text:
Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church

The Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church, also known in the United States as the Byzantine Catholic Church, is a sui iuris (autonomous) Eastern Catholic church based in Eastern Europe and North America. As a particular church of the Catholic Church, it is in full communion with the Holy See. It uses the Byzantine Rite for its liturgies, laws, and cultural identity.

Name
While not directly associated with the former Ruthenian Uniate Church, the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church also derives its name from the Rusyn and Ruthenian Slavic peoples of Eastern Europe and their communion with Rome. While Ruthenian Catholics are not the only Eastern Catholics to utilize the Byzantine Rite in the United States, the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church refers to itself as the "Byzantine Catholic Church" within the US.

History
The Ruthenian Church originally developed among the Rusyn people who lived in Carpathian Ruthenia. Christianity and the Byzantine Rite was brought to the Slavic peoples in the 9th century as a result of the missionary outreach of Saints Cyril and Methodius.

Following the Great Schism of 1054, the Ruthenian Church retained its Orthodox ties until the Union of Uzhhorod.

Union of Uzhhorod
The present structure of the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church traces its origins to the 1646 Union of Uzhhorod, when Eastern Orthodox clergy were received into communion with the Holy See of Rome. Sixty three Ruthenian clergy were received into the Catholic Church; in 1664 a union reached at Munkács (today Mukachevo, Ukraine) brought additional communities into the Catholic communion.

Initially, the Union only included lands owned or administered by the noble Drugeth family; essentially, most of the modern-day Presov Region and part of Zakarpattia Oblast: Abov County, Gömör County, Sáros County, Szepes County, Torna County, northern Zemplén County, parts of Ung County, and the city of Uzhhorod itself.

The resulting dioceses retained their Byzantine patrimony and liturgical traditions, and their bishops were elected by a council composed of Basilian monks and eparchial clergy. In this part of central and eastern Europe, the Carpathian Mountains straddle the borders of the present-day states of Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Romania and Ukraine. Today, the church is multi-ethnic. Members of the metropolitan province of Pittsburgh are predominantly English-speaking. Most are descendants of Rusyns – including sub-groups like the Boikos, Hutsuls and Lemkos – but the descendants of other nationalities are also present such as Slovaks, Hungarians and Croats as well as those of non-Slavic and non-Eastern European ancestry. The modern Eparchy of Mukacheve in Ukraine is mostly Ukrainian-speaking but remains part of the greater Ruthenian Church.

After almost a thousand years of Hungarian rule the region became, in part, incorporated in Czechoslovakia after World War I. Annexation to the Soviet Union after the war led to persecution of the Ruthenian Catholic Church. Since the collapse of Communism the Ruthenian Catholic Church in Eastern Europe has seen a resurgence in numbers of faithful and priests.

United States
In the 19th and 20th centuries, various Byzantine Catholics from Austria-Hungary arrived in the United States, particularly in coal mining towns. Members of the predominant Latin Church Catholic hierarchy were sometimes disturbed by what they saw as the innovation, for the United States, of a married Catholic clergy. At their persistent request, the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith applied, on 1 May 1897, to the United States rules already set out in a letter of 2 May 1890 to François-Marie-Benjamin Richard, the Latin Archbishop of Paris. These rules stated that only celibates and widowed priests coming without their children should be permitted in the United States.

The dissatisfaction of many Ruthenian Catholics had already given rise to some groups placing themselves under the jurisdiction of what is today the Orthodox Church in America (at that time a mission of the Russian Orthodox Church). The leader of this movement was the widowed Ruthenian Catholic priest Alexis Toth, whose mistreatment by Archbishop John Ireland of Saint Paul, Minnesota, led to Toth's transfer to Eastern Orthodoxy. He brought with him many Ruthenian Catholics, around 20,000 by the time of his death with many who followed afterward, and was canonized a saint by the Orthodox Church in America in 1996.

The situation with Alexis Toth and the Latin Catholic bishops highlighted the need for American Eastern Catholics to have their own bishop. Pope Pius X appointed the Ukrainian bishop Soter Ortynsky in 1907 as bishop for all Slavic Eastern Catholics of the Byzantine rite in America. For this period the Ruthenian Byzantine Catholics were united to the Ukrainian Greek Catholics in the same eparchy. Ethnic tensions flared due to cultural differences (mostly of a political nature) between Ukrainians who came from Austrian-ruled Galicia and the Rusyns and other Byzantine Catholics who came from the Kingdom of Hungary.

This caused Rome to split the groups after Ortynsky's death, creating two ecclesiastical administrations for Eastern-rite Catholics in the United States, divided along nationality lines: one Ukrainian and the other Carpatho-Rusyn. Each was headed not by a bishop, but by an administrator: Father Peter Poniatyshyn for the Ukrainians and Father Gabriel Martyak for the Carpatho-Rusyns. Later, the Rusyn priest Basil Takach was appointed and consecrated in Rome on his way to America as the new eparchy's bishop. Bishop Takach is considered the first bishop of Ruthenian Catholics in America, and his appointment as the official founding of the Byzantine Catholic Metropolitan Church of Pittsburgh.

Clerical celibacy of American Eastern Catholics was restated with special reference to the Byzantine/Ruthenian Church by the 1 March 1929 decree Cum data fuerit, which was renewed for a further 10 years in 1939. Due to this and other similar factors, 37 Ruthenian parishes transferred themselves into the jurisdiction of the Greek Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch in 1938, creating the American Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Diocese.

Relations with the Latin Church Catholic hierarchy have improved, especially since the Second Vatican Council, at which the Ruthenian Church influenced decisions regarding using the vernacular (i.e. the language of the people) in the liturgy. In its decree Orientalium Ecclesiarum, the Second Vatican Council declared: The Catholic Church holds in high esteem the institutions, liturgical rites, ecclesiastical traditions and the established standards of the Christian life of the Eastern Churches, for in them, distinguished as they are for their venerable antiquity, there remains conspicuous the tradition that has been handed down from the Apostles through the Fathers and that forms part of the divinely revealed and undivided heritage of the universal Church.

The Second Vatican Council urged the Eastern Rite Churches to eliminate liturgical Latinization and to strengthen their Eastern Christian identity. In June 1999 the Council of Hierarchs of the Byzantine Metropolitan Church Sui Iuris of Pittsburgh USA promulgated the norms of particular law to govern itself. In January 2007, the Revised Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom and the Revised Divine Liturgy of St. Basil the Great were promulgated. In December 2013, the Pope approved the request of the Congregation for the Eastern Churches that appropriate Eastern Church authorities be granted the faculty to allow pastoral service of Eastern married clergy also outside the traditional Eastern territory.

Membership within the Ruthenian Catholic Church, like the other sui iuris churches, is not limited to those who trace their heritage to the ethnic groups affiliated with the church.

Structure
, the membership of the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church was estimated at some 419,500 faithful, with seven bishops, 664 parishes, 557 priests, 76 deacons, and 192 men and women religious. The Church is not organised as a single synod. This is mainly because some of the priests and faithful of the Eparchy of Mukacheve desire that it should be part of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church.

 * Sui juris (self governing)
 * Metropolis of Pittsburgh
 * The canonical territory of the metropolis includes the whole of the United States of America and Canada. It was erected as a metropolis (archdiocese) by Pope Paul VI in 1969. The apostolic exarchate in Canada serves Slovak Greek Catholics.

 * Immediately subject to the Holy See
 * Greek Catholic Eparchy of Mukachevo in Ukraine (1771)
 * Apostolic Exarchate of the Greek Catholic Church in the Czech Republic (1996)

Saints

 * Blessed Theodore Romzha, bishop and martyr
 * Blessed Teresa Demjanovich, nun

title: Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church


text:
Grand tourer

A grand tourer (GT) is a type of car that is designed for high speed and long-distance driving due to a combination of performance and luxury attributes. The most common format is a front-engine, rear-wheel-drive two-door coupé with either a two-seat or a 2+2 arrangement. Grand tourers are most often the coupé derivative of luxury saloons or sedans. Many iconic car models, such as the Ferrari 250 GT, Jaguar E-Type, and Aston Martin DB5, are considered classic examples of gran turismo cars.

The term is a near-calque from the Italian language phrase gran turismo, which became popular in the English language in the 1950s, evolving from fast touring cars and streamlined closed sports cars during the 1930s.

Origin in Europe
The grand touring car concept originated in Europe in the early 1950s, especially with the 1951 introduction of the Lancia Aurelia B20 GT, and features notable luminaries of Italian automotive history such as Vittorio Jano, Enzo Ferrari and Johnny Lurani. Motorsports became important in the evolution of the grand touring concept, and grand touring entries are important in endurance sports-car racing. The grand touring definition implies material differences in performance, speed, comfort, and amenities between elite cars and those of ordinary motorists.

In the post-war United States, manufacturers were less inclined to adopt the "ethos of the GT car", preferring to build cars "suited to their long, straight, smooth roads and labor-saving lifestyles" with wide availability of powerful straight-six and V8 engines in all price-ranges like the 1955-1965 Chrysler 300. Despite this, the United States, enjoying early post-war economic expansion, became the largest market for European grand-touring cars, supplying transportation for movie stars, celebrities and the jet set; notably the Mercedes-Benz 300 SL (imported by Max Hoffman),  the Jaguar XK120, and the Ferrari berlinettas (imported by Luigi Chinetti). Classic grand-touring cars from the post-war era especially, have since become valuable cars among wealthy collectors. Within ten years, grand touring cars found success penetrating the new American personal luxury car market.

Characteristics
The terms grand tourer, gran turismo, grande routière, and GT are among the most misused terms in motoring. The grand touring designation generally "means motoring at speed, in style, safety, and comfort". "Purists define gran turismo as the enjoyment, excitement and comfort of open-road touring."

According to Sam Dawson, news editor of Classic Cars, "the ideal is of a car with the ability to cross a continent at speed and in comfort yet provide driving thrills when demanded" and it should exhibit the following: Grand tourers emphasize comfort and handling over straight-out high performance or ascetic, spartan accommodations. In comparison, sports cars (also a "much abused and confused term") are typically more "crude" compared to "sophisticated Grand Touring machinery". However, the popularity of using GT for marketing purposes has meant that it has become a "much misused term, eventually signifying no more than a slightly tuned version of a family car with trendy wheels and a go-faster stripe on the side".
 * The engines "should be able to cope with cruising comfortably at the upper limits on all continental roads without drawbacks or loss of usable power".
 * "Ideally, the GT car should have been devised by its progenitors as a Grand Tourer, with all associated considerations in mind."
 * "It should be able to transport at least two comfortably with their luggage and have room to spare — probably in the form of a two plus two seating arrangement."
 * The design, both "inside and out, should be geared toward complete control by the driver".
 * Its "chassis and suspension provide suitable handling and roadholding on all routes" during travels.

Historically, most GTs have been front-engined with rear-wheel drive, offering more cabin space than mid-mounted engine layouts. Softer suspensions, greater storage, and more luxurious appointments add to their appeal.

GT abbreviation in marketing
The GT abbreviation—and variations thereof—are often used as model names. However, some cars with GT in the model name are not actually grand touring cars.

Among the many variations of GT are:
 * GTA: Gran turismo alleggerita - the Italian word for 'lightweight'. GTAm indicates a modified version. GTA is also sometimes used for automatic transmission models.
 * GTB: Gran turismo berlinetta
 * GTC: Various uses including gran turismo compressore for supercharged engines, gran turismo cabriolet, gran turismo compact, gran turismo crossover and gran turismo corsa - the Italian word for 'racing'.
 * GTD: "Gran turismo diesel"
 * GT/E: "Gran turismo Einspritzung" - the German word for 'fuel injection'
 * GTE: "Grand touring estate"
 * GTi or GTI: "Grand touring injection", mostly used for hot hatches following the introduction of the Volkswagen Golf GTi
 * GTO: "Gran turismo omologato" - the Italian word for 'homologation'
 * GTR or GT-R: "Gran turismo and racing"
 * GTS: sometimes "Gran turismo spider" for convertible models. However, GTS has also been used for saloons and other body styles.
 * GT-T: "Gran turismo turbo"
 * GTV: "Gran turismo veloce" - the Italian word for 'fast'
 * GTX: "Grand tourisme extreme"
 * HGT: "High gran turismo"

GT racing series
Several past and present motor racing series have used "GT" in their name. These include:
 * LM GTE 1999–2023: A set of regulations for modified road cars, which is used for the 24 Hours of Le Mans race and several related racing series. LM GTE was originally called 'GT class' and was also known as GT2 class from 2005 to 2010. Also known as GTLM in the United States
 * GT World Challenge Europe 2013–present: A racing series for Group GT3 cars. The FIA GT Series replaced the FIA GT Championship (1997-2009) and the FIA GT1 World Championship (2010-2012).
 * GT4 European Series 2007–present: A European amateur racing series with the least powerful class of GT cars.
 * IMSA GT3 Cup Challenge 2005–present: A North American racing series for Porsche 911 GT3 Cup cars.
 * FIA GT3 European Championship 2006–2012: A European amateur racing series for Group GT3 cars.
 * FIA R-GT: As part of its structure, the Group R regulations have a provision for GT cars, known as R-GT.

There have also been several classes of racing cars called GT. The Group GT3 regulations for modified road cars have been used for various racing series worldwide since 2006. The Group GT1 regulations were used for the fastest category of sports car racing from 1994 to 2001.

Examples of grand tourers
The inclusion of "grand tourer", "gran turismo", "GT" or similar in the model name does not necessarily mean that the car is a grand tourer since several manufacturers have used the terms for the marketing of cars that are not grand tourers.

Evolution of the gran turismo car
Grand touring car design evolved from vintage and pre-World War II fast touring cars and streamlined closed sports cars.

Italy developed the first gran turismo cars. The small, light-weight, and aerodynamic coupés, named the "Berlinetta", originated in the 1930s. A contemporary French concept, known as "grande routière", emphasized style, elegance, luxury, and gentlemanly transcontinental touring; the grande routières were often larger cars than the Italian gran turismos. Italian designers saw that compared to traditional open two-seat sports car, the increase in weight and frontal area of an enclosed cabin for the driver and mechanic could be offset by the benefits of streamlining to reduce drag. Independent carrozzeria (coachbuilders) provided light and flexible fabric coachwork for powerful short-wheelbase fast-touring chassis by manufacturers such as Alfa Romeo. Later, Carrozzeria Touring of Milan pioneered sophisticated superleggera (super light-weight) aluminum bodywork, allowing for even more aerodynamic forms. The additional comfort of an enclosed cabin was beneficial for the Mille Miglia road race held in Italy's often wintry north.

1929 Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 GT
The first car to be named "gran turismo" was the 1929 Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 Gran Turismo, a sporting dual-purpose road/race chassis and engine specification that was available with a wide variety of body styles or carrozzeria. The influential Weymann fabric-bodied berlinetta version by Carrozzeria Touring, "an early example of what we generally perceive to be a GT car", was winner of the Vetture Chiuse category at the 1931 Mille Miglia. An improved and supercharged version, the 6C 1750 GTC Gran Turismo Compressore, won the Vetture a Guida Interna category of the 1932 Mille Miglia. The Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 was designed by Vittorio Jano, who would later be instrumental in the design of the 1951 Lancia Aurelia B20 GT.

1935 Fiat 508 Balilla S berlinetta
From the basic Fiat 508 Balilla touring chassis came the SIATA and Fiat aerodynamic gran turismo-style Berlinetta Mille Miglias of 1933 and 1935. Siata was a Turin, Italy-based Fiat tuner, typical of a popular class of Italian artisan manufacturers of small gran turismo, sports and racing cars—usually Fiat based—that came to be known in the 1970s as Etceterini, such as Nardi, Abarth, Ermini and, in 1946, Cisitalia. The Fiat and SIATA berlinettas, influenced by the successful Alfa Romeo 6C GT/GTC coupés, competed in the Mille Miglia endurance race and were significant among Weymann and Superleggera enclosed sporting cars appearing in the 1930s. They featured tuned Fiat engine and chassis, and bespoke carrozzeria, in common with the landmark post-war Cisitalia 202 SC, and are among the first small-displacement gran turismos.

1947 Cisitalia 202 SC
The first recognised motor race specifically for gran turismo cars was the 1949 Coppa Inter-Europa held at Monza. It was initially hoped by Italian motor industry observers that the small and struggling Italian sports and racing car manufacturer, Cisitalia, would find in the 1949 Coppa Inter-Europa regulations (initially called Turismo Veloce or Fast Touring) a category for its Cisitalia Tipo 202 SC—the road-going production coupé version of Cisitalia's single-seat D46 racing car and two-seat 202 open sports car. However, the Fiat-based 1100 cc four-cylinder Cisitalia was no match on the race track for Ferrari's new hand-built 2000 cc V12, and Ferrari dominated, taking the first three places. An 1100 cc class was hurriedly created, but not in time to save Cisitalia's business fortunes—the company's bankrupt owner Piero Dusio had already decamped to Argentina. The Cisitalia 202 SC gained considerable fame for the outstanding design of its Pinin Farina coachwork, and is credited with greatly influencing the style of subsequent berlinetta or fastback gran turismo coupés. A Cisitalia 202 "GT" is exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

1947 Maserati A6 1500
The Maserati A6 1500 won the 1500 cc class at the 1949 Coppa-Europa. It was driven by Franco Bordoni, former fighter ace of the Regia Aeronautica who had debuted as a pilota da corsa at the 1949 Mille Miglia. The A6 1500 was the first road going production car to be offered by the Maserati factory, featuring a tubular chassis with independent front suspension and coil springs, the 1500 cc six-cylinder being derived from the Maserati brothers pre-war voiturette racing engines. The body of the A6 1500 was an elegant two-door fast-back coupé body, also by Pinin Farina.

1949 Ferrari 166 Inter
Enzo Ferrari, whose Scuderia Ferrari had been the racing division of Alfa Romeo from 1929 until 1938, parted ways from Alfa Romeo in 1939: Enzo Ferrari's first car (itself an Etceterini) the Fiat-based Auto Avio Costruzioni 815 racing sports car, debuted at the 1940 Mille Miglia. Two were produced. The first car constructed in Ferrari's name, the V12 125 S, also a racing sports car, debuted in 1947 at the Piacenza racing circuit. Again, only two were produced, but they rapidly evolved into the 159 and 166 models, including the 1949 Ferrari 166 Inter, a road-going berlinetta coupé with coachwork by Carrozzeria Touring and other coachbuilders.

The Ferrari 166 'Inter' S coupé model won the 1949 Coppa Inter-Europa motor race. Regulations stipulated body form and dimensions but did not at this time specify a minimum production quantity. The car was driven by Bruno Sterzi, and is recognized as the first Ferrari gran turismo.

After that race, the national governing body of Italian motorsport, CSAI (Commissione Sportiva Automobilistica Italiana), officially introduced a new class, called Gran Turismo Internazionale, for cars with production over thirty units per year, thereby ruling out Ferrari's hand-built berlinettas.

1951 Ferrari 212 Export
Ferrari's response for the new Italian Gran Turismo Internazionale championship in 1951 was the road/race Ferrari 212. Twenty-seven short-wheelbase competition versions called Export, some with increasingly popular gran turismo-style berlinetta coupé coachwork, were produced for enthusiasts (Ferrari called the first example 212 MM ) while the road version was called Inter. The Ferrari 212 Export featured long-range fuel tanks, high compression pistons and triple Weber 32 DCF carburettors; power was 170 bhp from the 2600cc Gioacchino Colombo-designed 'short-block' V12 engine, evolved from the earlier Ferrari 166 (2000cc) and 195 (2300cc). All versions came with the standard Ferrari five-speed non-synchromesh gearbox and hydraulic drum brakes. All 1951 Ferraris shared a double tube frame chassis design evolved from the 166. Double-wishbone front suspension with transverse leaf spring, and live rear axle with semi-elliptic leaf springs and radius rods were employed. The Ferrari 212 Export (212 MM) gran turismo berlinetta (chassis No. 0070M) debuted in first-place overall at the April 1951 Coppa Inter-Europa, driven by Luigi Villoresi, and in June (chassis no. 0092E) was first in the gran turismo category at the Coppa della Toscana driven by Milanese Ferrari concessionaire and proprietor of Scuderia Guastalla, Franco Cornacchia. The 212 Export continued to serve Ferrari well in the Sports and GT categories until replaced by the 225 S, and although it would later be overshadowed by the internationally famous 250 GT, the 212 Export was an important model in the successful line of Colombo-engined V12 GT cars that made Ferrari legendary.

1951 Lancia Aurelia B20 GT
1951 was the stunning debut of Lancia's Aurelia B20 GT.

Lancia had begun production in 1950 of their technically advanced Aurelia saloon; the design had been overseen by Vittorio Jano. At the 1951 Turin Motor Show, the Pinin Farina-bodied gran turismo B20 coupé version was unveiled to an enthusiastic motoring public. Here, finally, according to historians Jonathan Wood and Sam Dawson, was a fully realized production GT car, representing the starting point of the definitive grand tourer:

"This outwardly conventional saloon bristled with innovation and ingenuity, in which the masterly hand of Vittorio Jano is apparent. In the B20 are elements of the Cistalia of 1947, coupés which Pinin undertook on a 6C Alfa Romeo and Maserati in 1948, along with the Fiat 1100 S coupé with its rear accommodation for children. The original Aurelia had been under-powered and, in 1951, the V6 was enlarged to 1991 cc, which was also extended to the coupé, though in 75 rather than 70 bhp form as the B20 was developed as a sporting model in its own right. In addition the B20 had a shorter wheelbase and a higher rear axle ratio, making it a 100 mph car. Lancia chose the Gran Turismo name for its new model and the suggestion could only have come from Vittorio Jano himself, for had he not been responsible for the original 1750 Alfa Romeo of the same name back in 1929?"

Four semi-ufficiali works B20 GTs, together with a number of privateer entrants, were sent to the Mille Miglia in April 1951, where the factory Bracco / Maglioli car finished second overall, behind only a Ferrari sports racer of twice the engine capacity. Lancia Aurelias swept the GT 2.0 Liter division. In June 1951, Bracco was partnered with the "father of GT racing" himself, Johnny Lurani, to race a B20 GT at Le Mans, where they were victorious in the 2.0 liter sportscar division, placing a very creditable 12th overall. A 1–2 finish at the famous Coppa d'Oro delle Dolomiti, among other victories including the 6 Ore di Pescara, rounded out an astonishing debut racing season for this ground-breaking car, winning its division in the Italian GT Championship for Umberto Castiglioni in 1951. Lancia B20 GTs would go on to win the over 2.0 liter Italian GT Championship in 1953, 1954 and 1955 with the B20-2500.

1952 Fiat 8V "Otto Vu" Zagato
A surprise to the international press, who were not expecting a gran turismo berlinetta from Italy's largest manufacturer of everyday standard touring models, the Fiat 8V "Otto Vu" was unveiled at the Geneva Salon in March 1952 to international acclaim. Although not raced by the factory, the Otto Vu was raced by a number of private owners. Vincenzo Auricchio and Piero Bozzinio raced to fifth in the gran turismo category of the 1952 Mille Miglia, and Ovidio Capelli placed third in the GT 2000 cc class at the Coppa della Toscana in June, with a special race-spec lightweight Zagato coupe; the GT category overall at this event was won by Franco Cornacchia's Ferrari 212 Export (refer above). Capelli and the 8V Zagato topped this accomplishment by winning the GT category of the Pescara 12 Hours in August, ahead of two Lancias. The new Fiat 8V garnered sufficient competition points over the season to become the national two-liter GT Champion (a feat it repeated every year until 1959).

Elio Zagato, the coachbuilder's son, was successful in competition with the Otto Vu in 1954 and 1955, attracting further customer interest and leading Zagato to eventually develop two different GT racing versions. Upon his passing in 2009, Elio Zagato was described as a leading figure of Italian GT racing and design:

"Elio Zagato, who has died aged 88, was one of the leading figures of Italian Gran Turismo (GT) racing and car-body design. In the 1950s, driving a Zagato-bodied Fiat 8V, Elio emerged as the consummate gentleman racer in Italian GT championship events. Zagato, his father's firm, provided the lithe, lightweight aluminium bodies for many of the Lancias, Alfa Romeos, Abarths and Maseratis that dominated these meetings. Elio won 82 races out of the 150 he entered, and won four of the five championships he entered. Working with the chief stylist Ercole Spada, Zagato produced some of the most beautiful GT designs of the era; spare and muscular cars such as the Aston Martin DB4GTZ, the Alfa Romeo Junior TZ and SZ, and the Lancia Flaminia Sport. These were minimalist shapes bereft of superfluous trim that introduced phrases such as 'double bubble' roof to the car body design language: twin shallow domes, devised by Elio, to give extra head room and strengthen the roof. For lightness, Zagato pioneered the use of Perspex and of aerodynamics, with trademark forms such as the split or stub tail. Indeed, Elio would take prototypes out on the autostrada covered in wool tufts in order to test air flow over the body."

The 8V Otto Vu earned its name courtesy of its high-performance V8 engine (Ford having already trademarked "V8").

1954 Mercedes-Benz 300SL
The German automotive industry was devastated by the second World War, but in the post-war period a small number of firms brought it to prominence again. The emergence of the classic Porsche 356 is covered in the accompanying sports car article. In 1957 author John Stanford wrote: "The post-war Mercedes sports cars are in a way even more remarkable than those of Porsche. The firm was particularly badly hit by the war and it was several years before anything but a nominal production of cars could be undertaken. In 1951 appeared the "300", a luxurious and fast touring car with a single-camshaft six-cylinder engine of 2996 c.c. and chassis derived from the pre-war cars with swing-axle rear suspension. The "300S" was a three-carburetor edition, but in 1952 great interest was aroused by the almost invincible performance in sports-car racing of a team of prototype cars of extremely advanced and interesting design. By 1954 these had undergone sufficient development to be placed on the market as the "300SL", one of the costliest and most desirable cars of our time. The conventional chassis has been abandoned in favor of a complex structure of welded tubes, although the coil spring suspension is retained, and exceptionally large brakes are fitted, inboard at the rear. The engine is sharply inclined to the near-side in the interests of a low bonnet-line, and with Bosch fuel injection produces 240 b.h.p. at 6,000 r.p.m. Claimed maximum speed is in excess of 160 m.p.h. and although the car is by no means small, dry weight has been kept to 23 cwt. The depth of the multi-tubular frame prevents the use of conventional side-hinged doors and these cars are fitted with the roof-hinged "gull-wing" doors which characterize an exceedingly handsome and practical car. An open touring version is available. In competition the "300SL" has become a powerful contender, and abetted by the success of the Grand Prix cars [and "300 SLR"] has captured a substantial portion of the export market."

1956 Ferrari 250 GT
"The 250GT Ferrari must surely represent the ultimate in modern high-speed sporting travel, or GT competition, and holds today a position similar to the Bugatti 57SC of 1939. In 1962 the GTO Ferrari coupés had a remarkable season of successes in G.T. racing and have become the standard by which any competition coupé is measured, and by steady development [the Ferrari 250GT] has become one of the world's greatest cars."

- Motor Sport, March 1963.

1953 saw the first serious attempt to series produce the Ferrari motor car, two models of the Type 250 Europa being produced. The cars were an evolution of the previous models, available with either the Colombo or Lampredi versions of the 250 V12 engine, coil spring front suspension, an improved sports gearbox (four speeds) with Porsche synchromesh, large drum brakes and luxurious outfitting. A few appeared in motorsports but did not initially threaten the international Mercedes-Benz 300 SL and Porsche 356 competition.

"In the Mille Miglia of 1956 the first of the lightweight grand touring coupés, driven by Gendebien, battled with the Mercedes 300SL of Metternich and Einsendel to come in fifth overall and first in G.T. over 2,000 c.c. The G.T. Ferrari had arrived! Motor Ssport, March 1963."

After its 1956 debut, the 250 GT "went from strength to strength". Powered by the Colombo 250 engine, output was up to 240 b.h.p. at 7,000 r.p.m. A short-wheelbase (SWB) version of the 250 chassis was employed for improved handling and road-holding in corners, and top speed was up to 157 m.p.h. In 1957 Gendebien finished third overall in the Mille Miglia, and won the "index of performance". Alfonso de Portago won the Tour de France and GT races at Montlhéry and Castelfusano in a lightweight Carrozzeria Scaglietti 250 GT. Gendebien became a gran turismo specialist in 250 GTs when he wasn't driving sports racing Ferrari Testa Rossas ("Red Heads" for their red engine covers), achieving success in both the Giro Sicilia and Tour de France.

In 1958, sports racing Testa Rossas swept the Manufacturer's Championship, and in 1959 the T.R. engine was adapted to the 250 GT. The spark plugs were relocated and each cylinder now had a separate intake port. Larger Weber twin-choke carburetors were employed in a triple configuration (sports racing T.R.s employed six) and some special customer cars had three four-choke Webers (one choke per cylinder). Dry-sump lubrication was employed, and the camshaft valve timing was only slightly less than the full-race Testa Rossas. G.T. power was up to 267 b.h.p. at 7,000 r.p.m. (240 b.h.p at 6,800 rpm for road versions). Experiments were conducted with Dunlop disc brakes, which were adopted in 1960, along with an even shorter wheelbase for competizione versions.

In 1962, the definitive competition gran turismo was unveiled, the 250 GTO. A full Testa Rossa engine was employed (albeit with black crinkle-finish engine covers) with six twin-choke Webers. Power was up to 300 b.h.p. at 7,400 r.p.m. and with a lightweight 2000 lb body and chassis: the car was an immediate winner. <

"Remarkable as it might be on the circuit, it is also a remarkable machine on the road. One American Ferrarist, who owned and raced many G.T. Ferraris, commented that the G.T.O. is an even more pleasant car on the road! He maintains that it is most tractable and overheating in traffic congestions is no problem. In its short lifetime the 250GTO has established an enviable record. It is also one of the most sought after competition cars as evidenced by recent European suggestions that "black market" G.T.O.s bring higher prices than new ones. The demand is greater than the supply."

- Motor Sport, March 1963.

In November 2016, it was reported that a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO was being offered for public sale—normally brokers negotiate deals between extremely wealthy collectors "behind closed doors". GTOs had previously been auctioned in 1990 and 2014. The 2017 sale was expected to reach US$56,000,000.00, the particular GTO concerned (the second of just thirty-six ever made) thus set to become the world's most expensive car.

Impact of racing
The Italian Mille Miglia thousand-mile race, held from 1927 to 1957, was central to the evolution of the gran turismo concept. The event was one of the most important on the Italian motor-sport calendar and could attract up to five million spectators. Winning drivers such as Tazio Nuvolari, Rudolf Caracciola, and Stirling Moss; and manufacturers such as Alfa Romeo, BMW, Ferrari and Porsche would become household names.

According to Enzo Ferrari:

"In my opinion, the Mille Miglia was an epoch-making event, which told a wonderful story. The Mille Miglia created our cars and the Italian car industry. The Mille Miglia permitted the birth of GT, or grand touring cars, which are now sold all over the world. The Mille Miglia proved that by racing over open roads for 1,000 miles, there were great technical lessons to be learned by the petrol and oil companies and by brake, clutch, transmission, electrical and lighting component manufacturers, fully justifying the old adage that motor racing improves the breed."

The Mille Miglia is still celebrated today as one of the world's premier historic racing events.

A closed sports coupé almost prevailed at Le Mans in 1938, when a carrozzeria touring-bodied Alfa Romeo 8C 2900B, driven by Raymond Sommer and Clemente Biondetti, led the famous 24-hour race from the third lap until early Sunday afternoon, retiring only due to engine problems.

Johnny Lurani was impressed by the dominant performance at the Mille Miglia in 1940, by a carrozzeria touring-bodied BMW 328 coupé, winning the event at over 100 mph average speed, driven by Fritz Huschke von Hanstein and Walter Bäumer:

"The BMW team included a splendid aerodynamic Berlinetta, wind tunnel designed by German specialists, that was extremely fast at 135 mph... I couldn't believe the speeds these BMWs were capable of."

1937–1948 CSAI
Italy's national governing body of motorsport was the Commissione Sportiva Automobilistica Italiana (CSAI). Count Giovanni Lurani Cernuschi (popularly known as Johnny Lurani) was a key commissioner. He was also a senior member of the world governing body, the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA).

Lurani was instrumental in designing the regulations for the Italian 1937 Turismo Nazionale championship, whereby production vehicles approved by the CSAI were raced with the original chassis and engine layout as specified in the factory catalog and available for customers to buy; engines could be tuned and bored out, but the bodywork had to conform to regulations. The CSAI were concerned that FIA (known as AIACR at the time) 'Annexe C' Sports cars were becoming little more than thinly-disguised two-seat Grand Prix racers, far removed from the cars ordinary motorists could purchase from the manufacturers' catalogs.

The CSAI was shut down by the Italian Fascist government under Mussolini at the end of 1937, and replaced with a new organization called FASI. The Italian Fascists, as in Nazi Germany, sought control of motor racing as an important vehicle for national prestige and propaganda. FASI replaced Turismo Nazionale with the less strictly regulated Sports Nazionale championship, which ran in 1938 and 1939.

Postwar, the CSAI was re-established and in 1947 Italian national championships were held for both Sports Internazionale (FIA Annexe C sports cars) and Sports Nazionale. Sports Nazionale was abolished in 1948, creating the opportunity for a new category in 1949.

1949 Coppa Inter-Europa
The first race specifically for grand touring motor cars (at the time the regulations, designed by Johnny Lurani, were actually called "turismo veloce", or 'fast touring') was the 1949 Coppa Inter-Europa,  held over three hours on 29 May, at the 6.3 kilometer Autodromo Nazionale di Monza (Italy). It was won by a limited production, V-12 engined, Ferrari 166 "inter", originally known as the "sport", with a coupé body by Carrozzeria Touring of Milan with the Superleggera system.

After this race, governing body CSAI officially introduced a new category, called Gran Turismo Internazionale, for 1950. The regulations were drawn up by Johnny Lurani and fellow Italian motor racing journalist and organizer Corrado Filippini, requiring for qualification the production of thirty models per year, thereby ruling out, for the time being, Ferrari's hand-built berlinettas. Nonetheless, Ferrari 166 (including the upgraded MM - Mille Miglia - version) were produced and raced in sports car categories as both open barchettas and closed berlinettas, including winning the 1950 Mille Miglia outright.

1950 Mille Miglia
On the third weekend of April 1950, it was the occasion of the annual Mille Miglia, one-thousand miles from Brescia to Rome and back over closed public roads, to include a Gran Turismo Internazionale category for the first time: twenty-four GT cars were entered, including Alfa Romeo 6C 2500 SS coupé touring, Cisitalia 202B berlinetta and Fiat 1100 S coupé. The field was rounded out by a solitary Fiat-based Siata Daina. Alfa Romeo took first place in the Gran Turismo Internazionale category (a creditable tenth overall) and also second place in category, followed by three Cisitalias. The overall race winning Ferrari 195 S was also a gran turismo-style coupé, but in the over 2,000 sports car class—in fact a special 166MM/195S Berlinetta Le Mans, chassis No. 0026MM, famously driven by Giannino Marzotto in a double-breasted suit, "a fitting advertisement for his family's textile business".

1950 Coppa Inter-Europa
The 1950 Coppa Inter-Europa at Monza was held in March. Separate races were held for sports cars, and for gran turismo cars in four classes: 750, 1100, 1500, and over 1500.

Ferrari entered, and won, the Sports car 2000 class with a Ferrari 166 MM berlinetta, while an Alfa Romeo Sperimentale (over 2000 class) won the sports car race overall.

The gran turismo race was contested by Lancia Aprilia, Cisitalia 202B, Stanguellini GT 1100, Fiat 500, Alfa Romeo 2500 and Fiat Zagato. The overall winner was WWII fighter ace Franco Bordoni's Maserati A6 1500.

1950 Targa Florio
The annual Targa Florio in Sicily was held the first weekend of April, and featured a Gran Turismo Internazionale category for the first time, in two classes: 1500 and over 1500. Contested by Lancia Aprilia, Cisitalia 202, Fiat 1100, Maserati A6, and even a solitary British Bristol 400 (based on the successful pre-war BMW 328), the Gran Turismo Internazionale category was won by Argentinian driver, Adolfo Schwelm Cruz, in an Alfa Romeo 6C 2500 SS.

Schwelm Cruz and Alfa Romeo repeated their success in the 1950 Targa Florio and Mille Miglia by winning the gran turismo category at the Coppa della Toscana in June. An Alfa Romeo 6C 2500, driven by Salvatore Amendola, was also victorious in the gran turismo category of the Coppa d' Oro delle Dolomiti in July, run through the Dolomite Mountains, starting and finishing in the town of Cortina d'Ampezzo. An Alfa Romeo 6C 2500 took the gran turismo honours again at the Giro delle Calabria in August. The Alfa Romeo 6C 2500 was based on a pre-war design, and is considered by some to be the last of the classic Alfa Romeos.

1951 Campionato Gran Turismo Internazionale
For 1951, the CSAI organized an Italian national championship for the Gran Turismo Internazionale category in four classes: 750, 1,500, 2,000, and over 2,000 cc. Interest was attracted from manufacturers such as Alfa Romeo, Lancia, Maserati, Ferrari, Fiat and SIATA. The championship was held over ten events, including all the classic long-distance road races (the Giro di Sicilia, the Mille Miglia, the Coppa della Toscana, the Giro dell'Umbria, the Coppa d' Oro delle Dolomiti, the Giro delle Calabrie and the Stella Alpina) as well as three circuit races (the Coppa Inter-Europa at Monza, the Circuito di Caracalla night-race in Rome, and the 6 Ore di Pescara).

1954 FIA Appendix J
Prior to 1954, internationally agreed motor-sport regulations existed only for racing cars and sports cars (FIA Appendix C). After a testy initial period, the FIA introduced for the 1954 motor racing calendar new "Appendix J" regulations covering production touring cars, tuned special touring cars, gran turismo cars, and production sports cars. This was the first officially sanctioned international recognition of the gran turismo category.

The 1954 gran turismo regulations stipulated cars for personal transport with closed bodywork built by the manufacturer of the chassis, although open bodies and special coachwork were admissible if listed in the official catalog of the manufacturer of the chassis and if the weight of the car was at least the same as the closed standard model. Minimum production was 100 cars during 12 months and cars needed to have only two seats.

Gran turismo categories (under 1500 and over 1500) were first included in round three of the 1954 FIA World Sports Car Championship at the Mille Miglia (the first placed GT being the Lancia Aurelia B20 GT of Serafini and Mancini). GT entries would become a regular feature alongside their sports car brethren at international races from this time forward: GTs raced in world championship rounds at the Targa Florio from 1955, Nürburgring from 1956, Sebring from 1957, Le Mans from 1959, and Buenos Aires from 1960 (from which year every round of the world championship included GT cars). In 1960 and 1961 an FIA Coupé de Grand Tourisme (Grand Touring Cup) was awarded.

The FIA grand touring category came to be known as "Group 3", and is defined in the 1961 Appendix J (English) regulation as: "Vehicles built in small series for customers who are looking for better performance and/or maximum comfort and are not particularly concerned about economy. Such cars shall conform to a model defined in a catalog and be offered to the customers by the regular Sales Department of the manufacturer."

1962–1965 International Championship for GT Manufacturers
In 1962 the FIA, addressing concerns to reduce the speeds attained in sports car racing following the disastrous accident at Le Mans in 1955, shifted focus from Appendix C sports cars to production based GT cars of Appendix J. The previous World Sportscar Championship title was discontinued, being replaced by the International Championship for GT Manufacturers, won by the Ferrari 250 GTO in 1962, 1963 and 1964.

Cobra Ferrari wars
The period 1963–1965 is famous for the "Cobra Ferrari wars", a rivalry between American former-racing driver and Le Mans winner Carroll Shelby (Le Mans 1959, Aston Martin DBR1/300), and Enzo Ferrari, whose 250 GTs were the dominant grand touring cars of the time. Shelby retired from driving due to a heart condition, returning to California from Europe in 1959 with the idea to marry the AC Ace sports car chassis with Ford's V-8 small-block engine: the resulting Shelby AC Cobra was a sales success. Like Enzo, Shelby sold road cars to support his racing team, and like Ferrari the Cobra was a success on the track, at least on the short circuits common in the United States. On the longer tracks prevalent in Europe however, the Cobra's crude aerodynamics could not compete with the sleek 180 mph Ferrari 250 GTOs: even fitted with a removable roof the Cobra's top speed was 150 mph. At the 1963 24 Hours of Le Mans, a Cobra placed seventh; Ferraris placed first to sixth. Shelby team engineer Pete Brock hand-designed a Kamm-backed aerodynamic body for the Cobra, creating the Shelby Daytona coupe, and a showdown with Ferrari was set.

In testing, the Shelby Daytona coupe attained a top speed of 196 mph, and went on to win the GT class at the 1964 24 Hours of Le Mans. Shelby had beaten Ferrari on the biggest stage; however, the fast and reliable Ferrari 250 GTOs were again victorious in the 1964 International Championship for GT Manufacturers. The championship was controversial: Enzo Ferrari, with only a narrow points lead over Shelby, attempted to have the radical new mid-engined Ferrari LM250 homologated for the final championship round at Monza in Italy. When the FIA turned Ferrari down, Ferrari withdrew. The race organizers Auto Club d'Italia, fearing a financial disaster from the withdrawal of the famous Italian team, canceled the event, and Ferrari was crowned world champion. In the aftermath, Ferrari declared he would never race GTs again, and for 1965 the rivalry with Ferrari was taken up by Ford Motor Company and the Ford GT40, also mid-engined, in the sports car divisions.

In 1965, with Shelby's race team now dedicated to the GT40, the Daytona coupes were entrusted to Alan Mann Racing in the United Kingdom, and easily won the GT world championship. From 1966 the FIA returned its world championship focus to the sports car division, however GT entries remained an important feature of international sports car racing.

British grand tourers 1946–1963
While Italy was the home of the gran turismo, of all the other European nations that took the concept up, it was Britain that was most enthusiastic.

1946 Healey Elliot
Before Donald Healey turned to production of the small, light and inexpensive Austin-Healey 100 sports car in 1952, he had brought to market a fast and aerodynamic 2$1/2$-liter Riley-powered Healey Elliot closed saloon (named for the coach-builder). Claimed to be the fastest closed car of its day, only 101 were made before production was given over to the successful new sports car.

1947 Bristol 400–406
Immediately following the Second World War, H. J. Aldington, pre-war Frazer Nash manufacturer and BMW importer, sought out BMW's badly bombed Munich factory and there discovered the special-bodied open BMW 328, duly returning with it to Britain with a view to building Fraser Nash-BMWs with the aid of key former-BMW personnel. The Bristol Aeroplane Company, looking to enter the car sector, acquired a majority shareholding. There were government concerns about using German engineers, and in the end, only Fritz Fiedler was involved as consultant to Bristol's own engineers. By the time the new car debuted at the 1947 Geneva Motor Show, it was known simply as the Bristol 400.

The Bristol 400 was essentially a hand-built, to aircraft industry standards, BMW 327 two-door coupe, mounted on a BMW 326 chassis, powered by the legendary 2-liter BMW 328 engine. It was fast, 90 mph, but expensive. The 1948 401 featured an improved aerodynamic body in the lightweight Touring Superleggera fashion; and the 1953 403 boasted improved suspension, brakes, and gearbox, while power was boosted from 85 to 100 bhp. The 1954 short-chassis 404 had a completely new body, and top speed was up to 110 mph. The 1958 406 was the last of the BMW-powered versions and was produced until 1961, after which they were superseded by a range of automatic transmission equipped and Chrysler V8 powered Bristols, with the engines rebuilt by Bristol engineers and fitted with high-lift camshafts and mechanical lifters.

1953 Aston Martin DB2
David Brown purchased the Aston Martin concern in 1947, and the company was effectively reborn for the post-war era. Unlike the Bristol, the Aston Martin DB2 which debuted at the 1949 Motor Show (as a prototype Le Mans racer) was an all-British affair. The 2.6-liter twin overhead camshaft Lagonda engine was designed by W. O. Bentley (Brown having also purchased the Lagonda company). Brown decided on a closed coupé body in the latest Italian tradition, rather than the traditional Aston Martin open two-seater sports car. The 1950 production DB2 was a styling triumph for designer Frank Feeley, and Brown later recalled that many believed the car styled in Italy. The 105 bhp DB2 was a genuine 110 mph grand tourer; in 1951 came the more powerful optional 125 bhp "Vantage" version. In its original form, the DB2 was a two-seater; the 1953 DB2/4 added a 2+2 and hatchback arrangement and a 3-liter engine in 1954. A Mark II version with Tickford coachwork appeared in 1955 (Brown had purchased this company too). The Mark III version from 1957 to 1959 developed 162 bhp, and was available with 180 and 195 bhp high-output engine options.

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

title: Grand tourer


text:
Helen Schucman

Helen Cohn Schucman (born Helen Dora Cohn, July 14, 1909 – February 9, 1981) was an American clinical psychologist and research psychologist. She was a professor of medical psychology at Columbia University in New York from 1958 until her retirement in 1976. Schucman is best known for having "scribed" with the help of colleague William Thetford the book A Course in Miracles (1st edition, 1975), The 1st edition of A Course in Miracles was published in 1975 as a 4-volume set of books. Vol. 1 contains Chapters 1-14 of the "Text" section of the Course, Vol. 2 contains Chapters 15-30 of the "Text" section of the Course, Vol. 3 contains the "Workbook" section of the Course, and Vol. 4 contains the "Teacher's Manual" section of the Course. The Foundation for Parasensory Investigation - founded and run by Judith Skutch and her second husband Robert E. Skutch - was the publisher of the 1st edition of the Course, and also held the 1975 Copyright to the work. The Freeperson Press, a small privately owned printing/publishing company located at 325 Ninth Street in San Francisco, California, did the actual printing and binding of the 1st edition of the Course. The edition published by the Foundation for Inner Peace claims that the course "was published in three volumes in June 1976".

The 1st edition of the Course consisted, in total, of 300 sets of the 4-volume Course. These 300 sets of the 4-volume Course were printed and bound - over a period of several months in 1975 - by the Freeperson Press. Eleanor Camp Criswell, owner/manager of the Freeperson Press, was in charge of the printing and binding of the 1st edition of the Course. Consequently, it has become customary to refer to the 1st edition of the Course either as the "Criswell edition" or the "Freeperson Press edition".

Criswell only printed 100 sets of the 4-volume Course at a time - as they were needed for sale and distribution - so the 1st edition of the Course is actually three separate "printings" of the books. The "first printing" of the "1st edition," consisting of the first 100 4-volume sets of the Course printed by Criswell, were bound in yellow covers. The "second printing" of the "1st edition," consisting of the next 100 4-volume sets of the Course printed by Criswell, were bound in white covers. The "third printing" of the "1st edition," consisting of the final 100 4-volume sets of the Course printed by Criswell, were bound in blue covers. By February 1976, all 300 4-volume sets of the "Criswell edition" of the Course had been sold and/or distributed.

Judith (born Judith M. Rothstein on April 12, 1931) married Robert Edward Skutch (born July 19, 1925) in 1966 (it was Judith's second marriage), but they divorced (on friendly terms) in 1980. Later in the 1980s, Judith Skutch married William Wallace "Whit" Whitson (December 3, 1926 - February 8, 2018) and became known as Judith Skutch Whitson.

Eleanor Camp Criswell (born May 12, 1938) became known as after her marriage to philosopher Thomas Louis Hanna (Nov. 21, 1928 - July 29, 1990) on June 25, 1974. Thomas L. Hanna was the originator of Hanna Somatics, aka Hanna Somatic Education. In 1975 Thomas and Eleanor co-founded the Novato Institute for Somatic Research and Training, located at Novato, California. the contents of which she claimed had been given to her by an inner voice she identified as Jesus. However, at her request, her role as its "writer" was not revealed to the general public until after her death.

Early life and education
Schucman was born Helen Dora Cohn in 1909 to Sigmund Cohn, Sigmund Cohn (July 14, 1871 - February 1951) was a prosperous metallurgical chemist, born in New York City. Sigmund died in February 1951, and he was cremated on February 4, 1951, at the Ferncliff Crematorium located on the grounds of the Ferncliff Cemetery and Mausoleum (Hartsdale, Westchester County, New York). Sigmund Cohn began his business career by partnering with David Belais (July 2, 1862 - June 5, 1933) in 1901 to form Belais & Cohn, which was located at 13 Dutch Street, near the Financial District in lower Manhattan, New York City. When Belais & Cohn was dissolved in 1917, David Belais remained at 13 Dutch Street and, partnering with his brother Henry Belais (March 2, 1857 - June 1, 1940), resumed business under the name Belais Brothers. Belais Brothers went out of business in 1929. Shortly after the dissolution of Belais & Cohn in 1917, Sigmund Cohn moved to 44 Gold Street (which is only about 2 blocks east of 13 Dutch Street) in lower Manhattan and resumed his business under the name Sigmund Cohn Manufacturing Company Inc. Over the years this company (whose main office was located at 44 Gold Street at least between 1919-1950) became very successful and expanded to become several different companies, located in different states. The parent company, which eventually relocated to Mount Vernon, New York, now operates under the name of the Sigmund Cohn Corporation. From the beginning of his career in 1901, Cohn was engaged primarily in the business of platinum refining and in the manufacture of precious metal platinum alloys for the jewelry industry. In the 1900-1925 period, the jewelry industry was by far the largest consumer of platinum alloys. Presently (2013) the Sigmund Cohn Corporation, via its several companies, specializes in manufacturing precious and base metal products, and supplies approximately 20 different industries, including: aerospace, defense, medical devices, semiconductors, temperature measurement and control, automotive components, jewelry, and electronics. After Sigmund Cohn's death, his son Adolph Cohn (1897-1984) became President and Director of Research of the Sigmund Cohn Corporation. The current President and CEO of Sigmund Cohn Corporation is Thomas A. Cohn (born 1957), who is a great-grandson of Sigmund Cohn. For additional documentation on the history of both Belais & Cohn and the Sigmund Cohn Manufacturing Company Inc., see http://www.leagle.com/xmlResult.aspx?page=1&xmldoc=19478716gztcm865_1664.xml&docbase=CSLWAR1-1950-1985&SizeDisp=7 - Cohn v. Commissioner 6 T.C.M. 865 (1947) (Sigmund Cohn v. Commissioner. Docket No. 9659. United States Tax Court. Entered July 18, 1947) a prosperous metallurgical chemist, and Rose Black, the daughter of a former rabbi from Germany. They married on October 18, 1896, in Manhattan and Schucman had an elder brother, Adolph Cohn, who was almost 12 years her senior. Though her parents were both half-Jewish, they were non-observant. Schucman's mother Rose had an interest in Theosophy and various expressions of Christianity such as Christian Science and the Unity School of Christianity.

However, it was the family housekeeper, Idabel, a Baptist, who had the deepest religious influence on Schucman while she was growing up. In 1921, when she was 12, Schucman visited Lourdes, France, where she had a spiritual experience, and in 1922 she was baptized as a Baptist. Later in life, she considered herself an atheist.

She received her B.A. from New York University (NYU), (1931–1935), where she met fellow student Louis Schucman in 1932 and whom she married, in a 10-minute ceremony in a local rabbi's office, on May 26, 1933. Louis owned one or more bookstores on "Book Row" in Manhattan, and during the early years of their marriage Schucman worked at his main store. Growing restless in her early forties, she returned to NYU to study psychology. She received her M.A. in 1952, followed by her Ph.D. (1952–1957).

Career
Schucman was a clinical and research psychologist, who held the tenured position of Associate Professor of Medical Psychology at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons at the Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York City. During her tenure at Columbia University, Schucman worked with William Thetford, whom she first met in early 1958.

A Course in Miracles (ACIM) was "scribed" by Schucman between 1965 and 1972 through a process of inner dictation. She experienced the process as one of a distinct and clear dictation from an inner voice, which earlier had identified itself to her as Jesus. Her scribing of A Course in Miracles began with these words: "This is a course in miracles. Please take notes."

Wouter Hanegraaff distinguishes Schucman's process as a type of channeling that articulates revelation, clarifying that "... in cases of inner dictation in which the medium hears a voice dictating messages, (s)he writes down [these messages] in a fully conscious state." Hanegraaff continues by specifically characterizing Schucman's case as spontaneous channeling, indicating that "...[o]ver the years the voice proved to be remarkably consistent, stopping the dictation when interrupted [by Schucman's daily activities] and continuing at the next opportunity." Hanegraaff also references specific dialogue between Schucman and William Thetford citing author Robert E. Skutch, among other authors, including Kenneth Wapnick (1942-2013), whom Hanegraaff indicates as a "good" source for complete discussion on this subject.

During this time, Schucman worked in a collaborative venture with William Thetford in scribing A Course In Miracles (ACIM) and also with its initial edits. The main transcription process took seven years, from 1965 through 1972, during which time she would take down the notes in shorthand, then each day read back these notes to Thetford, who would type them out while she read them. After all the ACIM material had been initially transcribed it was then edited for publication by Schucman and the other two primary editors, Thetford and Kenneth Wapnick.

Schucman also wrote two supplemental ACIM pamphlets by the same process as well as a collection of poetry later published as The Gifts of God. Following the transcription and editing, Schucman began to reduce the level of her direct involvement in the ACIM related effort and was never as heavily involved with teaching or popularizing the material as were its editors, Bill Thetford and Kenneth Wapnick.

Death
In 1980 Schucman was diagnosed with advanced pancreatic cancer. After a prolonged illness, she died of related complications at age 71 in 1981.

Legacy
A collection of her poems, The Gifts of God, was posthumously published by the Foundation for Inner Peace.

Absence From Felicity: The Story of Helen Schucman and Her Scribing of A Course in Miracles is the only biography of Schucman. It was written by her longtime friend, Kenneth Wapnick.

Wapnick later founded the Foundation for A Course in Miracles (FACIM), an organization that claimed to hold a copyright to A Course In Miracles. Upon Wapnick's death in 2013, the purported copyright to A Course In Miracles reverted to the Foundation For Inner Peace (FIP).

Writings

 * (contains 114 poems that share the spiritual content of the Course as well as the prose poem "The Gifts of God," which summarizes the teachings of the Course)
 * (contains 114 poems that share the spiritual content of the Course as well as the prose poem "The Gifts of God," which summarizes the teachings of the Course)
 * (contains 114 poems that share the spiritual content of the Course as well as the prose poem "The Gifts of God," which summarizes the teachings of the Course)

title: Helen Schucman


text:
Bharat Rashtra Samithi

The Bharat Rashtra Samithi (abbr. BRS), formerly known as Telangana Rashtra Samithi (abbr. TRS), is an Indian political party which is predominantly active in the state of Telangana and currently the primary opposition party in the state. It was founded on 27 April 2001 by K. Chandrashekar Rao, with a single-point agenda of creating a separate Telangana state with Hyderabad as its capital. It has been instrumental in carrying forth a sustained agitation for the granting of statehood to Telangana. In the 2014 Telangana Assembly Election, the party won a majority of seats and formed the first government of the State with K. Chandrashekar Rao as its chief minister. In the 2014 general election the party won 11 seats, making it the eighth largest party in Lok Sabha, the lower house (lok sabha) of the Indian Parliament. After a landslide victory in 2018 Telangana Legislative Assembly election, the party formed the government in the State for the second time. In the 2019 Indian general election, the party's tally had fallen to nine seats in the Lok Sabha. As of February 2023, the party holds seven seats in upper house of Rajya Sabha.

Later on 5 October 2022, the name of the party was changed from Telangana Rashtra Samithi to Bharat Rashtra Samithi to foray into the national politics. After suffering a decisive defeat in the 2023 Telangana Legislative Assembly election, the party was restricted to winning only 39 seats in the state of Telangana.

Ideology
On 27 April 2001, Rao resigned as Deputy Speaker of the Telugu Desam Party. He opined that Telangana people were being categorically discriminated against within the undivided State of Andhra Pradesh. Consequently, Rao argued that only the creation of a separate State of Telangana would allow for the alleviation of the people's predicament. Accordingly, KCR founded the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) Party at Jala Drushyam, Hyderabad in April 2001, with the objective of achieving statehood for Telangana. The party initially won one-third of Mandal Parishad Territorial Constituencies (MPTC) and one-quarter of Zilla Parishad Territorial Constituencies (ZPTC) in Siddipet within sixty days of the formation of the party.

2004 elections
In the aftermath of 2004 Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly election, the party won 26 state assembly seats and also won five parliament seats. The TRS formed an alliance with Indian National Congress and joined the United Progressive Alliance. In September 2006, the party withdrew support for the central government on the grounds of indecision by the government over the delivery of its electoral promise to create Telangana. On 13 September 2006, Rao triggered a by-election in his Lok Sabha constituency of Karimnagar, claiming provocation from Congress MLA M. Satyanarayana Rao and citing delay in the formation of Telangana state, as promised by Congress in its 2004 manifesto. He won the subsequent by-election with a strong majority. All TRS MLAs and MPs resigned their positions in April 2008 when the Central government did not meet their demand for a separate state in its latest budget session. The by-election was held on 29 May 2008. In the 2008 by-elections, TRS retained only seven out of the 16 assembly segments and two out of the four Lok Sabha segments that it resigned, a significant defeat for the party. TRS president K. Chandrasekhar Rao offered to resign after the by-election losses, but instead remained in office after other party leaders rejected the resignation.

2009 elections
In 2009, TRS formed an alliance with TDP and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance. The party contested 45 assembly and nine parliament seats to win only ten assembly and two parliament seats. This was considered another major defeat.

2014 elections
In the 2014 Assembly and National Elections, TRS did not align with NDA or UPA and fought the elections on its own. TRS, which led the campaign for a separate State for more than a decade, emerged victorious by winning 11 of the 17 Lok Sabha seats and 63 of the 119 Assembly seats, and emerged as the party with the largest vote share in Telangana. The TRS' campaign had no other stars except KCR who addressed over 300 public meetings, heli-hopping around and often addressing more than 10 meetings in a single day. The TRS not only retained its north Telangana stronghold but also made inroads in south Telangana, a Congress bastion.

It was only after the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh, and the creation of separate Telangana state that the party begun to deliver electoral success. TRS won 63 out of 110 seats it contested in the 2014 Assembly elections in the newly formed state, and went on to form the government. K. Chandrashekar Rao, had taken oath as the first Chief Minister of the new state of Telangana on 2 June 2014.

2018 Telangana Legislative Assembly election
The TRS Government headed by Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao on 6 September 2018 dissolved the Legislative Assembly, the first after the formation of Telangana, to pave the way for early elections in the state. The party announced a list of 104 candidates for elections on the same day.

In the 2018 Telangana Legislative Assembly election, held three months after the house dissolution, the TRS party won with a massive majority. They won 88 seats, more than 70% of the 119 total.

2019 Indian general election
In May 2019, TRS Chief Rao flouted the idea of Federal Front, aiming for a non-Congress and non-BJP government at the centre. The party won nine out of the contested 17 seats, a reduction of two seats from the 2014 election.

Bharat Rashtra Samithi
The name of the party was changed from Telangana Rashtra Samithi to Bharat Rashtra Samithi on 5 October 2022 to foray into national politics ahead of the 2024 Indian general election. On 6 October 2022, officials from BRS submitted the relevant documents required for name change according to the Representation of the People Act, 1951 to the Election Commission of India in New Delhi. As of October 2022, the party activities are taking place from a rented building at Sardar Patel Marg in Delhi. On 14 November the party office was inaugurated at New Delhi.

Andhra Pradesh unit
The party created its local unit in the residual Andhra Pradesh state on 2 January 2023. Dr. Thota Chandrasekhar, former general secretary of the Jana Sena Party, was named its president. Other leaders from Andhra Pradesh who joined the party on the on its state unit's formation include former minister Ravela Kishore Babu, former IRS official Partha Sarathi, and former Praja Rajyam Party leader T. J. Prakash.

The state unit suffered a setback in April 2023 when the Election Commission of India derecognised the BRS as a state party in Andhra Pradesh. The party had been enjoying state party status in Undivided Andhra Pradesh since 2004, and then in the states of residual Andhra Pradesh and Telangana since 2014.

2023 Telangana Legislative Assembly election
At the 2023 Telangana Legislative Assembly election, the party lost their majority, with their vote share falling by 10.52% to 37.35% and their seat count falling from 88 to 39. They retained their seats in the Greater Hyderabad region, but lost most of their seats in the rest of the state to Congress, who won 64 seats and formed the next government.

2024 Indian general election
The party suffered a further setback at the 2024 Indian General Election. Despite their previous national ambitions, the party only contested in Telangana. However, they were wiped out, losing all 9 of their seats in the state. The party's vote share was over cut in half from 41.71% to 16.68%.

Membership
TRS Party president K Chandrasekhar Rao announced a schedule for the membership drive, which began on 3 February 2015, and elections to party committees from the village level. After a spectacular victory in the Assembly and Lok Sabha elections in Telangana, The TRS Party is now focused on strengthening it in the state.

KCR said the TRS Membership Drive 2015 would continue until 20 February. Elections to party committees at different levels would be held during March and April.

TRS party officially started registration process to get membership from 3 February 2015.

List of chief ministers
Chief Minister of Telangana

title: Bharat Rashtra Samithi


text:
Dormition Cathedral in Smolensk

The Cathedral Church of the Dormition (Успенский собор), dominating the city of Smolensk, Russia, from Cathedral Hill, has been the principal church of the Smolensk bishopric for 800 years.

Monomakh Cathedral
The first brick church on the spot was started by Vladimir Monomakh in 1101. The large six-pillared edifice, similar to Monomakh's cathedral in Vladimir, took several decades to complete. It was finally consecrated during the reign of Vladimir's grandson Rostislav of Smolensk in 1150. In the course of the following 500 years, the church survived numerous wars and fires. Especially serious was the damage inflicted during the great siege of Smolensk (1609–1611).

According to the official legend, the remaining defenders of the city locked themselves in the cathedral and then set fire to the gunpowder in the ammunition depot in the church's basement on June 3, 1611. The explosion that followed caused the roof to collapse, killing all the people inside, who preferred death to being taken prisoner by the Poles. It is unclear, though, what happened in reality except that the ammunition depot in the basement really did explode. It was not unusual in medieval Russia for civilians to seek asylum in churches when a city was overrun, so it was likely civilians, rather than defenders, who died in that explosion. What caused the explosion will probably forever remain an open question: it could have been a Masada-style suicide but it might well have been an accident.

The old cathedral survived the explosion, however. On September 9, 1627, the bishop Lew Rzewuski pleaded Lew Sapieha to preclude "the 500-year-old church" from being converted into a Roman Catholic church, which would violate the terms of Smolensk's surrender to the Poles in 1611. In a 1636 engraving, the cathedral is represented as being covered with a temporary wooden roof.

After Smolensk was recaptured by the tsars and recognized as belonging to Russia in the 1667 peace treaty, the Russian voivode Prince Repnin was commissioned to inspect the cathedral and to prepare a list of urgent repairs. In 1673 the archbishop of Smolensk was authorized to restore the roof and the domes without damaging its original walls. The ancient bricks, however, proved too dilapidated to put to good use. The old cathedral was completely demolished between May 5 and July 13, 1674.

New cathedral
The current six-pillared, five-domed edifice was constructed over a period of almost 100 years due to flaws in the original design and its implementation – at one point one of the walls collapsed – but it was eventually completed in 1772. The building’s Baroque design is impressive, especially looking up from the base of a wall. Viewed from certain locations it often looks as if it is suspended in the air because it is situated on hill surrounded by trees, concealing the base of the building.

One of the most notable views is inside the cathedral, namely the iconostasis that separates the altar from the nave area of the cathedral, which stands almost the height of the interior space. On it there are icons and interspaced with intricate gold-covered wooden decorations including figures of cherubim and columns entwined with vine branches.

According to local legend, when Napoleon Bonaparte entered the cathedral after Smolensk had fallen to the French army in 1812, he looked up at the altar wall and proclaimed that if any one of his soldiers dared to steal anything from it, he would personally kill that man. The cathedral sustained enormous damage during World War II, when the 11th-century miraculous icon of Theotokos of Smolensk perished in a great fire.

The cathedral appears in Christian Bot's 2013 novel When we were Heroes, in the context of the 1812 Battle of Smolensk.

title: Dormition Cathedral in Smolensk


text:
La Tour d'Argent

La Tour d'Argent (English: The Silver Tower) is a historic restaurant in the 5th arrondissement of Paris, France. It is located at 15 Quai de la Tournelle. It has a rating of one star from the Guide Michelin.

History
The restaurant claims that it was founded in 1582, and that it was frequented by Henri IV, but offers no documentation to support these or other claims about its history. The Quai de la Tournelle, where the restaurant stands, was not paved until 1650, before which it was "a slope, often flooded and almost always made inaccessible by mud". The restaurant today is at the corner of the Rue du Cardinal-Lemoine, which did not exist until the end of the eighteenth century.

The restaurant does not appear in an 1824 list of "The principal restaurants, who are distinguished by the elegance of the decoration of their salons and by the number and the care taken with the dishes found there...". In 1852, a metals dealer occupied number 15 Quai de la Tournelle, and a hairdresser and wood dealer number 17.

Baedeker's 1860 guide to Paris describes the establishment's current location as "out of the way", while mentioning a restaurant associated with a low-cost "Hotel of the Tour d'Argent": "Between Notre Dame and the jardin des Plantes, on the Quai de la Tournelle, facing the bridge of this name, there is a little hotel and the restaurant Lecoq; Hôtel de la Tour d'argent, a bit out of the way, it is true, but well kept and cheap (room, 2 francs, beefsteak, 1 franc). Facing a swimming school, which has the advantage of not yet being encumbered and imprisoned by all the filth of Paris."

The restaurant was owned in the 1890s and 1900s by Frédéric Delair, who began the tradition of presenting a numbered certificate to each person who ate the restaurant's signature dish, pressed duck. A dinner was held there for the Wright Brothers in 1906. In 1912, the Terrail family bought the restaurant. It was operated first by André Terrail, then by his son Claude, who died in 2006 at the age of 88, and then by Claude's son André.

In 1984, a branch was opened in Tokyo, in the Hotel New Otani.

Since 1986, La Tour d'Argent has been a recipient of the Wine Spectator Grand Award.

Until 1996, the Guide Michelin awarded the restaurant three stars. The rating was reduced to two stars in 1996, and to one star in 2006.

Specialities
Duck, especially the pressed duck, is the speciality (Canard à la presse, Caneton à la presse, Caneton Tour d'Argent, and recently renamed “Caneton de Frédéric Delair”). The restaurant raises its ducks on its own farm. Diners who order the duck receive a postcard with the bird's serial number, now well over 1 million. (Serial number #112,151 went to U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, #203,728 went to Marlene Dietrich, and #253,652 went to Charlie Chaplin).

The restaurant's wine cellar, guarded around the clock, contains more than 450,000 bottles whose value was estimated in 2009 at 25 million euros (£22.5 million). Some 15,000 wines are offered to diners on a 400-page list. During a routine inventory control in 2024, wine worth more than €1.5m was found to be missing from the wine cellar.

The dining room has an excellent view of the river Seine and Notre Dame.

Cultural references
In Accidental Agent, A thrilling account of underground warfare in France, John Goldsmith, agent of the British Special Operations Executive, tells how after escaping his German SS captors at Hotel Continentale in the Rue de Rivoli, he was hidden in an upper-floor flat in the Tour d'Argent building that was occupied by Rumanian actress Madame Tantzy.

In A Moveable Feast, Ernest Hemingway says that the Tour d'Argent rented some rooms and gave its lodgers discounts on the meals; also that a valet there used to sell English books left by the tenants.

Marcel Proust mentions the restaurant three times in his novel À la recherche du temps perdu (In Search of Lost Time). For example, the haughty Mme Verdurin sniffs "The Tour d'Argent is not nearly as good as they make out".

In a scene in the 1960 novel The Centurions where French prisoners of war are discussing the kinds of meals and cars they plan to buy with their backpay, an officer named Captain Verdier mentions that Lapérouse has been surpassed by Tour d'Argent in quality, a fact that he finds "most annoying".

The restaurant inspired scenes in the 2007 Pixar movie Ratatouille, and received an "unexpected boost" from the film.

Four episodes of Fuji TV's Iron Chef had chefs from the Paris and Tokyo branches as challengers. From the Paris branch, Bernard Leprince faced Iron Chef Japanese Komei Nakamura twice, with either chef winning once (Leprince won the initial meeting on the French Special at Chateau de Brissac with salmon as the theme, while Nakamura won the rematch in Tokyo with duck as the theme). Meanwhile, from the Tokyo branch, Tadaaki Shimizu bested Iron Chef French Hiroyuki Sakai with lobster as the theme, while Dominique Corby was the 300th challenger and battled Iron Chef Chinese Chen Kenichi to a draw with foie gras as the regulation theme and asparagus as the overtime theme.

One episode of Root into Europe (British comedy starring George Cole) was filmed in the hotel, and the duck being pressed is shown and served to the actors. Claude Terrail appeared as himself.

The restaurant was visited in the Paris episode of Remarkable Places to Eat (presented by Fred Sirieix, with Michel Roux Jr. as the guide), featuring the duck being pressed at their table, and a visit to the wine cellar.

title: La Tour d'Argent


text:
Talk:New America (organization)

Discussion
Touché. I still wouldn't call them centrists, they're not moderate and they're not looking for a consensus. If they were finding any consensus in the centre they wouldn't be so controversial. Real environmental issues, such as climate change, a common concern of both liberals and conservatives, are conspicuously absent. This fits with a corporatist or neoconservative ideology. Most environmental issues on the site relate to corporate investment and corporate solutions (and where money can be made).

http://www.newamerica.net/index.cfm?pg=issues&IssueID=8

For example, their item about fuel subsidies for hydrogen-powered cars focuses on terrorism and finance surrounding oil. There is not a scrap of concern about the pollution oil causes at all. Additionally it focuses on getting the government to subsidize "a similar federally sponsored project" to the 90% subsidization of National System of Interstate and Defense Highways "to build a hydrogen-distribution infrastructure". The article is asking for taxpayers to solve the problem through money without regulation. The idea is neither a correct nor incorrect solution, but it is definitely far from a moderate liberal idea, which centrism is supposed to include.

So either reply with your thoughts on this or I'm taking out the "Ironically part". I don't think the views show they are centrist, I think the views show they are pandering, generally to the right, and definitely to private business and corporations. I thought I was being fair by including Neoliberalism in there, since they are fairly libertarian too (which also fits into the corporatist category). :\

 * I think they would certainly agree they are not moderates. I supposed it depends on whether you think the term 'radical centrist' has any meaning at all (I guess bare 'centrist' is confusing, so I'll amend that).   While some of their proposals are certainly right-leaning, others - like universal trust funds - are very leftist.   And their call for universal service is very anti-libertarian.  So I don't think its accurate to pigeonhole them just because -some- of their proposals favor the right.  Would you like to see more concrete examples of their anti-right proposals?Drernie 17:14, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Maybe I just don't understand how "radical centrist" is defined. They don't really fall in the middle of a left-right political spectrum, so to me, that's not any type of centrism, radical or not. But, now that I think about, I can kind of see where the moniker "radical centrist" comes from. To me, their "radical centrism" isn't really in the left-right spectrum (like centrism is), but is outside of that spectrum (being 'radical'), and draws from both sides (being 'centrist'). Maybe "radical centrism" just needs a better definition. It just bugs me that "centrism" and "radical centrism" are very different in key ways, yet they share a name which suggests they are working towards the same things (like moderation and consensus), only one of them "radically" so, which I don't think is the case here. Like if I said I was a "radical liberal", it's pretty obvious what I mean, I'm really far on the left. If I said I was a "radical centrist", well, it just doesn't make sense, because I can't get any more in the middle. You could only intuit that I hold my ideals of centrism strongly. Really, I think NAF are "radical" and draw ideas from all sides to form political ideas that are neither left, nor right, nor "centric" they way "centrism" is defined. By calling themselves "centrists" they are actually trying to define the centre of a left-right politcal spectrum. But, since they are radical and aren't looking for moderation and consensus, they are doing no such thing, and are more independent. I suggest they be called "radical independents" which sits much much better with me.

 * Maybe, but I think that is par for the course. Most people on the Left and Right hate being identified with their radicals, so why should centrists be any different? :-)   Besides, the term has been around for a while, so whether you like it or not is the common understanding.  At any rate, we should probably continue this discussion on the Radical centrist politics article, where I'll try to incorporate your comments.Drernie 03:51, 28 May 2004 (UTC)

Aaagh. I'm saying that they aren't centrists at all, by the definition of centrism. I'm saying the nomenclature is deceptive. "Radical centrists" have no legitimate claim to centrism. Since, apparently, the term has been around for "a while" I will move discussion to Radical centrist politics.
 * It's marketing fluff. There's nothing radical about this foundation's work at all.  It's positioning.Bruno23 (talk) 09:32, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Drernie I think that the explanation/questioning of the NAFs political name and such (the second paragraph) should be taken off, since the issues with Radical centrist politics can be better said on the actual Radical centrist politics page. Also there should probably be a direct link to the NAF site? --Ben 08:07, 2 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Drernie I've taken off the explanation and questioning of the NAF. --Ben 00:04, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
 * Fine with me; it was a (non-radical) centrist who complained, and I think he didn't realize the larger movement existed at that time. Thanks, I also added a high-level link. Drernie 18:26, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

This needs to be reworked
This reeks of a vanity piece... just awful. Cowicide 05:41, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
 * So, how about making some constructive suggestions, or even some edits, rather than just complaining? Drernie 17:02, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Looks like someone listened to your suggestion and as a result I have restored an earlier version which removed an un-sourced and irrelevant statement. 144.89.97.30 05:02, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't want to slap a tag to the article yet. However, I think the article could use inline citations. Kushal 14:50, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

NYT is centrist???
Really? Would anyone consider the NYT centrist? The editorial board hasn't endorsed a Republican president since Eisenhower. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.242.232.242 (talk) 16:12, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Which may say more about the Republican Presidents following Eisenhower than it does about the NYT. Besides, if the definition of "liberal" is "endorsed Democrats for President", then does that make the Socialist Worker a hard-right magazine? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zifnab25 (talk • contribs) 22:45, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

What are their positions?
Somebody should write about where this organization stands on the issues. That's the single most important thing about a "think tank", and certainly the reason people come to this article. But they get nothing. AxelBoldt (talk) 05:43, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Same here. They are a think tank, nothing in the article says anything about their position or platform. If they are notable, then there should be a description of their position in many sources, especially for a think tank, otherwise I question their notability. The vacuum of details makes this article not neutral. 67.81.26.23 (talk) 03:33, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Absolutely agree. Without this information, the article is next to worthless. ---Dagme (talk) 15:54, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

Doherty article
The fact that someone associated with this think tank co-wrote an article, and someone else wrote a blog post criticizing it, isn't notable. I could follow this formula to create a similar "Controversy" section about any article: summarize the original article, summarize the critical response, cite them both, and a "controversy" has been created. If a publication isn't completely ignored, it will probably be greeted with a negative response from somewhere. You need to provide some indication of why this is more notable than any other conversation that's taken place around an article written by a New America Foundation employee. The fact that something can be sourced doesn't mean it deserves to be included in an article.Prezbo (talk) 19:07, 27 August 2009 (UTC)
 * This is information about the viewpoint and positions espoused by the Foundation, which were significant in the public debate about the greatest foreign policy crisis of the year to date. Furthermore, the critical response was covered in a reliable secondary source. The information is relevant, it is informative, it is easily verified. You're going to need a lot more than "I can do this to anybody who's taken a significant position" to get rid of it. Ray  Talk 19:13, 27 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Doherty's views aren't the foundation's views. If the critical response was covered in a reliable secondary source then add that source; right now, all you have is an example of that response.  You're right, this was significant, but I doubt it's the most significant thing someone associated with the NAF has published, even in the last year, and its significance isn't explained in the article.  You should at least not call it a "controversy" or give it its own section, which is really giving it too much weight.Prezbo (talk) 19:33, 27 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Actually you're essentially right, I apologize. I reacted irrationally because I hate "controversy" sections.Prezbo (talk) 21:19, 27 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm not too fond of them myself - they have a tendency to become massive overblown collections of dueling quotes. But if it comes to trading off relevant information versus better style, well, Wikipedia seems to prefer the former. After all, style can always be corrected later as more information appears, but getting rid of information tends to make it difficult to retrieve later. Ray  Talk 23:03, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

Iran election
This sections needs to be changed or removed entirely. It makes the false assertion that this organization was the only one who used the poll results when infact many people did, such as Reuters. It was infact the most used set of polling for their election in the western world. It also makes it seem like the poll is an outlier, when it is not, because polling after the election done by others, for example "World Public Opinion" corresponds with the results. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.207.134.145 (talk) 14:56, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

Board of Directors
Nearly every member of their board of directors is a known Democrat or Democratic supporter. Are we supposed to pretend this group is really nonpartisan, because that goes completely counter to the definition? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.110.179.229 (talk) 23:17, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I was about to state that as well. I would suggest leaving off the "non partisan" tag, as it for some odd reason seems to want to legitimize the organization for that, rather than the work it does. 68.4.92.193 (talk) 16:38, 23 March 2016 (UTC)Bruce

== Hardly non-partisan ==

This tag should be completely dropped. New America Foundation has openly declared its desire to have traditionally left-leaning news organizations in every state of the union, in addition to publishing a completely falsified study which attempts to portray "white American radicals" as the perpetrators of more violent attacks on US soil than jihadists. Not only is this a factually incorrect statement (DC beltway sniper attack, Ft. Hood, Boston Marathon bombing, Islamic-motivated attacks on homosexuals in Seattle, beheadings of two Coptic Christians in New Jersey, and two dozen other attacks puts the tally at around 71 jihadi attacks in the US, post-9/11; this number also doesn't address the untold numbers of ATTEMPTED attacks which were thwarted, such as the Times Square bombing attempt), but it was rapidly picked up in all of the left-leaning press and repeated without scrutiny:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/25/us/tally-of-attacks-in-us-challenges-perceptions-of-top-terror-threat.html?_r=2 http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2015/06/24/33254169-white-americans-are-biggest-terror-threat-in-us-study?d=1 http://mic.com/articles/121263/white-groups-muslim-terrorist-attacks http://mic.com/articles/121268/study-more-whites-committed-terrorist-acts-in-u-s-than-muslims http://www.vox.com/2015/6/24/8838659/right-wing-terrorism-new-america http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/24/domestic-terrorism-charleston_n_7654720.html

But not only did New America Foundation write this wholly erroneous politically-motivated study, it proceeded to lionize those same left-leaning media outlets who chose to run with it and publish it: https://www.newamerica.org/new-america/why-we-need-a-new-york-times-in-every-state/

I'm sure it's just a coincidence, though. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.199.243.30 (talk) 01:16, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Sources need to be in the article itself, not just in edit summaries
Re. this edit, when a citation is requested, a source needs to be provided in the article. Providing a potential source in an edit summary is not sufficient. Safehaven86 (talk) 16:21, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

NYT report on Google meddling with the think tank via funding
The NYT reported that Google has pressured the New America think tank which is supported by it, to remove a statement supporting the EU anti-trust fine against Google. After Eric Schmidt voiced his displeasure from the statement, the whole research group involved were sidelined in the New America think tank, which gets funding from Google. Consequently, the Open markets research group went to open their own think tank, which will not get any funding from Google.

 * According to Sheelah Kohatkar ("The Enforcer,"The New Yorker, September 6, 2021, pp. 48-57, p. 54), Google's contributions were $20 million over twenty years. Kohatkar also quotes Slaughter as saying that  [despite coming two days after Khan's Web post], the ousting had nothing to do with the article.    Kohatkar also said that Khan et al. also re-established Open Markets. Kdammers (talk) 17:58, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

Updated article citations and removed clean-up template
Removed cleanup template from April 2016 after adding numerous sources throughout article and removing several sections that were likely the reason the article was flagged for routine commentary.--Nxu188 (talk) 22:42, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Merge New America NYC & Open Technology Institute
I propose merging New America NYC and Open Technology Institute into this page, as the NYC branch and a technology part of the organisation aren't independently notable enough to pass WP:GNG. Joseph2302 (talk) 17:45, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

 * Support: Content is quite short, so it should be easy to merge both into their respective sections. --MarioGom (talk) 17:49, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

 * Support seems obvious that this is not a tenable article--but there's another good alternative, which is deletion.  DGG ( talk ) 06:03, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

Update Board-chair Information
Hello, I am wondering if it is possible to request an update to this article. I know that I personally can not make changes to the New America page as an employee of the company, but would like to help correct outdated information. In the second paragraph, Eric Schmidt is listed as board chairman, which he has not been since 2016. Linked here is an updated list of New America’s board members as a source: https://www.newamerica.org/board/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lmcarthur95 (talk • contribs) 19:59, 30 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the talk-page prompt. Klbrain (talk) 21:56, 9 November 2019 (UTC)

✅

title: Talk:New America (organization)