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John Stevens, Baron Stevens of Kirkwhelpington

John Arthur Stevens, Baron Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, (born 21 October 1942) is a former Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis (head of the Metropolitan Police Service), having served from 2000 until 2005. From 1991 to 1996, he was Chief Constable of Northumbria Police before being appointed one of HM Inspectors of Constabulary in September 1996. He was then appointed Deputy Commissioner of the Met in 1998 until his promotion to Commissioner in 2000. He was a writer for the News of the World, for £7,000 an article, until his resignation as the hacking scandal progressed.

He sits in the House of Lords as a crossbencher.

Police career
Stevens was educated at St. Lawrence College, Ramsgate, the University of Leicester, where he took an LLB degree, and the University of Southampton, where he did his MPhil degree. Before becoming Chief Constable of Northumbria, he served as Assistant Chief Constable of the Hampshire Constabulary (1986–88) and Deputy Chief Constable of the Cambridgeshire Constabulary (1988–91).

He presided over an external police inquiry into allegations in Northern Ireland of collusion between the British security services and loyalist paramilitaries in a series of killings during the Troubles. Stevens's third report, published on 17 April 2003, upheld the claim and explicitly said that collusion leading to the murder of Catholics (and some Protestant wrongly thought to be Catholic or nationalist) had taken place. In the aftermath of the report, David Trimble, then-leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, called for a parliamentary inquiry into the collusion, while the leaders of the SDLP and Sinn Féin called for a full public inquiry. A subsequent government ordered review by Sir Desmond de Silva, QC, announced in December 2012, confirmed the findings of the Stevens 1, 2 and 3 Inquiries regarding collusion between British security forces and loyalist paramilitary groups in killings in Northern Ireland, which resulted in 97 convictions, and a large number of recommendations, which were accepted.

Post-retirement
After his retirement as Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis, on 6 April 2005 he was created a life peer as Baron Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, of Kirkwhelpington in the County of Northumberland. He headed a Metropolitan Police inquiry, Operation Paget, into the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, on 31 August 1997, which reported its findings in 2006.

Lord Stevens was asked by the Conservatives, under David Cameron, to be their candidate for the London Mayoral elections. He declined this offer.

On 29 June 2007, having become one of the UK's leading security experts, in-coming Prime Minister Gordon Brown appointed Lord Stevens as his Senior Advisor on International Security Issues. David Cameron appointed Stevens as Chair of the Borders Policing Committee in 2007, a position he held for 9 months focusing on the reorganisation and policing of the UK's borders. In 2011, he was appointed by Yvette Cooper MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Home Affairs to Chair an Independent Commission Policing Commission into the Future of Policing in England and Wales.

The Commission, which reported its findings in Spring 2013, was set up in place of a Royal Commission and is made up of nearly 40 members all of whom are experts in the fields of academia, politics, national and international policing/security as well as key figures from community initiatives and business. In addition the Commission has secured contributions from 35 academics from 25 Universities from around the world including, Oxford University, Cambridge University, Northumbria University and Harvard University.

Lord Stevens became Honorary President of the Police Credit Union in 2007.

He is also Patron of the Police History Society.

Lord Stevens holds positions at a number of security consultancy companies. Since 2014, he has been Chairman of the private investigative and security consulting firm Quest Global Limited, where he is also a person with significant control. In 2020, Lord Stevens was forced to apologise when he was "found in breach of the House of Lords' code of conduct for failing to correctly declare his work for foreign governments" in connection with his position at Quest Global Limited and his other consultancy work. Quest Global Limited was also mentioned in connection with the alleged bugging of Sir Frederick Barclay at the London Ritz hotel in 2020 and the subsequent legal action brought by Sir Frederick and his daughter against other members of their family.

Honours
Awarded the Queen's Police Medal in the 1992 New Year Honours, he was knighted in the 2000 New Year Honours and made Deputy Lieutenant of London in 2001. In 2002 he was made a Knight of the Order of Saint John.

In April 2007 Lord Stevens became Honorary Air Commodore of No 3 (Royal Auxiliary) Air Force Police Squadron. He is the Honorary Colonel of Northumbria Army Cadet Force. On 28 November 2005, he was appointed Chancellor of Northumbria University.

He holds an Honours Degree in Law, a master's degree of Philosophy, a Doctor of Law, Honorary Degrees of Doctor in Civil Law, Doctor of Letters and a Doctor of Philosophy.

He is a Fellow of Wolfson College, Cambridge, and was a visiting professor at City University of New York (CUNY).

Lord Stevens holds a Commercial Pilot's Licence and is part owner of several aircraft.

Styles and honours

 * Mr John Stevens (1942–1963)
 * PC John Stevens (1963-through ranks, including Detective Chief Superintendent-1986)
 * Assistant Chief Constable John Stevens (1986–1989)
 * Deputy Chief Constable John Stevens (1989–1991)
 * Chief Constable John Stevens (1991–1991)
 * Chief Constable John Stevens QPM (1991–1998)
 * Deputy Commissioner John Stevens QPM (1998–2000)
 * Commissioner John Stevens QPM (2000)
 * Commissioner Sir John Stevens QPM (2000–2001)
 * Commissioner Sir John Stevens QPM DL (2001–2002)
 * Commissioner Sir John Stevens KStJ QPM DL (2002–2005)
 * The Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington KStJ QPM DL FRSA (2005–present)


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Mirandese language

Mirandese (mirandés or lhéngua mirandesa) is an Asturleonese language or variety that is sparsely spoken in a small area of northeastern Portugal in eastern Tierra de Miranda (made up of the municipalities of Miranda de l Douro, Mogadouro and Bumioso, being extinct in Mogadouro and present in Bumioso only in some eastern villages, like Angueira). The Assembly of the Republic granted it official recognition alongside Portuguese for local matters with Law 7/99 of 29 January 1999. In 2001, Mirandese was officially recognised by the European Bureau for Lesser-Used Languages, which aims to promote the survival of the least spoken European languages.

Mirandese has a distinct phonology, morphology and syntax. It has its roots in the local Vulgar Latin spoken in the northern Iberian Peninsula.

Mirandese is a descendant of the Astur-Leonese variety spoken in the Kingdom of León and has both archaisms and innovations that differentiate it from the modern varieties of Astur-Leonese spoken in Spain. In recognition of these differences, and due to its political isolation from the rest of the Astur-Leonese speaking territory, Mirandese has adopted a different written norm to the one used in Spain for Astur-Leonese.

History
In the 19th century, José Leite de Vasconcelos described Mirandese as "the language of the farms, of work, home, and love between the Mirandese". Since 1986–87, it has been taught optionally to students at the primary and lower secondary level, and has thus been somewhat recovering. By Law 7/99, Mirandese was given official recognition by the Assembly of the Republic alongside Portuguese. The law provides for its promotion and allows its usage for local matters in Miranda do Douro.

Today Mirandese retains fewer than 5,000 speakers (but the number can be up to 15,000 if counting second-language speakers) in the villages of the municipality of Miranda do Douro and in some eastern villages (such as Vilar Seco and Angueira); in Caçarelhos, it is considered recently extinct of the municipality of Vimioso, and some linguistic influence can be observed at other villages of the municipality of Vimioso and the municipalities of Mogadouro, Macedo de Cavaleiros and Bragança.

A 2020 survey by University of Vigo, carried out in Miranda do Douro, estimated the number of speakers of the language to be around 3,500 with 1,500 of them being regular speakers. The study observed strong decline in the usage of language in younger people.

Variants
Three variants of the Mirandese language exist: Border Mirandese (Mirandés Raiano), Central Mirandese (Mirandés Central) and Sendinese (Sendinés). Most speakers of Mirandese also speak Portuguese.

Despite there being a singular writing system for mirandese, there is one aspect that is written differently in different dialects. In the Sendinese dialect, many words that in other dialects are said with /ʎ/ $⟨lh⟩$, are said with /l/ $⟨l⟩$ (alá for alhá 'over there', lado for lhado 'side', luç for lhuç 'light', amongst others)

The main differences between Mirandese in Portugal and the Astur-Leonese languages in Spain are caused by the dominant languages in each region. Mirandese has been influenced phonetically and in lexicon by Portuguese and the Astur-Leonese languages in Spain, by Spanish. All have distinctive orthography that phonetically reflects the respective main national languages. Another difference is that Mirandese and Leonese remain very conservative, while Asturian has undergone a greater amount of change.

Phonology
Some historical developments in Mirandese are the following:
 * Mirandese maintains distinct reflexes of all seven medieval Ibero-Romance sibilants:
 * {| class=wikitable style="text-align:center;"

! Ibero-Romance||Mirandese||European Portuguese||North/Central Spanish
 * or || $⟨ch⟩$ / $⟨ch⟩$|| $⟨ch⟩$ / $⟨x⟩$ || $⟨x⟩$ / $⟨j⟩$
 * }
 * and indicate apico-alveolar sibilants (as in modern Catalan, northern/central peninsular Spanish and coastal northern European Portuguese), while  and  are dentalized laminal alveolar sibilants (as in most modern Portuguese, French and English). The unrelated Basque language also maintains a distinction between  and  (Basque has no voiced sibilants), which suggests that the distinction originally was an areal feature across Iberia.
 * or || $⟨g⟩$ / $⟨j⟩$|| $⟨g⟩$ / $⟨j⟩$ || $⟨g⟩$ / $⟨j⟩$
 * }
 * and indicate apico-alveolar sibilants (as in modern Catalan, northern/central peninsular Spanish and coastal northern European Portuguese), while  and  are dentalized laminal alveolar sibilants (as in most modern Portuguese, French and English). The unrelated Basque language also maintains a distinction between  and  (Basque has no voiced sibilants), which suggests that the distinction originally was an areal feature across Iberia.
 * }
 * and indicate apico-alveolar sibilants (as in modern Catalan, northern/central peninsular Spanish and coastal northern European Portuguese), while  and  are dentalized laminal alveolar sibilants (as in most modern Portuguese, French and English). The unrelated Basque language also maintains a distinction between  and  (Basque has no voiced sibilants), which suggests that the distinction originally was an areal feature across Iberia.
 * }
 * and indicate apico-alveolar sibilants (as in modern Catalan, northern/central peninsular Spanish and coastal northern European Portuguese), while  and  are dentalized laminal alveolar sibilants (as in most modern Portuguese, French and English). The unrelated Basque language also maintains a distinction between  and  (Basque has no voiced sibilants), which suggests that the distinction originally was an areal feature across Iberia.
 * }
 * and indicate apico-alveolar sibilants (as in modern Catalan, northern/central peninsular Spanish and coastal northern European Portuguese), while  and  are dentalized laminal alveolar sibilants (as in most modern Portuguese, French and English). The unrelated Basque language also maintains a distinction between  and  (Basque has no voiced sibilants), which suggests that the distinction originally was an areal feature across Iberia.
 * }
 * and indicate apico-alveolar sibilants (as in modern Catalan, northern/central peninsular Spanish and coastal northern European Portuguese), while  and  are dentalized laminal alveolar sibilants (as in most modern Portuguese, French and English). The unrelated Basque language also maintains a distinction between  and  (Basque has no voiced sibilants), which suggests that the distinction originally was an areal feature across Iberia.
 * }
 * and indicate apico-alveolar sibilants (as in modern Catalan, northern/central peninsular Spanish and coastal northern European Portuguese), while  and  are dentalized laminal alveolar sibilants (as in most modern Portuguese, French and English). The unrelated Basque language also maintains a distinction between  and  (Basque has no voiced sibilants), which suggests that the distinction originally was an areal feature across Iberia.

 * Portuguese spelling still distinguishes all seven and is identical to Mirandese spelling in this respect, but in pronunciation, Portuguese has reduced them to four except in northern hinterland European Portuguese dialects, including those of the area that Mirandese is spoken. Northern/central Peninsular Spanish has also reduced them to four but in quite a different way: . Western Andalusian Spanish and Latin American Spanish have further reduced them to three:.

 * Retention of the initial from Latin, like nearly all dialects of Western Romance (the major maverick being Spanish, where >  > ∅).
 * As in Portuguese, the Latin initial consonant clusters, , evolve into.
 * Proto-Romance medial clusters and  became medial.
 * The cluster /-mb-/ is kept.
 * Proto-Romance becomes :  > lume.
 * Falling diphthongs, preserved.
 * Final -o becomes.
 * Voiced sibilants are still maintained.
 * Retention of intervocalic,.
 * Western Romance, can diphthongize to ,  (as in Italian). That happens not only before palatals, as in Aragonese, but also before nasals.
 * is palatalized word-initially (as in other Astur-Leonese languages and in Catalan).

Consonants

 * As stated above, the laminal dental sibilants correspond to Portuguese . These are spelled c/ç and z. The corresponding alveolar sibilants are apical and are spelled s(s) and s. Furthermore, there is an additional palatal affricate ch that is distinct from the fricative, spelled x. The voiced  is spelled j or g, as in Portuguese. Standard Portuguese has reduced all those sounds to just four fricatives:.
 * The "hard" or "long" R is an alveolar trill, as in other varieties of Astur-Leonese and Spanish. The Portuguese uvular fricative is not found in Mirandese. The "soft" or "short" R is an ordinary alveolar tap  commonly found in the Iberian Peninsula. As in other languages spoken in the region, the two contrast only in the word-internal position.
 * Voiced stops can be lenited as fricatives.

Vowels
All oral and nasal vowel sounds and allophones are the same from Portuguese, with different allophones:

 * has allophones of, with , and  with  and . And with the addition of nasal vowel sounds  and  for.
 * Vowels can become glides  when preceding or following other vowels.

Dialectal variations
The main differences between the three mirandese dialects are in the pronunciation of words.

Morphology
As in Portuguese, Mirandese still uses the following synthetic tenses:
 * Synthetic pluperfect in -ra.
 * Future subjunctive in -r(e).
 * Personal infinitive in -r(e), which has the same endings as the future subjunctive but often differs as the personal infinitive always uses the infinitive stem, whereas the future subjunctive uses the past.

Protection measures
The following measures have been taken to protect and develop Mirandese:

 * allow primary teaching staff in the district of Miranda do Douro to teach in Mirandese, since 1986/1987, thanks to the ministerial authorisation published on 9 September 1985;
 * publish books in Mirandese and about the Mirandese language, promoted by the Council of Miranda do Douro;
 * facilitate annual celebrations in the city as well as a literary competition, promoted by the Council of Miranda do Douro;
 * use of Mirandese in town celebrations, official commemorations and, occasionally, on social media;
 * publish two volumes of the Asterix comic books;
 * translate all the toponymic signs in Miranda do Douro, promoted by the Council of Miranda do Douro in 2006;
 * develop studies by research centres in Portugal, such as "Atlas Linguístico de Portugal", by the Centro de Linguística at University of Lisbon, and "Inquérito Linguístico Boléo", by the University of Coimbra;
 * create Biquipédia, a Mirandese Wikipedia;
 * make sites available in Mirandese, such as Photoblog and WordPress.
 * Mirandese music was recorded by Roberto Leal for his albums "Canto da Terra" (2007) and "Raiç/Raíz" (2010).

Sample text
The following is a sample text of the Mirandese language, written by Amadeu Ferreira, and published in the newspaper Público, on 24 July 2007.

Then a comparison of the previous text in three modern languages of the Asturo-leonese group:

Recognition
Mirandese, given its status as a recognised language in Portugal after Portuguese, has been the subject in recent years of some publicity and attention in other parts of Portugal. A monthly chronicle in Mirandese, by researcher and writer Amadeu Ferreira, appears in the daily Portuguese national newspaper Público. The first volume of the Adventures of Asterix, named Asterix, L Goulés (Asterix the Gaul), was published in a Mirandese translation by Amadeu Ferreira in 2005, and sold throughout Portugal. Amadeu Ferreira also translated into Mirandese the epic poem by Camões, Os Lusíadas (Ls Lusíadas), under his pseudonym Francisco Niebro [sic] and published it in 2009. In 2011, the four Gospels of the Bible's New Testament were translated into Mirandese, and in 2013 the entire Bible was translated into the language by Domingos Augusto Ferreira.

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

title: Mirandese language


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Townsville

Townsville is a city on the north-eastern coast of Queensland, Australia. With a population of 179,011 as of the 2021 census, it is the largest settlement in North Queensland and Northern Australia (specifically, the parts of Australia north of the Sunshine Coast). It is unofficially considered the capital of North Queensland. Townsville hosts a significant number of governmental, community and major business administrative offices for the northern half of the state.

Part of the larger local government area of the City of Townsville, it is in the dry tropics region of Queensland, adjacent to the central section of the Great Barrier Reef. The city is also a major industrial centre, home to one of the world's largest zinc refineries, a nickel refinery and many other similar activities. As of December 2020, $30M operations to expand the Port of Townsville are underway, which involve channel widening and installation of a 70-tonne Liebherr Super Post Panamax Ship-to-Shore crane, to allow much larger cargo and passenger ships to utilise the port. It is an increasingly important port due to its proximity to Asia and major trading partners such as China.

Dominant sectors of its diverse economy include defence, administration, health and education, manufacturing, energy, transport and logistics. The city is a national hub for renewable energy, in green hydrogen and polysilicon, as well as the centre of CopperString 2032 being Australia's largest renewable transmission project. Townsville is Australia's 'fortress city', home to a large part of the strategic capability of the ADF, offering essential services including maintenance and supply chains including one of the largest military bases in Australia as well as a Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) base that can accommodate most military aircraft in service. Townsville is the industrial heart of northern Australia with a GRP of $15.1 billion in 2023. The city is served by Townsville Airport and the Port of Townsville, the largest general freight and container port in northern Australia.

Popular attractions include "The Strand", a long tropical beach and garden strip; Riverway, a riverfront parkland attraction located on the banks of Ross River; Reef HQ, a large tropical aquarium holding many of the Great Barrier Reef's native flora and fauna; the Museum of Tropical Queensland, built around a display of relics from the sunken British warship HMS Pandora (1779); Castle Hill or as it was originally known Cootharinga, the most prominent landmark of the area and a popular place for exercise; The Townsville Sports Reserve; and Magnetic Island, a large neighbouring island, the vast majority of which is national park.

Early history
Aboriginal peoples such as the Wulgurukaba, Bindal, Girrugubba, Warakamai and Nawagi originally inhabited the Townsville area. The Wulgurukaba claim to be the traditional owners of the Townsville city area; the Bindal had a claim struck out by the Federal Court of Australia in 2005.

James Cook visited the Townsville region on his first voyage to Australia in 1770, but did not actually land there. Cook named nearby Cape Cleveland, Cleveland Bay and Magnetic(al) Island. In 1819, Captain Phillip Parker King and botanist Alan Cunningham were the first Europeans to record a local landing.

In 1846, James Morrill was shipwrecked from the Peruvian, living in the Townsville area among the Bindal people for 17 years before deciding to return to British society when the frontier of colonisation came to the region.

In 1860, George Elphinstone Dalrymple led a maritime expedition to the region from Brisbane. The expedition sailed to Cleveland Bay, finding a very numerous Aboriginal population. They landed on the shore near to where the modern city of Townsville now stands and met with a number of Aboriginal people, giving them biscuit and tobacco. The Aboriginal people started to touch and feel all the expedition members, and began "smacking their lips", which Dalrymple interpreted as an indication that they wanted to eat them. Another group of Aboriginal people came down, attacking them with a shower of stones and spears. Dalrymple and his men "were necessitated" to fire upon them, "repulsing them with loss." They landed again near to Cape Pallarenda to obtain surveys from the hilltops but decided to descend to their awaiting dinghies as they noticed residents of three Aboriginal camps below were moving in their direction. These people were yelling and dancing "in a very hostile manner" and Dalrymple felt obliged to fire upon them. Dalrymple's group then made an "orderly retreat" to the dinghies halting at intervals to fire upon those throwing spears. The crew which had remained upon the Spitfire had seen about eight armed Aboriginal men in canoes approaching them from nearby Magnetic Island in an apparent attempt to board the ship. They were repulsed by a discharge of the brass gun.

Establishment
The Burdekin River's seasonal flooding made the establishment of a seaport north of the river essential to the nascent inland cattle industry. John Melton Black of Woodstock Station, an employee of Sydney entrepreneur and businessman Robert Towns, dispatched Andrew Ball, Mark Watt Reid and a detachment of 8 troopers of the Native Police under the command of John Marlow to search for a suitable site. Ball's party reached the Ross Creek in April 1864 and established a camp below the rocky spur of Melton Hill, near the present Customs House on The Strand.

Edward Kennedy, a Native Police officer accompanying the group, recalled how his "boys" (the Aboriginal troopers) chased four or five local tribesmen into the ocean. Kennedy then stated that he "left the "boys" in the water, pumping lead and hurling derisive cries at them, neither of which seemed to reach their mark". A member of the expedition who was from a town in the south accidentally shot dead an elderly Aboriginal man. He said that he thought he was being stalked by an alligator. On the return journey to Port Denison, the group "dispersed" another Aboriginal camp in reprisal for the killing of a shepherd. After the fighting, the "boys" rounded up around 12 women and each took turns based on their rank in selecting one. "In five minutes, each had chosen their spouse and the ceremony was complete."

The next group of colonists, led by W. A. Ross, arrived at Cleveland Bay from Woodstock Station on 5 November of that year. In 1866 Robert Towns visited for three days, his first and only visit. He agreed to provide ongoing financial assistance to the new settlement and Townsville was named in his honour. Townsville was declared a municipality in February 1866, with John Melton Black elected as its first Mayor. Townsville developed rapidly as the major port and service centre for the Cape River, Gilbert, Ravenswood, Etheridge and Charters Towers goldfields. Regional pastoral and sugar industries also expanded and flourished.

The Alligator Creek meatworks was established in 1879. Up to 1500 workers, many who resided in Townsville would work at the factory. It helped to build up the economy of Townsville. Jack Flowers was a local of Townsville and started working at Alligator Creek when he was 13 years old (in 1913). He worked there for 58 years and would walk from Townsville to Alligator Creek. In 1915 the train line extended from Townsville out to Alligator Creek and in 1946 there was a dispute with workers who left work 15 minutes early to catch the 4:30pm train back to town and the factory threatened to sack 340 workers reporting that it wasn’t 15 minutes but some had stopped working at 3:45 or 4pm.

Importation of South Sea Islander labour
On 8 July 1866 Robert Towns imported the first boatload of South Sea Islanders into Townsville to labour on the cane and cotton farms. They numbered 56 and arrived on the Blue Bell which had brought them from the Loyalty Islands and the New Hebrides. Charges were made against Henry Ross Lewin, the recruiter for Robert Towns, that some of the Islanders had been kidnapped to work on the plantations. In 1867, a magisterial enquiry was set up into the death of an Islander working on one of Towns' plantations. A pharmacist attending was of the opinion the death was caused by a lack of proper nourishment, the Islanders receiving only cornmeal for food. Other evidence was given by employees of the plantation company who claimed the labourers were treated well and a verdict of death by natural causes was declared.

Turn of the century
Townsville's population was 4,000 people in 1882 and grew to 13,000 by 1891. In 1901 Lord Hopetoun made a goodwill tour of northern Australia and accepted an invitation to officially open Townsville's town hall, occasioning the first ever vice-regal ceremonial unfurling of the Australian national flag. With Brisbane, in 1902 Townsville was proclaimed a City under the Local Authorities Act.

The foundation stone of the Townsville Cenotaph was laid in Strand Park on 19 July 1923. It was unveiled on 25 April 1924 (ANZAC Day) by the Queensland Governor, Sir Matthew Nathan.

Townsville/Thuringowa
The rural land surrounding the city was initially managed by the Thuringowa Road Board, which eventually became the Shire of Thuringowa. The shire ceded land several times to support Townsville's expansion. In 1986 the Shire became incorporated as a city, governed by the Thuringowa City Council. The cities of Townsville and Thuringowa were amalgamated into the "new" Townsville City Council in March 2008, as part of the Queensland state government's reform program.

Japanese influence
In 1896, Japan established its first Australian consulate in Townsville, primarily to serve some 4,000 Japanese workers who migrated to work in the sugar cane, turtle, trochus, beche de mer, and pearling industries. With the introduction of the White Australia policy, the demand for Japanese workers decreased, causing the consulate to finally close in 1908.

Second World War
At the beginning of 1942, Townsville had 30,000 inhabitants and between 5,000 and 7,000 of them voluntarily evacuated to other places. During the Second World War, the city was host to more than 50,000, and Townsville Naval Section Base. American and Australian troops and air crew, and it became a major staging point for battles in the South West Pacific. A large United States Armed Forces contingent supported the war effort from seven airfields and other bases around the city and in the region. Many buildings, schools and 177 private houses were commandeered for use by the military. Slit trenches were dug in many places, and 18 concrete air-raid shelters were built, six of them in Flinders Street. The first bombing raid on Rabaul, in Papua New Guinea, on 23 February 1942 was carried out by six B-17s based near Townsville.

Some of the units based in Townsville were:
 * No. 3 Fighter Sector RAAF, Wulguru & North Ward
 * 1 Wireless Unit, Pimlico & Stuart & Roseneath
 * North Eastern Area Command HQ, Townsville, Sturt Street (now the Federation building)
 * Castle Hill, Townsville tunnels & bunkers
 * Green St. Bunker, West End, Sidney Street West End, Project 81 (now the SES building)
 * 96th Engineer Battalion (which mutinied in April 1942. )

In July 1942, three small Japanese air raids were conducted against Townsville, which was by then the most important air base in Australia. On 25 July 1942 two Japanese Kawanishi Flying Boats dropped 15 bombs which landed near the mouth of the Ross River, only 400 yards east of oil tanks in the harbour. On 28 July, one Japanese plane dropped eight 500 lb bombs near the Garbutt airfield. On 29 July 1942, a single "Emily" Flying Boat dropped one bomb at the Experimental Station of Oonoonba and seven bombs landed in Cleveland Bay where bomb craters are still clearly visible. There were no deaths and structural damage was minimal, as the Japanese missed their intended targets of the railway, the harbour and the airfield and destroyed a palm tree at the Experimental Station of Oonoonba. Although the Japanese aircraft were intercepted on two of the three raids, no Japanese planes were shot down.

1960s and 1970s
In 1961 the University of Queensland established a campus at Pimlico, near Pimlico State High School, later developing a site at Douglas near the Army Barracks, and across the new Nathan Street Bridge. The faculties of Arts, Law, and Education, and several residential colleges, Union, St Mark's, and John Flynn relocated from central Townsville. This was followed by the relocation of St Raphael's college for women. A large modernist building was established. In 1971 Cyclone Althea with flooding slowed progress of infrastructural building, but by 1972 James Cook University was established, with ecru academic gowns, quite different to those of older universities. From 1961, only the first years of studies for Medicine and for Veterinary Sciences were offered in Townsville, but the establishment of a new General Hospital at Mount Louisa provided facilities necessary for the establishment of an independent Medical School.

In 1970, Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh and Her Royal Highness Princess Anne toured Australia including Queensland. The Queensland tour began on Sunday 12 April when the royal yacht Britannia entered Moreton Bay at Caloundra, sailing into Newstead Wharf. After visiting Brisbane, Longreach and Mount Isa the Royal Family travelled to Mackay. The royal party had a leisurely cruise to Townsville, taking four days to arrive after their departure from Mackay. On the morning of April 20, they were met by The Deputy Mayor of Townsville Mr. T. Aikens, M.L.A. and Mrs Aikens and Mr W.W. Shepherd, Chairman of the Townsville Harbour Board and Mrs Shepherd. The day’s program began with a cavalcade of progress at the Townsville sports reserve. The grounds were filled with crowds and children waving their Australian flag. It was a spectacle for the royal visitors and the local community who came out on the day.

Following lunch on board Britannia, the royal family were driven to the site of Queensland’s newest university, the James Cook University, Townsville campus. In the presence of many dignitaries, HRH Queen Elizabeth II formally granted autonomy to North Queensland’s new educational institution. In 2020, James Cook University celebrated its 50th anniversary with a Treasures exhibition, showcasing 50 collection items from Special Collections, Eddie Koiku Mabo Library, James Cook University, Townsville.

The rare collection item – ‘James Cook University Development: Pimlico to the First Chancellor archival footage, 1960 – 1970’ was one of the Treasures selected for the anniversary year. The 12min film preserved on NQHeritage, the University Library’s Special Collections online repository, shows footage of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II arriving at the official ceremony and being introduced to the official party. Their Royal Highnesses first appear in the film at 6:06 minutes.

On Christmas Eve 1971, Tropical Cyclone Althea, a category 4 cyclone, battered the city and Magnetic Island, causing considerable damage.

In 1973, Indigenous activists Eddie and Bonita Mabo established the Black Community School in Townsville, where children could learn their Indigenous culture rather than white culture. Eddie Mabo worked as a gardener at James Cook University in the 1970s and 1980s. It was at the university in 1974 that he first learned of the implications of the terra nullius doctrine which held that he did not legally own the land he believed was his under the traditional land inheritance system of his people.

1980s
Buchanan's Hotel in Flinders Street, regarded by architectural historians as Australia's most significant building in the Filigree style, was lost to fire in 1982.

In 1981 a land rights conference was held at James Cook University and Eddie Mabo made a speech to the audience where he explained the land inheritance system on Murray Island. The significance of this in terms of Australian common law doctrine was taken note of by one of the attendees, a lawyer, who suggested there should be a test case to claim land rights through the court system. Mabo decided to take on the Australian Government. Perth-based solicitor Greg McIntyre was at the conference and agreed to take the case; he then recruited barristers Ron Castan and Bryan Keon-Cohen. McIntyre represented Mabo during the hearings. The James Cook University Douglas campus library is now named after Mabo.

1990s
On 3 June 1992, the High Court of Australia ruled in favour of Eddie Mabo in Mabo v Queensland (No 2) recognising native title in Australia for the first time.

In 1993, the New South Wales Rugby League announced that a team from Townsville would be admitted to the expanded, nation-wide competition, and the North Queensland Cowboys made their debut in the 1995 ARL season.

2000–present
In October 2000, a Solomon Islands Peace Agreement was negotiated in Townsville.

In February 2019, Townsville experienced a major flood event, which caused five deaths. Floodwaters damaged approximately 3300 homes and about 1500 homes were rendered uninhabitable.

Urban layout
Inner-city high-density development has also created population growth and gentrification of the central business district (CBD). One significant contributor to CBD development was the construction of a new rail passenger terminal and re-siting of the railway workshops, releasing prime real estate which formerly belonged to Queensland Rail for the development of residential units, retail projects and a new performing arts centre. The skyline of Townsville's central business district has undergone dramatic changes over the last few years, with a number of new highrise buildings, both commercial and residential, constructed.

In the short term, much of the urban expansion will continue to the west and the north, in the former City of Thuringowa. The most significant of these is North Shore Estate, a new A$1 billion 5,000-lot housing estate, located close to the Bruce Highway, just north of the Bohle River.

Medium-term city expansion will be focused on two major urban developments that have started in 2017 and 2018. Elliot Springs, a satellite city to the south of Townsville developed by national developer Lendlease Group, is expected to be home to 26,000 people by 2057. Additionally, the Queensland Government announced it will be offering 270 hectare of state-owned land (the former abattoir reserve), just south of the Bohle River, for urban expansion.

Geography
Townsville lies approximately 1350 km north of Brisbane, and 350 km south of Cairns. It lies on the shores of Cleveland Bay, protected to some degree from the predominantly south-east weather. Cleveland Bay is mostly shallow inshore, with several large beaches and continually shifting sand bars. Magnetic Island lies 8 km offshore, to the north of the city centre. It, together with Castle Hill in the town centre and Mount Stuart to the south of the city, form a large quartz monzonite igneous province.The Ross River flows through the city. Three weirs, fish stocking and dredging of the river in these reaches has resulted in a deep, stable and clean waterway used for many recreational activities such as water skiing, fishing and rowing. 30 km from the mouth (at the junction of Five Head Creek) is the Ross River Dam, the major water storage for the urban areas.

The historic waterfront on Ross Creek, site of the original wharves and port facilities, has some old buildings mixed with the later modern skyline. However, the central city is dominated by the mass of red granite of Castle Hill, 286 m high. There is a lookout at the summit giving panoramic views of the city and its suburbs, including Cleveland Bay and Magnetic Island. There are a number of parks scattered throughout the city, including three botanical gardens — Anderson Park, Queens Gardens and The Palmetum.

Climate
Townsville has a tropical savanna climate (Köppen climate classification Aw). Owing to a quirk of geographical location, Townsville's winter rainfall in particular is not as high as elsewhere in the eastern coastal tropics of Queensland, such as Cairns. The winter months are dominated by southeast trade winds and mostly fine weather. Further north the coastline runs north–south and the trade winds are lifted to produce rainfall right through the year. Townsville, however, lies on a section of coastline that turns east/west, so the lifting effect is not present. As a result, winter months are dominated by blue skies, warm days and cool nights, although at times significant rainfall may occur.

The average annual rainfall is 1095 mm on an average 61 rain days, most of which falls during the six-month "wet season" from November to April. Because of the "hit or miss" nature of tropical lows and thunderstorms, and the powerful influence of the El Niño–Southern Oscillation, variation from year to year is almost uniquely large for so wet a climate, being comparable only to a few cities in the Northeast of Brazil (e.g. Fortaleza). Since records at various urban locations started in 1871 twelve-month rainfalls in Townsville have ranged from a mere 217.9 mm between December 1901 and November 1902 at the peak of the Federation Drought, to as much as 2956.2 mm between March 1990 and February 1991. On average, the driest year in ten can expect only half the mean rainfall, compared to around 64 percent in Brisbane, 68 percent in Sydney, and 72 percent in Darwin.

Rainfall also varies considerably within the metropolitan area; it typically ranges from 1136 mm at central Townsville City to 853 mm at Woodstock, a southwestern suburb. The wettest 24 hours on record was 11 January 1998, with 548.8 mm falling mostly in a 12-hour period after dark, which has since been dubbed the "Night of Noah" by Townsville residents.

December is the warmest month of the year with daily mean maximum and minimum temperatures being 31.5 °C and 24.1 °C respectively. July is the coolest month with daily mean maximum and minimum temperatures being 25.1 °C and 13.7 °C. Townsville experiences an annual mean of 8.5 hours of sunshine per day, averaging 120.8 clear days per year.

Tropical cyclones and flooding
Like most of Northern Australia, Townsville is susceptible to tropical cyclones. They usually occur between December and April, forming mainly out in the Coral Sea, and usually tracking west to the coast. Notable cyclones to affect the Townsville Region have been: Cyclone Kirrily (2024), Cyclone Yasi (2011), Cyclone Tessi (2000), Cyclone Sid (1998, in particular damaging The Strand and causing major flooding), Cyclone Joy (1990), Cyclone Althea (1971), Cyclone Leonta (1903), and Cyclone Sigma (1896). The city was also affected by the 2019 Townsville flood, the convergence of a monsoon and a slow-moving tropical low.

Governance
Townsville has offices of many State and Federal Government agencies, such as Centrelink and the Australian Taxation Office.

Local
Townsville is governed by a City Council, comprising an independently elected Mayor and 10 Councillors who each represent a separate division within the local government area. Following local government reform undertaken by the Government of Queensland prior to the March 2008 elections, the previous entities of NQ Water, The City of Townsville and the City of Thuringowa were amalgamated.

In the 2024 Townsville City Council election, Troy Thompson (Independent), was sworn in as Mayor of Townsville. The previous Mayor of Townsville was Jenny Hill, a member of the Labor Party. Hill was elected in April 2012, replacing the retiring Les Tyrell and defeating main opposing candidate Dale Last. Tyrell was the immediate past Mayor for 17 years of the former local government authority, the City of Thuringowa. The previous Mayor of Townsville for 19 years was Tony Mooney (Australian Labor Party). Hill faced a largely hostile chamber in her first term, with 'Townsville First' candidates winning the majority of divisions. When local government elections were held in March 2016, Jenny Hill was re-elected as Mayor of Townsville. She was re-elected in the 2020 Queensland local government elections.

State
In the unicameral Queensland Parliament five electorates cover the Townsville Region:
 * Electoral district of Burdekin (southern suburbs): Dale Last MP (Liberal National Party of Queensland)
 * Electoral district of Hinchinbrook (northern suburbs): Nick Dametto MP (Katter's Australian Party)
 * Electoral district of Mundingburra (central/southern suburbs): Les Walker MP (Australian Labor Party)
 * Electoral district of Thuringowa (western/northern suburbs): Aaron Harper MP (Australian Labor Party)
 * Electoral district of Townsville (CBD + Magnetic & Palm Islands): Scott Stewart MP (Australian Labor Party)

Federal
The majority of the population of Townsville is represented in the Australian House of Representatives by Phillip Thompson of the Liberal National Party, reelected as the member for the Division of Herbert at the 2022 Australian federal election. Some of the suburbs on the southern fringe of the urban area are part of the Division of Dawson and are represented by Andrew Willcox, representing the Liberal National Party. Some of the northern suburbs of Townsville, known collectively as the "Northern Beaches", are included in the Division of Kennedy which is represented by Bob Katter (Katter's Australian Party), who is based in Mount Isa about 900 km west of Townsville.

Economy
The city has a diverse economy with strengths in education, healthcare, retail, construction and manufacturing. It is a defence hub and is home to thousands of military personnel. It is also a major manufacturing and processing hub. Townsville is the only city globally to refine three different base metals — zinc, copper, and nickel — and it is planned in the near future to be home to a $2billion lithium-ion battery manufacturing facility developed by the Imperium3 consortium in partnership with Siemens. Nickel ore is imported from Indonesia, the Philippines and New Caledonia and processed at the Yabulu Nickel refinery, 30 km north of the port. Zinc ore is transported by rail from the Cannington Mine, south of Cloncurry, for smelting at the Sun Metals refinery south of Townsville. Copper concentrate from the smelter at Mount Isa is also railed to Townsville for further refining at the copper refinery at Stuart.. The zinc refinery is one of the world's largest with an expansion from 2019.

Townsville has several large public assets as a result of its relative position and population. These include the largest campus of the oldest university in northern Queensland, James Cook University, the Australian Institute of Marine Science headquarters, Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, the large Army base at Lavarack Barracks, and RAAF Base Townsville.

Demographics
Townsville's population was 179,011 at the 2021 census. The city has a younger population than the Australian and Queensland averages. The city has traditionally experienced a high turnover of people, with the army base and government services bringing in many short to medium term workers. The region has also become popular with mine workers on fly in/fly out contracts.

In 2021, 9.0% of Townsville's population was of Aboriginal or Torres Strait islander descent. In 2021, there were 21,180 people of Aboriginal or Torres Strait islander descent living in Townsville.

Education
There are over 60 private and State schools of primary and secondary education within the Townsville area. Townsville Grammar School is the oldest co-educational school on the Australian mainland. The Townsville State High School opened on 7 June 1924.

Universities
James Cook University (JCU) is a public university based in Townsville. Established in 1970, the main campus is located in the suburb of Douglas. JCU was the second university in Queensland and the first in North Queensland. The University has a strong and internationally recognised expertise in marine & tropical biology. The JCU Medical School was established in 1999 and is linked with the adjacent tertiary-level Townsville Hospital. The Veterinary Sciences undergraduate facility is the newest in Australia.

CQUniversity first established a presence in Townsville in 2014 with the opening of a Distance Education Study Centre in the CBD. The University quickly felt the demand for a face-to-face teaching presence in Townsville and has since opened a purpose built campus in the city offering many on-campus courses including nursing, paramedic science, business and psychology as well as supporting growing numbers of online students.

Vocational education
The city is home to the Pimlico and Aitkenvale campuses of TAFE Queensland North — a Technical and Further Education College, a campus of Queensland Agricultural Training Colleges, and Tec-NQ.

Culture, events and festivals
The Australian Festival of Chamber Music is an international chamber music festival held over ten days each July in Townsville. The festival has been running since 1991, and attracts many acclaimed international and Australian musicians. Townsville also has its own orchestra, the Barrier Reef Orchestra, which presents concerts throughout North Queensland. The Townsville Entertainment Centre, seating more than 5,000 people, is host to many national and international music shows, as well as sporting and trade shows.

The region has many renowned festivals, many which celebrate the international heritage of many that call North Queensland home. The Annual Greek, Italian and Indian Festivals are popular with the locals and tourists alike. The Stable on the Strand is celebrated each Christmas. The Townsville Civic Theatre is North Queensland's premier cultural facility. Since its opening in 1978, the Theatre has been a centre of entertainment and performing arts, providing an environment to further develop the performing arts in Townsville and the North. TheatreiNQ is an independent professional theatre company based in Townsville, presenting four shows a year including the popular annual Shakespeare Under the Stars in Queen Gardens. Dancenorth Australia is a contemporary dance company based in Townsville, whose works tour all over Australia and the World. Dancenorth is the only performing arts organisation based in regional Queensland to be included in the Australian Government's National Performing Arts Partnership Framework.

The Perc Tucker Regional Gallery is the public art gallery of Townsville. Located on the eastern end of Flinders Mall, the Gallery focuses on artwork relevant to North Queensland and the Tropics. Every second September the gallery presents sculpture artworks and art festival called Strand Ephemera, exhibited over the two kilometre beachfront strip. The City is also home to Umbrella Studios who regularly exhibit and promote the work of artists from the region.

The Townsville City Council and Townsville Intercultural Centre annually organises Cultural Fest in mid August. The festival has been held in various locations across the city over its history, and is currently held on the grounds of James Cook University. The Cultural Fest showcases the cultural diversity of the city and dance, food, and music from different ethnic groups in the region. The city has several museums. The Maritime Museum of Townsville, also known as the Townsville Maritime Museum, is located as part of the Port of Townsville. Its features include HMAS Townsville (FCPB 205), SS Yongala, and lenses from current and former lighthouses. The Museum of Tropical Queensland (abbreviated MTQ) is a museum of natural history, archaeology and history. In addition to housing artifacts from the wrecks, the museum administers the shipwreck sites for HMS Pandora and SS Yongala. The Museum of Underwater Art (MOUA) features the work of underwater sculptor Jason deCaires Taylor, including the coral greenhouse at John Brewer Reef and the ocean siren at The Strand.

The city has many restaurants, concentrated on Palmer Street in South Townsville, Flinders Street and along the Strand. The city also has a vibrant pub and night-club scene, many of them located in Flinders Street East.

Architecture
There are many well-preserved old buildings in Townsville dating from the 19th and the beginning of the 20th centuries, especially in Flinders Street which is the oldest street. One of the most famous buildings is the Townsville Post Office, built in 1886 with a clock tower which was dismantled in 1942 and reconstructed in 1963/64. Another sightworthy building is the Australian Joint Stock Bank which was built 1887–88. Tattersalls Hotel which was built as early as 1864, the former Bank of New South Wales dating from 1887 and the former Bank of Australasia built in 1905 are sightworthy historic buildings as well. The Australian Joint Stock Bank (1887–88), the Townsville Technical College dating from 1920/21, the Westpac Bank Building (1935) and the Great Northern Hotel with its large balconies which was completed in 1901 are worth a visit as well. The former Main Train Station opposite the Great Northern Hotel was built 1910–1913 and inaugurated on 24 December 1913.

One of the most impressive churches of Townsville is Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Cathedral which was built 1896–1902. St. James' Anglican Cathedral was built in two stages 1887–1892 and 1959–1960.

Parks
Queens Gardens, laid out in 1870 in the Northern part of Townsville cover an area of 4 ha. Originally they were a part of a botanical garden of 100 acre dedicated to the experimentation and propagation of tropical plants like breadfruit, mahogany, coffee and mangoes.

The Strand is considered the most popular park of Townsville. In 1950, Tobruk Memorial Baths were inaugurated here. The Strand is known for its Rock Pool and for various cultural events which take place here.

Anderson Park covering an area of about 20 ha in the district of Muningburra is mainly known for its ferns and pandanus. The park is named after William Andersen (1845–1935), the first curator of parks of the city. The park was laid out in 1929. Its design was prepared in 1962 by Allan Wilson, Superintendent of parks from 1959 to 1969.

Townsville Palmetum, a park covering an area of 17 ha with about 300 species of plants, was inaugurated in the South of Townsville in 1988. Most of the 60 species of palms which are native to Australia can be seen here.

The first park in the city centre which was named Anzac Memorial Park later was laid out as early as 1912. A bandstand was built in the middle of the park in 1913.

Media and communications
Townsville is the media centre for North Queensland, with four commercial and five narrowcast radio stations, North Queensland ABC radio station, three commercial television stations, one regional daily newspaper and one community weekly newspaper (both owned by News Ltd). There are no local Sunday papers although The Sunday Mail (Qld) — based in Brisbane — does have a North Queensland edition. Media distributed on the World Wide Web include the Townsville Bulletin.

Sport and recreation
Townsville hosts several sporting teams that participate in national competitions. These include the North Queensland Cowboys (National Rugby League), who play at Queensland Country Bank Stadium and the Townsville Fire (Women's National Basketball League) who play at the Townsville RSL Stadium. The city also formerly hosted the Townsville Crocodiles, (National Basketball League) who played out of the Townsville Entertainment Centre, known as The Swamp during Crocs home games.

Queensland Country Bank Stadium is the home ground for the Cowboys. It replaced the Willows Sports Complex. The Willows Sports Complex was an official venue for the 2003 Rugby Union World Cup, with three matches played in Townsville. Townsville hosted the popular Japanese national rugby union team. Tony Ireland Stadium, in the suburb of Thuringowa, has an international standard cricket and AFL stadium. Townsville was a host city for the preliminary rounds of the men's (Pool B) and women's (pool A) Basketball competition for the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games.

The most popular sport in Townsville is rugby league. In addition to the Cowboys in the NRL, Townsville and its surrounding suburbs host a number of local junior and senior rugby league sides in the successful Townsville District Rugby League, including A-grade sides: Brothers Townsville, Norths Devils, Souths, Western Lions and Centrals ASA Tigers. The local league has produced a number of Australian internationals such as Gorden Tallis and Gene Miles.

Townsville also hosts two Touch Football associations. The Townsville/Castle Hill Touch Association (TCHTA) conducts competitions annually at its grounds at Queens Park, Townsville. Thuringowa Touch Association (TTA) also conducts competitions at Greenwood Park, Kirwan. Both competitions have produced a host of regional, state and national representative players and officials.

Townsville is also home to Football Queensland North. Soccer is played by junior participants in the city. Major clubs include MA Olympic, Brothers Townsville, and Saints Eagles Souths FC. As of 2020, soccer had 3,614 participants in the region.

Townsville and Districts Rugby Union run a successful Winter Junior and Senior Rugby Union competition including teams from Ingham, Charters Towers and Ayr. Townsville has produced a number of members of the Australia national rugby union team (the Wallabies) in the past including Peter Grigg and Sam Scott-Young.

AFL Townsville operate a regional Australian rules football league in the region. Jake Spencer is the first local player to play in the AFL.

Several Australian Test and ODI cricketers have come out of Townsville including fast bowler Mitchell Johnson, Andrew Symonds and James Hopes. In 2012 Townsville hosted under 19 cricket World Cup preliminary matches, semi finals and the final featuring Australia and India.

The Townsville Running Festival is an annual event organised by the Townsville Road Runners that began with the first Townsville Marathon in 1972 and now also includes several shorter fun runs.

The Reid Park Street Circuit is located in Reid Park. Each July since 2009, it hosts the Townsville 400 for the Supercars Championship.

Townsville also has a go cart track and motocross track; Townsville had a 1/4-mile dragstrip, but it closed its gates on 25 August 2012 due to urban development.

Rowing occurs at Townsville & JCU Rowing Club and Riverway Rowing Club. Both clubs cater to competitive masters, social, learn to row and school-based rowing programs. In 2009 the Townsville & JCU club won its first Queensland Club Premiership and in 2010 Riverway club claimed theirs.

Townsville has 3 Tennis Clubs. The Western Suburbs Tennis Club Inc., Tennis Townsville Inc. and Kalynda Chase Tennis Centre. Each year Tennis Townsville host the NQ Open Championships and Western Suburbs Tennis Club host the Townsville Open. These tournaments see Australian and international players competing for up to $10,000 prize money and the opportunity to improve their Australian Tennis Ranking.

Townsville Speedway is a speedway venue located at the Townsville Showground on Showgrounds Road, off Ingham Road. It has also been used for motorcycle speedway and has hosted important events, including the Australian qualifying round of the Speedway World Championship in 1990 and the final of the Queensland Solo Championship on four occasions.

Health
The Townsville Hospital is a 580-bed university teaching hospital in the suburb of Douglas. The Townsville Hospital was formally located in North Ward whose main building serves an example of the Streamline Moderne style of architecture. It is co-located with the James Cook University School of Medicine. The hospital caters for the city of Townsville, as well as people in the north as far as Thursday Island and Papua New Guinea, west to Mount Isa and south to Sarina. During the year 2010, the hospital admitted 54,941 patients, and had 60,676 presentations to the emergency department. The hospital is also the major tertiary maternity centre, with 2,308 babies delivered in 2010.

The Townsville Hospital underwent a $437 million redevelopment as of 2011, delivering an additional 100 beds, a four-storey expanded Emergency Department, expanded Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, and expansion of oncology services. The Emergency Department will be the largest in Queensland.

There are four other public health campuses in Townsville: the Kirwan Health Campus, the Magnetic Island Health Service Centre, the North Ward Health Campus and the Townsville Hospital Dentist, located in North Ward.

In addition there are two private hospitals in Townsville, the Mater Hospital and the Mater Women's and Children's Hospital.

Transport
Townsville is the intersection point of the A1 (Bruce Highway), and the A6 (Flinders Highway) National Highways. The Townsville Ring Road, planned to become part of the re-routed A1 route bypass, circumnavigates the city.

Townsville has a public transport system contracted to Translink, which provides regular services between many parts of the city. Public transport is also available from the CBD to Bushland Beach. Regular ferry and vehicular barge services operate to Magnetic Island and Palm Island.

Construction of railways in the area of Townsville started as early as 1879, and the first railway line was inaugurated in 1880. The line to Mount Isa which is used by The Inlander today was inaugurated in 1929. The railway lines to Cairns and Brisbane which are used by the Spirit of Queensland were inaugurated in 1929 as well. The former train station, a very representative building at the end of Flinders Street, was completed in 1913. The present train station of Townsville was opened in 2003.

The Tilt Train service connects Townsville railway station to Brisbane in the south and Cairns in the north. Townsville is a major destination and generator of rail freight services. The North Coast railway line, operated by Queensland Rail, meets the Western line in the city's south. Container operations are also common and the products of the local nickel and copper refineries, as well as minerals from the western line (Mount Isa), are transported to the port via trains. The Port of Townsville has bulk handling facilities for importing cement, nickel ore and fuel, and for exporting sugar and products from North Queensland's mines. The port has three sugar-storage sheds, with the newest being the largest under-cover storage area in Australia.

The city is served by Townsville International Airport. The Airport handles direct domestic flights to Darwin, Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, as well as direct regional flights to destinations such as Cairns, Mackay, Mount Isa, Rockhampton and Toowoomba. Airlines currently servicing the airport include Qantas, Virgin Australia, Jetstar, Regional Express, Qantaslink and Airnorth.

Defence facilities
The Australian Army maintains a very strong presence in the north of Australia and this is evident by the basing of the Army's 3rd Brigade at Lavarack Barracks in Townsville. The 3rd Brigade is a light infantry brigade. The brigade consists of two light infantry battalions — the 1st and 3rd Battalions of the Royal Australian Regiment (1 and 3 RAR) – and a cavalry contingent – the 2nd Cavalry Regiment. It also has integral Artillery, Engineer, Aviation Reconnaissance and Combat Service Support units. It is a high-readiness brigade that has been deployed frequently at very short notice on combat operations outside mainland Australia. These include Somalia, Rwanda, Namibia, East Timor, Bougainville, Solomon Islands, Iraq and Afghanistan.

In addition to the 3rd Brigade, a number of other major units are based in Townsville. These include the 5th Aviation Regiment, equipped with MRH-90 and Chinook helicopters, co-located at the RAAF Base in Garbutt and the 10th Force Support Battalion based at Ross Island. 10 FSB is a force logistics unit that provides back up logistic support to deployed units. The battalion provides specialist transport (including amphibious) and supply support. Along with this there is also the 11th Combat Service Support Battalion and the 3rd Combat Engineer Regiment.

The Army also maintains an Army Reserve brigade in Townsville designated the 11th Brigade. This formation is similar in structure to the 3rd Brigade but comprises reserve soldiers only. There is also two active cadet units, 130 ACU located within Heatley Secondary College and 15 ACU located on Lavarack Barracks as of 2010, previously located at Ignatius Park College.

As with the Army, the Royal Australian Air Force also maintains a presence in Townsville. RAAF Base Townsville, which is located in the suburb of Garbutt, houses the Beech KingAir 350 aircraft from No. 38 Squadron RAAF. This unit operated the venerable DHC-4 Caribou aircraft until late 2009; however, it has re-equipped in the short term while protracted analysis for a more appropriate Battlefield Transport and Utility aircraft continues. This detachment provides support to the Army units in Townsville. The base is also a high readiness Defence asset and is prepared to accept the full range of RAAF aircraft types as well as other international aircraft including the huge C-17 Globemaster III.

Townsville is also the staging point for the movement of personnel and materials to the remote parts of Northern Australia and many overseas locations. The Australian Navy's two Canberra-class landing helicopter dock ships visit Townsville frequently to exercise with the 3rd Brigade and other troops and formations from the area and deploy them when tasked.

Community groups
The Townsville branch of the Queensland Country Women's Association meets at the CWA Hall at 36 Latchford Street, Pimlico.

Sister cities
Townsville's sister cities are:

 * 🇵🇬 Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea
 * 🇯🇵 Shūnan, Yamaguchi, Japan
 * 🇯🇵 Iwaki, Fukushima, Japan
 * Changshu, Jiangsu, China
 * 🇰🇷 Suwon, Gyeonggi, South Korea
 * Foshan, Guangdong, China

Athletes

 * Jarrod Bannister (1984–2018), Australian athlete and Olympian
 * Glenn Buchanan (born 1962), Australian Olympic butterfly swimmer
 * Lizette Cabrera (born 1997), Australian International Tennis Player
 * Tom Chester (born 2001), Australian rugby league player
 * Brett Clarke (born 1972), Australian Olympic table tennis player
 * Natalie Cook (born 1975), Australian Olympic beach volleyball player
 * Mervyn Crossman (1935–2017), Australian Olympic field hockey player
 * Daisy D'Arcy (born 2002), Australian rules footballer
 * Tony David (born 1967), professional darts champion
 * Renita Farrell-Garard (born 1972), Australian hockey player and dual Olympic gold medalist
 * Dennis Firestone (born 1944), Australian racing driver
 * Helen Gray (born 1956), Australian Olympic swimmer
 * Tom Green (born 2001), Australian rules footballer
 * Peter Grigg, Australian rugby union player
 * Josh Hall (born 1990), Australian rules footballer
 * Rob Hammond (born 1981), Australian field hockey player
 * Ellie Hampson (born 2001), Australian rules footballer
 * Jarrod Harbrow (born 1988), Australian rules footballer
 * Lesleigh Harvey (born 1960), Australian Olympic swimmer
 * Valentine Holmes (born 1995), Australian Rugby League player
 * James Hopes (born 1978), Australian cricketer
 * Josh Jenkins (born 1989), Basketballer and Australian rules footballer
 * Corey Jensen (born 1994), Australian rugby league player
 * Mitchell Johnson (born 1981), Australian cricketer
 * Breanna Koenen (born 1994), Australian rules footballer
 * Laurie Lawrence (born 1941), Australian Olympic swimming coach
 * Summer Lochowicz (born 1978), Australian Olympic beach volleyball player
 * James Mason (born 1947), Australian Olympic field hockey player
 * Luke McLean (born 1987), Italian Australian Rugby Union footballer
 * Gene Miles (born 1959), Australian rugby league footballer
 * Jack Miller (born 1995), Australian MotoGP rider
 * Danny Moore, (born 1971), Australian rugby league player
 * Greg Norman (born 1955), former golf world number one
 * Aaron Payne (born 1982), Australian Rugby League player
 * Russell Perry (born 1938), Australian Olympic weightlifter
 * John-Patrick Smith (born 1989), Australian tennis player
 * Braydon Preuss (born 1995), Australian rules footballer
 * Sam Scott-Young, Australian rugby union player
 * Gehamat Shibasaki (born 1998), Australian rugby league player
 * Jamal Shibasaki (born 2005), Australian rugby league player
 * Jake Spencer (born 1989), Australian rules footballer
 * Andrew Symonds (1975–2022), Australian cricketer, played for the Wanderers club in Townsville
 * Gorden Tallis (born 1973), Australian rugby league footballer
 * Sam Thaiday (born 1985), State of Origin and Australian rugby league player
 * Pud Thurlow (1903–1975), Australian test cricketer in the 1930s
 * Johnathan Thurston (born 1983), first North Queensland Cowboys NRL Premiership winning co/Captain with Matthew Scott
 * Adrian Trevilyan (born 2001), Australian rugby league player
 * Libby Trickett (née Lenton; born 1985), Australian Olympic swimmer
 * Breiana Whitehead (born 2000), Australian Olympic kitefoiler

Journalists

 * Julian Assange (born 1971), editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks
 * Clem Christesen (1911–2003), journalist and editor of the Australian literary magazine, Meanjin
 * Yvonne Sampson (born 1980), Foxtel sports journalist
 * John Vause, CNN reporter and anchor

Artists

 * Ben Bennett, Australian singer
 * Billy Doolan (born 1952), Australian Indigenous artist

Military personnel

 * James Cannan (1882–1976), former Australian major general
 * Charles Raymond Gurney (1906–1942), Australian aviator
 * Air Vice Marshal Ellis Wackett (1901–1984), Australian military aviation pioneer
 * Sir Lawrence Wackett (1896–1982), Australian aircraft industry pioneer

Lawyers and politicians

 * Bill Heatley (1920–1971), former Liberal senator
 * Patricia Staunton (born 1946), Australian magistrate and former NSW politician
 * Russell Skerman (1903–1983), Supreme Court judge

Scientists and mathematicians

 * Joe Baker (1932–2018), marine scientist and rugby league footballer
 * Terry Hughes (born 1956), marine biologist specialising in the study of coral reefs
 * Helene Marsh (born 1945), environmental scientist, specialising in the study of dugongs
 * Ralph Douglas Kenneth Reye (1912–1977), Australian pathologist who first described Reye's syndrome.
 * Peter Ridd, physicist and author
 * John Veron (born 1945), specialist in the study of corals and reefs
 * Edwin C. Webb (1921–2006), Biochemist, Vice-Chancellor of Macquarie University
 * Nicole Webster, marine scientist
 * William J. Youden (1900–1971), statistician

Others

 * Lyn Ashley (born 1940), actress, daughter of Madge Ryan
 * Harriet Dyer (born c. 1988), Hollywood film actress
 * Rick Farley (1952–2006), Australian activist for Indigenous Australians’ rights and former CEO of the National Farmers Federation
 * Rachael Finch (born 1988), Miss Universe Australia 2009 and 3rd runner-up at Miss Universe 2009
 * Madge Ryan (1919–1994), Hollywood, Broadway, and British (Witness in the Dark) stage and film actress – (Vide supra, daughter, Lyn Ashley)
 * Francis Stuart (1902–2000), Irish writer
 * Natalie Weir (born 1967), Australian choreographer

title: Townsville


text:
Charles Collé

Charles Collé (14 April 1709 – 3 November 1783) was a French dramatist and songwriter.

Biography
The son of a notary, he was born in Paris. He became interested in the rhymes of Jean Heguanier, the most famous writer of couplets in Paris. From a notary's office, Collé was transferred to that of the receiver-general of finance, where he remained for nearly twenty years. When about seventeen, however, he made the acquaintance of Alexis Piron, and afterwards, through Gallet (1698?–1757), of Panard. The example of these three masters of the vaudeville decided his future but also made him diffident; and for some time he composed nothing but amphigouris—verses whose merit was measured by their unintelligibility. The friendship of the younger Crébillon helped broaden his horizons, and the establishment in 1729 of the famous "Société du Caveau", a drinking-club known for its wit and good company, gave him a field for the display of his fine talent for popular song.

In 1739 the Society of the Caveau, which numbered among its members Helvétius, Charles Pinot Duclos, Pierre Joseph Bernard, called Gentil-Bernard, Jean-Philippe Rameau, Alexis Piron, and the two Crébillons, was dissolved, and was not reconstituted till twenty years afterwards. His first and his best comedy, La Vérité dans le vin, appeared in 1747.

Meanwhile, Louis Philippe I, Duke of Orléans, who was an excellent comic actor, particularly in representations of low life, and had been looking out for an author to write suitable parts for him, made Collé his reader. It was for the duke and his associates that Collé composed the greater part of his Théâtre de société. In 1763 Collé produced at the Théâtre Français Dupuis et Desronais, a successful sentimental comedy, which was followed in 1771 by La Veuve, which was a complete failure. In 1774 appeared La Partie de chasse de Henri Quatre (partly taken from Dodsley's King and the Miller of Mansfield), Collé's last and best play.

From 1748 to 1772, besides these and a multitude of songs, Collé was writing his Journal, a curious collection of literary and personal strictures on his companions as well as on their enemies, on Piron as on Voltaire, on La Harpe as on Pierre Corneille.

Collé's lyrics are frank and jovial, though often licentious. The subjects are love and wine; occasionally, however, as in the famous lyric (1756) On the capture of Port Mahon, for which the author received a pension of 600 livres, the note of patriotism is struck with no unskilful hand, while in many others Collé shows considerable epigrammatic force.

Works
Sainte-Beuve saw in Collé an historical and moral witness of his time.

The plays he composed for the Duke of Orleans were collected under the title Théâtre de société, 1768, 2 volumes in-8. Some of his parades are, but truncated and disfigured in Théâtre des Boulevards, 1756.

The collection of his songs, published in 1807, form 2 volumes in-18.

 * 1745: La Mère rivale
 * 1747: La Vérité dans le vin ou les désagréments de la galanterie, comédie en 1 acte et en prose
 * 1753: Daphnis et Eglé, music by Rameau
 * 1762: La Partie de chasse de Henri IV
 * 1763: Dupuis et Desronais, comedy in 3 acts and in free verse, premiered by les comédiens français ordinaires du Roi 17 January
 * 1768: L'Île sonnante, music by Monsigny
 * 1770: La Veuve, comedy
 * 1777: La Tête à perruque ou le Bailli, petit conte dramatique en 1 petit acte et en prose
 * 1807: Journal historique ou Mémoires littéraires, Paris, 3 volumes in-8 ; reprint by H. Bonhomme, 1868

title: Charles Collé


text:
Alexis Piron

Alexis Piron (9 July 1689 – 21 January 1773) was a French epigrammatist and dramatist.

Life
Alexis Piron was born in Dijon, where his father, Aimé Piron, was an apothecary. Piron senior wrote verse in Burgundian. Alexis began life as clerk and secretary to a banker, and then studied law. In 1719, when nearly thirty years old, he went to Paris where an accident brought him money and notoriety. The jealousy of the regular actors produced an edict restricting the Théâtre de la Foire, or licensed booths at fair times, to a single character on the stage. None of the ordinary writers for this theatre would attempt a monologue-drama for the purpose, and Piron made a great success with a piece called Arlequin Deucalion, representing Deucalion immediately after the Deluge, amusing himself with recreating in succession the different types of man.

In 1728, he produced Les Fils ingrats (known later as L'Ecole des pères) at the Comédie-Française. He attempted tragedy in Callisthene (1730), Gustave Vasa (1733) and Fernand Cortes (1744), but none of these succeeded, and Piron returned to comedy with La Metromanie (1738), in which the hero, Damis, suffers from the verse mania.

His most intimate associates at this time were Mademoiselle Quinault, the actress, and her friend Marie Thérèse Quénaudon, known as Mlle de Bar. This lady was slightly older than Piron and not beautiful, but after twenty years' acquaintance he married her in 1741. He was elected in 1753 to the Académie française, but his enemies raked up a certain Ode à Priape, dating from his early days, and induced Louis XV to interpose his veto. Piron was nevertheless given a pension, and during the last fifty years of his life was never in want. His best title to remembrance lies in his epigrams. The burlesque epitaph on himself, in which he ridicules the Academy—"Ci-gît Piron qui ne fut rien/Pas même académicien" "Here lies Piron, who was nothing,/Not even a member of the [French] Academy"—is well-known, among many others. Friedrich Melchior, baron von Grimm called him a "machine a saillies." He was later (1762) elected to membership in the Académie des Sciences, Arts et Belles-Lettres de Dijon.

Piron published his own theatrical works in 1758, and after his death his friend and literary executor, Rigoley de Juvigny, published his Œuvres completes. M. Bonhomme produced a critical edition in 1859, completed by Poésies choisies et pièces inédites in 1879.

Piron is compared to the Elder in The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Pavlovich as a compliment of wit.

title: Alexis Piron


text:
Coleco Adam

The Coleco Adam is a home computer and expansion device for the ColecoVision by American toy and video game manufacturer Coleco. The Adam was an attempt to follow on the success of the company's ColecoVision video game console. It was available as Expansion Module #3 for the ColecoVision, converting it into a home computer, and as a standalone unit. As such, it had the benefit of being entirely compatible with all ColecoVision games and peripherals. The computer came with 64 KB of memory, a tape drive for a proprietary medium called Digital Data Packs, a daisy wheel printer, and productivity applications, along with two DDPs for SmartBASIC and Buck Rogers: Planet of Zoom Super Game. It was released in October 1983 with the initial price of $700.

Although its presentation and concept were positively received, the Adam was heavily criticized upon launch for numerous defects in early units. Users lodged complaints about the reliability of the disk and tape drives. In particular, when the computer starts up, the power supply emits an electromagnetic pulse so strong that it can scramble or destroy data on storage media left inside the drives or near the computer. Other design flaws were noted, such as the Digital Data Pack tapes being corrupted by the drives they are stored in and the peculiar decision to require users to plug the machine into a printer for power. About 60 percent of Adam owners returned their units because of the defects. Besides the defects, the Adam also suffered from store availability issues, with Coleco having shipped only 95,000 units rather than the goal of 500,000 by the end of 1983. Many of the quality issues were resolved, but the Adam's reputation was permanently damaged and, in spite of price reductions, its sales negatively impacted, with Coleco reporting a loss of over $258 million. The Adam was discontinued in January 1985, and Coleco never recovered from the losses incurred, discontinuing its ColecoVision shortly afterward and finally declared itself bankrupt in 1988. Several computer journalists consider the Coleco Adam computer to be one of the worst ever. Despite its failures, it has gained a following among enthusiasts, who continue to develop hardware and software for it.

History
Coleco announced the Adam at the Summer Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in June 1983, and executives predicted sales of 500,000 by Christmas 1983. From the time of the computer's introduction to the time of its shipment, the price increased, from US$525 to US$725.

The Adam announcement received favorable press coverage. Competitors such as Commodore and Atari almost immediately announced similar computer/printer bundles. The company engaged in an extensive marketing campaign, with television commercials for "boys age 8 to 16 and their fathers ... the two groups that really fuel computer purchases", and print advertisements in nontechnical publications like Time and People.

The Boston Phoenix, observing that Adam's $600 price was comparable to the lowest price for a letter-quality printer alone, stated "a nice trick if they can do it!" It was a trick; the computers were shown behind tinted glass that hid the fact that they were hand-made and had non-working tape drives. In June, Coleco promised to ship the computer by August. In August it promised to ship a half million Adams by Christmas, but missed shipping dates of 1 September, 15 September, 1 October, and 15 October. Ahoy! reported that Coleco had not shipped by early October because of various problems. Each month of delay could mean losing the opportunity to sell 100,000 units, the magazine reported, adding that missing the Christmas season would result in "inestimable losses". CEO Arnold Greenberg promised in late September to ship by "mid-October", but claimed that Adam was "not, primarily, a Christmas item". The printer was the main cause of the delays; after it failed to function properly at demonstrations, by November InfoWorld reported on "growing skepticism" about its reliability, speed, and noise.

Greenberg refused to say how many units he expected Coleco to ship by the end of the year. The company did not ship review units to magazines planning to publish reviews before Christmas, stating that all were going to dealers, but admitted that it would not meet the company's goal of shipping 400,000 computers by the end of the year; Kmart and JCPenney announced in November that it would not sell the Adam during the Christmas season because of lack of availability. Despite much consumer interest for Adam and a shortage of competing home computers, Coleco shipped only 95,000 units by December, many of which were defective; Creative Computing later reported that "the rumored return rate was absolutely alarming". One store manager stated that five of six sold Adams had been returned, and expected that the sixth would likely be returned after being opened on Christmas. Coleco partnered with Honeywell Information Systems to open up repair chain stores around the nation. By December 1983, the press reported that company executives at a news conference "fielded questions about Coleco's problems with its highly publicized new Adam home computer, which has been plagued by production delays and complaints of defects", with the company able to fulfill only one third of its Canadian orders for Christmas. Less than 10% of Adam units had defects, the company claimed, "well below industry standards".

An analyst stated in early 1984 that the company had

"targeted a very special area: primarily home users who have students or teenage children who are writing term papers and who tend to be naive computer users. Coleco has tried to make the Adam easy to use and attractive to that group, consciously excluding other groups by the way that [they] configured the machine."

By March 1984, John J. Anderson declared Adam as having caused for Coleco "a trail of broken promises, unfulfilled expectations, and extremely skittish stockholders". On January 2, 1985, after continuing complaints about Adam failures and low sales, Coleco announced that it was discontinuing the Adam and would be selling off its inventory. Coleco revealed that it lost US$35 million in late 1983 (the time of the Adam's launch), along with a loss of US$13.4 million in the first 9 months of 1984. Coleco did not reveal which company they were selling the inventory to, but stated that they had worked with this partner before. No final sales numbers were revealed of the Adam computer and expansion, but one analyst estimated that Coleco had sold 350,000 Adams in 1983 and 1984.

Technical details
In its favor, the Adam had a large software library from the start. It was derived from and is compatible with the ColecoVision's software and accessories, and, in addition, the popular CP/M operating system was available as an option. Its price gave a complete system: a computer with 64 KB of RAM, a tape drive for a proprietary medium called Digital Data Packs, a letter-quality daisy wheel printer, a typewriter application, and a word processor called SmartWriter, along with two DDPs for SmartBASIC and the Buck Rogers: Planet of Zoom Super Game. The IBM PCjr sold for $669 but included no peripherals, and although the popular Commodore 64 sold for around $200, its price was not much lower after the purchase of a printer, tape or disk drive, and software.

Like many home computers of its day, the Adam was designed to be able to use a television set for its display via an included RF port and RF modulator, but it also supported higher-quality video output to a contemporary computer monitor via a built-in composite video port or a DIN connector which also carried audio. The SmartWriter electronic typewriter loaded when the system was turned on. In this mode, the system operated just like a typewriter, printing letters as soon as the user typed them. Pressing the Escape/WP key put SmartWriter into word processor mode, which functioned similarly to a modern word processor.

SmartBASIC
Unlike other home computers at the time, the Adam did not have its BASIC interpreter stored in ROM. Instead, it featured a built-in electronic typewriter and word processor, SmartWriter, as well as the Elementary Operating System (EOS) OS kernel and the 8 KB OS-7 ColecoVision operating system. The SmartBASIC interpreter was delivered on a Digital Data Pack tape cassette; this version of BASIC was designed to be mostly compatible with Applesoft BASIC. The interpreter was developed by Randall Hyde of Lazer Microsystems.

Software developers who received technical information from Coleco had to agree to an extremely restrictive license. Coleco demanded the right to inspect and demand changes in their software, forced them to destroy inventories of software if Coleco revoked the license, and prohibited them from publicly criticizing Coleco in any way.

A less expensive version of the Adam plugged into a ColecoVision, which delivered on one of ColecoVision's launch commitments that owners would one day be able to upgrade their game system to a fully featured computer system.

Printer
The Adam printer computer used daisy wheel printing, giving a higher quality print than most dot-matrix printers of the time. The print ribbon was a one-time ribbon, of the type also used by IBM Selectric typewriters. The one-time ribbon produced better quality print than reusable ribbons, but they needed to be replaced more often. While the print quality was high, the print speed was quite low. Daisy wheels with different fonts were available, but difficult to find. The printer had a friction feed rather than a tractor feed system, so they didn't need continuous form paper. The printer was only capable of printing text, so it couldn't do graphics (other than ASCII art).

Problems
Many early Adams were defective. An author of the computer's manual reported receiving "300 calls on Christmas week" from owners with problems, saying that some callers were on their fourth or fifth Adam. Defective computers at the time could be repaired only by mailing it to Coleco in Connecticut. Despite improving product quality and the Honeywell repair partnership, the company could not improve the computer's poor reputation. Problems included:

 * The Adam generates a surge of electromagnetic energy on startup, which can erase the contents of any removable media left in or near the drive. Making this problem worse, some of the Coleco manuals instructed the user to put the tape in the drive before turning the computer on. A sticker on later Adams warned users to not turn the power on or off with tapes in the drive.
 * Since Coleco made the unusual decision of using the printer to supply power to the entire Adam system, if the printer's power supply failed or the printer was missing, none of the system worked. Amstrad CPC and PC designs of the era did similar with the power supply in the monitor.
 * Once put into Word Processor mode, SmartWriter could not get back into the typewriter mode without the system being rebooted.
 * The Adam's Digital Data Pack drives, although faster and of higher capacity than the audio cassette drives used for competing computers, were less reliable and still not as fast as a floppy disk drive. At the time of Adam's design, tape drives were still a popular storage medium for home users, but by the time of its release, floppy disks had dropped in cost and in some markets were the preferred medium. Coleco eventually shipped a 160 KB 5¼ inch disk drive for the Adam.

Software
ColecoVision software that was not built-in was mostly on ROM cartridges, with AdamCalc, Personal Checkbook, and SmartFiler programs also being on tape.

 * Adam Banner
 * AdamCalc
 * Business Pack I
 * CP/M 2.2 and Assembler
 * Data Calculator
 * Home Budget Planning
 * Personal Accountant
 * Personal Checkbook
 * Power Print
 * Savings and Loan
 * SmartFiler
 * SmartLetters & Forms
 * SmartLOGO
 * Turbo Load
 * Update for Coleco AdamLink Modem

Reception
To showcase the machine at the 1983 Summer CES in Chicago, Coleco decided to demonstrate a port of its ColecoVision conversion of Donkey Kong on the system. Nintendo was in the midst of negotiating a deal with Atari to license its Famicom (later called the Nintendo Entertainment System) for distribution outside Japan, and the final signing would have been done at CES. Atari had exclusive rights to Donkey Kong for home computers (as Coleco had for game consoles), and when Atari saw that Coleco was showing Donkey Kong on a computer, its proposed deal with Nintendo was delayed. Coleco had to agree not to sell the Adam version of Donkey Kong. Ultimately, it had no bearing on the Atari/Nintendo deal, as Atari's CEO Ray Kassar was fired the next month and the proposal went nowhere, with Nintendo deciding to market its system on its own.

The September 1983 issue of Byte reported that the Adam's introduction had "dominated" the June CES in Chicago. Citing its $599 price, bundled hardware, and compatibility with ColecoVision and CP/M software, the magazine compared the Adam's potential impact on the home-computer industry to that of the Osborne 1. Ahoy! reported in January 1984 that "early indications were that the Adam would be a runaway best seller" but the delays, technical problems, and Coleco's reputation as a toy company "should combine to keep buyers away in droves", and predicted that "there is no reason to think that the Adam will topple the C-64 from the catbird seat".

The Washington Post's T. R. Reid gave "an 'A' for ingenuity [but] would have to stretch to give Adam a gentleman's 'C' for performance" in January 1984. While praising the keyboard and SmartWriter's ease of use, and calling the data pack "a reasonable compromise", he described the documentation as "wholly inadequate" and "generally inexcusable". Reid said that "a more serious flaw with Adam is in the hardware", citing defects in a data pack and both the printer and a replacement, and the computer's unusability without a working printer. He concluded that "I'd dearly like to" recommend the Adam, but "for the time being, though, I'd advise you to proceed with caution", including confirming that the computer worked before leaving the store. Popular Mechanics in February 1984 was more favorable. Calling the bundle "the most revolutionary concept in how to design and sell a home computer that we have seen", it also praised the keyboard and SmartWriter. While citing flaws such as the "slow and very noisy printer", the magazine concluded that "Adam competes with and overpowers everything else in its class", inferior only to the IBM PC and Apple IIe.

Compute!'s March 1984 review also approved of the Adam's prepackaged, all-in-one nature and called the keyboard "impressive", but cited widespread reports of hardware failures. Byte's April 1984 review was much harsher, stating that "it is often said that if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. The Coleco Adam is no exception to this rule". It called the tape-drive technology "impressive", and approved of the keyboard, but reported several cases of data errors and deletions when using the tape drives, a buggy word processor, and a BASIC manual that was "the worst I have ever seen". The reviewer reported that he was waiting for his fifth Adam after four previous systems malfunctioned in two months; only the keyboard did not fail. Surmising that "the computer was apparently rushed into production", he advised "don't buy an Adam—yet. Wait until Coleco fixes all of the Adam's bugs and delivers on all of its promises", and concluded "Coleco is [apparently] betting the whole company on the Adam and it's not yet clear that it's going to win that bet".

The Adam received some good reviews based on the quality of its keyboard and printer, and offered competitive sound and graphics. Its BASIC interpreter, called SmartBASIC, was largely compatible with Applesoft BASIC, which meant that many type-in programs from computer books and magazines would work with the Adam with little or no modification.

Sales were weak, especially after the technical problems became obvious. Coleco lost $35 million in the fourth quarter of 1984 as returns flooded in. Officially, Coleco blamed "manuals which did not offer the first-time user adequate assistance". Coleco reintroduced Adam with a new instruction manual, lower price, and a $500 college scholarship along with each unit for use by a young child (with $125 paid for each completed year of college). Fewer than 100,000 units ultimately sold.

A New York City-based advertising firm, Ketchum Advertising, won the assignment of promoting the computer. The agency staffed up to handle the work, and the prestige, of the new business. However, when the January 3, 1985, edition of The New York Times reported that Coleco was abandoning the computer, agency executives, who had no prior warning, were caught off-guard.

The Adam was permanently discontinued in 1985, less than two years after its introduction. Coleco never recovered from the $258 million it had suffered in losses, which has been attributed to the launch of the Adam. Shortly after, the company discontinued sales of its ColecoVision line of consoles, and, in 1988, it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Because of its numerous defects and design flaws, several computer journalists consider it to be one of the worst personal computers of all time.

Legacy
Despite its critical and commercial failure, the Adam has attracted a group of enthusiasts who continue to develop hardware and software for the computer with the help of early dedicated newsletters. Third-party developers contributed to the overall success of the Adam after Coleco abandoned the Adam. Developers such as Orphanware, In House Reps, Thomas Electronics, Oasis Pensive, Eve, E&T, Micro Innovations, Microfox Technologies and others added multiple-density disk drives, memory expanders, speech synthesizers, serial cards, printer cards, IDE cards and other hardware so the Adam could follow other computers into a newer modern age. A group of Adam enthusiasts have also been gathering every year since 1989 for an event called AdamCon.

Specifications

 * CPU: Zilog Z80 @ 3.58 MHz
 * Support processors: three Motorola 6801 processors at 1 MHz (memory & I/O, tape, and keyboard control)
 * Memory: 64 KB RAM, 16 KB video RAM; 32 KB ROM
 * Expansion: 3 internal slots, 1 cartridge slot, and a 62.5 kbit/s half-duplex serial bus called AdamNet. Both the stand-alone and expansion-module versions also have an external expansion port of the same type as the ColecoVision expansion port, on the right hand side.
 * Secondary storage: Digital Data Pack tape cassette, 256 KB
 * Graphics: Texas Instruments TMS9928A (a close relative of the TMS9918 in the TI-99/4A)
 * 256 × 192 resolution
 * 32 monochrome sprites, max. 4 per scanline
 * Sound: Texas Instruments SN76489AN (a rebranded version of the TMS9919 in the TI-99/4A)
 * 3 voices
 * white noise

title: Coleco Adam