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Junius (writer)

Junius was the pseudonym of an anonymous British writer who contributed a series of letters to the Public Advertiser, a London-based political newspaper run by Henry Sampson Woodfall, from 21 January 1769 to 21 January 1772. The signature had been already used, apparently by the same writer, in a letter written on 21 November 1768. These works, along with numerous other personal letters were not included in his Letters of Junius collection that was published in 1772.

Choice of "Junius" as a pseudonym
The name may have been chosen because the same author had already signed Lucius and Brutus, and wished to exhaust the name of Lucius Junius Brutus, the Roman patriot who led the overthrow of the Roman monarchy. Alternatively, the name may have been derived from the Roman poet Juvenal, who was thought also to have had the nomen Junius. Some say that the author of the Junius letters had previously written under numerous other pseudonyms, and that he continued to do so, under different pseudonyms, after the 36-month period (January 1769 – January 1772) in which the Junius letters were published. He may, for example, have written as Philo-Junius, a character who came to the rescue of Junius when it was clear that the public was misinterpreting his messages. There is weak evidence that he also wrote as Veteran, Nemesis and other anonymous correspondents published in the Public Advertiser.

Objectives, goals and achievements
There is a marked distinction between the main Letters of Junius, intended for the erudite public, and his miscellaneous letters. The latter deal with a variety of subjects, some of a purely personal nature, such as the alleged injustice of the Viscount Barrington, the secretary at war, to the officials of his department.

The Letters of Junius had a definite objective:
 * to inform the public of their historical and constitutional rights and liberties as Englishmen;
 * to highlight where and how the government had infringed upon these rights.

Foremost in his sights was the ministry of Augustus Henry Fitzroy, 3rd Duke of Grafton, a fellow Whig whom Junius viewed as particularly corrupt. Grafton's administration had been formed in October 1768, when William Pitt the Elder was compelled by ill health to retire from office, and was a reconstruction of his cabinet of July 1766. Junius fought for the return to power of Pitt, who had recovered and was not on good terms with his successors.

Amongst the letters' promotion of Whig causes (e.g. sympathy with the American colonists and with John Wilkes) is the recurrent Whig hostility towards Scots and a resentment of perceived Scottish political and Court influence. As with Wilkes's satirically named publication The North Briton, Junius resented the King's identity as a Briton, not an Englishman, claiming "believe me, Sir, you were persuaded to pay a very ill-judged compliment to one part of your subjects at the expense of another" and asserting that the Scots "have no claim to your favour".

Junius' private correspondence has been preserved, written in his usual disguised handwriting. He communicated with Pitt, with George Grenville, with Wilkes (all opponents of the Duke of Grafton), and also with Henry Sampson Woodfall, printer and part owner of the Public Advertiser.

The letters are of interest on three grounds:
 * their political significance;
 * their style; and
 * the mystery which long surrounded their authorship.

The matter of his letters is considered by some to be invective, though close inspection of his writings reveals a principled man ahead of his time, exposing blatant corruption by the only means available (anonymity) in a country struggling with the idea of freedom of speech.

He began with a general attack on the ministry for their personal immorality. An ill-judged defence of John Manners, Marquess of Granby, the popular Commander-in-Chief of the Forces, by Sir William Draper gave Junius an easy victory over a vulnerable opponent with weak arguments. It was in this short tussle that Junius' style and wit first developed a reputation and public audience. Junius then realised the potential he had to influence public opinion.

Confidently, Junius then went on to expose the problems at their cause—the ministries of Grafton, Lord North (Grafton's cousin) and the Duke of Bedford. The core of Junius' arguments were the arbitrary appointments made by Grafton, presumably to stay in favour with the Duke of Bedford and his party (also known as the Bedfordites or Bloomsbury Gang). Most notable was Col. Henry Lawes Luttrell (later 2nd Earl Carhampton), whom Grafton appointed MP for Middlesex (instead of the duly elected Wilkes), and Richard Rigby, whom Grafton made Paymaster of the Forces. Junius ended with an assault on Lord Chief Justice Mansfield, who Junius argued had set dangerous legal precedents regarding press freedom and political libel from the Wilkes affair.

Junius was highly disappointed not to have influenced King George III in his 19 December 1769 letter. He tried to encourage the King to overcome his resentments towards the petty Wilkes and also to relinquish his trust in corrupt officials. Junius was not a radical anti-royal Whig, as many texts suggest, though he did trouble himself with explaining to the public the real constitutional role of the royal prerogative, and (if engaged correctly) how it benefited the country.

Contrary to some opinions, the practical effect of the letters was highly significant—they made Grafton unpopular enough to end his ministry in January 1770. Junius could only have been disappointed by Grafton's replacement, Lord North. Junius confessed himself beaten in his private letter to Woodfall of 19 January 1773 for not having achieved his goals. Despite this, Junius' letters were noticed and talked about for generations afterwards and spread throughout Europe in many languages. His concepts on democratic elections, freedom of the press, legal history and the constitutional rights of individuals are now common-place. Few in history have influenced so many and sparked an interest in such real concepts of liberty.

Style
Latin literature (such as the satires of Juvenal, and the speeches of Cicero against Verres and Catiline) was not only studied but imitated at that time, and supplied the inspiration for numerous writings. If Junius was doing what others did, he did it better than anybody else, a fact which sufficiently explains his rapid popularity. His superiority lay in his style. Here also he was by no means original, and he was uneven. There are passages in his writings which can be best described in the words which Burke applied to another writer: "A mere mixture of vinegar and water, at once vapid and sour". But at his best Junius attains to a high degree of artificial elegance and vigour. He shows the influence of Bolingbroke, of Swift, and above all of Tacitus, who appears to have been his favourite author. The imitation is never slavish. Junius adapts, and does not only repeat. No single sentence will show the quality of a style which produces its effect by persistence and repetition, but a typical passage as follows displays at once the method and the spirit. It is taken from Letter XLIX to the Duke of Grafton, 22 June 1771: "The profound respect I bear to the gracious prince who governs this country with no less honour to himself than satisfaction to his subjects, and who restores you to your rank under his standard, will save you from a multitude of reproaches. The attention I should have paid to your failings is involuntarily attracted to the hand which rewards them; and though I am not so partial to the royal judgment as to affirm that the favour of a king can remove mountains of infamy, it serves to lessen at least, for undoubtedly it divides, the burden. While I remember how much is due to his sacred character, I cannot, with any decent appearance of propriety, call you the meanest and the basest fellow in the kingdom. I protest, my Lord, I do not think you so. You will have a dangerous rival in that kind of fame to which you have hitherto so happily directed your ambition, as long as there is one man living who thinks you worthy of his confidence, and fit to be trusted with any share in his government.... With any other prince, the shameful desertion of him in the midst of that distress, which you alone had created, in the very crisis of danger, when he fancied he saw the throne already surrounded by men of virtue and abilities, would have outweighed the memory of your former services. But his majesty is full of justice, and understands the doctrine of compensations; he remembers with gratitude how soon you had accommodated your morals to the necessities of his service, how cheerfully you had abandoned the engagements of private friendship, and renounced the most solemn professions to the public. The sacrifice of Lord Chatham was not lost on him. Even the cowardice and perfidy of deserting him may have done you no disservice in his esteem. The instance was painful, but the principle might please."

Readership
The pre-established harmony between Junius and his readers accounts for the rapidity of his success, and for the importance attributed to him by Burke and Johnson. Before 1772 there appeared at least twelve unauthorized republications of his letters, made by speculative printers. In that year he revised the collection titled Junius: Stat nominis umbra, with a dedication to the English people and a preface. Other independent editions followed in quick succession. In 1801 one was published with annotations by Robert Heron. In 1806 another appeared with notes by John Almon. The first new edition of real importance was issued by the Woodfall family in 1812. It contained the correspondence of Junius with Henry Sampson Woodfall, a selection of the miscellaneous letters attributed to Junius, facsimiles of his handwriting, and notes by John Mason Good. Curiosity as to the mystery of the authorship began to replace political and literary interest in the writings. Junius himself had been early aware of the advantage he secured by concealment. "The mystery of Junius increases his importance" is his confession in a letter to Wilkes dated 18 September 1771.

Woodfall felt assured that

"when kings and ministers are forgotten, when the force and direction of personal satire is no longer understood, and when measures are only felt in their remotest consequences; this book will, I believe, be found to contain principles worthy to be transmitted to posterity."

Identity of Junius
The identity of Junius is open to question and debate, and may never be finally resolved unless documents are found which establish his identity. Some scholars support the identification of Philip Francis. William Petty, 2nd Earl of Shelburne claimed to know the identity of Junius a fortnight before his death on 7 May 1805, but died without revealing what he thought he knew.

More recent use of Junius
Samuel Saenger, political editor of the Fischer publishing house's journal Neue Rundschau from 1908 to 1934, signed several of his articles as 'Junius'. Most of these were political chronicles that presented a critical left-liberal perspective on German politics. Many of these texts were titled 'Aus Junius' Tagebuch' – 'From Junius' Diary'.

Rosa Luxemburg published the Junius Pamphlet in Switzerland in April 1916, and it was secretly distributed in Germany. The text, also known as The crisis in German Social Democracy, had been started in prison in February 1915. It was adopted as the founding policy statement of the International Group, better known as the Spartacus League, which became one element of the Communist Party of Germany in January 1919.

The pseudonym was used as well by the great Italian economist Luigi Einaudi, who expressed his liberal beliefs in two series of letters signed 'Junius': the former published in 1920, the latter in 1944, while he was living as a refugee in Switzerland. Irish novelist James Joyce satirised the style of Junius in the 14th episode of his 1922 novel Ulysses, known as "Oxen of the Sun", which takes place in a maternity hospital. The Junius passage is one of 32 parodies of English prose style that make up the episode, in which Joyce charts the development of literary style through history alongside a complex reflection on fecundity and human reproduction.

Robert Goddard's 2005 suspense novel Sight Unseen is set in the present day; however, the identity of Junius is a major theme in the novel.

The Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail has carried the following legend on its editorial or front page for many years: "The subject who is truly loyal to the Chief Magistrate will neither advise nor submit to arbitrary measures. Junius".

A Boston, Massachusetts, indie-rock band has been performing and recording under the name Junius since around 2003.

In the third season of the HBO series True Detective, Junius is a central figure to the cover-up and mystery. The character had been identified earlier as "Mr. June."

title: Junius (writer)


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Michael Aitkens

Michael Aitkens (born 1947) is a British actor and writer of drama scripts for movies, television and stage. His BBC situation comedy Waiting for God, first shown in 1990, was BAFTA nominated.

Early life
Michael Aitkens was educated at Haileybury in England. He then lived in Australia for ten years and Los Angeles, United States, for two years, graduating from the AFI Conservatory (Los Angeles) in 1981.

Career
In the mid-1980s, Aitkens featured in the Australian children's television series The Henderson Kids as Walter Mullens, the long lost father of Tam and Steve Henderson.

More than 150 of his scripts have been produced in the United Kingdom, United States and Australia. He now lives in London, where he works as a writer/producer, mainly of his own original series, and formed an independent production company, DAISYLU. He is also an occasional humorous newspaper columnist.

He was a core writer for Midsomer Murders from 2006–2014.

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

title: Michael Aitkens


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Broken Bow (Star Trek: Enterprise)

"Broken Bow" is the two-part series premiere of the science fiction television series Enterprise (later renamed Star Trek: Enterprise). It originally aired as a double-length episode, but was split into two parts for syndication, though releases on home media and streaming maintain its original one-episode format. A novelization of the episode, written by Diane Carey, was published in 2001. The episode won the 2002 Emmy Award for Outstanding Special Visual Effects for a Series, and was also nominated for sound editing and make-up.

It is nine decades since Zefram Cochrane produced humans' first warp flight (as seen in the film Star Trek: First Contact), and Earth finally launches its first starship of exploration, Enterprise NX-01. Commanded by Captain Jonathan Archer, and against the objections of the Vulcans, it departs on an urgent mission to return an injured Klingon to Qo'noS, the Klingon homeworld, but come into conflict with the Suliban.

Part 1
On Earth in 2121, a young Jonathan Archer is painting a model spaceship with his father, Henry, principal designer of Earth's first Warp 5 engine. Without fully understanding the reasons behind the Vulcans' constraint, he believes that there must be an explanation for holding the human space program back.

Thirty years later, in 2151, a Klingon named Klaang crashes in Broken Bow, Oklahoma. He kills his two Suliban pursuers, but is then critically wounded by a farmer. Archer, now Captain of the soon-to-be-launched prototype starship Enterprise NX-01, is called to Starfleet Headquarters, where he discusses the incident with Admiral Forrest and Vulcan ambassador Soval. The Vulcans wish to delay the launch of Enterprise. Archer, after consulting with the Denobulan Doctor Phlox, convinces Forrest to allow the new ship to take Klaang to Qo'noS.

Prior to departure, Archer seeks additional crewmembers, including Phlox and linguist Hoshi Sato, while Sub-Commander T'Pol is assigned as their "Vulcan liaison". Meanwhile, on a Suliban vessel somewhere, Silik, leader of the Suliban Cabal, speaks with a mysterious, nameless humanoid figure from their future. The figure orders Silik to recover Klaang. On Enterprise Klaang regains consciousness, but the universal translator does not allow Archer and Sato to communicate with him effectively. Suddenly, Suliban attack the ship and main power is disrupted. During the chaos, one intruder is killed and Klaang is kidnapped.

Later, in Sickbay, Phlox shows Archer the autopsied Suliban corpse, and points out several genetic enhancements. Sato completes a translation of Klaang's speech, and keywords reveal that T'Pol has been withholding information about the Vulcan investigation, including the fact that Klaang had been on Rigel X. Meanwhile, an alien officer aboard the Suliban complex interrogates Klaang in the Klingon language. Arriving at the Rigel X Trade Complex, Archer, Sato, Tucker, and T'Pol are seized by Suliban agents.

Part 2
Sarin, once a member of the Suliban Cabal, tells Archer that she gave Klaang a message to the High Council with proof of Suliban involvement in attacks on Klingon factions, and that the enhanced Suliban are following orders in a Temporal Cold War. Suliban from the Cabal show up, and attack, Silik kills Sarin and Archer is shot, but the away team escape back to Enterprise. T'Pol modifies Enterprise's sensors to track the Suliban vessel that attacked them, and they follow it to a gas giant. Meanwhile, aboard the alien complex, Silik talks with the mysterious figure again.

Within the gas giant is the Helix, a Suliban structure composed of hundreds of Suliban cell ships, which the Enterprise crew scan to find Klaang. Using the grappler, Enterprise grabs an attacking Suliban ship, the pilot ejecting. After studying the captured ship and its controls, Archer and Tucker pilot it to the Helix. Becoming separated, Tucker returns with Klaang to Enterprise. After a brief physical confrontation between Archer and Silik in a temporally altered audience room, Tucker uses Enterprise's new transporter to beam Archer out of the Helix.

They deliver Klaang and his message (encoded as DNA in his blood) to Qo'noS and the Klingon Chancellor and Council. Archer tells Tucker and T'Pol that Starfleet has ordered them to continue their mission. After reconsidering his preconceptions of Vulcans, he also invites T'Pol to stay on board and she agrees to ask permission.

Production
Production began on Monday, May 14, 2001, and saw the return of many crew with past experience on the Star Trek franchise. Director James L. Conway had previously directed various episodes of Star Trek across the different series, and was offered the chance to direct the first episode of Enterprise by Rick Berman. Conway thought the script was fantastic and wanted to do the episode, but at that time he was executive vice-president at Spelling Entertainment, and had to ask Aaron Spelling and Duke Vincent for permission for a leave of absence to do it. Conway said it was the best experience he ever had directing a TV show. They had a long 32-day filming schedule, and a huge budget. All the sets had to be built, costumes and props had to be made, and all the setup costs of the show were included in the budget of the premiere. He also knew many of the crew from his previous work. Conway described himself as "a fan first and a director second" and he hoped that he did justice to the scripts and brought enthusiasm to every episode he did. Conway returned to direct several more Enterprise episodes, including "In a Mirror, Darkly" Part 1. Returning crew included First Assistant Director (1st AD) Jerry Fleck, Director of Photography (DP) Marvin V. Rush, and Visual Effects Supervisor Ronald B. Moore, all whom had been with the franchise since The Next Generation. Michael Okuda continued as Scenic Arts Supervisor, and as technical consultant to the writing staff. Production designers Herman Zimmerman and John Eaves also worked to create the look of the new series.

The episode introduces much of the cast of Enterprise, which remains for the rest of the show; it also has many guest stars. James Cromwell reprises the character Zefram Cochrane (uncredited), having previously played this character in the 1996 film Star Trek: First Contact. Klaang, the crash-landed Klingon was played by Tommy "Tiny" Lister Jr. John Fleck played the Suliban leader Sillik. Starfleet personnel, Admiral Forrest, Admiral Daniel Leonard and Commander Williams, were played by Vaughn Armstrong, Jim Beaver and Jim Fitzpatrick, respectively. Their characters were named after actors Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley and William Shatner. This was Armstrong's ninth of twelve different characters on Star Trek. Vulcans are played by Gary Graham as Soval, and Thomas Kopache as Tos. The character name "Tos" is another nod to The Original Series, commonly abbreviated as "TOS". The butterfly dancers at Rigel X were played by the Klimaszewski Twins, Diane and Elaine. In Part 2, the Suliban female Sarin was played by Melinda Clarke, and the mysterious "Humanoid Figure" was played by James Horan.

Release
The premiere of "Broken Bow" was at the Paramount Theatre on September 20, 2001. It was attended by the cast and crew of Enterprise, as well as several from Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: The Next Generation.

It was first aired on UPN on September 26, 2001. The broadcast saw the episode come in first place during the timeslot, with 16 million viewers watching, with an average of 12 million. This was slightly lower than the premiere of Voyager but represented an increase of 42% over the final episode "Endgame", and was the best ratings for any series on that the channel since Voyager.

In the UK, "Broken Bow" first broadcast on satellite TV channel Sky One, before airing on Channel 4 during July 2002.

This episode was released as part of Enterprise season one, which was released in high definition on Blu-ray disc on March 26, 2013; it has 1080p video and a DTS-HD Master Audio sound track.

On the launch of the Paramount+ streaming service, on March 4, 2021, a one day only free Star Trek marathon was presented, featuring the first episodes of the various Star Trek television series, including "Broken Bow". The marathon started at 7 am PT/10 am ET and was live streamed on the YouTube internet video platform, going through each episode chronologically in order of release, with "Broken Bow" airing after "Caretaker".

Reception
The episode received positive reviews from critics. Ron Wertheimer of The New York Times gave the episode a positive review, saying: "Enterprise gets back to basics, then improves on them." David Segal of the Washington Post was critical of the first episode, saying that "the script is riddled with clunkers and jargon" and that the show "has a bargain-basement feel that lands just this side of camp; the space fights aren't much more convincing than PlayStation offerings. And everything is wrapped in a trite message about unity and the importance of getting along." Laura Fries of Variety says the prequel setting "rejuvenates a somewhat tired notion" but also says "viewers are reminded that this is more akin to their father's Star Trek." She praised Bakula for bringing "an earthy quality back" to the captain, making him "personable and accessible". Howard Rosenberg of the Los Angeles Times predicted that Star Trek fans would either "raise the bar impossibly high for this series or watch it because they watch everything with this brand" but as a casual viewer he found the premiere "mildly entertaining, but mostly plays rather tepidly, its occasional glints of intellect pushed far into the background by action." Allan Johnson of the Chicago Tribune was positive about the series as an accessible entry point for potential new fans. Entertainment Weekly gave it a grade B+, and said it was "appealing to both Trekkies and non-fans of this pop-cultural institution". Hal Boedeker of the Orlando Sentinel called the story "a standard adventure" and was critical of action sequences as "familiar" and that "it goes boldly and unapologetically where dozens of series have gone before." He praised Blalock for her performance: "Star Trek purists might not be amused, but the captivating Blalock energizes the franchise. Enterprise needs every bit of pizazz she can supply." Aint It Cool News gave the episode four out of five, praised Blalock for her performance, and said: "Clearly, an extraordinary amount of love and attention went into this endeavor, from the propulsive teleplay to the careful casting to the world-beating production design." IGN rated it three out of five, and wrote: "There's enough new, interesting stuff there to make me want to see more." Tor.com rated it five out of ten.

A review of the Blu-ray release by Blu-ray.com, commented on the visuals, remarking: "The scene in Brazil in "Broken Bow" does offer some nicely brilliant greens, and certainly some scattered traces of good, honest colors are seen throughout, but mostly this is a very uninspired palette", and also pointing out the special effects are in lower resolution than HD that causes some "jagged edges, and lack crisp details." They were more positive about the audio, remarking of the surround sound track: "The controversial theme song has never sounded better. It's rich, full of life, and with well-defined vocals and precise instrument clarity and reproduction. Much of the action on board the NX-01 is brought to life by the subtle, deep hum of the engines and the little odds and ends sound elements that define the atmosphere."

Accolades
"Broken Bow" was nominated for three Emmy Awards. It was nominated in the categories Outstanding Makeup For A Series (Prosthetic) and Outstanding Sound Editing For A Series, and it won the award for Outstanding Special Visual Effects For A Series.

In 2014, The A.V. Club include this episode on their list of the ten episodes that best represented the series. The double-episode was praised for establishing most of the key ideas that would drive the show. "It's a faltering beginning, but it hints at the potential Enterprise would spend seasons trying to realize." In 2015 Wired said that when the NX-01 leaves space dry dock for the first time is the best moment in the whole series.

In 2016, SyFy ranked "Broken Bow" as the third best out of six Star Trek pilot episodes. In 2017, GameSpot ranked this as the fourth best pilot episode of any Star Trek series.

In 2016, The Hollywood Reporter rated "Broken Bow" the 80th best episode of all Star Trek episodes. IGN ranked "Broken Bow" the 21st best episode of all Star Trek. Empire ranked this the 37th best out of all Star Trek television episodes. Screen Rant ranked "Broken Bow" the fourth best episode of all Star Trek franchise television episodes.

Novelization
A 240 page novelization written Diane Carey was published in 2001 by Pocket Books. Carey was given only the script and wrote the novel without any further information from the production team. She said would normally take about two weeks to write a novelization, but that Broken Bow was written in just four days. In the Season 1 DVD special features, producers Rick Berman and Brannon Braga discussed how Diane Carey used the character's internal monologues to frequently criticize the script. It was Carey's last Star Trek novel.

title: Broken Bow (Star Trek: Enterprise)


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Henry Sampson Woodfall

Henry Sampson Woodfall (21 June 1739 – 12 December 1805) was an English printer and journalist. He was born and lived in London.

Biography

Woodfall's grandfather Henry Woodfall (c. 1686–1747), was the author of the ballad Darby and Joan, for which John Darby and his wife were the originals: the elder Woodfall had been apprenticed in 1701 to Darby, a printer in Bartholomew Close in the Little Britain area of London, who died in 1730.

Woodfall's grandfather printed many of the works of Alexander Pope. Woodfall's uncle George was a bookseller in Charing Cross. His father, Henry Woodfall (1713–1769), was the printer of the newspaper the Public Advertiser, and Woodfall was apprenticed to his father. At the age of nineteen, Woodfall took over the control of the newspaper.

In it appeared, between 21 January 1769 and 21 January 1772, the famous letters of Junius. In December 1769 Woodfall published a "Letter to the King" by Junius that brought legal charges against Woodfall and five others for seditious libel; Woodfall's case went before a jury in June 1770 but a verdict of mistrial was handed down by Lord Mansfield in November 1770. Woodfall sold his interest in the Public Advertiser in 1793.

His son George Woodfall (1767–1844) was also in the family printing business. Woodfall's younger brother, William Woodfall (1746–1803), a journalist, established in 1789 a daily paper called the Diary, or Woodfall's Register, in which, for the first time, reports of parliamentary debates were published on the morning after they had taken place. William Woodfall's nickname was "Memory" Woodfall based on his ability to memorize Parliamentary speeches at a time when journalists were not allowed to take notes or write down speeches while they were being delivered.

title: Henry Sampson Woodfall


text:
Stelleroidea

Stelleroidea is a superclass of marine echinoderms including three classes:
 * Asteroidea: true sea stars
 * Ophiuroidea: brittle stars and basket stars
 * Somasteroidea (sometimes also Stomasteroidea): ancestral stelleroids

title: Stelleroidea


text:
Outback Steakhouse

Outback Steakhouse is an American chain of Australian-themed casual dining restaurants, serving American cuisine, based in Tampa, Florida. The chain has over 1,000 locations in 23 countries throughout North America, South America, Asia, and Australia. It was founded on March 15, 1988, with its first location in Tampa by Bob Basham, Chris T. Sullivan, Trudy Cooper, and Tim Gannon. It was owned and operated in the United States by OSI Restaurant Partners until it was acquired by Bloomin' Brands, and by other franchise and venture agreements internationally.

History
The first Outback Steakhouse location was opened on March 15, 1988, in Tampa, Florida.

Canadian Outback Steakhouse restaurants began in 1996. In March 2009, Outback Steakhouse Canada abruptly closed all nine locations in the province of Ontario, citing poor economic conditions, but in June 2009, Outback Steakhouse opened a location in Niagara Falls, Ontario. A second location in Niagara Falls has been opened, but these are the only Outback Steakhouse locations currently operating in Canada.

Outback Steakhouse opened in the UK with locations in Birmingham, Basildon, Enfield, Romford, Stevenage and Staines. By September 2011, only its Basildon and Romford stores remained and they closed down on September 13, ending Outback's foray into the UK market.

In 2006, a new Outback logo was introduced, dropping the old kangaroo logo for a more simplistic and modern Outback mountain range logo.

With this new logo, Outback then went on an aggressive remodeling campaign, starting in 2008, renovating most of their locations, along with opening brand new ones, for a fresher, more modern look to their business model. This included the removal of their iconic neon signs for more energy efficient LEDs, and the switch from a dark, rustic feel to a brighter, more vibrant look.

Today, few original-style Outback locations remain, with most of them either abandoned for newer location, or renovated.

On June 14, 2007, OSI Restaurant Partners completed a stock repurchase plan, and the company became privately held. In April 2012, Bloomin' Brands, the current owner of Outback Steakhouse, filed with the SEC to raise up to $300 million in an initial public offering.

Bloomin' Brands, Inc. became a publicly traded company on NASDAQ under the ticker symbol "BLMN."

Most Outback locations are corporately owned by Bloomin Brands, however locations in California, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico are separately owned by a corporate franchisee, Out West Restaurant Group.

Outback Steakhouse currently operates over 1,000 locations worldwide, with 694 in the United States.

Bloomin' Onion
The Bloomin' Onion is a signature Outback item, though it is not an Australian item and is not typically sold in Australia apart from this chain. It is a 1 lb onion cut to 'bloom' open, breaded, deep-fried and served with mayonnaise-horseradish sauce. Other restaurants offer items similar to the Bloomin' Onion, as in Chili's Awesome Blossom (discontinued), Texas Roadhouse's Cactus Blossom, and Lone Star Steakhouse & Saloon's Texas Rose. Many of the Bloomin' Onions have come under fire for high-calorie counts, sometimes going over 1,500 calories.

Community
Outback Steakhouse has a program to support the communities in which its restaurants are located. They have also joined GroupRaise, a platform where non-profits can book restaurant fundraisers in their locations. On a national level, Outback partners with Heineken USA and their Heineken with a Heart program to raise funds for various organizations in these communities.

Political
The company and its founders are major contributors, via the Outback Steakhouse PAC, to the Republican Party, contributing $303,015 and $334,197 for the 2000 and 2004 election cycles, respectively. The Outback Steakhouse PAC itself is one of the largest donors in the food and beverage sector, second only to the National Restaurant Association, which itself represents 300,000 restaurants.

Advertising

 * Outback blimp Tampa 2008.jpg]]The company owns two blimps: the Bloomin' Onions I and II, both named after their appetizer.
 * For several years, the company ran a media campaign with an Australian-themed variation of the Of Montreal composition "Wraith Pinned to the Mist (And Other Games)."
 * General (Ret) Tommy Franks sits on the Board Of Directors for OSI Restaurant Partners, INC., which owns Outback Steakhouse.

Sports
Outback Steakhouse was the title sponsor of the Outback Champions Series tennis events and NCAA football's Outback Bowl. The sponsorship lasted through 2020.

Outback is also a partner of the Tampa Bay Lightning and has a concession stand in Amalie Arena.

Motorsports
In 2012, Outback Steakhouse became a sponsor of Ryan Newman and the No. 39 Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. In their first race as sponsor, Newman won the 2012 Goody's Fast Relief 500 at Martinsville Speedway. One of the promotions the company had with Newman is a free Bloomin' Onion on the Monday after a race in which Newman would finish in the Top 10. Kevin Harvick took over Outback's sponsorship and promotion in 2014 for two races in their No. 4, after Newman left the team to drive Richard Childress Racing's No. 31 car. The company was on Harvick’s car from 2014 until 2018, including his championship in 2014, and in 2019 and until the COVID-19 Pandemic in 2020, the steakhouse was a personal sponsor which kept the Blooming Monday promotion around still. It ended after 2020. The company also sponsored retired Sprint Cup Series driver and current Fox NASCAR announcer Jeff Gordon's No. 67 for the AC-Delco 200 in the Busch Series during the 1990 season.

In September 2023, Outback Steakhouse sponsored Stephen Mallozzi, who had previously worked as a server at the restaurant, for a NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway.

title: Outback Steakhouse


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Cisleithania

Cisleithania, officially The Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council (Die im Reichsrat vertretenen Königreiche und Länder), was the northern and western part of Austria-Hungary, the Dual Monarchy created in the Compromise of 1867—as distinguished from Transleithania (i.e., the Hungarian Lands of the Crown of Saint Stephen east of ["beyond"] the Leitha River). This name for the region was a common, but unofficial one.

The Cisleithanian capital was Vienna, the residence of the Austrian emperor. The territory had a population of 28,571,900 in 1910. It reached from Vorarlberg in the west to the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria and the Duchy of Bukovina (today part of Ukraine and Romania) in the east, as well as from the Kingdom of Bohemia in the north to the Kingdom of Dalmatia (today part of Croatia) in the south. It comprised the current States of Austria (except for Burgenland), as well as most of the territories of the Czech Republic and Slovenia (except for Prekmurje), southern Poland and parts of Italy (Trieste, Gorizia, Tarvisio, Trentino, and South Tyrol), Croatia (Istria, Dalmatia), Montenegro (Kotor Bay), Romania (Southern Bukovina), and Ukraine (Northern Bukovina and Galicia).

Term
The Latin name Cisleithania derives from that of the Leitha River, a tributary of the Danube forming the historical boundary between the Archduchy of Austria and the Hungarian Kingdom in the area southeast of Vienna (on the way to Budapest). Much of its territory lay west (or, from a Viennese perspective, on "this" side) of the Leitha.

After the constitutional changes of the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, the Cisleithanian crown lands (Kronländer) continued to constitute the Austrian Empire, but the latter term was rarely used to avoid confusion with the era before 1867, when the Kingdom of Hungary had been a constituent part of that empire. The somewhat cumbersome official name was Die im Reichsrat vertretenen Königreiche und Länder ("The Kingdoms and Lands represented in the Imperial Council"). The phrase was used by politicians and bureaucrats, but it had no official status until 1915; the press and the general public seldom used it and then with a derogatory connotation. In general, the lands were just called Austria, but the term "Austrian lands" (Österreichische Länder) originally did not apply to the Lands of the Bohemian Crown (i.e., Bohemia proper, the Margraviate of Moravia and Duchy of Silesia) or to the territories annexed in the 18th-century Partitions of Poland (Galicia) or the former Venetian Dalmatia.

From 1867, the Kingdom of Hungary, the Kingdom of Croatia, the Kingdom of Slavonia and the Principality of Transylvania were no longer "Austrian" crown lands. Rather, they constituted an autonomous state, officially called the "Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of St Stephen" (Szent István Koronájának Országai or A Magyar Szent Korona Országai, Länder der Heiligen Ungarischen Stephanskrone) and commonly known as Transleithania or just Hungary. The Condominium of Bosnia and Herzegovina, occupied in 1878, formed a separate part. Both the "Austrian" and "Hungarian" lands of the Dual Monarchy had large Slavic-settled territories in the north (Czechs, Slovaks, Poles and Ruthenians) as well as in the south (Slovenes, Croats and Serbs).

Crown lands
Cisleithania consisted of 15 crown lands which had representatives in the Imperial Council (Reichsrat), the Cisleithanian parliament in Vienna. The crown lands centered on the Archduchy of Austria (Erzherzogtum Österreich) were not states, but provinces in the modern sense. However, they were areas with unique historic political and legal characteristics and were therefore more than mere administrative districts. They have been conceived of as "historical-political entities".

Each crown land had a regional assembly, the Landtag, which enacted laws (Landesgesetze) on matters of regional and mostly minor importance. Until 1848, the Landtage had been traditional diets (assemblies of the estates of the realm). They were disbanded after the Revolutions of 1848 and reformed after 1860. Some members held their position as ex officio members (e.g., bishops), while others were elected. There was no universal and equal suffrage, but a mixture of privilege and limited franchise. The executive committee of a Landtag was called Landesausschuss and headed by a Landeshauptmann, being president of the Landtag as well.

From 1868 onwards Emperor Franz Joseph himself (in his function as monarch of a crown land, being king, archduke, grandduke, duke or count) and his Imperial–Royal (k.k.) government headed by the Minister-President of Austria were represented at the capital cities of the crown lands—except for Vorarlberg which was administered with Tyrol, and Istria and Gorizia-Gradisca which were administered together with Trieste under the common name of Austro-Illyrian Littoral— by a stadtholder (Statthalter), in few crown lands called Landespräsident, who acted as chief executive.

Kingdoms

 * Kingdom of Bohemia (Land of the Bohemian Crown)
 * Kingdom of Dalmatia
 * Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria

Archduchies

 * Archduchy of Austria above the Enns (unofficially Upper Austria)
 * Archduchy of Austria below the Enns (unofficially Lower Austria)

Grand duchies

 * Grand Duchy of Kraków (Subdivision of Galicia and Lodomeria)

Duchies

 * Duchy of Bukovina
 * Duchy of Carinthia
 * Duchy of Carniola
 * Duchy of Salzburg
 * Duchy of Silesia (Land of the Bohemian Crown)
 * Duchy of Styria

Margraviates

 * Margraviate of Istria (Part of the Austrian Littoral)
 * Margraviate of Moravia (Land of the Bohemian Crown)

Princely Counties

 * Princely County of Gorizia and Gradisca (Part of the Austrian Littoral)
 * Princely County of Tyrol
 * Princely County of Vorarlberg

Free Cities

 * Free City of Trieste (Part of the Austrian Littoral)

Condominium

 * Condominium of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Governed Jointly by Cisleithania and Transleithania) from 1878

Politics
According to the "December Constitution", a redraft of the emperor's 1861 February Patent, the Austrian government was generally responsible in all affairs concerning the Cisleithanian lands, except for the common Austro-Hungarian Army, the Austro-Hungarian Navy and the Foreign Ministry, these k.u.k. matters remained reserved for the Imperial and Royal Ministers' Council for Common Affairs of Austria-Hungary. The Austrian Reichsrat, a bicameral legislature implemented in 1861, became the Cisleithanian parliament. Originally consisting of delegates of the Landtage, in 1873 direct election of the House of Deputies (Abgeordnetenhaus) was introduced with a four-class franchise suffrage for male landowners and bourgeois. Equal, direct, secret and universal suffrage—for men—was not introduced until a 1907 electoral reform. In this Lower House (with 353 members in 1873 and 516 in 1907), at first German-speaking deputies dominated, but with the extension of the suffrage the Slavs gained a majority. An ethnic nationalist struggle between German-speaking and Slavic deputies, especially in the context of the Czech National Revival, was played out. Leaders of the movement like František Palacký advocated the emancipation of the Slavic population within the Monarchy (Austroslavism), while politicians of the Young Czech Party principally denied the right of the Reichsrat to put any decisions relevant for the "Czech lands", and used means of filibustering as well as absence to torpedo its work. They were antagonized by radical German nationalists led by Georg von Schönerer, demanding the dissolution of the Monarchy and the unification of the "German Austrian" lands with the German Empire.

After 1893, no k.k. government was able to rely on a parliamentary majority. Nevertheless, Polish members of parliament and politicians like Count Kasimir Felix Badeni achieved some success involving Galician Poles by special regulations for this "developing country"; thence the Polenklub played a constructive role most of the time. Politics were frequently paralysed because of the tensions between different nationalities. When Czech obstruction at the Reichsrat prevented the parliament from working, the emperor went on to rule autocratically through imperial decrees (Kaiserliche Verordnungen) submitted by his government. The Reichsrat was prorogued in March 1914 at the behest of Minister-President Count Karl von Stürgkh, it did not meet during the July Crisis and was not reconvened until May 1917, after the accession of Emperor Karl in 1916.

For representation in matters relevant to the whole real union of Austria-Hungary (foreign affairs, defence, and the financing thereof) the Reichsrat appointed delegations of 60 members to discuss these matters parallel to Hungarian delegations of the same size and to come, in separate votes, to the same conclusion on the recommendation of the responsible common ministry. In Cisleithania, the 60 delegates consisted of 40 elected members of the House of Representatives (Abgeordnetenhaus) and 20 members of the Upper House (Herrenhaus). The delegations convened simultaneously, both either in Vienna or in Budapest, though spatially divided. In case of not getting the same decision in three attempts, the law permitted the summoning of a common session of both delegations and the eventual counting of the votes in total, but the Hungarians, who averted any Imperial "roof" over their part of the dual monarchy, as well as the common ministers, carefully avoided reaching this situation. Austria-Hungary as a common entity did not have its own jurisdiction and legislative power, which was shaped by the fact that there was no common parliament. The common diplomatic and military affairs were managed by delegations from the Imperial Council and the Hungarian parliament. According to the compromise, the members of the delegates from the two parliaments had no right to debate, they had no right to introduce new perspectives and own ideas during the meetings, they were nothing more than the extended arms of their own parliaments. All decisions had to be ratified by the Imperial council in Vienna and by the Hungarian parliament in Budapest. Without the Austrian and Hungarian parliamentary ratifications, the decisions of the delegates were not valid in Austria or in Kingdom of Hungary.

Population
The largest group within Cisleithania were Austrian Germans (including Yiddish-speaking Jews), who made up around a third of the population. German-speakers and Czechs made up a majority of the population. Almost 60% of Cisleithania's population was ethnically Slavic.

title: Cisleithania


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Richard Glover (poet)

Richard Glover (1712 – 25 November 1785) was an English poet and politician.

Life
The son of Richard Glover, a Hamburg merchant, he was born in London and educated at Cheam in Surrey. His mother was a sister of Richard West, Lord Chancellor of Ireland. The young Richard was said to have been something of a favourite of his uncle.

In 1739 he became one of the founding governors for the Foundling Hospital, a charity dedicated to saving children from the plight of abandonment. The success of Glover's Leonidas led him to take an interest in politics, and in 1761 he entered parliament as member for Weymouth and Melcombe Regis. Glover was one of the reputed authors of the Letters of Junius; but his claims, advocated in 1825 by Richard Duppa, are slight.

Works
He wrote in his sixteenth year a poem to the memory of Sir Isaac Newton, which was prefixed by Henry Pemberton to his View of Newton's Philosophy, published in 1728.

In 1737, he published an epic poem, Leonidas, which proved highly successful. It retells the story of the Battle of Thermopylae of 480 BC, drawing heavily on ancient accounts of Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus. It was commended by the prince of Wales and his court, and celebrated by leading literary figures such as Alexander Pope, Henry Fielding, and Jonathan Swift. Translations into German, French and Danish followed, as did several stage adaptions; and a number of writers across Europe, including Willem van Haren, Abbé Prévost, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock and Friedrich Schiller cited and praised the poem.

In 1739, Glover published a poem entitled London, or the Progress of Commerce; and in 1740 he published a ballad, Admiral Hosier's Ghost, popular in its day. The ballad's real target was not the Spanish but Sir Robert Walpole.

He was also the author of two tragedies, Boadicea (1753) and Medea (1761), written in close imitation of Greek models. The Athenaid, an epic in thirty books, was published in 1787, and his diary, entitled Memoirs of a distinguished literary and political Character from 1742 to 1757, appeared in 1813.

In May 1774, shortly after the death of Oliver Goldsmith, Glover published his "Authentic Anecdotes" on the poet in The Universal Magazine. Edmund Burke included the piece in The Annual Register for that year, and when Edmond Malone in 1776 worked on a biographical memoir for Poems and Plays by Oliver Goldsmith (1777) he based it on Glover's Anecdotes as well as first-hand information from Dr. Thomas Wilson, Senior Fellow at Trinity College, Dublin.

title: Richard Glover (poet)


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Federal Department of Foreign Affairs

The Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA, Eidgenössisches Departement für auswärtige Angelegenheiten, Département fédéral des affaires étrangères, Dipartimento federale degli affari esteri, ), so named since 1979, is one of the seven Departments of the Swiss government federal administration of Switzerland, and corresponds in its range of tasks to the ministry of foreign affairs in other countries. The department is always headed by one of the members of the Swiss Federal Council. Since 1 November 2017, the department is headed by Federal Councillor Ignazio Cassis.

Mission
The mission of the FDFA is to safeguard Switzerland's interests abroad and its relations with other countries, as stipulated in Art. 54, para. 1 of the Swiss Federal Constitution. The subsequent paragraph further outlines the parameters by which Swiss foreign policy is to be conducted:

"The Confederation shall ensure that the independence of Switzerland and its welfare is safeguarded; it shall in particular assist in the alleviation of need and poverty in the world and promote respect for human rights and democracy, the peaceful co-existence of peoples as well as the conservation of natural resources."

At the beginning of every parliamentary legislature, the FDFA submits a foreign policy strategy to the Federal Council, setting out the main focus areas and foreign policy priorities for the term. For the 2020-23 period, these focus areas include:

 * Peace and security
 * Prosperity
 * Sustainability
 * Digitalisation

History
The FDFA has been one of the key Swiss ministries since the creation of the modern Swiss federal state in 1848.

Originally, what was then known as the "Federal Political Department" (FPD) was led by whomever held the rotating presidency, meaning the responsibility for foreign affairs changed on a yearly basis. With very limited means at its disposal, it comprised a meagre staff of officers in Bern and a very limited diplomatic and consular network abroad.

In 1887, the department was restructured by then-president Numa Droz, who then assumed leadership of what was thereafter known as the Federal Department of the Exterior for five years. Beginning in 1896, the Federal Council reprised the previous rotating system, which would be maintained until 1914 with the passage of the Federal Administration Act. From that moment forward, the head of the FPD would no longer change from year to year, and the Department, in liaison with the Department of the Economy (present-day known as the Federal Department of Economic Affairs, Education and Research) accrued increased competence in commercial matters. With Switzerland's accession to the League of Nations in the aftermath of the First World War, the FPD's responsibilities were further expanded and in particular as Geneva was transformed into a major hub for international diplomacy, marked in particular by the construction of the Palais des Nations in to serve as headquarters for the League in that city.

Following the Second World War, in which Switzerland remained neutral, the orientation of Swiss foreign policy adjusted to the new paradigms of the Cold War. Switzerland did not join the newly-created United Nations, which succeeded the League of Nations. The reason for this refusal was that it was impossible to obtain explicit recognition from the organisation of its status as a neutral country. In 1961, specific structures were created within the FDP for the administration of official development assistance and for fostering relations with other countries in Europe and, in particular, the various European cooperation organisations that emerged in that period, such as the European Coal and Steel Community.

With the expanding portfolio of responsibilities assigned to the ministry, in 1979 the FDP was once again reorganised and renamed, this time to the present name, Federal Department of Foreign Affairs. At the same time, the position of FDFA state secretary — the number-two person at the Department – was created, and competences of the Department were increased to cover areas such as disarmament, science policy and human rights.

In 2002, Switzerland joined the United Nations, following the endorsement of its accession through a popular referendum. In 2023, it assumed a seat as a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council.

Former Names

 * 1848–1887: Federal Political Department
 * 1888–1895: Federal Department of the Exterior
 * 1896–1978: Federal Political Department

Organization

 * General Secretariat
 * Presence Switzerland
 * State Secretariat
 * Presidential Affairs and Protocol
 * Crisis Management Centre
 * Directorate of Political Affairs
 * Europe, Central Asia, Council of Europe, OSCE Division
 * Middle East and North Africa Division
 * Subsaharan Africa and Francophonie Division if
 * Asia and the Pacific Division
 * Americas Division
 * United Nations and International Organisations
 * Human Security Division
 * Sectoral Foreign Policy Division
 * Division for Security Policy
 * Directorate of European Affairs, DEA
 * Directorate of Corporate Resources (DR)
 * Consular Directorate CD
 * Directorate of International Law DIL
 * Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC)

List of heads of department
• 1848–1849: Jonas Furrer

• 1850: Henri Druey

• 1851: Josef Munzinger

• 1852: Jonas Furrer

• 1853: Wilhelm Matthias Naeff

• 1854: Friedrich Frey-Herosé

• 1855: Jonas Furrer

• 1856: Jakob Stämpfli

• 1857: Constant Fornerod

• 1858: Jonas Furrer

• 1859: Jakob Stämpfli

• 1860: Friedrich Frey-Herosé

• 1861: Melchior Josef Martin Knüsel

• 1862: Jakob Stämpfli

• 1863: Constant Fornerod

• 1864: Jakob Dubs

• 1865: Karl Schenk

• 1866: Melchior Josef Martin Knüsel

• 1867: Constant Fornerod

• 1868: Jakob Dubs

• 1869: Emil Welti

• 1870: Jakob Dubs

• 1871: Karl Schenk

• 1872: Emil Welti

• 1873: Paul Cérésole

• 1874: Karl Schenk

• 1875: Johann Jakob Scherer

• 1876: Emil Welti

• 1877: Joachim Heer

• 1878: Karl Schenk

• 1879: Bernhard Hammer

• 1880: Emil Welti

• 1881: Numa Droz

• 1882: Simeon Bavier

• 1883: Louis Ruchonnet

• 1884: Emil Welti

• 1885: Karl Schenk

• 1886: Adolf Deucher

• 1887–1892: Numa Droz

• 1893–1896: Adrien Lachenal

• 1897: Adolf Deucher

• 1898: Eugène Ruffy

• 1899: Eduard Müller

• 1900: Walter Hauser

• 1901: Ernst Brenner

• 1902: Josef Zemp

• 1903: Adolf Deucher

• 1904: Robert Comtesse

• 1905: Marc-Émile Ruchet

• 1906: Ludwig Forrer

• 1907: Eduard Müller

• 1908: Ernst Brenner

• 1909: Adolf Deucher

• 1910: Robert Comtesse

• 1911: Marc-Émile Ruchet

• 1912: Ludwig Forrer

• 1913: Eduard Müller

• 1914–1917: Arthur Hoffmann

• 1917: Gustave Ador

• 1918–1919: Felix Calonder

• 1920–1940: Giuseppe Motta

• 1940–1944: Marcel Pilet-Golaz

• 1945–1961: Max Petitpierre

• 1961–1965: Friedrich Traugott Wahlen

• 1966–1970: Willy Spühler

• 1970–1978: Pierre Graber

• 1978–1987: Pierre Aubert

• 1988–1993: René Felber

• 1994–1999: Flavio Cotti

• 1999–2002: Joseph Deiss

• 2003–2011: Micheline Calmy-Rey

• 2012–2017: Didier Burkhalter

• 2017–present: Ignazio Cassis

title: Federal Department of Foreign Affairs


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Talk:List of English public school slang

this page is messed up. It only has english public school slang, without any american slang. Greenmountainboy 18:18, 14 Dec 2003 (UTC)


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Rotary Rocket

Rotary Rocket Company was a rocketry company that developed the Roton concept in the late 1990s as a fully reusable single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO) crewed spacecraft. The design was initially conceived by Bevin McKinney, who shared it with Gary Hudson. In 1996, Rotary Rocket Company was formed to commercialize the concept. The Roton was intended to reduce costs of launching payloads into low Earth orbit by a factor of ten.

The company gathered considerable venture capital from angel investors and opened a factory headquartered in a 45000 sqft facility at Mojave Air and Space Port in Mojave, California. The fuselage for their vehicles was made by Scaled Composites, at the same airport, while the company developed the novel engine design and helicopter-like landing system. A full-scale test vehicle made three hover flights in 1999, but the company exhausted its funds and closed in early 2001.

Origins
Bevin McKinney had been thinking about the idea of a launch vehicle using helicopter blades for several years, when Wired magazine asked Gary Hudson to write an article on the concept. The resulting article resulted in a commitment of funding from billionaire Walt Anderson, which was combined with an initial investment from author Tom Clancy and allowed the company to get started. Hudson and McKinney were joined by co-founders Frederick Giarrusso, Dan DeLong, James Grote, Tom Brosz, and Anne Hudson, who together launched the company in October 1996.

Helicopter to orbit
Gary Hudson's and Bevin McKinney's initial concept was to merge a launch vehicle with a helicopter: spinning rotor blades, powered by tip jets, would lift the vehicle in the earliest stage of launch. Once the air density thinned to the point that helicopter flight was impractical, the vehicle would continue its ascent on pure rocket power, with the rotor acting as a giant turbopump.

Calculations showed that the helicopter blades modestly increased the effective specific impulse (Isp) by approximately 20–30 seconds, essentially only carrying the blades into orbit "for free". Thus, there was no overall gain from this method during ascent. However, the blades could be used to soft land the vehicle, so its landing system carried no additional cost.

One problem found during research at Rotary was that once the vehicle left the atmosphere additional thrust would be necessary. Thus multiple engines would be needed at the base as well as at the rotor tips.

This initial version of the Roton had been designed with the small communications satellite market in mind. However, this market crashed, signaled by the failure of Iridium Communications. Consequently, the Roton concept needed to be redesigned for heavier payloads.

Helicopter from orbit
The revised and redesigned Roton concept was a cone-shaped launch vehicle, with a helicopter rotor on top for use only during landing. An internal cargo bay could be used both for carrying payloads to orbit and bringing others back to Earth. The projected price to orbit of this design was given as $1,000 per kg of payload, less than one-tenth of the then-current launch price. Payload capacity was limited to a relatively modest 6000 lb.

The revised version would have used a unique rotating annular aerospike engine: the engine and base of the launch vehicle would spin at high speed (720 rpm) to pump fuel and oxidizer to the rim by the rotation. Unlike the landing rotor, due to the shallow angle of the nozzles in the base rotor, the rotation speed self limited and required no control system. Since the density of the LOX (liquid oxygen) was higher than that of the kerosene, extra pressure was available with the LOX, so it would have been used to cool the engine's throat and other components, rather than using the kerosene as the coolant as in a conventional LOX/kerosene rocket. However, at the high G levels at the outer edge of the rotating engine block, clarity on how LOX would work as a coolant was both unknown and difficult to validate. That added one layer of risk.

In addition, the rotating exhaust acted as a wall at the outer edge of the engine base, lowering the temperature of the base to below ambient due to ejector pump effect and creating a suction cup at the bottom in atmosphere. This could be alleviated using makeup gas to develop base pressure, requiring an additional rocket engine to fill up the base of the main rocket engine. (Similar problems would have occurred in a conventional aerospike engine, but there, natural recirculation plus use of the turbopump gas-generator's exhaust as the makeup gas would have largely alleviated the problem "for free.")

At the rim, 96 miniature jets would exhaust the burning propellants (LOX and kerosene) around the rim of the base of the vehicle, which gained the vehicle extra thrust at high altitude – acting as a zero-length truncated aerospike nozzle. A similar system with non-rotating engines was studied for the N1 rocket. That application had a much smaller base area, and did not create the suction effect a larger peripheral engine induces. The Roton engine had a projected vacuum ISP (specific impulse) of ~355 isp, which is very high for a LOX/kerosene engine –and a thrust to weight ratio of 150, which is extremely light.

During reentry, the base also served as a water-cooled heatshield. This was theoretically a good way to survive reentry, particularly for a lightweight reusable vehicle. However, using water as a coolant would require converting it into superheated steam, at high temperatures and pressures, and there were concerns about micrometeorite damage on orbit puncturing the pressure vessel, causing the reentry shield to fail. These concerns were resolved using a failure-resistant massively redundant flow system, created using thin metal sheets chemically etched with a pattern of micropores forming a channel system that was robust against failure and damage.

In addition, cooling was achieved two different ways; one way was the vaporization of the water, but the second was even more significant, and was due to the creation of a layer of "cool" steam surrounding the base surface, reducing the ability to heat. Further, the water metering system would have to be extremely reliable, giving one drop per second per square inch, and was achieved via a trial/error design approach on real hardware. By the end of the Roton program, some hardware had been built and tested. The reentry trajectory was to be trimmed, similar to the Soyuz, to minimize the G loads on the passengers. And the ballistic coefficient was better for the Roton and could be better tailored. When the Soyuz trim system failed and it went full ballistic, the G levels did rise significantly but without incident to the passengers.

The vehicle was also unique in planning to use its helicopter-style rotors for landing, rather than wings or parachutes. This concept allowed controlled landings (unlike parachutes), and it was 1/5 the weight of fixed wings. Another advantage was that a helicopter could land almost anywhere, whereas winged spaceplanes such as the Space Shuttle had to make it back to the runway. The rotor blades were to be powered by peroxide tip rockets. The rotor blades were to be deployed before reentry; some questions were raised about whether the blades would survive until landing.

The initial plan was to have them almost vertical, but that was found to be unstable as they needed to drop lower and lower and spin faster for stability, the heating rates went up dramatically and the air flow became more head on. The implication of that was that the blades went from a lightly heated piece of hardware to one that either had to be actively cooled or made of SiC or other refractory material. The idea of popping out the blades became much more attractive at this point, and initial studies were made for that option. This rotor design concept was not without precedent. In 1955, one of five Soviet designs for planned suborbital piloted missions was to include rocket-tipped rotors as its landing system. On May 1, 1958 these plans were dropped as a decision was made to proceed directly to orbital flights.

Rotary Rocket designed and pressure-tested an exceptionally lightweight but strong composite LOX tank. It survived a test program which involved it being pressure cycled and ultimately deliberately shot to test its ignition sensitivity.

A new engine
In June 1999, Rotary Rocket announced that it would use a derivative of the Fastrac engine under development at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, instead of the company's own unconventional spinning engine design. Reportedly, the company had been unable to convince investors that its engine design was viable; the composite structure and gyrocopter reentry was an easier sell.

At the same time as this change, the company laid off about a third of its employees, lowering approximate headcount from 60 to 40. At this point, the company planned to begin its commercial launch service sometime in 2001. Although the company had raised $30 million, it still needed to raise an additional $120 million before entering service.

Atmospheric Test Vehicle (ATV)

A full size, 63 ft (19 m) tall, Atmospheric Test Vehicle (ATV) was built under contract by Scaled Composites for use in hover test flights. The $2.8 million ATV was not intended as an all-up test article, since it had no rocket engine and no heat shielding. The ATV was rolled out of its Mojave hangar on March 1, 1999, bearing an FAA registry of N990RR.

The rotor head was salvaged from a crashed Sikorsky S-58, at a price of $50,000 –as opposed to as much as $1 million for a new head. Each rotor was powered by a 350-lbf (1,560 N) hydrogen peroxide jet, as intended for the orbital vehicle. The rotor assemblage was tested in a rock quarry before installation on the ATV.

The ATV flew three successful test flights in 1999. The pilot for these three flights was Marti Sarigul-Klijn and the copilot was Brian Binnie (who later gained fame as pilot of Scaled Composites' SpaceShipOne on its second X-Prize flight).

The ATV made its first flight on July 28. This flight consisted of three vertical hops totaling 4 min 40 sec in duration and reaching a maximum altitude of 8 ft (2.4 m). The pilots found the flying extremely challenging for a number of reasons. Visibility in the cockpit was so restricted that the pilots nicknamed it the Batcave. The view of the ground was entirely obstructed, so the pilots had to rely on a sonar altimeter to judge ground proximity. The entire craft had a low rotational inertia, and torque from the spinning rotor blades made the body spin, unless counteracted by yaw thrust in the opposite direction.

The second flight, on September 16, was a continuous hover flight lasting 2 min 30 sec, reaching a maximum altitude of 20 ft (6.1 m). The sustained flight was made possible by the installation of more powerful rotor tip thrusters and an autothrottle.

The third and last flight was made on October 12. The ATV flew down the flightline at Mojave Air and Space Port, covering 4,300 ft (1,310 m) in its flight and rising to a maximum altitude of 75 ft (23 m). The speed was as high as 53 mph (85 km/h). This test revealed some instability in translational flight.

A fourth test was planned to simulate a full autorotative descent. The ATV would climb to an altitude 10,000 ft (3,050 m) under its own power, before throttling back and returning for a soft landing. At this point, given that further funding was then unlikely, safety considerations prevented the test being attempted.

Criticism of the design
Rotary Rocket failed due to lack of funding, but some have suggested that the design itself was inherently flawed.

The Rotary Rocket did fly three test flights and a composite propellant tank survived a full test program, however these tests revealed problems. For instance, the ATV demonstrated that landing the Rotary Rocket was tricky, even dangerous. Test pilots have a rating system, the Cooper-Harper rating scale, for vehicles between 1 and 10 that relates to difficulty to pilot. The Roton ATV scored a 10 — the vehicle simulator was found to be almost unflyable by anyone except the Rotary test pilots, and even then there were short periods where the vehicle was out of control.

Other aspects of the flight plan remained unproven and it is unknown whether Roton could have developed sufficient performance to reach orbit with a single stage, and return – although on paper this might have been possible.

Last days

Engine development ceased in 2000, reportedly two weeks before a full-scale test was due. The vehicle failed to secure launch contracts and Rotary Rocket closed in 2001.

The timing of the venture was unfortunate: the Iridium Communications venture was nearing bankruptcy, and the space industry in general was experiencing financial stress. Ultimately, the company did not attract sufficient funding – even though numerous individuals provided a total of $33 million of support, including writer Tom Clancy.

The Atmospheric Test Vehicle was to be displayed at Classic Rotors Museum, a helicopter museum near San Diego, California, but an attempt to move it there on May 9, 2003 via a short-line sling-load under an Army Reserve CH-47 Chinook failed when the Roton began to oscillate at airspeeds above 35 kn. Instead, the vehicle was kept at Mojave, and on November 10, 2006, the Roton was moved to its permanent display location at the intersection of Airport Blvd and Sabovich Road.

The Rotary Rocket hangars are now occupied by the National Test Pilot School.

title: Rotary Rocket


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Child Poverty Action Group

Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) is a UK charity that works to alleviate poverty and social exclusion.

History
The Group first met on 5 March 1965, at a meeting organised by Harriett C. Wilson. It followed the publication of Brian Abel-Smith and Peter Townsend's work Poor and the Poorest: both men were founding members of the Group.

At the second meeting one of the points raised was "That although increased family allowance might be the simplest and most equitable way of overcoming the poverty of large families, there was likely to be considerable difficulties in bringing about a change of this kind, partly because of the fear that this would tend to encourage people to have large families."

One of its first actions was to send a letter to the Prime Minister, on 22 December 1965, signed by a number of distinguished public figure, which stated:"'The signatories of this letter would probably not all agree on the precise details of a scheme for reform: we are agreed, however, that action should be taken to achieve a radical improvement in the standard of living of families in poverty and we wish to bring this memorandum to your attention. We ask that the present arrangements for family allowances and the allowances for children be reconsidered and revised, and that bigger direct allowances be paid in respect of children in the poorest families.'"Tony Lynes was the first full-time secretary of the Group in 1966. Frank Field served as Director of the Group from 1969–1979 and was followed by Ruth Lister (1979-1987) and Fran Bennett, and later by Kate Green (2004-2009).

Activities
CPAG programmes include:
 * Research and publish the latest facts and figures of family and child poverty in the UK
 * Lobby the UK government, lead and support campaigns for effective policies to prevent, alleviate and abolish child and family poverty
 * Provide up to date information and reliable advice on the UK social security and tax credits systems
 * Conduct training courses in Welfare Rights, for both new and experienced advisers, to help them keep up to date with developments in social security and tax credits
 * Undertake test-cases to extend the interpretation of law in favour of claimants in social security, tax credits and related law using, where appropriate the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights.

title: Child Poverty Action Group


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Optimist International

Optimist International is an international service club organization with almost 3,000 clubs and over 80,000 members in more than 20 countries. The international headquarters is located in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Optimist International is also the sponsor of Junior Optimist International, designed for elementary school through high school aged youth.

Organization
Optimist International is an organization comprising self-governing Optimist Clubs that engage in community service work. Every club raises its funds and independently selects service initiatives aimed at enhancing the well-being of children. Examples of typical projects include sponsoring youth athletic leagues, holding essay and oratorical contests for scholarships, and supporting local schools.

History
The international organization was founded at a convention in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1919. It united various local and regional clubs, the first of which had been founded in Buffalo, New York, in 1911. At the convention, the first official charter of the international organization was awarded to the club in Downtown Indianapolis, Indiana which had been founded in 1916.

Several Optimist clubs participated in the June 1917 organization meeting of the Lions Clubs International held in Chicago, Illinois. However, the delegates sent by the clubs opted not to join the new organization and withdrew from the meeting.

Organizational philosophy
Optimist International delineates its mission, vision, and purpose to encapsulate its objective of promoting and fostering the development of youth. These statements serve as a concise representation of the organization's goals.

In 1922, the Optimist Creed was adopted as the official creed of the organization. The Optimist Creed was developed by Christian D. Larson. It details a number of pledges to which members attempt to adhere.

title: Optimist International


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Environmentalist Agrarian Party

The Environmentalist Agrarian Party (Partia Agrare Ambientaliste) is an Albanian political party founded in 1991.

The party was founded by Lufter Xhuveli. Initially, the party was known as the Agrarian Party of Albania (Partia Agrare e Shqipërisë), until a name change took place in 2003. It is a reformist party that supports a free market economic system.

History
In the 1997 elections, the party won one of the single-member constituency seats, but none of the proportional seats. In total the party got 0.65%. In the 2001 elections, it received 2.6% of the vote and three seats in Parliament, Lufter Xhuveli from Zone 125, Ndue Preka from Zone 126 and Refat Dervina from Zone 127.

In the 2003 local elections, the first contested under the new name PAA, the party contested in alliance with the Socialist Party of Albania (PSSH) in some areas. The PAA-PSSH combine won in three municipalities.

In the 2005 parliamentary elections, the party received 88,605 votes (6.5%) and 4 seats.

In 1998 Xhuveli became Minister of Agriculture. Under the Majko government he was made Minister for the Environment in February 2002. In 2003 he was replaced during the reforms of Prime Minister Fatos Nano.

On 2016 Xhuveli resigned. The current leader of the party is Agron Duka, a former member and MP of the Republican Party of Albania.

title: Environmentalist Agrarian Party


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Socialist Party of Albania

The Socialist Party of Albania (Partia Socialiste e Shqipërisë, PS or PSSh) is a social-democratic political party in Albania. It has been described as centre-left. It was founded on 13 June 1991. The PS is an associate of the Party of European Socialists and a member of the Socialist International, and holds pro-European views.

History
The PS' predecessor, the Party of Labour of Albania (Partia e Punës së Shqipërisë - PPSH), was formed in November 1941, and has been known as the Socialist Party (Partia Socialiste - PSSH) since 1991, when it survived in the wake of the dramatic changes that had taken place in Albania since 1989. PPSH was the Albanian Communist party under its founder and longtime leader Enver Hoxha and the only ruling party in the country since the end of World War II. Hoxha's successor Ramiz Alia was forced to introduce limited reforms in the late 1980s. On 11 December 1990, Alia announced that the PPSh had given up its monopoly of power. The PPSh won the 1991 Albanian Constitutional Assembly election, the first free elections held in the country in almost 80 years. By this time, it was no longer a Marxist–Leninist party. At an extraordinary congress on 10–13 June 1991, the PPSh voted to change its name to the PS in an effort to survive in the new system.

Fatos Nano, a man from the intelligentsia, was elected the new chairman. Nano helped to reform the old Communist party and made it a member of the Socialist International. A faction of the party, led by Ilir Meta, split away from the PS in 2004 and formed the Socialist Movement for Integration (Lëvizja Socialiste për Integrim, LSI).

On 10 October 2005, Nano resigned as the chairman of the PS after losing the 2005 Albanian parliamentary election, and was succeeded by Edi Rama. Under Rama's lead, the PS formed the Alliance for a European Albania, which united several political parties. The alliance won the 2013 Albanian parliamentary election, thus returning the Socialists to the government after 8 years.

The Socialist Party, now running alone, again won the 2017 election and the 2021 election, winning 74 seats in both of them and is thus currently able to rule Albania alone, although it is externally supported by the Social Democratic Party in parliament.

Political positions
In its 2013 party platform, the party has pledged to replace the flat tax with a progressive tax, and also supports universal health care. Party leader Edi Rama has indicated that he supports LGBT rights in Albania. The party is also pro-European, supports the accession of Albania to the European Union, NATO membership, and considers Kosovo "Albania's main strategic partner and ally". Rama has also said that he strives to follow the Third Way approach of former British prime minister Tony Blair.

Logos
The current logo is based on the fist and rose logo in the version created by José María Cruz Novillo for the Spanish Socialist Workers Party in 1977.

title: Socialist Party of Albania