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Waterloo County, Ontario

Waterloo County was a county in Canada West in the United Province of Canada from 1853 until 1867, then in the Canadian province of Ontario from 1867 until 1973. It was the direct predecessor of the Regional Municipality of Waterloo.

Situated on a subset of land within the Haldimand Tract, Waterloo County consisted of five townships: Woolwich, Wellesley, Wilmot, Waterloo, and North Dumfries. The major population centres were Waterloo, Kitchener (known as Berlin prior to 1916), Preston, Hespeler, Blair, and Doon in Waterloo township; Galt in North Dumfries; Elmira in Woolwich; and New Hamburg in Wilmot. All are now part of the Regional Municipality.

Background
Waterloo County was once one of the most densely wooded sections in North America. Oak trees three to four feet in diameter, maple, beech, elm, ash oak and great pines were common. The county, located in the northerly edge of Attawandaron land, was excellent for hunting and fishing.

Haldimand Proclamation (1784–1800)
In 1784, by way of the Haldimand Proclamation, the British Government granted the Grand River valley to Iroquois confederation refugees from central and western New York State, indigenous peoples who served as allies during the American Revolution. The area was from Lake Erie to the Elora falls, and the width being six miles on each side of the river. The First Nations soon offered almost half of the upper area for sale. It was divided into four blocks. Blocks 1, 2 and 3 were sold by 1816; this large area became the townships of Waterloo, Woolwich and Dumfries.

The western part of this area was initially settled by Mennonites of German extraction from Pennsylvania; most settled the area that would become Kitchener, St. Jacobs, Elmira and surroundings. The southern part (now Cambridge) – as well as areas that would become Fergus and Elora, just outside Waterloo County – were settled by Scots. Except for grist, woolen and saw mills, there was little industry in any of these area until about 1870.

Early arrivals from Pennsylvania (1800–1819)
Settlement of the what later became the Township of Waterloo started in 1800 (in an area that is now a part of Kitchener) by Joseph Schoerg (later called Sherk) and Samuel Betzner, Jr. (brothers-in-law), Mennonites, from Franklin County, Pennsylvania. At the time, the upper part of the Grand River Valley was considered deep in the wilderness, and was difficult to penetrate into with wagons due a lack of roads. One Waterloo County historian, W. H. Breithaupt, believed that Schoerg and Betzner, after arriving in Upper Canada, travelled from Ancaster westward through Beverley Township to a point on the Grand River near where Paris would later be founded, using a road cut through the wilderness the previous year by two Englishmen named Ward and Smith. They then followed the Grand River northward. Joseph Schoerg and his wife settled on Lot 11, B.F. Beasley Block, S.R., on the bank of the Grand River opposite Doon, and Betzner and his wife settled on the west bank of the Grand, on a farm near what would become the village of Blair. The homes built by the next generation of these families still stand as of March 2021, on what is now Pioneer Tower Road in Kitchener, and have been listed as historically important; the John Betzner homestead (restored) and the David Schoerg farmstead (not yet restored) were erected circa 1830.

The German Company, represented by Daniel Erb and Samuel Bricker, had gotten into financial difficulties after buying the land in 1796 from Joseph Brant who represented the Six Nations. The payment to Beasly, in cash, arrived from Pennsylvania in kegs, carried in a wagon surrounded by armed guards.

Other settlers followed mostly from Pennsylvania typically by Conestoga wagons. Many of the pioneers arriving from Pennsylvania after November 1803 bought land in a 60,000 acre section of Block Two from the German Company from Richard Beasley who had acquired a massive territory. The tract had originally been purchased from the Six Nations Indians by the British Crown in 1784; it was acquired in 1798 by Richard Beasley and two partners who decided to resell land, in smaller parcels. The Tract included most of Block 2 of the previous Grand River Indian Lands. Many of the first farms were least four hundred acres in size.

At this time, many Mississauga people still frequented the area. Recorded history documents that the relationship between the Mississaugas and early settlers could sometimes be strained. In one case, a John Erb (likely the same John Erb who built the first mills at Preston) was shot and wounded by a Mississauga man in Haldimand County in 1804. Ezra E. Eby, whose history of Waterloo Township was based on oral family histories of early settlers as well as written history, highlights positive social relationships between early settlers and indigenous people, describing frequent trade between them, that settlers' children and indigenous children would play together, and that indigenous people would sometimes stay overnight in settlers' houses. However, in one surviving document from the period, a group of settlers in "Beasley's Township" (the name used before Waterloo Township was adopted) petitioned the Upper Canada legislature in 1808 to ban the sale of spirits to indigenous people, citing social disorder and "bad behaviour" including the shooting of another settler. Another, later historian, Angus S. Bauman, points out in his own history that Ezra Eby may have been aware of these incidents, highlighting Eby's comment that "[i]n those early times the Indians were very numerous and if kindly treated would never injure anyone," noting that "perhaps these men did inadvertently displease the Indians."

The majority of the settlers of the Lower Block along the Grand River (including areas such as the current Freeport and Hespeler) were also Mennonites from Pennsylvania often called Pennsylvania Dutch although they were actually Deutsch or Deitsch, German. Others immigrated from the British Isles and directly from Germany, producing a mix of cultures.

The first school opened in 1802 near the village of Blair, then known as Shinglebridge and now part of Cambridge, Ontario. The first teacher's name was Mr. Rittenhaus. By the early 1800s, a corduroy road had been built along what is now King Street in Waterloo; its remains were unearthed in 2016. The road was probably built by Mennonites using technology acquired in Lancaster County Pennsylvania, between the late 1790s and 1816. The log road was buried in about 1840 and a new road built on top of it. A historian explained that the road had been built for access to the mill but was also "one of the first roads cut through (the woods) so people could start settling the area".

Later declared the founder of the city of Waterloo, Abraham Erb, a German Mennonite from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, bought 900 acres of bush land in 1806 from the German Company; (this would later be part of Waterloo Township). He built a sawmill in 1808 and a gristmill in 1816; the latter operated continuously for 111 years. Other early settlers of what would become Waterloo included Samuel and Elia Schneider who arrived in 1816. Until about 1820, settlements such as this were quite small.

By 1804, the cemetery in the village of Blair (now part of Cambridge) was already in use. The next cemetery to be started is the one next to Pioneer Tower in Doon; the first recorded burial at that location was in 1806. The cemetery at First Mennonite church at 800 King St. East in Kitchener is not as old, but contains the graves of some notable citizens, including Bishop Benjamin Eby who died in 1853, Joseph Schneider, and Rev. Joseph Cramer, founder of the House of Friendship social service agency.

In 1807, 45,195 acre of Block 3 (Woolwich) was purchased by Pennsylvanians John Erb, Jacob Erb and others.

Later named the founder of Kitchener, Benjamin Eby (made Mennonite preacher 1809, and bishop in 1812) arrived from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania in 1806 and purchased a very large tract of land consisting of much of what would become the village of Berlin (named about 1830). The settlement was initially called Ebytown and was at the south-east side of what would later become Queen Street. (Eby was also responsible for the growth of the Mennonite church in Waterloo County; he built the first church in 1813.) Abram Weber settled on the corner of what would become King and Wilmot Streets and David Weber in the area of the much later Grand Trunk Railway station. Benjamin Eby encouraged manufacturers to move to the village. Jacob Hoffman came in 1829 or 1830 and started the first furniture factory. Almost as important as Benjamin Eby in the history of Kitchener, Joseph Schneider of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania (son of immigrants from southern Germany) bought lot 17 of the German Company Tract of block 2 in 1806. While farming, he helped to build what became "Schneider's Road" and by 1816 built a sawmill. Years later, Schneider and Phineas Varnum would help form the commercial centre of Ebytown.

The War of 1812 interrupted settlement. The Mennonite settlers refused to carry arms so were employed in non-combatant roles in camps and hospital and as teamsters in transport service during the war.

William Dickson of Niagara purchased land in the township of North Dumfries and South Dumfries. With his land agent, Absolom Shade, he located a town site on the Grand River. Settlers were attracted, largely from Scotland with the price of land being about four dollars an acre. Years later (1827), this village would be named Galt for John Galt, the British author and then Superintendent of the Canada Company headquartered in Guelph. Galt was a friend of William Dickson.

Rural development (1819–1852)
During and shortly after the War of 1812, government expenditures on roads increased dramatically, leading to the improvement and extension of a number of roads in Upper Canada. By 1819, a new road had been constructed, which ran diagonally across Beverley Township from Dundas to Galt. The new road gave pioneers in Dumfries Township (and by extension, Waterloo Township) a direct route to urban centres near Lake Ontario, although it was over a difficult track which passed through many swamps. This "Beverley Road" was the predecessor to the later. Before commercial mills were constructed in the Waterloo area, settlers had to bring their grain in wagons along the road to Dundas to be milled. By the 1830s, the government had adopted a new strategy: the creation of toll roads maintained by private companies. The first such company, incorporated in 1829, was the Dundas and Waterloo Turnpike Company. It had a capitalization of CA£25,000, almost double the government's expenditure on roads the following year, and was committed to improve and maintain the Galt–Dundas road to a width of 30 ft. Despite these funds, the company struggled financially, and a debenture of another £25,000 was requested and authorized in 1837. A further £8,000 was authorized two years later, in 1839, for macadamization.

The earliest recorded proposal for a railway in Waterloo County was in January 1836; at the time, no public railways existed in Canada, as the first, the Champlain and St. Lawrence Railroad, was still under construction and would only open later that year. This first proposal was for a long-distance route from Dundas to Goderich, going through Preston. A similar proposal for a "Toronto and Lake Huron Railway" was made in August, which was intended to pass through the townships of Dumfries and Waterloo. However, an economic crisis in 1837 delayed railway development, and it wouldn't be until the railway fever of the 1840s that new proposals would emerge.

John Eby, druggist and chemist, arrived from Pennsylvania in about 1820 and opened a shop to the west of what would later be Eby Street. At the time, it was common for settlers to form a building "bee" to help newcomers erect a long home. Immigration from Lancaster county continued heavily in the 1820s because of a severe agricultural depression in Lancaster County. Joseph Schneider also settled in that area and built a frame house in 1820 on the south side of the future Queen Street after clearing a farm and creating a rough road. A small settlement formed around "Schneider's Road" which later became the nucleus of Berlin. The home was renovated over a century later and still stands.

The village centre of what would become Berlin (and later, Kitchener) was established in 1830 by Phineas Varnum who leased land from Joseph Schneider and opened a blacksmith shop on the site where a hotel would be built many years later, the Walper House. A tavern was also established here at the same time and a store was opened. At the time, the settlement of Berlin was still considered to be a hamlet.

By 1830 the village of Preston was a thriving business centre with Jacob Hespeler, a native of Württemberg and a prominent citizen. He would later move to the village of New Hope that was renamed Hespeler in 1857 in recognition of his public service and the industries he started there. Jacob Beck from the Grand Duchy of Baden founded the village of Baden in Wilmot Township and started a foundry and machine shop. Jacob Beck was the father of Sir Adam Beck.

The first newspaper of the county (first issue dated August 27, 1835) was the Canada Museum und Allgemeine Zeitung, printed mostly in German and partly in English. It was published for only five years.

The land which now makes up the township of Woolwich, including communities such as St. Jacobs and Elmira, were first settled in the early 1800s. The early settlers were primarily from England or Ireland but after 1830, Mennonites from Pennsylvania formed a significant proportion of the population. The area still retains much of its traditional character. Old Order Mennonites can still be seen on the local roads using their traditional horse and buggy transportation.

By 1835, many immigrants to Waterloo County were not from Pennsylvania. Many settler came from England, Ireland, Scotland and Germany to areas such as New Germany in the Lower Block of Block Two. In 1835, approximately 70% of the population was Mennonite but by 1851, only 26% of the much larger population were of this religion. This was due to the large wave of new German migrants from Europe, particularly between 1830 and 1850.

The Wellington District and Waterloo County were formed in June 1840 from territory transferred from certain other districts:

The district town was Guelph.

Records indicate a population of 13,782 in 1841. The Smith's Canadian Gazetteer of 1846 states that the Township of Waterloo (smaller than Waterloo County) consisted primarily of Pennsylvanian Mennonites and immigrants directly from Germany who had brought money with them. At the time, many did not speak English. There were eight grist and twenty saw mills in the township. In 1841, the population count was 4424. In 1846 the village of Waterloo had a population of 200, "mostly Germans". There was a grist mill and a sawmill and some tradesmen. Berlin (Kitchener) had a population of about 400, also "mostly German", and more tradesmen than the village of Waterloo.

Reorganization of the county (1852–1853)
At the beginning of 1852, the County was divided into three, forming the United Counties of Wellington, Waterloo and Grey:

The County of Waterloo was withdrawn from the United Counties in January 1853.

Urbanization and centralization around Berlin (1853–1894)

There had been some contentious debate between Galt and Berlin (later, Kitchener) as to where the county seat would be located. At the time, Berlin was a hamlet with a population of only 700, as opposed to Galt's population of 2,200. one of the requirements for founding was the construction of a courthouse and jail. When the local Berlin hotelier Friedrich Gaukel donated a small parcel of land he owned (at the current Queen and Weber streets), this secured the county seat for Berlin. The courthouse at the corner of the later Queen Street North and Weber Street and the county gaol were built within a few months. The first county council meeting was held in the new building on 24 January 1853, as the county officially began operations. The new county council included 12 members from the five townships and two villages; Doctor John Scott was appointed as the first warden (reeve). Though the courthouse has since been replaced with a modern structure, the gaol and adjacent governor's house remain to this day under historical designation; they have been repurposed for further legal capacities (courtrooms and prosecutors' offices). In the following years, various County institutions and facilities would be created, including roads and bridges, schools, a House of Industry and Refuge, agricultural societies and local markets.

The Grand Trunk Railway reached Berlin in 1856 and that accelerated the growth of industry. In the next decade factories and the homes of labourers and wealthy owners replaced the early settlers' log houses. A rail line did not reach St. Jacobs or Elmira until 1891. The Grand Trunk and the Canadian Pacific railways provided useful transportation and as a result, furniture manufacturing and other industries began to open in Elmira.

After about 1850, settlers direct from Germany began arriving to all parts of the county, including Woolwich Township. Waterloo was incorporated as a village in 1857 and became the Town of Waterloo in 1876 and the City of Waterloo in 1948.

The population was 38,750 by 1861. In 1864, there were two grammar schools in the county, at Galt and Berlin, three Roman Catholic Separate Schools in the township of Wellesley, and two others in the township of Wilmot.

By 1871, the largest ethnic groups in the county were Scots (18 per cent of the population), Irish (8 per cent), English (12.6 per cent), and German. At that time, those with German roots (direct from Europe or from Pennsylvania) made up nearly 55 per cent of the population. That was much higher than the 10 percent typical in the rest of Ontario.

The first hospital in Waterloo County opened in 1890 as Galt General Hospital. Additional buildings and facilities were added in the early 1900s. By 1918, the facility had an X-ray room, a 27-room nurses' residence and was also a nurse training school.

By 1911, there were nearly three times as many Lutherans as Mennonites in that area, for example.

Nascent urban hierarchy

In urban studies, a metric called the "functional unit" is sometimes used as a measure for the complexity of a settlement. A functional unit is a measure of a type of economic activity, such as milling, banking, or retailing. A single establishment could contain multiple functional units; one example, common in pioneer settlements, is the general store/post office, which would constitute two functional units. For Waterloo County, statistics on functional units are possible for 1864 onward using contemporary data sources. In 1864, Galt was clearly at the top of the county's urban hierarchy, with of all functional units, while Berlin had only. Waterloo, Preston, Ayr, and New Hamburg all followed with between and  each; no other community in the county had more than  of the county's functional units.

By 1871, Galt still held the lead, but several small and mid-sized settlements in the county had dramatically increased in total number of functional units, overtaking others. In particular, New Hamburg, Elmira, and Ayr pulled ahead of Preston, while St. Jacobs and Hespeler more than doubled and tripled respectively. From 1871 to 1881, the county entered an era described by the geographer Fred Dahms as one of "competition and centralization". Between 1871 and 1881, the rural population decreased while the urban share of total population increased by nearly, despite a total population growth of only. The total number of settlements with functional units increased between 1864 and 1881, reaching an all-time peak of 44, and communities were widely dispersed. The result of this was numerous hamlets with one or two functional units (often a hotel, general store, or smithy) which had developed at road intersections, and a road system which allowed anyone with access to a horse and carriage the easy ability to return from a day trip. Economic functions, however, had already begun to centralize amongst a handful of major settlements.

House of Industry and Refuge
In 1869, the County built a large poorhouse with an attached farm, the House of Industry and Refuge that accommodated some 3,200 people before being closed down in 1951; the building was subsequently demolished. It was located on Frederick St. in Kitchener, behind the now Frederick Street Mall and was intended to minimize the number of people begging, living on the streets or being incarcerated at a time before social welfare programmes became available. A 2009 report by the Toronto Star explains that "pauperism was considered a moral failing that could be erased through order and hard work".

A research project by the Laurier School of Social Work has amassed all available data about the House and its former residents, digitized it and made the archive available on-line at WaterlooHouseOfRefuge.ca. According to Sandy Hoy, a director of research projects, the "inmates" included not only the poor, "but folks with disabilities, women, children. Some were single women who had been servants and became pregnant; in fact, many were single mothers of all types. The archives also indicate that in addition to food and shelter for "inmates", in return for labour in the house and on the attached farm, the House also donated food, clothing and money for train tickets to enable the poor to reach family that might be able to support them. There were also two cemeteries for the poor nearby, including "inmates" of the House who had died.

Street railways

Although railways had arrived in Waterloo County in the 1850s, street railways only arrived several decades later. Urban railways offered a number of advantages to developing communities, but required a serious infrastructure investment which often fell to local municipalities or private businessmen. Street railways tended to lead to the development of the "streetcar strip" – highly developed urban commercial corridors – in contrast with older downtowns, which were usually less linear in form. With King Street already dominant as a linear commercial corridor, it was natural that early street railway development would connect two of the county's urban centres (Berlin and Waterloo) along this established route. This came about in 1888 in the form of the Berlin and Waterloo Street Railway. It initially started operations with horsecar service before later owners electrified the line and began using electric streetcars.

The next street railway system to be constructed in the county was the Galt and Preston Street Railway in 1894, which, similarly to the Berlin and Waterloo, connected the existing urban centres of Galt and Preston. It soon became the Galt, Preston and Hespeler Street Railway after a branch line was built which connected Preston and Hespeler along the east bank of the Speed River. This system hosted not just passengers and mail, but also full carload freight. In 1904, the railway's Galt–Preston mainline was effectively extended with the construction of the Preston and Berlin Street Railway which, despite its name, took on many of the characteristics of an interurban. It featured two new freight yards, one in Berlin and one in Waterloo. These systems were gradually consolidated over several years and by 1914, they were known under the unified name of the Grand River Railway, which dispensed with street railway nomenclature. The Berlin and Waterloo Street Railway, in contrast, never lost its street railway traits and continued to operate similarly in the 20th century under Kitchener Public Utilities Commission management as it had in the 19th century, until its eventual shutdown in 1946.

Interurban railways

By the turn of the 20th century, interurban railways had begun to spread throughout North America. These were a natural evolution from street railways, but represented a more substantial commitment to regional rail infrastructure. The Grand River Railway was noted by rail historian John M. Mills as one of the earliest interurbans in Canada, and "for many years one of the most energetic and progressive." While plans for a northern extension of the mainline never resulted in new construction, a succession of lines provided connections to the south. These were the Grand Valley Railway, built as an extension of the Brantford Street Railway and extended north to Galt in 1903, and the Lake Erie and Northern Railway, a more modern successor to the Grand Valley Railway which opened in 1916.

Taken as a sum, these interurban lines created direct rail connections between Waterloo County, Brant County, and Norfolk County, as well as freight interchange with significant Canadian National Railway, Canadian Pacific Railway, and Michigan Central Railroad lines and intercity stations. In fact, both lines were indirectly controlled by the Canadian Pacific Railway, and starting in 1931, they were managed together as a single entity known as the Canadian Pacific Electric Lines. Ridership on passenger trips declined, and services began to be cut starting in the late 1930s with the cancellation of trips to Waterloo, though the system had a brief swan song in ridership during the Second World War. Regular passenger service ended in 1955. Freight service continued, though the line was extensively relocated to make room for highway expansion in south Kitchener during the 1960s.

German heritage
While German-speaking settlers from Pennsylvania were the most numerous until about 1840, a few Germans from Europe began arriving in as 1819, including Friedrich Gaukel, a hotel keeper, being one of the firsts. He would build what later became the Walper House in Berlin. Two streets in present-day Kitchener, Frederick and Gaukel streets, are named after him. Other German-speaking immigrants from Europe arrived in Waterloo County during the 1830s to 1850s, bringing with them their language, religion and cultural traditions. Waterloo County soon became recognized throughout Canada for their Germanic heritage. The German community became industrial and political leaders, and created a German-Canadian society unlike any other found in Canada at the time. They established German public schools and German language churches.

Both the immigrants from Germany and the Mennonites from Pennsylvania spoke German of course, though with different dialects such as Low German or the incorrectly called Pennsylvania Dutch, actually Pennsilfaanisch Deitsch (German). (This dialect is different from Standard German with a simplified grammatical structure, some differences in vocabulary and pronunciation and a greater influence of English.) The combination of various types of German-speaking groups was a notable factor in the history of Waterloo County. The two groups of Germanics were able to understand each other quite easily and there was no apparent conflict between the Germans from Europe and those who came from Pennsylvania.

Some sources estimate that roughly 50,000 Germans directly from Europe settled in a large area of Southern Ontario, in and around Waterloo County, between the 1830s and 1850s. Unlike the predominantly Mennonite settlers from Pennsylvania, the majority of Germans from Europe were of other denominations: most in the first groups were Catholic and those who arrived later were primarily Lutheran.

In 1862, German-speaking groups held The Sängerfest, or "Singer Festival" concert event that attracted an estimated 10,000 people and continued for several years. Eleven years later, the over 2000 Germans in Berlin, Ontario started a new event, Friedenfest, commemorating Prussian victory Franco-Prussian war. This annual celebration continued until the start of WWI. In 1897, they raised funds to erect a large monument, with a bronze bust of Kaiser Wilhelm 1, in Victoria Park. (The monument would be destroyed by townspeople just after the start of WWI.)

By 1871, nearly 55 percent of the population had German origins, including both those of Pennsylvania Mennonite and European Germans. This group greatly outnumbered the Scots (18 per cent), the English (12.6 per cent) and the Irish (8 per cent). Berlin, Ontario was a bilingual town with German being the dominant language spoken. More than one visitor commented on the necessity of speaking German in Berlin.

Immigration from continental Germany slowed by 1880. First and second-generation descendants now comprised most of the local German population, and while they were proud of their German roots, most considered themselves loyal British subjects. The 1911 Census indicates that of the 15,196 residents in Berlin, Ontario, about 70% were identified as ethnic German but only 8.3% had been born in Germany. By the beginning of the First World War in 1914, Berlin and Waterloo County were still considered to be predominantly German by people across Canada. This would prove to have a profound impact on local citizens during the war years. During the first few months of the war, services an activities at Lutheran churches in Waterloo County continued on as they always had. However, as anti-German sentiment increased throughout Waterloo County, many of the churches decided to stop holding services in German.

By the early 1900s, North Waterloo County (the Kitchener, Waterloo and Woolwich Township areas) exhibited a strong German culture and those of German origin made up a third of the population in 1911, with Lutherans as the primary religious group. The Mennonites at that time primarily resided in the rural areas and small communities.

The governor general of Canada, the Duke of Connaught, while visiting Berlin, Ontario, in May 1914, discussed the importance of Canadians of German ethnicity (regardless of their origin) in a speech: "It is of great interest to me that many of the citizens of Berlin are of German descent. I well know the admirable qualities – the thoroughness, the tenacity, and the loyalty of the great Teutonic Race, to which I am so closely related. I am sure that these inherited qualities will go far in the making of good Canadians and loyal citizens of the British Empire". Nonetheless, before and during World War I, there was some Anti-German sentiment in Canada and some cultural sanctions on the community, particularly in Berlin, Ontario. However, by 1919 most of the population of what would become Kitchener, Waterloo and Elmira were "Canadian"; over 95 percent had been born In Ontario. Those of the Mennonite religion were pacifist so they could not enlist and the few who had immigrated from Germany (not born in Canada) could not morally fight against a country that was a significant part of their heritage. The anti-German sentiment was the primary reason for the Berlin to Kitchener name change in 1916. News reports indicate that "A Lutheran minister was pulled out of his house ... he was dragged through the streets. German clubs were ransacked through the course of the war. It was just a really nasty time period.". A document in the Archives of Canada makes the following comment: "Although ludicrous to modern eyes, the whole issue of a name for Berlin highlights the effects that fear, hatred and nationalism can have upon a society in the face of war."

The Waterloo Pioneer Memorial Tower built in 1926 commemorates the settlement by the Pennsylvania 'Dutch' (actually Pennsilfaanisch Deitsch, or German) of the Grand River area of Waterloo County.

This county is still home to the largest population of Old Order Mennonites in Canada, particularly in the areas around St Jacobs and Elmira.

Running for nearly 50 years now, the Kitchener-Waterloo Oktoberfest has been a remembrance of the Region's German Heritage. The event includes beer halls and German entertainment, as well as a major parade, The second largest Oktoberfest in the world, the event is based on the original German Oktoberfest and is billed as Canada's Greatest Bavarian Festival. In recent years, it has been attracting an average of 700,000 people to the county. During the 2016 Oktoberfest parade, an estimated 150,000 people lined the streets along the route.

Successor
Created in 1853, Waterloo County consisted of five townships: Woolwich, Wellesley, Wilmot, Waterloo, and North Dumfries, including the cities, towns and villages in each area.

The county was dissolved in 1973 and the new Regional Municipality of Waterloo, was formed, consisting of the cities of Kitchener, Cambridge, and Waterloo and the townships of Wellesley, Woolwich, Wilmot, and North Dumfries. In addition, a small portion of Beverley Township, in the former Wentworth County (now City of Hamilton), was added to North Dumfries and the Waterloo Region.

More specifically, the cities of Galt, Kitchener, and Waterloo were previously independent single-tier municipalities prior to joining the newly formed regional municipality. In the 1973 reorganization, the fifteen towns and townships of the county were reduced to just seven in the new Region of Waterloo. The new city of Cambridge was created by the amalgamation of the city of Galt, the towns of Preston and Hespeler, the village of Blair, and various parcels of township land. One township vanished when the former Waterloo Township was divided among Woolwich Township and the three cities of Kitchener, Waterloo, and Cambridge. The community of Bridgeport was annexed to the city of Kitchener. Erbsville was annexed to the city of Waterloo. The former county government was given broader powers as a regional municipality.

The Region of Waterloo, with Jack A. Young as its first chairman, took over many services, including Police, waste management, recreation, planning, roads and social services.

The Region is 1,369 square kilometres in size and its regional seat of government is in Kitchener. The Region's population was 535,154 at the 2016 census. The former village, town and city councils joined into the council of a new township or city. An overseeing regional council handles the former county-level responsibilities, as well as now providing police and other service for the Region as a whole.

title: Waterloo County, Ontario


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Extrapyramidal system

In anatomy, the extrapyramidal system is a part of the motor system network causing involuntary actions. The system is called extrapyramidal to distinguish it from the tracts of the motor cortex that reach their targets by traveling through the pyramids of the medulla. The pyramidal tracts (corticospinal tract and corticobulbar tracts) may directly innervate motor neurons of the spinal cord or brainstem (anterior (ventral) horn cells or certain cranial nerve nuclei), whereas the extrapyramidal system centers on the modulation and regulation (indirect control) of anterior (ventral) horn cells.

Extrapyramidal tracts are chiefly found in the reticular formation of the pons and medulla, and target lower motor neurons in the spinal cord that are involved in reflexes, locomotion, complex movements, and postural control. These tracts are in turn modulated by various parts of the central nervous system, including the nigrostriatal pathway, the basal ganglia, the cerebellum, the vestibular nuclei, and different sensory areas of the cerebral cortex. All of these regulatory components can be considered part of the extrapyramidal system, in that they modulate motor activity without directly innervating motor neurons.

The extrapyramidal tracts include parts of the following:
 * rubrospinal tract: Conflicts between the motor commands sent by the cerebrum and body position information provided by the proprioceptors cause the cerebellum to stimulate the red nucleus of the midbrain. The red nucleus then sends corrective commands to the spinal cord along the rubrospinal tract.
 * reticulospinal tract: connects the reticular system, a diffuse region of gray matter in the brain stem, to the spinal cord. It also contributes to muscle tone and influences autonomic functions.
 * lateral vestibulospinal tract: Connects the brain stem nuclei of the vestibular system with the spinal cord. This allows posture, movement, and balance to be modulated on the basis of equilibrium information provided by the vestibular system.
 * tectospinal tract: This tract projects from the midbrain to the spinal cord and is important for postural movements that are driven by the superior colliculus.

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

title: Extrapyramidal system


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Talk:Waterloo County

This page is obsolete, replaced with this page on Waterloo County. As the author, I request it be deleted. Sorry!

 * Delete not necessary; I redirected. Radagast 02:40, Jun 1, 2004 (UTC)

title: Talk:Waterloo County


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User talk:207.157.54.2

September 2017
Hello, I'm Shellwood. I wanted to let you know that I reverted one of your recent contributions —the one you made with this edit to Robert Boyle— because it did not appear constructive. If you would like to experiment, please use the sandbox. If you think I made a mistake, or if you have any questions, you can leave me a message on my talk page. Thanks. Shellwood (talk) 13:18, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

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February 2022
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title: User talk:207.157.54.2


text:
Province of New Jersey

The Province of New Jersey was one of the Middle Colonies of Colonial America and became the U.S. state of New Jersey in 1776. The province had originally been settled by Europeans as part of New Netherland but came under English rule after the surrender of Fort Amsterdam in 1664, becoming a proprietary colony. The English renamed the province after the island of Jersey in the English Channel. The Dutch Republic reasserted control for a brief period in 1673–1674. After that it consisted of two political divisions, East Jersey and West Jersey, until they were united as a royal colony in 1702. The original boundaries of the province were slightly larger than the current state, extending into a part of the present state of New York, until the border was finalized in 1773.

Background

The Province of New Jersey was originally settled in the 1610s as part of the colony of New Netherland. The surrender of Fort Amsterdam in September 1664 gave control over the entire Mid-Atlantic region to the English as part of the Second Anglo-Dutch War. The English justified the seizure by claiming that John Cabot, an Italian under the sponsorship of the English King Henry VII, had been the first to discover the place, but it was probably to assert control over the profitable North Atlantic trade. Director-General of New Netherland Peter Stuyvesant, unable to rouse a military defense, relinquished control of the colony and was able in the articles of transfer to secure guarantees for property rights, laws of inheritance, and freedom of religion. After the surrender, Richard Nicolls took the position as deputy-governor of New Amsterdam and the rest of New Netherland, including those settlements on the west side of the North River (Hudson River) known as Bergen and those along the Delaware River that had been New Sweden.

Proprietary government
In March 1664, King Charles II granted his brother, James, the Duke of York, a Royal colony that covered New Netherlands and present-day Maine. This charter also included parts of present-day Massachusetts, which conflicted with that colony's charter. The charter allowed James traditional propriety rights and imposed few restrictions upon his powers. In general terms, the charter was equivalent to a conveyance of land conferring on him the right of possession, control, and government, subject only to the limitation that the government must be consistent with the laws of England. The Duke of York never visited his colony and exercised little direct control of it. He elected to administer his government through governors, councils, and other officers appointed by himself. No provision was made for an elected assembly.

Later in 1664, the Duke of York gave the part of his new possessions between the Hudson River and the Delaware River to Sir George Carteret in exchange for settlement of a debt. The territory was named after the island of Jersey, Carteret's ancestral home. The other section of New Jersey was sold to Lord Berkeley of Stratton, who was a close friend of the Duke. As a result, Carteret and Berkeley became the two English lords proprietors of New Jersey. The two proprietors of New Jersey attempted to attract more settlers to move to the province by granting sections of lands to settlers and by passing the Concession and Agreement, a 1665 document that granted religious freedom to all inhabitants of New Jersey; under the British government, there was no such religious freedom as the Church of England was the state church. In return for the land, the settlers were supposed to pay annual fees known as quit-rents.

In 1665, Philip Carteret became the first governor of New Jersey, appointed by the two proprietors. He selected Elizabeth as the capital of New Jersey. Immediately, Carteret issued several additional grants of land to landowners. Towns were started and charters granted to Newark (1666), Piscataway (1666), Bergen (1668), Middletown (1693), Woodbridge (1669), and Shrewsbury.

The idea of quit-rents became increasingly difficult because many of the settlers refused to pay them. Most of them claimed that they owed nothing to the proprietors because they received land from Richard Nicolls, governor of New York. This forced Berkeley to sell West Jersey to John Fenwick and Edward Byllynge, two English Quakers. Many more Quakers made their homes in New Jersey, seeking religious freedom from English (Church of England) rule.

Meanwhile, conflicts began rising in New Jersey. Edmund Andros, governor of New York, attempted to gain authority over East Jersey after the death of Sir George Carteret in 1680. However, he was unable to remove the position of governorship from Governor Phillip Carteret and subsequently moved to attack him and brought him to trial in New York. Carteret was later acquitted. In addition, quarrels occurred between Eastern and Western New Jerseyans, between Native Americans and New Jerseyans, and between different religious groups.

East and West Jerseys
From 1674 to 1702, the Province of New Jersey was divided into East Jersey and West Jersey, each with its own governor. Each had its own constitution: the West Jersey Constitution (1681) and the East Jersey Constitution (1683).

The exact border between West and East Jersey was often disputed. The border between the two sides reached the Atlantic Ocean to the north of present-day Atlantic City. The border line was created by George Keith and can still be seen in the county boundaries between Burlington and Ocean counties, and between Hunterdon and Somerset counties. The Keith line runs north-northwest from the southern part of Little Egg Harbor Township, passing just north of Tuckerton, and reaching upward to a point on the Delaware River which is just north of the Delaware Water Gap. Later, the 1676 Quintipartite Deed helped to lessen the disputes. More accurate surveys and maps were made to resolve property disputes. This resulted in the Thornton Line, drawn around 1696, and the Lawrence Line, drawn around 1743, which was adopted as the final line for legal purposes.

Dominion of New England
The Dominion of New England was a short-lived administrative union. On May 7, 1688, the Province of New York, the Province of East Jersey, and the Province of West Jersey were added to the Dominion. The capital was located in Boston, but because of its size, New York, East Jersey, and West Jersey were run by the lieutenant governor from New York City. After news of the overthrow of James II by William of Orange in the Glorious Revolution of 1688 reached Boston, the colonists rose up in rebellion, and the Dominion was dissolved in 1689.

Royal colony
On April 17, 1702, under the rule of Queen Anne, the two sections of the proprietary colony were united, and New Jersey became a royal colony. Edward Hyde, Lord Cornbury, became the first governor of the colony as a royal colony. However, he was an ineffective and corrupt ruler, taking bribes and speculating on land. In 1708, Lord Cornbury was recalled to England. New Jersey was then again ruled by the governors of New York, but this infuriated the settlers of New Jersey, accusing those governors of favoritism to New York. Judge Lewis Morris led the case for a separate governor and was appointed governor by King George II in 1738.

New York–New Jersey Line War
The New York – New Jersey Line War was a series of skirmishes and raids that took place for over half a century between 1701 and 1765 at the disputed border between the two American colonies the Province of New York and the Province of New Jersey. Border wars were not unusual in the early days of settlements of the colonies and originated in conflicting land claims. Because of ignorance, willful disregard, and legal ambiguities, such conflicts arose involving local settlers until a final settlement was reached. In the largest of these squabbles some 210,000 acres of land were at stake between New York and New Jersey. The conflict was eventually settled by royal commission in 1769.

Provincial Congress

The Provincial Congress of New Jersey was a transitional governing body of the Province of New Jersey in the early part of the American Revolution. It first met in 1775 with representatives from all New Jersey's thirteen counties, to supersede the royal governor.

First state constitution
New Jersey's first state constitution was adopted on July 2, 1776. The American Revolutionary War was underway, and General George Washington recently had been defeated in New York, putting the state in danger of invasion. The 1776, the New Jersey State Constitution was drafted in five days and ratified within the next two days to establish a temporary government, thereby preventing New Jersey from collapsing and descending into anarchy. Among other provisions, it granted unmarried women and blacks who met property requirements the right to vote.

Judiciary
The Supreme Court was established in 1704, to sit alternately at Perth Amboy and Burlington, consisting of a chief justice, a second judge and several associate judges.
 * Chief justices

title: Province of New Jersey


text:
Charles DeWitt

Charles DeWitt (April 27, 1727 – August 27, 1787) was an American statesman and miller from the U.S. state of New York. He served as a delegate to the Continental Congress.

Early life
DeWitt was born in Kingston, New York, the eldest son of Johannes DeWitt and Mary (née Brodhead) DeWitt. Among his siblings was brother Andries J. DeWitt, who married Blandina Elmendorf Ten Eyck (parents of Jenneke (née DeWitt) Bruyn and grandparents of U.S. Representative Andrew DeWitt Bruyn). He was a first cousin once removed of Charles Clinton, DeWitt Clinton, George Clinton, Jr. and Jacob Hasbrouck DeWitt.

DeWitt attended school in Kingston and pursued classical studies. He helped his family operate a flour mill in Greenkill (in what is now Rosendale, New York). The first mill at the site was built by Mattys Mattysen Van Keuren in 1677. Van Keuren had no children and when he died the mill was passed on to his nephew, who was a DeWitt.

Career
He was first elected to the New York General Assembly to represent Ulster County in 1768. He was returned to that seat in every election until the Assembly was replaced in the American Revolution by a Provisional Congress for the colony in 1775. That year he was one of the members who voted to approve the work of the Continental Congress. As the revolution drew near, and the Ulster militia was expanded, he was named Colonel of the 2nd Ulster Militia regiment on December 21, 1775.

DeWitt served in the New York Provincial Congress from 1775 to 1777 while continuing his militia duties. In the New York Provincial Congress he served on the committee that drafted the state's first constitution. He also served on the Committee of Safety. After active warfare slowed, he was elected to the New York Assembly under the new government. He served in the assembly from 1781 to 1785 and 1785–1787. The assembly sent him as a delegate to the Continental Congress in 1781 and 1784.

DeWitt supplied a great deal of flour to the Continental Army from his grist mill on the Greenkill.

Personal life
On December 20, 1754, DeWitt was married to Blandina DuBois (1731–1765) in Hurley. She was the daughter of Gerrit DuBois and Margaret Elemendorf, and was a great-granddaughter of Louis DuBois, a Huguenot who was one of the earliest settlers and founders of New Paltz, New York. Together, the couple had five children:

 * Johannes "John" Charles DeWitt (1755–1833), who served as the Town of Hurley supervisor for three different terms (1788-1793, 1796–1797, 1807–1808); he married Cornelia Kantein in 1778.
 * Margrietje "Margaret" DeWitt (1758–1827), who married Johannes Bruyn (1750–1814), a New York Assemblymen from Ulster County, a presidential elector for New York, and a member of New York State Senate who was the son of Jacobus Bruyn.
 * Maria DeWitt (1760–1798), who married Jacobus "James" Hasbrouck in Kingston in 1783.
 * Gerret DeWitt (1762–1846), who married Catharine Ten Eyck (1765–1840), a daughter of Matthew Ten Eyck and Cornelia (née Wynkoop) Ten Eyck, in 1786.
 * Ann DeWitt

He died on August 27, 1787, in Kingston and is interred in the Dutch Reformed Cemetery in Hurley, New York. He wrote his will on July 7, 1776, as he prepared to set out for the defense of New York City. He left the mill to his son Gerret, who expanded it in 1806, and the water-powered mill would continue in operation until 1922.

Descendants
DeWitt's grandson, Charles G. DeWitt, served in the U.S. Congress. Another grandson, Charles DeWitt Bruyn (1784–1849), was a New York Assemblymen from Sullivan and Ulster counties from 1821 to 1822. His great-grandson, Matthew Pawling DeWitt, served as Hurley Town Supervisor from 1856 to 1857, and Matthew's son (Charles's great-great-grandson), Christopher Newkirk DeWitt, served in this position from 1880 to 1886 and 1896–1899. Another great-great-grandson, Matthew TenEyck DeWitt, was Hurley Supervisor on multiple occasions (1910-1911, 1914–1915, 1924–1927, and 1933–1935, his death). Another great-grandson was David M. De Witt.

title: Charles DeWitt


text:
Mormopterus

Mormopterus is a genus of molossid microchiropterans, small flying mammals referred to as free-tailed bats. The genus has been the subject of several revisions, and the diversity of taxa centred on Australia were separated to a new genus Ozimops, and two monotypic genera, Setirostris and Micronomus. The species of Mormopterus, in this stricter sense, are only found in areas outside of Australia and West Papua.

Taxonomy
A description of the genus was published in 1865 by Wilhelm Peters, as a new subgenus allied to Nyctinomus.

While the species-level taxonomy became better resolved, the integrity of the genus Mormopterus as it stood was less clear and molecular sequencing data indicated that Mormopterus was paraphyletic. The closest relatives of M. kalinowski are members of Nyctinomops. Further phylogenetic work is required to resolve the relationships of the species’ groups from the three regional areas, and what their relationships are to other molossid genera.

Investigations of Australian bat systematics have resulted in species confusion, which has in turn inhibited other research and recognition for the purpose of conservation; Mormopterus had presented the greatest difficulties to taxonomic workers. A revision in 2014 used a multilocus approach, combining morphological and molecular analysis to further separate the genus; this recognised the subgenus Micronomus and erected two new taxa, subgenera Setirostris (monotypic) and Ozimops, which circumscribed four accepted and three new species of Mormopterus. Prior to this revision some taxa were given tentative labels of convenience by workers, Mormopterus sp. 1, 2, 3 ..., following a molecular study in 1998 that identified probable species without publishing descriptions.

The Australian Faunal Directory, citing a 2015 taxonomic publication that elevated subgenera published in a 2014 review, recognises genera Ozimops, Setirostris and Micronomus and the new generic combinations of taxa formerly assigned to this genus.

Diversity
The genus Mormopterus has seven species occurring in geographically disparate locations, three species from the west Indian Ocean region (Madagascar and the Mascarene Islands and possibly South Africa and Ethiopia), one species from western Indonesia (known from a single specimen from Sumatra) that appears to be related to the above three species; and three species from the neotropics (the western side of South America as far south as northern Chile, and Cuba). The former subgenus Ozimops, later elevated to genus, is most diverse in Australia, although also found in the Indonesian Archipelago, Halmahera, Ambon, Seram and West Papua, and in Papua New Guinea. The two monotypic subgenera Micronomus and Setirostris, also elevated to genus, are endemic to Australia.

Species
The intergeneric arrangement, prior to 2014 elevation of the four subgenera, may be summarised as:
 * Subgenus Mormopterus
 * Mormopterus acetabulosus Natal free-tailed bat
 * Mormopterus francoismoutoui, Reunion free-tailed bat
 * Mormopterus doriae Sumatran mastiff bat
 * Mormopterus jugularis Peters's wrinkle-lipped bat
 * Mormopterus kalinowskii Kalinowski's mastiff bat
 * Mormopterus minutus little goblin bat
 * Mormopterus phrudus Incan little mastiff bat

Synonyms
Synonyms of mainly Australian species, later recognised as new genera.
 * Subgenus Micronomus
 * Mormopterus norfolkensis East-coast free-tailed bat,
 * Subgenus Setirostris
 * Mormopterus eleryi bristle-faced free-tailed bat
 * Subgenus Ozimops
 * Mormopterus planiceps, southern free-tailed bat,
 * Mormopterus beccarii, Beccari's mastiff bat
 * Mormopterus loriae, Loria's mastiff bat, little Papuan mastiff bat
 * Mormopterus petersi, inland free-tailed bat
 * Mormopterus kitcheneri, south-western free-tailed bat
 * Mormopterus ridei, eastern free-tailed bat,
 * Mormopterus lumsdenae, northern free-tailed bat
 * Mormopterus halli, Cape York free-tailed bat
 * Mormopterus cobourgianus, mangrove free-tailed bat

In addition, Peters's flat-headed bat (Platymops setiger) and Roberts's flat-headed bat (Sauromys petrophilus) were once thought to belong to this genus.

title: Mormopterus


text:
WSB-FM

WSB-FM (98.5 MHz) is a commercial radio station in Atlanta, Georgia. It carries an adult contemporary radio format and is owned by the Cox Media Group, serving as the group's flagship FM station. WSB-FM is the oldest FM radio station in Atlanta. The studios and offices are on Peachtree Street NE in Atlanta, in the WSB-TV and Radio Group Building.

WSB-FM has an effective radiated power (ERP) of 100,000 watts. The transmitter is at the end of New Street NE in the Edgewood neighborhood of Atlanta. It shares the tower with WABE-TV, WSTR-FM and WVEE-FM. It broadcasts in the HD Radio hybrid format; the HD2 subchannel airs a soft adult contemporary format, and the HD3 subchannel carries the Regional Mexican format heard on WLKQ-FM, and also feeds FM translator W296BB (107.1) in Jonesboro.

Early years
In the early 1940s, the Atlanta Constitution started an FM radio station. After an experimental period, it became WCON-FM on 98.5 MHz. The call sign contained the letters "CON" for "Constitution". The competing Atlanta Journal had already put Atlanta's first AM station on the air in 1922, WSB. In 1948, the Journal added a companion FM station, WSB-FM, broadcasting on 104.5 MHz.

When the two newspapers merged under Cox Enterprises ownership in 1952, WCON-FM and WSB-FM went silent. WSB-FM returned to the air in 1955 on WCON-FM's dial position, 98.5 FM. While it has the call letters of WSB-FM, the station traces its founding to when WCON-FM first signed on.

During its early years, when few people had FM radio receivers, WSB-FM mostly simulcast the programming on WSB (AM). That included dramas, comedies, news and sports from the NBC Red Network, as well as local shows. As network programming moved from radio to television in the 1950s, WSB-AM-FM carried a full service, middle of the road format of popular music, news, sports and information.

Beautiful music
In the 1960s, the Federal Communications Commission encouraged large market radio stations to provide separate programming on their FM outlets. WSB-FM would begin airing beautiful music, 15-minute sweeps of orchestral music, mostly cover versions of pop songs, as well as Hollywood and Broadway show tunes. It was mostly automated.

A planned merger of General Electric and Cox in the late 1970s would have caused WSB-FM to be spun off. Noted African-American broadcaster Ragan Henry had plans to acquire WSB-FM and use the call letters WEZA on the station, so it would no longer share its call sign with WSB-AM-TV, but the GE deal did not materialize.

Switch to AC
In the 1970s, WSB-FM added some soft vocals to its beautiful music playlist. The ratio of vocals to instrumentals continued to increase until March 15, 1982, when the station formally switched to soft adult contemporary music and eliminated the instrumentals.

In the 1980s, many FM stations were rounding off their dial positions on the air; WSB-FM stopped identifying itself as 98.5 and rounded it off to "99FM". In 1985, WSB-FM sued its soft AC competitor WLTA-FM, owned by Susquehanna Broadcasting, which had begun calling itself "Warm 99". Cox Broadcasting claimed trademark infringement, saying listeners would be confused with two Atlanta stations with similar formats using "99" as their dial position. Arbitron was having trouble crediting each station in the ratings because of the common use of "99".

Cox v. Susquehanna Broadcasting became a landmark case in United States district court. The judge was handed a digital radio and asked to tune to 100.0 MHz, but there was no signal. To find the nearest station, he pressed the "Scan" button, and it stopped on 101.5 MHz (WKHX-FM). Next, he entered 99.0 MHz, which, again, contained no signal. Scanning from there, the radio hit 99.7, WLTA's frequency. In his precedent-setting decision, the judge stated that on a radio dial "a radio station's frequency is its address" and one cannot trademark an address. On June 25, he ruled in favor of Warm 99. A short time later, WSB-FM began calling itself "B98.5FM".

Competing with 94.9
Another former beautiful music station, WPCH, made the transition to soft AC shortly after WSB-FM in the early 1980s. The two stations were locked in a battle for "at-work listeners" for two decades, with formats designed for workplace listening. WPCH, at various times, called itself "95 WPCH", "Peach 94.9", and "94.9 Lite FM", and even switched its call letters to WLTM. On December 18, 2006, 94.9 flipped to country music as WUBL.

For a year, the soft AC format and WLTM call letters were moved to the weaker frequency of 96.7. When that station (now WBZW) switched to classic country, WSB-FM became the only adult contemporary music station in Atlanta. Over time, WSB-FM would move to a more upbeat AC direction.

DJs and programming changes
On December 29, 2006, WSB-FM became the Atlanta affiliate for the nationally syndicated Delilah show (which was previously broadcast on 94.9 Lite FM/Peach 94.9). Delilah was dropped from WSB-FM in December 2011.

On July 1, 2008, Steve McCoy and Vikki Locke joined WSB-FM as the morning hosts after 17 years at adult top 40 station WSTR "Star 94". Steve McCoy was let go on February 25, 2010. In March 2011, Kelly Stevens from the old "Kelly and Alpha" show rejoined the station and was paired with Vikki. In August 2012, in the early morning hours one day, Stevens' SUV was totaled by a vehicle driving the wrong way while he was driving to work on the Georgia 400 Freeway. The other driver was killed. Stevens' left leg was broken and left elbow shattered, but he was in good spirits later in the morning at Grady Hospital, when he called in to the show.

In the past, WSB-FM produced an annual "Family Fun Fest" event, where companies that provide products for kids and families would showcase the products and services they offered. The show featured live events and appearances from local sports stars. The station conducted live broadcasts from the location both days of the event. The festival ended in 2009.

During the spring of 2011, WSB-FM shook up its on-air staff and format due to declining ratings. All music before 1980 was dropped, more songs from the 2000s were added, and WSB-FM abandoned the longtime "Atlanta's Best Variety of Soft Rock" tagline. Its slogan became "Your Favorites From the 80s, 90s, and Now", later shortened to "80s, 90s & Now".

From 2001 to 2003 and again from 2009 to 2011, each weekend WSB-FM would play only music from the 1980s. On September 16, 2011, the station changed from "All-80's Weekends" to "80's and 90's Weekends". As of January 2012, 1980s and 1990s weekends no longer air. The station had previously aired all 1970s weekends during the 1990s.

On April 27, 2012, longtime WSB-FM afternoon DJ Kelly McCoy retired after 27 years in the same air shift, after joining the station in January 1985. At 4:00 that afternoon, WSB-FM aired a special tribute during his last show. It was the first time in recent memory that the station broke format during afternoon drive time. McCoy was replaced by DJ Mike Shannon. On January 4, 2013, Cox Radio management fired Shannon after just nine months on air.

title: WSB-FM


text:
User:Keeper of Records

CUSTODIAN OF RECORDS- USC TITLE 18, SECTION 2257 COMPLIANCE

title: User:Keeper of Records


text:
Carl Brandon Society

The Carl Brandon Society is a group originating within the science fiction community. Their mission "is to increase racial and ethnic diversity in the production of and audience for speculative fiction." Their vision is "a world in which speculative fiction, about complex and diverse cultures from writers of all backgrounds, is used to understand the present and model possible futures; and where people of color are full citizens in the community of imagination and progress."

The Society was founded in 1997 following discussions at the feminist science fiction convention WisCon 23 in Madison, Wisconsin. It was named after "Carl Brandon", a fictional black fan writer created in the mid-1950s by Terry Carr and Pete Graham. This also alludes to the James Tiptree, Jr. Award, named after the fictional male persona used by the writer long known as "James Tiptree, Jr.".

The Society maintains annuals lists of fantastical works published by writers of color.

CBS Parallax and Kindred Awards
Source:

Inaugurated in 2005, the Carl Brandon Parallax Award is a juried award given to works of speculative fiction created by a self-identified person of color. The 2005 Parallax, the first to be awarded, went to Walter Mosley for his young adult novel 47.

Inaugurated in 2005, the Carl Brandon Kindred Award is a juried award given to any work of speculative fiction dealing with issues of race and ethnicity; nominees may be of any racial or ethnic group. The 2005 Kindred Award went to Susan Vaught for her young adult novel, Stormwitch.

The awards were not given for years from 2012 to 2018, but resumed with awards for 2019.

Carl Brandon Parallax Award Shortlist for 2006

 * Ashok Banker: "Prince of Ayodhya" (Penguin India)
 * Tobias S. Buckell: "Toy Planes" (Nature, Oct. 13, 2005)
 * Octavia E. Butler: "Fledgling" (Seven Stories Press)
 * Daliso Chaponda: "Trees of Bone" (Apex Science Fiction and Horror Digest, #3)
 * Marcia Douglas: "Marie-Ma" (Femspec, Vol. 6, #1)
 * Hiromi Goto: "Nostalgia" (Nature, Sept. 1, 2005)
 * N. K. Jemisin: "Cloud Dragon Skies" (Strange Horizons, Aug. 1, 2005)
 * A. H. Jennings: "Owasa" (Farthing, July, 2005)
 * Alaya Dawn Johnson: "Shard of Glass" (Strange Horizons, Feb. 14, 2005)
 * Ahmed Khan: "The Meaning of Life and Other Clichés" (Another Realm, March, 2005)
 * Gail Nyoka: Mella and the N'anga: An African Tale (Sumach Press)
 * Nnedi Okorafor: Zahrah the Windseeker (Houghton Mifflin)
 * Nisi Shawl: "Wallamelon" (Aeon Magazine, #3)
 * Vandana Singh: "The Tetrahedron" (Intranova, March 15, 2005)

 Carl Brandon Kindred Award Shortlist for 2006

 * Tobias Buckell: "Toy Planes" (Nature, Oct. 13, 2005)
 * Octavia E. Butler: Fledgling (Seven Stories Press)
 * Daliso Chaponda: "Trees of Bone" (Apex Science Fiction and Horror Digest, #3)
 * Marg Gilks: "Before the Altar on The Feast of All Souls" (Tesseracts 9)
 * Walter Mosley: 47 (Little, Brown)
 * Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu: Zahrah the Windseeker (Houghton Mifflin)
 * Liz Williams: "La Gran Muerte" (Asimov's Science Fiction, April 2005)

The 2006 Carl Brandon Society Awards were presented during a ceremony at WisCon 30.

 Carl Brandon Parallax Award Shortlist for 2007

 * Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu: "The Shadow Speaker"

 Carl Brandon Kindred Award Shortlist for 2007

 * Minister Faust: "From the Notebooks of Doctor Brain"

 Carl Brandon Parallax Award Shortlist for 2008

 * Vandana Singh: "Distances"

 Carl Brandon Kindred Award Shortlist for 2008

 * Tananarive Due: "Ghost Summer"

 Carl Brandon Parallax Award Shortlist for 2009

 * Hiromi Goto: "Half World"

 Carl Brandon Kindred Award Shortlist for 2009

 * Justine Larbalestier: "Lair"

 Carl Brandon Parallax Award Shortlist for 2010

 * Karen Lord: "Redemption in Indigo"

 Carl Brandon Kindred Award Shortlist for 2010

 * Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu: "Who Fears Death"

 Honor Shortlist for 2010

 * N.K. Jemisin: "The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms"
 * Anil Menon: "The Beast with Nine Billion Feet"
 * Charles Yu: "Standard Loneliness Package"

 Carl Brandon Parallax Award Shortlist for 2011

 * Tenea D. Johnson: "Smoketown"

 Carl Brandon Kindred Award Shortlist for 2011

 * Andrea Hairston: "Redwood and Wildfire"

 Honor Shortlist for 2011

 * Zen Cho: “The House of Aunts”
 * Zen Cho: “Rising Lion – The Lion Bows”
 * Minister Faust: "The Alchemists of Kush"
 * Tenea D. Johnson: "Revolution"
 * Yoon Ha Lee: “Ghostweight”
 * An Owomoyela: “All That Touches the Air”
 * Nisi Shawl: “Black Betty”
 * JoSelle Vanderhooft: "Steam-Powered: Lesbian Steampunk Stories"

The 2011 Carl Brandon Awards were presented at Arisia, January 17–20, in Boston MA, USA.

Through 2012–2018, the Carl Brandon Award ceremonies went on hiatus.

 Carl Brandon Parallax Award Shortlist for 2019

 * Akwaeke Emezi: "Pet"

 Carl Brandon Kindred Award Shortlist for 2019

 * Michele Tracy Berger: "Doll Seed"

 Parallax Honor Shortlist for 2019

 * Alex Jennings: “Mister Dog”
 * Indrapramit Das: “Kali_Na”
 * Jaymee Goh: “The Freedom of the Shifting Sea”
 * Rebecca Roanhorse: “Harvest”
 * Craig Laurence Gidney: "A Spectral Hue"
 * Suyi Davies Okungabowa: "David Mogo: God Hunter"

Octavia E. Butler Memorial Scholarship
The Octavia E. Butler Memorial Scholarship was established in Butler's memory in 2006 by the Society. Its goal is to provide an annual scholarship to enable writers of color to attend one of the Clarion writing workshops where Butler got her start. The first scholarship was awarded in 2007.

title: Carl Brandon Society


text:
Vespertine

Vespertine is the fourth studio album by Icelandic recording artist Björk. It was released on 27 August 2001 in the United Kingdom by One Little Indian Records and in the United States by Elektra Entertainment. Björk aspired to create an album with minimal and intricate electronic music to evoke an intimate and domestic feeling, in contrast with the louder styles of her previous studio album Homogenic (1997). She enlisted producers such as Opiate, Console and the duo Matmos, and has also worked with harpist Zeena Parkins. Production on the album began whilst filming her role in Dancer in the Dark.

Björk composed arrangements with thin-sounding instruments, including the harp, the celesta, clavichord, strings and custom music boxes. Assisted by Matmos, Björk created "microbeats" from various commonplace sounds, such as that of shuffling cards and ice being cracked. Lyrically, the album revolves around Björk's new relationship with Matthew Barney, featuring themes of sex and love. Other lyrical sources include the poetry of E. E. Cummings and British playwright Sarah Kane's Crave. Three singles were released from Vespertine: "Hidden Place", "Pagan Poetry", and "Cocoon". The music videos of the latter two were banned on MTV for their depictions of sexuality. Björk embarked on the Vespertine world tour with Parkins, Matmos, and a choir of Inuit women, where they performed at theatres and small venues in favor of acoustics.

The album peaked at number 19 on the US Billboard 200 selling 75,000 copies in its first week and at number 8 on the UK Albums Chart. It was certified gold in Canada, France, and the United Kingdom. Noted for its erotic, intimate mood and sonic experimentation, Vespertine received universal acclaim from music critics, with some considering it Björk's best album to date. The album appeared on several publications' lists of the best albums of 2001 and of the decade, and has been evaluated by many critics to be one of the best albums of all time.

Conceptualisation
Björk had released her previous studio album, Homogenic, in 1997. The album's style differed from her previous two releases, described by her as "very emotionally confrontational and [...] very dramatic". She also described "All Is Full of Love"—Homogenic's closing track—as the first song on Vespertine, as it opposed the rest of the album's "aggressive, macho" aesthetic. Writer and critic Mark Pytlik writes, "Her appetite for thumping techno had been, temporarily at least, subsumed by a desire for stark melodies and minimalist production". In 2000, she starred in Lars von Trier's Dancer in the Dark, and composed its soundtrack, Selmasongs. While she worked on the film, she also began producing her next album, writing new music, and teaming with new collaborators. She has said "Selmasongs was the day job and Vespertine was the hobby". During this time, she also began to use her new laptop to write music, and Vespertine has been retrospectively referred to as "her laptop album".

She initially set about making a record with a domestic mood featuring "everyday moods and everyday noises translating into melodies and beats", hence its working title Domestika. Marius de Vries told Sound on Sound that the project was driven by an "overriding aesthetic of being homely and comfortable", which had "all to do with Björk wanting to make a record as a reaction to the wanderings and the pain she experienced making Dancer in the Dark… [and coming back] after you've wandered." Björk's initial idea was also to "celebrat[e] the banalities of everyday life." For example, the title track "Domestica", originally titled "Lost Keys", was meant to be a "gentle, humorous snapshot" of Björk looking for her keys.

Her new relationship with artist Matthew Barney, and the tension while filming Dancer in the Dark, have been referred to as the two major forces that shaped what would become Vespertine. Her relationship with Barney influenced her lyrics, which were now more intimate, detailed, and revealing as opposed to those of her past works. A particular example is "Cocoon", which is sexually explicit. As the process of filming demanded that she be extroverted, the new music she was creating became hushed and tranquil as a way to escape.

The eventual title change of the record reveals its changing nature. Writer and critic Mark Pytlik notes that, "where [Domestika] signified a focus of extracting magic from the platitudes of everyday life, [Vespertine] [...] suggested a creation of magic through much more powerful forces. In fine style, Björk had set out to write an album about making sandwiches. She'd ended up with an album about making love". A stylistic antecedent was her poem "Techno Prayer", published in Details magazine in July 1996, which would later be used as part of the lyrics of "All Neon Like". It featured thematic ideas such as cocooning and thread-weaving that she would later explore on Vespertine.

Recording
The earliest sessions took place in Spain with programmer Jake Davies. Björk commissioned Valgeir Sigurðsson to relocate some of his studio equipment from Iceland to Denmark where Dancer in the Dark was being filmed. While living in Copenhagen, she also contacted the electronic musician Thomas Knak (also known as Opiate), after having enjoyed his 1999 album Objects for an Ideal Home.

In Iceland, programmers Jake Davies and Marius de Vries joined Björk for a writing session, laying down more tracks, in addition to nine already mixed. Then, she "set up camp [...] during summer" in a New York City loft, and began to work with harpist Zeena Parkins. Much of Vespertine was "composed, crafted and edited" in that loft, in what has been called the "Domestika sessions". Some tracks were recorded as an overdub "on top of a slave mixdown" of the Spanish sessions.

"Undo" was written during a two-week session with Knak that January in Reykjavík. Björk recorded her vocals on top of Knak's minimalist rhythmic backbone, and months later she had added a full choir and string section. "Cocoon", also produced by Knak, was one of the last songs to be written for the album; its melody suddenly came to Björk and she contacted him. Knak took it as a chance to make a more minimal track, similar to his own releases. Björk contacted Console in early 2000 and they met in London; she then added her vocals on top.

"Heirloom" was based on an existing instrumental track from electronic musician Console's album Rocket in the Pocket (1998), titled "Crabcraft" (which itself samples Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark's "Sacred Heart"). During this period, Björk also worked with Bogdan Raczynski on the song "Who Is It", but it did not make the final cut and was subsequently re-recorded for the album Medúlla. Björk said that she worked on Vespertine for three years.

Instrumentation
As she wanted to write her own songs on music boxes, Björk contacted a music box company requesting transparent acrylic boxes because she wanted the sound to be "as hard as possible, like it was frozen". Björk decided to use sounds that would not be compromised when downloaded from sites such as Napster, such as "microbeat[s]", whispered vocals, the harp, music box, celeste, clavichord, and strings which "ended up being more panoramic textures in the background." For the string and music box arrangements, she used Sibelius scorewriter software.

For Vespertine, Björk wanted to make a "microcosmos of thirty or forty beats interacting". To do this, she recorded noises around her house to make beats out of them. Once the songs were almost finished, Björk contacted the duo Matmos, who she considered "virtuosos" in the field, and sent them various songs to work with. They added beats made from the noise of crushing ice and shuffling cards, among others. In her documentary Minuscule, Björk explained that this process consisted of "taking something very tiny and magnifying it up to big", intending to convey the "sensation that you've been told a secret", that is also present in micrographs. Marius de Vries and Björk did much of the sound design on Vespertine with a text-based synthesizer called SuperCollider. De Vries said that typing in commands as opposed to using knobs, "take[s] you in surprising directions." Additionally, Knak used an Ensoniq ASR-10, for "Cocoon".

Composition
Björk has stated that she wanted the album to sound like "modern chamber music", referring to the times where "the most ideal music situation was in the home, where people would play harps for each other". She also considers Vespertine to be the opposite of her previous studio album Homogenic, the former being an introverted, quiet, winter record; the latter a loud, dramatic, summer record. Björk has also described the album as "more electronic folk music".

Critics have classified Vespertine as electronica, art pop, psychedelia, ambient, trip-hop, folktronica, and glitch pop. Music journalists have also noted the experimental nature of the record. The Orlando Weekly wrote that with the album, Björk "[took] her modernist art-pop further into the abstract". According to Joseph Hale of Tiny Mix Tapes, described Vespertine's music as a combination of "psychedelic techno, chamber music, and chorale together into modal constructions that swelled and receded like emotions (or psylocibin)". David Fricke of Rolling Stone wrote "Vespertine is the closest any pop-vocal album has come to the luxuriant Zen of the new minimalist techno". Björk's performance on Vespertine has been described as that of an "art-rock torch singer".

Stylistically, Vespertine incorporates elements of both art and dance music. For example, the instrumentation of choir, strings, and harp is suggestive of Romantic art music, while the "synthesised keyboard sonorities, filtering effects and complex percussive sounds" are elements characteristic of dance-based pop. Academic Nicola Dibben wrote that its "classical and dance-based elements" combine "the spiritual and the sensual" allusions of the album.

Vespertine is also characterised by "the obsession with sonic traces of analog technology – that is, the pervasive use of loops, static and white noise". Unlike previous albums like Debut and Post, "electronic sounds are the norm, and the acoustic sounds become the interjections." Influenced by the 1999 album New Ancient Strings, a recording of kora duets by Toumani Diabaté with Ballaké Sissoko, Björk said she "messed up the sound of too angelic instruments, like the harp or the glockenspiel" on Vespertine. Björk's voice is used as a supplement to "the complex electronic textures". Her vocals often appear to be recorded close to the microphone and with little treatment, and sung in a sometimes "unstable whisper", conveying a sense of close proximity and reduced space suitable for the intimate lyrics.

Tracks 1-6
The album opens with "Hidden Place", which features a soprano section and strings, "over the top of a warm, intimate melody". Michael Hubbard of musicOMH felt the track was reminiscent of Homogenic's "Hunter", but less focused on the beats. NME called it progressive folk, while Drowned in Sound wrote it was electro. Björk sings about "how two people can create a paradise just by uniting", as she intones: "I'm so close to tears/And so close to/Simply calling you up/And simply suggesting/We go to that hidden place". "Cocoon" is "based around an exploratory bassline and beats that sound like fingertips on skin". Discussing the glitch nature of the track, Björk said, "when you take technology and use the areas where it breaks, where it's faulty, you're entering a mystery zone where you can't control it". Lyrically revolving around making love, the song alternates between metaphors like "Who would have known/That a boy like him/Would have entered me lightly/Restoring my blisses", and explicit lines such as "He slides inside/Half awake, half asleep" and "Gorgeousness/He's still inside me". Björk sings a breathy, "whispered, near-cracking falsetto" on the track.

"It's Not Up to You" has been described as a "dizzying ballad" and a song that lifts the album upward. Michael Paoletta of Billboard described the track as "melancholy". Its lyrics are about "love for the unknown devices that culminate in 'perfect days'", and "pleas to find beauty in unlikely places". The "caressing lyrics" of "Undo" assure that: "It's not meant to be a strife/It's not meant to be a struggle uphill". Biographer Mark Pytlik wrote that "Undo" is "a reassuring reminder that anything can happen once you let it. If you are in pain, undo it, Björk suggests, no hint of disingenuousness in her voice, over climbing strings and a rising choir". "Pagan Poetry" is a "harp-splashed" song that concerns unrequited love. The track builds slowly, "with Björk wailing over swelling keyboard crescendos", until, at the four-minute mark, "all the music drops away, leaving Björk utterly exposed" as she sings "I love him, I love him/I love him, I love him/I love him, I love him". The song also features "a flotilla of music boxes with an Asian-teahouse touch". The instrumental interlude "Frosti" has been described as "metallic tundra". Its sound stems from a music box, creating an intimate, fairy tale-like effect.

Tracks 7-12
"Frosti" fades into "Aurora", while "a warm, faintly crunchy sound" is heard. These are samples of footsteps in the snow—the work of Matmos—re-appropriated as the song's "subtly shifting beat". "Aurora" has been described as "something that appeals to a child-like imagination", and having a "magical and airy quality". In the lyrics, she addresses a Nature goddess, and sings about "literally dissolving with pleasure" as she "prays to become one with… the northern lights". One of Björk's broodiest compositions, "An Echo, a Stain" is underpinned by a creeping choir line and nibbling clicks, and features an "unresolved, ominous tension" that is atypical of her writing style. Most of the song's lyrics speak directly to incidents in Sarah Kane's 1998 dark-themed play Crave, so much so that it was titled "Crave" up to the last minute. "Sun in My Mouth" is an adaptation of E. E. Cummings' poem "I will wade out/Till my thighs are steeped in burning flowers", with an emphasis on the vocal and accompaniment provided by a string orchestra, a harp, and soft electronica. The track's lyrics have been considered a "startling allusion to masturbation", positioned "within the fantasy-like imagery of burning flowers, sea-girls, darkness and the sun".

"Heirloom" alters "between what sounds like a samba preset on a vintage Wurlitzer organ and skittering breakbeats, and is decorated with inverted synthtones and analog keyboards". The song's lyrics tell a "fuzzy story" about a recurring dream, while "[likening] the art of singing to swallowing and exhaling 'glowing lights'" as Björk sings: "During the night/They do a trapeze walk/Until they're in the sky/Right above my bed". Film director Harmony Korine wrote "Harm of Will"'s lyrics. The Slate album review noted the minimalist nature of the track, pointing out a lack of hook, beat and melody. It is a slow song, as is the closing track, "Unison". The latter "[contains] a refrain directly inspired by [Björk's] experience in Dancer in the Dark and a healthy dollop of self-effacing humor evoked to counter the balance". It "brings beats and strings together in a final crescendo that also manages to incorporate a little jungle".

Artwork
The album's ethereal artwork mirrors its "delicacy and introverted romance". The cover art, shot by Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin in Los Angeles, California, is a black and white photograph of Björk lying down on the patterned ground next to a swimming pool, covering her eyes from the sun and wearing the Marjan Pejoski swan dress that she wore at the 73rd Academy Awards in 2001, which caused a media frenzy and was widely criticised.

The duo M/M (Paris), known for applying and integrating their work on photographs (so called dessin dans l'image, or "drawings in the picture"), illustrated the cover, featuring a swan and the album's title with feathers. Björk thought swans embodied Vespertine's music, describing them as "a white, sort of winter bird" and "very romantic". Vespertine came with a booklet of M/M (Paris) artwork. Michael Hubbard of musicOMH commented, "the spine of the CD is entirely white, while the rest of the sleeve features innovative photography and artwork". Academic Nicola Dibben has likened Vespertine's artwork and promotion to representations of the Greek myth of Leda and the Swan, emphazising the erotic overtones of both.

Release and promotion
Vespertine was released later than One Little Indian Records had intended. Originally, the album's release was scheduled for May, but by March it had been put back to August, so as to enable Björk to work on the album's promotion. On 22 May 2001, Björk premiered six songs off the new album in an intimate concert at the Riverside Church in New York City, accompanied by Matmos and Zeena Parkins. Vespertine was released on 27 August, as a double 12" record, CD and compact cassette. To coincide with the release of the album, Björk also released an eponymously titled coffee table book, created by her and edited and designed by M/M (Paris). A second single, Towards the end of 2001, Vespertine was released as a DVD-Audio. The music videos for "Hidden Place", "Pagan Poetry" and "Cocoon" were included in the DVDs Volumen Plus (2002) and Greatest Hits – Volumen 1993–2003 (2002).

Appearances
Together, Elektra, and New York-based independent marketing firm Drill Team, created the Björk Vespertine Syndicate (BVS), a group of 30-plus websites that had exclusive access to non-album tracks, music videos, and concert/rehearsal footage. To promote the album, Björk appeared in various magazines in mid-2001, including: The Fader, Q, Pulse, URB, USA Today, InStyle, Vibe, Us, Nylon, Index, CMJ New Music Monthly and, Spin. Magazines Dazed & Confused and Les Inrockuptibles featured a special issue with texts, photographs, and different CDs issued randomly, each with a different song from the album. The Times issued a Björk special, featuring videos, music, photographs, and a competition to see Björk perform. She also appeared on several TV shows, including: The Rosie O'Donnell Show, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Space Ghost Coast to Coast, The David Letterman Show and, Charlie Rose, among others.

Hidden Place
On 6 August 2001, "Hidden Place" was released as the album's lead single, its music video having premiered in July. It was released as two CDs and a DVD, featuring B-sides "Generous Palmstroke", "Foot Soldier", "Mother Heroic" and "Verandi".

The music video for "Hidden Place" was directed by Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin and co-directed by M/M (Paris). It was shot in London over four days in February 2001. It was originally planned for a song from Selmasongs, but Björk felt the project was more appropriate for Vespertine. The video consists of close-up shots panning around Björk's face, as fluids flow in and out of her facial orifices. M/M (Paris) said that they "wanted to get as close to her as we could, as we all felt she had never been portrayed as the 'real' and beautiful woman she is.", and that the fluids in the video "visualiz[e] all possible emotions pulsating and circulating in her very busy brain.

Pagan Poetry

"Pagan Poetry", was released on 5 November 2001 as two CDs and a DVD, featuring a remix by Matthew Herbert, "Domestica", "Batabid", an Opiate remix of "Aurora", and the music video for "Pagan Poetry".

Nick Knight, who had previously shot the cover art for Homogenic, directed the music video for "Pagan Poetry". It is about a woman preparing herself for marriage and for her lover, as she sews a wedding dress onto her skin. As she had asked him to make a video about her love life, Knight gave Björk a camcorder and asked her to shoot her own private scenes. Shots of skin being pierced were also recorded with this camera; the people being pierced were five women who "were into subculture and piercings" and Björk herself, who only pierced her ear. This first two-thirds of the video contains a great deal of post-production by Peter Marin, who gave the image its abstract watercolor-like effect. The shots of Björk with her Alexander McQueen topless wedding dress were filmed in super 35 format. The main idea behind the music video was: "to do something with the moving image that was a mirror of what was happening musically". Although the music video has been well received by critics, it was highly controversial and banned from MTV in 2001.

Cocoon
"Cocoon", the album's third single, was released on 11 March 2002. Its music video had premiered in February. Once again, the single was released as two separate CDs and a DVD, with "Pagan Poetry", "Sun in My Mouth" and "Amphibian" as B-sides.

The music video for "Cocoon" was directed by Eiko Ishioka and was shot in April 2001 in New York City. One of Björk's most avant-garde music videos, it: "plays with minimalist white for both costume and bleached eyebrows, treating Björk as a geisha whose makeup extends over her entire nude body". Red threads emerge from her nipples and circulate between her breasts and nose, finally enveloping her in a cocoon. Björk actually wore a very close-fitting body suit. Although not as controversial as the "Pagan Poetry" music video, it was still banned from MTV.

Tour

In early August 2001, Björk confirmed the first set of dates for the Vespertine world tour which would take place at opera houses, theatres, and small venues, with favourable acoustics for the concerts. She enlisted Matmos, Zeena Parkins, a choir of Inuit girls from Greenland, and conductor Simon Lee; Visually, fauna illustrations by Ernst Haeckel were used as a backdrop during the tour.

The tour opened at the Grand Rex in Paris on 18 August. While in Paris, she held a press conference to discuss the album but gave no individual interviews saying that: "she'd rather do music than talk about it." While in France she also received the National Order of Merit at the Ministry of National Education in Paris. Another press conference was held in Barcelona on 3 November 2001 while touring in Spain.

A 16 December 2001 performance at the Royal Opera House in London was released as the DVD Live at Royal Opera House in 2002. A DVD release featuring a behind-the-scenes look at the tour, titled Minuscule, was released at the end of 2003. Vespertine Live, a live album consisting of songs recorded during the Vespertine world tour, was included in the 2003 box set Live Box; it also includes a live version of "All Is Full of Love", a song from Homogenic and "Overture" from Selmasongs.

Commercial performance
Vespertine debuted at #19 on the Billboard 200 chart, selling 75,000 units in its first week, becoming her career peak in sales. It also debuted upon the top spot on the Top Electronic Albums chart, staying there for 3 weeks. One Little Indian head Derek Birket declaring that the album had sold over 1.2 million copies in Europe alone. That month, the album also became number one on the album charts in Iceland, Sweden, Denmark, France, Norway, and the European Top 100 Albums chart. In addition, Vespertine charted in the top 10 of Canada, Italy, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, Finland, Belgium, Switzerland, Sweden, Austria and Australia. The album has been certified Gold in Canada, France, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.

Lead single "Hidden Place" reached the top spot of the singles charts in Spain, also charting in the top 40 in the United Kingdom, Canada, Italy, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Belgium and France. Following release "Pagan Poetry" also performed well in Spain, while entering the French chart at number 49 and the UK chart at number 38. "Cocoon" performed more poorly, charting at number 61 in France and number 35 in the United Kingdom.

Critical reception
Upon release, Vespertine received universal acclaim from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 88, based on 28 reviews. Various writers including David Fricke and Simon Reynolds named Vespertine Björk's best album to date. The album received some praise for its themes of intimacy and introversion, with Anthony Carew from About.com writing: "What makes Vespertine even more intriguing is the way that it marries its musical ambitions to its thematic emotions… And what makes it great… is the purity and intimacy of its feelings." Fricke and musicOMH 's Michael Hubbard have both noted that the singer had shown a more mature side of her. The A.V. Club's Keith Phipps found it to be: "an album both timeless and of the moment, an avant-garde electronic-pop exploration of classic themes". In a later review for The New Rolling Stone Album Guide, Douglas Wolk described the album as "a banquet in the hall of Björk's personal erotics" and stated that "it's not the stuff of radio hits, but the music is spectacular".

An enthusiastic review came from The Wire, which felt that: "In the end, Vespertine commits its magic by daring to go places more obvious and more human than one would have ever expected." Calling it "one of the most impressive and cohesive" albums of the year, Tiny Mix Tapes found Vespertine to be Björk's most effective use of the studio as an instrument. Chris Smith of Stylus Magazine praised the album for its nuance and delicacy, describing its sonic palette as "a breath of fresh air." Additionally, Vespertine was thought to have challenged gender roles in rock music and in sexuality.

Q also praised the album, stating that it "quietly proves that cutting-edge production and human contact aren't mutually exclusive." American music journalist Robert Christgau enjoyed the album's central theme of sex and wrote: "when she gets all soprano on your ass you could accuse her of spirituality". A more lukewarm review came from Pitchfork's Ryan Schreiber, who felt that: "while undeniably beautiful, Vespertine fails to give electronic music the forward push it received on Björk's preceding albums". David Browne of Entertainment Weekly said "her lyrics occasionally dive into the deep end" and "her voice is at times stiff", although he also wrote "when it all comes together, [...] Björk and her electronica collaborators create moving interplanetary chorals". Almost Cool wrote: "if there's one question to be raised with the album, it's that it's all simply so lush and nice that on some levels it fails to excite".

In a 2015 interview with The Pitchfork Review, Björk said that her work on Vespertine was not fully acknowledged by press, she further added, "Matmos came in the last two weeks and added percussion on top of the songs, but they didn't do any of the main parts, and they are credited everywhere as having done the whole album.".

Accolades
In 2002, Vespertine was nominated for the Shortlist Music Prize, though the award went to In Search of... by N.E.R.D. The same year, the album received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Alternative Album, losing to Coldplay's Parachutes. In addition, Björk was nominated for Best International Female Solo Artist at the Brit Awards, and Best International Female Artist at the Italian Music Awards, while Vespertine was nominated for Album of the Year at the Icelandic Music Awards.

 * Critics' lists

Track listing
Notes
 * "Hidden Place" samples "Transfigured Night, Op. 4" (1899) by Arnold Schoenberg.
 * "Undo" heavily samples "1% in 2/3 Speed" (1999) by Opiate.
 * "Sun In My Mouth" contains lyrics from "Impressions" by E. E. Cummings from Complete Poems: 1910–1962.
 * "Heirloom" is based upon "Crabcraft" by Console.
 * "Unison" contains a sample of "Aero Deck" by Oval from Systemisch.
 * $undefined$ signifies an additional producer.

Personnel
Credits adapted from the liner notes of Vespertine.

Musicians

 * Jake Davies – programming (1, 5), beat programming (7)
 * Damian Taylor – programming (1, 12), beat programming (7, 8)
 * Guy Sigsworth – programming (1, 12), choir arrangement (1, 8, 12), clavichord (3), clavichord arrangement (3), beat programming (8), celeste (8, 9, 11), celeste arrangement (9, 11)
 * Matthew Herbert – programming (1, 12)
 * Matmos – programming (1, 12), beat programming (7, 8)
 * Björk – bassline (1, 5, 7, 9), choir arrangement (1, 3, 4), harp arrangement (3, 7, 12), programming (5, 12), music box arrangement (5-7), beat programming (7, 9), string arrangement (11)
 * Vince Mendoza – choir arrangement (1, 3, 8, 11), orchestration (1, 3, 4, 8, 9, 11, 12), string arrangement (3, 4, 8, 9, 12)
 * Thomas Knak – programming (2, 4)
 * Valgeir Sigurðsson – beat programming (3, 9), programming (12)
 * Zeena Parkins – harp arrangement (3-5, 8, 9, 12), harp (3, 4, 7, 8, 9, 12)
 * Caryl Thomas – harp (3)
 * Jack Perron – adaptation to music box (5-7)
 * Marius de Vries – additional programming (7), beat programming (8)
 * Martin Console – programming (10)

Technical

 * Jake Davies – Pro Tools recording engineer (1, 3, 7, 12); Pro Tools (4), recording engineer (4, 8), vocals recording (10)
 * Damian Taylor – Pro Tools recording engineer (1)
 * Valgeir Sigurðsson – Pro Tools recording engineer (3, 12), Pro Tools (4), recording engineer (4, 8, 9, 11)
 * Leigh Jamieson – Pro Tools recording engineer (3)
 * Jan "Stan" Kybert – Pro Tools (4)
 * Eric Gosh – music box engineering
 * Juan Garcia – assistant engineer (Magic Shop)
 * Damon Idins – assistant engineer (Astoria)
 * Eric & Rory – assistant engineers (Avatar)
 * Aarron Franz – assistant engineer (Sear Sound)
 * Adrian Dawson – 2nd assistant engineer (Sear Sound)
 * Ricardo Gary Walker – assistant
 * Jason Spears – assistant
 * Aaron – assistant
 * Matt Fields – assistant
 * Daniel Porter – assistant
 * David Treahearn – assistant
 * Björk – vocal editing (4, 11)
 * Mark "Spike" Stent – mixing (all tracks)

Artwork

 * Inez van Lamsweerde & Vinoodh Matadin – sleve design
 * M/M Paris – sleeve design

title: Vespertine