them had great expectations, great hopes for the future." Sinn Féin as an organisation initially refused to co-operate with the investigation into the attack because the RUC was involved. On 17 May 2007, McGuinness stated that Irish republicans would co-operate with an independent, international investigation if one were created.

The security forces believed the Real IRA were responsible. RUC Chief Constable Ronnie Flanagan accused the bombers of deliberately trying to direct civilians towards the bomb.

As the trial of a suspect started in 2006, British government prosecutor Gordon Kerr called the warnings "not only wrong but... meaningless" and said that the nature of the warnings made it inevitable that people would be moved towards the bomb.

Three days after the bombing, the Real IRA claimed responsibility for planting the bomb but strongly denied intending to kill civilians and apologised to the victims. It also announced that "all military operations have been suspended". The group came under intense pressure to end its campaign. IRA members visited the homes of sixty people connected with the Real IRA, and ordered them to disband and stop interfering with its arms dumps. On 7 September, the Real IRA called a ceasefire, although it would later resume its campaign. The Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) also called a ceasefire on 22 August. The National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism has accused the INLA of providing supplies for the bombing. The INLA continued to observe the ceasefire and later began to disarm. BBC News reported that, "Like the other bombings in the early part of 1998 in places like Lisburn and Banbridge, Omagh was a conscious attempt by republicans who disagreed with the political strategy of Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness, to destabilise Northern Ireland in that vulnerable moment of hope. It failed – but there is a terrible irony to the way in which the campaign was halted only by the wave of revulsion triggered by the carnage at Omagh."

In response to the bombing, both the British and Irish governments vowed to enact tougher anti-terrorism laws. On 3 September, the British parliament passed the Criminal Justice (Terrorism and Conspiracy) Act 1998, and the Irish parliament passed the Offences Against The State (Amendment) Bill. Members of both governments described the measures as "draconian" and the bills were rushed through, despite protests from members of parliament and civil liberties groups. The new measures included allowing suspected members of terrorist groups to be convicted on the word of a senior police officer, curtailment of the right to silence, and longer detention periods.

Allegations
The Real IRA claimed responsibility for the bombing at the time. On 7 February 2008, a Real IRA spokesman stated that the group "had minimal involvement in Omagh. Our code word was used; nothing more. To have stated this at the time would have been lost in an understandable wave of emotion. ... Omagh was an absolute tragedy. Any loss of civilian life is regrettable."

On 9 October 2000, the BBC's Panorama programme aired the special "Who Bombed Omagh?", hosted by journalist John Ware. The programme quoted RUC Chief Constable Ronnie Flanagan as saying, "Sadly up to this point we haven't been able to charge anyone with this terrible atrocity." Panorama alleged that the police on both sides of the Irish border knew the identity of the bombers. It said, "As the bomb car and the scout car headed for the border, the police believe they communicated by mobile phone. This is based on an analysis of calls made in the hours before, during and after the bombing. This analysis may prove to be the key to the Omagh bomb investigation." Using the phone records, the programme reported the names of the four prime suspects as Oliver Traynor, Liam Campbell, Colm Murphy, and Seamus Daly. The police had leaked the information to the BBC since it was too circumstantial and coincidental to be used in court.

Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Mandelson praised the Panorama programme, calling it "a very powerful and very professional piece of work". Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern criticised it, saying that "bandying around names on television" could hinder attempts to secure convictions. First Minister David Trimble stated that he had "very grave doubts" about it. Lawrence Rush, whose wife Elizabeth died in the bombing, tried legally to block the programme from being broadcast, saying, "This is media justice, we can't allow this to happen". Democratic Unionist Party assembly member Oliver Gibson, whose niece Esther died in the bombing, said that the government did not have the will to pursue those responsible and welcomed the programme.

The police believe that the bombing of BBC Television Centre in London on 4 March 2001 was a revenge attack for the broadcast. On 9 April 2003, the five Real IRA members behind the BBC bombing were convicted and sentenced to between sixteen and twenty-two years.

Prosecutions and court cases
On 22 September 1998, the RUC and Gardaí arrested twelve men in connection with the bombing. They subsequently released all of them without charge. On 25 February 1999, they questioned and arrested at least seven suspects. Builder and publican Colm Murphy, from Ravensdale, County Louth, was charged three days later for conspiracy and was convicted on 23 January 2002 by the Republic of Ireland's Special Criminal Court. He was sentenced to fourteen years. In January 2005, Murphy's conviction was quashed and a retrial was ordered by the Court of Criminal Appeal, on the grounds that two Gardaí had falsified interview notes, and that Murphy's previous convictions were improperly taken into account by the trial judges.

On 28 October 2000, the families of four children killed in the bombing – James Barker, 12, Samantha McFarland, 17, Lorraine Wilson, 15, and 20-month-old Breda Devine – launched a civil action against the suspects named by the Panorama programme. On 15 March 2001, the families of all twenty-nine people killed in the bombing launched a £2-million civil action against Real IRA suspects Liam Campbell, Colm Murphy, Seamus Daly, Seamus McKenna and Michael McKevitt. Former Northern Ireland secretaries Peter Mandelson, Tom King, Peter Brooke, Lord Hurd, Lord Prior and Lord Merlyn-Rees signed up in support of the plaintiffs' legal fund. The civil action began in Northern Ireland on 7 April 2008.

On 6 September 2006, Murphy's nephew, Sean Hoey, an electrician from Jonesborough, County Armagh, went on trial accused of twenty-nine counts of murder, and terrorism and explosives charges. Upon its completion, Hoey's trial found on 20 December 2007 that he was not guilty of all 56 charges against him.

On 24 January 2008, former Chief Constable Ronnie Flanagan apologised to the victims' families for the lack of convictions in relation to the Omagh bombing. This apology was rejected by some of the victims' families. After the Hoey verdict, BBC News reporter Kevin Connolly stated, "The Omagh families were dignified in defeat, as they have been dignified at every stage of their fight for justice. Their campaigning will go on, but the prospect is surely receding now that anyone will ever be convicted of murdering their husbands and brothers and sisters and wives and children." Police Service of Northern Ireland Chief Constable Sir Hugh Orde stated that he believed there would be no further prosecutions.

On 8 June 2009, the civil case taken by victims' relatives concluded, with McKevitt, Campbell, Murphy and Daly being found to have been responsible for the bombing. McKenna (died 14 July 2013) was cleared of involvement. The others were held liable for GB£1.6 million of damages. It was described as a "landmark" damages award internationally. Murphy and Daly appealed and were granted a retrial, but this second trial also found them responsible for the bombing, with the judge describing the evidence as overwhelming.

On 10 April 2014 Daly was charged with murdering the twenty-nine victims of the Omagh bombing and with other offences. He was arrested in Newry by police after he crossed the border into Northern Ireland. The case against Daly was withdrawn in February 2016, with the Public Prosecution Service deciding there was "no reasonable prospect of conviction".

In 2021, Michael Gallagher, whose son Aiden was killed during the attack, brought a case to the Belfast High Court which resulted in Mr Justice Mark Horner ruling that when considering certain grounds "there was a real prospect of preventing the Omagh bombing." Horner also called for new investigations on both sides of the Irish border.

Police Ombudsman report
Police Ombudsman Nuala O'Loan published a report on 12 December 2001 that strongly criticised the RUC over its handling of the bombing investigation. Her report stated that RUC officers had ignored the previous warnings about a bomb and had failed to act on crucial intelligence. She went on to say that officers had been uncooperative and defensive during her inquiry. The report concluded that, "The victims, their families, the people of Omagh and officers of the RUC were let down by defective leadership, poor judgement and a lack of urgency." It recommended the setting up of a new investigation team independent of the new Police Service of Northern Ireland, which had since replaced the RUC, led by a senior officer from an outside police force.

Initially, the Police Association, which represents both senior officers and rank and file members of the Northern Ireland police, went to court to try to block the release of the O'Loan report. The Association stated that, "The ombudsman's report and associated decisions constitute a misuse of her statutory powers, responsibilities and functions." The group later dropped its efforts. RUC Chief Constable Ronnie Flanagan called the report "grossly unfair" and "an erroneous conclusion reached in advance and then a desperate attempt to find anything that might happen to fit in with that." Other senior police officers also disputed the report's findings. Flanagan issued a 190-page counter-report in response, and has also stated that he has considered taking legal action. He argued that the multiple warnings were given by the RIRA to cause confusion and lead to a greater loss of life. Assistant Chief Constables Alan McQuillan and Sam Kincaid sent affidavits giving information that supported the report.

The families of the victims expressed varying reactions to the report. Kevin Skelton, whose wife Philomena died in the attack, said that, "After the bomb at Omagh, we were told by Tony Blair and the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, that no stone would be left unturned ... It seems to me that a lot of stones have been left unturned," but then expressed doubt that the bombing could have been prevented. Lawrence Rush, whose wife Elizabeth died in the attack, said that, "There's no reason why Omagh should have happened – the police have been in dereliction of their duty." Other Omagh residents said that the police did all that they could. The Belfast Telegraph called the report a "watershed in police accountability" and stated that it "broke the taboo around official criticism of police in Northern Ireland". Upon leaving office on 5 November 2007, Nuala O'Loan stated that the report was not a personal battle between herself and Sir Ronnie, and did not lead to one. She stated that the "recommendations which we made were complied with".

Independent bombing investigation
On 7 February 2008, the Northern Ireland Policing Board decided to appoint a panel of independent experts to review the police's investigation of the bombing. Some of the relatives of the bombing victims criticised the decision, saying that an international public inquiry covering both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland should have been established instead. The review was to determine whether enough evidence exists for further prosecutions. and to investigate the possible perjury of two police witnesses made during Hoey's trial. Sinn Féin member of the Policing Board Alex Maskey stated that, "Sinn Féin fully supports the families' right to call for a full cross-border independent inquiry while the Policing Board has its clear and legal obligation to scrutinise the police handling of the investigations ... We recognise that the board has a major responsibility in carrying out our duty in holding the PSNI to account in the interests of justice for the Omagh families".

Advance warning allegations
In 2001, a double agent known as Kevin Fulton claimed he told his MI5 handlers three days before the bombing that the Real IRA was about to bring a "huge bomb" across the border. Fulton claims he also told them who he believed was making it and where it was being made. He said that MI5 did not pass his information over to the police.

RUC Chief Constable Ronnie Flanagan called the allegations "preposterous" and said the information Fulton gave his handlers was full of "distortions and inaccuracies". However, Flanagan admitted that some of Fulton's information was not passed to RUC Special Branch due to "an administrative error". In September 2001, British security forces informer Willie Carlin said the Ombudsman had obtained evidence confirming Fulton's allegations. A spokesman for the Ombudsman neither confirmed nor denied this assertion.

David Rupert, an American citizen, was jointly run as an agent by MI5 and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He worked as a fundraiser for the Real IRA. On 11 August 1998, four days before the bombing, Rupert informed his MI5 handlers that the Real IRA was planning a car bomb attack in Omagh or Derry. It is not known whether this information was passed to the RUC Special Branch.

The Gardaí also had their own agent close to the Real IRA at the time, Paddy Dixon, who stole cars that were used by the group to transport bombs. Days before the bombing, the Real IRA had Dixon steal the Vauxhall Cavalier it would use in the attack. Dixon immediately told his handler, Detective Sergeant John White. On 12 August, White passed this on to his superior, Detective Chief Superintendent Dermot Jennings. According to White, Jennings told him that they would let the bomb go through, mainly so that the Real IRA would not become suspicious of Dixon.

In 2003, a transcript of a conversation between Dixon and White was released. In it, Dixon confirms that Gardaí let the bomb go through and says that, "Omagh is going to blow up in their faces". In February 2004, PSNI Chief Constable Hugh Orde called for the Republic of Ireland to hand over Dixon. In March 2006, Chief Constable Orde stated that "security services did not withhold intelligence that was relevant or would have progressed the Omagh inquiry". He stated that the dissident republicans investigated by MI5 were members of a different cell than the perpetrators of the Omagh bombing.

A 2013 independent report concluded that the British, Irish and US intelligence agencies "starved" police in Omagh of intelligence that could have prevented the bombing. The report was commissioned by the victims' families and produced by Rights Watch (UK).

GCHQ monitoring
A BBC Panorama documentary, titled "Omagh: What the Police Were Never Told", was aired in September 2008. It revealed that the British intelligence agency GCHQ was monitoring mobile phone calls between the bombers as the bomb car was being driven into Omagh. Ray White, former Assistant Chief of RUC Special Branch, said GCHQ had been monitoring mobile phones at their request. He said he believed GCHQ were listening to the phone calls 'live', rather than merely recording them for later. John Ware claimed that a listening device had been hidden in the car and that GCHQ had recordings of what was said. None of this information was given to the RUC in Omagh at the time. Transcripts of the phone calls were later handed over to RUC Special Branch.

Independent statutory inquiry
In February 2023, Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris announced an independent statutory inquiry. As opposed to a public inquiry, the chairman would decide which portions of the investigations could be made available to the public and the press. The inquiry will look into four different issues highlighted by a 2021 High Court ruling, namely the handling and sharing of intelligence, the use of mobile phone analysis, the possibility of the existence of advance knowledge of the bomb, and whether the attack could have been prevented by disruption operations.

Victims' support group
The families of the victims of the bomb created the Omagh Support and Self Help Group after the bombing. The organisation is led by Michael Gallagher, whose 21-year-old son, Aidan, was killed in the bombing. Its website provides over 5,000 newspaper articles, video recordings, audio recordings, and other information sources relating to the events leading up to and following the bombing as well as information about other terrorist attacks.

The group's five core objectives are "relief of poverty, sickness, disability of victims", "advancement of education and protection", "raising awareness of needs and experiences of victims, and the effects of terrorism", "welfare rights advice and information", and "improving conditions of life for victims". The group also provides support to victims of other bombings in Ireland, as well other terrorist bombings, such as the 2004 Madrid train bombings. The group has protested outside meetings of the 32 County Sovereignty Movement, an Irish republican political activist group opposed to the Good Friday Agreement that the families believe is part of the RIRA.

In April 2000, the group argued that the attack breached Article 57 of the Geneva Convention and stated that they would pursue the alleged bombers using international law. Michael Gallagher told BBC Radio Ulster that, "The republican movement refused to co-operate and those people hold the key to solving this mystery. Because they have difficulty in working with the RUC and Gardaí, we can't get justice." In January 2002, Gallagher told BBC News that, "There is such a deeply-held sense of frustration and depression" and called the anti-terrorist legislation passed in the wake of the Omagh bombing "ineffective". He expressed support for the controversial Panorama programme, stating that it reminded "people that what happened in Omagh is still capable of happening in other towns".

In February 2002, Prime Minister Tony Blair declined a written request by the group to meet with him at Downing Street. Group members accused the Prime Minister of ignoring concerns about the police's handling of the bombing investigation. A Downing Street spokesman stated that, "The Prime Minister of course understands the relatives' concerns, but [he] believes that a meeting with the Minister of State at the Northern Ireland Office is the right place to air their concerns at this stage."

The death of Adrian Gallagher, along with the experiences of his father Michael and those of other families in the Omagh Support and Self Help Group formed the story of the television film Omagh, a Channel 4-RTÉ co-production. Film-maker Paul Greengrass stated "the families of the Omagh Support and Self Help Group have been in the public eye throughout the last five years, pursuing a legal campaign, shortly to come before the courts, with far-reaching implications for all of us and it feels the right moment for them to be heard, to bring their story to a wider audience so we can all understand the journey they have made." In promotion for the film, Channel 4 stated that the group had pursued "a patient, determined, indomitable campaign to bring those responsible for the bomb to justice, and to hold to account politicians and police on both sides of the border who promised so much in the immediate aftermath of the atrocity but who in the families' eyes have delivered all too little."

Media memorials
The bombing inspired the song "Paper Sun" by British hard rock band Def Leppard.

Another song inspired by the bombings was "Peace on Earth" by rock group U2. It includes the line, "They're reading names out over the radio. All the folks the rest of us won't get to know. Sean and Julia, Gareth, Ann, and Breda." The five names mentioned are five of the victims from this attack. Another line, "She never got to say goodbye, To see the colour in his eyes, now he's in the dirt" was about how James Barker, a victim, was remembered by his mother Donna Barker in an article in the Irish Times after the bombing in Omagh. U2 guitarist The Edge has described the song as "the most bitter song U2 has ever written". The names of all 29 people killed during the bombing were recited at the conclusion of the group's anti-violence anthem "Sunday Bloody Sunday" during the Elevation Tour; one performance is captured on the concert video U2 Go Home: Live from Slane Castle, Ireland.

Irish state broadcaster RTÉ and UK network Channel 4 co-produced the 2004 film Omagh dramatising the events surrounding the bombing and its aftermath. It was directed by Pete Travis and was first shown on television in both countries in May 2004.

National remembrance
A nationwide minute of silence was observed across the Republic of Ireland at 3:10 p.m. on 22 August 1998; exactly one week after the bombing.

Omagh memorial
In late 1999, Omagh District Council established the Omagh Memorial Working Group to devise a permanent memorial to the bombing victims. Its members come from both public and private sectors alongside representatives from the Omagh Churches Forum and members of the victims' families. The chief executive of the Omagh Council, John McKinney, stated in March 2000 that, "we are working towards a memorial. It is a very sensitive issue." In April 2007, the council announced the launch of a public art design competition by the Omagh Memorial Working Group. The group's goal was to create a permanent memorial in time for the tenth anniversary of the bombing on 15 August 2008. It has a total budget of £240,000.

Since space for a monument on Market Street itself is limited, the final memorial was to be split between the actual bombing site and the temporary Memorial Garden about 300 metres away. Artist Sean Hillen and architect Desmond Fitzgerald won the contest with a design that, in the words of the Irish Times, "centres on that most primal yet mobile of elements: light." A heliostat mirror was to be placed in the memorial park tracking the sun in order to project a constant beam of sunlight onto 31 small mirrors, each etched with the name of a victim. All the mirrors were then to bounce the light onto a heart-shaped crystal within an obelisk pillar that stands at the bomb site.

In September 2007, the Omagh Council's proposed wording on a memorial plaque – "dissident republican car bomb" – brought it into conflict with several of the victims' families. Michael Gallagher has stated that "there can be no ambiguity over what happened on 15 August 1998, and no dancing around words can distract from the truth." The Council appointed an independent mediator in an attempt to reach an agreement with those families. Construction started on the memorial on 27 July 2008.

On 15 August 2008, a memorial service was held in Omagh. Senior government representatives from the UK, the Republic of Ireland and the Stormont Assembly were present, along with relatives of many of the victims. A number of bereaved families, however, boycotted the service and held their own service the following Sunday. They argued that the Sinn Féin-dominated Omagh council would not acknowledge that republicans were responsible for the bombing.

A memorial service was held on 15 August 2018 to mark twenty years since the bombing. A bell was rung 32 times at 15:10, the time the bomb went off, to represent the 31 victims with an extra peal for those who have lost their lives in attacks all over the world. A memorial service was also held on 13 August 2023 to mark the 25th anniversary of the bombing.

title: Omagh bombing


text:
1920 Summer Olympics

The 1920 Summer Olympics (Jeux olympiques d'été de 1920; Olympische Zomerspelen van 1920; Olympische Sommerspiele 1920), officially known as the Games of the VII Olympiad (Jeux de la VIIe olympiade; Spelen van de VIIe Olympiade; Spiele der VII. Olympiade) and commonly known as Antwerp 1920 (Anvers 1920; Dutch and German: Antwerpen 1920), were an international multi-sport event held in 1920 in Antwerp, Belgium.

In March 1912, during the 13th session of the IOC, Belgium's bid to host the 1920 Summer Olympics was made by Baron Édouard de Laveleye, president of the Belgian Olympic Committee and of the Royal Belgian Football Association. No fixed host city was proposed at the time.

The 1916 Summer Olympics, to have been held in Berlin, capital of the German Empire, were cancelled due to World War I. When the Olympic Games resumed after the war, Antwerp was awarded hosting the 1920 Summer Games as tribute to the Belgian people. The aftermath of the war and the Paris Peace Conference, 1919 affected the Olympic Games not only due to new states being created, but also by sanctions against the nations that lost the war and were blamed for starting it. Hungary, Germany, Austria, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman Empire were banned from competing in the Games. Soviet Russia had just emerged from the Civil War and chose not to attend the Games. Germany did not return to Olympic competition until 1928 and instead hosted a series of games called Deutsche Kampfspiele, starting with the Winter edition of 1922 (which predated the first Winter Olympics).

The United States won the most gold and overall medals at the 1920 Summer Games.

Host city selection
In March 1912, during the 13th session of the IOC, the bid on the behalf of Belgium to host the 1920 Summer Olympics was made by Baron Édouard de Laveleye, president of the Belgian Olympic Committee and of the Royal Belgian Football Association. No fixed host city was proposed at the time.

The organizing committee was created on 9 August 1913. It had four presidents:
 * Édouard de Laveleye, president of the Belgian Olympic Committee
 * Henri de Baillet-Latour, member of the IOC
 * Robert Osterrieth, president of the Royal Yacht Club of Belgium
 * Charles Cnoops, vice-president of the Belgian Fencing Association

Among the 22 vice-presidents of the committee were people with a military or industrial background, and further people from sports organizations like Paul Havenith, president of the football and athletics club K. Beerschot V.A.C. and Nicolaas Jan Cupérus, president of the Belgian Gymnastics Federation.

The first action of the committee was to send an official letter to the IOC in Paris, confirming Antwerp as the city for the Belgian Olympic bid. With Antwerp confirmed as the Olympic Games host, Belgium began reconstructing the Beerschot Stadium into the Olympisch Stadion. Construction on the new Olympic stadium began in July 1919 and finished in May 1920.

In 1914, a 109-page brochure was created to promote the idea of Antwerp as a host city for the Olympics: Aurons-nous la VIIème Olympiade à Anvers? (Will we have the 7th Olympiad at Antwerp?). It was sent to all IOC members and was used during the 6th Olympic Congress in Paris in 1914, where the candidacies of Amsterdam ((which would eventually host the 1928 Summer Olympics), Antwerp, Budapest, and Rome (which would eventually host the 1960 Summer Olympics) were discussed. Despite a slight preference at the time for Budapest, no final choice was made, and the outbreak of World War I soon afterwards prevented any further progress.

In 1915, Lyon made a bid for the 1920 Games, but after some discussion, they agreed to support Antwerp and postpone their bid until 1924 if Antwerp was liberated in time to organize the Games. The support for Belgium by cousin country France, then the leading country of the IOC, also meant that Amsterdam and Budapest (in an enemy state) had no chance for the 1920 games against Antwerp.

New candidacies from American cities did not have that disadvantage, and bids were received from Cleveland, Philadelphia, and Atlanta (which would eventually host the 1996 Summer Olympics), while Cuba also submitted a bid for Havana.

However, shortly after the armistice in November 1918, the IOC decided to give Antwerp their first preference, if they were still willing to host the 1920 Games. In March 1919, the Belgian Olympic Committee decided to go ahead with the organization of the Games: on 5 April 1919, at a meeting in Lausanne, Antwerp was officially declared the host city for the games of the VIIth Olympiad.

Organization
The 1920 Summer Games organizers had very little time to prepare. The time between the IOC's decision of choosing Antwerp as the host city and the start of the Olympic Games was less than two years.

An executive committee was established on 17 April 1919, with Henri de Baillet-Latour as chairman and Alfred Verdyck, the secretary of the Belgian Union of Football Clubs, as general secretary. Seven commissions were created, to deal with finances, accommodation, press relations, propaganda, schedules, transport, and festivities. Finances and scheduling proved to be the two hardest parts to tackle: the program of events only was published in February 1920, six months before the official start of the Games.

Between 23 and 30 April 1920, an ice hockey tournament marked the early start of the Games. Held in the "Palais de Glace" or Ice Palace in Antwerp, it was the first time that ice hockey was an Olympic sport.

The first stone of the new Olympisch Stadion was laid on 4 July 1919 by Jan De Vos, mayor of Antwerp, and inaugurated less than a year later on 23 May 1920 with a gymnastics demonstration.

When the Olympic Games began, the stadium was still unfinished with some events being built over fortifications and others using existing locations. The athletes quarters were crowded and athletes slept on folding cots.

The nautical stadium or Stade Nautique d'Antwerp was built at the end of the Jan Van Rijswijcklaan, using the city ramparts there as a spectator's stand. Other events, like shooting, boxing, and equestrian sports, were held at pre-existing locations in and around Antwerp and as far away as Ostend.

The amount of spectators were low throughout Antwerp's Summer Olympics since not many people could afford tickets. In the closing days of the Olympic Games, students were allowed to attend the event for free. After the conclusion of the Olympic Games, Belgium recorded a loss of more than 600 million francs.

Highlights

 * The Olympic Games being a symbol of peace and global solidarity shone at Antwerp. These Olympics were the first in which the Olympic Oath was voiced, the first in which doves were released to symbolize peace, and the first in which the Olympic Flag was flown to display the unity of the world's continents through its 5 rings.
 * The United States won 41 gold, 27 silver, and 27 bronze medals. Sweden, Great Britain, Finland, and Belgium rounded out the five most successful medal-winning nations, with France and Belgium being the nations that fielded the most athletes, with the United States being only the third by that statistic.
 * The Games also featured a week of winter sports, with figure skating appearing for the first time since the 1908 Olympics, and ice hockey making its Olympic debut.
 * Nedo Nadi won 5 gold medals in the fencing events.
 * At the age of 72, Sweden's 100 metre running deer double-shot event champion Oscar Swahn, who had participated in the 1908 and 1912 Games, came in second in the team event to become the oldest Olympic medal winner ever.
 * 23-year-old Paavo Nurmi won the 10,000 m and 8000 m cross country races, took another gold in team cross country, and a silver in the 5000 m run. His contributions for Finland broke a record in track and field with 9 medals.
 * Duke Kahanamoku retained the 100 m swimming title he won before the war.
 * The sailing events were among some of strangest moments in Olympic history:
 * there were originally 16 events scheduled but there were no entrants for the 9 metre, 1907 rating class nor the 8.5 metre 1919 rating class
 * the 12-foot dinghy event took place in two different countries. The final two races in the event were independently held in the Netherlands, on its own accord, supposedly because the only two competitors in the event were Dutch.
 * Sport shooter Guilherme Paraense won Brazil's very first gold medal at the Olympic Games.
 * The United States sent a women's swimming team for the first time, and the Americans won seven out of seven available swimming medals.

Sports/Events
There were 162 events in 29 disciplines that were part of the Olympic program in 1920. The number of events in each discipline is noted in parentheses.

Korfball was a demonstration sport. Women's water polo was a demonstration sport.

Venues
Seventeen sports venues were used in the 1920 Summer Olympics. This marked the first time that the football tournament was spread throughout the country, which has mostly been the case since.

Participating nations
A total of 29 nations participated in the Antwerp Games, only one more than in 1912, as Germany, Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria and Ottoman Empire were not invited, having lost World War I and sanctioned for starting it. From the newly created European states, only Estonia took part, and Czechoslovakia, succeeding Bohemia which had sent athletes prior to World War I as part of the Austrian Empire. Poland and Soviet Russia were busy with the Polish-Soviet War and therefore were unable to form an Olympic team. Argentina, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, Brazil, and Monaco competed as nations at the Olympic Games for the first time. New Zealand, which had competed as part of a combined team with Australia in 1908 and 1912, competed on its own for the first time.

 * The Dominion of Newfoundland had one competitor, Eric Robertson. But as the dominion had no official Olympic committee, his nationality could not be confirmed and he represented Great Britain.

As the local Olympic Organizing Committee went bankrupt during the Antwerp 1920 Games, no official report of the Games was ever produced. The documents of the Games were archived at the Belgium Olympic Committee headquarters in Brussels.

Medal count

These are the top ten nations that won medals at the 1920 Games. These were the first Olympics where the host nation did not win the most medals overall.

title: 1920 Summer Olympics


text:
Talk:Dunstanburgh Castle

Units
I was wanting to have a go (some time, no rush!) at sorting out units and convert templates and all that stuff here, a bit more consistently than it is at the moment. On a quick scan through for the flavour, it looks as it we mostly have imperial units first, then metric. This isn't without exception but is, I think, the broad picture. I have a slight personal preference for metric but I am unaware of anything that would force it that way, and I do value a peaceful quiet life. So I am quite tempted to just keep it all acres-first or, like, whatevs. What do you think? Best to all, DBaK (talk) 19:51, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

 * Consistency is useful, but I'd be happy with consistency within each unit rather than necessarily all metric or all imperial (if that makes sense). On the scale of metres, I'd prefer to use metres first with yards and feet in brackets as that reflects modern practice archaeological and architectural practice, though some of the sources will use imperial units first. For hectares/acres I have a weak preference for metric first, though personally I find either a little tricky to conceptualise. For miles/km, as long as it's consistent I don't mind too much, I think there's only one case where that would apply in the article so that's easy! Richard Nevell (talk) 17:15, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

Dungeon below dunstanburgh castle
I seem to remember going down a steep ladder and visiting a dungeon there 2A02:C7F:4CC9:9B00:6CD2:106C:BA2A:5E56 (talk) 14:01, 30 December 2022 (UTC)

 * You do remember! Many of us of a certain vintage+ do. It was discussed a little at Talk:Dunstanburgh Castle/Archive 1 a mere sixteen years ago, when it was mentioned in the article, at least as a reputed dungeon; it seems to have been lost since then. I don't now know what RS mentions it, but if you think it's inportant you could have a look for a source. (I am thinking of the days when Mr Stephenson was custodian, btw ...) Cheers DBaK (talk) 19:29, 30 December 2022 (UTC)
 * That is very likely to have been dealt with by Peter Brears in "The Administrative Role of Gatehouses in Fourteenth-Century North-Country Castles", The Medieval Great House. I don't have access to the chapter at the moment but will see what I can track down. A change in interpretation would be worth mentioning in the castle, especially if some readers are coming here specifically for information on a dungeon Richard Nevell (talk) 00:45, 31 December 2022 (UTC)
 * That would be excellent, thank you! My own knowledge of this issue tends more towards the folkloric than the encyclopaedic so your input would be more than welcome. Cheers, DBaK (talk) 13:02, 31 December 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:Dunstanburgh Castle


text: Talk:Counterpoint

title: Talk:Counterpoint


text:
Quodlibet

A quodlibet (Latin for "whatever you wish" from quod, "what" and libet, "pleases") is a musical composition that combines several different melodies—usually popular tunes—in counterpoint, and often in a light-hearted, humorous manner.

There are three main types of quodlibet:
 * A catalogue quodlibet consists of a free setting of catalogue poetry (usually humorous lists of loosely related items).
 * In a successive quodlibet, one voice has short musical quotations and textual quotations while the other voices provide homophonic accompaniment.
 * In a simultaneous quodlibet, two or more pre-existing melodies are combined. The simultaneous quodlibet may be considered a historical antecedent to the modern-day musical mashup. Simultaneous quodlibets are found in elementary music classes, referred to as Partner Songs.

Renaissance
The quodlibet originated in 15th-century Europe, during a time when the practice of combining folk tunes was popular. Composer first used the term in a specifically musical context in 1544.

Francisco de Peñalosa's quodlibet Por las sierras de Madrid occurs in the Cancionero Musical de Palacio, a manuscript of the early 16th century. Composer Ludwig Senfl (1486–1542/43) was able to juxtapose several pre-existing melodies in a cantus firmus quodlibet; one such piece, "Ach Elslein, liebes Elselein" / "Es taget", was noted for its symbolism rather than its humor. In Spain, 1581 saw the publication of the ensaladas of Mateo Flecha et al. The ensaladas were comical compositions that mixed literary texts in a way similar to the quodlibet.

It was not until 1618, however, that anyone published a rigorous definition of the quodlibet: Michael Praetorius described it as "a mixture of diverse elements quoted from sacred and secular compositions". During the Renaissance, a composer's ability to juxtapose several pre-existing melodies, such as in the cantus firmus quodlibet, was considered the ultimate mastery of counterpoint.

19th century to today
The quodlibet took on additional functions between the beginning and middle of the 19th century, when it became known as the potpourri and the musical switch. In these forms, the quodlibet would often feature anywhere from six to fifty or more consecutive "quotations"; the distinct incongruity between words and music served as a potent source of parody and entertainment. In the 20th century, the quodlibet remained a genre in which well-known tunes and/or texts were quoted, either simultaneously or in succession, generally for humorous effect.

Classical music

 * The masses of Jacob Obrecht, which sometimes combine popular tunes, plainsong and original music.
 * The last (thirtieth) variation of Bach's Goldberg Variations is a quodlibet.
 * Bach's Wedding Quodlibet or Quodlibet, which is not a quodlibet by the above definition but a ten-minute procession of nonsense, jokes, puns, obscure cultural references, word games, and parody of other songs. At times, the music imitates a chaconne and a fugue while deliberately obscuring the counterpoint. It is unlike any of Bach's other works, though the sole surviving source is a fair copy manuscript in Bach's own handwriting.
 * Gallimathias musicum, a 17-part quodlibet composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart at the age of ten.
 * Louis Moreau Gottschalk combined "Hail, Columbia" and "Yankee Doodle" at the end of his piano piece, The Union.
 * Symphony No. 4 of Charles Ives, like most of Ives' music, includes frequent popular and band tunes which unfold independently from the rest of the music.
 * Scherzo from Charles Ives' piano trio labeled "TSIAJ" (This scherzo is a joke), includes the American fraternity tunes "My Old Kentucky Home", "Sailor's Hornpipe", "The Campbells Are Coming", "Long, Long Ago", "Hold the Fort", and "There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood", among others.
 * Quodlibet on Welsh Nursery Rhymes by Welsh composer Alun Hoddinott.
 * Pianist Glenn Gould improvised a quodlibet including "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "God Save the King". According to his account, Gould came up with this quodlibet while taking a bath.
 * Peter Schickele's Quodlibet for Small Orchestra, Unbegun Symphony, Eine Kleine Nichtmusik, and others.
 * Allan Sherman's "Variations on How Dry I Am" from the album "Peter and the Commissar".
 * Fantasia on Auld Lang Syne (1976) by Ernest Tomlinson. The composer claims that the piece references 129 works.

Popular music

 * The Grateful Dead's medley "That's It for the Other One", on their album Anthem of the Sun, includes the movement "Quadlibet for Tender Feet" (sic).
 * Scholar Alan W. Pollack has pointed out that The Beatles' "I've Got a Feeling" is a quodlibet of sorts.
 * "I Believe" – Stan Beard and Barry Tucker published a quodlibet arrangement of this popular sacred song with Bach-Gounod "Ave Maria" in 1972.
 * Nina Simone's 1958 interpretation of "Little Girl Blue" is a quodlibet, combining the Rodgers and Hart melody and lyrics with the melody of the popular carol "Good King Wenceslas".

title: Quodlibet


text:
Talk:Tantalum

Untitled
Article changed over to new WikiProject Elements format by maveric149. Elementbox converted 11:03, 14 July 2005 by Femto (previous revision was that of 09:59, 12 July 2005). 12 July 2005

Information Sources
Some of the text in this entry was rewritten from Los Alamos National Laboratory - Tantalum. Additional text was taken directly from USGS Tantalum Statistics and Information, from the Elements database 20001107 (via dict.org), Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) (via dict.org) and WordNet (r) 1.7 (via dict.org). Data for the table was obtained from the sources listed on the subject page and WikiProject Elements but was reformatted and converted into SI units. --

Capacitance
In case anyone wonders about my "capacitance" edit: it is not correct to say that tantalum has a higher capacitance than other substances (as the pre-edit version did). Capacitance is a property of an electronic component, not of a material; it would be like saying that titanium has a higher velocity than iron. (Sure, if you build a high-performance jet out of it, but...) I substituted what I think the author of that sentence probably meant, which is that tantalum's main electronic application is in capacitors with high capacitance.129.97.79.144 21:11, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * Absolutely makes sense even without an explanation. Femto 17:48, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Wrong geochemical-mineralogical data
"Most commonly encountered are oxides of Ta(V), which includes all minerals." Not true. Native tantalum has Ta(0), and Ta is also not pentavalent in tantalcarbide, TaC. And that's not all the exceptions. See: (1) https://www.mindat.org/min-7329.html; (2) https://www.mindat.org/min-7327.html; (3) https://www.mindat.org/min-7120.html; (4) https://www.mindat.org/min-39368.html; (5) https://www.ima-mineralogy.org/Minlist.htm Eudialytos (talk) 19:29, 11 December 2021 (UTC)
 * Picky, but true.--Smokefoot (talk) 20:22, 11 December 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks Eudialytos (talk) 22:55, 18 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Eudialytos (talk) 22:55, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Bad Map
Text around map says Rawanda, highlight isn’t. 2601:281:D57F:950:E5EB:A6C9:CA9D:472F (talk) 04:10, 4 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Which map? The 2015 map has Rwanda highlighted in green. I do agree, however, that the color scheme chosen is very misleading, as it overemphasizes the minor producers over those with ~50% share. –LaundryPizza03 ( d c̄ ) 23:22, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:Tantalum


text:
Icy moon

Icy moons are a class of natural satellites with surfaces composed mostly of ice. An icy moon may harbor an ocean underneath the surface, and possibly include a rocky core of silicate or metallic rocks. It is thought that they may be composed of ice II or other polymorph of water ice. The prime example of this class of object is Europa.

Icy moons warmed by tides may be the most common type of object to have liquid water, and thus the type of object to possibly have water-based life.

Some icy moons exhibit cryovolcanism, as well as geysers. The best studied example is Saturn's Enceladus.

Orbits
Most known large icy moons belong to giant planets, whose orbits lie beyond the Solar System's frost line; the remainder (such as Charon and Dysnomia) formed around dwarf planets such as Pluto and, typically in large impacts not unlike the impact thought to have formed Earth's moon. In the case of icy gas giant satellites, an additional requirement is that a moon did not form in the inner region of a proto-satellite disk, which is too warm for ices to condense.

Europa is thought to contain 8% ice and water by mass with the remainder rock. Jupiter's outer two Galilean moons Ganymede and Callisto contain more ice since they formed further from the hot proto-Jupiter.

Saturn's moon Titan looks and behaves more like Earth than any other body in the Solar System. Titan is known to have stable pools of liquid methane on the surface.

title: Icy moon


text:
Talk:Mutt

I put the dog definition back at the top. Sorry mav, but this is the more common meaning to non-computer people. Wikipedia readers are probably mostly computer geeks like us but maybe this will change someday ;-) Merphant

 * No biggie. --mav

mutt as in "of mixed descent"
Why is the term "mutt" (A person of mixed racial descent) not in Wikipedia, as it is in urban dictionary? "Slang" doesn't belong here? I think the labelling as "derogatory" depends on the viewpoint and is PC. --Philipp Grunwald (talk) 15:53, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Bolding for Acronyms
Pace, I think using bolding is the quickest, neatest way to indicate the source of an acronym. Anmccaff (talk) 00:37, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

 * Personal preference aside, it's not supported by WP:MOSDAB or any other section of WP:MOS that I'm aware of. older ≠ wiser 00:44, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

 * Certainly supported by precedent. From Acronym:

 * Pronounced as a word, containing only initial letters
 * NATO: North Atlantic Treaty Organization
 * Scuba: self-contained underwater breathing apparatus
 * Laser: light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation
 * GIF: Graphics Interchange Format
 * Pronounced as a word, containing non-initial letters
 * Amphetamine: alpha-methylphenethylamine
 * Gestapo: Geheime Staatspolizei ('secret state police')
 * Interpol: International Criminal Police Organization
 * Nabisco: National Biscuit Company
 * Pronounced as a string of letters, containing non-initial letters
 * PMN: polymorphonuclear leukocytes
 * OCA: oculocutaneous albinism
 * PCM: paracoccidioidomycosis
 * Pronounced as a word, containing a mixture of initial and non-initial letters
 * AIDS: acquired immunodeficiency syndrome
 * Necco: New England Confectionery Company
 * Radar: radio detection and ranging

 * There are numerous other examples, by the look of it. Anmccaff (talk) 01:33, 22 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Those are examples of acronyms in the MOS, not guidance on how to present the derivation of the term using bolding. Very few of the articles use such bolding. In this case, the initialism is self-evident and requires no emphasis. older ≠ wiser 01:38, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 25 June 2022

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Comic moved, but no consensus for the disambiguation page. There is clear consensus favouring a move for the comic strip, so it should be moved ASAP. But there is no enthusiasm for treating the dog type as primary. A second RM to focus on just the disambiguation page can be done later. (closed by non-admin page mover) — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 03:34, 2 July 2022 (UTC)

– It can be argued that the primary topic of both "mutt" and "mutts" is mongrel, the type of dog. The comic strip in particular is directly based on the type of dog. They should be WP:PRIMARYREDIRECTs to that article. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 00:26, 25 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Mutt → Mutt (disambiguation)
 * Mutts → Mutts (comic strip)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Neutral on 1st move, but Support (alternate) 2nd move — i.e. the comic strip's article should be moved to "Mutts (comic strip)", then the plural "Mutts" should redirect to the disambiguation page. Paintspot Infez (talk) 19:40, 26 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Weak oppose 1st, support 2nd, I'm not sure there is a primary topic for this term but the comic strip clearly isn't primary so per Paintspot I'd have no primary topic. While Google suggests the dog may be primary the race meaning and other meaning come up as much.  Crouch, Swale  ( talk ) 10:04, 1 July 2022 (UTC)
 * Neutral on 1st, support 2nd. Basically identical reasoning as above. Skynxnex 17:51, 1 July 2022 signing after the fact Skynxnex (talk) 02:01, 2 July 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:Mutt