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Charles Renouvier

Charles Bernard Renouvier (1 January 1815 – 1 September 1903) was a French philosopher. He considered himself a "Swedenborg of history" who sought to update the philosophy of Kantian liberalism and individualism for the socio-economic realities of the late nineteenth century, and influenced the sociological method of Émile Durkheim.

Biography
Renouvier was born in Montpellier and educated in Paris at the École Polytechnique. He took an early interest in politics, but never held public office, spending his time writing, away from public scrutiny.

Philosophy
Renouvier was the first French philosopher after Nicolas Malebranche to formulate a complete idealistic system, and had a vast influence on the development of French thought. His system is based on Immanuel Kant's, as his chosen term "néo-criticisme" indicates; but it is a transformation rather than a continuation of Kantianism.

The two leading ideas are the dislike of the "unknowable" in all its forms, and a reliance on the validity of personal experience. The former accounts for Renouvier's acceptance of Kant's phenomenalism, combined with rejection of the thing-in-itself. It accounts, too, for his polemic on the one hand against a Substantial Soul, a Buddhistic Absolute, an Infinite Spiritual Substance; on the other hand against the no less mysterious material or dynamic substratum by which naturalistic Monism explains the world. He maintains that nothing exists except presentations, which are not merely sensational, and have an objective aspect no less than a subjective. To explain the formal organization of our experience, Renouvier adopts a modified version of the Kantian categories.

The insistence on the validity of personal experience leads Renouvier to a yet more important divergence from Kant in his treatment of volition. Liberty, he says, in a much wider sense than Kant, is man's fundamental characteristic. Human freedom acts in the phenomenal, not in an imaginary noumenal sphere. Belief is not merely intellectual, but is determined by an act of will affirming what we hold to be morally good.

In his religious views, Renouvier makes a considerable approximation to Gottfried Leibniz. He holds that we are rationally justified in affirming human immortality and the existence of a finite God who is to be a constitutional ruler, but not a despot, over the souls of people. He nevertheless regards atheism as preferable to a belief in an infinite Deity.

Renouvier's dislike of the unknowable also led him to take up arms against the notion of an actual infinite. He believed that an infinite sum must be a name for something incomplete. If one begins to count, "one, two, three ..." there never comes a time when one is entitled to shout "infinity"! Infinity is a project, never a fact, in the neocritical view.

Renouvier became an important influence upon the thought of American psychologist and philosopher William James. James wrote that "but for the decisive impression made on me in the 1870s by his masterly advocacy of pluralism, I might never have got free from the monistic superstition under which I had grown up."

Works

 * Essais de critique générale (1854–64)
 * Science de la morale (1869)
 * Uchronie (1876)
 * Comment je suis arrivé à cette conclusion (1885)
 * Esquisse d'une classification systématique des doctrines philosophiques (1885–86)
 * Philosophie analytique de l'histoire (1896–97)
 * La Nouvelle Monadologie (1899)
 * Histoire et solution des problèmes métaphysiques (1901)
 * Victor Hugo: Le Poète (1893)
 * Victor Hugo: Le Philosophe (1900)
 * Les Dilemmes de la métaphysique pure (1901)
 * Le Personnalisme (1903)
 * Critique de la doctrine de Kant (1906)

title: Charles Renouvier


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LNER Class A4

The LNER Class A4 is a class of streamlined 4-6-2 steam locomotive designed by Nigel Gresley for the London and North Eastern Railway in 1935. Their streamlined design gave them high-speed capability as well as making them instantly recognisable, and one of the class, 4468 Mallard, holds the record as the world's fastest steam locomotive. Thirty-five of the class were built to haul express passenger trains on the East Coast Main Line route from London Kings Cross via York to Newcastle, and later via Newcastle to Edinburgh, Scotland. They remained in service on the East Coast Main Line until the early 1960s when they were replaced by Deltic diesel locomotives; they themselves proving to be worthy successors to the A4s. Several A4s saw out their remaining days until 1966 in Scotland, particularly on the Aberdeen – Glasgow express trains, for which they were used to improve the timing from 3.5 to 3 hours.

Overview
Gresley introduced the Class A4 locomotives in 1935 to haul streamlined Silver Jubilee trains between London King's Cross and Newcastle. The service was named in celebration of the 25th year of King George V's reign.

During a visit to Germany in 1933, Gresley had been inspired by high-speed streamlined Flying Hamburger diesel trains. The London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) had considered purchasing similar trains for use from London to Newcastle but the diesel units of the time did not have sufficient passenger carrying capacity and the capital investment in the new technology was prohibitive.

Gresley was sure that steam could do equally well with a decent fare-paying load behind the locomotive. Following trials in 1935 in which one of his A3 Pacifics, No. 2750 Papyrus, recorded a new maximum of 108 mph and completed the journey in under four hours, the LNER's Chief General Manager Ralph Wedgwood authorised Gresley to produce a streamlined development of the A3. Initially four locomotives were built, all with the word 'silver' in their names. The first was 2509 Silver Link, followed by 2510 Quicksilver, 2511 Silver King and 2512 Silver Fox. During a press run to publicise the service, Silver Link twice achieved a speed of 112.5 mph, breaking the British speed record and sustained an average of 100 mph, over a distance of 43 miles.

Following the commercial success of the Silver Jubilee train, other streamlined services were introduced: The Coronation (London-Edinburgh, July 1937) and the West Riding Limited (Bradford & Leeds-London & return, November 1937) for which more A4s were built.

Design
The A4 Pacifics were designed for high-speed passenger services. The application of internal streamlining to the steam circuit, higher boiler pressure and the extension of the firebox to form a combustion chamber all contributed to a more efficient locomotive than the A3; consumption of coal and water were reduced. A further design improvement was fitting a Kylchap double-chimney, first on 4468 Mallard in March 1938. The double-chimney improved the capability of the locomotives further, and the last three locomotives of the class (4901 Capercaillie, 4902 Seagull and 4903 Peregrine) were fitted with the Kylchap exhaust from new and the rest of the class acquired it in the late 1950s. The class was noted for its streamlined design, which not only improved its aerodynamics, increasing its speed capabilities, but also created an updraught to lift smoke away from the driver's line of vision, a problem inherent in many steam locomotives particularly those operated with short cut off valve events; fitting smoke deflectors was an alternative solution. The distinctive design made it a particularly attractive subject for artists, photographers and film-makers. The A4 Class locomotives were known by trainspotters as "streaks".

The streamlining side skirts (valances) designed by Oliver Bulleid to aerofoil shape that were fitted to all the A4 locomotives, were removed during the Second World War to improve access to the valve gear for maintenance and were not replaced. This apart, the A4 was one of few streamlined steam locomotive designs in the world to retain its casing throughout its existence. Many similar designs, including the contemporary Coronation Class, had their streamlining removed or cancelled to cut costs, simplify maintenance and increase driver visibility.

World record
On 3 July 1938, 4468 Mallard - the first of the class to enter service with the Kylchap exhaust - pulling six coaches and a dynamometer car, set a world speed record (indicated by the dynamometer) of 126 mph. Gresley never accepted it as the record-breaking maximum. He claimed this speed could only have been attained over a few yards, though he was comfortable that the German speed record of 124.5 mph had been surpassed. Close analysis of the dynamometer roll (currently at the NRM) of the record run confirms that Mallard's speed did in fact exceed that of the German BR 05 002. The Mallard record reached its maximum speed on a downhill run and failed technically in due course, whereas 05 002's journey was on level grade and the engine did not yet seem to be at its limit. On the other hand, the German train was four coaches long (197 tons), but Mallard's train had seven coaches (240 tons). One fact, often ignored when considering rival claims, is that Gresley and the LNER had just one serious attempt at the record, which was far from a perfect run with a 15 mph permanent way check just north of Grantham; despite this a record was set. Gresley planned another attempt in September 1939, but was prevented by the outbreak of World War II. Prior to the record run on 3 July 1938, it was calculated that 130 mi/h was possible; Driver Duddington and LNER Inspector Sid Jenkins both said they might well have achieved this figure had they not had to slow for the Essendine junctions.

At the end of Mallard's record run, the middle big end (part of the motion for the inside cylinder) ran hot (indicated by the bursting of a heat-sensitive "stink bomb" placed in the bearing for warning purposes), the bearing metal had melted and the locomotive had to stop at Peterborough rather than continue to London. Deficiencies in the alignment of the Gresley-Holcroft derived motion meant that the inside cylinder of the A4 did more work at high speed than the two outside cylinders – on at least one occasion this led to the middle big end wearing to such an extent that the increased piston travel knocked the ends off the middle cylinder – and this overloading was mostly responsible for the failure.

Performance in service
No other British steam locomotives have a longer or more consistent record of high speed running than the A4s. Instances of 100 mph running by them must exceed those of all other types combined, though 90 mph running was a relatively rare event with steam traction, much less 100 mph. It should also be remembered that A4s operated on the East Coast Main Line which has more opportunities for high speed running (particularly Stoke Bank) than any other in the UK. In August 1936 the Silver Jubilee train on the descent of Stoke Bank headed by 2512 Silver Fox driven by George Henry Haygreen achieved a maximum of 113 mph, then the highest speed attained in Britain with an ordinary passenger train. The fastest recorded post-war speed with British steam was also recorded by an A4. This occurred on 23 May 1959 on the Stephenson Locomotive Society Golden Jubilee special when 60007 Sir Nigel Gresley achieved 112 mph when hauling 400 tons down Stoke Bank. The driver, Bill Hoole, had hoped for an attempt to beat Mallard's record but Alan Pegler, who was on the footplate and mindful of the risks, told him to ease off.

Although A4s were primarily designed for high speed express work they were also capable of high power outputs. In 1940, 4901 Capercaillie exerted 2,200 drawbar horsepower on the straight and level track north of York when hauling 21 coaches (730 tons gross) at an average of 75.9 mph for 25 miles. On W.A. Tuplin's method for grading steam locomotive performance based on both power output and duration of effort, this was the highest value ever achieved by any British locomotive, at Grade 26.

The highest recorded power output from an A4 was 2,450 drawbar horsepower when Mallard herself was hauling 11 coaches (390 tons tare, 415 tons gross) up Stoke Bank at a sustained 80 mph in 1963. O.S. Nock thought this performance superior to Mallard's world record run in 1938. An A4 with the same load on a "good run" would be doing about 50 to 60 mph at the summit of Stoke Bank. On a run on 8 September 1961 Mallard had its train travelling at 78 mph.

Post-war history
Although newer Pacifics had been introduced since the war and the streamlined locomotives were never reinstated, the A4s continued on top link duties, notably on the London to Edinburgh services.

Even after the war was over, the A4s still continued to perform non-stop services. In August 1948, 60028 Walter K. Whigham managed to perform a non-stop service run from King's Cross to Edinburgh, setting the record for distance travelled for 408.65 miles. It would hold this record until 4472 Flying Scotsman's visit to Australia in 1988.

Improved methods of aligning the Gresley conjugated valve gear in the 1950s led to tighter tolerances for the bearings used within it and, consequently, to almost total eradication of the overloading of the middle cylinder. History repeated itself with the inside big end being replaced by one of the Great Western type, after which there was no more trouble, provided that maintenance routines were respected.

The wholesale application of double Kylchap chimneys to the entire class was entirely due to the persistence of P. N. Townend, the Assistant Motive Power Superintendent at King's Cross from 1956. He, at first, met with considerable resistance from higher authority. When permission was eventually given, it was found that the economy obtained over the single chimney A4s was from six to seven pounds of coal per mile, which more than justified the expense of the conversion.

These improvements led to greatly increased availability.

Locomotive data
The first four locomotives included the word 'silver' in their names because they were intended to haul the Silver Jubilee train. 2512 Silver Fox of this batch carried a stainless-steel fox near the centre of the streamline casing on each side, made by the Sheffield steelmakers Samuel Fox and Company. The next batch of A4s were named after birds, particularly those that were fast flyers, Gresley being a keen bird-watcher. Five (4488–92) were named after British Empire countries to haul the new Anglo-Scottish Coronation train; and two (4495/6), intended to haul the new West Riding Limited, received names connected to the wool trade: Golden Fleece and Golden Shuttle. 4498 was the hundredth Gresley Pacific to be built and was named after him. Subsequently, some other A4s were later renamed, usually to names of directors of the LNER.

Withdrawal
One locomotive was withdrawn and scrapped after being damaged beyond repair in a German bombing raid on York on 29 April 1942 during World War II; this was No. 4469 Sir Ralph Wedgwood, which at the time had been overhauled and was based at Gateshead. It was running local trains to run it in and was stabled in York North Shed (now the National Railway Museum) where it suffered a direct hit; however, its tender survived and was later coupled to a Thompson A2/1.

The next five withdrawals, in December 1962, were: 60003 Andrew K. McCosh, 60014 Silver Link, 60028 Walter K. Whigham, 60030 Golden Fleece and 60033 Seagull. The rest of the class was withdrawn between 1963 and 1966. The last six in service were: 60004 William Whitelaw, 60007 Sir Nigel Gresley, 60009 Union of South Africa, 60019 Bittern, 60024 Kingfisher and 60034 Lord Faringdon. 60019 and 60024 were the last to be withdrawn in September 1966.

Preservation
Six of the locomotives have been preserved; three of them were assigned to sheds in Scotland after the closure of King's Cross shed (34A) to steam in 1964. Four A4s are in the UK and have run on the BR main lines at some point during their preservation career. Another two (Dominion of Canada and Dwight D. Eisenhower) were donated to the Canada and the US, respectively, upon withdrawal by British Railways. Both North American-based A4s, along with the other three British-based A4s were moved to the National Railway Museum, York, in late 2012 on three-year loans as part of the NRM's 2013 celebrations of the 75th anniversary of Mallard breaking the world speed record for steam, bringing all six preserved A4s together. During 2013, 4464 'Bittern' underwent a series of high-speed runs, partly in commemoration of Mallards' record, partly to see if mainline speeds for certain heritage steam locomotives could be increased (The current maximum is 75 mph.). During the "Tyne Tees Streak" run, Bittern broke its own 91 mph speed record set just a few months prior by reaching a maximum speed of 93 mph (149.7 km/h).

From 2015 to 2020, Union of South Africa was the only A4 operational with a valid mainline certificate until it expired in 2020; 60007 was withdrawn for overhaul on 20 September 2015 and 4464 operated until the end of 2015 at the Watercress Line when it was withdrawn and placed on static display in 2018 Crewe. Union of South Africa was withdrawn in October 2021 due to boiler issues and with the coming expiration of its boiler certificate in early 2022. Sir Nigel Gresley returned to the mainline on 21 April 2022 and worked its inaugural railtour on 21 May 2022 following the completion of its major overhaul. As of 2023, 5 of 6 surviving A4's are on static display, the only working one being 60007 Sir Nigel Gresley. 60019 is planned to be moved from Margate to North Yorkshire for a mainline standard overhaul in 2024.

Loco numbers in bold mean their current number.

Models
The distinctive shape of the A4 has made it an obvious choice for model manufacturers, with examples being made in the majority of the popular scales, including a wooden example for the Brio wooden railway. One of the first two Hornby Dublo locomotive models produced, in 1938, was an A4. In 1999 a 'Super Detail' Hornby A4 was released, later complemented by a budget 'Railroad' model Hornby also produced an 'OO'-scale live steam version in September 2003, that used an electrically heated boiler to produce steam – not previously possible in such a small model. Trix produced an 'OO' scale model A4 from 1970; it was re-branded as a Liliput model in 1974 and survives to this day in modified form as a Bachmann model – Kader, Bachmann's parent company, had bought Liliput in 1993. Dapol currently produce several versions of the A4 class in N gauge and have also expanded their Black label range to include the A4 class as well.

Video links

 * 1935, Demonstration run of Silver Jubilee to Grantham
 * 1944, Retirement of driver Duddington

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

title: LNER Class A4


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Carl Bosch

Carl Bosch (27 August 1874 – 26 April 1940) was a German chemist and engineer and Nobel Laureate in Chemistry. He was a pioneer in the field of high-pressure industrial chemistry and founder of IG Farben, at one point the world's largest chemical company.

He also developed the Haber–Bosch process, important for the large-scale synthesis of fertilizers and explosives. It is estimated that one-third of annual global food production uses ammonia from the Haber–Bosch process, and that this supports nearly half of the world's population. In addition, he co-developed the so-called Bosch-Meiser process for the industrial production of urea.

Early years
Carl Bosch was born in Cologne to a successful gas and plumbing supplier. His father was Carl Friedrich Alexander Bosch (1843–1904) and his uncle was Robert Bosch, who pioneered the development of the spark plug and founded the multinational company Bosch. Carl, trying to decide between a career in metallurgy or chemistry, studied at the Königlich Technische Hochschule in Charlottenburg (now Technische Universität Berlin) and the University of Leipzig from 1892 to 1898.

Career
Carl Bosch attended the University of Leipzig, and this is where he studied under Johannes Wislicenus, and he obtained his doctorate in 1898 for research in organic chemistry. After he left in 1899 he took an entry-level job at BASF, then Germany's largest chemical and dye firm. From 1909 until 1913 he transformed Fritz Haber's tabletop demonstration of a method to fix nitrogen using high-pressure chemistry through the Haber–Bosch process to produce synthetic nitrate, a process that has countless industrial applications for making a near-infinite variety of industrial compounds, consumer goods, and commercial products. His primary contribution was to expand the scale of the process, enabling the industrial production of vast quantities of synthetic nitrate. To do this, he had to construct a plant and equipment that would function effectively under high gas pressures and high temperatures. Bosch was also responsible for finding a more practical catalyst than the scarce osmium and expensive uranium being used by Haber.

There were many more obstacles as well, such as designing large compressors and safe high-pressure furnaces. A means was needed to provide pure hydrogen gas in quantity as the feedstock. Also, cheap and safe means had to be developed to clean and process the product ammonia. The first full-scale Haber–Bosch plant was erected in Oppau, Germany, now part of Ludwigshafen. With the process complete he was able to synthesize large amounts of ammonia, which was available for the industrial and agricultural fields. In fact, this production has increased the agricultural yields throughout the world. This work won him the Nobel prize for Chemistry in 1931.

After World War I Bosch extended high-pressure techniques to the production of synthetic fuel via the Bergius process and methanol. In 1925 Bosch helped found IG Farben, and was the first head of the company. From 1935, Bosch was chairman of the board of directors.

He received the Siemens-Ring in 1924 for his contributions to applied research and his support of basic research. In 1931 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry together with Friedrich Bergius for the introduction of high pressure chemistry. Today the Haber–Bosch process produces 100 million tons of nitrogen fertilizer every year. After the Nazi seizure of power, Bosch was one of the industrialists selected for membership in Hans Frank's Academy for German Law in October 1933, where he served on the General Economic Council (Generalrat der Wirtschaft). In December 1933, Bosch received a contract to expand the production of synthetic oil, a development which was essential to Adolf Hitler's future war plans.

Personal life
Bosch married Else Schilbach in 1902. Carl and Else had a son and a daughter together. A critic of many Nazi policies, including anti-Semitism, Bosch was gradually relieved of his high positions, and fell into depression and alcoholism. He died in Heidelberg.

Legacy
The Haber–Bosch Process today consumes more than one percent of humanity's energy production and is responsible for feeding roughly one-third of its population. On average, one-half of the nitrogen in a human body comes from synthetically fixed sources, the product of a Haber–Bosch plant. Bosch was an ardent collector of insects, minerals, and gems. His collected meteorites and other mineral samples were loaned to Yale University, and eventually purchased by the Smithsonian. He was an amateur astronomer with a well-equipped private observatory. The asteroid 7414 Bosch was named in his honour.

Carl Bosch along with Fritz Haber were voted the world's most influential chemical engineers of all time by members of the Institution of Chemical Engineers.

The Haber–Bosch process, quite possibly the best-known chemical process in the world, which captures nitrogen from the air and converts it to ammonia, has its hand in the process of the Green Revolution that has been feeding the increasing population of the world.

Bosch also won numerous awards including an honorary doctorate from Technische Hochschule Karlsruhe (1918), the Liebig Memorial Medal of the Association of German Chemists along with the Bunsen Medal of the German Bunsen Society, the Siemens Ring, and the Golden Grashof Memorial medal of the VDI. In 1931 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for the contribution to the invention of chemical high pressure methods. He also received the Exner medal from the Austrian Trade Association and the Carl Lueg Memorial Medal. Bosch also enjoyed his membership of various German and foreign scientific academics, and his chairmanship of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society of which he became the President in 1937.

Awards and honours

 * 1931: Nobel Prize in Chemistry
 * 1919: Liebig Medal of German Chemists Association
 * 1924: Werner von Siemens Ring of Stiftung Werner-von-Siemens-Ring foundation
 * 1932: Wilhelm Exner Medal of Austrian Trade Association
 * Bunsen Medal of the German Bunsen Society
 * Golden Grashof Memorial medal of the VDI
 * Carl Lueg Memorial Medal

title: Carl Bosch


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Margaret of Denmark, Queen of Scotland

Margaret of Denmark (23 June 1456 – 14 July 1486) was Queen of Scotland from 1469 to 1486 by marriage to King James III. She was the daughter of Christian I, King of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, and Dorothea of Brandenburg.

Life
Margaret was born in Denmark to King Christian I and Queen Dorothea of Denmark, Norway and Sweden. Not much is known about her upbringing. By the time she was four years old there were talks about her marriage to the Scottish Prince James. In 1468 Margaret was betrothed to James of Scotland as a means to stop a feud regarding the debt Scotland owed Denmark over the taxation of the Hebrides and Isle of Man. The marriage was arranged on the recommendation of king Charles VII of France. In July 1469, at the age of 13 she married James III at Holyrood Abbey. Upon their marriage all of the Scottish debt was cancelled. William Sinclair, 1st Earl of Caithness, was at that time the Norse Earl of Orkney. In 1472 he was made to exchange his Orkney fief for Ravenscraig Castle, so the Scottish throne took the earl's rights to the islands too. Queen Margaret was given the largest jointure allowed by Scottish law in her marriage settlement – one third of the royal revenues, together with Linlithgow Palace and Doune Castle. She was interested in clothes and jewellery, and known for always being dressed in the latest fashions of the time. Following the birth of her son James, in 1473 she went on a pilgrimage to Whithorn and then rejoined the king at Falkland Palace. She may have taught her son James to speak Danish. She became a popular queen in Scotland and was described as beautiful, gentle, and sensible.

The relationship between Margaret and James III was not described as a happy one. Reportedly, she was not very fond of her husband and had sexual intercourse with him only for procreation, though she did respect his position as a monarch. One reason for their estrangement was that James favoured their second son over their eldest. In 1476, James had decided that he wanted the Earldom of Ross for his second son and accused John MacDonald, the Earl, of treason. Macdonald was then put on trial before the Parliament, but upon Margaret's request he was allowed to remain as Lord of Parliament. During the crisis of 1482, when James III was deprived of power by his brother for several months, Margaret was said to have shown more interest in the welfare of her children than her spouse, which led to a permanent estrangement. Politically, she worked for the reinstatement of her spouse in his powers as monarch during this incident. After the crisis of 1482, the couple lived apart: James III lived in Edinburgh, while queen Margaret preferred to live in Stirling with her children.

Death
Margaret died at Stirling Castle on 14 July 1486 after falling ill, and was buried in Cambuskenneth Abbey. Her husband, James III, was interred with her after his death in 1488. The abbey has mostly been reduced to ruins, apart from its bell-tower, which is still standing today. The grave was enclosed and restored in 1865 at the expense of their descendant, Queen Victoria.

A story told by her son claims that Margaret was killed by poison given to her by John Ramsay, 1st Lord Bothwell, leader of one of the political factions. As he was still favoured by the royal family after her death, this is doubtful and maybe slanderous, although he did know poisons.

Jewels and costume
Records of costume and fabric bought for Margaret of Denmark survive in the accounts of the Lord Treasurers of Scotland. Fabrics and fur were bought by her chamber and wardrobe servants, Andrew Balfour, Caldwell, and Sandris Wardrop (Sanders of the Wardrobe), from merchants and shopkeepers in Edinburgh including Isobel Williamson, Thomas Yare, and Sandy Turing. Shoes were made by Hud, described as a "souter". A skinner in Stirling made leather gloves. Garments made in 1473 and 1474 include gowns of blue velvet and red satin, cloaks, a kirtle of green damask, a riding gown, "stomaks" made of satin lined with ermine, "bonnets of tire", "turrets" (veils), tippets and collars of velvet trimmed with fur. Gowns were also bought for the six gentlewomen of her chamber.

An inventory of a chest or "kist" and a coffer called a "gardeviant" from Stirling Castle containing some of the jewels of Margaret of Denmark was made in 1488 following the battle of Sauchieburn. The contents included belts of cloth of gold and crimson fabric with gold fittings. There were rosaries and gold chains, a collar of chalcedony with a pendant including a container of musk perfume, a pearl "fret" (a hair net), a swan collar, a small bag with nine unset precious stones, and a bag of lavender. There was a serpent tongue (a fossilized shark's tooth thought to be a safeguard against poison) and a piece of a unicorn horn set in gold, probably used to assay food at meals. She also owned a ring set with a "paddock stone", a toadstone also valued as an antidote to poison. There was a book of gold leaf for gilding, and purple bed curtains and a counterpane embroidered with thistles and unicorns. She had a pendant fashioned as her initial "M" set in diamonds with a great pearl.

Issue

 * James IV (17 March 1473 – 9 September 1513)
 * James Stewart, Duke of Ross (March 1476 – January 1504)
 * John Stewart, Earl of Mar (December 1479 – 1503).

title: Margaret of Denmark, Queen of Scotland


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Late Night with Conan O'Brien

Late Night with Conan O'Brien is an American late-night talk show hosted by Conan O'Brien. NBC aired 2,725 episodes from September 13, 1993, to February 20, 2009. The show featured varied comedic material, celebrity interviews, and musical and comedy performances. Late Night aired weeknights at 12:37 am Eastern/11:37 pm Central and 12:37 am Mountain in the United States. From 1993 until 2000, Andy Richter served as O'Brien's sidekick; following his departure, O'Brien was the show's sole featured performer. The show's house musical act was The Max Weinberg 7 and led by E Street Band drummer Max Weinberg.

The second incarnation of NBC's Late Night franchise, O'Brien's program debuted in 1993 after David Letterman (who hosted the first incarnation of Late Night) moved to CBS to host Late Show opposite The Tonight Show. In 2004, as part of a deal to secure a new contract, NBC announced that O'Brien would leave Late Night in 2009 to succeed Jay Leno as the host of The Tonight Show. Jimmy Fallon began hosting his version of Late Night on March 2, 2009.

Replacing David Letterman
Upon Johnny Carson's retirement from The Tonight Show in 1992, executives at NBC announced that Carson's frequent guest-host Jay Leno would be Carson's replacement, not David Letterman. NBC later said that Letterman's high ratings for Late Night were the reason they kept him where he was. Letterman was bitterly disappointed and angry at not having been given The Tonight Show job; and, at Carson's advice, he left NBC after eleven years on Late Night. CBS signed Letterman to host his own show opposite The Tonight Show. Letterman moved his show to CBS virtually unchanged, taking most of the staff, skits, and comedy formats with him. However, NBC owned the rights to the Late Night name, forcing Letterman to rename his show Late Show with David Letterman.

NBC was not prepared to replace both Letterman and Late Night. Aside from the name, it needed to build a new show. Both Dana Carvey and Garry Shandling declined to host it. Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels was brought in to develop the new show, and comedians Jon Stewart, Drew Carey, and Paul Provenza auditioned to host. Michaels suggested to Conan O'Brien, an unknown writer for The Simpsons and former writer for Saturday Night Live, that he should audition for the job. Despite having "about 40 seconds" of television-performance experience as an occasional extra on Saturday Night Live sketches, O'Brien auditioned for the show on April 13, 1993. His guests were Jason Alexander and Mimi Rogers; the audition took place on the set of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. NBC offered the show to O'Brien on April 26, and O'Brien made his first meaningful television appearance later that day when Leno introduced him on Tonight. On the final episode of his 16-year run, O'Brien stated that he "owed his career to Lorne Michaels".

Debut
O'Brien's Late Night debuted on September 13, 1993, with Andy Richter chosen as O'Brien's sidekick. The premiere episode featured John Goodman, who received a "First Guest" medal for his appearance, Drew Barrymore, and Tony Randall with cameos from George Wendt and Bob Costas. The episode featured a cold open of O'Brien's walk to the studio with constant reminders that he was expected to live up to Letterman. Tom Brokaw makes a cameo, welcoming O'Brien to NBC but, doing as those on O'Brien's walk had done, warning him that he had "better be as good as Letterman, or else...", before menacingly crushing saltine crackers in front of O'Brien, appearing to be representative of the fate that awaited the new host if he failed to meet expectations. After seeming to be unaffected by the comments, O'Brien arrives at his dressing room and cheerfully prepares to hang himself. However, a warning that the show is about to start causes him to abandon his plans.

The show's first musical guest was English rock band Radiohead, who performed during the second episode. American singer-songwriter Jonathan Richman was the show's second musical guest.

O'Brien's inexperience was apparent, and the show was generally considered mediocre by critics in terms of hosting. The Chicago Sun-Times' Lon Grankhe called O'Brien "nervous, unprepared and generally geeky", and Tom Shales wrote "As for O'Brien, the young man is a living collage of annoying nervous habits. He giggles and titters, jiggles about and fiddles with his cuffs. He has dark, beady little eyes like a rabbit. He's one of the whitest white men ever." (O'Brien wrote for The New York Times a satirical review of the first episode the day it aired titled "O'Brien Flops!", in which he told readers "Frankly, I was not impressed". ) The originality and quality of the comedy, however, led by original head writer Robert Smigel, was widely praised. Although O'Brien benefited by comparison from the quick critical and commercial failure of the fellow new late-night The Chevy Chase Show, NBC only offered short-term contracts, 13 weeks at a time and once for six weeks, as widely reported by the press at the time. O'Brien was reportedly almost fired at least once in this period, but NBC had no one to replace him. According to Smigel, "We were basically canceled at Conan, and then they changed their minds in August of '94, gave us a reprieve."

In an unusual form of advertising, Conan O'Brien's credits in The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror IV episode, released on October 28, 1993, all reference his new role as host of Late Night. One credit says "Watch My Show" as his "middle" name. In all Simpsons Treehouse of Horror shows, the names on the credits include Halloween-associated middle name nicknames in quotation marks. 1993 was the last year O'Brien wrote for the Simpsons.

One NBC affiliate, KPRC-TV in Houston, dropped Late Night with Conan O'Brien in September 1994 due to low ratings and was replaced with first-run episodes of The Jenny Jones Show. KPRC reinstated O'Brien's Late Night in the fall of 1996, but scheduled it to air as late as 2:40 a.m. while the station, in addition to The Jenny Jones Show, had aired Extra, Access Hollywood, Ricki Lake, Montel Williams, Inside Edition and a rebroadcast of its 10:00 p.m. newscast between Leno and O'Brien. Houston became the subject of a skit (via classic remote piece) in which O'Brien made impromptu stops at Houston's central bus terminal and the Astrodome to watch an episode of his own show with Houstonians in 1997. KPRC began airing Late Night with Conan O'Brien directly following The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in 2004.

According to O'Brien, NBC network executive Warren Littlefield told him, with regard to Andy Richter, he'd "never succeed until I 'got rid of that big fat dildo.' That was the tone of the conversations between us and the network." It was widely expected that the host of Talk Soup, Greg Kinnear would take over the role, but Kinnear turned down the opportunity. (Kinnear would instead become host of Late Night's then-lead-out program, Later, in February 1994, remaining there for two years before deciding to pursue an acting career.) Stars like Tom Hanks agreed to appear on Late Night, which boosted audience awareness. Even Letterman, who admired O'Brien's comic sensibility, appeared as a guest to register his support. O'Brien's performance style improved through experience, and he began to receive more favorable reviews and ratings the following year. With the ratings gradually improving over the course of two years, Late Night reached a new level of critical and commercial success in 1996. Tom Shales officially recanted his previous critical review with the headline "I was wrong", and O'Brien received his first Emmy nomination for writing, which he received every year until 2011.

1996–2000
In 2000, Richter left Late Night on good terms, to pursue his acting career, a move that emotionally affected O'Brien, as evidenced by Richter's last show. The show's comedy bits and banter had usually depended on O'Brien's interaction with Richter. O'Brien's wacky non-sequitur comedy became more pronounced as he played all of his comedy and commentary directly to the audience and Max Weinberg instead of towards Richter.

2001–2009
In 2002, when time came to renew his contract, O'Brien had notable offers from other networks to defect; Fox was reported to have made particularly strong overtures, pitching him an 11:00 p.m. show. O'Brien decided to re-sign with NBC, however, joking that he initially wanted to make a 13-week deal (a nod to his first contract). He ultimately signed through 2005, indicating that it was symbolic of surpassing Letterman's run with 12 years of hosting.

In 2003, O'Brien's own production company, Conaco, was added as a producer of Late Night. The show celebrated its 10th anniversary, another milestone that O'Brien said he wanted to achieve with his 2002 contract. During the anniversary show, Mr. T handed O'Brien a chain with a large gold "7" on it. O'Brien: But Mr. T, we've been on the air for ten years! Mr. T: I know that, fool! But you only been funny for seven!

O'Brien's last season on Late Night attracted an average of 1.98 million viewers, compared to 1.92 million viewers for The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson.

Humor
The show was known for its wacky and absurd sophomoric comedic sensibility that is edgier than most other talk shows. Like his Late Night predecessor, David Letterman, the show's humor also had a streak of biting sarcasm and irony. According to Robert Smigel, who served as head writer in 1993, the show's comedic approach was to focus on being different from David Letterman:

"I set down a lot of rules, some of which were crazy, but ultimately it forced us to come up with a lot of original stuff. We had the added bonus of being Letterman's replacement."

Typically O'Brien would play the 'straight man' role to the general absurdity of the comedy, treating the material or wacky nature of the sketches with sincerity. The show had an unusual quantity of comedy and original content rather than other talk shows such as Late Show with David Letterman or The Tonight Show with Jay Leno that relied heavily on recurring segments and 'found' humor. The show was particularly unique in the lack of 'found' humor to derive content from i.e. most content being scripted as opposed to Letterman's Small Town News or Jay Leno's headlines that used this "found humor". O'Brien would often playfully chide his audience for an underwhelming or overly enthusiastic response to his jokes.

Particularly in the early years, comedic sketches overtook all segments on the show, occasionally even interrupting guest interviews and O'Brien's monologue. Frequently sketches would randomly begin without introduction, such as during banter between Richter and O'Brien. A lot of the humor had a fantasy-like quality to it, where inanimate objects would talk or silly characters would disrupt the show. Sometimes a short story would emerge in these sketches with a resolution culminating in a song.

One recurring technique is to superimpose lips onto an existing image, as in the Syncro-Vox limited animation technique, resulting in the speaker saying things often quite out of character.

Although Late Night used political humor, it did so far less frequently than competing shows did. During the 1996 and 2000 presidential election seasons, Late Night was found to be the least politically oriented late night program. It averaged 310 political jokes per election season, in contrast to the Leno-led Tonight Show with 1,275.

(See List of Late Night with Conan O'Brien sketches for an extensive list)

The Max Weinberg 7
The show's house band was The Max Weinberg 7, led by drummer Max Weinberg. The other six members were Mark Pender on trumpet, Richie "LaBamba" Rosenberg on trombone, Mike Merritt on bass, Jerry Vivino on saxophone and brother Jimmy Vivino on guitar, and Scott Healy on keyboards. Weinberg sometimes took extended leaves of absence to tour with Bruce Springsteen as the drummer for the E Street Band. During his absence, James Wormworth would typically fill in on drums, and the band was led by Vivino under the name Jimmy Vivino and the Max Weinberg 7.

With the departure of Andy Richter from Late Night in May 2000, Max Weinberg assumed a bigger role as an interlocutor for O'Brien's jokes. One common running gag was Max's awkwardness on camera and his apparent lack of chemistry with Conan. Weinberg was often used in sketches as well, which usually revolved around his purported sexual deviance (mostly a penchant for bedding barely legal groupies), although long-running sketches also spoofed Max's lack of knowledge of current affairs.

"LaBamba" was also used as the butt of many of Conan's jokes. These humorous sketches usually revolved around LaBamba's sizeable mustache, his poor acting skills, and his alleged inability to read written music. Mark Pender would often sing songs on the topic of a current event which ended with him screeching uncontrollably and climbing the risers into the audience. All members of the 7 have had successful side careers as studio musicians.

Theme song and other music
The show's opening theme was co-written by composer Howard Shore and John Lurie (of the band The Lounge Lizards). Lurie would later say that he was contracted by Shore to write the theme, and after he turned in the piece, Shore made minimal changes and claimed an unwarranted co-writing credit. Lurie also claimed to have been a finalist for Late Night's band leader position, but said producers told him, "Conan thinks you’re funnier than him and that scares him."

As is common in the talk show format, the Max Weinberg 7 performed the show's opening and closing themes, played bumpers into and out of commercial breaks (they actually played through the entire break for the studio audience), and a short piece during O'Brien's crossover to his desk after his monologue. The show's closing theme was called "Cornell Knowledge", and was lifted from Jerry and Jimmy Vivino's first album together. However, on Late Night, it was played at a much quicker tempo than the album version. The band also played a wide variety of songs as bumpers coming to and from commercial breaks and introducing guests—usually popular music from a variety of eras.

Joel Godard
Joel Godard, a long-time announcer for NBC shows, was the program's announcer and a frequent comedy contributor. On the show's final episode, Conan noted that Godard was originally hired to simply announce the show's intro and claimed "nobody thought you'd ever see him"; however, he was gradually worked into the show's comedy pieces. These bits usually revolved around Godard's supposed homosexual fetishes, deviant sexual habits, substance abuse, and suicidal tendencies. The humor came in part from Godard's delivery. No matter how depressing or deviant the topic being discussed was, he always did so in an exaggeratedly cheerful voice and with a huge smile plastered on his face. Several sketches ended with Godard apparently committing suicide in his announcer's booth. When Andy Richter left the show in 2000, Godard began to appear in sketches more frequently.

Writing staff
In the first few seasons of the show, the writing staff consisted of several now-prolific comics including Robert Smigel as the head writer, Bob Odenkirk, Louis C.K., Tommy Blacha and Dino Stamatopoulos. Smigel left his position as head writer of the show in 1995 to pen several movies but continued to appear on the show to do bits as Triumph the Insult Comic Dog and the 'Satellite Interviews'. Jonathan Groff took over his position until replaced by Mike Sweeney in 2001.

Members of the show's writing staff frequently appeared in sketches on the show. Among the most prolific were: Brian McCann (Preparation H Raymond, FedEx Pope, The Loser, Airsick Moth, Jerry Butters, Awesome Dave, Funhole Guy, Bulletproof Legs Guy, Adrian "Raisin" Foster, S&M Lincoln, etc.), Brian Stack (Hannigan the Traveling Salesman, Artie Kendall the Ghost Crooner, The Interrupter, Kilty McBagpipes, Fan-tastic Guy, Clive Clemmons, Frankenstein, Ira, Slipnut Brian, etc.), Jon Glaser (Segue Sam, Pubes, Awareness Del, Wrist Hulk, Ahole Ronald, Gorton's Fisherman, Jeremy, Slipnut Jon, etc.), Kevin Dorff (Coked-up Werewolf, Jesus Christ, Mansy the half-man/half-pansy, Joe's Bartender, Todd the Tiny Guy, etc.), and Andy Blitz (Awful Ballgame Chanter, Vin Diesel's brother Leonard Diesel, Slipnut Andy, Chuck Aloo aka the star of the 24 spin-off series 60). Blitz went so far as to travel to India for one bit in which he carried his computer through the streets of India to get technical support firsthand from the telephone representative at NBC's technical help center.

Several writing staff interns have gone on to become noted actors or writers including Vanessa Bayer, John Krasinski, Mindy Kaling, Ellie Kemper and Jack McBrayer.

Sketch actors and cameo appearances
Late Night employed a number of sketch actors, many of whom were frequently reused in different roles in different episodes. Several years before joining the cast of Saturday Night Live, and before playing the role of Leslie Knope on another NBC TV show, Parks and Recreation, Amy Poehler often appeared as a regular in many sketches, though she was best remembered for playing the recurring role of Andy Richter's Conan-obsessed teenage sister, Stacy. Other notable comedians such as Jack McBrayer, Rob Riggle, Rob Corddry, H. Jon Benjamin, Ellie Kemper, Bobby Moynihan, Matt Besser, Ian Roberts, Matt Walsh and Andrew Daly also frequently appeared as sketch actors on the show for several years. Triumph the Insult Comic Dog (created and voiced by original head writer Robert Smigel) began as part of a sketch on Late Night. Celebrities such as Dr. Joyce Brothers, Nipsey Russell, Abe Vigoda, James Lipton, Bob Saget and William Preston as the character Carl 'Oldy' Olsen also made frequent cameo appearances in comedy sketches on the show at different periods. One of the show's graphic designers, Pierre Bernard, was featured in several sketches, such as "Pierre Bernard's Recliner of Rage" and "Nerding It Up For Pierre".

Celebrity guests of the night would also occasionally appear in sketches either during their interviews or during the earlier comedy segments, e.g. in "In the year 2000" (which always included the participation of a celebrity guest after Andy Richter left the show) or a sketch where Conan would pretend to write in his diary while an attractive female guest was there. Quite rare for a talk show, sometimes interviews began normally but turned into sketches with both the guest and Conan participating, usually when the guest was a "friend of the show."

Costumed characters
Unusual for a late night talk show, Late Night made frequent use of various costumed characters such as The Masturbating Bear, Robot on a Toilet, and Pimpbot 5000. The humor in these sketches often derived from the crude construction of the characters' costumes as well as the absurdist nature of their conceptions. For example, Pimpbot 5000 was a 1950s-style robot who dressed and acted in the manner of an exaggerated blaxploitation pimp, while The Masturbating Bear was a man in a bear costume wearing an oversized diaper who would invariably begin to fondle himself to the tune of Aram Khachaturian's "Sabre Dance" when brought on stage. Many of these characters did little more in their appearances than walk across the stage or be wheeled out from behind the curtain, but some had extensive sketches on the show.

Appearances in other shows
The show made a cameo appearance in the Sesame Street special Elmopalooza, where Conan was interviewing two aliens while Big Bird was passing by them carrying a video tape.

The show also made an appearance on The Simpsons in the episode "Bart Gets Famous", where Conan interviews a now famous Bart.

Production
Late Night was a production of Lorne Michaels's Broadway Video (and, since 2003, O'Brien's Conaco). It was taped in Studio 6A in the GE Building at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York City. Next to the door were framed pictures of Letterman, Carson, Jack Paar and Steve Allen, each of whose groundbreaking late-night shows originated from studio 6A or 6B (where The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon is currently taped). The studio holds just over 200 audience members. It was taped at about 5:30 pm as an uninterrupted hour-long program, with the band playing music through the portions that would be filled by commercials. Generally, shows were taped at 5:30 pm Monday through Friday, although for much of the show's run, reruns would be aired on Mondays and the show would not tape that day.

The show's format consisted of an opening monologue from O'Brien, followed by various "desk bits". These generally included several brief sketches, recurring segments, or some other form of comedy. Typically O'Brien would play the 'straight man' role to the general absurdity of the comedy, treating the material or wacky nature of the sketches with sincerity. In the show's second and fourth segments, O'Brien interviewed two celebrity guests, between which, in the third segment, O'Brien listed the next night's/week's guests. There was often a comedy bit as well during this segment. The show's fifth segment was usually reserved for a musical or stand-up comedy performance, or occasionally another guest interview. The show's final segment was usually a quick "goodnight" and the closing credits, which sometimes featured part of a bit from earlier in the show. Quite rare for a talkshow, frequently comedy segments would also spill into the interviews, typically when a guest was a 'friend' of the show.

During the live tapings, and prior to the show, there was an audience warm-up, during which the audience watched a montage of highlights from the show, and staff writer Brian McCann greeted the audience (this task was formerly undertaken by head writer Mike Sweeney). McCann delivered a few jokes, told the audience what to expect, and finally introduced the band and then O'Brien. O'Brien then thanked the audience for coming, meeting as many audience members as he could. He would often then do a musical number with the band to pump up the audience ("Burning Love" was one standard). After the show was finished taping, O'Brien sang the "End of the Show Song", which never aired on Late Night, although in February 2009, a short video of it was posted on Late Night Underground. The End of the Show Song finally did reach air on January 21, 2010, his penultimate show as Tonight Show host. It also was aired on the March 29, 2012 episode of Conan. The tradition of singing The End of the Show Song has continued, un-aired as usual, on Conan.

Broadcast
Late Night began broadcasting in 1080i ATSC on April 26, 2005, with a downscaled letterboxed NTSC simulcast (unlike The Tonight Show, whose NTSC simulcast is fullscreen). O'Brien celebrated the conversion to the widescreen HDTV format with jokes throughout the week.

On December 6, 2005 Late Night with Conan O'Brien segments began selling on the iTunes Store. Most segments were priced at $1.99, as were most episodes of other shows, with "special" best-ofs and other longer segments priced at $9.99. In December, 2007 NBC stopped selling all its television shows on iTunes, but the network returned it to iTunes in September 2008 after NBC and Apple worked out a new agreement. The show was offered free at Hulu.com and the NBC website but has been unavailable on the Internet since the 2010 Tonight Show conflict. However, in May 2018, O'Brien and TBS, announced they would partner with NBC to make his entire Late Night archives available online, marking the 25th anniversary of O'Brien's late night debut.

Set design
O'Brien's Late Night had three long-term permanent sets, but retained the basic structure used when Letterman occupied Studio 6A: the performance space at the viewer's left, and the desk area, to the viewer's right, where interviews were done. O'Brien did his monologue in the performance area, emerging at the start of each episode from the area where musical guests perform. The Max Weinberg 7 were in the corner made by the stage-right wall and the wall in front of the audience. The desk area had a desk for O'Brien, a chair and couch(es) to the viewer's left for guests (and originally Andy Richter), and a coffee table.

Primarily, set changes involved the background behind the desk and chair and couch. The original set, used from the show's debut in 1993 until August 6, 1996, was primarily yellow, and the desk background resembled the living room of a New York City apartment, with windows that looked out at a Manhattan backdrop; it was modeled after Lorne Michaels' office. For years afterwards, O'Brien mocked this original set, particularly its "mustard color". The two subsequent set designs featured darker blues and violets to emulate the feel of nighttime, with the final set featuring a balcony railing in front of a backdrop with the view from the top of Rockefeller Center. This set debuted on September 4, 2001, and necessitated changes almost instantly as its backdrop view of New York City contained the World Trade Center, which was destroyed a week later. A special curtain was used to obstruct the towers until October, when the curtain became a permanent part of the set design even after the backdrop was altered. During his final week of episodes, Conan took an axe to parts of the set, giving it out to audience members as souvenirs, not wanting to allow it to simply be thrown away.

Remote pieces and episodes shot on location
Remote pieces shot on location were a recurring staple on Late Night, but occasionally, entire episodes were shot on location, usually during sweeps months. The first vacation for the show was a week-long stint of shows in Los Angeles the week of November 9–12, 1999. This was the only location week for the show while Andy Richter was with the show, and the only time the show's theme was altered for the week, with a more surf-style version of the show's normal theme (though the Toronto shows ended the normal theme with a piece of "O Canada"). The show was broadcast from NBC's L.A. studios (NBC Studios Burbank) and an L.A.-themed set was built, very similar in layout to the New York set.

From February 10–13, 2004, Late Night broadcast from the Elgin Theatre in Toronto, Canada. The guests for these episodes were all Canadians (with the exception of Adam Sandler), and included such stars as Jim Carrey and Mike Myers. As the show was taped at a theater, unlike the trip to L.A., the set built was not like the show's standard set.

From May 9–12, 2006, the show made a similar venture to the Chicago Theatre in Chicago, Illinois, taking cues from their previous trip to Toronto. Between April 30 – May 4, 2007, the show originated from the Orpheum Theatre in San Francisco.

In a sketch called "Conan O'Brien Hates My Homeland", Conan mocked every nation in the world to see which ones he gets letters from. An announcer on the Finnish entertainment channel SubTV, which airs the show a couple of days after it is aired in the US, asked people to defend Finland before Conan got to insult it, and the viewers in Finland began sending mail before the bit had even gotten to the letter F. Conan responded by assuming the Finnish "just couldn't wait" to be insulted and officially insulted Finland in the segment. An overwhelming number of postcards were supposedly received, which apparently "forced" Conan to give Finland a formal apology. Conan then went as far as to have the flag of Finland shown in the background during a speech and slandered the Finns' "hated" neighbor Sweden with a sign saying "Sweden Sucks!" printed over the flag of Sweden. It would seem that this chain of events led to elevated ratings in Finland and subsequently also sparked a special relationship with the viewers in Finland. Later when Conan was talking to audience members before the show, a group of fans visiting from Finland commented that he resembled their female president Tarja Halonen. Conan mentioned the resemblance on his show, even showing pictures of Halonen next to himself. When he discovered that Halonen was up for reelection he began making satirical commercials in support of Halonen and vowed to travel to Finland to meet her if she won re-election. When she did indeed win re-election in January 2006, Conan traveled to Finland and met with her. One episode, broadcast on March 10, 2006, was compiled mainly of footage from O'Brien's trip to Finland. In the episode, Conan greeted fans at the airport, participated in a Sami cultural ceremony, appeared on a Finnish talk show, and attempted to visit a fan who had written to him. The episode was not strictly taped as a live episode there, however, but was prefaced by an introduction by O'Brien taped in New York. The Finland episode came as the culmination of a long-running joke on the show.

Aside from location shows, the show also did special one-shots in its early years. In 1995, one episode of the show was taped aboard a New York City ferry in New York Harbor. Dubbed "The Show on a Boat" by the showtunes-style song-and-dance number performed by a trio of "sailors" at the start of the show, O'Brien, Richter, the band and guests were all crammed onto the deck of the ferry. The show was taped at its normal afternoon time, while it was still light out.

Technical and production difficulties
A more unexpected shoot occurred on October 10, 1996, when a five-alarm fire in Rockefeller Plaza rendered the 6A studios out of commission for the remainder of that week. The fire occurred on early Thursday morning, which left O'Brien's staff precious little time to assemble a show elsewhere. Pressed for time as 12:35 approached, O'Brien taped the show outside, after dark, despite the cold weather, on a makeshift set with the Prometheus statue and 30 Rock serving as a backdrop. Furthering the unfortunate nature of the evening's circumstances was the final guest, Julie Scardina, who brought along wild animals, including birds that Conan explained had to be kept tied up, as they could not be freed outside. Earlier in the show, O'Brien and Richter walked into Brookstone (located in the lobby of Rockefeller Center), camera crew in tow, and bought a massaging leather recliner for the first guest, Samuel L. Jackson. The second of the two "fire shows", on Friday night, was taped in the Today Show studio, which was not affected by the fire, though the East L.A. rock band Los Lobos performed in the blustery wind a song from their newest album Colossal Head.

During the Northeast Blackout of 2003, O'Brien and the staff taped a short 10-minute introduction explaining that the episode they had planned would not be taking place due to the blackout. Studio 6A was powered by a generator and lit by battery-powered floodlights. A standby show was aired in-progress after the intro. One of the scheduled guests that night, The Dandy Warhols, commandeered the studio's green room, where they stayed until they performed on the show the next night.

Gimmick episodes
Other shows that were taped in the regular 6A studio were augmented by special gimmicks:

A lot of high-concept gimmick episodes were done in the early years of the show, such as a 1995 show done entirely on a boat of the circle line or "Time Travel Week", four episodes from early 1996, where Conan and Andy (and the rest of the crew) "time-traveled" to a different point in time each night. Times and locations included The Civil War, Ancient Greece, The future, and The early '80s (featuring a cameo by David Letterman in the cold open, who occupied Conan's studio in 1983, cruelly brushing off Conan and Andy's attempt at explaining their presence in Letterman's dressing room by saying, "Why don't you two fellas go find a nice, warm place to screw yourselves? Security!").

In 1997, a special episode was taped in which the studio audience was composed solely of grade-school age children, primarily 5–10 years of age. Conan interacted with the children, encouraging them to laugh and cheer to keep away the boredom monster.

The October 18, 2002 episode was re-shot entirely in clay animation nearly seven months after its first airing, including the opening credits and commercial bumpers. The episode's originally broadcast soundtrack was retained while the visuals were reproduced to mirror the original footage in a small-scale reproduction of the studio 6A.

On October 31, 2006, a similarly conceptualized Halloween episode was created from an episode which originally aired in May and featured Larry King, among other guests. Using a process the show called "Skelevision", all the visuals were re-shot with a Halloween motif, with human skeletons adorned with the clothing and accessories of the humans. This re-shoot was shot using the actual studio, and the puppeteers moved the skeletons with wires and cables while being visually obscured by green screen technology. Once again, the opening and bumpers were altered, this time including a model of a hearse winding through a foggy landscape and cemetery, and the voice of Bill Hader as Vincent Price in place of Joel Godard.

U2 exclusive
The October 5, 2005 episode of Late Night was devoted entirely to the band U2, marking the first time in the show's then 13-year run that it had devoted an entire show to a single guest. Jim Pitt, the talent executive in charge of booking acts for the show, remarked that in his 12 years of working for Late Night, U2 and Johnny Cash were the "dream artists" he'd tried, but never succeeded in getting. The band performed three songs, two more than the customary one song, then had a lengthy interview with Conan.

Episodes during the 2007–2008 writer's strike
After two months of being off-air, the first show to air during the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike on January 2, 2008, featured a small musical segment at the beginning of the show detailing O'Brien's newly grown beard in a show of support for the striking writers. At the beginning of the January 28 episode, it was revealed that Conan had shaved his beard, which was followed with a similar musical segment.

Several times during the episodes produced during the writer's strike, O'Brien would kill time by spinning his wedding ring on his desk, which he previously only did during rehearsals. His personal best was 41 seconds, achieved during an un-aired rehearsal. After several unsuccessful on-air attempts to break his record, during the show originally broadcast on February 9, 2008, O'Brien broke his record for endurance ring spinning, setting a time of 51 seconds by coating his wedding ring with Vaseline and spinning it on a Teflon surface. The feat was accomplished with the help of MIT physics professor Peter Fisher. These episodes are considered by most fans to be the magnum opus of O'Brien's television career, considering the spontaneity of each episode. The strike also gave rise to associate producer Jordan Schlansky's repeated appearances on the show as an embellished version of himself.

"Feud" with Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert
Early on in the later half of the 2007–2008 Writer's Guild strike, Conan O'Brien accused his show of being the sole cause of presidential candidate Mike Huckabee's status in the polls, due to his use of the Walker, Texas Ranger Lever while Chuck Norris was coincidentally sponsoring Huckabee. Stephen Colbert made the claim that because of "the Colbert bump," he was responsible for Huckabee's current success in the 2008 presidential race. O'Brien claimed that he was responsible for Colbert's success because he had made mention of him on his show. In response, Jon Stewart, host of The Daily Show, claimed that he was responsible for the success of O'Brien, and in turn the success of Huckabee and Colbert. This resulted in a three-part comedic battle among the three hosts, with all three appearing on each other's shows. The feud ended on Late Night with an all-out mock brawl between the three talk-show hosts.

Anniversary episodes
In 1996, a third anniversary episode was taped, though it aired in the regular 12:35/11:35 late night time slot. The show was composed of clips of the best of the first three years, and featured cameos from many former guests, including Janeane Garofalo, Scott Thompson, Tony Randall and George Wendt. Typical of O'Brien's style of comedy, he introduced his first guest (Wendt) by listing his notable achievements in television (particularly Cheers) then introduced each subsequent guest by repeatedly listing Wendt's achievements (insinuating that all of his guests for that night's show played the role of Norm on Cheers). In 1998, Late Night aired a fifth anniversary special in prime time, mostly consisting of clips from the first five years. It was taped in the Saturday Night Live studio, also in the GE Building. The special was later sold on VHS tape. In 2003, a similar tenth anniversary special was taped in New York City's famed Beacon Theatre and later made available on DVD.

The final episode
Late Night with Conan O'Brien's last episode was recorded February 20, 2009, and aired shortly after midnight that next morning. The episode featured clips from past shows and a reflection on the show's sixteen-year-long run. John Mayer sent a farewell video message, singing a song about how Los Angeles is "going to eat [Conan] alive" (an ironic foretelling of things to come). In a short remote piece, Conan released regular contributor Abe Vigoda "into the wild," as he could not bring him to Los Angeles for the move to The Tonight Show. Will Ferrell made a surprise visit as George W. Bush, which quickly devolved into Ferrell tearing off his business suit to reveal an ill-fitting green leprechaun outfit that had been worn in a number of previous appearances on the show.

Former sidekick Andy Richter, who re-joined O'Brien when he took over The Tonight Show in June, joined O'Brien onstage for two segments, watching clips and reminiscing about the show. Among the clips shown, O'Brien noted that his all-time favorite Late Night piece was when he attended a re-enactment of an American Civil War-era baseball game, played at a Long Island, New York museum, Old Bethpage Village Restoration. During the course of the final week, O'Brien began violently dismantling and handing out pieces of the production set to the audience. In the final show, a large piece of the stage's frame was pulled down and chopped into pieces. O'Brien then promised to give each audience member in attendance a piece of the set.

One of Conan's favorite bands, The White Stripes, performed a new, slower arrangement of their song "We're Going to Be Friends" based on Conan's lullaby rendition of the song, with drummer Meg White playing second guitar and singing along with vocalist/guitarist Jack White. The performance proved to be the band's last before their breakup in February 2011. The song would be used many years later as the theme for O'Brien's podcast Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend. The program concluded with a visibly emotional O'Brien giving a farewell speech from behind his desk, thanking his fans, writers, producers, backstage crew, his family, the Max Weinberg 7, David Letterman, Joel Godard, Jay Leno, and Lorne Michaels, as well as a final assurance that he would not "grow up" as he moved to The Tonight Show.

About 3.4 million viewers watched O'Brien's final episode of Late Night, the largest audience since the January 24, 2005 episode that followed Jay Leno's tribute to Johnny Carson.

After the end of the series, Studio 6A at Rockefeller Center was remodeled for The Dr. Oz Show. In the summer of 2013, NBC moved Late Night with Jimmy Fallon to Studio 6A while 6B, which housed Late Night since Fallon succeeded O'Brien in 2009, was being renovated when Fallon took over The Tonight Show on February 17, 2014, while The Dr. Oz Show moved to ABC's Upper West Side studios.

International broadcasts
CNBC Europe used to air Late Night with Conan O'Brien on weeknights from 11:45 pm–12:30 am CET, with weekend editions on Saturdays and Sundays at 9:45 pm–10:30 pm CET. However, in March 2007, CNBC Europe decided to show only the weekend editions, and drop the weeknight editions, to make way for more business news programmes in their weeknight schedules.

On the week of August 4, 2008, however, CNBC Europe has discontinued showing the NBC Nightly News, which for many years was shown live from America in a 12:30 am–1:00 am CET slot. Late Night with Conan O'Brien has now replaced NBC Nightly News in the 12:30 am–1:00 am slot. The weeknight editions are a 30-minute condensed version of the show. The show follows the weeknight condensed version of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno which airs at 12:00 am CET.

In September 2008, CNBC Europe changed the weeknight schedules to include full uncut editions of Late Night with Conan O'Brien broadcast in the 11:45 am CET/10:45 pm GMT 45-minute time slot. This schedule usually runs from Tuesdays to Fridays. CNBC Europe decided to stop broadcasting Late Night as of January 1, 2009, a mere two months before Conan's last show as host. Instead of following The Tonight Show reruns on weekends, CNBC now broadcasts two Tonight Show episodes in a row.

title: Late Night with Conan O'Brien


text:
Nenets

The Nenets (ненэй ненэче; ненцы), also known as Samoyeds (deprecated term), are a Samoyedic ethnic group native to Arctic Russia, Russian Far North. According to the latest census in 2021, there were 49,646 Nenets in the Russian Federation, most of them living in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Nenets Autonomous Okrug and Taymyrsky Dolgano-Nenetsky District stretching along the coastline of the Arctic Ocean near the Arctic Circle between Kola and Taymyr peninsulas. The Nenets people speak either the Tundra or Forest Nenets languages. In the Russian Federation they have a status of Indigenous small-numbered peoples. Today, the Nenets people face numerous challenges from the state and oil and gas companies that threaten the environment and their way of life. As a result, many cite a rise in locally based activism.

Etymology
The literal morphs samo and yed in Russian convey the meaning "self-eater", which is considered derogatory. Therefore, the name Samoyed went out of usage in the 20th century. The people are known as the nenety/nenaj/nenaye, which means "human".

In Russian Empire, the term Samoyed was often applied indiscriminately to different peoples of Northern Russia who speak related Uralic languages: Nenets, Nganasans, Enets, Selkups (speakers of Samoyedic languages). Currently, the term "Samoyedic peoples" applies to the whole group of these different peoples.

Number and settlement
The names of two autonomous regions of Russia (Nenets, Yamal-Nenets) mention the Nenets as the titular nationality of the region; another such district (Taimyrsky (Dolgano-Nenetsky) Autonomous Okrug) was abolished in 2007 and transformed into the Taimyrsky Dolgano-Nenetsky District of the Krasnoyarsk Krai.

The Nenets are divided into two groups: tundra and forest; the two groups have different languages. Tundra Nenets are the majority. They live in two autonomous regions. The Forest Nenets – about 1500 people - live in the basin of the Pur and Taz rivers in the southeast of the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug and the east of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug – Yugra.

According to the 2021 census, there were 49,787	 Nenets in Russia.

Language
The Nenets language is on the Samoyedic branch of the Uralic language family, with two major dialects, Forest Nenets and Tundra Nenets. Ethnologue says that in Siberia, most young people are still fluent in Nenets, whereas in European Russia, they tend to speak Russian. Overall, the majority of native speakers are from older generations. UNESCO classifies Nenets as an endangered language. Some believe that the use of Russian and Komi is due to inter-ethnic marriages.

History and way of life
There are two distinct groups of Nenets sensu stricto, based on their economy: the Tundra Nenets (living far to the north) and the Khandeyar, or Forest Nenets. A distinct third group of Nenets, (Yaran people), has emerged as a result of intermarriages between Nenets and Izhma Komi people.

The Samoyedic languages form a branch of the Uralic language family. According to one theory, they moved from farther south in Siberia to the northernmost part of what later became Russia sometime before the 12th century.

They ended up between the Kanin and Taymyr peninsulas, around the Ob and Yenisey rivers, with only a few of them settling into small communities like Kolva. Their main subsistence comes from hunting and reindeer herding. Using reindeer as a draft animal throughout the year enables them to cover great distances. Large-scale reindeer herding emerged in the 18th century. They bred the Samoyed dog to help herd their reindeer and pull their sleds, and European explorers later used these dogs for polar expeditions, because they were well adapted to the arctic conditions. Tundra wolves can cause considerable economic loss, as they prey on the reindeer herds which are the livelihood of some Nenets families. However, the introduction of snowmobiles in the 1990s allowed the Nenets of the Yamal Peninsula to decimate the local wolf population, as the wolves have nowhere to hide on the open tundra. Along with reindeer meat, fish is a major component in the Nenets' diet. Nenets housing is conical yurt (mya).

They have a shamanistic and animistic belief system which stresses respect for the land and its resources. During migrations, the Nenets placed sacred items like bear skins, religious figures, coins and more on a holy sleigh. The contents of this sacred sleigh are only unpacked during special occasions or for religious rituals (like sacrifices). However, only esteemed elders are allowed to unpack the sacred sleigh. They had a clan-based social structure. The Nenets shaman is called a Tadibya.

After the Russian Revolution, the Nenets culture suffered due to the Soviet collectivization policy. The government of the Soviet Union tried to force the nomadic Samoyeds to settle down permanently. They were forced to settle in villages and their children were educated in state boarding schools, which resulted in erosion of their cultural identity. One significant way in which the Nenets culture was affected was in the change of the male's societal role. Previously, in the tundra, the male had the very important task of herding the reindeer. However, once the Nenets had to transition to a life away from the tundra, men found that they had lost their role. Much of the responsibility that awaited them in the village was considered, from the traditional point of view, to be women's work. This erasure in the male identity was further enhanced by the Soviet government. In taiga villages occupations such as market gardening, fur farming, cattle breeding, trade, medicine, etc. were emphasized and these happened to be the ones that were marketed towards women. Lastly, the jobs offered by the Soviet government were often occupied by women and not men as many of the men had taken up the habit of hard drinking. Consequently, the once traditional culture of the Nenets people was swiftly upended. Many, especially in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug, lost their mother tongue and became assimilated.

One repercussion from the collectivization policy was reindeer ownership. Due to the collectivization policy, many herders moved north while many of those that remained were "deprived of their reindeer". Nenets people once owned many reindeer but after the war, many Nenets had to transition to small-scale herding. Although the Nenets herders were greatly affected, their lifestyle was not at threat for too long. While in the rest of Russia, the collectivization policy lasted for a very long time, it was only invoked onto the Yamal area for a decade. This was because after Stalin's death in 1953, traditional economies were saved. 1950 to 1960 saw a 50% increase of reindeer and this number had almost doubled by 1980. The next few decades saw the slow progress of the Nenets people regaining and preserving their traditional nomadic lifestyle. The accomplishment of appeasing officials while maintaining their culture was achieved through a series of stratagems. For example, herders would often mix up the herds so that inspectors would find it impossible to see the true ratio of private to collective deer. Another method was for young herders to get a job as official workers of the state and pasture their own collective reindeer herd along with the private herd of one of their relatives. Once these herds were together and migration commenced, officials would not be able to know which of the reindeer were privately owned.

Since the 1930s, a few Nenets have expressed themselves professionally through cultural media. For instance, Tyko Vylka and Konstantin Pankov became well-known painters. Anna Nerkagi is one of the most celebrated Nenets writers. Yuri Vella, though living as a reindeer herder, has become the first writer in the Forest Nenets language.

Environment
Although the Nenets people were able to remain resilient in the face of continuous change and maltreatment, a new challenge now awaits them. Environmental damage to the Nenets' is significant due to industrialisation of their land, colonization and climate change. The Nenet people depend heavily on fishing and reindeer herding to support their lifestyle. However, these practices are highly reliant on the environment which is under threat from the oil industry. Specifically, the nomadic lifestyle the Nenet people have been accustomed to for generations is in danger as the oil industries encroach on reindeer pasture and territory. Approximately half of the 10,000 Nenets people in the Yamal Peninsula are nomadic and herd reindeer. With oil industries continuing to expand, the impact on the Nenets people is expected to increase.

Oil drilling in the peninsula
Since the 1980s, the Arctic Circle has gained the interest of those in the energy and mining industry. Although expansion halted briefly in the 1990s post-USSR disintegration, development picked up in 2004. As oil and gas companies continue to expand, along with it has come an expansion of infrastructure coming in the form of roads, power lines as well as human and vehicle traffic. A big milestone was in 2008, when Gazprom, the largest natural gas company in the world, entered the Yamal peninsula in their efforts to launch the Yamal Megaproject. Gazprom's arrival to the Yamal peninsula has brought about significant change to the area. According to the company's website, they operate a total of 32 fields. These fields bring in up to 360 billion cubic meters of gas per year and in 2019, Gazprom alone produced 96.3 billion cubic meters of gas. Another milestone was when Yamal LNG Project: Novatek, another Russian owned company, partnered with two other international corporations to build a plant on the Yamal peninsula in July 2013.

The impact on the Nenets people
The impact of large energy corporations in the Yamal peninsula can be felt in numerous ways. The largest of these can be seen in the effects on migration routes. With the Nenets people being nomadic and reliant on reindeer husbandry, the migratory routes for the reindeer are very important to them. These migratory routes are very specific and a lot of consideration goes into planning them. Additionally, the herders believe that it is necessary for the reindeer to migrate in order for them to maintain their good health. The herders claim that this is because the vegetation found on the coast are good for reindeer as they are richer in salt and minerals. Also, by reaching the coast with the migrations, the reindeer are able to find relief from insects such as mosquito and botfly by avoiding infestation periods. These migratory routes that the herders and reindeer use are made of rugged terrain as they provide a good space to herd the reindeer. However, the companies that enter the Yamal peninsula also prefer this rugged terrain to build their infrastructure upon, causing a direct overlap in land of interest. For example, in the Bovanenko core area, a research study was conducted that found that industrial development targeted "rugged, elevated drier land" which is the type of land used by the reindeer herders. Thus, as the Nenets people rely on reindeer that, in turn, rely on the migratory routes, the expansion of industrial development has had a large impact on the Nenets people.

Although not directly related to migration routes, another impact is the effect on Nenets peoples' sacred spots. The Nenets people have a tradition of designating a sacred spot where they make a request of the spirits for a successful migration. Nenets sacred spots are made into a major sand/quarry pit and marked by wooden pegs. In one case, a sacred spot of the Nenets people was fenced in during the industrial development, dissolving it of its traditional significance. Many of the workers believed that their construction did not actually intrude on the sacred spot, however many of the herders believed that the spot had been "desecrated". This difference in perceptions highlights how many non-indigenous people are only able to view land as something to be owned. Meanwhile, for indigenous people, such a viewpoint is non-existent. Herders have a spiritual relationship with the land and do not view it as simply owned vs not-owned.

Another smaller effect of the industrial development has been its impact on fish. Due to the industrial development, there has been a degradation of freshwater sources which has led to a decrease in the population. Additionally, the industrial development has spilled over to occupy much of the fishing grounds necessary for the Nenets people. As the Nenets people depend on the fish as their source of food in the summer, the depletion of fish has directly impacted the Nenets people.

Lastly, an impact that is loosely related with the migration routes is accessibility to health care clinics by the Nenets people. Since the arrival of large oil and gas companies in the 1990s, climate in the region has been impacted. In fact, since 1991 temperature anomalies in the Kanin have increased an estimated 1.4 degrees Celsius per decade. Within this same period, researchers found a trend of delayed herder arrivals to their local health clinic. Researchers cite the lengthening of the migrations as the reason for the delay. As the herders need open water to freeze to make crossings of reindeer and herders possible, there is a specific window in which herders can visit their local health clinics. Since 1991, the arrival of herders at one health clinic can be observed shifting from October to December, marking an evident postponement in arrival.

Nenets activism
There are some Nenets people, activists, and researchers who are nervous about the current situation in the Yamal peninsula. They worry that the authorities of the Nenets people will make a deal to merge with another region. Nenets people worry that the deal will lead to a further decline in their autonomy as well as their language and traditions.

Nenets people also face danger from industrial companies. Although the industrial companies have paid compensated the Nenets people and made efforts to assist them, some experts say that the current process does not allow for participation from the Nenets people. The relationship is described by some as "paternalistic" because it does not allow Nenets people to make their own decisions.

The Nenets people have previously attempted to organize and protest against these oil and gas companies. However, it is difficult for the nomadic people to gather as a collective unit as they live so far apart from each other. Yuri Vella is a notable example of an individual protestor. Vella was a Nenets writer and, having lived near a lake that was licensed over to an oil company, protested often. Most notably, he is remembered for having stood up against a bulldozer alone with an axe.

Vella is not alone in his activism. There exists a rural protest community called Voice of the Tundra that currently speaks on topics such as the rights of the Nenets people. As aforementioned, it is difficult to gather collectively and so this community relies on VKontakte, a Russian online service, to mobilize and communicate. Additionally, rather than being led by lawyers or journalists or scholars, the community has a young reindeer herder from the tundra as their leaders. The Voice of the Tundra focuses its attention on three main issues: a shortage of land for the reindeer due to oil and gas companies expanding use of the territories, the uncertainty surrounding the future of nomadic reindeer herding, and the lack of Indigenous leadership and organization.

The Voice of the Tundra project is being celebrated as it symbolizes a return of politics to Russia's Indigenous peoples. Specifically, a reindeer herder by the name of Eiko Serotetto is being heralded as the main activist generating the change. Serotetto is not someone who has had a traditional background or education. However, in 2016, he demonstrated that this would not weigh him down when he began to take action in the aftermath of the anthrax epidemic. Serotetto posted a petition on social media that asked for attention to be brought to the Indigenous peoples and their reindeers. Serotetto requested protection of Indigenous habitats, reindeer, and rights. This petition brought attention to the Russian officials who were not addressing the "real life of the tundra and Indigenous people". Later, Serotetto's most impactful petition was made when he advocated for the boycott of Russian oil and gas.

Although there are many Nenets people who are against the industrial development going on in the Yamal peninsula such as the activists aforementioned, there are also many who are in support of the developments. Those who are in favour of the developments highlight the economic benefits that they are able to receive. In a research study conducted in the area, one villager reported that they were able to coexist with the industries through social agreements, voluntary giving, and compensation for damages.

Some argue that this variance in support for the industrial companies from the Nenets people lies in factors such as active leadership from community leaders. This reasoning can be seen as falling similarly in line with what the Voice of the Tundra was fighting for, as it can be seen that proper Indigenous leadership and involvement can lead to higher satisfaction among the Nenets people.

Genetics
Nenets men typically carry the haplogroup N. 57.4 percent of them belong to the subclade N1b-P43 and 40.5 percent have the subclade N1c. Autosomally Nenets' ancestry can be modelled to be 79 percent Nganasan-like.

Notable Nenets

 * Tyko Vylka (1886–1960), painter
 * Konstantin Pankov (1910–1942), painter
 * Anastasia Lapsui (b. 1944), film director, screenwriter
 * Yuri Vella (1948–2013), writer, poet, environmentalist, social activist
 * Anna Nerkagi (b. 1952), writer, novelist, social activist

title: Nenets


text:
Jules Simon

Jules François Simon (31 December 1814 – 8 June 1896) was a French statesman and philosopher, and one of the leaders of the Moderate Republicans in the Third French Republic.

Biography
Simon was born at Lorient. His father was a linen-draper from Lorraine, who renounced Protestantism before his second marriage with a Catholic Breton. Jules Simon was the son of this second marriage. The family name was Suisse, which Simon dropped in favour of his third forename. By considerable sacrifice he was enabled to attend a seminary at Vannes, and worked briefly as usher in a school before, in 1833, he became a student at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris. There he came in contact with Victor Cousin, who sent him to Caen and then to Versailles to teach philosophy. He helped Cousin, without receiving any recognition, in his translations from Plato and Aristotle, and in 1839 became his deputy in the chair of philosophy at the University of Paris, with the meagre salary of 83 francs per month. He also lectured on the history of philosophy at the École Normale Supérieure.

At this period he edited the works of Nicolas Malebranche (2 vols, 1842), of René Descartes (1842), Bossuet (1842) and of Antoine Arnauld (1843), and in 1844–1845 appeared the two volumes of his Histoire de l'école d'Alexandrie. He became a regular contributor to the Revue des deux mondes, and in 1847, with Amédée Jacques and Émile Saisset, founded the Liberté de penser, with the intention of throwing off the yoke of Cousin, but he retired when Jacques allowed the insertion of an article advocating the principles of collectivism, with which he was at no time in sympathy.

Political career from 1848 to 1871
In 1848 he represented the Côtes-du-Nord in the National Assembly, and next year entered the Council of State, but was retired on account of his republican opinions. His refusal to take the oath of allegiance to the government of Louis Napoleon after the coup d'état was followed by his dismissal from his professorship, and he devoted himself to philosophical and political writings of a popular order. Le Devoir (1853), which was translated into modern Greek and Swedish, was followed by La Religion naturelle (1856, Eng. trans., 1887), La Liberté de conscience (1857), La Liberté politique (1859), La Liberté civile (1859), L'Ouvrière (1861), L'Ecole (1864), Le Travail (1866), L'Ouvrier de huit ans (1867) and others.

In 1863 he was returned to the Corps Législatif for the 8th circonscription of the Seine département, and supported "les Cinq" (Darimon, Favre, Hénon, Ollivier and Picard) in their opposition to the government. He became minister of instruction in the Government of National Defense on 5 September 1870. After the capitulation of Paris in January 1871 he was sent down to Bordeaux to prevent the resistance of Léon Gambetta to the peace. But at Bordeaux, Gambetta, who had issued a proclamation excluding from the elections those who had been officials under the Empire, was all-powerful. Pretending to dispute Jules Simon's credentials, he issued orders for his arrest. Meanwhile, Simon had found means of communication with Paris, and on 6 February was reinforced by Eugène Pelletan, E. Arago and Garnier-Pages. Gambetta resigned, and the ministry of the Interior, though nominally given to Arago, was really in Simon's hands.

Third Republic
Defeated in the département of the Seine, he sat for the Marne in the National Assembly, and resumed the portfolio of Education in the first cabinet of Adolphe Thiers's presidency. He advocated free primary education yet sought to conciliate the clergy by all the means in his power; but no concessions removed the hostility of Dupanloup, who presided over the commission appointed to consider his draft of an elementary education bill. The reforms he was actually able to carry out were concerned with secondary education. He encouraged the study of living languages, and limited the attention given to the making of Latin verse; he also encouraged independent methods at the École Normale, and set up a school at Rome where members of the French school of Athens should spend some time.

He retained office until a week before the fall of Thiers in 1873. He was regarded by the monarchical right as one of the most dangerous obstacles in the way of a restoration, which he did as much as any man (except perhaps the comte de Chambord himself) to prevent, but by the extreme left he was distrusted for his moderate views, and Gambetta never forgave his victory at Bordeaux. In 1875, he became a member of the Académie Française and a life senator, and in 1876, on the resignation of Jules Dufaure, was summoned to form a cabinet. He replaced anti-republican functionaries in the civil service by republicans, and held his own until 3 May 1877, when he adopted a motion carried by a large majority in the Chamber inviting the cabinet to use all means for the repression of clerical agitation.

His clerical enemies then induced Marshal MacMahon to take advantage of a vote on the press law carried in Jules Simon's absence from the Chamber to write him a letter regretting that he no longer preserved his influence in the Chamber, and thus practically demanding his resignation. His resignation in response to this act of the president, known as the "Seize Mai", which he might have resisted by an appeal to the Chamber, proved his ruin, and he never again held office. He justified his action by his fear of providing an opportunity for a coup d'état on the part of the Marshal. However, the May 1877 crisis eventually ended in MacMahon's demise and in the victory of the Republicans over the monarchist Orleanists and Legitimists.

The rejection (1880) of article 7 of Ferry's Education Act, by which the profession of teaching would have been forbidden to members of non-authorized congregations, was due to his intervention. He was in fact one of the chief of the left centre Opportunist Republicans faction, opposed in the same faction to Jules Grévy and also to the Radical Gambetta. He was director of Le Gaulois from 1879 to 1881, and his influence in the country among moderate republicans was retained by his articles in Le Matin from 1882 onwards, in the Journal des Débats, which he joined in 1886, and in Le Temps from 1890.

Works
His own accounts of some of the events in which he had been involved appear in Souvenirs du 4 septembre (1874), Le Gouvernement de M. Thiers (2 vols., 1878), in Mémoires des autres (1889), Nouveaux mémoires des autres (1891) and Les Derniers mémoires des autres (1897), while his sketch of Victor Cousin (1887) was a further contribution to contemporary history. For his personal history, the Premiers mémoires (1900) and Le Soir de ma journée (1902), edited by his son Gustave Simon, may be supplemented by Léon Séché's Figures bretonnes, Jules Simon, sa vie, son œuvre (new ed., 1898), and Georges Picot, Jules Simon: notice historique (1897); also by many references to periodical literature and collected essays in Hugo Paul Thieme's Guide bibliographique de la littérature française de 1800 à 1906 (1907).

Simon's Ministry, 12 December 1876 – 17 May 1877

 * Jules Simon – President of the Council and Minister of the Interior
 * Louis Decazes – Minister of Foreign Affairs
 * Jean Auguste Berthaud – Minister of War
 * Léon Say – Minister of Finance
 * Louis Martel – Minister of Justice and Worship
 * Martin Fourichon – Minister of Marine and Colonies
 * William Henry Waddington – Minister of Public Instruction
 * Albert Christophle – Minister of Public Works
 * Pierre Teisserenc de Bort – Minister of Agriculture and Commerce

title: Jules Simon


text:
Étienne Joseph Louis Garnier-Pagès

Étienne Joseph Louis Garnier-Pagès (December 27, 1801 – June 23, 1841) was a French politician, born at Marseille.

Soon after his birth his father Jean Francois Garnier, a naval surgeon, died, and his mother married Simon Pagès, a college professor, by whom she had a son. The boys were brought up together, and took the double name Garnier-Pagès.

Étienne found employment first in a commercial house in Marseille, and then in an insurance office in Paris. In 1825 he began to study law, and made some mark as an advocate. A keen opponent of the Restoration, he joined various democratic societies, notably the Aide-toi, le ciel t'aidera, an organization for purifying the elections.

He took part in the revolution of July 1830; became secretary of the Aide-toi, le ciel t'aidera, whose propaganda he brought into line with his anti-monarchical ideas; and in 1831 was sent from Isère to the chamber of deputies. He was concerned in the preparation of the Compte rendu of 1832, and advocated universal suffrage. He was an eloquent speaker, and his sound knowledge of business and finance gave him a marked influence among all parties in the chamber.

His half-brother, Louis-Antoine Garnier-Pagès (1803 – October 31, 1878), fought on the barricades during the revolution of July.

title: Étienne Joseph Louis Garnier-Pagès