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Grey import vehicle

Grey import vehicles are new or used motor vehicles and motorcycles legally imported from another country through channels other than the maker's official distribution system or a third-party channel officially authorized by the manufacturer. The synonymous term parallel import is sometimes substituted.

Car makers frequently arbitrage markets, setting the price according to local market conditions so the same vehicle will have different real prices in different territories. Grey import vehicles circumvent this profit-maximization strategy. Car makers and local distributors sometimes regard grey imports as a threat to their network of franchised dealerships, but independent distributors do not since more cars of an odd brand bring in money from service and spare parts.

In order for the arbitrage to work, there must be some means to reduce, eliminate, or reverse whatever savings could be achieved by purchasing the car in the lower-priced territory. Examples of such barriers include regulations preventing import or requiring costly vehicle modifications. In some countries, such as Vietnam, the import of grey-market vehicles has largely been banned.

Overview

Grey imports are generally used vehicles, although some are new, particularly in Europe where the European Union tacitly approves grey imports from other EU countries. In 1998, the European Commission fined Volkswagen for attempting to prevent prospective buyers from Germany and Austria from going to Italy to buy new VWs at lower pre-tax prices; pre-tax price is lower in Italy, as in Denmark, due to higher tax on cars. It is even possible for car buyers in the United Kingdom to buy right-hand drive cars in EU countries with right-hand traffic where left-hand drive cars are the norm.

Japanese used vehicle exporting is a large global business, as rigorous road tests and high depreciation make such vehicles worth very little (in Japan) after six years, and strict environmental laws make vehicle disposal expensive. Consequently, it is profitable to export them to other countries with left-hand traffic, such as Australia, New Zealand, the Republic of Ireland, the United Kingdom, Malta, South Africa, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia, Mozambique, Malaysia, Bangladesh and Cyprus. Some have even been exported to countries such as Peru, Paraguay, Russia, Mongolia, Yemen, Burma, Canada, and the United Arab Emirates, despite the fact that these countries drive on the right. It is actually because of these vehicles' RHD configuration that many of them are sent to LHD countries in the first place, for use as mail delivery vehicles. Many Japanese market Jeep Cherokees, for example, have found new use with rural mail carriers in the United States.

Thailand is the third largest exporter of brand new and used right-hand drive cars after Japan and Singapore, because of that country's high-volume production of diesel 4x4 vehicles such as the Toyota Hilux Vigo, Toyota Fortuner, Mitsubishi L200, Nissan Navara, Ford Ranger, Chevy Colorado, and others. The Toyota Vigo is the most exported vehicle by parallel exporters. Unlike Japanese and Singaporean exports, the majority of Thailand's grey exports are of new vehicles and the market is dominated by two companies. One of them known as Alpha Automobile Co., Ltd. These trucks are also exported many countries include Japan due to Japanese domestic makers no longer officially selling them through authorized dealers there.

Similarly, there are exports of left hand drive (LHD) used cars from Germany to countries in Eastern Europe, some EU countries (less likely Spain, Portugal and Greece) and West Africa (especially Ghana and Nigeria, not Senegal and its surrounding countries). Some cars in the United States are sold only as export by insurance companies due to them having been stolen and recovered, or damaged in other ways.

United States
Because the United States and Canada uniquely have not signed onto United Nations Economic Commission for Europe standards for automobile design (see World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations), they use an anomalous set of motor vehicle safety and emission regulations.

For the U.S., these are developed and administered by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). They differ significantly in detail from the international UN Regulations used throughout the rest of the world.

From 1976 to 1988, individual Americans were actually able to obtain cars conforming to World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations standards and "convert" them to vehicles compliant with U.S. regulations - this was known as the "grey market," in that it was a legal activity parallel to officially sanctioned manufacturer efforts.

Vehicle manufacturers face considerable expense to type-certify a vehicle for U.S. sale – this amount is not widely publicized, but Automotive News cites a 2013 model vehicle where this modification cost US$42 million. This cost particularly affects low-volume manufacturers and models, most notably the makers of high end sports cars. However, larger companies such as Alfa Romeo and Peugeot have also cited costs of "federalizing" their vehicle lineups as a disincentive to re-enter the U.S. market.

Pre-1968: Era of Freedom
During the Second World War American servicemen stationed in Europe began to experience the benefits of the nimble British sports cars, and many shipped them home on their return. There were no legal restrictions to this behavior until 1967. Some owners even acted as sales reps for manufacturers who were happy to help, leading to official imports and the British sports car craze in North America. As with future waves of imported cars, this led the U.S. automakers to respond by introducing home grown models, such as the Nash-Healey, Ford Vega, Ford Thunderbird, and Chevrolet Corvette.

1968: Walled Garden
Beginning in 1968, U.S. regulations surrounding vehicle importing became far harsher, and many vehicles, like the Mini, were immediately excluded from the market.

NHTSA and EPA regulations post 1968 criminalize the possession of a vehicle not meeting U.S. standards. Exceptions exist for foreign nationals touring the U.S. in their own vehicle and for cars imported for Show and Display purposes.

Response of Market Demand
Because of the unavailability of certain car models, demand for grey market vehicles arose during the Malaise era in the late 1970s. Importing them into the US involved modifying or adding certain equipment, such as headlamps, sidemarker lights, bumpers, and a catalytic converter as required by the relevant regulations. The NHTSA and EPA would review the paperwork and then approve possession of the vehicle. It was also possible for these agencies to reject the application and order the automobile destroyed or re-exported. The grey market provided an alternative method for Americans to acquire desirable vehicles, and still obtain certification.

Tens of thousands of cars were imported this way each year during the 1980s. The vast majority of these imports were by individuals importing just one car. Many otherwise unavailable vehicles entered the US via the grey market, like the Citroën CX, Range Rover Classic, Renault 5 Turbo, and Mercedes-Benz G-Class.

1988: Crackdown
The grey market was successful enough that it ate significantly into the business of Mercedes-Benz in North America and their dealers. The corporation launched a successful multi-million-dollar congressional lobbying effort to stop private importation of vehicles not officially intended for the U.S. An organisation called AICA (Automotive Importers Compliance Association) was formed by importers in California, Florida, New York, Texas, and elsewhere to counter some of these actions by Mercedes lobbyists, but the Motor Vehicle Safety Compliance Act was passed in 1988, effectively ending private import of grey-market vehicles to the United States. There have been allegations of improper lobbying, but the issue has never been raised in court.

As a result of being practically banned, the grey market declined from 66,900 vehicles in 1985 to 300 vehicles in 1995. It is no longer possible to import a non-U.S. vehicle into the United States as a personal import, with four exceptions, none of which permits Americans to buy recent vehicles not officially available in the United States.

Registered Importer
After 1988, a vehicle not originally built to U.S. specifications can, under certain, very limited circumstances be imported through a registered importer or independent commercial importer, who modifies the vehicle to comply with US equipment and safety regulations and then certifies it as compliant, at enormous expense. In practice, this avenue is nearly impossible, even for Bill Gates. Those who import nonconforming motor vehicles sometimes bring in more than one car at a time to spread the substantial cost of the necessary destructive testing, modification, and safety certification. Destructive crash testing is not always needed if the vehicle can be shown to be substantially similar to a model sold in the U.S.

Canadian cars in U.S.
Even Canadian-market vehicles may not meet these requirements. Since Canadian regulations are similar to those in the U.S., an individual can import a vehicle manufactured to Canadian motor vehicle safety standards if the original manufacturer issues a letter stating that the vehicle also conforms to U.S. motor vehicle standards. The decision to issue a compliance letter is solely at the discretion of the manufacturer, even if the vehicle is known to meet U.S. standards. Before issuing a compliance letter, most manufacturers request proof that the owner of the vehicle is a resident of Canada, and that the car was registered and used in Canada for a minimum period. This is done because the manufacturers maintain separate pricing structures for the U.S. and Canadian markets.

25-year rule
In 1989, NHTSA granted vehicles over 25 years of age dispensation from the rules it administers, since these are presumed to be collector vehicles. However, there are two exceptions to the rule. One is California, where vehicle emissions requirements make it difficult to register a classic vehicle from overseas. (California Smog Check is mandated for automobiles 1976 and newer.) In 21 states, mini trucks (JDM market kei trucks) of any age can be legally imported and registered as a utility vehicle with on-road use and top speed restrictions varying by state, although states that allow mini trucks to be operated on public roads prohibit their operation on Interstate highways. In 2021, Maine began deregistering third-generation Mitsubishi Delica vans that were legally imported through the dispensation by classifying it as an off-road all-terrain vehicle. Rhode Island also deregistered legally imported Kei cars (including non-van models) in October 2021, citing a best practices guideline (non-legally binding) issued by the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators.

JDM
Some Americans are interested in Japanese domestic market vehicles, like the Nissan Skyline. In 1999, a California company called Motorex had a number of Nissan Skyline R33 GTS25s crash-tested. They submitted their information to NHTSA and petitioned for 1990–1999 GT-Rs and GTSs to be declared eligible for import. Many Skylines were subsequently imported through Motorex. This lasted until late 2005, when NHTSA learned not all 1990 through 1999 Skyline models would perform identically in crash testing. Motorex had submitted information for only the R33, but had asserted that the data applied to R32, R33, and R34 models. NHTSA determined that only 1996–1998 R33 models have been demonstrated as capable of being modified to meet the federal motor vehicle safety standards, and that only those models are eligible for import. In March 2006, Motorex ceased all imports and Motorex principal Hiroaki "Hiro" Nanahoshi was arrested and held on $1 million bail on financial, kidnapping, and assault charges.

Market demand signals from grey market
Penetrating the market via the grey market first, is a valid market entry strategy. The Lamborghini Countach was initially only available as a grey market vehicle (from 1976 to 1985), as were the Range Rover and Mercedes-Benz G-Class. These automakers later made US models to meet the demand.

This avenue of vehicle availability was increasingly successful, especially in cases where the US model of a vehicle was less powerful and/or less well equipped than versions available in other markets. For example, Mercedes-Benz chose to offer only the sluggish 380SEL model in 1981 to Americans, some of whom wanted the much faster 500SEL available in the rest of the world. BMW had the same issue with their 745i Turbo.

Nissan developed the 2008 Nissan GT-R to meet this market demand in the United States.

As with the earlier G-Wagen and 560SEL, Mercedes-Benz was also able to use the grey market to read market demand signals – with the Smart Fortwo, which was imported in this manner in 2004–2006, prior to its official U.S. release in 2007.

Canada
Cars not originally manufactured to Canadian-market specifications may be legally imported once they are 15 or more years old. This has led to the import of many Japanese sports cars such as the Nissan Skyline. The only categorical exception to the 15-year rule is that many – but not all – vehicles manufactured to United States-market specifications can legally be imported into Canada under the compliance modification and inspection program administered by the Registrar of Imported Vehicles. Typically, modifications to meet Canadian standards include the installation of daytime running lights and tether anchors to permit secure attachment of infant car seats, documentation indicating that any repairs required in response to the original manufacturer's factory recalls are complete, and passenger cars assembled on or after September 1, 2007 are also required to have an immobilization system that meets the CMVSS 114 standard. Labelling of the vehicle to indicate its imported status, to warn that the odometer is counting in miles (as made-for-Canada odometers have used kilometres since 1976) and to translate safety-related warning labels (such as airbag maintenance procedures) is typically also required. Speedometers in US and most Canadian vehicles indicate both miles per hour and km/h, either with dual calibration or with a single set of numbers that can be made to display miles or kilometres at the driver's option, so are usually left unmodified.

In March 2007, Transport Canada initiated proposed rulemaking to change the importation laws such that vehicles not originally manufactured to Canadian-market specifications would be eligible for import only once they are 25 years old, rather than the present 15-year cutoff rule. The main impetus behind this proposal is the significant influx of Japanese-market vehicles in Canada in recent years, particularly in Western provinces such as British Columbia due to geographical proximity to Asian ports of departure. BC's public auto insurance administrative body, Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, in 2007 released a report finding that right-hand drive vehicles are involved in 40% more crashes than left-hand drive vehicles in that province.

New Zealand
In the 1980s, New Zealand eased import restrictions, and reduced import tariffs on cars. Consequently, large volumes of used cars from Japan appeared on the local market, at a time when most cars in New Zealand were locally assembled, and expensive compared to other countries, with most used cars available being comparatively old.

Local buyers now had a much wider choice of models, but despite specifications being higher than so-called "NZ New" cars, there were many problems with "clocking" or odometer fraud, with the odometer wound back to display a much lower mileage. Other problems include vehicles damaged in accidents in Japan. This is in contrast to those imported from Australia, for which the history of such vehicles, including write-offs, is readily available from insurance companies.

However, the widespread availability of used Japanese imports prompted official importers to reduce the price of brand new cars, and in 1998, New Zealand became one of the few countries in the world to remove all import tariffs on motor vehicles.

Grey market vehicles comprise a majority of cars in the national fleet. These secondhand imports have achieved 'normal' status and are used and serviced without comment throughout society. A huge industry servicing and supplying parts for these vehicles has developed. After years of trying to stop grey imports the car companies themselves have become involved, importing in competition with their own new models and providing owners with spare part and repair services. Russia and many African countries, albeit not South Africa where second-hand car imports are illegal, import large quantities of secondhand vehicles from Japan and Singapore.

Nevertheless, a great many used vehicles are imported, 94.6 percent of which come from Japan, most of which are Japanese makes. Most of the other makes are German, such as Audi, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche and Volkswagen. There are a smaller number of United States makes such as Chevrolet and Chrysler, which were built in right hand drive for the Japanese market. Although in heavy decline from 2005, used-vehicle import totals are higher than those of vehicles first registered in New Zealand. In 2006, 123,390 ex-overseas vehicles were registered, compared to 76,804 brand new vehicles.

Used vehicles must, with some exceptions, be right-hand drive, and they must comply with recognised European, Australian, Japanese, or American emission and safety standards, or they are ineligible for import to New Zealand.

In some cases a left-hand drive vehicle can be imported into New Zealand if it meets certain conditions or is a specialized vehicle. Left-hand drive vehicles 20 years or older normally do not have to meet any special requirements but must weigh no more than 3500 kg.

Ireland
Japanese used car importing has been quite common in Ireland since the 1980s. The imported cars are cheaper than local used cars due to the very low value of used cars in Japan (and to an extent, used products in general), and a much larger range of specifications are available on Japanese models compared to the very limited ranges sold locally – even in comparison to the UK, model ranges of Japanese cars can be very limited –  mostly due to the high vehicle-registration tax and other taxes imposed on new cars sold in Ireland.

For example, the Toyota Corollas sold in the late 1980s up until the late 1990s (E90 and E100 series) were only available in Ireland in one specification level, with few features and only the base 1.3 litre petrol and diesel engines. In Japan, however, 1.5 and 1.6 litre engines were also available, with around 6 different trim levels, options such as sunroofs, central locking and electric windows available on many specs as early as 1989, ABS and driver airbags optional since 1991, four-wheel drive, and performance GT models. Very basic saloons and diesel-engined models with automatic transmissions also appealed to taxi drivers.

In more recent years, Japanese imports have become less common with typical family cars, probably due to the great change in the Irish economy over the past 20 years – people generally have larger incomes now, and sales in new cars have soared. Imports from Japan has become more of a specialty market now – importing of sports models not originally available in Europe such as the Mitsubishi FTO, Toyota Corolla Levin/Toyota Sprinter Trueno, Toyota Starlet Glanza and Honda Integra has become quite popular, and sports cars like the Nissan Skyline GT-R, Toyota Supra and Mazda RX-7 are more easily available as imports. Also, small commercial kei car models such as the Daihatsu Midget II and Nissan S-Cargo are used by some businesses as advertising aids, as they are quite distinctive and eye-catching on the roads in Ireland.

No modifications are required for Japanese imported cars to be registered and driven on the roads in Ireland. One disadvantage is that Japan uses a different FM radio band than everywhere else, so a band expander or a replacement stereo system is required to receive the full FM band used locally. Like all other cars used on public roads in Ireland, Japanese imports have to pass the National Car Test.

Other used imports sold in Ireland are from the UK, the most readily identifiable being those from General Motors, which badges its cars in the UK as Vauxhalls, not as Opels as in Ireland. As of 2007 the number of cars being Imported into the Republic of Ireland from both Northern Ireland and Great Britain is at record high levels due to high new-car taxation in Ireland and the fact that UK cars are of a higher spec than Irish ones. This trend was highlighted by RTÉ in a consumer programme entitled "Highly Recommended".

United Kingdom
In the United Kingdom, many people have chosen to buy new cars in other EU member states, where pre-tax prices are much lower than in the UK, and then import them into their own country, where they only pay the UK's rate of value added tax (VAT). This is especially the case in Northern Ireland, as pre-tax prices in the Republic of Ireland are kept low because of a vehicle registration tax levied on top of VAT. Other UK buyers can also request a model in RHD when ordering from a dealer in continental Europe for a small supplement. Motor dealers in the EU are compelled under EU competition law to supply right-hand drive models at the same price as LHD models should a buyer request it. Strictly speaking, such imports are known as parallel imports.

Warranties on new cars bought in an EU member state are valid throughout the EU, meaning that a UK resident who has bought a new car in another member state and then imports it into the UK will be covered by the same warranty. However, whereas UK warranties tend to be for three years, those in other EU countries may be only for one or two.

There are also some Japanese imported cars found in the UK, the most popular being the Mazda Eunos Roadster, Nissan Figaro and Mitsubishi Pajero as well as performance cars such as Nissan Skylines, Mitsubishi FTOs and highly tuned Subaru Impreza and Toyota Supra variants that were never officially imported into the UK. These cars tend to be cheaper than official UK imports, but often have better Japanese domestic market specification levels by comparison. The range of Japanese vehicles in the UK is rising all the time as UK customers see the impressive high spec, low-mileage Japanese vehicles on the roads. Each month new models are being imported by dealers and rapidly become popular on the UK market.

Importing a vehicle from outside of the EU may require the vehicle to be subjected to an IVA test if the vehicle is under ten years of age. This test is carried out by the government agency known as the DVSA. If the vehicle is left hand drive this is fairly straightforward to submit an IVA test application and then present the vehicle to the local test station. The vehicle will likely need changes to lighting systems e.g. amber rear indicators, addition of rear foglight and correct UK headlights. If the vehicle being imported is right hand drive then it must be a personal import i.e. owned by yourself for at least 6 months and you are returning to live in the UK permanently having lived outside of the EU for at least 12 months.

Australia
In Australia, the commercial import of used motor vehicles is significantly regulated and restricted by the Department of Infrastructure.

The allowed imports are limited to what are called special and enthusiast vehicles (SEVS), or cars manufactured 25 years ago and older (With the introduction of the ).

All vehicles imported into Australia must also be listed on the "Register of Approved Vehicles"

Limitations of vehicles manufactured after 1 January 1989 was to ensure compliance with the regulations governing safety of vehicles on Australian Roads that came into force on this date.

Until the present regulations entered force at the start of 2004, cars over 15 years old could be imported, and would need to gain a Vehicle Inspection in Australia (needed for registration transfer in many states anyway) and often safety modifications to ensure that they met with regulations that would have been in force at the time of their manufacture.

To bring a special or enthusiast vehicle into Australia, the importer must either apply to have the car added to the SEVS register, or import a car already listed on the register.

Vehicles can also be imported to Australia under what is known as a "Type Approval", this is generally used by remanufacturing companies who wish to import a vehicle that is commercially sold overseas, and remanufactured for use in Australia. Examples of vehicles such as this are the Chevrolet Camaro, the RAM Family of Trucks, and the Ford F-Series.

Grey imports can pose considerable challenges, due to Australia using Left Hand Traffic, as opposed to the more common Right-Hand Traffic.

This means that vehicles produced for compliance from a country that uses Right Hand Traffic would need a number of modifications to be compliant with the Australian Design Rules, these modifications must be compliant with the Vehicle Standards Bulletin 14, primarily the components that relate to Suspension and Steering, and Lighting

Vehicles imported into Australia must be complied by a Registered Automotive Workshop for use on the roads in Australia. This is different to a regular workshop as detailed in the Vehicle Inspection in Australia article, where a regular automotive workshop can be authorised to conduct vehicle safety inspections in most states.

External Territories
Australia's external territories include Christmas Island, the Cocos (Keeling) Islands and Norfolk Island.

You do not need to obtain an approval under the RVS legislation to import a road vehicle into an external Australian territory.

However, you do need to obtain an approval to import a road vehicle into Australia from an Australian external territory.

Russia
In Russia, grey imports, both new and used, comprised, at certain points, up to 80% of all automobile fleets, because of domestic production being unable to meet the market demands, both in numbers and in quality, especially in the early to mid-1990s.

In western Russia, most imports were from Germany, while to the east of the Ural Mountains where the cost of delivery made both the German imports and domestic productions particularly unattractive, a thriving industry of importing used vehicles from Japan developed. Even though Russia is a left hand drive country, RHD vehicles are nevertheless legal there, provided that some adjustments (e.g. retuning the headlights) are made, but these are cheap and easily done, thus making the cheap and well-built Japanese cars, trucks and tractors (which proved sturdy enough to withstand severe Russian climate, bad roads, often inadequate servicing and questionable quality of fuel/oil) particularly attractive to the customer. In main import centers such as Vladivostok and Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk a large-scale service and aftermarket industry developed, including parts depots, auction houses, and logistic centers, all geared for servicing and supporting this relentless import drive. The authorities tried to fight this phenomenon to protect the domestic industry, but the effects have so far been mixed. While increasingly stringent technical requirements and stiffer import tariffs had some effect, they only managed to force the locals to import newer and more expensive vehicles, and to invent various quasi-legal ways to circumvent these regulations. Japanese manufacturers themselves have also stepped in, creating local assembly plants that produce new, left-hand drive models to try to compete with the grey imports.

South Korean used vehicle imports become highly prominent in Vladivostok, as the solution to save Russian market from sanctions they have caused by the suspension of Japanese used vehicle imports from 2014 onwards.

China
The parallel market has existed to a limited extent in China for several years, especially in port cities Tianjin and Dalian. The Shanghai free trade zone has a 'car dealer' where new cars imported from other territories are sold. Due to price arbitrage, these vehicles can be significantly cheaper than the same vehicle available from the official distributor. For example, a Porsche Cayenne parallel imported from the United States are priced significantly cheaper, sometimes up to CNY 200,000 ($30,000) than the official version sold in Chinese markets due to heavy dealer markups.

Hong Kong
Although Hong Kong is a Special administrative Region of China, the cars in Hong Kong are Right Hand Drive, which in contrast with China. Quite a lot of used cars from Japan are registered in Hong Kong, including both Japanese makes and even European makes, since both Hong Kong and Japan are right hand drive. In addition to used cars from Japan, some new cars are also independently imported too. In order to register the car in Hong Kong, the car must be right hand drive, less than seven years old, gasoline powered, meets Euro VIc emission and noise standards, with E-mark for all glasses, all lamps and safety belts, and an unleaded-fuel restrictor installed (if not present already). For cars over 20 years old, they can be imported as classic cars and do not have to meet Euro VIc emission standards. However, Hong Kong does not accept privacy windows. If a Japanese used car is fitted with privacy windows, it must be converted to AS-2 standard clear glass in order to register in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong does not have import tax for cars, however, the first registration tax is high. And the first registration tax rate is progressive, which means a higher price car will fall into a higher tax bracket. Since the used car values are mostly lower than new cars of the same model, used car can enjoy a lower tax rate due to depreciated car value.

Philippines
In the Philippines, the main source of import grey market vehicles, both passenger and commercial, is Japan. Second is Korea, third is the US via trans-shipments through Japan. Only one port, Port Irene, Cagayan, was open to grey market passenger vehicles between 2008 and 2014. Some dispute over the legality of importation of passenger vehicles arose and led to a Port Irene ban. Currently the Executive Order 418 has been upheld, thus banning the importation of used passenger vehicles into the Philippines. Commercial vehicles, special purpose vehicles are not under EO 418 and thus are currently being imported into Subic and Poro Point, San Fernando. Subic sees roughly 1 cargo ship per week, and has many licensed locators. A second port, Poro Point is, as of February 2014, once per month and is solely facilitated by Forerunner Multi-Resources as the licensed locator, and SASTRAD KK in Japan as the sole shipper.

There is a grey-area trade of used mini trucks from Japan flourishing in Cebu. Mini trucks are chopped in Japan, imported as "parts" and are re-assembled by welding chassis parts together. Cheap to buy, they are a staple of small businesses transporting goods.

Japan
In Japan, although the laws against grey import products were strict, and domestic car makers and authorized dealers have to conform the vehicle dimension standards and other various regulations differing from Europe and United States, the laws against grey-imported vehicles are very lax due to absence of import tariffs, and there are some grey imported vehicles that were never officially sold in the Japanese domestic market. These ranging from small city cars like Toyota Aygo and Smart ForTwo, to sports cars like AC Cobra and Chevrolet Camaro, to commercial vehicles and pickup trucks like the Toyota Tundra. Most cars were imported from their country of origin, and a few were converted to RHD, though some were later introduced to authorized dealers due to popular demand.

Some grey market importers have tried to import domestically-made export-only cars, such as the Subaru BRAT and Infiniti FX, back into Japan's grey market. In Japan, the term used to refer to this scene is called Gyakuyunyū (逆輸入), and this mainly applies to Japanese-branded vehicles. Also, due to NOx laws and some other differing regulations, pickup trucks like the Toyota Hilux are no longer officially distributed in the JDM, so importers continue to import foreign-built trucks into Japan.

The concept of Gyakuyunyu is referenced in the music album Gyakuyunyū: Kōwankyoku.

In Japan, foreign cars sold locally have traditionally been LHD, which is regarded as exotic or a status symbol. This even applies to British brands (although cars for the British market have the steering wheel on the right), in part because many have been imported via the US. Many tollbooths in Japan have a special lane for LHD vehicles. However, some US manufacturers have made RHD models for the Japanese market (namely the Ford Taurus and Chevrolet Cavalier), though with limited success; and as continental European brands become more popular, the preference is increasingly for RHD models, many of which are re-exported to countries like New Zealand as grey imports, along with Japanese models.

Sweden
In Sweden, the main source of grey market vehicles is via Germany, which has more liberal laws and better tax deals on new imported cars. Many used cars also come from Germany, which has a bigger domestic market and rigorous roadworthiness tests. There are no age restrictions on imported vehicles, as such.

Thailand
In Thailand, most grey imports are expensive, rare, and/or sports cars. Most are right-hand drive cars from the United Kingdom, Japan, or Hong Kong, though some are brought in from the US (as left-hand drive cars).

Mercedes-Benz Thailand, an authorised distributor, does exist, but many Mercedes-Benz cars are imported and sold by grey importers. As of 2011, Mercedes-Benz Thailand has a new policy of not providing warranty work to grey-market imports.

The new Thai law prohibits the importation of used cars, effective on December 10, 2019.

Trinidad and Tobago
In Trinidad and Tobago, nearly all used imports come from Japan, with some vehicles coming from Thailand and Singapore. Before February 2016, cars under 6 years old could be legally imported. Since February 2016, no car can be imported and registered if over 4 years old. An import licence is required and most imports are through dealerships. No new importer dealerships are permitted.

Senegal
Grey imports from France are generally being most common in Senegal. There are also grey imports from Spain, especially vehicles formerly being owned by their taxi companies, though some are brought in from Italy or even Belgium.

Slovakia
Grey import in Slovakia exists in some ways. As part of the EU, importing vehicles from member states is not restricted at all, although imported vehicle has to be inspected for origin (VIN number manipulation, possible stolen vehicle legalization) Main destinations for import are Germany, Austria, Italy, and the Czech Republic.

Imports from non-member EU states are restricted by age. Personal vehicles are restricted to 8 years (from date of first registration to date of customs declaration), and vehicles intended to be used for business are restricted to 5 years. Vehicles imported from non-member states which are not approved for European roads have to pass import inspection, and modified to meet restrictions. For vehicles from the U.S. or Canada it is mandatory to change headlights, or adjust them for the EU bulb pattern, change red rear turn signals to orange ones, separate them from brake wiring, and add fog lights. Importing cars with RHD has been allowed from 20 May 2018, but the headlights and fog lights have to be converted to the continental pattern.

Pakistan
Grey imports in Pakistan do exist; however, it is limited by passenger cars no older than 3 years old and 4x4 jeeps or off-road passenger vehicles no older than 5 years old at the time of arrival in the Port of Entry. There could be a significant saving on luxury cars in Pakistan, as the official dealer channels may be excessive in price, and also the used car markets may also be excessive in price.

The Federal Board of Revenue for Pakistan gives the importer three scenarios which a passenger vehicle could be imported into the country. These scenarios are as follows:
 * Personal Baggage scheme
 * Transfer of Residence scheme
 * Gift scheme

The Pakistan Customs Duty rates of imports, providing that the vehicles (excluding jeeps) meet the age requirements for Pakistan, are shown below:
 * Up to 800 CC (other than US$6,600 Asian Makes);
 * From 801 CC to 1000 CC US$5,500
 * From 1001 CC to 1300 CC US$11,000
 * From 1301 CC to 1500 CC US$15,400
 * From 1501 CC to 1600 CC US$18,700
 * From 1601 CC to 1800 CC US$23,100

In 2018, after years of appealing with the Pakistan Government, the Classic Car Club of Pakistan was delighted to announce that the Pakistan Government has finally allowed the importation of classic vehicles. The Express Tribune of Pakistan reported on the subject by stating;

"...Earlier in the budget announcement for fiscal year 2018–19 at the end of April, the government had said that it would impose a flat duty of $5,000 on the import of vintage or classic cars and jeeps. A formal notification was issued by the FBR on July 3..."

“...The federal government is pleased to exempt vintage or classic cars and jeeps meant for transport of persons on the import thereof from customs duty, regulatory duty, additional customs duty, federal excise duty, sales tax and withholding tax as are in excess of the cumulative amount of US dollars five thousand per unit,” said the FBR notification.

The duties have been exempted in exercise of the powers of the Customs Act 1969, Federal Excise Act 2005 and Sales Tax Act. However, it clarified that vintage or classic cars and jeeps mean old and used automotive vehicles, falling under PCT Code 87.03 of the First Schedule to the Customs Act 1969 (IV of 1969), manufactured prior to January 1, 1968. APP..."

Greece
Grey imports do exist in Greece. However, they are rare, expensive, and are really limited by small and medium vehicles must be new and not more than 15 days old, buses, vans, and heavy vehicles cannot be more than 25 days old, and vehicles have to be left hand drive before arrival in Greece. Vehicles from left hand traffic countries must be at least 3 years old, have to be converted to left hand drive, and must be inspected before arrival.

The majority of grey imported vehicles originate from either Germany, Netherlands and France, and was the most preferred way to purchase a used vehicle until 2020, when the Ministry of Energy and Environment had announced environmental tax measures that:

 * Prohibited the import of vehicles that meet Euro III (or lower) standards
 * As for Euro IV vehicles, the importer has to pay a fee of €3,000
 * As for Euro V vehicles, the importer has to pay a fee of €1,000
 * As for Euro VI vehicles, the importer does not pay any environmental fees upon importing
 * The only exception from the restrictions above is when an imported vehicle is over 30 years old and intended for historical use only.

Cambodia
Used cars in Cambodia are mainly imported from Taiwan, United States, Russia, Japan, South Korea and the GCC countries (mostly UAE). Used vehicles from Germany and also the Netherlands are rarely imported there due to the lack of port cities and also due to troubled and highly problematic cost of delivery.

Singapore
As of 2019, the Land Transport Authority mandates that vehicles imported into Singaporean soil must be brand new or manufactured at most three years ago.

Armenia
Used cars in Armenia are mainly imported from Japan, Singapore and the United States. There are also used cars from European countries, but they are mostly over 15 years old.

Kyrgyzstan
In Kyrgyzstan, Grey imports of used cars from Japan and the United States are generally most common there. Used cars from European countries are predominantly more than 15 years old, and mostly limited to German car brands.

Suriname
Grey imports from Japan and Singapore are generally being most common there in Suriname. LHD vehicles are also allowed on the road, but importation of LHD vehicles (especially from the US) is prohibited. Used vehicles from the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland, Australia and New Zealand are rarely imported there.

Most of the privately owned buses are imported from Japan, since they are already RHD. Most state-owned buses, however, are from the US and the doors have to be repositioned.

Myanmar
In spite of the change to driving on the right, most passenger cars in the country today are RHD, being second-hand vehicles imported from Japan, Thailand, and Singapore. Now, only left hand drive can be imported to Myanmar and the reason behind is that right hand drive cars are unsuitable for Myanmar's road traffic system.

Caribbean
In many Caribbean islands where traffic drives on the left, such as the British Virgin Islands, U.S. Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, the Bahamas and Turks and Caicos Islands, most passenger cars are LHD, being imported from the United States or even Korea. Only government cars, buses and vehicles imported from Japan are RHD. The US Virgin Islands (originally a Danish protectorate which drove on the left, as did Denmark until the early 20th century) are particularly notorious for a high accident rate caused by American tourists from the mainland who are unfamiliar with driving on the left in their rental cars – the confusion from which is obviously compounded by using a LHD vehicle.

title: Grey import vehicle


text:
James Maitland, 8th Earl of Lauderdale

James Maitland, 8th Earl of Lauderdale, (26 January 1759 – 10 September 1839) was Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland and a Scottish representative peer in the House of Lords.

Early years
Born at Haltoun House near Ratho, the eldest son and heir of James Maitland, 7th Earl of Lauderdale, whom he succeeded in 1789, he became a controversial Scottish politician and writer. His tutor had been the learned Dr. Andrew Dalzell and James Maitland then attended the universities of Edinburgh and Glasgow, completing his education in Paris where, it is said, he became radicalised.

Parliamentary career
Upon his return home in 1780, he was admitted a member of the Faculty of Advocates and successfully stood for election to parliament the same year. From 1780 until 1784 he was a member of parliament representing Newport and from 1784 to 1789, Malmesbury. In the House of Commons he supported the prominent Whig Charles Fox and took an active part in debate and was one of the managers of the Impeachment of Warren Hastings.

From 1789, in the House of Lords, where he was a Scottish representative peer, he was prominent as an opponent of the policy of William Pitt the Younger and the English government with regard to France. He was a frequent speaker and also distinguished himself by his active opposition to the Habeas Corpus Suspension Act, the Sedition Bill, and other measures. Upon the outbreak of the French Revolution, of which he was thought to be in sympathy, he ostentatiously appeared in the house in the rough costume of Jacobinism.

In July 1792, he fought a bloodless duel with Benedict Arnold after impugning Arnold's honour in the House of Lords.

French Revolution
In 1792, in the company of John Moore, Lord Lauderdale travelled again to France. The attack on the Tuileries and the imprisonment of King Louis XVI took place three days after the earl's arrival in the French capital. After the massacres of 2 September, the British ambassador having left Paris, the earl left Paris on the 4th for Calais. However, he returned to Paris the following month and did not leave for London until 5 December. Upon his return from France, he published a Journal during the residence in France from the beginning of August to the middle of December 1792.

According to the antiquarian Andrew Thomson, "James Maitland 8th Earl of Lauderdale was known as 'Citizen Maitland'. An extremist, he was in Paris during the French Revolution and was a personal friend of Jean-Paul Marat. He rarely visited Scotland". The earl had helped to found the British Society of the Friends of the People in 1792.

New peerage
Upon the formation of the Grenville administration in February 1806, Lauderdale was made a peer of the United Kingdom as Baron Lauderdale of Thirlestane and sworn a member of the Privy Council. For a short time from July 1806 he was keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland.

Napoleonic treaty
On 2 August 1806 the earl, fully fluent in French, departed for France, invested with full powers to conclude peace, the negotiations for which had been for several weeks carried on by the Earl of Yarmouth. Arriving on the 5th he and Yarmouth set about the arduous task of treating with Napoleon and Tallyrand. Yarmouth was recalled on the 14th and Lauderdale was left alone.

In his 'Memoirs ' Eugène François Vidocq wrote that circa Battle of Copenhagen (1807) Boulogne was also bombed. According to Vidocq at this moment Lauderdale was right in Boulogne, and was almost lynched by Frenchmen.

He was an Englishman, and the exasperated people were desirous of revenging themselves on him: they surrounded him, mobbed him, and pressed upon him; and in defiance of the protection of two officers who were attending him, they showered stones and mud upon him from all sides. Pale, trembling, and faltering, the peer thought he was about to fall a sacrifice, when sword in hand, I cleared my way through the rabble, crying 'Destruction to whoever strikes him!' I harangued the multitude, dispersed them, and led the way to the harbour, where, without being subjected to further insult, he embarked on board a flag of truce boat. He soon reached the English squadron, which the next evening renewed the bombardment.

Following the renewal of hostilities he left Paris for London on 9 October. A full account of the progress and termination of the negotiations appeared in the London Gazette of 21 October 1806.

After acting as the leader of the Whigs in Scotland, Lauderdale became a Tory and voted against the Reform Bill of 1832. Lord Lauderdale was made a Privy Counsellor in 1806 and a Knight of the Thistle in 1821.

Banner dispute
In 1672 on the death of the Earl of Dundee, the Duke of Lauderdale was appointed Hereditary Bearer for the Sovereign of the Standard of Scotland, and this right was retained by his heirs until 1910.

In 1790, James Maitland, 8th Earl of Lauderdale matriculated arms in the character of Hereditary Bearer for the Sovereign of the Standard of Scotland and Hereditary Bearer for the Sovereign of the National Flag of Scotland.

In 1952 after a meeting with the Earls of Lauderdale and Dundee the Lord Lyon advised the Queen to confirm the Earl of Lauderdale's right to bear the saltire as the Bearer of the National Flag of Scotland, and to confirm that the Earl of Dundee as the Bearer of the Royal Banner bears the Royal Standard of the lion rampant.

Writings

Maitland wrote an Inquiry into the Nature and Origin of Public Wealth (1804 and 1819), in which he introduced the concept that has come to be known as the "Lauderdale Paradox": there is an inverse correlation between public wealth and private wealth; an increase in the one can only come at the cost of a decrease in the other. This work, which was translated into French and Italian, produced a controversy between the author and Lord Brougham; The Depreciation of the Paper-currency of Great Britain Proved (1812); and other writings of a similar nature. The "Inquiry" was the first work to draw attention to the economic consequences of a budget surplus or deficit and its influence on the expansion or contraction of the economy, and was thus the basis of the later Keynesian economic theories which are now widely applied.

Death
He died at Thirlestane Castle, near Lauder, Berwickshire, at 80.

He is buried in the Maitland vault, also called the Lauderdale Aisle, at St Mary's Collegiate Church, Haddington.

Family
On 15 August 1782, he married Eleanor Todd (1762–1856), the only daughter and heiress of Anthony Todd, Secretary of the General Post Office. They had ten children: None of his seven sons were married.
 * Lady Eleanor, married James Balfour (parents of James Maitland Balfour MP, and grandparents of Prime Minister Arthur Balfour)
 * Lady Mary, married Edward Stanley of Cross Hall, near Ormskirk. Mother of Edward Stanley MP.
 * Lady Julia, married in 1823 Sir John Warrender, 5th Baronet (1786–1867)
 * James Maitland, 9th Earl of Lauderdale (1784–1860)
 * Admiral Anthony Maitland, 10th Earl of Lauderdale (1785–1863)
 * Five other sons.

Works

 * An Inquiry into The Nature and Origin of Public Wealth and into the Means and Causes of its Increase 1804 (second edition 1819)

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

title: James Maitland, 8th Earl of Lauderdale


text:
Valley of the Ten Peaks

Valley of the Ten Peaks (Vallée des Dix Pics) is a valley in Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada, which is crowned by ten notable peaks and also includes Moraine Lake. The valley can be reached by following the Moraine Lake road near Lake Louise. The ten peaks were originally named by Samuel Allen, an early explorer of the region, who simply referred to them by using the numerals from one to ten in the Stoney First Nations Language. He may have learned the terms from his Native American guides, who helped him with the horses. The Nakoda–also known as the Stoney Indians–is a tribe whose culture and dialect are closely related to that of the Assiniboine First Nation, from whom they are believed to have separated in the mid-1700s, and who roamed large parts of the prairies and mountains of western Alberta well into British Columbia. The secluded Valley of the Ten Peaks was part of their original homeland. Gradually, though, all but three of the mountains were renamed in honour of noteworthy individuals, including Allen himself.

Mount Hungabee was not included in the original peak list by Allen, even though it is higher than Wenkchemna Peak, the latter of which is really an extension of Hungabee.

Peaks
The ten peaks, in order of how they are numbered from east to west, are:

There are other peaks visible from within the valley as well, including Mount Temple, Mount Babel and Eiffel Peak. Fay Glacier is developed between Mount Babel, Mount Fay, Mount Little and Mount Bowlen.

The Valley of the Ten Peaks was featured on the reverse side of the 1969 and 1979 issues of the Canadian twenty dollar bill; see.

The Neil Colgan Hut, a mountaineering destination and the highest permanent structure in Canada, can be reached in 8 to 12 hours of climbing the Perren Route from Moraine Lake.

title: Valley of the Ten Peaks


text:
Richard Anuszkiewicz

Richard Joseph Anuszkiewicz (May 23, 1930 – May 19, 2020) was an American painter, printmaker, and sculptor.

Life and work
Anuszkiewicz was born in Erie, Pennsylvania, the son of Victoria (Jankowski) and Adam Anuszkiewicz, who worked in a paper mill. His parents were Polish immigrants. He first studied art under Joseph Plavcan while still in high school, later describing him as his most significant influence. Anuszkiewicz trained at the Cleveland Institute of Art in Cleveland, Ohio (1948–1953), and then with Josef Albers at the Yale University School of Art in New Haven, Connecticut (1953–1955), where he earned his Masters of Fine Arts. While at Yale, Anuszkiewicz was roommates with a fellow abstract painter of Polish descent and a student of Albers, Julian Stanczak.

He was one of the leading figures in the Op Art movement during the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s. Victor Vasarely in France and Bridget Riley in England were his primary international counterparts. In 1964, Life magazine called him "one of the new wizards of Op". While reflecting on a New York City gallery show of Anuszkiewicz's from 2000, New York Times art critic Holland Cotter described Anuszkiewicz's paintings: "The drama — and that feels like the right word — is in the subtle chemistry of complementary colors, which makes the geometry glow as if light were leaking out from behind it." Anuszkiewicz exhibited at the Venice Biennale, Florence Biennale and Documenta, and his works are in permanent collections internationally. He was elected into the National Academy of Design in 1992 as an Associate member, and became a full member in 1994.

Style
Anuszkiewicz was concerned with the optical changes that occur when different high-intensity colors are applied to the same geometric configurations. Most of his work comprises visual investigations of formal structural and color effects, many of them nested square forms similar to the work of his mentor Josef Albers. In his series, "Homage to the Square", Albers experimented with juxtapositions of color, and Anuszkiewicz developed these concepts further. Anuszkiewicz continued to produce works in the Op Art style over the subsequent decades of his career.

In 1963, Anuszkiewicz summarized his approach to painting as: "My work is of an experimental nature and has centered on an investigation into the effects of complementary colors of full intensity when juxtaposed and the optical changes that occur as a result, and a study of the dynamic effect of the whole under changing conditions of light, and the effect of light on color."

Selected collections holding works

 * Akron Art Museum, Akron, Ohio
 * Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo
 * Art Institute of Chicago
 * Blanton Museum of Art, University of Texas
 * Boca Raton Museum of Art
 * Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh
 * Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art
 * Cleveland Museum of Art
 * Columbus Museum of Art
 * Currier Museum of Art
 * Denver Art Museum
 * Detroit Institute of Arts
 * Flint Institute of Arts
 * Fogg Museum, Harvard University
 * The Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller Empire State Plaza Art Collection
 * Hokkaido Museum of Modern Art
 * Honolulu Museum of Art
 * Indiana University Art Museum, Bloomington
 * Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
 * Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville
 * Museum of Modern Art, New York
 * Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
 * Guggenheim Museum, New York
 * Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford
 * Whitney Museum of Art, New York
 * Richard M. Ross Art Museum, Ohio

Grants and awards

 * 1953: Pulitzer Traveling Fellowship
 * 1963: Charles of the Ritz Oil Painting Award
 * 1964: The Silvermine Guild Award for Oil Painting
 * 1977: Cleveland Arts Prize
 * 1980: Hassam Fund Purchase Award
 * 1988: Hassam Fund Purchase Award
 * 1994: New York State Art Teachers' Association Award
 * 1995: Emil and Dines Carlson Award
 * 1996: New Jersey Pride Award
 * 1997: Richard Florsheim Fund Grant
 * 2000: Lee Krasner Award
 * 2005: Lorenzo dei Medici Career Award, awarded at the Florence Biennale

Exhibitions
Anuskiewicz exhibited in many public collections around the world, including such New York galleries as Sidney Janis, The Contemporaries, and the Andrew Crispo Gallery.
 * 1955: Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio
 * 1966: Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, Ohio
 * 1967: The Hopkins Center, Hanover, New Hampshire
 * 1968: Kent State University, Kent, Ohio
 * 1972: Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville, Jacksonville, Florida
 * 1976: La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art, La Jolla, California
 * 1977: Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, Ohio
 * 1978: Ringling Museum, Sarasota, Florida
 * 1978: Allentown Art Museum, Allentown, Pennsylvania
 * 1979: Alex Rosenberg Gallery, New York City, New York
 * 1979: Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts
 * 1980: Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, New York
 * 1980: Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
 * 1984: Heckscher Museum of Art, Huntington, New York
 * 1984: Canton Art Institute, Canton, Ohio
 * 1986: Tampa Museum of Art, Tampa, Florida
 * 2005: Florence Biennale, Fortezza da Basso, Firenze, Italy

title: Richard Anuszkiewicz


text:
Henri Dutilleux

Henri Paul Julien Dutilleux (22 January 1916 – 22 May 2013) was a French composer of late 20th-century classical music. Among the leading French composers of his time, his work was rooted in the Impressionistic style of Debussy and Ravel, but in an idiosyncratic, individual style. Among his best known works are his early Flute Sonatine and Piano Sonata; concertos for cello, Tout un monde lointain... ("A whole distant world") and violin, L'arbre des songes ("The tree of dreams"); a string quartet known as Ainsi la nuit ("Thus the night"); and two symphonies: No. 1 (1951) and No. 2 Le Double (1959).

Works were commissioned from him by such major artists as Charles Munch, George Szell, Mstislav Rostropovich, the Juilliard String Quartet, Isaac Stern, Paul Sacher, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Simon Rattle, Renée Fleming, and Seiji Ozawa. In addition to composing, he worked as the Head of Music Production for Radio France for 18 years. He also taught at the École Normale de Musique de Paris and at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique, and was twice composer in residence at the Tanglewood Music Center in Lenox, Massachusetts.

Among Dutilleux's many awards and honours were the Grand Prix de Rome (1938) and the Ernst von Siemens Music Prize (2005). When describing him, the music critic Paul Griffiths wrote that "Mr. Dutilleux’s position in French music was proudly solitary. Between Olivier Messiaen and Pierre Boulez in age, he was little affected by either, though he took an interest in their work. But his voice, marked by sensuously handled harmony and color, was his own."

Life
Henri Dutilleux was born on 22 January 1916 in Angers, Maine-et-Loire. He was the great-grandson of the painter Constant Dutilleux and grandson of the composer Julien Koszul. He was also a cousin of the mathematician Jean-Louis Koszul. He studied harmony, counterpoint, and piano with Victor Gallois at the Douai Conservatoire before leaving for the Conservatoire de Paris. There, between 1933 and 1938, he attended the classes of Jean and Noël Gallon (harmony and counterpoint, in which he won joint first prize with the cellist Paul Tortelier), Henri Büsser (composition) and Maurice Emmanuel (history of music).

Dutilleux won the Prix de Rome in 1938 for his cantata L'anneau du roi but did not complete his entire residency in Rome due to the outbreak of World War II. He worked for a year as a medical orderly in the army and returned to Paris in 1940, where he worked as a pianist, arranger and music teacher. In 1942, he conducted the choir of the Paris Opera.

Dutilleux worked as Head of Music Production for Radio France from 1945 to 1963. He served as professor of composition at the École Normale de Musique de Paris from 1961 to 1970. He was appointed to the staff of the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in 1970 and was composer-in-residence at Tanglewood in 1995 and 1998. His students included Gérard Grisey, Francis Bayer, Alain Gagnon, Jacques Hétu, and Kenneth Hesketh. Invited by Walter Fink, in 2006 he was the 16th composer featured in the Rheingau Musik Festival's annual Komponistenporträt.

For many years, Dutilleux had a studio on Île Saint-Louis. He died on 22 May 2013 in Paris, aged 97, and was buried in Montparnasse Cemetery, in the same grave as Geneviève, his wife who died in 2009. His tombstone is made of grey granite and bears the epitaph "Compositeur".

Influences and style
Dutilleux's music extends the legacies of French composers such as Debussy and Ravel but is also clearly influenced by Béla Bartók and Igor Stravinsky. Among his favourite pieces, he mentioned Beethoven's late string quartets and Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande.

His attitude toward serialism was ambiguous. While he always paid attention to developments in contemporary music and incorporated some serialist techniques into his work, he also criticized the more radical and intolerant aspects of the movement: "What I reject is the dogma and the authoritarianism which manifested themselves in that period." Dutilleux refused to be associated with any school.

Dutilleux's music contains distant echoes of jazz, as can be heard in the plucked double bass strings at the beginning of his First Symphony and his frequent use of syncopated rhythms. He often calls for Ray Robinson-style cup mutes in the brass section, which seems to indicate the influence of big band music. Dutilleux was greatly enamoured of vocalists, especially the jazz singer Sarah Vaughan and the great French chanson singers.

Some of Dutilleux's trademarks include very refined orchestral textures; complex rhythms; a preference for atonality and modality over tonality; the use of pedal points that serve as atonal pitch centers; and "reverse variation", whereby a theme is revealed gradually, appearing in its complete form only after a few partial, tentative expositions. His music also displays a strong sense of structure and symmetry. This is particularly obvious from an "external" point of view, in the overall organisation of the different movements or the spatial distribution of the various instruments, but is also apparent in the music itself (themes, harmonies and rhythms mirroring, complementing or opposing each other). According to Stuart Jefferies, "A passage may be conceived as a symmetrical shape of notes on paper and only later given musical substance. He loves symmetrical musical figures such as palindromes or fan-shaped phrases".

Dutilleux's music was influenced by art and literature, such as the works of Vincent van Gogh, Charles Baudelaire and Marcel Proust. It also shows a concern for the concepts of time and memory, both in its use of quotations (notably from Bartók, Benjamin Britten, and Jehan Alain), and in short interludes that recall material used in earlier movements and/or introduce ideas that will be fully developed later.

A perfectionist with a strong sense of artistic integrity, he allowed only a small number of his works to be published; what he did publish he often repeatedly revised. In his own words:

"I always doubt my work. I always have regrets. That's why I revise my work so much and, at the same time, I regret not being more prolific. But the reason I am not more prolific is because I doubt my work and spend a lot of time changing it. It's paradoxical, isn't it?"

Compositional history
Dutilleux numbered as Op. 1 his Piano Sonata (1946–1948), written for the pianist Geneviève Joy, whom he married in 1946. He renounced most of the works he composed before it because he did not believe them to be representative of his mature standards, considering many of them to be too derivative to have merit.

After the Piano Sonata, Dutilleux started working on his First Symphony (1951). It consists of four monothematic movements and has a perfectly symmetrical structure: music slowly emerges from silence (first movement—a passacaglia) and builds towards a fast climax (second—a scherzo and moto perpetuo), keeps its momentum (third—"a continuous melodic line that never goes back on itself"), and finally slowly fades out (fourth—a theme and variations).

In 1953, Dutilleux wrote the music for the ballet Le loup ("The Wolf").

In his Second Symphony, titled Le double (1959), the orchestra is divided into two groups: a small one at the front with instruments taken from the various sections (brass, woodwind, strings and percussion) and a bigger one at the back consisting of the rest of the orchestra. Although this brings to mind the Baroque concerto grosso, the approach is different: in this piece, the smaller ensemble acts as a mirror or ghost of the bigger one, sometimes playing similar or complementary lines, sometimes contrasting ones.

His next work, Métaboles for orchestra (1965) explores the idea of metamorphosis, how a series of subtle and gradual changes can radically transform a structure. A different section of the orchestra dominates each of the first four movements before the fifth brings them all together. As a result, it can be considered as a concerto for orchestra. It quickly achieved celebrity and, following its première by George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra, was performed in several North American cities, then in France. Métaboles is one of his most often performed works.

In the 1960s, Dutilleux met Mstislav Rostropovich, who commissioned a cello concerto from him. Rostropovich premièred the work, Tout un monde lointain… (A whole distant world...), in 1970. It is considered one of Dutilleux's major achievements.

After the cello concerto, Dutilleux turned to chamber music for the first time in more than 20 years and wrote the string quartet Ainsi la nuit (1976). It consists of seven movements, some of which are linked by short "parentheses". The parentheses' function is to recall material that has already been heard and to introduce fragments that will be fully developed later. It is based on a hexachord (C♯–G♯–F–G–C–D) that highlights the intervals of fifth and major second. Each movement emphasizes various special effects (pizzicato, glissandi, harmonics, extreme registers, contrasting dynamics...), resulting in a difficult, elaborate work.

Dutilleux also published various works for piano (3 Préludes, Figures de résonances) and 3 strophes sur le nom de Sacher (1976–1982) for solo cello. The latter was originally composed on the occasion of Paul Sacher's 70th birthday in 1976, on a request by Rostropovich to write compositions for cello solo using his name spelt out in musical notes as the theme eS-A-C-H-E-Re (Es is E♭ in German, H is B♮ in German, and Re is D in French; see Sacher hexachord). He then returned to orchestral works in 1978 with Timbres, espace, mouvement ou la nuit etoilée, inspired by Van Gogh's The Starry Night. In this composition, Dutilleux attempted to translate into musical terms the opposition between emptiness and movement the painting conveys. It employs a string section of only lower-register instruments: cellos and basses, no violins or violas.

In 1985, Isaac Stern premiered L'arbre des songes (The Tree of Dreams), a violin concerto he had commissioned from Dutilleux. According to the composer, it is based on a process of continual growth and renewal: "All in all the piece grows somewhat like a tree, for the constant multiplication and renewal of its branches is the lyrical essence of the tree. This symbolic image, as well as the notion of a seasonal cycle, inspired my choice of 'L'arbre des songes' as the title of the piece."

Dutilleux's later works include Mystère de l'instant (for cymbalum, string orchestra and percussion, 1989), Les Citations (for oboe, harpsichord, double bass and percussion, 1991), The Shadows of Time (for orchestra and children voices, 1997), Slava's Fanfare (for Rostropovich's 70th birthday, 1997) and Sur le même accord (for violin and orchestra, 2002, dedicated to Anne-Sophie Mutter). In 2003, he completed Correspondances, a song cycle for soprano and orchestra inspired by poems and letters by Van Gogh, Prithwindra Mukherjee, Rainer Maria Rilke, and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. This work received a very enthusiastic reception and has been programmed several times since its première.

Dutilleux's last major work was the song cycle Le temps l'horloge, written for American soprano Renée Fleming. It consists of four pieces and an instrumental interlude on two poems by Jean Tardieu, one by Robert Desnos and one by Charles Baudelaire. The first three songs were premièred at the Saito Kinen Festival Matsumoto, Japan in September 2007. The American première of this partial version took place in November 2007 with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. The complete work was unveiled on 7 May 2009 at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris.

In 2010, Dutilleux added a third movement to his chamber work Les citations. The expanded version was premiered at the Festival d’Auvers-sur-Oise.

In 2011, with Dutilleux's approval, Pascal Gallois transcribed three of his early vocal works for bassoon and piano: Regards sur l'Infini (from the early cycle for voice and piano Quatre mélodies) and Deux sonnets de Jean Cassou (originally for baritone and piano). He played them in a concert at the Hôtel de Lauzun in Dutilleux's presence.

Dutilleux allowed only a small fraction of his work to be published. He often expressed a wish to write more chamber music, notably a second string quartet, a piece for clarinet and ensemble, one for solo double bass, and more piano préludes. He long considered composing an opera but abandoned that project because he could not find a libretto that appealed to him.

Those who commissioned works from Dutilleux include Szell (Métaboles), Rostropovich (Tout un monde lointain… and Timbres, espace, mouvement), Stern (L'arbre des songes), Mutter (Sur le même accord), Charles Munch (Symphony No. 2 Le double), and Seiji Ozawa (The Shadows of Time and Le temps l'horloge).

Legacy
After Dutilleux's death, the composer and conductor Laurent Petitgirard paid tribute to him as "one of the very rare contemporary composers" whose music became part of the repertoire in his lifetime, predicting that "[h]is work will remain intensely present after his death".

Several major musicians and conductors championed Dutilleux's works, notably Stern, Sacher, Mutter, Fleming, Ozawa, Munch, Szell, Rostropovich, Simon Rattle, and the Juilliard String Quartet.

The conductor and composer Esa-Pekka Salonen said of Dutilleux, "His production is rather small but every note has been weighed with golden scales... It's just perfect – very haunting, very beautiful. There’s some kind of sadness in his music which I find very touching and arresting."

The critic Tom Service wrote for the BBC, "Dutilleux's exquisite catalogue of pieces is becoming, rightly, ever more popular with performers and listeners all over the world".

An obituary in Gramophone commented, "Dutilleux represented a generation of musicians with roots almost back into the 19th century; certainly his music can be seen in a direct line from that of his great predecessors Debussy and Ravel." In an obituary in The Guardian, Roger Nichols described him as "the outstanding French composer between Messiaen and Boulez", adding that he "achieved a wholly individual synthesis of ear-catching colours and harmonies with formal rigour."

The Daily Telegraph said, "Because Dutilleux was a perfectionist and self-critical to a fault, his output was small. He wrote barely a dozen major works in his career, destroyed much of his early music and often revised what he had written. His early work was clearly derivative of Ravel, Debussy and Roussel; but his later music, though influenced by Bartok and Stravinsky, was entirely original and often seemed—in its scale—more German than French." The Daily Telegraph's critic Philip Hensher called Dutilleux "the Laura Ashley of music; tasteful, unfaultable, but hardly ever daring ... Personally, I can’t stick him."

Rob Cowan, the BBC Radio 3 presenter and critic, recalled in June 2013 an interview with Dutilleux in which he told Cowan that his personal favourite among his own works was Tout un monde lointain....

Awards and honours

 * Grand Prix de Rome (for his cantata L'Anneau du Roi) – 1938
 * UNESCO's International Rostrum of Composers (for Symphony No. 1) – 1955
 * Grand Prix National de Musique (for his entire oeuvre) – 1967
 * Praemium Imperiale (Japan – for his entire oeuvre) – 1994
 * Monaco : Commander of the Order of Saint-Charles (13 May 1998)
 * Prix MIDEM Classique de Cannes (for The Shadows of Time) – 1999
 * France : Grand'Croix of the Légion d'honneur (31 December 2003)
 * Grand-Croix de la Légion d'honneur – 2004
 * Ernst von Siemens Music Prize (for his entire oeuvre) – 2005
 * Prix MIDEM Classique de Cannes (for his entire oeuvre) – 2007
 * Cardiff University Honorary Fellowship (for his entire oeuvre) – 2008
 * Gold Medal of the Royal Philharmonic Society – 2008
 * Marie-Josée Kravis Prize for New Music – 2011

title: Henri Dutilleux


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Alba, Michigan

Alba is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) located in Antrim County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 287 at the 2020 census.

Located just north of Mancelona along U.S. Route 131, Alba is divided between Star Township on the east and Chestonia Township on the west.

History
Alba was first settled as a flag station named Cascade along the Grand Rapids and Indiana Railroad in 1876. At the time, it was part of Forest Home Township, Michigan. A post office opened on December 4, 1877, and the village was platted the next year. The name was changed to Alba in 1884 after local entertainer Alba Haywood.

The community of Alba was listed as a newly-organized census-designated place for the 2010 census, meaning it now has officially defined boundaries and population statistics for the first time.

Geography
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the Alba CDP has an area of 2.73 sqmi, all land.

Demographics
Alba consists of 128 households, of which the median income is $79,808. The employment rate is 84.2%. The population of Alba is approximately 94% White, 0.6% Black, 0.3% Hispanic or Latino, and 3.4% are two or more races

title: Alba, Michigan


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User talk:Fhar

Are you Fhar who lives in Santa Cruz? Kingturtle 01:18, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

title: User talk:Fhar


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László Szabó (fencer)

László Szabó (born 1905 in Târgu Mureș, date of death unknown) was a Hungarian fencing master. He got known for his book Fencing and The Master, which is until this day important literature for fencing coaches. Szabó wrote it after accumulating broad knowledge during his lifetime such as from his maestro Italo Santelli.

Fencing and The Master
In his book Fencing and The Master he describes correct fencing positions and the important details for the coach. In particular, he mentions the importance of loose muscles for quick flexibility and reaction.

title: László Szabó (fencer)


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Samuel Francis Du Pont

Samuel Francis Du Pont (September 27, 1803 – June 23, 1865) was a rear admiral in the United States Navy, and a member of the prominent Du Pont family. In the Mexican–American War, Du Pont captured San Diego, and was made commander of the California naval blockade. Through the 1850s, he promoted engineering studies at the United States Naval Academy, to enable more mobile and aggressive operations. In the American Civil War, he played a major role in making the Union blockade effective, but was controversially blamed for the failed attack on Charleston, South Carolina in April 1863.

Early life and naval career
Du Pont was born at Goodstay, his family home at Bergen Point (now Bayonne), New Jersey, the fourth child and second son of Victor Marie du Pont and Gabrielle Joséphine de la Fite de Pelleport. His uncle was Eleuthère Irénée du Pont, the founder of E.I. du Pont de Nemours Company, which began as a gunpowder factory and today is a multinational chemical corporation. (Samuel was the only member of his generation to use a capital D.) Du Pont spent his childhood at his father's home, Louviers, across the Brandywine Creek from his uncle's estate and gunpowder factory, Eleutherian Mills, just north of Wilmington, Delaware. He was enrolled at Mount Airy Academy in Germantown, Pennsylvania, at age 9. However, his father was unable to fund his education because of his failing wool mill, and he was encouraged to instead enlist in the U.S. Navy. His family's close connections with President Thomas Jefferson helped secure him an appointment as a midshipman by President James Madison at the age of 12, and he first set sail aboard the 74-gun ship of the line USS Franklin (1815) out of Delaware in December 1815.

As there was no naval academy at the time, Du Pont learned mathematics and navigation at sea and became an accomplished navigator by the time he took his next assignment aboard the frigate USS Constitution in 1821. He then served aboard the frigate USS Congress (1799) in the West Indies and off the coast of Brazil. Though still not yet a commissioned officer, he was promoted to sailing master during his service aboard the 74-gun USS North Carolina (1820) in 1825, which sailed on a mission to display American influence and power in the Mediterranean. Soon after his promotion to Lieutenant in 1826, he was ordered aboard the 12-gun schooner USS Porpoise (1820), returned home for two years after his father's death in 1827, and then served aboard the 16-gun sloop USS Ontario (1813) in 1829. Despite the short period in which he had been an officer by this time, Du Pont had begun to openly criticize many of his senior officers, who he believed were incompetent and had only received their commands through political influence. After returning from the Ontario in June 1833, Du Pont married Sophie Madeleine du Pont (1810–88), his first cousin as the daughter of his uncle, Eleuthère Irénée du Pont. As he never kept an officer's journal, his voluminous correspondence with Sophie serves as the main documentation of his operations and observations throughout the rest of his naval career. From 1835 until 1838, he was the executive officer of the frigate USS Constellation (1797) and the sloop USS Warren (1827), commanding both the latter and the schooner USS Grampus (1821) in the Gulf of Mexico. In 1838 he joined the ship USS Ohio (1820) in the Mediterranean until 1841. The following year he was promoted to commander and set sail for China aboard the brig USS Perry (1843), but was forced to return home and give up his command because of severe illness. He returned to service in 1845 as commander of the USS Congress (1841), the flagship of Commodore Robert Stockton, reaching California by way of a cruise of the Hawaiian Islands by the time the Mexican–American War had begun.

Mexican–American War
Du Pont was given command of the sloop USS Cyane (1837) in 1846 and quickly showed his skill as a naval combat commander, taking or destroying thirty enemy ships and clearing the Gulf of California in the process. Du Pont transported Major John Fremont's troops to San Diego, where they captured the city. Du Pont then continued operations along the Baja coast, including the capture of La Paz, and burnt two enemy gunboats in the harbor of Guaymas under heavy fire. He led the main line of ships that took Mazatlán on November 11, 1847, and on February 15, 1848, launched an amphibious assault on San José del Cabo that managed to strike three miles (5 km) inland and relieve a besieged squadron, despite heavy resistance. He was given command of the California naval blockade in the last months of the war and, after taking part in further land maneuvers, was ordered home.

Between wars
Du Pont served most of the next decade on shore assignment, and his efforts during this time are credited with helping to modernize the U.S. Navy. He studied the possibilities of steam power, and emphasized engineering and mathematics in the curriculum that he established for the new United States Naval Academy. He was appointed superintendent of the Academy, but resigned after four months because he believed it was a post more appropriate for someone closer to retirement age. He was an advocate for a more mobile and offensive Navy, rather than the harbor defense function that much of it was then relegated to, and worked on revising naval rules and regulations. After being appointed to the board of the United States Lighthouse Service, his recommendations for upgrading the antiquated system were largely adopted by Congress in a lighthouse bill.

In 1853, Du Pont was made general superintendent over what is typically considered the first World's Fair in the United States—the Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations, held in New York City. Despite international praise, low attendance caused the venture to go into heavy debt, and Du Pont resigned.

Du Pont became an enthusiastic supporter of naval reform, writing in support of the 1855 congressional act to "Promote the Efficiency of the Navy." He was appointed to the Naval Efficiency Board and oversaw the removal of 201 naval officers. When those under fire called upon friends in Congress, Du Pont himself became the subject of heavy criticism, and subsequent review of the dismissals resulted in the reinstatement of nearly half of those removed.

Du Pont was promoted to captain in 1855. In 1857 he was given command of the steam frigate USS Minnesota (1855) and ordered to transport William Reed, the U.S. Minister to China, to his post in Beijing. Du Pont's Minnesota was one of seventeen warships parading Western force in China, and after China failed to satisfy demands for greater access to its ports, he witnessed the capture of Chinese forts on the Peiho River by the French and English on April 28, 1858. He then sailed to Japan, India, and Arabia, finally returning to Boston in May 1859. He played a major role in the receiving of the Japanese ambassador that year, accompanying him on his three-month visit to Washington, Baltimore, and Philadelphia; the trip was a breakthrough for opening Japan to American trade and investment. Du Pont was then made commandant of the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard in 1860. He expected to retire in this post, but the outbreak of the Civil War returned him to active duty.

He was elected as a member to the American Philosophical Society in 1862.

Civil War
When communication was cut off with Washington at the start of the Civil War, Du Pont took the initiative of sending a fleet to the Chesapeake Bay to protect the landing of Union troops at Annapolis, Maryland. In June 1861 he was made president of a board in Washington formed to develop a plan of naval operations against the Confederacy. He was appointed flag officer serving aboard the steam frigate USS Wabash (1855) as commander of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, leading from Norfolk, Virginia, the largest fleet ever commanded by an American officer at that time. On November 7, Du Pont led a successful attack on the fortifications at Port Royal harbor in South Carolina. This victory enabled Union naval forces to secure the southern waters of Georgia and the entire eastern coast of Florida, and an effective blockade was established. On January 3, 1862, he was promoted to the newly created rank of Flag Officer (equivalent to the rank of Commodore, which would be created in July 1862). Du Pont received commendations from U.S. Congress for his brilliant tactical success, and was appointed rear admiral on July 16, 1862.

Towards the end of 1862, Du Pont became the first U.S. naval officer to be assigned command over armored "ironclad" ships. Though he commanded them ably in engagements with other ships, they performed poorly in an attack on Fort McAllister, due to their small number of guns and slow rate of fire. Du Pont was then given direct orders from the Navy Department to launch an attack on Charleston, South Carolina which was the site of the first shots fired in the Civil War with the fall of Fort Sumter and the main area in which the Union blockade had been unsuccessful. Though Du Pont believed that Charleston could not be taken without significant land troop support, he nevertheless attacked with nine ironclads on April 7, 1863. Unable to navigate properly in the obstructed channels leading to the harbor, his ships were caught in a blistering crossfire, and he withdrew them before nightfall. Five of his nine ironclads were disabled in the failed attack, and one more subsequently sank.

The Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles, blamed Du Pont for the highly publicized failure at Charleston. Du Pont himself anguished over it and, despite an engagement in which vessels under his command defeated and captured a Confederate ironclad, was relieved of command on July 5, 1863, at his own request and was replaced in this Office by Rear Admiral John A. Dahlgren. Though he enlisted the help of Maryland U.S. Representative Henry Winter Davis to get his official report of the incident published by the Navy, an ultimately inconclusive congressional investigation into the failure essentially turned into a trial of whether Du Pont had misused his ships and misled his superiors. Du Pont's attempt to garner the support of President Abraham Lincoln was ignored, and he returned home to Delaware. He returned to Washington to serve briefly on a board reviewing naval promotions.

However, subsequent events arguably vindicated Du Pont's judgment and capabilities. A subsequent U.S. naval attack on the city failed, despite being launched with a significantly larger fleet of armored ships. Charleston was finally taken only by the invasion of General Sherman's army in 1865.

Death and legacy
Du Pont died on June 23, 1865, while on a trip to Philadelphia and is buried in the du Pont family cemetery. The cemetery is located near the Hagley Museum in Greenville, Delaware.

In 1882, 17 years after Du Pont's death, the U.S. Congress finally moved to recognize his service and commissioned a sculpture of him to be placed in Pacific Circle in Washington. A bronze sculpture of Du Pont by Launt Thompson was dedicated on December 20, 1884, and the traffic circle was renamed Dupont Circle. In attendance were U.S. President Chester A. Arthur and Delaware senator Thomas F. Bayard. Though the circle still bears his name, the statue was moved to Rockford Park (part of Wilmington State Parks) in Wilmington, Delaware, by the du Pont family in 1920, and replaced by a fountain designed by Daniel Chester French, dedicated in 1921.

Louviers was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.

Dates of rank

 * Midshipman – December 19, 1815
 * Lieutenant – April 26, 1826
 * Commander – October 28, 1842
 * Captain – September 14, 1855
 * Flag Officer – January 3, 1862
 * Rear Admiral – July 16, 1862
 * Died – June 23, 1865

Namesakes
Fort du Pont near Delaware City, Delaware, and three U.S. Navy ships; the torpedo boat USS Du Pont (TB-7), and the destroyers USS Du Pont (DD-152) and USS Du Pont (DD-941) were all named in honor of Samuel Du Pont. Public School 31 in the Greenpoint neighborhood of New York City, is named after him, as is Dupont Circle in Washington, D.C. Grant Avenue in San Francisco, California, at one time was named Dupont Street following the Mexican–American War of 1846–1848. While it was renamed after President Ulysses S. Grant in 1906, Grant Avenue is still written and said in Chinese as "Dupont Gai" (都板街, Gai 街 means street).

title: Samuel Francis Du Pont


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Alden, Michigan

Alden is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) located in Antrim County in the U.S. state of Michigan. Located within Helena Township, the community is located upon the shores of Torch Lake. The population of the CDP was 123 at the 2020 census.

History
Alden was first settled as early a 1868 by storekeeper F. J. Lewis in Helena Township, and he chose the name Noble as the name for the new settlement. The growing community was located along the mouth of Spencer Creek along Torch Lake, which was named after John Spencer. The community itself also became known as Spencer Creek and was given a post office under that name on June 15, 1869. In 1891, the Pere Marquette Railway expanded into the area, and Spencer Creek was renamed Alden after railroad official William Alden Smith, who would later become a state politician. The post office was renamed Alden on July 18, 1892.

The community of Alden was listed as a newly-organized census-designated place for the 2010 census, meaning it now has officially defined boundaries and population statistics for the first time.

Geography
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the Alden CDP had a total area of 0.40 sqmi, all land.

Demographics
As of the 2020 census, Alden has a population of 123 with 59 households and a median income of 49,063.

title: Alden, Michigan


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Andrea Barber

Andrea Laura Barber (born July 3, 1976 ) is an American actress. She is known for playing Kimmy Gibbler in the ABC sitcom Full House and the Netflix sequel series Fuller House.

Early life
Barber is the youngest of three children. She graduated from La Serna High School in Whittier, California. She earned a degree in English from Whittier College in 1999. Barber also has an MA in Women's Studies from the University of York, England. She returned to Whittier as assistant to the director of Whittier College's Office of International Programs.

Career
Barber's first major role was as the original Carrie Brady on the American soap opera Days of Our Lives, from 1982 to 1986. She also guest-starred and starred in many movies and television series. Barber is known for her role on the sitcom Full House as Kimmy Gibbler, the best friend of D.J. Tanner, which she played from 1987 to 1995. She was at first a recurring role, but shortly after that became a regular. After Full House ended, Barber retired from acting and focused on her personal life. In 2012, Barber reprised the role for a Funny or Die sketch called It's F*ckin Late alongside Dave Coulier, her former Full House co-star.

Barber reprised her role as Kimmy Gibbler in the Full House spin-off series Fuller House, along with Candace Cameron Bure and Jodie Sweetin. The series premiered on Netflix on February 26, 2016, and concluded on June 2, 2020, after five seasons. She plays Principal Willingham on the Nickelodeon series That Girl Lay Lay, which premiered on September 23, 2021.

Personal life
In 2002, Barber married Jeremy Rytky. They have two children together. The couple divorced in 2014.

Barber enjoys running. She has completed twenty-six half-marathons and three full marathons, as of 2016.

title: Andrea Barber


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Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold

Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold (also known as Blake Stone 3-D) is a first-person shooter for DOS created by JAM Productions and published by Apogee Software on December 5, 1993. The following year, a sequel called Blake Stone: Planet Strike was released, which continues where Aliens of Gold leaves off. Some copies of the game provided a Command Control Gravis Gamepad.

Plot
The story is set in the year 2140. Robert Wills Stone III, also known as Blake Stone, is an agent of the British Intelligence, recruited after a highly successful career in the British Royal Navy.

His first major case is to investigate and eliminate the threat of Dr. Pyrus Goldfire, a brilliant scientist in the field of genetics and biology, known for his outright disrespect of professional ethics. Backed by his own organization, STAR, Dr. Goldfire plans to conquer Earth and enslave humanity using an army of specially trained human conscripts, modified alien species, and a host of genetically-engineered mutants. Agent Stone is sent on a mission to knock out six crucial STAR installations and destroy Goldfire's army before it can assault the Earth.

Gameplay
The gameplay of Aliens of Gold is very similar to Wolfenstein 3D. Playable areas are single-leveled, with orthogonal walls and textured floors and ceilings, and have a wide variety of human, mutant and alien enemies – the latter two are sometimes dormant in canisters and on work tables – and frequent encounters and fights with Dr. Goldfire. Level features include locked doors that can be opened by four colors of access cards – gold, green, yellow and blue – plus red access cards to enter new floors; an auto-mapping system; food dispensers that exchange tokens for healing items; friendly interactive Informants who are distinguishable from the Bio-Techs by what they say and give information, ammunition and tokens; one-way doors; secret rooms accessible through pushable wall blocks; and teleporters that instantly take the player into another location within the level, or, in one instance, to one of the episode's secret levels. Five weapons are available, consisting of a silent pistol with infinite ammo, three hitscan guns and a grenade launcher type gun.

In every level the player can boost points for score by destroying all enemies, collecting all points and keeping all Informants alive, which increases the three respective statuses. Total Points is affected by both the enemies destroyed and the treasure collected. The 'all informants alive' bonus can only be obtained if all informants survive after the first two bonuses are obtained. Floor rating is affected by the other three statuses. Mission rating is affected by the overall statuses from floors 1 to 9. Killing Informants decreases both Floor and Mission Rating.

Level structure
The game consists of six episodes, each with 11 levels – nine regular and two secret. A main elevator goes through levels 1 through 10 and is the only means of moving between the levels. The goal of each level from 1 through 8 is to secure a red keycard and use it to unlock the next floor. The elimination of all enemies and the collection of all treasure on the current floor are optional objectives which provide bonuses upon completion. "Plasma alien" enemies, which spawn repeatedly from electrical outlets, do not count towards the kill ratio. Blake Stone can take the elevator back down to previous levels to find missed items or kill any remaining enemies.

On level 9 of each episode, defeating a stronger version of Dr. Goldfire forces him to drop a gold keycard. The key is used to unlock the way to the boss, which holds another gold keycard for the level's exit – the episode's end. Each episode features two secret levels. One of them, floor 0, can be accessed through a teleport hidden somewhere within the same episode. The other is floor 10, directly accessible through the main elevator. A red keycard is required to enter, and is usually hidden on floor 9. Secret levels do not have special objectives; their only purpose is to boost the player's score.

Development
Blake Stone uses the Wolfenstein 3D game engine. Its working title was "Secret Agent Game". Development was handled by JAM Productions, a startup company consisting of Mike Maynard, Jim Row, and Jerry Jones. Little work on the game was done in-house at publisher/distributor Apogee Software, though Apogee programmer Mark Dochtermann implemented the ceiling textures and Joe Siegler participated in playtesting the game.

Complaints about getting lost in Wolfenstein 3D prompted the creation of an automap feature. The protagonist's name was thought up by Maynard and Row, taking some inspiration from action figure marketing techniques. The maps were created using Tile Editor (TEd), which Apogee had previously used for Wolfenstein 3D. The game took about 18 months of development. The antagonist was named Dr. Goldstern in the initial release, but was changed to Dr. Goldfire in response to a complaint that the game portrayed Jewish people as evil.

Release
The shareware version of the game was released on December 3, 1993. The registered version of Blake Stone shipped with a comic book, called Blake Stone Adventure. id Software released Doom one week after Apogee released Blake Stone. Doom quickly eclipsed Blake Stone, which sold poorly after initial success. Joe Siegler presented the game at COMDEX in Las Vegas.

In 2009, the game was re-released with Windows support on GOG.com, with support for macOS added in 2013 and Linux in 2014 (using DOSbox emulator); a Steam release followed in 2015. Native Linux version of the same (BStone) source port can be built manually. In 2017, the game was ported to Amiga.

Reception
Computer Gaming World reported in March 1994 that while not quite as good as Doom, "Blake Stone is nonetheless a high quality, first person blast-fest". The magazine concluded that the game "delivers the goods on all counts" and was worth the registration fee.

In a retrospective review, AllGame editor Colin Williamson was critical of the game, saying that it "stunk" and was a "bore-fest". Williamson criticized the outdated game engine and mocked the "silly" looking enemies, recommending Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, or Quake instead.

title: Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold


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HMS St. James (D65)

HMS St. James was a Battle-class destroyer of the Royal Navy. She was named in honour of the Battle of St. James Day which took place in 1666.

St. James was built by Fairfields at Govan. She was launched on 7 June 1945 and commissioned on 12 July 1946.

Operational service
In 1946, St. James joined the 5th Destroyer Flotilla, part of the Home Fleet. On 25 August 1946, while undergoing calibration trials off the Isle of Portland, she accidentally hit and sank the tug Buccaneer with a 4.5-inch shell, while aiming at the target Buccaneer was towing. St. Jamess captain, Commander J. Lee Barber, went alongside and took off Buccaneers crew without loss, but St. James suffered a damaged propeller when the tug capsized. An inquiry was held aboard the cruiser HMS Superb (25) on 28 August, at which it was decided that no further action would be taken.

In 1950, St. James deployed on a Home Fleet Spring Cruise, which saw her, as well as many other vessels, including the aircraft carrier HMS Victorious (R38) and two other carriers, as well as the battleship HMS Vanguard (23), visit the Mediterranean, which included stops in Italy. The group performed the usual naval exercises in the region, as well as undertaking 'fly-the-flag' visits to a number of ports.

In 1953, St. James was placed in reserve along with a number of her sister ships. However she did take part in the Fleet Review to celebrate the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II.

In 1957, St. James finally began a refit to modernise the destroyer, but just the following year, her refit was cancelled, and she was subsequently placed on the disposal list. In 1961, at Newport, St. James was broken up.

title: HMS St. James (D65)