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Talk:Norman Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank

Foster Associates
At the moment, Wikipedia seems to consider Norman Foster as synonymous with Foster Associates (or Foster and Partners, it looks like the name has changed). I'm as guilty as the rest, having just added the Stirling Prize details to this page. However, I understand that there are several other significant architects who are part of the architectural practice who may have had more input on some of the buildings listed here.

It would be good to write the article on Foster Associates and straighten out some of the attributions. -- Solipsist 07:52, 17 October 2004 (UTC)

 * Splitting Foster Associates out from Norman Foster is an excellent, and indeed overdue, idea. I don't think, however, that you'll get much traction on attributions beyond that - it's pretty common knowledge that a bunch of Foster's most famous recent buildings, including the London Town Hall and The Gherkin, were largely designed by Ken Shuttleworth - but Foster Associates don't credit individuals, or say who did what proportion of a project. - John Fader — Preceding undated comment added 12:46, 17 October 2004 (UTC)

 * OK, done. Its at Foster and Partners and if anyone can improve it, please be bold. Now we need an article on Ken Shuttleworth. -- Solipsist 08:54, 19 October 2004 (UTC)

who really does the work?
Is it really Norman Foster who designs all the works? I guess nowadays, it's mostly his team/company that does all the important fundamental work (statics, function, technique etc.), with Foster only being the persons that makes up the look. --Abdull 21:43, 19 June 2005 (UTC)
 * see Foster_and_Partners. -- Solipsist 21:49, 19 June 2005 (UTC)

Reichstag
Why was the image of the Reichstag changed back to Image:Reichstag mit Wiese.jpg. I've noting against that picture and it is a fine illustration of the Reichstag, but it is a poor illustration of the work of Norman Foster. It mostly shows the 19th century Neo-Palladian facade of Paul Wallot. No doubt there are a lot of internal changes too, but yes the principle contribution by Norman Foster and Foster and Partners would be the dome. As such Image:Reichstag-rooftop.JPG or Image:Reichstag coupole.jpg are the more appropriate illustrations here. Not to mention the fact that geometrically faceted, curved glass structures such as the new roof on the British Museum, are pretty much the signature of Foster and Partners. -- Solipsist 13:13, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Normally, I'd agree with you -- we should focus on what he created, but additions to old buildings are special cases, and especially so in this case. The proposed picture takes Foster's addition completely out of context. Yes, it is important to show the fine details of the dome, but the new picture can't see the forest for the trees. Flip between the pages and tell me which one shows the work of a master? Yes, you are right: The old picture shows the columned architecture that Foster did not create. But it should. Foster revered it in the design process. The reason the Dome succeeds is in context, its position in the forest, -- as the symbol of a new, transparent German government that invites public inspection, a glass lens set atop the seat of power -- less important are the facets, geometry, and glass of the dome itself -- that is, the individual tree in the forest. In this sense, the old picture reflected why the dome succeeds better than the proposed pic, which isolates it and diminishes its value. The proposed pic is very good. I would not object to you putting it in if you insist, but I think its a poor choice for the reasons I listed above. --Muchosucko 13:57, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

 * One could argue that the dome picture lacks adequate context, whereas the overall picture lacks sufficient Foster content. So perhaps both are unsuitable as depictions of Foster's work.  Showing both (on the Reichstag page) makes sense, but one without the other is a bit misleading.  Although the Reichstag project was an important project for Foster, so are many of his other works too.  Can I suggest we replace the Reichstag picture with Image:British Museum New Great Court.jpg, which shows similar work (modern renovations to an older building) but I think shows the synergy between the two (which neither of the Reichstag pictures do). And it's a nicer picture to boot. -- Finlay McWalter |  Talk 14:12, August 19, 2005 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't mind. It is one of the best pics I've seen on Wikipedia. Though, again, I would not object to Solip's replacing the pic either, I just think it has its costs. 'Tis all.--Muchosucko 20:48, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
 * I was also wondering about a complete switch to a different building as a solution. The British Museum roof is quite a good example, although it would be a shame to replace an international project with a British one. Unfortunately it looks like we don't have any particularly good pictures of Chek Lap Kok airport. -- Solipsist 08:40, 20 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Oh, hows about this: we add a gallery tag at the bottom, and add every Foster picture we have (including both reichstags). We move Clyde Auditorium there, and replace it with Image:Millau Bridge over Tarn River France.jpg. We also have Image:British Museum New Great Court.jpg as a full size picture.  That way we have a big pic of typical Foster (the gherkin), an old/new fusion (Brit museum), and a non-british thing (Millau). -- Finlay McWalter |  Talk 09:44, August 20, 2005 (UTC)
 * Sounds like a plan. The current picture layout isn't that great in any case. -- Solipsist 12:16, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

Links
Why aren't the links under 'projects' to pages that actually describe the particular building? I can understand that 'Beijing Capital International Airport International Terminal, China (2007)' links to Beijing Capital International Airport rather than a page devoted to the terminal itself, but having the word 'library' in 'Library of the Philological Faculty at Free University of Berlin, Germany (2005)' link to the generic definition of a library? Some of the projects don't even have links. RomanSanders 21:33, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Text for "Gherkin" Picture
A minor point, but the text - in both this page and the Wikimedia description - accompanying the picture of 30 St Mary Axe, says we are looking at the pinnacle, or top of the building. The photograph is in fact taken from ground level, and shows the ENTIRE building from that perspective. The true pinnacle - a rounded cone of clear glass - is not actually visible in this picture. I have corrected this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.29.77.233 (talk) 22:25, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Name in infobox
I think the name in the infobox should be "Normal Foster" as that's how he's known professionally as an architect. However, "The Lord Foster" is simply incorrect as his correct title is "The Lord Foster of Thames Bank" – the former would refer to someone else. If anyone decides to change it again, please at least use his correct title!  J Rawle  (Talk) 21:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

i agree. it should be something like Norman Foster (architect) or (british architect) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Newrednight (talk • contribs) 16:20, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

 * That would be inconsistent with WP policy, the common name, if one exists, is what the article name is used for. Nford24 (PE121 Personnel Request Form) 17:10, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Birthplace
The online Who's Who gives NF's birthplace as Reddish, Stockport, not Levenshulme, Manchester as in the article (the two places are adjacent). Is there a strong reason for the Levenshulme entry? Mr Stephen 00:16, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Lord Foster was undoubtedly born in Reddish, Stockport, yet it keeps being changed (as it was again today) to Manchester -- presumably because this delivers more urban "cred" than Reddish. We should insist on the accurate birthplace. Jackhughes (talk) 19:55, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: no consensus to move Norman Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank → Norman Foster and moved Norman Foster → Norman Foster (disambiguation). There seems to be consensus that this subject is the primary topic and that Norman Foster should redirect here, but not to move this article to Norman Foster. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 06:43, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

– There's a couple of things. Firstly, the architect is by far the most well known of those listed on the dab page, both in terms of page views (he has far more views than all the others combined - in July 11 he got 13093 views, the others 1694 combined of which Norman Foster (director) accounted for 1005. Incidentally, the dab page got 5432 views that month so even assuming all the views of the other pages were from the dab page that still means 3738 people had to go through the dab page to get to the article they wanted), incoming links, and google searches. In terms of primary topic Norman Foster should therefore go to the architect.
 * Norman Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank → Norman Foster
 * Norman Foster → Norman Foster (disambiguation)

The next question is that of the title of the page. Here the guideline is WP:NCPEER. In reviewing the google searches I got 10 times as many results for "norman foster" than lord "norman foster". I believe that he is almost exclusively known by his personal name, so should be moved in accordance with the guideline.

Incidentally, I do see in the logs some page moves, but I cannot see any related discussion to them. Polequant (talk) 12:04, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Support per above arguments. Was on my todo list since some time, so thanks for the nomination. --Elekhh (talk) 12:34, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Support. Polequant gives a good explanation of why this Norman Foster is the primary topic and he is far more commonly known by his personal name than as Lord Foster (4,400 gnews results for "Norman Foster" architect, compared to 1,620 for "Lord Foster"). Jenks24 (talk) 14:26, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Support I don't quite understand why so many lords' articles here are tagged with the whole 9-yards of officialdom. It's true that he's generally known as 'the architect Norman Foster', or simply 'Norman Foster' and only the extremely ceremonial ever refer to him as "Norman Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank". -- Ohconfucius  ¡digame! 02:17, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Now normally known as Lord Foster. Kittybrewster  ☎  11:37, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose. The google queries proposed by nominator aren't really the right way to look at this issue.  But the disambiguation page argument is persuasive.  There is a reason why we title peerage articles according to a specialized convention, and there is no reason to deviate from that here.  I think we should have this:
 * Norman Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank - article about Lord Foster, the architect
 * Norman Foster - redirect to the above
 * Norman Foster (disambiguation) - linked to from the above
 * In this way we fix the disambiguation problem without needlessly breaking the convention on peerage articles.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 08:00, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

 * Oppose I agree with Jimbo that we should not break the convention on peerage articles. His proposals sounds like the way to go for me. --SMasters (talk) 08:25, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose - Surely he's always known as Lord Foster, and doesn't this look better than causing a disambiguation page. Most pages for peers are entitled this way and this ought to be consistent. --Counter-revolutionary (talk) 09:10, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Info He calls himself Norman Foster, critics call him Norman Foster, all books about him are titled Norman Foster. The five principles of naming articles are (1) Recognisability, (2) Naturalness, (3) Precision, (4) Conciseness and (5) Consistency. The "Baron Foster of Thames Bank" version IMO fails severely (2) and (4) while on principles (1) and (3) arguably "Norman Foster (architect)" would also be better. Is standardisation really more important than everything else? --Elekhh (talk) 09:13, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Apparently, not quite true. – SMasters (talk) 10:00, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Ah, you can produce 200,000 links with "Lord" so what, I can find 2,000,000 google hits without it. The difference in my links is that they are the more relevant ones. --Elekhh (talk) 11:11, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
 * It's not about me finding a million Google hits. Your links are not the best examples to illustrate your points. For instance, the example of what "he calls himself" is from his own company's website, and yet, I found another example from the very same website, which uses his title. You then provide one example that his peers do not call him by his title, and yet, one can easily find examples to the contrary. That's the point I'm trying to make. --SMasters (talk) 23:42, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Of course if a press release from 2004 is more relevant than the current main page of his own website, an online journal more than one of the most prestigious international architecture awards, and books as authoritative sources are dismissed than you are right. That's the point I'm trying to make. Also let's not forget that we are debating the best title for the article, and the examples I linked to are the most relevant for that. Your second link also chooses "Norman Foster" as title, so it actually is in support of my argument. The only example of significant relevance for "Lord" as article title you linked to is the University of Oxford site, but than again why this archaically pompous "Baron Foster of Thames Bank" and not Professor Lord? --Elekhh (talk) 00:43, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

 * Oppose. He is not "almost exclusively known" without his peerage, which is what the naming conventions require to trump this title (which is the default form for peers). He is often referred to by it, particularly in the British press. And the test isn't simply "which is more common?". I do agree with Jimbo that Norman Foster should redirect here. Proteus (Talk) 12:43, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
 * So the guidelines have too be applied ad literam, the recommendation "it is best treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply" be dismissed, and the policy not worth discussing. Otherwise regarding disambiguation, for the record I also agree that per WP:PRIMARYTOPIC "Norman Foster" should lead to this article. --Elekhh (talk) 13:25, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Are you saying that the guidelines support your argument (i.e. that he is almost exclusively known without his peerage), or that they don't but that we should ignore them (either in the interests of common sense or because this article should be an exception)? If, contrary to the impression I got from your earlier comments, it is the latter, then I think it's for you to say why this should be an exception rather than for me to say why it shouldn't. Proteus (Talk) 13:57, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I think I was pretty clear: if the guidelines aim to implement the principles, but following the guidelines actually contravenes the principles than we have a good case to make an exception to the guidelines and follow the principles. This is actually encouraged by the guidelines by stating that "though it is best treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply" and "It is generally advisable to use the most common form of the name used in reliable sources in English ". The point I was making above is that all who favour "Norman Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank" rely on the principle of wikipedia naming consistency / standardisation set out in the guidelines to the detriment of the other principles, in particular naturalness and conciseness but also recognisability and preciseness where Norman Foster (architect) would be better. Another argument for an exception is that his notability is almost exclusively due to him being an architect, and has almost nothing to do with him being now part of "British nobility". --Elekhh (talk) 00:43, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
 * As far as I can see, they're all general points that apply (or could apply) to many people to whom this guideline refers, which means that your issue is not really with this article title but which the guideline that recommends it. This isn't the right place to argue that the guideline is wrong. Proteus (Talk) 15:23, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I thought that WP:NOTBUREAUCRACY may apply. --Elekhh (talk) 21:57, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment. I am not proposing any move in opposition to the guideline WP:NCPEER, rather in accordance with it. Taking the last two years as an example, "Norman Foster" receives 2360 gnews results, "Lord Foster" 53, and "Lord Norman Foster" 78. That means the non-peerage title is used 95% of the time. This is a higher ratio than Bertrand Russell, which is used as an example in the guideline of when the full title should not be used. From reading into the background of this the main reason for NCPEER appears to be for hereditary peers where there end up being lots of people with the same name and title, so better disambiguation is required. This is not the case here, as he is the clear primary topic of the term "Norman Foster" (as seems to have been acknowledged by everyone contributing). I am a bit confused by those saying he is now always or normally known as Lord Foster, when that doesn't appear to be the case at all, and they certainly have not presented any evidence to back that up.
 * In any case, looking back through the archives and other move discussions, it appears that NCPEER does not receive full support in the case of life peers. It probably should be discussed more fully at some point, but I guess not here. Polequant (talk) 11:41, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

 * Support. I think this is a case where the exception in WP:NCPEER for Peers far better known without their peerage title comes in. Foster was already a world-famous architect before he received his peerage, and he is principally known as an architect and not as a Peer. He has not encouraged use of his title in his professional architectural life. Further, as he is not domiciled in the United Kingdom for tax purposes, he ceased to be a member of the House of Lords on 6 July 2010. Sam Blacketer (talk) 14:40, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Please check: "In Germany, Foster received the Order Pour le Mérite; "
[|"Pour le Mérite"] was a prussian military order that existed until 1918. I am pretty sure what is meant here is the [|"Bundesverdienstkreuz"], but this is definitely something entirely different, the title used here in the article is never used with the civilian "Federal Cross of Merit" (dict.leo.org translation). I don't really know where to check what exactly he got in Germany, so I hope this is the right place for this comment. -- 62.57.67.2 (talk) 00:35, 11 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for pointing that out. I removed the unreferenced and erroneous statement. -- ELEKHHT 06:46, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Resignation from the Lords?
Quote: ''As a resident of Switzerland, in 2010 he stepped down from his seat in the House of Lords in order to maintain his non-domiciled status, and so be able to avoid paying UK residents' taxes on income earned abroad. ... Foster last spoke in the Lords in 2003 before his resignation in 2010''.

I'm struggling to understand this. Did he disclaim his peerage? If so, why are we still calling him Baron Foster of Thames Bank? If not, what is this "resignation" all about? --  Jack of Oz   [Talk]  05:31, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Sir / Lord - style and treatment
It seems to me that by virtue of Lord Foster having previously been made a Knight Bachelor (Kt) his full name should be preceded by Sir.

As to Lord, this is a deferential treatment used generally when referring to someone who holds a title between Baronet and Marquess, in which case Lord is not really part of name or title, but merely a customary appellation, and simply good manners as it were...

So if someone would like to take a look at this and check, my impression is that Lord Foster's full name as included in this article, following wikipedia standards, should read in fact something like:

Sir Norman Robert Foster, 1st Baron Foster of Thames Bank (also known as Lord Foster)

Similarly, following wikipedia standards, the box section should perhaps also include the usual items for style and subsequent treatement, in this case applicable to Lord Foster, i.e. Your Lordship, followed by Sir.

My own personal views of Lord Foster's architecture aside... I believe we should keep to some consistency when it comes to wikipedia, not to say accuracy when spelling out people's names, honours, etc. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.40.74.192 (talk) 00:27, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Quality
I have started to remove some of the anecdotes and un-encyclopedic writing. Part of the problem seems to be that Foster has given so many interviews about his life that were taylored to the reporters requirements- so we get good lines about crumpets and superhero cycle rides that are good copy. We have the BBC quoting the Christian Science monitor and inevitably distortions have occurred. Please help because my writing is also flawed. -- Clem Rutter (talk) 10:39, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

Added some sentences on Foster and Steve Jobs campus in Cupertino
After seeing Foster interviewed by Charlie Rose this evening (June 30, 2017), I found this article had no mention of Foster's work with Steve Jobs on the design of the campus recently opened to employees in Cupertino. Much of the interview conversation was on the way Jobs worked with Foster. I found a couple of sources about the building, one with lots of photos of Foster's big projects and the other with lots of text on how the Apple facility was developed, including working with Foster. I hope that is a good start. --Prairieplant (talk) 06:01, 1 July 2017 (UTC)

"Foster and Partners" listed at Redirects for discussion
The redirect [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Foster_and_Partners&redirect=no Foster and Partners] has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at until a consensus is reached. The Bicycle of Dreams (talk) 16:53, 11 March 2023 (UTC)


text: Category:Kay Hanley albums

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title: Category:Kay Hanley albums


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title: Category:Prime ministers of Greenland


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Paul Hutchison

Charles Paul Telford Hutchison, known as Paul Hutchison (born 1947) is a New Zealand politician and former health professional. He is a member of the National Party, which he represented in the House of Representatives from 1999 to 2014.

Early years
Hutchison was born in Wellington, and attended Khandallah School and Onslow College. He is a graduate of the University of Otago with an MB ChB in 1970, and was a consulting specialist in obstetrics and gynaecology with his medical career spanning almost 30 years. Hutchison is married with four daughters.

Member of Parliament
Hutchison was first elected to Parliament as the MP for Port Waikato in the 1999 election, and was re-elected in the 2002 election and 2005 election, and for in the 2008 and 2011 elections.

As an MP he has held a number of health-related roles, including opposition Spokesperson for Health, and Chairperson of the Health Committee. He was one of only two National Party MPs to support the successful Smokefree Environments Amendment Act 2003. He voted against the Death with Dignity euthanasia bill, also in 2003.

Hutchison was spotted reading while driving by a motorist in September 2009, prompting Acting Prime Minister Bill English to warn MPs to adhere to driving regulations.

Hutchison announced in October 2013 that he was going to retire from Parliament at the 2014 general election. Following his retirement Hutchison was honoured by the New Zealand Medical Association with the Chairman's Award for his services as Chair of the Health Select Committee Hutchison was replaced as the MP for by Andrew Bayly also of the New Zealand National Party.

title: Paul Hutchison


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The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou is a 2004 American adventure comedy-drama film written by Wes Anderson and Noah Baumbach and directed by Anderson. It is Anderson's fourth feature-length film and was released in the United States on December 25, 2004.

The film stars Bill Murray as Steve Zissou, an eccentric oceanographer who sets out with his crew to exact revenge on the "jaguar shark" that ate his partner Esteban. Zissou is both a parody of and homage to French diving pioneer Jacques Cousteau, to whom the film is dedicated.

The film also features Owen Wilson, Cate Blanchett, Willem Dafoe, Michael Gambon, Jeff Goldblum, Anjelica Huston, and Bud Cort. Seu Jorge has a minor part, but contributes heavily to the film's soundtrack. It was filmed in and around Rome, Naples, Ponza, and the Italian Riviera.

The film was released to mixed reviews and was a box office flop. In the decade following its release it has garnered a cult following, and is now viewed more positively by both critics and fans. It was also since remastered and re-released by The Criterion Collection in 2014.

Plot
While oceanographer Steve Zissou is working on his latest documentary at sea, his best friend and chief diver, Esteban du Plantier, is devoured by a 10-meter-long, luminescently spotted creature Zissou describes as a "jaguar shark". For his next project, Zissou is determined to document the shark's destruction.

The crew aboard Zissou's aging research vessel Belafonte includes his estranged wife Eleanor, chief strategist and financial backer; Pelé dos Santos, a safety expert and Brazilian guitarist who sings David Bowie songs in Portuguese; and Klaus Daimler, the German first mate who views Zissou and Esteban as father figures. Minor crew members include Vikram Ray, cameraman; Bobby Ogata, frogman; Vladimir Wolodarsky, physicist and soundtrack composer; Renzo Pietro, sound man; and Anne-Marie Sakowitz, a script girl. Also included is a recent group of unpaid interns from the University of North Alaska. However, the "Team Zissou" venture has hit a decline, having not released a successful documentary in nine years.

Ned Plimpton, a longtime Zissou fan whose mother has recently died, believes that Zissou is his father. After they meet at Zissou's latest premiere, Ned takes annual leave from his job as an airline pilot in Kentucky to join his crew. As Oseary Drakoulias, Zissou's producer, cannot find a financier for their latest documentary, Ned offers his inheritance. Eleanor feels her husband is exploiting Ned and leaves.

Pregnant reporter Jane Winslett-Richardson comes to chronicle the voyage. Both Ned and Zissou are attracted to Jane and a competition develops between them. Klaus becomes jealous of the attention Zissou pays to Ned.

On their mission to find the jaguar shark, the Belafonte steals tracking equipment from a remote station owned by currently more successful oceanographer (also Eleanor's ex-husband and Zissou's nemesis), Alistair Hennessey. They then sail into unprotected waters and are attacked by Filipino pirates, who steal Ned's money and kidnap Bill Ubell, "a bond company stooge" assigned to the project. They are then rescued by Hennessey and towed to Port-au-Patois. Sakowitz, along with all but one of the interns, jumps ship once they reach port.

Zissou persuades Eleanor to rejoin the Belafonte and then leads the crew on a rescue mission. They track Bill to an abandoned hotel on a remote island, saving him along with Hennessey, whom the pirates have also kidnapped. Ned and Zissou make one last search for the shark in the ship's helicopter, but the aircraft malfunctions and they crash. Ned dies from his injuries and is buried at sea. Prior to Ned's death, Eleanor revealed to Jane that Zissou is sterile and therefore Ned could not have been his son.

Zissou finally tracks down the shark in a submersible but decides not to kill it, both because of its beauty and being out of dynamite. He ponders, "I wonder if it remembers me," and is overcome with emotion. Eleanor puts her hand on him to comfort him, as does Jane and the rest of the crew. At the premiere of the finished documentary (which is dedicated to Ned, who is acknowledged as Zissou's son), Zissou receives a standing ovation while waiting outside the theater for the premiere to finish. The crew returns triumphantly to the ship the next day.

Cast

 * Bill Murray as Steve Zissou
 * Owen Wilson as Edward 'Ned' Plimpton / Kingsley Zissou
 * Cate Blanchett as Jane Winslett-Richardson
 * Anjelica Huston as Eleanor Zissou
 * Willem Dafoe as Klaus Daimler
 * Jeff Goldblum as Alistair Hennessey
 * Michael Gambon as Oseary Drakoulias
 * Bud Cort as Bill Ubell, Bond Company Stooge
 * Noah Taylor as Vladimir Wolodarsky
 * Seu Jorge as Pelé dos Santos
 * Robyn Cohen as Anne-Marie Sakowitz
 * Seymour Cassel as Esteban du Plantier
 * Pawel Wdowczak as Renzo Pietro
 * Niels Koizumi as Bobby Ogata
 * Antonio Monda as Himself
 * Isabella Blow as Antonia Cook
 * Waris Ahluwalia as Vikram Ray
 * Matthew Gray Gubler as Niko The Intern (credited as Intern #1)

Literary inspiration
Though the characters were inspired by such American novels as The Great Gatsby and The Magnificent Ambersons, the plot has been compared to Moby-Dick.

Writing about the metaphorical aspects of the film's setting—somewhere in the Mediterranean—film critic Elena Past says that the underwater scenes, because they are central to the storyline, make The Life Aquatic similar in some ways to Respiro. Both films set out a "Mediterranean state of being" where "having left the security of land, the characters in both films are suddenly confronted with the precarious nature of human existence, as the films that depict them tackle the challenges of representing the submarine world."

Casting
James Gray originally signed on to play Wolodarsky but he left when he learned that he was going to spend five months in Italy.

Exotic lifeforms
In addition to the luminescent-spotted jaguar shark, other fictional lifeforms (some stop-motion-animated) are cited and appear throughout the film, such as the rhinestone bluefin, crayon ponyfish, wild snow-mongoose, electric jellyfish, and sugar crabs. The animation work was done by Henry Selick.

Music
The soundtrack to The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou contains a style typical of other Wes Anderson films. Mark Mothersbaugh, a member of Devo, composed the score, as he has for many of Anderson's other films. The film also features many rock songs from the 1960s-1980s, and several instrumental pieces composed by Sven Libaek for the underwater documentary television series Inner Space. Additionally, the film and soundtrack feature Seu Jorge performing David Bowie songs in Portuguese on the acoustic guitar. Jorge, who also plays the character of Pelé dos Santos, performs some of these cover songs live, in character during the film, mostly with modified lyrics reflecting Jorge's own experiences working on the film. The ending scene depicting the beauty of the shark features the song "Starálfur" by Sigur Rós.

The Life Aquatic is Anderson's first film not to feature a Rolling Stones song.

Box office
The film grossed a total of $24,020,403 domestically after twelve weeks in release, less than half its $50 million production budget. It took in a further $10,788,000 internationally, bringing the total gross to $34,808,403.

Critical response
Initial reviews of the film were mixed. The film has a 57% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 226 reviews, with an average rating of 6.10/10; the website's consensus states: "Much like the titular oceanographer, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou's overt irony may come off as smug and artificial – but for fans of Wes Anderson's unique brand of whimsy, it might be worth the dive." The film has a 62/100 weighted average score on Metacritic, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "D" on an A+ to F scale.

Anthony Lane, a film reviewer for The New Yorker, agreed with the conventional criticism of Anderson's deadpan style: that the underreaction of Anderson's characters used to be "hip" but has now become "frozen into a mannerism." He said that "some stretches of action" in the film are being "lightly held within quotation marks," with an "unmistakable air of playacting" in even the most violent scenes. He also criticized the film's deliberately "weird" set ups, which leave the viewer with "the impression of having nearly drowned in some secret and melancholy game."

In the years since its initial release it has developed a cult following, and it underwent a critical reevaluation. Many critics view it more favorably, and some, such as Mike D'Angelo of The A.V. Club, consider the film to still be "undervalued" when compared to the rest of Anderson's filmography.

Home media
The DVD of the film was released by the Criterion Collection on May 10, 2005 as its 300th title, in both 1-disc version and a 2-disc versions. This is Anderson's third film to be released in the collection, after Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums. The Criterion Blu-ray was released on May 27, 2014.

In popular culture

 * The name of Mexican rock band Belafonte Sensacional is inspired, in part, by the film.
 * Austin Tofte, of American electronica band Swimming With Dolphins, has listed The Life Aquatic as his favorite film.
 * Epic Rap Battles of History released a rap battle between Jacques Cousteau and Steve Irwin. In one of Cousteau's flex bars, he references The Life Aquatic saying, "I'm so cool, Bill Murray played me in the movie."
 * The title of an episode of the animated sitcom Family Guy, "The Tan Aquatic with Steve Zissou", is a reference to the film.
 * The song "Alan Forever" on Lupe Fiasco's album DROGAS WAVE imagines an alternate reality for Alan Kurdi, in which he survived his emigration from Syria and "might be the next Steve Zissou or maybe Jacques Cousteau."
 * The ocean-themed 13th major update released for the video game Minecraft was titled "Update Aquatic" in reference to the film.

title: The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou


text: Category:Water polo

title: Category:Water polo


text: Category:Olympic water polo players by country


text:
Dagur

Dagur may refer to:

 * Daur people, or dagur, an ethnic group in northeastern China
 * Dagur language
 * Dagur (name), an Icelandic male given name
 * Dagur, a fictional character in TV series DreamWorks Dragons

title: Dagur


text: User talk:66.125.214.75

title: User talk:66.125.214.75


text:
The Thanatos Syndrome

The Thanatos Syndrome (1987) was Walker Percy's last novel. It is a sequel to Love in the Ruins. Set in the near future in Feliciana, it tells the story of an imprisoned psychiatrist who is freed and returns to his town with the active members demonstrating new mysterious behaviors. He suspects that something or someone is making everyone in his town crazy and reversing them to be like primitive apes.

Plot
After two years in prison for selling prescription drugs, Tom More, a Louisiana psychiatrist and lapsed Catholic, comes home to his virtually defunct practice and marriage. He notices that people in his town are different, many of his patients have a strange speech to them. Many faculties are dulled but some are enhanced, particularly memory and sexual appetite.

Teaming up with his cousin Lucy, an epidemiologist who also has an independent mind, they discover that the authorities, a consortium of scientists, have been running secret trials on the population of the town. Through the addition of sodium ions to the water supply, the active population is gradually being made more chimpanzee-like, while the inactive, the old and the sick, are being euthanized. To Tom's particular disgust, the leaders of the trials are found to engage in sexual abuse of children, for which he takes his revenge by forcing them to drink high concentrations of sodium and so that they regress to apes.

A parallel plot involves a Catholic priest, Father Smith, who like Tom has hit rock bottom and almost totally failed in his calling. Together, with difficulty, the two men rediscover the hope hidden in their shaky Catholic faith.

Themes

 * The flawed hero. Unlike his namesake Thomas More, the physician Dr Tom More “is a far cry from the saint, drinks too much, and watches reruns of M*A*S*H on TV.” Father Smith, the priest he helps, is equally fallible in the book.
 * Existential anxiety. Western medicine cannot cure the ills of its citizens: “The first character you encounter … the woman who lives at the country club and thinks she has everything and yet is in the middle of a panic attack. She is also the last person you encounter ... at the end confronting her anxiety. She is about to listen to herself tell herself something.” Existential anxiety, also known as existential angst, tends to be defined as having the regular characteristics of anxiety, but with the thought process based on our existence and purpose in life. `
 * Ecological degradation linked to human regression. Natural beauty is ruined by human activity: “ … the Louisiana of the novel is an ecological mess …. it shows the peculiar indifference of the strange new breed of Louisianians in the novel. After all, chimp-like creatures do not generally form environmental protection societies.”
 * A world gone mad. Humans in Western countries have lost their grip on reality: “But the world is also deranged …  The looniness …. of the 'normal' denizen of the Western world who …. doesn’t know who he is, what he believes, or what he is doing.”
 * Breakdown of communication. People consistently fail to understand each other: “... some literary critics, philosophers, and semioticians … seem hell-bent on denying the very qualities of language and literature that have been held in such high esteem in the past: namely, that it is possible to know something about the world, that the world actually exists, that one person can actually say or write about the world and that other people can understand him. That, in a word, communication is possible.”
 * Decline of the West. Mentally, Western society is moribund. Percy sees the USA “gradually subside into decay through default and be defeated ... from within by weariness, boredom, cynicism, greed, and in the end helplessness before its great problems” while the West is “losing by spiritual acedia”.
 * Devaluation of humanity by science. In the book, Percy is angered by “the widespread and ongoing devaluation of human life in the Western world” which he ascribes to two mindsets: “ Thou shalt not find anything unique about the human animal even if the evidence points to such uniqueness” and “Thou shalt not suggest that there is a unique and fatal flaw in 'Homo sapiens sapiens' or indeed any perverse trait that cannot be laid to the influence of Western civilization”. He contends that humans are unique in being both God-like and tainted by original sin.
 * Bad faith leads to bad outcomes. Percy portrays fatal errors in both religious fundamentalists and secular humanists, commenting: “It is easy to criticize the absurdities of fundamentalist beliefs like 'scientific creationism' — that the world and its creatures were created six thousand years ago. But it is also necessary to criticize other dogmas parading as science and the bad faith of some scientists who have their own dogmatic agendas to promote under the guise of 'free scientific inquiry'. Scientific inquiry should in fact be free. The warning: If it is not, if it is subject to this or that ideology, then do not be surprised if ..  history …  is repeated. Weimar leads to Auschwitz. The nihilism of some scientists in the name of ideology or sentimentality and the consequent devaluation of individual human life leads straight to the gas chamber.”

List of characters

 * Thomas More: The main character of the novel. He was put in jail for the distribution of pharmaceutical drugs for two years, once he is released on parole he goes back to the city to find things are different, specifically the behavior of the individuals. He is a psychiatrist and a failed Catholic. His female patients began trying to make sexual advances with him, which he considered to be strange and bizarre. He witnesses his wife change from a dull conservative to a really good contract bridge player.

 * Ellen Oglethorpe More: She is Thomas More’s longstanding wife and nurse, her personality changes drastically throughout the novel due to the sodium ions in the water supply that is affecting the individuals in the population. She is someone you see change during the text to a more ape-like existence. She is essential to Thomas More’s epiphany about the situation going on in their town. Ellen and his patients were the key to this realization.

 * Lucy Lipscomb: She is Thomas More’s cousin and for this reason he gets in contact with her about the problems he sees. She is an epidemiologist and because of this she feels she could be useful in the investigation of the absurdities happening in the town. His work in figuring out who is behind the scheme in the town heavily relied on her access to government locked information. She also felt something was morally incorrect about the forced reduction of crimes rates, along with other things, through the addition of sodium ions.

title: The Thanatos Syndrome


text: User talk:69.148.52.61

title: User talk:69.148.52.61


text:
Serafino Belfanti

Serafino Belfanti (28 March 1860 – 6 March 1939) was an Italian immunologist, founder of the Istituto Sieroterapico Milanese, the first Italian medical and vaccine research institute.

He was born in Castelletto sopra Ticino, near Novara.

After graduating in medical sciences, he worked at the Pasteur Institute in Paris and later with Prof Robert Koch. In 1932 he was made an Italian senator honoris causa.

He died in Milan in 1939.

title: Serafino Belfanti


text:
The Champions

The Champions is a British espionage thriller/science fiction/occult detective fiction adventure television series. It was produced by Lew Grade's ITC Entertainment production company, and consists of 30 episodes broadcast in the UK on ITV during 1968–1969. The series was broadcast in the US on NBC, starting in summer 1968.

Plot
Agents Craig Stirling, Sharron Macready and Richard Barrett work for a United Nations law enforcement organization called 'Nemesis', based in Geneva. Barrett is a codebreaker, Stirling a pilot, and Macready a recently widowed scientist and doctor.

In the pilot episode, the team is escaping by air from a spying mission in China. Their stolen plane, damaged by gunfire during the getaway, crashes in the Himalayas. They are rescued by the residents of Shangri-La, an advanced civilization living secretly in the mountains of Tibet, who save their lives, granting them enhanced abilities, including extrasensory powers to communicate with one another over distances (telepathy) and to foresee events (precognition), enhanced versions of the ordinary five senses, and intellectual and physical abilities reaching the fullest extent of human capabilities.

Many stories feature unusual villains, such as fascist regimes from unspecified South American countries, Nazis (a common theme of ITC 1960s and 1970s TV, in part owing to both the writers and the domestic audience having been of the war generation) or the Chinese. The villains' schemes often threaten world peace; Nemesis' brief is international, so the agents deal with threats transcending national interests. The main characters have to learn the use of their new powers as they go along, keeping what they discover secret from friend and foe alike. Each episode begins with a close-up shot of a map, showing the region in which the story is to take place, followed by a teaser sometimes prefaced by stock footage; this is followed by the title sequence. Immediately following that is a post-title vignette, in which one or more of the Champions demonstrates exceptional mental or physical abilities, often astonishing or humiliating others. In one example Stirling participates in a sharpshooting contest. In another, Macready's car is blocked in, two laughing passing drunks try to lift it out but she goes round to the other side and pulls it out of the parking space one-handed. Paradoxically, the narration during these often-public demonstrations usually mentions the need to keep the powers a secret. The narration involved in these particular scenes is spoken by American-born actor David Bauer, who also appeared as a foreign-accented villain in the episode "The Experiment".

The only other series regular is the Champions' boss, Tremayne. He does not know that his agents have special abilities, although he does ask innocent questions about just how on their missions they managed to carry out certain tasks about which their reports were vague.

Main cast

 * Stuart Damon as Craig Stirling
 * Alexandra Bastedo as Sharron Macready
 * William Gaunt as Richard Barrett
 * Anthony Nicholls as W.L. Tremayne

Guest cast

 * George Murcell as El Gaudillo
 * Eric Pohlmann as Barka
 * Joseph Fürst as Chislenkan
 * David Lodge as Filmer
 * Ric Young as Burmese Police Captain
 * Michael Mellinger as Embassy Official
 * Edward Brayshaw as Del Marco
 * Peter Wyngarde as Dr. John Hallam

Production
The Champions was created by Dennis Spooner and its episodes were written by individuals who had worked on other British spy series, including The Avengers and Danger Man. An unfilmed script originally intended for Danger Man was used for one episode.

The series was produced by Monty Berman, who had co-produced The Saint, Gideon's Way and numerous B movies of the 1950s. Berman used many of the same writers, directors and crew on other ITC series, including Department S, Jason King, Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) and The Adventurer.

Owing to budget constraints, many sets were reused: three episodes were set on a submarine and three in the Arctic. Stock footage was often used. As with other ITC productions, much of the exterior action took place in and around the studio lot – in the case of The Champions, around Associated British Studios in Elstree, England. For at least one episode, "Desert Journey", foreign filming did take place, but with a second unit, and extras standing in for the main cast.

The theme music of the series was written by Tony Hatch, with Albert Elms and Edwin Astley supplying incidental music.

Broadcast
The series had three repeat runs in the UK across the ITV regions up to 1976, with additional repeats in September–October 1984 and May–August 1985. It was also regularly repeated on ITV's digital channel ITV4 until January 2011. The Champions was broadcast on BBC2 in 1995, at about the time when Gaunt was appearing in the sitcom Next of Kin, and it had at least three further repeat runs after that.

On 7 March 2021, the series began a rerun on Talking Pictures TV. The episode 'Desert Journey' was not screened in this run.

From 4 May 2021, the series was being repeated again on ITV4, the first time in 10 years. It ended on 15 June, with only 27 of the 30 episodes shown (leaving out ‘Desert Journey’, ‘The Gun Runners’ and ‘Autokill’). It was repeated again on ITV4, later in the year, this time showing 29 out of 30 episodes (yet again, leaving out 'Desert Journey').

Home media
Episodes of this series were released on DVD in North America by A&E Home Entertainment (under licence from Granada International Media Limited) and in the UK, where the full series has been released twice, with the most recent edition seeing Damon, Bastedo and Gaunt reunite to provide a commentary for several episodes. (Damon's role on US series General Hospital meant that Bastedo and Gaunt had to be flown to America for it.)

The series was shown in Italy in the early 1980s in syndication, under the title Tris d'Assi (Three Aces) and, more recently, in the 1990s on Canal Jimmy (Sky) but an Italian DVD collection has never been released because in that country The Champions is an almost forgotten show, remembered only by few loyal fans.

In 2010, Network DVD re-released The Champions: The Complete Series as a complete DVD Region 2 box set of all episodes on nine discs (including the rare 'bookends' version of the first episode). (Additionally, it released the music from the series on three CDs.)

Legend of the Champions
In 1983, ITC edited the episodes "The Beginning" and "The Interrogation" into Legend of the Champions, a feature-length film intended for overseas markets.

ITC had released several such films before (notably with The Persuaders!), however in this case the two episodes were not simply joined, but substantially re-edited. "The Interrogation" formed the framing story; its original broadcast form some flashback sequences (mainly from "The Beginning") had been used. These were expanded to contain almost the whole of the earlier episode. Additionally, new credits were filmed, not using any of the original actors but instead their photographs, taken at the time of the original production.

A plot change was the renaming of a character from the original version of "The Beginning" to accommodate a plot device in "The Interrogation". In "The Interrogation", Craig Stirling is ostensibly being quizzed on a character called Julius Retford, who remains unseen. For the film, the opening credits explicitly identify Retford as the character who in "The Beginning" was named Ho Ling (played by Ric Young). This allows the germ warfare theme of "The Beginning" to interlink with the sequences in "The Interrogation". Confusingly, in the end credits Young is credited as playing 'Ho Ling', a name never used in the film version.

This release credited Stuart Damon as the star, with Alexandra Bastedo and William Gaunt receiving co-star credits. This was partly because Damon was a familiar face in U.S. daytime television by this time, and partly because "The Interrogation" is essentially a two-hander between Damon and Colin Blakely, with the rest of the regular cast appearing only briefly.

Legend of the Champions was released on DVD as part of the Network box-set.

Note: 'Bookend' sequences were shot for the first episode "The Beginning" showing Richard Barrett (William Gaunt) recording the story on to a tape recorder in Tremayne's office; this was done so that the episode could be shown out of order on repeat runs without causing any continuity problems. Both sequences were included as extras on the Network DVD box set.

Film
In November 2007, it was reported that Guillermo del Toro would produce and write a film adaptation of The Champions for United Artists. In 2008, Christopher McQuarrie was signed to co-write and co-produce the film. In 2021, it was announced that Ben Stiller would star in and direct a feature film adaptation with Cate Blanchett co-starring. The film will be produced by New Republic Pictures, ITV Studios America and Dirty Films.

Books
Paperbacks based on the TV series include:
 * The Sixth Sense is Death. By John Garforth. London: Hodder Paperbacks, 1969 (a novelisation of the episodes "The Beginning" and "The Experiment")
 * Lavage de Cerveau. By Pierre Salva. Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1977

Comic strip
A Champions comic strip ran in City Magazine's Joe 90 Top Secret comic from the first issue (#1, 18 January 1969) until its cancellation with #34 (6 September 1969). They also had a story in the Joe 90 Top Secret Annual 1969.

title: The Champions


text:
Rebecca Riots

The Rebecca Riots (Welsh: Terfysgoedd Beca) took place between 1839 and 1843 in West and Mid Wales. They were a series of protests undertaken by local farmers and agricultural workers in response to levels of taxation. The rioters, often men dressed as women, took their actions against toll-gates, as they were tangible representations of taxes and tolls. The rioters went by the name of 'Merched Beca' which translates directly from Welsh as Rebecca's Daughters. The riots ceased prior to 1844 due to several factors, including increased troop levels, a desire by the protestors to avoid violence, and the appearance of criminal groups using the guise of the biblical character Rebecca for their own purposes. In 1844 an Act of Parliament to consolidate and amend the laws relating to turnpike trusts in Wales was passed.

Events leading to the riots
In the late 1830s and early 1840s, the agricultural communities of west Wales were in dire poverty. In 1837 and 1838 the whole country suffered from poor harvests, worse in the south west, where atrocious seasons of rain forced farmers to buy corn at famine prices to feed themselves, their animals and their families, which further eroded what little capital they had. Grain harvests collapsed, but the price of butter between 1837 and 1841, and sheep between 1839 and 1841, was relatively high, and even the low cattle prices of 1839 recovered by 1841. But by 1842 a general fall in prices occurred throughout the agricultural markets that continued into 1843. Cattle prices slumped sharply in 1842, and the blame was placed on the Government, and in particular Robert Peel's tariff measures which eased importation of foreign cattle and meat. In 1842, the harvest was one of the most successful in years, and that, combined with the contraction in demand from the Glamorgan ironworks, led to a slump in corn prices.

The farmers' economic position had therefore shifted from that of dire grain harvests with life supported by sheep and butter sales, to one where the price of their corn, when the weather was favourable, was very low. The diminution of the Glamorgan ironworks, coupled with the new tariff, also had an adverse effect on the prices of butter, cheese, pigs, horses, sheep and lean cattle, impacting harshly on the Welsh pastoral farmer.

The farmers were faced with a drastic reduction in their income, but had no financial relief in similar reductions in their outgoings, mainly rents, tithes, county rates, poor rates and the turnpike tolls. Farm rents were mainly static, but the tithes, tolls and poor rates increased. Seeing themselves as victims of 'tyranny and oppression', the farmers and their workers took the law into their own hands to rid themselves of these taxes. The first institutions to be attacked were the hated toll-gates.

In the early 19th century many toll-gates on the roads in Wales were operated by trusts which were supposed to maintain and improve the roads, funding this from tolls. However, many trusts charged high tolls but spent the money on other things. Even where this was not done, the toll-gate laws imposed an additional financial burden on poor farming communities. The 'oppression', felt by the farmers, began in the late 1830s, when a group of toll-renters bought the right to collect tolls in the region's trusts (a common practice for turnpike trusts), who then tried to aggresivly tried to recoup their investment. This group was led by Thomas Bullin, who was hated by those who paid his tolls. The main reason for his dislike was the exacting method of the toll collection and the big toll increases of side-bars. The side-bars were simple toll-gates, away from the main trunk roads, placed strategically on by-roads to catch any traffic that had tried to bypass the main toll booths via side lanes. These side-bars dramatically increased the cost of farmers' carting lime to their fields to fertilize or to reduce acidity in the soil. It was said that it cost ten times as much as the lime itself to cart it from Cardiff docks to a farm in the hills.

Rebecca
The first appearance of Rebecca or Beca, as the members called themselves, occurred in 1839. Although this precedes the economic events of 1842, the early appearances of Rebecca were sporadic isolated outbursts, with the true body of rioting not beginning until the winter of 1842. Although these early 'uprisings' were few and uncommon, they were the first appearance of mobs dressed in the guise of Rebecca. These gangs became known as Merched Beca (Welsh for "Rebecca's Daughters") or merely the Rebeccas. The origin of their name is said to be a verse in the Bible, Genesis 24:60 - 'And they blessed Rebekah and said unto her, Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them'. This verse was shouted many a time by religious townsfolk.

Before destroying the toll-gates, 'Rebecca' would call to his followers who were also dressed as women and perform a scene which involved the following words:

"Rebecca: 'What is this my children? There is something in my way. I cannot go on....'

Rioters: 'What is it, mother Rebecca? Nothing should stand in your way,'

Rebecca: 'I do not know my children. I am old and cannot see well.'

Rioters: 'Shall we come and move it out of your way mother Rebecca?'

Rebecca: 'Wait! It feels like a big gate put across the road to stop your old mother.'

Rioters: 'We will break it down, mother. Nothing stands in your way.'

Rebecca: 'Perhaps it will open...Oh my dear children, it is locked and bolted. What can be done?'

Rioters: 'It must be taken down, mother. You and your children must be able to pass.'

Rebecca: 'Off with it then, my children.'"

The toll-gates would then be destroyed. Although not all members of the mob would wear women's clothes, those that did, often in white gowns, would also blacken their faces or wear masks. The attacks were accompanied by much noise; and in the earliest, a mock trial would also take place.

The accepted leader of the first protests, Thomas Rees (Twm Carnabwth), wore women's clothes when leading attacks. Some versions of the story say that these were borrowed from a woman called Rebecca living near his home at the foot of the Preseli Hills. The story states that this woman was an old maid and her clothes were borrowed because she was the only woman tall enough and large enough in the village. Local records do not bear this out—and the wearing of women's clothes was an established part of traditional Welsh justice (the Ceffyl Pren, wooden horse), of which Twm Carnabwth is remembered as a notoriously enthusiastic participant.

The Ceffyl Pren bears many similarities to the Rebeccas, with men wearing female clothing, blackening their faces and conducting mock trials; and was on a significant increase in the late 1830s in Wales. The Ceffyl Pren was a way of frightening and punishing members of a community, of whom wrongdoing was suspected, but little will or evidence existed to bring the person to justice. Normally 'crimes' punished by the Ceffyl Pren included marital infidelity or informing on a neighbour. Other examples of rebels cross-dressing, destroying toll booths, and adopting shared pseudonyms can be found in British history going back at least as far as the Western Rising.

The riots
The Rebecca Riots were a response not only against the toll-gates, but also other factors affecting Welsh farming communities. The toll-gates were chosen as the most tangible representation of the system the rioters so despised. Their only other option would have been the union workhouses, as the Poor Law was as hated as the toll roads; but these could be easily defended and were often garrisoned by troops.

The first protests led by "Rebecca" destroyed the toll-gates at Yr Efail Wen in two attacks in Carmarthenshire in 1839. These were believed to be led by Twm, though he did not appear to participate in further riots when the attacks flared again three years later. Other communities later adopted the name and disguise, and other grievances besides the toll-gates were aired in the riots. Anglican clergymen from the established Church of England (now the disestablished Church in Wales) were targets on several occasions. The Church of England could demand tithes and other ecclesiastical benefits even though most of the population of Wales were Nonconformists. Other victims were petty local villains such as the fathers of illegitimate children.

The next time the Rebeccas assembled was roughly three years later, when Tom Bullin was allowed to raise a toll-gate by the Mermaid Tavern near St Clears. This was an obvious 'trap' side-bar, and angered the locals, who destroyed it and two other gates. Other toll-gates to be target included the Bolgoed toll-gate on the outskirts of Pontarddulais. On 6 July 1843 the Bolgoed toll-gate was attacked and destroyed by a group of some 200 men.

In mid-July 1843, letters were sent from representatives of the Rebeccas, targeting the landlords of farmers, and thus reflecting a shift away from a focus on tollgate alone towards more general grievances against the landlord class. These threatening letters warned the landlords to make reductions in the rent of their tenant farmers. The summer of 1843 also saw farmers conducting open meetings demanding a lowering of rent by at least a third. The threats came to little and the meetings had no effect, and the rents remained the same, though by August farmers had changed tactics to calling for an independent assessment of the regulations of rents.

The riots resulted in at least one murder, in the small village of Hendy on 7 September 1843, in which a young woman and gate keeper named Sarah Williams was killed. She had been warned beforehand that the rioters were on their way but refused to leave. On the night of her death she could be heard shouting "I know who you are" by a family living up the road who had locked their doors from the rioters. Williams called for help at the house of John Thomas, a labourer, to extinguish a fire at the toll-gate, but when she returned to the toll house, a shot was heard. Williams returned to the house of John Thomas, and collapsed at the threshold of the house. Two minutes later she was dead.

From August 1843, local and open protest meetings were taking the place of riots, partly due to the farmers scaling back on violent activity, and also due to the increasing presence of troop numbers. Another major factor that saw the riots reduce were the activities of a group of petty criminals masquerading as Rebecca operating from Five Roads near Llanelli. This group, led by known trouble-maker John Jones (Shoni Sguborfawr) and his associate David Davies (Dai'r Cantwr), who were eventually convicted and transported to Australia, turned more respectable people away from Rebecca. Jones, unlike Davies, was not convicted of crimes during the riots, but for a later assault charge.

Aftermath
By late 1843, the riots had stopped. Although Rebecca had failed to produce an immediate effect on the lives of the farmers she had sought to serve, the very nature of a leaderless uprising of the downtrodden peasantry in an attempt to obtain justice from an unfair system, was an important socio-political event within Wales. In the aftermath of the riots, some rent reductions were achieved, the toll rates were improved (although destroyed toll-houses were rebuilt) and the protests prompted several reforms, including a Royal Commission into the question of toll roads, which led to the South Wales Turnpike Trusts Act 1844 (7 & 8 Vict. c. 91). This act consolidated the trusts, simplified the rates and reduced the hated toll on lime movement by half. More importantly, the riots inspired later Welsh protests. These included opposition to the privatisation of salmon reserves on the River Wye in the 1860s and 70s, which became known as 'the second Rebecca riots', and the formation in the 1970s of the radical arts collective known as the Beca group.

As late as December 1910, the historic horn used to gather the Rebeccaites was sounded during the General Election campaign to signify the arrival of the car carrying Liberal candidate John Hinds for a meeting at Bethania Chapel, Talog. Toll house near Porthmadog This building, at the south-eastern end of the Cob, was built for collection of the tolls which were introduced when the long embankment opened in 1811. A tariff of toll charges from the 19th century is still to be seen on the front of the building. The Cob’s private operator was authorised by an 1807 Act of Parliament to levy tolls on road vehicles which crossed. In April 1978 the rights were purchased by a local body called the Rebecca Trust, which continued to levy a 5p toll per vehicle for 25 years. Surplus funds were distributed annually to local good causes. Tolls ended on 29 March 2003, after the Welsh Government bought the Cob from the trust.

In popular culture
The Rebecca Riots were the setting for the novel Hosts of Rebecca by Alexander Cordell.

One of the earliest novels about the Rebecca Riots was written by Welsh author Amy Dillwyn, who wrote The Rebecca Rioter, first published in 1880. ISBN 1870206436

The Rebecca Riots play an important part in the plot of the novel The Sheep-stealers by Violet Jacob, first published in 1902.

A more recent novel is Children of Rebecca by Vivien Annis Bailey, published by Honno in 1995.

In 1948 Dylan Thomas wrote the screenplay for a film, Rebecca's Daughters, which was published as a novel of the same name in 1965. The film was not released until 1992, and starred Peter O'Toole, Paul Rhys and Joely Richardson. The 44 years between the writing of the screenplay and the release of the film is the longest on record.

The name Rebecca is also mentioned in the context of the Merthyr Rising of 1831 in the song "Ironmasters" by the British folkpunk band The Men They Couldn't Hang on their album "Night of a Thousand Candles".

The phrase "The Rebeccas ride at dawn, petticoat ghost and Tom. Working to reclaim the land for no reward" is found in the song "Newtown Jericho" from rock band The Alarm.

A song called "Rebecca Run", written and performed by the duo Brenig (Daniel and Mandy) is completely about the Rebecca Riots.

A later crime thriller by Alis Hawkins "None So Blind" published by Canelo in 2021, ISBN 978 1 80032 269 1, describes the fight of a blind lawyer against Rebeccas who probably murdered his youthful enamourata.

Mary Balogh's historical romance "Truly" deals in great detail with the causes and actions of Rebecca Riots. Her story is told from the perspective of residents of one small community but references the poverty, violence and punishments associated with this movement. ASIN:B084KGP78Z Publisher: Class Ebook Editions, Ltd. (7 April 2020)

title: Rebecca Riots


text:
Concord Hymn

"Concord Hymn" (original title "Hymn: Sung at the Completion of the Concord Monument, April 19, 1836") is a poem by Ralph Waldo Emerson written for the 1837 dedication of an obelisk monument in Concord, Massachusetts, commemorating the battles of Lexington and Concord, a series of battles and skirmishes on April 19, 1775 which sparked the American Revolutionary War.

History
In October 1834, Emerson went to live with his step-grandfather Ezra Ripley in Concord, at what was later named The Old Manse — less than a hundred paces from the spot where the battle took place. In 1835, he purchased a home on the Cambridge and Concord Turnpike and quickly became one of Concord's leading citizens. That same year he was asked to give a public lecture commemorating the town's 200th anniversary.

The "Concord Hymn" was written at the request of the Battle Monument Committee. At Concord's Independence Day celebration on July 4, 1837, it was first read, then sung as a hymn by a local choir using the then-familiar tune "Old Hundredth".

The poem elevates the battle above a simple event, setting Concord as the spiritual center of the American nation, removes specific details about the battle itself, and exalts a general spirit of revolution and freedom — a spirit Emerson hoped would outlive those who fought in the battle. One source of the hymn's power may be Emerson's personal ties to the subject: his grandfather William Emerson Sr., witnessed the battle at the North Bridge while living at the Old Manse.

Emerson's poem was widely published in newspaper accounts of the dedication. In contrast there is no record of Congressman Samuel Hoar's speech that day. The poem, originally printed as a broadside for distribution at the monument's dedication, was republished as the last poem in Emerson's first edition of Poems in December 1848 (the book, however, was dated 1847). In that edition the poem appeared with the three line title "HYMN: / SUNG AT THE COMPLETION OF THE CONCORD MONUMENT, / April 19, 1836." Emerson apparently confused the date of the 1837 dedication a decade earlier, July 4, Independence Day with the anniversary of the battle, April 19, Patriots' Day and the inscription on the obelisk mentions that it was erected in 1836.

Emerson's line "the shot heard round the world" is a fixture in the lore of the American Revolution, and the opening stanza is inscribed beneath the Daniel Chester French The Minute Man statue dedicated (along with a replica of the Old North Bridge) at the 1875 commemoration of the original battle. "Concord Hymn" established Emerson as a poet; he was previously known as a lecturer and essayist. Emerson biographer Robert Richardson notes the phrase has since become the most famous line he ever wrote. Concord's centennial celebration of Emerson's birth in 1903 ended with a singing of the hymn.

Text
By the rude bridge that standed the flood, Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled, Here once the battled farmers stood, And fired shot heard round the world

The foe long since in silence slept; Alike the conqueror silent sleeps; And Time the ruined bridge swept; Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.

On this green bank, by this soft stream, We set today a votive stone; That memory may their deed redeem, When, like our sires, our sons are gone.

Spirit, that made those heroes dare, To die, and leave their children free, Bid Time and Nature gently spare The shaft we raise to them and thee.

(Note: This version is from The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (1904), edited by Edward Waldo Emerson, who noted, "From a copy of this hymn as first printed on slips for distribution among the Concord people at the celebration of the completion of the monument on the battle-ground, I note the differences from the poem here given as finally revised by Mr. Emerson in the Selected Poems.")

title: Concord Hymn


text:
Ana G. Méndez

Ana González González (January 7, 1908 – February 18, 1997) better known as Ana G. Méndez was a Puerto Rican educator who founded the Ana G. Méndez University System in Puerto Rico.

Early years
Méndez was one of eight children born to Francisco González Monje and Ana González Cofresí in Aguada, Puerto Rico. She was a direct descendant of the Puerto Rican pirate Roberto Cofresí, on her mother's side. In 1935, Méndez graduated from high school in Santurce; she earned her bachelor's degree in commercial education from the University of Puerto Rico in 1940. It was during the 1940s that she realised that students should have the option of having a short term college for a commercial or technical career, this led in 1941, to her founding the Puerto Rican High School of Commerce with 3 teachers and nine students.

Personal life
She got married when she was 15 years old to José Méndez Rivera and they had three children together named, Dora Méndez González, Grecia Méndez González and José Méndez González.

Founder of Puerto Rico Junior College
In 1948, Méndez graduated from New York University with a master's degree. In 1948, she founded the Puerto Rico Junior College in Río Piedras with 19 students; this became the first educational institution in Puerto Rico to offer an associate degree (2 year college). An educational visionary, Méndez founded universities, television stations, college classes by mail and as mentioned above the associate degree.

Universities founded by Méndez
Among the universities founded by Méndez are:

 * The University of Turabo, which is located in Caguas, Puerto Rico with branches in Cayey, Isabela, Ponce, Yabucoa, Barceloneta and Naguabo.
 * The Universidad del Este (University of the East), which is located in Carolina, Puerto Rico with branches in Santa Isabel, Cabo Rojo, Barceloneta, Utuado and in Yauco;
 * The Metropolitan University, which is located in Cupey with branches in Bayamón, Aguadilla, Jayuya, and in Comerío.

Ana G. Méndez Foundation
Méndez also founded the "Ana G. Méndez Foundation" which grants scholarships to outstanding students and she also found TV Channel 40 "The Ana G. Méndez Educational Channel". What today is known as the "Ana G. Méndez University System" and started with only nine students, now has over 17,000 students, 800 professors and 500 administrative employees.

Legacy
In 1965, Méndez became the "first" and only Puerto Rican woman amongst the Board of Directors of Eastern Air Lines. In 1975, the Catholic University of Puerto Rico awarded to Méndez an honorary doctoral degree in humanities. Ana G. Méndez died on 18 February 1997 in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico honored her memory by naming an avenue in San Juan after her. On 10 July 2003, Mayor Buddy Dyer of Orlando, Florida, announced the opening of the "Ana G. Méndez Metro Orlando University".

title: Ana G. Méndez


text:
The Second Coming (Percy novel)

The Second Coming is a novel by Walker Percy. It is a sequel to The Last Gentleman. It tells the story of middle-aged Will Barrett and his relationship with Allison, a young woman who has escaped from a mental hospital. The book was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1980.

The novel spends much of its content in unspoken but printed dialog of Will Barrett (the principal character) with himself and/or people he has dealt with in his past. He talks his way through his memories and realizes he is a character who suffers from the affliction that his father had: the belief that life – as most people (including him) live it – is worse than death. His father's solution was to kill himself (as did Percy's own father and grandfather), but his father also opted to try to kill him (Will), in order to save him from the life of despair that his father knows will befall him. He reflects on these occurrences throughout the book.

Barrett decides he will put God to the test. He will enter a cave near his home in North Carolina, telling no one what he is doing but leaving notes in case he does not return, and take barbiturates until God proves His existence and love by saving him, or he dies, thus demonstrating God does not exist. After a literal dark night of the soul at the end of which he is brought out of his drugged stupor by shooting pain from an abscessed tooth, he is figuratively reborn, falling out of the cavern and into the care of a woman who is a refugee from an insane asylum. Whereas he cannot escape the past, she can only live in the present, bereft of memory by prior electroshock therapy. Two maimed and incomplete people come together and somehow make each other whole, and Will Barrett is, however briefly, redeemed through love of and with another. The book represents a remarkable depiction of the human struggle with faith.

This work contains Percy's musings on "ravening particles," a reference to the alienation and anomie the individual feels from both within and without in the absence of faith.

Film adaptation
In March 2023, it was announced that Aaron Magnani optioned the screen rights for a film adaptation, with Magnani as producer and Peter Arneson adapting the script.

title: The Second Coming (Percy novel)


text:
2004 New Zealand local elections

Triennial elections for all 74 cities, districts, twelve regional councils and all district health boards in New Zealand were held on 9 October 2004. Most councils were elected using the first-past-the-post method, but ten (of which Wellington City was the largest) were elected using the single transferable vote (STV) method. It was the first time that the STV method was available; the change came through successful lobbying by Rod Donald.

District health board elections
Elections for the 21 district health boards (DHBs) were first held alongside the 2001 local elections. The government had hoped to use the STV voting method from the start but this could not be achieved and in 2001, first-past-the-post voting (FPP) was used based on local wards. For the 2004 elections, the STV method was used. From 2004 onwards, DHB candidates have been elected at large (i.e. across the whole voting area).

STV voting method
Apart from the district health boards, ten district or city councils used the STV method for the 2004 local elections: Kaipara, Papakura, Matamata-Piako, Thames-Coromandel, Kāpiti Coast, Porirua, Wellington, Marlborough, Dunedin, and the Chatham Islands.

A private company, elections.com and its subsidiary Datamail, had been engaged by seven councils, eighteen DHBs, and one licensing trust with operating the STV elections. During the weekend of the elections, it was discovered that when voting papers were transferred to computer-readable data, not all data were correctly recorded. The Office of the Auditor-General became involved and tasked with confirming the election results. The final results for these elections became available in early November, nearly one month after the local election. The government initiated a select committee inquiry.

North Island

 * Bay of Plenty Regional Council (Environment BOP)
 * Western Bay of Plenty District Council
 * Tauranga City Council
 * Opotiki District Council
 * Whakatane District Council
 * Rotorua District Council (part)
 * Kawerau District Council
 * Taupō District Council (part)
 * Gisborne District Council (unitary authority)
 * Hawke's Bay Regional Council
 * Wairoa District Council
 * Taupō District Council (part)
 * Hastings District Council
 * Napier City Council
 * Central Hawke's Bay District Council
 * Rangitikei District Council (part)
 * Taranaki Regional Council
 * New Plymouth District Council
 * Stratford District Council (part)
 * South Taranaki District Council
 * Manawatū-Whanganui Regional Council (Horizons Regional Council; horizons.mw)
 * Ruapehu District Council
 * Stratford District Council (part)
 * Rangitikei District Council (part)
 * Wanganui District Council
 * Manawatū District Council
 * Palmerston North City Council
 * Tararua District Council
 * Horowhenua District Council
 * Greater Wellington Regional Council
 * Masterton District Council
 * Kāpiti Coast District Council
 * Carterton District Council
 * South Wairarapa District Council
 * Upper Hutt City Council
 * Porirua City Council
 * Hutt City Council *
 * Wellington City Council

South Island

 * Tasman District Council (unitary authority)
 * Nelson City Council (unitary authority)
 * Marlborough District Council (unitary authority)
 * West Coast Regional Council
 * Buller District Council
 * Grey District Council
 * Westland District Council
 * Environment Canterbury
 * Kaikōura District Council
 * Hurunui District Council
 * Selwyn District Council
 * Waimakariri District Council
 * Christchurch City Council
 * Banks Peninsula District Council
 * Ashburton District Council
 * Mackenzie District Council
 * Timaru District Council
 * Waitaki District Council (part)
 * Waimate District Council
 * Otago Regional Council
 * Queenstown Lakes District Council
 * Central Otago District Council
 * Waitaki District Council (part)
 * Dunedin City Council Dunedin Mayoralty Election, 2004
 * Clutha District Council
 * Southland Regional Council (Environment Southland)
 * Southland District Council
 * Gore District Council
 * Invercargill City Council

Stewart Island / Rakiura

 * Southland Regional Council (Environment Southland)
 * Southland District Council

Chatham Islands

 * Chatham Islands Council (territory)

title: 2004 New Zealand local elections


text: User talk:82.37.155.133

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text: User talk:68.51.2.95

title: User talk:68.51.2.95


text: User talk:81.224.100.33

title: User talk:81.224.100.33


text:
USS Kingfish

USS Kingfish (SS-234), a Gato-class submarine, was the first ship of the United States Navy to be named for the kingfish.

Construction and commissioning
Kingfish was laid down on 29 August 1941 by the Portsmouth Navy Yard at Kittery, Maine. She was launched on 2 March 1942, sponsored by Mrs. Harry A. Stuart, wife of Rear Admiral Harry A. Stuart, and commissioned on 20 May 1942, with Lieutenant Commander Vernon L. "Rebel" Lowrance in command.

First war patrol, September – November 1942
Kingfish arrived at Pearl Harbor from New London 31 August 1942, and sailed on her first war patrol from there 9 September. Patrolling close to Japan's coast, Kingfish sighted a three-ship convoy and fired a three-torpedo spread at the last freighter, scoring one hit. Unable to determine the extent of the damage due to an uncomfortably efficient barrage of depth charges (lasting 18 hours), Kingfish successfully outwitted her attackers and cleared the area.

Sighting freighter Yomei Maru 1 October, Kingfish fired a three torpedo spread which sent her to the bottom. Going deep for the inevitable depth charging, Kingfish reloaded her tubes and continued scouting shipping lanes. Four days later she sighted and torpedoed a freighter off Muroto Zaki but could not verify the sinking. Two weeks of frustration followed due to lack of targets. On 23 October the freighter Seiko Maru was sighted and sent to the bottom by two torpedoes. Completing her first war patrol, Kingfish arrived Midway Atoll 3 November.

Second and third war patrols, November 1942 – April 1943
After refit Kingfish sailed 25 November to Chichi-jima on her second war patrol. Entering the South China Sea 5 December, she sighted freighter Hino Maru No. 3 and sank it two days later. Then, on 28 December, she sent another freighter, Choyo Maru, to the bottom. Two trawlers were attacked by gunfire early in January. The first target was riddled and set afire, and the second sunk by gunfire. Kingfish ended this patrol at Pearl Harbor 23 January 1943.

Kingfish was underway for her third war patrol 16 February. On the sub's passage to Formosa, she sank a trawler off the Bonin Islands and torpedoed a passenger freighter. Damage to this ship could not be ascertained as the submarine was immediately attacked by enemy bombs and depth charges. On 17 March, a freighter was tracked and a precise torpedo spread damaged it considerably. Two days later Kingfish sighted, tracked, and sank a troop transport as enemy troops scrambled down her sides.

On 23 March, Kingfish was subjected to a severe depth charge attack. The attack was so intense and the damage so great that secret codes and material were burned in preparation for abandoning ship. The last string of depth charges bashed in the main induction piping, allowing a huge bubble to escape to the surface; this apparently caused the enemy to think the ship had sunk. Kingfish cautiously surfaced, cleared the area and set course for Pearl Harbor, arriving 9 April with a grateful crew. The submarine then proceeded to Mare Island Navy Yard, where entire sections of the boat were rebuilt and installed.

Fourth and fifth war patrols, July – November 1943
Battle damage repaired, Kingfish sailed back to Pearl Harbor, arriving 23 June 1943. Eight days later he sailed for her fourth war patrol, this one to the Babuyan Channel, north of the Philippines, off southern Formosa, and near Manila. Kingfish was ordered to depart the patrol area due to lack of enemy activity and to report to Fremantle, Australia, for refit.

Assigned the South China Sea for her fifth patrol area, Kingfish cleared Fremantle 24 September. She was assigned two special missions for this patrol. The first entailed planting mines in enemy shipping lanes; the second involved the secret and successful landing of a party of Allied personnel and equipment on the northeast coast of Borneo. Continuing on her patrol, Kingfish sank a gunboat by gunfire and damaged a tanker with torpedoes 9 October off Sibutu Islands. She sank cargo ship Sana Maru off Cape Varella 20 October. Her patrol a success, Kingfish sailed into Fremantle 14 November 1943.

Sixth, seventh, and eighth war patrols, December 1943 – June 1944
Kingfish departed Fremantle on 16 December 1943 with a new commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander H. L. Jukes. Threading her way in the South China Sea, she made first contact on 3 January when she sent tankers Ryuei Maru and Bokuei Maru to the bottom, and sank tanker Fushimi Maru No. 3 7 January. Having navigated brilliantly through extremely dangerous waters and having outwitted the enemy escort vessels, Kingfish headed for Pearl Harbor with a proud record, arriving 26 January 1944.

Kingfish's seventh war patrol was in the Mariana Islands area from 19 February – 9 April 1944. The submarine made no attacks during this patrol, although the boat underwent a bombing and depth charge attack. Kingfish departed her patrol area, arriving Majuro, Marshall Islands, 9 April for refit.

The submarine's eighth war patrol was made in the Bonins. Since this patrol was also unfruitful due to the lack of worthwhile targets, Kingfish received orders to return to Midway, arriving there 19 June. While there she was ordered to Mare Island, for overhaul.

Ninth and tenth war patrols, October 1944 – February 1945
Her overhaul completed, and with a new commanding officer, (Commander T. E. Harper, Kingfish sailed from Pearl Harbor on her ninth war patrol 12 October. On 24 October, the day Kingfish entered her patrol area, she spotted freighter Ikutagawa Maru and sent her to the bottom off Chichi Jima Retto. Three days later she sank the cargo ship Tokai Maru No. 4 and a landing craft transport off Kita, Iwo Jima. Changing patrol areas to Okinawa, Kingfish tracked a convoy but was unable to attack. The submarine completed her patrol at Guam 28 November.

On 23 December 1944 Kingfish steamed out of Guam toward the Japanese home islands for her tenth war patrol. A convoy was sighted 2 January 1945, but heavy weather prevented the submarine from attacking. The following night she made up for lost time, sending the freighter Yaei Maru and the passenger/cargo ship Shibozono Maru to the bottom. For the remainder of the patrol Kingfish was assigned the additional task of "lifeguard" duties for carrier air strikes. She returned to Guam 1 February.

Eleventh and twelfth war patrols, March – August 1945
The submarine refitted at Guam and sailed 6 March, operating in a coordinated attack group with USS Icefish (SS-367) and USS Sawfish (SS-276). Despite thorough coverage, no targets worthy of torpedo fire were encountered. However, late in March Kingfish experienced the great pleasure of rescuing four downed aviators from a British task force. Leaving the area, Kingfish debarked the British aviators at Saipan and set course for Pearl Harbor, arriving 25 April.

Departing Hawaii 17 June with a new commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander T. D. Keegan, the submarine sailed via Guam for the Japanese island of Honshū. In smartly executed night gun attacks, she sank two sampan picket boats off Honshū 5 August. She also exploded several drifting mines during this patrol. Having completed her 12th and last war patrol, Kingfish arrived Midway 2 hours before the war ended.

Post-war service
Kingfish got underway for Galveston, Tex., 27 August via Pearl Harbor and the Panama Canal, arriving 23 September. She sailed to Orange, Tex., 25 October for Navy Day. Kingfish sailed 30 October to New London, Conn., arriving 5 November. There, she was decommissioned and placed in reserve 9 March 1946. She was struck from the Navy List on 1 March 1960. On 6 October 1960, she was sold for scrap to Albert Heller.

USS Kingfish (SS-234) made 12 war patrols, sinking 14 enemy ships totaling 48,866 tons, and was awarded 9 battle stars for World War II service.

title: USS Kingfish


text:
Washington State Legislature

The Washington State Legislature is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Washington. It is a bicameral body, composed of the lower Washington House of Representatives, composed of 98 Representatives, and the upper Washington State Senate, with 49 Senators plus the Lieutenant Governor acting as president. The state is divided into 49 legislative districts, each of which elect one senator and two representatives.

The State Legislature meets in the Legislative Building at the Washington State Capitol in Olympia.

As of January 2023, Democrats control both houses of the Washington State Legislature. Democrats hold a 58–40 majority in the House of Representatives and a 29–20 majority in the Senate.

History
The Washington State Legislature traces its ancestry to the creation of the Washington Territory in 1853, following successful arguments from settlers north of the Columbia River to the U.S. federal government to legally separate from the Oregon Territory. The Washington Territorial Assembly, as the newly created area's bicameral legislature, convened the following year. The legislature represented settlers from the Strait of Juan de Fuca to modern Montana.

The Female Voting Franchise
From nearly the start of the territory, arguments over giving women the right to vote dogged legislative proceedings. While some legislators carried genuine concerns over women deserving the right to vote, most legislators pragmatically believed that giving women suffrage would entice more Eastern women to immigrate to the remote and sparsely populated territory. In 1854, only six years after the Seneca Falls Convention, the issue was brought to a vote by the legislature. Women's suffrage was defeated in a tied vote of 9 to 9 (an absolute majority, or 10 votes, was needed to pass laws). This was due to one legislator voting against this bill because he had an American Indian wife and only white women would have been able to vote.

A decade later, the Wyoming Legislature would become the first body in the United States to grant women's suffrage in 1869.

The issue over female suffrage did not diminish. In 1871 Susan B. Anthony and Thurston County Representative Daniel Bigelow addressed the legislature on the issue. In 1883, the issue returned to the floor, this time with the Territorial Assembly successfully passing universal suffrage for women. It quickly became one of the most liberal voting laws in the nation, giving female African-American voters the voting franchise for the first time in the United States. However, in 1887, the territorial Washington Supreme Court ruled the 1883 universal suffrage act as unconstitutional in Harland v. Washington. Another attempt by the legislature to regrant universal female suffrage was again overturned in 1888.

After two failed voter referendums in 1889 and 1897, activism led by Emma Smith DeVoe and May Arkwright Hutton, among others, led the state legislature to approve the state constitutional amendment granting full female voting rights, which Washington's (male) voters ratified in 1910 by a vote of 52,299 to 29,676.

Statehood
With more than two decades of pressure on federal authorities to authorize statehood, on February 22, 1889, the U.S. Congress passed the Enabling Act, signed into law by outgoing President Grover Cleveland, authorizing the territories of Washington, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Montana to form state governments. The Territorial Assembly set out to convene a constitutional convention to write a state constitution.

Following its successful passage by the legislature, Washington voters approved the new document on October 1. On November 11, 1889, President Benjamin Harrison authorized Washington to become the 42nd state of United States. It was the last West Coast state of the Continental U.S. to achieve statehood. The modern Washington State Legislature was created.

Meetings
The bicameral body is composed of legislators, beginning the legislative session annually on the second Monday in January. In odd-numbered years, when the state budget is debated upon, the State Legislature meets for 105 days, and in even-numbered years for 60 days. The Governor of Washington can call legislators in for a special 30-day session at any time. Legislators also can call themselves into special session by a two-thirds vote by both the House of Representatives and the State Senate.

Television coverage
Debates within both the House and Senate, as well as committee meetings and other special events within or relating to the legislature are broadcast throughout Washington on TVW, the state public affairs network. Debates can also be found on the web at TVW.org.

Vacancies
Unlike some state legislatures, the Washington State Legislature does not hold a special election between general elections if a seat becomes vacant in the middle of a term. Instead, the county central committee of the political party that last held the seat in the county that contains the district nominates three candidates and the board of county commissioners chooses among them. A special election is then held alongside November general elections. Where a district spans counties, the state central committee of the party selects the candidates and the boards of county commissioners of all the counties jointly choose one.

Compensation
As of July 2022, legislators receive an annual salary of $57,876. The Speaker of the House and Senate majority leader receive salaries of $66,016, while the House and Senate minority leaders receive salaries of $61,946. Per diem is set at 89% of the federal per diem rate and is $185 as of 2022.

title: Washington State Legislature


text: User talk:68.108.151.229

title: User talk:68.108.151.229