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Red Hook, Brooklyn

Red Hook is a neighborhood in western Brooklyn, New York City, United States, within the area once known as South Brooklyn. It is located on a peninsula projecting into the Upper New York Bay and is bounded by the Gowanus Expressway and the Carroll Gardens neighborhood on the northeast, Gowanus Canal on the east, and the Upper New York Bay on the west and south. A prosperous shipping and port area in the early 20th century, the area declined in the latter part of the century. Today it is home to the Red Hook Houses, the largest housing project in Brooklyn.

Red Hook is part of Brooklyn Community District 6, and its primary ZIP Code is 11231. It is patrolled by the 76th Precinct of the New York City Police Department. Politically, Red Hook is represented by the New York City Council's 38th District.

Colonization
The native Lenape referred to the region as Ihepetonga, meaning a high point of sandy soil. The village was settled by Dutch colonists of New Amsterdam in 1636, and named Roode Hoek, after the red clay soil and the point of land projecting into the Upper New York Bay. In Dutch, means "point" or "corner," and not the English hook (i.e., something curved or bent). The actual hoek of Red Hook was a point on an island that stuck out into Upper New York Bay at today's Dikeman Street west of Ferris Street. In 1657, Roode Hoek became part of the Town of Brooklyn.

Rapelye Street in Red Hook commemorates the beginnings of one of New Amsterdam's earliest families, the Rapelje clan, descended from the first European child born in the new Dutch settlement in the New World, Sarah Rapelje. She was born near Wallabout Bay, which later became the site of the New York (Brooklyn) Naval Shipyard. A couple of decades after the birth of his daughter Sarah, Joris Jansen Rapelje removed to Brooklyn, where he was one of the Council of twelve men, and where he was soon joined by son-in-law Hans Hansen Bergen. Rapelye Street in Red Hook is named for Rapelje and his descendants, who lived in Brooklyn for centuries.

American Revolution
During the Battle of Brooklyn (also known as the Battle of Long Island), Fort Defiance was constructed on the hoek. It is shown on a map called "a Map of the Environs of Brooklyn" drawn in 1780 by Loyalist engineer George S. Sproule. The Sproule map shows that the Fort Defiance complex consisted of three redoubts on a small island connected by trenches, with an earthwork on the island's south side to defend against a landing. The entire earthwork was about 1,600 feet long and covered the entire island. The three redoubts covered an area about 400 feet by 800 feet. The two principal earthworks were about 150 feet by 175 feet, and the tertiary one was about 75 feet by 100 feet. Maps from Sproule and Bernard Ratzer show that Red Hook was a low-lying area full of tidal mill ponds created by the Dutch.

General Israel Putnam came to New York on April 4, 1776, to assess the state of its defenses and strengthen them. Among the works initiated were forts on Governor's Island and Red Hook, facing the bay. On April 10, one thousand Continentals took possession of both points and began constructing Fort Defiance which mounted one three pounder cannon and four eighteen pounders. The cannons were to be fired over the tops of the fort's walls. In May, George Washington described it as "small but exceedingly strong". On July 5, General Nathanael Greene called it "a post of vast importance" and, three days later, Col. Varnum's regiment joined its garrison. On July 12, the British frigates Rose and Phoenix and the schooner Tyrol ran the gauntlet past Defiance and the stronger Governor's Island works without firing a shot, and got all the way to Tappan Zee. They stayed there for over a month, beating off harassing attacks, and finally returned to Staten Island on August 18. It appeared that gunfire from Fort Defiance did damage to the British ships.

Samuel Shaw wrote to his parents on July 15:

"General Howe has arrived with the army from Halifax, which is encamped on Staten Island. On Friday, two ships and three tenders, taking advantage of a brisk gale and strong current, ran by our batteries, up the North River where they at present remain. By deserters we learn that they sustained considerable damage, being hulled in many places, and very much hurt in their rigging. So great was their hurry, that they would not stay to return our salute, though it was given with much cordiality and warmth; which they seemed very sensible of, notwithstanding their distance, which was nearly two miles."

Almost the entire New York metropolitan area was under British military occupation from the end of 1776 until November 23, 1783, when they evacuated the city.

Industrial era
In the 1840s, entrepreneurs began to build ports as the "offloading end" of the Erie Canal. These included the Atlantic Basin, dredged in 1850, and the Erie Basin, dredged in 1864. Simultaneously, in 1849, the New York Legislature granted permission to dredge the nearby Gowanus Creek so it could be used as a 1.5 mi commercial waterway connected to Upper New York Bay. The creek's dredging was completed in 1860. Another act of the Legislature in 1867 allowed the canal to be deepened further. With the completion of the creek's dredging, Red Hook became an industrial hub, seeing up to 26,000 ships per year.

Dockworkers of various ethnicities began settling in Red Hook. African-American dockworkers began to move to Red Hook in the 1890s, while Italians had settled around Columbia Street. Many dockworkers lived in boarding houses, some of which had been speculatively built rowhouses. The industrial development also gave way to haphazard shanty towns. By the mid-1880s, a "Slab City" of 2,000 squatters and several hundred livestock had developed around Hamilton Avenue.

By the early 20th century, Red Hook had gained a reputation of decay, with organized crime having started to develop in the area. From the 1920s on, many poor and unemployed Norwegians, mostly former sailors, were living in the area in what they called Ørkenen Sur ("The Bitter Desert") around places like Hamilton Avenue and Gospel Hill. In 2015, NRK made a documentary about it in Norwegian. There is also an old documentary film about this.

Investment and decline
In the 1930s, the area was poor, and the site of the current Red Hook Houses was the site of a shack city for the homeless called a "Hooverville". Officials began looking to revitalize Red Hook at that time. The Red Hook Play Center and Red Hook Recreational Area opened in 1936 and 1940, respectively. The Red Hook Houses were completed in 1939.

In the 1990s, Life magazine named Red Hook as one of the "worst" neighborhoods in the United States and as "the crack capital of America". Patrick Daly, the principal of P.S. 15 in Red Hook, was killed in 1992 in the crossfire of a drug-related shooting while looking for a pupil who had left his school. The school was later renamed the Patrick Daly School after him, who was beloved within the school.

In 2010, Red Hook's first community newspaper, The Red Hook Star-Revue, began publication. Red Hook was heavily damaged by Hurricane Sandy in 2012, two years later. In 2024, the New York City government took over about 120 acre of land on Red Hook's waterfront, with plans to redevelop it.

The Mary A. Whalen and Lehigh Valley Railroad Barge No. 79 are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Location
Red Hook is a peninsula between Buttermilk Channel, Gowanus Bay, and Gowanus Canal at the southern edge of Downtown Brooklyn. Red Hook is in the area known as South Brooklyn, which, contrary to its name, is actually in western Brooklyn. This name is derived from the original City of Brooklyn which ended at Atlantic Street, now Atlantic Avenue. By the 1950s, anything south of Atlantic Avenue was considered South Brooklyn; thus, the names "Red Hook" and "South Brooklyn" were applied also to today's Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill, Columbia Heights, and Gowanus neighborhoods. Portions of Carroll Gardens and Cobble Hill were granted landmark status in the 1970s and were carved out of Red Hook.

Red Hook is the only part of New York City that has a fully frontal view of the Statue of Liberty, which was oriented to face France. (France gave the statue to the United States following the US centennial). Red Hook is the site of the NYCHA Red Hook Houses, the largest public housing development in Brooklyn, which accommodates about 6,000 people. Red Hook also contains several parks, including Red Hook Park. The park is in the vicinity, if not the exact location, of where the celebrated Civil War era baseball team Excelsior of Brooklyn played many of their home games. The neighborhood contains a heritage trail recalling its portion of the Battle of Brooklyn in the revolutionary war.

IKEA
Red Hook has a large IKEA store (346000 ft2) that opened on June 18, 2008, near the Gowanus Expressway. The building of IKEA was controversial. Opponents cited concerns including traffic congestion, a decrease in property values and destruction of this transit-oriented neighborhood and historically significant buildings in the area. Brooklyn artist Greg Lindquist exhibited a group of paintings in February 2008 in New York City that depicted the IKEA site in process, juxtaposing the maritime decay with the new construction.

As part of the IKEA development, a number of Civil War era buildings were demolished and the Red Hook graving dock, a 19th-century dry dock still in use, was filled in and leveled for use as a parking lot. A Maritime Support Services Location Study by the New York City Economic Development Corporation found that New York City needed eight more dry docks. According to the report, it would cost $1 billion to replace the one sold to IKEA, although no schedule for replacement was announced. In addition, IKEA's contractor was found to be in "violation for not having filed asbestos work, failing to monitor the air, not posting warnings, failure to construct decontamination protections before disturbing the asbestos-containing materials, and doing nothing to protect and decontaminate the material, as well as the workers and building waste."

Once run by New York Water Taxi, the now-free weekend only ferry service is run by NY Waterway and goes to IKEA, Wall St/Pier 11, and Midtown/Pier 79.

Demographics
Based on data from the 2010 United States Census, the population of the Carroll Gardens/Columbia Street/Red Hook neighborhood tabulation area was 38,353, a change of 26 (0.1%) from the 38,327 counted in 2000. Covering an area of 1040.71 acres, the neighborhood had a population density of 36.9 PD/acre.

The racial makeup of the Carroll Gardens/Columbia Street/Red Hook neighborhood tabulation area was 60.9% (23,342) White, 11.9% (4,573) African American, 0.2% (61) Native American, 4.5% (1,728) Asian, 0% (13) Pacific Islander, 0.4% (143) from other races, and 2.4% (912) from two or more races, and Hispanic or Latino of any race were 19.8% (7,581) of the population.

The majority of residents identified as either Black, Hispanic, or Latino during the late 20th century. As late as 2000, 43% of the neighborhood's population was Black, and nearly half identified as Hispanic of Latino. Between 2000 and 2016, the ratio of white residents increased by 320%. According to a 2016 U.S. Census estimate, Red Hook's population was 31% white and 35% Black; in addition, 44% of residents identified as Hispanic or Latino of any race.

Police and crime
Red Hook is patrolled by the 76th Precinct of the NYPD, located at 191 Union Street. The 76th Precinct ranked 37th safest out of 69 patrol areas for per-capita crime in 2010. The 76th Precinct has a lower crime rate than in the 1990s, with crimes across all categories having decreased by 83.1% between 1990 and 2018. The precinct reported 4 murders, 9 rapes, 53 robberies, 91 felony assaults, 65 burglaries, 210 grand larcenies, and 28 grand larcenies auto in 2018.

Fire safety
The New York City Fire Department (FDNY) operates two fire stations serving Red Hook:

 * Engine Company 202/Ladder Company 101 – 31 Richards Street
 * Engine Company 279/Ladder Company 131 – 252 Lorraine Street

Schools
Schools in Red Hook include:

 * Pave Academy Charter School – Grades K–8
 * P.S.15 Patrick F. Daly – Grades PK–5
 * Summit Academy Charter School – Grades 6–12
 * South Brooklyn Community High School – Grades 9–12
 * Red Hook Neighborhood School – Grades PK–5
 * Basis Independent Brooklyn – Grade K-12

Library
The Brooklyn Public Library's Red Hook branch is located at 7 Wolcott Street, near Dwight Street. The branch was originally housed in a Carnegie library structure, which was built in 1915 but burned down in a 1946 fire.

Water
New York City has expanded its water ferry service, operated by New York Water Taxi. This service normally runs between IKEA and Pier 11 in Lower Manhattan, but has added a new stop at Van Brunt Street to support local businesses hurt by Hurricane Sandy. The free ferry runs between 10am and 9pm. Originally, when this free service was first introduced, it proved to be popular with local residents, causing changes in the operating policy to favor IKEA shoppers. Under the current schedule, the ferry runs from Monday to Friday, every 40 minutes from 2pm, $5 for one way. On Saturday and Sunday, it runs free of charge, every 20 minutes from 11am.

Red Hook has been served by NYC Ferry's South Brooklyn route since 2017.

The transatlantic liner RMS Queen Mary 2 docks in Red Hook. In spring 2006, a new Carnival Cruise Lines terminal, the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, opened at Pier 12 at Pioneer Street, bringing additional tourists.

The Red Hook Container Terminal is one of four such facilities in the Port of New York and New Jersey and is the only maritime facility in Brooklyn to handle container ships.

Public transport
Subway service in the area is sparse. The closest subway stops are along the IND Culver Line, at either Carroll Street or Smith–Ninth Streets stations.

New York City Bus service is also sparse, but popular. The B61 bus route provides service from Hamilton Avenue, through Erie Basin/IKEA Plaza, to Van Brunt Street and then northward, through the Columbia Street Waterfront District and terminates in Downtown Brooklyn. It also connects with the Culver Line's Smith–Ninth Streets station. The B57 bus connects Red Hook with Downtown Brooklyn and Maspeth, Queens.

IKEA provides a complimentary shuttle that runs to Smith–Ninth Streets, Fourth Avenue / Ninth Street, and Court Street – Borough Hall subway stations from 3 to 9 pm daily, Monday through Friday every half hour, and Saturday and Sunday from 11 am to 9 pm every 20 minutes. Non-shoppers also use this service.

Streetcar project
Although electric trolleys have not run in Brooklyn since 1956, activists led by the Brooklyn Historic Railway Association (BHRA) have been trying to revive streetcars in Red Hook since 1989. With permission from New York City's government to develop a streetcar line running from Beard Street to Borough Hall, in the 1990s BHRA president Robert Diamond collected disused PCC streetcars that had been used in Boston and Buffalo for potential use on the new line. By 1999, Diamond had begun laying new track for the project, but in 2003 transportation officials elected to revoke Diamond's rights to the route's right of way, instead intending to sell them to the highest bidder in the event that the project ever moved forward. Diamond's efforts to secure independent funding were not successful.

In 2005, Rep. Nydia Velázquez helped obtain a $300,000 federal grant for a six-month streetcar study. Although BHRA had estimated $10–$15 million would be required to complete the project, the New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT) streetcar feasibility study (completed in April 2011) concluded that the 6.8 mile line would cost $176 million in capital funding, plus an additional $6.2 to $7.2 million in annual operating funds. A significant portion of the capital cost would be required to make modifications to Red Hook's narrow streets in order to allow streetcars to make right turns. The study ultimately found that the streetcar was not feasible because of high costs, potentially low ridership, and physical constraints like narrow streets.

In January 2016, a new proposal for a streetcar line in Red Hook, called the Brooklyn–Queens Connector, was made public by a non-profit group named Friends of the Brooklyn Queens Connector. The study proposed a 17 mi route between the neighborhoods of Astoria in Queens and Sunset Park in Brooklyn, passing through several neighborhoods on the way, including Red Hook. The private results of the study estimated that the streetcar's construction would cost $1.7 billion and would serve 15.8 million annual riders by 2035. In February 2016, the office of Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that the city would begin planning work for the streetcar line. However, although a list of possible routings for the streetcar was released in November 2016, there was insufficient funding to start construction. By August 2018, the southern terminal of the proposed streetcar had been truncated to Red Hook and the proposed cost rose to $2.73 billion, with projected completion postponed to 2029.

Vehicular
Red Hook is connected to Manhattan by the Brooklyn–Battery Tunnel, whose approaches separate it from Carroll Gardens and Columbia Street to the north. The tunnel's toll plaza was formerly located in Red Hook but was removed in 2017, replaced by electronic toll collection gantries on the Manhattan side of the tunnel.

The Gowanus Expressway (Interstate 278) also runs through the neighborhood.

Events
The Red Hook Waterfront Arts Festival is an annual summer kick-off held in Louis J. Valentino, Jr. Park & Pier featuring dance, music, and spoken-word poetry. Dance Theatre Etcetera, the producers of the event, concentrate local resources for residents and bring in community partners with activities for the whole family.

Sundays at Sunny's is a reading series held the first Sunday of every month, co-sponsored by Sunny's Bar and the independent bookstore BookCourt, and co-ordinated by writer Gabriel Cohen.

Red Hook Crit is an annual, unsanctioned bicycle race held on a springtime night on track bikes. It began as an underground event but has grown to become "what is possibly the country's coolest bike race."

The Brooklyn Street Circuit is located in Red Hook and hosts the annual New York City ePrix.

Notable residents

 * Carmelo Anthony (born 1984), former NBA player
 * Jaimie Branch (1983–2022), jazz trumpeter
 * Al Capone (1899-1947), gangster
 * Joe Gallo (1929-1972), who was commemorated in Bob Dylan's song "Joey" from the album Desire.
 * Albert Gallo, mobster and brother of Joe Gallo
 * Stephen Kunken (born c. 1971), actor
 * Michael Lerner (1941-2023), actor
 * James McBride, writer
 * Norman Mailer, novelist
 * Sarah Rapelje, for whose family Brooklyn's Rapelye Street is named
 * Hell Razah, rapper, member of hip-hop group Sunz of Man
 * Matty Rich, director of movies Straight Out of Brooklyn and The Inkwell
 * Shabazz the Disciple, rapper, member of hip-hop group Sunz of Man
 * Michael Shannon (born 1974), actor
 * Peter Steele (1962-2010), member of Type O Negative
 * Taz (born 1967 as Peter Senerchia), former professional wrestler and color commentator
 * Eli Wallach (1915-2014), actor
 * Michelle Williams (born 1980), actress
 * Dustin Yellin (born 1975), artist

In popular culture

 * Red Hook was the setting for the H. P. Lovecraft 1927 story "The Horror at Red Hook".
 * In Thomas Wolfe's short story "Only the Dead Know Brooklyn", a character rides the subway at night and is warned by the narrator to not walk around in Red Hook. It is written in transliterated circa 1936 Brooklynese.
 * The 1954 film On the Waterfront is set in Red Hook, though it was filmed in Hoboken, New Jersey.
 * The area was used as the setting for Arthur Miller's 1955 play A View from the Bridge, and subsequently for the opera of the same name by William Bolcom.
 * Red Hook is the setting for the 1961 book Memos from Purgatory by Harlan Ellison.
 * Red Hook is the birthplace of gangster Joe Gallo, which was commemorated in Bob Dylan's song "Joey" from the album Desire.
 * In the 1988 film Spike of Bensonhurst, the protagonist moves from Bensonhurst to Red Hook after being chased out of his old neighborhood by the Mafia.
 * Red Hook was the setting for the 1964 novel Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby Jr. and the 1989 film of the same name.
 * The 1991 independent film Straight Out of Brooklyn is set in the Red Hook Housing Projects.
 * Red Hook is the setting of Reggie Nadelson's 2005 crime novel, also called Red Hook.
 * Red Hook is featured in Lil Kim's music video for the song "Lighters Up", which pays homage to Lil Kim's hometown of Brooklyn.
 * Pier 41 at 204 Van Dyke Street was used as the setting of a bar scene in the 2005 Will Smith film Hitch.
 * The cast of The Real World: Brooklyn, part of MTV's reality television series The Real World, resided at Pier 41 in 2009.
 * Red Hook is the setting for Visitation Street, a 2013 novel by Ivy Pochoda.
 * Red Hook is the birthplace and sometimes current residence of Steve Rogers, also known as Captain America.
 * "The Red Hook" is the name of a cocktail created at Milk & Honey.
 * Red Hook is featured prominently in the FX TV series The Strain.
 * Red Hook is the setting of the Type O Negative song "In Praise Of Bacchus" from the album October Rust, as evidenced by the lyric, "The street lamps light a wet old Red Hook road". The song also references the Brooklyn Bridge and Pier 6. Frontman Peter Steele has mentioned the neighborhood in other songs, such as "Nettie" and "Stay Out Of My Dreams".
 * Red Hook is the setting of the 2018 indie drama-comedy music film Hearts Beat Loud directed by Brett Haley.

title: Red Hook, Brooklyn


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User talk:Jericarmel

Love In The Land.

We love

We stand

To Love

In the Land

That we are

Peace & Love

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

title: User talk:Jericarmel


text:
Austrian Netherlands

The Austrian Netherlands was the territory of the Burgundian Circle of the Holy Roman Empire between 1714 and 1797. The period began with the acquisition by the Austrian Habsburg monarchy of the former Spanish Netherlands under the Treaty of Rastatt in 1714. It lasted until Revolutionary France annexed the territory after the Battle of Sprimont in 1794 and the Peace of Basel in 1795. Austria relinquished its claim on the province in 1797 through the Treaty of Campo Formio.

History
The Eighty Years' War (1568–1648) later led to a division of the Low Countries between the Dutch Republic in the north and the Southern Netherlands, which later became Belgium and Luxembourg. The area had been held by the Habsburgs, but was briefly under Bourbon control in the War of the Spanish Succession. Under the Treaty of Rastatt (1714) which ended that war, the remainder of the Spanish Netherlands was ceded to Austria. Administratively, the country was divided into four traditional duchies, three counties and various lordships.

Brabant Revolution
In the 1780s, opposition emerged to the liberal reforms of Emperor Joseph II, which were perceived as an attack on the Catholic Church and the traditional institutions of the Austrian Netherlands. Resistance grew, focused in the autonomous and wealthy Duchy of Brabant and County of Flanders. In the aftermath of rioting and disruption in 1787 known as the Small Revolution, many opponents took refuge in the neighboring Dutch Republic where they formed a rebel army. Soon after the outbreak of the French and Liège revolutions, the émigré army crossed into the Austrian Netherlands and decisively defeated the Austrians at the Battle of Turnhout on 27 October 1789. The rebels, supported by uprisings across the territory, soon took control over much of the territory and proclaimed independence. Despite the tacit support of Prussia, the independent United Belgian States, established in January 1790, received no foreign recognition and soon became divided along ideological lines. The Vonckists led by Jan Frans Vonck advocated progressive and liberal government, whereas the Statists, led by Hendrik Van der Noot, were staunchly conservative and supported by the Church. The Statists, who had a wider base of support, drove the Vonckists into exile through terror.

By mid-1790, Habsburg Austria ended its war with the Ottoman Empire and prepared to suppress the rebels. The new Holy Roman Emperor, Leopold II, was also a liberal and proposed an amnesty for the rebels. After defeating a Statist army at the Battle of Falmagne (22 September 1790), the territory was soon overrun and the revolution was defeated by December. The Austrian reestablishment was short-lived and the territory was overrun by the French in 1794 (during the War of the First Coalition) after the Battle of Fleurus.

Imperial Council of State
The Council of State acted as government, and formed the council by imperial consent:

 * Baron Franz von Reischach, Imperial Diplomat
 * Cardinal Christoph Bartholomäus Anton Migazzi
 * Cardinal von Frankenberg
 * Baron of Gottignies, Imperial Lord Chamberlain
 * Philippe von Cobenzl, vice Chancellor of the Imperial Council of State.
 * Henri d'Ognies, Prince of Grimberghen, Imperial Lord Chamberlain
 * Count of Neny president of the Privy Council, member of the Imperial Council of State
 * Count of Woestenraedt, Imperial Lord Chamberlain.
 * Marquess of Chasteler, Lord Chamberlain
 * Count of Gommegnies, President of the Council of Hainaut
 * Viscount of Villers; Imperial Treasurer General
 * Franz Joseph, Prince of Gavre: Grand Marshall of the Imperial Court of the Archduchess.

French rule
1794 was the third year of the War of the First Coalition. The Austrians gave up on contesting the Low Countries after the Battle of Fleurus (26 June), and left them to the French. After three months of military occupation, on 15 October an Administration centrale et supérieure de la Belgique was installed. On 1 October 1795 the departments were activated and the definitive annexation started, liquidating the Belgian Governing Council, which ceased on 22 November. France annexed the Austrian Netherlands from the Holy Roman Empire and integrated them into the French Republic. The commissioner of the Directory, Louis Ghislain de Bouteville du Metz, finished his work on January 20, 1797, after which no common Belgian authority remained.

title: Austrian Netherlands


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User talk:MetaMind

I'm thinking of giving everyone who signs up for the MetaMind an account on Wikipedia. I can automatically update their entry in WikiPedia with the profile data every time they update the profile data. I could also add some of their links from the database and make a link in the database to their Wikipedia page.

If I can do this for Wikipedia, I can do it for other sites which require login as well.

title: User talk:MetaMind


text:
Excite (web portal)

Excite is an American website (historically a web portal) operated by IAC that provides outsourced internet content such as a metasearch engine, with outsourced weather and news content on the main page. As of 2024, all of Excite's operations are controlled by services outside of the business.

In the United States, the main Excite homepage had historically a personal start page and web portal called My Excite. Excite once operated a webmail service commonly known as Excite Mail until August 31, 2021, when it would be renamed BlueTie and given a paid business model rather than the free model of Excite Mail.

The original Excite company was founded in 1994 and went public two years later. Excite was once a popular site on the Internet during the 1990s, with the main portal site Excite.com being the sixth most visited website in 1997. The company merged with broadband provider @Home Network but together went bankrupt in 2001. Excite's portal and services were acquired by iWon and then by Ask Jeeves, but the website went into a steep decline in popularity afterwards.

History
Excite originally started as Architext in June 1993 in Cupertino, California, created by Graham Spencer, Joe Kraus, Mark VanHaren, Ryan McIntyre, Ben Lutch and Martin Reinfried, who were all students at Stanford University. The goal was to create software to manage the vast information on the World Wide Web. In July 1994, International Data Group paid them US$80,000 to develop an online service. In January 1995, Vinod Khosla, a former Stanford student and partner at venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, arranged a US$250,000 "first round" backing for the project, with US$1.5 million provided over a ten-month period. Soon thereafter, Geoff Yang, of Institutional Venture Partners, introduced an additional US$1.5 million in financing and Excite was formally launched in October 1995.

In January 1996, George Bell joined Excite as its chief executive officer (CEO). Excite also purchased two search engines (Magellan and WebCrawler) and signed exclusive distribution agreements with Netscape, Microsoft and Apple, in addition to other companies. Jim Bellows, then 72, was hired by Excite in 1994 to figure out how to present the content in a journalistic manner. He paid good journalists to write brief reviews of web sites. However, users wanted to get directly to the content and skipped the reviews, so the partnership with Bellows ended in 1998. Excite's original website design was mostly based on the color orange. In 1997 it was redesigned with a black and yellow theme, which mostly continues to this day.

On April 4, 1996, Excite went public with an initial offering of two million shares. Its offering was however overshadowed by its biggest rival, Yahoo!, which also went public at the same time. Excite's six founders became millionaires after the offering. In November 1996, America Online (AOL) agreed to make Excite its exclusive search and directory service, in return of a larger 20 percent share in Excite and sale of WebCrawler. In June 1997, Intuit, maker of Quicken and TurboTax, purchased a 19% stake in Excite and finalised a seven-year partnership deal. On October 16, 1997, Excite purchased Netbot, a comparison shopping agent. At the same time Intuit announced the launch of Excite Business & Investing. Later that year a deal was finalized with Ticketmaster to provide direct online ticketing. On March 31, 1998, Excite reported a net loss of approximately $30.2 million and according to its first quarter report it had only enough available capital to meet obligations through December. Content from Excite's portal was collated from over 100 different sources. Excite was the first portal to start offering free e-mail, and this step was followed by rivals Yahoo! and Lycos.

A November 1997 press release showed that there were about 11.8 million unique visitors to the Excite "network" during a 28-day period from September to October.

Around this time, Excite was monetized with online advertising that corresponded to the number of "eyeballs" that visited the portal.

In December 1998, Yahoo! was in negotiations to purchase Excite for $5.5 billion to $6 billion. However, prompted by Kleiner Perkins, @Home Network's chairman and CEO, Thomas Jermoluk met with Excite's chairman and CEO George Bell on December 19, and Excite was subsequently acquired by @Home Network, on January 19, 1999. At this time, Excite was the sixth largest Internet portal by traffic. At one point, Microsoft was also interested in Excite, and had plans to merge it into its own MSN portal.

According to Steven Levy in his book In The Plex, in early 1997 two graduate students at Stanford University, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, decided that BackRub, the name of their research project that later became the search engine Google, was taking up time they should have been using to study. They went to Bell and offered it to him for $1 million, but Bell rejected the offer, and later threw Vinod Khosla, one of Excite's venture capitalists, out of his office after he had negotiated Brin and Page down to $750,000. In a 2014 podcast and later again to CNBC, then-CEO of Excite, George Bell, said that the deal fell apart because Larry Page wanted Excite's search technologies to be replaced by Google's, to which Bell did not agree.

Excite@Home

The US$6.7 billion merger of Excite and @Home Network in 1999 (equivalent to $ billion in ) became one of the largest mergers of two Internet companies at the time. @Home's high-speed Internet services and existing portal were combined with Excite's search engine and portal, with a move towards personalised web portal content following the merger. The new company was named "Excite@Home" (the stock symbol and the company's name in regulatory filing records remained as "At Home Corporation" (ATHM)) and, six months after the merger, Tom Jermoluk stepped down as CEO of Excite@Home. Excite's George Bell, who was the president of the Excite division of @Home after the merger, became the new CEO of the combined Excite@Home, whilst Jermoluk remained the chairman of the board. The merger was billed as a "new media network for the 21st century."

Following the merger, the Excite division purchased iMall, as well as online greeting card company, Blue Mountain Arts. Excite also acquired photo sharing company Webshots. Excite furthermore paid for sponsorship of Infiniti Indy car driver Eddie Cheever, Jr., through the 2000 and 2001 racing seasons. However, the merger between Excite and @Home fell disastrously short of expectations. Online advertising revenue plummeted, while cable network ISP revenue continued to grow. On September 21, 2000, after stock value had dropped 90%, George Bell announced plans to step down as CEO within six months. On April 23, 2001, Excite@Home announced Patti S. Hart, the former CEO of Telocity, would become its third CEO in three years. In the same announcement, George Bell resigned and left the company completely. The company also reported first-quarter net loss of $61.6 million, compared with a loss of $4.6 million in the same period the prior year.

The search engine Magellan, which Excite had purchased in 1996, was closed down in May 2001.

On June 11, 2001, Excite@Home announced that it had raised $100 million in financing from Promethean Capital Management and Angelo Gordon & Co. Part of the deal was that the loan was repayable immediately if Excite@Home stock was delisted by NASDAQ. The loan, structured as a note convertible into shares of Excite, had an interest rate of zero. By August 20 of that year, Excite@Home had replaced its auditors Ernst & Young with PricewaterhouseCoopers. This triggered a demand from Promethean Capital Management and Angelo Gordon & Co for the immediate repayment of $50 million in debt. Furthermore, Cox Cable and Comcast announced that they would separate from Excite@Home by the first quarter of 2002.

On September 13, 2001, Excite@Home sold Blue Mountain Arts to American Greetings for less than 5% of what it had paid less than two years earlier. On October 1, 2001, Excite@Home filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of California. The company's remaining 1,350 employees were laid off over the following months. As part of the agreement, @Home's national high-speed fiber network access would be sold back to AT&T Corporation. @Home Liquidating Trust became the successor company to Excite@Home, charged with the sale of all assets of the former company.

At the end of 2001, the Webshots assets were purchased by the company's founders for $2.4 million in cash from the Bankruptcy Court.

Despite the financial problems, the Excite network of sites continued to draw many visitors in the U.S., albeit behind AOL Time Warner, Microsoft and Yahoo!

Excite Network
During the collapse of Excite@Home, iWon, an Irvington, New York–based venture, had surreptitiously commenced the design of a new Excite website; iWon planned to acquire the Excite.com domain name and brand in the course of the bankruptcy proceedings. iWon eventually made a joint bid with Seattle's InfoSpace to purchase the domain name and brand. On November 28, 2001, the court accepted the bid and gave iWon less than three weeks to launch a new Excite portal. Bill Daugherty, iWon's founder and co-chief executive at the time, told The New York Times, "I feel like a guy who lived through a hurricane, got pounded and pounded and managed to survive when everyone else was destroyed. Suddenly you walk outside and because of the storm you have beachfront property. That's what Excite is to us."

On December 16, 2001, iWon launched the new Excite portal and transferred millions of Excite users to its new home. iWon changed its corporate name to Excite Network, and continued to operate Excite, iWon, and a third portal, MyWay. Outside of the United States, Excite Italia took control of portals in the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, and Austria. InfoSpace, for its part, owned and operated the web search function on Excite, with Excite's own database now depreciated and instead using Overture and Inktomi search results, along with DMOZ (Open Directory) for the directory and Dogpile metasearch for news results. This proved to be a short-sighted arrangement as searching became big business on the Internet in the ensuing years.

Acquisition by Ask Jeeves
Excite continued to operate until the Excite Network was acquired by Ask Jeeves (now Ask.com) in March 2004. Ask Jeeves promised to rejuvenate iWon and Excite, but was not able to. Ask Jeeves management became distracted, according to the East Bay Business Times, first by a search feature arms race with Google and Yahoo!, and then by its merger with Barry Diller's IAC/InterActiveCorp, announced in March 2005. "Hopefully, as we start to invest more and get the staff in place and some of the changes to the portal properties that we want, we hope to see (revenue) grow back in the latter half of the year," said Ask Jeeves CEO Steve Berkowitz during a conference call with analysts on April 27, 2005.

On May 20, 2005, Ask Jeeves made two announcements regarding the rejuvenation of the Excite brand. It first announced that it had acquired Excite Italia B.V. (the operator of the Excite portals in Europe), from Tiscali, S.p.A.; and, secondly, the company reported that it had reached a comprehensive settlement with InfoSpace regarding Excite in the United States, whereby Ask Jeeves and InfoSpace would share marketing costs and revenue from the Excite web search function. Regarding the acquisition, Ask Jeeves CEO, Steve Berkowitz, said, "We look forward to working with InfoSpace to enhance the search experience on Excite, now that our interests are aligned." On October 17, 2007, GOADV, a media company specialising in the generation of Internet "traffic", announced the completion of its acquisition of the European Excite group of companies.

Excite has never managed to recover back to its heyday popularity. It remains more relevant in Japan, however. Excite Japan, headquartered in Tokyo, was founded on August 4, 1997 in a partnership with Itochu. After Excite@Home's collapse, Itochu became majority shareholder of Excite Japan (90 percent).

Excite ended support for their webmail service on August 31, 2021. Those who already had accounts were offered to pay for a BlueTie Home e-mail account to keep their messages and contacts.

FreeLane by Excite
In a bid to compete against Internet Service Providers like NetZero and Juno Online, which offered free or low-cost dial-up access in the United States, Excite started offering its own "no-pay" service for private customers by partnering with 1stUp.com to create FreeLane by Excite: 1stUp would allow Excite customers to download software in order for them to be able to log-on to the Internet. The software would then rotate a series of sponsored banner advertisements on the user's computer while they surfed the Internet. 1stUp.com soon went out of business, and Excite switched to another partner named WorldShare, rebranding FreeLane as FreeLane version 2.0. As of March 1, 2001, FreeLane was discontinued.

Ticketsmate
Ticketsmate, in partnership with Excite, sells tickets to customers in the United States. The portal is essentially a ticket selling website where users can buy tickets and search through thousands of events and venues. The powerful search engine capabilities of the Excite server are used on this website to help the user search for tickets and events.

Excite Education (HigherEdu.com)
Excite also has an education portal called HigherEdu.com that can be used by people to search for and apply for different degrees and online courses. The portal was originally called Excite Education and it once featured a list of thousands of educational institutes across America for prospective students to browse through and apply at but now features a much smaller list. The popularity of HigherEdu.com has declined along with the main Excite portal.

title: Excite (web portal)


text:
Kevin Shelley

Kevin Francis Shelley (born November 16, 1955) is an American politician, who was the 28th California Secretary of State from January 6, 2003, until his resignation on March 4, 2005.

Early life
Shelley was raised in San Francisco, the only son in a family of five. His father, Jack Shelley, was a State Senator, member of the U.S. House of Representatives, and Mayor of San Francisco.

Shelley graduated from St. Ignatius College Preparatory in 1973. He received his B.A. in political science from the University of California, Davis. He obtained his J.D. from University of California, Hastings College of the Law. He joined the staff of Congressman Phillip Burton and continued in his position when Sala Burton assumed her husband's seat after his death.

Political career
In 1990, Shelley was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. In 1996, he won a seat in the California State Assembly. He wrote clinic protection ordinances and sunshine laws to make government more accountable. He authored the Marine Life Protection Act that protects coastal ecosystems, the California Nursing Home Reform Act to protect the elderly, and the Healthy Schools Act to protect children from pesticides. He created a voting reform package that includes a Voters' Bill of Rights and allows each voter to permanently vote by mail. Term limits prevented Shelley from seeking a fourth term as an Assemblyman in 2002, so he sought election as California's Secretary of State, the state's chief elections official.

Recall election
Within weeks of Shelley's taking office as Secretary of State, petitions were filed to recall Governor Gray Davis, a fellow Democrat. Six months after taking office, Shelley had to certify that there were enough signatures on these petitions to mandate the 2003 gubernatorial recall election, the first such election in state history. As Secretary of State, Shelley was responsible for overseeing that statewide special election.

Shelley was generally credited with good work on his handling of the 2003 recall election and on his handling of the controversy over the verifiability of electronic voting machines. He was the first state election official to decertify DRE voting machine systems already in use, to require all DRE voting machine systems to contain an accessible paper copy of a person's vote, and to adopt standards and security measures for such systems. He initiated an investigation into electronic voting machine manufacturer Diebold Election Systems (now Premier Election Solutions), and at the conclusion of the investigation, requested that then-State Attorney General Bill Lockyer investigate Diebold for criminal fraud.

Scandals
A number of former staffers and other associates came forward and accused Shelley of abusive behavior toward his staff.

Other accusations surfaced charging Shelley had received allegedly laundered campaign funds during his race for Secretary of State. Shelley maintained that he did not know that the funds were illicitly transferred to his campaign treasury. (After an investigation, then-state Attorney General Bill Lockyer publicly exonerated Shelley, saying he was innocent of any wrongdoing in connection with the case.)

On October 29, 2004, Shelley replaced three of his top aides, including the assistant state secretary of communications, with veteran civil servants, in an effort to bring more accountability to his office. Shelley announced his resignation on February 4, 2005, effective March 1, although he did not leave office until three days later, on March 4.

Chief Deputy Secretary of State Cathy Mitchell briefly served as Secretary of State until Bruce McPherson, a Republican, was appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Upon taking office, McPherson reversed Shelley's actions, and on March 10, 2006, McPherson certified the use of DRE voting machines without verifiable, auditable paper trails.

California State Bar records indicate Shelley resumed practicing law in April 2005.

title: Kevin Shelley


text:
Yom HaShoah

Yom HaZikaron laShoah ve-laG'vurah (יום הזיכרון לשואה ולגבורה), known colloquially in Israel and abroad as Yom HaShoah (יום השואה, יום השואה) and in English as Holocaust Remembrance Day, or Holocaust Day, is observed as Israel's day of commemoration for the approximately six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust by Nazi Germany and its collaborators, and for the Jewish resistance in that period. In Israel, it is a national memorial day. The first official commemorations took place in 1951, and the observance of the day was anchored in a law passed by the Knesset in 1959. It is held on the 27th of Nisan (which falls in April or May), unless the 27th would be adjacent to the Jewish Sabbath, in which case the date is shifted by a day.

Rabbinate-instituted day (1949–1950)
The first Holocaust Remembrance Day in Israel took place on December 28, 1949, following a decision of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel that an annual memorial should take place on the Tenth of Tevet, a traditional day of mourning and fasting in the Hebrew calendar. The day was marked by the burial in a Jerusalem cemetery of ashes and bones of thousands of Jews brought from the Flossenbürg concentration camp and religious ceremonies held in honor of the victims. A radio program on the Holocaust was broadcast that evening. The following year, in December 1950, the Rabbinate, organizations of former European Jewish communities and the Israel Defense Forces held memorial ceremonies around the country; they mostly involved funerals, in which objects such as desecrated Torah scrolls and the bones and ashes of the dead brought from Europe were interred.

Knesset-instituted day (1951–1958)
In 1951, the Knesset began deliberations to choose a date for Holocaust Remembrance Day. On April 12, 1951, after also considering as possibilities the Tenth of Tevet, the 14th of Nisan, which is the day before Passover and the day on which the Warsaw Ghetto uprising (April 19, 1943) began, and September 1, the date on which the Second World War began, the Knesset passed a resolution establishing the 27 Nisan in the Hebrew calendar, a week after Passover, and eight days before Israel Independence Day as the annual Holocaust and Ghetto Uprising Remembrance Day.

On May 3, 1951, the first officially organized Holocaust Remembrance Day event was held at the Chamber of the Holocaust on Mount Zion; the Israel Postal Service issued a special commemorative envelope; and a bronze statue of Mordechai Anielewicz, the leader of the Warsaw Ghetto revolt, was unveiled at Yad Mordechai, a kibbutz named for him. From the following year, the lighting of six beacons in memory of the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis became a standard feature of the official commemoration of Holocaust Memorial Day.

Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day Law (1959)
On April 8, 1959, the Knesset officially established the day when it passed the Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day Law with the purpose of instituting an annual "commemoration of the disaster which the Nazis and their collaborators brought upon the Jewish people and the acts of heroism and revolt performed." The law was signed by the Prime Minister of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, and the President of Israel, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi. It established that the day would be observed by a two-minute silence when all work would come to a halt throughout the country, memorial gatherings and commemorative events in public and educational institutions would be held, flags would be flown at half mast, and programs relevant to the day would be presented on the radio and in places of entertainment. An amendment to the law in 1961 mandated that cafes, restaurants and clubs be closed on the day.

Date
The date is set in accordance with the Hebrew calendar, on 27 Nisan, so that it varies in regard to the Gregorian calendar. Observance of the day is moved back to the Thursday before, if 27 Nisan falls on a Friday (as in 2021), or forward a day, if 27 Nisan falls on a Sunday (to avoid adjacency with the Jewish Sabbath, as in 2024). The fixed Jewish calendar ensures 27 Nisan does not fall on Saturday.

Evening
Yom HaShoah opens in Israel at sundown in a state ceremony held in Warsaw Ghetto Square at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes Authority, in Jerusalem. During the ceremony the national flag is lowered to half mast, the President and the Prime Minister both deliver speeches, Holocaust survivors light six torches symbolizing the approximately six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust and the Chief Rabbis recite prayers.

Daytime
On Yom HaShoah, ceremonies and services are held at schools, military bases and by other public and community organizations.

On the eve of Yom HaShoah and the day itself, places of public entertainment are closed by law. Israeli television airs Holocaust documentaries and Holocaust-related talk shows, and low-key songs are played on the radio. Flags on public buildings are flown at half mast. At 10:00 a.m., an air raid siren sounds throughout the country and Israelis are expected to observe two minutes of solemn reflection. It is customary to pause what is being done and to reflect, including motorists who stop their cars in the middle of the road, standing beside their vehicles in silence as the siren is sounded.

Abroad

Jewish communities and individuals throughout the world commemorate Yom HaShoah in synagogues as well as in the broader Jewish community. Many hold their commemorative ceremonies on the closest Sunday to Yom HaShoah as a more practical day for people to attend, while some mark the day on April 19, the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. Jewish schools also hold Holocaust-related educational programs on or near Yom HaShoah.

Commemorations typically include memorial services and communal vigils and educational programs. These programs often include talks by Holocaust survivors (although this is becoming less common as time passes and there are fewer survivors who remain alive), candle-lighting ceremonies, the recitation of memorial prayers, the Mourner's Kaddish and appropriate songs and readings. Some communities read the names of Holocaust victims or show Holocaust-themed films.

Since 1988 in Poland, a memorial service has been held after a three-kilometer walk by thousands of participants from Auschwitz to Birkenau in what has become known as "The March of the Living".

Yom HaShoah is also commemorated by Australian Jews. In 2022, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, who is Jewish, commemorated Yom HaShoah at the Melbourne Hebrew Congregation on the synagogue's 180th anniversary.

While in Europe Holocaust Remembrance Day is celebrated on the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp by the Soviet military in 1945, the Israeli government chose to commemorate a day that honored Jewish resistance and heroism in the face of the Nazi genocide.

Religious observances and liturgy
In the last few decades all the prayerbooks of Conservative and Reform Judaism have developed similar liturgies to be used on Yom HaShoah. The siddurim of these groups add passages that are meant to be added to standard weekday service, as well as stand-alone sections. These liturgies generally include:

 * Lighting of a candle (often each member of the congregation lights one)
 * Modern poems, including "I believe in the sun even when it is not shining..."
 * El Malei Rahamim (God, full of mercy, dwelling on high)
 * Mourner's Kaddish

In response to the lack of liturgy dedicated to Yom HaShoah, Daniel Gross composed, in 2009, I Believe: A Shoah Requiem, a complete musical liturgy dedicated to the observance of Yom HaShoah. An a cappella oratorio scored for cantor, soprano solo, adult chorus and children's chorus, I Believe features several traditional prayer texts such as the Mourner's Kaddish (Kaddish Yatom) and the El Malei memorial prayer, and also includes the poetry of Paul Celan and Primo Levi. On April 7, 2013, I Believe had its world premiere presentation at Orchestra Hall at the Max M. Fisher Music Center in Detroit, Michigan.

Orthodox Judaism
While there are Orthodox Jews who commemorate the Holocaust on Yom HaShoah, others in the Orthodox community, especially Haredim, including Hasidim, remember the victims of the Holocaust in their daily prayers and on traditional days of mourning that were already in place before the Holocaust, such as Tisha B'Av in the summer, and the Tenth of Tevet in the winter, because in the Jewish tradition the month of Nisan is considered a joyous month associated with Passover and messianic redemption. The moment of silence is by some purposely ignored because of the non-Jewish origins of this sort of memorial. Some Haredi rabbis recommend adding piyyutim (religious poems) about the Holocaust to the liturgy of Tisha B’Av; some adherents follow this advice.

Conservative Judaism
In 1981, members of the Federation of Jewish Men's Clubs FJMC, a branch of the mainstream Conservative/Masorti movement, created a special memorial project specifically for Yom HaShoah. A dedicated yahrzeit candle was conceived, with yellow wax and a barbed-wire Star of David logo reminiscent of the armbands Jews were forced to wear during the Holocaust. This object has come to be known as the Yellow Candle. Approximately 200,000 candles are distributed around the world each year, along with relevant prayers and meditations.

In 1984, Conservative Rabbi David Golinkin wrote an article in Conservative Judaism journal suggesting a program of observance for the holiday, including fasting. In his article he noted that while private fasts are indeed prohibited during the month of Nisan (a major Orthodox objection to the placement of the day), communal fasts for tragedies befalling Jewish communities had indeed been declared throughout the pre-Modern period.

Another prominent Conservative Jewish figure shared the Orthodox sentiment about not adopting Yom HaShoah. Ismar Schorsch, former Chancellor of Conservative Judaism's Jewish Theological Seminary of America held that Holocaust commemoration should take place on Tisha b'Av.

The Masorti (Conservative) movement in Israel has created Megillat HaShoah, a scroll and liturgical reading for Yom HaShoah. This publication was a joint project of Jewish leaders in Israel, the United States and Canada.

In 2011, the FJMC introduced a related Yellow Candle concept for use on Kristallnacht (The Night of Shattered Glass), November 9–10, commemorating the first organised Nazi pogrom of Jews in 1938, and other important Shoah commemoration dates. Called the Ner Katan, FJMC's new version consists of six Yellow Candles provided for communal observances and ceremonies.

More recently Conservative rabbis and lay leaders in the US, Israel and Canada collaborated to write Megillat Hashoah (The Holocaust Scroll). It contains personal recollections of Holocaust survivors. A responsum was written by Rabbi Golinkin expressing the view that not only is it legitimate for the modern Jewish community to write a new scroll of mourning, it was also incumbent to do so.

Reform Judaism
Reform Jewish congregations have tended to commemorate the memory of the Holocaust either on International Holocaust Remembrance Day or on Yom HaShoah. These commemorations of the Holocaust have used a ceremony that is loosely modeled after a Passover Seder. The focus of the seder has changed with time. The earlier Holocaust seders commemorated the losses of the Holocaust through a reenactment events from the Holocaust and through the lighting of six yahrzeit candles to reflect the approximately 6 million Jews murdered. More modern Haggadot for Yom HaShoah, such as Gathering from the Whirlwind, have concentrated on renewal, remembrance, and the continuity of Jewish life.

In 1988 the American Reform movement published Six Days of Destruction (Elie Wiesel and Rabbi Albert Friedlander). Narratives from Holocaust survivors are juxtaposed with the six days of creation found in Genesis.

Gregorian dates
Upcoming dates of observance:
 * 2023: Tuesday, April 18
 * 2024: Monday, May 6
 * 2025: Wednesday, April 23
 * 2026: Monday, April 13
 * 2027: Tuesday, May 4

title: Yom HaShoah


text:
Red Lake

Red Lake may refer to:

Australia

 * Red Lake (Western Australia)

Croatia

 * Red Lake (Croatia) (Crveno jezero)

Romania

 * Red Lake (Romania) (Lacul Roşu)

United States

 * Red Lake (Arizona–New Mexico)
 * Red Lake (Orlando), Florida
 * Red Lake (Minnesota), the largest lake entirely within the state
 * Red Lake (New York)
 * Red Lake (Douglas County, Wisconsin)

Canada

 * Red Lake, Ontario

United States

 * Red Lake, Arizona, a census-designated place
 * Red Lake Peak, a summit of the Sierra Nevada mountains in California
 * Red Lake, Minnesota, a census-designated place
 * Red Lake County, Minnesota
 * Red Lake Indian Reservation, Minnesota
 * Red Lake Senior High School, Minnesota
 * Red Lake shootings, a series of shootings in 2005
 * Red Lake River in Minnesota
 * Lower Red Lake, Minnesota, an unorganized territory
 * Upper Red Lake, Minnesota, an unorganized territory
 * Red Lake Township, Logan County, North Dakota

title: Red Lake


text:
Äänekoski

Äänekoski is a town in Finland. It is located in the Central Finland region, about 45 km north of Jyväskylä. The town has a population of 0 and covers an area of undefined km2 of which undefined km2 is water. The population density is undefined PD/km2.

Neighbouring municipalities are Kannonkoski, Konnevesi, Laukaa, Saarijärvi, Uurainen, Vesanto and Viitasaari.

The municipality is unilingually Finnish.

The municipality of Äänekosken maalaiskunta was consolidated to Äänekoski in 1969 and the municipality of Konginkangas in 1993. The municipalities of Sumiainen and Suolahti were consolidated to Äänekoski in 2007.

History
Äänekoski is named after the nearby rapids. Folk etymology connects the name to the word ääni "sound", but Terho Itkonen has suggested another origin: a Sámi term meaning "big, large" (compare Northern Sámi eanas, "most").

Swedish sources mention a salmon fishery by the rapids around 1455, Ænækoski laxefiskeri. At the time, it was not a proper settlement and was located in the hunting grounds of the people of Sysmä. The Rautalampi parish was established in 1561, at the time it was a large parish covering most of Central Finland north of the Päijänne. The Laukaa parish, including the area of Äänekoski, was separated from Rautalampi in 1628.

A settlement named Äänekoski has existed at least since 1752. It remained a part of Laukaa until the parish was established in 1907 and the municipality Äänekosken maalaiskunta was established in 1911. At the time, Äänekosken maalaiskunta was called simply Äänekoski. The municipality was divided in 1932: the actual settlement of Äänekoski became the kauppala of Äänekoski, Suolahti became another kauppala while the old Äänekoski municipality was renamed Äänekosken maalaiskunta and its administrative seat was moved to the village of Honkola. Äänekoski and Äänekosken maalaiskunta still shared a parish.

The first industrial enterprises appeared in 1896–1900.

Four municipalities have been consolidated with Äänekoski: Äänekosken maalaiskunta in 1969, Konginkangas in 1993 and Sumiainen and Suolahti in 2007. Äänekoski adopted the coat of arms of Suolahti in 2007.

Geography

Äänekoski is located along Finnish national road 4 approximately 40 km north of Jyväskylä. Finnish national road 69 to Suonenjoki begins in Hirvaskangas, 12 km south of Äänekoski center. Finnish national road 13 between Kokkola and Lappeenranta passes through Honkola, 6 km south of Äänekoski center. Äänekoski center is located between the Ääneselkä open water part of Lake Keitele and Lake Kuhnamo.

Villages
Modern Äänekoski is a product of a merger of multiple former municipalities, where the following villages were officially named:
 * Konginkangas: Kalaniemi, Konginkangas center, Pyyrinlahti
 * Sumiainen: Paadentaipale, Raikkaus, Sumiaisten kirkonkylä (Sumiainen church village)
 * Suolahti: Suolahti center
 * Äänekoski ja Äänekosken maalaiskunta (Rural Municipality of Äänekoski): Äänekoski center, Honkola, Kangashäkki (main part of which is in Uurainen), Kiimasjärvi, Koivisto (Koivistonkylä) and Petruma.

Besides these official divisions, the following villages or neighborhoods are also informally recognized: Hietama, Hirvaskangas, Laajaranta, Liimattala, Mämme, Parantala ja Rannankylä.

Nature
The area is heavily forested. It is also defined by the fractured Lake Keitele, which stretches generally in the southwest-northeast direction from Äänekoski center to the open waters of Keitele proper in Havusalmi, but which has multiple bays in the perpendicular, southeast-northwest direction.

There are 13 Natura 2000 protected areas in Äänekoski. These include esker areas, waters rich in bird life and part of the Hitonhauta-Kylmähauta-Hirvasjoki ravine area, which extends from Äänekoski to Laukaa.

There are altogether 170 lakes in Äänekoski. The biggest lakes are Keitele, Kuhnamo and Niinivesi.

One of the world's smallest rivers, the Kuokanjoki, is within the area. Aatunselkä is also located in this area.

Demographics
In 2021, there were 18,318 inhabitants, of which 75.8% lived in urban areas. There are three urban areas: Äänekoski center (12,899 inhabitants), Konginkangas (445) and Sumiaisten kirkonkylä (church village of Sumiainen, 406). Suolahden keskustaajama (the center of Suolahti), Kierälahti and Paatela used to categorized as a separate urban areas, but they are now counted as a part of Äänekoski center.

Economy
Äänekoski is a major industrial center. The largest corporate tax payer is Valtra, a manufacturer of tractors and agricultural machinery, which is a part of AGCO Corporation, followed by Kurikka Timber, a manufacturer of window components. Aura cheese is manufactured in the Valio's Äänekoski dairy. The forest, pulp and paper industry is a major employer. In 1891, a groundwood pulp mill and a cardboard factory was founded in Äänekoski. Currently, sites in Äänekoski include a Metsä Board folding boxboard factory, Metsä Fibre kraft pulp and bioproduct mill, Metsä Wood plywood factory (former Finnforest) and a Nouryon plant (former CP Kelco), which manufactures chemical derivatives of cellulose.

Twin towns – sister cities
The following cities or municipalities are twinned with Äänekoski:

 * 🇸🇪 Örnsköldsvik Municipality, Sweden
 * Brande, Brande Municipality, Denmark
 * 🇳🇴 Sigdal, Norway
 * 🇺🇦 Alushta, Alushta municipality, Ukraine
 * 🇷🇺 Borovichi, Novgorod Oblast, Russia (status unknown)
 * 🇷🇺 Sestroretsk, Russia
 * 🇳🇪 Niamey, Niger

title: Äänekoski


text:
New Haven Coliseum

New Haven Coliseum was a sports and entertainment arena located in downtown New Haven, Connecticut. Construction began in 1968 and was completed in 1972. The Coliseum was officially closed on September 1, 2002, by Mayor John DeStefano Jr., and demolished by implosion on January 20, 2007.

The arena's formal name was New Haven Veterans Memorial Coliseum, but most locals simply referred to it as "New Haven Coliseum". The Coliseum held 11,497 people at full capacity, and occupied 4.5 acres (18,000 m2) of land next to the Knights of Columbus Building and faced the Oak Street Connector/Route 34 downtown spur.

Hosted events
The Coliseum hosted the New Haven Knights of the United Hockey League, New Haven Nighthawks, New Haven Senators, and Beast of New Haven of the American Hockey League, as well as the 1984 Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference and Yale University's 2002 National Invitational Tournament men's college basketball tournament opening round games. Also, it was home of the Connecticut Coasters roller hockey team in 1993, the Connecticut Pride of the IBL during the 2000–01 season, and the New Haven Ninjas af2 team in 2002. The UConn Huskies men's basketball team played home games at the arena as their part-time home from 1978 to 1987. Ice Capades has also been presented at the Coliseum. New Haven Coliseum was also second home to Yale University Hockey, playing games sporadically at the Coliseum over the years. The U.S.A. Women's Olympic Squad played an exhibition game vs. Sweden on December 15, 2001.

Notably, in 1986, the Coliseum served as the setting for Van Halen's multi-platinum concert film Live Without a Net. Many of the era's most prominent musical stars also appeared at the Coliseum. It also was the home of the famous "Eruption" solo performed by Eddie Van Halen and his bandmates which took place on August 27, 1986.

The pilot episode of WWE SmackDown was filmed at the Coliseum on April 27, 1999, and aired on UPN two days later.

Tool was the final musical act on August 20, 2002.

The final event held at the Coliseum was a professional wrestling show held by World Wrestling Entertainment, one of the original attractions in the arena since 1972. The WWE considered the Coliseum its home arena, as it was—for much of its history—the closest venue to WWE's headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut. Most matches were broadcast, first on WTNH, as well as on local UHF stations.

Construction
The Coliseum was built to replace the New Haven Arena, New Haven's prior indoor sports and entertainment venue. The Coliseum, as well as the neighboring Knights of Columbus building, was designed by the architect Kevin Roche of Roche-Dinkeloo. One interesting aspect of the arena's design was that the parking garage was built on top of the actual Coliseum structure; this was necessitated by a high water table in the area which made it overly difficult to construct sub-surface parking facilities. Though an interesting solution, this design was unpopular because of the quarter-mile helical ramps required to access the parking. Vincent Scully, the revered architectural historian at nearby Yale University, often referred to the design as "Structural Exhibitionism" in his modern architecture lectures. Other features of the design, such as street storefronts and an exhibition hall, were never completed.

Deterioration
During the 1980s, the structure of the parking garages had deteriorated to the point where large canvas panels had to be attached to the outside to catch pieces of concrete that would occasionally drop off onto the sidewalk below. Renovations were made to correct that problem. The city shut down the facility in 2002 after concluding that it was a drain on city coffers. However, the city did not hold any public hearings, referendum votes, or conduct any surveys, and several groups, local stakeholders, and the Coalition to Save Our Coliseum mounted a campaign to save and renovate the Coliseum, to no avail. Others in the community supported the plan to demolish the arena. Despite Mayor DeStefano's plan to close and demolish the building within six months, it ultimately took more than four years.

Among the reasons for the Coliseum's demise was the construction or renovation (often with state money) in the 1990s of alternative comparably sized venues within the southern Connecticut market. The Arena at Harbor Yard in Bridgeport attracted a minor league hockey team, the Bridgeport Sound Tigers. The Mohegan Sun Arena was built about an hour away, and became the home of the Connecticut Sun. Many musical acts started booking the Oakdale Theatre in the city of Wallingford, Connecticut, after it was upgraded and expanded. Even though the state gave $5.5 million to the arena for new paint, signage, and scoreboards, the Coliseum simply could not compete with newer facilities. Even as early as 1980 the Coliseum was decried as a "white elephant". Mayor DeStefano also had staked out a strategy of investing city resources into arts and cultural activities rather than attracting sports teams to the city.

Demolition
Actual demolition work began in late October 2005 with removal of most of the arena area. At 7:50 a.m. on January 20, 2007, after years of wrangling and delay, the Coliseum was finally imploded, using more than 2,000 pounds of explosive. It was said that the implosion could be heard all the way to Meriden and Northford. As it came down, a massive cloud of dust and smoke covered the surrounding area, but blew away quickly toward the shoreline. Upwards of 20,000 people watched from the nearby Temple Street Garage and other buildings, and residents of nearby apartments were evacuated. The two helical ramps were not imploded, and were subsequently destroyed by conventional methods.

The city has tentative plans to replace the Coliseum with a new downtown/Long Wharf redevelopment plan, including a relocated Long Wharf Theatre and a new campus for Gateway Community College.

A temporary 400-space parking lot opened on the former Coliseum site on December 4, 2007, but plans are advancing to redevelop the site with a hotel, hundreds of housing units and approximately 40000 sqft of commercial space. The master developer, LiveWorkLearnPlay had the project approved in 2013, but construction has been delayed due to cost issues related to the moving of utilities and conflicts related to planned highway improvements.

On January 12, 2009, the Knights of Columbus filed a lawsuit against the City of New Haven, Stamford Wrecking Company and Demolition Dynamics Company. The lawsuit seeks repayment for damages incurred to the Knights of Columbus Building and Knights of Columbus Museum across the street from the Coliseum.

After demolition
A poster archiving all concerts held at the Coliseum was installed on the parking lot, on March 4, 2021. It was a commemoration of the Coliseum and rock 'n roll culture.

title: New Haven Coliseum


text:
James Ross

James Ross may refer to:

Australia

 * James Ross (Australian lawyer) (1788–1865)
 * James Ross (Australian politician) (1895–1975), New South Wales politician

Canada

 * James Ross (MLA) (1814–1874), member of the Legislative Assembly of Quebec
 * James Ross (Ontario politician) (1817–1895)
 * James Gibb Ross (1819–1888), Canadian merchant and politician from the province of Quebec
 * James Ross (Alberta politician) (1851–1936)
 * James Alway Ross (1869–1945), politician and poet in Ontario, Canada
 * James Walker Ross (1885–1941)
 * J. Arthur Ross (1893–1958), Manitoba politician
 * James W. Ross (born 1938), Canadian senator

United States

 * James Ross (Pennsylvania politician) (1762–1847), lawyer and senator from Pennsylvania, 1794–1803
 * James E. Ross (1921–1993), Pennsylvania state senator
 * Jim Ross (politician), former member of the Ohio House of Representatives

Sportsmen

 * Jim Ross (Australian footballer) (1927–2015), Australian rules footballer
 * Jim Ross (ice hockey) (1926–2016), Scottish-born Canadian ice hockey player
 * Jimmy Ross (footballer, born 1866) (1866–1902), Scottish association footballer
 * James Ross (rugby union) (1880–1914), Scottish rugby player
 * Jimmy Ross (footballer, born 1895), Scottish professional footballer
 * Jim Ross (born 1952), wrestling executive and commentator

Canada

 * James Ross (Canadian lawyer) (1835–1871), participant in Red River Rebellion
 * James Ross (Canadian businessman) (1848–1913), Scottish-born civil engineer and businessman
 * James Hamilton Ross (1856–1932), Yukon Territory Commissioner
 * James Sinclair Ross (1908–1996), Canadian author

United Kingdom

 * James Ross, 4th Lord Ross (died 1581), Scottish nobleman and an adherent to the cause of Mary, Queen of Scots
 * James Ross, 6th Lord Ross (died 1633), Scottish nobleman
 * James Ross, 7th Lord Ross (died 1636), Scottish nobleman
 * James Ross (conductor), British conductor
 * James Ross (surgeon) (1911–1997), Scottish surgeon
 * Sir James Clark Ross (1800–1862), British polar explorer
 * Sir James Ross, 1st Baronet (1895–1980), British surgeon
 * James Ness MacBean Ross (1889–1964), British medical doctor
 * James Ross (physician) (1837–1892), Scottish physician

United States

 * James Ross (mayor), mayor of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, 1934–1938
 * James Ross (American author) (1911–1990)
 * James Delmage Ross (1872–1939), superintendent of lighting for Seattle and member of the Securities and Exchange Commission
 * James F. Ross (1931–2010), American philosopher
 * Jimmy D. Ross (1936–2012), retired United States Army general
 * Jamie Ross (born 1939), American actor
 * James William Ross IV (born 1988), American drag queen

Other countries

 * James Henderson Ross (born 1941), Australian botanist
 * James Ross (artist) (born 1948), New Zealand painter, exhibited alongside Mervyn Williams
 * Jimmy James Ross (1936–2000), Trinidad and Tobago singer

Other uses

 * RRS James Clark Ross, a 1990 British Antarctic Survey ship
 * Jamie Ross (Law & Order), a character on Law & Order
 * Jimmy Ross, a character in The Airmail Mystery

title: James Ross


text:
Talk:Battle of Helm's Deep

Merge Battle of the Hornburg here
Following on from the recent AfD of the Battle of the Hornburg, I propose that it be merged here. As discussed then, the Battle of the Hornburg and Helm's Deep are virtually synonymous. "Helm's Deep" is the common name. Also, fictionally speaking there are no other significant events that occur at Helm's Deep.--Jack Upland (talk) 02:24, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

 * The Battle of the Hornburg refers to an event. Helm's Deep refers to a location.  They should be kept separate. Teacherdan1701 (talk) 11:41, 4 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Merge sourced content into this article and let it incubate summary style until a split is warranted. That the battle occurred in this location makes the proposal sufficient. (not watching, please )  czar  21:08, 16 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Merge Yes one is an event, the other a place, but we are dealing with fictional things. They are notable in interrelated ways, and so there is no justification for having what amounts to two articles approaching the same topic from different angles. Plus "Battle of the Hornberg" violates the actual common name rules about this, in the total literature that mentions this battle, Helm's Deep is a more common term.John Pack Lambert (talk) 14:08, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * A merger will also hopefully make it possible to find enough sources to move this article into being adequately sourced to secondary sources.John Pack Lambert (talk) 14:13, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment. I don't really see secondary sources in either article. Is there evidence that even combined we could pass WP:GNG? I'm not opposed to the merge, but without more sources I'm wondering if it would be more appropriate just to delete both articles. BenKuykendall (talk) 20:11, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
 * BenKuykendall, the Battle of the Hornburg has just survived an AfD.--Jack Upland (talk) 22:07, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
 * .... okay, kinda surprised the AfD panned out that way.... but then I will support the merge. Per the deletion discussion, it looks like editors found sources describing the production of the battle in the Peter Jackson films. I guess post-merge, we should focus on using sources and filling out that section. BenKuykendall (talk) 22:22, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

 * Merge - Due to the above discussion. -  FlightTime  ( open channel ) 22:25, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Merge - as above, the place is known for the event, and there's little to say about it other than that; and the name "Helm's Deep" is certainly far better known than "Hornburg". There seems to be good consensus for this merge and plenty of time has elapsed so basically we should just get on and do it now. Chiswick Chap (talk) 16:38, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Battle of the Hornburg is the name of the battle
The term "Battle of Helm's Deep" comes from Peter Jackson's movies, it never appears in the book. This page should use the "Battle of the Hornburg" as the primary name and specify that the "Battle of Helm's Deep" is the name given in Peter Jackson's adaptation. See:

"‘A struggle somewhat grimmer for my part than the battle of the Hornburg,’ answered Aragorn. ‘I have looked in the Stone of Orthanc, my friends.’ (LotR, The Passing Of The Grey Company)

"March 3 - Theoden retreats to Helm’s Deep. Battle of the Hornburg begins. Ents complete the destruction of Isengard." (LotR, Appendix B)

There is also an entry for 'Battle of the Hornburg' in the book's index.

Kadaveri (talk) 02:51, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

 * Many thanks for discussing. Firstly, you are certainly right about Tolkien's usages as cited. Secondly, you are probably right that the term is Jackson's, though it may well have been used by fans long before that. But those points do not necessarily mean that we should rename the article. We may observe that the chapter containing the battle is titled "Helm's Deep"; it may well be that Tolkien was here being deliberately obscure, as we know that he was intentionally ambiguous with chapter titles as with much else, but that does not negate the fact that readers come to the battle in a chapter called Helm's Deep, and only learn that the battle is elsewhere referred to as the Hornburg much later, if at all, and only in passing. Be that as it may, the fact is that readers of Tolkien, and readers of Wikipedia, are familiar with the title "Battle of Helm's Deep". Google returns some 35,700 hits for "Battle of the Hornburg, and some 214,000 for "Battle of Helm's Deep", while excluding the terms "film" and "movie" from the search still leaves some 117,000 for "Battle of Helm's Deep". In other words, per WP:COMMONNAME, the article is correctly named at the moment, as was noted in the discussion in the 2019–2020 thread above on this talk page. Since Jackson, of course, other things such as games have continued to use the name "Helm's Deep", so that name has steadily grown in usage. Even scholarly sources like Charles Oughton's "Roman Heroes at Helm's Deep?" cited in the article are now comfortable with that name. So, whatever book purists (and Tolkien himself) may think or have thought, the world now has chosen Helm over Hornburg, that's how it is. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:16, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Battle of Helm's Deep


text:
Kenny vs. Spenny

Kenny vs. Spenny was a Canadian reality comedy television series starring Kenny Hotz and Spencer Rice, where they face against each other in competitions. The loser of each episode performs an act of humiliation, usually selected by the winner. Hotz and Rice created the series in addition to serving as executive producers, and it was typically shot in their hometown of Toronto (the pilot was filmed in Los Angeles), based mostly out of the house they shared. As of November 2008, the show aired on CBC, Global and Showcase in Canada, Comedy Central in Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands, The Comedy Channel in Australia, Animax and later, Sony MAX, in South Africa, Italia 2 in Italy, FX in Portugal, on Jim in Finland. The series concluded with an hour-long Christmas special that aired on December 23, 2010, at 9 pm ET/PT on Showcase. It aired in Latin America on Sony Spin for a short time.

The series was nominated for the Canadian Comedy Awards in 2010 and 2011 and for Gemini Awards in 2005, 2006, and 2008 as the best Canadian comedy series, and received a Rose d'Or nomination in Switzerland for "best international comedy series". The show has spawned several replicas of its format, including a family-friendly French Canadian version called Frank vs Girard that airs on VRAK.TV. Also following the format are Ed vs. Spencer in the United Kingdom, Juan vs. Roman in Colombia, Elton vs. Simon in Germany, Katja vs. Bridget, Dennis vs. Valerio in the Netherlands, and Sid vs. Varun in India. In 2009 the show was named #8 among the top 10 Canadian television shows of the decade.

Premise
Kenneth "Kenny" Joel Hotz and Spencer "Spenny" Nolan Rice are lifelong friends who compete against each other in a series of competitions. The loser of each competition must suffer a humiliation chosen by the winner.

The show's comedy depended on the polarizing personalities of Hotz and Rice, who are respectively extroverted and neurotic. Hotz embraced devious tactics during the show and often cheated, found loopholes in the rules for a competition, and intimidated Rice with insults, elaborate schemes and manipulation.

In contrast, Rice rarely cheated and tried to compete honestly. He felt he could retain some dignity if he promoted awareness of social or political causes, such as promoting awareness of climate change during "Who Can 69 The Longest?" or Irritable bowel syndrome during "Who Can Keep a Dump in their Pants the Longest?"

However, Hotz's strategies and jokes made Rice increasingly paranoid and short-tempered towards Hotz and the production crew as the show progressed.

Rules
A repeating trend as the show progresses is how cheating is tolerated as long as the person is not caught, eventually becoming an unspoken rule, much to the chagrin of Spenny.

Part of the drama involves the multiple instances in which Kenny and Spenny argue about what the nature of the show should actually be. Spenny has argued that the point of the competitions is to find out who is the better man, and that while Kenny at times manages to genuinely outsmart Spenny, the moments in which he goes over the line ruins the purpose of the show. On the other hand Kenny holds less value in the “sanctity” of these competitions, repeatedly stating that the reason they compete is to humiliate the other person on TV.

Ultimately it becomes clear that their perspectives on what the nature of the show should be is motivated by creating a playing field that is biased towards their respective strengths.

Kenny’s approach to problem solving is to think outside of the box and to find a clever workaround, thus causing him to prefer rules that are minimal and vague. Spenny on the other hand prefers rules that are concrete, and tends to employ admirable if reductive strategies that rely on hard work as well as physical/mental endurance.

Cheating
Hotz cheated during 27 out of 56 of his victories, while Rice cheated during five of his 27 victories. In some cases, both Rice and Hotz were helped by their production crew, families and friends in their attempts to cheat. While Rice would cheat out of desperation, Hotz justified his cheating by arguing the loser is ultimately whoever does a humiliation.

Insults
Hotz regularly tried to make Rice annoyed during competitions so he would lose focus. Hotz regularly joked that Rice was a violent and emotionally disturbed man with a micropenis; that he engaged in rape, pedophilia, necrophilia, zoophilia, and incest; and that he was racist, an anti-Semite and related to Adolf Hitler.

Rice's family were also often the victims of Hotz's insults and jokes. Hotz regularly joked about having sex with Rice's mother and accused her of being sexually promiscuous and morbidly obese. In "Who Can Imitate the Other Guy Better?" Hotz—while pretending to be Rice—performed a song about being sexually abused as a child by Rice's grandfather.

Deception and intimidation
Hotz's main tactic was to deceive Rice and make him become angry or upset. In "Who Is Funnier?" Hotz drafted a letter from Ontario's health ministry that Rice had recently had sexual intercourse with someone who had tested positive for HIV/AIDS. Rice was too upset to complete his stand-up comedy routine at a Toronto Yuk Yuk's. Hotz used the prank as his entry. Rice was poisoned with Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) during “Who Can Wear A Dead Octopus On Their Head The Longest?”

Hotz sometimes invented comedic characters and dressed in costumes to entertain the viewers and crew while antagonizing Rice. As an example, Hotz harassed Rice as "Silencio," and wore a white jumpsuit and Lucha libre-style mask in "Who Can Stay Blindfolded The Longest?"

Rice often lost competitions because his paranoia made him sabotage his own efforts. In "Who Can Kiss More Women?" Rice believed Hotz was spying on him after a woman who recognized Rice from the show started helping him. Hotz said he did not know who the woman was. During "Who Can Blow the Biggest Fart?" Hotz made a chili filled with an antiflatulent. Hotz filled his anus with air using a bicycle tire pump and made it appear like he had bigger farts. Rice ate some of the chilli and was unable to fart for the rest of the competition.

Use of family and friends
Hotz often recruited his family to help with his campaigns against Rice. His mother, Tzafi, was in 18 episodes and frequently helped her son. In "Who Can Win a Ten Mile Race?" Tzafi agreed to pretend to have died during filming of the episode after pretending to be sick. Hotz gave Rice a fake funeral time in the hopes Rice would not have enough time to win.

In "Who Can Dance the Longest?" Tzafi let Hotz hide in her home as Rice searched the house for him. In the same episode, his sister demanded payment from Rice in exchange for any information on Hotz's whereabouts and Hotz's brother refused to help.

Rice's family also appeared in the show. In "First One to Talk Loses," Hotz invited Rice's cousin to the house where they filmed for a date. Hotz hoped Rice would speak out in anger, but instead heard Hotz asking her "please?" when he tried kissing her. She returned to help Rice in "First Guy to Get a Boner Loses" and performed a striptease for Hotz. This failed because Hotz had asked his brother—who is a physician in Toronto—for a nerve block to temporarily stop erections.

In "Who Can Get Further With The Other Guy's Mom?" Rice took his robe off in front of Tzafi after he attempted to kiss her. Hotz got Rice's mother drunk and said he "could not legally say what happened," but smelled his finger and made a disgusted face to suggest he touched her genitals.

Friends and mutual friends were often used by both Rice and Hotz to help with plans or unnerve their opponent. Hotz regularly met with Hwang Goldfield, a practitioner of alternative medicine in Toronto’s Koreatown neighbourhood, for supplements and advice. The two had a falling out after Hotz tampered with products in the store and joked that Goldfield planned the September 11 attacks.

Involvement of the production crew
Both Hotz and Rice had their production crews get props and equipment, and get involved with strategies. Rice has admitted in interviews following the show’s end he agreed to let Hotz and the crew conspire against him in exchange for deciding each competitions rules.

Soundman Brendan Michie and unit co-ordinator Jamie Tiernay were frequent production crew members who helped Hotz. Michie used his skills as a pianist, guitarist and saxophone player to compose songs for Hotz. Tiernay was often an active participant in Hotz’s plans. In "Who Can Wear a Gorilla Suit the Longest?" Tiernay and Tzafi wore gorilla costumes to confuse Rice.

Rice regularly relied on his unit co-ordinator, Donny Rose, to help brainstorm strategies, stop Hotz from cheating, or foil Hotz's attempts to make Rice lose. Hotz fired Rose after two seasons because he felt he was giving too much help to Rice. During "First One to Talk Loses," Hotz reprimanded Rose for helping Rice become unglued from a dresser.

Rice also had production assistant Brian Peco and unit co-ordinator Kevin Morgan help with his plans and offer feedback. In "Who Can Make the Best Viral Video?" Rice's crew encouraged him to drink his own urine and post it online.

The crew were often used to disrupt competitions, act as judges and settle disputes over rules. During "Who Can 69 The Longest?" the crew got bored because Hotz and Rice had spent much of the start of the competition on a couch. The production crew and other people physically abused Hotz and Rice. The abuse ended when Rice quit after the two were sprayed with a fire hose from the Niagara Falls fire department.

In cases where both Rice and Hotz failed to win a competition, the crew chose a double humiliation for them. Both Hotz and Rice had to take a nude bath together following "Who Can Smoke More Weed?" and make out with each other after "Who Can Survive in the Woods the Longest?" They also joined humiliations. After "Who Can Win a Cockfight?" Hotz made Rice smoke a joint made from the crew's body hair. The crew vomited on Rice after "Who's the Best Soldier?"

Production
Starting with the fourth season, Kenny and Spenny were both executive producers and received credit separate from five other executive producers. Matt Stone and Trey Parker, creators of the TV show South Park, joined the show for the fourth season and were given their own separate credit as executive producers for the ten episodes in which they were involved. Instrumental and electronic music is frequently used throughout episodes scored by Composer Richard Pell. Ride of the Valkyries, Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Montagues and Capulets and Peter and the Wolf, Gioachino Rossini's La gazza ladra, Mozart's Symphony No. 40 in G minor – 4th Movement, and music by Toronto electronica band Holy Fuck are very frequently used.

Kenny and Spenny each have their own production assistant, camera operator, and sound engineer, who film their independent exploits for each episode. In the earlier seasons, the crew was shared between Kenny and Spenny. Crew members eventually split up into two teams, some joining Kenny's "side", and others joining Spenny's.

During the Industry Standard podcast, Kenny stated the series had a budget of 100,000 CAD per episode for the first season and 350,000 CAD per episode thereafter.

Broadcasting
During an interview with Strombo, Kenny states that Kenny vs. Spenny was originally made for MTV, where the duo was given $8,000 to develop a 3 minute pilot. However, MTV ultimately passed on the show for unknown reasons. He then states USA Network gave them $40,000 to shoot a full 22 minute pilot, but pulled the plug while the pilot was still in production. Kenny and Spenny both decided to finish the pilot anyway and eventually brought it to CBC Television where the show would first air. Despite the claims made by Kenny, the DVD release of Pitch states that the pilot for Kenny vs. Spenny was actually picked up by Canada's Life Network where the show was to go into production in 2001. This ultimately never happened. CBC cancelled the show after the first season, and Showcase Television picked up the series in late 2005. The show has switched broadcasters and been cancelled many times, including by Showcase, and again by CBC, when one of its commercials aired by accident during the network's "toddler block". Spenny has stated in multiple interviews that the main reason for CBC's cancelling of the show was because it aired right before CBC News, and news viewers tuning in early were offended by the show's humiliation segment.

It was produced by Breakthrough Films and Television since its inception. Re-runs of the first two seasons air on CBC late at night, and on CBC's Bold station weekday afternoons. Re-runs also aired on Showcase, and episodes of the show have aired on Shaw Media's Action. The show has aired on GSN in the United States. It is shown internationally on TV 2 Zulu in Denmark, Jim in Finland, the now defunct ZTV Norway, Comedy Central in Sweden, FX (repeats on Challenge) in the United Kingdom (no longer airing), The Comedy Channel in Australia, FX in Portugal, Comedy Central in Germany, Italia 2 in Italy, Comedy Central in the Netherlands and The XtraHOT channel in Israel. Fox Entertainment Group in Latin America has distributed the episodes, which can be seen on the Latin American versions of FOX channel and FX.

Christmas special
The series finale Kenny vs. Spenny Christmas Special aired December 23, 2010, at 9 pm eastern time on Showcase.

DVD releases
Video Service Corp has released all six seasons of Kenny vs. Spenny on DVD in Region 1 (Canada only). Beyond Home Entertainment has released the first three seasons on DVD in Region 4.

Streaming availability
Between November 7, 2012 and December 22, 2012, Hotz uploaded the series to his personal YouTube account. On January 22, 2016, Hotz took down the YouTube series (by setting the clips to private), as Rice objected to the episodes being available for free. Hotz stated in a tweet a few days later he was not happy with the removal.

In March 2018, all the videos were made available again on his channel. Following the 2020 protests over the murder of George Floyd, the two-part episode "Who Do Black Guys Like Better?" was privatized briefly by Hotz.

Hotz began re-uploading the series upscaled to 4K resolution in January 2022. These episodes were removed from the channel towards late March 2022, but re-uploaded later that summer. The episodes are also available on Breakthrough Entertainment's YouTube account.

Season 1 of the show is available on CBC Gem.

Statistics
The records and winning percentages vary depending on the definition of a win used by each competitor. The interpretation of what constitutes cheating also varies depending on the competition and may lead to some discrepancies in the statistics.

 * If competitions where Kenny cheated (16) or arguably cheated (3) and won are not counted, the record would be -21-5 for Kenny; If they are counted as wins for Spenny (as Spenny suggests they should), then Kenny and Spenny would be tied, each with a record of --5. Note though that Spenny cheated 8 times.

If the competition ends in a draw, there is either no humiliation, or a double humiliation. Although there have been exceptions to this rule.

Kenny vs. Spenny: Versusville
After the show first aired on CBC, a game was released based on the first season called Kenny vs. Spenny: Versusville. Versusville is a first-person shooter with 3D environments and 4 main game modes. It was released sometime between June and July 2004 on Windows and had online leaderboards and online multiplayer functionality.

The game was considered lost media ever since 2006 when the television show Kenny vs. Spenny moved from the CBC to Showcase. However, on November 4, 2021, Versusville was found by Reddit archivists Ben, Carson, John, and Metalock and has since been made available on https://versusville.com/ with permission from Kenny Hotz, Ira Levy and Mark Greenshields.

Gameplay
Kenny vs. Spenny: Versusville contains 4 main game modes, with each having a unique gameplay style and 3 of which having once supported online multiplayer. Each game can be played from a first-person or third-person perspective.

 * Residence Evil: A singleplayer-exclusive stealth game mode that originally acted as a tutorial, requiring the player to complete it in order to unlock the other 3 game modes. The map is a rough recreation of the house from Season One, where the player must open the vault without getting caught by Kenny or Spenny. Eventually a v2 was released, which no longer required the player to beat Residence Evil in order to unlock the other game modes.
 * Wasteball: A multiplayer shooter where players would compete in slime-filled matches. The map is described as a disused building that has been transformed into a chemical waste paintball arena.
 * Grave Rave: A multiplayer shooter where players must throw zombie parts in order to dispatch each other. The map is described as a late night cemetery filled with a gruesome array of weapons.
 * Kart Dart: A multiplayer racing game where players must complete a certain number of laps and end with the most points. The vehicles are a selection of different shopping carts, with 3 unique maps all based on food markets.

Awards
! scope="row" | 2005  Other appearances
 * Kenny vs. Spenny: Versusville
 * Canadian New Media Award's Excellence in Gaming

A flash game was released in early 2004 called Kenny vs Spenny: Quest for the Family Jewels on GSN's website.

Another flash game was released in 2008 called Kenny vs Spenny: Best Friends/Worst Enemies. However, this game was only a demo for a larger mobile game of the same name. The full game is currently considered lost media.

Kenny Hotz appears as a non-playable character in the 2014 video game Goat Simulator for Windows PC and the protagonist of the game is a playable goat named Pilgor who is modeled after Kenny's goat from the season 4 episode "Who Can Be Tied to a Goat the Longest?" Kenny also makes an appearance in Journey to the Savage Planet through in-game commercials.

On January 2, 2023 Kenny Hotz posted a teaser of a new game to his Youtube channel, titled Super KvS. The game is designed by developer Dark Pixel Studios, with no specified release date.

Revival attempts
Both Hotz and Rice have expressed interest in a film adaptation of Kenny vs. Spenny. In a 2013 interview, Rice elaborated, "if it happens I don't think I will live through it but it will be good entertainment." Later on March 7, 2014, Hotz began the Facebook and Twitter campaign #BringBackKvS in an effort to encourage Netflix to commission a seventh season of the show. Netflix had recently resurrected the Trailer Park Boys series from its 2008 finale, and it was Hotz's intention to replicate this success. Between March and May 2014, Hotz and Rice embarked on a 13-city Kenny vs. Spenny vs. Canada comedy tour, showing and discussing rare and unseen Kenny vs. Spenny footage that had been rejected by broadcasters. The tour was filmed for a Kickstarter-funded film titled Kenny vs Spenny: On The Road, however the campaign failed to meet its goal and the film was not released.

Hotz and Rice revisited their onscreen antics in the 2020 CBC Gem special Paldemic, which directly referenced Kenny vs. Spenny and its effect on their friendship and careers in the years since. They jointly received a Canadian Screen Award nomination for Best Host in a Web Program or Series at the 9th Canadian Screen Awards in 2021.

title: Kenny vs. Spenny